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Rick Archer: Welcome to Buddha at the Gas Pump. My name is Rick Archer, Buddha at the Gas Pump is an ongoing series of interviews with spiritually Awakening people. There have been nearly 340 of them now over the past six years, so if this is new to you and you want to check out others go to batgap.com and look under the past interviews menu. I always say this in the beginning also that there’s a Donate button on the site, and we rely on the support of appreciative listeners and viewers. For to enable us to do this. My guest today is Mary Reed. Mary is an accidental mystic, which is the title of her book, who, following 11 years of profound involuntary visions and insights into divine realms surrendered her executive life in Washington DC to explore her spiritual gifts in a remote Buddhist Nunnery in India. She grew up without any interest in religion, but with an innate knowing that humans had more ability to access greater wisdom than most seem to realize. She’s originally from the US southwest, but spent most of her career directing global health care programs and creating nonprofit partnerships throughout America and Africa. Today, she divides her time between tamas selling Nunnery in India where she is often immersed in silence. Cambodia, where she works with wide open wings, a small charity she co founded, and traveling to speak with a variety of audiences to share her story as a way to illuminate the common ground of love, and precious divinity in all of us, and to inspire joyful, collective resurrection and remembrance with her unique view of our beautifully awakening world. And as you can tell Mary’s a good writer for because she wrote back where I just read. And, and her book was very well written, and it’s kind of a page turner. And when it starts, you’re telling the story of how you very kind of methodically and carefully, we’re in the process of committing suicide by taking a whole lot of pills. And in the book, you don’t talk too much about what led up to that decision, although you do allude to, you know, financial difficulties and relationship difficulties and stuff like that. But perhaps you could start in just telling us your story, wherever you’d like to take wherever you’d like to start. And we’ll see where we go with it.
Mary Reed: Okay, well, first of all, thank you very much for the invitation. I’m really delighted to be here. I love your work, as I was telling you before, I really love what you do. And I’m so appreciative of all that you offer all of us. So thank you,
Rick Archer: oh, thank you, oh, I want you to start by telling us actually where you are right now what time it is there. And what it actually what it actually takes to get to that place, because it’s an amazing thing that we’re even able to do this.
Mary Reed: It is it’s totally an amazing thing. So I’m at Towson Ling nunnery, which is a really tiny little remote nunnery, it’s located in the rice fields. Excuse me, you have to walk 10 minutes after your lead off at a little bridge by a taxi. And I’m in the northern Maine, right in northern India, it’s about so by bus, it would be 12 hours from Delhi. And then I’m in the actually I’m in the Abbasids office. And everybody here at the nunnery was very excited about this interview. So they fixed it all up for us. It’s really a very, very simple little nunnery. So that’s where I am. And actually to make this happen, they actually increase the Internet services, just for this interview, because it’s really very, it’s really very remote here.
Rick Archer: That’s great. The little guys are outside running at double speed on the treadmills getting it. Yeah. Okay, so that’s where you are. And that in itself is interesting, then we’ll talk about why you ended up there. But um, let’s go back a bit and start at the beginning.
Mary Reed: Yeah, so, the reason so you asked first about, or you commented first about the suicide, that suicide came about because me being here in this Nunnery is really, really really far from the life that I was living. For many years. I was an executive in Washington, I had a life that I really enjoyed, and I didn’t have any religious background ever at all, nor did I have any interest in any kind of religious topics. I was never a seeker never had a lot of questions and never met the Bible. I didn’t know anything about other religions. And in the summer of two 1000 I began hearing a voice. And that voice said that I was supposed to be doing something very important. And I tried to ignore the voice, but it just kept getting more persistent and more pronounced. And after six months of that, there was a series of
Rick Archer: events that are up so voice, I presume you mean, just sort of an intuitive prompting? Or was it sort of like a, you know, Charlaine, Heston movie booming voice, you know, was it actual audibly inside your head, or just kind of more like an impulse?
Mary Reed: Um, you know, I think I’m, the way that I phrase it in my book was that it is more like, you know, when a bass singer hits a bass note, like a really heart, you feel a little after sound vibration, that’s what it felt like that it was more like a packet of information that’s interpreted as a vibration. And it was very, very, very clear. And it kept coming to me again, and again, and again, at every single time, it would say the exact same thing. And that voice said, you’re supposed to be doing something very important. And so after six months of that, there was a series of events. That will, I’m sure we’ll talk about, that led to my first metaphysical event, and then the gates just flung open to all of this metaphysical abilities. And when that happened, it was incredibly confusing to me, because everything was related to God and Jesus and Buddha and angels and the divine realms. And I had no context for any of that, because I have no religious background. And so I was really very, very confused. And so specifically, you
Rick Archer: had a metaphysical event, and everything was related to God and Jesus. And but, I mean, what were you actually experiencing that, you know, caused you to realize that everything’s related to Jesus and Buddha, and what was that medic physical event?
Mary Reed: Well, the first metaphysical event was, I went to find out what this voice was, I went to see a friend of mine, who’s a psychotherapist, and she specializes in near death experience, and that sort of stuff in Arkansas. And I went to see her to get help with figuring this voice out. But at the same time, I had already just a few days before I went to see her, I also had this sudden realization, this really profound realization that I had forgotten something really important. And I knew that those two things were connected. So I went to her to get help with this. And I don’t mention this in the book. But I’ll tell you, when I was on the plane flying from Washington, DC to Arkansas to see her. I was trying to figure out what could be so important that something keeps prompting me to do something very important, or this thing that I’ve forgotten. And on the plane, I had this notion somehow, that I must have forgotten something like I know the secret to purifying water, like some very simple little sidenote silly, some simple little thing that if I imagine it, you know how many people I could help if I knew something really, really simple like that. That is exactly what was in my head when I went to see her, and that’s the sort of scale that I was thinking on, it’s probably something like water. And
Rick Archer: because you’re doing that sort of thing, I mean, trying to help with AIDS in Africa and things like that.
Mary Reed: Yeah, at this time, I was actually doing clinical research and respiratory medicine and AIDS. And so but you know, I’ve always done work to help people. So I thought it had to be something to help people. And so when I actually saw her, she put me under, she just had started putting me under hypnosis. And I went into this event, which ultimately was going into the body of Jesus, at his moment of crucifixion. And in that event, learning everything. Like suddenly I just knew everything about the evolution of man up to that point. And then I knew everything that was happening in the world at that moment of the crucifixion, not just around the Crucifixion scene itself, but everything that was happening. And then I could watch as everything unfolded from that point forward to current day. So you
Rick Archer: say you knew everything in the world that was happening? Do you mean in minut detail like you knew what some guy in China was doing and what was happening in the southern tip of Africa are more like a broad stroke kind of sense of where the world was at and trends of time and all that.
Mary Reed: The latter it was but But it was it’s the scale of it is just not fathomable it was knowing everything, but also embodying all of the nuances of everything that it had was happening at that time and everything that had led up to that moment.
Rick Archer: Okay, this silly question, I’m not going to ordinarily interrupt you as much as I am right now. But I’ll let you get rolling. But for some reason, this silly question has been kicking around my head since I read your book. And that is, do you think that Jesus was aware that, you know, some chick from the future was kind of crashing his his experience there and tuning into it already? Is this something that you just tuned into, and it had nothing to do with his subjective experience?
Mary Reed: Well, in that moment, I did not have the identity. As Mary, I was aware of myself, but I didn’t have the identity of Mary had the I, I had the identity of Jesus on the cross and Christ in the spirit form then. So there was no separation between his knowledge of his own being and me within him. So does that answer your question?
Rick Archer: Kinda? I mean, there was yeah, there wasn’t. So it’s not like Jesus, the the man 2000 years ago, being crucified, was aware that people from the futures are namely, you were tuning into what he was experiencing? It was just, that’s probably too rational and linear, an explanation of what was actually going on?
Mary Reed: Yeah, it was, it was very much me being present in that moment. And there was no. Essentially, I wouldn’t have been from the future in that moment, if that makes sense. Yeah. And so in that, in that scene, that was very much me. Understanding the world before Christianity, with the birth of Christianity, and then the evolution of Christianity from the perspective of Christ. And so this is the kind of so that that scene was three and a half hours. And then the next day, she took me back in a in a regressive hypnosis, we back in a different way, it was completely different scene, but again, in the ethereal realms and meeting angels, and godlike being and other things in another three, almost three and a half hours. So that weekend began a series of these these really profound events, but almost all of them were related to the origins of something that we think of as divine truth. For example, the, you know, the origins of what we would consider the universe, the origins of Buddhism, the origins of these, a thought and a fear and other things. You were going to ask something? Well,
Rick Archer: just Why do you suppose you were being shown all this? There must be a reason. Yeah, I would say,
Mary Reed: yeah, well. It would just be conjecture on my part, at this point, I have not been shown specifically, you need to know this. I mean, in the big picture. related to my life’s work about coming here to be able to bridge the ethereal realms in the physical realm, that that is my purpose. That’s why I can’t. And one would think that that would, you know, as part of my course, in this destiny, this would be how it’s going to play out?
