Fresh Thinking, Inspiration, and Vision on the Process of Spiritual Transformation

There are a number of reasons why people celebrate in the spring. The snow is gone; we’re moving into another season. Daffodils are showing their heads; hyacinths are in bloom and putting fragrance into the air. There are also the celebrations of Easter and Passover, which are considered holy holidays at this time of year. Both of them represent, to me, an acknowledgment of something arising, a knowing at a higher level of awareness than might have been known before. In the story of the Passover, certain people knew to mark their doorways and avoided an awful fate. Was that just luck, or was something known? And if it was known, how was it known? What brought Mary to the tomb to see that it was open? It was an awareness that was the result of a way of living: a vibration that she had welcomed in her life that brought vision, which others around her did not have. I certainly have touched that in my life. I have had the privilege of knowing other people who touched it, as well, and felt put together for the purpose of holding it, so that others might be able to welcome that same experience.

There was a time in the ’80s when many people I knew were creating pyramids. A lot of people were wearing them on their heads as a way to energize themselves or to find that high vibration. I remember people who used to make their meal and put it under the pyramid so that it would be a higher vibration before they consumed it. Pyramids may do that, but I wasn’t drawn to use that technology. I suppose I didn’t like the thought of wearing a pyramid on my head! I also have a huge collection of stones, all of which carry a very beautiful vibration. I have lovely pieces of amethyst, fluorite, obsidian, and various quartz crystals. If you come to my office or my house you can sort through them. I love the vibration they bring as well—but I also felt there was more I was supposed to bring.

So here on this Easter day, a lot of people are celebrating the resurrection and the ascension. What does it mean to have resurrection and ascension in this living body today? What is your greatest experience of holding that vibration of resurrection and ascension with people? We have the experience of saying, “I will.” You know things will come that will create stress and tension, and you have the opportunity to hold it anyway. In our Leadership Program we are engaged in an exercise titled “Whatever It Takes.” You do it, whatever it takes. And if you don’t, you get sent to the “wilderness”—a time of personal reflection—to figure out why you’re not doing what you say you really want to be doing. It might seem very fundamental, but it is an opportunity to be honorable in what you’ve promised your friends. It is a step in learning how to stay in agreement, how to stay in the awareness that caused us to do the exercise in the first place. From that awareness, you may be able to see more and possibly know that there is a tragedy to be avoided, or something stony in your own heart to be moved. There is an advantage to being in a group of people who have agreed to do whatever it takes to increase vision.

As we have been considering, when we move to a highest place of awareness we have a vision of how everything and everyone fits. We see the wholeness of our world, how it all fits together. And if we have let ourselves be drawn to that place of awareness ourselves, we hold a place for all who are interested in that high place. They go there themselves—they rise to the top of their holy mountain.

In the past, there have been times when I thought that if I just hung around with people who were there, I’d get there. I could scootch in on the tails of those who actually are willing to hold it, and then ask them to forgive me when I didn’t. In reality there’s an internal place where we don’t want to be forgiven—we want to be honorable. We want to hold that place and be honorable with those to whom we have said we will hold it. That’s how things get to “arise,” as we sang earlier. The words in Previn Hudetz’s song speak of sacred and beautiful things. We don’t experience that sacredness and beauty without opening our own awareness to it and letting it flood through us. It certainly doesn’t happen just because somebody else is doing that. Beauty and sacredness cannot be bequeathed to us from someone else. They are brought into the world by us when we let them come through our awareness.

Here is part of the Easter story that depicts an opening of awareness by Mary Magdalene:

But Mary stood without at the sepulchre weeping: and as she wept, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulchre,

And seeth two angels in white sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain.

And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? She saith unto them, Because they have taken away my LORD, and I know not where they have laid him.

And when she had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus.

Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away.

Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. (John 20:11-16)

These words are beautiful to me. Mary was listening to that higher vibration, that higher knowing. There came a time in my life when I was willing to listen to a higher vibration, and I finally heard someone say my name. I remembered who I am and why I am here. And I said I would live the rest of my life with that name, so that I might invite others to have that same experience.

Easter celebrates this invitation. It’s what Jesus’ life was for me, an invitation to rise up to a higher place in consciousness and hear my name; and an invitation to speak my name so that others might hear theirs—so that when I say my name clearly, through my living, you hear your name spoken. I don’t expect to be called Rabboni in return, but friend and partner in bringing the most sacred and the most beautiful essences of being into the world.