Beginnings

Beginning in January and throughout the year of 2012 I will dive deeply into cross cultural religious and spiritual practice.  I will begin each day with a short version of the "Integral 3 Body Workout"  (approximately 15 mins) leading into 20 minutes of just sitting in stillness followed by 15-20 minutes of Devotional Reading in the context of Lectio Divina beginning with A Course in Miracles and followed by a reading from the Koran/Quran and  Paramahansa Yogananda's The Second Coming of Christ and/or another sacred world scripture such as the Bhagavad Gita.  I will follow the 5 Precepts of Buddhism, Catholicism and the 5 Pillars of Islam to the best of my ability. Furthermore, I shall plumb the depths of the great religions by reading the ancient, modern, postmodern and  integral mystic writers and writings of spirituality.
Within Christianity I will give particular attention to the writings of the Gnostic Gospels, the Desert Fathers and Mothers and Meister Eckhart.  I will also focus on some of the Emergent Church writers and preachers along the way. I will give significant attention to the practices of Father Thomas Keating's Contemplative Prayer and the Integral 3 Faces of God/Spirit process.
I will read as much as I can on Jewish Kabbalah, Reform and Jewish Renewal Movements, especially those of Reb Zalman Shacter-Shalomi, Rabbi David Cooper and  Rabbi Michael  Lerner. I will attend Synagogue on and celebrate Jewish holidays and festivals to the best of my ability seeking out a local Rabbi to communicate and get info from.
Within Islam, I will concentrate on Sufism both ancient and modern.  I will try and get a grip on the differences between Shia and Suni Islam and reach out to local Muslims and Imams in order to communicate and understand their cultural differences and similarities. I also promise to read from the Koran/Quran daily. I freely admit I have never done this and am completely open to whatever I can learn and understand. Any Muslim brothers and/or sisters please feel free to interject anywhere along the way.
Within what some call the New Age Movement, I will give significant attention to A Course in Miracles, Eckhart Tolle, Edgar Cayce's readings and The Association of Research and Enlightenment. I will follow A Course in Miracles reading the text, workbook and teacher's manual throughout the year.  My heart is drawn strongly and tightly to this message, so I will do my best to let it loosen and weaken my ego in order to see my way home. It has been called by some the Christian Vedanta which I believe is an apt name for it. I enjoy the fact that it is a beautiful synthesis of both east and west in it's dialogue and approach.
As far as giving the Devil his due diligence, as in what some may call the "secular" world and terminology, the poetry of Walt Whitman and the Beats have always resonated with me, so I'll try to give them ample time and study. Modern Psychology must be represented with C.G. Jung, dreamwork, art (especially that of Alex Grey), and Integral Shadow Work.
I will post my reading/book/movie lists later.  I do promise to seek out books, and movies that have an overt spiritual and/or religious theme to them for the entirety of the year.
I will also follow the span and depth of the practices and principles of Ken Wilber's Integral Path concentrating on each of the 4 modules (body, mind, spirit, shadow) each and everyday. For those not in the know please check out:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_Theory

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_(spirituality)

http://www.katalpa.be/documenten/introintegraltheory.pdf


Anyway, enough for now and I hoping I'm doing OK with this blogging thing as I'm new at it???

Best Wishes this Holiday Season,
Daniel Butler