Abundance

Posted on April 10, 2011 by Jennifer

The Creator is lavishly abundant—wildly abundant. A salmon lays around 3,000 eggs. A typical frog lays around 20,000. A fully grown oak tree produces over 2,000 acorns. A swan can have over 20,000 feathers. And while no one knows for sure, some scientists estimate that the average human body has over 100 trillion cells. There are about 300,000 different kinds of plants. There are over 7,000 different varieties of apples alone! Some experts believe there are somewhere between 1 and 10 million different kinds of insects in the world. The Atlantic Ocean has approximately 17 quadrillion gallons of water. That’s 17 followed by 15 zero’s. The Pacific Ocean has around 35 quadrillion. That’s a lot. Astronomers think there are over 200 billion stars in the Milky Way. And there are 100’s of billions of galaxies.

Of course we know only a small percentage of those salmon eggs will survive. Same with the frog eggs. That’s the scientific reason there is so much of everything in nature—survival. And that’s true. It is also true that the Creator is lavishly abundant. When the paints come out not only the canvas, but the whole room gets filled with color.

Imagine whirling in a shower of cherry blossoms. Imagine a field of white, wild flowers—dazzling your eyes in the sun. Imagine a school of blue and yellow neon fish, thousands of them darting, dipping, and rising as one. Imagine a flock of barn swallows doing the same over a cornfield along the turnpike. Imagine each slender palm on each thick stalk of corn that opens its lemon-gold packages to the sky, has around 700 kernels.

The Creator made an abundant universe and an abundant Earth. If this is so for the world of nature, and we are surely a part of the Whole, then why would we ever fear lack? Why would we ever fear anything? The Creator lavishes us with a thousand, thousand snowflakes, each different, and crystalinely brilliant. How much more so then with us?

Yes, eventually our bodies will melt away too, dust to dust, but our spirits are eternal. The Creator didn’t just create us to live a handful of decades. We are designed to live forever. Lavishly abundant indeed.

Not only that, but just as the tadpole becomes a golden-eyed leaper, and the gluttonous caterpillar becomes a nectar sipping, bejeweled wisp of a flyer, and just as the river becomes the sea, we too pass through our own stages of metamorphosis to become winged, golden-eyed things, soaring through mansions and gardens and ponds of glory. So why fear anything?

There are riches aplenty. There are resources aplenty. Dream your dreams lavishly. Imagine your possibilities with the flair of a giant flock of penguins torpedoing into the breath-seizing water. Visualize your plans with the audacity of the horizon—sun-filled, moon-filled, and lightening-filled—stretching as far as the eye can see. Lavish your dreams with fearless creativity—then go, make them real, they are flowing towards you already.

Angels Watching Over Me, Part II

Posted on March 27, 2011 by Jennifer

As I sat down to take the tests, there were very particular and strict directions about what to do and not do during and after the test. One of the directions was to not write anything down after the test.

Parts of the tests were computerized and other parts were written. As I took the tests, I remembered my Jamaican angel. I also remembered what it says in the Big Book about when we are nervous: “We relax and take it easy. We don’t struggle. We are often surprised how the right answers will come after we have tried this for a while.” And boy, did I need right answers.

Well, after a couple hours, I finished. I was shaking. I could see two out three test scores on the computer screen, and I could see I had passed them. And even though I knew I passed them and would be getting an official transcript in a few weeks, I still wanted to remember my scores right then. So, ignoring the rule not to write anything down after the tests (rules apply to me?), I tore off a teensy, tiny, little scrap of paper and wrote down my scores. What harm could that do?

I gathered my belongings from a locker and left. I walked down the hallway and got to the elevators. I pushed the down button and as I was waiting for the doors to open, I noticed the test administer rushing out of the room. She looked a bit frantic. She spotted me.

“I need that little piece of paper you wrote on,” she said. “We know you wrote something, and we have to disqualify your scores if you don’t give me that paper.”

