By Kevin Moore, writer of Christmas Tales, Quantity II
I realized to wish on the age of three, although I didn’t understand on the time that my mom was guiding me right into a lifelong dialog with God. As she moved by our railroad flat condo, I’d observe her, praying for every particular person whose title she talked about and for data and knowledge, which I nonetheless search now, though I didn’t perceive their that means on the time. This was just the start of my journey into what I now perceive as The Language of God—a singular and private type of communication that differs for everybody.
Once I was six, mendacity on the hood of a automobile, I found that you would communicate to God with out uttering a single phrase. The sounds of children taking part in stickball, skellsy, and hopscotch in my New York Metropolis neighborhood stuffed the air because the early autumn solar warmed my face. I drifted between wakefulness and sleep, experiencing a state of being the place one half of my thoughts rested whereas the opposite remained alert—one thing akin to the unihemispheric sleep of whales and dolphins. The voices and laughter round me appeared to fall like autumn leaves, getting ready me for an interior stillness I hadn’t recognized earlier than.
At that second, I didn’t have the vocabulary to explain what was taking place, however in hindsight, I acknowledged that I used to be meditating. Whereas prayer is a type of talking to God, meditation is a means of listening. In a world typically crammed with chaos, that was the primary time I sensed one thing far larger than myself—larger than my household, faculty, church, and even authorities. It was a common fact, a figuring out. There’s something bigger than all of us, whether or not you name it God, the Supply, the Universe, or by another title. The Nice I Am is all the time making an attempt to speak with us. Discovering your personal language, your distinctive means of interacting and listening to God is a deeply private journey that belongs solely to you.
Exploring this non secular language has been one of many best joys of my life. It’s a journey that nobody else can dictate for you—whether or not you discover it whereas tending flowers in your backyard, floating on the water, or sitting in a church, it’s about opening your self to that communication and really listening. My relationship with God has grown by practices like utilizing mantras, conventional prayers, songs, transcendental meditation, yoga, and the individuals in my life.
As a storyteller, spirituality is integral to my characters, as important as their eye shade or birthplace. Whether or not they’re launched as believers, atheists, or agnostics, the presence of God and spirituality is there, even in its absence. It’s about unfolding a personality’s relationship with the divine, whether or not that entails an awakening, anger, or emotions of abandonment. I’ve skilled all of those feelings in my life, but I proceed to hear and search connection. I’ve realized that God shouldn’t be a genie in a lamp, right here to grant our each want. Whereas the facility of prayer can result in miracles, they typically are available kinds we by no means anticipated however deeply want. In spite of everything, who is aware of what you want higher than God?
Discovering your personal language with God is a exceptional journey, one which has enriched my life and located its means into my writing. I take nice pleasure in weaving this non secular awakening into my tales, the place even essentially the most unlikely characters can expertise a profound shift, sparked by seemingly insignificant or extraordinary occasions.
Writing Christmas Tales, Quantity II allowed me to delve deeply into these themes. The Christmas season, with its wealthy significance within the Christian religion, provides an ideal backdrop for exploring life, love, and spirituality. It’s a time of giving and gathering, the place pleasure and magic mingle with recollections of the previous, each comfortable and unhappy. For me, Christmas has all the time been a season of heat and surprise, although tinged with sorrow, as my mom handed away two days earlier than Christmas throughout my teenage years after an extended battle with breast most cancers. Her loss profoundly affected my potential to totally benefit from the season till I had youngsters of my very own and re-awakened to my private non secular journey.
Christmas embodies hope, love, and renewal, making it a strong setting to discover these themes in my writing. My hope is that readers will discover themselves encountering these non secular truths in a means that feels genuine and life-like, not preachy. Whether or not in my Christmas tales or my earlier and upcoming books (The Ebook of Souls, Waking Sleeping Magnificence), I goal to awaken one thing in readers—be it a way of hope, a deeper understanding, or a renewed connection to the divine.
In the long run, it’s not simply concerning the solutions we discover but additionally concerning the questions we proceed to ask. Maybe the best lesson is that in looking for, we uncover greater than we ever imagined.
