19 Jun Letter to a Young Mystic

Before we get to the main message below..

Big thanks to all of you who checked out the Amazon page for my new book, to be released on July 15th!

In case you haven’t got a chance to see it yet, click here:
https://amzn.to/3oOruKc

If you prefer ebooks, and haven’t ordered mine yet, please stand by. In the week before its release I’ll be offering special free gifts to you so we can create an “Amazon Bestseller” wave together.

And if you’d rather view the book info on a non-Amazon site, click here:
https://store.bookbaby.com/book/surviving-the-divine

Now, about that Letter to a Young Mystic..

In my new memoir, Surviving the Divine: A Memoir of Rude Awakening, a voice from Spirit moves through me from time to time. The words are mine, but they’re guided by an aspect of Being that is beyond personality. Not “channeled,” exactly, but more propelled into form. Has anything like that ever happened to you?

Part of why it was a “rude awakening” for me is that this voice was fierce and completely uninterested in coddling me through the awakening process. It was powerful and beneficial, for sure, but not usually nice.

This letter, as you’ll see, is almost like a dare. “Are you brave enough,” it asks, “to see the whole truth in a radically inclusive way?”

Personally, it took me awhile to get used to, but my ultimate shift to that radical inclusion was priceless.

I’m curious how the letter lands for you.

In Spirit and Great Gratitude,

Raphael
___

Letter to a Young Mystic

This path is not for the faint of heart.

Your yes to everything must be unconditional.

Just as you gaze in awe at the majestic redwood, so, too, must you cling to reverence as the hawk on its limb rips the flesh from a mouse.

A live mouse.

If the glinting sun on an ocean wave swells you with ardor, then swell equally, without reservation, at the tsunami that flattens a seaside town.

And pries a howling infant from its mother’s frantic grasp.

It’s weak, fake, to proclaim the glory of God only in the throes of elation.

Try it in the pits of hell—God made those, too.

Your crushing depression . . .

Your lover’s leukemia . . .

Blind fear . . .

The schemer who steals your promotion . . .

The family man who turns his back on a tortured refugee . . .

The gas chambers and the killing fields . . .

The innocent who rots in solitary, hour after hour, on his way to the electric
chair . . .

God’s handiwork—all of it.

Blink, shy away, and you’re no mystic.

Don’t get me wrong. Choose any other path and you still have God’s blessing.

But if you choose this one, just don’t pretend.

Every moment contains its opposite.

The tenderest touch: a gunshot wound.

A toddler’s laugh: the carnage of a freeway pile-up.

Thrill: boredom.

Promise: betrayal.

Can you love all of that?

Can you love the God of the Old Testament as much as the New?

What kind of love is that, anyway?

A feeling? An action? A set of principles?

Is it even possible?

Recommendable?

No, it’s not.

Walk this path only if you must.

If nothing less will do.

Sing out in glory, rage, shame, absolute befuddlement.

Nothing less will do.

A mystic’s prayer is unstinting.

It wails as it worships.

Puts God on trial.

Takes the fall.

As God is my witness, I am God’s witness.

All I see is a part of me.

And thee.

And we.