Balance

As I search for balance,
I teeter between arrogance and humility,
between light and dark, between belief and doubt.

As I search the archives of religion
I find both beauty and decay.
I am both touched by the devotion of past thinkers
who felt their thoughts deeply and expansively within their soul,
as I do at times,
and also disturbed by their inability, as well as mine,
to change the world for the better forever.

I seek that place of balance between false hope and despair,
fantasy and harsh reality, narcissism and selflessness.
I ask, "Do I have a right to expect anything from my Creator?" and
"Does my Creator expect anything from me?"

I long to bridge the divide within my mind
that causes me to believe we are separate.

As I weave in and out of the corridors of thoughts and prayers,
hopes and intentions, philosophies and theologies I find I am in awe
and bewildered by them all.

So I lay them all down; the rules, the dogma, the rituals,
the teachings from earlier and present times.
I am here now, in this moment, and I understand that none of them matter.

All that matters is love.
All that matters is the compassion and kindness of love.
There is no dogma, rule, ritual, philosophy or theology
that can dictate love. - Love is. 

It is up to me to accept it within myself,
to grow in the spirit of love and learn from it.

To create within that spirit of love my own rituals, my own beauty and my own form of worship.

I have witnessed that all things fade and then return in a new form.
I have seen how we either destroy those things which we cling too tightly to
or that “they” destroys us.

I am content with the knowledge, that should I die and all
that I believed was wrong and all those who laughed at my foolish way of
life were correct.
It will not matter;
I won't know and I still would not choose to live any differently.

I believe that with love I will satisfy the hunger within me to know.
I will quench the thirst to understand. 
I will quiet the turbulence within my soul.
I have come to terms with the fact that I cannot adhere
to any religion, philosophy or theology with their rules or rituals.

For I see both their beauty and their limitations,
the solace they bring to others
and the harm.
I have found that there is only one rule with love and that is balance.

Daily life and whatever transpires within it, should I so choose
and intend it to be, is a ritual of love.

The Spirit of Love is what I worship.
It is an increase in Love within me that I ask for and strive for.
Love is the giver and the gift.
If I have love, I have everything.
Love will fill that great divide within my mind that
keeps me believing that Love and I
are separate
and in turn that I and others are also separate. 
Once the divide is filled with love, love brings all things into balance.

-Miriam
​ 09/04/2011