THE VEIL

I spent Friday night and Saturday in a spiritual retreat put on by Celebrating Life Ministries. Today I feel like there is a veil between me and the world. The masters speak of detachment and I have understood that idea in my head. And I believe this veil is my experience of being detached – in the world and not of it! The veil insulates me from the addictions of the world that can be addictions to both high and low places. Sometimes the spiritual path has been characterized as one of piercing the veils that stand between us and God. The unexpected thing that has happened as I pierced and went through a veil this weekend is the veil reconstituted behind me as a veil between me and the world. Never noticed that before.

 This is apparently what I went to Phoenix to receive. And I didn’t know I was going for this. It is said that God gives us what we need, not necessarily what we want. Certainly true for me this weekend. Sometimes the gift even comes wrapped with the appearance of something we don’t want. And this was my experience.

I have been in a relationship with a woman and believe that this is a relationship that is meant to be. Friday night she informed me that she believes she is meant to be with someone else. Of course, my first reaction was why, and why now? The Friday night session at the retreat had been powerful and I was on that high! This information sent me crashing down! Also it turns out this was just what I needed for my process at the retreat.

I went to the retreat Saturday morning with a heavy heart! The teaching that day and the night before was about releasing the world and centering in God. It became clear to me that my attachment to this relationship was what I was being called to release. I had put this woman on a pedestal and she had become the altar at which I was worshipping. And I knew this (actually I had known it for some time), and it felt good and I liked it a lot. Please God, don’t make me give that up! Anything but that!

My time on the spiritual path has taught me that the hardest lessons are the most valuable. I knew not to run from this one and that I needed to engage it, and engage I did. I asked God for help to release this addiction to this relationship as I knew I could not do it myself. And today I have that release. I am okay with or without the relationship. It is a preference still and not a need. And I got a bonus! It would seem that I am okay with or without any worldly thing. I seem to be more detached from the world than I have ever known myself to be. Hallelujah!!!! I have a new addiction – the veil which is a manifestation of the grace of God. The veil of the love of God which insulates me from worldly attachment which is the source of my pain. Thank you God for this great and unexpected gift!

THE PAIN OF DISCONNECTION

My PR person wants me to write about pain. Makes sense since the reason I began to expose myself to the world through this website and my writing is because I am a pain doctor and believe I have an important message to communicate about the pathways to releasing pain. What is obvious to me, and might not be so obvious to others, is that all of my writing in the inspiration section here has been about pain and pathways to releasing it. When I wrote about self image I was writing about something that drives chronic pain in many pain sufferers. The same with all of the other topics I have written about. They all point to the main dynamic that drives all pain – the dynamic of connection versus disconnection.

On self image for example, Dr. Sarno’s work is all about how one’s beliefs about themselves are the key driver in the presence or absence of pain in their body/life. When a person believes they have a "bad back" (herniated disc, etc.) because they have been told so by a medical professional, their back pain is often unrelenting. Then upon being diagnosed with TMS and being told they do not have a structural back problem ("bad back"), their pain can disappear with in days to weeks with a return of normal functioning and a normal life. A change in self image is clearly causing a change in body function. Self image then is a key determinant in health and wellness.

The key dynamic underlying all is one of connection versus disconnection. And this is what all of my writings have been about. When a child is born they are part of a whole with no distinction between what is them and what is not them. For an infant, the whole world is "me." Mommy and daddy are part of them from their all connected perspective. So are the floor and the furniture. For the infant all is one (me). Gradually over time that perspective shifts and the infant develops the concept of self and other. And here is where all the problems start. Spiritual teachers have said for eons that we are all one. So the infantile perspective may have been the correct one all along. The struggle in adult life as I attempt to regain a spiritual perspective is the struggle to again see all as one. And as I write, I highlight that struggle in it’s various different expressions.

In disconnection we are in pain. It may be physical pain expressing as a pain syndrome or other illness. Or emotional/spiritual pain expressing as mental unrest/illness. The answer then is to reconnect – to ourselves, to others, to nature and to God. And my writings are about the ways we can be disconnected and the ways to then reconnect, which are the pathways to releasing pain. So come with me on this healing journey if you will!

GOD

Well, there’s a big topic and quite appropriate for a Sunday morning as I finish my Sunday morning walk. My first 1.5 mile walk as I continue to reclaim my youthful vitality as if I continue to stare death in the eye. And that is another topic entirely. And that walk is certainly a testament to some power greater than little old me who only one month ago was basically a couch potato. So for those of you mired in the quicksand of anything in your world you do not like, know that your turn around is only a moment away!!!

