Conversations For Transformation: Essays Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

Conversations For Transformation

Essays By Laurence Platt

Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

And More

Mystical Connection II

Muir Beach, California, USA

June 8, 2013

This essay, Mystical Connection II, is the companion piece to "I" / "Me".

It is also the eleventh in the complete group of Experiences Of A Friend (click here for the open group Experiences Of A Friend II):

so far, in that order.

It is also the sequel to Mystical Connection.

I am indebted to The Eranos Foundation who inspired this conversation.

It's my 63rd birthday. This is a day of celebration - as most birthdays are. But this one's different. Something new is afoot. I can tell. It's subtle. It's very subtle. How this subtlety shows up is I notice there's a slightly different focus celebrating this birthday than celebrating birthdays gone by. I don't know when the focus shifted. I just notice it's different now than it was. On birthdays gone by, the celebration focused on the achievements of the year gone by, on the accomplishments of the year gone by, indeed on all the years of my life until then. But on this birthday I notice the focus of the celebration is on the future to come - not on what I've been and done, but rather on what I'll do and who I'll be from now on.

There's something else as well ... and although I sense its newness, it takes me a while to distinguish exactly what it is. Then I get it - and when I get it, I love what it is. No, that's way too mild. It's I adore what it is. It's while others are celebrating another year of my life, what I'm celebrating for myself is another year with you, another year of this mystical connection we are, another year of the privilege this mystical connection we are, is.

Photograph courtesy The Eranos Foundation - 2007

Werner Erhard

What I'd like to share about this mystical connection is it's a profound affinity with you. It has its personal aspects and it has its intensely private aspects. And it's true being in it is a privilege. To express it in any other terms is to disrespect it. And to disrespect it is to lie about what it is.

However to only express this mystical connection as something personal, as something private, is to disrespect it in a totally different way, which is to do it a disservice in a totally different way: by limiting it, by confining it. I'd like to expand on this.

The idea of a mystical connection connotes my Self in a profound state of connectedness ie in a profound state of union with your Self. And that definition of a mystical connection is good enough for jazz almost always in most conversations ... almost always, except in this conversation it lacks rigor.

Where this definition of a mystical connection breaks down is in its naïve conceptualization. The very idea of my Self as separate and different than your Self is revealed, after rigorous examination, to be patently false. There's only one Self ... which completely defiles the notion of a mystical connection being either personal or private.

While the way it shows up for me is indeed both personal and private (and the way it may show up for others may also be both personal and private), in truth it's neither.

So I'd like to recontextualize (I love that word) our mystical connection like this: my mystical connection with you is also my mystical connection with everyone - that is to say, it's also my mystical connection with the one Self everyone really is. But it's more than that really. It's our mystical connection is also your mystical connection with everyone ie it's your mystical connection with the one Self everyone really is. But it's even more than that. It's our mystical connection is also everyone's mystical connection with you. And it's also everyone's mystical connection with everyone.

To express the idea of a mystical connection in any other way is to be totally unclear on the concept. And here's the thing (if I may add): it's your brilliance and your generosity and your genius and your relentlessness and your unflinching integrity which enables the idea of what a mystical connection really is, and renders it totally and unambiguously and unmistakably clear and openly available for everyone. I love you for that.

Here's how the dictionary defines the word "mystical" (this is the Cambridge International Dictionary):

<quote>

Definition
mystical

adjective
from the noun mystic
someone who attempts to be united with God through prayer

<unquote>

I have five issues with this dictionary definition of "mystical" and its root "mystic" (remember, the dictionary wasn't written for languaging transformation and it certainly wasn't written coming from transformation):

1)	"someone who attempts to be united with God ..." is not the same order of things as "someone who is united with God ...". In the context of transformation there's only "Be united with God!" or "Don't be united with God!". There's no "Attempt to be united with God!" (as Yoda the Jedi Master may have said).
2)	Furthermore, "someone who attempts to be united ..." naïvely reinforces the notion of separateness, as well as the notion of there's more than one - but there's only one (as the Highlander may have said).
3)	Even if the dictionary stated "someone who is united ..." instead of "someone who attempts to be united ...", merely "being united" falls short of being united and also generating united-ness like a possibility.
4)	I love God. I do. Really. That said, "... united with God ..." is simply too fraught with already always listening, association, interpretation, meaning, and significance to be useful in the context of a conversation for transformation - and all I mean by that is it's difficult to listen "... united with God ..." newly and freshly ie with Zen beginner's mind. You're God in your universe (yes?) so I'd prefer to refer to you explicitly this way.
5)	For my concerns about "... prayer ...", see my point #4. However prayer is really a kind of conversation (yes?) so I'd prefer to refer to it explicitly this way.

Given these five issues I have with the dictionary definition of "mystical" and its root "mystic", I've written my own definition. Here it is, new from The Laurence Platt Dictionary:

<quote>

Definition
mystical

adjective
from the noun mystic

old	:	someone who attempts to be united with God through prayer	--- Cambridge International Dictionary
new	:	someone who sources who we really are as conversation	--- The Laurence Platt Dictionary

<unquote>

Also from the Cambridge International Dictionary:

<quote>

Definition
connection

noun
the state of being related to someone or something else

<unquote>

I've got no issues with this dictionary definition of "connection". It works for me.

The Bottom Line Of This Mystical Connection We Are Is "I Love You"

The bottom line of this mystical connection we are is "I Love You". That's what's there for me to say to you before anything else is said. And that's also what's there (that's what's always there) for me to say to you after everything else has been said.

The final barrier over which I'm victorious before I'm free enough and adult enough to fully live this mystical connection we are is surrendering to the love you are - which includes both surrendering to the love I am as well as surrendering to the love we are.

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