Nothing to Lose

            Not for the first time, I'm putting myself out in full sight, for your scrutiny. Here's a strange fact of my life.

Sometimes words, ideas and even whole passages appear in my mind. They don't seem to come from me. They come from somewhere else. 

I know. 

It's kind of hard to accept. 

It wasn't easy for me, either. For a long time I saw this as somewhere between odd and crazy. Even when a prophetic message undeniably came true in my life, I called it coincidence. But  after numerous signs and a whole lot of coincidences, I couldn't deny it any more. 
Sometimes I have thoughts that are not my own. Often, these are concepts that are new to me and sometimes they're difficult for me to grasp. I call them Universal Truth. 

I’ve come across some wonderful teachers in my life, including some who have also professed to have received knowledge that came from beyond their physical being. I'm very grateful to be privy to the gift of Universal Truth in their words. And, at times, I've also been disheartened when I've witnessed a shift in them. Some seem to move from, “I’m offering a possibility” to “I have the answer” and finally to “I am the answer.” 

But I don't believe hearing these truths makes one special. Universal Truth is there for the taking. It's there for anyone who’s listening. 
Sometimes, I’m listening. 
Sometimes the words pass through me, from somewhere beyond to my mind to my fingertips to the keys of my laptop and finally to the world’s shared brain which we refer to as the internet. When this happens, the sensations inside me— tingling awakeness, vibrant flowing energy—carry a potent rightness. Sharing these thoughts brings a rewarding sense of purpose and what seems to me to be a tangible intimate closeness with the Divine. I feel grateful for the messages and share them wherever there’s a willing ear—

Sometimes.

Other times I'm resistant and unwilling to listen.
Doesn't that seem strange? 

For a moment, accept with me the possibility that I actually hear messages that are... divinely given. Shouldn’t I be clamoring to write them down? Wouldn’t you think I’d be putting everything else aside to make certain I don’t lose a syllable?

Why do I find it so hard to stay with something that seems so important?
And even when I do become aware of a bit of this Universal Truth, and then choose to write it out, I sometimes feel the need to add something of my own. I mean, I'm doing it right now! 

Why? 

Why, when I wrote “Water Girl,” didn't I just write the conversation between Ella and her alter-ego - words which came to me in one whole piece - without first writing a thousand words to get there? And when I heard from two sources that the story was a little long, my human ego pulled up rage and grief and blame and fear—a clear sign that I was not on the right track. 

I can see that my human self wants to be able to take the credit. I want the story to be mine.  When someone says, “Wow,” I want to believe that their enthusiasm is directed at me. If I don't add anything to the pieces that seem to come from outside of me, how can I call them mine?

Isn't this the same trap I've seen others fall into? 

I know that's not what I want... but still I feel as if I deserve some recognition. If I write something and give it to the world, I should get something in return. Right? Isn’t that how it’s supposed to work? 

Something does not seem right, but I don't know what it is... so, in a clear voice I ask the Universe,
"Am I really supposed to give something for nothing?"

And I hear an answer.

You can’t own anything in this physical universe—including approval. Accountability is written on two sides of an archaic coin—acclaim on one side and blame on the other. When you understand there is only one being, you no longer need either.

Okay. I know. I've heard this before. But it's hard to imagine that I can't possess anything... When I try, I feel a great sadness... hopelessness... an intense feeling of emptiness. 

Emptiness is an illusion.

But if I have nothing... isn’t that emptiness? 

If you give someone money, or the shirt off your back, do you still have those things?

No! See... if I give someone what I have then I have less… 

What about when you give someone love?

This stops me. I put down my vigilant, confrontational ego and listen. 

You can’t possess anything in the physical world because you are already completely full of the only thing you need. 

You are made of love. 

You have believed that if you give something to another you have lost something of your own. 

But there is no other and every gift is love. 

Listen. 

Trust. 

Let it flow through you. 

You truly have nothing to lose. 

Evolutionary Soup

(My experience during the eighth Generation One class - an intensive with Barbara Marx Hubbard. We were working on Code 36:

Guide the Metamorphosis of Your Earthly Self with the Coding of Your Universal Self.)

I closed my eyes, noticing the rush of excitement. Only a few times had our group of five attempted this kind of connection. On my own, I’d been a frequent visitor to that space which some called The Field. Making the voyage with others—beyond breath, beyond the darkness of closed eyes—was a relatively new experience. Each time, it seemed to get easier and the joy within greater.

