Separation is an interesting phenomenon. Whereas our soul is connected to all things, we are compelled to tune out our oneness, our connectedness with them. We do this so we may experience our individuality in such a way that we think we are separate from everything else. We embarked upon this adventure long before we put on matter so the illusion of separation has its roots far outside of materiality.  

Yet the pain of loss is very real, and it takes a long time to pass through it. For some of us, we will mourn our loss to a certain degree for the rest of our life. While for others of us, we will pass through the long dark night and by meeting life moment by moment, we will eventually emerge in to the light of day.  

Life exacts an incredible price from those that love but the rewards are greater yet. Our pains, terrible as they are, will pass and our joys will be with us through eternity. Defeat is intertwined with victory, and one is not possible without the other. Deep within the pain of loss resides that energy that we will transform into eternal love. 

Neither we, nor our loved ones have our home in the earth. We are anchored in higher realms but have chosen for a while to spend our attention on materiality. We did not begin our relationships here nor will they end when we leave. Life in the earth with all of its trials is an incredible opportunity but it is not natural to us. Only after we have left our material experience will we consider ourselves at home where we belong.  

We are children of incredible holiness, divine and eternal. We have always been and we will always be. When we suffer the agony of separation it is important to understand it is a real experience for a soul in the earth. However, it is equally important to understand we must respond to it, to become more compassionate, more patient, and kinder to those in our lives. For in simple kindness, one to another; is the road that leads from the dark of night to the light of day. And, in our tenderness we will sooth the pains of those that travel this road with us.

Materiality is a transient state of consciousness but it is not an illusion. It is very real to those of us that occupy and function in this intensely focused condition.

What may be some of the advantages gained by an immortal soul from an experience in materiality? Only in time, the ability to meet life incrementally can we awaken and experience patience. Only in a consciousness bound up in space, allowing us to measure the distance between events, can we experience persistence. Only in a consciousness where we can experience a sense of separation can we awaken and experience a sense of faith. Only when clothed in flesh and bone, where the outcome seems uncertain to us, can we awaken and experience the attribute of courage.

These are not traits consigned exclusively to materiality but they are readily available, to a soul in search of itself, in a physical consciousness. These experiences, once gained, remain a part of our immortal soul as we grow in creation. Thus by surrendering for a short while our awareness of all that we are, we can gain incredible personal experiences to carry with us through eternity. And here in eternity is where we will express our creativity forever.

Although we are so much more than what we appear to be, there is great value in narrowing our focus. The gifts gained from the experiences in our day to day lives are invaluable. We do not serve our immortal selves well by depreciating the value of our daily affairs. All that we meet from morning to evening are placed before us so that we may experience spiritual gifts; eternally. It is not the size or even the complexity of what we encounter that determines the value of our experience but rather how we meet these conditions.

As we go out in to this day before us let us do so in the spirit of expectancy. For each moment in our day is where we have chosen to meet eternity, and in this way may we as everything, become something, to become everything.

As children of divinity we need do nothing to become holy. However, there is much we can do to express holiness in our daily affairs. The business before us need not be somber, dramatic, or world shaking to be worth our investing our divinity. Everything, every single thing we do is an opportunity to express our holiness. As co-creators the business at hand is the perfect opportunity for us to express our divine nature. There is no experience we can encounter that is not worthy of our complete involvement. We are either expressing our perfection or we are not; we are growing or we are not. If we are seeking an opportunity, if we are preparing, we are not expressing our perfection.

When we give less than all of our attention to the task before us we are depreciating both its importance, and our opinion of ourselves. We may choose to excuse our inattentiveness by believing we are accomplishing many things at the same time. However, multitasking robs us of our focus, our devotion to our opportunity, our chance to be completely creative in the moment, and in the end to fully express our divinity. There is no hurry; no need to take short cuts, no need to multitask, for creation is endless, and opportunity will surely wait for us.

Our mission is not to become complete but to express our perfection. That being said, is it not more helpful to express ourselves, as co-creators, fully in what we find before us this moment? The universe is a marvelous mechanism, and we may find that as we express ourselves fully in smaller things we will encounter those that are larger. However, we will never encounter that which is too unimportant or too difficult for us to experience.

This day will require courage, patience, persistence, kindness and gentleness from each of us. We certainly have a sufficient quantity of these qualities to meet our opportunities, and all that is required of us is to do so. 

