Sword of the Spirit – Part 3: Living Large

It’s not fun to watch yourself deteriorate mentally, physically, and spiritually. It certainly wasn’t fun for me. The result was a very small life, characterized by an endlessly repeated daily grind of working, eating, pooping, sleeping, and watching TV. Such a life is soulless, joyless, and seriously out of whack with the way we were designed to be.

So what flipped the trigger for me, what caused me finally to step away from the miserable grind? I think the first trigger, and one of the Universal Principles, was Honesty. I got honest about my situation, and became aware of what I was doing to myself. I am responsible.

Gratefully, throughout the duration of that impossible job, I kept myself surrounded with people who cared about me. As frustrated, overworked, physically depleted, and emotionally drained as I was, I never isolated myself from people who knew me well enough to remind me consistently of who I really am. I may have felt abused, fearful, weak, and victimized, but they persistently reminded me of the Truth that I am strong, connected to an infinite Power, and personally responsible. I credit these constant reminders with moving me out of my “stuckness.”

And that’s a powerful point about the Spiritual Life: We cannot do it alone. As human beings we are not designed to be the “Lone Ranger,” and the myth of “rugged individualism” so cherished in our culture is a perfect and utterly destructive LIE. If you believe that you are a rugged individualist, and that it is possible to drag yourself up by your own bootstraps and survive alone in the world by your own wits unaided, my hat is off to you. But I don’t believe that really works, not for an instant. The truth is that we are by nature social creatures, and only thrive in Community.

The good news here is that no one can do it alone, we all require each other to maintain inspiration and encouragement on a day-to-day basis. You help me, and I help you. Gratefully we aren’t all broken on the same day, and when my candle goes out, you light my candle with yours; when your candle goes out, I light your candle with mine. Neither of us loses anything by lighting the other’s candle; we just end up expanding the Light. And that is the profound beauty of Interdependence: When I accept the apparent paradox that I am responsible, but we cannot do it alone, I begin to understand that when we help each other, both of us flourish.

Here’s a concrete example of how this can unfold: I recently attended a conference that was pretty expensive, and full of very challenging information. It was a terrific conference, but it was difficult and almost too much information to absorb. We were all a little shell-shocked by the end of the first day.

I was heading out to dinner, when I realized I had left something back in my room. On the way back down the elevator, I shared the ride with one of the conference participants, who recognized me. He was very angry, frustrated with just about every aspect of the conference and the organization that put it on. We chatted for about half an hour, and by the end of the chat, he had calmed down considerably, and was ready to go back to his wife and spend a quiet evening with her. I felt I had done some good by “talking him down,” and went off to dinner very grateful, believing that I had been his “angel” that night.

The next day, I took a look around the room at the conference, and I couldn’t find my new friend. It was then I realized that I was not his angel, but rather he was mine. Although I had reached down to light his candle, the expanded Light helped me as much (or more) than it helped him. This is the magic of Interdependence: We help one another, and somehow both of us come out synergistically better than we were individually.

This expansion of Light is the point: Individually our lights may falter, but when we willingly reach out to assist each other, Light expands endlessly and we grow in the process. It is the willingness to experience this Growth that makes life so amazing, and leads us directly into the Spiritual Life.

It is said that we either grow or die, one or the other. We cannot live without growing, expanding our boundaries, pushing the envelope – and to avoid growing is the very definition of spiritual death.

To find the Willingness to continue growing closer to the ideals in the Universal Principles that govern life is, I believe, my highest calling. Such Spiritual Growth isn’t pretty: it’s not easy, it’s far from painless, and it’s uneven and halting at best. And Spiritual Growth is unending: We can’t EVER arrive. It is continual slow progress toward the unattainable.

Sounds awful, doesn’t it? Well, that’s where Interdependence comes in. We can’t do it alone. We must do it together, and encourage each other to stick to it as we continue to grow. And I can tell you from personal experience that although the process of Growth is difficult, there can be no Joy in life without it. The secret to finding true Joy in life is a willingness, day in and day out, to practice the process of Spiritual Growth, enduring the discomfort and frustration by helping one another. There is no other way to live Spiritually except by cultivating the willingness to practice Growth and Interdependence.

The good news is that because there is no attainment of the Universal Principles in this life, the goal is not to attain them! The goal, simply, is to practice. As long as I’m willing to practice, the Spiritual Life unfolds gradually and automatically – I’ve already arrived at the goal!

The result of such practice is an ever increasing awareness of personal responsibility, an ever greater Willingness to help and encourage others, and an unflinching Courage to face each day with Hope. And that, I believe, is the mother lode: By practicing the Spiritual life, I find Hope to continue with the process, no matter what challenges face me. And I grow larger and larger in the process. I have seen this Truth proven over and over again in the lives of others, and know with a certainty that it is also being proven in mine. I can see it in my own eyes, just as I’ve seen it in the eyes of others. I cannot deny the fact of the Spiritual Awakening that has resulted from the willingness to practice.

In the next post, I will discuss my own Spiritual Practice, which will almost certainly differ from yours. Somehow, we all get a part of the Truth, but none of us gets all of it. And that’s another reason why none of us can go it alone!