 O Living Flame of Love
O living flame of love you that tenderly wound the deepest center of my soul! Since you are no longer harsh, please complete your task: rend the veil of this sweet encounter! -- St. John of the Cross (tr. Stanley Appelbaum) What are the fundamental desires of every human being? Aren't they happiness, health, safety, and the feeling / knowing of being wanted? This fundamentalism is the only place to start in considering the ingredients for cultivating the grace of awakening... quite obviously, one needs a certain amount of creative leisure in order to make any sort of sustainable progress in this spiritual direction... so, wouldn't you add creative leisure to the list of fundamental human desires? If we now have, perhaps, agreed upon five fundamental human desires, does it make sense to re-frame these desires as the conditions required for any human being to thrive? Recognizing these conditions not only allows for the human being to thrive, but also to wonder, ponder, question, seek, and engage in natural contemplation... The Tao Te Ching of LaoTzu is perhaps the fruit of centuries of natural contemplation by the sages and mystics of ancient China: and also a fruit still very edifying and useful for every 21st century person hungry for thriving... There is nothing small or lesser in regards to natural contemplation: it is not only the ground upon which the edifice of a spiritual life is raised, but it is at the very same time, the natural end of the contemplative life: there is no genuine separation between "spiritual" and the "mundane", between the "divine life" and the so-called "ordinary life"... For many this can be confusing, but "satisfaction" can be "satisfied" in this subtle "no difference"... In any case, we all can only begin exactly where we are... It is of no advantage to imitate a monk or nun, or an ascetic or other-worldy-penitent, if one is not specifically called to be or to live as one... Natural contemplation is the humble grace of receiving the pleasant "knowledge" of always being good enough... Good enough to care, to engage, to practice kindness and justice, and to enjoy the natural sweetness of the now and place of one's life: good food, good work, good friends, good questions, good conversations, good pleasures, and good times with one's lover... Gratitude is the bridge between the human, the human community, and the ponderific-possibility of some sort of Transcendental Consciousness behind or even in-filling all of Creation... This transcendental consciousness is unknowable and un-nameable: although as is our wont, we do name (and obviously kill) because of it... LaoTzu was right, though, in simply calling it Tao... or Way... or Path that We Must Walk to Thrive... But, for right now and right here, we'll keep to our purpose in cultivating the grace of awakening... (To be continued...)
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AuthorRobert Daniel Smith was privileged to serve the homeless and marginalized for 30 years in California. He is living now almost within shouting distance of the Twin Cities. He is a poet, artist, writer, and long-time Companion of the Way still dreaming... Archives
May 2022
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