Yesterday was a massive breakthrough day. The break through was finally able to admit that my monastic teachings are a corruption in my brain and I must re-wire if I expect to live happily "out here." The main problem is form over content. The content of the lay people I meet is as vital as the vowed religious. The form of the vowed religious is equally decorative as the form of the lay people.
When I left the monastery, it was with a commission: be a monk in the world. And I spent a good 9 years developing that. But I now realize it is killing me. I got it wrong. But I have also found environments to change that. In going back to AA, I re-claimed a spirituality separate from form. In AA, you can clearly see principle of A Course in Miracles at work for healing and uniting. The little gap is cleaned and God builds the bridge (text 28.III.2):
"2 No mind is sick until another mind agrees that they are separate. And thus it is their joint decision to be sick. If you withhold agreement and accept the part you play in making sickness real, the other mind cannot project its guilt without your aid in letting it perceive itself as separate and apart from you. Thus is the body not perceived as sick by both your minds from separate points of view. Uniting with a brother’s mind prevents the cause of sickness and perceived effects. Healing is the effect of minds that join, as sickness comes from minds that separate.
3 The miracle does nothing just because the minds are joined, and cannot separate. Yet in the dreaming has this been reversed, and separate minds are seen as bodies, which are separated and which cannot join. Do not allow your brother to be sick, for if he is, have you abandoned him to his own dream by sharing it with him. He has not seen the cause of sickness where it is, and you have overlooked the gap between you, where the sickness has been bred. Thus are you joined in sickness, to preserve the little gap unhealed, where sickness is kept carefully protected, cherished, and upheld by firm belief, lest God should come to bridge the little gap that leads to Him. Fight not His coming with illusions, for it is His coming that you want above all things that seem to glisten in the dream."
You don't know how hard it is to do something simple, like go to dinner, when everything in your brain is screaming against it. After the AA meeting where I blurted out my revelation, I bought 2 pieces of carrot cake and ate them.
Of course, I didn't agree with some of the decadence of the religious order where I found myself. Of one thing I am glad to be free of: religious holidays in the convent. Oh Lord. Saturday would have been spent cleaning and decorating; while I wished for some free time to go running. Today would be spent cooking and secretly decorating the chapel for Midnight Mass; while I secretly wished for time to go running. We'd gather in the chapel for Christmas lessons; and living out the contention over who got to sing them. Then we would be up til the wee hours doing Christmas Vigils and Midnight Mass and serving cookies to guests and then cleaning everything up. Tomorrow would be more liturgy, table setting and then a feast. I hated the feasts. They took too long, seemed decadent, required a ton of dishes; and I wanted to go running.
Nothing like clean rural Missouri air and hilly dirt roads to clear a nun's mind.
I have also corrupted some of A Course in Miracles. I hope to continue to correct my thinking with His help.
Lesson 127/8:
The world I see holds nothing that I want.
Escape from every law in which you now believe.
Allow His Voice to teach love's meaning to my open mind.
Love's meaning is my own and shared by God Himself.
Last week, I covered 76 miles and did 23 hours of workout, plus 3 strength sessions. Yesterday, I walked 15 miles. This gave my Achilles a little break. I have a race next this Saturday.
I am one of the 5% of people who don't participate in Christmas. Send your insults and guilt trips; I'm still not going to do it.
Today I am going to the park for a few miles. I have experimented with taping my toes but not cutting holes in the shoes. I still need to solve the issue of tearing up my toes before I can do more than 50 miles. My previous tape jobs have been hit and miss. At Ultracentric, it was a massive miss. So, back to the drawing boards. It doesn't help that I have 2 pairs of new shoes, men's size 10, when I think 11s are going to be my future.
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