What if spiritual growth isn’t about climbing higher, but circling deeper? Inspired by Cynthia Bourgeault’s “Practicing Living Presence,” this post explores why real transformation feels messy, repetitive, and sacredly slow.
"She compares it to a boat’s hull speed. You can hoist all the sails you want, but if your vessel’s not built for it, you’ll capsize. Growth has to be digestible." What a great comparison. I got stuck at spiritual fog a bit earlier and it reminded me of when years ago I took my family sailing in our yacht(or more accurately, a dinghy with cabin, of doubtful temprament and voracious appetite for money) it was a beautiful day, everything was warm and clear, we were having a great time then almost instantly a bank of fog swallowed us, all sense of direction was lost, my daughter was concussed by the boom as we gybed unexpectedly, an element of panic appeared (hi, I'm panic, we meet again) and the waves breaking on the rocks appeared to be from all around us. Then the fog thinned a bit and we made it back to harbour, less confident and mildly traumatised. Yes, the spiritual life as a sailing metaphor, it works.
In lots of perhaps pre-Christian (definitely pre-psychoanalysis :D) European stories (and others around the world? it seems to be a very universal human thing), a sudden fog or mist indicates you are now travelling in unexpected directions...when the fog clears, you will be somewhere else, often in some other type of existence (the Fae realms, the Underworld [hopefully only briefly! ;)], another dimension, etc.). When you travel again to get back home (often the long way round), you will be changed, hopefully for the better, but definitely wiser for the experience. :)
Nancy, yes. The fog isn’t just confusion. It’s initiation. You think you’re lost, but really you’ve crossed a threshold. Something old is dissolving and something else is forming, but you don’t get to see the blueprint. You just get mist, disorientation, and maybe a knock to the head from your own spiritual boom. By the time you make it back, you’re not the same. You’ve been re-mapped. The journey did what it came to do.
Dearest VMB, This opened my heart to understand my love of the labyrinth, particularly walking the Chartres Cathedral labyrinth. Marching in toward the center only to find myself circling way out to the edge, then close, then farther. Just keep walking. This is not a maze. There is no getting lost. Just follow the path. Release what is carried into the labyrinth. Suddenly realizing the path to the center is now. No. I’m not ready. Too soon. But the path leads where the path leads. Be present to Presence (that was there every step of the way.) Stay. Receive. Be still. Be present. Then carry forward back into the world with all the twists and turns. Then a moment of panic. Am I lost? Did I do this wrong? Others are passing me by! Is this making any sense? Follow the path. There are no mistakes when one foot is in front of the other. Breathe. Trust. What has been received has always been present within. Awaken. Go forth.
A friend and I have a little thing we say to each other often - progress is better than perfect. Yes, we're coming back to old wounds with deeper understanding every time (if we're relatively clever and paying attention) and every crisis of faith, emotion, or fury is an opportunity to learn.
“Your false self wants results. Your true self just wants you to sit down and shut up.” Oh, dear sweet kind wise truth-teller who must be an old soul…I can’t stop laughing hysterically. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 You SO NAILED ME! I won’t type the words I’m thinking, my Ego doesn’t want me to disavow your audience of the progress I’m making on a daily basis. My fog lifted for a beautiful 15 minutes yesterday. I had a really good fun check-in with my support group with 3 friends I’ve known 40 years. They have patiently listened to me prattle on about all the wondrous miracles being bestowed on me, since Bill passed 10 months ago; I shouted my excitement about meeting Mary Magdalene (with a deep bow to you, VMB) expressing how much actual fun I’m having now, at this time of my current life: I’m content, happy, grateful for everything I have which I’ve known for a long time is enough. I want for no-thing. Well, maybe a hot romance with a Frenchman who will love me like only French men seem to know how…my SoulMate of 47 years being an exception, but actually may be responsible for what I deemed my discovery of my French heart, maybe 40 years ago when we learned he had two French sons: I LOVED having a French stepson, fell in love with France and the French appreciation for small homes, old spaces, culture, good food, good wine, 3-hour dinners…well, if you know you know…I fantasize packing up Jessie and myself and moving to the French countryside, small Gîte next to a bustling village where we walk daily to collect fresh produce for my dinner…
But I digress. After I passed on absolute “must-reads” to my friends…The Meaning of Mary Magdalene, St. Teresa of Avila’s castle, the Gospel of MM, yada, yada. I ended my sharing that I’m loving my seclusion, and relishing the luxury of spending my days seeking the next step in my Spiritual Journey. After I closed my ZOOM session of being on a high, I literally collapsed
Into a fatigue, was sad: I really am alone on this journey. People are interested and relieved to know how well I’m handling the most excruciating pain of loss and grief. I cried, and took a long nap, ordered groceries, played ball with Jessie. And felt so alone. Then I noticed all the plums I had rescued from the ground, and were healing and ripening on my counter top. I don’t bake so jam is not an option. I texted my meditation group and two friends raised their hands and said they’d take some. I put my precious manna from Heaven into bags, hopped in my car and delivered them: I told them to be sure to eat them leaning over the sink…they are so sweet and juicy.
