The Wild Reed

Sunday, October 11, 2026

Quote of the Day

To those who are upset over Trump’s plan for a public execution, which news channel do you watch?

Cuz the news I watched showed this:

Not only have 74,000 Palestinians been publicly executed in the world’s first live-streamed genocide over the past three years, U.S. taxpayers all pay for Israel’s carnage. Both Biden and Trump took your tax dollars to pay for mass murder in Gaza.

Where was your loathing of barbarian behavior during this? Did you only developed it after Trump was elected?

– Lady Bunny
via social media
October 11, 2026

Saturday, October 10, 2026

A Course in Miracles and the Sufi Way

If you are a regular visitor to The Wild Reed then you would know that I am both a student of A Course in Miracles (ACIM) and a spiritual seeker on the Sufi way, the “Path of the Heart.”

For quite some time now I’ve been reflecting on what Sufism and ACIM share in common. The short answer is that both of these systems of transformative thought share a profound mystical focus on (i) non-separation, (ii) the ultimate illusion of the material world, and (iii) the realization of inner divine oneness.

More specifically, I’ve discerned the following four core similarities shared by these two mystic traditions.

• The Illusion of Separation: Both traditions teach that the fundamental problem of human existence is the belief in separation from God or the Divine. ACIM states that separation is a dream-like error, while Sufism views multiplicity and ego-identity (nafs) as veils hiding the ultimate unity of reality (Tawhid) or Oneness of Being (Wahdat al-Wujud).

• Forgiveness and Inner Purification: ACIM centers its entire curriculum on forgiveness, which undoes the ego’s projections and grievances. Similarly, Sufism emphasizes tazkiya (purification of the heart) and the letting go of worldly illusions, anger, and egoic attachments so as to achieve spiritual clarity.

• Direct Experiential Knowledge: Both paths look past rigid external rules and dogmas to prioritize a direct, inner experience of the divine. Classical Sufism is the esoteric (bāṭin) heart of Islam, while universal Sufism is a resolute expression of the mystic heart of all the religions. For its part, ACIM operates as a self-study spiritual thought system that bypasses organized religious structures.

• Love as the Transforming Force: Both systems treat universal love as the ultimate healing power. Sufi poetry (like that of Rūmī) famously portrays divine love (ishq) as the dissolver of all boundaries, echoing ACIM’s premise that love is the only reality and fear is its absence.

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:

THE SUFI PATH
• Sufism: Way of Love, Tradition of Enlightenment, and Antidote to Fanaticism
• Love, the Sufi Way of Being
• The Sufi Way
• A Precise Metaphysical Claim
• Sufism: A Call to Awaken
• Sufism: A Living Twenty-First Century Tradition
• Inayat Khan and the Sufi Message
• “Like a Stream Running Into the Ocean”
• Inayat Khan and the Heart of Sufism
• Inayat Khan on Mysticism
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Kabir Helminski
• As the Last Walls Dissolve . . . Everything is Possible
• Clarity, Hope, and Courage
• “Joined at the Heart”: Robert Thompson on Christianity and Sufism
• Doris Lessing on the Sufi Way
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Doris Lessing
• The Gorgeous One
• Saaxiib Qurux Badan and the Winged Heart
• Held in the Presence of God
• The Act of Surrender
• The Journey Home
• Living From the Heart
• Bismillah
• The Road to Love: An Exploration of Coming Out in the Islamic World
• As the Last Walls Dissolve . . . Everything Is Possible

A COURSE IN MIRACLES
• A Course in Miracles: A Gift of Peace
• Why A Course in Miracles Is Not “New Age”
• Mysticism and Miracles
• Gifts of Abundance
• I Am One With the Beloved
• Being One With the Beloved, the Source of All Things
• Your Peace Is With Me, Beloved One
• Dwelling in Peace
• The Peace of God
• You Are My Goal, Beloved One
• Be In My Mind, Beloved One
• Stepping Out of Time and Resting Your Mind
• Resting in the Presence of the Beloved
• In the Stillness and Silence of This Present Moment
• The Beauty and Challenge of Being Present in the Moment
• Today I Will Be Still
• I Need Do Nothing . . . I Am Open to the Living Light
• Aligning With the Living Light
• An Expression of Humility
• Choosing to Awaken
• Choosing to Understand
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Marianne Williamson

