America

I just finished watching a CNN special on the widening gap between the rich and poor, and the disappearing middle class.   I'm also reading more about gun registration/background checks, and the increasing violence in our nation, from many sources.   I find myself distressed at the inability of our government to do the right thing, i.e., dealing with crises in ecology, fracking, GMO foods, unsupportable student loans, waging war in other countries, failing to care for our veterans, and so much more.

What will it take, to become again the United States we all want it to be?   Regardless of differing beliefs and standards, it feels that we're divided because of these things, rather than having it bring us together.   How do we get to know our neighbors?   How do we get to the place where we can find respect and even love for those who think differently that we do?   How do we convince major corporations to do the right thing, and not always just the financially beneficial thing?   How do we do that in our private lives too, i.e., automatically doing what we know to be right, instead of what we can avoid?   How do we convince people to learn the issues and candidates, and vote with the highest degree of preparedness?

I love my country.   I don't want to live anywhere else.   I simply want a better, friendlier, safer USA to leave for my grandchildren and their grandchildren.

Any thoughts?

Mystical figures?

I've been wondering lately if everyone occasionally "sees" a figure out of the corner of your eye?   I do, have seen them all my life, frequently.    Never expected, they'll just kind of pop up and I'll turn my head to see them, and they're not there.   I've always believed we live in several Universes, or plateaus, or some form of alternate reality.   At times I've seen more than one person, or an animal, in this way.  

I don't often talk of this, but at my elder age I feel I can now talk about anything I want to.   Over the years I've been hesitant, for fear I'd be seen as mentally ill.   I opened up about it with Dorothy Starlite, my teacher, and found that she and most of the Sisterhood of the Medicine Heart also see these figures!   What a relief!   My beloved teacher Dorothy died this last October, and I'm missing her terribly.

I haven't posted here for many moons, but today am concerned.   I'm going to be looking for a spiritual path to help me find love, without judgement, without dividing into "me" and "them".

I’m concerned about the great divisions between us, from politics to religion to violence.  All great teachers have tried to teach us that we must learn to truly LOVE each other, to know we’re all one.  That means I work to love the man who shot people in the Colorado theater.  I have to work to love the people who spew hate.   I have to learn to love people in prison, to learn to love those who have been coerced into gangs.   I have to love the homeless, no matter what the reason for their homelessness is.  That’s the tough stuff, the stuff that’s so hard to learn.   Yet, I don’t know any other way we can overcome all the diversity.   Just love.  Only love.   Jesus taught this.   As did Buddha.  And MLK.  And Ghandi.   It’s the underlying teaching of all religions.    Can we begin to focus on love?

More from Dorothy Starlite's retreat

Okay, this one happened on the last day of the September retreat, and it's the one that is haunting me.   Haunting, but not in a frightening way, just an awesome way.   I'm in awe.
This was the last retreat, on the evening before we all left.   There were 6 of us including Dorothy, and she asked us to picture a 6 pointed star, points at each woman there.   I don't remember if she put on music before we talked or not, but I do remember that she asked each of us what energies or guides we were inviting to be with us.   She asked me first.
Just before she asked me, I was "seeing" (visioning) a room just slightly to the left of the one we were in, and just a tiny bit higher.   The room was the same, but faded, not as firm as the one we were in.   There were 6 women in that one too, sitting next to or behind each of the women beside me.   The 6 pointed star touched each of them, and overlapped the 6 pointed star that touched each of us.   The figures were fuzzy, I don't know if they looked like us or not, but they were most definitely experiencing a meditation the same as we were.

I've mentioned before that I've been aware of the parallel Universes all of my life.   I didn't know what they were, didn't have a name for them, but knew there was something more.   This experience was the first time I've actually SEEN the 2 worlds connected, and experienced it.   The two worlds were, for a time, touching and encroaching on each other.  I know we can wander between worlds, and I've done a lot of it, but never before have I seen them completely meshed, joined, being ONE.

I wonder if they saw us too?   Or if each of the women in the other world, was somehow attached to one of my sisters sitting in the circle at Dorothy's?

This vision is still strongly with me, I haven't seen anything more like that, but it still feels very real.   I can close my eyes and picture it, and I'm back there.   It sounds simple, but it isn't, it's one of the most profound things I've experienced.

At Dorothy Starlite's

A few weeks ago I went to a retreat at Dorothy Starlite's.   She's been my teacher for many years, and has a sweet home very high up in the Colorado Rockies.   Elk, Deer, and red foxes regularly go through her yard, and in the morning we often hear the Elk bugling in the hills above her place.   It's magical, beautiful, and with Dorothy's guidance, deeply spiritual.   Each of us who comes to the retreats here, is on a quest to grow, to stretch our beliefs, to question everything, to find the Spirit in the deepest part of us.   We're called the Sisterhood of the Medicine Heart, and truly we are in each other's hearts.

I had several etheric experiences, of which I'll write the first one here, and others another time.    In one meditation session, we were looking for guides to show us an archetype.   I used the guides I've used for years, and suddenly "saw" another one.   I saw a man, wearing a long beige trenchcoat, carrying a suitcase.   The suitcase fell open and out spilled all of the religious, all sciences, the Cosmos, all visions, all parts of who I am.   I came to me that I am The Mystic Traveler.   That's my archetype.   An exploration of all of the above, not in a physical sense so much as in a spiritual/meditative sense.    I'm going to be exploring that archetype more over time.   Is anyone reading this, also feeling that they travel in the ether?   I'd love to hear what others are seeing and hearing and experiencing.

