Centering Thought: I am a contributing member of my own life. I choose to observe my relationship with the life around me on my own terms.
Spirituality is incredibly personal and individual. It is also universal. How can this be true?
While we are unique individuals, each having our own personal experiences in life, there are some similarities we naturally share. Fingerprints are just one example: While every print is different in some way, the basic pattern of a fingerprint looks similar for every primate.
The way we think about “a higher power,” or spiritual connection to other life, varies not just person to person but also moment to moment. We can shift this relationship or our perspective on it many times throughout our lives. There is no concrete right or wrong with this.
The words we use to describe this concept vary widely, too: “Higher power,” “Universal force,” “energy,” “cosmos,” “spirit,” “God” or “Goddess” are just a few. We can even use non-spiritual, more scientifically-based language, like “frequency fields.” The point is not to find a standard language, but to embrace and recognize that we are contributing members of a universal relationship to life every day.
When we use our powers of observation to recognize that our feelings and responses can impact the feelings and responses of the people around us — and that the world around us also impacts us, likewise — we become more in tune with a type of ‘co-creation’ of our day-to-day journey through our lives. After all, we are not in control of or responsible for every single thing in the world. However, we are able to manage how we respond or react to our worlds. We can do this even if it means we first react in ways we don’t like and then we correct our reactions responsibly.
What does a cooperative relationship with life around us look like or feel like today? What do we want it to be like?