Holiday Dreaming -- Daily Inspirations for the Holidays

This morning I woke up with a dream: I was in a foreign country on a trip, when I thought that I did not have enough money. So I went down to this place where clerks acted as an ATM to give people cash from their bank accounts. I got $300, and I saw on the receipt that they charged me a $55 service charge. This disturbed me, but what choice did I have – and it was already done. Later I decided I wanted more money, and I went back to get more. This time I processed for $1000, but this time they charged me $550 service charge, and didn’t give me my money. I went all around trying to find someone to complain to and get my money, but no one was available. No one was seemingly there anymore.

As I was journaling about my dream later, I became aware of some of its significance for me.

The “foreign country” was the holiday season. There is no time comparable to this time in our culture. Suddenly it is like we have gone to different place with different ways of doing things – away from “home”.

When, in the dream, I thought that I did not have enough money, I don’t remember how much money I actually had. I just remember thinking that I needed “more”.

I am aware that when I participate in the “foreign country” – the Holidays – from a material perspective, there is always a hidden service charge about to be assessed to my spiritual “account”.

As I listened, I remembered that the spiritual intent and purpose of the holidays is celebrate the offer and receipt of intimate and loving Presence from our God, and then from others – and finally from ourselves. As the holidays become materialized, there is a spiritual price that is being assessed to our “presence” account.

Spirituality, in my experience, is the loving, unconditional Presence that we can have with God, with others, and with ourselves. So we can lose conscious contact – Presence – with God, with others, and with ourselves -- which is really the meaning and purpose of the season?

Jesus said, “Do not lay up treasure on earth where rust can corrupt, thieves can break in and still, and moths can devour. But lay up treasure in heaven”. And “the kingdom of heaven is within you.”

The spiritual meaning of the season is within us, not outside us. And every time we take intimate hope, joy, and love outside our inner selves, we pay an increasingly high price of self. We pay a price of separation and disconnection from our God, others, and from ourselves.

And because it is the “Season”, we tend to just accept the cost and go on. What else can we do?
What if we gave ourselves – and not things to others? This is a “foreign country” – many would probably not understand what they were being given. And we could possibly be abandoned and rejected by others who do not know the spiritual language of Presence. They might not understand. We are not sure if we could “understand” ourselves.

Where can we go from here?

There are two options, as I experience this.

1. 
   First, we can submerge ourselves into the unconsciousness of the season with all its material distractions and disruptions of self-awareness and Presence. We can just take the loss of the outrageous “service charges”, and go on into the oblivion of darkening shadows -- something not quite being there – missing – the real Presence that belongs under every Christmas tree.



2. 
   Or we can take the risk of consciously feeling our losses and fears – the separations between ourselves and our God and others – that the Season tries to mask and disguise – hide from our consciousness. And we can take these conscious feelings to our God, and to others who are also struggling with these same awarenesses. We can listen and connect to a higher Presence, and with this higher Presence’s love, take conscious action to reinsert our real selves into the Spirit of the holidays. Whether with gifts or with only our presence, we can give others a deeper, more present and loving connection and intimacy. Some may not understand – some may even be frightened by the consciousness our intimacy and love produces. But ultimately the “Gift” we will be giving will be real and true.

I have found the story of Jesus’ life interesting: He was described as having been sent as the ultimate “Gift” of God’s Presence. And yet the story of the baby born in a manger ends with His being murdered because the world could not accept His level of intimacy and spiritual consciousness – and the absence of expected material gifts. It is frightening to be real and true – to step beyond the material world and into our own heart worlds. Rejection and abandonment are both possible and likely. But “if we have hope only in this life, we are of all people most miserable.” If you are conscious enough to experience some level of misery with this “foreign country” – the Holidays – we have other options.

Together, we can give something that changes lives and hearts – especially our own. Maybe we can find a way to wrap ourselves in our God’s love, and give ourselves to those we care about – and others we haven’t yet met.

We have a chance to make the Holidays a better place by our God’s design – by the birth and life of our truest, most present selves -- into the lives of others.