Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – A Spiritual Life

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Bible, Choice, Lou Holtz, Personal, Religion, Religious path, Spiritual, spirituality

I believe that having a spiritual life is so important in everybody’s life.

Lou Holtz

What is spirituality? What is spiritual? It is what you decide it is. For some, it’s reading a Bible and going to church. For others it is meditating. For others, it is being in nature or spending a quiet afternoon with family.

Each of us gravitates to what we need. I enjoy reading my Bible daily, doing my spiritual exercises, working through my yearly discourses, journaling, and doing my best to live up to the things my religious path requires.

I believe that each of us chooses the life we want. We choose what we believe and ignore what we don’t. It was Henry Ford that said, “When you believe you can do a thing, or not, you’re right.” I believe this quote fits what I’m trying to say here. Whatever spiritual beliefs you hold are right.

Each of us lives our lives the way we want to (with certain limits). For me, having spirituality in my life is a wonderful thing. For others it may be a bunch of “mumbo jumbo”. This is OK. Each of us needs to follow our own path. That path is perfect for us.

Now, if you are unhappy with what you’ve chosen—change it. Go out and investigate various spiritual paths and start experimenting. If you put your effort into this, you’ll find something that aligns perfectly with what you need.

My path is exactly what I want and need. It fills gaps in my life that would be empty without spirituality. If you feel yourself feeling “empty”, this may be what you are missing. You are the only one who can make that decision.

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – What is the Lesson?

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Attachment, backup, creativity, Problems, redundancy, Resilience, Spiritual, spirituality

I missed yesterday’s posting because of a laptop that decided to die on me. I thought we lost power in the house, but actually it was my laptop battery. HP laptops need a working battery, despite being plugged in, before the operating system will kick in (My brother is a professional techie, and helped me figure it out).

Not a big deal since I have a desktop, but my desktop has been unused for about 6 months, and now I’m dealing with all of the updates that I didn’t do. Oh, well.

What does this have to do with spirituality? It is a lesson in undue attachment. I thought I was living a pretty detached life, but then this laptop thing happened and I went into a bit of a tizzy. The lesson was clear. I am not as detached as I thought I was.

Well, I’ve got a battery on order and things are back to normal, but wait….I don’t have a webcam anymore. Oh no!!!! Not a problem I’ll go to Amazon and place an order. Webcams are out of stock on Amazon, Best Buy, Staples, and Walmart. Logitech, a manufacturer of webcams is out too. I thought for a moment. It’s the remote work that has increased one thousand fold since the lockdown.

To overcome this, I’m using a Bluetooth keyboard and my iPhone app to make today’s posting. My PC is updating and is only at 24% so it was time to get creative. It was also a keen lesson on the importance of backup systems and redundancy. Lesson learned on a few different fronts.

I missed yesterday’s posting due to this debacle, but now I’m back on track.

The moral of the story. You always have room to improve and you are never safe from unexpected issues that pop up. It’s how you handle these problems and continue to strive forward that matters.

Well, folks. That’s all I got for today as I stare at a blue screen with 24% on it. I hope each of you has a terrific Saturday!

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – The Love You Give Returns

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Altruism, Charity, Giving, Goodwill, Love, Saturday, Selfless, spirituality

What is spirituality? Some folks believe it is attending church, a mosque, or a synagogue, and following the rituals associated with their religions. Others meditate and read and learn about mindfulness and themselves. Still others do the best they can for their families, contribute or take part in charities, and follow the golden rule. Based on what I’ve written here, it is what you make of it.

Spirituality, at its most simple level, is serving others. It is giving and receiving love. It is putting everything you have into something. Putting love into it. It is extending your goodwill to all. It is expressing your love for others without trying to control them or forcing them to be who you want them to be. This is a detached love. It is loving someone for who they are, nothing more. It is a love without strings attached.

When you do something selflessly for someone else, there’s a good feeling that comes with it. It’s like love leaves you and goes where you are putting your efforts. Then, that love returns to fill you right back up. The more love you give, the more you get. This universe is just that simple. It is we humans that make it hard. The human mind loves complicating things.

Have you ever decided to love someone and serve them, regardless of what they do or don’t do? It is a very selfless act. It is also hard. It’s hard to serve and love someone that does not return that love. Yet, it still comes back. The more love you give, the more you get.

