Is our “Joy Retreat” too indulgent for the world’s crises?
In a world full of chaos, suffering, and turmoil, what place does a “Joy Retreat” have? Shouldn’t we be meditating! This retreat will embrace the world’s suffering AND use the power of joy for individual and collective healing.
Some spiritual and buddhist folks who run across this “Joy Retreat” have wondered if the act of feeling “joy without cause” is wrong? Inappropriate? Spiritually bypassing? Insensitive? Narcissist? Irresponsible? Impossible?
I am the one of the co-leaders of the June retreat “Nature + Mindfulness + Joy.”
I believe a more important question is this: can we open our hearts to all the suffering, the fraying of our world-wide Web of Life… and yet still feel “joy for no reason,” at times, throughout any given day?
I know it is possible.
I live to do both.
The joy retreat will do both.
One of the greatest calls to our soul growth is, in fact, to cultivate the capacity to feel both suffering and joy in the same beating heart.
Let me be poetic for a moment, without having to define these juicy metaphors:
- Weaving together the experience of suffering (our own, and/or that of “others”) and joy is like the astonishing weavings in a traditional Navajo rug.
- This weaving is leaving the “paradox of wholeness.”
- This is the wizard and wizardess, living between the multiple realms of existence.
- It is the Unifying Way.
- Such unifying is the way the true soul loves to figure-eight flow.
- Holding both together can come to you in a “flash awake”.
Have I opened you to a deeper embrace of feeling both suffering and joy?
I will go one step further: feeling joy, in the world as it is right now, is actually a responsible act.
Here are four flash reasons why:
- When you peel back all the layers of our human suffering, anxiety, task orientation, conditioning and programming, you can find a living waters of pulsating joy — verified by spiritual practitioners of every religion, through every century, in every culture.
- If our world has any kind of energetic field(also called the unifying field, noosphere, Indra’s network, quantum potential, whatever you may call i)t, then experiencing joy in such a field fertilizes it for all others. This is an astounding power that I will discuss more fully in another blog post).
- Feeling joy brings the life force flowing through your circulation, leaving you stronger — energizing you to enjoy your life, while simultaneously being of benefit for others.
- Feeling joy breaks you out of your trance, default, task-ego orientation — and suddenly you are in larger, true nature.
For those of you interested in this retreat, Yes! this is an IN-PERSON, co-ed retreat! And yes, the co-leaders and retreat center are taking every precaution to ensure there is COVID-SAFETY. We are excited to offer this second annual retreat. The success of our first one confirmed our vision — that participants love this “UN-retreat”. No long hours of silence (except for your 24 hr solo!), with alot more fun, alot more community building, everything outdoors … in stupendous beauty, at 8,600 feet in the Rockies, 45 mins from Boulder, CO.
CLICK HERE FOR ALL THE DETAILS, INCLUDING THE INEXPENSIVE COST
P.S. DEDICATION OF MERIT:
Whatever merit these thoughts may have, I dedicate this merit to all Beings everywhere
(including plants, animals, oceans, icebergs, etc), and hope that it may help soften the
suffering of BILLIONS on our planet right now.
P.S.S. I would love your comments, ideas, questions … Please let me via email, [email protected], or text 1-303-619-1890. Frederico
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An earlier version of this post appears on the Unifying website, at https://unifying.com/events/june-2021-in-person-retreat/
