dyad with spirit
At this “unique moment in time” I think we need to get into dyad with spirit.
Whatever is going on for us, we need to re-enliven our lived experience of connection to spirit.
What does dyad with spirit mean?
Let’s start with dyad:
“In sociology, a dyad is a group of two people, the smallest possible social group. As an adjective, "dyadic" describes their interaction.[1] The pair of individuals in a dyad can be linked via romantic interest, family relation, interests, work, partners in crime, and so on.
Dyad means two things of similar kind or nature or group, and dyadic communication means the interrelationship between the two. In practice, this relationship refers to dialogic relations or face-to-face verbal communication between two people involving their mutual ideas, thought, behavior, ideals, liking, disliking, and the queries and answers concerning life and living in nature. A sudden communication between two strangers in the street and not continued afterwards or not having lasting aftereffect on each other can not be termed as dyadic communication. Examples of dyadic communication occur between Jesus and Peter, the Buddha and Ananda, or between Socrates and Plato, where dialog is not only outward, superficial, or mechanical, but instead brings the two people into a sphere where each person influences the other.
A lasting communication of ideas between two people for long duration of time or of any intensive duration of deeper impact may be called dyadic communication.”
And you can use the definition below for spirit, and/or/definitely define it for yourself.
spirit - the force within a person (being) that is believed to give the body life, energy, and power
- Brittanica Dictionary
In addition to getting into dyad with spirit, I also propose we come away from the digital and superficial, and begin to tune into the local field.
For, how do we trust spirit when we spend much of our days in digital worlds we cannot trust?
The only way is to up to be with spirit - however it shows up in the moment.
Start with the spirit of nature; if we tune to that, it always offers a response.
Or with the spirit of the moon, starting to know its rhythm, its cyclic wisdom.
Start with perceiving (or imagining) how energy really moves.
Or gets stuck.
When energy gets stuck, spirit will give us powers of a crow-bar, a lighthouse, a broom.
Start by noticing the spirit of our internet.
Start with really hanging out with an animal. Get together with “the spirit” of that animal. Set a timer and for 5 minutes do what that animal wants to do. If they are napping, lay down. If they want a treat, have one together.
Or spend time with a tree. Any tree will do, it doesn’t have to be a “fancy tree” in a “botanical space”. For 3 minutes imagine you ingested a mild psychedelic that lets you talk to this tree, but mostly you are going to listen. Three minutes of presence turns any tree into a wisdom-wizard.
Start by tuning into your own spirit, right now, in this moment…
Being in dyad with spirit makes things pretty simple. Instead of chasing productivity, instead of asking for “answers”, listen to spirit – wherever you can find it.
Once you start hearing something with spirit, ask if it is coming from the highest frequency of love. If the answer is yes, carry on being in dyad with whatever aspect of spirit you are currently in the presence of. If the answer is no or muddied, cut off that convo. and move onto a new one.
This new moon in Gemini has Uranian aspects. New realities can pop into being at any moment.
May we travel light and stay light on our feet.
May we engage spirit at this new moon - perhaps more boldly than we ever have before.
Until next time,
Jess
“What does the money machine eat? It eats youth, spontaneity, life, beauty, and, above all, it eats creativity. It eats quality and shits quantity.”
- William S Burroughs
“What is the nature of the human spirit? What are we here for? Let’s stretch our minds and our imagination a little bit.”
- Kapacha
“Certain professions are more or less completely incompatible with the achievement of man’s final end; and there are certain ways of making a living which do so much physical and, above all, so much moral, intellectual and spiritual harm that, even if they could be practised in a non-attached spirit (which is generally impossible), they would still have to eschewed by anyone dedicated to the task of liberating, not only himself, but others.”
- Aldous Huxley
"It's a folk singer's job to comfort disturbed people and to disturb comfortable people."
— Woody Guthrie
“If there must be kings, let them be oak kings. Let our queens be wild apple trees. And our elders, let them be the wise, immortal yew.
It’s a gift to be with these trees. In these old woods, I find reassurance: animism isn’t just a concept. It’s not something to convince ourselves of. Animism is an experience. You can feel the aliveness here, the intelligence. Spirit.”
- Amanda Yates Garcia
“Steiner said we were on the cusp of developing a fifth body, which he called the “Spirit Self.” This is the ability to consciously mediate and master the energies of the astral body. The astral world pours desires and cravings into us—they lead to depression, addiction, psychosis. But as an echelon of humanity learns to master those cravings and impulses, we move into a fifth world of development. So it’s good to have different mythologies—that one really resonates with me.”
