KEEP GOD FIRST...ALWAYS AND ALL WAYS

He stayed through the night gazing deeply into the bankruptcy of the human life based upon its own strategies. -- the Buddha coming into his enlightenment

I am convinced that until we accept that "human life based upon its own strategies" can only lead to bankruptcy, mental, moral, spiritual, we will be wandering in the wilderness.

What makes the spiritual journey so exciting is the road toward that acceptance. It is, for instance, at the point of unexplainable where the miracle of God appears. And the unexplainable is where the reasoning mind digs in, obsessively trying to explain the unexplainable...thus blocking the miracle of God from appearing.

As one example, it is hard to welcome being misunderstood, yet it is only through welcoming it that we are released of its pain. To welcome being misunderstood is to welcome the pain of our ego losing. Those of us chasing God want, or declare that we want, ego deflation in depth. Yet that is really all the pain of being misunderstood amounts to.

The problem is in our fighting being misunderstood...that's what invites the pile-on. Whoever misunderstood us to begin with has a vested interest in proving his point of view. We resist her point of view by presenting ours, thus in effect calling her a liar. And right back a' cha, we all cry.

I have found myself incapable of rising above anything, so I find it necessary to say something when I'm feeling at sixes and sevens with another. "That's an interesting point of view" works well, or just "Interesting." Or just make listening notices. The real work is in maintaining a nonjudgmental attitude...ah, that's where God has my work cut out for him.

And we're back to the exciting journey toward acceptance. The acceptance being of self, specifically, the limitations of self. I cannot change my own mind, upgrade my own attitude, love the unlovable...on my own. God and only God can and will if sought.

It all comes down to: Keep God first, all else will fall in line behind.

Thank you.

A WORTHY GOAL

We should be willing to act as a balm for all wounds. -- The last words in the diary of Etty Hillesum (from "An Interrupted Life, The Diaries of Etty Hillesum 1941-43")

There. There's a worthy goal. To act as a balm for all wounds... our own, those not our own, those of friends and foes and those of the vast unknown to us. All.

To hold a consciousness of "a balm for all wounds" is to live in God consciousness...speaking of worthy goals.

Thank you.

JUST GET OVER YOURSELF

The trouble with anxiety (other than anxiousness) is it becomes addictive. It's like most all negatives...it fires our inner juices. Unfortunately, those juices scare the bejesus out of us, but they're the only juices we're allowing ourselves at the moment so we stay there, feeling stuck.

According to Fr. Richard Rohr, "If you find yourself afraid, stressed, or defensive, perhaps use the Welcoming Prayer as a way to be present to your feelings, to observe without becoming attached."

My advice is just get over yourself, but Rohr's is a kinder way of putting it. That's why my golden rule for me is, "Don't be as nasty as you want to be."

The hard thing to remember is: That golden rule applies to our own self, too, not just to Gertrude, Frank and Sylvia Schloppenhoffer. It's an inside job whether we're sending love out or dwelling in our rues, regrets and remorses.

Our ah-ha moment comes when we realize that the bottom line of any golden rule is: Just get over yourself...with love and laughter.

Thank you.

ON LOOKING FOR THE GOLD IN THE DROSS

I awoke with a busy mind...judging Jill for judging me. My blinding flash of the obvious: When am I going to turn my eagle eye within? It does no good to me to see every detect in the world that you have. In fact, it does me a harm because that binds me to my judgments, my ego-victory mind.

As I ponder that, I realize I am never going to learn that. Not until I find the gold in it. Just exactly as it is.

Then I realize that my learning begins with my judging. There's my gold. The gold grows in my eager willingness to see what in me am I seeing and judging in you.

You, therefore, are my angel, the one who brought me the gold for me to use to free me from me.

We hear so often, and pejoratively, "It's all about me." Well, it is! It is if we're looking to get free. It's not if Gertrude has a heart attack, we go see her and talk all about our aching feet. Everything's relative.

God is so good to us. God is so good, God is.

Thank you.

GOD CAN...THANK HIM

I'm a believer that still more spiritual growth begins with detaching from the goal of still more spiritual growth...for that goal is all up in the head, a want that keeps us from doing.

The old Nike, Just Do It, is still the bold standard. Not Just Think It, but Just Do It.  We can't get much bolder than that. Basically, all that is required is that we hold our nose and take a leap of faith. Believe me, that "all" is ALL for we'll never need more courage and less thought.

