Tag Archives: Existence

Suffering

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My wife is a special educator.  She tells me stories about kids who are and will be, no matter how hard they work, miles and miles short of successful functioning in our society.  I hear about the amazing ways that she confronts them and engages them to draw out even the most basic responses to external stimuli – things like pointing to or grabbing a particular picture that indicates something they want or need, communication in its most elemental forms.  My mind spins off into the future for these little lives and I ache.  Something in me inclines toward discouragement.

According to Wikipedia, 230,000 people died, in 2004, in the Indian Ocean Tsunami (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_earthquake_and_tsunami), triggered by an undersea megathrust off the west coast of Sumatra.  The millions that survived carry the soul etching memory of terror, and the loss of loved ones, places and ways of life that were wrenched irrevocably out of their being.  Even from a distance, the collective soul of the earth feels and bears the rip, the wound and the scar.

The Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University (see http://costsofwar.org/article/afghan-civilians) estimated, in February 2013, that between 16,700 and 19,000 civilians have died in Afghanistan as direct or indirect casualties of Operation Enduring Freedom.  iCasualties counts 3383 deaths of coalition troops since the war started in 2001 (http://icasualties.org/oef/), not to mention the traumatic head injuries, loss of limbs and suffering of families of the injured.

Life as we observe it and experience it is full of suffering, whether natural, psychological or of our own making.  And it is so for the observer and survivor just as it is for the victim. 

The Sanskrit term dukkha captures this completely.  The Wikipedia article on dukkha (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dukkha) explains it in three categories:

  • The obvious physical and mental suffering associated with birth, growing old, illness and dying.
  • The anxiety or stress of trying to hold onto things that are constantly changing.
  • A basic unsatisfactoriness pervading all forms of existence, due to the fact that all forms of life are changing, impermanent and without any inner core or substance. On this level, the term indicates a lack of satisfaction, a sense that things never measure up to our expectations or standards.

When we choose to stay stuck under the metaphorical Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, life is indeed dukkha.  We see everything through a lens of a battle to eliminate the pain of our current existence, even to the point of killing others and increasing pain because we think somehow our own security will be enhanced and our dukkha decreased.  In reality, we just pile it higher and deeper.

I have a friend, Vern Rempel, who postscripts his emails with these words of his:  “The code of the universe is written in beauty.” The Buddha said:  “I have taught one thing and one thing only, dukkha and the cessation of dukkha.”  Somehow I think these two assertions are headed in the same direction.

We cannot judge the pain of temporal existence any more than we can judge – as good, bad or indifferent – the unfolding of our universe and the emergence of life itself.  It is.  It is, it is, it is.  To say “it is” is not indifference, but rather acceptance of and wonder at the mysterious whole and trajectory of creation.

The cessation of dukkha is no more nor less than the choice to live under the Tree of Life.  It is, I believe, a more complete nirvana, and the essence of the Greek term metanoia, translated in the Christian Bible as repentance.  That word has become heavy laden with the trappings of a religion of judgment.  More accurately, it simply means to change, or to turn away from.

When we turn away from our judging and fearful view of life under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, we find ourselves, simply, under the Tree of Life.  We repent of dukkha.  We let go of, we turn way from our limited and temporal view of suffering and we engage fully in the ongoing act, the revelation/evolution of creation.

We, in our evolutionary state, have been given at least the level of awareness that comes with observation.  And we have been gifted as well with the ability to judge what we observe.  We also have the ability to choose our response.

We can willfully try to manipulate life and the world around us, desperately seeking to avoid what we perceive as dukkha.  When we do this, we only create more.

Or we can willingly accept and participate in the beautiful and staggeringly powerful onslaught of creation, sharing compassion, soaking in the beauty and mystery, acting in the creative initiative of God/Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source.

There is a tremendous ache, the ache of birth, in the act of creation.  We are part of it.  The birth, the code of that ache, is the handwriting of the universe.  The child of it all, the child of us all when we participate in and do not fight the unfolding, is beauty beyond words and saying.

Come, turn, breathe, care, steward and create.  Live under the Tree of Life.

© Two Trees in the Garden.  Share as you please.  Mention the source.