Related Off-site Links:
Recalling Hazrat Inayat Khan and his Universalist Sufism – James Ford (Patheos, February 5, 2022).
Inayat Khan and Universal Sufism – Filip Holm (Let’s Talk Religion, December 8, 2024). The Sufi Concept of “Fana” – And Why Modern Psychology Is Only Just Catching Up – Ahmad Fatahillah (Medium, May 22, 2026).
3 Truths From A Course in Miracles That Inspire Inner Peace – Carolyn Jean Roney (The Huffington Post, December 6, 2017).
Heaven Is Real, Hell Isn’t: My Spiritual Journey Through Ego, Love and Seeking Out Peace – Aui’a Vaimaila Leatinu’u (Pacific Media Network, December 11, 2025).
Simply Consciousness: An Interview with David Hoffmeister – Claudia Navone (Thrive Global, July 3, 2019).
The Power of Your Thoughts and A Course In Miracles: An Interview with Marianne Williamson – Aubrey Marcus Podcast (December 24, 2024).

Friday, October 09, 2026

Quote of the Day

It’s starting friends, the pre-election violence is ramping up. If you look at what they’re doing in California and New York, if you look at the threats they’re making in Minnesota, if you watch the drones over Minneapolis and Columbia Heights every single night - you know it’s getting real.

They are trying to tell you that you need them to protect you from the immigrants and the gangs and the fraud. They are trying to tell you that you should fear your neighbors and put your faith in their armed men who will "keep you safe." They are lying to you so that you will give them the power to oppress you. They can’t let this election happen because if they lose, they will be held accountable for the laws they’ve broken, so they are going to come with force and they’re hoping you will side with them when they do because of your fear.

Somali people are not your enemies, they are your neighbors. They are beautiful and generous and kind and they make this place better. You don’t need to fear them, they aren’t hurting you. Immigrants are not your enemies, they are your neighbors. They make your community better! You don’t need to fear them, they aren’t hurting you. No one is hurting you except the government that is promising to save you, they are raising your prices and taking your healthcare and sending armed, masked men to follow your school buses. Don’t let them tell you that you are in danger and don’t let them tell you they will keep you safe -- neither are true.

You will never be safer by attacking your neighbor. Either we’re all safe or none of us are; either we’re all free or none of us are.

– Brenna Zeimet
via social media
October 9, 2026

Related Off-site Links:
“Abolish ICE”: Protests Erupt in NYC After ICE Agents Shoot Father with 5-Year-Old Son in Car – Democracy Now! (October 9, 2026).
Trump ICE Surge in California Condemned as “Clear Attempt to Intimidate” Latino Voters – Brad Reed (Common Dreams, October 9, 2026).
Mosques Step Up Safety After Trump’s Comments Targeting Somali Minnesotans – Estelle Timar-Wilcox (MPR News, October 9, 2026).
Operation Metro Surge Hasn’t Ended. It’s Expanded to the Suburbs – Nicolas Scibelli (Sahan Journal, February 19 2026).

UPDATES: Warning Signs Are Flashing Red for American Democracy – Ben Manski, Michael Shank, April Doner (OtherWords via Common Dreams, October 11, 2026).
Rep. Ilhan Omar’s Home Raided by DHS Following Trump Deportation Threats – Stephen Prager (Common Dreams, October 12, 2026).
Mamdani Says ICE Agents Who Shot Man in New York Looked Like “Mass Shooters” – Keely Aouga (The Guardian, October 12, 2026).
New York ICE Shooting Illustrates Deliberate Policy of Harm and Medical Neglect – Chuck Idelson (Common Dreams, October 12, 2026).

