Truth is within ourselves, it takes no rise

from outward things; whate’er you may believe

there is an inmost center in us all

where truth abides in fullness; and around,

wall upon wall, the gross flesh hems it in,

this perfect, clear perception which is Truth.

A baffling and perverting carnal mesh

Binds it and makes all error; and to know

rather consists in opening out a way

whence the imprisoned splendor may escape

than in effecting entry for a light supposed to be without.

Robert Browning, “Paracelsus”

When you enter the Wheel of Initiation in the South, you will set your intentions, thereby agreeing to the precepts of your journey. Then, when you move into the West, you will learn how to free yourself from habitual patterns, beliefs, and negative mindsets that are limiting you; this is essential for spiritual transformation. In the North you will apply the skills of meditation and contemplation that further enhance your journey, and in the East you will experience regeneration.

Each of us has experienced wake-up calls of illness, loss, close calls, or radical change. Sometimes we heed the wake-up call, and sometimes we run from it. These wake-up calls are asking for your attention; they want you to take the journey of your life. To go by choice means to listen to your soul’s calling and to wisely and consciously step into the Wheel.

Listen to the call to go deep into your being and bring forth the imprisoned light. For at least several months, if not for a year, take yourself into the woods on the inner pilgrimage of personal spiritual initiation.

The Wheel of Initiation, once entered, can offer you skillful and personal means of freedom from painful habitual states. But be warned, you will be leaving the shores of your comfort zone behind you. As André Gide so rightly stated, “One doesn’t discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.” You will need a willingness to let go of old beliefs and assumptions about yourself and the world in order to “see” anew.

However, you will not be offered someone else’s beliefs to replace the ones that you are dispensing with. This spiritual initiation is simple but not easy, and it opens inner doors so you can access and discern truth for yourself. It is accessible to all because the splendor is indeed hidden within each one of us. The Wheel, as an organic template, presents you proficient means to open the inner doors for yourself, choose for yourself, and initiate yourself.

Many of us are now living various degrees of an uninitiated life. We are living in a false dream, a life that is more like sitting on the soft-cushioned deck chair on a cruise ship (that may or may not be heading for an iceberg). We tend to choose comfort to get us through the rough seas and the difficulties of life, but these insular comforts too often keep us a spectator of life rather than a participant. We all want happiness, yet we tend to do that which causes more pain. If outward comfort freed us from our suffering, we wouldn’t need bigger toys or more potent drugs. Those who experience personal initiation have left the comfort of the deck chair and the sight of their own familiar shoreline.

To order book from Publisher:

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“The road to death is paved with disobedience.” Taken from a sacred story within the book: Teachings of the Santeria Gods: the Spirit of the Odu by Ócháni Lele.

“ . . . . Everything we abandon before we can bring it to a conclusion continues to live until it is played out, until the story is finished. All strains will be played out.” –Andrei Codrescu, The Blood Countess

Your life is an unfolding story. You are living a story right now.– Is it your own? Is it the one you want to be living?

People come in to see me for help and what they share are their stories. They want to transform their pain-story and live their authentic-story. Throughout our day we are constantly interacting with each other’s stories. To know someone’s stories is to be intimate with them. The most personal closeness with others, where revelation occurs, is through the exchange of stories.

Without story the world would be dead. The teachers would be without their teaching sticks. The grandmothers who hold the sacred stories in many traditions would be silent. There would be no movement because there would be no beginning, no middle, and no end. And if you have one story about to end you best get busy creating your next story. You can use patakís (sacred stories) and other stories to do this.

Our spiritual parables and sacred stories show us the way out of danger and give us real means to confront the patterns that keep us habitual, stuck or ill. Truth (both relative and universal) is best taught through parables, myths, stories and legends. It is through story that our spiritual teachers reveal hidden and relevant truth to us. Every religion relies on their stories to pass on their message and to teach their congregation.  Parker Palmer, educator and author of A Hidden Wholeness refers to the use of stories to heal and teach us as “The Third Thing.” Instead of just smacking someone with advice, give a story. That’s what the Gods do.

“Storytelling seems to be a dying art, and people are starved for this knowledge. I believe that if we don’t start writing down the stories we know about the orishas, the odu, and the people who lived and died following the orishas, one day these things will be lost. The death of each elder priest or priestess represents the destruction of an entire folkloric library that simply cannot be rebuilt if these stories are not shared.” Ócháni Lele, author of Teachings of the Santeria Gods

In the sacred divination system of the Santeria are the sacred stories known as patakís. When I came across this culture of orisha worship, I knew I found something purposeful. At the core of the diloggún­–the sacred divination system of the religion Santeria–are the sacred stories known as the patakís, narratives whose themes are as powerful and relevant as they were in the minds and lives of the ancient Yoruba who safeguarded them. Since it is likely that the human race originated in the same place these patakís originated (Africa) to have at least one diloggún divination in your lifetime would be valuable. “With this oracle,” Ócháni writes, “a diviner accesses the knowledge and ashé (spiritual powers) of all creation. When Ócháni Lele does a divination he casts the diloggún and patterns are revealed that point to a patakís that applies to the client.  “By casting the diloggún, a diviner accesses one of these ‘chapters’ on behalf of his client.”

One does not have to be an adherent of this faith to appreciate and benefit from this divination tool. In his recent book: Teachings of the Santeria Gods, Ócháni Lele gives the reader access to some of these core sacred stories. These are parables that teach and guide and can be used outside the diloggún of which they originate.

And as we all know, every good story has an element of sacrifice.