Environmentalism and the Two Trees

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In some big way, the Earth is the tree in our garden.  Going back to the C.S. Lewis view of the garden of creation in the Narnia books (Two Trees in the Garden, “The Fruit of Our Heart’s Desire”, July 26, 2013), our two trees – the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life – are really the same tree.  The difference is in how we approach the tree and our use of the fruit we take away.

The Earth is the giving tree of creation.  It is full of fruit.  We choose, each day of our lives, which tree we will make it.

When we view the Earth from our perspective under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, we view it through a lens of scarcity.  Whatever the Earth might provide us, there is never enough.  The natural response is to grab, to grasp, to hoard and to engage in glutinous consumption.  The consequences of that view are apparent.  There is a rapidly increasing gap between the haves and the have-nots in the United States, the wealthiest nation on Earth. (A recent president referred, with some chilling sarcasm, to “the haves and the have-mores”, blatantly celebrating the disparity.)  Resources are gathered and consumed without regard to the social or environmental cost.  And, ultimately, this gathering and hoarding is protected with violence and the cost of life.  War after war has been waged in the name of some lofty principle or other that masks the underlying defense of access to natural resources and the associated wealth.

We can swing our environmentalist, social justice and peacenik bats as fast and furiously as we like.  Certainly we must take positions of clarity on this issue.  Ultimately, this is a spiritual problem and needs to be addressed at that level.  We should be neither blind to nor distracted by the possible consequences.

Jesus, Gandhi and King are exemplary here.  Certainly there are others, but these we know in the West, the United States in particular.  In our objection to greed and abuse of power, we should never overlook the obligation and compassion of call to the one lost under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

Jesus’s call to Zacchaeus, whose greed and fear were expressed in the abuses available to the tax collector, is a clear and simple picture.  There was some spark for Zacchaeus, at least enough curiosity to cause him to climb the tree so that he could see Jesus.  Jesus called him out.  He confronted him with compassion.  Zacchaeus changed his behavior.

Under the Tree of Life, our response to greed and fear must be the call of compassion, a call that cares for the perpetrator lost in self-centered fear and greed while at the same time fending for, protecting and improving the lot for the victims of the perpetrator.

We should never delude ourselves about the grip of power and wealth.  The human heart lost in that grip will resort to killing and devastation of anything to avoid freedom from and relinquishment of those false protections.  But neither should we be deterred or dismayed.

If we save the world from devastation through violence, we have saved nothing.  We have only lost ourselves to our own isolation under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

There are no guarantees of success in the short-term.  We could lose the Earth to the violence and environmental degradation caused by those who are themselves lost in the grip of plunder, convinced that comfort and ease in this particular life will somehow protect them from bodily demise.  And we could easily die, as so many others have, standing in the way and making the compassionate call to view the Earth as our shared Tree of Life, with enough for all, and with a vision that is longer, broader and deeper than our current incarnation in the here and now.

In fact, there are no guarantees of success in the long-term, either.  There is only a choice of faith:

  • faith that the choice to live under the Tree of Life is the ultimate path of spiritual progress
  • faith that sets aside both hatred and fear
  • faith that expresses compassion and stewardship in ways that transcend our necessarily limited physical view and understanding of the world around us

I am neither a pessimist nor an optimist about the future of our planet.  It is a beautiful gift, one that calls for nurture, restoration and compassionate stewardship that seeks the good of all.  We choose what tree it will be – a nourishing Tree of Life or a depleted and exhausted Tree of the Know ledge of Good and Evil.

What I am convinced of, deeply, is the challenge and importance of our choices, personally and collectively.  My spirit rises to the call of the Tree of Life:

  • the call to steward, to stand, to confront and to call with compassion and welcome
  • the call to take the bullet or to be nailed to the tree when a frozen heart is convinced that our death will clear the path for the temporary safety of wealth and power
  • the call to rise up again – and again and again – to rise up again and to live in the home of love under the Tree of Life.

There is no end.  There is nothing to fear.

© Two Trees in the Garden.  Take what is useful.  Share it.  Mention where you found it.

Spiritual but not Religious

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In the past few years I have heard people describe themselves, and have sometimes described myself, as spiritual but not religious.  The label begs definition.  I guess, on a very simple and literal level, it means having a sense of larger connection to something we might call spirit that envigorates, guides and, in truth, is us, but having checked out of, or never been part of, institutional religious expression of a particular faith.

