THE TRADE

THE TRADE

 

The inward battle—against our mind, our

wounds, and the residues of the past—is more

terrible than the outward battle.

—Swami S

 

If you don’t have 10 minutes, you don’t have a life. 

Tony Robbins

We’re in a Game of Thrones society now. We’re tethered to a remarkably short and fraying fuse, ready for combat at the slightest disrespect or perceived injury. Everything is always winner take all, and there’s a trail of bodies in our wake, because losing an argument now is cause for public shaming. We’re all so very war- weary, and it feels like we’re under an existential threat. As Father Thomas Keating said, we’re in a cultural straightjacket.

Most of us are getting progressively more desperate for less Game of Thrones and more I love Lucy in our daily lives– a little humor, a little perspective, a little lightheartedness.

I think I know how we got here.

We traded communion for connection, after

We traded wisdom for information, after

We traded eye contact for feedback, after

We traded contemplation for activity, after

We traded authenticity for truthiness, after

We traded mastering ourselves for managing our image, after

We traded understanding and community for tribal identity, after

 We traded accuracy for speed, after

We traded self- knowledge for goals.

Not coincidentally, we’re immersed in the trivia of each other’s lives to the exclusion of our own. We’re more attuned to whether others are succeeding at their goals or agree with us, than knowing what we truly want. Its a world of spiritual poverty and perceived dire scarcity, and yet we run from the fact that we’re all connected, because we’re all connected.

Everything that’s happening in the world is actually happening to us.

Charles Eisenstein

As one Hurricane Harvey survivor put it,

Everybody needs everybody.

It hurts and makes us feel even more helpless and tiny than we do already, unless we can get in there immediately and help. Hurricanes Harvey and Irma brought us together as we all jumped in and helped, donated, or both. But, other things, farther away, like the Congo make us feel somewhat impotent. What’s the point of seeing all of this suffering if we personally can’t get in there quick and do something about it? Of course, there is a point, and yet we run from it like Ebola. We voluntarily make the trades mentioned above rather than face it. It might as well be written on a tablet in Greek, locked in a cave with the Dead Sea Scrolls, because that’s how far away we want it to be.

We’re afraid we’re going to have to sit in a prayer closet in the lotus position, breathing like a lifelong Yogi, waiting for God to show us what our purpose is, and there will be only silence. Or, even worse, we’ll do it wrong, we’ll have spent the money for the prayer pillows and the God box, and somehow, we’ll piss him off. Or that in the silence in the middle of the night, after we turn off the reruns and the infomercials, we’ll realize we aren’t anywhere close to our path, or that the grief we feel will break loose in a torrent and we’ll lose ourselves in it forever.

But, it’s simple. It’s how we think of it that’s terrifying. TV taketh away, but sometimes it givith, by showing how something scary and complicated isn’t either of those things. I’m going to get us there via a TV show called The Leftovers about running away from loss and pain, individual and global, about existential crisis. But that has nothing to do with us, right?

Each character devises a story to explain his or her pain, in the hopes of minimizing it. There are clues to the greater meaning, as we and they attempt to decipher it all. Some characters even attempt to escape the suffering and ambiguity by dying.  But they can’t, and no answers ever come. Their elaborate explanations of why are false, and each is operating as an imposter because of them. Each character finally hurls themselves into what is, facing the darkness and their own imminent mortality, only to find they get to start again.

The brilliance of the show is that we go along for the ride, only to discover the clues were just red herrings, pointing to the now obvious: there’s no escape.   The situation was horrible, but they were inflicting the torture upon themselves.

The only way out is through, hurling ourselves into loss, grief, and  uncertainty, and the fact that none of us have enough time, by learning to listen to the silence, so we can hear our true natures, for how can we face the world and all of its tragedy as imposters? 

 But, its not about hours logged in the prayer closet like its punishment or atonement, its our reward. We fear, because we misunderstand what silence is and what’s required to listen. Silence is playing with the dog for 10 minutes in the back yard and noticing that he smiles, and then noticing the trees are whispering as they dance in the wind. Something magnificent is happening at this moment, and we’re here in it. Something turns and softens in us and we aren’t scared or resentful or mad as hell anymore.

Listening is simply listening in the moments when life is trying to tell us something, letting ourselves know that life is paradox, love, and loss, and letting the silence, the truth, and the tears cleanse us like rain, so we’re no longer haunted by the past. We can pay attention to what is happening now, all the wacky, crazy, tragic, comic beauty of it. Silence cleanses us of what blocks us from bravely facing the world as ourselves.

