A Small Part

 Did you get baptized so that you would go to heaven?  That is like going to AA to stop drinking.  Becoming a member of a religion or AA is about changing your whole life, one step and one day at a time.  In the beginning of the process, people don’t yet know that.  The motivation might be to belong to the “right” religion.  Or to get out of a bad life.  But what you are getting into is the real work of change.  We would rather be right than to change.  But so be it.  At least it is a step and one can always hope that the light will go on to work with the grace of a newly discovered power in one’s life.  

The Focus

 So how is your prayer life going today?  Are you asking God to fix your world, change things you don’t like, make you feel better?  Well, that is one focus, but will it make you a better person?  I find that I get out of self range when I ask what is God’s will for me and the power to  do what God wants.  I am often blind as to what I need, but God is not so blind.  God knows.  I don’t.  

Magnolia

There is a huge Magnolia tree outside my window.  It rarely blossoms.  It feels no need to show off or call attention to itself.  But now it has gifted me with a blossoming branch of flowers.  Only I can see it.  You cannot see it from the ground or from across the street.  Other branches obscure the view of these blossoms.  They blossom just for me, unworthy as I am.  A nearby branch is almost completely dead, but this does not deter the tree from blossoming.  Can I be like the tree, no need to perform or call attention to myself?  Accepting that though part of me is no longer functioning well, I don’t have to let that deter me from blossoming my best self nonetheless.  Age and time can diminish but not destroy.  Always have hope.  Today may be your blossoming day for you.  You just might be a gift for someone else.  Hope.   

Grumbling

I often grumble to myself about something I don’t want to do but should do.  It is part of my self-orientation moments.  I am really about isolation at that moment.  I ought to go to a gathering of people who are trying to live a more spiritual, less self-oriented life.  This would bring me into God range and out of self range.  And it would bring me out of isolation.  Grumbling is the shovel by which I dig my own hole.   

Muscles

 When I go jogging on a chilly, foggy, San Francisco morning, I am exercising my physical muscles.  I progress to develop these muscles if I keep to the daily routines of exercise.  Well, I have spiritual muscles too.  I exercise them when I meditate and be of service to others.  If I keep at these things my spiritual muscles will develop and I will feel overall better.  Just as there are days of boredom or ennui when I go out the door to run, there are such days when I meditate and be of service.  But I do it anyway, and the feelings pass.  I always feel better later too.  Muscle up!

Memory

 Two things are a problem when it comes to any spiritual practice. One is a short memory and the other is feeling good.  Now these can both be good things under other circumstances, but in a prayer or recovery practice it helps to recall why you began this in the first place.  You were not feeling so good and needed some power/God/meditation/action to pull you out of the funk.  So don’t forget that past mess and remember that you might be one step away from it.  I try not to live on yesterday’s practice.  You eat today even though you ate fine yesterday.  

Short Stuff

If you thought your life was going to be short, how would you live today?  I don’t think I would make too much change in today until I reached acceptance of my life being short.  At my age, shortness is a reality.  I used to think I always had tomorrow or next week or next year.  Always lots of time to do what I want that gives life, or what I ignore/put off, because I don’t want to do it now.  We all have a limited number of “now” so why wait and put important things off.  You can take a really fit body from gym/exercise time to the grave, without saying thank you or telling someone you love them, much less writing a letter.  Why die with a lot of stamps in your drawer and writing paper in your desk, or FaceTime app never downloaded.  Or drunk, saying, “Tomorrow I will stop.”  That leaves a lot of collateral damage behind.   

The Mall

 This time of year, apparently, the Boulder, Colorado, Pearl Street Mall is filled with flowers planted by the City in dirt squares for a two block long extravagance of color and shape.  Beautiful for a slow walk.  But so few people even seem to notice or stop to look.  Some walk alone at a pace to get to the next place, turning neither left of right to see the flowers.  Some walk in groups, talking to one another.  Some walk to see and be seen, but the flowers go unnoticed.  Nature waves in the breeze, but few wave back with attention much less awe.  So I keep the flowers company with my gaze as I walk along and try not to run into anyone.  So if you find yourself unnoticed, don’t let it get you down or judge yourself less than beautiful.  Preoccupations narrow people, and if they are all about themself, they cannot see the glorious you.  

The Cupboard

 Sometimes I am like the cupboard that is full with back-up supplies, relying on myself to never run out.  A full cupboard prayer life fills me up with thoughts, images, written prayers, readings so that I never am empty or worse, bored.  I am fed by all my efforts.  But then I am never empty enough to the Divine Power that hides in emptiness.  Self-trust will never fill me up enough.  Meditation is to let go, to allow space, the emptying for the fullness to follow.  

