HOW BIG IS YOU WONDER?

I wonder if you ever get to the point where you “know” and then you find it hard to break out of the silence to try to convey what you know? I wonder what this writer will do with that skill of writing? Rumi fell into poetry. Others have written it in story form from fiction to non-fiction to mythological conveyance. A writer who is true to his or her craft can only truly right from his or her point of view about anything at the time when the writing is happening. That NOW is captured and plugged into a level of understanding that can only be interpreted by the reader’s understanding at that particular time of their reading of it. I cannot tell you how many times I have either re-read or watched again a movie, or thought about either of these a time down the road and my understanding was completely different from the first time or I caught something I totally missed before. So whether you read or you write or you do both, know that everything is unfolding and changing and becoming more alive, more understood to the core IF you are awake, aware, alive, and have the desire to see what you may not have seen before. Open mind. Open heart. Swallow it all and expand, expand, expand.

CHRISTMASTIME IS THE SPIRIT OF LOVE ANYTIM

It is truly Christmastime for anyone of any faith, religion, belief, creed, nationality, sexually preference or orientation, causes, past deeds, or future hopes and dreams anytime of the year when they recognize that all they are are Energy – loving, peaceful, powerful, joyful, quite, noisy, rambunctious, ever moving Energy in form – regardless of whatever labels, demands, or judgments they may place upon themselves, others or events. Any moment that anyone recognizes this, the gate opens, the jail door swings wide and they step into a freedom they never knew was so near, so reachable, so indescribable.

I wish for each of you that the precious gift of Christmastime may become alive and conscious within you. You do not have to have certain beliefs about Jesus or Buddha, or any form whatsoever in order to become a CONSCIOUS, ever moving, and free creation. Neither would your disbelief in any deity or form of religion or spirituality be an obstacle from experiencing the Energy that you are. It doesn’t require that you name It or worship It but rather that you become conscious of It and allow It to work in, as, and through you as you.

May you continue to experience the transformation from your Pinocchio puppet existence so that you can cut the ties of your socialization, indoctrination, and expectation so that you may become REAL and FREE at last in the Spirit of Love.

LIFE-CHANGING EVENTS: Which way are you going to go?

Any event in your life can cause a shift in your perspective. These may be very personal to you because they are happening or have happened to you or someone you are close to or they may be events such as disasters that affect whole communities. The crimes or abuses you may read about, the death of someone famous or known world wide can affect you in ways you may not be aware of.

I could name several life-changing events that have impacted my life. Some of these changed me forever; some changed my opinion; some changed my religious or spiritual perspective; some forced me to go out on branches that I would not otherwise have gone; some left an impression on me that helped me to understand behaviors or choices of others or to at least to view them differently so that I had compassion and forgiveness that might not have been possible otherwise.

Some experiences I had as a child left me with fear and shame and my perspective of myself was not a healthy one. I allowed this state of consciousness to dictate who I was and that in turn encouraged all sorts of behaviors and choices that lead to more and more of this miring deeper into that quicksand of self depreciation. As I grew older, however, this uncomfortable state I lived in soon began to be so awful I sought healing. That path of healing is a story unto itself and very unique to me; however, part of the healing came from more life-changing events that continued to unfold in my life. These events I chose to ride to victory even if the ride was scary and very hard to go through. I could have buried myself in sadness, depression, and self pity which would have spiraled into a well so deep I would never get out. Something inside of me wanted to live and to live in peace, in harmony, in love, in joy, and into appreciating my human condition. Something inside of me wanted to free me from my self doubts and to build on my own individuality and capabilities with my ego safely under the direction and tutelage of Love.

One of the many, many books I have read through the years that had a great impact upon my own life was Victor Frankl. This is a quote from him: “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.(Viktor E. Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning) Another of his quotes that goes nicely with this is “What is to give light must endure burning.” There are no real shortcuts. Experience is what grows us, changes us and it is up to us to use it as a millstone around our necks or to use it as a stepping stone to a better life.  

THE UGLY DUCKLING AND LOVE

Many of you are familiar with the story of the ugly duckling who looked nothing like his brothers and sisters. He didn’t act exactly like them. He didn’t fit in but was trying with all his might to act like a duck. Mother duck took care of him just like the other ducks but all the ducks thought he was so ugly and didn’t fit in. They made fun of him. After a while the ducklings grew into young adults. Out on the pond was all these beautiful ducks being ducks and they were amazed because in their midst was a beautiful, dazzling, graceful, pure white swan. The swan could stop being what he was not. He was not a duck. There is nothing wrong with a duck. They have their own beauty, abilities, and purpose but the swan also has his/her own beauty, ability and purpose. Nothing is ugly. Everything and everyone is just being what they were born to be.

