What is temporal? What is eternal?

Hello fellow travellers,

What brings me to the PDA movement, and what gives me the strength to face the prospect of collapse is the context I have through my spiritual life. I say this tentatively, as I know it is often said that the PDA movement is not served by finding ‘pollyanna’ solutions through religious beliefs, or the like. But I also see that the fruits of those with a committed spiritual and/or religious practice are some of the healing substance that is brought into the dialogue.

My path is within the tradition of Mystic Christianity. The word ‘mystic’ here denotes experience, as opposed to belief. There are mystic aspects to all of the religious traditions, usually lesser known, and at times viewed as heretical. And the word ‘Christian’ here denotes human, the human spirit – that flame of being within every single human (in any or no tradition) that is capable of love.

There is much more I could say on this, and I would be happy to be contacted if anyone would like to hear more, but in this learning forum I offer instead one exercise, simple to explain but not so easy to do:

At the end of each day, sit quietly and review it for yourself, seeking to discern out of all of its contents: What is temporal? What is eternal?

You can use your own understanding of this as the gauge (which itself is part of the exercise), in terms of discerning what a temporal or eternal nature is. Also, in terms of what you include in the review, ie. your own inner life – thoughts, feelings, actions you take individually, your interactions with other humans, your interactions with other life forms – animals, plants, minerals, world events that you hear about or consider, actual ‘things’ you engage with – chairs, tables, computers, clothes, food…

In all or any of these, discern, which are of a temporal nature, were any of an eternal nature?

That’s it! It’s a subtle exercise that can build over time into a different way of standing in life. If anyone takes it up, I’d love to hear how it is for you, especially in relation to facing collapse.

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