A Ghost of Christmas Presence

Happy Holidays. I hope the Peace of God has found you in this season of Love.

I've been exploring some dark places in my own life this week, probably as a way of subconsciously being in tune with the darkest part of the year. There have been some things brought to my attention (because I asked the Holy Spirit to show them to me) that haven't been easy to look at...Ways that I've behaved towards others, that in looking back, I'm feeling shame about. In the moment of actually acting that way, I was coming from a different perspective, and didn't see the behavior as hurtful to others, and ultimately to myself.

Trouble is, now that I'm aware of it, I'm not sure how far back it goes...I could have been doing this for my entire adult life, and that's not a pretty feeling inside me! When I first felt my peace dissipating, I asked the Holy Spirit to help me see this in another way, meaning, "Please take my pain and absolve my guilt so I don't ever have to feel this way about myself. Please make it untrue that I've been such a raging bitch to all these people." Well, of course, that was my ego asking to be dignified and validated. The Holy Spirit did me a favor by not helping me in the way my ego was asking.

I actually felt a little like Scrooge in A Christmas Carol. Here I was being visited first by the Ghost of Christmas Present in seeing the behavior in the moment, after a heated discussion with a colleague. Then, as I drove home from my meeting on roads slick from the blizzard that was raging all around, I fought tears as the Ghost of Christmas Past began to show me memories of how I've behaved this way before, and the results of the behavior. Those results probably didn't have that much impact on anyone but myself, merely adding to the guilt that I stored in my unconscious warehouse of unloving thoughts towards myself. The result was also a negative reputation I had built with others, here-to-fore which I thought was impeccable professionally, but which now I had to question as to its desirability in my life. I had thought my reputation was for representing my clients in the pursuit of a perfect project for them in the end. Now I was finding that, while that was partially the reputation I had, I also had a reputation for unreasonable standards of perfection and for always pointing the finger at the party I deemed responsible for the slightest imperfection.

I drove along in the blizzard, feeling the pain of my actions while I tried to blow my nose and wipe my tears and keep my car from spinning out on the ice. The metaphor and symbolism of Dickens' story was immediately apparent to me, and I wondered how Scrooge was able, really, to find the joy in the moment he realized he'd been so wrong after all those years. How did he go out on Christmas morning and face the humiliation of how he'd been all those years? My own inclination was to hide myself away in shame and self judgement. Then the Ghost of Christmas Future visited.

This ghost, which was really the Holy Spirit, delivered Absolute Grace from God to me. All I had to do was be willing to accept it. This is what true forgiveness is in A Course in Miracles...the realization that all of this nightmare of the ego's bad behavior is just that: a nightmare, a bad dream. It's not real. Only God's Love is real. Period. That large shed of evidence and judgment and condemnation that I stored was now exposed for what it was...just a lot of tools my ego could use to plant its garden of shame, to feed its addiction to guilt and keep me feeling separate from the rest of humanity. This is what Scrooge was blessed to understand much sooner than I have been able to get: None of the past matters! In fact, none of it really happened, so there are no victims, and no guilt to continue to drag into the present and future.

I thought about this behavior of perfectionism that I was "guilty" of. Perfectionism is a dangerous, double-edged sword that will injure and potentially kill those who try to use it. Those who are still naive enough to think it's a good thing, that it means one is "on top of" all the details and making sure everything goes right have no clue that perfectionism is the choice to demand an impossible standard. This world, which was created by a Mind whose thoughts imagined it could ever be separate from God, its Creator, cannot be perfect. Anything that has death and deterioration as a part of it, which this world has, can never attain perfection.

As I realized that my own perfectionism had left a wake of hurt feelings and resentment towards me for all these years, I started to realize it's also impossible for me, on the level of the ego, to ever be perfect either. It's a losing proposition. I can put in my best effort, but perfection cannot be possible. So, if I could begin to cut myself some slack, maybe I could begin to cut others some slack and trust that they had the integrity to do their very best also...that it wasn't always just me who cared. I did not have to carry the burden of total concern for my projects anymore...that's why there was a team around me.

Well, now I could start to feel some of the joy of a burden lifted that must have given old Scrooge the spring in his step on Christmas morn'. This was truly the Grace that would free my soul from the anchor created by my ego. The Ghost of Christmas Future began to show me that my life didn't have to be so much pain and effort from here on out.

This experience has chipped away a whole big chunk of that murky, tar-like, icky psychological matter better known as "guilt and shame." There's bound to be more to discover within my psyche, but this feels like a break through that will allow me to make choices in the future that are less self-punishing and less self-sabotaging. That is the best gift I can think of to both give and receive.

Merry Christmas to all of us!