Category: Soul journey

Waves

Waves have always existed on this planet, in Nature and as part of the human trajectory. So many different waves, so many different colors. Today, a shimmering iridescent blue; tomorrow, perhaps a rainbow. Diverse people flowing together from every direction. We feel joy at the unfolding, hope in the possibilities. Dawn emerging over the ocean, peacock feathers, butterflies, sunflowers…. This is not a political party or belief system. This is the inclusive wave that connects us all through time and space, a seamless expression of love and compassion, which can only arise when separation falls to the wayside.

Yes, we currently live individual lives in different bodies, but before that we were all light, indivisible. No opposites or polarities. Before birth and after death, there is oneness. Can we open to it now as well? When we set aside the illusion of birth/death, oneness is revealed as a continuous Presence. Beyond the complicated systems humans have created, there is only stillness, peace. Take a deep breath and you are there. Everywhere all at once, no beginning or end. This is what wise souls throughout the ages have spoken of, and we have only to pause and breathe to realize it at the deepest level.

We are entering that Pause now (also called the Great Shift). One by one, people are dropping the stories they have been told all their lives and entering the present moment, in which their minds and hearts meet around the globe and form a garland of color and light. A garland that is both ephemeral and eternal. It is a shift in conscious awareness. Ultimately, each human being becomes one with infinity, which envelopes all lifetimes and Being itself.

Humans originally formed beliefs and opinions to explain the universe and protect themselves from fear of uncertainty and “others.” Those systems of thought, based on artificial separations (us/them), are currently dissolving or imploding, and we are discovering that the world around us contains emerging seeds of harmony and unity. Together, we are learning the truth of connection, which transcends words and language and even fear. Seen from our hearts and souls, there is only the Oneness that infuses the cosmos with love.

In Virginia Woolf’s novel The Waves, one of her main characters expresses an inability to distinguish his life from the lives of others around him. Perhaps we too are reaching that sense of merging—that we many are all one and were never really separate. Global awakening to what has been called the universal soul. Or waves in an infinite ocean.

Clear the Fear!

I’ve become increasingly aware of how fear rules the airwaves and the collective mindset these days. So many people are terrified of “others,” as well as all that they can’t control in their lives. The media (both programming and advertising) feeds on and amplifies those fears. The mainstream news focuses on war, shootings, political fighting, disasters. Crime-solving drama series, filled with violence and gun battles, proliferate. Drug companies advertise medications to treat various conditions (including anxiety and depression), at the same time listing dangerous potential drug side effects (stroke, suicidal thoughts…). Interspersed among all the rest are promos for films with horror or terror themes. The ads alone can give you nightmares! 

These frightening images and stories stick to our brains and fill us with fear and hopelessness. Isn’t it time to turn our backs on this noisy onslaught of negativity and look to our own hearts for a more positive way to live life? Turn off the TV and computer, put down your cell phone, and take a walk outside in a park or nature sanctuary. Find your inner balance among the trees and flowers. Listen to birdsong and the sweet silence that surrounds you. Look at the sky, morning, noon, or night, for inspiration and a deep sense of something greater guiding the universe. 

What if the cosmos unfolds independently of our longing for control? What if it’s on its own trajectory? A vast, constantly changing kaleidoscope of colors and light, an infinite matrix within which our souls live diverse human lives on Earth. What if everything we see and experience is part of a divinely orchestrated pattern that we have yet to fully perceive? Human life may be our entry point to wisdom and awareness as we pass through fear, recognizing it for the illusion it is, and step into the “peace beyond understanding” described by the great sages throughout time. Perhaps we are on exactly the right path to finally see the love and light that has always lived within all of us.

Granted these are intense times with many challenges, including public and private tragedies, but don’t let fear freeze you and make you incapable of standing up for the integrity of your own life and life itself. Remember that ancient wise teachers have foreseen this era of tumultuous transition and rebirth. We are not here to destroy ourselves or one another. We are here to recognize fully the blessing that each of us is—and the blessing that our Earth home is. Feel connection with your neighbors. Beneath the surface of all the turmoil and headlines that seem to crowd our daily lives, something else is occurring: the emergence of love instead of hate, cohesion instead of friction, open hands instead of closed fists. It won’t happen overnight, but it’s closer than you think.

