Being on Facebook has been an unexpected gift to me. As a writer of personal essays, I enjoy getting feedback on what I write. In another world I would have been a newspaper columnist, but such is life. Primarily I am a spiritual writer, but I sure do like to make people laugh as well as cry. What I avoid is coming from the head; copy addressed to the head is dry. I used to have things in The Reader’s Digest Towards More Picturesque Speech. That was lifetimes ago, just as the humor I wrote about my two children when they were growing up. I don’t even have the manuscripts anymore; but they were hilarious. We were a nuclear family and Bob and I raised them with no help and could rarely afford a babysitter. When Laurie got ill, I continued to write comedy, but now sold to Joan Rivers and other prominent performers. Tears and laughter don’t interfere with each other in my book.
My son inherited my wicked wit, which I got from my father. He, too, liked to write newspaper columns and had a great collection of humor books. I got those after he died, but at some point got rid of them. I have gotten rid of most of my spiritual books as well. Now I live a pared-down life and love it. One thing I am always working on is reclaiming the inner land for myself. I am not so prone to do things to please people anymore. There are precious few people in my life. When I die, there will be no large congregation of mourners. My ego worries about that. Heck, it worries about everything. But when I sit in silence, it dissolves back into nothingness, as do I.
What, after all, is the good of interacting with a sleeping world, populated by snoring people? if everything is within, and it is, why mingle on the movie set? Joel Goldsmith had many trenchant things to say about going within. He said that “All conflicts must be settled within one’s own consciousness.” How’s that for simplifying your life? Vernon Howard said that you come into life to enjoy the journey, not to pick up hitchhikers in your car. Life is for us, for our inner growth and enjoyment, which prove to be the same thing.
Much of my writing is about grief and loss; I am true to that theme as I am true to myself. I hope my readers understand that I use it as a way into the heart and not as anything else. For the heart’s home is honesty and nothing can bar the door to the heart except unconsciousness. Ram Dass’ guru said, “Never put anyone out of your heart.” Well said, Maharaji, well said. For those of us trying to awaken, the heart is being cleaned by a supreme crew, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. They don’t do windows. They make them.
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