By
Way of My Personal Library
I
have over three thousand books in my personal library;
a
thousand or so on make-do brick book shelves in the basement,
and
the rest in nice bookcases throughout our two-story home
here
in beautiful Georgian Bay, Ontario, the most necessary books
handy
for my writing in what Virginia Woolf called “a room of one’s
own.”
But I certainly have not read all of my books, and probably
never
will. As Andrew Marvel said to his coy mistress, “But at my back
I
always hear /Time’s winged chariot hurrying near,” and what time
I
have left on this side of the Great Divide, I hope to spend on the books
I
have already written and are ready to see the light of day. It’s been
a
long journey of self-discovery, and every book in my library has served
its
purpose in my quest for my true self; the unread books giving me
comfort
and support (and a little guilt) just being there to look at; many
books
that I read for knowledge and intellectual stimulation; and many
more
books that I read for spiritual guidance, two, three, and four times
even
(Ouspensky’s In Search of the Miraculous that introduced me to
Gurdjieff’s
Fourth Way teaching that changed my life; Jung’s Memories,
Dreams,
Reflections;
Glenda Green’s Love without End and The Keys
of
Jeshua
that opened up Christ’s cryptic teaching; Adam Begley’s biography Updike that
I read four times to write my novel Talking with John Updike;
and
books of poetry and personal essays that I re-read for the pleasure
they
always give me), and as I paused this morning from reading my novel
memoir
Three Friends: An Atheist, An Agnostic, and Me that I hope to see
published
before I cross over to the Other Side, I looked at all my books
in
my writing room and smiled at how far they had taken me to get to where
I
am today, to the mystical union of blissful resolution of my inner and outer
self
that Carl Gustav Jung called “mysterium coniunctionis,” also known
as
the sacred marriage of our paradoxical nature, my Soul Self.
Composed
in Tiny Beaches,
Georgian
Bay, Southcentral, Ontario
Sunday,
November 17, 2024
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