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There’s something grounding about faith, and I can’t quite put my finger on it. Once it gets even a small foothold in our hearts and minds, it leads to all kinds of unimaginable outcomes. Once we’re allowed to experiment with the idea that we have value, that we are destined for better things, that we are allowed to have hope or believe in real love or look forward to our futures, we start operating with a little bit of certainty in those outcomes. We start standing a little straighter, our shoulders out, our chins up, our heads held high. We are allowed to feel inspired, to be ready for a challenge, to embrace a setback, or be vulnerable with a loved one, no matter the outcome, because faith in Good or whatever-you-want-to-call-it allows us to imagine things will all work out in the end.

I am two years into imagining what faith might look and feel like in my life, and eleven days into operating as if it is my birthright as a human being on this planet, mainly because at this point, why the BLEEP not? And things have gotten a little messy, y’all.

Most spiritual practices warn us about such repercussions. Once we see the light, it’s hard to sit in the dark. Once we allow ourselves a little hope, its hard to remain hopeless, because hope becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy moving in the right direction. I want to say that growth and change are hard, but I’m not even sure that’s true anymore. I think we make life far more difficult than it needs to be when operating from a place of fear, control, or anger. Now that I have a glimmer of what life is like with belief or faith in positive outcomes, in Good of the highest order, I look back at some of the trials in my life and think, My God, I made it so much harder than it needed to be.

I sympathize with that other, younger self and I sympathize with others in the thick of it, slogging through life resisting love or help or hope. There is great relief in letting go and letting God, as they say in the recovery world. There is great relief in just seeing what happens and pressing ourselves to assume the eventual outcome will be good, even if it’s a year in the making. There is great relief in “allowing” or being like water as is written about in the Tao Te Ching. There is just so much promise in allowing ourselves to focus on positive outcomes.

I am clearly no expert. I am still very much a spiritual novice, but I’m actually starting to enjoy it. I may even get a bongo drum (that’s a joke… or is it?).