Beginning Level Connective Practices
Start with these if new.
The Five Methods of Spiritual/Emotional Connection
(June 8, 2023) These are deep psychological needs of humans so we naturally use them to connect to divine powers (deities). Pick one or two of these which work best for you to start.
Give and Receive Offerings To a Deity
For many people the giving and receiving of gifts is a major sign of love. If you have this emotional resonance, the perfect gift or gesture shows that you are known, you are cared for, and you are prized above whatever was sacrificed to bring the gift to you. A missed birthday, anniversary, or a hasty, thoughtless gift would be disastrous—so would the absence of everyday gestures.
Words of Affirmation (Praise of Deity)
Actions don’t always speak louder than words. If this is one of your emotional resonances unsolicited compliments mean the world to you. Hearing the words, “I love you,” are important—hearing the reasons behind that love sends your spirits skyward. Insults can leave you shattered and are not easily forgotten.
Quality Time (Devotions, Meditation, Spiritual Studies)
Mothing says, “I love you,” like full, undivided attention. Being there for this type of person is critical, but really being there—with the TV off, fork and knife down, and all chores and tasks on standby—makes your significant other feel truly special and loved. Distractions, postponed dates, or the failure to listen can be especially hurtful.
Acts of Service (Teaching, Charity, Maintaining a Sacred Space)
Anything you do to ease the burden of responsibilities weighing on an “Acts of Service” person will speak volumes. The words he or she most want to hear: “Let me do that for you.” Laziness, broken commitments, and making more work for them tell speakers of this language their feelings don’t matter.
Physical Touch (Ritual)
A person whose primary emotional resonance is Physical Touch is a touchy-feely person. Hugs, pats on the back, holding hands, and thoughtful touches on the arm, shoulder, or face—they can all be ways to show excitement, concern, care, and love. Physical presence and accessibility are crucial, while neglect or abuse can be unforgivable and destructive.
Meditation
(July 7, 2022) Meditation and divination are two halves of the same coin. Both are ways to check on the state of our emotional/spiritual channels by exposing the unperceived emotional/spiritual currents in our lives. Divination predicts the future only indirectly. Uncovering the hidden allows for more accurate insights into future events.
Meditation and divination are intertwined because of the Spiritual Uncertainty Principle. We are unable to separate out the influences coming from our own brain from the influences coming from our spiritual and social networks.
Nature-based meditation is not the meditation of the Buddhist tradition. Stillness of mind is not the goal but only a means to an end. Mind stillness is used to find those quiet voices in the background which are covered up by the loud mind chatter of day to day living. Meditation is a spiritual listening practice.
Divination is also a spiritual listening practice except that Divination uses various techniques to guide thoughts for uncovering the hidden spiritual/emotional influences. A basic divination technique flowing right out of meditation is using the chakras to focus thoughts on the resonances from different parts of the body.
Spirit walks are another good divination/meditation practice for any level of practitioner. Find a place in nature where you will not be interacting with people and try changing your perception by just feeling and reaching out. Perhaps close your eyes for a bit and mentally or even physically go through the opening stages of a ritual. Then start walking with spiritually soft eyes. See things not as they are but for what they might mean. What are the trees, flowers, and birds saying to you?
Spiritual Yoga for Awareness and Mental Discipline
(July 7, 2022) Yoga is a physical and spiritual exercise which developed in India after the Zoroastrian Persians invaded the Indus Valley. The word "yoga" means "connection" in Sanskrit which gives a hint of its original purpose.
Most people who start Yoga today just want a well balanced exercise regimen which also exercises balance and flexibility. Yet after about 6 months many people notice themselves becoming more aware of their emotional/spiritual flows. When I asked others on a Yoga retreat how they got into Yoga most said this very thing. Its spiritual benefits came as a complete surprise.
Yoga's Two Time Scales
Yoga works at two time scales. The short time scale is a single Yoga session. At the end of such a session the mind is ready for a connective practice like a ritual, meditation, or a divination. The long term time scale is all about changing our habits of mind in a more connective direction.
