Choose or Be Chosen

I have been observing the function of focus lately in an attempt to see how focusing on the divine altered the experience of life. The great news is in fact that doing that, like focusing on beauty or seeing love in others, has a marvelous effect. Suddenly the entire world looks sacred and holy.

In addition it was my intent to actively choose this focus. While all of us have that part of the brain that concentrates our focus on foreground, relegating all else to background, actively choosing to focus on this or that engaged the RAS and its focusing function. When in the middle of that mental conversation it hit me how arrogant or ego-centric it was to assume that my choosing made the sacred appear. It was not m choosing at all but in fact that god had already chosen me – all of us.

I cannot pretend that I am choosing god – god has already, always chosen me. And there is nothing in my choosing that can alter that, except that I forget and turn away from time to time. But each time I turn back there is god waiting, accepting, and welcoming me back. So while I do have a choice (whether to look away or toward god’s light) it is not my choosing that makes it so. It is that god has – long before you or I ever had this thought – chosen us, in the very act of giving this life to live.

The thought suddenly relaxed me – like my shoulders dropped from their tensed p position – like feeling as if it was all a huge effort I had to do. It isn’t. It is quite easy, Kris. Just shut up and accept the gift (I am not good at receiving gifts – much better at giving I think). Oh I am certain I will forget this lesson and turn away, but as it always has been, all I have to do is turn back and remember, effortlessly, and there it is. I think this is what others have called surrender.