shanemagee.com inspiration circulation

…I gradually form the habit of listening inwardly, whenever I want to say something, to be sure I have the authority to say it. Gradually I learn to keep my mouth shut, except when I really have something to say. And I come to recognize two beings in my self: a personal ego which is often inclined to chatter, without control, purely for the sake of communicating and attracting attention to my person - and in the background of my consciousness, a higher self which restrains my personal ego, telling it when and what it is to speak and do, and when it is to reman silent or passive. The important thing is to listen to and obey the orders of this higher self. Merely to hear its commands is not enough….

excerpt from ‘Initiation’ - by Elisabeth Haich

In the book, the above passage comes shortly after the author casually talks about spirituality with her trusted servant, only to realise that the servant isn’t ready to assimilate such lofty thoughts, and that telling her might even have done more harm than good by causing her undue worry. It is a passage I can most certainly identify with. I remember after I discovered the joys of meditation for the first time, I was in such a hurry to tell everyone about meditation and how great it was. Invariably many conversations around this time, if they did not start with meditation, would inevitably be turned towards meditation and end with a lengthy monologue on its benefits.

However, with the expansion of one’s meditation, one’s heart also expands. More and more, I come to realise that every human being has his own way through which his soul must make progress - for some this way will be through some kind of spiritual practice, for others their purpose might lie in making great music, art, some amazing athletic feat or perhaps raising kids, helping their community, or just getting by as best they can.

And with time, the inner voice that I yearn to connect with in meditation also comes to the fore in outer life, and I remember more and more to consult it before I talk, for it knows not only what is best for me but for everyone else, the inner voice of each human being inseperable from the inner voice of the Universe.

More and more, I remember to envision the soul of each person I am talking to, and to pray that my voice be one that is of service to it and not one that delays its progress. I always try to keep any conversation I have inspiring (in fact of late, I have become more determined to either raise the tone of any uninspiring conversation I get entangled in or tactfully detach myself from it - life’s just waaay too short to be talking about nothing), but more and more I try and judge ‘inspiring’ more from that inner feeling and less from an ‘everything-would-be-great-if-everyone-was-all-like-me’ perspective.

I was just doing a spot of gardening a couple of days ago in this glorious weather when a blue butterfly chanced across my path. I had never seen a blue butterfly before - my childhoods were spent chasing Red Admirals and such - but the colour of this one was so unusual as to make me wonder if God was not playing one of his little Games again. In spiritual circles, this kind of light blue evokes vastness and consciousness, the vastness of the sea and the sky. In the course of the day, I was indeed to see more blue butterflies, but none near as blue as that first one I saw.

A couple of days later, I had half a mind to take a pruning shears to a holly bush just a ways up the road, but my boss reckoned there might be holly blue butterflies nesting there. A quick perusal of the BBC website reveals holly blues (top left) are actually quite rare, andd actually easily confused with the common blue butterfly (right). Maybe the first one I saw was a holly blue, because it was MUCH bluer than the others. In any case, I’ll leave off pruning the holly bush for another month or so.

I was leafleting for some upcoming meditation classes run by the Dublin Sri Chinmoy Centre, and I went into one cafe to find the manager of the cafe having a good old yelling match in Chinese with one of her staff. It struck me how no matter where you are in the world, anger comes uniformly dressed in a raised voice. But much more importantly: a smile is still a smile.

Later on, someone came up to me from a local radio station and asked me to describe the leaders of all the political parties in only one word (it’s general election time round here). If ever there was a task specifically crafted to send my brain into absolute lockdown, this was it. I responded with the word ‘populist‘ for three politicians in a row before realising maybe thats not what the poor girl is looking for. I did, however, come up with ‘velvet-gloved‘ to describe one particular party leader - maybe you can guess which one

Maybe I will actually keep ‘hello world’ as my first post title. At the moment I’m in New York under a beautiful blue sky. Sitting on a stairwell looking at a beautiful blue house. Perhaps my brother will come by and then I can get him to take a picture of said blue house. I have to be quick so I can rehearse my (very few) lines I have for a play tonight. I am to play a weary traveller in the kingdom of Akbar the Great, the legendary Moghul Emperor of India, who gets captured after stealing a box of treasure because he was upset at the way he got treated. So I am in quite an angry state in the play, but I am remembering some advice from a good friend of mine who directed a play I was in when I was in college - she said ‘whatever you do, don’t think “OK now I have to be angry” ‘. I guess she means that it is more important to have a oneness with the character you are playing. Which is a bit hard because the play is partly comedy. Must remember not to yell too much. I had an unfortunate experience at age 7 when I was narrator of a nativity play performed in front of the whole local community, and I shouted the whole script into a microphone, deafening the audience. Twenty years later, when I go to visit my parents, I still get people (my mother’s friends, usually) coming up to me, shouting “Jesus, Mary and Joseph!” -  mimicking my childhood performance.