Pawprints on Our Hearts

We bought Kodi for our son for his second birthday.  It was our first pure-breed-with-papers dog.  We picked him from the litter and anxiously awaited the day when he would be old enough to take home to join our family.  Kodi was short for "Jakob's Kodiak of Fallbrook".  I guess when you have a "papered" dog you have license to come up with wacky names.

Puppies are hard work.  Kodi  was the pick of the litter. The alpha male.   Jake was a precocious two-year-old.  They would fight over who would sit on my lap, pushing each other out onto the floor and then crying.  For a few weeks, I thought we had made a big mistake.  I was exhausted by my toddler and our psycho puppy.

 

Over the years, though, Kodi became the best dog I have ever known.  He was awesome with kids, fiercely protective of our property, and funny too.  One time when we were sleeping at my bro/sis-in-law's house, E n I were discussing our upcoming Avocadofest party.  Kodi burped and it sounded like he said, "GUAC" really loud.  We laughed so hard we woke the house up.  He would also make Wookie noises if he really wanted to get our attention, like when there were apple slices on J's plate that he felt he was entitled to.

He was big and barrel chested, like most boxers.  He was great to hug.  He would follow us around and fall to the ground at our feet when we finally sat down.  He let our son ride him like a horse.  He didn't like it, but he tolerated it and never snapped at him.  He farted like no-one's business. 

He loved to chase thrown grapefruit.  He would jump high and pick them out of the tree, then get this really distinctinctively sharp yip that described his love/hate relationship with the bitter fruit.  He would follow and snap at bubbles.  He made our child feel safe in his bed at night.

Kodi died last week.  After dealing with a mysterious malady that almost killed him and put him on antibiotics and steroids for a few months, he had a heart attack in the vet's office while awaiting a routine blood check. 
We were devastated.  The vet's office is going to make a paw-print in clay for us. 

A few days later, E drew parallels between the recent loss of his father and our doggie.  Both lived life to fullest, right  to the end.  Right now, Kodi and Punky are living it up in the afterlife, binging on salami and beer.

Kodi sent another dog our way just days later.  Two, actually, but only one to stay.  (Another long story.)  He knew we couldn't bear to be dogless.  He knew that us taking in another dog wouldn't diminish our love or sorrow, but build a bridge to heal our hearts.  He was intelligent and loving and will live forever in our hearts. 

                                                    R.I.P.  Kodi.  We will love you forever. 

A Course in Miracles

"Are you ok?" E asked me as I lay on our bed, my arm covering my eyes.
"Yeah." I moan, then get up with a purpose in my stride and get out my laptop.
"What are you doing?" he asks, looking up from playing Angry Birds on his phone.
"Blogging."
"About what?"
"My new book."
"The one you got today?"
"Yeah."
"Did you finish it already?"
"The preface."
"And you're going to write about it?"
"Yeah."

I've known for a few years that eventually, A Course in Miracles would come my way.  It was mentioned again and again in books and audiobooks I had read/listened to.  I had decided to not actively seek it out, knowing that when the time was right, it would be the right time to read it. 

Yesterday, my girl A and I were perusing the shelves in Barnes and Noble, our favorite "girl date" site and I was scanning the Spirituality shelves.  I had a gift certificate from my son and I was ready to spend it.  A few titles jumped out at me with names like A Course in Miracles in Five Minutes and A Course on a Course in Miracles.  I opened one of them to find out the original author of the original book.  Helen Schucman.  I went to the "S" section.  It wasn't there.  I went to the self-help computer and typed it in.  The computer said that there was a copy in stock, in fact the copy was a combined volume with the text, workbook for students and manual for teachers all in one.  Score!  I went back to the section and got back to the "S's".  Nope.  Not there.  Was this a sign that now was not the time for me to read this book?  Hmmm.  Looked at the computer again.  Stroll down a few other religious aisles. Still not there.  Ok.  I will start at the beginning of the Spiritual aisle and look at every title.  If it's not there, find something else for now.  I got to about the 5th row and there it was.  A Course in Miracles, combined volume, new third edition, "the only complete course as authorized by its scribe and published by its original publisher", published by the foundation for inner peace.  Wow.  Ok.  The book was sealed in plastic so I couldn't thumb through it, but all of a sudden, I didn't want it anymore.  It looked boring.  The cover was dark blue with gold lettering and there were no pictures to suck me in.  It looked time consuming, the thickness of a Bible or textbook.  It looked life-changing.  My ego spoke loudly about how I was doing JUST FINE and did I really want to delve into new thinking patterns?  I told A I didn't want it.  I asked aloud if it were just my ego getting in the way. A reminded me that I had been waiting for this book to land in my hands for over 3 years.  I had to get it.  "Ok." I sighed.  "Let's get to the checkout counter before I change my mind."

I later discovered that the reason the book wasn't in the "S" section for Schucman was because she didn't feel she had written the book herself, that the book came to her and that her job was to write down what she was told.  "The names of the collaborators in the recording of the Course do not appear on the cover because the Course can and should stand on its own.  It is not intended to become the basis for another cult. Its only purpose is to provide a way in which some people will be able to find their own Internal Teacher."  (viii) Dr. Wayne Dyer has said this before about some of his books, that an overwhelming need to write down a message is often put in his lap, at which time he gives thanks for it, meditates on it a bit, then starts writing. 

