Spiritual Way-Showers

In the midst of restructuring my life, I have been reflecting upon all that has gone before — and I suppose it helps the process <grin> to have transiting Uranus squaring natal Ascendant and Neptune squaring natal Moon.

The earliest spiritual way-showers for me were Bach and Beethoven. Bach's 2- and 3-part inventions, preludes and fugues undoubtedly helped to form mental and intuitive structures so that when astrology, and later computers and web design, came my way, I was able to master them with little effort in minimal time.

And the raw emotional power and spiritual force shining through Beethoven's music played an immensely important role in opening me to these realms.

I feel so very blessed to have had these early experiences, and to even now be able to play their music, which is an unending source of inspiration and upliftment. And for this I owe so much to my mother, who in the midst of war and economic depression bought us a piano.

Later on, in late teenage years, it was the Beat Generation — Allen Ginsburg, Jack Kerouac, William Carlos Williams, Gregory Corso, Lawrence Ferlinghetti — and the French Existentialists who helped shape my response to the larger world I was just becoming aware of. How vividly I remember, in 1958, receiving my copy of Howl from City Lights Bookstore in San Francisco, encased in its soft blue cover!

This led me directly into the Berkeley Free Speech Movement (cheers to Mario Savio and company!), and a short time later to the so-called Hippie Movement and its heroes — Timothy Leary, Richard Alpert (later known as Ram Dass), Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead, Buffalo Springfield, Bob Dylan, the Beatles, Woodstock, et. al. — and seminal works such as the Tibetan Book of the Dead; Be Here Now; Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, The Doors of Perception and Island; William James' The Varieties of Religious Experience; and the writings of Dane Rudhyar.

These experiences helped me to become aware of the power of meditation, the Great Mother, the Goddess, the Feminine, astrology and the Mysteries, and the awesomeness of Nature. And then, just a wee bit further down the road, Findhorn. Whew! What a journey!!

And as I stand poised on yet another threshold, I feel enormous gratitude toward these wonderful beings for all they have given, and hope that in some small measure I may share these gifts with those who are open to receiving.

Blessed Be!