Rick Archer: Yeah. Because my sense is, if you had this sort of nagging, prompting that you’re supposed to be doing something, you’re supposed to be doing something, then there was some sort of higher and given given what you subsequently experienced, there’s some sort of higher intelligences that were prompting you. And so when you had these hypnotic sessions and began experiencing all this stuff, you must I would assume that you are getting shown the things that they wanted you to be shown to have the kind of education you needed to have to do whatever you are subsequently doing or going to do.
Mary Reed: Yeah, I think that’s a fair statement. And it feels to me like they just sort of threw me off the deepest end, and if we’re going to start there, and and so this is how the whole thing has progressed every single time that these things have happened. And the only time that had happened under hypnosis was those first two times and then I began to spontaneously have these things start happening. And every time that they’ve happened, it’s been like, all the way to the The fundamental origin of something, in this case, for example, the origins of Christianity. And so the challenge that I have so, so going back to the original comment about the suicide was, you know, I had a very big life in Washington, DC, I was very busy, I had a lot of projects and programs around the country and around the world. And so, and I live very much a sort of normal executive life, and without any kind of spiritual context, anything. And so having all of this stuff come into my life that I couldn’t talk about, because it’s not something that you can kind of just tell people at the watercooler over the weekend. And so I didn’t know how to talk about it. And I also didn’t know how to hold it. And, and I didn’t know what to do with it. And so it just kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And there was a, there was a large piece of me that was feeling quite insane with with the profound unspeakable nature of all of these things. And so, trying to hold my two worlds in balance was really very, very difficult. And so I kept trying to seek help with this, like I saw allopathic doctors and acupuncturist and shamans and various kinds of healers all over the world. And no one could help me understand what was happening, and they couldn’t help me talk about it, and they couldn’t help me know what to do with it. So the further and further along, I got in trying to seek help, the more failures I kept having over and over again, and then in around 2008 2009. All of the normalcy in my life and everything that I had been very successful in, just began to crash, everything, my relationship, my home, my work, my family, my finances, every single aspect of the normalcy of my life, just came crashing down in very certain point of no return ways. And at the same time, the spiritual pieces just pushing higher and higher and higher. So when the balance tipped upside down, I made a decision at that time that what must be happening in my life, was that it was, this was all a sign that the work I’m supposed to do is from the Divine Realms. And that was nothing at all that I had been shown, it was just a decision that I made in my massive state of despair. And so that’s when I made the decision to end my life with a drug overdose on. Ultimately, it was March 23 2011.
Rick Archer: I want to dwell on this a little bit, because I have pretty strong opinions about suicide. And I’m sure you do too. At this point. My mother tried to commit suicide three times taking massive overdoses of phenobarbital which my father needed to take for his epilepsy, I have had three very good friends who are ardent spiritual seekers, who committed suicide to buy gun one by self immolation. And, and, you know, a couple of those guys had been living on a monastic program that I had once been on and had been, you know, really applying, going at it. intensively seeking Enlightenment and God realization and so on. And, you know, if our little conversation here can save one person from making that decision, I think the whole thing will have been worth it just for that. Because in my opinion, which I stated is rather strong. I don’t feel I mean, I wouldn’t be opposed to euthanasia for somebody who’s on their deathbed suffering terribly or something. But, you know, for a relatively young person, relatively healthy person who thinks that they should check out for some reason, and that things will be that they have the right to just make that decision that they’re needed elsewhere, and that they should, you know, kill themselves. I just feel like it’s wrong, and they just need to work through something. And, you know, it’s very sad when that sort of thing happens. And they probably need professional help, because in all three of those cases, all four of those cases, including my mother, there was definitely a psychological disturbance going on depression and whatnot, that could have that’s the proper intervention could have perhaps balanced out and prevented that. That turn of events. So I just wanted to throw that in there as a sort of an editorial here, and then I’ll let you continue. Maybe you want to play off what I just said.
Mary Reed: You know, I can’t imagine that. There’s anybody that comes to that point. That hasn’t felt like they’ve tried everything that it is a it is a last ditch effort to end the suffering. And everybody has their own way, but what they would consider the depths of sort of the bottom, that there’s nowhere else to go. And in my case, so for example, in my case, I tried to seek help again and again and again and again and again. And so for me, there was no answer, I couldn’t get any answers anywhere in my life. And I’m sure that other people in the state of, you know, such despair as to seek suicide, feel the same way that there is no other place. So I don’t know. I do think, I do think that having someone to talk to, is probably one of the most important things to be able to prevent it. Because so for example, in my case, I couldn’t talk about what was happening, if I felt like I could trust other people and open up, it probably would have prevented me from going there. But and then and in that, I mean, like a friend or a family member or something, not somebody professional who’s paid to listen to you. But beyond that, I can’t I can’t place a judgment of right or wrong, uh, personally, on someone else, because the pain is. You know, if someone wants to end their life, if they’re terminally ill, and they’re really intense physical pain, we would have a lot of compassion about their their desire to stop that kind of pain. So is a mental or emotional pain, any less than a physical pain? Is it less significant or important to get to the point of wanting to end one’s life? I don’t know, I think that’s a very, I don’t feel in a place to judge that right or wrong, I certainly can.
Rick Archer: Delay right or wrong on it. But obviously, if you’re, if you’re dying of some kind of cancer, and you have, you know, weeks to live, I mean, there are spontaneous remissions, but chances are, you’re gonna die, and maybe you’re just gonna suffer for the next few weeks, and it’s compassionate to let yourself go. But if you’re in your 20s, and you happen to just be very depressed or something. You know, it seems to me it’s a different situation. You know, and various spiritual traditions talk about the karmic implications of all this. And you know, and you and you said, there was no place to go, and no one to ask no one who knew what to tell you. But now we’re actually having a conversation which 1000s of people will watch, in which we can say, hey, you know, keep your chin up, there’s, there’s light at the end of the tunnel.
Mary Reed: Well, and actually, this points to a very important issue, and that is, when I would see psychotherapist or physicians now remember, this is now 15 years ago, and when I would talk about that I was having metaphysical events. And there was this thing that I could not figure out, I people dismissed me pretty quickly. And people were very sort of suspicious, and, and not really feeling that it was really true to that I needed this kind of help. And so I think there’s a real value in having spiritual dialogue and mysticism, and particular metaphysical events, unexplained things, coming into common conversations, and health care and mental health in particular. And because, you know, the, the the therapists that I work with, they didn’t have any kind of training to work with somebody who was so seriously depressed. So you mentioned that a couple of your friends that committed suicides were people on the spiritual path. And I think that, yeah, so having somebody having health care professionals, in particular mental health professionals trained in being able to handle and manage and have their own resources to support their own work with these people is really valuable. And these, the therapist who finally helped me significantly, is part of a network of people that are trying to introduce that into their circle of professionals in the Maryland, Washington DC area. So it’s incredibly valuable. And I think that that’s something that really needs to be talked about in more of a public sphere.
Rick Archer: Yeah. And there was something maybe there still is called the spiritual emergency network and Stanislav Grof has talked about spiritual emergencies and many other people One there are therapists who are actually more or less beginning to specialize in this, or at least are very familiar with it because it keeps coming up so often. And don’t just dismiss such people as crazy, but realize that something is going on. And one of the one of the reasons I have people on the show on BatGap, who are having kind of fire up mystical, there are some people say, who say, for instance, you shouldn’t just keep having these people on who are seeing angels and all that stuff and having, you know, just talk about non duality. That’s the ultimate reality. But all but it’s becoming more or less epidemic, that people are having all kinds of amazing experiences. And you know, and we get feedback all the time from people who don’t know quite what’s going on, or why this is happening to them or what to do about it. And I think it’s necessary to sort of bring it into the culture more a wider a deeper understanding of this kind of phenomenon. So that when it does happen to people, they aren’t freaked out. And they feel like they can, yeah, turn to somebody for information.
Mary Reed: Yeah, because I didn’t know a single person. I couldn’t I and the other important thing about programs like yours, and the idea of introducing more spiritual conversation and sort of common culture, is that there’s a unique language to this awakening world right now, you just mentioned non duality, I would have had no clue what that meant. I didn’t even know the word consciousness. When I was referred to see Dr. Rudi Bower, he runs the Washington Center for consciousness studies, and I highly recommend him by the ways in Washington, DC. But I didn’t, I couldn’t figure out why the word consciousness was in the title of his business, like, what does that have to do with anything to me that’s just being awake. It didn’t, I didn’t have any idea about the use of these kinds of words in spiritual work. So introducing newcomers, and there’s lots of newcomers, I’ve watched a few clips from your show. And I know that you have people that had no spiritual background, who sort of had these, you know, profound events started happening, it’s important for us to have resources to go to to to understand how people are talking about it. And you know, what are they? Where are they getting their information? And how can I reach them? And how can I connect? Who is their community, none of this was available to me. I didn’t know how to find it, certainly 15 years ago,
Rick Archer: yeah. And incidentally, on BatGap, under the past interviews menu, there’s a one of the choices is categorical index. And in the categorical index, there’s actually a whole category of therapists whom I’ve interviewed, who are very familiar with this sort of thing. And wow, obviously, there are probably many more such people out there, but help is available. So we can move on to other topics. But you know, I just want to say that if anybody is feeling suicidal or depressed, or anything else, help is available, it’s not a it’s not a shortcut to anything to end your life. And your your, your existence, your evolution is going to continue, but it’s probably going to be a major speed bump to make that choice, and there are better choices.
