During a recent Energy Healing Cooperative, I coined the phrase “practical ecstasy” when attempting to describe what it is we’re doing when we, as lover and healers, gather together with the shared intention to raise the consciousness on this planet. I hope to flesh out that concept here.
First, Some Definitions
I find definition to be one of the biggest causes of clash and misunderstanding when communicating with others. So let’s start with a couple of definitions to make sure we’re all on the same page:
Practical – relevant to useful practice or effective action rather than theory, speculation, or improbability.
Ecstasy – the intense state of rapture and overwhelming bliss which bends space and time.
The Problem with Ecstasy
The problem with ecstasy is that one can’t quite function in 3D space. For example, the Indian sage Ramana Maharshi was so euphoric that he was malnourished and being eaten by insects when he was discovered in his meditation cave. Likewise, Ma Anandamayi needed her disciples to handle the more practical aspects of life. She too wouldn’t remember to do the simple things required for the physical form. Today, many seekers blissed out by meditation and non-dual practice are completely incapable of normal day-to-day living.
Natural states of ecstasy don’t come easily to many; I would even venture to say that it remains inconceivable to the majority. Perhaps that inconceivability is the only thing making ecstasy impossible to attain. It is attainable. But it isn’t very practical! Or at least, hasn’t been.
Getting Practical
So now, we are ready to understand the idea of practical ecstasy which affords us an accessible venture into the realms of heavenly delight while at the same time grounding us into our physical forms so as to impact this reality with that very rapture. It is, in essence, bringing Heaven to Earth.
Though the phrase may be new, it is hardly an original idea. Many cultures share the practice of grounding and rising, from various shamanic traditions to yoga to chi gong. The deeper we root, the higher we rise. Perhaps it has been the deeply imbedded self-rejection of our humanity that has caused us to avoid both the sinking down and the floating up.
But by doing so, by sensing and deepening our connection to both the earth below us and the heaven above, we are in essence, the love being made between the two. It is through the opening of the heart that we are then able to become practical, not by rejecting our humanity, but by embracing it along with all the miraculous agency it affords.
The questions we then must ask are:
- What can I do to share this feeling of elation and open-heartedness with everyone?
- How can I better care for myself and others while in this physical form?
- In what ways can I take this matter-less joy and manifest tangible wonder?
- How might I allow an ecstatic state to alter my sense of sovereignty and inform my responsibility to the dream I see before me?
Practical ecstasy is about actually being the bridge between Heaven and Earth. It is learning to “chop wood and carry water” as required but through the eyes that reveal it is “chopping emptiness and carrying God”, so to speak. It is bringing the sacred back to life, stepping into our power as creators, healers and lovers, and dreaming into being a new, more beautiful and enchanting reality by actually living it.
