Welcome...

Come meander with me on the pathless path of the Heart
in these anecdotal,
sometimes inspiring, sometimes personal meanderings of the Heart's opening in the every-day-ness of life...

Monday, December 28, 2015

Reflections on a Mother...

After a rather poignant moment at Christmas, when my mother squeezed my hand after we hugged good-bye, an unheard language was transmitted through the hands: Love – something not easily expressed between us - and I had these reflections…


I wish I could have had a different relationship with my mother – more open, authentic, and loving…  I feel sad that it couldn't have been different.  Because of our personalities and the dynamic in the relationship from the beginning – an unseen dynamic unfolded between the two of us; which has now softened as she becomes more fragile.  She is losing more and more of her vision, her abilities and faculties.  There is less cognizant ability to understand what is being asked of her.  Her brain cannot handle too much information or stimulation.  But maybe love is emerging…  Maybe that is what is left when the body-mind mechanism begins to fail…

She covers it well, talking mostly in clichés – turning the personality on – speaking from the face – the mask.  But don’t ask her what she had for breakfast, or what she did yesterday, or what the doctor told her – it will scatter and scramble her brain.  And she will hide from you…  and turn the conversation back to you and ask:  And how are YOU doing? – just to avoid the difficulty of holding a conversation…

Sometimes she gets frustrated and angry because she is losing her abilities.  I feel the frustration too, as well as sadness and compassion for her fragility, vulnerability and woundedness – and the relationship we never had, but which now seems to be emerging in an unexpected way.  There is a softness between us now – sometimes - a caring, a loosening of defense mechanisms that served to protect each other from each other - sometimes.

And now in her “failing” years I wish it could have been different – that I could have been more present and more open to her, to not have closed off my own heart, but to have really seen the illumined heart of love that was really there, in both of us, behind the dynamic without the mask that veiled that Love.  I know that when she dies I will grieve that, and the relationship we never had – and maybe even the one we lost – and the one we might have had. 

In some ways my heart has already started to grieve the love we missed: a  genuinely loving mother-daughter connection; and yet it is not over…   Maybe, just maybe, our hearts will open to each other.  It seems they are beginning to...

Photo:
 a picture of my sister-in-law’s and mother-in-law’s hands…
My mother-in-law is in a Nursing Home with Alzheimer’s,
and yet there is still a “connection” through touch…

I made comment to my sister-in-law that it was interesting that
in some cases we can’t really connect with our mothers
until they are fragile and vulnerable,
and become like children again…




Blessings to Mothers and Daughters


Friday, December 25, 2015

Christmas Cheer!


My 87 year old mother seeing her son
for the first time in 6 years
Via FaceTime on cell phone


It was a poignant moment...

 Joy, Laughter and Tears…
with Dad looking on from "on high"... 




My sister playing with her cat "Shadow"
in the bag




A special visit from “Biscuit” the deer
at the door, waiting for a hand-out – literally
J
She is hand fed through the door…

   

A Merry time was had by all...

Just a little peek into my world... 


Thursday, December 24, 2015

"Holi"-day Wishes...


Whatever your Holiday tradition is -

May the Mystery and Wonder
 of
Existence ItSelf…

fill
 you with
 Light
 Love,
and
new
Joys
of the Heart

~

Peace and Blessings to All…


Mystic Meandering


Monday, December 21, 2015

Solstice - Shimmer of Light...

We are the Grace of Love fulfilled,
the shimmer of Sacred Light,
lustrous uniqueness in a field of
multitudinal Divine Shimmers
in glittering oneness…

We are the twinkle of liberated luminosity
radiating from the Heart pulse of the
Divine Mystery…
We are created and create from
the glowing embers
of the furnace
of
Love’s
Fire

Touch the Holiness of the Solstice,
its symbolism,
upon which all the other
”holi-days” are based;
the real reason for the Season:
the symbolic return of The Light…

Let it awaken you to your Inner Brilliance,
Your Divine Nature,
Your Shimmer of Light…



Mystic Meandering

for Winter Solstice 2015

Friday, December 18, 2015

To Touch "The Divine"...

