I had hopes of a different kind than the reality that presents itself.  I am still furnishing the final details of my newer office space, yet it does not quite capture the place from which I had to move, which makes me feel a bit wistful, with some sadness.

I think individuals have commented positively on the space I am in now, and although it does not capture what I had, it is a positive something new, with more creative input from me than the place I had just found almost five and a half years ago now, content with how it was.

I think it is important to share this bit of personal information here at the beginning of this post, because when it comes to helping others on their paths, certainly for someone who might be reading this right now, it really comes down to just you and me, regardless of the space in which we find ourselves.

So the question comes to mind:

Who are we?

If I am perfectly candid, then I will say we are full of the potential for healing, defined as a connection which allows one to realize essential wholeness.

I can never do anything to improve upon your natural state of being. I can only help you allow this to come forth, where healing in this context means knowing and experiencing in this state, where whatever conditions you find yourself in, physically, mentally, in whatever way, you still feel yourself, and know yourself, to be all right.

I am someone who cares deeply for this connection of healing, for my own life path as well, a path of being with and in the moments, however they may be showing up, yourself being someone searching for this place of being and being all right also, which can be accessed in any moment, in any state.

Perhaps this sounds a bit philosophical, but it represents the truth as I know it, which has been uncovered in different ways in Western psychology.

I am someone whose best guess to contribute in the world has been psychologically, informed by what I could say are my spiritual roots, or the essence of my being, really no different than anyone else's essence.

I am to allow this being-ness to come forth, and I know you are here to receive some of this, realizing it for yourself.

Who are we?

We are two beings being together, and I think the essence of this is healing.

During this changing of the seasons, I thought it appropriate to share a letter from long ago, from a sannyasin or monk of the Ramakrishna Order to a student in California.

Letter excerpted from the book, Spiritual Treasures: Letters of Swami Turiyananda (edited by Swami Chetanananda).

I hope you enjoy, and enjoy the season.

"Rishikesh
17 February 1914

Dear X,
The life of renunciation is the only life that can make us truly happy. No other life can ever do so. It is certain that one day we shall have to give up everything whether we want to or not. It is much better to give it up gladly and freely before we are compelled to do so. But if one cannot do that, the next best course is to turn everything over to Mother and abide by her decree. Know her to be the only guide in life under all conditions. Pleasure and pain pass away. They do not last long. We gather knowledge through experience; and by not identifying ourselves with pain or pleasure we gain freedom. Be always content with what Mother ordains. She knows what is best for us. Such a life also brings peace and consolation; and then the world can do us no harm.

You are Mother's children; you need not be afraid of the world. Be devoted to her and she will take care of you. She alone is Real. All else is vanity and vexation. Did not Jesus say, 'What shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world, and lose is own soul?' Mother is the Soul of our souls. If we have her we no longer care much for the things of this world.

The world goes on its way and will continue to do so for all eternity. But he who sees Mother in everything and knows for certain that it is all her play will have rest for his soul and peace within. May we see her hand and guidance in everything. May she bless us.

Yours in the Mother,
Turiyananda"

The subject of this post, I find this to be so important for living, to not try, to not try as we might normally do, to be able to surrender to these moments, for it is in them we find renewal from the efforts we would normally expend, from whatever we have set out trying to do, to spend perhaps wasted energy on moments better spent in this mystery.

We are renewed and made whole in these moments.

We may find answers we were not expecting or awaiting.

We cannot carry on in life without this mystery or what it represents.

Why not honor that which we do not know, or partially know, as if hidden in veils, rather than struggle with the shock of ignorance or cluelessness that continues and always surfaces as a part of life?

Surrender, and honor this mystery.

We may give it names, but the mystery remains, and so shall we, in more peace, in more alignment with our path as we give mystery its proper place and due.

(In the spirit of mystery, I have simplified this site once again, hiding a few menu items, but keeping their references, or at least the elements of their spirit, in these posts.)

I think wherever we are in life, we are on the right path, because it is ours.  However, I do feel like more guidance can be given, more help can come our way.  With this post and its accompanying link and resource, I am happy and perhaps more than a little excited to share this guiding help with you.

(Please feel free to skip four paragraphs down to get right to the information on the resource.)

I have recently embraced the idea, understanding, concept, and reality of magick, whatever that may or may not mean to you.

