The pleasures of a life are many and fleeting but are as nothing compared to the ecstasy of life. The sublime experiences of the spirit are able to lift one from the midst of the daily grind, eliciting wonder and joy, giving a higher context to the purpose of living consciously and in search of the higher aspects of self versus the gratification of the lower. The juxtaposition of the physical and the spiritual is the cauldron of happiness and sadness we traverse through our experiences, the fixation of our attention and perspective alternating between the higher and the lower aspects of our lives. Navigating the Path between the two extremes requires discipline and dedication, mind control and emotional stability.
Life is both sweet and sour and it is designed to be that way. The Earth experience is not a garden of peace nor is it a war planet. It is both and neither, it is something more and something less. The more is the sum of its parts, the objective manifestation of all potentiality within a holographic material matrix of sensual inundation and psycho-spiritual bombardment that satiates the multidimensional requirements of evolving souls. The less is its relative and subjective nature, its tendency to overwhelm the senses and the mind, resulting in crass debauchery and physical enjoyment to the detriment of the higher senses.
Once you have experienced Oneness, the Godhead/Trinity, Unity, Source, directly and unequivocally, you are forever connected to it from that moment on. It lies behind every thought, it informs every relative truth, it denies all separation. It is the futility of living false lives, of telling lies, of being greedy, of serving the needs of self over others. It is pressing the internal button to turn on the omniversal multimedia presentation called Creation, to connect to it consciously, with the intent and purpose of complying with its directives, which represent the laws of energy conservation and movement at all levels of being. In all actuality, we are never disconnected from it – as it is our Home – but the inculcation of an egoistic personality complex and the mental structures of time and space navigation combine to obscure the deeper currents of mind, where the still and placid immensity of All That Is flow unendingly, ever available to those willing to let go and let God.
The pleasures of life lived for the senses are a mere distraction from the deeper pleasures of spiritual awakening. Going beyond pleasure, beyond happiness, beyond the need for any sort of material gratification or emotional intoxication is the reward of the spiritual quest. Food, sex, violence and all variations and associated modalities satiate the sensual, those whose highest aspirations are material gratification and that is as it should be, as life takes all types and we all co-exist at different levels of understanding and experience. But for those traversing these dales of lustful travails they pale quickly, the call ever heard to seek higher, go deeper, expand vision and experience wider. The quiet whisper of Truth promising something more, something amazing, something lasting, something real. And yet, paradoxically, it is the moderate experience of both sides that reveals the true meaning of life.
Complying with the directives of Creation is following the voice from nowhere, the one that speaks without sound. Learning to still the mind and cultivate the quietude of inner peace. Existing in the Now when necessary, recognizing the Crossroads moments and embodying purest Self in response, thereby fulfilling destiny and the highest potentiality of each and ever moment.
As humans on the journey of self-discovery it is necessary for us to be gentle with ourselves along the path. We will fail. We will backslide, meander, digress for a time, it is the nature of consciousness co-opted to alternate between sleeping and awakening for a time. But there will come another time when you will suddenly realize that you are awake more than you are asleep, that you are conscious of your path and purpose and you are actively manifesting the actions necessary to embody your truest expression of Self as only you can.
But to get to this space of Being one has first to begin the journey.
The gratifying reality of real spiritual advancement is that as you initiate your conscious and directed journey to realization you become aware of the existence of certain markers and signposts along the way. There are traditions that inform the seeker about roadblocks ahead or pratfalls to be traversed. Holy books filled with the wisdom of the ages and oral traditions cached with the truth of eternity. Continued immersion within spiritual themes contributes to control of the mind as contemplative practices such as meditation and prayer rarefy the mental space, making it a fitting abode for the Divine. As the mind purifies, the thoughts purify, as the thoughts purify so do the words and, as a result, the actions.
