Читать книгу Hineni: My Walk Into Beautiful Life - S. Joshua Mendel - Страница 6

Those with far greater ability to stay in Grace—Jesus for example!—state that Grace is a given; it isn't contingent upon doing anything. I don't quibble with that. However, it seems to me that just as a skater practices to be technically prepared to give that performance others dub "graceful", so each of us—me—must do the internal practice. To "prepare the Way for the Lord"; to be able to "let go and let God" so that Grace can indeed come unbidden. Having said that…

Grace also comes to me when I am flat on my butt; physically, mentally, or emotionally. When I am really stubborn, Grace comes as the result of a 2x4 to the head, kick-in-the-pants life event. Grace comes to me then because these are moments when my ego can't fight joining with Everything.

As in so many spiritual issues, opposites are both true. . . it's a paradox. And Grace, like God, is paradox.

* * * *

When I was 21, I had that kick-in-the-pants event. During winter vacation from school, I decided to help one of my friends learn to drive a car. . . using my dad's car. It was an icy day and turning a corner, the car skidded. Panicking, my friend put his foot on the accelerator and we hurtled towards a corner house. Had it not been for a fence around the yard; well, I am not sure how many might have been hurt nor how badly. I can still see the fence post sticking out of the transmission. . .

My father was surprisingly calm, even gracious given the fact that I stupidly totaled his prized Oldsmobile. But a self-loathing, tortured mind like mine would not let me off the hook. Returning to college, I reached an emotional low point even for my life. This was the first time I remember thinking actively about suicide. I was on my butt emotionally and so I was ready for Grace.

Ironically, I was on the 20th floor of a dorm tower with small, double-paned windows that could not open; yet I pondered how I might jump to my death. It was then that I heard a Voice:

"You have now hit bottom."

This is an amazing choice of words, as this is a classic Twelve Step term and I was twelve years from starting any recovery program.

I heard these words as a complete English sentence in my mind and yet there was no sound externally or even internally. The Words had a quiet power much greater than if they merely came to me through sound—I felt their truth with every cell of my body. They came with solidity and a surety that I knew was not my own. Perhaps someone out there would resonate with the word "inspiration". But that word leaves me cold. In fact, the right words fail me. And that is how I think it should be when it truly is Grace!

To say I was surprised to Hear these words is an understatement. I was shocked to my core. I was well into my first life by then. I avoided contact and conversation with people as much as I could. And I trusted no one; least of all, myself. I had long ago given up communicating with God. In terms of belief I was at the very least an agnostic and probably not too far from an atheist…

* * * *

Who wrote this first—Freud? Jung? It seems so basic an idea it could have been one of the ancients. Anyhow, I agree with them. My first concept of God was my parents. Didn't they give me life? Didn't they love me? Didn't they hold my life in their hands? And, unfortunately, didn't they fail me someplace, early on as a child? So I started with a concept of God that was conflicted in love, inconsistent in care and support, and untrustworthy. This was the subject of a fantastic seminar I attended at the Foundation for A Course in Miracles. The teacher proposed that the first painful experience one had with his/her parents was her/his basic grievance against God. That belief had to be made conscious and the grievance had to be given up in order for reunion to occur. Mine was my mother crying as she looked into my face; I was probably like three months at the time. So my grievance with God was that He was unhappy with me, did not love me, and did not want me.

Is this memory true? I cannot say for sure, but it seems likely. My mom related to me that she cried throughout the pregnancy of my sister, due to her fears over finances. (My sister was conceived within three months of my birth.) As a child, I would not understand the real reason(s) why my mom was crying; I would have thought it was my fault. Her crying meant there was something wrong with me.

As a child, I was challenged and confused by the words and imagery I was given about God. On TV, at Hebrew school and in temple school, I was told about or had seen the usual images—the white-bearded man on the throne; the guy in the white suit. I learned about a creative, all-powerful, loving God who was also jealous, wrathful, and vengeful. He had no problem "slewing" when he was unhappy and he didn't seem to have much Self-awareness or Self-control! God was a being of conditional love and you had to do a lot of pleasing—or else. At the end of Yom Kippur (the Jewish Day of Atonement), I was taught to pray to God, as the arbiter of life and death, to inscribe me in the Book of Life for one more year. There was a period in my life when I took that prayer very seriously.

Today, I am thoroughly confused by the phrase "I am God-fearing person." Because nothing will block Grace out of my mind better than fear!

Perhaps I held that God of my first life responsible for the victimization I experienced from so many and even myself. More likely, it speaks to my self-hating ego that to stay in power shut out everything—including Everything. And yet here at my ego's strongest moment; at my lowest point, I reconnected to Something greater than myself. A paradox. A miracle!

* * * *

Those Words stopped me in my tracks. . . my dead end tracks. Hearing them certainly put an end to my thought of suicide. But this miracle dramatically changed how I saw myself and acted in the future.

Those Words began my "uncovery": the now 38-year path of healing and growing into my truth, under the connection and guidance of a Higher Power.

Here as in more than one place in my life, my uncovery involved service, despite my belief that I had no worth and nothing to give. I didn't make an enormous splash into the world: I became active in the German Club on campus.¹¹ I agreed to be the organizer of the University of Kentucky's first and perhaps, only German film festival. That may not seem like much to many; then or certainly, now. But for me, from the place I started—wow! The festival was a success, by the way. . .

With those five Words, I started communications with "The Voice". At this point in my life, the communications were one-sided; The Voice speaking to me. And Words generally didn't come to me. It was more like a feeling of rightness. . . safety. . . when I was in a very difficult life space or facing a challenging issue. That didn't take much given who I thought I was and what I could handle then! So these were additional instances of Grace on my butt. Looking back, I think the miracle is not just that this Guidance came to me, but that I listened. I trusted. And I followed, whatever the difficulties and fear involved in carrying out that Direction.

I don't believe in a Creator/Planner/Daddy God. So how do I account for the strong, native capacities in honesty, openness, willingness, and courage that I brought with me into this life?

I can't.

You may be wondering about my use of the word "uncovery." Here is how I see it. How can I use the words "search" or "recover"? How can someone be lost from Everything? How can one recover what cannot be lost?