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Mar 16 2009

The God You Don’t Believe In

Bearded Man, 1981 by Seattle Municipal Archives

Tell me about the God you don’t believe in. Perhaps it is a God, who resembles a wise old man in the sky, with a beard who knows everything you do and is going to make you pay for most of it. Perhaps the God you don’t believe in seems a lot like the Big Kahuna who has everything as he likes it, is none too available unless maybe when there is serious bad stuff going down. Even then, contacting him, is an iffy proposition. Or even better, your non-existent God perhaps never did exist because look at all these truly horrific things happening here on Earth. “How can there be a God? That God is a real myth.” Maybe the God you left was that one the nun spoke of when you were seven, saying, “you better sit there and don’t even think of going to the bathroom unless you want to see this ruler imprinted on your hand. God is watching you and you are already in serious trouble”

Perhaps your discarded God wasn’t there when you were abused or felt abandoned. Or perhaps that God wasn’t around when your mother suffered and died too young with cancer. Then there are lots of folks who talk about a God found in large buildings where you dress up in your best clothes, pledge money to belong, serve on at least one committee and usher once a month. Perhaps that works for some folks.

I really tried to find God there for a long, long time. I loved the music and the stained glass windows and loved all the sense of connectedness with other people. I would have so loved to have found God in such a place.

I finally though, admitted to myself that I did not believe in any of those kinds of Gods either. I was hoping God would show up somewhere along the line but honestly, I was truly adrift for a long time over this. However, we all go through our own process of coming to a knowing of God Energy and Presence, or not.

Actually, I prefer any of these terms, Divine Presence, Spirit, Great Oneness, All That Is, the Great I AM to” God”, because I seem to be always stepping on other people’s views of the God they don’t believe in. The images connected with the word “God” are so loaded that it is a challenge to even use the word “God” when I am speaking about energy which is not in form, invisible, all knowing, powerful in untold ways, eternal, and present everywhere.

Is it just possible, that there is some type of Divine Presence which does not fit neatly into our present views and beliefs about God? Might we have our version of the God we don’t believe in, because we have never had a personal relationship with the Energy of the Great I AM? Perhaps we have only heard about this energy from age old stories which simply can’t be true. Or perhaps we have only experienced other people’s views of what God energy is and what it is supposed to do for us. Perhaps what we have heard of God, we don’t like and don’t believe. Other people’s stories seem too impossible to believe, so God has got to be a figment of people’s imagination.

I was raised in a religious practicing family. When I was a teenager, I became an internal skeptic. Then I became a benevolent humanist and agnostic. I felt better trying to be a nice, good person but I did not know if there was a God or not. Then I ran into a few brick walls, chronic debilitating back pain, a serious family illness, humongous fear and I became a seeker.

Meditation Begins At Birth by Premarian — Meditation Begins At Birth - in Croatia by Premasagar

One day through the “grace of God”, it seems to me looking back, I entered into intentional Silence and something amazing happened. I ran into God right in the middle of the Silence. I guessed it was God. I had not really expected to find that clarity, peace or knowing in that Silence. But there IT was, staring me in the face.

Then I began to share what I was learning with others and lots of other people also began to have similar experiences to mine and began to share them. They also moved from seekers to knowers. We had a movement happening. We had moved into the space of people who know there is a God force because we spend time with that force repeatedly. After a few months of entering Silence, we knew that Energy Force was always inside of us.

Then we began to see that after we had had that time of Silence and connecting in, we were more loving in all ways. We were more centered. We were more balanced and content. This became my own definition of God Energy then. All the questions I had, seemed to melt away. The experience of Divine connection which I found in the Silence was all knowing and I found that totally fascinating. It was as if through osmosis from somewhere in the Silence, I was learning about the real God, at least the one that was real for me. (stay tuned)

Mar 07 2009

Meditation Joys – The Still Small Voice

Many folks think that meditation is being quiet and breathing in an specified manner. That could be a good place to begin. However, if that is all that happens, the point of meditation is lost, not to mention that focused breathing and being quiet gets old rather quickly. Meditation is setting aside time to be still and listen to that still small voice. That still small voice can come as a voice, as a knowing, as an image, as a vibrational presence, as insight and in other ways as well. In the beginning, one may well have to mentally move through the “to do list” for the week, the worry list about kids and money and the memory bites of an argument before arriving at a place of stillness.

