A spiritual mentor of mine mentioned a friend (or student) of hers that was experiencing a lot of financial hardship. Her friend was in jeopardy of losing her home (and she had kids to provide for too). She and several others helped to bail her out, but the dire situations just kept recurring over and over.
The mentor said this woman was seeking to find fulfilling spiritual work that was important to the world, while missing completely that each and every moment and every activity is already sacred. Paraphrased she said, "When you stop searching for power, there's power there. The power comes when there are no ordinary moments--even peeling potatoes [is important]."
This insight was very relevant for me as I've experienced a vicious cycle of poverty in the last few years--including homelessless. Although things are slightly better, they don't feel quite right (right as in a natural grace rather than a stressful hustling, scrambling sensation.) I too felt that I dividing everything into those bins, "This is God, this isn't. This is Life, this isn't. This is holy, this isn't. This is me, that is not me."
There is an inclusiveness that's nondual and nondivisive when you really grok Ho'oponopono at the level of your Being. And that's how it seemingly 'works.'
I felt with all the economic woes in the world at this time it was also a potent time to apply Ho'oponopono and share that here. The crucial step (I believe) in Ho'oponopono is to acknowledge that the energetic pattern isn't out there, in that poor suffering person and surely not I. And neither is it strictly personal. It's a holding pattern of energy that became cyclical and stuck (in comparison to fluidity of a current), somewhat like an eddy in a river. You're just helping to release it into fluid movement again through the embrace of acknowledgement: I'm sorry, please forgive me (for previously ignoring or excluding, consciously or unconsciously), I love you, thank you.
A day or two after hearing the "peeling potatoes" story I shared above, I opened a beautiful book called, "Love Poems from God," edited by Daniel Ladinsky straight to this page:
It helps,
putting my hands on a pot, on a broom,
in a wash
pail.
I
tried painting,
but it was easier to fly slicing
potatoes.
I looked up who wrote the poem. It is a female Sufi mystic and poet from the eighth century, Rabia of Basra. Rabia's profile in the book also shared this hint and poem that speaks to healing and Ho'oponopono:
When God said, "My hands are yours,"
I saw that I could heal any creature in this world;
I saw that the divine beauty in each heart
is the root of all time
and space.
Art credits: Young Girl Peeling Potatoes, by Samuel Albert Anker