Tag Archives: life

What Got Me Through

Posted on by
Reply

triumph-deviantart

There is no easy walk to freedom anywhere, and many of us will have to pass through the valley of the shadow of death again and again before we reach the mountaintop of our desires.   Nelson Mandela

Someone was hurt before you, wronged before you, hungry before you, frightened before you, beaten before you, humiliated before you, raped before you . . . yet, someone survived. . .  You can do anything you choose to do.  Maya Angelou

Strength does not come from winning.  Your struggles develop your strengths.  When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength.  Arnold Schwarzenegger

You’re going to go through tough times – that’s life.  But I say, “Nothing happens to you.  It happens for you.”  See the positive in negative events.   Joel Osteen

In my deepest darkest moments, what really got me through was a prayer.  Sometimes my prayer was “Help me.”  Sometimes a prayer was “Thank you.”  What I’ve discovered is that intimate connection and communication with my creator will always get me through because I know my support, my help, is just a prayer away.   Ivanla Vanzant

There was a special kind of gift that came with embracing the chaos, even if I cursed most of the way.  I’m convinced that, when everything is wiped blank, it’s life’s way of forcing you to become acquainted with and aware of who you are now, who you can become.   Jennifer DeLucy

We All Are Going Through Something

Posted on by
1

deep-cleaning-delaunay-wikipedia

I’ve been coming across stories about people who have overcome very intense life challenges.  I don’t know if I’m more disposed to notice because of my particular situation or if the Universe is trying to let me know that, as difficult as I think my life is, there are many people who are going through much worse than I am.  Obviously, I know about the refugees and people in the Middle East who used to be middle class and are now in constant war.  Their whole lives have been devastated.  I know all about that.  I know about other people who are suffering.

But, sometimes I think of those people in an abstract way.  For any number of reasons, I move on to the next news item.  However, when I hear about someone’s personal story, it more deeply affects me.

In the October 2016 issue of O, The Oprah Magazine, Elizabeth Gilbert wrote about a man who got hit by a bus and lost part of his leg.  He didn’t let that stop him; he got a prosthesis and went on to be a successful triathlete.  During a competition, a van that wasn’t even supposed to be on the road ran into him while he was leading a pack of able-bodied bicyclists.  The accident left him paralyzed from the neck down.  This seemed totally unfair.

In the beginning, he became depressed, lost his way, and abused drugs.  By the time Gilbert met him, he had found an inner peace and joy that went beyond his physicality.  He told her, “Don’t waste your pain.”  That really struck me.  Whatever you’re going through, don’t waste this experience.  Use it as an opportunity to grow, learn, and develop your connection with that which is beyond your circumstance.

There is a comic book series about women who have been victims of acid attacks.  I Googled a real woman, not a comic book character, who had commented on the books. Her particular story involved her rejection of a marriage proposal.  The suitor got together a group of his friends and they poured a bucket of acid on her while she was sitting in her car.  65% of her body was instantly burned.  She’s been through 40 surgeries.  She talked about how hard it is for victims to take that first look in the mirror.  Usually, these women were very attractive before the attacks.

This was 10 years ago.  She’s now 28, still a young lady.  She talked about how the support of her family enabled her to make it through.  Each day, she struggles to pursue her dreams.  She’s now studying to become a fashion designer.

Continue reading →

Deep Cleaning

Posted on by
1

deep-cleaning-flickr

Deep cleaning my house has been very slow.  It’s taken months.  I’m finally getting to the point where I’m vacuuming my very filthy carpet.  As I vacuum, I think about things.  It’s been a trying time.  There are so many things that I need to do that I can’t do: maintenance my car.  I have deep cracks in my ceilings.  In my bedroom, the ceiling is bowed.  According to the Internet, this signifies that I immediately need to call a structural engineer.  But I can’t afford it.  I’m hoping that the issue is not the foundation.  I’m thankful to get through each day without my ceilings falling in.

I think, “why why why is my life like this?”

The thought came to me that I was the one who wanted to change my life, to turn my life around.  If you want to learn a sport, to become healthier, or to become proficient in anything, there are certain things that you have to give up.  You have to give up refined sugar, sitting in front of the television all day, drinking and hanging out every night, especially when you’re “of a certain age.”  Even though, to me, giving up income is not the same as giving up ice cream or cookies or TV, it still is, in a sense, a giving up of something.

