Tag Archives: Buddhism

HOW THE LIGHT GETS IN: 10 Principles for Reclaiming Your Spirit

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“With gentle encouragement vs. harsh directives, sharing rather than simply instructing,
Angela nudges us to play with practices that are deep in their simplicity.”
— Michael McMorrow, D.D.

Friends, I’ve written a new book! And it’s a book that’s a very different turn for me. I guess you could say it’s the way I know how best to contribute something of value and urgency to this American life we’re presently living.

Navigating the murky waters of life is a job with tenure. All the money and station in the world won’t reprieve us from the task. From living through the pandemic to being thrust into a present-day American culture whose democracy and basic humanity are being threatened, we are experiencing a life that has become more surreal, more unpredictable, and more challenging every day. What tools do we have to cope with the uncertainty of these anxious times?  How the Light Gets In offers a practical guide of 10 principles to aid in taking care of our spirits, keeping sanity, serenity, and joy in our daily toolbox, living with greater authenticity, and staving off the harmful effects of the “fight or flight” mechanism of a sympathetic nervous system in hyperdrive. This little book does not propose we shut our eyes on the world we live in, but that we cultivate stronger, more lasting practices with which to sanely take on our world, while maintaining crucial emotional and spiritual wellness through self-reflection and personal application.

In addition to spending my life as a writer, musician, and artist, I’ve also spent pretty much half that life in the study or practice of Buddhism, Taoism, metaphysics, yoga, meditation, and many other inward-turning disciplines, each of which has contributed to the formulation of this 10-pt practice for rejuvenation of the spirit.

Other than the purchase of this book, there is no further money asked of you, no miracle potions to buy for younger skin or longer life, no ongoing prescription that takes money out of your bank account every month, no predatory pitch at the end of a long “free” video. This path-to-wellness idea is contained solely within this little book for anyone who wants it, and all it costs is the desire it takes to put these principles into practice.

How the Light Gets In is suitable for readers new to wellness topics. I will, of course, greatly appreciate your support, but even more importantly I believe this book and its principles can be a valuable augmentation to your radiant life already in progress.

And as always:

Create — even if you’re not an artist.
Support artists — especially the independents.
Live well — doesn’t take money to do it.
And be whole.

Love & Wellness,
ACB

To Buy This Book

From the Black Church to New Thought

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As spoken at Unity Southeast in Kansas City’s Black History Month commemoration, entitled “From the Black Church to New Thought” on February 1, 2024.  An evening filled with music and attestations.

I grew up in the Black church. It’s almost a label — “Black Church” — as it doesn’t merely describe a church peopled with Black folk, but instead regards an institution uniquely of its own creation. Packed with history, much of which is trauma-generated, the Black Church has come to symbolize a kind of spiritual ablution & healing of the ancestral painbody, demonstrated in the exhortations, the dancing and shouting, and the speaking in tongues. My dear mother used to call it “gittin’ happy.” The Black Church is an unparalleled experience to behold. I was baptized at age 10, at Trinity Baptist Church in Los Angeles, under the ministry of the Reverend Elliott Mason. My siblings and I all sang in the Youth & Young Adult choir. For a brief time, as a teen, I was even the choir accompanist, as our choir director also happened to be my piano teacher, the Reverend Carl Johnson, and he believed in giving his students opportunities for growth and grown-up responsibilities, because in the Black Church you weren’t just raised by your parents; you were raised by the village. And to this day, Carl remains a force in my life. My maternal grandfather, the Reverend Felix Shepard, was a Baptist minister in St. Louis. My paternal grandfather, Prentiss Brown, had been a deacon at our church in L.A. My roots in the Black Church run deep. 

There came a point in my early adulthood when I graduated away from the church; not only the walls of Trinity, but the church as an institution. Because I had questions. About everything.  I questioned what I considered to be the fire & brimstone aesthetic. I questioned the very idea of a patriarchal deity, and an iron-handed one at that. I had questions. And my own personal experience was that you don’t have questions. You adhere. So I drifted away. And for a good decade or two after that, I lived with no relationship whatsoever to a church community.

