“Circle of Compassion”
January 18th, 2014 at 11:06 pm (Uncategorized)
How to Be in More Than One Place at a Time
Hmmm…time and space…that’s a BIG topic. I better start early for this one. Actually I think I’ve been working on time and space issues my whole life long and then some!
Only quantum physics can save me now! Or Madeline L’Engle. My favorite book of all time, her brilliant gift to us all: A Wrinkle in Time. I still remember reading this book in one sitting in one chair in the living room when I was 11 years old. My hands were in fists the whole time. I don’t even know how I was able to turn the pages! Literally I think I inhaled it.
Tesseracting, I’ve been working on perfecting ever since! Sofar I’ve to come to the realization that it’s a ‘belief’ thing…That the wrinkling of time and space between point A and point B must be done by the perceiver, the believer. You should see me telling myself that when I’m in the car trying to get somewhere 25 minutes away in what the clock says I’m allowed only 10 minutes. Well it’s a little ‘lame’ to ‘believe’ that I can make it if I don’t start believing it a little sooner than that! I also can’t buy the ‘other’ approach of hearing someone say, “we’re late” when it’s not even the time we’re supposed to be there yet! To me, that’s not a healthy projection either! I can’t be late until I’m LATE.
But the bigger issue I’m waking up to this morning is how to be in two places at the same time when my body isn’t even moving there. Here’s my thought process:
I’m falling to sleep feeling awful, lots of pain. I’m waking up feeling awful, lots of pain.
I hobble downstairs and try stretching but then shortly plop on the sofa feeling the same pain. It just doesn’t seem to stay in the room where I’d like to leave it. That being the case, I’m resting a bit more hoping to then move a little more, then walk a bit, then soak a bit in some epsom salts. In the ‘MEANTIME’….the ‘betweentime’…I guess that’s between point A and point B or between some point where I am and the next point I’m hoping to be…In the meantime,…there must be something I can accomplish that might help me later get to point R or somewhere along my path?
This brings me to FAITHFULNESS….that’s the believing part that I WILL ‘move on down the line’ or I WILL make it full circle. Sometimes I feel like a train moving around the Roundhouse, being repaired, being prepared for my next part of my journey. I can envision and believe where that will be and I can trust that I will not be forever chugging around in the roundhouse.
I want to be with my Mom. I want to hold her hand, make sure she’s comfortable, okay, and knows how much I love her. Likewise I want to be with my Dad. I want to reassure him that we’re all holding hands on this one. And what I know is that my stamina and windows of time during each day have sofar only been for a few hours and then I’m back to feeling awful. Where do I then go to lay my head when that wave of pain and fatigue wells up? What good would I be to them in that sort of shape? So how to be at two places at once? How to care for me and my Mom….
What I know is that my Mom and Dad are in loving arms and hands with my brothers and sister and sister in laws and her nieces and church and friends. They have a circle of love and circles of light all around them. They have been creating circles like that for others all their lives. And I guess what I’m really seeing is that if point A and B are each ends of the diameter of a circle, then they’re connected anyway. So I’m right there with them! And they’re right here with me! The only part of me that gets in the way of knowing that is the part of me that thinks there are no circles! How can we live in the world we do and NOT know there are circles! Moons and stars and orbs of light. Earth and planets and holes in the ice! Eyeballs and horizons that are 360º.
So even zero means everything!
So Mom, I’m there now. I’m with you and Dad and all my siblings. And because I AM my body will also get around to being there, too. Sometimes it just takes it a little longer.
After writing all this, I came across Einstein’s wonderful quote. Could’ve just found that first! Thanks, Albert!
“A human being is a part of the whole, called by us “Universe,” a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest as kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely, but the striving for such achievement is in itself a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner security. ” Albert Einstein
Quoted in H Eves Mathematical Circles Adieu (Boston 1977).