Here’s a nice Sufi idea mentioned in the Love section of Eat, Pray, Love, (which I finished today, and yes, I do want to go to Bali now):
”God long ago drew a circle in the sand exactly around the spot where you are standing right now. I was never not coming here. This was never not going to happen.”
But that only works if we’re looking back from where we’re standing now. Any place we end up is where we inevitably had to end up, based on how all of existence has unfolded to that point. But it doesn’t work if we’re facing forward into the future, because then we still have to choose which step to take next. Once we’ve chosen, we are immediately standing again in the circle God drew long ago.
And just to keep us on our toes about time, I read about a culture that visualizes the future in back of them, because it is unknown, and you can’t see behind you. The past is up ahead, clear as day. So if you walk backward into the future which lies behind you, you can beat the system and get to where you were meant to be before God even hears about it.
We stepped backwards into this comment. Didn’t see it coming at all.
Another way of considering the forward-backward nature of time and existence is an inner-outer perspective.
Elana forwarded us this fascinating interview with Bruce Lipton:
http://www.theintentionexperiment.com/podcast
where he talks about individual cells receiving and perceiving their identity from their surrounding environment rather than the other way around. It’s the cellular kabbalah. (he has a lot more on his website: http://brucelipton.com/)
p.s. Have you heard about the East Bay Open Circle?
http://www.eastbayopencircle.org/index.htm
They bring spiritual teachers from around the world to speak. Perhaps you would like to arrange to give a talk / session / satsang / workshop, whatever you have in mind there while you’re out here.