{"id":81,"date":"2013-03-07T17:54:45","date_gmt":"2013-03-07T17:54:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/yourbestlifenow\/?p=81"},"modified":"2013-03-07T18:19:13","modified_gmt":"2013-03-07T18:19:13","slug":"why-do-i-meditate-pray-and-write-about-the-spiritual-path","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourbestlifenow\/2013\/03\/why-do-i-meditate-pray-and-write-about-the-spiritual-path.html","title":{"rendered":"Why Do I Meditate…Pray…and Write about the Spiritual Path?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I am frequently asked, “Why do you meditate…pray…or, for that matter, write so much about spiritual things?”<\/p>\n

It’s who I am. How could I be otherwise? I’ve tried for years to be what others have wanted and, frankly, I’ve grown weary of it. I’m not here to entertain you…or please you…or dance around some ring in an effort to get you to like me…or, agree with you just so you’ll feel better about you. I didn’t show up to be someone I am not.<\/p>\n

Nor did you.<\/p>\n

I have exhausted much of life trying, too. And, I’m done with it.<\/p>\n

If my beliefs offend you, then I suppose you’ll just have to be offended.\u00a0 If my beliefs are too frightening for you, then you’ll just have to shiver. \u00a0I will not squeeze myself into your tiny box of “truth.” If you want to go through the rest of your life suffocating in some belief box of narrow thinking, then have at it.<\/p>\n

Not for me.<\/p>\n

Instead? \u00a0I will live free.\u00a0I will be me. I’m going to be the person God has created me to be.<\/p>\n

And, that person isn’t you! So, get over YOU!<\/p>\n

You say, “But I don’t agree with half the stuff you write. \u00a0In fact, sometimes, you just plain suck!”<\/p>\n

Then “UNFRIEND ME, my friend!”<\/p>\n

Like Dah!<\/p>\n

I do not WRITE for you any more than you LIVE for me.<\/p>\n

No longer will I say I believe things just so you’re comfortable. If you do not know that Jesus meant what he said, when he said, we are to love God with all our heart and with all our MINDS (Luke 10:27), then you’ll just have to figure it out the hard way.<\/p>\n

The mind part is just as important as the heart part. The mind involves everything rational and true and sometimes that means we have to let go of the primitive, limited understanding of people in the Bible who thought things we know better than to think today. \u00a0So, my friend…it’s OK to have questions. It’s OK to have doubts. You do not disrespect the Bible by admitting it’s limited understanding of many things. You only disrespect it by when you pretend otherwise. The questions you don’t want to ask or your friends do not want you asking either – that’s gotta go. Don’t buy the lie disguised as truth in the nauseating cliche’ \u00a0“The Bible says it; we just believe it; so that settles it!”<\/p>\n

Settles what?<\/p>\n

Settles absolutely nothing. All it is…is an avoidance tactic they’ve cleverly confused for faith.<\/p>\n

It has nothing to do with faith, however. Instead, it has everything to do with fear. \u00a0Their fear. That’s really how they’re living – in fear dressed up as faith and singing to the top of it voice…so loudly, in fact, they can’t think.<\/p>\n

The charade won’t last my friend. The party is coming to a close on this kind of shallow religion. If you don’t believe it, you’ve been living with your head in the sand.\u00a0Just go pick up this morning’s paper. \u00a0Or read it on your device. People, in record numbers, are realizing there’s been infinite good in religion and equally infinite evil. And I, and you, have a choice.\u00a0The madness of so much religion is daily being replaced by the discipline of spiritual living. People are giving up knowledge about Jesus and in exchange are knowing the life-transforming Jesus.<\/p>\n

So, if you must…if you’re just too frightened to do otherwise…go ahead, and pretend you don’t have a mind…just pretend to love God without it…pretend that you believe things that, secretly, you and I both know, you really do not believe.<\/p>\n

The curtain will drop soon enough.\u00a0One day you’ll know you can neither love God only with your heart but without your mind than you can eat pizza without a crust. (Oh, I just met someone who can! LOL!).<\/p>\n

You will know that you could never know a God you’ve crammed into the box of your tiny thinking.<\/p>\n

When you’re ready…and that may take a lifetime…but, when you’re ready, you’ll step out of your own box of pretension.\u00a0And, my friend, when you do, you’ll make discoveries beyond imagine.<\/p>\n

Rumi, the Sufi poet, asked the all important question, “The prison door is open! So, why would you stay inside?”<\/p>\n

Step out of everyone else’s expectations and INTO…<\/p>\n

YOUR BEST LIFE NOW!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am frequently asked, “Why do you meditate…pray…or, for that matter, write so much about spiritual things?” It’s who I am. How could I be otherwise? I’ve tried for years to be what others have wanted and, frankly, I’ve grown weary of it. 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