the everyday infinite

Spiritual resource to share: awe

A few months ago, I went to a little mountain town in the cloud forests of Costa Rica to see my son graduate from high school and to visit his host family.  One night, I was walking with a friend under a rare and almost clear night.  Some thin wisps of clouds were brushed across the sky and I commented on it.

My friend loves stars so much that she can name them all, and there is even a star with her name on it.  She later wrote me:  "The universe ... is almost certainly infinite and expanding in all directions so no matter where you are in the universe (or whichever galaxy you are in) it appears that you are at the center and the universe is expanding around you.  What we were seeing that clear night in Costa Rica was the Galactic Center, the center of our own galaxy which is called the Milky Way. "

What appeared as a simple, wispy cloud was actually an innumerable amount of stars swirling, twirling in their own orbits.  My thought was letting in the infinite and started expanding itself. 

 

Inspired that night? Yes.  And reminded of the everyday infinite that we can brush right by if we're not alert.  Things have more complexity and order than it may first appear.  People have more compassion and capacity for good than it first may appear.  Everyday we can experience what is infinite:  It's in the pure darkness and breadth of the sky as readily as it is in the intimate tenderness and depth in the eyes of the person right next to you.

This everyday infinite is the stuff we are made of.  There is no end to the infinite possibilities and love we each carry within ourselves.

There is beauty and revelation everywhere.

your definition of God = your religion

Spiritual resource to share: infinite God

I have been sharing Godwords on my facebook page for months now. Godwords are a collection of 3 to 7 words that prompt thought into considering the multi-faceted nature of God.


So when I wrote the Godwords of today: brilliance, improvisation, order, calmness and music, a friend responded:

Hi friend. Why GODwords? Are brilliance, improvisation, order, calmness and
music dependent on religion? Love you.

I thought it was a good question because it makes you ask other questions. Like -- can a spiritual quality be dependent on a spiritual discipline? Hmmmm. Or -- can religion encompass universal qualities? Can religion be universal?

I can see the larger question here.

If one understands religion as being a restrictive way to govern behaviour, a system of beliefs passed down from generation to generation, or a formalized and traditional way of determining meaning in life, it is difficult to smoosh into that narrow definition qualities of thought that are expansive, eternal, infinite and universal. So if that is the case, then the answer to the above question must be no. Actually the question itself is hard to answer because there is no dependence here.

God is infinite and infinity is not something the limited human thought can easily grasp. Humility - that quality necessary for our spiritual growth - ushers in the idea that we are not the creator, but reflect all that our Creator, God is. Seeing that God is infinite, we are in awe!



What if one's understanding of religion went beyond a system of beliefs to a practice of infinite spiritual ideas that results in harmonious relationships, bodies and organizations? What if one's understanding of religion ran parallel to math or to music?

What about math? The principles are fixed, but its applications are infinite. Solutions are found.
What about music? The notes may be the same, but their infinite combinations create comfort, inspiration , unity, and joy.

SO what about religion? I see it as a way to understand God, as all that is infinite. It does not restrict, but releases and reveals the joy, order, peace and spontaneity of God's love! Its applications are infinite and the infinite interplay of spiritual qualities create all that is good.

MBEddy writes: "The infinite never began nor will it ever end." Neither will our understanding of God ever end, but grow increasingly more comprehensive, expansive and practical. As my understanding of God grows, so does my religion.






To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

breathless

Spiritual resource to share: moments that take your breath away

"All nature teaches of God's love to man...." Yes. This I know to be true. To take in the awe of a mountaintop, the stillness of a lake and the tenderness of a hummingbird, and then to realize that the same Creator of these intimate and infinitely lovely creations is the same Creator who has created us - and has created us in His/Her own image and likeness. Wow (but said in a hushed and curiously, quizzically, wondrous way)

w o w.

I have been cataloguing in my mind the many times when the natural world reminds me of God's love and when nature blows me away with its power, beauty and grace. There was the time:

While driving to pick up my son from school, I turned a corner on a lonely highway and startled two bald eagles. They flew up and continued flying - one on each side about five feet from my car. We kept moving together for a surprisingly long time, until they realized they couldn't gain on me and flew off.