Luckily I had it and didn’t lie like I would have a few years prior when I got caught doing something wrong. I just gave her the paper and told her what I had done. She assured me it would be OK now that she had the piece of paper, and then sternly admonished me for not following directions. She reminded me how lucky I was that she found me. I thanked her profusely and turned to press the button on the elevator. It dawned on me then that she was another angel. She didn’t have to come looking for me. And whoever was operating the camera that caught me writing my down my scores was another angel.

I was still shaking, when the doors finally opened. And there, standing with a big, beautiful grin, was the Jamaican parking garage attendant.

“You passed, didn’tcha’ mon?” he asked.

“Yes, I passed,” I said, as my face was flushed with a child-like pride. And as I looked up at him, my mind was swirling with the thought, “What was he doing in here? Shouldn’t he be in the parking garage?”

Trembling with relief and joy, I stepped into the elevator with him. He pushed the button to close the doors.

“Good, mon. I knew you would pass, mon. But the real test is now.”

“What do you mean? I asked.

“You need to apply what you learned to help the children that are coming to you. That’s the real test, mon.”

And as we walked together back to the parking garage and to my car, I had such a deep gratitude for God’s Love and Mercy. I thanked the angel, gave him as big of a tip as I had to give, and got in my car. He handed me the keys. “Peace, mon,” he said.

And I swear when I looked back to see him again as I was driving out of that place—he was gone.

Angels Watching Over Me, Part I

Posted on March 26, 2011 by Jennifer

During the workshop I presented on the Wonder Child at the Emmet Fox weekend a few weeks back, I told of a miracle that happened to me two years ago. It is a popular story, so I thought I’d share it here. After all, someone might be doubting their dreams, or that God loves them, or they might be feeling like some situation they are facing will never work out. It’s a story for anyone frightened about facing some difficult task. It’s a story about me, a praxis test, and a Jamaican parking-garage attendant. I hope you like it.

A couple of years ago I decided to go to grad school to get certified to teach in public schools. To do so I had to take a series of praxis tests that to me, seemed quite daunting. I studied as best I could, even though every time I sat down to study I’d be compelled to fall asleep. Anyway, I studied hard and the day finally came when I had to take the tests that would make or break my teaching in a public school.

Terrified, I drove downtown Philly to take the tests. When I got there I couldn’t find any place to park close by the building where the tests were being administered. Feeling very annoyed, I drove around until I found a parking garage several blocks away. I pulled in and I didn’t realize until it was too late that it was a valet parking garage. I hate valet parking garages because I have a few “tiny” OCD tendencies—well, control freakish tendencies really–I don’t like anyone else touching my stuff, that’s all. But there was a car behind me so I couldn’t back up.

I was cursing under my breath as the attendant walked up to my car. He leaned into the window and said in a wonderful Jamaican accent:

“Hey, mon, welcome, mon…You’re here for the praxis tests, aren’tja mon?”

“Ah…Yes,” I began…wondering how the heck he knew…but before I could get too much further he said, “You’re going to do great, mon. Just remember to breathe mon. You’re going to pass mon. No worries, mon. Just relax and have fun mon.”

And right there, in a downtown Philly parking garage, I met an angel. He helped put me at ease. And as I handed him my keys and got out of the car, he said once more, “Remember to breathe, mon.”

I thanked him and began walking the several blocks to the testing center. I was still a little nervous, but there was a lightness to my steps. I knew the Wonder Child, the God that runs my life, was at work.

I finally found the building and went in. And I will tell you tomorrow what happened next.

Go Slow, Go Far

Posted on March 13, 2011 by Jennifer

Nine years ago I was teaching first grade and I took to the practice of writing each of my students a poem for their birthday. I didn’t believe in giving meaningless homework to first graders so instead I would give them tasks like: memorize their birthday poem—learn it by heart so that it lives there. Then I had them recite their poem once a week on the day closest to when they were born. All of the poems I wrote for those first graders were about seeds and about growing. This particular poem was written for a little girl who desperately wanted to learn to read and was feeling bad that things weren’t moving as fast as she thought they should be. It’s amazing how the poems I wrote for those first graders still teach me things today.

