Lighten Up!

Lighten up!
When you can see the Truth
In Everything.

This is the second time that I have received a haiku without having to state the first line to prompt it.

The first one may be found here.

While waiting in the outer office of a business, I read a woman's magazine to pass the time. One of the articles offered advice on how to reduce stress, and achieve other health-giving benefits (low blood pressure, for one) by laughing.

The writer, a woman, told of a neighbor who dressed impeccably, maintained a perfect house, and never seemed harried by life's daily routines.

Since her neighbor had it together, and she didn't, she always felt intimidated when the neighbor came to visit.

On one such visit, the neighbor perceived her anguish, and told her: "Lighten up!" Rather than allow her feelings to be hurt, she began to take a closer look at the woman's advice. Perhaps it was through the use of humor that her neighbor had learned to cope with life's many stresses.

The article detailed what science had learned about laughter, and the benefits that one could derive from a mere thirty minutes of laughter daily. Comedy, of all sorts, it concluded, could bring amazing health benefits into our life.

And the article ended by repeating the words again: "Lighten up!"

The days that followed, the words showed up again and again, so often that it ruled out the possibility of chance. I heard them on television, and read them on the Internet. The words "stalked" me for days. That's when I realized that more was going on than mere coincidence.

On the morning of July 30, 2008, as I spent time, as is my custom, in meditation, the haiku was "whispered" to me, and I repeat it here:

Lighten Up!
When you can see the Truth
In Everything

There it was. That's where all of this was leading. Later, as I thought over the possible meaning of the haiku, the following words from Jesus' teachings came to mind:

43 ¶ Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust....

48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. Matt 5: 43-48

Still, I wasn't making the full connection. And that's when it was shown to me: The light from His sun was His Truth which did not discriminate between "the evil" or "the good," but could be found dispelling the darkness of the lie with the Light of Truth. And the rain that He "sendeth" was His love, and it fell on the "just and the unjust" alike.

Have you ever been caught in the rain? Remember how drenched you were when finally you found shelter? Remember how soggy the earth and glistening the grass becomes, and how wet the leaves on trees, and other plants, after days of a steady downpour?

Our Father, then, may be found sending forth a rain of Love upon His children, so much so that we are always drenched, and soggy, and glistening. We may not always be aware of this downpour of Love, nevertheless it's there.

We, too, can follow Jesus' advice and be "perfect, even as [our] Father which is in heaven is perfect." We, too, can shine the Light of Truth upon Everything, dispelling the evil in our heart, and in our world, and allow our love to rain down upon the earth, and upon our neighbors--for all are our neighbors, whether they dwell clear across the world, or on the block where we live.

It's been said: "It's always raining somewhere."

Let me assure you: "It's raining all the time, every where." We only need eyes to see, and ears to hear, as it falls steadily on the roof of our being, and against the window panes of our soul.

Father's Day

How do I live this day:
Every day
Is Father's Day.

I thought this to be a clever play on our observance of Father's Day. Everyday is God's Day. Although we make a big deal of celebrating our earthly fathers, and it seems appropriate and proper, I'm also reminded of Jesus' admonition:

And call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven.

What better way to show our devotion to God and our willingness to do His Will, and to be about His (our Father's) Business, than to consecrate each day to His Service, and to His Divine Business.

Consumed as we are with our own business, we forget that each day we have the opportunity, but not the demand, to live each one as our Father's Day and not our own, and to begin and end that Day as a celebration of Him and Him alone.

God Is Priceless?

God is priceless

you have to
back off

6-02-07 -- I provided the first line. I heard the next two. As with many of the others I have received, this haiku surprised me as well. If God is priceless, clearly we cannot approach him. Hence, pricelessness can not be one of the attributes of God, although, at first blush, you would think so.

I'm keenly aware that my blog speaks to many of you who already hold very strict views of God, and have deep, sacred, religious views of life and existence. Please construe nothing here as an attempt to disabuse you of your beliefs. If you find anything I say here offensive, or counter any religious or atheistic views you may hold, please let us part ways amicably. I seek to make friends only and not foes.

