I find it very comforting that Jack Kornfield says that even after ecstatic \u201cenlightenment\u201d experiences people have trouble when they go back to \u201cthe World.\u201d The wounds of childhood are still unhealed and a lot of spiritual practice is necessary to learn to live in community.<\/p>\n
From After the Ecstasy, the Laundry<\/a> p220 I find it very comforting that Jack Kornfield says that even after ecstatic \u201cenlightenment\u201d experiences people have trouble when they go back to \u201cthe World.\u201d The wounds of childhood are still unhealed and a lot of spiritual practice is necessary … Continue reading
\n\u201cMost of us in spiritual life have to go through a large measure of family healing…\u00a0 My family pain had been covered over in my early monastic meditation…\u00a0\u00a0 But it was there underneath, waiting, unconsciously influencing my whole way of being, and when I returned to family and to intimate relationships, the struggles all came back…
\n“To find myself still struggling with my emotions was hard.\u00a0 I needed the assistance of both meditation and therapy before I could acknowledge the deepest levels of fear, anger, judgement, and grief I carried.\u00a0 The therapist was essential as a compassionate witness, another being to help me face the images and fears I carried in my body, everything that I had not been able to face alone.\u00a0 I saw how much the old patterns had reinforced my small sense of self.\u00a0 In the face of pain in our family, my brothers and I had each become regularly depressed or angry, fearful, cynical, needy or cautious.\u00a0 These deep wounds remain part of each of us to this day, but by opening to them, we begin to lessen their power.
\n\u201cPerhaps this is the best we can do: to help when we can; to witness each other with kindness; to offer our presence; to show the trust we have in life.\u00a0 Spiritual life is not about knowing much, but about loving much.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"