The Three Faces of Spirit

One of the ways to deepen the practice of seeking, receiving, and following divine guidance is to unpack our constructs of the Divine Source.

Integral Theory has a great practice to help open our perceptions of Source. It is called the The Three Faces of Spirit and can be found at:

http://integrallife.com/awaken/spirit/practice-three-faces-spirit

Lame Deer - Seeker of Visions

John Fire Lame Deer (Native American Shaman)

I was all alone on the hilltop. I sat there in the vision pit, a hole dug into the hill, my arms hugging my knees as I watched old man Chest, the medicine man who had brought me there, disappear far down in the valley. He was just a moving black dot among the pines, and soon he was gone altogether. Now I was all by myself, left on the hilltop for four days and nights without food or water until he came back for me... Darkness had fallen upon the hill. I knew that hanhepiwi had risen, the night sun, which is what we call the moon. Huddled in my narrow cave, I did not see it. Blackness was wrapped around me like a velvet cloth... Slowly I perceived that a voice was trying to tell me something. It was a bird cry, but I tell you, I began to understand some of it … I heard a human voice too, strange and high pitched, a voice which could not come from an ordinary, living being. All at once I was way up there with the birds. The hill with the vision pit was way above everything. I could look down even on the stars, and the moon was close to my left side. It seemed as though the earth and the stars were moving below me. A voice said, "You are sacrificing yourself here to be a medicine man. In time you will be one."

- John Fire Lame Deer

Erdoes, R. (1972). Lame Deer Seeker of Visions. New York: Washington Square Press, p.1-5

Gravity Waves

I ride the waves of gravity,

surfing on the cosmic sea of light,

rippling distortions in the fabric of space-time,

rising from the past,

cresting in this very moment,

falling toward an unknown future shore.

Have to remember to ride the now,

looking back or looking ahead,

is always how I wipe out.

Night Watch

In the fall of 1985 I visited the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. I remember walking into the room where Rembrandt’s “Nightwatch” was hung. I froze in my tracks and softly gasped (in-spired). The painting’s presence was so powerful that it felt as though I had entered the presence of some great force. The painting seemed alive, as though Rembrandt had captured the life energy of himself, the people he was painting and the presence of the divine, and fused it all into the paint and canvas. I sat in front of the painting for hours, while it spoke to me through image, character, story, color and light about human struggle and divine yearnings within myself and within all of humanity. The messages I was receiving from the painting seemed to be answering some of the inner questions that had been on my mind just before I entered the museum. That night I lay in bed feeling a deep sense of gratitude for the gifts of the inspiration and guidance I had received at the foot of that giant wondrous canvas.

Zen Ox Herding

Seeking the Ox

Finding the Tracks

First Glimpse of the Ox

Catching the Ox

Taming the Ox

Riding the Ox Home

Ox Forgotten, Self Alone

Both Ox and Self Forgotten

Returning to the Source

Returning to Help Sentient Beings

Creating Without Expecting

"The Tao gives birth to all beings...
nourishes them,
maintains them,
cares for them,
comforts them,
protects them,
takes them back to itself,
creating without possessing,
acting without expecting,
guiding without interfering."
- Lao-tzu (Tao Te Ching, 51)

The Sacred Tetrad

The Sacred Tetrad

"Meditate upon my counsels;

love them; follow them;

To the divine virtues

will they know how to lead thee.

I swear it by the One who in our hearts

engraved the sacred Tetrad,

symbol immense and pure,

Source of Nature and

model of the Divine."
- Pythagoras (The Golden Verses)