Benefits of Meditation: Health professionals, popular magazines, gurus like Dr. Chopra, and TV celebrities like Dr. OZ have long been touting the benefits of meditation. Perhaps its most convincing advocates, however, are average practitioners like you and me, who have been meditating for years, and who can attest first-hand to…
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Baha’i Tenets according to the Charlotte, NC Baha’i Community As a non-denominational minister in Atlanta, I often talk to others of different faiths and even coach individuals of various faiths. Last weekend I went to an interfaith event and met a…
In my first post on Taoism, I mentioned that the Tao Te Ching is the central text within Taoism. What many don’t realize is that the book is not only a compilation of philosophical wisdom about the Tao but was intended as a guide-book for government leaders. According to Taoism,…
Non-dualism has become an increasingly popular spiritual idea in the West, but long before it bumped up against our shores it has been known in India as Advaita Vedanta. A Single Consciousness So, just what is Advaita Vedanta, or non-dualism? Essentially, it’s the belief that all souls exist within a…
Is Energy God? Energy constitutes matter, constitutes our thoughts, constitutes virtually everything within the universe, and has been an active player since the universe’s creation. Could energy, therefore, be considered “God”? It’s certainly a question that merits investigation. But to better understand energy, we first have to take a fleeting…
Islam pivots around one central figure. If asked, most non-Muslims would guess it to be Muhammad. Most Muslims, on the other hand, would promptly identify it as God—for everything and everyone comes second. Still…. Muhammad is pretty close on His heels. At least, for a mortal. After every utterance of…
The word Shinto comes from the Chinese word Shen-tao, which means “the way of the gods”. In Japan, these gods are called “kami”; however, the meaning of kami encompasses not only gods, but also one’s ancestors, the spiritual essence that occupies everything, and anything/person that inspires reverence or awe. In general, however, while…
Most people know that Rumi was a Sufi and that the whirling dervishes are Sufis, but that about sums up their Sufi expertise. So, I’m going to provide you with a few other fundamentals, as I understand them. It is mystical: Sufism is not a separate sect of Islam, but an…
With his long hair whipping, he leaps and bends and twists amid a circle of flames, yet the dance movements are graceful and controlled, the facial expression tranquil. According to Khan Academy, Auguste Rodin once wrote that the sculpture known as Nataraja was the “perfect expression of rhythmic movement in…
If today’s Christian could travel back in time to the first and second centuries, she would no doubt be surprised that the simpler, purer, and homogenous Christianity so often portrayed in Christian children’s books never was. I discuss this further in my Spirituality Counseling Sessions, but let me explain here…