Positive Energy Guide

What does it mean to realize Self?

The more developed we become the fewer people are able to fully take in who we are, or recognize where we are coming from. Since we are social animals, we instinctually tend to bond by becoming like those around us, to fit in. This urge toward social adjustment is most intense during youth. It is limiting. Teens, for example, may conform rigidly in their group’s particular brand of nonconformity.

Individuation is a step toward Self Realization. Individuation—becoming a fully developed individual—challenges us to step into our uniqueness. As we do so, we may well find that our values, preferences, and ways of spending time are out of step with the herd. Our insights may be intolerable to those who live more superficially.

In this context of personal development, self realization can mean:

–Becoming who we genuinely are
–Making ourselves real
–Bringing forth our essence and expressing it in the outer world
–Realizing—as in having insight into—who we are

It can be strange to be around people—perhaps even stewing in the energy they are putting out—and realize that they do not and cannot recognize where we are coming from, how we feel, and what is important to us.

After the difficult process of separating the fibers we have entangled in group, family, or couple identity to weigh in as our authentic and unique selves comes figuring out how to relate all over again. How do you realize who you are without viable reflections from the people around you?

One way is to develop friends, healers, and/or spiritual associates who are at or beyond your own level of development. Relating being-to-being, in a two-way flow is a blessing. We all need accurate mirrors. Love, clarity, support, and co-creation bless such encounters. They enhance insight, clarity, fortitude, purpose, and confidence.

Until we stabilize authentic self knowledge, the way we experience ourselves may be markedly different among the projections and misconstructions of those who are unable to mirror us, who may in fact oppose or obstruct us. Those of us who are empathically open are often challenged to maintain our realization of who we are, feeding clarity, understanding, and love back into our Selves around confusing input. This process is an opposite of seeking to bond with a group that requires conformity. It may take some practice to learn to bond with groups open enough to encourage authentic participation.

The urge toward self realization, actualization, self awareness, awakening, and so forth is a major driver in the Universe. It provides the impetus to grow, supplies meaning, and gives us myriad processes that develop character, substance, positive values and mastery in the personality. Holding this aim, no matter what we call it, offers us the chance to take whatever experience we have and to dignify it by applying it toward something of ultimate value.

How do we become real to ourselves?

How do we become self aware?

What stands in the way of becoming self aware?

“In order to become myself I must cease to be what I always thought I wanted to be, and in order to find myself I must go out of myself, and in order to live I have to die.”  ~ Thomas Merton

Questioning the purpose and value of our lives need not be morbid. It arises from a longing for something more, something important. Beyond distraction, looking to relationships for belonging, or seeking to diagnose these feelings, they can be seen as a call of the soul for meaning.

Let me make a quick aside and say that belonging is meaningful, but does not substitute for being able to create an internal and a more universal sense of meaning. I am saying that if our only source of meaning depends on belonging with specific persons and groups, this may be insufficient. We can lose people and groups can disband. In addition to belonging with people or groups, we need to develop a sense of belonging in, of, and as our Selves, as citizens of and participants with the Universe.

As we mature emotionally, we learn that life purpose is not all about what we do in the outer world. We learn that meaning supplied by external situations and relationships is transitory, and can be eroded by life’s inevitable losses. This realization can hit hard around retirement. I have also seen it arise in the young and brave, the profound, and in those struggling with illness.

When we are truly able to know that we will die, how we spend our time and what it means to us become vital.

While we may well have meaningful projects and purposes in the world, daily life is our foundation—and may eventually become all that we can sustain.

When we do not create and imbue our days with a sense of meaning, we feel hollow and unsatisfied. Daily life can become like going through the motions, or even drudgery. We seek something to make it worthwhile.

Enacted with Presence and Love, taking care of day to day needs is inherently meaningful. Our experience is a matter of what we bring to it.

Remembering that we will die supports living fully.

Suppose we consider death our Ultimate Retirement. There is much we can do to prepare, and this particular type of Inner Work has inherent meaning and value. Living well in preparation to death has similarities to planning for retirement. Unlike planning for retirement, planning for Ultimate Retirement does not involve putting things off or holding things back for later. It consists of doing things now that will appreciate over time in addition to making daily life more meaningful.

