If You Can Believe

I took this sunset photo on my way to Unity Church for World Prayer Day Sept. 10th.

I love parables or stories. Here's one out of Spiritual Economics: the prosperity process by Eric Butterworth (borrowed from the church library)

pg.73 "In his classic work 'Wind, Sand, and Stars,' St. Exupery tells the story of a pilot who was downed in the rugged, snow-blocked region of the Andes. He trudged through the snow for days, only to find his way hopelessly blocked by a yawning crevice in the ice. He quickly concluded that he had three choices: (1) Give up and die of exposure; (2) Make an attempt to jump across the fissure, knowing full-well that it was impossible to do so; (3) Convince himself that he could jump across, and make an attempt out of the conviction.

When considered in this kind of logic, the choice was clear. So, he backed away a few yards, closed his eyes in a moment of inner communion, then, loudly shouting, 'I can! I can!' he ran and jumped, and barely reached safety on the other side. Trudging off down the mountain, he was finally found and saved.

Now, faith was no magic bridge. This was no miracle of God picking him up and depositing him bodily on the other side. What the man did was accomplished with his own concentrated mind and by special effort by his own muscles. But his believing attitude released a flow of energy from his own inner God-potential."

...

"No miracles are required. It is the way you have been created. You are a rich and creative spiritual being. You can never be less than this. You may frustrate your potential. You may identify with that which is less than what you can be. But within you now and always is the unborn possibility of a limitless experience of inner stability and outer treasure, and yours is the privilege of giving birth to it. And you will, if you can believe."

Hypochondriac cartoonist writes to her younger self

New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast who grew up as "worried peas in a worried pod", here writes to her nine-year-old self:

"Roz,

You are not going to get leprosy. I promise. Or lockjaw. Again, I promise. Don't ask me how I know. I just do. Those nights you lie in bed feeling that your tongue is suddenly eight time bigger than normal, testing your jaw for stiffness, gulping down saliva repeatedly to gauge if you're having difficulty swallowing - they're over. YOU WILL NOT GET SICK.

I'm not one of those adults who think kids have the best lives. I knew how much the world's traps and dangers burden you. Ever since you learned that Helen Keller sensed the heat of an electrical fire by putting her hands against the wall, you occupy your idle minutes fretting about the wires behind the plaster. Ever since you read how Trixie Belden had to suck the venom out of her brother's foot, you've been keeping a watchful eye out for rattlesnakes on the occasions when you're forced to leave the safety of your family's Brooklyn apartment.

But you're going to be okay. Roz, here's the other thing I want you to know: Being an adult is better than being a kid. You're going to grow up - healthy and whole - and everything you're feeling now is going to be great material for your work."

Poem from December 1997

After the Storm

I go down to the dock

to hear the restful lapping

of waves so recently slapping.

Raging wind has raced into the future

and storm is a remembering.

Hear the insect voices humming.

See the crabs and minnows dart

beneath the willows drooping shelter.

Clouds have past

and left a dome of glass.

Sun does its glittering dance

across the peaceful water

into my eyes it's sparkling.