I remember sitting in a Spiritualist church service in Lily Dale, New York. Most Spiritualist services
include an opportunity for members to receive healing from certified healers, and this was no different.
I sat in my chair and watched one of the healers work on a woman who had been sitting next to me.
The healer was an elderly lady with an interesting mix of ethnic features. She could have been
Caucasian, or she could have been Black, or Native American … it was hard to tell, but none of that
mattered. What struck me about this woman was the love that seemed to flow from every pore of her
body. When she finished sending healing energy to the woman seated on the small bench before her,
she took the younger woman's hands in her own and simply smiled. She didn't need to speak; her smile
said it all. It was pure love. Pure connection.
I sat there in that church with tears streaming down my face and thought, Why can't we all be like that? Why can't we all just love each other?
The question was rhetorical, actually, because I already knew the answer. I had asked God that same question a little while back. At that time I was sitting on an airplane full of people of different sizes, colors, cultures, and beliefs. I'd been strapped into my seat reading a book on spirituality, yet as I looked around me, I realized that I felt no spiritual connection with my fellow human beings on that plane. Over the course of several years I'd come to understand that we're all spiritual beings housed in a physical body, but even with that knowledge I failed to feel any sense of oneness with the other souls traveling with me that night. And that bothered me terribly.
I laid my book in my lap, closed my eyes, and prayed, God, how can I feel less separate? How can I feel more of a connection with others?
As so often happens when I ask a very pointed question in my prayers, the answer didn't come right away in a booming voice from the heavens. No, the answer waited until I was in the middle of the long drive home from the airport. When it came, it hit me in a torrent of thoughts and realizations as if someone in the spirit world had opened up the floodgates of the great Reservoir of Understanding. The thoughts were so insistent that I had to pull over to the side of the road and dig out some paper and a pen from my tote bag.
I got back on the road, and began to write the "aha" thoughts as they continued to hit me one after the other. I steered with one hand and wrote with the other, never taking my eyes from the road, lest I end up in a ditch as a result of my prayer. I wrote completely by feel, yet when I arrived at home and put the paper under a light, my notes were completely legible, with no overlapping lines. I guess God wanted to make sure I could read His answer.
Here's what I heard that night:
If we want to feel oneness with others instead of separation, we have to understand that we humans are like individual cells in the metaphorical body of God. Just as all the cells in a body are made of the same basic building blocks, each human being is made of the same God essence. Just as each cell in the human body has its own unique role, each of us has a different role to play here on Earth. And just like the cells in a body, when there is disharmony among human beings, we begin to destroy each other like a cancer. What affects one cell or one group of cells ultimately affects the whole.
If we are a cell in God's body, how can we not love all the other cells? Oh, you're thinking as you picture your nasty neighbor or a smelly bum lying in an alley, it's easy to not love someone like that. But that's only because you've forgotten our true essence.
It becomes simpler when you think about someone you love-someone you truly cherish with all your heart. Picture that person now … Imagine kissing their hand. You love that hand, don't you? You love it because it's a part of the person you love. Picture their cheek as you lovingly stroke it. You love that cheek, don't you? Because it's just one part of the great big whole that you adore. Picture their toes. Perhaps they're not the prettiest toes in the world. Maybe they're a little crooked or there's a little fungus growing in the nails. But it doesn't matter, does it? You can overlook the imperfection. You love that person's toes because those toes are a part of the person you love. The pretty parts, the not-so-pretty parts, the sweet-smelling parts, and even the somewhat stinky parts … when you love someone, you take the good with the bad. You love all the parts because you love the whole.
To love God, to honor God, and to show appreciation to God, we merely need to love the creations of God. All people, all animals, all living things, no matter how pretty, no matter how unsightly, no matter how sweet-smelling, no matter how smelly, are all parts of the whole: the whole of God's creation … cells in the body of God.
When we feel separate from others, when we fail to love others, it's because we don't realize or simply forget that we are all made of the same God essence. God is an omnipotent, omnipresent, impersonal creative force, but God becomes personal by manifesting into billions of diverse personal human forms. God IS. But just as you cannot separate the wave from the ocean, you cannot separate the creation from the Creator. The unmanifested God expresses its true nature-which is love-through its creations.
When you send love to a perfect stranger on an airplane or a bum on the street through kindness, through a smile or a loving thought, you are loving God, for that person is an aspect of God. When you speak sweetly to an animal and show it love, you are loving God, for that animal contains the pure essence of God. When you take the time to stop and admire a flower, admire the nearby weed as well, for both are manifestations of God, of the one Divine Mind.
We all have it within ourselves to love one another, because at our very source we are Love. It's only when our pride and ego get in the way that we forget who we are and put up our walls of separation, of mistrust, and judgmentalism. If we take the time to remember who we really are: cells in the metaphorical body of God-truly made in God's image-life becomes simple.