Earning for retirement supports hope for a golden period. Whether or not that period is indeed golden will depend in part on these preparations. It also depends on being able to support a sense of meaning without the organizing principles and structures of work life, and in the face of unavoidable losses that accumulate through the course of life.

What makes retirement happy and helps us to decline with dignity and grace?

Part of preparation for retirement or death depend on coming to grips with losses; taking joy in having had experiences in our lives, even if they are no longer be available. Part of it is also gratefulness for what we are able to experience in the moment. We can learn to appreciate the past, but still release it—without being bitter or destroyed by the difficult experiences or angry about losing the pleasant ones. Without denial or being insincere, this means practicing surrender to the realities of life. It is never too soon to do this Inner Work.

Short of a near-death experience we rarely become suddenly able to accept life and death gracefully. It takes practice and intention. It is meaningful Work. This Work begins as soon as we are able to do so.

Think about those you have seen who are preparing for death. Many become bitter, regretful, contracted, and fearful. Some bring forth a precious courage and generosity of spirit that inspire the living.How and when do we become like that? 

Do you have any role models for aging or dying positively?

How do/did your models inspire you?

How do YOU create a sense of meaning during daily activities?

Life conditions and circumstances can be excruciating. The spiritually advanced people to whom I have been exposed have not had easy lives. They do not flinch from the hard realities. Neither do they become enmeshed in difficulties. They learn bring peace into the world by cultivating peace internally, in the midst of life.

One spiritual teacher I know teaches learning to maintain one’s spiritual attunement through life’s conditions and circumstances. He maintained his rhythm, practice, open heart, and positive approach in the face of financial crisis, loss of a son, and cancer, all three within about eighteen months. (Remind me not to teach that!) He deepened admirably, inspiring his community.

Those who are spiritually advanced are not necessarily better people. Owing to their experience, they make useful role models. Addressing the wounds, resistance, fears and challenges that keep us from fully participating in life is an ongoing process. It takes time, intention, and courage. And under some conditions we just can’t bring those resources forth. If we can still practice generating wholesome energies, such as compassion, forgiveness, and peaceful power, our process becomes easier.

Acceptance of life as it is is not something we arrive at and then own. Acceptance is an active and living accommodation. Acceptance is supported by practicing discernment, and developing a stream of Guidance that helps us to sense what is ours to do and what is not. When we recognize what we can and cannot do, it is easier to release the things over which we have no direct influence.

Involvement in life is as much a matter of Being in ways that make a difference than of engaging in external projects and events.

If we view participation only with respect to what we DO, we miss much of importance. As we age, for example, we can aim to radiate love and wisdom, whether or not we are able to engage fully in external affairs. Our value is not determined by Doing. BEing matters at least as much as what we DO.

Feeling and caring is Being. Prayer, everyday habits that support the planet, and breathing in ways that create a calm or loving atmosphere can be just as important as taking up service to a cause. If we take up too many causes we dilute our ability to do good, exhausting ourselves and dissipating the energy that underlies our positive influence. Living with intention, resting and nurturing our bodies, and accepting our limitations are ways of Being that serve the world too.

Spiritual growth can and does result from what we think, choose, and enact. It is perhaps most greatly expedited by intentionally cultivating particular types of energy. Meditation cultivates calm, even, positive energy. Meditation on Beings who have become spiritually illuminated is even more direct—if one is drawn to it. There are numerous ways to cultivate positive energy.

As we grow spiritually, it helps to keep power and love in balance, by developing them alternately. When love is stronger, compassion may make it painful and overwhelming to keep an open heart. More power is needed. When power is more prevalent than love, we may become insensitive or strident, calling for increased love and compassion. Although not linear, this aspect of spiritual growth is like climbing a ladder, hand over hand, with alternate rungs of love and power.

The more mastery we have over our own energy—and hence our state—the more power and influence we have. This power must be tempered by wisdom if it is to be of benefit without causing problems. As wisdom matures through life experience we realize more vividly how vital it is to sense when to act and when to reserve action and temporarily surrender expressions of personal will for the Highest Option for All Beings.

Do you feel your value when you are BEing, or must you DO to feel you are worthwhile?

How is your current balance between power and love?

