Here is another guest blog. Can you guess WHO is not writing much these days. (WHO is also my Writing Down Your Soul acronym for Whole & Holy One — the Voice that speaks to me in in WDYS! I Am WHO I Am! I Am Whole & Holy. I Am That, I Am! explains Jesus saying what he said. We just left out the comma, I Am One, I Am All he was saying.
Rev. Lauren McLaughlin is author of Go To Elf — a book about spiritual and living wisdom and the Eternal Life Force, ELF
Anyway here is Rev. Lauren. I just discovered her blog; she is also on Facebook and UnityNow website. She IS a Wisdom teacher and her wisdom frequently comes with humor, so belly laughs are allowable.
http://laurenmclaughlinwisdomteacher.wordpress.com/2012/06/24/the-calm-spot/
The Calm Spot
This picture is of my friend Gayle Lawrence, swimming around with some of her favorite whales. She created her own business, Journeys of Discovery, so that she could spend quality time with the whales and the wild dolphins and introduce them to others who love them as well.
She told me a story about the day a mother whale, with a baby, came up to the whale-watching boat she was on and signaled that she was open to receiving visitors in the water. Gayle and her friends dropped smoothly into the waves and began to admire and entertain the baby. Satisfying herself that these humans were harmless to her and her child, the mother whale swam off a little distance, apparently to take a little “time out” from mothering. Gayle said the Mama whale’s eye was always at water level though, and even though she closed it sometimes, she cocked it open periodically to check on her “little” one (2,000 lbs at birth).
When I asked Gayle what it felt like to spend play-time with he baby whale, she asked, “Did you ever watch a baby in a bath tub playing with his rubber ducky?” “Yes, I have,” I said. “Well,” she grinned, “the baby whale was playing in the water and we were the rubber duckies.”
One of the things she gets the biggest thrill from when she’s whale-watching, is seeing those huge creatures leap and then dive. “They are so magnificent and they leap so high and then dive so deep,” she told me. “They take your breath away.” Then she described the “calm spot” – a circle of entirely still water that forms on the surface of the waves after a dive – as if to make the point that even though the whales may be mammoth, but they are here only as creatures of peace.
Metaphysically, that calm spot on the surface of the water illustrates for all of us that the deeper we dive into our own inner-space, the greater the depths of peace we discover; and when we are truly at peace, all the energies around us become peaceful as well.
It made me wonder, how deep I would have to go within to create my own “calm spot”.
Although I always hate to broad-brush anything that has to do with gender differences, it does seem that men and women approach the achievement of inner peace differently. And men are especially good at escaping into themselves to find their calm spot. They don’t have the basic need to be busy every minute like I do, and like many women I know do, too. Multi-tasking is not a natural word in their vocabulary.
If you’ve the missed the brilliant humor in this video clip, produced by marriage counselor Mark Gungor, I’m thinking you will enjoy it now. And even if you have seen it before, you’ll probably want to watch it again. It does add some clarity to understanding the way men and women think.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BxckAMaTDc
Funny? You bet, but any woman who has ever lived with a father, brother, husband or son can attest to the reality of “The Nothing Box.” Before I saw this video and learned about “The Nothing Box”, I used to accuse my husband, John, of going to “Planet McLaughlin.” Physically, he didn’t appear to be doing anything at all when he was visiting his private planet, and mentally he had clearly checked off this earthly plane. If left uninterrupted, he could stay there for hours in total contentment.
I thought shimmering out of recognizable consciousness and into cyber space was just a “guy thing”, enviable but not available to me, until I read about a woman recently who also has created her own private planet called Amazonia. Amazonia isn’t empty – it isn’t a “Nothing Box” – it’s definitely a “something box” – specifically filled only with the “somethings” she likes best. And whenever she visits Amazonia she says, she’s always in a state of peace. On her planet there are at least five shoe stores to every other kind of store – always open. There is a great bounty of delicious food that is totally free of calories, and it never, ever rains when she’s just had her hair done or washed her car.
The more she described Amazonia, the more I realized I wanted my own planet – my own perfect place where peace always prevailed, too – and why not? So – I created, Planet My Way.
On Planet My Way everything – houses, stores, paintings, automobiles, clothes, jewels, even people – are always clad in brilliant color – gorgeous, jewel-toned colors that fill me with joy. There is a Day Spa on every corner, fully staffed to pamper only me. Delectable gourmet treats, always served elegantly by a handsome chef on Lalique dinnerware, are of course, calorie free. My multiple clothes closets are filled with beautiful designer fashions – all size 6 and they all fit perfectly. Music is performed regularly by the finest symphony orchestras, with just a little Willie Nelson thrown in for flavor. Broadway plays with glorious casts open each night, just for me. World leaders ask me what to do before they make major decisions and the members of Congress always vote according to my instructions. I sleep on silks and satins, and soft feathers fill my pillows and comforters. The temperature, inside and out, is always perfect. The trees are always green and the birds are always singing. Nothing is ever “out of place” and most importantly, absolutely everything is always done – My Way.
And –like all other dreamy “destination spots”, Planet My Way is a nice place to visit but I wouldn’t like to live there all the time. Sometimes, like the whales I have to surface back on Planet Earth because I was born to explore, to learn, to experience, and to discover what the Spiritual Teachers called Abraham call – contrast. How could I know what “My Way” would look like if I didn’t first discover what it doesn’t look like?
Planet My Way is only exciting because I’m always free to leave whenever I want to. And because here on planet earth I don’t always get my own way, I’m able to enjoy visiting Planet My Way even more, whenever I do.
The secret to my happy life is to travel easily between calm and chaos – and to choose where I want to be at any time. Having a choice makes all the difference. That’s also my way.
It could be yours as well . . .
AFFIRMATION: PEACE, LOVE AND JOY ABOUND IN MY LIFE.
Napkinwriter 