Thought is malleable like clay. And while I’m not a potter of it, I’m a potter of thought-we each are. I’ve thought about this a lot lately. You can let stuff outside you shape your thinking or you can get in there and shape the clay of your thoughts…..Get in there. Shape the clay. Even if there’s seeming raw, tender feelings of unknowns. Even if there’s a lot of unclears, doubts, fears, and what ifs…
Something in me is telling me to trace the steps and stages of my thinking from 15 months ago til now..when I left all that was familiar and find myself very similarly back to the very area I left.
And so I just may. YET…what remains ever the more tender aha isn’t so much that I’m walking familiar streets and seeing some familiar faces and nodding and sometimes even hugging familiar vendors who’ve graciously said “where’ve ya been? ” (the Ukranian man at 7-11 to be exact. And yes, I have a weakness for their green hot tea…it’s right around the corner…and a meeting mecca of the community actually).
I want to say this: I’ve had to carve out my sense of home more deeply than I ever thought I would. And much that has shaped this sense is my faith and understanding in that immoveable relationship I share, we each share, with the divine Principle that is undergirding all things. This oneness I share has proved my foundation even when I just haven’t known where to go or where to land.
How?
Well, when you defend your oneness to this Principle, you have a constant rudder. And it doesn’t speak to you per se or give you lightening bolts or bellow forth “Tre I need you here.” But it grounds you, gives you a foundation you can live from. And while all others may call you a gypsy (which frankly I haven’t minded) or while others still call you aimlessly running around or scoff at your existence, you block all that out. That’s the thoughts that would try to impose themselves on your thinking and manipulate your innocent yearnings and longings.
Leaning on this solid foundation of your oneness, you learn to listen thought by thought–the exact reason I’ve titled my blog as such–and you learn to really face down the biggest fears you could ever conceive. But it’s not so very difficult when your awareness and understanding of the divine Principle that is basing your life is so clear. Unmoved by what if’s and doubts and fears, you can walk forward through every single moment unaffected by the throngs of anti-good–all the muck that would attach itself to your thinking.
I’m not advocating everyone sell all their belongings and hit the road as I did. I am advocating listening deep within. You may not realize how easy it is to let others’ opinions shape your choices.
Anything from why you’re spending what you are for something vs why you are living the lifestyle you are. But it’s deeper than that still. I’m talking about how you feel as you go about your day.
Do you feel alone? separated? distant? removed? surrounded by strangers or good people vs bad people? Why? Ask that…probe it….Some of the most tender voices and lives I’ve interacted with I am sure a large percentage of ‘most people’ I have wouldn’t necessarily have welcomed into their life.
Take Gina.(not her real name). For two years Gina asked me for money outside 7-11. Now I knew full well she’d be there every time I’d go. And I’m embarrassed to admit that sometimes I would wait to enter 7-11 until she spoke to someone else or was otherwise occupied so I didn’t have to deal with her.
I asked myself why. She didn’t threaten me.
Her question did. “Please miss can you spare a little change.”
It didn’t help me at all to keep avoiding her. And it made me feel uncomfortable. She had every right to beg, though I could suggest a ton of other ways she could have been productive with her time. So why did her choice to do that bother me?
Because my heart went out to her….And I wanted to somehow teach her of her true worth or rather somehow draw it out of her. She already had it. I just wanted to somehow awaken it, draw it out, make her see how truly powerful and significant her life is.
But more. I wanted to stop giving into the mental pull to see her as copping out of her own worth and selling out to a system that encourages people to beg. I wanted to stop seeing her as giving her consent to this scenario that she was poor and homeless. I wanted to somehow get her to stop accepting that lacking, deprived, limited view of herself.
While you can’t really get into someone’s thoughts and change them, you can change your view of that person. And that’s exactly what I did.
Instead of getting frustrated that she’s vulnerable or weak and sold out to a limited view of herself, I started insisting she was a beautiful woman who was full this moment of her spiritual inheritance, her innate goodness. I insisted that she was and is now an idea or expression of the one true Being and as girded and based by divine Principle.
And this conviction allowed for another shift. I decided to stop avoiding Gina. Instead, I opted to greet her, go up to her and embrace her her wholeness and completeness each time I spoke with her, whether a simple hello or a longer conversation.
It wasn’t easy. Sometimes she was intoxicated but still begging. Sometimes she clung to me while asking for money.
Sometimes I gave her money. Sometimes I bought her lunch. Always did I greet her straight on and talk with her about the day, the weather, my dog (she adored him). But always did I give her that respect and honored her as a woman. And pretty soon she’d interrupt our conversation and say “Excuse me Tre, don’t go away” and then turn to the next passerby and ask him/her for money.
Months passed. She stopped asking me for money. She started giving me something: a hug. Seriously. It was like a complete shift occurred in her thinking toward me.
But here’s the even more precious part. On one of my first nights back in the city I’d left 15 months ago, who do I see on the same corner but Gina. This time all gussied up and acting like she was waiting for something. I got out of my car. And before I could say a thing to her I hear “Girl, where have you been? Come give Gina some love.” And with that, she threw her arms around me and gave me the longest hug I’d had all week.
Then she started tearing up. “Girl, I have a home now. And a job. And I’m a neighbor.” She pointed to Castle Square apartments around the block.
And in all her excitement, she squeezed my hand. And she said, “Girl, thank you. Thank you for talking to me all last year. Thank you for listening to me. You gave me my worth back girl. You really did.”
And then she said “When ya coming over for dinner? I have a full house now. But soon okay?” And then her ride came and this beaming face waved goodbye.
Wow.
What Gina didn’t know was that at that very moment I was the one without permanent housing. I’d been driving for hours that day to reach my destination but had no idea where I was gonna sleep that night.
Seeing Gina, getting her hug, hearing her words gave me that tender reminder of living in the right now. And a whole lot of hope. Her embrace squelched all my wonderings of where I was gonna go that night or how I was gonna re-emerge to the city I’d formerly left behind.
I will tell her someday because I’m quite certain our paths are gonna cross again.
But dressed to the nine’s or not, asking for money or simply waving, anyone you pass on the street is worthy of respect, honor, and the compassion and tenderness of human kindness. No matter what the surface appearance or circumstance.
So this is just one small example of the many ways that moment to moment I’ve felt and understood the constancy of that oneness we each have to divine Principle.
What are some of the ways you’ve felt it? proved it? seen it in your life?
As always, email me or leave a comment if you wanna chat more…..
Thanks for reading..and be well….Tre 🙂