When the opportunity presents itself to venture out into the natural world for a camping trip, performing my traditional morning rituals in the woods is like meeting with old friends in a forest. The simple pleasures of preparing the first meal of the day beside the trees and in the cool early morning air are … Continue reading Our Connection with the Natural World
The title of the song in the background of the video below is “Beyond This Moment,” by Patrick O’Hearn. I’ve mentioned his work before and heard it on the radio on the way home one evening, and it stuck with me. The title started me to thinking about how we might discover what lies “beyond … Continue reading Consciousness Video Series: Episode 8: Beyond This Moment
Last summer, in August of 2022, I posted episode six of my “Consciousness Video Series: Metaphor and the Inner Experience.” https://johns-consciousness.com/2022/08/27/consciousness-video-series-episode-6-metaphor-and-the-inner-experience/ This video described metaphorically my immediate impressions, as I struggled to express, understand, and relate my very personal interpretation of a profound sense of recognition of my inner life, which invariably suggested the elements … Continue reading The Path Beneath the Terrace
The Destroying Angel and Daemon of Evil...William Etty 1832 All my life, from the very first memories I seem to have, I believed in angels, and miracles, and saints. I also was eventually taught to believe in their opposites—devils, tragedies, and heretics. This was a strange mix for a young boy at the “age of … Continue reading Angels of Hope
"Driftwood," by Winslow Homer (1836-1910) “I can reach a state where I seem to be watching things happen as if I were there. That is, I suppose, that my memory supplies what I had forgotten, so that it seems as if it were happening independently, though I am really making it happen. In certain favorable … Continue reading Blog Post #400 – Moments of Being
Webster’s Encyclopedic Dictionary says: “A supernatural event regarded as due to divine action; an extremely remarkable achievement or event; e.g. “it was a miracle he wasn’t hurt.” Anyone possessing even a passing familiarity with religious ideas has probably heard of what holy books have described as miracles—turning water into wine, healing the sick, and other … Continue reading The Mystery of Miracles – Divine Intervention or Just Impossible To Explain?
***(The planned blog posting "The Mystery of Miracles," will appear in the coming weeks. In the meantime, I thought my readers might enjoy a more personal look at the subjects at hand, as I tell the story of one very intense "metaphysical or mystical" experience from my younger days. Enjoy!)*** Edwin Austin Abbey (1852 - … Continue reading Bonus Material: – Musical Ecstasy = Mystical Experience?
“We are at this moment participating in one of the very greatest leaps of the human spirit to a knowledge not only of outside nature, but also of our own deep inward mystery.”—Joseph Campbell While Joseph Campbell lived, he was considered as perhaps the most important scholar of the mythologies of the world. His seminal … Continue reading The Man, The Myth, The Legend
Anyone even vaguely familiar with the term “mystical,” whether from a religious practice or simply from an investigation into the subject generally, can usually agree that it includes a whole range of possible experiences which may qualify. In his classic volume, “Varieties of Religious Experience,” William James writes: “The adjective ‘mystical’ is technically applied, most … Continue reading The Mystical Is Often Metaphorical
The title of this posting has expanded well beyond my initial idea for it, and as I explored a number of resources in the research phase of the writing process, I began to see part of the reason why there is a kind of muddling in the terminology between all of those listed in the … Continue reading Metaphysical, Mystical, Mythological, Metaphorical, or Just Plain Mysterious?
John's Consciousness 