We have all heard the saying, "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear." I would like to posit here for you that we are all drawn to those experiences, sources, relationships, and information forms that we are ready for--and that those forms of information are all your 'teachers.' In fact, I would like to remind you that you, yourself, have played a primary role in the planning of your adventures, in the creation of the conditions and circumstances that you believe will most benefit you and your soul's evolution. Those things most useful for your growth at this moment, the information most appropriate to your current ability to comprehend, are the things that you, the 'student,' is calling forth. Also, these things are present and available to you, in many forms, at each and every moment.
Like food, the events and information flowing to and around you offer your soul the nourishment that it craves. Like food, we can get stuck in patterns of what we choose to eat because of familiarity and comfort. Our 21st Century social conditioning and media brainwashing cause us to allow constructs of fear or anxiety to form patterns in our thinking and behavior to which we become overly attached. Yes, they can serve us on many levels, but, ultimately, how they might best serve us is when we are able to recognize them for the patterns of restriction and limitation--or dis-ease--that they are causing. Then we can figure out how to rise above them, throw them off, and choose new patterns less closed off, more open to a greater flow of the great life force that is coming from our True Self, our Divine Essence. So, yeah: Try new things. 'Eat' and 'drink' while trusting your gut, trusting your intuition--which is the voice of your Higher Self. Ingest with the attitude that whatever you choose to interact with is intended to be useful for your highest good and for the highest good of the Cosmos.
"When the Personality is ready, the Soul will appear." Except that the Personality, or Ego, is being bombarded with an overwhelming amount of information coming from "outside" and for some time has quite a bit of trouble figuring out which information to trust, which information is in actual fact life-giving 'soul food.' The Personality/Ego can put up quite some resistance to letting go of its comfortable patterns and familiar habits. And yet, the Soul is not expecting huge or immediate change. As a matter of fact, the Soul understands that it is most often the case that the Personality is only able to "try new things" a little at a time. As it is difficult going from a meat and potatoes diet to that of meat and dairy-free vegan or gluten free or even a spicey Asian diet, so, too, is the sudden and radical change of information 'food' for the Personality. And yet, it does happen, it is possible.
I remember as a young adult I was exposed to some fairly unusual and mind-opening information which was being presented to me through the written form in some books. While I was ready for some of the information to which I was being exposed, my comprehension of the wisdoms conveyed through these books was quite limited. And yet, apparently, I must have recognized at some very deep level that these books offered some very profound and very healthy nourishment for I have continued to return to those books over the past thirty years (both in their actual physical form but also through my memory of their information) with each revisitation providing me with lessons and understanding at far deeper levels.
A particular form of literature and film that I was strongly attracted to in my twenties and thirties was fiction containing what I call "messianic" characters. Time and time again I found myself buying books or going to movies which displayed a character that provoked in his or her surroundings and within me, the audience, a kind of elevated spirit, an increased courage and empathy for life, love or wisdom. Somehow, these fictional messiahs caused everyone and everything around them to rise or expand in their spiritual awareness and moral principles. Some examples from my own personal encounters include: Prince Myshkin in Dostoevky's novel The Idiot, Levin in Tolsoy's Anna Karenina, Siddhartha in Hermann Hesse's novel of the same name, Michael Valentine Smith from Robert Heinlein's Stranger in A Strange Land, Judas in Nikos Kazantakis' The Last Tempation of Christ, Donald Shimoda from Richard Bach's Illusions, Paul Atreides from Frank Herbert's Dune series, and even Amory Blaine from F. Scott Fitzgerald's This Side of Paradise. In film I connected with Peter Sellers' character "Chauncey Gardner" from Being There, Rutger Hauer's "Roy" from the sci-fi classic, Blade Runner, Robert Sean Leonard's "Neil" from Dead Poets Society, Christian Slater's character, "Mark," in Pump Up The Volume, Marlon Brando's "Colonel Kurtz" from Apocalypse Now, and Peter Finch's "Howard Beale" in Network--to name a few. I believe that it was my contact with these characters that awakened within me my own "elevated spirit" which then motivated me to dig deeper into the world of esoteric art and symbolism, to make lifestyle choices that were less-than mainstream, and, eventually, to open the flow of my own creative juices (in such forms as writing, music, parenting, and the healing arts). I also believe that the inspiration I received--and here I mean quite literally "inspiration," for the effect of engaging with these particular art forms breathed into me an expanded flow of spiritual energy which then awakened an awareness of and craving for more spiritual information--I believe that the inspiration I received from these creative forms enticed me into seeking out "live" action among and "live" interaction with other humans. I had come to recognize that it is my most comfortable nature to be alone, to live in isolation from the "dangers" of "real life"--to live safely in a cocoon with the stimuli of other human beings' art and creative work to feed me. This is all well and good--there is no right or wrong way to live life on the Earth Plane--and I know I have lived many lives in solitary or monastic life styles--which is why these patterns are so comfortable to me--but something about my confrontation with the art of others kept prodding me to wake up and do something scary--go out into the world. I was able to learn to recognize that it is among my fellow humans, out in the full elements of the Earth School experience, where my most valuable lessons were to be found. It's hard. It's tough work. But it is so rewarding.
