Tag: experiencing God

Photography (art and the spiritual)

I’ve been drawn into visual images recently, both fine art creations such as paintings, drawings, etc. and also photography. Beauty is really a calling from the Divine. God is Beautiful. Also the epitome of beauty and perfection. For all people beauty is one of those eternal ideals we all are drawn to on some other level. Every culture prizes it. It harkens to something more, something off the map. Art may bring us in contact with our longing, and our connection to this great mystery.

I’m going explore it a bit more with photography. Perhaps with nature and portraits. It is not the external, surface of beauty, I will seek, but the essence, really the Socratic form of it.

Awakening to the Power of Dreams

(Excerpts/edits, and reflections from my reading, “Dreams: A Way to Listen to God” by Morton Kelsey, Paulist Press, 1978. ISBN: 0-80911-2046-1)

• 99% of the time when you dream about others, you are really dreaming about some part of yourself (whether positive or negative).

• Dreaming about war or fighting nearly always has to do with inner conflict.

• Certain universal themes/plots like being chased by a shadowy figure, or finding a new area in a house, have to do with reconciling issues of the inner person, or self-discovery.

• Dreams abide in the realm of symbols. Watch for repetition, patterns, and the associations you have to the symbols in waking life to start to better understand them.

• Dreams can carry both personal and universal symbols, and point out places for personal growth, increased harmony, and prosperity (on all levels).

• If you feel your dreams are important, and take care to begin logging them, you will harvest much personal growth, (including interpersonally) and can experience added spiritual awareness.

• Whether we remember them or not, we dream 5-7 times per night. In studies, animals and humans deprived of dreams develop mental health issues.

If you would like to share comments on dreams or share a powerful dream here, go right ahead.

To discuss your dreams and their potential meanings privately, you may contact me through my website.

seasons and the spiritual

bike path-river trailIt was an uncharacteristically mild day, and I took a long bike ride. The recent inclement weather left the roads with gravel and debris in many spots–quite a danger for a cyclist. My riding buddy commented that a good rain would wash away the problem, and make it right again to ride more safely. It made me think of the cyclical system of nature–the rains that clean and restore. And also the approach of springtime. Rebirth. The theme of regeneration (and seasons/cycles) is ever present with us. It’s ingrained into the fabric of our experience, and I think our human nature. We want to start over. We crave rejuvenation. though change can be frightening, it also means liberation–and we know it deep down in the marrow. It is a reminder–all around–that the spiritual, and the Divine, is as close as one allows it to be.

Feeling threatened/inciting growth: A "how to"

At the margins of growth–personal, emotional, vocational, spiritual, and otherwise–we feel discomfort. The natural feeling is to, in some way, feel threatened. Our stress increases. Our resistance lives at the edges of what we know. Pushing past the edges involves learning and experiencing-and too, conquering fear. It probably involves some sort of pain, process, or persistence.

Think of anything you ever became good at doing. It was threatening in the beginning, and after perseverance, it grew easier. Sports, music, or learning a language, it’s all the same.

Because most people shift to avoid pain/discomfort or associate it so quickly with negative aspects of human experience, we often fail to realize our opportunity for growth lies in the red flags that signal that we feel threatened. These feelings point to patches where we can learn something new about ourselves, our world, another person, a useful skill, or something else. This is how greater understanding comes about.

Like a root-bound potted plant, or a caged bird, we were meant emerge from our surroundings. We can use the native emotions (once seen as negative) that surface for our growth and benefit.

Share your stuff about feelings and growth….

And if you’ve ever used pain/discomfort to grow…feel free to share a blurb.

(experience/belief) posing a question…

While reading recently, I came up with an interesting thought. I was going to try to create a poll to seek answers from readers, but I thought taking comments would be more interesting, if people are willing to leave them.

Do you believe in God more than you experience God? (explain)