Creatures Great and Small

 

I was reminded, once again, of what animals have to teach us. Today I reached into a small, dark lift (elevator, of sorts) in a 150-year-old church where I play organ. I heard a buzz go by my ear and then a trapped buzzing sound coming from my back. After shaking my shirt shoulder a couple of times, I realized a wasp was trapped in between my diaphanous overblouse and my linen shirt. I took off the sheer outer garment and by looking over my shoulder, I saw the buzzer sitting quietly on my back shoulder. I walked outside and requested it leave, and he/she did so. This brief episode brought into focus how our attitudes affect everything around us. The wasp and I had direct contact on my hand, my ear, and my back. Never at any time did I feel anxious or afraid. And neither did it. When I think back on the times my pets have been anxious or calm, depending upon my feelings — well, our thoughts are mobile and emotions fly fast! Let’s stay calm and positively directed today. Who knows who may benefit from it? Namaste …

“Understanding the control which Love held over all, Daniel felt safe in the lions’ den, and Paul proved the viper to be harmless. All of God’s creatures, moving in the harmony of Science, are harmless, useful, indestructible.”

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 514:26-30

“Are you invulnerable? Then the world is harmless in your sight. Do you forgive? Then is the world forgiving, for you have forgiven it its trespasses, and so it looks on you with eyes that see as yours. Are you a body? So is all the world perceived as treacherous, and out to kill. Are you a spirit, deathless, and without the promise of corruption and the stain of sin upon you? So the world is seen as stable, fully worthy of your trust; a happy place to rest in for a while, where nothing need be feared, but only loved. Who is unwelcome to the kind in heart? And what could hurt the truly innocent?” 

A Course in Miracles T-31.VI.6:1-10

A Sweet Story

 

Sunday Flight by Christian Schloe

I love this story from Kurt Vonnegut. Happy Sunday everyone!

“When I was 15, I spent a month working on an archeological dig. I was talking to one of the archeologists one day during our lunch break and he asked those kinds of ‘getting to know you’ questions you ask young people: Do you play sports? What’s your favorite subject? And I told him, no I don’t play any sports. I do theater, I’m in choir, I play the violin and piano, I used to take art classes.

“And he went wow. That’s amazing! And I said, ‘Oh no, but I’m not any good at any of them.’

“And he said something then that I will never forget and which absolutely blew my mind because no one had ever said anything like it to me before: ‘I don’t think being good at things is the point of doing them. I think you’ve got all these wonderful experiences with different skills, and that all teaches you things and makes you an interesting person, no matter how well you do them.’

“And that honestly changed my life. Because I went from a failure, someone who hadn’t been talented enough at anything to excel, to someone who did things because I enjoyed them. I had been raised in such an achievement-oriented environment, so inundated with the myth of Talent, that I thought it was only worth doing things if you could ‘win’ at them.”

Kurt Vonnegut

The Good That Is Unfolding

Afternoon Tea

By Catrin Welz-Stein

I heard a term which sent me directly to a search engine: Adulting. Its definition is: “the practice of behaving in a way characteristic of a responsible adult, especially the accomplishment of mundane but necessary tasks”. I have found it difficult to “adult” at times when I let myself become overwhelmed by too many activities. If my mind is racing in circles with a multitude of duties whirling around in it, I may flit from one to another with no focus anywhere. At those times, it’s easy to think there is too much on my plate and I’d rather retreat into a good book. Through the years, I’ve learned to sit quietly, listening for the rhythms of divine order to lead the way, and then to be present in the Now. Some people like to make lists and prioritize, others want someone to tell them what to do first, but few of us believe there is an omnipresence which can help us navigate life’s activities. It can be difficult to override our ego’s dictates, admitting that we may not know what is best, releasing control and flowing with the good which is unfolding right in front of us. But I’m going to keep trying, because I’ve seen how much easier it is than thinking I know it all!

“The objects of time and sense disappear in the illumination of spiritual understanding, and Mind measures time according to the good that is unfolding.” Mary Baker Eddy, Science & Health Page 584

“Do you really believe you can make a voice that can drown out God’s? Do you really believe you can devise a thought system that can separate you from Him? Do you really believe you can plan for your safety and joy better than He can? You need be neither careful nor careless; you need merely cast your cares upon Him because He careth for you. You are His care because He loves you. His Voice reminds you always that all hope is yours because of His care. You cannot choose to escape His care because that is not His Will, but you can choose to accept His care and use the infinite power of His care for all those He created by it.” 

A Course in Miracles T-5.VII.1:1-7

Frugal Repast

When I was a very young child, my parents had a slaughterhouse. It was a small operation in a small town and people would bring in the steer they raised, or the chickens they kept in the yard, to have them killed and dressed to put in their freezer. I wasn’t particularly traumatized by any of this, but I did hold the false notion that this humane treatment was the standard practice in our country. Then I started paying attention. After that, I began to restrict my animal intake and now call myself a wanna-be vegetarian (because I do on occasion eat meat). Apparently those occasions are rare enough that an indulgence in a big burger and fried side dishes has made me feel groggy and sluggish for more than a day! I’m not writing this to promote any particular way of eating, but I am hoping that everyone in the world will pay attention to what exactly it is we’re putting in our mouths. Our vegetables are poisoned on a regular basis, the corn syrup situation is frightening, and animals are living a nightmare to supply the outlandish amount of meat which is eaten. I know I eat too much and often am uncaring of what that intake is. While I’m not going to beat myself up over that burger and fries, I am going to try to eat a diet suitable for a small planet! 

