I was accused of being calm and thoughtful the other day and I had to look around to see who she was talking about.  I don’t see myself as using “calm thoughtful reflection.”  I feel jumpy and scared like a little rabbit one minute, then sour and pouty the next.  I do feel like I’m in a neutral zone between passionate waves.  I guess the last wave lasted a while, but since I am an adrenalin junkie, I have trouble sitting in the trough of the wave.

Sanctifying the space is such a universal spiritual truth.  In fact I heard that nirvana lies between the breaths someplace.  I do know that to slow my breath at every stage is a tool that always works for me.  Why don’t I do it more often?  Only God knows, and She ain’t telling right now.

So maybe just holding that thought today–just enjoy long slow deep easy breathing.  Ok, let’s try that.

Hafiz is my inspiration this morning:

What I learned this weekend from a couple mentors, spiritual buddies, is to honor the silence.  I am in a neutral zone and sometimes I fight it, wanting to go back to frantic codependency and overbooking to “help” people.  What a joke.

Now is the time for opening up to the space within.  I plan to return to reading the Tao Te Chin–it is the empty space in a cup that makes it useful.  It is the hole in my ear that allows for earrings.  It is the sleeve in my shirt that opens up for my arm, the neck for my head so I can wear these clothes of this life.

Allow for space and honor the silence between the breaths.

There’s this theory that the only two forces in the universe are fear and love.  Fear is constriction and love is expansion.  So why do I feel like staying small?  What’s the fear?  I suppose it is the feeling that I won’t succeed, so why try.  Or that it takes effort and I have this little self-righteous brat voice (AM NOT!!) that I deserve everything immediately without any effort.

Being born took effort–did you notice?  And life in a body with a pull-date can be a struggle–but it is in the attitude of the body-holder.  Many people with serious body dysfunctions have a brilliant can-do attitude.  Why not me today?

Well, let’s just move to the love part and out of the constriction.  Since I need to stretch (wow, what a concept), dress and move. Interesting that the habit of work gets the body moving, but the deeper knowledge of eternal light of spirit has me reconfirming the love here every morning.

Aren’t we lucky to know about the expansive warm comforting flying free arms of Her Love.

Being human and having a body that wears out and has dysfunctions can be a pain in the ass.  It hurts when I sit.  What does that tell me?  “Don’t sit” you say.  Well, I suppose I could get a tall table and stand at work instead of sitting at a desk.

Here I am at my home office standing at my keyboard.  That’s a bit awkward, but it is easier on my butt.  My body telling me to walk more than sit.  My bills and boss telling me to sit and do work more than run around having fun.

Following spiritual lessons as translated through the body is a tricky path.  And, as this human distracted spirit, I doubt myself at every turn.  Sure, exercise.  Leave my job and be a poor hermit.  Just walk more.  When, in the middle of the night?  Who needs sleep and rest. 

They say to give up the argument.  If I gave up this human/spirit argument, would I expire and go to heaven?  The quest of an addict–to go back to the womb the fast (ineffective) way.

I lean on the Divine One to remind me of bliss.

A popular saying in my neighborhood goes something like “we get a daily reprieve based on our spiritual condition.”  Phew, just living with others can tax the patience.  Their moods, complaints, irritations and erratic behavior.  Then there is the loving affection, the laughter and deep conversations.

I need a daily connection, a constant conversation, with the Divine of me.  The Divine in me.  To remind me that I am connected to all.  That I am truly living as each one of those around me.  That I do not need to dive into another person’s angst–I have plenty of my own.  And that “getting over it” is not necessarily the goal of life.  Breathing through it might be a bit more appropriate.

Breathing into the Divine Me–the Dear One, the Sweet Lady, the Handsome Man inside me– sounds even better.  Let’s do that today.

Are “truth, justice and love” truly eternal elements that are beneath all the contrary images we see these days?  Is it just the adrenalin-seeking media that sells paranoia, death, tragedy and violence?  Or am I a pollyanna sticking my head in the sand.

I think it all comes down to attitude, which is all in the beholder.  Half-full, half-empty or “I ordered a cheeseburger” perspective.  And the practice of remembering that part of us are bigger than our bodies, as expansive as our imaginations, with energy to transform the world–spiritual practice–is the key to feeling that balance. 

It is such a practice to remember that more than my fingers on the keyboard, more than the tired bones getting ready for another day at the factory, I am a start-child, at-one with the universe, a brilliant point of light.

Today I take the bushel basket off myself and let the eternal “me” shine.

Once there was a tiny embryo in the womb that wanted more–she pushed and kicked.  Finally the prison she was in opened a door and she dove out.  But it was hard and constraining and difficult and a chore–she was born.

Wanting something, seeing a treat, she screams at her mother.  Tired and irritated that the world doesn’t revolve around her enough, she fusses and fights.  And does not get her way, but falls asleep.

Teenage years finds her pressing that envelope–staying out late, trying the drinking drugging thing cautiously–and then recklessly.  She worries her folks, gets into scrapes, flails at the world with her beauty and boldness.  Finally a personality of courage and crazy sets in.

Motherhood grabs her by the belly and slams her down into double-time reality.  Work, home, kids, husband, she does the whole routine.  Until one day, late at night, kids asleep, husband drunk on the couch, in her work clothes she sits in the kitchen and hears herself say: Is this all there is?  Months later she goes out drunk and breaks the family apart.

Years later, very sober, the family readjusts in a new configuration.  There are arguments, there is pain, there are rivers of tears.  And there is reconciliation and peace.

Stories of struggle and grace.

What would it be like to live on a higher plane each day?  To be above the tit for tat, the duality battle, the insecurity story and see the beautiful globe of wholeness.

It won’t be that I am “above it all” as the feet still always are trudging on the ground.  A trudge is not a bad thing, it is constant, persistent and real–no matter what.

But in the plane flying up up over the land, seeing the busy highways, the pure blue water, houses and houses, rolling hills and then turning up over the mountain ranges–all of reality expands.

It feels open, free, and soaring.

Yellow bushes burst out of their gray shells.    A squirrel perched on the fence wiggles it’s tail–communicating to the neighbors.  Brilliant bird calls soothe the overcast morning.

I see tiny tender pink buds easing out from bare stiff twigs on the tree.  From nothing to everything, full of potential, minding their own business just pushing out from the smooth bark to fragile powerful green.

Thank all the Divine Ones, the Ultimate One and the Tao beyond all Gods for this yearly reminder that life renews at each moment.