Trudge Time

November 20, 2012
Today life feels like a lot of work, it just feels hard.  Lots of dysfunction, pain and fear with many people.  Fortunately Maria and I only have the pain and fear part.  We are trying to be examples of peace, love and compassion, accepting what is and working with it.  Several of my friends are struggling to overcome personal difficulties.  Some have physical pain.  The pinched nerve in my shoulder has not healed completely, so I still have a small amount of pain.  On days like this, I just try to be aware of my feelings, and, taking a lesson from my Buddhist teachers, neither push the feelings away or attach to them.  I just consider a day like this to be “trudge time” and let it pass.
Today contrasts markedly with the way I felt yesterday, and nothing has changed other than my attitude!

November 21, 2012
This was a neutral day.  Fortunately, trudge time has passed, as it always does.  The sweat lodge tonight was canceled, giving me some extra time, so I made a large batch of soup and relaxed more.
I spent the morning in various staff meetings, and was struck by the fact that other people conduct themselves largely based on fears of things like liability, judgment and responsibility.  I do take steps such as knowing the laws and documenting my activities, in order to address the liability issue, but I also have the basic knowing that everything will be fine and that if I follow my guidance, I have nothing to fear.  I follow the course of love and service and just figure that I will be taken care of.

An Impact of Love

Today a friend commented that there is a “strange sort of magnetism” associated with our home.  This comment was made because birds and other animals tend to hang out around our house.  Many people have made similar comments and many animals, especially young ones, do  tend to stay here.  As I say in my website “The source power/love/God is in all things and all people, not just humans, Christians, Muslims or Pantheists. A person can sense it in all things and they can sense it in you. I have had a family of rabbits play at my feet, been wrapped in feelings of love and scent from trees and had various children and adults react strongly to the presence of that force.”  More recently, when I go out to put food out for the birds or other animals, they just don’t go away.  They look up, see me coming and go back to eating, as if to say “it’s only Charlie”.  I then ask them to move and they do,  just not far.  This spring we also had a family of young ravens come to visit us each morning, peering in windows, walking on the roof and communicating with each other.  They were a delight.  As I also comment in my website “ A truly magical experience in each case.  I could sense the God/source/power in them, and they could sense it in me, an incredible experience.”  The feeling of love/God that I walk around with has an impact on everything around me, even machinery and “inanimate” things.

Love Versus Superiority & Judgement

Maria and I just attended the movie “Lincoln”, starring Daniel Day Lewis, about the end of the Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation, ending slavery and changing the Constitution.  What stood out to me was man’s inhumanity to man.  One of the main themes in the movie was the use of harsh judgement, exclusion, superiority and criticism of one white male toward another, toward people of color and women of any color.  The movie portrayed this theme within politics at that time.  The use of judgement, superiority and exclusion has also been part of virtually every religion and the general world culture throughout recorded history.  This attitude has been part of humanity and does not come from God or fit within love.  We are one with God and each other.  Each of us is connected to everything and everyone.
In reflecting on this theme or human tendency, I think of the behavior of children or puppies.  I don’t get angry at children or puppies when they do silly things.  I find it difficult to get more than momentarily angry at a puppy for making a mess or chewing the leg of some valued antique.  They don’t know any better and I am the one being silly if I judge them for their behavior, or place value where it does not belong.  It’s the same with human beings.  Whether we talk about white males, Muslims, Palestinians or Christians, they just do not realize their interconnectedness, if they did, they would behave differently.

Love and a Change in Perspective

I was reminded today of a change in perspective that many of my clients go through.  They finish the 6 month program at B2B and then return home for a few days.  When at home, generally they can clearly see  the dysfunction in their family for the first time, usually lots of insecurity, triangulation and taking things personally.  Generally they fight me vigorously when I initially bring these things up, a few months previously.  They usually disagree and can not see the problem.  Over the next months they become relatively direct and honest and tend to see the dysfunction as needless, hurtful drama.  They come to love their family members even more, and see what is going on as very human.  There is no judgment or criticism,  just loving, accurate observation.  They frequently recognize that their parents and/or older members of the family are unlikely to change, and become good with that.  Quite a change for them and quite something to watch!

