Sight Is A Gift

Neither sensory empiricism, nor pure reason, nor practical reason, nor any combination thereof can see into the realm of Spirit. ~Ken Wilber, The Marriage of Sense and Soul, p. 174

We are only given to see and understand the realm of spirit, the inner truth of everything and every event. ~jpc

Sight is a gift, not our accomplishment. Namaste.

image: www.the-manifest.org/ blog/2004_05_02_archive.html

Sunday Dialogue (XII)

Journer: Does everything have meaning?

Nez: Yes. Meaning is everywhere.

Journer: How do we see it?

Nez: With the inner eye.

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image: satyajitray.ucsc.edu/ films/innereye.html

Once You Are Real

Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand. . . . [O]nce you are Real you can’t become unreal again. It lasts for always. ~Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit, via Megha Merani

Do you identify with this passage? When did you become “Real”? ~jpc

O to delight in our eternal realness. Namaste.

image: www.community4me.com/ Velvetveen.html

Self-transcendence

Self-transcendence makes possible awareness, freedom, and relatedness. ~Paul Tillich, Systematic Theology, vol. III, pp. 234-237

One of my most effective spiritual practices is what I call the periscope: it rises out of my head and allows me to look down on myself, helping me transcend those times when I’m obsessed with myself, my situation, my emotion, etc. It helps me be aware, related, and free – to be in my situation but not of it. ~jpc

How wondrous is our consciousness in response to spirit. Namaste.

Profound Practice

Every goodbye is a practice run at death. ~John Updike

Those going off to serve in Iraq know this. Many of those in New York City who said “goodbye” to each other the day of 9/11 did not realize this. “Goodbye” means something. ~jpc

O not to be unaware about the gift of life. Namaste.

As Good As It Gets

Recite the 23rd Psalm and accept the way it is:

I am cared for
I am sustained
I am at peace
I am restored
I am just right
I fear nothing, not even death
I am never alone
I am comforted
I feast with all creation, even my enemies
I am blessed and fulfilled
I am always at home
Goodness and mercy are mine forever

This is the way it is when I'm led by spirit. Namaste.

"Was the Garden of Eden Grass?"

“The empty front lawn requiring mowing, watering and weeding previously on this location has been removed,” reads a placard set amid veggies in oval planting beds fronting the street. ~Patricia Leigh Brown, “Redefining American Beauty, by the Yard,” nytimes.com, 7/13/06, via Michael Dowd http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/13/garden/13lawn.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

The article starts with a 7th grader’s essay and lays out how the grass lawn became tradition. Tradition can be changed, especially for ethical reasons. ~jpc

What is the Garden of Eden today? Namaste.

image: archrecord.construction.com/.../ FritzHaeg.asp

Rebirth

I have no desire to be reborn until I have exhausted every possibility of this life in this time on these few hundred square miles of earth I call my home. . . . ~The Unpublished Letters of Edward Abbey, “Cactus Chronicles,” orionmagazine.org, July/August 2006

The way I say it: rebirth is an ongoing creation, or a re-creation. It’s happened to me hundreds of times. No, thousands. ~jpc

Everyday with spirit, and many times I know it. Namaste.

image: "Rebirth" www.goshen.edu/~kevin/newdimen/newdimen.html

Sunday Dialogue (XI)

Journer: Where do we come from?

Nez: From the universe, of course.

Journer: How do you know?

Nez: As one of my students* said, “The [universe] story has its imprint everywhere. . . . If you do not know the story, in a sense you do not know yourself; you do not know anything.”

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*Thomas Berry

image: one of the 31 panels of the Universe Story Exhibition embroidered by the Kopanang Women's Group in S.A. http://www.faithfulfools.org/kopanang_gallery_1.htm for gallery of their universe story panels

The Beginning of Truth

All great truths begin as blasphemies. ~George Bernard Shaw

Many would say that “God loves all equally” is a blasphemy. Is this “blasphemy” becoming truth for more and more? Yes. To say one can be closer to spirit than another is not true. To say God loves one more than another is not true. ~jpc

Let God be God. Namaste.

image: religion.info/english/articles/article_227.shtml

Blessed Are They

We don’t have to make money, only a difference, and particularly in the lives society counts least and puts last. ~William Sloane Coffin, Jr., via Megha Merani

Who are the endangered these days? ~jpc

Blessed are all, for they shall inherit the earth and hopefully restore it. Namaste.

image: www.metaphotography.com/endangered.htm

Now Is the Time of We

At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally. Least of all ourselves. For the moment that we do, our spiritual growth and journey come to a halt. The time of the lone wolf is over. Gather yourselves! . . . All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. ~anonymous, via Roseanne Sands

Some say this is from a Hopi Elder's speech, but that is refuted online. Anyhow, it’s a good word. ~jpc

Now is the time / We are the ones. Namaste.

image: www.heretikinc.com/WeAreTheOnes_wh_bk_reg.htm

Eternity Now and Then

God is real to me but not definable, only “experiencible.” However, that is what gives every moment of life both its depth and its ultimate meaning. Life is a tremendous and wonderful adventure that touches eternity time after time. . . . ~John S. Spong, via Richard Kroeger, 7/12/06

We live in eternity past, present, and future, because that’s when eternity chooses to reveal itself, time after time. Eternity is a state of being as well as a memory, experience, and promise. ~jpc

Eternity is real. Time is man-made reality. Namaste.

