Category Archives: Abundance

Meeting the Basics

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Scale by Antonietta

Sometimes, it’s worth being reminded that the challenges I talk about here on the blog are largely “First World” problems. Issues we face only when the basics are mostly taken care of. If you lacked food or security, basic needs would take a higher priority over musing about your spiritual life. If you’re reading this article, you also have Internet access. That’s not an option for many people in the world. You can browse the International Wealth Index if you’re not convinced. Of course, wealth equality is another layer, but this isn’t about economics. Abraham Maslow modelled a hierarchy of … Continue Reading… →

Celebration

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Fireworks by Adam Carter

I looked at adding an Interfaith calendar to this site until I realized how complex that would be. Each faith has many celebrations each year, many of which have to be calculated. The fourth Sunday or the full moon after the solstice, for example. However, I did want to mark the key value of celebration. While life can have struggles, we want to amplify our progress in milestones and anniversaries. Celebrations increase gratitude and bring us together. This helps refine and support the heart. Events may be full of symbolism, like the candles on a birthday cake and blowing them … Continue Reading… →

Grace

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stork

Grace is an important element of the spiritual journey. Around the world, we see grace in one of two ways. The first type of grace is unexpected gifts or unmerited favour of the Divine. Peter Wehner described it as “unconditional love given to the undeserving.” For example, there is no manifest “cause” of awakening. It happens when the Divine gifts it. It is not personally earned but rather is given to move things along in the whole. In that sense, grace isn’t personal. Bono, the lead singer of U2, said “Grace defies reason and logic. Love interrupts, if you like, … Continue Reading… →

Nature’s Support

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ocean of love

I wrote about Nature’s Support last spring but the topic has come around again from a different angle.   There is an idea in eastern philosophy known as the support of nature. As we stop resisting life and instead learn to work with what is arising, we cooperate with the flow of life in and around us. Our desires are then fulfilled more easily, we can work out problems faster, and what we need just shows up.   Keep in mind that everything that happens is being done. Our cooperation allows those who support us to support us more easily. … Continue Reading… →

Success

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dylan drums

When we’re young, we often feel inspired, full of life, and desire experiences of all sorts. As we move into child-rearing years, our priorities may shift and security & stability become more important. By the time we get to mid-life, our dreams are often forgotten. Failures may have overcome our willingness to take chances. We may just ride our life out, enjoying the moments we can. Perhaps we plan for retirement, not realizing that what we’re bringing to the table is more important than the events around us. If we look at models like Jane Loevinger’s stages of ego development, … Continue Reading… →

Feeling Supported

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sand sub

There is a great curiousness to the human condition. We’re bathed in a sea of love and yet many experience being alone and unsupported. Our body itself is a community on multiple levels and yet we experience being a separate individual. There is profound work in creating and sustaining our life. Yet we’re often unaware of this. Historically, we lost our connection to the Divine in the descending cycle of time. This caused us to grasp at what we still knew of, our sense of personal identity. But disconnection from the whole caused us to fall out of sync with … Continue Reading… →

Offer it Back

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prayer of the frog

If we’re struggling in some area of life, it may be due to the cycles of time, the collective, or unfolding karma. But it’s also useful to look at how we are with circumstances. If we’re resisting or responding with depression or other heavier emotions, we may be offering a sinkhole to the energy of growth. This is not a suggestion of blame. It’s natural to feel bad when things go poorly. But soon, it’s time to move on. What are we bringing to life? What are we feeding? What is supported now? An early example for me was Maharishi … Continue Reading… →

Wanting Something Else

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feather

When we don’t know who we are, it’s natural to chase things outside of ourselves. The senses tell us satisfaction comes from the world around us so we follow the senses and chase experiences. But nothing they bring us ever lasts. Real satisfaction comes from stepping into the qualities of our deeper nature. We can have tastes of eternal qualities like love, peace, and happiness, but until we awaken there isn’t the stable platform for them to become ongoing. When their presence becomes ongoing, it addresses deep unmet needs, even those we may not be conscious of. This helps heal … Continue Reading… →

The Source of Grace

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There is a curious paradox in spiritual practice. On the one hand, awakening and progress in consciousness happens through grace, through the hand of the Divine. Awakening isn’t an experience or something a person does or has – it’s an awakening from the person. There is nothing we can do directly to make it happen. And yet, we are not separate from the Divine. The Divine moves though us to prepare the way and organize circumstances that allow grace to happen. This shows up as the opportunity for good practices, teachers, books, and so forth. As the renowned sage Vasishtha … Continue Reading… →

The Great Shadows

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While I’ve explored karma in several other posts, I thought it would be useful to take it another step into application. As the saying goes, we come into this life with a suitcase of karma to work through. There will be lots of little bits plus a few big ones. We might call the biggies life lessons or life challenges. They’ll show up in certain areas of our life and not in others. For example, we may have reasonable health and good work but relationship challenges and issues with money. These things seem to be ongoing or show up repeatedly. … Continue Reading… →

The Abundance Code

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There’s a new movie out for New Age audiences that builds on prior films like The Secret called The Abundance Code. It has the common theme of talking heads surrounding an illustrative back story. As usual, there is the “it’s all about me” approach and the “change your thoughts, change your world” message. But mixed in was a surprising amount of deeper insight. There was talk of letting go and allowing life/ nature to guide you, about allowing oneself to not know, about abundance not for the sake of gathering wealth but for having more experiences, and several even touched … Continue Reading… →

True Wealth

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I recently read that the ancient Africans measured wealth by how much you could afford to give away. When we step beyond what we need into a little elbow room, we can reach sufficiency. However, a sense of sufficiency doesn’t come from getting ever more. That’s a form of grasping that’s a symptom of a belief in not enough. From that platform, we’ll never reach enough. If it’s never enough, what do we have to give away? One of the insidious forms of “not enough” is the widespread entitlement you see in the west. Advertising media has cultured a sense … Continue Reading… →