Sunday, December 20, 2009

Playing With Maya



Life is a game, a dance, a play in which we are the willingly fooled participants, and as agreed, we have forgotten all of this so that we may play the game of remembrance.
Imagine the universe as a living entity.  You can visualize it as an actual deity, such as Brahma (the Creator), while you, the earth, and other aspect of our reality, are but a small part of this larger, living whole.  We are like the little finger of Brahma.  Is the little finger not a part of Brahma too? Yes, it can act independently and unaware of the greater body of which it is a part, but just because it does not know, does not mean it is separate.  This is us.  We are unaware of the larger consciousness of which we are an inseparable component, but that limited perspective does not create an actual separation.

Maya, my six year old, is home now on Christmas Break from school.  She is distracting to have around, and I told her she needed to go outside and play with our border collie Chloe, so that I can have a few minutes to write in peace.  I just heard the front door open and Maya say, "Come Chloe!" to bring her back inside after only being gone from my awareness for a couple minutes.  My immediate reaction was just to yell back, "Maya, stay outside!" And the door slammed shut as she retreated back out.  To me, this is a perfect example of how we live in our 3D reality.  The Maya, or illusion, is scurrying all around, but we want even the idea of it to be hidden so that we may get on with our oh-so-important tasks at hand.  But are they really that important, all that stuff we fill our time with?  No.  It's all just a game, with an end goal of awakening, with no winners or losers, or first place.  And how we play the game, the journey from start to finish, is completely up to us.  I'm going to end this diversion now; I've got a puppy and my Maya to play with.  This hand of Brahma is going to throw a Frisbee.

Friday, December 18, 2009

CONCIOUSNESS RISING: Autopoiesis, Yoga, and Psychotherapy for Personal and Global Healing



I will be on a panel discussion at the Association of Transpersonal Psychology's annual conference in February 2010 with Babalola Chris-Rotimi, PhD and Tina Benson, MA.
Our panel will be:

CONCIOUSNESS RISING: AUTOPOIESIS, YOGA AND PSYCHOTHERAPY FOR PERSONAL AND GLOBAL HEALING

In this panel discussion you will hear from three different practitioners; a spiritual healer, a yoga teacher, and a psychotherapist about how these modalities can and are being used to create Self realization and bring healing to a world in crisis.  Babalola Chris-Rotimi, Ph.D., will briefly explore the concept of the Autopoiesis Theory of living systems, applying this theory to the idea of God as such a living system, share some thoughts on how God seems to be undergoing its own evolutionary process through the ages, and finally relate all of these to personal and global healing.  Marisa Smith, M.A., will share how as an ancient science of personal growth and the lived experience of spirit, yoga is helping to heal the Western psyche and the epidemic disharmony of life without inner knowing. Tina M. Benson, M.A., will be looking at the role of the pyschotherapist in guiding clients towards a transpersonal and transcendent experience of their own divinity.  She will also be showing a short film entitled, What Matters Most; a compilation of voices expressing the human longing for remembering each other and ourselves as expressions of the divine. 


This is sure to be an incredible event with many other inspiring speakers and discussions.  For more information, visit the ATP website.  


Hope to see you there!

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Futuristic Love

Friend's of Bill and I, Karen and Jason, have created a monthly art collaborative here in Boise.  Each month two words are selected at random with which we budding artists use to inspire a creation in the medium of our choice.  For December, the words were Love and Futuristic.  Me being a writer, Bill encouraged me to write a blog using those words.   

Here goes...

Love Futuristic: Futuristic Love

Love is an energy, a felt sense, an experience of the present moment that opens us to the unknown, to the infinite, to the formless, compassionate feeling of unity and interconnection that is at the heart of our being.  Yes, our actual heart-centers.  If you were to pause now and bring forth a feeling of love, it wouldn't begin in your little toe, or in the core of your brain, though it can become whole body.  It would arise from the center of your chest, from your heart.  Close your eyes an breath into the love; feel its warmth melt the walls around your heart.

Love is singular, love is plural, an love is universal. Each is like a rung in a ladder, for it is impossible to realize universal love without first attaining self-love.  Loving oneself, or another, requires courage, forgiveness, acceptance, and a sense of humor.

Love is a verb, not a thing.  It cannot be possessed nor contained.  It is a process that we confuse with an object or event.  Life enlightenment, it may be realized, but it is not an end in itself.  It is the cocreative practice of making choices and acting from an open heart: to seek unity instead of division, to give freely, unconitionally, without expectations or boundaries, to see and be seen, as a mother gazes into a child's eyes for the first time.  

Love is our highest potential as human beings.  Feeling, deep , true, feeling is the challenge of our day.  So often we escape to intellectual descriptions because we truly o not know from experience the sense of embodying the explosive passion of this formless energy.  Return to the place before your birth, to the place of nonplace, nontime, free from judgment, where your soul merges with the infinite ocean of pure consciousness. 

The future never arrives.  You are always right here, right now.  At least, your body is.  Your mind is the ultimate time traveler, never lingering too long in the present.  It races from memories of the past to desires, hopes, and worries for the future, Out of a fear that it must always be prepared, to be on-guard.  Out of a disconnect from the ground of being, it creates the grand illusion of control.  We must learn to be comfortable with the unknown, for it is all we can truly know.  Let go, and be free.  In the free fall our wings expand.  Taking ourselves lightly allows us to soar.

Futuristic is that which might be, a vision for the future, an ideal projection from where we are to where we are going.  In the future we can hope to love more, to give more, to be more accepting and with open arms embrace from our authenticity the authenticity of another, shadows and all.

Compassion comes from knowing oneself at a core level.  From witnessing one's own shortcomings, errors, misdeeds, and disappointments can one know the struggle we all go through in living.  We are courageously doing our best...for what?  To be loved.

As Albert Einstein said, "A human being is part of a whole, that we call Universe - a part limited by time and space.  He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something seperate from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness.  This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us towards our personal desires, and to affection for a few persons nearest to us.  Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embreace all living creatures and whole Nature with its beauty.  Nobody has been able to achieve it completely, but striving for such an achievement is a part of liberation and the foundation for inner security."

Plant the seeds of love now, in the tilled soil of your soul which yearns to connect.  The future will bear the fruits of your efforts, for love is never wasted. 

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