Persons acquaint us with the impersonal . . .

"Persons are supplementary to the primary teaching of the soul. In youth we are mad for persons . . . But the larger experience of man discovers the identical nature appearing through them all. Persons themselves acquaint us with the impersonal . . .

[For] the [impersonal] Oversoul is the background of our being, . . . an immensity not possessed and that cannot be possessed."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Photos: (Left) A Cottonwood leaf rests on a root of its parent tree, Horsetooth Reservoir, Larimer County, CO, October 21, 2014; (Top RIght) Cottonwood trees, Horsetooth Reservoir, and the foothills, Larimer County, CO, October 21, 2014;(Middle Right) Cottonwood tree and cliffs, Red Mountain Open Space, Larimer County, CO, October 20, 2014; (Bottom Right) Red cliffs at sunset, Red Mountain Open Space, Larimer County, CO, October 18, 2014

To feel we belong to the world, we must be deserted.

 

"To feel we belong to the world, we must be deserted."

Ellen Meloy 

I find that the more other people disappoint my expectations of what I would like them to be, the more I begin to detach from my own small-self and identify instead with the larger self, which is one with God and with the cosmic perspective.  For me, desert landscapes are especially effective in supporting this approach. I found this to be true in a special way yesterday, when I encountered not a single soul on my hike in an arid landscape just forty-five minutes from my home.

Photos: Red Mountain Open Space, Larmier County, CO, October 20, 2014

Wilderness Space Heals Afflictive Emotions

 

Thomas Keating, one of my spiritual mentors, used to remind his students that afflictive thoughts and emotions often surface from the unconscious mind when a person sits down to practice silence and contemplative prayer. It seems as though all hell is breaking loose, but in reality, the flood of thoughts has a purpose: the cleaning out of the psyche.

In my own case, this surfacing of afflictive thoughts happens when I'm out hiking and photographing alone in the wilderness. Today it occurred to me that when these troubling thoughts arise, they are begging me to transform them into something sacred!
 

For me, this means viewing them as echoes - however twisted and distorted - of a divine love-word arising as though out of nowhere. In terms of mystical Judaism, the thoughts want me to "sweeten" them by including them in my practice. Viewed in this way, I begin to see my painful thoughts and emotions as a necessary means toward understanding how much my help is needed!

Photos: (Top) Cliffs and Cottonwoods, Red Mountain Open Space, Larimer County, CO, October 18, 2014; (Bottom Left) Sunset at Red Mountain Open Space, October 18, 2014; (Bottom Middle) Aspen leaves at Bridal Veil Falls, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, October 17, 2014; (Bottom Right) Cottonwoods, prairie, and the peaks of The Snowy Range, near Centennial, WY, October 14, 2014

Vocation to Solitude - To entrust oneself completely to the silence of a wide landscape of woods and hills . . .

"Vocation to Solitude - To deliver oneself up, to hand oneself over, entrust oneself completely to the silence of a wide landscape of woods and hills . . .

"This is a true and special vocation.  There are few who are willing to belong completely to such silence, to let it soak into their bones, to breathe nothing but silence, to feed on silence, . . .

"and to turn the very substance of their life into a living and vigilant silence."

Thomas Merton

Photos: (Top) Cottonwood tree and cliffs, Poudre Canyon, near Fort Collins, CO, October 13, 2014; (Second) Aspen trees, Poudre Canyon, CO, October 13, 2014; (Third) Wild Geranium leaf and cascade on Cow Creek, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, October 17, 2014; (Bottom) Sunset at Vedauwoo Recreation Area, Medicine Bow National Forest, WY, October 14, 2014

Wild parks are Nature's cathedrals.

"Wild parks are places of recreation . . . , 

 

 

 

 

Nature's cathedrals . . . ,

 

 

 

where all may gain inspiration and strength and get nearer to God."

The Contemplative John Muir

 

 

Photos:(Left) Sunset in Red Mountain Open Space, Larimer County, CO, October 18, 2014; (Top Right) Cottonwoods and colorful cliffs, Red Mountain Open Space, Larimer County, CO, October 18, 2014; (Middle Right) Narrowleaf Cottonwood leaves and cascade on Cow Creek, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO; October 17, 2014; (Bottom Right) Sunset at Vedauwoo, Medicine Bow National Forest, WY, October 14, 2014

'Tis the gift to be simple; 'tis the gift to be free!

