A Short Talk About "Activist Mysticism"

Last week, I gave a small talk about my first book, Activist Mysticism. It is a collection of talks given during a decade of teaching to diverse audiences. I tried to express in words the unspoken, and I needed a context which might give coherence. Well, the context is in the poem at the beginning of the book.   

I am returning from pilgrimage.

I traveled tens of thousands of miles. Literally, in fact. Not mythical. I had spent a great deal of time on airlines and at airports,

I bring you blessings from Al-Andalus.

I traveled to southern Spain to the great mosque at Cordoba. Nothing happened at that mosque to speak of. I was in search of what was unspoken. I was in search of some hint of the Sufi saints. Then the poem goes on.

I bring you fire from Berat

Berat is a city in Albania where Sabbatai Zevi is buried. And then the poem goes on.

 I bring you truth from Skopje

Skopje is in Macedonia where Nathan of Gaza is buried.

So, what is this all about? I'm in an ongoing conversation with Jesus of Nazareth, Ibn Arabi, Sabbatai Zevi, Nathan of Gaza and Jacob Frank and to my teachers Gussie and Don Manuel. This is ongoing. It never stops.

Your challenge is to learn how to listen. I'll give you an example of it. I was invited by a young man to visit him in Southern India maybe 15 years ago or so. I went to his ashram and was with him for about 10 days. He insisted that I sleep in his bed, and he slept on the floor next to me in his private apartment. Otherwise, I didn't see him much. One day when it was getting to be time for me to leave, he came to me and said that he had a gift, a teaching for me.

We got together at the fountain inside the ashram. It was hot and there was a lot of mosquitoes. Milling around us were a bunch of his American devotees. They were asking him questions. They wanted to know, who I was, what I was doing at his ashram and why he and I were spending time together. Finally, he dismissed them as if they too were more mosquitoes. As we were sitting at the fountain, he told me a story about an ancient village in that part of Southern India. The story was simple. The villagers were disturbed by some kind of negativity and decided that they needed protection, so they created two energies situated at the entrance to the village. These energies protected the village. The story ended and my host was quiet. The heat was really bothering me and so were the mosquitoes. It was time for me to get out of the sun. I remember walking away not having any clue what was going on.

On the long plane ride back to San Francisco I still had no clue. And then sometime later, I don't know if it was a month or a week, in the presence of a negative energy, I found myself replicating what this guru had described. I can replicate that to this day. And I can do it very rapidly. When I replicate one of these energies, it remains in place if I anchor it in place. Or I can return and dissolve it when it's no longer needed.

What is that all about? I have no idea what it's about, except to say that I was given a teaching, an instruction, and I carry that teaching.

I'm now a carrier. This guru is a carrier from his teachers. The individuals I talk about in this poem are carriers from their teachers. These teachings are available. None of them is lost.

Activist Mysticism is an invitation to understand that there is an immense amount of hidden teaching if you can learn how to listen, how to be open, how to receive it. None of it is obvious and none of it is hidden.

I have memorialized this teacher without giving his name. I'm not sure he would have liked me to give his name. He's now dead and I have preserved this teaching.

Within the pages of this book, there's a lot of gifting. Some of it is simply to help you with your understanding, with your awareness. Some of it is more practical. None of it is about the material life. There is nothing about self-help. There's nothing about psychology. There's nothing about medical issues. It's other than that. It's about the fire. It's about the fire of God.

I learned how to listen at a little brook in a remote mountain area.  I would sit and listen to the noise of this brook. And the noise changed seasonally depending on the snow melt. It was a remote place where I was undisturbed. I would go and listen, sometimes once a week, sometimes three times a week. It was a two hour drive each way. and then there was a hike to the brook. For a long time, nothing really happened. Finally, I stopped hearing the brook. I would arrive, sit down on one of the rocks and listen to the noise. Then there was complete silence. And the silence went on until I started to get cramps in my butt or legs from rock sitting or the winter chill would get to me. I would come out of the silence and resume listening to the noise of the brook and then slowly get up and leave. What I learned was never obvious and never immediate and I have teachings gifted to me from that brook.

You don’t need to understand what you are learning. You don’t have to explain it. You don’t have to remember it. You won't forget it and when you need it, it will be there for you.