HerWork

Right out of college, back in the early 1980s, my first job was as a clerical worker on a clerical team in a high rise office building. My first supervisor, a woman, was a doll. Taught me everything I knew, was very patient and professional. Of course, then she got promoted, and was replaced with a new guy. I’ll call him Phil.

My fellow clerks and I soon discovered Phil had strong misogynistic tendencies. We were all young women, unsure of our place in the world. Phil began to throw his weight around, asking us to do things that were inappropriate to make his life easier. Basically, we had to do our jobs and his job too. However, we weren’t authorized to do some of the things he was trying to avoid. He literally wanted to sit around all day just telling us what to do, but he offered no support or encouragement or management, really. Weird dude.

Well, we put up with this as best as we could. We all developed different tactics. One worker feigned incompetence so he would leave her alone. The other made herself very very busy whenever he was around. This left me. I simply refused to do what he asked whenever I deemed it outside the scope of my job description.

When I prayed about this, as I did occasionally, I tried to see him as a child of God. This didn’t work real well, meaning I wasn’t able to do it. But prayer did open my thought to the understanding that God would take care of it. I didn’t need to do anything, God would protect me and my fellow workers. I could feel secure in this understanding and not fear.

If I’d been more experienced I might have been more worried. But as it was, I had an almost childlike faith that all would turn out fine and that I should stick to my guns. I resolved to continue to express complete cooperation about doing my own job well but to also adhere to my own integrity in not doing things I wasn’t authorized to do.

Next thing you know, our manager, Phil’s boss, called the three of us into her office for a dressing down. Apparently *he* had complained about *us.* Well, then the proverbial caca hit the fan. The three of us let rip about what had been going on. Our manager was shocked, and Phil was out of there within a few days.

Nice job, God!

I was reminded of this story the other day while reading Psalm 64:

1 Hear my voice, O God, in my prayer: preserve my life from fear of the enemy.
2 Hide me from the secret counsel of the wicked; from the insurrection of the workers of iniquity:
3 Who whet their tongue like a sword, and bend their bows to shoot their arrows, even bitter words:
4 That they may shoot in secret at the perfect: suddenly do they shoot at him, and fear not.
5 They encourage themselves in an evil matter: they commune of laying snares privily; they say, Who shall see them?
6 They search out iniquities; they accomplish a diligent search: both the inward thought of every one of them, and the heart, is deep.
7 But God shall shoot at them with an arrow; suddenly shall they be wounded.
8 So they shall make their own tongue to fall upon themselves: all that see them shall flee away.
9 And all men shall fear, and shall declare the work of God; for they shall wisely consider his doing.
10 The righteous shall be glad in the Lord, and shall trust in him; and all the upright in heart shall glory.

“So shall they make their own tongue to fall upon themselves.” The principle revealed in this psalm has stayed with me all these years. When I’m feeling attacked, I don’t need to *do* anything. I just stay the course, acting under my own integrity. The Divine will cause to be revealed whatever needs to be revealed, and I will be protected. It’s happened time and again.

God’s pretty smart. You can count on it.

// posted by Laura @ 3:00 AM 0 comments

Carnegie wrote another book, How to Stop Worrying & Start Living. As I browse through this book (I took a Dale Carnegie course a couple years ago—revolutionized my public speaking), I’m finding it laced with spiritual concepts.

For example, in his chapter “How to Cure Depression in Fourteen Days,” Carnegie gives Seven Ways to Cultivate a Mental Attitude That Will Bring You Peace and Happiness (he is very fond of capital letters). The first is, “Let’s fill our minds with thoughts of peace, courage, health, and hope, for ‘our life is what our thoughts make it.’”

Carnegie also quotes Theodore Dreiser, famed atheist of his day but also to my mind a spiritual man: “I shall pass this way but once. Therefore any good that I can do or any kindness that I can show—let me do it now. Let me not defer nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.”

Reminds me of a Bible passage I love: “Withhold not good from them to whom it is due, when it is in the power of thine hand to do it. Say not unto thy neighbour, Go, and come again, and to-morrow I will give; when thou hast it by thee” (Proverbs).

True in business, true in life. If you think of something good to do for another, do it now. Don’t wait. If you wait, next thing you know days have passed and you rationalize it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Do it as soon as you think of it, though, and you build a habit of doing good and soon it will be second nature.

Lord, I’m sounding like Dale Carnegie! So let me be me for a second. I think this practice gets its power not from the results it incurs, but from the spiritual truth it represents. Divine Love fills all space. Infinite Mind is constantly coming up with ideas. Omnipotent Principle makes things happen. One moment of caring about another, having an idea to help them, and then following through enacts Love, Mind, and Principle all at once. That deed has the power of the divine behind it, giving it the force of good.

I think that’s what makes it all work. Check out this from Carnegie’s chapter on curing depression:

Here is the most astonishing statement that I ever read from the pen of a great psychiatrist. This statement was made by Alfred Adler. He used to say to his melancholia patients: “You can be cured in fourteen days if you follow this prescription. Try to think every day how you can please someone.”

This works not because of human will, but because it’s tapping into a universal spiritual concept: we are one with Love, and when we express Love, we feel Love.

Anyway, I’m enjoying Dale Carnegie’s writings. They’re worth investigating if you’d like practical tips on how to apply the ideas you’re learning on your spiritual journey.

// posted by Laura @ 3:02 AM 2 comments