Portal of Presence

By Deborah Koff Chapin

Portals of Presence is the fruit of a lifetime’s work. From my earliest memory, the drawing of faces has been central to my psyche. Over the years it has become a core practice through which I center myself and attune to deeper levels of awareness. One of my first memories is of drawing a face. I was about 2. years old. Sitting at a table, I picked up a crayon and spoke out loud as I drew. “Here is Stevie’s BIG eyes, and his BIG nose, and his BIG mouth!” I have quite a visceral memory of the magic of bringing a face into being out of nothing.

At fourteen years old, I was teaching myself to draw by copying fashion models in magazines. A display featuring fur coats included a fur-clad indigenous child staring out from the page. This was not a fashion face. It felt to me like this child was holding the pain of all the children of the world. I got my charcoal pencil, placed a large sheet of paper on the floor, and began to draw. As the child’s face took form on the page, I felt it coming alive. Feeling such a strong presence come though my drawing brought me to the edge of fear. I walked around it, repeating over “Why are you looking at me? Why are you looking at me?” This moment revealed the presence and power that can come through the drawing of a face.

When I went to art school, I focused on minimalist abstract painting, which was the predominant style in the art world at that time. Once, in my final year, I picked up a pen and began doodling silly little faces. I wrote on the page “What’s wrong with drawing faces?” I tucked the embarrassing piece of paper away. But something was gestating in my psyche, a seed of what was to come.

On my very last day in art school in 1974, I was helping a friend clean up in the print shop. Before wiping the ink off a glass plate, I placed a paper towel down and playfully moved my fingertips around on it. Lifting the paper off the ink, I saw the imprint of my touch on its underside — lines coming directly from my fingertips! I laughed ecstatically with this discovery. Gestures moved through my hands and onto successive paper towels. Soon the organic marks took form as faces. Childlike and natural, they were direct imprints of my being on paper.

Although this experience appeared to be simple play, beneath the surface I sensed something profound. This drawing process was emerging into this moment from a realm outside of time. It had a purpose that was larger than my personal use. I had a knowing that this direct and fluid art form was meant to serve an evolving human consciousness. I felt called to share it with others.

But first, Touch Drawing became my own lifeline. During difficult times, I would turn to the drawing board to release emotions. I witnessed my feelings as they poured through my hands onto the page. This enabled me to move through a range of states without judgment. At the end of a session, I would reflect upon a series of drawings depicting the transformation of my psyche. The process left me feeling clear and whole.

As time went by, the personal emotional process faded as I began to draw from a more transpersonal impulse. It was like dipping my hands into a universal pool and pulling out archetypal forms and figures. I began to put more time into the crafting of each Touch Drawing, enriching the images with layers of color. This is the body of work out of which the 120 SoulCards were selected. Through this format, my art has found its way into the hands and hearts of people all over the world.

Though all my images are created through Touch Drawing, the forming of faces has been a centering practice. It provides a simple, centering pattern that is infinitely variable. As I bring a face into form, I am gazing into a mirror that takes me beyond myself. I dab paint onto a board, roll it smooth and lay a sheet of paper upon it. Focusing my attention inward, I note subtle sensations within my face. I place both hands on the paper and move them in accordance with the patterns I am feeling. Lifting the paper off the inked board, I see the imprint on the underside created by the pressure of my touch. A unique face has come into form on the page. I lay that drawing aside, roll the board smooth, place another paper upon it, and begin again. When I am in the zone, the drawing board feels like a portal through which the being depicted can peak into our world.

When am I drawing my self and when am I drawing another? This is a question I ponder. In the midst of drawing a face, self awareness is a sensory tool. As a point of contact with life, I experience impressions in my own being that are expressive of the other. I have practiced this over many years in the form of Inner Portraits. These are sessions in which I sit in the presence of a person with the intention of creating drawings for them. We begin by setting intentions and gazing into each other’s faces. I then enter an intensive drawing session, creating 12-16 drawings in a couple of hours. As I gaze at each successive blank sheet, I sit in a moment of emptiness.

Within moments, I feel the initiating impulse for the next drawing. When reflecting upon the drawings, the subject of the Inner Portrait often recognizes aspects of their psyche. Over the years, I have come to trust this process. It encompasses more than my conscious mind can comprehend.

The practice of drawing from a sense of connection has expanded beyond one-on-one sessions with individuals. I love creating images inspired by powerful places and events. I have drawn at ancient sites such as the stone circles of Callenish in Scotland and Avebury in England. I have sat on the cold stone floors of Chartres Cathedral in France and Rosslyn Chapel in Scotland, and in the Mayan temples of Tikal and Uaxactun in Guatemala. I have carried drawing materials when hiking in the alpine mountains of the North Cascade Range in Washington State, into a rain forest in Costa Rica, and within the ancient Llanfeugan Yew tree circle in Wales. I have also been interpretive artist at many events including the Parliament of the World’s Religions, the Dawn of Interspirituality, and the Fairy and Human Relations Congress.

This has enabled me to create in the presence of inspiring people and lineage carriers such as the His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Mevlevi Whirling Dervishes, indigenous elders and many others. And of course I have drawn during many classes with David. So many faces have passed through my fingertips over the years! Again and again I have wondered what I should do with all these faces. Is there a reason they have come through my fingertips? Is there a purpose the beings they depict want to serve? The idea of creating a new deck with only faces emerged in the early 2000’s. At times it would feel so real, but then the idea would fade away. Finally the time feels right to offer these faces to the world.

I trust that Portals of Presence will find a way into the hands and hearts of people who will enliven them, and be enlivened by them. My hope and prayer is that this set of cards contributes to a deepening relationship with life, and helps us find our way through these transformational times.

Portals of Presence will be available in early March, 2021. Visit Deborah’s website to learn more

Everyday Delight

By Anne Gambling

As a writer, I enjoy playing with language. Such that, when re-contemplating a gift received from a friend in late 2019 (a piece of folk art exhorting us to ‘delight in the everyday’) during a 2020 defined and bookended by unexpected and surprising health concerns (societal: covid; personal: cancer), I suddenly saw its message in a new ‘light’. Hmmm, I thought. Why just everyday? Why not every ‘every’? And so a poem was born within the blink of an eye, the space of a breath. A poem to remind me of the every ‘every’ deserving of my attention, to encounter its presence with a view to finding its capacity to delight.

My desire to entertain a bit of whimsy when all around I bore witness to anxiety, despair – expectations of grief regardless or not if any immediately presented (it’s amazing the depth of negative associations people have of the word ‘cancer’; to which the word ‘covid’ fast became its 2020 ally) – is nothing new. I am a perennial optimist, and love sharing my joy of life with nearest, dearest, and beyond (a constant annoyance to one and same). As a child, I had Pollyanna’s ‘glad game’ down pat. Now in my 50s and with my youngest graduating high school, I figured it was time to put pen to paper and confirm to every ‘every’ what I thought.

To supplement the poem pinned to wall, 2020 kept me successfully occupied finding new monikers for the months as a trigger to search out anything but the bad, sad, fad news flooding each everyday. J-months become Joy months (such luck – 3 of them, 91 whole days; and we even get to begin each new year with Joy!); A-months stand for Awe; M-months for Magic, and so on. In my Annie-calendar there is no March 21 to look forward to, for example, but Magic-21, preceded (of course) by 20, and postmarked by a further 10, looking in any/all cranny’d nooks for evidence of Magic in the everyday. Each find I duly record so Magic compounds (like bank interest) with my re-reading or re-telling of yarn. Only a single D month, meanwhile, to close the year, but most happily it is Delight’s own. On, on, 2021!

Plus, in one of those ‘it-just-gets-better-and-better’ moments of fun, I recently realised that each time my Swiss husband says: ‘Can you turn on the light?’ (or some such) he could as easily be saying: ‘Can you turn on delight?’ Sure! I reply. How about 24/7 radiance?

Of course this little unintended wordplay only makes sense if one knows that German has no ‘th’ sound; no matter how perfect a German mother-tongue’s English pronunciation, ‘the’ more often than not sounds like ‘de’, hence … In this way, December 2020’s (delightful) Winter Solstice celeb became a seesawing glad game to toast the returning ‘light of delight’ and ‘delight of light’! Pure mergence, in other words – stellar-cloaked and champagne-giggly.

