I didn’t know what I did not know. I know that’s a common phrase but it holds such uncommon truth. I spoke of truth. I acknowledged the Oneness, consciousness as All. The Universe moved through me, informed my awareness, speaking without the precursor of thoughts. Healing energy poured through me as it would, when it willed. Compassion was ablaze within. I didn’t mind what happened, right up until my intimate dance with death, and even then, I integrated each precious breath knowing the likelihood of another was not assured. The energy of aliveness caressed my form, coursing through in waves of love, and yet, I did not know.

It was too normal, too ordinary. It wasn’t remarkable at all. It couldn’t be that. The mystics wrote infinite verses to Its stunning magnificence so the ordinary, unexceptional truth couldn’t be It. Meticulous escape plans counted on an ultimate prison break rupturing this less than special, more than painful existence … and I didn’t even know that.

I think that’s why I missed it, why I overlooked it with such ease even though every mystical finger points straight to It. Most likely, that’s why you miss it too.

And then one day, not a special day at all, a very normal ordinary day, something shifted. Instead of seeing past or seeing through, the seeing turned around within itself to the seer.

Years ago, a few months after Kenny died, I went out to the chicken coop. I’d already collected eggs and the hens were in for the night but something compelled me to go take a look. There was an owl, an enormous great horned owl, in the pen. The chickens were pressed against the back wall of the coop and outside stuck in the netting of the pen was a creature of mythic proportion. Knowing it needed help to free itself, and after a few minutes of soothing, I walked over and gently tugged it loose. As I stood there with my hands on either side of its back, I remember thinking it was the most beautiful creature I’d ever seen. Seconds later, it swiveled its head and looked deeply into my eyes and we both stood transfixed for what seemed forever. It was an experience I cannot yet put into adequate language. Moments later I eased out of the pen door and lifted the owl skyward as it unfurled its wings in flight.

The shift was like that, akin to the swivel of that breath-taking owl’s head. For no reason at all my unknowingly incomplete, unwittingly misdirected spiritual world shattered. It continues to break apart, dissolving the pieces I didn’t know still remained. Some days the dissolution feels gentle. Other days it is all earthquakes, tornados and firestorms. Evidently extreme measures are required, at least for this dug-in, well-worn system of beliefs and emotions, thoughts and feelings. Each expression of Consciousness is, after all, unique.

Is there an end to the undoing? I don’t think so. I don’t see how that would be possible but what do I know. It changes, of that there seems no doubt. It shifts from uncovering our true nature to walking in and as true nature. Come walk with me.