Reality Check

Today I am feeling pulled by thoughts to the past, to childhood places and people especially my Dad who passed away a little over a year ago. Where is he now I wonder? Sometimes I feel he is nearer to me than other times and I wonder if that's my imagination.

I am presently reading a book titled "Why we believe what we believe," by Andrew Newberg and Mark Waldman. Its a fascinating read exploring the biological aspects of how beliefs are formed and the workings of the brain. When you realize how much our brain fills in the blanks for us and how much our beliefs depend on a general consensus from those around us combined with the emotional aspect of it feeling comfortable, you realize I could have a completely different set of beliefs if I'd grown up in another part of the world.

The author says when we encounter someone with a different set of beliefs we naturally want to convince the other that our beliefs are right because we have made our beliefs our truth. In reality there is no truth only best guesses. Even mathematics which is held up as a definable truth as in 2 + 2 = 4 can be proven to be inaccurate by a mathematician by the name of Kurt Godel. If there is no truth we must create it so we can feel comfortable in our world. We cant rely on our eyes or our ears  as our brain is selective and cant possibly process all the information it receives. So what does this all tell us? I haven't finished the book yet so I don't know where the author is taking this but for me it means I need to question my beliefs a little more and hold less rigidly to some while allowing other people theirs. It adds up to greater compassion and gentleness and understanding in my mind.

As to where my Dad is today, I have my theory's but I know he is in my mind, in memories now fuzzy or distorted and his presence in my life is palpably in my heart as the love that never dies.  

Childhood Gifts

“Its never too late to have a happy childhood” Tom Robbins

Our childhoods gave us infinite gifts some we easily recognize as good and grounding and adding to our well being and others not so much.
I just learned that mushrooms dont need light to grow, they get all their nutrients from the earth, however humidity has to be just right for them to flourish. I personally love light, my living room is light filled and I love to sit in the window seat to read and feel the greeness of the plants outside. My least favourite time of day is dusk when the light is fading and night approaches.

When I think about my siblings (of which I have eight) and our unique personalities and life paths, having come from the same parents and home environment, I imagine that we each had individual needs most of which were met there, enabling us to grow and flourish like the mushrooms. I also know that almost always some ingredient is missing in a childhood, some aspect of light or love. Maybe it was a feeling of safety, maybe it was unconditional love, maybe not enough attention, maybe too much attention! Each of us, as we meet the challenges of life have our dark moments of fear or doubt, feeling our area of weakness or lack of confidence. The process of re-parenting, where we identify our unmet need and rather than having someone or something outside of ourselves fulfill it or solve it or mask it, attend to it ourselves, can be the process by which we discover our truest gift of childhood; the one that if we work with it right can be our greatest strength and gift in this lifetime.

Spiritually we talk about enlightenment and talk of bringing the light of love or Spirit to a situation. Bringing something dark into the light dissipates the scary aspect and dispels imagined ghosts and goblins. We often find the thing we thought of as unforgivable or shameful was not our fault and that we are blameless. If we are truly spiritual beings we chose our parents, our life circumstances and the lessons we wished to learn. There are no mistakes in Spirit. Negative associations are just that and can be changed and released if we choose to do the work. We are in the perfect place at the perfect time to begin the healing process. Its a powerful healing choice and we have an ability with our new enlightened vision to turn our previously imagined lack into our gain and strength and most of all our gift to the world. What is your less obvious gift?