Archive for December, 2010
Don’t you love the grand potentiality hovering in the air? It seems as if everyone I speak with says they will gladly pronounce 2010 over and done at the stroke of midnight tomorrow night!
I feel the excitement of the new year–oh what challenges, opportunities and growth await each of us. Roll out the red carpet, polish up those little statues, prepare the stage . . . here we come for an award-winning year!
POWER
Power is the word for this fifth day of Christmas. I am filled with power–spiritual power–and it is the basis for my eager anticipation of 2011.
We all possess power, with a capital P, but its strength in our lives can only be revealed when we give it permission to come forth.
Spiritual power is innate and beautifully imprinted on our beings in a unique and personal dimension of connectedness with our Creator. The gift of Power allows us the opportunity to express the other 11 Christ attributes (the previous four being faith, strength, wisdom and love).
Power hinges on my willingness to serve as a conduit, as a spiritual messenger. Not everyone chooses the conductor path; some choose to remain unplugged from the divine current. Perhaps there is an inherent responsibility that comes with the territory; it isn’t easy to take the high road during a crisis of character, condition or circumstance.
I have to work at being prepared to call Power forth. There are times when it takes too much effort and there are times when I just flat refuse to do the work. And always there are consequences to my non-action.
Those times and consequences don’t matter as much as concerning myself with the present moment, this holy instant and as I stay focused, the moments suddenly add up to a whole day of being.
Be here today–I am here today, God, and ready to fulfill whatever lies in store. I feel your Power; I am your power. Together we are a mighty force in breathing, experiencing and healing life.
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We’ve reached the point of looking at 2010 in the rear-view mirror; its end looms like a setting sun about to drop below the horizon. There may be a few moments of daylight left–in fact, some of the most beautiful–but for the most part, the sun has also set on the year, and I am excited.
It’s been a really long time since I’ve felt such a rush of anticipation for what the turn of the calendar holds. My heart feels the potential of magic as we stand on the precipice of 2011.
LOVE
Wonder and love–love is the word for today’s Fourth Day of Christmas. Unity’s perspective on love embraces sending love, feeling love for those who don’t want love, or perhaps are unable to accept and give it.
That is my aspiration–to move from a place of thinking about how difficult it is to love people who are rude or hostile or unlovable toward me, or those who hold a grudge against me or are just downright weird (in my estimation). Instead, I want to love as Jesus loved–without regard for the person’s circumstances or involvement in my life.
The human in me can feel hurt over a family Christmas incident which was all about my expectations anyway. Instead, I want my spirit to deny the hurts effect on me and love them anyway.
The human me can feel revulsion over a woman on an airplane who was constantly picking at individual strands of hair, pulling at them, snapping of the ends and then brushing them away. The spirit-led me takes her inside with me and communes with her spirit.
That is the Jesus love I want to express.
The spiritual muscle needs vigilant exercise. There is a message deeply ingrained in spiritual work that I am worth it, worth the effort, worth the prayer, worthy of the deeper practices Jesus demonstrated.
It’s hard, no doubt, and once again let me be clear–these are aspirations. The probability of failure, many times over, is huge. My prayer is that each failing brings me a wee bit closer to the spirit-led woman I want to be.
I am a long, long way from the nearly spiritually dead place where I lived 20 years ago. We all have a history of change.
The new year is one of traditional resolutions. In the past, those “I resolves” were ego-based. Now they are spirit-based and led by love.
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The spiritual power for Day Three of Christmas is Discernment, also known as Wisdom.
I don’t believe that discernment only involves knowing when and how and why a decision needs to be made. When we are able to discern between two things, there’s a huge difference between figuring something out and understanding from a spiritual perspective.
Discernment is the spiritual part of the knowing. I pray for discernment because I want my still, inner voice to give me the intuitive sense of “do I?” or “should I?” In order to connect with my intuitive self, I have to slow down. In fact, the process works best when I pause completely and call forth God’s presence, affirming it’s holiness. I also affirm that whatever the decision, I have the strength to allow guidance toward that decision.
DISCERNMENT
My old self–the still practicing ego–tries to tell me all the mamby-pamby, mumbo-jumbo is for sissies, those who can’t make a decision on their own.
