CLING TO NOTHING...FLY FREE

My July 14, 1985, "God Calling" note: Just tried to help a June bug caught in a screen at my window get free...finally told it that it had God same as me and it would have to let God do it because I couldn't...as I turned away, it flew free. 

My note this morning: I am the June bug, He is my wings. 

We are the June bug...America is the June bug...the Universe is the June bug...He is our wings.

I am reminded of the vignette in "Lazy Man's Guide" that the author Golas wrote about when he was seeking to love, to learn how to just love. He dropped acid which took him on a scary trip with a hideous monster coming after him. As he fought to get away, the monster said, What was it that you thought needed to be loved?

There it is. Love...resist not...accept...we are the June bug, He is our wings.

Thank you.

THIS MORNING'S MEDITATION

God's will is individual to each of us. God does not have a preferred way other than it is always good, always for the benefit of all.

His way for me is whatever way I choose...every second of my life. That choice of mine His will meets and perfects. Our faith is built on trusting the outcome of that even and especially when, to our egoic mind, it feels and appears to be all wrong...it is being perfected for our benefit even then. That's why we say thank you asap and trust His perfected results.

Every life decision is a hold-your-nose-and-jump situation...that is spiritual initiation...some more reasoning mind than others but all self bound...trust by doing, do by trusting.

To rely on affirmations is to rely on the reasoning mind. We affirm ill health as non-existent, i.e., whole and healthy mind, heart, lungs, etc., but no...the human condition brings what it brings. The Christ is with us within us in the midst of any condition, imbuing us with peace and calm and joy (just as my friend spoke of as she lie dying in hospice).

The Father within meets each condition that self bring and perfects it for our benefit...it is our reasoning mind that is the slacker and needs calming...through spiritual discipline.

He goes before us to make the crooked places straight.  Our blinding flash of the obvious is that His going before us is our face meeting our crooked place. It is magic thinking to believe the crooked place is removed so that we never need meet it...it is in the meeting that our faith is built.

Thank you.

WHEN ITS TIME HAS COME

When the Christ has been realized, Its activity can never be impaired, impeded, delayed, or hindered. God has a way of wiping away every obstruction. Nothing can prevent the fruitage from appearing in our life when its time has come. -- "The Art of Meditation," Joel Goldsmith, at p. 89

Fear may natter, heart may stutter-step, hands may shake, and to sweat blood may seem next up...still we go forward, inexorably toward our Red Sea. With thank you on our lips...along with, who's kidding whom, a silent plea that Meister Eckhart knew what he was talking about.

Thank you.

PEACE IS FOUND IN THE UNCOMFORTABLE SPACE

Most of us need to have the status quo shaken now and then, leaving us off balance and askew, feeling alienated for a while from our usual unquestioned loyalties. In this uncomfortable space, we can finally recognize the much larger kingdom of God. -- Fr. Richard Rohr, "Daily Meditation," July 11, 2018

I am finding that it is in the midst of that feeling of alienation that our thank you brings peace...peace kicking and screaming maybe, so let's go with the promise of peace.

Don't you think that it is fear and fear alone that shakes our inner peace, our sense of security? My fear of being left alone, your fear of financial insecurity, their fear of us, our fear of them...makes no never mind what we name our fear, it is all from the same pot, i.e., ego, or not God at any rate.

The problem is, we cling to our fear...we see ours as justified but yours as lack of faith. This is our reasoning mind fortifying its position. We must go beyond reason to love. Ah, here's our spiritual discipline reminding us that love is acceptance... is gratitude...is detachment...is divorcing our self from our own opinion, actually.

God is not found amongst the roses, wrapped in adulation and dollar bills. In this uncomfortable space, we can finally recognize the much larger kingdom of God.

Thank you.

THY KINGDOM COME, THY WILL BE DONE

The new way of thinking that spiritual growth leads us to and through is raised consciousness, and we cannot live there on self-will alone...even wanting to, we can't. In the wanting to, we tend to think of God doing the holding us up, when it is holding to our decision to turn over to God that does it. According to me.

