Spirituality for Living

I’ve been asked to describe a normal day of mine, or rather abnormal? My day actually starts in my night. I have some unusual conditions I deal with so taking a Taoist view helps me accept “my way” in life, since I can’t implement “common sense”. I’m autistic among other things. I always dream lucidly. [...]

Inner deaths. Those little changes that represent a growth period, but do end a facet of your existence. When it feels like an iron door has slammed shut, but was it really “abandon all hope ye who enter here”? For me it was more of an entering into the world, and in a way more [...]

Egyptian religion was both intuitive and rationalistic.  Since its focus was so pragmatic the Greeks and Romans actually saw no reason to compromise it, and translated some of their concepts into Greek or Roman terms. Thus the cult of Osiris gave birth to the elusian mysteries, and other imagery became very wide spread. There was [...]

The Norse saw there as not being one world, but nine. Perhaps corresponding to the chakras of eastern mysticism, and these nine worlds rested on ygrdassil the world tree not unlike the Jewish tree of life. Modern physics also have a theory of ten dimensions, but seen from our point of view it might seem like [...]

The spiritual insights of the Norse religion can be summarized as a collection of intuitive metaphors called “kennings”, and we still use the word. They governed community meetings, called “things”. This is how their communities were governed, and skalds kept the remembrance of the kennings as well as the decisions and events that occurred in [...]

The ‘Working with Chakras’ series of posts is an interview of a conversation on the chakras. What they are, and how you can work with them. We hope you find it of value in furthering your understanding of energy and personal growth. Working with Chakras: Part I starts with an overview, Part II begins to [...]

The shamans knew about the full mind. Do everything counter to the way that everybody else did. This is the path of the Heyoka. Sacred clown. They support their tribe by showing them how things are undone, keeping them alert. They were tricksters, but because they went backwards. They just “undid” things. People kept aware [...]

Halloween is very much ingrained in our collective unconscious, and has a very long history. It was basically the Celtic New Year. Like the Norse legend of the world being born of ice, they see winter as the first season not the last (or rather they did). Halloween is more like the traditional thanksgiving. This [...]

If you are fascinated with the astral plane, this is where you lose control because you set it apart. You see it as special, and disempowered yourself from dealing with it. When you set it apart you blind yourself, and many people do. They don’t want to engage. They want a fantasy story. They want [...]

Jainism is a religion of Indian origin, but with a minority following that may be the oldest example of an ascetic religion in the world and does still exist today. It shares many concepts with Vedantism, also known as Vedic Hinduism, but differs in its emphasis on the individual and the sanctity of the individual [...]

Jains see every Jiva as being in a relationship to every other, including the angels and hell beings. Much of the imagery of the Buddha being confronted by demons comes from that belief.  But unlike more common beliefs, the angels and demons are equal to humans. So reviling demons gives you negative karma, and attachment [...]

Self declared enlightened people seem to think it’s suppose to come with a good dose of ‘serious’, and seriousness is defined by a kinetic zeal. They are serious about what they do. If they stop doing, then where does the enlightenment go? Mother Teresa was known for not really enjoying ceremony. She preferred the down [...]

In Norse belief most people go to hell. This is the literal source of the word and it was governed by the Vnir goddess Hela. To the Norse, hell was just a place of dreary boredom. Hell wasn’t for the evil. It was just the underworld instead of the sky.
Helios is Greek for sun, which [...]

First seclusion, then the next stage of a rite of passage is limination. Going to the edge.  These days many people make a career of that but there is no reason. It is sort of rebellion but without a clue. They go to the edge because they don’t like the center. Naturally it’s crazy, but [...]

There are many solar deities, but they all share things in common. Both giving and punishing, both warm and potentially damning. Does this seem to refute our contemporary understanding of the sun? But in the ancient world the power of the sun was considered a living power. They didn’t have this concept of living and [...]

The Kabbalah is Jewish esotericism. It’s a bit more widely known than people realize, and some of its arguments are arrived at and used by people who aren’t Kabbalists. The basic concept is that Gods essence is incomprehensible to us, and though Christians criticise this mysticism they still use that idea. The universe exists as [...]

The shamanic traditions dealt with the trickster. The Australian aborigines, as well as really all myths, speak of a “time” or phase before anything had a real form. That scary falling place you sometimes get into before you really sleep. That fear you might really go to hell because of your desires, and yet the [...]

Sikhism is a religion that started at about the same time as the Protestant movement did in Catholicism. It takes influences both from Islam and Hinduism, and it’s original lineage was preserved by a short lineage of Gurus before it was encoded in their religious text.
Please forgive my lack of mastery of the language, but it [...]

Darkness is a part of spirituality, yet there is a trend to censor it in some spiritual groups. No one really likes to talk about the bad side of things, and part of the reason they don’t is either an idea that it somehow makes their efforts impure, or just simply the tendency to label [...]

Zionism is both political and spiritual. It has been going on for a long time, and it even translated into other cultures.  In America it became manifest destiny.
Zionism is ultimately the idea that God has promised land, and that it’s ones sacred duty to either take it or preserve it. The belief in an otherworldly heaven [...]