Collaboration Journal
Special Feature
Spiritual Tips for Living in the United States
MICHAEL MIOVIC
THE COLLABORATION JOURNAL SPECIAL FEATURES series highlights notable articles from Collaboration journal and makes them available to readers without a subscription.
Collaboration has issued a call for essays on the “Soul of America,” but since honesty is integral to yoga, I must say that I don’t know much about this topic because I’ve never experienced the psychic being of the nation. However, I have lived in the U.S. long enough to learn a useful American solution which is, when faced with not knowing something, to just talk about something else instead. So, in that spirit here I will talk about the land of the U.S. and hope that no one minds the shift in focus. FYI, if someone does, at least they can’t sue me because I provided this little disclaimer up front, which is another American solution. And if you come to my weekend workshop or buy my book, then I’ll learn you more great American solutions at half price—plus show you how to get the Brooklyn Bridge for free. Believe me, you’ll never see a deal like this again.
Relax, that was a joke. But in all seriousness, the land of the United States is very special because she is conscious. I don’t know how to describe this other than to say that she is. The rocks are alive, the soil speaks to you, and you can feel it even in things like cement, asphalt, walls, windows, and telephone poles. Everything physical somehow feels close, awake, and intimate. I’ve been to India and Europe and things are different there. In Europe the land glows more than here in the U.S., and it’s truly beautiful to behold, but it’s a sort of light from the mental plane while the physical substance feels further away and less full. And in India the situation is even more dramatic: one feels a profound spiritual atmosphere everywhere, but the physical substance seems forgotten or, in some places, even disrespected or somehow dirty. Of course, this is not so in the Sri Aurobindo Ashram and Auroville where physical things are conscious, but step outside of these zones and you will see what I mean. The cement in Hyderabad is just no match for that in New York City, because the latter simply feels more present, like it matters.
Now, one of the most important things in any culture is to know where to find God, or whatever you call that big thing we can’t define. But let’s not get lost in words and keep the issue down to earth: suppose you have a problem in life and you have to make a decision. What do you do or where do you go to get an intuitive answer from that thing we call “God”? Well, in Europe they have many churches and cathedrals that are truly awe-inspiring, and in Asia they’ve got a wealth of ancient and beautiful temples that represent many different religions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Christianity, Judaism, and even Zoroastrianism. Those places all work well, you can get quiet, go deep into inside or feel your consciousness opening into other worlds, and then an answer comes. So, the bottom line is that Europe and Asia have excellent places to talk with God—or Gods and Goddesses, take your pick. Personally, I like the ancient temples of Greece, where you can meet with Zeus, Athena, Poseidon, Pan, and so on. Lots of choices and possibilities in the Eastern hemisphere.
The problem over here in the Western half of the world, however, is that our churches and temples don’t work that well. They’re nice for people to get together to pray and sing, and there’s nothing wrong with that, to socialize and prevent loneliness. However, these places just don’t have much power apart from the people; that is, you can’t walk into one of these buildings and easily feel God or Gods revealed. Apart from a few ancient Mayan temples that are still awake, I can’t say that I’ve met many conscious churches, mosques, or temples in the Americas. There might be a few budding Hindu temples built by immigrants where you can feel a little something, but these are nothing like the ones in India in terms of spiritual power.
So why is this? The U.S. is full of Christians who have more money and building technology than just about anyone in the world, and yet they can’t seem to make a church that really works. It’s odd. They’ve built massive skyscrapers that show plenty of engineering and architectural ability, but their churches are a bunch of woodsheds, brick boxes, or faux copies of Europe. Where is the inspired expression of aspiration? Where is the conscious power that we call God? Not in the buildings, it’s in the land, that’s where it is. In America “God” does not like to be cooped up in churches or temples, because she prefers to spread out across the land that she created and inhabits. Little buildings made by human beings are too small to hold her massive spirit, so she built something bigger in which to dwell, places like the Grand Canyon and towering redwood forests that speak to your soul. Those are the real churches and temples of America, and I think that’s why this earth we’ve got here is so conscious. You see, this land can talk to you, teach you, provide for you, guide you—anything you need she can do it. She’s like a spiritual mother, always close and comforting but also wise and disciplined, so don’t get lazy or she’ll teach you a lesson.
