Real Magic: Strange Stories, Amazing Facts

If we live within centuries of a sea parting, or the whole world flooding, or someone being turned into salt by God, our inherent and inherited belief system is amazing in that we really believe stuff like that can happen. So when Jesus comes later and says believe and be healed, we know we already believe, and so we are healed.

Now, a couple of thousand years passes and we live in a world of science and technology, and magic is stuff like cloning sheep, and virtual reality, and seedless watermelon. But it’s also the world of near death experiences, past life regressions, and being able to heal yourself. Why do some of us have a hard time believing the natural magic over the tinkerings of science? 

If we limit our beliefs, don’t we only limit ourselves? Seems there is a large spectrum of believing, but only the upper limits have the “gold.” Man cloning sheep pales in comparison to God creating man and endowing him with the natural ability to heal himself.

Where else is the real magic happening today? And does it even matter, because if we experienced it, how many of us would immediately doubt it, ruining our very own surprise party (that the magic is real). The most recent “real” magic for many kids was Harry Potter. And if they didn't have anything else that they believed in to that degree, thank God they were at least instilled at a young, impressionable age, with the belief in powerful magic. Doesn’t matter that it’s fictional, it matters that the foundation of believing was laid. 

Do you have a magical foundation of belief? What is it for you? Did Raiders of the Lost Ark do it for anyone? Mine happened in a book of all things, because I never used to read. I was about 8 years old, out of school for the day because of another ear infection, and after the doctors my mom took me across the street to the Smithtown Public Library for a used book sale. She found me a Reader’s Digest special edition that looked interesting: Strange Stories, Amazing Facts. I think it cost a nickel. 

I dug pretty deep into this book, and on page 382 I read for the very first time about Padre Pio, The Miraculous Monk; never really leaving a small Italian town, yet appearing to people worldwide, comforting and healing them; I believed it ALL. And by God’s grace, I never let that level of believing go; it has made all the difference in my life. Would you like to be someone who just believes somewhere on a spectrum, or someone who climbs up out of the spectrum and knows? Seek to know! All God’s powerful magic…it’s real; and the more you believe in it, the more you can grow and heal from it.

How Faith Works

Ever wonder about that…how faith actually works? I’ve seen it work enough that I know it’s real, but I thought it would be fun—and hopefully informative—to explain exactly how faith works its magic.

So there’s you, sitting, reading this, and electric impulses are firing-off in your head and all over your body, and though you maybe can’t feel it yet, those impulses are emitting a biomagnetic field around you that is the average of what you are being right now. If you could feel it, it’d be like physically experiencing corresponding states of water.

If you read this with skepticism, your biomagnetic field is a lot like watery Jello that’s about to set. If you were totally closed-minded when you started reading this, and you just now reaffirmed that you’re not budging, your field is like a block of ice. If you’re curious, your field is like a light, dancing rain. And if you’re totally open, your field is like a pleasant, almost-imperceivable mist.

Now, to understand further, I need you to pretend you are telekinetic and can move any of those water-like forms with your mind. Which form do you imagine would be the easiest to influence? Jello’s so thick and likes to jiggle back to its original mold. Good luck trying to influence the ice block; you’d need an actual sledgehammer or chainsaw for that one. Rain is more easily swayed, but you’d still need a good, strong wind. Mist is so light and weightless, it would easily yield to your telekinetic mind or your natural breathe.

So having faith is most like being an open-minded, light, weightless mist that then has the greatest ability to yield to and be influenced by subtle Divine sways. Yielding your will through the openness of faith allows you to exist within life’s gentler breezes (diminishing the need for strong winds, sledgehammers or chainsaws); if you consciously or unconsciously choose a state that is less yielding, it will be that much harder to guide you to where you want to be. That's how faith works and pays off in every instance you have it, and how it’s blocked off in every instance you don’t. Choose faith!

Up in Arms!

Despite my tweet…

Since God is the foundation of everything, 

it's going to be so much fun the day science finally proves
and thereby gets to meet its Creator.

                            …I really do like science and scientific explanations for things. In the days of Trivial Pursuit--if my memory is correct--the green questions were my faves. (Green was science, right?)

I've already blogged in Good Vibrations about the science behind the reality of the biomagnetic field or aura. And I don't need science to prove my relationship with Divine Intelligence because science is, in all its genius, still missing the forest for the tress. But since I already know God personally and scientifically as the Quantum Field of Intelligence, I can still appreciate science for keeping me in check when I do explore new ideas; theoretically.

