Heroic Hearts

Today brought many personal victories on my road to relearning ways in which to perform daily chores and activities. While I don’t feel the need to recount them here, I did tell a friend and she replied, in part, with this quote from Ulysses by Alfred Lord Tennyson:

“We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”

I thank everyone who is sending love to those of us who are willing to catch it!

“Miracles are teaching devices for demonstrating it is as blessed to give as to receive. They simultaneously increase the strength of the giver and 

supply strength to the receiver.” 

A Course in Miracles T-1.I.16:1-2

“Spirit is symbolized by strength, presence, and power, and also by holy thoughts, winged with Love.”

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 512:8-9

A Dream of Judgment

I’m noticing a few traits which are shared by many of my favorite humans. They don’t talk about others negatively. Not sharing in this destructive chatter makes life simpler, because we needn’t try to figure out what people’s motivations are: they do what they do. Actually, our happiness doesn’t rely on what others are doing — or not doing. When we put a label on someone, such as thief, then we’ve fixed that person in our mind with a conceptual identity. The mind does this, often focusing on a person’s shortcomings, and then we are trapped. At some point, we realize the more we trap others, the more we trap ourselves. As Jesus said years ago, “Judge not, lest ye be judged”. The world cannot change without a change in thought — our own thought — and it requires vigilance for us to check the words in our head! When we notice our judgments and labeling practices, let’s not think of it as a failure on our part. It’s a great success to catch the thoughts and realize what you’re doing. When you see it, it loses its power over you — and you can choose again!

“The power of the human will should be exercised only in subordination to Truth; else it will misguide the judgment and free the lower propensities. It is the province of spiritual sense to govern man. Material, erring, human thought acts injuriously both upon the body and through it.” 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health with Key to the Scripture 246:4-9

"A dream of judgment came into the mind that God created perfect as Himself. And in that dream was Heaven changed to hell, and God made enemy unto His Son. How can God's Son awaken from the dream? It is a dream of judgment. So must he judge not, and he will waken. For the dream will seem to last while he is part of it. Judge not, for he who judges will have need of idols, which will hold the judgment off from resting on himself. Nor can he know the Self he has condemned. Judge not, because you make yourself a part of evil dreams, where idols are your ‘true identity’, and your salvation from the judgment laid in terror and in guilt upon yourself.” 

A Course in Miracles T-29.IX

Everything You Do Is Sacred

Graham - Neighbor Cat

"Now is the time to know

That all that you do is sacred.

Now, why not consider

A lasting truce with yourself and God.

Now is the time to understand

That all your ideas of right and wrong

Were just a child’s training wheels

To be laid aside

When you can finally live

With veracity

And love.

Hafiz is a divine envoy

Whom the Beloved

Has written a holy message upon.

My dear, please tell me,

Why do you still

Throw sticks at your heart

And God?

What is it in that sweet voice inside

That incites you to fear?

Now is the time for the world to know

That every thought and action is sacred

This is the time

For you to deeply compute the impossibility

That there is anything

But Grace.

Now is the season to know

That everything you do

Is sacred."

– Hafiz

“Do human hopes deceive? Is joy a trembler? Then, weary pilgrim, unloose the latchet of thy sandals; for the place whereon thou standest is sacred.” 

Mary Baker Eddy- Miscellany - Page 341:14-16

“Brother, this day is sacred to the world. Your vision, given you from far beyond all things within the world, looks back on them in a new light. And what you see becomes the healing and salvation of the world. The valuable and valueless are both perceived and recognized for what they are. And what is worthy of your love receives your love, while nothing to be feared remains.” 

A Course in Miracles - W-164.6:1-5

The Best Laid Plans …

Alaska - Photo from Aaron Springston

All our lives we have been taught to take control of our lives; to have goals and make plans, and to follow through with them. It takes quite a bit of unlearning to realize that this is the ego’s idea and usually brings nothing but unhappiness. I used to think I was in control and it was my job to orchestrate everything (and everyone!) around me. How many misunderstandings, disappointments, and broken promises this has caused! Now, I understand my needs are met before I know I have them. By releasing my own certainty that I know what’s right, I leave myself open to the field of all possibilities. And in doing this, the perfect avenue is readily shown to me. All I need to is follow!

“When we fully understand our relation to the Divine, we can have no other Mind but His, — no other Love, wisdom, or Truth, no other sense of Life, and no consciousness of the existence of matter or error.”
MaryBaker Eddy - Science & Health Page 205:32-3

“Peace abides in every mind that quietly accepts the plan God set for its Atonement, relinquishing its own. You know not of salvation, for you do not understand it. Make no decisions about what it is or where it lies, but ask the Holy Spirit everything, and leave all decisions to His gentle counsel.”
A Course in Miracles T-14.III.12:4-6

Loving My Community!

