Pathways

Faith is like climbing a mountain.

There are many paths that lead to God. Depending on one's point of origin, a certain path may be easier than another. It does not matter which path one takes; it only matters that one is climbing toward heaven.

Like the trails that lead to the top of a mountain, the path one chooses seems the best, the smoothest, the fastest, the most direct route to the summit. Sometimes one begins to think that it is the only route to the summit. Actually, each path is a mix of easy and difficult, smooth and rough. Each path may lead to the top.

The higher one climbs on the mountain, the more one finds that the different paths converge. Although each faith, each religion, emphasizes a different part of the Truth, the more one understands God and the Universe, the more one realizes the importance of all the parts, all the messages, and the more universal Truth becomes. By the time one reaches the top of the mountain, all the paths have converged. All paths have become one.

Through history there have been many trail guides up the mountain. Trail guides are our teachers. Sometimes, the fact that a teacher knows a pathway, leads some to believe that the teacher is God. These trail guides are not God; they are teachers who point the way to God.

Some have claimed to be trail guides without really understanding the mountain. Some have led followers up blind alleys. Some have even led them off the face of a cliff. Some of these false guides are blind, some are self-deluded, and some are evil.

It is important to keep looking to the top of the mountain. It is important to ask yourself whether the path you are taking is truly taking you closer to God. It does not matter if you take a well-worn path, trodden by many others, or if you strike out alone cross-country. What matters is that you keep climbing.

Life is Full of Choices

Throughout our lives we continually make choices. Some choices are explicit, such as buying a new car. Others are implicit, such as not making a decision until a deadline has passed. Both are choices and equally binding.

We choose our actions and beliefs just as we choose the clothes we wear and the books we read. Through time, our actions and beliefs move us in the direction we really want to go.

Where we really want to go and where we think we want to go are not necessarily the same thing. Each reflects differing commitments. Some of these commitments are transitory and some are fundamental. The question to ask ourselves when making a choice is whether this course of action will further the commitments that we have chosen our lives to be about.
At each decision point, we are fully free to make whatever choice we want to make. All decisions are made with free will, even though we sometimes like to believe that we “had no choice” or were “forced to choose” something we did not want.

Not all choices are pleasant. Some are very tough. Sometimes the most important decisions in our lives may seem like choices between “bad” and “worse.” They are still choices. Destiny may exist, but it does not choose for us. Our choices reside within ourselves; they are not made by fate and they are not made by the circumstances in which we find ourselves. Circumstances influence our choices, but they do not control them.

This does not mean that we are responsible for other people’s choices. Other people are not responsible for our choices, and we are not responsible for theirs. We are, however, fully responsible for the choices that we make.

Growth occurs both when we consistently make choices in alignment with our chosen commitments and when we raise our awareness of the times we have made choices that are not in alignment. The important thing is that we learn from all the choices we make. The process of learning to make decisions in alignment with our chosen commitments is the heart of growth. As we learn to surmount obstacles, life presents us with new and different challenges. If we fail to learn how to surmount obstacles, life will present us with the same challenges again and again.
We are at our strongest when we accept our choices without regard to the outcome. If a decision turns out to have consequences that we did not intend or anticipate, we can learn from it. If the choice is aligned with the direction we have chosen, we can learn from that also.

Our lives and our growth are determined by the choices we make. We have full freedom in making our choices and we have full responsibility for the choices we make.