I slept poorly last night. Sometime before dawn I woke up to odd sounds. I lay there listening for a few minutes, then got up to ask Rob if he heard them. “They’re coming from outside,” he said in answer to my question about the source. I thought it might be from the heating vent. “It sounds like a big truck doing some sort of work,” he went on.
I got back into bed but it was hot in the bedroom and the noises continued for a long time. I was wide awake. I remembered dream fragments about healing people, about cleaning out my part of a vegetable drawer and the more I took out, the more appeared. So I gave them to the woman with the bin next to mine. I don’t know where we were.
This morning I had a bowl of Cheerios and a cup of tea. Then I read the paper and washed my hair. Of course I worked Facebook in first thing. It is always first thing. Our late friend Jeff Belyea admitted looking at Facebook before he began his day. And then one day he made his last post. It was a poem called “Bird of Paradise.” And then he walked into another room. A room of light, a room of eternity. And we all miss him ever day.
We are all doing time here, as someone said. No one actually knows anything about what is in the next room. I fancy my little girl and husband are there waiting for me to come home. For this world is not my permanent home. How could it be? Love does not know anything but itself and on this side of the veil, hatred makes its presence known. So Jesus had to remind us that His kingdom was not here but in heaven.
My friend Peter found his ego falling away and was forever grateful. After that he didn’t mind his crippled body for he had healed his soul. Now I walk through my days mostly alone and definitely not knowing anything. I often used to try and pry into the next world but it is under lock and key.
Here we never feel quite safe or properly loved. Losses loom large; in fact letting go is our primary job and no one teaches us how to do it properly. So we have spiritual teachers that give us pointers. Death itself is the greatest pointer. It is not the enemy but the awakening into eternity. It demands respect and awe. We fear and tremble in its face for we are life full-on and living the mystery of the opposites.
No one has all of the answers or even all of the questions. No one can ever love too much or become too wise. We must turn away from the mind and venture into the garden of the soul. There find Jeff and Peter and all of the beloved figures that left too soon. Smiling at us, they want us to do only one thing….learn to love ourselves while in these fragile temporary human incarnations. Anything else is just a diversion.
Vicki Woodyard
“Anything else is just a diversion”. Yes it is. I’ve always told my kids…It’s all window dressing. No value or meaning whatsoever. I always tried to tell them to try not to be lured into the money chase. It leaves us empty. Love you Vicki!
Less is always more, on every level.
The idolization of human teachers is a shame. We all know our own inner behaviors are often shockingly bad.
Teachers are no different although they do not often cop to their failures in specific ways.
The reminder “less is always more” is appreciated, that is so easily misplaced here in the land of confusion. I learned some facts regarding my mentors apparent life last week that undermined much of what I thought that I knew regarding him. Now I must regroup and know that the core teaching remains sound my own journey was not a pretty picture ether, the end result is much more real than the trials and tribulations that deliver us home. A lesson in love and what really matters is to stay true to ourself and love ourself and also love life as it has been given it remains what it is the great unknown something which we are not capable of or meant to totally comprehend, life is good no matter the twists and turns it all comes out in the wash.