In husk and shell a maple tree slept

Deep through winter, quiet and blessed.

She dreamed of swaying through morns and eves,

And standing with starlight draped over her leaves.

“I want to sprout,” the maple tree said,

And a good kindly ground hog over heard from his bed.

“In due time, dear seedling, for grace is not rushed.”

And he fell back to sleep, in the snow-dappled hush.

So the maple tree waited, impatient and weary,

And dozed off to sleep so as not to feel dreary.

One day the sky cried warm tears of joy

And springtime returned for each girl and boy.

The seedling arose, trembling and proud,

Reaching for heaven through rolling white clouds.

The Burial

Posted on February 26, 2011 by Jennifer

It was oddly industrial. My brother and I witnessed the burial, and just before it began, the representative from the funeral home warned us kindly that it involved a backhoe.

A man from the cemetery fastened ropes to the stone box that they placed my mother’s casket in and signaled for the backhoe driver to lift it up. As the casket rose from the ground it swayed, bumped into the arm of the backhoe, and then, as the machine began driving towards her grave, actually began to spin around. It was bizarrely comical and tragic all at the same time. An amusemnet park ride for the dead. It was definitely cold and industrial.

As her casket was lowered into the ground, a man stood atop it to steady it and center it into the hole. And even though I know in my soul that my mom is elsewhere, happy, healthy, young again, the process seemed disrespectful to the shell that was her body. But I know those performing the inglorious task were trying their best to make it OK, so I cannot fault them.

After the casket was settled in the ground, my brother and I tossed down two white roses. And for a brief instant I had the sensation to jump into the hole and make a big dramatic scene. But I didn’t. Thank goodness I am slowly learning that I do not have to do everything my thoughts say to do. It reminded me of the few times I’ve someplace high and the thought comes to jump, and I don’t. It was sort of like that.

After we sent the roses down, the backhoe shovel began to slowly, and I will say, almost tenderly heap the heavy, February dirt into the hole. I think the backhoe operator knew how difficult this was to watch for my brother and I and he really tried to make it as gentle as possible.

As I watched this process I was reminded of a poem my wife Amanda wrote when her dad’s mother died. At that burial, her dad and the other pallbearers actually lowered the casket down themselves. The poem she wrote is very moving and so I will, with her permission, end this post with it.

Pallbearer

Your brothers and you are lifting

your mother from the back of the hearse

as she once lifted you

from the deep shaft of nothing,

and you are thinking “she has left me behind,”

as you left her behind and learned to live

a story she had not hoped for you.

Around you it is weirdly warm for January,

and you are coatless before the bare trees

and your own grown children watching

like blossoms on dark stalks

beside the waiting hole.

You are holding her body that once held you,

the wet earth smell around you like a blanket,

and carrying her across the muddy graveyard

as she first carried you when you were too small

to walk, too small to bear

something as heavy as your life.

The casket is so heavy,

the thing inside so light

as you lower her,

as she lowered you,

gently to your cradle,

covering you with kisses that fell

like flowers on your face.

Becoming

Posted on February 18, 2011 by Jennifer

Moving further down

the muddied roads,

along the tiny villages

of water, the memory

drips with secrets.

Every reminiscence

cups drops of moisture

at its center. Filtering

into the thinnest gullies,

each memory’s warm

liquidity dissolves image

after image, lovingly,

from the inside. Until

one night, the past stumbles,

and the future rises, like

a manta ray leaping for the moon,

like a clear word sung tirelessly

all morning, like

breath into prayer, like night

into morning, loss into gain,

eternity into

eternity.

Something Like Truth, by Jennifer Angelina Petro

Posted on February 17, 2011 by Jennifer

A child can lift her arms, open them, like this,

and hold the sky without feeling cheated or disappointed.

