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.

I hear that phrase in my head: There is only one of us.  Wouldn’t it be interesting to go through the whole day considering that we are one huge organism–all of us tiny atoms or bacteria or photons in a galactic body.

Somehow it soothes the idea that I should be doing something big, something special, saving Japan, feeding the poor, working overtime.  I am a cog in a most excellent being, doing my precise “cogness” as best as I can.  Waking, moving, eating, typing, talking, worrying–everything as it should be for this little special “one of a kind” just like so many other millions of cogs.

It connects me to all you I don’t know, that we are on the same planet, breathing the same air, “at one” with each other.

It isn’t as easy as it sounds–to express myself.  I am an emotional person and I go up and down like waves–sometimes big and noisy, splashing everyone around me; sometimes tiny little lake waves like left over tears melting the sand.

And when I have some feelings about what YOU are doing wrong–well I certainly want to EXPRESS myself!  But that expression is not really about you–your actions are hitting a trigger inside of me and from all my years on the planet I want to gather resentment and make you change.  Those triggers have been set from ancient history, other lives, dead parents, trivial silly misinterpretations turned into massive fables of betrayal.  And I want YOU to pay for it.

I need to disengage myself from the story and allow myself to just rest on the path, sit on a little park bench and open my ears to the chorus of birds singing around me.  Let my heart hear the joy of life and let the waves of feeling wash me, soothe me, heal me through to grace.

So, I’ve been chanting “I love you” over and over again, as if I’m saying that to my God and She’s saying it to me.  But I still suffer, being human and all, with insecurity and lack of self-appreciation.  With a little inspiration, I’m now chanting “I love ME!”  And that seems to need an exclamation point with it.

If I am truly a child of the Divine, having an eternal burning flame of the Galactic Fire inside me, then the Divine is inside of me.  How can I not love the Divine-Me if I love the Dear One so much?!  It has revolutionized my tenderness to myself.

Thus, no matter mistakes (still have a human side), or stumbles, I am charged with enjoying every bit of this earthly paradise and bumper cars–on an adventure from pure spirit like a warrior trying a new feisty horse.