What did that say?

Years ago while serving in my first church in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, I was driving through Denver on my way to a minister’s meeting at Mile High.  Passing a fundamental church marquee, I caught a glimpse of a statement about paying attention. 

I drove around the block and parked to get the whole message.  It was as follows:  “Life is free.  All you have to pay…is attention.”  That is like the statement Ernest Holmes has in the textbook about, “Every man must pay the price for that which he received and that price is paid in mental and spiritual coin.”

Recently, I decided that I again was going to work on my consciousness in order to not only increase it, but to allow more of what life has to offer to be revealed within me.  Digging into my files, I found the following in my Consciousness folder:  “We build consciousness by 1.  Showing up.  2.  Paying attention.  3.  Telling the truth.  4.  Releasing the outcome.”  I don’t know who the author is of this little gem but it keeps biting me in the posterior sections of my anatomy. 

Pay attention.  Since I have heard this most of my life, I really have to tune in to “pay attention” whenever I hear it.  We get messages from so many levels within us that it is sometimes hard to get that the messages we hear or feel or sense are really for us. 

Thinking about what it is that we want or thinking about what is going on or thinking about what is important in our lives, that is paying attention and paying in spiritual and mental coin.  Pay attention.

Dazzling

I took the time this week to do a manicure and painted my nails a bright red.  This morning while contemplating what pen to use for my journaling experience, I was admiring my nails.  They looked beautiful.  And I was dazzled. 

Being dazzled is a wonderful experience.  Each time it happens to me, it sort of picks me up and places me into an unknown territory of magical delight. 

Delight should be a natural occurrence and maybe even a daily if not a more often occurrence.  Maybe I am just not paying close enough attention to those things that delight me, bring me joy, or make me laugh uncontrollably.

In sharing a sense of humor with a sister, we use to have the goal of making each other laugh so hard that we couldn’t breathe.  I can remember a time when she was living in Kansas City and I was in San Jose and we use to talk on the telephone for hours.  This was before the times of the “lots of minutes for $49.00” a month.  I don’t remember what she said but I laughed so hard I couldn’t breathe or talk and I went silent…she kept saying, “Cindy, are you there?”  I could only grunt for long minutes later.  That incident still makes me smile when I think about it.  I remember thinking I need to use the telephone and knock on wood so that she would know I was laughing too hard to talk. 

I want more of those experiences.  I want more of those times when I laugh so hard my muscles ache around my stomach. 

My challenge this week is to find more ways to dazzle, astonish, delight and laugh at just the things that make life worth living.

Resolving the Mysteries of Life

In many ways, we are far more powerful than we think we are and there are some aspects of life that are just unexplainable.  Or maybe, I choose not to think too deeply about things that happen because then I would have to be more powerful “all” the time.

Several years ago, I was in Sedona, Arizona, when I bought a turquoise stone necklace set in gold.  I had looked long and hard for one because they are usually set in silver and I don’t wear silver.  I wore it home and was wearing it the following Sunday back at work.  While getting ready to go out and start the service, I am looking in the mirror and “patting” things into place when I notice my necklace is gone. 

Since I didn’t have time to look for it any where, I kind of said to myself and under my breath that I hadn’t gotten enough wear or use of it so put it in a convenient place to find please.  During the whole service, I felt “off center,” like something wasn’t quite right. 

Before leaving the facility we were in at that time, we looked all over the floors, the bathroom, and kitchen and started the walk toward the car.  We checked the trunk because I had stuff in there we needed for the service. 

As I opened my door to get into the passenger seat, in the crease of the leather close to the front, I saw a sparkle of gold and there was my necklace. 

How did it get in the seat?  If it fell forward, it would have landed in my lap and if it fell backward it would have landed farther toward the rear of the seat. 

After thinking about it, I decided that it didn’t matter where I “lost” it, I recreated it in a place where I could find it.   And I did.  Thank you God in me.

Trees Where I've Lived

We bought some trees for our backyard recently and while my Beloved was digging the holes, I got to thinking about all of the trees I have had in my life.  I got really sad when I realized that while in California, our lemon, orange, avocado and cherry trees reached maturity about the time we moved.

Every place I have lived, there were new trees planted.  The last house I was in, I grew five oak trees from acorns.  What fun it was to watch them come up, grow, thrive and begin to look like mature trees instead of being in the gangly teen years.

I got really sad when thinking about all of the trees I have left behind. 

This week, somewhere in my reading, some wise person was quoted as saying that “wherever you are, leave some value.” 

Trees are my value.  So, instead of being sad about the trees I left, I got really happy thinking about all the joy someone was having eating the cherries, avocados, oranges and lemons.  The last house will have lots of shade trees this summer.  Maybe even an apricot or two this spring.

The Monterrey Oak we have just planted is still a teenager and will need some years to flesh out and look like a real tree.  I have had the joy of watching all of the trees grow, thrive and provide lots of green against a vivid blue sky. 

My value is not only trees, but the beauty they bring wherever they are.  I think I like that lasting legacy. 

Now What?

For years, I longed to be in the place that I am now occupying.  A place of financial freedom, being independently wealthy – well, having an income of sustainability each month, and being able to pick and choose each day’s plan of action.

For years, I remember saying, when I have the time to…I am going to…somehow I have forgotten what I was going to do. 

I am in a place of having to choose something really new and different for me.

Yes, I am doing my complicated knitting projects; yes, I am culling my library; yes, I am writing segments for my new book; yes, I continue to clear up and complete decorating this beautiful house we live in, and deciding what new thing needs to be done next in our residence, this along with the usually cleaning and tiding that needs to be done on a regular basis.

But now, I think I am open and receptive to something very new and different in my life.  But I am making the very public statement that however Divine Mind delivers that new idea, concept, inspiration, I am ready.  I think I am even ready to take on a huge, major project in order to utilize my talents, skills and abilities to the highest developed at this point.

For now, I am ready for “now what.”  Bring it on!