Know Thyself

I think that knowing ourselves may be the most important spiritual tool. When we truly know ourselves, there can be no room for doubting our own precious value to the world. As unlimited creators made in the likeness and image of God, we could never be any less than perfect. And in fully accepting this truth, we cannot help but shine brighter in the world, living in awareness of the grace, intelligence and love that we embody.

Our existence provides much room for questioning the perfection of ourselves and our world, but that is as it should be, for we know something much more completely by first experiencing its absence. We are given anger so that we may know forgiveness, pain so that we may know peace, and fear so that we may know faith, and ultimately love. The dichotomies of our world give us divine experience in choosing a higher truth to live by. All is such that we may grow in forgiveness, peace, faith, and love for ourselves.

Know thyself doesn’t mean complete awareness of our own goodness in every moment. I believe that it means knowing just as thoroughly those parts of ourselves that are disconnected from the truth.  The less-than-perfect stuff is harder to get to know, because we tend to push it out of our awareness.  But both the darkness and the light are God within, expressing perfection through the finite, physical form that is us.

God is there, in our resistance to the parts of ourselves that get stuck and forget. God is also there watching our resistance, and knowing its temporary nature, a wave rolling by atop the vast ocean of our eternal selves.

In making friends with both the darkness and the light in our thinking, we find the courage to let go of the small stuff that captures our attention and holds us back. In our loving acceptance of ourselves, ripples of loving acceptance move out into the world, serving the highest good for all.

May this tool be a blessing. . .