Wednesday, June 23, 2010

The religious and occult communities seem biased in favor of the spiritual over the material. Your work has more balance between the two. Do you believe the material and spiritual are co-equals in power/importance or does one dominate the other?

While I do think that it is possible to focus on one at the expense of the other, that is not my way.

I consider the material world to manifest out of the play of awareness and energy. In a sense I am very Taoist in my approach to things like wealth, sex, and health. I think that increasing all of them in a skillful way supports rather than detracts from your spiritual path. If you do not bring them onto the path however, they can easily disturb your spiritual efforts.

I think it is natural that in the main stages of life one focuses on the material world in this way, and that at the latter stages of life, you turn your mind more towards purely spiritual issues in preparation for death.

I realize that there are many teachings, including many Buddhist teachings, that stress the importance of spiritual preparation for death at all times because you never know when the end comes. And I have done enough work that I am prepared well enough for the bardo. That said, I do not like this motivation through fear of death. Even if I did no work towards it, I did'nt mind the 10,000 years before I was born, and I doubt I will mind the 10,000 years after I am gone.

I am however hear now.This life is more than a test, and more than something to escape.

Ask me anything

1 comment:

ConjureMan Ali said...

How wonderfully put! Without disparaging those who emphasize the spiritual over the material, to me it always seemed like escaping life would be like trying to skip out on an examination at school--always leads to shoddy grades.