Friday, May 16, 2008

INTO THE OPEN

Friday, May 16, 2008

“God leads us out into the open, into a spacious, free life.”
-- Romans 8:6, The Message

It became clear to me this morning that there are really only two ways of viewing life – as spacious or cramped. Reality is either a wide-open, boundless festival or a narrow, restricted prison. I’m either part of a limitless miracle or a tight and chaotic struggle. Unfortunately, I have spent a good part of my life believing in the latter. Life, for me, has been fairly “small”. I’ve often seen myself as a hugely insignificant and vulnerable mortal who’s forced to make a constant effort simply to survive from day to day. I’ve played out my days imagining myself on a very small stage surrounded by rigid boundaries. This morning, though, I’ve been able to see more clearly the other, entirely different, viewpoint. This view sees life as a being absolutely unlimited – without boundaries of any sort. In this view, the stage of life is unimaginably vaster than even the realms of the stars. There are no beginnings anywhere, and no endings. Nothing is separated from anything else, because there are no boundary lines. Every so-called “thing” and every experience blends into every other one to make a seamless, measureless whole. From this expansive viewpoint, nothing is more important than anything else, and no supposedly “individual” experience is more important than the overall, boundless whole. Each seemingly separate and crucial event is merely a wave in an infinite ocean. Perhaps I can look at life today from this thoroughly freeing perspective. Perhaps I can remind myself that the stage on which the universe (and I) play out the cosmic drama is larger than the distance between the farthest stars. It might help me to relax and enjoy the show.

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