A breath.

Relax

A breath.

Be open

A breath.

Whatever comes is exactly right

Despite my attempts to drop expectations, I found myself watching for the glimmer I’d seen before, and indeed the darkness did seem less absolute.

Another breath. A single blue line… and then another… and then a whole horizontal grid appeared just above my head.

Another breath. The azure web stretched beyond perception. I felt myself rising up, pushing into the blue lines, which folded over and around my head like an intangible net.

As I continued to rise into the grid, I saw it stretch at four other points as spheres rose up nearby. As each sphere stretched into an oblong, the net seemed to stretch and strain as light poured out. In the bright illumination, I saw the faces of the others.  Our five points of light were the angles of a star. The space between us was extremely bright and getting brighter as we continued to rise. Necks, shoulders, arms and bodies pushed up through the grid. By the time my legs and feet emerged, the light was so intense I found myself squinting even though my eyes were still closed.

I could hear the breath of the others. I felt energy all around me. Together, we seemed almost infinitely vast but also I was aware of how tiny I was within the endless Field. I put one hand on my heart, pulling the energy into that place that seemed to hold the physical essence of me, and extended the other hand out towards the other points of light. Powerful waves ran through me and outwards, connecting me to the others. We were five distinct beings and yet we were one.

“There’s movement… just wave after wave of pure love,” came from one point of our star.

Laughter poured forth from another. “It’s so bright!”

A third said, “I’m like a drop of water in this vast ocean—separate, but part of the whole.”

It wasn’t the first time I was reminded of the Five Elements—Water, Fire, Wind, Earth and the Void—and mused to say so and then to explain, “Movement is like Wind. Bright light is like Fire. And the drops of water are of course, Water.”

A little later, I asked, “If you three are Wind, Fire and Water, then who is Earth and who is the Void?”

Our fourth star-point chuckled. “I’m Earth,” he said, definitively.

“Ah,” I said, smiling. “Then I am the void.”

It seemed we’d joined hands across the miles that separated our physical forms. Love, joy, peaceful connection and calm reassurance blended into one emotion as we simply existed together. There was a long pause. In the silence, I thought of the nothingness of the void and the familiar sense of paradox crept in.

The void, which it seems should be nothing at all, holds the promise of everything. A moment before the Big Bang, the Universe would have seemed empty, but within that nothingness was everything that has ever been. In the void, all things are possible.

And then, suddenly, a wave of something else. Something… insistent.

“Does anyone else feel that? A shift? Like a sense of…urgency?”

 “Can you talk a bit more about that?” asked Wind.

“I don’t know… I just had the strangest thought. So strange, but I feel like I should say it. I felt as if I was a simmering broth just waiting for the perfect ingredients to create… something amazing.”

Fire said, “Put all the ingredients together into the void and you’d get… Evolutionary Soup!”

Light and joy and laughter came along with murmurs of  Evolutionary Soup. The time had come to step back from the squint-bright darkness, the sense of urgency, and the immeasurable joy of joining in the Field. That night and the following day, the physical world had many requests of me, but now, in the silence of another evening I wonder at the memory of that lovely blue grid, the infinite star, and the urgency of evolutionary soup.

Always

He first came to me during meditation about two years ago.

Alone, in the silence of my room, I'd been posing one of life's questions to the great beyond without any expectation of an answer. Suddenly this being seemed to just be there. He was right beside me. His presence was profoundly real.

My first thought was not, how is this possible? It was, why is he male? For a very long time I'd proclaimed to anyone who seemed willing to listen that God - however one defines God - was certainly around before genders. I could see no reason an infinite entity would feel the need to be limited to one gender or another. Yet, here before me was a being that seemed to exist beyond the physical world and I couldn't deny that he was a he.

The question--the all consuming life-journey question I'd been posing to the Universe--was an ussue I'd been struggling with for years. I felt desperate and pushed resistance aside. 

"Are you really there?"

"I am here."

And right then and there, this being showed me the way through. A new understanding unfolded around me and my issue resolved.

Since then, he's come to me again and again. I came to think of him as my guide, and whenever I sought him out, 

"Are you there?"

He'd appear.

