OUR PATH-THROW BACK POST

I read this post this morning and realized that this was one that I posted a while ago that I really liked. So I decided to re-post it today, I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I. Please to ask your questions, as I also enjoy our question and answer interactive sessions. I love you all, I know you feel it. Mth, Kia, and all my bloggers and peepers please remember to pray and affirm all things. The key to life is Prayer. If you have not learned anything from me, please learn this as TRUTH!

Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil...A line from psalm 23. We are all on a Path, we are all travelling somewhere. We might not know where or how we will arrive, some of us may not even know that we are on a path, but we are. Transported here on this earth plane through the womb, innocent,  sinless, faultless, with no care in the world at first arrival, nurtured and cared for by parents, for some, for others abandoned and neglected, but then we begin to grow and the world begin to become familiar, and as we grow we shed innocence, we become friends with sin, in thoughts, words and deeds, and we become at fault for things that we do or create. We begin our path.

Everyday I wake up and I worry what will I write about today. I am sure you have seen me write this very thing before, worrying about what to share. As I have said before I am not a planner, I am very spontaneous. I do not see life like others do, I do not understand words like others do, I do not think like others do. I am not ‘Normal” to what conventional society may believe is normal. So I struggle everyday to relate to you out in cyber world and not shock you with my thoughts, my real thoughts, and beliefs about life and everything therein, things that I have learned while on my path. This is why I worry what to write here in this blog daily. Will I throw caution to the wind today and begin telling you about what is before us on this realm which we cannot see, the things we interact with daily which we have no knowledge of?, annuh duppy (no ghost). Do I explain the real process of the nine months of pregnancy a woman goes through and all the entities and spirits who are there with her, some to take away the fetus and some who is responsible to see it come in? Do I tell how they work, how they look and where they are from and how they came into being?. Do I explain to you that before you enter your bathroom, you should knock three times first and why?. Do I tell you what happens while you are cooking and what flutters around you in the kitchen. drawn not to the food but to your action while cooking, the energy you let off?. Do I tell you all these things and shockingly more?. I struggle with topics, because I know one day I will have to release some information but I do not know how or even when.

Today’s topic is about Our Path,our journey, and how do we find the way. I believe it is import that we find our path and to strive to walk its way properly and this is done through prayer, meditation and perseverance.  As with everything every road leads to some where, even if it says Dead End when you get there, and you have to start all over again. On your Path and by this I mean your purpose of being, you will meet many people along the way. People who will be put in place to test you, tutor you, mentor you, challenge you, distract you, love you, hate you, stalk you, set you up, teach you, assist you, some will even try to harm you, steal from you, defame you,  and like me some of these people will be family, some friends, some teachers, neighbors and others. They will come to you as good when they are bad and some you will believe are bad when they are indeed good. Sounds confusing I know but it really is not. What I have just told you in so many words is to Pay Attention. Although we take it for granted, paying attention is not really that easy. Our minds tune in to what it believes is important and tunes out  what it does not. Often times tuning out to what it does not understand and believe is not conducive to its lifestyle, wants and needs. So we walk around, like zombies until some thing knocks us on the head to bring back to focus. Suddenly we become awake and we begin to seek for enlightenment. What matters however is not how you get there but that you realize that you are indeed there.

A spiritual teacher is present in your life only to assist you into better understanding of what you already know. The spirit which resides in you knows a lot. It has been here so many times before, and it holds the key to you and your being, your well being. We all came here for different reasons, therefore we cannot live each other lives, nor can we teach our children how to live their lives. Like our guides, we as parents have to help and steer the children to what we may believe is the correct path but eventually the choice will be theirs. Whereever you are at this moment in your life spiritually is exactly where you ought to be. Remember these sayings from me which I always share, and it is my belief.. “Everything happens for a reason and Everything comes when it must” ….Nothing happens by chance, absolutely nothing! However pray your way through life, do not allow your self to be blind sided, because there are obstacles which will present itself and challenge you, this is a must. These things, obstacles, encumbrances, tormentors, detractors, have their place in the world and they must fulfill THEIR purpose by doing their job. Life is indeed a cycle! The glamour of life becomes a distraction for some people, but regardless of that, bare in mind that you are on your path and are who you really are suppose to be at this point and time in  your life. If you feel stuck, you may well be, but you maybe you are stuck because it is not the time for you to move forward, do not fight life!

Meditation is very important, but the discipline it takes for you to even begin is not easy. Some may begin but cannot keep it up, because to them it is just not important and has no place in their life right now. The discipline it takes to connect to you and your soul consciousness is not easy, but regardless of all that you are on your path, where you are right now in life is where you should be. I cannot be you nor can you be me, we can only be ourselves, and when the time is right for us to to connect and KNOW that we have connected it will happen. There is no correct time in the scheme of consciousness or the path to enlightenment, the Universe does not operate off our time line here in this realm. Do what you love to do. There may be a message for you  in which you are drawn to. Do not hold yourself back in life by doing what you believe society wants you to do, or how people believe you should behave, as long your actions are not destructive to your self, as in your health or mental and physical well being and you bring no destruction onto others, or to the planet in which you live or to the human race of which you apart of, as long as your actions are responsible, be yourself. Know that what you chose to do in life brings with it repercussions, good or bad. If you have a law degree but you have a passion for carpentry, do it. Your life may just open up for you in the way it is to suppose to, if you just follow the path where your head leads you to.

