The Journey Upward

The joyful journey, the Positive Way, is often ignored by serious spiritual writers. The reason for this is philosophical, and is discussed in the digression on dualism.

I first came across the Journey Upward in - I was going to cite a book, but of course we mostly encounter the Journey Upward in our childhood. I am not (and it is a fault in me) a particularly childlike man, but my sense of wonder and my joy in learning are the most childlike things about me. Supertramp sing about this in their Logical Song, which, from memory, starts something like:

When I was young, it seemed that life was so wonderful,
Magical, a miracle;
And all the birds in the trees, they were singing so happily,
Joyfully, playfully watching me.

They go on to speak of how logical, academic training can destroy this childlike joy and leave a person grasping for identity in a world grown grey and cold and meaningless; and this is part of the dilemma of our society.

Rejoicing in the imagination, in the created world and its beauty, and in the derivative creations we make are the heart of the Journey Upward. I became consciously aware of this first through the small but wonderful book called The Practice of the Presence of God, compiled from conversations and letters of a simple seventeenth-century monk called Brother Lawrence. My awareness was strengthened through John Piper's Desiring God, which he describes as "a serious book about being happy in God."

It was not, however, until I read Betty Edwards' Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain that I truly took off on the Journey Upward (and, incidentally, became interested in Zen). And this is not because it is a better book, either truer, or better written, or containing deep insights that Lawrence and Piper have missed. It is simply because their books, however focussed they were on things beyond my logical, rational mind, were talking to that mind; whereas Edwards told me how to open up the parts of me where most of the Upward Journey actually happens. Despite Edwards' title and her emphasis, this is not only the "right brain", but also the "limbic brain" - an idea discussed more fully in the chapter on Awareness of the Mind's Mechanisms.

Distracting the Earthbound Brain

There are a number of ways of moving out of the confines of the mundane into the Journey Upward, and I discuss some I know of here.

Art, Symbol and Myth

These are traditional "inward-journey" tools that also help us on the Journey Upward.

Affirmation of Creation

The "stepping stones" or "stairs" to the knowledge of God in the tradition of the Via Positiva (Positive Way) involve contemplation of the beauty of creation. This is also an enjoyable and worthy activity in itself.

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