I was nine years old when my first miracle happened. It was June, and a school field trip to the zoo was about to be cancelled in light of a monsoon-like morning. The torrential rain was forecast to continue well into the next day. I’d been looking forward to this outing for weeks and, like any good Aries, wasn’t going to take this lousy weather lying down. Home for lunch, I headed to the living room, pressed my hands together, knelt down and whispered. “Dear God, please stop the rain.”
You can guess where this tale is going—as soon as I returned to the kitchen, my mother (who had been washing dishes at the sink) declared she had just witnessed a glimpse of blue sky through the window. It was still pouring hard but by the time I finished eating and returned to my class, the day had transformed into a hot sunny afternoon. And yes, the field trip was on.
Looking back, I realize I made this petition to a diety of weather management from beginner’s mind. I wasn’t raised to believe in God, but had heard from my devout grade five teacher that Jesus was a miracle worker and prayers were meant to be answered. I simply believed him. This direct and immediate response to my request for a sunny day would become the spring board for a life of questing for the miraculous. And a life of wondering why sometimes the divine seemed to be on-call for my requests and other times, missing-in-action entirely. At age nine, the mystic in me was born and along with it, the seeker.
I realize now that one of the primary drives of any spiritual seeker is to swap ordinary reality for an array of non-ordinary experiences. In my case, these looked like kundalini risings , sexual tantra and drum-induced shamanic trances. For other seekers, it can involve reality altering substances like Ayahuasca, psychedelic mushrooms and mescaline, plant medicines that open doors of perception. And then there is the whole metaphysical angle where what is sought is extraordinary phenomena, from psychic surgery to hands-on healings to reliable predictions of the future. Simply, there is a deep yearning to trade in the mundane for the numinous, to abandon the everyday for a wild ride on the mystical side.
But the catch is that the capacity to engage the miraculous, when sought from the vantage point of our separate self, often remains stubbornly unfound. Sure, we might have hit or miss moments with our Super Normal Powers (what the Hindu’s call Siddhis), but the full blossoming of these abilities perhaps requires first the emptying out of the self that would misuse them.
In waking up from the dream of being a separate self, I often used the word “emptiness” to describe the sense of being a borderless vastness. Now, it’s clear that I called it emptiness because what had spilled out was the individual mind, leaving this boundless container that one could name God, Presence or even Awareness. The name we give our true nature is not nearly as important as the recognition we are the very thing we seek—we are the miraculous. It’s not out there. It’s in here.
In the film the Matrix, there is a scene where a boy under the tutelage of the Oracle, bends a spoon without touching it, while Neo, our hero, watches.
Spoon boy: Do not try and bend the spoon. That’s impossible. Instead… only try to realize the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Spoon boy: There is no spoon.
Neo: There is no spoon?
Spoon boy: Then you’ll see, that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.
The teaching here is crystal clear: We access the miraculous when we remember our true nature is the very stuff of reality. We are the script writer, director and actor in this grand play of life. And if we want to walk on water, we simply need to know we are both the walker and the water. When this unity is apparent, then miracles become ordinary and the ordinary, miraculous.
Awareness is here, (levitating soon in a theatre near you, and most recently, talking with Christian clergy about miracles and awakening on the Way of Consciousness radio show )
Lori Ann
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Rajiv Gandhar
Vedanta is not a branch of Buddhism. This is chronologically impossible; the Vedas predate the life and teaching of the Buddha by seven or eight centuries. This is easy to verify. In fact it is the other way around: Buddhism is a chip off the block of Vedanta.
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awarenessishere
Hi R–I am not sure what you are referring to here?
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Joseph Polaschek
Hi Lori Ann!,
Perhaps reading my response to Rajiv will help.
Would love to visit with you in person sometime!
Hugs again,
Joseph
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Joseph Polaschek
Rajiv,
OOPs! Following the lines of Advaita and Bhuddism is difficult, even for religious scholars who have noted that Bhuddism and Vedanta should not be viewed as two opposite systems, but one which starts with the Upanishads and are different expressions of the same eternal absolute truth.
