by William Johnston
It is interesting to note that modern psychology frequently compares life to a journey, and recently we have heard more and more about a second and a third journey - and then about a final journey which is death.
It is as though human life passes through several cycles in which the same person has new values, new ideals, a new orientation - in which he or she is a new person. Now that the life span has increased dramatically, such new journeys are becoming a normal part of human living.
And here I want to say that the crisis you have passed through is the beginning of your new journey. A page has been turned in the book of your life. You will look back and reflect: "Until now I lived on the surface of life, little realizing the depths and depths that lie beneath." Now you will realize that, like Peter, you are launching out into the deep, into unknown and unchartered areas of you psyche and spirit where you will catch innumerable fish. A new life is beginning.
The crisis will come to an end gradually. Remember that the unconscious is surfacing and your true self is being born. This true self is very beautiful; but in rising up, it brought with it all kinds of garbage and crud - and this has caused you trouble. But gradually you will learn to cope. Gradually you will learn to accept. Gradually you will learn to integrate. And peace, deep peace, a peace that the world cannot give, floods your mind and body and spirit. But do not think that the process is over. The crisis may be over; but the process is not. You will never be free from storms. Only now you have learned to accept - and to smile.
I have said that your true self is coming to birth. Now let me add that the Rhineland mystic Eckhart, following an ancient mystical tradition, speaks of the birth of God in the soul. And I tell you that not only your true self but the very Word of God is coming to birth in you.
That is why you can cry out with Paul, "It is no longer I that live but Christ lives in me." That is why you can say with Paul, "For me to live is Christ. . . ." You are becoming more and more filled with the presence of One who loves you and gave Himself up for you.
However, your journey is only beginning and I must give you some instruction about what you should and should not do. But remember that I cannot give you a map. With Saint John of the Cross, prince of Christian mystics, I tell you that to go to a place you do not know, you must go by a way that you know not. You know neither the way, nor the goal. God alone knows where you are going - and how. But, on the other hand, it is also true that mystical language is full of paradox; and there is a sense in which you do know the way and the goal. You know by unknowing. You know by denying your ordinary knowledge and living by dark faith.
The mystical journey has two aspects. There is the way of personal effort and the way of non-action. Let me speak briefly about these two ways.
The way of personal effort is what the words say. It is the way in which you work and do your part: you labor and sweat and toil. This way begins with a great resolution, a great determination. Here you can learn much from the Zen people who stake their lives on their practice, declaring that even if they die, they will go through to enlightenment. And you, too, must make a mighty resolution to go over the mountain and ocean in search of your Beloved, plucking no flowers and fearing no wild beasts.
Concretely, this is a resolution to follow Jesus in His life and in His death, to follow Him to Gethsemane and to Golgotha and to Galilee. And in order to do this you must read the Gospels again and again and again until they come alive within you, penetrating the subliminal levels of your mind and rendering you one with Jesus. Above all, the Cross of Jesus must be constantly before your eyes.
Pay special attention to those parts of Scripture that speak of the demands of discipleship. The one who does not renounce all possessions cannot be the disciple of Jesus. The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure buried in a field: a man sold everything he possessed (and note that everything does mean everything, and that he did this with great joy) in order to buy that field. To be the disciple of Jesus you must hate father and mother, yea, and your own life also. You must take up your cross and follow Jesus. No need to give a list of such passages. Only let me say that you must become completely emptied and radically poor.
And don’t neglect the Apostle to the Gentiles. Make your own that passage in Philippians where Paul is running like an athlete in the Greek games: "that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and may share His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death, that if possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead" (Phil. 3:10). What a magnificent description of the race you are now in! It passes through the suffering of Jesus to His joyful resurrection from the dead.
Remember that in the Christian way the most important discipline is love of neighbor. In this is everything contained. Read the authentic mystics and you will find them saying: "Mysticism is love. No love: no mysticism." So be sure that human love penetrates your life and that it keeps growing and growing.
No need to tell you that there are many kinds of love, and that all play a crucial role in your life of prayer. There is the tender love of the Good Samaritan by which you go out in compassion to the sick and the afflicted, the oppressed and the lonely. There is the love for community by which you wash the feet of the brethren - and you must always remind married people that love for their family is their royal road to mysticism. Then there is the love of friendship, a love that leads to intimacy and mutual indwelling. Such love has played a central part in the lives of outstanding mystics.
And here let me pause to point to a strange paradox (or should I say aberration?) in the lives of some good, would-be mystics. They have thought that they should insulate themselves from human love in order to practice heroic detachment. What a strange misreading of the Gospel! That have thought that the deep involvement, the inner turmoil and the sleepless nights that often accompany authentic love would be an obstacle to their tranquil life of prayer. Do not fall into this error. It is true that authentic human love may tear out your guts; but the emptiness of the lover is precisely his or her way to enlightenment.
And needless to say there is the table of the Eucharist about which I have already spoken constantly. This is the agape, the banquet of love.
So much for the way of personal effort.
Together with the way of personal effort you must practice the way of non-action. In this way your prayer becomes more and more effortless. For this is the way of surrender or abandonment. How often I have told you to let the process take place, let growth take place, let nature act! And, of course, this is agonizing because it means that you give up your desire to control, your desire to be master of your own life, your desire to make plans.
In your case as with every Christian, you are surrendering to the action of a loving God whom you believe to be the author of all that happens in the universe and in your life. Yes, you surrender to the Spirit.
And as you surrender to the Spirit you will find that you must let go - let go, let go, let go of all that has given you security. You must let go of all those needs the consumer society has created in you. And not only that. You must let go of attachment to health, to reputation, to possessions. Even more painful - you must let go of attachment to friends, to work, to longing for recognition. And as you let go of all that gave you security, you will feel an awful insecurity, as though you were disintegrating psychologically and even physically. There may be times when you feel you are falling apart.