When the time is right, we will have done all the necessary thinking. The only thing that keeps us from that leap of faith is our entertaining that one more thought: Is the time really, really right? Now is the time. There is no better time than now, because now is all we have. Just do it.

The "it," of course, is anything we think we cannot do. And there's the hook...we can't. God can. Thank him.

Thank you.

AN UNCHIPPED EGO WILL DRIVE US....

We come...eventually...to understand, to realize, that it is the grace of God that heals our hurt hearts...that solely through our mental efforts we will never find forgiveness, love and/or peace.

Grace is a gift, and we never know when we will be gifted or what the gift may be. That is why we have spiritual principles to guide us, to help us live in common courtesy at least...and at best...until grace melts our hearts...which may not happen until three days after we're dead.

We learn when a human relationship goes awry, we must be the first to extend peace...with courtesy  and love. Learning and doing are two different things, but failing to do what we learn is a guarantee of misery within that we cannot contain...it will shed without and all over completely innocent people. That's the "it rains on the just and the unjust alike" principle, I'm guessing. Our job is to learn to rain courtesy and love.

The vital piece in being the first to extend such is to give the other person something to stand on...so he walks away without regret or resentment, and we have remained true to our own principles. This is win-win.

In the end, what if she believes she was right? What does that cost us, really? Another chip off our ego is all which is never ever a bad thing.

There. That is exactly why we require God in our lives. Ego-chipping is impossible to the unaided self. And an unchipped ego will drive us to ruin.

Thank you.

BEWARE OF THE OVERLY SCRUPULOUS

Beware of the overly scrupulous.... -- from "The Cloud of Unknowing" by an anonymous 14th century monk.

Scrupulosity. So few of us pay any mind to scrupulosity...mainly, I'm guessing, because it goes counter to the reasoning mind's dictates that black is black, white is white, and grey is boring. End of discussion.

I'm convinced that being "overly scrupulous" is the bar that we must cross to be freed of our either/or mindset, that place where the reasoning mind rules. It is called "the dual mind," and it rules through its absolute reliance on being provably right. There is no God there. Quite simply, we will never get out of duality until we are freed of our fear of being wrong, according to me.

That road to freedom is our reliance on the unseeable fact of God in our life...the unseeable fact that God does have our back...the unseeable fact that God's hand is in it, it being every wrong or right appearing, everything, every minute. There can be no rues, regrets, remorses when we know from our toenails up that God has already corrected and perfected whatever our reasoning mind is regretting.

I know from experience that it takes a lot of "whistling in the dark" to get to that complete reliance. Experience that is still aborning, she says, whistling while she works.

And that's where  scrupulosity can trip us up... we know, we hope (with fingers crossed).

Thank you.

GOD LOVES ME...AND MY PEEPS

Oh, it's a great gettin' up morning!

This is my golden day.

This is the day the Lord saved for me...put my name on it...and when I got to it, he picked me up, hugged me, kissed me, sat me down with my peeps, and called my name Blessed. 

Cling to the belief that all things are possible with God. This truth accepted and firmly believed in, is the ladder up which a soul can climb from the lowest of pits to the sublimest of heights. -- "God Calling," August 24.

Thank you, great God almighty, thank you.

USE IT OR LOSE IT

If you hate a person, you hate something  in him that is part of yourself. What isn't part of ourselves doesn't disturb us. -- Herman Hesse

That says the same thing as "What you see is always yourself," my personal favorite. Or, "If you can spot it, you got it." It has a lot more leverage coming from the likes of Herman Hesse, doesn't it?

Why, then, knowing these pithy truisms... agreeing with them even!...do we continue to immediately react in either hurt or anger to any objectionable remark that comes our way? Rather than look within and find our self?

Turning our efforts toward self-awareness, discipline and desire for spiritual answers is an upgraded life's work. We will perceive deliberate snubs...we can know they say absolutely nothing about us personally. Or we can stay in the reasoning mind, ever guarding against an incoming slight, with our race-race mind trying to perfect an all-purpose put-down.

We can...we must if we are going to grow spiritually...simply choose not to pick up an incoming. The minute we pick it up, we own it. That's when the reaction turns inward, rides us like a pony, and we send out our own deliberate snub...which will hit its target, be processed as needing a like response and shot back in a never-ending cycle of no-growth, spiritual or otherwise. Unless of course we count expanding our ego as growth.

Just learning restraint of tongue and pen is obviously a good thing, but the better thing is learning to upgrade our attitude one minute before we need restraint of tongue and pen. The message a restrained tongue held with a bad attitude sends is as discordant as playing the "Minute Waltz" repeatedly on an untuned piano.

