Taking the Lid Off God
Part One: Awakening Spiritual Energy and Ecstasy
As we have explored spiritual energy, it’s now time to consider the common outflow and experience of the presence of this energy: ecstasy. Many of us have been brought up to keep a lid on such powerful emotions, and therefore on how God’s spirit often manifests within—in ecstatic bliss and energy.
Especially for us as respectable, well-mannered Westerners, ecstasy might sound a little . . . extreme. It may arise apprehension, or maybe even discouragement as an unrealistic experience to hope for. Perhaps you feel perfectly satisfied with a quieter, more contemplative spirituality and ecstatic spiritual energy sounds a little too “out there.”
That may be your path and that’s ok. But it may also be only half of the story.
Spiritual practices of contemplative stillness are ultimately meant to bring us into a place of intimacy with the deep divine, into union with God, into a state of new life and being. The felt experience of this will often not be one of stillness, but be filled with energy, ecstasy, and bliss. We will find ourselves not just in the quiet, but in the experience, presence, and union with God beyond, beside, and being us.
Are experience, presence, and union with God the primary intentions of Christian spirituality? If so, is our spiritual practice leading us toward that realization? Could it be possible that our attachment to stillness is repressing the flow of spiritual energy which can be our awakening into the wholeness of integrated, embodied Christian mysticism?
“The Two Energies” by Sergii Radkevych
The Spiritual Paths of Stillness & Ecstasy
“The eternal, primal, infinite energy is the same in all. The energy spent is as great in repression as in expression, in negation as in affirmation, in silence as in sound.”
–Sri Aurobindo
Awakening to a new state of being in the early church was nearly always characterized by an ecstatic state of bliss, a spiritual practice full of energy, flow, and “speaking forth” higher wisdom. This was the outpouring and arrival of spirit, of a higher state of consciousness for the first Christians. This was an ecstatic path of spiritual awakening.
Contemplative traditions approach this higher consciousness more through stillness, focusing on silent meditative practices of letting go and releasing. There is much value in these practices of stillness and solitude, especially today in a world of frenetic energy and hectic busyness. Jesus often went alone into the garden to pray and be with his abba.
The path of silent contemplation also seeks to strip away the ego attachments and lesser identifications we all hold. Stillness is the place where we can be free from all the encumbrances that usually distract and disguise God. These are all very good and important parts of the spiritual journey.
It’s certainly possible to take just one of the paths, to remain on the path of stillness or the path of ecstasy. As integralists, we think it’s best to integrate both into our spiritual practice. And in fact, when we do that, we find that the stillness cultivates and holds our spiritual energy, while the ecstatic bliss deepens and expands our stillness.
The encouraging and crucial component of the ecstatic path is that it can be transmitted instantly and permanently. The Christian contemplative path was primarily developed in monastic settings for a life context in which there were hours of time available to pray and a community of accountability and support. We must modify and adjust our spiritual path to match the present cultural realities we face—global realities that require change now. We can look to the path of ecstasy to “hasten the journey” so to speak.
This is not a cheap shortcut—there is still work to be done after transmission and energetic practice. Our stillness practices will help us in that. But this mystical energetic presence within and among us can move us directly into a loving state of direct contact with God, into spiritual knowing, and vitalizing the engagement of active participation in our spiritual gifts.
This is no self-indulgent ecstasy just to make us feel good. This is the energy of evolution, empowering social change and evolution.
“May God preserve within me the deep taste, and the sort of lucid ecstasy, that intoxicate me with the joy of Being — a joy drunk in as though from an everlasting spring . . . I sometimes feel an indefinable bliss when I remember that I possess — in a total, incorruptible and living Element — the supreme Principle in which all subsists and comes to life.”
Of course, there are abuses and misuses of energetic practice. If we get “power-drunk,” sentimental, or addicted to it, then we have gone astray. Practices of stillness help us in this regard so that we don’t become attached, overly identifying ourselves with our experiences or our spiritual energy. These and other detours exist on the path of stillness as well. This is why the best option is an integration of both together. The potential for error when misused is not a legitimate reason to avoid the proper, healthy form of a practice.
There will be some periods in our life when we need more of one than the other. If we find ourselves in a dark night, a period of stripping away, we would be better served by practices of stillness and waiting. But let us not repress the possibility of the awakening of spiritual energy within by over-attachment to a path of stillness. Let us not hold to the cross so much that we miss the resurrection.
My journey from cross to resurrection
I (Paul), beginning as a young teenager, have always admired the startling and iconoclastic Jesus that I found in the Gospels. I was also attracted to early Christianity before it became a religion. This “Christianity before it became a religion” was full of mystical fire and transforming energy, and I set out to find if it was around today. In college, a Baptist deacon in a church where I worked adopted me as a “spiritual son” and introduced me to an interesting combination of New Thought and Charismatic Christians, called neo-Pentecostals back then. During that time, I had lots of famous charismatics pray for me to get something I thought I didn’t have, but not much happened to me, even though it did with my friends.
In seminary, we studied this early Christianity, but that was “back then,” and I was told that God did things differently now. I lead the church I pastored for 49 years as best I could, and many of those folks did seem to experience new and transforming life as we moved from traditional church, to charismatic church, to progressive, then integral church. In all of that time I could see some small progress in my own spiritual awakening, but not what I was wanting.
It was then, at age 60, I found out why. This was my particular challenge but may represent other kinds of healing challenges that others face. I always knew I was an emotionally repressed person and had spent twenty years in therapy to work on that. However, after 33 years of marriage and two adult children, I finally realized that I was not the straight man I had always thought I was, but a gay one. For a brief period, I was the only openly gay Southern Baptist pastor in the world! Not for long though as they finally kicked our church out of the denomination after years of trying to get rid of us for other un-Baptist-like views.
With the new-found release to be who I was, a friendly divorce, supportive kids, wonderful friends, and accepting church, I began dating—this time with the appropriate sex—other men. Life became very exciting. What was even more amazing is that my spiritual life took off, too! With a boost from Ken Wilber’s integral philosophy, I found a way to understand Christianity that was incredibly liberating, and a daily practice of relating to Jesus and Abba God that was transforming. I began having the mystical experiences I had always wanted. Not just occasionally, but almost all of the time. I have finally taken the lid off my spiritual life and am much more deeply in the ecstatic joy and delight of communion and union with God.
I share my journey with the hope that if you have a longing in your heart for more, that you will follow your heart to all that God has for you, no matter how long it takes.
The Ecstasy of St Theresa by Giuseppe Bazzani 1745-1750