The 11th Commandment

What if? What if you could write the 11^th commandment? What would it be? What would make the most difference in your life? In the lives of others? What if you lived by it?

Is it heresy? Is it presumptuous to think of adding to the original ten covenants between the Hebrew people and their Creator? Don’t lie, don’t steal, don’t kill, honor your father and mother - for many, these are part of the collective consciousness. If consciousness, like the Universe, is continually expanding, perhaps an 11^th is an inherent part of natural growth and change.

The opportunity to expand on the ten was recently presented to a spiritual community of which I am a part. Interactive. That’s the key word. Co-creation is another. It’s no longer enough to watch CNN News, we have to Facebook and Twitter about it during the broadcast, becoming part of the news with others, co-creating it. During the past month, community members submitted their ideas for an 11^th commandment. There were thirty submissions, fourteen finalists, votes for top three, one final choice.

Some had fun with it. . .

• You shall eat chocolate in any form.
• You shall not upgrade to the latest electronic gear, even if it is shiny, just because you want it.

From 8-10 year olds. . .

• Be good. Be helpful.
• Love and respect each other.

Some were familiar. . .

• Be kind and gentle.
• Breathe before you speak.
• Don’t believe everything you think.

Among the finalists were. . .

• You shall not abuse or ignore your physical temple.
• You shall create peace in your heart, in your life and in your world.
• You shall not take things personally.
• You shall honor the earth; protect and preserve her flora, fauna and natural resources.
• You shall always remember that you are Love. Love everyone – no exceptions.

Author, and member of the TIME 100 (Most Influential People in the World), Deepak Chopra says, “When you make a choice, you change the future.” Choosing to live by a commandment has that impact. What about the commandments we, consciously or unconsciously, give ourselves? Some of the choices we make occur before the age of five. Those decisions can have the impact of commandments. The Spiritual Adventuress gave herself a commandment at age two, when startled awake in the middle of the night by the wailing siren of a New York City fire engine. While crying, when no one came to pick her up and comfort her, she commanded herself, “You’re on your own,” changing her future. She became an independent contractor as a real estate agent – working on her own. Her marriage ended in divorce, leaving her on her own. She became a single parent, raising her son on her own. After many years of personal growth work, the impact of that hidden commandment became apparent. And with it, came a gift - the power to choose a new commandment, and with it, the future. What commandment have you given yourself? If it is an unconscious one, it can be detected and deduced by observing life patterns which may no longer serve you. As its final choice, the spiritual community decided on its 11^th commandment, changing its future: “You shall remember always that you are an expression of the Divine; you shall know your own divinity and live from it.”

Follow the Drinking Gourd

In honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day, a beautiful baritone voice sang “Follow the Drinking Gourd,” the song of slaves making their way north to freedom along the Underground Railroad by following the Big Dipper constellation, or “drinking gourd,” which points to the North Star.

A drinking gourd was part of the daily physical reality of slaves who drank water from it. In stellar form, it was a spiritual reality from which they could drink hope, guidance and freedom. Symbolically, water, necessary for life, represents spirit. The Big Dipper consists of seven stars. Metaphysically, seven is the number of completion. The slaves could complete not only their physical journey to freedom guided by the North Star, but also their spiritual journey into an awareness of themselves as whole, equal and complete expressions of Spirit. The North Star trued them up, kept them on course, both physically and spiritually.

It is interesting to note that not only is the North Star the brightest star in the Ursa Minor constellation, it is 2.5 times brighter today than when Ptolemy observed it according to research reported in Science magazine. Astronomer Edward Guinan considers this to be a remarkable rate of change. He says, "If they are real, these changes are 100 times larger than [those] predicted by current theories of stellar evolution." Change. A remarkable rate of change. Increasing brightness of a guiding light. Certainly these are relevant themes in our lives today, both individually and collectively.  