Along with the intricacies of the term itself comes its connection with the sacred feminine.  I think of it as a way to actively be with and work with the all-embracing nature of the sacred feminine.  There is a reverence and an active agency, both at play, when working with magick, to my understanding.

Along with this comes the idea of divination, again, a surrendering to the mystery of the sacred feminine, but also an element of understanding or suggestion of wisdom for active implementation of the knowledge gained.

Here is where the resource comes in which I am truly happy about.  I have developed an online approximation of a divination tool.  It pulls from a story archetype which I have been using to inform my practice since its beginning.  The archetype can be arguably found in the stories of all cultures of all time periods, and you may call it a way of living which honors the sacred feminine and ourselves.

Time and again I have seen how my own life follows this mapped out way of living, this pattern that author Kim Hudson identified in her own life and in the stories of cultures across time.

When I work with anyone, this universal story, this timeless way to go about being truly happy and fulfilled in life, guides me in the background, for all I do, because it resonates in a way a universal piece of wisdom should.  It seems to continue to speak to those who encounter it and take the time to investigate it.

Without further explanation, please enjoy reading about and comparing your own life to this archetypal story, this guiding pattern which I feel helps us on the way to a fulfilling life.

The Virgin's Promise: A Path for Life

(Click on the words to divine the path.)

I am again bringing over sensibilities from another website I started, sharing the spirit of it here.  This comes from a band I used to listen to when I was quite a bit younger.  I will say this song, the title of the post, captures the opportunities presented to us in troubled times.  I have mentioned doorways recently in posts, as places and opportunities for deeper discovery.  I am posting the lyrics here before the song itself, which may not be to everyone's taste, of a heavier nature.  But, I stand by the lyrics and am happy to share them here.

Long Since Dark

It's been long since dark

Sitting here bathed in the moonshade
Underneath a willow tree
To stare above, the sky is burning
The diamonds dance in nocturnal symphony
What does it mean? How do I fit into the scheme?

Why is there dark sky above, what does it veil?
Is there a purpose to the point
Beyond the norm we hail?

Reflecting on my future to come
Underneath the crescent moon
Long since dark, and my thoughts are flowing
And deeper still, beyond the cloak of unknown
Relentless drone, why was I put here, left alone?

Why do I hunger to know what will I gain?
Is there true wisdom without end
Or will I find just pain?

How many times do we take for granted
Simple things that make life sweet
Enraptured by material longings
We miss the point, we need to know, to see
Beyond our being, and in the void lies the meaning

Just as the dark sky above had spoke to me
The answers came so clear, then vanished
For a moment I was free

I am free

Songwriters: Warrel Dane / Lenny Rutledge

Long Since Dark lyrics © EMI Music Publishing, Universal Music Publishing Group

--

Long Since Dark (Song) by Sanctuary
Into the Mirror Black (Album)
℗ 1990 Epic Records, a division of Sony Music Entertainment

[I have taken this post from another blog I started, in an effort to bridge the sensibilities there with the ones I have here.  I am happy to incorporate this under the blog post category I have of Magick.]

I began considering this blog post by thinking of the importance of sacrifice in my life and its connection to the kind of power that means anything to me in a real sense. I realized that unless a mystical framework or theory becomes presented as behind these ideas, as informing what I have to say about them, my speaking of sacrifice and power would fall short or not be as fully realized here as I would like them to be.

When I speak of mysticism, I am referring to what I am becoming more and more comfortable with as my own approach to living and what informs what I am doing and value most in life: leaving the world behind. From an early age, I found more comfort in religion and spirituality, the reality this seemed to uncover, rather than anything the world might offer. For whatever reasons or circumstances helped shape my fondness for this way of living or this natural desire to more and more openly go towards these understandings, they have brought me to where I am now, and to me sharing here, and I am richer in life experience because of it.

What mysticism means is a way to discover what is outside the world, or ultimately informs the world, its origins, its reasons or ways it has existence. A mystic, which I am also becoming more and more comfortable identifying myself as, is someone who naturally and interestedly, perhaps I'll even say passionately, goes towards that experiential understanding of what lies behind all of this, the world, existence, any idea, concept, or reality that can be conceived of or that exists. A mystic then is someone who wants to merge with God, experience the oneness of the universe, or who simply wants to be real and live life from such an authentic place.