The Absolute and Eternal

For the last several days I have spent less time in the morning doing my deep meditation or zoning and more time just sitting and contemplating on the absolute of God/love/presence.  I do this by sitting in front of the wood stove, possibly doing some spiritual reading and simply focusing on the feeling of love and the presence of God.  I refer to this as absolute because, in fact, nothing else really exists.  There is none of the duality, like hot versus cold or black versus white, we are accustomed to, only the love.  I also have, in the background, the awareness or memory of things like hate, apathy, hurt, pain and depression, feelings that make the absolute of love feel even stronger because of the comparison.  There is also an awareness that the worldly feelings are illusory and transitory.  In part, it is a matter of focus.

What Matters in Life

I have mentioned it in this journal before, but I talked of the phrase in a meeting today have been reflecting on the comment that “nothing matters very much and very few things matter at all”.
I was taught that things like performance, what others thought of me and my intellectual achievements were pretty much the only things that mattered, a fear based approach which resulted in a great deal of angst.  The more I accomplished, the greater the angst.  Those things matter little, if at all.  The things that truly matter are things like relationships, love and compassion.  The more I develop those things within myself, the better and more peaceful I feel.  Those things have some eternal significance and come from God.  “Money, power and prestige”, come from humans and only have short term significance.

A Path With Heart

It felt like a very solid day and I feel firmly rooted on my path.  However, paradoxically, I’m not sure what that path is beyond being strongly connected to God, asking for guidance, doing the next right thing and being of service.  I do not feel attached to much of anything in the created order.  I also have no idea where my path will lead me.  My path has no firm boundaries, limits or direction, and that is excellent, but a little strange.
I had four clients today.  I clearly “comforted the afflicted” with the first and “afflicted the comfortable” with the last two. The second was a mix.  All actions were taken with the utmost love respect and I had a good connection with each.  I was a good conduit today!

Connection With All Things

I have been reading a book called Wolfkiller which consists of stories and wisdom of a Navajo sheepherder from early in the 20th century.  His stories and wisdom were, in turn, passed down to him from his mother and grandfather, through their oral tradition.  He lived close to the earth.  Through his stories it becomes quite clear that he realized and treasured the knowledge that we are all connected to everything and everybody.  It is also quite apparent that knowing of that connection changed his life and made it quite beautiful and fulfilling.  Knowledge of that connection changed his general attitude and the way he interacted with the world around hin.  I too value that connection.  There is a love and respect for all things there and knowing of that connection has also changed my life dramatically.

Understanding is not Required

When I say “understanding is not required”, it is an acknowledgment that I do not need to thoroughly understand something intellectually.  As in the last entry, my accepting a very limited, and totally non-intellectual understanding is based on love and faith, not intellect.  Pursuing a thorough, intellectual understanding would be fear based and would very likely detract from or completely eliminate the spiritual experience.  As several workers in the field have realized, scientific analysis and an attempt at a thorough understanding of spiritual things frequently conflicts with or eliminates spiritual events.  The intellect and the spiritual represent different paradigms and one cannot be used to evaluate the other, except in very simple ways.  For example, it is possible through scientific study to show that healing touch expedites healing in mice but not why or how.

Divine Assistance

We had a very strong lodge tonight and I was clearly “targeted” by the lodge, meaning the lodge, which is more closely connected with God than I am, had selected me as its target for special interest.  The targeting actually started before the ceremony and continued during.  Before the lodge began, the smaller and older of the two lodges on our property summoned me to it and had me place my hands on it so that it could better connect with me.  When I placed my hands on it and began to focus and be open, it began to do a combination of a transcendental healing and a “downloading” (the best description for how it feels) of information into me.  It was so intense I found it necessary to make contact only for a minute or so, before taking a break to walk around some.  While walking around, I was in a dazed state and only minimally connected to what we think of as reality.  I did the contact and walking around several times before lodge time.  During the ceremony, which was in the large lodge, the process continued in much the same way, but less intense so that my connection with reality was stronger and I was more able to interact.  Quite an honor!  I can’t say that I understood what took place but I do know that God and the lodge was helping me with my healing and helping me to be the person I wish.  Understanding is not required.