The
Brady Archive
Mountains
of the Mind
By
Robert Brady, (KJ
25, bookzine on Sacred Mountains of Asia)
Everyone knows
that the mind becomes extremely mountainous only a few steps in from
the coast. The creatures that reside in this uncharted area on our mental
maps are seldom seen by others, yet are common to us all; still, they
can be a hazard to the solitary explorer who is not prepared to confront
the unbelievable in his hinterland as he wends his way into the nether
regions, from which few return unchanged.
Hermits, poets and other explorers of these fastnesses are well acquainted
with the species of the inward realms, and are even known on occasion
to have them eating out of their hands. But these nether fauna can never
be completely tamed; and what would the outer reaches be, without their
inner complement of native wildlife?
Between ourselves, however, we can only use metaphoric nomenclature
to speak of these denizens we harbor in common, the names we call them
imparting no description of their morphology, coloring or way of life.
These are not crude and dispensable beings, but highly developed and
specialized life forms essential to our spiritual ecology (psychological
and religious taxonomy notwithstanding).
And there are many more such beings that have no names; yet we all know
very well in ourselves of at least the presence of these creatures,
who have at times poked their heads out of the thick undergrowth that
adorns the verge of each of us; they are all part of the vastness of
the experience when, in the world outside, we see a mountain and its
wilds, that call to us as like to like; to climb such a peak and view
the world from its summit is to do so as well within ourselves, to view
at one remove the panoramas that we are.
And in so ascending we metaphorically surmount the wilderness within,
survive vicarious passage to the summits of ourselves, to a clearer
light, a cleaner wind. And we take this knowledge with us on our return
to the narrow lowlands where we spend our daily lives as habitants of
seeming mountainous islands, surrounded by seas of intercourse teeming
with creatures that thrive in the depths of the apparent distance between
us, those sometimes stormy, sometimes tranquil seas of relation that
are as much illusion as the real world; for as each mountain is aware,
at the foundation we are all connected.
Copyright
held by the author
Back to Brady
Archive
Subscriptions
