Being Centered and Safe in the "Home of Yourself"

There is a place I can go that is always peaceful, where I hear my truth without distraction and can rest in the knowledge of who I am. It is the "home of myself."

During my time with the Church of Divine Man, and its teaching arm, the Berkeley Psychic Institute, I became aware of the question of whether I was in, or out of, my body. Up to that point I had heard about “having an out-of-body experience” as something to strive for, with the expectation that being out of the body was how we connected with something greater than ourselves.

I soon learned that being out of the body was no big deal. I was out of my body most of the time, and if I’m honest with myself that's still true much of the time today. It goes along with being human, learning to become fully aware of ourselves as God.

Spirit is not “out there,” but within us. It doesn’t exist in our thinking, and so we can’t intellectualize it. We can try; I know I do. But in the end we know ourselves as eternal spirit, and see God in all things, when we are present with what is happening, noticing the body’s reactions, feeling the emotions that arise, and choosing consciously in that moment who we will be in the midst of all of it.

I’m finding that I’m much more true to myself when I feel my way through things, rather than think my way through. My thinking can lead me down the path of being reactive or defensive, and can limit my ability to see my highest truth about how I want to proceed in any situation.

But if I first choose to just sit within myself and fully notice the experience, my emotions are felt and honored and processed. Sitting with emotions can be uncomfortable, and that’s why we tend to think and react instead. But if I go within and allow myself to really experience how I feel about something, I can usually move forward from a place of peace, forgiveness and understanding that all is here for my good.

One simple technique for going home to yourself is “pulling the aura in.” When we attend to things out in the world, and are affected by them, our aura expands to encompass all that we are attending to. The aura is the energy field around the body that many believe contain our spiritual energy, and they can get very big!

You can try pulling your aura in like this:  Without effort, allow yourself to “see” or sense how large your aura is. Does it seem to envelop a much larger amount of space than just yourself? If so, begin to pull the edges closer to you, and allow everything that your aura had contained to be released to divine consciousness.

When you sense that your aura is about 12 to 18 inches out from your body and no more, take a moment and notice how that feels. You may be aware of your body quieting down, and feeling less anxious or responsible.

I do this sometimes at night when I’m having trouble falling asleep. I bring all of my “energy” back so that all I’m aware of is my body and about 12 inches beyond it. My thoughts quiet, I'm aware of my heart beating, and I exist fully in that space without distraction. In that moment, I am one with myself. I am.

As you move into the "home of yourself," you will likely find even greater amounts of peace and joy!

May you come home to yourself often, and may this tool be a blessing. . .

Holding the High Watch

I heard someone say long ago that it doesn’t matter what we do; what matters is the energy we’re in when we do it. How very true. Our vibration in any given moment gives rise to our experience, and affects those close to us and ultimately the entire world.

We have a choice in every situation what energy vibration we will “own.” Thank Goodness we have a lifetime to remember this, because it’s very easy to forget when we get caught up in some dramatic human moment.

Someone came to me today angry at a person we both know, and as I listened I certainly understood his point of view. It probably shouldn’t have happened, but it did, and my colleague needed to talk about it and find a way to rectify the situation.

As he described the situation, what I heard behind the words was that he felt judged, and diminished. It’s a frustrating situation, and it would have been easy for me to “match” his vibration and move into anger myself. But it was a good opportunity for me to “hold the high watch.”

There are countless opportunities for us to do this. It simply means standing firm in truth no matter what is going on around us. In this situation, I listened, and told him that I understood how he felt. And then I gently suggested that the other person is doing the best she can, and that it really is not personal. I mentioned that perhaps she gives us an opportunity to find the best, most loving parts of ourselves.

We can also hold the high watch without saying a thing. It is an energetic “space” that we choose that actually speaks louder than words. By just standing quietly in our own highest truth about something, we allow others to recognize and match it.

It reminds me of what happens here at work sometimes, when gossip starts. I try really hard to stay out of it, and am mostly successful. I’ve noticed that when gossip does start, if I hold loving thoughts but don’t participate, the gossip stalls. As sensitive energetic beings, we are aware of the vibrations of others. When just one person holds the high watch, standing firmly in the truth of the divine in everyone and in all things, there is light in the darkness..

May your high watch shine divine light in the world, and may this tool be a blessing. . .

Letting It Be Enough

I heard the notion of “enough” discussed in a way that caught my attention recently. As I thought about it, it made me realize what a gift it is to notice that we have, in all things, enough.