2020 was one heck of a year, on that we are all agreed. And although now officially ‘history’, something we can talk about in the past tense, I take three presents with me into 2021’s present – covid on a societal level, cancer on a personal level, and delight on a ‘wrap-your-arms-around-the-world-and-touch-every-every-with-your-capacity-for-joy’ level. Who knows how long the first present will remain (with us all) or the second (with my sweet stoic body). But my hope is for the constancy of the (light of) delight and the (delight of) light to ever-walk at my side, prodding me to search out the merest sliver of silver in the lining of every ‘every’ I encounter, staying present to the present of each in/out-breath delightedly breathed as I continue this grand adventure of life in a new year, and beyond. Blessings to all!

DELIGHT: A POEM

delight in the everyday

delight in the everynight

delight in the everywhere, and

delight in the everywhen

delight in the everyhow

surely delight in the everywho too?

so now delight in the everywhat, which and why

c’mon, why not just give it a try!

wander the heights of your own joyous making,

(rocky) mountain mammas in each (delight’d) direction,

revel in the present, express joy in the now,

delight in the precious things simply breathing Life’s Tao,

training each living sense on every wonder they meet …

now! now! please try it: now!

don’t leave Life’s everyday for any other someday (oneday)

because you just might find (by the time you have time)

that the moment has passed

and your clock simply stop-watched –

and you’re just not here (anymore) to delight …

 +++++

.

January 6, 2021

I cannot begin to express the depth of my sorrow and my anger over the assault on the United States Congress and Capitol on Wednesday. It was an attempt to overturn an election and halt a Constitutional process that has defined this country throughout its history: the peaceful transition of power from one Administration to another. Seeing a Confederate battle flag carried through the Rotunda of the Capitol building, I felt shock and dismay. In a matter of minutes, a mob, with the instigation and encouragement of the sitting President of the United States, was able to accomplish what no Confederate troops were able to do during the four years of the Civil War.

That this happened is inexcusable, but it is not a surprise. For some time now, my subtle colleagues have been saying that the United States is facing a test of its principles and its ideals. Having proclaimed ourselves as a union, a republic, in which all people are equal before the law and possessing a right to equal opportunities to grow and thrive and pursue happiness, we cannot escape from having our collective feet held to the fire of proving it. If this is our destiny, to be a vision of what is possible when people come together and work together, then we will be asked over and over again to make it so until it is second nature to us, its reality as much a part of us as our blood and bones.

As Wednesday's event showed, we’re not there yet. We’re still choosing the destiny we wish to fulfill. Will it be the one enshrined, however imperfectly, in the vision of our Founders, a vision of reaching across differences to build an equitable and free society together? Or will it be the vision of a world, not unlike that of Pottersville in the movie It’s a Wonderful Life, in which the country is divided between the winners and the losers, between those who dominate and those who must submit, between those who have and those who have not, a country in which those who achieve power conspire to hoard it and never let go?

One doesn’t have to be psychic or have contact with subtle beings to have seen the forces gathering over the past several years to bring us to this particular boiling point. Day after day, the signs have been there to suggest that some form of collision of world views was coming, mainly because our divisions were being fed and stoked and widened. Perhaps Wednesday's events will be the shock that brings everyone to their senses and allows reconciliation and healing to begin to happen. Perhaps not - we may have further, perhaps even worse confrontations to come. As my subtle colleagues are fond of saying, “What unfolds is up to you and your choices.”

What, then, are we to do after an event like this?

First, those who instigated, nourished, enabled, and enacted the assault on the Capitol, on Congress, and on our democracy need to face consequences for what they have done. We need to let our Representatives know that this is our will as citizens and require them to keep up the pressure until this is done. If those responsible are excused or there are no consequences, then such collisions and confrontations will continue, and the next ones may be worse. Why not, if those who do these things feel they can do so with impunity? The hard truth is that we cannot be soft-hearted about this. We cannot take this democracy for granted. A line was crossed, and if we choose for the United States to succeed, this line cannot be crossed—or even approached—again.

Beyond this, we need to do what we always need to do in healing and blessing our world. We need to be in ourselves the quality and spirit of life we wish this country and our planet to embody. If division lives in my heart, then I will create a world that is divided. Indeed, if I feel I can be a winner and not a loser, I may seek divisiveness as a source of power and safety, If unity lives within me, then I will seek a world of cooperation and community in which we are all winners, each in our own unique way. Either way, I choose what I am.

This is, for me, the gift of Incarnational Spirituality. It offers me a vision of the sacredness and wholeness of incarnation, a vision of my potential as a whole individual. It offers an evolving practice that honors and strengthens in down-to-earth ways both my individuality and the larger community of life in which I participate. It helps me realize that I contribute to the incarnation of the larger wholes of which I am a part—specifically in this case, the incarnation of the United States as a force for blessing in the world. This gives me power and purpose right where I am, for I can choose and act to bring the greater, nobler spirit of America to life in my own daily relationships.

In the days ahead, whatever they bring, we don’t need to tear this country down and apart in our desire to be right. We can build up the country by choosing our ability to stand together, respecting each other in our Light.

In this moment of living history, I invite you to stand steadfast in the Light and Love of your Presence. Together, we shape the unfolding incarnation of wholeness in our country and in the world..

DAVID’S DESK #164 - Seeing Things Afresh

David's Desk is my opportunity to share thoughts and tools for the spiritual journey. These letters are my personal insights and opinions and do not necessarily reflect the sentiments or thoughts of any other person in Lorian or of Lorian as a whole. If you wish to share this letter with others, please feel free to do so; however, the material is ©2019 by David Spangler. If you no longer wish to receive these letters, please let us know at info@Lorian.org.

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Before I say anything else, let me wish you a blessed, productive, abundant, and happy New Year.  How wonderful to have 2021 arrive!  2020 was a challenging beast of a year, and I’m happy to have it behind us rather than ahead of us.  Of course, we have no idea what this year may have in store for us, but there are reasons to hope, a COVID vaccine being among them.

The main reason to hope, though, from my perspective at least, lies not in any external events but within ourselves.  It lies in our capacity to rise above the past and the habits it imposes and to see things in fresh ways, to say, “Whatever has gone before, today I start anew.”  This is a power of choice that we always have within us, but New Year’s Day is the time when we most acknowledge and celebrate it.  

New Year’s is such a peculiarly human celebration. From the point of view of the maple tree in my backyard or the birds that nest in it, January 1st is no different from December 31st.  The sun sets, the sun rises, and the cycle of the day goes on as it always does.  Furthermore, picking the first day of January as New Year’s Day is a cultural decision.  Throughout human history, other cultures have picked other days to celebrate the beginning of a new year, sometimes based on agricultural cycles, sometimes on celestial ones. 

The importance of New Year’s Day lies not in when it occurs in the course of the year but in what it signifies: a chance to reset and begin anew.  We make resolutions of what we will change in our lives.  We say, “This year is going to be different.”  And in the flush of that first day of the new year, we mean it.  We have a sense, however momentary, that things will change, that the year will be different, that something new is beginning.  We grasp the vision of these possibilities. We recognize the opportunity to see the world and our own lives afresh, leading to new choices and new actions that will make a difference.

What is needed is the will to act on that vision and make those choices and take those actions.  The gift of New Year’s is not that it’s a new year but that it encourages our innate power to see ourselves in a new light, recognizing that change is possible if we choose to make it so.

It's the choice that’s important, and the will, the steadiness, and the vision to see our choices through into implementation. No season of the year will do this for us.  But it can remind us that this is who we are, people with the power to choose and to change. It can remind us to see ourselves afresh.

Many years ago, the young child of friends of mine wished me a “Happy New You!”  We chuckled that she got the words wrong, repeating what she thought the adults were saying, yet in fact, she got the words exactly right.  Behind everything else—the fireworks, the celebrations, the ball dropping on Time’s Square in New York City, the parties—this is what we are affirming:  a “new you” that we can each become if we so choose and the new year that can emerge from that choice.

So, my friends, I wish you a Happy New You.  May you see yourself and the world afresh, ready and able to make 2021 a year of healing, of hope, of restoration, and of blessing.

New Rituals for New Times

By Julie Spangler

The other day while hiking in a park nearby, my friends and I met a tall elderly man coming the other direction on the trail. We were all masked because we are living through the stressful and strangely isolating times of the Covid19 pandemic.

Pre-Covid, I used to always smile and say hello. I was not alone in that. A store was a marketplace of connection, sometimes even running into old friends or acquaintances I hadn’t seen in years – a village square of meeting and greeting. Now, it is a strange place of fear and not looking in order to protect each other from a dread contagion.

But on the trail, this day, this gentleman tipped his mask! Whoa! Now there is a new permutation of the old tip of the hat in greeting! As he approached, he pulled down his mask when he was an appropriate distance from us, smiled in greeting, letting us know he was friendly, and then replaced the mask to pass us safely.