Jesus can get you there, as can Buddha, as can Muhammad, as can Eckhart as can Blavatsky as can so many others. The understanding that surpasses sectarian subjectivity and cultural relativity is the realization that all speak of the same underlying reality by way of differing perspectives. We each take on the perspectives that are comfortable to us. All who follow the path sincerely and with dedication will arrive at the same goal eventually. The path is an inner one and the religious traditions all possess the keys that will unlock the gate. Choosing to unlock the gate is choosing to integrate the higher and lower natures and to accept life as it comes, forgoing the dependency upon the physical nature to solve our problems and determine our goals in life. Getting past impatience and anger, jealousy and greed. Cultivating patience and tolerance, compassion and altruism. Becoming a complete human being, squaring the circle and enlightening the consciousness.
The experience of total union, of submersion within Oneness will retaining a recognition of one’s self apart from that Oneness sears the synapses, clearing emotional detritus of a lifetime and allowing the individual to return to mundane waking life. But that does not remove her from experiencing the effects of her actions. Past karma is cleared but current karma in the Now must always be resolved as both the seed and the result are contained within every action. The wisdom of the Ages instructs without err in proclaiming that those seeking to live a higher form of life must free themselves of all attachments, be they good or bad. By so doing, future actions will not create karma that must be resolved in this or another lifetime.
Human experientiality ranges in the median of all energetic variables. Our senses experience only a small fraction of the total. We see and hear in the middle of the visual range, our other senses are limited to our perceptual awareness which is all too often minimized due to the distracted nature of our thought processes. The inherent subjectivity of human incarnation is made even more difficult by the isolation of ego and the facade of relativity mistaken as objectivity. The inability to see and experience reality clearly result in obscurations that must be reconciled along the spiritual path. That reconciliation is the goal of all aspiration.
Those who achieve this state of being are often apart but never lonely as their compassion fills the world, connects them to all souls within the world and beyond. Normal relationships may fall by the wayside as people move on, as they are not receiving what they were previously on the emotional side of the relationship. The individual may appear uncaring on the level of romantic love, even though the heart of compassion is alive within them. To old friends and lovers, they may seem like a different person altogether. And they are. The memories of the person they were before remain, but the emotional connections no longer define them. The experience of true unity, true all-encompassing, all-permeating, all-existent love, compassion and one-ness contextualizes human aspiration and life and we incarnate within its grasp become visible at our true scale in relation to all things.
Well, that got on my nerves too. We had just had a new baby so we were very sensitive to Ray’s dander getting everywhere and cleaning up after him so I took it upon myself to discipline him. If he would get up on something, getting his hair everywhere, I would go and snatch him by the hair on the back of his neck and put him in the attic and close the door. Eventually, he got to the point where whenever I would come near him, he would myooowr at me and go into submissive position, laying down with his head on his paws, the way he used to with his mother, whenever she would cuff him for being a nuisance.
Next time I saw Ray, I grinned at him and it seemed to me that, in his attitude and demeanor – casually licking his paws and studiously not looking at me while prancing around lightly – he grinned back. The energy between us was no longer tense and he was no longer submissive. It felt as if we had both been freed.
An holistic and multi-dimensional understanding of reality must include recognition of the potentiality that phenomenon considered singular in nature might have some relation to other phenomenon. Also, that at different levels of understanding, phenomenon considered singular in nature might actually have multiple forms of expression. The individual’s journey through the depths of his or her soul is but a microcosmic example of the greater interrelation of galaxies and solar systems, of multiverses and universes. A person’s soul can be part of a group-soul and group-souls can make up Higher Selves, Avatars or Names of God, depending upon terminology and perspective. Finding relationships between disparate phenomenon of a higher ethereal nature cannot occur independent of that phenomenon’s expression on the material plane of existence. With these understandings, we can examine certain ideas and determine whether there are relationships of note to be highlighted and expounded upon.
For that reason, entering into the Age of Aquarius, the ancient Hermetic conception, As Above, So Below - which I employ perhaps to distraction in many of my writings – resonates as an appropriate phrasology in this instance as well. The Maitreya energetic construction as a combination and reconception of the savior-complex that typifies the universalizing religions and unity-consciousness templating currently invigorating world populations exemplifies a demi-urgic group soul imperative manifesting during the current phases of human spiritual evolution. It is important to realize as well that the current entry of the Earth into galactic space correlated with the beginning of the Age of Aquarius and also coinciding with Earth’s ascension above the galactic plane and entry into the densest and highest energetic region of the galaxy. While there is much confusion surrounding the astronomical aspect regarding Sol-System’s current position in regards to the galatic plane, the increase in cosmic energetic bombardment of the Earth and the increase in meteoric and cometary appearances in the space surrounding our planet may be indications that it is occuring.
