On a Spiritual Journey

The purpose of this blog is to share my own meanderings on my own spiritual journey.  Writing has always been an outlet for me.  It has also been a surprising means of self-reflection.  As I go through my day, I am thinking of things I could be writing as I wrap up my day.  As I write, I often come up with other epiphanies.   After having read The Go-Giver: A Little Story About a Powerful Business Idea by Bob Burg and John David Mann, I have come to some surprising conclusions about giving and receiving.  I have long been on a spiritual journey.  Most of it has been quiet I usually keep it under wraps.  That changes today.  My writing is my gift.  I have been told so in the past.  Instead of keeping it to myself, I will now share it with you.

By no means am I a perfect saint.  Far from it.  But like many of you, I am on a journey of spiritual fulfillment.  I had some thoughts of waiting until I had read a few more books, gained some spiritual insight, but I decided against that.  Spiritual fulfillment isn’t an arrival, it is a journey.  It is a journey without ending.  If I wait until I am spiritually fulfilled before I start writing, I will never start writing!

In The Go-Giver, Burg and Mann provide “The Five Laws of Stratospheric Success.”    I could go through all five right now, but it really doesn’t serve my purpose for today – sharing my epiphany.  My epiphany has to do with the first law, and the last two laws.  “The Law of Value,” “The Law of Authenticity,” and “The Law of Receptivity.”

I am renting a room in a house at the moment.  I am doing it very cheaply.  The situation is far from what I would call ideal for me or for my five year old son, who lives with his mother, but still spends time with me.  However, I have come to accept that it is perfect for me here and now.  I am trying to get some bills paid off, and I would like to start saving up for a down payment and closing costs on a house.  The house is a typical bachelor pad – three guys live in it!  As such, cleanliness is a bit lacking.  Now, some people would tell you that I live like a slob, but I do have my limits!  I also have a problem when things don’t work right – this is a problem that really came to light with my last roommate.  He suggested that I “like to complain a lot.”  At the time, I didn’t see it as “complaining,” I saw it as “reporting.”  As in, “I am reporting that there is a problem with the air conditioner because their is too much humidity in the air.”  When I moved into my new place, I started to see myself through my old roommates eyes.  I started to see that I was complaining a bit, to myself mostly, at first, but I did start to see that I had a bit of a negative mindset. “The pool is dirty,” and “I smell cigarette smoke in the air,” and “Damn, this kitchen is messy!”  My comments came out in sort of disguised complaining, but I realized, bunched together, it could be seen as a general displeasure with the overall situation.  Who wants to hear about that all the time from a roommate?

Then, I got The Go-Giver, after I read the first law – “The Law of Value” – which states, “Your true worth is determined how much more you give in value than you take in payment.”

Let me stop for a moment here, I did not buy this book to learn how to make money.  It was recommended by the minister of my church, Creative Living Fellowship.  She saw the spiritual value of the story, and framed it as a book that shared principles that were true for spirituality as well.  I am a teacher, I haven’t really expected to make a lot of money.  However, don’t get me wrong, if anything leads me in that direction, I willingly accept it!

As I was saying, if I expect my relationships to be satisfying, then I need to look at my position on giving and receiving.  Like many people, I had this mindset that if I gave too much of myself, I would just plain tire myself out!  I had evidence of that from past relationships.  Man, those women could wear me out!  It is probably a contributing factor to why I haven’t been in a serious relationship since my divorce about three years ago – I just don’t want the drama anymore!  That doesn’t mean I am not open to the right situation, obviously.  Anyway, I realized that if I wanted what I wanted from my living situation, I was going to need to change my outlook on my situation.  No, I don’t like it, but it is what it is – make the best of it.

As it turns out, both my roommates are extremely cool guys.  The owner has said, “No problem” to everything I have asked, from lowering the temperature on the thermostat to allowing me to store my furniture in the family room.  The other roommate is a computer whiz, and he helped me fix a problem on my computer that would have probably led to me buying a new computer out of sheer frustration.  He literally saved me at least $500.  So, I decided that I needed to give.  I was already receiving, so why shouldn’t I give back?

