The Choice to Rejoice

"The world will end in joy, because it is a place of sorrow. When joy has come, the purpose of the world has gone. The world will end in laughter, because it is a place of tears. Where there is laughter, who can longer weep?" (A Course In Miracles, Manual for Teachers)

If you ever doubted for a moment that spiritual truth runs very deep, you haven't pondered Jesus' words about suffering and joy. In a singular passage Jesus says there will be many trials and tribulations in life and be of good cheer. I have heard and read these words countless times before, but the last time was the decisive stroke that split my heart open. I can't explain why in just that moment, I was so deeply moved by the significance of this juxtaposition of seeming opposites. Perhaps my ego was dozing and let its guard down momentarily, for in that instance these familiar words were transmuted from platitudinous utterances, to a portal into my own deeper spiritual understanding. As the depth of meaning reached my heart, I shuddered and felt the sure sign of profound truth - a tingle that ran down my arms.

Do you feel it too? Can you wrap your heart around the enormous significance of a spiritual reality that makes joy possible in the midst of suffering? Human perception scoffs at such a notion for it seems that the trials of life are the barriers to our enjoyment of life; that difficulty and joy are mutually exclusive.  Our hearts are sensitized to close and resist the tough stuff, to push back in the face of tribulation. Hardly an atmosphere for rejoicing. But there it is in the same breath, master of Life, Jesus who well knew about suffering, advocating joy in the midst of life's trials.  

What did Jesus know that allowed him to advocate a seemingly impossible response to difficulty? He knew that he was not a mere body. He knew that worry was counterproductive to faith and prosperity. He knew that anger and resentment and resistance only serve to separate us from the God moments we all seek. He knew his true essence was spiritual. He knew he was the light of the world. He made the same claim for you and me.  He talked about a Kingdom that had already come; a heavenly awareness that was accessible to all.  The difference between Jesus and us, that makes all the difference, is Jesus didn't just talk about the Kingdom within, he lived there. It was his moment to moment abiding place.  

When we live on the surface of life our capacity for enjoyment rises on the good news and falls with the bad news. Trials and tribulations knock us for a loop, and we see no way out until things get better.  But there is a dwelling place, an abiding place within us, beneath the appearances of life, where all is indeed well. This is how Jesus overcame the world. This is how we too can be in the world but not of it; how we can live in this world and still be happy.

Of course, all of us find ourselves at times saying "if this or that would happen, then I would feel happier!"    It's an easy trap to fall into for us humans and clearly it a journey that will not bring us home for the holidays.  The truth is in the reversal.  All of those stories about what keeps us from deep joy are, well, just stories.  Nothing can keep us from the goodness of God, from the joy that runs deep within us.  At the end of the day, it's about you and me trusting in the goodness of God, whether the appearances support our faith or not.  Hang in there long enough, and deep enough with your faith in the Presence, and your journey will bring you home, sweet home, for the holidays, and beyond.

Love From Above

"I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love." - Mother Theresa When I think about what really brings me into the heart of the Christmas season it is usually a story about how unfathomable love prevailed against great adversity. One such story that still tears me up and reminds me of the depths to which love is capable is of a mother with a terminal illness who made the conscious, heart rendering choice to find foster homes for all of her children before she died. Most of us can only imagine, and wince at the pain she went through. Yet the beautiful paradox revealed by this story is how human love can come up against its limits, endure great pain, and be transmuted into extraordinary love. Who would have blamed this mother if she found it unbearable to release her children to new parents and clutched them to her side until her last breath. But this mother knew about a higher love that would outlive her suffering and the suffering of her children.  She accepted the inevitable, though devastating, reality that her physical presence as their mother would soon end.  She found a way to endure this reality and the pain of releasing her children by tapping into a greater love, a love that would continue to live and love long after her human heart could not. This is our great challenge if we are to ever really know the high form of love that is possible; the divine love which Jesus embodied and demonstrated in his life on earth.  The hardest part of love is in letting go.  The reason it is so difficult is that when we love humanly we get attached to people and we cling to them being a certain way. Their being or acting a certain way constitutes our love of them. Of course when we are aware of this tendency we realize that we are never really loving a person, but loving our image of them, our expectations, and the mandate we have placed on our love for them. Ouch, you say! Yes, this is a painful awareness. It stings to realize that our love is not as pure as we imagined. But you and I are capable of a truer form of love; love that is seeded in our souls and available to our hearts if we are open and willing to know it.  It begins by letting go of conditional love. It will  take extraordinary willingness to release clinging to preferences of how others should be. But as with the mother who endured the pain of separation from her children, we too can tap into a love that connects us deeper and wider with no limits of time or space by releasing our ideals for other people.   Unconditional love is demanding, but it gives more than it asks of us. Ultimately it's about allowing a lesser love to die so that eternal love can be born. Jesus demonstrated this lesson at the end of his life as well. Though he might have clung to his preferences for his life on earth, a deeper wisdom allowed him to release the form that would only limit his expression of love. He released limitations and unleashed the power of a love so great that to this day we can be reborn by its power made manifest in us.  Divine love is more than a heavenly ideal, but a real possibility for mothers who have transcended ordinary love and those of us who would follow.

