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Sheryl Glick host of “Healing From Within” and author of The Living Spirit Answers for Healing and Infinite Love a tale of healing, miracles, spiritual communication and a guide to your soul awareness is delighted to welcome Edward Viljoen author of Ordinary Goodness a guide to living a life with passion and happiness in the face of life’s daily challenges.
Sheryl and her guests share their experiences hoping to find a clearer understanding of metaphysical realities and further enhancing awareness of our multi-dimensional life force to utilize both our spiritual and physical qualities wisely. It then becomes possible to discover answers to age old questions such as “Who am I?” and “What is life all about?” Edward Viljoen author of The Power of Meditation and a senior minister at the Center for Spiritual Living in Santa Rosa, California will share with us in his new book Ordinary Goodness how caring about ordinary things leads to meaningful and extraordinary life experiences, and how faith is a muscle that must be exercised in order to truly appreciate the gift of life.
Edward takes us back to his earliest remembrances of his grandmother whom he dearly loves, and the values she shared with him that encouraged the work and values he holds dear as an adult. Edward’s grandmother’s willingness to be kind and listen to Edward, putting full attention on him, inspired him greatly. She was awed by whatever was in front of her, with smiles and delight, she would exclaim..”My goodness” and “Goodness gracious me” When looking at my report card or a new friend we brought into the house, she always gave us her complete attention. Another person that influenced Edward greatly was Meister Eckhart the medieval Christian mystic who wrote about spirituality in a way that reaches beyond a particular faith. He talked of a single component in people that he called the “soul” or “intellect” and thought of it as the foundation of humankind’s potential for noble actions and good choices. He urged us not to flee from the world to discover this spiritual potential, but to find and embrace it wherever we are, and in whatever we are doing. Spirituality is not something we find, but is permanently present waiting for us to express it. Whenever we turn to this light within us it will guide us to love, goodness in ourselves, and in others.
Edward wrote Ordinary Goodness for good hearted people who want to be reminded that despite all of the challenges in our world, and despite all of our progress in technology and communication, there is still nothing more powerful than ordinary goodness to connect us, to guide our choices, to deepen our faith in each other and to declare the world a beautiful place to be.
Sheryl tells Edward that she just saw a new movie The Shack taken from a book that she read years ago. Sheryl found the vision of the writer and movie makers to be very accurate in their artistic depiction of our higher world or other life after physical death. Sheryl says that as a medium connecting with souls and feeling the energy of peace goodness and love during her channeling of information from the Unified Field of Consciousness, she has learned that we all need to hold onto a vision of the possibilities of peace and love in the Afterlife, especially in times of loss. In the movie it seems the father who lost his young daughter has a near death experience, communicates with the various aspects of the Divine, and learns to forgive his daughters murderer, allowing him to release bitterness and find greater faith and greater appreciation of life. He learns that it is not God who creates the problems of the world nor is it anyone’s fault for the tragedies that befall us. A greater plan by an evolving Universal Force allows and accepts us all to find our way in a world that has both goodness and evil.
Caring about ordinary things results in extraordinary life experiences. Humans animals and plants flourish with regular expressions of care. It is possible to survive without it, but a caring touch, a sincere handshake, or a friendly hug does wonders because of the warmth communicated by such ordinary acts of kindness. Practicing kindness does not need to be any more complicated than a genuine smile, an act of service, spending quality of time with someone or engaging in a conversation and listening generously and will yield an extraordinary feeling of warmth and connection.
Sheryl says in her book The Living Spirit she addressed this form of caring in the following way and wrote, ”I have learned as a result of deep meditation practices and the messages received from Spirit that the giving and receiving of love is the major reason a soul welcomes a physical life. The giving of love may not necessarily include grand gestures: rather it is communicated through glances, words, music, undivided attention and concern, and the time invested in others. While this applies to romantic love, it applies to all forms of attachments as well. If we ask the Divine power to bring us greater love, then that is the first step towards achieving it.”
