TO SEE WITHIN...WITHOUT SEEKING

We must summon, from the unconscious, ways of seeing that we know nothing of yet, visions that emerge from deeper within us than our conscious rational minds.  -- John Philip Newell from Fr. Richard Rohr's "Daily Meditation," April 30, 2020

To trust the Lord, just that and that is all.  To trust that unseeable Force that has a home in our heart, soul, body, brains, hands and feet is a long and compelling journey.  Basically, it requires only our commitment to just that...to trust the Lord.

That cannot be done on our want-to alone...or on our will or willingness, clearly not on our conscious intellect. Ah, but each and all of those are necessary components in bringing us to the jumping-off place. That place where we hold our nose and take a leap of faith...or crash and burn. That place where the pain is beyond bearing and the despair is beyond hope, and the human mind is left with no expectations.

There. That is another of God's hidey holes...the place of no expectations. Beyond the reasoning mind. We must go beyond reason to love.

It is a long and lonely road with unexpected bowers of flowers and puppy dogs and rainbows that we trudge while building our trust in the Lord. Occasionally getting glimpses that this climb is unnecessary...that we already have that which we seek, trust in our Lord. All we need do is use it. Just trust. Hold our nose and take a leap of faith. Or crash and burn. 

Oh...oh, I see.

Thank you.

TRUST...THE OPERATIVE WORD IS TRUST

My own personal experience tells me that there is a sliver of gold in everything. That sliver of gold, I choose to believe, is the door to God's hidey hole. We find that sliver within...like, where else would we go to get it...then we hang on to it. It is that tiny sliver of gold that can and will lift us deeper...to that place where our peace abides.

There is that iota of gold for each of us in this pandemic...our own personal goldmine, and our singular job is to find it.  (Ah, this may be the Way to knowing we are Oned since we all wind up in the same place...with Love.)

I'm choosing to believe that the whole world is in liminal space right now...pushed, dragged, lifted by the pandemic.

It is what I choose to do about my space there, there in liminal space, that is my focus. This painful, numb, scary, peaceful place where I'm getting only reasoning mind questions (or are they angel whispers?) and hurried-up answers (or is that God calling?).

This is where doing the next thing counts...fret or don't fret, but pick up the newspaper and take it to the recycle bin down the hall.

Phone a friend or answer the door to the panicky neighbor who will talk my ear raw.

SIDEBAR: When the neighbor comes to the door, I can just not answer and cause myself guilt-angst, or answer it and obey my own good boundaries. Nobody can talk my ear raw unless I invite it...and she may well be what I need that will drop kick me, Jesus, through the goalposts of life, (Lifted from a Bobby Bare song from the '70s, an old favorite).

I can pray God will help us find a cure that will take this pandemic away...now, or I can pray my Thank You and trust God for best outcome...whenever: Your Father knows your needs before you ask him. -- Matthew 6:8

Thank you.

ALL IS WELL...REALLY

Fr Richard Rohr's "Daily Meditation" this week is about liminal space. His today's guest, LaVera Crawley, writes, It takes willingness, fortitude, knowledge, skill, and a deep trust in Spirit to go into these dark places. 

I wonder if what the world is in today doesn't qualify for just that, liminal space, a place of transformation.

I see the world today living with climate change which is causing many of us to be in fear and consternation for Mount Kilimanjaro being snowless and polar bears being without a floe to float on. Then there's the the pandemic causing some to be in a state of mindless panic in fear of death or worse and others in fear of the world in economic collapse. Some of us are begging to believe that somehow God will not let any harm come to us or ours while others are so numb that we can only feel whatever. 

All of that says to me that the majority of us are stuck in our reasoning mind without a clue and only fear for company...all the while leaning on our reasoning mind for a way out. Talk about going down that wrong road again.

I heard Jon Meacham on "Morning Joe" this morning talking about how we got to this place, and his words that stuck with me are: ... the refusal to accept an inconvenient fact.

Whoa! Here's me, gobsmacked.

No matter of whom he was speaking, that has my name all over it. That's the liminal space for me. The place where I see me as the source of all my woes (a.k.a., an inconvenient fact). Where I quit looking for someone to blame and start the uphill climb toward willingness...willing to accept responsibility for my resistance to my reality.

Oh my. A dark and scary place indeed.

Crawley continued, about entering liminal space: The first step requires trusting that, in the course of time, the very healing we seek can emerge by our journeying through liminal space, listening attentively to what the liminal seeks to tell us.

Trusting what the Unseen, the Unknown...Spirit...seeks to tell us. Then we know, and we know we know: I Am Responsible for the place whereon I stand.

 All is well, all is well, all is well with my Lord. Can I get an Amen!

Thank you.

COMFORTING MEMORIES...LIMINAL SPACE

In my reading Fr Richard Rohr's "Daily Meditation" this morning, I was awakened to liminal space...which I've heard of in passing but never before connected with.

I was reading Paula D'Arcy's story which flashed me back to 1948, back to when my brother Paul first exhibited signs that he was losing his mental faculties (undiagnosed tumor of the brain), and how scared I felt. I avoided him even as he was alone in his bed...and no one but me there in that moment to comfort him. And I did not. 