All right, now that we got that first thing straight, let’s talk about roads because they also matter. You can’t separate life and God because they come together in a package deal. We’ve got to have these roads to do work and business, or else we’ll all die. That’s just a fact of modern life. However, we also need these roads to get to all those national parks and other sacred places I just mentioned, and it’s out there on the road that most Americans meet the land, so roads are also spiritual. You’ve got to know that or else you’ll die spiritually, and that’s another fact of living in the U.S. So, whenever you’ve got a real life problem to solve, that’s when you have to hit the road—and you can talk to God in between doing other personal or professional business. You don’t have to pull life and God apart because the land can do both together and therefore you can, too.
Here’s how to do a road trip: get in your car, get out on the highway, and drive away from all the buildings. Go to the open land or where the forests start. Now just relax and hear the sound of the tires on the road and feel those rhythmic thuds along the way. Listen to the engine droning and the wind whipping by, it’s like a mantra or some kind of chanting. Slowly your awareness will stretch out sideways like a pancake and just settle down onto the land. Let that happen—you’ll see how your mind widens, thoughts get quieter and farther apart, and the spaces between them larger. You might even feel your consciousness sink down into the earth. And then the answers start to come: that’s the land speaking, that’s her way of communicating with you, and when she speaks you should listen. Even her silence is a blessing, so that’s a good thing too. It might take a while for her to answer, but she will. You can rely on her, in fact, I’d say she’s more reliable than many of the people around here.
After you’ve got the hang of road trips, the next step to living in the U.S. is to pay more attention to the roadcuts[1] because they are, to the best of my knowledge, the only product of modern engineering that actually enhance the consciousness of the earth. So much has been said about how current U.S. culture consumes and abuses the earth, and it’s true. We are a civilization of waste and misuse, and future generations will pay dearly for our lack of consciousness. Nevertheless, let us not forget the positive and give credit where it is actually due, and the fact is that American roadcuts are divine. These little human-made miracles release the hidden powers of the earth, reveal her consciousness, and are scattered across our land like periodic blessings along the way. Roadcuts are mini canyons where one is suddenly reminded of the mysteries of Time and the miles upon miles of rock below our feet. One sees all the layers of past eons summarized in sediment, meets faces of elemental beings, feels the ancient presence of wisdom and power and hidden love and the yearning of sacred substance to manifest God on earth. So whenever you do a road trip, be sure to commune with roadcuts. It only takes a few moments, but you will be glad you did it.
You see, human life is so small and strange once you start to think about it. All of our hopes and dreams and whorl of drama and worry transpire in a thin layer of greenery that is scarcely a few hundred feet thick. Our concerns rarely reach above the treetops, or down more than a few feet into the soil. So, when you are doing a road trip and meditating with the land, most of that meditation does not reach deep into the ground—that is, until you meet a roadcut. Then suddenly you feel it: the rock below your feet comes up to meet you and pulls your awareness down into the worlds of bedrock below us. That meeting is a blessing, a healing, a reconnection with the earth. It happens to me every day while driving to and from the office, and my life would be a waste without it. Without roadcuts, I would be just another white guy with a massive carbon footprint who produces tons of garbage per year and has an unresolved national history of exploiting both land and people. With roadcuts, however, I receive the blessings of Mother America and feel whole again, and holy. I don’t understand it, but I have never once felt the land punish me for all my transgressions against her, nor what my ancestors did. It’s a real mystery how she can be so loving and forgiving, but she is. She does not seem to hold grudges, nor ask much in return for her gifts.
Another tip for living in America is not to forget the seafloor; remember to include her in your meditation, too. This advice is probably not relevant to people who live far away from the seacoasts, and of course people who live in the Great Plains are standing on an ancient seabed, so they can just commune with that. I’ve done it and it works. But when you live near the big waters and great lakes, it’s important to remember the rock hidden beneath them. The religions from the Eastern part of the world say it’s good to pray to God in heaven before going to bed, and they must be right. But what happens to me at bedtime is that my prayers sink down to God below us, on the seafloor. I suspect that happens because the jewel centers (chakras of the earth) in the East open to nonmaterial planes of consciousness, so prayers tend to rise upwards over there, while here in the physical center of the world the consciousness is denser, so our prayers tend to go down into the ground.