Being differentiated from the Soul Mate conception by its exclusivity, the Twin Flame energy is commonly believed to be unique to only two souls who may come together in an incarnation or not. However, the societal and cultural infractions that pervert all spiritual traditions as they become institutionalized and bent to the desires of those who define them have similarly resulted in the corruption of the Twin Flame ideal. Through the synthesis of definition and a focus upon primary intent, the Soul Mate conception can be said to relate to any individual with whom innate soul recognition is shared and with whom previous incarnational resonances can be felt during the currently lifetime. Each person, therefore, has many soulmates that they continue to incarnate with and interact with in lifetime after lifetime. Twin Flame energy, contrary to popular belief, is not a binding of two souls that may or may not meet during a lifetime, but instead a resonance based upon current vibrational frequency that shifts as an individual grows into greater spiritual awareness.
In drawing the different threads of this article together, the Age of Aquarius proceeds upon the ushering in of the potential of the Maitreya energies realized first individually, through the personal spiritual evolutionary process, then through partners and the male/female union and then collectively as greater soul-groups find themselves surpassing the 100th monkey effect and the cascading imprints of the Twin Flame and Maitreya templates achieve avataric expression and inevitable material manifestation. The rise of the Divine Feminine in relation to the onset of the New Age supports the higher energetic resonance of those already attuned to spiritual growth life-patterns within the current incarnational matrix. More individuals will therefore find themselves engaged in Twin Flame unions as they each do the hard inner work of reconciling their own oppositional natures. The full flowering of the Age of Aquarius, then, must inevitably result in a more tolerant and loving world, as the collective energetic vibration rises due to the influx of cosmic energy, more people engage in soul work and more couples express the Twin Flame template. As that spiritually-aware group coalesces, a simultaneous focusing of energy and intent will result in the concentration of the Maitreya avatar within a twin-flame pairing or an individual. Avatars must exist and spread their teachings for and within each Age.
Life is too short. It seems like just yesterday that I was two, living in Maine, lying in the grass on a cool Fall’s day, intensely aware of the blue sky above me. Pale, green blades of grass streaked with gold rising above the fur of my hood, rustling gently, the sound of wind and the awareness that I was connected, that I was a part of something I could not define at such a tender age, but which I now recognize in remembrance as 
Fifteen years old, finding Carlos Casteneda’s “
Twenty-two years old and astral-projecting through 
The difficulty of doing so is known to us all by direct experience. Our perception of the world is constantly trying to distract us from the Now through the workings of our minds; our Egos, inordinately concerned with regrets about the Past and worries about the Future, obscuring the moment. 
Everything becomes a matter of urgency, a matter of the utmost importance, a matter of foremost importance to the 
The present, and Death still threatens comfort and complacency, as always. Life is too short. Those we love won’t be with us for long. Every decision we make counts. It’s never too late to say you’re sorry. Relationships are what much of life is all about, and when those people we love are gone, we won’t be able to hold them, to kiss them, to tell them that we love them, and to confess the deepest truths of our hearts and souls – and to bear witness to the confession of theirs – to the ones who love us and have loved us and will love us till the End of Forever draws close.
It remains amazing how life applies force, through the medium of experience, in order to let us know when it is time to move on. Conversely, it remains amazing to recognize how we often work against this force in order to stay where we are at. Opportunities arise at seemingly coincidental stages that give us the option to move out in a new direction, to optimize our experiences by adding on to what we already know with new things, infinite possibilities. But the old, familiar beliefs beckon, whisper in our ear, urge us to remain planted, feet firmly on the ground, resisting all temptation to strike out into the unknown. Life is irresistable though, and each time we resist movement, we invite harder and more painful lessons into our life, until that force then forces us to embrace change.
