Stepping Mindfully Into the Unknown
By Mirabai Starr
Many of you, like I, have been sensing the impending upheaval of all our false structures and counterfeit comforts for a long time. We knew in our own vibrating cells that rampant capitalism was not sustainable, that we had been swept up into a system of too-muchness that violated our personal values but which we felt powerless to resist. We longed for more stillness in our days, for a radical simplification of our lifestyle, for a way of being rooted in the feminine values of cooperation and relationship, of lovingkindness and courageous truth-telling, of embodied creativity and sacred spontaneity.
I, for one, was on a fast-moving train I didn’t know how to jump off.
And now, many of you, like I, are accepting these extraordinary times of the COVID-19 pandemic as an invitation to turn inward and recalibrate our most fundamental beliefs and practices. We are stepping mindfully into the unknown with our hearts open to the suffering of the most vulnerable. We are willing to experience a conscious collapse of all we have taken for granted —- a dark night of the soul of the world -— and rest in the mystery, while lifting up a prayer that our collective being will be rendered new, that we will enter the transfigured world bearing all the best of who we are, radiant and rested, ready to serve.
The Sacred Feminine reminds us of what we have always known but which the patriarchy has conditioned us to forget: we belong to each other. Women, men, people of all genders and none. Humans and animals, tropical rainforests and desert succulents, river and storm. May we continue to excavate and lift up the jewels of feminine wisdom, so long buried, that they may be a source of radical renewal in these times.
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Click below to watch Mirabai's Catalyst interview: Click below to read Mirabai's answer to the question: What is the nicest thing a non-family member has ever done for you? Click below to read Mirabai's answer to the question: How does traditional spirituality differ from a spirituality that honors the Divine Feminine? |
Mirabai Starr is an award-winning author of creative non-fiction and contemporary translations of sacred literature. She taught Philosophy and World Religions at the University of New Mexico-Taos for 20 years and now teaches and speaks internationally on contemplative practice and inter-spiritual dialog. A certified bereavement counselor, Mirabai helps mourners harness the transformational power of loss.
Mirabai’s newest book, Wild Mercy: Living the Fierce and Tender Wisdom of the Women Mystics, was named one of the “Best Books of 2019” by Spirituality & Practice. It's essential reading for anyone ready to awaken the feminine mystic within and birth her loving, creative, and untamed power into the world.
Mirabai has received critical acclaim for her revolutionary new translations of John of the Cross’ Dark Night of the Soul and Teresa of Avila’s The Interior Castle. She is author of the poetry collection, Mother of God Similar to Fire, a collaboration withiconographer William Hart McNichols, and the award-winning book, God of Love: A Guide to the Heart of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The transparency of her journey through grief in her memoir, Caravan of No Despair: A Memoir of Loss and Transformation, is a gift to those who are struggling with unimaginable losses.
Mirabai is on the 2020 Watkins List of the “100 Most Spiritually Influential Living People of the World.” She lives with her extended family in the mountains of northern New Mexico.
Click here to visit Mirabai’s website.
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This article appears in: 2020 Catalyst, Issue 8: Navigating the Shutdown
