03
Anything properly considered becomes a portkey to realization and transformation. A horoscope, a fortune cookie (The fortune or the cookie), a horseshoe nail... The key is a meditative perspective and a problem or a pressing question, and the probing inquiry: "How does this connect with that?" Sit with the question as a novice might wrestle with a koan. "What does that have to do with this?" Carry it with you through the day, perhaps for several days, looking for the connection, the contact point, the "Aha!" of recognition. The magic is there waiting for you to do the work of preparing the way for the magic to happen. How significant is the problem? How pressing is the question? The motivation for seeking the magic has to carry you past boredom and frustration into the work of seeking the philosopher's stone.
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02
Between being unbalanced and out of harmony, and being centered and focused, in the flow and at one with ourselves and our circumstances, are we conscious of the transition point where one goes over into the other? Do we know when we are moving from one to the other? Are we mindful enough of our state of being to know when we are facing a choice that has the potential of destabilizing us or re-stabilizing us? If we are destabilized, do we know what it will take to re-stabilize us? Everything depends upon, flows out of, revolves around our balance and harmony-- our connection with our center, core, foundation, source, original nature. To be in accord with this is to be in accord with the Tao and at one with the flow of life through time and place. Knowing and avoiding what disrupts that flow, and finding our way back to it when it is disturbed, are the guiding principles of the species, and we would do well to nurture and maintain our connection with them throughout our days.
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01
Growing up is waking up. Waking up is growing up. Both involve transforming our relationship with ourselves and our life. "Nothing changes until we do" could be a bit of Mary Poppins wisdom on the order of, "Anything can happen if you let it." Even Chinese fortune cookies can wake us up "if we let it." We stand between ourselves and what might yet be. Whose side are we on? What is not working in our life? What do we need that we don't have? Waking up is growing up, is seeing what needs to be done and doing it. What is keeping that from happening? What has to change for everything to change? Think of the Tao as "The way things need to be." Living in accord with the Tao is living to assist things in being what they need to be in each situation as it arises-- no matter what it might mean for us personally. This is the fundamental message of Jesus of Nazareth. "Do not think about yourselves and what is in it for you! Pick up your cross daily, and come along with me!" Jesus was one with the Tao. He was what the situation needed him to be in every situation that came along. The answer to the question, "What would Jesus do?" is "What needs to be done in every situation that arises all your life long." What is keeping that from happening?
