Debra Basham

Living and Loving

Tag: worry

  • Divine Order

    For three years she had been struggling with the issue in of bleeding in her colon. The things that she had gone through — including transfusions to ease the horrific anemia exhaustion, hospitalization and IV antibiotics to fight infection, and weeks of daily sessions in that hyperbaric oxygen chamber (traumatic, with her claustrophobia) but nothing she had done had eradicated the risk of colon cancer.

    Telling his nurse her guts were hostile, the surgeon finally agreed to do surgery. Heroic efforts for preparation followed months of scheduling delays, but the operating room had been booked for the entire day.

    They made the early morning trip and she was as prepared as she thought she could be. Things did not go the way she expected. After administering the epidural, her hand went numb. The surgery was scrapped!

    The risk of a cerebrovascular accident (stroke) had her admitted to ER and waiting hours for an MRI rather than going into pre-op, OR, post-op and having the surgery in her rear view mirror.

    Three years of the stress. The following evening through a flood of tears she named the disappointment, worry, and fear to her good friend and wellness counselor. They had journeyed together for decades, and she finally broke down, saying, “I can’t go through this again. Maybe this is the time the Lord is going to take me. But I don’t want to leave my family.”

    “You won’t leave your family,” her friend assured her, “we all leave our bodies, but we do not leave our loved ones.”

    As they continued sharing her friend asked her at what age she had first been feeling disappointment, worry and fear. The light went on. She was six years old, and her mother was the patient — in that very hospital! She spoke with renewed faith in divine order, saying simply, “I couldn’t know what was happening. I couldn’t know what the future held. All I experienced was fear. Every time I walk in there I go back to her. Thank you so very much. I feel much better and hopeful.”

    Reading from the Daily Word the following morning:

    Trusting God I release attachments and rely on divine order.

      How many times have I realized in hindsight that my life is actually better because the situation didn’t work out the way I expected or I didn’t get what I thought I wanted?

      These memories remind me of the importance of patience as I wait for divine order to unfold. Even if I’m tempted, I don’t get attached to rigid time frames or specific outcomes.

      I get clear on my goals — healthy relationships, career satisfaction, more love in my life. I take these desires into prayer and spiritually surrender them. With a grateful heart, I release my desire for control, trusting the best outcome may be beyond my imagination.

      My mind may be limited, but divine mind is limitless. I relax, release and trust divine order.

      Psalm 119:18
      Open my eyes so that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.

  • The End of Suffering

    There will be something,
    anguish or elation,
    that is peculiar to this day alone.
    I rise from sleep, and say:
    Hail to the morning!
    Come down to me, my beautiful unknown.

    ~ Jessica Powers Word for the Day (gratefulness.org)

    Today’s journal entry:

      Wednesday, June 1, 2022

      Dear Holy Spirit,

      During the night I woke up with worry about Joel. This morning I know it will be helpful to do a drawing, but I’m guided to first do a three-card spread asking why, with all the release I’ve been doing, does that happen. As I’m reaching in the closet to get the cards, I hear, “You are with John, so you are constantly worried about him. Because you are not with Joel, the worry pops into awareness and you notice that. Let’s look at the seed of that worry; the manifestation of it; and the path through it. Then we will do the drawing.

      Seed of Worry – 8 of Fire Traveling

      Everybody is trying to have some destination in life. But the implications…. You were hurrying so hard, and you were worrying so hard, and this is the outcome.

      Manifestation of Worry – 4 of Fire Participation

      We are behaving almost like blind people. In such a beautiful world we are living in a small pond of our own misery. You could not have dreamed of a better universe.

      Path Through Worry – 14 Transformation

      The conflict is in man. Unless it is resolved there, it cannot be resolved anywhere else…. The politics is within you, it Is between two parts of the mind.

      A very small bridge exists.

      If this bridge is strengthened these two minds become one, the meeting of the male and female within, the meeting of yin and yang, the meeting of the left and right, the meeting of logic and illogic, the meeting of Plato and Aristotle.