The lesson to learn unto living is that God, the Spirit within each of us, has already solved any problem we can ever perceive. Has already gone before us to make the crooked places straight. Our only job is to come to realize there is no problem to be fixed... there is only Solution, i.e., God.

Then use It.

Thank you.

TO LIVE THERE

Most of us come into our reasoning mind world believing (because it's what we've been taught) that we have to stand up for ourselves...speak up...don't get pushed around! All of which is true but only up to the point where spiritual growth enters. Up to that point, we're trying to learn to work and play well with others...which too often winds up being each of us for our own self and thinking the Golden Rule should be "undo others before they undo you."

There are the blessed few who are gifted, and I believe born, with divine intervention, and they need no instructions.

The rest of us, however, specifically the lucky few who crash and burn through self will... ah, we need, seldom want but surely need. And spiritual growth is ever our need. Our own willingness is God's gold key.

It is the willingness to change our mind that will break our own sound barrier...that barrier where the only sound we hear is self, nattering in praise or pliant...about self. Our ears are opened, and we hear angels. Each of whom is whispering, "God has your back...now you can begin your journey of needing to have another's back...friend or enemy, it makes no never mind for each is God appearing."

We learn that an incoming nasty (or simply thoughtless) word or action is never personal. It concerns us not. We can look through the appearance, mentally bless it and the one who sent it, and move on. 

As long as we remain in the reasoning mind, that is an impossibility even when we are trying to do just that. It is the "trying" that tells the tale. Trying is a self-determined objective, and self does unto self. There is no God there.

We know we are on the right track, moving in the right direction, when we receive an incoming slight and neither respond in kind nor wrestle with it mentally. We kiss it as it flies by. But that's not the best...here's the pearl: When our slinger of the dart mistakes our non-response for gutless or ignorance, we respond not at all...inside or outside, but especially inside. For any inside response will show forth on the outside and never for our benefit.

There. No inner or outer response is the exact point where we know God. We know God and I are one. We know God has our back...we know God is our back. Because our reasoning mind is at peace, singing "Amazing Grace," and paying no attention...just feeling easy.

We visit there ever so often, but, oh, to live there.

Thank you.

THERE IS ONLY GOOD TURNED GOLD

I am reminded by the various notes I have written in my "God Calling," that this is a singularly important day in my life. I am so happy that I make notes in  my daily readers and put the year out to the side for they are beloved reminders of both the good and the less-than-good times of my life.

More important, I get to see the end result...that which looked so terrible when I wrote it, with tears in my eyes, turned out to be a blessing beyond reasoning. And the good...well, there's another gift. Sometimes it turns out not so good according to my expectations, but then becomes the pearl beyond price when I loose those "I wants" and appreciate what I got. And sometimes it just turns out not good. That happens if we're doing it right... how else do we learn acceptance?

I made the most important phone call of my life on this date in 1971. Then, same date in 1972, I shared for the first time with God, myself and another human being the exact nature of my wrongs. Talk about a dread turned gold! The gold from that experience (and, through the years, many more of the same) has become my mother lode, and just keeps feeding my soul.

This day in 2003 marked the last day of my last career conference. In San Diego. My beloved Ellie was with me. He came over from Phoenix to help me celebrate... to mark this important occasion and to wrap up my work life. He passed from this plane just two years later in August 2005. I still miss him.

Every day for the next five will be mini-anniversaries for me. Special days. God loves me sooo much days and they are the markers for the proof.

I bring tears to my own eyes.

Thank you.

OUR SINGULAR PURPOSE

I'm wholly consumed with courtesy this morning. Or, specifically, the lack of courtesy in the world... or even more specifically in each of our own lives.

As I'm forever saying, my golden rule is to try not to be as nasty as I want to be...which I picked up in the early '80s from a Henry Mitchell column in "The Washington Post," To which I've added as a rule of thumb for my own behavior: Just don't react in kind to incoming ugly.

The blinding flash of the obvious is that when we self-determine to not react in kind, we will rarely get a courteous response... or even a neutral response. The hook is in the self-determined. Attitude speaks louder than words, and a teeth-gritted, self-driven, silence-with-a-smile is going to fool no one, appease no one, and tick off most anyone.

That's why courtesy is on my mind. I'm beginning to think we need to teach classes in basic courtesy starting in kindergarten, and every step-up thereafter... elementary, jr. high, high, college. Good manners are simply learning to put another before our self.

