Body or Spirits?
I heard something the other day that resonated deeply with me....
"We must remember the following:
We are spirits experiencing this Earthly body, not Earthly bodies experiencing spirits"
It's an age-old tale about our bodies being mere vessels to transport our spirits through the Earthly realm.
After having my daughter, life has become more meaningful to me on a spiritual level.
I realize that there are undoubtedly greater purposes for me as a being, it's not only to contribute to my spiritual growth, but to ensure that my daughters spiritual growth is nurtured with the best possible guidance that I am capable of providing.
When I was left only to care for myself, my spirituality was within. It's something that I keep to myself and believe strongly in others doing the same.
For many years, I have had long discussions with my peers, family & randoms about the existence of higher powers.
My approach to my spiritual growth has been internalized and rarely shared, even with my wife.
I have family who are very versed in the traditional forms of religious followings and friends who are the same. I myself have chosen (for a long time now) to keep my distance from many of the organized religions. I realize that each person can take away whatever they want from anything. Maybe my personal bias' have kept me from experiencing some of the goodness that exists within the churches of the world.
Lately, I've been leaning (ever so slightly) towards introducing some religious aspects to my daughter.
I recognize that there are many great goods to come from religious experiences of the organized kind.
There is learning what's "right" and "wrong"...
there is teaching one to care for something other than themselves...
and there is ....well,.....BABYSITTING.... ha.
Almost all organized religions have programs for the children...these programs can be a savior (p.i.) for the parents.
Not only do they have culturally geared programs such as Chinese Schooling, Korean Schooling, etc. but they also have after school programs.
Many of these things allow parents to continue working and not having to spend an arm & a leg on the daycare costs of today (Kindercare is NOT cheap peoples).
The diagram of the modern family now is usually comprised of 2 working parents and rarely are there grandparents that are available to retire & take care of the grandkids while the parents work.
Some lucky family structures do have strong bonds that will allow for many conveniences to the parents.
Myself, I am not in that luxury.
So, in order to make my wife's life easier, which in turn makes my life easier, I have come to reassess my hard lined stance to keep myself & my children out of organized church.
Now this is no way whatsoever a guarantee you will see me at a church near you, but it is a single step towards it.
Let's just say I'm not so opposed as I used to be.
Now back to my original points about Humans being spirits experiencing Earthly bodies.
You can tell a lot about how a person takes care of their body by how they take care of their cars.
After all, both are vessels for our spirits.
Our bodies need constant tune ups.
That requires us as imperfect beings, to be able to sit back and truthfully assess our stance in the world.
Do the things we do coincide with how we want to be seen?
Do the things we do represent the person we are?
An experiment that I've done for a long number of years is to sit in front of a mirror and talk to myself.
Ask myself the hard questions that will fluster my soul, question my existence and even make me rework my angles of attack.
It's a very difficult thing to look yourself in your face and ask yourself:
"Are you a good father?"
"Are you a good husband?"
"Have you been a good son?"
"Are you a contributing member of society?"
"Have you accomplished all you are capable of?"
"Can you do more than what you are already doing?"
"Do you lie to yourself to protect yourself from shame?"
(notice how the questions get longer and longer)....
It's a very long experiment and sometimes you can be drawn to tears and other time you have sheer Joy when you can genuinely tell yourself that you've done what you've chosen to do.
I believe that we are our own correctors.
We have to hold ourselves responsible more...we have got to show ourselves that we are what we say we are (cue Dennis Green, lol).
Our friends & family, they are versed in covering up our faults.
Rarely, can you find a person who will shoot it straight to you when you F*** up.
when you find one of those people, many times you shun them away because they make you uncomfortable.
However, when you are uncomfortable, usually it means that there is something that could be changed (for the better) to make you comfortable.
Leaders have the knack to make people uncomfortable.
They are willing to ask the questions that are left silent elsewhere.
They are willing to pose a situation that will force others to evaluate their own actions.
Leaders don't stay quiet, they speak up.
Leaders are first and many times have more mistakes than followers.
Mistakes are great sources of growth.
only if you learn from them though...remember, making the same mistake over and over while expecting the same result is the definition of insanity.
We must all find a way to become Leaders of the New School (hip hop reference, =)...the school that is going to change our spiritual minds in 2012...
Once we are willing to look at ourselves, clothes off, inhibitions turned off, protective lies erased, we will begin to grow spiritually.
I hope this long rant doesn't make you think I'm a crazed drug filled conspiracy theorist, what I hope it does is make you reassess your approach, be real with yourself, don't fake the funk and live life how it should be lived. With love for yourself, others & our spirits....
"We're fighting for our spirits & mind"......G.O.O.D.ie M.ostly O.ver B.ullshit!
free,d
"We must remember the following:
We are spirits experiencing this Earthly body, not Earthly bodies experiencing spirits"
It's an age-old tale about our bodies being mere vessels to transport our spirits through the Earthly realm.
After having my daughter, life has become more meaningful to me on a spiritual level.
I realize that there are undoubtedly greater purposes for me as a being, it's not only to contribute to my spiritual growth, but to ensure that my daughters spiritual growth is nurtured with the best possible guidance that I am capable of providing.
When I was left only to care for myself, my spirituality was within. It's something that I keep to myself and believe strongly in others doing the same.
