My time spent at Yellowstone helped boost my meditation practice . . .

This past weekend, I found that the magical, ethereal atmosphere of Yellowstone served to stimulate my meditation practice in a very evocative way. For just as the steam, mist and unearthly colors made me feel like I was inhabiting another world, so Wilderness Insight Meditation helps me see that every thought, perception and emotion is - as it were - arising from some other world, like an echo resounding throughout eternity with no original Sound ever present! Viewed through the filter of meditation, EVERY moment is therefore a Yellowstone moment! :)

Photos: Yellowstone National Park, WY, September 5, 2015

At best our so-called sacred sites are like side chapels that need to open onto the living sanctuary of the universe.

"In New Harmony, Indiana, there is a modern place of prayer that is called the Roofless Church. It has four defining walls, but there is no roof, and it sits open to the elements . . . Wherever our sacred sites are, we must ensure that the language we use, the rituals we celebrate, and the symbols we employ keep pointing to the great living cathedral of earth, sea, and sky. At best our so-called sacred sites are like side chapels that need to open onto the living sanctuary of the universe."

John Philip Newell

Photos: Globeflowers and Static Peak; Alpine Sunflowers and the Nokhu Crags; a Bull Moose; American Lakes Trail, Never Summer Mountains, CO, June 27, 2015

An essential feature of rebirthing within the Christian household will be to remember that the well of truth is not ours.

"Too often in the past our approach to truth has been to assume that we have it and others do not. Consequently, we have thought that our role is to tell people what to believe. We are being invited instead into a new humility, to serve the holy wisdom that is ALREADY stirring in the hearts of people everywhere, the growing awareness of earth's interrelatedness and sacredness. An essential feature of rebirthing within the Christian household will be to remember that the well of truth is not ours. It is deep within the earth and deep within the heart of humanity. Our role is to be a servant of that well."

John Philip Newell
"The Rebirthing of God"

Photos: Mt. Cumulus appearing out of the fog, Golden Banner, and Elk browsing among the willows; Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, June 15, 2015

Masculine Elk Power with Women!

"Spotted Tail was a great chief. He did not drink or use the white man's tobacco. But he loved women. He could not resist them, and they could not resist him. One of his nicknames was 'Speaking with Women.' He had the elk power, which charms women. There was nothing wrong with this from the Indian point of view at that time. We do not think about such matters as white missionaries do."

Leonard Crow Dog
Lakota 

Photo: Bull elk, willows and stream, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, June 15, 2015

Solitude is a way to defend the spirit against the murderous din of our materialism

"Solitude is a way to defend the spirit against the murderous din of our materialism."

Thomas Merton

Photo: Raven, Trail Ridge, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, June 1, 2015

Human beings are not our primary source of meaning in life . . .

"Jesus did not fully entrust himself to any person, . . . for he knew what was in a person."

John 2:24

Again and again, life teaches us that people can never be our primary source of meaning in life. At their worst, they are fickle, narcissistic and mean. At their best, they serve as windows through to a much vaster Love - one that is indeed expressed in snippets through people, but that is designed to leave us hungering for union with our Ultimate Source. In silence and solitude, we realize that our lives are carried out in the relationship between Transcendent Father and Immanent Mother, and in the creative tension that occurs by dwelling in the middle between the Two. People are born, live and die, but our relationship with the Divine endures forever. And for me, the primary vehicle of revelation about the Ultimate Relationship occurs within the natural world.

Photos: Elk grazing, Rawah Range from Trail Ridge, and Wallflowers, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, June 8 and 12, 2015

I never felt the companion that was so companionable as solitude.

"I never felt the companion that was so companionable as solitude."

Henry David Thoreau

Photo: A lone crow looks off toward the Never Summer Range, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, June 1, 2015

It's winter at 10,000 feet and Spring at 8,500 feet!

It's winter at 10,000 feet and Spring at 8,500 feet. I love it!

