dailydatewithgod

In order to begin to understand the madness of this world in which we live, we must be willing to look at the madness that resides in our own hearts.  What is happening outside of us in no more foreign to us than our own true sense of self.  It is easier to witness it outside of ourselves.  The greater task is taking the time to slow down, get quiet, and connect with the truth of our hearts.  I find that the ability to be tolerant allows me room to be where I am in my thoughts and my feelings.  I don’t have to like something to be tolerant of it.  I don’t have to buy into it to be tolerant.  Tolerance creates space for thoughts and experiences of which I am not yet certain is okay with me. This space is what I understand God to be.  It as though his gentle hand takes mine and guides me to take a look and observe what is happening.  I do not need to defend against it or seek to hide and protect myself.  By being tolerance and with God at my side I can investigate, explore, and perhaps be open to something even more than tolerance.

God is the Ultimate!  God is da Bomb! Where else in the universe can we find the power of love more affirmed than in the smile of a child.  I have had the opportunity to marvel at the smiles of such little ones with great frequency lately and it simply elevates my mood.  I notice that when I am around them, whatever else is going on just melts away with that smile.  The beauty of the excellence of a smile is that it not only transforms the face that is conveying it but it also beams light to others.  Just last week I ran into a man who was working at a grocery store who smiled with his eyes as well as his lips.  I went up to talk to him just because the light beaming from his being was so alluring I couldn’t resist.  We take for granted the simplicity of a smile.  I have even tried the experiment of looking in the mirror and making myself smile for a couple of minutes to see if it improves my mood.  Eventually I found myself smiling genuinely out of the absurdity of the experiment.  Apparently, it works!  My prayer for us is the courage to experiment with the effects of a smile in ourselves and others today.  Make it a great one!  Peace~Colleen

God is definitive.  God is illuminating.  Being in the presence of Our Creator is like being in a brightly lit room that has no doors or windows.  There are no boundaries in love because its purpose is to permeate all.  Being in a physical reality that is all about lines and boundaries it is hard for us to imagine an energy that does not obey those same rules.  Our minds know where one thing ends and another begins.  We see distinction between ourselves and others.  Love blurs those lines.  This is why on some level it does not make sense to us.  We cannot wrap our heads around the idea of an all permeating force that connects every one and every thing.  But what if we aren’t supposed to wrap our heads around it at all?  What if it is the knowing of our heart and spirit that is meant to resonate with this idea?  What if our mind and our thinking are not the dominant force?  When we are touched by love there is a knowing resonance that calms the mind and reassure the soul.  This cannot be explained in language but we know it when we experience it.  We live in a world that relies on thinking and understanding and knowing in the traditional sense.  It is seen as the most powerful way to reside in this world. This makes it difficult for us to step away from and consider another possibility.  In my experience when I get quiet and still, tune in with my breath, and slow down the dominant resonance of my being does not come from my mind.  It comes from an underlying rhythm that seems to be flowing no matter what I do.  This is the rhythm of God.  This is the knowledge of existence from the heart and spirit.  My prayer for us is a willingness to be with the resonating rhythm of love that runs through us and from us today.  Make it a great one!  Peace~Colleen

God is identifiable.  God is available. Making the time each day to connect with the one who created me started as a necessity and has grown into a necessity.  At the entrance into recovery from my disease of food and sugar addiction I had to make some drastic changes to my behavior not only physically but mentally.  I could no longer continue on the path of my thinking and expect that I would somehow stop trying to kill myself with food.  The mind-set change would mean that whatever actions I took around food and exercise would be sustained because they had a basis of understanding in my head.  I had thrown any kind of self-care except for the bare essentials out the door long before that and with it a nurturing of my body.  I needed the help of others who lived this way of recovery but most importantly I needed to create relationship with a God that saw this form of self-care and self-esteem as the truth of who I am.  With concerted effort and a willingness to be uncomfortable, day by day, I began to create new course for my life.  I concentrated on what I thought my newfound sense of God would think of my actions and not listen to my own head which had the same story about not being good enough or what was the point or the built up anger at my body and the world around me.  The women who mentored me through the process required that daily prayer and meditation be a part of that formula.  So it was a necessity if I wanted what they had and over time it has become a necessity for my very livelihood.  I had no clue how to meditate and knew enough about prayer to get started, but all I had to do was take the action and be willing to do it badly.  To my amazement I found that God does not care in the least about how I attempt to connect with Him, just that I show up.  These daily dates are much more than some obligatory and good girl action, they are the signs of a woman who desires to remember who she truly is and who all of us are in God’s eyes.  My prayer for us is a willingness to concentrate our efforts for five minutes today in connecting with God as we understand God in whatever way, shape or form it takes. Make it a great one! Peace~Colleen