Just one year before, my hero, my Uncle Charlie, had died in a fiery auto accident...he was my first true love. I knew he loved me better than any of his other nieces or nephews, plus he looked like Clark Gable. In 1947 that was the capper on love interests for me and a whole lot of other females.

The blessing for me occurred when I was maybe 16 or 17...before college, still living at home, and with no religious convictions at all. I was in my bedroom trying to decide what to wear on a date that night, and, from no known where, the thought flashed that my brother's death was the saving grace in our family's consciousness.

I fully recognized for the first time that Paul had been the singular center of our lives, meaning, he was my father's favorite, he was my mother's favorite, he was my sister's favorite and he was my favorite...and we simply tolerated each other.

In a flash, I "saw" Paul being lifted up with ribbon-like ropes attached to him and to each of us that pulled each of us together. I knew that Mom and Dad had a much easier relationship now, and my sister and I had become best friends when before his death we'd ignored each other. Further, that Uncle Charlie's death, in our familial setting, paved the way for this to happen.

In D'Arcy's story, she revealed how liminal moments can occur at any time: Then some indescribable light fights its way through the impenetrable dark—an unpredictable, unimportant, runaway moment that lights up everything you’ve been unable to see until then. That light removes all the shoulds and oughts, all the illusions about fairness. You enter liminal space....

That liminal space, a fleeting thought lasting no longer than the beat of my heart, exchanged my lingering guilt and despair for gratitude and grace.

Thank you.

THE GRACE OF MY AFFLICTIONS

God will refine me in the furnace of my afflictions. 

I heard that at a Zoom meeting in Santa Fe recently, and I immediately knew the grace of gratitude. I have pondered it since and continue to feel graced.

Later I checked it out and found it originated in Isaiah 48:10...proving me wrong about the Bible once again. It really does speak truth to me when I am ready to accept it.

Thank you.

ON BEING FULLY IN THE PRESENCE

Coming into your quiet place of being, bring yourself fully into the presence of the Beloved, not expecting anything, only coming to give—of yourself and your time. Give freely, and allow yourself to simply be with the One who loves you. Let your spirit roam where it needs to—let your courage emerge to help you. Bless your life for all that it is. -- Fr Richard Rohr, "Daily Meditation," April 25, 2020 

Let your spirit roam where it needs to—let your courage emerge to help you. Bless your life for all that it is. 

Never fear being thrown into the lion's den for the lion in the den is Aslan. -- A long-ago blinding flash of the obvious.

Thank you.

BE THE FIRST TO GIVE OVER

When we find ourself in disagreement with a friend or a frenemy, we need to be the first to give over. This is a purely spiritual act, meaning there is no peace in doing it without God as our guide.

Plain speak: A self-determined objective is to decide to give over because we're supposed to, plus we'll get points for doing it...so we do. Chances are we wind up feeling less-than, put-upon, sorry and more vindictive than before.

To be the first to give over requires pondering, seeking God's will and making a decision to go with God's will whatever that may be.

A self-determined objective is for the benefit of self, i.e., an ego-builder.

After we ponder or meditate or talk with God, we find ourself being led down a whole different path than what we had in mind toward our goal. The path is never laid out before us for our permission probably because we would not give it. God's path, our new path, doesn't even resemble what we had in mind to achieve, i.e., looking good while giving and getting peace, love and joy. Sometimes, just looking good is close enough.

I believe that God's intent for us is not to just stop being selfish or self-willed. According to the word of saints and holy people who have gone before, God's intent for us is to love Him with all our heart, soul, body and brains, and to love all others as ourself.

It is my belief that it is my job to work with my Father to bring me up to speed in loving myself so that loving others as myself is as pure as it can be. Loving others as myself while I don't love me is hanging on to ego and calling it humility.

Thank you.

THE ART OF IMPERSONAL LOVE

One of the major inner discoveries in my spiritual growth was the fact that I would never be free of my nemesis as long as I hated it, cursed it, prayed it be gone. It wasn't until my mind had been changed that I found I needed to hug it and kiss it to let it go...when I was ready for it to be released.

Heard in the rooms: We may want to go to Paris, we are certainly willing to go to Paris..ah, but there's a lot of preparation for us before we are ready to go to Paris. Same goes with our nemesis.

It's natural to love our assets, but it's brand new thinking to realize each of our defects of character needs love, too...more than our assets need love, we can see after the light first dawns. I suspect it was our resistance to a new-born defect of character that nurtured it into our nemesis.

Learning to love everything just as it is requires shucking our shields...that personal armor we've gripped for so long that chances are we originally had it at the head of our list of assets. (Which is probably why one of my once favorite songs has the line, Looking back and longing for the freedom of my chains.)

When we realize resist not evil is simply resist not hate, our mind begins to open...open to learning the art of impersonal love.   

Hate begets hate which is a four letter word for resistance...change the four letters to love and its acceptance. And there we are...at the gateway to impersonal love.

