VISIONARY TEACHINGS
by Gill Schwartz

THE DIVINE IMPULSE
A Teaching Vision

On retreat. At last... A long weekend getaway from a tormenting time in my life. In desperation, I answer the long-ignored soul beckoning. I cancel appointments, postpone obligations and leave. I come here to these lushly wooded hills where friends keep a few simple cabins for just such needs.

The first day I decompress, indulge in ruminating as to why my life isn't working, fantasize on what I or they should be doing it instead. I pamper myself with food and smoke and gripe to my friends. I ramble the familiar winding trails through stately old growth of pine and oak, hoping to get lost.

Midway through the second day, I start to settle down, and open to my inner practices. I lay out my prayer rug and meditation pillow, light the votive candles in their blue glass holders on the altar I brought, say a simple, heartfelt prayer and give myself over to the enticing inner beckoning.

Through practices evolved from yoga and energy movement, my aura-body eases open as breath and chant flow through me. My outer, day- to-day mind quietens, ceases the nagging soliloquy. A profound self- resonance arises that lovingly gentles me right down into my core, awakens me to the melodious flow of my aliveness.

All at once, Crazy Owl, my celestial Medicine Teacher, appears. "All right, so you think you've lost direction. Not the end of the world. You just need a little visioning to set you straight." He's an ancient Kwakiutle shaman with fox and possum pelts for robes, owl feathers in his long raggedy gray braids and a disposition fit for midwinter in the Arctic.

"Sometimes I wish you could remember better from one time to the next. How much light do you need?" he asks with joking impatience, face in a toothless, crackly grin.

I open myself to his bidding with deeply welcomed relief and sense him working within my subtle bodies, loosening restraints to allow my awareness to expand, to gather and hold all the myriad parts of my mind and heart, known and hidden.

My focus is drawn away from the outer, material world and fully poured into the subtle channels of life-force coursing throughout me. The spirals of my Chakra-lights flood and come into blissful alignment. They reveal my awakened Mind and the levels of my being that connect me with every Realm that is, Earthly to Divine. I exalt in this rapturous fullness.

"Now you are your Cosmic Self again," Crazy Owl happily affirms. "Now you may offer it all to the One in Highest Consciousness and Love."

In a breathless rush of devotion, I gather all that I am and am part of, all together, held in the hollow of my cupped hands, and gratefully offer it on the altar. I make this supplication with profound reverence, and leave it with complete trust.

With this gesture of my soul, I am instantly impelled to merge with the All, Boundless, pure Being. My chattering mind is struck dumb. The 'me-sayer' is gone. The hurts and dreams and disappointments that so occupied me vanish, along with the 'me' that held them so real. Ancient, unfathomable needs and longings are quenched, sated to their roots in this Wonder. The wailing, hungry ghost in my shadow is finally appeased. The world serving, burdensome human masquerade is shed. At last.

Suspended in this Source of all, every aspect of me, every atom of my being becomes a vessel for the One. Then the vessels themselves dissolve into that Infinite Ocean of Being. Absorbed in this holy, musical silence, there is only the heartfelt Knowing that engulfs everything.

At one with the ALL, there is Nothing but the pulsating Light of pure Being. Bathed in and filled with ecstatic illumination, I know only the sacred rapture of total belonging, of pure Unity. This is the Truth that I've lived for, longed for. This is where I belong, where I'm whole. I am Home.

All that remains of my mind is a devout witness. The only thing left of "me" is a tiny point of light within the ten thousand suns that fill my consciousness. The only doing that's congruent, is effortless surrender. I dissolve into the Embrace of Source, my spirit absorbed in its Beloved.

Eternities flow past. They come and go with each languid breath. Gradually, as if born out of overfullness, in the midst of Source, I perceive a surge begin, a bubbling forth in this Ocean of Fulfillment. A gathering vortex of potential. A great, mounting Wave. An avalanche of radiant latency arises on the still expanse of Infinity.

"Good," Crazy Owl informs me, "Now we can begin our Journey," pleased anticipation in his worn voice. "Now, my questing disciple, you will see what should heal your bond to those world longings that worry you so."

This swirl of movement in boundless Source, Crazy Owl helps me comprehend, is God taking form within God: Creator God emerging from Source Godhead. Its movement, Its force and impending purpose flow out from Source's very Heart. Witnessing this fills my heart to bursting.

"The Divine Impulse," Crazy Owl sings as the swirling becomes a Wave that flows. It flows out beyond the Infinity of Source, as if Its movement creates and overflows an edge, a boundary in the Eternal. "Now there is distinction between God the Immanent and God the Boundless Transcendent, the Known and the Unknowable." And as the Wave of Divine Impulse surges out, my speck of witness is swept along with it,

"It brings into being Realms of the subtlest vibration, giving the Nothing form. The formlessness of Eternity is transmuted into archetype and mythopoetic image, the spiritual seeds and matrices of manifestation," Crazy Owl explains.

