Voice for the Minority
If someone informed you today that the number of days, weeks, or months you have left to experience life on this planet and in this physical form are suddenly limited, reduced to a period of time which is significantly less than what you had previously contemplated, how would that change the way you live?
I met a man today who is living in that stark reality, a kind, kind person whose physicians have given him a prognosis of one year until his physical body will slowly and finally shut down and become unable to sustain life in the way he knows it. And until that final and ultimate transition, he will painfully struggle for each and every agonizing breath he takes in every moment of his days, battling against a disease that is methodically paralyzing his lungs and robbing him of even the smallest and simplest of his day-to-day joys, like walking and talking and laughing.
Boy, if there was ever a time to become clear about what matters and what doesn’t matter, I imagine facing your own imminent transition out of physicality would be it. I also imagine that all the things that may have once seemed meaningful — a bigger house or a fancy sports car or plenty of money in the bank — would suddenly fall into the shadows of “stuff that’s not important” when your thoughts and energies are consumed with your next breath, and your next breath, and your next breath, and your next breath.
If I was not paying attention today, I could have easily missed the opportunity to answer some really big and very important questions. I might have confused my reason for being in that room as having to do with my job, believing that I was simply there to do what I was being paid to do. I might have preoccupied my mind with my unfinished “to do” list, thinking about my almost-empty refrigerator and the long overdue grocery trip or that load of clothes in the washer (for the second time) or whether or not I remembered to tape my favorite television program.
But I was paying attention, the result of which led to the first fundamental question I posed to myself: Why am I here?
I knew the answer to this powerful four-word question was really big and really important as it would chart the course for not only our time in this perhaps fleeting relationship, but long after and in large and unseen ways. It would lay the foundation for not only my own experience, but it would significantly impact the experience of all those in the room. And as I stepped into the clarity of which aspect of Divinity my Soul yearned to experience, I could hear more vividly, I understood more deeply, and I felt more perceptibly.
My question also caused me to understand that this terminally ill man, whether intentionally or not, was in the room to serve as a reminder to me, and all those who are now reading this, to live into our own highest visions and ideas about who we are all the time, in every moment, embracing every opportunity as a chance to live our best lives. If, as the book The Only Thing That Matters says, 98% of the people on this planet are spending 98% of their time on things that don’t matter, we might want to consider amending our “bucket lists,” which are most likely filled with all the things we want to “do” in our lifetime, to include the things we desire to BE in our lifetime — compassionate, fully present, kind, supportive, loving, understanding, patient, etc. — because these are the things that ultimately really do matter.
Why are YOU here?
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
Yes, it is almost here again, Valentine’s Day. The arrival of this “Day of Love” can produce a broad spectrum of experiences for those who are touched by it. For some it will glide in on the wings of new-found love and breathtaking romance. For others it will simply not arrive at all – or at least not in the way it is desired. Either way, has Valentine’s Day evolved into just another holiday which places the focus of what it is we all imagine ourselves to desire in a relationship firmly in the thoughts, choices, and actions of another? Will he buy me flowers? Maybe he will shower me with expensive jewelry or escort me to the finest restaurant in town? Perhaps she will have sex with me? Will I even be the recipient of a thoughtful card?
But what happens when the thoughts, choices, and actions of another on this particular day fall short of what we are hoping to experience? Is Valentine’s Day truly a day of love, a celebration of partnership, a reminder of our unity? Or rather, is it just another day of consumerism, the perfect setup for unrealistic expectations, and perhaps more divisive than cohesive when it comes to moving forward in our partnerships?
Are we so attached to the external shiny objects that are dangled in front of our senses on this day – the flowers, the candy, the jewelry, the food, the sex, the presents, the promises – that we lose sight and stray off of the path that will truly lead us to the experience of joy, happiness, and love in our relationships?
Don’t get me wrong. I am not a prude. And I love romance – hey, I am the “Romance & Relationship” columnist after all! But I have found myself on the receiving end of feeling disappointed on Valentine’s Day for not receiving a card or a gift and constructing some pretty harsh judgments around that, placing myself in a position of asking myself, “What is that about?” Especially when that particular person never let a moment go by where his love and presence were not wholly known and deeply felt in ways that transcended the potential of any material expression.