To be clear, when I say sacrifice, besides knowingly conjuring images of the dark practices of other times (which I am not endorsing here), I am specifically referring to our sacrificing a conscious sense of self, of our ideas of who we are, of our ideas of reality, of what we think we know and have established as real and solid and permanent in our lives and ways of living them. From my experience, of almost half a century now, as we start to lose our sense of self, we start to open the door into this understanding, of what lies behind it all. We are entering into the dark womb of creation, the strangely disturbing void, from our egoic perspective anyway, of an experience of absence, not presence. We are going into the place we can arrive at in meditation, a place for which I have found the practice of meditation invaluable over the years.

Addressing the idea of power now, gained from this sacrifice, we experientially know so much more, and I am not talking about faith, belief, or assumptions made. I am talking about the real experience of knowledge, and this knowledge becomes life changing, if that even captures the experience of ever having received this knowledge.

Buddhist ideas of emptiness come to mind, certainly came to mind after I had had this experience myself, which set me on another course of life. It so profoundly affected me that I am still incorporating or unpacking what I seemed to experience back then. I use the word "seemed" to describe the experience, because it is one characterized by my above definition of sacrifice, where our sense of self keeps vanishing and thinning out, to the point at which it almost does not exist--so how can we be sure of what exactly occurred, if there was no sense of self as we know it, hardly being substantially there to begin with, to reference and to make a reference back to what may have been experienced?

Power comes from understanding how nothing really has the substance you once thought it did. This knowledge as power can be recalled and be realized whenever the world may be encroaching upon you again and again. This does not become a practice of not facing reality or not dealing with what becomes presented in everyday life. Very personally for me this becomes a way to find the root of all reality again, to not only see and experience the absence of self in going there, but also the oncoming bliss that can be uncovered from that absence. It is almost as if while the experience of that peace of annihilation is ongoing, in which we are released from the bondage of having to perpetuate again and again our attachments and obligations and responsibilities in everyday life, love certainly does rush in, constituting the bliss often mentioned and referenced in spiritual practices. As maybe the most precious taste I could ever reference, as perhaps the very reason I call myself a mystic, the best way to describe this experience is to encourage and point out such self-removing practices as meditation. When you return over and over again to the knowledge and power that enemies and obstacles in your world ultimately have no existence, no substance like you had originally thought, that you are out beyond them, actually at the root of it all, what made them to begin with, you have released yourself into the bliss-peace-lovingness of ultimate existence, and upon any return to the world, after such a self-sacrificing experience, I have found that answers do become clearer, and the remedies for the world do become easier to implement. The insubstantiality of this place and your experienced sense of a loss of self, of your sacrificing of ego in going to this place to begin with, provide you with a new experience of the world: it has a less substantial reality than you remembered.

The continued practice of this sacrifice of ego and the knowledge which this brings, together these constitute the mystical path to the power I am referencing.

I am venturing quite a bit beyond perhaps the conventional blog post one might find on a therapist website. However, I feel like I am leading by example in doing this, sharing what I feel matches up honestly with me, and does also represent now a part of the work I do.

Let me tell you a story.

I used to be enchanted with all things fantastic and otherworldly, what one might find in a fantasy novel such as The Lord of the Rings or in similar genre tellings.

There used to be a fantasy series of books, gathering the tales from many world cultures, called The Enchanted World, which fascinated me greatly, to no end it would seem, since I am still recalling it fondly, particularly a few books in the series. It was put forth by Time-Life Books, and the complete set was ordered through the mail, one each month, if I remember correctly.

I have now, it would seem, come full circle in my interests, but with truer wisdom, and experiences harkening back to what I had read about in some of those otherworldly tales from different cultures.

Doorways do exist to other places; there are ways to thin the veil between this world and another.

I cannot claim to have experienced what these stories relate or say, or even what some claim to be the truth of these other worlds, but I do know that this reality we all seemingly experience can shift more into the quality of another one, or the truer or more vibrant form of this one, which can emerge from the encrustations of culture which glom over our eyes and prevent us from seeing.

I have been reading books lately on portals or doorways, from at least three different authors, one of whom writes from her actual experiences of such experiences, she claims.

I think my intention in this post is to more completely and satisfyingly present who I am, as a person helping others--even by sharing this, perhaps I am helping through connecting with you or another who resonates similarly with what I am telling.