I know what I say here may tax believability, but I would be immensely disingenuous if I detailed only those experiences with which, I believe, readers would agree. Now, with that out the way, let me say:

All may approach God, without exception. We're told Moses was allowed to approach God only after he removed his shoes. We can do the same, once our bare feet come in contact with the ground--once, that is, we humble ourselves, by casting out the notion that God is in Heaven and we're on earth, by knowing, then, that the very place upon which we stand is Holy ground.

The purpose of this blog is to encourage you, if you're not already doing so, to have a dialog with God. He's more than ready to listen, and to speak back in a way that you can understand. Happily, He is continually talking to us, whether we're listening, or not.

I asked Him once, "God, why would you want to talk with us," thinking that he had better things to do.

His answer: "Why wouldn't I want to talk to myself."

On another occasion, He promised: "Ask me anything you want to know, and I will answer you."

If you're not having a dialog with God, one is possible. It's just a matter of knowing that it is possible and, like Moses, preparing the heart with the solvent of love.

Remove your shoes (the belief that there's a separation between you and God), and stand humbly on "holy ground" before the burning bush of God's presence, which is nothing more than going within and firing your consciousness (the bush the fire cannot consume) with love, and speaking expectantly to Him from your soul and the depth of your being.

You, too, will find that place within to be Holy ground. And, like Moses, you, too, will dialog with God.

God's Light

( Request:

[God] give me your light )

( Response:
I can't put
My finger on it )

Observation: 6-23-07. It's been 21 days between haikus.

I have been preoccupied with other nocturnal activities (usually prayer and meditation), so it comes as no surprise. Puzzled as to the meaning of the haiku, I asked God for an explanation: I received two responses, connected by a spell of 5 mins:

First: "You are the light."

Second: "I can't tell where My Light ends and yours begins."

It appears, then, that I was asking for something I already had.

This haiku is one of my favorites because it establishes, indisputably, our relationship to God.

One of the meanings of "put the finger on" is to identify. Since God's Light is everywhere he would have to first identify my light to give me His, thereby creating a separation between the two of us, a clear suggestion that one exists.

He is suggesting, further, that I possess no light of my own, that if he could put His finger on my light, it would mean that His Light and my light are two separate lights, rather than one.

Finally, I'm asking for something I already have: the Light of God.

I found four references to the "finger of God" in the KJV of the Bible.

Ex 8:17-19
17 Aaron stretched out his hand with his rod, and smote the dust of the earth, and it became lice in man, and in beast; all the dust of the land became lice throughout all the land of Egypt.18 And the magicians did so with their enchantments to bring forth lice, but they could not: so there were lice upon man, and upon beast.

19 Then the magicians said unto Pharaoh, This is the finger of God: and Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he hearkened not unto them; as the Lord had said.

Ex 31:18 And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him upon mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God.

Deut 9:10 And the Lord delivered unto me two tables of stone written with the finger of God; and on them was written according to all the words, which the Lord spake with you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly.

Luke 11:20 But if I with the finger of God cast out devils, no doubt the kingdom of God is come upon you.

In all these instances, the "finger of God" represents His omnipotence, His power over and above that of impostors, as in the case of Pharaoh's magicians, and the "devils," and His omniscience, the Mind and Intelligence to give to humankind all that is needed to bring the "kingdom of God" to bear upon those forces that seek to usurp God's power, and authority.

Again, the words

----------------
I can't put
My finger on it

suggest that it's impossible for God to alter His divine nature, even in the act of answering my prayer (that is, clothing me with His light). Yet, my prayer becomes an answered prayer, as a result of His divine presence (His all-inclusive nature), existing as He does as the omnipresent Light, a Light that includes me, despite my individuality, suggesting a oneness with Him, although we appear to stand apart.

In addition,"to put one's finger on" also means: to remember; to recall. Surely the omniscient Mind doesn't need to recall or to remember. So the statement, "I can't remember or recall" suggests that His Light was never lost in the first instance, or existed under a condition where it would be necessary for it to be "recalled," that is, recovered.

If any thing needs to be recovered, it's the knowledge that the Light is omnipresent, and already ours to delight in.

One night, I meditated on the Light, and that the Light was God's Love. I saw this Light filling all space, existing everywhere all at once.

On the morrow, I visited my sister in her hospital room; she was there because she had recently undergone surgery, and was now in bed recuperating. She was alone when I entered the room. After the usual pleasantries and inquiries as to her health, I asked her if she would like for me to pray for her. When she consented, I sat in a chair near the foot of her bed, and continued where I had left off the previous night meditating on the Light.