So, when I heard about the idea of spiritual arms (which I guess also have spirit fingers), I wanted a rational explanation to encourage what I was about to undertake. Let me start by saying that it came to my understanding that to experience the subtler fields of energy that are Divine, you had to develop spiritual arms to connect (in a more physical way) with the spiritual flow. In other words, you had to consciously form your biomagnetic field from its current state of unconscious blobyness with imbalances, into a balanced form that has arms, hands (and, hey, why not add wings?!). I'll always admit when I see how something can sound crazy to most, but if you're curious, please indulge yourself further:

To feel the biomagnetic fields of others, it is tremendously helpful to have arms and hands; they allow me to move through and experience such fields with ease and precision. I've been practicing Reiki for about 15 years, and I find it requires a lot more concentration to experience someone else's field with just my body, arms at my side; and then, even when I can feel their field in this way, it's nearly impossible to then feel the differences within their field without lifting my arms. But that wouldn't be a problem if I had spirit arms! But, is such a thing possible? Well, logically speaking, yes.

We all can have certain, real protrusions in our fields that directly follow our personas. If you are a super creative type that doesn’t care too much for the logical world, there is no doubt your biomagnetic field on the right side of your brain is protruding out, such that if it suddenly became solid matter, you'd tip over to that side. If you're a teenager that's hyper-focused on finding a mate, you might have a biomagnetic protrusion of another kind. (Your heart!) And so on. So if we can subconsciously create our protrusions, why not consciously then? I was willing to test my hypothesis, and I didn't hold back; I believed it was possible!

I started by imagining my spirit arms while I was driving; they would start at my sides--seats, doors, and other car parts didn't get in the way--and I would raise them up slowly over my head into what I know as a sun salutation. I'd then lower my imaginary spirit hands into prayer position over my heart, then let my spirit arms fall back down to my sides again. I'm in my car for hours every day, and after a few weeks of practicing this, I begin to feel my spirit arms! For those of you who remember learning Reiki, it's like your first time feeling the biomagnetic field, ever so subtle, but you know it's real and that you aren't imagining things. (For those of you who don't know Reiki, it's like your first time experiencing the feeling of falling in love, and how powerful, different and real that is.)

I can only feel my spiritual arms at about 3% of the strength that I feel my physical arms, but it's enough and encourages me to continue practicing. Since they are spirit arms and therefore limitless in range (as are all magnetic fields), I start expanding my arms--with newly upgraded wings--higher and higher into the sky. Until the day I reach up and feel another set of arms reach down--5% strength--and grab mine, merging with them, the loving energy flowing into my heart, and all of my being disappearing into God's Bliss. (Totally new meaning of driving under the influence.) 

I got to the point where I could feel the physical presence of God in my heart any time I was energetically balanced (physical + mental + emotional + spiritual balance = energetical balance), anytime my mind was clear and still, and anytime I could move my consciousness into my heart. And soon after, I was able to experience Jesus in the same way, but even stronger. And I didn't even have to do a sun salutation with my spirit arms anymore for my connections to happen, so I stopped practicing with them. Then weeks went by and I was no longer able to connect at will. And it wasn't until just recently I realized that I needed to practice with my spirit arms again, for I could no longer feel them either.

Hi, my name is Kurt, and it's been a five days since I started practicing with my spirit arms (with wings) again…

Connecting with Jesus – Into the Great Wide Open

I was fortunate enough to be born mostly open-minded, because if I hadn’t been, or if I’d been born to fearful parents, or into a fearful community, perhaps I never would have experienced any of the following in my search as a Christian seeking a closer, real connection with the Divine:

When, early on, I was just trying to think about God more, I made a point to think about Him whenever I saw a digital time with all the same numbers, like 3:33 or 11:11; it was usually once a day, though could sometimes be more. Then I saw an awesome picture of thousands of Muslims bowing and praying to Allah (God), and learned they did that 5 times a day, religiously. This made me reflect on how many times a day I was turning to God, and made me want to “bow” to Him a lot more, which I then started practicing and continue to practice to this day, with the goal of following Him 100% of the time.

When I first learned Reiki and 30-days later had practiced enough to feel biomagnetic fields (as real as I feel anything else), I thought a lot about what it takes for us to heal and for others to heal us, and admired and appreciated Jesus even more for becoming and being the perfect master of healing on all fronts. I was born knowing of Jesus, but this marked the beginning of me wanting to get to know him more personally; though, for all my desire and faith, he was elusive for me for some time, all-the-while giving me signs that I fully appreciated and that led me onward in my seeking.

