In Our End Is Our Beginning
Going Deeper
Monday, December 29, 2014
It’s one thing to read the Daily Meditations (or any spiritual text). It’s quite another to integrate the teachings into your very being. I hope you will take all of what I say deeper than mere intellectual understanding, perhaps in some or all of these ways:
- Contemplative practice: Contemplation is a “laboratory” in which you learn to die and to be reborn. The rest of your life becomes the field in which you live out this way of surrender and participation in Love. Commit to a daily practice of some kind—silent meditation, yoga, chanting, or maybe one of the “Rest” practices introduced in the Saturday meditations.
- Sabbath: Set aside regular, longer periods of quiet or retreat, simply to rest in awareness of God’s presence. Find a rhythm of rest and work that allows for renewal so that you enter your active life from contemplative grounding.
- Service: Allow the natural welling-up of love to flow outward in acts of justice, healing, and compassion. Life is not about you; you are about life!
- Shadow work: The task of searching out and embracing shadow—the parts of yourself that you hide or ignore—is ongoing, the work of a lifetime. Let the people and circumstances that “push your buttons” be your teachers. Look for yourself with a loving gaze in the mirror of both your enemies and those who enthrall you.
- Spiritual direction: If you do not have someone to guide you, to hold onto you during the times of not knowing, you will normally stay at your present level of growth. Seek out a sacred companion you can trust to be honest and present to your journey, who can reflect back to you God’s presence in your life and the world.
In the year to come I’ll continue suggesting ways of opening your full being—heart, mind, and body—to Presence (such as the “Gateway to Silence” or the “Practice” in the Saturday meditations). It’s never something you achieve, but always a gift awaiting your awareness and receptivity. May you grow in your awareness of God’s presence everywhere and always.
Gateway to Silence:
God, keep me in your truth.
Image Credit: Ensō (円相) – Zen/Japanese calligraphy wallpaper (detail)
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Daily Meditations