To touch “The Divine” imbues
a quiet stillness of being;
feeling the pulse of energy
coursing through your body,
feeling yourself in the
 formless field of Silent Aware Beingness,
feeling the Living Presence hum through every cell,
being absorbed in Its Rhythm of Silence;
and feeling the body respond
to ITs Touch…

To touch “The Divine” ~
not an entity - as such,
not a “god” or “deity” – as such
but a formless field of energy
that we float through
and that floats through us,
brings a harmonious wholeness
in reciprocal
 oneness

To touch “The Divine” in the
 Great Silence
is complete rest,
complete release,
complete equanimity,
surrendered wholly to
”the Divine”

Not a surrendering – as such,
only allowing oneself to be
Touched;
to feel the
The intimate Touch of
 “The Divine”
 within ~

It can’t even be called “Love” – as such
It is way beyond “Love” - as we know it...
It is a sublime energy,
a deep stillness
that cannot be
described,
 or named
by words

Only felt,
experienced,
in the body,
in the energy field
and substance of the body,
through direct awareness…

And all one can do is breathe
and say thank you~
Thank you for the Mystery of
this wondrous, ineffable
  Divine Touch




Mystic Meandering
Meditative Writings
Dec. 15, 2015



Friday, December 11, 2015

Rest in the Great Heart...

Rest in the Great Heart – and wait…
Entrust yourself to
the Heart of the Great Mystery ~
The Ineffable Mystery
That which infuses all life
with the greatest Mystery~
Existence…

Let yourself be held by the
rhythm of the Cosmos
Let it
take you ~ carry you
in its music

Be absorbed in its rhythmic
fluidity of Silent Awareness
beyond time and space…
And be still

Embrace your Fear
and allow ~
The “answers” will be revealed
in their own time
by the movement of
the Universe -
the movement of Life ItSelf ~ within you…

Rest in the Great Heart of the Mystery…

Trust…

All is held in place by
the Great, ever-lasting
Mystery of Existence
like the stars suspended in space…

Let go
 into The Mystery
the Unknown…
Be absorbed in it – by it
Dissolve in it…

Experience
the “energetic rhythm”
of the Great Heart
that never
ceases
to
BE



Mystic Meandering
Meditative Writings
Dec. 10, 2015



Sunday, December 6, 2015

Take a Lesson from the Cosmos...

Take a lesson from the Universe, learn from the ways of the Cosmos.  If you look at it, really see it, it’s all about ever-expanding Awareness.  There’s no “closure”, no convergent anything.  It’s all divergent, synchronous energy, ever-expanding, ever aware.  It’s an organic energy that wants to be expressed.  What’s in us is the same energy of the Universe that wants to be expressed.  All we need do is – become aware - of the energy of Awareness that IS the Universe/Cosmos, in us…

There is Dissonance *and* Harmony.  The synthesis of Dissonance and Harmony creates the experience, not static energy, not either/or concepts.  The totality of the experience *includes* both –  duality and non-duality, sadness and joy, light and dark.  They are just energetic experiences.  Essentially they are one movement, one rhythm, functioning synchronistically.

My husband J

Photo - Moon, Jupiter and Venus June/July 2015



Thursday, December 3, 2015

"No More!"...

I heard a voice of a young child as I was waking from sleep yesterday morning.  It yelled “No More!”  The voice came from *inside* - How strange I thought.  I wondered if this was a message for me, or, if it was me screaming from the inside – “No More!” – enduring a particularly stressful time at this moment in life. Or was it my inner psyche calling out to a world gone mad; witnessing a species apparently turning against itself, apparently trying to destroy itself in so many different ways – or so it seems.  And the rest of us – onlookers – enduring the dance of darkness that plays itself out – forced to face the darkness within and without.  I pondered this all day, turning my awareness inward to the fear inside – repeating the phrase internally – “No More!”  At the end of the day’s reflection was the sense that sometimes all we can do is endure the way life is – day to day.  And I wondered why - why that is true, why is it that we must “endure” such pain, such suffering, both within and without…  But there was no answer….

 Maybe the voice was from a dream I didn’t realize I was having.  And maybe that really is what life is – a dream we don’t realize we’re having – that we must endure for as long as the dream lasts, until we are awakened from the dream by a voice saying “No More!”…  I don’t know…  I cannot presume to know anything anymore…

~

Below is a “poem” I wrote from my meditative writings
sometime between 2004 and 2006 that gives a
different perspective.



