Community

 What is the point of living in community?  One good reason is that community allows those with whom we live to become our teachers.  See yourself as a learner amongst those with whom you associate or with whom you live.  Learn what?  How to escape self-complacency.  You read in a paper or on line about the sufferings of someone(s) in some other place or country.  You sort of dismiss it or pass over this story moving on to something “more interesting.”  Why?  Because their suffering differs from your own.  Their home got flooded out, but you are suffering from a toothache.  You would stop at a story that was about the latest dentistry and tooth decay solutions.  It is harder to escape those with whom we live in community.  Which is why they can upset us all the more than a story in the news.  

Do Over

 Why do people drink too much alcohol?  They want a do over of reality.  They want a reshoot of the scene in which they find themself.  An example: they walk into a room full of people at a social occasion.  They feel lonely, not part of any group.  They lack sober social skills to fit in.  But when they start drinking the scene changes for them.  They feel able to speak and interact and feel part of the whole social scene.  Until the social scene does not feel part of them.  Too much scene changing alcohol.  So if you feel disconnected at a social event, realize it is only your opinion.  The reality may be you are more connected than you think.  Sober.  

Feelings

Feelings are optional.  We cannot control them.  But we need not wait for them in order to make a decision.  For instance, we can say we are sorry for something without waiting to feel sorry.  You can make an act of the will not to do whatever you are not yet sorry for.  You need not feel sorry.  Pray and decide to change.  People go to recovery meetings without feeling a desire to go.  People go to church, synagogue, ashram, temple, without feeling a desire to go.  Feelings are always optional.  I have met many a person who did not feel like going to recovery meetings anymore.  Then they drank and only bad things happened.  If I waited until I felt like writing a blog there would be many a blank day.  Or jogging for that matter.   

Any Length

 There is a story in the Gospel in which a woman goes to any length to help her daughter whom she love dearly.  Love goes to any length is the point.  She is a foreigner to Jesus.  She is not a Jew.  So it is a bit outside her purview to ask him for anything since he is a foreigner to her.  They have a whole history and culture of staying separate.  But the woman loves her daughter and Jesus is the answer to healing her daughter.  The woman is insulted by Jesus when she asks for help.  So twice she has to eat her pride, her sense of self.  But she does follow her tenacity which inspires her wisdom. “Even the dogs eat the scraps from the master’s table,” she says, when Jesus refers to her as a dog.  She gets what she wants.  Love conquers regardless of the price.  

First Things First

 There is a lot to be learned from reading wisdom stories.  Read the Gospels.  Jesus walks on water.  What to be learned from that?  Well, before he walked on water he went up to the mountain by himself for the night.  Up to that point he had been first a carpenter, then a healer and then a teacher.  Others had been healers and teachers.  But no one walked on water.  Jesus first did deep meditation, a night full, in silence and solitude.  He got in touch with his God, Father, Power.  He realized his deepest and truest self.  Then he walked on water.  We all can be so much more than we think we are, or are told we are, if we have a deeper prayer life.  

Enough

 There is a famous bible story in all four gospels in which Jesus feeds thousands of people with just a little food.  Well, actually he does not do it, or does not do it alone.  His disciples actually do the distribution of the food, and Jesus looks to heaven before he gives them the food.  The disciples say they cannot feed all these people.  True, but God Power can help them do more than they thought.  They are concerned for the hunger of the people, but feel powerless to do anything about it.  Left to our own devices, yes.  But with a bit of power greater than oneself, lots can be done.  I try not to let concern for the suffering of others be the termination of my assistance.  

Idols

 People who downgrade religious worship say that Sunday is idol worship.  They scoff at the God believers.  But those same people have their own idols.  Activity is their idol.  For some it is work, seven days, all day, each week.  For some it is packing in endless activities on Sunday.  One event after another or more than one event at a time.  Kids are brought into this mayhem going from one thing to another lest they become “idol” or bored.  Silence, stillness, meditation, reading outside of homework are nowhere to be found.  Doing nothing much is not equal to laziness.  It may well open the gift of time to renew or discover are true self.