Fear. Who Cares!

I'm finding it difficult to write this post because I have so many thoughts rattling around in my brain. I am struggling to sort through them all and to figure out exactly what I'm thinking and feeling.

There were certain ideas presented in the chapter I read today in "A Course in Miracles". I guess I will start with these ideas and my thoughts about them.

This was under the section titled "Atonement and Miracles". Atonement, as I understand, means undoing of sins, forgiveness, letting go of everything that makes you feel separate from God. "You have a role in the Atonement which I will dictate to you. Ask me which miracles you should perform. This spares you needless effort, because you will be acting under direct communication." I thought, of course, why not just ask. I've been wondering what I'm supposed to be doing for too long. I have been successful in getting what I need when I have asked in the past. (By the way, it is believed that "A Course in Miracles" was dictated by Jesus Christ himself) So, I picked up a pen and my journal and wrote, "What miracles would you have me perform?" I sat very still, with pen in hand, and made my mind receptive, expecting to receive an answer. The only word I felt compelled to write was "Care.". Yes, I doubted if that just wasn't a product of my conscious mind rather divinely dictated to me. Then I thought, "Who cares what the source is." (Maybe I should care) I think caring is an admirable thing to do and I know I don't do it enough.

I will make sure that my goal in any situation is to care. I will care about my fiance, my friends, my neighbors, my family, people I work with, the kids I teach and even the strangers I pass on the street. I will care for myself, my home, my dog and the house plants. I'll care more about the environment and how I impact it. I'll take better care of my car. I know my fiance will appreciate that. Perhaps, I could even care about things that aren't in my immediate environment, like the starving children in Africa or the orphans in China. I think that covers just about everything. I do feel pretty happy to have a direction or a specific, personal ideal to uphold.

The next thing I read that caught my attention was, "Child of God, your were created to create the good, the beautiful and the holy. Do not forget this." I will try not to forget this, but at times that I feel all I've created in my life is a big, stinking pile of crap, it is easy to not believe this statement. Which brings me to something else I read, "The real purpose of this world is to use it to correct you unbelief. You can never control the effects of fear yourself, because you made fear and you believe in what you made. All aspects of fear are untrue because they do not exist at the creative level, and therefore do not exist at all. To whatever extent you are willing to submit your beliefs to this test, to that extent are your perceptions corrected." I actually fear submitting my beliefs of what I'm fearful of to the untrue test. That sentence may not seemed to make any sense, but this is how I feel. I fear being vulnerable and submitting to these things that I am fearful of seem to offer me protection from getting hurt. At the same time I want to be the best person I can be, I want to have a fulfilling life without fears and doubts. I like the idea of doing God's will.

Somewhere in the text I read today, it said something like we are afraid of losing something by making the commitment to live a holy life. I do feel this way, probably because of how I perceive living a holy life. To me it looks like living in a monastery in silence for the rest of my life. That does not seem pleasurable to me. I wonder, can I live a holy life and still have the company of my fiance, have a family, build a house in the woods and perhaps travel the world? Is it appropriate to continue to seek financial security? It is the fear of not knowing the right thing to do that keeps me down. I fear giving up worldly desires because I really don't know what living a holy life feels like.

I think it is an appropriate time to talk about two of my most profound spiritual experiences. They were on my mind today and these experiences are what got me in this predicament in the first place. When I first started meditating in my early 20's, I wasn't sure if God existed. I was hoping that I would find out one way or the other through meditation. I had been meditating for about a month and all I experienced was a scattered mind and a sore back. I was getting frustrated, but was told to be patient. I basically was at the point to where I was fed up. I had been going through, what was at the time, the pain of meditation for something I wasn't even sure existed for a month now.

I decided one night that I was going to sit in meditation for as long as it took to know the truth about God. I wouldn't stop no matter how much my back ached or how sleepy I got until I knew the answer. I would sit there all night if I had to. So I sat down in the proper pose, did my breathing exercises exactly as I was taught and stated my petition. "I want to know God, my Self, peace, love and joy." I was not humble enough to just ask for one thing, I wanted to know it all.

I had been sitting for only about a minute and I was surprised at how still my mind was. Ever fiber of my being was determined to know the answer. Then to my surprise, I perceived someone or something approaching me. It was the feeling you get when your lying down with your eyes closed and someone enters the room. You don't hear them but you just know some how someone is there. Then I saw in my mind that the something was light, not just any light, but I knew it was light with spirit. Then the light penetrated my soul like a spear that shattered my physical body and physical conscious into a million pieces that fell away. What was left was me, my true self, my own spirit of light. The Light filled my light and I knew that it was God. I new "I and the Father were one". I knew who I was and who God was. And God was Peace, Love and Joy. I felt the most perfect peace, the most divine love, and the greatest and most pure joy I had ever experienced and have yet since then. I felt cradled in a warm blanket whose fibers were made of peace, love and joy. I knew that I came from God and I never was separated from God.

The experience only lasted moments but felt like eternity. I was given a glimpse into what I could experience all the time once I do the work. It was great motivation.

Six years later:
I had been meditating and practicing spiritual disciplines for six years since my God experience. I was involved with a spiritual organization that I had become very involved in. I was spending most of my time teaching, doing fund raisers, going to meetings and class as well as working a full time job and still trying to keep up with an hour and a half of spiritual disciplines each day. I had gotten to the point to where something had to give and what ended up going on the back burner were my spiritual disciplines. I would do them if I had time and wasn't too exhausted. But I was exhausted and didn't even know what I was doing anymore. I pretty much decided I was going to leave the organization.

I had a dream one night after my decision. It was a lucid dream. Those had been occurring more and more as a result of disciplining my mind and learning about dreams and their meaning. In my dream there was an annoying, violent cat, a cat or any animal represents habits. I was aware of what habit the dream was presenting. I knew I should kill the cat, death means change. I couldn't kill this cat. I tried everything and the evil cat lived. One of my teachers was there in a white robe. I asked her what I should do. She told me the choice was mine to make. I had exhausted all ways to force myself to change this habit into something more productive. So I looked to the sky and raised my arms and said, "Ok, I surrender!". As I spoke those words the cat exploded into an infinite number of points of light until all that was around me was light. Next thing I new I was in another place. Not another dream or awake in my bed, but another REAL place. I was totally alive and awake in some kind of palace. The floors looked like golden liquid but they were solid. It was a huge palace with huge columns. The walls were golden and the columns were shiny and white and reflected the gold. There were two people with me, one on each side of me. They were wearing white robes. They placed their hands on my arms and said, "Now it's time to look in the mirror". They turned me around and on the wall was an enormous gold framed mirror. I was in complete awe in what I was experiencing and it was blowing my mind. I was also very afraid. Just as we got to the mirror, I collapsed. Like my legs could no longer hold my weight. The two people, or beings, caught me and sat me down gently and said, "you need to breath". I started breathing deeply and immediately found myself back in my bed.

Even though the notion of being in a real place that is not the earthly world I'm familiar with was frighting and disturbing to my feeble mind, I want to go back. I want to look in the mirror. I wondered after that dream what was the meaning of it all. Why could I not look in the mirror. I realized more completely today that I wasn't ready. It is my fear that keeps me from knowing. It is my fear of losing something and feeling vulnerable.

Maybe the best way to deal with my fears is to just jump in with both feet or rip the band aid off in one quick motion. It is time for me to dive off the high dive. I've been afraid of the unknown for too long. I'm going to start caring about everything... with the exception of fear.