I am what i believe

“Your beliefs become your thoughts

Your thoughts become your words

Your words become your actions

Your actions become your destiny.

Mahatma Ghandi,” he said. “There’s more, but I can’t remember it all.”

                                Louise Penny, A Fatal Grace

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It is true to say that our beliefs are revealed in our actions

Which means of course, that our actions reveal our beliefs

It is easy to say one believes this, or that

“I believe in Love”

“I believe in Jesus”

“I believe in life”

But words are words, and are the least trustworthy form of communication

Actions?

Well, they are concrete.  And they are what they are.

We generally can’t take them back.

And they speak a thousand words

If I want to know what another person is really all about

If I want to know what I am really all about

Then behaviors may be the key

Instead of asking”What did they say?”

One can ask, “what did they do?”

and seek to find the values and beliefs

that drove those actions

What kind of values and beliefs drive

Violence?

Abuse?

Exclusion?

What kind of values and beliefs drive

Generosity

Kindness?

Inclusion?

Where does one have to be coming from

To cage children?

To exclude another from one’s church?

To hit a spouse?

To get arrested for protesting ?

To gut climate control legislation?

To give to a cause?

To be accepting of all (in behavior not just words)?

It is not infallible

We are complex creatures

But our body or work shouts loudly

About who we are and what we believe

Here are the things

I believe I value

Justice

Equity

Grace

Generosity

God ( who is Love) and God’s way (which is Love)

I believe that we are called to protect the vulnerable

To lift each other up

To make sure we all get there (where ever “there” is) together

With no one, if possible, left behind

I hope my actions reflect this

I suspect they sometimes do

I also suspect they sometimes don’t (I am merely human)

My prayer for myself

Is that I will have values that honor my divine DNA

And that, as I connect with the Sacred within me.

I will live like a Sacred child

Each and every day