This is part 7, and the final installment for now, of a series about combining the practice of meditation and dream interpretation.

Please see Part 2 and 3 of this series for more details  regarding the basic techniques I suggest you use when writing out the description of a dream.

Last week I mentioned three primary features to Jungian dream interpretation that I have drawn on as I developed my own process. Please see Part 6 for a recap on the first two of these methods.

The third method of Jung’s process is to use imagination and visualization as another way to work with a dream while awake.

In my experience this is one of the least well known, but highly effective ways to work with a dream. Generally the process goes like this. After you write out a dream and determine the relevance of the dream to current life issues or emotional formations, you then imagine different outcomes to the dream that are more consistent with how you wish the dream had ended.

For example, if you imagine you are trying to get somewhere in a dream but keep getting lost or delayed, with this method you imagine finding exactly where you were trying to go. Or, if you are chased by threatening figures in a dream, while you are awake and thinking about the dream you imagine turning to those figures and asking them to sit down with you to talk. You can ask them where they were born or what their life is like or any question you want. If you have a dream being in a house you spent many years of your life in, you can imagine or visualize going back to the house and redesigning the house with the features you always wished the house had. Another idea is to draw a picture of the primary scene in the dream and then draw variations on the dream imagery.

In short, with this third method Jung suggested, the dream is no longer frozen or fixed. You can imagine and visualize very different outcomes to a dream. If a parent who has been dead many years appears in your dream you can imagine having the conversations with them you were not able to have while they were alive. If a sexual encounter in a dream is unsatisfying you can visualize a more satisfying outcome to the dream when you are awake.

If you have a very mysterious dream where someone in the dream utters a particularly cryptic remark, you can imagine talking to them and asking them, “What did your comment in the dream mean?” Or you can ask them to repeat the comment in another dream but next time with more explanation. Or, you can imagine them saying something entirely different.

If you have a strong dream that is set in a location near where you live, you can go and sit for a while in the place where the dream action unfolded. You can sit, and by quietly sitting in the dream location, give the unconscious a sign that you are willing to live with the dream over time as a way of gaining additional understanding of the dream.

You can also infuse a sense of compassion and bright strength into the uncertain or murky dream imagery you are reflecting on and thereby transform the emotional tone and sense and memory of the dream.

In short the dream and the dream imagery need not be “cast in stone” with its message of anxiety or confusion or unfulfillment also “cast in stone”

You can take the writer’s chair, at least in waking life, and rewrite the dream with different outcomes.

After the holidays I will return to this theme of dream interpretation to discuss lucid dreaming and its counterpart, a term I believe I have coined, lucid waking. I will also go into more detail of the relationship between meditation and dream interpretation.

Please feel free to send me an email or to call the number below if you wish to discuss dream interpretation in general or any specific dream you have had in particular.

Will Raymond Author or “The Simple Path of Holiness”, host of Meditationpractice.com

will  at meditation practice   dot com  ( spelled out to limit spam)

774-232-0884

This is part 6 of a series about combining the practice of meditation and dream interpretation.

I ended last week’s post saying I would write a bit about Jung’s process of interpreting dreams through the “amplification” process. I now realize it is best to hold off on this till I have a chance to do more detailed studies.

For now it is enough to sum up a few of the basic points of the past few weeks and lay the groundwork to return to sustained reflections on Jung’s more advanced methods.

Writing out a dream as soon as you awaken, will allow you to remember important details of the dream. As you write out the dream imagery, it is likely “associations” will “pop-up” in your mind which are triggered by the key details, images, and feelings of the dream. Making notes of the “associations” that “pop-up” will give you valuable insights into the message of the dream. Please see Part 2 and 3 of this series for more details, or send me a note with your questions.

What is important to remember is this: The dream is about the dreamer’s current life. The message of the dream is closely related to some event, issue, feeling, fear, wish, or drive in the dreamer’s current life and concerns and deepest emotional structure.

The key to any dream is to understand that the dream is essentially a commentary and replay of something in the dreamer’s recent past, or a portrayal of a concern the dreamer has about their near or long-term future. On one level, as confusing as dream imagery may be, at the core, each dream is about some issue or practical concern that is very personal to the dreamer. In my own language, the primary method I use for dream interpretation is based on Jung’s initial method of dream interpretation.

The second method of Jungian dream interpretation is the “amplification” of the dream. In this approach key images of the dream are compared with images from ancient myths, fairy tales, and folk stories from various historical periods of human history.