Photos: Snow in the Snowy Range, WY, and Springtime Paintbrush and a Hummingbird at Vedauwoo, WY; May 26, 2015

Vine Deloria's Words of Praise for Russell Means

"As I was listening to Russell Means I continually looked around the room to see the faces of the people as he spoke. Almost every face shone with a new pride, a beatific vision of the tribe as it should be, not as it had become through a century of betrayal. Old men sat entranced and nodded ever so slightly at the different points Russell discussed. I came away from Means' speech with the feeling that Russell is a terribly important man to our tribe. He may be the greatest Lakota of this century and his ability to light the eyes that have been dimmed so long is probably more important for us than anything that anyone else can do. I think it is the pride in living that many Indians have lost, and in the clarity of Russell Means' speech many Indian people found that pride and also found a strength they did not know they had possessed. We should cherish this man as one of our greatest people. History has a way of leveling all the honors of a century and allowing the truly great figures to emerge from the shadows as they really were. I cannot remain silent and allow a chance to go by to honor as best I can a man who gave to my tribe even for a brief moment a vision of something better than what we had. If Russell Means has faults, and we all do, he also has talent and dedication which greatly outweighs the faults and which in my mind make him one of the great Indians of our time."

Vine Deloria, Jr.
Author of "God is Red" and "Custer Died for Your Sins"

Photos: The South Dakota Badlands, Russell Means, and Bison in the Black Hills.

It is only imperfection that complains of what is imperfect.

"It is only imperfection that complains of what is imperfect. The more perfect we are the more gentle and quiet we become toward the defects of others."

Joseph Addison,
17th century English essayist

Photo: Bull Elk with asymmetric antlers, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, May 11, 2015

It does not require many words to speak the truth.

"It does not require many words to speak the truth."

Chief Joseph
Nez Perce

Photos: (Top) Wild Plum, Cottonwood and Ruddy cliffs, near Livermore, CO; (Middle) Blue Grouse, Red Feather, CO; (Bottom) Pasqueflowers, Red Feather, CO. All three photos were taken on May 2, 2015

Learning from the tail-severing ability of lizards!

When attacked by a predator, many lizards practice autotomy, a feature allowing the tail to sever, thus enabling the lizard to flee unharmed. Often the detached tail will continue to wriggle, creating a deceptive sense of continued struggle and distracting the predator's attention from the fleeing lizard. A set of sphincter muscles then contracts around the caudal artery to minimize bleeding. Over a period of weeks, the tail will at least partially regenerate!

I find this ability amazingly instructive for us as human beings. When we are attacked emotionally by another person, our wounded sense of identity will wriggle in pain at the offense. But perhaps we can make a virtue from the suffering by creating a kind of game out of it, allowing our surface identity to "play" hurt while secretly detaching ourselves from the need to react to the incident and withdrawing instead into our Center.

Several weeks ago, I came across an amazing quote by Carlos Castaneda. He says: "No person is important enough to make me angry." Perhaps the same could be said of emotional hurt! In any case, I am so grateful for the vastness and beauty of Nature which enables me to release my sense of identity from the claustrophobia and tightness of painful human interactions, and melt instead into a Larger Whole!

Photo: Lizard regrowing a tail, near Moab, UT, April 19, 2015

Death and Resurrection are One!

I burn away; laugh, my ashes are alive!
I die a thousand times:
My ashes dance back -
A thousand new faces

Jelaluddin Rumi

Photo: A fire-roasted grasshopper lies next to a new plant sprouting from a burnt stalk, less than a month after the High Park Fire, Larimer County, CO, July 2, 2012

Our thoughts and emotions are floating on a vast lake and atmosphere of Divine awareness, love and bliss!

Yesterday's hike up to Gem Lake was sunny, warm, and spirited. I love the Spring! When I photographed a Limber Pine cone resting on the barely frozen lake surface, the cone looked like it was floating!

"Floating" seemed to be the lesson of the day, as a Green Hairstreak flitted suddenly onto the Easter Daisies I was photographing, and a fly kept returning to a Pasqueflower. This week, may all of us realize that our thoughts and emotions are - at their core - actually light and transparent! Our temptation is to think that they are solid, weighty, and often oppressive. In reality, however, our thoughts, emotions, plans, worries and joys are all floating on the vast lake or atmosphere of divine awareness, love and bliss :)

Photos: A Limber Pine Cone rests on thin ice on Gem Lake; a Green Hairstreak butterfly alights on a clump of Easter Daisies, and a fly visits a newly-opened Pasqueflower; Gem Lake Trail, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, March 21, 2015

The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has enough time.