When social and personal imperatives elevate the importance of material success, personal strength as exemplified by well-developed egocentric personality constructs become the norm, sublimating the inner, spiritual core that undergirds the ego, bolsters it, informs it at its foundation. Success as defined by worldly pursuits minimizes empathy, compassion and the importance of the collective over the individual. The Cult of I proliferates and the spirit is sublimated beneath the chorus of experiences that chatter incessantly, drowning out the quiet voice that originates in our center. Past and future take on real and threatening aspects that obscure the moment. As we regret and worry, the petty events of our days and nights, our interactions with others, all lead us into the cause and effect creation of karmic debt that then limits the cast of possible future situations, while simultaneously hardening the imprint of past situations and their related choices. We are then pushed remorselessly into temporally impenetrable future choices and situations that, once we make them, also seem as inevitable as the originating choices and situations themselves.
It really is that simple. All knowledge is internal not external, and we know the answer to all of our questions before we even ask them. Once we realize a few things about ourselves, consciousness and the world around us, we realize that things we’ve always believed to be true about life just aren’t, and that there is more to existence than the pursuit of material satisfaction, happiness or riches. Perfecting clarity, or removing the multiplicity of experientially-biased lenses that we and society have created in order to limit our perception, becomes the only goal worth achieving, at this point. And this means going above and beyond, shifting our efforts from external pursuits to internal. Undergoing a life-review in extensive and personal detail, finding out where our most deeply held beliefs were born, where our most secret disfunctions live, where our most intimate desires are whispering for us to go. Clearing a lifetime of mental and emotional detritus, all of which are spattered viscous and gross, like bugs on the windshield of perception, causing Self to squint and crane in the attempt to see past the mess and interpret incoming stimuli accurately and in the service of our best karmic and dharmic interests. Life deserves our best effort, and we can only give it if we obtain Knowledge of Self first, and then use that to better the lot of those around us, in service of the Divine that we finally realize is manifest in every single aspect of Creation, from the most humble beggar to the most arrogant Moabite.
In the first installment of this series, I examined the issue of trust and how it can affect friendships, making the point that trust is something that has to be offered to the Multiverse and to Life itself, rather than to individuals. Trust cannot be taken, trust cannot be given. Trust can only be offered forth as a gift, as an acknowledgment of love, of solidarity, of belief in a larger, connected conception of Reality that goes beyond the individualized conception of self-protection and selfishness that seems to be the natural human condition. 
Just the simple experience of having a parent tell them they can have or do something and then change their mind about it, for whatever reason, is a betrayal of trust that begins the process of qualifying unconditional trust; of creating barriers, separation between that child and his or her family, friends and the world. This process of mask creation forms the social face that becomes necessary as a wall between our true st, inner selves and the world as we age and begin to interact more and more with external society. Many of us as adults still have an Inner Child that is in need of healing, of love and understanding, as an acknowledgement that we exist and that our existence is meaningful. Learning to trust should be a large part of that healing process. 
Many years ago, the social sciences (Geography, Anthropology, Sociology, Political Science, etc.) believed in this theory known as Environmental Determinism (ED). The theory itself was very simple. Humans who evolved in hot climates (Africa, the Americas, etc.) were inferior to and less industrious than humans who evolved in cold climates (Europe, E. Asia, etc.), because people in cold weather climates were driven to create technologies based upon their diligent resistance to the cold environment, whereas, those in the hot weather lands had no incentive to do anything but have Siestas, party, pick and eat fruit off of the trees, run around naked and have sex all of the time.
Other scholars, such as Garrett Hardin, came up with corresponding theoretical exemplars such as the idea of Lifeboat Ethics, whereas the rich countries are afloat upon an ocean of despair with all of their amenities, and the poor and unwashed masses of the world are swimming toward the lifeboat, wanting to get on, giving rise to the questions: Can the Western lifeboats carry all of the world’s populations? Is there room on the lifeboat for everyone? 
