Push . . . . . Pull

"I want only You, Lord.

Fill me with Thy Presence."

This mantra came to me the other day.  It's not original.  I've seen or heard it before.  It's the type of devotional chant that we're taught in SRF.  It helps to awaken devotion, to quicken our desire for spiritual bliss and to put in the meditation time necessary to access it.  It stills the endless mental chatter, allowing the ever present, but always hidden, inner quietude to bubble to the surface.

I cringe at the words, at their emotion, at the obvious Christianity, at the pleading.  If I heard these words from another I'd recoil; from the sentimentalism,  from the naivete of calling on something called God, of being so needy.

Yet, it's exactly such pleading devotion, a mantra repeated as often as memory and will remind me to push back the endless chatter and distractions, that transports me to that equally endless meditative bliss and quietude.

How can I dislike meditation so much when after just a few moments I don't want to move, desiring only to exist in the stillness of the body, the quiet of the mind?  But, oh the work it takes to get to the meditation chair.  If meditation is so good for me why do I resist?  What's behind the mental chatter, behind the darkness of closed eyes that despite my constant pushing away continually pulls me in?

Fun with Sharpies

Who knew that playing with a $3 Sharpie could be so much fun!  Drawing upon ideas from Alisa Burke's newest online class, Create Daily Holiday Edition, I've been in right brain bliss for hours this morning.  I don't know what chemicals my brain releases when I start playing around with creative stuff but it's a real mood changer.

It also got me from the breakfast table to the craft table.    Good thing, since I was in real danger of  major calorie overload.  So easy to do on a lazy Sunday morning.

Along with the glass items I found at Laverty's I also picked up some old Christmas ornaments.  All are perfect for doodling with the new oil based Sharpie pen.

Extra river rocks found in my garage work well, too.

Back to the playground!

The Bliss of Stillness

This morning our local SRF Meditation Circle celebrated our annual

Christmas meditation.  This is a tradition started by Paramahansa

Yogananda of setting aside one day during the busy holiday

season for divine communion.  It's the spiritual celebration

before the social celebration.

It's amazing how quickly one can go into the depths of inner

silence & stillness when one simply sets aside the time

to be quiet and listen.

Of course, having a group of like-minded souls to meditate with

is an enormous help.  Environment is stronger than will and 

when one is in a spiritual environment it makes it so much

easier to ignore the aches & pains of the body and

  helps to tame the ever restless 'monkey mind.'

Joy to the World

May we all be instruments of peace and goodwill.