dailydatewithgod

On some level, it seems unfortunate that it is only when we face adversity or challenge do we get a sense of who we are. It only seems that way because it appears paradoxical. Why couldn’t we the whole spectrum of ourselves through an internal lens of awareness? Who says we don’t? Who says that it is not in fact that internal awareness which moves us to walk into and face those very challenges? As far as I can tell if there is nothing else true about life it is that it is meant to be lived. All of it. Not just the good or fun stuff. The hard stuff, the ugly, the frightening stuff, and so much more. As someone who was busy numbing out the pain of life for many years, it seemed as though life was something to get through. Early on it got wonky and I was hurt profoundly. In my child’s mind, I took that to mean I best be on guard and there was little room for anything else. Thankfully, the spirit of life within me would not listen to my mind as the sole authority. Underneath the bruising breathed a heart that was untarnished by life’s circumstances. Every now and then it would sneak out and catch me by surprise. The surprises served as evidence that perhaps there was more to life than I could conceive in my own mind. Within each of us lies a strength supported by the universal imperative of life to keep going. It uses the energy of our hearts to propel us forward in the very challenging moments we think we can’t go on. I remember times when I wanted it all to just end and quickly, yet there I was still breathing. What is that? I could not deny that clearly, my heart contained a level of creative thinking about the purpose of life which laid outside my mind’s eye. When I was most broken down and found myself in recovery. It was a moment of reckoning with the fact that I could not continue on with what I was doing and had no idea what other options there were. Thankfully in the rooms of 12 steps, I found a community of people with like-minded hearts. People who could show me based on their experience what they had done when despite their best efforts their hearts kept pumping and moving forward to face whatever challenges and joys would lie ahead. God invites each of us to tap into the creative strength of our hearts when our minds appear to be tapped out of ideas on how to take the next indicated step. It just takes one breath to shift our mind’s eye to an awareness of the presence of our hearts which hold the key.