One feature of the patakís and its divination system is that of sacrifice. They ask you what are you willing to give back (to life, to the gods, to the world) in exchange for their help? In my work, initiation can only take place if someone is willing to do whatever it takes to free themselves from what binds them to the false self and to their pain-story. So, in any divination or spiritual effort be willing to give up something in order to generate the desired movement you want.

In closing I ask Ócháni Lele himself to share a few words with you in this topic of divination and sacred stories:

“At the core of the Lucumí (Santeria) faith are thousands of sacred stories that we know as patakís. They are myths, histories, yarns, tall tales, fables and short stories dealing with life in all its exquisite mystery. Instead of being random tales told with no connection to each other, each of our patakís are told in conjunction with one of 256 signs in the diloggún known as the odu, sacred energies that we believe guide creation. They are neither static nor unchanging; they are in a state of movement and constant renewal. When one has divination with the orishas, one’s place in those energies is identified: Using the sacred cowries of an orisha an odu is discovered that resonates with that individual, and inside that odu are hundreds of stories that might apply to the client. The work of the diviner is to mark which of those stories engulfs his client, and by interpreting the client’s place in that patakí, evolution unfolds. For most of the world divination might seem a parlor trick or a mindless entertainment; however, to the Lucumí divination is a sacred act, a ritual, that helps us find our place in the world and overcome it for a better existence. It is a time where stories unfold and are told, a sacred moment in which we, if we listen, can understand our place in the world.” bstuartmyers@gmail.com

Prompts off and on the Page

Contact Ócháni Lele at bstuartmyers@gmail.com to receive your reading and your own sacred story. It cost only $31 for a divination session. Let it assist you in the insight and movement you want. Journal your experience and witness how this patakís reveals needed information for you to use.

Read his book and discover the stories from the Santeria that are relevant to you today. Take one of the stories and use it to teach someone else or to guide a child. Instead of giving feedback to others practice sharing a personal or sacred story.

http://www.innertraditions.com

http://www.amazon.com

Write about what needs sacrificing in order for you to move forward in your life.

When we carry our history and our pain stories, they can become too heavy for us to bear alone. When we unveil our past and tell our stories, we are less alone. In the simplest way, we just need to be heard. But much opens and unravels as we go into our lives stories. Our pain stories can be released, and the story of our soul, our authentic story, becomes revealed, like a secret garden buried after years of neglect. Taken from my new release, The Wheel of Initiation: Practices for Releasing Your Inner Light.

“The shamanic concepts of taking ourselves apart and resembling the pieces, coupled with a story-based approach; life is a story that we weave, and healing requires an understanding of the story, the plot, and the characters and how to change them.”

–Lewis Mehl–Madrona, M.D., Ph.D., Coyote Healing

How do you make meaning of your more significant experiences? How do you interpret a synchronistic encounter for example? How do you make meaning of the creative tension in your life? How do you make sense of the difficulties or times of darkness? Since our experiences occur within the context of our life it is essential that each of us be our own meaning maker.

So often this ability to make meaning of spiritual or mystical experiences, difficulty or significant encounters is stolen from us. Academic institutions focus on teaching our children what to think rather than how to think. Medical systems discourage you from listening to your intuition. Religious institutions often push doctrine and discourage followers from interpreting their own experiences. Many will use fear to control devotees. Those in the psychological fields will too often interpret and diagnosis according to their education and set view, thus obscuring their client’s ability to grasp truth for themselves.

By letting others dictate the meaning of our experiences we lose an opportunity to learn and integrate spiritual and psychological occurrences for ourselves. Then we may miss an opportunity to write a great poem or story, or create something new because we are not feeling the discomfort and vulnerability of being our own meaning maker.

Instead, we could stay in the center of our experience and live with the creative tension and questions that it can bring forth in us. We can then interpret the experience within the context of our inner and outer life. (Rather than from the framework of someone else’s mindset.) To answer the big questions we need to hold an open conversation with all of life.

We can trust ourselves.

To create the desired movement in our life we must find our own capacity to import meaning from our experiences. We then continue to step through the threshold of familiarity and take the next step on our quest into the Unknown. Not making our own meaning would be like finding a treasure map but not actually taking the adventure to discover the treasure. The treasure is right there, on the map, in your hands.

“In Lakota framework everyone is a meaning-maker, everyone must make sense of his or her experience. Woableza has been translated as “realization.” It has always seemed to me that this word acknowledges that each person has a capacity to make meaning; that understanding is very personal, is timed by him or her, and is not predictable; and for woableza to exist, a change in the person should take place.” ­– Gerald Mohatt, The Price of A Gift

My book, Wheel of Initiation is available now through the publisher! ENter the Wheel and become your own Meaning Maker. . .

http://store.innertraditions.com/Product.jmdx?action=displayDetail&id=3726&searchString=978-1-59143-111-4

At the age of fifteen I was condemned to hell by a southern Baptist minister. I stood before him in my shorts and tee shirt, I admit scantly covered as he announced my banishment. Once censored he turned his back on me to greet the next parishioner as he received each of them coming out of the sanctuary. Souls on the assembly line for Christ. It felt much like a wedding reception line where you don’t mention to the bride that the groom is a scoundrel. You congratulate. You give or receive a blessing and you move on.

Being myself I told the minister I didn’t agree with his take on Jesus.

