Thursday, September 26, 2019

LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT

Tomorrow marks the first anniversary of my friend Roger’s passing. It was as shocking as it was sudden. No illness or warning. No chance to prepare or say goodbye. His massive heart gave way to immortality and instantly he was gone.

I have long been fascinated by such transitions. I have known several people that have exited embodiment in a similar way. My fascination is in my own inquiry as to whether there is any indication for them that death was imminent. Was there any notion, any awareness that the end of this lifetime was about to come to a close? Did the last goodbye with loved ones somehow feel unique, more precious, more vital? Was there an extended embrace, a lasting gaze, and a one-last-time look of love?

Though I didn’t frame it in such a way I vividly remember my final experience of Roger in this realm. I did not have one-to-one interaction that day. Though from a distance it was somehow both infinite and intimate, usual and extraordinary. I was doing what I do, and Roger was being Roger in relationship to my expression. Yet it was curious, profound, memorable. He captured my attention in a way that I am rarely riveted while doing my work.

And that was our goodbye in this level of experience.

One of the myriad gifts from this and my many lifetime goodbye’s is the reoccurring awareness that I never know when an embrace will be the last. When the words I speak will be the final declaration to those around me. When my unconsciousness will haunt me because of how I ended a relationship, not knowing the reactivity would be a farewell address. When the time I did not take the time would result in no more time.

If this were my own last day on earth, how would I consciously show up? How long might I choose to embrace, linger, gaze, and intentionally give love? How might I gift others with the legacy of my final memory? What would I regret not being, doing, giving, and contributing? How might I allow the ordinariness of this very day be an extraordinary series of precious moments?

Having survived three life-threatening illnesses I am gifted with the mindfulness that in a real and relative way tomorrow is not promised. This is augmented by the fact that I have far more people on the other side than I do on this. Roger joined a host of loves that though physically gone are vitally a part of my present day living.

A precious part of my remembrance of them is in knowing that I do not know when I will join them in that Luminous state of pure being. I think and feel that I am prepared. I do not fear death, though the process of how that might happen continues to give me pause.

Being prepared to die is what makes me more able to fully live. More awake to my inner-action and interactions. More conscious of how I show up, relate, respond. More decisive of my energetic last will and testament to this life.

My last will is to love. My lasting testament is that though I have loved imperfectly and have suffered loss repeatedly I still chose to love. I have not allowed continued hurts to keep within me a closed heart. I have needed to set boundaries and even to remove people from my direct sphere of experience. But I did not confuse boundary with essential belonging. I have chosen to continue to consciously bless even if it needed to be from a distance.

And if these are the final words I ever share please know that this my life has been a wondrous and grand adventure. I have willed to love and that is a testament to the Power of Source in a human experience. And I am grateful that you have been a part of it.

Thursday, September 19, 2019

TRUTH TELLING FREEDOM

It took me decades to finally be able to tell myself the truth about myself.

Ouch.

When I finally dared to tell myself the truth about myself the truth did indeed, as sacred writings promise, set me free.

It was an incredibly painful experience.

It was equally liberating.

Though I use the word “was” it is a process that is still occurring, and likely will until I finally lay these sometimes-weary bones down. Every day there is another humiliation. The more I seek to embody the Light the more it shines into my unresolved darkness.

Though it is far more comfortable to blame you for my woes, it is always my ability to respond that is at stake. Projections show me what I have disowned. I am always looking into the mirror of my own consciousness. I am always viewing life with what I am viewing with.

Ouch.

Truth telling is painful. And truth telling about oneself is the only way to truly be free.

It is aggravating and enervating. It requires courage and bravery and grit. It is a never-ending process that refines us as it awakens us. It strips away the dross of denial and suppression. It takes us into what we most don’t want to see.

Though it is far more popular to pink paint our self-image for the sake of fitting in that paint job will cost you. It will cost you the profoundly liberating experience of true honesty and authenticity. Pink painting will cast you into the role of fugitive, always hiding what you don’t want the world to see. It will cost you compassion and mercy and empathy. It will cost you connection, and it will cost you belonging.

You cannot lie or role play for the sake of fitting in and know true belonging.

We all either unconsciously or consciously utilize “Cosmic Central Casting” to bring people into our lives who perfectly demonstrate for us what we most need to see. How we respond to these characters will either perpetuate our projections or free our unconsciousness.

I am clearer than ever about my own imperfection. I know how deep my commitment is to be an embodiment of all that is Source. And I know that I flounder in that unfoldment. I am equally clear that your stories about me have little to nothing to do with me. I am a character in your story just as you are one in mine. There is nothing you can say about me that I haven’t already said about myself.

And that has set me free.

And so today I dare to tell the truth about myself.

I watch the tendency to want to tell my version of the truth about you. I mostly take a pass on that these days. And in my imperfection sometimes I fall into the trap of telling my truth about you.

When I do, I do not stay in that trap for long. I am here to tell my truth, not what I think yours might be. If I am open enough to observe compassionately your painful behavior, I know I am awake to the truth of being. I know I have been truthful enough about myself to be a beneficent presence to you.

It all comes back to daring to tell the truth about myself to myself.

And that is the truth that sets me free.

Thursday, September 12, 2019

THOUGHTS AND PRAYERS

Thoughts of prayer is not enough.

Read that again.

Thoughts OF prayer is most certainly not enough.

From so many directions these days we hear the anger-laced cry that thoughts and prayers are not enough. This is coming from politicians, celebrities, social media, and even clergy. The implication is that rather than think and pray, we must do something. Do something, anything. In an over-masculinized society, the emphasis is always on doing. And perhaps the only thing more impotent in our culture than thought is prayer.

I have yet to hear this cry from someone who I felt had really spent any deep and qualitative time in prayer.

I would be the first to agree that indeed thought is not enough. The constant mind-spin of thinking, commentary, and narrative has little potential or power. While a vast majority of the world’s population thinks its way through prayer, I would offer that the equation robs prayer of its transformative power.

Prayer is not thought. Praying is not thinking.

Deep, progressive levels of prayer originate in and then from the heart-center. It is vibrational, not conceptual. It is a quality of attention that then transforms energy via consciousness. It is felt, not thought. It is not so much something that we do. It is something that happens within us when we so allow.

We pray when we realize we are being prayer.

To put enormous amounts of time and energy into thinking about problems, and then outlining how we think an outer god should fix things, is certainly futile. From that perspective I agree that thoughts and prayers are not enough. The thought stream energizes the problem and the “prayer” misuses the laws of consciousness. If that is the prescription for solution, we had better indeed get busy. The innate problem with said busyness is that it is imbued with problem-energy. It escalates what we seek to be rid of.

Deep levels of prayer do not directly deal with “the problem.” Praying is opening to allow the Presence that is God to shine forth from our receptive and spacious hearts. This type of prayer does not frame things as problems, rather it sees unutilized potential. It does not set out to fix anything. It simply shines forth as a higher reality. It does not devolve into mind spin. It aligns within the Presence and then it holds presence. It is a soft and compassionate gaze. And in its softness, it is unstoppable.

Thoughts of prayer is not enough.

Felt-sense, heart-centered, embodied prayer is enough, and it is more. It is action. It is inner action becoming interaction. It is Divine Activity. It is Presence which is all Power.

Don’t think about it. Be it. Be prayer this day and then do what you feel called to do.

It is collective prayer and the resulting transformed consciousness that will change this world.

I’m in. Are you?