If God does not want or need anything from me, why do I place those expectations upon the person with whom I share my life’s journey? Could it be that somewhere along the line I was taught and then adopted the idea that love was measured in direct proportion to that which I was either giving or receiving? The more you give me, the more you love me? The more I receive, the more I am loved?
And if that is not the case, then how DO we express this thing called “love”?
How do we express that which is so profound and so complex and so seemingly “unexpressable” in our limited human capacity?
My life has demonstrated to me that the answer to that question is foundationed in first understanding and living each moment of your life in full awareness of the Agenda of your Soul, and understanding that the people with whom we share a relationship also have a Soul Agenda — whether they are aware of it or not.
But what does the Agenda of my Soul have to do with Valentine’s Day? Or my partnership? Or anything I do, for that matter?
It has everything to do with not only those things, but each and every choice I make and the entire purpose of my life. If I am clear on the Agenda of my Soul — or at least recognize that I have one — and when my partner, too, is living in alignment with his Soul’s Agenda, then our love, our companionship, our presence in each other’s life becomes an expression of that purpose and that intention, creating moment after moment of experiencing our communion with God and Unity with each other, reaching completion of that which we are here to experience…Over and Over and Over again…knowing ourselves as Soulmates and remembering who we really are.
I could be wrong. It could really about the chocolates and the lingerie and the sappy cards. I could measure the extent of my spouse’s love and commitment against the value of the gifts he may – or may not – give to me. I could hinge the purpose of our relationship upon a single day, in single a year, and what I “get” out of it.
But I don’t think so.
I sense that it is much, much larger than that. I may happen to receive a sweet card or some exotic flowers or perhaps go out for a romantic dinner on Valentine’s Day. Or I may not. Either way, I am very clear on one thing: my Soul will not yearn for more or less than the perfect experience of being exactly who I already know myself to be: LOVE.
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
How many times has the phrase “I just want to be happy” crept into your thoughts and tumbled out of your mouth? Perhaps someone close to you has uttered these six words in the midst of their own “unhappiness” on an occasion or two, looking to you for the solution?
But just what does “happy” look like?
What images does the word “happy” conjure up for you? Does it represent a state of being which so far life has kept from you like a callous game of keep-away? Does your mind paint a pleasant scene of someone other than you skipping gleefully down a flowery stone path, indulging in an ice cream cone, and humming a joyful tune? Is it in that perfect relationship that you envision and yearn to be a part of, the one that looks nothing like the relationships you are currently experiencing?
If you Google the word “happy,” the first image that pops up is a giant yellow smiley face. Is that what it means to be happy?
If not, what does it mean to be “happy”?
And why do so many people claim not to experience it on a regular basis, if at all?
Our spiritual leaders teach us that a happy life is a peaceful life, doing what brings us joy. Our parents tell us their only wish for us is that they want us to be happy. But if we don’t have any real concept of what “happiness” is, how will we even know if we ARE happy….or, for that matter, have any idea how to get there?
Maybe we are closer to a state of happiness than we actually think we are. Perhaps we are simply hung up somewhere in that space between what we think “happy” looks like and what happiness truly is.
We have become a fun-seeking, happiness-producing society: Take more vacations. Engage in a hobby. Go out for date night. Ladies’ night out. Men’s night out. Eat more. Drink more. Play more. Get more. Do more. Have more. But what would happen if we valued no moment in life as more “fun” than another? What if we perceived all of life as equally fun, equally meaningful, equally purposeful?
Maybe happiness isn’t found in that which we think we are not doing enough of or in that which we think we are not getting enough of. What if we considered the possibility that happiness is already there, always there, patiently waiting for recognition, quietly knowing its potential? Perhaps happy is found in the deep sense of knowing that no matter what is taking place in my life right now, no matter how chaotic or discombobulated or challenging it may seem, that everything is occurring to serve my highest good and the highest good of all. Could we accept the nonsensicalness of it all, at last experiencing the highest level of happiness, knowing that life does not have to be one continuous sweeping run of “fun” experiences unfolding before our very eyes?
Maybe happiness is experienced in loving exactly where you are…and not where you think you should be.
Maybe happiness is experienced in loving exactly what you have…and not in what you imagine yourself to lack.
Maybe happiness is experienced in loving exactly who you are…and not in who you think you are supposed to be.
