Greetings all,
It's here at last the final post of the year. It's been close at times but there was a post out every week. I wish they were all top notch, but when you write on a schedule inspiration is sometimes lacking. The upside is you write often enough that it keeps your mental gears greased so when ideas do strike they are easier to present. It also gets you to look at your life differently.
I had a blog for several years prior to my weekly posting ritual. I was lucky if I posted more than once a season. At that time it was mostly an update to let people know what I was doing in relation to the retreat center I was a part of with a friend of mine. After we parted ways under less than cordial circumstances I was adrift for a while. I renamed the blog and I made the commitment to write a post a week. Looking back it was probably the healthiest thing I could do. I got a lot of my emotions worked out in writing. I continue to do so. It helps me order my thoughts and get clear in my mind where I've been and where I'm heading. The structure that the blog provided was perfect and continues to serve me as a mirror for me to see my own inner workings. Of course, sometimes it is a rant fest, and that's alright too.
Reflection these days seems like a dying art. Selfies do not count. Reflection takes quiet time alone with few distractions or amusements. With our phones, computers, and televisions everywhere it can be hard to unplug. I've caught myself texting people when I have a spare moment. Filling the void of time with conversation that really could have waited. It's almost like we're afraid of having time completely to ourselves. We have become a society of sound bites and memes. I remember the time before cell phones and broadband. I remember great stretches of time alone. I did a lot more meditating in those days. To be fair I didn't have much else to do. I might have only had one or two friends and they lived beyond my means to get together with more than a few times a year. I was bored and sad, but I used the time to hone my metaphysical skills. These days I am never bored, but I have to make myself cut out time to just be alone. I find airplane mode on my phone helps.
So why is reflection so important? Without it we are blind to what drives us, why something gets on our last nerve. We find out not only what is going on in our heads, but often we can even put a good estimate together about what is going on in the skull cavities of others. We start to see the same driving factors in the people around us. We are not so different. We all wish to be safe, belong, and have a deeper meaning to our lives. What separates us often is the misunderstanding of those motivating factors. We incorrectly assume that people's behaviors are about us, when really they are all about them and the scars they carry. Reflection allows us to see them more clearly just as we see ourselves.
Back to you guys though. Do you take the time to sit quietly when there is little going on or do you grab your phone? Do you sit back and listen to the winds and rain, or do you scroll your day away on social media? Do you take the time to find the mirror of your mind and heart, or do you lose yourself in the glitz and glamour of entertainment? I'm not saying there isn't room for entertainment and frivolities, but there should be just as much room for reflection. How would your life change if you saw yourself more clearly? Would you find the mirror to be comforting or more like a funhouse mirror? What happens if you see beyond that reflection to the truth behind the masks of self we wear? Try it out and let me know about it in the new year.
Peace and Blessings,
Thomas Mooneagle
Musings
Sunday, December 27, 2015
Sunday, December 20, 2015
Cookies of Christmas Past
Greetings all,
I hope you are having a happy holiday season so far. The next two weeks we'll all be kicked into high gear with Christmas and New Years. These are both the most anticipated and dreaded holidays. They lift our hearts or weigh them down. At times in our life it will be both.
Holidays are great stirrers of memory for us. In every tradition there are certain holidays where families come together and share with one another. Some of us are touched most deeply by the bright decorations and lights we string up in the dark of the year. Some of us are grabbed by the music of carols and chants. Some love the giving and receiving of gifts (some even relish the shopping). Some of us look forward to the sweet temptations of the table.
What stirs my memory is the baking, and the tins and tins of Christmas cookies. In our house an abundance of cookies was a great rarity. I remember helping to decorate cream cheese cookies and almond cookies in the shapes of wreaths and trees with colored sprinkles. I of course remember gifts as a child, but as I got older there were fewer things that I really wanted, and it is the taste of the holidays that most brings me back to the feelings of being a child at the holidays.
