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| Mission Unfinished |
A Mission Unfinished
As I write this I’m sitting in the TV room at the Salem Mission shelter, finally getting a chance to write about why I chose to come here in the first place. Yes, as strange as it may seem I did choose to come here knowing this experience would be difficult. You’re probably wondering who in their right mind would want to be homeless? Well I’ve always had a place to live but rarely have I felt at home. I’ve moved so many times and since I’ve experienced sleeping outside or in homeless shelters when people ask me where I’m from and I just tell them, I don’t really know. To fully understand what motivated me to come here to this shelter you’ll have to be patient and not rush through to get to the point.
A couple years ago I had an experience that completely changed my view on life and the world around me. Ever since that experience I haven’t been able to live a normal life and as much as I tried to, the more out of place I felt. Some call it an epiphany or a spiritual awakening and both may be true but this vision quest has led to inspiration, self-discipline and a life of poverty and celibacy. Many nights of prayer and fasting had brought on a new understanding of my place within the cosmos. I began to have visions of a world to come and it didn’t look good. My dreams became more symbolic and lucid and my daydreams grew even more intense. These dreams have inspired me to finally become interested in education but outside of traditional learning institutions. I was motivated to self educate and hit the books harder than I ever have in my life. I was never much of a reader because I didn’t really retain the information but suddenly I could make sense of what I was reading. I used to just read and not comprehend the text very well but that all changed after this awakening.
I always had a passion for writing in my early teen years but I just gave it up. There weren’t many people interested in reading what I wrote and I felt that was why I wrote to begin with so I figured if people aren’t interested I don’t want to write any more. I had a lot of things I wanted to share with the world but it didn’t seem like anyone cared. A handful of people did encourage my writing and said that I was ahead of my time but I still stopped writing. I was told I talked too much so I gradually became a more reserved and quiet individual. Well, something became instilled in me after experiencing these visions and I felt like I was being instructed to do the following. Read, learn, live and write. This time it didn’t matter if I wanted to write any more or not, I felt I had to. I’m not an eloquent speaker or professional writer and I don’t use the most proper grammar when writing. One thing that’s for certain though is I write and speak from the heart. Something told me that I had to write to live.
Since I made a decision to detach myself from the material possessions that once enslaved me I began my spiritual quest. I knew it didn’t matter what anyone told me about finding a “regular job” because I knew I needed to live among the people I wanted to help. The problem, or so it seems, is the fact that I don’t have a clue how to help the poor if I’m living in poverty myself. This may just be a paradox that I’ll come to understand at a later time. I know I can rise from this on my own because my track record proves that I have overcome many obstacles in my life. I’ve been in the gutter before but this quest is one for the people who experience a form of injustice you couldn’t understand fully unless you also experience their injustice. My visions had instilled in me a number of ideas to help solve some of the world’s problems and I know my time will come and people will listen. These visions sparked something inside me and led to my mission in Salem to continue working on a book and documentary. To find out what the documentary is about you will have to wait and see, or hear.
I have never worked on anything like this and had no idea how to begin such a project but I have very good intuition and things are being revealed to me gradually so I trust in this mission. I do believe that this documentary will have a positive impact in some people’s lives and inspire the poor in spirit to never give up the fight when their purpose is just. That’s my intention anyways but I do have a habit of screwing things up when I start something with the best intentions.
Over the past couple years my spiritual path caused some family and friends to become distanced from me but it’s also led me to meet some very interesting and inspirational people where I least expected it. The hardest thing to accept was that this spiritual path was going to be a solitary one. I felt I had to come to the Mission to help the poor not with money but maybe with some guidance and direction. Unfortunately I don’t know how I’m supposed to do that because I have no training in how to teach or mentor and I still feel like I have much to learn. Besides, who would have faith in a poor mans words? People want solid proof. Who would follow the guidance of a man who appears to have no direction at all? I know I wouldn’t prior to my experience but now I’ve learned so many valuable lessons from such a diverse group of people that I’ve learned to listen more than teach. I realized that a lot of people don’t want to be told what to do or what not to do; they just want someone to listen. These lessons have inspired my writing and poetry and have guided the direction of the documentary. I’m learning that timing is everything because inspiration comes when you least expect it. Trust and believe that.
