A metaphysical adventure currently in production. You can check out the first chapter below.
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I was sat on the floor of the lounge in lotus, mirrored by my spiritual teacher, overflowing with joy at the breakthrough I'd made after a decade of disciplined study. Many tears had been shed, and now there was joy, and it was all the reward I could have wanted. But a delighted Mr Sunshine had thought of more, presenting me with a ticket: THE BOOK OF ERM.
"What in the world is this?" I asked, looking up from the golden card, which was written in black, with scattered esoterics, little discs and lines and meaningful squiggles. More love rushed through me as I saw him, his smile as wide as my own, his golden robe never so bright, his thick, flowing hair never so black. And to think, we'd just celebrated his seventieth birthday! He didn't look a day over thirty-five.
"What in the worlds, don't you mean?" he said. "This ticket is your pass to a round-the-mind adventure to find The Book of Erm, a powerful text divided into seven sections, each located in a different dimension. To read it is to experience a dramatic expansion of consciousness, propelling one, if not into, then certainly very close to the Heart of God. It is the prize awaiting you for making this breakthrough, finally forgiving your rather terrestrial father for disowning you all those years ago, your crime the decision to pursue enlightenment instead of entering the family trade."
"Oh, I must call him!"
"Indeed you must! And indeed you will. But might I suggest, not right at this moment? I know you are excited and wish to share your pleasure, both with him and the mother with whom you have maintained occasional contact, she tending a touch more towards the higher things. But time is short for finding Brother Orph and we should temper ourselves for now. This enlightened being is to be your guide in the quest for The Book of Erm. I have worked with him before – he is excellent, though very tricky to track down. He usually operates at extremely high frequencies which see him far removed from the physical, and indeed from even the most spiritual of spiritual. Only very occasionally does he materialise. And only very, very occasionally does he materialise in our particular version of physical reality. By way of a missive from his personal assistant, I have learned he'll be phasing to our world this afternoon, touching down at two and departing at three. You will have that hour to find him, the twelve minutes till then to be occupied by preparatory dialogue. A phone call to your estranged father would cut into that precious time, as the two of you delighted in your reunion. And if it didn't, well… though it pains me to say this, the conversation likely wouldn't have gone well, he hanging up on you and so deflating your energy, you'd have little chance of finding Brother Orph."
"I would hope the former would be the case!"
"As would I. And no doubt, when the time comes, it will be. But for now, it makes sense to temper, even though I know the desire to reunite must be almost overwhelming."
"Ah, it is true… I do burn for the man. It would mean so much to touch him right now, to reach out and say, 'Oh father, it is over!' Yes, I see it, it is all so clear… my smiling, his smiling, our deep embrace, as mother sniffs to hankie just behind… What a scene!"
"It is glorious indeed, bringing tears to the eyes, bringing sniffs to the nose, a certain clogging to the throat. But quick as they come, these pictures of the mind, much quicker than the phone, than the travel, than the wine, than all of those things which would manifest the scene, still they take time and have cost us vital seconds. Brother Orph touches down in ten-and-a-half minutes."
"Time, time… enough with this time! My joy would not be bound."
"And yet, you are physical, and so you are bound. Time is law, shaped by situation."
"Then let us follow the law, but change the situation. This Orph sounds most high, but surely there are other guides, ones with more relaxed schedules."
"Certainly there are others, and many are excellent, but none is as excellent as Brother Orph. His approach, while unconventional, is just what you need at the current stage in your development. He can give you things others cannot. That even I cannot."
"You are busy, I know. The summer session approaches."
"No, it is more than that. Even had I the time, I couldn't give you what you need. My talent only goes so far."
"What? A descendant of Elidium to be lacking? I find that hard to believe."
"Oh believe it, Levitus, star pupil of mine. You and the other students may call me Master, and in your present condition, I may strike you as divine, but as I try to remind you, there is much more to this than me. There are worlds and teachers outside this Sunshine Centre, remarkable beings such as Brother Orph who can lend much texture to your spiritual life, particularly if you come to them at just the right time. When I learned a few weeks ago that the Brother would be phasing, I prayed you would make your breakthrough in time, giving you the vision not only to find him, but also to be guided by him. For as you will learn once the breakthrough settles, your sight has been much enhanced by your opening, granting new powers you will need in the search. For Orph. For Erm. For the very Heart of God. I do take it the Heart of God is of interest…?"
