Because it's not as though I haven't been on a path with God for longer than I realize. It's not as though I am starting this journey to become whole, by which I mean become a million pieces that I can feel moving, today. I've been on this journey for so long. And sometimes I am centered and one with everything and with whom I know myself to be.
And sometimes I am not.
This year, I got very lost for a long time. I allowed fear into a world that can only be lived through fearlessness. I allowed my wrist to be held in the fog when my soul and spirit wanted to run forward into the sunlight. I forgot to get up every day and look at the sunshine. I gave love where it wasn't returned and held love back where I could have grown by sharing. I got very, very lost. And when I finally was ready to come home to myself, I had no roadmap back.
Which is not to say that it was really that hard. Because at the heart of it all, I am one with me and it was only the process of severing my belief in concepts rather than realities that was hard.
And then I became inspired by
Hilary's powerful quest for her own spiritual center.
And then I became inspired by the
hard work Carrie is doing.
And I found my old Thankfulness Journal and decided to start a new
one, in a new form.
And this beautiful man who is with me in these moments said to me, one day while I was struggling, "If you need to find your way back to something, do it with words. That's how you've always done it before."
And so this blog will be my recording of the lessons that I need to remember. It will be a collection of the words - both mine and others - that help me find the Truth in the world. It will sometimes be pictures, and sometimes be poems and sometimes be silence. It will, to the best of my ability, be the collage and the scrapbook of my roadmap. Of the images and words and sounds and memories that I use to build my soul up.
It will not be updated daily, or sometimes even weekly, because nobody chooses the moments in which they understand their being. But I have always believed that a relationship with God, in every form he has ever taken, is hard work. You cannot sit in the middle of the field and wait for the universe to drop baskets of manna in your lap. You have to do the hard work. The hard work of exploring. Of finding your way. Of taking actions that offer thanks and making sacrifice so that the universe will give you goodness. You have to be good, be dedicated, be hard working, be diligent and be sincere. Not just say that you are those things. Doing those things is harder than saying them.
You have to know that you will fall. Often. You will be less than the best version of yourself frequently, and the moments in which you are not will require that you constantly make yourself aware of every way in which everything you do impacts not only this moment but the moments forward. That is hard.
You will have to forgive yourself when you have fallen. You will have to forgive others when they have fallen. You will have to begin to understand the fine, paper thin barrier between forgiving people and allowing them into your life if their impact will work against your becoming whole. You will have to live forgiveness while knowing your own limits
You will have to be fearless. So fearless - because the universe, because God, will challenge you every day. You will have to believe in the value of yourself beyond all reasonable faith. And you will not always succeed in this, and then you will have to find your way back to believing it again. And that is the greatest challenge the universe will give you.
And, of course, you will have to love. You will have to love with abandon. You will have to love with flaw (and love flaws). You will have to accept love even when it means that you know it will hurt you, or even when it means that you know it will hurt the other person eventually. And you will have to offer love every time it is asked for, because to do less would be to be ungrateful for the love you have been given.
You will need to be grateful, and generous, and strong enough to hurt yourself and others when it is the right thing to do. And wise enough to know what is hurtful and what is Right. You will need to learn how to let go of things no matter how badly you want them if they are not in your plan. You will need to learn how to hold on to things patiently even when it is hard.
These are the things I am on a constant daily journey to do. I'm am working harder on it now than I ever have before, but maybe because I most recently failed more than I ever have before.
Come on my journey with me. More importantly, start your own. And work hard at it. Wake up. Be good. Do good. Do not destroy yourself when you cannot do and be good. Find a roadmap for yourself.
The picture in the right hand side of this blog is Matisse's "Open Window." It has always been a transformative image for me. When I look at it, I always see the vibrant colors of the world, coming in through the windows of my mind and heart and filling me up. You need to look at it that way - not as though the colors are on the outside of the window and your soul is on the inside, but as though the open window between the two things lets them fill each other up. When I can do that at every moment, I will no longer need this journal.
This journal will most likely be with me, in some form or another, for always.
(and now, some tips on becoming
sustainable green).
