God IN Us

Dave Brisbin 11.3.24
I’ve tried to make amends to people I’ve hurt in the past. Sometimes I felt reconnected. Sometimes my apology was flatly refused. Sometimes the words of forgiveness were spoken, but everyone knew nothing further was exchanged. In all of them, there was no reconciliation. We’ve not spoken since.

The 9th Step of AA tells us to make direct amends wherever possible except when doing so would injure someone. But what are these amends? Dictionary says putting things right, restitution, mending. But if our attempts don’t mend, is there still purpose in the process? Turns out, process is all we have, all we can engage, so if there’s any purpose, that’s where we’ll find it. And regardless of outcome, the process of making amends is all about forgiveness—properly understood as freedom from the limitations of victimhood.
 
For both victim and perpetrator, the freedom of forgiveness is essential. Whether a victim of someone else’s actions or our own, we’re not free to connect with anyone or God’s presence until we’re free enough of our limitations: the resentment, blame, fear, paralysis of victimhood. But amends themselves can’t make us free. So why make them?  

Jesus said that if we forgive another, God forgives us, but if not, then not. Truth is, God doesn’t forgive at all. God is forgiveness itself…leaving to us the choice whether to accept the radical connection that is God—not mentally or verbally, but by engaging a gradual process of liberation. If we have created a victim, we can’t uncreate it. But making amends is a gift we give to help clear a path for our victim to free themselves—from us. Remove some of the debris blocking them from forgiving us. The beauty of amends is that in clearing the path for our victim, we are simultaneously clearing a path for ourselves. It’s the only way to do it.

I’ve hurt people who will never forgive me, or may never know if they do. Doesn’t matter. We can’t make our victims forgive us, and they couldn’t forgive us if they tried. But together, in the process of amends, we can help each other free ourselves with forgiveness. If we wish.

We are all as forgiven as we wish to be.

As Forgiven As We Wish

Taker of seat, flame of roar, innumerate of faces, unpetal the real. 

Flowery Graces Unpetal The Real

Dieser Song ist die vierte Zusammenarbeit von Tamashi und Cobain’s Erben und widmet sich der dunklen Faszination, die das Böse auf den Menschen ausüben kann. Mit hypnotischen Rhythmen und archaischen Klängen erzählt das Lied von einem Wanderer, der durch einen nächtlichen Wald streift und auf einen unheimlichen Hexenkreis trifft. Die Melodie fängt das Tranceartige und das Verführerische ein, während sich Männer und Frauen um ein Feuer drehen, wie im Rausch einem unsichtbaren Ruf folgend.
Es geht darum, wie leicht der Mensch sich von dunklen Mächten verführen lässt – wie die Grenze zwischen Realität und Verlockung verschwimmt, wenn das Böse zum Tanz einlädt. Die Komposition verstärkt die mystische, mittelalterliche Atmosphäre und ruft das Bild eines uralten, verborgenen Rituals wach.

This song marks the fourth collaboration between Tamashi and Cobain’s Heirs, diving into the dark allure that evil can hold over humanity. With hypnotic rhythms and archaic sounds, the song tells the story of a wanderer who stumbles upon a sinister witch’s circle deep in a nighttime forest. The melody captures the trance-like, seductive atmosphere as men and women dance around a fire, as if entranced and following an invisible call.
The song explores how easily humans can be tempted by dark forces—how the line between reality and allure blurs when evil invites them to dance. The composition enhances the mystical, medieval atmosphere, conjuring the image of an ancient, hidden ritual.


Der Feuertanz

Kate Wolf and Eric Newman are joined by Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, novelist, and translator Forrest Gander to discuss his new book, Mojave Ghost. A long poem situated along the 800-mile length of the San Andreas Fault, which runs from Northern California where Gander lives to his birthplace in the Southern California Desert, the work reflects both exterior and interior landscapes with tender precision and heightened awareness. Gander moves through memory, grief, and fault lines— in the earth, our country, and himself. He confronts what it means to be a self that contains divisions born out of time, experience, and relationships to other people, both living and gone.
Also, Simon Critchley, author of Mysticism, returns to recommend A Most Remarkable Creature by Jonathan Meiburg, and give a tip of the hat to Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson.

Forrest Gander's "Mojave Ghost"

A conversation with Los Angeles writer Colin Newton about art, philosophy, spirituality, suicide, sky funerals, Sandman, and South Park.

Interfaith Interludes: E4 (Memento Mori)

This meditation is about opening your heart to Divine love and Grace which is always freely given. It invites you to open to Christ and experience the glory of the blood of Christ which restores and renews.  This track was recorded at live meditation retreat. Enjoy.

