Have you ever noticed how many predatory, seemingly amoral jerks seem to end up with all the marbles? During my meditation today something occurred to me. I've always wondered why people with no consciousness, or sense of morality, end up with prosperity while good, hardworking, well-intentioned people often get left feeling locked out in the cold. Once the answer came to me, I was amazed at how easy it was...Meditation (as well as a random act of kindness) is like that. Receiving the bounty of life has less to do with the negativity we project than it does the positivity we accept. Allow me to repeat that:
Receiving the bounty of life has less to do
with the negativity we project
with the negativity we project
than it does the positivity we accept.
Not to get into gender issues, I'd like to say that I believe men receive more from life than most women (especially women of my age group), because of the way they face it. The world is their oyster, they're taught, while we have been taught to accept our lesser lot with grace and gratitude. And always, the way our life turns out has a lot to do with the men in our lives (fathers, husbands, bosses). If we make bad choices, or life hands us someone who doesn't have our wellbeing at heart, well...
Because of the basic training I received growing up in the Fifties, I believe that my lack of success and security is due first to daring to be a single mother at a time when that wasn't so common (or acceptable), and second, to living authentically, refusing to spend my life in the closet. You can't expect much help when you buck the patriarchal status quo.
But my real point here is about how I chastise and torture myself with thoughts that my frequent sense of futility somehow creates more "bad luck". I'm here tonight to say, bullshyte! That's not what has held me back. What's held me back (as well as Nettl and I as a couple) is that I've never accepted positivity.
My heart's desire is to be financially secure enough to create random acts of financial kindness for people who are in need. I don't give a tinker's damn about being rich, of having a big house, big car, or any of that. I want to be a philanthropist. That's it. The problem is, whenever anyone has acted as a philanthropist in my behalf, I've given that money to someone or something else.
Case in point: every Christmas and every birthday, Nettl's father and stepmother send each of us a check for $100. That's $100 from him and $100 from her. That means that at Christmas, we receive $200 apiece—$400 total. And what do we do with it? At Christmas, we buy groceries for Christmas dinner and gifts for the kids. That's not really so bad. What's bad is that the birthday checks have always gone toward rent or the bills. Today, I realized that what we're doing is cutting off the flow. If I can't receive, how can I ever hope to give? That a no-brainer!
Well, that all changed today. We decicded to step out on faith and put our money where our mouth is. Literally. We received a financial gift and we aren't paying bills or buying groceries with it, although that goes against our survival instincts. The gift was given with the intent that we use it a certain way and that's what we're going to do. I thank the giver not only for the gift, but for the opportunity for me to gain some small degree of enlightenment. Seems so simple now.