The inaugural speech addressed rapid changes taking place in our country and our world. It set a course still in alignment with the North Star of the Drinking Gourd, weaving together the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the inauguration of a new legacy on the same day: “We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths – that all of us are created equal – is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall; just as it guided all those men and women, sung and unsung, who left footprints along this great Mall, to hear a preacher say that we cannot walk alone; to hear a King proclaim that our individual freedom is inextricably bound to the freedom of every soul on Earth.” For the first time, women’s rights, African-American rights, gay and lesbian rights were combined as civil rights in an inaugural speech – the increasing brightness of a guiding light.

For the first time in several years, the Spiritual Adventuress found the usual, year-end rituals to release the past and intend the future held no energy or inspiration, but asking herself some questions about her North Star did.  What is your North Star this year? How will you emancipate yourself? What path takes you to freedom? What star will guide you to your destination? Reflecting on the inauguration contributed too. What are you inaugurating, beginning, starting, creating in your life? Choosing touchstone values as a guiding North Star for the year can be energizing and inspiring. This approach was fulfilling and successful once before when the Spiritual Adventuress used darshan, or an audience, with Mother Meera to determine her North Star while editing a book.

Mother Meera, born Kamala Reddy in 1960, is believed by her devotees to be an embodiment (Avatar) of the Divine Mother (Shakti or Devi). Several years ago, there was an opportunity to see her face-to-face at UCLA. The audience was conducted completely in meditative silence. When it was time for the Spiritual Adventuress to edit a friend’s book about energy gardens she created in Peru’s Sacred Valley (Chakra Gardens: Opening the Senses of the Soul), determining the editor’s role was essential. Clearly it was to keep the book in the writer’s voice, not the editor’s. Clearly it was to assure the book channeled the highest light or spoke the greatest truth. Additional guidance for the editing process came from extracting the essential qualities of the darshan experience with Mother Meera: Surrender, Devotion, Humility, Compassion and Service. These qualities became the North Star that guided the way whenever a decision had to be made about how to proceed. The book was selected as Best Metaphysical Book of 2010 by Writer’s Digest. The guiding light showed the way. When we are open and receptive, guidance can appear in a variety of ways, even as a drinking gourd pointing to a star and freedom. 

One Teaspoon at a Time

“A prisoner gets out of jail one teaspoon at a time,” the Spiritual Adventuress told her neighbor and garden guru, Betsy-of-the-morning-glory-seeds, yesterday. This was while freeing the root ball of a twenty-year-old jade plant from a large, sage green, ceramic Costco pot. Stuck. Just like the liberator. Ready to begin new ventures, but crowded into a confined space with the roots of old, dead growth that no longer serve.

Like Fu Dogs, the twin jade plants guarded the entry of homes in San Clemente, Santa Barbara and Albuquerque. They lolled on a friend’s patio in Ventura, CA for a year while the Spiritual Adventuress relocated to New Mexico. Then, one fateful night last February, on a moving truck in Flagstaff, AZ, they froze. There’s a distinct climate difference between sunny, sea-level California and snowy, mile-high Arizona and New Mexico. They arrived with drooping petals and limp stalks. In Albuquerque, jade plants are indoor plants, but not when they are in move-with-a-hand-truck-because-they’re-too-heavy ceramic pots.

“Rescue Remedy,” after Flagstaff, consisted of removing dead branches, covering the plants with black plastic bags, taping the bags to the pots to ward off gale-force winds, frost and snow. Miraculously, spring brought growth – new petals on spindly limbs – and warnings from neighbors, winter would mean bringing them in. “I can’t lift them and don’t have room inside. They’ll have to make it on their own, or not.” Or not came with the first frost this October.

Since fall, the root-bound pots jammed with dead stalks called for attention from the front porch: “Yoo hoo, replant us. . .” Well, that would mean emptying the containers somehow and require chiseling through the cement-like soil. How? The answer came when Betsy saw me working in the garden and asked, “Is spring on its way?” “New soil and bulbs are on their way for spring,” I replied, “once these pots are empty. Prisoners get out of jail one teaspoon at a time.” Betsy likes to talk this way. She is a writer.

