OUTRO… GO WITH THE FLOW
It is possible to respect the integrity of another person’s faith without dilution of one’s own. The golden rule of religion is said to treat others as we want to be treated ourselves. This is part of the foundation from which I have been carrying out my research and writing. Life has presented me with experiences that have breathed faith into information. Words are information, faith is cultivated and gauged – by listening to our ‘gut’ intuition (like the analogy given in this book of a spirit compass). Faith is up to you, I simply offer the information in this book as someone who cares.
When we go with the flow of the universe – its inherent stream and currents, we can maximise our potential through a natural law of attraction. This is what some people have spoken of when they have said smile and the universe smiles, do good and the universe will conspire to help you. Gandhi said it doesn’t matter how much of a minority you are in, if you stand in truth then you are no less right… It’s just that those around you may lack integrity, it doesn’t mean you lack integrity. It is the same principle spoken of in David and Goliath. Even if you are by yourself, if you hold genuine integrity then you stand in the truth of the universe. This truth ultimately transcends any individual so it makes sense to remain open to it. Openness doesn’t mean to say we are not grounded in faith.
If we push against the power of the universe it will likely push us back. An example was given on a counselling training day I attended, that if we stand shoulder width apart and hold our hands up to meet another person’s above our heads…When we are in harmony we are in balance but as soon as one person pushes the other, then the other has to push back to maintain equilibrium, otherwise they will fall over. But if we push the universe, ultimately we will just push against ourselves. The universe is much stronger than any individual! We may consider that the currents of life and the challenges that we face as individuals or groups have spiritual purpose.
Light may be thought to be simple – lucid – clear, and enlightenment as though light bulb moments when the darkness of misunderstanding is vanished. As individuals, our experiences may shine light on our unique consciousness, also we may learn of a collective state of consciousness. As a collective, Western society’s current state of consciousness and window upon life has been broken up into shards and the process of collecting, identifying and re-joining the shards can at times be complex. I feel that I can clearly identify with others who ‘see the light’, which appears to me as to be not of any one human label but our inherent humanity and nature which ultimately are part of ‘creation’. Bob Marley says that beyond tribulation (difference) we as a generation can walk to the roads of creation (unity)… In terms of this book, beyond the difference of our individual streams of life we can journey together to the great ocean of oneness – the Great Spirit / God / unity consciousness.
“So we gonna walk – all right! – through de roads of creation:
We the generation (Tell me why!) (Trod through great tribulation)
trod through great tribulation.” (Marley cited on azlyrics.com)
Meditation and other ‘conscious activities’ are a way of connecting and aligning with the deeper parts of ourselves to achieve inner peace. A way of observing and calming the flow of our stream of life. Many spiritual teachers would say that to achieve peace in the world around us we must find peace within ourselves.
REFLECTIVE MEDITATION
Meditation and self reflection are a key teaching throughout diverse spiritual and cultural perspectives. John Selby writes in relation to this in his book Seven Masters One Path that discusses the teachings about meditation of Jesus, Mohamed, Buddha, Lao Tzu, Patanjali, Gurdjieff and Krishnamurti:
“Almost all world cultures have developed deep meditation traditions, some dating back to prehistory. There’s surely nothing new under the sun in terms of the basic natural process through which the human mind opens up to, contemplates, and merges with the divine.
No matter what our theological or philosophical beliefs, the actual direct spiritual experience that lies beyond human ideas and thoughts is universal. For this reason, this meditation program works equally well if you are a Christian or a Taoist, a Hindu or a Buddhist, a Theosophist or scientist – or whatever” (Selby 2003 p.6)
“You might be wondering how I chose, from all the spiritual teachers of all time, the seven Masters featured in this book. Clearly the first five Masters – Patanjali, Lao Tzu, Buddha, Jesus, and Muhammad – were remarkable world teachers who not only touched my own soul with their teachings, insights, and techniques but stand eternally at the centre of the world’s largest spiritual movements.
The last two I chose, Gurdjieff and Krishnamurti, perfectly round off our meditation process because, along with their special impact on my own understanding of meditation, they have made new contributions and provided examples to provide the world community’s ongoing spiritual advancement.
