The cycle of the microcosmic orbit is from the Tan Tien or Perineum, up the back to the crown and down the front, through the hard palate and tip of the tongue, chin, throat, solar plexus, genitals and back to the Tan Tien.

What I came up with was that the flow of energy goes from Earth to Heaven and then to Humanity (represented by the heart).

Is that the way experience/existence should be filtered? Experimentation shall ensue.

EDIT: (1/30/12) — What if experience is actually best absorbed in the reverse direction and response is filtered in the above manner? What if experience is best absorbed through the heart chakra? My intuition tells me this is very important.

1) Verbal/Linguistic – The most recognized type of prayer. “Our Father” “In shallah” etc.

2) Visualizing/Manifesting

3) Loving – Feeling love deeply

4) Devotion -

While ruminating on this practice it occurred to me. There are conduits that the LORD channels his love through. Some of these might be friends, family, pets, food, mountains etc. Anything, really. Everything in fact. Some of these are conduits through which HER love is felt more strongly than others. There is a certain girl who, when I am around her, I can feel the LORD intensely, immediately and intimately. I can feel the love through Carlos, my dog. I can feel Love through the sunshine and smell Love in the rain. But it’s easy to forget these everyday (or mundane) things. The nature of our existence is Maya (illusion or forgetting) and that can make it tough to remember to open ourselves to the flow that is all around us and to focus on the things that we get a rush from. I get a rush from the girl. Then when the girl is gone I feel the loss. As if a part of me is missing.

Today I thought to myself “The Yogi feels (feeds) from all sources, deeply and well”. The yogi does not climb heights, the yogi swells to breadths.

What if, rather than us focusing our energy outward, creating things and such, we ought to be taking in our surroundings; leaching into our beings. Is this the meaning of The Receptive? (Hexagram 2)

Hmm…

To contend with Fear gives it more power than discovering (it’s) root & letting it simply wither.

In other words: Cease nourishing the fear and it will slowly die off.

I have dreamt of being a rockstar. I even spent many years working toward that dream and the few people who’ve seen me perform tend to agree that whatever that certain something is, I’ve got it. I’m not bragging. Just stating a fact. I’ve had guys from South Central LA, ten years my senior and steeped in the funk rhythms of James Brown, George Clinton and Larry Graham tell me repeatedly and with great emotion that I am one hell of an entertainer.

So why, you ask, am I not famous? Why have I not made my dream come true and become the rock star I so long(ed?) to be?

Short answer: I don’t know. I just haven’t been able to make it happen. For one reason (can’t seem to get a band together) or another (really I’m a morning person. Late nights kill me.)

But there has to be more to it than that. I try to let the LORD lead me and it seems that his leadership doesn’t point toward the stage. But… But… But, I’d be AWESOME!!! I don’t… understand. Why not? Why can’t I?

There’s either a reason or there’s no reason. Let’s take the tack of there being a reason because nihilism doesn’t really suit us now does it?

Dharma. Tao. The Way. Path. When we are beginning our journey we make decisions and agreements before we ever arrive at this our physical destination. We have decided. Krishna said to Arjuna that it is better to follow your path no matter where it may lead than it is to succeed greatly at the path of another. He also said we should not be attached to the fruits of our labor. Being a rockstar is all about the fruits, is it not?

Social responsibility may be that same quality but applied to a group or family.

To whom shall I be responsible? Th what group or groups shall I give my service? This might be something like personal responsibility taken to the next step.

When I ‘grow’, i.e. learn new skills, improve my ability to communicate or simply begin to percieve things in a new or deeper way, I suspect I am altering my genetic code on behalf of my, as of yet, unborn progeny.

I believe that were we to anthropomorphize nature, she would have intended and be thrilled by this.

I suspect that there are some of us who are super-accelerators of this process. People who grow a great deal. Some people grow a little and some learn a lot. I have learned a fair amount and I have several friends who have as well.

One of the things I am currently struggling with is my ego. When someone to whom I am close tells me of things they did which elicit negative feelings in me I find myself trying to ‘change my mind’ i.e. alter my consciousness in order to empathize with them while curbing my own judgemental nature.

These situations cause me emotional/psychic stress (which I do my best to avoid) and they offer me opportunity for growth.

Nature LOVES my growth. So much so that she offers up numerous opportunities for it. They are the back end of an initially pleasurable experience. It’s the old bait and switch. “Here’s something delightful! And here! And now comes the bill…”

As I say, I do my best to avoid psychic stress. Stress subtracts from my overall joy/peace/harmony/sense-of-well-being. I LIKE my overall sense of joy/peace/harmony/sense-of-well-being. But it seems that things that are pleasureable (ice cream/loose women/etc.) often cause me to suffer. Therefore I often forego those situations possibly to the chagrin of Mother Nature.

Question: Did Mother Nature create addicts in order to foster evolution?

Question: Does quality of life suffer or benefit when avoiding pleasure (and the consequent growth)?