“Brother, stand the pain.
Escape the poison of your impulses.
The sky will bow to your beauty, if you do.
Learn to light the candle. Rise with the sun.
Turn away from the cave of your sleeping.
That way a thorn expands to a rose.” ~Rumi

Some of my worst moments occur when I feel forced to squander countless hours trying, for example, to download a year of financial information that some mandatory update has eaten, and telephone “help” no longer supports the platform I just repurchased. With the thousands of people in mind who are in the same position, being treated to casual cruelty, irresponsibility, and the company’s rhetoric about their lack of support for the products they inflict on the public has reduced me to shouting. It’s the helplessness.

I know this is trivial. The triviality makes it worse. Stress from major life events at least seems meaningful. Real trauma is vitally alive. It demands transformation. In contrast, dry and useless waste of precious days is like death by a thousand paper cuts. Meaningless stress deadens us and erodes societal well being.

Inability to accept the mundane increases my pain. Aiming for self mastery or contribution offer a sense of choice about some part of the experience, adding some meaning. When I am willing and able to practice this it reduces my distress.

One of my spiritual goals is to be able to remain in my heart—or at least avoid spiking my cortisol—in frustrating, trivial circumstances. It helps me to take a strong stand for everyone who may have to deal with the same thing. I seek to enroll anyone who may be able to make a difference in the way that company does business, asking them to help reduce meaningless planetary stress by advocating positive change during meetings, and by notifying policy makers. Breath practices help me too. 

We may be unable to control circumstances, but we can at least gain some influence over our responses to them.

When we do not participate in the ways that ARE possible, we suffer more.

Looping back into our several-post topic of spirituality and suffering:

When we feel that God will cause us suffering, I think we must ask ourselves What we take God to be. (Please substitute your own word or concept if you don’t like the G-word.)

When we experience ourselves as separate from God, we can be messed with by God. When we feel we are an integral part of God, like a cell within the whole of the body, we play our part. We are impacted by the whole but it is not doing anything TO us; we are part of it.

Someone once said to the spiritual leader, Hazrat Inayat Khan, “I don’t believe in God.”

Inayat Khan replied, “You haven’t experienced God. How can you believe in something if you have not experienced it? Wait until you have some experience and then believe.”

Inayat Khan also said that god is a vibration, and that we create that vibration. We bring it forth from within us as an ideal, and train our energy to resonate with that ideal, making it real by bringing it through us into the world.

No matter what we believe or what we call it, we can practice bringing love into the world. It’s not easy, but it is inherently worthwhile.

Working with love and forgiveness AS ENERGIES invites expanded and redemptive experience. Working through the mind is less efficient. We need to FEEL it. When we are willing to love ourselves during our moments of distress, and to forgive ourselves for our wounds, we move toward happiness that transcends circumstances and conditions.

What do YOU resist, and how does this resistance ultimately increase your distress?

Can you identify some way to create a sense of choice or freedom within your experience?

“Because true belonging only happens when we present
our authentic, imperfect selves to the world,our sense of belonging
can never be greater than our level of self-acceptance.” ~ Brené Brown

Exposure to energies that promote rapid spiritual growth almost inevitably brings us up against the that prevent us from sustaining those energies within ourselves. When we are passionate about transformation, we view this as an opportunity to stretch ourselves with respect to these limitations. We are, however, rarely of one mind about it. When the going becomes painful, we are apt to view these challenges as an affront. Here we are, doing our best to be all that we can be, and it feels like we’re being tested or tormented, let alone receiving support.

One of my readers brought up what she aptly calls “the universal 2-by-4.” I would like to speak in part to those who have experienced sudden awakenings and transformational life experiences which they were not actively courting. My reader was brave and authentic enough to admit that she felt resentment toward God after having such extreme experiences.

I understand. In the face of this kind of experience it is easy to feel resistant to growth, fear of more pain, angry, and stuck.

About twenty years ago I went through an episode of acute spiritual agony. I was mad at God. Even if one kills one’s self, I reasoned, one could not escape suffering because it is nearly impossible to step off the Wheel of death and rebirth. I did not recall choosing to participate, maybe back at the beginning of being a distinct, individual soul, or agreeing to the intensity of the challenges. I resented that so much learning comes through distress. Why not through love?

Whatever we believe and however we couch it, intense suffering can bring up rage. On the bright side, rage can assist with transformation. It focuses a huge amount of energy. Rage itself is life-affirming. We do need to use this force toward positive ends.

