Dancing With Our Shadows: Money Ghosts

Do you ever go back and watch our Sunday service? Or maybe you're new here and just learning about us. Either way, I encourate you to do so. Missing Sunday service, for me, means missing my weekly mindset reset, which I count on to keep me grounded and focused for the week ahead. While listening to the recording doesn't have the same energy as being in the room, it's the next best thing. Revisiting a talk when it especially resonates, or as a reminder, also helps the important parts stick.

So, on Sunday, Bridge Minister Rev. Michael Auch kicked off October's theme, Dances with Shadows, and our annual Pledge Month fundraiser by talking about the demons and ghosts we have around money. Appropriate.

We all have beliefs and behaviors about money, most often learned from our families, and when uncovered, we realize how they do, or don't, serve us.

I appreciate Rev. Michael's honesty and his willingness to be vulnerable with us. On Sunday, he said that CSL Ballard is a safe place, and one of few where we can be fully vulnerable. I feel that. There's something powerful about learning, growing, and practicing what we teach in community: meditation, affirmative prayer, gratitude, and exploring our inner worlds more deeply.

Rev. Michael and I agree that October is an especially good month to visit our shadow selves. With Samhain, Halloween, the Day of the Dead, and other traditions honoring ancestors and spirits, this time of year has long invited us to look toward what’s hidden, which is why it makes sense to look at some of our deepest beliefs, too.

We all have a shadow self, that part of ourselves we're not proud of, the thoughts and behaviors we judge as negative and would rather keep hidden, sometimes even from ourselves. Until we acknowledge and accept it, our shadow may shape our choices without our noticing.

Much of our shadow gets programmed when we're too young to question it. Don Miguel Ruiz writes in The Four Agreements that our beliefs about money, relationships, and community come from what the adults around us said and did. We also learn by watching, and by giving meaning to what happens without discernment.

We continually reinforce these beliefs until their weight forces us to look more closely. Rev. Michael said that's where the good news comes in. Some of our shadow started out protecting us, and some of it still does. But our demons and ghosts also invite us to go deeper, and sometimes, they kick us in the ass to find the light.

Dancing With Our Money Ghosts

Rev. Michael started by naming his own money ghosts: I'm not worthy. I don't deserve it. I'm not enough. He called them dance steps, and said he's really good at them. They're even better with a partner, he joked, because then we can feel unworthy together. When he asked who else knew these steps, hands went up. He thanked everyone. It helped him feel less alone.

Rev. Michael's ghosts were first planted when he was six. Until then, his family was active in the community, and his life was full of lessons and activities. Then his dad went to prison, though Rev. Michael was told he was in the hospital. The lessons and activities stopped, and he did what kids do: he made it mean something about himself. That's when he first believed he wasn't worthy. Close to three years later, his dad came home and told him the truth, which Rev. Michael called one of the most powerful gifts his father gave him.

Ernest Holmes taught that we attract what we mentally become and feel ourselves to be. So when Rev. Michael feels unworthy, guess what he finds? More proof that he's unworthy. I know this feeling. (Did you miss Sunday, too? You can watch the talk here.)

Over time, though, life brought him different evidence. At 13, someone paid his boarding school tuition. During the Vietnam War, a draft board supported him as a conscientious objector. To him, that was abundance, too, and proof he was worthy and enough. Later, he applied to graduate school at the University of Washington, one of the top five social work schools in the country. When friends asked where else he was applying, his answer was simple: nowhere. (He got in.)

Those moments didn't erase the old belief, but they caught his attention. Most of us know this dance, too. Evidence shows us we're worthy, we're enough... and then the rent, mortgage, or tuition is due, and suddenly everything we know about abundance and oneness with Source is hard to believe, let alone embody. I so get this right now.

They Don't Go Away, But We Get Better at Spotting Them

Rev. Michael confirmed his demons and ghosts haven't disappeared. But now, he recognizes them faster. When not enough shows up, he can say, "Oh, there's that ghost again." It doesn't throw him like it used to, and he can ask himself what he wants to do differently.

We all have ghosts

I have those ghosts, too. My mom raised me on her own, and there often wasn't enough. She made sure I was fed and clothed, and thanks to my grandparents, we had a roof over our heads. What got missed was an example of a good relationship with money. As I learned this, I got better at saving, but it can still be a struggle, and I have a lot of shoulds around money, and my worth. In the middle of a long job search, those ghosts get loud. Making peace with them takes work.

Rev. Michael said his husband, Scott, often reminds him how much he's acknowledged and praised, and that he can't seem to hear it. I get that. Depending on my frame of mind, I may or may not be able to hear it either, even when someone I love points it out.

How to Be a Ghost Hunter

Holmes also wrote that our old thought patterns cling to us with great tenacity, but because they're thoughts, we can change them. Rev. Michael asked: What if our new thoughts clung to us with the same tenacity? That we're worthy, that we're enough, and that we're all connected, to each other and to Source.

If only. New thoughts don't stick nearly as well as old ones, and that's partly how we're wired. Our ancestors survived by watching for danger, so our brains still notice the bad faster than the good. Psychologist Rick Hanson says the brain is like Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones. That's why the practices matter.

Rev. Michael shared some tools for ghost hunting:

• Come early on Sunday for the 20-minute meditation before service.

• Journal about what's coming up for you.

• Talk to one of our practitioners. (He can't figure out why people aren't lining up for this. Same.) And a note to self: it's OK to ask for help.

• Make something, or let music open you up.

• Give yourself credit when you do something well.

• Practice generosity, whether that's with money, kindness, or just listening.

A Morning Practice

Every morning, Rev. Michael writes seven things he's grateful for. Some mornings it's his candle and his cup of coffee. Coffee? Yep. To him, it's a miracle (me, too!). When we're grateful for something that simple, he said, we open our hearts to knowing we deserve pleasure, that we're worthy of it, and that we're prosperous enough to have it.

I'm taking that last bit to heart - that we deserve pleasure and we're prosperous enough to have it. My morning gratitude practice aims for 10 things, but I don't always feel it, so if I get to five or seven, that's pretty good. And, if you just start with three, that's worth doing.

Don't Do This Alone

Practitioner Ann Forest Burns opened the service by reminding us that ours is an optimistic philosophy, but not a happy-clappy one. With everything in our recent news, it can feel like history is repeating itself. As a whole, we don't always rise above our worst instincts. But each of us can raise the world by being our best selves, and by seeing God (Spirit, Source, Universe) in every face, even when it doesn't look like it.

She closed with Holmes: "It is right that we should be successful, for otherwise Spirit is not expressed." That ties back to Rev. Michael's talk. If Spirit expresses through us, then "not worthy" and "not enough" get in the way of its full expression. It's our job to be our best selves, and that's a good reason to go ghost hunting.

Rev. Michael called generosity a spiritual practice, which is a different way to think about giving during Pledge Month. Generosity with our money, our time, our kindness, and even our attention is one of the ways Spirit gets expressed.

Rev. Michael said this community is a place where he feels safe enough to be seen, and safe enough to take risks out in the world. That's why we come together, he said: to help each other recognize the dances we do with our ghosts, and to support each other in taking new steps.

At the end of the service, Jillian Harrison, from Ukelicious, said we have it really good here, that this place is magical. I agree. That's what community is all about. Here, we can show up as our authentic selves, be with what is, and know we're all loved and part of something bigger.

With gratitude,

Laura