The Inward March for Peace

"There is no way to peace, peace is the way." A. J. Muste

I grew up as part of a generation of idealists that marched for social change.  We marched against unjust wars; we marched in opposition to unfairness and to redress inequality for those subjugated by barriers of race, gender, and socioeconomic status. Wherever and whenever injustice reared its prejudicial head we took to the streets with signs or candles to bring awareness to the ignorant side of humanity.  In our vision for a liberated humanity, change meant activism.

The question I ask today, from a more integral perspective than I had 30 years ago, is what is the most effective method of achieving beneficial changes in society and in our own personal lives?  While activism was an easy answer in my earlier life, today I pause to consider that response. 

What is different for me today is a realization that my motivation will determine the results of my actions. That is, where I'm coming from will determine where I end up, regardless of my plan of action. I've come to notice that righteousness is not a path to peace, nor is indignation, nor is judgment. No matter how justified I may feel in my disapproval of a situation or an individual, these feelings will, by universal law, only create after their kind, and I'll never get the peace I'm after.  As Einstein noted, you cannot make plans for war, in preparation for peace. 

When we feel conflicted with another person or with a particularly troubling situation, we cannot achieve peace  of mind if it's dependent on a change in events or of another's heart.  If this is our form of activism we will march until our legs fall off and in the end we'll still be upset and confused.  Peace eludes us when we make it dependent on outer conditions. Why is this? Because peace is not the mere absence of discord or conflict but a divine quality that is embedded within us. Peace is seated in the soul.

If I make the mistake of seeking peace as a destination - a place of calm and well being that I'll get to when a certain outcome comes to pass - I will never get there. Finding peace is a deeply personal endeavor, that no-body or no-thing can give me. As an eternal verity of Being, it is not a destination, but a realization.  I must restore awareness of the still point inside of me. I must be still and know. This is the true peace that Jesus referred to when he said, "My peace I leave with you, not as the world giveth, give I unto you."  The world gives us a set of conditions in which peace is possible. Spirit offers peace without condition. 

Today I know that any march for Peace must first be inward, then outward.  When I center myself in the ground of being peace, I am best equipped to take up the causes that stir me to action.

The Advent of Hope

A few weeks ago we all turned our clocks back one hour. It marked the end of Daylight Savings Time. It was an act that would shift the quantity of light in our days and nights. I've seen no opinion poll, but am sure there are those who embrace the change, and those who lament it; those who find greater acceptance of an earlier dawn versus an earlier dusk. Regardless, we all encounter days of less light as we move from the summer solstice to the winter counterpart on December 22.  Each day we have less light than the day before with correspondingly longer nights. It's significant to realize that this is our experience in the northern hemisphere; the people of the southern half of the earth are experiencing days of more light. Just as when we watch the light diminish with the setting sun, there are others with an opposite perspective experiencing greater light. Perspective is everything. So it with our experience of light and dark in the human condition.  If we take in the headline news accounts of this day, there seems to be a lot of darkness in the world. Across the globe countless lives are threatened by poverty, disease, and endless warring. If we take this in, even a little bit, we can be overwhelmed by the seeming darkness. Of course the challenges and difficulties of our own lives can dim our perspective as well. Again perspective is everything. Our current president ran a successful campaign based on the promise of restoring hope to Americans - it was an open invitation to exchange pessimism over the way things had been for positive expectation of a better life for all. Politics aside, this a powerful message rooted in spiritual reality. Hope is not some flimsy religious notion that denies reality in order to falsely buoy our spirits. Hope is the legitimate offspring of a true understanding of Reality. We too can carry an expectancy of greater good for our lives when we hold tenaciously to our primary assumption; that we are heirs to the Infinite Life and Love and Goodness of the Divine.  Heaven is metaphysically defined as "ever expanding good," and Jesus declared that it is "the pleasure of my father to give you this kingdom," and it is "spread before upon the earth."  Hope sees the apparent darkness of the human condition without losing awareness of an inner Presence, an interior Radiance that illuminates possibilities for good. A positive expectancy for life is not mere Pollyannaish wishful thinking, it is an attitude based upon the Supreme facts of Life - that there is nothing or nobody than can separate us from Ultimate Good. Life can toss us about, and we can sustain great losses, but whatever happens externally, "it will not come near us." We can take refuge in this Higher Truth through all the "dark days," knowing that the Light that enlightens every man and woman coming into the world is in you and me. This Light is foundational to our Being, universal, unconditional and deathless. It is the light by which we can navigate the uncertain and dangerous passages through life. It is a beacon of Hope that draws us ever forward like the Shepherds who followed a star in the East, that we too might be present at the scene of a blessed event - a scene where even in the lowliest of human conditions the Christ is born in the manger of our own hearts. May we begin this season of Advent by restoring Hope. Not the wimpy wishful kind. Let our hope be ignited by nothing less than the Light of God within our souls. This Light always leads us unerringly to recognition of Love made manifest in our life.

