Here is an excerpt from my book, The Silent Master: Awakening the Power Within
An Open Mind
This requires having an open mind. You may have to say, “I don’t know all that I am to be, but I know what I am not, and I desire to be rid of my old self. I am willing to try something new.”
I call this openness forming an empty cup. This means you are willing to regard your body and your life as an empty vessel ready to be filled with the new. The Bible expresses this idea in this way:
No one sews a patch of un-shrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the new piece will pull away from the old, making the tear worse. And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, he pours new wine into new wineskins. (Mark 2:21-22)
These words tell us that transforming your life does not mean patching up or fixing the old. It means starting over. It means getting a new vessel to hold a new you. You need a new mind and a new body to create a new life. Sometimes in my classes I actually bring a full cup of water to class and show my students what happens when you try to pour new water into a full cup. The full cup simply overflows and cannot hold anything new.
I also say have a large empty cup! Let your cup be ready to hold many new things. If we focus only on looking for a pearl, we miss the diamond at our feet. It’s good to have a specific goal, but also be willing to receive all kinds of new ideas, new feelings, and new visions. The only way we can ever truly learn something is if we are totally open and receptive. The greatest obstacles to our learning are our own doubts, suspicions, and self imposed limited judgments.
Having a large empty cup means you are willing to fill it with anything and everything good, not just one thing. You may start on a self discovery journey to lose weight, for instance. But if you limit yourself to just that you may not let your spiritual growth open other avenues for you. In the process of losing weight, for instance, you may develop interests that remind you how much you like reading. What may have begun as a journey to lose weight could end up being a journey to become the librarian you were meant to be, and had always wanted to be.
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