As I sat there at the foot of her bed, rather than attempting to heal her, I meditated on the Light and the Love that the Light represented. After about fifteen minutes of this, I felt the doors and windows of my mind open as if on command and the fresh air of Love rush in.

Simultaneously, I felt the presence of someone inside of me. This is the only way I can describe it. It and I were occupying the same space within. I spoke to it, and, as I recall, rather forcibly that my sister was indeed the perfect child of God, and that the presence knew it.

I was meditating in this manner, when my sister broke my train of thought by calling my name, and asking, "Are you still praying for me?"

I told her that I was, and asked her, why?

"Well, it's because I have this strange feeling in the pit of my stomach."

It appeared that my prayer was having a palpable effect on her physically, and had left her with the assurance of a speedy recovery.

Strangely, she doesn't have a recollection of that day, and that I had visited her.

Shortly afterward, I left the room, the presence of Love (the Light) so permeated my consciousness that everything I looked upon took on a brilliance reserved, I imagined, for things celestial. Everywhere I looked, objects shined with a light more brilliant than that of the most precious of diamonds.

As I walked down the hallway to the exit, even the dullest of objects, the most mundane of things gave off a brilliance that defied their worth. Nothing was common. Nothing was base. All things took on a brilliance that was transforming. I saw a power that would have been the envy of those seeking an alchemist's magic, or a philosopher's stone.

Surely, Love's transformative power can take the basest of things and render them perfect--including our lives, our bodies, and our world.

turn the other cheek

turn the other cheek
a leap
of faith

I will do my best to keep this page light (deep is okay) but not heavy. The aim of this page is to awaken those that are asleep to the New Age we're entering. It's an Age where God, Himself, will speak to the hearts of His children, rather that use intermediaries such as pastors, ministers, Rabbis, or messengers of any sort.

Although I call myself the First Domino, the name refers to the many that are now awakening to the possibility of having a direct dialog with God. We don't have to do all the talking anymore. It doesn't have to seem like a one way street anymore, where we do all the talking and, with a little luck, God do all the listening. God can, and will, talk back.

Please don't be "mental zombies" and accept everything that I say here as Gospel. It's not. Check it out with your own "truth compass," and if we're both pointing North, then let's go down that road together. If your compass is pointing to some place else, by all means blaze a new trail, and let us in on the direction you're going by posting to this page. For all you know, we may like your direction better than our own, and follow you for a time. Note, I said for a time. We can't all be in agreement on any direction a hundred percent of the time.

Now back to the haiku.

Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth: But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek turn to him the other also.

What a radical statement! Many of us have heard these sayings from our youth, and don't really appreciate how radical this statement was and is. Those who heard it for the first time surely did, because the saying was contrasted with what they had heard most of their lives.

How preposterous this must sound to the uninitiate! Humans generally agree that self-protection is understandable ("If the sucker hit me, I'm gonna hit him back."). However we're not at all on the same page regarding "justice" or "revenge", as is suggested in the "eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth" statement above.

Yet Jesus' teachings and the haiku above step out of mainstream thinking (then and now) and offer another solution for dealing with human conflict: "...resist not evil...."

But this business about not resisting evil, well, that takes a "leap of faith." And, you might say, "I'm not sure if I have that kind of faith. And if that kind of faith is required of me, I don't need that statement." I feel you.

Let me give you what I believe Jesus meant about turning the other cheek. Mind you, your take on this is just as valid as mine. I'm just offering one man's interpretation, nothing more definitive than that. Okay?

Then Jesus said to them, “Children, have you any food?” They answered Him,“No.”
And He said to them,“Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.”

The solution to many of life's problems lie in the opposite direction from that in which we're going. I learned that from a book (or maybe a magazine article) many years ago, the title and author of which, I no longer remember. And I feel it applies here. If you're not catching fish on the left side of the boat, for God sake, don't continue fishing in that same spot, ad infinitum, fish somewhere else, in this case on the opposite side.

You can oppose evil (that is, what you find discordant in your life) or you can turn the cheek. Believe it or not folks, Love is the solution to all problems.