It’s that simple: it’s a trade. We escape running and distraction for embracing the loss, the pain, the grief and helplessness and letting it wake us up, yet again, to our own lives, our own heartbeats, and tears. If we do this, then even the most mundane things can become our sanctuary, sprinkled in the sacred.

Lauren

http://www.lekinzie.com

 

“A spiritual journey is a terrible thing to waste.”

 

DON’T FEAR THE THRESHOLD!

sunflowerblog

God has opened a lot of doors for me in my life. But, not a single one of these opportunities looked like a door at the time. They looked like failure. They looked like defeat. They looked like unbearable conflict and loss, eventually driving me from that particular situation to find something more peaceful. They looked like sudden physical limitations, springing from nowhere, that forced me to limit and change my focus. They always looked like crisis and change. And pain.

With the wisdom of hindsight, I see that these events that I perceived as horrible at the time, were answers to my own prayers for direction, deliverance and other things. They were thresholds.

My entire writing career resulted from being fired from a job as a lawyer. I had been charging down the legal path for decades at full tilt with success, which blinded me to the unpleasant changes happening in my life and my personality. Law is a great venue for believing the fantasy of control: if I just work harder and longer… what I want or what my client wants will be mine.

I had two very young children at the time. My daughter was 4 and my son was 2, and I never saw them. They were in bed when I went to work in the morning and in bed when I got home. Their father had to take care of almost everything, while I worked sometimes until 4 am answering e-mails, worked on holidays, worked on weekends. I was in pursuit of “ success’, and was going to crack this code, if I just worked harder.

One day, I was at work, of course, and I got a call from our nanny, frantic because she was at the hospital ER with my son, and they would not let her check him in. He had fallen down a flight of stone stairs. He was ok after some emergency surgery to put his teeth back in his mouth, and fortunately I was able to be there with him through this ordeal he doesn’t even remember.

This was a huge signpost that I missed. But, my subconscious was working on me. I did not want to give up being a parent to be a professional anything. My love for the job never really returned after that, and it was just a matter of time before my employer saw it. It was humiliating and painful and horribly unjustified I thought at the time. After all, who worked harder for these people?

It was merely a threshold God was asking me to go through. I began writing in journals to get my myriad emotions out. The emotions erupted in the form of poetry. It took all of these events for me to remember that I had originally wanted to write. I finally remembered that I had started writing poems at age ten.

God had returned me to who I really was, and I had fought him every step of the way.

I started a poetry blog, which led to a book, which led to this blog. I may have been a lawyer by trade, but in my heart, I was always an artist, with the soul of a poet. God had returned me to myself by erecting a threshold, and creating circumstances that urged me to walk through.

In retrospect, he was removing obstacles from my path, which a large portion of the time was I. My ambition. My will. My hunger for approval.

What a God! …Every God direction is road- tested. Everyone who runs to him makes it…You cleared the ground under me so my footing was firm.

Psalm 18, Message Version.

 

We don’t suffer because of what happens to us. We suffer because we struggle against it. That struggle is based on what our thoughts tell us about where we are versus where we should be. But our thoughts lie to us. All the time. Our minds lie to us, because we want our will instead of God’s, and we tell ourselves stories justifying it.

 

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.

Ralph Waldo Emerson.

 

When it seems that I have tried everything and am beating my head against a brick wall, I am. There is no door there anymore. It’s scary, but all I need do is pray, look for the prompts, and take the next step in faith. It isn’t the end. It isn’t a death. It is only a threshold. Don’t fear the threshold; fear the cage that forms around us when we refuse to go through, struggling and fighting what is, and therefore, what could be.

 

IT’S HOLY WEEK! GET DOWN WITH YOUR ” BAD” SELF.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Do not fear mistakes, there are none.

Miles Davis

This is my favorite quote in the world. What liberation lies in those words! Are there really ” flaws” or mistakes for someone submitting their will to God, every day or even more often? Let’s unpack this a little further.

As a reformed guilt and unworthiness addict, I’ve looked back on my life, and come to the opinion that these words are quite literally true. That is not to say, that there are no sins or missteps, but even my biggest missteps were not only not fatal, but led me back to Jesus and my true path.