Mary Reed: So let me just add, obviously, my suicide attempt, it didn’t work, I took 97, prescription pain and sleeping pills with three glasses of wine. And then I just miraculously woke up on my own two days later. And when I, I woke up very sick. And my physical state was really very bad. I was in excruciating pain, I had no ability to control my motor skills. And when I was conscious enough to realize what I had done to myself, and and the reality finally hit of what would have, what the implications of that act would have been on my family and my friends, and, you know, my former colleagues and all of this, it was really a profound remorse and and I still struggle to this day, with. Sorry, was the idea of what I did to me.
Rick Archer: Sorry, that’s good.
Mary Reed: This happens in my talks, too. It’s really it’s really extraordinary. I mean, I don’t I obviously don’t know what I would have thought had I succeeded. Maybe I would have been in a blissful state thinking Well, I’m happy to be free but I’ll never know that in my in my physical form. Now in a body that that is really you know, it’s forever I have a liver that will never be the same. It’s it’s really something I have to live with for the rest of my lives.
Rick Archer: Yeah. And what would your insights be on the notion that the body is a vehicle? And, you know, you, you don’t want to damage the vehicle that that you depend upon to make this journey.
Mary Reed: I would say that’s 100%. Correct. And for me, I consider my painful right side, which still pains me today, five years later, as a chronic reminder, not chronic but a constant. Persistent. And I’m quite loving, like, it’s not a this is not continual punishment. This is just a reminder that this body is important. And there’s no other system for me in this world to bring in source and allow all that I am and all that comes through me to express itself except through my body. Yeah,
Rick Archer: yeah. And I would say that’s kind of a universal truth. Yeah, yeah. Okay, so obviously, your horse, your whole story is not just about your, your suicide attempt. There’s much more to it. So unless there’s more you want to say about that? Let’s move on to what happened after that. And, you know, what, where are you? How things have been progressing over the years?
Mary Reed: Um, well, actually, when I woke up from that suicide attempt, you know, I had at that time, two worlds that I couldn’t live in, I couldn’t figure out how to be successful in my normal physical life. And I couldn’t figure out what to do with the spiritual life. So I couldn’t, I couldn’t do either one. And I had been trying forcefully, aggressively eagerly. To figure it out to be in control of my life, as I always had been. And after I woke up from the suicide attempt, I realized that there’s, there was nothing I could do, I needed to stop, I just needed to stop. And so I stopped trying to figure things out, I stopped trying to plan I stopped trying to fix, I literally sat on the edge of my couch, numb, and I, I just decided I surrendered in the most supreme way. And I, every day, many times a day, I would just say, God, you can see I have no idea what I’m doing. So if there’s going to be doors, that open, you’re going to have to open them, I cannot be the project manager for my life anymore. And when I got into that really extreme state of surrender, literally, within just days, all these doors just started opening one by one by one by one, I didn’t even really have to push the door. I mean, it was just like an invitation to come this direction, and come this direction and come this direction. And one of the first doors to open was leading me to a therapist. Now by this time, I had seen more than 40 practitioners, various kinds of nobody came even close to helping me. And right after the suicide attempt, the door was open to this absolutely perfect therapist who worked with me to get me back on my feet. And then she happened to have trained with Dr. Rudi Bower at the consciousness Institute. And so it was just you know, the right resources, one right after the other, but it was after I stopped trying to be the one in charge. And let my my life unfold in the way that it was meant to. It’s interesting.
Rick Archer: Irene was just saying the other day, how it seems that surrender so often precedes a significant spiritual awakening or shift. And, you know, and how hard knocks can often bring one to the point of surrender, you know, various other kinds of difficulties, but it does seem to be a common theme that this sort of, you know, the old bumper sticker let go and let God seems relevant. Yeah.
Mary Reed: I, I’m often asked that question in my talks about, Do I feel like that it’s really necessary for people to get to that stage. I don’t think it’s necessary for everybody. And I recently saw your interview with della, I think, and she seemed like a woman. She was very happy and she had this awakening without any kind of crisis that led up to it. But I think for many people, I have a very strong mind. I You know, I couldn’t have otherwise living in Washington DC for 17 years. But it in order for me to get to a path, particularly because I had no religious background, in order for me to get on that path, something really serious had to take me out of where I was going to go or where I, where I wasn’t where I wanted to go. And there was no other way for me to do it, I would not have gone gently in that direction, it just wouldn’t have happened. So I think for people that are really entrenched in their ideas of what their life should be, and they’re really not headed in the direction that at a deeper level they want to be, or they’re here to be, I think that that that state of surrender has to be pretty, they have to be sort of pushed there.
Rick Archer: Yeah, I would say one way of putting it would be that as long as you feel like you’re in charge, and that you can handle things, and so on, and so forth, there’s a natural tendency to want to do that. And, you know, to run the show, and, you know, maybe some people are flexible enough or humble enough for something that they can just recognize that, you know, without being knocked over the head by something, they can just recognize that maybe there’s a better way to do it, and they should just relax. But, but I think a lot of people, myself included, really needed to sort of hit bottom before before, you know, shifting gears like that, and kind of allowing something else to take care of it. And when do you also say that it’s not just a sort of a black and white, you know, first you’re here, then you’re there kind of situation, but they’re certainly deeply ingrained tendencies and remnants of styles of functioning, that are just going to keep cropping up again. Or for you, was it a complete watershed moment? And ever thereafter? You have been in the backseat?
Mary Reed: Well, yes, yes. To the latter, it was a watershed moment, and I have not known how to impart I haven’t been able to feel like I’m in control, I tried to do it. After nine months here, living here in the nunnery getting sort of, okay, now I can put my life back together again. And that was just a complete disaster. But also, I’m gonna go back to something that you said, so people like him, don’t bring up della again. So what I thought when I was watching her, which was a lovely interview, by the way, is that I think that so for me, in my situation, there was enormous lessons that came out of it. Because on the other side, after the suicide attempt, and after coming into the spiritual journey with really, in this focus, what I could then see was all of the conditioning of my own life, my old life. And all of these lessons that were just beautiful in what I had been doing, which was not a bad thing, I lived a very nice life, I enjoyed what I did, and I helped a lot of people. But I saw it through a completely different lens. And I know that I came into this life, intending to have that kind of rich continuum of experiences, I intended to do that. And so people like dela and other folks who, perhaps they come in already having done a lot of that work, and they have those sorts of dudes innately with those experiences to get those different understandings and lessons that they’re more already a part of who they are. That’s that’s sort of how I thought when I was watching that interview.
Rick Archer: So your your voice broke up slightly when you were saying that, but I, to summarize, then to make sure we got it all. You’re saying that, in retrospect, you can see how all the events of your life were, were various lessons, different types of lessons, and that the it was all sort of well and wisely put in terms of teaching you the things you needed to learn? Right? You were saying? That’s what you’re saying? Right?
Mary Reed: Yeah, that’s, that’s a fair summary. Okay. And,
Rick Archer: and you said, you know, somebody like Dell, or maybe other people come in having already learned a lot, but I don’t know, I would, I would conjecture that if if you come in at all, there’s more to learn, or you wouldn’t be here.
Mary Reed: Oh, yeah. But I’m saying maybe hers were different, less different. So. Yeah, yeah. Maybe they don’t need to be learned so sharply. Right now there’s a, there’s a different kind of embodiment of an experience to learn it gently or to learn it more sharply or severely. And, for me, mine was definitely the hard route.
Rick Archer: Yeah. I mean, are you comfortable? universalizing that, you know, to say that, you know, Syrian refugees are learning lessons and you know, you know, kids who are enslaved in Bombay and you know, and stuff like that are learning lessons. or is that does that seem too harsh?
Mary Reed: Well, everybody is learning lessons. It doesn’t matter whether we are a prince with no problems, which I doubt but or Syrian refugees or children’s sold into slavery or whatever, there are lessons on every side of those issues. But bigger than that, and this is part of what my site is my site is very, both with the details, and also more cosmically, but the lessons that those people are teaching are not specifically just for them. They’re teachers, actually, on a much larger level, it’s more to the conscience consciousness, sorry, to the conscience of the collective. And so there’s a lot of dialogue. Syrian refugees is a great, a great example. We have a lot of, of global conversations about compassion, about responsibility, about fairness, about fear, about judgment, we have so many conversations, because we have millions of people teaching us that there’s a problem, that there’s a global cry, there’s a loud cry of love, and how are we going to answer it. And so people like that. People that have the more severe, publicly noticeable issues, there are different kinds of teacher and they’re learning different lessons, as we are, we’re learning lessons with them.
Rick Archer: Well, as you know, spiritual traditions, Buddhism, Hinduism, and so on, kind of know that they address this point of learning lessons. And they all sort of indicate that, you know, we’re all progressing towards something through these lessons. And you’ve given this some thought and had mystical insights regarding the progress of the culture over the past couple of 1000 years. So, you know, what would you say without just parroting what Buddhism says? What would you say about that, about what we’re progressing toward individually and collectively?