- Daniel Pinchbeck
“Clear your field of the old stories
If your mind says you do not deserve it or it is too much for you, those are old frequencies that need to be cleared. Guilt, fear, and shame are the fastest ways to close your receiving channels.”
- Shaman Durek
“By putting your hands on your body, holding the issue in your mind’s eye, being specific about what’s actually needing to be met, getting out of the way by simultaneously activating your peripheral vision, and holding steady while your body goes to work according to its greater wisdom, you can heal. It’s really that simple. It’s consciousness healing trauma with presence. It’s not spiritual bypass, but the opposite: intimately re-visiting what got stuck in your body because you were overwhelmed at an earlier time. When you can do that, blood flow returns to the area and you’re free.”
- Stella Osorojos Eisentein
“Animals are something invented by plants to move seeds around. An extremely yang solution to a peculiar problem which they faced.”
- Terrance McKenna
Chairman: “Item six on the agenda: the meaning of life. Now, Harry, you’ve had some thoughts on this?”
Harry: “That’s right. Yeah, I’ve had a team working on this over the past few weeks, and what we’ve come up with can be reduced to two fundamental concepts. One: people are not wearing enough hats. Two: matter is energy. In the universe, there are many energy fields which we cannot normally perceive. Some energies have a spiritual source which act upon a person’s soul. However, this soul does not exist ab initio. It has to be brought into existence by a process of guided self-observation. However, this is rarely achieved, owing to man’s unique ability to be distracted from spiritual matters by everyday trivia.”
[pause]
Chairman: “What was that about hats, again?”
- Monty Python’s Meaning of Life
"To live content with small means. To seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion. To be worthy not respectable, and wealthy not rich. To listen to stars and birds and babes and sages with an open heart. To study hard, think quietly, act frankly, talk gently, await occasions. Hurry never. In a word, to let the spiritual, the unbidden and the unconscious rise up through the common. This is my symphony."
- William Henry Channing
“In our day, we confine ourselves at the best of times to discussing the imagination. The word “imagination” is beautiful and vast, but it doesn’t hold everything. But what is the spirit, the spiritual life? If only I were up to defining such things! Robert Musil says that the spirit synthesizes intellect and emotion. It’s a good working definition, for all its concision. In the case of poetry, literature, it’s simpler to say - theologians know a thing or two about this - what the spirit isn’t. It’s not psychoanalytic any more than it is behavioral, sociological, or political. It is holistic, and in it are reflected, as in an astronaut’s helmet, the earth, the stars, and a human face. These are difficult and dangerous considerations.”
- Adam Zagajewski
“Once in a while it vanishes - in the sense that I become deaf to beauty for a week or two or three. This coming and going of the inner life - because this is what it is - is a curse and a blessing. I don’t need to explain why it’s a curse. A blessing because it brings about a movement, an energy which, when it peaks, creates a poem. Or a moment of happiness.”
- Adam Zagajewski
You Were Made For This
“Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach. Any small, calm thing that one soul can do to help another soul, to assist some portion of this poor suffering world, will help immensely. It is not given to us to know which acts or by whom, will cause the critical mass to tip toward an enduring good. What is needed for dramatic change is an accumulation of acts, adding, adding to, adding more, continuing. We know that it does not take everyone on Earth to bring justice and peace, but only a small, determined group who will not give up during the first, second, or hundredth gale.
One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times. The light of the soul throws sparks, can send up flares, builds signal fires, causes proper matters to catch fire. To display the lantern of soul in shadowy times like these -- to be fierce and to show mercy toward others; both are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity. Struggling souls catch light from other souls who are fully lit and willing to show it. If you would help to calm the tumult, this is one of the strongest things you can do.
There will always be times when you feel discouraged. I too have felt despair many times in my life, but I do not keep a chair for it. I will not entertain it. It is not allowed to eat from my plate. [...]
In that spirit, I hope you will write this on your wall: When a great ship is in harbor and moored, it is safe, there can be no doubt. But that is not what great ships are built for.”
--Clarissa Pinkola Estes
"I don't quite know what we're doing on this insignificant cinder spinning away in a dark corner of the universe. That is a secret which the high gods have not confided in me. Yet one thing I believe and I believe it with every fiber of my being. A man must live by his lights and do what little he can and do it as best as he can."