Think about a dog. Dogs are selfless lovers. When you walk in the door, they are so excited to see you. When you are watching TV or reading a book or whatever, that dog is always there. Right there with you. Can you imagine how much love that dog feels? They love without regrets, without demanding something in return. This is a perfect example of selfless love. The more love you give, the more you get.

Are you in a difficult relationship? Remember how wonderful it was when you first met? Over time, little things build up. Little slights. Little trespasses. You wake up one day and things aren’t right anymore. How do you get it back? You guessed it. Love your partner. Love them. Serve them. Expect nothing. Don’t fix them. Let them be who they are. The more love you give, the more you get.

The more love you give, the more you get.

Have a great Saturday, folks.

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – In Times of Trouble…

Tags

Bible, God, Inner Peace, Meditation, Prayer, Religious Practice, Spiritual Exercises, spirituality, The Calm

They say that we seek comfort during times of trouble. Many reach out to friends and family. Others use activities to take their mind off of things. Some turn to their religious beliefs.

It’s hard now because they’ve banned public gatherings across the country. Religious institutions are closed. No one but families in the home can get together. So how do you get comfort?

Some religious institutions are offering worship services online. Others are doing charitable work in the community by delivering food and other items to those less fortunate or at risk. Some will read their Bible or religious tome and rely on the faith they have in their hearts. I fall into the last group. I have a faith belief that all things happen for a reason and that whatever happens is exactly what should happen. “Everything is in its rightful place in the worlds of God.” – Harold Klemp.

How you comfort yourself and your family is up to you. I am comforted by the timeless principles in the scripture I read daily. I am also comforted by the daily spiritual exercises that help me reach the calm within. It is always there—waiting.

I hope each of you finds the calm in your own way. It is a tremendous place to be during calamity, disaster, and chaos, when the world seems to get more frightening daily.

Be safe. Follow the guidance provided by authorities. Take care of each other. We will all get through this together.

Until next time…

Dave

 

 

Daily Ramblings – Motivation Monday – Week of March 16, 2020 – Updated

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Blogging, Coronavirus, Exercise, Learning, motivation, Reading, social media, spirituality, Writing

***Both of my gyms have closed. I’ll be moving all of my workouts into the home with my exercise bands.*** 

Well, it’s another week, folks!

What are you working on? As always, I packed my week with reading, writing, educating myself, spiritual work, and exercise. It’s going to be great fun!

My schedule:

• Scene construction for my fiction book – daily.
• Blogging – daily.
• Spiritual reading – daily.
• Spiritual exercises (meditation) – daily.
• Exercise – daily (see my workout routine) – daily.
• Algebra, Spanish, Python, NLP classes – daily.
• Post articles and quotes to social media – daily.
• Read writing book, fiction book, and Bible – daily.
• Journal – daily.

With all the news about the coronavirus (COVID-19), I would be remiss if I didn’t discuss it briefly. My advice: take all measures specified by your government. If you get sick, stay home, watch your symptoms, and get yourself to a hospital if your symptoms get worse.

Take care of yourself. Eat right, drink plenty of fluids, keep social distance, and help out your friends and family if they need it. My folks are in their late 70s and early 80s, so I’ll be on hand to step in and help if they get sick. We’re in a pretty small town and have not had any cases arise yet. We’re monitoring it.

What to do? Read, catch up on your movie watching, pay attention to your new outlets, exercise at home if your gym is closed or too far away, and follow any protocols your employer has put in place. My brother, sister, wife, niece, and nephew have all been moved to remote work/school, so life will be different for a few weeks.

Most important: Do Not Panic. I know it’s hard with the 24-hour news cycle, but use your common sense and don’t go overboard. Everything will be alright.

Have a great week, folks!

Until next time…

Dave

 

Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – Reaching an Accord

Tags

Challenging People, Dreams, Harold Klemp, Karma, Past lives, Reaching an Accord, Soul Travel, spirituality

One of the biggest lessons we can learn in life is to do everything possible to reach an accord with the individual we are having trouble with.

—Harold Klemp
The Language of Soul

Human beings are social creatures. We enjoy interacting with one another, making friends, and hanging out. Every once in a while, you run into that one person that just rubs you wrong the moment you meet them. Have you ever run across someone like that?

If you believe in karma, you already know the reason for this disagreeableness. Karma does not pertain only to this lifetime, it spans lifetimes. So, whenever you run across someone you immediately dislike or a person who dislikes you, this is typically the culprit.

