He told me
“Son, its lonely on the path”
This, after I shared with him
My terror at the possibility
Of being destroyed
He told me
“We have fear, because we have no power.
The closest thing to power is choice
As our awareness broadens with time
It informs our choices more completely”
I got off the phone and thought
Thank God for that man
I am not alone.
In memory of “Jim”
(James Marvin Gordon, November 17, 1935-August 22, 2011)
© 2016 Martin H. Wilde
Communion with the Great Primal Other is made possible through an authentic sacrifice or offering. It is not necessary that the offering be perfect, but it is essential that the offering is authentic.
The authentic offering makes it possible to move from literal space to ritual space. It is in ritual space that the Great Primal Other can provide the energy that powers the spiritual transformation.
Carrier wave from nether
Shatters the boundaries
In Split-rock time
And holds the tension
Of conflict
Suspended
Between pairs of opposites
I carry and await
The rising of the third
God appears in the black space
In the tension
The unknown
The uncertain
I’m in the vacuum
Untamed and wild
A universe
With no leash
God is wild
Wild is real
God is real
God is wild
© 2015 Martin H Wilde
“It is lonely on the path”
She disagreed
And commented idly upon
His truth mined from lifetime’s pain
“I have gone where no man goes
And found what no man finds”
Its his hubris and grandiosity
Mumbled the mask on the agreement reality
“Someone needs to stop him”
She said to the woman beside her as she continued her macramé
He shared his findings
His fire, and his soul
He rides alone
Down roads uncertain
Through banks of fog
In the valley of the Devil’s own threat
To the place of oneness
The place of unity
To the place of nothing
The place of all
No dependency
In-dependent
© 2015 Martin H Wilde
I know where I’ve been
I know my enemy
I know my fear
I know my courage
I know aloneness
I know the others
I know my past
I know future uncertainty
I know you
You have been there all along
You have hidden in disguise
You have hidden beyond my fear
You have hidden behind my mask
You have hidden behind desire
You have turned the wheel
At the last instant
And left me standing here now
© 2015 Martin H Wilde
A man of knowledge is one who has followed truthfully the hardships of learning, a man who has, without rushing or without faltering, gone as far as he can in unraveling the secrets of power and knowledge. To become a man of knowledge one must challenge and defeat his four natural enemies.
When a man starts to learn, he is never clear about his objectives. His purpose is faulty; his intent is vague. He hopes for rewards that will never materialize for he knows nothing of the hardships of learning.
He slowly begins to learn–bit by bit at first, then in big chunks. And his thoughts soon clash. What he learns is never what he pictured, or imagined, and so he begins to be afraid. Learning is never what one expects. Every step of learning is a new task, and the fear the man is experiencing begins to mount mercilessly, unyieldingly. His purpose becomes a battlefield.
And thus he has stumbled upon the first of his natural enemies: fear! A terrible enemy–treacherous, and difficult to overcome. It remains concealed at every turn of the way, prowling, waiting. And if the man, terrified in its presence, runs away, his enemy will have put an end to his quest and he will never learn. He will never become a man of knowledge. He will perhaps be a bully, or a harmless, scared man; at any rate, he will be a defeated man. His first enemy will have put an end to his cravings.
It is not possible for a man to abandon himself to fear for years, then finally conquer it. If he gives in to fear he will never conquer it, because he will shy away from learning and never try again. But if he tries to learn for years in the midst of his fear, he will eventually conquer it because he will never have really abandoned himself to it.
Therefore he must not run away. He must defy his fear, and in spite of it he must take the next step in learning, and the next, and the next. He must be fully afraid, and yet he must not stop. That is the rule! And a moment will come when his first enemy retreats. The man begins to feel sure of himself. His intent becomes stronger. Learning is no longer a terrifying task.
When this joyful moment comes, the man can say without hesitation that he has defeated his first natural enemy. It happens little by little, and yet the fear is vanquished suddenly and fast. Once a man has vanquished fear, he is free from it for the rest of his life because, instead of fear, he has acquired clarity–a clarity of mind which erases fear. By then a man knows his desires; he knows how to satisfy those desires. He can anticipate the new steps of learning and a sharp clarity surrounds everything. The man feels that nothing is concealed.
And thus he has encountered his second enemy: Clarity! That clarity of mind, which is so hard to obtain, dispels fear, but also blinds. It forces the man never to doubt himself. It gives him the assurance he can do anything he pleases, for he sees clearly into everything. And he is courageous because he is clear, and he stops at nothing because he is clear. But all that is a mistake; it is like something incomplete. If the man yields to this make-believe power, he has succumbed to his second enemy and will be patient when he should rush. And he will fumble with learning until he winds up incapable of learning anything more. His second enemy has just stopped him cold from trying to become a man of knowledge. Instead, the man may turn into a buoyant warrior, or a clown. Yet the clarity for which he has paid so dearly will never change to darkness and fear again. He will be clear as long as he lives, but he will no longer learn, or yearn for, anything.