I’m reminded at this juncture of that South Park episode where Jerome “Chef” McGilroy was irate over the racist South Park flag that showed a black stick figure being lynched by white stick figures. Throughout the episode, he’s arguing civil rights with the Klan, who are clearly racist, and the townspeople, who are more interested in the town’s heritage, while the kids debate both sides of the flag question without ever realizing that race has anything to do with it at all. 
As above, so below. As we are pushed toward greater self-understanding, so must we also understand who we are as groups and as nations, and by doing so, understand where we have been, where we currently are and where we are going in our relationships with other groups and with the natural world. While Gaia may shrug, casting diseased humanity into oblivion, she will continue to exist, incorporating our ills within her very structure. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Trust between nations and peoples can only exist as a gift that we collectively choose to give to the Multiverse. There is no other rational course of action.
The desire to trust is beyond the Four Noble Truths and approximates the answer to the human condition, in that true , freely gifted Trust elevates human consciousness to a plane of selflessness that is exemplified by the willingness of an individual to sacrifice of one’s Self. By the ability to give of one’s Self without expecting anything in return. To gift trust, not expecting that trust to be honored. And, by the even more daunting prospect of self-sacrifice, of freely gifted trust, in the face of death itself.
This time of year is often one that is very difficult for people, for many different reasons. For me personally, it is the first Christmas that I am not spending with 3 of my children. For other people, this season may remind them of Christmases with their family members passed on or estranged, for whatever reason. It may remind people of failed relationships, or terrible events or of personal scars attained during the outer and inner growth processes. The difficulty of the season is in all actuality a challenge to us each to go within in order to process the emotions that it gives rise to. We are presented with an opportunity to examine our inner emotional baggage and either continue to glorify it by giving it power over our lives or we can process and integrate it, thereby refusing to empower it to the extent that it causes us emotional pain.
Remembering past injustices by friends or family members, Christmases spent in conflict or in love, holiday seasons of deprivation or of excess, the rise and fall, the ebb and flow of emotionalism as those feelings we felt then come back to haunt us now, contextualizing the moment, taking us out of the Now and back into the Past, effectively re-creating the emotional conditions of yesteryear in the crucible of the present.
Exiting our memories and entering the present moment can lead to an encounter with fear as the option of releasing our past confronts us. Does letting go mean that I love any less? Does moving on mean that I am heartless? Does releasing memories mean that they are no longer important? Does embracing the Now mean that the past is meaningless?
Allowing the magic to re-enter into one’s life, much as Scrooge did in that old classic Christmas tale. When confronted with the inevitability of mortality we become apprised of the reality that we are not promised tomorrow and what we do with today is the most important decision that we can make. If we choose to make today all about yesterday then we engage in the very definition of insanity, by doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. If we choose to always be the same, then we are choosing the same results. We cannot expect our lives, our inner selves, our emotional bodies, to change, if we do not manage that change consciously ourselves, committing to the idea of living our lives and experiencing each day to the fullest.
Does anybody know anyone who is just so negative in their outlook that whenever they talk to you, either it’s about nothing, or it’s about something that’s happened to them? They complain about everything all the time, even when good things happen, or they’re afraid to try things because of the negative things that may happen as a result?
How does it affect you? What can you do about it? The first thing that has to be done is to recognize these people, which seems to be the easiest part, right? I mean, who doesn’t recognize it when someone is moaning, whining and complaining all the time and always has something negative to say? It should be obvious, shouldn’t it?
Wrong. We all are One. Nothing is External, All is Internal, which really just consolidates the above understanding and makes what’s going on outside of yourself an internal, personal issue, rather than an external, impersonal issue.
By the media concentrating for 24 Hours a day (CNN, FOX News, MSNBC) on the many world Crises, it empowers them, which then gains a psychic and emotional strength that encompasses and influences our shared collective unconscious, infecting the dreams and desires of the entire world’s population with this singular vision of destruction and mayhem.
We do so – those of us who can afford to (and many of us who can’t that wish we could are equally culpable) - in the name of security; in the name of providing for ourselves and our children; in the name of providing for the future. I wonder, sometimes, what future that is, and if it is a future worth living in. All of these things are really different aspects of fear. Fear that we see in others, who we project our fear onto and who reflect it back into our faces. It is said, that which we hate most about others is that which we hate most about ourselves.
