dailydatewithgod

They say that unless you know what direction you are heading in you do not know where you are going.  When we are focused on the end result, the culmination, or the agreed-upon moment where our focus will be different it can be helpful to have a sense of direction.  Our minds are much more at ease with direction and things that make sense.  Yet the spirit of our hearts long to enjoy the journey even the moments when we seem to lack direction.  Our hearts invite us to get our sense of direction from within us instead of solely relying upon outside of measurements of our journey.  According to the outside world, the only kind of direction that is valuable is the one that leads somewhere proven to be worthy of our time.  Yet our hearts know the value of moments outside of time and space that takes place absent of any direction.  It is not a matter of choosing the mind versus the heart’s direction.  It is a matter of valuing both equally and discerning when it is the moment to follow the direction of the heart and put aside the direction of the mind and vice versa.  Unless we value the direction of all of who we are we will not arrive intact whatever direction the journey of our lives takes us.

There is something very intrinsic in our nature that tells us when we touch things they are real.  We often use other terms to describe touch. As a way of annoying each other, my sister and I would hold up a toy for when the other asked to see it and say “see!”  We knew full well that what the sister wanted was to touch it and play with it.  It’s not like this stops when we reach adulthood. The understanding of a concept is made real for us when we have a tangible model or are present at the actual event. We are more convinced by something when we can touch it with our own hands.  The tangibility factor is how we create a deeper sense of reality.  We have so many sensors in our hands and fingers that just the act of touching something lights up parts of our system of which we have no conscious awareness.  Think of the difference between the first time you saw someone you were attracted to and the first time you touched them.  Hmmm, just thinking about it makes me light up inside.  The tangibility factor speaks to the limitations our minds have in conjuring ideas.  Only by incorporating the tangibility of something into the picture does it seem real.  The tangibility whether real or imagined awakens senses in our hearts, our bodies, our emotions, and our spirits. Tangibility awareness is the attunement to the power of embodying a reality.  It incorporates action which takes something out of the head and into our lives.  God invites us to a tangible relationship with the unbelievable through faith.  We may not understand God in our minds, but by allowing the tangibility of our everyday human experience to sink in we can embody the miraculous nature of life by simply taking in a breath.  Our lips, lungs, diaphragm, and every one of the cells in our body can awaken the reality of being alive when we allow ourselves to be present with the tangibility of our breath.

The closer we get to any kind of material the more we are able to perceive all the intricate parts that are woven together to create the whole. This goes for materials, people, and cultures.  Often when picking something apart it begins to unravel in an unforeseen way because we were not aware of the intricacies holding it together.  This happens in our interpersonal relationships. We are engaged in conversation and someone uses a particular phrase or word and we have a reaction. Upon observation the reaction seems disproportionate to the context but yet it is still present.  Prior to the experience, we were not aware of the intricacy of meaning attached to the word or phrase. Rarely are things within themselves the root cause of our reaction.  The intricacy of interpretation and meaning are ours alone.  God encourages us to use the awareness of our intricacy that comes about because of a disproportionate reaction.  Instead of reacting in a situation to the word or phrase we can take a beat through our breath and discover the intricate web we have spun around the word or phrase. God does not condemn the intricacies we have created, God simply invites us to see them for the creations they are separate from the reality of the situation we are in.  It is a marvel how we can use intricacy in our lives and every interaction with another is a chance to examine what we have created.  From there we can determine which intricacies of meaning are still valid today. It sounds like a lot of work, but it is merely a practice of freedom.