The goal is to see how these links to myths or fairy tales from the world’s cultures “amplify” the meaning or evocative power of the dream imagery.

This is a very creative idea and I believe it conforms to Jung’s views that deeper and deeper layers of a dream’s meaning are linked to older and older periods of human history. The limit I am running into with studying this method is this: I can only begin to imagine how much research it would take to determine how much of this is true as compared with how much may simply be a very imaginative and colorful idea.

What I can say is this. In my experience, some dreams I have present images which are highly symbolic in nature and deeply surreal in tone. Also, these images, are drawn from very different historical periods other than the one in which we live now.

From these experiences I can conjecture that Jung’s “amplification” process may be highly relevant.

The problem in general is this. No one will dispute that Jung was one of the most educated and brilliant people of the 20th century. The problem is he did not present the second method of his approach to dream interpretation, with his accompanying theory of the Archetypes, in a clear and systematic way. Also, there is a very real possibility his ideas are based in part on the evolutionary biology of Lamarck. Lamarck offered competitor theories on evolution to Darwin’s theories in the late 19th century. Lamarck’s theories have been, at least in part, discredited since then.

In short it is difficult to sort out which of Jung’s ideas are drawn from methodical, empirical investigation as compared with those which are simply the florid imaginations of a gifted, original thinker.

This is not to say it may not be very helpful to compare certain vivid and numinous images in dreams to medieval, or ancient images, or fairy tales or myths drawn from cultures in the far corner of the world.

What I am saying is for now I cannot be sure of any way to really evaluate Jung’s process of “amplification.” But I believe it is a subject worthy of ongoing study.

Do you have strong opinions for or against Jungian dream interpretation? If so, please send a note along. All constructive comments will be posted.

Will Raymond Author or “The Simple Path of Holiness”, host of Meditationpractice.com

will  at meditation practice   dot com  ( spelled out to limit spam)

774-232-0884

This is Part 5 of a series about the combining the practice of meditation and dream interpretation.

Please see Parts 2 & 3 for the specific techniques I suggest you use when writing out a description of your dreams and as you begin the process of interpreting your dreams.

This week I will focus on recurring dreams.

Those dreams which recur in identical, or at least a very similar ways, over several years or decades are particularly important. The fact that the unconscious is presenting a certain drama over and over again is a strong indication the issue is of primary importance for a dreamer to work on and resolve.

Here is a prime example of a recurring dream someone I am working with had many times. FYI, I am only discussing this dream as a “case study” because the person gave their consent as long as their identity was not disclosed.

In this recurring dream, the dreamer is sexually attracted to someone. But just as things start to heat up it becomes clear that someone else is nearby and watching and does not approve. Consequently the dreamer feels they cannot consummate the act.

Two key questions in interpreting this dream was “Who is this disapproving person?” “What do they represent and where did this disapproving voice come from?”

In this case it became apparent the dreamer had been affected by the general tendency of the traditional Christian culture they were raised in to think of sexual desire as something shameful and something to be negated.

The disapproving person symbolized an element of both the dreamer’s family life and the dominant religious culture of their society that viewed the body in general, and sexual desire in particular, in a very unfavorable light.

The suggestion given to the dreamer was that they realize the disapproving voice was not coming from outside themselves, but rather was something that had been imposed on them by the unhealthy undercurrents of the family life and the Christian tradition in which they were raised. In addition to these Christian undercurrents, the dreamer was also impacted by similar undercurrents of other religious cultures which have similar body-and-world-negating tendencies.

The first part of the mindfulness practice in this process kicked in when the dreamer reflected on the force and tone of this disapproving voice and the frustration they felt as the desire was blocked. A second mindfulness reflection was to spend time in waking life to discern all the various ways the body-and-world- negating messages were communicated over the course of their life and studies. This investigation let to the way they could begin to disperse this unhealthy influence that had “taken root” in their unconscious.

For some examples:

Psalm 51 from the Hebrew bible, “Indeed I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me.””

Also in this vein, St. Augustine, a very pivotal figure in both conservative Catholic and Protestant cultures, believed the curse of original sin was transmitted to the child by the sexual act of procreation.

I know of other people who were told by priests that self-gratification sex was a ticket to hell. In another case a fourteen year old girl was told that French kissing was also a damnable offense.

From another culture there is the example of Bhante Gunaratana, a best-selling Buddhist author. In one of his books he likened the sexual act to the act of a leper trying to stop the itching of his sore by applying a burning hot iron to their sores.

