About 18 years ago, I wrote The Happiness Revolution. Recently, its Appendix B has been replaying in my mind. It was a dream-like dictation that woke me one August morning in 2006.
In the last two years, cancer and the upcoming advent of my 70th birthday reshuffled my life’s priorities. It ‘purged my personal growth bucket list’ of my top 50 life priorities narrowing them to three: love, family, and having meaningful conversations. These three have been constant in my heart for years.
Capturing those ‘meaningful conversations’ as a writer, journalist, and lifelong student has always been an obsession of joy and fascination. Maybe just the act of writing my dreams and desires oiled an inner listening device and activated a voice of truth that I would later know to be my own, while ridding my mind of unwanted squeaky chatter.
Recently I was reminded that such conversations began at around age ten when youth ministers, my parents and a host of odd elders all appeared around me. They resurfaced twice more at ages 14 and 17. With tidal swells of insights using books and ideas, they lifted me out of the harbor of self-imposed limitations and started me on my quest to ponder and paddle on streams of inner knowledge. After that, reading the Upanishads and the ‘great books’ became a habitual flow of magic missions… every inward journey helping me to remember who I am and who I could become.
My view of meaningful conversations expanded. I realized that our most sacred conversations are constantly available to all of us—at any age, any time. Just grab some paper and pen, oil your inner listening device with a few soothing breaths or beverages, and prepare for the unexpected.
Here is that loving voice which swept through my keyboard on an early August morning to comfort my despairing heart in a mid-life crisis. It was gentle and direct. It seemed both feminine and firm.
Enjoy!
OB1
There is no other.
An Excerpt from The Happiness Revolution by Blair Lewis, Appendix B
Until you hear my voice, there is no other voice worth hearing.
Until you heed my voice, there is no other worth heeding.
You may need tragedy to interrupt all your distractions in order to find me. However, you need not seek out such drama, simply quiet your restless body and breath. This will soothe your mind and soon I will appear.
On a quiet morning sit still. Compare these two voices as you recite the following in the privacy of your mind: “I am here, I need nothing.” And, “I want this, I fear that!” Repeat it over and over until you can hear the difference.
Until you can hear me, there is no one else to listen to.
Many people will come and go in your life. They always have and they always will. But I am your one faithful companion. I am that which brings insight, clarity, laughter and love to every moment.
You may offend them or you may serve them, but until you serve me, you are only a victim or puppet of others. I am the only way. Have no other Gods before me, including television, the suggestions and opinions of others, memory, desire, fear, intellect or hatred. If there is a larger picture, a God of the heavens, a prince or princess of peace, you will not find them or see them, until you know me. It is through me that all is known and all is seen.
Until you hear my voice, the voices of others will please you, confuse you and frighten you. There is no way you can ever organize and assimilate the events of this world until you bond with me.
I am known by many names, but in truth I am most easily known by your name. When your beloved calls out your name, your lover is not calling out to your mind, but rather to you. Not the memories, not the histories, not the recent past or the fantasies of the future, but here and now, your beloved wants you. And I am that.
I am your conscience. When you see me as your true identity and no longer mistake yourself for your personal past, your desires, or your errors, then you will forsake all these trappings and join me. Then you will be at peace.
Everyone wants you. Everyone uses you for their own needs. In return, you try to use them to satisfy your wants and desires. It works a lot of the time, but the achievements are short-lived. They claim to love you and want to be with you forever. But, someday all of them will leave. The only one who will always be with you is me.
Why keep trying to please them, find them, or use them? It is a hoax that it will help you.
Once you recognize me, enjoin with me, merge into me, then the world is your toy and everything becomes a possibility. No longer will fear hold you back or lust drive you into a corner. Your ability to love others becomes unlimited and life becomes grand.
Once you know me, once you are me, then all that ever was and ever will be, is yours.
You only need to pause and consider the possibility of my existence. I am the love you seek.
I leave you with these comments:
I Am The Great Sun
I am the great Sun, but you do not see me.
I am your Husband, but you turn away.
I am the Captive, but you do not free me.
I am the Captain you will not obey.
I am the Truth, but you will not believe me.
I am the City, where you will not stay.
I am your Wife, your Child, but you will leave me.
I am that God, to whom you will not pray.
I am your Counsel, but you do not hear me.
I am the Lover, whom you will betray.
I am the Victor, but you do not cheer me.
I am the Holy Dove, whom you will slay.
I am your Life, but if you will not name me,
Seal up your soul with tears and never blame me.
— Charles Causley, on a Norman Crucifix, 1632.
I am waiting – ever calling, ever loving, ever waiting.
Because there is no other.
Love,
Terri and Blair
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Fear is selfish.
Courage is selfless.