Mary Reed: Well, a couple of things. First, I don’t know what Buddhism says, I’m in a Buddhist nunnery. But I don’t I don’t know about the Buddhist doctrine. I get the support of the nuns here, but I don’t actually know the philosophies. I know them from the experiences of being in the mind of Buddha. But that’s very different than the teachings that came out of it. And I have much deeper than just a 2000 year. Look at this literally, from the origins of the first. I know my first thought as conscious awareness, literally my first thought and I had seen in a very global way, not global, cosmic way. How evolution is happening. And evolution is kind of a funny word, because that implies linear point A to point B to point D. And that’s not really my experience of it. However, I know that individually and collectively, the whole point is that we are seeking to be all that we are, and all that we are is love and goodness. And so the exploration of what all is possible in that state, is exactly what we’re doing. And so the the, there’s not really an end goal, but our purpose is to feel the wholeness of of what we are of all that we are. And that’s an infinite. It’s infinite possibilities. And so what we’re doing is exploring that, but what we’re what we’re progressing towards now is ways of exploring that in a way that’s not a dualistic conflict based exploration. And that’s where we’re coming out of, we’re not coming into we’re going to be whole suddenly it’s that we’re going to continue experiencing the possibilities of that in a way that is much gentler, and I just, it is not, so it’s not suffering based. That’s where we’re going.
Rick Archer: So a couple of questions. So, when you say you know, your first thought this means like, when you as an entity first came into existence like 1000 lifetimes ago or whatever, you know, is that what you meant by that you know, your first emergent impulse as an individuality
Mary Reed: so I had so in the in the scene that I was talking about with with Christ is the Moment of the crucifixion, and understanding all of the world in that moment. And in another instance, not under hypnosis was going into the mind of Buddha, at his first moment of Enlightenment, and seeing what he saw, and understanding things in the way that he’s he saw them, he understood them, before any words were ascribed, but that situation or any teachings came out of it. So was the moment of the foundation of what ism. And in that same kind of origins way, in the field, the ultimate field of nothing, the exquisite void of nothingness, which is also the field of pure potential. What was described to me as the primordial ground that being before there’s being or the potential for life before there’s the living of life. So I, I entered into that field. First seeing it and then becoming it. There’s no separation, and then experiencing the way that it came into the men the manifestation of life, the existence, and that is the infusion of that God’s source or that that love source the source, into its vessel, for expression. And in that moment, in that first pivotal moment, the waking up to conscious life, and understanding, the first thought was, I am goodness, and I want to be all that I am. And when that happened, in my own individual awareness, which I’m also in oneness with everything, everything was set in motion. Everything, all of evolution started from that point,
Rick Archer: for your particular Jeeva your particular soul or entity, it’s out you’re you’re saying or free for the whole universe, which one is saying,
Mary Reed: my experience? Well, there was no separation between those two, there was no this and that it was all the same.
Rick Archer: I mean, what what I’m getting at is, I mean, we have this sort of notion of a big bang, you know, the universe emerging from nothingness or from pure potentiality. But we also have the notion of, you know, some people speak of old souls, for instance, that, you know, some people young souls, some people are old souls So, so the notion seems to be that souls kind of emerged from the primordial soup, you know, at a certain point, like, like little bubbles coming out of ginger ale or something, and then they, you know, according to whatever tradition you ascribe to, they progress through a series of many, many, many, many incarnations, and evolve up the scale and eventually become human and keep evolving, so on and so forth. So, when you talk about your initial emergence, your first thought that’s the kind of the kind of framework that I might put it into, I’m not sure whether that’s what you’re saying or not.
Mary Reed: Well, it would be so if you have an old soul, that soul has to have an origin somewhere. Yeah, presumably. Right. Yeah. And so it would be the origins of where that initial before there were many came? Yeah. Or if because we think of things in a in a time sort of way. But it’s not really that way. It would be when one was the individual and the many at the same time,
Rick Archer: right. But you know, there are 7 billion people on the planet and many more billions of other sets of species. Are you saying that, you know, each of these soul, each of these beings has an origin as a soul? And that, you know, if, if we could have the omniscience to see it, that we could see where that particular soul emerged? And that each of each of them has its evolutionary trajectory?
Mary Reed: Well, I can’t, I don’t know the answer to if everyone has their individual soul. And the reason I can’t answer that is because soul is a word. And when we get into this problem of trying to identify or contain something with a definition, then we necessarily exclude possibilities of something else. And so I can’t really say definitively this or that, in my experience, it wasn’t that kind of clear delineation. It is. It’s more complex than that. And we don’t have a word for it. We don’t have a concept for it. We have the, you know, the definition of soul is wrapped around a concept of this happening and then these things happening from there and it’s, it’s beyond that. It’s not really something that I can put into words,
Rick Archer: when you have mystical insights or visions or experiences, do you come out of them with a sense of frustration in a way, because it’s almost impossible to translate what you experienced into words, or even into into rational thought?
Mary Reed: Yeah, in the beginning, I really struggled with that I really and I have to. It’s not so it’s not so bad now. But in the beginning, I have to write really fast, but you know, to like, and then it’s like, what do I what do I write? I can’t even like, what do I, then this happened? But how do I say that. And it’s, it’s, it’s really impossible to capture all of the nuances of everything that happens, it’s not possible, it’s what I can capture is just an EQ of the scale of these things. And anybody who has these experiences, I’m sure has said the same thing. But the other thing that I experiencing sort of coming back, it’s not so bad now. But in the beginning, it was so sharp, that this sort of difference from that, that world to this world. I would experience great frustration in coming back to this world, I I once wrote a creative piece called The Mystic in the coke bottle. And that’s what it felt like coming back from these events is sort of squeezed back into this life, having been so expansive, and, and then I have to come back in and everything feels very rigid. And I really struggled enormously with that in the beginning, especially because I was I was having these things while I was working, or while I was in my neighborhood, or whatever. So it was it was just too messed up.
Rick Archer: Yeah. Interesting. Do you feel like you’re in much better shape now in terms of integrating the boundaries with the boundless?
Mary Reed: Yes, much better. It’s, and it’s, you know, I have the foundations, the foundations were sort of the first pieces to come. And so I needed a long time to integrate those understandings and those perspectives into my normal day to day life. You know, most people who, who approach the spiritual path from more of an intellectual curiosity, like they do a lot of reading or studying or whatever their their part is hearing the, the series or the philosophies, and then taking the time to sort of figure out how that fits into their life or to apply it to their life. And I’m on the other side of that, I have the knowledge, and then I have to figure out how that how to fit that into my life from the other side. So either way it takes it takes a long time, but for me, this part is much, much easier. Now. It’s it’s much gentler.
Rick Archer: Yeah, I would have to say that the name of the game of spiritual evolution and Lightman and all that stuff is, yeah, is learning how to integrate unboundedness with boundaries, to use a couple of simple terms, or there could be other terms. But you know, and for some, some people, it becomes a, you know, they go through phases, where the, it’s really lopsided, you know, there’s some people in this world, of course, who are very good at boundaries, you know, very good at precise performance of various kinds, flying a jet plane or doing neurosurgery or something, but who may not, you know, have any sense of unboundedness. And there are other people more rare, who end up having some kind of blowout awakening, and have to relearn how to brush their teeth and stuff, you know, because they, they totally lost any sense of how to function within boundaries. But ideally, one could, you know, fly the jet plane or do the neurosurgery Well, you know, firmly established and very unbounded condition.
Mary Reed: Yes, I can totally relate to the, you can’t figure out how to do things. Particularly, there’s a, there’s a part of this site that is kind of quantum and in nature, not a mystical vision as much as more energy. So I can also have these experiences of and I should mention that all of these are uncontrolled, of seeing, transcending the mechanisms of interpretation of reality, and coming straight to just the field of energy. And in those moments, I can’t figure out at all how to be normal. I can’t figure out where I stop and then something else begins and forget brushing my teeth. I mean, it’s not I couldn’t even like what’s the toothbrush like? It’s it’s a really difficult thing, but I also want to say something about I don’t know how you set up the A spiritual journey is all about this or that
Rick Archer: integration of having it be a living reality. I mean, there are these vast causes, yeah, regions, unbounded awareness and all kinds of subtle realms and all this stuff. And, you know, ordinarily we’ve we’ve kind of got it together in terms of being able to function as an individual, at least to some extent, you know, we’re good at functioning within boundaries. But then, you know, when we start dipping into the spiritual realm, we discover that there’s this fast other thing that, in many people’s experiences is very hard to integrate with having a job and raising a family, you know, functioning efficiently within boundaries. Yeah. Monks, because they don’t have, they don’t have to do anything, they can just kind of like wallow in the, in the wonderfulness of
Mary Reed: I’m gonna tell them downs here. Yeah, that’s what they’re, that’s what their life is about. You know, I sort of see it a little bit differently. I agree with you that, that, I understand how you frame it that way. And I, I appreciate that. My experience is, there’s sort of two ways to the beauty of it. And I really consider it so exquisitely beautiful, this spiritual journey. One is, as we come into awareness of something, then it lives in a in a more mystical way or greater divine understanding our, our conditioned life is suddenly illuminated, like we understand how we have been fearing or how we have been judging, or how we have lived our life in this way, because of this conditioned belief, or pattern or habit or whatever. And understanding those pieces of ourselves and how we came to be how we are and engaging with other people. And then seeing being able to recognize that in other people is so beautiful, it really is, how we’ve done this is just magnificent. I mean, we sort of took the hardware to do it, but it’s really beautiful. And so there’s an understanding of where we’ve been and who we are and how we are, that’s really valuable. And at the same time beyond that, or beneath that or however you want to call it is the other side of the coin is the the greater divine understandings of the uncondition ality the equality state, the the lack of fear, the total trust how we’re completely loved, in a way that we have no idea about, regardless of what we’ve conditioned ourselves in this other life. So for me, I see those two things really coming together, more and more and more on the spiritual journey is really appreciating both sides and how one is supporting the other and one has been supporting our other life all this time. And we’ve had no idea about the all of the intricacies of it that are really beautiful.
