Not to Use Force

The Cathedral at Reims

Feb. 25

Raining outside. At lunch, I take a brief walk across Broadway at 39th street. The wetness seems a blessing. 

The clouds part a bit, and it is utterly magnificent...

I saw this morning that it’s very important not to force the parts together in any way.

This needs to be said because we do everything inside ourselves with too much force. It’s a natural tendency born of our innate tension and the dysfunction of our overall state. Each one is weak by itself and immediately tries to overcompensate.

Because of the fact that one has spent a lifetime already, all day long every day, dwelling with too much force in oner part or another, there are times when one needs to compensate. This happens when the intelligent (as opposed to automatic or mechanical) parts of ourselves awaken. I speak here of the spiritual part of the mind, the body and the feelings, as opposed to the physical or natural part.

Even the mind (which is supposedly intelligent) rarely uses its intellectual part: instead it dwells in the physical part of associations or the impetus and momentum of its emotional capacities. If it uses its intelligence, already a different kind of thought arrives.

In the same way, sensation has an awakened part which functions through and with a new intelligence; and feeling has exactly the same capacity. If we come into touch with these parts there are times when we need to allow them their own space to be in their own way—without trying to invoke the other parts. 

That is to say, harmony and balance emerge slowly and over a long period of time as we sequentially inhabit the awakened functions of the parts. First one; then the other; gently, gradually. 

If I discover a new relationship within one aspect of awakened intelligence, let it be. Value it; respect it; become familiar with it and make friends with it. 

Don’t however, direct it or correct it.      

May your heart be close to God, 

and God close to your heart.

Lee

Lee van Laer is a Senior Editor at Parabola Magazine.