When we lived on a small lake, our neighbors across the way raised white homing pigeons and trained them. On clear and warm days, I could watch these white birds flying together in circles above our lake.

In this same area, there was another couple who raised caribou and lived beyond the forest preserves from us. On cold and crisp nights in the dead of winter, I could hear caribou bellow out their soulful calls to one another.

In the spring, I walked my sons down our gravel road through the woods to their bus stop. Whenever the weather was warm enough for another bloom of mosquitoes to hatch, we could count on an army of dragonflies to swoop in and help us decrease the mosquito population. The dragonflies were so numerous, that we could stretch out our arms and the dragonflies would tickle as they landed on them. The sun glinted off their wings. We giggled all the way to the bus stop.

Our current home is fringed by a creek that joins two larger lakes. In the warmer months, a loon couple flies over from one lake to another in the morning and evening, giving their haunting calls which start and end our days.

Glittering snowfalls, booming ice on a lake, the crystal clarity of a star lit night, it just doesn't end! What have been some of your moments?



All photos by Gabe Korinek and copyrighted

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

the joy of cleansing and renewal

Spiritual resource to share: renewal

Happy New Year, kind of - Thai style! Our new exchange student daughter from Thailand, Taew, has been bravely dealing with our continued snow and cold, windy conditions.

However, these last three days, her very large family and countrymen have been whooping it up with the Songkran Festival - a national celebration whose main theme is renewal or rebirth.

"The idea is that as the old year gives way to a new one, it is a time to give thanks to elders and others who have bestowed acts of kindness upon you in the past year, and conversely, to expel all the bad luck and look forward to the good times the coming year will hopefully offer." Everything old and useless gets thrown out and people are drenched in water as a way to celebrate cleansing and renewal.

On learning of this, I poured through the internet, if not just to find pictures of people in extremely hot weather and sigh.

But, I thought further, what time is NOT good for renewal and rebirth? Now is a good time! Now is a good time for gratitude and appreciation and repentance and new ideas!

• Isa 43:19 Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert.
• II Cor 6:2 Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.
• Rev 21:5 Behold, I make all things new.
• Lam 3:22 It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.

So in honor of this most fun festival, get wet, throw out your garbage, kiss your grandparents and great aunt and uncle, and look forward to all of the infinite possibilities for good that lie ahead!



To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

breaking through habitual thinking

Spiritual resource to share: logic and reasoning

Reason, rightly directed, serves to correct the errors of corporeal sense; but sin, sickness, and death will seem real (even as the experiences of the sleeping dream seem real) until the Science of man's eternal harmony breaks their illusion with the unbroken reality of scientific being. - MBEddy from Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures

Have you ever heard of the game Mastermind? It's one of my favorite games. It's a code-breaking game in which you use logic to deduce the code of your opponent hidden in a series of 4 beads of any combination of 6 colors. (You can go here to play it.)


The reason I have juxtaposed this game with MBEddy's quote above is because both deal with breaking certain patterns. MBEddy talks about the illusion of the "errors of corporeal sense" - an habitual pattern of material thought. The game also deals with patterns of thought and the success of the game is largely dependent on one's ability to break out of dead end patterns and see the winning pattern.


Here's the analogy: In the game, you start out with six colors and have eight attempts to break the 4 color code. I have been able to be consistently successful in this game if I recognize when I am exclusively pursuing one particular color pattern. When this happens, I consciously change my course, consider new alternatives and try a new pattern. Then I usually win at the fourth, fifth, or sixth attempt.


In play, the game Mastermind has taught me the value of recognizing habitual thinking and replacing it with new ways of solving the problems.


In life, I see the same thing. The downward tendencies of habitual thinking ( like old arguments re-surfacing, mindless repetition, sensual stimulation, thoughtless words or actions) can subtly enter thought and depress energy.


Once this is recognized, I can consciously decide to break this pattern. I give my consent to the fact that there are new ways to think, to act, and to be. I realize that Mind (another word for God) has "infinite resources with which to bless mankind." This "reason, rightly directed, serves to correct the errors of corporeal sense."


