Faith Venture

I began the contemplative journey before I left high school. There was the Zen influence from the Beat Generation (I identify more there than the Hippies who came later). Then I read St. John of the Cross and Thomas Merton. And I was off.

Like many, I began searching for enlightenment. Of course, I didn’t know what that was. 

Enlightenment is comprised not merely in the seeing of luminous visions, but in making the darkness visible. The latter procedure, however, is more difficult, and therefore, unpopular.

Carl Jung

Recently re-reading New Seeds of Contemplation by Merton I was reminded that there is contemplation through the dry periods after enlightenment. The times when I sit and nothing comes. God? Who’s she? The contemplative continues to sit through those times.

If we are not routinely embarrassed by how we behave, the journey to self-knowledge hasn’t really begun.

Alain de Botton

Who, me? I am certainly routinely embarrassed by my behaviour. Maybe I’m on the way.

Those who are unconscious of themselves find their own shadows coming to meet them.

Carl Jung

I have been shown the universal kinship of all humans in peace and love for all. I have also been shown all the sins and evils I am capable of within me. Maybe Jung would be satisfied. 

Life lived looking inward and at the same time serving outward is well lived.

I got up this morning with a very stiff lower back muscle. That feeling is rare. I’ve had to bend a few times to loosen it.

It could be my mattress. Most likely the cause stems from a new exercise in my weight lifting routine. I’m thinking about alignment. If I don’t have my body perfectly aligned with my arms raising in the proper alignment and my breath just right, sore muscles will occur.

We teach proper alignment constantly in Yoga. One misalignment holding a pose can cause pain somewhere.

A person I’ve just met asked me about calming her soul. I told her 60 years of meditation dealt with much of my emotional and anger issues. She had heard too much about all the postures, things to do with hands, chants or mantras. I told her it is easy. Don’t stress. Just sit in a solid chair. Relax arms. Eyes closed or open. Don’t care. Thoughts fly through the brain like a flock of blackbirds in autumn. Don’t care. Just align breathing intentionally. In…Out… Thoughts come and go. I told her I can do 2 hours in corpse pose in bed. But 5 minutes a day is sufficient. Heck, even 2 minutes to begin. It’s like an old cola commercial…”the pause that refreshes.”

We align our soul with our breath.

That helps us align our soul with our life leading to a better, more appropriate response to what life brings to us.

The human condition. We think too much. We worry too much. We are anxious about being perfect too much.

Relax. Take a deep breath. Then another. Then tackle life’s challenges one thing at a time as we align our flow to the situation.