So back to God – the most confusing and hotly debated topic on the planet. I was in a workshop yesterday with Swedish mystic Anette Carlström. She told us that there are only two things we have to remember! And as she further stated, that makes it kind of simple. Most of us can easily remember two things. Well, things just got a lot easier where my/our pursuit of God is concerned!

First, we need to connect with God. Fortunately, this is pretty easy also as it turns out. Scriptures tell us that if we take one step toward God then God takes a hundred or a thousand steps toward us. So God will do most of the work in making this connection – that’s a relief! Really then, all I have to do is diligently seek God. I have to make God a priority in my life. And the God we are seeking doesn’t have to be named God – any name will do. This is a personal matter and we are very much seeking a God "of our understanding." So we each have a personal God, and even better still, God lives in us. So tell God hello in the morning and goodnight in the evening and spend some time with God in your own way during the day. Anette says 3 minutes twice a day is a great start and then grow the relationship from there. God went walking with me this morning!

Now that we have a relationship with God the Almighty, that power is at our disposal to use as we might see fit. Of course this is very much a collaboration with that almighty power and the power has some rules about its use. Sorry, God is not the cosmic Santa Claus or genie in a bottle. A great use for this power, according to Anette is to use this power as our ally to face and transform our inner suffering. Not generally the first thing most of us think of doing although in the Bible, God was used to cast out demons. And what we are talking about here are our inner demons. To find our inner suffering we just need to pay attention to when we are suffering – feeling less than fully joyful and alive. This can feel like sadness or fear or anger or any variation or combination of those emotions. So when we feel those things instead of running from them, which is our typical response, we can face them instead. And when we face them, they process through and out of our system, leaving us in our natural state of peace and joy.

Anette describes this facing of our inner suffering as sitting and boiling in it, much like an egg being boiled. Not a very comfortable situation.  And this is where God comes in. Most humans can’t take much boiling. After a few seconds we are ready to run and we typically do, and the job of facing and integrating these emotions/demons never gets done. No wonder we live in a world that at times appears to be full of demons – IT IS! And now we know who they belong to – YOU AND ME! Instead of running then, we can do the work of processing the emotions and the good news is God the Almighty is with us to help us! So as we are tempted to run we could instead call on our friend God (after we have created the friendship) and ask for help to face out inner suffering. And as we call, God rushes in and we clean up our emotional mine field instead of adding to it. This clean up occurs as we sit and face the emotions (boil in them) for as long as it takes for them to clear. For strongly attached emotions it could take multiple sessions. And with God as our ally we are now strong enough to boil as long as necessary.

 So two easy steps:
1. Know God.
2. Use God to face your inner suffering.
Easy to say and harder to do. And the good news is this process gets easier the more we practice it! And the reward is far greater than we can imagine! Inner peace instead of inner turmoil! Who doesn’t want a bunch of that.

So I spent yesterday with 25 spiritual warriors in search of God. And I have God in my life more than ever today! And I feel better than ever. God is real and palpable to me today more than ever before! I am in bliss as I write this! Was in bliss on my walk. Plan to have a blissful day! I am on a road less traveled by and it is making all the difference! Join me if you will! There is room for all!

WHAT’S LOVE GOT TO DO WITH IT?

Spiritual teacher Matt Kahn talks about a love revolution! You can find Matt on YouTube if you want to hear him speak. He believes that if every person on the planet woke up today and said to their own heart, "I Love You," that all of our planetary problems would end in that instant! Fukishima and other toxic sites immediatly cleaned up and poverty, hunger and war all things of the past! My brain says that sounds a little far fetched. My heart, which I have told "I Love You" this morning, knows that he is most likely correct!

 So is love that powerful? I believe we all know it is. We all know that when we experience love everything seems right in the world. Think of the experience of being in love! Most people love to be with babies and house pets. I believe it is because of the ease with which we can experience love from those sources.

A country song talks about "looking for love in all the wrong places." So where do we look for love? As Matt Kahn suggests we can start the search inside ourselves. We can always love ourselves, not that it is always easy. It has been said that we can, fake it until we make it. So even if self love isn’t easy or comfortable we can do it anyway. So look in the mirror today or just look at yourself in your minds eye and risk telling yourself, "I Love You." It can’t hurt and may help more than you can imagine!

Once loving has started inside then we can share it. I believe you can’t share what you don’t have. So cultivate that love inside then let it out. As you meet someone on the street you might not feel comfortable telling them you love them and you can think it in your mind. You can tell them with your eye contact. This is especially important with the ones that we find difficulty being with. Let’s let love transform our difficult relationships. Many have written of the transformations seen with this approach. Let’s love the slow driver on the highway ahead of us. Hard for me and I plan to do it today!