Thank you.

THE EXPERIENTIAL AWARENESS OF GOD

Contemplation and mysticism . . . both mean loving experiential awareness of God: not ideas in the head or on the lips, but personal living experience.  - Fr Richard Rohr, "Daily Meditation," April 21, 2020

Meditation gradually * * * releases tremendous resources to solve our problems. - Eknath Easwaran, "Words to Live By," April 22

It is not necessarily that we are slow to learn, it is that we are slow to believe that which we are learning; namely, that all of our problems have already been solved for our benefit...just seldom in the way we held dear.

We tend to believe because we agree, or want to agree, with the writings of the likes of Rohr and Easwaran that represents gut-bucket belief. So why hasn't my problem(s) been solved to my satisfaction?

The inability to believe lies squarely in our refusal to let go of our reliance on that which our reasoning mind holds dear...self in a word.

Agreeing with the Sermon even does not represent gut-bucket belief, it represents our want-to. When we come to the realization that we must needs experience that which is written, we begin to fulfill the hardest of all things...the exchanging of our mind. Swapping the reasoning mind for the spiritual mind in fact.

When we experience a heavy-duty loss...of a dear one or of an eye or a limb or even of the "perfect" job...and we know to pray our thank you with a sincere heart, we are heading in the right direction. There. That is our bare beginning.

Our awakening is born in our experiential awareness of God that our personal living experience
delivered. It comes with our acceptance of that exchanged mind and the different kind of joy it brings. There it is. Our proof the belief we seek is ours...and by God and by grace we will grow with it. 

Thank you.

ON BEING CHANGED FOR THE LESSER

This was my blinding flash of the obvious some time ago: Just saying it is my ego doing my thinking for me will not stop it...that would give me control...no, I must turn to God every time and give me and my will over to him each time. It may be that every delay, lie, exaggeration, fear-balk slows God's will as he deals with that ego-delay for me.

My friend Gertrude, who has moved to an assisted-living facility, is not adjusting well to her move. She  has taken to calling me when she feels fearful. She called me five times within 45 minutes yesterday when I was in a Zoom meeting. Four times I answered quietly and told her I was in a meeting...the fifth time not so quietly.

Gertrude's lack of impulse control for which later I chewed her a new one, this morning I recognize as my own lack of impulse control.

After pondering and journaling about my reaction, I realize that I need Gertrude in my life to teach me impulse control. There is no change in Gertrude because of her move or otherwise, she has ever lacked impulse control...it is just magnified and multiplied by her fear now. Plus, the biggie: It was never directed at me before.

My intention: When Gertrude calls, no matter how often in an hour, to treat her with respect...being respectful of my own self at the same time. I plan to tell her upfront that I cannot keep her from calling, but that I will answer the first one and let any further calls go into voicemail. I know that if I hear a need, I can call her back.

In my journaling, I was given to wonder if this isn't a part of my recent insight that I am being changed, the fear-feeling being that I am being changed downward, made lesser.

I choose to believe that is my sliver of gold...that indeed I am being changed downward, away from self toward trust in the Cosmic Invisible which is leading me to where I need to be, using the tools I have selected for Its use.  And I lean on Meister Eckhart's spiritual growth is about subtracting rather than adding on.

God's gifts often come in reused (by us) brown paper...when opened, we find the pearl of great price.

Thank you.

TO ACCEPT ME, MINI-ME AND YOU...AH, PEACE

For over forty years, [Teresa of Ávila ] never spent a single day without physical pain. *** Through this, as in all else, Teresa learned how to let go of her own will and trust in God. She vehemently asserts that we must 'determine once and for all to swallow death and the lack of health,' or there will be no hope for us. - Fr Richard Rohr, "Daily Meditation," April 20, 2020

As I read that I realized two things: (1) the power behind our thank you prayer; and (2) for us bare beginners, long before we ever get to acceptance of "swallowing death and the lack of health," we must needs learn the art of acceptance of life's little nits and nicks.  For openers, why we'd best not resist that which another is thinking, saying, doing, being which is not to our liking, but focus on finding acceptance within.

The first part is self-explanatory. Dealing with the second part, we find our difficulty in not resisting lies in our not knowing how to do that without currying favor, or without feeling that we've sold our self out. The fact  is, both are simply ego standing in the way of God's will which we suspect is going to go against us.

Interestingly, the first paragraph of Easwaran's "Words to Live By" today gives us the answer: As long as there is something we want to get out of life before we go -- a little more money, a little more pleasure, a chance to get in a parting dig at someone we think has hurt us -- there will be a terrible struggle with death when it comes.

Building on that truth, my contention is that there will be a terrible struggle with our life in the very moment we resist that which is appearing to us. For instance, I did not resist JoB, I did resist Mini-Me...I have been at peace with JoB, I have had to find my peace with Mini-Me. And my peace with Mini-Me has come from seeing the fault in me.

It seems our life is simplified when we look to ourself as the source of our woes. To give up the struggle to change another is to find the change in our own self...ah, peace.

