We Share One Life, We Are One Life
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To really know our "nothingness" we must also love it. And we cannot love it unless we see that it is good. And we cannot see that it is good unless we accept it.
*Thomas Merton
What is this "nothingness" about myself I am to love and respect? This is a mystery. I cannot state it, only receive who I am. Possibly, there is a hint in the word "nothing" - no-thing. I am not a thing among things. I am nothing. And this means, likewise, I cannot be something. Add any word to I am and there is a movement away from this graceful being, but never being someone or something.
But, then, who is this I that loves and respects my nothingness? This I is the witness of nothingness, even as it arises from nothingness, is nothingness. Nothingness communes with nothingness, while there is only a single, simple, and pure Nothingness, or Oneness. Yet, we do not turn this Nothing into something, or Something, for Nothing is just that - Nothing. Finally, even the idea of nothingness and Nothing lose meaning, for that without meaning is our last resort, our being-in-Grace.
I was challenged to fulfill some requirements by a certain deadline. For days I struggled to proceed. Then, when I started proceeding, a point came in which I seemed to meet my limitations. My general ego strength pressured me to fulfill my ideal, but mind and body were too exhausted to meet the deadline. Likewise, I was working with illness in my family, had made a major move in the last months, and was getting used to a new work setting, ...
I called up a dear friend, who listened with compassion. After a time I felt the anxiety shift into a subtle, relaxed sense of peace. I felt a shift from fighting against my limitations to being gentle with myself had happened during the sharing. I admitted to her, "What has happened is I have come up against my limitations."
At the point of our limitations, we are invited to recognize our nothingness. Rarely does anyone, if ever, come to see his or her nothingness in success. At the point of our limits, we can relax into the Truth we are one with. The Truth of who we are is Truth. Then, we are not struggling to be someone or something, to prove ourselves to someone, not even to ourselves. All we have proved from the sense of a separate person will eventually die, anyway; it is the story of the sense of being a body among bodies.
We are nothing and cannot become anything or anyone, or something, and we discover this is an opening to the bliss of Life. Yes, we will continue to assume roles and duties, but we will come from an awareness that guides us to live sanely and in communion with the Truth within us. Likewise, we begin to see the same Truth within everyone, and we rejoice in that Truth through them, even as we embrace ourselves, our wonderful nothingness, in Love. We learn to reverence others and ourselves, and Love becomes to us so much more than a feeling or even the most noble of thoughts. Truly seeing becomes an act of Life Itself, a ritual of Grace admiring Grace.
♥ ♥ ♥
Grace and Peace to All
The Sacred in Me bows to the Sacred in You
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