While I do not hold with rigid belief, I do believe that the urge to grow is part of our nature. We experience fulfillment through growth. We experience fulfillment by cultivating our hearts, and meaning through involvement with The Greater Whole.

The more we feel separate from God, others, the Universe, etc, the more we suffer. When we feel at One with It, we feel better and are more likely to experience meaning. If we cannot feel it now, we can aim to remain open.

Life is what it is and does what it does. We want to think it could be “fair.” We attempt to apply logic, to hold life to human standards of what should and should not happen. These standards were usually taught to us as children. Sometimes we regress when we cannot understand Life with our minds.

Apparently The One Being That embraces Everything does not maintain our biases against suffering and death. Much that we can experience directly, through our hearts, cannot be rationalized or explained. This includes the paradox of Divine Compassion.

Life is a big fat mystery. It full of paradox and both-ands. It does not and will not conform to our expectations. When we resist, we hurt more. I can understand resenting that.

The more I do practices that increase my ability to remain in my heart the more I experience myself as participating instead of feeling done-to.

How do YOU feel about using difficult circumstances to grow?

What brings you a sense of having a choice?

To progress in our Inner Work, we need to be willing to observe
our resistance to reality, our attachment to our self-image,
and our fear. (Understanding the Enneagram)

We learn from experience. Some experiences take years to integrate. Quality guidance quickens our ability to integrate them. Coming to grips with and discovering—or creating—value from any kind of trauma often requires additional life experience. We re-chew and digest what has happened, while learning thorough other life events that gradually put them into perspective.

The parts of myself that I feel the best about, which ultimately bring me the most joy, developed by working to integrate difficult or painful experiences.

If we cannot yet understand the meaning, value, or purpose of our experience, this does not therefore mean that our experience has no purpose or value.

It is an error to impose a belief system on others, telling them that this or that is the reason or purpose of their experience. We need to come to it on our own. Sometimes we can offer our own understanding and experience to others, and if it fits for them, it helps to develop valuable perspective.

I don’t believe in making up some kind of meaning like a platitude. Meaning surfaces from the heart, through assimilating direct experience.

Whether the oyster is happy to have built a pearl, or whether the oyster feels resentful about having been invaded by sand in the first place, we do not know. In any case, it is often beneficial to examine our relationship to resistance.

It is wise to distinguish between unhealthy resistance and the kind of hesitancy that arises when something is not right for us. The later may come from instinct or internal guidance. This process is similar to telling the difference between an unhealthy food craving and the feeling we get when our body is pulling for something like salad or protein. The sensations are different. It is an advantage to learn to discern when something really doesn’t feel right for us, and notice how this differs from resistance to wholesome things that do serve us. We do this through the function of Sensing. Thinking will become circular and confusing.

For the most part, resistance makes life more difficult. Initially, as we are forming a distinct sense of self—ideally as a teenager with our parents—resistance helps us to identify who we are in contradistinction to others. It can assist in learning not go along with things that do not serve us, like saying “no” to an offer to take drugs.

When we resist what life itself throws our way, resistance has little to offer. It almost always prolongs pain and difficulty. Yes, resistance can be a crude source of power like tenacity, but as we heal we find we can hang in there or say “no” without perceiving something as “other” and reacting against it.

Even if we were drowning, certain there was no way to save ourselves, it would be of benefit to focus on love or spirit during these last moments, or to become curious about the process of Transition. Kicking and tensing up increase distress. Acceptance cannot be forced. We arrive at acceptance through due process. Almost all of us can improve our experience by learning to relax non-useful resistance.

The above is hard to do when we’re afraid of being hurt. I’ll address other aspects of this in the next five posts.

When I can create peace within my own body by working with my energetics, I become less reactive and resistant to circumstances. I have more choices. A mundane example: When someone in a car drives behind and pesters me, if I can practice staying in my body and breathing into my abdomen or heart, and focus on my experience, I can keep from letting the other driver disturb me. This is very hard for me since I’m so sensitive to energy. If I can achieve peace even for a few moments, I gain a feeling of freedom rather than frustration and anger. More choices show up when I aim for inner peace.

Peace gives us more power. And peace gives us the space to use that power with discernment.