I don’t believe that happiness is reserved for a select few, nor is it earned or doled out to those who most deserve it. It is experienced within our choice to BE it. It is felt in companion with sadness and confusion. It is known in the moments when life requires us to stretch the furthest and bend the most and love the deepest.
What does “happy” look like to you?
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
It was recently brought to my attention that my driver’s license had expired and that I had been driving around town “illegally” for over two weeks. This troubled me, of course, because I immediately thought for sure Murphy’s Law would pay me a visit and I would, for the first time in years and years, now ironically get stopped by the police for a moving violation or a broken taillight or, worse yet, maybe find myself involved in an automobile accident, my expired license only adding to my misfortune. Yes, I was frantically writing my own best-selling “what if” story.
But my mind was also busy imagining a situation that perhaps, at least more immediately, was even worse than that — the dreaded thought of having to make an early Monday morning visit to the Department of Motor Vehicles to renew my lapsed license. Oh, just the thought of waiting in those long lines, only to be served by overly tired, underpaid, and under-appreciated government employees who spend long dreary days in a gray office with no windows, determined to suck all of us into their miserable lair. Thought by thought, I was erecting giant walls of resistance around me.
So I came up with a plan. I would be the very first one in line! That way I will avoid those long painful lines and maybe find myself fortunate enough to be served by someone at the DMV who hadn’t yet been worn down and numbed by a full day of monotony. Yes! That is what decided to do. So I smugly arrived at the DMV at 7:45 a.m., knowing they opened at 8:30 a.m., and feeling confident that I would be the first to arrive.
Except I wasn’t. I was not the first person in line. I was the second person in line.
And this is when I met Bob.
Bob is an 82-year-old gentleman who, like me, came to the DMV office to renew his driver’s license. But it did not take long for me to experience the “real” reason Bob was there.
Bob was there for me.
This soft-spoken, kind man, with a smile that extended into his eyes, thought that the driver’s license office opened at 8:00, only to discover that he now had 45 minutes to wait outside on the unforgiving hard sidewalk, with nowhere to sit, nowhere to rest his frail legs. But what he did have is someone to talk to, to share his life with, to laugh with, to be present with, someone who understood the much, much larger reason for his “mistake” in thinking the DMV opened at 8:00 and someone who also now understood the underlying purpose in my premeditated “plan” to beat the crowd.
I was there for Bob.
In those precious 45 minutes, I learned from Bob that he said goodbye to his life-long companion just six short months ago. And he misses her dearly. I could feel his sadness and deep love for her. I knew that Bob was experiencing her presence just by having someone to share her memory with, that her essence was alive and very real in our interaction with each other, and I was honored and profoundly touched to be chosen as a surrogate with whom Bob could once again experience her love and grace.
I learned from Bob that he wobbles when he walks sometimes. But he says he does not think of or label this as “stumbling” or “wobbling.” Bob says he is dancing. And in our short time together, Bob danced a lot. I wonder if in some of these seemingly unsteady moments his soul is engaging in a breathtaking waltz with his beautiful wife?
I learned from Bob that even though he is no longer able to travel around the country in his motor home as he once did with his Beloved Other, there is a wonderful channel on his Dish network that shows beautiful scenery from around the world — majestic mountains, tranquil beaches, and colorful fields of flowers. And if you get up really early in the morning, at 4:00 a.m., as he does, you can watch that program and “feel like you are right there. ” And “if you are a believer,” as Bob offered to me, “they even scroll some scripture across the bottom,” to which he gently and thoughtfully added, “if you want that.”
I learned from Bob that even though his life partner has continued on in her soul’s journey, he still greets each new dawn with purpose and appreciation. While he oftentimes yearns for the physical presence of his wife, he understands that he still has soul work to do and a life to live and experience – and he has decided to show up in his own life with humor, kindness, and intention.
There was a point in my life, not too very long ago, when I would have missed entirely the enormous gift being presented within this relationship and within this experience. There may have even been a time where I would have avoided this wonderful elderly gentleman altogether by inconspicuously burying my face in my phone or casually dismissing him with a polite smile. Boy, am I thankful I am not living in that space anymore.
My encounter with Bob is a reminder that what I think is going on isn’t always what is going on. My well-laid plan to beat the crowd at the DMV and to make sure that I avoided an uncomfortable personal experience had nothing to do with what I originally imagined. Bob and I had a soul agreement long before our bodies arrived at that particular location at that particular time and in that particular way.
