Body and Sprit

"A spirituality that is divorced from the body becomes an abstraction, just as a body denied its spirituality becomes an object."- Alexander Lowen.

     Is it really true that there is a war between our minds and bodies - between our logic and our emotions - between our conscious and subconscious minds - between our spirit and our flesh?

     Wouldn't it be more accurate to say that we are units with many different aspects ... And sometimes we artificially isolate one of those aspects from the others? Sometimes we ignore our guts. Sometimes we don't listen to reason. Sometimes we indulge our bodies in hedonism or float away in our heads.

     As I sit here soaking up the sound of bird chirps and the sight of one of my cats, Sparklet, draped over a shelf next to a window looking out on weeping willow trees after a rain, the spirit never seemed less disembodied. I feel my Higher Power in my bones. S/He/It is some indescribable wholeness within and around and on and over and through and Beyond me.

     And spirit can flow through your body too. Balance is the key. And awareness.

Who Are You Talking To?

                                               "You can't pray a lie."

                                                      Mark Twain

     Communications experts, speaking instructors and writing coaches all say to target our words at a specific audience. This makes our words relevant and powerful.

     There are those who say our real audience is ourselves; If we write for ourselves, we will reach our kind of readers and listeners.

     What if we addressed all our words to God, to the Universe?

     When a person is in front of us, we would speak to the Divine within them. Appeal to their best self.

     When we are angry, we could then show the our listeners the respect Job's complaints showed the Lord in the Bible.

     Of course people are not actually God, not the Universe. For one thing, they don't have that much power. For another, they don't always have our best interests at heart.

     But how much time do we want to waste talking to their lesser faces?

     What I like most about addressing my words to God is that this makes me more honest. I can still lie to myself, and thereby to the Universe. But I'm not really kidding anyone.

     That's also what scares me most about doing all my talking to God, to all of Reality.

     But what good does it do us to lie?

The Confidence Of The Skeptic

     It has been claimed in reference to the notoriously skeptical philosopher David Hume that no one is so gullible as a skeptic. There is some reason to think this is also a good way to look at Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of the character Sherlock Holmes. Holmes was supposedly very observant, logical, intelligent and scientific. Yet his author, Doyle, fell for many of the supernatural fads of his day.

     I count myself a skeptic. Yet I now choose to affirm my solid trust in a Higher Power many people would say is a figment of my imagination.

     I explained some of what went into this in my post The Best Possible Decision. I see no need to defend the reasons for my faith any more than I did there and will do in my forthcoming memoirs. I can prove to myself as well as anyone can really prove anything that my trust in my Higher Power is well placed.

     But I do want to address the contradiction some might see between calling myself a skeptic and taking such a dramatic leap of faith.

But aren't skepticism and faith opposites?

     Although I discussed in the post I mentioned that we have no choice but to trust something, whether we admit it or not, I will concede that the evidence -or lack thereof - suggests the wise path would be not to expose oneself to danger by blindly trusting anything.

     Having set aside the question of proof and evidence, it's now possible to look more scientifically at the attitude of the skeptic and of the faithful. We prejudice the question of the real essence of a person's mindset when we argue over whether it's the best one or not. Truth about one aspect of a question can sometimes distort our interpretation of related truths by overshadowing them.

     We "know" that skeptics lack confidence in beliefs, while the faithful have few or no doubts about their convictions. And because we "know" this - and because it's true in many cases - we blind ourselves to the fact that an attitude of confidence and an attitude of doubt have no necessary connection at all to being skeptical or faithful.

     Put simply: A skeptic can be very confident in his conviction that a lot of beliefs are highly questionable. He can even be absolutely certain of it. Meanwhile, the faithful may choose to act with absolute fidelity to their beliefs, yet still be afraid that their truths are false.

Even if they aren't opposites, don't they lead in different directions?

     The key thing to understand about the skeptic is that he usually has far greater grounds for confidence in his evidence-bounded beliefs than the trusting man has for confidence in his sweeping faith ... if it turns out the skeptic's beliefs really are more limited by the evidence than are the true believer's. All else being equal, the less you concede, the more likely it is you won't be wrong.

     So how can I be skeptical and full of faith as well? By having examined the question of trust and faith rigorously.