Composer: Never was there a time when the symphony was not and never will there be a time when it will not be.

C: You mean that it is eternal magnificence?

Composer: That is exactly what I mean.

C: Where do I come from?

Composer: I constructed the instruments so they would produce and sustain that unique resonance to express the perfect you forever. Then I called you forth into an eternity of magnificence.

C: Then I did have a beginning at that time?

Composer: No, little one, you existed as you resounded harmoniously in my mind. Then, there was a point at which I changed your form from the resonance within me to approximate the resonance from outside of me.

C: At this time of change were there other notes? Were they also changed in form, so to speak?

Composer: Yes, and I changed all of them at once. Until that time the most magnificent melodies, the most moving harmonies existed inside of me. They were me and I them. I wanted to give them a destiny of their own. I wanted to approximate removing them from myself so that they could grow independently of me. I wanted them to explore, to create on their own. I wanted them to know the joy of discovery and the satisfaction of self-expression. I did not disconnect them as you would imagine but I exist in their uniqueness, and as they express their remarkable originality, I experience it too. So, as the musical notes express the melodies and harmonies that are me, they do it eternally. Then, I may experience the endless variety of harmonies that are us.

C: When you constructed the instruments to externalize us were all instruments constructed to produce perfect notes?

Composer: Yes, little one, but you must understand there are slight variations in the same note when produced from a different instrument. Each instrument is itself unique and a C from a French horn will not resonate exactly like a C from a cello. Both will express a slightly different quality of the note of C, and only together will the entire orchestra produce the perfect C. You, dear one, are the perfect C. All of my notes are perfect and I call you forth into an endless variety of perfect harmony.

C: I did not know there were other notes, how many are there?

Composer: There are many notes, each of them finding perfection through the seemingly endless varieties of instruments that produce their resonance.

C: Why then have I been unaware that there are notes beside myself? I thought I was all of the notes. I thought I was the whole.

Composer: Try dearest, to understand this. You are the whole but at the same time you are not. Without you the whole would not be. Without the whole, you would not be. You are one and the same. You are the music. None of my notes can exist without all of the others; each one is a variation of the creative resonance. Each note depends upon the other for its being. Now picture this if you will. You do not just join the other notes. The notes are not produced independently with each striking the skein of eternity at the same time. Each note enters you so you embody each one. You permeate all that you embody, you transform with your unique resonance all of the other notes which you embrace, and then you release what you have created.

C: Wow, I never thought of it that way. Do all of the other notes do the same thing?

Composer: Yes, dear heart, they do, and it is all done simultaneously, free of the fetters of time and space.

C: Now I see what you meant when you said that we are each part of the whole and we are each not. Now this gets us back to my big dilemma and that is how do I know what I add to the whole? If the whole of magnificence cannot exist except as it comes from me, how can I ever know what I add to it? How do I know how it is transformed by my embodying it?

Composer: Listen, I gave you the capacity to hear, so listen.

C: Listen to what? All that I hear are the most miraculous harmonies, the most exquisite melodies, how do I hear me? Wait, why don’t you stop the music for a moment and let me resonate alone, then I will become aware of my own resonance?

Composer: I will not do that. I have called all resonance into being so the symphony of creation would play forever. I will never stop that.

C: So I have no hope of ever hearing myself?

Composer: Yes you do. I have made you so that you can stop listening. If you wish, you need not listen to all that you embody. This will create the illusion of your resonating alone. Then you will hear yourself. I gave you the gift of this capacity so that you may enhance your appreciation of yourself and ultimately of the whole. Having gained such an appreciation, you will add immeasurably to the endless varieties of your resonance. Thus, the eternal symphony will express my highest dreams for it and we will make music forever.

C: OK, I have done it and you would not believe how incredibly beautiful I sound.

Composer: Yes, I do.

C: Finally I can hear all of the nuances created by the different instruments that together produce me. What a wonder, what a wonderful thing I am. I never knew.

Composer: No, dear heart, as you did not know what you were until you listened to yourself, you will not know who you are until you stop listening to yourself.

C: I don’t understand. What if the instruments stop resonating me? How will I know? What will become of me?

Composer: Understand this, my treasure, when you did not hear yourself, you did not give even a thought to your eternal being. You knew you were beauty and you knew you were forever. Only when you closed out the others from your hearing, when you created this illusion of separateness, did you also create this illusion of mortality. I tell you this, my heart, you are immortal, you are mine, and you will exist forever. Now I will show you.

