Monday, August 29, 2016

Reflections on Dancing with God

Below is a copy of one of Susan's talks she gave in November 2014.  It can be found in our new book  about Spirituality.  Our book is a collection of Spiritual essays designed for reflection and meditation to assist you on your own journey to God.  We hope you enjoy reading this sample of our work. In  the future we will provide other entries for you to review.



dancing with god

(Sample of Talk given by Susan Eby, November 2014)

"Walking with God is a lot more like a dance.  When you walk with someone, there’s not much interaction.  But when you’re dancing, you are moving together, each step followed by another, synchronized and balanced to create a beautiful harmony.  Our life with God, should be like a dance.  He embraces us, we embrace Him.  He leans, we lean.  He steps, we step.  And this giving and receiving relationship creates a dance that leads others to see His glory."  (Wayne Dillard)

Oneness… moving together in harmony.  Synchronized and in touch with Spirit completely.  He embraces us, we embrace him.  No separation.  He leans, we lean, He steps, we step.  Movement and joy.  A giving and receiving relationship like no other.  A relationship that is complete and unconditional Love.

Integrated with God.  Dancing with the Good.  Synchronize means cause to occur at the same time.  There’s no separation.  There’s no imbalance.  There’s only perfection in our dance with God.
He reaches into our mind and body; heart and soul to teach us the dance.  All we have to do is breathe it… feel it… follow it… become it…  Bring it into us.  Then we are dancing with God.  But, like anything that’s done well, it needs to be practiced.

To be balanced means the ability to move OR remain in a position, without losing control or falling.  We have to ability to move.  In Acts, Paul said, “In Him we live, MOVE, and have our being”.  We have the ability to move or remain stagnant.  It is up to us.  Our part of the dance to learn and to practice.
 
Sometimes God asks that we move… from a negative thought or action to a positive  one.  Are we listening? This is part of the dance. To dance through life filled with joy, abundance, gratitude, health and love and harmony and we can’t do this if we’re caught up in negativity. 
 
The negative dis harmonizes (is that a word?) the dance.  We have a misstep.  We lean too far backward and lose our balance.  Or we forget the embrace and go off dancing by ourselves; sometimes into all types of painful and unnecessary situations.  Sometimes we seem to lose control of the dance, but the secret is… we’re not leading.  When we start to lead we lose control.  There’s only one leader in the dance.  And that leader, for us, is God.  We choose to go his way.  When we don’t follow His steps we get out of sync.  Our life becomes unmanageable.  But, there’s hope, because even though we may not feel the music or the steps don’t seem to come naturally, we’re still capable of dancing with God because God is always dancing.

Dance has been around forever. Dance comes naturally to us.  People even danced in the Bible.  
 In Psalms we read: Let them praise His name with dancing.  Praise Him with tambourine and dance.  (Gary, did you bring the tambourines?  No, ok, maybe next time.)  "Jesus invited us to dance." (Steve Brown) I found that quote on the web, and I do believe Jesus taught us to dance… he taught us to dance love, music, and harmony.  He may have also taught us to square dance and hula, but I haven’t found any evidence of that. God invited Jesus to dance, and as we all know Jesus danced beautifully. When we dance, we connect with God, even when we dance in brokenness.

Even when we are feeling separated from God we are not, because there is always the dance.  It lives in our hearts.  We dance from our soul.  Even we are broken… sad, lonely, angry,  hurting, depressed, anxious, anything that takes us away from God, we can immediately reconnect with Him through this dance.

Here’s a quote from someone we all know who was very broken:  "Consciousness expresses itself through creation.  This world we live in is the dance of the Creator… I feel my spirit soar and become one with everything that exists.  The Creator and creation merge into one wholeness of joy."  (Michael Jackson)

Michael Jackson said this.  We all know what a painful life he had, yet he also had great joy.  He knew how to dance with the Creator.  Part of him knew the truth about who he was, yet for some reason he couldn’t hold onto it.  I think like many of us, we forget how strongly we are connected to God.  Our minds take over and our hearts grow quiet.  Spirit speaks to the heart, the dance comes from the heart.  Maybe this is how we forget.  Maybe this is how Michael forgot.

It’s so easy to get caught up in the world.  We always seem to have so much to do!  I think for Michael Jackson this was all too true and it became too much.  But, in his heart, he understood the connection.  He just couldn’t keep hold of it.  Let me read what he said one more time.