 

'Tis the gift to be simple
'Tis the gift to be free

Shaker elder Joseph Brackett,
Maine, ca. 1850

Photo: Bellvue Dome, fields, and Cottonwoods, Bellvue, CO; October 15, 2014

Nature and Mind mirror one another.

"Every natural fact is a symbol of some spiritual fact . . .

"Every appearance in nature corresponds to some state of mind, . . .

"and that state of mind can only be described by presenting that natural appearance as its picture."

Ralph Waldo Emerson 

Photos: (Top) Wild Geranium leaf and cascades on Cow Creek, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, October 17, 2014; (Second) Cottonwood tree and Eagle Rock, near Estes Park, CO, October 17, 2014; (Third) Narrowleaf Cottonwood leaves and cascades on Cow Creek, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, October 17, 2014; (Bottom) Narrowleaf Cottonwood leaf resting on a lichen-covered rock, Red Mountain Open Space, Larimer County, CO, October 18, 2014

The Universe is the externalization of the soul

"The Universe is the externalization of the soul."

Ralph Waldo Emerson

(Top) Aspens and the peaks above Moraine Park, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, October 11, 2014; (Second) Sunrise on Lost Lake, near Paonia, CO, September 27, 2014;

(Third) Changing Aspens and the Ruby Range, just off the Kebler Pass Road, CO, September 27, 2014; (Bottom) Aspen trees in the Flattops Wilderness, CO, October 5, 2014

The practice of meditation resembles a crisp, clear autumn morning.

The practice of meditation resembles an autumn day.  Rather than focusing on particular thoughts and emotions - our usual habit - we allow the mind instead to settle into its natural state: vast and spacious, like an alpine sky.  This is not a "spaced-out" sort of vastness, however.  For within this wide-open awareness, our attention is paradoxically able to become crisp and clear, like a Fall morning.

 
 Then, as our thoughts and emotions arise one by one within that spaciousness, they manifest themselves as vivid and shimmering, like autumn leaves dancing in the wind. 

Identifying with the sky of awareness instead of with the particular content of our thoughts and feelings, we practice amazement at the fact that they could arise at all!  Like hiking a mountain trail and coming around a corner to find a grove of aspen or cottonwood radiating in golden glory, we feel the awe and wonder of our life here on earth!

Photos: (Top) Aspen leaves and stupa at the Shambhala Mountain Center, Red Feather, CO, September 29, 2014; (Second) Lichen-covered rocks, Engelmann Spruce and Sugarloaf Mountain, Snowy Range, WY, October 14, 2014; (Third) Cottonwood tree and foothills, near Bellvue, CO, October 14, 2014; (Bottom) Rocky cliffs, Cottonwood tree, and the Poudre River, near Fort Collins, CO, October 13, 2014

He is the happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds peace in his home."

 

"He is the happiest, . . .

 "be he king or peasant, . . .

 "who finds peace in his home."

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Photos: All of these photos are from landscapes within a couple miles of my home in Larimer County, CO, October 15-16, 2014

Our relationship to the earth horizon is the nurture of the spiritual life.

"Naked space excites in the heart the subtle sense of relationship to the earth horizon which is the nurture of the spiritual life."

Mary Austin

My life experience of people is this: they appear in our lives, become intrigued with us for a short time, and then move on when more interesting things beckon.  This pattern has become even more prominent over the past several decades, when the pace of life has quickened at an ever-accelerating rate. For me, this situation is an important lesson in learning to identify ourselves with the vast, sacred expanses of the heart and mind rather than with the small, individual ego-self.  This spaciousness is the vastness of a divine love in which ALL of us appear, thrive for a time, and then dissolve like echoes out of Nowhere back into that vast, ever-expanding love.  This, I believe, is the only way to stay sane in a hectic, frenetic, impersonal, corporate-industrial society.

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Photos: (Top) Horses, prairie, and The Snowy Range, near Centennial, WY, October 14, 2014; (Middle) The Mummy Range, seen from the prairie expanses near Centennial, WY, October 14, 2014; (Bottom) Deer Mountain, Moraine Park, and Aspen tree, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, October 11, 2014

To reveal the splendor of your essence, you need to burn in the fire of love!