We may talk about doorways and portals to other places, or realities, as metaphors in works of fiction, but I think that what makes more sense to me now is that the words themselves have power. Yes, there is a spelling going on of a different sorts. A way to transport oneself, shift one's mind and reality, if perhaps just through language. But, how fundamental is language to our experiencing and reality?

I just want to share here that I have stepped through a doorway myself, a long time ago now it seems, and I have not been the same since, because the substantiality of this reality has not been the same; it has not been as present, in a serious or cumbersome or even burdensome way, since then.

What does magickal living mean then? It means the truth of those tales, whether they be of fairies or of other such similar places, because language has power and it does transport us.

We can and are able to shift our awareness, to experience life more in alignment with who we are, and what is real, in all its variations.

I am not putting forth the claims of flesh-and-blood other worlds here.

I am putting forth the power of words and imagination, and actual shifts in understanding and comprehension that can fundamentally alter the reality in which we live.

I do feel I walk in one world and the other familiar one we all might first come into contact with and be aware of in our lives.

I think magickal living for me personally is to honor the spirit of this shift in awareness and reality in reading again about such places, however an author may portray them, and to continue in the spirit of this knowing in the world we all seemingly inhabit every day.

I may also be bringing over blog posts from another website which I began, wanting to blend the magickal sensibilities there with what I have been posting mostly here.

I consider myself a mystic as well, coming to accept this term myself, after another first identified me this way.

It means someone experiencing a fundamental urge or need to connect with that greater understanding, whether you call it God, the universe, or however you might express it.

I think behind, beyond, and beneath, around and among, all portals or doorways, or otherworldly passages to other places, you will find this, what is to me, a precious understanding of this greater universe or God.

Or Goddess! (which is more in alignment with how I feel and experience this connection).

I just want to, and do, live life in appreciation of all the variations this vaster and unnameable magickal reality puts forth.

I think this serves in the enjoyment and fulfillment of life, as it is lived, wherever and to whichever places our own journeys, when we honor them, take us.

Recently I came across a couple of passages, one each in a couple of books, which reminded me of my intention to more outrightly speak to my spiritual understandings in the work I do, to share with you that I certainly offer spiritual guidance in what I do.

In actuality, it informs all I do, and I want to share that with you.

​I know, and want you to as well.

From the 1994 book by Vine Deloria, Jr., God is Red: "The severance of medicine and psychology from religion has only been a recent event in the histories of religious people."

Introduction by Samuel Bendeck Sotillos to the 2013 book by Laleh Bakhtiar, Rumi's Original Sufi Enneagram: "From its inception through the events of the so-called Enlightenment that occurred in Europe during the 17th and 18th centuries, modern psychology has fundamentally repudiated its roots in the spiritual domain."

I feel this and know this, and believe those passages to be true, and am careful in what I take in with modern psychology, what I may apply from it, never dismissing what helps from it in the process, but having an understanding considered spiritual as my foundation, that will always be my guide, and helps in my guidance of others.

My understanding, ironically, seems to be beyond any sense of me, but there is no way to prove this except to point to this experience of understanding or suggest ways to experience this yourself.

Understanding, real understanding, comes from a place deeper than we can be taught, so again, providing words and guidance to this understanding, using these very words, helps in trying to uncover this for you, but does not do it alone.

I cannot get outside of this limited sense of self, or remove it from your experiencing, when trying to communicate that there is something outside of us that preciously exists and is there for us.

Conceptually, you will always, or can always, take note that here is one person sharing his thoughts in the form of words, so how can I ultimately know that what this person says is not limited to this one person and this person's view?

Precious. Everything. God. Jesus. Kali. Buddha, with Heart and Mind. Tantric journeying. Not Neo-Tantra. Space. Peace. Love that just is. Insanity without. Sanity with, and beyond.

Behind all the work I do, I am led by a different understanding, a different reality, that to me has become the most precious understanding anyone can ever come to know.

I often involve others in creating space for themselves, and in this space, the fruits of this understanding emerge. They start to come forth, whatever descriptors or words you want to use about or around them.

Meditation thins the ego to the shimmering half-reality that it is. This undercuts all reality as we know it in everyday life. If we all perceive through an ego, then what to see beyond this, when it starts to thin?