And that simple stricture... putting another before our self...is the tip of the spear. For that's where the reasoning minded person and the spiritually minded person come together. Putting another first cannot be done by self-will alone. Or at least according to me. It goes against what we learn is the first rule of survival... self, take care of self.

There's our link. The reasoning minded having learned common courtesy, i.e., others first, is opened to love as a way of life. And here comes God to save the day.

It seems clear to me that if we're ever going to get into the spiritual growth thing, we will at some point need to simply hold our nose and take a leap of faith. We learn through doing that God does have our back. We can depend on God, rely on God, which cannot be done in our heads... from our eyebrows up so to speak.

We need to risk all for the singular purpose of being of service to God and others. The reasoning mind, standing all by its lonesome, is never going to go there. Again, and yet again... we must go beyond reason to love.

Thank you.

THIS ONE'S ON YOU, GOD

I'm a believer that the biggest block to spiritual growth is refusal to accept that the daily slings and arrows, hurts and irks, are not to be overcome, demolished or made to disappear. No. They are to be welcomed, accepted as God's helpers in overcoming our own self.

That is the all of still more spiritual growth... to overcome our self. 

"It is not so much human searching, so much as human consciousness...." as God Calling puts it.

I don't think it matters a squat to God how we get there... there being to God. It only matters that we head in that direction, with God as our soul and sole goal.

Then when the unfairness of life as we see it happens, we fight not the seeming unfairness, but joy in the choice before us... to spit, curse and cry, or to know that this one is God's. We can joyfully say, "Here you go, God. Let me know what you want me to do...then do it."

Grant what thou commandest and then command what thou wilt. -- Saint Augustine

Thank you.

CEASE FIGHTING TO WIN

To win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill. -- Sun Tzu

It... the answer I seek...always comes back to cease fighting, give up the struggle, surrender.  All of which mean exactly the same thing...accept.

It is by acceptance that we realize the battle has never been with you, with it, with them... it is ever and always with our own self. What we see is always our self. Who then is there to win over?... to get over on?

Acceptance is the way to inner peace, inner peace is the way to outer peace. Peace...God's only will.

Give up the fight and win.

Thank you.

THE QUESTION IS IMMATERIAL....

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.-- Edmund Burke

I love that quote but the trick is in learning what to do about the evil. I believe that it is not in resisting the evil, or the "evil-doers," for then we become them by our resistance, i.e., we wind up reacting in kind. The question then is how do we accept evil, while seeking change.

Most all change starts in the mind, and the most important change is giving up the notion that by our own efforts we can, will, or should come up with the right answer, the perfect solution... to most anything.

Change comes instantaneously with the realization that the answer is love, the way there is through God... or the answer is God, the way there is through love... that is interchangeable, being one and the same.

We must needs take our reasoning mind out of the mix. Make a decision to open our heart, soul, body and brain to God's perfect outworking...then sit and wait on the Lord. The reasoning mind will rebel: "Nothing would ever get done" is the quick rejection.

Remember, it was Goethe who said, in effect, make a decision and Providence will move heaven and earth to fulfill it.

And, honestly, all of us have experienced that at some point... we just keep calling it luck. That is the nature of the difficulty in changing our mind. Our refusal to believe there may be a better answer than the one we should be, but never have been, able to find by thinking on it.

It is true...God can and will if sought. The seeking is in believing that God can and will if sought.

Thank you.

LOVE ALONE ONES THE FRAGMENTS

"Driven by the forces of love, the fragments of the world seek each other so that the world may come to being." -- Teilhard de Cardin

I consider it a boon when I read something that I have no idea what it meant to the author but it speaks to me. This quote spoke to me immediately upon reading "Driven by the forces of love, the fragments of the world seek each other...."

I flashed on all the uglies of my world... the rues, regrets, remorse, resentments, dislikes, misunderstoods, unfairs, unkinds...outgoing and incoming. I saw them as the fragments of the world, driven by love to seek each other. Then the completion... so that the world may become one in and through love. It is love and love alone that ones the fragments to live on within us/without us, healed.

The ego, through the reasoning mind, always legislates for itself. That is where "un" is born, specifically, unloved, unneeded, unwanted, unappreciated.

It is our love, innate and accessible only through "great love or great suffering," that wipes the "un" clean. Loved, needed, wanted and appreciated then flow free, out from within, seeking only to set others free to love.

Thank you.

