It is said that when the people came to make a sacrifice in the time of the Holy Temple, they entered through one door but were required to leave through a different one—they were not able to leave the same way that they entered. Now this small detail may perhaps seem insignificant or even senseless to us. Was there really a need for a whole other doorway? I mean, couldn't the people go out where they had come in?
The answer is no. We know that according to Kabbalah, there is a reason and purpose for everything. Nothing is done "just because." The reason people entered and exited through different doors was because they didn't want familiarity to kill the excitement of the action they were performing—making the sacrifice.
This seemingly minor historical point contains an important message for our own life.
All too often, we lose sight of the significance of the journey we go on every day. We forget or ignore the significance of our relationships. We don’t see the beauty of being connected to something beyond ourselves. Our daily comings and goings become so expected, so mundane, even so boring that we begin to not really think about what we are receiving throughout the day. And we start to take people, things, and situations for granted.
I read an article recently in which the author, actor Mark Ruffalo, called attention to our lack of appreciation for the renewable resources that we have to work with as we deal with the current energy crisis. He talked specifically about wind, water, and sunlight (WWS). The truth is that spiritually we tend to do the same thing. Stuck in our habits and in our daily, weekly, and monthly routines, we forget about the endless renewable spiritual resource we have at our fingertips each and every moment.
We forget that when we wake up every day, it's a beautiful world. The minute we put our feet on the floor and our eyes open and we are able to see, it's a beautiful world. Now we may think, wait a minute. What do you mean: It's a beautiful world? Don't you know I just lost the contract? Don't you know I'm divorcing my wife? Don't you know there are so many awful things going on with me right now, I can’t even count them?
The answer is yes, things happen. But what we need to realize is that the truth is this: that we are living each day with a miracle from the moment we open our eyes and breathe air into our lungs.
Each day, we are given another opportunity to redirect our consciousness to point to the things that are significant. Each day is another chance for us to make other people feel significant in our lives. This is our job and the reason we are here. Why? Because when we manage to make others feel that they are significant, then we are also significant.
Each and every one of us must deal with our own set of troubles in our life. These troubles could be rent or mortgage, a business problem we have to overcome, or one of a myriad of personal issues (we could probably write a list of them that would last from today to tomorrow). Yes, it's true: We all face daily difficulties. But there is also always the energy of the Light that we have captured via our volunteering, our charity, or the simple human dignity we accord to other people. That is the Light that exists every day. We must never lose the understanding that in our life there exists Light.
The Light is something that accumulates, and as it does, it takes out the garbage—ego, drugs, depression, anger, all forms of negativity—that is stuck in the basket of our life. But the truth is that to remove those things from the basket, we've got to put some energy in. But this energy doesn't come from a good business deal, making money, or getting a new position. The only way things in our life become productive and beautiful is if we don't just take from life but we give back to life—if we don't only receive from the universe but also have something to offer it.
The truth is that most of us are so busy that we don’t notice what’s going on around us. But when we are in this mode—when our consciousness is always focused only on what we can get or on how can we produce or build more for ourselves—then our energy is saying to the universe that we don't want to be part of the grand wheel of life. Our energy is saying that we just want to take.
It's important sometimes to remember that when we leave this world, the only thing that will remain with us are the people that love us; the people we gave to and shared with; the people that wake up in the morning and say to us, “It's because of you, my life has changed for the better, and thank you.” That's all we will have at the end of our life. Not the businesses, not the friends that are there because they have to be there, not the relationships that we have that we don't really want but need to have because we get something from them. What we will have at the end are the people we have loved and shared with and the things we have done to create that constant Light that allows our soul to shine.
None of us are angels. No one expects us to be. But we do become lazy. We take our spiritual practices as a rote system. We fall deeply asleep in our everyday life. So let’s wake up. Let's remember this week that the universe is a mirror, and if we wake up and start acting on behalf of the Light, we will awaken the Light on our behalf as well.
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