"I am here."

Sometimes I'd forget. I'd struggle on my own until I couldn't stand it anymore and then suddenly I'd remember and ask, "Are you there?"

"I'm here." 

As trust grew between me and this seemingly all-knowing one, I called on him more and more. 

"Are you there?" 

He began to answer, "Always." 

And recently, I've come to call him with a single questioning word. 

"Always?"

"Always."

I've just returned from a women's retreat. We shared songs and strength,  deep connection and gentleness. The experience filled me up with love as I bonded with fifty spirit-filled women. On the last night, I had the opportunity to read something I'd written to the whole group. 

But I didn't. 
Out of nowhere, I suddenly found myself filled with fear. This was much more than stage-fright. I was in a full-blown panic and this brought such anger--anger at myself--that it brought me to tears.As far as I've come, despite all my hard work, I was so full of fear that I could not even speak.

I was crying from anger at my fear and embarrassed that I was crying. It was all so confusing! I ran outside and found a dark place to hide my tears far from the rest of the group.  

I walked aimlessly until I saw the labyrinth. I'd walked it the night before with several others, but it was empty this time. I paused at the entrance and wiped my face on the backs of my hands. 

"Always?" 

"Always."

I stepped onto the path. My guide matched my pace around the curves and bends while I gathered my thoughts. Through gritted teeth I finally called into the night, "Am I ever going to be rid of this fear?"

"Yes."

The word was so clear and true in my mind, but my anger wasn't finished. It bubbled up and I spat out, "I've worked so hard! It isn't fair! I could have read to the whole group and I wanted to. I wanted to share with them, and it was safe to share with them and I've worked so hard! But this fear... this fear! Why haven't you taken it away?"

He smiled as I seethed, exuding a gentleness that seemed to stroke my hair. He said, "You've never asked."

I stopped still, gasping at that truth. 
A breath. 
Another breath. 

I started forward again, my pace slower as I ran over all the things I'd tried to rid myself of fear. Doctors and therapists, massage and reiki, meditations and medications... I've struggled through so much of my past but the one thing I'd never done was ask to have my fear taken away. 

It had never occurred to me.

And so, through a fresh layer of tears and in a much softer voice, I asked, "Can you take this fear away? Because I am 
so 
tired 
of living with it...
in it... 
through it...
Will you please please take it away?" 

"I will."

We walked into the center of the labyrinth where I paused, eyes closed, to reflect on the simplicity of asking. In time, I began the journey back through the labyrinth's tracks and turns. Since another question was right inside me and my ever-present guide seemed also ever-willing, I asked, "When?"

And the answer, of course, was, "Always."

Unconditional Love

I’ve been reading “The Five Levels of Attachment,” by don Miguel Ruiz, Jr. At the same time, I’ve been working to understand the concept of “unconditional love”.

My understanding of the message from the book is that our attachments to our beliefs get in the way of our following our own, best path. The more strongly we are attached to a belief, the less likely we are to challenge it, even if it becomes almost impossible to make that belief work with what we see around us.

People kill and die because of their beliefs. That belief may be that only their religion is right, that their country is the best, or that their physical body’s shape, size, or color is somehow better than another.

The Dalai Lama, the well-known Tibetan Buddhist teacher, explains the difference between attachment and unconditional love:  “Attachment and love are similar in that both of them draw us to the other person. But in fact, these two emotions are quite different. When we’re attached we’re drawn to someone because he or she meets our needs.[…] On the other hand, the love we’re generating on the Dharma path is unconditional. We simply want others to have happiness and the causes of happiness without any strings attached...” He neither accepts nor denies that unconditional love is possible, but he does explain it quite clearly.

People harm each other because of attachments to a belief that there is a limited way to love. I’d bet on the fact that you know someone who believes it is wrong to love outside of your race, your religion, or to love someone of the same gender. Those same people may tell you that God doesn’t want you to love in the ways they believe are wrong—and they may also tell you that God loves unconditionally. 

Perhaps they explain this as a paradox—that God loves unconditionally, but with a few conditions.

A Yoruba priest, Kalila Borhgini says, “God’s love is unconditional, but God also has expectations and requirements.” She accepts this and, a little later, calls it a paradox.