God is simple.  God is profound.  The heart of God from which we were created is the pure definition of whole-hearted living.  The essence from which our being was generated has bestowed upon each of us the capacity and capability to share with the world love that knows no bounds.  Our minds will rebuff just at the notion of trying to comprehend such a reality. How is the even remotely possible given the evidence of the world in which we live and what is happening these days?  It seems  highly unreal to even entertain such a profound notion.  Given what we see with our eyes it is time to throw in the towel, right?  We might as well concede that it is all random and there is no overwhelming power of love that runs through everything in existence.  Such a power would transform this world, wouldn’t it?  But maybe it is not a question of whether or not it exists, but rather our awareness of it.  Maybe we are looking in the wrong place for the evidence.  Maybe we have lost sight of what miracles really are and rely only on grand gestures to convey our belief in such a possibility.  I had the pleasure of spending some time recently with my niece and nephew both under the age of 5.  Watching kids on the playground is a simple glimpse into the steadfast profound reality of love.  The way that he would marvel at being able to climb up the step.  The almost breath-taking excitement that took hold of his heart as he was about to go down the slide.  The twinkle in her eye when she made it up a winding staircase only to find a new apparatus to conquer upon her arrival.  The assurance of safety as he saw his dad at the bottom of the slide ready to catch him.  The laughter and applause with which her mom greeted her when she made her way across the monkey bars.  Having the chance to witness the profound love that this small family shares in the play of life today made my heart break open with joy.  So how does this outshine the madness going on somewhere outside of my experience?  I was given the gift to be fully present to it and let it in.  God allowed me to see that this is one experience when fully breathed in that mirrors the love and joy with which our creator looks upon us every moment.  No newscasters showed up to film this.  No politicians will be discussing it in the next debate.  It was just a regular day with family at the park . . . or was it?  My prayer for us is the courage to let go of the idea that the ordinary is anything less than a simple expression of the profound nature of love today?  Make it a great one!  Peace~Colleen

God is All.  God is One.  We are created from the space of oneness.  It only seems like we are separate because we are housed in separate bodies.  But that is like assuming that our hand is separate from our foot because it is a few feet above and takes a different shape.  Both are part of the same body.  They serve different functions and in theory one does not need the other to exist until we go put on a pair of shoes. When we are willing to integrate ourselves into the whole and accept the different parts that we all play we can remember the oneness from which we were created.  God invites us to acknowledge the integration of love in the whole of our bodies, minds, and spirits.  We begin this integration by engaging our connection with the One who designed us fully integrated and whole from the start.  By aligning ourselves with God we are able to see with the eyes of integration and the separateness falls away.  My prayer for us is a recognition that we need not fall for the illusion of separateness just because the integration is not yet part of our view today.  Make it a great one!  Peace~Colleen

God is in the moment.  God is in the being of life.  It is the gift of life and the opportunity to be present for it that allows us to experience the joy of being alive.  When we step into the moment that we are in we connect completely with the Divine.  It is the present moment where the eternal meets the temporal.  This is the precious gift of the now.  It is why many spiritual practices, religions, spiritual and philosophical leaders share their experiences of the moment as though it was the greatest present they ever received.  It is difficult for our minds which are constantly looking back to evaluate and forward to predict to step out of the processing and into the current moment.  Asking God to allow us to process this moment is a simple way of calling ourselves to the present.  It is not about changing or fixing what we do automatically but instead noticing what we do and asking for help and gearing it towards a way to connect with Our Creator.  Processing our breath going in and out of our body.  Processing the sounds we are hearing around us.  Processing how our heart feels beating inside our chest.  Processing the sights our eyes are capturing.  Processing the sounds of the voice of the person who is speaking to you in the moment.  All of these things can take on a magical quality when we allow them to sink in.  My prayer for us is the courage to ask God to help us utilize the tool of processing for savoring the present moment.  Make it a great one!  Peace~Colleen

God guides. God abides.  God is the answer, no matter the question.  Life is not about having the answer or thinking it is the same as the last time we asked the question.  Life is about knowing where to go to get our questions answered and being in the question without an answer in the meantime.  God resides in our hearts at all times.  Tuning into that wisdom is what allows us to be guided by All That Is.  The intuitive knowing is right at our fingertips. It is a rhythm that guides all of our existence and we rarely stop to notice it.  We breathe and our heart pumps blood to all the cells in our body. If this intuition keeps us alive physically without us even being aware of it, perhaps it also contains the sustenance for our mind and spirit.  My prayer for us is a willingness to draw quietly into our hearts and see what wisdom awaits us from the voice of intuition today.  Make it a great one!  Peace~Colleen

God has made a mark on humanity through its creation. It is the mark of love.  This mark is inscribed in every cell in our bodies and is the underlying energy of our hearts and minds.  We suffer to the extent that we try to be outside of the marking of love.  The source of all dis-ease comes from the idea that we are somehow separate from our true self, separate from love, separate from God.  When we behave in ways that express this unaligned thought we are in turmoil because we are going against the inscription on our hearts.  When we do it long enough we become numb to the turmoil and strife.  We layer on top of it a story that justifies our way of living so it all makes sense in our minds.  But deep down in the quiet of our hearts, God never stops speaking to the truth of who we are.  When we experience a breakdown or even a slowing down we are gifted with a chance to begin to hear and even listen to the voice of truth that reads our inscription.  My dates with God are about the writing on my heart.  I first had to be willing to get quiet enough, slow down, and in my case break down so that I could begin to read the inscription.  My prayer for us is the courage to slow down and be willing to read the writing on the wall of our hearts today.  Make it a great one! Peace~Colleen

God is light.  God is wonder.  When we are in the company God we find that we cannot break away from the light.  There is an illumination that occurs in every area of our lives when we step into connecting with All That Is. We can become accustomed to living in the dark that when light is present we find ourselves alarmed.  We are jarred by seeing things as they really are.  God’s light is luminescent.  It is not produced by heat, there is no fire-like destruction required.  It is a simple call to see things for what they really are.  It is an invitation to step into reality as God understands reality.  This requires altering our perception away from what we think we know It is a process of letting go of that which seems tolerable or even fruitful in the dark.  When illuminated, however, the benefits and opportunity for growth are not there.  God is all about what is going to allow us to grow more fully into the love that God already knows us to be.  Love doesn’t grow in the dark.  We need not run from our darkness but instead be willing to have it illuminated by God’s love.  In God’s luminescence we can gently and patiently accept the reality we are called to live.  My prayer for us is a curiosity of the power of luminescence in the parts of our lives that we think are best kept in the dark today.  Make it a great one!  Peace~Colleen