In any case, whatever the reason, here’s what happens: as I’m lying there in bed with my body aching and my mind tied into knots from forgetting the earth all day while I was doing some b.s. in the office, I suddenly remember that I completely forgot about the seafloor. And this feels disturbing, like being subtly cut in half, because the seafloor is also an important part of the earth and so we should remember her even though we cannot see her. Her labors matter, too, and in fact the scientists say she invented life itself a few billion years ago, and that all land animals evolved from some ancient fish, including us. There is more land on this planet below the sea than above it, so how can we say that seafloors do not matter? We must remember the seafloors, and bedtime is good time to do it. Thus, as I close my eyes, I start to see the land of Boston stretch out towards the harbor, like she’s reaching to reunite with the sea. I follow the land out to the beach and then down into the dark waters, sliding along her back as she dives ever deeper into the darkness. Sand turns to bare rock, crags emerge, cliffs drop down and the water rises ever higher above. The darkness grows denser and deeper as the seabed descends towards a bottomless bottom. All becomes still, quiet, stable and solid, and at last one feels whole and reconnected with something or someone very ancient. A presence is there, a knowing, and then it is a good time to sleep. The work is too big for any one person or nation, so while people in the East remember heaven at bedtime, in the Americas we can remember the seafloor. Maybe one day our joint efforts will bring earth and heaven together. That would be nice.
There are many, many worlds below our feet and it’s hard to put this into words. The geologists have learned extraordinary things about the evolution of the Earth, plate tectonics, how she has changed over time. It’s a gift to have this knowledge and we should share it. However, it’s also tricky because only part of the earth is physical and with the physical movement of rocks and lava comes an opening into other worlds that are subtle. Hard to describe, but there are Gods and Goddesses down there, spiritual beings, dimensions of past and future, memories of things that were and will be. It is truly amazing, this wisdom of the earth. An ancient being of ananda lies wrapped in the purusha consciousness of the Adirondacks, Rhode Island has a drop of divine love in the mind of matter, and the bedrock of Lake Superior yearns to do pranam at the feet of Sri Aurobindo. These are mysteries we cannot understand, but that is all right because we do not have to. We can just let the land hold us and carry us forward to whatever is her goal. She will find a way to get there—and bring us with her.
The next tip for living in the U.S. is to understand that even though it appears like people can carve up the land and own it, in fact she owns herself. You can put up some fences and pay lawyers to defend your property rights, but that doesn’t control the consciousness of the land. She remains forever free, undivided, and impartial to all the people who walk across her surface. There is no way human beings can own all those miles of bedrock below our feet. The land was here long before we were and will remain long after we’ve given way to some other species, hopefully one that is more conscious than we are. This land has been talking with the Divine Mother for much longer than we have, so she can probably teach us a thing or two.
This situation leads to another American lesson, which is how to get the Brooklyn Bridge for free. Here’s what you do: do a road trip to New York, then stand in front of the Brooklyn Bridge and feel the miles of rock all around and below your feet. To me this New York bedrock radiates a greenish aura, but maybe to you she shows another color. Anyway, you feel the power, the tremendous energy of the bedrock, and now you know why New York City has so much muscle. Feel how the Brooklyn Bridge grows out of that consciousness, expresses the dreams of the land, and now you’ve got that bridge for free. Go across town to commune with the Hudson River and the George Washington Bridge, and now you own that one too. Keep going west across the continent to San Francisco and feel how the Golden Gate grows out of Marin headlands to span the waters, and now you have all three bridges for free. Keep on going like that and pretty soon you’ll own the whole continent—and then you’ll also realize that in fact you grow out of her and she owns you. Let that blessing grow bigger, and then you’ll feel the consciousness of the land stretch even further, from pole to pole and sea to sea until she covers the entire Western half of the globe, with her seafloors. That is Mother America and she is not divided by those little lines people draw on maps. No, she is one gigantic goddess with all the chakras and planes of consciousness arranged very nicely in her earth, as I’ve explained in a prior article on jewel centers in this journal.[2]
Well, those are some basic tips for living well anywhere in the Americas, North or South. Of course, you will have to go deeper into the particular land where you live, because each part of Mother America is conscious and has her special ways and secrets. But if you get your relationship with the land straight, then everything else will work out. Eventually even the people will fall into place, sooner or later … well, later, given the nature of people. We are a very difficult bunch because our minds got too big as we evolved from monkeys. Then we developed the ability to dream up nasty schemes to exploit each other and the earth, and that’s why we’re in this global crisis now. It’s very dangerous, you know, to carry a human brain around in your head, like a bomb up there just waiting to go off. I don’t think many people on this planet are actually qualified to operate the human mind, maybe only the Dalai Lama. I know I’m not and yet I’ve got one nonetheless. What a mess.
