Flipping the switch... Illumination!

When we enter our home at night, illumination comes as we flip a switch... and the lights come on!

 

So, the question is: "Can we find illumination just as quickly when we face a decision or issue that calls for a response?"

 

Each day brings with it the sunrise. The mystery flaming torch that lights our days and is absence to us at night. There is a rhythm to this magical globe of illumination that comes and goes in cycles. We take it for granted since that is our experience and has always been our experience.

 

This is the nature of our world in which the sun with its light and energy illuminates our environment and produces growth and change. Without the sun and earth in the proximity that exists, life, as we know it would not exist.

 

The illumination that comes into our consciousness is also like a light of knowing, bringing clarity to us to some extent... even though the mystery always exists.

 

Answers and messages come in the light of day and also in the light of night through dreams in which our highest Self, that aspect of our being is tranmitting symbols and messages from other less conscious aspects of who we are.

 

The dream scene may be trying to convey some reality and energetic dynamic that our egoic mind may not be aware of and in fact may actually be guarding against its entrance to our consciousness. Now the egoic mind is not 'bad' or 'negative.' It is the result of learning survival in our earth world and as it has built a strong fortress, it also has developed a might defense against change to varying degrees depending on each person.

 

In fact, a night 'terror' or 'nightmare' may actually be some bit of illumination trying to get past the defensive walls of the ego. We experience this as fear in the night and in our body and when it actually may be the ego using fear to inhibit change and expansion of awareness.

 

Dreams are one avenue for illumination.

 

Another path of illumination is our intuition and active imagination. In intuition we tune into our body and sensations and answers coming into our consciousness beyond the reasoning mind. This may be the experience in relaxation and meditation in which we still the mind chatter and let go of trying to "figure it all out."

 

In active imagination, we may do a day-dream type journey to the top of a mountain where we meet up with a wise person with whom to talk. Another method is to visualize looking at clouds or entering the clouds and asking our guides , God, or Higher Self a questions and allow an answer to emerge from the unseen... answers from the unconscious. Answers may come in the form of symbols, words, images, or simply a knowing in our body. The trick is often to trust what we receive before the egoic mind starts to analyze and bring in doubt and confusion.

 

Another more 'acceptable' form in our societies is to do the research, think it through, do the mental work of understanding and learning as much as we can about the focus of our inquiry. Then in the periods of incubation and silence, there sometimes pops an answer, a solution, an option we had not considered. This may be seen as building a point of mental tension in which the creative spark and impulse may leap across the mysterious chasm of the unknown into our consciousness. Many inventors find their genius-ness in this very way...

 

Illumination is that which brings clarity in the confusion and light into the darkness. It brings 'out of the box' answers and a new and fresh beginning of sorts.

 

Where does clarity come from? From the mystery it seems... from the mind that is One mind... from the unified field that transcends egoic defenses and breaks into our consciousness from time to time... In essence, we may say that all is energy and all is mind and all is connected...so, clarity and illumination bridges the spiritual and material and shows us the oneness beyond duality. 

 

Each of us can flip the switch and have the lights come on... trust the larger mind to which we all have access... of which we all are included in the One Life Energy...

 

Much Love,

John Hutchinson

December 26, 2012
John@sunhutch.com