UNTIL WE GET IT RIGHT

Blinding flash of  the obvious: We neither get nor do we maintain a resentment from the way another treated us. We get and maintain a resentment by our reaction to the way we perceive another treated us...by resisting through reliving our perception. 

It is our reactive discourtesy, hurt or anger, that we keep replaying in our heads, trying to perfect it in order to make the other pay. The resentment is our ego's inability to be satisfied...to get it just right in our own heads for us to feel ego-satisfying justice.

Until we accept that there is God and that is all, the ego will resist all to defend, to protect.

The spiritual secret is: There is no me to defend or protect. 

That is where the solution lies...in the realization fully and completely that there is no me to protect, to defend, to feel mistreated in the first place. It is the reasoning mind that deals in duality. It is the mental picture that gives life to our ego.  That is the sense of self that bars God's entry.

To simplify the entire process, we do not need to believe or disbelieve anything...just be the first to be courteous. No matter what we perceive coming at us... just respond courteously and move on mentally and physically. Mentally in particular for just speaking polite words and thinking otherwise just breeds resentment...and there we go again.

All this is no more, no less, than trying to DO the prayer of Saint Francis. We say it, most of us love it...but doing it? A whole 'nother life. And that we will get...until we get it right.

Thank you.

TRUTH MUST BE PROVEN

God whispered to me in the night, "Truth must be proven." He whispers this to me ever so often. Whenever I'm talking truth and doing whatever I want to do, actually.

Truth...as in we have all the patience we'll ever need within us right now, all we need do is use it. I've noticed that I've been telling me that a lot lately, then I proceed to sit in judgment of the latest irritant in my life...which is just impatience. Or self back in the driver's seat.

Likes and dislikes...I wonder if those aren't, as one, the single source of all our woes. Easwaran is forever reminding us that his spiritual adviser, his Granny, taught him that when he meets someone who is a particular irritant to him, to get closer to that person. In other words, get over himself.

Another truth...whenever I meet someone who is a particular irritant to me, I am looking at me. My job is not to find out how, where, why I am in her and/or him...my job is to get closer to them, show interest in them for their sake.

God can then clarify in me what I need to learn. It is never up to me to fix me...it is up to God who uses me to fix me.

To prove truth is to do truth...silently...as we breathe.

Thank you.

AND GOD SIGHS

I can't believe I've done this again. I know better...or I surely hope I know better by now! I know, when my feet hit the floor in the morning, I'm going to feed Ruckus, walk Ruckus, do my yoga, go into my quiet time. The first two is taking care of another, the third is intro to my quiet time, then quiet time. So it all counts as one.

Here's the part where I should know better...I've moved yogurt into the mix. I haven't eaten yogurt in years, but it was on sale, and it was a great sale. That addition has completely scrambled my entire quiet time focus.

First off, I hate yogurt unless it is frozen so I don't have to deal with its slimy texture, not to mention its smell. I buy the little containers and freeze them. The problem being, it takes a scientific genius to figure exactly how long to defrost them unto smoothness. And it's not the same time every day. I'm guessing it depends on the room temperature, and good luck with that...the way the outside temp is going from 60 to 100 on any given day, it is impossible for me to keep a regular room temperature.

I get up at 5:00 AM, here it is after 8:00, and I haven't gotten settled into my quiet time yet. And the yogurt wasn't smooth either. It was like eating yogurt ice chips...yuck.

The really ugly part is, this started last week and now we're at Wednesday...a week and a half already.

I blame the dentist who did in Cecil. Possibly Donald Trump.

Which makes me kinda regret I ever realized that I can no longer use, "Forgive me, Father, for I know not what I do," as my get out of jail free card. Because I do know what I do. I've worked hard to get to know me, who I am and what I'm all about. Then I told everybody.

We'll do better tomorrow, won't we, God?

Thank you.

IT IS...THEREFORE IT IS OF GOD

Blinding flash of the obvious: It is...therefore, it is for my good. 

"For my good" is the hook. Our reasoning mind can only love believing that everything is "for my good."  The problem is the reasoning mind is set at my good being my money good, my popularity good, my influence good. God's good has nothing to do with pleasure, prestige, prosperity. And knowing better does naught toward our peace of mind if our knowing better is solely from the eyebrows up.

We must go deeper to higher consciousness.

We come again to that choice we're given of two ways of living our life, whether to live from the reasoning mind or from the spiritual. A part of our awakening is the realization that we cannot deny the reasoning mind, we do not quit using the reasoning mind (an impossibility, I'm guessing). No. We make a decision to give up reliance on our reasoning mind. We put spiritual consciousness first...we choose to go to God for God and that is all. Without resistance, our reasoning mind slips a cog allowing spirituality to move to our forefront.