That was just an illustrative story but in real life as we know it as humans, we all know that when someone doesn’t look like you or act like you or believe as you do, you think they are odd. You think they are ugly. You call them misfits. You don’t give them credit for being different. If the difference you experience is unbearable it is your choice to not hang out with them. It is also you choice to love them or not anyway. You can love people you don’t fit in with or who don’t fit in with you. It is possible. You have the power to decide to accept or not accept them for who they are. In the story, once the ducks saw the beauty in the swan they stopped rejecting him and ridiculing him. They accepted him for who and what he was in his own way.

It is not your job to change someone into you. It is not their job to change you into them. It is your honor and privilege as well as theirs to each respect the other person’s gifts, talents, and quirks. Does this mean that you allow someone to disrespect you, trample upon you? No. Just try to remove yourself from them because they are not yet grown enough to be able to give love, respect, and honor. You can still send them love and a desire for them to find their own beauty so that they can see it in others.

Love should not hurt if it is absolute and pure. Love understands. Love spreads its wings over the wounded, clasps the wounded to its breast and tenderly heals. It brings out the “swan” in all creation.

SHOW ME THE WAY TO GO HOME

I remember the first day of school like it was yesterday. My mother had walked me to school to show me how to get there. Back then I was one shy, scared little girl who had a very scary first day of school which did not help me by the end of the school day. The first thing that happened was traumatic for me. Our teacher gave out those big fat pencils they used to use and told us to put them at the top of the desk in the little dug out place. She told us not to touch the pencils until she told us to as she was giving them out. My desk was wobbly and be a nervous little kid not to mention that the seat was hard, I shifted my body a little. Because the desk was not seated evenly on the floor, the pencil rolled out of its nesting place and onto the floor. A nearby student told the teacher I dropped my pencil. By this time I had retrieved it and place it back in its place. My teacher came over to me and asked me to hold out both hands palms up. Being an obedient child and fearful not to, I did. I had no idea what was coming next but she took a ruler and soundly smack both my palms for having “touched the pencil” without her permission. It was all an accident but I sat there to stunned to cry or to explain. Welcome to school Brenda Osgood.

Finally the day was over and it was time to go home. i stood at the top of the steps of the school in a daze. So much had happened since I got to school that day. Now how do I get home? I think I cross the street and go to the right but I was probably so traumatized I just couldn’t think. I could not remember so I sat down on the steps and cried. I sat there until one of the cleaning ladies came out and saw me crying. She asked me what was upsetting me. After I told her I didn’t know how to get home she asked me who my teacher was. Oh my goodness, she was taking me to the woman with the ruler! Finally though, someone called my mother to come fetch me. Mom was VERY upset with me because you see, I had a little baby brother at home and she was freaking out about, I assume, that she had to find someone to watch him while she came to get me. So instead of comfort I was given a scolding because I forgot how to get home. One more nail in the coffin of self unworthiness that I would leave scars for a long time.

I was a child that felt every little thing deeply and took everything inside of me. I had dreams for years about being lost and not finding my way back home or being afraid of losing my way in every sense of the word. We didn’t have GPS until recent years so i dreaded driving where I didn’t know my way around for years. It became a part of me, this feeling lost and scared that I couldn’t find my way back home.

Today I am not that little girl who fears being lost. Today I know that there is a Light inside of me that guides me and no matter how many “wrong turns” I make or how long it takes me to get wherever I am either literally or figuratively going, it will be in the best way and the best timing. It is the LIGHT within us that shines on our path. Follow that and you will never be lost.

HOW DEEP IS YOUR LOVE?

Back when my children were small we sold our house and moved out in the country in the house we were building, in January, in Georgia. Can you say freezing weather and wrong time to move? The house was a shell. The walls were up but I didn’t have a kitchen sink. To my husband’s credit, we did have one working bathroom and some heat but little else including no frig. We were pioneering in the middle of modern society. For a special added twist, the only water we had was from the well and you guessed it, the pump froze so for a while, we had no water. Did I mention it was freezing cold that time of year?

When the well was being dug, our money was a bit tight and it cost us a bunch for every thousand feet they had to dig to hit water. Five thousand feet later, they hit water. Yes, it was a pretty deep well and costly to us so you can imagine to have the pump freeze and we couldn’t access the water, was, let’s say, disappointing to say the very least. We quickly learned to insulate the well and enclose it in it’s own little house. It was a very trying time for all of us but we learned to get through it and I swore I would never move into an unfinished house again.

