“For it is only the finite that has wrought and suffered; the infinite lies stretched in smiling repose.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
TODAY THERE IS JOY IN MY LIFE
I have a few magical people in my life who (no matter what is happening) can somehow reach into that infinite well within themselves and locate the remarkable quality of joy.
It wasn’t so long ago that I really had lost all track of joy. I didn’t see it in my life at all. During much of the pandemic, what I experienced instead was an unrelenting internal urge to create what I believed to be my Good.
And it was good. But it came with a price. That urge didn’t come with ease. It didn’t come with grace. It came with an intensity so fierce that it had me creating at warp speed, leaning into life so hard, that I literally froze. My shoulders (think “shoulders to the grindstone”) seized up and I experienced frozen shoulder in both my right and left shoulders. Crazy?
So, like any good practitioner, there was lots of mental work, and lots of spiritual work. Lots of re-minding myself that my life was flexible, that I had ease operating in my life, and that yes – I could in fact go with the flow.
Today, my shoulders are strong. A few weeks ago while weight training I managed to deadlift 65 pounds – half my body weight. My mental resilience is up, and I am experiencing joy again.
So what exactly is this “joy” quality? I don’t know that I have ever understood it as much as I do now.
For me it has become a sweet acceptance and surrender of what is (the dark as well as the light). It is that place that people speak of when they say their greatest challenges came with their greatest gifts.
There is a still place in the middle – and it seems to come when we pause and simply breath. We take life in. Eating. Drinking. Walking. Talking. Living. Playing. We are no longer “thinking” about life, rather we are “in” the midst of all of life simply doing it.
When we are there, we don’t think. When we are there, we simply act. It’s as natural as breathing. As natural as doing the next right thing. No second guessing. Just one foot in front of the other.
This is the joy of the “smiling repose” that Emerson speaks of. We rest, we see, we know.
Right now, I know I have Joy. Today, I choose to make Joy the foundation of my life. There is a creative energetic spark with Joy that inspires me to keep creating. And as I do, I surrender whatever grievances I may have, whatever pain and suffering I may be experiencing, into that void, knowing that I am safe, I am whole, and this life, my life, is worth living just as it is.
Affirmation
I live my life in Joy, and as I do, the world laughs with me.
COMING UP
If you want to have more spiritual growth in your life, take a class, or sign up for a book study or something. There’s nothing like being with others, and talking about our spiritual selves, to get the juice of life going!
Keep an eye on our website and Facebook page as we begin to roll out several educational offerings, including the wonderful Science of Mind introductory program Keys to Expanding Consciousness, as well as two book studies (Heal Your Body and The Power of Intention), and the accredited course “Mental Equivalents” (more details on that in about a week).
Peace and blessings,
Rev. Karin
PS: Read more news in the weekly Our Community blog post published on Thursdays!
If you missed yesterday’s Sunday celebration titled Celebrating Life as Source, you can watch the replay and other past services on the CSLK YouTube channel.
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