In some forms of Buddhism a primary reward of “enlightenment” is that one finally does not have to be reborn again into a body and this world of suffering. What is one to think of a monastic culture that refers to rebirth in this world as a form of purgatory or punishment?  (For an exception to this note the story of a Bodhisattva)

None of this is to imply that celibacy is by definition unhealthy. None of this is to imply there are not also very healthy body-and-world-affirming aspects which are also woven into the very same religious cultures discussed above (See the “Song of Songs” in the Hebrew Bible for a very vivid example).

But for the dreamer highlighted in this post the impact some aspects of their religious culture had on their sex life was an essential insight to uncover. So was the insight that the interpretation of a dream can lead to observations which go far beyond the basic story line of the dream. More on this latter point, which Carl Jung referred to as the “amplification of a dream,” next week.

Have you had any recurring dreams?

Please let me know the story line of your recurring dreams. Please be assured I will not write about the dream unless you give me express permission to do so. But I am glad to talk with you about the interpretation of your dream.

Will Raymond Author or “The Simple Path of Holiness”, host of Meditationpractice.com

will  at meditation practice   dot com  ( spelled out to limit spam)

774-232-0884

Please see the posts of the previous three weeks for my opening remarks about writing a description of your dreams and how to begin the process of interpreting your dreams.

To reiterate an earlier comment, the best chance to interpret a dream comes about when you write out the dream with as much detail as possible. If you do this first thing in the morning you will remember a far greater level of detail than if you do not write out the dream or wait until later to do so.

For a second recap: as you write out the dream, use your skills with mindful awareness to note any associations that pop into your mind as you write out the dream. Place each “pop-up” association in a parenthesis and continue to write out the dream while continuing to note additional “pop-up” associations as they arise.

While writing don’t spend time thinking about the associations, unless some secondary associations, or memories, are triggered by the first “pop-up.” If so, make a note of these secondary associations or memories and preserve a sense of matter-of-fact reporting of the dream along with an open, fluid, mind-set that allows other “pop-up” associations to arise.

Regarding the process of noting and working with the general emotional tone of a dream, please see Part 3 of this series. The process of linking the emotional tone of a dream with the similar emotions experienced in waking life is a very important part of both mindfulness training and dream interpretation.

Here are some additional questions to ask as you interpret the dream.

What is the actual physical setting of the dream?

Is the setting of the dream a place that is related to a specific period of your life? For example are you in a house that you lived in as a teenager or child or young adult?

Or is the setting very current, say the job you have now?

Are one or more of the characters in the dream associated with a specific time or event in your life? For example, I had a dream about a specific teacher I had in the 11th grade when I was in high school. In the dream I talked with him about one or two of the dismissive comments he made to me. For another example, I often dream about the house that I lived in during my young adult years during the time when I and my former wife were raising our child.

Does the setting of the dream, or do the characters portrayed in the dream, allude to a specific period in your life?

Also, see if the associations that “popped-up” as you were writing out the dream bring to mind a specific event, or person, or place, or time in your life.

Do any of the characters in your dream appear at a very different age in the dream than they are in your current life? If so, what was happening in your life, or theirs, when they were the age they appear to be in the dream?

Here are the central questions along these lines: What is going on in your life now that is similar to, or an echo of, what was happening in the period of your life alluded to in the setting of the dream? Is it possible that whatever dynamics, concerns, or issues that are being highlighted by the dream were set in motion during the period of your life that is being featured in the dream?

As noted last week (see Part 3 of this series) it is more than a little helpful to see how the specific emotional tone of a dream relates and compares to very similar feelings you are currently experiencing, at times, in your present life.

So too, look carefully at any images or hints about current or earlier times of your life alluded to in the dream, or in the “pop-up” associations of the dream.

What is the relationship between the challenges or issues of your current life and the challenges or issues you experienced in the period of your life being alluded to in the dream?

In general, a very important function of dreams is to link current experiences, emotions, and core challenges of your current life with events or emotional constructs from the earlier periods of your life when the dynamics you are experiencing now were originally set in motion.

By seeing how and when current patterns, or behaviors, or fears were set in motion, you will have a much better chance to diffuse (or to de-fuse) the original causes which set current patterns, behaviors, or fears in motion.

According to some scientific research, one of the functions of dreams is to provide a way of storing current events in long-term memory. The process of dreaming does this by linking very current experiences with similar memories from different historical periods of your life.