Then through constant vigilance we keep spiritually centered, being ever aware of the danger of scrupulosity. To paraphrase the anonymous monk who wrote "The Cloud of Unknowing," we must ever beware of the overly scrupulous for their self-determined objective is their god.

We go to God for God, that is all. For it is God who allows: It is...therefore, it is for My good.

Thank you.

GOD, THE ROOT OF ALL THINGS

I went to the root of things, and found nothing but Him alone. -- Mira Bai (as quoted in my Eknath Eswaran daily reader today)

I have no idea who Mira Bai is, but her (his?) quote affirms my belief that God's hand is in it...whatever, wherever, however, whomever...God's hand is in it.

It is in going to "the root of things," continuing to dig deep within and deeper still, that we find "Him alone."

This is the way out of the ego's snare of resentment, the rocky road we must be open to take away from our ego/reasoning mind's blame-to-shame game. The ego's way is ever up, up to the head where our reasoning mind sits, just waiting to justify and/or deny. We must needs go ever deeper till we find God alone, the root.

This is my comfort today...my once again proof that God is living my life, and he can and will remind me as needed. I got disturbing (to my ego) news yesterday...30 years old news. My ego is no respecter of age...I felt like "it" had happened yesterday.

I awoke this morning with it nattering to me, and I reminded myself that God's hand has got to be in this. Then I sat down to my quiet time, and there in my first reading is God, affirming my truth.

God is so good to me.

Thank you.

EVER CLOSER TO SURRENDER

Getting over our own self...what if that is the key, the sole goal of life itself?

That's a whole new thought to ponder. If true, it would confirm the personal need for a benevolent power greater than ourselves to rely on...to trust...to believe in. And that does not come without repeated trial and error.

It occurs to me that repeated trial and error may be It. Wouldn't it be wonderful if that were the right, fit and wholly proper way to go about getting over our own self? Through trial and error bringing us ever closer to surrender. All the while we're up in our reasoning mind just beating the bejesus out of ourselves for those very errors.

Whether or not every wrong step we take is the necessary road to enlightenment, it is my proven fact that beating ourselves up for those wrong steps won't get us anything but a deeper need to get over ourselves.

In the realization of a benevolent power within, we are gifted with a  new sense of Self love. This comes as a deep feeling of acceptance that self has nothing to do with. Maybe this is the Unnameable...this deeper sense of love born in the midst of remorse. There...that may well be the golden key that opens our hearts to others. 

Letting ourselves feel love...and loved...in the midst of our rues, regrets and remorses is to get over our own self.

Thank you.

I RAISE MY FIST...AND WHISPER, 'ME, TOO!'

I am blessed by having many friends who are richly talented in the arts not to mention Mensa-smart. I am not...I put on airs when I compare myself to Grandma Moses.

I am reminded of that because I again came across my favorite poem. It is by Maya Angelou, and I keep rereading it. There are certainly more sophisticated, much deeper, poems...indeed, most all are! I'm guessing really cosmopolitan folks may well consider this one plebeian. But, oh, what I would give to be able to claim this as mine and not be lying.

Still I Rise

You may write me down in history

With your bitter, twisted lies,

You may trod me in the very dirt

But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?

Why are you beset with gloom?

'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells

Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,

With the certainty of tides,

Just like hopes springing high,

Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?

Bowed head and lowered eyes?

Shoulders falling down like teardrops,

Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?

Don't you take it awful hard

'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines

Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,

You may cut me with your eyes,

You may kill me with your hatefulness,

But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?

Does it come as a surprise

That I dance like I've got diamonds

At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame

I rise

Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear

I rise

Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,

I am the dream and the hope of the slave,

I rise  

I rise  

I rise. 

 From the book AND STILL I RISE by Maya Angelou

Thank you.

THE REST OF THE STORY

In my post yesterday I wrote, "More and more I’m believing that the way to no more arguments, up to and including wars, is to be the one to agree first."

The rest of the story is that self-willing agreement just to be the first is just another self-determined objective. I've believed for some time now that there is no God in self-determined objectives.

Sidebar: I hope it is obvious that there is a mountain of difference between self-determined objectives and personal goals. Self-determined objectives as mentioned here relate to human relationships as per the Sermon. Personal goals are self-explanatory.