As you let go, you are advancing further and further into the unknown. In order to go to a place you do not know, you must go by a way that you know not. And this can be, oh, so frightening. You may feel very lonely: and again you may wake up at night trembling with fear. But do not let this stand in your way. Accept the fear! Do not fight it! It will give way to peace - or, more correctly, it will become peaceful. For your sorrow will be turned into joy.
In these circumstances you may grasp desperately at some bauble, like a drowning man clutching at a straw. But this bauble will not help you. It may even torture you. You must simply let go: there is no alternative. Let me express it in another way.
You are starting out on a journey and you must say good-bye. You will have to say good-bye constantly - to everyone and everything. It is a radical farewell. "Good-bye! I’m going on a journey. Good-bye, father and mother and brethren and wife and family and friends and lands. Good-bye, structures and rules and regulations that gave me security. Good-bye, states of prayer that gave me joy. Good-bye, doctrines and dogmas that made everything seem so clear and certain. Good-bye! I’m venturing out into the deep with no land in sight and no other light save the love that burns in my heart."
To say good-bye to what you see and hear and touch is one thing. Even more painful is your farewell to the figures in your unconscious, to the memories to which you have been clinging. As the process goes on you will find (without perhaps knowing what is happening) that you are saying good-bye to memories. Perhaps, after many decades of separation, you are only now saying good-bye to father and mother, to the memories of childhood and of your whole life. This is a radical farewell; and you will feel deep grief. If tears come to your eyes, let them fall. Weep abundantly as you say good-bye. These tears should have fallen decades ago. Only now are they streaming down your cheeks. So let them come. This is a wonderful purification of your memory; and it will make you free. Yes, a great liberation will ensue.
When with tears and anguish and pain you have said good-bye to everything, you will find that you have lost nothing. You have not said good-bye to your friends: you have said good-bye to clinging and attachment to your friends. You have not said good-bye to memories: you have said good-bye to clinging and attachment to memories. You have not said good-bye to the good things of this world: you have said good-bye to clinging and attachment to the good things of this world. You have not said good-bye to knowing and rationality; you have said good-bye to clinging and attachment to knowing and rationality. You have not said good-bye to doctrines and dogmas: you have said good-bye to clinging and attachment to doctrines and dogmas. And so for all good things.
Now you can resonate with Paul who wrote: "Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things" (Phil. 4:8). For all things are yours; and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.
This is enlightenment. Liberated from addictions and enslaving needs (yes, even those which dwelt in your unconscious and tortured you), you will gradually come to an inner freedom that brings intense joy. You will experience moments or periods of joy like that man who sold everything to buy that field in which lay buried the treasure. Or yours will be the joy of the merchant who found a pearl of great price: the joy of all those strange and beautiful people who laughed when they possessed nothing - only God. Their security was in having no security.
You will find that you are becoming more spontaneous, more human, more alive. Now you can laugh and cry and sing and dance without those constricting inhibitions that formerly cramped your style. For now you have become your true self. In losing the little, separate ego you have found the true self which is one with the flowers of the field and the birds of the air, one with the poor and the sick and the suffering, one with the universe, one with God Himself.
And now you can love. You can love father and mother and brethren and wife and family - even your own life you can love. You may find that for the first time you are capable of authentic friendship. For now you love your friends not for the security they give you but for what they are in themselves. Now you may find that you love everyone you meet in the street or on the bus. Like Paul, you have become all things to all men and women.
And you will experience a wonderful flowering of your personality, as unexplored and untapped potential rises to the surface of consciousness. That mask by which you identified with your role was limiting you, making you wretchedly narrow. Now that you have cast it away, other talents come to the fore - talents you never dreamed you possessed. You have blossomed and become a richer person. You rejoice in that wisdom beside which the knowledge of the scholar looks like ignorance.
And as you become your true self you will find that you are strangely indifferent to public opinion and to what people say and think. If formerly you were a drifter who went along with the crowd, saying and doing what the masses say and do, now you will find that you stand apart as your unique self. And, of course, that will get you into trouble. Yes, when the chips are down, any institution, be it church or state or college or religious order, feels uncomfortable with the person who is himself, thinks for himself and says frankly what he thinks. Such a person stands out like a sore thumb. Such a person is a misfit.
The Carmelite mystics (Teresa and John) say clearly that one who sets out on this path can expect trouble, and that a man’s enemies are those of his own household. So you must learn to accept criticism - "that’s their problem, not mine" - and realize that, like the prophets, you may be put to death. But if so, you will die with a smile.
I have outlined the spark of enlightenment that will come to you. But I told you before and I tell you again: never think you have reached the journey’s end. Never think that you have arrived. Keep climbing the mountain, and remember that wise and gentle lady who responded clearly to her young disciple’s questions:
"Does the road wind uphill all the way?"
"Yes, to the very end."
"Does the day’s journey take the whole long day?"
"From morn ‘til eve, my friend."
As you climb up that road you will have more crises and storms. Having put your hand to the plow, don’t turn back, even though the road winds up and up and up.
When I was half way through my thirty-first year God sent me an
illness which prostrated me for three days and nights. On the fourth
night I received the last rites of Holy Church as it was thought I could
not survive till day..." So wrote Julian of Norwich, describing a series
of visions or "showings" that came to her.
Good guy or bad guy? 
Walter Hilton was an innovator. He was the first man to write a book
of mysticism in the English language. At that time, Latin was the
language of the church--although Wycliffe and his Lollards had worked
hard to circulate manuscripts of an English Bible.