C: How? What may I do to become immortal again?

Composer: Listen to the others, listen the way you did before, take your attention from yourself.

C: Oh my, the music is so magnificent, the beauty is so indescribable, and it is me. I am the music, I am the symphony, the symphony is me and we are forever, this is truly who I am.

Composer: Yes, little one, you know what you are, and because of that you know who you are. We are magnificent, are we not? We are the music, and we are forever.

May God bless you each in the knowledge of who and what you are. And, in so knowing MAY YOU, HIS PRECIOUS ONES, BE HEALED EVERY BIT THIS DAY.

(Excerpted from Letter To His Beloved by Harvey A. Green)

There is something we can do now to put our fears to flight, and that is to purposely work on a we consciousness. To remind ourselves every part of every day we are not apart from our creator can become habit forming. Once we can remember we are one with our God, what have we to fear? It is only in our forgetfulness we become isolated and fearful.

Finally, as part of God you and I are all part of one another. There is only one God, there is only one we, and we are all us. When we begin to remember our oneness with God, our awareness of our oneness with each other will naturally arise. This awareness of oneness will not come about all at once, nor will it rise to the same level every day. However, as we continuously make choices guided by our awareness of our oneness with God, we will naturally find more love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, forbearance, and faithfulness.

If we are prudent we will avoid entering in to the darkness. We cannot combat the sheer number and ferocity of its residents; for to try will simply increase their strength. However in prudence we will have abandoned our brothers and sisters in the darkness. If we are compassionate caring individuals simply avoiding the darkness is not enough. We may conclude being prudent is insufficient. Yet, we cannot combat the terror and agony without facing certain defeat. However, there is a way to prevail, to bring peace and goodness in to an overwhelmingly painful situation.

Let us now imagine we live in the light.  When simple kindness and devotion to goodness have become our way of life we are filled with this light. The light of love will saturate our consciousness, shine forth from us, and illuminate the world wherever we find ourselves. Only then dare we enter the darkness, protected by the light of loving-kindness. Acting as beacons of grace, our reflected light will bring about the dawning of a new day, mercifully ending the long night of horror. In this way those who wish to leave the darkness may remain enveloped by the light of tenderness, and those who do not are free to make their own darkness elsewhere.

We may find it is not what we do that dispels the darkness but what we have become. No kindness is ever lost or wasted and has a reach we can scarce imagine.

Many of us think of our self as separate from God. We believe we are external to our Lord, that there are things about us He does not know. Our triumphs, failures, fears and aspirations are all known intimately from the smallest to the largest. This is because we do not reside outside of the consciousness of our God but within Him. Further, no matter what we think of our self, our Lord has never wavered in His indescribable love for each of us.

We often think of ourselves as far less than we really are. Convinced, as we may be, that we are in the image and likeness of our Lord, we assume He is as flawed as we. But we are not flawed; we are simply in the process of growing into a more accurate image of our creator. When we bump up against the boundaries that guide us this is not error but why they were placed there in the beginning. The pain we feel when we go astray is not a punishment but a blessing. Even the possibility of going in the wrong direction is a consequence only of our mobility, and our maturation. If we are to become fully self-aware we are to experience our self, and if we are infinite as is our Lord, we are to experience our self infinitely. We have no beginning only that point when we began to become self-aware. We have no end for like our gracious Lord we are eternal. We simply have the glory of endlessly experiencing our own divinity.

We do not experience our self alone because we are part of our loving Lord. We experience Him as He experiences us. As part of the same incredible adventure we share with our God, through experience, we grow in awareness of our self and of our Lord. There is no life outside of our God. Everything is part of our Lord and resides within his tender loving care. Whatever we can possibly encounter is a part of God, existing within the embrace of His consciousness.

Finally, God is infinite mercy. When we feel forsaken, outside of the embrace of our precious Lord, let us ask ourselves, “For what purpose has that tenderness I call Infinite Mercy allowed me to experience this?” Then in the twilight of our awareness let us move forward courageously. Let us take one gentle, one valiant step at a time, knowing in our quest we are immortal, we are part of that unspeakable holiness we call God and nothing can change this.

