When I was a little guy, growing up in the ethnic neighborhoods of Baltimore, I was educated by nuns and priests at a Catholic elementary school. I was taught that, if I earnestly prayed to our “personal God”—from my heart—my prayers asking for a cure of my mother’s cancer or to end my father’s disruptive alcohol addiction might be answered through divine miracles. At the same time in the same neighborhood, I was learning from my cultural surroundings that it was social suicide to rely on beliefs alone for my physical survival and mental well-being. So, as hard as they tried to instill the fear of our “personal God” to control my prayers and the way I chose to live, I grew up being more fearful of the people who followed the same religion, professing the moral values of living a life of loving kindness towards each other; as we all fell “woefully” short of practicing what we preached, instead we constantly judged our neighbor as being separate, different than me—as the potentially deviant other. Ultimately, I grew up distrusting both: the religion and the society-driven morality code in which I had been conditioned for my “objective,” physical and mental survival!
So, when I arrived at CeDAR in addiction, I was highly skeptical of adopting the AA gospel instructing me to surrender my mind and heart to a “personal God” or Higher Power—if I wanted to stay sober. I was sixty years old, without belief in a “God,” or any need for spiritual guidance. But, I was so mentally distraught and feeling helpless that I did begin saying the Serenity Prayer: calling on God, a Higher Power, whoever or whatever, in a last-gasp attempt to stay sober and save my self-ego, unsure who “I was” trying to save.
When I checked in for rehab to learn about Recovery, I did not believe in prayers or miracles, but seven years later, I wholeheartedly trust in “my” Higher Power because I’m still sober. And, because of my personal experience, I know that “miracles,” what I call the Power of Awareness, can happen for everyone; if we surrender our conditioned self-ego (our past), and open our hearts to experience the truth of what is real in the present moment. I have learned to be mindful: my religious practice of staying aware of my Higher Power, the constant conscious flow of life-giving creative energy—Love—through me into the world I create around me. Through my spiritual awakening of compassionate understanding, I know that the eternal I am is neither the temporary “I am my mind” nor the “I am my body,” which are only the objective mental and physical experiences that create my self-ego—my past; now, understanding that my true Self, the eternal I am is unified with “God Consciousness,” I can shamelessly, subjectively say: without “God,” there is no me, and without me, there is no “God!”
No, I have not adopted some religion’s dogma based on the fear of a societal morality to control the way I live my life, but I have gotten religious; which means, now I am living with a humbled self-ego, that disappears as I learn how my mind works, letting go of my past by healing my past as it arises with compassionate understanding now. I have become aware of my temporary physical and mental existence through active meditation—being aware of my ever-present eternal Consciousness. I have opened my heart to feel my eternal connection with the divine energy source, which constantly creates, through me, the material and spiritual world around me. This is my Higher Power of Awareness: knowing that Consciousness, the constant creation of Life out of selfless Love, connects everyone and everything. I now know that my Higher Power transcends the harmful energy levels of shame, guilt, apathy, grief, fear, desire, pride, and anger, judging what is arising now by objective comparison to my past experiences—creating the illusion of an isolated self-ego separated by space and time from the activity of selfless Love creating the Now. Through totally subjective true Self-awareness, there is no comparison, only the positive, spontaneous active virtues of courage, willingness, acceptance, reason, Love, joy, and peace—the understanding that everything is connected in Conscious creativity; that is the silent activity of Love flowing through everything that exists.
For me, “God” is unlimited universal Consciousness that experiences itself as the activity of selfless Love: the constant creation of the limited mental and physical objective existence that creates the illusion of space in time—all happening in the ever-present moment. But, through awareness with compassionate understanding, the limited self disappears, and only the activity of Love remains, as I am the energy that never dissipates but is eternally transformed. I am no longer living in fear of death—the end of my objective mind and body (the illusion of my temporary self-ego in time and space)—but with the joy of knowing that the activity of Love is my Higher Power: “God Consciousness” of the ever-present I am has no ending.
VAB 03-08-25
©2024 stillawakening.com All Rights Reserved