As family members have moved away, or passed beyond the veil, though our celebrations grow smaller. In many respects it just isn't feasible to make so many of the holiday treats for a shrinking circle. So the feasts have become smaller, and now with everyone's busy schedules it takes a supreme effort to get together to make our cookies. This year we are forgoing some of my favorites. It can be hard because as we let go of more of our dishes it feels less and less like the holidays of days past. Although bittersweet perhaps it is for the best. If we hang on too tightly to the experiences of the past we miss the joys that are around us in the present. We forget to appreciate what we have. You will only have so many cookies in your lifetime, and only so many holidays with relatives before they too are lost either by time, distance, or estrangement. As we grow in our lives sometimes sadly we grow apart.
Don't be such a downer Mooneagle you might be thinking. I do have a point I swear. We must learn to let go of some parts of our traditions or we become slaves to them. Is there something this season that you are forcing yourself to do only because you've done it in all the years past? We can be so afraid of letting others down especially this time of year that we spend more time stressing over the holidays than actually enjoying it with our loved ones. We are supposed to gather in love in fellowship in the dark of the year. We don't have to follow the exact same route each year. If we do, we leave the hearts we had as children in the past. The holidays really aren't about getting everything you want whether at the table or under the tree. They are about coming together and appreciating the people around the table. Try to remember that this year.
Peace and Blessings,
Thomas Mooneagle
I hope you are having a happy holiday season so far. The next two weeks we'll all be kicked into high gear with Christmas and New Years. These are both the most anticipated and dreaded holidays. They lift our hearts or weigh them down. At times in our life it will be both.
Holidays are great stirrers of memory for us. In every tradition there are certain holidays where families come together and share with one another. Some of us are touched most deeply by the bright decorations and lights we string up in the dark of the year. Some of us are grabbed by the music of carols and chants. Some love the giving and receiving of gifts (some even relish the shopping). Some of us look forward to the sweet temptations of the table.
What stirs my memory is the baking, and the tins and tins of Christmas cookies. In our house an abundance of cookies was a great rarity. I remember helping to decorate cream cheese cookies and almond cookies in the shapes of wreaths and trees with colored sprinkles. I of course remember gifts as a child, but as I got older there were fewer things that I really wanted, and it is the taste of the holidays that most brings me back to the feelings of being a child at the holidays.
As family members have moved away, or passed beyond the veil, though our celebrations grow smaller. In many respects it just isn't feasible to make so many of the holiday treats for a shrinking circle. So the feasts have become smaller, and now with everyone's busy schedules it takes a supreme effort to get together to make our cookies. This year we are forgoing some of my favorites. It can be hard because as we let go of more of our dishes it feels less and less like the holidays of days past. Although bittersweet perhaps it is for the best. If we hang on too tightly to the experiences of the past we miss the joys that are around us in the present. We forget to appreciate what we have. You will only have so many cookies in your lifetime, and only so many holidays with relatives before they too are lost either by time, distance, or estrangement. As we grow in our lives sometimes sadly we grow apart.
Don't be such a downer Mooneagle you might be thinking. I do have a point I swear. We must learn to let go of some parts of our traditions or we become slaves to them. Is there something this season that you are forcing yourself to do only because you've done it in all the years past? We can be so afraid of letting others down especially this time of year that we spend more time stressing over the holidays than actually enjoying it with our loved ones. We are supposed to gather in love in fellowship in the dark of the year. We don't have to follow the exact same route each year. If we do, we leave the hearts we had as children in the past. The holidays really aren't about getting everything you want whether at the table or under the tree. They are about coming together and appreciating the people around the table. Try to remember that this year.
Peace and Blessings,
Thomas Mooneagle
Monday, December 14, 2015
Whispers in the Dark
Greetings all,
This week brought us a very powerful new moon. With strong energies flying about they can surface in unexpected ways. For me when an energy is not expressed or a connection is not quite made it will often play out in my dreams. While I have had a few predictive dreams in my life (as many of us do) that is not my true gift with dreams. The true value my dreams provide, is that they often tell me what is going on right now behind the scenes and facades of my conscious world. This is far more valuable to me than prophetic dreams. It is a symbolic understanding of the now.
