The loss of Sacred Text and the finding of spirituality

One of the saddest things that happened to me as a result of abuse was losing the ability to find comfort in the sacred text of my faith.

This was a direct result of the 'accusing voices' or 'critical parent' script, that told me what to believe about what I was reading once I physically got away from the abusive family and church I was a part of.

I was always able to find joy in the Psalms, however.

I have only just recently been able to return to other portions of the Word. The Gospel of John has always been a deep comfort, along with his other books. They are so mystical, so only-easily grasped by the heart and spirit, that I don't know if I ever heard a sermon on them. 

The Song of Songs was another - oh, to be loved that way, and to love! I have returned to this book over and over through the years, re-reading it over and over before key moments in my spiritual journey.

Before I became Catholic, it was all I read. Before I entered Mt. Carmel and before my first and second promise. I imagine if I am called to continue in Carmel the rest of my life, I shall return again to this masterwork of the Spirit.

With the freedom of the Spirit, I have been able to read and appreciate other spiritual traditions without fear of being hexed by the bogeyman.

I'm currently reading The Four Agreements, and I've found that its common sense take on life not only echoes but reinforces my own tradition, and give me muscular practice in spiritual change.

I find the sayings / teachings of Rumi inspiring as well.

Right now for formation I'm reading the Spiritual Canticle of St. John of the Cross. I feel like I am looking into his soul. It is his personal Song of Songs. Sometimes I almost feel carried away, out of myself. I can't read it through without entering a spiritual state.

Poetry has always spoken to me, has been there for me, and has given me a voice to express the inexpressible in my own life.

My day has been tiring. My sleep was broken multiple times, by outside forces, but I was able to surrender my sleep to my Higher Power, even surrender the inability to return to sleep, and took it as an opportunity for communion.

I'm getting better at moment by moment communion.

I subscribe to the emails of Richard Rohr, and his meditation today (by someone else) about the God particle was profoundly moving.

St. John preaches the "NADA" or the way of nothing. My ego, my will, my control, my addiction as they slowly drop off me or reveal to me my weakness, expose my nakedness, my personal expression of image and likeness, to the divine impulse.

I slowly become, I slowly return to the garden of delight, of intimate universal communion.

But I run from God, he frightens me, a creature, by his realness, and so he comes to me in the darkness, hidden living inside a body, my body and I give love to him by loving the self and together we walk hand in hand, moment by moment.

The way of nothing is the way to everything. Because without God everything is nothing, but with him, nothing is everything.

Just for today I will try to improve my conscious contact with God.

Just for today I will seek love with love.

Pure program, St. Teresa

I already told you elsewhere that sometimes the devil gives us great desires so that we will avoid setting ourselves to the task at hand, serving our Lord in possible things, and instead be content with having desired the impossible. Apart from the fact that by prayer you will be helping greatly, you need not be desiring to benefit the whole world but must concentrate on those who are in your company, and thus your deed will be greater since you are more obliged toward them.

- St. Teresa of Avila

Step 1 - Admitted I am powerless over blog content

Step 1 - Admitted I am powerless over blog content, that my blogging had become unmanageable.

After typing Step 1, I realized that, actually, I do know what this blog will be about.

Granted, I don't know what form or story it will take each day, but I do know this is about my journey through the 12 steps and how this interacts within my life as a child of God in the 3rd order or lay Carmelite vocation of the Catholic church.

Step 1 is very powerful. The second I say, "I don't know," I admit to the possibility that someone else does, or that the answer exists outside myself. I don't have to know, right now. 

When I am okay with not knowing, then I am ready to know.

My blogging is unmanageable, because of control. I I I need to control control control everything.

I don't know which direction this blog will take, other than the above mentioned. I don't know if anyone will read it. I have no control over the fact that my mind starts to obsess about all the things I need to know if I am going to start blogging again. I have to plan for all the bad things that could happen. I have to plan for all the good things that could happen. What if. What if. What if.

No. I do not have to know. I only have to trust that, right now, I need to make this blog. IF someday I need to move it, I can. IF someday, I need to delete it, I can.

When I am okay with not knowing, then I no longer have to control. I can rest in the fact that I only have to do, right now, what I need to do next. That is all that is expected, to do the next right thing.

The unmanageable shrinks down into its right size until I am able to see only the next thing, because I never really saw the big picture anyway. The mirror of my mind had distorted everything, like one of those curved mirrors at the funhouse.

When I am okay with not knowing, then I am ready to know.

Step 1 - We admitted we were powerless over alcohol, that our life had become unmanageable.

I pray that we will find the serenity we seek, and that we will see that what we seek has always been inside us, waiting for us to return to ourselves to find rest.

We are loved with an everlasting love, and surrounding us are the everlasting arms.

No-people, No-place, No-thing, can separate us from the love of God.

Let yourself be loved.