When I was young I participated in organized religious ceremonies. I went to church. There was a lot of prayer involved and a lot of ritual. I didn’t choose to go, I was taken there by my parents.
As an adult, I stopped going to church. After a while I began to, sheepishly, deny my religion. I stopped participating in religious ceremony.
And now, I readily admit that I don’t have the answers. I know that we are here by some kind of miracle, every one of us.
The trouble that I had with religion was not related to the prayer or the ritual. Those were actually my favorite parts. The trouble that I had with religion was the dogma. The man-god idea does not feel right to me. I have a hard time believing that humans have the answers. Religion was invented by man. It was a vain invention. And it was also male egocentric.
The physical world has been discovered and studied and many things are now well-understood. But when you get very, very small and very, very big things get fuzzy and uncertain.
The spiritual world is less clear. When it comes to the non-physical we have very little understanding. But, as humans, we crave understanding, and we want to believe in something greater than our individual selves.
I don’t know what lies beyond my physical world. I do know that we, as humans, are one. We are united by our DNA. The separate physical experience we are all having gives us individuality. But, there is something beyond our body that gives us life-force.
No one knows where that life-force comes from. We each drive our force through our time-space continuum. The spectrum of ways to live is almost as varied as the number of stars in the night sky. Each of us has a unique experience.
We can choose to work hard and go against the flow, or we can tap into the river and be whisked into the stream of potential.
I recently heard a talk by Caroline Myss. In it, she spoke about Prayer and the value of Prayer on our connection with our Soul. During the talk she says “You cannot enter the soul without prayer, the mind cannot get you there.”
As a child, church was a way to connect to my soul, through the weekly guided prayer sessions. I mostly tuned out during the dogma, and did an excellent job at memorizing the cracks in the ceiling. Did you know that if you stare at a crack and let your eyes relax, you can see an illusion where the depth of the crack is multiplied tenfold. And also….if you stare at a square grid on a (very high) ceiling and relax your eyes you can create an illusion where the ceiling comes down almost close enough to touch it. Those were the moments when I connected with my soul, and thus with God.
Enough about that.
Mysticism is a personal experience. It’s different for everyone. But, it is deep, authentic and personal. Really getting to know and love yourself is the way to get closer to God. Through prayer and love we get closer to ‘heaven.’ Getting to know your inner depth will bring you closer to your ability to manifest a life that is exactly what you desire. And, in the end only You know what it is.
One wonderful thing about religion is that is creates belonging. You are part of a group that creates value through prayer and unification of belief. There’s something assuring about it.
Caroline says you should ‘pray like a crazy person.’ One example of a prayer: ‘Get me out of this mess, I’m going to sleep.’ Isn’t that the best? She’s not telling God how to get her out of the mess, she is allowing the way to be determined by the Devine. What an awesome way to do it. I’m going to add that to my list of prayers!
Want to hear Caroline Myss’ talk? Here’s the video: