The Key to The Gate of the Road to Shambhala

I’ve known about Shambhala for a long time. I’ve had information about Shambhala for a short time. I always thought it was one of those mystical lands populated by high beings that found their way out of here and now live there and... well; that’s where my information pretty much stopped. I’ve been finding out more about Shambhala lately. That’s a very brief synopsis. I had something far more detailed and thought I had bookmarked it but... alas... no longer to be found. There’s some interesting history available for those able to find it.

Most of us who read here have heard about the great separating out that is to take place during the transition period of the coming and going 25,000 year cycle. You might imagine a series of invisible highways, weaving their way toward some unknown location. These highways pass near one another at times and we can see those who are on the different highways. Sometimes they might bisect for a brief period and conversation and experience may pass between those headed in their particular directions and then there’s the bellow of the fog horn as they pass like ships in the night.

I make no judgment on the paths chosen by anyone. The value of decisions made concerning one’s direction must rest within the heart of those so affected by their choices. I cannot know the hearts of others and what inclined them toward the place where they are bound. I do not even know my own heart entirely. I believe that my direction is partly due to what I seek and partly due to what is seeking me. It could be that all of these highways lead to a version of the divine, acceptable to the traveler. It is fairly certain that these highways lead to the treasures of their heart, Jesus Christ said something about how where your treasures are, there your heart is also.

One person’s Heaven may well be another person’s Hell. Highways lead in all directions, out and up and down. Some are steep and graded and some are gradual. Some are narrow and relatively untraveled and some are near gridlocked with the crowds. Again, I can pass no judgment on this. People will find what they are looking for. They will find it here, if it is here and they will find it elsewhere if it is elsewhere. There is a mysterious magnetism within us that connects to the object of the yearning of the heart. It knows the way regardless of whatever we may think we know.

It’s in the blood, after a fashion. The love of spiritual things and material things is in the blood. Why some are made, or fashion themselves, to long after material things and some after spiritual things is a mystery. To me it seems like degrees of blindness. We all hunger after something and that would have to be something we are capable of seeing or imagining to exist. We have the natural affliction of appetite and then there are those things desired that are not as inherent as the need to feed and reproduce.

It has been said that we are all fallen. It has been said that we bind ourselves with Karma through our actions in the fascination for coagulated dust of one kind or another. It has been said that life is an illusion play for the entertainment of an unseen audience, as well as whatever other audience there may be. People say a lot of things. It is very difficult to know anything but it doesn’t seem to stop us.

I can only speak for my own experience and what is obvious to me through my observations. With the latter, I can only expect agreement or understanding from those equipped to make the same observations. There’s something you eventually learn in the process of living and that is to be able to see when it is okay to share your observations. I find very little of value to be had in manifest life, so this puts me outside the general mindset of most everyone else. I do value whatever it is I may have learned and realized because- I am led to believe- I get to take this with me when I go; wherever that may be.

I’ve come to realize that some sort of Shambhala waits for me... or something more of what I am already going through; or something else, more or less attractive, more or less substantial, more or less dense, lighter or darker. I suspect it is a matter of attraction. If you are attracted to the light then you seek it out. The same would apply to darkness. Sometimes it is hard to know what is, or is not, darkness or light... because darkness has its own form of light. I have heard that light can appear to be darkness because it can be too bright to see and one is made blind from it.

I cannot imagine that the short time I have been here in this go around has equipped me with any encompassing understanding of what is going on. I don’t know how long one would have to live to gain this but I believe it is greater than any single life is capable of. It seems to me that I live in a world of assumptions and presumptions and camaraderie can be gained or lost by one’s ability to adapt to the presence of these in others.

If I set out today for Shambhala or The Western Pure Land or Shangri-La, I have some idea of their general location and those locations are all in the same general area; according to what’s been said about them by those presuming and assuming. I think these places are like camouflaging life forms that adapt to the coloration of their surroundings. You might be looking right at it and still not see it. I like to think I am on the road to Shambhala, no matter what direction I may be headed in.

In the process of my heading to Shambhala on foot, or in my mind, I find that the world is not cooperative in my efforts. Even those closest to me are not cooperative unless I disguise my pursuit in such a way that it appears to them as something they can integrate with their own interests. Kalil Gibran wrote a book about Jesus Christ in which 77 people who met him describe him. They were people of all types. Some were enemies and some were friends. It is called, “Jesus the Son of Man”. If you haven’t read it you might find it an interesting read. I lived with an ancient Archbishop of the Old Roman Catholic Church for a couple of years when I was very young. Gibran had come to visit him once. He said to me, “He was a lovely man but he drank too much wine.”

It’s been said that Shambhala is very hard to find and there are indications that people have perished in the attempt. The latter doesn’t bother me much. People generally perish in much more foolish pursuits so... that wouldn’t be a bad way to go and might be a way of finding it as well. It seems like something one might need to keep to themselves because of the injury done to ones determination by the commentary of those you encounter on the way.

When I was in the restaurant/catering/food preparation business, I used to tell people I was in the music business because I looked at everything I did as being part of the journey to my songs being heard by whatever audience was going to hear them. That’s of no concern to me now because it’s of no importance. None of the things I am engaged in are of any importance to me now. I continue to do them and with no less industry and focus but... they don’t really matter at all.

Shambhala, or whatever it represents to me, is important. Walking through this world is like walking naked through nettles or... barefoot through the desert. There’s a consistency of wounding that is the operative theme of every culture under the imprint of civilization. Some are indifferent to it due to the thickness of their skin and the absence of love. It seems to me that love is one of the keys to the gate of the road to Shambhala and one of the keys to love is vulnerability so... there you are aren’t you?

Somehow we must become impervious to this world while maintaining our precious vulnerability at the same time. We have to appear to be engaged here on our way there. It’s another one of those circumstances where words are not going to do what is required of them and where a great many more words are required even though they will not accomplish the task either and now we have come to the end of the usual stream of words to be found here.

Visible sings: ♫ I'm Coming Back ♫
'I'm Coming Back' is track no. 4 of 12 on Visible's 2007 album 'Color Ball'
Lyrics (pops up)