I was struck by this new ‘tip of the hat’ gesture. It got me thinking about the ways new social protocols are made – evoked by the social conditions at the time. We used to shake hands to show we were not carrying a sword or weapon. We bowed to honor the sacred within the other, and perhaps to keep from touching hands and sharing germs. Gentlemen tipped their hats to show welcome and respect and perhaps interest to a lady. Now, in the time of Covid19, we wish to show kindness and connection and it is not easy behind an isolating mask. So what new social conventions do we invent, new ways to connect?

Some new conventions, I have noticed, do not support connection. We look away when we pass each other to avoid contamination, or perhaps to make another person feel more safe. Unfortunately, however motivated, this just exacerbates feelings of isolation so rampant today. Even the wearing of a mask has become contentious – a distinction between those who identify with their personal freedom and those who identify with the wellbeing of the larger community. Do you belong to the maskers or the unmaskers? If you wear a mask among unmaskers, you may feel shamed. If you are unmasked among the masked, you may feel defiant.

How do we embrace this new-to-the-US phenomenon of wearing a mask in public to prevent the spread of disease? How do we connect through the barriers that a mask creates?

It is worth noting that the human need for connection is stronger than any pandemic. It is part of our DNA to seek community with each other. More than ever, our love is needed in the air we breathe. We may forget this when there is contention and stress around us, but a tip of the mask reminds us that we are all in this together. Small gestures of kindness make a difference in how we connect. Even smiling eyes over the top of the mask is an avenue of connection. And when I meet those who are not wearing masks, safe behind my mask I can still greet them warmly through my smiling eyes. I can keep myself and my community safe and still wish the best for those who choose another road. It is on me to keep the love flowing through the air between us.

Isolation is not a natural state for humans. We seek to connect, and when the normal patterns of connection are disrupted, we make new ones. What are new ways we may offer kindness and caring to our community and our world? It is important at this time of constriction that we make an effort to reach out and stay connected, even if it is simply safely tipping the mask to reveal a smile beneath.

DAVID’S DESK #163 - The Return of the Lights

David's Desk is my opportunity to share thoughts and tools for the spiritual journey. These letters are my personal insights and opinions and do not necessarily reflect the sentiments or thoughts of any other person in Lorian or of Lorian as a whole. If you wish to share this letter with others, please feel free to do so; however, the material is ©2019 by David Spangler. If you no longer wish to receive these letters, please let us know at info@Lorian.org.

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From our bedroom window, I can see a house on a cul-de-sac that is a block away as the crow flies (and we have a lot of crows in our neighborhood) but is three blocks away if I were to walk to it. Over the years we’ve lived here, this house has taken on a special significance for me. Every year, on the day after Thanksgiving, its occupants put up all their Christmas lights, the first on their cul-de-sac to do so. It becomes a colorful house of lights, shining in the night.

When, on a late November evening after sunset, I walk into our darkened bedroom and see that these lights across the way have come on again, I feel a sudden thrill of joy. I know that the Christmas Season has come once again with all its magic and mystery.

Seeing the Christmas lights appear on this house has become my personal marker that the Celebration of Light has begun, leading up to the winter solstice, Christmas Day, and then the beginning of the New Year.

One year, these distant neighbors must have spent the holidays elsewhere as their house never lit up. Even though throughout December, a great many other decorations and lights filled our neighborhood, I kept having this nagging feeling that something was off, that somehow Christmas wasn’t coming that year. Of course, come it did, but this feeling made me realize how much I had come to look forward throughout the year to the first moment when I see these Christmas lights shining through our bedroom window in an otherwise darkened neighborhood.

One evening a few days ago, with nearly two weeks to go until Thanksgiving, I walked into our bedroom and to my surprise and delight, through the window I could see the familiar burst of light and color. The Christmas lights had returned to the house across the cul-de-sac! And not only them. Our neighbors immediately over our back fence, whose house faces that cul-de-sac, had their Christmas lights up, too.

Since that evening, I’ve discovered other homes in our neighborhood have put up their Christmas lights as well: no decorations, just the lights. In the nearly forty years we have lived in this house, I don’t remember this ever having happened before Thanksgiving. In fact, part of the tradition the weekend after Thanksgiving is to go out and witness how in the span of two days, the neighborhood has transformed itself into a fairy land of lights. But now it’s happening early, one house at a time, a pandemic of light spreading around us. I feel I need to dig our lights out from where they’re stored in the garage and join in.

Thinking of the year we’ve had and how stressful and horrific it has been, I’m not surprised that people are eager to see some reminder of normality and of joy. Thus, the lights return. Not everywhere, not all at once, but more and more as people around here remember what they have stored in their garages and storerooms and decide not to wait. We need these lights now!

I take this as metaphor. If we need anything in our lives this winter, it’s a return of the Light that we all have stored away in our hearts and in our souls. Out of a cold, bleak year of division, anger, fear, and death, we need to festoon ourselves with a fiery hope, with love, with compassion, with anticipation of better and brighter days, and with a shining will to make the days ahead different from the days behind us.

The magic of our winter holidays, whether the Solstice or Christmas, Hanukkah or Kwanza, has always been that in the darkest, coldest part of the year, Light returns. It is the promise that whatever the circumstances seem to be, Light cannot be extinguished. If in dark times, it seems to leave us, this Holiday season reminds us that it always comes back.

Light returns!

My distant neighbors couldn’t wait another two weeks for the traditional time of turning on their Christmas lights. The joy, the comfort, the promise they bring is needed now, and so they set their house aglow.

As we move on from this difficult year, we need to remember and set our hearts aglow as well. May we all be blessed by the promise of this Season. May we equally bless each other.

Let the Light return!

Joy and the Path of Suffering

By David Spangler

When I was twenty years old, I was invited to give a series of lectures on spirituality at a metaphysical center in Los Angeles. The details of how this came about are unimportant to my story here, but if you’re interested, you can find them in my book, Apprenticed to Spirit.

I had only been lecturing for a couple of weeks, though I’d had some public speaking experiences in high school and in college. For my subject matter, I was drawing on some of my subtle world encounters. These contacts were notable for the depth of love and joy they brought. They frequently expressed a desire that we embodied humans learn to recognize the vivifying power of the joy at the heart of life.

As a consequence, on that evening I was exploring this theme of joy and its importance in our lives. I was abruptly interrupted by a woman who sprang to her feet, pointed a trembling finger at me and said, “Blasphemy! You are the Antichrist! Life is about suffering, not joy! You are the Antichrist, giving false teachings!” At which point, she stomped out of the lecture room. I watched her go, a bit stunned, and then, not knowing what else to do, went on with my talk.

Obviously, this event imprinted itself on my memory since I can vividly recall it fifty-five years later. For one thing, it was the first (though not the last) time anyone had called me the Antichrist, and in the spiritual teacher business, you always remember the first time this happens! More seriously, though, it made me wonder what had happened in her life to orient her so fully towards suffering that she would deny the reality of joy. One of the people in the audience who knew her later told me that she had indeed known a lot of unhappiness and suffering in her life, so much so that she took it as a badge of honor that God would test her, like Job, with so much misery. She had become proud in her suffering and identified with it. No wonder, I realized, she had reacted as she did.

By contrast, a couple of years later, a woman who was in one of my classes asked if she could come talk with me. She said she was troubled about her spiritual life and was wondering if she were doing something wrong. When I asked her to explain, she said, “I’m happy all the time. My life is filled with joy, and I find joy in everything I do. I have a wonderful marriage, great children, and I love my job. If I’m on a spiritual path, shouldn’t I be suffering?” Her name, appropriately, was Joy, and she truly radiated it.

For me, the spiritual path is life itself: how we engage with it, what we draw from it, and the effect we have on others for better or worse. For some, understanding, strength, and compassion come from dealing with difficult issues, with pain and suffering. For others, development comes from being and holding a presence of joy within a challenging world. For me, there is no “Path of Suffering” or “Path of Light and Joy.” There is only the unique path that each soul trods in its own way, encountering whatever life brings and using it as the means for its development. Given the nature of the world these days, it is likely that this will mean dealing with both joyful and difficult times. What really defines the nature of the soul’s “Path” is how it resolves its encounter with either one.