I felt better, once again grounded in my fog and told Jessie we have each other (she’s a rescue who found us a month before Bill passed…she stays nearby at all times. She is an old soul and my Soul friend. I pray I can outlive her. She’s almost 5 and I’m 78. She deserves to cross the Rainbow Bridge before I do,
Thank you writing this teaching. I know it in my mind, but my body and fragile emotions not so much. One more time, I deeply appreciate you reaching out your hand, your words, your heart to this neophyte. I’m afraid I had hoped I could get a head start because I had observed and walked by the side of Bill as he spent 47 years on his spiritual journey. And that’s definitely true because I’ve been on my own journey since my early 20’s. Meeting MaryMagdalene is a game-changer. I just fell off my ladder yesterday…and today notice I am welcoming the fog…and actually comforted by it like a big warm blanket. One day at a time. ❤️🙏❤️😎🐶
Sandra, this was beautiful. Raw, grounded, funny, and real. That part about shouting your joy on Zoom, then collapsing into fatigue—that hit. Hard. That’s the rhythm nobody warns us about on the spiritual path. It’s not all upward motion. Sometimes it’s shouting “I’m free!” one minute and hugging your dog the next, wondering where everybody went.
And the plums? Literal grace. Not some metaphor. Just messy, ripe sweetness passed hand to hand, juice dripping down to remind you you're still here. Still connected.
You didn’t digress. You told the truth in the way it actually unfolds. Thanks for bringing all of it. No performance. Just presence.
I’ve been trying to understand why your feedback feels so precious…it’s more than kindness. YOU are telling the Truth, no performance, just presence. I have maybe 1, maybe 2, friends who will tell me the Truth. You are truly gifted in how you perceive, how you honor the truth, and then share it with us. Maybe you’re channeling Mary Magdalene. I just realized why meeting Mary has become so passionate for this day…I am parched for hearing Truth. I’ve come to think many don’t even know Truth anymore. Getting people to tell the truth in work settings was my mission. I feel as though Mary has lifted me above the current rough seas of lies and scams and heinous crimes on humanity, disrespect for Truth, ignoring rules of law agreed to so a society can manage itself for the betterment of all mankind. Not sure what Mary would say (please don’t tell me!)but I seriously considered withholding my money owed to the federal government, and instead give it to my governor. I chickened out. Still think it’s a good idea. 😁👍👍
Sandra, if you’re parched for truth, no wonder Mary feels like water. She’s the one who stood when the others ran, who named what was happening when everyone else hid behind doctrine.
That hunger you’re talking about, that’s not new. Every age buries the truth under the rubble of its own convenience. Every age needs people stubborn enough to dig it back out.
Awww🙏 This is wonderful and helps clarify that it’s okay to have conflict and just sit with it instead of fighting and worrying and being so hard on myself. And others. There is so much in our cultures whether religious, spiritual, social, physical or perhaps all together that can get to swirling in my brain - I lose sight of what the “goal” even is🤣
Lately I laugh a lot more - partly thanks to you VMB 😁 There just seems to be a lot of silliness around me and inside me.