Rick Archer: Yeah, I think that’s kind of what I was saying to it’s just in different words entirely. Yeah, just different way of putting it. But um, you know, sometimes, like the word Brahman means totality, you know, and Brahman is kind of a synonym for Enlightenment in a way the Brahman consciousness and so on. But it’s It would mean a, you know, having subsumed within the greater totality of one’s experience, all the sort of diversities and complexities and everything else, you know, and coming to appreciate and know that experientially, as the one thing, you know, the, the essential constituent of of everything, you know, the ultimate reality. And that takes a great degree of integration and assimilation, assimilation, and so on. I just heard the term the other day, I think, Swami Shivananda, or something used that a week Yogi’s people who have term he used people who have sort of had this yogic awakening, but are still very deficient in certain rail areas of their personality, their behavior, things like that. There hasn’t hasn’t yet been a complete infusion of that, you know, deeper reality into all the channels of their relative life.
Mary Reed: Yep, I can understand that.
Rick Archer: So, you know, getting back to what you originally told when you started hearing this voice, you know, you got important work to do in the world. There you are in a monastery in the Himalayas. I’m not working too much.
Mary Reed: Well, actually, I’ve been working for them the nunnery.
Rick Archer: Yeah. But I mean, do you feel like the best is yet to come in terms of what you may end up doing? And, you know, would you say that, in a nutshell, that involves somehow serving as a conduit through which the deeper realizations you have had, can be transmitted or infused into world consciousness?
Mary Reed: Yeah, without a doubt. And I am literally I can feel it so strongly. In fact, I, I’ve been working at the nunnery part time and exchange for my room and board here. And to have a place where I can stay in this sort of peaceful environment. But I do come out to talk about my story and share and that sort of stuff in the last two years. And part of that has been me sort of tiptoeing out into the world, to see how it feels to use my voice on a public stage. And to see how people hear that, what do people hear me say? And what do people how do people respond to my presence or my words? And then what is it that they’re, what is it that they’re responding with? And this has been great, great learning for me, I had no clue I hadn’t, because I don’t attend church, I don’t, I had no idea about the level of people’s hunger, I really had no idea. And that has been very poignant. In seeing how people react to me and to my story, and to my, my, my my message of hope. And people, I mean, you can just see it in their eyes that people want that permission to have hope. It’s phenomenal. And so yes, I do feel like the best is yet to come. And I feel myself right now, literally, like within the last few weeks, just starting that like, yeah, here it comes, I can just feel it. And so it’s no coincidence that I mean, no accident, rather that we’re having this interview at this time. And I’m feeling more more inspired to write and things are starting to sort of formulate, and whatever. So I can see definitely ways that I want to share my knowledge and work with people most assuredly. And I’m very excited about it. I have to say,
Rick Archer: yeah. And so how, how do they react? You know, and you mentioned, you know, you’ve been out doing some speaking and very inspiring how people react and so on and so forth. I mean, what kind of impact has does it have on people? Not only inspiring them in the moment where they’re sitting in there and a lecture, but perhaps, are there any anecdotes of shifts or changes that have taken place in people’s lives of more of a kind of a permanent nature?
Mary Reed: Yeah, I didn’t. You know, when I when I set out to just tell my story, and I really had no expectation I just needed, I knew I needed to tell my story, I needed to start start talking. I had no expectation about what was going to happen. I certainly didn’t anticipate really changing people’s lives, I just thought they might find it an interesting story, they might find permission to feel okay, if they have these events start happening in their life. I wanted to let people know that they may have friends or family that maybe start having this or if these stories start coming out in the public, that this is reason to have hope. That’s the sort of things I wanted to talk about. And what happened was from the very first talk, and my first talk was in a Roman Catholic Church in Stamford, Connecticut, I was invited to several churches there. And it was mostly little old ladies, like the average age was probably 80. And I had no idea how they’re gonna react to a Mr. Coming to tell their story. And they were 100% across the board blown away. I could feel it as as I was talking, and I was like, I don’t I don’t exactly know what’s happening here. And when I finished my talk, I said, So I’m happy to answer any questions that you have. And there was dead silence throughout the room. And, um, and it was a packed room. And I just thought, well, I have no idea what this means. And then finally, this woman in the front row, she raises her hand and says, I’m sure that I have questions, but I am so spectacularly startled. I have no idea where to start. And then everybody says, yeah, that’s that’s how I feel. They weren’t used to hearing such direct profound information from somebody standing right in front of them talking about it. Same things that Christ came to talk about the same teachings that they’re trying to sort of incorporate in their life. I’m standing before them saying, I’ve never read the Bible, but I can tell you what you know about the teachings of love from Jesus are absolutely spot on. And that there is this resurrection that’s happening. And I understand the Christ within I know what this is. And so I just didn’t, I didn’t expect that. And every single place that I went, that was the reaction every single time, it doesn’t matter if it was in Connecticut, or Michigan, or North Carolina, or wherever, across the board, the reactions were really profound. And then people, you know, after the talks, people, you know, line up to meet me and get me sign or book or whatever. And then people started to tell me, their stories and the, you know, lots of things that they don’t tell that are the same kinds of mystical mystical secrets that they’ve been keeping. And so they have a little insight into themselves, that opens those doors. But the other thing I really didn’t know, and I certainly didn’t anticipate was the level of people’s personal struggle, that they have to find answers to their deep questions or their deep sorrow. And when people started to come up afterwards, and sort of whisper to me that these really, really intense problems, you know, a terminal diagnosis, or a child who has died, or these other things, and they’re looking to me, this person who just simply has a story at this point, to give them some level of guidance, I didn’t anticipate that because I’ve never been a spiritual teacher or in a spiritual counseling role. And what happened to me in those moments when people are coming to me, and they’re, they’re eye to eye with me telling me these things, I, it’s a little bit like an out of body experience, I have no idea what’s going to come out of my mouth. And then there’s this thing that just transpires between us, and whatever’s happening, whatever’s coming through me and out of my mouth is so perfect. And I don’t mean that arrogantly, but it’s just, there’s this thing that’s coming through to say, I hear you. And here is this love that we can offer in this moment. And so, in that way, it’s been, it’s been stunning. It’s been really, really beautiful. So I’m very much looking forward to more of that.
Rick Archer: That’s, that’s really sweet. Yeah, I mean, we’ve talked both before this interview, and during it about, you know, serving as an instrument of God or an instrument of the Divine. And it’s, it’s very interesting, having that experience. Because of the, the surprises, one, one experiences as things come out of your mouth, you know, that you wouldn’t have anticipated, or that you didn’t know, you knew, and things like that, that you know, you couldn’t possibly have calculated would be just the right thing for that person to hear.
Mary Reed: Yeah, and I’ll mentioned what we talked about last night was, I was saying that you in particular, you’re like the, the lab partner, you’re like the spiritual lab partner that people should seek out because you like, do all of the work. And we can just peek over your shoulder and look at your notes. It’s all of the work that you’re doing. And we don’t have to do the work ourselves. You’ve got the people that you’re interviewing and the stories that they tell and what you do is really phenomenal. We’re really very, very blessed to have you.
Rick Archer: Well, thanks. You know, I’m just doing my little part, and I couldn’t do it without people like you, and people like Irene, without whom this whole thing would be organizational shambles. So, you know, we’re all kind of like one big team playing different, you know, positions.
Mary Reed: Yeah, go team.
Rick Archer: Um, okay, so where should we go from here? You know, we’ve, rather than just sort of dreaming up a question, is there any impulse within you of what we haven’t covered? And you know, what we want to be sure to cover as we go along today.
Mary Reed: Nothing comes to mind right off the bat.
