Sometimes I just need to escape. Escape from everything that lives and breathes around me. Escape from Your other children. Escape from the pressure of simply being me. When this urge arises, it does not feel good. In fact, it feels as if I am disappointing You – like there is something inherently wrong with me.

I wonder why this happens as I am meandering about on this journey. With great care, I start my days in Your presence, surrendering my will to Yours, and asking for Your guidance. Those moments are always the most peaceful, the most serene, the most fulfilling. Then, as I step out into the world and into the lives of others, the peace, serenity and fulfillment slowly – or sometimes very quickly – vanish into self-righteous judgment, irrational expectations, and an emptiness beyond description.

Maybe I am giving too much to this world.
Maybe I am relying too much on this world.
Or maybe, when I leave my quiet room each morning, I am somehow leaving You. Oh, what a horrible thought that is. I am nearly blinded by the words as I see them before me on this page!

Yet, I think in some way, the words are true. For today, when I escaped from the office to the solitude of the edge of a stream, I found You waiting there for me. I felt You in the cool breeze and the warmth of the sun on my shoulders. I listened to You sing birdsongs from the trees. I watched you paddle along the flowing waters while honking the duck’s call. I saw You resting on a bench nearby, in an old man’s withered and worn body. You were everywhere there, by that stream.

How lovely! How marvelous! In this recognition of Your everywhere-ness, I am lifted. Lifted from the knowledge of my brain that tells me You are everywhere into the authenticity of my seeing heart. Seeing You everywhere by that stream filled the emptiness, removed the expectations, relieved the judgment. Seeing You everywhere by that stream allowed me the privilege of being everywhere with you. By Your breeze of lightness, I traveled through the sun’s rays, along the melody of the songs, below the coolness of the waters, in the aura of Your aged child. How lovely! How marvelous!

Help me, God, to live always in this authenticity of my seeing heart. Help me to see You also in the world’s less-picturesque places. Help me to feel You also in the day’s more mundane moments. Help me to run nowhere but to You. Most of all, God, help me to remember that my stumbling along the path of the life You have given me does not disappoint You – for it is in all that I do and in all that I am that I am everywhere with You.

With enormous gratitude, I pray these words…Amen.