Deconstructing from denominational assertions that perfection, whatever that is, is required to please God 😳 is often painful. Realizing that my existence pleases God just because I’m the one and only me 😌 sets me free to address the swirl. I can’t fail. I can grow, evolve, backslide - it’s all about the process of being human. And in my opinion, part of being is relaxing into becoming comfortable in my own skin instead of always trying to “transcend” my body. I’ve never understood why, if we really are created in God’s image, it is so important to escape our bodies. ??
Anyway, I love this piece. Lots and lots of food for thought. And another book to put on my list📚☺️
Too often, I ask myself when I will finally NOT feel like I'm in a state of transition. As I read your words, I think about it differently. I think, with gratitude, that I'm not stagnant. Transition is good. It's a sign of growth, and yes, it's like a spiral.
“I lost some time once. It’s always in the last place you look for it.” 😉
Thank you for this, O Monk! ✨
From many scenic turnouts I learn daily that *a* path – mine – not *the* path unfolds beneath my feet as I go. And I’m not to throw myself away in order to *arrive*.
I suppose when I was much younger I thought there was a destination. Now though, instead of annoying people by saying there’s no such thing as a destination, I could say, there’s ONLY destination… my dance around the still point is both journey and destination — both process AND product.
My educated guess is that it’s nigh onto impossible to sell to those content within the dominant culture that any sort of enlightenment is an destinationless life doing. Lifelong?? Oh, hell no!
…wearing my goofy cosmic surfer self at the moment. Later today I’ll likely be old crone grumbling about the dog barking, a neighbor’s lawnmower, and the predator politicians that pop culture loves and obeys.
Donna, if your goofy cosmic surfer self ever runs into my barefoot chaos monk, we’re gonna break the algorithm and probably confuse a few theologians.
“Destinationless life doing” is exactly the kind of phrase that makes people blink twice and look for the exit. They want the map, not the mystery. They want a QR code for bliss and a refund if it takes more than one podcast episode.
Thank you. You always add clarity but leave much to ponder.
I am reading Bourgeault's The Holy Trinity and the Law of Three. I separately came across The Mandelbrot Set, the fascinating forever expanding spiral. There are wonderful illustrations of the Set both as it occurs in nature and computer generated. Sometimes I do better visually.
Anyway, not trying to be obtuse, but your writing here feels like the third component.
Ofter it is not the large stuff that is reinforcing but the small.
Celia, this is beautiful. The Mandelbrot Set as a visual for the Law of Three makes a lot of sense. That spiral keeps showing up in places where change doesn’t follow a straight line. It deepens, circles back, and then suddenly something new appears.
Like fractals! I always imagine God as a fractal artist; plug in the constants, the variables, figure you want something like "Spheres! So many, this color, in that direction; wind it up, let it go, and see what happens! :D"
I've yet to see/hear/meet a fractal artist who wasn't pleasantly surprised, if not outright thrilled, at what the work actually turned out to be. :)
(Fun fact: the closest duplicate to an actual photo taken from a satellite of a coastline didn't come from people measuring it meter by meter, or centimeter by centimeter, but through approximating it using fractals. :D)
I'm not sure what it is, maybe the difference between "Western" and "Eastern" thought, but there's been a long history of the RISE!!! and FALL!!! of various empires, etc., and with "progress," it always HAS to be in a straight line going up, or else (maybe especially nowadays?). :-/ I like more natural philosophies; in nature, everything is cyclic, and I figure if you've got a cyclic outlook, even if you want to head upwards, if you're spiraling, even a fall isn't too far down...not like a Dramatic! FALL!!! that lasts for way too long. :-/
(I'm also a big fan of that silly song, "Tub Thumping" ["I get knocked down, but I get up again!"]... :D)
I love all of this. The vision of a spiral 🌀 is one of mystery and wonder. The fear of doing the inner work keeps many people away from the healing to move beyond the false narratives placed on us. Thank you for this writing ❤️
And, so, we beat upon the great cloud of unknowing. We want to get past the clouds but what I have learned, like Moses on the mountain top, is that what is beyond the clouds is too bright for us to manage with our measly eyes. Even Moses could only see G!d's back(side) and the glory was so great, he had to wear a veil over his face to not freak out his people.
