A touch of grace

Why are we humans so attached to our problems? I suppose it could just be me, but even with all the spiritual self-discipline I have at times, sometimes I still struggle and grapple with a problem until it’s too painful to handle anymore before I will let go.

The thing about letting go is, even though it usually happens while one is at the edge of the pit of despair, the relief is immediate and palpable.

I had a particularly emotionally difficult night a couple of nights ago. So many things coming at me from multiple directions. Way more than I could process and expect to sleep at all before work. By the time I got home, less than 4 hours before I was supposed to be at work, I was freezing from walking outside for a couple of hours and my heart was heavy. I got into bed trying to warm up, but lay shivering for some time. As I was lying there hoping to settle down enough to go to sleep, I experienced a moment of grace.

My thoughts were racing from an earlier interaction with a friend that caught me off guard. I was crying. And I realized that, with regard to the particular situation that was troubling me, I have no answers anymore. It needed to be turned over to God. Trying to figure it out, which is something I have been putting effort into for far longer than just recently, causes distress.

When I reached the end of my rope, I prayed…in the name of Jesus, something I haven’t done in a long time because I am no longer a member of a church and I don’t consider myself a Christian by the standard definition. What happened was a small miracle. It was after 3 a.m. and I get up for work at 6 a.m. I was tearful and cold and felt very alone. It was one of those situations where I could have lain awake for hours, but knew I needed at least a little sleep to be able to do my job. So I simply said: I am out of answers, this situation requires grace, not obsessive worry. Jesus, please take this burden from my heart so I can rest a few hours before work. Then I fell asleep.

It was amazing because the effect was immediate. I said the prayer, closed my eyes and went to sleep instantly. I don’t fall asleep that easily on a normal day when everything is good. I’ve always had trouble shutting my mind off. I feel tremendous gratitude for this miracle.

Two very big lessons came to me from this experience.

The first is that even though it can feel uncomfortable, that dark place, the place of despair where you’ve run out of ideas, that’s not a bad place…unless you stay there spinning your wheels. That moment is the moment of grace, if you are willing to receive it. If you are willing to truly let things go and put no more energy into struggling. It’s really quite beautiful.

The other insight I gained from the experience is just because I am not a Christian by other people’s standards does not mean that I am no longer allowed to call upon the name of Jesus. That is a relationship nobody can take from me and I should never have given it up voluntarily.

Because of my understanding of religion and metaphor, it should have been clear to me that the name of Jesus does not belong to anyone exclusively. Jesus belongs to anyone who anyone who wants to connect with him.

In the truly difficult moments I am always somehow reminded that I am not alone. For this I am eternally grateful.

Namaste.

Willing heart

Life is bittersweet sometimes.

Things are still a ways from being perfect, but sometimes when I think about how the universe works, I am humbled and amazed.

On November 2, when I was in the deepest, darkest place of uncertainty, I tweeted this: The universe is bringing everything my family needs to keep going. I believe this and I give thanks in advance. ❤ I had very little tangible evidence to support that statement and I knew, even then, that my belief was in something much bigger than the circumstances in which I found myself.

Faith is like a muscle that is built by accepting what life brings with as much grace and equanimity as can be mustered. I do this to the best of my ability, though I will admit I do not always succeed, and sometimes feel very petty and weak.

Composing that tweet was a conscious and aware decision. I knew what my situation was, I knew something needed to happen, and I knew I had nothing I could point to as an indicator that things would be okay. But I knew that believing that things would not be okay was not an option. If I go around thinking things are going to suck and then they suck, I feel like I contributed to that outcome. But when I am truly able to believe things will work out, they do. It’s beautiful, especially when the connection between the belief and the outcome seems obvious.

A few days after posting the tweet, a friend tipped me off to a potential earning opportunity, which resulted in another friend offering to employ me until my permanent job starts. It’s not a lottery win, but it is a giant step toward things being okay again. I feel the difference the most in my heart. I have been carrying some heavy, heavy burdens with very few people to talk to. But once I finally told someone how scared I was feeling and how hard things have been, it started getting better immediately.

Faith requires a willingness to admit the truth about ourselves and about life. If we can do this with compassion, the universe responds…with loving kindness. God–whatever that means to a person–loves us. It is humanity that is harsh with itself.

The moments of truth that lead up to the tweet declaration were of the Jesus take the wheel variety. I was praying a lot and while talking to God about my life and circumstances, I finally came to the question Whatcha gonna do? And my answer was: I got nothin’, God. That place of ultimate surrender. The place where you have to surrender because there are no other options.

