Stopping the War

For the month of November, our theme is A Path With Heart,by Buddhist author Jack Kornfield. The subtitle of the book is A Guide through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life. It is a delightful book with moving stories, insightful practices and practical information. It is about loving every aspect of ourselves --warts and wonders.

Kornfield wisely points out the need to bring kind attention to all the parts of ourselves. He especially emphasizes bringing loving attention to our wounds. 

He writes: "The unawakened mind tends to make war against the way things are. To follow a path with heart, we must understand the whole process of making war, within ourselves, how it begins and how it ends. War's roots are ignorance. Without understanding we can easily become frightened by life's fleeting changes, the inevitable losses, disappointments, the insecurity of our aging and death, Misunderstanding leads us to fight against life, running from pain or grasping at security and pleasures that by their nature can never be truly satisfying.
Our war against life is expressed in every dimension of our experience, inner and outer."

He goes on to say:"Ours is a society of denial that conditions us to protect ourselves from any direct difficulty and discomfort. We expend tremendous energy denying our insecurity, fighting pain, death and loss, and hiding from the basic truths of ...our own nature."  

We are taught to be brave. To not let feelings show. To act "like a man."

All the time we are making ourselves wrong for whatever is going on within us,we are at war with ourselves. There is always tension, concern. Yet all beings will experience loss, death and pain. Long ago I learned that pain was certain but suffering is optional. However, denying our suffering simply intensifies the pain. try it right now. If you are experiencing any tension or discomfort, simply accept it. Let it be. I usually notice that it slips away.

Kornfield gives an example of a man who was grieving over the death of his child several months previously. The man came to this retreat with sacred symbols from each of the previous retreats. He clearly was struggling. Kornfield suggested that the man put them all away and simply be present to whatever was going on within him. Within a few minutes he was crying. After a few minutes more he was sobbing, truly experiencing the grief that he had been avoiding. That experience was the beginning of his healing. he stopped the war and let the peace begin.

Is there something you are avoiding by your busyness? Is there something you need to feel to be truly present? Is there a part of you that you have been ignoring because it may feel too risky to feel it?

The time is now to stop the war. Call in the troops. There is no need to defend or attack. Wayne Dyer used to say,"You can't take sides in a world that is round." Stop making any part of you wrong. War ends today.

Up to Know Good

Mom, Heather (with a far-off look in her eyes), sister Cheryl 

Intuition is your inner architect. What if you heard someone declare loudly, "You are up to know good, aren't you?" Audibly you could not distinguish the homonyms "no" and "know." Depending upon the speakers inflection or feeling tone, you would probably think you were being scolded.

When I taught junior high school, if the class was too quiet, I knew that something was afoot, someone was up to no good. Of course I understood life in terms of rules, right and wrong behavior, choices, etc. But since coming to this teaching the lines are blurred. Because I know that God or Good is everywhere present, the best thing someone could say to me is that I am "Up to Know Good." I am living on purpose and living following the stirrings of my soul.

Just like the junior high students would get quiet, you and I need to get quiet, to still our busy minds and our bodies, this is required to Know Good. When I began meditating, I had the erroneous thought that there was a "right" way to do it. I would try so hard not to think about anything. I would be so intent on doing it right my body was filled with tension. Of course, nothing can happen in that atmosphere. All I was able to do was to know God as struggle. But since God could not possibly struggle, I was using the holiness of the I AM unwisely. When I remembered the quiet expectancy of the evening of my spiritual awakening, I realized that I had begun my spiritual journey by getting still to "know Good."

Some of you know my spiritual awakening story, and if you know it, skip to the end of this blog. When I was a young woman, in my early thirties, I was quite cynical. I believed that "religion was the opiate of the people" and was not for me. I was too smart. (Haha!) I had just started teaching again after a two year interruption to prove myself in the real world. I was living in a huge old house, built in the early 1900's. I was newly married for the second time. My sister and her boyfriend were living with us.

One Saturday evening, in early September,in addition to the four of us, my girlfriend from Calgary and a new neighbor, recently moved from London,had a dinner party. We barbequed steaks,with all the fixings -- baked potatoes,corn on the cob and ceasar salad. The wine flowed freely. None of us had to drive anywhere that night. After dinner while we were sitting around sharing stories, our new neighbor Hayley, asked if we were interested in the supernatural. We all had some curiosity. None of us had any religious convictions that this was bad or wrong. She had a Ouija Board which she brought over. We started playing.

We relaxed and put our hands lightly on the board. Then as if powered by something unseen,the cursor flew around that board. We all looked at each other suspiciously. Who was making this happen? It was delivering a message to me, the great skeptic. It answered some questions. The big question I had was, "Did I know the man who recently shocked me with an obscene phone call? Did I know this person? What reason would he have for doing such a thing?"

The Board told me that the call was from my first boyfriend, one that I had throughout highschool and first year college. When asked why would he do it? the Ouija Board answered with a group of letters, that we determined was a French word. It was still a mystery but was going to get cleared up in a few days. My sister was studying at a French immersion college and she didn't know the word and asked her professor who also didn't know but later found the word in a French dictionary. It is obsolete and hasn't been used in common usage since the 1100's! What does it mean? It means to reclaim what was once yours, as in claiming an indentured servant. I didn't find that out until later that week, but after the revelation of why we decided to ask, to whom are we communicating. The answer was God! Now, nothing could have shocked this smart-aleck, know-it-all agnostic more than the word, "God."

For the next few weeks all I could do was to attempt to recapture the feeling of playing that game, to get back to the consciousness that allowed the Divine to speak to me, and me to listen. My greatest desire was to Know God. I was often "Up To Know Good!" and have been most of the time since then.