Then Eastern Thought came into my life. The ancient Buddhist principles of the 8-fold path. The wisdoms of the Tao. Yogic practices of turning inward. Meditation. I joined retreats and dharma sits, led by Thai Buddhist monk, Thanissaro Bikkhu, of the Metta Forest Monastery in San Diego. I found great resonance with those practices. Still do, and always will. And it was during that time that I was invited by a friend to sing at my first Unity Church, Unity of Pasadena, under the helm of the Reverend Marilyn Roth, who singlehandedly brought my early church upbringing back into my personal fold in such a loving and beautifully metaphysical way that my heart began to expand in even newer and greater unfoldments. And what stood her out from the many is that though she blessedly didn’t sell the story of fear, as many Christian churches do, she also understood that rather than a reliance on feel-good salves for fragile souls, without the crucial first steps in any authentic spiritual work of courting the caves for exploration and excavation, the practice becomes precious rather than revolutionary. I loved her for that.

And before I knew it, I was singing and communing with the many Science of Mind and Unity communities around L.A. In addition to Unity of Pasadena, two other churches I also call home are the Center for Spiritual Living Granada Hills, under the Reverend Michael McMorrow, and the Center for Spiritual Living Simi Valley, under the Reverend Stephen Rambo, who both entrusted me with their choirs, and who have lifted me up always. And what all three of those churches have in common is that they are New Thought. New Thought has this tiny gem of an idea that God isn’t outside of us, and only reachable through a prism of dogma. God is the power within every cell and every molecule, living and demonstrating through every thing and every one.

I was chatting with a friend not long ago, and I mentioned my involvement with New Thought, and he, a very devout Christian traditionalist, reacted to the term, which he had never heard before, with “New Thought, huh? Like, as opposed to the Old Thought?” And his question betrayed a concern that his religious beliefs were now considered old and dusty. And my response to him was: “No. Not as opposed to. There is space for all of the voices out here trying to make sense of this baffling world we live in, and the immense responsibility we have, to wear these flesh uniforms and do our duty of making our connections with each other. And toward that goal, one size doesn’t fit all.” 

We are all connected, not separated. Not by religious labels, the color of our garments, the flag we wave. And for me, this is what New Thought holds as its essence. A welcoming of the mighty forces, many, for us to ponder, consider, examine. Even question. What New Thought has actually done for me is allow me to draw my childhood church experience back into my embrace, after all of the years away, and to think of that puberty in my life with a new set of eyes. When I examine my life today, and the Black Church in which I was raised, I realize I never truly left it, as I have taken with me into the rest of my life its uniquely roof-raising music. Its impenetrable sense of community. And I have taken its Christ Consciousness with me into the rest of my life, to sit right alongside the Buddha Consciousness. The Tao Consciousness. The Abrahamic Consciousness. The Pagan Consciousness. For the first time in my life, this past holiday season, I actually commemorated the 7 days of Kwanzaa. It just spoke to me to do so, out of the blue, and was a deeply meaningful experience. This is how Spirit, or Source, or God, works. It integrates. Not segregates. 

Three years ago I moved to Kansas City, where I had no family, and knew no one. It happened right at the beginning of global lockdown. And after a few months here, getting my footing, finding a job, and all in a locked-down environment, I decided to try and find the New Thought here. I actually just Googled it, and started calling numbers. And everything was closed. Except for Unity Southeast in Kansas City, under the helm of the Reverend Randy Fikki. It was still open, though with the strictest policies of temperature tests at the door, mask mandates, social-distance seating, and hand-sanitizer everywhere you turned. But it was still operating, I came to learn, because of its unwavering ministry to the houseless community, which didn’t stop needing help just because a pandemic had arrived. In that instant, I kind of fell in love. And I was welcomed in, embraced so fully and so instantly. And I knew I was home. One of many.

Part of writing this has been to recognize the importance of roll-calling all of the spiritual leaders who have been pivotal and vital to my life and personal growth. That’s why the litany of names and shout-outs to the Pastors, the Monks, the Teachers, who have shaped me, lit a fire under me, tempered my pain, and still aid me in finding my way in this world. Because — again — this is how the majesty of it works. It integrates. Not segregates.

Satori

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Satori

I don’t know why this has struck me on the most lusciously overcast day we’ve seen yet this year, but a remembrance of one of the hottest days that last summer saw suddenly flit past my eyes, and I thought I’d share it here.  It was an especially hard day for me, as I futily tried to rid my brain of obsessive thoughts over a personal issue.  Here’s what happened (not the personal issue, which I’ll just keep personal, but the day in question).  I decided that going to see friends of mine who are in a band perform at a summer solstice fair in Santa Monica would be just the needed anesthetic for my flooded brain.