I'll stay in the cloud with my feet plodding on the ground, a lamp at my feet.
Right on VMB/Alek, this is a truth that costs nearly everything to acquire, that I’m not ‘failing’ I’m expecting different than reality. Many years spent in recovery work and a recent foray into ACA work has taught me this one truth; I am exactly where I am supposed to be, else I’d be somewhere else. Thank you brother 💖
"She compares it to a boat’s hull speed. You can hoist all the sails you want, but if your vessel’s not built for it, you’ll capsize. Growth has to be digestible." What a great comparison. I got stuck at spiritual fog a bit earlier and it reminded me of when years ago I took my family sailing in our yacht(or more accurately, a dinghy with cabin, of doubtful temprament and voracious appetite for money) it was a beautiful day, everything was warm and clear, we were having a great time then almost instantly a bank of fog swallowed us, all sense of direction was lost, my daughter was concussed by the boom as we gybed unexpectedly, an element of panic appeared (hi, I'm panic, we meet again) and the waves breaking on the rocks appeared to be from all around us. Then the fog thinned a bit and we made it back to harbour, less confident and mildly traumatised. Yes, the spiritual life as a sailing metaphor, it works.
You just turned a metaphor into a full-blown parable and I’m here for it.
That sudden fog. The unexpected boom. The disorientation that doesn’t care how clear things used to be five minutes ago.
Yep. That’s the path.
Thanks for sailing it out loud.
In lots of perhaps pre-Christian (definitely pre-psychoanalysis :D) European stories (and others around the world? it seems to be a very universal human thing), a sudden fog or mist indicates you are now travelling in unexpected directions...when the fog clears, you will be somewhere else, often in some other type of existence (the Fae realms, the Underworld [hopefully only briefly! ;)], another dimension, etc.). When you travel again to get back home (often the long way round), you will be changed, hopefully for the better, but definitely wiser for the experience. :)
Nancy, yes. The fog isn’t just confusion. It’s initiation. You think you’re lost, but really you’ve crossed a threshold. Something old is dissolving and something else is forming, but you don’t get to see the blueprint. You just get mist, disorientation, and maybe a knock to the head from your own spiritual boom. By the time you make it back, you’re not the same. You’ve been re-mapped. The journey did what it came to do.
"You might understand your trauma, even forgive your abuser. But try telling your nervous system that when someone raises their voice.
Healing isn’t linear. It’s layered. And the body always gets the last word."
This is sooooo true. Great article and a recommended read for anyone confused as to why they struggle with spiritual growth.
Appreciate you, Bo. You’ve walked enough roads to know that truth isn’t always cognitive—sometimes it’s cellular.
Thanks for sharing the scroll.
You are most welcome. :-)
Dearest VMB, This opened my heart to understand my love of the labyrinth, particularly walking the Chartres Cathedral labyrinth. Marching in toward the center only to find myself circling way out to the edge, then close, then farther. Just keep walking. This is not a maze. There is no getting lost. Just follow the path. Release what is carried into the labyrinth. Suddenly realizing the path to the center is now. No. I’m not ready. Too soon. But the path leads where the path leads. Be present to Presence (that was there every step of the way.) Stay. Receive. Be still. Be present. Then carry forward back into the world with all the twists and turns. Then a moment of panic. Am I lost? Did I do this wrong? Others are passing me by! Is this making any sense? Follow the path. There are no mistakes when one foot is in front of the other. Breathe. Trust. What has been received has always been present within. Awaken. Go forth.
(You are such a gift. Thank you, VMB♥️)
This right here is a whole homily in bare feet.
The labyrinth doesn’t lie. It doesn’t rush. It doesn’t punish detours or reward speed.
It just asks. Will you stay present even when the center feels too soon?
Your reflection is sacred ground. Thank you for walking it with such tenderness.
