I believe in Divine Plans: delicately orchestrated ‘missions’ that are laid-out well in advance of our being born. I believe that every human being has, whether they’re consciously aware of it or not, their own Divine Plan. And I believe that it’s up to each of us to find out what ours is - or maybe ‘remember’ is a more accurate word - and then live that unique plan to its fullest realization while here on the physical plane. I also believe that Life has a way of peppering the path with little clues that’ll help us recognize when our Divine Plan shows itself. But there’s a catch (isn’t there always?): if you ever hope to know what your plan is, you’ve gotta pay attention. So yeah, it’s about awakening to what’s going on all around us.
Living awakened lives is definitely not an easy task, especially given that we’re essentially sleepwalking most of the time, myself included: distracted by technology; caught-up in an endless stream of mental chatter; swept away by our own self-created drama; lost in an endless stream of mundane tasks and duties . . . you know, sleepwalking. Here, let me give you an example from my own experience that illustrates just how one of these Divine ‘clues’ can be staring you right in the face - in my case, quite literally - without your even being aware of it . . .
One of the unspoken rituals of being indoctrinated as a Freshman in college centers around the task of decorating your dorm room. And since you’re most likely sharing the space with a total stranger - who, if you’re lucky, becomes a friend - you’ve got exactly one blank wall to work your magic on. Typically that means a trip to the local poster store where you, along with a slew of other anxious teenagers, will pick through a bevy of images that’ll hopefully fill the emptiness of being away from home for the first time.
I remember my trip to the poster store in 1990 like it went down yesterday. With both parents in tow, I culled the wide selection very carefully, all 3 floors worth. Yeah, this place was big and it was bumping with lots of activity. Generally, the types of posters could be lumped into 6 basic categories: movies, rock stars, athletes, sports cars, bikini babes, and of course, beer. Naturally there was some cross-pollination among those 6, typically something involving a red sports car, a swimsuit babe or two in a highly suggestive pose, and a few cold beers all lumped into one uber-machismo image.
The athletes, cars, and beer posters weren’t even possibilities in my book. And while I can certainly appreciate beautiful women, I wasn’t about to plaster my wall with one of them, especially with her boobs exploding out from behind a string bikini. Sorry. Just not my style. Bob Marley and/or the Beatles were the only rock stars that had a chance of making the cut, but even they were nixed. That left movies, which, given my life-long passion for them, seemed like the obvious choice . . . I mean c’mon, The Godfather, Star Wars, Taxi Driver. All classics. But nope, they were scratched from the list as well.
As it turns out, what ended up catching my attention that afternoon in August was a poster of - can I get a drum roll please? - Albert Einstein. And just to be clear: seeing Einstein’s now iconic frazzled mug on a poster was a bit of a rarity back then, so this was definitely a weird sighting . . . but not quite as weird as the fact that I chose this particular poster out of literally thousands. Suffice to say, going with Einstein instead of say, Led Zeppelin or Lawrence of Arabia, was light years out of character for me. And to make the whole thing even more bizarre, here’s the quote of his that was scrawled along the bottom of the poster:
“I want to know God’s thoughts. The rest are details.”
Okay, let me clarify a few things: (1) I was never into physics - I could barely handle any subject in school that called for even the most mundane maths skills; (2) I certainly wasn’t an admirer of Albert Einstein - he’s cool and all; just wasn’t on my radar; (3) I had no interest whatsoever in anything that even remotely touched on the subjects of God, religion, or spirituality; and lastly, (4) What were God’s thoughts anyway and why would I even care?
As far as I could see at the time, I saw myself as just another exceedingly average middle-class 18 year-old white kid from San Pedro California . . . one who liked movies, Saturday Night Live, acting in school plays, and hanging out with his friends. Period. I mean . . . isn’t that who I was? . . . Or were there other unknown, festering desires buried deep within my subconscious that were itching to be realized, and - as totally odd ball as this probably sounds - was this poster of Albert Einstein in fact one of those Divine clues trying to point me towards my higher purpose in Life?
So again I’m back to the obvious: What are God’s thoughts? Now as it turns out, not more than a month after hanging the Einstein poster in my dorm room, I would be introduced to the many wonders of drugs and alcohol, and so, any serious inquires into whatever God might be ‘thinking’ would have to be put on-hold for a while - about 18 years to be precise - until 2008 when I happened upon a book that would forever change my Life for the better: A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle.
And as fate would have it, here’s what Eckhart Tolle had to say about this very quote of Einstein’s:
“I want to know the mind of God,” Einstein said. “The rest are details.” What is the mind of God? Consciousness. What does it mean to know the mind of God? To be aware. What are the details? Your outer purpose, and whatever happens outwardly.
So while you are perhaps still waiting for something significant to happen in your life, you may not realize that the most significant thing that can happen to a human being has already happened within you: the beginning of the separation process of thinking and awareness.
Many people who are going through the early stages of the awakening process are no longer certain what their outer purpose is. What drives the world no longer drives them. Seeing the madness of our civilization so clearly, they may feel somewhat alienated from the culture around them. Some feel that they inhabit a no-man’s land between two worlds. They are no longer run by the ego, yet the arising awareness has not yet become fully integrated into their lives. Inner and outer purpose have not merged. (page 261 and 262)
Let’s just say that my feeble mind was sort of ‘blown wide open’ by Tolle’s words . . . I mean, this is exactly the sort of spiritual path my life would eventually take beginning in my early 30s as I began the slow crawl towards my own kind of personal ‘awakening,’ a journey that continues to this day.
So what was the deal then with that Einstein poster? Was it a subtle indication of things yet to come, one of those Divine clues I mentioned earlier. Or was it a metaphorical ‘seed’ of sorts that, once planted within my subconscious mind, slowly grew over the next 15 years? Or was it just some strange coincidence that I’m molding into a mountain from a mere molehill? Of course I’ll never know for sure what purpose the poster served, if any, or what it was meant to indicate. Such is Life: it’s mostly a mystery.
Still, this whole Einstein thing makes me think that there really is some kind of enigmatic - dare I say Divinely inspired? - order to each of our lives, one that unfurls its deepest secrets slowly over time. For what it’s worth, here’s my parting advice: pay close attention to everything that shows up in your Life. Remember, your very own magnificent mystery is unfolding all around you right now in this very moment. The question is: Are you awake enough to see the clues that are steering you towards your destiny?
Show up.
Pay attention.
Be Yourself.
-Christopher
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