Perhaps you can see the reason for my misunderstanding from another source. I apologize for the error! Of all religions, Bhuddism/Advaita Vedanta come closest to truth, but they are still religions.
I apologize again for the error.
Thank you,
Joseph
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zenkitties
“And if we want to walk on water, we simply need to know we are both the walker and the water.”
Powerful statement, would be nice to meditate on that if one sought to see reality. And of course… if meditation is your bag, baby! *in austin powers voice*
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Simply Begin
Reblogged this on SIMPLY BEGIN and commented:
Outstanding !!! ♥♥♥
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Joseph Polaschek
I’m sorry, but this is not a miracle. The world we think we live in does not exist. Praying to god or anyone is nice but it is meaningless. The only “Miracle” is forgiveness, not forgiveness to destroy as in forgiving someone who we think has done something, but forgiving ourselves for thinking that we could be affected by anyone. Remember that we are not here, but living something like a dream, which itself does not exist. We are still the Son of God, never having left our true home. God does not even know about this “dream” and certainly doesn’t act in it. Everything is as it is. We have no fear and there are instants when we know we are “home.”
Thank you.
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Joel
You claim to know that ‘God’ does not know about this ‘dream’ and ‘certainly does not act in it’. Yet ‘you’ know about this ‘dream’ and are acting in it to tell us what ‘God’ does not know. So either you know what ‘God’ does and does not know because you are ‘God’, in which case you are lying on behalf of ‘God’ since you know something ‘God’ does not know, or you do not know ‘God’ and are guessing what ‘God’ does and does not know, in which case you are reporting your own conjecture as a fact, which it cannot be. In either case you are maintaining ‘certainty’ as a mere faith, and not only do you not actually know what you are talking about, you by your own position cannot know what you are talking about. So why speak?
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Joseph Polaschek
Hi Joel,
Perhaps it will help to review my response to Lori Ann. People throughout the ages have spoken of this (I forgot to mention Meister Echhart) in the middle ages) but most if not all were excommunicated. There is only one true God, not the one we made up to serve our purposes here. On one level I still “do” things here, but keeping in mind the truth. We are all the Son of God, the true one, that is, and never left our true home. Since this began with the Son of God’s tiny small idea that we could be separate from God and did not laugh at the thought, a good healing for us is laughter as we see in the Laughing Christ picture. We are still civil when necessary, all the time living the truth.
Hope this helps!!
Thank you,
Joe
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Joel
Well you’re the only one who needs to be content with that Joseph. There are many points of view. The philosopher Philipp Mainländer, for instance, felt that God was truly tired of existence and so created the universe as the only possible way he could commit suicide (deicide). Human beings, being fragments of this divine intention, therefore ought to follow their creator’s wish to its logical conclusion and therefore find redemption in their own suicide. You, on the other hand, prefer a laughing Jesus. Horses for courses.
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Joseph Polaschek
Hi Joel, you are absolutely right, there are many ways to the truth. Each person should follow what “resonates: with him/her. Personally I don’t believe in suicide, although I have contemplated it many times. It seems to me, for example, that Jesus essentially took his own life when he told Judas to go do what he had to do and alerted the soldiers where he would be. He knew that his own death would be the result. After many years of being open to many teachings, I still can’t reconcile this except for Him to demonstrate that death was not “real.”
I wish you happiness and peace in your own spirituality.
Thank you,
Joseph
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Joel
I am not as inspired as you are by the Jesus story, but I do agree that the Judas angle as represented by Nikos Kazantzakis makes more sense than the standard religious understanding. But there doesn’t seem much point keeping stories around and trying to second-guess motives from a distance once one has seen one’s true nature, save as a hobby of interpretation. As good as gardening, in that regard.