For many years, I have had long discussions with my peers, family & randoms about the existence of higher powers.
My approach to my spiritual growth has been internalized and rarely shared, even with my wife.
I have family who are very versed in the traditional forms of religious followings and friends who are the same. I myself have chosen (for a long time now) to keep my distance from many of the organized religions. I realize that each person can take away whatever they want from anything. Maybe my personal bias' have kept me from experiencing some of the goodness that exists within the churches of the world.
Lately, I've been leaning (ever so slightly) towards introducing some religious aspects to my daughter.
I recognize that there are many great goods to come from religious experiences of the organized kind.
There is learning what's "right" and "wrong"...
there is teaching one to care for something other than themselves...
and there is ....well,.....BABYSITTING.... ha.
Almost all organized religions have programs for the children...these programs can be a savior (p.i.) for the parents.
Not only do they have culturally geared programs such as Chinese Schooling, Korean Schooling, etc. but they also have after school programs.
Many of these things allow parents to continue working and not having to spend an arm & a leg on the daycare costs of today (Kindercare is NOT cheap peoples).
The diagram of the modern family now is usually comprised of 2 working parents and rarely are there grandparents that are available to retire & take care of the grandkids while the parents work.
Some lucky family structures do have strong bonds that will allow for many conveniences to the parents.
Myself, I am not in that luxury.
So, in order to make my wife's life easier, which in turn makes my life easier, I have come to reassess my hard lined stance to keep myself & my children out of organized church.
Now this is no way whatsoever a guarantee you will see me at a church near you, but it is a single step towards it.
Let's just say I'm not so opposed as I used to be.
Now back to my original points about Humans being spirits experiencing Earthly bodies.
You can tell a lot about how a person takes care of their body by how they take care of their cars.
After all, both are vessels for our spirits.
Our bodies need constant tune ups.
That requires us as imperfect beings, to be able to sit back and truthfully assess our stance in the world.
Do the things we do coincide with how we want to be seen?
Do the things we do represent the person we are?
An experiment that I've done for a long number of years is to sit in front of a mirror and talk to myself.
Ask myself the hard questions that will fluster my soul, question my existence and even make me rework my angles of attack.
It's a very difficult thing to look yourself in your face and ask yourself:
"Are you a good father?"
"Are you a good husband?"
"Have you been a good son?"
"Are you a contributing member of society?"
"Have you accomplished all you are capable of?"
"Can you do more than what you are already doing?"
"Do you lie to yourself to protect yourself from shame?"
(notice how the questions get longer and longer)....
It's a very long experiment and sometimes you can be drawn to tears and other time you have sheer Joy when you can genuinely tell yourself that you've done what you've chosen to do.
I believe that we are our own correctors.
We have to hold ourselves responsible more...we have got to show ourselves that we are what we say we are (cue Dennis Green, lol).
Our friends & family, they are versed in covering up our faults.
Rarely, can you find a person who will shoot it straight to you when you F*** up.
when you find one of those people, many times you shun them away because they make you uncomfortable.
However, when you are uncomfortable, usually it means that there is something that could be changed (for the better) to make you comfortable.
Leaders have the knack to make people uncomfortable.
They are willing to ask the questions that are left silent elsewhere.
They are willing to pose a situation that will force others to evaluate their own actions.
Leaders don't stay quiet, they speak up.
Leaders are first and many times have more mistakes than followers.
Mistakes are great sources of growth.
only if you learn from them though...remember, making the same mistake over and over while expecting the same result is the definition of insanity.
We must all find a way to become Leaders of the New School (hip hop reference, =)...the school that is going to change our spiritual minds in 2012...
Once we are willing to look at ourselves, clothes off, inhibitions turned off, protective lies erased, we will begin to grow spiritually.
I hope this long rant doesn't make you think I'm a crazed drug filled conspiracy theorist, what I hope it does is make you reassess your approach, be real with yourself, don't fake the funk and live life how it should be lived. With love for yourself, others & our spirits....
"We're fighting for our spirits & mind"......G.O.O.D.ie M.ostly O.ver B.ullshit!
free,d
First of all... TGI*MFing*F !!!!
So... having a child being a life changing experience is most certainly true from looking at you Dizzle.
I have seen much change in you my friend. I mean, how can you not? You are the guardian of another human "sole." Our bodies indeed are just ships for our souls. Souls last forever but unfortunately our bodies do not as evident from my aches and bruises. It delights me to hear that you are taking a vested interested in her spiritual growth. Noodles has an AWESOME father.
I believe Lan has been in talks to MC about trying out our church. In fact, I have just spoken to Cho about coming back to Sundays. Hint hint! No pressure, it's just out there. We can even do lunches, play ball after while the girls do their thing... options are endless!!!
Dang, you are good with your words. I am not good at expressing myself with words. Only good at scoring on SCRABBLE!! WHOOOO!!! XI, ZA all day erday~!
What's the good word for the weekend? I got work to do. Been actually busy for a change!
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Church Smurch....lol.
the only thing it's good for is daycare.... =)
***sarcasm ends
I am horrible at expressing myself in words, 99% of the times it's just rambles & scrambles.....
you and chosen1 are killing the scrabble ish right now....
Can we play RISK instead?
or shoots and ladders?
Lakers will be your 2012 champs...
yea, I said it!
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