"When error confronts you, withhold not the rebuke or the explanation which destroys error. Never breathe an immoral atmosphere, unless in the attempt to purify it. Better is the frugal intellectual repast with contentment and virtue, than the luxury of learning with egotism and vice." Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 452

Society is a Foolish Juror

 

New Friends

Continuing the theme of communication with the incomprehensible, I am remembering a woman at choir rehearsal. I don't know her well. She began to complain that she hadn't been able to watch her "programs" because of those "horrid people lying about the president". Rather than chastise her or ignore her, I listened to her. She rambled on about tuning in to TCM and watching an old movie called The Red Shoes. She is an Englishwoman and she mentioned it was the first movie her mother took her to see when she was 8 years old. I began asking her questions and it turns out she wanted to become a ballerina and had been told she couldn't marry because she must devote all her time to dance. Well, when she was 18, she met and married a man from Oklahoma, who was in the military stationed in England. He didn't know what ballet was and didn't want to, but she loved him and he loved her, and so she gave up her studies, married, and moved to the United States. That was more than 60 years ago. In talking to her, I found she was a lovely woman, if not an educated one. And I liked her. 

"Society is a foolish juror, listening only to one side of the case. Justice often comes too late to secure a verdict. People with mental work before them have no time for gossip about false law or testimony. To reconstruct timid justice and place the fact above the falsehood, is the work of time. " Mary Baker Eddy, Science & Health Page 238:25-28

“Yet you must learn to doubt their evidence will clear the way to recognize yourself, and let the Voice for God alone be Judge of what is worthy of your own belief. He will not tell you that your brother should be judged by what your eyes behold in him, nor what his body’s mouth says to your ears, nor what your fingers’ touch reports of him. He passes by such idle witnesses, which merely bear false witness to God’s Son. He recognizes only what God loves, and in the holy light of what He sees do all the ego’s dreams of what you are vanish before the splendor He beholds.” A Course in Miracles  W-151.7:1-4

Reactions Against Oneness

Photo credit: Aaron Springston

During a conversation with a friend about political separation, she said that it was all a "reaction against Oneness". I love that statement! I'd much rather think of my desire to argue with people about their beliefs as a "reaction against Oneness", wouldn't you? That makes it much easier to hold a conversation which is not adversarial, even if I'm tempted to tell someone they're wrong. I thank you, dear Friend, for helping me to see every situation as either one of unity or one of separation. My son and his baby son will be visiting me soon. He also will be spending time with his dad who lives in a neighboring town. That side of his family are full of conservative views on life, and I’m about as liberal as they come. There is an event planned where we will all be together and I had not been looking forward to it — until I remembered the words of a fellow ACIM student: it’s just a reaction against Oneness. I promise myself to steadfastly look for the ideas which prove our unity. We all love our families and friends. We want to be comfortable in our homes and are grateful for the abundance which surrounds us. We love my son and his new baby more than we want to voice differences of opinion. I am especially grateful today for the words of my dear friend, Anne, which remind me to recognize unity rather than separation. Namaste…

"Oneness is simply the idea God is. And in His Being, He encompasses all things. No mind holds anything but Him. We say 'God is', and then we cease to speak, for in that knowledge words are meaningless. There are no lips to speak them, and no part of mind sufficiently distinct to feel that it is now aware of something not itself. It has united with its Source. And like its Source itself, it merely is." 

A Course in Miracles W-pl.169.5

“Atonement is the exemplification of man’s unity with God, whereby man reflects divine Truth, Life, and Love. Jesus of Nazareth taught and demonstrated man’s oneness with the Father, and for this we owe him endless homage. His mission was both individual and collective. He did life’s work aright not only in justice to himself, but in mercy to mortals, — to show them how to do theirs, but not to do it for them nor to relieve them of a single responsibility.” 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 18:1-9

Light Where Darkness Was Before

 

Photo credit: Blake Lasater

I read a letter Sigmund Freud wrote to Albert Einstein, who had written him asking if there was a way to free humankind from the threat of war. Mr. Freud has quite a bit to say on this subject. One phrase which brought pause was, “…the lust for aggression and destruction”. I had never thought of it that way, and it caused me to stop and think. Part of his conclusion is as follows: “The upshot of these observations, as bearing on the subject in hand, is that there is no likelihood of our being able to suppress humanity's aggressive tendencies. In some happy corners of the earth, they say, where nature brings forth abundantly whatever man desires, there flourish races whose lives go gently by, unknowing of aggression or constraint. This I can hardly credit; I would like further details about these happy folk.” In our world, we see famine and harsh conditions in many places. I question whether this is the way creation is supposed to evolve. I’m pretty sure when we follow the laws of nature, life as we know it would become Life as we wish it were! As light bearers, we lead the way with every thought and action. Nothing is more powerful than the divine Love which moves through us into the world.

"Heaven: Harmony; the reign of Spirit; government by divine Principle; spirituality, bliss, the atmosphere of Soul." 

Mary Baker Eddy, Science & Health, Page 587

“Behold your role within the universe! To every part of true creation has the Lord of Love and life entrusted all salvation from the misery of hell. And to each one has He allowed the grace to be a savior to the holy ones especially entrusted to his care. And this he learns when first he looks upon one brother as he looks upon himself, and sees the mirror of himself in him. Thus is the concept of himself laid by, for nothing stands between his sight and what he looks upon, to judge what he beholds. And in this single vision does he see the face of Christ, and understands he looks on everyone as he beholds this one. For there is light where darkness was before, and now the veil is lifted from his sight.” 

A Course in Miracles T-31.VII.8:1-7