Since I was raised in the Baptist religion, I got a lot of Bible scriptures which now make a lot of sense to me because I can truly see them from a Spiritual view point unattached to any religious sect. I bring this up because I remember the story of Jesus and the woman at the well. She offered him a drink of water from the well and Jesus told her that there was water that she could have from a well that would never run dry. I now know where that well is and I know of the water that will never run dry. There is a “well” deep inside of each of us whether or not we are conscious of it and it is filled with nothing but endless Love. Whether you draw out a teaspoon, a cup, a bucket full it is complete and full of all there is. Once you learn how to dive into it, you will no longer need the teaspoon, the cup, or the bucket.

How deep is your love? How deep is your well? If you are loving only with your own effort, that is, you still give and receive love as a learned behavior, that is good; however, if you have a very deep well of love that you consciously know and feel and experience within you, this is even better and this well will never dry up unless you abandon it, freeze the pump, or shut off the outlet.

Keep priming your pump with your desire and by your letting go of all the walls you may use to protect yourself from your fears. Use prayer, meditation and any other practice that you find personally effective to keep that well open and flowing properly. Whatever you do, don’t die of spiritual thirst when the love and the well is so deep that it is endless.

BABES IN THE WOODS: Growing into our spiritual bodies

Pure LOVE knits us in our wombs so that is what we are made from. Whether or not our physical parents loved us or wanted us That Which Formed us made LOVE (us) out of nothing at all. We are complete and whole and perfect in every way as babies of Pure Love no matter how our physical, fleshy form takes shape and no matter what we seem to become as we grow physically.

Soon after birth we are taught the ways of the world and this teaching goes on throughout our lives. As this process happens we lose more and more of the awareness of Love or That Which Formed us. Some to more of a degree than others. This formation of the world is necessary in order for us to be able to navigate through the “new world” in which we find ourselves. We then need rules and laws and consequences because we are no longer operating as awake and aware Love Babies in our purest form. Those who become Christians or become some other denomination are introduced to their spiritual book which contains spiritual truths but in allegorical and mystical language that are seen more as laws, rules and consequences rather than the words of Love spoken to the heart. Others see the way some of us who follow a religion and talk about God behave and notice that people don’t always practice what they preach. We may notice that, in fact, they are more narrow of mind and remain babies spiritually so we either find our own way or we deny the existence of this one they call God. Places to hide are in the intellect, although, this is not to say that all who take the intellectual path won’t get back to their original Self and become a more enhanced form of human – a matured spiritual being.

Those of us who pay attention to the emptiness that comes with being a trained human and living through the bumps and grinds of the human experience may find that there is a desire to somehow find our way back to our original, innocent state. We keep that desire in front of us like the carrot before the horse, moving forward trying to get that carrot and feeling that we can’t reach it. Why is it that way? Because if we think we have gotten the carrot, we will indeed fall short of the mark. We never really quite maintain our spiritual self but as long as we are in human form we work towards the marrying as it were of the spirit and the flesh. We become one with ourselves first, then we can see our oneness with everyone and everything else.

Meanwhile as this process takes place, this getting back to Love, we stubble around like toddlers. In a sense we mess in our diapers, we bump into things, we lose our balance, we stub our toes, we cry with unhappiness, we cling to others to find comfort and sometimes we do pretty nasty things because we are angry or our brains have little hiccups during which time we hurt others one way or another. But no matter how much we stumble around and mess our diapers it doesn’t change what we really are. So keep on keeping on, Babe in the woods, and you will experience Love again.  You will experience who you really are again. You won’t be sorry. Let me just say this, you are the cutest thing I have ever seen even as you throw your tantrums and run like a crazy person through your terrible two’s, three’s, four’s…you get the idea.

THE LOVE OF YOUR LIFE

You cannot grab a handful of wind but you can feel it and know that it is present. You cannot grab a handful of Spirit either but you can feel it. You can allow it to blow through you, around you, in you and through you. You can let it work its “magic”. All you have to do is to give your permission and offer your cooperation. That may mean giving up some of the hate you have; your stubbornness; your insistence upon being right and the other person wrong; your desire for revenge; your need to be adored; or you lack of the ability to know your own worth along side the wonder and worth of others. Can you do that? Need a little help with that? Learn to go inside and find the LOVE OF YOU LIFE. You can do this. You’ve got this. Go for it.