By revealing the link between current experiences and important memories from earlier periods of your life there is a basic message being communicated. It is as if the dream builder is saying: “This current emotion, or challenging situation, or behavior pattern was generated in this earlier period or situation in your life. What was happening in this earlier period of your life that set in motion the current pattern or challenges?”

The essential goal of all this activity is to reveal by current dreams how you may be repeating old patterns, behaviors, or challenging emotional responses that are impairing your ability to thrive in the present.

In my view dreams are saying, “Here is something you need to work on, or here is something to be careful about, or here is another path you could take that will help you.”

I am aware these are subtle and complex subjects. I am glad to talk with you about any aspect of these reflections by discussing your current or older dreams. Please feel free to email or call

Will Raymond  Author of “The Simple Path of Holiness” and host of Meditationpractice.com

will at meditationpractice   dot com (spelled out to limit spam).

774-232-0884

Please see the posts of the previous two weeks for my opening remarks about writing a description of your dreams and how to begin the process of interpreting your dreams.

This week I am continuing my comments about identifying the basic emotional tone of a dream.

As I noted last week, after you finish the process of writing out your dream take a moment to see if there is an over-riding emotional tone to the dream. Not all dreams will have a prevailing emotional tone to the dream. Some dreams may offer a specific message or guidance about some path you are being encouraged to take or some path you are being encouraged not to take. I will write more about those dreams in another post.

But many dreams do have a strong emotional tone such as anxiety or a maybe even a strong sense of fear, or being deeply embarrassed by realizing you are naked at work, or being unprepared, or very late for an important meeting, or neutral, or happy, or aggressive, or deeply sad, or just plain confused.

There are other emotional tones I have only recently identified or understood. For example a feeling of frustration or incompleteness, or feelings of loss and separation, or a feeling of being powerless, or a fear that you are in a life and death struggle for survival.

Here is where the meditation practice kicks in.

During the active hours of your life as you labor to meet whatever challenges or responsibilities you have in your life, be mindful of the feelings that arise within you.

With clear mindful awareness begin to see feelings as they arise within you. These feelings may be a response to something outside of you. Or, they may be a reaction to some memory or a thought about some future activity you are considering.

Look carefully at the emotions that arise and observe them as they pass.

You will begin to see that many of the feelings you have during the waking hours are very similar to at least some of the feelings you have in dreams. It is just that the feelings at night are more concentrated and more vividly displayed. They also may be feelings you ordinarily do not think of yourself as having, but which surface in the more open environment of the sleeping and dreaming state.

The first stage of the awareness process is to simply observe the feelings during waking hours without judgment. It is enough simply to observe and note the feeling, “Anger has arisen within me or, “Fear of not being prepared for work or school has arisen with me,” and so forth.

Over time, if you persevere with formal meditation practice, you will gain a wide range of skills with mindfulness, concentration, insight, right effort, and wisdom. With this strength and skill you can begin to limit the escalation of challenging emotions and supplant them with one of the cardinal virtues.

A more detailed awareness of dreams will give you insights about which emotions you are being called to work with. Greater skill with meditation and mindful awareness during waking hours will give you the skill and discipline to work with challenging moods and emotions as they arise and have impact.

Calming the fires of challenging emotions during the waking hours will allow the dream imagery at night to deepen and to shift to other themes that are both more satisfying and creative.

Skilled dream workers talk about Lucid Dreaming where you are aware you are in a dream and have the ability to shape the dream as it unfolds.

One way to approach the practice of Lucid Dreaming is to practice what I call Lucid Waking.

To be fully awake while you are awake and to gain a measure of skill with molding emotions and actions during the waking hours of life. The heightened awareness and advanced skills of this Lucid Waking process will make Lucid Dreaming more possible and more creative.

More next week.

What dreams are you having? Do you feel you have a clear interpretation of those dreams? Please feel free to send me an email or call. We can set a time to speak.

I would like the chance to do more with this theme of helping people see how meditation and dream interpretation can work together to real benefit.

Will Raymond Author of “The Simple Path of Holiness” and Host of Meditationpractice.com

will at meditation  practice dot com  (written out to limit spam)

774-232-0884

This Sunday November 16, is the 2nd day of this year’s Natural Living Expo at the Best Western Royal Plaza Trade Center and Hotel, 181 Boston Post Rd West (Route 20 West) in Marlborough, MA.

There are over 200 exhibitors offering a most fascinating diversity of spiritual practices and gift items. Admission is $12 which also gives you access to many free work- shops.

