Through living, I learn

I’ve known for a long time that I believed personal faith and enlightenment could be found anywhere and not just by walking through church doors.  It was harder for me to grasp what that truly meant for myself and to come to terms with the idea that I didn’t believe in God and that Christianity wasn’t for me.  Of course years of ingrained Lutheran Church faith seemed to have planted the seed that I couldn’t and shouldn’t believe otherwise, but I finally allowed myself to grasp the ideology that it’s not a bad thing to not worship God or even believe there is a God.  After that admission to myself, I thought about what that meant for me because I still wanted to be able to find peace and/or faith in nature and inside my soul.  For that reason, I thought of myself as agnostic, not atheist, since I believed there was something out there to put one’s faith in.

It wasn’t until very recently that I discovered an interest for Taoism.  Dictionary.com defines Taoism as a philosophical system that advocates life of complete simplicity and naturalness and of noninterference with the course of natural events in an effort to have a happy existence in harmony with the Tao.  What drew me in about this school of thought is how the Tao is person and specific to each individual because it centers on what you as a person will do for enlightenment.  I sat down and had two ideas of my personal Tao right off the bat:  seek to understand before responding, and be me and let others be themselves.  A third one was added not long after that and states:  Report only what you see; with no personal inference.  Today, I added another one.

This morning, I had a conversation that was pretty politically charged with my dad.  He called and like always, I thought it would be a nice catch-up type of call.  Only, I made the mistake of asking whom he was going to vote for.  As I was asking it, the little voice in the back of my mind was saying, “Do you really want to know that answer?”  He gave me his response (I won’t keep you in suspense, he voted for Trump) and despite being written on sticky notes and posted on the wall in front of me, all of my personal Taoisms flew out the window.  After our conversation, which ended on a positive note after I apologized and we got off the touchy subject of politics, it seemed to be all I could think about.  Someone I respected and looked up to was making a different decision than I expected or wanted and I was really struggling with it.  Coming on the heels of another choice my daughter made earlier this week to allow someone injurious back into her life seemed to pepper the sentiment all the more.  

As I was driving to the barn to spend time with my horse in an effort to forget about my feelings, I thought about why I was struggling with my personal Tao and came to the realization that I will make mistakes and it will sometimes be difficult to live by the guidelines I’ve set out for my personal enlightenment and quest to be a good person.  I also need to realize that is okay and I need to accept it and move on because dwelling on it will do no one any good.  If I can’t accept it, I can’t move forward and try to do the right thing the next time something similar happens.

So, this is my fourth Taoism:  Know that you will make mistakes and struggle with parts of your beliefs – that is okay and you need to accept it.  After adding this to my repertoire, I decided to meditate to further relieve the stress I’m feeling when things aren’t how I expect them to be.  It’s a process and I am enjoying having something to guide me, but it’s not easy.  Nothing ever is.