Entropy

The shadows have come to roost
and
 *everything*
 is
 collapsing
~
~
~
~

The tides and ripples of entropy will continue
until all is returned to Source again ~
the Primordial State:
Pure Life Energy…

Entropy is not necessarily a bad thing.
It is the way of Existence.
It is a

T

E

L

E

S

C

O

P

I

N

G

 of everything that is,
back to its original Source/State;
a re-homing of all that was created in form,
the conceptual structures,
so that only
the Eternal
Essence
 remains


Do not be alarmed by the seeming destruction
of what you have *believed* to be real.
The false must be released, shed – like dross.
In this there is a sense of chaos, destruction, loss, and death;
the crucible affect;
a state of alchemy,
the refinement of all things in existence
to its Original Nature.

Nothing is lost in the process.

All is coming Home.

The
Divine
 Outbreath
Has
 Been
 Re-called.

Bring your awareness to the place of Stillness within.
Don’t try to create order in the chaos.
But be still and let the chaos pass.
”Order” is found in the Stillness,
in returning to deep Stillness

The healing of mankind
is
 in
 the
 *recognition*
 Of
 The
 Truth
 of its Eternal Essence -
Infinite Beingness…

Entropy is the crucible of that healing…

Allow it…

~

The invitation
 is to expand our view of reality
and return to the *awareness* of
our Eternal Being…



Mystic Meandering
taken from my
Meditative Writings
written between
 2004 and 2006


Wednesday, December 2, 2015

The Portal of Wholeness - Matt Licata

At times, you may be asked to travel into the very groundless and contradictory landscape of the emotional world, without any understanding of what is being asked of you.  It is so open here, but simultaneously disorienting to the mind that is longing for answers.  It is as if everything you were so sure about only days before has fallen away…

Unmetabolized feelings, orphaned sensations, and vivid images are surging in the somatic field, seeming disconnected and…..chaotic.  But things are not always as they seem as you approach the threshold of wholeness. The invitation has been made: trust in the process of disintegration and the intelligence of immediate experience.

Yes, it may always be disturbing to stay embodied to the burning feelings and sensations that appear alongside the dissolution of old dreams and the way you thought it was all going to turn out.  But in the commitment to meet what is appearing with presence, you may discover that this destruction is sacred, unbearably creative, and soaked with reorganizing wisdom.

Before you turn from the confusion and scramble to transform or heal it with learned process, open into the uncertainty, the hopelessness, and the breaking of your heart.  It is there you will find life, longing to erupt and shatter the dream of partiality [fragmentation].  For each visitor of the inner and outer worlds is unfolding in the radiant [moment] as an unprecedented portal of wholeness…



~

Photo - reflection of the sky on the hood of a car
Photo upside down :)

Thursday, November 26, 2015

Graced With Gratitude...

Gratitude arises
like a warm flame
in the Heart;
a flame that
comes alive
on its own
from within

Overtaking me by surprise…

It’s a gratitude of
unknown origin -
not contrived,
or cultivated,
but
deeply felt in the
core of my Being;
only awareness is
needed….

A gratitude
not for being alive,
but for Aliveness ItSelf,
for the Aliveness that
is Life;
that dances and sings
the Cosmos
into being;
that imbues existence
with LIFE!

For the color and movement
of life being lived
in every minute detail;
for the opening and
unfoldment of life
that has its own
course,
its own
way,
unfolding Itself in
total freedom of Being

I am truly graced with Gratitude -
beyond words…


Mystic Meandering
Meditative writings
October 2015

~

Photo: street light through ice on window
2011



Saturday, November 21, 2015

Room For Sadness - Jeff Foster


Your sadness doesn't say,
 "Please fix me,
heal me, or release me".
It doesn't say, "Please get rid of me,
 numb yourself to me, pretend I'm not here".

Sadness does not come to punish you,
 or reveal to you what a 'spiritual failure' you are.
 Sadness is not a sign that you are unevolved
 or far from healing, awakening, enlightenment, peace.

The presence of sadness is not an indication
 that you've done something wrong.