Beautiful…and helpful. I’m getting to walk a Labyrinth…somehow your description gives meaning to the exercise. Thank you
A friend and I have a little thing we say to each other often - progress is better than perfect. Yes, we're coming back to old wounds with deeper understanding every time (if we're relatively clever and paying attention) and every crisis of faith, emotion, or fury is an opportunity to learn.
Yes to that. Perfection is a control fantasy. Progress, especially the messy looping kind, is where the real alchemy lives.
Appreciate you naming it so plainly, Alma.
“Your false self wants results. Your true self just wants you to sit down and shut up.” Oh, dear sweet kind wise truth-teller who must be an old soul…I can’t stop laughing hysterically. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 You SO NAILED ME! I won’t type the words I’m thinking, my Ego doesn’t want me to disavow your audience of the progress I’m making on a daily basis. My fog lifted for a beautiful 15 minutes yesterday. I had a really good fun check-in with my support group with 3 friends I’ve known 40 years. They have patiently listened to me prattle on about all the wondrous miracles being bestowed on me, since Bill passed 10 months ago; I shouted my excitement about meeting Mary Magdalene (with a deep bow to you, VMB) expressing how much actual fun I’m having now, at this time of my current life: I’m content, happy, grateful for everything I have which I’ve known for a long time is enough. I want for no-thing. Well, maybe a hot romance with a Frenchman who will love me like only French men seem to know how…my SoulMate of 47 years being an exception, but actually may be responsible for what I deemed my discovery of my French heart, maybe 40 years ago when we learned he had two French sons: I LOVED having a French stepson, fell in love with France and the French appreciation for small homes, old spaces, culture, good food, good wine, 3-hour dinners…well, if you know you know…I fantasize packing up Jessie and myself and moving to the French countryside, small Gîte next to a bustling village where we walk daily to collect fresh produce for my dinner…
But I digress. After I passed on absolute “must-reads” to my friends…The Meaning of Mary Magdalene, St. Teresa of Avila’s castle, the Gospel of MM, yada, yada. I ended my sharing that I’m loving my seclusion, and relishing the luxury of spending my days seeking the next step in my Spiritual Journey. After I closed my ZOOM session of being on a high, I literally collapsed
Into a fatigue, was sad: I really am alone on this journey. People are interested and relieved to know how well I’m handling the most excruciating pain of loss and grief. I cried, and took a long nap, ordered groceries, played ball with Jessie. And felt so alone. Then I noticed all the plums I had rescued from the ground, and were healing and ripening on my counter top. I don’t bake so jam is not an option. I texted my meditation group and two friends raised their hands and said they’d take some. I put my precious manna from Heaven into bags, hopped in my car and delivered them: I told them to be sure to eat them leaning over the sink…they are so sweet and juicy.
I felt better, once again grounded in my fog and told Jessie we have each other (she’s a rescue who found us a month before Bill passed…she stays nearby at all times. She is an old soul and my Soul friend. I pray I can outlive her. She’s almost 5 and I’m 78. She deserves to cross the Rainbow Bridge before I do,
Thank you writing this teaching. I know it in my mind, but my body and fragile emotions not so much. One more time, I deeply appreciate you reaching out your hand, your words, your heart to this neophyte. I’m afraid I had hoped I could get a head start because I had observed and walked by the side of Bill as he spent 47 years on his spiritual journey. And that’s definitely true because I’ve been on my own journey since my early 20’s. Meeting MaryMagdalene is a game-changer. I just fell off my ladder yesterday…and today notice I am welcoming the fog…and actually comforted by it like a big warm blanket. One day at a time. ❤️🙏❤️😎🐶
Sandra, this was beautiful. Raw, grounded, funny, and real. That part about shouting your joy on Zoom, then collapsing into fatigue—that hit. Hard. That’s the rhythm nobody warns us about on the spiritual path. It’s not all upward motion. Sometimes it’s shouting “I’m free!” one minute and hugging your dog the next, wondering where everybody went.
And the plums? Literal grace. Not some metaphor. Just messy, ripe sweetness passed hand to hand, juice dripping down to remind you you're still here. Still connected.
