Who is Bill Epperly? What can you tell me about yourself and your professional journey? I sometimes think of myself as a pragmatic mystic. I have been walking the spiritual path most of my life through all kinds of states, from dark nights to great illuminations. By grace, I have experienced a stable spiritual awakening. […]
“The satisfaction derived from solving a problem with an experiment was a very heady experience, almost addicting. Looking back, I realize that nurturing curiosity and the instinct to seek solutions are perhaps the most important contributions education can make. With time, many of the facts I learned were forgotten but I never lost the […]
“Enlightenment is the crumbling away of untruth. It’s seeing through the facade of pretense. It’s the complete eradication of everything we imagined to be true.” ― Adyashanti Ten years seems like a long time to me. Perhaps for most people. Do you remember what you were doing ten years ago? I can name a few highlights, but […]
There’s a mighty old oak on the corner of Zeeb and Joy in Ann Arbor. I visited it many times during my grad school days. And I became rather fond of it over time. To say that grad school was a difficult time is an understatement. Experiments failed, progress on my doctorate in biochemistry was […]
“We are not just a skin-encapsulated ego, a soul encased in flesh. We are each other and we are the world.” – Charles Eisenstein Interbeing is the understanding that nothing exists separately from anything else. We are all interconnected. By taking care of another person, you take care of yourself. By taking care of yourself, […]
“We are fellow-helpers with God, co-creators in everything we do. When Word and work are returned to their source and origin, all work is accomplished divinely in God. And there too the soul loses itself in a wonderful enchantment.” – Meister Eckhart A spirituality that is only private and self-absorbed, one devoid of an authentic […]
Life offers its wisdom generously. Everything teaches. Not everyone learns. Life asks of us the same thing we have been asked in every class: “Stay awake.” “Pay attention.” But paying attention is no simple matter. It requires us not to be distracted by expectations, past experiences, labels, and masks. It asks that we not jump […]
“The Noble Truth of suffering (dukkha) is this: Birth is suffering; aging is suffering; sickness is suffering; death is suffering; sorrow and lamentation, pain, grief, and despair are suffering; association with the unpleasant is suffering – in brief, the five aggregates of attachment are suffering.” – Shakyamuni Buddha Meditation on the Self I have sensations, […]
When, through [practice], the mind ceases its restless movements, and becomes still, one realizes the Self, It satisfies one entirely. Then one knows that infinite happiness which can be realized by the purified heart but is beyond the grasp of the senses. – The Bhagavad Gita “His disciples said to him, ‘When will the […]
“God has to work in the soul in secret and in darkness because if we fully knew what was happening, and what Mystery, transformation, God and Grace will eventually ask of us, we would either try to take charge or stop the whole process.” – St. John of the Cross We must let […]