Zion National Park: a magnificent outdoor temple.

Zion National Park is truly an outdoor temple.  One can gain a sense of its vibrantly spiritual character just listening to the names of the park's formations: West Temple, Towers of the Virgin, the Altar of Sacrifice, Angel's Landing, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob Peaks, Mount Majestic, Cathedral Mountain, Mystery Canyon, Mountain of Mystery, Temple of Sinawava, the Pulpit, Weeping Rock, Great White Throne, Mountain of the Sun, East Temple, the Watchman.

The most special aspect of Zion for many is the hike up the Narrows of the Virgin River, where thousand-foot cliffs rise right out of the water and hanging gardens composed of scarlet-colored monkeyflower, yellow columbine, pink shootingstar and maidenhair fern luxuriate in the springs that seep from the walls.

Here, one hikes right in the cool mountain water in intense desert heat within a slot canyon that stretches out for seventeen miles upstream. One feels simultaneously embraced within the womb of Mother Earth, yet open to a vast masculine sky.  The abundant orange and white sands contribute their cleansing power, while the brilliant wildflowers and colorful streaked walls towering above jade-green pools provide a sense of optimism and beauty.

Truly, a few days spent at Zion never fail to send the physical and spiritual adventurer home with an attitude of profound joy and hope that overflow into the routines of daily life for a very long time afterwards.

Photo: Cardinal Monkeyflower blooming in a hanging garden in Zion Canyon, Zion National Park, UT; May 27, 2012

A Sense of Belonging

Yesterday I had a difficult day.  I found myself saddened by thoughts about  potential loss of work, disappointments with people, upset at my own shortcomings, wondering where my place in society really is. However, as I descended the trail on my daily afternoon hike in the foothills near my home, I suddenly came upon a bird - just three feet away from me - sitting on the trail.  It was a male Lesser Goldfinch. At first, I thought the bird was a baby that had fallen out of the nest, unable to fly.  However, as I stood there, the bird hopped around a bit, peering at me curiously now and then, preening a few times, then nibbling on a flower, obviously quite relaxed.  Immediately these words struck me: "I KNOW you."  It was as if the Divine Presence residing within the bird and within the surrounding landscape was letting me know that I indeed DO have a place in the world.  Then, after a few minutes, the goldfinch finally flew off, leaving me with a profound sense of belonging that stuck with me for the rest of the day.

Photo: Lesser Goldfinch, Lory State Park, CO, May 30, 2012

The Holy Spirit is a living, all-pervading fluid, full of wisdom and knowledge.

"Nothing varies from the path ordained by the wisdom and power of the living fluid agent which envelops it.  What is this living, self-moving, powerful, and most wonderful fluid?  What is it which so copiously pervades universal nature? . . . Heat, light, electricity, and all the varied and grand displays of nature are but the tremblings, the vibrations, the energetic powers of a living, all-pervading, and most wonderful fluid, full of wisdom and knowledge, called the HOLY SPIRIT."

Orson Pratt, Mormon elder and pioneer, 1855

Photo: Hiking the Narrows of the Virgin River, Zion National Park, May 26, 2012

True power is self-emptying.

"Then I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain, standing in the center of the throne."  (Revelation 5:6)

A common human tendency is to see power as the capacity to rule over others. However, an enlightened view understands that an attitude of self-emptying is the only true source of power.  In the famous "kenosis" passage recorded in the book of Philippians, Jesus is presented as receiving his power through radical self-emptying.  Often referred to as a sacrificial lamb, he understood well the nature of this truth of living for the good of others. Like him, we too can realize that self-emptying is in the very nature of God. To this end, meditation practice teaches us that all things arise - magically, almost - out of the spacious backdrop of human awareness in which God forever loses himself in bliss. We understand that we too can learn to unite with God's humility in drawing out and learning from the spiritual qualities of others rather than arrogantly attempting to impose our own ideas on them.

Photo: A Prickly Pear cactus flaunts its beauty, while the Great White Throne looms in the distance on the left.  Observation Point, Zion National Park, UT, May 26, 2012.

Love the goodness in yourself. Then, put that goodness into the world.

"Goodness is the natural state of this world.  The world is good!  Even when it seems evil, it's good.  There's only goodness in God.  And that same goodness is in us all.  You can feel it in yourself.  You know when you feel good inside.  Yes, you're God's child, too.  You are good.  You are sacred.  Respect yourself.  Love the goodness in yourself.  Then, put that goodness into the world.  That's everybody's Instructions.  God made you so you feel good when you do right.  Watch when you feel good and follow that good feeling.  The good feeling comes from God.  When you feel good, God feels good, too.  God and you feel good together."