We learn so much by observing others and mimicking their behavior.  On some level, we are all walking imitations of each other.  We never realize the impression we leave with those because we underestimate the exchange of energy in our actions.  We see it clearly and often literally with children because they have not yet learned the nuances of how to express that imitation. Yet we adults have become so nuanced about integrating our imitations we forget we are doing it and claim a disproportionate sense of individuality. It is neither good nor bad to imitate others, it happens naturally through the process of observation. God invites us to look at it from the lens of courageous learning.  What about who we are being is something to be imitated?  We look at it not so we can alter our behavior to be perfect and hide all the elements of ourselves we deem as unworthy of imitation.  Instead, with a curious eye when we see the imitation of ourselves mirrored back to us we can witness how the whole of who we are is showing up.  Imitation can be taken as a criticism, flattery, or simply a gift of outside observation. Instead of spending our time crafting the perfect being to be imitated, we could open our hearts to witness the imitations drawn from us as an opportunity to accept the whole of who we are in any given moment.

When so much of the world around us seems to be traveling super fast and our response is requested faster than we can fully digest what is coming at us, it is easy to get a little dizzy.  It makes sense that we let go of responding and just react. God invites us to pause before responding through the motion of our breath.  Literally to speak or move we need our breath first.  This automatic body system speaks of the value of taking a beat before reacting. Perhaps this is because we spend so much time reacting because of the seeming urgent request and we forget that our response is about who we are, not about what we are responding to.  It is our words that come from us, it is our actions that demonstrate our behavior.  We like to think that everyone is willing to give the benefit of the doubt and take the time to look back at what preceded our thoughts, words, and actions, but everyone else is also in a rush and feels the need to react as well.  Caught up in this maelstrom of reactions we lose sight of what started it all.  Think of a time when you found yourself fighting with someone.  Not long into the argument and neither party remembers what kicked it off.  If we take the time to contemplate a response or at least take the full breath demanded within our system to respond or react, we might find a moment of respite from the dizzy cycle. Our hearts contain the knowledge of the truth of who we are and provide the empowering energy needed to provide a response that mirrors who we really are versus who we are pretending to be by keeping up with everyone else.   Wouldn’t we rather respond or react to the truth of who each other is versus who we are being because we are stuck in spinning in the cycle of an expected speedy response.

Life will metaphorically throw all kinds of things at us to the extent that it sometimes feels like a battle to overcome instead of a life to live. One of the most profound sayings I ever read was, “Be kind for everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about.” It is debatable who said it but the reality is it is prompted by a distinct understanding that our reality is happening within us. It can be saddening or frustrating but ultimately it is a beautiful demonstration of courage.  We do not know what endurance is until we live it. Our minds will tell us we cannot go on, we don’t have what it takes or it is not worth it.  Our hearts know full well the courage of endurance that is ready to be tapped into.  I choose to believe we live in a friendly universe that wants us to know all of what life has to offer.  We think the gems to be discovered are out there, but when we face challenges, we see the beauty of life through our capacity to endure.  It is precisely when our minds cannot see or conceive the possibility of keeping on and we fear we have no more resources, that our heart’s endurance shows up.  The form of endurance I adopted as a child facing sexual abuse at the hands of an ill father, may have seemed counterproductive from the outside because it involved self-harm.  However, it got me to a place where when it fell apart at the seems I had the agency as an adult to face the reality of what I had been enduring.  Everyone is fighting some kind of battle and it is not our business to understand why it is as large or small for them. It is the very battle that will open up the pathway to reconnect to the truth of who they are at their core. Our battles are our gifts in messy wrapping. Finding the endurance within us to face our battles shows us how connected we already are to what we need to live life fully.  When we take the time to connect to each other through our hearts we can witness with kindness the battles we are each enduring knowing that ultimately we are heading on the same path to the truth of who we are.

We do not know what is coming around the corner.  We can plan all we want but no life is devoid of the invariably bumps and curves that we all encounter.  The decision is, do we want to shape our lives by the curves presented, or do we want to shape our lives to handle the curves? We think it is all about knowing in our minds what the possible curves might be and planning ahead of time how to get around or through them and that can work to some extent.  It is the unexpected curves that require us to know the shape of who we are so we can navigate them as the curves and bumps present themselves.  Even when we know there is a curve ahead we do not know the full texture and composition of it.  An awareness of the shape of our hearts means we can tap into our internal courage which will guide us through the curves and bumps on the road in a way that we both learn more about the truth of who we are and our capacity for love.  We may think it is necessary to begrudge or fear the unknown curves and bumps because that is what we are told.  Yet often it happens that the very thing we feared and were resisting ends up being the curve or bump that allows the shape of the wholeness of ourselves to shine. God invites us to trust the shape of our hearts to guide the experience of what it means to show up and be both transformed by and transform the very curves and bumps we fear.

