Calls For A New Life

Sad news today, New Orleans is flooding again. And thousands have been stranded in Texas and Louisiana on gridlocked freeways trying to escape Rita.

Most tragically, a bus carrying elderly evacuees, who were trying to escape Hurricane Rita, caught fire while stuck in that gridlock near Wilmer, Texas.

Residents of a nursing home, their oxygen tanks exploded.

What a horror for them and the people in the cars around them who witnessed this terrible event as the bus burned into a blackened shell. As many as 24 people were killed.

How do we make sense of it all? For it is part of a bigger picture.

It may be that we need to change our lives and ways of living or this earth, under such pressure from our activities, will change them for us.

I have received several "wake up" calls in my life. In two very dramatic instances I escaped death - just barely.

I've lost a home and family. In retrospect I see I was living a joyless life in which I was not authentic. Pulled by what people said I "should" do, I worked and lived a "quiet life of desperation."

Although it looked successful from the outside, either my life course had to change or I had to die. That's clear to me, in retrospect, because I wasn't doing what I came here to do.

I chose change over death. I chose finding my authentic path, one small footstep at a time away from the old life. Thanks to God's grace, I had that choice.

But don't think that now I live an authentic life every second or that I am "in the flow" every moment.

Far from it. But I know when I'm straying too far away from the core of who I came here to be, and I self-correct. The line has been drawn in the sand and I know when I'm crossing over it.

Katrina, Rita and all the trials that face us now have one major purpose. They call us to examine our lives.

An unexamined life is a life just waiting for the wrecking ball.

Instead, know who you are - really - and get in touch with what you came here to do.

I'm betting it's not to waste your life on trivial entertainments, work at a job you hate or criticize others because you are unhappy or resentful of them.

I bet its to find your own "Kingdom of God" down here in which you follow your authentic path so that all the puzzle pieces start falling together and life begins feeling good and making sense.

I bet it's to find a way of living and working that brings peace, fulfillment and connection so you are always in the right place at the right time and never, ever running for your life in any sense of the word.

As Sarah Ban Breathnach asks in Simple Abundance:

Could your bliss and an authentic life be one and the same? What if whatever it is that makes you ecstatic, brings you joy, sends you soaring, satisfies your hunger, fulfills your yearning, ignites your passion, makes you reach out to others, and gives you peace - in other words, your bliss - is the Kingdom of Heaven?

Have you ever considered that The Kingdom of Heaven is not up in the sky but is something we are to create here, both individually and collectively?

Given current events, perhaps it is time for each one of us to begin today to find that authentic path for ourselves.

Too much misery and sorrow occurs when we don't. Let us pray:

Dear God,

There is one Presence and one Power in the Universe: You.

By Your Grace, life agrees with me.
I place myself under your care as You guide me on my authentic path.

You guide me in making the corrections I need
And comfort me as I make these changes.

By Your grace, I am able to digest every new thought
And assimilate every new experience so it frees me.

I am able to respond and make good decisions.

I am surrounded by Your angels and I am safe.

Nothing is more powerful than Your love
And Your desire that I know joy.

I love my life.
My life is a blessing to myself
And to the world.

Amen.

From Prayerforce: 365 Days To A New Life

Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. Psalms 30:5