This problem brings us to the last tip for living in the U.S., which is where to find the land’s psychic center in case you would like to tap into that support for evolving in consciousness beyond the mind. In my experience Massachusetts radiates a powerful psychic presence and is a fully conscious being, although of course others are free to disagree and have a different experience of land in the U.S. But before you form your own opinion of Massachusetts, it’s worth meeting her in person because she’s a marvel: even though she appears to be rather plain and ordinary on the outside, on the inside she is extraordinary. Of all the road trips you can take in North America, this one is the most uncanny: drive on I-95 from Connecticut northwards, and as you approach Massachusetts note what happens. The trees grow more compact and wizened, as if you are ascending onto an alpine plateau—and yet the impression is odd because the elevation is in consciousness rather than altitude. It feels as though you are rising into a zone that is on the ground yet somehow hovers just above it, and you wonder what on earth is happening. Then you see the road sign that says “Welcome to Massachusetts,” and pretty soon you realize like Dorothy that you’re not in Kansas anymore.
Now, once you have arrived in the little land of Oz that is Massachusetts, it helps to understand the ways of this wonderful witch of the East so that you can absorb her blessings deeply. She has three M’s to her outer method, which are merit, measure, and mettle, and she uses these to manifest the two M’s of her inner soul-power, which are mystery and magic. The first three of these qualities are visible in her effects on human culture, but the last two can only be known directly, through communion with her land.
The first “M” of Massachusetts is merit: she seeks always for truth and judges things not by their appearances but by their inner substance. However, to her, truth is always progressive, so past and present are but preparations for tomorrow. Thus, Massachusetts reaches ever towards the future and is constantly growing towards a higher perfection. We see this psychic influence of her land on people very clearly in the last 400 years of history. Massachusetts supported democracy well before Europeans arrived upon her shores by participating in the Iroquois League of Nations in her west. She then gave a home to the one of the earliest settlements of Europeans in her east, purified these Puritans by demonstrating how witch trials lack merit, and finally taught these immigrants democracy. Massachusetts is thus the only land on earth to have developed democracy twice, in quick succession, among two different human cultures whose only similarity was where they lived. This tends to show that democracy was transmitted from land to people, since the two peoples involved were largely separated by conflicts and thus had limited transmission of consciousness with each other. And, for the record, the subsequent history of wars and land grabs pursued by European immigrants across the continent are not the fault of Massachusetts, for she offered friendship. If you go visit the land near Plymouth Plantation you can still feel this friendly aura welling up from the low hills and wind-swept trees that face the sea. Massachusetts is still waiting for her offer to be fulfilled, for the simple reason that collaboration has more merit than monarchy, witch trials, colonialism, bigotry, racism, and capital greed.
In support of merit, Massachusetts went on to develop ideas and knowledge in all spheres. She built the first public school in the Americas (Boston Latin) and the first university (Harvard). She gave birth to its first great scientist (Ben Franklin), made room for the Shakers,[3] and within the single town of Concord read the Bhagavad Gita and started transcendentalism; wrote Walden Pond and launched environmentalism; and raised the Alcott sisters who gave us the beloved story of Little Women. Massachusetts inspired writers and poets in her western lands, such as Melville and Dickinson, while in her east she advanced the causes of feminism and abolitionism and gave the U.S. four presidents and one founding father. She performed the first surgery with general anesthesia in the world and went on to make both her educational and medical institutes among the finest on the planet. She is the home of American psychology and The Varieties of Religious Experience, and through the Kennedy family brought us civil rights, NASA, and the greatest quantity of progressive legislation ever written by a single senator. Massachusetts also gave Mahatma Gandhi the method of civil disobedience, brought Martin Luther King, Jr., to study and develop his ideas, and elevated a once unknown fellow named Barack Obama into the national spotlight at Boston’s Democratic National Convention in 2004. He went on to become the nation’s first biracial president. Human beings have cures for childhood cancer because Massachusetts said they could, set foot upon the moon because she said they would, and now have mRNA vaccines because she said they should.
