A new definition of “work”

For anyone who actually enjoys most of their job, calling it “work” seems like a misnomer. Think about it. Other than when you are referring to your job, doesn’t it take on a negative meaning? “It was so much work.” “That’s a lotta work for one person.”

It’s been a loooong time since I thought that my job-work was a negative thing. Since it takes up so much of my life (I throw myself into it), I have always looked for job-work that has been fulfilling, meaningful. And it’s worked for me (hehe).

I read a Bible story the other day that gave me a new insight on what work can be. It’s the story in Luke about Jesus healing a woman who was crippled and twisted and bent over so much she couldn’t even look up. She had been like this for 18 years. Jesus saw her when he was teaching in a meeting-place and right then and there he laid his hands on her and healed her immediately, and she stood straight and tall.

Well, the head honcho of the religious group was furious, and told the whole congregation that Jesus had broken the commandment about keeping the Sabbath day (day 7 of the week) holy. “Six days have been defined as work days. Come on one of the six if you want to be healed, but not on the seventh, the Sabbath.”

Jesus responded, “Gimme a break!!!!” (or words to that effect). “Each one of you on the Sabbath unties your cow or your donkey and leads it to water. Why shouldn’t this woman be “untied” from her physical constraint on this day?”

Wow. I have read this story many, many times in all the years I have studied the Bible. This is the first time I realized that the religious leaders were equating what Jesus was doing as work (bad)! And Jesus was defining his “work” as his healing ministry. I mean, if it is work, it is HOLY work, no?

Jesus even equated the feeding and caring for the animals as holy work. Seems to me this indicates that any effort to care for one another, to love another, isn’t work (bad) at all, it is holy work (good).

Here’s a definition of holy work from the another chapter in Luke:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised…”

So every day we are helping our fellow man in some aspect of the above job description is our real work…our holy work. And it is blessed.

KOP…and keep shining

Keep On Praying. A friend of mine signed her email to me this way, KOP. I am really happy I can help her this way. She is in a very high-powered and highly stressful job right now and a lot of people depend on her personal involvement in most of their activities. Because she is really good at what she does. But seriously, how many pieces of one’s self can a person divide up each day?

So that is what I am praying about today. If you think there is only so much of you to go around to help people, you are already behind the eight-ball. The definition of who you are and what you can do is, from the get-go, limited.

But what happens if you think of yourself as a reflection of Spirit? The unlimited, infinitely resourceful divine Spirit? As a reflection, you don’t “do” anything on your own, you reflect. Can a mirror decide what it can and can’t reflect from the original image? No, it has to mirror exactly what the image is.

So it is with each of us as spiritual reflections of the One Spirit. All the abilities we need to do every day, all the capacity we must have, comes to us without diminishment from the unlimited Divine.

Years ago I remember reading an inspirational story about an oil lamp. The basis of the story is from the Bible, that of 10 virgins who were taking their oil lamps to meet their bridegroom. Half of the virgins had oil in their lamps and the other half did not (huh? why bring an empty lamp to a midnight fiesta?). So when the bridegroom calls everyone to the festivities, the oil-deprived virgins beg for oil from their oil-rich sisters. “Not enough for all of us…if we give some to you, none of us will make it to the party,” was the response.

Maybe this sounds harsh, but the inspirational story I read gave me some very helpful insight. What the bridegroom expected at the party was the LIGHT from the oil lamps. Without oil, there is no light. The party is a bust and nobody wins. The virgins with the oil understand this. Unfortunately, the other virgins did not and came very unprepared…they were literally in the dark.

When any of us does a good job or is a good friend, co-workers and friends want to be around us…they are attracted to our light of goodness. Who doesn’t want to be around people who make them feel good?

So the light is the effect of the oil source. What is the oil that each of us needs to maintain and secure? In my favorite spirituality book, Science and Health, “Oil” is defined this way:

“OIL. Consecration; charity; gentleness; prayer; heavenly inspiration.”