We tend to think in terms of absolutes and extremes, but few, if any of us, live lives that are all one thing or another. I’m sure that the woman in my lecture fifty-five years ago had known happy times, and Joy, my student, met challenges and difficulties. Life presents itself to us as a complex melody, but we can choose to hear only one or two notes within it. The woman in my lecture was insisting, at least to me that evening, that there was only one note that had value, and that was the note of suffering. Joy, on the other hand, came to see me because she didn’t want the note of joy that was so strong in her life to overpower her ability to hear and understand other, sadder notes when she needed to do so.

Through my experiences with the subtle worlds, I have come to understand that joy is a radiant quality that enhances and empowers life. It vivifies. It is like a metabolic enhancer. What it is not is a synonym for happiness. We regularly confuse the two, but the difference between them is important. I am happy about something; that is, it is an emotion caused by something: I get a raise at work, I get an extra piece of chocolate cake, I hear that my candidate has been elected, and so on. Joy is deeper than this; it is its own cause, a presence that in turn causes other things.

My metaphor for this is the sun. Sunlight makes life possible on our earth; it is the energy source that everything depends upon. Remove the sun and its light and there is no life. But life itself needs both light and dark. The seed germinates deep in the darkness of the soil where sunlight doesn’t reach it. The darkness of the night enables us to sleep (and also to see the stars). The cool shadows of shade refresh us on hot days. Our lives move through cycles, experiencing both light and dark, but the sun is always there, holding the earth in its energy.

For me, Joy is like this. I can know happiness and sadness, pain and relief from pain, but Joy is a constant underneath all of them. It is the life-giving energy that allows me to draw from each experience that which will enable me to grow and deepen and become more whole. It doesn’t deny me light and shadow, but it enables me to benefit from both.

Going through numerous surgeries for cancer, I found myself confronted with more pain than I had ever imagined. It was not momentary but went on for days and weeks and months as I dealt with the aftermath of these surgeries. During this time, I learned to make friends with the pain and allowed it to teach me and deepen me, opening up new resources of resilience and strength. I learned that although parts of my body were suffering, other parts were healthy and going about their business as if all was right with the world. I experienced more deeply what I already knew, that wholeness can embrace both suffering and health, darkness and light, pain and calm. Wholeness was saying “both/and” to life so that my consciousness could embrace and know all the parts of what I was dealing with and not identifying with just one or the other.

It was joy that enabled me to do this. I would have been happy—deliriously so—not to be in pain, and being in pain meant I was not happy. But I was joyous. This was not automatic. It was a choice.

These days, with the prevalence of COVID-19 in the air, we are asked to wear masks, and many of us do. The role of a mask is not to protect ourselves as much as it is to protect others. As we can be infected before we show any symptoms of the disease (or while never showing symptoms) and thus spreading the coronavirus without realizing it, the mask keeps us from adding dangerous viral content into the air that others are breathing,

As someone sensitive to the subtle energies around us in our environment, tapping into Joy was like putting on a mask. It didn’t take away my own suffering; I still felt pain, and I still didn’t like it! I wasn’t “happy.” But just as sunlight isn’t really about darkness and light but about energizing life, making a choice to hold Joy in my consciousness was about ensuring the subtle energies I was radiating into my environment weren’t carrying the “virus” of my own suffering but would energize the life and well-being of those around me who had to “breathe” my subtle energetic influence. I used the practical tools of Incarnational Spirituality not to deny my pain or avoid suffering but to ensure as best I could that the nurses and doctors and people around me could feel my love and my appreciation for them. I wanted them to feel empowered because they were facing energetic atmospheres of fear, suffering, anger, loss, grief, and pain every day in order to serve and help and heal. I was their patient, but I could also be their ally in subtle energetic ways.

There is no spiritual merit to avoiding suffering, though it’s a natural thing for any organism to do; we’re built to avoid pain when we can. Likewise, there is no spiritual merit in seeking out suffering for its own sake. It’s what we do with our times of suffering and not-suffering that counts. It’s how we use these times to learn something and to grow. If I fetishize either suffering or happiness, holding either on a pedestal as being “the meaning of life,” I limit my ability to experience and benefit from life in its wholeness. I also limit my understanding of Joy as an energetic source that transcends either suffering or happiness.

There is a lot in this world about which we should be unhappy. It’s a far from perfect place. Millions suffer everyday in ways that could be alleviated or eliminated if collectively we chose to do so. Just taking incarnation on Earth could be seen as a “Path of Suffering,” whether directly in our personal lives or indirectly by sharing a world filled with the pain of others, both human and non-human.

The calling of Incarnational Spirituality is really a simple one: to affirm and bolster a sense of joy in being incarnated, a sense of love for the embodied earth and all upon it, and a realization of our generative, sacred nature as a foundation for engaging the world in new ways, based on the 'More" of who we are, not the "Less" of who we are. It is a calling of liberation and empowerment, and Joy is a key element within it.

My belief and my experience is that Joy is not a turning away from the suffering of the world, not a “spiritual bypass,” but rather the source of the very energy that can enable us to honor life, support life, cherish life, protect life, nourish life, and make the choices that will bring about change. To be in Joy is the most powerful thing we can do if we are serious about remaking the world in wholeness. It is like being the sun so that life can thrive.

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David Spangler, MCS is the Director of Research in the Lorian Association. He is a mystic, writer and educator in the integration of spiritual values, energy and presence into everyday life. He was co-director of the Findhorn Community and has taught extensively for over 40 years. Since 1965, David has worked clairvoyantly with a group of spiritual beings whose purpose was to explore and develop a spiritual teaching around the process of incarnation. David is the author of many books, including Apprenticed to Spirit: The Education of a Soul * and Working with Subtle Energies*.

*These titles are available through Amazon. If you order by clicking on the links above, Lorian will receive a portion of the proceeds. Thank you for your support!

Conversations with Lorian: What is the Role of Conscious Suffering?

Editor's Note: Conversations with Lorian is a collection of different voices and perspectives responding to inquiries pertaining to Incarnational Spirituality. Often we receive questions that don't have a single, uniform answer, due to the ways that individuality and sovereignty shapes our practice. At times like this we like to gather a number of responses from teachers, priests and other colleagues in order to honor our diverse yet complimentary approaches to Lorian's work in the world.

Please note that Conversations with Lorian blog posts are the personal insights and opinions of individual practitioners and do not represent others in Lorian or the Lorian Association as a whole.

If you have a question you'd like the Conversation team to respond to, please email info@lorian.org.
 

Question :

“I’m a person who has, for years now, been disillusioned by the new age focus of hope, light, butterflies, and ‘if you tune into energies high enough and correctly, all will be well’.

Life on this planet also includes pain. Life here is not life without suffering.

These are realities. This duality is real. So is paradox.

My question: Is there a place in Lorian’s focus for Conscious Suffering as a subtly chosen path? Or is this a ‘compromise path’ for those who ‘faltered‘ along the way, a path for those of us who are less evolved? - to be navigated better and more correctly in a future incarnation?

I balk often at the spiritual need to remain serene and unruffled on a planet so energized by ruffling, flow and energetic (and emotional) extremes that I sometimes wonder if we are here to fully experience life at all.” - J.S.

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I too have witnessed the pressure in spiritual communities to conform to positions that exclude suffering, though I think this is far from being a “new age focus.” From the moment human beings first invented the idea called belief, we also created a structure around it that associated misfortune with punishment.

It can be equally problematic, though, to attach oneself to conscious suffering. Many of us are spiritually sophisticated enough to recognize the importance of paradox, yet often the only ways we can think to create balance is to move to the side of the boat where fewer people sit. (I’m guilty of this!) We position ourselves in an either/or state, and cling to an idea of transcendence as an elevation above conflict.

Real transcendence is the ability to focus on the internal movement of spirit regardless of where we’re sitting. A spiritual practice focused on either love and light, or suffering and pain, strikes me as our personalities clinging to stories about life, instead of accepting certain complexities that are simply part of the cost of admission.

I personally feel the beauty of Incarnational Spirituality lies in its simplicity. We are here - that means we belong. God exists anywhere we are. For me right now, God exists in a middle aged, brown-skinned cis heterosexual woman. This body and life is not just a suit that I must transcend in order to have a spiritual experience. It’s an integral part of that experience. I have experienced racism, cruelty, sickness. I have been physically and emotionally abused. I have suffered health challenges. At a glance, society would see me as marginalized in multiple ways. At times I have seen myself as a victim. Other times a survivor. All of these versions hold some truth. Yet I also recognize that when I said yes to this strange and surreal adventure, God chose to express itself through me in this particular form and shape. And I came here to experience something, to achieve something, to be something here in an incarnated form that really isn’t possible without a body, mind, spirit and complex set of emotions. There are things we all came to do that really aren’t possible anywhere except on earth in skin suits of humanity.

