7/7/99
Divine Carelessness
Question: Contemplate this enigmatic phrase and tell us… Why in the world would this be a quality that is looked for? How do you suppose divine carelessness is different from the standard carelessness we see all about us?
Glenys gave us an interesting twist on this phrase. She seemed to present the idea of letting go of our cares as a means of achieving carelessness. In other words, we should not be too attached to our cares nor let the cares of the world interfere with our ability to serve humanity.
This is indeed a quality needed by the disciple and is most probably a part of the multi level meaning of the phrase.
The meaning I was probing for is a little different, however. I was thinking of careless in the normal sense of reckless abandon.
Why then would a disciple ever be careless? Aren’t the qualities we have been discussing those of one who takes care and is balanced and sensible?
The answer is simple. In normal times the disciple is careful, rather than careless, about doing the right thing. But then there comes a time that a fork in the road is reached and a choice is presented. Like the parable in The Immortal the disciple must choose the path on the right, the one on the left or stand still and delay a decision through fear.
Sometimes the disciple is in a situation where neither decision looks good and both paths seem reckless. In this case he must remember the injunction: “the wrong decision is better than no decision.” The disciple makes his best decision and proceeds with a willingness to make corrections when error is revealed, but will continue on the path unless a higher way is revealed.
To his friends and family the disciple may appear to be taking a careless and reckless action, but to the soul he is making a divine move forward from darkness to greater light.
Divine carelessness can also occur when the disciple is faced with a seemingly good decision along with what seems to be a bad one. He could receive a communication through the soul to go with what appears to be a careless choice. Then again the disciple may be facing no particular choice and receive a spiritual communication to follow a path that seems to make little sense. To onlookers it seems that the person is being careless in his choice.
This last circumstance happened to me in a memorable way. Those of you who read The Immortal will remember that I first took note of my wife-to-be when I was teaching a class on handwriting analysis and looked at a sample of her handwriting and realized that she had the qualities that I had always looked for in a companion. Some time later she attended another class I was teaching. As I was preparing to give the lesson I looked down at the audience and noticed her eyes looking at me in anticipation of what I was going to say. There was something about her look that deeply impressed me. I felt from her eyes that she had great faith that I was going to feed her soul with wonderful knowledge and understanding.
I felt wonderful and terrible at the same time. It was wonderful that there was a person in the audience who expected great things of me, but it was terrible that my lesson material was just ordinary stuff and that I might disappoint her.
I paused a moment in thought and decided to trash my entire lesson and searched my mind for something better to teach. As I contemplated, a phrase came to my mind that I had not given much thought to in the past. The phrase was: “divine carelessness.” Something told me to talk on this subject and that is what I did.
As I taught the words freely came to me and as I delivered them I saw Artie’s (my wife’s real name) eyes widen and felt she was absorbing every word with joy. I felt as if there was no one else in the room but her and me. The discourse I delivered was beyond my normal ability and I found myself learning along with the students as I heard some of the teachings coming from my mouth for the first time.
I have always wished I had a tape recording of that class because it was probably the most spiritual presentation I have ever made and after I finished I knew within myself that all souls were fed and were satisfied.
I won’t give all the details, but after the class I talked with Artie and she said to me a phrase I will always cherish: “You made love to our minds,” she said.
Right around this time lightening struck us both at the same instant and we both fell instantly in love. I asked her if she felt something unusual.
She said she did, but wasn’t sure what this instant-in-love feeling meant.
I told her it meant we were going to be seeing more of each other.
Three days later I carelessly proposed to her even though we had never had had one official date together. She weakly resisted, saying that things were happening too fast, but then said yes.
Some of my friends thought that I was being careless and impulsive but because I was following guidance through my soul I knew I was dong the right thing. Now over ten years later (30 years at the time of this edit) I still know I did the right thing and all my friends and family now agree with me.
Rick mentioned that courage ought to be on this list. He is right, but the disciple will have courage on three levels rather than one and the disciple will have to show courage where the correct decision is not so cut and dry.
