The Shadow Box

 The Shadow Box

 

“Good does not become better by being exaggerated, but worse, and a small evil becomes a big one through being disregarded and repressed.  The shadow is very much a part of human nature, and it is only at night that no shadows exist.”        Carl Jung

Once a deed or thought is justified with the blessings of goodness we feel we are in the right.  If we follow a creed or dogma of an excepted belief to the core we may find ourselves in the midst of doing just the opposite of what the original faith or institution was designed to embrace.  To stand at the  side of leader whether religious or secular we must always understand that there is a tipping point as with everything reversing the course of the intended journey.  

To keep life in balance we must always evaluate both sides of our nature and the nature of the creeds and values we hold as truth.  To stand back from the crowd, to view our place in the larger picture is vital to keeping the scale of life level.   To follow any group or individual that claims to have all the answers blindly with out question or introspection is stepping into the territory of the shadow; keeping in mind that the individual who claims to have all the answers may be oneself.

Brave’s New World

                

Brave’s New World

 

The history has past from calling you brother

Today you look beyond the time of the setting rays

And walk much closer to the window of the newest century

 

Not always so - willing to look so forward

There were only the memories of winters behind

The smell of spring in the first thaw

 

Time’s meaning had greater meaning then

You watched the herds for signs of movement

You  listened closer to the wind’s words

 

Voices today all melt together carrying no song

The sun still sets in the western horizon

The wolf once more finds shelter beneath the snow

 

In your face I read the turmoil of worlds

You glance at the window hungry to pass

This gap of era’s linked only by Wikipedia’s portal

 

Your youth still favored in resumes 

The choice of destiny stands impatiently bookmarked

You must let the call die quickly –

 

Or accept communion with the Greater Spirits

 

bkmackenzie

 

Creating Life’s Tapestry

 

The Reverse Side of the Tapestry

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All goes well when God is, so speak, both the author and the object of our faith, the one complementing and augmenting the other.  In is like the right side of a beautiful tapestry being worked stitch by stitch on the reverse side.   Neither the stitches nor the needle are visible, but, one by one, those stitches make a magnificent pattern that only becomes apparent when the work is completed and the right side exposed to the light of day; although while it is in progress there is no sign of its beauty and wonder.

————Jean-Pierre de Caussade  1675-1751

From: The Sacrament of the Present Moment

 

 

 

Many spiritual writers speak to us about our life as being a work in progress, analogies from the clay on potters wheel molded by the hand of God, to the metamorphosis of the caterpillar into the butterfly ready to take flight.   Jean-Pierre de Caussade’s ,a Jesuit priest in the 1700’s, compares life to a tapestry in the making as another way of viewing  life as the handwork of God’s love. 

Tapestries though today  mass-produced by machine, in de Caussade’s time were framed and stitched one stitch at a time.   He notes that neither stitch nor needle is visible until the pattern is complete and the reverse side exposed to the light of day.   Jean-Pierre speaks to the reader poignantly that we as the tapestries in the process of creation can only truly be completed to perfection through self-surrender to the will of the creator.   It is the hand of our creator that knows and holds the pattern of our soul’s intention.   Should we choose to fervently clutch to our own version of the pattern we often stumble and lose site of what the true finished picture on the reverse side of life’s tapestry is meant to picture and represent.   It is only through the surrendering of self  to that universal artist of life - that the masterpiece of our life will be completed to its intended beauty.   Each years threads stitched exactly where they were designed to be; the colors and magnificence once finished is exposed to the light of day revealing the handwork of a life lived to its fullest and finest potential. 

It is much easier said then done this - surrendering to the hands we can not see.  For myself it is a daily reminder that my life carries not the importance of my self-importance but the ultimate significance that my completed tapestry will represent in the universal good of all.

 

Ending To My Lookingglass Story —- signed bkm

 

 

 

I always start at the ending.  It could be the ending of anything that has an ending, which is literally everything that is blessed with a beginning.   It is an unlikely story for most who have a bazaar tendency to begin at the beginning of things that have a beginning, but these people do, more times than not, never get to the ending.  

 

 I choose to shield myself from that group of humans choosing instead to follow the path of white rabbits and one-handed drummers.    I came upon this trait quite early in my life - not from being hit in the head, though that did happen when a rock who thought it would stop there on its course of travels to say hello, did just that.  And I replied “Hell oh!” 

 

No, No this extreme backward pleasure came upon me while visiting a woodland on the backside of the 40 acre field that was the home of a wild stream of creatures who within their treasures held a bottle. A bottle  that could never be emptied.   These gnome-like creatures though short in stature were tall in numbers.   I say tall in numbers because they stood on each others shoulders to get the best view of what was happening below.   I could have told them just to ask the guy at the bottom of the gnome ladder since he saw what was happening below better than anyone else.  Especially better than  the gnome on the very top who was much more concerned about the strength of the bottom gnome’s shoulders than what he was actually seeing from up there.   But I figured that they had to learn for theirs-elf’s, “like the rest of us,” my father would always say.   That reminds me why I came to the woods in the first place to find out what was there “like the rest,” of the humans who had stepped here before.  And all the gnomes shouted, “Here, Here! No humans have ever been here.” I echoed, “Oh Dear.”

 

Well it is time to get back to the story at hand, which is why we are starting at the end of this story.  The Bottle That Can Not Be Emptied was filled with the endings of stories from people who never finished what they had started; so the endings had to go somewhere and that somewhere was not over the rainbow like everybody thought, but into this bottle that could never be emptied.   Can you believe it?  I could not either, at first , until I asked the gnome holding up his fellow country gnomes above.   I said, “ Sir, Gnome is this truth you are speaking here? That this flowing liquid of life coming from this bottle labeled, Bottle That Can Not Be Emptied is all endings to stories that will never be completed by humans?”   He said, “Yes.”  Well, that was good enough for me.   I believed him and vowed never, never, never not to finish something again.

 

Later that night upon arriving at my place of abiding with the rest of my family of humans I sat and had dinner.   We talked about a lot of different subjects, but I refused to tell them of my visit in the woods behind the 40 acre field.   I did however, watch their every move and listened to their every word hoping I would here of an ending to anything that one of them had started.   To my gravest of fears that did not happen, so I had to make a decision right then and there.   I decided I would always and forever, begin at the end of everything I did, therefore I would finish everything and my endings would never wind up in the Bottle That Can Not Be Emptied.  (Is that clever or what?)

Within the next moments of moments I left my dinner and  my conversation.    Went to end my bath before drawing the water, and in preparing for bed I placed my feet on my pillow and covered the tips of my hair for a good mornings sleep.  I proceeded to dream of yesterday and what I would do then.

    

Well, I have to begin my story now, so thanks for helping me with the ending.  

 

signed bkm —