Noble Red Man (Mathew King), Lakota elder

Photo: Ponderosa pine and Bear Lodge, Devil's Tower National Monument, SD; May 18, 2012.  Bear Lodge is considered a sacred presence by many different tribal nations.

The grief and attention we offer to divine Nature is like candy to her.

"A young man must fall in love with 'the goddess, Nature' so that he can throw his soul's great expectations to her, rather than onto his human lover.  Large expectations and fantasies become debilitating to the human women we love.  The intensity of one's inner life can never be fully handled by another human, despite our romanticized expectations of marriage and relationships.  Nature, on the other hand, can accept and handle all the emotional turmoil and grief a man is willing to express.  The grief and attention we offer to divine Nature is like CANDY to her."

Martin Prechtel, Mayan shaman

Photo: The candied formations of  Yellow Mounds Overlook, Badlands National Park, SD; May 19, 2012.  The yellow wildflower blowing in the breeze is vetch.

We Lakota don't need your church. We have the Black Hills for our church. The Universe is the tabernacle of God.

"God made everything so simple.  Our lives are very simple . . . We don't need your church.  We have the Black Hills for our church.  And we don't need your Bible.  We have the wind and the rain and the stars for our Bible.  The world is an open Bible for us.  We've studied it for millions of years.  We've learned that everything God made is living.  Even the rocks are alive.  When we use them in our sweat ceremony we talk to them . . . and they talk back to us.  The Universe is the tabernacle of God.  When the wind blows, that's the breath of God.  When you or I breathe, that's also the breath of God."

Noble Red Man (Mathew King), Lakota elder

Photo: My tent with Bear Lodge in the background, Devil's Tower National Monument, WY; May 19, 2012.  Bear Lodge is a part of the Bearlodge Mountains, which are a northern extension of the Black Hills.

Our mind is part of God's mind. Our mind is part of Nature, part of God.

 

"Everyone is sacred.  You're sacred and I'm sacred.  Every time you blink your eye, or I blink my eye, God blinks His eye.  God sees through your eyes and my eyes.  We are sacred . . . I know God is with me.  I believe in God's power . . . That's God's power we're thinking with. It's God's mind.  Our mind is part of God's mind.  Our mind is part of Nature, part of God.  To Indians, Nature is God and God is Nature.  So when I work for my people, I'm working for God, I'm working for Nature.  Who are YOU working for?"

Noble Red Man (Mathew King), Lakota Elder

Photo: The Badlands - sacred land of the Lakota - at sunset, Badlands National Park, SD, May 19, 2012

Happiness seeks us when we become still.

"Happiness is much like a butterfly - the more you chase after it, the more elusive it becomes. But should you cease your frantic activities and sit down in the middle of the meadow, the beauty all around you will become apparent and, by and by, the vibrations of the meadow will become your vibrations. When you have become as one with the serenity of the meadow, the butterfly will no longer see you as a threat but as a part of the beauty all around it. Thus, the butterfly will seek out your company and alight upon your head. May we become the vessel which happiness seeks."

Nelson Augustine, Elder, Migmag Nation 

Photo: Boisduval's Blue butterflies sucking water from a recently dried up streambed; Lory State Park, CO, May 22, 2012.  I took this photo yesterday evening; Nelson made his Facebook posting this morning.  What he describes is precisely what happened to me.  After causing the butterflies to scatter when I approached, I settled down in the grass next to this dry streambed, and the butterflies all returned, allowing me to come very close without being viewed as a threat.

If you are interested in imbibing daily bits of wisdom - skillfully combining attitudes of protest with spiritual acceptance, earthy details with philosophy, and tribal pride with openness to others, please look up Nelson on Facebook.

The Creator is like a spider, weaving all creatures into a single, sacred web.

In many of the indigenous traditions of the American Southwest, the Creator is envisioned as a Spider. She is always a feminine presence. Sometimes she's called "Grandmother Spider" or "Spider Woman" or "Thought Woman."  In any case, she thinks the world - and all of its creatures - into existence, and in so doing, weaves them all together within her vast and sacred web.  Thus, there is no such thing as an individual being living all by itself.  For ALL of us are part of a vast divine web, and our true self is always a  MULTI-centered self.

Photo: Spider on Indian Blanketflower (Gaillardia), Lory State Park, CO, May 21, 2012.  On my hikes, I find quite a few of these red-and-yellow blanketflowers containing a resident spider - also red-and-yellow.  Apparently, camouflage serves the spider well!

That's how you pray to God - you LISTEN.

