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My Spiritual Journey v2

A lot happened between the previous installment  and the trip west. Interlude: While I was at Samford I was drafted to serve in Vietnam.  Being a hippie and an outspoken, highly visible, anti-war protestor, I wore underwear that said ‘give peace a chance’ on the butt to my physical.  Remember, I was living in Alabama at the time. It wasn’t always safe to be a hippie walking down the street.   At my physical, they decided I was a conscientious objector.   I spent my two years doing civilian duty and continued to protest the war. During these interlude years,  Jesus Freak me worked at His House, a Christian mission  helping the homeless, drug addicts, and runaways, had a gospel radio show, worked with special needs children, got married, spent 4 months traveling the country in a red VW micro bus, and discovered mushrooms.

The borders of my spiritual world began to expand as I transitioned from my narrow, rule based understanding of ‘truth’ to a more open understanding.  I was moving from intolerance to tolerance.  I was moving from being judgmental to being loving.

A Young Man and His New Wife Go West

With everything we owned packed in a Dodge van, no where to stay, no job prospects, and little money, we drove to Golden Gate Seminary  in Marin County, California.   Within the week, we had good paying jobs that came with a ranch style home and I was enrolled is seminary. Cool beans. The Universe provides.

There was a professor at the seminary who was getting a third PhD in biology.  He was easily in his 60s, maybe older.   I was curious and asked him why he was the pursuing this degree.  He said, ‘God created everything.  If you want to know about God learn about what He made.  It says a lot about how He thinks.’  Around the same time I started watching Alan Watts on TV.  The intersection of these two events were a pivotal point in my journey.   The professor’s ‘learn about what God made’ and Watts’ blend of Taoism and Zen changed my mindset.

I no longer wanted to explain ‘truth’, I wanted to see it clearly without the filter that is language.  The word is not the thing.   The name of a thing is a label.  How do you know it’s labeled correctly?

I have to toss this in the mix, learning to easily read the New Testament Bible in Greek was a real spiritual eye opener too.

Stay tuned for the next installment: The Bus Years

Don’t forget we travel in at least four dimensions:  spiritual, emotional, mental, and physical.   I know I left out time.  We invented it.  It’s part of the mental dimension.  I know I left out space.  It’s mostly empty.   It’s part of the physical dimension. MU

See what else I’m doing.

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