(Question 2 on Hope)

You may also have experienced this kind of hope, (See https://contoveros.wordpress.com/?p=12505&preview=true) but not thought of it in those terms. Think of a time when you felt sure you were going to attain a lofty goal, even though the path to the goal was not apparent. That is the hope that comes from your being. Describe this feeling of certainty in your journal. – Deepak Chopra 21-Day Meditation Experience (Feeling Hope)

I was a buck private in training as a soldier in Fort Dix, NJ, when I had a vision or what Zen Buddhists call a “satori” or moment of clarity of what I needed to do with my life.

I needed and wanted to write a book.

Not just any book, but one where I was the hero. Well, hero may not be the right word. In the book, I was to be the center of attention while everything I’d write about would involve me and things that I had some sort of contact with. I used the model of the Bible as a guide.

I figured that the greatest book that there ever was should be the map and framework for my book. I’d be just like Christ, but not face crucifixion or circumcision. There was a driving force behind this idea. The idea stayed with me from the moment I was nineteen years old until I finished working for a living and found the leisure time to write about what I had discovered over the years.

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I didn’t know that I would write a book when I started dabbling with a Blog. I started writing at WordPress the same month that Uncle Dom had died in 2009, and I guess I haven’t stopped since then. The blog became my way of expressing what I was seeing around me and what was happening to influence me. I learned that most of what I was learning was something I already knew, but had forgotten.

I think that much of spiritual knowledge is like that. We don’t get our “smarts” from someone or some book out there. We get it from inside where true wisdom, love and hope resides. It takes some of us a lifetime, however, to realize that. All we needed to do was to become as silent as Dominick, smile, and hope to visit that wise child inside who has never left us. The child becomes the guide and offers us the inspiration to set goals and to eventually achieve them.

You’re reading this right now, and that goes to show you that I achieved another step toward my goal. You can do it once you identify your goal and stick to it as if your life depended on it.

Your spiritual life will depend on it for you to follow through for your salvation.

(For the first question on hope, please see previous post with a click below left.)

Editor’s note. Contoveros wrote two books, one a novel about Francis of Assisi, his favorite community organizer, and a second one on his spiritual journey to Ithaca, NY.