How do you solve a conundrum of this sort? Go into prayer, meditation, or contemplation, and ask: Why is this happening? Then pay attention to what comes during your period of prayer, meditation, or contemplation. You can also pay attention to your dreams. The answer can come through there too.

The problem associated with karma is when you earned it with another person. Some of it you earn during this lifetime. The rest of your karma comes from previous lives. Once you know what’s going on, you can work with it.

For those of you who don’t believe in this sort of thing, that’s ok. There are numerous articles online you can read that can help you with challenging people.

If this topic intrigues you, here’s a book you may want to read. It’s called Past Lives, Dreams, and Soul Travel, by Harold Klemp, the author of the quote above. You can get the Kindle version for $8.49.

Well, that’s it for today, folks. I hope you are having a terrific weekend!

Until next time…

Dave

 

Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – Be Grounded in Something

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Doing your Best, Expertise, God, Grounded, Harold Klemp, Paying attention, spirituality

“Become an expert in something. You need to be grounded in something. When you do something for God, for the highest principle, you do each step until it sings.”

—Harold Klemp, The Language of Soul

When I first joined the Army back in the early 80s, my first few years were tough. I was going through the motions, doing all I could to stay out of trouble, but my heart wasn’t in it. I was in this organization 24 hours a day and wasn’t really doing all I could to do my best.

I thought about that one weekend and decided to change things up. I said to myself, “You’re here. You might as well make the best of it and do the best you can at anything the Army asks you to do.” It was hard at first.

Then, as I began to gain some pride in myself, I began feeling good about my uniform, my room, my equipment. I began to put even more effort into the service. I began reading military history, started exercising in the base gym, began reading regulations, field manuals, anything I could get my hands on. You know what? My life in the Army transformed. I actually began to enjoy the service I volunteered for. The remaining 18 years was a joy.

I’m not sure if other veterans can relate, but I’m pretty sure that a great many followed the same path I did. They realized that they were here, anyway. Why not do your best with the time you have?

That lesson led to many other experiences and taught me something. It’s better to do the best you can on any job, than half-ass it. You feel great when you do a good job. You feel great when you develop expertise in something. The people around you notice too. They will approach you to help them. They will ask you how you got good at it. They will notice.

I enjoy writing. I enjoy learning. I enjoy programming. I enjoy exercise. I enjoy my spiritual path. In each of these areas and many others I do my best. I do the best I can.

The moral of this posting is this: We can all be lazy and do the bare minimum. That’s easy. If this is you, try something different. Try putting all you have into each task, whether it’s making your bed, folding your laundry, or taking out the trash. Take your time, do the best job you can do. Then, when you’re done, take a minute and think about how you feel. It’s a great feeling when you know you did your best. It feels even better when you decide to do your best for God. Then, it takes on a whole new meaning.

Do everything until it sings.

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – Watch What you Let In

Tags

consciousness, facebook, Negativity, News, social media, spirituality, Stress

“Negativity sells.” – Stephen A. Smith

I follow Stephen King on Facebook and he mentioned today that he was leaving Facebook because there was so much false and misleading information on the platform. I agree, but Facebook has one primary purpose for me–to stay connected with friends and family.

When I first started using Facebook, I’d accept friendship requests from anyone. Then I began to learn my lesson rather quickly. Fake profiles, crazy crap showing up on my newsfeed, and people pestering me for money on Facebook messenger. Lesson learned. In early 2017 I went through my entire list of “friends” on Facebook and developed my own simple rule: If I haven’t worked with someone, met them in person, went to school with them, served in the military with them, or met them through a trusted source, like WordPress, friendship is rejected. You know what? My newsfeed is now filled with wholesome, funny, and relevant content that I enjoy.

The false and misleading information doesn’t stop at Facebook. It is all over the news. Another lesson: Stop reading the news. I scan the news, because I like to stay up on world events and know what’s going on, but I do not open up any news articles unless it’s from my hometown newspaper or it covers something I am interested in, like STEM topics, productivity, psychology, writing, or movie/music/book reviews. If I read something outside of my interest areas, it is purely for entertainment. You know what? My stress levels decreased immeasurably. Just because I refuse to get sucked into articles that are designed to piss me off, stress me out, or make me worry about something.

