PS When you turn 70, you still have to keep evolving, studying, suffering, fumbling around...but if you’re lucky...you meet wise, compassionate, clever people (even online!) who will teach you lessons with grace and wit and humor. Thank you for popping up in my inbox today dear Ally! ❤️
Oh yes! I remember when I was maybe 20 thinking that surely by 40 or 50 you’d have things figured out and basically know who you are and get to coast the rest of the way home 🤣🤣🤣 Then I had a private client who was 75 when I met him and I realized, ohhhhh, you’re NEVER “done.” Not until you exhale for the final time and who knows what happens then?! Hugs!! Thanks for your awesome comment.
Yes. My latest theory about having a spiritual practice is that practice is all we can do - over and over and over again - to strengthen ourselves enough to live with an open heart. For times such as your family is experiencing. To be present with compassion, comfort and support as best we can. I’m so sorry and send love to all of you. ❤️
Thanks so much, love. The kids are good so I am good. I know you know what I mean. And I am also good aside from that, with hours when I am deeply sad or grieving or anxious. I am fine with that, it’s been a lot of loss the last few years so it would be strange if I weren’t feeling the feels. But I’m mostly good lol. Hugs and love xx
I really enjoyed reading this post Ally, and as someone working out my own religious viewpoints, I found this incredibly helpful. Do no harm, be kind are all rules to live by for sure! And if someone said Mr. Rodgers was God, I would be on board too!
I’m really glad this was helpful, Ruth Anne. These are things I’ve been thinking about for years. I have someone close to me who’s gone done a radical path and it’s pretty heartbreaking so it’s given me a lot of food for thought. And then there’s the “spiritual community” which has taken some pretty weird twists in the last few years. Anyway I think it’s something everyone has to grapple with at some point (what do I think is going on here etc) in order to calibrate the inner compass so to speak. And yeah, Fred Rogers. I feel like he raised me and I know there are a lot of people my age who feel that way! Hugs and love to you xx
I have come to be a disbeliever in the word ‘karma’. No one earns any of that bad shit, certainly not a 6 year old child, their parents or family.
Somehow I feel we do predetermine our individual and group lessons. Small, moderate, and great, I know I chose my family. Maybe we’ll all come back together shuffled around. Or not.
I was 3 (I know this bc we lived in a house in Golden, and moved before I turned 4 while our parents’ new house was being built). I woke my dad up frequently telling him about a recurring dream I had with vivid details that I just couldn’t shake.
My pop said (to a 3 year old), “I think you’re such an unusual child because of some of your previous lives.” Meanwhile, mom being my mom in 1963 who had received a D in child psychology, side whispered ‘child psychiatrist’, to my dad. That’s when I learned something must be wrong with me. It’s taken my entire life to accept that I might be different, but I’m not broken and I need to know how other people are navigating this individually, too.
Bad people win sometimes, they might just get away with horrible stuff their entire lives. Those folks might have the hardest job as a universal teacher ever, during one single lifetime of harming others. We learn that life can be unfair or downright cruel to an innocent child and we don’t always win, but the god/universe energy always loves us.
I don’t think there are many mistakes. I know my lessons aren’t over because three times I should’ve died but was miraculously saved. Things hurt, but I’m learning. I’m going to respond better, I’m going to keep listening to your podcasts and read your substack.
I’m going to have as much mercy on my and other people’s souls as I can muster. My challenge has always been faith in the middle of chaos. I’m not graceful and I learn slowly. My god doesn’t judge people at all, much less as harshly as people judge each other.
I love the building blocks I find in your stories and from others who reply. It’s no accident that I found you during a crappy period.
Like there’s no such thing as time, there’s no such thing as karma. Everything happens? Sort of, yes, but not consciously to a young child or their parents, family and friends - call it spiritual amnesia, or one more tool to put in our belt.
Thanks so much, Laurie. And yes, I don’t claim to be an expert on any of this nor do I pretend to know how it all works or what happens next. I have certainly met people I feel an instant connection with and a kind of “knowing” and I have also had times in my life when I asked for signs (though I couldn’t say exactly who I was asking), and got them. I “prayed” my mother would somehow at least show up in my dreams and it finally happened 9 months after she died. Incredibly vivid. I’d write more about that but I’m not fully ready. Anyway, I’m sending you hugs and love across the interwebs and through the ethers and I hope you feel it 🤍
PS When you turn 70, you still have to keep evolving, studying, suffering, fumbling around...but if you’re lucky...you meet wise, compassionate, clever people (even online!) who will teach you lessons with grace and wit and humor. Thank you for popping up in my inbox today dear Ally! ❤️
Oh yes! I remember when I was maybe 20 thinking that surely by 40 or 50 you’d have things figured out and basically know who you are and get to coast the rest of the way home 🤣🤣🤣 Then I had a private client who was 75 when I met him and I realized, ohhhhh, you’re NEVER “done.” Not until you exhale for the final time and who knows what happens then?! Hugs!! Thanks for your awesome comment.
