Kris's address today - "Kicking goals", is all about finding direction in our lives: - "our need of a compass rather than a gps" to navigate our lives through calm - as well as stormy - weather. "But - are you ready for the journey?" Kris asks.
Expanding Horizons
"Kicking goals - out?"
[Music] You're listening to Expanding Horizons, the podcast of the Unitarian Church of South Australia, a home of progressive spirituality and free religious thought and action since 1854. The views expressed in these podcasts are those of the speaker and are not intended to represent the position of the church itself or of the worldwide Unitarian Universalist Movement. For more information visit UnitarianSA.org.au [Music] What to remember when waking. In that first hardly noticed moment in which you wake coming back to this life from the other more secret, movable and frighteningly honest world where everything began. There is a small opening into the new day which closes the moment you begin your plans. What you can plan is too small for you to live. What you can live wholeheartedly will make plans enough for the vitality hidden in your sleep. To be human is to become visible while carrying what is hidden as a gift to others. To remember the other world in this world is to live in your true inheritance. You are not a troubled guest on this earth, you are not an accident amidst other accidents. You were invited from another and greater night than the one from which you have just emerged. Now looking through the slanting light of the morning window toward the mountain presence of everything that can be, what urgency calls you to your one love. What shape waits in the seed of you to grow and spread its branches against a future sky? Is it waiting in the fertile sea, in the trees beyond the house, in the life you can imagine for yourself, in the open and lovely white page on the writing desk? Now I will invite Sandy to give a reading for us today from a book by Marianne Williamson, and Sandy not only has the book but she has a prop of some bread which I really wondered about when I saw that there with her she expected me to offer communion today, but you will see its relevant to the reading, thank you Sandy. There is a myth that some people are more faithful than others. A true statement is that in some areas some of us are more surrendered than others. We are surrendered to God first of course, the things we don't really care that much about anyway. Some of us don't mind giving up our attachment to career goals, but there is no way we are going to surrender our romantic relationships or vice versa. Everything we don't care that much about, fine, God can have it, but if it's really, really important we think we better handle it ourselves. The truth is of course that the more important it is to us, the more important it is to surrender, which is surrendered, is taken care of best. To place something in the hands of God is to give it over mentally to the protection and care of the beneficence of the universe. To keep it ourselves means to constantly grab and clutch and manipulate. We keep opening the oven to see if the bread is baking, which only ensures it never gets a chance to. And Sandy, I think that bread will be available for consumption later, anyway, we'll see. Please stand if you are able to. Please stand if you are not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not. I am not peace, I am not, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace, I am not peace - the manager inquired from the neighbouring workstation - where is that whole unit gone? Why aren't they in the office? The reply was, "Oh, well, you know how health and well-being is the overarching goal that we have as a council? They thought for their health and well-being, they should go early on Fridays." So, it wasn't quite what the community had in mind. It does raise the question, do we sometimes take something altruistic? Do we sometimes take something altruistic, but actually transform it into something self-serving as we define personal goals? The self-development gurus tell you you have to have goals, they give power and predictability to your life, and I suppose they are comforting in a way, a raft to hang on to rather than just drifting along. And you know the sorts of things they talk about, people have goals, I am going to make a million dollars by the time I am 30, maybe too late for most of us here, or I am going to have a mansion on the seafront at Glenel or something, which you probably need goal number one above to get to that. Goals do give our lives meaning, there is no doubt about that, but are we using them as a replacement for a faith that all will work out as it should? I am not suggesting that the goals that people choose are unworthy, now a lot of people will choose material goals to have enough money, to be able to pay off the house, to have enough super, and while these aren't trivial, I question whether these can mean that we are missing out on valuing the most important things in life in terms of loving relationships. As the comedian, Lily Tomlin said, "The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you are still a rat." And look, many of the goals that people take on are about relationships, might be to have a companion, someone to marry, or perhaps to heal a relationship in our lives. There is nothing wrong with any of that. But I wonder whether a better approach is to look inward to see if we are ready for these gifts that are available to us. If we want a companion, are we ourselves capable of being a good friend, of being attentive and helpful? If we want a wife or husband, are we capable of commitment, integrity, homemaking? If we want to heal a relationship in our lives, and it disturbs us that it's broken, marred in some way, then are we ourselves working on being wise and kind and loving, so that we are in a position to helpfully engage with someone who is feeling hurt and disappointment. Even Buddhist's speak of goals, for example, the goal of enlightenment that is said to be the purpose of treading the eightfold path. I've talked about that at other times. But the question, how many steps are on that path? Just one, the step in front of you. Goals do energise us, that's true. And the ego bristles at the thrill of running the race of winning. And yet, although it might be working to satisfy the urges within, I wonder, is it possible to live without that competitive energy, without that sense of grabbing something from the world? It doesn't mean doing nothing. It doesn't mean sitting on a rock or living in a cave. But I'm talking about progressively letting go of the imposition of the ego places on the world. When I say the world, it means other people in all sorts of situations. If we are sensitive to the impulses within us, then nature unfolds. We naturally seek the companionship we need, the food we need, the money we need through that. And apart from those inner impulses, we have impressions coming at us all the time, from people and things in the world. Of course, we respond to all of them, either by instinct or by choice. But I'm not sure that we need to impose our plan on others to receive what we need. As I was saying, if we focus on responding rightly and remaining at peace as we do so, we still respond. We still go out and socialize, live our lives, carry out what we need to do schoolfully, whether it's the shopping or our employment, whatever. But we can live without a compulsion