A YEAR IN A SUITCASE PART 4

Setting out for an adventure! One year living out of a suitcase! Scared shitless! Getting rid of everything I own that didn’t fit into a 22” suitcase and backpack….why… because I was mad at God. I had done everything He’d asked… as He so eloquently pointed out… things He didn’t ask… and this was the thanks I got…. A crashed life? Fine… take it all… have it all… fuck you!~ (Being Real for the first time in my life! And then… because I wasn’t happy.

Life as I previous knew it had changed… and somehow I knew if I was going to survive… I had to change too…. And in order to change… I had to go out and find different ways of living.

So after the end of a thirty-year marriage and bankrupt business I decided to get rid of everything that didn’t fit into a 22” suitcase and backpack, including my car!

You may be asking why in the world would you do that? Well, I was out of options! The church’s answer to my current situation was, “You just need to do, give and pray more… You’ll be fine!” I’d been doing that and it wasn’t working!

Then the solution from Western Medicine was… “You need pills!! Hormones, anti-depressants, and sleeping pills…. In effect… we’ll put you out for this next learning cycle of your life. “Uh, no thanks! You did that for my mom and sister and their both dead!”

By the grace of God, I knew that something had to change and had realized that something had to be me.

I began to understand that everything changes. I had come from an ultra conservative background where I believed that as long as everything remained the same, “I was doing it right!”

But through this experience I realized that absolutely nothing stays the same. All we have to do is look around us and see that nature is a great mirror to witness first hand that in fact… everything changes. We can see this easily in the four seasons or the monthly waxing and waning of the moon. I began to embrace change instead of resisting it and learned to appreciate what Plato meant when he said, “You cannot step into the same river twice.”  

In my latest book, A Year in a Suitcase, one can easily see that when one has the courage to make changes in their life….magic happens! Read all about possibilities… A Year in a Suitcase is still on sale! Two books for $30, plus shipping. 

See you next year!!! 

LET THE BEAUTY OF WHAT WE LOVE BE WHAT WE DO

Today, like every other day, we wake up empty and frightened. Don't open the door to the study and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument. Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground. Rumi 

My final days in Grass Valley, CA (I think:) I've been meeting people from my old church and even attended the Unity Church, meeting some wonderful people there. I went for a walk with an old friend and we were talking about Mass. Later that afternoon, I had planned to go to the 5PM Mass. But before that, I went to see an old friend who had moved to a retirement community in town. 

I knocked on her door and after hearing, "Come in!" I walked in. Her eyes lit up like I was Santa Claus! We visited and she told me about her bloody sheets that were soaking in the small bathroom sink. I offered to put new sheets on her bed, but enjoying the company, she insisted that we do it together. Later we then took her laundry to the washer and I walked her down for dinner. (Self-Care note: I was invited for dinner but said No Thank you, not this time.) 

Of course by this time Mass was over and I thought to myself, "I've just been to church." I joyfully spent time with another and I experienced God. Like Rumi says, There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground. And for me, There are hundreds of ways to be with and experience God and sometimes it happens in sharing in a like minded communities (church), sometimes it happens in the presence of another and sometimes it happens all alone. And it's all GOoD!

GIVING EVERYONE, INCLUDING OURSELVES, PERMISSION TO EXPERIENCE GOD IN THEIR OWN WAY!

A few years back I was driving across country with one of my daughters and I had written about the experience.

As we arrive at the Dakotas, as sacred to the Native Americans as the Holy Land is to Christians, I notice the young Indians rebel against the ways of their elders as many Christians rebel against theirs the same way many children rebel against their family traditions.

It’s natural; it’s normal; it’s how we learn; it’s how we grow.

The similarities in the Lakota Ceremonies and the Christian Rites are amazing to me.

I think God – One God – One Creator – One Universe, One Great Mystery, One Holy Spirit, One Great Spirit – One Wakentanka…but as many ways to worship as there are people in the world. (One Great Mystery, beyond all understanding)

If a person’s life experience has turned them from one form of honor and worship, there is always another waiting to be discovered. For me today, out in the open, in the beauty and the Wind of the Spirit, I listen to John Denver’s Eagles and Horses and I realize…that I have been to church.

This holiday season, find your individual way of worship, giving thanks and co-creating life by dreaming BIG, with the Creator of your understanding!