Uncategorized | Bonnie Barnard - Part 10

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Try a Metaphysical Christmas

Bible stories to a metaphysician is like analyzing a good dream to a Jungian psychologist. It’s all about symbology. Meta-physical means “beyond the physical.” Or, in this case, not the literal. When the Christmas story is looked at from this perspective, it isn’t a story about a baby born over two thousand years ago in a manager by a virgin mother; it is the story of The Light or the Christ (meaning the anointed One) being born within each of us right now. Each character has its own meaning. The Virgin Mother is the pure feminine or untouched Intuition. Joseph is the masculine contribution or the logical intellect. King Herod is the energy which wants to kill the birth of Light/Anointing. The primary story line is in birthing one’s inner radiance (Christ) it is necessary to give Intuition the lead, supported by the intellect. Then leaving one’s comfort zone which threatens this birth into a quiet remote inner space. Once the birth has arrived you will be met with...

Permanently Changing

Impermanence. Buddhists use this term to describe the constant state of change. Life is impermanent. Everything changes. Suffering, the Buddhist says, exists in part when we hold on to that which changes, wanting it to stay the same. Today in Phoenix is the perfect day to write about this. It is the second day in a row we’ve had non-stop rain. I have mud-caked tennis shoes in the car port looking like I just left a horse stall, not walked down my palm tree lined street. I’ve lived here for two and a half years and this is the first time I’ve experienced this. It is different, not the same. And, today I like it. It reminds me of Seattle without the promise it will remain this way for four, five, or six months. It will change. It really doesn’t matter if I like it, anyhow, because it is what it is … raining. Elements of life are this way. We do have influence over much of life, some...

As Long as We’re Breathing, We’re Learning

Guess what? I’ve gone back to school. I’ve prepared for it all week beginning with a conversation with my Starbuck’s barista. Brian welcomed me with my venti, Passion, no sweetener, iced tea informing me “school has started.” “I know,” I tell Brian, “I am taking a class, too.” “Really? Now why would you take a class?” He says with twenty year old curiosity. “To learn,” I respond as he begins laughing. He sees the world in semesters and degrees. I see the world in chunks of learning. I signed up for a three credit English class on magazine writing. I don’t care about the credit. After twelve weeks I want to hold up a portfolio of pitched and in process articles I’ve written. I drove up to the campus, very comfortable, as I’ve worked on college campuses and enjoy the sensation of being surrounded by individuals interested in the discipline of learning. After getting my parking permit and mortgaging my house for the purchase of two paperback text books...

To Live or To Expiate

Expiate — To extinguish guilt or to atone In his essay, Self Reliance, Ralph Waldo Emerson says “I don not wish to expiate, but to live. My life is not an apology, but a life.” Let’s live today. Let’s pause and recognize this moment is different from the previous one and different still from the one yet-to-come. From our bones and from our Soul, let us express this moment as who we are without apology. Let’s decide to be ourselves fully. Let’s speak what is ours to give voice to and be quiet where it doesn’t matter to us. Let us do what is ours to do and let others make their contribution with equal conviction. I often speak to the “how” one lives their life and the “what” one does through their life’s actions when officiating a memorial service. These are two different ways to examine a life. For example, I can Google my father’s name and pull up a portfolio of his work left behind. This is the “what” is done in life. And then there...

Soul Discovery

The past two years for me have been about “Birthing My Soul.” I had gone through a very extended rough patch which I celebrate physically living through. I worked with a team of doctors, spiritual coaches, therapists of many genres, to support this transformation. My Energy Doctor told me early on in the disintegration process that I would be well the day I had more of “Me” in my body than “other people.” This comment resonated within me as I stripped away all of my relationships, most of my books, and many sources of opinions, that I may listen the still small voice within. I moved out of town into the sunshine, floated as much as possible in the pool, and surrendered a little bit at a time. It was rough going, and yet in finding my Center, in finding my Soul, I am now in a place to experience Radiant Health and much Joy. I was guided in meditation to share with my blogging community moments when I found...