Weather

 Why do we always want our own weather?  We want it to be other than it is when we long for our own weather.  More sun, or more snow, or drier or wetter.  I look out my window and say, “I wish it were less windy.”  Why not enjoy the beauty of the way things are, as someone suggested to me.  This is where the spiritual path and sanity comes in to play. I don’t control the weather for one.  And what is in front of me, is the real and it has its own beauty.  But only if I have the inner eye to see.  

The Flowers

 Flowers bloom at the monastery during different times of the summer.  What catches my heart is that they bloom from what seems like scruffy bushes, almost weed-like greenery and branches going here and there.  Without a bloom, this greenery seems to disturb the landscape around the monastery grounds.  But I have learned over the years to keep watch.  With little rain or moisture from above, the plants will bloom when they want.  They do not ask for my help or my permission or approval.  They do not care for their lack of attraction most of the year.  They do not envy the Aspen Tree.  They are comfortable being what they are and they will reward the world in their own time.  We can learn a lot from these flowering plants.  God made you beautiful.  Just be yourself.  

The Quiet

 I have never found a quiet, a stillness, like I experience at the Snowmass Monastery high in the Rockies.  No stream or river or leaping lack shore.  No sound even of a breeze in mid-afternoon.  The birds and ground scampering creatures are all quiet.  I think this is God’s creation that is most like God: quiet and still.  Why?  So that creatures like me can become humbly aware of the chattering mind.  Nature is inviting me to a profound stillness and silence within my deepest self.  When there or here, I am home.  

Marketing

 If a Marketing Professional were to look at religion they might look at it as a “packaging of spirituality.”  In marketing, the outside packaging invites you to go to the insides which means you have to buy the package in order to get into it.  What if the package is no longer moving off the shelf?  The marketer might change the outside look.  If that did not do enough, then change the insides.  You see this all the time in cereals.  Tony the Tiger on the Frosted Flakes box did not change all that much while the buyer became healthier conscious about sugar and good teeth.  So the company just made a lot of other cereals.  Lots of brands and variety, but all cereal.  Religion to the marketer is the package.  Not moving?  Loss of customers?  Change the outsides with catchy signage people see as they drive by.  Not working? Change the insides, that is, what you do, how you pray, who leads, better sound system, comfortable seating, hospitality, welcoming, air/heat.  But religion is loath to change the insides.  People are desperate for inner spiritual formation and fulfillment even if they don’t know how to find it.  So what to do?

The Package

 Religion is not obsolete.  It still has a purpose.  But it is at a loss for relevance to a lot of people, especially the younger generations.  Remember the Black Berry electronic device?  Everyone seemed to have one.  Then something else came along and no one had a Black Berry. It worked just fine.  It was not obsolete.  It just lost its relevance to its market.  Another example is the vinyl record player.  The vinyl record spun around at 78 RPM or 33 RPM and you put the needle onto the record.  You heard your music.  Then something else came along.  The record player and vinyl record worked just fine.  They were not obsolete, just no longer relevant.  Now, young people are getting those record players and vinyl records out of grannie’s attic and buying vinyl records.  Taylor Swift is relevant on vinyl now.  Maybe religion will come back.  But I would not just wait and see if I was running a church.  Obsolete never comes back.  

Next Day Delivery

 Why is Amazon so relevant and successful and popular today while religion is not?  Well, Amazon is quick.  We seem to like quick.  Any satisfaction with religion or other spiritual formation paths are often abstract and slow.  You have to work at it, and the “it” is not always obvious.  Try Recovery Programs or a Catholic mass.  Spirituality takes patience.  It gestates.  No patience needed for an Amazon delivery.  To enter a recovery program when you are jobless is not so bad.  You have time, which is just what you need.  But spirituality is meant to be for a lifetime.  Consumer products, not so much.  

Consent

 Why does the Caholic Church say that “consent” of both the bride and groom are necessary for marriage to be a sacrament?  Well, there was a time when marriage was all about the father of each person making a social contract with the families.  It was “deal” making.  What the bride wanted was of no concern.  She was property, and the father of the bride often had to come up with a dowery, cash if you will, for the groom’s family to take the bride who would now be an “expense” to the groom’s family.  Having children would help of course.  So the church actually stood up for women in this case and got involved in marriages.  The woman now had a say.  Marriage became a sacrament, one of only seven.  Of course if the woman refused, she could be locked up in a tower, like Ripunsel, who then grew her hair so long that her Prince Charming could climb up the braids.  Who remembers these old tales?  

Off The Wall

 There are a lot of suggestions, instructions, rules that are written on walls, in books, on stones, and wherever they can be written out.  The problem is not the suggestions, which are often criticized and ignored by people who never try them.  The problem is that these instructions are never taken off the wall or out of the book and applied to one’s life.  They are never put into practice.  If your life is a mess, or people tell you your life is a mess, you might want to try some of these things written on the walls.  None of them will hurt you.  Well, they may hurt your ego.  

