by Linda La Croix
The Christmas holidays offer many fun events for people to experience. If you attend, they can bring a lot of positive energy into your life. Most every year, I attend a fund-raiser for the Lake Orion Lighted Parade, enjoy the downtown Rochester buildings lit up and their Santa Parade, as well as all holiday music and seeing Santa.
Writing about spiritual living is fun for me, too. I am always grateful to hear the articles and learn positive, practical, spiritual thoughts that resonate with some readers.
One thank you from a reader said he felt they give people hope. That was a wonderful comment, but it also told me there was an energy around hope, and I had to find it. Taking time to think and going into the stillness where I let God’s energies, the universal energies, or whatever name you have for a higher power, bring an awareness to me.
The thought came to be aware that a general consciousness exists that there is not enough good in our world. So, the man was correct: hope is needed; there isn’t enough visible good to see or hear. Even though I write every month about how good exists in everyone. Telling everyone how to create more good by living a spiritual life is not enough.
It may seem impossible to find that good depending on what is happening in your life. A cashier once mentioned to me that it was hard to believe the good I write about exists, but it does! Not 100 percent of the time, because life happens, but we can learn how to change our lives from within and move forward.
Moving forward is not given to us freely; it takes awareness and action. Sometimes, we miss the good in our lives because we are not accepting of how it appears. Other times, we are busy telling God energy how it must show up, or we don’t act.
In spiritual living, we learn that no one is coming to change our lives for us. We are taught how to look within and that we change our lives. One thing about change is if it’s necessary, and you don’t act, it will still show up but in an unfavorable way. Act before God’s energies bring it on, and you HAVE to adjust.
If you look up the Romans and the Spartans from hundreds of years ago, you will find there has always been bad happening in this world. To find the strength to keep going, people rest in the hope that something better is coming. With this, we actually combine our hope with faith. Faith is to believe, from within, something greater is coming.
When we are down and out, just knowing there is an energy with the potential to show us the way will present itself for our action is all we need. It’s comforting, and I call that awareness “the Christ” energy that lives within each of us. Using that, we can change our lives for the better.
In times of struggle, we grow as something good will always present itself to us. All we must do is be in unity with what is on the outside of us and what’s inside of us. Do this by going deep within your consciousness where you connect and commune with the God energy of all of life. Think of this space as the Kingdom of Heaven.
When not balanced with spiritual living, Earthly living can make it seem like bad is happening all around us. Yet, the world has not recently gone bad; the bad has always existed. Duality tells us that if the bad is there, the good is there, too. Sometimes, bad is accepted because it is the consciousness the people share. However, if you dare to know and explore the good, you become more aware of that.
Spiritual people know you can choose to live as though hell is here on earth, or you can choose as though heaven is on earth. Whichever one you choose, you will find. You create it!
Once, while shopping, I received information to help a family member from another shopper. That is how easy it is when you are spiritually aware of how God’s energy works in your life. Things that make your life better can come in many ways; be open to them.
If you are seeing only bad in the world or get a calling inside that change is coming, use your faith to hold onto your hope for something better. God’s energy will send you the organization, people, or ideas to support you. Maybe in the paper, a business card hanging at a local business, another shopper, or a friend.
Anytime you want to change, you can do that, just by the choices you make. At Unity of Orion, we teach how to find the light in the darkness. The steps to do this are available from many sources, including the bible, if you can interpret its truths. People have interpreted these truths and given them to us for years.
One example is in our hymnal, “O’ Little Town of Bethlehem,” written by Phillip Brooks over 150 years ago. When you sing the words and choose to make a conscious awareness of them, you are affirming that you know about the energy of the love and light that was born into the world one Holy night. When you are in connection to that, you request that God silently, with no drama, send down that same wondrous gift of energy to fill your open heart. To shine a star so that you will see it. You are willing to look at many sources if need be, with your hope for something better. You have faith to know it is filtering into you; no, you are not dreaming. Your hopes and fears through all your years are met in knowing that “the Christ” lives and shines within you.
There is your good. Be humble and open to receiving the blessing of the Christ consciousness as it enters your heart and mind this winter solstice. Our ears will not hear it; our eyes will not see it. Our hope brings it to us if our faith and trust will open us to accept it.
Christmas time – is the perfect season to remind ourselves that the peace, love, joy, and hope that is God’s energy is attainable by our awareness of it.
Merry Christmas,
Linda La Croix, Unity Director, Unity of Orion