We expend a great deal of energy working on accumulating enough – enough money, enough connection and intimacy, enough success, enough leisure and play and health. The list is endless. The quest seems to take on a life of its own, and the seeking to have becomes the focus rather than simply enjoying what we have. What we think and believe manifests in our experience, and so seeking reinforces the reality of lack.

I believe that what people feel most lacking in is love. The yearning may be unconscious and the sense of lack can manifest through many different thoughts, but what we really seek is enough love. The part of us that is disconnected from our true selves cannot imagine ourselves worthy of the amount of love that we want and need.

This can cause such conflict in relationships, when we get caught up in expectation about how someone should treat us, then we can feel that we were not loved enough. It can happen in the important relationships in our lives, or with perfect strangers. If I get ticked off at the driver who cuts me off on the freeway, it could be argued that the core belief behind all of it is that the stranger didn’t love me enough to treat me differently.

As with all things, I’ve noticed what a really small shift of awareness it is to move my thoughts from darkness to light, and from a lie to the truth. The ego lives to preserve our identity as individuals, and is in constant battle with anyone or anything that might seem to threaten us. But I can thank my ego for its concern and then pull my energy back from its worry, and say “it is enough.”

The love I have is enough, even when hurrying people act without thinking, or when others don’t put me at the top of their priority list. The connection I have with family and friends is enough, even when we are all busy and moving through life’s demands and challenges as gracefully as we can. The resources of money and time that I have are enough, and have always been enough, to provide me with the security and opportunity that I need to navigate this glorious life.

It brings to mind the words to one of Unity’s prayers:

The inexhaustible resource of spirit
is equal to every demand.
There is no reality in lack.
Abundance is here and now manifest

It’s all in how we choose to see it.

Thank you, God, that I can be worried over a perception that something important is missing, but then affirm that “it is enough,” and I realize that it is so.

May you know "enough" as the essence of who you are, and may this tool be a blessing. . .

Sacred Longing

I attended a wonderful Unity workshop last weekend on peacemaking. One of the facilitators introduced the idea of sacred longing, which was new to me and intriguing. I love the idea of it, because it describes a very holy gift in our human experience.

Sacred longing is that deep, persistent need to know the presence of God within us and in all things. It is the profound wisdom that leads us to seek to better understand ourselves, even when we are so busy with life’s details that without that intrinsic longing we would never even realize that there was more to our experience than we can see.

My spiritual path has most definitely been one of sacred longing. Throughout all of the circumstances of my life, relationships that came and went, ones that stayed, job changes, things that were important to me for their time and then faded as new interests emerged, the longing has remained constant. At times its voice was loud and insistent, and I took very definite and intentional actions to learn more about my spiritual nature. I actively sought out philosophies and teachers that felt right. Big jumps in my understanding happened during those times.

At other times, the voice of sacred longing was quieter, not urging me toward big changes but to gentle shifts in my awareness. In those times I felt the need to slow down and listen more, both to my own thoughts and feelings, and to the subtleties of others’ expression.

To me, sacred longing reflects that part of us that is always on our perfect path, no matter what chaos our personal growth may be creating in the moment. It is the beacon within that guides us to the light, even as our human experience feels disconnected from the light. Once we become aware of the unquenchable thirst of longing to know the divine, we must open ourselves to its gentle but insistent pull.

Sacred longing always knows the right next step, and its urgings are infinitely trustworthy. Even though it is not a roadmap indicating the exact twists and turns that we will make, it keeps us moving ever forward in the right direction, and we are never lost.

May you recognize and heed the pull that is your sacred longing, the voice of God leading you unerringly home, and may this tool be a blessing. . .

Healing the World as We Heal Ourselves

I have recently discovered the writings of Pema Chodron, an American Buddhist nun who teaches in Nova Scotia, at the first Tibetan monastery in North America established for westerners. Her books have provided me with some very practical and appreciated insight from the Buddhist perspective.

In the book I’m reading now, called Taking the Leap, Chodron addresses in her gentle but powerful manner how we often use our spiritual practice as a way to feel better, but could broaden our perspective to allow our practice to teach us the tools we need to help uplift others.

More specifically, she states that “for many, spiritual practice represents a way to relax and a way to access peace of mind. We want to feel more calm, more focused; and with our frantic and stressful lives, who can blame us? Nevertheless, we have a responsibility to think bigger than that these days. If spiritual practice is relaxing, if it gives us some peace of mind, that’s great – but is this personal satisfaction helping us to address what’s happening in the world? The main question is, are we living in a way that adds further aggression and self-centeredness to the mix, or are we adding some much-needed sanity?”

