Living and Loving
She had been looking for her credit card reader for two days.
She arrived at the venue without yet finding it.
Calling her by name, she said right out loud to her daughter in spirit, “It it is here, show me where it is.”
She picked up a bag of bags and there was her credit card reader!
These are sacred stories. Pay attention to happenings in your life. Do you have a story to share? Send email to debra@scs-matters.com.
I am starting a two-year study with Barbara Brodsky and Aaron and John Orr. As a preparation, Barbara shared a detailed meditation/dream she had where she was asked what her highest intention was. As part of this process, a high being conducted a sort of interview. This being asked if there were those who would speak to their experience of Barbara.
The deva of the lady bugs came forth saying Barbara had been carefully removing them from the window sill and gently taking them outdoors.
A deva of the spiders said Barbara was fearful and had done great harm to their kind when they approached her. She admitted this was true.
The wise being conducting the interview said, “These balance each other out.”
As I read the rest of Barbara’s accounts, each balancing one another out, I wondered who would speak and what could be said about me.
One of my most frequent mantras is, “May all beings come to the end of suffering.” Each Sunday morning Celeste closes our meditation with the extended version including the wish that all beings know love and find peace. Is that enough?
Wondering if the times I have worried about finances and withheld my generosity be balanced by the times when you know you are supported by the abundance of the universe and give generously. “I am a co-signer on God’s bank account.” Do you know this truth?
Perhaps the moments of patiently waiting in line or traffic or saying for the third time still with kindness how to do something will be able to balance my sharp tongue and unwholesome reply when anxious about something.
What will be made of our lives? What is being made?
I had a post-Sangha conversation on the sidewalk with Don as we were leaving the library. He spoke of the great understanding coming from a true sense of what is meant by the term karma. One might steal, cheat, lie, then find themselves on the receiving end of unkindness and true lack of safe conditions for life. If you can recognize the starting of the turning of the wheel, you can release any sense of being a victim.
One of my earliest jobs was to count 50 gallon wooden barrels filled with cherries in bleach solution for making maraschino cherries. (Yes, before they become artificially red or green, toxic chemicals are used to make them white. Yuck!) Many dozens of barrels laid end-to-end in the wide open field adjacent to the warehouse of the cider mill my dad managed. Our job was to walk the barrels, stepping from one to the next, counting, making sure the people took what they paid for. This was the perfect home to a gadzillion HUGE yellow and black field spiders.
In my childish fear, I did not understand the benefit of these creatures. I only knew the fear. We would catch dozens of them in jars where they would fight to the death in this unnatural lack of territory. The unnatural environment made the spiders appear fierce and hostile.
Interestingly, years later I would discover “spider” is my one of my primary animal totems…
Thankfully, we can come to a genuine recognition of the worth of all beings and experiences.
The Four Immeasurables as a Traditional Tibetan Buddhist Prayer
May all beings have happiness and the cause of happiness.
May they be free of suffering and the cause of suffering.
May they never be disassociated from the supreme happiness which is without suffering.
May they remain in the boundless equanimity, free from both attachment to close ones and rejection of others.
Her son had passed that winter, and she and her daughter went to a place that is very sacred to her to spread his ashes.
As her daughter was taking photos, she started noticing that beams of light showed up where his ashes were placed. She would change the position of the camera or where she stood but the beams still came through.
She said, “It was an amazing experience. We spent time celebrating his life and our enduring love for him.”
These are sacred stories. Pay attention to happenings in your life. Do you have a story to share? Send email to debra@scs-matters.com.
Most of us are aware of algorithmic editing at some level. All information we access is filtered according to a predetermined “sorting.” The news is full of Russia’s manipulation of social media (Facebook) and the hidden criteria of search engines (Google). Even if you are not new to the truth and implications, check out Eli Pariser’s TED talk about filter bubbles.
Pariser says the key threat is this: “If I search for something, and you search for something, even right now at the very same time, we may get very different search results… And you know, the funny thing about this is that it’s hard to see. You can’t see how different your search results are from anyone else’s.”
The biggest algorithmic editing risk might just be to our relationships. What if we have family and friend “filter bubbles” operating and we don’t even notice? Sky Nelson-Isaacs has looked at a model for synchronicity based on a process called “meaningful history selection.” His book, Living in Flow: The Science of Synchronicity and How Your Choices Shape Your World, is due out in the spring of 2019.
This is so alive, so organic, so vital. Our brains operate just like these search engines: our thoughts and emotions are generated by our memories, and then our experiences are generated by our expectations. I don’t see you as you. I see you as my history of you. I don’t experience you as you, I experience you as I expect you. I am co-creating you in my image of you.
Of course, as Jerry Ashmore wrote, “YOU” and “I” don’t exist on the ultimate level of reality. Even at the relative level we can see this is truth. We can look at our hand and see all of the fingers and we know the fingers are a part of the hand. We know the hand is also part of the body. Everything and everyone is part of everything and everyone.
A precious friend has a life-long history of difficult interactions with a sister that has resulted now in a choice to “put her out of my life.” Conversations with my friend are around my hope/wish/insistence we can access genuine freedom inside buy changing how we look at things.