I have admired that position, at least insofar as it represents a bravery about rejecting or not being actively concerned with blind dogma and positions that separate rather than unite humanity – demands that people say this or that and assurances that if you follow the particular company line, heaven is just around the corner.

But there is, at least for me, something significant lost in that position, as well.  What is lost is the sense of belonging, of being part of a close-knit community of commitment.

Every fall, just after Labor Day, the community of Estes Park hosts the Long’s Peak Scottish Irish Festival.  There are bands and dance competitions, jousting, and real cannon firing bowling balls to try to sink an inflatable plastic dragon in Lake Estes.

And there is a parade.  It features, I think, just about the biggest collection of pipe and drum corps in the nation.  And it features clan after clan marching in alphabetical order, families in their tartans and kilts, marching proudly and happily together behind their particular plaid.  I have to admit there is something that grabs me at the root and brings tears to my eyes as I see them march by – little children, old men and women, their little Scottish terriers all decked out, heading to no war, setting aside their own squabbles and differences for a day of being part of something that reaches way back and commits to going forward, reveling in pure belonging.  I can’t help it.  Tears just run down my face.

I don’t know how long it has been true, but it is true now that something very special has happened in those ranks.  Yes, there are tall lordly Scotsmen – some kind of purebred marked by a particular demeanor and full white moustache – and strong women capable of cutting down forests with only a few strokes of the axe.  But there are also, in the clans, marching with all the same pride, people of Asian or African descent, fully Scottish just because they have married into the clan and everybody says so.

There is nothing inherently bad about religions.  They are just the tools we make them.  And there is value and meaning in belonging – in a commitment to community that says, come hell or high water (or, as we have in Estes this week, the hell of high water), and regardless of our petty differences, we are one.  We will stick together and care for one another and we will take pride in and celebrate our values and commitments.

There is nothing inherently bad in this, so long as there is a significant grain of salt in all our sacraments.  Strength comes in offering and welcoming, in serving and caring.  The stories we tell and the lessons we teach are nothing if they don’t result in true humility and compassion.  We may display our colors with pride, so long as the door is open and says come in if you like.  And so long as we know our door is just one of many on the street.

At the end of the day, we may take off our clothing, grateful that it has protected us and provided a vehicle and context for our service.  But that is all it is, a bit of pretty decoration for a body that is no different, or better or worse than the one inhabited by each of our global and religious – or not – neighbors.

And our religious families are wasted and nothing if they are not chiefly a magnification of service and welcome at the level of community, rather than just the individual.

Spiritual but not religious is, I believe, a wonderful position that sheds, appropriately, the strictures when community has lost its way, more concerned about the clothing than the body, wrapped up in pomp, power and appearances.  It is a sign of prophetic rejection of all that is hollow and false.

But it is also lonely.  Grant us community, a family that makes us part of something broader and stronger, that accomplishes so much more than we are able on our own.  And gift us, Great Spirit, Breath of Life, the vision that whatever our community, we are always part of a larger family still, a family that flourishes on strong humility and confident sharing, founded on a bedrock of compassionate service.

Make us one, be us one, under the Tree of Life.

© Two Trees in the Garden.  If you like it, share it.  Kindly note the source

The Day of Non-Judgment

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Check yourself when you wake up in the morning.  What’s that first feeling inside?  Is it angst about the things you have to do?  It might be worry about meeting with certain people or concern about the pile of unfinished tasks that lies ahead.  Or maybe it is relief that this is a day off, or excitement about an especially anticipated event – a birthday or the beginning of a long awaited journey.

Whatever the feeling, it is almost certainly one of prejudice – pre-judgment.  We are pretty sure that things will be this way or that way.  And we have pretty much decided that this way is good or that way is bad.

I am not an advocate of positive thinking, of trying to manipulate actions and outcomes by painting them bright yellow and giving them a spin to the left or to the right.  Positive thinking is only what it is – a veneer we try to paste on our muddy core of judgment.

Nor am I an advocate of denial of feelings.  Feelings are simply the natural reactions to reality as it is perceived and experienced by small “m” me, the me I discovered when I awoke to my surroundings under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  The very name of the tree implies exactly what it is – the tree of judgment.

