How to Be Spiritual Without Being Religious by D. Patrick Miller

Author:D. Patrick Miller
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781612834276
Publisher: Hampton Roads Publishing

THE FINEST IMPATIENCE

Patience is waiting with intention. The finest kind of patience carries the intention of love. Intending to love, we may sometimes fall short, and become impatient; but even so we can say that the intention of love is behind the finest kind of impatience.

PATIENCE VS. PASSIVITY

Because patience has an intent, it should not be confused with an unhealthy passivity, that is, waiting around for something good to happen because we do not want to work for change.

If you want to get struck by lightning, you can't do it by curling up on the couch under a warm blanket in the safety of your own house while a storm rages outside. Rather you have to be willing to run into an open field in the middle of the storm, and then wait out there, soaked and shivering . . . and then it still may not happen.

But who wants to get struck by lightning anyway? The lightning that's worth waiting (and shivering) for is enlightenment, a shocking moment of growth in which some habitual, fearful part of oneself gets burned away and something new, pure, and childlike emerges to refresh and renew one's way of life. In various traditions, such a shock is also called kensho, or self-realization, or the holy instant.

The bolt of enlightenment seldom strikes the passive—those attempting to sleep through life and only grumble and turn over on the couch when prodded to awaken. This kind of lightning does eventually strike the patient. It hits those who have ventured bravely into storm after storm of self-confrontation and waited studiously, their faces upturned to the rain and the roiling clouds. The irony is that when lightning does strike the patient seeker, it usually happens when least expected—like a bolt from the blue, as the old saying goes.

Once it has been received by someone willing, this kind of lightning can find the same target again and again in a single lifetime. Enlightenment strikes many times before the burning it gives is complete.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.