That brings me to “The Law of Authenticity,” – “The most valuable gift you have to offer is yourself.”  (I didn’t skip steps two and three, they are just not relevant to my story.)  So, I decided to fix the toilet.  I’d fixed toilets before, and I knew I could do it.  All I had to do was replace the chain attached to the flapper.  Because I had nothing better to do, and I was not tired, I decided to start working on it at midnight Saturday night/Sunday morning.  Don’t ask me why.  My mom always kids with me that others can hear things I can’t hear, because I am hearing impaired, but you know, how noisy could replacing a chain in the toilet be?  I removed the lid, and carefully set it on top of a sponge which was on top of the sink so that it wouldn’t make a noise.  Wouldn’t you know it, it slid right off that sponge, clattered across the sink, and came crashing down on the tile floor.  And I mean CRASHING, into a million little pieces.  I could believe all those pieces actually used to be one big piece!  Oy vey.  I picked up a few of the larger pieces and opened the door, waiting for everyone to come rushing to find out what had happened.  But no one came.  To be honest with you, if it was midnight, and I had heard a crash like that, I would have stayed in my room too!  I wouldn’t want to get caught up in cleaning it up half-asleep.  As it turned out, one of them didn’t even hear it, the other heard it, but didn’t know it was in the house.

Of course, I am thinking to myself, I am trying to do something helpful.  Why does this have to happen to me when I am just starting with this mission?!

The answer came to me later that morning as I sat in church listening to Dr. Michele Whittington speak about these last two laws.  The Law of Authenticity says that the most valuable gift you have to offer is YOURSELF – NOT someone you are not.  I am not a plumber!  That is NOT my gift!  My gift is writing.  That is how I need to give.  It was as if a searchlight-sized laser had blasted my brain.  “Stick with what you know.”  Needless to say, I think I fixed the problem – still trying to find a lid for the toilet, though!

The last thing I learned today was that I am not as open to receiving as I thought I was.  As I sat in my pew at church, I was probably moping a bit.  After all, I’d spent a late night cleaning up a million little pieces of porcelain, and finally fixing the flapper.  I was a bit tired.  Before the sermon even started, they had a drawing for those who chose to make “Conscious Giving” (tithing, in other words) a part of their routine with the church.  I’d attended the dessert social the week before and filled out my ticket for a prize to be drawn at a later date.  The person who drew the name said, “Dan… Hatton.”  Several people said, “Dave.”  I must admit, I was a bit startled.  Are you sure it is me, I thought.  I’m sure I had a confused look on my face.  Then I started thinking, isn’t there someone more deserving of this?  I mean, I broke a toilet lid last night, for crying out loud!  I was really thinking that!

The prize was a ticket to attend the church workshop of my choice during the 2009-2010 years.  Now you have to understand, we have some incredible speakers come to my church throughout the year.  The value of the certificate was definitely not lost on me.  Part of me wanted to give it back.

Then, Dr. Michele, as we call her, started talking about “The Law of Receptivity” – “The key to effective giving is to stay open to receiving.”  At first it didn’t register, but when she said that you can’t breathe without inhaling AND exhaling, she likened that to not being able to succeed without giving AND receiving.  The example rang true with me not because I liked the example, but because I have seen it work in my own life – just not as frequently as I would have liked.

Many of you have heard this story, but it bears repeating, and makes sense here in this context.  There was a man sitting on his porch as flood waters from a drenching rain lapped at the steps of his home.  A man in a boat offers to give him a ride to safety.  The man on the porch says, “No, I’ll be fine, God will protect me.”  Later, when the man finds himself on his roof, and the water is up around the eves, another boat happens by and offers to take him to safety.  He again says he has no worries, God will protect him.  Soon, he finds himself at the top of the roof with the water lapping at his feet when along comes a helicopter throwing down a rope ladder.  He waves them off saying, “God will protect me!”  Finally, the flood waters rise and he finds himself in heaven after having drowned.  He has a puzzled look on his face, “But God, why didn’t you save me?”  God says, “I sent you two boats and a helicopter, what more can I do!”

The story is a funny one, yes, but I needed to take a long, hard look at my own openness to receiving.  I am not here to proselytize.  So I won’t say you need to do the same.  Hopefully, though, the story will allow you to give your own receptivity to receiving a “looksee.”

Namaste
Dave