Rick Archer: Okay. So let me just ask you, then. You know, there, I took a whole lot of notes from your book, and I could start glancing at them and asking you questions based on those. But one thing that that sort of comes up based upon what you were saying is that, and I was thinking as you’re speaking of, you know, shifts in cultural and scientific understanding that were, were so difficult for for the pioneers like Galileo or Louis Pasteur or others like that, who had a new understanding of the way things worked, and were ridiculed and threatened with All kinds of dire consequences if they kept saying what they knew. But eventually, you know, there’s there’s a saying in Sanskrit satyameva jayate day, which is that truth alone is victorious. And eventually it sort of when it’s time for something to be understood by the culture, there’s no stopping it. And, you know, it can be very challenging for the avant garde, who have to sort of deal with the prevailing ignorance is an appropriate word. But you know, what I was thinking, as you were speaking about the little, little ladies in Stanford, it was that there may be a much greater groundswell of awakening, and mystical experiences and so on, than we realize. And there may be, you know, a lot more people than we realize out there who are having these things, and I don’t know, quite quite what to make of them are afraid to tell anybody, that kind of thing. In fact, George Gallup, whom I actually met in 1976, has done polls of this sort of thing, I don’t know if he’s still alive anymore. But his organization’s done posing large percentages of the population, say they’ve had mystical experiences, and so on. And so, you know, we still live in a society in which a materialistic mindset is predominant, and kind of governs that kind of the economies and governs the sciences, and so on. But if we really are heading for a more enlightened age, then that has got to shift. And, you know, people like yourself, and many others are playing an important role in helping it do so.
Mary Reed: Yeah, so there’s several things I want to say on that. One is, I think that as we more and more of us wake up, and more and more of us mobilize, to infuse into our communities. And in our day to day lives, the our understandings are more of just a really basic fundamental level, about choices in life, about what we’re listening to about what we believe all of these things that then will ripple out into the systems, all of the systems that support the problems that we see in our world, economically, religiously, politically, etc. So I think that there’s a lot to come in that regard with the everyday people making different decisions and making different choices about their life just based on these understandings that they come into. But bigger than that, with I think, in addition to these, these understandings, I think that old language, and and in some ways kind of new language, too, I think we’re going to rethink the value of sort of the one line teachings that people really rely on and see the see the benefit of a more inclusive way of talking about spirituality, religion, etc. And, by that, I mean, so there’s a lot of the spiritual teachings that I, in my very short little time here, have watched. So for example, the idea of karma. The idea of saying that our world is an illusion, the law of attraction, this idea that suffering is intended to be here to make us stronger, that we’re intentionally conflict, basically, all of these sorts of things. There are ways that we recognize in a more sort of enlightened perspective, that these kind of hold us back, and they’re a little bit of a cop out in some places. And so for example, I live in India. And karma is often talked about, you know, somebody’s in a, for example, most notably the untouchables here, the caste that nobody has anything to do about. And so there’s a, there’s a blowing off of the need for compassion for that group, because it’s just their karma. And there’s also this idea that people can play now and pay later with karma. So, you know, I’ll do what I know I shouldn’t do now. And I’ll just pay the consequences in the next life. I hear these things here. And so there’s a watering down of the initial intention. And so I think that as you know, like, the law of attraction as well, you know, we look at a lot of people and think, Well, if they would just think more positive thoughts, you know, this wouldn’t be happening or, you know, I I’m especially troubled by the idea that this teaching about the We’re all just being an illusion. That really dismisses our call for compassion to people that are really suffering. And I often think about I think about my own spirituality, my my sort of check on things. I imagine I’ve worked in very hardship places, I worked in really, really destitute townships in Africa, in many places. I see it all around here, I also work in Southeast Asia. And I think about seeing a room in which there is a nine year old girl who has been sold into sex slavery, she lives in a room with a padlock on it. And her mother has sold her into slavery, because she needed the money. And her clients are soldiers. And so I think about, like the application of spirituality, if you’re standing in the doorway, of that nine year old girl on one side, and the mother and the soldiers lined up on the other side, what is the spiritual practice or a spiritual philosophy, that honors all that’s happening? In this moment, I can’t turn to a nine year old and say, if you just think more positively, you know, for this is a karmic thing, or this is all an illusion. Or, you know, if you’re just this is just awareness, you know, this is, there’s real, there’s real cop out, in my own opinion, with that kind of stuff. It’s a dismissal of real true suffering that goes on that I’ve seen that I know is around and I, I personally can’t let go have that level of deep desire to end suffering for all beings. With such single minded sort of not single minded, narrow minded philosophies, I know that the intention of those philosophies is not narrow minded, but we in the normal societies tend to take that and kind of cop out with it. So I hope that what evolves and I sort of what I see more and more, is a more inclusive way of talking about the application of spirituality and the principles of things like they helped. And that’s not to say that they don’t have value, I think they have enormous value. And I think they have enormous validity. But I think we’re gonna get out of this idea of using these as excuses, that we’re not digging deep.
Rick Archer: Yeah, that was beautiful and brilliant. And I was listening just this morning, as I was riding my bike, to Matthew, right, who am I going to interview next week, he’s an Episcopal priest, young fellow. And he was talking about the second Axial Age, we’ll be talking about this next week. And he, he was talking about how certain traditions you know, used concepts such as karma or world is an illusion, and, and so on, and so forth. And, you know, went very deep in a certain dimension, but we’re really not all inclusive. And he quoted father, Wayne Teasdale, who is a Catholic theologian, I believe, as talking about how and many others have said this, that it’s really not non duality, to say a thing like that it’s a kind of a lack of recognition of the, the presence of God, that in that nine year old girl and those soldiers, there is, you know, I’m not saying this anywhere near as well as I’d like to but there, you know, what I’m trying to say? It’s like, if God is really omniscient and omnipotent, and so on, and and if we think a little bit, we can kind of convincingly see that it is God is that divine intelligence permeates every speck of creation, then, you know, than to say the world is an illusion, what we really probably are trying to say is that the world is not as we ordinarily perceive it to be, but that doesn’t mean it’s, we shouldn’t care about it, it just means we actually failed to appreciate it, you know, that it’s actually much more divine much more sublime much more wonderful than we recognize. And if we, if we treat it as mere illusion, or mere material stuff, or anything else, we’re doing a disservice to the reality of what is.
Mary Reed: Yeah, that’s well put, I would agree with that.
Rick Archer: Yeah. And if we could actually, go ahead. No, no, go ahead. I was gonna say if we could actually appreciate what is then, you know, compassion would be unavoidable. It would be inevitable. You know, we couldn’t, we couldn’t. Well, you know, it was what’s the Golden Rule Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. If you actually see that you are them, then we can’t bear their suffering any more than we can bear our own. And we’re we’re forced To translate our, our divine cognition into action of some sort.
Mary Reed: Yeah, I mean, I, so I think my own my own response in that situation, standing in that doorway and looking both directions would be that. First of all, I see you and I see your suffering. And. And second of all, I hear this loud, profound cry for unconditional love for that connection to God. And so my responsibility in this is, how will I answer that call. And for me, it’s that simple. It is, you know, the looking into my own life and my own work and my own abilities, my own story, my own skills, my own access, and determining what, how will I respond to this? And in what way where, where in the thread, because what we’re seeing in these moments I mentioned earlier about these people are our teachers, these are the really big teachers, for us, teachers on a much greater conscience level, and that they’re the, they’re the, they’re the outcome of the problem, they are not the problem. And so taking time and taking the responsibility to look back in the mind streams, all that’s included in these mind streams that have brought them and asked to that moment, what’s in there, and what part of me and my choices in my life are in those mind streams supporting it. And so I think the I think the work is really deeply nuanced. And I think if each of us can come to that place of a honouring and seeing the suffering, and then be questioning how we’ll answer that call, because we’ve all got a way to do it, that’s really valuable. Every single one of us has a way to do it. That’s incredibly valuable.
Rick Archer: Yeah. And as you were saying that as, as you were kinda like, laying out that hypothetical, not, it’s not hypothetical, laying out that situation in which the nine year old girl is a sex slave and their soldiers outside the door, there are literally situations like that going on right now in the world. You know, my thought was, gee, that people listening to this might think, oh, yeah, it’s terrible. But what can I as a spiritual aspirant, do about something like that? I mean, I’m not there. If I were there, I’d probably get arrested or killed or raped or something, you know, you know, how do you confront? You know, Christ said, resist not evil? How do you confront a situation like that, and actually bring about change in the world. And, you know, I could give you my answer, but I’d rather hear yours.