Om by rrrrrrrrrrrrrrr — Om taken in Mauritius by Adrasteia 9

Meditation is more than being quiet. It is being quiet with the intention of connecting with the I AM energy of All That Is. It is listening to the Silence for what is revealed. It is sitting until there is a change in breathing, energy flow and a sense of wholeness returns to our being. This may take several months before one is consistently able to enter Silent space with ease and confidence. It begins with taking that step to try it once and see what happens.

How can I know that what I am doing in meditation is working? If we are getting up from meditation and return to our old ways of operating, we are not getting it. If we still have the same arguments, get angry over the same issues or feel repeated irritation with ourselves or others, we have not actually meditated. We have perhaps sat in meditation but we have not actually arrived at a space of newness and balance. We have not let enough go, consciously connected with Inner Peace or opened to the God energy within. The God-energy within is there, for all of us. God-presence is not outside of ourselves. It is in the void of seeming nothingness from which all is created.

It is in the Silence that we can most reliably connect with God-energy. We are that energy. However, if our focus is mostly on what we are doing, how we are doing it, why we are doing it and if anyone will recognize our efforts, we will miss the still small voice. That voice is where the wisdom is. That is where our own best knowing is found. That still small voice is pure love but we must make a space for this in our lives. As is true for all sorts of practices, the more we do it, the easier it is to enter into the flow of meditation.

What is the real point of meditation? Why would we step out of our daily routine for something that is seemingly so unproductive? We have so many things that do require our time, what can meditation actually do for us?

Sky-Diving Over the Ocean 2 by C Ronaldo 7

Meditation is like stepping off the edge of a cliff and free-floating. That can be scary to some, even overwhelming to others. ” What if we fall, or find that we can’t get back to “real life” or what if who or what we find inside is not a pretty sight? What then? We should probably just let well enough alone. ” Many people leave the exploration of meditation at exactly this place. This way we can feel we are still in control of every aspect of our lives. This way there is nothing unconventional that we inadvertently set in motion. If we stay in control, we will at least know what is happening.

Besides the fact that these perceptions are myths, created by our ego and are therefore untrue, they are also common reactions of the mind when beginning meditation. That is because fundamentally the mind wants to be in control of our thoughts, feelings and actions. That is what we call the ego. We can choose to stay here but the costs mount as we have more and more challenges in our lives. In order to move beyond anger, judgment, anxiety, depression, grief, jealousy and pride, we have to enter into the Stillness and call forth the power of our God-energy. That energy is within us, all powerful, all knowing and always present. When we enter into Silence we have a chance to get to know that power, the Presence that is inside of us. That is the main reason for meditation. We open up the pathways to inner knowing, peace and balance.

Final Light Pacific Beach, San Diego, California by moonjazz

To really understand why meditation is advantageous, we need to completely embrace that there is ONLY one God, one Source, one Power. That Source is constant, true and reliable and it is the ONLY power that is. All other illusions of power are just that, illusions. Any other masquerading power we give our energy to may appear powerful and desirable at first, but that lasts only a short while. The lasting All Power is within each of us. Meditation can open our knowing of this power at very deep levels. However, this inner-knowing, God-power must usually vie for our attention and allegiance. We are constantly seeking out other possible sources of power in the form of money, influence, real estate, board shares, work, jewelry, club memberships, cars and education at the “best” schools, to name a few.

Frequently people say to me, “I just don’t have time for meditation“. I have to believe that this view comes out of ignorance of what meditation really does for us. Of all the choices in the world open to us, meditation is the most powerful step we can take to peace, balance, success and wholeness. There is no better way to know the God-presence within each of us. There are lots of ways to learn about that God-presence but no other way to truly know it. It must be experienced, not just talked about, mused over, theorized about or debated. There is no other way to really know the God-presence with which we have been gifted. All other forms of seeking power, influence, success and control are in the end, fruitless. “Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.” (Psalm 127)

Meditation or a meditative state is the only way to hear the still small voice. Most of the time the voice we hear is our ego voice. “Don’t do that, who do you think you are? If you try this, you will just end up a loser. Why do you think you can make a good decision here, most of the things that have happened in your life have been simply random occurrences. He is really out to get you, watch out. ”

The still small voice is just that, still, small and a voice that is not our usual jabber of the mind. Wouldn’t you move heaven and earth if you knew there was an all knowing, all powerful, every where present Presence which was inside of you waiting to become more fully actualized? There is. Why then don’t we seek this with all our heart, all our mind and all our soul as we have been commanded to do for eons and eons ?

