#wholism

WHOLISTIC SELF MAPPING

I no longer care whether the world is an illusion or whether it is real. Whether God exists or does not. Whether I reincarnate or come to a full stop when this body dies. I no longer care about being spiritual or being enlightened. I care only that I live as the open hand in the midst of that which offends me. That I surrender my self-righteousness when it rears its tight fist. That I meet you in tenderness without needing to take care of you or please you. I am no longer scared by dark feelings, because nothing is dark when it is fully allowed. Sadness, regret, loss and despair ... all these are children of the One Life, and all are welcome here. Each one of them comes home to my heart and kisses me gently before it is gone. Nothing is denied and nothing stays. I am no-thing and I am every-thing. I am both the dream and the dreamless. I am the unbroken amidst the broken.~ ~Amoda Maa Jeevan

Lord Alfred Tennyson 

― Shalom Melchizedek, Learning To Love: And The Power of Sacred Sexual Spiritual Partnerships

As we strive ever further towards the elimination of the process and the bolstering of the product, we increasingly discover that the product was the process all along. The best part of heating is constructing the fire. The best part of good health are the arts of exercise and cuisine. And the best part of unveiling an artistic masterpiece are the countless hours spent in its growth wherein time ceased to exist. In other words, the goal is not reached by its pursuit; the goal is its pursuit.

Hwaet! So, listen - the cosmos is alive. It is alive because you are alive. You are alive because your ancestors were alive. And those ancestors? They took great care to realise that the world was full of things other than humans. The trees, the rocks, the animals, all of them were interconnected, the ties between kin stretched back through the bonds of wyrd. Spirits followed family lines, and ancestors participated at feasts though they were long dead. Many of them did not believe in magic, or viewed it with suspicion. But nonetheless they understood the importance of kinship, of coming together for the benefit of all. To be outlaw, to be outcast, was a punishment most terrible. Not only were you no longer protected by the law, but you were on your own in a world that owed you nothing. Tied to the land, to the place you dwelt, and to the place you travelled. Were you to travel and settle somewhere new, rites were performed to name the land as your own. To curse an enemy, you might rile up the landvaettir of his realm, so that he might starve or be torn asunder. And nor were all wights, all spirits human shaped. They blurred, they shifted and danced. A stranger on the road might be a god, or that bear watching you with unnerving intelligence might not be what it first appears. And this my friends, is why I hate it when the world is divided, into woo, or non woo, or rational and mad, or god and man, material and spiritual. Waes hael, friends. Be whole, not divided. You are part of something vast and rich, and there are many ways of seeing, being and doing. Our ancestors knew this - elves, giants, gods, men, hidden folk...all a wonderful variety of existences. And all we have, if we do as we're told by society, is a bunch of two-legs and then things that are less than us. Which is the more impoverished worldview, I wonder?

- attributed to Rumi