sadeewhip

I came upstairs to dirty dishes and the kitchen in general disarray from last night’s meal with a guest. I got a little huffy that I was going to have to clean it up since my sweetie had gone to work early today. Not super huffy, I just noticed a little “hrmph” about it.

So I made some tea and sat down to the pile of books I’m reading. I decided to open up the Christian bible. I opened it to Proverbs, in the Old Testament. Wow. Proverbs has some amazing stuff in it.

Here is what I looked at:

As water reflects the face, so one’s life reflects the heart. Proverbs 27.19

So many thoughts rushed in at once. First I was mortified that my life - me getting up in the morning and seeing the dishes and “hrumph”ing - reflects that my heart has pettiness in it.

Then I began to reflect on all these notions of “you create what you think” and “thoughts create reality” kinds of things. And I thought of the many people who work very hard at manifesting their thoughts who don’t have the kind of success they want. Or have to work really, really hard for the success they do experience.

This verse doesn’t say: As water reflects the face so one’s life reflects the mind. It says “the heart.”

My ego isn’t really all that keen on me living from heart. Take this morning kitchen incident fro example. My heart says to joyfully clean the kitchen - that the mess is the result of a lovely evening with a friend and the abundance of our lives and the beautiful home we live in. Cleaning it without complaint is an act of love and acknowledgement to my boyfriend. It is also an act of love and acknowledgement of my own blessings.

My ego says “Oh, sure, leave the mess for me. It was your friend who came over. What am I, a servant? You shouldn’t treat me like this…blah blah blah.” I mean, really ridiculous stuff.

If I were focused on my mind I would have to do a lot of thinking and wrestling to get my mind to not have such thoughts. I would have to put effort into figuring out what thoughts I need to manifest a different scenario in the future. Because right now what I have is dirty dishes and a messy kitchen.

But by living from my heart and letting my heart lead, I notice what my little petty self is like and it hurts me because I do not want my life to reflect pettiness. I want my life to reflect love. So I tap into my heart for guidance and it appears the thing to do is to clean the kitchen mindful of my blessings and to see those blessings evidenced in the empty, food stained dishes and dirty pans and messy countertops.

All of a sudden the kitchen looks beautiful. Truly.  And now all I can see is the beauty of the kitchen. It’s practically shining. A big love glow is coming out of it. It reeks of blessings. There is nothing to change, in me or anyone else. I don’t have to think different or go get therapy or life coaching, I simply need to let my heart run the show.

When I was in Nepal on a Buddhist mediation retreat I learned of the notion of Buddha Consciousness. Buddha Consciousness is the concept that there is already a fully realized, perfect self in the center of each of us. There is no evolution or growth required. We are already fully enlightened. And every one of us has it - no one is more special or better than anyone else. We are all equally endowed with this Buddha Consciousness.

And I think that is what love is. I think we all have love alive and well inside of us. That we all know how to love perfectly and wholly. That all we need to do is turn our attention to it and let it run the show.

How much love are you hiding? How much love do you hold back and refuse to let out every day? Maybe instead of all the therapy and seminars and books and working on ourselves we simply stop holding back the love?

I know that it embarrasses me to love sometimes. I have so much of it, like you do, and I think “oh, I can’t possibly love that person right now, they’ll think I’m crazy!” Or “I will look weak if I let the love out.” For you parents it might be “I can’t do what my heart tells me right now because they need to learn a lesson.”

Loving is a very humbling thing that the ego and the mind are not all that happy about. I think working too much with the mind is a huge distraction. I think working too much with one’s psychology and “issues” is also a huge distraction. You don’t have to fix yourself before you can love. Love now and your life will reflect love. Isn’t that what drives us to “fixing” ourselves anyway? We simply want love to be more alive in our lives. If that’s true for you then today’s glob brings good news: you can have a life of love right now! (Now go put the money I just saved you on books and coaching to good use - feed the hungry or buy blankets for someone who is cold or get some school supplies to little kids or diapers for babies in a shelter)