Daily

H,

There is something about the daily grind of living that keeps us from life. We are constantly in this battle for our own minds against the tide that would tell us how to live and what is important. The tide disguises itself as simplicity when what it really does is muddle things up. It robs us of focus, clarity and the peace of mind that comes in resting in God. It does not come with all the loud clanging of other temptations, it comes with its own sort of of silence; an axiomatic argument based on our own base desires for relevance, recognition and acceptance. There is nothing wrong with any of those things, base desires are not bad just basic, but to make them the focus of our coming and going takes us away from the story of grace and onto the well worn paths of running up that Sisyphean hill. This is an even more insidious mound of rock and sand than in the fable. This has marks of progress and sparks of artificial light. We quickly forget the higher things to which we are sworn. Endless advancement becomes the eternal goal and eternity becomes something you earn with earthy sand.

To clear, the tide is not part of the world but the world itself. It is easy to compartmentalize and say there is something in the world to extract and seek balance in. This would be a mistake. It is even easier to say that the world is full of evil people with evil intent and a wilderness is always required. This would be an even graver mistake. There is no “us” against “them”. We are all facing this tide. We are all divine beings having a human experience. We are all trying to make sense of the universe.

Our challenge is to remember this shared camaraderie, this common destiny and this beautiful idea that we were created to think and feel and love and be honest until we know the truth, everyday. We are not at war with each other, not competing over dogmas and definitely should not care who will be right or wrong in the end. This division is only part of the tide. It takes us away from the simplicity of our faith. It stops us from demonstrating in character what our faith says in the holy book. It robs us of both our connection to the divine and our connection to each other. The former cannot exist without the latter.

We need to be rid of the tide. It is not easy and it will take a lifetime to this. It is not important to panic, fret or be in a hurry to free of these things that bind. It is enough that we know this today. It is enough that we remember this daily.