Thank you.

DOUBTS...JUST ANOTHER GOD-HUG

[The following is a reprint of my blog of September 8, 2017.]

I had an "out of head" experience yesterday. A long-time friend had passed, and several of us gathered to share remembrances. We were talking about the way we were back in the day. Nearing time to break up, I was moved, for I know not what reason, to share how I was feeling right that very minute...which was very like I used to feel at any gathering back in the day; i.e., anxious, intimidated, near tears, shaky...uncool in a word. A couple of others shared and we parted with hugs, end of that story.

Later, as I sat watching the U.S. Open, my head went into overdrive: What a fool you were! Will you never ever learn? What is the matter with you? I'll bet they're all thinking, 'Whoa, what a dolt she is!' Lord, why do you take coffee breaks just as I need you most?

And in a flash I heard, What were you wishing for? Did you share exactly how you were feeling just to get admiration for your honesty? Your humility? And if you pulled that off and they are thinking how admirable, etc., you are still being ego-led. If, however, you had no ulterior thought, and they are thinking, 'What a dolt!', you have been blessed beyond imagining. And I knew that to be true.

This morning, I'm having my doubts...and God grins.

God loves me so much.

Thank you.

Addendum: It was sometime after I wrote the above that I was gifted with the following: It was Cicero who said 'I have always been of the opinion that unpopularity earned by doing what is right is not unpopularity at all...but glory!'  Don't tell me God doesn't have my back!

LOVE IS LETTING GO OF FEAR

Households, cities, countries, and nations have enjoyed great happiness when a single individual has taken heed of the Good and Beautiful. . . . Such wo/men not only liberate themselves; they fill those they meet with a free mind. -- Philo (from Eknath Easwaran, "Word to Live By," April 18)

It occurs to me that Philo's advice toward free minds and Diogenes' search for an honest man spell out the difference between seeking to find peace from within (Philo) and seeking to solve the problem from without (Diogenes).

The answer is akin to the proverb, "Physician, heal thyself," which pretty much covers all bases. And all bases is not just the mindset behind the thought of Philo or of Diogenes, but our mindset, our tendency to accept or reject without thought, on sight.

Which leads me to Matthew 6:22-23, The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is sound, your whole body will be full of light....If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness! 

I view that as our sound eye interprets with God's mirror-imagery (my idea of bad is God's blessing in disguise) not by Lucy With The Football's imagery (I want equals I need).

If our eye is not sound, we see and interpret through our want-to will or our egoic mind. It is that unsound seeing, no matter the days or years seeking spiritual growth, that causes our unsound interpretations. It is they that cause our bumps, bruises, stumbles and falls, a.k.a., our rues, regrets and remorses.

Ah, but leaning on our learning to see through God's eyes, those remorses are our blessing for they turn us to God quick, fast and in a hurry. Only fear turns us there faster, and what else is a regret but fear? 

Still leaning on our learning, we know fear is God in camouflage, so we pray our thank you and walk free.

Love is letting go of fear...to quote a cheap self-realization book from years ago, and don't tell me God didn't have a hand in it.

Thank you.

ON SEEKING PEACE, OR TO GET OVER MYSELF

Looking back at my early life, my wholly self-willed years, I was ever aware that I sought peace of mind...and said so often. But I neither knew nor wanted to know the Father within. That place where the peace that passes understanding lives. That peace we crave which can never be stolen, but can be given away by our free will (self will in disguise).

Ah, free will. Free will deserves a Bible all its own for it may well be God's greatest gift to us. It allows us to choose whether we want to go it alone, thanks, or that we'd best lean on a power greater than our fine mind can comprehend. 

The wonderful part being that we can change our mind any time. The less-than-wonderful part, it nearly always takes deep pain unto suffering for us to change our mind toward surrender. Toward giving up. Toward losing. Toward knowing ourself to be a loser. 

It is that knowing that all but guarantees our crash and burn...which then rockets us into the fourth dimension. For myself, being rocketed into the fourth dimension put my feet in the right direction, headed toward glory, away from self.  Then I would turn me around in midair and head toward a self-determined objective...then get turned back around heading toward glory again...then get turned around....

Imagine my shock! shock! to learn all of that is doing it right. Rocketed into the fourth dimension does not ensure our landing at the right hand of God forever and ever, amen. No. It means we can now, if we choose and choose every day, head in that right direction...away from self toward God. 

Looking back, I can see that is and has been my journey for nearly fifty years now. It is what I think of as returning my free will to God in exchange for his will. It has been as rough and rocky as it needed to be for me to begin and continue seeking to just get over myself...for me to remember and recommit to my goal to go to God for God and that is all.

Thank you. 

OUR EXTERNALS WILL REARRANGE

The realization is deepening that all of our self-centered regrets are born and nurtured in our egoic mind. Spiritually, each regret is our pearl beyond price for each turns us to God...sometimes p.d.q., but usually slow and slower...as we try to will it dead.

We tend to forget that it is our attempts to kill our rues, regrets and remorses that in fact nurture  them...our entire attention focused on them? That is Miracle-Gro to the ego,  regret or not.

