Seeing The World Through Rose-Colored Glasses

Spiritual growth and healing on your spiritual journey!

Subject(s): General Interest
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March 18, 2007 at 16:15:55

by Vidya Ishaya Page 2 of 2 page(s)

http://www.awakeningpath.com

Now, this process of focusing-on-the-spiritual-core can be an interesting practice at a coffee shop. But it can be even more powerful when done in deeper relationships. Let me give an example that occurs in counseling.

When someone comes to me for spiritual support, they often come with a tightly-held set of beliefs and attitudes. Sometimes these beliefs and attitudes are producing a sense of disconnection. Instead of reacting to the specifics of their belief system, I try to first look past it all, and focus on the spiritual bond that unites us.

It doesn't really matter to me whether a person considers himself to be a Republican or a Democrat, an agnostic or a religious fundamentalist. It's just not that important to me. If there is an unloving attitude that is causing the person pain, I might point it out, and help them to find an alternative. But my real work is to keep a constant sense of the spiritual connection between us - and between us and everyone else.

In the long run, I find that this is a much more productive approach. It begins to dissolve the sense of separation between all of us. It can open the doors to an ever-expanding "holy relationship" - a true, deep experience of spiritual connection that embraces everyone.

Self-Concept Versus Self

As a parallel to the "dreamer and the dream" theme, A Course in Miracles also introduces the idea of "self-concept versus Self." This is a theme that I've covered in previous writing as well.

The idea here is that each of us tends to form a strong self-concept as we make our way through the world. This is the foundation of our individual "dreams." The bottom line of our self-concept is: "This is who I am, and that's who you areÂ…and perhaps we have some things in common, but not much."

Again, this self-concept creates a sense of separation - and it also prevents us from recognizing the glorious spiritual Self that we really are. Our true, spiritual Self is far beyond any worldly definition. It isn't really a concept at all, but an experience. In order to experience our spiritual Self, we must be willing - at least for brief moments - to relax our grip on our personally-generated self-concepts. Instead of saying:

"I'm a political centrist, and you're not."
"I'm a rock climber, and you're not."
"I'm a spiritual seeker, and you're not."

Â…we become willing - at least for a moment - to drop all our ideas about ourselves (and others), and receive a sense of our shared spiritual glory. This doesn't mean that we become amorphic non-thinkers without passion or direction. But it does mean that we choose to recognize a deeper truth beneath our personal ideas - the truth of our spiritual connection.

Recently, I noticed that a surprising number of my friends consider themselves to be agnostics or atheists. I actually hadn't been very aware of this until a new friend said, "You and your buddy are an odd pair. You're so into spirituality, and he doesn't believe in God."

I had hardly given it a thought! That was good to see. It showed me that, to some degree at least, I had been joining with the dreamer, not the dream - the person, not the philosophy. That's my goal in all my relationships.

Again, to be clear, I am not suggesting that we abandon our ideas and opinions. Not at all. But while we're sharing our thoughts with each other, we can look past self-concepts to our deeper Selves - past disconnecting philosophies to our underlying connection. This not only facilitates good communication; it also places everything in the right perspective.

As we focus on our shared spiritual connection, we recognize that we're neither alone nor apart - that regardless of our personal beliefs, we're all in this together. That vision can produce a wonderful experience of peace, love, and interpersonal joining.

Dan Joseph
http://www.DanJoseph.com

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