The intent that I expressed to change my life has somehow overridden my desire to have instant money.  Left to my own devices, I would continue to do the things that have caused me to gain weight, to sit all of the time, to be unhealthy, to be unhappy and stressed out of my mind.  The Universe, responding to my intent, stopped and blocked me and said “no no.  You’re not going to do this.  You’re going to do THIS.”

My solution would be to win a million dollars.  This would solve all of my problems.  I don’t know why I can’t win the lottery when others have.  Apparently, that’s not in line with my intent.  Perhaps that outcome would change my life, but would not change me, which is my ultimate intent.

The path that I used to take seems to be closed to me right now.  Perhaps in the long run, looking back, I will see that it was a good thing that it was closed because otherwise I would continue to do the same thing.  It was easier to get and go to a miserable job every day to obtain money.  That’s what I’ve done for the last 25 years.  It’s been a good way to pay my bills.  If I could do the same thing that I had been doing, which is to be able to get a job quickly, then I would be working right now.

Continue reading →

We Are All Responsible

Posted on by
Reply

cloud plasma artistym deviantart

One morning during meditation, I was feeling bad about all of the pain in the world and asked “Why?”  What did Native Americans do to deserve such annihilation?  What did Africans do to become slaves and colonized?  What was the cause of such pain and degradation of peace-loving, Spirit-loving people?

Of course, there are numerous hypotheses, the main one possibly being that the cause is human nature.  From the very beginning, humans have killed one another for power, control, possessions, retribution, punishment, emotions, and survival.  Nevertheless, as we presumably evolve away from our animalistic characteristics, can we become consciously aware of ways in which we contribute to nurturing the very base level of our existence?

It came to me that we create devastation in our world and contribute to it every day by our thoughts and behavior.  Unchecked anger, hatred, bigotry, jealousy, resentment, worry, anxiety and other unproductive energies contribute to a force that feeds from and integrates with beings and systems with like vibrations.

In an episode of the Star Trek television series, the crew attempted to get rid of Jack the Ripper, who was thought to have died centuries earlier.  They discovered that “he” was actually a universal force that received its energy from the negative thoughts of everyone on the Enterprise.  The force would enter a body and make it perform harmful acts.  When others reacted in fear, anxiety, and anger, the force became more powerful.  Ultimately, the crew realized what was giving the force its strength.  They began to focus on happy thoughts.  Laughter drove the force away from the ship and into space.  Unable to find an entity like itself to which it could attach, the force dissipated.

My meditation was interrupted by a handyman hired by my apartment complex.  When I opened the door, the man spoke to me while looking at certain parts of my body.  He never looked me in the eye.  When I resumed my meditation, all I could think of was my anger towards this man.  It took quite a while for me to return to my meditative state.

Calming myself, I saw that the same way I allowed myself to be taken away from my meditative peace was the way that I allow myself to become uncentered throughout each day and throughout my life.  I start out on one path and, then, allow people and events to detract me, to spoil my day, to make me ungrateful, angry, resentful, or irritated.  I realized how easily negative thoughts come to my mind and how, instead of passing them through, I nurture, revisit, and build upon them.  I was able to see how I then attract certain energies to me, not necessarily the energies upon which I am focusing, but the type of energies in various forms.  A small hole can be just enough to let in a flood.

Continue reading →

Growth Periods

Posted on by
Reply

grow deviantart

Everything happens for a reason.  It may be better to call crises “growth periods” because, when we get through them, we will surely have learned something about ourselves, our relationships with others and to the Universe.  Deepak Chopra, in his Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, states that every single problem in life is the seed for an opportunity for some greater benefit.

Looking back, I can see the lessons.  I can see the growth.  Sometimes, looking forward, all I can see are circumstances that will cause me to experience extreme anxiety.  Is it possible that I manifest in my life that which I fear the most?

Part of a poem by Henry Van Dyke reminds me that, despite all signs to the contrary, I am in control of my future:

We build our future, thought by thought
For good or ill, we know not
Thought is another name for fate
Choose then thy destiny and wait

 

The more quickly we learn the lesson of our present “growth period,” the sooner we will move on to our next stage of evolution.  The trick is to discover what the lesson is. Catastrophic losses of health, wealth, and loved ones are external phenomena that can point to something within that needs to be explored.  Perhaps your life needs to change.

