Spiritual Resources

Note of apology to readers:
To those of you who subscribe to Seeking the Spiritual Life, you may have wondered what has happened to the author and the postings?   My goal has always been to post once a month but even in the good years I have posted 10 a year...but this year I'm on track to post 5 - yikes!  And nothing posted since June.    I have actually been in a spiritual tangle (watch for future posting on that issue) and it has interfered with my ability to write for my blog.   But I believe I have untangled myself and will be back in 2016 with more to say.

Spiritual Resources

Today I sat with a group of people as we shared with each other what our spiritual resources are - what the books are that we turn to every time for spiritual nurturance, inspiration or uplift.  All great religions of the world have their own sacred scriptures.  But why be limited to only one source of spiritual enrichment?   Many of the people in the circle shared the same thing - that they had texts they had read all the way through and found inspiring, and now kept in a place of prayer.  They shared that they would open them randomly - trusting that they would be lead to just the right page, and that in fact it did feel that they were lead to just the right bit of wisdom.    So I share with you here the pile of books that lives on my bed stand and a little bit about why (in no particular order).   If you have not read these, then here is some 2016 inspiration for sure:

Illusions by Jonathan Bach...yes this is actually a novel.  But it is a novel about a man on a spiritual journey who is given the "Messiah's handbook"...the quotes in the "handbook" are as meaningful to me now as they were in 1989 when it first came out.   Pages that are not the handbook still point me to the ideas the book contains.

Emmanuel's Book I (or book II) compiled by Pat Rodegast & Judith Stanton.   My best-friend sent this to me as a gift, also in the 80's, with a sort of guilty note about how she did not really believe in channeling (the whole book is channeled - the authors are simply a medium and recorder of a spirit named Emmanuel.) but that she found great spiritual truth's in the book and thus found it useful to read.   I would heartily agree with this.   In other words I don't really understand how channeling would work, but when I hold the words in the book before my truth meter - the words ring true and consistent.    Very complicated spiritual issues are addressed since the audience got to ask questions and the answers are what are recorded.  I found answers in here early in life that helped ground my spiritual journey.  There were things I have not worried about because these answers worked for me.

A Testament of Devotion by Thomas Kelly.    Thomas Kelly, a Quaker, wrote this book in 1945 as WWII was ending.   One would think this would make it dated, but his mysticism and ecstatic expression of God is so profound as to be timeless. (The only way it is dated is somewhat gender heavy language.)   A brief book with just 5 chapters...has to be read slowly, or over and over, to take in its richness.  The chapter On Holy Obedience speaks profoundly to a life of leading and faithfulness.   The chapter on Simplification of Life speaks to the need to slow down and to be faithful - to strip away distracts and false idols.   The chapter on The Eternal Now and Social Concern probably saved my life since I read this in my 20's.  Kelly states: "I dare not urge you to your cross. But He, more powerfully, speaks within you and me, to our truest selves, in our truest moments, and disquiets us with the world's needs.  By inner persuasions He draws us to a few very definite tasks, our tasks, God's burdened heart particularizing His burden in us."  In this passage and throughout the book Kelly helped me to know that I did not have to fight every injustice, I had to listen for what the part God wanted me to do was and simply be faithful to that.   Without his words I indeed would have died on way to many crosses that were not mine.

The Power of Intention by Wayne Dyer.   Over the years various Wayne Dyer books have been on my bed stand, but for me the gold standard is this one.   Dyer describes Co-creation or manifesting, but in away that avoids the materialism and self-centeredness of the Secret.  He also describes a helpful spiritual posture and some of the obstacles that get in our way as we try to do this.

The Prophet by Kahil Gibran  This book has also been on my bed stand since my 20's.  For those who came of age in the 70's or 80's this book was so commonly referenced by people as to be rather clique and therefore then disregarded.  However, I have found that those currently in their 20's and 30's are not aware of this book and that is frankly a great tragedy.  Again this book holds such wisdom about 27 different subjects (the key and central areas of life from love, to food, to freedom) in just 1 to 2 page chapters about each - as to inform one for a life time.   My ideas about marriage and child rearing and work have all been permanently and much to the good impacted by Gibran's timeless wisdom coming to us from 1923 Syria.

