My previous blog post connected "wholeness" with "courage". I must admit that connection hadn't occurred to me prior to writing the post. So I want to explore that connection here.
Geocosmysticism holds at least three notions together: cosmology, planetary consciousness and the embrace of mystery as core spiritual principles. Within the "planetary consciousness" component can be contained much of what we consider "material reality" - biology, embodiment, the human experience of living, loving, dying, Earth sciences and human knowledge in general. I would also include what have been referred to as "matters of the heart", sentiment, aspiration and even moral philosophy. Note that I am avoiding the word "feeling" here. That word, in my opinion, is used indiscriminately these days. The meanings it contains are rich and important. However, they have also become diluted through over-use. A topic for another day ...
So ... the word "courage" emerged about 600 years ago to refer to just about anything having to do with "the heart" (the French word for "heart" is "cour"). Only later did it become synonymous with "bravery". So, consider this. What if "heart" refers less to simple emotions, less to the muscle that pumps blood, and rather points us toward the mid-point in the Ayurvedic model of "chakras"?
A person of uncommon courage, as I see it, is a person who lives and acts boldly every moment, in alignment with the flow of energy moving in the seven chakras, or energy centers. In my judgment, it is this alignment that constitutes personal wholeness. I attribute the following aspects of courage with each chakra (I find it helpful to consider them in reverse order, from high to low):
Chakra #7 - Mind, Consciousness
Chakra #6 - Radiance, Beauty
Chakra #5 - Voice, Movement
Chakra #4 - Compassion, Connection
Chakra #3 - Passion, Full Range of Gut-based Feeling
Chakra #2 - Flow, Rhythm
Chakra #1 - Ground, Locus, Stance
Now, some folks think of these chakras literally, and some consider them metaphorically, and some just dismiss the whole model as "new age" nonsense. I happen to find them useful as a frame upon which to experiment with systematic geocosmysticism. Oh, yeah!
"Wholeness" is an ideal. "Courage" is both the means and the end of the pursuit of "wholeness", which, although an ideal, is never beyond approach. Forward, march!
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Wholeness
"Whole: physically sound and healthy... having all its proper parts or components ... constituting the entirety of a person's nature or development".
portions of Mirriam-Webster's definition
I consider "wholeness" a value worthy of contemplation and cultivation in my life, a virtue worthy of pursuit. Observing wildlife outside my window in the morning helps me contemplate "wholeness". There is a range of textures, colors and movement, mini-dramas of inter-species conflict, a gust of wind moves a flowering branch and petals cascade onto the grass. The scene is relentlessly dynamic, and at the same time wonderfully harmonious. "Wholeness" means the richest of complexities in fluid and joyfully organic co-operation.
I don't equate "wholeness" with the absence of tension or stress. I don't necessarily agree with the common expression, "it's all good". I certainly believe, at the macro-cosmic, micro-cosmic, and planetary level, there is a kind of grand "wholeness". It's at the level of my own experience - the human dimension - where the cracks and hiccups in the flow appear. The stars and planets and galaxies swirl effortlessly around in the sky. The wild critters don't seem to wrestle much with managing relationships. We of the highly evolved brain and a modicum of self-reflection ... well, we find our existence laborious, and we suffer. We yearn for that which hangs just beyond our grasp. We strive to achieve successes that are measured by the number of hits on our website. We are sadistic and masochistic, narcissistic and paranoid. We are starving for community and yet continue to spend our fleeting hours riding our vehicles of perpetual isolation (cars, computers, tvs, hypno-video toys). We relish our discontent, and wouldn't know what to do with ourselves if the Market didn't give us our daily marching orders.
I want my life to mirror the wholeness that I observe in nature, the wholeness I believe is preeminently natural. I guess a life of wholeness, for me, above all, calls for uncommon courage. More on that to follow.
I consider "wholeness" a value worthy of contemplation and cultivation in my life, a virtue worthy of pursuit. Observing wildlife outside my window in the morning helps me contemplate "wholeness". There is a range of textures, colors and movement, mini-dramas of inter-species conflict, a gust of wind moves a flowering branch and petals cascade onto the grass. The scene is relentlessly dynamic, and at the same time wonderfully harmonious. "Wholeness" means the richest of complexities in fluid and joyfully organic co-operation.
I don't equate "wholeness" with the absence of tension or stress. I don't necessarily agree with the common expression, "it's all good". I certainly believe, at the macro-cosmic, micro-cosmic, and planetary level, there is a kind of grand "wholeness". It's at the level of my own experience - the human dimension - where the cracks and hiccups in the flow appear. The stars and planets and galaxies swirl effortlessly around in the sky. The wild critters don't seem to wrestle much with managing relationships. We of the highly evolved brain and a modicum of self-reflection ... well, we find our existence laborious, and we suffer. We yearn for that which hangs just beyond our grasp. We strive to achieve successes that are measured by the number of hits on our website. We are sadistic and masochistic, narcissistic and paranoid. We are starving for community and yet continue to spend our fleeting hours riding our vehicles of perpetual isolation (cars, computers, tvs, hypno-video toys). We relish our discontent, and wouldn't know what to do with ourselves if the Market didn't give us our daily marching orders.