This afternoon I turned away from my computer and walked outdoors just as the sun was slipping toward the horizon. I paused as a dragonfly landed on my foot and moved its wings silently, reflecting the light. In a tree nearby, a chickadee was calling “chick-a-dee-dee-dee” as it made its way through the branches. Bluejays flew from oak tree to oak tree, gathering acorns for the winter. Moments like these center my heart in the spacious stillness of all Being everywhere. Any lingering fears of the day fall away, and I am reminded once again that Life is bringing me, and every one of us, Home. Free and clear.

Life as Drama…and Serenity

There are times when life feels like those famous drama masks that denote comedy and tragedy in theatrical productions. One mask is smiling, the other crying. On any given day, I can experience both laughter and tears, joy and sorrow. Sometimes both simultaneously. Each year brings new ways that life unfolds in all its dramatic diversity. Yet, underneath it all runs a balancing stream of serenity.

When I was growing up in the Midwest, I remember wondering, a bit fearfully, about the meaning of life as I looked up at the vast star-filled night sky. I wanted to be 9 years old forever, safely reading books in the branches of my favorite climbing tree. But I also wanted to travel the world. My life unfolded in ways that included both those ways of being, as well as extended spiritual exploration.

I continued to be an avid reader (and later a writer and editor) as well as a lover of Nature. I traveled extensively, swimming with wild dolphins in Costa Rica, whales in Hawaii; hiking Machu Picchu in Peru, the Alps in Switzerland. Vision quests in Montana and spiritual ceremonies with Maya elders at sacred sites in Guatemala. Over time, I came to realize that every bit of it was part of my soul’s journey for this lifetime, finding equilibrium among inner and outer experiences.

Growing older has brought unexpected challenges (e.g., breast cancer survivor), but ultimately these have taught me patience, acceptance, and resilience, day by day. Sadness about the passing of family members and friends, as well as apprehension about my own eventual death, are also part of aging. Still, simultaneously, my life is filled with so much joy and love: good friends, old and new, and my dear partner, Anne, with whom I’ve shared 43 years (!) of wonderful life adventures. Each morning we open the door to sunlight over the treetops and birds singing (robins, cardinals, song sparrows, goldfinches). Who could not feel grateful for blessings such as these?

I’ve learned that whether you are crying or laughing, 9 or 90, there is always some beauty to be found in the world (in spite of political conflict or personal pain)—in Nature and in the loving kindness of friends and strangers alike. At any time, I can set aside the tearful mask and pick up the smiling one; let go of worry and embrace trust. Each moment holds all of life. Sometimes we need to cry and release sorrow. But we also need to laugh and find the sweetness of life. And make our way to the inclusive space of neutrality and peace that lives within.

The soul is timeless, not attached to the human framework of hours/minutes; it is beyond circumstance and action/reaction. In our souls we are pure Presence, and we know we are infinite. The temporary form we inhabit while on Earth has experiences while the eternal soul observes everything. Eventually, it all blends together as One. Any separation is an illusion that we realize as we transition, or if we are fortunate, at moments of awakened awareness while we are still in physical form.

With each second that passes, with each precious breath we take, we can open our heart of hearts to a soul vision that will guide our lives to the serenity within the drama. We are here in our human lives to do just that. It is what is meant by Peace on Earth.

Moon, Stars, Infinity

When astronauts landed on the moon in 1969, I was barely out of my teens and more interested in my life on Earth than what was happening in outer space. Everything seemed somehow different, however, when I looked at the photographs the Artemis II astronauts recently took of the moon’s surface, with distant Earth barely visible over the horizon. I was awe-struck by that visual: infinity perceptible to the human eye. Our home planet looked so tiny in the vast cosmos; our individual lives miniscule. Yet all of it was somehow of a piece; I could sense the oneness that connected everything. Perhaps an indication of how far I had lived since 1969.

