I have been writing essays for so long now and yet I never run out of material. I put my entire life into each essay, for that is all I know. It has been a life that started out fortuitously and is ending quite lonely, having lost a daughter and husband. My son and I rattle around this old house and try to avoid quarreling or upsetting each other. The wounds are still raw somewhere down deep. They are made of love and so they deserve respect.

I took to the spiritual path because nothing else has interested me. I hope you know that the integrity of the reader keeps me going. If I remain unread, I remain misunderstood.

What we know about each other is that we have no idea what the path will demand of us; it is different and yet the same for all of us. Heaven and hell is what our lives are about and woe be unto him or her that does not know that.

We have to choose how we will live our lives and yet they are being lived for us. This causes us great consternation, truth be told. For no one knows on any given day whether or not we will rise to the occasion and love ourselves instead of the world.

There is a weariness of soul, for sure, and that is natural for someone on the inner way. I know how lost we all are and that the world is not where we belong. The world is an alien landscape without redemption. Only the individual can be redeemed.

And what is redemption but self-forgiveness? This may be the reason why we are living. The ego lives to survive in a world gone mad and self-forgiveness is not required of most of us. But if you are on the right path, it will be a matter of daily self-forgiveness.

Love yourself and everything will come right.

Vicki Woodyard