Tag: spirituality

Time to Act

2021 has arrived!   Holidays and celebrations are over.  It’s time to resume working!  The important work, however, has changed with the year. This time, our work is not simply to do a job to earn money. It is the work of healing our planet, restoring respectful and nurturing connections among our human species and between humans and the denizens with whom we share our planet and developing a social order supportive of these goals.  It is becoming a renewed kind of people, each of us the kind of people with whom we would like to live. It is the work in which each of us has a part, and which without each part, the chances of manifesting lessen.  This is the most important work we have ever had.  It is time to get started.  Time is running out.

There is so much to accomplish – work which takes physical activity, mental effort, emotional processing, spiritual energy. It is easy to hide one’s head in the sand, and pretend that all is well, and our government will do what is best for us and achieve the goal.   Opting out in such a way is abandoning the task and increasing the chances that we will all face either destruction, or an outcome we do not wish, possibly even one which negates our humanity. Why?  First, the work to be done cannot be accomplished from a top-down stance.  Big anything will not be able to get it done.  Big politics, big government, big technology, big business, big media, and the like will never, ever create a healed Earth or a healed web of life.  The “bigs” create what supports the “bigs”; Big Brother may take care of us, but will also tell us how to be, what to do, how to live, what to think.   That is the first reason.

In addition – perhaps this should be first, as it underlies the former – we are each responsible for who we are, how we grow, what we do and how we live.  For this, we do not answer to Big Brother or any “big”.  We answer to life itself, and to the results we produce for ourselves.  If one is religious, we answer to God.  Because we are responsible, we also have the power, individually and especially collectively, to affect our goals.  In microcosm, if we are adult, we can no longer blame our parents for our ills, because we possess within ourselves the power to right them, if we wish to exercise that power.    On a larger scale, we cannot blame the government, the opposite political party, religious organizations, people we think are maliciously trying to control us, people who we perceive as enemies, careless other people, being too young or too old, or anything else for what we dislike.  Each time we do that, we are giving away a bit of our power to create harmoniously, to make things right.

We need to heal our Earth, reforest, and renew her.  To that end, we also need to, among other things, adjust our economies, our lifestyles and consumption of resources.  We need to balance our consumption with our production and our capacity to renew that from which we take.   We need to create a social order that assigns equal humanity to each human being on the planet.  Note, that does not mean “same”.  Each of us is unique.  It means that we extend equal value, consideration, and use of resources to each human being, whether they are like us or not. We need to think about giving “rights” to others, not about how to get them. We need to wean ourselves from killing, especially knee-jerk killing, and replace that with respect and love.  We need to learn to listen to each other.  We need to learn to govern ourselves effectively, without relying on any of the “bigs” to tell us what to do.  We need to learn to grow food and medicines respectfully, in ways which replenish the Earth which nurtures us.  We need to eliminate war.  We need to learn to grow ourselves so that our actions, visions, and responses are rooted in the loving essence from which we all come.  We need to learn to express that essence and recognize the oneness between not only us humans but also each expression of life.

That is only the beginning, and already the task is huge.  It will take all of us to accomplish, but it is absolutely possible, despite the pull from entropy.  We can use our inner vision to project – what would the world look like if we achieve our goal?  What would it be like, if it survives at all, if we do not?  Here are two easily-read resources to check out: Brave New World combined with Brave New World Revisited, both by Aldous Huxley, and the entire Celestine Prophecy series, by James Redfield.  There are others, but those are good starts. 

Each of us has his or her own unique talent, his or her own thing that he or she loves or does well.  Large or small does not matter.  Current standards of pay do not matter.  Leading, supporting, or working independently does not matter.   Excuses to not act do not actually excuse; they only indicate an unwillingness to participate.  Even the bedridden can participate; the power of prayer and vision holding is great.  The power of extending love is infinite.  

Are you one who cares for the land, who grows food and medicines?  Are you one who can use tools and build?  Do you do best at designing structures?  Can you understand and translate the processes of nature into harmonious human activity?  Are you a cook, a teacher, a nurturer?  Are you a visual artist, a musician, a storyteller? Are you a philosopher, a priest, one who can perceive the surrounding world most of us find invisible?  Are you a healer? Are you an activist?   Find your talent and commit to the task.  In such a way, 2021 can be the year in which we respond to the challenge to grow, heal, and become.

