Will I become a Mystic Without a Monastery?

I’ve been reading the most recent of Caroline Myss’ books, “Entering the Castle.” (2007) It is intended to give a spiritual path to seekers. The central inspiration for the book is Teresa of Avila’s sixteenth century work, “The Interior Castle.”

Already I have to stop and reflect. From page 36:

“That is the mystic’s life purpose - to know his or her soul and put it to use in a spiritually radical form of service to others. And mysticism is spiritually radical. For one thing, you enter into a realm of consciousness that is truly “extra” ordinary. Second, your interior life becomes more valid, more real than your exterior life.”

I am struck that I am in the midst of pursuing this “extra” ordinary experience, but my exterior life so frequently is far more real than my interior life. This may also be the case for you.

I get tangled in my expectations that I must produce a secure financial lifestyle, so that I may retreat into some kind of quiet realm. Still, the world is all around me, and Teresa of Avila observed, “God lives also among the pots and pans.” Instead of retreating, I may be called to find my retreat within the hustle and bustle of life.

Another passage that stopped me is this: “I’ve watched people chat away their grace, so to speak. They discuss their spiritual lives as casually as family matters or sports.” She advises far more silence about your spiritual life: “Contain your experience with the divine so that it does not escape you but rather reshapes you.”

I must confess that when spiritual experience comes upon me I wish to shout with joy, or at the very least tell the nearest person of my good fortune. The joy bubbles over. Still, there is the memory of my mentor telling workshop participants not to share their growth experience for a full day or more after the workshop. This way they might allow it to do its full work within them. Perhaps I must be more careful with the power working its way through my internal life?

Finally, the author states that, “people are starving for this awe and for the sacred. This is why people make pilgrimages to sacred sites and participate in sacred rituals from various native traditions. They want to touch, see, and feel the sacred.”

It is my experience that people come to me searching for something far deeper than a better marriage, or more satisfaction in life. Rarely do they know it at first, but they want this deeper connection that gives meaning and clarity to their experience. But they do not find it in the hurry-up bustle of the world around them. They have no sense of discovering their deeper purpose in this life, and frequently expect that there is no wonder and awe left for them.

“This is why the mystics and I suggest, no insist that you have a spiritual practice, a discipline in which every day something is expected of you as an individual.”

I am very much looking forward to the rest of the book. I am expectant about what it will teach me and what inspirations it will trigger.

If you are so inclined, read along with me, Click Here=>  Entering the Castle