Thank You Note Courtesy of the Fabulous

Rebecca Becker

Last night, in a building which is dear to my heart, a benefit was held to help me with expenses. This structure was built in 1914, as home to the Christian Science Society. It remained as such until a decade or so ago. My parents began attending this church when I was 8 years old, and I began playing the organ there when I was 11. When we had to close our doors because of lack of membership, I knew the building must continue as a “structure of Truth and Love”. And it has. It is now a spiritual center for groups who do not have a place of their own. This beautiful edifice has hosted Sufis, Native Americans, various metaphysical discussion groups — anyone who needs a place to meet and join together in Love. Last night there was a love fest planned by two local artistic treasures. They performed George Bernard Shaw’s “Village Wooing”. The event was billed as “an evening of Love and Laughter”. The outcome is overwhelming to me, and I am humbled by the caring response. I love my community!

"The Church is that institution which affords proof of its utility and is found elevating the race, rousing the dormant understanding from material beliefs to the apprehension of spiritual ideas..."
Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 582:14

“A church that does not inspire love has a hidden altar that is not serving the purpose for which God intended it. I [Jesus] must found His church on you, because those who accept me as a model are literally my disciples. Disciples are followers, and if the model they follow has chosen to save them pain in all respects, they are unwise not to follow him.”
A Course in Miracles T-6.I.8:5-7

I Want To Be Like Jennifer

Herb and Jennifer in WKRP in Cincinnati 

Recently, I told a friend about a scene I remembered from a decades-old sitcom, WKRP in Cincinnati. The beautiful character played by Lonnie Anderson was stuck in an elevator with the boorish character named Herb. There was a fire in the building and Herb was certain they were going to die. Jennifer, played by Lonnie Anderson, said to him, “Everything will be all right.” Herb told her she couldn’t possibly know that. Lonnie Anderson said yes, she did, because nothing bad ever happened to her! I told my friend that when I heard that, I realized that was the attitude I wanted for myself. And now I realize I have it! No matter what happens, I do not label it as good or bad; I look at it for what it is. This putting aside of judgment and preconceived notions doesn’t happen overnight. And many times, I forget and fall into old thought patterns. I used to see things as bad and want to turn them into good. I might’ve seen good and wanted it to be bad! But whatever the case, it is such a relief to see things as they are, without putting my interpretations on them.

“Communication ends separation. Attack promotes it. The body is beautiful or ugly, peaceful or savage, helpful or harmful, according to the use to which it is put. And in the body of another you will see the use to which you have put yours. If the body becomes a means you give to the Holy Spirit to use on behalf of union of the Sonship, you will not see anything physical except as what it is. Use it for truth and you will see it truly. Misuse it and you will misunderstand it, because you have already done so by misusing it. Interpret anything apart from the Holy Spirit and you will mistrust it. This will lead you to hatred and attack and loss of peace.”
A Course in Miracles T-8.VII.4:1-9

“The world of error is ignorant of the world of Truth, — blind to the reality of man’s existence, — for the world of sensation is not cognizant of life in Soul, not in body.”
Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health 13:29-32

Moving Through The Day

Dinner Salad

How many tears of frustration have I shed today? Let me not count them! My every move must be analyzed, watched, planned. There can be no mindless moves, nor rushed actions. This is a study in being in the present moment. I’ve always thought I lived in the Now, but how little did I know! A few times today I found myself thinking, “I can’t do this“. Eventually, I caught myself in this negative thought and started turning it around to something like, “Yes, this is difficult, but I’ll think of it as a little mini-workout, feeling every muscle stretch out, every move, enjoying what seems so difficult.” And so it is. As I enjoy my freshly-made salad this evening, while watching a favorite series called Stick, I am grateful for the cooler weather coming soon. I am thankful for the showers of rain we have had today, and the bees and hummingbirds I see flying in my garden. What could be better?

“Who could maintain that lessons such as these are easy? Yet you have learned more than this. You have continued, taking every step, however difficult, without complaint, until a world was built that suited you. And every lesson that makes up the world arises from the first accomplishment of learning; an enormity so great the Holy Spirit’s Voice seems small and still before its magnitude. The world began with one strange lesson, powerful enough to render God forgotten, and His Son an alien to himself, in exile from the home where God Himself established him. You who have taught yourself the Son of God is guilty, say not that you cannot learn the simple things salvation teaches you!”
A Course in Miracles T-31.I.4:1-6

“This Science of being obtains not alone hereafter in what men call Paradise, but here and now; it is the great fact of being for time and eternity.”
Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 285:3-6