All posts tagged: Awakening

Arrows of Meaning

April 13, 2013
by Michael
comments 6
Poetry

The central sun is blackened and hollow, a rotating furnace of unimaginable heat without boundary or Beginning. It is the heart of all places. Where maths meet its circumference, they dissolve into music. Then disappear. There are no boundaries, but simple beings walk along the periphery in thoughtless becoming. They walk in circles called orbits with arms behind their back, in repose, while tigers and shadows tumble and slash in the distance and formations of doves swoop in […]

A Heart in Bloom

April 9, 2013
by Michael
comments 2
Christ / Creative

The banana yellow 1960 Impala convertible drifted to a stop about ten feet from my front porch.  The top was down and Hafiz was perched behind the steering wheel, motionless as a statue, wearing an over-sized floral shirt, an Oakland Raiders ballcap turned backwards, and a pair of mirrored sunglasses.  Near as I could tell he was staring straight down the boulevard, waiting, as if I knew what the hell was going on and would […]

Is Acceptance a Perpetuation of Suffering?

April 3, 2013
by Michael
comments 3
Christ / Course Ideas

If you are on a spiritual path- a path to awakening, a path to acceptance of the Christ within you and within everyone else and within all that is, eventually you will have a high noon showdown with the following paradox.  To be awake is to know that the ever-changing expressions of Love that collectively are Creation do not simply ‘happen to’ us.  They are not foisted upon us by a wrathful Creator.  Nor are […]

Chasing the Wind

March 22, 2013
by Michael
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Christ / Creative

The village in which I have lived my whole life is nestled along the coast.  It is full of sun and figs and light breezes.  Beyond our little harbor there is a great sea that stretches to the horizon and extends beyond the borders of the known world.  No one has ever found the End.  As children we used to go up on the roofs of our parent’s houses on calm spring days with baskets […]

A Possibility That Never Began

March 16, 2013
by Michael
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Creative

I don’t know if you’ve ever imagined a state of complete and total nothingness- a field of emptiness without form or time, and most importantly, without any speck of awareness at all.  It is hard enough to imagine being formless, but this is beyond formlessness.  This is not being at all, which can be even harder to envision.  This is picturing Nothing. This Nothing could go on forever, right?  But I’m not that patient, so […]

Desert Wandering. Desert Discoveries.

March 8, 2013
by Michael
comments 13
Christ / Creative

There is a desert inside of me where I wander, like a hermit, my vocabulary reduced to variations in the salinity of my tears and one Name that I give to everything.  I found myself there again last night, sheltered against the wind by a robe of old rags, walking alone amidst an endless quilt of rolling dunes beneath the stars.  I know I am not the Originator of this place, even though it is […]

The Conundrums of a Conflicted Mind

February 23, 2013
by Michael
comments 2
Christ

Who is studying the Course?  And to what end?  Who hears the words?  Who is stirred to hope for a new life?  Who recognizes Love and surrenders, turning round then to confront their darkness?  Who finds it too complicated or difficult? Who knows? My little, egoic self is a Seeker.  The starting point for this little one is the deeply held belief that my unique and particular historically-derived collection of personal experiences is all that […]

A Journey of the Heart

February 20, 2013
by Michael
comments 4
Creative

It began with thickets and brambles.  I was mired neck-deep in a conclave of every manner of growing thing possessive of sharp, pointed, prickly, skin-penetrating armor.  I was hacking a path to nowhere with a partly rusted machete, swearing, sweltering in the mid-day sun, growing increasingly angry at the steady rain of recently hacked-in-two, thorn-laden vines that seemed bound and determined to fall down on top of me.  I was way behind schedule.  My arms […]

A Rambling Exploration of Perception

February 15, 2013
by Michael
comments 5
Course Ideas

Perception is the only mode of awareness available to the separated mind.  To say it another way, perception is a way of consciously viewing ourselves and the world that is based upon the a priori assumption- or belief- that separation is real.  Once we have accepted this false premise- that we are truly separate from God and from one another, that the ‘I’ within ‘me’ is an island unto itself- then perception is the primary […]

A Wasteland of Hidden Thoughts

February 12, 2013
by Michael
comments 4
Course Ideas

Recently I convinced myself that I was in desperate need of an Inception. (I don’t know if you have seen the movie, but I hope you have.  If you have not, I have provided a summary of the relevant points at the bottom of this post.  I’ve tried not to get too carried away and engage in any wanton acts of plot spoilage…) I wanted Jesus to go into my subconscious and ride around my […]