When I met my first Buddhist hospice patient and she taught me that her practice had always included nightly meditations on her own death—being at peace with it so that when her actual time came, she could be likewise—I started doing the same, and any and all fear of death quickly disappeared, my faith filling-out, filling-in the newly open spaces.

When I felt my spiritual growth was not moving forward enough, I came upon the book Autobiography of a Yogi, and the fairly-recent stories about the possibilities of the spirit and methods to know God personally reinvigorated my seeking. From there I was led to a spiritual talk about Tao (God), Te, Huang Di and Lao Tse, and learned that the way to mergence with the Creator is by quieting the mind and developing oneself as a spiritual heart; I practiced that until I was able to feel Divine peace. And when they said finding spiritual places of power were helpful in developing further, I opened myself to finding one.

When I was walking through my friends’ new house, I trusted the constant tingling down my spine as we were being shown a favorite room, and when I revisited the room on my own later, I discovered a divine, loving energy flowing through it that over the course of three months tuned and raised my vibration enough to feel God’s presence in my heart.

And when my spiritual group invited a psychic to receive Reiki from the three of us to clear some of the blocks she felt she had, and after the session she informed me that Jesus was there with me, I decided to try and feel him the way I feel God. About a week later, Jesus came in through my heart and filled my entire spirit with a peace and a love that eclipsed everything worldly. And since then, he visits with me whenever I invite him, and I am in the right space, and I can clear my mind and open my heart.

All these things and more because I am fortunate enough to be open-minded, open-hearted, ever seeking The Connection.

Connecting with Jesus – Living Water

My spiritual group was now up-to-speed on all my latest Jesus happenings, so we set a conscious intention to connect with him during our meditation. Soon as the meditation began, my thoughts turned off and I entered my heart where I could feel his presence with me, throughout me, subtle and peaceful.

Then about half-way into the 22 minute meditation, it was as if somebody had suddenly turned the sun on right behind me, and I felt as if I was one with this intense but calming light. Had I opened my eyes to find myself floating a little above my chair, I wouldn’t have been surprised, because that’s how light and free I felt. I was wondering what had caused the shift from subtle to intense. I didn’t have to wait long for a possible answer to present itself.

I know it takes the other two people I meditate with a certain amount of time for their minds to settle down. And, in my experience, thinking is a primary block to experiencing the spiritual. I know Jesus himself was not big on thinking; when he said things like, “Why callest thou me good? none is good, save one, that is, God,” and, “I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me,” he was essentially saying, “It’s not my thoughts that matter or that make me good, but being with God and doing His will.”

Lying in bed that night I contemplated all of this in Jesus’ presence. Then knowing the answers and what matters, I stopped thinking so I could be fully present with him in my heart and let him influence all of me without any mental distractions. I soon noticed a strong, wide current of loving energy flowing from behind and through my heart. My first experience of what I would describe as living water; I fell asleep wishing to practice feeling this as often as possible…

Connecting with Jesus – Heart to Heart

Had another Jesus connection today and just noticed a pattern with most of my connections to date; they happen when I am facing another person who has a relationship with Jesus. (The distance has ranged from 4-6 feet, but I’m sure it would happen—maybe with an even stronger sensation—if closer.) Here’s what happened today:

I was in a restaurant waiting room with an acquaintance and we were told it was going to be about 15 minutes. We were initially shoulder-to-shoulder in the crowded room, and since we both seemed content to wait silently, I decided to clear my thoughts and go into my heart to look for Jesus. Being in the peace and calm of my silent heart was very enjoyable, but I wasn’t feeling Jesus just yet.

Two sets of people were called and some seats opened up. Soon as I sat down and went into my little “Where’s Jesus?” trance, I felt him! Then I also noticed that I was now sitting directly across the room from my acquaintance. Interesting. I sat very happily with Jesus in silence until we were called for lunch, looking forward to the conversation I was going to start.

“Mind if I ask you some personal questions of a religious nature?”

     “Sure”

“I’m guessing you’re a Christian right?”

“Yes.”

“Now which would you say is more true for you? You believe in Jesus, or you walk around with him in your heart.”

“Oh! I definitely have a personal relationship with Jesus.”

“Thought so.”