Mix Up

 Some of us, when we hear a suggestion, we think it is a criticism.  So, we tend to ignore it or refuse to accept it.  Fear of change, or desire for ego control, can be the cause of this mistranslation.  Even worse, we may see a suggestion as criticism being used as a weapon against us.  This borders on insanity.  If insanity can leave us alone for a bit, we might get some clarity and see that the suggestion is a tool and not a weapon/criticism being used against us.  Even better, and more sane, is that we decide to get someone to help us if we have never used the tool before.  It will all lead to a better self, less fearful and  less lonely.  My blogs are suggestions.  

The Barriers

 What gets in the way of meditation?  Well, a couple of things to mention here.  You never sit still enough to allow yourself to internalize and absorb a still, quiet voice.  Some people, without ever trying to listen, say that there is no quiet voice.  They don’t hear anything.  Well, the voice is “quiet.”  Another preventive to meditation is that you only trust yourself, and thus refuse to give up control.  Control means you won’t turn over your thoughts and actions to something other than your own ego.  More control and fear here.  Sit still enough, wait a while, and trust to let go of focus on your thoughts and just maybe you will enter the world of meditation.  Oh, and maybe close your eyes nd turn off the TV, and other media.  

Brother Raymond

 Today is the birthday of my friend, Brother Raymond, a Trappist Monk, 87 years old and still with plenty of pep.  The monastery is being sold, but Brother Raymond does not want to leave and live somewhere else.  Many of us in this big country have this feeling.  Where we want to live, have been living, no longer will sustain us.  The job, career, necessity requires a move to another place.  We are leaving home and this is not easy.  Migrants want to come to the USA for work or safety, but still, they are leaving home, the familiar in language, geography, and relationships.  A new job or aging can require a move.  These moves are never easy.  I am still trying to feel “at home” in San Francisco.  I make new friends, I learn the geography’s landscape, interesting places and so on.  But it takes time.  And energy.  So I need a spiritual practice to keep me energized to keep outreaching.  Inside reach leads to a better outside reach.  

Dust

 Reading the Psalms is pretty good spiritual literature no matter your belief or lack thereof.  Why?  They deal with reality and human emotions.  Today’s thought is psalm 103 and going to the gym.  What?  Well the psalm says, “Remember that we are dust.”  It reminds me in a sobering fashion that I must not let my spiritual life of reading, meditation and service be put aside for the purpose of building up my body.  If I can do both then this is fine.  So I tend to figure early in the morning when I am going to do fit spiritual and when I am going to fit physical conditioning.  Being up here in the monastery at the moment this is not too difficult, but in busy San Francisco it is a challenge.  Well, running up here is very difficult.  No oxygen.  

Humility

 I am at the monastery as I write this.  Here, I get up one hour earlier than on the West Coast.  My blog therefore goes out one hour earlier than on the West Coast.  More people read the earlier posted blog.  This means that some people will read the blog if they see it, but won’t go looking for it at a later time.  I am not all that important to them in their spiritual journey.  This is good to know.  Keeps me humble.  I can do a good act without thinking of the results.  Results are not up to me.  I don’t need to be popular, but I do need to be consistent.  Just keep doing the good you do.  

Drawing The Shades

 When you enter a shaded room, windows covered up, you cannot see how much dust or mess there is.  Open the shades, and let the light shine on the dust and mess.  Meditation is like that.  We can tend to go through the day with the shades of our inner life drawn shut, like an abandoned room.  Meditation is when we let in the light and see the mess that needs our attention.  Of course, that attention takes time and work.  This is called action.  Meditation is not just discovering our mess.  Prayer and action is a good one and two.  

The Center

 If you want to be the center of the universe you will find it quite crowded with people who are pretty self-centered, and never satisfied.  That self always wants more, especially attention.  So I don’t care so much for crowds.  I try to stay out of the center, but not out of being useful to others, generous with time, patience, acceptance and a listening ear.  It does not have to be joyful all the time.  Joy is a feeling that comes and goes.  Happiness and fulfillment have more staying power.  As long as I don’t want it to be all about me.  

Options

It is said that growing old is not optional.  Well, if you kill yourself I think growing old can be optional.  If you do something for a long time, it is because you have a long life.  If someone says they don’t drink for forty years, this is partly because they lived all that time.  So I don’t take much credit for doing something for a long time.  But I do take credit for growing up.  That is optional.  It is not a physical thing, so much as spiritual.  To grow up is to become selfless.  Children generally are not selfless, nor are childish people.  So I do some work to be physically fit, but make sure that I am doing daily work to be spiritually fit.  I try not to let workouts get in the way of meditation.  Growing up seems to be ongoing and I have been blessed with lots of time to do it.  Work in progress! 