Baptist Rev. John Piper writes, “There is such a thing as unconditional love in God, but it’s not [...] for everybody. Else everybody would be saved, since they would not have to meet any conditions, not even faith.” What I get from this is that God loves us unconditionally, only if we have faith—which is of course, a condition.

I don’t believe in paradox. My feeling is that when we see something as paradox, it’s because we are seeing part of the equation incorrectly. 

2+3 will never equal 4. No matter how attached I am to the number three, as long as I hold it in that part of the equation, I am going to come up with a paradox because the only thing that logically fits, is another two.

Consider this statement: God is everywhere. 

At first, I took that to mean that God was here with us, all the time—that God was always present, right along with everything else. In time, I considered the possibility that God was neither another dimension superimposed over what we see and feel, nor a presence far away that was somehow aware of everything else.

Maybe God isn't here WITH everything, but AS everything. Maybe God’s presence “everywhere” really means that everything and everyone is God. 

Einstein and other physicists tell us that all matter is actually energy. Slow down energy's vibration and you get what we call matter. This means everything we see, feel, know or imagine is energy. Our thoughts and feelings, our movement through space, and even our bodies. 

Everything is energy. God is everything. Therefore God is energy. This equation makes sense to me. 

Perhaps God slowed down bits of that energy in order to experience what we think of as the physical realm. 

In the Law of Attraction teachings (also called the teachings of Abraham) it says, “Unconditional love is staying in the vibration of Source regardless of the condition.” To me, this says that we can only love unconditionally if we are in alignment with the vibration of the Universe (God). In a way, this is saying the same thing as the Baptist Reverend--that faith(or alignment with God) is a condition of unconditional love. 

One could look at it to mean that only God can love unconditionally, but if we did accept the premise that God is all, then God is us, and we are God and therefore, we should be able to achieve unconditional love.

I will make mistakes and you will make mistakes, yet God is perfect. If we are God, then mistakes do not take away from our perfection. How can that be? 

If I am God and you are God, then the concept of ‘loving thy neighbor as thyself’ has a different flavor. Thy neighbor IS thyself and both of us are God. We are meant to love ourselves and others and God constantly and equally, because they are one and the same and Divine—and therefore perfect. It’s like saying God has unconditional love for us because we are Divine and perfect aspects of God. That equation seems to ring as true as 2+2=4. Both sides are equal and the same. 

Catholic Fr. Vincent Serpa writes, “God does love us unconditionally in that he loves us even in our sins. But he cannot love our sins.” This is the “love the person not their actions” version of “unconditional” love. It represents an attachment to the “good and evil” concept. 

But maybe the way we choose to manipulate the energy around us (the way we choose to live our lives) is not good or bad. Maybe that judgment is irrelevant to God. Maybe God does not have any expectation of how we will use our time in this physical realm, but instead, has a knowledge that all aspects of God will always be aspects of God regardless of how we shift that energy—that no matter what we do, we are still perfect.

We would not put the three in the 2+3=5 equation unless we had a really good reason to believe that the three belonged there. If we were to accept that this paradox of expectations and unconditional love is a faulty equation, what attachment would have caused us to create it?

I think it’s an attachment to conditional love that moves me—and others—create the paradoxical equation. 

In my most rational moments, I don't actually believe God loves one person more than another. I accept that everyone and everything is an aspect of God, and that God loves all aspects of the Universe equally. Therefore, what I do here has nothing to do with how much God loves me.

The first time I considered that idea, I was surprised by a wave of fear. Why would that be a scary thought?

As a small child, I wanted to be loved unconditionally but I learned that love was conditional. I believed my parents were not capable of giving me unconditional love because I was not capable of being "good enough". If I believed unconditional love was possible, I also had to accept that my parents chose not to give it to me. This is harder to accept than to believe there’s an unknowable paradox—which would allow me to never have to look at the situation too closely.

In order to imagine this need for unconditional love being fulfilled, I personified God. I gave God the quality of requiring a condition for love, a quality that actually belonged to my parents. Like many (as my examples above display) I developed an attachment to the belief that "unconditional" love would be given to me if I followed a certain set of rules.

An attachment to this belief has several benefits.

For one thing, I can solve the greatest dilemma of my childhood. With God, I can finally be "good enough" to receive “unconditional” love. 

