True art reflects and enhances the whole of human life. It illuminates our joys and our sorrows. It makes everything beautiful, no matter how dark and difficult. And it often reassures us that all will end well. It brings us peace. It brings us a deep knowing, a knowing that cannot be spoken of except in the language of the poet. Great art is the product of the mystical impulse of the artist and therefore speaks most deeply to those of us who have those impulses also. As it is true that great artists are a variety of mystic, it is also true that self-proclaimed mystics often create great art: the sacred music of Hildegard von Bingen, the sacred poetry of Meister Eckhart, the poetry of Rumi and of Kabir and Hafiz. Mystics and artists are inspired-"inSpirited"- and know and deeply feel the wonder and majesty of the Divine Presence. As that Presence cannot be directly spoken in ordinary language, art is the result of the need to express in form the language of the Divine. Please join us for a day of wonder and joy artistically and mystically co-created.

The Halloween-time of the year has for many centuries been considered a time when the veil between heaven and earth is very thin indeed. We can, it is said, most easily at this time access other dimensions of consciousness. This is an exciting time for mystics all over the world because we know that spiritual growth often involves moving into exalted states of awareness (other dimensions of consciousness) for transformational information and bringing it back to be used in everyday life. In 2012 we focus particularly on the mystical dimension of Positive Expectancy, especially for the collective Birthing of the Winter Solstice but also for our personal healing, learning and transformation amid the turbulence and peace of this profoundly changing time.

In this Musing we explore gratitude as a mystical state of being, rather than a compendium of practices. Mystics have a natural gratitude born of the experience of God as a benevolent, all-loving Creator, and of Life as a meaningful and blessed journey. And we have daily practices of expressing that gratitude in prayer and spoken appreciation. We also have silent gratitude as we stand in awe of the beauty of nature, the beauty of artistic creations, the holding of a newborn, the intimacy of being with loved ones. Some days we are aware of our blessings, some days not. Sometimes we say "thank you", some days we forget, but when we move fully into the gratitude as a state of being, there are no off days and on days--we LIVE the gratitude. This Sunday we offer suggestions (and one key "doing") of how to move into a deepening state of thanksgiving.

In this Musing we speak of the value and the joy of direct experience of Gaia, Mother Earth. This experience is most available by connecting with Her heart to heart. We will offer easy and powerful techniques for making this important connection. And we will discuss how this interaction is needed as balance to the connection with "Father Sky". We will also speak of the unique gifts she has to offer us, and of the way our life is changed by incorporating Her into our individual energy-bodies. She is the earth-mother, the source of groundedness,the provider of health, and the great nurturer of our souls.

Please join us as pay tribute to Earth Day and Water Day by invoking the Spirit of the Great Mother who dwells in and on the sacred earth and is the Earth Herself.

Curiosity for the mystic is grounded in humility, grounded in the knowledge that each day we leave behind the old and awaken to the new. The Divine is Infinite and always has new treasures awaiting us. Without curiosity we leave the realm of the spiritual and enter into the realm of religion, which preaches its doctrine of absolutes.
Commitment is based on a direct experience of the Divine which asks us to commit again and again to a life of love.
So curiosity and commitment are "natural" on the mystical path. And at this point in our collective evolution we are asked to become more consciously aware of them both and to listen to the call to seek and maintain an openness to transformation and an eternal, ever evolving Love.

We are slowly going deeper in the portal of our mystic practice, deeper and closer with Creator, with Source, with God, with the Beloved especially when praying, meditating, connecting ourselves heart to Heart in a beautiful intimacy with the Beloved. We are moving together from feeling the transcendence of Divine Presence to the feeling of immanence of Spirit. Metaphysically this involves thinking about the Beloved not as a Being, but as Being itself. Embodied Being focuses on deeper, continuous breathing and more skillful micro-movements. We live in a world that is made up entirely of Divine Being. This includes us, and everything, and everything is us! We know on an e-motional level, our Oneness with all that is. Let us explore together some ways of coming closer to Creation, some ways of coming closer to ourselves.

The portents for this year are of creativity and manifestation. One such creative endeavor is the opening of portals between dimensions, between people, among all the earthly kingdoms, between heaven and earth. In this Musing we speak about how we can create portals of all sorts, how we can maintain them, and how we can close them. The creating of the vortex of energy that we call a Portal happens every time we pray, meditate, are intimate with another or with Spirit Guides and other divine beings, or open to receiving the grace of the Creator.
We will have fun consciously portaling together! We hope you will join us!

Appropriate for mystics of all faiths, with this Musing we invite our Christian and Jewish and Buddhist members to join us along with people of all other religious and non-religious backgrounds and practices. Focusing on the miracle of "the Word becoming flesh", we speak about that sacred alchemy in the context of our present day evolution. We suggest simple practices to achieve that alchemy using the example of the Christmas story. Our contemplation will synchronize with the themes we have been focusing on in the last few Musings, and lead us to a deeper understanding of the incarnating of Spirit. The Musing will celebrate the joyous news Jesus of Nazareth brought to us of Love and the possibility of the sacred transformation into Oneness. Along the way we will sing some carols and celebrate together the good news of the Christ event. It will be a festive and joyous time with one another. Please join us!

We seek to mine the riches of the dark sides of life in this Musing. There are more gifts than we may have noticed in the down times. We already know that we go through these passages for cleansing and self-knowledge, and that we have experienced great awakenings following these difficult events. While we will comment briefly on these issues, we are more interested in investigating how we navigate the light/dark dialectic in our daily lives. We look at how our attitudes about the relationship between the yin and the yang can make a huge difference in how we choose to live our lives. And we talk about the fascinating mystery of it all, and what it can mean to us to invite the mystery into the depths of our being.

What attitudes and perspectives do we need to add a sense of lightness in our lives? What is the benefit of bringing lightness to our spiritual path? What are the obstacles? There are several steps that lead to the lightness (and to the Lightness) of our journey at this disturbing time in human evolution that we will share with you. We will also speak about lightness in relationship with yourself and with others. We ask, "How can we bring a light touch to prayer and meditation, and to the practice of manifestation?" We ask also how to process difficult feelings in a less heavy and less serious way. We will offer some a practical teachings for bringing lightness to our everyday lives. Please join us for an uplifting Mystical Musing.