How would our lives change if we viewed every person with whom we interacted as an intentional and purposeful gift? Have our souls chosen the people who are in our lives and those that are held within our next choice? Or are we just randomly bumping into each other? It is easy to view our own biological families and chosen partners and our children and friends as gifts. But what about the passers-by? What about the person next to you in line at the grocery store? What about the “overly tired, underpaid, and under-appreciated government employees who spend long dreary days in a gray office with no windows”?
We sometimes realize after-the-fact that something big, something of importance, something Divine has just taken place. But when we come to this same realization “in the moment” we are actually experiencing it, we can see the opportunity we are being given to remember a little bit more about who we are and why we are here, and we become powerful creators and flow-throughs of God’s love.
At 8:30 on the nose, the doors to the DMV opened and I followed Bob into the building. We parted ways to go to our respective service windows, immense feelings of gratitude welling up inside me. When I arrived to meet the person who would be assisting me that morning, the person to whom I had projected unfavorable predictions upon, the individual whose mere existence I was a short while ago resisting, I was warmly greeted with a radiant smile and a cheery, “Good morning! How may I help you today?” – and I immediately knew another opportunity was presenting itself to me.
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com)
Joining the progressive movement of environmental stewards who are zealously embracing and actively stepping more fully into the concept of sustainable living, Jennifer and Jason Helvenston, Orlando, Florida, set an impressive goal of producing 75% of the food they consume on the property they own and live on. And what a bountiful and lush edible oasis they have cultivated with their own two hands, a 25×25 foot vegetable garden in their front yard, brimming with succulent tomatoes, mouthwatering leafy greens, and a wide variety of other colorful and nutrient-dense produce. Their garden has grown to be so plentiful and robust that they generously share it with neighbors and friends, educating passers-by with gardening techniques and sharing the gift of their wisdom and experience freely.
Sounds wonderful, right?
Not to everyone, unfortunately.
This health-boosting, life-sustaining, crafted-with-love patch of vegetation, affectionately named the “Patriot Garden” by the Helvenstons, is on the chopping block by the City of Orlando officials for not being in compliance with the City’s code. Fines of up to $500 a day will begin to accrue if the young couple does not uproot their garden and replace it with code-appropriate traditional grass.
But these forward-thinking, earth-friendly homeowners are not going down without a fight. “The greatest freedom you can give someone is the freedom to know they will not go hungry,” said Jason Helvenston. “Our Patriot Garden pays for all of its costs in healthy food and lifestyle while having the lowest possible carbon footprint. It supplies valuable food while being attractive. I really do not understand why there is even a discussion. They will take our house before they take our Patriot Garden.”
It is alarming to me that in a day and age where the natural resources on our planet are being pilfered, the food we consume is laden with chemicals and preservatives, and, perhaps most unimaginable of all, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of people in our world who die every day because they do not have a morsel of food to put in their mouth, that we would consider placing more importance on maintaining outdated zoning codes or landscape uniformity/conformity than we do to the welfare of our planet and the well-being of all our brothers and sisters.
We, as a society, are ignoring and destroying one of our most important relationships of all: Our relationship with Mother Earth.
At what point in time did it become more important to have a perfectly manicured lawn than to contribute to the vitality and sustainability of life as we know it? What levels of indifference and negligence and abuse will we allow ourselves to sink to before the results of which will ultimately cause us to agree at least on some basic level that we have got some real work to do and some significant changes to make, both individually and collectively, locally and globally, if we want to continue to rely on our planet to support and sustain us in the way we have come to expect it to?
With the legal muscle of the Institute for Justice Florida Chapter backing them, Jason and Jennifer Helvenston are launching “Plant a Seed, Change the Law,” a protest of Orlando’s law, which they say violates their constitutional right to peacefully use their property to grow their own food.
And they just may be putting a dent in some of the City’s antiquated laws as some Orlando planners have proposed changes to the code. Upon entering office several years ago, the city mayor himself, Buddy Dyer, launched Green Works Orlando with the goal of becoming one of most environmentally friendly cities in the country and established four community vegetable gardens around the city. But City officials admit the code has fallen behind the rebirth of urban gardening.
