RAISED CONSCIOUSNESS WITH SKIN ON IT

Overcoming self-determined objectives is a spiritual need, i.e., hard, ain't it hard, Lord, lovin' You.

I have two opportunities today...to stay with self or to move on up. My egoic wants and my spiritual needs are push-pulling me. 

I feel like I am arm-wrestling with God, torn between my ego's want to remain alone, not go out of my hidey-hole home, to only talk to others by phone or text...torn on the other hand by my inner recognition of my higher consciousness need to be with others. 

My want is to stay home alone, hunkered down with my fantasizing thoughts; my need is to go out to dinner and a meeting and mingle...noon, small Step meeting, little required but to show up and chat; or my friend's anniversary meeting...5:30 PM dinner then on to 8:30 speaker's meeting...lots of interaction available...yes but, oh wait, i don't know, i don't wanna, etc. 

I could do noon only. I could do evening only. I could do both.   

I hold my nose and take a leap of faith...God's will, God's way. Trust and ponder no further...I will be contacted.  

Later blinding flash of the obvious: I need to be with my raised consciousness with skin on it...people in the flesh. 

Thank You.

TO CLAIM OUR OWN, PRAY THANK YOU

Effective light does not call attention to itself; rather, it lights up the world…. Any faith that does not manifest itself in works is not faith; it is complacency and self-satisfaction. -- Amy-Jill Levine, Daily Meditation, January 2, 2025  

I am reminded of a long-ago friend's mantra; namely, Faith without works is fantasy.

That saying has been visiting my thoughts off-and-on recently. I finally stopped long enough to let it speak fully to me, and I realized that it is my self-described "80s" that is doing the nattering. As I have mentioned, when I turned 80, I experienced an entire change in my thinking, feeling, doing...being. 

The gift of the change is the choice I was given...love and laugh with 80 or roll around in the self-pity of being 80, old, used up, no good, etc., ad nauseum. I chose and choose love and laugh.  

So I love and laugh and learn even more. For instance, I learned the word "works" flips on my guilt switch. My egoic guilt lives to shower shame and thus gets its reward with more guilt. (Just for giggles, I call it gilted guilt.)

Back to faith without works...I am living today the different meanings of "works." I've been beating me up for not doing more physical work...dig ditches or sweep floors kind of work. That kind of work, i.e., physical, went out the door for me at least 25 years ago. 

Here's God's way...I now know the gift of spiritual communication. I am available to listen to anyone in need who reaches out to me. I silently acknowledge God's will so my feedback is egoless, and the majority of the time the listener's thinking is upgraded.

We each are given God-gifts. All we need do is claim our own...with thank You.

Thank you.

THE UPSIDE-DOWN TRUTH OF GOD'S WILL & WAY

When we can weep, when we can identify with the little ones, when we can make peace, when we can be persecuted and still be joyful—then we are doing it right....As long as some people hold on to the upside-down wisdom of the gospel, it will be enough to flavor the whole meal of life. -- Fr Richard Rohr, Daily Meditation, December 30, 2024

I keep coming back to the upside-down wisdom of spirituality, of spiritual growth. That, to me, is the inside truth of God's will, God's way. 

We must let go of any notion that our reasoning mind will get us where we most need to be...which is out of self. Into we know not what! That's the spiritual gift, not knowing. We can say it will get us "into Heaven" but face it, we do not have a clue what that means. 

Oh, but to the reasoning mind, we know! It means looking good, sounding better (or at least better than you), no aches, no pains, at peace with self, i.e., Correct...always. To the reasoning mind, anything less means we aren't doing it right. When less, in God's world, is the Way.

Here's the truth that bucks our want to believe: when we can be persecuted and still be joyful. We know that means unjustly persecuted, like as if there is a "just" persecution. There it is...the upside-down wisdom. 

"Not fair" is never a welcome feeling...until we are blessed with the new-to-us wisdom of spirituality, "Not fair" is now "Welcome! You have much to teach us."

We do need to note that we do not bar the reasoning mind for it serves us well...as long as we do not serve it, we're on the right track going in the right direction. 

The spiritual slogan of the upside-down world of spiritual growth is I do not know. Followed by the inner thought, God does...thank You.

Thank you. 

