Like many other religious traditions and rituals, most follow the letter of the law but not necessarily the spirit of the law.  I have recently seen people posting on Facebook that they are giving up the following:  alcoholic beverages, caffeine, sugar, sex, a bad habit, or an addiction.  Since I did not grow up with this tradition, the first time I heard about it, I wondered what happened at the end of the 40 days.  Do they go back to their old ways of being; or do people notice a change within their mind, body, and spirit?  Is Lent a practice or ritual that has lost its true importance? 

For the next few weeks as we continue to focus on a Season of Non-Violence, we will begin to look at what it would mean to Keep a True Lent.  Charles Fillmore gives this definition:   

“Lent is a season of spiritual growth –

A time for progressive unfoldment

And transformation.”

 Charles felt it was of no use to go through the outer practices of change if those same changes did not lead to a deeper feeling of communion with the one presence and the one power.

Charles used a scripture from Isaiah 58:6 which speaks of “losing the bands of wickedness.”  We will take a look at that scripture translated through The Message on Sunday Morning.  I will urge the spiritual community that meets at 4319 Saundersville Road toKeep a True Lent  – to breathe into the statement “I am holy. Only goodness comes from me.”  Imagine your life as you “lose the bands of wickedness” by using tools of emotional hygiene and building a muscular compassion for all those you meet. 

As we prepare for our Nashville Chooses Peace Event on April 8 – let’s all step into the ways in which we can be a #force4good in our homes, in our neighborhoods, in our city and in our world.   We just might discover how Keeping a True Lent will assist us in that goal. 

I had never heard the term “Emotional Hygiene” until I began reading A Force for Good by Daniel Goleman.  The term refers to a process that is similar to the physical hygiene taught in schools today. 

Most of us were taught that there are certain things our bodies need to stay healthy and free of disease.  The main objective would be to stay clean so that we will not be subjected as easily to those things that cause disease in our bodies.  

Those of us who have studied New Thought and writers like Louise Hay know that dis – ease in the body is not necessarily caused by outside pathogens.  Many times dis – ease is caused by our own thoughts and emotions, hence the need for Emotional Hygiene. 

The Dalai Lama states that our emotions, when taken to the destructive level, can become emotional pathogens causing us as much difficulty as what we have labeled ‘dangerous viruses’.  Our schools teach physical hygiene, why not emotional hygiene?  Why were we not taught these things?  Why are we not teaching our children to label, express, and release emotions? 

Our personal emotions are somewhat etched into our brains.  Each of us as humans has a certain set point of emotions that seem to be genuinely “us”.  These are the emotions that we regularly visit.  The visiting is not the problem.  It is the destructive emotions that we may choose to live in for years that cause struggles in our lives and in our world.   

What if that fact did not have to be the case?  What if we learned how to be more mindful of all emotions?  What if we were so connected to ourselves, and the world, that we saw the wonder of it all in every situation we encountered and allowed it to pass through us?  What if as meet someone having a negative experience we remember our oneness knowing that they are our brother or our sister?  

In using the Laws of the Universe the Law of Attraction states that what I put out into the universe will come back to me heaped up, pressed down, shaken together, and running over.  Whether you want to call that the Law of Attraction, the Law of Increase or the Law of Cause and Effect, it is really saying the same thing.  I am responsible for my personal experience in this thing we call life. 

So here’s the 200,000 dollar question:  If what I put out there comes back to me, doesn’t it make sense that if I reach out to others in being a force for good then when I need it, someone will reach out to me also?

Sunday February 19^th will again be a day to experience 7 more words from the Season of NonViolence.  These 7 Words, when used together, provide a backdrop for us to begin looking deeper at those emotions that may have kept us stuck and to release the things keeping us separate from God and each other. 

Let’s all become a Bridge Over Troubled Water  for those in our world that seem to be weary and feeling small.