RIGHT HERE AND RIGHT NOW

It is resistance to what is that causes mental paralysis.

It is our ego's legislating for itself (which is its natural state so we can only recognize that, not change that) that causes us pain. It is our attempts to avoid pain that brings the unintended consequence...of pain.

It is our nonresistance to our idea/fear of pain that leads us out of ourselves into God.

Primarily, the pain we are trying to avoid is psychic pain. Psychic pain is entirely personal, based in fear, and, if our choice is freedom from the bondage of self, there is no way around it...we must go through it.

We walk through it, unresisting (sometimes known as "beaten"), we get to the other side...lo, it's a miracle, life is good. Sometimes, life is good only because we got to the other side, but the overwhelming majority of the time, life is good because we have received a gift beyond our ability to plan for...we never knew it existed. It is understanding beyond our reasoning mind. 

This is the pearl beyond price...this is God consciousness. The open field of nonresistance, acceptance, I'm not right/you're not wrong and it makes no never mind anyway since we're both winners...and this place is only available to us right here and right now.

Thank You.

GOD'S PERFECT WORK DONE

I came across a note I wrote in 1986 in a daily reader of mine: "'My mind connected today that I, the Christ, is Nancy who appears today to be my nemesis...the lesson is to love the nemesis...not to win out over it nor to beat it at its own game...love it...'agree with your adversary quickly' is my goal."

Here's me, 27 years later, and I remember Nancy and my situation with her at the job and that we parted friendly.

The best part, and the proof of the truth of my note: I remember her without bile...without the same anger I felt toward her 27 years ago...I haven't thought of her at all since then except maybe fleetingly...but without malice.

The rest of the story is whether and how well I carry that over in my today life...do I realize that about the  others I view as my nemesis du jour? In general, I do for which I am grateful from my toenails up...but in general isn't good enough, not going to bring real peace.

My mind goes to another person from my last job, and I immediately feel the same bile toward him that I felt when last our paths crossed. Because I have since retired, I do not see him, but when his name crosses my mind, my attack mind picks up where it left off...telling him off, setting him straight. The laugh-er is that I just had a "yes, but" thought, justifying my ten-year-old anger!

The end of the story is when I sincerely (humbly is the word) ask God's help with letting go of my anger, my self-centered justifications...for just knowing I need to let go, praying to let go is lip service for a self-determined objective. I reread my note of 1986 and the key words "my mind connected that..." not that I've decided, or I'm thinking about. It was a realization gifted me from within...not me pondering and pulling to cause it to happen.

My job is to make myself available for God's perfect work to be done with me, within me.

Thank You.

ON BEING TRANSPARENT TO THE NOT GOOD

I have read that to be really secure, we must begin to find a source of security within ourselves.

What strikes me about that is the word "begin." Begin this minute, and the next minute, begin again. I'm convinced being really secure is of the moment...and looking back over the day, feeling at peace within, but realizing that is not permanent. It's like all else: This, too, shall pass. For, as it says somewhere in the Bible, it rains on the just and the unjust alike. Meaning, of course, that if we're doing life right, we'll get good and we'll get not good. Many of us live in the belief that if we're doing life right, we'll never have ugly visit us again...that we'll feel "really secure" permanently.

I suspect we confuse the happenings in our life with the evidence of our security or lack thereof. It is our search to avoid the not good that magnetizes it, and sends us down that wrong road again...searching for permanent security, i.e., the not good to not happen.

It's like praying to get in touch with our feelings, then feeling really crappy. Instead of realizing we just got in touch with our feelings, we blame God because we feel crappy, not happy...and take that as still not being in touch with our feelings.

It's in giving up the search for permanent security that allows peace to be with us, within us...passing through.

"It's not what we're called, it's what we answer to," said the black man about being called "nigger." And there it is. Nothing stops the not good from coming to us, it is our nonresistance to it that deprives it of a home.

Thank You.

GRACE IN THE MIDST OF THE HUMAN CONDITION

Yesterday I did what I do. I was just me being me. I got home and realized...OMG, that was really rude. I shoulda, coulda, woulda, except...and I thought of a really good excuse. I quick called my friend toward whom I was just being me...gave her my CYA excuse, we laughed, end of story.