I love Emmet Fox’s definition of meekness; as in: blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. (Matthew 5:5)

He describes this rare quality as the mental attitude of being teachable. To me, that is the definition of true humility, not focusing on my unworthiness to the exclusion of all else.

Well, if we are to be teachable and humble, then presumably, there are lessons to be received and learned, and we will be given ample opportunities to practice. It’s an Internship that never ends. Aren’t we to assume that our infinite Maker knows these missteps/ lessons in advance and intends them for our ultimate good, according to his divine timing?

If I focus on mistakes and flaws in a self- shaming way, other people become my God, because they have the power to label my behavior or me a mistake. But, if I view these “ flaws” and “ mistakes” as lessons I get to learn with my God right there, teaching me, it’s a positive, expansive experience. I can rejoice in my progress, however small.

birdy

Don’t put your spiritual growth in someone else’s hands. We all need trusted advisors and friends who will tell us the truth, but none of us needs our own personal Chorus of Doom. Sadly, there are folks to whom this is their whole job in life: pointing out others’ flaws and mistakes. You know whom I mean: The Oh! Bless your heart! You are so crazy/ naive/ inexperienced/ wrong/ But, I’ll pray for you Folks. Turn your back and run as fast as you can. As Marc & Angel Chernoff point out in their marvelous book, 1000 + Little Things Happy Successful people Do differently, we are the average of all the people we hang out with.  We can’t help but be affected by people who only see our flaws or can’t see that we aren’t failing at all.

 

Interesting to me is The Talmud’s interpretation of the verse ” if a leader has sinned.” The Talmud interprets ” if” to be derived from the word ” fortunate”. The Torah values truth above all else.

If our leaders establish a precedent for truth, we would be fortunate to have them as…role models, and would not hesitate to admit when we’re wrong. Truth sets us free to correct mistakes.

Schlomo Ressler

 

And the freedom to correct our mistakes and move beyond them, seeking God’s guidance, is that spiritual flowering others call growth.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder means so much more than what it says on the surface! What we perceive as awful missteps that trigger shame may be inspirational in the eye of their beholder. They may be beautiful in the eye of our Creator, because we were obedient to what we perceived as his will:)

A spiritual journey really is a terrible thing to waste.

Me. 

Happy Easter and Passover !

 

 

 

I FOUND JESUS AT THE JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTER

Clean your finger before you point out my spots.

Benjamin Franklin

headshot1

I’m bearing witness to how I can trick myself out of miracles by imposing rules or limits on my Higher Power to appear “appropriate “or holy, not being flippant or disrespectful.  If I have free will, doesn’t God? Won’t he show up where and when it suits him best?

I spent years in an Old Testament box awaiting punishment, because I put God in a box, and refused to believe he was big or limber enough to find me outside of that box. I wanted everything about my faith and my relationship to God to be intellectual and complicated. If it is important, it should be complicated and difficult, right?

If there is one thing on which those of us who believe in a Higher Power can agree it is this: whatever we choose to call this divine being, it is omnipotent, infinite, omniscient, and omnipresent. For grammatical simplicity, I choose to use the pronoun, “he”.

His holy presence is everywhere and cannot be labeled or limited in any way. A host of amazing things follow from this:

Miracles are possible anywhere, anytime.

Sanctuary is too, because it isn’t a building. It is the presence of grace.

Spiritual community can happen anywhere, because true community is about joy and the freedom from fear and shame.

I used to think that thinking was the highest function of humanity. Now I know that loving is our supreme function, because it can transform both those who receive it and those who give it.

Through love, my faith has become about freedom, not labels and limits. Through the eyes of freedom, life becomes a simple adventure: I ask for help, blessings, and even miracles, and then just let them fall on me like summer rain. They happen when and how God wants them too. They don’t and can’t look the way I forecast them in my head, because my imagination is too small.

IMG_0381

Lift up your eyes all around, and see;

they all gather together, they come to you…

Then you shall see and be radiant;

your heart shall thrill and exult,

because the abundance of the sea shall be turned to you.

Isaiah 60:4-8

So, why wouldn’t I be able to find my God at the Jewish Community Center, regardless of whether or not I am Jewish? There is such warm and loving acceptance of individual beauty there, such a beautiful spiritual atmosphere that is spacious and has room for me; I am immediately receptive to divine guidance, love and presence.

I swim laps outside, and, more often than not this winter, I have literally been swimming through clouds. Tell me, that isn’t 3 steps from Heaven! The warm water carries me and I don’t have to struggle or fight or try. It’s literally a communion between nature, spirit and body. That sounds like sanctuary and spiritual community to me.