Ooooh, what light can shine from this oil! No wonder people are attracted to this light. Our responsibility is to continually replenish our “oil”. How? Looking to the Spirit as our Source of all goodness and love, loving our fellow beings regardless of how they act, living a life of grace. All these expressions, beginning with the acknowledgement of and devotion to the One Creator (who we reflect), add to our storage of oil. And with this unlimited source of oil, we can shine without fail.

When you think about oil this way, how could the 5 virgins even give oil to their sisters? Prayer, heavenly inspiration, love for fellow man, gentleness, consecration to good — these are individual expressions, unique to the person expressing them. So even if the virgins wanted to share their oil, they really couldn’t.

The oil is for each of us to increase. Our light is for each of us to share.

I am sharing my light with my good friend…and I know that she has infinite resources for her oil and nothing can diminish or divide up that supply. So she can KOS…Keep On Shining too!

I misplaced my temper

Gad, I lost my temper yesterday and today I am feeling badly about it. No big deal you might be thinking? Well, it is to me because I rarely lose it. I know exactly where it is most of the time: under control.

I reacted to an action a colleague took that seemed to me disrespectful and hurtful to other colleagues.  And I called this person on it in very harsh terms. The dressing-down of the colleague may have been warranted (well, at the time), but for me there is little comfort in that. Because I know better.

I should have handled it with grace…there is strength in grace, power to defeat all inequities without any inflammation. Grace corrects the problem without causing more waves. Grace could have been my effective “weapon” — but instead I sided with conventional anger.

Sigh. And just yesterday I wrote a heartfelt blog on Love. Yet another example of why spiritual author Mary Baker Eddy says, “The warfare with one’s self is grand.”

One of my spiritual mentors used to offer something to think about when you want to react. He said, “Ask yourself this: did God tell you that?”

You are supposed to ask this BEFORE you react! I forgot.

But today I am thinking it is not too late to ask God, What are you telling me now? Because now I am listening.”

First, I need to know that the harmony of God’s universe is established and permanent. And that nothing I do can disturb this fact. And it is a fact of life. Spiritual harmony is like gravity — you can’t see it, but the system of the earth’s operation depends on it. You know the saying, “What goes up must come down?” You can jump in the air but gravity ensures you land. Spiritual harmony is kinda like that…you try to push against it but its power is supreme and mandates alignment.

So, in the universe of Spirit, I can’t disturb the reality of harmony. Phew. That is good news. It’s a start.

But I need to correct my thinking about the situation…otherwise I will think I can push against natural harmony without impunity. That is not the point. This is my opportunity to make the effort to eliminate even the desire to react.

So I am thinking that in this world of Spirit’s harmony are only creations of good and love. That must include me….and the individual I yelled at. Neither one of us was created by the Master Creator to be disrespectful to others. We can’t abuse others or hurt others. We are created only to love our neighbors. (This is consistently stated in so many religions and spiritual paths that I really believe it to be a Truth of being.)

This is why grace is a natural reaction and anger is not. So where does the tendency to react come from? Sheesh, where do mathematical mistakes come from?? You can jump in the air for a moment but you will always land — and function — on the ground.

Anger in me, and my colleague, is not our natural state. Therefore, it has no control over us. The only control over all being is Spirit and its infinite expressions of good: grace, love, support, kindness, compassion, strength, etc.

Hah! I just realized that, in spiritual fact, I have no temper to lose!

Feeling better. I am very sure I will be given an opportunity to prove that I have learned yet another spiritual life lesson.

Think Love, not suicide

Oh, I just heard from a dear friend that the son of a mutual friend tried to commit suicide over the weekend. He is in the hospital in critical condition. And what I want to do right now is hug my friend and give her and her son all the love I am capable of giving.

How much love is that? When I think about where true love comes from, then it is really really a LOT. And it is a love that overwhelms and diminishes anything unlike it. Yeah, it is that powerful.

