Tonight feels like the first normal night I have had in a week (actually it is): came home from work, ate, napped, and worked out. I have come home to the dimensionless, infinite solitude of my one bedroom apartment.
It is not that I cannot socialize or am not good at it; it’s that I seek something beyond the material world. Seeking the Beyond in solitude is not disrespectful or arrogant toward other people. Spiritual solitude is just a choice to serve all by attending consciously and directly to the Presence. As one person remembers God, they do so for all; since minds are joined.
The world does not understand the need to change false beliefs and silence worldly thoughts for the purpose of remembering God. I am following a spiritual course of action because the awareness of God is the top of my priority list.
My trainer nixed my idea of the Maryville Marathon. So now I need to hunker down and just steadily work out until July 23: Lunar Trek (40 mile ultra, at night on the Kansas prairie). It’s back to the silence and the pondering of the Presence. I love being consistent. I love turning right into health and fitness; while the world jabbers away but takes no action.
Tomorrow I will head out for a long ultra pace run. Nothing will be proved. Time will be spent. It will be sweaty. It will be monotonous. I will be just a girl, jogging along with a thought of God playing over and over in her head.
It is not that I cannot socialize or am not good at it; it’s that I seek something beyond the material world. Seeking the Beyond in solitude is not disrespectful or arrogant toward other people. Spiritual solitude is just a choice to serve all by attending consciously and directly to the Presence. As one person remembers God, they do so for all; since minds are joined.
The world does not understand the need to change false beliefs and silence worldly thoughts for the purpose of remembering God. I am following a spiritual course of action because the awareness of God is the top of my priority list.
My trainer nixed my idea of the Maryville Marathon. So now I need to hunker down and just steadily work out until July 23: Lunar Trek (40 mile ultra, at night on the Kansas prairie). It’s back to the silence and the pondering of the Presence. I love being consistent. I love turning right into health and fitness; while the world jabbers away but takes no action.
Tomorrow I will head out for a long ultra pace run. Nothing will be proved. Time will be spent. It will be sweaty. It will be monotonous. I will be just a girl, jogging along with a thought of God playing over and over in her head.
One of my favorite things I learned in monastic life:
St. Romuald's Brief Rule
Sit in your cell as in paradise;
put the whole world behind you and forget it;
like a skilled angler on the lookout for a catch
keep a careful eye on your thoughts.
The path you follow is in the Text -- don't leave it.
If you've come with a novice's enthusiasm and can't
accomplish what you want, take every chance you can find
to sing the Text in your heart and to understand it
with your head; if your mind wanders as you read
don't give up but hurry back and try again.
Above all realize that you are in God's presence;
hold your heart there in wonder as if before your sovereign.
Empty yourself completely;
sit waiting, content with God's gift,
like a little chick tasting and eating nothing
but what its mother brings.