To see a photo of the Helvenston’s front-yard garden and to follow their Patriot Garden blog, click here. If you would like to support the Helvenstons and their ability to continue to grow their own food, you can sign their petition to the City of Orlando here on the Change.org website.
After all, this movement is not solely about supporting Jennifer and Jason’s rights to grow and consume their own produce; this is much, much bigger. We are at a critical juncture at this time on our earth where we all are faced with a choice, an opportunity to decide what is truly important, what truly matters. And as a natural outgrowth of that choice, if we desire to ensure that our world will continue to be an abundant and peaceful place for us and our children and their children and their children and their children to live and grow and thrive upon, we will do as the Helvenstons did – boldly declare that decision, stand up to the stagnant and rigid beliefs held within the pages of the Old Cultural Story, and “get our hands dirty” by beginning to co-create the kind of world that we all desire and the kind of world which God intended for us to have.
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team atwww.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com)
Isn’t it heartwarming and wonderful to watch very young children, two-, three-, four-year-olds, who express and demonstrate their love so spontaneously and unreservedly? It’s not unusual to hear the collective sound of a harmonious “awww” from observers on a playground witnessing two new young friends sharing in an impromptu hug or unforeseen kiss on the cheek. These children live in pure awareness. Their love is unfiltered, not yet programmed, authentic, allowing them to exemplify the level and kind of love we all yearn for but have somehow forgotten how to experience.
But why have we forgotten?
At some point in our childhood, we are exposed to and told to believe in a different kind of love. This different kind of love works swiftly to reprogram what we come here already knowing: that we already ARE love. This different kind of love then works tirelessly to convince us that if we “do this” or “be that” or “do things in a particular way,” we will finally earn and be rewarded the love of another. Haven’t we all, at some point or another in our lives, yearned to hear the words “I love you”?
But what do we really mean when we utter these three words to another with an underlying hope that we will, in turn, hear “I love you” back? To say nothing of the paralyzing fear that the possibility exists that we may not be the recipient of another’s confirmation of love. Would it be possible to be in a relationship where the knowing of one’s love was so palpable that the desire and need to hear this verbal affirmation would no longer present itself?
Somewhere along the way, in an attempt to capture the essence of love in a way that makes sense, we boxed it into our language, as we do many of life’s esoteric ideas and concepts, and formulated our own version of love. We have minimized, twisted, stretched, warped, contorted, and manipulated this small but powerful phrase — “I love you” — to the point that its meaning is almost spiritually unrecognizable. We hinge or hasten our expression of love upon some need-driven expectation of what we may or may not receive in return.
Imagine a world where we did not condition our love, or the expression of it, upon an assurance and acknowledgment that we will be loved back, a world where everyone demonstrates their love freely, openly, and unconditionally, where love was not bartered over or bargained for. I have, on more than one occasion, found myself asking the question: Are we even capable of experiencing unconditional love for a period of time beyond an occasional moment or two?
And the answer I receive is that if we fully awakened to who we really are – all of us – we would never place another condition upon our love. We would not need to prove love’s reciprocity because we would already know and feel its omnipresence. Fear and doubt would never cause us to hesitate in expressing our deepest gratitude and affection to anyone, as we would no longer buy into a perceived need to self-protect; but rather we would each place into the world our highest intentions and actions, giving freely from the source of our own abundance, understanding that the entire purpose of our being here in the first place has very little, if anything, to do with ourselves…and everything to do with all those with whom we share our path.
I once saw an interview with Tony Robbins, the well-known motivational speaker, where he was asked if he gets nervous before he walks out on a stage in front of thousands of people. His answer was (paraphrasing): “If I thought that going out on that stage had anything to do with me, I would be nervous, tongue-tied, struggling to find my words. But going out there has nothing to do with me. It is about those people in the audience. I am here for them.”
That, to me, is unconditional love, giving your gifts absent the necessity to receive anything particular in return, a choice and demonstration of your Highest Self which arises out of a deeper understanding of why you are here. Unconditional love asks, “Who am I in the room to heal? And how will I let them know I am here?”
Perhaps as our world continues to shed its Old Cultural Story, the one which carries with it a “different kind of love,” we will collectively begin to once again behold the world as our playground, just as we did when we were children, spontaneously and unreservedly declaring and expressing, returning to Love and a remembrance of Who We Really Are.