The metaphor was apt. The tip of a trowel removed the soil, one tiny bit at a time. Chiseling away rock-solid soil around the inside of the pot, freeing the root ball to wiggle loose like a tooth, I understood I’m releasing myself from old restraints preventing growth. I’m releasing myself from a dinosaur phone that only makes calls for an iphone that surfs, scans, creates pdfs and emails. I’m releasing myself from voice-only phone calls for international video-calls with friends on Skype using my Christmas-present webcam. I’m releasing myself from traditional real estate practice by joining Keller Williams Realty which has no file cabinets in its offices. I step into the now, into the new, paperless business reality. Not only self-imposed professional and technological, but also personal and spiritual, restraints are ready to be released.

Quantum change can be scary, overwhelming. I know exactly when I put the brakes on once before. When I was introduced to metaphysics in the 1980s, Terry Cole-Whittaker offered a class on “Creation.” The intention of the class was to create in one month what had previously taken us one year. We could join small focus groups on different topics: finances, career, body, relationships. . . I chose career. So it was my intention to earn in one month, selling real estate, what I had earned in the previous year.

We made a list of what would need to change for that to happen, followed by a list of action steps for each change. We held ourselves accountable in weekly focus group meetings, checking off completed action items. Then we converted our completed action steps into a percentage. If I did 6 of 10 action items, I scored 60%. Terry said the average person keeps their word to themselves about 10% of the time, so if you score 50%, you are doing pretty well. What would 80%, 90% or 100% do?

Astoundingly, at the end of the month, I met my goal, earning $38,000 that month compared with $42,000 the year before. Close enough for horseshoes. It was startling. Mind-bending. I thought, “What if I lived every area of my life this way?” Then I felt like the starship Enterprise shifting to warp speed at the beginning of the program, dots of starlight becoming streaks. And I scared myself. It felt out of control. I didn’t think I could handle it. So I put on the brakes, restraining my growth, becoming more and more root-bound.

Fast forward thirty years. I have a second chance - another opportunity to experience that kind of quantum change. Every aspect of my life is ready for spring growth and summer blossoms, but first, I must provide the space and soil in which new thoughts, feelings, experiences can take root. . . by removing the old, calcified ones. . . one teaspoon at a time. I have the tools and the wisdom of spiritual insight.

What percentage of the time am I willing to keep my word to myself? Face my fears? Keeping my word to myself, is integrity. The word integrity comes from the same root as integer, or one, as in a “whole number.” Whole, not a fraction or a part. Whole as in the oneness of Spirit. How often am I willing to remember I am whole, then act and create from that? When I am aligned with the truth of my being, I am in true integrity. 100%. When I am aligned with the truth of my being, there is nothing to fear, because there is no duality, nothing outside myself of which to be afraid. Hmmmm. . . “Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing at all.” It looks as if I’m in my right place. How about you?

Duke City Shout Out: Deepest appreciation to Ejé and Robin Lynn-Jacobs, Grant King and Johnny Garcia for Skype help.

Step Into the Flow

“Step Into the Flow.” Choose. Yes. It’s that simple. The Spiritual Adventuress is talking to herself here, and, if you wish, to you too! The flow of divine energy is always present, always flowing. We can step into it, or step out of it, by choice. It’s one thing to understand this principle intellectually, and another to embody and live it experientially. It’s still another to spend all, or almost all, our time in the flow. Spiritual practice.

Recently, the Spiritual Adventuress has been out of the flow (in a “funk”), by choice, of course, choosing not to RPM (rise-pee-meditate) every morning ("Oh, I’ll just stay in bed a little longer. I’ll get up when I finish reading this chapter. . . this article. . ."). The dot-dot-dots are always there, trailing off into nothing. Nothing. The blog isn’t going to write itself ("It’s not???" Whine.). Devas will not finish the book manuscript and leave it neatly stacked on my oak, roll-top writing desk (“They won’t???" Do you want cheese with that whine?).

The Universe, taking the form of an aquacise companion, lovingly invited me back into the flow. A published writer of young adult and juvenile fiction books, she, too, was “feeling like a zombie” and “saw the look in my eyes,” she later said. She offered to lend me her favorite anti-funk book on resistance and procrastination, one of five copies she keeps around her house for herself: The War of Art – Break Through the Blocks and Win your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield. It goes without saying, well, almost, that the book not only applies to writing but also to the creation of our lives.

