Today, I'm meeting with friends. At one time, I did this often. Not so, now.
Life's demands, make it imperative making time that enriches us. This includes setting aside time to invest in ourselves. Mind you, I'm with people all the time. If you are isolating, it may be God wants you connecting with others---pronto.
What a joy it is breathing in life, calmly, delighting in its glorious wonder. This can not happen when we live frantically. Our American sensibilities, often equate busyness with productivity or success.
It isn't true.
Learning from Processionary Caterpillars
Now, place seeds that processionary caterpillars love eating, inside. These critters would walk around and around and around---fol-lowing one another.
They would circle the pot, forever, eventually dying from starvation.
The nourishment needed was less than a quarter of an inch away, inside the ceramic container.
Doing a task right isn't the issue. Doing the right task, is. People who succeed, have goals. They know their priorities.
Appreciating the little things of life and nature. Allowing time for our spirit to express itself, making nutritious, delicious meals. They are ways of being grounded in the present.
Listening to music we love, engaging in intimate, authentic conversations with emotionally friends nurtures us.
Doing what it takes so that we can sleep more than seven hours allows our soul to drink in the sanity and serenity life offers.
Living by helpful principles, exercising boundaries----even when pressured to do otherwise by unpleasant, bullying, demanding people and narcissists, is loving and caring for ourselves.
A Spiritual Awakening
These are all forms of a spiritual awakening. Being spiritual isn't feeling superior or wearing a halo of self-righteousness. Living fully is seizing the joys the day offers while being practical and responsible, too.
A spiritual awakening involves enjoying the beauty of living in the here and now, not tinctured with bitterness, fear or self-loathing.
It is sharing life with emotionally healthy friends. It is spending time with loved ones and family. Connecting with God and life involves luxuriating in emotional safety, tranquility, order, and ease.
This is bonding of the good kind and having intimacy with others who accept us as we truly are. We can be ourselves.
When the above is our reality, we will have an Attitude of Gratitude.
How About You?
In what ways are you enjoying a Spiritual Awakening?
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6 comments:
I totally agree that our culture mistakenly equates productivity with success...where did that originate? Maybe it's just a product of a Capitalist mindset.
When I am down I don't take the time to pray. I feel like it is useless and that there is no hope for me. When I feel healthy I pray several times a day!!!!!!!
Hi there, Keith!
Thanks for your two cents. I agree with you. My main focus on this piece was our captivation with being busy, as if that means we are important.
I find less is more. Solitude, simplicity and silence, not to be gotten by a harried lifestyle. But they are three necessary ingredients for serenity and sanity.
Wow, Vanessa!
I like your honesty. Sometimes it helps acting "as if," when we are not sure about God, His existence or loving nature.
My dear, you must feel sad, when you feel despair like that, during dark times, when attempting to pray. Remember, you are not alone. Not only do you have your family, friends and loved ones, you also have this innkeeper rooting and praying for you.
It helps not flying by sight----solely by our emotions or intellect. It helps enormously when we have principles and truths that as our instrument panel, allowing us to fly straight and true when windows to our cockpit are clouded.
Thank you, for dropping by, sharing and letting us know what goes on within you.
An appreciative innkeeper who hopes to see you again, soon.
Dear Innkeeper,
On this Tuesday evening, I am grateful...
1. I could listen to Father Tim M's talk during a Palo Alto Al-Anon Retreat on a DVD in my car today, and hear him say, "My love cannot save the ones I love... This is my powerlessness." Deeply profound!
2. To also hear him say, "It's time I stop letting people live rent free in my mind; those I'm harboring resentment toward."
3. To take time to reflect before reacting; placing principles above the vulnerable, even flawed and haunted hallways of my personality.
4. To watch the film "Impossible" with my wife tonight. To witness the horror, fear, hopelessness,nail-biting suspense, indominatable spirit, and finally overwhelming joy of one families true-story, against-all-odds, journey through the 2004 Tsunami.
Dear Carl,
It's good remembering that there is only one God and we are not it. Can you share a recent time when you exercised your recovery, instead of an old, ineffective habit?
You must feel good, spending time with your wife, sharing time together.
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