Yoga Mentorship Personal Guidance for Becoming Whole As your mentor, Julie becomes another point of orientation — a witness to what is already alive in you. Excavating the terrain between where you are and where you’re called to be, rooting your steadiness, softening resistance, and helping you reclaim your natural way of moving through the world. With Julie as your guide, you explore: • What is trying to emerge in your life • What patterns, loyalties, or fears are keeping you small • What steadiness you need to root more deeply • How spiritual practice can support real movement
ESOTERIC THOUGHT
ESOTERIC THOUGHT
The Teachers Return: Understanding This Moment Through the Lens of Ageless Wisdom BY SHEIDA KOURANGI Humanity is going through a dark night of the soul at its most pivot- al and consequential moment in its long history. The crisis we’re fac- ing is at core a spiritual crisis: the spiritual here meaning the essence of who we are, the oneness and sacredness of all life, and that which uplifts and makes our planet whole. This is what has mostly been for- gotten or sidelined. The extent of disharmony and imbalance in economic, political and ecological arenas underpins all the crises we witness today, rooted in the fragmentation of our lives inwardly and outwardly, where spirit is divorced from matter and materialism dominates all aspects of our lives. Yet health and healing come from wholeness. Heal, whole, and holy all stem from the same Old English root: hāl . To heal is to make whole. Humanity has lost its compass, its reason for being. We don’t know who we are and where we’re going. Perhaps we never did, at least not in the modern era. When you strip life of all meaning and purpose, the only thing that remains is a tiny globe whirling into the darkness of space. And we’re the tinier still specks on that globe, desperately hold - ing on and trying to find our way. But when there is no aim or purpose, can there still be a way? Physics shows us there is nothing static in the universe. Everything is in constant motion; every atom, every speck of dust is in a process of becoming. Yet it removes the telos from the process, along with in - teriority and subjectivity. Everything is a random accident without an aim. According to the philosophical thought known as “Ageless Wisdom,” the purpose of life is evolution — not blind growth, but growth with a purpose woven into the very fabric of the universe, in its most minute as in its most grand, whether in a seed or a solar system. It also tells us evolution never stops. It is a never-ending process of becoming. And just like humans, everything evolves, including planets and solar sys- tems. We are lives within greater lives, reborn in cycles of manifesta- tion within yet greater cycles. As cells are in our bodies, so are we cells in the body of the planet, which is a conscious living entity. “As above so below” is a principle in the whole of cosmos. And consciousness is ubiquitous. Science applies evolution to physical bodies alone, but the evolution of consciousness is why we are here. The Evolution of Consciousness Ageless Wisdom, also known as esotericism , is the philosophy and science of the evolution of consciousness that gives us the scaffolding in which to place all the varied dimensions, areas, aspects and layers of our lives, and see their correct relationships. It offers a compass and tools for our conscious development, as well as a blueprint for our personal and collective evolution that ultimately leads to the full em- bodiment of the awakening to who we really are. The becoming side of our nature requires us to seek a fuller expression of that awakening continuously, so the outer life reflects it in every aspect and area of our lives. Within this school of thought, transmission of this knowledge tra- ditionally has been in secret, passed down from teacher to student, master to disciple. But while remaining esoteric (hidden) for millen -
nia, it has started becoming exoteric, per the maxim that “the teacher appears when the student is ready.” The first phase of the teachings was given openly to the world through an enigmatic Russian lady named H.P. Blavatsky in 1875. The second phase came through eso - teric author Alice A. Bailey between 1919 and 1949, her books dictated to her by a Master of Wisdom known in esoteric circles as the Tibetan or Master DK. Her contemporary, Helena Roerich, a Russian theoso - phist and writer gave out the Agni Yoga teachings. The third and con - temporary phase was given from 1974 until 2016 through Benjamin Creme, a Scottish artist and esotericist, after he was contacted by his Master by way of higher mental telepathy. A Time of Transition We often hear that these are unprecedented times. But what makes them so, besides the obviously rapid socio-political and technical changes we all witness? Astronomically, the gradual wobble of the Earth’s axis shifts the ver - nal equinox point — the location of the Sun in the sky at the spring equinox — completing one full cycle in about 25,800 years. On aver - age, every 2,150 years, its position against the backdrop of the celestial sphere moves backward through the constellations of the Zodiac. This is called the “precession of the equinoxes.” Astrology enters into the interpretation of the timing and the meaning of this celestial event for Earth. For over two millennia, the Sun was in front of the constellation Pisces at the equinox. We are now at the beginning of a new cosmic cycle, but still in transition between the two ages. The trouble with transitions is that they are rough and bumpy. Many of our current global upheavals stem from the more or less equal potency of these two energies. Even as one is waning and the other is waxing, the clash
between them underlies the extreme polarities between worldviews: the old and the new. The old systems and institutions are failing everywhere we look, whether it’s societal, political, educational, economic, or environmen- tal, because the energies behind them are withdrawing. As the ener - gies recede, the systems crumble for lack of what has so long sustained them. And as the new energies of Aquarius gain potency in our world, structures and institutions have to be built that can embody them and give rise to the new order emerging. The exact timing of the Age of Aquarius has always been unknown or disputed, due to the different ways the boundaries of each constel - lation are defined. However, according to the esotericist and author Benjamin Creme, we officially entered the New Age in 2009. But this is a very gradual shift; it takes time for the energies of Pisces to with- draw and those of Aquarius to pour into our system. It is an esoteric truism that everything is energy. The particular en- ergies from the constellations that reach our planet possess certain qualities and ideas which in time become our ideals and aspirations for that age. The Age of Pisces gave us the gifts of idealism, devotion and indi - viduality, necessary for our evolution; but they have been distorted. Ideals have remained ideals without becoming actualized, devotion to one aspect of truth or reality has caused fanaticism and blindness to the truth about the whole, and the cult of individuality has turned to separatism, pitting the interest of the most wealthy and powerful against the interests of the people and the planet. The qualities of the new age are in stark contrast with what we are currently witnessing: endless wars, polarization and fragmentation, lives reduced to commodities, and institutional manipulations of and
This work is especially powerful for people navigating seasons of transition, creative threshold, spiritual awakening, burnout, grief, or identity reconstruction.
Julie S. Holly Soma. Soul. Skill. info@juliesholly.com JulieSHolly.com
Photo by Michelle Stafford
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64—PATHWAYS—Fall 26
PATHWAYS—Fall 26—65
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