Of course, you can turn the cheek using lesser lights such as:

patience for impatience
harmony for discord
trust for distrust
compassion for unmercifulness
understanding for disagreement
calmness for anger
peace for violence
good thoughts for evil thoughts
goodness for evil
meekness for arrogance

And the list goes on.

But you can cut the Gordian Knot with the sword of Love and conquer the world with Love alone.

When the cheek is burning, stinging, smarting, from being slapped or hit, of course you may want to hit or slap back (And you just might!). I do it all the time, until I realize that that's not going to solve the problem. I do it mostly in my mind. You know what I'm talking about. You create a mental scene in which you lash out at, or smack down, the persons causing the ruckus. You call them every name in your name-calling thesaurus. And for a time it makes you feel better--really, it makes you feel good.

Okay. That approach only makes you feel good for awhile, but it doesn't solve the problem. There's a better way.

I had a neighbor, a single father, renting the house next to me--our houses were no more than five feet apart. He had three generations of his kids living with him. I thought that was responsible of him. But, then, they all lived in a house only big enough for one family, not three. And the first generation of kids, being grown, would bring their hoodlum friends over. (You got to trust me when I say they were hoodlums.) They took drugs and you never knew when a fight would erupt because of disagreements.

All the cars in that household were equipped with speakers so large that the only place they would fit was the trunk. The bass on those things were at such a low frequency that my walls would vibrate, my windows would vibrate, my eardrums would vibrate, and my temper would explode.

The man of the house for a time moved in his ex (Honestly, I don't what kind of ex, maybe an ex-girlfriend, an ex-wife--I don't know which.) But, some years ago, she did have two kids for him, both boys (five and six), one of which (I think the oldest.) tortured his puppy by throwing it on the ground, picking it up by one leg, and doing it all over again (I got it on tape, if you don't believe me.)

Three vicious dogs were released into the backyard, the meanest of which was kept on a short chain. That dog almost choked himself to death wrapping that chain around the post that tethered it. What was just as bad, periodically the men would goad the dogs to fight.

If you've never seen dogs fight in this way, you can't imagine the cacophonic sounds that emanate--dogs growling and yelping in pain and in anger while spectators egged them on using the worse expletives they could think of. Dog lover or not, it breaks you down into a tangled mess of sympathy for the dogs and disgust for the humans.

Okay. You know what Love was up against. I loved (rather than hated) that man right out of the neighborhood. Before you get the wrong idea--yes, I was grateful that this man was prompted to move but that wasn't what I sought. I sought nothing in particular, only to know that my neighbor was Love.

That was it. I would affirm, with as much love as I could muster, that my neighbor was Love, not the expression of Love, but Love itself, divine Love. This is what I did each time I thought of him. By so doing, I turned the other cheek. But you got to love folks. You got to feel it. And if you can't feel it, you got to work at it, practice at it, until you do.

What you once thought was a "leap of faith," becomes a substance, "the substance of things hoped for," a firmament in the heaven, a realization of Immanuel, God with us, the palpable presence of God in our heart and in our affairs.

>>5.13.07 : say a prayer<<

say a prayer
put a word
into the mouth of God

Whispered to me as I was awaking, this haiku epitomizes what prayer means to me. I use "whispered" not because I don't hear the words clearly spoken, but because they have an ethereal quality. It should be the aim of every supplicant to evoke the power of God on behalf of his or her prayer. When one's prayer becomes a "word" in the mouth of God, to be spoken by Him, that prayer goes forth with God's full authority, with an omnipotence that "calleth those things which be not as though they were."

"...Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." Matt 4:4

Our jobs, our bank accounts, our investments--that which provides us material subsistence (food, clothing, shelter)--are at best variably reliable, unless they proceed as "words" (spiritual assurances) from "the mouth of God."

Here's the answer I received when I asked God how He healed me of a certain affliction:

As My Thoughts touch your thoughts, and your thoughts touch Mine, together We shall keep you in perfect health.

As God's Thoughts touch ours, and our thought's His--what does that say about the quality of thought required, in the first instance, to touch the Thoughts of God? Nonetheless, it's always the Mind of God that's operative--that is, indispensable in effectuating an answer to prayer.

I don't have definitive answers on prayer or any other subject. On issues such as these, and any others that may arise on these pages, follow your own heart, your own feelings--which, for you, are as infallible as your own eternal existence.