But also, by believing that God’s unconditional love actually has some conditions, it gives me an illusion of power. If I do “God’s will” then surely God will love me more. I will become one of the chosen, the beloved, the saved—whatever name you’d like—by fulfilling the conditions imposed by my belief system.

If I give up the attachment to the concept that I gain God’s love by following certain rules, does that mean I have to believe I can’t gain God’s love?

Yes. That's true. I can’t gain God’s love because I already have it. We can't ever lose it.

If we have to follow rules in order not to lose God’s love, we live fear-driven lives. There is constantly the possibility that I might lose the love I need, so my actions are driven by the set of imposed rules in my belief-system.

If I truly accept that God's love is unconditional, then I am no longer driven by fear of losing that love. It is that fear that seems to hold us to the rules of society—the things our society has decided are "moral” or “right”. Without that fear-driven base, It seems I would no longer be governed by the laws of man. I would be free to act exactly as I'm called to act. The moral "dilemma" would not exist. 

Our attachment to the concept of "good and evil" may be the hardest one to release. How many paradoxes would be wiped out of existence if we saw that this is really a societal concept, not an actual law of the universe? We would not have to hold ourselves (mankind) to a different standard as the rest of nature, for one. We would not have to judge ourselves or others harshly for "making mistakes", for another. We all know we are going to "make mistakes" yet we live in resentment, shame and guilt. 

If we were going to release our attachment to societal morals. We would have to raise our children in an entirely different way. When a toddler first experienced rage and struck out to show it, we would not tell him what he was doing was wrong. Instead, we would teach him that everything and everyone IS God, just as he is, and that when he strikes out against the world, he is striking out against himself. 

Of course he would not understand this as a toddler, but neither does a toddler understand “wrong”. We drive that into children until they believe it and then expect them to accept the "paradox" that God loves unconditionally—with some conditions.

Shining

Do you believe that someone other than you should decide what's best for you?

Neither do I. Whether we call it God, Spirit, intuition, or conscience, we all have our own guidance system. Yet I've seen many intelligent, educated people become blind followers.  Do you know anyone who gets their "news" from sources as unreliable as forwarded emails, "viral" Youtube videos, or Saturday Night Live?

In a recent interaction with a friend, I was astounded once again by how someone I know is open minded and intelligent could be easily swayed by societal pressure. She posted something on facebook which she'd gotten from another friend (a re-post that had been making the rounds.) She added this comment: "This is why you can't ever trust any drug companies, hospitals or doctors!"

I pointed out that her comment felt a little strong. Actually, I called her a bigot. I admit, that might not have been the best way to handle it, but I felt a volatile word would get her attention, and it did.

Her response was, "I'm not a bigot, but doctors don't get any training in nutrition. How can I trust them?"

I didn't point out that saying any entire group of people shared a specific trait was indeed bigotry. I just told her what she said about doctors having no training in nutrition sounded like propaganda. Yes, I know - another volatile word.

She said, "It's not propaganda if it's true!" and with this comment she posted a link to the Harvard Medical School Curriculum where indeed there was not one single class that dealt with nutrition. "See," she said, "They don't teach nutrition in med school!"

I posted a link to the Cornel Pre-Med program in which one can find several classes that deal directly with nutrition, with the comment, "That's because they have to know this stuff before they can get in to medical school."

Her reply, "Jeez, Sharon. I just want to post some shit on facebook."

I left it alone at this point. My need to push my belief that we all need to be able to trust doctors with our lives at times and that the propaganda she was spreading was bringing fear without any just cause was pushing me to behave in ways that were outside of my integrity. Osho, an Indian spiritual philosopher, would tell you that truth is truth no matter what we believe. We can't change what's real, we can only change our perception of what's real. Neither her post nor my inflammatory words would change truth. While I felt very much as if I was right and felt determined to prove it, it is not my responsibility to force my beliefs on others. If others want to find truth, they will.

As I've matured, I've come to a place where I try to live in integrity and admit my mistakes when I see them. I recently had to send an email retraction to about thirty people because my first email was sent out before I knew the entire truth. In our need to fit in it seems we can sometimes jump on the bandwagon without looking to see if it's actually carrying a band, or possibly is instead full of manure. I suspect we can all say that we have fallen into defending a position we were not entirely certain of, at some time or another. There have been times when I - like my facebook friend - have been more concerned with protecting my self-image than the truth.

