Re: Looking for a Mentor

Posted by qOLOp on 1120692253

Dear Looking:
I am an old woman and I've been down your path. I sense from your questions you are youthful in spirit, no matter what age your body is. I am going to tell you the greatest secret to happiness, spiritual fulfillment, and enlightenment I have ever learned. This secret has changed my life and those I know who used it.
I give this advice of a practical nature, to help you discover God. While certainly you said you were searching for religion, what that means is you don't satisfactorily see God's presence in the religious documents you have read. Sometimes that means you have not read with your Spirit but with your mind, however, no one can answer that, perhaps not even you.
My advice is this: You will find God and therefore be satisfied with religion by performing godly acts. Go out of your way to "commit" beautiful things. Do something for someone who is not ABLE to thank you. This, after all is the nature of GOD. Most human-created gods are selfish. GOD is selfless and gives without need of thanks or of reciprocation. By behaving in this way, you will see God's presence in your life. Examples: Volunteer to lead mentally handicapped children around on horseback one day a week. They cannot thank you, don't know it's expected, and you will do a service to the Universe for the love of your soul. YOU will be the recipient of grace and blessings, both large and small while they receive your attention and time. Another: volunteer at a school, not to talk about religious things but to simply help kids learn to read/do math/get their coats on, etc. The teacher may appreciate it but children won't thank you. That's okay. THAT'S WHAT YOU WANT. It only works if you receive no thanks from the people who receive your kindness. Give SECRETLY to someone who has a monetary need, such as, pay a gas bill or part of it, (even a dollar) for some elderly person on social security, just to give them a little reprieve. They won't know who did it and CANNOT thank you. That, dear Looking, is the TRUE key to the door.
Have I always been perfect in this? No. Nor will you. Forgive yourself and get on with it. And do not destroy yourself for some other person (meaning, don't offer to open a halfway house for sex offenders unless you are a trained professional. That is not where this leads at all), but look only for things that will bless the "least" of mankind. (Hint: it is not a blessing to hand a wino a buck. Go and buy him a hamburger and hand him that instead.) Look for the littlest things you can do in small measures in small lives.
I know not everybody is an heir to Bill Gates' fortune. But you can in small measure as you have been given, give back to the world. If you can arrive at a place where you give ten percent of all you have in time and possessions, to doing these un-thanked acts of righting the wrongs of the world, you will discover who God really is.
Blessings upon you. God will come to those who earnestly seek, so put down the books and act out your earnestness.
NT