dailydatewithgod

When I was a kid I remember that the kids with nicknames seemed to be cool. I am sure it was just a perception as it was only a shortened version or their initials that gave them a nickname. For a while I had my friends call me by my initials but it did not quite stick. I suppose something about giving myself the nickname to a group of people who already knew me made it hard to stick. When I was in college I had more luck. Nothing in my life was going according to my plan of moving away from home and going to a dance school so I figured I would give myself a new moniker. As I met new people at university I introduced myself as Cole. It took many of the letters of my name and I love Cole Porter’s music. Gratefully, It stuck for all 4 1/2 years before I decided to retire it. There was something about having a moniker of my choosing. Something connected to my love for music and particularly unique. It was also interesting to notice how many eyebrow lifts I got from professors as to why I was seemingly known for a typically male nickname. But I did not care in the least and I even met one guy at the Catholic Newman center who knew who Cole Porter was. It made up for all the clever folks who said “Cool Cole” like it was the first time it had ever been uttered. We do not all get to choose our names but we can choose a moniker. Even if it is one that is not uttered to anyone but ourselves. I often wonder what God’s moniker is for me. God calls each of us by a moniker that calls us to show up as the unique and true expression of life what we are. It matters little what monikers other people have for it, it is ours. I like to think of it as my moniker written in love. A love so profound that I only come close enough to potentially uttering it through the resonance of my being but not through words. We concern ourselves a lot with how people see us, but God invites us to see what the moniker on our hearts is because it is within that moniker that we will hear the voice of love.

When determining our stance on a particular issue it is important to consider all the factors involved. We have this unique capacity as human beings to explain our behavior post-action by some reasoning which may or may not explain our behavior. It is humbling to admit we do not know why we actually do something. The reality is so much of our behavior is automatic and programmed based on very well-practiced habits. Those habits are shaped by observing those around us at a young age and adapting our behavior to match theirs. It is how cultural constructs and accepted norms are formed. With the practice of awareness and mindful practice, we can alter our stance to mirror that which is aligned with the truth of who we uniquely are. Not all of our automatic stances need to be realigned. We can pick and choose as some of them may serve us well. Another difficult concept to grasp is that we do not do anything that does not serve us. It sounds preposterous especially when we find ourselves behaving in patterns that clearly are hurting us. This is where the recognition of our stance becomes useful. In our minds, formed before we were aware of it, there are fixed ideas and notions serving a survival purpose. Determining if it is actual survival or survival of who we think we are or are supposed to be, is the nitty-gritty of defacing the stance we are holding. God encourages us to investigate the mental and emotional stances underpinning our perspectives that create behaviors we sense we are no longer truly connected to so we can return to a place of choice in our lives.

There are endless things to sign up for and become involved in.  Almost too many to consider.  It is not until we enroll that we can consider ourselves involved.  Enrollment requires a commitment both to ourselves and to that which we are enrolling.  Enrollment is an agreement whether in writing or in conversation that we are putting energy and intention in a particular direction.  We can find ourselves invited to enrollment by others but it is our decision of enrollment that seals the deal.  On our daily dates, God invites me over and over again to enroll in the truth of who I am at my core.  When I am willing to let go of all my preconceived notions and trust that what God knows of me is more than I can possibly see or understand about myself and that whatever it is I do not need to fear it, do I agree to enrollment. The enrollment puts me in touch with the courage of my heart to face my fears about myself and what I will encounter in life.  It is the courage of the heart that sees past what my mind can see and gives me the power to walk forward in trust and hope.

In the modern world, it seems as though we are doused with information.  Always something coming at us.  I supposed it is relative as given our state of mind a barrage of information can seem like a lot coming at us or not.  Our mind’s natural propensity towards survival means we are on guard against any potential threat.  Whether we see ourselves existing in a friendly or harmful universe would thus determine the degree of dousing we experience.  On the other hand, when it comes to the positive and life-giving elements to be aware of it feels more like a splash.  It is the dash or pinch of an ingredient in the cake versus the cups of flour.  God encourages us to pay attention to the splashes as well as the downpour. The key is remembering that the splash can be all we need to wake us up and turn our attention elsewhere.  Sometimes splashes come in the form of annoyance so we wipe ourselves off in the hopes of not letting it affect us.  Other times a splash is a welcome way to cool down or wake up.  Either way, it subtly grabs our attention because it has an unknown pattern.  God invites us to both welcomes the splash that catches us by surprise and knows how to create a splash in our lives when we need to wake up.  Allowing ourselves the chance to flexibly engage with life’s unexpected patterns, grows the strength and courage for which we were born.