Anyone, and therefore any leader, is capable of making a mistake. Not all are willing to admit it. Religious leaders are not exempt. Maybe they have come to know great truths. Maybe they have a great desire to spread this wonderful knowledge to everyone. Even so, that desire can be the exact thing that leads them astray. When spreading the word becomes more important the the word itself, things can get misconstrued.

I've found a spiritual path that works for me. The fact that it's right for me does not mean it is the one-and-only path. So - even if you're 100% certain that someone else knows where they're going, can you be certain it's where you should be going?

I'm not saying we all need to reinvent the wheel. We can listen to what others have to offer and learn a great many things but all the while we need to be checking our own compasses. We may forget we have one, but it's always there. The doctor who is treating me may be very knowledgeable AND he can make a mistake AND this doesn't mean that we can never trust anything a doctor says. This is where that inner guidance comes in. Whether a little glimmer of the universal truth is coming from a minister, rabbi, shaman, or yoga instructor, a street prophet, college professor or bartender, we can listen, evaluate and then assimilate only that which feels in line with our own inner guides.

One of the things my inner guide tells me is that humility may be the most important trait in any teacher. If my teachers are driven only by the desire to pass on truth and not by the need to have others believe it, I feel safer in trusting what they say. From my experience, it seems as if our greatest spiritual teachers (think Moses, Jesus, Krishna, Mohamed, Buddha, etc.) did not tell us they had the one and only answer. They preached love and acceptance and their own version of "stay the coarse".

Over time, their words have been translated by others who have been translated by others who have been re-translated and re-translated and so their words have come to our modern ears through many folds of interpretation. In some cases the original message is so misconstrued it's completely lost in the darkness of time.

Two examples of this are the words “sin” and “evil”. These words, from ancient Aramaic, were actually archery terms.

An archer aims his arrow at a target. Whoosh! It just misses the bulls eye.
A spotter calls out, “sin” to indicate that he was close, but missed his mark.
The archer aims again. This time he misses the target altogether.
The spotter announces, “evil” because the archer's aim is way off.

That was the original meaning of sin and evil. Were they judgments of character? Did they indicate that the archer was being led by the Devil? No. They were objective terms. Being “evil” didn’t indicate a need for punishment. It indicated a need for a change in coarse.

If you were to read the Bible, the Talmud, and the Koran, applying the original meaning of the words “sin” and “evil,” how might your interpretations of these ancient texts differ from what you might hear in a place of worship?

I believe these kinds of misinterpretations have led us to our modern-day belief in dualism. We take it as a given that there are opposing forces of "good" and "evil" pulling at us, all the time. I think there is only one force, sort of like gravity. Nothing is suddenly going to  take hold of us and pull us off the planet. To do that, we have to work hard to defy gravity.

In ancient times, "Earth-based" religions were practiced all over our planet. These Native Americans, Australian Aborigines, African tribes, and Pagans and Shamanic belief systems in Europe and Asia did not teach dualism. There was no God-and-Devil battle. Instead, there was a universal spirit that lived inside each of us and in everything around us. Spirit could be found everywhere and you were either seeking it, turning towards it and following your true path, or you were turning away. If you were turned away it was of your own doing, and therefore was easily corrected. You simply opened your eyes and found the right coarse. No exorcism necessary. No punishment required.

I also like the common analogy of God or Spirit as light.
The word darkness describes only a lack of something, a nothingness. In my knowing, "the Devil" is like darkness. It doesn't really exist. It's only the absence of light.

When darkness surrounds me, I turn on a light and the darkness disappears. By tuning in to my inner guide, I can shine my light in front of me and safely navigate around obstacles, find doorways, and make conscious, educated decisions. If someone tells me I'm going the wrong way, I can look around and determine whether or not it's true.

There's no need to fear darkness because my inner light is always there. All I have to do is remember to turn it on.

My Pattern of Life

I know the last post was kind of out there. I've been struggling with how to write what's in my head for weeks.

I've always looked at the God question like it was black and white. Either one believes or one does not. Of course there are those who question but don't completely deny, but that's not what I mean. What I'm trying to say is that believing isn't the end of the story. There are infinite levels of God.

I know my definition of God is not exactly mainstream. I think of God as everything. Our world and every other planet, the sun and every other star, every living thing and all matter and all the spaces in between, every breath of time and any other thing one can imagine and all the things we can't fathom. It is all God.