True healing is not the fixing of the broken,
But the rediscovering of the Unbroken.

…we bow to sadness then,
 we recognise how it's already allowed in,
 how there's enough room in us for sadness,
 how we are not 'the sad one',
 not contained within sadness,
 but the room for sadness,
 its space, its home,
 its salvation,
 its loving embrace;
 not as a goal,
 but as our nature - consciousness itself,
 already free.

Don't heal yourself from sadness; let sadness heal you.
 Let it show you the way when you have forgotten.
 Let it reveal to you the mysteries of love.
 Let it remind you of your vast heart,
 your refusal to split off from any part of your ancient Self.
Let sadness help you remember that
 bigger Happiness you danced when you were young.


Jeff Foster




I have put Jeff's words
into prose poetry form.

~*~

Also see my poem:
The Rhythm of Sadness




Thursday, November 19, 2015

Awareness Simply Is - Leo Hartong

If you want the truth, you have to look beyond the concepts of the individual ego and self-improvement, and beyond the states of mind that you’d like to acquire, and the belief that you are a separate entity.  You are the sourceless source from which all arises. Know yourself as the limitless field of Pure Awareness in which the drama of life merely arises.  Once this is recognized and it is clear what you truly are, you’ll see that everything is exactly as it should be.   Everything emanates from the same Source beyond space and time, which escapes all attempts at labeling and yet has been given many names, such as God, the Ultimate, the ground of Being, The Tao, your original face, or the deep Self. 

Awareness is the consistent characteristic in and behind ALL experience, yet it is also what which most easily escapes our attention.  We see the stars and ignore the space; we read this text and ignore the page; we see the movie and ignore the screen; yet it is obvious that the ignored space, page, and screen are as fundamental to our observations as the stars, the text, and the movie, which hold our attention.  Awareness is the space that sustains both the noticed and the ignored.  Awareness simply is.  Everything that comes up/happens is contained in and embraced by this Awareness, including objects perceived as “out there” (rocks, cars and other sentient beings, events) and emotions, thoughts and feelings experienced as “in here.”  In this sense, Awareness is as much in the body-mind as the body-mind is in Awareness.

Pure Awareness is what you truly are.  Know yourself as the limitless field of Pure Awareness in which the drama of life merely arises.  This Awareness is That Being which we all have in common, the luminous, self-aware center of our collective Being. In knowing this we are released from the burden of trying to control life, and constantly improve one’s self.  The ego has the same level of reality as an echo… The sense of a separate ego can only be an activity of the true Self…  The Self loses itself in the dream of existence…..and creates an illusory ego.  You are the living Awareness, which is the clear and open space in and from which everything arises, including your sense of individuality.  Pure awareness is simply present with no beginning or end.


So just sit down and relax…

Leo Hartong
Awakening to the Dream



Monday, November 16, 2015

The World's Insanity - Ivan Granger

Islamic extremists have certainly grabbed headlines in recent years, but the world also has its Christian extremists, Jewish extremists, Hindu extremists… as well as plenty of atheist and non-religious extremist groups. Extremism is not a problem of a particular religion; it is a disruption in the human psyche in general.

Religious extremism has very little to do with religion, if you think about it. It is partly a reflexive response to the intensely fragmenting nature of the modern world. And it is partly a reaction against unavoidable, sometimes unsettling encounters with different peoples and cultures and beliefs in our ever more integrated and multi-layered world. But mostly—mostly it is an act of desperation when the heart of true religion has been lost. People become violently obsessed with rules and traditions and texts only when they have lost the sense of what they really point to.

If you know where the Beloved lives, you are content, no need to argue with others over street names. Conflict only arises when you aren’t so certain you know the way; that’s when another person’s map threatens your certainty. Fundamentalism and extremism are an admission of that spiritual uncertainty. Absolutism is not an expression of faith; it is a symptom of the lack of faith. It is a symptom of the lack of true spiritual experience and knowledge.

The real long-term solution to the problem of violent religious extremism in the world is to reawaken that sweet, secret, sacred bliss within ourselves, to gently and generously share it with others, and to create environments nurturing to that continuing quest. The more we fill the world’s dry troughs with fresh water, the less likely it is that people will go insane with blind thirst.