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Joseph Polaschek
Hello again,
I take all stories with a grain of salt, particularly those in the bible which were written from oral tradition and the whole thing put together by Iraneus of Lyon and a small group of men who decided what should be included. So I draw from many traditions and sources that which makes sense to me. At some point, I put it all together, and live accordingly. Forgiveness, for example, just seems like a good principle by which to live.
Again, the best of all to you, Joel.
Thanks for “conversing” with me on this subject.
Joseph
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awarenessishere
HI Joe:
Is that your direct experience? I hear ACIM spoken like a liturgy here. hugs, Lori Ann
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Joseph Polaschek
Hi Lori Ann,
Yes, that is my experience which comes from many sources in my search for true spirituality.
Although much is derived from ACIM which I began studying many years ago (and not fully comprehending it), there are many others such as Advaita Vedanta, a branch of Buddhism, which is close, but not right on because it is still a religion. Certain parts of the bible when understood correctly and being aware that is was compiled by a religion to meet its desires. The Books of Judas and Mary Magdalene were discarded, for example, because they contained the truth. In fact, Judas was the only one who understood the teachings of the Enlightened Jesus, but he was made out to be evil by religion. This has been an interest of mine since early teens.
One might say that religion may lead to spirituality and maybe to enlightenment and something perhaps beyond?
Thank you!
Joe
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awarenessishere
Hi Joe:
When I read your words I get a mixed vibe. One is a wisdom seeker, the other is some one looking to declare it all Maya, and retire from reality. Know what I mean?
I stumbled today on this ken wapnick quote, about ACIM teachings:
“Let me mention, because it does not come up in these principles, that the goal of Course in Miracles is not to awaken from the dream. The goal is to change the nightmare dream into a happy dream. In the happy dream, we are still living within this world of illusion, the world of separate bodies, but no longer projecting any guilt onto it. It is living in this world with what is called “true perception.” That is what the Course terms “the real world”: it is a world totally without sin in our minds. That is the goal of the Course. Then it says that God takes the last step Himself, and that is what finally awakens us from the dream entirely. But the focus of Course in Miracles is to help us live in this world, which is a world of the body, but without the projections of guilt.” (Ken Wapnick)
If the goal at one point prior to “grace” is a happy dream–a happy maya/illusion-then this validates the idea that there is a progression here, in this dream. From nightmare maker, to the miracle of a “shift in perecption” where we see the inherent goodenss in the isness…leading to the happy dream.
Next, waking up from it..think that is Buddha territory.
I wonder: Are you without suffering in your existence? Is your dream a happy one. Curious to know.
Lori Ann
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Joseph Polaschek
Hi Lori,
What you say is all correct, from ACIM. Ken Wapnick added to his teachings the concept of Level 1 and Level 2 because people were getting confused. Level 1 concerns this world/universe and how to interpret ACIM. Per Ken, “We should not take literally much of what we read in the Course.” From the Course itself: “This course remains within the ego framework, where it is needed. It is not concerned with what is beyond all error because it is planned only to set the direction toward it. Therefore it uses words, which are symbolic, and cannot express what lies beyond symbols.” (C-in.3:1-3).
Other spiritual leaders say the same thing, essentially, that words can only be pointers. The beginning of the Dao is “The Dao you you are reading is not the true Dao.” We live in this world even when “awakened”, such as the teacher known as Jesus.
Yes, my “dream” is a happy one, though I still experience pain and suffering, but see through them. Does that make sense?
Big Hugs!
Thank you,
Joe
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Simply Begin
Fabulously beautiful!!! The message here resonates masterfully!!!
And the attached Interview HIGHLY RECOMMENDED FOR LISTENING….
Lori you rock!!!
Thank you I am for this moment!!!♥♥♥
~Kate/ I am
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Christine
Loved this! Oh, yes, the deep longing for the mystical was really my desire to come home to myself as myself, ending the separation! Love to you…
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Luey Anderson
You observations always offer a fresh perspective and a boost of inspiration…thanks Lori 🙂
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