Awe plays a wonderful part in creating a more meaningful life. Edward believes in purposefully fostering the habit of being awe-filled and interested in life. Just the development of noticing people, places and events, and appreciating everyday things, makes you see life in a more interactive way and like learning to participate in activities or open yourself up to new experiences, you begin to actually enjoy life and experience it not in your mind only, but by being present and sharing love and happiness within and with others. You may begin by moving past restrictions or fears and say “Yes” to life and awe will certainly find its way into your view of life.
Edward mentions in Thornton Wilder’s Our Town Emily, a young girl who has died, looks back at life and asks…”Does anyone realize how wonderful life really is while they live it.” This thought made him think of his grandmother and how she seemed present for the world, engaged and endlessly available to be amazed and interested in life. Edward tells the story of finding a picture of his grandmother’s English boyfriend when she was 16 before she was to be married. Sheryl shares a coincidence with Edward’s grandmother as she usually does with her guests. Sheryl says, “In a box of mine is a photograph of my first boyfriend when I was sixteen a year before I met my husband. It made Sheryl smile to remember first love and the awe of every experience no matter if good or bad that we are meant to experience, ultimately finding the beauty and goodness of that experience.
There are ways to commit to awe You can commit by praising and nurturing the talents and contributions of each person in family or group. You can commit to treating people as valuable and precious resources and commit to resolving conflicts in gentle ways.
You can acquire faith even when you can’t seem to access it on our own by studying role models of faith kindness and compassion in people in your life or studying the life of historical figures, both present and past. You may attempt to duplicate their habits and attitudes in your lives which is a good way to become faithful. We don’t have to have complete faith in religion or scripture to begin to have faith in goodness and express goodness into our daily activities. A good way to develop faith is to hang out with people who have the kind of faith you want to acquire. We influence each other this way.
Sheryl agrees and suggests that “The Universal Law of Attraction” which states that “Like finds Like” and energy like a magnet draws people and experiences to our energy showing us that our thoughts and actions must be refined if we wish to eliminate fear, negativity, lack of hope and bring a greater quality of love joy awe prosperity and people who resonate in harmony with us into our lives.
It is possible to become more compassionate than you are. However, you may simply be out of practice due to the challenges of physical life. When we begin to slow down and pay attention to each person and event by listening carefully, we become more interested in learning about and understanding ourselves and often then we can help others as our natural born compassion within rises. Edward’s point of view is that reawakening compassion is enjoyable and good for your health and as it flows more, you will find more opportunities to awaken this divine state of your soul being.
Edward shares a very intimate and life awakening story when he was in South Africa as a young man, riding on a segregated train. Somehow a black man had gotten onto the wrong car and was beaten by some passengers and then taken away. A man seated near Edward sensed his discomfort with what happened and said abruptly, “You know what happens to people like you don’t you?” It hurt Edward to remain silent in face of this injustice and later he took a soul-searching into what had been done by failing to act. Edward realized he knew what he needed to do on that train. There were alternative actions to doing nothing. Edward wrote, “I have struggled with the inclination to live from goodness mainly because of how it has put me at odds with “the instinct of self-reservation”. I have struggled with speaking up for goodness when doing so would put me at odds with others and with the way everyone understood things to be. But when I have risked doing and saying what goodness would have me do and say, the results, while not always comfortable have been satisfying in a soul nourishing way.”
Sheryl tells the story of crying out while a man was being pulled out of his car in the street and the two men were beating him to death. Sheryl screamed “Stop it You’re killing him” in her loudest voice and they ran away. She didn’t hesitate or think of what harm might come to her. It was a moment of acting honorably and she didn’t think of the consequences, it was the courage and goodness of her soul reacting. Years later as Sheryl became an intuitive healer and medium she faced the challenges of disbelief and anger from many people who could not understand why she had embraced with awe, the realm of energy and afterlife.
Learning to stand up for your truth and to help others is a wonderful way to know greater love and compassion for life, and to honor similarities rather than the differences between people. It is the way for healing many injustices and finding greater awe and joy in life.
Edward goes on to show us we can show more compassion and love for ourselves by developing self-compassion and love which means to first be gentle with ourselves when things don’t turn out the way we hoped or when we feel we have made a mistake or done something we regret. It also means coming to know that there is no perfection in us or the world. We are continually learning new attitudes and skills and can only do the best we can in any given moment without expecting unrealistic results. It is in facing our fears and not allowing self-pity or regret to gain hold in our thoughts or heart: it is in allowing and accepting life to unfold and then to make choices that honor the best within ourselves. It is giving ourselves a break even though we think we messed up.