I gave my work shop\, “Meditation and Dream Interpretation”, yesterday at 6pm.

I was very gratified that there was such a good turn-out considering it was the last session of a long day.

It is interesting to me that so many people are intrigued by dream interpretation in general and the combination of dream interpretation with meditation.

In last week’s post I addressed some of the general attitudes that are helpful as one begins to make the effort to gain a better understanding of the dreams they have at night. I also touched on the steps people can take to begin to remember more of their dreams.

This week’s post is for those people that do remember many of their dreams.

If you have a sequence of several dreams in the night just pick which ever dream is the most vivid or the most beautiful or the most unsettling and write the dream out.

Here is a basic perspective to keep in mind:

Write out your dream with as much detail as possible in a matter of fact way. But while you are doing this see if you can summon a sense of honoring both the dream and the effort you are making to write the dream out in detail. This sense of honoring the dream is offered as a way to show respect for the importance and the value you ascribe to the dream.

Here is a basic technique to employ:

While you are writing out the details of your dream pay close attention to whatever thoughts arise as associations to the details in the dream. Whatever images or thoughts pop-up, take the time to right them out but put them in parentheses. Continue writing out the rest of the dream.

You can come back to those details and associations in parentheses when you are ready to interpret the dream.

For examples:

I was walking towards the sand dunes that led to a beach (Horseneck Beach). I saw others in the dream and they were walking on the sand dunes in a way that will make erosion of the beach worse…

I see a young man coming toward me with a knife (looked like the curved dagger an Arab Sheikh has in the movie “Salmon Fishing on the Yemen”) (looks like the paring knife my former wife has owned since the time I met her 40 years ago to the present)

My former wife is in a large closet (Like the one in the house I grew up in only bigger) She is sorting through a large batch of photographs. (The Memoir she is writing)

I am visiting my home town and see one of the baseball fields (riding a bicycle similar to the one I road to baseball practice at age 13-15)

I see three very separate and very large solid glass figurines each in the shape of a bull ranging in size from 18 inches to 2.5 feet (Doctrine of the Trinity merged with the Bull imagery of Egypt and Greek Mythology) and I see a wise confident man in green (Muhammad) (Comparison of Christian Trinity with Muslim view of One God.)

I am fighting in a church (Norse Saga story of violent battle in a church from the days when they colonized Greenland)   (Thirty Years War).

Writing out the dream will help you remember more details. As you write out the details, associations in your memory banks will be triggered and will pop-up in your mind. Between the basic story of the dream, the characteristics of the people and places in the dream, and the associations that come up from the dream; all this will give you a good basis to begin interpreting the dream.

After you finish this process,  see if there is a specific emotional tone of the dream. If so make a short comment about whether the emotional tone was anxious, or embarrassed, of feeling exposed, or neutral, or happy, or aggressive, or deeply sad, or just plain confused.

Understanding what is the basic emotional tone and coloring of the dream gives you another perspective on the dream that will also help with the process of uncovering the meaning the dream has for you.

More next week about those dreams that are not so much emotional in nature but which may be built around an idea or a vivid surreal symbol.

Will Raymond Author of “The Simple Path of Holiness” and Host of Meditationpractice.com

will at meditation  practice dot com  (written out to limit spam)

774-232-0884

This year’s Natural Living Expo is next week-end, November 15-16, at the Best Western Royal Plaza Trade Center and Hotel, 181 Boston Post Rd West (Route 20 West) in Marlborough, MA.

Admission is $12 which is good for both days and gives you access to many free work- shops. This Saturday- November 15th- at 6pm in Salon “A”, I will be presenting one of the free workshops.

Meditation and Dream Interpretation– a guide to deeper experience.

What is the relationship between meditation and dreams?

Most of us have a wide range of personal issues. For some it might be low self-esteem, a sense of unconfidence, or a tendency to be too hard on ourselves. For others it might be tendencies towards anxiety and specific forms or fears such as how we are judged by others. Many have significant challenges with anger or unresolved issues with loved ones who have died or unresolved issues with our children. And for almost all of us there are various aspects to our sexual life that get played out in dreams at night.

Any of these issues can have a significant impact on our mind and are part of the reason why so many find it difficult to quiet their mind during meditation or in waking life.

Our dreams present little movies about these conflicts to us as a way of saying, “Here is the work you still need to do.”  “This is what you need to be looking at.”