So that now makes three experiences I’ve had with three Jesus lovers where I’ve been facing them and them me, and we were about 4-6 feet away from each other at the time. Shoulder-to-shoulder, no feeling; heart-to-heart, I can feel Jesus is with us. Curious what my next Jesus encounter will be and what else I will learn. I seem to be seeking and finding. Thank you Jesus! Thank you God!

Connecting with Jesus – Feeling is Knowing

I vividly remember the first time I actually, clearly felt Jesus’ presence, while awake. I’d been in his presence many times in visions within dreams, but that’s a whole other post. But because I had met him before, I knew what it felt like to be in his presence.

To help you understand, imagine what your heart feels like when you’re in the presence of someone you are in love with. You could be having a rotten day, walking down the street with your head down, feeling depressed, but if you happened to suddenly bump into that special someone, the swelling of love in your heart would instantly brighten your entire being, like magic.

Well, a few years ago I was having one of those rotten days. I think I was even muttering to myself a little as I grabbed an overpriced container of half-and-half and walked, head down, toward the convenience store counter. Then I suddenly felt Jesus in my heart, uplifting me, lightning my mood. I was totally surprised until I looked up at the cashier—now in front of me—and saw him wearing a big smile and a “Jesus Loves You!” lanyard around his neck.

Then and since then I have learned that Jesus’ instruction, “where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them,” does not require people to make an announcement, but can also easily and spontaneously happen when those who know Jesus in their hearts simply cross paths.

Just the other day I was having dinner with my wife and close friends. The night started with us arriving with take-out food and us all eagerly sitting down to eat. As I listened to the conversations (non-religious/spiritual), I noticed Jesus in my heart and throughout my entire being, and a lot stronger than I had ever felt him while awake before. My body was vibrating in a pleasant way and I had a huge smile on my face. I was still processing and enjoying what was happening, so I didn’t say anything at the time, but watched as the conversation switched to my friend and I being inspired by a series of great ideas for our beginning spiritual practice (yet another post). We were thrilled!

And I was thrilled because that was when Jesus inspired me to write about our connection that was clearly real and clearly happening on a more frequent basis. The next day I thought about what happened, remembered my “Jesus Loves You!” experience, and considered who else at the dinner table had Jesus in their heart. It was clearly my friend who has a whole display cabinet dedicated to Jesus. This was getting very interesting.

At this point, I’m only one post away before I catch up to my present-day Jesus connections. Excited to see where this all leads…

Connecting with Jesus: Stream of Spirit Contemplations – First Post

I've been spending more personal time with Jesus, enough that he's inspired me to blog about the story of our friendship and his mentorship, past and present. This is my first entry. I can feel his presence pretty good these days, so I tried connecting with him to ask him what I should call this series of blog posts. I shut my thoughts off and let my consciousness slip into my open heart, the only place I like to blog and tweet from. I’m totally at peace and I wait, calling out to Jesus. Thoughts clearly and singularly come into my mind:

I want to be honest! I’ve been holding back a little because I sometimes worry how the truth will sound to others. For example, just today I was reading about people’s reactions to an article on how Transcendental Meditation is spiritually dangerous, saying it’s an act of the devil. People be crazy, I mean, under-educated and ill-informed.

Then a pseudo-quote from Mother Thersesa comes into my mind, “In telling the truth, people might offer death threats or say you’re doing the devil’s work. Tell the truth anyway.”

I mention the death threat thing because I was talking with a psychic the other day who can see and talk to angels, and she was saying how she really does gets death threats. And I hate that that’s not more surprising to me. Ok, Mother Theresa, I will tell the truth anyway.

This is me: I’m one of those people who thinks ANYTHING is possible (except going back in time). So when I first read about Jesus saying, “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater,” I absolutely took that literally and absolutely took that to mean he was talking to everyone, including me. So why aren’t more of us there yet?

When I was a chaplain, I met a nursing-home worker named Michael, a great guy who was also surprised people weren’t spontaneously healed more with the power of the Holy Spirit. I fully know how crazy that can sound, I but I also fully know that if you really believe in Jesus, you too must believe these things and more are possible. I also remember meeting a fellow Clinical Pastoral Education student at a workshop in Reading, PA, someone who was taking the traditional pastoral route of seminary, and him being curious why more greater (yes, more greater) things weren’t happening as “promised in the Bible.” And a fellow substitute teacher who wanted to be a monk (of sorts) like me, and wanted that to be a real thing people can make a living doing as a part of society. (I’m curious if I’ll cross paths someday with one or more of them, sharing all that I have learned since then, unless they have learned even more themselves.)