Don’t I believe that God loves me enough to reveal himself to me in a way that I can see and understand? You bet I do! I’m not going to cheat myself out of another miracle.

This blog was partially excerpted from my book, Undamned, My Escape from the Old Testament, which just happens to be 61% off March 7-10th. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/s/ref=is_s_ss_i_0_6?ie=UTF8&k=undamned&sprefix=Undamn

Happy Spring:)

 

 

 

GUILT. (DON’T SHOULD ON YOURSELF!)

nightwithmoon

 

You don’t have to suffer continual chaos in order to grow.

John C. Lilly

 

It’s so unseemly when we should on ourselves! Yet for almost all of us, except for perhaps those on Capitol Hill, guilt seems to be the Great Common Denominator. We torture ourselves with it, sabotage ourselves with it, spend millions of dollars in therapy because of it, and warp our religious heritage because of it.

I spent more than half my life dragging my own personal Old Testament Tribunal with me everywhere I went: finding myself guilty and choosing my own punishment, until I escaped because I learned I was treating the wrong things reverently.

One day recently, I was watching television. During the holidays, certain commercials play on what seems like a continuous loop. I saw the one showing the abused and neglected kittens and puppies, with the sad, pleading eyes. Only $19.50 a month would save them. “ I should save them!” I thought. I felt like a personal failure for not taking all of them home. Before, I knew it, I was in the middle of a second commercial for the Wounded Warrior Project. Only $19.50 could pay for a caretaker for one of these magnificent warriors. “ I should do this! They fought for my freedom!” Before I could even reach for my check book, a third commercial appeared about becoming the benefactor of a starving child in a far- away country for only $19.50.

By the time the three ads finished running, I was convinced that the Pergo floor my chair rested upon would open up and my immediate descent to Hell would begin. I felt guilty that I was confused as to which charity I could afford to give that money. I felt guilty that I actually assessed my budget and whether it would support this monthly commitment.

Then, I remembered that I am supposed to tithe 10 percent to my church, and if I gave to these charities, I would not be able to do that. The bonus of legalism had crept into the mix in the span of 3 minutes. Guilt had led me down a labyrinthine rabbit-hole to a place where God would be mad at me for giving money to the less fortunate, because to do so, would lessen my tithe. I had should on myself until I couldn’t see straight. I had confused compassion for those who are hurting, with being the source of that pain. Did God send these confused and guilty feelings? No. I generated them in my own spinning little brain in response to a thing created by humans, designed to move other humans to gratitude and compassion.

 

What is the remedy for this dire state of affairs? A little bit of irreverence– enough to gain a fresh perspective.

Guilt is a serious subject because I take myself way too seriously. It stems from the delusional and arrogant belief that I should be perfect and be all things to all people, and when I don’t meet this standard, I fail.I realized that I suffered because I chose to punish myself with guilt. It was an albatross I was voluntarily strapping to my back.

I finally got that guilt is always a choice and that shoulding on myself isn’t ever divine. It is exactly what the expression implies: a decision to denigrate and punish myself for human failings. A loving Creator, who created me to be me, would never give me the near constant message that I was not enough. I no longer believe that God has a smite button he longs to hit whenever I fall short of the mark. I believe I cause most of my own suffering, with my beliefs and attitudes, and that God does not want me to take on his job of judging or punishing. I believe my Higher Power rejoices in my progress and the fact that I am imperfect and fearful enough to constantly seek him and his guidance. He rejoices in forgiving me.

Guilt does not lead to spiritual growth or transformation; it prevents it. It keeps us regretting the past and fearing the future and robs us of peace and the ability to fully give ourselves to others in the present. True remorse and a desire to obtain forgiveness for our wrongs brings us closer to our Creator, while guilt causes us to run and hide from our Creator and those we may have wronged, because we haven’t acknowledged these mistakes and decided to make amends and do better. God’s grace is inexhaustible.

 

For we are his workmanship, created … for good works, which God prepared beforehand. Does this sound like a creature to be should upon?

Ephesians 2:10.

 

 

WHAT ” AWESOME” REALLY MEANS

superflag

 

 

 

When I looked up the definition of the word “awesome”, which I use any time I don’t know what else to say, I found this:

 

1) Inspiring an overwhelming feeling of reverence, admiration, or fear; causing or inducing awe: an awesome sight.2) showing or characterized by reverence, admiration, or fear; exhibiting or marked by awe.”