Dorothy at one point challenged us to meditate on the question, "What If Everything Is Possible?".    At first during the meditation I was in a lot of pain (injured knee & other stuff, likely old age), and I resented being held in my body.   I was drawn into focusing on those things I used to be passionate about, i.e., first piano, then flying.   Neither of those is still open to me, since my hands & feet don't cooperate very well.   However, once I got a bit deeper, I realized that it isn't just piano or airplanes that I miss, it's the PASSION that came with them.   Those events, those learnings, are in the past, but Passion isn't.   So what's my Passion now?   I think seeking God (in any sense of that word), or maybe some activity that leaves me completely absorbed.   Maybe a lover?   Maybe a cause?   Maybe teaching Reiki and more advanced healing techniques?   I want to be open to finding that passion, as I know it will overcome the pain and fragility of my age.  

So, okay, here's my Atman Project.   An Atman Project is anything that replaces God, whilst I'm on the Path to God.   PAIN is my Atman Project!   Transmuting pain is my goal.  I can do this through the Heart Center, which has no preconceptions, no preferences, no opinions, no agenda.   It will connect my ego with my soul.

I am a healer on the way to God, and will work at transmuting the pain to the point where it no longer interrupts that path.   I am dedicated to remaining open to new ways to find God in my life.   It feels right to wait for a "calling", instead of figuring it out.   Thus, I'm to remain open and watchful, but not projecting.  

So all of that (and more to come at a later time) are a part of my path in the current & parallel Universes.   Multi-verses?   I think there are many.

Does any of this connect with anyone?  

September 11th

Today we remember the 10th anniversary of 9/11, and I'm uncomfortable about it.   I've been thinking of this as our generation's Pearl Harbor,or the Holocaust, or Japan's Hiroshima, or so many other events that we also commemorate.   Yet, I don't feel as lifted by this, as I do in remembering the other events.  Why?

I think the reason I feel more comfortable with remembering the Holocaust, is that it reminds us always of the dangers of letting prejudice rule.   I can remember Hiroshima because it reminds me of the horrors of what we think we have to do to win a war.    I can remember Pearl Harbor because the memorial in Honolulu clearly remembers those servicemen who lost their lives in bravery rather than remembering an enemy.   In every case, we remember something that changed the way we think, something that changed us, something we won't let happen again.  In every case, the following years brought changes that lifted us.

With the 9/11 attacks, the lessons are more obscure.   It feels as if we're simply remembering that we were victims.   We were told by the President that we should go shopping, rather than the way Roosevelt handled it...... by saying we needed to come together, and we needed to conserve resources.    This time, we only remember we were shocked, we were sad, we were frightened, and we're still paranoid about terrorist attacks.   In other words, mostly what we learned is that we're vulnerable and helpless.   In some cases, people are even feeling an intense prejudice against an entire religion, and an entire culture.   

I'm so very much in touch with honoring the incredibly brave men and women in New York who raced into burning buildings to rescue whoever they could.   Today they're on my mind, in my heart.   This is what we should take away from 9/11, not the victimology.   Could it happen again?  yes.   Can we guarantee it won't happen again?  no.  But nonetheless, we learned just how brave people can be, and that's what we should take away with us.   Let the memory of those people lift us, rather than letting a few terrorists drag us down.

So okay, friends, this isn't about parallel Universes or the Cosmos or alternative realities.   Or is it?

The Guru

It's hard to believe that it's been nearly 2 months since I posted!   Things have been moving here, my mind, my emotions, my spirit.   However, the biggest news hit me in the last few weeks, and now it's time to pass it on.

Most of you know that I've been intrigued and a followed of the guru Ram Dass, for many years.   In fact, since his l960's book "Be Here Now" was published.   I've read his books, still have most of them, though have given away many copies of "Be Here Now" when people wanted them.   Then I just go buy another, smiling because I know the word is spreading.   The word is, of course, Love.   Ram Dass teaches love, heart awareness, loving kindness, as did his own guru, Maraj-ji.

About 10 years ago, not long after his stroke, Ram Dass was in Portland, and of course I went.   It was a scorching hot evening, no a/c in the building, and those of us there coped with the heat but it was worth it.   Ram Dass talked to us, Krishna Das was there doing chanting, it was a spectacularly wonderful evening.

A couple of years ago, I became aware of a website for Ram Dass' library, and a group that is working to keep his work alive, both in books and taped lectures.   I joined the website immediately, ordered some tapes to listen to in my car, and was thrilled in several cases to even hear his beautiful voice.

About a year ago, I had a new awareness, i.e., that he was doing monthly telecasts!   I signed up, and for a modest donation was included.   At that time, I decided to become very, very brave.   I wrote Ram Dass an email, and asked if he would consider being my guru.   I also asked if this was possible, since we've never met, and what he might want in the way of compensation.   He responded quickly, YES.   YES!  Wow.  He told me his recompense would be what I give to others in my Reiki and grief counseling practice.  

In this last year, I've had occasion to talk to Ram Dass, one on one, via Skype.  Again, WOW.   Okay, I know that's not the best or most descriptive word, but there it is.  WOW.   I'm not remembering exactly what we talked about, but I do know that a short meditation at the end of these sessions, is amazing.  

So.... that brings us up to the present, and my joy.   I've been invited to go to Ram Dass' home in Hawaii, and to spend a few days in his home, seeing him a few times one on one, and doing a self-directed meditation retreat.   I can't believe it.   I've talked with his secretary several times since that first phone call, and have now made airline reservations from November 3rd to November 9th, to be with my guru.   In person,   One on One.  To be in his presence.  

I'm elated, joyful, and filled with loving awareness.  

I'm still studying writings and lectures of Michio Kaku and Amit Goswami, finding the scientific connect with God/Spirit, but the trip to meet and be in the presence of Ram Dass simply overshadows just about everything.