What I’ve noticed over my many decades of life is that beliefs change as we inquiringly look beneath the surface into the depths of people, places, situations and things. I’ve also noticed that when we give ourselves to a particular belief and experientially dive into it, the lenses we see through change and rearrange our reality. Theory becomes practice and practice becomes a process that changes over time. When I was a boy, my world was as small as my immediate surroundings. The more my surroundings changed, the more my beliefs changed.

I remember the first time I flew in a single propeller airplane. My twelve year old self had never flown over neighborhoods, towns, lakes, forests and rivers he’d explored on foot or by car. The vision from a couple thousand feet above the ground traveling over a hundred miles an hour changed my perspective, my reality, my beliefs about the world. Do you remember your first kiss, the first time you drove a car, the day you got married, experienced death, had a child, lost a friend, a job, a dream?  Each one of these experiences helped you see reality in different ways. Each acted as a lens to see into a new reality. 

Presently the global village is experiencing a pandemic that seems to have come out of nowhere and yet, it’s been here in the planetary experience without our knowing. What lenses were you wearing that said this couldn’t happen? What lenses are we now wearing that make us believe  this virus to be a curse rather than seeing some benefits in the experiences we’re having? Can we look within, beyond ourselves to our Divine Self to recognize the possible need for large doses of separation, silence, observation, listening, loving and suffering? What parts of reality are we not seeing? What parts are we not aware of?

Might this experience be an initiation for us into the fragility of life and the ever present darkness and difficulties inherent in our life together? Might it be teaching us life lessons about birth, life, death, and new life; that darkness and light, suffering and serenity, love and loss, pain and pleasure are all part of this human/divine incarnation? Could it be a lesson in awareness, an invisible catalyst to disrupt our pride, indifference, craving, apathy, arrogance, and self centeredness? Could it be a process of creative destruction that inspires a transformational age of awakening and evolutionary innovation?

In all the spiritual traditions I’ve engaged, darkness and light are a sacred unity: Birth, life, death and new life are a Oneness. Winter is the season of darkness where dormancy is normal, where new birth is incubated. Spring is the new life that births from that which has come before. Summer is the growing season while Autumn is the time of harvest and preparation for Winter. In every cycle, birth brings life, life brings growth, growth brings harvest and harvest brings death and new life. It’s the eternal resurrection cycle that happens every day all over the planet. It’s April’s Aspiration to bring Life to Life!

The problem for most of us is we don’t give ourselves to the infinite pattern, to our at-one-ment, our Kosmic nature, our Christological intelligence. We say we believe but we don’t give ourselves to it. We only hold the idea rather than trusting the deep redemptive power of the experience. We fear the courage and vulnerability it takes to transcend and include the darkness and light. When we awaken to the at-one-ment process however, we begin to see and embrace the parts of reality we’ve feared and withdrawn from. From this awakening; birth, life, death and new life merge to become the catalytic Source of Life. 

Over the next months, the Global Community will celebrate great love and great loss, suffering and surrender, death and new life. This didn’t just happen two thousand years ago, but is what happens every day in every part of our global community. It’s the perennial pattern of Life that’s manifesting always and everywhere. We’re part of the darkness and light, the birthing, living, dying and rebirthing that goes on into infinity. We’re part of April’s aspiration to bring forth new life! We’re part of a transition that’s  creating and experiencing new realities, new possibilities. We’re the ones called to “do greater things.” 

• As you walk through the next weeks of April, dive into the depths of your soulful  aspirations. Take note of the ‘lenses’ you’re seeing the world through. Ponder what parts of reality you’re seeing and what parts you’re blind to. Change your ‘social distancing’ to ‘spacious interconnectivity.’
• Allow yourself the gift of looking beyond your false self to experience your True Self. Allow the gift of large doses of silence, inner observation, listening, loving and losing. Learn the master’s  lesson of surrendering to love and notice the new life that comes from it, short and long term.
• As difficult as it may be; practice gratitude in all things. Search for the silver lining in every fear, challenge and vulnerability. Continue surrendering to Love and notice the changes in your reality.