| Dear Counselor, friend and confidante of my deepest heart: Once again I come to you with a heavy heart and a troubled mind. The recent unexpected death of my friend and neighbor Charles left me very sad. And then last night I got the news that a childhood friend of mine would probably die before morning. Then, I was completely numb; today it is all sifting through my mind, and I find myself deeply sad, and afraid too, crying from time to time, and utterly useless. I have put all my work aside, and from the window I look out at Charles’ empty apartment, with its familiar well-worn wooden porch steps. Suddenly I realize that his apartment is the mirror image of mine. Some people would say he didn’t leave much of a life behind, really, yet in some ways he had a great deal. He had children and friends who loved him, even though he lived almost like a hermit. He was beautiful in spirit, and I wasted the opportunity to know him because I was sot of a recluse too, keeping to myself. For the last few years I’ve been asking, praying, and seeking “my Mission” in life, my “right Livelihood,” and the Path of Joy. My request to God was to “Give me joyful work.” Now I realize that the joy I want may not come from any work, but only from the people that I share my soul’s work with, that I share my true self with, that I dare to know and join with in a spiritual and truly honest way. Oh, but this will make me so vulnerable. Lord, Counselor, my heart is jumbled full of so many questions and feelings about both life and death. I can not say them all, or even know them all, but You know them. Dear God, Dear Counselor, please speak to the questions you know are in my heart, struggling to be known. If you have time in your eternity, please speak to me now. I am in need of Your light. So many times it feels like my life is opening, but yet it never quite does. I feel as if something is about to be born, or maybe is about to die, and today I have suddenly realized that both may be the same. | |