Remember that top down does not work; top down most often gets in the way.  Big anything does not have the power to do anything for us.   Each of us is responsible for the outcome; each of us has the power to affect it. 
We can choose to give up our power, and declare ourselves helpless, or victims that need rescuing.  That sinks us deeper into the quicksand.  Each of us needs to listen to the other, and each of us needs to work.  Let us be the people who rise to the challenge.  Let us choose life.     Happy New Year!

Peace, Diane

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From Gratitude to Joy

“It is easy to be grateful for what you have in abundance and for what you like,” continued the lecturer.  “It is harder to be grateful for what is not yet perceived as having arrived or for what we may not find pleasant.”  I was watching a virtual presentation on the topic of the joy of gratitude.  That sentence remained forefront in my mind.   Most of us find it relatively easy to, if not feeling deep gratitude, at least say “thank you” for what we consider to be a benefit.  Giving thanks for what we perceive we do not actually possess, what has not yet manifested in material form, or for a difficult situation or event is more likely to be relegated to the category of complaint.

Most of us are seeking happiness, which happiness we believe will appear if we have a particular thing or if this, that, or the other situation occurs.  Sadly, the specific condition usually remains a will-o-the-wisp, or, once arrived, is swiftly followed by another condition to be met. The truth is that gratitude does not follow simply as a result of receiving what we think we want, or of our fleeting joy at getting our way; gratitude is actually the precursor of happiness.  Whether we are grateful for receiving what we want, or whether we are grateful for receiving what we do not find enjoyable or for what we are still anticipating, the happiness will not be there until the gratitude has arrived.  It is said that the happiest among us are the most grateful.

If we find ourselves not as facile as we wish at achieving a state of gratitude, despite frequent affirmations to that effect, perhaps it is because we are approaching the situation backwards.  Waiting on the manifestation of a particular condition for gratitude to appear brings us just that – more waiting, rather than the appearance of either the condition or the feeling of being grateful.  Perhaps if we were to develop the practice of being grateful for what we don’t seem to have or for what we don’t want or find appealing, we might find happiness even though our particular conditions do not appear.   Still more, our very embrace of gratitude for itself just might facilitate the manifestation of what we thought would never appear.

When the husband of one of my friends lost his job, it was to him as if his very identity had been snatched from him.  Fear and anger dominated his days – fear that he would not be able to provide for himself and family, fear that he would cease to exist as a valuable person, anger that he might need to be provided for by others.  Slowly, he began to open to the hidden benefits of being unemployed.  He began to appreciate the added time with his family, especially his children.  He began to enjoy being able to go for a walk in the wooded areas near his home.  He read more.  The disadvantages did not go away and were still difficult.  Yet, they were eased by his appreciation of what he had begun to enjoy.  The appreciation turned to gratitude, and he began to give thanks that his former job had disappeared, and for the benefits that loss had brought him.  Surprise – within a month of his embrace of gratitude for his difficult situation, he received a job offer that he had not expected.  

Even harder is the concept of being grateful for what has not been achieved or for what is not yet manifest.  The vision of what needs to be done, of what “has” to happen, or of what needs to come is massively powerful, and the nagging question remains of why the vision has been given if the opportunity has not accompanied it.  Inspirational speakers on gratitude, such as, for example, the late Wayne Dyer, explain how the position of believing that one already has that which one wishes, envisioning it and being grateful for it, brings that very vision into manifestation – if not exactly, then very closely.  The wisdom of the gratitude coming first is clear; when we complain about what we do not have we are actually in the process of affirming that lack.  Our words have power.  If we can see, hear, and feel that which we wish, and be grateful for it, we are emitting a positive creative energy, which can draw to us that which we wish.  (How quickly is not promised; patience is a virtue, too.)  At the very least, we can focus more attention on being grateful for what we have in front of us, instead of complaining about what is not before us.

Gratitude is a powerful change agent.  There is an even better reason, though, for practicing the feeling of gratitude.  Gratitude presupposes a feeling of satisfaction.  When one feels satisfied, there is no perception of lack.  One is satisfied with the conditions that are and with the physical good one has.  That does not mean that there are not goals for later, or that the present moment is static and that what is present in the moment is all there will ever be.  It simply means that satisfaction is now, and that with satisfaction comes content or joy and an openness or non-resistance to what is.   Gratitude practiced simply for itself, without the expectation that a desired change will indeed follow, is the underpinning of being happy.  It is a connection to the creative essence from which we all emerge and to which we all return.  It returns us to what we are, unsullied by the stories and desires we weave around us.  Gratitude is a form of love.