This minister, who had to be in his late fifties did not know me. He did not know how I tried to let Jesus into my heart. He did not know I spent years already reading the bible. He did not know I was on a long-term spiritual pilgrimage. He did not know I prayed everyday. He now knew that I didn’t agree with what he was proselytizing to all the other steamed up listeners — basically, unless you are reborn you are in deep shit. You must view yourself as a lowly sinner and beg for god’s mercy. I can’t recall the entire sermon but it included words like, blood, Christ, sinners, redemption, everlasting life for the few. . . During the sermon he invited those up who were letting Jesus in; those who were willing to announce their rebirth. Oh how grand it would have been for all if this young woman who sat in the farthest row of sinners could make her way up to the front and be saved.

I didn’t move. It would have been dishonest. I didn’t feel anything but rebellion. Not a Jesus in sight.

After being condemned, an elder of the church approached me. Her words broke through my bardo-like state, where I was not fully there nor was I gone, “Don’t worry dear he’s pretty zealous. God talks with him everyday.” At first I thought she said, “jealous.” Later I looked up the word zealous, not knowing what it meant. Apparently he was committed, dedicated, hard-core, eager, ardent. All words my dictionary and thesaurus afforded me.

My rebellion turned into fear. God makes a daily visit to this man, I thought.

What if I was missing the one opportunity for salvation, for nirvana? What if this was my one chance to guarantee a secure and happy afterlife? Would you just shrug it off and walk away? Wouldn’t you want to confirm a place in heaven, feel as if you belonged to something bigger than yourself?

Where do you want to spend eternity?

As this story goes I went back to the church the following day and found it open. (This was back in 1971, doors were left unlocked). I went in and prayed. Okay, I begged. I begged to whatever god was listening to please show me the way, give me something to go on. I begged for that Jesus in my heart feeling. I begged for personal insight. Later that morning the elder came into the church and we talked. I set up a time to visit with the minister for an hour that morning.

You can guess how that went.

He didn’t see before him a child with a beggar’s heart. He gave me scripture. He recited commandments. He told me not to dance with a man until I was married. I sat and listened and felt my lowliness. After our one-way visit ended the elder got my address and for a year she and I would write. I poured my teenage heart onto paper and she would kindly send me books, scriptures and a few supportive words. Turns out a few of the books were worth my time — but still Jesus never showed. I continued to feel the pain and eagerness of the search. Hell was looming out there for me and all my loved ones. Which brought up another concern of mine. –Even if I were to find a way to secure a heavenly place, what about those in my life who didn’t care about the afterlife? Who were not even attempting to make room in their hearts for Jesus? What about their souls?

A year passed when I finally wrote the minister himself. After all, he talks to god. Everyday. By then I needed a direct line. My brother was getting ill and crazy from schizophrenia, my boyfriend was a drunk and my dad seemed to go missing. I sent out a three page letter to the minister and then waited. Several weeks passed, longer than usual. I sat up nights reading the bible and going over the books the elder sent. “Ring of Truth,” is a title I haven’t been able to discard even now after forty years.

My oldest brother seeing me with one of my books commented sarcastically, “Ring of bullshit! You think God is going to say no to you? If you were God would you reject you?” His prompt was a good one but weakened by his steady commitment to pot and alcohol. So I kept reading and waiting and then the letter arrived. It was bulky. As it turns out it was thick with scripture and notes from the elder. Not any mention of my letter to the minister. Not a word from him.

On that day something broke open in side of me. (Something escaping out rather then being invited in.) I realized no one person holds a special relationship with god. There are no closed fists or one size fits all when it comes to god or a means to the afterlife. I also gave up on the idea of setting up room for Jesus in my heart. (I can sense the panic arise in many a good Christians as I put this down in writing!)

I rejected the premise that someone else’s path can adequately determine another’s.

I took the letter out to our back yard which was an apple orchard on the brink of extinction. I looked out and had my own conversation with god. It included a few wrathful words.

•      •      •      •      •

In Zen they warn how the great teachers and teachings can be a fierce and intimidating enemy. This is because we have to find the source on our own, from our side. If we simply plug into some religious program or blindly go the way that others have found worked for them we will miss the genuine cultivation of our own inner flame. We won’t feel the discomfort and pulse of our own life and will miss our chance that only this incarnation can give. We can’t, as Joseph Campbell says, follow someone else’s hero path. We must find and pave our own. We can of course borrow from those who have gone successfully before us. Those whom, by the way, paved their own way.

Believe nothing just because a so-called wise person said it. Believe nothing just because a belief is generally held. Believe nothing just because it is said in ancient books. Believe nothing just because it is said to be of divine origin. Believe nothing just because someone else believes it. Believe only what you yourself test and judge to be true. –The Buddha

Writing Prompts

Write about a conversation with God.

Write a story about one of your childhood spiritual or religious experiences. How did this influence your chosen spiritual or religious path now?

Write about your last (past) life.

Write about a sanctuary using the following words: doorway, visitor, retrieve, market, lips.

What do you know for certain? You can write about this repeating the words (without lifting your pen), “I know for certain.” Then write about an opposite truth. What is an opposite of something you are certain of?

His Holiness of course was generous in his teaching making the Heart Sutra accessible to all those who attended the teachings this May in Indiana. His introduction included emphasis on applying ourselves and studying the Dharma. And he concluded with a reminder to study, to access Wisdom through reading and studying. He reminded us how the Buddha discouraged people to simply follow him and instead emphasized the importance of everyone generating a mind and heart of compassion and enlightenment.

“The Buddha can only show you the path but cannot do it for you. Liberation lies in your own hands,” the Dalai Lama. (This points to my previous Blog on the Zero Point Agreement where we practice the principle of living life from our side). Prayer and chanting are not enough he went on to say, it gets down to our ethical and moral practices.

