Today, I am inviting you to "pause", spiritually throughout the day. You might begin right now, with a releasing exhale (of any measure), then a slow, quite inhale. Pause, and a slow release. It seems to me that May, 2024 is off to a rather jarring start. This weekend brings catastrophic flooding to the Houston area, and continued flood watch and warnings across Texas and Oklahoma. Growing up in Houston, I learned to live with water, floods, hurricanes, thunder and lightening and tornado warnings. Family and friends are still there, so I check in as I can. I note severe flood warnings in Brazil and Kenya while I follow Houston's. In an odd mix, today is also Cinco de Mayo, the Mexican-American holiday that arose from Mexico's victory over the French during the Franco-Mexican War in 1892. Despite the ominous weather warnings, the parades, dances and parties continue in Houston and across the Southwest. Additionally, this has been an intense week in the academic world as University student protests on the Israeli/Gaza war have escalated across the country with encampments, threats and counter threats, vandalism and arrests, provoking further division and conflict. And also notable, May is Mental Health Awareness Month.
While considering today's post, I came across a note, in my own handwriting, used as a quick bookmark, that advised: "Rid yourself of dependency in cultural/social/material structure." I don't know when I wrote it, but it referred to a paragraph by Emmet Fox, summed up by a quote of Jesus, Matthew 6:33, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God." If I changed the word "dependency" to "attachment", it would be a Buddhist teaching. Yet now, my sense of spirituality leads me to see the world and it's processes, it's complexity and "cultural/social/material structures" are all expressions of God. In truth, we do depend on one another, as persons and as a collective social order. This is the kingdom. This is the "garden". We are the current expressions of the transcendent, living our part, our contribution to the whole. We consciously know only a fragment of that whole. Whether we focus on the things, people, places, events of the world, or whether we withdraw to "seek God", we never leave the spiritual field. Despite the world's turmoil and seeming tragedy, we all live, move, and have our being it that which we name God. As we trust that more, "jarring" events are more manageable. The next step and the next become clearer.
Today, find those pauses that remind you: you have never left the spiritual ground of being. Pause for peace, for silence, for direction, for rest, for strength. Pause to remember. Have a day of Peace. (Susan Nettleton)
for poetry: https://www.poetry-chaikhana.com/.../SecondPoemth/index.html