I think this is because we really, really don’t think there is just One power, just One Source, just One God. We may think we are a power unto ourselves. Look at all we can do, create, get, be, say, build, paint, write, etc. We may think that God is outside of ourselves, we are here and God is elsewhere. We may have bought into teachings which have placed humans and God as co-existing at the same time, sharing power.

These all miss the Truth point. Everything comes from God-power, the good and the bad as translated through our thoughts, feelings and perceptions of our connectedness to God. All That Is is the only Power, the only God, the only Source of God energy. All else parades as power and falls short of the mark. If we enter into meditation with the purpose of listening to the still, small voice we can’t help but be successful, for every step we take we are met with 99 others being illuminated by the God-Presence, within. When we listen to the still small voice, we can get all the guidance available to us. Take a risk. Sit in Silence. Any time there with intention to connect with God-presence will be worth your while. It is more loving, more powerful and more illuminating that any other experience in the entire world for spiritual living. As many of you know, spiritual living leads to tangible, specific manifestations in our daily lives. Or if you don’t know this, try meditating with the goal to develop a personal relationship with Divine Knowing, right within you own being.

You will learn that you are a deeply wondrous and significant being.
You will learn that if you want a conscious connection with God, you can have it.
You will learn that all the help you need is as close to you as the breath in your nostrils.
You will learn that aligning with the One True Power in the Universe means you clear out the rubbish and debris keeping you from manifesting a life of peace , balance, wholeness and joy.

Go ahead, dare to risk time in Silence and see what wondrous things are revealed about who you truly are. The greatest Counselor of all time is available 24-7.

Feb 26 2009

Doing Our Spiritual Work

For 18 years, I had chronic back pain. It began four or five months before I was in an automobile accident or I might have blamed the other driver. I had been working full time, doing research for my doctoral thesis, moved in with my husband’s family, taken a new job which I barely tolerated, left it for another job with higher visibility, and regularly traveled internationally. I began to have constant pain during those months and then I was hit from behind by a van at a stop light. The entire back of my car was crunched to the back seat. I wore a neck brace off and on for months. This began my chronic pain odyssey.

Looking back, my way of responding to all this could be summed up as pushing, harder and harder. I did not really reevaluate my choices, take care of myself, ask my Greater Power for help or work less. In truth, I did not personally know a Higher Power. I was determined not to let the pain, hold me back, keep me down or seal my fate. I simply ramped up doctors’ appointments, scheduled more exercise, added weight lifting, and mostly tried to ignore the pain during the week. However, every Saturday, I was either a whiny lump in the bed or an angry, impatient demanding person, still on the treadmill of life.

I don’t know if someone had suggested then, that I meditate whether I would have listened. Probably not, as I was not listening much anywhere and certainly not to myself. I was so determined to “get this pain licked” that I pursued all types of treatments and doctors looking for a cure. I went about this with my relentless determination to conquer the pain. I simply would not give up and I would not be beaten.

One day when I had gotten my husband to rig up a picnic bench on a 45 degree angle and had strapped myself to it with bungee cords, head down, feet up, I did briefly wonder whether I was completely beyond the pale. Bless his heart, he did not say a word ! I could have been dubbed “the little train that could”. At that point, I had not yet encountered anything that I could not manage, respond to, overcome or solve, myself. The idea of asking for help from God literally never crossed my mind. There was help everywhere. Along this pain trek, I had personally experienced enough pain management techniques to write a book. I knew I was an independent woman, completely competent and self-sufficient, just one in constant pain.