 

So, wouldn’t the real definition of awesome  be more like this?

 

“Greater love has no one  than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” John 15:13

 

Something that would inspire awe or reverence would be a person who voluntarily gives his life for a concept – like freedom, or for people he or she doesn’t even know. That person would be a hero. A person, who loves us, his country, so much that he forgets his fears, his own personal interests and lays down his life for us. This kind of love and sacrifice is almost beyond comprehension, like Jesus or Mother Teresa’s example.

 

But, some of you do this every day. You do this for us, despite the fear, awful conditions during combat, and often, when you get home. You do this despite the devastating financial hardships on your families.

Awesome is too small a word. So is Hero.

That is what awesome really is.

 

So, goodbye to my trivial and ridiculous use of the word “ awesome”. I’m retiring it and reserving it for those who truly deserve that moniker – those who are in the military service, now or then, alive or dead- The Greatest generation, the next generation, the gen X generation or this one. Your bravery and sacrifice and that of your loved ones are beyond my comprehension. My gratitude is beyond expression.

You are the true definition of awesome. You deserve so much more than my mere gratitude.

 

 

 

 

 

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN HEAVEN AND EARTH CONVERGE?

cloudsonwater

 

The picture at left was the view from my balcony this weekend. The heavens appear to be literally touching the water, but it’s simply the vivid reflection of the clouds off the ridiculously clear water. Me being me, I immediately began wondering, do heaven and earth collide, and what would it look like if they did? I’m always reaching and looking towards Heaven and squinting really hard to see if I can get even a faint glimpse.

I think I now have a surprising answer. Yes, all the time, and it doesn’t look like what one would think.

I don’t know why I have to travel hundreds of miles away from my life to figure out things in my life, but apparently I do.

Because of my biblical training, steeped in Saints and martyrs, burning bushes and of course, Jesus’s example, I actually had it wrong. I thought a bridge between heaven and earth was huge, rare, probably involved the heavens literally opening and God saying something like, “ Hey, you! I’m right here!”

I now know differently. Heaven and earth collide all the time. All that is necessary is a small bridge between the two. I like to call it a Bridge to Marvel. Something that takes us, if even just for a moment, out of our worries, our fears, and ourselves and seems to direct us to focus towards a Benevolent Father long enough to notice he is there.

There was no cell service in the canyon, so I had 3 days where I was forced to pull my head out of my own purse long enough to see these amazing Bridges to Marvel happening with regularity. The first day without Twitter I was somewhat twitchy, but that sustained period of focus produced a multitude of these beautiful little bridges.

The first was the most annoying monarch butterfly in creation. Every time I got away to myself even for just 30 seconds to sit in the sun and reflect on something a speaker had said, she would show up. Not one for subtlety, it took about 10 times for me to figure it out. She would circle me and then go straight for my face, startling me. Every time. As if to say, “ Hey! I’m right here!”

My second bridge was a public one and everyone in the room at the time, knew it. God appearing in a grand flourish. The last night of the conference, there was a campfire where everyone gathered for friendship, and conversation. There were some great professional musicians there, who blessed us with their gifts. But, these musicians encouraged non- professionals to jump in. They used their considerable gifts to bolster and support people trying to escape their comfort zone. The last song of the night, a non- musician stepped up and started singing an old hymn. The guitarists joined in. Something happened. All of us, every last one of us, were pulled into the song and each other and everyone sang, harmonized, drummed and strummed. We all looked at each other like 6 year olds surveying their Halloween bounty. We could not believe it was happening, but it was. It was magnificent. It was reaching up to God and finding him.

My final bridge to marvel was in the person of my roommate. She was the closest thing to the embodiment of an angel as I’ve ever seen. Of course, she did not look like what I thought she would. She was in her late 70s, walked with great difficulty and was too tired to do the late night campfires. She had the most radiantly happy countenance. One day, she got up to sing a song about her son. In a clear, soft voice she sang of how she knew she would meet him again, for he had died of a brain tumor years ago. She sang it with that same radiant countenance. The next morning, she casually mentioned that the reason she could not join me in many of the conference activities was that she had been diagnosed with cancer for the third time. She supposed that the stress of being at her son’s hospital bedside for months on end and finally watching him die had been the culprit. Then she said, “ I’ve learned that we have to give praise anyway.” Boy, she taught me a thing or two that I still ponder and will for some time. She was a bridge to heaven. “Hey You! I’m right here, looking at you!”

