It Starts With Me

It starts with me:

I’ve largely ignored the news lately, catching just enough in background noise to further my purposeful retreat. The world’s a mess, and not likely to get better. Some will celebrate certain developments, for others they will be cause for despair.

and everything continues pretty much the same as ever.

for me, I’ve taken lesson 153 from A Course in Miracles to heart — that the world gives rise to defensiveness, it’s rooted in attack and anger, there’s no safety here, and that peaceful of mind is all but impossible. Hardly a great message for a spiritual text.

but it does hold promise.

in my defenselessness…my safety lies.

with this one lesson I am asked to lay down my weapons of defense.

and so I do.

it’s difficult, of course, as I have my own strong opinions and concerns. I have long wished for a more fair and equitable world, homeless offered shelter, every starving child fed, and the environment cared for. Those dreams seem so far off now, more so than any other time before. And I’m tired of asking for the world to change. It’s not going to happen. In fact, it’s not supposed to — but we are.

and it starts with me.