I Already Have A Moses

Yesterday, Dorothy White responded to my post on minority control saying that one of the best ways to help people see things differently is one-on-one. I agree whole heartedly. Mass media and collective action are influential, too. But usually those reinforce beliefs and opinions people already hold. But often – and this is true of the media, too – people are unable to hear something that’s been there all along until they hear it said the way only one of us knows how to say it. Each of us matters…more than we know. Never before has the universe happened just the way I am or you are.

 

There’s an old Hassidic tale of a man named Zoysa who wanted to be just like Moses. All day, every day, before he did anything he asked himself, ‘what would Moses do?’ and tried to do that. Then one night, he had a dream in which God asked him: ‘I already have a Moses, so why aren’t you Zoysa?’

Minority Control

As I wrote about the T Party and Republican obstructionism yesterday, I felt a little guilty. After all, here I am a metaphysician wanting to practice forgiveness, inclusiveness and cooperation, ranting about my brothers and sisters. We are better together. I know that. I know about how gerrymandering creates safe rightist districts which in turn creates the fear of being primaried. I also know how good it feels to operate from a place of fearlessness and inner guidance and this frustrates me.

 

I want so much for my T Party and Republican brothers and sisters to know this too. I want so much for them to rise above their fear-based ideology and get in touch with the humanity they share with the rest of us and see how much their ideological ‘purity’ creates and adds to the present pain, discomfort, and discontinuity so many of their fellow human beings are experiencing - that they need not experience. 

What’s going on now, need not be, it’s self inflicted. We ARE better together. Can’t we ALL understand that and work together to reduce our present difficulties?  Yes, we can.  Will we? Well that seems to be up to a handful of ideologues, approximately 30 of them in the US House of Representatives and 20 in the US Senate. Fifty people impacting the lives of hundreds of millions here and around the world…. Wow!

No Consequences

Yesterday the guy who delivers The Herald drove by but didn’t give me and most of the people on my block a paper. Today he delivered two papers: yesterday’s and today’s. He wrote a note on the wrapper of yesterday’s saying he was sure he delivered it, that I got him in trouble with his supervisor when I called in the failure to perform, and he has to pay $5. for each complaint. Too bad. There needs to be consequences for non-performance. Too bad there are no consequences for Congressional non-performance!

 

We are once again embroiled in a self-inflicted ‘crisis’ created, managed and performed by the Republicans in Congress, a ‘crisis’ with no apparent downside consequences for them. While large majorities of Americans and even some T Party and Republicans want the Congress to operate smoothly and without crisis, that doesn’t count and somehow the obstructionists in Congress are collecting rewards for not doing their job greater than the punishments that can be meted out to them.

 

Who are the T Party and Republican Congressmen really working for? Who are their real constituents, the people who can reward and punish them? Not the majority of Americans in their districts. Obviously there are no negative consequences for being obstructionist. Obviously T Party and Republican Congressmen are being rewarded for pleasing their real constituents, whoever they are. Too bad those of us who disapprove of obstructionism and imagine ourselves to be their constituents can’t punish them as much as their real constituents can reward them.

 

Spiritual Technology

I’ve noticed that when I give an idea away I don’t lessen it. Have you noticed that? Unlike a physical object which when I give it away is gone, when I give an idea away I actually strengthen it. All of the idea is still mine, although all of it has been given away. In fact if the person I give the idea to accepts it as theirs, it reinforces the idea in me and thus increases it. Have you noticed this? Does it happen to you, too?

 

This is the basis of spiritual technology. If everything that we humans do begins as an idea, begins in the invisible, intangible non-physical world—the spiritual world, then working in that world first, working with ideas first is the most effective and efficient way to accomplish anything. Makes sense, doesn’t it? Going to the source, the cause, and working there has got to be better, more effective and efficient than working with the effects.

 

This way of being and doing is a no-brainer in everyday life. If the movie is out of focus, I don’t go up to the screen to fix it. I get an usher and ask her to call the projection booth. We can do the same with the bigger things in life: climate change, budget deficits, gun safety. What are the ideas that make these things concerns? Let’s identify the kind of beliefs, thinking and ideas that hold these things in place and keep us from cooperating and change the ideas first, then pass legislation if any is needed. Let’s work from the inside-out.

