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This month I want to share
with you some thoughts that I
have spoken of as
"SPIRITUAL/PHYSICAL DOUBLE
ENTENDRE." This has evolved
from the cumulative effect of
joining with the congregation
Sunday after Sunday for years
speaking a blessing to our
children following the minister's
little talk to them as they begin
to file out to their Sunday
school class:
WE LOVE
YOU
WE BLESS YOU
WE APPRECIATE YOU
JUST THE WAY YOU
ARE
That last line has been
working its significance into my
consciousness and has finally
blossomed into an attitude that
has great promise for me as I
"cope" with people, and perhaps
you may get a boost from thinking
about this with me.
"Just the way you are"
obviously refers to the present
human condition of any person we
may be thinking of, but the
double entendre aspect is that it
can help us to remember that, in
our present human condition we
are all perfect "just as God
created us!"
It is of course easy to love
and bless and appreciate people
when everything about them
pleases us and is without undue
stress on our calm, poised state
of mind! This spiritual exercise
is intended to help us see them
"as God sees them" when at times
we tend to have trouble with
dealing with their humanness.
Can I safely assume that this may
describe you occasionally? OK,
then let's proceed.
There is a line in the story
of Jesus' life (Mark 10:21) that
describes what I have in mind:
"Then Jesus beholding him loved
him . He was beholding and loving
the young man who has just told
Him he had already fulfilled the
Ten Commandments and was ready
for the one last thing he needed
to do to inherit eternal life. It
was the young man's humanness
that Jesus loved!
Somehow there has been
developing in my consciousness
for the last two or three years a
new sense of appreciation for
humankind's humanness. All my
life I have been plagued by the
attempt to hold myself and others
to a kind of perfectionism. This
is pretty common for us human
beings. But I have been feeling
into my own and others' sincere
inner struggles to be good and do
well and so have felt more
appreciation for the fact that we
are all learning and growing and
making mistakes along the way.
Jesus loved the young man instead
of ridiculing and shaming him.
But, at the same time, He gave
the young man some pretty heavy
spiritual work that he still
needed to do.
The double entendre idea I am
writing about might be described
as seeing the perfection and
wholeness in and of people as we
look through and beyond their
human state! We can't accomplish
this until and unless we rise
into a true spiritual
consciousness that gives us this
spiritual vision that sees
through the appearances which
Jesus taught us not to judge by!
And of course who are we - any of
us - to assume that we can judge
anyone else?
This spiritual consciousness
is essentially love. The more we
love, the more we understand, the
more patient we are, the more we
forgive. So when we love, bless,
and appreciate others "just as
they are" in this spiritual
state, the better we are to see
that they are really beautiful,
wonderful, whole, and
complete.
The great thing about all this is
that people "clue-in" to how we
are perceiving them, and in many
cases "perform" better than they
would do otherwise. This relates
to the manager and the baseball
player, the sales manager and the
rookie salesperson, the parent
and the child, any person with
any other person!
My batting average for
practicing my own preaching about
this is not the world record, I
am sure, but I believe my wife
thinks I'm going to be a 300
hitter in 2002. No telling how
high my average will be with more
practice.
I found David Spangler, famous
since his Findhorn days, saying
much the same thing in Unity
Magazine, November/December 2001
issue:
"There are ways of
seeing others and the world at
large that, by virtue of their
openness and supportive
nature, enhance the
possibilities for a
relationship of blessing. They
'beat the heart' more
strongly. Such attitudes are
familiar to us. We call them
compassion, respect,
willingness to accept others
as they are and not as we
think they should be, openness
to listen, attentiveness,
love. Such attitudes open our
inner hearts to each other.
They allow us, if only for a
moment, to become one heart
sharing the circulation of the
unobstructed world."
You may have been thinking
along the same lines. I would
like to know what your
experiences have been!
Contact me at- unity@vic.uimc.ca
PS (Particularly
Significant!) Have you
noticed that sometimes your PSes
are something important that you
meant to say and fortunately just
remembered before mailing the
letter? Well, this morning in the
shower it suddenly dawned on me
that I had omitted an important
point: you and I must acknowledge
(because we surely know it) that
this spiritual consciousness I'm
writing about and which I equate
with love must first be directed
to how we perceive and treat
ourselves. Before we can
handle the peskiness of
others, we must love
ourselves and handle our own.
Then we have a good chance of
understanding and having
compassion for the other
fella!
Don
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