Waking up under that tree, we believe that our life task is to sort our pile of baby blocks just as quickly and effectively as we can.  This block is good . . . It goes in this pile.  This block is bad . . . It goes in that pile over there and I hope I can figure out a way to trash it so it never comes back.  And, oh my goodness, worst of all, I can’t decide about this one.  What will it become?  How do I know?  What should I do with it?  What will it do to me?

I think I will bury the feelings, maybe over here under positive thinking, so I don’t have to feel this way anymore.  Shit!  That didn’t work either!  And now I am late for my meeting!

Chill, baby “m”.  Let “Me” (big “S” Self) hold you and tell you that we are here together.  And we are not, as you believe, under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  We are under the Tree of Life.

We are not our feelings.  We just experience them.  And our true response comes from the source of everything we need – the fruit of the Tree of Life and the living water of the river by which it is planted – the gifts of Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source – our essence, breath and true being.

The essence of that water is love.  It nourishes the sustaining fruits of the tree, which are peace, true joy, patience and compassion.  Whether baby “we” know it or not, that is what we truly seek.  And when we open the eyes of our Spirit, on any given morning, we know that we have exactly what we need.  And we can offer it to our small “s” selves.  We can live it in all of our actions, in the touch of all whom we encounter.

Let’s hold that little fearful self for a moment to calm its terror about the day.  Let’s sit with it in joy and help it to let go of the angst that the things we have judged to be good might not work out.  We can tell it that all is well, that we can choose to be and to act, in each moment of each day, without judgment.  We can choose to be and to act as our true Self, the one that is fed and cared for – by and one with C/S/M/S – under the Tree of Life.

The practice of stillness, at one with the action of willingness, creates the doorway to non-judgment.  It is the practice of being the center of the spinning wheel – completely at rest and fully in motion.

Our focus and activity, in each moment and without judgment, is to drink the living water, which makes it possible for us to be the very fruit of the Tree of Life.  We offer this nourishing fruit, we offer Ourselves, in each moment and in each action.  We offer it first to the little one, the little self, crying in our arms.  We offer it to redeem and to transform the false vision of all who find themselves anxious and unhappy under the tree of judgment, the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

A peach, for you and for me, together, under the Tree of Life.

© Two Trees in the Garden.  Feel free to quote as useful, with appropriate reference.

Deep Wounds, Pure Hearts

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About ten years ago I heard a bright young praise band at a church singing a love song imploring Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source (C/S/M/S) to “Break me, Lord.” I am sixty-one. I, and likely you, have been broken. At the time, I was pretty much shattered – not by the music, but by the events of my life. I actually felt anger as I listened to the song, and after the service I felt compelled, firmly, to address the unsuspecting singer. I looked the poor girl straight in the eye and said, “Don’t you ever ask God to break you. You will, indeed, be broken, whether you ask for it or not. And when that happens, you just pray your heart out that you live through it.”

Who knows, she had probably already been broken. She certainly did not deserve my hurt projection. I hope that she has forgiven me and, perhaps, that she even found, sometime or other, something useful in the experience.

We speak of a broken heart. But somehow I don’t think it is our hearts, really, that get broken. Our hearts are only found. And generally that takes some heavy duty cracking of shells and some serious excavation.

We get what we seek from our tree in the garden. Stuck in our perception of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, we get a calcified hardness. Wounded as children and watching so much of life and relationship in the world around us, we paint ourselves with layer after layer of lies. Year after year, layer after layer, we build up our defense.

Mostly we try to create an image, a projection of something. Like Alice, we may make our images bigger or smaller. We may give the appearance of hardness, of knowing, of being aloof. We may project power, weakness or defense. We may paint ourselves servile or happy or the color of pity. We bake our colors on with fear, anger or greed.

And after a while, we actually begin to believe in what we have created – to believe, in fact, that we are what we have created. Our belief becomes the motor and wheels that move our bigger than life image around under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

We meet and confront other images. We create alliances and do battle. We bully and jockey for position, seeking protection through both defense and offense, wheeling around in our armor, busy being the thing we have made of ourselves.

Sometime, some place, our illusion is shattered. The bigger we become, of course, the harder we fall. Hitler, Qaddafi, the various empires that have come and gone, Elvis – any one of us, or any communal collection of us, can only push this thing so far.

Let’s bring it home. Whether it is in a violent, surprising or dull demise, whatever it is we have created comes to its end, at some point, under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. We die, and while we may have done some damage, the illusion we have created is gone. The shells fall away and turn to dust.