There have been a number of random situations when people have heard me speak just a few words and have since asked me for advice on various things and I was caught off guard. This was my affirmation that timing is everything and that if I’m going to offer anyone my words I can’t force it. No one likes a teacher to just run into their life and bombard them with information and advice. If people want guidance or advice they can ask but there are some people who don’t think anyone cares enough to listen so they don’t ask. I do wonder how many of them take the advice and how many people have benefited from it. If they listen but don’t apply I wonder if I’m wasting my time and theirs or was the conversation still supposed to occur for some purpose unknown at that particular time. I don’t want to preach to people but I would like to inspire, uplift and motivate others to see the light within themselves and develop more appreciation for the world we live in.
Sometimes I wish I could just wave a magic wand at people and cure their sadness and anger but I’ve realized that there are people who don’t want to be healed of their misery. Some feel it’s deserved and some can’t imagine any other way of being so they just hold on to the belief that no one cares about them and there’s no reason for them to care about anything. People have grown so accustomed to suffering it’s become the norm for a lot of people. This really upsets me and I don’t think this is how it should be or will always be but until God instills a spark in more people to bring about this change I’ll just play my part within the cosmos. I just hope I’m doing a good job but I’ll probably continue to make more mistakes. The only thing I can do is learn from them, remember them and improve my life based on that knowledge. If I see others going down a path that’s familiar to me, I guess all I can do is offer some words to reflect on.
As I said before, I don’t see myself as a spiritual mentor because I am still a student of life but since I do live a spiritual life sometimes it’s hard not to want to teach others how to live with less stress and conflict. Then again, I have nothing so who wants to take advice from someone with nothing to show as solid proof of success. Right now I’m being reminded of a recent conversation I had with a beautiful girl who lifted my spirit one morning by telling me she admired me and called me a hero. Now don’t get it twisted, I don’t allow compliments to instill me with pride because my ego was deflated a long time ago but it made me wonder why someone would think such a silly yet flattering thing. I don’t mean to call her silly but I think it’s silly that someone would look at me like a hero. I mean, who have I saved and what have I saved them from? People might listen to my advice but if they don’t at least try to apply it, my words are like seeds being sown on unfertile ground. What does that say for me, the one sowing the seeds? Who have I inspired or motivated? To the best of my knowledge, the answer is no one. I’m just a young man with a vision and a passion to bring it to fruition but if I am a teacher then where are the students? I once heard a proverb that said when the teacher is ready, the students will appear and when the students are ready, the teacher will appear. So I guess at this stage in my quest I’ll just be patient and follow Gods guidance.
I knew that I was going to learn many great things and meet many great people on my journey and I have. I think maybe this is all what was supposed to happen. I think I may have been guided to the mission to continue to learn as well as teach others who want to learn. After all, each one is supposed to teach one right? My question is, what do you do when someone doesn’t want to listen? Do you keep trying to guide and lead by example or move along to the next person willing to learn? That’s where I’m stuck. I see so much potential in many lost souls but I can’t force them to take my guidance even though the guidance I speak of is from God. I fear being a hypocrite by going against my own advice but I have succumbed to the reality that I am a human as long as I’m in this body. Haven’t we all been hypocritical of our words at one time or another? All I can do is keep walking the path I’m on and if anyone’s behind me my advice to them is just watch your step.
In the event that I should fall, I want people to know that I never claimed to be perfect, nor righteous. I simple want to be remembered as a person who cared about peoples well being, even though I don’t always explain best it in words. As a matter of fact I had a conversation with a local artist about realizing that I have a good heart but a vile tongue. What I’ve learned from this experience is what I don’t want to become and how I don’t want to live. I believe that someday if not already I will make a positive difference in the world. I know I can’t force it so until the time comes for me to make that difference, I consider my mission not impossible, just…unfinished.
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Posted by JustBe777 on 2009-07-18 16:28:52 | Rating: | Views: 35
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