Mystical Peace...

A stranger arrived yesterday,
unexpectedly,
engulfed me in Her Peace...

In Her Presence
everything settled...

everything let go of me..
all entanglements
all resistance
all struggle

everything became strangely Quiet within...

everything rested within me,
not lifeless - just rested...

It was like a mystical fog of Peace
surrounding me,
holding me -
and I was still - 
at my core...

When She arrived
life was allowed to be as life is,
despite what was going on externally.

I listened deeply to her whispers...

She felt 'strange' to me
only because She
was just there
unbidden,
a softening presence....

She was larger than life;
beyond mental understanding
or explanation...

Yet, I knew that I know this "stranger."
She was strangely familiar...
I'm sure we have met before...

I welcomed her with gratitude...

She drew closer and wrapped Her mantel of Peace
around my Heart...

The Fire-Light within began to brighten...

Love emerged...

She was Home...

Mystic Meandering

adapted from a poem written in 2015

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
Winter 2015

~

 Even in the midst of chaos there is Peace...
Even in the midst of complexity there is Simplicity...
Even in the midst of confusion there is Stability... 

I keep reminding myself to
stay rooted in my Eternal Nature at the 
Core of my Being...

MM

The Gasp of Peace - a mystical meandering...

This happened several weeks ago...

I laid my head back against the top of the soft chair cushion,
and let my head tilt backwards into the cushion

I automatically laid my left hand across my lower neck,
curving the clavicle where it meets the top of the sternum - comforting

In that same moment there was an exquisite felt sense of deep peace
that overtook me - and I gasped

It was such a pristine feeling of Peace that I've never felt before -
nor since

It filled my head, overtaking all thoughts and emotions -
without effort on my part

Some have called it "the  peace that passes understanding"

It was as if I had found a "mystical spot" on the clavicle that
opened me to a realm of Peace that I have never entered before

The peace was not sought, and only came in that same moment
that my hand embraced my clavicle - and has never happened again

It was only momentary - although I felt like it lingered long.

I was gifted with such a sweetness in the midst of personal chaos

I was filled with awe at such an intense presence of Peace

But *I* could not sustain it

It came on its own and left its imprint,
then released itself to the ethers...

Mystic Meandering
March 2023

~

Photo - South Pole Aurora Borealis
from the Internet

Peaceful Presence - a meandering...

Suddenly peace overtook me and I was no longer
engaged in mental thrashings about life circumstances...
at least in that momentary, fleeting moment...

And I thought to myself:
Finally, Peace has come!

I actually fell into a twilight sleep -
aware that I was at last at peace/peaceful,
without trying to be peaceful, just basking
in the unbidden feeling of being at peace.
It was wonderful -
and somehow I knew that everything is deeply okay;
deeply peaceful at its core; at its essence...

Was this real, a dream, a mystical experience?

I understood that underneath the tempests of the mind
there is an abiding peace at the core of our being;
lost to us most of the time, to our awareness,
by the crashing waves of the mind's turmoil, but can be
felt in between the waves; like the pause between the
breaths.  There is a peaceful pause that sustains itself

 - even if not felt...

Everything is at peace at its core, but you can't try to get
there, you can only allow it to come through, to just
receive it when it emerges/arises on its own within,
and make yourself available to it when it does...

If only for one fleeting moment...

Mystic Meandering 
Jan. 7, 2023
around 3pm

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

Peace in the Attic ...

Photo by Dan V on Unsplash.com

I am grateful for the Quiet in this "House"...
Immersing me in the Quiet within;
The Stillness - with only the whir of the ceiling fan
and occasional distant sounds that somehow soothe...

It's as if the "House" is not my house -
but houses me anyway -
like the body "housing" my spirit,
allowing me to dwell here,
living in its spaces...

Its space holds my "things" - that
aren't "my" things - only accumulated
symbols of a life lived - spiritually, creatively,
intuitively, meaningfully -
mementos for someone's attic someday.

The "House" is still - yet Alive,
breathing in and out with the breeze;
curtains softly sway at the window...

When there is peace in the Attic of the mind there are
no addicting stories, no ruminating on the past, no trying
to fix anyone's problems - 
just quiet peace...

"The Mystery" of Life itself also
inhabits this "House"
- untouched - undisturbed -
filling every closet, drawer and cabinet;
and every space of my Being,
with its Fullness...

~

A dog barks sharply, breaking the Quiet...

But the "House", and its inhabitant, remain still -
breathing with the breeze...

Mystic Meandering
Sept, 20, 2022

 

Epiphany - 2013

It seems that my "spiritual path" has been laced with small
"epiphanies" and "divine flashes" of awareness, and "mini
awakenings" over the years.  I had one of those moments
back in 2013 when standing in my backyard.  I had stepped
outside to be in nature for a while, connecting with the stillness
and silence - taking it all in - noticing and feeling the connection.
I was in the process of taking some pictures of the shadows 
that the late afternoon sun in November was making on the fence,
when suddenly the words: "There is nothing but 'God'" ran
unbidden and unexpectedly through the silence of my being.
Say what!  There was an immediate sense of profound peace,
contentment, and joy in my heart.  I even started to giggle to
myself.  But I was also completely shocked by the word - 
"God" - and my very tangible felt experience of it.

I had not used the "God" language in years, after leaving the
religion of my childhood some 26 years before this, as it holds
imagery of my Christian upbringing of a person in the clouds
with white beard, meting out judgment.  It has so many old
paradigms, somewhat fundamentalist "religious" connotations
from my past, which made it all the more surprising that this
was the word that floated through.  If the inner "voice" had said:
 "All there is, is "Awareness," or "Consciousness, " or "Pure Being,"
 I would have gone, of course! - as those are the words that I often

use, abstract as they are. I also have used words like Buddha Nature,
The Divine,The Self, Brahman, The Ineffable, The Eternal, or
The Infinite. But I was jolted awake by the clear use of the word
"God." As this phrase ran through me I had the image of a deep
golden light, like a sunset, that ran across the screen of my mind,
as if to show me the depth and vastness of the word.  As it wasn't
 the persona "God" image of my childhood.  No, it was an
 incomprehensible sense of vast, expansive, all-inclusive, infinite,
 ubiquitous, Alive Presence, with which I felt an immediate sense of
  inherent communion - not one which needed to be sought after,
 but that was already actively happening...  And with that
realization came profound sense of Grace...

It was also realized that it doesn't matter if there is a sense of
a "me" or "no-me"; if one "concentrates" or not, or meditates,
or not.  It is inconsequential.  It was just realized that all there is,
is Infinite Existence that just IS - no matter what name or
qualities we give It...  or how we discover it for ourselves.

_/\_

Mystic Meandering
2013

~

Art: Mystic Meandering
Ethereal Vortex
Done with fingers and Craypas oils
2010

 

Peace...

Come into Peace...

Even in the midst of chaos there is Peace...
Even in the midst of complexity there is Peace...

Even in the midst of confusion there is Peace...

In everything there is a Peaceful Silent Presence...

In life and death we are held deep within the
Great Heart of Silent Peace...

Mystic Meandering

~

Photo from Pinterest

 

Peace...

 Even in the midst of chaos there is Peace...
Even in the midst of complexity there is Simplicity...
Even in the midst of confusion there is Stability...

Stay rooted in your Eternal Nature at the 
Core of your Being...

MM