You didn’t digress. You told the truth in the way it actually unfolds. Thanks for bringing all of it. No performance. Just presence.
I’ve been trying to understand why your feedback feels so precious…it’s more than kindness. YOU are telling the Truth, no performance, just presence. I have maybe 1, maybe 2, friends who will tell me the Truth. You are truly gifted in how you perceive, how you honor the truth, and then share it with us. Maybe you’re channeling Mary Magdalene. I just realized why meeting Mary has become so passionate for this day…I am parched for hearing Truth. I’ve come to think many don’t even know Truth anymore. Getting people to tell the truth in work settings was my mission. I feel as though Mary has lifted me above the current rough seas of lies and scams and heinous crimes on humanity, disrespect for Truth, ignoring rules of law agreed to so a society can manage itself for the betterment of all mankind. Not sure what Mary would say (please don’t tell me!)but I seriously considered withholding my money owed to the federal government, and instead give it to my governor. I chickened out. Still think it’s a good idea. 😁👍👍
Sandra, if you’re parched for truth, no wonder Mary feels like water. She’s the one who stood when the others ran, who named what was happening when everyone else hid behind doctrine.
That hunger you’re talking about, that’s not new. Every age buries the truth under the rubble of its own convenience. Every age needs people stubborn enough to dig it back out.
You’ve already got the shovel.
Awww🙏 This is wonderful and helps clarify that it’s okay to have conflict and just sit with it instead of fighting and worrying and being so hard on myself. And others. There is so much in our cultures whether religious, spiritual, social, physical or perhaps all together that can get to swirling in my brain - I lose sight of what the “goal” even is🤣
Lately I laugh a lot more - partly thanks to you VMB 😁 There just seems to be a lot of silliness around me and inside me.
Deconstructing from denominational assertions that perfection, whatever that is, is required to please God 😳 is often painful. Realizing that my existence pleases God just because I’m the one and only me 😌 sets me free to address the swirl. I can’t fail. I can grow, evolve, backslide - it’s all about the process of being human. And in my opinion, part of being is relaxing into becoming comfortable in my own skin instead of always trying to “transcend” my body. I’ve never understood why, if we really are created in God’s image, it is so important to escape our bodies. ??
Anyway, I love this piece. Lots and lots of food for thought. And another book to put on my list📚☺️
You just blessed this scroll with more clarity and grace than most pulpits manage in a month.
Yes to the swirl. Yes to the silliness. Yes to dropping the perfection cosplay and letting our holy weirdness be enough.
And this: “if we really are created in God’s image, why the rush to escape our bodies?”—I want that tattooed on the inside of every theology degree.
You can’t fail. You can only unfold. Some days in spirals. Some days in sprawls. But you’re still on the altar.
🙏😁yes!
Too often, I ask myself when I will finally NOT feel like I'm in a state of transition. As I read your words, I think about it differently. I think, with gratitude, that I'm not stagnant. Transition is good. It's a sign of growth, and yes, it's like a spiral.
Yes, Dawn. If we’re honest, transition is the baseline. The still points are just brief mercies in the movement.
Grateful you’re letting the spiral shift the frame. That’s holy work.
“I lost some time once. It’s always in the last place you look for it.” 😉
Thank you for this, O Monk! ✨
From many scenic turnouts I learn daily that *a* path – mine – not *the* path unfolds beneath my feet as I go. And I’m not to throw myself away in order to *arrive*.
I suppose when I was much younger I thought there was a destination. Now though, instead of annoying people by saying there’s no such thing as a destination, I could say, there’s ONLY destination… my dance around the still point is both journey and destination — both process AND product.
My educated guess is that it’s nigh onto impossible to sell to those content within the dominant culture that any sort of enlightenment is an destinationless life doing. Lifelong?? Oh, hell no!
…wearing my goofy cosmic surfer self at the moment. Later today I’ll likely be old crone grumbling about the dog barking, a neighbor’s lawnmower, and the predator politicians that pop culture loves and obeys.
