Some Brainstorming on Strength

I was just about to write that I have never considered myself a strong person, but I couldn't write it because it's not true. I think instead that I have wanted to be a strong person looking like I'm trying to be effortlessly strong. And there's a strength in trying something over and over without it working. That type of imbecility certainly takes persistence, and persistence builds a muscle.

But to acknowledge something and then to say no to it. That takes a strength I haven't developed yet. And I tend to think, "If only . . ." and then I rely on the outcome to prove that I'm doing something right. I rarely breathe in the anger on the spot. I rarely believe that there's a finite amount of anger and that I can make a difference by transmuting the anger I encounter. I think anger is finite, but like the universe, expands. And yet I believe love is infinite? I don't know how to put these ideas together. I don't know who the Devil is, exactly. Temptation and ego and God and love. Creativity. If conflict is how I learn about myself and others and if I grow by taking that conflict and turning it over to love, then wouldn't I want to be tempted into the evil? Or does the evil just find me? Where is the strength in being found? I'm very confused!

Karma, Desires, Forgiveness, Reflection

This morning: Oh, please forgive my trespasses. I will forgive anything I need to! I'm trying to build it up! How can I look at things differently? The sun rose with it's pinkness peaking over the grey. Always bright. I come to my mantra to try to remember that things are the way they are. It may not be a matter of forgiveness as much as it is forgetting. Letting go.

Upon reflection, I see my role in the pattern of things. I will keep coming back to this. I know I will be an old woman thinking these things--but maybe I can also think about other things, too. Can I accept without judgement the thoughts I have about wanting attention? What I label girly is what is causing me damage.

Ram Dass: "And therein lies the tale that I'm still paying for. If you've got power desires you get everything you ever wanted. That's what's so horrible about it. You recognize having something that you wanted about 10 years ago. And you gotta have it now. And if you want to get rid of it you'll have it again, that's what so horrible about it. You just gotta have it. Let it run off, running off old karma"

And all things we never named and all the desires of others. We're bound.