Curious Mind Grapes
Curious Mind Grapes is a podcast where we explore all the strange, wondrous, interconnected things in life. In each episode, sometimes with guests, we explore topics like psychology, health, energy medicine, science, pop culture, and so much more.
Curious Mind Grapes
Grounding Spiritual Values in the Everyday
Have you ever experienced a serendipitous moment so profound that it felt like the universe was speaking directly to you? Join Curious Mind Grapes as we bridge the gap between the mystical and the practical. We discuss how aligning our intentions with the greater good can enrich our professional and personal lives. Join us for a thoughtful reflection on integrating spiritual values and insights into everyday actions, and learn how to live a life imbued with love and purpose.
Ana Jones https://anajonesonline.com/
How Do Quakers Worship? https://quaker.org/how-do-quakers-worship/
A bit more about Quakerism https://housatonicmeeting.org/ (scroll down below the Tag Sale info 🙂)
Visit us on Instagram @curiousmindgrapes_podcast!
Feel free to share your questions or episode requests. Thank you for listening!
Welcome to Curious Mind Grapes with your hosts Mary and Christine.
Speaker 2:So a few days after I had that channeled reading with Anna Jones, where she ended by saying that she had an image this is not the channel part, but it's just at the end image, um, this is not the channel part, but just at the end she had an image of someone handing me, or some hands giving me, a red rose and then my taking it into my heart, which I, um we then she and I then talked about the thousand goddesses gathering and whether that was something that I had done before, because she felt it was, um, like an image of something that I had done or was going to do in conjunction with that. But so, anyway, a few days after that, I was at Wilton Friends meeting and during Quaker meeting people sit in kind of silent prayer, silent meditation, and they're only supposed to speak if the spirit moves them or if you get a message where you know it's from spirit and not just like something you read in the New York Times or something that you'd like to lecture people about, which some people do, and it was just so beautiful and simple about the importance of bringing love to everything that you do and not just talking about love or just intellectualizing this idea of like agape love or love for all beings, but rather how do you put that into action? And I forget how he put it, but it was just really simple. And the reason they're called Quakers is because the original folks, who were very mystical Christians, when they got one of these kinds of messages, they'd say that their body would start shaking, like you'd feel this like energy going through your body and you knew you had to say whatever was coming through, because it wasn't coming from your intellect, it was coming from spirit, because it wasn't coming from your intellect, it was coming from spirit. And when this, after this message, was shared, I actually felt that kind of vibration in my body, that quaking, even though I wasn't moved to share a follow-up. So afterwards I kind of located where I had heard the voice. It's like etiquette is that you don't open your eyes and look at who's talking, because it's not the point of who's talking, because it's spirit.
Speaker 2:And it was this guy who I'd never seen before and apparently he's fairly new to the meeting, and so I asked him about the message, about the message, and um, yeah, it sounds like he's been since the pandemic. I kind of left the corporate world and tech actually, and has been, um, doing more inner work and has been really meditating on and trying to figure out. How do you live in the world in a way where you're every all your actions do serve this idea of the greater good through this universal love for others? How do you operationalize that? It's a pretty abstract concept, although there are examples of people who do that, but how does the average person do that? So we had a really interesting conversation and at the end of it he said interesting conversation.
Speaker 2:And at the end of it he said um, I'd like to offer you a symbolic rose. And he made this gesture with his hand, like he was handing me a rose. And he said um, so the symbolic rose is to place in your heart as a gift of, of love, and apparently that's something he's been doing with people. And I just got teary because, like I thought of what Anna had said and that image, I was like what are the odds? What are the odds of this? This is really interesting and and I got the sense that there's probably something I should be working on with this guy because clearly it's like I don't know him well enough. I don't know if he's someone I would want to work with, but he's definitely trying to formulate something, um, that is in alignment with the kind of work that I've been doing.
Speaker 1:So just the fact that you felt the quaking.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean that's. That's a pretty specific image. I can tell you no one's ever offered me a rose to put in my heart. Yeah, I go. Maybe I'm unusual in that regard, but that doesn't happen to me very often. So, first of all, I love this idea like it's coming from spirit, so it doesn't matter who's saying it, and as you were saying that, I thought because it's not coming from. You said intellect, but my mind said ego with that.
