The Citadel

The Sage views the straw dogs

I'm working through "Change your thoughts, change your life" by Dr Wayne Dyer at the pace of a very slow snail. That seems to be the right pace for me. The verse I am at describes the impartial nature of the Tao, its unconditional nature.

"The sage is not sentimental, he treats all his people as straw dogs." 

Often times things come to me when I give a Relaxation in class. Often times all my planning goes out the window, and the Relaxation becomes a creative flow. I experience it as do my students. Something that flows out of the unknown through my mind and weaves itself together all by itself. And it ties together all the questions that have been in my mind forming an answer.

Another thing takes over then. Something in the mind peaks. My consciousness blossoms and the answer grows into a knowing. When that happens I have learned to understand that that answer is then indelibly imprinted on my awareness. It has become, it is now part of me forever. Its hard to describe this kind of knowing as it has a heightened quality, like you touch a truth beyond reason. It fills you with a feeling and a sense of totality. I guess that's the union of Yoga, the moment when there's a deeper sense of connection with something much larger than your normal self.

So last weeks Relaxation was like that.

I began describing a star, gold and silver. Now a star is one of the very lofty images I sometimes use, very much beyond the symbols of sun and moon in Yoga. To me the star transcends all that, it's a symbol of where we come from and where we are returning. Its a lovely thought for me to contemplate the light of a star. Each star shines upon us and can be seen by everyone. Well not particular stars, but stars in general. It strikes me that the star is like the sage. It gives its light to all in an equal and "unsentimental" way. And from this there is a natural expansion of an idea...un-conditionality. The star is its exemplar.

The star shares its light equally and without stint on everyone. And if the star is the highest form of universal energy and light we can contemplate, then a (mystical) understanding unfolds from this. Its only our mind, with its narrower focus, that draws the conclusion of inequality, of more or less for us or others. It isn't the nature of the star. The star is unconditional in its giving. 

For anyone who contemplates this - not just intellectually - but meditatively, I believe there are some quite rich insights to be found. Contemplation of the star can unfold deeper recesses of our awareness of how the universe functions mystically.

Bring to your mind the image of a star in an indigo sky. Infuse the image with your breath, perhaps holding your awareness inside the space of the mind as you do. Contemplate the star and its nature and the journey of its light to you.

"He gives and gives, without condition, offering his treasures to everyone." - The Tao Te Ching

Much love,

Wendy.

   

 

The Light of the world is for all

It's a couple of days to Christmas, and it's time to reflect on the year as we move into New Year as well. For me its been an eventful year, almost like three years in one.

This year my world grew larger. The more some things in my life seemed to contract, the more some expanded. Its also a year the meaning of Christmas deepened for me as I studied and embraced some mystical Christian ideas.

It brings me now to contemplate the status of Christianity today, and the rise of the Christian Right. Today fundamentalists are pushing their agenda into civil rights in many parts of the world. In leading free nations like the USA they have succeeded in having constitutional rights stripped from minorities, through ballot measures such as Proposition 8 in California. This measure has stripped the right of marriage from same sex couples, the ability to adoptchildren by unmarried (same sex) couples in other states like Arkansas.

But by what authority do these fundamentalists do these things. Most will say the inerrant
truth of every word of the Bible.

But I view sacred writings - such as the Bible - as initiators of meditation, that connect us to higher energies. The words inspire and uplift us to a higher consciousness, past limiting beliefs into liberation. So for me the reading the Bible is an intuitive process, not a literal one. To see it as a book of regulations alone seems a shallow interpretation of the incredible depth it offers. It's a book to be studied, ingested and tested in real life.

What I have divined from it is an ascending scale of ever refining ideas. I think this makes me a "supercessionist" Biblically. The idea is that the Bible presents themes, even archetypes which evolve and succeed each other. Jesus's life and teaching is considered the penultimate expression of these. And that his penultimate teaching of finding Grace and extending Unconditional Love to all is the fundamental of Christianity. An aim I know meditation supports utterly.

To be active in stripping GLBT's of their right to marry or adopt children is to be heading in a descending direction away from those penultimate teachings towards division and elitism. As a meditator, division and elitism are manifestations of the Ego we seek to subdue. And that's where I'd place the supporters of Prop 8, as creating an elite based on biology. That was an idea we had a world war over. Let's not go there again.

So this Christmas I'll be reflecting that Jesus spent his time amongst lepers, prostitutes, the destitute and the poor - minorities. He was not about marginalizing sections of humanity, but about including all in God's Kingdom, with equal love and dignity.

Much love, Wendy.  

     

Take heart, forget mind...

 

"The Golden Gate" Photo: Wendy Bradtke 2004 (C)

As I wrote in my last blog about my retreat in a Buddhist Monastery, I'm finding new
insights keep appearing as I work through my day-to-day. I'm seeing even a short time
spent in silence in a meditative way, makes a real change. Imagine if I spent more? 
Not sure if I can grasp that yet, but given time...who knows...

...anyway...

If I see the retreat, and the changes I went through, like a series of locks - I've
been talking to my friend Jeri who lives in the Cuyahoga Valley about the Erie Canal -
then I understand how mind is like that, it flows, opens up and moves
to a new level all the time  -  especially when we meditate -  we become very 
conscious of that. Its like watching our mind as a river, bubbling
and moving and being aware we are on a boat being carried along. And for me
meditation is how I learn to steer my boat, rather than bobbing all over.

