Interbeing - Oneness

 I've  been reading some Thich Nhat Hanh and also some Meister Eckhart. Some of their concepts are remarkably alike. I have been pondering one of them this morning. I'd like to share some of my thinking with you.

Eckhart talks about the seed of God in you, about the Cosmic Christ in all things - in other words, about Oneness.

Thich Nhat Hanh talks a lot about interbeing, about everything being connected and interrelated. He has given many examples. I'll share something like his idea. Look closely at a piece of paper. If you look closely, you can see the tree it came from, and the plant that turned it into paper, and all the hands that touched it umtil it came to you. If you look closer, you can see the cloud that rained on the tree and gave it water, and the oceans and lakes and rivers that evaporated to make the cloud to make the rain. You can see the sun that shone upon the tree giving it photosyunthesis and life, you can see the orbit of the earth around the sun and the orbit of the solar system around the Milky Way. And if you look very deeply, you can see the big biang and know that every atom that makes up everything vivible came from that big bang, that the visible is all made of star dust.

It boils down to us being one, participating in a connected, interrelated life. Everything is partof everything.

Everything, everyone, every moment are all sacred and part of the Grand Divinity, the Intelligence orchestrating the manifest universes and beyond.

Contemplate this with me and open to the Great Mystery.

Taste It To Know It

 “The ultimate dimension of reality has nothing to do with concepts,” he warns us. You cannot just describe and talk about apple juice — you must drink it. "Things cannot be described by concepts and words. They can only be encountered by direct experience.”               ---  Matthew Fox,"Meister Eckhart, A Mystic Warrior for Our Time"

Words are useful, but cannot convey meaning alone, for example if the listener has no experience to understand the particular words used or has a mind-made-up-already stance based on other people's experience. They might as well be speaking a different language. The words "apple juice" have no useful meaning to someone who has not tasted actual apple juice. They may understand what the category juice is, but not the taste of this juice.

You may be thinking it's no big thing to not understand apple juice. Yet this is a principle that can be applied to important things, important things like God, soul, unconditional love, forgiveness, peace, and other spiritual principles. 

Most people allow television, internet and social media to colonize their minds. With techniques of hypnosis, these things impart control and seed a mixture of untruths, partial truths, with a smattering of truth. They numb us to the greater Reality.

People become more concerned about what's supposedly going on in some celebrity s life than in the lives of people actually in their lives. They get upset by propaganda. They miss the gorgeous sunset. They miss the tear in their loved one's eye. They block the essence of life and lessons so dearly the soul needs and yearns.

It is an honor to be able to come to earth and experience the spiritual hiding behind the appearances, to develop our spiritual muscle and understanding, to experience the Divine and know Oneness. 

Here in this place we have limits. All is on loan. All is temporary. We must learn to be present so as not to miss those precious moments sculptured, tailored for our soul growth. You may not pass this way again. Be present for every moment.

Speak to Me

 Speak to me,

I speak to you in the morning breeze.

Speak to me,

I speak to you through the cooing of the morning doves.

Speak to me,

I speak to you through the happy faces of the flowers.

Speak to me,

I speak to you through the exuberance of children.

Speak to me,

I speak to you through the eyes of love of all whom you know.

Speak to me,

I speak to you even in the shadows, in deep valleys, and darkest of nights.

I speak to you at all times, in all places. 

I am always with you.

I am everywhere. 

I am the Energy at the heart of all.

I am you.

 --- M. Marlene Oaks

My Teacher Across Centuries

“All roads lead to God for God is on them all evenly.”                                               ---Meister Eckhart, 1260-1328 C.E.

 As Thomas Merton wrote in the margin of one of his journals - Meister Eckhart is my lifeboat. When I first discovered the mystics during my studies in the 70's, I thought "I have found my people." Meister Eckhart  was my first, then along came a village with Mechtild  of Magdeburg, Hildegard of Bingen, Jacob Boehme, Julian of Norwich, Brother Lawrence and many others, including others not Christian, but from other centuries and places.

I discovered there is something like a deep well of wisdom and knowing and that some people in all cultures, all times, have drunk from this well and have known the same truths. You could say Cosmic Christ (as Colossians 1), the Tao (The Way) or use other terms. Interestingly, the original followers of Jesus were followers of The Way.

The same well is open to us. However, we need to prepare our inner ground so that the seed of God in us can grow and flourish, and so that we become ready to receive the immense Truths, Wisdom and Love that await us. To everything there is a season, and for the season of our spiritual awakening we now prepare.

We  need to become gardeners of our souls. Pull up weeds of negativity, fear, greed, selfishness, anger, hatred, etc. Spend time in spiritual practices from reading inspirational words, to prayer, contemplation, journaling, to good deeds of kindness and lifting others.

Be ready for a powerful awakening. Without preparation, we could not stand it or even understand it. As Jesus said that it can come like a thief in the night. Even though we prepare, it can be startling. It is absolutely wonderful and unlike anything else.

In God's Image

 God has formed and created the soul very like himself, for we read that our Lord said: “Let us make human beings in our own image” (Gen. 1:26). And this is what he did. So like to himself did he make the soul of a person that neither in the kingdom of heaven or on earth among all the splendid creatures that God created in such a wonderful way is there any creature that resembles him as much as does the soul of a human being alone. --- Meister Eckhart

How wondrously and marvelously we are made! Our centers, our souls, they are in God's image. There is a sacred center in each and every person.