Resting in Grace

Dave Brisbin 11.10.24
What do you think of as a miracle? Seas parting, walking on water, healings? Dictionaries tell us miracles are events not explainable by natural or scientific laws. But what if an event is not explainable to or by you personally? Or leaves inexplicable space between data points? When you raise your hand, can you explain that? What happened between unthought intention and action? When you think a thought, where did it come from? When you forget, where did it go?

A thing doesn’t have to be spectacular to be inexplicable. Common, everyday events are as well. Maybe a better definition of a miracle is a gift that we could never have given ourselves. Birth. Next breath. A friend’s forgiveness. Abraham Heschel, the great Jewish theologian, said that his greatest talent was his ability to be surprised. Jesus, another Jew, never gravitated far from a child’s point of view, and the genius of children is to live in a world that is magical—full of surprises and inexplicable gifts immune to the density of entitlement, the illusion we’ve earned all we have. 

Children embody Jesus’ Kingdom as a state of amazed gratitude, but life works against our inner child. 

Hard work breeds entitlement and familiarity breeds contempt. Still, some moments cut through: surprising enough that miraculous gifts reveal themselves—smiles spreading without permission. But a lot of life can slip by between such uncultivated moments, and if we’re waiting, we’re neither grateful nor amazed. The 10th Step of AA is continuing to take personal inventory; if we limit it to mere cataloging of defects and bad behavior, we miss it.

Chesterton said we see things fairly when we see them first…recovering the candor and wonder of the child, the unspoiled realism and objectivity of innocence. The 10th Step is the fulcrum on which the other eleven are balanced—the practiced ability to see ourselves and life as if for the first time is both the cause and effect of our transformation. It’s a swimming against the current of life that keeps us surprisable, seeing the miraculous in the commonplace, grateful and amazed at gifts we could never give ourselves.

Grateful And Amazed

Tamashi ist ein Trap-Künstler aus Krefeld, der tief aus den Abgründen seiner Seele berichtet. Seine Musik, die er selbst schreibt und komponiert, erzählt von inneren Kämpfen, Dunkelheit und der Suche nach einem Ausweg. Tamashi bringt seine Tracks durch seine eigene Stimme sowie die von anderen zum Leben, und kreiert so eine kraftvolle Verbindung zwischen intensiven Beats und emotional aufgeladenen Texten.

Tamashi is a trap artist from Krefeld who draws deeply from the depths of his soul. His music, which he writes and composes himself, tells stories of inner struggles, darkness, and the search for a way out. Tamashi brings his tracks to life through his own voice, as well as incorporating other voices, creating a powerful connection between intense beats and emotionally charged lyrics.

Embodied frequency meditations for unveiling the limitless potential within through the mystical union empowered by the Holy Trinity.

Christievallance.com

Audio podcasts delivered at theeffect church in San Clemente, CA. theeffect is a community of imperfect people working together to find the emotional recovery and spiritual transformation that is theeffect of God’s love by unlearning limiting perceptions, beliefs, and compulsions, and engaging a first century Jesus in a non-religious and transforming way. See more at theeffect.org.

Enjoy a humorous and intense examination of some of today's most intriguing and underreported issues through the lens of mystical intersectionality. Featuring a rotation of insightful and inspiring guests that include award-winning actors, authors, faith experts, esoteric researchers, tour guides, filmmakers, banking/lending experts, housing activists, magicians, and members of the United States Armed Forces. Something for everyone!

True North with Dave Brisbin is a podcast about the things that can bring you back to center, whether God, spirituality, community or family or all of them. Never esoteric or abstract for its own sake; always practical and full of common sense, we’re interested in exploring the effect of what we believe on our lives and questioning what we believe in light of the deep connection we’re meant to live. Dave Brisbin is an author, speaker, coach, and songwriter. He is the teaching pastor of theeffect, a faith community and recovery ministry in San Clemente, CA and executive director of Encompass Recovery, an addiction treatment center in San Juan Capistrano. For more on finding deeper spiritual expression free from limiting beliefs and behavior, go to davebrisbin.com.

ambient devotional experiments 
synth + shortwave
theology + hauntology

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The Los Angeles Review of Books magazine was created in part as a response to the disappearance of the traditional newspaper book review supplement, and, with it, the art of lively, intelligent long-form writing on recent publications in every genre, ranging from fiction to politics. The Los Angeles Review of Books seeks to revive and reinvent the book review for the internet age, and remains committed to covering and representing today’s diverse literary and cultural landscape.

New tracks tagged #Mysticism