As I walked through my garden, I noticed a single pink rose. Instantly I re-membered myself… knowing that this single rose was a symbol of my soul.
In a state between wakefulness and sleep, I was shown this rose. Unusual since it was the only one that blossomed from a large climbing rose bush. You can see the other buds seemingly ready to bloom but they never did. Just a single pink rose.
Something remarkable happened as a result of that day …when higher guidance showed me the rose. I stopped searching. A new understanding emerged … one that seemingly took a whole lifetime and yet happened instantly. I am Melisa. Not a sacred pipe carrier…not an elder … not a healer … not a teacher of this or that. Just simply…I am. It was a splendid moment … an arrival.
There was no longer the need to define who I was… what I did….what was my purpose…where I was going… how I was getting there. I was able to just Be…in the moment…
As I looked back at my journey … there is much humor in all of this. My magnetic center had me searching under and over every nook and cranny only to find out that what I was looking for was already in me… it was me. To finally realize that all I needed to do was to honor myself…my essence, my light and shadow sides…
Spirit has a great sense of humor. It’s so wondrous to be home…to feel like you have arrived. I am Melisa. Nothing more and nothing less… the totality of everything that makes me beautiful and spectacular, mixed in with all my mishigas (craziness)…
Jean Joy Smiths words come back to me many times to remind me that what is necessary is to get down to the root of who we are … to shed all that is superfluous and to get down to the core… to our real selves. This is our work.
The Everything and The Nothing by Meher Baba
A Journey Without Journeying
The succession of experiences that one goes through in the process of involution is called the Spiritual Path, and the going through them is likened to a journey.
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The experiences are so innumerable and varied, that the journey appears to be interminable and the Destination is ever out of sight. But the wonder of it is, when at last you reach your Destination you find that you had never travelled at all! It was a journey from her to Here. As one Sufi expressed it, When I plucked the date (Fruit of Realization) I found the fruit was within me.
We finally arrived at a point where scientist and spiritual leaders can stand on common ground. Let’s take the cell. At first, we were able to determine that human beings are made up of lots of space & many particles called cells. With advances in technology, we were able to look further into the cell and determine that cells were made up of more space and more particles which we called atoms. With further advances in science, we were able to determine that the atom was composed of space and other particles called proton, neutrons and electrons. So forth and so on….***
Scientist now agree that we are made up of space and particles that “agglutinate” or gather to create form by an unknown energy that has awareness. How else can we explain the “miracle” of life, where a fertilized egg can lead to a full and perfectly formed human being. Encoded in this cell is everything from the color of our hair, eyes and skin to our height and personalities, etc….
In essence, we are all made up of an energic creative force that has awareness and consciousness.
Now, let’s call this ever expanding creative force in the universe of which we are come from Spirit. You can call it anything you want. G_d, the universal consciousness, Christ, Buddha, the Great Mystery, the Great Spirit…..
So if all that separates us is space and particles, we are in essence connected to each other. What disconnects us is our perception of separateness –
the image of ourselves as individuals. In other words, our egos.
I am Melisa the mother, the wife, the martial arts instructor, the meditation teacher, the spiritual mentor, etc….. In reality, I am much more than that. I am part of Spirit – that ever expanding creative force in the universe. I am part of you and you of me. That is our heritage and the heritage of human kind.
When we are born and before we engage in self-awareness, we have a very clear connection to “Spirit”. It’s only over time that this connection starts to pick up static and becomes less clear.
Carlos Castaneda’s teacher was Don Juan Matus, a Yaqui Indian from Mexico.
He was a sorcerer (which by definition is “one who seeks to connect to the source”) from a long lineage going back to antiquity. He is quoted as saying, “Whenever the internal dialogue stops, the world collapses, and extraordinary facets of ourselves surface, as though they had been kept heavily guarded by our words”.
In other words, our thoughts and words hold firm this world. Upon quieting the mind, our true nature and all our possibilities become evident.
When we enter into the NOW, or into the GAP, we are essentially disconnecting from the physical world of thoughts and things and entering into pure “Spirit”. Imagine that….being able to connect and recharge and heal by plugging into our power “source”.
That is what meditation is all about.
If this is not enough to motivate you to meditate, then let’s talk briefly about the Power of Attraction that has been fueling so much debate since the launching of the popular DVD and book called “The Secret” by Rhonda Byrne. In the dvd, they explain that we are again beings of energy and like all things that are made of energy we either attract to us or repel from us everything that is in our lives. In other words, we are magnets.
The law of attraction states that if you are a positive person that is giving and joyful towards others, life in general will be positive and we will attract positive and joyful circumstances into our lives. It goes further to state that what you are thinking is what you manifest into your life. Since we have over 60,000 thoughts per day, it’s hard to monitor your thoughts. So, they tell you to monitor your emotions.
Good emotions lead to positive results…..Bad emotions lead to negative results.
Now, if we take into account the nature of the mind. This can be very difficult. Our minds flits from one thought to the next like a galloping horse or the ever ready bunny. If we can stop our thoughts and connect to our source or Spirit, we can recharge, calm the mind and relax the body. In addition to this, the Edgar Cayce method of meditation helps you to change how you think. If you tend to be negative and ponder on the negative possible results of situations and people in your life, then this is a great tool for you. It is also a great tool to bring a spiritual or physical ideal from the mental realms into the physical realm.
In other words, we can learn to change our lives , “we can become the Micheangelos’ of our own Davids”.
Edgar Cayce Method: CLICK FOR REST OF ARTICLE
(For more information on Edgar Cayce, go to www.edgarcayce.org )