Having said that, I don’t wish to ignore conscious suffering completely. Life on earth does seem to require some suffering. Why? Spiritual teacher Reverend Cynthia Bourgealt once illustrated the reasons as part of a lecture series I listened to a handful of years ago. Here is what I gleaned from her teaching:

God, the One, the Almighty, was undivided. An infinite artist and creator always seeks to unlock their own potential, so God divided itself into an infinite number of expressions of self. In one incarnation, God chose to be, say, a gay priest struggling to come to terms with the church’s teachings and their inner experience. In another incarnation, God chose to be that priest’s father torn between what they had been taught of right and wrong and love for their child. Both are expressions of the same God.

How can we not have suffering on Earth with so many different incarnate expressions of Oneness running around loose? God’s experience of Themself generates conflict. Why? It’s because God wants to expand beyond God’s own limitations. Expansion requires tension.

I know this view may be difficult to accept. We don’t easily identify as divine expressions any people or forces whose actions create opposition to our values. Yet every person that lives and has ever lived has a purpose in being here. Apart from the inherent challenge in this statement is the fact that resistance to the Sacredness within others often masks a resistance to the Sacredness within ourselves.

The Compromise Path

I find it interesting how our human minds got it twisted that an absence of conflict equates with a more spiritually evolved person. I’d say the opposite is true. The truly evolved people are the heavy lifters. A sweeping glance at modern history immediately produces a few outstanding characters: Victor Frankl, Etty Hillesum, John Lewis. In moments when I feel like I’ve had all that I can take of challenging conditions on planet Earth, I look to Man’s Search for Meaning by Victor Frankl and An Interrupted Life by Etty Hillesum. I don’t know how anyone could walk joyfully away from the Holocaust with their spirit intact, but Victor Frankl did. Etty Hillesum died at Auschwitz in 1943, and her journal stands as a testament to the resiliency of the human mind, body and spirit to transcend suffering by wholly embracing the state of one’s life exactly as it is. My father recently shared with me a similar degree of respect for civil rights leader and US senator John Lewis: I don’t know how that man survived what he did and still loved people.

It seems to me that the lightweights are those who surround themselves with "love and light", and retreat from any experience which contradicts their ideas of spiritual abundance. If God loves me, then he will bless me with happiness, comfort and ease. There's nothing wrong with desiring a life free of pain; however, true spiritual abundance is the ability to connect with the God within oneself, no matter one's external circumstances. It's finding the Sacred Inside the Fire.

On September 30, 1942, just over a year before she was slaughtered in a Nazi concentration camp, Etty Hillesum wrote the following in her journal:

“To be true to one’s own spontaneity, to what one set out to do in an all too spontaneous moment.

To be true to every feeling and thought that has started to germinate.

To be true in the fullest sense of the word, to be true to God, to one’s own best moments.

If I have one duty in these times, it is to bear witness. I think I have learned to take it all in, to read life in one long stretch. And in my youthful arrogance I am often sure that I can remember every least thing I see and that I shall be able to relate it all one day. Still, I must try to put it down now.

I seem able to see ever more clearly the gaping chasms which swallow up man’s creative powers and joie de vivre. They are holes in our own mind. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. And: man suffers most through his fears of suffering. The body keeps leading the spirit, when it should be the other way around…

How much I want to write. Somewhere deep inside me is a workshop in which Titans are forging a new world. I once wrote in despair: ‘ it is inside my little skull that this world must be rethought, that it must be given fresh clarity.’ I still occasionally think so, with the same, almost diabolical, presumption. I know how to free my creative powers more and more from the snares of material concerns, from the idea of hunger and cold and danger. They are, after all, imaginary phantoms, not the reality. Reality is something one shoulders with all the difficulties. And as one shoulders them so one's resilience grows stronger. But the idea of suffering (which is not the reality, for real suffering is always fruitful and can turn life into a precious thing) must be destroyed. And if you destroy the ideas behind which life lies imprisoned as behind bars, then you liberate your true life, its real mainsprings, and then you will also have the strength to bear real suffering, your own and the world’s.”

- An Interrupted Life: The Diaries of Etty Hillesum 1941 - 1943

No matter who we are, where we are, and the darkness of the times in which we live, there is a path of light. Truly, the only compromise that I can see lies in the denial of even the tiniest aspect of our human experiences, no matter how overwhelming it may seem in moments of vulnerability. I don’t think we need to consciously seek out suffering as a life choice. Instead we should openheartedly accept the unfolding of our lives in fullness. After all, they, with their particular difficulties and graces, are the places where the Gods within us seek to embrace the world.

- Drena Griffith

Engaging with the Future

By David Spangler

Editor's Note: This blog post is an excerpt from Year 10 Issue I of David's quarterly journal Views from the Borderland.

At the moment, the future's a scary place. This is especially true now because so many things are changing, and it's not clear where these changes will lead us. The Unknown is often a scary place, though it can be a place of invitation and exploration as well. I frequently am asked if I know what is going to happen. More often than this, I am asked how to handle the rising tension and anxiety and tumult that people are feeling. What guidance do I have for facing the future?

I can get dire messages from the subtle realms about "what's coming," leaving me wondering how much of them to share or whether to share them at all. I have no desire to promote fear. And my subtle colleagues counsel inner strength and calm, and "holding the Light."

First, a word about the "dire warnings" and the "what's coming." One doesn't have to be psychic or privy to subtle world prognostications to see that the world is changing and that human civilization will need to change with it and adapt accordingly. This is going to entail loss and death; it already is. We need to be prepared and resilient, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. We don't need a spiritual being to tell us this.

Having said this, it would be a mistake to assume that the only future visible from the vantage point of the subtle worlds is a nasty one, or, for that matter, a rosy and beautiful one. All manner of futures are possible.

My subtle colleagues seem to see and work with a constantly shifting pattern of "future-threads" from the "impossible" to the "improbable" to the "possible" to the "highly likely." These threads are constantly shifting, especially in the short term, as people make decisions about their actions. This can turn a "highly likely" into a "less probable" and vice versa. Yes, there are events that are planned and orchestrated, in some cases hundreds of years in advance in our time, by beings who operate outside of time and with a very long-range view of human and planetary evolution. Some processes and changes are "baked into" the life of Gaia in much the way that puberty is "baked into" the life of an individual. But much is subject to creative will and imagination and dependent on "in-the-moment" decisions and actions on the part of people with free will. These are the threads that can shift unexpectedly, making discerning the future difficult.

On the other hand, beyond this shifting weave of possibilities and probabilities, there is a basic underlying structure--the "loom" itself on which the threads are suspended--and this structure is one of hope and joy, empowerment and Light. Holding ourselves in alignment with the steadiness of this "loom" seems incredibly important right now to give us the power to shift the threads of possibility and potential in helpful and hopeful ways. This does involve strengthening our inner self. It means realizing that we are actually one with the loom, not the threads. It's the loom that can define us, not the threads or the patterns they weave.

It's not enough merely to be calm or centered, important as these things are. We need to realize that the future is not presenting itself to us, certainly not as a fait accompli. It is inviting us, calling to us, to help shape it. We are asked to partner with the present to create the future.

We can do this because within each of us is the power of a creative imagination and what I call the spirit of holopoiesis. Holopoiesis is a word I coined to describe an innate impulse to create wholeness. This is innate in us because it is innate in the universe. Based in love, holopoiesis or the commitment to wholeness and to creating wholeness, is what holds creation together. This is a creative force within us.

The dark and foreboding future that seems to await us in "what's coming" is almost always imagined and depicted as a future of fragmentation, conflict, separation, violence, and division, in short, the opposite of a future based on and giving expression to wholeness. If that future scares us—and it should!—then we cannot retreat simply into calmness. We need to recognize our innate power, through love, through connectedness, through imagination and creativity, to create wholeness. We need to act out of that power in whatever ways are appropriate and available to us in our life situation. We need to act on behalf of the world and the future we want.

To act holopoietically is to act with deliberation and intent, not in reaction. For this reason, it is action proceeding out of the calm and strength of our centeredness. It is an action to shape, not simply to respond.

DAVID’S DESK #162 - VOTE

David's Desk is my opportunity to share thoughts and tools for the spiritual journey. These letters are my personal insights and opinions and do not necessarily reflect the sentiments or thoughts of any other person in Lorian or of Lorian as a whole. If you wish to share this letter with others, please feel free to do so; however, the material is ©2019 by David Spangler. If you no longer wish to receive these letters, please let us know at info@Lorian.org.