The pain finally wore me down. My stubborn independent streak was very deep, however and persisted for 16 years until I actually asked out loud for help. I was away on a weekend with my husband and was in such excruciating and constant pain that I was in the bath tub crying, running the water so he could not hear me. In a moment of great surrender, I said out loud that I so desperately wanted to be free of pain so that I could stop focusing on me all the time and use my energy to help others. By that time, all my discretionary time went to pain management and seeking help. I had lost myself in all that misery. I had hit bottom.

It took me hitting bottom before I really, really asked with all my heart, my soul and my energy for help from the Great I AM. When my time came, I was calling out for help from a sense of deep anguish and pain. The moment though froze in my memory because I realized it was the first time I had actually asked for help for myself. I had spent years and years trying to get well myself and I suppose I thought this was my last hope.

My general learning from this odyssey in looking back is:

ask for Divine help in the beginning
ask in as many ways as needed
ask knowing without a doubt help will come
hold the healing space until it comes
stay open as to how it comes

Ask even if you don’t think you know how, even if you don’t think you know God, even if you think you have asked before and feel you were not answered. Ask anyway. Keep asking.

The question may arise, do we ask God for help in the same way we might ask a friend for help? Maybe yes, maybe no. No, if we think of asking for help when we feel lack, insufficiency, need or frustration. Yes, if we ask friends for help from a place of appreciation, possibility and expansive positiveness. When we come to a place where we feel imbalance, ask knowing that all the help that is needed is available, that your positive energy is expansive, that the Universe is full of infinite possibility. Limitation is fear speaking, not possibility speaking.

These are the most powerful commands I know, which I take to Divine Knowing now, when I am in a situation which is unbalanced.

Show me where am I separated from God/Divine Peace/The Great I AM.
Show me what lessons I need to learn before I can move on from here.
Show me the fear I am I carrying which is fueling my pain/this situation/my thoughts and feelings.
Show me what benefits I am getting from continuing to live my life the way I have been in this situation.

I have to be absolutely sure I am fully ready to ask for this type of support and insight before I act. What usually follows is a series of very tough interactions with people or myself, usually resulting in my feeling upset, angry, embarrassed or all three until I “get” what is fueling my pain, my situation or my relationship. Before I knew this, I did not realize I was jumping into the flames and that this was super hard and super productive. Typically when I ask to be shown, I get many, many chances in the space of a few days to fully see what I am doing which is manifesting imbalance in my life.

One week when I was just beginning to see what was behind my back pain, I got very angry with everyone in my path because I felt I was getting no support on several projects at work, on every single task at home and from committee members at my church. By the end of the week, I was literally steaming and in horrible pain as well. I finally got that if I continued to think I needed no help, was totally self-sufficient and continued to make no space for people to want to help me, I would continue to feel as I was feeling.

As I let this all sink in, my back started to relax. Here was a tiny glimmer of connection. This glimmer continued to grow and grow as I learned to stop pushing myself, began to ask for needed help with appreciation and felt moved to feel gratitude inside for my blessings. At the end of the week, I remembered that I had of my own accord, asked to be shown what lessons I needed to learn. I was dumbfounded by the entire week. It had all been orchestrated for my learning. This was both humbling and utterly amazing for me to experience my very own self.

We can only change ourselves. However, we can spend as much time as we want to thinking of how to change others, what it would look like if another would act in a certain way and what it would be like for us if they would simply change and do it our way. In fact, we can spend whole lifetimes thinking in this way. We have all the time we need. It is up to us. We can change our thoughts and feeling now, or later, or never. We only have consequences ahead to encounter, depending on our choices.

Focusing on changing others is a great way to remain separated from our own power. If we work out our imbalances as other people’s issues, we can repeat the situations over and over again in all kinds of settings until we do finally get good and tired, or good and sick, or good and fed up. Then we might begin to ask to be shown what we need to learn with our entire heart and soul in order to work our way out of the imbalances we are in.

This is doing our spiritual work. This is growing our consciousness. This is claiming our power. This is creating with the bountiful love that is all around us. This is the future that awaits us which is full of the amazing choices for love in every aspect of our lives. When we look at our part in imbalance, with love and seeking, we are likely to see what we have not seen before, name it, release it and move on. And so it is, for all of us.

