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* * *
I was in college and newly married, needing work for income. I began with an informal interview near the small school, in a little town with few job opportunities. The interview was for work at a local gas station, only some 3 miles from our home on campus. During the interview, I was informed I would have to sell alcohol. I was, then, a fundamentalist Christian and raised to see any alcohol use as wrong, even evil. Though I needed a job and the job was at an ideal location for me as a husband and student, I turned the job down. I informed the manager I could not sell alcohol, for that would violate my religious beliefs.
Looking back, that is rowing the boat. One could say, "You should have taken the job." Others might disagree, saying, "Good for you, you did what you felt right." Now, as I look back, I realize this was a wholehearted engagement with life in that moment, with myself, and as part of the communion. So, this was not mainly about making the right decision or the wrong decision, this was about wholeheartedly rowing, doing something from a commitment to the whole, the communion, that the Way is. Today, I might choose differently, that does not matter. The Way is always changing, we are always changing, how we express fidelity changes.
* * *
in the Way
being one with everything
does not lessen responsibility
it highlights even more how responsible we are
for, now, we are responsible to it all, everything
yet, this does not have to seem restrictive
this can be sensed as expansive
and, this does not have to feel like a burdensome moral duty
this can received as a liberating blessing
with joy and gratitude
acting as an isolated agent (individual), life is survival
living as part of all (communion), life is celebration
*Brian Wilcox. "Harmony of Light and Shadow". Flickr.
(C) Brian K. Wilcox, 2019.
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