Guiding Thought

You are now aware of your complete harmony with All of Life. Choose to carry the harmony of Oneness with you in all areas of your life. Awareness of Oneness brings immediate peace to all your relationships and interactions. Choose Peace. Choose recognizing Unity with All. Choose Oneness with All.

Reflection

I had a bit of trouble with clarity of understanding the first two sentences. I want to be aware of my complete harmony with All of Life…but I kept thinking how do I do this? In addition, I was wondering about how harmonious Life is right now. Isn’t there really a lot of dissonance in the world?

A part of me understands that the harmony is behind/beyond the dissonance. In other words, the harmony is always there because it is in that realm of the Divine, which exists in all times and spaces. The dissonance is only “here”, as a result of our disconnectedness from the Divine.

I understand that the Guiding Thought stretches my mind toward the harmony beyond the dissonance, but I could not feel the harmony, or even think about it today, so it was very difficult to get myself to a place where I could choose it for All.

My ability to comprehend, to feel, and to apply both harmony and choice shifted with the next sentence: Awareness of Oneness brings immediate peace to all your relationships and interactions.

I was able to shift because I have experienced the immediate peace that Oneness brings.

It has happened to me at least a dozen times over the past eight years, and it has occurred in 1:1 interactions and relationships.

Perhaps you can relate, all of my “dozen times” happened under this type of circumstance: Think about a time when you have been in a disagreement with someone you like or love, someone you are in a relationship with (romantic, familial, or business…).

There is talking. Talking becomes misunderstanding. Misunderstanding becomes feeling the need (you or the other person) to be heard, to be understood, or maybe to be right. The talking becomes more emphatic, with more insistence on a certain point. Sometimes the point turns into something completely different, not even relevant to the original point. There are direct or implied accusations, someone feels attacked. As a defense that person attacks back. And so it goes. Feelings get hurt, there is no understanding, once an attack is launched, the whole conversation becomes a series of defense-attack-defense.

I have been through enough of these types of scenarios to know the dynamic, to recognize when one is beginning, so I started stopping them when they were still at the point of someone needing to be heard, to be understood, or maybe to be right.

I started being aware of Oneness, and bringing that awareness to my mind as the conversation was just becoming intense.

How did I do this?

1. I recognized the dynamic, and knew that there would be no reconciliation if I continued it.
2. I made a choice to check my ego-personality, and submit it to a higher good. This can be hard, especially if I feel invested in the outcome (and I’ve learned to divest from this, too).
3. I brought my attention to that place within that knows better than I do what the “higher good” is. This place is the place of Oneness–the place that connects us all, and knows the highest good for all involved.
4. I mentally asked that place (through prayer, mantra, or invocation) to take over.
5. I waited patiently, usually backing out of the conversation, except to confirm, affirm, or speak-to the feelings of the other person. It’s at this point where I’ve had the most doubts, the “I don’t know what I am doing!” feeling.  It’s at this point where I have needed to stay connected to the higher part of myself, and to trust that whatever I do or say will be for the highest good.
6. Every time, and I mean every time, the dynamic shifted. We would not get into attack-defense, words were not taken personally, and there was a conclusion and resolution with no hurt-feelings.

The Peace is immediate when you bring Oneness into the picture.

Since I have had these experiences, I feel very confident now about choosing Peace, choosing Oneness. I know how the results feel; I know how the results impact relationships.

Each time I read the Guiding Thought, I was able to tap into these memories, to understand what it was saying.

I would like to think that by the end of my contemplation time I was a little bit closer to understanding how to do this with All of Life.