Tag: infinity

Forever and Ever…

When I was five or six years old, I began having a recurring nighttime thought that terrified me. I described it to my mother as “The world goes on forever and ever.” My mind froze with fear when that perception arose in my consciousness, and I sat bolt upright in bed shaking my head frantically to get rid of it. My mother tried to help by suggesting I distract myself with happier thoughts. Her loving presence comforted me but did not erase the underlying feeling of terror and overwhelm. Years later I called it fear of infinity or eternity.

It felt like I was looking into the farthest stretches of the universe, an infinite void with no beginning and no end. As a child, I had no language or framework for that. It was so huge, so vast, I felt lost, engulfed. As a young adult, I ran from it, attempting to avoid its appearance in my night thoughts. Eventually I embarked on a journey of spiritual seeking, trying to come to some understanding of the nature of life/death, and resolution of my own existential despair—the grief beneath the fear of “forever and ever.”

Over the years, various teachers, in particular Panache Desai, helped me see infinity in a more positive light—indeed as light, as spirit. I was looking into the darkness, but within the darkness was the light of eternal Spirit, which cannot really be understood but only experienced. A five-year-old child staring at that limitless space does not recognize it as God or Spirit but rather as the unknown; emptiness. Something to be feared. Only recently have I begun to see my child’s vision as a soul gift, which set me on a life path of searching for the meaning of life and learning about Spirit’s presence.

I have tremendous gratitude for that gift, for the awareness it has brought me through so many spiritually expansive experiences. Yet there still remains a kernel of sadness within me as well. A recognition that life’s mysteries can never be solved. Many Native American cultures teach that only in complete acceptance of the “Great Mystery” as such is there peace. I’m finally reaching that view now, and I realize it is all part of my soul’s plan for my life.

For years, I thought that I could “solve” the mystery, and my nighttime fear of infinity would disappear entirely through “understanding” God. This was partially true: deeper soul awareness and trust in the wisdom of Spirit softened the edges and frequency of the fear. Ultimately, however, I am learning that only in full acceptance of life as is, as profound divine mystery, does total inner peace arise. I still have passing moments of sadness or grief about the nature of human life and death and “forever and ever.” At those times, the only “answer” is acceptance, surrender, complete letting go. If I take a deep breath and look up, seeing the infinite blue sky with my soul’s eyes, I feel peace. And perhaps that’s the greatest wisdom of all. 

The Wisdom of Slow

There is a profound blessing in aging: the pause for reflection. As I grow older, I find that I think more slowly, thoughts moving through at their own pace, unfolding, flowering. I often walk that way too, step by step, holding the awareness that I may never pass this way again: this moment, this experience, this perspective. I remind myself not to miss the subtleties, the hidden beauty, the wonder. Truthfully, it feels to me like the wisdom of a lifetime.

There is a great push to rush through life in the 21st century, as if we were running a race or trying to escape a predator. Many of us feel that pressure—violence and hatred at our doors, poverty and loss not far behind. Everything, particularly in the current political climate, has become a game of survival. Every film, TV show, and news story focuses on outrunning an enemy, surviving an apocalyptic situation. Death always threatening. Yet, life on Earth is so much more than this, if we pause and remember.

Sunrise and sunset each day. Seasonal changes. The love of family and friends. Since the beginning of time, these have always been present, just as there have always been fears and uncertainties. We came here to experience it all. This century may be particularly challenging, but this is the soulwork we signed up for. To remain calm and peaceful in the midst of chaos; loving and kind in the midst of conflict. Humans are evolving, slowly, often imperceptibly, but if we remember the long view we can take a slow deep breath and continue.

I keep coming back to slowness. It seems the key to so much. If you and I rush, we lose one another in the process. We forget who we are at the soul level and why we are here ultimately. When I listen to my friends, slowly and carefully, I really hear the voice of their inner being, what they want to express, to me and to the world. If I speak without rushing my thoughts, I express my heart’s essence. Together, we share our common humanity. When I walk slowly through a park or sanctuary, I fully experience all of Nature with each step and each breath. I hear birdsong and see every season’s flowering. This is the wonder of being alive, no matter what else is going on in the world.

As the days and years pass, I feel all of this more acutely. Yes, my soul is eternal, but this particular lifetime is unique, a gift not to be wasted or hurried through to an imaginary finish line. Every single moment holds within it a drop of infinity, the spirit of all that is, which I can only receive if I slow down and breathe it in with gratitude and appreciation. It is then that time falls away, and my soul and my humanity are One.

Past and Present, Here and Now

I heard recently that one of my best friends from high school, Lyn, died a few months ago. I had not seen her for years, but so many memories of our teenage selves resurfaced. We laughed so much together, and yet she is gone now. At least her physical form is. I know her spirit continues somewhere in the great cosmos, but I am also aware of her absence, the end of this particular lifetime. Which of course reminds me of the lifetimes of all those I have known and loved in my life, past and present—and how quickly time passes, in retrospect. At 14, you have an entire life ahead of you. At 60 or 70, you wonder how the years went by so fast. When old friends or family members transition, it makes you appreciate those who are still alive even more. Your love and gratitude intensifies.