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Feb 18 2009

Asking Forgiveness

If we are already forgiven for what we have done, as it says in the Bible, why do we need to ask for forgiveness ourselves?

In Psalm 103, we read, “Praise the Lord with affection and do not forget God’s blessings and benefits, for God forgives all your iniquities and heals all your diseases. In summary, therefore, this does say, all is forgiven.

Asking for forgiveness, however, is as much about our receiving forgiveness and knowing we have been forgiven as it is about the asking. If we don’t ask for the forgiveness we need, we keep carrying around the imbalanced energy of what we have done which has caused that imbalance. When we receive forgiveness, we reestablish the whole, we open ourselves to healing and to the blessings of Divine Grace. That opens up many other options of healing for us as well. The forgiveness is always in the unformed energy around us. If we ask for forgiveness, we give it form by making the request, and the vibration actually comes into our energy field bringing a new balance and equilibrium where we have been out of balance. The Iranian mystic Rumi says, ” if you never know forgiveness, you’ll never know the blessings God gives”.

Forgiveness is a prerequisite to authentic prayer. If we are harboring negative thoughts or feelings in our hearts, they literally short-circuit and neutralize our prayers. When forgiveness is received, what has been previously blocked or sealed off from love is thereby opened to receive God’s Love. That’s how it happens. When we are too filled up with un-forgiveness, there is no room, no space, no place of peace where we can receive the Love of God. It’s like having a house too full of clutter to be able to offer a guest a place to sit and rest.

You might feel you have been asking for Divine Healing Presence but that you do not feel it. Why might that be? It is most likely something in the connection and it is probably on our side. One of the most prevalent reasons for a poor connection with Spirit is blockage because we need to forgive someone or we need forgiveness ourselves. Another block may be that we are not consciously seeking a relationship with Divine Energy/God/All That Is.

When we need forgiveness, we are energetically out of balance. Therefore, we can’t receive that which we most need, even when it is all around us. We have to make space for the Energy of God if we want it. There is almost no way to make space for the Divine Presence without making a conscious effort to do so. Most of us aren’t likely to run into this energy on our way to work though that is not impossible.

We can live our entire lives without making a conscious effort to connect with our Higher Power. Why would one want to go to God if we are not sure how we will be received? If we have been raised to believe that we need to be good in order to be loved, we may have a sense of unworthiness before God. We might not want to acknowledge our mistakes and the poor choices we have made. We might not feel worthy of God’s love for ourselves. It is all too easy to think of our Higher Power as judging energy.

However, there is little to no “truth vibration” in this judging concept of Divine Presence. We see a judging God as probable because all around us, those in power often act in judging ways. We might have been told as a child that God is watching so we had better behave. Isn’t it just accepted that God is like a person, an entity, a being, and usually is separated from us? Our language reinforces this and we know lots of folks who think this way.

Divine Presence, however, is boundless energy in all its unformed perfection. Further that same spark of Divinity is inside every single person in body regardless of how covered over it might be. This has been proven again and again to me through the medium of healing. I call for healing energy with another, the energy comes, is received and healing happens. It does not matter at all who the person is. This healing energy is available for all. Based on this experience, I have developed some ways of asking for help, which work for me.

How do we ask for forgiveness or for the healing presence of God?

We ask for help

knowing that we will always be heard,
that God is always for us and never against us,
that what is needed is given, and
that there is nothing we can do which can make us unworthy of the Love of God.
I cry out to you by Rachel Sian

From John 3, “Beloved, I desire above all else that you may prosper and be in health even as your soul prospers.” God’s love for us is the constant here. We essentially cannot earn it because it is freely given, fully given and available all the time. There is nothing we can do that will set the love of God beyond our reach. We are loved because we are. Simply that. We are, therefore, we are loved.

We are children of the Great I Am/All That Is/God , created in this image, a tiny spark of the Divine. We can’t do anything that will forever separate us from the Love of God. However, we can be distanced from the Love of God by simply not being tuned into that Love or by not embracing the fact that there is real, practical help from the Divine for every aspect of our lives. We can choose to have any kind of relationship with Divine Wholeness we want. It can be close, trusting and mutually appreciative. We can have a theoretical relationship with All that Is, one we hold in abeyance in case we might need it someday when things are really bad. We can also live our lives as if the Love of Divine Oneness is something we heard about in temple, the synagogue or the church. We just never quite get around to really knowing that love for ourselves or asking for that love to come into our lives in ways we can know its fullness.

