Practiced daily, this basic activation exercise enables you to gradually shift the center of your being to your heart. The ideal is to start your day with it, but you can do it at any other time, including just before going to sleep.

Mystics very often see the links of all things – not only between all humans, but between humans and nature, and sometimes they feel a total immersion with the Ground of Being that upholds the universe and every living being. More and more, modern science stresses the same reality, and that apparent divisions are a socially conditioned illusion.

It is of interest that the current spiritual reawakening is mainly happening outside the carefully patrolled borders of our organized religions.

In Northern Ireland, Catholics and Protestants are frequently segregated, with some neighborhoods divided by barbed wire fences, reflecting deep historical conflicts between the faiths.

No one can give you a specific technique for how to surrender. You have to find out for yourself what surrender is, and the way you respond to the felt current of the life force as it makes its way through the conduit of your body will be unique to you. Your dance won’t look like anybody else’s...

The number of people who bury their dead relatives without any official ceremony is increasing rapidly in Sweden, up from less than 2% a decade ago to 8% this year.

Over the past few decades, vacant and underutilized churches have become a familiar sight in American cities.

The 23rd Psalm is one of the most popular prayers in the Western world. This beautiful collection of words can be the key to reclaiming spiritual power. Most of us recognize the 23rd Psalm's familiar phrases, but what we don't often appreciate is the impact of the principles contained in the Psalm, probably because it doesn't fit the model of what we've been taught a prayer should be.

Many people who are struck with sudden, progressive or terminal illness are kept alive mechanically, while families and doctors make decisions about treatment.

When most of us are introduced to the practice of meditation and mindfulness, usually our opinion is that thinking is bad. After all, we reason, our thinking and ideas have become a layer between the present moment and ourselves. Our mind has convinced us that we are isolated. At least, that is how we often perceive the situation.

Certainly there are injustices to be named in this world, and hate-filled situations to be changed, and inequities to be remedied. There is appropriate treatment to be demanded, without prejudice or fear. But can we do these things without destroying ourselves through anger?

What goes on in the external world cannot change who we are or affect our true nature. No matter what happens to our body, personality, relationships, career, finances, or worldly politics, external events cannot affect who we are at our core. Our divinity remains intact.

People over 50 who attend religious services and pray privately may notice better memory performance, researchers report.

The political power of the American Christian right naturally leads to interest and speculation about the influence of similar groups in Canada.

One of the most important celebrations for Hindus throughout the world: Rakshabandhan, a ceremony honoring the bond between sisters and brothers.

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The unicorn is an enduring image in contemporary society: a symbol of cuteness, magic, and children’s birthday parties.

If we can begin to understand how the Spirit operates continuously in our lives, then our daily existence will become less stressful and more relaxed, filled less with drudgery and more with enchantment, and we in turn can become more creative and begin to enjoy a new sense of purpose, fulfillment, and enthusiasm.

Unconditional love is loving people freely, fully and openly, with no expectations, demands or restrictions. It gives total acceptance and respect and does not criticize or judge. Unconditional love is constant and is not turned on and off as in conditional love.

The purpose of meditation is to slow down so that we can see clearly into the nature of the mind, making it possible for us to become fully present in each moment, to gain understanding of the way things truly are. It can give rise to the deep sense of calm that comes from really knowing something for yourself.

People travel to the Amazon to learn from the shamans or to India to practice yoga to expand their minds’ capacities. They delve deeper into the knowledge of the people and nature of the Himalayas, and they replace conventional diet and medicine with their organic and holistic equivalents.

For many of us, the idea of sitting quietly is painful. Many of us like being busy. In our American culture, we are applauded for checking as many items as we can off our to-do lists. It makes us feel we have accom­plished much, that we’re going places fast. But many of us are running on empty. We are just whirling, twirling.

In this essay I will explore another view of what modern people can draw from the ceremonial approach to life. This alternative is not a substitute for the rational, pragmatic approach to solving personal or social problems. It is a reunion of the ceremonial with the pragmatic built upon a profoundly different way of seeing the world.

We all start out as a closet case. We have a secret life with secret pain that we keep under wraps in this closet. We bolt the door and hide the key, keeping our dark side hidden away, and we work very hard to function over the top of that pain, fear and anguish and go on somehow with our lives, perhaps thinking we are the only ones with secret pain.