It should come as no surprise to learn that our egoic mind is one of God's hidey-holes...face it, that is the last place we would look to find surcease of our perceived pain. And the last place we look is ever the site of our crash and burn...also the site where the mystical hope that Cynthia Bourgeault writes about is born.

Cynthia Bourgeault writes:  This journey to the wellsprings of [mystical] hope is not something that will change your life in the short range, in the externals. Rather, it is something that will change your innermost way of seeing. From there, inevitably, the externals will rearrange. . . . The journey to the wellsprings of hope is really a journey toward the center, toward the innermost ground of our being where we meet and are met by God.  -- Fr Richard Rohr, "Daily Meditation," April 16, 2020

Thank you.

COMMON WELFARE IS WIN-WIN

Since we were rocketed into the 4th dimension once, doesn't it follow that we can be again? Isn't that our spiritual call...our out-of-self-into-God path?

Since we cannot get there on our intellectual firepower alone, or on our want-to for that matter, we understand why our self-determined objectives are pretty much useless...more likely the cause of our heading in the wrong direction.

I believe all the great mystics, Allah, the Buddha, Jesus, Saint Clare, Saint Francis, et al, existed...literally lived and breathed...in the 4th dimension (or a dimension way higher but four's my limit so far). It follows then if we want what they had, we do what they did. Which is pretty much why I use the Sermon on the Mount as my manual...for my convenience since I knew about it before I knew it, and I knew nada about the others.

At any rate, the Sermon spells out in plain speak, exactly what we need do to begin the process of expanding our consciousness...not to put too fine a point on it, but we need to get over our own self. If we get that, I mean get that, we can come to a full stop.

But since we don't get that early on, we go for help. The Sermon was my go-to, and it begins with the Beatitudes. Confession: The first few (hundred) times I read them, they did not make a lick of sense to me. So I just went with what I was led to, and let God clarify when, as or if I was ready.

According to me, the Sermon encompasses our life's need to practice the belief that our common welfare must come first, together with our need to make amends when, through selfishness (justified as forgetfulness), we neglect that.

The Sermon reminds us that we have ceased fighting anything and anybody. It is all about denial of self-interest in the care and concern for the other. We no longer curry favor in order to get, but we practice care and concern in order to give. 

Long/short: To me today, the Sermon teaches me that I need to do the opposite of what I want to do. Practically speaking, that means I need to do for another, not for me.

Common welfare is the win-win, and we know God's hand is in it when both sides come out the winner. 

Thank you.

PRAISE GOD...GOOD NEWS: WE DON'T KNOW

[We] discover what Job finally experienced: in the midst of suffering, God can be trusted...we usually only know this in hindsight after the suffering and the struggle. It cannot be known beforehand, not theoretically or theologically. Our knowledge of God is participatory. God refuses to be intellectually 'thought,' and is only known in the passion and pain of it all.... -- Fr Richard Rohr, Daily Meditation, April 14, 2020.

If we are ever, in truth and in fact, going to live a turned-over life, we will need to gut-bucket, toenails-up, trust the God of our own understanding. That means we trust that what is, is for our very own personal benefit...especially when it, what is, looks and feels so wrong. And hurts alot into the bargain.

That's the point at which we are turned away from our reasoning mind, our common sense if you will, and hear declared within us the good news, that we don't know what we don't know. We are unknowing...powerless in a word...and in that vacuum of unknowing, we see.

People waste so much time in seeking to work out what they see. I declare to  you that in the seeing My purpose, all is done. (God Calling, April 14)

Oh my...there it is:  Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.

Thank you.

LIVING AT PEACE IN OUR NEW HOME

There is hunger for ordinary bread, and there is hunger for love, for kindness, for thoughtfulness; and this is the great poverty that makes people suffer so much. -- Mother Teresa of Calcutta

It is almost a certainty that everyone in the world wants to be loved...most of us believing that we want to love. We slowly learn our difficulty is that we must needs give love...ah, but give love to the unlovable. We have never accepted that as the missing action in our desire to love and be loved...we want to feel love wrapping us in feelings of safety, security, peace and joy. We've never envisioned how it might feel to give love to someone we don't already love, to take the action within our own self to give love away.

There's the rub...we don't have to ponder about loving our already loved ones, our pets, lovers, parents, friends. It is the act of giving love to our self-perceived haters, our detractors, our bullies, our thieves that is our full stop. But that is precisely what the Sermon tells us is ours to do. Specifically, at Matthew 5:43: You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you so that you may be children of your Father who is in heaven....For if you love those who love you, what reward have you?

What reward, in deed. We are seeking the reward of simply getting over our own self. It is our own self-centered fear (which, who's kidding whom, is paranoia in fancy dress) that is the source of our woes.

What takes the place of our obsession with ourself if/when we do get over ourself? Why, love, of course. The whole world is our potential friend. Hate nobody, resist no one, take nothing personally...here lives the love we seek, our Father.

