dailydatewithgod

Venturing into the unfamiliar is not given the credit it deserves.  It is like random words put together.  We easily compare unfamiliar versus familiar as known versus unknown and think we have grasped the distinction.  What we fail to realize is everything about us is steeped in what is familiar.  It is not simply that we know about it.  We live the familiar. Our brains are wired for the familiar.  The goal when approaching the unfamiliar is to quickly and with the least amount of energy possible make it familiar.  Our minds do a lot of leaps and stretching of distinctions to do this survival task.  And again, all of this is baked into our automatic mechanisms we do not realize it.  In fact, often long after the unfamiliar has become familiar do we realize it has happened. We forget how daunting or unusual whatever flavor of unfamiliar we were bracing ourselves to face. God invites us to choose and intend to not only embrace the unfamiliar but to revel in the process.  It wakes us up, it engages our curiosity, it causes us to take in more oxygen and exert more energy.  In other words, it allows us to come alive. Our minds are so focused on making the unfamiliar familiar as soon as possible while our hearts are looking to enjoy all the moments in between.  Our hearts dare to step through each moment of fear and uncertainty.  Our hearts remind us it is not just about reaching the goal of familiarity.  It is equally about expanding how we are familiar with ourselves and our capacities.

There is a constant narrative running through our minds.  So much of it, we are not aware of because it is typically the same narrative.  We have become so used to it we do not notice it is even happening.  We would most likely go mad if we were to notice all the thoughts running through our heads. It would literally exhaust our brains.  Therefore our minds must have the capacity to filter and draw our attention only when necessary.  The difficulty with this is when we have narratives that do not serve our best interest.  The ones we have had running since before we recognized our capacity to take in information.  It is the default narrative.  The only way to catch it is to pause and notice it. One way is to notice the things we say without thinking.  The words or phrases that seem to topple out of our mouths.  They give us an indication of what kind of narrative we have about the situation we are facing at the moment. On my daily dates with God, I was exposed to the practice of just noticing the thoughts that ran through my mind by watching them and not owning them. It may sound strange but it creates a distance from them.  The distance then allows us to determine which parts of the narrative are truly ours versus what we took on when our brain was on record as a little kid.  Given the power we hand over to the voice in our head, the narrative must be one that supports who we are at our core.  It can be overwhelming to listen to the narrative when we first start, but it is worth the discomfort.  Only by noticing what we are allowing to narrate our lives can we know what we are working with and the distinction between the unknown narrative running through our minds and the narrative of our hearts.  God stands ready to hold witness without judgment and listen with a warm embrace.

When we link in with the energy of our hearts we are connected to a different kind of vision than the one provided through our eyes. It is not that one is right and the other is wrong, they both have their place and their role in our lives.  Our hearts have an assortment of capacities that our minds do not but they work in cooperation with one another. Connecting to our hearts brings us closer to the breath of life.  Learning to see our lives through the assortment of lenses provided by our hearts provides a level of humility.  It is a humility that we do not lend ourselves when it comes to believing what we see with our eyes. We have such certainty and fixed ideas when it comes to what we are physically seeing.  Given the assortment of lenses in our hearts, we cannot feel the same certainty.  It is not as easy to fall for the illusion of certainty, especially when we find the lens of our hearts impacting the lens of our eyes. God invites us to peer into the assortment of possibilities that God has access to by connecting to our hearts.  As assortment that moves beyond our fixed ideas of how things should be or whatever other expectations we have.  In the expansive assortment of the lens in our hearts, we can pursue avenues of perspective that our minds will tell us are not possible.  God encourages us to give the assortment of lenses of our hearts a try and notice if we experience some freedom.

Sometimes it is hard to know what to do with the information we are given. We may not know what we think or feel about something or someone.  Our mind automates what category it falls into in an effort to minimize our having to think about it.  The brackets in our brain were established in the first seven years of our life when we were watching and taking in all the information and ideas we could from the words and behaviors of those we saw as authority figures.  We looked to our parents, teachers, media, culture, loud and popular voices and actions to tell us what bracket to know where to put pieces of information.  When something new to us arrives within our realm, we assess it based on the established brackets and know what to do with it.  If it does not seem fit within a particular bracket, we will either automatically disregard it or put energy into creating a new bracket or a way to make it fit in an existing one.  We call them biases and predispositions but neurochemically they are well-worn pathways and strong circuitry in our brains.  God invites us to open up the circuitry to the bracket of our heart so we can look at information and experiences through another well worn albeit less used path.  It is the bracket that encapsulates the variety and possibilities which cannot be held within our minds. The pause needed to make time for the path to and from the bracket of our hearts is well worth the wait but it is not as immediate as the one provided from the first thought.  It takes a level of discipline and intention to allow for the pause to travel to and from the bracket of our hearts.  The good news is the more practiced we get the quicker the travel time.

There are some people we meet that we feel connected to automatically.  There are situations we find ourselves in and we have this sense it is exactly where we are supposed to be.  These experiences are so striking to us we see them as perhaps unusual and rather profound.  What if what we are experiencing is an awareness of the linkage that our hearts have with other hearts.  Henri Nouwen used the phrase “Heart Speaks to Heart.”  The linkage we feel with others and certain experiences or even things comes from the space within our hearts.  It is a place that recognizes the sacredness of all things.  Most of the time we default to the vision provided by our eyes and so we can miss the linkage.  The profound and outstanding moments of linkage come when the power of the linkage supersedes the vision of our eyes and see more from the eyes of our hearts.  In the moments when my eyes seem to blind me to anything sacred or heart like in another person or situation, I turn to God with one simple prayer. “Help me to see with the eyes of my heart.” When I am willing to let go of the vision I am holding with my eyes alone, the linkage appears and ultimately I see the sacredness in whatever I am beholding.