Being more aware of our dreams is in some ways just another extension of mindfulness. While most of us are not mindful of our dreams while we are dreaming, taking the time to write a detailed description of our dreams upon waking is an excellent practice of mindful awareness. Furthermore a careful effort to write down the dreams will allow a wide range of memories that are related to the details of the dream to surface into conscious awareness.

In short you will begin to access the deeper layers of memory and the unconscious. This will allow you to resolve personal issues. The resolution of personal issues will allow the mind to settle into deeper states of peace during meditation.

The dreams are a visible layer.

The memories and associations that surface while writing out and talking about your dreams will allow you to peer into the sub-basements of the mind.

To begin with, one needs to have enough confidence and personal strength to face the unresolved conflicts and personal issues. For many this confidence comes from having faith that is deep enough that God or the universe will support them in their journey to the center of the psyche. For others they have a good therapist or spiritual mentor that is helping them realize they are now strong enough to deal with whatever has previously been too much to face. For those who are in the early stages of recovery from moderate to severe trauma it is wise to not try to do too much with dream work unless you are having nightmares. When the time is right you and your therapist can decide to descend into the basement of the mind. But please make sure you have strong supports as you make this journey down the basement stairs.

Secondarily, one needs to have the willingness to see some aspects of self that are troubling or embarrassing.

With this confidence, faith and the right kind of support that matches your personal preferences, coupled with a pure willingness to enter upon the journey, you will proceed to the next part of your journey.

The last piece is a strong commitment to personal honesty.

It is the willingness to face one’s personal issues that allow the dreams to surface and be remembered.

These insights will provide you with clear messages about personal issues that need to be resolved before you can progress to the next level of peace and insight on your journey.

For those who do not remember their dreams there is a simple technique that will work, at least for most people.

Keep a pad of paper and pen right by your bed and as soon as you awake from a dream write down whatever fragmentary image you remember. It may not be much at first but as you keep this up night after night, the unconscious will get the signal that you are ready and willing to face and explore more of the unresolved issues that you may have tended to have kept “under the rug.”

For those who readily remember their dreams, pick whatever is the most vivid dream you remember and write it down with a sense of honoring the dream and your experience with yourself or others in the dream.

As you write it down, be mindful of any associations or memories that pop into your mind as you write out certain details. Put these associations in parentheses and continue to finish writing out the dream. You can come back to the associations when you are finished.

The associations that “pop” into mind while you are writing will generally hold the key to interpreting the dream although for particularly vivid dreams this subtlety may not be needed.

More next week.

Will Raymond Author of “The Simple Path of Holiness” host of Meditationpractice.com.

will  at meditation practice dot com  (Spelled out to limit spam)

774-232-0884

Meditation practice is not just about quieting the mind and cultivating states of deep peace and relaxation, although working towards and attaining these experiences are major aspects of practice.

But in many ways learning to quiet your mind and heart and body so that states of deep peace can develop are preparation steps for what Theravada Buddhists refer to as Insight Meditation practice.

Insight Meditation is the practice of directing the mind to reflect on any one of a wide range of subjects. The goal is to penetrate to a true understanding of whatever is being considered. This can be engaged at any point of practice whether the mind is calm and clear or not. But it is especially effective when the mind and heart are very calm and the body is very relaxed.

In last week’s post and in this one I am proposing that one such subject for reflection is the current state of the official policy of the United States regarding nuclear weapons. For those who live in other countries that possess nuclear weapons, or those which are seeking to develop nuclear weapons, I suggest they focus on the policy of their country’s leaders regarding nuclear weapons.

For those of us who are Americans, engaging in this reflection will reveal the depth of unreality and hypocrisy of many government and church leaders.

In 1996 the UN General Assembly approved a Comprehensive Ban on all nuclear weapons testing. This was a major step forward from the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty which still allowed for underground testing. By calling for a ban on all nuclear testing the new treaty is a good step forward towards limiting the proliferation of nuclear weapons and the upgrading of existing arsenals.

President Clinton signed the treaty in 1996 but the Republican controlled senate under the leadership of Bob Dole refused to ratify the treaty. Perhaps if Mr. Clinton was not a chronic adulterer he would have had time and focus to make a better effort.

President Obama said he would aggressively campaign for senate ratification but has not done so. Now he may well lose a democratic majority in the senate. We will know later this week if that is the case. In defense of President Obama his efforts in 2009 with the START Treaty in Russia is a step forward as it lowers the number of nuclear weapons and called for new ways to inspect Russian arsenals. Also, in defense of the US Senate they ratified this treaty by a strong margin of 71-26 in 2010 although in this case it was led by a democratic majority.

