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A Maturing Covenant
C. Allie Knowlton, MSW, LCSW, DCSW
The hopefulness of this New Year is tempered by the everyday realities that are difficult to comprehend. A baby is born with the greatest hope of new life, yet this baby is not certain its body is strong enough to sustain its soul purpose and so hovers between life and death. A building housing twenty-four separate businesses is nearly burned to the ground late in the night. A father lies in hospice in the process of releasing his spirit, his personality long transformed by Alzheimer's. A beloved son prepares for a third military deployment to a war zone. I'm sure each of you have your own stories that weigh heavy on your heart. In the face of all of it, I found myself wondering, how do we encourage hope?
With a gift of Christmas money, I bought a book on the Dalai Lama written by Pico Iyer whose father was a personal friend of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. Iyer first met this world renowned person when he was seventeen. Since that time, he has followed him around the world in his role as a journalist. While reading the book, I was struck by the way Iyer consistently referred to the Dalai Lama as a realist. He comes to tell us that he is real, “as real as his country, bleeding and oppressed." "As a longtime student of life and ruler of his people before the age of five--the Dalai Lama listens every morning to the Voice of America, to the BBC East Asian broadcast, to the BBC World Service -- even while meditating -- and devours Time and Newsweek and many other news sources.” The author goes on to describe that when the current Dalai Lama was a small boy, he witnessed many killings, and saw his former home, the Potala Palace, used as a prison for his former regent.* The Dalai Lama's own father was murdered and it was reported that his own brother was asked to kill him. And yet, in every interview we have seen or heard we are struck most with his easy and spontaneous laughter.
A dear friend of ours participated in an assembly of Native people from around the world who gathered in the Swiss Alps to meet the Dalai Lama. She shared that even when he was obviously tired and the event had gone way past the allotted time, he waved off those who attempted to end the evening. He continued the dialogue with the awareness that people had traveled from around the world to share their wisdom and listen to his own about the healing of this planet and her people. We wonder how he holds onto his faith as he listens with tears in his eyes to the stories brought to him by the Tibetan refugees who reach his present home. Iyer gives us some clues he has gleaned from attending his annual teachings in Dharmasala and other places around the world. The Dalai Lama characteristically says there is no need for temples or complicated philosophy, “One’s own mind, one’s own heart, is our temple.” Iyer also reminds us of a significant fact about the Tibetan religion “the connection between other worlds and our own has not been broken.”
The fact that there are connections between other worlds and our own encourages realistic hope for both the present time and our future. In my own journeys to my Spirit Teachers, I was told that this earth is in a transformational process. This process is not a return to the Golden Age, or the Garden of Eden as some would hope. It involves a maturing ot the covenant between the unseen world of spirit and human beings. I went to the dictionary to clarify the word “covenant”. I found that it is an agreement, usually formal, between two or more persons to do or not do something specified. This leads us to the question, what is our own individual covenant with beings in the unseen world? If we are clear about our agreement, we can embrace what each day brings to us, knowing we are “tapped into” the unlimited resources of the Universe. We can laugh at ordinary things in the manner of the Dalai Lama, we can allow the depths of our sorrow and we can renew ourselves at the well of our covenant.
My partner and I joke with one another when life gets more challenging than usual. We yell in mock anguish,“I want to see my contract! Did I really sign up for this?” Usually in the same breath we remind ourselves of another one of our tenets, “When the going gets tough--the tough pray!”
In our shamanic tradition, we have a process called “soul remembering” where we can go to the spirit world on behalf of another to the time just before their soul was to enter a physical body. The purpose is to clarify what this person’s soul intended for this lifetime. We frequently see the soul essence of this person standing with other Beings as they declare their intention. Sometimes, the beings question their intention because it appears to be a difficult choice. Other times, there is an obvious sense of blessing and affirmation. In either case, there is always clarity before a being slips into the embryo to be born.
What is important to note here, is that a covenant implies by its very nature that we are not alone in this adventure of life. And if we are not alone, we have help in facing and resolving the nearly overwhelming global issues of our times. Those with whom we have made our agreements are with us now. We may not have chosen all the individual events that befall us, but we did choose to be here and to be in relationship with other beings outside of our realm. These companions with their unique perspective on both our soul's choices and our physical plane are available for consultation and support! Our covenant may vary based on our personal spiritual tradition but the nature of the covenant is the same. It is a relationship between us in physical form and others in nonphysical form.
When I pressed my Spirit Teachers for more specific information I was given four focal points:
1. Know with whom you are in covenant. For some, it is with the Earth as a sentient being. For others, it includes the deities offered by their religious tradition.
2. Know what your covenant is. As the Dalai Lama has invited, go into the temple of your own mind and heart to inquire, investigate and listen with deep attention.
3. As in any relationship, decide if the form of this covenant needs to evolve, perhaps letting go of any form that no longer holds meaning.
4. Establish a daily practice that will support this covenantal relationship to mature and support you while sustaining your part of the commitment.
As our individual covenantal relationship matures, our planet and her people will heal and move into what many have called “The New Earth.”
- Allie Knowlton
*A regent is one who rules when the leader is ill, incapacitated or traveling.
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C. Allie Knowlton, MSW, LCSW, DCSW is a psychotherapist, shamanic teacher and healer in practice with her partner Evelyn C. Rysdyk. Included in the book Traveling Between the Worlds, Allie and Evelyn are among the world’s most influential writers and teachers of shamanism.
Allie brings a lifetime of connection to Spirit to her work with individuals and groups. Originally trained as a minister, she presents eco-spiritually focused training programs--which include advanced shamanism and shamanic healing -- across the USA and Canada. In addition, as a founding member of True North, a unique, integrated medical center in Falmouth, Maine --she collaborates with physicians, nurses, a psychiatrist, a naturopath and several other complementary healthcare practitioners to provide a new model of health care that includes Spirit.
www.spiritpassages.org
www.spiritliving.org
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