This week I returned to my RPM and morning-page writing practices. And guess what? As soon as I stepped back into the flow, it was there. It had been there all the time. I just needed to plug my lamp into the electrical grid. Synchronicities showed up. Joyful experiences showed up. Because I decided to show up. W.H. Murray put it this way: “A whole stream of events issues from the decision (to be committed), raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way.” A week ago I clipped an intriguing 3-line event ad out of Albuquerque’s Alibi, the independent arts and entertainment weekly: “Duke City Dime Stories, open mic prose reading for 3-min. fiction or non-fiction.” It sounded like fun. Just days later, at the launch and author signing of the second annual edition of the literary journal bosque (the magazine) at a local bookstore, a member of my writing group and I were catching up with each other. She said she was writing about grief with two people she met at “Dime Stories.” I told her about clipping their ad. She then turned around and introduced me to one of the co-hosts of “Dime Stories” who had been standing five feet away from me during the entire presentation. Her business card is now in my wallet. The flow is that close. All the time. When we are available to it.

The Universe, in the form of Alice Brasfield, decided to send along a little loving encouragement too. The Albuquerque Journal headlined a same-day article about her this way: “Woman, 81, Is Now a Published Author.” Alice prefaced her bookstore reading with a few wry comments about the newspaper story: “While I’ve never hidden my age, I didn’t expect to see it in a headline.” A grammatical error in the story referred to her as a “former mother.” Everyone laughed as the editors of the literary journal made it perfectly clear they were responsible for neither mishap. Three separate people introduced me to Alice during mingle time. The third time, Alice asked the person how she knew me (aquacise). Curious, alert, alive, humorous – I told Alice her obvious intelligence and her sense of humor made her an inspiration and role model for us all. Then she told us her son recently informed her, “Eighty is the new sixty.” One of his class instructors is eighty.

By attending the bookstore reading to support others, I supported myself (there’s only one). Not only was I inspired by Alice, not only did I meet the founder of “Dime Stories” personally, not only did I warmly reconnect with friends, I also learned of writing opportunities, submission guidelines and deadlines. I could step back into the flow without having a difficult struggle, without having to swim upstream, without having to be miserable, without having it take a long time. I only needed to know the flow is always there and to choose to experience it. It’s great having life work seamlessly. It’s great being supported by the Universe. All I need to do is choose, then act.

“. . . destiny. . . is the child of action.” Deep Truth: Igniting the Memory of Our Origin, History, Destiny and Fate, by Gregg Braden

Ultimate Freedom, Ultimate Power

Someone you really love, perhaps your child, is in an intensive care unit diagnosed with a life-threatening illness, undergoing a difficult treatment of last resort that has a 15% chance of success. Is joy present? Is peace available? Humor? Love? Is it possible for you to experience them in such circumstances? It can be counter-intuitive, to say the least, to believe they are and you can.

Jet airplanes loaded with fuel and people crash into and destroy both towers of the World Trade Center killing almost 3,000 people. In a church the following Sunday, the minister tells her congregation, "Send love to everyone," and you know she means the hijackers too. Can you possibly do that? Why would you want to? Emily Parker's father, the first parent to speak publicly after the Sandy Hook shootings, so choked with emotion he could barely talk, requested love for everyone, including the shooter and his family.

Among the outpouring of candles, notes, stuffed animals, Christmas trees and ornaments in Newtown, Connecticut, a sign appears: "We Are Sandy Hook. We Choose Love."  The residents are refusing to allow their circumstances to victimize them, to affect their values, to determine their response. They are practicing the ultimate freedom, the ultimate power each of us has every moment of our lives. Viktor Frankl, a Jewish  psychiatrist stripped of everything and imprisoned in a concentration camp during World War II, wrote about this freedom, this power, in his book, Man’s Search for Meaning: "Forces beyond your control can take away everything you possess except one thing, your freedom to choose how you will respond to the situation. Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom." 

