Posted by giveawayboy on July 29, 2001 at 19:29:30:
In Reply to: Mandalas posted by Pollavon on July 29, 2001 at 15:44:17:
: Hello again Bill,
: We also should talk about mandalas. They have also been a love of mine. I have studied them from a Jungian perspective focusing mainly on Celtic and Tibetan Buddhist, the latter being incredibly intense and full of symbolic meaning that would take years to learn. I had the pleasure and honor of seeing the Tibetan Buddhists from the Loseling Monestary construct a sand mandala at the Oglethorpe University Museum when I was a student. To date, it remains the holiest experience of my life in the sense that it prompted complete, spontaneous, ecstatic tears of wonder and amazement in the presence of God. I also participated in the dismantling ceremony and have some of the sand which I keep with my sacred things. I also have a book of Hildegard Von Bingen's mandalas and was taught about them briefly in class. I remember screaming out "she's a witch!" very proud of the fact that a Christian nun practiced herbology, healing and the like. I sure was a rebel!
: Here's some info about Jung and mandalas:
: These symbols assisted Jung in helping his patients complete the individuation process of welding together the different elements of the psyche bringing an inner-feeling of wholeness and unity. He used the mandala for two reasons: to attain a direct experience with the inner center without societal influence, and to restore a lost sense of balance. The circular form of the mandala inherently provides a feeling for its viewers that "life has again found its meaning and order". Jung explains that the spheric mandala is the ultimate symbol of the completely balanced psyche, including the relationship between man and the whole of Nature. Within mandalas the orientation of the spiral axis symbolizes the permanent collective unconscious where the self retains its center even through spiritual highs and physical lows. Likewise, there are two opposing yet complementary sides of a mandala which are conservative in that they restore a previously existing order yet are creative in that they give expression and form to something that does not yet exist, something that is new and unique. Tibetan Buddhist and Celtic cultures create and meditate with mandalas.(The Essential Jung, Anthony Storr).
: I'm including a link to a page on my Web site I'd love to talk with you about sometime. It was God-inspired in a moment of rapture and I look back at it from time to time and still wouldn't change it.
Along with Catholic Eucharistic theology, which flows from Judaism, the medicine wheel has been a huge part of my spiritual evolution. Talk about restoring a sense of balance. First you realize that all your travels around the medicine wheel are not for yourself, but for all your relations. This means that you are 'neighbor' conscious and not 'self' conscious. The whole medicine wheel holds together in the Creator, the mystery who is at the center and from which all things come and to which all things return. This is the basic idea at least. Some people delve from here into the world of magic. I think a good teacher will focus more on the way we see ourselves in relation to God, our neighbor and creation. It is basic to most cultures to orient themselves with a similar cosmology. There might be slight variations but usually they have an awareness of the four directions, sky and earth and Creator, or Spirit. Here I am referring mainly to American cosmologies, esp. Lakota and Mayan which i have spent time learning about. For me, the medicine wheel and the manadalas and the Eucharistic worship (see Revelation) are complimentary. They are all based on fours and sevens and are circular, but contain within them a square or cross, at least an implied one. O.K. I'm getting too metaphysical now.
Thanks for your touching mandala words.
Love, Bill