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com)
Day after day, week after week, month after month, and year after year, hundreds of thousands of people travel from all corners of the globe to the small southeastern European country of Croatia to communicate with a man named Braco, to engage in a unique “conversation,” if you will, that surpasses spoken words, an interaction which has demonstrated itself to be impervious to religious preferences, nationality, race, age, sexual orientation, gender, or any other brand of identifier we could place upon ourselves. These exchanges do not even discriminate against those who have little or no financial ability…as they are completely free to every single person who wants to attend.
Braco does not speak, he does not make physical contact with anyone, nor does he use any type of nonverbal suggestions.
He simply gazes silently into each and every person’s eyes.
For 5 to 7 minutes, in a room filled with people, the only form of communication taking place is a silent gaze into each other’s eyes, where participants can see themselves reflected back through Braco’s eyes, connecting to something greater than themselves. And while Braco does not claim to be a healer, but rather a flow-through of the positive and beautiful feelings and energy which we all carry within us, thousands profess to have experienced significant transformations in their life after a silent gazing event.
As with many nontraditional forward-thinking concepts, these gazing events have not gone without criticism by skeptics and nonbelievers. But why are thousands of people flocking to this man, yearning for this experience? My intention for writing about this phenomenon is not intended to be an advertisement for Braco, but rather he caused me to reflect upon and explore more deeply how we could apply this very same methodology in our own personal relationships right here, right now, without the need to embark on a pilgrimage to Croatia.
The way we choose to communicate in our relationships determines and changes the way we experience our relationships. We are pretty good at speaking our minds when we have something to say, but how good are we at using our bodies to communicate? If our body language is not in harmony with our words, is our message being conveyed the way we would like to believe it is? And when someone is communicating with us, are we “gazing” in their eyes? Are we leaning in to them? Are we being a “flow-through” for the energy exchange taking place…or are we resembling something more like a brick wall?
I am sure we can all come up with several instances where the loving glance of a parent reassured us or the pinched brow of a partner conveyed feelings of hurt, without the necessity of words. So often we drift out of the present moment, excitedly gathering our thoughts about what we want to say next, perched so closely on the edge of telling our story that we even go so far as to actually talk over the sacred expression of another. How can we receive if we do not create the space of silence for it to be placed within? How can we truly hear if we are striving so desperately to be heard?
In the most heartfelt and intimate of conversations with our loved ones, we are more apt to settle into a space of intention and commit to being fully present and open and available. But what prevents us from entering into that space with all of our relationships? Our co-workers, our parents, our neighbors, our children, each and every person we encounter each and every day?
Perhaps Braco is really on to something here. Hundreds of thousands of people from around the world seem to think so. Maybe we as a society are too busy talking, writing, thinking, intellectualizing, planning, analyzing, and strategizing. Perhaps it is in the stillness of our being and in the reflection of each other’s eyes that we hold the ability to understand each other on a level never before experienced.
And if we are willing to consider that possibility, could it then be possible that the answer to the question that would change life as we know it on our planet — “How is it possible that 6.9 billion people can all claim to want the same thing (peace, security, opportunity, prosperity, happiness and love) and be singularly unable to get it?” — could also be found not within our words, but rather within the sacred and silent gaze of our eyes?
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team at www.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
I was born on the last day of the year. So the annual transition of “out with the old and in with the new” feels especially pivotal to me as I reflect with gratitude upon what once was, I look forward with hope and anticipation for what is yet to come, and I explore more deeply the larger reason for my birth. And, yes, I do make some “New Year’s Resolutions”; however, they have nothing to do with resolving to fit into last year’s pair of blue jeans. And while more money flowing into my bank account rather than out of it would bring some much-needed financial relief, I will not be making that my top priority either. Nor will I be committing to get a better job or setting my sights on traveling around the world sampling exotic foods.
Part of the reason why I believe New Year’s Resolutions “fail” is because the purpose for which we enter into such agreements with ourselves has very little to do with the purpose of our lives. I am sharing a letter I wrote to my 18-year-old son, as it captures the essence of how I feel about the arrival of a new year. The gifts I have been given the opportunity to receive and give within the context of my relationship with my son have been some of the most profound and life-changing. And I believe deeply that by allowing the gifts to flow through me to you, they become a gift to us all.
