Tag: nature

Only Love

by nondualmind, posted in Thoughts
Anne Pryor, artist, connector and inventor, created this Lovitude® image. Lovitude represents the quantum energy of Love and Gratitude.
Anne Pryor, artist, connector and inventor, created this Lovitude® image. Lovitude represents the quantum energy of Love and Gratitude.

Dr. Masaru Emoto is a researcher who has studied the effects of human consciousness on the molecular structure of water. I first became acquainted with his work in the movie, “What the Bleep Do We Know!?” Mainstream scientists dismiss Emoto’s work as pseudoscience. I can’t say if his work is valid or not, but I see some non-dual connections that I’d like to share.

The metaphysical community has long held that “thoughts are things.” We know they can produce physical changes in the body: anger can raise blood pressure, meditation can reduce stress, etc. In the video, the result of the ‘higher’ vibrational energies (love, gratitude, devotion etc.) produced crystals with form. The lower vibrational energies (hate, anger, judgment etc.) did not. Pretty simple, even logical when you consider how our bodies react to the same stimuli. Now the leap…

Non-dualism teaches us that Love is the blood of Consciousness (the Absolute). The Christian view would be “God is Love.” Since Consciousness (God) creates form, I think you can extrapolate here that Love created the material universes. The Shakti, which is the creative power, (as well as the power of our own consciousness, since God dwells within us as us), manifests the dream of the Absolute into the form we perceive of as the material world.

So, if Emoto is indeed on to something and I’m correct in connecting the dots, all of what we see and perceive of as matter comes from Love, which could explain why we feel such bliss when experiencing ‘oneness’ while in Nature. No wonder bhakti (devotion/love) is so important in spiritual practice. Love is all there is.

Photo note: The image used was inspired by Dr. Emoto’s work.

(If you go to the you-tube link, there is a short explanation as to how Emoto conducted his research)

Harvest Moon

by nondualmind, posted in Thoughts

I don’t look up anymore.  I noticed that when I crossed my apartment courtyard the other morning to get my mail.  The first light was just coming through, but the sky was still dark enough to see the stars.  I remember because on that occasion I did look up. Just as the day was dawning, it dawned on me that I don’t look up at the sky anymore.  I blamed it on urban living: too many city lights to truly appreciate the night sky, but I suspect there is more to it than that.

When I was kid, you couldn’t stop me from stargazing. And I grew up in the Bronx, so there goes the ‘urban living’ excuse.  “Starlight, starbright, first star I see tonight,” I’d chant and make my magic wish.  And it wasn’t just gazing up at the night sky that consumed my evenings as a child.  I’d lie in the grass during the summer and watch the clouds travel across the sky catching a glimpse of a dog before it changed into a dragon.

No matter what is happening ‘down here,’ nature is ever constant. Oh sure the seasons change, the weather changes, even the constellations that are visible change, but whatever is going on in my life, or your life, doesn’t affect any of this.

I never realized how comforting that is.  I remember a PBS special from years ago featuring Audrey Hepburn. She was walking through a garden and said something that I remember to this day, “Whenever you’re feeling upset or sad (or words to that effect), go outside…” She knew.

Being outside and letting nature just ‘wash over you’ is its own kind of meditation. It connects you to that part of yourself that is bigger than yourself.  The simplicity of that moment when I stood alone and lifted my eyes above the fray of what I call ‘my life,’ was alchemical.  It instantly changed my mood and hence my day– for the better.

This morning, as I drove to work, I enjoyed the last of the full moon from the autumnal equinox of the other day. A Harvest Moon and it was magical……

Ocean of Consciousness

by nondualmind, posted in Thoughts

I don’t want to turn this into an essay about ‘what I did on my summer vacation” but I just spent the past week in Daytona Beach. My sister and brother-in-law have a condo there and they invited me down.  I felt compelled to go even though the seven-hour drive from Atlanta (by myself) seemed daunting to me.  So I packed up my car and hit the road. It had been a while since I’ve spent time at the ocean. Heck, it’s been a while since I spent time in nature. I had a meditation retreat in the Georgia mountains one weekend in June, but it was right after school let out and right after I had my cat put down, so I was way too stressed and tired to fully appreciate my surroundings. Once I got to Florida, I felt a stirring that I hadn’t felt in a long time. Some of the stirrings were childhood memories I have of the ocean. Growing up in New York, I spent a lot of time at the beach.

The next few days were spent relishing the sights, sounds, and smells of the sea.  There I was standing on the shore, the waves lapping at my feet, unable to take my eyes off the water. My mind was quiet.  I could feel the energy of the ocean. I could feel being a part of that energy.  This will sound like a cliché, but I felt one with my surroundings. Somehow, the other people on the beach didn’t seem like strangers. We were connected, not only to each other and the vast ocean in front of us, but to the One Reality or pure Consciousness permeating all of creation.  Nature is the external manifestation of the Sacred.

With my sister and brother-in-law nearby, I asked what it was about the ocean that drew people to it like a magnet. My brother-in-law suggested that maybe it was because we came from the ocean. That primordial memory of our watery beginnings beckoning.  I think that’s part of it, but I also think this sense of oneness happens in any natural setting. It’s hard not to be moved by the majesty of our natural world.  Being in nature, whether it’s hiking a trail in a forest, sitting in the middle of a garden, or staring up at the stars on a clear night, reminds us that we are a part of something bigger.

The ocean appears infinite and constant. For many, while in meditation, it is the picture we see in our mind’s eye that represents the Absolute Consciousness we perceive as God.

You don’t have to be at the beach to dip your toes into the ocean of consciousness.  When the mind is quiet, as in meditation or contemplation, you allow yourself to be immersed in the Absolute, the One Reality, that Is ……..