Helen Schucman was a professor of medical psychology at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York city in the 70's.  She and a fellow professor found themselves on the path to this book after the head of their department "unexpectedly announced that he was tired of the angry and aggressive feelings (their) attitudes reflected, and concluded that 'there must be another way.'  As if on cue, I agreed to help him find it.  Apparently this Course is the other way."  (vii)

Helen's co-worker suggested she write down the "highly symbolic dreams and descriptions of the strange images that were coming to her and she came to realize that she was being dictated to by a Voice that seemed to be giving her a kind of rapid, inner dictation which she took down in a shorthand notebook."  She would dictate this to her co-worker, who would type it out.  This went on for seven years.

The curriculum of the Course states specifically that "a universal theology is impossible, but a universal experience is not only possible but necessary." "Although Christian in statement, the Course deals with universal spiritual themes.  It emphasizes that it is but one version of the universal curriculum.  There are many others, this one differing from them only in form.  They all lead to God in the end."  (viii-ix)  The workbook contains 365 lessons, though it is encouraged to stay with a lesson for more than one day if it seems appropriate. 

Nothing real can be threatened.
Nothing unreal exists.
Herein lies the peace of God.

           

One more time? Nothing unreal exists? We may find ourselves in a world of perceptions which leads us away from Truth, the love of God. "What perception sees and hears appears to be real because it permits into awareness only what conforms to the wishes of the perceiver." (x)

This is how A Course in Miracles begins.  It makes a fundamental distinction between real and unreal; between knowledge and perception.  Knowledge is truth, under one law, the law of love or God.  Truth is unalterable, eternal and unambiguous.  It can be unrecognized, but it cannot be changed. . . . The world of perception, on the other hand, is the world of time, of change, of beginnings and endings.  It is based on interpretation, not on facts.  It is the world of birth and death, founded on the belief in scarcity, loss, separation and death.  It is learned rather than given, selective in its perceptual emphases, unstable in its functioning, and inaccurate in its interpretations.  . . . What perception sees and hears appears to be real because it permits into awareness only what conforms to the wishes of the perceiver.  This leads to a world of illusions, a world which needs constant defense precisely because it is not real. (x)

The intro goes on to say that when one is "caught in the world of perception, (one) is caught in a dream."  This sounds mighty familiar to me, as I am a huge fan of Don Miguel Ruiz's The Four Agreements, a book which changed the way I viewed my life and those around me.  Ruiz explains that from birth, we are introduced to a dream-state by our caretakers who aren't trying to punish us by bringing us into this illusion of lack and scarcity and hate and pain, but only because it is only what they know.  Time to wake up, people!



The Four Agreements image borrowed from http://ideainnovator.ideamappingsuccess.com/

                                      

"The world we see merely reflects our own internal frame of reference-the dominant ideas, wishes and emotions in our minds.  'Projection makes perception.'  (p 445) We look inside first, decide the kind of world we want to see and then project that world outside, making it the truth as we see it.  We make it true by our interpretations of what it is we are seeing.  If we are using perception to justify our own mistakes-our anger, our impulses to attack, our lack of love in whatever form it may take-we will see a world of evil, destruction, malice, envy and despair.  All this we must learn to forgive, not because we are being 'good' and 'charitable,' but because what we are seeing is not true."  (xi)

"Sin is defined as 'lack of love' (11).  Since love is all there is, sin in the sight of the Holy Spirit is a mistake to be corrected, rather than an evil to be punished.  (!!!)  Our sense of inadequacy, weakness and incompletion comes from the strong investment in 'the scarcity principle' that governs the whole world of illusions.  From that point of view, we seek in others what we feel is wanting in ourselves.  That, in fact, is what passes for love in the dream world.  There can be no greater mistake than that, for love is incapable of asking for anything." (xi)

The law of attraction states that what I surround myself with in my mind will come to pass in the physical world.  It is time for me to read this book.  Dr. Wayne Dyer states, "Change the way you look at things and the things you look at will change."  I am ready for a change.  If I felt the need to blog after reading just the intro, who knows what will be coming up the pike?!?  Thanks for listening.

Then She Found Me

I love Helen Hunt.  I hate to limit myself to saying this or that is "my favorite", but she's at the top of my list.  I love her earnest way of looking into the face of who she's speaking to.  She's cute in a unique kind of way.  I watch "Twister" yearly.  She's great in it.  I love "As Good As It Gets".   If you haven't seen it, stop reading this and watch it now.  I was browsing through Netflix's instant view movies and when I saw she starred in and directed "Then She Found Me", I knew it was the one to watch.  I had never heard of it, but it also stars Bette Midler and Matthew Broderick.  How could I go wrong?

The movie made me laugh and cry and smile and cry a little more.  Helen plays April, a 39-year-old woman who has recently married her best friend (Broderick), who soon decides  that he doesn't want to be married to her anymore.  Her adoptive mother dies the next day.  April wants a child more than anything.  When she finds out a few months later that she is pregnant, she is resolved to see it through.  In the meantime, she has fallen in love with the father of one of her students (played by Colin Firth).  I won't spoil the rest of the happenings, but I loved the relationship between April and her new found love.  He is a little neurotic and holds a lot of anger against his ex-wife, but he sees April to the depth of her being. 

Midler plays April's kooky birth mother, whom she has never met before.  She is a tv personality and readily picks up on people's emotions.  She lies about various things and it is hard for April to trust her. 

I really identified with April's hunger for a child.  We have one.  He is lovely and keeps us busy, but.  for a few years, however, I have been hungering for another.  We discuss adoption from time to time, but never do anything about it.  What is holding us back?  Laziness?  Complacency?  Fear of the unknown?  Money?  The space in our two-bedroom-one-bath house?  Excuses, excuses.  I have written and erased this paragraph 3x already.  What emotions am I shying away from?  What truths?  Hmmmm.  Enough said for now.  Thanks for listening.