Do not neglect to hope. Hope is the thing that can draw you into your new life. I am not saying everything will be perfect, but so often we just settle for what we have, not being able to see past the dark, looming forest before us. Hope comes in handy especially when you feel like you are in a rut – in a relationship or in your job, for example. If you go to work everyday or just try to get by in your family everyday, putting up with the same old tired patterns, you will get depressed. ...
Tag: change
Dark Nights (Plural)
You have heard it talked about that most people go through some kind of “dark night of the soul” at some point in their lives. Well I don’t know about you, but I feel like I go through some kind of depression/darkness almost monthly (if not more often) when I feel depressed and it feels like there was no way to avoid it. I just need to be depressed, something needs to die.
My wife told me last week too that babies go through a fussy period when they are getting ready to move through ...
Freedom In Suffering
I have long been fascinated by and drawn to stories of people who have suffered greatly and yet live free. That’s why my favorite movie is The Shawshank Redemption. I heard once that Nelson Mandela was able to find a sublime level of peace in his soul while imprisoned. You have probably heard similar stories. I have even wished suffering upon myself at times because in suffering, we learn who we truly are and what really matters in life bubbles to the surface. Weird, right?
We cannot really ...
Acceptance
I wonder what the world would be like if we did not work so hard to avoid everything. So much in our lives exists to help deaden our senses: not only drugs and drink, but electronics and countless other diversions. If we really felt everything there is to feel, I wonder if we would fall apart. The world seems like it would drastically change if we just accepted and encountered the pain of our circumstances head on, as it is. But we do not. We anesthetize in order to avoid feeling too much.
If we allowed ourselves to feel the pain in the world, I believe we may move on to better things. We would have to change things. We would not be able to bear things the way they are.Growing Down
We often think that as we grow spiritually, we will leave people behind. We tend to struggle with how to approach or talk to people we see as “beneath us” because we are just so “spiritually mature.” We act like we have entered some other realm they cannot even come near.
Then I look at Jesus, who embodied perfect consciousness, all wisdom, maturity and strength and I see how he treated people who might have been seen as “beneath him.” Beggars, cripples, the ...
Your Emotional World
We should pay attention to our emotions. It is our emotions that are the barometer for where our hearts are and where we are going. These subtle inner shifts in our feeling system are what the Spirit uses to shape us and teach us. It is problematic that we are always trying to dull important emotions and in that way, render the work of the Spirit ineffective. Our pathology springs from our attempts to always dumb down, lock up and forget about the myriad emotions that have been given to us to ...
Growing Up
It is interesting that we spend our children’s lives wishing health and happiness for them. Raising children is basically trying to teach them what to avoid and hoping they don’t mess up when they are a teenager or adult. Then we loose them on the world, watching to see if they will “succeed” or not.
We forget that the way all of us have learned our greatest lessons has been through our failures. I’m not saying we shouldn’t teach our children the way to go, but ...
The Never-Ending Shed
Life is a continual series of surrenderings. Once you think you have died enough, life and God are back to prune some more. There is more to shed. If you are wise, you will continue to be open and ready for these little deaths. Do not build up your shields against them because then they will just fall harder and faster – it will take more to undo the cozy shelter you have built for yourself. The shelter is that which you have built to protect yourself from what – more abundant life? ...