It has been nearly a year since I posted anything, for sometimes silence in the face of all the clatter and clamor of our lives seems to be the greatest gift that anyone can give. But not long ago a letter arrived from a friend in Europe, struggling with tough times (like all of us), and what she wrote is so clear and calm that I marvel: Is this the meaning of Enlightenment? . . .

Dear Sophy,

“I’ve not been feeling great today, and praying a lot. At a certain point when the kids were playing, I sat knitting in the kitchen.  And it struck me that I am really missing a very important point: the divinity that is part of all of us.

The deepest mystery is right there inside us. We don’t have to search for it.  We just have to listen. There is nothing to push. Just be quiet, and it’s right there. Trust it, and it will unfold like a flower that catches you softly and gently when you jump, following your heart.

And we must never see our lives as ordinary or mundane. We all have the seed of the divine in our hearts. We all have the opportunity to cultivate it and let it grow. But we have the choice. It demands courage. A lot of us choose not to listen. And those who do, are ridiculed by the ones that do not see the divine in all living creatures.

I think God is telling me to keep calm and stop despairing.  Trust, and things will work out. Love, and good things will come. Share, and you will get tenfold of what you give. Walk on the path that you know in your heart is right, and you will find what you are looking for.

Because even if the divine did not exist, being as good as you possible can, and as true to your heart as life allows will always be right.  Pushing never works. Calm does.”

A-M

In my own life, I have discerned five Rules of the Universe (as I call the Divine):

1.  “Find, don’t seek” is one, and another:
2. “If you give it away, it will come back to you, greater, in larger measure.”
3. Put in the negative: “What you clutch, you have already lost.” Uncurl your fist, and you find you were holding only empty air, lost dreams.
4. And this Rule from great horsemen: “Throw your heart over the fence, the horse will follow.”  Be calm Wait until your Intuition tells you to move, but then throw your heart at it:  act.
5. For  the fifth Rule is this:  When you are ready, do not hesitate. Make a decision and the Universe will turn itself inside out to bring you, by the most astonishing coincidences, unexpected events and meetings, the desires of your heart.

But first we wait. In A Book of Angels, I quote The great 17th century mystic Emmanuel Swedenborg, who wrote of  angels, whispering and singing to him all his life — communicating spiritually, by thoughts that flashed into his mind. He learned the angels look on all things as proceeding from God, and they repeated over and over that we poor beings should not worry about the future but only trust to Providence. For Providence will bring all things that we desire — not necessarily when we desire them, “but yet, if it be for their good, they obtain them afterward, when not thinking of them.“

Have you had that experience?  “Oh, I remember wanting that!” I think. “And look,  here it is! I’d totally forgotten about wanting it.”  I guess the moral is, you can have everything you want when you don’t care anymore. I’m still working on that Rule.