“Dear James,
As night gently falls on 2012 and the promise of a new dawn in 2013 hangs in the air, billions of people around the world will be resolving and committing to make changes in their life, hoping to stick to long-lasting resolutions that will finally deliver to them the things in life we all desire most — abundance, prosperity, better health, joy, security, happiness, and love — believing that this time, this year, their well-intentioned efforts will resemble more than simply a “to do” list for the first week of January.
I wonder if you, too, feel that yearning, if you hear a beckoning to a higher calling, if you desire to make new choices with an eye on shaping and defining not just your experience for a particular year, but with an eye on shaping and defining the entire purpose of your life. Ah, the purpose of life — the question that has perplexed scholars and religious teachers around the world, the question which has led countries into war and tested and stretched the fabric of every relationship we enter into, the question that is most looked at in the final moments of our physical being here on earth:
What is the purpose of my life?
My Beloved Son, I am here to share with you the answer.
I will begin by sharing with you what the purpose of your life is not. As my good friend, Neale, has shared many, many times, the purpose of life has very little to do, if anything, with “getting the girl, getting the car, getting the job, getting the house, getting the spouse, getting the kids, getting the better job, getting the better house, getting the promotion, getting the grandkids, getting the gray hair, getting the office in the corner, getting the retirement watch, getting the illness, getting the burial plot, and getting the hell out.”
And so far, in the 46 years that I have been blessed to have on this earth, this has demonstrated itself to be true – life is not about any of those things. I’ve had most of the things on that list, and some of them more than once. And I am here to tell you that the purpose for my life was not realized or remembered by “getting” or “having” any one of them.
So if life really isn’t about any of those things, then what is it about?
This is what I know to be true:
The purpose of your life is to create the purpose of your life.
When you were a very young child, it mattered not to me whether you played baseball or joined Cub Scouts, whether you went swimming or read a book, or whether you ate pizza or spaghetti. And now, as a young man who is living on his own, it matters not to me which career you choose or what area of the world you reside in, what you have for dinner, how you enjoy your spare time, or what kind of clothes you wear.
Do not confuse “not mattering” with “not loving.” My love for you is without conditions. These choices would only matter to me if somehow the level of my love for you was attached to a particular outcome designed by me or hinged to a misguided idea that somehow you could fail in this Life game.
I want for you what you want for you.
And here is where it gets even better, James:
God wants for us what we want for us.
Society will tell you that in order to “earn” God’s love, you must be a certain way and do certain things. Have you questioned this for yourself? Have you wondered why a God who is “unconditionally loving” would place such conditions upon his love? Have you dared to imagine a different kind of God?
And if God wants for us what we want for us, and the purpose of our lives have nothing to do with what we have or what we get, what will the arrival of a new year mean to you? What will you strive for? What will you draw upon to ascribe meaning to the experiences in your life?
Your life is an opportunity. Within every occurrence, there is an opportunity for you. And within every relationship, you are an opportunity for someone else. Will you see those moments and embrace those gifts, both those that are being given to you and those you have to give? As the world collectively and consciously welcomes the New Year, perhaps the largest number of people purposefully and simultaneously placing positive energy and intention into the world, how could our world not become a better place? Where will you be in that process? And WHO will you be in that process?
What will you decide and what will you declare the purpose of your life to be, my beloved son?”
What will the arrival of a New Year mean to you, my friends? A new car? More money? Fitting in last year’s blue jeans? Or perhaps at last the answer to one of life’s biggest questions: What is the purpose of my life?
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team atwww.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
Pope Benedict XVI said, no, we are not in his annual Christmas message to the world, one of his most important speeches of the year, where he once again proclaimed that same-sex marriage is destroying “the essence of humanity.”
“People dispute the idea that they have a nature, given to them by their bodily identity, that serves as a defining element of the human being,” he said at the Vatican. “They deny their nature and decide that it is not something previously given to them, but that they make it for themselves.”
He further went on to say, “When freedom to be creative becomes the freedom to create oneself, then necessarily the Maker himself is denied and ultimately man too is stripped of his dignity as a creature of God.”
Could it be, as Pope Benedict suggests, that life truly is a shallow existence of “what you get is what you get”?
What would the Pope tell a child born a hermaphrodite, a condition in which someone is born with both female and male sex organs – a body given to him by God, by the way? Too bad? You deserve no one? Or perhaps the contrary: “Lucky you, you can have a relationship with whoever you want”?
