The portals of heaven

Fred sitting on the window sill

One thing that I need to be always aware of, is the tendency to look for what is wrong. I find myself petting the cats, and using it as an opportunity to check them for ticks, see if their ears are clean, and scan their furry little bodies for signs of trouble. This is just a bad habit, but wow is it a big one for me. I’ve justified it by saying, “I might as well do two things at once.” But it isn’t true. Petting, appreciating and lovingly gazing at the animals (or at human beings for that matter) is a very different energetic activity from looking for what is defective, inadequate, insufficient, potential trouble, or disease.

My mother was a nurse, and I can remember her doing this with us; always pointing out a pimple, uncombed hair or some other untidy little “defect” that she picked up…..and she looked at herself with the same critical eyes. I wish I could say that I didn’t do this with my sons, but that wouldn’t be true. I didn’t become aware of this trait until they were grown and gone.

So I am working on changing this today. Today, I choose to look for what is right, perfect and lovely, both in myself and in all other beings.

“There is no physician like cheerful thought for dissipating the ills of the body….To live continually in thoughts of ill will, cynicism , suspicion, and envy is to be confined in a self-made prison hole. But to think well of all, to be cheerful with all, to patiently learn to find the good in all, such  thoughts are the very portals of heaven; and to dwell day by day in thoughts of peace toward every creature will bring abounding peace to the possessor.” James Allen (from As A Man Thinketh, 1903)

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Sowing generous thoughts

“Westward Window”, (Mixed media, digital photography, thread) artwork by Kim Gifford http://www.pugsandpics.com          I bought this “photograph” at the Pig Barn Gallery show over the weekend, and now this wonderful little girl (and friends) are keeping an eye on me from above my desk!

I woke up the other night thinking about giving. Most of us are familiar with the idea of “Give and it will be given back to you…” and yet if we feel that we don’t have “it” (whatever that may be) then how do we give it? But giving starts in our minds. What about our thoughts? Do I give generous, big, kind, loving thoughts to the people around me? To my family? To my friends? To my associates?

A man I know had been trying to sell his camp on a local river for a long time. After a couple of years, every time I rode by his place, and saw his for sale sign, I would think, “He’s never going to sell that. The price is too high, it’s not in a good location….” A month or so ago, I finally caught myself with another thought which was, “That was not generous thinking Mary”, and I started saying, “I know that someone is going to want _______’s camp, and look forward to hearing that it sold.” As soon as I thought this, I felt so much better.

If I want a big, abundant, expansive life, I won’t get it by giving small, stingy thoughts about myself, or about any one else.  Beneath the surface of life, we really are all one. So it follows that just like I cannot think a poor, unhappy thought about someone without owning it first (after all, it is my thought so it will impact my life), I cannot think a wonderful, loving, generous thought about someone else without it positively changing me and my life as well.

P.S. a couple of days after I had the thought about the camp selling, Jack came home and said, “Guess whose place finally sold?!”

“You have to sow before you can reap. You have to give before you can get”. Robert Collier

(Robert Collier wrote a number of books in the 1920′s and 30′s on the creative power of thought and they are really wonderful)

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as we think of ourselves

Eleanor

A few years ago, I was starting a new venture in my life, and as I sat with a very close friend talking about it, feeling somewhat discouraged that it wasn’t right, she said, “It’s too small for you Mary.” She went on to tell me, what she thought some of my real talents and abilities were, and I listened to her. I didn’t brush off or dismiss her positive thoughts about me. So many of us have been conditioned to refuse “compliments”;  To see them as empty and valueless, to believe that we shouldn’t listen to them, and this is true about “empty praise”, but I think that the greater danger is in not taking another persons more expansive view of us, to heart.

I have had people say some very nice things about me and thought, “If they only knew me, or if they could see inside my head they wouldn’t think that.” which is really the internal chatter that goes on day and night telling us how sub-par we are, how inadequate. If someone says that I am kind, my mind will throw up examples galore of how I was impatient. There is a part of us that blocks these higher opinions of ourselves from “taking root”.

Our lives and our worlds change for the better when our conception of ourselves changes for the better, but if we won’t “let in” any new information; any new and better view of ourselves, we don’t change. The people in my life that have helped me the most are the ones who have had, and held, the highest and best thoughts about me.

How about making a decision to listen, and pause, and to really take in, the next compliment that you are given. Take a minute to consider it to be true.

“As A Man Thinketh,  FORWARD, by James Allen

THIS little volume (the result of meditation and experience) is not intended as an exhaustive treatise on the much-written-upon subject of the power of thought. It is suggestive rather than explanatory, its object being to stimulate men and women to the discovery and perception of the truth that—  “They themselves are makers of themselves”  by virtue of the thoughts, which they choose and encourage; that mind is the master-weaver, both of the inner garment of character and the outer garment of circumstance, and that, as they may have hitherto woven in ignorance and pain they may now weave in enlightenment and happiness”.

(this entire little book is available on-line as a free download)

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Heaven on Earth

my morning coffee spot and new wind chime

I went out yesterday evening to shut my cars windows before it rained. The sweet guy who mows our lawn had just left and as I walked around the back of my car I noticed that the rear window was shattered. A stone must have flown up from our driveway and hit it. I am sure that he didn’t notice it as he zipped around on his riding mower, with his protective headset on.

I felt stunned and thought, “I should do something, but I am not sure what that is!” It was 6 pm and too late to call for an appointment to get it fixed. I decided to cover it with a blue tarp and went back inside. I sat down to read and opened to the words, “Heaven on earth is happening simultaneously with the way our lives are showing up, right now in this moment. The trick is to be able to access this coexisting state, day in, day out, moment by moment, not just when in pleasant, ideal circumstances.”

I was going to take a picture of my car to post with this blog and then thought, “So many wonderful things happened yesterday, why would I choose the one thing that felt not great to capture forever and show to the world?”  We do this sometimes. We “showcase” our pain/drama/chaos because it makes captivating reading, telling. It also becomes a way of life, and leads to a very emotionally rough ride.

As I repeated to myself, “This is not a big deal, the solution will be perfect”, and kept saying these words to myself, my emotions calmed down too and I started to feel the way that I wanted to feel instead of letting my thoughts/feelings take me on a wild ride and leave me exhausted and depleted at the end (still with a broken windshield that had to be taken care of today). It has taken me many years to realize that I can choose how to think about anything.

I ordered the windchime, in the picture above, last week and it came yesterday too. It is really magnificent. Yesterday was a great day. Today is a great day.

“A particular train of thought persisted in, be it good or bad, cannot fail to produce its results on the character and circumstances. A man cannot directly choose his circumstances, but he can choose his thoughts, and so indirectly, yet surely, shape his circumstances”  James Allen  (1864-1912) from the book, As A Man Thinketh (a great little book by the way!)

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