The Mundane Way

Mainstream American culture is addicted to security, convenience and comfort. Ads of all kinds bombard us endlessly, promising products and services that will please, excite, satisfy, comfort or reassure us just the way we like. In short, they're selling a fantasy. Life is not always comfortable, secure or convenient. It is often messy, uncertain, fragile, confusing and unpredictable. What is the cost of our dependence on comfort, security and convenience? In addition to the strain on our wallets, what is it costing the earth, our bodies, our communities, our souls? I don't want to get extreme about this, but it might not hurt to allow myself to experience a bit of discomfort or to live with a minor inconvenience rather than buy something to "fix" it. If c onsumerism is the belief that the solution to every problem or the fulfillment of every need ends with a purchase, I could try instead to imagine solutions and satisfactions that don't involve acquiring anot...

I think very young children children know much more of Truth in a much more immediate way than adults can fathom. They can't tell us about it, of course, but not because their vocabulary or linguistic development are lacking. It's because there are no words with which to tell such a thing. Even those rare souls who have glimpsed Truth as grown men and women are ultimately at a loss to convey what they've seen, though many have tried and I'm grateful for their efforts. The Truth as seen by children and mystics cannot be described fully; it can only be experienced fully. So say those who have had the experience, anyway. I wouldn't know. What a child knows intuitively, the youth slowly forgets, and the adult must work tirelessly for the rest of his life to have even a faint hope of recovering it.

The growing awareness of one's imperfection that comes with spiritual progress is not a shame-filled experience, but a pure, humble and healing awareness. It comes as we begin to glimpse, very faintly, the vastness of divine love, the depths of peace, the unshakable faith of those precious few souls who know God face to face. In these glimpses, we realize that the perfection to which we are called is so far from our current state that to feel ashamed seems silly. The task is so nearly impossible that it's a wonder we're on the path at all.

I am drawn to the idea that I may be "used" by God in many ways of which I am unaware. This possibility regularly quells the ego-driven notion that I should be doing something "special" or more "spiritual" than what I'm already doing in my daily life. Instead of getting up in the middle of the night with my young daughter, or changing the oil in our family's cars, or bringing home enough money to allow my wife to stay home with our children, I should (so my ego says) be volunteering at a homeless shelter, leading a meditation retreat or protesting mountain top removal. Of course any of these things have their place and they all meet real needs, but I'm not sure they are more important, more spiritual or more meritorious than the other activities. I don't think God does the same kind of spiritual accounting that I do. Nevertheless, I must acknowledge that the "God works in mysterious ways" principle can be a cop out. God will use...

“If you die a little bit every day of your life, you won’t have too much to worry about on your final day.” Fenelon Die before you die. I read that somewhere a while back. Die before you die . Suffer the sloughing off of old thoughts, resentments, fears, calcified guilt. Allow the withering of your self-will, your craving for selfish pleasures large and small, your demands for certainty and comfort beyond what you can reach through faith. Absolute certainty and comfort come only after the ego dies. Pursue the death of the ego, but not fanatically. Keep in step with God, whose pace will seem slow at times. When it does, that is good. It means you are allowing him to carry you. Imagine a small child walking beside her father. Though the father walks slowly, the child must hurry to keep up. But if he picks her up, she no longer seems to be moving quickly, though her rate of progress has not changed. If you try to outpace God by walking on your own, you will tire out and may lose your...

“One should not reason too much; it is enough if one loves the Lotus Feet of the Mother.” Ramakrishna This hits me today. I was just thinking (there I go again!) about how I have such trouble keeping my attention on the mantram whenever I try to repeat it. I believe part of the reason is I start thinking about the mantram: how important it is to repeat it regularly, the benefits of doing so, how I might find more opportunities to do it, and so on. Of course, the minute this kind of pondering begins I’ve lost the mantram itself. What’s so damned frustrating is I often don’t even notice that I’m getting pulled away before I’m down the rabbit hole again. Ultimately what drives my distraction is fear. I am afraid, or rather my ego is afraid, of the emptiness, the void into which it seems the mantram will carry me. Absence of thought equals absence of self, and absence of self equals nothingness, a blank. So the reasoning mind sees it. And in a sense it is true, the great ones say. But...

"At once the spirit sent him out into the desert." Mark 1:12 This statement immediately follows God's declaration of love for and approval of Jesus after Jesus is baptized by John. Maybe God wanted Jesus to be aware of his favor before he entered the challenging period in the desert. Don't take difficulty as a sign of God's absence or displeasure. It may be just the opposite.