Dirty Dishes

 Life will always have dirty dishes.  Clean up one day and the next day will have its own dirty dishes.  Life on life’s terms.  But many an addict in recovery does not see this.  They think they have cleaned up their act, done the steps, read, been of service and kept clean and sober.  They did their dirty dishes with lots of help.  They then think life will be good.  They are emotional teens.  I did what I was told or did a good thing, so I should be rewarded with hassle free life.  Every day will have new resentments for such a person, because every day has the dirty dishes of living life.  Messes come along.  Recovery is how you deal with them.  One day at a time.  

Sugar Spirituality

 Do you ever want to feel good in your meditation? Duh! Yes.  Well, that can be spiritual sugar.  It is sweet, immediate gratification, but not all that healthy on a continuing basis.  We need to meditate when it does not feel so good, like eating your greens, or taking medications that heal but don’t taste good.  People tend to fill their spiritual life with images, statues, things, with all the wanting to feel good, or successful in prayer.  Most of these people would think prayer a waste or failure if it was all boredom, silence, solitude, darkness.  God did not make the statues and images and things, but God did make the darkness.  It came before the light.  Transformation, not feeling good is the spiritual life at its best.  

A Place Setting

 We are a place setting for God, Higher Power, Ultimate Reality.  This is what we do in Meditation.  We set a place for us to sit and then we wait.  We have done all we can do.  So we wait, humbly for God to come feed upon us.  What feeds God?  Our love, our repentance, our humility as we honestly look at ourself.  For the addict, the Higher Power does the heavy lifting, but then is hungry and wants to be fed by us, in this image of place setting, not by our works but by our silent waiting, giving up our time when we could be doing something much more self-serving, or serving others.  We burn out if we are always busy outwardly in service to others.  We need to be in service to our hungry heart that needs this silence and solitude, this waiting.  The spiritual life needs to be fed.  

Fireworks

 Did you have a fun Fourth of July?  Mine was better this year than last year.  Why?  Better fireworks?  No. Better attitude.  We have fireworks, noisy rockets right across the street from me in our St.Mary’s Park.  They are not supposed to happen, but they do.  I like to go to bed early, so last year, my first here for these fireworks, I was upset with all the noise interrupting my routines.  But a lot of other people might have been very happy with local rockets shooting off into the sky, and no fog to get in the way.  Our town has water on three sides, so we have fireworks.  The City does them over the Bay where there is fog and big crowds along the waterfronts.  From my room, there are no crowds, and no fog.  So I am into acceptance.  Life on life’s terms and that many people stay up late and enjoy these events.  I am not grumpy this morning.  Just glad that this holiday comes but once a year.  

As I Am

 I turn myself over to God as I am. God does the heavy lifting.  It is called grace.  So what is my part in this?  The effort to turn myself over to God as I am requires some humility and faith that “as I am” is enough.  So then, what is the next right thing for me to do?  A simple question that usually has an answer right in front of me.  As I am, with all my shortcomings, inconsistencies, inclinations, is not about to save the world, but I can do what is right in front of me that needs doing.  If I am a mess at this moment, small steps are possible with the Power of my God.  I don’t do life alone.  

Skin Deep

 I hear people talk about how they have seen the light and now are going to do the right thing, the tough work to become whole and be of service to others.  Then I never see them again.  What happened?  Excessive self-reliance is what happened.  In their “decision” there was nothing about weakness, or knowledge of the difficulty in changing one’s life.  Self will changes nothing.  We need grace, the help of others, the realization of our weakness.  Desire is a step but it is not the Power.  So today I would like to be my better self.  I cannot do this alone.  I need others and I need the Power, the God of my understanding to help me.  Alone, I am at best delusional.  

Differently Abled

 I came across this term, “Differently Abled,” when I attended a play recently.  It struck me that we can all have our differences, in the way we are put together in our neurons, our thinking and feelings, but different does not make one person less than or more than.  It is simply differences.  Humility, patience, acceptance are what needs to be developed in order to live with one another in our differences.  A person may be able to do complicated math in their head, remember facts, but not want to be touched.  Another person can have highly skilled physical abilities, maybe due to size and strength, but cannot master reading very well.  And so it goes.  We are Differently Abled and need one another to make a whole.  

Surrender

 You don’t want to surrender, as it makes you feel uncomfortable.  Well, how do you know since you did not surrender?  I have found that in surrender, I come to find myself, my truer self.  In holding on to what I know, or holding onto fear of surrender, I have no peace.  It seems insane to hold onto a fear-based life, but that is what many of us do.  We like the fear we know, rather than the surrender we do not know.  Surrender does not have to be dramatic.  It can simply begin with asking someone what they would do in a similar situation.  It is asking for guidance from someone who seems to have more peace than you do.  Yes, with surrender can come peace.