Tag Archives: ONENESS
Are you feeling dismayed, stressed, and helpless in the face of the current conflict and uncertainty? During this time when the world is experiencing the growing pains that accompany change, the need for compassion is greater than ever. One of the first things the teachers at the ashram taught us was the importance of the “flowering of the heart.” This is the first step on the spiritual path in order to really progress, they told us. And this applies to…..
We know so much and yet we still don’t know how to live in peace with each other and our planet. Rather than acquiring more knowledge, more beliefs, what is needed is a transformation of consciousness, a shift in how we view ourselves and our world. Maybe stepping outside of our limited idea of ourselves and contemplating the mysteries of the Universe can help us recognize the vastness, the unfathomable nature of all that is. Maybe contemplating the unknowable can…..
Several years ago, I went whale watching with a small group of people on a sailboat off Maui. The captain had brought along his four-year-old autistic son who was non-verbal. The little boy was happily playing on the deck of the boat when suddenly he began speaking in unintelligible sounds. It seemed he was calling forth a whale, communicating with it through his vocalizations. The captain helped his son into the water and together they swam out to commune with…..
“Our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this planet, we all breathe the same air, we all cherish our children’s future, and we are all mortal.” John F. Kennedy I believe, as humans, we all carry the desire, however hidden it may be, to uplift and care for each other. After all, we’re all in the same boat here on Earth. We are all subject to suffering as well as joy. These days, as we are suddenly…..
“There is only one you, it is truer than true. No one on earth is more youer than you.” –Dr. Seuss When Katharine (not her real name) came to my office for counseling, she presented me with a list of things she wanted to change about herself. She was a screenwriter and was experiencing writer’s block. She felt insecure about her abilities as a writer, and her insecurities spilled over into other areas of her life. She was unhappy with…..
“Nothing’s gonna change my world…” This line from the John Lennon song, “Across the Universe,” suddenly had new meaning when I was listening to it the other day with a friend who told me it was written after the Beatles met with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and had some spiritual experiences. Experiencing “nothing”–meaning the void, emptiness, silence–is going to change his world. This brings me to the topic for the week–nothing. I saw a video recently of a talk by David…..
One day on my lunch break I was at Shoreline Park watching a young seagull perched on a picnic table a few feet away. Perfectly still except for his soft, brown feathers ruffling in the breeze, he gazed at me for a long time. I thought about the Eastern concept of darshan—the sight of a holy person. Just being in the presence of a Master, a highly evolved being, we receive grace. When they open their eyes and their gaze…..
One night a powerful storm rolled in over the Big Island of Hawaii, dropping snow on Mauna Kea summit, where winds were measured at an incredible 194 miles per hour. As the storm raged outside, shaking the house and rattling the windows, Stu and I settled in to watch a movie—a documentary on the men who had walked on the Moon. All the Moon-walkers who were interviewed for the documentary decades after their journeys into space, had experienced a major…..
