Awareness

I am practicing a new kind of awareness. Meditation is becoming part of my routine, slowly but surely. I have not adopted it into my daily routine, but it is getting to that point. I find that I become aware as I become organized. My room was a mess this afternoon. I cleaned it tonight after spending a few hours with the Kansas City Jesuits at their humble abode, and directly after I lit a stick of incense and began to sit. One of the Jesuits, Dirk Dunfree, who also gets the award for greatest name, allowed me to borrow two books on Zen as well as his sitting stool. He practices Zen meditation every morning at 4 am for at least twenty minutes and has been doing it for at least 15 years. His words have been encouragement for my seeking and searching.

When I say I am practicing a new kind of awareness, I find this to be completely parallel with the Ignatian ideal of seeing God in all things. I have such a loose conception of God right now that I could not be more distant from the ‘man on the cloud’ image. I see God as a force penetrating all things simultaneously. We meditate to become aware of this omnipresent force at a deeper level, and as we enter into this awareness, we become connected with a more profound spirituality that we realize has existed within us all along. We open ourselves beyond the distorted ideas we have of the world and enter into a more pure acceptance of what God has presented to us. I stared at my cabinets today as I meditated. Simple, mundane objects that usually are not worthy of the slightest glance. As I continued to stare and become more aware, I began to see fluctuations passing through each drawer, showing to me how unique and magnificent they truly are. I was praying, and God was answering my prayers by making himself seen. As these realities present themselves to me, I find myself at a point in which I inhibit their full realization, for my ideas of ‘how the world is’ do not allow such a strange reality to present itself in the fullest. I sit and I begin to see depth to surface objects, and immediately, I begin to think and attach ideas to my new perception. This inhibits a further realization. Yet Zen is about patience, as well as Christianity. We cannot expect enlightenment immediately. We must remain patient, we must sit, we must devote time and energy to God, and we will come to see the world as it is. We will become more acquainted with the inexplicable reality God has so graciously offered us.

I go forward attempting to carry this ever deepening awareness into all my actions and moments. I strive not to make judgments on people or situations; rather, I will to let them unfold as they do, in a pure fashion uninhibited by false ideas. This is difficult with classes full of goof-off kids, but it is the ideal I strive for. I love the kids. They fuel me with a new energy, and their interests deepens my own. I find I am connecting to them on levels I never thought possible. They are filling me with fresh ideas and new perspectives that grant me a deeper glimpse into the strange nature of the universe. Sure, their minds are quite preoccupied with useless concerns, yet I find our time together is a time of looking beyond those concerns and entering into a deeper contemplation of reality and God’s presence within it. Will they get anything from this class? I can only hope so at this point. In the meantime, I will not be blocked by empty fears and false ideas. I will be myself, I will bring to them what I have learned, and I will attempt to instill within them a newly felt sense of presence, allowing for them to be receptive to God at a level they never before knew. Even if they cannot understand what is significant about taking a ‘step back’ as I allow them to do in class, I hope that further down the road, they can look back on the class and realize that it was one of their first glimpses into the personal spirituality they find. I wish them the best, and I ask God to remain with me as I continue treading this path toward the deeper unknown, with friends, family, and loved ones at my side, humbling me and allowing me to realize I am nothing without them. I love you all who have taken time out of your all-important days to read this. Thank you for your continual support, compassion, and Love, and I only hope I can offer you to some degree what you have offered me.

*As a final note, I collected and read their journals the other day, and here are some of the best sentences that had to be recorded:

      “I believe god is in my soul at all the times like Mcdonalds he is open 24/7.

      “My uniqueness is being able to eat a sandwich in 2 bites.”

        “I try to find God in all things. Something I really find him in is food. I really want some food     

          right now.”

        “Gifts are something inside you, physically or mentally, and talents are what you choose to do 

          with your gifts.

          “Who am I? I am a conglomerate of atoms that somehow came together in just the right formation 

           to initiate life.

And finally, some quotes by the great Jesuit thinker Anthony DeMello:

“Ideas actually fragment the vision, intuition, or experience of reality as a whole. This is what the mystics are perpetually telling us. Words cannot give you reality. They only point, they only indicate.”

“To know reality you have to know beyond knowing.”