Dear Svetlana
I am happy that you had a nice time on your vacation.. I have been busy here working on websites and helping people through counseling and listening. I am happy that you had some time to meditate in the shade and watch the dance of the sun upon the water of the black sea. I understand when you talk about your life and your fears, about "work going on in its usual way". For many people that is how their lives will be. Some people will live our their lives in a small village or big city and often will feel a deep sense of desperation. They will reach for what they can grasp and if they are not successful in first attempt, they will feel that perhaps what they are reaching for is the impossible. The greatest work that we can do is exploring our inner selves in order to be more available to other people in our lives. As we explore our inner selves and reach out with love and kindness to those around us we find a deeper sense of joy in our life. Love begets Love and that which we do is usually reflected back to us. You write of challenges that you are facing. The food and the heating oil and the fears of the people as they move through the streets. Some are seeking solace in the Vodka bottle and waking up as empty as the bottle they were drinking. The challenges that we face are usually our greatest lessons in life and enable us to see deepest within ourselves. Our choices as we face our challenges shows reveal whether we will live through love or fear. We are blessed when we allow ourselves to truly be ourselves and live our lives according to some greater vision of the future. Day by day we encounter people in our lives who share with us some aspect, some part of themselves. If we are able to look deeper, we can see the flower, or we can see the beginning buds of the flower, or the seed from which the flower will spring forth. The water that nurtures the flow is love. The light that feeds the flower is Spiritual practice. As love and Spiritual Practice are combined we blossom forth into our fully realized selves. We may be in a big city or a small village. We may be in Russia or Germany or the United States or we may be in South America or Africa. But those seeds are there. The soil can be enriched through positive interaction with others in our community. A life is lived and shared and though far away, you and I share our hearts and minds. To the extent that we share our ideas, we share our minds, to the extent that we share our feelings about those ideas, we share our hearts. The growth of friendship is the growth of mutual acceptance and communication. I am happy that you had a good vacation and I understand that you are worried about the coming winter. I will do what I can to send you a book to help you with your English and to help you with your goal of deepening your heart and being a better teacher to the children in your town. I believe in you. YourSpiritualFriend.