Speaker 2:Not true. Yeah, that's a great way to put it. Yeah, that's more accurate, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and just the idea that, yeah, just in our everyday lives, if we just take even a second, a second to stop and let it come from somewhere else and not come from ego, you know what different types of thoughts and reactions will we have. Yeah, I love that. And so his idea is that you said how are actions, how does the, the average person, align their actions to always be helping the greater good? Is that how you said it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, although those are not his words, but that's how I'm envisioning it, because, like when you say in service of personal love or agape love, that's really abstract. So I guess in my mind, again I'm trying to operationalize it using the terms from research, like when you are taking abstract concepts and you're trying to measure it, like you have to operationalize it, like how would it look in the world? Like in psychology, if you're trying to measure altruism, which is a very abstract concept, there are specific behaviors that people could exhibit or specific thought patterns that would get at it. Yeah, so again, I'm just trying to imagine, although and I don't know that he's far enough along in what he's working on to articulate exactly how that works. I'm saying I don't know. I think he said he's not, he's still working on it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was, I was. I guess I was asking myself the same question what does that look like and sound like in everyday life? You know, does it? You know you're boiling down to things like I'm at the grocery store, at the checkout counter and I'm doing that, and or talking about bigger actions, bigger, more global visions and missions for yourself.
Speaker 2:Right, and it could be all of the above. Yeah, just thinking back to my inner MBA training, so much of the discussion was about that and the different levels that it can take and how that can look like in a corporate environment. How that can look like in a corporate environment.
Speaker 1:I was thinking that too. How do you incorporate that into something that may seem like it's a for-profit big company type of environment?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Even something that isn't, but maybe it's hard for you to do, like I have a friend who has been in nursing for a very long time Pretty, you know. I have a friend who has been in nursing for a very long time, pretty intense situations too, like emergency rooms, pediatrics, so you can imagine your nervous system gets a little fried, you know. But it's not, it's not. You know she doesn't really want to leave. It doesn't make sense. So how can you just take that idea into that, into helping you feel good in your role when there's things that don't necessarily work for you anymore?
Speaker 2:Right, right. How do you show that kindness, mercy and and love towards people who may be annoying you or who just are stressing you out in those situations?
Speaker 1:And I think one of the things that's a barrier to that is this for me anyway, situations will put us on guard, like we'll want to put up defenses, put up a moat, you know, around ourselves, like people impose on our time, they impose on our boundaries. And how do you balance, how do you trust that if I'm doing those things, it's all going to be okay?
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:I think that's amazing, that, that, that, that, that that came up in your reading it was.
Speaker 2:It was so specific. Yeah, she, as I mentioned, she's she's amazing because she's so grounded and she's so knowledgeable, but she's also just so tuned in on this other level. Um, yeah, it's rare to find someone with a combination of all those things she's well read, has a really scientific mind and can kind of speak to, I don't know, all sorts of phenomenon and history and all these like very concrete things, and then weave it all into the yeah mutual stuff that we experience in a way that it's very help um.
Speaker 1:Yeah, cause it's one thing like I've had a reading before. Where it was, it was really interesting and cool, but it was very out there cerebral. You know, this is how I see things. But there was no. I didn't know what to do with it afterwards.
Speaker 2:Right, she, and I think that's so grounded and when, and also because these readings are not coming from her again, coming from spirit. They can have some abstract or vague things, but for the most part they are very tangible, which is and to me that's a sign of um sign of it again not coming from someone's ego. You know it's pure information or information. Not pure information because it's always filtered through whoever's um giving the reading, but but because she's such a great filter we and some people.
Speaker 1:Maybe they just that's not part of their gifts to be able to ground it in the everyday, or they just don't know to do it. But the fact is, you know, we've incarnated as humans because we do have to do it in the everyday. That's part of our job and our mission. If we can't do it on earth, that's the whole point. We're supposed to be trying to do that on earth right so we can move forward so where were we?
Speaker 1:I felt like in the your rose which, as you were saying that, I'm sorry, it sounded like the bachelor, but um, you're talking about the rose, the receiving it. You met the person at the Quaker meeting. Um, you felt like maybe you were called to do some work with him, but it's still very nebulous. Um, how do our actions serve the greater good? How can we be in service of it in our everyday lives? And what does that look like and sound like?
Speaker 2:Right, right Right.
Speaker 1:America.
