The Infinite

Sometimes, floating is synonymous with peace; adrift in solitude and wonder. But one bit of unfavorable news and things can get out of hand.

In a moment we can be negotiating rapids, searching and preparing for underwater obstacles, all while keeping our head above the water line.

When the flow becomes unruly, the number of great possibilities doesn’t diminish, but they change.

Life is full of ebbs and flows, and sometimes the faucet is opened too much and we get tossed around more than usual. There is no real security from that, but our spirit can be aligned with the flow and we in turn can be aligned with that spirit.

We can peacefully accept the changes in flow. The flow doesn’t stop to be examined. We must remain in the flow and ACCEPT it to understand and be able to react appropriately to it – or better – ‘with it’.

We may be experiencing new emptinesses in our life that will be filled. Listening can help us understand this vital situation in which we all find ourselves and it may provide critical insights into how we are to negotiate these rapids and how we can control what will be filling our current emptinesses.

Oppose the flow and it evaporates, leaving you up river, abandoned by current events and vital information.

This is not at about doom and gloom. Just the opposite.

Grab a white-water raft, or just swim a little better. There is a bubbling effervescence flowing out there! A scintillating mystery in which we can all play our part.

This virus isn’t the problem, it is the adventure!

How’s your island today? Shrinking?

Your mind is not chained to the floor. It is open to dreams, expansiveness and discovery. Those mysterious places where ideas are born may still be hidden but are accessible. We may have to turn a few more corners to get them into gear.

The novelty and association we have lost to this quarantine can be regained by mental expansiveness.

It is so easy to add actions to a routine. Instead, experiment! Take different paths – for everything – at least mentally. Do things in ways you never thought possible. Get new perspectives for everything you know. Discover how things might be when viewed in a new way.

Feel like your in a box? The box is really not there, we are just reminded of its pseudo-potency too often. What is outside of that box is still there. It has lost none of its majesty or intrigue.

One unexpected vision . . . one unusual result . . . can change a person’s life . . . forever.

Standing room only.

Someone asks, ‘Where do you want to eat?’ All the usual restaurants are mentioned. But never do you hear, ‘Let’s search through some dumpsters and meet up under the bridge.’ Nor does anyone say, ‘How about we take the Lear Jet over to New Orleans and go to Brennan’s?’

For each subject everyone has personalized ‘answers’ which are also the only answers possible for that person, at that moment.

What are you going today? One person says, ‘Gotta go to Publix, Wal-Mart and take a walk’ while another says, ‘Going over to Jimmy’s and pick up some ‘Ludes and some purples’ while still another says, ‘Meeting of the Board at 2:00, then that formal banquet this evening.’

Common to all is the ‘choice’ process. A question is asked and each person populates the answer column with items that are familiar.

All the answers you give to any question fall in a realm that is comfortable for you. The answers we all give form a ‘class’ to which each individual belongs.

We are responsible for the selection of what group to which we belong. It is our minds that pick what set of rules we are going to abide by.

How are you today? If you really answer that question you will look for the ‘answers column’ of your mind to SEE the possibilities it holds. Then you will share all or part of that vision.

Bear in mind that YOU are the only one responsible for the contents of your ‘answer column’.

You see – only what you put in there!

Any type of chaos brings more and different decisions that we must negotiate.

Rather than these extra little burdens bogging you down, a slight shift in how they are handled may turn the process into one of great benefit.

If nothing is changed, these added concerns will pile up into a heap of unwanted problems leading to angst and more chaos.

But if this current influx of decisions is viewed as positive, it’s whole complexion can be transmuted.

Each question we ever have to address can be thought of as a gift, and we have the ability to ask of each one, ‘How can this be used to make things better, or even perfect?’

Remember: every choice you make has a bearing on who you are and who you will become.

Give thanks for everything – and choose wisely.

Apparently the press today is for the patient to be able to input with the doctor on decisions about the patient’s health.

