Archive for June 5th, 2011
Honouring the Numinous Presence Within
Buddha in a cave in Marble Mountain, DaNang, Vietnam
I am rather pleased with how well this low light photo turned out, a photo I took in a cave in Marble Mountain just south of Da Nang, Vietnam. It’s not a perfect photo, but then again, that isn’t the point. The idea is to capture an idea, a feeling, a hint of something beyond the actually image.
I get both a sense of power and of almost acceptance for who I am in relation to the whole, to God, to the Self. I know that I am not the whole though I do feel part of the whole. I know this; it resonates within. Yet . . .
In the face-to-face world, I don’t measure up even a little bit and come up short on too many scales. I am an outsider for the most part. I am distant. I am flawed with a high level of distract-ability which often finds me leave projects in various stages of completion only to have them forgotten and abandoned. I am becoming more and more “selfish” in terms of relation to others. What does this mean? I guess it means taking more time to listen to myself, to honour myself and to accept myself in spite of what others might want, need or demand.
And I get angry with the attitudes that tell me I am getting worse as I get older. I get angry at myself for getting caught up in this anger. And I get angry with others who let me know that I am failing in terms of what is expected of me in relationships. I know that there is no need for anger within me, that I should not take the attitudes of others to heart and let those attitudes wound me. I know that the attitudes are not really about me at all, but about each of those who look at me and evaluate me as “worse.” But, there is this damned “hook” that I carry that catches all of these projections and then suffer the turmoil until the energy has dissipated enough so that I can see what has happened to me, by me.
I have learned a few things along the way during these six decades of living. One of the valuable lessons is to own my own stuff and not take on the stuff of others. Of course, this lesson is always after the fact. At least this allows me some peace when the conflict/complex is deactivated within me. I turn away from the black hole that could consume me, that of being a victim, and turn towards a hint of the numinous that embraces me and tells me that I belong.
