Synchronicity

I think God's trying to tell me something. These are the messages I got today. I only have one problem with them- I don't feel I owe an amends to any one. I feel that several are owed to me. Of course, I know when you expect an amends you never get one. At any rate I'm putting on here the e-mails I got today.

Today's thought from Hazelden is:

...All things... that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.
--Matthew 7:12

In the midst of active addiction, the drug dictates how we relate to others: on good days, overly cautious, boastful, and effusive; on bad days, nasty, negative, rude, sometimes cruel. Recovery means being aware that others are affected by our behavior. And that only abstinence grants us the freedom to choose our actions.

When we first go into recovery, we are terrified by the openness we feel emotionally. We often feel wide open to others. We don't have the drugs to hide behind. We don't have a way to manipulate our moods and to make sure we are acting in the "right" manner. It is a new feeling, and often frightening, to realize that our moods have been so manipulated by our using.

But as our spiritual life grows, we find a new peace. We learn to trust ourselves and others in a new way. With the help of our Higher Power and others in recovery, we become confident that our love and good intentions are lasting. Our love, joy, and sharing are beginning to seem real, and straight from the heart. Soon, we will feel proud of the way we treat others.

Today give me the courage to treat other people the way I would like to be treated.
From Body, Mind and Spirit by Anonymous

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"Friends are God's way of taking care of us."

This was written by a Metro Denver Hospice Physician:

I was driving home from a meeting this evening when I got stuck in traffic on Colorado Blvd., and the car started to choke and splutter and die - I barely managed to coast into a gas station; glad only that I would not be blocking traffic and would have a somewhat warm spot to wait for the tow truck. It wouldn't even turn over. Before I could make the call, I saw a woman walking out of the "quickie mart " building, and she slipped on some ice and fell into a gas pump. I got out to see if she was okay.

When I got there, it looked more like she had been overcome more by sobs than her fall; she was a young woman who looked really haggard with dark circles under her eyes. She dropped something as I helped her up. I picked it up to give it to her. It was a nickel.

At that moment, everything came into focus for me: the crying woman, the ancient Suburban crammed full of stuff with 3 kids in the back (1 in a car seat), and the gas pump reading $4.95.

I asked her if she was okay and if she needed help, and she just kept saying " I don't want my kids to see me crying," so we stood on the other side of the pump from her car. She said she was driving to California and that things were very hard for her right now. So I asked, "And you were praying?" That made her back away from me a little, but I assured her I was not a crazy person and said, "He heard you, and He sent me."

I took out my card and swiped it through the card reader on the pump so she could fill up her car completely, and while it was fuelling, walked to the next door McDonald's and bought 2 big bags of food, some gift certificates for more, and a big cup of coffee. She gave the food to the kids in the car, who attacked it like wolves, and we stood by the pump eating fries and talking a little.

She told me her name, and that she lived in Kansas City. Her boyfriend left 2 months ago and she had not been able to make ends meet. She knew she wouldn't have money to pay rent and finally, in desperation, had called her parents, with whom she had not spoken in about 5 years. They lived in California and said she could come live with them and try to get on her feet there.

So she packed up everything she owned in the car. She told the kids they were going to California for Christmas, but not that they were going to live there.

I gave her my gloves, a little hug and said a quick prayer with her for safety on the road. As I was walking over to my car, she said, "So, are you like an angel or something?"

This definitely made me cry. I said, "Sweetie, at this time of year angels are really busy, so sometimes God uses regular people."

It was so incredible to be a part of someone else's miracle. And of course, you guessed it, when I got in my car it started right away and got me home with no problem. I'll put it in the shop tomorrow to check, but I suspect the mechanic won't find anything wrong.

Sometimes the angels fly close enough to you that you can hear the flutter of their wings...

Psalm 55:22 "Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee. He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved."

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A COURSE IN MIRACLES
WORKBOOK LESSON
HEALING PERSPECTIVES

Lesson 168: "Your grace is given me. I claim it now."

