Mysticism and Spirituality Circle

by Frederica Helmiere

My wife keeps finding new books about relationships with bees. That’s what first drew me to this article. And his spiritual connection to bees is moving and profound. But I found much more to love and recommend you take the time to read it all.

For instance: “…

What I have seen is if you don’t follow your heart, you will regret it, because your mind is a coyote. It thinks it knows what it’s looking at, but it’s all smoke and mirrors. Even though the coyote tells a great story, he has no concern whether the story is true or not. He tells a good one, so we listen to it. But your heart is an eagle, and it operates on a whole different level. Eagles never experience the storm. They’re always flying above it. The storm is like a foreign concept to an eagle; it doesn’t worry about what’s happening down there. The eagle in our heart is not a good storyteller, but it always tells the truth. The truth is often simple, so the eagle doesn’t really talk much. 

We spend a lot of time fretting over the past or imagining the future, and maybe we imagine to the point where we become anxious about it. Like, I got this appointment tomorrow, or I should have said something yesterday and I feel so bad. We live in the past or we’re thinking about the future, but what the rewilding part loves is this particular moment in time.”

It was behind a pay wall so I copied it in its entirety into a Google doc for all of you, my beloveds. However please don’t share it except with a small group of your own beloveds.

Enjoy.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zxjvVLYvh4tb1lO6pTLonkNlz3NbHs-EsZ1uJUCIiB8/edit?usp=drivesdk

Gratitude to sister Amina for sharing this on her most recent blog, “Love, Harmony, & Beauty #102”

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We need a new religion around here

with words unstained by blood and institutions,

and ways to lift our heads and sing

without a male god listening. 

We need a scripture written by trees

and the sounds of water in the running brooks,

a faith revealed by the light of dawn

and prayers to say in the evening mist. 

Come, let’s drag enormous rocks 

and upend them in a circle, and learn there 

to move again in time to sacred rhythms.

–       Pir Elias Amidon

Maybe it’s just me, but this question posed by the inimitable Sufi poet, Rumi, truly resonates. And his poetic insights are spot on as we muddle through this “prison for drunkards.” As my teacher often quotes, “we’re all just bozos on this bus.” Enjoy.

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All day I think about it, then at night I say it.
Where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing?
I have no idea.
My soul is from elsewhere, I’m sure of that,
and I intend to end up there.

This drunkenness began in some other tavern.
When I get back around to that place,
I’ll be completely sober. Meanwhile,
I’m like a bird from another continent, sitting in this aviary.
The day is coming when I fly off,
but who is it now in my ear who hears my voice?
Who says words with my mouth?

Who looks out with my eyes? What is the soul?
I cannot stop asking.
If I could taste one sip of an answer,
I could break out of this prison for drunks.
I didn’t come here of my own accord, and I can’t leave that way.
Whoever brought me here will have to take me home.

This poetry. I never know what I’m going to say.
I don’t plan it.
When I’m outside the saying of it,
I get very quiet and rarely speak at all.
~Rumi

It’s okay to be broken. It’s okay to not be where you thought you’d be right now, where you want to be. Truth is, nobody else is either, or at least most of us aren’t. It’s okay to be flawed. It’s okay to have blemishes. It’s okay to be beautifully imperfect. It’s okay to be human. The weavers always wove a mistake into their rugs to remind themselves only Creator is perfect. We are here to be refined, but to need refinement means first you are rough. Unpolished stone. Corners and bumps and cracks. It’s okay to cry. It’s okay to acknowledge the pain the world has put you through. It’s okay to sit in the weight of it all and be “incapacitated.” Because within that brokenness is the stillness we need to honor our emotions. After they are truly and deeply honored, then they can be released and we can MOVE on. Thus stillness is sometimes the fastest pathway to true movement. Brokenness the fastest pathway to reassemblage and becoming whole. Don’t let the glitter and gloss fool you. When the lights go out and the night is quiet, we all fight our demons. We all struggle up our mountains. The trick is to see the beauty in the struggle, the beauty of our journey, however imperfect it can and will be. Stepping to the side of the path to rest does not mean you are giving up, it just means you are resting before you begin again. They are not asking us to be perfect. They are just asking us to try.