Occasionally I am thrown something in a dream that puts me off for a bit. Nightmares used to be much more frequent for me than they are now. I might get a few a month. These days it might be a handful a year, but when they happen oh boy do they pack a punch. I should point out that most of my nightmares don't have monsters or serial killers. (Monsters are afraid of me). I do have those dreams too, but those are more like watching a movie. Often what is the most disturbing doesn't sound like much, and on the surface of the narrative it isn't. It is the feelings that come through that are so intense, either of great sadness or of sheer terror. When I wake from these, telling myself it's only a dream is not an effective coping strategy because on some level I know that they are very real.
Let me paint you a picture. It is daytime I am walking following a car into an underground parking garage. The tunnel in seems to be absurdly long. When I get to the parking structure it is unlit. It is very deep under the ground. It is dark. Not shadowy, but dark, I mean absolute blackness. The thought hits me as I turn that I could be lost in here and never find my way out. I sense there is something there with me, watching me. This darkness is not the mere absence of light but a presence of its own, a weight, a malevolence luring me in to fall upon me and suffocate me. I turn and try to find my way back. After a short time I do manage to find a passage back, but it is almost a dead end with an opening too small for me to fit through. I finally wedge myself out to where there is light, which stops at the threshold; it does not filter in. The little grate that I am trying to escape from won't let go and there is a feeling that the dark wants me.
I'm going to skip ahead. I got out. I woke up shortly after in a state of terror. I turned the lights on and read before I felt I could go back to sleep. On reflection, the events of the dream don't seem that scary, but the feelings of imminent danger and being preyed upon were intensely strong. The shaky feeling stayed with me throughout the day and I even sobbed uncontrollably after my meditation. So at the dark moon I dreamed of the creeping dark, the malice that waits for us to step into its lair. Oddly enough I'd had a week of accomplishment. I'd started teaching again and I was on the cusp of getting my print edition of my book proofed and ordered. I don't necessarily hold darkness as evil either, I even have a guide that is made up of darkness (who is very good and helpful if a bit intense).
As I delve deeper into myself and work to heal deeper wounds I am coming into a depth of self that has been burrowed away to protect itself. This abject terror was within me and needed a way out. I have since journeyed on this dream and gotten some answers and healing. The day after I began a concerted effort of cleaning out my living space of clutter. So I think this dream brought about some clearing just not in a very enjoyable way. People can sometimes mistake inner work for all play and self indulging in one's fantasies. While there are times when play and fun self discovery are the methods, more often than not the work is hard emotionally and can put us in a state of great vulnerability. This inner work stuff is not for faint of heart.
Speaking of self indulgence, I need to bring this back to you. I mean you don't care about my dreams. So how about you? Have your dreams given you any clues as to what's going on beneath the surface? Do you run from your nightmares trying to forget them, or do you mine them for meaning and direction? Do you descend into the depths or seek only the light fluffy thoughts? What old pattern is calling you into the dark whispering its fear into your bones? Can you seek it out by the light of day, or will you meet it by night astride a mare of dark dreams?
Peace and Blessings,
Thomas Mooneagle
This week brought us a very powerful new moon. With strong energies flying about they can surface in unexpected ways. For me when an energy is not expressed or a connection is not quite made it will often play out in my dreams. While I have had a few predictive dreams in my life (as many of us do) that is not my true gift with dreams. The true value my dreams provide, is that they often tell me what is going on right now behind the scenes and facades of my conscious world. This is far more valuable to me than prophetic dreams. It is a symbolic understanding of the now.
Occasionally I am thrown something in a dream that puts me off for a bit. Nightmares used to be much more frequent for me than they are now. I might get a few a month. These days it might be a handful a year, but when they happen oh boy do they pack a punch. I should point out that most of my nightmares don't have monsters or serial killers. (Monsters are afraid of me). I do have those dreams too, but those are more like watching a movie. Often what is the most disturbing doesn't sound like much, and on the surface of the narrative it isn't. It is the feelings that come through that are so intense, either of great sadness or of sheer terror. When I wake from these, telling myself it's only a dream is not an effective coping strategy because on some level I know that they are very real.
