Take a Bite, It's Delicious

I'm grateful for the time my first grade art teacher let me paint a mural on the wall. Today, I am an artist.

I’m grateful for the time we took the new girl into our little Jr. high school clique. She’s been my best friend ever since.

I’m grateful for all the jobs I never got, that led me back to school to acquire skills I never thought I’d have.

I’m grateful for all the times I followed my gut feeling. Especially when my thinking mind could make no logical sense of it. In retrospect, they were some of the best things I could have ever done for myself.

I’m grateful for the realization that I possess freedom of choice as to where I apply my focus, that dictates the quality of my experience here in this place.

I’m grateful for the ability to make a difference.

I’m grateful for all the times I recognize when I’m believing lies, such as thinking I’m not worthy of something or not good enough.

I’m grateful for the music that moves my soul to places I never want to leave.

I’m grateful for Tofurkey and....you guessed it.....chocolate. ;p

I’m grateful that I’m grateful for so many things that I’d never be able to list them all.

And, of course, I’m grateful for my cherished family, my beloved friends, and the people I don’t like, all without whom I would not have the ability to see myself.

Happy Thanksgiving. :)

Who Do You Think You Are?

My body is the vehicle and my thinking mind is the OS, operating system, or software that directs it. All was well and good when our software was being used to discover fire, create the wheel or bang out the first rhythmic beat.

It was when the operating system assigned itself an identity that things began to go awry. I realize in addition to self-discovery there was the cultivation of fear, outside of real fight or flight situations. It reminds me of one of those sci-fi movies where advanced technological intelligence "discovers itself" and suddenly begins a hostile takeover of the world and everything in it.

Even though this sounds a lot like what human beings have been doing these last few thousand years, there must also have been some people who were using their neocortex for "higher functions" or conscious thought. Hence the expansion of consciousness manifesting a new world.

The more I can remember that I am not my body or thinking mind, that these things are how that which I Am gets around in this place, the freer and better guided I am. In the meantime, I can have fun with the changing identities my thinking mind assigns. Today I'm feeling kind of cute and astute.

So, who do you think you are?

Realize

Repercussions in the morning sun

of many of the underlying fears.

Emptiness is on the run

from all the consequential years.

Systematically the winds blow

and turn us in directions unforeseen.

Tell me when you realize 

which is consciousness and which

of these are dreams. 

-G. 1991

I Spy With My Little Eye

When we are very young our world consists of only a few people and things. As we grow, our view and understanding of our world expands.

I can liken my expansion to looking at life through a straw. At first, I can make out a pebble, then maybe a blade of grass. I contemplate concepts like Life being a mirror to my thoughts or what I focus on I attract, and with each expansion of my consciousness, or the growth of my understanding of these ideas, my view widens. I can see several pebbles, grass and even a few flowers.

The more revelations I experience, or the more my consciousness is expanded, the greater, wider and more beautiful my view becomes. I can now see a panoramic scene that is grander than I expected. I suspect we are incapable of completely seeing "the big picture" while incarnate, and to me, this is understandable. The vastness of it all has to be inscrutable to the limitations of a frontal lobe.

I now understand the view I see through my straw-of-understanding is greatly affected by a couple of things. Acceptance, not condonation, of what is, awareness of the present moment, and not believing my own lies that do not serve me or the world, make all the difference. I also have the power to point my straw (my focus) on that which serves me and others.

If while here in this place I'm able to experience a small piece of the One, I'm going to make sure it's a good piece. A piece chock full of love, laughter, passion, my favorite Prince songs playing over and over and over again.....and, oh yes, you guessed it.....chocolate. ;)

What do you spy with your little eye?