It’s all good. 🫶
Donna, if your goofy cosmic surfer self ever runs into my barefoot chaos monk, we’re gonna break the algorithm and probably confuse a few theologians.
“Destinationless life doing” is exactly the kind of phrase that makes people blink twice and look for the exit. They want the map, not the mystery. They want a QR code for bliss and a refund if it takes more than one podcast episode.
And perhaps one or two will blink twice and decide to stay.
Thank you. You always add clarity but leave much to ponder.
I am reading Bourgeault's The Holy Trinity and the Law of Three. I separately came across The Mandelbrot Set, the fascinating forever expanding spiral. There are wonderful illustrations of the Set both as it occurs in nature and computer generated. Sometimes I do better visually.
Anyway, not trying to be obtuse, but your writing here feels like the third component.
Ofter it is not the large stuff that is reinforcing but the small.
Blessings.
Celia, this is beautiful. The Mandelbrot Set as a visual for the Law of Three makes a lot of sense. That spiral keeps showing up in places where change doesn’t follow a straight line. It deepens, circles back, and then suddenly something new appears.
Like fractals! I always imagine God as a fractal artist; plug in the constants, the variables, figure you want something like "Spheres! So many, this color, in that direction; wind it up, let it go, and see what happens! :D"
I've yet to see/hear/meet a fractal artist who wasn't pleasantly surprised, if not outright thrilled, at what the work actually turned out to be. :)
(Fun fact: the closest duplicate to an actual photo taken from a satellite of a coastline didn't come from people measuring it meter by meter, or centimeter by centimeter, but through approximating it using fractals. :D)
What a gift to be told this, reminded of this, thank you! Circling deeper instead of climbing higher. Wow. And yes!
I'm not sure what it is, maybe the difference between "Western" and "Eastern" thought, but there's been a long history of the RISE!!! and FALL!!! of various empires, etc., and with "progress," it always HAS to be in a straight line going up, or else (maybe especially nowadays?). :-/ I like more natural philosophies; in nature, everything is cyclic, and I figure if you've got a cyclic outlook, even if you want to head upwards, if you're spiraling, even a fall isn't too far down...not like a Dramatic! FALL!!! that lasts for way too long. :-/
(I'm also a big fan of that silly song, "Tub Thumping" ["I get knocked down, but I get up again!"]... :D)
I love all of this. The vision of a spiral 🌀 is one of mystery and wonder. The fear of doing the inner work keeps many people away from the healing to move beyond the false narratives placed on us. Thank you for this writing ❤️
Thank you for reading and taking it in, Rev.
Glad the spiral spoke to you.
And, so, we beat upon the great cloud of unknowing. We want to get past the clouds but what I have learned, like Moses on the mountain top, is that what is beyond the clouds is too bright for us to manage with our measly eyes. Even Moses could only see G!d's back(side) and the glory was so great, he had to wear a veil over his face to not freak out his people.
I'll stay in the cloud with my feet plodding on the ground, a lamp at my feet.
Amen, Janee.
People out here begging for clarity when the cloud is the initiation.
You don’t get to sidestep the blur and skip straight to the glory.
Even Moses came down glowing like radioactive grief.
Give me the cloud.
Give me the fog and the veil and the trembling path lit by just enough.
That’s the holiness we survive.
Spectacular - thanks - big resonance.
Glad it landed, Bubba.
Thanks for riding the resonance wave with me.
Your essays nail it every time. You put words to my feelings and revelations. Loving your content. ❤️
Thank you, Vas. Honored to be part of your path, even in pixels.
Grateful you're here and walking it with heart.
Right on VMB/Alek, this is a truth that costs nearly everything to acquire, that I’m not ‘failing’ I’m expecting different than reality. Many years spent in recovery work and a recent foray into ACA work has taught me this one truth; I am exactly where I am supposed to be, else I’d be somewhere else. Thank you brother 💖
That’s it, Jim. Reality doesn’t need our approval. Just our willingness to stop wrestling and start receiving.
Grateful for your hard-won clarity, brother.
Thank you. This has been my own experience, too.