Our shell is shattered in the relational, institutional and political pile ups we engineer on the autobahn we have built around the base of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. If we are fortunate enough to walk away from the wreckage with breath and years ahead of us, we have a choice. It’s the same choice, of course, we had before we painted on the layers. It is the choice between willingness and willfulness, the choice between experiencing the giving tree in our garden as the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil or the Tree of Life.

Our hearts are not broken. It is only our shells that shatter. Our hearts are pure and supple and everlasting. Gandhi, Jesus, Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa all knew this. To the extent that they were able to set aside ego and fear, they expressed their true selves, their pure hearts. They chose the fruit of the Tree of Life.

None can avoid the end, or protect themselves from the hazards of mingling with all in this life. The little hard-shelled knights with their wheels and motors of fear and greed shot Gandhi and King to get them off the road. Jesus got nailed to a tree. Mother Teresa, well, I think she pretty much died every day she went to work.

But when we are open, when we are open and willing, we stop painting on the layers, and the layers get stripped away, and away, and away. They crinkle, break and roll off. They peel and are rinsed until all that is left is our heart, the one we were given from the start. All that is left is the undefended. All that is left is kindness, regard and compassion. All that is left is true creativity, a creativity that gives and receives, rather than forces and grasps.

All that is left is what always is, the heart and breath of C/S/M/S that we truly are, under the Tree of Life.

© Two Trees in the Garden. Quote as useful. Please reference the source.

Scientism and The Tree of Life

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My son John called a few months back to tell me that he had spoken with my father.  That’s a sweet and common thing, right, for a child to speak with a grandparent?  And it was especially nice that he bothered to tell me.   The thing is, Dad died suddenly more than 27 years ago.  We adopted John, then just under three years of age, 26 years ago.  John never met Dad on this plane.  He just gets these kinds of visits.

There was no life-changing message in the conversation, at least yet revealed.  Mostly it contained well-wishes for all of Dad’s descendants, with a heartfelt sentiment about how much he loved them and was proud of each of them.  John received a distinct sense of each, including far-flung infant first cousins once removed that he truly did not even know.

There were other uniquely identifying memories in the exchange, a particular car, for instance, that Dad talked about.  John described it to me in detail, a car I had no photos of and would never have had reason to mention to my son.  I knew immediately which car it was and found a photo of one just like it on the Internet and sent it to John.  He recognized it with certainty as the car Dad was talking about.

And my Grandma Schertz was pushing some kind of greeting through in the background, too.  She would have done that, while she was busy busy minding her plants.

I am probably thinking about this today because my good friend Ki Johnson sent me Eben Alexander’s wonderful book, Proof of Heaven, last week.  If you are not familiar with it, Alexander is a neurosurgeon who experienced an extended and particularly deep NDE (near death experience) in 2008, an experience that has changed the course of his life and expanded his view of science and spirituality.

We have become, over the past four hundred years, so enamored with science that we have created a new religion, scientism.  Perhaps nothing in the world has greater allure and power to hold us under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and to blind us from the fullness of the Tree of Life.  Scientism would certainly dismiss or rationalize in some material way my son’s experience.

There is, of course, so much to be grateful for in the scientific method and its fruits.  In addition to the amazing advances in medicine, transportation, communications, daily comforts and understandings of the physical universe, there has been the very valuable checkmate of the abuses of religious dogma and the crushing power of the super-institutionalized church.

But scientism is no different than its religionist adversary.  Scientism turns an essentially useful tool into an abusive force when it claims ultimate and exclusive truth.  Scientism says that if science has not seen it, touched it or named it, it does not exist.  Scientism becomes especially queasy, if not downright dogmatic and fundamentalist, when spirituality enters the room.

Science, itself, in an interesting turn of events, may be approaching spirituality.  Or at least a perhaps necessary but over-exuberant burst of human pride at the discoveries and advances of the scientific method may be coming to a more balanced and humble correction.  We have been presented with the observations of astronauts as they view the earth from space, the photos of galaxies from the Hubble telescope, and, in another direction entirely, the almost infinite tininess of the Higgs boson.  And we learn that rocks and trees and skies and seas are all made of the same stuff – the tiniest of particles whirling and attaching in relationship with mostly space in between – just like the universe – just like us, the most sentient of beings on our speck of a planet.