When consumed by resentment and frustration, I am unable to access the power to notice my available choices. Then I might feel victimized by circumstances. If I dissipate my energy in anger or resentment I am too busy to discern exactly how I might optimize my experience, to whatever extent it is possible.

It takes a lot more time to cultivate our thoughts, feelings and insights around major life experiences, to become able to accept What Is enough to create peace. But, we really have nothing better to do. Thrashing around makes things worse. There is nothing wrong with thrashing, but it makes life still harder.

We do have free will. We do not HAVE to develop. Growing to develop greater mastery helps us to optimize experience and improves our lives.

What do YOU resist?

How does your resistance bias the way you experience related events?

What is going on inside when you resist positive integration?

I experience “subtext” (people’s unvoiced, private thought) like being in a room with a radio station playing in the background. Some of people can tune that input out, while others find it intrusive.

How we response to subtext can depend on which ‘station’ is playing, and on our state at that moment in time. Our ability to tune things out depends in part on our ability to concentrate. The better we are able to concentrate, the more choice we have about what to let in and what to tune out.

When someone is emotionally important to me I am more attentively tuned to them, so their subtext stands out more. Subtext can indicate that a sensitive topic has arisen, and the person is readying to address it. This attracts my attention. When I am entirely comfortable and trust the person not to withhold communication, I find it easy to wait for what they might bring forth. When I feel uncertain or shut out, I may find myself anticipating with discomfort communication that is not simply being shared.

As I consider intuitive communication I find myself wanting to share several stories from a recent meditation and spiritual dance retreat.

My spiritual Teacher communicates through intentional “text” (unvoiced yet direct communication). He broadcasts his intentions, and any energy he decides to share, with lucid congruence between energy, body, speech, and emotion.

During practice sessions he models different inner states by palpably producing their energy. He also broadcasts intention when demonstrating clear boundaries. If he were, for example, walking along and did not wish to be disturbed, even an insensitive clod would find it daunting to interrupt him. A friend described this: “It’s as if he has a huge ‘do not disturb’ sign on his back.”

During lunch at the retreat, he and I were sitting at the same table. A young man across from us was saying that he could meditate and work, but could not exercise, because his emotions would come up. The rest of this story is is embarrassing, but worth sharing. I was very tired at the time, and felt like I was going to get drawn in and start to explain how important it is to be in touch with one’s feelings. Having finished eating, I wanted to get up and go, but I did not want to be rude.

“I’m probably the wrong person to say that to,” I told him, “since I bring people’s buried emotions.” Missing my implication, he began to explain his situation in detail. I wasn’t sure how to get out of this without shutting him down.

My Teacher had one bite left on his plate. I thought, I’ll just wait until he’s done and get up when he does. A moment later he stood up as if to leave. As I in turn stood up, he immediately took his seat once again. The food was still on his plate. I hope I didn’t gape. As I scuttled off with my plate, I saw him look to the young man saying, “Have you considered some form of movement therapy?”

He had made it so simple. I was struck by his economy of words, grasp of the situation, and practical compassion.

I said to him later, “Thank you for helping me escape at lunch.”

He said, “So you’re one of those people who find it hard to turn away when people need too much from you?”

“Yes. I handle it pretty well at work, but the boundaries can be confusing in social situations.”

We had a kind-of repeat the next night. I was exhausted during the evening program and wanted to leave, but did not want to offend the speaker. When I glanced in his direction my Teacher stood up as if to move toward the door, then sat back down. I left.

Now it’s up to me to remember and apply this Zen lesson in all appropriate circumstances, to be fully present or take body with me wherever I’m thinking about going!

It is stimulating to be in situations in which my own text and subtext are as clearly consequential as direct speech.

I suspect that what we do not say aloud is always of consequence. Usually it’s just less obvious.

Do YOU remember being in circumstances in which someone was apparently aware of whatever you were thinking?

What was that like for you?

Contemplate this statement: “Personality is a vehicle for development of the soul.” (source unknown)

We use our dilemmas, quandaries, incapacities, dramas, faults, power struggles, and areas of blindness right alongside our strength, beauty, positive will, aspirations, compassion, creativity, and generosity. These attributes bring one another into focus and develop awareness. Our difficulties hone, exercise, and strengthen positive motivation, bringing us closer and closer to accepting the realities of life as it is.