What a kind gesture!

There is another similar strategy that is, and always has been, available for anyone – and for any question whatsoever.

It is simply a time of openness where the person becomes quiet and sensitive, and allows answers to flow into him or her.

The salient difference is that with this latter method, the answers are never wrong.

Margo Price does a great C&W song entitled, ‘Learning to Lose’. In it she repeats the haunting question, ‘Is winning really learning to lose?’

Hopefully, for the benefit of introspection, consider something about you that is not perfect and just seems to linger around year after year. Perhaps a bad habit, etc.

Now, consider what you say – to yourself – about it. We don’t want to be wrong, we don’t want to lose, even to ourselves. So we rationalize and we become masters at that craft. We perfect our responses and repeat them over and over to ourselves and others.

And in some strange way we use these responses to convince ourselves that we have won another round. Only two things change; you reinforce the problem – and you make it through another day without having to do anything that may actually help your situation.

The critical distinction here is that no learning takes place. You are not learning how to lose, you have already perfected that. You are merely practicing repetition of something that is not pure in the first place. You don’t want to face the problem, so instead you fortify your status quo, assuring that no change for the better will ever have a chance of happening.

If this system of avoidance seems pertinent to you, maybe a trip to secluded mountains is in order. Perhaps there, in solitude, you may get a hint that ‘losing’ this round is the best thing that could occur. This type of ‘losing’ is the big, important kind. It is realizing that even the track you were running on was flawed. And the ‘prize’ you were after was at best – a deception, a lie.

This entire message could be entitled, ‘Not trying to win UGLY races’. ‘Learning to lose’ is an extremely valuable lesson in protecting an individual from personal detriment.

If you find yourself in any type of ugly race, lose! And if there might be more than one, learn to lose! Get on a track that is worthy of YOU! One where winning is beneficial.

You’ll be so happy you lost!

Some days the awakening process is uneventful.

Reach down, rip off a piece of today, and that’s it. Like the ripped off piece was just another part of life’s to-do list.

But all too infrequently we mistakenly grab the page entitled ‘The Mysterious’ and we rip a section of that off.

We look at it and fascination begins. We realize that we not only can’t understand it, but that it is too abstract for any kind of manipulation.

It sits in our mind for awhile as we attempt to even consider what to do with it. There are no words that describe it, no numbers, merely feelings of some kind. Even our sandbox has changed. Gone are the shovels and pails – and even the sand. We are left alone, as that that is the way of the mysterious.

It is a new reality with no dimensions, no directions and no rules. But ironically for most, there is an unwritten law that doesn’t permit this divine association with the Mysterious to last very long. Perhaps unfamiliarity is the culprit or the lack of any suspicion that this amazement might be exactly what we have been looking for our entire life.

So, the kettle boils, the cat meows, the dog barks – and the door begins to close on this Mystery. We reach for the ripped off piece, but it has disappeared. Another fleeting dream. The door closes, and the possibility the Mysterious delivered, is gone.

Ah, it was just an enigma anyway, wasn’t it?

Perhaps, though, an ember was left smoldering. Or, a seed may have been planted before the Mysterious left, to germinate in a day or two.

Disappearing fragments . . .

who would have thought?

As is almost always the case, words can’t begin to convey Perfection.

Please allow the exquisite image to speak to you directly.

The things that really matter, stay hidden behind the chatter.

Too haughty to be revealed, preferring to stay concealed.

Majesty as mountains, playfulness as fountains.

Glorious selections, observed in reflections.

Beauty that couldn’t be higher, warmth from a camp fire.

Magic ambience all around, punctuated by not a sound.

Where elevated thought freely flows, a place that only the Infinite knows?

Roam around – be free, there’s even Magic in that tree.

What matters can be heard, maybe this time from a bird.

Answers aren’t scheduled from a clock, better luck looking under a rock.

Still can’t find it – that’s a shame, try looking for a better frame.