On my daily dates with God, I have experienced the compassion and grace of being willing to go into the dark spaces. The parts of myself that I was ashamed of or did not want anyone to know about.  Carrying them around for years in my heart and mind became a weight (almost literally) I could no longer sustain. Learning to face the truth of myself in recovery has been painful at times. Sometimes the greatest pain has come from realizing that my adaptive style of self-hatred and being really hard on myself are not effective tools for reconnecting with the truth of who I am.  When we realize something we do regularly does not work there is a sense of loss and confusion.  In part, this comes from the fact that it served us in some way for a time.  God invites us to look at the alliances of our self-defeating patterns.  We see them as faults and want to get rid of them.  God sees them for what they are.  Adaptive thoughts or behaviors aimed at getting our needs met and continuing to live the best we can.  God is everpresent to the light of life that dwells within us and knows while the expression of the alliance to life may have become counterproductive its alliance is true none the same. As we begin to see this in ourselves we recognize it in others.  It is something I need to be reminded of both for myself and others.  If I focus on the alliance I have compassion.  If I focus on the expression I have contempt.  Thus far compassion has engendered more change in myself than contempt could even attempt.

With the world in a tizzy, it is easy to see how we might want to just pull the covers over our heads and close off our hearts. I certainly have thought about it as my alarm went off in the morning and I find myself saying “I can do this!” as I get ready for work.  Some days it is no small feat to get of bed, go for a walk and then drive to work at the hospital.  For some, it might be the thought of spending another long day in close quarters with the same people.  And still others about taking care of a loved one who is not well.  We all have our various struggles, too many to name here.  God invites us in moments of uncertainty, grief, stress, and frustration to find shelter in our hearts.  One thing I know, it is my heart that gives me the courage to show up.  We think the solution is to put a barrier around our hearts and shelter it. However, It is our hearts themselves which shelters us from believing all the fears that run through our minds.  It is in our hearts where the courage to be present in our lives, no matter the challenges.  Our hearts by their courage are the shelter we need to not forget the truth of who we are in a world that is telling us to hunker down and be scared.  Sometimes the most profound thing we can do is take a deep breath. Simple but easy to forget.  Our breath connects us to the shelter of our hearts which encompasses the courage we need to take the next indicated step.

I could say that I have no idea what it is like to experience analysis paralysis but alas that would be a lie.  I think most of us have some familiarity with the way our brains are wired to investigate and understand.  How many times do we catch ourselves saying, “I wish I could wrap my head around it, or once I get my head wrapped around it, I can move forward.”  Like all elements of ourselves, there are darker and lighter shades of expression. Our minds have this seemingly endless capacity to find a million rabbit holes to travel down.  It is good to investigate, review, and even survey what we are being asked to make a decision about.  Given that everything we act on starts with a decision it makes sense to think before we act.  However, we are not simply minds with bodies attached.  We are a complex system that gives and receives information and takes action on many levels.  Relying simply on the inspection authored by the mind leaves open the possibility that the actions we choose are not the fullest expression of ourselves or even the truth of who we are.  God invites us to bring along the inspection of our hearts.  Our hearts have a sensitivity that our minds do not have.  Our hearts can wrap themselves around things our mind could spend our whole lives inspecting and still not get any answers.  By inviting our heart’s inspection into the picture as we move to action we practice strengthening the interconnection of our hearts and minds and acting from a whole and powerful place.

When we orient our intentions with our actions we are in an alignment phase that empowers us to move coherently through the world. Since none of us are perfect most of the time it is a kind of dance in out of coherence with ourselves and our lives.  God invites us to open up the experience we are in and expose it to the phase of our hearts that never changes.  There is light and life force always operating within ourselves which can courageously work to bring our various phases into alignment.  When we are scattered in mind and being we can pause and take a deep breath. The breath brings our focus to our hearts which awakens the energy needed to help us become aware of which phase is not in alignment with our truth in the moment.  It looks like pausing and taking a deep breath and choosing to step away or ask a question or not react.  All of these actions if we are honest with ourselves are in alignment with where we are in the moment we feel out of alignment. Even more expansive is how our hearts know to connect with the mind and the body to remind them how to bring ourselves to a place of peace.  Many spiritual teachers have spoken of how the peace we seek lies within ourselves.  Trusting in this message beings with a breath.

When I think of how we are programmed to function as human beings it is not hard to get caught up in the idea that we are robots of some sort.  On some level that almost sounds easier especially when it comes to reprogramming some of our inborn behaviors.  We have various reflexes set up to enable us to survive for which I am most grateful.  Other adaptive reflexes come from the programming set up at a young age which is entirely context-based.  However, because of the state of our mind and the part of the growth in which they occurred our system did put a stop in place to account for the context.  In other words, when we are reflexively reacting to something in our current environment which in any way mirrors or is similar to a past context our brain kicks in and runs the program already in place.  Gratefully, there are also mechanisms of new growth so that new reflexes can be set up but they take time to become established.  The best way to initiate the process is to introduce our hearts through our breath into the mix.  When we consciously pause and breathe we awaken our heart and change the vibration around our heart to move at a pace we want versus the automatic reflex which likely has our heart ramped up. From the pause and deeper slower breath, we can detach ourselves from the old context and how it is overlaying the current situation.  It is a skill that takes practice.  God designed our hearts to be involved in this process not only because it physically then feeds the rest of our system but it has the courage and the compassion to keep practicing.