Experience the bliss of Self-Respect and give respect to others at all times. When I am prejudiced against another, my narrow vision and small heart lower my self-dignity and self-worth.
If you are insulted by another person, and you become angry in response, the sin is the anger which you create not the insult. You are asleep to the truth that you just hurt yourself, and that you are the creator of your anger not the other person. And now you have a recording in your consciousness that contains an image of the other surrounded by the energy of anger. You put it there, not them. Next time you see them, up comes the anger again, and in that moment you are at your least effective, paralyzed by self created anger, you are effectively out of the game until you cool down.
“Thought for Today” ~ Brahma Kumaris
August of 2017 was a month of ginormous change. We were settling into our new tiny home. My brother-in-law, Jim, passed peacefully early in the morning on Wednesday, August 16. My nephew, David, was released from prison and began what was to be one year of parole. Over the months, I have mentioned him in previous blog posts. The story of his being accepted at the men’s mission in Holland (Google Maps and 70×7); helping him get his commercial driver’s license back (A Wonderful Week); calling on kitty therapy to breathe through a crisis (Pure Positive Energy); confessions of dealing with fearful patterns (The Voice of Assurance); and his being incarcerated again (Depression: The Secret We Share).
Through each of these posts, my fingers on the keyboard brought clarity, peace, and sanity in times of calamity and collapse. Today, again, I write.
Last week David got out of Jail, and his mom picked him up and brought him to St. Joseph to get his truck. His job was going to keep him, and the place where he was staying was going to let him come back. Within 24 hours he cut himself out of the tether, and went on a binge again. Two days later he called his mom, asking for $200 or the dealers were going to “bash his head in.” She told him she didn’t have the money, and for him to try to get away. He ended up having my brother-in-law come and get him and he turned himself in again. His parole agent said David is in a very dark place and has asked to be sent back to prison saying parole is too hard.
These posts are about my process, as much as they are about David. I share his pain, his disappointment, his discouragement, his despair.
I am reminded of a funeral I went to decades ago. I do not even remember now who the woman was but I remember she had committed suicide. The pastor talked about the way we tend to view the whole by looking at a single part. He lifted up how hard she had fought the depression, how many moments of success she had experienced, how much she loved life and her family. He reminded us to remember those moments too, not just this moment of her death.
Part of my therapy this week was watching Momma Mia! (again). Feeling my chest tighten, witnessing the lump in my throat, and welcoming tears as Meryl Streep and Amanda Seyfried sing “Slipping Through My Fingers” , I knew I was also watching for David. Here are the lyrics, but if you can, please, click on the link to watch the clip. Streep is brilliant. Seeing this clip is moving because it holds such truth for our human condition.
Schoolbag in hand, she leaves home in the early morning
Waving goodbye with an absent-minded smile
I watch her go with a surge of that well-known sadness
And I have to sit down for a while
The feeling that I’m losing her forever
And without really entering her world
I’m glad whenever I can share her laughter
That funny little girl
Slipping through my fingers all the time
I try to capture every minute
The feeling in it
Slipping through my fingers all the time
Do I really see what’s in her mind
Each time I think I’m close to knowing
She keeps on growing
Slipping through my fingers all the time
Sleep in our eyes, her and me at the breakfast table
Barely awake, I let precious time go by
Then when she’s gone there’s that odd melancholy feeling
And a sense of guilt I can’t deny
What happened to the wonderful adventures
The places I had planned for us to go
(Slipping through my fingers all the time)
Well, some of that we did but most we didn’t
And why I just don’t know
Slipping through my fingers all the time
I try to capture every minute
The feeling in it
Slipping through my fingers all the time
Do I really see what’s in her mind
Each time I think I’m close to knowing
She keeps on growing
Slipping through my fingers all the time
Sometimes I wish that I could freeze the picture
And save it from the funny tricks of time
Slipping through my fingers…
Slipping through my fingers all the time
Schoolbag in hand she leaves home in the early morning
Waving goodbye with an absent-minded smile..
Songwriters: Benny Andersson / Bjoern K Ulvaeus / Bjorn Ulvaeus
Slipping Through My Fingers lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group
This morning I hold my mala beads as I let the illusion wash away:
Marker bead: Namo Prajna, Paramita Hridaya. Homage to the wisdom mind.
63rd Bead: Whatever has the nature to arise has the nature to cease and is not me nor mine.
64th bead: When wholesome thoughts arise, cultivate the wholesome.
When unwholesome thoughts arise, abandon the unwholesome.
65th bead: Tend the contents of the mind with compassion, as a mindful gardener tends his garden.
66th bead: This is the way to purify the mind and
remove the clouds that obscure the vision of ultimate reality.
Intention bead: In this way will I train myself.
David is not his actions, skillful or unskillful. He is not his thoughts, wholesome or unwholesome. He is not his emotions, pleasant or painful. Nor are you and neither am I. May all beings come to the end of suffering.
P.S. Let me know if you would like a copy of the 108 Bead “Daily Recollection” version by Barbara Brodsky of Deep Spring Meditation Center.
