Spiritual Production

All of our lives we’ve heard about the number of cars produced by a plant, electronic parts produced by various countries, the number of widgets and gidgets we’re expected to produce at our jobs for any given hour of any given day. At the job that paid my way through college I was expected to help produce, pack and load X number of boxes of butter per day. Sometimes that was only fifteen thousand pounds. Sometimes it was twenty-five thousand pounds or more. For a scrawny college kid who didn’t weigh a lot more than the boxes he was throwing around, it could be exhausting work in the summer heat. Air conditioning consisted of stepping outside in the sun to catch a breeze on a ninety-plus degree day.

It was work I’d seen done all of my life by my coworkers. Some of the guys were my age. Some were like uncles who had known me since birth. It was only natural that when it came time for me to go to college, I would pay my own way. It was also natural that I would join the union and be hired to work in the factory where I’d grown up. I went from the three year old who ran through the factory stealing and devouring fresh warm butter to the teenager who put it in a refrigerator the size of half a house.

As time has gone on I’ve learned that the way life works is that I produce for the outer world. Whatever the product of the moment is — in this case, this article — fulfills my end of the bargain. Previously it was working at some corporation or another. I did the work and they gave me a paycheck.

Other times it was sending souls Home to heaven or an exorcism sending demons and damned souls to hell.

With age and maturity I’ve been made aware of how much of the true work we perform in life is done inside. It’s the interior work that matters most. I can do my part, but God does the heavy lifting. It always has.

To achieve my authentic life’s goal forces me to confront myself on a continual basis. This is far more challenging than any exorcism I have ever performed.

It’s one thing to stand at the gates of hell looking down into the abyss and know that I am surrounded by angels holding me to earth. In spite of being told what goes on in the physical world by observers, I must admit ignorance to it. When they say the colors of the sky change, that strong winds rise up and rattle trees and houses, I take their word for it.

I am in a different sphere of creation. My body may be in place, but my soul has been taken out of this world.

I am engaged in the never-ending confrontation with evil and damnation.

It is quite another matter to face my interior self. This commands a confrontation with the Sublime. Like each human who has ever lived or will live, I have no choice. I must stare into the face of the Divine each day or see my spirit die. I must decide if I am willing to let the Creator do to me and for me what is beyond my comprehension.

Daring thought that it is in this world of self-reliance, the Creator does for us more than we can possibly imagine.

We learn that we have to earn love. With each other that might be true. But with our Creator it is not. We are loved. Simply, without question or excuse.

Humans will always fall short. Regardless of their failure to help our souls continue to grow, so long as we keep our focus on the Creator we are on the right path.

Whatever becomes of that situation, our ultimate responsibility is to ourselves.

We can produce more silence, more serenity, more our genuine selves.