Unveiling The Splendor Within

A Spring message to my family @ Unity Kitchener, and to others...

Perhaps you're like me and you're terrible at math. I've always been bad at it. Give me history, english, even geography, but please no math. And yet over the course of my 32 years I've become pre-occupied with addition. Let me explain. I grew up believing that who I was wasn't good enough. I was taught that something was missing, that I needed something I didn't naturally have in order to complete me. Thus the addition commenced. Maybe you can relate. I tried a creedal religion, I tried "the right beliefs" (whatever that means), I tried prayer. All of these things were an attempt to complete me. I am glad that I said goodbye to that way of living, and that eventually I found my way to Unity. But I must ask myself, have I replaced one set of additions for another? Am I still trying to become something better, more acceptable? It is easy to fall into, even as someone who loves Unity. Are you like me in that you read all the self-help books, say countless prayers, recite affirmations and denials, attend all the services? These things are not bad in and of themselves, of course not; I am glad for them. But they must not become additions that we use in order to become better or more acceptable to Spirit or to others. For, my friends, each of us already has a radiant splendor within us, from the time that we are born - yes, even before that! This is one of the key differences between Unity and many other faiths. There is nothing that we must do in order to "be better" or more loved or more worthy. Life is not an arduous journey in which we endlessly search for an answer that we do not have. Rather, all those self-help books, those prayers and affirmations, and those services, they are tools we can use to uncover the already existing magnificence within. Once we realize deep inside that all we need is already within us, everything changes.

Blessings of love and peace,

Mark Andrew Alward
Secretary, Unity Kitchener