Let us suppose you are a fireman and you see that a child needs rescued from a burning building. You know there is a certain amount of risk in rescuing the kid, but you enter the building anyway.
This is physical courage and is very admirable, but many people who are not disciples possess it.
Suppose now you are not a fireman, but a regular guy, and have a phobia of fires and are in the same situation. Now in order to save the child you must not only have physical courage, but emotional courage. The emotional fear can be a much larger obstacle than the physical fear.
Now let us go to a third level of courage. You are a fireman again and discover a child in a burning building, but it would not just be risky as before to save the child, but you would be plunging yourself into certain death and chances are the child would die also.
Many thoughts go through your mind. You are at the scene and know the risks much better than any one will after the fire is out. If you do not rescue the child you sense the child’s parents and possibly some other firefighters will think you are a coward. In addition, you will have to deal with your own feelings of failure.
Then you think of your own children who depend upon you and weigh their loss of a father compared to the glory of dying in a fruitless rescue attempt. You painfully decide not to rescue the child.
Think of it… Sometimes it takes the greatest courage to put yourself in a position where others may call you a coward (or some other negative judgment) because they think you have no courage.
On the other hand, you may be in this situation and it appears that a rescue will be certain death and you may hear the voice of the soul telling you to proceed and that you will be protected and the child saved. In this case you will show great spiritual courage by proceeding as you mentally consider the certain doom.
George Washington showed this second type of courage. I do not remember all the details but my memory of reading a biography of him goes something like this.
Washington and his army appeared to be in a no win confrontation with the British and it appeared that the logical thing to do was retreat. This was a tactic that Washington used many times before to save his men so this was the expected move.
Instead, Washington commanded his men to charge the enemy. After the command was issued every single man found himself frozen still in fear and not one of them proceeded forward into what was a great risk.
Washington saw that his men were paralyzed in fear, but he knew from soul communication that they must make the move so he charged the British all alone. As he charged the British hundreds of bullets were shot at him as he rode right up to the British lines and cruised aside them for a while and then rode back to join his men. As he rejoined his men and they saw that bullets had grazed his clothing, but he was unharmed and they felt ashamed for their lack of courage.
Then Washington spoke again: “Do I have to charge them alone again or will you follow?”
This time every single man followed and they won a great victory.
Now the books on Washington did not make any mention of the Spirit or Soul, but it is obvious that he charged the British because his soul gave him assurance and he had the spiritual guts to follow.
Reflecting on true courage as this really makes one even more disgusted with the gutlessness of present leaders doesn’t it?
Even after Washington became President he actually led a regiment in person to take care of the Whiskey Rebellion. That would be comparable to Clinton leading a battalion in an invasion of Kosovo before the peace agreement with him as a prime target. Hard to imagine isn’t it?
Washington did not just perform one or two acts of courage, but many.
Long before the Revolutionary war during the French and Indian War Washington fought so bravely against the Indians that he was thought by some of them to be a God and was known to the Indians as the great white warrior who could not be killed.
Perhaps Washington’s greatest act of courage was his refusal to become a king when the privilege was offered to him. Few men in that age would have had the courage to say no.
To many Washington was just careless and lucky, but to those who know he was divinely careless. Without his divine carelessness this nation just may not be.
Time to proceed to Quality 19 which is:
Service before personal growth.
For the beginning seeker personal growth is number one, but as one proceeds upon the path something else comes to the forefront. Service to humanity is seen as much more important than the progression of the tiny self.
Why is this such an important quality? To the disciple approaching the path of service it may seem that personal growth will be sacrificed, but is this the case? What are the personal benefits of unselfish service?
Copyright by J J Dewey
Index for Older Archives (Like this One) in the Process of Updating
Easy Access to All the Writings
For Free Book go HERE and other books HERE
JJ’s Amazon page HERE
Gather with JJ on Facebook HERE