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Walking with the Wind

By Claire Blatchford

When John Lewis died I realized I really didn’t know him. It was a photo of him in the newspaper, shortly before he passed over, standing in the Black Lives Matter Plaza in D.C. that brought on this realization. Yes, I knew who he was and was aware in the 1960’s of the Freedom Riders, the Freedom Fighters, the Marches on Washington and Montgomery, then, later, John in the House of Representatives. This awareness came to me by way of TV, photos and newspaper articles. I was, in the same way, aware of Julian Bond, Harry Belafonte, Rev Ralph Abernathy and others. And, of course, Martin Luther King, Jr whom I followed much more closely. MLK’s death—two days before my wedding day-- was a factor in my husband’s decision to do alternate service, as a conscientious objector to the Vietnam war, for a year at Tuskegee University.

John Lewis’s face, in the photos I saw of Black activists over the years, wasn’t always prominent—meaning center-stage—but was always present. There he was again and again like a link in a chain. With time his face changed and grew on me as he aged. And when I saw him standing there in the Black Lives Matter Plaza, physically diminished, leaning on a cane, I had two thoughts. The first was, “You may be a bit bent now, John Lewis, but, as far as I know you are truly upright. You’ve been marching for freedom forever!” The next thought was one of resolve, “All these years I have seen you but I haven’t really known you, I want to change that!” So I purchased his book, Walking With The Wind A Memoir of the Movement, that day.

This memoir is a hefty read (a bit over 500 pages.) I’ll confess I lost the thread of his account once or twice because of the seeming endlessness of the struggle for racial equality. There were moments when I felt I couldn’t read any more, then remembered he never concluded he couldn’t take any more, so returned to it. His book, chock-full of thoughtful observations, vivid details, insider incidents, and profound meetings with others, such MLK and Bobby Kennedy, truly changed my perspective on the year my husband and I were at Tuskegee.

My intention here isn’t to write a review of John’s book, but to share how his life has changed how I’m living mine. First, however, there’s a “little story” (John’s words) he tells at the beginning of his memoir which not only explains the title of the book, but truly, as he himself says, the essence of his life. John’s telling of this story is well worth reading but is too long to put here. So I’m taking the liberty of giving a brief synopsis of it and will include in italics important quotes from his telling.

John was, when four years old, playing one Saturday afternoon in the dirt at his aunt’s house in Alabama with several other children when a fierce wind storm arose. There was thunder and lightening. John’s aunt herded the children into her small house and it began to sway. She then told the children to hold hands and to walk together toward the corner of the room that was swaying:

"From the kitchen to the front of the house we walked, the wind screaming outside, sheets of rain beating on the tin roof. Then we walked in the other direction, as another end of the house began to lift. And so it went, back and forth, fifteen children walking with the wind, holding that trembling house down with the weight of our small bodies.

This is the story in essence, of my life, of the path to which I’ve been committed since I turned from a boy to a man, and to which I remain committed today. It is a path that extends beyond the issue of race alone, and beyond class as well. And gender. And age. And every other distinction that tends to separate us as human beings rather than bring us together.

That path involves nothing less than the pursuit of the most precious and pure concept I have ever known, an ideal I discovered as a young man and that has guided me like a beacon ever since, a concept called the Beloved Community." (p. xvii)

What caught and held my attention when I read this book was the way John, throughout his life, walked with the wind, towards danger, rather than away from it. As is evident, not just in his memoir but in all the stories circulating now about him, he was fearless. Whatever he was facing: discrimination, ignorance, hatred, fear, he looked at them, into, and beyond them for the Good, without hesitation or flinching.

In this fragmented time in our country, I believe John’s life story underlines how important it is to walk with the wind. Walking with the wind, for me, means trying to think and feel more deeply into the situations in which I find myself, my community and our country. There are, admittedly—to continue to speak metaphorically-- hurricanes going on out there, but I’m not referring to those. It’s the local winds of despondency, discontent and animosity I’m thinking about.

When my husband and I were at Tuskegee we didn’t, I’ll admit, walk with the wind. We mostly stayed in our own world because we felt as though we were from another country. It was clear to us, through the unsmiling looks and almost complete absence of hospitality, that neither the local White nor Black communities were happy we were there. Were we “agitators”? Had we come to “study” the race question, then conveniently return where we came from in the northeast? In fact, we did return to the northeast, for personal reasons, within 18 months. Though we were young white newly weds who meant well, we were asleep to so much that had been going on.

Over the years since then I’ve read many books by Black authors and, more recently, such books as "The Warmth of Other Suns" by Isabel Wikerson, Just Mercy by Brian Stevenson, The Sun Does Shine by Anthony Ray Hinton and Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates. All wonderful, all deeply moving to me and friends I’ve shared them with. I recommend them highly. Yet, I feel the wind John Lewis walked with during his life, and still moves with now, asking for more. What is this more? I’m not altogether sure. More than reading? More than marching for the cause of racial justice? I believe an experience I had the morning after I finished John’s book is—for myself, at least-- one answer to this question.

That morning I woke to thick fog on the field beside my home. As I looked at it I inwardly saw a figure striding out of it up to me.

Yes, John Lewis!

“Are you here—outside my house—or am I seeing you in your book?” I wondered.

John looked radiant. I was amazed and humbled he could see me and understood I was not being singled out in any way. Whatever my skin color, gender, or age, I felt him telling me I, too, am a part of the Beloved Community. I’m certain that John, even if in the Post Mortem Realms, can see all of us, and may, indeed, be looking into our faces right now with the same hope he looked into the faces of those with whom he marched and those towards whom he marched.

I didn’t get an answer to my wondering, yet a thought came directly to me from him. This was the thought:

“Stay true to your simple self.”

I’ve been holding those words close since I heard them. When I heard them, I felt my simple self: a self full of gratitude, hope and faith in the intuitive process at the core of my being. I know when I’m receptive to those three I’m able to find my way into and along with whatever wind I’m in, no matter how wild.

A few weeks ago ago when my mind was caught up in the tempest of the moment, I simply asked the wind to show me some “Good Trouble.” That one got me into writing letters to voters who may be in difficult circumstances and may lack the courage to vote, particularly in swing states. I’m not telling them who to vote for, I’m round about reminding them, “You can be heard in this country by way of your vote. It does matter.”

Then there are the days when I don’t want to walk with the wind, especially not towards danger. Another story of brutality and physical assault, what can I do? I’ve heard my simple self say, “Okay! It’s okay to take a break from the news today. Walk with the wind round the hill you live on.” So I go do that—quite literally—and am certain as I walk that every clump of golden rod spinning out teeny-tiny stars, every rock my feet uses as a spring off point, every tree that my eyes greet: they are all also a part of the Beloved Community.

DAVID’S DESK #160 - THE KNIGHT REVISITED

David's Desk is my opportunity to share thoughts and tools for the spiritual journey. These letters are my personal insights and opinions and do not necessarily reflect the sentiments or thoughts of any other person in Lorian or of Lorian as a whole. If you wish to share this letter with others, please feel free to do so; however, the material is ©2019 by David Spangler. If you no longer wish to receive these letters, please let us know at info@Lorian.org.

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In December, 2013, the topic of my David’s Desk was “The Knight of Fiery Hope.” I 'd had a visionary experience that I wanted to share with my readers. It had been about a particular kind of hope, and I felt then that a message of hope was needed. Now, with the world struggling with a global pandemic and crippled economies, with authoritarianism and political oppression on the rise, with the challenge of racial injustice, with the increasing impacts of climate change, and, to top it off in the United States, with the most divisive and vitriolic election campaign this country has seen in a very long time, it seemed to me we could use a dose of hope. It seemed like a good time to revisit the Knight.

I have many newer readers that never saw that earlier essay, so I’m going to repeat parts of it here. For those of you whose memories go back seven years, not only do I take my hat off to you but I trust you’ll forgive the repetition. It can be good to be reminded of important things.

I began by describing the experience that prompted the essay:

“I was sitting on a sofa in my home reading when a non-physical being abruptly appeared in the air in front of me. While this in itself was not unusual for me, the appearance of this being was. He looked like a knight out of a storybook, clad in shining golden armor, its face hidden within its helmet. On its chest burned a flame, as bright and radiant as a piece of sunlight. It said clearly, “I am a Knight of Fiery Hope! I speak to all humans. You are not entering a darkened age. You are entering a time when the Light of your creative spirit can manifest new vision and new life. Be what I am. Let fiery hope, not despair or fear, shape your world.” Having delivered this message, this being then disappeared.

