Free Will Under the Veil

I remember a friend saying to me, many years ago, when I complained for the twentieth time of feeling trapped in a relationship with an irrational and sometimes violent boyfriend, "We always have a choice, even when it seems as if we don't. We always have a choice."

We are constantly choosing, constantly telling the world of how dear to us our freedom is, yet constantly struggling under the weight of the necessity of choosing.

This beloved Earth realm both cradles and challenges us. It is the realm of choice-making and is not now, nor ever has been, a place for the faint of heart or those lacking courage. The veil of separation from ALL-That-Is allows us to make choices from our seeming separateness. This means that our consciousness hides from itself its essential Oneness with the ALL to allow itself to choose and choose and choose again - and always the choice is quite a simple one; love or fear.

It takes many forms. Inclusion or exclusion. Acceptance or judgement. Yes or no. Sharing or hoarding. Opening up or closing down.

I'm not speaking here so much about the choice of what to wear today, or what to eat for lunch, although even in such mundane and seemingly petty choices there are shades of love and fear. When we choose, for example, based on what others might think of us, we generally tend to be choosing fear over love.

There is a good deal of use made of the word 'intention' these days, and when we intend, we are also choosing. When we decide, we are choosing. Don't let the words get in the way. This instead of that. Him instead of that other one. These are choices. Will I reply to that email? Opening or closing? Acceptance or judgement? Love or fear?

When I intend to open myself and offer myself in service to the ALL, I choose love. When I sink into uncertainty and feel anxiety about what awaits me in the days and times to come, I have a choice - love or fear. The exquisite perfection of the veil's unknowing is that my choice must be made from this limited perspective. I do not know. I cannot. Those among us who claim that they do know are mistaken. None of us know what will come. God doesn't know what will come, for we are creating the future even now. It is not a done deal. And all that we are and all that we do has an effect on what will be and what will happen. So we are free to choose, under the veil of unknowing, of forgetting who We are, and the choice to love is made in trust. That's the only way it can be made because we do not know.

And the choice, made in trust in the moment, will be made again and again and again by us. Every moment, we have a choice. We must make it. Love or fear. Trust or all that is not trust.

Trust in Gaia. Trust in ourselves. Trust in the process. Trust in God.

Not easy, this. But perfect. For as we choose, we build this reality moment by moment. We are creators of our world, seeing only what lies directly before us, almost blind within our not-knowing. Trusting. Choosing love. Or not. That's okay; all of our choices create the world here under the veil.

Sonnet #3

When to this world some madness seems to cling,

Now words of war, now hatred, violence bring,

Or to the world itself seems damage made,

Now dam-held flow, now fear where children played,

Then ours is not to weakly weep and sigh.

The answer known from birth until we die,

That all that seems without is yet within.

And all the world's our body, sky our skin.

And ours a power larger than the sun -

To speak our will, for by our will be done

All works of Earth, of rock and wall and gate;

The world expressed - our saying is our fate.

Thus, speak from deep within of glorious day.

We make the unending world by what we say.

 Free will under the veil is an undertaking that defines our world and ourselves. We created it. We chose it and we choose and choose within its perfect framework, just as I carefully chose each word in that sonnet. We and our works are not perfect, but are always perfectly imperfect, beautifully limited. Enjoy the view from under the veil. And choose well.