There Goes the Judge -- The Prerequisite for Making New Year's Resolutions

New Year's Eve -- a time to bid goodbye to the "old" and celebrate the coming of the "new."

Are you trying to get rid of an old, unsatisfactory you and find, with perhaps some New Year's resolutions, a "fixed-up," perfected, new you?

Look a little deeper here -- doesn't it sound as though there's a judge "in there" somewhere, frowning down on you and telling you how much of you needs to be made-over and improved?

So many people, whether they are aware of it or not, suffer under an internal judge. That judge can be subtle, just leaving you with a vague sense of dissatisfaction and stress. Or, it can be so vocal that you are all but paralyzed by the thoughts of "not good enough."

Before trying to make any New Year's resolutions based on that judge, consider bringing in some compassion. Start with acceptance and compassion for the "fixee." Is your performance really that bad? Are you doing your best? And especially, are you identifying yourself as a child of God, an expression of the Infinite Good?

The judge, too, needs acceptance and compassion. What suffering, perhaps in childhood, caused the development of such a harsh critic in the first place? Is the noise of that self-criticism a desperate attempt to erase feelings of pain and shame? Do you suppose that embracing that prickly judge with understanding and love could melt its harshness?

The judge is not really separate from the rest of you; it's another aspect of the ego you were trained to think of as yourself. And you, as you truly are right now, are not separate from Love Itself. The wholeness, the Allness of God-Being is your real Identity, with no need of guilt, shame, or "fixing up."

So, whatever resolutions or intentions you wish to form this year, make them in the Light of Love. And on New Year's Eve, say goodbye to the oldness of the illusory separation from God, and celebrate the Presence of the unchanging One forever new.

Don't Forget. . .The Gift!

Last Sunday's newspaper brought a"Family Circus" cartoon by Bil Keane that is a "keeper." The strip shows a mother and three little ones walking through a shopping mall, passing displays successively labeled "Don't forget wrapping paper," "Don't forget tree lights," and "Don't forget candy." The last frame shows the mom and kids, having left the mall, walking past a church with a creche scene in its front yard, and a large sign next to the creche saying simply, "Don't Forget!"

Fra Giovanni Giocondo, the 16th-century Franciscan friar whose work I introduced in this blog this past July, wrote a lovely meditation on "Gift" in 1513. It came to my attention first as a Christmas card sent to me by a friend many years ago, and certainly is suitable during this season of gifts, joy . . . and sometimes sadness. I'd like to reproduce it here:

"The gloom of the world is but a shadow, behind it, yet within reach is joy, there is radiance and glory in the darkness could we but see, and to see we have only to look, I beseech you to look.

"Life is so generous a giver, but we, judging its gifts by their covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard, remove the covering and you will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of Love, by Wisdom, with power.

"Welcome it, grasp it, and you touch the angel's hand that brings it to you. Everything we call a trial, a sorrow or a duty, the angel's hand is there, the gift is there, and the wonder of an overshadowing Presence. Our joys, too, be not content with them as joys. They too conceal diviner gifts.

"And so at this time I greet you, not quite as the world sends greetings but with profound esteem and the prayer that for you, now and forever, the day breaks and shadows flee away."

That is my prayer, too, for the world and for each one who reads this. Never forget Love's Gift of Itself, whether in the form of a magnificent story still celebrated today, or beyond all form.

'Tis the Season for Peace on Earth

As I drove home from an interview with an engaged couple about their wedding ceremony, my attention was attracted by a large billboard beside the Interstate. It showed a childlike drawing of Santa in a large red sleigh (which looked a bit like a bath tub), drawn by a 2-legged, red-nosed reindeer, and read simply "I Wage Peace.org."

Intrigued, I looked the organization up on the web as soon as I got home. Their website stated the following: "I Wage Peace.org is dedicated to inspire Peace Makers through education, film, creative advertising, information distribution, and links to world-class peacemaking organizations."

A visit to their site explains this organization's program better than I can in this brief post, and it's well worth some exploring. For instance, among nine actions listed under the heading "Everyone Can Wage Peace" were to support and/or join peacemaking organizations (dozens are listed on the site), write letters to the editor, and pray for peace.

I want to just mention that one of my long-time favorite peacemaking organizations is the American Friends Service Committee, since I didn't notice it on this particular site. Nonviolent action is so important in our war-intoxicated world.