And, of course, Hinduism, perhaps the oldest of the major religions, can point back to its roots and say “I told you so.”  Its philosophical underpinnings and observations of its sages reflect the kind of unitive creative force and energy to which physics now also points.

So as we consider our own spiritual path, what are the implications?

  • We begin to experience our old concept of God more as Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source than as an image of us, a human form, who lives and rules from somewhere in a direction that we have arbitrarily chosen to label up.
  • C/S/M/S is no less real or personal.  In fact, just the opposite.  C/S/M/S is in and through all of that creative space and energy, the stuff that you and I and everything are made of.
  • The immanence and transcendence of C/S/M/S begin to seem more like the realities of the physical universe and less like theories for discussion.   In fact the distinctions between physical and spiritual, immanence and transcendence, begin to blur, if not disappear altogether.
  • Our role clarifies.  Somehow, because we have been granted the gift of consciousness (insofar as we can say what that is and that we possess it in some unique and special way), we have both the power and the responsibility of co-creation, of participating in our own way in the ongoing act of creation and its care.  That is perhaps the most distinguishing characteristic of being in the image of C/S/M/S.

Scientism and religionism duke it out in a futile and unending struggle of ego under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  Science, the observation of what is, and spirituality, the willingness to be, rest and act comfortably in each other’s presence, without judgment, under the Tree of Life.  Let’s be there.

© Two Trees in the Garden.  Quote as useful.  Please reference the source.

I Believe

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Two Trees in the Garden grows out of more than sixty years of experience in Christian community, with a steadily growing awareness and restlessness about the boundaries and limitations of that experience and particular discomfort with the dominant narrative of creation, fall and atoning sacrifice.  Twenty-some years of study and reflection across the scriptures and religious traditions of the world, carried out in the context of a constant, simple breath prayer (“Thy will be done.”), have led me to the following working statement of faith, the themes of which are expressed in the weekly blog:

  •  I believe in Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source (C/S/M/S) – immanent, transcendent, omnipotent, omnipresent, love, essence, ground of our being and so much more, beyond all language, in whom/which we live and move and have our being.  I grew up with the name God, but choose in general not to use it in this writing because it seems especially important in these times to break out of the cultural trappings surrounding that name.  Names of any sort speak only to the limitations of our gift of language and intellect and fall inconceivably short of the reality.  Most succinctly: C/S/M/S is; C/S/M/S is love; love is.
  • I believe we are expressions of prana, the Sanskrit term for life essence breathed by C/S/M/S.  We are created in the image, like Jesus, like the Buddha, like Aunt Susie and every other Child of C/S/M/S who has walked the Earth.  We are enlivened by the breath of life.
  • I believe in basic free will choice.  When prana enlivens a body, we gain awareness, including awareness of our temporal limitations.  This body needs resources to live.  This body is born and dies.  We can choose the isolation and limitation of our bodies (the choice of ego), which results in fear and its countless expressions in efforts to possess and to control, coupled with its rage when those efforts are thwarted, as they ultimately are.  We can also choose our higher Self, the fruit of which is confidence and rest in the eternal and enlivening C/S/M/S essence which both pervades and transcends all things temporal.  Our life is the journey of that choice, with consistent results, individually and as societies.  We grow to the extent that we learn from our choices, moving toward Self and away from ego.
  • I believe that revealed scripture –whether Judeo-Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, Mormon, Islamic or other – is inspired.  It is full of Truth.  This Truth is filtered and interpreted over and over: by the person to whom it was revealed; by the scribe; by the translator; by the reader; by the listener; and by the responder who turns it into human action.  When the human interactor is aligned and free in Spirit, the truth of scripture is revealed and results in acts of creative beauty, kindness, healing and compassion.  When the human interactor is aligned with ego and fear, scripture is twisted and misused.
  • I believe there are no closed canons of scripture.  My friends Jeff Gundy and JD Martin write scripture – the expressions of their C/S/M/S essence – in poetry and song.  Georgia O’Keefe painted it and a million voices sing it in every instant.  Scripture is the very essence of our created hearts, yours and mine.  Time and historic comings and goings do not begin or end the Word, nor do the sacred and secular labels that we apply to justify our egotistical judgments.  An open and willing heart is an open canon.
  • I believe that historic scripture is a useful record of the human experience with C/S/M/S, subject to the limitations of vision and experience for the writer, requiring and welcoming constant conversation, evaluation and fresh revelation in the context of the present experience and expression of C/S/M/S in our hearts and being.
  • I believe that religions of any label — Pagan, Christian, Buddhist, Jain, Hindu, Islamic and hundreds more, past, present and future – are neither more nor less than our corporate (communal) expression of the maturity of our understanding and expression of C/S/M/S.  A powerful social tool, religion holds the potential for the communal expression of an open and willing heart, with hands, feet and voices of compassion, healing, welcome and stewardship.  It holds the same potential for chasing useless sacrifice, empowering hierarchical mediators of the sacred and profane, instituting rules of obligation and shame, and justifying hatred and violence of all kinds.  Either way, we choose, engaging and using the tool under our own gifted power.
  • I believe that worship means to be engaged, individually and corporately, in the creative activity of C/S/M/S.  It is to be engaged in joy, beauty, healing, compassion, curiosity and creation.  It has nothing to do with noises of adoration separated from these acts of creation, especially when these sounds and acts are engaged primarily for self-indulgence or a hope of gaining points for access to an eternity to which we already belong and of which we already partake.  As with so many of our religious terms, we do well to let go of the baggage laden worship label and engage in being the true article, our essence, that for which we are created.
  • I believe in life everlasting – that prana, as the metaphorical out breath and in breath of C/S/M/S, never changes as it enters and leaves any particular body or temporal expression.  We – our spirits – are part of that breath, enlivening and departing the bodies we inhabit.  While some report direct awareness of lives before and beyond the one we experience in any given present, I have yet to possess, and do not strive for, that particular gift or awareness.   Yet I trust that, to the extent we are open and willing, we are always (before, in and beyond time) growing, learning in grace and love, with deeper and deeper Self-awareness, which is to say, experience of our C/S/M/S essence.