She quotes a story about a Native American grandfather who was speaking to his grandson about violence and cruelty in the world and how it comes about. The grandfather said that it was as if two wolves were fighting in his heart. One wolf was vengeful and angry, and the other wolf was kind and understanding. The young man asked his grandfather which wolf would win the fight in his heart. And the grandfather answered, “The one that wins will be the one I choose to feed.”

The challenge, says Chodron, for our spiritual practice and for the world, is how can we train right now, not later, in feeding the right wolf?

One practice that she suggests in our “training” is something she simply calls “a pause.” Throughout the day, as we are able, she recommends that we just pause from what we are doing, and step back from the mind’s activity for a count of three breaths.  That is all.

I’m finding that when I do this I step back into that space of being the watcher, the I who watches me, the divine within me that is able to notice where my mind has been, but remains forever loving and peaceful regardless of its travels.

Chodron’s belief, as I’m coming to understand it, is that as we step back from the unconscious activity of mind we are able to access our natural intelligence, openness and warmth, and carry that forward into our interactions with others. These are words to heal a world by!

May you pause often to connect with our collective, perfect good, and may this tool be a blessing. . .

Having Compassion For Yourself

In the years I've been writing I haven't yet gotten to this topic, which isn't surprising given how much easier it is for most of us to offer compassion to others than it is to have deep compassion for ourselves.  It seems that the very definition of being a good person must include trying to understand that others have different perspectives than we do, seeking to forgive when others have somehow wronged us, and just generally taking the high road and cutting other people some slack.  I think we would do well to remember to include ourselves in this gentle approach.

Many of us tend to be harder on ourselves than on others.  I see other people facing challenges and sometimes acting in negative ways, and compassion comes easily.  My deep intention in those times is to find a way to understand, and to forgive.  I send my prayers out into the universe for the best to happen for them, and I know that it is done.  I try to remember to allow my best and highest to express in the situation, too, and know that it is also done.

I'm finding that compassion for myself needs to go deeper than that.  I'm seeing now that it's not wrong or selfish to focus more on compassion for myself than for others. That's a different approach for me, but I see the importance of it.

The more intentional we are about listening to ourselves, taking the time to hear what we need to do to take care of ourselves, feeling and honoring our emotions, and holding ourselves in compassion and love, we are a light in the world, allowing others to do the same.

When I step out of trying to fix a situation for someone else and focus instead on my own wholeness, I find myself again in truth where everything around me is already perfect, and there is nothing that I or anyone else need to do better or differently.

When I seek first to understand myself, and forgive myself, and then cut myself the same slack I would for another, I am holding a space for divine love.  When I shift my awareness to seeing myself, and the situation, as God does, there is limitless compassion.

May you find compassion first for yourself, and may this tool be a blessing. . .

Asking for Help

It can be hard sometimes to ask for help. We feel the need to manage things on our own because we don’t want to appear incapable or weak, or because we don’t want to burden others. Or maybe we just get so caught up in pushing our way through something that the thought of seeking help doesn’t even occur to us.

There have been countless, everyday situations in my life when my load was made lighter because I decided to ask for help. There have been times when I probably should have asked for help but didn’t, and other times when I felt uncomfortable asking but did it anyway, and was later gratefully aware of what a gift it was to be unexpectedly held by another in my time of need. I’ve also been able to move forward from major, life-altering events in my life because I reached out and someone was there on the other side to grab my hand.

We all experience these times in life when maybe we could go it alone but it’s difficult, or when we just can’t manage something by ourselves. When it’s hard to ask for help, I’ve found that just choosing to be willing to seek help with something opens the door for Divine Consciousness to present the help I need in the most perfect way.

As the song says, “We get by with a little help from our friends,” or from our family, a stranger we encounter, a caring professional, or from that perfect passage that jumps out at us from a book we’re reading. The key for me seems to be the willingness part - being willing to acknowledge that I am confused and stuck, and that God in her infinite expression will provide the answer I need. I just need to ask so that I can be answered.

I’ve learned what a gift asking for help can be to the person providing the help. There is a state of grace inherent in caring for, and being cared for by another. In helping another we know ourselves as strong, and loving, and compassionate. And in being helped by another we are able to experience the truth of how precious we are.

May you trust that the help you seek awaits you, and may this tool be a blessing. . .