Some simple things we can do to infuse our lives with more goodness are to slow things down, take more time to appreciate the people animals and things in our life, appreciate people in the form of giving them a simple compliment, or writing them a note. Appreciating animals and things can take the form of treating them mindfully and affectionately. Other simple activities that infuse our lives with goodness (love) include being interested in people, asking them questions about their lives and listening wholeheartedly. Being less self-absorbed and more mindful of others, and most effectively, developing the habit of asking yourself when making a choice or decision, “What would goodness have me do, what would be most loving?
We can trust goodness in the face of life’s tragedies. The example Edward shares is from the writing of Kahil Gibran in The Prophet that reminds us that freedom comes not when we are finally without cares, but when we rise and break the chains that bind us despite the cares that girdle our lives.
Edward also mentions Reverend Frederick Emerson Small’s song “Everything Possible” which asserts the normalcy of diversity and affirms that no matter what you and I choose for our lives or whom we choose to love, love will not be withheld from us. Edward tells us the event that happened in the Amish community of Lancaster County Pennsylvania in 2006 when a gunman went into the school house and murdered many children traumatizing people all across the country, but the Amish community showed the nation how to forgive and accept God’s plan, and in believing in goodness and kindness found their way to ask the nation to forgive Robert the man who committed the murders and asked them to pray for his wife and children. The Amish people didn’t arrive at this incredible ability to forgive their children’s murder on that one day alone. They got there after many years of practicing their faith. Forgiveness is one of the cornerstones of the Amish people. We don’t know of anyone whose life has not been touched by tragedy in some way, yet there are those with great faith who are examples for us to emulate. Edward himself had family members murdered in their home, and a brother who was an epileptic and was developmentally challenged and came to accept the need to trust that all would be well according to a higher plan. Sometimes it is hard to see ordinary goodness if we are focused on the bad stuff of life. We cannot hold ourselves responsible for the whole world, but when we let go of grief sadness anger jealousy negativity, we allow the warmth and goodness of life to return and take us forward again.
Ordinary goodness leads to a redefining of Divinity as is evidenced in Rudyard Kipling’s poem If and Ecclesiastes 3:1… Goodness calmed me when stress and challenges of life seemed overwhelming and reminded me that some things have enduring values and other things pass in time.
Sheryl shares another coincidence with Edward who read the words of writers who sought to live with balance and goodness and Edward mentions the poem “Desiderata,” by American writer Max Ehrmann who instructed us “to go placidly through the noise and haste of the world and to remember that peace can be found in silence and in holding true to the quiet voice within that knows your personal truth and resonates with the wisdom of the Universe” By staying calm and coming to know that we are all interconnected we can resist separating ourselves by either religion, race, gender, or any other label of our ego physical life reality and return to our own divinity within. In each Reiki class Sheryl teaches, she and her students read “Desiderata” in order to establish a bond with Universal love and cooperation and set forth a conscious awareness of the lifestyle and commitment of a Reiki trainee.
Edward Viljoen (full yoon) author of Ordinary Goodness has offered readers beautiful endearing ways to develop and appreciate kindness compassion and love in order to live a purposeful life empowered by hope and sharing many ways to deal with the struggles of depression and addictive tendencies.
We have discussed themes involved in altruism, integrity, good values, and a code of conduct all which change as events and the many people who inhabit our daily life experience their own encounters with human and physical challenges. We have discovered that if we value caring for others and in turn get to appreciate the goodness within ourselves, we can handle daily life in a more positive and hopeful way, respecting others and being kind. These continuous ways to reach out to the world and share a better reality of light and decency make us role models for the next generation and help us to lead a meaningful life serving others, and in that way serving our own desire to be happy.
Edward and Sheryl would ask our listeners to join us in a walk, holding hands and being joyful about having a physical life in the first place. Finding hope no matter what challenges face us, and sending ordinary goodness kindness and love out into the world, inevitably, bringing about the changes that conquer fear and limitation allowing harmony, balance and peace, into an ever changing world community.
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