     The key fact I realized when I took a truly skeptical and scientific approach to faith is that the Universe did not leave me a choice as to whether to trust. I have no way of knowing whether the food I eat is poison, I just take that on faith. I don't know whether the air is poisoned. I don't even control my next breath. Sucking air is an act of faith.

     In short, I was skeptical of the view that faith is an irrational, unscientific approach to the world.

     So skepticism led me to faith in the Universe.


     

   

The Real Problem

"Anyone can become angry. That is easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose and in the right way - that is not easy."- Aristotle.

     There is really only one psychological problem holding us back - each of us individually and all of us together. This problem is a victim mentality.

     We hear it everywhere: Trump is oppressing me or Clinton is oppressing me or taxes are unfair or no one listens or why doesn't someone fix the environment or I can't help it (i.e. I'm disabled somehow) or you make me feel (fill in the blank) or I'm no good (i.e. a victim of myself) ...

     We all get victimized. Sometimes we need to defend ourselves. And anger can be a positive motivating force at times. But being a victim is a choice.

     Being a victim is the choice to either passively accept your victim status and get walked on, or to fight back - in other words, it's a kill or be killed attitude. The law of the jungle.

     With everyone harping on how unfair life is, is it any wonder the world is messed up? A victim mentality - a kill or be killed mentality - justifies anything, no matter how inhumane or unjust.

     That's something to think about the next time you get angry.

     If you ever doubt whether a victim mentality is a kill or be killed attitude, just visit a prison and see who most inmates think the real victims are.

     Are you really a victim or just afraid of something (afraid of taking responsibility, afraid of accepting your powerlessness, afraid of being inadequate when you do exercise your power ...or ...?

     Because anger is inseparable from fear. Anger and fear are just different forms of our fight or flight response to danger. In essence, fear comes from believing we are vulnerable. And we often are.

     How much more scary it is, however, to be a victim ... So we fight the demons we blame for our vulnerabilities ...

     Yet how empowering to be an honest human who admits vulnerabilities and addresses them constructively. How empowering to be one who sees her or his own virtues and vices in other people ... who isn't ruled by the law of the jungle, who stands up for what's right without sinking to the level of a criminal.

     Is life unfair, or is it just life?

Black and White

Why is it I've never been able to

See blended in me neat

The good and bad I see in you

Only the illusion of perfect or flaw complete?

The Light of Night

An insight after a night's rest;

Personal growth after terrible suffering;

Newfound intimacy with a loved one after a heated argument;

Sometimes a dark night is needed to illuminate.

The Beyond Is Here And Now

I see the "Beyond" - beyond the known, beyond the controlled, beyond the current limits of the self - as the direction we take to grow. I also see the Beyond as the source of creativity. And as something Divine.

Here's the paradox: We don't move into the Beyond only by turning inward and imagining that things are different. We also taste the Over There by focusing on This; We go There through here and now.

It makes sense though, doesn't it? The here and now is ever-changing, ever moving out there beyond us, beyond our control, beyond what we have known.

Isn't the inner ever-evolving too? How much difference is there, really, between inside and out if the one constantly adapts to the other?

The Joy of Grief

"Grief may be joy misunderstood; Only the Good discerns the good." - Elizabeth Barrett Browning

     Here's the big problem I see with the loss of a loved one:

     We want - even need - to honor the value our loved one brought to the world. We need to affirm our love for them. And our personal integrity and love prevents us from denying the joy their mere memory brings us. We do all this by holding onto our loved ones in our hearts. But our mental health, our functioning - sometimes even our survival - requires some kind of letting go, some kind of moving past the sadness.

     It's an impossible bind.

     There is no right way to resolve this dilemma, and each relationship with a person is unique. So no one can give us a solution. We must find resolution on our own, if we can.

     What words of comfort do any good?

     Still, I always tell grieving people that I hope they can somehow change their sadness over the loss of a valuable person into gratitude for the value that person brought to the world.

     For example, a few years ago, after the loss of my mom, I started sending cards to several mothers every Mother's Day. I'm celebrating what mothers do (the most important job on the planet).

     I cry when I write those cards.

     But the tears no longer hurt. They feel good.

     Bittersweet, yes.

     But good, like mom.

     Would you like to honor your loved ones? Hold onto the best of them without paralyzing yourself in grief? You can.

     What was that person's signature value? What was the most important thing they brought to the world? Celebrate that, in whatever way works for you.