The love that I am so earnestly wanting to share right now is that which comes solely from God, and is expressed through His divine nature, Christ. This is the Christ-love, the Comforter as described in the Bible.

My friend Eva is a mother who loves her son Ricardo unconditionally. He has been through various trials, like any kid in their path to adulthood, and she has guided him and corrected him with the strength, courage and wisdom of true mother love.

Eva’s love is rooted and anchored in the Mother Love of the whole universe. This Love is ever-present and active, not distant, as she has been present and active in Ricardo’s life. In fact, in her family, Eva has expressed without hesitation, the Love that is inherent in her nature because it was given to her by the Divine. Her nature is an expression of the Divine’s nature, the Christ.

The same goes for Ricardo. Not only is he totally embraced by the divine nature, this is HIS nature too. This spiritual nature is all-powerful and cannot be overcome by any dark, negative thoughts.

Sometimes suicidal thoughts come from a belief of feeling unloved and rejected, a feeling of unworthiness. This feeling can be overcome by the opposite: a sense of being loved unconditionally and without limitation. Because we have been created to be loved. This is our value to the Supreme Being. We are the object of the Supreme’s Love. And this is our undiminished and incalculable worth.

This is how God loves each and everyone of us, no matter what we think we have done to separate ourselves from it. We can’t do it. Even an attempt to separate ourselves isn’t noticed by God. Because God’s love is a law: unbreakable, inseparable, fulfilled. God can only see what He has created, right? What else is there in His world?

This is a favorite reminder for me:

“…divine Love cannot be deprived of its manifestation, or object; that joy cannot be turned into sorrow, for sorrow is not the master of joy; that good can never produce evil; that matter can never produce mind nor life result in death. The perfect man — governed by God, his perfect Principle — is sinless and eternal.” (Science and Health 304:10)

Would or could Eva ever stop loving Ricardo? Not possible! Then how could God, who is the Supreme Being over all His creation, love any less?

What a comfort to know that whatever happens in our life, whatever we think we have done, even whatever punishment we think we “deserve”, it has no effect on the love God showers us with. This Love is the only influence that guides us, corrects us, uplifts us beyond the hurt and pain of negative mortal thinking. This Love is our life.

In fact, this Love is all we can feel and know, especially in times of darkness.

This is the Love I am expressing and hugging Eva and Ricardo with right at this moment.

Tribute to fallen firefighters

Yesterday my friend Kim said she felt an urgent need to pray as she passed by her local firehouse in Boston on her way to work. Not unusual for my friend because she strives to be in “prayer-mode” most of the time…but she hadn’t seen the news yet about the 9 Charleston (SC) firefighters who were killed fighting a fire. Something impelled her to be specific in her prayers right at that moment.

While not realizing it, Kim was joining with thousands of people who are praying for the firefighters, their families, co-workers and friends. To me, prayer is the only thing in times like this that makes me feel I am actually doing something to help, to comfort, to contribute. Even better is to know that I am adding my mental “voice” to a chorus of thousands who are reaching out to the Divine to feel that grace that serves to lift heavy hearts.

Can you think of any other daily job that requires you to put your life on the line every time you go to work? For First Responders this is the primary purpose: to rush into danger, when everyone else is running away. How do they do that? Think about the qualities required to perform their job: courage, fearlessness and, best of all, selflessness. To put another’s welfare above your own is the ultimate proof of selflessness.

These qualities are spiritual and show to me the firefighters’ deep and unbreakable relationship with the divine Spirit. This relationship was secure before the fire and most definitely secure now.

There is a story in the Bible about a man who also ran to meet danger when under attack. David was the only soldier in King Saul’s army who volunteered to fight Goliath, the leader of the Philistines. He said he could do it because of his unconditional trust that God would deliver him.

Not only did he run to meet Goliath ALONE, he did it without any of the standard armor of the day. Oh yeah, Saul put it on him but David said he hadn’t “proven” it — and he didn’t trust what he hadn’t proven. So David rushed to battle with a slingshot and his total trust in God. His spiritual armor of courage, fearlessness, selflessness and faith in God was enough.

