Meditation, the silence and solitude of it, is not simply to make one a  less crazy person.  This would be too individualistic.  It is to inform your occupation and profession.  That is, even unemployed, retired, living in leisure, you are part of a greater world in your daily occupations.  When I get in my car or go out on an errand or just for a walk, I am entering a world larger than myself.  How do I respond to someone else in that world?  Ignore them?  Compete with them for mutual services such as queue lines for purchase of something?  H ..read more

 One way to get beyond the self and into the world of the common good, is to bypass the greater good.  Why?  Well, the greater good might be greater for a few people, but not for everyone.  In the world of consumption, production, investment and distribution, the greater good is for whom?  Often for those who have plenty of good already, and at the expense of the many who are still lacking.  When making decisions do you seek the advice of others who might be affected by your singular want or what you think is right?  Or are you open to the common good, the gr ..read more

 My sister is a painter.  She even belongs to a League of Painters.  They paint pictures, not houses.  But you cannot just want to paint.  Nothing happens with simply wanting.  She has talent, but talent does not paint.  It is in the category of potential.  She has to have a certain life-style.  Like what?  Like a space for painting in her house.  Then she has to buy the materials and set them in the space.  Then she has to consciously choose a life that gives her time to paint.  That is a lot of work before she even puts pencil ..read more

 Yesterday, in the local Aspen newspaper, the front page story was that our monastery in Old Snowmass was up for sale.  The asking price is $150 million.  The monastery has 3600 acres of ranch and buildings.  It is in expensive Pitkin County.  So now that it is official, in the news, people are really sad, or curious enough to finally come up the seven miles from the highway to see the place.  As a Trappist monastery, it will be no more.  But as a ranch and a place for retreat and quiet, a spiritual center, if you will, I believe it will go on.  The new ..read more

 One way you know that your life is going in the wrong direction, is that you change your goals to meet your life.  Maybe you had lofty goals, but then your life behavior went downhill, into self-destruction.  But you don’t want to admit this, because of pride, fear, ego-inflation, so you simply change your goals, you downsize your future so that you don’t have to change your destructive behavior.  People in recovery have been there and done that.  Their lives were filled with loss so they simply changed their goals.  Those losses were not all that important. &nbs ..read more

 Recovery can teach anyone about a lot of things.  Example:  a bottom is when the next thing you are about to lose is more important than drinking.  What to learn?  Well, say you are thinking of suicide in the midst of a miserable life at that moment.  It is a life in that moment full of feelings of fear, despair, hopelessness, and self-pity for instance.  Your future is all behind you.  But you don’t do more damage at that moment because you decide that living is more important than dying.  You don’t have to be an alcoholic to have the above feelin ..read more

 Honesty is not easy.  It is not painless.  It generally invites change.  Change from what we thought was important, who we thought we were, even the rutted pattern of our daily life.  If you are a Jesus believer, he says, “Where I am you must be.”  You might be a believer, but you are only working from the mind, the creed.  Honesty will generally tell you that you are anywhere but where Jesus is.  Your prayer is for him to give you what you want in your set of priorities.  His plea is to change your life.  If you are in recovery, page 58 of th ..read more

 Now and again we can get some bad news, such as a physical illness, cancer, chronic stuff, or that we are being laid off, or our rent has doubled, or the car is come to the end of its useful life, unexpectedly.  Fear can then dominate our emotional life.  Fear can be buried in various ways, none of them very good, or good at all.  If we are in a fit spiritual condition with some trust in a God or some spiritual power of our own discovery,  then the fear need not dominate us emotionally.  We will have the tools to face it in a balanced and healthy fashion.  I ..read more

 I ran into a drunk who is in recovery.  She no longer drinks and feels much better physically.  She is helpful to others, and tries to avoid any bad habits in thinking and acting.  But she had one fear she could not get over.  It was the lack of money, $$$ since her drinking gifted her with the consequences of unemployment.  I reminded her of something that was passed onto me when I was “unemployable.”  She was rich with ‘spiritual currency.”  In her drinking days, she was spiritually bankrupt.  Each day of prayer, service, avoiding emotional drama ..read more

 I cannot relate to the little girl who has a vision of Mary and decides to dedicate her life to serving her God, doing good for people, becoming a religious and being quite pious.  That was never me.  When I was a little boy I was clueless and though I did a lot of stuff on the outsides, I remained clueless for another 30 years or so.  I can relate more to Jesus and Buddha.  They did stuff before eventually going into their “desert experience.”  I am an “eventually” guy.  Playing a role got old and I was not very fulfilled in it.  Outsides OK.  Ins ..read more