This Christmas is different from before.

This Christmas is different from before. Every Christmas, I do all the Christmassy things. I put up my tree, decorate it, buy gifts and the like. I pray to Jesus and I wish him a happy birthday. I get excited, wearing my red santa cap. I go out for a nice dinner with family.

But this Christmas has been different. I didn’t do most of the things. I stayed at home alone for a personal reason I’d rather not discuss right now. This Christmas, I FEEL Christmas in my heart. I feel Christ. I don’t pray to Jesus, I speak to Him. In my heart. And I know that he listens.

Somewhere along our history, we have forgotten our personal and direct connection with God. We look to outside sources and items and places to help us connect to the Divine energy. All this time, God has been residing right in our hearts. Not in Idols or pictures, but inside of us, inside others, inside animals and plants.

No matter what religion you may follow ( unless you are an atheist ), you certainly believe in a divine creator who created everything. So, if you really think about it, you will realize that everything is divine. Everything has been created by the creator and hence is divine. To think of anything as unholy is to insult the creator. To disrespect any part of creation, is to be disrespectful to the creator.

So shouldn’t it be a given, that everyone who is religious automatically considers everyone and everything to be sacred and treat them with nothing but kindness and respect? But why doesn’t it happen? Why do people hate people they don’t even know ? Why do people assume they are superior to some ? Why kill animals for game? Why destroy nature for monetary benefit? Where did the thought system derail and move towards destruction?

Humans are inherently loving and kind. You’d notice this if you observe a baby. We learn a lot of terrible things while growing up. We learn hate and judgment. We learn fear. We learn it by observing the bad things in the world. We forget our natural state of joy and lose connection to our divine nature. This in turn leads to poor choices of treating others and the world around us. This affects the future babies growing up. It’s a vicious cycle, you see.

But what if it starts going the other way from now? What if more people become more aware of their divine nature? All it takes is self reflection, which has somehow taken a backseat to “living a life” . Many people think that spirituality isn’t really important to living a life. They don’t realize spirit is what they are! Of course, spirituality is important! Its like watching a movie which is in a language that you don’t understand. You sort of get it, you can figure out the plot and can watch the whole movie and be entertained. But you don’t get the whole movie, do you? You don’t enjoy it to the fullest. You sort of drift through it. That’s how life is without spirituality. I know. I was an atheist. Now I’m an Omnist. Yes a big jump right?!

I believe there’s truth in every religion. And I’ve come to this conclusion, as a result of many many years of self-reflection. And I mean pure self-reflection. Away from the outside world most of the time (No I’m not imprisoned, I’m not a loner). It was a choice. For a while, I needed to contemplate everything. And I mean EVERYTHING. And this is how, a person who was lost in life and busy with the everyday things and wandering aimlessly, having no idea what life was about, came to know life on a very deep level. I can’t begin to explain the things I’ve realized. And Im grateful for the initial blow that broke me, and led me to begin contemplating life. Otherwise I would have probably never known. Or perhaps this is what I would have realized once I retired from my job if I had kept going (Yes I’m unemployed right now, again-by choice).

My point is (I think I have a point, haha) self-reflection and contemplating the nature of our reality and looking at the bigger picture is equally important to living a life, earning a living etc. And yet , it’s overlooked and thought of as unnecessary or irrelevant. Many people do it after they retire and it’s quite late. What’s the point in understanding only the last part of the movie, right?

We don’t need years of thinking/meditating. Just a few hours/minutes now and then. To disconnect from the outside world and connect to the inside of us. To try finding meaning in it all. To understand why things are happening and why we feel the way we do and do certain things. It’s easy to derail from our true self when engrossed in our busy lives. Its easy to become a machine with routines and obligations. We need to stop and think. Stop and observe.

With contemplation, we get clarity-about our lives and ourselves. We’ll stay true to ourselves and catch and heal harmful habits and beliefs. We heal our emotions so that they don’t subconsciously control our life decisions. You’ll be surprised at how many decisions you’re making out of fear alone.

And when you keep connecting to yourself more and more, you start connecting to the
Divine. You start understanding the Divine. And then you’ll know what I’m talking about and why I’m stressing on the importance of deliberate thinking.

If more people become aware like this , there would be more peace in this world. There would be more sustainable living choices. There would be more joy. When we slay our inner demons, we’d be nicer to each other. When we stop hurting inside, we’d stop hurting others. We are all an ecosystem of emotions and actions. We affect one another. And I hope we all heal ourselves. So that we stop perpetuating the hate and all the bad stuff happening in the world.

Merry Christmas everyone !! I wish you a lifetime of joy and peace.

Remember to love yourselves. Always. You are Divine.

-Zen Wabbit