 His Holiness talked about our ability to differentiate right from wrong, and how our choices and actions need to come from compassionate wisdom and moral principles. Every arena of our life should be rooted in moral principles. So we have to ask ourselves, – “What are my spiritual principles?” “What ethics do I live by and apply on a daily basis?”  In my upcoming book on initiation I point to how spiritual (ethical) principles are the core of an initiated life, a life that truly expresses our highest nature. Therefore, spiritual initiation is dependent upon knowing and relying on your spiritual principles. A spiritual pilgrim responds to all of life’s circumstances with a spiritual principle. These principles come out of your chosen spiritual tradition. Mine are found in the Lojong practice within Buddhism. Yours may be the within a Christian context or the 4 Agreements put out by the Toltec tradition (Don Miguel Ruiz). Whatever they may be, they are to be applied within every arena of your life – “even in business,” His Holiness reminds us.

 There are certain conditions that will determine whether or not your chosen practice truly reflects ethical and moral principles. I give such a checklist in my upcoming book The Wheel of Initiation, and you can find such benchmarks by other authors and teachers. Therefore, we need to do some research, and investigate the concept of spiritual principles as well as determine what makes up a moral principle. Once we have undergone such study and investigation then we apply our principles, daily. We also need to continue studying the texts and material that sustain these principles. 

His Holiness spoke about what promotes our moral ethics. — For Buddhist we are motivated to live a principled life due to our faith and understanding of Karma – the law of causality. For Christians and others it may be a faith and understanding of “ultimate truth,” or a concept of God. For those who come from a more secular tradition, they have confidence that a more ethical and compassionate person is more calm, happy and healthy and this itself is a great motivation to live a principled life.

 “A disturbed mind makes mistakes and doesn’t know or see reality,” His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Indiana, 2010.  In order for us to see beyond our ignorance and negative projections we need to rely on a set of moral and spiritual principles. 

Depending where you are on your spiritual pilgrimage, take a look at your life and discern if you have spiritual/ethical principles available to you. And if so, how are you doing in expressing these in your daily life and relationships? Furthermore, where do you go for deeper understanding of these chosen principles?

 (I will continue sharing these teachings in Indiana in several future Blogs, posted every Friday). 

This article is taken from my upcoming release titled: The Zero Point Agreement: The Door to Freedom and Lasting Satisfaction.

All true and lasting happiness is based on this one principle. When you are in agreement with this principle, happiness and contentment will be the result. No matter what your spiritual base, no matter what you are practicing, without this agreement your spiritual practice and its achievements will be fragile and ephemeral at best. When you are not in agreement with this principle, difficulty and unhappiness will ensue. This agreement will be found within the core of all the major spiritual traditions and psychological methods. This is the agreement that all other agreements and principles rely upon for fruition. Without consciousness or understanding of this agreement, none of your spiritual practices will be effective.  There is not one place where this principle isn’t true. Furthermore this is where all spiritual or personal transformation takes place.

 This is also the only place from where you can be of benefit to others.

 In Tibetan there are the terms rangdon and shendon which translates respectively as ‘the function of oneself’ and ‘the function of others.’ To be of benefit in the world, we have to first put ourselves in order. This agreement is about placing our efforts on our own work and continuously being accountable for our part of any given situation. Polish our own mirror; focus on our own practice.

 The pithy phrase for this agreement is: I live life from my side.

Basically you are on your own.

But it also means, as is expressed in the I Ching, to go half way in our relationship with all others. To fulfill this agreement we must show up to the halfway point, not go past it or isolate our self by holding back either. Don’t go pushing our agenda on the other but don’t withdraw through indifference. Ultimately, as the I Ching further expresses, all relationships including to your spiritual source, reflect this principle.

 The best teacher can only bring the teachings to you; you have to practice on your own. Yangsin Rinpoche at his talk this past Sunday at Deer Park in Oregon Wisconsin began with “ the good news/bad news is – you have to do the practices for yourself.” He laughed and spoke about this principle and used the analogy of the sport trainer. The coach can put a lot of effort in training her athlete but the athlete has to run the marathon herself. She is on her own in the race. Fortunately, this means that the athlete or spiritual practitioner also experiences the results of her efforts. In spiritual or psychological contexts, no one else can have a realization for you. This may seem obvious but in many religious practices the effort and experiences are often placed on the religious leader or teacher. Healers and teachers that go past the half way to “heal” you while you passively “receive” are doing you more harm than good.  I speak to this in detail in my upcoming book on Spiritual Initiation in the chapter, The Toa of Not Following. (To be released August 15^th, 2010: The Wheel of Initiation: Practices for Releasing Your Inner Light.)  This book also offers an organic template from which you are given practices needed to fulfill this core agreement. 

All transformation happens from our own side, a result entirely based on our efforts. Miracles as I wrote in a previous Blog article arise as an opportunity; what we do with that opportunity is entirely up to us. 

What we do with this precious (brief) human life is up to each of us.

The Ten key points of this agreement of “I live life from my side:”

1.   You are 100% responsible for your motivation and effort. You create the conditions for a happy and satisfied life from your side.

2.   You are the athlete, the spiritual practitioner; you are on your own when it comes to the effort. (You then experience the direct results of this effort.)

3.   You rely on a qualified teacher as your coach. A qualified teacher is someone who exemplifies this principle.

4.   You show up half way for all your relationships. Going past half way disrespects boundaries. Just so, not showing up to the halfway point means you are not truly living.

5.   Your true and lasting happiness is dependent on your attitude and what you focus your mind on. It all gets down to the condition of your mind.