Closing The Gap

"...We are asked to consider that the distance we perceive between any other human being or living creature and ourselves is the exact distance that lies between us and our experience of Presence. In the same breath, we are invited to consider that in any given moment, the significance we place on this gap is what prevents us from realizing that it is always Presence looking directly back at us from the other side of the gap."       

                                        - Michael Brown, The Presence Process

 Today I muse  that Jesus sensed the real nature of the universe and was among other things, a master teacher of quantum reality.  Of course  he did not have quantum in his vocabulary, yet he clearly had the mystical awareness of the inseparable energy that connects all things.  He called it the kingdom of God, which in the language of his time, was the vastest encompassing descriptor of the boundless energy that is the source of all that is.

Quantum science refers to a "field," or "zero point field," an invisible sea of minuscule vibration in the space between all things. Some scientists, who do not subscribe to the "field" notion, subtract it out of the equations.  But when the field is considered fundamental to understanding reality, it resembles our spiritual perspective in which  everything and everyone is connected together by an imperceptible web.

We too have the choice to exclude the field, i.e. perceive separation or include, i.e., recognize connection when we look upon our world and the "others" that share this world.  Our mortal minds too easily perceive the boundaries of bodies, and space and time and fall into the belief that we are separate entities with scant resources, clamoring for separate interests. Our failure to notice the ties that bind us is most notable (and troublesome) in our inability to recognize Presence in other people. We may have an easy time "loving God with all our heart, soul and mind," but "loving others as our self" can be very difficult. 

I know that the separation I feel with other people is the crucible for my spiritual growth. It is the gap, Michael Brown alludes to in the opening quote, that becomes the very measure of my separation from Presence itself.  As Jesus, observed You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor^[i] and hate your enemy.'  But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. Like the quantum perspective, we simply can't make exceptions to where we find Presence  It is Omni-Presence, which means everywhere and everyone.

Wherever and whenever I decide God is missing, marks the place and time of my suffering. Wherever I perceive a dark place in my life, or in an individual, I know I must invite Light to show me the truth about the situation or the individual. Until that Light illumines my perception, I do suffer, because maintaining the "gap" is a gaping wound in my relationship to my Wholeness, to Presence, to God.

This is why so many of Jesus teachings emphasized relationships, loving of enemies, forgiveness, compassion, and service to others. He held a deep understanding that closing the gap of separation by whatever means is the way to our Oneness with God.

One of the ways we can close the gap of separation is in serving others.  Even if we don't perceive the spiritual benefit beforehand we can often discover the personal value in fostering the good of another through the act of serving itself. Social scientists and biologists have established this phenomenon. When we serve others from an unconditional place of sincere help, we are blessed with the realization that our good is inseparable from the good of others. This is more than enlightened self-interest.  It is the actual experience of enlightened service that makes real the axiom "as I give, I receive."

What Wisdom Knows

O seeker,
        These thoughts have such power over you.
        From nothing you become sad.
        From nothing you become happy.

        You are burning in the flames
        but I will not let you out
        until you are fully baked,
        fully wise and fully yourself.
                                               - Rumi

One of the most upsetting moments in our spiritual development is the moment we identify the suspect who is responsible for our life experiences. What a distressing moment when we realize the singular and constant source of all our experiences. That source of course is you, it's me. In every iteration and manifestation of the myriad life experiences that I have loved or hated over the years, I am the only one who was there, every time, to have the experience. Whoever else may have been present, whatever else may have been happening, the experience that I logged, was perceived, interpreted, and translated by moi. The same goes for you, and you, and yes, even you. The Truth will set us free, but first it may tick us off - big time!

