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...

Sunday, April 1, 2018

Uncover the Original Center - Mark Nepo



Each person is born with an unencumbered spot -
an umbilical spot of Grace where we were each first
touched by God.  Psychologists call this spot
Psyche, Theologians call it the Soul, Jung calls it the
Seat of the Unconscious, Hindu Masters call it Atman,
Buddhists call it Dharma, Rilke calls it Inwardness,
Sufis call it Qalb, and Jesus calls it the center of Love.

To know this spot of Inwardness is to know who we are,
not by surface markers of identity.....but by feeling our
place in relation to the Infinite, and by inhabiting it.  This
is a life-long task, for the nature of becoming is a constant
"filming over" [covering over] of where we begin [began],
while the nature of being is a constant erosion of what is
not essential; to be worn back to that incorruptible spot
of Grace at our core.

When the film [covering] is worn through, we have
moments of enlightenment, moments of wholeness,
moments of Satori, as the Zen Sages term it, moments
of clear living, moments of full integrity of being,
moments of complete Oneness.

And whether the film is a veil of culture, or religious
training, the removal of that film and the restoration
of that timeless spot is the goal.  This is the only thing
worth teaching:  how to uncover that original center and
how to live there once it is restored.  The process of
return, whether brought about by suffering or love, is
how we unlearn our way back go God [to the core of Grace].

Mark Nepo
Excerpt from: The Book of Awakening


~

Photo of Tomato

I sliced a tomato a few weeks back and
found the white Christian cross in the center, and
in the middle of that cross, a little red heart.
Can you see it?!

Although I am no longer a Christian, or any other
religion for that matter, I still seek the Truth of
Existence and direct experience of "The Divine",
however one defines that for themselves.
I couldn't help but see the message in the tomato;
not a "Christian" message, but a universal message,
that no matter what one's religious identification,
regardless of "tradition",
The Heart, Love, is really the "original center" of
everything!

Namaste!

_/\_



3 comments:

  1. Glad you looked at it long enough to see the heart...symbolism has so much meaning to our brains, doesn't it? And then there's the heart!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Actually saw it all right away, and gasped! Maybe having been raised a Christian, my brain has been conditioned with those symbols... Who knows. I just thought it was amazing to cut into a tomato and see it! LOLOL

      Delete
  2. Of course there is a larger symblic meaning of the archetypal symbolism too - from a Christian perspective - the crucifixion and resurrection. What is dying (the cross as crucifixion) so that something new can emerge (the True Heart)... See Matt Licata's post on Honoring the resurection
    https://alovinghealingspace.blogspot.com/2018/04/honoring-resurrection.html

    ReplyDelete

All comments are subject to moderation