Mary Reed: But I want to hear yours as well. But so, you know, there are people for whom it is a joy and a passion to respond to that directly, like they will, they will start a charity or work for a charity or volunteer for a charity that addresses that issue. And then there are all of the sorts of causes that lead up to that, that they may join in those efforts, oppression, gender inequality, economics. So they’ll come into it from different places that ultimately are drivers of that kind of suffering. And for them, that is there’s lots of ways that they can do that. And then there are people whose most valuable thing that they can do is pray and and offer up some this call for greater compassion and greater sight and and then they can extend that call into their own life of what are they doing to support in any kind of way, the factors that influence that kind of suffering. But I’m actually glad you you brought this up, because I did want to mention something. There is a way that our own internal work especially on our fears and judgment, especially on our fears, and judgment, have a massive impact on the collective and particularly now as we’re, we’re sort of in this really great stage of momentum in our world. So let me give you an example. Let’s say that, and I’m going to speak now on an energy standpoint, energy perspective. Let’s say that you and I have a conflict. And maybe you heard one of my talks on this. And we Okay, so this is this is an important example because it really is a very profound thing that’s happening on our planet and that that is really works on an individual basis. So let’s say that you and I have a conflict. And I’ve done something terrible to you when I’m If I’m mad at you, and you’re mad at me, and we have these energies of anger and blame and frustration, what that looks like on an energy level, it looks exactly kind of like a thread looks like a little beaded thread. And it’s a thread that gets really tangled up between us, doesn’t matter that you’re there. And I’m here energetically in the field of awareness. This is what it looks like, it looks like a thread that we just wind up around us and get it all tangled up. And then as I’m in my world, and I’m telling people about how awful you’ve been in this situation, and I can’t believe you did this, and this, and this, I’m winding that same thread around these other people, and you’re on your end talking about it with people. And so you’re doing it to you’re wrapping that, that thread around. And so as we move around, and we move around in our lives, and we bask in the energies of blame and victimhood and all of these sorts of things, we’re all just tangled up in this massive tangle of conflict, energy, and planetary airily, this is what we have looked like this, we are all just in this mass entanglement energetically, and we’re bound down literally, it looks like we’re bound down and held still, without being able to, to have a greater frequency or float. And so in this situation of conflict, if I in this circumstance, if I really earnestly take the time to go in and, and evaluate my own role in this my own part, my own responsibilities, my own feelings, and I own everything that I feel, and I finally get to the place of forgiveness. And that is not forgiveness of you. Because that would be a judgment right there that you’ve done something wrong, that forgiveness is always only for me for the way that I’ve seen things or the the thing that I’ve done, when I get to that place of authentic forgiveness for me, what happens energetically is that thread that has completely been round, round, round me, just opens up and begins to fall away, it begins to flow because I have transmuted my own fear and judgment, to compassion and understanding and love. And this is what’s happening. On my end, that thread just begins to fall away. And as it begins to fall away from me, it necessarily begins to fall away from you, you no longer have that push and pull on my end, it’s the same thing that begins to happen with the people around me and with the people around you all because I did my own work and plan a terribly. This is also now what’s happening with us this now, the flow is beginning to open up on a massive scale. Because more and more and more of us are interested in this introspection and getting into that place of really authentically transmuting our behaviors and reactions and these habitual things that we’ve manufactured long ago. And we’ve begun to let them go, we’ve began to open it up. And so now all around the planet, we are having these threads open up and now we begin to vibrate at a higher frequency, we begin to flow more readily and easily between us. And really sensitive people can actually feel that. So in a situation where we look at suffering of others that we don’t think that we’re related to or whatever they are impacted. The the energies that are creating those scenarios are impacted ultimately, by what we’re letting go up individually, anything that is in their entanglements, any of the energies that are in their entanglement, and I’m sorry for speaking in sort of in these solely energetic terms, but the things that entangle them, oppression, inequality, judgment, fear, etc, any of those common threads that we have that we clear on our own field, we begin to open up in those fields as well. And what that looks like, in real life is that you begin to see these sudden, just miraculous kinds of policies that change or a new leader comes into existence in a place where it’s really key for this kind of issue in our country or something. These things both, that’s the manifestation of the changes that we’ve made in the collective energy field.
Rick Archer: That’s great. I’m reminded of a simple analogy, which is that if you want the forest to be green, all the trees have to be green, you know, And, and it’s interesting to think of specific examples, for instance, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany, or the abolition of slavery, or the passage of the Civil Rights Act, you know, major sort of social milestones that have taken place in the world.
Mary Reed: And it’s just all recently, they all have happened just in the last 100 years, when you look at just the last 100 years, all of these enormous like, based on race based on gender based on non sexual orientation, all of these enormous advances in equality. And this is where we’re all going, it’s all going to come out, especially in equality, because in and I talked about this in my book, in the field of potential, everything is equal. There’s no judgment, there’s, everything is equal. So when we come into a dualistic setting, we, we intend to come in like this. But eventually we start right, wrong, less than more than whatever, and in there is suffering. And so as we reduce that suffering, we become more and more and more back to the state of equality. And so this is why you see it more and more coming about in these issues.
Rick Archer: Yeah. So it does seem that there’s a an acceleration of social change taking place. I mean, you can look on the dark side and thing, and, you know, certain political factions are always saying, Oh, the country’s going to hell in a handbasket. And, you know, we got to restore America back to its original greatness, and make America great, again, is the catchphrase, and, and so on, and so forth. But when you actually look at the sorts of changes that have been taking place, as you say, in terms of equality for LGBT and, you know, civil rights issues and a number of other things, there seems to be, you know, an acceleration of progress taking place. And so would you say that it’s some in some way, as a result of people unraveling their tangles to use your metaphor? on a mass scale? And what’s causing masses of people to unravel their tangles? What’s the cause of that? If we want to take it a step further back?
Mary Reed: Yeah, it’s no coincidence that all of these changes have coincided with a greater spiritual awakening. Yeah, I mean, we, we look at the last 100 years, all of the things that have sort of come out, that have mobilized people’s curiosities, and explorations and access to excuse me to books, to lectures, all these sorts of things, starting in the early 1900s. I mean, Eastern religions starting to come into the United States and our ability to travel and get exposed to more cultures and ideas and collaborate, elaborate more. Now look at the internet, right? It’s absolutely beautiful, absolutely beautiful. And I especially love watching the youth rise up through the use of social media, it’s like right in time for a group of youth that are not thinking the same way that you and I thought when we were young, I mean, they’re thinking in a much more collaborative, loving, harmonious unity inspired kind of way, and they have social media to let them do that to let them work together. Yeah. I was going to say something. It maybe it’ll come back to me.
Rick Archer: Okay. Well, yeah, I mean, it’s pretty, I don’t know what the cause is, but, you know, whether cosmic rays are being beamed to us from the center of the galaxy, or what but it does, it does seem to be you know, and there are various astrological explanations and so on. And cyclic, you know, in the Vedic tradition, various cycles that take place and so on. But there does seem to be this upsurge taking place and collective consciousness. And, you know, and it has its manifestations in terms of, you know, the technologies you just mentioned, but then those technologies in turn enable it to happen. So there’s this kind of positive feedback loop. Yeah, we’re all celebration. Yeah.
Mary Reed: Yeah. I do know what I wanted to mention. I knew it would come from, you know, I know you’re trying. It’s I’m reminded of Harry Potter who shall not be named, but I know you’re talking about Donald Trump. And make America great thing, even here in the nunnery, we know about him. You know, there are many, many, many things that look really dire in our world and really accelerated and their occurrence and really crazy, just like they’re just at the level of like, what To Hell. And this is not to be unexpected. That is, again, that’s not the problem. That’s the outcome of the problem. So the momentum began long, long, long ago. And particularly energies that look like Donald Trump and his ilk, they like things to push against. That’s, that’s something that makes the friction and the more that we, you know, historically have pushed against it, the greater those energies have become the problem or the the, the, the opportunity that we have now is not about the expression of that problem. It is our reaction to the expression of that problem. Because now we are more and more and more and more of us are reacting. Rather than fighting back to the problem. We’re reacting much more compassionately, and we’re mobilizing in much more productive and compassionate and collaborative ways that we haven’t done before. And so I was, I was talking about that in one of my talks in Greenwich, Connecticut. And I was saying that, you know, there cuz somebody in the audience, I think, had mentioned something about these, you know, there seems to be more war and all of these different things. And I said, it is not that it is the war. That is the, the opportunity for us right now to change. It is our reaction to that now, that’s that we’re changing. And there were two women happens to be two women in the audience that were from the Sandy Hook community, which was the site of one of the massive school shooting things that had just happened, I think, a couple of years before my talk. And both of those women raised their hands and said, well, actually, we can testify to that firsthand, because when the shooting happened in their community, the day that it happened, their community immediately came together around the motto, we choose love, because everything around them, the media, the you know, all of the people coming into their communities, everyone wanted to blame, they wanted to hate they want. And they just said we were understood immediately that the last thing that we need is more hate. That was the that’s what led to this. So our reaction from this point forward will only be love and they had literally T shirts and bumper stickers and everything. And then the whole community came together around it. And we’re seeing more and more and more of that. Not just in America, but all kinds of places around the world. We don’t hear these stories often on the headline news, but they’re most assuredly happening.
Rick Archer: Oh, yeah. I just watched a documentary about Malala the other night, you know, the little Pakistani girl and when she was shot, as instead of, you know, defeating her what she was standing, you know, trying to do education for girls in Pakistan it it rally the nation around her and you know, actually awaken the soul in a way she kind of served as a sacrificial lamb for that, but came out fortunately lived and came out more more articulate and brave than ever. But one thing she said in the documentary that someone some question or some reporter was saying, you know, don’t you have any kind of blame or hatred or anything? She said, No, not even one molecule, not even one atom, not even one quark. I just have absolutely not reacted that way to what happened.
Mary Reed: Wow. And how poignant that it is a young girl from the Middle East, that this that that becomes that voice that becomes that poster child for forgiveness and for mobilizing, and a really productive, loving, compassionate, system changing world I just, I’m so excited about it. Literally. This is I just, I’m giddy about all these changes. It’s really so beautiful. Yeah, so beautiful. And look how eloquent she is. I mean, it’s just a young girl knows the word Quirk.