The joy living the Sermon brings, the "agree with your adversary quickly," "turn the other cheek," "resist not evil," cannot be found through self-willing any part of it. To happily live the Sermon, or any spiritual principle for that matter, we must realize, surrender to, a power greater than ourselves.

The hardest thing life is ever going to ask of us, according to me, quite simply is to change our mind.

We are taught that it takes great love and/or great suffering to ever realize, even partially, the love of God. The few stories I've read of the lives of some of the  saints surely make that point. I'm reminded of Mother Teresa whose diaries and letters set out her great torment at her own lack of faith. I always figured she had extremely high standards for herself...but maybe that's our problem, too. The answer is not to lower our standards, it's to change our mind.

We must needs remember that God's good is by God's own standards. On its face, God's good rarely, if ever, comes to us looking like rainbows and roses. It may look to our reasoning mind like dog dung...to our reasoning mind, it may even smell like dung.

Leave that reasoning mind behind...rise up, rise up! We go beyond reason to love.

Thank you.

ON GETTING OVER OUR OWN SELF

More and more I’m believing that the way to no more arguments, up to and including wars, is to be the one to agree first. I'm guessing that the biggest impediment to our willingness to agree first is our projecting the final worst-case result. Which, of course, is fear of looking like a loser.

I say "looking like" because in God's world, there are no losers. And there it is. That is the concept we must needs grasp, or we'll live at war forever.

We need to learn to think small...to project smaller...to detach in a word. Detach from our own opinions, from our own fears.

In growing spiritually, we learn to distrust the reasoning mind for, led by ego, it will always legislate for itself. Those who have made the decision to seek still more spiritual growth are learning to legislate for others...we are learning to give over, or just get over ourselves actually.

We learn to keep our imagination reined in to our Self...right now...in this moment. This is the only place God is to us...within us now, this instant.

Same goes with Putin/Obama right this minute. Ditto our friend/sibling/parent/spouse /boss/co-worker who may or may not be giving our ego fits. God's got it...God cannot not "got" it.

According to me, that is the way to no more wars. Each of us learns to turn within and humbly ask for the knowledge to do our higher power’s will, whatever that may be, then be ready to accept that it will not be to our ego’s liking or for our ego’s benefit. It will always be for the benefit of another...seemingly.

It is by the sense of joy we experience when we give over to another that we understand that God is always on our side. With God, we are never left out. That's what makes ego deflation in depth painless in the end...and chances are the ego, being self-centered in the extreme, will think it's done good and won't even know it's been had! 

God loves us so much.

Thank you.

IT IS GOD'S, AND IT IS DONE

Some years back, I had a friend whose college-bound son did not want to go to college. My friend suspected drugs, she suspected a lot of things actually, and her suspicions were making her nuts. She finally realized and said that she would just have to hug him and kiss him and let him go.

I've used that phrase as a reminder to myself ever since...whenever I get up in my head, directing the traffic of my recalcitrant thoughts, I consciously hug 'em and kiss 'em, and let 'em go.

I'm reminded of that this morning for my "God Calling" is all about our very need being God's call. It is in the very need that our healing is completed. Completed! I've underlined that in many colors with exclamation marks out to the side, and yet it seems every year that I'm blown-away in delight when I read it...as if I never read it before.

And here's the gift...the new way of thinking: At one time that would have been depressing to me...that I could read the same thing every year and it seem like news to me each year. "When will I ever learn?" would have been my lament. My realization now is this being news to me each year is proof that I am still growing in the right direction...I will have needs until three days after I'm dead if I'm doing it right. So every year on this day, my need of the moment is abated...with delight. What a priceless gift.

Which brings us again to the fact that there are two ways of looking at everything...materially (reasoning mind) or spiritually. The reasoning mind is fairly cynical (it dare not hope), so how is every year there's a need driving us a good thing? Those of us who rely on the reasoning mind will find that hard to love.

Yet, those of us seeking still more spiritual growth can rest in the reminder that our very need is God's call...it is not ours to fix, it is God's, and it is done. And that is hard to hate.

Thank you.

THE OTHER SIDE OF DREAD AND FEAR

Praise is such a fickle bitch. That's all we need to remember when we're worried about looking good in public as opposed to showing our butt in public...neither being a particularly fine state of consciousness, but they pretty much comprise the human condition. Seems like to me at any rate.