Beware the red flashing light of warning: The self-determined objective of getting over our own self through study, diligent work giving over, concentrating on doing good...ain't gonna get us there. Will make unbelievers out of us, more likely.

Remember, we go to God for God and that is all...he's slow but he's certain-sure. We've done all the hard work making our decision to live a turned-over life...now we await instructions from within. As we wait, we do the decent for a passing stranger. Or for our nemesis. Just for practice.

There it is. It is in looking back, when we are at peace in our new Home, that we realize the kept-promise: He goes before us to make the crooked places straight.

Thank you.

WE PRAY TO GIVE, NOT GET, LOVE

I believe the Christian faith is saying that the pattern of transformation is always death transformed, not death avoided. -- Fr Richard Rohr

That certainly caught my attention. I immediately thought, isn't that the basis of what/how I believe God works? As in, alcoholism transformed not avoided, my petty and/or big fears transformed, not avoided. On that belief is built faith from whence comes the ability...the need...to love.

According to me, the lack of love is the bane of the reasoning mind...the lack of giving, not getting, love is the source of all our woes. Our refusal to give from the endless supply of love we were given at birth is the result of our inviting the dark forces of fear, ego-birthed fear, to edge God out.

An actual practice that works: When we find our thoughts stuck in blame, shame or regrets, we pray our thank you prayer, immediately followed with, What could need my love more than this?  Then we wait for the click-click that tells us God has kicked in. We may not always hear the click, but it keeps our mind focused on God and off the blame, shame and remorses, a winner in itself.

As Franciscan sister and scientist Ilia Delio wrote, Breakdown can be break through if we recognize a new pattern of life struggling to emerge.

Thank you.

WE MUST GO BEYOND REASON TO LOVE

Remember that My followers are to be a peculiar people, separated from among others. Different ways, a different standard of living different customs, actuated by different motives. Pray for Love.--"God Calling," April 11

[O]ur natural state of consciousness: pure love -- "Word to Live By," Eknath Easwaran, April 11

That our natural state of consciousness is pure love explains why My followers are to be a peculiar people, separated from others, etc.

That takes a blinding flash of the obvious to grasp, which on first reading might seem to be fairly simple...until we begin our attempt to live it. The Sermon on the Mount, at Matthew 5:43, spells out the how-to...short form: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. Whoa! Not so simple now.

Here's a hint why it is so difficult to honestly live our natural state of consciousness of pure love: To the reasoning mind, those who persecute us are those who disagree with us; those we disagree with are just wrong.

That brings us to the very state we need to be to get rocketed into the fourth dimension, or out of our reliance on our reasoning mind, our own brain-power, into reliance on our natural state of consciousness of pure love. We recall that the hardest thing life will ever ask of us is that we change our mind. Now we learn that really means we must needs exchange our minds. Or be stuck forever in either/or, right/wrong...the dual consciousness of me vs. the other. There is no God there...there is no love there.

The ever and always answer: We must go beyond reason to love.

Thank you.

A GOOD FRIDAY AWAKENING

This comes to me this Good Friday morning, and this I know is my Truth: 

No, there is nothing wrong with me as I so often lament...there is and has always been my search for the Father within me, God. Looking back on my life, specifically the '60s in Beverly Hills, CA, that's what kept me from becoming the high-flying EGH's satellite or Doug Whozits girl...my search for God. 

No, I do not know what normal is for normal does not spend her life chasing God...normal goes with the normal...and that's fine, but it is not me, and it is not wrong. It is I, be not afraid. Thank you.

All my rues, regrets and remorses were and are but my time wandering in the wilderness...all that time in the wilderness was and is necessary, yes, essential, to my Now, my awakening.

It hardly matters what day it is any more, since the future is so unclear. I sit quietly, and I open my heart and mind for the unexpected. My prayers of the heart are "humility, through mystery," and "peace, through acceptance." –C. Thorman  (from Fr Richard Rohr's "Daily Meditation," April 10, 2020)

God loves me so much. You, too.

Thank you.

WHEN IN NEED, SEEK INSIDE HELP

My dream: I am standing at the edge of a precipice with a rope bridge across to the other side and a ravening beast, whose name is Ego, is fast coming up behind. If I go forward, that rickety bridge probably will not hold me, and I will fall to a horrific death; if I stand still, Ego will eat me alive. Do I trust God to hold the bridge together for me? So I can walk out into an unknown, but hopeful, life, or go to my go-to, ego, known but less-than-wonderful. That fear is God in camouflage...I it is who calls me forward; i, Lucy, it is whose self-centered fear holds me back. Go with God and be saved from self.

We first hear about initiation as something deeply religious initiates once had to go through on their way to full priesthood. 

Then we began to hear that initiation is the only entryway into a spiritually based life. It is the framework for our decision, the decision we need to make to turn our life and our will over to the care of God...specifically, to turn away from our self-determined objectives.

We are coming to believe that life is initiation...if we are paying attention, everyday we are presented with the choice to trust God or to go with our free will. It takes discipline (ongoing, neverending discipline) to hesitate, to wait for the Lord's input. Face it, it's the same common courtesy we allow a friend in a like situation, yet our free will too often wins. 