Who knows where that may take us.  I love our journey.

© Two Trees in the Garden.  Feel free to quote, as useful, with proper reference.

Deteng, Baby, Deteng!

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I keep talking here about letting go, relinquishing attachment.  You might get the impression that I am advocating the life of a hermit or an ascetic.  Not at all, not at all.  In fact today let’s talk about engagement, true action, the kind of action that happens without grasping, without attachment to outcomes.  Perhaps there is a good word in English for this.  Since I have not found it, I have invented one – deteng, or short for detached engagement.

What we seek to relinquish is not action, but the grasping at hopes or the shrinking from fears about outcomes of our actions.  These things, in fact, obstruct pure action in life and destroy the beauty and benefit of true living experience.

Take the moment I am in at present.  I have committed, right now, to write this week’s blog entry.  It is very tempting to worry about what the little readership graph on my blog administration site will look like tomorrow.  Will there have been more viewers than last week?  Any comments?  What will you think of me after you have read this, if you have read this – if anything at all?   This represents the attachment of desire.

And sometime soon I really should build up the email list to expand distribution of the blog.  I could be distracted by that thought, which feels like work, a chore.  I don’t want to be bothered, which is the attachment of aversion to action.

In either case, desire or aversion, I am distracted by my attachment to outcomes.  I want to have, or to avoid, a certain result, and that becomes my obsession.  And In either case, I compromise the fullness of current action, which is to sit in the recliner with my laptop, writing exactly what I am able to write, without concern that it will not be complete or enough, in the time that I have at present.  Deteng.  I am doing what is before me.  I am relaxed in spirit.  I am fully and completely doing what I am doing.  I am at peace.  Deteng.

I believe that the best result of my action, my writing in this case, always happens when I have “given up” on outcomes and have gifted and immersed myself and you, to the extent that I am able, in Spirit, before, during and after the process.

How do I do that?  Very simply.  Call it prayer, call it meditation, call it relinquishment.  I engage in the act of bringing you to mind in the all-encompassing presence of Spirit before I write, and I pray the prayer I pray throughout every day – “Thy (Spirit’s) will be done.”  I breathe Spirit into me – Thy will – Spirit’s will.  I release Spirit to you – be done.  This is for you.  It is through me.  It is of Spirit.  It is interactive.  It is one.  It is just us together, at one, in the breath of Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source.