    This all reminds me of a poem I’ve used many times at funerals. Note* Today at 11:00 we will attend the Celebration of Life of the father of a friend.

    THE STATION

    By Robert J. Hastings

    Tucked away in our subconscious minds is an idyllic vision in which we see ourselves on a long journey that spans an entire continent. We’re traveling by train and, from the windows, we drink in the passing scenes of cars on nearby highways, of children waving at crossings, of cattle grazing in distant pastures, of smoke pouring from power plants, of row upon row upon row of cotton and corn and wheat, of flatlands and valleys, of city skylines and village halls.

    But uppermost in our conscious minds is our final destination–for at a certain hour and on a given day, our train will finally pull into the Station with bells ringing, flags waving, and bands playing. And once that day comes, so many wonderful dreams will come true. So restlessly, we pace the aisles and count the miles, peering ahead, waiting, waiting, waiting for the Station.

    “Yes, when we reach the Station, that will be it!” we promise ourselves. “When we’re eighteen. . . win that promotion. . . put the last kid through college. . . buy that 450SL Mercedes-Benz. . . have a nest egg for retirement!” From that day on we will all live happily ever after.

    Sooner or later, however, we must realize there is no Station in this life, no one earthly place to arrive at once and for all. The journey is the joy. The Station is an illusion–it constantly outdistances us. Yesterday’s a memory, tomorrow’s a dream. Yesterday belongs to a history, tomorrow belongs to God. Yesterday’s a fading sunset, tomorrow’s a faint sunrise. Only today is there light enough to love and live.

    So, gently close the door on yesterday and throw the key away. It isn’t the burdens of today that drive men mad, but rather the regret over yesterday and the fear of tomorrow. Regret and fear are twin thieves who would rob us of today.

    “Relish the moment” is a good motto, especially when coupled with Psalm 118:24, “This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.”

    So stop pacing the aisles and counting the miles. Instead, swim more rivers, climb more mountains, kiss more babies, count more stars. Laugh more and cry less. Go barefoot oftener. Eat more ice cream. Ride more merry-go-rounds. Watch more sunsets. Life must be lived as we go along. The Station will come soon enough.

    The drawing on my page today is a spiral. From the upper right to the lower left the ink dances across the page. From birth to death, our lives unfold.

    The words are about the teaching on emptiness from the Heart Sutra – Śūnyatā is the Pali word.

    This “self” we cherish so devotedly is nothing more than a temporary coming together of various aggregates: form, sensations, perceptions, mental activity or formations, and consciousness. It is EMPTY. Suffering ends with the recognition of its origin – grasping, clinging, aversion.

    I title the drawing: The End of Suffering.

  • A New Hairdo for Zeus

    Will Rogers says if you find yourself in a hole, stop digging. That is very valuable to remember!

    The twinges in my low back started on Sunday, in anticipation of going to Joel’s overnight to take Zeus, Joel’s male cat, to the vet for de-matting of his fur (under sedation).

    Zeus with his severely matted fur.

    Zeus needed to have nothing to eat after midnight, and no water after 6:00 am, and he needed to be at the vet office about 7:45 am. The overnight made the most sense, but I could feel the tension building. By the time I left for Kalamazoo, my low back was so ouchy, I was not sure that I would be able to carry my laptop into the house.

    As it turned out, I may as well not have brought it because when I got into the bedroom in the lower level, I realized I had no Wifi available. At 8:15 pm I crawled in to bed without any of my usual distractions: no music, no email, no videos, no podcasts. Just an aggressively affectionate McGee who was letting me know August 2021 is a long time from November 2019, the last time I had shared the downstairs overnight with her.

    It was more challenging than I had imagined to get an 18-pound-formerly-feral-and-terrified cat into the “Pet Taxi.” I began barking orders like a drill sergeant. Fortunately, Joel had been in the army, and he was able to assist. I could not have done it without him….

    The entire drive was punctuated with mournful meowing. It sounded just like Zeus was saying, “OUT…. OUT…. O-U-T….”