We always have the opportunity to change, but don’t for whatever reason.  So life takes matters into its own hands.  It can stop us cold and say, “Will you look at me now or do you need something more drastic?”  It will keep trying to get our attention until we take the time to complete this point in our schooling and graduate to the next level.

What will it take for you?  The loss of everything in a fire or earthquake, the abandonment of friends and family, financial destitution, cancer, loss of physical mobility?  Some people go through intense trauma and still don’t advance to a higher potential.  The Universe is patient.  It has time for you to stay in that class for eons if that is your desire.

Each and every one of us has a cross to bear.  What looks good on paper or on smiling faces or inside of a gleaming Mercedes-Benz or silk dresses or three-piece suits does not always express the true story within.  Many have material things and great health, but are not balanced spiritually.  They aren’t in tune with their inner selves.  Each of us has personalized learning lessons, some of which can be experienced with material success and health and others without.

Continue reading →

I Feel a Shift

Posted on by
Reply

One Light desktopnexus

I have had an intense urge to deep clean my house.  I have been cleaning window sills; floor baseboards; walls; sweeping ceilings; dusting books, photo albums, dolls and figurines; orange oiling everything wood.  The amount of dust and grime revealed almost reduced me to tears.  Why did I wait so long?

My office will be the culmination of my efforts.  Here, I will have to get rid of years of files, including those of my mother who passed four years ago.  While preparing her final taxes, I had to take deep breaths and step away several times before I finished.  Over the years, bit by bit, I have gotten rid of her clothes and other personal effects.  Now, I am ready to at least move to the garage for later shredding documents that evidence how she lived and handled her life.  This is a very daunting task; but, space has to be made to accommodate the new.  I have to move on.  I am ready to move on.

I feel a shift.  Like a cloud has lifted.  Energy has been cleared.  A new door has opened.

Recently, my dreams have emphasized the color brown.  In one, a brown person was dressed in brown clothes and a brown hat.  My dream book stated that brown represents the earth, spiritual death, and degradation.  Initially I thought, “That’s not good.”  After a few days of thought and meditation, I had a different reaction.

Earth represents the material.  Spiritual beings in the body must manifest the material to survive and to nurture and please ourselves.  A human body must have material sustenance and live in physical abodes.  Perhaps the meaning of my dreaming the color brown is that the manifestation of my desires and intentions is imminent.  I am about to move beyond barely surviving to abundantly thriving.

Perhaps my spiritual death reflects an evolution from caterpillar to butterfly.  I am breaking through my casing and radically transforming into something greater.  The old me is dying, dissolving, to give birth to the new.

In a past journal entry, I noted that, during meditation, I received an awareness that the removal of cherished circumstances from my life is to enable me to see the One Light.  While I was surrounded by superficial light, I refused to see the One Light.  I wrote: “it is only in darkness that you become more aware of light.”

Continue reading →

I Have Enough

Posted on by
Reply

eruption rainbow deviantart

I dreamed that I was in my car trying to park in the bus terminal in order to purchase a bus ticket.  A transit authority official told me to move my car.  I turned right onto the next street to look for another place to park.  There was a hotel, but no parking whatsoever on either side of the street.  Then my car disappeared and I was trying to park my bicycle, but I didn’t have a lock.  A woman from the hotel came up and told me that it was ok for me to park my bike across the street in a partially enclosed bus stop with a bike rack.  So I put my bike there.  It was about a block downhill back to the terminal.

I finally got to the ticket machine.  From there I could see my bike.  I kept trying to put a $5 bill into the dollar slot.  It kept being rejected.  The $5 bill returned faded.  I looked up and my bike was gone.  I woke up stressed.  My immediate thought upon awakening was, “You always make everything so difficult” or “You always do things the hard way.”  Something like that.

I sat in meditation thinking about my dream.  My interpretation was that I had a car, yet I was unsuccessfully trying to buy a bus ticket.  Then the car disappeared and was replaced by a functional bicycle.  I put the bike aside, didn’t secure it, and continued an attempt to force money into an unaccommodating receptacle.  Finally, I had nothing – no car, no bike, no bus, and money that didn’t work.  The question was why, when I had sufficient transportation, was I trying to secure less than what I had?  That search itself expressed a denial of what already existed.  Accordingly, it all went away.

