June 20, 2008   Center for Spiritual Living , Center for Spiritual Living Santa Rosa , Ernest Holmes , Inspiration , Music , Peace , Prayer , Spirituality

Spiritual Practices in a Group Setting

Ernest Holmes wrote a wonderful passage about the merits and challenges of folk coming together in group spiritual practices for a specific ...

Ernest Holmes wrote a wonderful passage about the merits and challenges of folk coming together in group spiritual practices for a specific goal/focus. The piece is just wonderful in that it points to the beauty of our uniqueness and how each of us has a specific idea of how anything should be. This is both beautiful and somewhat of a potential burden when doing spiritual practice together for something specific – because we are challenged to put our ideas down.

Ernest Holmes suggest that when we join for a purpose, for example, a New Music Director for the Center for Spiritual Living, that we put aside our individual ideas, lay down our individual visions, needs and desires, and let our work be about individually attaining the highest or deepest consciousness for the greatest good in this matter.

In other words, our job is not to vision, visualize or create the details when we’re engaged in this particular kind of spiritual practice. Our work can be instead, to repeatedly and joyfully look inward to that place where we know the big T truth about how Spirit works in such a situation as embracing a "New Music Director".

So my invitation is for you to join me in a 30 day HIGHEST WATCH – letting be….all forms and ideas and fears and hopes and dreams and pictures and ideals and outcomes and wants and desires and attachments and whatever else comes through mind… letting them be and turning relentlessly to the highest consciousness possible individually.

Part Two – is a little more advanced and requires getting into the above practice for a while. So I’ll be happy to receive requests for Part Two of the assignment in about two weeks from interested parties. (The staff has already begun the process and together we really mined some gems out of consciousness last Tuesday. Wow, the room was rockin’)

NEWS NEWS NEWS NEWS

Steven Abbott is singing two incredible songs at Service on Sunday. Two extraordinary prayers: Rickie and Michael Beckwith – Byers “Make Me Stronger” and St. Francis of Assis’s Prayer for Peace. These fantastic songs might as well be the mantras for the assignment above and in my opinion are going to add an element of holiness and beauty to the service. I am excited. PS, don’t come to service late or you’ll miss the first one which takes place right after the call to worship. (I’ve always wanted to call it that… ha.)