Portals and Passages: Book 1 and Book 2 — by Ian Prattis
Description of Portals and Passages: Book 1
As an idealistic teenager I wanted to save the world. It took a long time to realize that first of all I had to save myself – to deal with internal devastation, injustice and dislocation – before I could turn to the external, global manifestation of the same energies. This personal pilgrimage was long and arduous as I frequently ignored the necessity of doing it at all. I know what devastation, injustice and desolation are. These energies plagued me for a long time until I owned them, took care of them and transformed them. We all make mistakes and I have made more than my fair share, yet I am now better able to recognize them and take responsibility. I take my mindfulness and engage, as best I can, with the world of which I am a part. This theme in Portals and Passages: Book 1 is about change, cycles of transformation and discovering how we contain everything within ourselves. Impermanence and transformation provide the twin shears for our learning curve on the life-long path of mindfulness practice.
The opening chapter – Surrender and A Lotus – deals with near death experience in an ashram in India. Followed by Shattering of Concepts and Self, which outlines my journey with anger and childhood sexual abuse. A map for Levels of Meditative Experience is provided in Chapter Three. The final chapter – On Being Splendid – investigates the boundaries of being splendid. It begins with Shambhala warrior training and continues with the Buddha’s masterpiece – the Sutra on the Full Awareness of Breathing. Life’s seasons spun me through change, cycles of not knowing, and engineered a trust that my existence has a purpose greater than my mental limitations. There was a boundless consciousness deeply hidden under the morass that my patterns and habits of denial created. There was a lot of mud in my seasons, yet that mud provided the necessary compost to cultivate flowers.
Description of Portals and Passages: Book 2
My insights, disasters, joys and occasional breakthroughs are the basis for this volume of essays. Chapter One draws on my shamanic training to map the territory of Healing Journeys, in particular that of the wounded inner child. My training as a yogi in India is the subject of Chapter Two – Gayatri Mantra and Consciousness Expansion - which charts my struggles with a discipline I was not accustomed to. The next chapter – Punk Palace in the Moonlight – is about my adventure in the drug underworld of Glasgow to retrieve my son from harm. The final chapter deals with the notion of Taking Refuge, so that we know how to touch Christ Consciousness and Buddha Consciousness. Once we do that, there is no further need to search for either Jesus or the Buddha.
Our journey of healing, of transforming suffering and growing into wholeness has a surrounding framework – the economic, political and planetary structures we must engage with from the intelligence and clarity of our refined consciousness. Engagement with the structures that frame our lives is so we may effect change for the betterment of humankind and mother earth. But how are we to engage and with what motivation, agenda and quality of energy? The quality of our engagement with society and the environment rests on our quality of being. When the quality of being is rooted in the stillness of non-action, in silence, then there is a different ground for all subsequent actions. Deep silence, truly doing nothing inside, allows love, compassion, understanding and wisdom to emanate from the core of being. This touches those around us so events may take a different course. This is the quality of engagement required for our postmodern world - being deeply rooted in non-action, located in stillness and lucidity. We can be very active in this way and our foundation in non-action brings harmony to those we are with.
Portals and Passages: Book 1 is now available on Amazon Kindle for $2.99. That is the lowest price Amazon permits. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007EG91EY
Amazon also has an app that can be used to download Kindle E books to most platforms.
Key Words: Near Death Experience, Impermanence, Mindfulness, Sexual Abuse, Chakras, Breathing Sutra, Thich Nhat Hanh, Suicide Prevention.
Portals and Passages: Book 2 is now available on Amazon Kindle for $2.99. That is the lowest price that Amazon permits. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007EECFUI
Amazon also has an app that can be used to download Kindle E books.
Key Words: Shamanic Healing, Interbeing, Gayatri Mantra, Drug Abuse, Taking Refuge, Altered State of Consciousness, Plum Village.