“Come on, let’s go, we may miss this opportunity,” is what the ego says to me. Those words are a familiar refrain since I did spend a good portion of my life running pell-mell into decisions that had the potential for great harm.
Today, I deny the ego’s power. In fact, as we leave Fort Lauderdale today, I’ll do my best to leave my ego by the sea.
My power of discernment–represented by the disciple James, son of Zebedee, is rock-solid today because I am actively working with the powers of faith, strength and love (tomorrow’s Power). God’s love and Jesus’ examples of love are the touchstones of my new way of being.
Are their examples in your life when you’re aware that your decisions are spiritually charged? Can you tell the difference? Is spiritual discernment a decided part of your daily life?
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The word for the second day of Christmas is strength. I love Unity’s scripture selection: “God is the strength of my heart,” from Psalms 73:26.
The chosen affirmation also feels so appropriate for today’s work. “I am centered in the power and presence of Christ within and I grow stronger each day.
STRENGTH
As I write from the 20th floor balcony across from
Ft. Lauderdale Beach, I feel the strength of the sea. From the point at which a wave begins far out in the ocean, strength develops with each gathering roll. There may be a brief moment of respite before the wake prepares for the next and the next until finally in a last mighty push, it crashes against the shore. Then, and only then, can it relax and allow the outbound current to pull it back to its beginning.
In life, many are raised with the “buck up, pull yourself up by your bootstraps if you want to make anything of yourself” attitude. I was a
Horatio Alger child. Anything worth achieving required brains, brawn and a whole lot of guts.
And that’s the way I lived my life–work hard, play hard.
In this second half of my life, I’m blessed with an amazing realization. While I’m killing myself being all I can be, gathering momentum to coil myself into one more rolling wave, I suddenly get it.
I’m trying to go it alone. No wonder it’s so damned hard. God’s strength is infinitely available for every circumstance. Here’s the cool part–I gain strength when I let go of control. God’s strength is mine and that is how I grow stronger everyday. Growth is not the result of quadrupling my efforts to muscle through a present condition.
The disciple Peter represents faith and his brother
Andrew is associated with strength. Faith must be present in us before we can build resilient strength.
How is your strength level today? God has your back, you know, even if you don’t feel strong. Knowing that, I’m bringing God’s strength inside of me and believing that because his strength endures, so will mine.
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If, as a child, someone had told me that Christmas extends to January 6 (the day of Epiphany), I would have thought more presents! Kids aren’t supposed to think of Christmas as a spiritual experience; it is about presents with the original presents being given to the baby Jesus.
Likewise, children aren’t required to think of the 12 days of Christmas as anything more than a rhyming song mostly about birds (French hens, turtle doves, swans, geese and a partridge).
FAITH
In fact, I was well into adulthood when I learned there was another meaning for the 12 days of Christmas; it has only been in the last few years that I’ve come to understand the days do not lead up to December 25th, but follow it.
This year, as a final nod toward significant inner searching about the meaning of Christmas in my heart, I’ve decided to follow Unity’s “Awakening the Christ Spirit Within” Advent booklet and write each day about one of the 12 Powers, considered gifts from God.
December 26th, the First Day of Christmas, is aligned with the Power of Faith.
For me, faith is an unshakable belief that God is the source of all good and that everything in my life–from the most minute detail to the towering, emotionally charged “big deals”–falls under God’s area of responsibility. The simple prayer of Thy will be done, is one that helps me loosen my grip on anything and everything that I try to control in my life. When I open my clenched fist, faith is set free. It rises up around me and then rains back down drenching me in the aftermath of total surrender.
Warm and carefree winter days in southeast Florida strengthen my faith. Shelling on the coastal beaches with seagulls dipping and diving and palm trees firmly rooted against gusting ocean winds, deepens my faith. Gulls give way to air currents, palms bend from their tops, each in a natural form of surrender. From my deepest self, I learn to emulate their movement.
All God’s creatures, great and small, intelligent and intuitive, must eventually trust a life-affirming process.
Faith is that process for me.
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In July of 2009, I had an epiphany. For about a month prior, I was emotionally distraught, increasingly depressed and having serious thoughts of drinking again (after 18 years of sobriety).
I struggled to wrap my arms around what could possibly be wrong with me. I had all the trappings of a good life, one others would love to emulate--great job, dream house, traveling for a living, a life mate . . . the list goes on. 
