Building Your Spiritual Home

What Shapes My Life

Although so much of my life results from conscious choices I have made, I increasingly feel that I am also being led. For example, fourteen years ago I just happened to be at a lecture by a nurse who was caring for traumatized Cambodians at a local clinic. She did it single-handedly, so I met her after the talk to volunteer some time. That led me to her clinic, Lynn Community Health Center, with which I have had a rich and rewarding relationship. When I was 63, my friend Rick gave me a reading with a numerologist, Louisa Poole, which changed my life. I wasn’t looking for anything, but when it came, it altered the course of this lifetime. As a result, I began major innovations in my clinic and also began my career reading Tarot. Years later, my minister Mary, suggested the sabbatical which has allowed me to write this. Neither she nor I had any idea where this sabbatical would lead, but here I am. One could say that I am a willing follower. But more importantly, I feel I have been led into the life that I now love.

While I can definitely see God’s hand in shaping my life, I do feel that there is a small engine inside me that also moves me along. I call it the “me-in-me”. It is like my will. I have an intention, like get rid of the waiting list at my clinic. My motor gets going in that direction. Hundreds of things happen that either help or hinder. They all are bigger than my small motor. Amidst this ebb and flow, the me-in-me keeps chugging away, slowly, always leading toward the same goal. I have little control over policy, but what little I have- a remark here, a decision there- always pushes in that same direction. And after a long while, I get where I am going.

This has certainly been true in my gradual approach to God. A long time ago I set this course, and the me-in-me began pushing. A friend suggested writing a “letter to God” every morning. So I tried that for a while. Then we had a spiritual retreat at my church. I went. Conversations with friends head off in the direction of spirituality, so I move a bit further. A setback: I stop meditating for a few months. Then start again. I chose to see the movie that has a heroic character. I inch forward. And so forth. There are few dramatic breakthroughs, but I am on a path, and the me-in-me-keeps chugging on. I am almost unaware that it motivates my everyday decisions, but when I look back, I can see the direction I’ve been following.

1) Do you see your life getting nudged in some direction?
What were some of the things that nudged you along?
2) Do you see yourself as pursuing some path that gradually shapes your life?
3) What were some of the choices you have made that changed you and the direction of your life?

CHAPTERS

GET A LIFE
THE JOY OF A DEPRESSED MOTHER
OPENING MANY DOORS
GETTING COMFORTABLE WITH ANGER
THE PATH OF MEDITATION
GIVING UP CONTROL
MARRIAGE AS A CHANGE AGENT
STRUCTURES THAT SUPPORT LIFE
VERMONT AND NATURE
TO HELL WITH DIGNITY
COMPANIONS ON THE ROAD
DOUBLE VISION
WHAT SHAPES LIFE
DISMANTLING SELF
TOLERATING GOD’S LOVE
MAKING FRIENDS WITH GOD