I woke up this morning with a sense that I must give and receive conscious love. In all of my years on this planet, I have never pared down the truth in this elementary way. It seems to be my new exercise, if you will.

It is said that Jesus died conscious; he was not living the mechanical life that most human beings are. So he realized that conscious suffering can be transmuted into conscious love. And so he did that for all mankind.

If we are led to a teaching or a lifetime of teachings, as I have been, we know that it is one “slip and fall” after another. Life is designed to teach us, not entertain us.

In these perilous days for Planet Earth, there is little to entertain us and much to teach us if we can manage to listen for a few minutes every day. Why so little time? Because we are all in a state of hypnotism made worse by the constant barrage of evil coming at us.

We are not meant to fight the evil but to give conscious love to it. I know, this surprises me, too. How can I give conscious love to Putin and his likes? It is the only thing of value that you can give to anyone at any time. And human beings know next to nothing about it. We give it lip service but lip service changes nothing.

Right now it is cold and gray outside and hours of emptiness lie ahead of me. Emptiness is my food and light is my drink. “Straight is the way and narrow is the gate and few there be that enter in.”

Whatever happens today is what is destined to happen, including this new sense that I must now give myself over to conscious love. This very giving is a receiving.

Vicki is living a mechanical life, but the Soul within her is coming to life one breath at a time.

If she gives herself over to conscious love, alchemy is guaranteed to happen. This guarantees test after test after test in which she will keep forgetting what can happen if she lets go.

Life is tailored to fit each individual. Even if the suit is loose, light is pouring in. Darkness will press against it, but it is the light which will prevail.

Give conscious love to yourself and in that way you will be giving it to others.

Vicki Woodyard

It is hard for us human beings to focus on our wrongness; we are used to projecting it onto others.

When we do admit that we are constantly hurting other human beings, the reward is a bit of silence. It is a deep relief to admit that we inflict wounds as well as receive them.

Forget what you learned in Sunday school; that is not nearly enough to come to terms with life. For this, one needs a fierce honesty about how we treat other people. Never mind how they treat us. There is no justification for harming others. Ironically, when we harm them, we are also harming ourselves. And when we forgive other, we are also forgiven.

This Friday finds me in a very peaceful state and for no good reason. I will go to the grocery with Rob soon and then the rest of the day is for resting.

Rest is vital to us and it has no real value in society, for society is about draining ourselves in order to please or appease others.

Rest, for me, is to feel gratitude for a calm that comes over me when I have nothing to do but be. Being has nothing to do with society, for society is a false measure of everything. So-called good people may be doing good out of fear and guilt, for we are all complex.

Please appreciate yourself today for knowing that the truth is ever at hand, but only to those who want it.

Vicki Woodyard

Some of you may wonder why my writing is all over the place these days. Sigh. It is probably a sign of fidgeting inwardly.

Every day I see that I am not as organized as I used to be. My solution is to donate books and doodads every time an organization calls me. It is one that is dedicated to people needing literally everything.

I am addicted to sticky pads and I still forget stuff. Comes with the territory of aging. I saw the chiropractor yesterday as my shoulder is being a bit troublesome. I hadn’t seen him since the beginning of the pandemic.

Life has never been easy for any of us; it has built-in roller coaster rides. I have stopped going to the amusement park, so my rides are inward ones.

How long can I live here? Should I put the house on the market? Is it okay to let everything go on just as it is?

I turn to the words of Jesus and find comfort. “Let not your heart be troubled; neither let it be afraid.” But life is troubling and we human beings are afraid.

I breathe into his words and feel a letting go within.

I am only human but always divine. Let that one sink in.

The divinity is living through us all if we but let it.

Do you have concerns about your life? If you don’t, you will at some point.

My little girl was pure in heart, yet she left us after turning seven.

My son and I are forever changed by the two cancers in our family.

Let is be. Let it be because we humans are learning how to let go and let God.

My hands are typing what my heart knows is true. Nothing can be changed but it can be accepted.

Grace is tending God’s sheep and grace is our insurance policy when everything and everyone has let us down.

Grace wins over fear every single time.

Vicki Woodyard

Love is the law in the higher kingdom; here on earth we have forgotten that! My life these days is simplicity itself. I have time to reflect on what my earth lessons have been and still are. They cannot be put into words because love is never about words.

So wordlessly I type these words (what a contradiction) and they unfold in a certain order. I do not know who is wanting to heal anymore as everyone should be desiring that.

Healing, for me, is about resting in the Void. “Rest in the Void; the Void takes care of its own.”

Words may arise but they do not stay in the Void for long.

The Void, or silence, is a knowing substance, as is the Soul.