What a beautiful description of the dance.  Of co-creation.  When we become one with God, when we dance with God, that beautiful becoming of togetherness, that time (all the time) of completeness with our Good, we become One with everything.  God expressing through us.  Us expressing throughout the world.  I think this is the most powerful dance of all.  Maybe a tango or a salsa… co-creation.  What a powerful concept.  Expressing God, through us, through our uniqueness and individuality into the world. Being what God needs us to be in this world.  Being God in this world.
 
Each of us is a unique aspect of God.  Just as we are.  Without any adjustments or changes we express God in the world.  We need to stop saying to ourselves:  I can’t, I won’t, I’m not good enough, I’m not smart enough,  I’m not good looking enough.  What we must affirm is We are children of God, and perfect in every way.  Every aspect of my being comes from the Good.  I am light, I am light, I am the Christ.

Jim Lee, a Unity minister in Detroit talks about a 10 second meditation.  When we do this we are experiencing God, not thinking about God, but dancing with God.  He says to breathe in and relax; think about something that gives you true joy, that makes you smile.  Harmony is in that moment, we start to have clarity.  Then, just go about your business. Renewed, refreshed and totally connected to the Source.  No longer broken, no longer feeling disconnected.

"Movement is freedom of the body ; stillness of the mind." (Marty Rubin)  This, I think, is what Reverend Lee is talking about.  That 10 second stillness of the mind, that allows us to reconnect with God.   That movement that is the dance.

I usually think about dancing with God in those ten seconds.  It brings me joy and peace.  It brings me to a place where dance is sacred.  A prayer for the moment.  Reminding me of my single most purpose: To be a conduit for God.  To co-create with the Creator.  To fully express the Good in my world and the world.

I say to God… “Your whispers are gentle echoes that sway winds of harmony in the symphony of life.  Each word is wrapped in rhapsody… Dance with me, within my soul.  Let me Love You”.  (Oksana Rus)

You can’t dance wrong.  Even if you have two left feet (Gary…) your dance with God is perfection.  Even if you can’t dance at all, your dance with God is perfection.  We are drawn to the start of a sweet melody that stirs from within.  We smile.  Reminded that our hearts and souls can dance, even when our feet cannot.  My point is… there are no limitations.  Our body doesn’t have to be perfect, because we dance with God in our heart… in our soul.  We move and sway, perfectly in rhythm with the Divine.  Limitation is nonexistent when we are dancing with God, and we bring unlimited joy into the world.  God teaches us through the dance, and this is part of what he is teaching us here.

"You can dance in the storm.  Don’t wait for the rain to be over… You can do it now.  Wherever you are, right now; you can start… right now in this very moment."  (Isaelmore Ayivor)  We don’t have to wait for that “perfect” time to connect with God.  We can do it RIGHT  NOW!  Wherever we are, God is, all is well.  And, wherever we are, we are well, because God is our comforter.  God is our partner.  God is our dance partner.

Difficult to say to yourself.  Believe me, I know.  This is why the 10 second meditation is very powerful because we affirm the truth of who we really are.  Perfection.  Right here and right now.  Like the people say, “God doesn’t make junk”.  And like I say, God invites us to dance our perfection with Him in the world… as Him.

"There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action and because there is only one of you in all of time, this expression is unique…."  (Martha Graham) You have to keep yourself open to the urges that motivate you to keep this channel open.  We need to dance with God on a regular basis.  Not just in meditation, but carrying the Truth always in your heart and soul.  This dance has no beginning, no ending.  It’s a flow that has always existed and will always exist.  All of us belong to this infinite dance… without time, without space, without limits.

"To dance is to be out of yourself.  Larger, more beautiful, more powerful.  It is God’s glory on earth and yours for the taking."  (Friedrich Nietzsche)

You can have it now, my friends… you can dance with God… you can feel the connection.  You need never be separate from it.  You are never separate from it.

And, so it is… Namaste.

Meditation is similar to the dancer.  You need not reach anyplace, you just have to delve deep into yourself to find the true self and become a soul searcher.

And, with that, let’s take a deep breath and prepare ourselves to dance with God…

(We hope you enjoyed this talk and are ready to try some meditation; it takes practice, just like dancing...  but it is well worth it.)

In Joy and Peace,
Gary and Susan Eby

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