Ice Cream Sandwich

Have you ever had an ice cream sandwich? Two boring cookies with a yummy, luscious centre of ice cream. What am I saying? Who hasn’t had an ice cream sandwich? Well at least the cookies are chocolate. But they are usual soggy.
Kind of reminds me of life. You have the soggy bits. You may even have a lot of bits that are soggy in your life. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt to prove it!
Nonetheless, that is life isn’t it? Now have a look at the picture of the ice cream sandwich. What is the part that stands out for you? If you are like most people, your eye will be drawn to the dark brown soggy cookies. The white just seems to blend right in with the background.
Again, just like life. Sometimes you can’t see the forest for the trees. – very familiar saying. Sometimes it seems like we just go from crisis to crisis, bad to worse. But do we really? Is your life really all that bad? Are there not some yummy times of ice cream?
As I write I look back on these last three and a half years. Exactly three years ago I started to have warnings from my body (heart) that my life had to change. I have gone through a very painful separation and divorce (yes admit the pain; it’s best for healing – just don’t dwell there). I watched the person I loved and married after ten years suddenly, and I mean very suddenly, change into something I couldn’t recognize. I watched as addictions took over his life and subsequently mine until I made the sad choice to walk (on a metaphysical level my heart trouble was being caused by a broken heart as we romantics call it). I have been to the brink of ruin financially. I have not had or even wanted a relationship. I have seen my consulting go down to nothing. I have lost several friends for various reasons (or choices). I have watched my kids go through a very painful experience as they watched their beloved Grandmother die. I have had three addresses and will now be moving yet again! I have had to go to the government and ask for financial aid in the form of admitting to be disabled (rather slightly, but all the same). I have had to admit all of this to my friends and family.
I could take you down a longer and more winding road of memories (45 of 50 years). But why? I want ice cream!!!
Now what about that ice cream. Well over the same period I have experience the joy of having my business flourish before it crashed. I had the joy of starting to write this blog only this year. When I moved out on my own I found the most lovely place. I have affectionately called it my healing home. I have had the support of wonderful friends and family. I have watched my son fall in love with a wonderful young woman. I have bought a new car on the same day as my daughter, Sarah, did. I moved into friends’ house while they moved away and have had the absolute thrill of my life renovating and redecorating. That spoke to my creative abilities big time! I have made new and wonderful friends. I have started at a place of work that I love. I actually love my job for the first time in many, many years. I am still working with clients as a consultant. I am now studying to be certified as a Celebrant. I have had a steady, albeit very small, income through the months I needed to physically recover from the trauma of my divorce. I have been to Mexico! I have been on my first cruise from Mexico to Hawaii and then spent 3 days there with my son, Tim. As he said once, “that was a trip for the books”. And so, so, so much more.
So I have a choice here:

I can be dwelling on the unsettled life I’ve been living these last few years…
OR
I can be ever so grateful for the ice cream!

I choose…………………

……………Ice cream

MY TRUTH:I have learned that the secret to a joyful life is not to just endure the soggy bits, but to seek out and rejoice in the ice cream in between the soggy bits. It’s hard work sometimes; very hard work. But in the end it is truly what keeps me sane. It is truly what keeps me connected to myself and a benevolent Force that I believe is holding this all together. What about you???? I would really love to hear what you feel below.

Ice Cream Sandwich

Feeling Stressed?

I’m not sure about you, but my most stressful moments seem to come at nighttime. You know the time. It’s 2 am or later and the mind starts to chatter like a chimpanzee! I really, truly, honestly, dislike that chatter.

Sometimes I can quiet my mind with meditation. Sometimes I can distract my mind with a show or book. Sometimes I can distract my mind through physical activity. The there are those moments when I use all my weapons in the arsenal and I just keep hearing the chatter.

It is in these moments that I choose something we forget is so easy to do Listen to what my mind is saying. Stress is all about the Possible possibilities; the worst case scenarios. Sometimes it helps to listen to the stressed mind, acknowledge it, thank it for trying to protect us and then let it go.