We know better than to think we understand the great mysteries in life. It is better than we stand in silent awe of them.

There is a grayness to January that bids me reflect on how I carry that grayness inside of me. It is a heaviness that happens after the holidays. No more tinsel or sugary treats, so now we feel fat and lazy with a touch of depression.

I retreat into the Void of my own nature; I know it well.

Breathing, I am it. Silently I am it.

I know that the year will bring its share of woe and darkness. May we know this consciously and understand that “My kingdom is not of this world.” So in our soul we rise above the world as many times as it takes to re-enter the Void.

Vicki is never able to balance all of the teachings in her head so she retreats into the silent heart.

The silent heart sinks deep and then rises free and clear of guilt and condemnation.

The Void is my home, as is my heart. Words are just window dressing.

Vicki Woodyard

T

Vernon Howard was my destined teacher. He has been gone for a few decades now and his imprint remains on my soul.

He taught the difference between the False Self and the True Self. As a teaching method, he yelled at us to wake up.

I still have trouble waking up and I know that you do, too. In spite of repeated advice, we choose ego over soul again and again.

He used shocks to get our attention.

You see, our attention is on things that we want and impressions that we want to make on other sleeping people.

Sleeping people have nothing to give each other but an endorsement that leads nowhere.

In the middle of nowhere is where we find ourselves as long as we prefer sleep to awakening.

All we hear are echoes and no change is possible in the Canyon of Echoes.

He used to say, “When the pain gets too bad, come back.” And he knew we were all in pain.

I do everything in pain,, as do you. It is the pain of being apart from God.

Seeing this pain is essential, for it presents itself to us again and again. It comes disguised as pretense and use of “the showcase personality” to make people like us. They are doing the same things!

So it is a good idea to sit in silence and watch your thoughts, which are always born from a state of sleep.

The watcher is who you truly are. The True Self is the Watcher on the Hill.

Vicki Woodyard

The writing that I do arises in the moment of my fingers hitting the keys. I never have an idea what the essay will be about. I just let myself begin with a few words and from there an essay is born.

Today’s essay is about near-death experiences. I have never had one, but the reports of them seem real to me. Oddly enough, we are all leading near-death lives. What I mean by that is that once we are born, we begin to die.

Death has disfigured my life twice and the only comfort I had was writing. I knew it was my forte and I used to think I could make progress as a writer. I was wrong about that. I was not destined to be known; I much preferred living in an unknown simplicity.

I almost died once from a hemorrhaging uterus; in the hospital a nurse came and sat by my bedside when I told her I feared going to sleep because I might die. I underwent a hysterectomy and had several units of blood before I was stable.

The nurse told me that she had a sense that someone was going to be needing her so she was working an extra shift in order to sit by me and make sure I didn’t get worse. After I returned home I caught the flu and I spent a month recuperating from that.

Now my life is simple and I often feel a sense of shame that I have made nothing of my life except these writings.

I don’t mind the isolation that my soul has chosen, but I often forget that it was a soul choice. Several people have seen a large angel with me but I have no awareness of it. A dear friend told me that I had chosen not to be in touch with the other side.

The writing arises from all of the knowledge that I ingested from reading hundreds of books on the subject of spirituality. I have no special skills connected with the other side.

Vicki is not much to brag about; she has been an underachiever out of her need to self-isolate.

On the other hand, she is able to let go of her inadequacy in order to type another essay. No essay is anything but words forming under my fingers. I know when an essay is finished and this one is open-ended for some reason. I breathe into the light and let myself know peace and I am still.

Vicki Woodyard

My energy level is low and all I can do is to know that. January is a tough month for many people. Christmas bills are coming due and the weather is full of floods and tropical-like temperatures. Are we coming or going? The future of Earth may be in peril.

I look at my life on this January morning. My shoulder is giving me problems and I probably need physical therapy. Psychologically I feel winter’s dull and gloomy passage. It is not time for springtime optimism yet. We have to pay the price of being in debt and in support of a war that puts freedom in peril.

The remedy for me is simple; I automatically cut down on my energy expenditures. I begin to do simple exercises aimed at range of motion of my shoulder. It has frozen twice in the past and the P.T. for it is painful; I want to avoid that if I can.

The first three paragraphs disclose my state of mind. Now I turn to my spiritual state of being. I begin by entering the silence. I just sit for five minutes or so. I notice my breathing in order to slow it down. I take some deep breaths, letting my body know that I love it and now it is in pain.

My spirit is in no danger of being broken; it leads the way to inner healing moment by moment by moment. I rest in the silence. I breathe into healing.

A few simple words of Jesus come to mind:

“I will never leave thee or forsake thee.”

“Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”

“Straight is the way and narrow is the gate and few there be that enter in.”

I need to enter through the narrow gate of silent surrender where I drop all of my burdens.

The silence changes me, if but momentarily. I breathe it in and out. I let it soothe me.

Nothing more is required of me. I need not keep suffering from my ego. And suffering from the ego is mechanical, whereas suffering from awareness guarantees its end.

We forget the power of conscious suffering; it is the last thing we think of to do.

I rest my head on the shoulder of the teachings and let them do their work. This is the Alpha and the Omega of the broken heart.

Vicki Woodyard

I have gone through enormous suffering and I still suffer.

You, too, have your suffering to contend with. But resist the temptation to argue.

Argument is a tool of mechanical forces. Lose and you win.

Breathing consciously is an act of self-mercy. It heals the wounded soul.

Let it be.

Suffering ceases when you rise above the opposites.

The opposites control this planet. When you begin to be for one side or another, you are embracing energy loss and you can feel it as a tightening of the body.

Jesus continually reminded his disciples that his kingdom was not here.

He rose from the dead; that is, he rose from the power of the opposites.

We, too, can rise from life lived on the mechanical level.

In that moment we are free of sin and death. We will fall again and again and yet we still have the chance of rising above the mind.

Let it be.

Vicki Woodyard

My writing is the only contribution I make to life. Yep. I have looked and looked and I can’t find anything else.

Sometimes I write sad; at other times I write funny. Words are my metier (I have never used that word before.)

I don’t let Vicki know what words she is typing; otherwise it would be self-aggrandizing.

This January morning Vicki is feeling both penitent over eating too much sugar and craving more sugar! Go figure.

She sees cobwebs all over the place. She has a vaulted ceiling, so many of them will never be removed. January is not the month to deep clean anything.

There was a time when she had no sense of style and shopped with someone who did have one. After her husband died, she began going to what she called “the bazaar,” by which she meant T. J. Max and Marshall’s. (Her Mac program will not allow her to put the next “x” in T. J. Max, so you must bear with her.)

She is of a certain age, which she shouldn’t be telling. Her body is old enough that finally she can say No to most social invitations. Let’s face it; she doesn’t get any and she doesn’t want any. Pounding out these essays is her raison d’etre (You didn’t think I was smart enough to use that word, didn’t you?

She has neurological problems that will get worse in time. So far so good. We’ll see what eventually keeps her from her “job” of writing essays.

Mostly, this confession is about inadequacy, isn’t it? That the person writing this is rather useless. Well, aren’t we all? The whole point of awakening is to see that there is no one there to awaken.

What I write next depends on what I wrote earlier; otherwise you wouldn’t still be reading. Don’t you have anything better to do? I didn’t think so.

To reward you for reading to the bottom of this essay, I am giving away something more precious than gold. What is it?

I don’t know, either; but don’t tell Vicki. She thinks she is doling out the truth when in fact, she is only killing time until she can have another cookie.

Vicki Woodyard

“There is a secret place. A radiant sanctuary. As real as your own kitchen. More real than that. Constructed of the purest elements. Overflowing with the ten thousand beautiful things. Worlds within worlds. Forest, rivers. Velvet coverlets thrown over featherbeds, fountains bubbling beneath a canopy of stars. Bountiful forests, universal libraries. A wine cellar offering an intoxication so sweet you will never be sober again. A clarity so complete you will never again forget.” ~ St. Teresa of Avila

There is a secret place inside of me that is realer than the sorrows of this world. What a powerful thought.

St. Teresa describes this place in detail, but few there be that find it.

I look within myself and see that I don’t understand her descriptions yet I feel their truth and it is calming.

How can I remember what needs to be remembered? That is the ultimate question that I have. In forgetting, I become hostage to the hostile world of men.

I look at who is generating the political news. I look at who and what I am reacting to. And how I am emotionally charged by what I discover.

I am letting the news of the world enter my sacred space, my secret place that St. Teresa describes and that I feel the truth of what she said centuries ago. She didn’t live in the political landscape of today.

Where I live is not as important as what influences me. If I let negativity influence me, I become negative and pass that energy on to everyone I meet.

However, and this is a big however, the truth must be told. We cannot throw a blanket of roses on top of it. No, we should see clearly what is wrong.

This clarity enables us to function in the world of men, clearly seeing right from wrong. But we must also look within to see where we are enjoying the negativity that today’s world generates.

Ultimately I look to the words of the Master. “Let not your heart be troubled. Neither let it be afraid.” A mantra worth imbibing like a fine glass of wine.

Drink the body and blood of the teachings and then let us see what happens next.

Vicki Woodyard