"Yes, of course. And while I picture my parents, I do picture that too. Or sense it, so tremendous, such an intricate work of Light… Ah, what a fool I am being! For burn though it might, my heart will survive another hour or so. Before I know it, I will be sitting down to dinner with my beloved father and mother, the crimes of the past released and forgotten, our minds retuned to bright, loving times. That will soon come, and naturally so. But this gift of yours, this dream, this great passage, is not so sure in its flow. For that, I must temper, must focus on Orph, and right now, ere he flights, perhaps forever."
"It is the spiritually mature decision."
"Yes, that is clear now. You have brought me to it. As you have brought me to so many other realisations in the decade since our lives intertwined. Ah, what a day that was! You appearing in Michael's Café, a golden vision to lift me from my gloom, from the dark depression into which I'd slid. And rise I did, rising up from my chair, as you spoke, almost sang: 'You are destined for greatness. Do join my little group. We meet thrice-weekly. You'll try the prune-stuffed prunes for dessert, yes?'."
"I will never forget it, Levitus. It was as powerful for me as it was for you. You became, in that moment, my son, spiritually speaking. And oh, to then sit and take prunes with you! To watch you command those mind-bending fruits for which the café is famed. A young man with no training, and it was all clearly there. As it is all clearly here today. But come, enough reminiscing, as pleasing to the soul as it is. The clock ticks on towards the hour and there is much to discuss before you go. Are you settled?"
"Yes, I am tempered, though the joy lives on as a pyramidal crystal in my heart. And the body is soft, suppled by the yoga you have taught me and which I practise every day, drawing me out of that tight ball of gloom to become a really most flowing, bendy thing."
"It is good to flow, and good to know the crystal. Both work to the prize. Now let's begin. Three matters must be covered before you depart, all pertaining to the locating of Brother Orph: first, appearance, that is, what does this man look like?; second, whereabouts, that is, where is this man to be found?; and third, coming-into-fieldness, that is, how is this man to be reached? As usual, we will employ logico-spiritual dialogue, opening the mind rather than spoon-feeding the brain, but moving quickly on account of the pressing clock. We start with the man's appearance. Begin."
"Do you have a photograph?"
"I do, taken forty years ago on Brother Orph's last visit to our shores to attend a spiritual conference. He and I both spoke on a panel, and a picture was taken as we entered debate, which became most heated, he overwhelming me, though in so doing revealing an inner truth. I may have lost that day, but I won in other ways, and I made sure to secure a print of the picture, which is kept in my special box."
"That box on the shelf in your sleeping quarters reserved for your most treasured spiritual possessions?"
"The very same."
"Then while I know this container is for your eyes only, there being things within which would unsettle us lowly students with their potent metaphysical vibrations, perhaps in this case an exception could be made. It is but a picture after all, and though touched by the Brother and other higher waves which may have leaked from the box's more symbolic contents, one would think the new strength the breakthrough has brought me would provide sufficient shield against the flummoxing."
"Yes, the shield would protect you, at least from the topmost tray, where rests the picture. Also, a stick of chalk."
"The box has layers? I had thought it was just one thing."
"No, it is seven, seven layers from seven trays, the possessions spread across the levels in a very particular way. For you see, this box holds a special secret, a correspondence between itself and Erm, with each of its levels mapped to a section, top to first, next to second, and so on. And the objects at each level are connected too, being tools to be used to help you find your way to Erm. But only when you're ready, when you're shielded as you are. To come to them too soon would be… unhealthy."
"A sadness flits across your eyes, sir."
"Flits, and is gone. It is nothing, of the past. And we are of the present, of the now. This same now in which I tell you you are ready for the top, for the objects therein, for this print and stick of chalk."
"Being tools to be used in Brother Orph's locating?"