In our dreams we have an example of our heads resting in one place and our minds being elsewhere. The doubters among us would maintain, it is the imagination alone that gives rise to the illusion of being present elsewhere than in our own bed. However, even the most cynical may eventually come to accept, at the very least our imagination is not bound up in time and space. Once we can accept our imagination can be where we are not physically present, we begin to see only our physical attributes are tied to a single fixed material location. If the imaginary forces of our mind are not limited to a fixed location then perhaps our cognitive reasoning is not either.

There is no reason why forces not bound up in time and space should be subject to its limits. If we can imagine our mind as a single mechanism with various parts, why can’t these individual parts work just as well when not physically touching? Simply, why cannot our mind be spread out over a vast expanse, and work just as well as when it is compressed into a small space? If we assume the mind, our mind, can work fairly well spread out across the landscape of reality, then let us consider the possibility all parts can focus equally well, independently of the others. To be more precise, all parts of our mind are equally capable of perception. Then, all that we perceive would be integrated in to our consciousness, and in this way, what we have a mind in a state of omnipresence.

Of what benefit is it to us to understand omnipresence and our role in it. If our mind occupies the vastness we call consciousness then we have an effect on all other minds with who we share it. There is nothing we can do or even think that does not influence us all. Thoughts are real, they are things and they are enlivened, given form by actions. In the way we think and the way we act we affect all souls that occupy consciousness with us. We deceive ourselves by thinking that our thoughts affect only us, and our acts only those to whom they are directed.

We are children of infinite holiness, all that we think, all that we do touches upon the lives of all those with whom we inhabit eternity. Let us consider the consequences of our actions knowing we touch all others. We are indeed present in their lives as they are in ours. If our actions bruise those to whom they are not directed, we would do well to consider we cannot explain them away. There is no explaining, no rationalizing, there is simply omnipresence, and we are either pouring out miracles or curses in to the lives of others.

May this new year be the perfect opportunity for each of us to begin changing the world, one thought, one act at a time.

If our normal reaction is to mistrust what we have at hand, we surely will not be disappointed with the result. However, an attitude of trust encourages inquiry that enables us to perceive with greater clarity. Trust is a normal state whereas doubt is an unnatural response.

Children naturally trust. We find this so endearing an attitude we wish to protect them from disappointment. Disappointment is not the enemy of trust; it is simply the result of how we have used trust. Disappointment is natural, it is a helpful teacher. It is not something to be avoided but to be used as a learning tool. Disappointment is the great educator, and not simply a punishment. There are many ways we can use trust, seeking the appropriate ways to express our faith is a process of maturity. If we no longer trust we are not faced with the hard work of further maturity.

Doubt fosters cynicism while trust promotes optimism. So many worthwhile attributes flow from a life of optimism we should question why anyone would choose the emotional poverty of pessimism. We will err again, and again, and again. However, when we do err, it is far better we err on the side of trust.

May we each let optimism run free and expressed in a joy of trust. In a life illuminated trust there is no room for the darkness of fear or doubt. No matter how we have lived we may choose to live differently. In reaction we will reinforce old habits but in action we will create new ones. We need only to remember trust is our natural state, and to act purposely.

What has transpired is but a memory that neither longing nor regret will change. What is on the horizon is the result of what we are doing with the day in which we find ourselves. The past and the future pour in upon us in the form of motivation but they are not where our attention should be focused. Choices that have been made or to be made are influences that should simply guide us in our day to day lives. However, choice is the currency that can only be spent in the present.

Life is not stagnant but it pours in to each of us new every moment. What was; need only be if we make it so. There should be no regrets because we are made new this day. Yesterday’s sunlight does not illuminate the world today, nor does tomorrow’s radiance light up our lives us now. The promise imbued within this day dwarfs any experience we may long for. Anticipation is a forsaking of the promise for an illusion. Consequently, neither fear nor longing will change one thing in our lives but they will rob us of the opportunity to live fully in the present. Where we find ourselves, in the present, we may soar like eagles above the commonplace to make the moment holy indeed. Would we forsake this opportunity because of fear or regret? 

As we begin a new year may we realize, nothing we have ever done, need hold us back. The future is the reflection of the light shining forth from this very day. We have today to live fully in it, and the choices at hand are all we really need. Let us choose to live life in the present, to partake of the banquet before us without fear or regret. In so doing we may unravel the past and create the future.

Today is the gift from unspeakable Loving Kindness. This is indeed a new day in a new year. May you make a miracle of this day, and those He has given in to your care.