This is what has always been and will be.

If psychology simply addresses the concerns of the reality known as ego, then this is a never-ending journey for lack of success. We want wholeness, in our bones, experienced, dare I say, in our souls.

Answers are beyond the ego; are beyond the ego.

If you think a brick wall with the thought of sunlight behind it is the reality you are working with psychologically, is the reality you are working towards in your process, and you never question the necessity or reality of the brick wall to begin with, then perhaps this is a crude way to describe to you the fruitlessness of psychologically working with only ego, or even ego so much as a reality in itself.

I am saying and always trying to share that the sunlight beyond this brick wall always is, always will be, and our thoughts of our own brick wall are part of the problem, maybe even the very problem itself, in reaching for this understanding.

What if I were to say to you that the brick wall has never been there like you thought it was, or may not have ever been there in the first place?

This is where psychology honors or begins to honor the roots of itself.

This is where you find that place of peace and deeper understanding within you, beginning to go down this path.

When working with others, I am not sure I can ever uncover a better reality or truth together with you.

I am offering this post as a comfort for times of discontentment and difficulty. I am sharing my understandings for what I feel I know, to a large extent, reality to be. If you find yourself relating to these descriptions, then take comfort. You have been brushing with reality, or ultimate reality, and you may not have even known it.

This post presupposes an underlying layer of the universe which helps make up all of its parts, its possibilities, its every conception conceived of or yet to be conceived. You may call it truth, reality, God, or simply the universe even.

Does there exist an unchanging background to all we see and experience, can experience? Does it provide value to speculate on this, think about it, or come up with reasons for seeking such an understanding in the first place?

Let me share my understanding of what this reality may be, or is even. Then I may elaborate on the value of this, or let this come to you through your own considerations.

If we conceive of an ultimate reality, one which underlies all we experience, then for me I have not found a better explanation for this than in Hindu thought and philosophy, namely, in Advaita Vedanta, as put forth by Swami Vivekananda, in alignment with his teacher, Sri Ramakrishna.

What follows has been shaped largely by their understandings.

First, let us take up the consideration of this world, where we experience the phenomena of the senses, this world which we may consider to be our most easily understood version of reality.

Vedanta calls this a world of duality, a reality of duality, not ultimate reality, which I will refer to later.

We know everything in the context of at least one other thing. We see because one thing is next to another. If it were not, how could we see it to begin with, because then we would experience seeing only one thing?

We smell something in the absence of that smell in what came before, and another smell, or the lack of that first smell, occurs in what comes after.

Whether you speak of before or after in an experience of time, or in an experience of any of the five senses, there has to be a different experience before and after the experience occurring, or else there would be no experience at all to begin with.

Take the example of touching someone's arm: there is a moment of time before you are touching and experiencing this person's arm; there is the experience of touching this person's arm; and then there is the experience after you have touched this person's arm when you are no longer touching it. You need the experience of not touching it to begin with to experience the actual touching of it at all.

This illustrates how an experience of before and after sets up these two types of experiences, the experience of touching, and not touching, and how the experience of touching cannot exist without the experience of not touching before it.

All experiences depend on this duality, if you will, of time-related experiencing. We cannot have one experience without the experience of its absence as well, or without another and different experience being experienced right before or after the experience we are referring to.

We experience phenomena because there are different ones to experience, not just because there is no experience and then there is one. We know black because we know other colors besides black. We need just one other color to be experienced to be able to experience seeing the color black. If there were no other color to be experienced, ever, then we would not experience black, because there would be no understanding of color to begin with, and we would not be able to experience seeing anything different.

If you think about any one of the five senses and any possible experience of it, you will find that any single experience of that sense depends on the absence of that experience, or the experience of something different with that same sense right before that experience.

This then becomes the explanation of living in a world of duality, a reality in which nothing alone can said to be all-pervasive or eternal, in which nothing can be experienced which does not rely on another experience to begin with.

Where does it all come from though? Does this seem a valid question? What would an ultimate reality underneath all reality be like?

If an ultimate reality were to be speculated, it would seem to me to be not dependent on any other. No other experience should be required for it to be there.

In other words, ultimate reality is non-dual, without duality.