Ivan Granger
Poetry Chaikhana

Written in 2010



Friday, November 13, 2015

Hokusai Says: Let Life Live Through You

 Hokusai says –

Look carefully.

He says pay attention, notice.
He says keep looking, stay curious.
He says there is no end to seeing.

He says Look Forward to getting old.
He says keep changing,
you just get more who you really are.
He says get stuck, accept it, repeat yourself
as long as its interesting.

He says keep doing what you love.
He says keep praying.
He says everyone of us is a child.

Every one of us is ancient,
every one of us has a body.
He says every one of us is frightened.
He says every one of us has to find a way to live with fear.

He says everything is alive -
shells, buildings, people, fish, mountains, trees.
Wood is alive.
Water is alive.
Everything has its own life.
Everything lives inside us.
He says live with the world inside you.

He says it doesn’t matter if you draw, or write books.
It doesn’t matter if you saw wood, or catch fish.
It doesn’t matter if you sit at home
and stare at the ants on your verandah or the shadows
of the trees and grasses in your garden.

It matters that you care.
It matters that you feel.
It matters that you notice.
It matters that life lives through you.

Contentment is life living through you.
Joy is life living through you.
Satisfaction and strength
are life living through you.
Peace is life living through you.

He says don’t be afraid.
Don’t be afraid.
Look, feel, let life take you by the hand.
Let life live through you.

Roger Keyes

Hokusai (1760-1849) was a master Japanese artist, painter and printmaker.  He was best known for his woodblock print, the famous Great Wave off Kanagawa. 

Roger Keyes – is/was an art historian and writer who traced Hokusai’s works and wrote about them.  How he came to write this poem is unknown.
~
Photo - Sunlight through glass
Mystic Meandering



Wednesday, November 11, 2015

On the Threshold of Winter...

Well actually I think we’ve crossed it.


Winter arrived this morning in all its beauty...
At least 6-8 inches of snow covered everything.

The leaves still on the trees twittered in the wind.


Evidences of an invisible hand leaving its signature behind…

~

Excerpt from: Eternal Echoes
by John O’Donohue


“Within and around us there is an invisible [Formless] world; this is where each of us comes from.  Your relationship to the invisible influences so much of your life.  When you cross over from the invisible into the physical world, you bring with you a sense of belonging to the invisible that you can never lose or cancel.  Under the guise of emptiness, the invisible keeps its secrets to itself.  Yet the invisible remains the great background.  There is always some magnet that draws your eyes to [It] or invites you to explore behind things and seek out the concealed depths.  Your longing for the invisible is never stilled.  You know that the real nature of things is hidden deep within them.  When you enter the world, you come to live on the threshold between the visible and the invisible.  You are both artist and pilgrim of the threshold…”


Friday, November 6, 2015

A Deeper Rhythm...

I’ve been hearing a deeper rhythm lately…
Composed of cello, viola and oboe.
I heard it when I was in the kitchen
cooking dinner one night,
a few weeks back,
and every other night after that
until recently
when the noise of my life
became too loud.

There was no music on the stereo,
just the sound of the meal cooking,
and the sounds of daily living
outside the window:
children playing,
dogs barking,
lawn mowers,
power saws,
and birds -
chirping…

Underneath it all was a Rhythm
so melodious I could even hum it,
but I just listened, with wonder…
Where is this coming from -
this music -
this slow, deep, melodious rhythm,
drawing me in…

I didn’t even have to try to listen,
it was just there
soft – in the distance,
barely audible,
as if in another room,
through another door,
maybe even in another realm…

I knew somehow that my own life rhythm
 is hidden in this deeper Rhythm…
But I keep losing it,
drowned out by the
*noise* of living
other people’s
rhythms -
and
the external
rhythms
of
life

But now I know it is there -
somewhere,
in an experiential way,
and I listen for it -
this deeper Rhythm,
that underlies
all rhythms..

The Rhythm behind the rhythm…

Mysteriously playing…


Mystic Meandering
Nov. 5, 2015


~*~

“The real music happens between the notes…”
Louis Armstrong


~*~


Photo: Mandala Art
Original: Winter’s Jewel Mandala
radially blurred