Understanding the infinite nature of God and man explains "the Science of man's eternal harmony" and this understanding "breaks (corporeal sense's) illusion with the unbroken reality of scientific being."


It is energizing to know we can break out of old patterns of thought and embrace the wider realm of God's thoughts that always refresh and bring us home to the right answers.






PS - And let me know if you know if you like this game! Or if you know of other games that have a metaphysical lesson, please share it here!

What intrigues me most about Christian Science - revisited

Spiritual resource to share: revisiting a new/old inspiration

Now that I have literally hundreds of these blogs, I find myself browsing through them, looking at past lessons learned, my gradual improvement at writing, continuing spiritual growth. When I came across this one blog, I was surprised how much I still feel the same way I did when I first wrote it. But then, Christian Science is like that for me. It is always fresh.

Here is the old blog:

Recently I was talking to a number of other Christian Science practitioners and we were all asked this question: What intrigues you most about Christian Science. Their answers were clear and varied. One practitioner loves the sound reasoning of Christian Science. Another practitioner loves how effective Christian Science is at problem solving. Another practitioner commented how Christian Science taught her to move through the world with dominion.

As for me, not only do I love the fact that Christian Science is so many things to so many people, but I am most thrilled to know that Christian Science spells out the universal law of Love and shows how to apply it to every situation imaginable.

Let me break this down as I understand it.

Christian Science is the science or the "how to" of Christianity.
Science is all about a system or method reconciling practical ends with scientific laws or the application of certain principles that bring about a consistent result.

Christianity is based on the teachings of Christ.
Christ is all about the expression of an omnipotent and omnipresent God (Love) in our human experience.

So, Christian Science explains "how to" do universal love, how to be loving, and be loved, and how to heal and harmonize with divine Principles of Love.

OK, so the thrilling part of this again is that these principles of Love find receptive hearts everywhere: with your immediate family members with whom you live and in situations a half a world away. Regardless of any human category you put yourself into or any situation you find yourself in, there is a principle, a law of Love, which when applied, brings the human picture into harmony.

To practice Christian Science means a never-ending discovery into the depths of understanding infinite Love and feeling the effects of Love's harmonizing influence. It has an impact on our individual lives. Christian Science has an impact on communities and nations. It seems to me that Christian Science explains the science of genius, of all that is brilliant and good and enduring. Through the science of Christ's teaching, we can all experience the promise that "with God, all things are possible."

Another friend commented that when she first read Science and Health ( the textbook of Christian Science) she was left breathless. It still does that to me, even after years of reading and practicing the ideas in it.







To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

when the party is over

Spiritual resource to share: continuity of good


I am on a Twain kick as of last posting. Here is another one of his quotes that just made me laugh. "There is no unhappiness like the misery of sighting land (and work) again after a cheerful, careless voyage."

My one son had a very quiet couple of days after his trip to Germany, and today, I called my other son to arrange an airport pickup tomorrow. Both aren't too happy about leaving their adventures behind. Both of them would probably agree to Twain's sentiment.

I understand. After a trip, I have felt a shift when returning to all that is familiar and sometimes a let down or downright depression. But it happens much less. Here are some ideas that have helped me see that Life is always full, and always an adventure. (And no doubt, ideas that I'll share with my boys!)

• There are no big events in Mind.
• God, Mind, always operates constantly, harmoniously and efficiently. There is never more good at one time and less good at another time. Good flows continuously.
  
• "To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven."
• There is a time to be bold and raucous, and a time to be still. After particularly wonderful times, it is allright to have some quiet time to digest the richness of those experiences. There is a time for expression, and a time for reflection.
  
• "In Christian Science there is never a retrograde step, never a return to positions outgrown. "
• The good in new experiences expands your sense of self. You can never return to what you once were. You have grown. Perhaps limitations were challenged, you took on more responsibility than ever before, or you realized that you had a new talent or a latent skill that blossomed. You bring these new perspectives to your day to day experience and find that everything may look a little brighter.
  