“As always when dealing with subtle beings, the felt sense behind an encounter or communication is at least as important, and sometimes more so, than the actual words that are used. The thought processes of such beings are invariably dense with interconnections and meanings, far more than can be accurately reproduced in a few lines of linear text. In this case, I was aware that what this being was saying had little to do with the future. He wasn’t saying, “Have hope for the future” or “Have hope because everything’s going to work out and your planetary problems will all be solved.” Rather he was describing a creative presence and potential within us—something “fiery” in the sense of being active and dynamic and something that holds open the door of possibility.

“This “fiery hope” is not about events but about ourselves, that we are a source of hope because we are—or can be—a source of change and new vision. A particular course of events may be inevitable, but our response to it is not. We can respond in ways we could not have predicted or that a simple description of the event would have predicted.”

After describing the experience of “Fiery Hope,” I wrote about examples of people triumphing over difficult circumstances due to never losing hope. Then I wrote the following statements: “Hope isn’t a wish; it’s an inner capacity to be open to possibilities for action and vision that refuse to be circumscribed or defined by circumstances and which thus can be transformative in the moment.”

And…“Hope can change the future by opening us to new possibilities and choices which can make a difference; but just as importantly, hope can change ourselves. It can change how we meet events that cannot in themselves be changed for one reason or another but which can be altered in their effects by how we respond, especially by how we work together and care for each other.”

I concluded that David’s Desk by writing, “The author of the utopian novel, Ecotopia, Ernest Callenbach, died in 2011, leaving behind a farewell letter. It discusses the many ecological challenges and other difficulties facing humanity. He then asks the question, “Although we may not be capable of changing history, how can we equip ourselves to survive it?” His answers include mutual support, teamwork, altruism, working on behalf of the common good, and the “enormously creative” power of collaborative thinking, all things I’ve discussed over the years in these essays. But the number one survival quality on his list is hope. Hope makes all the other things possible by opening us to them.”

Re-reading this, I feel what I had to say then is applicable to where we are now. It seems to me we are in danger of losing hope, of seeing hope as itself a hopeless emotion, a kind of wishful thinking that denies the reality of the world around us. And there’s no doubt that people can and do express a naïve hope that does ignore the pain and danger present in our world.

But hopelessness is like a crowded room in which we can’t move our arms but can only shuffle along in lockstep with wherever the press of the crowd pushes us. Fiery hope is like stepping into a clearer space where we have a chance to think of possibilities and the elbow room to act on them.

Watching the news, I do not lose my hope, but I do see hope under siege, attacked by the circumscribing, limiting energies of anger and fear, hatred and division. And there’s no question - there’s a lot to be fearful about in today’s world. There’s a lot to fear, a lot to be angry over.

But then I got an email from a friend in Canada who sent me an article written by Thomas Homer-Dixon, an environmental researcher and author, in which he describes a new book of his that has just been published called Commanding Hope: The Power We Have To Renew a World in Peril. In the article, these words stood out for me:

“Our capacity and need for hope, as long as we keep that hope honest, is a precious gift, because it encourages us to keep open a space for possibilities, and to use our imagination to create possibilities in that space. That hope thrives on mere possibility is not a weakness but its greatest strength.”

I can just see the Knight of Fiery Hope nodding his head and smiling.

More On Coping with Darkness and Holding Light

By Susan Stanton Rotman

I recently wrote about dealing with the presence of darkness in these times and received some thoughtful follow-up requests to share more about what it means to accept the fact of darkness in the world and for practical advice on how to do this in daily life.

So just how do we accept the presence of darkness? What does such acceptance mean? What do I do?

First, I admit that darkness exists in this world. Accepting darkness is not to embrace it, not to hold it and not to approve it.  It means only to acknowledge it is there, that darkness is a reality in our lives.  And why should we acknowledge it?  So we know what we are dealing with.  To deny the fact of darkness is to give it power, to give it an advantage by sidelining our own intention and capacity to counter it. Light works in relation to shadow, and of course shadow works in relation to light, neither exists without the other. To deny one, is to deny the other.

Second, I recognize that I alone cannot change the world. I cannot make darkness go away. It took me many years to reach a place of this level of acceptance. My idealistic and younger activist self, both inner and outer activist, believed, or at least wished and hoped, that darkness could be denied. It cannot. To deny its existence is to give it free rein; it will be there even if I refuse to look at it.  There is no chance to defeat darkness if we don’t admit it exists.

While it may seem paradoxical, I have found that facing the fact of darkness has freed me up to be more light, more expanded while more grounded, less fearful, and altogether more effective in countering negative forces. The way I approach this is not to engage with darkness, but to acknowledge it and then to fully engage with the light. 

In practical terms this is accomplished through simple acts of love and joy. If you can find a feeling sense of delight, then you have found light. What experiences open your heart? Who makes you laugh? How do you give and what gives you that feeling sense of warmth and affection, comfort, connection and tenderness towards life? Is it a sunlit day, is it your partner, your child, your pet, your garden, a favorite book, music, art, beauty, good food, good company? In short, what “lights you up”? Humor, fun, social connection, and all occasions to smile will nurture your light.

Being connected in the present and to ordinary life experiences support the sense of well-being that is your lightness. Look for the signature vibration or resonance that is yours when you feel happiness, pleasure, and love. That is the starting point. And then attend to nurturing and revisiting and expanding upon those moments.  When we recognize our feeling sense of joy, of love, we have identified our feeling sense of light.  

It’s important to realize that working with light doesn’t simply mean visualizing light and sending it somewhere.  It means merging with it, being it.  And how do we do that? Through joy in connection with life and with others.  Light is love. And love is an act of engagement.  

Holding light is not passive, it is an action.  It may be an inner movement, but it has outer consequence. And when enough of us nurture and hold light, we do surround and blind the darkness. Indeed, this is what we are going through right now. As enough of us hold the intention for change and carry light forward, we are seeing movement towards the ending of old and archaic structures and the influx of new understanding.

As I was completing this blog, I took a moment to sit and ask if my inner contacts wished to add anything and received this comment:

“These are most challenging of times, but also times of great opportunity. You hold in your selves the possibilities of the future, the power to create change.

The great distraction, the chaos, the uproars that surround you are instruments of those forces that seek to neutralize, immobilize and disenfranchise you, looking to corral your attention in order to diminish the true power each of you hold and the immense collective impact you may have when you each stand in your own love and self-light.

Know that you are the stronger in this confrontation because you are one of many standing together, in love and truth.  Nothing frightens darkness more than to face such splendid brilliance.”

Much appreciated words of encouragement!

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Engaging the Soul of America (Part Two of Two)

By David Spangler

Editor's Note: This essay was originally published in 2008. A subscriber recently inquired about it, and David felt the message (with a few minor updates) was still relevant today. We recognize that this blog post in its entirety is particularly focused on the United States and we hope that our non-US readers will appreciate David's wisdom given challenging circumstances on this side of the world.

The Soul of America

The Soul of America has all the capacities and performs all the functions of any other country’s soul, as I discussed above. But what is the spiritual destiny which it embodies and empowers? What are the gifts that the United States has to offer humanity and the world? What are its talents?

A place to start is with the “self-evident” truths presented by the Declaration of Independence: “…that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” These are certainly qualities which the Soul of America has a destiny to develop and offer: Equality amongst all people; liberty and freedom; the sanctity of a person’s life with all its unique potentials; the capacity of all individuals to seek their highest good and to possess happiness in their lives, particularly the happiness that comes with the opportunity to unfold their potentials and to accomplish good in their lives.

To these four qualities, I might add a generosity of spirit, a capacity for innovation, invention and discovery, and an attitude of accomplishment, that whatever needs to be done, can be done. Finally, I would add a spirit of hospitality and community.

These are all human qualities and potentialities that the United States, which is itself an invented nation and an immigrant nation, seeks to develop within itself and to offer to the world. You may think of others that are part of the destiny—the talents—of this country. Feel free to make your own list.

Partnering with the Soul of America

The simplest way to partner with the Soul of America is to share its tasks and to express the qualities and virtues that represent its talents and gifts to the world. You might ask yourself, “What do I do to express the best qualities of being an American in my everyday life? How do I express and promote equality, liberty, generosity, openness to the new, and a spirit of possibility? How do I enhance the lives of others and provide opportunities that support their pursuit of happiness and the fulfillment of their own potentials? How do I nourish the common good in my country and foster cooperation instead of conflict? In the realm of civic discourse, how do I promote civility to ensure good, clear, and truthful communication? Do I enrich in some way the emotional and mental life and character of my country, if only in my own sphere of influence? Am I hospitable to those who are different than I and open to the gifts their differences may bring? Do I diminish or increase the use of violence—whether emotional, mental, or physical—as a means of problem-solving? In the midst of extremes, do I find the creative and empowering middle, the Radical Middle, where synthesis and co-creativity may flourish? Do I diminish fear and its crippling effects in my community?”