6.   You investigate truth, teachings, and instructions for yourself. You decide. You are the meaning maker.

7.   You prepare for spiritual experience or teachings from your side through purification and other practices such as meditation or investigation.

8.   You recognize the preciousness of human life and the responsibility that goes along with it.

9.   You take refuge in wholesome and strong intentions.

10.  You acknowledge and have a spiritual/ethical practice you rely upon.

When you are engaged in the following you are out of alignment with this core agreement:

1.   Anytime you complain.

2.   When you ponder others.

3.   When you make someone else responsible for your unhappiness or happiness.

4.    When you feel overwhelmed.

5.   When you need to be right.

6.   When you are making assumptions about others.

7.   When you try to change someone else’s attitude or behavior.

8.   When you make choices and act according to how you think others will respond to you.

9.   When you get angry with others rather than transform the anger from your side.

10.  When you are caught up in such negative emotional states as jealousy, revenge, hate, attachment, or judgment.

11.  When you are competing to win rather than competing to do your best.

12.        When you are chronically unhappy.

13.  When you are disappointed with others and do not take the effort to change the situation from your side.

14.  When you experience challenges and difficulty (including difficult people) as a validation of a negative perspective.

15.  When your resistance to follow-through on a creative, spiritual or ethical commitment is stronger than your motivation.

16.  When you are focused on external conditions of unhappiness or happiness, such as money, prestige, success, or popularity.

 There are more signs that point to how you are out of alignment with this core agreement as well as ways to become strong in this principle (available in both books mentioned above). In fact, every worthwhile practice will point to this agreement as its foundation. For now you may want to investigate this further for yourself through spiritual journaling and personal inquiry.

 Investigation through Spiritual Journaling and personal inquiry:

 1.   Begin with reading through a text you rely upon now in your spiritual practice. Find this agreement within and write about it.

2.   Notice how you or others may be complaining. Become conscious of changing complaints into motivations. Take some action to remedy the issue or let it go. Create an intention around this.

3.   Write about water using the following words:  self, reliance, guided, undercurrent, direction, and rock.

4.   Write about what conditions are necessary for you in order to have a happier life. Then write about what you are going to do from your side (internally and externally) to bring these about.

5.   Preorder my book on spiritual initiation and sign up for my free seminar on “Entering The Wheel,” Friday August 13^th at Thundering Clouds, LLC. See my calendar for details.

6.  Take a problematic situation and apply this principle as best you can. Write your insights in your journal.

http://www.fpmt.org/teachers/zopa/

“Our soul is always calling us home. And the way home is through the mind” –Jiivanii

So you are moving along in your life and then something happens that stops everything. You find yourself unable to get out of bed or off the couch. What once was easy is now riddled with anxiety and dificulty. Panic sets in and takes over the mind, body and spirit. What’s happening?

Clearly a lot of people experience various degrees of depression and anxiety. Even in good times, there is an average of 16 million new cases of depression in the United States every year, leading me to ask, “What is really going on here?” There are numerous ads announcing the latest drug treatment. A friend told me recently that one such television ad (we don’t have television) announces that “If none of your other medications work for depression tell your doctor about this one!” An implication here is that this drug may be your last chance.

There are no last chances until you are dead. And even then I am certain our karma continues, as do our chances.

You probably want my position on drug treatment. I am not opposed to it; I am also not in favor of it as the “first or only” response to depression and anxiety. In fact, in all cases of drug treatment one should be engaged in psychological, spiritual, social and environmental remedies.

There is a cure for depression and anxiety. Just as the African proverb suggests: “the treatment is right next to the wound.” The solutions are right next to the problems. In my thirty years of offering counseling I find that the answers are in the questions. Each client carries within themselves the answers they need. Look at your life and find the cure.

When confronted with such suffering as depression and anxiety, your cure is in your response. So don’t kill the messenger.

Don’t Kill the Messenger 

Depression is a part of a whole life, not something one can separate out and label only as “chemical” or biological. Even so in those situations where biology may be a primary factor—to leave out the rest of the human experience (emotional, mental, spiritual, social and environmental) would be a failure in treatment. In fact, when someone experiences an onset of depression their life is talking to them. Their soul is sending out an SOS  – something is not working here! So to just take medication would be to cover up the discomfort of the message and in so doing kill the messenger. To be free of depression or anxiety or to at least not be run down by them, one must be able to listen to the Voice of the antagonist. So even in the situation where medications help, be mindful to take enough to help but not so much to kill the messenger before you understand the message.

Narcissism In Healing

When we become ill or dis-eased there is a need for us to become somewhat self-absorbed. For example, if we are hit in the head with a brick we need to clean the wound and bandage our head. We would need to stop the bleeding. What tends to happen though with depression and anxiety is we may get too caught up in the whole drama of it all. Everything is about our depression and anxiety. As soon as possible we have to agree that this dis-ease, this problem is not just about me. It affects everyone around me. Self-absorption is not a cure and will result in more sense of isolation. Take care of the bleeding and then get on with the transformational healing.

So, at the same time you will need to hold up the mirror and be willing to take a look at your life and ask yourself some questions. What in my life is not working?

A New Map of the World

Your view of the world will need to change – you can’t keep looking out into the world in the same way, it is not working for you anymore. For this change in view to take place you will need some process of thought transformation. Such practices can be found in Buddhism (Lojong practices, meditation,) cognitive-behavioral and didactic therapies, and awareness techniques, for examples.