"You can call Wakan-Tanka by any name you like.  In English I call Him God or the Great Spirit.  He's the Great Mystery, the Great Mysterious.  That's what Wakan-Tanka really means - the Great Mysterious.  You can't define Him.  He's not actually a 'He' or a 'She,' a 'Him' or a 'Her.'  We have to use those kinds of words because you can't just say 'It.'  God's never an 'It.'  So call Wakan-Tanka whatever you like.  Just be sure to call Him.  He wants to talk to you . . . When I go up on the hill to pray I don't just talk to God.  I try to get the talking over quick.  Mostly I'm listening.  Listening to God - that's praying, too . . . So that's how you pray to God.  You LISTEN."

Noble Red Man (Mathew King), Lakota elder

Photo: Bear Lodge, Devil's Tower National Monument, WY, May 19, 2012

One of the reasons we love the desert is because there's enough space to let the mind go free. It's a positive nothingness.

"Each time [I] look out upon this world it seems to me more alien and dreamlike than before. And all of it, utterly empty."

"NADA.  There's plenty of that out here.  But it's a positive nothingness . . . One of the big reasons I love the desert, any desert, is because there's enough space to let my mind go free."

Edward Abbey

Photo: Sunset, Badlands National Park, SD, May 19, 2012

The saint is everywhere where nature prays, and he prays with her and in her.

 

"We pray, and prayer fashions us.  The saint has himself become prayer, the meeting place of earth and Heaven; he thereby contains the universe, and the universe prays with him.  He is everywhere where nature prays, and he prays with her and in her: in the peaks, which touch the void and eternity; in a flower, which scatters its scent; in the carefree song of a bird."

Frithjof Schuon

Photo: Sticky Geranium, Lory State Park, May 12, 2012

Perceived beauty is the outward projection of a universal quality immanent within us.

"Beauty perceived outwardly must be discovered or realized inwardly, for we love that which we are and we are that which we love. Perceived beauty is  . . . the outward projection of a universal quality immanent in us."

Frithjof Schuon

Photo: Frittilary butterfly visiting Sulphurflowers, Lory State Park, CO; May 15, 2012

The church is a baby-house made of blocks

"The preachers and lecturers deal with men of straw, as they are men of straw themselves.  Why, a free-spoken man of sound lungs, cannot draw a long breath without causing your rotten institutions to come toppling down by the vacuum he makes.  Your church is a baby-house made of blocks, and so is the state
. . . If there were any magnanimity in us, any grandeur of soul, anything but sects and parties undertaking to patronize God and keep the mind within bounds, how often we might encourage and provoke one another by free expression . . . The church, the state, the school, the magazine, do you think they are liberal and free!  It is the freedom of the prison-yard! . . . What is it you tolerate, you church today?  Not truth but a lifelong hypocrisy.  Let us have institutions framed not out of our rottenness, but out of our soundness.  This factitious piety is like stale gingerbread.  I would like to suggest what a pack of fools and cowards we mankind are.  They want me to agree not to breathe too hard in the neighborhood of their paper castles. If I should draw a long breath in the neighborhood of these institutions, their weak and flabby sides would fall out, for my inspiration would exhaust the air about them.  The church!  it is eminently the timid institution . . .
The church! it is eminently the timid institution . . . [And] what is called faith is an immense prejudice . . . People are the creatures of an institution. They do not think; they adhere like oysters to what their fathers and grandfathers adhered to."

Henry David Thoreau, from Selections from the Journals.

Photo: Hewlitt Gulch Fire, Poudre Canyon, CO, May 15, 2012

Spiritual balance means that outward things become transparent to the inward Reality.

"When we have achieved a balance between the inward and the outward, the outward is no longer equated with disordered desire and anxiety; it is in a certain way interiorized, its contents are transparent . . . When we interiorize ourselves, God so to speak exteriorizes Himself while enriching us from within; there lies all the mystery of the metasphysical transparency of phenomena and of their immanence in us."

Frithjof Schuon

Photo: A new aspen leaf  in the mist, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO, May 11, 2012

In solitude, we are expanded, recreated and enlightened.