During these times when we are surrounded by so much that we feel we do not want, by difficulties that sometimes seem too much to bear, by fears of loss, lack and deprivation, let us find the things for which we can be grateful.   Let us practice gratitude for those, and through practice, gratitude for what is and for life in general.    Let us practice becoming genuinely happy.  

Peace, Diane

Form and Content

There is an old idiom, “Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.” It derives from the times in which people drew water, heated it, put it in tubs to bathe, and then tossed it out when the bathing was done. It means to retain the old values, those handed down from millennia, as the forms of things are so rapidly changing. The “baby” is the eternal values, the “bathwater” is the forms that no longer work. I am passionate about this. Of course, the forms need to change. If they did not, there would be no growth, and no growth means the end, death. However, that does not mean also abandoning the values and truths that those forms contained.  One of the areas in which the baby is in danger is religion.

 Religion is under attack.   Although no one has proposed to abolish the First Amendment,  laws are being advanced which require people to pay for and participate in actions which are contrary to their beliefs, and the public viewpoint of those who express religious beliefs is that these people are racist, biased, ignorant, possibly violent, and utterly unfit to hold public office; those who are supported by religious people are also deemed less desirable for office, as they are seen as being influenced by religious positions.  The worst examples of those who claim to be religious are publicized.

Religion has a bad name with people who see religion as harmful, the cause of societal ills, and who choose to be either agnostic/atheist, or “spiritual” but claim no form and often no company or group/congregation.  Religion is also under attack by the state, which would like to see all people believe and act the same because it is easier to govern that way. The state insists that any kind of religion not interfere with what the state says is right to do. Both, I believe, are confused.

Religion consists of two aspects, form, and content. Form is the structures in the physical world which define the expression of the content. Form codifies how a given people perceive and how they are urged to act upon the underlying aspects they perceive as eternal.  Forms are human and belong to the physical world. Forms are many and varied and sadly, their adherents often tend to quarrel about which one is better.  Forms are human;  they exist in time and space and are amenable to the effects of each.

Content is the core reality, the unembodied source that form encodes.  It is that core which mystics, saints, seers, master shamans, prophets, and bodhisattvas understand and have borne witness to for eons. Content is universal and crosses all expressions.  Content is not judgment, punishment, or condemnation.  It is loving, in an eternal sense.  Content belongs to the realm which has no boundaries of time or space. Content is like water or air – here on Earth, it needs a structure or form to contain it. Therefore, in the physical world, forms, or practices, have been made to hold it. Some forms have lasted longer than others. Some forms have also altered over time, even shifting shape from the basic content they were designed to hold. Of course, change is necessary – but so also is continuity.

Many people profess a form and are sometimes quite active in it and devoted to it and are good people. Yet, if all they have is form, and they do not understand or connect with content, what they have is essentially an empty vessel. It is no longer the whole.  An empty vessel, an empty form, is simply that. It is not religion as a whole.   Empty form is not connected with the core which gives it meaning, and thus can draw people into conflicts, judging and behavior oppressive of others. 

Some people have an understanding only of content – those who are “spiritual” without having either a private or collective form or practice in which to contain their content. For these, over time, the content tends to dissipate, as will air or water not in containers. These folks may have touched the essence of being and been thereby enriched, but without a container, a form, a practice, the essence will not be enduring for them.

There are many forms. Try the names of all the world’s religions. Privately created and regularly practiced forms are still others.   Positioning forms as subservient to the state, or trying to eradicate them, serves to weaken that which contains the content.  The content is essential to our survival and the survival of our planet.  Happily, more and more people are beginning to seek for and connect with eternal content to fill their forms, private or communal.

There is no need to ban or weaken religion.  There is also no need to agitate for the forms of one religion over another, or for the prevalence of the one position of the state.   There are win-win solutions if we only look for them. Each faith form is an expression, in a different language, of the same essential and ethereal content.  Better to recognize and respect all the forms and focus ourselves on perceiving and understanding the universal content and striving to live our lives accordingly.    That is progress, not the requirement of the state (or, in a theocracy, one form which is the state) for all to think and act the same.

It is time for people to come together in cooperation and respect, and to heal the Earth and ourselves with understanding and the creative energy from which we draw our being.   It is counterproductive to expect others to express their understandings in the same way we do, or to have the state decide and regulate expression of the truth.

Peace, Diane