Instantiation Journal

In September last year I started a side journal specifically to cover what I sensed would be an period of transition. In August I caught somewhat more than a glimpse of an upcoming challenge. I was at the point with my return to active Christianity that it would either stick or all fall apart. One Sunday morning I actually walked the up the middle aisle of the cathedral when everyone else was preparing to approach the table. That morning I couldn't do it. I was simply overwhelmed and was in a literal fight or flight state. There isn't anything too educational about the events of that morning or even the days leading up to it. There were some reasons that I might have been frustrated but really I had knowingly reached that threshold of in it or leave it. I was too close to what the real and that brings up a natural aversion that has to be recognized, addressed and transcended. It happens in lots of contexts. It can be particularly dramatic when it occurs in the realm of the spirit or even better when the spirit is brought to bear on the challenges of incarnated life. So that morning I got out. It was best choice at that particular moment in time. I retreated not far away to Cafe Umbria and began journaling in the notebook that I bring to classes & discussions. Not where I usually journal but it was good that I had it. I found neutral ground, neither the church nor my house, and began to deconstruct the complex pile of thoughts and emotions that I was feeling crushed by.

The result of that morning's meditations is a side journal to my usual one. I enjoy using the moleskin journals. They have nice lined pocket ones that last a good while (despite the term I don't actually journal every day, but over the years it has become an important practice to enable the thoughts, work and experience of days turn into a more lasting transformation). For particular purposes I like these thinner ones that come in packs of three. Quite nice. I even have one hidden in a library in a different work of mine with the condensed version of the manual for the order I created & nearly activated based on alchemical symbolism with a mission of reconciling the traditional opposites of the light and the dark, the left and the right. This is clearly a wholly separate story that some how snuck into this post, but that seems to be the nature of that particular order, which is probably the reason I and the others let it go without further pursuing its manifestation in the apparent world. I do get to revisit the subject of alchemy at a Rosicrucian Conference open to the public next September in Santa Fe. I shall be contented in that. Alchemy was how I came to the Order in the first place. It is a very auspicious return to the beginning for me.

So diversion aside, what I thought might be three or four months, became nine and have been cataloged in this little side journal as a way to remember as well as learn from my experiences, including the creation of this blog as way of recording but also beginning to communicate them. As an aside I realized the other day that this blog is hyper-focused on me, which I will admit is true of a lot of my life. Some reading I was doing reminded me that "humility is not thinking less of yourself but thinking of yourself less". I've seen this two places without attribution so I don't know where it actually originates. That make me wonder whether this blog was following a bad habit. Perhaps, but it is not meant to be a comprehensive representation of my thinking, working, or collaborating. It is essentially an electronic forum where I can perform a necessary self-examination with the possibility of witnesses. I doubt very many people will read these words, which is probably for the best, but one of the things I did at the outset of these writings is notify a handful of people that I trust of their existence. That is enough.

As a way of absorbing some of this side journal into the blog itself, I will do what I did with my primary journal, just list out the headings from the side journal. My usual one just has dates but the side one has no dates but has topic/event headings:

A beginning amidst the stormy sea of Galilee
Counsel from a visionary of Christian Existentialism
Counsel from an old ally
Return to Sabbath reading
Squaring the triangular circle
Healing Prayer (in the context of Trinity's Taize Service & Caritas Community)
A word from the Apostle
A wound from the bow of Par-Is
An echo from the Labyrinth
October: Opus Dei phase two [N.B. Opus Dei as a term for the Daily Office]
On the 40th day...
Schedule my birthday week including retreat to Trappist Monastery
Caritas convened
Class convened
Retreat among the Trappists
Compline at St. David of Wales
Healing Amidst Taize
A revisit to the emerging church
A focused Advent and a foggy Christmastide
Five actions to return to the way
Confraternity of St. Gregory's Abbey
Opus Dei Magnam Gloriam
On to Lent
Holy Week
Albuquerque #2
A lunch to bridge the conference and the diocese
Useful meetings back at home
A class retreat
Episcopal Village - Mission West

And thus I am "in a very different place by June."

A changed a couple titles for this venue as things shifted from the metaphoric to the practical towards the end. This in an of itself tells me that the journal did its work.

The one at the end which did not change is the Episcopal Village- Mission West conference which I think it really what will make that connection between my subjunctive future and my indicative present tenses. It should be excellent and hosted right here in Portland at St. David's (mentioned above as the location of Compline after my Trappist retreat). One month away. Just in case it does anyone any good I can't help but put in the link:

Episcopal Village - Mission West

And on it goes. With the sun, another little Easter.