I want my life to mirror the wholeness that I observe in nature, the wholeness I believe is preeminently natural. I guess a life of wholeness, for me, above all, calls for uncommon courage. More on that to follow.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Cosmic Ennui
"The more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it seems pointless."
Steven Weinberg, Ph.D.
Nobel Prize in Physics, 1979
Weinberg was a panelist on Ira Flatow's NPR program "Science Friday" a few weeks back, along with Brian Greene and a couple other brainy guys. They were discussing what we know and don't know about the cosmos. I was saddened to read this quotation from him, but not surprised. So many "brilliant minds" appear to see nothing in existence but tedium and meaninglessness. And sometimes, because I tend to revere science and "brilliance", I allow myself to sink into a cynical, bored disposition toward life. Partly I do that by choice, to connect with a part of me that IS that way, the part that recognizes that meaning is NOT self-evident, and that there IS mostly randomness in the universe. Once I've spent the obligatory moments there, I come back to myself, and permit the eyes of childlike fascination to be the lens through which I see my world. It is such a wonderful reunion with myself! I get to imagine the world at play, the random swirling eddies (that's a band name!) as splashes of motion and color on a cosmic canvas. I get to see my world as ART, and if I believe anything at the core of my being, it is that humans have evolved as the species of ARTISTS, and not merely as mechanics or technicians or analysts or diagnosticians or brainiologists of one form or another. So, Dr. Weinberg, keep on comprehensing our universe, keep on peering and peeking with those prodigious, smartypants, adultist peepers. You'll keep on seeing no point. Because the point is ... "there is none so blind as the one who WILL not see." Point, game and match!
Nobel Prize in Physics, 1979
Weinberg was a panelist on Ira Flatow's NPR program "Science Friday" a few weeks back, along with Brian Greene and a couple other brainy guys. They were discussing what we know and don't know about the cosmos. I was saddened to read this quotation from him, but not surprised. So many "brilliant minds" appear to see nothing in existence but tedium and meaninglessness. And sometimes, because I tend to revere science and "brilliance", I allow myself to sink into a cynical, bored disposition toward life. Partly I do that by choice, to connect with a part of me that IS that way, the part that recognizes that meaning is NOT self-evident, and that there IS mostly randomness in the universe. Once I've spent the obligatory moments there, I come back to myself, and permit the eyes of childlike fascination to be the lens through which I see my world. It is such a wonderful reunion with myself! I get to imagine the world at play, the random swirling eddies (that's a band name!) as splashes of motion and color on a cosmic canvas. I get to see my world as ART, and if I believe anything at the core of my being, it is that humans have evolved as the species of ARTISTS, and not merely as mechanics or technicians or analysts or diagnosticians or brainiologists of one form or another. So, Dr. Weinberg, keep on comprehensing our universe, keep on peering and peeking with those prodigious, smartypants, adultist peepers. You'll keep on seeing no point. Because the point is ... "there is none so blind as the one who WILL not see." Point, game and match!
Monday, May 4, 2009
Medical Brief
This is brief blurb on a subject I've been ruminating and dialoging about for two decades. The subject is medicine, especially the welcome challenges of CAM (complementary and alternative medicine) to the modern medical model. With current fears about "pandemic" being inflamed by hyperbolic media coverage of the H1N1 virus, the subject is on my mind once again.
"Medicine" is a word that has a rich etymology that goes all the way back to the origins of language itself. It's meaning begins as "thought" itself, reminding me of Dr. Julian Jaynes argument about the "Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bi-cameral Mind". His theory is that our brains were once a single lobe. During that time, we didn't have the capacity for reflective thought, acting more or less instinctively, much like the rest of the world's critters. The evolution of the hemispheric brain enabled us to have "internal conversations", i.e., "thoughts".
We then discover the roots of "medicine" evolving the meaning of "judgment", as thinking leads to discernment and discrimination between and among elements of our environment. "This is better than that ... that is a friend, this is a foe", etc. Further development includes the emergence of a class of people refered to as "mediators", priests to mediate between people and gods, and later doctors to mediate between common people and the mysteries of their bodies.
Consider this analogy: as the Protestant Reformation reflected the beginning of an age of empowerment of the masses through access to information through print media, and the throwing off of the authority of "mediators" in their relationship to knowledge, might we be in the throes of a Medical Reformation, reflected in the growing distrust of medical authority and re-discovery and recovery of a personal, unmediated relationship with our bodies, ourselves?
"Medicine" is a word that has a rich etymology that goes all the way back to the origins of language itself. It's meaning begins as "thought" itself, reminding me of Dr. Julian Jaynes argument about the "Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bi-cameral Mind". His theory is that our brains were once a single lobe. During that time, we didn't have the capacity for reflective thought, acting more or less instinctively, much like the rest of the world's critters. The evolution of the hemispheric brain enabled us to have "internal conversations", i.e., "thoughts".