Happier than God by Neale Donald Walsch.   Walsch is better known for his series of books: Conversations with God (I, II and III).   I have read those and several other Walsch books, but this one is my favorite.   I hate its' title, and yet the book chose me.  I stood in front of a shelf of books by him, closed my eyes and pointed, landing on this one.  I winced and opened it to several different pages and knew that indeed I would need to purchase it.   This book is also about manifesting - but mostly about manifesting a God filled life.   Also Walsch, unlike all other books on manifesting that I have read, does not turn away from the fact that we live in an unjust world, or fail to mention that.   The book is also supremely positive.

Previous inhabitants of the Bed stand:
I have of course over the years had to remove some to make room for others, but I thought the previous ones are worth a mention here.  As noted above other titles by Dyer and Walsh.
The Bible...for obvious reasons.
The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff.   Hoff quotes from Winnie the Pooh throughout this book while relating it to Toaist teachings.   Both amusing and thought provoking.
Hind's Feet on High Places by Hannah Hurnard - this is an allegorical novel about a journey which takes place on many levels.  Heavily Christian imagery.   It has many allegories that speak profoundly to the spiritual journey.  I eventually removed it because some of the "obedience to God" part seemed to describe a kind of God and a kind of discipline which is not how I now conceptualize God.

Happy Reading.   I would love for readers to post a comment sharing their favorite spiritual source and why.

Intending who We are

In the book Illusions, the main character of Richard Bach’s novel gets a Messiah’s Handbook which he reads verses of throughout the book.  These snippets indeed carry real wisdom.  Some examples: 

“Remember where you came from where you’re going, and why you crated the mess you got yourself into in the first place.” 

“Learning is finding out what you already know”.

“The simplest questions are the most profound.  Where were you born?  Where is your home?  Where are you going?  What are you doing?  Think about these once in a while, and watch your answers change.”

“You are led through your lifetime by the inner learning creature, the playful spiritual being an that is your real self.  Don’t turn away from possible futures before you’re certain you don’t have anything to learn from them.  You are always free to change your mind and choose a different future, or a different past.”

Collectively what I got out of these bits of wisdom and the book itself, at the tender age of 23, was a sense that if we let go of external symbols, rules, others expectations, and a sense of  the unweilding “facts” of our lives that we can find our true selves and work with that “clay” throughout our lives.  What goes with that for me is a sense of all of life being an exciting adventure, where learning is always possible and where mistakes really are just learning opportunities.  It means claiming growth as a birthright of all humans.  It has also meant that it is really important to look carefully at the story we tell about our own life and the power that story has to shape the way we feel about and experience our lives.  With clients I see this all the time and am very sad sometimes by the profoundly sad and limiting stories people tell about their own lives and the way they will steadfastly cling to that story even while bemoaning the unhappy and unpalatable results of such a story.  This also has tied back to my offerings of last month about how we involve the divine Spirit in this continuous process of creating the life we lead.

This has also lead to my own unique approach to New Year’s resolutions.  Every New Year’s Eve I sit with my journal and try to remember where I came from and where I’m going.  The very first time I did it I tried to list what I thought I was learning from the events of that year.  Then looking at that I wrote identities I felt I was working on developing: wife, mother, therapist, activist, physical body, spiritual being, etc.

Then for each one I wrote down who I wanted to be more of in the coming year.  In the years that followed I would look at my list of intentions and write about how I did on them and why,  and new learnings and then write down my intentions for the next year.

So for example, as a therapist I want to make time to pray (privately) for my clients, as a spiritual being I want to be more in touch with gratitude and the expression of gratitude and so forth. It is also possible to deal transformatively  in this process with any identity we don’t like.  For if you notice any negative story you tell about your self (I’m too busy, I’m disorganized, don’t have enough friends,…whatever) then it is possible to tell a different story.  To in your statements of becoming for the New Year to positively address those issues.  (“I move purposefully, and at measured pace throughout my life creating order and meaning in my life.”)

I remember once rather innocently describing this process to a man in my church and him saying:  “Wow, I always saw New Year’s resolutions as being about setting goals, but I have never thought that I can have goals for how I live, for who I am.  That feels really good”.  It does…you might want to try it.

