So often we face situations that are baffling, confusing or unwanted. Yet, in every one of them, there’s a special, perhaps unique invitation. Our focus today is the important question: What’s the invitation in these situations, events and circumstances that enter our lives?

In fact, every moment in life is an invitation! Our soulful self is always inviting us to fuller life, richer growth, dynamic expansion and further awakening. We’re programmed to look at these circumstances through the eyes of our judgments (“This isn’t good.”) and desires (“I don’t like this.”), but we can also view them through the eyes of our wise and knowing soul. Here, we discover that every circumstance carries a special plan, divine design and sacred invitation.

I’d like to invite us to two approaches that can help us enormously in grasping the invitation of any circumstance: openness and ownership.

To help ourselves be open to the invitation, we might try simply sitting in the middle of our soulful center and uttering the words: “I am open and receptive to the truth and wisdom of this moment.” Also, it can be most helpful to own that I am an intimate part of the creation of every circumstance in my life. So, to assert that “Nothing is ever done to me” and “I co-create every element of my life, even if it doesn’t feel at all good” can prepare me to meet and grasp the deeper invitations with clarity.

I now invite you to two profound invitations—present in every situation in which you find yourself. Side by side with the obvious invitations, your soul is always inviting you to:

•    become the very creative power that brought forth each circumstance; in short, you are the very power of all creation.

•    love every part of the circumstance; feel the love in the mystery; find the love that carries the gift.

I close with the following prayer and blessing for you:

May you always be blessed with events whose beauty you can see!

May the circumstances of your life bring you the power and love you deserve! 

May your life know firsthand the gift that each moment offers you!

May you always treasure each creation as a loving kiss of nature!

May each moment invite you into yourself more fully and wondrously!

May every condition of life bring you the peace that already lives in your core!

May the divine source ever support your receptivity to its sublime invitations!

May all the invitations of your life add up to one grand explosion of love—forever!