The proof is in the pudding

Here’s one of my pet peeves. I don’t really claim to have any hang ups. But we all do. Even if you don’t believe you have any, they will roar their ugly heads the second you encounter them. It’s like Ram Dass says: “ If you think you are so enlightened, spend a week with your family”.

But this is one thing that openly rubs me the wrong way. I don’t care to resolve it rubbing me the wrong way, because I still believe that it’s something that first off has to be addressed by the people exhibiting that sort of behavior. Not by me getting over my irritation by it.

Self-advertisement. People laying claim on such given things that God favors them. Or that they have the Divine light in them. To a lesser degree people who advertise their happy life grind me too, but its banality really is beyond me, so I just smile and nod. Yes, dahlin, you have a fabulous life. Nothing ever sucks in your day. So back to the people who claim to have a copy right on God or enlightenment. When I come across people like that, the first thing I always wonder is, who is this “I” you are saying is so enlightened. If you truly were in such depth of spiritual comprehension, you would have overcome your egoic claims long time ago and would perfectly understand that this “I” you think is so much more spiritually evolved still holds you hostage in your ego’s mind.

Many, many years ago, when I was taking prerequisites for nursing school, I was taking a night class in chemistry so I could make the cut for the program. In the six years it took me to get my degree, I was always working two jobs, seven days a week, switching over to nightshift to accommodate my school schedule, while raising the girls who were still very young then. Exhausted doesn’t have meaning until you fall asleep standing up at the register while trying to ring up a customer. My body was at constant war of fighting to stay awake to make time to eat or just falling asleep feeling famished. Anyways, one night my fellow students were having a casual conversation with our instructor. One of them piped up and said a particular student was the instructor’s favorite. Based on the fact that this particular student aced all tests with ease and had an apparent knack for chemistry, so something obviously in common with the instructor. I on the other hand, could barely pass the tests, if at all, just as I could barely stay awake during class, due to my chronic exhaustion. Oftentimes falling asleep while sitting front and center in full view of the instructor. The instructor laughed and said: "No, not at all. If I had a favorite student, it would be Heike.”

My fellow students’ jaws dropped. Here I was, the “worst” student in class. How could I be the teacher’s pet? The reason was simple. The instructor was completely aware of my struggle to stay afloat. To get through the prerequisites to make the cut for the nursing program while working the way I did to support myself and my family. Admiration and support came easy to her for someone like me. No, life has never been an easy ride for me, but then I never asked for an easy ride. I think I would be missing out on all the treasures life has hidden for us if I asked for a challenge-free life.

Here’s my point. I wouldn’t be where I am, if I wasn’t “favored”. If I didn’t have some sort of spiritual insight. People believe that if you accomplish things that are measurable in this world such as status, income, possessions, those sorts of things, that one can run around and claim to have God on their side. God doesn’t show favors that way. It makes me laugh that people actually believe that.

God loves us all the same.

God loves us all the same. It is us who do not love God the same in return. And it shows in the beliefs we carry, the choices we make, the life we live. If you have to run around proclaiming how favored or enlightened you are, you are not fooling anyone but yourself. You don’t have to tell God that you are favored by God or that you have a special relationship with God. Do you?