Tag: A Return to Love

Let the Universe Rise Up to Meet You

SuzettePersonal Growth

india arie

Oprah’s interview with India Arie is a beautiful lesson in having the confidence to follow your own God-given instincts.  Of the many lessons in this interview well worth watching, one valuable take away that India shares is this:  When you follow your instincts for God’s plan on your life, the Universe will rise up to meet you where you are.

My reading this morning from Marianne Williamson’s book A Return to Love:  Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles, continued this theme for me.  Marianne’s book carries the blessings of a daily devotional.  I relate to her teachings because she is preaching what I believe: God Is Love.  Jesus Is Love.  If we all conducted ourselves from this foundation, I believe the travesties of today’s society would cease.

This morning’s reading resonated with me not because of its impact on a global level but because it hits me where I am today.  A creative with an entrepreneurial spirit and a strong desire to help others, I am as far removed from a “salesperson” as you could be.  My “anti-sales” attitude causes me to stand in my own way in my desire to help others, however.  I am so strongly opposed to “selling” someone that I sometimes prevent myself from doing what I really want to do:  help them.

“When we are motivated by the desire to sell, we are only looking out for ourselves.  When we are motivated by the desire to serve, we are looking out for others.”  Marianne Williamson

The Universe is truly meeting me where I am this morning, leading me to read this chapter at a time when I needed it most.  Mary Ann talks about the concept of refusing to do what you feel called to do because you “can’t make a living doing it.”  In the interview I watched last night between Oprah and India, they talked about the “walking dead,” people who are just existing in the world, not doing what they were sent here to do because they don’t see how they could support themselves doing it, or they lack the confidence to follow their instincts and just do it. They end up just going through the motions of life, not truly living.  Even worse, the failure to do what you were created to do causes depression, irritability, and physical disease.

“Whatever it is you want to do, give it away to your community.”  Marianne Williamson

This is so in keeping with where I am today.  In a conference call with my Wildtree director last week, I told her I just don’t want to be a salesperson.  I cannot approach my business that way.  It is the total antithesis of who I am.  I have to work in service to others, and if God wants me to make a living doing it, that’s great, but that cannot be my reason for doing it.  I am doing it for the shear pleasure of helping others, and I am letting God decide what that will look like.

Thank you, Universe, for rising up to meet me where I am with these messages from my Sisters in Christ.

Shalom!

Love Is Strength

SuzetteSpirituality

As so often happens in life, the idea of forgiveness that I was being led to follow and share yesterday was “coincidentally” continued this morning through the book I am currently reading.  If you have not read Marianne Williamson’s “A Return to Love:  Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles,” it is worth your effort.  If more people in this world followed these principles, we would share a peaceful existence that would bless every one of us.

“To the ego, love is weakness.  To the Holy Spirit, love is strength.”

Marianne shares a story in which she had been hurt by someone.  To any one of us, she would have been justified to be very angry and react accordingly to the other individual in the situation.  Because she was practicing the principles taught by Helen Schucman and William Thetford in “A Course in Miracles,” she knew she would not get the results she wanted if she reacted the same way she had in similar past situations.  We all know that definition of insanity, right?

“I gave the situation to God and remembered that I need do nothing.”

Marianne doesn’t claim that this new found practice was easy.  But she does share that by working to release the situation to God and let Him handle it rather than react toward a brother in anger, she achieved the results that she desired.  What were those results?  They were not to allow that individual to continue in her life in the same context that he had been involved with her before – that would indeed be weakness.  But it was the ability to deal with the individual from a place of peace and love while at the same time disallowing him to be in her life in the way he had been previously.  She was able to hold her head high as she dealt with the situation from a place of love, which in the end demonstrated great strength that would never have been achieved had she lashed out in anger.  She was able to walk away from the situation in peace and contentment, which is all she really wanted in the first place.  Don’t we all?

“As long as I was not at peace, my behavior would carry the energy of my conflict.  Conflicted behavior cannot bring peace.  It can only produce more conflict.”

Marianne’s story is nothing compared to the conflicts that we are experiencing today, but the principles are the same.  We cannot eradicate evil with evil.  We cannot heal hurt by inflicting hurt, and we cannot heal anger with anger.  If this song did not make sense yesterday, I hope Marianne’s story will help shed light on it today.