In the past it was appropriate to visualize social status in terms of rank. A linear hierarchy that held certain qualities or traits of greater or lesser value than others. Money, fame, status; these were (and still are, but are on the wane) seen as valuable indicators of power and ability to rear offspring.

The raising of offspring has, in the past, been fraught with dangers but has become increasingly less so in the past several decades with the proliferation modern medicine, social safety nets and public education. As such, mates no longer need be chosen by the strongest, wealthiest or most dominant traits that have served our race so well in the past.

We have reached a threshold. Barring any unforeseen plagues, or foreseen ones for that matter, the human race is here to stay. What that means is, we as a race are free to mate with whomever we wish. We can date someone because they make us laugh or are artisans which inspire us.

The continuum of traits which we had viewed (rightly, due to survival necessity issues) as a linear hierarchy may now be viewed as a plane. A flat surface where that which we personally find valuable becomes socially desirable. And because we define value ourselves, the plane resolves itself into a sphere. Everyone’s own quality of choice is at their own apex of the sphere.

To what extent does that same thing hold true for life? How much does ‘knowing’ a thing limit our ability to experience?

Is it possible that infants and toddlers are capable of learning at such an amazing rate specifically because they have no pre-conceived notions which hold them back from immersing themselves fully in an experience?

At the same time, the LORD named his creations into existence. To what degree does a name validate existence itself?

Ok, so she’s not crippled. But she still thinks Howl won’t come after her because she isn’t pretty. Maybe that’s her disability. Poor self-image. Hmm?

After watching this bizarre movie where she becomes increasingly lovely, it’s easy to think that was the message: inner beauty. But this movie was so odd that I wonder if that was it at all. I would doubt they had that theme in mind.

I hope you enjoy it!

Many years ago I suddenly realized that religion was the ‘bucket’ that gave some kind of ‘manageable/transferable’ form to faith, and that it was easy to carry around the bucket and still have no faith inside.

There are those who carry around the bucket, and decorate it with all kinds of attractive things actually believing the bucket is the real deal.  They have limited their perception because real Faith is beyond them and finally an amazing gift from God to each person, not something one can hold, contain, control,  decorate, or use to give an ego boost.

There are those who carry the bucket around to use as a weapon to wound others who do not carry a bucket,  or one that looks like theirs that they might approve of or identify as authentic.   They continue to make religious laws about their bucket and how it must be ‘respected’ or honored or supported with the best protection available.  They frequently want you to purchase a copy of their bucket or at least carry one just like theirs.

There are so many who have been wounded by the bucket or, let down by ‘bucket carriers’ with their political ambitions or power plays that they don’t want anything to do with the possibility of embracing the FAITH the bucket was intended to carry in the first place.   They don’t want to be even remotely  identified with the bucket carriers.   They sometimes live in pain and struggle with experiencing the many gifts of Faith in their lives available to them because the bucket carriers have misrepresented the one who is the origin and lover of all humanity.

But, praise be to God, there are those who are awash in FAITH.  You can feel it.  They are willing to honor even the buckets which are not their own or that they completely understand, for they TRUST that somehow God will use all the diversity that God has created to bring about more Grace and love in the world.

Those who have ‘come up from the river’  are aware that having faith is difficult because life is so scary and faith is so, … well illogically abstract, unprovable, and sets one ‘up’ for appearing to be  ‘stupid’ in the light of the world’s rational empirical standards.

Those who have been hit by the summer shower of faith are aware it is something they don’t control like they ‘owned it’.  They know it isn’t earned by anything they’ve done, said, thought or promised.  They have learned to simply open themselves at whatever level of trust they have ‘that’ day and pray that God will use their lives and give them strength and wisdom to be a ‘gift’ as they go through their day.

Those who have experienced even a mere sprinkling of FAITH are aware that faith is something that is granted by God in those life situations and occasions that need an act of trust in light of fear or threat.  That attitude of trust will hunt for a life-giving solution.  That trust will look for hope when it does not appear to be anywhere close.  That trust will understand time and patience are gifts to be honored.  They will wait on the Lord.

Those who have experienced being hit by the water pistol of faith are aware that a faithful response is something in which we may surprise ourselves.  Somehow on that day in that circumstance we are just able to TRUST ,  bringing ‘light’ to our lives and a situation, beyond any logic.  We are able to bring LOVE to a difficult situation out of some deep well or shallow splash of Grace that sustains and supports us beyond our own selfish limited spirit.

Those who experience even a small amount have a sense that faith is something fluid or even airy that LIVES and sustains our very being.  It is like the manna in the wilderness, something we must receive every morning in trust that it will be there at the right time and place in our lives to bring nourishment and joy;  move forward in faith.

“We call Jesus the Christ not because He brought a new religion, but because He is the end of religion, above religion, and irreligion, above Christianity and Non-Christianity.  We spread his call because it is the call to every person in every period to receive the New Being , that hidden saving power in our existence, which takes from us labor and burden and gives rest [and purpose] to our souls.”
Paul Tillich

Grace and Peace.
Phil