Often depression and anxiety is brought on by one’s paradigm shifting, life has brought to your doorstep some big changes. But you keep holding on to the same view, the same way of relating to your life. Depression and anxiety then is again the call of your soul to change your view, to transform your self. For example, where in the past everything came easily, you didn’t have much to worry about. Then you lost your job or a loved one. Or some other outward circumstance triggered a big change. Now you need a new map of the world since the world around you has changed. If you keep trying to take the old road to the new place you will remain lost. Other times it is that the life you thought would bring you happiness isn’t. So the paradigm wants to shift but you may not know how to go about this transformation, this change in view. You will have to choose some antidotes to the depression: some techniques of thought transformation so your view and relationship to your life can change.

The Unlived Life

Your response, your cure, will need to include a spiritual component. Spiritual for me means bringing forth such qualities as love, forgiveness, creativity, compassion, and awareness.

Many times someone has come to me depressed and angry and it doesn’t take a long search to find out that they are leaving a large part of their life unlived. Their cure is simple (but not easy): they need to activate their creative life – take that class, bring out the guitar, write that book, move to the country and raise organic chickens, or simply read more books and take more trips. They need to commit to the creative life.

If you don’t fulfill your creative calling, we all lose

            Spirituality also means that we come to deeply understand that we are all connected somehow, that our life and what we do with it touches everything and everyone. Your life matters and it matters in a big way. For me this includes holding the awareness of karma and how every experience (result) has causes. We didn’t get here alone or by accident. Our entire life leads up to this moment, to this experience. Furthermore, in my Buddhist practice I understand that I am also influencing future lives. Ultimately it doesn’t matter who threw the brick or why, it is best to put our energy in applying the antidote.

I hope for you a happy, creative life. I hope you listen to the messenger and seek the antidotes for true happiness. It is never too late and there are no last chances, just the one before you now. Something beautiful wants to happen; a treasure wants to be revealed! Get that updated map and get going!

            Consider these:

Spend some time outside aware of what gets your attention. Allow the natural beat of nature to sooth you. Breathe in some outdoor air, notice where the moon or sun is in the sky. Take some time to journal afterward.

Watch the Movie Off the Map. What do you think brought the husband and the visitor out of their depressions? Consider how the entire movie is a metaphor for our life’s journey and the difference choices we have. How does each person represent different parts of your self? Notice how we influence one another.

Read, Parker Palmer’s book, An Active Life.

Find a qualified spiritual teacher or a transpersonal psychotherapist that will help you with thought transformation, meditation practices and experiencing the reality of oneness.

Keep a spiritual journal. In October I will be offering another round of Spiritual Journaling Classes. See my calendar.

Check out your area for Shambhala trainings, and mindfulness meditation classes.

Watch the movie 10 Questions for His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

Read the 14^th Dalai Lama’s book, Ethics for a New Millennium. 

Preorder my book: The Wheel of Initiation: Practices for Releasing Your Inner Light. 

Someone recently inquired about what I thought a miracle was. So, in response of course I sat down and wrote my thoughts in my journal. After all, everything is grist for the mill when it comes to spiritual journaling and the writer’s life.

The response came quickly because I have experienced many miracles in my life. Just yesterday morning looking out my window I witnessed a miracle.

Miracles often go beyond our ability to explain how they happened. Of course there is much around us that cannot easily be explained. However, when we have a miracle show up it is through our understanding of it that we experience it as a miracle.

There are many levels of miracles and depending on and through one’s view, one experiences a miracle. Your view includes your perspective, your mind set, your assumptions and your spiritual knowledge.

One “level” of miracle is through synchronistic encounters, another “level” is through experiencing our oneness with all of life (this can be a healing miracle or a spiritual epiphany). Paradoxically, I experience many miracles in nature and through scientific phenomenon. Seeing a redheaded woodpecker at my feeder can be understood as a miracle due to their rarity. Being in a terrible accident without a scratch on you could be a miracle. Someone recovering from cancer could be a miracle. Someone having cancer could be a miracle. 

Miracles are relative to the person witnessing or experiencing one.

Just yesterday I was sharing a story of a personal miracle I experienced back in the late 1970’s. (And even though I consider this a more personal miracle it fulfills my requirement for an authentic miracle.) An authentic miracle is one that moves the individual and environment (social and natural) in the direction of one’s evolutionary destiny (destination). An authentic miracle is recognized as such. An authentic miracle is perfectly timed (but this timing cannot be explained rationally). 

An authentic miracle holds an opportunity for the recipient. 

So, back in the second summer after I graduated from High School I went to the admissions office of the University. I had attended my last two years of High School at one of the first alternative high schools: Malcolm Shabazz. Grades were not important, but one still had to get credits to graduate. Up until my senior year I had no plans of going on to college. But upon graduation I decided I wanted to be a writer and become a social worker. So with my “eggs all in one basket,” I took my transcripts to the admission’s office with the plan to attend the University that Fall. The woman at the admissions took my material and told me to come back the next day. Which I did. When she retrieved my transcripts she informed me that I did not have enough algebra credits for admission.

I left confused and stumped. My plan felt SO correct for me. I could feel the momentum of this idea I held for my self and my life. 

I went for a walk down to a local drug store that at the time had a counter where one could get sodas, sandwiches and ice cream. (Back then they were known for grilled cinnamon rolls — buttered and flipped on the grill!) I sat down and ordered a coca-cola. As I sipped and considered my predicament (I was also asking Spirit, How can this be, and What should I do now?), someone sat down next to me. I was pretty self-absorbed but I did look up to greet this person.

Can you guess who sat next to me that day?

My algebra teacher from Malcolm Shabazz. I told him what just happened and he told me that I did in fact take enough algebra and that he would write a letter stating so.