I'm convinced it is the human condition that we must loose our hold of...the excuse of the human condition, really. "Fear is the human condition so don't beat yourself up for feeling fear." Since fear is the basis of every human defect of character, according to me, it seems to me we can accept our human condition, but, if we are to find peace (for it is impossible to live at peace in fear), we seek spiritual solace in that human condition. In other words, instead of excusing ourselves we seek a different perspective in order to change...specifically, to change our mind.

Since there are two ways to view everything...from the reasoning mind perspective and/or spiritually...we know we must go beyond reason to love...to live at peace within ourselves.

I am reminded of the story of St. Francis, who, on being asked how to find perfect joy, explained that perfect joy does not come from the adoration of others, or being able to heal others, or by doing great charitable works. He went on to explain the secret of perfect joy:

Brother, suppose we go to that monastery across the field and tell the gatekeeper how weary and cold we are, and he calls us tramps and beats us and throws us out into the winter night. Then, Brother, if we can say with love in our hearts, 'Bless you in the name of Jesus,' then we shall have found perfect joy.

There. That explains to a T why we stay stuck in the comfort of the human condition. While Francis's way is spiritual, noble and holy, it surely sounds very, very uncomfortable.

And that is the paradox of still more spiritual growth...from the reasoning mind's standpoint, you just know it is going to be hard, and it is going to hurt, probably a lot. But it is in the doing, the walking with God to the other side of our dread and fear, that we find perfect joy. Which the human condition can never deliver.

Thank you.

GOD CAN AND WILL IF SOUGHT

I lived a miracle recently. I did nothing of mine own self. That's how I know it was a miracle.

I had it in mind (I was obsessed with the idea) to set straight my friend Gertrude (who has been a royal pain, and I have forgiven her enough already). Being not entirely stupid, I knew very well that would be heading down that wrong road again, so I knelt (yes! on my bum knees!), and I thanked God for the opportunity to get over myself with regard to Gertrude. I assured him he was going to have to do the heavy lifting because if I could've, I would've by now. Thank you and Amen.

Here was me, consumed in the night with thoughts of what I "needed" to do and how I "needed" to do it...and the next morning the first friend I met, literally the very first, was Gertrude. The second friend I met was a friend of ours who came walking by at that very same time! She was delighted to see us both, and we all had a group hug right there on the street.

We all laughed and scratched and hugged and went to brunch together. And I was supremely unconscious of the irony or the grace of it. It just was, and I enjoyed it as did the other two.

I had not another thought about my all-consuming resentment, and yesterday afternoon Gertrude called to say how much she enjoyed brunch, and we agreed to do it again soon.

As I fixed dinner for Ruckus, I was lit by the fire of realization. I recognized the miracle, but more important, I saw that it came only after I had made my decision to throw in with God on this and had told us so in grateful prayer.

God can and will if sought. We say it so often...we hear it said even more often. I'm kinda glad it's still a surprise when it proves true.

Thank you.

THE GRACE OF SURRENDER

Blinding flash of the obvious: To be misunderstood is truly of God for nothing drives the ego harder, resisting. That resistance drives us to our knees, and, lo, there's our angel aborning.

This is innate knowledge that comes back to us only through "great love or great suffering."  This is where we make our U-turn...away from self back to God. We realize that our one instruction at birth was to return free of self. We learn...slowly...that can only be accomplished through care and concern for others...the pearl of great price.

Thus when we are sent to our knees, in realization of our own powerlessness, we go in gratitude for being misunderstood. We choose peace rather than a useless, fret-filled ego victory where we can only come out the loser...even if we win. Especially when we win.

To win is to have to fight the same battle again...and again...for it is only in our reasoning mind that our ego wins. We will refight the same battle endlessly until our reasoning mind gives up the fight...we crash and burn so to speak.

It is when we declare our self the loser that we find joy. We know grace for we are free. There. That, Beloved, is what is known as surrender. And we realize there was never a fight to begin with...there was only God.

Thank you.

TO FORGIVE? OR TO ANALYZE?

I awoke this morning with one thought in mind..."I want to live this day with a forgiving heart and head."

My second thought..."or would it be head and heart?"

I'm guessing I need go no further in explaining what I've been pondering ever since...three full hours later. Not even how to have a forgiving heart and head...or head and heart. Just which comes first...a forgiving head to order the heart, or a forgiving heart to whisper to the head?

It doesn't take Jung to spot the missing link. Forgiveness itself. I'm so busy analyzing which one, head or heart, goes first that actually forgiving is forgotten.

And there's my gold! That being true, it follows that I haven't had a thought as to whom in my head I want to forgive.

I'm going to let that be close enough to perfect for me.

Thank you.