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Yesterday I was driving through the mountains of Central Oregon—with a sick wife and incessantly trilling dog. My dog doesn’t whine, she trills. Finally, exasperatedly, I turned off the highway where there was a bridge crossing a creek, drove up an old, deserted road, pulled up, and found a trail leading into the woods. I…

The Worm’s WakingThere is a worm addicted to eating grape leaves.Suddenly, he wakes up,call it Grace, whatever,something wakes him, and he is no longer a worm.He is the entire vineyard, and the orchard too,the fruit, the trunks,a growing wisdom and joythat does not need to devour. This poem by Rumi is so good that it…

About three weeks ago, I attended a workshop on Integral Christianity at the Boulder Center for Integral Living in Boulder, Colorado. This center is housed in a former church building (with a storied past), and is the brain child of Jeff Salzman, who is an extraordinary Integral teacher in his own right (see video clips…

This Christmas, I found myself at home in Teasdale, Utah with a house (and guest house) full of mostly new faces, one of whom was detoxing off a heavy mix of drugs and alcohol.  Welcome to my world. A new Integral Recovery intensive was in its first week. I had to cancel my almost yearly…

Over the weekend I flew to Seattle with my wife Pam to see Eckhart Tolle. I felt a lot of consternation about the time, effort and expense of the visit, but we stay with Pam’s sister and husband and their two wonderful little kids when we are in town, and that’s always great, and besides…

In the unfoldment of the work that is Integral Recovery, the Shadow and its releasing and transmutation have become ever more one of the chief cornerstones of the building. First, what is Shadow? It is that which is in the darkness, which either through conscious thought or unconsciously has been relegated to the realms of…

I was in Boulder, Colorado, two weeks ago. I was there on Integral Recovery business and had the opportunity to meet with Robb Smith, David Riordan, Marco Morelli, and Jeff Salzman. All of these folks are extraordinary individuals in their own right, and are part of the present arising of this Integral wave. Someday they…

In a recent conversation with my friend Rabbi Marc Gafni, he said something to the effect that “shadow is the part of your life that you have not lived.” And I thought to myself, “There goes Marc again, a Seven on the Enneagram, putting a happy spin on things.” My current working definition of shadow…

I am home again, and still in the process of metabolizing and assimilating our sojourn to Europe. Again I am brought back to Assisi… During our stay there (Pam and me), I took a walk to visit the ancient church San Damiano (a church so old it was falling down in Francis’ time) that Francis/Francesco…

It seems that lately in my practice (or perhaps it has always been so), as I approach the depths of my being, the inner light, God, what have you, I hit a thick layer of self-loathing, where my failures, imperfections, and neurotic conditioning-or to use the Christian language, my sinful nature or my sins-all become…