I was admitted into the University that Fall. (I now have eight published books and hold a Masters in Social Work).

I know we have to show up for these miracles, they don’t come to us. We have to “meet the Creative” halfway as the I Ching consults us to do. We have to participate in the evolutionary momentum of our life and the life of the planet. When we do this, miracles show up to help us.

I witnessed a miracle recently. One that is relatively common — someone addicted to drugs and alcohol hit the wall, hard. The wall was the miracle. The miracle was his feeling the impact of the wall. The miracle was in his choice of recovery.

In the movie The Cave of The Yellow Dog the Grandmother shows her granddaughter the miracle of life. She asks her to try and get a grain of sand to land on the top of a needle. When she is unsuccessful her Grandmother says, “That is how difficult it is to have a human birth.” 

Ideally, miracles are recognized as such and not wasted.

Journaling Around Miracles

What do you consider a miracle? Write about a recent one. What kind of miracle would help you at this point with your intentions or life?

Write about a missed opportunity (or wasted miracle) using the following words: precious, reluctant, chance, future, sunset, over. 

How can such difficulty as cancer or losing something be a miracle?

Take a different bus or route home. Notice something unusual and write about that.

 Freedom involves making decisions, and each decision is a destiny decision.- Joseph Campbell

What do a snowstorm, winter prairie, prayer flags, frozen seeds and enlightenment have in common?

Well, being a meaning-maker, I decide that. Oh how I love the writer’s life, I can take and make meaning of everything!  As the spiritual practitioner I am also the meaning maker but use sacred texts as a skillful means to make meaning of my encounters and experiences. After all, awakened Beings have gone before me and traversed the difficulties and distractions leaving behind many maps for me to use.

So my walk through the prairie and its 12 inches of snow afforded me inspiration for both my writing and spiritual life. It usually does. This of course is in part due to what I bring into the spiral with me, my view as a writer and as a spiritual practitioner. Joseph Campbell in his work often pointed to that it is not so much the experience itself (any one can walk through the prairie, attend church, or listen to a spiritual teaching) it is “what we bring to it.” We all bring our view to our encounters and this view determines what we get out of it. One’s view includes beliefs, intentions and assumptions. If you are having an unpleasant experience, check your view; check what you are bringing to it.

Then as a writer, notice what arises from your view and write about it. As a spiritual practitioner notice what arises from within and without during a certain event and use it as material for your spiritual practice. And then, if you want, bring the two together.

On my winter walk I noticed how the sun appeared like a phantom through the haze of snow and cloud. This reminded me how even though we don’t see the sun or the moon they are always there. Much like the Buddha or my root guru Padmasambhava. They are always there but often hidden behind something. Then I realized that I see the Buddha when I practice, when I come out from hiding. The Buddha is in the practice. Actually more what I mean is that the Buddha is seen through my practice. When I bring the Buddha into my experience I get more of the Buddha back. I bring him or her out from hiding. 

This took me further into the realization that the only teachers I rely on (and recommend others rely on) are ones that are first most practitioners. They too bring the Light of the Buddha or the Christ or the Truth out as they practice what they teach.

On this walk through the prairie the sun remained hidden behind a haze of cloud and snow but still sent out some light, enough for me to get through the prairie, enough to make my way on the unhiked and snow covered path.

As I continued I remained aware of what I was bringing to my walk as well as what caught my attention as I walked . . .

I saw seeds frozen on top of the snow, small tracks of mouse having braved it across the white landscape, how the path disappeared and reappeared, the faded Tibetan prayer flags moving with the wind, the call of the crows as I walked deeper into the spiral, the familiarity of it all and how the prairie gives me the feeling of belonging.

Instant Enlightenment

Frozen seeds crown the December snow

some will make it to bloom yet.

While others will be devoured whole

by the local residents.

Searching

When in the prairie

I need not search around for enlightenment,

This would be like the Echinacea

trying to conceal its seeds.

Here, Now,

 I feel a thousand lifetimes away from awakening,

Unknowingly

walking at the feet of the Buddha.

So that’s what destiny is: simply the fulfillment of the potentialities of the energies in your own system. The energies are committed in a certain way, and that commitment out there is coming toward you.  –Joseph Campbell

Journaling Practices for You –

Take five subjects you notice while either on a meditative walk outside or just throughout your day:  snow stuck on trees (what kind of tree?), the sounds of a child playing with a friend in the adjoining room (playing what?), red-tailed hawk swooping down on a mouse (does she get it? Are you happy for the bird?), the frozen foot print (of a boot, a coyote, mouse?), etc. . . . Write about them with the intention to draw some spiritual meaning from them. Notice what you “bring to” any given encounter. Write this into your piece. Spend a good deal of your time outdoors or during the day simply noticing. Notice what you are bringing to something (attitude, assumptions, ideas.) Notice what comes to you, what gets your attention on your walk or during the day. Who or what shows up? Where is the sun? What’s in your pockets? What do you want? What do you hear? How does what you bring to an encounter (walk, visit with a relative) change the experience? Write about that. Write about experiencing something for the last time (a meal, a walk in your favorite spot, a sound of your child, for examples.)

Write a poem beginning with, “I am called”.

I am called

Write a poem beginning with, “Earth brings me.”

Earth brings me

Write a poem ending with

I watched as it fell

Happy Writing to you. Happy Awakening. Blessings on this Winter Solstice.

I am called to sing

a song I’ve never heard

Visit the friend

I’ve never met.

I am called to dig

For the words hidden deep

Find the meaning

of this unknown place.