Grace only comes where it is truly needed. It is not welcome when we choose to grapple and struggle with things on our own. It is in giving up, saying fuck it to the cosmos, that we create the space necessary for grace to enter our hearts. When it happens, it is sublime. At the same time, I realize that some moments can’t be experienced if things are always going smoothly. We experience joy in proportion to our capacity to endure hardship without bitterness. In proportion to our willingness to see things as good no matter how they seem on the surface. How do I know my experience is good? Because it is the one I am having.

On November 2, I didn’t know what I was going to do to get my life back on track, but I knew one thing, I was willing…to do whatever it would take…and to be open and unconditionally accepting [of myself] in my darkest moments.

I see the light again.

Because of the difficulties that my life has been blessed with, I have experienced the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding. How can I fail to be grateful for this?

If any of this resonates, please check out Chapter 18, section 5 of A Course in Miracles. I actually looked it up just prior to writing this post, well after my own recent miracle was underway, but it so beautifully completes my thoughts here. And much more eloquently.

The thing at the top of my gratitude list these days? Sleeping soundly.

Amen.

When the going gets really tough

So I have a job interview this week.  I really want to go back to work.  I’ve worked since I was a teenager and these periods of unemployment in the past couple of years have been hard.  The big question I am trying to answer without freaking out is: Will this job manifest in time?

I have been doing this for the past couple of months.  Barely a reprieve from worry and yet miracles have been happening pretty consistently.  It’s funny I can see that in retrospect and even sometimes as the miracles are happening, but not when they are on their way.  When I am in waiting mode it feels like nothing will ever get better.

Lately I have been watching more news than I normally do.  I’m feeling ill at ease and sort of helpless, which probably means I shouldn’t be watching the news.  I took a break from most news for a couple of years and I think it was a good decision.  It’s not like I completely trust any news source anyway.

The thing that has me feeling weird lately is the reaction to Osama Bin Laden’s violent demise.  I’m not saying that at this time in history we are not better off without him, it’s just that celebrating a violent murder, even of someone who deserves it, makes me uncomfortable.  I hope to make it clear that I am not condemning anyone for celebrating or saying that those who have suffered from Bin Laden’s actions are not justified in feeling relief.  Celebrating violence  just isn’t my thing.  I remember when people in some parts of the world were celebrating after the 9/11 attacks and that was really upsetting.

With our economy in the state it’s in, I would hope for people to take to the streets in favor of some relief from this oppressive poverty so many of us are struggling with rather than with misguided national pride.  It’s not like most of us did anything to deserve the conditions we find ourselves in, there was a carefully crafted financial coup d’etat (to use the words of Michael Moore) that put us where we are.  And the really creepy thing is that some of the very people who orchestrated the collapse of our economy are now blaming poor people for the current economic situation.

I want to clarify calling what we’re in a recession.  This is a depression, not a recession.  Economists who say otherwise are splitting hairs.  And it stands to get worse between the rising gas prices and the natural disasters destroying crops all over the place.  These are the same kinds of conditions that took place in the 1930′s during the great depression.  For some reason, we’re just better at denying it now and many Americans do not have the reasoning power to see through the charade to recognize how they’ve been duped.

Many of these things I have been saying for a long time to people I know well enough to speak frankly with.  There is something sinister going on with corporations and their control of the media and the political process in this country.  There is a reason certain diseases are becoming so prevalent and why others are not being cured as quickly as they should.  Anyone who watches television is bombarded with messages telling them how sick they are and how all the drugs they have been taking for these illnesses are surely not working so they should add new ones.  It’s pretty disgusting.  And that’s just the tip of the iceberg of what I’m talking about.

Sometimes it makes me nervous to watch television because even though I have a fairly high level of awareness and control over my mind, it can’t be good to have those intentions coming at me and my kids.  We are healthy and I mean to keep it that way.

This has turned into a rant.  I’m not sure if that’s a good thing, but it’s how I’ve been feeling lately.  I don’t insist I’m right about any of this, lest I offend anyone, but I have frustrations and I would like to see some of these things improve.  John Lennon once said: Today America is the Roman Empire and New York is Rome itself.  True enough, but that might not be a good thing.  Just sayin’…

One of the things I have been wanting to write more about is how challenging it can be to live in this world after a spiritual awakening.  It’s something I have seen a few people write about in blogs, but there isn’t a whole lot of information out there that addresses this.  When a person awakens and recognizes the truth of unity, it makes it impossible to live life as it was lived before that realization.

There’s more to it than that (full post forthcoming), but the shift in perspective is one that can rock the foundation of one’s beliefs and after that it takes a while to figure things out.  There was a time when it was much easier for me to hate and blame others.  Now I realize the futility of that.  But at the same time, like the above rant I just wrote, sometimes the truth needs to be expressed, even when it’s ugly.

