Wednesday, June 25, 2008

response to a comment on "unsure"

the comment was on my unsure post, down a couple weeks. he says:
I think that little voice is our king inside. The one who gives orders to our warrior self, congratulates him for his successes, and admonishes him for his failures. My struggle is in the practice of listening to that king. I'm a warrior by nature (I think) - I like to do, and often times I'm doing just to be doing, without real purpose, without direction from the king. That's very wasteful and I appear guilty before the king regularly.

My hope is to check in with the king once a day (bring myself to account), get my orders for the day and do them. Rinse and repeat. Well, and my king voice seems to need to be heard more regularly than once a day, maybe it's not a daily ritual, but a steady state of willingness to listen when the king is ready to talk. Or maybe it's both.

It's so easy to just go and do, we're praised so much for doing and praised so little for stopping to listen. Hmmm... how to overcome that temptation and stand before the king. Thoughts?


I am going to quote this from the book: Alcoholics Anonymous.
In thinking about our day we may face indecision. We may not be able to determine which course to take. Here we ask God for inspiration, an intuitive thought or decision. We relax and take it easy. We don't struggle. We are often surprised how the right answers come after we have tried this for a while. What used to be the hunch or the occasional inspiration gradually becomes a working part of the mind. Being still inexperienced and having just made conscious contact with God, it is not probable that we are going to be inspired at all times. We might pay for this presumption in all sorts of absurd actions and ideas. Nevertheless, we find that our thinking will, as time passes, be more and more on the plane of inspiration. We come to rely upon it.
pgs. 86-87

Some other stuff I have read brings up a few more points. This paragraph seems to be speaking to those of us who are "new" at "talking" with our Higher Power. But it is important to realize that we can never be so close to God that we don't need to check our behaviors against other, more objective people. The idea that we receive direct inspiration from God can become a dangerous one if not tempered by the humility of our continuing reliance on other people for support as well. Although in theory a total reliance on the God-voice would be ideal, it seems that it would require a level of perfection from us that we are not able to consistently produce. Hence we are given wonderful people in our lives to provide dissension and confirmation to what we hear from within.

I think that the unavoidable conclusion of all of this talk is what I have never wanted to admit-that I have to "grow up" to be as wise as the "grown-ups". I always wanted to believe in my own intellect (still do) and ability. I wanted so badly to be a prodigy, the possessor of a wisdom beyond my years. Of course I also wanted this to be recognized by others. But I am coming to the realization that knowledge is not the same thing as wisdom. Neither is wisdom something that comes automatically with aging. It all takes work-application of the learned actions and ideas against a continuing experience of the reality all around me. Answers beget more questions. Learning begets more discovery. As of right now, I would have to say-as cliche as it sounds-that the more I learn, the more I realize I still have to learn. And that as I continue on my journey, I will learn to consult with my King more and more. It just keeps getting better with age, right J?