Surrender and Resonate

Part 1: Surrender

I have always been better at feeling God’s message than seeing or hearing it. I'm not talking about needing glasses or a hearing aid; I mean with eyes and ears of the heart. I am writing about feeling a strong and undeniable Presence in my life. This presence is unmistakably not originating from inside my own conscious thought.

At times, this ‘feeling’ is more of an affirmation of God’s presence than if I had physically touched, seen or heard it. At other times of my life, I have felt lost without this feeling and longed for its return. At these times, it seemed that the stronger I wanted to be filled with this Presence, the more numb and unable of feeling I had become. This has happened to me time and time again. When I am finally reunited, I realize the Presence had never really left. I was just focused in the wrong place - every time – over and over. In a way, it was as if I was straining to look beyond the horizon and it was right under my nose. In reality I had made myself numb.

I have never been able to look at one of those paintings that if you stare at long enough, you see the picture – you know, the ones that look like a bunch of colorful dots. I am told that if you stare and shift your focus, then you can see the hidden image. It’s this type of shift that brings the Presence back for me. Now, if I had to wait staring at one of those paintings, then I’d be hopeless! :) For me, it's somewhere between seeing the hidden image in these paintings (impossible for me) and the switching of focus/perspective to see the different faces in the sketch of the old bag lady and the young woman (I wish it were that easy).

Another aspect of this focus shift for me is an active surrender of my own will; just letting the shift happen on its own, as opposed to trying to force it with all my stubborn might. This involves being still, open and quiet in mind. Not easy with a 15 month old tugging on my shorts! :) There is also a surrender of my desire for the experience itself and a surrender of my want to analyze every bit of my streaming thoughts.

I used to have wide swings of spiritual highs and lows, depending on whether I was feeling the Presence or not. Sometimes the energy that I received would peter out if I felt alone for too long. For the past six or seven months I have been on neither a high nor low - just on a kind of general 'up'. In this time, I have been delighted that this Presence has just 'popped in' without me looking for it. I could be putting away laundry, taking a shower, sitting on the 'throne' or spending time with John or my wife. It seems to have sunk in that I'm not alone and in retrospect, it seems childish that I had wanted so hard to maintain that high of being in continuous presence. I now liken it to how a child not only wants the support of his/her parent, but how there's a need for them to be physically present. I don't assume I no longer need support. I do. I don't think I no longer have need for Your presence. I do. I wonder what a teenager would say if I asked if they were mature or if they were an adult. I can guess that answer. Dare I wonder if some parts of me are just reaching a spiritual adolescence?! Modestly I think, "I thought I was further than that!" :)