There are no fancy metaphysics involved. It simply is that way.

Arms open. The sky comes in.

All Beginnings Begin at the End

Posted on February 14, 2011 by Jennifer

Once upon a time a man wandered through a thick, dark forest. He could barely see the road ahead, and he stumbled over gnarled roots and stones. At certain times he realized he had been walking in circles when he tripped over a particularly obvious, yet small root that he kept telling himself he would step over the next time that he saw it. And since he walked in circles he saw the root repeatedly. Consequently, he fell repeatedly.

One day he went in a different direction. He looked up and caught a glimpse of the sun through the web of the canopy, and began to follow that singularly radiant star. After trudging uphill for a few miles he smiled to himself when it dawned on him that he hadn’t tripped over that pesky root. The journey seemed a little lighter, especially because he could laugh at himself just enough to know that it was OK to make mistakes. This idea struck him so happily that he made himself a little song about it:

“Kings and queens can never grow

Without mistakes to use as guides,

They help us know the way to go,

And gold within their heart resides.”

The fact that he had spontaneously referred to himself as a king struck another chord of joy within him and now suddenly beams of the sun shot through the trees so that with every step he took he felt as if he were on a stage in a grand spot light. And instead of feeling nervous to be on stage, he felt like he could play, even dance. And the dust particles danced. And the branches of the trees waved and danced. The birds caught up in song. And the path itself turned golden. And the roots from the trees lining the path were no longer obstacles to be avoided, but things to be marveled at and studied—for some of them looked like little bridges, others like monster’s arms frozen in the ground, others seemed like statues of snakes or dragons, or like sculptures of rivers.

“Indeed,” he thought to himself, “if God is King, then that makes me a Prince. And good kings always want their princes to have the kingdom.” And then he remembered the line: “Fear not, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”

And that was the end, and so the beginning began.

Beginnings

Posted on February 14, 2011 by Jennifer

This blog began over forty years ago. Of course, I didn’t know anything consciously about blogs when I was three, but what I did know is: I was a seeker. I sought after truth, safety, acceptance, love. And I sought through many avenues and passageways: religions, addictions, relationships, therapies, and many other places to hide. I say, “hide,” because when one is lonely, hurt, abandoned, abused, there is a yearning to find something, someone, someplace in which to curl up in and hide–anything to fill the hole inside, anything to make it OK, anything to oddly enough keep things the same. I sought through sordid places, made many mistakes and wrong turns. And after many years of searching and suffering, I had enough—I wanted a change—a new life.

I embarked on a path in which I didn’t have to be alone anymore. I didn’t have to hide anymore (unless I consciously chose to). I didn’t have to be slave to my feelings and negative beliefs and paradigms. This path brought friends, mentors, and spiritual brothers and sisters in suffering into my life. And slowly I learned to let them in.

Some in this fellowship studied and lived by the writings of Emmet Fox and the 12 Steps. I dove into these teachings out of sheer hopelessness and ended up learning to swim and play (and yes, trudge) through them—constantly discovering ways to apply them to my life. Today, there is hope. I have a deep and meaningful conscious-contact with the Wonder Child. I need never feel lonely again. The way has opened and I walk hand-in-hand with my fellow seekers. Creativity and intuition are part of my life now. And so is joy—the deliciousness of being alive.

One of these seekers suggested I start this blog as a way of celebrating, processing, and sharing my journey in contacting the Wonder Child. So here I am. And here you are. Everyone is welcome. There is room for everyone. For everyone has suffered. Everyone carries shame and guilt. Everyone carries pain and negative beliefs and self-talk. And yes, everyone carries within them the Wonder Child. Let’s embrace the feelings we need to embrace and move together towards our dreams, towards God, towards freedom–towards the Wonder Child.

The Wonder Child Blog

Sharing the Journey

Author Archives: Jennifer