The Other Side

 Inside my room or cell, life mostly on my terms.  I control a lot about the room.  But when I step through my bedroom door I am entering into life on life’s terms.  Am I ready?  Yes, if I am in a good spiritual condition.  Because then I realize stuff might happen or show up, or be annoyingly repeated, and I have little to no control.  I walk out of my room with acceptance.  This keeps me serene more than resentful.  I am free from having the things in life control my emotions such that I react negatively to life not on my terms.  I don’t look to get my way.  I have preferences but not demands.  If I am not practicing a spiritual way of life, then look out!  The rage will rise again.  

Explanations

 I like the story of Matthew.  Jesus simply passes by and says "Follow me."  Matthew is a tax collector sitting at a table counting money.  Not only does he get up and follow Jesus, but he gives no explanation as to why he did it.  Nor did he have any expectations of what he would get out of following Jesus.  For me, a spiritual path needs no explanation nor expectation of what will happen on it.  I simply feel an urge, a pull, an inclination, or a "call" if you will.  People ask why a monastery or priesthood or whatever.  I don't have to have any reason but that I feel the pull.  If I say I want more silence and solitude, then I have an agenda and am not open to the One who is inviting me.  Sometimes the heart cannot find the words or the reasons.  It just knows.  

Too Much Info

 I would not read too much about meditation before beginning a practice.  Too much info and you begin to thing you know what it is and how to control that “good Buzz” you imagine will come if you do the right technique.  Meditation is a relationship with a Power Greater Than yourself.  That is, not you.  We don’t control relationships.  We show up. We listen. We wait.  And then, at times, in the seemingly ordinariness of it all, something happens, unique to each one of us.  So don’t try too hard.  Don’t control.  Don’t be greedy for more.  Then, in time, you will begin to show up to life in service, and not judgment, in acceptance, not resentment, in letting go, instead of grabbing for more.  and you will find peace. 

By Myself

 Being by myself is not the same as being alone.  Do you “live alone” or do you “live by yourself?”  There is a difference in the answer and I can often tell it in a person who is in recovery.  To be alone, for me, is more about being separate from others, toward disconnection, a path to isolation.  So you walk into a room with other people already there and seek to sit separate from anyone?  You might ask yourself if you want to be alone or want to be by yourself.  Being by myself, I am comfortable being me.  I can be near others because I like me and can be with myself comfortably around others next to or near me.  Being by myself is not about geography or distancing.  It is about practicing a spiritual life that makes me grow in being at peace with me.  Sometimes people separate themselves because they don’t like themselves and assume others won’t either, or since they don’t like themselves, they don’t like or even trust the proximity of others.Am I alone in a monastery? No, but I am often by myself.  

Inside To Outside

 Someone said, “I don’t meditate much, since I don’t believe in any God.  But I do try to be of service, to be helpful to others.”  Such is this person in recovery from addiction.  Yet they are meditating in the sense that they are working from their insides to their outsides.  Like what?  Well, they are of service to others because first of all they know it will change their insides.  So they are in touch with their inside needs. Second, they have some empathy for others, and that comes from the insides.  Empathy and compassion, thinking of others, is the result of some interior life, even if we don’t formally recognize it.  Plus the energy of the Higher Power does not need a person’s “belief.”  This person used to be a helpless addict, self-centered, and self-willed to the max.  The person did not change all by their own power.  They had none.  Such is addiction.  Happiness spreads from the insides to the outsides.  

Empty

 Do you ever feel empty, as in “I feel so empty inside.”  When it happens to me, I do one of two things.  I try to find a fill up on my “outsides.”  In this manner, I am trying to fill me up with things outside of me, be it persons, activities, places, study, internet, and none of it solves the emptiness.  On the second hand, if I realize that the emptiness is a necessary, and good thing, I try to fill it up on my “insides.”  I turn to meditation.  This is usually a much better solution for me.  I believe that we are supposed to feel empty at times, to remind us that we need to attend to our inner, spiritual life.  This life needs the food of meditation.  There can be a lot of happiness and fulfillment in the world.  But not if that is my only solution to the inner emptiness.  

Unlikeness

 If my truest self, my best self, along with the flaws that get in the way, is within me, then whenever I spend my time focused outside myself for fulfillment, I am living in the land of unlikeness.  The outsides are not unlike my insides.  The quest for happiness on the outsides will leave me alienated from ME.  Like what outsides?  Fantasy for one.  Living completely in the land of imagination.  Imagination is good, but not if it is your full time  focus.  Spouse or partner.  You think they will be your fulfillment, but they cannot be that.  To live only focused on them or on family members, is to try and make them super people responsible for your happiness.  You will end of blaming or complaining.  They are mere humans.  What family, community, partner can do is be a key to open you up to yourself in the relationship.  Otherwise you will never learn to get out of your own way.