We then discover the roots of "medicine" evolving the meaning of "judgment", as thinking leads to discernment and discrimination between and among elements of our environment. "This is better than that ... that is a friend, this is a foe", etc. Further development includes the emergence of a class of people refered to as "mediators", priests to mediate between people and gods, and later doctors to mediate between common people and the mysteries of their bodies.
Consider this analogy: as the Protestant Reformation reflected the beginning of an age of empowerment of the masses through access to information through print media, and the throwing off of the authority of "mediators" in their relationship to knowledge, might we be in the throes of a Medical Reformation, reflected in the growing distrust of medical authority and re-discovery and recovery of a personal, unmediated relationship with our bodies, ourselves?
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Squirrely Strategies
Our yard is host to many of our common Easter Grey Squirrels. There have been as many as ten battling for morsels under the bird feeders. We also see a couple American Red Squirrels, and lately they appear to have the upper hand. When it comes to defending their grazing zone, the reds are ferocious. Let a grey get too close, and he's likely to lose a hunk o' tail.
Of course it's also "courting" season, so the pheromones are feeding the frenzies. It's comical to see a territorial standoff followed seamlessly by a wild romantic scramble up and around the tree and out to the end of a branch and back again. All the while the goldfinches and chickadees and titmice flit from feeder to feeder in their own seasonal dance of nesting and gathering and brooding.
It's comforting to see everything working the way it's meant to.
Of course it's also "courting" season, so the pheromones are feeding the frenzies. It's comical to see a territorial standoff followed seamlessly by a wild romantic scramble up and around the tree and out to the end of a branch and back again. All the while the goldfinches and chickadees and titmice flit from feeder to feeder in their own seasonal dance of nesting and gathering and brooding.
It's comforting to see everything working the way it's meant to.
Friday, May 1, 2009
Work: Round #3
"Work is part of our display, part of the parading of our beauty. It is the way we return our beauty to the community, and this is important both to the individual and to the community. Why? Because all beauty yearns to be conspicuous. Beauty and display go together; so, therefore, do beauty and work. Our work is meant to be beautiful, to increase the beauty of the world, of one another, of the worker."
Matthew Fox, The Reinvention of Work.
"Why do you worry about clothing? Have you noticed the flowers doing that? Oh, right - they aren't smart enough to worry. They're just happy being beautiful!"
Jesus (paraphrased)
I spent some time with a friend yesterday assembling musical instruments. The time flew by, and the results were rewarding. I feel deep gratitude for the chance to share in creating something of genuine material beauty.
I recall having always had the desire to make things. I also recall getting the message that there was something either too mysterious or too complicated or too pedestrian about shaping natural materials into things of beauty. These activities were fine as "hobbies", but they didn't constitute "real work". There was this abysmal gap between "work" and "art" as I was instructed, because art was more like play, like fun. And work is meant to be ... well ... work. Something we must do because we must eat and shop and have shelter and retire. One mustn't expect to derive pleasure or satisfaction or spiritual reward from work. One does one's work as one does one's duty, as an obligation imposed on one by virtue of one's birth.
Matt Fox comments on statement from Thomas Aquinas, a 13th century philosopher of the Church. Work is "display", like flowers and harmonies and Rose-breasted Grosbeak males exposing the deep red patch on their chests as if to say, "see my beauty!"
My geocosmystical work is to make beauty. Like a bird. Like a cherry blossom. Like a great joke or a poem or a play. Or a song. Yes ... a song! And a wooden instrument to decorate my song, and many voices and sounds and rhythms ... yes! A song!
Matthew Fox, The Reinvention of Work.
"Why do you worry about clothing? Have you noticed the flowers doing that? Oh, right - they aren't smart enough to worry. They're just happy being beautiful!"
Jesus (paraphrased)
I spent some time with a friend yesterday assembling musical instruments. The time flew by, and the results were rewarding. I feel deep gratitude for the chance to share in creating something of genuine material beauty.
I recall having always had the desire to make things. I also recall getting the message that there was something either too mysterious or too complicated or too pedestrian about shaping natural materials into things of beauty. These activities were fine as "hobbies", but they didn't constitute "real work". There was this abysmal gap between "work" and "art" as I was instructed, because art was more like play, like fun. And work is meant to be ... well ... work. Something we must do because we must eat and shop and have shelter and retire. One mustn't expect to derive pleasure or satisfaction or spiritual reward from work. One does one's work as one does one's duty, as an obligation imposed on one by virtue of one's birth.
Matt Fox comments on statement from Thomas Aquinas, a 13th century philosopher of the Church. Work is "display", like flowers and harmonies and Rose-breasted Grosbeak males exposing the deep red patch on their chests as if to say, "see my beauty!"
My geocosmystical work is to make beauty. Like a bird. Like a cherry blossom. Like a great joke or a poem or a play. Or a song. Yes ... a song! And a wooden instrument to decorate my song, and many voices and sounds and rhythms ... yes! A song!
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