The dream was trying to tell me that I already had what I was seeking.  By denying my sufficiency, I was affirming lack in my life.  Denial is wanting more without acknowledging and giving thanks for what is.

Not knowing who we are and what we have causes us to constantly focus on other than.  Causes us to look for a bus while a car is taking us where we want to go.  Causes us to not value and secure what we have while we persistently covet something more and different.

Continue reading →

In Order to Go, You Have to Leave

Posted on by
Reply

change sephiroth deviantart

The spiritual journey does not consist of arriving at a new destination where a person gains what he did not have, or becomes what he is not.  It consists in the dissipation of one’s own ignorance concerning oneself and life, and the gradual growth of that understanding which begins the spiritual awakening.  The finding of God is a coming to one’s self.  Aldous Huxley

Set peace of mind as your highest goal, and organize your life around it.  Brian Tracy

A negative mind will never give you a positive life.  Ziad K. Abdelnour

The one who follows the crowd will usually go no further than the crowd.  The one who walks alone is likely to find himself in places no one has ever been before.   Albert Einstein

In order to go, you have to leave.  Grey’s Anatomy, Season 11

We can let the circumstances of our lives harden us so that we become increasingly resentful and afraid, or we can let them soften us and make us kinder.  You always have the choice.  The Dalai Lama

Maturity is learning to walk away from people and situations that threaten your peace of mind, self-respect, values, morals and self-worth.  Tiny Buddha

Awareness of Your True Passion

Posted on by
2

nature or notion binaural beats

For a long time, my life felt like I was in the movie Groundhog’s Day, where a man finds himself living the same day over and over again.  I felt like I was in a forest trying to get out and kept ending up at the same tree from which I started.  I continuously kept going round and round in a circle until I decided to change me.  I began to focus on changing my perceptions and behavior instead of blaming “them” and reflecting on how “they” should be.  I began the life-long process of refining and molding myself into what I wanted to see in others and in my life.

More frequently, I recognize how I can better speak and react.  After tense interactions, I ask myself, “Were my words and actions loving and compassionate in the face of unfairness and harshness?  Did I maintain composure and a steadfastness of being centered in my internal peace and joy?  Am I even aware of and, therefore, capable of expressing my internal peace and joy?”  Often, the answer is still no; but, I am increasing my self awareness.  At least I have a clue as to what I need to work on.  I’m not yet out of the forest, but I haven’t seen that tree in awhile.

I now re-define “obstacles” and “failures” as opportunities to evolve.  In athletic pursuits, we know that, to become more skillful, we must practice consistently and work on techniques.  Developing our inner selves takes the same commitment and perseverance.  I commit myself to that strategy.

You may find that your perceived setbacks were actually building blocks that form the foundation of a life that is more in line with your nature than your notions.

For example, sometimes what you believe to be your passion may not manifest according to your exact vision.  If you change your perspective and become open and receptive to what is currently unknown, you could find yourself moving with greater speed and clarity towards your destiny.

I want to be a successful writer.  However, as I review my primary activities past and present, I see that that I have repeatedly pursued opportunities to increase my knowledge of the Essence of Life.  I obtained a masters degree in theology, not a masters in fine arts with an emphasis in writing.  I continue to study religions and various Eastern philosophies.  I practice yoga.  I attend workshops and seminars on opening oneself to Universal Energy.  Today, I recognize that my writing is not my primary goal.  It is one expression of my journey on the Path towards knowing the Infinity of my Self.

Continue reading →

Live the Life You Love

Posted on by
Reply

passion red-rose publicdomainpics

Almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.  Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking that you have something to lose.  You are already naked.  There is no reason not to follow your heart.   Steve Jobs.

What I know is that if you do work that you love, and the work fulfills you, the rest will come.   Oprah Winfrey

My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style.  Maya Angelou

Love what you do and do what you love.  Don’t listen to anyone else who tells you not to do it.  You do what you want, what you love.  Imagination should be the center of your life.   Ray Bradbury

Love the life you live.  Live the life you love.  Bob Marley

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones that you did do.  So throw off the bowlines.  Sail away from the safe harbor.  Catch the trade winds in your sails.  Explore.  Dream.  Discover.  Mark Twain