I am called to undo

the pain of the past

And to know you

for the first time

again and again.

For more on poetry go to my Poet’s Page at my website. Enjoy my guest poet William Stafford. And did you know that you can back order my book on Initiation that is going to be released this August? Simply go to Inner Traditions/Bear & Company! Spring/Summer 2010 frontlist catalog. You will find my book on page 32.  Thank you!

There is a great theft going on, one that steals our power, our medicine and our ability to hold our seat when necessary. Words are being stolen right out from under us.  What happens then is we find we are going right when we thought we were going left. We find ourselves believing without reservation that North is up and South is down. We find ourselves being scared of someone because they are a Christian or a Muslim. We find we shouldn’t feel entitled or hungry. And that selfish is always bad and love is always good. (Many, many nasty acts have been done in the name of love.)

War is patriotic but peace is unpatriotic. 

We need to claim these stolen words back and do so bravely and relentlessly. In our writing and in our speech we must use and speak out forbidden and stolen words, reframing them when necessary. “I am a monger of peace.”

Find the root meaning of words. Know the original intentions of a word.

Listen to what you are agreeing to when someone tells you something.  “I did it out of love.” “This is what a patriot does.”

 Listen for assumptions in someone’s speech and help reframe words and watch the world transform around you. This transformation is much like the restoring of a prairie to a more natural and honest state. We don’t let one plant horde the soil and light; we don’t let a word’s stolen meaning reek havoc on our intentions. We are not robots to other’s meaning of words. (We are the Meaning Maker.)

 Break the pattern of agreeing to a stolen meaning of a word or phrase and allow for a diversity of meaning to beautify a prairie and a conversation. Speak up. 

Shake up the conversation. 

Consider every word we carry as sacred and itself a container of a potent elixir or poison. You carry this word around with you affecting your psychophysical body as well as when spoken you impact the world around you. You release the elixir or poison from the bottle. When a word is stolen and we haven’t claimed it back then the vibration and meaning of the stolen word is the one carried in our psyches as well as the one heard and felt by others.

 “The penthouse is always on the top floor because the higher up you are the better. The better view is from on top.”

 “Dark is dangerous and bad.” 

“You bring me down.”

“This is ugly.”  What makes something ugly? And I wonder, where does this word originate? If something is considered ugly, is it considered bad?

 “Many of us know the northern countries are ‘on top’ and it is always better to be on top.”

“She’s ugly.”  “She’s beautiful.”

“I am patriotic.”

“Let’s be friends.”

“He’s a Pagan.”

Stolen words hold many assumptions and agreements and often hidden lies. When we numbly agree to stolen words our creative expression is halted. Stolen too. If top is always better than bottom where does that leave the snake, the inhabitant of the first floor apartment, or the earthworm? If hot is always red? . . . The day was blue-hot. A hot so uncontaminated it purified and released the long-ago deceased. It was time for everyone to go home. The dead knew their way and fell into the blue of sky, the blue of heat. Even the dead seek the warmth.

I hear people often say, “I think,” when what they are often trying to say is, “I know.” “I think,” communicates a wavering, an invitation for a robbery. “I think I want to try that,” sounds quite a bit different than, “I know I want to try that.”

“I think so.”

“I know so.”

  When you only think you know then others can easily step in and hold a conviction in your place. Predators enter where we waiver. Resistance arises where we hesitate.

Maybe the volume of stolen words is just too great to tackle. Just too premeditated to wrestle. Just too much to even consider. But let me remind you, words and the use of words make up both our inner and outer world. Words and the stories they weave are the world. What better past time to have but shouting out on the page or at the gathering, “I don’t agree”!  ”I don’t agree!”

“I don’t agree!”

“Hey, I don’t agree!”

Here are several stolen words, can you add to the list? –

 Up 

Down

Lesbian

Black

Dyke

Homosexual

spiritual

Christian

God

Medicine

patriotic

Muslim

natural

winning

love

forgiveness

entitled

pagan

justice

to be fair

ritual

democrats

I know 

republicans

green

divorced

stoned

beautiful

childless

family

home

sin

goddess

crazy

Buddhist

Caring

Humility/humble

Shadow

Selfish 

“If love is the answer, could you please rephrase the question?”  Written by Jane Wagner for Lily Tomlin.

Write about what you were taught love is. How was love used (or misused) in your family, religious institution, or community?  Is love, “never having to say you’re sorry?” Is love, “This hurts me more than it hurts you?” “She loved him so much she had to do what she did.” What does it mean to love god?  What is god’s love? What does love mean to you now? Whom do you love and how? Choose a better word to represent this affection for others. Sometimes we reclaim a word by finding another one to takes it’s place.

 “Fire has a love for itself­–

It wants to keep burning.”   Hafiz,  Sufi Master and Poet

 Write a piece repeating the sentence:  “This is what I know . . .” Remember not to stop to think instead repeat the above sentence until the muse begins to flow. Fill up one page without stopping your pen.

Reclaim the above stolen words for yourself. Write a story or a letter to someone using several of the stolen words, claiming them back in the process. 

Identify and write about several other stolen words. What makes them stolen? Win them back by writing about them.

Write about an enemy using the following words: reluctant, inside, fearless, grasping, mirror, revelation.

What makes up a family for you?

You are fourteen years old. You just slept over at your best friends house. The next morning you are sitting in her room watching a show where someone reveals they are gay and your friend says, “What do you think about being gay?” Finish this conversation. 

Midway on our life’s journey, I found myself

In dark woods, the right road lost.                  Dante’s Inferno