Mile Markers

"There seems to be a kind of order in the universe, in the movement of the stars and the turning of the earth and the changing of the seasons, and even in the cycle of human life."    Katherine Anne PorterTwenty one days into writing these daily prescriptions and I am hearing from readers just what I was hoping to hear… “Every morning when I look at the Rx it seems like it is speaking directly to me in my life!”  How can this be?? Well, I would love to take credit as an all-knowing uber powerful intuitive, but nothing could be further from the truth. Everything in this universe has an order and a cycle… and on any given day we each fall somewhere and everywhere within that cycle.I know that sounds confusing, but it is actually very simple. When we begin to speak, listen, and live within the symbolic language that the universe is speaking to all of us, a peculiar thing begins to happen. We start to understand the deep spiritual concept that ‘ there is only One of us here.’  This is something I say to my clients all the time. The first time I say it, they look at me like I just lost my mind. . .  But over time as I keep saying it, and pointing out this truth… they too begin to see it.One of my regular clients, who also reads this blog, asked during her appointment last week, if I ever worried that I was going to run out of material to write about. She surmised that having the pressure of a blog to write each day must make me anxious.  (A part of me, of course, resonated with these words and that window of fear that we talked about yesterday beckoned for just a moment.) In response to her question, I made the following statement, “The universe will tell me at some point today what I need to write about tomorrow. My only work is to watch, listen, and take the next indicated step when it is given.”This is exactly what I do each day. It is wonderful-and it is temporary.  When tomorrow dawns, I will need to surrender all over again and trust that what is needed will once again arrive. This trust in the universe, it is not a destination I get to arrive at and then rest. This trust is more like a mile marker that I get to reach each day. These mile markers let me know I am on course, and moving in the right direction- but they still require that tomorrow, once again I surrender.  I simply have to trust that another mile marker will show up, if I show up.I saw that client again today. She walked into my office and announced she had had an epiphany of sorts. She has been struggling to find her way in a relationship that has great potential, but has yet to form into a straight line leading in any particular direction.  She announced her revelation with great conviction, “ Your blog is my relationship!”, and then she quickly recanted this and said, “I mean, my relationship is your blog!”  A split second of silence filled the room before we both laughed and agreed, “Yes and yes!!”She understood on a very deep level that her journey was my journey- and mine was hers. She was able to see that for me to be successful at my writing endeavor I have to surrender to a process that will deliver me safely, each and every day, to the next indicated place. And more importantly she understood that for her to be successful in her relationship, she too, has to surrender the need to know ‘what comes next’ and instead let the natural ebb and flow of a relationship that is growing, show her the next indicated step… not once, but every day.This same thing is true for all of us.  We all have a big-ticket item in our life right now that has the potential to make us suffer. We will suffer if we think it is up to us to wrestle this issue into compliance; whether it’s a marriage, a sales quota, or a mother in law who moved in and won't move out. Whatever it is, if we are demanding to be in charge and force what comes next; we are struggling.  We suffer not really from what is happening to us today, but because we cannot clearly see what is waiting for us a mile or two down the road. How dare the universe hide the path!!!  In truth, our suffering would stop immediately if we could begin to see that this universe has a natural order- and that we are in this natural order- and regardless of what we do or do not do- just like everything else under the cosmos, our lives, and our jobs and our loves and even our nasty neighbor will settle perfectly into this natural order. All we need to do is surrender. The universe will show us the next indicated step… there is simply no other way for it to be.If we can begin to look at our lives from the perspective that "There is only One of us here," then we begin to see that all of life is a teacher, and that we all experience the exact same joys and sorrows- we just call them by different names. Everything and everyone is part of a perfect cycle… the suffering comes when we try to control or usurp that cycle. The pain in our lives- it never comes from being wrong or from being lost. The pain comes from believing that we are separate from the whole, and that we have some how fallen out of the cycle of all that is.  Once we realize that this can simply never, never, never, happen…. then we can surrender. Then, we are truly free.