Thinking I am an individual, separate from my brothers and from God, is a mistake. Thinking my brothers are their bodies or their personalities is a mistake. Believing in separation is a mistake. This mistake will continue until I accept and claim God's grace. It is through God's grace that I receive the means for laying down these illusions, these mistakes. So my focus now is on claiming the grace that God has given me.

God has already given me the means by which I lay illusions down. But I have to be willing to claim God's gift. That is my job now. Because I am so familiar with mistaken thinking, I need to return again and again to opening to God's gift. As I claim God's gift, I receive it. As I receive God's gift, the Light I receive causes my false ideas to disappear. When the false ideas disappear, the effect of holding onto those false ideas also disappears. I am then able to see the Light behind the masks of individual personalities and individual bodies. I am able to focus on the truth instead of the lies of separation.

In this stage of my awakening, I seem to wobble back and forth between making illusions real and remembering the truth that all is one in God. This lesson is giving me the answer to every problem I think I have. This lesson teaches me to open to God's gift of grace whereby the means are given me to lay illusions down once again. I need to open to God's gift of grace again and again until all my belief in separation is undone. This is a process. Instead of feeling guilty for my mistakes, I recognize them as mistakes and with God's grace, I lay them down. This is my one function, being willing to claim God's grace which provides the means for me to lay all errors in thinking down. I have the means by which to remember that I am free. I just need to claim it.

This lesson is reinforcing the immediacy of salvation, of complete release from all fear and guilt. I need only acknowledge and accept it and it is mine because it has already been given me. In today's lesson, God's grace means to me that He would not let me wander off into insanity without giving me the means to return to sanity.

In our creation He gave us all of Himself, including all of His power. Thus when we chose in our insanity to misdirect that power, He could not interfere with that choice or He would be making us of a lesser order of power. We would no longer be equal in power as He created us. But by His grace, the moment we made the mistaken choice, we were given the means to undo the mistake. We still need to make the choice to let it be undone, but the means is already given.

My heart is filled with gratitude that I have a Father so loving that He was unwilling to make me lesser than He and equally unwilling to leave me comfortless and without a means to return to Him. The Holy Spirit is His Answer to all my mistaken ideas.

My only need is to acknowledge my mistakes and accept the means for them to be undone. I do not need to undo them alone. To attempt to do so is to reject the means He gave me. Rather, I need to accept His help and it will be done for me. As long as I continue to believe in false ideas and desire that they be true, I will not accept the means for them to be undone.

My part in healing is very simple. Acknowledge my mistakes and accept the means for them to be undone. This is the willingness that Holy Spirit needs. With that willingness, the rest is done for me. Today I will practice being mindful with the Holy Spirit's help to recognize my mistaken ideas and then turn them over to Him to let His light shine them away. That is my job today. And I give thanks that I have the means to be free.

"Your grace is given me. I claim it now. Father, I come to You. And You will come to me who ask. I am the Son You love." This is so inspiring. I know what the poets mean when they say, "it makes my heart soar," because that is exactly how I feel each time I say this prayer.

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I've kind of found the common thread for what I received via e-mail today. Coincidentally, it came to me in the form of a song.

So Small

As sung by Carrie Underwood

Yeah, Yeah
What you got if you ain't got love?
The kind that you just want to give away
It's okay to open up
Go ahead and let the light shine through
I know it's hard on a rainy day
You want to shut the world out and just be left alone
But don't run out on your faith

Chorus
'Cause sometimes that mountain you've been climbing
Is just a grain of sand
And what you've been up there searching for forever
Is in your hands
When you figure out love is all that matters after all
It sure makes everything else seem so small

It's so easy to get lost inside
A problem that seems so big at the time
It's like a river thats so wide
It swallows you whole
While you sitting 'round thinking 'bout what you can't change
And worrying about all the wrong things
Time's flying by
Moving so fast
You better make it count 'cause you can't get it back

Chorus x2