~ Lyla June

These quotes and practices from Richard Rohr’s Daily Meditations, are beautiful and germane to all of our hopes for change and provide the tools we need to keep working toward a more sane and equitable world.

“If you listen to the Spirit, you will be drawn toward an opportunity to serve. At first, the thought will frighten or repel you. But when you let the Spirit guide you, it will be a source of great joy—one of the richest blessings of your life.”
—Brian McLaren

“The contemplative life is not, and cannot be, a mere withdrawal, a pure negation, a turning of one’s back on the world with its sufferings, its crises, its confusions, and its errors.”
—Thomas Merton

Practice GRACE

Buddhist teacher Joan Halifax describes a method of collaborative discernment with, and on behalf of, others. 
 
GRACE [is] an active contemplative practice. . . . GRACE is a mnemonic that stands for: Gather attention. Recall our intention. Attune to self and then other. Consider what will serve. Engage and end. . . . 

Gather Attention: The G in GRACE is a reminder for us to pause and give ourselves time to get grounded. On the inhale, we gather our attention. On the exhale, we drop our attention into the body, sensing into a place of stability in the body. . . . 

Recall Intention: The R of GRACE is recalling intention. We recall our commitment to act with integrity and respect the integrity of those whom we encounter. We remember that our intention is to serve others and to open our heart to the world. . . . 

Attune to Self and Other: The A of GRACE refers to the process of attunement. . . . In the self-attunement process, we bring attention to our physical sensations, emotions, and thoughts—all of which can shape our attitudes and behavior toward others. . . . From this base of self-attunement, we attune to others, sensing without judgment into their experience . . . [and] engage our capacity for empathy. . . .  

Consider What Will Serve is the C of GRACE. . . . . We ask ourselves, What is the wise and compassionate path here? What is an appropriate response? We are present for the other as we sense into what might serve them, and we let insights arise, noticing what the other might be offering in this moment. . . . 

Engage and End: The first phase of the E in GRACE is to ethically engage and act, if appropriate. Compassionate Action emerges from the field we have created of openness, connection, and discernment. 

Experience a version of this practice through video and sound.   

Joan Halifax, Standing at the Edge: Finding Freedom Where Fear and Courage Meet (New York: Flatiron Books, 2018), 241–242, 243. 

Grow poetry in the debris left behind by rage.

Plant so there is enough for everyone to eat.

Make sure there is room for everyone at the table.

Let all of us inhabit the story, in peace.

~ Joy Harjo

Dear Amina recently posted this on her blog Love, Harmony & Beauty #99. It is a compelling statement from John O’ Donohue that reminded me of Kim Stanley Robinson’s quote I posted earlier, “…pessimism is a dereliction of duty…”

We can never be reminded enough of how important it is to remember our power and practices that allow us to continue our critical social and earth justice work in these profound and challenging times.

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The world is not decided by action alone. It is decided more by consciousness and spirit; they are the secret sources of all action and behaviour.

The spirit of a time is an incredibly subtle, yet hugely powerful force. And it is comprised of the mentality and spirit of all individuals together.

Therefore, the way you look at things is not simply a private matter. Your outlook actually and concretely affects what goes on.

When you give in to helplessness, you collude with despair and add to it.

When you take back your power and choose to see the possibilities for healing and transformation, your creativity awakens and flows to become an active force of renewal and encouragement in the world.

In this way, even in your own hidden life, you can become a powerful agent of transformation.

