(Note: reading is slightly different than final text, but I included it because some people like to listen!)
Stop Worrying, Start Walking By Schuyler Brown October 2024 1. I don't know when I lost the key to my heart, I suspect it happened gradually then all of a sudden: CLOSED. Maybe on the playground; my first heartbreak; the first lie I told my parents; the first lie I told myself. Maybe it was the accumulation of pain without holding or suffering without meaning in this secular materialist paradigm. Is there a moment you can point to? When your heart retreated? When you shut it down? A series of injustices-- too much to handle? When did you lose your courage to love in the face of loss? Sometimes, it takes losing something to recognize its worth. Getting lost, I began to seek. Numbing out, I became determined to feel. Closing off, I learned to open my heart again. 2. Now, I have a secret that wants to be shared-- I know HOW to open the heart. I found the key. Would you like to hear? We must all be still. We must listen to each other like our lives depend on it; like the breath is punctuation; like our conspiracy might be detected: Let's do it together! Countless hearts entraining to one rhythm-- One, two, three, JUMP. 3. First, you must remember that you forgot. Recognize that you're not there --in the heart-- for whatever reasons, and to whatever degree. You've fallen out of your center, descended the throne that is yours by right, fallen out of Love, and you've been wandering. Forgive yourself. It's OK. You're not alone. The longing you feel to GIVE of yourself freely, to RECEIVE recklessly, to be LOVE for a world that needs it now, to be of SERVICE... is the way.
Selfless desire incinerates all distractions! Follow the clues, breadcrumbs, signs all placed in your path by none other than YOU. Your heart wants you to find the way. You want you to find the way. The whole Universe is waiting for your return-- so, pay attention. 4. I saw the Sacred Heart. I'd seen it thousands of times before, but this time, I really saw it. It drew me in. Jesus pulling back his garment to reveal a flaming, mystical, pulsing source of LOVE. With a gaze so direct, he says, "Look, and do not look away. You won't have many chances. This is the destination. I am showing you the way." I looked and did not look away. I contemplated the flame Western-style; and meditated on it Eastern-style; and begged for answers human-style: "What is this combustion; this alchemical process; in the body? Show me the way home." I felt the fire first-- in the center of my chest-- burning away the dross, active and hot. For months it burned and ached. "Something must be wrong!" My fear raised it's suspicious head, "Becoming LOVE shouldn't hurt so much." Or maybe it does. The flame is not pointing to hellfire and damnation, I realized... but, to an elemental force. I've felt the fire of kundalini. I know this heat in the channels. Aha! It's the same...familiar glow. Only now, it's lodged in residence at the heart. It's not complicated, only subtle. The pain is now pleasure. 5. I BURNED until I was nothing but ash. What phoenix would rise now? I thought there was nothing left... MERCY handed me the key at the eleventh hour. I heard a voice say, Stop worrying. Start walking. I suddenly felt the shroud preventing me from seeing; and the wall of concepts obstructing my view... It all dropped like a robe and NAKED, I started to walk. Without a promise of being met. Without a promise that the ground would be there to catch me if I fell... I took a first intentional step. Trust and surrender. Now, I tasted the fruit. An almost-accidental stumbling into, by the grace of God, a chance encounter with, a temporary, fleeting glimpse of... LIFE through the lens of the heart. I felt myself in it, I felt the world through it, I found myself there in the union of opposites, in the place beyond paradox, in the TRUTH. And I felt the resolution of duality into something multiform and singular all at once: the earthly and the cosmic the masculine and feminine the above and below the eternal and the now inside me and everywhere. And I felt the positive, negative, and neutral energies of creation brewing a cosmic stew for every beggar in the Universe to enjoy. YAM. Yum. 6. At the same time though I was out of time Let's say, simultaneously-- I was hit with the suffering, too. ALL OF IT. I was in touch with the suffering of all beings That's when I understood the thorns piercing the flesh of the Sacred Heart: It's not good. It hurts. Oh, humanity... Oh, God! And Ah! Ah! Ah! The ecstasy of it all. Silent wonder, profound awareness, How do we hold all of it? Only the heart knows. Only the heart knows. 7. The greatest trick the dark forces play is keeping us distracted and confused about our Divine Heritage and feeling unworthy of our Divine Inheritance. You are... A child of the Sun A child of this Earth A child of our ancestors A unique expression of the One. Let go of what you think you know about Love and the Heart. The idea, the dream, the memories, even these words, are all just signs. They point the way, but the only way, is to do it for yourself: Stop worrying. Start walking. Stay. ~*~*~
Join my upcoming virtual course: Fierce Love to explore the fundamentals of the Sacred Heart and learn ways and practices for coming into the heart and abiding there. It’s happening Sundays at 12-2pm EST from Nov 3 to January 5, 2025. It will be a beautiful and rich container to see us through the winter. More information and registration here…
indeed...
thank you Schuyler,
~c
A beautiful, meaningful and heartfelt gem of a poem. You have lived it and learned and evolved. We all can. Thank you!