Harmony Lake Ranch Vision Statement
Harmony Lake, view from the South
Harmony Lake Ranch exists so that people can have fun; and experience themselves as and live from the undivided, unconditional Love that We Are.
The Experience That Informs the Vision
" I give you living water, from which you will never thirst... this will become in you a spring of water welling up to eternal life." John 4:10 - 15
When you look within yourself, what do you see?
You may notice thoughts, feelings, opinions, sensations (like feeling hot or cold). The combined experience of our thoughts, feelings, opinions and sensations are what most people take themselves to be. But is that the whole of you? When you look within, you may also notice that there is something... a Presence of sorts... that is noticing everything that is coming and going within your inner landscape, that notices everything that happens outside of your body as well. What is that Presence?
That Presence doesn't come and go, and yet it is not an object. Its function seems to be the unconditional allowing of everything that appears to it. It doesn't have age, nor gender, nor particular shape. It has no boundaries, yet is alive to all. There are no divisions between this Presence awake within one being, and the same Presence vibrantly receiving and unconditionally allowing all things in another being. We can’t help but think of Paul’s reference: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus." (Galatians 3:28) Are we not actually One in this way, right now, irrespective of belief? Might this One Presence be the Spirit that Jesus said would be with us "...always, even to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:18-20)? Is this not the unconditional Presence or Spirit in which everything "...lives and moves and has its being..." (Acts 17:28)?
When we take the perspective of this Unconditioned Presence, which is pushing no experience away - nor pulling any experience toward itself, we can allow any circumstance to be as it is. When one pays closer attention to this Unconditioned Presence than to the thoughts, feelings and perceptions that one might have always taken to be oneself, the Unconditioned Presence reveals what you really are. When you realize this, and live from it - contrary to what the mind might imagine - there is neither anarchy, nor life lived as a doormat. The wholeness of that unconditioned Presence is alive in you, and guides you at all times and in all places--allowing you to respond to any situation (rather than to react), even in the most difficult of circumstances. Yet in each moment, this calls for “death” to your personal will--a journey to the Cross, not unlike what moved Jesus to his ultimate surrender.
The point, it seems to us, is not to "copy" Jesus, rather to drink from the well of Living Water within that nourished him and provided his power, authority, and authenticity (and toward which he constantly pointed in his teaching), both in order to experience fullness of life, and to move with freedom and grace in all situations. In this way, you are not an imitation of Christ - rather you experience the power and freedom that allowed him to say at the Cross, “…not what I want…” but what is wanted from Source, Ultimate Reality, or in the word Jesus preferred: “Father.”
When you know yourself to be a manifestation of The Divine One, you can see the personal nature of the thoughts, feelings and sensations that are coming and going within the unconditioned Presence for what they are and be moved instead by the Unconditional Source of all. In that way you begin to ‘die to self, in order to be born again,’ experiencing Jesus’ reality, Jesus’ presence, and Unconditional Love in every moment. That is the promise, and the triumph of the cross.
You may notice thoughts, feelings, opinions, sensations (like feeling hot or cold). The combined experience of our thoughts, feelings, opinions and sensations are what most people take themselves to be. But is that the whole of you? When you look within, you may also notice that there is something... a Presence of sorts... that is noticing everything that is coming and going within your inner landscape, that notices everything that happens outside of your body as well. What is that Presence?
That Presence doesn't come and go, and yet it is not an object. Its function seems to be the unconditional allowing of everything that appears to it. It doesn't have age, nor gender, nor particular shape. It has no boundaries, yet is alive to all. There are no divisions between this Presence awake within one being, and the same Presence vibrantly receiving and unconditionally allowing all things in another being. We can’t help but think of Paul’s reference: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus." (Galatians 3:28) Are we not actually One in this way, right now, irrespective of belief? Might this One Presence be the Spirit that Jesus said would be with us "...always, even to the end of the age" (Matthew 28:18-20)? Is this not the unconditional Presence or Spirit in which everything "...lives and moves and has its being..." (Acts 17:28)?
When we take the perspective of this Unconditioned Presence, which is pushing no experience away - nor pulling any experience toward itself, we can allow any circumstance to be as it is. When one pays closer attention to this Unconditioned Presence than to the thoughts, feelings and perceptions that one might have always taken to be oneself, the Unconditioned Presence reveals what you really are. When you realize this, and live from it - contrary to what the mind might imagine - there is neither anarchy, nor life lived as a doormat. The wholeness of that unconditioned Presence is alive in you, and guides you at all times and in all places--allowing you to respond to any situation (rather than to react), even in the most difficult of circumstances. Yet in each moment, this calls for “death” to your personal will--a journey to the Cross, not unlike what moved Jesus to his ultimate surrender.
The point, it seems to us, is not to "copy" Jesus, rather to drink from the well of Living Water within that nourished him and provided his power, authority, and authenticity (and toward which he constantly pointed in his teaching), both in order to experience fullness of life, and to move with freedom and grace in all situations. In this way, you are not an imitation of Christ - rather you experience the power and freedom that allowed him to say at the Cross, “…not what I want…” but what is wanted from Source, Ultimate Reality, or in the word Jesus preferred: “Father.”
When you know yourself to be a manifestation of The Divine One, you can see the personal nature of the thoughts, feelings and sensations that are coming and going within the unconditioned Presence for what they are and be moved instead by the Unconditional Source of all. In that way you begin to ‘die to self, in order to be born again,’ experiencing Jesus’ reality, Jesus’ presence, and Unconditional Love in every moment. That is the promise, and the triumph of the cross.
After walking a little further, he threw himself on the ground in prayer,
“My Father, if it is possible, let this cup [of suffering] pass from me;
yet not what I want but what you want.” Matthew 26:39
Our experience is that Jesus’ journey to the Cross is an invitation for each one of us to surrender personal will in order to know the truth of our being.
“My Father, if it is possible, let this cup [of suffering] pass from me;
yet not what I want but what you want.” Matthew 26:39
Our experience is that Jesus’ journey to the Cross is an invitation for each one of us to surrender personal will in order to know the truth of our being.
Photo on this page courtesy of Michael Baugh