- Walker Percy
“One day Fawn heard Great Spirit calling to her from the top of Sacred Mountain. Fawn immediately started up the trail. She didn’t know a horrible demon guarded the way to Great Spirit’s lodge. The demon was trying to keep all the beings of creation from connecting to Great Spirit. He wanted all of Great Spirit’s creatures to feel that Great Spirit didn’t want to be disturbed.
Fawn was not at all frightened when she came upon the demon. This was curious because the demon was the archetype of all the ugly monsters that have ever been. The demon breathed fire and smoke and made disgusting sounds to frighten Fawn. Any normal creature would have fled or died on the spot from fright.
Fawn, however, said gently to the demon, “Please let me pass. I’m on the way to see Great Spirit.”
Fawn’s eyes were filled with love and compassion for this oversized bully of a demon. The demon was astounded by Fawn’s lack of fear. No matter how he tried, he could not frighten Fawn, because her love had penetrated his hardened, ugly heart.
Much to the demon’s dismay, his rock-hard heart began to melt, and his body shrank to the size of a walnut. Fawn’s persistent love and gentleness had caused the meltdown of the demon. Due to this gentleness and caring that Fawn embodied, the pathway is now clear for all…”
- Medicine Cards, Jamie Sams & David Carson
“Describing what a Muse is feels like trying to list every name we have for soul, spirit, god and ghost. Something outside of the artist asks to come in and when we say yes, we’re filled with ideas and clarity.”
- Jaqueline Suskin,
"We believe everything is out there.
We often act as if we understand everything. This is very egoistic. When we see the world only in terms of ourselves, we lack a broad perspective.
We think that all is as we see it. We are unaware of our ignorance. We want to have an idea we can hold on to. We want to know.
The real world consists of both a conceptual world and a nonconceptual world. But we ignore the world we cannot get in our hands. When you cannot understand it, you reject it. But reality is not just the reality you understand. Even before you create any ideas or concepts about it, it is already present. It consists of the merging of what can be thought of and what cannot be thought of. Words cannot touch it.
This place, where nothing can be pinned down, is where we actually live moment to moment. If you think you can understand your life with just your ideas, you are ignoring where and how you actually exist.
All things - good and bad, right and wrong - are manifestations of the real world. You cannot understand the world just in terms of your own views. You must open to what you don't understand as well as what you do understand."
° ° °
"Usually we live our lives only in terms of the world we can see. When we do, we emphasize ourselves. We place the I first. Even when we take up the spiritual life, we place the I first. In other words, we pull everything down to the level of our personal views and feelings. We never forget ourselves.
What we tend to ignore is the world that sees us. This is not the world you think you see or hear. It is actually the world as it is before you are conscious of it - before you form some idea about it. If you emphasize yourself, you will completely forget this world.
If you want to practice compassion, you must accept simultaneously the world you see and the world that sees you. You can't judge your life just in terms of what you can see - that is, from your ego-centered perspective."
- Dainin Katagiri
"Pay attention to the gentle ones, the ones who can hold your gaze with no discomfort, the ones who smile to themselves while sitting alone in a coffeeshop, the ones who walk as if floating. Take them in and marvel at them. Simply marvel. It takes an extraordinary person to carry themselves as if they do not live in hell."
- D. Bunyavong
“We are not doing magical/spiritual things for approval from others. We are not meditating to look cool or be thought of in a certain positive light. This is not what these things are about. Meditation and other contemplative practices are here for our benefit - they are not meant to be one more thing to beat ourselves up about.
Your meditations don't have to "look" like meditation to anyone else. No one (including you!) needs to be judging the frequency, logistics or manner in which you meditate.
Your spiritual practices do not have to match anything you see on Instagram (in fact it is probably better if they don't).
Your inner work should feel like one big long adventure; where you are exploring new terrain and discovering all kinds of treasures that mean a lot to you, but don't necessarily need to be shared with anyone else.
You are free. You can sculpt and craft and create your own practice with no need for approval from anyone else.”
- Jessica Snow
“I just cannot adhere to any religion. I am spiritual for sure, but nature is my focus. That’s me though, and I’m not saying my way is for everyone.”
- Neko Case
“We were a Lawless people, but we were on pretty good terms with the Great Spiti.”
- Tatanga Mani, Walking Buffalo
"I am of the order whose purpose is not to teach the world a lesson but to explain that school is over."
- Henry Miller