When I arrived at the beach, it was a gorgeous day in spite of the triple-digit heat, and everyone from every Venice/Santa Monica walk of life was out, and in their inimitably Bohemian form. My kind of folks. I traversed from where I’d parked my car about six blocks inland of Main Street, and found the stage where my friends would be playing.

And as the music began, and I found a nice shade spot on a nearby curb on which to sit, I began to catch myself, here and there, not listening to the music. The blue noise in my head was louder. So, I briefly moved away from the crowd and called a friend who lives in the neighborhood and had him meet me there, just to add to the party.

He showed up, and we sat together and clapped our hands and snapped our fingers, and “whoooo whoooo”d and whistled at the end of solos, and were happy to see each other. But I was still afflicted. What other tricks could I pull? What other pill could I pop?

And that’s when I realized that this music before me was being used by me as a tool for checking out. And it deserved to be heard for its own sake. Not as distraction from problems, where then its only task is to be noisy enough to drown out that other noise. For that matter, I could’ve found a nice landfill where sanitation trucks would loudly dump their refuse. Or just sat by the side of a freeway overpass and let the engines and car horns and screeches easily drown out the clutter in my head. But I chose music instead.

Something that is sacred and transformative. Something that is never noise. I whored it.

And just at the instant that I had this realization, I truly heard the music for the first time that day. And felt lifted. I even, at one point, felt my phone vibrate on my hip and I ignored it (something I simply never do) in favor of a magical moment between two guitar players that I just didn’t want to sacrifice. And then it was gone. Blue noise in the head back again. And as loud as ever.

I started to notice the people around me. A little boy, maybe 4 or 5, danced and twirled euphorically until his father swooped him up onto his shoulders and his mother suddenly slathered his little face with sun block. It took the kid by surprise, who expressed his great irritation in the form of tears, wails, and a furious wiping of his face. Until only seconds later, the annoying sun block was forgotten, and little tyke was euphoric in giggles and twirls once again. It made me smile, which turned into a laugh.

I noticed an older woman, maybe homeless, it was hard to tell, who found herself a chair in the hot sun, and sat for the entire two sets of music, never once moving to find shade, as everyone else was doing, and so completely focused on the music in front of her. And I wondered what key to enlightenment she had that I could not seem to find.

And in those moments of people-watching, I was once again tuned into the music. As if the music was the conduit to a sudden state of presence. To listening, and observing, and taking in every sensation, every smell, every sound, every judgment even. And embracing it all. The crazy man with the playhouse on his head, who played air drums right along with the real drummer on stage, was glorious to me. And I thought of the scene in the movie American Beauty where the video-wielding kid from next door shows his new girlfriend footage he’d taken of a piece of paper floating in the breeze, and how beautiful he found this thing that was really nothing. It is a statement about finding treasure in every cell of every thing.

And as my day progressed, I found myself in and out of this remarkable sense of true presence, of finding that treasure in every cell, interspersed with hits of my blues and my burdens, which are all about being chained to past and future, and recognized what Buddhists call satori, which is defined as a “brief flash of insight.” I was flashing all over the place. But could never seem to find what in aeronautics is called gimbal lock.

Can we really reach a point where we’re always in an uninterrupted state of true presence, never allowing our problems to sit in the brain and furiously try to work themselves out, as brains will do? Or if we can at least count on a few brief flashes here and there to periodically anchor us and remind us that everything has value for its own sake, and not just as tools for medicating our wounds, isn’t that enough?

And sure enough, on the ride home, I felt full. Full with a day of communing with friends, and hearing wonderful music, and eating great food, and laughing. And none of it made my problems go away. It just managed to put those problems in their proper place in my brain, instead of allowing them the indulgent, repressive center stage.

I heard music that day for its own sake, even if only for moments at a stretch. And I found great meaning in the littlest things, if only in brief flashes.

I’ll take it.

 

 

Angela Carole Brown is the author of three published books, The Assassination of Gabriel Champion, The Kidney Journals: Memoirs of a Desperate Lifesaver, and Trading Fours, and has produced several albums of music and a yoga/mindfulness CD.   Bindi Girl Chronicles is her writing blog.   Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram & YouTube.