The more I am mindful of that before I write, the more fully I am engaged and at ease in the act of writing.  And the more open and engaged you are with Spirit as you read, the more complete, blessed and useful the outcome is for all.

The same is true for us in every action.  Life in Spirit is not about inaction.  It is about moving in Spirit.  I encourage you, if the language or some form of it works for you, to practice this before every action, before every interaction; to ground yourself in Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source by bringing the action and its intended recipient to mind.  Hold them in heart and mind.  Breathe in, “Thy will.”  Breathe out, “be done.”  Bless them, experience being blessed together.

And then act, in complete trust, with full engagement in your action – so much engagement that there is no room for worry about results or outcome.  Trust that you are in Spirit, in the flow and beauty and power of the universe.  So is your action.  And if they choose to be, so is your recipient.  Nothing could be better.  Nothing carries more health, peace power or goodness.  Nothing could possibly require less worry.  Nothing will ever find us more at home under the Tree of life.

Deteng, baby.  Deteng.  Will will be done.

Scripture today is from the Fifth Teaching, Renunciation of Action, of The Bhagavad-Gita:

A person who relinquishes attachment
and dedicates actions to the infinite spirit
is not stained by evil,
like a lotus leaf unstained by water.

Relinquishing attachment,
people of discipline perform action
with body, mind, understanding, and senses
for the purification of the self.

Relinquishing the fruit of action,
the disciplined person attains perfect peace;
the undisciplined person is in bondage,
attached to the fruit of their desire.

© Two Trees in the Garden.  Feel free to use, referencing the source, if you find it helpful.

For Shouldness Sake

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Many of us grew up with the notion of God and God’s religion – which was God’s complicated way of getting to us – as  being a big list of shoulds and should nots.  All of this, of course, had nothing at all to do with the intentions of Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source in the establishment of our being.  Nevertheless, I look back on a good bit of my life and realize that I could have been a lead character in a blockbuster children’s book, The Little Engine That Should.

It all started right there under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, where we learned that long long list, and the certain knowledge that we would never be good enough to stay in the garden because there was no way that we could ever possibly be all that we should be.

Should, in its very essence, is an endless chase that lasts beyond any concept of exhaustion.  Because any time we should be doing something, we are either:

  1. not doing it, which is totally unsatisfactory and fraught with guilt; or
  2. doing it because, well, we should – an External Motivator, which, chances are, leaves us perpetually falling a little short of full expectation.  Duck and run, here comes the big Unsatisfactory Rubber Stamp again.

Questions of should also lead to endless and useless discussions of how much and how often.  These questions imply giving up things in a zero sum game where, if we give what we should be giving (a tithe, for instance), we will have less of what we had.  If we do have more, it will, of course, be only because that External Source has rewarded us in some way for our good/should behavior.

Or we go to this meeting or belong to this church or that organization because we should.  Then we must attend x number of times per month or, once again, we are not measuring up for the Shouldness Judge.  Not to mention the time and energy wasted on worrying about this stuff.

And then there are the opportunities for humans to dress up like little Shouldness princes, princesses, priests and judges, casting shouldness spells on their scared and foolish but quite willing little subjects who pay exorbitant sums for the privilege of running around, all in a dither.

Ah, sweet life of our little ego creation under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  Krishnamurti said it so well:  “You might as well put a piece of stick you have picked up in the garden on the mantelpiece and give it a flower every day.  In a month you will be worshiping it and not to put the flower in front of it will become a sin.”

True creation is the flower, friends, and it is us.  Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source the Universe – that, who, what, beyond concept and language, whether noun or verb – Creator/Spirit/Mind/Source breathed the flower and breathed us, too.  There is no should under the Tree of Life.  There is only being.  And the essence of that being is both noun and verb.  It is the will and the willing to trust, to love, to appreciate, to give and to receive, all in the in and out breath of kindness and compassion.  These are action and stillness, a complete fullness, all in one.

There is no obligation, there is only essence.  There is no bondage, only freedom.  There is no shortage, no need for hoarding, only and always enough.

The one by Galilee got it so right:  “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these.”  And what did we do under the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil?  The usual thing, of course.  The shouldness thing.

We put him on a stick on the mantel and started to worship him.

Oh my shouldness.  Oh my shouldness.

© Two Trees in the Garden.  Feel free to use this stuff, referencing the source, if you find it helpful.