And all these accomplishments are but a small sampling of her achievements, as no object is above the ability of Massachusetts and no subject below her interest. She was quick to join the industrial revolution, built sailing ships to rival the fastest in the world, and in Waltham even made a watch more accurate than those of Switzerland. She has one of the best life-insurance companies in the industry (MassMutual), opened the first mutual stock fund (MITTX), and is the headquarters for Fidelity. Massachusetts gave children Dr. Seuss, invented basketball, and even made sneakers popular via her Converse factory in Malden. She plays many sports, hosts world-class marathons, produced the first undefeated heavyweight boxing champion in history, and her Celtics and Bruins have won umpteen championships. Her Patriots are the best football team ever to take the field, and with the greatest quarterback of all time. And how about those Red Sox? Legend has it they were absent from the World Series for 86 years due to a curse, and yet when Massachusetts finally broke that losing spell, she didn’t just swing for the bleachers, she swung for the ages: the Sox came from three games down to beat the Yankees in multiple overtimes to clinch the pennant, and then went on to become the only team in history to come from that far behind to win the World Series. Or if you prefer humor to sport, then Massachusetts has that base covered, too, for she created Car Talk for public radio, which was hosted by two Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduates who sported with callers about their car-related life problems. Massachusetts also produced the actor whose character of Spock made Star Trek iconic, and then she turned around and filmed the iconic Jaws on Martha’s Vineyard. The only thing she cannot do, and will not do, is to lower her standards and trim her vision of what is possible.
The second “M” of Massachusetts is for measure, which is the poise with which she shows her merit. Excellence is her very nature but excess is not, and therefore she always prefers to do a small thing well rather than large one poorly. That is why she keeps the scale of Boston restrained compared to the ungainly cities of the world, for she has an innate sense of balance, of harmony and proportion, and these combine to express her beauty. Massachusetts gave the U.S. its first great painter (James Whistler), built outstanding art schools and museums, and has always attracted artist colonies to her delicate fingertips at the end of Cape Cod. She engineered the first concert hall with perfect acoustics in the Western hemisphere and plays classical music via the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Pops in Boston while hosting Tanglewood in the Berkshires. Her conservatories are as good as any, and she is not limited in her tastes and styles: she is a master of European classical music but also plays jazz and contemporary music at Berklee, and at the New England Conservatory of Music gives jobs to Grammy winners who teach children how to find their voice. Her seventh-inning “stretch” at Fenway is the most melodious in the country, where the crowd’s rendition of “Sweet Caroline” is truly sweet, and Massachusetts can even rock. For example, she is the home of Aerosmith, the Cars, and New Kids on the Block, and to celebrate the nation’s bicentennial in 1976, she released the album Boston from a basement in Waltham. The clean and uplifting sound of that classic purified an entire genre of its drug-infused haze and gave to rock and metal her classic touch. For the same reason Massachusetts prefers candlestick bowling to that large and loud kind that is so unbecoming, because her way is more beautiful and also easier for the young and old. It is true that her tastes in homes, clothing, and interior décor tend to run a bit conservative, but that is because she sees the beauty and merit of tradition and has the grace to balance old and new. Such is the charm and elegance of Massachusetts, yet even these she expresses with a certain simplicity and plainness, just to show that she is American not European.
Nevertheless, though Massachusetts may be small and delicate, this does not mean that she cannot defend herself when needed, for her third “M” is mettle. You feel a hint of this in her sports teams and frank citizens, but where she really hits you with it is in defense of truth and justice. For that she will fight. India gave the world its first inspiration for democracy, and Europe incubated these ideas further, but never forget that it was little Massachusetts who fired the shot heard round the world. She sent Black regiments to wage the Civil War, launched one-third of all landing ships used at D-Day from her shores, gave three Kennedy brothers who stood for her dreams to the last breath, and she still sails Old Ironsides from Boston Harbor once a year to defy the monarchy of Time itself. She does not accept inaction on global warming, racism, homophobia, and gender rights, or sex abuse in churches; and she still fights to fulfill the ideals of equality which she nurtured in her cradle of liberty. Yes, it is true that Massachusetts is small, makes mistakes, and loses battles, yet even so her spirit remains undefeated. For defeat exists only for those who surrender to hostile powers, and Massachusetts surrenders only to the Divine Mother. She has fought demons, darkness, ignorance, and falsehood across centuries, and she will defeat these in the end because she has the endurance to go the distance. So a word to the wise, there are two paths you can take in life: the way which Massachusetts points out nicely to you today, or the way she will drag you kicking and screaming down that path tomorrow if she has to. Those are the options she gives you, and the first option is better because Massachusetts is the physical tip of the spiritual spear that drives the evolution of consciousness in matter.