Speaker 2:Right Everyday life emergency room nurses, room nurses I really have come to believe that we find ourselves in particular situations a lot of time because our particular skills or gifts are needed at that moment.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, as much as you feel like it may not be the right place, it may be where you need to be for the moment. If we're, even if we're in situations where, for some reason, it's it's not working for us personally, how can we adjust our approach or mindset, or view the situation in a different way?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and maybe change our definition of what's working for us. Maybe that's old stuff too, like, oh, it's, it's only working for me if these things happen, and just maybe the reframe is, it's actually just so much more simple. It's like what you're the guy at the meeting was saying, you know, we're just here to serve other people, yeah, or be in service. I should say that differently. We're just here to be in service and to help walk each other home, right, like yeah, it just doesn't have to be so complicated. Yeah, I mean, it reminds me when I was doing customer service. There were lots of other little things I had to do, but really my only goal was help someone feel comfortable by letting them know where to go and what to do and making sure that they were informed so that they enjoyed their experience.
Speaker 2:That was it.
Speaker 1:That was the only thing I really had to do each day Make someone happy that they're there. Really nice.
Speaker 2:Yeah, only thing I really had to do each day make someone happy that they're there.
Speaker 1:Really nice, yeah, what if we could.
Speaker 2:I feel like we don't, yeah, I guess. Well, in any role, like I think we're in an individualistic society, that's very goal-oriented in a lot of ways. Much of what we see as an example of the way to be is like what's in it for me? How do I get ahead when you place that all on yourself? It? It makes things harder and long. Um, it may tempt, it may work out for you in some ways, but then you compromise other aspects of your well-being or relationships.
Speaker 1:On the Isle of Mull there was a bus driver and everybody knew him because he also had a big cow, a hairy coo, stuffed animal in the windshield, so you'd see that flying at you and when he smiled you could see it like a mile away. And he was always smiling and waving. Everybody knew him and sure, his job was to get us from A to B but he really everyone was so happy to be on that bus with him.
Speaker 1:He just made everything and it was not an easy job because I was sitting next to him so I could hear him. I could hear all the nonsense that was going on about the schedules and the people complaining and um and the radio is on the radio and then he was sort of telling it was a long bus ride.
Speaker 1:So he was starting to tell me things like oh, this stuff happens, but the second. So I was privy to that a little bit, but the second he was interacting with everyone else, it was. It wasn't fake either. He really wanted to be happy with them and everybody knows him for that. Everyone looks forward to seeing him. He made that his job, not this. I got to schlep 40 suitcases and I got to get him out of the bus in under four minutes because the ferry is leaving and all the other nonsense.
Speaker 2:Right, right, yeah, and you do hear stories about that. Other nonsense, right, right, yeah, yeah, and you do hear stories about that. But people who are in um, service, service roles, where, um, sometimes the world looks, ignores them or just doesn't even see them. But if they're, if they come to the job with this idea of, like you said, serving or bringing joy or whatever it is, you can't help but notice and it has to make the job more tolerable, even though people can be pretty, pretty rude yeah, my favorite, one of my favorite things I ever did as a teacher was when I got assigned to lobby duty one year.
Speaker 1:So 700 kids were coming in at once from two different sides and I was the person who you know. My real job was to make sure they weren't running.
Speaker 1:You know you had to be an adult there in case something happened, but I really felt like it was my job to greet and also to look for the ones that looked like they needed human connection coming in and you could tell, and they usually came right to you and I just felt like it was my job to make them feel as welcome as I could, like I'm so happy to see you, I'm so glad you're here today. Oh, you wore that. That's that favorite sweater. Just connect with them. And I thought, gosh, I wish this could be my job all day. And I guess that's what I mean is who told me I couldn't?
Speaker 2:Right, right. You could bring that to whatever you do. Yeah, I don't know, maybe we're getting off topic again rambling, but I don't think so, because it's about this idea of how do you operationalize this idea of bringing love into the world.
Speaker 1:And if that's your, if that's your first the foot you put forward, do the other things fall into place.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. And everything doesn't have to be this grand gesture for the change in the world, building a nonprofit, or it can just be as simple as these acts of kindness.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like I, in those moments in the lobby, I could forget about all the lessons I had to plan and the reports I had to file and the data I had to collect and I could just. I felt like it was the most important part of my day and I wasn't teaching any lessons, right?
Speaker 2:well, well, in many societies yeah many explicitly yeah lessons are taught by example yeah yeah, just by elders behaving in a way that they'd like youngsters to behave. So it was your most profound teaching duty of all.
Speaker 1:There you go. So that's that's what I'm taking into my future roles is how can I remember that that's my primary purpose for being there? Thanks for listening to Curious Mind Grapes. Check out our show notes for more information about the topics we discussed today.
