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LOTUS OF THE HEART
Living in Love beyond Beliefs
We Share One Life, We Are One Life
* * *
There may be a great fire in our soul, yet no one ever comes to warm himself at it, and the passerby only see a wisp of smoke coming through the chimney, and go along their way. Look here, now what must be done? Must one tend the inner fire, have salt in oneself, wait patiently yet with how much impatience for the hour when somebody will come and sit down - maybe to stay? Let him who believes in God wait for the hour that will come sooner or later.
*Vincent van Gogh. The Complete Letters of Vincent van Gogh.
Here,
will you ever come, My Love?
Regardless,
I am Here
and
this aloneness
others shun
to me is
Home
Finally, we come to see our aloneness is not our aloneness, only aloneness. We see aloneness is not an absence or not a not-absence, not ultimately. We grow through a regular act of taking time apart from others, and to be quiet, to learn aloneness is already present, always. Aloneness is not to be feared, and we see aloneness is present as a quality of Being, or, we could say, is the Sacred. So, Aloneness is another word for solitude, a solitude that is present among others, even as we come to know aloneness as a quality enriching our time with others.
Yes, due to the satiation of the senses in modern societies, to develop this living-in-Aloneness, indeed living-Aloneness, we must choose intentional time apart from others, so we can develop the natural, innate capacity of an embodied awareness of Grace at all times, in all places. Solitude and silence are essential. This is the becoming at-home with the Void, the Divine Darkness, the Emptiness and, yet, one comes to be confronted with the truth that in the Desert flows Living Water. By passing, then, through the developed state of loneliness, one arrives at natural aloneness and befriends it as a grace of Soul, arising as an expression of the aloneness of the Center.
©Brian Kenneth Wilcox 2017. Brian is a Hospice Chaplain, living out his vow to serve all living beings by serving those preparing to die and their friends and family. Brian lives a vowed life, alone in a quasi-hermitic life, and integrates varied religions, but most especially the contemplative paths of Buddhism and his native faith, Christianity. Brian received a 'mystical' Christ-experience at age 9, and was introduced to a peace untouched by pain and suffering. Later, in his mid-30s, after surviving a dark night of despair, Brian was vowed to a contemplative Christian way of life on St. Matthew's Feast day, 1995, by Greenbough House of Prayer, in Georgia, USA. This began many years of ardent reading, spiritual practice, and exploration of many spiritual paths, including publication of his book An Ache for Union: Poems on Oneness with God through Love. The Journey has led Brian to the joy beyond the ache, a contentment in experiential union with Grace. Brian lives with the affirmation that Love, not as emotion but Divine Presence, transcends all paths of religion and is our Source and Destination. As St. Paul writes in the Christian Bible, "Now remain always, faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love." Peace to All!
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