Choosing to live a life vicariously through the artistic expression of others is an understandable and, I admit, viable alternative to the "real thing." But, you still have to eat; you still have to take care of your body, pay bills, and earn the money to pay those bills. Perhaps something will come out of it. Like Walter Mitty, we can live a very vibrant and satisfying life within the free space of a fertile imagination. There is no right or wrong way. Remember, these human lives we live are in fact illusions, constructs we have helped to create, our own movies or plays in which we are actors and, if we choose, writers and directors. With this in mind, who is to say which kind of experience, which kind of information is more valuable for the soul's journey, the imagined or vicarious or the supposed "real"? The advantage art has over real life experience is that it is considered like a highlight reel and therefore full of more compacted "peak" experiences, whereas the "real life" journey we experience in our day to day life is drawn out with those same peak experiences occurring less frequently and much further apart. Also, vicarious living never requires you to own your experiences, you do not have to admit responsibility for the choices made which lead to the sequence of events and their consequences, so it is much easier and "safer." The key to acquiring satisfaction in the "real life" choices, as I've figured it out, so far, is to cultivate perspectives from which one can choose to interpret as many of the "normal" or mundane experiences with the same value and intensity of joy or awe as those artistically created gem. This can be accomplished by living in gratitude, living more fully present, learning to appreciate the 'bigness' of the little things.
I am reminded for the umpteenth time of a character I ran across in some novel I read 30 years ago or so. It was an elderly professor of some sort living in communist Hungary--in Buda-Pest, to be precise. This quiet, unassuming man was recognized for his expertise on many things, but more he was sought after for his stories and descriptions of some of the most wondrous art, architecture and natural beauty from around the globe. He knew buildings, cities, maps, natural and man-made wonders intimately. You name it and he could talk about it with great intimacy. And yet, when push came to shove, this demure old man had to admit that he had never left his home town--had, in fact, rarely left the comfortable confines of his small apartment. he had never set foot in any of the museums, great monuments or hallowed grounds that he could describe with such clarity and with such glowing fondness. he claimed that all the traveling he'd ever done--that he had ver needed to do--he had done through the thousands of books he had read. In using the writings of others in combination with his own fertile imagination he had gained the profoundly detailed and 'living' intimacy that so many knew him to share.
This character, from a book, was trying to convince me that all the learning one might ever hope to acquire can be done without ever leaving one's own home or local library! This idea has obviously had a tremendous effect on me--has continued to burn inside me throughout my life. The conundrum posed here is, as it turns out, a central lesson, a key lesson, to my own path of growth and expansion. To break free of those safe, comfortable, familiar patterns in order to take risks, to have to confront my own ability or inability to handle the barrage of information coming at me every time I leave my home turf. It's daunting, challenging, scary, yet so rewarding! There is so much to be learned about oneself in 'conflict', that is, when having to face minute -to minute decisions. When caught in Ego Personality thinking one will most likely react from past established patterns of behavior. By breathing fully, by detaching from expectations and outcomes, by allowing oneself to feel and experience each every moment--and then to choose to interpret these "risky" "scary" encounters with the "real world" with the perspective of information, of 'food', to be used--or not used--for your health, sustenance, and growth--then can one let go of fear and begin to rust and enjoy the moment, enjoy the stimulus, value and find gratitude for the gift that is this moment, that is the many forms of information available to you--available for you to use as 'food' for your ever-growing ever-expanding concept of Who You Really Are and Who You Want to Be. This is part of what makes Life so Beautiful--of what makes Life such a great choice, what makes the human experience such an amazing vehicle, what makes the Earth School such an exciting playground!
Lest you think that I am diminishing or denouncing the value of art and imagination as unequal 'food' for soul growth, I will add that I know that artful expression and free and active imagination are quite useful as tools in the 'real world'. Art is provocative and evocative in ways similar to that of subjective activity. It's similar to if you were to take a divergent trip using another person's vehicle. The vehicle may not be yours and may be somewhat unfamiliar or different, and the ride may be intense and much more like a rollercoaster because the plan has been set up by someone else, but the way in which you experience, interpret and use the information gained from the experience can most certainly be as valuable as your own vehicle's experiences. The roller coaster ride is just a bit more controlled and prescribed. Your personal journey will be much more exciting if only for the fact that you can turn in any direction at any time that you choose knowing full well that whatever is ahead of you--or behind you--is yours and all yours to use in any way that you wish. And the more open you become to the ego-less flow of Universal energy and spiritual perspective the better able you will be to handle any and all encounters you draw to your Self. With spiritual flow comes openness and detachment. With spiritual perspective comes recognition of the Divinity inspiring every one and everything "outside" us--the same Divinity that flows through us, that is our True Nature, that is our common Home.
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