Generally speaking, in today’s world, our spirits are vastly undernourished. This is due to our misguided efforts with too much time, energy and attention being placed on attending to the physical world and its encumbrances. Not to minimize the need to provide financial security, food and shelter for our self and our loved ones, the balance requires a mediation of the physical and spiritual planes. Sadly what often occurs is that we place our spiritual yearnings and thirst for truth and knowledge on hold, relegating them to a lower priority level.
When we decide to embark on the spiritual path, regardless of how long or difficult it may be, the journey always begins with the first step, which involves diverting oneself from the superficial current of life.
The spirit is like the vast ocean. A single droplet of the ocean caught in the turbulence of a breaking wave crashing against a bolder on the beach is directed upward into the atmosphere where surrounded by air it evaporates. Sooner or later that droplet will coalesce with others in the same phase, condense and rejoin the ocean. This is precisely what occurs when one’s spirit leaves the Source of everything. It transforms and becomes a spiritual being having but a human ego-situated experience.
Rather than retaining that differentiation, it eventually rejoins the sea of spirit, returning to the ocean of Source, the collective soul of the universe. In truth, it is individuated and yet at the same time, it is not. The individual and all of the aggregates exist simultaneously without conflict. We all are separate yet we really are not.
One of the consistent tenants that most organized religions share is the desire and goal to return to oneness with the universe.
To initiate the process of communing with your authentic, spiritual self, you must first thaw your frozen patterns, letting go of attachments to the past. Your past attachments have not been for naught, however. In fact, each of your past experiences has prepared you, primed you for the journey that lies before you. They have brought you to the pinnacle on which you stand at this moment. They have delivered you to this place where your transcendent metamorphosis is about to unfold.
Climbing your spiritual mountain may not be the easiest of tasks. The journey may lead you through the most desolate of terrain. You may be forced to cross the deepest of crevasses; you will likely climb to heights where there is barely enough air to sustain you. If you listen to the silence and to the inner voice that beckons you, your eyes will open for the first time, allowing you to truly see where it is you are going.
It will likely require the utmost perseverance. Impatience actually works to our detriment. When faced with challenges such as these, our response is generally as if we were suddenly thrust into a totally darkened room. We tend to frantically attempt escaping the darkness regardless of how blinded we are by it. As such we end up getting even more lost in the darkness. On the other hand, through the practice of patience, by allowing our eyes to slowly adjust to the darkness enables us to see the terrain in a much different light, ultimately finding our way out of the quagmire.
In due time, by surrendering to the magnetism of this spiritual space, awakening will unfold. It will be like the aperture of a camera opening as wide as it can, allowing the brilliant illumination of the sun to flow unimpeded into its innermost recesses. The Light will impregnate the film of your life with a beautiful vision of the plan the Universe has in store for you. It is when our spiritual eyes open — that release will present itself with crystal clarity.
Peace and Love, Jim