But why has the President failed to follow up on getting the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty of 1996 ratified by the US Senate?

In defense of many church leaders, both progressive and conservative, the US Conference of Bishops and the National Association of Evangelicals supported the new START Treaty. But why have they not followed up with visible and vocal support for the 1996 Comprehensive Ban on Nuclear Testing?

When it came to fighting federal policies requiring Catholic organizations to provide insurance benefits that would pay for birth control measures for women the US Conference of Bishops launched a campaign in every parish in the country.

Why have they not done the same for the further reduction of nuclear weapons and for the support of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty? Is the question of whether women get insurance coverage for birth control devices more important to the US Conference of Bishops than further controls of nuclear weapons?

Here is the reflection:

Be aware of the stockpiles of nuclear weapons possessed by America and the other countries of the world (see last week’s post for approximate numbers).

Be aware of how little commitment many government and church leaders in America and around the world have regarding the goal of full nuclear disarmament. After all not only has America not ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, but China, Pakistan, India, Iran, North Korean and Israel have also refused to ratify the treaty. Russia, France, and England have done so.

Be aware of the devastation nuclear weapons would cause if exploded in major cities.

Imagine 1000 bombs in 1000 cities.

What do we need to do to create a world free from all Nuclear Weapons?

This is an interesting reflection.

I am not saying there are any easy answers. What I am saying is that there are answers.

Let me know what you are thinking. All constructive comments will be posted.

Will Raymond Author of “The Simple Path of Holiness” host of Meditationpractice.com.

will  at meditation practice dot com  (Spelled out to limit spam)

774-232-0884

This is a meditation practice, actually more of a reflection than a meditation, which can be engaged by Atheists and believers, and those who are not sure what they believe.

It is a meditation on the nuclear weapons possessed by America, Russia, China, France, England, India, Pakistan, North Korea and probably Israel.

What can be done to reduce the nuclear arsenals of the world?

How can America demonstrate leadership in dramatically reducing the numbers of nuclear warheads we possess? Approximate numbers for the US are 4800 strategic and tactical nuclear warheads. That number includes 2800 strategic and 500 tactical warheads that are not deployed.

Russia has about the same size arsenal.

As for the other nations: China 300, England 225, France about 200-300. India and Pakistan have 100-125 each. Israel may have as many as 100-200 warheads assuming the widespread rumors are true. Iran and Syria are attempting to develop their own nuclear warheads. I did not see figures for North Korea’s arsenal.

These figures are drawn from armscontrol.org’s web site and are assumed to be accurate.

What is the responsibility for spiritual people and atheists regarding these issues?

Could the Pope and the Dalai Lama and other major spiritual figures hold a press conference and get this issue on the front burner of public attention?

Can anyone claim they do not need to do anything?

The point of this reflection is to spend some time contemplating hundreds of thousands of people dying from a single bomb, or tens of millions or more in a full nuclear war between countries with large arsenals.

Can anyone feel safe knowing the knowledge and materials are widely available for both mainstream and rogue nations to build nuclear bombs?

Is there any doubt that someday fanatics may take over a country like Iran or Pakistan and threaten to use, or actually use, nuclear weapons in a showdown with the west?  Come to think of it, fanatics in North Korea already have the bomb and are testing long range delivery systems.

After the very tense days of the nuclear arms race of the 1980’s in particular, when the Cold War ended or at least subsided, most people more or less forgot about the menace of the thousands of nuclear warheads in the world.

I was one of them until I read a biography about Robert Oppenheimer, the physicist who led the team at Los Alamos to build the bombs that were dropped on Japan. I feel America was justified to build these bombs to make sure they were not beaten to the punch by Hitler.  After all can you imagine if Hitler or the Japanese had built nuclear weapons first? But I am less convinced than ever that we needed to actually use the bombs. A very real option that was passed over was to demonstrate the atom bomb’s destructive power away from civilian population centers. This could have been done to show the Japanese leaders the futility of continuing the war. In addition to this, there were very real military alternatives other than a full scale invasion by troops of the Japanese mainland.

But the bombs were dropped. Did America think that other nations would not also start to build atom bombs?

After the war Oppenheimer and many others made great efforts to prevent a nuclear arms race but lost out to the likes of Harry Truman and his advisors who blocked his efforts at every turn. Reading the history of these efforts in the years after WW II is like listening to the first act of a tragedy which you already know how it ends.

