Restoring Right Relationship with Spirit
Spirit is trying to help us heal. She is spontaneously trying to re-open the natural pathways for human flourishing, trying to excavate dried up riverbeds for the water of life to flow once more.
As much as we have to admit the unconscionable damage that we have done to ourselves and to the natural world by cutting ourselves off from Nature, we also have to admit the equally disastrous, if less immediately obvious consequences of cutting ourselves off from Spirit. As much as we are not separate from Nature, we are not separate from Spirit and our living disconnected from both of these Sources of Life lies at the heart of today’s brokenness and dysfunction in the world. By living as if we are independent autonomous beings answerable only to ourselves, and fooling ourselves that we can live independently of Nature and Spirit, we have damaged and destroyed the natural pathways laid down for human wisdom and flourishing. Even as we deny it, we are one with Nature and one with Spirit and we cannot survive in isolation.
‘Nature is God giving birth to itself.’ is one of my favourite truths, spoken by the Counter-Enlightenment philosopher, FWJ Schelling. That we are part of Nature, is undeniable and that we are part of God is manifestly obvious, yet the delusion was adopted that we could live independently of Nature and also freely destroy her according to our whims and greed. Even when the consequences of such hubris are seen everywhere we don’t row back because there is too much money at stake. Living cut off from Spirit, and losing connection with our innate spirituality has produced comparable, if less visibly obvious consequences. Our belonging to Spirit was once integral to our self-knowing, but this truth was jettisoned in favour of the notion that we are our own ‘masters,’ a notably masculine term.
The pathway that traditionally revealed our inherent divinity and belonging to Great Spirit was (and is) the path of spiritual awakening that leads an individual to an embodied and vibrant appreciation of the oneness of all creation and the recognition of humanity’s participation in the Great Mystery. The realisation of our participation in the wondrous beauty of Life naturally evokes awe, humility, and reverence for all of Life. Mysticism was one of the traditional pathways for spiritual awakening to unfold in an individual and a community, and the suppression of mysticism under the patriarchal privileging of the rational scientific attitude, and the religions’ preference for doctrine over Spirit, pushed this natural pathway of awakening underground to such an extent that it has been mostly lost as an essential avenue of transformation.
With its loss we lost the necessary wisdom to support the natural process of awakening as an essential pathway for human flourishing. That being said, the human hubristic denial of these energies does not kill them off. They are natural, transcendent spiritual energies that arise spontaneously and remain active, seeking to work on us and in us, even as we deny them and no longer understand or respect them. Without traditional or perennial wisdom and understanding of the spiritual life, we don’t know how to engage with what is being offered to us from beyond us. Mysticism has become alien to us, something that confuses and confounds us, so that we may feel we should ignore or hide our deep spiritual experiences, and we have nowhere to share them, speak about them and try to understand them. How could it be that someone could have a full kundalini awakening and not understand what is happening?
The urgent work of our time is to restore right relationship between humanity and Nature, and between humanity and Spirit. One way we can begin to heal our relationship with Spirit is to admit, welcome, and engage with the visionary and mystical energies that are in fact flooding the planet and individuals at this time. We need to acknowledge the spiritual energies knocking on the door of our heart and soul. Spirit is trying to help us heal. She is spontaneously trying to re-open the natural pathways for human flourishing, trying to excavate dried up riverbeds for the water of life to flow once more. One way for us to respond to the help being given is to admit to what is happening in the intimacy of our inner spiritual lives.
Millions of people across the planet are experiencing private awakening experiences and we need to find the confidence to admit to them and the wisdom needed to engage with them. We have to re-learn how to allow Spirit to guide our awakening. When we engage with awakening energies with reverence and humility, not ego or spiritual capitalism, our true soul gifts will be revealed as the medicine we have to bring forward for the benefit of the whole community at this time of breakdown.
This is what I am trying to do in my life, and part of my medicine is to share my visionary and mystical life as my contribution to helping heal the rift between humanity and Spirit. It’s also to support others on the spiritual path and encourage them to step forward with their soul gifts and medicine that others deeply need. I’m familiar with every instinctive recoil that arises at the thought of admitting to a vibrant inner life in a culture that ridicules, demeans, and pathologises mystical and visionary women. But with each person that steps forward we support each other, we build resilience, and contribute our energy to the collective awakening that is trying to be born at this time
Losing touch with our spirituality and our connection to Spirit happened one human at a time. We can only recover right relationship with our spirituality and with Spirit one human at a time. That means me, it means you, it means whoever you know who you can support to own and acknowledge the inner promptings to awaken so that more and more of us can begin living from our True Self our awakening self, and our unfolding divinity.
Image: La Houille blanche, Gaston Bussièree