Wow! 2016 has been a powerful year, hasn’t it? Extremes have prevailed! Terrible things have happened in our community in the last year – tragedy seems to have become a frequent visitor in our world. Just last week, a police officer was needlessly shot in Chattanooga. In addition, we went through the worst drought since 1904, culminating in forest fires that burned thousands of acres, not to mention the devastating fire in Gatlinburg which took lives of animals and humans.
In our community we have gone from feeling an almost smug sense of security to being on constant alert; it seems to be increasingly difficult to trust that our children are safe, even on the school bus, as attested by the horrific bus accident that took the lives of six precious students on their way home from Woodmore Elementary School.
We are discovering that we are not immune to the turmoil and chaos in the world. Uncertainty, and the inability to control outcomes has never seemed more apparent. We are being asked to exist in a Reality that, at times, seems difficult, even impossible, to accept.
In times like these, we have only one place to turn for inner peace. We can no longer fall for the illusion that we are going to be able to tuck ourselves into a safe cocoon and sit out the storm. No, the storm appears to have moved just outside our door. It is far-reaching and life-shaking. Death is a possibility for any of us at any moment. This has always been true, of course, but most of us have been able to buffer ourselves from having to face that possibility. No longer.
The one place we can turn for consolation and peace is to our Universal Creator Source, and to the Universal Law upon which this world operates. Belief in a Higher Power that protects, governs, and guides us is the only chance we have of transcending this time of woe.
For me, my daily practice has never been more important than now. Every morning, I strive to realign my thinking with the Guiding Principles of Reality©. To develop a practice is to place our fears and doubts into Bigger Hands than ours, and is especially imperative in a world gone mad with the insanity of believing our own personal lies about ourselves, others, and life.
It’s only through my daily practice that I am able to recognize and open to the abundance that is the other extreme of all the aforementioned darkness. Turning our focus from the awful to gratitude instead is the practice we must all strengthen, if we are to find peace in the midst of so much chaos. And truly, there IS so much for which to be grateful. The practice is to build the habit of looking up, even in times when we are most down.
My daily practice is where I look up during my difficult times, and doing so has greatly matured my understanding of life. The fear and sadness of life has forced me to rely even more on Source and Universal Guidance to light my way. As my trust in Source grows, I become even more willing to hear and do what the Inner Voice says. I continue to be amazed, and deeply, beyond my ability to express, blown away by the precision by which the details of even my smallest daily matters are handled when I am looking up – sometimes it appears as though the way was prepared months, even years, before my moment of need, as if it were arranged and waiting for the very moment it was to be made useful. Isn't that amazing?!