As we head into the end of the calendar year there is lots of discussion about what a rough year it has been individually and on a global level.  Since this is the only pandemic I have experienced in my lifetime I do not know the course of these things.  I only know based on the experiences in my life that most things do not follow the same kind of calendar that is on my computer. I am all for the hope that things will change and move in a better direction as we head into a new year.  This time of year as we head into a new season (in the northern hemisphere it is winter) we recognize we are at the cusp of a potential fresh start.  There are thoughts of what to let go of and what to carry with us into the new season or calendar year.  I can’t say I am for the idea of the pandemic continuing but I somehow think it will not resolve itself overnight.  In recovery, I learned and practice to the best of my ability the philosophy of One Day At A Time.  In truth, it is all we have.  The reality is each day we stand at the cusp of stepping into a new experience.  We know it will hold change and possibility and some of the same as the day before.  We get to choose at the cusp how we want to be with whatever shows up. It is the same as we close one year and enter another.  The cusp is simply a demarkation reminding us of our power to choose and create our experience whether it is a moment, a day, or a year.  I do not know what will come with 2021 but as I stand at the cusp of it I pause and reflect on who I have shown myself to be in 2020.  I want to bring what I have learned about love with me and use it as fuel to make choices in 2021.  I will ask God to help me let go of my ways of being that have pushed love away in 2020 and the courage to embrace the humility that comes with a desire to love more fully.  The cusp of a new year is an opportunity to reflect and remind ourselves we stand at choice every moment of our lives especially the ones that cannot be measured by the time clock.

In a world where we are seized with FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), it seems inconceivable that there are certain things we might choose to waive. It becomes a question of are we participating because something is available to us or because it is something we want to be available for. Just because we can participate does not mean it is for us. When we experience FOMO it serves as an opportunity to evaluate what the fear is really about. Most of the time our fears are not what they seem. By utilizing our capacity for mindful observation and curiosity, we can consider waiving our participation and see what surfaces. So often we rush to get rid of the fear that comes up instead of looking to the man behind the curtain, so to speak. We so quickly jump in and participate because we take the fear at face value. Knowing we have the option to waive our participation gives us the pause to determine whether or not we might actually want to wave goodbye to the experience. God encourages us to remember that whatever thinking and feelings are present in our reactions, they are indications of an energy fluctuation. Our level of energy fluctuation tells us something about ourselves. It is why life is about the process, not the content. We can waive the content but make use of the process by pausing to connect within and remember we are not slaves to our fears.

We tend to operate under the misconceived notion that because we do not think we are affected by something we are not. Given our mind’s propensity to already be on guard for what we knowingly perceive as potentially survival threatening concerns, we would be overloaded. The thing is so many effects of life are registered elsewhere. It is the ones that when we engage in the conversation with our mind about it, it is puzzling so we push it aside. Unless we have the awareness to acknowledge the effects that circumvent our cognitive understanding we can talk ourselves out of it. Taken to the other extreme we can believe we are affected on a deeper level than we are by everything. God invites us to recognize how we are designed. We are picking up on signals and we have a response to them. Most of those responses are automatic and we do not have to think about them. It is a brilliant design so we do not go into cognitive overload. When we experience things we cannot make sense of in our minds our nervous system will take over. Then there are times when no one around us or people whom we hold in authority cannot validate the effects we are experiencing because it is different from them. All of these factors combine to create a dynamic of how we interpret and put meaning in our minds to the various effects of what it means to be alive. Many of us have spent a fair amount of time talking ourselves out of the reality of an effect because there was no one to help us register it. When those patterns are made automatic we may find ourselves reacting to the effect of something as though it is affecting us more than it is in this moment. Our reaction is based on the reality of the past. Any time we have caught ourselves saying we swore we would not do that again or act like so and so, we are at the effect of some unrecognized effects. I am guilty of all those things and on my daily dates with God as I became aware of which effects I was handling as though I was affected by them at a different time, I learned to be in the life I am living today. Part of maturity is allowing ourselves the space to pause and connect to determine what effects of life are affecting us and then decide how to handle it. Making room to process the effects we are affected by and differentiating them from past experiences is what allows us to be with whatever we are affected by from a place of truth rather than the default mode. It is step by step, sometimes inch by inch work but its effects are the joys of getting to experience life as it is happening right now. It is this skill that allows me to approach the effects of life from a place of curiosity instead of fear.

