You will know Mirabai Starr for her previous books (Wild Mercy, for instance), her work as a bereavement counselor, her online programs (see mirabaistarr.com), and her many guided in-person retreats and symposia. She’s also a scholar of the world religions and a former professor of philosophy and religious studies. This new book is her most important yet and could be summarized by the first chapter title: “Intention: Deciding to Be the Mystic You Already Are.”
Then she demonstrates how to do it — through chapters devoted to Attention, Surrender, Transmission, Connection, Feeling, and Unfolding.
Starr does beautifully what she’s been doing for decades: demystifies mysticism, showing how the mystical is human and ordinary, and how it can and should be a greater part of your everyday life. “You do not need to trek to a remote shrine in the Himalayas, enroll in expensive seminars, or convert to a new religion to connect with spirit. Your life is holy ground. And you are a mystic.”
This is an essential message for people today whose everyday experiences most often communicate, not holiness, but an absence of it.
Hers is a book for the Spiritual But Not Religious (SBNR) who still tend to call what’s spirit and divine, God. She defines early on a mystic as “someone who skips over the intermediaries (ordained clergy, prescribed prayers, rigid belief systems) and goes straight to God.” And then she also accommodates other metaphors and names for the divine such as Goddess and Real Thing.
Just because you’re SBNR doesn’t mean you don’t find riches to explore in the world religions, and Starr’s book has many quotations and references to historical religious figures such as Teresa of Avila and the Buddha, in chapter 5, for instance, where there are also sub-sections titled “No One Can Save You” and “Let Your Saints Fuck Up.”
The book is full of spiritual practices to try, including a writing prompt at the end of each chapter. These, Starr explains, are to encourage writing that is like extemporaneous, flowing prayer. “I recommend you set a timer for ten minutes and then blast off,” she advises. The first prompt then is, “I find the presence of the sacred hidden in…”
try a spiritual practice on transformation
Go Deeper:
One Love: Navigating Life by Heart: An e-course with Mirabai Starr to to help you find your way in the realm of divine love.
