The Mystic Cave

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Jesus told a parable about a wealthy man who increased his holdings and expanded his storage facilities for all his goods, until the day came when he was informed that his soul was required of him. Would that he had cared for his soul before it was taken away. James Hollis has been counselling, writing, and teach...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Prophets don't call themselves prophets. They speak their words or write their books until people start to notice. Then they may open a wisdom school or create magical live events or succumb to interviews with podcasters. All this describes Stephen Jenkinson. When he writes, or speaks, or performs, you feel...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Out here on the far side of conventional religion it is important that the seeker find a few guideposts. Otherwise the open landscape can feel overwhelming. Thomas Moore has been a seeker's lodestar for over thirty years, ever since he reintroduced us to the language of “Soul” in his best-selling book, “Care...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Darold Black loves people and he loves pictures. So it's no surprise that our conversation about wisdom turned into personal stories about life. Wisdom doesn't come to us as lofty ideas. It comes to us as images from the heart. Darold is working on a documentary series called "E5," an attempt...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Some would prefer to say spiritual "companionship" rather than "direction," and that would probably be more accurate. Because it's not about directing anyone anywhere, except, that is, to pay attention to the subtle movements within your own heart and soul. And that's what spiritual...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Words fail us when we try to speak of the mysteries of life and death and the other soulful experiences of our lives. Except, that is, for the words of poets. In the modern age we turn to poetry as if to holy scripture, searching for the images and metaphors that help us express our deepest fears and our highest...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Many men, having inherited the cultural expectations of former generations, feel they are being shamed in the modern age. Traditional male traits, such as protectiveness, leadership, and strength, are now denigrated for their toxic potential rather than celebrated for their social value. It's a difficult tim...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). If we're searching for a connection with our souls, we needn’t look any further than our voice. Quite apart from the words we use and the intentions behind those words, our voice reveals the state of things within. Are we anxious, are we confident,  are we restful? The voice knows. Consequently, so does the...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Some say before we could sing, we drummed. Whether or not that's accurate, drumming is one of our most primitive forms of communication. Perhaps, it once helped us to "talk" across great distances. Perhaps, it brought us together to unify and strengthen the community. Perhaps, it was just ... fun....

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Yoga is not just about poses and posers. It's about a soulful engagement with our own lives that includes both our bodies and our dreams. It's about the rediscovery of the connection we have lost with the  Earth, and about the purpose that the Earth itself is dreaming for us. Rebecca Wildbear is a soul...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). "You can be so heavenly minded," the saying goes, "that you're of no earthly use." Ouch for all us lofty-headed idealists! But bringing together heavenly ideals and earthly resources--now that's useful! And that's what Howard Fischer is doing with Gratitude Railroad, his impact...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Many of us fear aging. We suppose that the long slow slide on the other side of the hill is a negation of the one life we've been given to live. But what if it's the opposite? What if aging is our crowning glory, all that experience finally adding up to something: meaning, depth, and even wisdom? Judy S...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). What if the Earth is beyond saving? What if only the abandonment of hope will deliver us to the new world we seek? What if eco-grief is the portal we need to rediscover our role in the natural world, and in its healing? Jodi Lammiman is an eco-awareness counsellor and spiritual guide who connects our fears and so...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Bob had decided to lock Christmas out this year. Given the events of the past year who could blame him? But Christmas had other ideas and snuck in the back door instead, leaving the door ajar. As it must be, if we're to let the Christ Child in. Music Credits (under license by SOCAN 2022) "O Holy Night,&...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). It was indeed intense, but I was learning the ways of Soul and shedding the fears that prevented me from knowing and living out, fully, my purpose on the earth. As we camped in the woods and wandered and drummed and danced and dreamed, I knew something important was happening. I was becoming ... myself. Naturally...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Morning coffee with one's spouse? Listening to other people's stories? Reading whatever you want? This is spiritual practice? If you've been on the spiritual path all your life, then, yes. Because in the end spiritual practice is whatever works, not whatever others have told you to do. My conversat...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Some forms of prayer seem to assume that we must capture the attention of a far-off God, like lassoing a star. Contemplation assumes God's already here, deep within, and not just within us, but within all created beings. Liz Rees, a contemplative teacher and guide, talks to me about how contemplative practic...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). When it comes to change in our lives, our rational minds can carry us only so far. Our bodies take us further. But rituals connect body and mind to Soul, creating transformative experiences that help us move through life's most significant passages. Sarah Kerr, death doula and ritual healing practitioner, sp...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Don't we all want to belong? Don't we miss it, and yearn for it, when we don't? Out here, on the other side of church land, belonging to a community is what seekers miss most about their religious pasts. But not all community is good community, and not every community lasts. In this conversation wi...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Out here, on the other side of church land, how do we give voice to the deepest longings of our hearts? Might poetry help us? Reading poems, might they become our sacred texts; writing them, our personal prayers? Poet Richard Osler believes that poetry delivers us to the deep and holy places of our own souls, pla...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). With this episode we launch a new season of The Mystic Cave,  with a look at Thomas Moore's 2014 book, "A Religion of One's Own"--for seekers who don't want to give up religious practice just because they've given up religion! In fact, Moore would say, we cannot escape religion, even...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). As David prepares to leave for home, he knows there is no going back. There is only going on, to wherever life is leading him next. But now, he looks forward to that mystery unfolding before him. He's faced it already, and he's found, in the process, his own soul. Making Contact: Face Book: “The Mystic...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). David is breathing easier now. His days on the Coast are coming to a close and soon he will be heading home, and whatever that will mean. But first, he must face the one challenge that has eluded him. He is drawn one more time to the rugged shoreline. Making Contact: Face Book: “The Mystic Cave” Face Book group W...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). Forgiveness is one thing, but penance is something else altogether. David faces the consequences of his actions, but that means facing his own humanity, which is perhaps what lies at the bottom of our deepest descent. Making Contact: Face Book: “The Mystic Cave” Face Book group Web site: https://www.brianepearson...

Click here to send me a text message (include your contact info if you want a reply). David, desperate to regain some measure of control over his life, makes one last attempt to train his mind on his ministry. But it's futile. The darker forces of Soul will not be repressed by the lofty ways of Spirit. Inevitably, all hell will break loose. Making Contact: Face Book: “The Mystic Cave” Face Bo...