RECONCILIATION
By
William Cottringer


There are two distinct halves to our lives: Our personal development and our spiritual development. What we don’t know is that these two “halves” are actually occurring simultaneously. They are really just different sides to the same coin.

During our personal development journeys we create chaos—we explore our minds’ wants to find happiness and success. During our spiritual development journeys we restore order—we become uncomfortable enough at our lack of progress in our personal journeys to try something else. We start paying closer attention to our souls’ needs to restore order to all the chaos we have created.

There are no chaos-creating prescriptions because they are part of the chaos we create; but there is a valid, simple order-restoring prescription. Resorting order basically involves reconciling seemingly opposite things. During our chaos-creating days, we have dismantled life and divided the whole world into this and that—“right and wrong, good and bad, yes and no.”

Sooner or later though, these things need to be put back together again and made whole with our heads, hearts and hands. The separation creates too much loneliness. This wants to be part of that and that has something to add to this.

There are little things, medium-sized things and very big things that need reconciling if we are to achieve the order that leads to our genuine personal and spiritual success. The profound realization that these two journeys are really one and the same is often what stimulates the reconciliation process.

LITTLE THINGS

Here are a few of the little things that we separated during our chaos creating days, which occupy our attention in the beginning of the second half of our order-restoring lives:

 The battle between our heads vs. our hearts.
 The difference between what we want and what we need.
 The dilemma of paying attention to ourselves vs. others.

Reconciling these little things is where we get the practice to move on to the next challenge in our personal and spiritual development, which we gradually begin to see as occurring at the same time.

To reconcile our heads and hearts all we have to do is to realize that our heads were designed to uncover the facts so that we can decide with our hearts. The difference between what we need and what we want is merely a matter of being honest about which choices are just a little more difficult to make now and will result in more gain in the long run. And, we can’t begin to understand and do any good for others until we do the same for ourselves, first.

MEDIUM-SIZED THINGS

After a certain amount of success in reconciling some small chaos, we are ready to move up to the next level of difficulty. The medium-sized things we need to reconcile are mostly social divergent problems, which are actually incapable of permanent resolution. These things really test our creative intelligence. A few of these are:

 Freedom vs. equality.
 Justice vs. mercy.
 Republicanism vs. democratic ways.

These divergent problems each turn into something undesirable if taken to the extreme; consequently we must figure out how they can co-exist cooperatively, without favoring one over the other too much, and getting too lopsided.

To be successful in this reconciliation process, we have to learn to check our ego at the door and not take our role too seriously in these sorts of activities. Both sides of the pendulum require equal air time and respect. The goal is to strive for balance.

BIG THINGS

As we begin to be successful at reconciling little and medium-sized things creatively with our heads, hearts and hands, there is a surprise waiting for us—some really BIG pairs of opposites that are so big and so far apart that we can’t see the whole picture all at once. This presents a particularly difficult challenge. The gigantic things we have to somehow figure out how to reconcile are:

 The disturbing sense of separation between us and God.
 The “war” between the material and spiritual worlds.
 The difference between the conscious path we follow in exercising our free will and choices, and the vague path of predestination that is always nagging us in the back of our heads.

On the deepest rational level, these seemingly polar pairs are really just opposite sides of the same coin. Their differences are only illusional because we can’t see the whole 360-degree picture all at once. We eventually have to discover this reality, but we can’t think, feel or see our way through this chaos. We just have to be patient and collect all the life experiences that help bridge the imaginary gap between these last big things and make their reconciliation and unity real and alive for us.

Ironically, we have unknowingly uncovered many clues that can help us with this last challenge, during our earlier chaos-creating days. Sometimes we don’t need any more new information; we just need to re-use and re-work what we already know in new and unusual ways. Given the fact that we are usually already three-quarters to where we are going before we know our destination well enough to have a name for it, it might be time to slow down and take inventory. Where have we been? Where are we now? Where are our feet headed?

Final reconciliation of the bigger things is slow going. We have to see, hear, feel, experience, understand, accept and practice these reconciliations. And then we have to have conversations with others to verify the truth of our findings. Maybe this is our main purpose for being here? I am asking for a second opinion, to determine if my own reconciliations are real order or just another form of chaos.


William Cottringer is a Business Success Coach, College Teacher and Writer from Collinsville, IL. He is also author of You Can Have Your Cheese & Eat It Too. He can be reached at ckurtdoc.charter.net