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The first definition or name that God gives of God’s self in the Bible is “I am who am” (Exodus 3:14). There it is: I am existence itself. I am pure being. I am the deepest selfhood of all that exists. I’m convinced that when we can surrender to the Great I AM, the Great Universal Being, the great shared consciousness that we all are, God gives us courage to accept our own I am in all of its eccentricity and in all of its brokenness. Your participation in the Universal Being or I am-ness of God gives you the courage to hand back to God the only life you’ll ever have. That will be the most humbling and the most courageous act of faith you’ll ever live, because what you hand back will always seem so tawdry and insignificant. But it isn’t. It is precisely the handing back that makes it momentous.
I’m just this little Richard creature, this little moment of time that’s going to be gone in a few years. I’m so aware of what I’m not and of how phony I am and of how I say it so much better than I live it. I have a thousand reasons to reject myself and hate myself, and you do too. It’s really not enjoyable to grow in self-knowledge, because the more you know about yourself, the more you are not impressed! But as long as you’re being held and received by the Great I AM, all shame and unworthiness is taken away. We realize that this little I am that I am is what God has always loved anyway, even with all of its imperfections and silliness.
We participate in a universal, cosmic forgiveness for being who we are and for all of reality being what it is: so utterly ordinary and so chosen as beloved! “How can this be?” the ego shouts! That’s the entrance into what the Buddhists call the Great Compassion. Once you find this compassion toward your own little I am, tiny and broken and poor as it is, then you’re able to share compassion with everyone and everything. The important thing is the willingness to give back the gift that is you, not the perfection of the gift itself. Can you feel the difference? If you find this difficult, imagine that you love a little child. You do not want their perfect drawing or gift. What gives you joy is that they want to give it to you—and the expectant smile on their face as they hand you their scribbles, largely outside the lines!
Adapted from True Self/False Self, disc 5
(CD)
Gateway to Silence:
I am who I am in the eyes of God, nothing more and nothing less.
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