I decide I want to try and connect with Jesus again to get a title for this series, so I re-quiet my mind, slip into my open heart, and I feel Jesus there, being patient. I ask my question and “Connecting with Jesus” comes into my mind. I laugh a little at how easy that was and at how much I like the title, and at how obvious it seems as it jives with my whole blog site in general. Thanks, Jesus!

Sourcery

Does it matter to be conscious of the source of something?

Does the source affect the result?

If the source of a car is Yugoslavia, is that the same as the source being Japan?

Is a car a car?

Is a person a person?

If the source of a person is their parents, is that the same as the source being The Creator?

Does the source affect the result?

Does it matter to be conscious of the source of you?

Signs? Signs!

I was visiting with an acquaintance who is actively looking, but undecided, about moving from his current apartment and onto a new adventure in another state. He retrieved his mail and noted he received a religious newsletter that appeared to be for the previous tenant. He studied it over, where it was from, and said aloud to himself, “Hmmm. Charlotte, North Carolina.” I half-joked, “Wonder if that’s a sign from God that you should move to Charlotte?” And he replied something like, “My mom doesn’t believe in signs.”
 
Hmmmmmmmmm.
 
First, I couldn’t imagine what my life would even be like if I didn’t believe in signs. Take work alone. I’ve been following signs for well over a decade and they have led me to 3 jobs I absolutely love(d), and 1 job that was a year-long, you’re-going-to-suffer-a-lot because-you-need-to-learn-a-lot experience. In thinking about encountering someone who says they don’t believe in signs, I wondered what I might tell them if they asked about my take on them. My mind went philosophical on me:

“We are given what we need. If you are unsure of what direction to head in life, if you take a moment and become aware of what you have been given, then that is exactly what you need to move forward. Like I was given this thought and I took it as my sign that I need to write a blog post about it. And, I guess, generally speaking, people are given a certain number of talents, and that could be taken as their sign to use them. (Get me?)”

I’m now at the point where I want to write more, but signs are not really about wants; they are about needs. And since now, I am not being given anything else to write, I’ll take that as my sign that I must not need to.

Good Vibrations

There is much more to you than meets the eye, that influences your health, your happiness, and your connections with others. People tend to focus on the physical, which I guess is no surprise because that is the easiest to perceive and experience; you don’t have to search for the physical, you simply have to look at it or touch it; it’s real. But there are other layers to you that are equally real, and they go deeper than you may realize. And failing to understand them puts you at a disadvantage if you care to increase your health, happiness, and connections.

Actually, if you think about it, you have experienced and do experience one of these other layers. People may say it's a sixth sense or intuition, but it’s much more scientific than that. It explains why when you meet some people they make you feel good even before they open their mouths, while others give you the creeps. It also explains how you can sometimes tell when someone is watching you, even if they are behind you and 30 feet away.

It is a truth of physics that wherever there is an electric current, there is an interactive magnetic field that is caused by and surrounds that current. Furthermore, the range of that field is infinite in space. As human beings, we have little electric currents running all through our bodies. That means you have magnetic fields emanating from you that can interact with the fields of other people, with no limit on their range. Not science fiction, but scientific fact.

So that explains how you know things about people before you actually start conversing with them. It also explains how you can feel it when someone is looking at you, behind you, from a distance. The vibes of the real you, the real everyone, cannot be hidden and are out there for everyone to perceive, consciously or unconsciously. The good news is that the fields are very subtle and fade in intensity with distance, so the more you distance yourself from “energy suckers” or creepers, the less they will affect you. The bad news is that even if you think you are doing well yourself, your own vibes may tell a different story and may be affecting you in ways that are not beneficial. How can you know?

Short of practicing feeling and adjusting your own magnetic fields, you can do things that make them healthier like eating healthy food, exercising, being more of a lover and less of a hater, practicing stress relief, and making real connections with other wonderful people like yourself. If you’re still unsure of the imbalances that may be affecting you, talk to people you respect and trust about this; you’ll be surprised not only by how many people are already aware of all this, but also by how many people you currently know do “energy work”—feeling and balancing human electromagnetic fields.

Interested in hearing more about this? Ask me a question in the comments below. I have been doing energy work for almost 15 years now and have quite a few amazing stories.

"Open Sesame!"