It sounds so simple. It seems so easy, yet I'm startled time after time to find myself in situations where I feel helpless, powerless, like a victim. It may take a moment (or two), a couple of breaths (or more!) to realize I have that ultimate power - the power to choose my response to my circumstances. Circumstances can seem so compellingly real - a friend says something hurtful, a family member is critical or unkind, our boundaries are violated, our expectations unfulfilled. It can be hard to remember there is a space between stimulus and response. Sometimes it's just stimulus/reaction, not stimulus/space/choice/response. Having your six-year-old child killed at school may be the ultimate opportunity to practice ultimate power. Yet so many of the parents who lost children at Sandy Hook are doing just that, shining their light, committed to “expanding awareness,” contributing to “awakening,” shifting consciousness. We are being confronted with global opportunities to make new choices in alignment with our highest values as we witness Indian women being brutally raped, an Afghani schoolgirl shot, Syrian genocide.

Giving birth can be painful. Six-year-old Benjamin Wheeler’s mother said she always knew he would do “amazing things” in his life, she just didn’t realize they would happen through his death. At Newtown's Town Hall, there's a banner reading: "Together We Birth a Culture of Peace." Together, painfully, means both houses of Congress. Viktor Frankel also said, “It is not freedom from conditions, but it is freedom to take a stand toward the conditions. When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” It is an exciting, and, yes, a challenging time to be alive birthing a new planetary consciousness. We are here now by choice, here to participate, here to take a stand. And, we are up to it.

Sky City

“Sky City,” or the Acoma Pueblo, is located on top of a 367’ high sandstone mesa at an elevation of 6,460’, so it’s easy to understand how it got its nickname. It is an hour drive, about 55 miles, west of Albuquerque, and an additional 15 miles south of Interstate 40 on Acoma Indian Reservation lands, nearly 500,000 acres of spectacular mesa and canyon country. Amazing rock formations and great natural beauty are just part of its uniqueness, so I especially wanted my son Grant to see it during his Christmas visit. We experienced that, and so much more.

I had attended the annual feast day celebration on September 2^nd honoring St. Esteban, patron saint of the pueblo and Spanish mission church built on top of the mesa. The two-and-three-story adobe buildings contain about 250-300 dwellings. The houses, plazas, and walkways have been used for more than eight hundred years, making Sky City one of the oldest continuously-inhabited communities in the United States. The isolation and location of the pueblo offered it great protection.

Historically, initial interactions recorded with Spanish explorers heading north were generally peaceful. Coronado’s expedition describes the pueblo in 1540 as "one of the strongest places we have seen." They "repented having gone up to the place," because the only access at the time was a set of almost vertical stairs cut into the rock face. It is believed Coronado's expedition was the first European contact with the Acoma. To this day, the old, original pueblo, Sky City, has no electricity, running water, or sewage disposal. Everything necessary for living must be brought to the top of the mesa. Fortunately, a road has replaced the original steep, rock-face stairs.

The relationship between the Spaniards and the Acoma declined by 1598 as the intensity of Spanish intentions to colonize the area and convert the Acoma increased. During the war that followed, most of the pueblo was burned, 600 people were killed and 500 prisoners of war were forced into slavery. The Spanish renamed the pueblos with the names of saints and started to construct churches at them. Survivors rebuilt their communities but were forced to pay taxes in crops, cotton and labor.

Bundled up in jackets, hats, scarves and gloves to ward off winter’s cold, Grant and I visited Sky City December 27^th. Traces of snow remained on the shady side of hills, creating white shadows for bushes. 2,000 limp, brown-paper bags, remnants of Christmas Eve luminarias, lined the access road to the pueblo. I was pleased to see that, unlike on feast day, the parking lot of the magnificent Sky City Cultural Center was almost empty. The beautiful 40,000-square-foot building, constructed in 2008, houses a museum, restaurant, gift shop, theater, and meeting rooms. Casino revenue has benefitted the Acoma in wonderful ways.