"There is nothing so sanative, so poetic, as a walk in the woods and fields . . . Nothing so inspires me and excites such serene and profitable thought.  The objects are elevating.  In the street and in society, I am almost invariably cheap and dissipated, my life is unspeakable mean . . . But alone in distant woods and fields, . . . I come to myself.  I once more feel myself grandly related, and that [the] cold and solitude are friends of mine.  I suppose that this value, in my case, is equivalent to what others get by churchgoing and prayer.  I come to my solitary woodland walk as the homesick go home.  I thus dispose of the superfluous and see things as they are, grand and beautiful . . . I come out to these solitudes, where the problem of existence is simplified. I get away a mile or two from the town into the stillness and solitude of nature, with rocks, trees, weeds . . . It is as if I had come to an open window.  I see out and around myself.  Our skylights are thus far away from the ordinary resorts of men.  I am not satisfied with ordinary windows.  I must have a true skylight, [where] . . . I am expanded, recreated, enlightened . . . It chances that the sociable, the town and county, or the farmers' club does not prove a skylight to me . . . They bore me.  The man I meet with is not often so instructive as the silence he breaks.  This stillness, solitude, wildness of nature . . . is what I go out to seek.  It is as if I always met in those places some grand, serene, immortal, infinitely encouraging, though invisible, companion, and walked with him.  There at last my nerves are steadied."

Henry David Thoreau

Photo: Golden Banner blooms, a vast sky, and Arthur's Rock, Lory State Park, May 1, 2012

Let us call Earth by her true name: "Mother."

                                                  "When the people call Earth 'Mother,'
                                                    they take with love
                                                    and with love give back
                                                    so that all may live.

                                                    When the people call Earth 'it,'
                                                     they use her
                                                     consume her strength
                                                     Then the people die.

                                                     Already the sun is hot
                                                     out of season.
                                                     Our mother's breast
                                                      is going dry.
                                                      She is taking all green
                                                      into her heart
                                                      and will not turn back
                                                      until we call her
                                                      by her name."

                                                      Marilou Awiakta

                                                      Cherokee Nation

Photo: Silvery Lupine blooming in Castle Valley, UT; April 21, 2012

That virtue alone is good which is in a certain way unconscious of itself.

"The essence of  the virtues is emptiness before God, which permits the divine Qualities to enter the heart and radiate in the soul . . . Virtue consists in allowing free passage, in the soul, to the Beauty of God . . . Intrinsically, that virtue alone is good which is in a certain way unconscious of itself and, as a result, becomes neither 'egoistic charity' nor 'proud humility' . . . It is we who enter INTO virtue.  Do not believe that 'it is I who am the virtue'; do not personalize it . . . Every virtue is a participation in the Beauty of the One . . . Virtue is essentially consciousness of the nature of things, which [therefore] situates the ego in its proper place . . . A virtue is a divine perfume in which man forgets himself . . . What matters is that a person knows it is GOD who acts.  A meritorious work [therefore] belongs to God, though we participate in it; our works are good - or better - to the extent we are penetrated by this awareness."

Frithjof Schuon

Photo: Boulder Raspberry flowers, Lory State Park, CO, May 10, 2012

A "superior" race is one that does the least harm to the Earth.

"My notion of a superior race, if such a thing were plausible, would be harmlessness: which group has done the least harm to the earth, to other forms of life, to other humans, to each other?  By that standard, the only superior races would be the Aborigines of Australia, the Bushmen of Africa, maybe the Hopis of Arizona. (But even there, the reason may lie simply in their lack of power and technology.)"

Edward Abbey

Photo: A recently-drilled natural gas rig sits just outside Canyonlands National Park, UT, April 22, 2012.  The La Sal Mountains loom in the background.

The life of adventure is the only life that makes sense.

"The life of adventure is the only life that makes sense.  Adventure interpreted broadly, of course - to include not only physical action, exploration, but also human love, ideas and ideals, the arts, and the common and daily motion and conflict and trouble of everyday people doing the world's hard work, making everything else possible . . . Without this electric charge in the spirit, the world would not be the arena of infinite possibility and adventure it seems to me to be . . . Life is a bitch. And then you die?  No: Life is a joyous adventure.  And THEN you die."

Edward Abbey

Photo: Joanne hiking up Professor Creek in Mary Jane Canyon, Castle Valley, UT, April 21, 2012

That which is farthest off is the symbol of what is deepest within. The lover of contemplation, accordingly, will gaze much into the sky.

"Whatever we see without is a symbol of something within, and that which is farthest off is the symbol of what is deepest within.  The lover of contemplation, accordingly, will gaze much into the sky."

Henry David Thoreau

Photo: Golden Banner proliferate as Arthur's Rock gazes up at the western sky; Lory State Park, CO, May 1, 2012

What a thing it is to sit absolutely alone in the forest, cherished by the talk that rain makes . . .

"Let me say this before rain becomes a utility that they can plan and distribute for money. By 'they' I mean the people who cannot understand that rain is a festival, who do not appreciate its gratuity, who think that what has no price has no value, that what cannot be sold is not real, so that the only way to make something actual is to place it on the market. The time will come when they will sell you even your rain. At the moment it is still free, and I am in it. I celebrate its gratuity and its meaninglessness . . .