A Billion Will Die

Tobacco alone is predicted to kill a billion people this century, 10 times the toll it took in the 20th century, if current trends hold. “In all of world history, this is the largest train wreck not waiting to happen,” said John Seffrin, chief executive officer of the American Cancer Society. ~usatoday.com, 7/10/06

I joined some fifty colleagues during the summer of 1984 in a pact to stop smoking. It took their support and six months of Nicorette gum for me to do it. What should fifty of us make a pact to do today? ~jpc

Don’t burn your temple down. Namaste.

image: www.appstate.edu/.../counseling/QuitSmoking.html

New Cosmic Grooves

I am endlessly compelled by the notion that higher stages or levels do not preexist, that is, they are not “given” but are literally created by brave individuals who actually venture into new, uncharted territory, laying down “Kosmic grooves” that others follow, which eventually become actual new structures or stages. ~Andrew Cohen, “God’s Playing a New Game,” WIE magazine, Issue 33

I be darn: the future is not preexistent. As we honor the past, we bow to that which transcends it. We are on the future's cutting edge. ~jpc

Always creating the future. Namaste.

image: blogs.zdnet.com/ emergingtech/?cat=5

Sunday Dialogue (X)

Journer: What are the three greatest qualities of us humans?

Nez: Consciousness and decision . . . and what do you think the third is?

Journer: Maybe creativity?

Nez: Try care.



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image: Sir David Attenborough with baby saltie www.abc.net.au/science/scribblygum/january2004/

Heart Over Mind

[Meditation] is not an intellectual affair, but when the heart enters into the mind, the mind has quite a different quality; it is really, then, limitless, not only in its capacity to think, to act efficiently, but also in its sense of living in a vast space where you are part of everything. Meditation is the movement of love. ~Jeddu Krishnamurti, yakrider.com, 7/7/06

We’ve all had this experience of the heart taking over our consciousness. I saw through baby Clara’s eyes her delight in the music and fireworks of the July 4th TV special. As we danced with her in the midst of it, she radiated that "different quality" of heart over mind. And we caught what she had. ~jpc

On a clear day. Namaste.

Sustaining Relationships

Most human societies, especially the so-called primitive or traditional societies, have been organized . . . on natural and therefore decent principles. It is only in modern times . . . , that is, in the last five thousand years, that the drive to dominate nature and human nature has perverted and now threatens to destroy . . . sound, conservative, sustaining relationships. . . . ~Edward Abbey, The Unpublished Letters of Edward Abbey, “Cactus Chronicles,” orionmagazine.org, July/August 2006

“Sound, conservative, sustaining relationships” in this evolutionary context makes sense. Reckon the first peoples were maybe more evolved? ~jpc

We pray for decent principles. Namaste.

image: www.aboriginal.sk.literacy.ca
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Our family celebrates the full and completed life today of Tom Deal. All is well, all is well.

Violence Only Provokes More Violence

Gandhi has been my hero. I’ve read a lot by him and about him. His 200-mile march to the sea stands out. They went to make their own salt to protest the salt tax. At every village more villagers joined the march. I know I’d have joined if I’d been there. What I remember most is that they had to cross a bridge and the British were waiting on the other side. Ten people went across and the British mowed them down. Ten more went across and the British mowed them down. The next ten went across and nothing happened. The British could not keep killing these nonviolent people. If they had fought back with sticks, stones, or whatever, I am convinced the British would have continued to mow them down. Violence only provokes more violence. ~reflection by Phyllis Hockley, EarthRise reflection

O for nonviolent ways to change the local-earth community. Namaste.

Feel Okay About Yourself?

Start as a human being in this culture, then . . . toss in being gay, toss in being HIV positive, toss in a religion that assures you God hates you for all of that – and then look me in the eye and tell me you can feel okay about yourself. I dare you, I just dare you. ~Ken Wilber, “Integral Spirituality in Real Life” http://www.beliefnet.com/story/167/story_16709_1.html

Feeling okay about myself is not something I just decide, or something I hear on a feel-good commercial, or something I say a hundred times as I look in the mirror and expect it to be so. However, sometimes it does happen that I do absolutely receive that truth from somewhere – that I am okay just the way I am – and if I really say yes to that truth . . . WOW (translated: Watch Out, World)! ~jpc

But it doesn’t hurt to rehearse that truth. Namaste.

image: http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~san/tenors.html

Ancestors of Every Color and Creed

[E]verybody on Earth descends from somebody who was around as recently as the reign of Tutankhamen [ruled Egypt 1333 BC]. . . . [A]ll of us have ancestors of every color and creed. Every Palestinian suicide bomber has Jews in his past. Every Sunni Muslim in Iraq is descended from at least one Shiite. And every Klansman’s family has African roots. ~citing Steve Olson, Mapping Human History (2002), usatoday.com, 7/2/06, from AP, 7/1/06

Who am I? In large part, I am my relationship and disrelationship to all of these ancestors and their descendants. ~jpc

Family divided against itself cannot thrive. Namaste.