Tour buses to the mesa top were scheduled on the half hour. My previous feast-day visit was too crowded and busy for tours. Our tour guide’s father was a tribal elder. Those who take tribal leadership positions are required to live in Sky City for a year, so her family lives on the mesa. Currently ten families reside there. Her connection to her family, history, tradition and land made seeing the pueblo with her a deeply enriching experience. She emphasized the sacred nature of the church, its graveyard, the dances and the dancers in traditional dress, explaining why photography was prohibited in that part of the pueblo.

First, she took us into the San Esteban del Rey Mission Church. A transformation had taken place since my previous visit. It still featured dirt floors, plastered, white, adobe walls and a two-story high wood-beam viga and latilla ceiling. A twenty-foot-tall, decorated Christmas tree now adorned the altar platform. Folding chairs filled with Acoma families lined the side walls. Gold tinsel garland festooned the walls, connecting each of the six antlered deer heads with the next. Eight dancers in traditional dress moved with the rhythm of a drum. We stood in the back. The diminished light of late afternoon beneath an overcast winter sky dimly lit the room, creating the feeling of a cloak drawn close. I could feel the energy shift on my back, arms, neck. Anticipation, and something more, something numinous, permeated the atmosphere, causing me to turn around. Then I saw them, deer dancers, each covered completely with a pine branch mask from crown to neck and a six-foot span of antlers. In the dancer’s hands, two wooden sticks embellished with fur symbolized the animal’s two front legs. Clattering seashells wrapped around the dancers’ legs accompanied ritual chants. I could feel the wordless sacredness of the experience at the cellular level. Silently we left when the dance ended. Later, I would read, “Although the Pueblo Indians value their privacy, outsiders may view the highly religious deer dance ceremonies.” It was an indescribable gift.

Our guide continued to walk us around the pueblo, explaining what we were seeing while greeting potters and vendors personally. The Acoma were ordered to build the church between 1629 and 1641, moving 20,000 tons of adobe, straw, sandstone, and mud to the mesa for the church walls, in which she said some of her ancestors are entombed. Limited space on the mesa made the graveyard four layers deep. She pointed out snow-capped Mount Taylor on the horizon, over 40 miles away, from which Ponderosa pine ceiling beams for the church were carried by community members. At 6,000-square-feet, with an altar flanked by 60-foot-high wood pillars, hand carved in red and white designs representing Christian and Indigenous beliefs, the church is considered a cultural treasure by the Acoma, despite the slave labor used to build it. Acoma Pueblo was named the 28th National Trust Historic Site in 2007 and is the only Native American site in the nation. Both the Mission and the Pueblo are Registered National Historical Landmarks.

The Acoma embrace both Catholicism and their own religion since they find value in each. Round kivas, or sacred Pueblo ceremonial chambers, were destroyed by the Spanish in their forcible efforts to convert the Acoma to Christianity. They bombarded the kivas with cannon, burned them and filled them with sand. The Acoma replaced the destroyed kivas with square structures disguised as residences to avoid detection by the Spanish, continuing to practice their religion in secret.

New Mexico tourism plays a large role in the Acoma Pueblo’s economic growth and well being with more than 55,000 visitors a year. Twenty-five years ago, business enterprises were established to help sustain the economic development of the pueblo. The Acoma own not only the casino and the cultural center, but also a hotel, travel center, RV park and big game trophy hunting and communication businesses. You can enjoy photos and videos of the pueblo, their art, music and dance on their website:  http://sccc.acomaskycity.org  The Spiritual Adventuress would like to express her gratitude to the Acoma people for the generosity of their inexpressible gift. May they continue to thrive.

Bearers of the Light

Solstice: 
These are the shortest, darkest days of the year, days with the fewest hours of light. Winter Solstice, Friday, December 21, 2012, one week after Sandy Hook, is "a culminating point, a turning point," when days begin to lengthen, to bring increasing light. You are invited to practice Three Days of Love: A Global Celebration of Love and Kindness on December 20, 21, 22, consciously expanding the presence of the light. Please join me in knowing. . .

My soul magnifies love.

My thoughts, my words, my actions reflect love.

I am vigilant for love.

I am committed to love.

With an open heart,

my moment-by-moment practice is love.

I allow myself to be who I am. 

I am the presence of love in the world.

I am a bearer of the light.

My soul magnifies love.