Growth

As I said in my last entry, two days ago, "I am always on new spiritual and emotional ground, always striving" to be the best person I can be, which sounds simple — but is not. When I look back in my history I find many discouraging interactions with people of all ages and levels of authority over me. Many people attempted to hold me back, sometimes "for my own good" or my safety when I was feeling overly enthusiastic. I now expect that and tend to hold myself back at times. I strive to be free of past disappointment and just move forward. "People are often unreasonable, illogical and self-centered; Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives; Be kind anyway. If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true; Succeed anyway. If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you; Be honest and frank anyway. What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight; Build anyway. If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous; Be happy anyway. Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough; Give the world the best you’ve got anyway. You see, in the final analysis, It never was between you and them anyway. (Mother Theresa)

Comfort

"Comfort is not part of Charlie" were the words I spoke a few years ago about my way of life. The fact is that I am always on new spiritual and emotional ground, always striving, so that I am never comfortably at rests. When younger, I did strive to achieve comfort through various material and worldly means only to be disappointed at how short lived and illusory the comfort was. I do feel a strong sense of joy and peace that I did not before, just not comfort.

Surrender

In our reading group yesterday the main topic was the spiritual significance of suffering and I commented that I gave every appearance of suffering, but was not because of the joy, peace love and eternity I lived within. I made the point that I had had a great deal of pain, which had resulted in ever deeper levels of surrender to the Love and eternity of God. I did not enjoy the pain when I was going through it, but I love the results. "To get we must also give, to advance we must also surrender, to gain we must lose, to attain we must resign. From the nature of things life means choice and selection, and every positive choice negates all other possibilities." p 46, Rufus Jones

Belief

I look around me and notice that many people, including our political leaders, are acting of an ultimately destructive seed by doing things like lying, denying the facts, pursuing self-centered objectives and short-term gains. I followed that path and fed that seed for many years until I became totally convinced the approach would ultimately kill me. Only after exhausting that alternative and through the love and support of many others, was I able to begin following a more constructive path. It is my hope that humanity follows a similar path. ".... We shall never succeed in stopping war until we have a human society permeated with persons who practice a way of life which removes and abolishes the grounds and occasions of war, and at the same time matures and ripens a spirit of mutual understanding and personal cooperation." (Rufus Jones)

Perspective

Today I felt tired, having not slept well, but also very solid, complete and connected to All-that-is, a good feeling. Once again I look around me and see that as a species many of us are killing each killing each other and destroying this planet we depend on. There are also those among us that are definitely contributing to the "integrity of the universe". All is well. "I take the spiritual life to be a life of which aims to discover human wholeness, the integration of all aspects of our humanity - body, soul, mind, emotions - and the connection of the self to all of creation." (Paul A. Lacey)

Spiritual Journey

Some time ago someone was asking how I was doing. I responded to their question with an involved reply and they then asked "are you at least comfortable" and I responded that "comfort is not part of being Charlie". The fact is that I am on a spiritual journey and constantly questing and evolving, which is not comfortable. I do not seek comfort though I certainly think about it. I think about just watching old "Andy Griffith" reruns and eating bacon-cheeseburgers but then I end up meditating instead. I am delighted with the choice I make and am aware of the alternative. "We want to be spiritually alive, but also to be comfortable; to be prayerful, but not to rise early in the morning to pray; to possess power to lead, but not to undergo the discipline that it takes to control the power." (Gilbert Kilpack)

Holistic Healing

Many years ago when I was unable to walk unaided, using crutches and talking with the leader of a workshop I was attending on mind-body healing, he told me to visualize walking for one week and then do it. My thought at the time was "it’s not that simple". It is now about thirty years later during which I have succeeded in doing something similar to what he suggested with many health problems and partially with my disability. I have learned that there are things one needs to do in order to heal. It seems to me that the body is very good at healing itself — if you can connect with it and convince it to do so, usually through meditation. There is/are generally one or more issues/reasons for the problem; sometimes simple pathology, sometimes attitudinal, sometimes both. The issues and reasons have to be addressed and overcome if one is to achieve healing. I am still working on that as far as my walking. Maybe I will succeed, maybe not but the journey is certainly entertaining!

Listening

Before 2006 I could "speak like the man in the six o’clock news", crisply, quickly and with authority. I was highly educated and experienced so people listened carefully to what I had to say. I also must admit that I judged and tended to dismiss people who did not speak quickly enough for me. Since that time, because of my disability, I talk very slowly, with poor enunciation and with great difficulty. I also notice that I am now one of the people that many people dismiss (irony and payback time)! This turn around gives me a much greater appreciation and understanding of people who do not present themselves the way I used to. I listen to all people with love and respect and realize they are all of value.

Meditation

Today was a Monday so I did the weekly grocery shopping in the morning and exercised in the afternoon. During the afternoon I would work out for a while and then meditate for around half an hour, very enjoyable and a good pace for me. I tire easily so this pattern works for me. When I meditate I reach the "I am" portion of my higher self within a few minutes. Reaching that place used to take fifteen minutes of focus on the feeling of power, Love and the eternal nature of all things. When I reach that place I am also near the Absolute or God. "Man is separated from God, but secretly united to God; that is the prime fact of life, and all things in all creation speak of this separation, this incompleteness which has infected all." (Gilbert Kilpack)

Seeking

I seek and feel God in all my activities during the day, seeking not due to guilt or some feeling of obligation but because of the Love, peace and harmony I find there. Today, while blessing the plants in our garden, a female ruby throated hummingbird came to feed on our pink flowers. We also got several butterflies of various species coming to our butterfly bushes. I could feel the Love, peace and harmony of the plants and animals. "Seek Him we must, with a headlong love, with enthusiasm and romantic ardor, but also with lowliness and patience, and that is a hard combination." (Gilbert Kilpack)