Rick Archer: I was smart girl. But in case anyone is thinking at this point, well, what does all this have to do with Enlightenment and so on? It? It has it has to do with it. Because Enlightenment is not just an individual thing. It’s not just you sort of marinate in this wonderful subjective experience, and it’s good for you. It has social implications. And, you know, we’re all in this together. And I don’t think that any significant number of people in the world can get enlightened unless, you know, commensurately. There’s a vast Well, it’s I don’t know what the chicken and what the egg is. But there’s two more people awaken spiritually, the more society is going to change. And the more society changes and more more easily, more easy it will be to awaken spiritually. So the when we lapse into discussions like this, I think it’s very relevant to those even even to those who feel, I really don’t care about all this social issue stuff, I just want in my own personal suffering and experience, you know, awakening, it’s all tied together.
Mary Reed: It cannot be that one person becomes enlightened, and nothing is, is impacted by that. So as more and more and more people come into these enlightened understandings, we become a more enlightened society. And that’s the goal, what’s the point of becoming enlightened, and then suffering still continues all around you. Like, so the
Rick Archer: little girl in the brothel and Bombay, that you alluded to? I mean, what’s the point of us being all sort of blissful, and wise and spiritual? If things like that are going to continue, it should be that our Enlightenment impacts those kinds of things and helps to, you know, eliminate them?
Mary Reed: Yeah, my, my Enlightenment is forever incomplete, if she’s not included. So, yeah, I mean, it’s, it’s to be expected, that’s the whole point is that we, you know, the girl is, if we, if we can wrap our heads around, this is no pun intended, the idea of this collective mind that we share the mind of God, that we’re all in there, like this is we’re all a part of it. And it is that collective being that we aim to love, unconditionally, fully, beautifully, romantically, to fall in love with it. And that means caring for every individual. And every issue.
Rick Archer: Yeah, that’s a very good point. Again, I was listening to Matthew Wright this morning, I forget who it was quoting. But he was saying something like, you know, the, the kidney can’t say, I don’t care about the heart, and the heart can’t say I don’t care about the brain. And, you know, it’s like, every one of these things within our own individual body depends upon every other component. And ultimately, nothing is less important than any of the I mean, you can afford to lose an arm, but we kind of need to function as a as a holistic, healthy whole, in order to be, you know, optimally functionally functioning human being. And so, again, it’s incumbent upon spiritual seekers, I would say, to recognize that, as you just said, you know, no, man is an island, we’re all part of the main and that, what what good is my Enlightenment, if it doesn’t contribute to the alleviation of the suffering of others? I think it’s a very Buddhist concept, isn’t it?
Mary Reed: Yeah, I suppose. So. Yeah.
Rick Archer: A lot of people I interview, do have private consultations with people over Skype and whatnot. And they, you know, they kind of some of them make their living doing that, or are you kind of into offering that sort of thing? Or is it just too difficult living up in the monastery and so on?
Mary Reed: Yeah, I’m actually just, as I said, just in the last couple of weeks really starting to come out. And that’s definitely one of the things that I would like to do. I don’t have it set up in a way to do that right now. But that’s definitely on the horizon.
Rick Archer: Yeah, yeah. Oh, if you do enough of it, maybe you can fund a fast internet connection there. But you’ll have a lot of nights up at two in the morning to talk to people in other time zones.
Mary Reed: That’s all right. What else am I gonna do? Yeah.
Rick Archer: There’s a few passages from your book I’d like to read as we kind of move toward a conclusion. They kind of beautiful. I’ll just read them and then you can elaborate on them if you like you say, Today I no changes coming in. It is not the conflict centered, fear driven story of Armageddon. It is love like we have never dared to imagine. I see this love without absolute certainty. It is coming. In fact, it is arriving more and more every day. I watch now as a massive gathering of countless divine beings, Masters archangels, angels etc. Come together throughout the cosmos. They all watch and jubilant celebration as individual bodies of light begin to illuminate one by one around the planet Earth. There’s a great love coming like a great tidal wave. Like the force of 1000 wins. It is unstoppable. You should welcome it when it comes.
Mary Reed: Yeah, that was that is So in my book, I alternate between my narrative in my life, my stories, and metaphysical events. And what you just quoted is from a metaphysical event in which I think that one was one in which I had been swept up into a greater Christ consciousness. And I am with both Jesus in that and the Christ consciousness as a whole. And that’s the, that’s the, the, the words coming out of that. And that is it, when that happened, the scale of what I can see, if you can imagine the cosmos rolling, like this, this momentum, this and you can assign sort of a joy to that momentum. This is what I could feel this is what I could see, this is what was coming out as this is happening. And these divine beings that are celebrating with us are just a testament to the fact that we’re not in this alone. And we’re not the only ones that are impacted by these remarkable changes going on. That this is a this is a universal momentum. And it’s a there’s, there’s celebration on every level happening. And I’m sure that if you’ve had other mystics on, they’ve probably told you the same thing. But it’s a it’s a jubilant time that we’re in on every level.
Rick Archer: That’s great. Well, do you have any these insights ever translate into any kind of specific predictions or timelines or anything like that? I mean, you know, do you ever get any kind of concrete visions about what things might be like 1020 30 years from now?
Mary Reed: No, there’s never a timeline with it. Because there’s never any time in these. There’s no aspect of time ever in these things. Everything is happening at once. With all of this. However, I have, I have seen where we’re going in terms of the state of more wholeness, the state of it, we’re already whole, it is a it is us recognizing more of our wholeness. And that part I’ve definitely seen, and it is not describable. But it’s, it’s definitely beautiful.
Rick Archer: So, even though it’s not describable, can you describe? I mean, you have a sense of like how society might function in 20 years, with greater wholeness being the norm. You know, what, what our political systems might look like our economies, that kind of thing?
Mary Reed: Yeah, and I can’t I can’t put yours on. It’s not,
Rick Archer: though. Yeah. Yeah. Let’s not, say 20 years, let’s just say sometime, whatever. Yeah.
Mary Reed: It’s definitely more. It’s more harmony based. And it’s, it’s much simpler. And it’s, it’s, you know, people still have differences. But it’s like, you know, different, I heard somebody talk about it in terms of different flavors of ice cream, it’s all ice cream, it’s just a different flavor of ice cream, we still have differences, but we don’t, we don’t experience them, nor do we deal with them in, in sort of a combative conflict kind of suffering way. It’s definitely more unity based, and collaborative and much more creative, much more creative. And the reason it’s much more creative is because nobody is bound into these roles and expectations that are societally imposed. And so people have the freedom to express their full potential and their full potential is far beyond what we do right now. Because we are really, really restricted in our expressions of divinity right now. And we’re heading into a place where we’re going to be masters of that.
Rick Archer: That’s great. Well, one of the reasons my interviews are so long is that I always have this feeling like I want to just discover everything about the person and give them the opportunity to tell everything about themselves to to the audience, but it’s by necessity always going to be sort of just a taste you know, just a glimpse. And you know, if people want to find out more than if they can pursue it, you know, book one can read and you’ll be doing more work as you go along. And, you know, other book, another book and You put you have a website where you’ve written a bunch of stuff, and so on and so forth. So, by necessity, you know, each one of these interviews is just sort of a glimpse into the world of one or another awakening person in the world. And it’s a great joy for me to be able to research people such as yourself week after week, and then have these conversations with them. It’s really a joy and a privilege. So, you know, really enjoyed this. And I just wish you the best, you know, in terms of
Mary Reed: thank you so much, I really enjoyed this as well. It’s been such a pleasure. And I’ve been looking forward to meeting you, I love your breadth of knowledge and your presence, I really am very, very grateful for you,
Rick Archer: and I for you. So let me just make a couple of concluding remarks. With regard to Mary. I’ll be putting up a page on batgap.com, like I always do with each interview that will contain some biographical information about her link to her website, link to her book, link to our next book, when you get published, Mary, let me know we’ll add that link. And some things like that, then, in general, with regard to this show, it’s an ongoing thing. And if you go to the website and explore, you’ll find all kinds of interesting things. One of which is that just this week, we finally got this system working geographical guest index, where if you type in a particular location, like Chicago, you’ll start you’ll see a list of all the teachers who are offering something in an outgoing radius from Chicago sorted by distance. So you know, 50 miles or this at 100 Miles is that, and that’ll be growing as more and more teachers register for it. But there’s about 50 people or so who put in their information so far. There’s also the email newsletter thing if you want to be notified by email each time a new interview is posted, or you can subscribe on YouTube and YouTube will notify you. the donate button, as I mentioned earlier, was an audio podcast for this. A lot of people don’t have the time or the bandwidth or whatever to sit and watch things for two hours in front of their computer, but you can subscribe to the podcasts and listening while you’re commuting or something so many people do that. So thank you for listening or watching and thank you again, Mary. And my pleasure. Thank you. Yeah, have fun up there in the Himalayas. And we’ll see everybody next week with Matthew right Am I mentioned earlier as being the next guest? Thanks.