Yes. My latest theory about having a spiritual practice is that practice is all we can do - over and over and over again - to strengthen ourselves enough to live with an open heart. For times such as your family is experiencing. To be present with compassion, comfort and support as best we can. I’m so sorry and send love to all of you. ❤️
Thanks so much, love. The kids are good so I am good. I know you know what I mean. And I am also good aside from that, with hours when I am deeply sad or grieving or anxious. I am fine with that, it’s been a lot of loss the last few years so it would be strange if I weren’t feeling the feels. But I’m mostly good lol. Hugs and love xx
I really enjoyed reading this post Ally, and as someone working out my own religious viewpoints, I found this incredibly helpful. Do no harm, be kind are all rules to live by for sure! And if someone said Mr. Rodgers was God, I would be on board too!
I’m really glad this was helpful, Ruth Anne. These are things I’ve been thinking about for years. I have someone close to me who’s gone done a radical path and it’s pretty heartbreaking so it’s given me a lot of food for thought. And then there’s the “spiritual community” which has taken some pretty weird twists in the last few years. Anyway I think it’s something everyone has to grapple with at some point (what do I think is going on here etc) in order to calibrate the inner compass so to speak. And yeah, Fred Rogers. I feel like he raised me and I know there are a lot of people my age who feel that way! Hugs and love to you xx
I have come to be a disbeliever in the word ‘karma’. No one earns any of that bad shit, certainly not a 6 year old child, their parents or family.
Somehow I feel we do predetermine our individual and group lessons. Small, moderate, and great, I know I chose my family. Maybe we’ll all come back together shuffled around. Or not.
I was 3 (I know this bc we lived in a house in Golden, and moved before I turned 4 while our parents’ new house was being built). I woke my dad up frequently telling him about a recurring dream I had with vivid details that I just couldn’t shake.
My pop said (to a 3 year old), “I think you’re such an unusual child because of some of your previous lives.” Meanwhile, mom being my mom in 1963 who had received a D in child psychology, side whispered ‘child psychiatrist’, to my dad. That’s when I learned something must be wrong with me. It’s taken my entire life to accept that I might be different, but I’m not broken and I need to know how other people are navigating this individually, too.
Bad people win sometimes, they might just get away with horrible stuff their entire lives. Those folks might have the hardest job as a universal teacher ever, during one single lifetime of harming others. We learn that life can be unfair or downright cruel to an innocent child and we don’t always win, but the god/universe energy always loves us.
I don’t think there are many mistakes. I know my lessons aren’t over because three times I should’ve died but was miraculously saved. Things hurt, but I’m learning. I’m going to respond better, I’m going to keep listening to your podcasts and read your substack.
I’m going to have as much mercy on my and other people’s souls as I can muster. My challenge has always been faith in the middle of chaos. I’m not graceful and I learn slowly. My god doesn’t judge people at all, much less as harshly as people judge each other.
I love the building blocks I find in your stories and from others who reply. It’s no accident that I found you during a crappy period.
Like there’s no such thing as time, there’s no such thing as karma. Everything happens? Sort of, yes, but not consciously to a young child or their parents, family and friends - call it spiritual amnesia, or one more tool to put in our belt.
PS this is what I was referring to earlier re: my parents, redundant I know. Time to let all of it go.
My sincere condolences. I think you really are here to teach and enlighten.
Thanks so much, Laurie. And yes, I don’t claim to be an expert on any of this nor do I pretend to know how it all works or what happens next. I have certainly met people I feel an instant connection with and a kind of “knowing” and I have also had times in my life when I asked for signs (though I couldn’t say exactly who I was asking), and got them. I “prayed” my mother would somehow at least show up in my dreams and it finally happened 9 months after she died. Incredibly vivid. I’d write more about that but I’m not fully ready. Anyway, I’m sending you hugs and love across the interwebs and through the ethers and I hope you feel it 🤍