No matter what we choose to do, whether we choose to watch news or not, blame or not blame, whatever, it needs to be done with love.  It’s the only way things will ever improve in a lasting way.  As I often say: we are all in this together.  The golden rule is not just good manners, it is our salvation.  Do what ya gotta do, but do it in love.  Love will never steer you wrong.  At least real love won’t.

Saint Augustine said:

“Once for all, then, a short precept is given thee: Love, and do what thou wilt: whether thou hold thy peace, through love hold thy peace; whether thou cry out, through love cry out; whether thou correct, through love correct; whether thou spare, through love do thou spare: let the root of love be within, of this root can nothing spring but what is good.”

Day of grace and miracles

I woke up feeling hopeful this morning. Nothing visible has changed in my world, but I feel blessed.  This is how life is supposed to feel regardless of one’s circumstances.

It’s a beautiful, sunny day.  Portland hasn’t had very many of those recently.  The past 6 weeks have seen record setting rainfall.

I started this post earlier; it is now the end of the day and all I can say is that the hopeful feeling that started my day was a sign of good things.

Yesterday I was on Craigslist because I was considering selling some bar exam preparation materials to make some money.  I saw an ad posted by someone needing to purchase Oregon specific bar exam materials.  I wrote to him inquiring what he needed, intending to sell anything I had that he could use.  He wrote back about the very few things he needed, explaining some things about his prior bar exam experience and his law school experience.  I felt a great deal of compassion for this person, probably due to my own struggles with bar exams.  I wrote back to him and offered him everything I have that covers the essay part of the Oregon bar exam, including my own personal notes and outlines and some things I have that are not available publicly and I told him I would like to give him the books for free because the good karma was more valuable to me than money right now.

After I did this I felt this incredible sense of joy.  And it was in that instant that I knew what has really been bothering me about this period of unemployment and financial struggle.  Though I do not enjoy struggling to pay my basic expenses, my sadness has been less about having money and things for myself than it has been feeling that I haven’t been helping others.  Focusing so much energy on meeting the needs of my own household left me feeling like I wasn’t contributing enough.  Offering something from my heart without expecting anything in return hit some sort of reset button for me. This is the first time in a long time that I have felt so much of this particular kind of joy.

I was born to give and help.  It’s what makes me truly happy and fulfilled.  And when I feel like I am not giving or helping, I feel a deep sadness. Offering a gift to a stranger was the best gift I have given myself recently.

It turns out that the person I was dealing with over Craigslist was not a destitute law graduate studying for the bar exam, he is a clerk for a federal district court judge who now thinks I am a very kind person.  Definitely not a bad person to help, though I would have done it for anyone.

This is where the story gets good.  Immediately upon doing this good deed, money started coming from all directions.  Not tons of it, certainly not enough to substantially change my situation, but nonetheless, there had been nothing coming in for a while and suddenly I won some money on a scratch off lottery ticket, had an unanticipated credit to my bank account, received some money in the mail and made some additional money I wasn’t expecting.  Then, I took my lottery ticket to the store, used part of the money to buy a few more tickets and scratched off two more winners.

I was reminded today of this New Testament parable shared by Jesus:

⁴¹And He sat down opposite the treasury, and began observing how the people were putting money into the treasury; and many rich people were putting in large sums. ⁴²A poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which amount to a cent. ⁴³Calling His disciples to Him, He said to them, “Truly I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all the contributors to the treasury; ⁴⁴for they all put in out of their surplus, but she, out of her poverty, put in all she owned, all she had to live on.”  Mark 12:41-44

I didn’t think of this passage because I felt that what I did was such a grand gesture, it was that I did what I could to help a person  in need by offering to give away one of the only things I could have sold to make extra money.  And I felt that the deed was blessed by God and I was rewarded by receiving more money, seemingly out of nowhere, than I would have made by selling the books.  On top of all of that, the person I offered the books to insisted on paying me for them.

My expenses for this month are now taken care of.  It is nothing short of a miracle.  I welcome this miracle, bless its Source and give thanks for it and the miracles yet to come.

 

Gratitude —->grace

I’m going to keep this short because I’ve been writing a lot lately.

Ever since I asked for help from the angels last week, I have been at peace in a situation where many people, including me, would normally panic.

Each day I try to give thanks for all the blessings in my life and not let others’ definition of success rule my heart and mind.  The trials I have been through do not define me.  How I respond to them does.  If I am gentle with the world, the world will be gentle with me.

I want to report that miraculously this morning I was given one-third of my rent for next month.   I am that much closer to having everything covered.  I am so grateful for this blessing that I had to share it here because it is not right to share my worries without sharing the miracles that are also a big part of my life.

Sure, I could worry about where the other two-thirds of the money is going to come from, but why would I when things always seem to materialize in time?

