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.