Our will is a toughie to hug and kiss and let go of. Yes! Because it needs to be. The easier the task, the shorter its shelf life. The harder the task, the surer it is that we'll need to seek help. 

Our hardest lesson a-learning: The help we need is inside. We'll need to seek inside help to turn away from self toward Self. 

We go to God for God...and that is all.

Thank you.

TO JUST LET IT BE...IMAGINE

Thank You, Father, for our everything just as it is right this very minute. 

Only by accepting our Now just as it is can we be opened to the already perfected Now just as it need be for us personally right this very minute. Thus we keep our eyes on the prize...Now.

For me to be lifted out of self into the perfect Now is to hear "Let It Be," one of my two favorite songs:

When I find myself in times of trouble

Mother Mary comes to me

Speaking words of wisdom, let it be.

And in my hour of darkness

She is standing right in front of me

Speaking words of wisdom, let it be.

Let it be, let it be.

Whisper words of wisdom, let it be.

Ah, imagine.

Thank you.

FOR THIS I ROSE AGAIN...TO FIND MY GOD

I heard Gov Andrew Cuomo of New York speak yesterday about the danger we are all in of cabin fever. Then he described cabin fever...mounting irritation with life itself, lashing out at loved ones, being snarky to spouse, partners, kids...even beloved pets. Ah, then doubling down on self.

There is no way to describe the blessed feeling of relief I felt with every word he spoke. 

I have no spouse, partner, kids or pet, but I do have loved ones...I just don't want that to become past tense, as in I did have loved ones. Oh, and I do have self...self with whom I sometimes feel as if I am in an ugly-name-calling contest, both of us looking to lose.

I remind myself: It is for this I crashed and burned and rose again...to follow directions this time 'round. To find the God of my understanding...find him living right there inside me. To find that I am never alone even when I'm resting in my needed peace alone. To discover already there within me the joy of being present for the benefit of others...and equally joyful for the presence of others there for the benefit of me.

After I head Gov. Cuomo, I heard a news report...scientists are discovering the earth's surface is changing. It is settling down, giving off less noxious gases, etc., due to the shutdown of business...less traffic, less commerce. The earth is getting its much needed chance to renew itself. 

There is no way to describe the blessed feeling of relief I felt even as I heard that. 

There is a sliver of gold in everything. Find that sliver of gold. Focus on the gold, detach from the sludge...focus, detach, focus, detach. As has been written, the dark and dreary seems always to be able to get a foot in ahead of the good. Accept that and be freed to keep turning our focus back to the good.

God knows our needs so this, too, is God's...which he has already healed. Focus.

Thank you.

THROUGH GRACE...LOVE AND FORGIVENESS

I do believe, having come to me from reading Meister Eckhart, that the only prayer we will ever need is thank you. I must admit, however, when (not if) I forget that, my fallback prayer is,  Father forgive me for I know exactly what I do, and I do it anyway.

Our Father cannot not forgive for forgiveness is love and our Father is love, so apparently my fallback prayer is God's reminder to me that it is my heart that needs to change. It is my belief that free will is our spiritual gift, given us purely to return to God, at the same time being our reasoning mind's bane as long as it remains unreturnable...awaiting our change of heart. 

This morning's Sermon, at Matthew 5:21-26, was all about reconciling with whomever we're angry with or whoever has reason to be angry with us...and the basis of our reconciliation in short is our accepting the blame. 

I take that as when wrong, promptly admit it, else all we do after is ego driven. Flash, flash! There is no God even in good works when we are living with an unacknowledged wrong of our own or with an unforgiven wrong of another. Face it, we need to make peace if only in our own heart with the one we have hindered. We can make nobody love us, but we can have love in our heart for anybody...through grace and the love of God.

Following [spiritual principles], we need to trust the down, and God will take care of the up. Although even there, we still must offer our yes. -- Fr. Richard Rohr's "Daily Meditation," April 5, 2020

Thank you.

JOYING IN THE I OF ALL IS JOYING IN ONE

This morning I found my 2005 note in my God Calling: "I need to joy in the I of us -- of all not just of me -- in order not to judge."

As I read that '05 BFO, the thought came that in God's world, the singular I is plural to form the One. Which thought led to another: Our problem is not that God will not heed us, it is that when we go with our free will, we do not heed God.

Now more than ever since August 24, 1971, I am in danger of indulging my disease...not so much because I may  physically indulge for my consciousness has been raised (plus I can't get to a store to buy my favorite poison), but because I will become self-will run riot just as I so often describe (judge) Donald Trump.

There it is: It is not only the pandemic I need be aware of but, much more importantly, I need be aware of the danger, by my very judging, of becoming as I perceive Donald J. Trump. Judge not lest ye be judged.

So my need is not only to joy in the I of all of us but to joy in the I of my self-perceived enemies in particular. It is fairly easy to think I am joying in the I of all just by wishing peace to the world; however, imagining, imaging, as in my heart, body, bones and brain not resisting but joying in the likes of Gertrude and Trump is a real stretch. 

