Getting To What We Want From Where We Are Pt 2

Alrighty, picking up from where we left off yesterday, the first step at progress is changing our perspective, our point of view and our outlook as encompassed by our mindset. How we see what's before us makes all the difference in the world. If for example you think something doesn't have value that may in fact be helpful you've just eliminated a source of inspiration at the least or what could have been your breakthrough path. If you're reading this thinking, "Ok Faith how do I change my mindset?". Well let me share this with you: we must RENEW our minds.

Romans 12: 1-2

So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. The Message

I decided to use the Peterson verse translation as I think it's the most plainly spoken i.e. less "religious". One can insert whatever your own individual practice into this to what works for you. I am trying to offer this as an assist, not something that will trip others up in incorporating. This is also for those of us who've been burned by the fake religiosity of others which is something I'm personally working through. I've come to realize you can't throw out the baby with the bathwater so to speak which brings me to the next step.

2. We must access spiritual power

If we think of this in exercise terms it's building your abdominal muscles to sustain you. It's strengthening your core. Believe me as I'm writing this there's a part of me that's surprised if only because it's something I've fought against. People have used and misused various religious tenets to control and harm people since the beginning of time. For many of us it has a particularly misogynistic bent as well that's being used to subjugate women. We also have to figure out how to place into proper context sacred texts and how it applies as well as knowing there has to be boundaries and consequences for going against our best interests. That could be an entire post in and of itself! Perhaps it will be, but for NOW this is in relation to finding our path in life and staying the course.

We all have our own paths in life. Since no two people are alike our experiences will be different. I'm reading Oprah's September message in What I Know For Sure (it's the last page of each O, the Oprah magazine) where she states: "When you know for sure that you're on course and doing exactly what you're supposed to be doing, fulfilling your soul's intention, your heart's desire, or whatever you chose to call it [they're all the same thing]. When your life is on course with its purpose, you are your most powerful. And you may stumble, but you will not fail."

How do we access spiritual power? I think we have to ask for it first and foremost. There can be no assumptions. Just like doing inverse crunches will strengthen your body we must find a set of spiritual "moves" that will yield results. Having a trainer to guide us can certainly help but in the end the work is solo and the efforts must be our own. We have to push through the discomfort and be consistent. We have to exercise AND change our eating habits to things that sustain us. We may have to limit our intake of certain people/thoughts/circumstances that are of no benefit to us. We have to be willing to change and be vulnerable.

We all have an inner voice, an intuition that guides us if we listen to it. What ways do you know for certain you can make changes in your own life?

Sometimes What We Really Need Is A Hug

With this emphasis on the exchange of material goods as a reward, we all know how some people have lost their damn minds. The religious and cultural practices take a back seat to getting that video game console or MP3 player. Some parents are feeling such financial strain, children are now asking for jobs to help their parents out. 

Dear Santa:

I am thirteen years old. My family has never had to ask for help before.

My mom and my dad have always had okay jobs and we were fine. Last year my mom got sick and she had to stop working. The bills from the doctors are very high. Even though my dad still is working, we don’t have enough money always to buy the things we need.

My teacher told me I could write to you because what I really want for Christmas is some new clothes.

We literally buy into this idea that to celebrate something with our friends and families requires a price tag and feel inadequate when we have to cut back and be frugal. Who really wants to stick to a budget if we've chosen to believe that bigger is better? We're missing the point though. Unless a larger event looms over our consciousness such as the death of a relative or something else that's usually unpleasant and unwanted, it takes a serious effort at recognizing our indoctrination.

People also mistake feelings of affection or lust as something that indicates familiarity and compatibility with another. How many people think of guarding their bodies as a necessity when we live in a society that likes to skip over getting to know themselves let alone another person? Unless we've been taught to value ourselves and learned how to evaluate others, we'll have to fumble our way through a bumpy road to enlightenment. The way people practice their religiosity can further compound that growth.

It's not an easy thing to accept when those that look like you could be your worst enemies or when blood ties are worthless. It could make one want to stay in bed and never leave. We have to look for that silver lining that's within every cloud. No matter how difficult things get there's someone else who has it worse. We may be under the weather but we can get through the storm. We just need to believe it and take the most miniscule of steps to move forward. One never knows how that smile you give a person on the street today could be the thing that gets them through it. That's why sometimes we don't need grand gestures or major declarations. Sometimes all we really need is a hug: literal or virtual.