"Yes."
"But given the correspondence between box and Book, wouldn't that then make the locating of this man – that is, the resolution of the three matters which comprise this dialogue – the first section in The Book of Erm?"
"Indeed. For though the guide yet eludes us, the story is underway. The Book of Erm has already begun."
"My, how subtle…"
"Delightful, isn't it?"
"Yes, quite. And quite exciting, hinting at such adventures to come. For I sense that this Book will often surprise me, will be rarely as I expect."
"As well it should be. Our expectations restrain us. And we are aiming higher, for the Heart."
"Then let us aim and pull the trigger, propel ourselves into this Book. Master, if I may be so bold, and if you would do me the honour, I hereby request an opening of the box, a presenting of the print, that I may forthwith commence my reading. For what better way to identify this Orph, to resolve the first matter concerning appearance, than to reference his very image."
"I will give you the picture, and also the chalk, for each and every tool should be used. But in the matter of appearance, the image will prove useless. The man you seek today will look nothing as then."
"Oh? I realise forty years have passed since the picture's taking, and that normally this would weaken the physical match, but if the conference marked Brother Orph's last visit to this reality, the shell shouldn't have aged since then. Unless he remained here for some years after?"
"No, he phased straight after the debate. And even if he hadn't, if the shell had been left exposed to those physical elements which cause its degeneration, his advanced spiritual practices would have kept him young, as do mine."
"Then why would he not appear as in the picture? Do we not learn that on phasing to a given physical reality, the spiritual body is coated with the same physical shell, providing both a means to operate in the world and a reasonably consistent personality, the latter important for the soul's stability?"
"Indeed we do. Just as we learn that time spent in the world will age the shell and eventually destroy it, so that another must be taken on subsequent visits. But this physical grounding, this taking of shell by the soul, works rather differently in beings such as Brother Orph. In more regular persons such as you and me, the shell is self-generated through memory or creative urge, depending on whether the reality has been visited before. Brother Orph's exceptionally quick vibrations interfere with this self-construction, to the point that the man cannot ground himself, at least within the slow, dense physical. There he must rely on another, someone who, though highly evolved, still possesses more conventional vibrations. It is this other whose memory or creative urge determines the look of the shell, and since he or she generally varies on each visit, Brother Orph generally never looks the same, even as his mastery of higher identity preserves a consistent personality. For this upcoming trip, I am certain the grounding person will be unlike the one from before, for that person was me, and the Brother seeks another. Namely, your good self."
"He comes just for me?"
"Yes. As he came just for me forty years ago, having spotted, as now, such spiritual potential. And I was also in my thirty-first year when my Master took the transmission, then presented a ticket, golden as well, a calling to the conference and a seat on that esteemed panel. For just as Erm is your path to the Heart, so to debate at the conference was mine, both Orphic challenges channelled by our Masters."
"Which challenge you said that you lost?"
"In a sense. I fared well with the pre-initiation, with this grounding of the Brother which opens the challenge proper. But the challenge itself was too much for me then, too much for my still tender soul. And yet, as I said, I also won that day, Brother Orph igniting a spark of inspiration which would lead to the creation of this Centre, a place which would nurture the talents of others, one of whom might succeed where I could not."
"I must admit, it isn't easy to hear you speak like this…"
"Like what? To speak of failing? Of being constrained in my talent? But this is the truth, Levitus. I am blessed, blessed, but not yet ascended. It is important that you recognise this, that you not deify me, that you move beyond me. It is part of your path to the Heart, to your own enlightenment and the wakening of many others who will be inspired by your efforts. Brother Orph comes for you, and through you for them. Succeed, and the world will be Love."
"Ah, the clock strikes…"
"And the Brother comes, I feel him…"
"While we remain at the first matter… just starting our preparation for the pre-initiation upon which, I take it, all depends."
"Yes, fail that and there can be no challenge. Brother Orph will simply phase away. But worry not, we aren't as far as you think. You have seen the pyramid crystal. I repair, briefly, to my sleeping quarters. Let us meet on the sun-splashed balcony."