God through the peephole

There is a peephole on the door of my apartment. What is it there for? To see who’s knocking at my door, of course. Well, I’ve only been here for a month so I haven’t had many visitors yet. So my peephole has taken on a whole different purpose lately; to try and catch a glimpse of my neighbor. I’m not really sure why, but I’ve developed a sort of obsession about the person living next door. I guess I’m just curious about the people that surround me. In my building, there is one long hallway with smaller hallway shoot-offs along one side. These smaller hallways have two opposing doors. The one on the right is my apartment; the one on the left is hers. So, when I look out the peephole in my door, I have a direct view of hers. I hear her come and go; sometimes in a phone conversation, sometimes with visitors and sometimes she just slips away in her apartment and I don’t hear another sound.

I’ve developed this game, a sort of secret spy, private-eye am I. I hear her leave with flip-flops on a 50 degree day. So, naturally she must just be running down to switch the laundry around or check the mail because who in their right mind would wear flip-flops on a day like this unless they were coming right back? Right? I must be right. Lo and behold, she returns a few minutes later with fabric softener in hand and I catch a small glimpse. Yes! I was right! How smart am I? Anyhow, it’s gotten ridiculous lately; I hear movement outside my door and I try to make it to the peephole before the door to her apartment shuts. I hardly ever seem to make it, which is probably why the obsession continues.

Ok, you get the picture. So, I had this realization today. In my spiritual classes and group meditations, we’ve been talking a lot about the priority of focus. In order to reach self-realization, the focus should be first on God, second on God in self, and third on God in other. God-self-other. So my realization was that I had been putting “other ”first. And that if I had that same obsession and curiosity about God, I would probably be free! Free from my patterns of separation and live in accordance with Divine Love, Wholeness and Oneness with all of creation. This obsession that many of us develop throughout our lifetime is usually what keeps us from being free. Unfortunately, the languaging of society tends to teach us that image and identity are the most important things. And, really, image or identity doesn’t exist without a comparison to other. We are “other” obsessed.

So, with this in mind, I am changing my focus. What if my third-eye is the peephole to my self-realization? If I even caught so much of a glimpse of God through my third-eye peephole, then life as I “know” it would be changed forever! So here I sit in my apartment adorned with pictures and figurines of the likes of Ganesha, Buddha, Kwan Yin, Jesus, Amma, Radha and Krishna, Saraswati, Lakshmi...you would think I'd be reminded every second of the day as to where my focus should be; not to mention all the unseen beings that are just waiting to support me in my awakening. I’m sure that someday I’ll actually just knock on my neighbor’s door, introduce myself and end the obsession. But, for the moment, God is knocking. I think it’s time I catch a glimpse through the peephole.