Bringing a loving heart, an open mind, and a will-to-good in any or all of these matters is an example of partnering with the Soul of America.

Connecting to the Soul of America

If you accept that there is a Soul of America as a genuine protective and nourishing presence and not simply as a metaphor or a projection, how might you contact and connect with this being? How might you invite its energy into your life as a citizen for your blessing and the blessing of those around you?

There are different ways this might be done, and ultimately you need to find a way that is right for you. For instance, you can invite the Soul of America, its qualities and energies, into your life through a prayerful and open-hearted invitation. Your commitment to live out the best and highest of the qualities and virtues this being represents is another way. You can imagine the Soul of America as a person, like Uncle Sam, who comes to you so you can have a conversation in your mind and heart with him. Also, partnering in the tasks of this being, as I mentioned above, is a means of connection.

In essence, contact and connection is through resonance, through like speaking to like. If you embody in yourself the kind of energy and qualities you imagine the Soul of America possessing, then you are connected. These qualities are its “address,” its “phone number;” you go to that address or you dial that number by actively expressing these qualities. To contact the Soul of America, be the Soul of America in your own unique way.

A Modest Exercise

Here is a modest exercise you can do to attune to the Soul of America in your own life. Here you are going to use your imagination to develop a felt sense of what America is for you. You are in effect recreating the spirit of America within yourself in your own individual way. This provides a resonant connection with the Soul of our country.

To begin, find a time and place when and where you can be uninterrupted. Take a moment just to relax and enter into a calming, refreshing inner silence.

You are going to work with four images: your American Self, the Land of America, Mythic America, and the Destiny of America. You may wish to record in some manner any ideas, images, insights, thoughts, feelings, or physical sensations that come to you as a result of reflecting on each image.

First, reflect on what it feels like for you to be an American. Who or what is your American Self? When you think of yourself as an American, what comes to your mind? What qualities in you do you identify as being American? (They may not be exclusively American; if a quality is generosity, for example, you can also see this as a human quality—and certainly citizens of other countries can be generous as well. But if you feel that part of being an American is to be generous, then claim it not only as a personal quality or a human quality but as an American quality, part of your Americanness.) Think of things you do that represent your Americanness to you. How does the spirit of America take concrete shape in your life? What is your felt sense of being an American?

Second, reflect on the land and geography of America. How does it influence or affect you? The land of America is spacious, rich, beautiful, and diverse. It had a profound impact on the Native Americans, the colonists, the pioneers, the settlers, and the explorers. Indeed, much of the American character has been shaped by our country’s geography and its vast openness and potential. How has it shaped you? Think of all the different aspects of our country: mountains, prairies, swamplands, deserts, forests, rivers, the Great Lakes, and so on. How do these images of the land make you feel? What kind of energy do they inspire in you?

Third, reflect on the stories and myths of America, the legends, and the persons, like Washington and Lincoln, who live large in our history. Mythic America, the inner landscape of our country, is a powerful force in our lives. Here are the stories we tell about who we are, the images we draw upon for inspiration, and the personalities we use for role models. What myths about America live for you? What is your relationship to mythic America? How do you draw upon its energy? What myths or stories do you tell about yourself as an American? Not all myths are useful or healthy, and myths that may have served our ancestors may not serve us now, like the myths that underlay and justified the practice of slavery. What American myths do you feel no longer serve the Soul of America or even obstruct its work? What myths that you hold help the Soul of America?

Fourth, reflect on the Vision of America, its sense of destiny. What does America have to offer the world? What are its gifts and talents? What vision inspired the men and women who created this country? What do you think are the spiritual and planetary tasks of our nation? How might it serve humanity? How does this vision live in you and influence your own life and actions? What is your felt sense of the Vision of America?

Finally, stand up. Feel each of these four qualities of your Americanness, the energy of the Land of America, the quality of Mythic America in your life, and the Vision of America as if they were four presences surrounding you. Each of them embodies one aspect of the Soul of America. Imagine them all stepping into you, blending, melding, becoming one, becoming the Soul of America within you. What is that like? What felt sense arises in you as you imagine this happening? Who are you standing in oneness with the Soul of America? As this felt sense emerges for you, you will find your own feeling of connection with the Soul of America. May it be a blessing and a partner in your life as a citizen, both inner and outer, of this great country.

Engaging the Soul of America (Part One of Two)

By David Spangler

Editor's Note: This essay was originally published in 2008. A subscriber recently inquired about it, and David felt the message (with a few minor updates) was still relevant today. We recognize that this blog post in its entirety is particularly focused on the United States and we hope that our non-US readers will appreciate David's wisdom given challenging circumstances on this side of the world.

An Introduction

From the standpoint of spiritual perception, a country is a living being, a field of collective energy that possesses a unique consciousness. Like us, it has an emergent nature and a transpersonal nature. On the one hand, it has characteristics that arise from the geography and ecologies that exist within its boundaries and from the energy of that land; likewise, it emerges from the thoughts and feelings of its inhabitants and their dreams, visions, hopes, history, myths, and actions. These two might be thought of as the body and the psyche of the country respectively.

However, the country as a being is more than just the sum total of all its environmental and human parts. It also has a larger wholeness that emerges from its connections with the sacred and with the world as a whole and draws its existence from spiritual realms. This is the transpersonal aspect, which might be thought of as the spirit of the country.

Spiritual Destiny

This transpersonal aspect embodies as well the country’s spiritual destiny. When we think of this, we may imagine an objective or goal, what a country is destined to become, the role it is intended to fulfill, or the tasks it must accomplish. In other words, “destiny” may be equated with “destination.” Spiritual perception suggests, though, that spiritual destiny may be better understood as a seed-presence—a “will-to-serve”—that unfolds and expresses as the unique contributions and spiritual energy which that country and its people have to offer to the world and its wellbeing. It might be thought of more as “talent” than as “goal.” It represents what this particular pattern of land, nature, and humanity uniquely embodies and can give to planetary and human wholeness and evolution.

The Soul of a Country

The soul of a country is that active intelligence that holds the body, psyche and spirit of a country together and integrates them into a dynamic wholeness. It expresses capacities for synthesis, love, and evolution. It is the custodian of the spiritual destiny. It nurtures and develops that country’s talents. It seeks to promote the qualities and capacities that are that country’s unique powers and gifts to the world.

If we think of a country as a collective field fed by energies arising from its geography, its ecologies, its people, and its spirit, then the soul of that country tends that field. It seeks to keep it clear and unobstructed. It seeks to reduce or if possible, eliminate toxicity and dysfunction within that field, particularly as manifested by violence. It seeks to enhance the flow and radiant power of love within its field. It enhances creativity and emergence. It promotes and nurtures connectedness, coherency, integrity and wholeness. It works to synthesize its various dynamic elements, such as the land and the people, into a mutually enhancing presence. It works to integrate its field with the fields of other countries and with the great collective field and presence of the planet as a whole and with the sacredness that underlies all existence.

That is the work of the soul of a country.

Inner Citizenship

Inner citizenship is what we do when we take up this work of the soul of our country. When we seek to embody and express its soul to the best of our capacities, we are being active inner citizens.

We are all familiar with outer citizenship. As citizens we seek to support the political, economic, and civic life of our country. We take on a responsibility for the physical and social wellbeing of our nation. Depending on where we live, this may entail voting, running for office, being part of volunteer organizations, supporting public education, and so forth. There are many ways in which we may be good citizens in our outer world.

Inner citizenship requires us to realize that there is more to our country than just its physical and social dimensions. The country exists as a field of energy and as a spiritual presence as well. How do we relate to these? How do we act on their behalf?

Inner citizenship takes place in the invisible realms of energy, thought, imagination, feeling, and spirit. In outer citizenship, we may vote, but in inner citizenship, we may pray or bless. In outer citizenship, we may run for public office, but in inner citizenship, we monitor the quality of mental and emotional energies that we broadcast into the collective fields of our neighborhoods,towns, our cities, or our nation. In outer citizenship, we may serve on a panel to clean up pollution in a city, but in inner citizenship, we clean up toxic energies of anger and violence that we may be holding in our own psyches or that we sense in the atmosphere around us.

Each is important. To truly be partners with the soul of our country, we need to be both outer and inner citizens.