Agents of Spirit

How do we highlight that the essence of facilitation is not method but spirit? In some ways I found the question confusing because it never occurred to me that facilitation was not about spirit. ~Larry Philbrook, Taiwan, EarthRise reflection, 7/1/06

If participants see a new vision of possibility, discern the underlying contradictions that suppress freedom, and plan for ways to release creativity and care, then that kind of method and its facilitation are attuned to spirit. ~jpc

Agents of spirit are everywhere. Namaste.

Sunday Dialogue (IX)

Journer: How do I become a spirit giant?

Nez: Spirituality is not just daily practices. You must walk through fire and survive it.

Journer: So it’s about my real life?

Nez: Of course. One* of my followers said, “No one can go to school for you. No one can take a bath for you. No one can die for you.”

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*Søren Kierkegaard

Visionary Care

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is to receive over $30 billion from Warren Buffett, joining the fortunes of the first and second richest in the world. Is this good to be focusing such wealth on global and environmental needs – sustaining, extending, and adding quality to life – while at the same time modeling for other foundations and the rich to do the same? Could be a trend. Bill insinuated in a news clip they are dedicated to ending HIV/AIDS and malaria. Where does such visionary care come from? ~jpc

O to be universally and strategically focused in our care as well as daring. Namaste.

Dance, Dance Wherever You May Be . . . on the Journey

Dance like no one is watching,
Love like you’ll never be hurt,
Sing like no one is listening,
Live like it’s heaven on earth.

~William Purkey, via Jeanette Stanfield – quote she read at husband Brian’s memorial service

What a testament. Namaste.

A Prayer Worth Praying

It is a prayer I still say for America today – a hope that we can live with one another in a way that reconciles the beliefs of each with the good of all. It’s a prayer worth praying and a conversation worth having in this country in the months and years to come.

~Barack Obama, 6/28/06, via Dick Kroeger http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2006/06/obama_on_faith_and_politics_an.html

“Reconcile the beliefs of each with the good of all.” This is at the heart of our pluralistic experiment in democracy globally, trying to consense on the good of all across our wild spectrum of beliefs, religious or not. Ain’t it hard, ain’t it hard? ~jpc

O to be one people in our diversity. Namaste.

You Must Go On, Till . . .

When you squeezed the agonizing creatures down in the ship, or when you threw their poor mangled remains into the sea, had you no relenting? Did not one tear drop from your eye, one sigh escape from your breast? Do you feel no relenting now? If you do not, you must go on, till the measure of your iniquities is full. ~John Wesley, Thoughts Upon Slavery (1774)

Sometimes we think John Wesley was a neurotically pious, little man. But he put a new face on piety. With his deep sense of equality he would be hard on his Methodist pastors and congregations today. Now as then, mostly the outcasts of society would flock to hear him preach. ~jpc

We would be relenting. Namaste.

Democracy

Democracy is an infinitely including spirit. We have an instinct for democracy because we have an instinct for wholeness. ~Mary Parker Follett, The New State (1918)

Where do we get that instinct if not from the way life is? We are driven to wholeness. Our founding fathers articulated this well, and in spite of our poor self-image these days, the USA manifests and demonstrates wholeness pretty darn well, but not as it shall be. ~jpc

We celebrate our wholeness today. Namaste.

Living Mission

We attended the “Profound Humanness” event in Asheville on Sunday, set up by the Baileys and Wainwrights and led by Charles Lingo and Marie Sharp (below), using Vance Sherwood Engleman’s book, In Search of Profound Humanness. About thirty were present, mostly from the Jubilee Community. In my group, Lori, a professor from an Oklahoma university, and Rowan, a 20-something doula, decided that the items in one cluster had to do with “living mission.” They said, “Vance is dead but his life mission, represented in his book and in our dialogue here, goes on.” Living mission is endless: Vance’s mission of nonviolence grows out of Gandhi’s mission and all those before and all those who follow. ~jpc

The “crimson line” winds on. Namaste.

top image: The Hindu, India’s national newspaper, as Vance makes comments about India’s future and announces his book: http://www.hindu.com/lf/2005/01/16/stories/2005011600320200.htm

Sunday Dialogue (VIII)

Journer: Why isn’t there more peace in the world?

Nez: Are you at peace?

Journer: A little, I guess.

Nez: Then share your little peace and watch it grow.

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image: Heroines of Peace, the Nine Nobel Women (some of you have met the last one). More at http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/articles/heroines

Training Exotic Animals

In this article* I became aware that I am an “exotic animal” whose behavior can be changed in kind. The article has to do with marriage – and a whole lot more. See if you agree that it could help you toward happier relationships. I read it to Lynda and she laughed and pondered hard. Who knows what she might try next. ~jpc

*Amy Sutherland, “What Shamu Taught Me About a Happy Marriage,” nytimes.com, 6/25/06 http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/fashion/25love.html?ex=1151467200&en=144468fd91d40925&ei=5087%0A

O to use hundreds of affirming treats. Namaste.