I was afraid to step away from Christianity when the time came for me to do so. I thought that I was abandoning Jesus who I loved so much, but I knew that I had further to go and I had to get myself out of the 66 books of which the Bible is comprised of. The fear held me back, because I was leaving all I thought I knew and abandoning my faith, but I pushed ahead. I have since realized that what held me back from letting go of the church, which was fear, and when I finally did let go, I was led to  better and clearer understanding about my life and even more about the Jesus I was so much in love with. I learned to accept, respect and appreciate all things complex, simple and otherwise. When I found my own path and connected with it, I began to realize that although I left the church, I carried with me what was needed in my life.The church was just one of the many roads I had to travel and meeting Jesus there was something that could not have avoided, because all this was along the way of my path in life. I began this post with Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil , which is from the psalm of David, which is found in the Bible belonging to the Christian faith of which I no longer practice. However, I can quote this line and correlate it with the message I want to give to you today. Psalms 23 was a psalm that was drilled into us in Sunday school, along with Psalm 27, we had to memorize it, and now it has become a tool of teaching for me, and not teaching through Christianity, but teaching of life. I had to walk the path of Christianity to become fully me, why? because I was born into it, and that is what was taught to me by my parents. We are all apart of each other rather than apart from each other, let us help each other along life’s way, even if it is through prayer. God Speed, and bless up oonuh self!

This was a great comment made by my friend ShanyRob on the original post, I thought to include it in today’s re-post!

Yet another great post that sparked a lot of conversation Obara! It is important to know that some spiritual traditions speak to followers and describe the road that one follows on his /her journey as “the path”,but in reality and more accurately it is “Your Path.” As Obara so elegantly spoke of and alluded to, each and every one of us has our own personalized path to tread .With that in mind , we can see that life is not one size fits all consequently ones life path paved by the unique decisions ,experiences and circumstances one chooses or find themselves in. Many people call themselves following “the path” to salvation, heading in a certain direction and wonder why their life is not turning out like the life of those that are guiding and /or directing along “the path”. These same people have never stopped to think about, “why”, they are following this path. The rationale that often drives these individuals/groups of individuals, is that of a sheep following the other sheep because this is what sheep do. Well I have some astounding news for the conscious human beings that are reading this ,we have this thing called a brain that enables us to think, rationalize and formulate questions. One question I often people or sheeple is , why do they follow a certain path or religious teaching e.g.Catholicism…… Well the overwhelming answer seems to be, because my parents do and their parents did, and so forth and so on. Ok, that is all well and good and even understandable , but perhaps you may need to deviate from the cookie- cutter mode and ask yourself does this really resonate with your spirit or is the right thing to do because the others before you did it?
While using your brain and accessing the soul searching mode within, one may find that X worked for mom and dad but it may not be for me. One would only be able to answer such a query by challenging his/her own status quo and exploring other options. My point here is that the beaten path is often for beaten people,these beaten people are often defeated because they do no use the faculties they were blessed with to think not only about what they are doing, but why they do what they do. Do no be a victim of religious or any other kind of dogma that guilts one into doing something as a formality , because someone said this is what one should do. Think about it, if someone said you should do something and you do so without considering if it is right for you,(A) shame on you and (B) you failed to exercise your ability to rationalize and therefore choose, guess who find themselves on the wrong path?

We are all individuals that coexist in this world but we all have to blaze our individual trails, albeit some of our trails will cross and intersect but that is fine.I challenge each and every one that reads this post to challenge themselves and to question and challenge some belief systems that are in place in their lives, in order to evaluate whether or not he /she is really on the his / her path. This is an exercise in challenging your personal “why”, which requires one to be honest with oneself,perhaps one is on the right path, but then again maybe not, only “You” can decide.

OUR PATH

I love quotes, if you have not yet notice, and I believe they teach us plenty, while growing up in my sweet Jamaica, the elders made use of quotes plenty, it is also done here in Africa, so I always include them in my post, do not skip them by, there may a message for you in one of them, pay close attention!

Bó pẹ́ bó yá, ogún ọdún ńbọ̀ wá k’ọ̀la. / 
No matter how long, twenty years time will one day be referred to as ‘tomorrow’…..Yoruba Proverb! 

[Keep hope alive]

All religions are valid as long as it teaches peace and love…Obara Meji

I truly believe that everything that we do and everyone that we meet is put in our path for a purpose. There are no accidents; we’re all teachers – if we’re willing to pay attention to the lessons we learn, trust our positive instincts and not be afraid to take risks or wait for some miracle to come knocking at our door.

Marla Gibbs

As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.

Henry David Thoreau

My message, especially to young people is to have courage to think differently, courage to invent, to travel the unexplored path, courage to discover the impossible and to conquer the problems and succeed. These are great qualities that they must work towards. This is my message to the young people.

A. P. J. Abdul Kalam

If you’re walking down the right path and you’re willing to keep walking, eventually you’ll make progress.

Barack Obama

What matters is to live in the present, live now, for every moment is now. It is your thoughts and acts of the moment that create your future. The outline of your future path already exists, for you created its pattern by your past.

Sai Baba

Man learns through experience, and the spiritual path is full of different kinds of experiences. He will encounter many difficulties and obstacles, and they are the very experiences he needs to encourage and complete the cleansing process.

Sai Baba

Ambition is the path to success, persistence is the vehicle you arrive in.