Deliciously my heart smiles

BIG sigh. My body sloughs back into relaxation, my mind is blissfully blank.

I could be frantically packing to drive 17 hours over two days to Florida. That was the plan. Neat, tidy, organized and loads of work. I vacuumed the car over three hours last Saturday and spent Sunday afternoon making a slipcover for the back seat because the kids say the smell of the fabric [not my favorite, either] makes them sick.

I had a plan and I was sticking to it, stuffing down how much work and bodily discomfort the trip would be. I was resigned to the drive, having scanned travel sites for months trolling affordable airfare x 4. Then an out-of-the-blue e-mail alert Tuesday and carefully-laid plans crashed. Rising up in their midst was an easier agenda of flying to Florida for barely more than the cost of gas, food and two nights of hotel bills.

Caught me so off-guard I almost missed this gift. I am used to working so very hard for things. I am certain my first-born status has much to do with this ethic. But very recently, I opened my eyes to the abundance in my life, scratching out the long-held pattern of looking at what I don't have. I believe that began 12 years ago when fibromyalgia snatched something from me. I am reclaiming it and looking at the silver lining as well as all of the other blessings in my life. And the more I find to be grateful for, the more rolls in. Including less pain and more energy.

My pastoral counselor reminded me that God(dess) only wants abundance for me. Which makes me ponder where the negativity originated. Do I dare wonder out loud about evil? I have never believed in a personified or organized evil, but, in recent years, do risk to consider it. I have had the conversation with a number of people, though it's not a casual topic, nor one I would enter into lightly. For so long, I have put much of it on myself, but I do question whether other "things" are at work. I've experienced, in times of heightened spirituality, everything red popping out on a nightly drive as if menacing and a pair of beady eyes. Overactive imagination or something else? The yin to the yang?

I told my first Quaker minister [technically, Quakers believe we are all ministers] about the eerie drive home and asked him about evil. He said his belief was pretty well confined to institutional evil: when an organization grows so big it takes on a dynamic of its own, almost outside of the people it serves and who compose it. I can conceptualize that.

Just a passing dark thought, nothing that will rain on my living abundantly.


• How have I adjusted my attitude to one of gratitude and abundance?
• When I have, what difference does it make?
• How do I feel Spirit in that mode?
• What is the reverse of an abundant spirit for me?
• What negative patterns or concerns about darkness do I hold?



deliciously relaxed
into the idea that I have ALL that I need


and intentionally practicing gratitude


trusting Goddess for what I need
so against my programming and culture


yet so freeing and life-giving


the smile in my heart knows
this is how to live