 

"The time has come to turn your heart
into a temple of fire.
Your essence is gold hidden in dust.
To reveal its splendor
you need to burn in the fire of love."

Jelaluddin Rumi

Hiking last week through the Fern Lake Burn - which occurred just two years ago - I found myself spellbound by the contrast provided by blackened trunks and colorful autumn aspen growth.  Fires always stimulate the underground roots - or "suckers," - of aspen trees to send out fresh shoots into the newly-sun-filled landscape that is so favorable to their growth   Without fires or other natural disturbances, aspen would never be able to survive!

Photos: Aspens and the Fern Lake Burn; Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, November 10th and 11th, 2014

Making a Practice of Embodying Landscape Spaciousness

Yesterday, I did some photography in Wyoming, whose border lies just thirty miles north of my home. One of the reasons why I love Wyoming so much is because it is so vast and spacious. Hiking or driving across those wide expanses reminds me that I am called to embody that spaciousness in my own awareness. For that open-mindedness, I'm convinced, is the primary dwelling place of our Divine Source. Eckhart Tolle has this to say about what he calls "space consciousness":

"Object consciousness needs to be balanced by space consciousness for sanity to return to our planet and for humanity to fulfill its destiny. The arising of space consciousness is the next state in the evolution of humanity . . . Space consciousness means that in addition to being conscious of things - which always come down to sense perceptions, thoughts, and emotions - there is an undercurrent of awareness. Awareness implies that you are not only conscious of things (objects), but you are also conscious of . . . an alert stillness in the background while things happen in the foreground."

In the practices of Christian Insight Meditation and Crazy Wisdom Meditation, I work consciously at maintaining a spacious frame of mind, and then watching - spellbound - as all perceptions, thoughts and emotions arise from that vastness like echoes out of nowhere. In a poem that epitomizes for me the basis of all true spirituality, Ram Dass writes:

"I make the effort
to maintain a ground of oceanic silence
out of which arises the multitude
of phenomena of daily life . . .
I often fail in these aspirations . . .
But I make the effort."

May all of us find the grace to live in this liberating and creative spaciousness all the days of our life!

Photos: (Top) Cottonwoods and The Snowy Range, near Centennial, WY; (Second) A Limber Pine and rocky outcrop at sunset, Vedauwoo Recreation Area, Medicine Bow National Forest, WY;  (Third) A pool, prairie, and the Mummy Range near the Colorado-Wyoming border; (Bottom) Horses graze in the shadow of The Snowy Range, near Centennial, WY. All photos were taken on October 14, 2014

Beautiful things would have poets . . . that they may re-exist and re-appear in the finer world of rational souls, and fill that realm with their fame.

Beauty is not a superfluous value.  Rather, it lies at the very heart of Reality.  For beauty lures us to activate that which makes us most human: our creative impulse.  We want somehow to possess beautiful things, but Beauty frustrates our attempts, forever eluding our grasp.  Like autumn leaves or sunset colors, She quickly hides herself almost as soon as She makes her first appearance. Gradually it dawns on us that the reason why we can never grasp and possess Beauty is because it is SHE who grasps and possesses US. 

For Beauty has her own subjectivity; She wants to be appreciated - worshiped, even - and remade into something fresh and new within our own divinely creative abilities.  Ralph Waldo Emerson puts it this way: "Every star in heaven is discontented and insatiable.  Gravitation and chemistry cannot content them.  Ever they woo and court the eye of every beholder.  Every person who comes into the world they seek to fascinate and possess, to pass into his or her mind, for they desire to republish themselves in a more delicate world than that which they occupy . . . They would have poets . . . that they may re-exist and re-appear in the finer world of rational souls, and fill that realm with their fame."

Photos: (Top) Prairie, Cottonwood trees, and The Snow Range, near Centennial, WY, October 14, 2014; (Middle) Rocks glowing at sunset, Vedauwoo Recreation Area, Medicine Bow National Forest, WY, October 14, 2014; (Bottom) Aspen trees and an unnamed rocky peak, Poudre Canyon, near Fort Collins, CO, October 13, 2014