Again gratitude comes running, and I remember my two favorites: "I shall fight no more forever,"  -- Chief Joseph and "We have ceased fighting anything and anybody." -- Anonymous

Now, more than ever, I must needs go to God for God and that is all.

Thank you.

LOVE, THE HEALER OF ALL PAIN

Various thoughts and interpretations from my April 4th readings: 

God Calling: When the Word flashed "I love you" to the two listeners, understand that very I love you is what is always present to everyone, everywhere, always. Ah, but it is most likely to be hearable to those who choose to maintain a conscious contact with God.

The first line, I am all-powerful and all-knowing and I have all your affairs in My Hands, is truth from My Soul to my conscious ears, i.e., mind. The I is I within me, the I Am that I am. Its truth is making its way from my inner Self now...it feels like it is coming from my brain, but my brain is just relaying My message.

The 23rd Psalm: Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me means goodness and mercy as interpreted in God consciousness...our rues, regrets, remorses, our glories, our sickness and health, everything...shall follow us all the days of our life and is good. All manner of things are good in God consciousness. 

The Sermon at Matthew 5:14-16: You are the light of the world....Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven. This is not about speaking at all, but about letting our good speak, shine, so those good works can and will give glory to our Father.

Fr Richard Rohr's April 4, 2020, Daily Meditation: The feeling of 'things should not be this way' is an additional and unnecessary pain on top of our inevitable suffering. We cannot avoid old age, sickness, and death, but we can remove the unnecessary assumption that things should be otherwise, and the psychic pain this assumption causes us. *** When we are willing to be transformed, we stop wasting time theorizing, projecting, denying, or avoiding our own ego resistance.

That affirms love in God's world is all there is. Feeling scared? What needs love more than fear? Anger...yeah, that too. Blue...oh my yes.

We remember, or learn again, that the hardest thing life will ever ask of us is that we change our mind. The surest way to do that is go to God for God and that is all...and there it is, love, the healer of all pain.

Thank you.

LET IT BE...MORE WILL BE REVEALED

I keep being led back...who's kidding whom, I keep running back...to the natural state of the world today in relation to the political state of the world today. Honestly, and no surprise, I know less than I need to know about the state of the world, and I am only verbal in my prejudices about the state of American politics.

It is my attempts to detach from my reasoning-mind prejudices that hold sway now, and detachment must needs lead to the spiritual.

I am re-reminded that we were once rocketed into the fourth dimension...if we could be once, we can be again and then as needed. Let that hold sway for it is there that we find true peace of mind

This time of our life is for us to know Trump is as necessary to us as Judas was to Jesus. Through Judas, specifically his act of betrayal, Jesus was crucified, died, was buried and rose again...as, according to me, our authentic I Am.

Our mistake when we think about Jesus is seeing him as a puppet for our wants...and discounting him for not giving us them.

I suspect it wouldn't hurt, in our new consciousness, if we knew our own self as the I that I Am. And then began walking that fine line rather than keep cursing God for not lifting us up and over.

What if My aim now were to just give love to my enemies and to my neighbors? Love formed in a whole new mold; i.e., at a different level than I have ever known...and that is unimaginable so I best quit trying.

Ah, comes the dawning...let it be...just let it be. Question not...good or bad, positive or negative...just let it be. From our own experience, we can know for a certainty: More will be revealed.

Thank you.

FEAR NOT OUR NEMESIS

Lord, bless us and keep us safe from our egoic self. 

Fear not your nemesis.

Whoa...now there's an impossible ask for the reasoning mind, the home of our nemesis. It will ever take us into our dark places, the inner home of our rues, regrets and remorses, leaving us feeling bloodied and bruised. It is not until we are ready and mentally crash and burn that we are released from those dark places.

We awake free for we find our Father already there to welcome us and gone before us having already finished the work. Ours is to realize that...to welcome it with our thank you prayer.

And there it is: Our dark places, brought up to the light, have transformed our former shame, withered in the sunshine of love and laughter. Through the grace of God and a little help from our friends.

Thank you.

THERE IS NAUGHT TO OVERCOME...THANK YOU

Morning blinding flash of the obvious: We pray not to overcome the pandemic, there is no pandemic to overcome, we pray our thank you to our Father which art in Heaven...and that is All.

Many years ago my friend Gertrude told me of an experience she had when she was preparing to sail around the world with her husband and a small crew. She was not unafraid and asked her spiritual director to pray for her protection.

The director replied, "There is no Gertrude to protect." Long story short, Gertrude knew it for truth and worried no more.

I, too, knew it to be true, but at that time my knowing was from my eyebrows up only.  Which counts, I've learned if we use it for its intended purpose, i.e., as our holding room for the truth to grow deeper until realization comes. And my realization arrived this morning with my BFO.

Be aware: Realizing that there is no pandemic to overcome does not remove the pandemic from the reasoning mind world. It does, however, keep our spiritual mind more fully focused on thank you from whence our peace comes, that peace which passes understanding.

Thank you.