By my definition, God is as big as the universe and as small as the smallest speck. God isn't only all around us and within us. We are God, just as everything is.

I've been reading a lot of spiritual literature. Some of it is Eastern (Most recently, Buddhist) and some of it is Western (like the religions we are more familiar with in this country - from Judeism and Christianity to Islam). I have a hard time picking one philisophy -one path - because they all seem the same to me. I try to look beyond the rules, the various slants placed on the concepts by well-meaning individuals, as best as I can. When I take off the layer of bias I find the same thing written again and again.

I found God when I was very young. I didn't call it God - I'd never heard the word. No one told me about God or religion because it was my parents decision that we would be raised without any of it - that we would "figure it out on our own" and decide for ourselves.

 I've often hated that decision. I felt so unconnected to other people, so isolated, because everyone else seemed to have some belief - even if it was atheism - and I had nothing. I so wanted to be part of it - to belong in a church or temple or somewhere....

I've come to appreciate my unique position on God. Because I was not told anything, I know God is real. I know it in a way I might not if it was only something I was told. This is because I really did figure it out on my own.
I was three or four years old. I was supposed to be taking a nap, but I wasn't sleepy. I was in the "nap room," a small room downstairs near where my mother watched TV in the afternoons. I was lying on the day bed and I was not to get up until my mother came to get me.

Wide awake, my mind was active and wandering and then
suddenly
something popped into my head. I don't know where it came from, or what led me to see it, but a pattern seemed to appear in my mind and somehow it seemed important. If I had known the word profound, that would have been a perfect description of how I felt about this simple pattern.

In my  mind, the pattern wasn't attached to anything concrete. I have spent a lot of my life trying to make the pattern more explanable - to make it into something that could be seen or heard or understood -  but it is really hard to put it into an image or music or words.

Regardless, I'm going to try to explain it.

Imagine that the pattern is just two things - black and white, for instance. The pattern would look like this:

black white white black

That's it. Just one thing, another thing, the second thing repeated and then the first again. That was what I saw in my head. Simple yes, but for some reason it felt profoundly important. I didn't understand why it seemed important, but right off the bat I loved the pattern because it was balanced. It wasn't immediately going from black to white, like walking from the left foot to the right foot, but it was still balanced in the end.

I thought about the pattern as I lay in that bed, and I thought - I could make it bigger:
black white white black
white black black white
white black black white
black white white black

I was delighted with this bigger pattern. I expanded it out another level

black white white black
white black black white
white black black white
black white white black

white black black white
black white white black
black white white black
white black black white

white black black white
black white white black
black white white black
white black black white

black white white black
white black black white
white black black white
black white white black

It took me a while to get it right. I kept losing my place as I tried to imagine the pattern moving from the first to the second thing and then switching it when it was supposed to. When I finally got it right I could almost see it in my mind. It was like a pattern of light and dark and it seemed perfect.

It was in that moment that I understood something else - the pattern could go on forever! I could keep expanding it, making it bigger and bigger and the tiniest portion would still be there, perfectly balanced, inside the bigger and bigger pattern, no matter how big it got. I had never heard the words "god" or "eternity" or "infinity" - but somehow, this pattern made me realize that everything can go on and on, that the universe is infinite and that all the things within it are also perfectly balanced and eternal.

About a year later, I was staying with my grandparents and they took me to church. As per my father's instructions, they did not talk to me about God or religion, even as they dragged me off with them that Sunday morning. It was what they did - attend church every Sunday - and so I had to go along, but they said nothing to me about it except, "Come on, we're going to church." Even when I asked, my questions were pushed aside.

I sat in the pew next to my grandmother and listened carefully to what the preacher was saying. It clicked. I understood that what they were calling "God" and "Jesus" was like my pattern. He must have said something like "never ending" and somehow I put it together.

Since no one was telling me anything, I assumed the God in that church was not for me. I wasn't supposed to know, that much I understood. It was their God. Their God was in that building and the books and the songs and the words the preacher was saying. That's why my grandparents went every week - so they could be connected with their God.

I decided the pattern my God. I didn't tell anyone about it because I didn't want it to be taken away from me. For some reason I was not suppose to know about God, but I did because of that pattern. My never ending pattern helped me understand God, but I kept it secret for most of my life, even as I tried to put the pattern into music and drawings and poetry.