Sadly, these many decades later, President Obama has done nothing to reduce the nuclear arsenal of America.

In fact he has set in motion a major program to modernize America’s nuclear arsenal over the next three decades that could cost as much as 1 trillion dollars.

Oddly enough as Commander in Chief he has the power to simply disarm and destroy as many nuclear weapons as he wants to. At least I think the constitution gives him that power but I could be wrong.

But where is the President who in 2009 called for a nuclear free world?

Where is the outcry of conservative and progressive Christians, Jews, Muslims, and Hindus? Where is the outcry of Atheists, Socialists, and Secular Humanists?

These are all good subjects to reflect upon.

More information next week on organizations that are working towards a nuclear free world. In the meantime please consider a letter to the White House asking the President to dismantle at least half of America’s nuclear bombs.

Will Raymond  Author of “The Simple Path of Holiness” host of Meditationpractice.com

will  at meditationpractice   dot com ( Spelled out to limit spam)

774-232-0884

While I generally write pieces that are relevant to both Atheists and those who believe or are trying to believe in God, this series is more focused on those who conduct their search for liberation in the context of a God-centered practice.

My hope is that Atheists will realize this information will give them insights into how other people believe and practice, rather than to think that I am asking them to agree with any of these specific views.

I believe it is unwise to read the major works of St. John of the Cross without first reading modern commentaries.

As I mentioned in last week’s post, Father Marc Foley, a Carmelite Priest, has provided the best commentaries I have seen so far. His recent book “The Ascent of Mt. Carmel-Reflections” offers some useful ways to help understand John’s terminology.

He correctly identifies a core problem for modern readers of John’s books. John used terms that had very specific definitions in the tradition from the Middle Ages that is the tradition that formed his approach to contemplation and his writing style. To one degree or another, those definitions are different from modern usage and these differences can easily create confusion for modern readers.

For example he gives a definition of how John uses the word “sense” and the word “spirit.”

1) By” sense” John meant, “…the five bodily senses and the interior senses of imagination, phantasy, and sense memory. “The Ascent of Mt. Carmel-Reflections” ICS Publications, Washington, DC 2013 Marc Foley OCD, page 3

John did not use phantasy in the way we might today. For him phantasy was more of a constructing function of the mind that assembles complex images.

2) By “spirit” John meant it,”… consists primarily of intellect, memory, and will.”   IBID page 5

Regrettably Father Marc Foley is not that clear about how “sense memory” in the “senses” is different from the way he refers to “memory” in the “spirit.” This is an example where better editing by the publisher really would have been helpful.

But still his commentary offers a reasonably clear description of what John meant by the word “sense” and the word “spirit’ and that is a helpful beginning.

It is helpful because the core description of John’s map of the progress with contemplative prayer has four aspects divided into the two general categories of “sense” and “spirit.”

The Active Night of Sense.

The Passive Night of Sense.

The Active Night of Spirit.

The Passive Night of Spirit.

By having a better idea of how he is using the words “sense” and “spirit” it is possible to have a better idea of what functions of the mind are being tended to in each of these four stages. I will go into more detail next week.

But, I encourage anyone who is interested in making a serious study of St. John of the Cross to obtain a copy of Father Foley’s two works, “The Ascent of Mt. Carmel-Reflections” and “Ascent to Joy.” I suggest you read them both before making an attempt to read John’s own writings. One major benefit to doing so is that Father Foley offers a reinterpretation that softens up some of the bleak and extreme language John often used. Whether he is correct in doing this I don’t know, but still reading Father Foley’s interpretation is, in my opinion, much better than starting with the original works.

Unfortunately Father Foley’s exposition on a wide range of topics related to John’s views on contemplative prayer are in some ways incomplete and in other ways vague and confusing in their own right. Still, one can get a solid overview of John’s method and use of key terms and this is a good beginning.

Why would anyone bother trying to understand St. John of the Cross if both he and his commentators often stumble as they try to get key points across?

Because the core message of St. John of the Cross is a highly effective way to study contemplative prayer in a Catholic context.

I will go into more detail as to why I feel that way next week.

Please let me know what experience, if any, you have of reading and putting into practice St. John of the Cross’s teachings.

Will Raymond Author of “The Simple Path of Holiness” and Host of Meditationpractice.com

will   at meditationpractice    dot    com  (spelled out to limit spam)

774-232-0884