He must do what he did with fear: he must defy his clarity and use it only to see, and wait patiently and measure carefully before taking new steps; he must think, above all, that his clarity is almost a mistake. And a moment will come when he will understand that his clarity was only a point before his eyes. And thus he will have overcome his second enemy, and will arrive at a position where nothing can harm him anymore. This will not be a mistake. It will not be only a point before his eyes. It will be true power.
He will know at this point that the power he has been pursuing for so long is finally his. He can do with it whatever he pleases. His ally is at his command. His wish is the rule. He sees all that is around him. But he has also come across his third enemy: Power!
Power is the strongest of all enemies. And naturally the easiest thing to do is to give in; after all, the man is truly invincible. He commands; he begins by taking calculated risks, and ends in making rules, because he is a master.
A man at this stage hardly notices his third enemy closing in on him. And suddenly, without knowing, he will certainly have lost the battle. His enemy will have turned him into a cruel, capricious man, but he will never lose his clarity or his power.
A man who is defeated by power dies without really knowing how to handle it. Power is only a burden upon his fate. Such a man has no command over himself, and cannot tell when or how to use his power.
Once one of these enemies overpowers a man there is nothing he can do. It is not possible, for instance, that a man who is defeated by power may see his error and mend his ways. Once a man gives in he is through. If, however, he is temporarily blinded by power, and then refuses it, his battle is still on. That means he is still trying to become a man of knowledge. A man is defeated only when he no longer tries, and abandons himself.
He has to come to realize that the power he has seemingly conquered is in reality never his. He must keep himself in line at all times, handling carefully and faithfully all that he has learned. If he can see that clarity and power, without his control over himself, are worse than mistakes, he will reach a point where everything is held in check. He will know then when and how to use his power. And thus he will have defeated his third enemy.
The man will be, by then, at the end of his journey of learning, and almost without warning he will come upon the last of his enemies: Old age! This enemy is the cruelest of all, the one he won’t be able to defeat completely, but only fight away.
This is the time when a man has no more fears, no more impatient clarity of mind–a time when all his power is in check, but also the time when he has an unyielding desire to rest. If he gives in totally to his desire to lie down and forget, if he soothes himself in tiredness, he will have lost his last round, and his enemy will cut him down into a feeble old creature. His desire to retreat will overrule all his clarity, his power, and his knowledge.
But if the man sloughs off his tiredness, and lives his fate through, he can then be called a man of knowledge, if only for the brief moment when he succeeds in fighting off his last, invincible enemy. That moment of clarity, power, and knowledge is enough.
==Carlos Castaneda, “The Teachings of Don Juan”
Incomplete and alone
No superstitions that work
Grandma’s morals decades old
Darkness haunts me
Alone in my car
Sunroof wind and sun
Black wing-tip gulls
Circling dozens up high
Floating in the universe
On the blue sky
Tectonic mountain front
Home at last
Such a lucky boy
In love with earth
Never lonely
Never alone
Home at last
© 2015 Martin H Wilde
Sure beats fear
That anger does…..
Its your backbone boy
Time you made friends with it
Its the part of you
That stands up
In the face
Of adversity
Its the personal power
That takes action
That separates you
From situations that would kill you
Once separated
From the trap
Clarity can again dawn
And my soul is again mine
Beware the bitterness
That holds onto anger
To define you by it
And imprison you in the dark
“Go ahead take this the wrong way…..”
© 2015 Martin H Wilde
Spiritual seeking or seeking God is a quest into the unknown; that which is beyond your current understanding. It is about expanding.
It is important that God is unknown. The more we try to pretend we “know” God, the less honest the quest becomes.
We are not supposed to feel safe and secure – life is insecure. Instead we put insecurity aside and honestly seek.
This is the day of the expanding man
I take one last drag as I approach the stand
==Donald Fagen
As opposed to achieving some fixed form of high wisdom, I think enlightenment is more the idea that insight comes on an as-needed, when-needed basis. And that it is not to be treated as currency, nor can one be materialistic with it.
This is my complaint with traditional religion. The idea that if you are a good boy, and save up all your good deeds [ideas] you get some sort of cumulative reward for being a good spiritual materialist.
Instead I’m leaning more toward the idea of seasons, timing, alignment of factors, instinct, intuition. I think intuition is the sum total of many instantaneous surges of enlightenment. They become imprinted on your being and are later there but not as intellect but more-so as intuition. They inform your choices which could be seen as enlightenment in action.
WarriorMedicine 