I watch, awed, as the Wave fills each Realm with beings that reflect and manifest Its Being, peoples them with angelics and entities and spirits, coming into being as It sweeps through.

The torrent Wave of shimmering Light cascades down into ever denserand more defined strata. The Surge births yet another boundary, creates another expression of Its ineffable Presence, as It enters his domain of slowest vibration and densest materiality. Here is the Realm of physical manifestation, the Four-Square Universe of space, time, matter and thought. I marvel as I watch the miracle of what had been merely the inert shell of matter become dynamic and animated as it is lifted into being and filled with the Wave of Divine Impulse flowing through it.

"Here is the Truth that gives this whole Realm significance," Crazy Owl instructs me in the innermost language of my soul. "Here is the knowing that can free you from your illusionary attachments. Without the Divine Impulse to ennoble it, to grace it with purpose and meaning, all that is, is simply swirls of dust in Eternity. Nothing more."

From the vastness of this Truth, I watch as each individual and unique organism -micro to macro- quarks, atoms, stars, living beings, and galaxies, is brought into being as the Wave lifts it, fills it, then passes away as It empties and flows on. Species, races, universes rise and fall as the Wave courses down the millennia. Each specific being is a meeting, a degree of entwining of the dual natures, material form and spirit, substance and Divine Impulse merging in all things.

Entranced watching this myriad "coming into being and passing away", I'm shown a third nature that shapes this miracle that I perceive as a energy matrix of radiant strands, a flexible but defining crystalline webbing. "Karma, karma, karma," Crazy Owl softly chants. "This is the constellating force behind all circumstance. This shape-birthing field penetrates from the subtlest thought-form domain through to the densest realms of matter.

Personal genetics, family illusions, soul-pacts and racial destinies all spin out through this delicate webbing that touches and interweaves with each soul being's life-field, that guides and gathers them all together.

"As the Wave's swell brings each individual into being, this intermeshing matrix of subtlest energies, --karmas of calling, of destiny, of awakening--shape its possibilities of manifestation down to the tiniest, most apparently insignificant detail. Through karma's formative capacity, Spirit and matter continually create the aliveness of the moment to moment Now. Witnessing the interplay of these forces adds dimension to the Knowing."

Not only my guide, but my mentor, Crazy Owl now leads me to observe how the lucent vibration of the Wave is received by the each creature. For all but humankind, I note, Its radiance is fully absorbed. Stone, tree, cloud and beast humbly welcome Its vibrant spectrum in grateful fulfillment. But, regretfully, with humankind, there is a wide variance of response It activates and passes through each person. Many are mindlessly opaque to it, ruled by a psyche with no place for the Unseen. In them, the Wave's radiance grows muted, distorted.

For some precious few selves, the Light is recognized, venerated and gratefully absorbed. In such accord with Divine Impulse, they are Awoken to their Selves. These rare beings transmit rich, intriguing variations of Its Glory, each elaborated with their own personal and unique harmonics. From that level of consciousness, I watch the Light refract through these Spirit prized souls. I perceive the Wave's column of Divinity surrounded and embellished with each one's unique rays and colors.

Crazy Owl, my shamanic Wayshower, now shows me that, beyond all marvels, through this legion of Awoken Ones, the Divine Impulse finds expression. Reciprocally, each individual's soul Calling is honored and woven into the Waves ebb and flow. Crazy Owl brushes my Wisdom Eye with a feather and I'm able to note that the more fully each person honors their own soul's Calling, the closer they take part in the Divine Impulse's manifestation.

Crazy Owl confirms this, and elaborates, "And so it is with you, my seeker of wisdom. The complete, fulfilled individual is a glorification of the Divine Impulse. This is a key and touchstone for your life. The closer you align with It, the closer your are to your own Essence, to your own singular Purpose and Calling."

Once again, my awareness is swept away by a heavenly force and merged with the All. Now with the fullest of views. All that I'd seen of the Wave's journey --from Its leaving Pre-Eternity down through the eons of time into matter and each individual's life-- I now see all at once. As I partake of this universal knowing, I recognize that every being and thing the Divine Impulse touches at all is an integral part of Its manifestation.

With that comes the heartfelt knowing that we are each manifesting, to some degree, and guided by It. As that certainty flows through my psyche, Crazy Owl hums his affirmation. "From that Knowing comes true self-esteem and confidence in the purpose in life."

In this boundless Light of consciousness, everything glows from within. Everyone and everything, in all of time, radiates the Splendor.

Crazy Owl chants in slow deep tones, his hands raised in benediction, clearly with intent to anchor this truth in my mind and heart forever, "Everything that is, matters and is Holy."

Amen

 

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Copyright Gill Schwartz 2003   www.WisdomVisions.com