A yoga session, when properly done in a spiritual way, works by having the student focus on feeling the sensations of their body as they move through the poses. Most of the time we do not consciously feel our body so this is an exploration of self-awareness. The poses are done to the point of feeling something out in the body away from the central core. Pain is never supposed to be felt because that means the student has pushed the pose too far. These generated feelings are "out there" yet they are still a part of our body. Once these "out there" sensations becomes habitual the student can then extend them more readily out beyond the body to others and to the spiritual realm.
At the end of every practice is a short meditation time called "Shivasina." At this time the mind is primed for connectivity and ready for some divination . Try to look out through your eyelids and clear your mind. You may eventually see different colors and patterns triggered by the eyeball's inner floaties. Interpreting these later requires that you know your personal emotional/spiritual correspondences.
Yoga's Long Term Use in Connective Emotional/Spiritual Conditioning
Yoga affects our habits of mind. Connective repetition of the various body feelings enhances the brain's ability to perceive connections while at the same time enhancing emotion focus. This is analogous to athletic training. If an athlete becomes good at one sport then he or she more readily takes up others because the basic body coordination skill set is already there. Thus yoga makes a person more spiritually aware in general. Over time this generates a generous and open personality.
The modern system is an adaptation of the older six chakra system found in the Vedas which was based upon actual body openings and depressions (fontanelle, nostril, mouth, depression just under the sternum, belly button, urethra, anus).
Shown below are river vortices which interrupt water flows. They also indicated hidden obstructions under the river's surface. Emotional flows are analogous to rivers and we often develop hidden blockages in our emotional/spiritual connections.
Chakra Framework for Meditation
(July 7, 2022) Identifying emotional blockages is difficult. The main emotional conflicts which lead to emotional blockages are outlined by the chakra paradigm developed in India.
The chakra system is based upon the idea that a full connection with the Divine is only possible if a person's conscious emotional/spiritual currents are freely flowing. This produces the maximum spiritual power in a person. This spiritual power is called "kundalini" power in the eastern traditions.
Achieving this full Divine connection requires the removal of all emotional blockages. These blockages may be put into the chakra correspondence framework in order to aid in their discovery by meditation.
The word "chakra" means "vortex" or "whirlpool" in Sanskrit because vortices in rivers block straight fast moving current flows. These chakras are associated with different emotional problems (blockages) associated with different regions of the body. The typical associations are:
Crown chakra - is associated with the crown of the head and represents the problems which occur in connecting to the divine realm.
Third eye chakra - is associated with our brain and it represents the problems which occur in reasoning and thinking.
Throat chakra - is associated with the voice box in the throat and it represents the problems which occur with miscommunication.
Heart chakra - is naturally associated with the heart and it represents the problems which occur with feelings of life-growth, that is, the feelings love, romance, self-worth and self-esteem. This is one of the life forces. These are also the cleanliness emotions because if you feel clean and pure you feel accepted and worthy. Consequently, this chakra is the water correspondence.
Solar plexus chakra - is associated with breathing and air as represented by the body’s diaphragm muscle. This represents the life force of movement. Consequently, this chakra represents problems of insight and empathy about the underlying causes and motions of things. This chakra is the air correspondence.
Sacral chakra - is associated with the sexual organs and it represents the problems which occur from interacting with heat and fever of our passionate primal emotions. This chakra is the fire correspondence.
Root chakra - or the first chakra is associated with the butt which sits us on the ground. As such it represents the problems of grounding and emotional stability. This chakra is the earth correspondence.
Optionally Choosing a Pantheon or Deity
(August 31, 2022) Or as Nature Pagans say, the deity chooses you because your feelings direct you towards some ancient conception of a deity that represents your dominant feelings at the time.
Sometimes your feelings do not fit any ancient conception that has come down to us so you can just make up your own name for it or just interpret it as a spiritual power or cluster of powers. Not everyone needs to personify a spiritual power or cluster of powers into a human living on a different plane of existence. Yet many do because their brain is wired to related best to other people.
If your deity is personified then you will connect with it in the same loving way as with human partner. These connective practices are:
- Giving words of affirmation or praise
- Giving quality time as mindfulness during a ritual or mediation.
- Giving gifts as offerings
- Giving acts of service
- Interacting with physical touch with various correspondences representing the deity.