Lord, I want my tongue to be the pen of a ready writer.
All these words that go forth from my lips do not come from me. They come from You. You are my courage, Father. I know that I will not hesitate speaking forth about Your love, because someone, even if I don’t know him, needs to hear exactly what You are telling me. Someone needs to know that everything is alright, and she doesn’t need to look down on herself anymore, because You sent Your Son to die in her place— to suffer in her place, and You have prepared a great destiny for her.
Father, I don’t want to be overwhelmed by fear, that’s why I’m looking up to You. You have made me realize that people do not need fragrant words or motivational talks just to be alright. Talking about having a passion for You is not enough. Encouraging them to live for You is not enough. They just need to hear about Jesus, because He is the exact, and incomprehensible manifestation of Your love for each one of us. Jesus is all we need. Amen.
Imagine ….Close your eyes and imagine my face. Look in the mirror and see the man I love. Look into your heart to find me. Hear it beat and imagine my voice. In your mind imagine I call your name. Sing out loud and hear the sound of the man I love. Pull a blanket around you and imagine my arms holding you. Hug a pillow and it knows the embrace I so miss. Breathe in and imagine the scent of my hair. Breathe across your arm and that is what your breath feels like on my skin. Touch your lips and imagine how my kiss feels to you. Feel on your fingers what your lips feel like to me. Put your hand to your face and imagine my touch. On your cheek you feel what your fingers feel like to me. Miss me and you know what it feels like for me to miss you. Because you know how much you love me, you can imagine how much I love you. Shed a tear and I cry. Know joy and I rejoice. For we are one. Remember that the same sun and the same moon pass across the same sky above both of us. And the same God resides in Heaven watching over both of us with mercy and grace and a love that surpasses even the enduring love that you and I know for one another. And while we remain apart. Imagine what it will be like when we are together again. Close your eyes and just - Imagine your wife c
February 13
Behavior Patterns
When I become aware of destructive behavior patterns, they can serve a wonderful purpose: I can use them as indicators of where my inner work lies. Any situation to which I have a constant over-reaction is telling me something about myself that I need to listen to. My first task is to realize that the reaction is not fitting the circumstance, then to sit with that realization, and see through association where it takes me. No one knows my history better than I do, if I allow myrelf to know it.
When I make the decision to come into conscious awareness, to find meaning in my life experience, I begin to experience my life as an adventure - my adventure. When I can raise the source of the unwanted pattern to consciousness to better understand where my pain or reaction stems from, I can begin to see it for what it is and let it go. Then I am no longer repeating history, I am making it.
I co-create my world.
Carl Jung
February 4
An Empty Place Inside
I have an empty place inside, a God-shaped hole that seeks to be filled. This hole is meant to be filled with the energy and electricity of soul. If I do not fill it with soul, I will fill it with anything that is available, attempting to incorporate people and experiences within myself so that I will not feel empty.
Soul is present in people and activities. Allowing myself to have the experience that lies at my fingertips is a simple but profound path to soul growth. If soul is incorporated in all that lives, then all that lives is incorporated in soul, and inuring myself to the life that surrounds me inures me to my life within. Until these fears or holes are felt in the present moment, come to terms with and understood for what they are, I will not realize how near at hand the solution lies.
All that surrounds me is imbued with soul.
And every common bush afire with God:
but only he who sees takes off his shoes.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
February 2
Suffering
I will suffer. Suffering is a part of the human condition, a part of the growth of soul. When I run from it, I run from my potential to develop and awaken, to shed old, tired selves and be born into new ones. I could cling to the familiar, but it would make me become ridiculous and dead inside. After all, I change constantly. If I want to look forever young, for example, all I will accomplish will be to look like someone old who is trying to look young. I will be pathetic rather than beautiful.
Growth means change and change includes struggle. If I want to live and love fully, I will need to be willing to struggle. If I really care, I will be making myself vulnerable to hurt; but just for today I prefer that to walking through life unconscious and untouchable.
I see suffering as a potential for growth.
Aeschylus
February 1
Combinatory Play
I will play with ideas. I will look at them from a variety of perspectives, examine them from all sorts of points of view. I will pull on them, test them, throw them up in the air and wait to see how they land. I will combine and recombine them, shuffle them and test them to see if they hold up under pressure. I will scatter them all over the floor and notice which parts of them leap out at me and which ones fade away. I will reinvent the wheel every so often just to stay in shape - just for the fun of it. I will use my mind and soul as a playground for ideas, my ideas. I will spin them like a top and let them go - throw them out like a boomerang and see if they will return. I will play.
I act as an incubator of ideas.
Christopher Bollas
