The Call
What happens if we get what we think is a call, and then sometimes along the way it seems to fizzle? What happens if things don't work out the way we had anticipated? We may think of a summons or a call as an event. It happens at a certain time in our life and then everything from then on is an unfoldment of that calling. However, a call is more like an ongoing dialogue. It is a relationship that grows and changes and matures throughout a lifetime. It can be clear and resonant at times, and silent and subtle at other times.
"There have been times in my life- sometimes very long periods of two or three years-when the energy of my calling seems to fade away and even disappear altogether. Then I am on my own, and I need to discover my connection with a deeper level of calling, one attuned to the primal call, the background call, In effect, I have to create my calling out of the love and wisdom and integrity of my own being."
— The Call
Long Live Play!
Unfortunately, in our society we tend to equate play with frivolity and irresponsibility. There certainly is play that is like that, but such play is usually a form of escape and disconnection from the world. True play, such as we see children engaging in, is the opposite: it takes them into the world in a way that honors imagination and the power of the moment to reveal new and unexpected things; it is an encounter that opens the door for emergence. It connects them with what is and with what might or could be. True play is a doorway into the future and into possibility and newness. Therefore, it is certainly a doorway into any and all New Ages.
"Play can be loving and wise; indeed, love and wisdom are at heart playful. In answering the call to build a New Age, learn to be playful, not as an escape but as an engagement."
— A Pilgrim in Aquarius
God Is A Lap
If I had to sum up my mystical theology in four words, they would be these: God is a lap."
— Parent as Mystic, Mystic as Parent
Blessing
A blessing is much more than just an act. It is an affirmation of our interconnectedness; it is the creation of an opportunity for the power of that connectedness to pour through our lives and the lives of others. So in practicing the art of blessing, we are really practicing being connected. We are practicing how to discover and express those parts of ourselves that innately understand that connectedness and the wholeness that emerges from it.
"In that context, whatever form it may take, blessing is at the heart of any spiritual practice. For ultimately all such practices are about remembrance, connectedness, wholeness, being a participant in the flow of love that weaves the world together from the most numinous to the most material. They are not about how we may develop ourselves or become holy, saved or enlightened. Spiritual practices are about how we give of ourselves, sharing our life, our presence, and our substance so that the body of creation may be seamless and the infinite may be reflected in the presence of the finite."
— Blessing: The Art and the Practice
Mystics and Parents
It may seem strange to equate mysticism with parenting. The one seems so transcendent and pure while the other seems so mundane and — with four kids at least — messy! But mysticism for me is not only giving one's attention to transcendence, for the love and creativity that is at the heart of the sacred is not found only in some higher, numinous realm. It is found all around us, waiting to be recognized and nurtured, and a mystic seeks to find these qualities and the presence from which they emerge, in the places and people that make up our world. A mystic to me is someone who aligns with the transcendental in order to serve and assist the incarnational. A mystic seeks the presence of God not to escape the world but to be more present in the world in a loving and empowering way. And nothing draws you into the world in a loving and empowering way more than learning to be a good parent.
"Of all human relationships, surely parenting is one in which we are called upon to re-create the primal universal dynamics of co-creation and emergence, love and adventure, discovery and delight, caring and compassion. It is the relationship in which we are most expected to embody the presence of the Beloved.
"It is a path of resonating with the primal spiritual forces that wrought the universe into being.
"It is possible to find that path in some solitary mountain cave or in the midst of a monastery. But I have found it by being a parent."
— Parent as Mystic, Mystic as Parent
Blessing a Stone
I was asked once to bless a stone. As I remember it was just an ordinary stone, the kind you could pick up from the ground in almost any field. As I held it in my hand, I took myself into my blessing space and began to love this stone. I admired it. I attuned to its hardness, its earthiness, working my own way down into it through my love for it. As I did, the spirit of the stone began to open and I found myself in touch with what I could only describe as the spirit of the earth or at least of its mineral nature. It seemed I could trace a line of connection from that stone right to the earth's molten core. At the same time, another line of connection ran out into space, into the ubiquitousness of the stone throughout the universe, In short, this little stone had become a portal for me into the vast community of spiritual beings who embodied the qualities of the mineral kingdom and its molecular and atomic structures throughout creation.
"Holding this stone in my hand, it felt just like a small living creature, particularly as I felt the energy coming from this larger community of 'mineral beings,' and I proceeded to bless it just as I would any living being. I attuned as best I could to the larger community from which is seemed to come, inviting its combined energy into the process, using myself as a vessel with which to receive and focus the blessing. Then I added my love and energy and enfolded the stone in the resulting mixture of energies, asking only that the essence of the stone be blessed so that its own spiritual evolution might be heightened in whatever way was appropriate for its highest good."
— Blessing: The Art and the Practice