My memory fades as I get older, which is completely fine, especially since I’m trying not to fill my head with any new junk. I always joke, “As long as I wake up knowing who I am, everything else is just a bonus.” According to my current memory, there is an old-school Bugs Bunny cartoon with a big Arabian guy who is trying to open the magical cave door to a treasure, and he keeps trying different spells like, “Open salami? Open sarsaparilla? Open sesame?” To his surprise, the door suddenly opens.

Wouldn’t it be cool if some things were that simple? You say a few words, or a prayer, or hold a wish in your heart with enough focus that it suddenly and magically happens? For those of you who are intent to seek the big prize in life—the real prize—I’m here to tell you, ye shall find another clue for your journey, and the prize could be as simple as “Open sesame!”

The big prize I am talking about is connecting with whatever you believe about or call the One True light, spark, intelligence, nature, universe, life force, the force that is sustaining everything, from atoms to galaxies to the unseen, for your learning experience and hopeful enjoyment. Like how when you connect with someone you really admire or think is hysterical and those moments and the moments after are better than the rest of your day—that kind of connection. Yes, it’s pretty cool and, contrary to what many believe, it’s actually quite simple. (This is where someone might say, “All great truths are simple.”) As simple as “Open sesame?”

The one small catch is that you are not saying, “Open sesame,” to the Creator, you are saying, “Open sesame,” to yourself. (Huh?) Yes, there is only one magical door standing between you and a connection that will uplift you like no other, and that door is your mind, or more specifically, your thoughts. If only you could magically command your thoughts to open up by shutting up. Because when you quiet your mind, your thoughts, and still all the nonsense, the peace you instantly feel is the connection you always have to the One that is that peace.

The good news is that with a little daily work, you can train your mind to open up (by shutting up), and connect with the peaceful, loving vibes that are the foundation of everything, as easily as saying, “Open sesame.” How? Keep seeking and you will easily find the answer to that one…

Tuning Into a Better Reality

We experience life on many different wavelengths. For example, think about stereotypical groups of young adults in high school and you can probably easily imagine how it might feel to exist on each group’s wavelength, or at the very least, how the one you exist(ed) on feels, and how all the others feel distinctly different. And how when you’re young, parents are on a completely different wavelength, and grandparents another. I don’t feel like I chose my wavelength back then. Did you get to choose yours? Do you choose yours now?
 
If your current wavelength has troubling people in it, know that there are other wavelengths where those people cease to appear (as much). I can say that because when I existed on a lower wavelength of fears, it’s inhabitants found me a lot, because I was unwittingly right on their path; people would come up to me, wanting to fight me, for no reason, which I suppose could be normal for high school, but it never felt quite right for me.
 
30 years later I look back and wonder how that mentality was ever my reality? Whatever wavelength I’m currently on, I know the lower ones with the physically and mentally aggressive individuals still exist, but those paths don’t really seem to cross mine anymore. But I also know, a fight could be only thoughts away, if for some crazy reason I allowed myself to return to the lower wavelengths.
 
I know people tend to think of heaven or nirvana as something you get to experience after you die, but they too are just other wavelengths available to experience, right now, if you know how to tune into them. Talk to anyone who regularly meditates, does yoga, or communes with nature, and they will let you know that those higher wavelengths are as real as the world we live in, and easily accessible with the right mindset. And if you don’t have time for any of those things, just five minutes of letting all of yourself melt away, except for your peaceful and loving intentions, will give you a taste of what your life could be like with practice.

Why Faith Matters

When I think about people I love who are still living, I imagine them wherever they actually are in that moment—at work, at home, maybe on vacation somewhere, etc. When I think about loved ones who have left this life for the next, I actually feel very close to them, because since they are spirits, free of their bodies and can be anywhere, I always imagine them right with me. When I think about God...well, before I tell you where He is for me, where do you imagine Him?
 
I found this kind of interesting but not surprising: When I asked two life-long, devout Catholics who never miss Sunday mass, where they imagine God when they pray to Him, I got two completely different answers. For one, God was in heaven. For the other, God was everywhere, including within us. And when I was a chaplain, I got the spectrum of answers from Him being with you, part of you, to Him being far off somewhere in heaven. And that made me wonder: Does where and how you imagine God make any difference? I guess that depends on what you desire from Him.

If you desire life—defined simply as a living, breathing existence—then, as you've probably already figured out for yourself, you can love Him, hate Him, worship Him, or exclaim He doesn't exist, because He gave you free will, and so He will not just stop blessing you with your gift of life because of what you say or believe. But as you've hopefully also figured out, there's a lot more to life than just simply being alive.