And yet one must never think that Massachusetts is a hard and cold master, for her methods are just the means she uses to manifest her spiritual mysteries and her magical soul of sweetness. And what a soul she has, so full of light and love and beauty, and so simple and sincere in her aspirations. She just knows that matter is sacred and conscious, and in her innocence she wants all souls to share in that blessing. To Massachusetts it is a self-evident truth that earth can house a life Divine, and she has faith that with the help of the Divine Mother this can actually be achieved. If there is something unholy or impure about matter then Massachusetts does not know it, nor does she recall that her Mother ever told her. Thus, if you really want to know Massachusetts, just approach her gently and tell her that you would like to grow in consciousness. That will not only disarm her, it will completely undo her. For what will Massachusetts not do for the soul who yearns to feel the sanctities of substance? She has a psychic light and touch and consciousness that join earth and heaven, and her whole joy is to join these in us. All you have to do is ask, and she will show you: she will haunt you with pastel skies and musing clouds that paint earthly scenes of delicacy unearthly and bewitch you with her mystical moons and nights mysterious. She will glow for you in every type of weather, enchant you in every season, nourish your meditations with her conscious forests and meadows, and whisper to you with breathes of psychic light that waft up from her soil and infuse straight into the depths of your soul. She will heal you on her seashores, teach you to talk with her at Walden, widen your witness consciousness at Mt. Wachusett, elevate your thoughts in the Berkshires, and even cleanse your subconscient at Shelbourne Falls.
And whatever spiritual opportunity Massachusetts cannot give to the soul who seeks it, she will obtain from other jewel centers of the earth, for she has neither ego nor envy. She scans the globe for quality and sends souls there to get it, or imports the gifts of other lands so that everyone at home can learn and grow as well. It was thus that Massachusetts summoned Mother Ann[3] from England with a vision, and when a certain Indian yogi aspired to come to America, it was she who sent a soul to greet him on the train from Vancouver and bring him back to Boston after he was rejected in Chicago. Massachusetts gave this swami a warm welcome, put a Harvard professor at his service, and even paid his ticket to the Parliament of Religions.[4] [5] And so it is that today people on every continent know of Vivekananda and Indian yoga, and yet how many of these souls have ever thanked the land of Massachusetts for making this growth of consciousness possible? But never mind, it doesn’t matter, for that was then and this is now, and Massachusetts is focused always on the future. She does the work the Divine Mother gives her, she does it with all her soul of love and beauty, and she does it so perfectly that she even signs her letters with a prayer to the big MA from the little one in Massachusetts. Friends, if all this is not mysterious and magical, then what is?
In closing, since honesty is integral to yoga, I must acknowledge that many lands are grander and more glorious than Massachusetts, not only outwardly but also inwardly in the planes and powers of consciousness to which they open. And yet, as a purely personal statement made from one subject to another, for me these wonders would be insubstantial and unfulfilling without the love of this mini miracle, this tiny treasure who goes by the name of Massachusetts. For I have never met a land of finer substance and higher aspirations, an earthly being who is more beautiful, more conscious, more sincere and pure than she is. And when I stand in the presence of this little princess of the Americas, my soul rejects the very notion of possessing any piece or part of her, not even one pebble or particle. No, may Massachusetts remain forever free and beholden only to the power of the Divine Mother, to her own soul, and to her dreams of an extraordinary future.
OK, I think I better stop here before Massachusetts decides I’ve gone to excess. When you are in the United States, just stay focused on the Divine Mother, the land, the road trips, and the road cuts. And if you ever come to Massachusetts, then try asking her for some tips on how to do the Integral Yoga.
[1] A roadcut is a cut through a hill or mountain for the purposes of building a road through it, rather than over it.
[2] Jewel centers are chakras of the earth, as explained in Miovic, M. (2012), “The Seven Jewel Centers of the Earth Mother,” in Collaboration, vol. 37, no. 3, pp. 9–13.
[3] See “The Shakers: Gift for the American Soul” by Susan Curtiss in this issue of Collaboration.
4] Burke, M.L., Swami Vivekananda in America: New Discoveries (Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama, 1972). See Chapter 1.
[5] Swami Vivekananda in the West: A Chronology (Vedanta Society of Southern California, 2016). Accessed from https://vedanta.org/swami-vivekananda-in-the-west-a-chronology/
MICHAEL MIOVIC is a clinical psychiatrist and long-time student of the Integral Yoga. He has collaborated extensively with colleagues around the world to apply the work of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother to psychology and psychiatry. He has a special interest in geospiritual studies based upon the seven jewel centers, or chakras, of the Earth Mother.