I came up here from the monastery last night, sloshing through the cornfield, said Vespers, and put some oatmeal on the Coleman stove for supper. It boiled over while I was listening to the rain and toasting a piece of bread at the log fire. The night became very dark. The rain surrounded the whole cabin with its enormous virginal myth, a whole world of meaning, of secrecy, of silence, of rumor. Think of it: all that speech pouring down, selling nothing, judging nobody, drenching the thick mulch of dead leaves, soaking the trees, filling the gullies and crannies of the wood with water, washing out the places where men have stripped the hillside!

What a thing it is to sit absolutely alone, in the forest, at night, cherished by this wonderful, unintelligible, perfectly innocent speech, the most comforting speech in the world, the talk that rain makes by itself all over the ridges, and the talk of the watercourses everywhere in the hollows!  Nobody started it, nobody is going to stop it. It will talk as long as it wants, this rain. As long as it talks I am going to listen."

Thomas Merton

Photo: Jewels of rain  adorn a leaf.  Lory State Park, CO, May 7, 2012.

The best communication with friends occurs at a distance.

"I find that I postpone all actual communication with my friends to a certain real communication which takes place commonly when we are actually at a distance from one another."

Henry David Thoreau

Photo: White Violets, Young Gulch, Poudre Canyon, CO; May 5,2012

Compared to hardened people, the hearts of rocks are comparatively soft.

"A hard, insensible man whom we liken to a rock is indeed much harder than a rock.  From hard, coarse, insensible people with whom I have no sympathy, I go to commune with the rocks, whose hearts are comparatively soft."

Henry David Thoreau

Photo: Sunset, Arches National Park, UT, April 21, 2012

Under the full moon, life is all adventure.

"When the moon shines, . . . I am filled with unrest and the urge to range valleys and climb mountains.  I want vistas of moonlit country from high places, must see the silver of roaring rapids and sparkling lakes.  At such times I must escape houses and towns and all that is confining, to be a part of the moon-drenched landscape and its continual sweep . . . All life is changed when the moon is full . . . Under the full moon, life is all adventure . . . So, when the moon shines, . . . I am apt to forget my work and responsibilities and take to the open, ranging the hills beneath its magic spell, tiring myself to the point where I can lie down to sleep in the full blaze of it."

Sigurd F. Olson, "Moon Magic"

Photo: Alpenglow blazes as an almost-full moon rises near Estes Park, CO, May 4, 2012

There is too much beauty in the world! There is too much to love, too much to desire!

"Tears!  There is too much beauty in the world!  O, there is too much to love, too much to desire!"

Edward Abbey

Photo: Bursts of Silvery Lupine blossoming in Castle Valley, UT, April 21, 2012

Each of us was born into the most esteemed place in all the world, and in the nick of time, too.

"I have never got over my surprise that I should have been born into the most esteemed place in all the world, and in the very nick of time, too."

Henry David Thoreau

Photo: Sugarbowl, Lory State Park, April 30, 2012

In the desert, you must come with no intentions of discovery. You must overhear things instead.

"The land does not give easily.  The desert is like a boulder; you expect to wait . . . But you expect sometime it will loosen into pieces to be examined . . . You can't get at it this way.  You must come with no intentions of discovery.  You must overhear things, as though you'd come into a small and desolate town and paused by an open window . . . You have to proceed almost by accident."

Barry Lopez

Photo: Waterfall on Professor Creek in Mary Jane Canyon, Castle Valley, UT, April 21, 2012

Water shines with an inward light like a heaven on earth.

"The water shines with an inward light like a heaven on earth.  The silent depth & serenity & majesty of water - strange that men should distinguish gold & diamonds - when these precious elements are so common."

"We are slow to realize water - the beauty and magic of it.  It is interestingly strange to us forever.  Immortal water, alive . . . and sparkling with life!"

Henry David Thoreau

Photo: Reflections of cliffs and a cottonwood in Professor Creek, Mary Jane Canyon, Castle Valley, UT, April 21, 2012

New ideas come into this world somewhat like falling meteors.

"New ideas come into this world somewhat like falling meteors, with a flash and an explosion, and perhaps somebody's castle-roof perforated."

Henry David Thoreau

Photo: Shooting-star flowers blooming next to a stream pool, Lory State Park, CO, May 1, 2012

The writer's calling is to praise the divine beauty of the world.

"What draws us into the desert is the search for something intimate in the remote . . .

I write to give pleasure and promote aesthetic bliss. To honor life and praise the divine beauty of the world."

Edward Abbey

Photo: Reflections of tree and rock in MaryJane Canyon, Professor Creek, Castle Valley, UT, April 21, 2012