The reason this realization rocks our world with such ferocity is that we've been living from a whole different paradigm for so long.  We get agreement from every corner of the world of appearances to tell us that our experiences are effects of external events.  The translation goes something like this:  If I get what I want, I'll be happy, and if I don't I'll be unhappy. It all seems very reasonable and rational to the surface mind that places causation outside of our self, and believes that our experience of life is shaped primarily by outer events. And each of us continues with this mode of search for happiness in all the usual outlets, seeking fame, fortune, power, and pleasure until we encounter disappointment after disappointment and we finally question the whole premise. That's a sad day for the ego, but a good day for the soul!

The fly in the ointment of this "outside-in" approach to happiness is that everything that changes (transient life circumstances) cannot possibly provide us with the constant, unwavering fulfillment that we are seeking. Thus our pursuit of happiness in the world yields only frustration. This is tantamount to quantum physicists trying to pin down the elusive location and movement of sub atomic particles. One moment you have it, and the next moment it's gone or has morphed into something else. It's an endless, maddening game of "seeking but not finding!"

The enduring spiritual truths of every great wisdom tradition all point to the futility of seeking our good outside of ourselves and extol  a deeper understanding of self and the unchangeable Truths,  as the enlightened approach to life.  This is the entry point of all Wisdom - the path that leads from suffering to liberation, inner peace and abiding joy - independent of circumstances.

From Blindness to Real Eyes

I've worn corrective lenses since I was 10 years old."Inherited myopia," the eye doctor decreed.  I remember the day I discovered my short sightedness.  Actually I didn't discover it. It was brought to my attention by my family. Driving home with the family one night, Mom exclaimed, "Look at the rabbit!" The open fields surrounding our new suburb provided a haven of cover and food for an abundant rabbit population, and sightings were commonplace. Except for me.  I said, "What rabbit?"   Didn't see it. Didn't see the next sighting or the next one either.  The conclusion?  I needed corrective lenses. Eye glasses followed, and just like that my vision was restored.  Soon after I had the newly acquired privilege to be the first in family to say, "Look at the rabbit" before anyone else spotted it!

Not all vision problems are so easily remedied and not all vision deficiency is a physical limitation.  Humanity's universal vision problem is metaphysical sight impairment. We struggle to behold the sacred in everyday encounters, fail to recognize the divine in the mundane landscapes of our lives, and to our peril we judge life merely by outer appearances.  Every great spiritual master or wise sage was a great seer, endowed with extraordinary capacity to penetrate the veil of surface understanding that obscures a deeper spiritual reality.

All the great spiritual awakenings refer to a new way of seeing. Jacob of the Hebrew Scriptures cried out with the realization, "The Lord was in this place and I did not know!"  Jesus referred to inner vision, referring to the eye that is "the lamp of the body," and "if the eye be single then the whole body shall be filled with light." In the Bhagavad Gita (Hindu scripture) it says, "Because you cannot see me with your natural eye, I will give you a celestial eye." 

We can get tripped up in our spiritual work when we focus exclusively on visualizing a better exterior life and neglect the essential practice of developing spiritual vision.  It of course is tempting to use our creative ability to solely improve the outer conditions because we are spared the need for developing spiritual vision.  Yet as we mature spiritually, we find our ability to recognize the presence of good, despite appearances to the contrary, is what truly blesses us through all the ups and downs of life.

In the Gospel of Thomas (Saying 113) Jesus' disciples ask him, 'When will the Kingdom come?' He replies, 'It will not come by waiting for it. It will not be a matter of saying 'Here it is' or 'There it is.' Rather, the Kingdom of the Father is spread out upon the earth, and men do not see it.' This is the good news in this myopic dilemma. What we are seeking is not missing, we just can't see it clearly yet. 

So our spiritual practice is to improve our vision.  And we have the spiritual technology to do it.  The simple prayer "Show me," show me what is here that I am not seeing.," can open our eyes to what is real.  I believe that just as Jesus restored sight to the blind, our spiritual vision is restored by the grace of God coupled with our willingness to see differently in every moment.

We can all be spiritual visionaries. I have great hope for a new world view, in which you and I can demonstrate corrected vision, and be the first to exclaim, "Look I see a greater Truth in this situation! " The power of spiritual vision is such that it does more than benefit one seer, it can become a revelation for a multitude.