The Idealist's Agony - a poem

                         Striving for the highest good

Home sick for a land we’ve never been

Hungering for an oasis just beyond reach

Disappointed by the fall into humanity

No perfected man.

All, washed in the pain of pride, greed, fear, inertia,

apathy and coldness.

So much good achieved…always flawed.

Try. Try again. Better luck next time, version 2, second try, practice, improvement, set back, try, disappointment, try, hurt, keep trying.

Always trying.

Wired for optimism they say. Darwinian edge to hope, to keep trying,

To not give up.

Oh, my imperfect love, how can I keep from cheating on you

with my visions, my dreams  for more, something more

complete, more whole.

Closer to Divine?

Oh, my broken, tarnished neighbors, how to not turn on you in wrath

and frustration, disappointment that you are not

my beloved community.

Oh, my Enemy, what power I give you by believing you are separate

from me, from all of us. By making you a receptacle of all our exiled parts to hold alone.

How do I walk among the half-done, the sweat, the broken promises

born of good intentions, the synchronistic moment, the passion,

the misguided attempt, the accidental success, the small kindness, the dropped ball, the over-engineered, the forgotten good idea and the lingering sweetness

                     ….into the fullness of life.

         No judgment; just is. Now—this moment.

         No expectations. No preconceptions.

Just is; Now—this moment—the fullness of life

"the Should's" whispers of the past

Therapists commonly recognize that when we get in the realm of "shoulds" we are in unfortunate terrain.  With shoulds people commonly beat themselves or each other up.  Should is the language of failure, disappointment, unmet needs, guilt and manipulation.  Commonly we think of it as undesirable self-talk or as a tool in a power struggle between 2 people.  But all of these conceptualization are fairly present centered.

Today I was working with a client on a heavy feeling of responsibility she chronically carries - a definite "should" about how she must be in the world.  Somehow I thought to ask if the sense of burden to provide for day to day survival was something her parents or grandparents had actually carried. (since she does not really have this burden in the present.)  She then revealed a very real and difficult struggle for survival that her mother had in childhood.  Such a curiosity, how we can wordlessly carry down the fears and traumas of past generations.  I remember a man telling me once how he realized he always held soup spoons in a strange way and then he remembered how his father, who had survived the concentration camps, but lost a finger there, had held his spoons this same way because of the missing finger.

Is it unconscious memories of parental actions or words - is it fears and angers so deeply held that they hang in the air- breathed in by our offspring- transmuted in the breast milk - or the the blood - held in the memory of cells?  Is the memory actually like a hologram in the egg and the sperm that unite to create us?  (The egg was there inside her mother even when her mom was a scared child.)  And if the shoulds are simply cross generational memories carried as survival imperatives - can we release them to the past to live in the present?  What is the karmic effect of releasing such bonds?  As the daughter relaxes can back in time the ancestors somehow know their struggles will be successful?

Prisons of our Own Making

For 10 years I was a volunteer in the prisons.  Ever since for some 20 years, I have had dreams where I am in prison.  This is not in a bad way.  I have not ever, to my recollection, dreamed I was incarcerated.  I simply dream that I am back in the prison, volunteering again.  Mostly these are pleasant dreams, unlike the reoccurring bad dream that I'm back in my High School.  (Now admit it, that would be a nightmare, would it not?)   My High School occupied one city block and was 4 stories high, passing period was 10 minutes because it really could take that long to get between classes.  It was easy to be lost in the labyrith of that building.  But those bad dreams usually combine some combination of being late to class because of being lost, realizing an assignment is due I have not done, or that I am horribly behind in school and may not graduate.   These HS dreams are dreams of inadequacy.

Carrie Newcomber, a song writer I love, has a line in a song...."most of our prisoners are of our own making".  I certainly agree with that idea and think therefore of these reoccurring dreams where I am in prison.  Most people think of prison as a bad place and yet in these dreams I am volunteering, I have come to do something good, I have come to a place where I experienced community and even love.  What if we could all recognize that we are volunteers to our own prisons?  That we can leave them or convert them whenever we want to places of love and community?  When my dreams tell me that I am in a time of inadequacy - when the HS dreams start again - could I see that it is a prison of my own making?  Could I break out of those old feelings, out of the illusion of inadequacy?