• Life doesn't end. It keeps getting better.
• MBEddy sums this all up nicely. "Life is eternal. We should find this out, and begin the demonstration thereof. Life and goodness are immortal. Let us then shape our views of existence into loveliness, freshness, and continuity...."

Our lives are a continual exploration of infinite good. Whether we are in a quiet time or a crowded and rowdy all round happy time, God's goodness continues. And there is always more to learn, more to love and more to grow. It is never really over.








To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

what is thought made of?

Spiritual resource to share: a little something to think about


I've picked up some interesting things from talking with people about thinking.

One friend commented that she read that someone said (okay, so much for credible sources) that a person schooled in the study of human behaviour said that 90 to 95% of our thoughts are what we have thought the day before.

Another friend commented that she heard we spend the majority of our thoughts and efforts on trying to get people to change their minds.

And another young friend recently heard on a talk show that the majority of people polled were convinced that they heard voices in their heads.

So what we have here is not necessarily credible sources on the science of thought, but an interesting question of what constitutes thought.

Are we mainly involved in habitual thinking? Preoccupied with trying to control or convince other minds to accept what our mind is telling us? Trying to figure out what voices we are hearing? Is this what we are spending the majority of our day doing? Bla. It makes me tired just thinking of it.

MBEddy shares some insights when she writes:

When the mechanism of the human mind gives place to the divine mind, selfishness and sin, disease and death will lose their foothold.

It makes sense to me that the human mind, in and of itself, is not creative, is not a Creator. So if we rise no higher than thinking that we are the creator, originator and supervisor of all that we see, that we quickly lose our juice, our inspiration, and thought falls into the ruts of habitual thinking. Limited thinking results in limited health, limited ideas and limited goodness.

But when we understand that there is one Mind, one creative source - we open up our thought to infinite ideas, brilliant originality, and startingly new ways of doing/seeing and thinking about things.

So, when we give our consent to reflecting the divine mind (God) the limited habitual ways of thinking make way for infinite possibilities.

It certainly is something to think about.

Have a great week thinking original and expansive thoughts!



To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

living from the inside out

Spiritual resource to share: a quiet and passionate happiness

Finally! I had been trying to reach an old friend from WAY back ever since my family and I moved back from the East Coast to the Midwest. And... after two years and many phone calls later, I found her!

We shared a love of getting out into the world and doing stuff - whether it was traveling, being an activist for some cause, or having outdoor adventures, we loved it! M's take on it always included the world and she did some mighty admirable things... she worked in Sudan with the American Refugee Committee, presented papers in China re: advances in physical therapy and skiied across Iceland (or was it Greenland?) on some environmental project. She was active helping others in the community and always mindful of having enough time for herself, a book, some company and a cup of tea.

Her wedding to a remarkable guy was most memorable. Each of the communities in which she and her husband were involved were so easy to distinguish: there were many from the Hmong community, the Catholic community with nuns in their habits, a number of folks in wheelchairs, the outdoor enthusiasts with their oddly lined summer tans, and other races and all ages. What a hoot!

(After finding myself taking notes on our conversation, I realized I need to get M into blogging. She's got so much good stuff to share!!)

Even after all these years, and all the changes that years give us, she was the same wise, humble, and fun person I have always known her to be.

So what have we learned from these many years? We realized that for both of us, it was the external things that helped define who we were. Our passions and commitments were played out in big ways. We both sought these experiences out and thrived in challenging situations.

It was M's thought that now she finds she is learning to live from the inside out. I had to agree. There are no major trips or pressing projects demanding me to challenge complacency, doubt or inability. That is something that is requiring inner strength to meet those kinds of challenges.

We are both parents of teen-age kids ready to claim more and more of their independence, which adds a demand for a whole new level of inner strength! Our current role with our kids is to be there for them, but also to learn to get out of the way. They are learning to make more choices, all the while we are still in the safety boat as they start off on their own journeys.

I know a lot of you reading this have had intensely challenging and spiritually rewarding demands placed on you by others, or other institutions. So now, when these external demands are gone, we are left with defining ourselves from our most still and quiet moments. Our happiness comes from a source within us, our inspiration comes from quiet moments with God. It was there all along when those external events demanded it. It is even here now.