–          John O’Donohue

From Fr. Richard Rohr’s Daily Meditations

Present Over Perfect

“And now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good.” —John Steinbeck, East of Eden

After spending many years seeking perfection, popular author Shauna Niequist discovered the freedom and love that can be experienced by being present to life as it is. She writes about the difference between a false perfection and a lived presence: 

Let’s talk for a minute about perfect. . . . Perfect is brittle and unyielding, plastic, distant, more image than flesh. Perfect calls to mind stiffness, silicone, an aggressive and unimaginative relentlessness. Perfect and the hunt for it will ruin our lives—that’s for certain.  

I’ve missed so much of my actual, human, beautiful, not-beautiful life trying to force things into perfect. But these days I’m coming to see that perfect is safe, controlled, managed. I’m finding myself drawn to mess, to darkness, to things that are loved to the point of shabbiness, or just wildly imperfect in their own gorgeous way. . . .  

And so, instead: present. If perfect is plastic, present is rich, loamy soil. . . . 

Present is living with your feet firmly grounded in reality, pale and uncertain as it may seem. Present is choosing to believe that your own life is worth investing deeply in, instead of waiting for some rare miracle or fairy tale. Present means we understand that the here and now is sacred, sacramental, threaded through with divinity even in its plainness. Especially in its plainness.  

Present over perfect living is real over image, connecting over comparing, meaning over mania, depth over artifice. Present over perfect living is the risky and revolutionary belief that the world God has created is beautiful and valuable on its own terms, and that it doesn’t need to be zhuzzed up and fancy in order to be wonderful.

Sink deeply into this world as it stands. Breathe in the smell of rain and the scuff of leaves as they scrape across driveways on windy nights. This is where life is, not in some imaginary, photo-shopped dreamland. Here. Now. You, just as you are. Me, just as I am. This world, just as it is. This is the good stuff. This is the best stuff there is. Perfect has nothing on truly, completely, wide-eyed, open-souled present

Shauna Niequest, Present over Perfect: Leaving behind Frantic for a Simpler, More Soulful Way of Living (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2016), 129, 130.  

The wisdom of Thich Nhat Hahn – with gratitude to sister Tarana who posted this on FB

“Whenever we throw food in the compost, it can smell bad. Rotting organic matter smells especially badly. But it can also become rich compost for fertilizing the garden. The fragrant rose and the stinking garbage are two sides of the same existence. Without one, the other cannot be. Everything is in transformation. The rose that wilts after six days will become a part of the compost. After six months the compost is transformed into a rose.
In the garbage, I see a rose.
In the rose, I see the garbage.
Everything is in transformation.
Even permanence is impermanent.”
~Thich Nhat Hanh

(Gratitude to sister Amina who posted this on her blog earlier)

We think that if we just meditated enough or jogged enough or ate perfect food, everything would be perfect. But from the point of view of someone who is awake, that’s death. Seeking security or perfection, rejoicing in feeling confirmed and whole, self-contained and comfortable, is some kind of death. It doesn’t have any fresh air. There’s no room for something to come in and interrupt all that. We are killing the moment by controlling our experience. Doing this is setting ourselves up for failure, because sooner or later, we’re going to have an experience we can’t control: our house is going to burn down, someone we love is going to die, we’re going to find out we have cancer, a brick is going to fall out of the sky and hit us on the head, somebody’s going to spill tomato juice all over our white suit, or we’re going to arrive at our favorite restaurant and discover that no one ordered produce and seven hundred people are coming for lunch.

The trick is to keep exploring and not bail out, even when we find out that something is not what we thought. That’s what we’re going to discover again and again and again. Nothing is what we thought.

Things are always in transition, if we could only realize it. Nothing ever sums itself up in the way that we like to dream about. The off-center, in-between state is an ideal situation, a situation in which we don’t get caught and we can open our hearts and minds beyond limit. It’s a very tender, nonaggressive, open-ended state of affairs. To stay with that shakiness—to stay with a broken heart, with a rumbling stomach, with the feeling of hopelessness and wanting to get revenge—that is the path of true awakening. Sticking with that uncertainty, getting the knack of relaxing in the midst of chaos, learning not to panic—this is the spiritual path.

Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing. We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don’t really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It’s just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy. – Pema Chodron