I used to think that I would know that I was victorious in some endeavor because others would notice and acknowledge me. I have come to realize that what simply another way of me seeking approval from others. The real triumph is when I become aware of overcoming or growing through something. It is less like a parade and more like a bump in energy from within when I notice a change in my thinking and behavior. The grand triumph is simply an accumulation of many little victories, mostly unnoticed, along the way. Going through a stressful day without turning it into a reason to count all the ways I messed up is a triumph. When I refrain from reacting and decided to take a deep breath is a triumph. When I find the story in my head wants to go on and on about how I can’t do it and I counter by listing for myself all the things I am doing, it is a triumph. When my head hits the pillow and I did not spend my day driving around for my next sugar hit, it is a triumph. When I can feel all there is to feel and know I am not defined by it or have to act from it, it is a triumph. We are so much more than what we think, feel, and do. God invites us to pause and notice how we are being at any given moment and when we do it is a triumph. It may sound impersonal and distant, but on the contrary, it opens up the space of our hearts which holds the knowledge of the truth of who we are and what we are capable of outside of what our mind is chattering about. Life is wacky, messy, beautiful, alarming, challenging, and a catalyst for us to discover who we are outside of our stories and the stories of others. Each day is different if we let it surprise us and the triumph for me today will be the number of times I remembered not to take myself so seriously.

It may sound strange to think of yourself as your own science experiment but that is so much of what living is all about. We set out with some set understandings of how things (meaning we as human beings) operate in the reality of the world as it is generally accepted. From there we learn through trial and error what adds to our livelihood and what deters us from it. Because we are each our own person as much as we are the typical human animal, we both experience and express ourselves in unique ways. We are all created to be a messenger of God’s love. How we do that correlates to the gifts we are given, what we are drawn to, and what makes us come alive. Only when we experiment with what is provided to us and then chart our own course we will truly know the correlation of what enables us to come alive. Life’s twists and turns especially the ones which cause us to veer away from the expected or standard are how we learn who we truly are. The correlation between being good rule followers and being normal and being the fullest expression of ourselves may not exist. We start with what is accepted and known. We learn and grow by experimenting with coloring outside the lines and engaging in the unexpected. It is the very process of life that invites us to determine our own correlations between what increases our capacity and capability to be the truth of who we are what does not.

There used to be this commercial of a woman who in the middle of a stressful situation would picture herself in a bubble bath and say “Calgon, take me away!” We can all relate to the wish to sometimes be plucked magically from someplace we do not want to be and placed somewhere we do. We tend to associate the circumstances with the cause of our distress. The only problem with that is on any given day we may find ourselves in a similar situation and feel like we can handle it, no Calgon needed. Our interpretation of what is happening is caused by our state of mind. When I feel like I do not have the resources to handle an experience, I will look for some kind of rescue. I have never been partial to baths per se but I can see the appeal of being surrounded by warmth and sweet-smelling scents. The sweet was my rescue of choice for many many years. The reality is I did not have the tools I needed to face life effectively. The spiritual path of the 12 steps contained the tools needed to face life on life’s terms as they say in the recovery world. On my daily dates with God as I began to see the truth of who I am, I realized the futility of looking for rescue at all. Sure, there are moments when I think if only God could rescue me from this. I get stuck thinking I do not have what is needed to handle the situation. The distinction is I do not turn to food or flagellating myself with negative self-talk anymore. I recognize my desire to be rescued and take a deep breath. I reconnect to the power of my heart which has the wisdom and the courage to face what is in front of me to face. By pausing and using my breath to awaken my heart, there is a space between thinking a rescue will make everything alright and noticing what it truly is I want to be rescued from. Is it really the situation or is it my thinking about the situation? In the space of my heart is the wisdom to notice if I am actually in the present moment. Most of the time I am not seeking rescue from this moment but from a time in the past where something similar did not turn out well and I am using that to forecast a future that will not go well. Or I am doing the bad forecasting without any past evidence. When I breathe I can more clearly see that if I do not have what is needed, I do not need to be rescued, but maybe need some support. Maybe what is called for is reinforcement, not rescue.