At the same time, even the most dedicated peacemaking will never permanently succeed unless and until people awaken to their true Identity as Conscious Being. Separation will continue to appear until the profundity of Oneness is realized. As Dr. Kenneth G. Mills noted in his book Given to Praise (Sun-Scape Publications, 1976):
"You are not a man of a nation.
You are a Light experience,
Or a Conscious experience,
And only secondarily a person with a nationality.
Your are Conscious Experience
Primarily."

This realization definitely can, and must, be engaged by everyone.

Pray for peace, yes, and let your prayer resound with the rejoicing that the Ineffable One knows nothing of separation, chaos, or strife, but only its own glorious Allness. And That is the true Identity to know and Be!

In this season when peace is on so many minds and hearts, Blessings!

Have You Witnessed a Random Act?

In the midst of the mass of holiday shoppers at Macy's in Philadelphia, the familiar, exhilarating sounds of Handel's Hallelujah Chorus ring out. Singers from the chorus of the Opera Company of Philadelphia, mingling with the shoppers, sing exuberantly, the music circling mysteriously seemingly from everywhere.

As the sound fades, a stranger in the crowd holds aloft a sign that reads, "You Have Just Experienced a Random Act of Culture."

If you haven't yet seen this delightful Christmas-time event on You-Tube, you can find it at www.youtube.com/watch?v=wp_RHnQ-jgU.

I discovered there have been a number of such "random acts" in various cities, sponsored by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Over the next three years, the Foundation will sponsor 1,000 of these events in eight cities, as a promotion of the arts. (For more information and additional videos, visit http://www.knightarts.org/.)

The music blossoms in unlikely public places, often crowded malls, as well as airports and markets. What I love most about these recordings is to see the faces of the surprised witnesses. A few people ignore, others look disconcerted and uncomfortable. But most show obvious delight, some as though they have just been awakened from the trance of their busyness. A number use cell phones to take photos. Some even join in directly to the fun.

The faces are fascinating, beautiful, captured in a wondrous moment of being themselves.

As a viewer commented on the You-Tube site of one of these classical performances, "This is pleasing to God!"

Enjoy!

Winter Holiday Blues? Try a New Focus

Sadness, depression, loneliness attack more than a few people at this time of year. Is there help for this?

Thanksgiving, carrying all its feasting and expressions of gratitude, has passed. With the first thoughts of all that needs to be done before the holidays also comes the thought that winter is upon us. Has the glow of Thanksgiving warmth died? No. The changing picture is just doing what it always does: changing.

But, as Dr. Kenneth G. Mills stated in his lecture Green Stuff, ". . . you can't believe the appearance if you expect to see a new spring." You have a choice. You can focus beyond the appearance.

Outdoors we see the apparent death of much of the landscape, with chill temperatures, naked trees and waning light. Dr. Mills speaks about those seemingly dead trees: "It wasn't that they were dead; it was that they were resting to be prepared to receive the wealth of foliage: that green stuff!"

Winter is darker and colder, for sure. But it is also part of an awesome pattern: the rhythm of the four seasons. Do you focus on the deadness, or on the eternal rhythms? (This applies to your inner state, as well!)

Of course, winter holds its own beauty. Pure snow, smooth and crystalline, before footsteps have mussed it. The intricacy of black branches revealed against a pearlized sky. The trees casting majestic shadows before the rosy four o'clock sun. Do you focus on the cold, or on the lovely details?

At the mall, "Black Friday" heralds the start of holiday shopping, and with it, so it seems, a seductive emphasis on over-consumption. A painful yearning for Something unrecognized may unfortunately find its release in frenzied buying and partying.

But as the holidays approach, there are also the people who volunteer to help out, to give of themselves to a number of causes. Do you focus on the feelings of sadness, or can you focus on compassion and take action to volunteer yourself?

Do you allow the holiday hubbub to sweep you unwillingly along, or can you focus on the spirit, the soul, the meaningful symbols of the holy-days of Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza?

Do you find yourself thinking of childhood traditions lost, or can you focus on your current story, whatever it may be, and what it might mean as allegory? There is power here, waiting to be discovered.

Most of all, do focus on That which IS beyond time, beyond all appearances. The winter-- the seeming cold and dark -- is but another disguise of the Divine Radiance. The lacks, the losses, are a distortion of the Abundance and Love that can never dissipate. All the suggestions of sadness and sorrow could not even seem to appear were it not for the clear, untouched Light of Consciousness. Love's embrace never goes away.

What is your focus now?

[Note: Green Stuff is copyrighted 2010 by The Kenneth G. Mills Foundation. See their website to order it as a chapter in Mills' book The Key: Identity or as a booklet with CD.]