Through full engagement we gradually come to an unconditional enough acceptance of Life to truly Love.

When we are smart, we use our suffering wisely; to build consciousness, consolidate insight, and develop comprehensive values.

I get to say these things because I walk the walk. I had an intense day yesterday, the dregs of old wounds active, painfully on the brink of a huge energy shift. It was physically and emotionally painful. Yet I did the Work I needed to do, so today I am more alive and inspired than I’ve been in a few months. My experience felt like some sort of initiation, and my energy systems are different. I could have wasted that intensity and cast myself into a lingering unpleasant condition by failing to call forth my better values to make healthy choices.

Our potential experience of divine perfection coexists with our humanity. It does not obliterate our humanity. In other words, we become able to experience divine perfection right alongside being flawed and having foibles. The one does not interrupt the other.

Every stage of human or spiritual development confers a different set of challenges.

As we progress spiritually we gain greater and greater self mastery. This does not mean that we cease to have challenges. If you’ve ever used sandpaper to make wood smooth, you will have noticed that once your surface is as smooth as you can get it, the next finer grit initially scratches it up and makes much more dust. The end product becomes smoother, subtler, and more refined. The same holds true doing Inner Work. As we refine ourselves we initially find more to do. We may seem like a mess, yet we are improving through the process.

Like wood, we also have knots. Our characters, natures, and egos have hard patches that don’t sand well. We may require a file. Other people and difficult life circumstances are required to address our knots. Certain people and circumstances can be like files. It is important not to feel that we are flawed because we have knots.

Powerful people usually have intense energy and personalities. Some lives and purposes require ego strength to manage their challenges.

Having a difficult personality can feel like a permanent flaw. When we can view ourselves with an understanding of what we need to learn and the burdens we carry for soul purposes, we see why we require strength.

Challenges also increase as does our strength. I remember complaining to my spiritual teacher in my twenties, saying, “The stronger my back gets the more they heap upon it!” He laughed and said, “Well then the load remains about the same.”

A weak personality can be just as much or even more of a hinderance as a powerful one. Our challenges may be less obvious to others, and our flaws may be harder to put a finger on. Weakness shows up less dramatically than unrefined power. Errors of omission cause different problems than the errors that we enact boldly on the stage of life.

My eighth grade choir teacher used to say, “If you’re going to make a mistake, make a loud one!” Similarly, the spiritual teacher Meher Baba said that when we make mistakes whole-heartedly we learn from them effectively and are less likely to repeat them. Bringing ourselves fully into what we are doing is practically always the Highest Option. When it is not, we probably need to do something else.

What are YOUR myths about spiritual growth?

How do you hold yourself back from full self expression?

Working with a spiritual teacher several decades ago, I remember getting really scared. I was thinking: “If I REALLY open my heart I will have to give everything to the poor and live like Mother Teresa.”

That was my concept about spirituality.

A dear client felt afraid to take her next step in personal and spiritual development. As we looked into this fear, she formulated its underpinning as something like this: “If I become perfect, I will have to give up getting angry, and therefore will have to do what my husband wants me to do and give up the control I feel through my resistance.”

Most of us fear transformation. Faced with the possibility of profound change, we often have an underlying, anxious construct like: “If I become like _____ I will have to _____, and therefore ______.”

Such constructs and resulting predicaments stem from unexamined assumptions, driven by fear. Either/or thinking often plays a part. The initial premise is usually an inaccurate assessment, which leads to an unrealistic extrapolation about a frightening and fictional future.

Noticing and investigating rhetoric or propaganda from our less-developed inner sectors is essential to successful personal and spiritual development.

Here is a line of inquiry for investigating fears and conflicts about inner growth:

• What are you actually afraid of?
• Is this fear warranted?
• How does this fear indicate a conflict of values between different parts of yourself?
• What part or value is most important to your life satisfaction?
• Can you intentionally choose your most important value and go with it?
• What inner resources would serve you in doing so?

Let’s walk this through with the fear I began with:
What are you actually afraid of? I was afraid that I would be compelled to sacrifice myself entirely in order to have spiritual validity.

Is this fear warranted? No. In actual fact, my issue has been with over-giving; too much sacrifice. My spiritual path has actually helped me to give in healthier ways.

