Stumbling Blocks and Switchbacks

My talk this past Sunday was on switchbacks, how many times while traveling the path of our life’s journey we must reverse direction and go backwards in order to continue on upward towards the ascent of our Higher Goodness. The thing about switchbacks is that they aren’t just zigzags going nowhere. And the thing about seeing switchbacks as a necessary reversal of direction in order to continue on upward and onward is not, as I also said in my talk, taking lemons and making lemonade. It’s seeing with clarity that no matter what or how earthly appearances may present themselves, the Truth is that the Absolute Goodness of God, a Goodness that knows no opposite, is always operating through each and every aspect of all Life – that being my life, your life, All Life.

As we continue on our path, we most likely will encounter seeming obstacles such as switchbacks or stumbling blocks, but we can know that these appearances do not hinder us. Rather, we can choose to bless them, knowing they are leading us to our Higher Good. As metaphysician Raymond Holliwell writes in his book Working with the Law: “Unite your forces for good with the good that is seeking you. Remove and dissolve every obstacle by blessing it and being willing to understand it. Mark it no longer a stumbling block, but a stepping stone, leading to your highest good.” (p. 129)

To begin to be able to understand that an appearance of an obstacle is a blessing, one must be actively engaged in a daily spiritual practice of affirmative prayer (what we call “treatment”), meditation, and contemplation such as journaling. This is the practice of sitting in quiet stillness in sacred communion with what I call God -- whatever name you may call it, it is the First Cause of all that is, the Source of all that is. Developing this intimate relationship with God is how we learn to trust that God is always present, powerfully Good, lovingly wise, and always available because we are always One with and of God – no matter what.

As we grow in spiritual understanding and maturity, we realize that we are all walking our own individual path as we journey together on an upward ascent to our return home. Home, being the mind and heart of God, where we absolutely know that we are one with God as a perfect individualization of God. And as we continue this walk home together, we do so blessing everything that we encounter along the way. Every Thing. Everything. This is a spiritual practice that sounds simple but is not easy for we can easily get seduced by appearances and thereby engage with them in a way that distracts us from our Highest Good. But when we are open-hearted and welcome any and every thing that comes along our way as yet another blessing, we are blessed with an abundance of Goodness that comes to us in a myriad variety of shapes and forms – including switchbacks and stepping stones.