Let me paint you a picture. It is daytime I am walking following a car into an underground parking garage. The tunnel in seems to be absurdly long. When I get to the parking structure it is unlit. It is very deep under the ground. It is dark. Not shadowy, but dark, I mean absolute blackness. The thought hits me as I turn that I could be lost in here and never find my way out. I sense there is something there with me, watching me. This darkness is not the mere absence of light but a presence of its own, a weight, a malevolence luring me in to fall upon me and suffocate me. I turn and try to find my way back. After a short time I do manage to find a passage back, but it is almost a dead end with an opening too small for me to fit through. I finally wedge myself out to where there is light, which stops at the threshold; it does not filter in. The little grate that I am trying to escape from won't let go and there is a feeling that the dark wants me.
I'm going to skip ahead. I got out. I woke up shortly after in a state of terror. I turned the lights on and read before I felt I could go back to sleep. On reflection, the events of the dream don't seem that scary, but the feelings of imminent danger and being preyed upon were intensely strong. The shaky feeling stayed with me throughout the day and I even sobbed uncontrollably after my meditation. So at the dark moon I dreamed of the creeping dark, the malice that waits for us to step into its lair. Oddly enough I'd had a week of accomplishment. I'd started teaching again and I was on the cusp of getting my print edition of my book proofed and ordered. I don't necessarily hold darkness as evil either, I even have a guide that is made up of darkness (who is very good and helpful if a bit intense).
As I delve deeper into myself and work to heal deeper wounds I am coming into a depth of self that has been burrowed away to protect itself. This abject terror was within me and needed a way out. I have since journeyed on this dream and gotten some answers and healing. The day after I began a concerted effort of cleaning out my living space of clutter. So I think this dream brought about some clearing just not in a very enjoyable way. People can sometimes mistake inner work for all play and self indulging in one's fantasies. While there are times when play and fun self discovery are the methods, more often than not the work is hard emotionally and can put us in a state of great vulnerability. This inner work stuff is not for faint of heart.
Speaking of self indulgence, I need to bring this back to you. I mean you don't care about my dreams. So how about you? Have your dreams given you any clues as to what's going on beneath the surface? Do you run from your nightmares trying to forget them, or do you mine them for meaning and direction? Do you descend into the depths or seek only the light fluffy thoughts? What old pattern is calling you into the dark whispering its fear into your bones? Can you seek it out by the light of day, or will you meet it by night astride a mare of dark dreams?
Peace and Blessings,
Thomas Mooneagle
Sunday, December 6, 2015
Spirit Tech
Greetings all,
This week has been full of ups and downs. The height of exhilaration and joy as well as the depths of sorrow and disgust has visited with me. The nature of life's pendulum seems to take you from one to the other fairly quickly if you're not enlightened. I am not enlightened, not even close. The way I see it there is plenty of time in the universe for me to take that road. This life I'm taking the long way round.
Many of you have been following along with the news out of California this week. I've seen quite hateful posts back and forth on the topics of gun control and religious extremism. So I'm going to talk about religion. It is one of the oldest technologies we possess. There is no way of knowing exactly how old it is, but it is probably at least as old as our use of fire.
Now some of you out there would argue that religion is not a technology it is one of the humanities. I beg to differ. Technology is our use of knowledge to create change in our world. I would say religion fits into that category quite well. It shapes our societies, it underpins many of our older legal traditions, and it organizes our relationships. Religion is at its heart a story, or an explanation of the way the world works. It usually seeks to explain the hidden causes behind the events of life. In some best case scenarios it tries to make the world into a kinder gentler place to be. In its worst case scenarios it seeks to exterminate all life that is not under the control of its dogma.
Right now religion is taking a bad rap, and quite deservedly so. It was originally a servant of man, a tool of understanding. It has in the past helped to create hospitals, cared for the poor and abandoned, and even inspired people to persevere under the most profound challenges to rise again. It can help comfort the grieving and uplift those that have fallen into despair. These days it is often used to push a political or commercial agenda. I'm not singling out one religion either. Although we hear much about Islamic terrorists, there are certainly Christian terrorists too. There are even Buddhist terrorists in Myanmar. This is what happens when we let ego entangle its limitedness into the fabric of faith in an infinite Authority.