When I would "disappear" into a dissociated state, it was my pattern I focused on. I could get completely lost in it when things were stressful. I would let my pattern take me away and keep me safe. I didn't call it God, but it was my God. It was my safety, my sanctuary, a place where I knew I would always exist no matter what.

Recently, I've had a new kind of spiritual opening. I wrote about my experience with the deer here. After that experience, I freaked out. I began to be very afraid of God because I suddenly understood it wasn't black and white at all. There were levels of "God" and it felt as if I was moving into a new level.

I began to think of what it had taken for me to understand God in the first place - all the pain of my childhood, all the awful things I had to endure - had brought me to the level of understanding I had up to now. I never would have understood it if I hadn't needed it so much.

So I began to wonder what would be required of me to move into this next "level of God"?

My logic was flawed here, but I didn't see it. I only saw my fear. I thought of what I'd given up as a child and then I began to ask myself what I was willing to give up now to attain this new kind of understanding. My life? Yes... I could do that. My health? That's harder, but I could do that if I had to. As I went down the line of those things I value most, I came to my children.

I am not willing to sacrifice anything to do with them. Not my relationship with them, not the health of any one of them or certainly not their lives.
I thought, NO! There are things I will not give up! If this is what I have to do then I don't want it.

I cut off all connection with God for over two weeks. I did not pray or meditate or look inward or do anything that might bring on the kind of stillness that would suddenly bring God back into focus. I was drinking a lot, and not sleeping much at all. My life was spinning out of control so fast that I couldn't even see it.

Then, a moment of stillness came from out of nowhere. In that moment - clearly and perfectly - I knew that I was safe. God isn't going to ask anything more of me in order for me to move into this new level. I'm already awake! I'm already on a path and it can only lead to one place. The things that happen in my children's lives are their lessons to learn. They will happen for reasons I can't know whether I turn towards God or turn away.

So I'm moving forward. I don't know where it will take me. I don't even know who out there will understand what I'm writing here - I hardly understand it myself. Gradually I've been unraveling this truth for the last week. I've spent a lot of time on images that try to bring this pattern into clarity - and I gave up for a day because it is not possible.

However, then I realized that even though I can't perfectly express this pattern in any two-dimensional drawing, it was bringing me closer to understanding in my mind with each drawing I did.

I could do them forever, but I decided to go ten levels and stop. It would be so easy to fall into it obsessively so I had to set a limit. I'm going to post the ten levels drawing here... for anyone who is following this and interested. Maybe now that I have this down here I can get back to living my life.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

It can go on infinitely. If they were really properly portrayed, they would get bigger left, right, up and down, exponentially. In addition, they would also expand in depth from one layer, to four, to sixteen - and so one.

Because I couldn't resist (and I really am going to stop now) I did an eleventh one. If the level one image is "4" (because it has four dots) the following image would be expressed with this number, according to my calculator; 1.04438888143152506691752710716E+1233 - and that's only if it stays a two-dimensional object! To get the real size you would have to multiply the above number by itself...

11

It goes on forever expanding infinitely... and somehow I know, this is what makes up the universe.

Putting the U in Universe

In our lives, we know only our tiny piece of the puzzle

If we really pay attention

- really work at living consciously and being aware -

we may begin to see other tiny pieces of life that exist nearby

And maybe we will become aware of the layers

- the pieces that exist in a pattern of life beyond the dimension we see and hear and feel  -

But even if we could see it all

We couldn't know what we were seeing



It is an unfathomable incredible immensity

 

We would get lost in the intricacy of the infinite possibilities

There are things we can try to imagine

and

Things we can't possibly know

And he colors of the infinite universe are made up of both

Night and Day

Black and White

Good and Evil
Me and Not Me

All of that duality is part of the illusion

An illusion woven into a pattern of infinite immensity

Perfectly balanced

Unbearably wonderful

With layers made of every shade

Of every color

Layers so densely packed they fill every speck in the universe

but if you could pull the layers apart

 

 

 

And if you looked very carefully

 

 



You might find a tiny shape

 

 

Which seems familiar

 

 

 

 

You are there
Inside that pattern of perfection.

You are part of it

And it can't exist without you