to impose ourselves on the world. In Christian terms, it has been called surrender to God. I'm not talking about a person that alone an old man with a beard sitting on a cloud. I am talking about having faith in a spirit of life, as Unitarians often refer to it. Having faith that there is ample in the universe to guide us and provide for us. I came across a very relevant poem in the Christian tradition by Norman McLeod, a 19th century Scottish clergyman and poet. It's called trust in God and do the right. I have modernized the language and rendered it gender neutral, as is my custom, but I've left the word God in there. If you have the impression it refers to a humanoid being and you're uncomfortable with that, then please let go of that conception so you can absorb the message of the poem. Courage people, do not stumble, though your path is dark as night. There's a star to guide the humble. Trust in God and do the right. Though the road be long and dreary and it's ending out of sight, tread it bravely, strong or weary, trust in God and do the right. Perish policy and cunning, perish all that fears the light, whether losing, whether winning, trust in God and do the right. Trust no party, church or faction, trust no leader in the fight, but in every word and action trust in God and do the right. Some will hate you, some will love you, some will flatter, some will slight, leave people and look within you. Trust in God and do the right. Fermist rule and safest guiding, inward peace and inward light, star upon our path abiding. Trust in God and do the right. In the reading from Marianne Williamson's book this morning, she speaks of surrender to God. And I know for some of you, it's a difficult conception. We've all heard so much about, you know, what is God. So sometimes we use the term 'spirit of life'. Whatever you may call it, I do declare that there is a harmony and a rightness underpinning existence with which we can find alignment. The ego's impulses, which try to change the world to suit our own selfish concerns, usually take us out of that alignment. Yeshua said, unless you become as little children, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. Of course, when he referred to a kingdom of heaven, he wasn't talking about a place, let alone a specific nation. Perhaps one could interpret it as a state of complete inner peace. But why did he ask his disciples to emulate little children? What was it about little children? Perhaps the capacity of the little child to be completely immersed in the moment, to play without self-consciousness, to live without goals. It's actually very hard to do as adults, as we accumulate countless hurts and rules and prejudices which get stored away in our psyche. Of course, we are aware that there are aspects of childish behaviour we should not emulate, like members of parliament in question time. The idea of surrender, of course, is at the very heart of the religion of Islam. Islam, the word, actually means surrender in English. It is the foundation of a faith that if we act rightly, all will be well. The old Egyptians had a wonderful concept of ma'at. The state one is in when one is aligned with the divine in the world. Indeed, they did personify ma'at but they understood it as more than just the God. It's so much easier to describe what it is not, rather than to describe what it is. And it's a little bit like riding a bicycle or a motorbike. If you've done it, you know how to do it and you know the experience of it. But when you're explaining to a three or four year old how to ride a bicycle and you just sit on it and pedal and you don't fall off, even though it's balancing on just two wheels, there's some anxiety about that. It seems impossible. And yet, we can do it. The old Chinese philosophers, not just the old ones, they didn't succumb to the temptation to personify God. They talked of the dal. One could say the way of the universe. Something like ma'at. As soon as you conceive it as a thing, like a soup we're living in or something, you misunderstand. It is something you either act with or act against. When you're at the beach, ten metres from the shore, you can either swim out against the waves or swim or float inwards. Both experiences can be pleasurable, but you certainly know the difference. One requires more exertion than the other. To follow the way, one can say, is to be less willful in the world. If you practice this, you still somehow do everything you need to do. As the dalists say, do nothing and everything is done. The Zen tradition in Buddhism could be described as a strenuous effort to do nothing. At a certain point, one gets the sense that no further effort is required. The Japanese have a word used in the Zen tradition, shikintaza, literally meaning just sitting. And it refers to a meditation practice of just sitting with awareness, not even focusing on the breathing or anything, just being with awareness. Much harder than it sounds. A venerable Tibetan Buddhist teacher who passed on last year, Franko Rinpoche, once said, "It may be difficult to trust the fact that something so relatively simple could actually bring one all the way to awakening." Another Buddhist teacher who recently passed, Tikhnyathan, said, "Life can be found only in the present moment. The past is gone. The future is not yet here. And if we do not go back to ourselves in the present moment, we cannot be in touch with life." That which is surrendered is taken care of best. Yet life must be lived and challenges must be faced. This was put to the test in the Bhakavad Gita, the account of the prelude to the battle between Prince Arjuna and the opposing army, which included some of his relatives. The Bhakavad Gita was folded into the great Hindu epic, the Mahabharata. Some time after the teaching of the Buddha became popular throughout India. It provides a setting for the God Krishna to provide life advice to the hero, Arjuna. Krishna tells him, "You have only the right to act, but no right to the fruits of your action. Let not the fruit of your action be your motive. Neither should you be addicted to inaction. Perform all of your actions with mind concentrated on the divine, renouncing attachment, and looking on success and failure with an equal eye." Now it was a terrible thing for Arjuna to make war against an army which included his own family members. He has heard Krishna say that wisdom is more important than action, so he asks Krishna, "Well, if that's the case, why do you advise me to continue with this struggle?" Krishna replies, "No one can attain freedom from activity by refraining from action. Nor can one reach perfection by merely refusing to act. One cannot, even for a moment, really remain inactive, for the qualities of nature will compel a person to act whether willingly or not. So, you will find yourself in action. And if you must have goals, use them as a compass, not a GPS. Even without the comfort of specific root guidance, you will find your way." We hope you've enjoyed this expanding Horizons podcast. These podcasts are the intellectual property of the presenter. They can be used only with the express permission and appropriate acknowledgement of the presenter. This permission can be obtained by emailing admin@unitariansa.org.au. Please feel free to leave a comment or visit us on Facebook or Twitter by searching essay Unitarians or by visiting our website at unitariansa.org.au. Thank you. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]