Summary: Have you ever felt frustrated by your spiritual practice? Where are those results you expected? Here is a letter I received from a student in my Life Principles Integration Process Online courses with that very frustration, along with my answer. First, his letter to me: Dear Bill, My question is: Why can’t I experience anything spiritual inside that validates, in a positive way, any practice or technique I have ever tried? Just wanted to show you there is a question to all that follows (because there is a background story that must be told. I’ll keep it as brief as I can though.) Part of this will be a bit of writing therapy for me as (at 63) my life, both inside and outside, lies in ruins all around me, I’m feeling suicidal, and I feel a need to yell at God.(Sorry, letting whatever happens be OK has run out of steam.) So…Beginners mind: In the early seventies I read Zen Flesh Zen bones which blew my socks off and changed me from an atheist who was profoundly disillusioned with life on earth to a rather naive seeker. After reading that book I knew that I had to find a teacher who could guide me to the Self, the God within (my favorite image is simply ‘freedom’ though.) Tried everything I had access to over the next seven or eight years. No dice; nothing moved me or resonated anywhere but inside my intellect. God didn’t want to know me. Each time something didn’t work I returned to sex, drugs and rock’n’ roll… which did work. But not good for the body. Went to the States in 78’ and tried to do a Jack Kerouac…indulge myself into a sort of wandering, quasi spiritual, substance abusing suicide, inspired by my profound disillusion with worldly life and my failed attempts at a spiritual life. Almost succeeded but under the most weird and extraordinary circumstances Baba Muktananda reached out into the byways of America and into my abject despair and hauled my sorry ass into Siddha Yoga… where, for the second time in my life, my sox were blown off. With a return of the enthusiasm of beginners mind I did an Intensive at the end of 79’ and had my first real transcendent encounter with the Self. On the strength of that I was graced with a year of profound personal power where I could — and did – do anything I wanted… with great love and respect. Glowing with “success” I went to India in 81’ (just to cross the ‘T’s and dot the ‘I’s on my enlightenment process.) There, the mat of my honeymoon period was slapped from under my feet and I discovered that (to put it mildly) there was still much work to do on my sadhana. I did not run away though, such was the power of my experience of Kundalini awakening — and the year of ‘home trial’ that followed it — that I was filled with determination to stay the course and do battle with my ignorant demons. This despite a slowly dawning realization that all the practices (meditation, chanting, selfless service, scriptural study etc.) seemed to be falling on deaf, internal ears. I felt nothing for them. Not quite true…I felt a steadily rising frustration. I also realized that a great part of the spiritual journey was about burning up the inner obstacles. This fire, at least, validated that I was moving along the path. Though I tried, however, I failed to find any ‘juice’ in the desert of my inner landscape. Thirty one years later it’s the same: all fire no joy, no happiness, no freedom… no inner benefits or validation after all my efforts. And on the outside… all of the indications of the failure of what I choose to do with my life… no home, no money, health in decline and a (Siddha Yoga) partner who I love dearly and am completely devoted to, but is worse off than me. Ironically Bill, it is spirituality that has made me excruciatingly aware that ‘nothing works for me’. My last hope has failed me. (No, of course that is not true, I have failed it.) That’s why I added Holosync to my Siddha Yo[...]