Last night, I lay awake thinking of my life partner, Anne, and the 42 years we have spent together. What I felt most deeply was that her love for me is one of the greatest gifts of my life. In joy or sadness, she is always there with me. I told her that this morning, with tears in my eyes. More and more now, she and I appreciate our love and the moments that make up our days and years together. Traveling the world or staying at home. Laughing or crying. All of it is such a miracle: that we found each other and have stayed together for decades. We “wake each morning with gratitude in our hearts for another day together” (our wedding vows, 2014).

And this is the yin and yang of life: grief and joy; love and loss; beginnings and endings, as well as what holds them all together, not opposites but rather one whole experience that stretches beyond past and present to infinity. And perhaps infinity is our “future perfect,” not a verb tense but beingness without parameters. It lives within our consciousness, indescribable in human language but informing all of life. We exist in the now and then, but our souls are forever.

These are the thoughts and feelings that come to me as I remember my friend’s life and look at my own life as a whole. We are so much more than we think we are, because the mind is limited in its perceptions. The soul, on the other hand, is limitless. It has no grief or fear about life and death or infinity because it is infinity. Deep within, we can feel a connection to that wise soul essence, which guides us through our human lives. Even as I grieve the loss of a lifetime friendship or celebrate a lifelong love, I am also touching the threads of a cosmic tapestry that is eternal. From that soul-full place arises peace and a trust in the perfection of All That Is, here and now, forever.

The Eyes of Infinity

On a few occasions in my life, I have experienced a shift in vision that allowed me to view the entire universe moving as one, every single detail connected to the whole in a symphony of synchronicity. The clouds, the cars, the leaves, the birds, the people walking by, all danced together, and I too was a part of the dance. It was extraordinary, breath-taking, life-changing. And that infinite vision has remained inside me ever since. Sometimes I wish I could evoke it consciously in my outer experience. Lately it has occurred to me that perhaps those moments arise from open-hearted soul awareness.

In the past, it felt like divine intervention, a magic wand waved—yet if God is everywhere and everything, then s/he is within my own consciousness, my own soul, continuously waving wands. The more consciously aware I am of this, the more I experience the world around me as magic, as wonder. When I remind myself that the sounds of noisy leaf-blowers and melodious crickets arise from the same Source and the golden sunrise and the evening shadows are reflections of one another, then I too become one with what I see and hear.

I was born with the Eyes of Infinity. You were too. This ever-changing and ever-constant vision includes the living breathing Earth and the cosmos that cradles it. What I see and what I don’t. No separation. When my heart opens wide enough to allow this ultimate oneness, then the music of the spheres takes physical form and dances all around me. The entire universe waltzes and rocks and break-dances. I feel the movement inside me and as far as my eyes can see and my ears can hear.

That happened to me before when fear about a health diagnosis cracked my habitual ways of experiencing life wide open, and I saw God dancing in the world before me. Today I felt all of it again as I looked skyward and consciously opened to that vision. You don’t have to wait for miracles. Actually, there are nothing but miracles all around you if you look and listen with the Eyes and Ears of Infinity. You are always in conversation with God!

This is what I’m learning, what I am being shown every day now as I lovingly choose the awareness arising from my soul. Beyond inner and outer, future and past, life and death; beyond every polarity ever invented to explain this world. When you and I open our eyes and hearts simultaneously, when we center ourselves in soul awareness, this is what we experience—infinitely.

Breast Cancer & Beyond— Book Excerpt

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. In my new book Breast Cancer & Beyond: An Unexpected Soul Path, I describe my recent experience with breast cancer in 2021–22. A cancer diagnosis can be daunting as well as frightening, but I wanted to write about how, in spite of that, for me, it turned out to be a deeply spiritual and often peaceful journey. Below is a short excerpt from the Introduction to the book. Both the print and ebook versions of the book can be ordered at https://amzn.to/4aka0eu.

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I am a breast cancer survivor. After the diagnosis, my surgery and treatment proceeded over several months. It took me a while to assimilate the medical information, as well as my emotional reaction to it. Coming to peace with it all is the essence of my journey. Since I am a writer, my first impulse was to write about my experience—what was occurring in my body, my emotions, my mind, and my soul. I wrote about everything as it happened, week by week. Gradually I came to see that it was part of my life plan, what I had chosen (pre-birth) to experience in this lifetime. We each have unique soul paths within which we grow and evolve, and this was mine. That inner awareness steadied and uplifted me every day as I moved forward.

What you will read in this book is what it was like for me to live with a breast cancer diagnosis and treatment over a period of seven months, and then the months of integration after that. There are some sections where I don’t mention cancer specifically, but everything here took place within that framework. Each part can be read separately or in sequence.  I wrote from my soul’s perspective because that is mostly how I experienced it, and that is what centered me in peace and acceptance. In the very beginning, my hand seemed somehow guided to find the lump myself just two weeks after a “normal” mammogram. I believed it must be part of my soul’s journey on Earth, what I (and God) had designed for my physical life and spiritual evolution. Within that context, there are no mistakes, and I am flowing with each day’s experience.

In the last part of the book, I write about the wider view of life (and eternity) that I received as I journeyed along the unexpected path of cancer and how it affected me going forward. With each week, the universe seemed to expand, and my sense of my place within it also expanded. That expansion has not ended, and I do not foresee an ending because that is the nature of human life as we grow gradually beyond the confines of our physical form and open to infinity. Every experience becomes an initiation into something greater. A blessed gift, all of it.