How does this fear indicate a conflict of values between different parts of yourself? Part of me wants to give everything, while part of me is survival-oriented and selfish.

What part or value is most important to your life satisfaction? Balance and healthy adjustment are more important to me than either sacrifice or selfishness.

Can you intentionally choose your most important value and go with it? Yes, and I have been practicing. When I begin to feel too self-sacrificing or too selfish, I make adjustments.

What inner resources would serve you in doing so? I understand that very life time has different requirements for balance, and that the things that serve my soul bring about real happiness.

When we become fully loyal to our most comprehensive values, we resolve mental conflict and can use our values to navigate life challenges.

A few more thoughts about scaring ourselves with ideas about growth:

• States of awareness that we move toward in the process of healthy development are rarely the way we imagine them from within our current limitations.
• We usually enter new states having developed the foundations that support them.
• A new state may require adjustment, but after adjusting we feel better than we did before.
• We usually develop new stages of awareness gradually, and must work to stabilize them so we do not regress. This process is like adding drops into a bucket of a waterwheel, which begins to move slowly once its weight hits critical mass. If we do not keep adding water it may come to a stop.

Spiritual work consists largely of learning to be able to accept and tolerate WHAT IS. This includes ourselves! We are not attempting to transcend our humanity, but to integrate it within the Whole.

Do YOU ever scare yourself about doing the things that are most important to you?

If so, how do you construct or deconstruct your rhetoric about it?

This year I found myself longing for traditional Christmas music. As I spent some time in stores, it struck me that all of the music was Santa and retail oriented—and almost painfully politically correct. I did not see one manger scene or image of Christ in yard displays during my neighborhood wanderings. I had never felt any attachment to them until they almost suddenly went missing.

Well, that’s not exactly true. . .  For several years I would seasonally think about adding a Frankenstein to manger scenes, in general. Cough. This began with my favorite Christmas card. One of the wise men is dragging Frankenstein through the desert at night. The other two wise men are yelling at him, saying, “We said bring FRANKINCENSE, you idiot!” 

 Typically, I took this to mean something more profound. I figure that most of us have so many family skeletons that rise from our closets during the Christmas holidays, which follows these days—in the stores anyway—right on the heels of Halloween. By the time people take down one set of decorations it’s practically time for the next.

Those of us who are well aware of it when issues arise, and prefer authenticity are likely to find the forced cheer that some put on for Christmas rather grating. A nice Halloween figure to represent the random element of darkness is a humorous nod to Holy Wholeness.

Despite my quirky humor, Christmas seemed rather hollow or even castrated without Christ. While I don’t want Christianity down my throat, it weaves important threads through our cultural tapestry.

I surprised myself on Christmas Eve, finding myself at a candle light mass at St. Mark’s church. I did not set out to go. I was planning to go on a walk with a friend. Through the way my guidance works with timing and directions, we found ourselves heading right into the church just as mass was beginning, greeted at the door by a priest in his robes. We were even handed candles for the candlelight ritual at the end.

I looked at the schedule. They were going to sing—along with the choir and a huge pipe organ—the most beautiful carols, my favorites. I wanted to sing. We stayed, and found the service unexpectedly satisfying.

The sermon was engaging. The priest talked about darkness being an important aspect of Christmas, and suggested remembering that it is a part of the occasion instead of forcing total brightness and happiness. He talked about the interplay between darkness and light, the way too much light can overwhelm, and the fact that the divine is present in darkness as well as light. I found it gratifying to hear him say this in a traditional context with six or seven hundred people present. It made me want to tell him about the Frankenstein, but I just shook his hand and thanked him on my way out.

My belief system is flexible. I have a sense of the deeper underlying unity of All, so it pleases me to participate on occasion in the rites of different religions. While I am not religious myself, I’ve found myself paying respect in Buddhist temples in Thailand, Hindu temples in India and Bali, a Catholic church in Slovenia, Mosques in Egypt and India, and several Quaker gatherings in Seattle. I’ve enjoyed songs and dances from a wide range of cultures and religions.

Religion is deep to a culture. Participating is a good way to penetrate to the heart of a culture and share in a meaningful way. In my experience, mental agreement is not important as long as one brings respect and love for the Divine. 

How did YOUR Christmas go?

What is your relationship with tradition?