We should understand that everything happens according to God’s will, whatever occurs happens with His will. We are here with obligations, with duties to perform, this we should understand too, something which can be difficult to grasp. If everything occurs with God’s will, why are we involved? If everything is ordained, why are we given the options of what is correct and what is prohibited? To understand, first we need to establish trust in God, and part of that trust means living without tomorrow, it means we are not worried about the future. We have no doubt, that worry has left because we trust in God, because we know everything is in His hands. Nevertheless we do have obligations, we do have duties, there are things we need to accomplish.
Sometimes this might be difficult to grasp because here we are, doing what we can in the world to accomplish certain things, and we are supposed to be satisfied with whatever occurs. This means we persist with goals, yet without attachment to them, we try to do things but without attachment to results. We think we are supposed to have results with certain things, we think a state of prayer should have results. The preparation to receive God seems to promise results, but prayer to God should be understood as obedience to Him.
If we understand obedience, the scope of obedience, and put ourself in that state, we can have that state of trust, we are not worried about results because all we are doing is being obedient. We need to find satisfaction in this act of obedience which requires an understanding quite different from the understanding of obedience in worldly terms, obeying the authority admonishing us to go to college, get a degree, raise a family, to work, to do all this in our life. Understand why we do what we do. Is it to make money, to satisfy our desires, our mind? Do we understand root causes, the reason we do things?
To understand this path we must understand our root causes, we must take the time to learn what they are, and if they are not the right reasons, we need to learn what they should be. This is what wise teachers tell us, they tell us how to interact with our life and our God, how to teach ourself to behave in certain situations if we want to be obedient to His will.
We can only understand Him if we are obedient to His will. Find someone who has that obedience, who can show us what it is like to be obedient, what happens when we are. When this is foremost in our existence our state begins to change. That is what this path is about, understanding a way to be, to live, to exist, it is about becoming, being a certain way, incorporating specific states of being, not merely talking about them, being them. What happens to us in moments of stress, moments of difficulty, how do we react, how are we different? If things seem easy, are we happier than when they are difficult? When we are praised are we more at ease than when we are blamed? Who are we? How do we react in different situations?
They say those with the greatest trust in God welcome difficulty more than they welcome ease, the usual possibilities of the world mean little to them. Their understanding is that things unfold as God wills, so they can exult in whatever they receive, it is something to praise, it is seen as a gift, even difficulties are seen as gifts. This means a different way of approaching the world, an approach no longer intended to satisfy the ego driven animal soul. This understanding, bypassing everything else, tries to form a relationship with the deepest part of our being, the part of our being which is the soul that comes directly from God.
First we have to be conscious of what constitutes everything else, so that when it begins to interfere with our state of being we recognize the interference. When this takes hold of us, pulling in certain directions, we need to know what it is, we need to know how to get off the train. Once we board the train it takes us wherever the conductor is headed, and he is someone we do not necessarily know, someone who can drop us off at strange, dangerous places unless we watch where we are going. Under the influence of our own lower self, or the influence of others following their lower self, we go only to places where the lower self goes, places where this inclination goes. This is an inclination away from God towards corruption, which means here anything taking us away from God. Not being involved with God takes us away from Him, confusing because there are many ways, even in the name of religion, we can be taken away from God. We should be careful, apply the smell test to everything we do. Does it smell authentic, does it smell holy, does it smell God-like or does it smell of the world?
We have an indwelling sense of right and wrong, an inherent sense of the soul which is from Him. If we can be at ease without the motives of our animal self, we can have the right understanding. To do this we have to be rid of our animal inclinations, be in a peaceful enough place so that these raging inclinations leave us, so that the ego driven inclinations of the world, of mind and desire leave us, then we can be in the place where we know right from wrong.
If we are thirsty we need to search for water to quench our thirst. We have to develop a true thirst for truth, not let anything quench that thirst but truth, we have to develop a sense of the appropriate and hold ourself to that standard, nothing less. The truth exists within us, we should not let it be veiled. The truth walks with us as the animal qualities do, both are within us. We can choose which side we are connected to and stand with that.
To stand on the side which is truth we need to develop trust in God, trust that what we are given is satisfactory, trust that what we are given is appropriate for our development. We should learn contentment because He reigns within contentment, we should learn patience because He reigns within patience, His kingdom exists within these qualities. If we want to be in His kingdom we have to live in these qualities or we are outside His realm. The one who locks us out is our own self, we put ourself in a place of detention away from the truth, close the door behind us and discover we have left the key at home. We need to get back home to unlock the detention center.
Go home, get back in, realize that to be with Him we need to be like Him. We are capable of being like Him, God created man in His image, He wants us to be like Him, we exist to be like Him, yet we have created a list of other reasons for our existence. These other reasons are different for each of us, but they have become the priority, the most important things in our life, the things which motivate us. We should be motivated by Him and for Him, we should understand the qualities and levels of patience. It is easy to be patient if we see that everything we can think of has been granted, it is much more difficult when we cannot see this.
A wise man was once asked, “When is patience most difficult, what is the most difficult time to be patient?”
The answer was, “The patience required to be without Him.” Understand that most of us are in the place which is most difficult for patience. Do we realize what we are being patient about? We cannot enter that realm of patience unless we realize we are walking around without Him, not even contemplating what we do not have.
It is essential to enter that realm, to know how lost we are without Him. When we are overwhelmed by our animal side, by our animal qualities, we should understand it, be conscious of it and change our state. If we do that it involves us in the mystery of creation, the intention to change pulls us to the mystery of creation, it separates us from the ordinary, takes us to the state of a true human being. We should make this intention grow, make the intention to exist with Him be a driving force in our life, the reason we do things. We should be actively inclined to live closer to Him, do the things which are necessary to be closer to Him.
Some of us have been given a miracle in our lives, we have lived in the company of a saint, we have watched what a saint does, what a true human being does. We have been blessed to see serenity in the presence of saintliness, when the interference of the world is cut away. There is nothing more important than that saintliness, than the true humanity of a person who represents the qualities of God. Our own elevation in that presence is beyond anything we have experienced.
The mind is incapable of differentiating the past from the future, it sees what happens now as no different from its memory. If we learn to use wisdom instead of the mind, use our inherent nature, we use a different part of our being. Intellect shuts down, judgment and illuminated wisdom function, then the heart vibrates without thought, we become qualities without definition, without the noise of the world. We become more like our true self, more like the eternal self existing within us. If we focus exclusively on worldly things or the body’s aches and pains, on the remedies we need for it, we identify ourself with the body, with images our mind creates. This pulls us away from the serenity and totality of being which comes in the presence of saintliness. We are pulled away from becoming God-like in serenity, in tranquility or peace, in patience, gratitude, mercy and compassion.
But that is the place we need to be. We must have a vehicle and a navigation system to help us find God. May He let each of us understand the path, make it easy for us to find it, stay on it and go towards Him.