"The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough."

Rabindranath Tagore

Photo: Green Hairstreak Butterfly on an Easter Daisy, Gem Lake Trail, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, March 21, 2015

The wonder of sunny, everyday beauty.

"THIS seems the one well-defined marvel of my life of the kind called supernatural; for, absorbed in glad Nature, spirit-rappings, second sight, ghost stories, etc., have never interested me since boyhood, seeming comparatively useless and infinitely less wonderful than Nature's open, harmonious, songful, sunny, everyday beauty."

The Contemplative John Muir

Yesterday it was 79 degrees F, an unusual occurrence at 5,000 feet here in Colorado for mid-March. The temperature in nearby Estes Park - 2,500 feet higher - was 82 degrees! Was that a fluke? Or the result of an overall trend toward global warming? In any case, I was happy to experience that "summer feeling," have the opportunity to open all of the windows in our house, and to begin dreaming about camping season.

Photos: Spring-beauty blooms, an unfurling Pasqueflower, and Ladybugs, Lory State Park, CO, March 15, 2015

Lessons I've learned from the Ladybug.

Today I found another Pasqueflower just unfurling its petals, and a Ladybug was once again present on the scene. Since I've seen Ladybugs almost every time I've photographed spring flowers over the past month, I finally GOT the message today (yes, I'm pretty THICK!) to absorb their beneficial qualities into my life. Here are some of the things I've learned.

First, just as the Ladybug's seeming flamboyance and confidence manifest themselves superbly in the bright-hued design of its wing covers, so the time is now ripe for me to act more confidently and flamboyantly in putting my spiritual vision out into the world. Over the past month, several important elements of that vision have clarified, and I am now ready to embody my calling in a new way.

A second lesson arises from the fact that the Ladybug withdraws like a turtle into its shell whenever it feels threatened. Although it has wings and can easily fly away, it more often withdraws into itself when apparent danger arises. This habit instructs me always to maintain my practices of spiritual retreat, meditation and solitude. Like the Ladybug, I too am called to remain with the challenges of life, using them as opportunities for deepening my practice of solitude and spiritual retreat rather than seeking instead to "fly away" from those challenges.

Photo: Ladybug and unfurling Pasqueflower, Lory State Park, CO, March 15, 2015

There are lots of Ladybugs this Spring!

There seem to be an abundance of ladybugs this Spring! Every time I lie on the ground next to a flower and begin photographing it, they begin appearing!

Photo: Spring-beauty flowers and ladybugs, Lory State Park, CO, March 11 and 12, 2015

I love Nature partly because she is not man . . .

"I love Nature partly because she is not man, but a retreat from him. None of his institutions control or pervade her. There a different kind of right prevails. In her midst I can be glad with an entire gladness. If this world were all man, I could not stretch myself, I should lose all hope. He is constraint, she is freedom to me. he makes me wish for another world. She makes me content with this."

Henry David Thoreau,
January 3, 1853

Today a snowshoe hike helped draw me outside myself in order to become fascinated by the larger world spread out all around me  :)

Photos: (Top and Middle) Bighorn Sheep rams, Big Thompson Canyon, CO; (Bottom) Moraine Park, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO. All three photos were taken on February 18, 2015

Love is its own reward.

"The Bridegroom [God] comes to you IN your desire. His desire gives rise to yours. For he first loved us, not we him . . . Therefore, love is its own merit and its own reward. Love needs no cause, no fruit besides itself; its enjoyment is its practice. I love because I love; I love that I may love. Love is a great thing; as long as it returns to its beginning in God, goes back to its origin, turns again to its Source, it will always draw afresh from it and flow freely. When God loves, he wants nothing but to BE love, knowing that those who love him are blessed by their very love. Love is the very BEING of the Bride [the soul]."

St. Bernard of Clairvaux,
12th century French Cistercian monk

Today in class we are studying the mystics of the 12th century, including the Cistercian monks. They wrote and practiced during the era of Courtly Love, when people realized that desire itself - even without erotic consummation - IS its own reward. The monks applied this realization to God, understanding that our desire for God IS God's desire for us. How apropos for Valentine's Day!

Photos: Ladybug and Spring-beauty flowers, Lory State Park, CO, February 11th and 12th, 2015