Crossing Nebraska

Occasional days of warmth and sun and new growth peeking from the earth have blessed us, yet winter’s gray embrace seems here to stay. So many people I’m close to are struggling mightily these days with loved ones dying, relationships crumbling, or serious illness descending full force upon them. It reminds me yet again of the howling reality that life can plunge us in an instant from the sunny heights of all is well into the icy depths of pain and bewilderment. Thus, even with spring right around the corner, I find myself revisiting what Zen Buddhists refer to as the Great Matter —the mystery that each of us must resolve regarding life and death. The first spring flowers this year If unresolved, the Great Matter follows close behind wherever grief may lead—darkening it, deepening it, and making it lonelier still. On the other hand, resolving the Great Matter provides context for our grief. Contextualized, our pain joins the chorus of loss’s universality rather than being an isolated

Gosh, it’s been almost a year since I began this series of posts recounting some of my recent experiences of synchronicity. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised at it having taken so long, though, given that I knew from the start this installment was coming and would require of me a fair bit of emotional heavy lifting. In fact, this post may well be the most personally revealing one I’ve ever written, dealing as it does with the dysfunction of my family of origin and the karma it has wrought. But to disregard such messy context would be to excise these synchronicities from everything that gives them power and meaning in the first place. Please bear with me then, as I share enough background information to allow you privy to my state of mind at the time of these events. You may read the first two installments here and here . Interior of Liverpool's Bombed-Out Church First of all, I must say that I’m a Zen Buddhist and not particularly invested in any theories about the afterlife, not