EXCEPT...this morning I had a blinding flash of the obvious. I realized that as long as I get away with CYA excuses, I will never find self-acceptance for myself...of me just being me. For there was no malice, no manipulation in my action...I was just me being me. If I keep CYA'ing for me being me, I will ever get home and play "gotcha" with myself...I shoulda, woulda, coulda...then become the God of my own understanding by fixing me with CYAs.

I picked up my Goldsmith book of Letters from 1955-1959. As so often happens, there (at page 540) is the answer to what I'd just been pondering: "...the secret of the Sermon on the Mount [is] where we learn that although the law teaches...the indulging of human-sense -- grace is attained by refraining from the law and abiding in the spiritual Presence."

As long as I depend on my reasoning mind, on human-sense, I will never be graced with self-acceptance or anything else...I will never know God's grace in the midst of the human condition.

Thank You.

THE GIVING OVER IS TO GOD'S WILL

I do believe that everything that happens to us happens by invitation only. I feel insulted, slighted, embarrassed? What did I do originally that set that in motion? I'd not believe that if it hadn't been set down as fact by Gautama the Buddha, Jesus the Christ, Lao Tzu, Bob Dylan...all the biggies.

The reason it is so important to believe that unto walking-around-acceptance of it is that our minds will be on the attack of the perceived insulter until we let it go. And it is next-door to impossible to let it go by our unaided will. If we do not let go our harsh thinking about her, our revengeful wanting, we  will never be free of him. Every resentful thought, every resentful plot to set her straight...it's all the same. It is our judgment on us...which feeds it into more frenzy.

We can think, we can believe, we have "forgiven" an insult, the insulter, but until we take concrete action giving over to that person, our thoughts will remain the same...resentful. We will not know peace and that insulter's name will be in our thoughts as the very cause of our woes...s/he is not, of course, it is our ego, seeking victory.

We can come to understand this...indeed, we must...but the crucial step that we need to take is still missing. This is when we give over to God, asking for His will, not ours, to be done...whatever His will might be. For, and I know this from experience, if we come up with a self-determined objective for showing our forgiveness, we will be legislating for ourselves...it will not bring peace, it will bring still more feeling slighted, insulted, embarrassed.

So the crucial step is...yet again...surrender. And the result, of course, is peace of mind and heart.

Thank You.

QUOTES FROM "CHOP WOOD, CARRY WATER'"

The following are various quotes from "Chop Wood, Carry Water, A Guide to Finding Spiritual Fulfillment in Everyday Life."

To understand truth one must have a very sharp, precise, clear mind; not a cunning mind, but a mind that is capable of looking without any distortion, a mind innocent and vulnerable. Only such a mind can see what truth is. Nor can a mind that is filled with knowledge perceive what truth is; only a mind that is completely capable of learning can do that. Learning is not the accumulation of knowledge. Learning is movement from moment to moment. -- J. Krishnamurti at p. 22

So when the shoe fits, The foot is forgotten,
When the belt fits, The belly is forgotten,
When the heart is right, 'For' and 'against' are forgotten. -- Thomas Merton at p. 194

The Dalai Lama, as quoted at p. 56:
The purpose of life is to increase the warm heart. 

If you can, help others; if you cannot do that, at least do not harm them.

Superfluous wealth can buy superfluities only. Money is not required to buy one necessity of the soul. -- Henry David Thoreau at p. 130

The lack of money is the root of all evil. -- George Bernard Shaw at p. 140

Thank You.


   

FINDING OUR JOY IN THIS DAY

I think it was St. Paul who said if we are ever to live happy, we must drop all thoughts of yesterday's rues, regrets and remorses, and press on to our Now, to this very moment (which is definitely paraphrased).

At any rate, I know that to be true. The best part in living happy is learning to laugh at yesterday's rues, regrets and remorses,  at us  in the midst of our RRRs. As long as we're not laughing, they are our God of the moment. They not only determine what we're thinking, feeling, doing and being in that moment, they rule our negative side which, by its nature, chooses to follow the path downward.

As long as we live in the regrets of yesterday, we delay living in the joy of today...and there is joy to be found in every day. Our job is to find it.

Thank You.