I have learned in recent months that ritual helps too. I write out the stressful stuff and then I burn it uttering a prayer like this:

I surrender this non-beneficial energy to the Universe.

I release it with LOVE and FORGIVENESS.

I entrust (myself, this situation) into the hands of (God, spirit, etc…)

Then as it burns I light a tea light and walk away. What does all this ritual represent? Whatever you need it to represent. I find it works for me. Find what works for you.

Feeling Stressed?

Steve Jobs Leaves Us With These Words

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd_ptbiPoXM&feature=youtu.be

 

Steve Jobs’ 2005 Standford Commencement Address

(with introduction by President John Hennessy)

Steve Jobs Leaves Us With These Words

Practice The Presence: Why?

Initially, when I was contemplating is excerpt for Practice The Presence and I came up with the title, my retort to the question was simply, Why not???

Isn’t that a great answer? A simple question? So why no?

• Because I don’t know how.


• Because I’m afraid to fail.


• Because I’m afraid what I’ll look like to others.


• Because I don’t have time.


• And the list goes on and on.

What’s your answer to why not? The list above is only a short list of the reasons I had, especially the first one on this list. But they are just excuses really. So before we consider any answers to the answer/question we really do have to go back to the first question: Why practice the presence?

Let me tell you why I practice the presence. I personally practice the presence because I want to see into me. I want to know me. In getting to know me I get to understand me. I get to really get why I do, why I feel, why I act the way I do.

So many seek enlightenment. So many want to see through their eyes the way that they think great ones like Buddha, Mohammed, Krishna, Jesus and others saw things.

I did too at one time. But I have come to know that what they saw was not the evil in others; the corruption in a world gone wrong. What they saw was themselves. They saw and knew how short that they fall short of what we seek as perfection. What they came to see was that for change to occur it had to happen to begin with themselves. It has to begin with me!

So why practice the presence? – Why not! This is no longer posed as a a question to a question. It’s a statement! If practicing the presence causes me to look inside and to transform myself, that will give me a new world view. And by practicing the presence my new world view will cause me to feel differently, then it will also cause me to act differently. And if I act differently that may cause others to inquire as to why they see someone who is different. And it is my hope that this will cause them to seek this enlightenment, to shine a LIGHT INTO THEIR OWN SOUL.

MY TRUTH: To practice the presence may seem selfish. It may seem to be a challenge. It may even seem impossible. But for me to not practice the presence means that I will miss out on something so wonderful, me..the real me…and the real you, because it affects how I see you.

Practice The Presence: Why?

Advent: CHRISTMAS EVE

On the eve of our Christmas celebration, many people are doing the last-minute rushing around, wrapping prezzies and having their Christmas Eve socials. Me, I’m sitting here, at home, typing this last entry in the Christmas Advent blog for 2013.

I used to love doing the social circuit at Christmas time. I had spent many years part of an organization that had Christmas pretty much ruined because it was the biggest fundraising drive of the year during this wonderful season. I would drag myself out of bed on Christmas morning after wrapping the children’s presents for hours into the night after they’d all gone to bed. I would actually be glad that it was over.

Now, I actually have a bit of a grieving process every year. I LOVE Christmas. Not because of the presents and rushing around. I love the tone it brings to our world (aside from the commercialism). It brings about a happy tone, a joyful tone. And then after all the prezzies are opened and the push through to New Years is done, all the lights go out, the music stops and we seem to just automatically go back to the same old, same old.

Even before Christianity took over the Yule Tradition it was a time of celebration in many cultures. Families gathered and gifts were exchanged – certainly not X-Box’s, laptops and smartphones! It was a time for family. And that’s what I love about it. Each on of the readings over the last four weeks reminds to be people of HOPE and PEACE and JOY and LOVE. As part of the Advent Wreath the last candle represents LIGHT. It is called the CHRIST CANDLE, because the person, Jesus, came to bring light to a world that was filled with hypocrisy, unnecessary rules and a failed religion.

Many may be offended to know that Jesus did NOT come to establish a new religion. He came to fix his own religion. Strange, so did Buddha and many others who have come to show us enlightenment.

