A Ramble of a Blog Entry, from Chicago

I flew to Chicago today. On the plane I read from the book The Untethered Soul by Michael A. Singer, loaned to me by my friend, Annie, who was the person who sent me to the bookstore to buy The Science of Getting Rich last winter.

I read a chapter that suggested one keep one's heart open, no matter what.

Dig this:

"The most important thing in your life is your inner energy . . . Learn to work with these things . . . You do this by opening and releasing. You do this by not buying into the concept that there is anything worth closing over. Nothing, ever, is worth closing your heart over." (The Untethered Soul, Chapter 5)

Sound familiar? Like maybe, truth, regardless of appearances?

Most everything I read these days I look to see how it relates or fits in with SGR since this is the study I've taken on. And I hope for the best results because I haven't been able to drop my other studies, as Wallace Wattles suggests. Awakening my consciousness and opening my heart - if I do have control over such things - are the most important things to me. Everything else is secondary.

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I feel that my writing today lacks organization or one particular point. Which, overall, is pointing to my general ADD style of things. So distractable! Sometimes I make a commitment only to look at email/Facebook twice a day. It's interesting to see how much more focused I can be. It does take practice in this ADD world I've created around myself.

Which brings me to the topic of Efficient Action (SGR, Chapter 12). This morning I felt the smoothness of efficiency: getting up and getting ready to go on my trip and making breakfast and cleaning it all up and driving to the airport and getting to my flight, smoothly, easily, on time. No hurry, no worry.

I heard from a friend the expression "stop the splatter" referring to doing too many things at once. What's possible if I actually focus on just one thing at a time?

Mr. Wattles:

"The matter turns, then, on the question of whether you can make each separate act a success in itself. And, this you can certainly do.

You can make each act a success, because the Infinite is working with you, and the Infinite cannot fail.

The Supreme Power is at your service. To make each act efficient you only have to put your own power into it." (SGR, Chapter 12)

I like to look at this through the lens of presence. When we are present with an action, when we are understanding that there is no other purpose at all for us than what's happening right in that moment, we are dialed in to the power of the Infinite. It is the Power of Now that Eckhart Tolle talks about. From there, every act is a success.

There is a de-programming that one must do in order to have a focus like that. In our culture, we are trained that most acts are a means to an end.

Ralph Waldo Emerson said this:

"The good news is that the moment you decide that what you know is more important than what you have been taught to believe, you will have shifted gears in your quest for abundance. Success comes from within, not from without." (Ralph W. Emerson, 1803 - 1882)

That means doing things in the certain way. Mr. Wattles reminds us that in living in the certain way, we may not be doing different things than what we were already doing; we just begin to do them in a different way. Success comes from within.

In my estimation, then, it is not about a competitive push to see who can do more faster than whom and all that jazz. It is about how present we are when we are doing things. And how filled with faith, purpose and gratitude.

I walked along Lake Michigan with my dad today after I arrived in Chicago. It's gorgeous out there, just across the street from his apartment building. I notice in myself when I come here to visit that sometimes I feel awkward. I still feel some of this, even now; worry that I'm disappointing him or causing him discomfort in some way. But I called on what I've been studying and practicing: presence, the impression of increase, keeping the heart open - no matter what, truth regardless of appearances. And noticed my mind wanting to make wrong and then just breathed, looked at the sky, the lake, the trees, the people, and kept feeling the openness and peace and love that I live in and just hung out in that, hoping that it translates.

My dad said to me, "I'm not sure if you're actually my child," jokingly and mystified as to how we can appear to be so different in how we live our lives. I told him, "That could be a liberating thought!" He said it wasn't. He said he still feels responsible for me. I told him, "You don't have to. I know you can't help it, but you really don't."

Would riches satisfy his concerns? Would him knowing somehow on a deep level that I am giving off the impression of increase and that my success is for the good of all? Will he come to know those things?

I hope so because my dad is a good and caring man, and I'm clear about my path, too. May my being radiate peace, radiate the impression of increase, so that others may benefit in exponential ways and so that we all may drop the false need for fear.

That IS the ultimate aim, is it not? Without fear, all things are possible. All love. All celebration.