It is our job, those of us who know the Truth, to live our lives aware and awake to the sacredness within, not only us, but also within each and every person. When we look beyond appearances and see righteously, as Jesus taught us, we help bring out that knowing in others. No matter how confused, lost, angry someone appears to be, deep within is the soul made in God's image.

So we have multiple choices daily. We can ask ourselves - Do we help to continue the appearance that imprisoned a soul by believing it, or do we see righteously and help the person set their soul free to live gloriously expressing the imprisoned sp!endor? Our thoughts are energy, As Isaiah said:

so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;  it shall not return to me empty ,but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,  and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

Or as Jesus said according to Matthew:

Listen and understand.

11 What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”

What goes out of our mouths is energy that either lifts or destroys. 

Let us strive to be lifters who know the soul is sacred, and, even if apparently hidden, is there and maybe, just maybe our thoughts and words can help free it.

God lives and dwells and has His Being in you.

Living a Script?

 I had a vivid vision. I was standing before a wall of bookshelves. They were arranged from left to right, easy to difficult, to very difficult.  I took down one in the very difficult section. The cover said "Job." I told my guide, "I will take this one."

That would certainly explain the strange events of my life. My general life script is like Job's. What was I thinking?

This morning, not wanting to get up yet, I was musing, and I was asking what I am to learn and what am I to do with the rest of my life? 

I saw the Bible as a cast of characters that outline all of our lives. I saw that it tells not only of God, but also of the human condition and the lessons we come to earth to learn. 

I thought of Shakespeare's all the world's a stage. Maybe, just maybe, there is some truth to this and to my vision.

Think on these things...

The Spirit Who Raised Jesus

 And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of[e] his Spirit who lives in you. For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.--- Romans 8:11, 14-17

 I was reading Richard Rohr again this morning. The section I was reading suggested reading Romans 7. I did and kept on reading chapter 8. Now, I have read the New Testament hundreds of times, and this time I read Romans 8, I was struck with the above verses. This is what I've been saying, and yet somehow I missed that Paul made the same point. Or maybe subconsciously I remembered and joined it with my life experience to know and teach our seeking and yearning for the Spirit of God.

It is the Spirit of God we seek, the same Spirit that worked through Jesus. Jesus showed us what that kind of life would look like, would be. When we become aware of the Union. the Unity, the Oneness, our lives shift into something wholly different from the life seemingly separate from God. The Spirit of God is everywhere, but we have spiritual blinders on until we awaken. It seems we are separate, but we are not. Only in our belief are we separate. Magnificent Oneness is there, knocking on our inner door all the time. We are not orphans, adrift on earth. We are children of God, co-heirs with Christ.

You Belong

 If the veil parts once and you know life is radically okay, then you are — to use the normal Christian language — a child of God. You are in union. There is nothing to prove. Nothing to attain. Everything is already there. It is simply a matter of recognizing and honoring and trusting. --- Richard Rohr, "Everything Belongs"

The veil can part in meditation, in prayer, in nature, in some moment in life that has sudden change,or seemingly random moments. You can't make it happen. You can make yourself ready by your spiritual practices, make your inner ground receptive.

However it happens, it is a profound life change. It may happen multiple times. It changes us more and more. The more surely we know of Divine Union, of Unconditional Love, of what's really going on, the more aware, awake, and at peace we are.

We know from experience that God exists, that God is with us, that life's lessons have purpose, that everything is part of the Whole. We know and know that we know. It's not intellectual, or hopeful, or hearsay.  You belong. You are okay ---  a magnificent one of a kind masterpiece of God, and so is everyone else. 

Arise

 Arise, shine for the light has come, and the glory of the Lord rises upon you.           - Isaiah 60:1

I opened my Bible randomly this morning, and opened to the above verse. As my husband walks better and better with a walker and is overcoming the stroke, this seemed like it was personally meaning-laden for us.

And, for all of us in process of overcoming various things, arise. I remember someone long ago saying People say I'm doing okay under the circumstances, what on earth are you doing under circumstances? 

Arise! Life happens. Life and its challenges/lessons happen for us all. We have to face them, overcome them, learn from them, hold out a hand to others also trying to overcome and move on. 

We cannot avoid life's lessons. As the Borg said "resistance is futile." In fact, resistance, complaint, weeping and wailing, only prolong it. 

We can avoid some of the challenges, however, by being present in the present moment and making better, wiser choices. As I have often said, "after most of our valleys we can say I knew I shouldn't have done that." It seems to me that we receive guidance that we ignore.

So let us listen more carefully, choose more wisely, be fully present, and when we find ourselves in a dark place, Arise!

Life Turns On a Dime

And suddenly all is different.

My husband and I were rejoicing that on Saturday it's our 37 the wedding anniversary.

BUT Tuesday he had a stroke. His legs no longer work. He's dizzy, throwing up. He's in the hospital.

Our future is not what we thought it would be.

Time to pray and regroup. There are new things to do, things we never expected or prepared for. What can I do? St. Francis' thought speaks to me.

Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.” —St. Francis of Assisi

So I'm about to help my husband do the impossible. Pray for us please.