Musings during the dream time

Sometimes I do my best thinking at 4 am.  At least AT 4 am it feels like my best thinking.  Sometimes when the sunlight falls across it, it crumbles into fairy dust and I just waggle my head and go back to sleep.  Its usually a thought about something that has been rolling around in my head during the day.

I have been thinking a lot about the relationship between the ego and the soul and how holding one's inevitable death dear can have a beneficial effect on them.  I was speaking to a group of people and got some feedback I hadn't expected.  A woman said, "When you say soul, you lose me because I don't believe in anything after death,  you are in the ground and its over,"    I don't claim to know much about atheists, but I did start mulling over the idea that if you don't believe in a soul what is that thing that binds us together when we share a moment with each other?  A moment when you connect with another human over something profound or trivial and it vibrates in your... soul.  But if you don't have a soul where does it resonate?  Then I pictured all of us with these tuning forks in our hearts.  They vibrate and hum when they experience kindness and connection.  I think the more of this they feel the more powerful their vibration becomes, and it comes with real medicine to heal.  I also believe that the quickest way to give our tuning forks a "tune up" is to be in nature.  I think my death bed regret might be that I didn't experience enough sunsets, sun rises, starry nights, or moon lit ones.  Nature is a great short cut to connecting to the divine and if I can hold this feeling throughout the day my tuning fork is humming along and vibrating with tuning forks in every heart I pass.  Its like a giant ripple effect.  Imagine a world where this is how we interact with each other.  

This is where holding our death's close comes in.  I believe that when I remember that I am small, insignificant and fleeting I am free to be my best self.  And I don't mean best self with the whitest teeth and the biggest wallet, the self that may be standing on a pile of other people's selves to feel good.  The self that death calls forth, is the one that puts itself last. It is a self that I find frequently in my work in hospices. People can be at their most open hearted, loving and present in the moment in this place. When I enter the room and see them sitting bedside and holding hands and telling stories, I can feel the vibration.  Admittedly this isn't always the case, just this week I was visiting with a woman at the end of her life who said,  "I wish I'd been kinder.  I mean I knew it all along.  I have this friend who is very successful and he is angry all the time.  When we drive together he is always flipping people off and yelling at them.  I tell him to stop that it isn't good to be so mean.  But here in this place where everyone is so kind,  I just wish I had used my life to be nicer to other people."   I heard her and reminded her that as long as she is still here she has time to be kind.  It was a powerful reminder for me to focus on what really matters in my short time here.