And what about the Pope himself who has been “defined” by God as a male, given a penis, and yet chooses not to fall in line with that “identity” and chooses not to express romantic love to a female and chooses not to enter into intimate relationships? According to his own definition, is he not “denying” his own “nature” that God intended for him to share in intimacy with a woman and to reproduce? Is he not participating in his own freedom and creativity in an effort to self-define who he is and what he believes about why he is here?
Aren’t we ALL doing that very same thing?
Why are we being told to feel bound to our physicality when it comes to S-E-X, but celebrated when we demonstrate our capacity for greatness beyond our bodies in other ways?
My friend, Mark, whose body is partially paralyzed and riddled with unrelenting pain – again, the body given to him by God — climbed 108 floors of the Sears Tower in Chicago…and plans to do it again this year. I imagine it would be quite difficult to find anyone who would say Mark has “stripped himself of his dignity” by creating a new definition of himself that expanded far beyond his physicality.
But again, I get it. We are talking about the unspeakable, the shameful, the only-talked-about-in-a-whisper topic of S-E-X.
However, the Pope’s declaration of “Gay marriage, like abortion and euthanasia, is a threat to world peace” appears to be falling upon deaf ears as the Constitutional Court in largely Roman Catholic Spain upheld the law legalizing gay marriage last month, the British government announced it will introduce a bill next year legalizing gay marriage, and in France, President Francois Hollande has said he would enact his “Marriage for Everyone” plan within a year of taking office last May.
These are the visionaries, the writers of our New Cultural Story, the mold-shatterers and rule-breakers who do not believe in a God that makes mistakes. They are not buying into the twisted idea that God would create something so extraordinary and then make it wrong.
What these New Cultural Story global authors do believe in is Love. They do not believe same-sex marriage is destroying the essence of humanity, but rather that it IS the essence of humanity. They believe that love transcends everything and is denied to no one, that Love that has no rules and is certainly not reserved for only a select few to be experienced in a select way, and that the biggest continuing threat to world peace is not found, as Pope Benedict suggested, within the loving union of a same-sex partnership, but rather in a belief system that embraces and promotes a vengeful and judgmental God.
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team atwww.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
This year Christmas did not arrive for me wrapped up in pretty packages with shiny bows, I did not feel the essence of Christmas by getting that front-row parking space at the mall on the busiest shopping day of the year, and I did not experience Christmas by savoring all the extraordinary food and festivities that plentifully show up this time of year.
I experienced Christmas in the airport.
As we joyfully awaited the arrival of my son’s plane near the gate, I noticed the people gathered around: little children in their pajamas, parents poised with video cameras, families hugging, laughing, crying, some people sleeping on the floor, men with flowers, women with gifts, all anticipating the return of someone special.
The realization was palpable.
You could see Christmas.
You could hear Christmas.
You could smell Christmas.
You could FEEL Christmas.
But it had nothing to do with trinkets or doo-dads, shopping malls or Christmas sweaters, cookies or egg nog, churches or Santa Claus.
It had everything to do with our relationship with each other.
Christmas serves as a reminder of our presence in each other’s lives. And on this particular day, in the wee hours of the morning, I experienced the significance of being in that Holy Space, witnessing and feeling the significance of who we are to each other. And while I was especially tuned in to the long-awaited reunion with my beloved son, I became keenly aware of the larger picture, that this night was an opportunity to experience unity with all those gathered together; that what I became a part of was no coincidence, but rather an invitation to carry forward what I was experiencing beyond the walls of the international airport, out into the world, and into the lives of others.
And not only to carry this experience forward simply through Christmas Day, but to extend the appreciation of and gratitude for who we are in relation to each other in every moment of my life…even in the moments when we must physically part once again with a loved one. In two weeks, when I find myself at the international airport again, but this time to say goodbye, I will enter the space with those gathered around with intention and compassion, knowing that we are all in that Holy Space not only with each other, but for each other…and that we are ALL each other’s loved one.
And I will once again discover Christmas in the airport.
(Lisa McCormack is the Managing Editor & Administrator of The Global Conversation. She is also a member of the Spiritual Helper team atwww.ChangingChange.net, a website offering emotional and spiritual support. To connect with Lisa, please e-mail her at Lisa@TheGlobalConversation.com.)