God is with us, within us, 24/7...ah, but so is ego. And, who's kidding whom, ego has a bigger mouth, a louder shout than God. It takes no effort to hear ego, but we must consciously go into the silence to hear God.

We will stumble, we will bumble, we will shout Oh No, repeatedly, in life, and that's if we're doing it right. That's how we learn to turn within again and again and again...we're walking our decision to live a turned over life.

Ego, legislating for itself, will prevail, then defend itself, then beat up on us for unknowingly letting it stumble. Spiritual growth, the only antidote to ego, teaches us to say our thank you (resist not evil), laugh, love, move on.

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven...it is through raised consciousness that Thy kingdom does come, that Thy will is done...Now.

Thank you.

LIFE, LOVE AND THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS

He [or she] who attempts to act and do things for others or for the world without deepening his own self-understanding, freedom, integrity and capacity to love will not have anything to give others. He will communicate to them nothing but the contagion of his own *** ego-centered ambitions.... --Thomas Merton, "Contemplation in a World of Action"

Merton's statement reminds me of my beloved book, "The Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment," in which it is laid down that We must go beyond reason to love. 

We are instructed to love by most any spiritual person from way before Christ to Haight Ashbury hippies up to right now, yet still we quibble, ponder, analyze and argue...within our self and without. Often not about the merits of love, but about our intellectual understanding of love... or, more to the point, why your understanding needs upgraded to be more like mine. 

I guess that's why We must go beyond reason to love is my go-to...along with I just try not to be as nasty as I want to be and, of course, Thank you. I kinda think of those as my Trinity mainly because the real Trinity is a tish over my head.

What I especially connect with in Merton's statement is, attempting to do for others without deepening our own self-understanding. There it is. Our own self-understanding is God's hidey hole. How else do we quit judging, gossiping, resisting but by, before we start down that wrong road again, going within and asking what our problem is here. Face it: I can't find the solution to you within me...I can within my own egoic mind but how far does that get me? 

All the right answers to life, love and the pursuit of happiness seem to be really simple. It's the doing  that we complicate...actually, it's the detours we take in the doing that complicate. Oh, hey! What if the detours are the side trips laid out by God for us to learn our still more spiritual lessons from? 

Love the detours, don't be as nasty as we want to be on those detours, and keep thank you rolling at all times. 

Thank you.

SMILE...LIFE IS CANDID CAMERA

Ask, and it shall be given to you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. -- The Gospel According to Saint Matthew

It's amazing how long it takes not to realize but to accept that Saint Matthew is not referring to material world goodies. To realize and be grateful that it's all about living and thinking from our raised consciousness, from God consciousness.

I sometimes think that our enlightenment is like the incredible dream with the answer to all life's problems that we half-awake from at 3:00 A,M., thinking there's no need to write that down, no way we'll ever forget it. Then as we awake fully at 7:00 A.M., no way we can remember it. It is gone.

As we live ever so slowly deeper within our raised consciousness, we realize the why of Seek ye first the kingdom of Heaven. Short answer: Because that is all there is.

Then we find out...oh, there is more. The more is and all these things shall be added unto you. And there goes my ego Lucy, grabbing for the keys to her promised Mercedes...again. Rope her in, bring her back. And come again to the realization, with acceptance dragging its feet behind, that all these things are not material world goodies either.

All these things are peace, love, joy, patience...all the things we pray for but only when we're feeling the need. These are the very things that before birth are sealed up within us...along with free will, they are gifted us, and we have a mostly unused supply still there within. Paradox alert! We realize they are already ours by using them. We can choose to be at peace, to give love...a lot, to shout silent hallelujahs...a lot, to let the other driver in and with a smile.

Better, we can simplify. We can choose to keep a continuous mental Thank You rolling. And with a smile.

Thank you.