Well, I came to my first lock, a huge stepping up place, on my first day of the retreat.
Until then I had been struggling with a deluge of information, most of it about Buddhism
itself. I have never considered myself a Buddhist and I've really struggled with aspects
of its beliefs for many years.  In fact I'm very shy of becoming attached to any religion
so as I sat cross legged in silence, immersed in a flood of Sanskrit words and Tibetan
deities, I was wondering what the hell I was doing in this place!

But I was there because I had followed my nose, a thing I am very inclined to do. Maybe
my inner voice might throw a few clues my way if I asked nicely. Or was it more that I
yelled for help!

One of my certainties is that a "call for help" will always be answered. I began to notice
shifting currents in my mental continuum as a result of my "call". The answer was so
blindingly simple, and it showed me how dazzlingly dim I can be. I was focusing on
my differences, the loud ego part of me that cries ME! ME!and then THEM! THEM! was
trying to separate ME! from all that was around me. So why wasn't I focusing on what I
have in common with not only Buddhism but with those meditating with me?

• we were all looking for meaningful solutions.
• we were all trying to release our suffering.
• we all had our hearts and minds focused in the same direction.

Those things have weight to me, especially that I value them in others.
I saw that words were just words, terms just terms...and this is where I slipped
through my first lock...I slipped from mind to heart.

I had one of those wonderful moments, when life chucks you a life buoy, and you
climb in and let the rope guide you through the water. I let myself be guided, and the
water turned warm and friendly, and I experienced the joy of letting my mind go.

Over the next week I passed through many locks, and I'll write about them soon. But this
first one was vital. The heart is a GATE to the eternal self we desire, but to enter it we
may need to put aside things we build our life around; the identity we cherish
may need to be cast aside. After this realization my meditations flowed very differently
and that led me to my next lock...

...I had to confront my pit of suffering - more on that soon...

Much love today, Wendy x.

What if Pandora's box is empty?

The Shiprock, New Mexico - Wendy Bradtke 07 (C)

I keep an ornate silver sugar caddy that belonged to my grandmother on my desk.
She always dispensed some wisdom or wry new angle when I got stuck. So I methodically
fill the caddy with tiny slips of writing that come into my mind when I'm involved on
other tasks. The caddy is part oracle - part sweet memory - of the sugar cubes it once
contained - my personal magic 8 ball.

Two days ago I drew from my oracle a slip of paper that said -

"Clinging to what defines us, also limits us."

 
Some oracular messages fly like darts...loud bells rang in my mish mash mind. I've
pushed the note around my desk 30 odd times and still its staring at me sphinx-like.
Sigh, back to my love hate relationship with riddles. What if this riddle is a major clue?
Maybe it answers one of my personal conundrums? Why does it scream its a whole
damn key!

You know the "chat" that little voice in your head sometimes has while you're on vacation
- for me recently in the desert - its goes "when I get back home I'm gonna..."

Well I'm home. I'm here. And I'm now staring at this damn riddle.

My train of thought reminds me of an occult term The Ring Pass Not  meaning -
"The limit in spiritual, intellectual, or psychological power or consciousness, beyond which
an individual is unable to pass until he evokes from within the strength and vision to carry
him forwards and over the circumscribing limits set by that individual's own karma."

It's a mouthful, but WOW I can see it's a piece of the puzzle. Karma really defines us, plus
there are some other quite tricky ideas there, like the other not so obvious landmine evokes
- they're huge keys within themselves. But I'm thinking the main key is strength and vision.
I'm amazed mish mash mind managed to get this far, my note is looking less inscrutable.

Strength...oy vey...images of herculean efforts, shovelling shit up a steep slope, throwing
myself to the ground looking sweaty, like being stressed! Its way to energy sapping for this
homebody, it ain't my style, its ain't useful. Nope, let strength be something more subtle,
like steadiness. There's more ease in that, it could work!

Suddenly mish mash mind completely shifts gear and delivers me this -

- The top of the pass over the Chuska mountains brings a full view of the desert from
the Shiprock to Farmington, New Mexico. Driving across the plain there seems nowhere
the monolith of the Shiprock, Tse' Bit'Ai, the rock with wings, can't be seen. Countless
eyes, inner and outer, have beheld the rock, so much energy poured into its mysterious
vaulted forms. The rock is so charged its like an apparition enfolded in ectoplasm - one
moment it may be there - the next it may disappear -

Mish mash mind fights back by answering one riddle with another, or so it seems, m-m-mind
is very tricky, I need to be watchful. However the riddle seems to be solved, at least for now.
So I will hold to my vision, keeping that steady will carry me to where I long to be - simple.

Did I say simple? On my.

For today, much love, Wendy.

Rain, Rain, Rain!

Sitting here as I am today on our first day of glorious rain for some months, and trying to reflect on all the stuff thats gone by in life. Its beautiful out there today. My roof is leaking, but rain is falling. So lovely just to hear it. A meditation in itself.

The Archangel of laughter

Many years ago when I was spending more time learning about western meditation, I learned about the power of laughter. In many of the western practices energies are ascribed to angelic forces, and the Archangel of laughter is the highest of all angels. Whenever there is laughter, energy naturally spirals upward. I have used this technique myself to re direct myself out of stale situations with great effect. I believe laughter is a potent antidote to resistant grief, depression and disease. Love flows naturally from those who can laugh.

It is shame to me to see the demise of the TV sitcom. It would have to be the most noble of all TV forms. Life in its own sweet way, so resembles a sitcom, its hard not to laugh all the day :D