Category — God

Along with being outside in a natural setting, one of my favorite places for meditation and inspiration is in the shower. When I am in the shower, I feel the most vulnerable but also the most secure. There I feel closer to God than almost anywhere else.

The fall of the hot water cascading over my skin makes me feel united with one of the most powerful forces in creation while giving me feelings of authority and humbleness. In the shower is where I often go to cry, to celebrate, to mourn, to laugh, to be a child again…if only for those precious minutes.

Water has always fascinated me as a symbol and manifestation of God’s spirit and supremacy. Even in its destructive wake of flood and crashing waves, there is a sense of dominion without limitations. And that power fortifies my own desire for freedom and control when it and I meld as one in the shower. The greatness of the water is both within and without me.

Showering has become something more than an expected and routine behavior or a daily ritual to me. It often takes on a sacred overtone. In its deluge I am touched, cleansed, baptized, blessed, refreshed and renewed. My tears add to its volume, my soul is stirred, and I am cuddled like a child by its embrace. The spirit of God is present in its unrivaled perfection and that lets me know I’m not alone.

Each magnificent drop of water is a world unto itself and a part of the whole. The joy of showers remind me that I am also as one with creation’s beauty and a receiver of its wonderful blessings.

From a very young age I didn’t think I was different, but I did feel set apart. There seemed to be some familial dissimilarity between me and my siblings who are an older sister and brother and a younger sister, born 4 years later on my birthday. Even with our shared birthdays, there still seemed to be a block between us.

I spent most of my inquisitive time with my father because my mother seemed to find fault with everything I did or said, including the dissenting mumblings under my breath for which I would often get a smack in the mouth. So I grew up under strained circumstances that made me aware of being in conflict with most of the people in my life.

Besides feeling separated from my family, my extreme thinness and gawkiness had an effect on friendships which limited my associations with my peers of both sexes. I was too quiet and introverted for the girls, and felt too unattractive and shy for the boys. As a result, I married the first man who came along when I was 19 just to escape my mother’s overbearing ways.

The marriage turned into a disaster with my husband’s infidelity, which coincided with my turning 21 and the happening days of the 60s. So for the next 13 years I lived a life of experimentation with drugs and sex, with people who had different slants, beliefs and attitudes unlike those with which I had been brought up.

My life continued its spiraling into the world of strong-willed activity until 1978 when I relocated to another state and sought a different spiritual path from the one I had been traveling. Although I found a deeper relationship with my concept of “God,” life wasn’t quite finished with me, and my period of metamorphosis was yet to come.

I met my “soul mate,” fell in love and added 2 more children to the 4 I already had with my husband. This man and I ended our violent and dysfunctional relationship involved in the throes of a civil child abuse case in 1988, and that  was when my life took a turn and my period of greater enlightenment began.

Sitting in court during the trial, and feeling completely anguished and sorry for myself, a voice spoke to my spirit and told me to “Pay attention.” These two simple words changed the perception of who and why I exist until today. I began to look outside myself at my life and the people in it to realize that I was not the only one “going through” something. The first victims I recognized were my sons and all the other children in their current situation of foster care or out-of-home placement.

There were many other parents, children and families just like me who were or had been alone, lonely, rejected, ignored and abandoned. But the voice made me realize that regardless of our circumstances, guilt or innocent, we are never alone. There is a supreme compassionate spirit, and my prayers which my mother said only went to the ceiling had not been rejected, were not being ignored, nor had I been abandoned. I might have felt lonely at times, but there was a power within me and in all of creation which had compassion for me and cared about my well-being.

The realization of the need to know that source of compassion struck me to the core, and from that time on I have felt it is my responsibility to give awareness of that source to others. So I blog about it and talk about it not only to those like me, but to everyone in which I came in contact, and I have become an advocate for those on the fringe, those considered “different.”

My understanding of the need to know about compassion goes deep into my moral fiber. I believe my experiences through life have groomed me for the mission I accept each day. If I am able to add value to just one life through the sharing of my experiences, I feel I have been able to extend the consideration that was shown to me. We are all human beings. One with the spirit of creation; and worthy of forgiveness, understanding, tolerance, and acceptance. But most of all, we are worthy of compassion.

A common experience like falling in love
Is familiar to all it comes from above
But the common experience of hatred and war
Is man’s greatest crime that’s spread from afar

Many know fear and many know pain
And many know bullets that fall down like rain
Mothers cry and children scream
While fathers and sons take their place on the scene

The enemy comes in with dogged determination
To wipe out a race, a religion, a nation
While others look on or support the infraction
With silence and guns and covert action

The common experience of hatred is spread
When men stand by and turn their heads
Or when words of peace they just don’t say
Or when they allow evil to just have its way

The common experience that we need to spread
Is peace and love and a decrease in dread
To stop the fighting and killing and such
An end to racism would help so much

Without prejudice and cultural strife
All of God’s children could have a peaceful life
A common experience is in man’s control
All we need do is let love unfold

When I awoke this morning, I had the words of my title in mind, but I was remembering an old Negro spiritual we used to sing in church. “How I got over. How I got over. My soul looks back and wonders, how I got over.” I remember my mother, grandmother and others singing it with gusto, thanking God for helping them to “make it through.” Then I typed in the words on YouTube, and found this song by The Roots, and it changed my whole attitude.

Rather than praise and worship, the words, music and images took my heart and mind into a totally different mood of distress, despair and disturbance. Tears began to flow, and my heart began to ache. For I remember, can almost smell and feel, the sensations of the people portrayed in the video; because it wasn’t too long ago that their plight was my own, and it hit too close to home.

I sit now, at my computer, with my heater going full blast in my cozy third-floor apartment overlooking a majestic oak tree, while the capitol building of the state of California is at the end of my block. There are limos, Lamborghini-es, and other luxury cars nightly pulling up to the restaurants, coffee houses and cafes that line my street.

Happy people sitting outside having lunch, dinner or just over coffee fill the air with their laughter and content. They smile and some even nod as I pass, thinking and accepting me as one of them, an equal. But I wonder what they would think about me if they knew that it wasn’t too long ago that I was homeless, living in a shelter with my two kids…friendless and alone? Would their looks be diverted away from me?

This is not the way I envisioned my day going when I woke up full of gratitude and rejoicing this morning. I had no intention of spending my morning revisiting an episode in my life that I seldom visit anymore. Not that I am trying to forget it, because I think it plays a significant part in my current sense of empathy. But today was not going to be one of those days when it would come back to me with such force, with a video as stark evidence that what happened then was real to me, just as now it’s very real to others.

But now that I think of it, both the rejoicing and the pain belong to me. I embrace them as value which has been added to my life. For without the pain there would be no joy. I would not know that it is possible to overcome and not be genuine in sharing that hopeful message with others. I would also not be able to serve as an example to those who think themselves above and beyond the possibilities of becoming like their less fortunate neighbors. It can happen to anyone.

There is a message for all of us in this, I think. For me, reminiscing keeps me grounded. For those who are struggling, I wish them God’s best. For those who are reading this, I hope it stirs something in you to reach out to even one in whatever way you can to those disenfranchised by the state of their birth or whatever life has thrown their way. A simple smile of encouragement will go a long way, and with just a little help one day those who are suffering won’t have to wonder how they got over, they will know.