Dear Baba,

Here's another background bit about me and my bias.  When I was becoming Catholic, after a personal 2-year process of searching, reading, inquiry w/ others, and a more formal 6-month study/community experience, I was invited to be received into the Catholic Church.  But I had been in the formal process for only 6 months and the others in my micro-community had been in it for a year.  I wanted to say yes, but I didn't feel I was "ready"; I wanted to have more of the total experience before I celebrated my reception!  

I asked my spiritual advisor for guidance.  She gave me some Ignatian prayer "exercises."  The way the exercise was to begin was for me to imagine climbing up a staircase and anything that came to mind I could think about all I wanted but then to pray in regards to that concern and then lay it on the stair before I moved on to the next step.  The staircase was however long I needed it to be.  When I got to the top (when I ran out of things on my mind), I was to imagine 3 doors, and I was supposed to choose one, open it, and see what lay beyond.  

Well, when I began my imaginative prayer exercise, my imagination really took over!  My stairs went down, down, down, in a spiral.  And when I got to the bottom, there was no bottom!!!  There was a big opening and it was dark, and I had to jump!  And I jumped!  And as I fell, I looked around and the channel had all kinds of nooks and shelves and things I wanted to look at, but I was flying past fast.  (It was a bit like when Alice jumped into the rabbit hole!)  As the channel went down, it expanded.  At the bottom I landed in a grotto on a soft grassy plain.  The back of the grotto was on my left and to my right was a big opening that spread out to a wonderfully luscious and sunny meadow.  I went out and looked around at the beautiful open expanse.  I thought "where are the doors?" (lol).  I sat down and waited.  

Then several figures began to approach me and each sat in a particular position forming a circle.  First M arrived and sat on my left.  Then L who sat on M's left.  Then came J who sat opposite M, and Mk who sat to J's left, my right.  There was an opening opposite me.  I looked and wondered "who is coming?"  And then Jesus came and sat opposite me, between L and J.  3 animals came with Him: a Dove, a Lamb, and a Lion.  The Lamb came into the circle and frolicked for a bit and then sat on Jesus' lap.  The dove flew over and around all of us.  But the lion remained outside the circle, up and off to my left.  

So I got up from my spot and I invited the lion to come in.  When the lion came into the circle, I gave it my left arm and he took it into his mouth.  He put his teeth onto my arm but didn't bite.  And then he opened his mouth and gave me my arm back.  Then the lion and I layed down in the circle w/ our feet sticking out, in the direction where I had been sitting.  All the while, none of the other figures had said anything to me, but each had gestured a greeting in some way.  Each was clothed in a different color (each of which has meanings for me), and I knew each to represent an aspect of myself.  But the figure that most surprised me was Mk (J Mk was the name I had chosen for my saint's name).  Mk's gown was entirely of dancing light!  There's more I could tell about that waking dream, but it was Mk's gown of dancing light that was the beginning of my conceiving of my Self as a light-emanating, pulsating orb.

As for how I would describe who you are in relation to me?  I need to give that some more thought before I write about it!

~Lucy