 

Spiritual technology such as mindfulness, meditation and affirmative prayer—the kind of technology that allowed Jesus to perform miracles, allows me to do this. When I take responsibility for my own thinking, beliefs and ideas and determine how well they’re working for me and others—are they creating fear, hate and blame, or love, compassion and inclusion – I can decide which ideas I want to represent and see manifest in the world. Working from cause to effect, from idea to result, from the invisible to the visible, from spirit to matter is what spiritual technology is all about.

House of Cards

This morning because it was too cold out (48 is too cold for this Florida boy), I was doing my Tai Chi in the living room as my wife did her morning exercise. We got to talking about the Kevin Spacey show, House of Cards, only on Netflix, about a majority whip in Congress, which we both enjoy immensely. Spacey’s character is a composite of Boehner, Cantor, and McConnell, egocentric, power driven and only occasionally interested in what’s good for his district or the nation. My wife and I are both political junkies and follow politics closely. The show lays bare the machinations, motivations and deals that lead to legislation and its passage – none of which has much to do with what’s good for the people or nation.

 

We were bemoaning this reality and observed that it had always been thus back to the Romans. Rich powerful special interests concerned only with themselves and not the nation or its people, have always dominated. Our current disappointment with this ‘natural’ state of affairs is that we thought we’d moved a little beyond it, that in America at least the poorer, less powerful classes had a chance to better themselves. Clearly this is no longer true, tho it was true once. The less powerful poorer classes are losing ground in America as is the nation as a whole. We used to be #1 in nearly all the quality of life indicators, now we’re not.

 

Why? Has the USA declined? Are we degenerate? Is God punishing us? Too much sex, gay rights and women’s equality? I think not. It is not so much that we have declined as that the rest of the world has gotten better and caught up with us. This coupled with our refusal to innovate, especially in the realms of spiritual technology, and our refusal to let go of outmoded traditions like the filibuster and subsidies to big agra-businesses and energy extractive businesses is holding us back.

 

After WWII, when the world was devastated and laid waste, and we were the only power, our shit didn’t stink. We had no competition so our inefficiencies and outmoded traditions – our shit - didn’t matter. But as the world has caught up – thanks in large part to our aid and efforts, our shit—our inappropriate inefficient ways of thinking, doing and being, has begun to stink.

 

This need not be. Don’t shit where you live is still good advice. Churchill said the people get the government they deserve. If we want to see a better, more effective efficient government, more in line with our ideals, then WE have to change and demand it. We’ve got to see our shit for what it is – shit – and manage it better.  We’ve got to seek the Kingdom first, use the spiritual technology that has always been available to us and work with the complex interconnections that characterize contemporary real life and use our best to build a world that works for everyone. Realizing that if you always do what you always did, you’ll always get what you always got, we’ve got to stop doing what we always did and clean up our mess, turn away from it and be more about what we want to be about - our ideals.

The Great Example NOT The Great Excetion

What if the Jew Jesus was not what he’s been made out to be—the Great Exception, the only ‘son’ of God, but the Great Example—the model the rest of us who are also the children of God, are meant to follow?  What if he came, not to die, but to be resurrected, to model a healthy beautiful life, not a fierce and horrible death? What if we’ve had it wrong all this time?  What if the good news the rabbi came to share was that we all have the same spiritual technology available to us that he used? Didn’t he say, “greater things than this shall you do also,”?

 

What if he was 2,000 years ahead of his time and the primitive culture he was born into couldn’t fully understand nor grasp the technology he used? Not that we’re so much better. Even now, as our scientific knowledge of the brain thru scanning and chemistry and our awareness the body-mind connection show that Jesus was right about ‘seeking the kingdom of heaven within’ first - that we feel better and do better when we come from that place, most people still seek outside themselves first. But hey, what can you expect from people who still don’t believe in global climate change or that women have the right to choose…?

Less History = Better Results

Here’s something I’ve noticed; perhaps you have, too. The more time I spend in the open, with few expectations, requirements and judgments, the more I get what I really want and need.

 

When I have little history and am open to knowing that whatever happens, from cancer to a flat tire, can be for my growth and benefit, whatever happens is for my growth and benefit. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. When I get my bloated nothingness out of the way of the divine circuits, the divine circuits deliver results far beyond what my puny ego could even conceive of, much less deliver.

 

Haven’t you noticed this, too? Cool, ingenious, elegant solutions that come effortlessly, miraculously, that benefit all concerned and harm no one, always seem to come when I downplay, let go of my history and turn my aspirations over to Spirit.