I just came back from a trip to
western North Carolina where a very good friend recommended a book entitled The Spiritual Awakening of the Great Smoky
Mountains, self published by Page Bryant (1994) Waynesville, NC.
As was Original Wisdom: Stories of an Ancient Way of Knowing, by Robert
Wolff [Inner Traditions Publishing, 2001], which I wrote about last month (Understanding
The Whole Helps Understand The Parts; Msg-3-Feb-2016), Page Bryant
was able to verbalize many of the feelings and intuitions I have been
experiencing without being able to express them well. Using different words,
she is expressing this identical overpowering sense of Oneness, where there is
no distinction between subject and object, that I have been experiencing yet
have not found the appropriate words.
During a brief morning
meditative moment this week, a spot of clarity about these nature-related
thoughts of Oneness flooded my mind. I want to share those with you today.
Page Bryant writes about her own
sense of Oneness she embraces when visiting the Great Smoky Mountain National
Park: “Though the entire area is
beautiful and helps to put me in a calm and open state of mind, I am
particularly drawn to the beautiful little roadside waterfalls found throughout
the area. These wonderful moist, green spots are delightfully fragrant with the
smells of the rich soil, the moss-covered fallen trees, and the negative ions
that seem to reach inside and caress the soul. The first time I visited such a
site I was almost instantly propelled into an altered state of what I call pure
‘nature consciousness’… that precious frame of mind and heart that stirs and
opens my deepest senses and emotions in complete safety and compassion for all
that lives; the state that brings my ‘connection’ with all that lives into full
consciousness….” (p. 34-5)
She writes a lot about Native
American rituals and ceremonies – many connected to very specific Smoky
Mountain sites of the ancient Cherokee. She wrote: “I believe that ceremony is one of the most valuable tools we have to
bring about a change in our consciousness, for healing the earth and ourselves,
and for getting into conscious touch with the [spirit and energy of the
plant, animal, and mineral kingdoms].”
(p.157-8)
As she was describing the role
of ceremony and ritual within Cherokee culture, I became very aware that, for
me, what she seemed to be saying is that ceremony or ritual has the ability to
help me remember to remember the power of intuition or experiential
(not cerebral) knowing. I need always
to remember to remember the awe inspiring occurrence of this kind of intuitive
knowledge – a knowing that simply
overpowers my intellect. It is not knowledge I have deduced. It is the knowing that I know to be true because I
experienced its truth for me.
She goes on to describe some of
this knowing. “We must, if we and our planet are to survive, return to a remembrance
that the Earth is alive! … We must, once again armed with a knowledge of the
sacred dances and songs, lift ourselves out of the mire of apathetic
materialism … that we might heal ourselves from the ecological and spiritual
tragedies which have resulted from our almost total reliance upon our
intellect. I take nothing away from the value of logic and reason and feel it
to be a necessary part of our approach to knowledge and understanding. But
omitting intuition and by not bringing our intuitive faculties to bear upon
whatever knowledge we gain, we run the risk of the precise one-sidedness of
materialism so apparent within society today. Science and the lifeless mechanical
world it permits to exist is not all there is. [To take a successful
journey to explore an intuitive awareness of unseen energies and life forces] we must carry with us the tool of [openness
and] willingness; a willingness to have a
honest sense of desire and expectation in order to become aware of earth’s
living energies and the mind to think of the world as a whole being that is
held together by a real living, unifying energy which links us all – every
place to every other place, every soul to all other souls, and, ultimately, the
Earth and her children…” (p. 69-70)
This call for remembering to
remember reminded me the other morning of the Christian ritual of the Last
Supper and Jesus’ words to the disciples: “Do this in remembrance of Me.” But after
reading Bryant and Wolff, along with the messages of A Course In Miracles (ACIM)
and the wisdom of AA, it helped me put this experiential sense I have been
having in a new light. Perhaps Jesus wasn’t saying “Remember me, I’m going to
die for you in order to satisfy the judgment of my Father” (a critical tenet of
Christian dogma), but saying: “Remember, we are all One. Every person is but a
reflection of you. The act of all of us tonight sharing together one cup and
one loaf is symbolic of that reality. Please do not forget that.”
Take what you want from this
message and leave the rest. Oh! Find and embrace a small waterfall regardless
of the weather today. Perhaps it will connect and enrich you.
Although these messages
are mostly for me, thanks for listening. As always – feel free to forward this
message to your friends, family, and those accompanying you on your spiritual
journey.
Don
#1 Mar 2016
Copyright 2016
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