What type of relationship do you want with God? All the help you need is fully available to you, if you ask, if you embrace it, if you listen for it in the Silence of your day. Sometimes the help shows up without a conscious seeking of it in a particular situation. Who knows why that is? I like to think perhaps it is because our deepest desires and needs are always known even when we ourselves are closed to them. However, I increasingly know when I need help. If I go after that help, I feel in the act of asking, I am preparing to receive it when the timing is right.

Put your trust in what which is really worthy of your trust. Put your trust in The Great I AM, your Higher Power. I spent many years putting my trust in “being somebody”, in “having prestige”, in “being respected” and in “being really good at what I did” and probably in a myriad of other conditions, as well. Many of us have likely spent years putting our trust in others or in our outer, public selves. Take a step towards getting yourself a new partner for life, one that is always available, immensely powerful and loves you unconditionally. Get into Right Relationship with God. Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and the door shall be opened. A vibrant fully actualized relationship with Divine Spirit results in wholeness, peace, health and balance.

Start with asking forgiveness for everything you ever needed to ask forgiveness for.

Offer forgiveness to all those you need to forgive.
Atardecer (Madrid) by laullon

Find the fountain of gratitude within and visit it daily.

Speak with the Great Knowing even though you may feel unprepared, awkward or unworthy. (Those are all human judgments that will pass with time. )

The risk of stepping out with Divine Oneness is that the experience will be more loving, more insightful and more powerfully present than you can possibly imagine.

Feb 12 2009

Loving of Self

“Loving myself seems indulgent. What is all this stuff about loving oneself? I get the best feelings when I help others meet their needs regardless of myself. When I focus on myself, I feel selfish.”

A spiritual definition of loving oneself might be a place to begin. Indulging oneself is yielding to our wants, desires and whims whether or not they are good for us. Loving oneself is making space for those things which feed our soul, our heart and our bodies.

Indulging oneself might be buying another tee-shirt in a color we don’t have or drinking the third beer when two is really enough for the particular evening. Taking a walk outside to be in fresh air and allow all our cares to float away with the wind, is loving of self. Calling a good friend to reconnect because we have been meaning to do it could also be loving of self. The first examples are little treats we might want which we give ourselves permission to do. They can be fun and though they are not really needed, we might say, “go ahead, you deserve them”. The second set of choices are gifts to ourselves of something we really need and benefit from, in order to feel love’s flowing energy in our lives. They are both fine approaches to living, the latter though can bring balance and flowing energy to our sense of self and our bodies.

Hiking Swiss Alps near Grindelward by Joffe Striker — Hiking by Jofre Ferrer Swiss Alps near Grindewald

Why is loving ourselves so hard to do?

Perhaps because we have not ever seen this behavior modeled. Perhaps because when we do things for others, we get recognition and appreciation from another which strokes our ego temporarily. Perhaps it is hard to love ourselves because we don’t recognize our real needs or even know what is a loving act for ourselves.

Loads of us put a very high value on what gets external recognition, reward or influence with others. Others make daily choices that will “get them ahead”, “get them in good with so and so”, or “pay off in the long run”. For example, Washington D.C. is one place I have lived where folks actually get together at breakfast meetings for the long run. When I first moved there, I was astounded to discover this repeatedly. When we continue to fill our days with such choices, our time gets filled up with things we think will bring us concrete rewards in the future. The present can become stale and literally lifeless. Our self suffers.

Then there are choices to help others because it is the right thing to do, it is my role in life, it is required and it is certainly expected of me. Frequently, women tell me they have no time for themselves because they are fully committed to their children, their husbands, their parents, their pets, their neighbors, their synagogue ( church) and the PTA. Men often tell me between home and work, there is no time to even consider what might be a loving act for self. The very thought of it is often strange to contemplate.