When I began writing this article, I was fully intending upon prescribe a course of action to follow when encountering such individuals, because I have one or two in my life that just drain me so much; when I’m around them it feels like, the more energy that is depleted from me, the stronger, the louder and the more strident their conversation gets! This energy depletion effect is so powerful, so real, that you get tired and kind of depressed just thinking about a time recently when it has happened to you, don’t you? I do.
I fully concur with these strategies, with only the added caveat that it takes continual practice to be able to retain love in one’s own heart especially when dealing with these people in the moment and remembering, always, that we brought them into our spheres of influence in the first place, so there was something about them or in them that we resonated to and liked. If we brought them into our lives because we were complaining about a specific issue or thing at some point and they were on about that too - and our entire relationship thereafter was built upon a shared disdain and distrust of the world - then it is incumbent upon us to remove those individuals from our lives, if we have grown to the point where we are attempting to remove the negative processes within ourselves, first.
Individuals who have reached this stage of transpersonal development virtually shine, and, if you are in their presence, it is immediately apparent that they are not your average everyday homeboy or girl. Even online, you can tell the difference, in the modes of writing or talking, an internal consistency of philosophical or spiritual knowledge that confirms Direct Experience of the Divine, of Gnosis. It cannot be faked for long.
Beyond the political and economic ramifications of that apparent fear-mongering, it is increasingly obvious to all that the world we live in is, indeed, changing, perhaps cataclysmically. Through that change, whenever and however it occurs, all we are truly responsible for is ourselves and the state of our individual souls.
Written mostly 3 years ago, but updated now, this article is the culmination of an intense process. In reflective moments arising out of the stillness of the Now, vignettes, scenes from my life, and epiphany-like realizations have helped me to pinpoint where I am, as far as the course of my Inner and Outer journeys is concerned. The empathic resonations of others are catylysts for a number of realizations regarding our individual life paths and needs.
I first learned to enter deep into my ‘inner body’ as a pre-teen child, during experiences of sleep paralysis. Then, as a teen, in order to escape peer persecution I would go deep within until I could not hear the teasing and laughing around me…sometimes entering that deep, vast space that lay beneath Ego and hovering, silent and formless, above my body, temporarily oblivious to the ego-based fear complex that left me, at that time, shattered, confused and alone inside myself. Then, the spiritual ecstasy of my early adolescent experience of Oneness and its pervading and compassion that I’ve spoken of in other blogs released something pent within me, contextualized my experiences at such a tender age and set me on a path that culminated in my total immersion in the experiential world in my late teens and early 20s (early college and military years), so that when i entered my early mid-20s and began consciously and subconsciously experimenting with meditation techniques, I experienced successes beyond what might be considered those of a novice.
I recognize, in my life now, advanced stages, or the ambient results of long periods of meditation and the inner sojourn, and wonder why I’m here, in this particular place in my journey, and also why I’ve been so hesitant to ‘take the next step’.
The bare outlines of possibility are tantalizing me just on the horizon of my previous experiments, and the ability to move ‘inside’ in order to allow the storms of life to pass is an irresistable goal, for me…emotional storms notwithstanding, the beauty of life becomes more visceral, the realization of Oneness more than an intellectual exercise, but a lived Reality. ‘Death to the Self’ is the imposition of Truth over the framework of truth. The sublimation of the subjective to the objective, a final opening of one’s life to the omniverse, releasing all pain, all happiness, all history, all future, into the expanse of Creation, baring yourself, exposing your innermost secrets, thoughts and dreams, to the world. And knowing, simultaneously, that all is One, that no one is better than any one, and that forgiveness, and surrender, are the only paths to the recognition of Love, that primal emanation exuded from the pores of the mulitverse itself, expressed through motion and kundalini’s serpeant-like coils, roiling beneath the veneer of time, and space, settling gently in the root chakra at the bottom of our spines, waiting for the opportunity to manifest its transformative Truthes in ever aspect of our lives.