So what do we do? I would say untether the spiritual practices from figures of authority whether they be human or in spirit. Throw out that which does not serve the individual and the community equally. Religion is made up of compelling stories. Perhaps it is time we look at those stories in a more critical light. I don't mean we should be examining them for literal truths. I believe that way is its own madness. We should be looking at the metaphorical truths. What does this story tell us about ourselves? Is it useful? Does it create more good in the world without adding to the tragedies of life? What do our spiritual texts imply about how we treat each other and our world?
This is a radical act. This will make you a pariah in traditional belief zones. Now I don't mean for you to go out there and ridicule the traditions either. They serve a purpose or they wouldn't have lasted. What we need is more understanding, not of the should and the should nots, but the why we should or shouldn't. People forget that societies and conditions change. Words on a page do not. The world is change and yet we continue to try and fit God into an unchanging box bound in leather with gold leafed pages. If you value your holy book more than people odds are you are using your religion for your own ends and not the ends of your professed deity of choice.
So where on the spectrum are you? What do you value: actions, words, faith, or people? Think long and hard about what you really think is important. Try to see the people and why they do what they do and why they believe. This is important. It is easy to see the other in people it is much harder for us to see ourselves. The tragedy of life is that the darkness calls to us all. The beauty of life is that so does the light.
Peace and Blessings,
Thomas Mooneagle
This week has been full of ups and downs. The height of exhilaration and joy as well as the depths of sorrow and disgust has visited with me. The nature of life's pendulum seems to take you from one to the other fairly quickly if you're not enlightened. I am not enlightened, not even close. The way I see it there is plenty of time in the universe for me to take that road. This life I'm taking the long way round.
Many of you have been following along with the news out of California this week. I've seen quite hateful posts back and forth on the topics of gun control and religious extremism. So I'm going to talk about religion. It is one of the oldest technologies we possess. There is no way of knowing exactly how old it is, but it is probably at least as old as our use of fire.
Now some of you out there would argue that religion is not a technology it is one of the humanities. I beg to differ. Technology is our use of knowledge to create change in our world. I would say religion fits into that category quite well. It shapes our societies, it underpins many of our older legal traditions, and it organizes our relationships. Religion is at its heart a story, or an explanation of the way the world works. It usually seeks to explain the hidden causes behind the events of life. In some best case scenarios it tries to make the world into a kinder gentler place to be. In its worst case scenarios it seeks to exterminate all life that is not under the control of its dogma.
Right now religion is taking a bad rap, and quite deservedly so. It was originally a servant of man, a tool of understanding. It has in the past helped to create hospitals, cared for the poor and abandoned, and even inspired people to persevere under the most profound challenges to rise again. It can help comfort the grieving and uplift those that have fallen into despair. These days it is often used to push a political or commercial agenda. I'm not singling out one religion either. Although we hear much about Islamic terrorists, there are certainly Christian terrorists too. There are even Buddhist terrorists in Myanmar. This is what happens when we let ego entangle its limitedness into the fabric of faith in an infinite Authority.
So what do we do? I would say untether the spiritual practices from figures of authority whether they be human or in spirit. Throw out that which does not serve the individual and the community equally. Religion is made up of compelling stories. Perhaps it is time we look at those stories in a more critical light. I don't mean we should be examining them for literal truths. I believe that way is its own madness. We should be looking at the metaphorical truths. What does this story tell us about ourselves? Is it useful? Does it create more good in the world without adding to the tragedies of life? What do our spiritual texts imply about how we treat each other and our world?
This is a radical act. This will make you a pariah in traditional belief zones. Now I don't mean for you to go out there and ridicule the traditions either. They serve a purpose or they wouldn't have lasted. What we need is more understanding, not of the should and the should nots, but the why we should or shouldn't. People forget that societies and conditions change. Words on a page do not. The world is change and yet we continue to try and fit God into an unchanging box bound in leather with gold leafed pages. If you value your holy book more than people odds are you are using your religion for your own ends and not the ends of your professed deity of choice.
So where on the spectrum are you? What do you value: actions, words, faith, or people? Think long and hard about what you really think is important. Try to see the people and why they do what they do and why they believe. This is important. It is easy to see the other in people it is much harder for us to see ourselves. The tragedy of life is that the darkness calls to us all. The beauty of life is that so does the light.
Peace and Blessings,
Thomas Mooneagle
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