A choice to love oneself is foreign in a world where we so often measure ourselves by how well we are doing externally and how fully we meet our responsibilities. A loving choice towards oneself only works when we move beyond finding pleasure in the way others see us, in our external indications of success and in the material possessions and experiences we can gather at will. A loving choice for self, requires some deep time with our own integrity to even begin to recognize what that might be for ourselves. We may have to make some mistakes before we know what really feeds us on the inside. Keep trying though, it is a pathway to the Divine.

When we love ourselves, we are actually able to come closer and closer to the divinity within. When we lose ourselves” to an endeavor of love such as a garden, a hot bath, a painting or walk up a mountain, we totally commune with ourselves. We are One with All That Is. We are not separate from All That Is unless we choose to be by not taking time to “be still and know that I AM God”. Loving oneself is a spiritual act, an act of loving kindness which enables our deep well of love to flow without consideration of the outcomes, rewards or implications. A choice for love enables us to be in the present moment which is all there really is, anyway.

We are not loving ourselves when we are pushing ourselves to do ANYTHING. We are not loving ourselves when we see ourselves as sacrificing our health, well-being or personal needs. We are not loving ourselves when we are trying to please others, influence others, impress others, get something from another or act some way other than in integrity with ourselves. We are not loving ourselves when we constantly choose others’ needs over our own needs.

Well, what about if we have to do something and the only way is to push ourselves to do it? A mental and spiritual adjustment may be needed but pushing is really not loving of self.

I was a life time hoarder before I worked with my mother to clear out her house where she had lived 40 years. I rarely threw anything out and the thought of spending an afternoon cleaning out seemed a completely distasteful experience. At 86, my mother finally decided she needed to move to a retirement center. I was the only one able to work with her to clear out the house, make the choices for keeping, throwing and selling of her things. I dreaded the thought of what had to be done.

I literally felt sick thinking that I had to do this but there was no other way presenting itself. I knew enough spiritually to realize that I needed to clear my fear of clearing out the family homestead and my fear of getting overwhelmed doing it. If I didn’t, I would simply make the process agony for myself and my mother. My mother was already overwhelmed enough for the both of us.

I asked myself, what is the most loving way I can do this without pushing myself, beating myself up, or going into anger and rage about what needs to be done? I decided to move my work around to allow for two days out of town with my mother each week until the work was finished. That schedule, I could handle. I could enjoy being with my mother if I was not paying heavily with my own life. I could have enough energy in small doses to actually be helpful. I could retreat at a given time and re-marshall my energy to be my most effective loving self. This way to work with my mother was a choice for love, and one of the biggest I had ever made. That time became a blessings for us so thoroughly and deeply, I could have never imagined it, ever. The love simply grew and grew between my mother and myself and between my brothers and me as well. The love simply took over and the work got done with the Grace of God, with Love’s Divine Presence! That choice for love turned out to be one of the best experiences Mom and I had ever had in our entire life. We laughed and cried with abandon and wove our hearts together in a new way.

When we choose to love ourselves, everyone around us benefits. We engage our highest self because we put ease, grace and love on the front burner. The act of loving oneself is deeply sacred because it helps us really know the deep integrity involved in making a loving choice for ourselves. One act of loving towards self can teach us more about love than helping everyone on the street and all our next of kin. When we put ourselves into the equation for loving acts towards others, we truly engage the part of us which acts from a pure place of service, loving without need for recognition, reward or attachment.

There is such a thing as a self-centered or selfish person. That is different from making loving decisions for oneself. A self-centered person operates from a space of lack. I need this to happen in this way and these folks to act in that way, for the following to occur. A loving choice for self can only be made from a completely different well inside. In that well is integrity, self-acceptance, allowing and kindness. From that one space, love can expand in infinite directions.

When we experiment and practice making loving decisions, then our choices to help others come from that well of loving kindness inside rather than from the well of shoulds, ought to and have tos. We can then allow the natural order of Divine Love Energy to swirl around, up and through us and extend out to all we meet. Make the choice for love of self with as much humility, kindness and gentleness as you can. You and everyone around you will be richer for this.

What choices can you make today which are loving ones for yourself ? Share these if you’d like, in the comments section at the end of this post.

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If we are already forgiven for what we have done, as it says in the Bible, why do we need to ask for forgiveness ourselves?

How do we ask for forgiveness or for the healing presence of God?

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