Rising From The Ashes

When was the last time you changed your soul chemistry?

We hear about various foods and exercises changing our body chemistry. That, in turn, alters our brain chemistry.

How often do we reflect upon the idea that what we do, how we eat and drink, has any effect on our souls? On our spiritual life?

We can live in the ashes of our lives. Of who we were and what we’ve done.

Or we can rebuild from the ashes of our old spiritual lives to create new spiritual structures. Building a new edifice is all very well and good, but not if it is artifice. We need a solid spiritual structure to have healthy spiritualities.

We need to put ourselves into it.

No building has ever gone up without the builders putting their minds and selves into the building process. Whether it’s drawing up plans, digging the basement or putting on the roof, nothing happens without forethought. Nothing happens without exerting some muscle.

Life happens when we throw ourselves into it. If we decide to fail and put nothing of ourselves into an endeavor, we get nothing. Or there are surprises. There are the little things that pop up in our lives when we exert some spiritual effort.

Do you ever slow down to think about the people in your life who keep you alive? A spouse, a friend or a child. Someone we have known since the beginning of time or met last week in the supermarket. Someone we chatted with at the coffee shop while waiting for our orders. Someone who says things in ways that we never quite think of.

We never think about the same topics in precisely the same way as other people.

Rather, people cross our paths who look at exactly the same things in life in very different ways from us. Doors and windows open in our minds when we listen to their thoughts. When we pay attention to how they express ideas which reach deeply into our souls. They may have unlocked a gate in our souls we had no idea was locked. Much less existed.

That’s the thing about rising from the ashes.

It’s quiet. Nothing fancy. No bells and whistles. No three-ring circus.

There is a stirring, a feeling deep within, that tells us to lift ourselves from where we have been. Come out of whatever it was that kept us at levels below where we could be.

Should be.

The memories of learning how to dance the tango led me to write about it. Writing about it, in turn, led to questions of why I no longer tango, why I had and when I will again. To tango is to be utterly caught up in the music of life.

To be carried away.

To rise out of what had been one’s soul to a completely new self. Simultaneously, one must be utterly aware of even the slightest movement made by one’s partner. Our soul must be attuned to their soul.

As it is with many of the dances of life, whether gardening, sewing, mowing the lawn or being walked by the dog. We have to pay attention not only to movement deep within our own souls. We must be aware of all of creation.

That is living in the mystery. Moving beyond the history of our lives to the mystery inside our souls.

Among the blessings in rising up from the ashes of our old spirituality is getting shaken up. People come into our lives when we aren’t ready for them. Things happen for which we have no preparation.

That is good.

That is when we test the foundations of our lives. We find out how well we have built the structure that is our spirituality.

Eagle eyed awareness apprises us of the fact that there is always more to do. We can never do enough, never grow enough.

It is forever our privilege to become better persons than we were five minutes ago.