So, for me it appears to be a matter of focus. If I can focus my awareness on seeing these Bridges to Marvel, they are everywhere, and if I can see a bridge, perhaps sometimes, I can be one. The hug I talked myself out of giving, the time I shrunk away from singing, speaking, dancing or loving, might have been someone’s bridge. Sometimes I am so stupid. I know that God works through people, but I try to pre- select whom he will work through. I don’t know much, but I do know that God isn’t looking for perfect people to be his reps. If that were the case, he wouldn’t have much human help would he?

10 SIGNS YOU MIGHT SUFFER FROM A SPIRITUAL ADDICTION

Tidal_Wave_Thorpe_Park  I have been thinking a lot about the beach. Even though I’ve had so much sun exposure that I will soon be a piece of charcoal, I still adore body-surfing in the surf and sun. The undulating waves instantly pacify my mind and body and bathe me in serenity. It’s a preference, but also a symptom for me.

It means I’m in my religious addiction again. I’m driving myself to earn something I think I need and I’m doing it with such relentlessness, my mind is signaling me it’s time to go to my happy place and press the reset button.

Instead of being a renewable source of serenity, peace, hope, confidence, and the unshakable certainty that you are enough, a religion that is an addiction produces the following:

 

1)   You feel drained and burned out, emotionally and spiritually.

2)   Submission to the will of God looks exactly like subservience to the wishes of others. You can’t “ let anyone down” without feeling acute disappointment in yourself, intense anxiety or both.

3)   Your shame is triggered by the behavior of other people towards you, not your own actions.

4)   Guilt and shame are indistinguishable.

5)   You forgive everyone but yourself. You can’t forgive yourself for whatever evidence of your imperfections that is present in your life. You treat yourself more harshly than anyone else.

6)   Forgiveness of others means never kicking someone out of your life, even if their presence dissolves your peace, happiness or self- worth. The potential that you may help them negates how they might hurt you.

7)   You fear punishment by your Higher Power and anger from others.

8)    Your own anger is so scary or “ wrong” to you that you are rarely aware of feeling it, even when boundaries are being crushed and it would be completely justified. Instead you often feel disappointment, sadness or fear.

9)   It’s often almost impossible to distinguish selfishness from simple self- care or self- discovery.

10) Faith and Grace may be bedrock principles in your religious practice, but trust in a God who loves you, understands you and is your friend seems as remote as the Hubble Telescope.

We are not meant to be perfect. We are meant to be whole. – Jane Fonda

 

My Favorite Way of Perverting My Higher Power’s Will

mockingbirdonsign

 

 

I can delay my spiritual journey in a heartbeat.

I have always told myself that my prime desire was to be in my higher power’s will for me, and meant it. I looked high and low for the burning bush and the host of angels singing “ amazing grace” to point me the way.

I have prayed and meditated and wrote in my journal and asked for guidance and, since I was not born with the subtlety or discernment genes, many times I have been shown something akin to a burning bush.

But, here’s what I do with that miracle:

It starts with that quiet knowing that I should go this way, rather than that; I should take one simple step in faith. But, nooooooooooo, that’s not enough for me. I take that beautiful moment of revelation and impose my own meaning on it, because I still cannot really deal with “not knowing.”

I say to myself. “ This is for God. So it has to be perfect.”

“ This is for God, so it has to be a success, otherwise, who will know that it is for God?”

“I have to be a light and a life-raft to the whole world, because God want’s me to.”

I should on myself.

We should never should on ourselves. It’s cruel. It’s legalistic.

When I should on myself, I replace peace and confidence with fear, ambition, competition and the inevitable fear those things produce. I take myself by the hand and drag myself back to slavery to other people and their opinions. I take myself out of my Higher Power’s will. It is soo stupid, but I am human, so I practice the adage,

“If at first, you do not succeed, guilt and shame yourself, redouble your efforts, but never change your strategy.”

The truth sounds simple but it is anything but. The only way I can truly know if I am in His will is to be fully present and alert, yet peaceful, in each and every moment. Then I will see what I need to see and hear what I need to hear and have sense enough to pray for the strength to do it, or even more difficult, to do nothing and wait for clarification. The truth is that all my higher power wants for me, is my willingness to surrender each and every moment. Yik