As human beings,
our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world
that is the myth of the “atomic age”
as in being able to remake ourselves.
~ Mahatma Gandhi
(Sign up to receive the “Word for the Day” from gratefulness.org.)
Signing up to receive inspiration daily (via email) is one of the many gifts of being here now during the information and technology age. Today’s thoughts from myriad sources really resonate to the hopes and dreams I have for all sentient beings, so this blog post is dedicated to you.
On this day of your life
Debra, I believe God wants you to know …… that when you see the light at the end of the tunnel,
it is not beneficial to go out and build more tunnels.It was John Quinton who observed that politicians do
that. Maybe you’ve caught yourself doing it, too. Just
when things look like they’re getting better, you start
seeing more things that “aren’t right,”
or “could go wrong.”The Universe is essentially a friendly place.
So friendly, in fact, that it will give you
exactly what you expect it to.Isn’t that wonderful? Of course,
it depends on what you expect…Neale Donald Walsch
(Sign up to receive Neale’s “Daily Inspirations” at today@nealedonaldwalsch.com)
For many years my friend has shared the Brahma Kumaris’ daily thought with me. Each of those comes with an image. Today’s image speaks louder than a thousand words:
The message that accompanied the image is: The greatest act of generosity is the ability to see beyond the weaknesses of others, helping them to recognize their innate qualities and core values.
In the USA, visit the Brahma Kumaris at www.brahmakumaris.org/us/o
For their guided meditation online visit: www.just-a-minute.org
The final gift I opened this morning was a delightful video interview with Shinzen Young: What is Enlightenment? If you are curious about moving beyond the pain and frustration of relative reality, check him out. His has studied the science and experienced the freedom that comes from making meditation a part of your life. Visit: Meditation is Real at https://www.shinzen.org/
In closing, I will use yesterday’s message from Betty Lue because she is on the West Coast so those come in later in the day.
Affirmations:
Love is the way to peace.
I quickly recognize, forgive and erase all blocks to Love.
It is safe, fun and easy to love, only Love.
All good comes from Loving without condition.
Closing:
Now is the time for us to engage one another in the dialogue of how to love and be loved.
We can begin with our family and ourselves.
We can ask one another: How can I love you better?
We can forgive ourselves for being afraid to love with innocence and trust, as a child loves.
We can choose again to remove (forgive and erase( all obstacles to being Loving always.
We can undo the false beliefs and limited thinking that separates us from one another.
We can choose to live in Love, with Love in our Hearts and Minds as Love in our world.
Life works when we Love,
Betty Lue
Sign up to receive Betty Lue’s Loving Reminders at http://daily.lovingreminders.org/
What an honor it is to “remake ourselves” as we live moment-to-moment with daily inspiration!
P.S. The heading of the last daily inspiration I opened this morning: “No tap dancing around problems.” Amen and amen….
Every day humans are making choices. Choices about where we live, what we do for work, where we go for play. We choose how we think, feel, and what we do and say. We make choices about our beliefs. This weekend, like many, was full of choices.
It has been fifty years since the class I would have graduated with completed high school, and last night was the class of BHHS Class of 1068 Reunion. One of the choices I made was not to attend. We did go to Babe’s (that bar holds a lot of history for a lot of us) on Friday night for the pre-reunion party. I enjoyed very much connecting with one woman I did not remember from school. She is a clinical therapist. I am anything but….
She shared her foreboding of her father’s death in an auto accident. She even knew where it would happen, and asked her dad not to go there. He said, “I am a good driver,” and he went anyway.
I told her, “Now, that is the sort of thing my life is full of.” I started keeping a journal 50 years ago to prove to myself I was not making up knowing things. We are participating in an experience called life that is more connected and less limited by time and space than we can comprehend.
We exchanged contact information and I hope we do follow up. It is my sense we have a lot to offer one another…
Rather than attending the reunion, Saturday evening I was enjoying a fabulous low-carb dinner with an intimate group who know me well and love me.
After dessert we played “Catch Phrase” which has been a favorite family game for years. I told the group about my mother-in-law having played the game with us one time in Tennessee. ‘Goldfish’ was the word she was trying to get her team to say. Her first clue was, “It’s orange, and it’s in a bowl.” That is a really good clue.
Unfortunately, that was her only clue. She would say it over and over, more and more slowly. “It’s o-r-a-n-g-e and it’s in a b-o-w-l.” She would say it over and over, more and more loudly. “IT’S ORANGE AND IT’S IN A BOWL.” We were all relieved when the buzzer went off and put us out of our misery.
One lesson worth learning about our choices is the importance of living free from regret. I have enjoyed looking at the photos posted from last night’s reunion this morning. It looks like those who went had a good time. I did recognize some faces and some names but it was a class of close to 500 and I did not know most of the people. I sincerely appreciate the choice I made to not attend.
Moments after I shared the story about my mother-in-law’s goldfish clue-giving fiasco, it was time for our host to give the clue.
He looked at the word briefly, smiled broadly, and said simply: “It’s orange, and it’s in a bowl.”
The entire table yelled out in unison, “Goldfish!”