We can measure our lives by how we show up.  In the end, there is very little to what we think and feel if it does not create some action.  Our physiology and neural networks function this way as does the whole of life.  The funny part is that we think we have a complete understanding of what motion looks and feels like.  We get stuck because we believe if the action does not show up the way we think it should it is not happening.  We presume to think that just because we do not see it, it is not there.  God encourages us to pay close attention to what motion in our hearts is like.  It is not something we are inclined to look for unless it is something that literally takes away our breath in either a good or harmful way. Yet there is energetic movement present in the whole of our being.  There is motion happening all the time but we rely mostly on what we can see with our eyes.  Learning to open ourselves up to what it means to detect motion in a holistic sense can provide the balm needed for a troubled mind.  Energy is constantly in motion.  Our hearts have a particular sensitivity to that which we cannot see because it does not need to be filtered through the need to understand and put language to that the mind requires.  The breath, the rhythm, and the subtlety to which our hearts are attuned are always there to be present with the motion as it is flowing through us when we choose to avail ourselves of it.

So much of the fear that lives in our heads gets its juice from the black and white paradigm through which it operates.  We fear changes because they are unfamiliar and we make the assumption that they are forever.  Yet the very nature of change is that the change whatever it is will change again.  We presume some long journey of potential suffering when perhaps it is more of a sojourn through a new experience.  We cannot know ahead of time what we perceive as an unwelcome trip through discomfort how long it will actually last.  We forget how quickly we adapt and even things that are long journeys are not long in the discomfort space because it is simply a sojourn through unfamiliar or uncomfortable.  When we bring our attention into our hearts into their very rhythm we find ourselves living a sojourn between breaths.  We assume it will come but we do not know and then after a while, we get used to not knowing.  God invites us to be with the rhythm of our hearts when we want to run amuck on the fear train conjured in our minds.  By reconnecting to our own internal flow, we can ride the sojourn around each moment of change and feel with our whole selves what it means to embody life.

We like to think the goal is to have it all figured out.  Isn’t that what we are all here to do?  Isn’t that what we are all driving towards?  It certainly explains why we value concepts like truth and honesty.  The honest truth is most of what we figure out is an estimation.  Our minds cannot hold the awareness and understanding of the entire universe not to mention the possible multiple universes. We get a taste of it which I presume is enough given that is what is happening.  It is funny then that no matter how much of an estimation we have to hang our hat on, we believe it is not enough.  If this year has taught us anything it is that certainty is an illusion.  The full picture is only in hindsight.  God invites us to balance our mind’s desire to have it all figured out and trust the flow in our hearts which reminds us the estimation is enough.  It is enough because it is what allows us to do what is right in front of us to do.  To guard ourselves against any unforeseen circumstances (which is a fool’s errand) we convince ourselves that we can figure it all out if we just keep playing it over and over in our minds.  Bringing our system into balance with the peace of our hearts which allows an estimation to be enough gives us the courage we need to keep showing up, to appreciate the fullness of estimation we have at this moment and trust in the more that will be revealed.  It is a process, a dance, and an engaging way to interact with life that I fought with my whole being before I got into recovery.  So much of the essence of my addiction was about fighting reality.  It is exhausting and almost caused me to dull my soul so much I would have been a walking ghost of a person.  I resisted trusting my heart’s estimation of my reality because it contradicted with those in authority (whomever or whatever I saw as an authority at that time).  My daily dates with God became the restorative relationship I needed to reconnect with the truth of who I am at my core and let go of taking on the estimation of others as my own.