2/1/12—Burning Through the Veil

Today's Draw: Awareness from the Osho Zen Tarot. What do you believe are the limitations of our species and our earth? Can you see where you're attached to certain beliefs and ways of being? Are you ready to open your mind to more possibilities?

This card isn't far off what we've been talking about all week. It talks about the burning away of the veil of illusion that keeps you from seeing the yet unseen. In this card, as the veil burns away, it takes with it the anxiety and trauma of man's existence, revealing the face of a young buddha. As man becomes more aware and enlightened, the more pure and and at peace he becomes. 

In the Hindu language, this veil of illusion is called "maya". It comes from a Sanskrit word that means "create". It is interesting to note that this word also signifies a member of the Mayan culture or the language that they speak. Interesting, because their whole culture is shrouded in a veil that we have yet to burn through...a veil that MAY (or may not) be partially lifted by the end of this year.

In Buddhism, awareness is heightened by detachment. As humans, we are attached to feelings, outcomes, memories, hopes and other people. Because of this attachment, we can't see clearly. Everything is painted by our perspective and by the "stake" we have in it. 

The Osho teaching that goes along with this card reads:

Mind can never be intelligent - only no-mind is intelligent. Only no-mind is original and radical. Only no-mind is revolutionary - revolution in action.

This mind gives you a sort of stupor. Burdened by the memories of the past, burdened by the projections of the future, you go on living - at the minimum. You don't live at the maximum. Your flame remains very dim.

Once you start dropping thoughts, the dust that you have collected in the past, the flame arises - clean, clear, alive, young. Your whole life becomes a flame, and a flame without any smoke. That is what awareness is.

If you're someone who gets their best ideas in the car, in the shower, upon waking or right before drifting off, then you understand the intelligence of "no mind". When driving, we often drift into a form of meditation. The repetitive, ritual action of showering can also bring us to that state. I know that I often get ideas the second I step away from the keyboard. But when we're fixated on something from the past or worrying about what we'll say in our meeting, there's really no room for original thought. 

This card embodies the peace of meditation for me. 

So "no mind", which can certainly arise from meditation, and detachment can help us burn through the veil. And while you're having no-mind and detachment, that also means you're not judging the ideas that arise from the void. You shed what you know and open to the entire spectrum of possibility. Otherwise you're still holding up a veil of preconceived notions. 

I don't want to get into a discussion of meditation, primarily because we've discussed it before and I know there are people out there who insist they can't do it. But certainly meditation is a clear path to "no mind". And you need to detach from the idea that you can't do it in order to get there. 

Another way to consider "no mind" is to become the witness, as if you're floating high above yourself and witnessing your surroundings. The meditation I suggested the other day is a good practice for developing the witness as well as for dealing with a restless mind. 

Burning through the veil is important because, as I mentioned the other day, I believe there is stuff going on out there that we don't see. And I'm not just talking about paranormal or psychic stuff either. The electromagnetic spectrum existed from the earth's beginnings, yet we didn't harness its powers—or even realize it existed—until relatively recently. Until it was harnessed, none of the technologies we rely upon today could exist. 

The chances that we've discovered everything there is to discover "out there" are pretty darned slim. And those chances will remain slim as long as we remain attached the notion of "I have to see it to believe it" or "prove it to me". Personally, I believe we have an urgent need to open our minds at this time. We're capable of so much more as individuals, as a species and as a planet. It's not about believing in the impossible. It's about suspending belief and making room for all possibilities. So consider stopping yourself at the point of doubt, "never' and "no" and part the veil just a enough to allow magic to flow in.

1/24/12—Stepping Into the Void

Today's Draw: Two of Wands from the Tarot of the Crone. Do you feel like you're in a little bit of limbo right now, or are you walking solidly toward your future? Have you ever had a premonition about something....anything? And where do you stand on the whole 2012 thing?

This Two of Wands depicts the passageway between this reality and another. It's a passageway you created—a passageway to your future. But beyond that, you can't know exactly where it leads.

I saw a quote from Sue Monk Kidd today that said: 

"When you can't go forward and you can't go backward and you can't stay where you are without killing off what is deep and vital in yourself, you are on the edge of creation."

It's interesting that a number of people said they felt that way right now. Like there's a mass limbo out there that has caught us in its grasp. So we stand poised in this passageway for a moment, getting up the energy and courage to meet our destinies. 

There are perfectly normal, non-woo-woo, non-conspiracy-theorist everyday folk out there who feel that way about 2012. This is probably the biggest "anticipated question mark" in many of our lives. Y2K was up there. The Cuban Missile Crisis. Maybe the moments after 9/11. I can't really remember a whole lot of times when so many were questioning the future—curious, anticipatory, powerless. 

A priest, a St. Bernard and an Octopalian walk into a bar...

I'm pretty curious myself. Like the feeling in this card, I don't know for sure what to make of it—a year like any other? Some sort of something that changes our worlds forever? I could totally go either way. I believe in ETs and I believe the Mayans had contact with them, so my best guess goes to "something extraterrestrial". IF anything happens, that is.

I could swear I've told the story before about how, when I was between 3 and 5 years old, I lived in my sister's closet? I couldn't find the story through search, so I'll tell it again. It was a walk-in closet just off my sister's bedroom, in a dormer. My sisters were 7 and 8 years older than me. So this was how I got my own room and they got their privacy. 

Anywho, this room—this house—was creepy. It was old. And I had to sleep in a closet just big enough for a single bed and a small dresser. And my sisters used to make me ask permission to leave my room so I didn't interrupt their private big-girl business. So I was like a little prisoner in this space that I was pretty convinced was haunted. Because the room was in a dormer, it just ripe for capturing whatever energies might be floating around, too. *shiver*

Many believe we'll attain higher levels of enlightenment in 2012.

Well, while I lived in this room I had a number of "experiences" and a few very clear "premonitions" that were beyond my years. One was that I'd be a writer who lived in Maine. One was about a past life. And another was that something would happen in my lifetime that would cause many people to disappear and I would survive it. It didn't occur to me until many years later how people would "disappear"...would they die or just "poof!" And it also didn't occur to me that maybe surviving it might not be a good thing. Who knows?

Anyway, that's the baggage I bring into 2012, yet I'm still open minded, because who's to say the premonition was about 2012? I didn't fear this thing as a child, and I don't fear it now. I err on the side of "positive outcome" regarding it, if there's any notable outcome at all. Certainly I'm making earthly plans for 2013 and beyond. 

All of life, whether it's in anticipation of some new dimension of our life or Armageddon, is like this red hallway to the mystery beyond. It takes incredible courage to be a human being and stand at this threshold repeatedly throughout our lives and take those steps forward. Because not even the best psychics and mediums know what lies beyond. (Most of them, by the way, believe it's a huge shift in consciousness that's going to happen. No harm. No foul.) 

I get the sense with this card that the further I go down this hallway, the more I'm going to see into the dark. I don't know if that's logical. But that's the feeling I get. We get this amazing opportunity at adventure every day we're alive. And since some may be concerned they only have about 300 of those days left, it makes sense to make the most of every one of them.