Qualities you may experience when reaching this understanding: your sense of self disappears, you are dissolving experience away from a separation of yourself and that which is experienced, one form of duality--you are beginning to lose a sense of separate identity as you approach this ultimate experience of reality underlying it all; your sense of time disappears, you are experiencing reality not dependent on another, where no sequencing of before or after is required since you are approaching the one experience all-pervasive, by definition one without a second, no time required for two or dual experiences; your sense of worldly concern vanishes, you experience that which allows all reality to be, where you are not present and time no longer matters, or exists--in your experiencing of this, ironically when your sense of self is not there, you are not separate from anything or anyone, you experience truth underlying and informing all existence, existence that ever was, will be, or is.

Meditation helps bring you to this understanding, and if you take notice of or recollect past meditations, you may find these qualities having been there or started to emerge.

Devotion to your own understanding of your higher power, or God, or even some general sense of the universe, which we may emotionally feel a connection to within ourselves, devotion can play a role in bringing us to these experiences of dissolving into something greater than ourselves, beyond us.

Reasoning, as briefly begun above, or even in the realms of science, quantum physics coming to mind, our minds are our pathways to these experiences of such an understanding as well.

I believe in these experiences. I have had these experiences.

I imagine that you at some point have come across these experiences in your own life too.

These are what set us on a different path of living life.

These are what give us glimpses of ourselves beyond the everyday world, of limited duality.

I think the value in all of this, you can come to explore.

I know the value in all of this informs the work I do.

May they ever be of comfort and of curiosity, such non-dual experiencing for you.

I consider this a follow-up to my previous post, where I spoke of darkness and light being a key to fuller understanding of oneself. They are the negative and positive aspects of and range of experiences of oneself, both within and without us, or outside of us.

When darkness occurs, when we experience what may be called a negative experience, we may be quick to shut off and shut down the memory and recollection of what happened. Much of this may be natural for psychological reasons, for containing a sense of self in the face of a perceived or real threat to what happened.

I spoke of embracing the mystery of life, allowing it to unfold naturally, or more naturally, as a way to work with the darkness of experiences, and by inference, the darkness of oneself.

When a negative experience occurs, part of us will always or naturally be led to wanting to understand more fully what happened, and to know why, what are the reasons it occurred.

We can come to understanding ourselves in relation to what occurred, but to understand beyond this, I might suggest the approach of embracing the mystery of life, of embracing the mystery of what occurred.

For me, and for I believe the experiential reality of others, life seems to expand and resonate more richly, be full of more light, and begin to be full of possibilities again, if we are able to allow the unknown of life, the unknown about why anything might have occurred, if we are able to get in the spirit, allow the spirit, of the vastness of the universe to be with us, as if looking at the night stars, away from city lights, into the seemingly infinite blackness of the starscape before us, where we feel small, but somehow comforted, knowing our place in the universe in this way, feeling content within ourselves, allowing a resonating and perhaps vibrating sense of energy within and with the universe, ourselves feeling peaceful and curious, perhaps spiritual and connected, not without alignment with what we see, feeling a part of this vastness, full of its space and perhaps uncommon beauty.

Darkness, in ourselves, in events that occur, contains a natural beauty, but only in the context of letting go into the unknown, into the unknown of why anything might have occurred, into the unknown where answers are not forthcoming, but we are able to tap into an understanding beyond the event, larger than the event itself, where we may get our self-referential answers of understanding, where we may feel embraced by a loving universe, the comfort and nurturing presence of it being felt as there, being felt as always there.

We are embraced in the vastness of the universe in these moments.

This we can know.

Some may align more, or try to, with the cold light of truth.

I feel it is time to speak of the love of the unknown of the darkness, however, of the love of the ongoing mystery of life, where we can feel out the answers, come to an understanding, where what we can know may never be enough for a rational and searching mind, but we can rest easy and at peace in knowing ourselves in the context of this larger scale of understanding.

We are embraced in the universe, in the night, peace, and darkness of it, in the unknown of it, where the answers of whether we are supported or not, of whether we have a place in it or not, become revealed as the mystery unfolds.

We do have a place in it, each and every one of us, but this does not come from knowing all the answers.

We must proceed unknowingly, trustingly, allowing the ever enveloping mystery of life, of the universe, to unfold. We will not know a love, on both this intimate and vastness of scale, if we do not.

Embracing the mystery of life, we allow the universe to unfold.