    Admittedly, Zeus was not alone in his stressful emotions; I also cried during his check-in process.

    Just before 2:00 pm, I spoke with Dr. Christine Williamson. She is amazing. She said Zeus did great, and she commented on what a wonderful guy he is. She did not do a full lion-cut, but was able to trim out all of the severe matting and leave his fur intact on the rest of his body.

    Here is Zeus with his new hairdo.


    While there, they did routine blood work, and everything looks good. His glucose level was high, but that could have been from stress. Probably a good thing they did not check my glucose level….

    A shout out to Dr. Williamson and everyone at Mattawan Animal Hospital.

    Joel went with me to pick Zeus up, and although Zeus was still meowing, on the drive home I swear he was saying, “Home…. Home…. H-O-M-E….”

    As anticipated, it was much easier to get him out of the pet carrier! And his beautiful fur will fill back in.

    Here is Zeus before his fur was matted.

    That brings me back to Will Rogers.

    Anticipatory stress is much worse than the experience….

  • What Else Is

    The definition of complaining is the expression of dissatisfaction or annoyance about something.

    A popular phrase is to speak of an undesired state (for example, complaining) as your eating rat poison expecting the rat to die. It is not always obvious, but our emotional state has myriad influences on US.

    Often, John and I remind one another of the valuable awareness to not waste our creative energy complaining about what is. Any moron can do that.

    Real wisdom arises as you devote your creative energy to what else is.

    This morning, a short poem came through which articulates this so well:

      What Else Is

      Stewing or fuming
      about what is
      such a waste
      of energy

      Open heart
      open mind
      open up to
      what else is

      Debra Basham 05-13-2021

    Sometimes it is helpful to be willing to see in what ways what is might be protecting you from what else is. Feeling anger might protect you from feeling powerlessness. Feeling impatience might protect you from feeling worry. Feeling boredom might protect you from feeling discouragement. A handy way to explore all of this is to be aware of an emotional guidance scale, such as the one described by Abraham-Hicks:

    1. Joy/Appreciation/Empowerment/Freedom/Love
    2. Passion
    3. Enthusiasm/Eagerness/Happiness
    4. Positive Expectation/Belief
    5. Optimism
    6. Hopefulness
    7. Contentment
    8. Boredom
    9. Pessimism
    10. Frustration/Irritation/Impatience
    11. Overwhelment (feeling overwhelmed)
    12. Disappointment
    13. Doubt
    14. Worry
    15. Blame
    16. Discouragement
    17. Anger
    18. Revenge
    19. Hatred/Rage
    20. Jealousy
    21. Insecurity/Guilt/Unworthiness
    22. Fear/Grief/Desperation/Despair/Powerlessness

    Thought for Today

    Sometimes you repeatedly find yourself faced with an unpleasant situation, until the mind begins to obsess with it. You may begin to ask the question, why am I so attracted to this obsession? It’s not a conceptual question. One begins then to investigate the nature of obsession itself.

    Different of you have different patterns of obsession. For example, some go into old stories, casting blame on others or on yourself. Others may look for a way to solve it, planning. Others of you may just feel anger and helplessness and move into a state of depression.

    You each have your own patterns. This is part of understanding the nature of obsession, to understand the habitual patterning with obsession. When mind becomes obsessive, what do you gain?

    ~ Aaron

    Aaron, as channeled by Barbara Brodsky, refers to emotions as “aggregates.” Aggregates are non-self. Aggregates are impermanent. Aggregates arise because of the senses, triggered by smell, touch, taste, sight and hearing.

    Aggregates rise up out from the sense experience and subside when the sense experience of our life changes. We feel worry when a person we care about is experiencing a health challenge. But worry (each emotion) is an aggregate, so YOU are not that worry.

    In fact, the one who is aware of worry is not worried. That one is aware.

    This is not about trying to not worry. In fact, as our friend, Yoda, says, “Do or Do Not. There is No Try.”


    Hmmmmm, if there is just do or do not that makes me really appreciate what else is….