NOT TO ANALYZE BUT TO REALIZE

Blinding flash of the obvious: There are changes taking place within me right this very moment that I know naught of...ah, God-consciousness growing within.

Interesting that I was led to research the following this morning after I flashed on the above.

John 3:8 is a verse from the Bible that reads: “The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit”. This verse is also translated in the New International Version as: “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

I doubt not that I was led to research John 3:8 this morning after I had my BFO...it has been sitting here waiting for me. 

The wind blows wherever it pleases is akin to the changes that have been taking place within me even without my knowledge but as they please the Lord. 

My need is to stay open to what I am being told, where I am being led by the Father within...not to analyze but to realize.

Not to analyze but to realize...thank You.

Thank you.

LOVE...ACTIONS OF MERCY AND JUSTICE

We have to find our inner authority through Christ in us; we have to find our purpose in our love of God and neighbor, and actions of mercy and justice. Otherwise, we’re not offering anything that the world doesn’t already have or can’t find in other places. —Richard Rohr, Daily Meditation, 1/4/25 

There it is: ...we have to find our purpose in love. Period.

To my mind, this is the essence of our being here, i.e., to find our purpose in love. 

The blinding flash of the obvious for me was the realization that I needed to find out what the meaning of love is to me. No wonder I have been such a drag-foot in learning the deeper/higher meaning of love...I couldn't even say the word back in the day.

When I realized that it mattered not what love means to you, or to Gertrude or to Sam, bur what it deep-meant to me, my realization turned the corner. 

Trying to learn that, I have dug and dithered and dug for years...never realizing that I was doing it right. 

I know now...I have realized (God's gift)...that is how I was meant to learn about love, its meaning, its purpose, its core...by digging, pitching some parts, keeping others. That is how I finally came to the God of my own understanding with legs and feet...no longer five words without a deeper meaning.

My current understanding will grow, but when first I read them, actions of mercy and justice seemed to sing to me. They still hum.

I am on the right road, heading in the right direction...with love surrounding me, and I know what that means to me now. 

God is so good to me. To us.

Thank you.

THE POWER OF POWERLESSNESS

This is how Jesus is the “Savior of the World.” He does it by choosing a minority position, entering Jerusalem on a donkey....his proclamation of the power of powerlessness, is the message that will save the world from self-destruction and for an eternal truth. --  Fr Richard Rohr, Daily Meditation, January 1, 2025

From our post of January 1: Our marching orders: Work with the Father within, and let it be so.

To work with the Father within ain't no walk in the park...reasoning mind will ever assert itself. To let it be so is another hidden hook...that may be the harder order actually. Our hands may be idle, but our mind? Oh, mercy. 

This is one of the earliest/hardest lessons of meditation...training our mind to sit in the silence and that is all. The Father within can, will and does do the rest, or so I am told...actually, I have experienced that Light but not enough, never enough. 

I am grateful from my toes to my nose that I have received a gift to be grateful for no matter the weight...the smaller the nugget, the greater the gift I tell me and remember the might of a minority position, love and laughter. Ah, there's our proof, love and laughter.

No matter the appearance of our burden, God's gift, love and laughter, lifts us up by lightening us up. 

Thank you.

2025 ARRIVES AS ON THE WINGS OF A DOVE

Freedom is not the capacity to be what we are not, but the capacity to be fully who we already are.... -- Fr Richard Rohr, Daily Meditation, January 1, 2025

The freedom to be who we already are using God's yardstick is my spiritual goal. The old say what you mean and mean what you say still stands the test of time, but it, too, must grow spiritually. 

We can no longer speak from our want-to alone...say what you mean and mean what you say is now filtered through God's will, God's way. This is another "impossible" until we let our self be guided into it...only nonresistance makes it not that difficult. 

Like most spiritual breakthroughs, it seems impossible even as we're doing it, and we don't get the thrill of victory until we've been living it when it's no longer victory, it is a way of life. 

Hmm...ego-reduction in depth realized. A spiritual two-fer. Don't tell me God isn't on our side.

We have a choice about this year, 2025. We can view it with dread as if it is hanging round our neck like an albatross or welcome it as coming in on the wings of a dove. 

Let's go with the dove and get grateful.

Our marching orders: Work with the Father within, and let it be so...Happy New Year.

Thank you.