This quote has come to mind a lot recently: “God sometimes does try to the uttermost those whom he wishes to bless.” ~Mohandas Gandhi

I believe that we are blessed to the extent that we allow grace to reign in our lives.  If we insist on having what the world [of advertising] says we should have, we may indeed have all those things through hard work and effort, but if we are willing to take a step closer to the edge and let go of the need to meet society’s arbitrary standards, we open ourselves to the possibility of receiving in the most miraculous ways.  Miracles only happen where they are needed.  We can rely on our own power or we can rely on that which makes the sun rise each morning and the stars appear at night.

I’m an example that shaky faith is better than none at all.

Giving thanks for all the beauty and goodness that surrounds me and wishing grace and miracles for those who need them.

 

The Secret

This blog is going to get a more positive spin, starting today.  Not that my posts have not been legitimate and heart-felt, I just think I would do well to remember some positive things and look to the future with hope rather than despair.  What can I say?  I’m a work in progress and I learn as I go…over and over and over.

Today was a good day and it reminded me of some times in my life when things started out looking bleak, but then took a sudden, and miraculous in my opinion, turn for the better.

One such example is my experience with the book The Secret. I love this story and I love sharing it, although I have only told it to very few people until now.

It was March 7, 2008 and I had resigned from my job a couple of weeks prior.  After telling off the owner of the company in no uncertain terms, there was little I could do but resign.  I applied for unemployment and the amount I was to receive was not enough to cover my rent.  I was seriously panicking.  I had no leads on jobs and needed to study for the bar exam…again.

This was back in the days of MySpace and I made a friend there who frequently commented on my blogs.  He lived in Philadelphia, so we were only friends over the internet and eventually, by phone.

One day I was talking to this friend on the phone, worrying out loud about how I was going to pay my rent.  My friend said he wanted me to do something without question, just do what he was going to ask me to do.  He said he wanted me to get off the phone and go straight to a bookstore and buy a book called The Secret and then come home and read it immediately.  I had heard of the book, but I had not read it, nor had I seen the dvd of it.

It is interesting that I did do exactly what my friend said because it is not like me to do something  just because someone told me to.  I’m more inclined to say okay and then procrastinate, eventually forgetting to do it at all.

Anyway, I went straight to Barnes & Noble and bought the book.  I think it cost $15.95, which had I not been under this spell, would have made me balk, especially because it was such a small book.

I took the book home and I read it in about 2 hours.  When I put it down I felt empowered.  It wasn’t that the ideas were new.  At that point  I had already watched What the Bleep Do We Know? and was blown away by the information in that film.

After finishing The Secret I don’t remember exactly what I did, but I know I felt good.  I knew everything was going to be fine.  I knew I was the one in control of my life and that I had the power to make things happen, but I needed to choose to make the things happen that I wanted to happen in my life rather than constantly dealing with stuff I didn’t want.

I have to back track a tiny bit to complete this story.

While I was in law school I was quite active working with the Oregon State Bar’s Affirmative Action program.  The bar had several programs to assist minority law students (I am Native American) and I participated in all of them.  The staff at this office had become my friends during my three years of law school and I was disappointed, along with many other people, when the administrator of the program left the bar under some very unfortunate circumstances.

One of the biggest minority law student events the bar sponsors is an event called Opportunities for Law in Oregon (OLIO).  It is a 4-day event with minority law students from all three law schools in Oregon along with judges, attorneys and a lot of support from the biggest law firms in the state.

Back to March 7, 2008.  Well, actually back to March 8, 2008.  The day after reading The Secret and being determined to manifest a job for myself, I received an e-mail from my friend at the bar.  The e-mail was asking me if I was going to apply for a grant to pay for the bar exam in July.  I wrote back and said yes, I intended to apply for the grant.  I also told her I was unemployed and looking for a job so if she knew anyone who needed someone to please keep me in mind.

My friend wrote back immediately, very excited because she was leaving the bar, the next day was her last day on the job.  They had not filled the position of administrator–the program was only a two person program, so that left nobody to plan, coordinate and execute the OLIO event, an event that was nationally recognized by the American Bar Association and much anticipated by the Oregon legal community.

Apparently the bar management team was frantic because they had been unable to find anyone who could step in and do this job with no training.  There were a couple of e-mails back and forth and in under two hours I was in a business suit driving to the bar for an interview.  I left with a job to begin the very next day.  Not only a job, but a job that would allow me to do for other law students what had meant so much to me as a law student.  Coincidence?  Absolutely not.

I have many other smaller examples of how I have used the law of attraction to manifest what I want in life, but I am never dishonest about it with people.  The truth is, I have not learned how to do it consistently.  I’m sure that’s obvious to anyone who reads this blog, but I have done it enough to know it works.  Some of my best moments of the past few years involve times when it has worked for me, in ways both large and small.

Here’s to making thoughts become things.

Cheryl