I guess what I’m trying to get across is the importance of maintaining your sanity by paying attention to what you let in to your consciousness. If you enjoy reading articles filled with lies, exaggerations, and are so slanted one way or another to fire you up, go for it. I choose not to. I’d rather fill my mind with the next scientific discovery on the horizon, look at terrific photos of landscapes, animals, or outer space. I’d rather learn something than read about all the infighting that has reduced our political dialogue to two monkeys throwing shit at each other at the zoo.

Read fulfilling literature, poetry, a well-written non-fiction or fiction book. Watch a good movie. Listen to healing music (classical, sound scapes, and instrumentals are my favorite). These are the things I use to build myself up.

The next time you feel yourself getting stressed out, check what you are letting into your life. I think you’ll be surprised at the stress you have that is self-inflicted.

I hope all of you have a great weekend!

Until next time…

Dave

Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – Earth is a Classroom

Tags

Coincidence, Experience, Growth, Learning, Maya, Purpose, spirituality, Truth, Unfoldment

Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself and know that everything in this life has a purpose. There are no mistakes, no coincidences. All events are blessings given to us to learn from. Elizabeth Kübler-Ross – Courtesy Wisdom Quotes

When I look back on my life, it is amazing to see how all the puzzle pieces come together. Each action, each decision resulted in my current circumstances. Perhaps it is because I like to find those pivot points—the points in my life that impacted my future life. I suppose all of our actions are pivot points, but the ones I think about are the points we arrive at that are forks in the road. If I went this way, I’d be here. If I went that way, I’d be there.

I believe this quote to the bone. We are exactly where we are supposed to be. The things that occur in our life are not a chance, bad luck, good luck, or mistakes. They just are.

It is sometimes surprising to see this in action. Why did I do that? So I could be doing this now. Why did I go there?  So I could be here now. I may not be explaining this right, but everything, and I mean everything has led to where I am.

All of us experience pain, suffering, hardships, and loss. We also experience love, success, joy, and pleasure. These are all realities in our lives. Our loved ones will pass away like we will someday. How do you deal with that? You live your life the best way you can, serve others, and realize that the physical shell you wear in this lifetime is just that–a shell. The real you is eternal. That you never dies. Nor do the real selves of your loved ones. We all continue.

When you realize this truth, there is no sorrow, pain, hardships or loss. There is only experience. This experience is what the real you needs to unfold and become more aware. The more you experience, the more you grow. The more you grow, the more service you can provide. Serving others without expectation of reward is the key. When you give of yourself selflessly, you gain more than you know.

The real you is on Earth to learn. Earth is a classroom. Nothing more, nothing less.

Until next time…

Dave

 

 

 

Daily Ramblings – Spiritual Saturday – Learning from Silence

Tags

Awareness, Calm, Inner Peace, Quiet, silence, solitude, spirituality

Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself and know that everything in this life has a purpose. There are no mistakes, no coincidences. All events are blessings given to us to learn from. Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, Courtesy: Wisdom Quotes

Silence. Most of us have a hard time with it. When I began my spiritual practices, the mind went crazy. Thoughts arose and off I went running down one of many rabbit holes.

When we think of noise, we think of loud voices, music, or traffic. The thoughts in your mind are also a noise. How do you turn this noise off? You rise above it. You can do this in several ways. One way I use is to create a metaphor. My thoughts become a stream of water running by me at my feet. When you can direct your mind to create these types of pictures, it becomes busy with that and the real you can leave it behind, much like a fussy child who is given a toy to play with in a doctor’s office. As soon as they have this source of entertainment, they pipe right down. The real you is Soul.

When I achieve this silent state, my body is calm. It relaxes to a point of almost going to sleep—almost. The serenity of this state is like floating in a perfectly calm pool with a temperature perfect for you. You could stay there for hours. Time stops. Everything is clearer. Each time you achieve this clarity, your awareness grows. This awareness is like the difference between looking down from a tree and looking down from a skyscraper. The more you can see the better decisions you’ll make. You will see the patterns in life and how everything that you experience was exactly what you needed when you needed it.

Experiences are painful and pleasurable. We learn more when things are painful. We learn what not to do. We see how we caused a situation through our lack of awareness. When we learn from these painful episodes, we avoid doing things that cause these painful experiences. This is wisdom.

Well, that’s it for today.

I wish each of you a terrific weekend.

Until next time…

Dave