I think of the Charlston firefighters as present-day Davids. They rushed forth with their spiritual armor on to fight the Goliath of fear, destruction and death. In my heart I know they were victorious, as they are as safe now as they always have been, their spiritual armor intact and protecting them right where they are.

So this is my prayer for the firefighters…thank you Father-Mother God for keeping them safe in your hands no matter what the material picture describes to all of us. Thank you for giving them the strength and trust to fight the battles on behalf of all of us, and thank you for loving them so much that is all they know and feel right at this moment.

Atmosphere of health, not allergies

A good and really long friend of mine emailed me the other day about helping his daughter find a new home in the dry, semi-arid climate of northern New Mexico. Evidently she is very sensitive to mold that grows in moist climates of the coast (where she now lives).

Oooh, when he described to me the mold that sets off his daughter’s reaction, my vivid imagination pictured the mold I have seen in two houses I lived in in the San Francisco Bay Area years ago due to extreme, and I mean EXTREME moisture. Ick. I had no physical reaction to mold but it was definitely not pleasant.

I replied right away that our climate was GREAT: really, really dry all year ’round. In fact, today’s humidity is 12%. By contrast, for instance, today in Santa Monica CA is fair, 72 degrees and 49% humidity.

So I was feeling good about his daughter’s move… and then I thought about the struggle with allergies I have had since moving here.

STOP! Thinking about the allergies finally stopped me from being fixated on the belief of germs floating in the air and attacking a person’s health. Because I have made significant progress in eliminating the effects of allergies in the past year through prayer alone. And I realized that what I have come to believe about God’s power to heal me of allergies can support my friend’s daughter too.

Last year, when I felt under constant attack for months, I finally got serious about turning to Spirit for help. Why did it take so long you ask? In all honesty I thought that the season of high pollen count would pass quickly and I would get over the allergies that way. Aaaaargh! New flowers, new trees, new grasses kept coming from spring through the summer. First lesson: the passage of time is NOT an effective cure for anything!

Finally, I got smart. While all my friends had recommended various drugs, potions and even acupuncture, I declined in favor of relying on spiritual means for help.

“If you decide that climate or atmosphere is unhealthy, it will be so to you. Your decisions will master you, whichever direction they take.” (Science and Health, 392:21)

Time to step up with a decision on the side of the atmosphere of good. This is the consciousness of God, which I understand to be the definition and life-force of the entire universe. All of God’s creation He created to be good, to be healthy, to be beneficial to every living being. How could He create a flower or tree or grass to release harmful pollens to any of His other creatures, like me?

God cannot create anything unlike Himself and living things have no power to create on their own, so where does an allergy or mold come from? This reasoning set me off on the right track to learn more about my true, harmonious and impenetrable being as a reflection of the one Creator. There couldn’t possibly be something harmful penetrating the atmosphere of His creating.

“The human mind acts more powerfully to offset the discords of matter and the ills of flesh, in proportion as it puts less weight into the material or fleshly scale and more weight into the spiritual scale.” (Science and Health, 155:21)

I love this because all I have to do is put more weight into the scale of spirit, the scale of true health as created by God. I don’t have to figure it ALL out, just believe a bit more in the reality of spirit than I do in the alleged reality of matter.

There were moments when I actually thought that my husband and I would have to move from Santa Fe, that this atmosphere was inhospitable to my health. But right on top of that thought came this one, that it wasn’t a physical change required, but a mental change in thought about where I truly live, and move and breath: in God’s pure, healthful environment. It is uncontaminated and totally life-giving.

The past several months have been so free of any effects, even with our very wet spring and bountiful flowers. And when the thousands of pinons released their yellow pollen in the air all I saw was the fresh green of new growth and re-birth.

Like the earth in spring, I have felt renewed and rejuvenated! OK, now I know how to support my friend’s daughter…I will embrace her in the atmosphere of good. This can only lead to practical solutions for her next home.