Eating dinosaurs

“Well it has your dinosaurs in.”

“What?” My son lounged on the bed looking perplexed. We were talking about yoghurts.

“Acidophilus.”

“Oh yeah. Well what’s yours then?”

“Bifidus.”

“Not the same beastie then.”

We had established some time ago that his particular strain of yoghurt based bacteria sounded like a dinosaur, whereas the stuff I have been eating thrice daily on my doctor’s recommendation has a less interesting name. Still, I was not about to refuse home-made mango yoghurt. Even if he was bribing me with it in exchange for socks.

“Still, ‘eating dinosaurs’… not a bad title for a blog. I could illustrate it with a random duck.”

“Everything is a good title for a blog these days! Why a duck?”

“Why not? Birds are the closest thing to dinosaurs we have. I have to at least try and get a respectable post out here!”

“None of your posts are respectable!”  The bare toe, hovering somewhere in the region of my hand as I lounge across the foot of his bed, is squeezed firmly in retaliation thus putting an end to his mirth. “ Ouch! So, a duck in disguise then.”

“Cheek! I manage to get some serious stuff in my posts!”

“What? And I’ve been reading them and not noticed?” He withdraws the foot from my reach hastily.

“There is usually some spiritual aspect to them, even if it is only suggested.”

“What! You’ve been feeding me undercover nerkism without me even knowing?”

“Sort of in disguise. Like the duck.”

“Closet nerkism! A 007 duck!”

“More of a 00-777.” He looks blank. “666…  everyone seems to know it as the number of the Beast from Revelations. “

“I knew that.”

“777  in some systems stands for perfection, the Trinity or the Christ.”

“Hmm….”

It is, I have to say, a good thing that no-one overhears these random conversations between my son and I. From bacteria to dinosaurs, yoghurt to spirituality in a few short phrases. Via undercover ducks. Were they ever to go public we would undoubtedly be looked upon askance and our sanity questioned. As it is, we are perfectly safe in the knowledge that no-one will ever know.

Which is just as well, as director of an esoteric school who might, conceivably, be expected to behave sedately and write from a lofty viewpoint.

Personally, I don’t buy that.

Spiritual consciousness is not something different from ordinary life. It is ordinary life.. or it should be. One of my favourite quotes is from Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, “Nous ne sommes pas des êtres humains vivant une expérience spirituelle, nous sommes des êtres spirituels vivant une expérience humaine.“ This is generally rendered as we are not human beings living a spiritual experience, we are spiritual beings living a human experience.

This phrase puts a lot of things in perspective for me, for if we can accept that we are spiritual beings then it renders all aspects of life sacred. Including the laughter and gentle, random lunacy shared with friends… or between mother and son.

It means we do not have to strive towards some nebulous distant perfection, we have only to see what lies within each other and in ourselves, to recognise and embrace it and bring it out of the inner shadows and into the world.

We don’t have to duck being human. It is what we are meant to Be.