Higher Power for me is simply Truth. I have long been wondering what Higher Power means to me. I have feared that just leaving that to my inner pondering would lead to something covertly letting me off the hook. My patterns are deep and compulsive, influencing my thinking at least as much as my acting. How can I trust, then, a Higher Power of my own (flawed) understanding.

Then I learned from a sacred book of a very foreign culture the statement, “There is but one God over all and that God is Truth.” That solved the problem for me. My Higher Power need not be my certain-to-be-self-serving creation; my Higher Power is what is in front of my face and before my feet. It is always present to me, demanding my attention and my humble compliance.

It is also inside of me: in the reality of my body and the strengths as well as the limitations of my personality. It is also in those I interact with as they really are, not as I wish them to be. My task, then, is clear: to attend to all of this intently, humbly and gratefully. Doing so is constant and intimate interaction with that power greater than myself of the 2nd Step.

I was pondering about this, half-asleep, early one morning. As usual I had concerns about my life happenings. I have always derived, for some reason, great comfort thinking of my utter incapacity to do what needed to be done. And I have wondered, “Is that some sort of spiritual masochism I am indulging in?” But no. Now I know it is opening my heart to the truth of my limitations, and thereby communing with God.

Bernard – 11/25/20