What is this enlightenment. Well look at the word for a second. It contains the word LIGHT. It is not a destination or achievement as some would have you think. It is a process. It is the process of shining the LIGHT into our own lives and seeing ourselves for who we really are. It is the process of looking at the path we are on to see if it is the most beneficial for ourselves and those around us. It begs the questions:

• Am I bringing HOPE to an otherwise hopeless world?


• Am I bringing PEACE to a violent society?


• Am I bringing JOY where there is sorrow?


• Am I the embodiment of LOVE to those who believe there is no love?

The truth for me is that I am and I am not. The truth for you may be different but probably not. Some days I don’t feel like I’m embodying any of these qualities, but I really am. Some days I am cranky. Some days I am just not ‘right’. Does that mean that I don’t embody the LIGHT. No, not really. It just means that the LIGHT looks a bit different on those days. In the Bible it says in Matthew 5, verse 16,

Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.

It’s true that some days I’m not all light and fluffy. But I can still exude that LIGHT from within. I can tell people that I’m not feeling up to par and that will give me integrity. And if on that day I offend someone I can go back and clean it up. That is who, even on the crummy days I can shine the LIGHT. But on those wonderfully joyous days when I feel full of HOPE, PEACH, JOY and LOVE I will choose to let my light shine before ALL men in such a way that they WILL see my good works…

Many blessings to you and yours at this time of year.
Thank you for following me here. I am honoured that you do.

James

 

Advent: CHRISTMAS EVE

Advent: CHRISTMAS EVE

On the eve of our Christmas celebration, <<<<<Jesus’ birthday>>>>>>, we light all of the candles of the Advent wreath. First we light the candle for HOPE because <<<Jesus is our hope>>>>>(Recap my own readings). Second, we light the candle for PEACE because Jesus is our hope and peace. Third, we light the candle for JOY because Jesus brings joy. Fourth, we light the candle for LOVE because Jesus is love. Finally we light the center candle. This is the CHRIST candle. Jesus is born. Jesus has come. Jesus is our salvation.

 

Advent: CHRISTMAS EVE

Advent: Week 4 - LOVE

Welcome to the fourth week of Advent. We have already lit the candles of HOPE, PEACE and JOY. Today we light the fourth candle of Advent, LOVE.

I don’t know about you, but I think the word LOVE has been over used and under valued! Just my opinion. Just sayin’.

• In the 1960′s it was all about making love not war. 
• In the 1970′s it was all about free love. 
• In the 1980′s and 1990′s it was about be careful who you love or you could catch your death!
• And so on and so forth. 

We banter this word around like a baseball at a little league practice. LOVE has become a by word that is equated with sex. “If you love me you’ll have sex with me.” How quickly love dissipates when the special moment passes or there’s an oops as the result.

This is not LOVE. As we light this fourth candle in the Advent Wreath we are called to real LOVE. Not the kind that fades like the froth on the root beer as it warms. It is the LOVE of I Corinthians 13.

LOVE is patient, LOVE is kind. 
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 
It does not dishonour others, it is not self-seeking, 
it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 
LOVE does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Then my favourite verse…

LOVE never fails.

This LOVE is NOT about being in LOVE. It is that LOVE that, no matter what, no matter where, no matter who, IT IS LOVE. It NEVER, EVER fails.

One of my favourite teachings I gave in my years as a minister was from Mark 12:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart 
and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength…
Love your neighbour as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.

I used to turn the verses inside out or turn them upside down and say it thus:

When you have learned to LOVE yourself,
you can truly LOVE your neighbour
(including those who are not quite so neighbourly).
When you have learned to LOVE yourself and your neighbour,
then you can LOVE God with all your heart, soul, mind & strength.

How can we say we LOVE something or someone when we haven’t had the experience of self LOVE? That’s the issue isn’t it?

If I could learn to LOVE myself then the rest is much easier. The rest will all just fall into place. Because if I truly LOVE myself, I will automatically love everyone and everything else. This is the LOVE that we are called to today and always.

Please join me for my final installment of the Advent series, 
Christmas Eve, December 24th at 5 p.m. (PST).

Advent: Week 4 - LOVE