As we’ll discover here, all true spiritual teachers lead their students towards the same ultimate realisation and experience – that of full immersion in the spiritual core of being that we all share, and from which we all draw our deepest sustenance, wisdom, vitality and insight” (p.12)
Music, stories and films offer a simplified and collectively relatable way of passing on this kind of knowing, as discussed in the chapter titled In The Movies. Some may be surprised to find such meditative perspectives in the realms of gangsta rap. ‘Thug life’ was more than a tattoo to Tupac, it was a philosophy. His poetry and prison letters offer this expression of self-reflection in a more raw way. This self-reflection is also in his track Until The End Of Time. Tupac’s choice of word as ‘ocean’ in this track suits the visualisation of ocean in this book:
“My attitude got me walking solo
Ride out alone in my lo-lo
Watching the whole world move in slow-mo
For quiet times, disappear
Listen to the ocean
Smoking ‘Ports, think my thoughts,
Then it’s back to coastin’ ”
(2pac cited on azlyrics.com)
The water in each individual’s stream of life may be viewed as to reflect with the greater communal and global bodies of water in rivers and the ocean. In this way global flows affect us just like the heat from the sun and tides of the moon.
Personally, rough areas through my own stream of life have given powerful moments of self-reflection into a more internal inner world of spirit. My individual struggles have led to deeper understanding for the connections in life. Whereas the outer world may be fluid, temporary and passing, the inner ‘spirit’ world appears to me and many others also as eternal and timeless. Here’s the lyrics from Goldie’s drum and bass track Timeless:
“Timeless
Inner city life
Inner city pressure
Inner city life
Inner city pressure taking over me
But I won’t let go
I won’t let go
Your love
Inner city life”
(Goldie cited on genius.com)
The word spirit itself suggests a process of refinement, a reduction of substance to its essence. An individual’s pain and challenges may offer a process of refinement to such eternal spirit. Here’s the chorus of 2pac’s track Until The End Of Time sung by R.L Huggar:
“So take these broken wings
I need your hands to come and heal me once again
(Until the end of time)
So I can fly away, until the end of time
Until the end of time, until the end of time”
(2pac cited on azlyrics.com)
A sense of meditative reflection and oneness is evident in diverse global perspectives from popular music and films, to quantum physics, to orthodox Western religion, to more ancient strains of indigenous shamanism. It is beyond any individual or group, it is humanity as a collective, in the words of Carl Jung it is of the ‘collective unconscious’.
Just as Newton observed the universal code of gravity in a falling apple and then observed it in other levels of the solar system, so too we can observe ‘spirit codes’ in our individual stream of life, and then observe them in other levels of the universe. All parts of the universe may be ‘readable’ as a signpost relative to other parts and avenues to the oneness of spirit, all parts as holographic. Beyond reading rational signposts we may achieve a more abstract internal sense of spirit connection or love that is not confined to time or space, not confined to human religious or scientific labels. As Bruce Lee says in Enter the Dragon:
“Its like a finger pointing away to the moon. Dont concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory.” (Lee cited on goodreads.com)
In this manner we may think of scripture as pointing to the spirit realm of oneness… Bruce Lee may have said do not focus on the words or you will miss all the heavenly glory. The heavenly glory is beyond words, beyond the rational aspects of life to the spirit realm of timeless and unified spirit consciousness.
The music of Tupac and Bob Marley is so passionate and powerful, this may be in part due to their meditation – as Tupac says in his lyric ‘listen to the ocean’. Bob Marley had a rock he would meditate on. In meditation, the mind can become to be in unison with the body and spirit so that deeper truths of our heart – our emotions and spirit can freely flow. Many cultures have seen the heart to be the gateway to higher consciousness, aligning mind to the direction of heart may live through spirit. Such spiritual power can unblock our stream of life to naturally flow in harmony in ourselves and with the greater will-power of nature.
It may be considered that the outward perception of the observer transfers through stillness of observation to the inner world, the internal bond between all life – the ‘spirit realm’. This stillness may be thought present in meditation as well as physical stillness – death or near death experience – transporting the individual’s consciousness to the ocean of spirit consciousness. Wim Hoff aka the Iceman speaks of being physically cold in a similar way. This also fits well with the analogy of water in this book – ice being ‘frozen’ water – water in stillness. Here’s a quote from one of Wim’s videos available on YouTube titled Wim Hof, The Iceman Cometh | HUMAN Limits:
“Cold is merciless, righteous, it brings you direct into depth of yourself. You’re not thinking. Your emotions stop. You are just surviving. And it brings you into purity of the physiology as well as the soul. And you get in a different plane than our conditioning. And that makes you a free man” (Iceman cited on Uproxx 2016)
To roll the book out, here’s another bad ass quote from Bruce Lee. Thanks for reading. One love
“Don’t get set into one form, adapt it and build your own, and let it grow, be like water. Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless — like water. Now you put water in a cup, it becomes the cup; You put water into a bottle it becomes the bottle; You put it in a teapot it becomes the teapot.” (Bruce Lee cited at wikiquote.org)