I like this idea of living from the inside out. It feels more like being the fountain than playing in the fountain. And, for me, this is my time to understand more the spiritual fountainhead of all the passions and loves that have played out in the first part of my life.

For all of you adventuresome friends reading this - whether you are rising to the challenge put to you, or cultivating your own inner strength, it is wonderful to know that the adventure of spiritual living just keeps going.

God expresses in man the infinite idea forever developing itself, broadening and rising higher and higher from a boundless basis. - Mary Baker Eddy

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

A New Day

Spiritual resource to share: the promise of new beginnings

So it is Monday, thoughts of Easter are still lingering, and I'm savoring the idea that resurrection is a daily occurrence. Here are some eye openers to start with:
From the Bible:

• Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.

From Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy:

• The purpose and motive to live aright can be gained now. This point won, you have started as you should. You have begun at the numeration-table of Christian Science, and nothing but wrong intention can hinder your advancement. Working and praying with true motives, your Father will open the way. "Who did hinder you, that ye should not obey the truth?"
• To those leaning on the sustaining infinite, today is big with blessings.

In a 19th century seminar class I took, it was pointed out that the word big in the mid-1800's ( when Science and Health was written) was actually used in reference to being pregnant, as in being "big" with child. So having a day "big" with blessings is like saying we have a day pregnant with possibilities!

Think of it. This morning, we have the opportunity to lay down every thing that may limit us, and start out fresh with a clean slate. This is not wishful thinking. This is as possible as it is for the sun to shine in on a new morning. It is natural, even divinely natural, to think of God as an open door of possibilities, God as the source of infinite inspiration and to think of ourselves as receptive, expectant, and firmly grounded on the solid foundation of Truth and Love.

We need everything this day will give us and this day has everything we need.



Impression, soleil levant (Impression, Sunrise) by Claude Monet -- used with permission

To share your thoughts on this or to explore this idea further, please feel free to be in contact with me, add your own comments below, email this article to a friend, or add to the healing finds and sites on the web to the right.

How big is infinite?

To understand God as infinite......

I was downhill skiing in Colorado and got off the main run and found myself in waist high powder snow. Intead of changing my weight backward on the skies, I kept it forward and landed in the snow with a soft *phlumph* I lay there, feeling of the bright sun and soft snow and views of beautiful mountains hemming the bright blue empty sky. I am a part of this, I told myself. Amazing. I am a part of this.

I did finally get up, taught myself a quick lesson in skiing powder, and joined friends at the end of the run. But the larger lesson - to have an answer as to my place in the universe, my purpose in life, which came to me in a *phlumph* - this lesson stays with me today.

"God is Love. Can we ask Him to be more? God is intelligence. Can we inform the infinite Mind of anything He does not already comprehend?" queries Mary Baker Eddy in Science and Health. Understanding God as All-in-all, we have arrived home.

Chau,

Kim

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Eternity in five minutes

"To see the world in a grain of sand, and to see heaven in a wild flower, hold
infinity in the palm of your hands, and eternity in an hour."

William Blake

In all respect to William Blake, his thought got me thinking...to understand infinity and eternity are daunting enough, but the possibility of experiencing eternity in an hour....I am wondering if it is possible to speed things up and hold eternity in five minutes?

OK, so this is a bit ironic. But what is eternity if not a sense of timeliness? What is time but a space between two moments? Can we feel eternity? And if so, what does that do for us?

Mary Baker Eddy writes in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, "

Become conscious for a single moment that Life and intelligence are purely
spiritual, neither in nor of matter, and the body will then utter no complaints.
.... Entirely separate from the belief and dream of material living, is the Life
divine, revealing spiritual understanding and the consciousness of man's
dominion over the whole earth."

Praying is a way to become conscious of spiritual things, the things of God: gratitude, affirmation of good and expectancy of healing. These are timeless attributes that show me a power beyond my own consciousness. This to me is getting a taste of eternity.

Filling thought with a consciousness of God opens the door to infinite possibilies, purifies thought and protects. It brings me into a place of peace and confidence and possibility.

Kim ................

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