Some of us may be a heart cell. Some of us may be a brain cell. Some may be a crooked toe cell, but we all have the same purpose: to serve the whole body. What affects one, affects all. That is oneness. We may be separated by our cell walls, but we are connected through our godliness. By loving each other, we are loving God.
I sat there in that church with tears streaming down my face and thought, Why can't we all be like that? Why can't we all just love each other?
The question was rhetorical, actually, because I already knew the answer. I had asked God that same question a little while back. At that time I was sitting on an airplane full of people of different sizes, colors, cultures, and beliefs. I'd been strapped into my seat reading a book on spirituality, yet as I looked around me, I realized that I felt no spiritual connection with my fellow human beings on that plane. Over the course of several years I'd come to understand that we're all spiritual beings housed in a physical body, but even with that knowledge I failed to feel any sense of oneness with the other souls traveling with me that night. And that bothered me terribly.
I laid my book in my lap, closed my eyes, and prayed, God, how can I feel less separate? How can I feel more of a connection with others?
As so often happens when I ask a very pointed question in my prayers, the answer didn't come right away in a booming voice from the heavens. No, the answer waited until I was in the middle of the long drive home from the airport. When it came, it hit me in a torrent of thoughts and realizations as if someone in the spirit world had opened up the floodgates of the great Reservoir of Understanding. The thoughts were so insistent that I had to pull over to the side of the road and dig out some paper and a pen from my tote bag.
I got back on the road, and began to write the "aha" thoughts as they continued to hit me one after the other. I steered with one hand and wrote with the other, never taking my eyes from the road, lest I end up in a ditch as a result of my prayer. I wrote completely by feel, yet when I arrived at home and put the paper under a light, my notes were completely legible, with no overlapping lines. I guess God wanted to make sure I could read His answer.
Here's what I heard that night:
If we want to feel oneness with others instead of separation, we have to understand that we humans are like individual cells in the metaphorical body of God. Just as all the cells in a body are made of the same basic building blocks, each human being is made of the same God essence. Just as each cell in the human body has its own unique role, each of us has a different role to play here on Earth. And just like the cells in a body, when there is disharmony among human beings, we begin to destroy each other like a cancer. What affects one cell or one group of cells ultimately affects the whole.
If we are a cell in God's body, how can we not love all the other cells? Oh, you're thinking as you picture your nasty neighbor or a smelly bum lying in an alley, it's easy to not love someone like that. But that's only because you've forgotten our true essence.
It becomes simpler when you think about someone you love-someone you truly cherish with all your heart. Picture that person now … Imagine kissing their hand. You love that hand, don't you? You love it because it's a part of the person you love. Picture their cheek as you lovingly stroke it. You love that cheek, don't you? Because it's just one part of the great big whole that you adore. Picture their toes. Perhaps they're not the prettiest toes in the world. Maybe they're a little crooked or there's a little fungus growing in the nails. But it doesn't matter, does it? You can overlook the imperfection. You love that person's toes because those toes are a part of the person you love. The pretty parts, the not-so-pretty parts, the sweet-smelling parts, and even the somewhat stinky parts … when you love someone, you take the good with the bad. You love all the parts because you love the whole.
To love God, to honor God, and to show appreciation to God, we merely need to love the creations of God. All people, all animals, all living things, no matter how pretty, no matter how unsightly, no matter how sweet-smelling, no matter how smelly, are all parts of the whole: the whole of God's creation … cells in the body of God.
When we feel separate from others, when we fail to love others, it's because we don't realize or simply forget that we are all made of the same God essence. God is an omnipotent, omnipresent, impersonal creative force, but God becomes personal by manifesting into billions of diverse personal human forms. God IS. But just as you cannot separate the wave from the ocean, you cannot separate the creation from the Creator. The unmanifested God expresses its true nature-which is love-through its creations.
When you send love to a perfect stranger on an airplane or a bum on the street through kindness, through a smile or a loving thought, you are loving God, for that person is an aspect of God. When you speak sweetly to an animal and show it love, you are loving God, for that animal contains the pure essence of God. When you take the time to stop and admire a flower, admire the nearby weed as well, for both are manifestations of God, of the one Divine Mind.
We all have it within ourselves to love one another, because at our very source we are Love. It's only when our pride and ego get in the way that we forget who we are and put up our walls of separation, of mistrust, and judgmentalism. If we take the time to remember who we really are: cells in the metaphorical body of God-truly made in God's image-life becomes simple.
Some of us may be a heart cell. Some of us may be a brain cell. Some may be a crooked toe cell, but we all have the same purpose: to serve the whole body. What affects one, affects all. That is oneness. We may be separated by our cell walls, but we are connected through our godliness. By loving each other, we are loving God.
LOVING GOD