I grew up frightened of infinity, all that stretched beyond my lifetime into eternal time/space. Late at night before sleep, thoughts of infinite nothingness caused a “brain freeze” in my child’s mind. As the years passed, I gradually learned to distract myself from those thoughts, although they never entirely disappeared. It was only when I began a spiritual journey in my 30s that I opened the door slightly to a different view of the universe.

Eventually, I was able to see infinity as Spirit, as Light, which lives within and all around us throughout eternity. What once seemed terrifyingly empty gradually became softer, almost comforting if I observed it through my soul’s eyes and not my mind. When I went through breast cancer treatment five years ago, my experience of all-inclusive Spirit became even deeper and more expansive. I could see my physical form as temporary and my soul, which was viewing it, as eternal, infinite.

Perhaps we all go through this evolution in our lifetimes, each in our own unique way. Every human life is a doorway to the infinite, and ultimately we realize how blessed we are to experience it. As I stared at the Artemis images of the moon, Earth, and stars, I could literally feel my heart open to infinity, to my own beingness within it and as it. We each come here to experience a version of continuous awakening to that awareness, perhaps not completely until the moment of our death. But actually it is always present.

Our humanity holds divinity within it, and we are multidimensional beings. The universe itself is multidimensional. It cannot be understood or explained by human mental effort, but rather only experienced through moments of profound opening, in Nature, in crisis, in love, in life/death circumstances. Suddenly, everything is everything, and we are One with it all.  An infinite kaleidoscopic tapestry of light and love. This is the view from space as well as from our own souls. We are the moon, the stars, and all of infinity, living one precious life on an extraordinarily beautiful blue planet, shining light in the darkness of the cosmos.

Growing Up Walden

One of my father’s favorite books was Walden by Henry David Thoreau. He loved Thoreau’s immersion in the natural world and his emphasis on a simple life. Recently, when I was watching a PBS documentary on Thoreau and his time living alone in the woods at Walden Pond, I remembered my childhood in Illinois and how my dad had created his own version of Walden on the five acres where my parents built a house nine years before I was born. The land had a number of old oak trees and a couple of streams running through it but was otherwise mainly open fields. By the time I was a young child playing there, my dad and mom had planted shade trees, evergreens, bushes, vegetable and flower gardens, a fruit orchard, and berry patches. The vibrant beauty of Nature surrounded me every day. Without realizing it, I was growing up immersed in Walden consciousness.

“Simplify, simplify, simplify,” my dad would often quote Thoreau. No wonder I inherited an aversion to complications and clutter—and a love of Nature’s beautiful simplicity. When I read Walden in college, it all came together for me. Thoreau’s writing, as well as that of other Transcendentalists like Emerson, aligned with my heart and soul. Thoreau’s small wooden cabin in the forest by Walden Pond seemed to call to me. A number of years later, I moved to Massachusetts, and Walden became a special sanctuary for me where I often walked the trails and gazed at the trees, water, and sky. In any season, it radiated peace and tranquility. It was as if Thoreau’s solitary spirit watched over and protected it.

When my parents flew from Chicago to Boston to visit me, two dear friends drove us out to Walden so that my dad could see it in person. It was a special moment for all of us because we knew how greatly he admired Thoreau and his philosophy. My father continued to plant mini-Waldens in other Illinois locations where my parents lived in later years. And I too have created “Waldens” in the various backyards (or porches) of houses where I have had an apartment.

Currently, my partner Anne and I live in a condo which faces a woods thick with deciduous trees and evergreens. Bird song fills the air when I open our deck doors at sunrise, and we hear spring peepers or summer crickets trilling after dark. Walden once again synchronistically surrounds me, the perfect circle of a lifetime. Early in my life, I learned that the wonders of the Earth are ever-present; every day I see them wherever I live. I am deeply grateful to Thoreau, my dad, and all those magical years of “growing up Walden.”
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Artwork above: “Thoreau’s View,” by Anne Katzeff