If you desire more love, peace, and bliss in your life, then where and how you imagine God matters a great deal. For example, how much joy do you think you will derive from God if you imagine Him as punishing? How much comfort can you feel from God if you imagine Him far off in heaven, praying that He hears your pleas for help? Conversely, imagine how much ease you'd feel overall if you imagine God as the living light that projects part of Himself in every moment with loving intention to create and sustain you with infinite peace and bliss? That's who and where He is for me, and truthfully, that's who and where he actually is for everyone, without exception.

If it's true that we are created and sustained by a peaceful, loving light, if that’s the essence from which we come, from which we are, and that flows through us, why is it that we do not experience that all the time, or at least whenever we do have the time for it? The answer to that question is faith, and it's why faith matters. The greater your faith to imagine all that God is, the more your imaginary obstacles to Him will disappear, including where and what He is. And when that inevitable moment comes when you quiet your thoughts and disbeliefs enough to finally start experiencing all His love, peace, and bliss flowing through you, as real as the life He gives you, your faith will be replaced with the comfort and gratitude of knowing the truth: He was and always is right there for you, bestowing all His gifts as you are open and ready to receive them.

Why Suffer Chaos?

It’s a fact that shared experiences bond people. And if you’ve seen Band of Brothers or know of anyone who's survived WWII combat, you also know it’s a fact that horrible, shared experiences are particularly good at bonding people. The good side of chaos?

Most of you wouldn’t willingly choose to experience horrible chaos in your life, though perhaps some of you are negligently inviting it in. Why? If you knew the answer to that, you wouldn’t be negligent, and you wouldn’t need to read this. (I guess another title for this post could have been, “Why Bad Things Happen?”)

If you don’t know the meaning of life yet, please allow me to share it with you; it’s actually pretty simple: The meaning of life is to grow in love. If you already love people, hooray, you’re off to a good start. If you love those people selfishly and unconditionally, even better. Now take that love, perfect it, and apply it to everyone, selfishly and unconditionally, and you’ll win the game of life. The number of steps from how much you currently love to how much you can love decides the amount of growth you’ll need to win.

I’ll admit I am nowhere near the finish line, but knowing the rules of the game makes it infinitely easier to play. It's a hard truth that in the game of life, growth either occurs in reaction to self-driven effort or life-driven chaos. In other words, if you are not continually pushing yourself to grow in love on your own, you could say you are in need of some chaos to push you forward.

You might infer from all this that I am saying that chaos will definitively stop happening to you and around you when you become more loving. I am not saying that; I can’t say that because I just don’t know what life has in store for you personally. What I am saying, what I do know, is that the more you fully grasp the meaning and rules of the game of life, the less you will experience the bad side of chaos, and the more you will experience the lessons and opportunities to grow in love. Consider this: When chaos does hit, who would you want next to you? Someone who is freaking-out, fearful, crying, and fully experiencing all the horror and drama of the chaos, or someone who is calm, collected, peaceful, loving and soothing the situation in which life has placed you? Who would you be? Who would you want to be?

On the chance that continually pushing yourself to grow in love does result in less chaos, please do your part. In the meantime, to pseudo-quote Louis C.K., “Of course it’s horrible when bad things happen. Earthquakes, plane crashes, wars. Of course those things are horrible. Of course they are. But maybe, just maybe, they need to happen to bond us to create more love in the world.”

Finding the Kingdom...

Ever go on a quest, in search of…, only to find out--surprisingly--it ended pretty much where you originally started. Happened to my wife when she thought she wanted to move back to NY, only to find out--surprise--she loved it where she was in PA. Happened to any of us who played that 90s PC game Myst. (“Bring me the blue pages!”) Happened to me when I decided I wanted to find God, not just talk to Him from afar.

I’ve always been a vivid dreamer who enjoys that other world, the one with no rules, where I can fly and make the sun rise. I thought if I could come face to face with God anywhere, it would be there. I’d call out into the sky, but He never appeared.

Where do you imagine He is? When you pray, is He far off in heaven and you’re hoping He is receiving you? Is He in the room with you, but you can’t see Him or feel Him yet? Where is He really?

The perhaps mind-boggling thing about finding God, is that once you realize where He is, you’ll simultaneously realize that He was there the whole time, and that, hey, wow, it is true that “the kingdom of God is within you.” But first, you have to understand what that seeming mystery means.

