Plumbing the depths of the sacred

"As the heart opens and the mind clears," writes Roger Walsh in Essential Spirituality: The 7 Central Practices to Awaken Heart and Mind, "we see further and further into the boundless depths of the mind."

When we begin to plumb the depths of the sacred, there is a sense of transparency that arises. Things we thought were obvious become less clear; the boundaries between finite and infinite, right and wrong, "them" and "us" and grow less distinct.

It's a bit like looking at this photograph: Where and what is real? On what safe, incontrovertible ground can we actually stand? Is it the grasses, rooted in the sand below, waving gently as the wind stirs the water? Is it the water itself, whose surface, ruffled by the summer breeze, adds texture to what we see?

Is it the boat above, which remains unseen, or could it be the reflection of the boat, its colors enriched and intensified by the light above shining through to the grasses below; that reflection which could disappear the moment a hand disturbs the water?

Is the pole part of the boat? Are they connected? Or is it only the piling to which the boat is tied? Is it just proximity that creates this ephemeral illusion of connection?

If recollection serves, this photograph was shot almost 11 years ago, when I was still living on Shaw Island. The boat belongs to the husband of a dear friend who is now struggling with cancer, and the image continues, despite all the photographs I've shot since then, to be one of my enduring favorites. But I don't believe I've ever actually been able to sell it. I remember framing it in white wood, then seeing it displayed on the floor by the door of the gallery, where it was accidentally kicked a time or two; the scuffs permanently marring the purity of the frame.

Which probably means that the ambiguity of the image -- that confusion, illusion and transparency which for me adds to its appeal -- is not as satisfying to the buying public, which responds more readily to the concreteness of the image below. For many of us the questions that arise in the course of exploration become uncomfortable. As Dostoevsky says in his Grand Inquisitor chapter of The Brothers Karamazov, mankind is more interested in having a crust of bread and someone to worship than in the pure joy of freedom that is Christ's most definitive offer.

The problem, I suspect, lies in the unfathomable distance that looms between the comfortable plane of reality and the peace that rests at the center of things. Like the Israelites, we find the journey across the liminal desert that lies between now and destiny to be interminably long and terrifying. When surface becomes permeable, when storms bring waves of anxiety, when we begin to detect the illusory nature of existence, to question that which once we took for granted, things can get very uncomfortable.

I am grateful now, for all the friends, writers, mystics, sages and spiritual advisors along the way and through the centuries, who continue to invite me to explore the spiritual deep, and who reach out and take my hand when I, like Peter, having stepped out of my safe and comfortable boat, lose faith, and begin to sink. With their help, each time I step out, I go a little further, become a little more comfortable with ambiguity, and come a little closer to the deepest peace, that serene calm that wells up from the Source in which all the levels come to rest.