For those of you who think of God only as a creator, you might imagine He created heaven and earth and Adam and Eve, only to then sit back in heaven, watching and occasionally amazing. If so, God may seem far away for you and therefore hard to imagine Him right with you.

Stay with me here: When you eventually come to the realization that God is not only a creator, but a sustainer--in that, in every second, we exist as ongoing projections of His light and love, condensed into energy and matter, living His dream with our own free will--you will then know the truth that you are actually created by His image, in His image, and with Him always.

He IS every molecule, every atom, every breath, every life. You cannot be separate from Him, even if you proclaim He doesn’t exist. Yes, you can create all the imaginary distance you want, or neglect the bond you have, but the flip side of that truth is, you can be as close to Him as you want, to the point of disappearing in His bliss for little vacations from our world.

The kingdom of God is within you. Quiet all the chatter in your head and experience His bliss today...

The World's Best Employment Agent

When you're just starting out in the world, there's always a handful of dreamers who advise you to do what you love for a living. That sounds nice, but it often seems an impossible reality. Then there’s that Bible verse that says if you delight yourself in God, He will give you the desires of your heart. Well, I learned that one's absolutely true, even if you're somewhat uncertain about what your heart wants.

In all my 46 years, the hardest question for me was always what I wanted to be when I grew up. I think I may have finally figured it out; however, along the way, I've gotten some amazing jobs with the help of the world's best employment agent. One job in particular, I never would have imagined myself doing, especially not when I was young, growing up on Long Island, New York.

I'm told I was a mischievous little kid, not because I was bad per se, but because it was fun. So when I was six and saw my neighbor was outside, the one who worried when I climbed trees, I pretended not to notice her and climbed to the very top of our oak tree, hanging out on a little branch, swinging and laughing to myself as she ran panicked into her house to quickly phone my mom and alert her. Not horrible, but not exactly an angel either. Perhaps that's why my parents were so surprised when a Catholic bishop halted mid-procession at an ordination ceremony in Queens, putting his hand on my seven-year-old head and proclaiming, "He is one of us."

I didn't go on to become a priest, or attend seminary, or even sign up to be an altar boy. I stopped attending church when I was 18. And in my late thirties, while a Reiki volunteer at a hospice in Connecticut, I even laughed out loud when a minister suggested I consider becoming a chaplain. Sure I had a solid personal relationship with God by then, where He was actively guiding my life, but my relationship was still new, it was private, and I wasn't feeling moved to share it with everyone...yet.

When I relocated to Pennsylvania, switching hospices and positions, my office magically just happened to be next to the lead chaplain. Within a few days, I saw that my office job of managing people and things didn't seem nearly as interesting as his job of visiting patients and families in the community, mostly just being present with them, and occasionally talking about and to God. I decided then that I did indeed want to be a chaplain, and with zero training, I consulted with my employment agent to see what could be done.

According to the world, to be chaplain, you needed to meet a bunch of requirements, including but not limited to a masters of divinity, multiple units of clinical pastoral education (CPE), and an ordination and endorsement from a recognized faith group. I officially had none of those and calculated it would take 4-5 years to reach my goal if I followed man's way.

My employment agent steered me away from seminary, had me sign up for and got me enrolled in one unit of CPE (with the help of the lead hospice chaplain), and gave me the green light on an online ordination for "those who felt they were being called" (though I'll always feel my original ordination was when I was seven). During CPE I learned that a lot of other chaplain candidates were also seeking work and going about it the more accepted and traditional way, masters in divinity and all. But since I had prior experience with my employment agent getting me amazing positions, I moved faithfully forward until His plans for me played out.

I remember it was about a year later and I was in temporary career limbo substitute teaching. I learned that one of my coworkers from the PA hospice was now a volunteer coordinator at Heartland Hospice and that it would be very easy for me to start giving and teaching Reiki there as a volunteer, almost immediately. We made plans for me to talk to the staff and introduce the new program, then suddenly everything was put off for months because they were moving their office.

When I finally did get to give my talk, it magically just happened to be on the same week their chaplain had quit. The clinical director, clinical supervisor, and office manager were all fellow transplants from New York. They all thought a masters in counseling was as good as a masters in divinity, and with my unorthodox ordination and my one unit of CPE, they hired me as their new spiritual care counselor. Ayyyy ohhh, God truly does work in mysterious ways! And that job--that I never would have picked on my own had He not led me there in steps--filled the desires of my heart for the years I was blessed to have it.