See also the following Wild Reed posts:
• “The Fascist Fist Is Tightening Because It Knows That It Is Losing Its Grasp on Us”
• The “Power, Peril and Importance” of What’s Happening in Minnesota
• Only the Beginning
• The North Remembers
• “It’s All Lies and Propaganda”
• What This Moment Feels Like in Minnesota
• Quote of the Day – February 23, 2026
• Greg Ketter: A Valiant Minnesotan
• Dispatches from Occupied Minnesota
• More Dispatches from Occupied Minnesota
• Honoring Renée Good and the “Astonishing Surge of Courage” of Minneapolis
• Renée Good and Alex Pretty: “They Were Alive. Then They Were Not”
• Bruce Springsteen and the Streets of Minneapolis in the Winter of ’26

Image: Brenna Zeimet, who on 9/11/26 wrote on Facebook: “These men stole a woman from her home in my community yesterday. These men brought assault rifles and tactical gear to raid a home on a quiet street looking for one woman. These men would not identify themselves, but they had ice vehicles and agents in their mix. These men would not show their warrant even to the lawyer who was on scene trying to protect the rights of this community member. These men staged in the Columbia Heights Police Department (CHPD) parking lot after they stole one of our neighbors - talking, laughing, moving equipment between their trucks, taking off their vests so they could drive their undercover vehicles around the community without being spotted. These men partnered with CHPD, putting the woman in the back of one of our squad cars after they took her. This is what it is like to live in a lawless, violent police state.”

Thursday, October 08, 2026

Love, the Sufi Way of Being

I came across the following online today quite by chance. It’s a beautiful piece written by Mariam Davids, and one that is appropriate to share as part of my ongoing series on the Sufi Path.

______________

Love, in the Sufi tradition, is not a simple human feeling, nor a passing emotion. He is the very breath of existence, the key that opens the door of divine mystery. He is both the source and the goal, the fire that consumes the ego, and the light that reveals Unity.

Love, the Essence of Creation

Wise ones say that the whole universe was created by love. “I was a hidden treasure, and I sought to be known,” says an expression attributed to the Divine. Love is therefore the force that drives the Being to manifest itself, to unfold itself through the multiplicity of the world.

Love is what gives meaning to the soul’s journey. He is the invisible thread that connects every being to the Whole. When we truly love, we align with the cosmic movement of returning to the Origin.

Love That Transform

True love is not just an attachment, it is a transformative force. He burns the fleeting to reveal the essential. In the Sufi tradition, the image of fire is often employed:

• Majnoun’s love for Leïla becomes a mystical quest; he doesn’t just love a woman, but through her, he discovers absolute love.

• The Moth and the Flame: Lover is like a butterfly attracted to divine light. He dances around until he’s completely consumed, achieving the perfect unity.

• The Wine of Love: Rûmî speaks of love as an intoxicating wine that makes one forget the self, that dissolves the boundaries between the lover and the Beloved.

Thus, to love truly is accepting to be transformed. It’s losing a part of yourself in order to become greater than yourself.

Loving and Leaving Me

The ego is the greatest obstacle to love. As long as we remain attached to our small identity, we cannot fully love.

Rûmî reminds us: “Tear your ego into thousand pieces, become dust under the feet of the Beloved. Only then will you understand what Love means.”

To love is to die to oneself in order to be reborn into Infinity. It’s to forget, no longer see separation between “I” and “the other,” between “I” and the Divine.

The Love That Unites

In the pursuit of love, there is first separation, desire, drive towards the other. Then comes the union, the dissolution of dualities: there is no longer lover nor Beloved, there is only Love.

True love is not possessive, it does not seek to hold, but to release. He is like the wind that caresses without closing.

Love does not need external proof. He lives in the silence of a glance, in the shared presence, in the simple joy of existing together.

Walk the Path of Love

To love is to choose a difficult path. It’s about accepting yourself to be broken, to be vulnerable, to be transformed.

Sufis dance, sing, cry and laugh, because they know that every emotion, every encounter, every moment can be a mirror of divine Love.

So, what to do?

• Love without expecting in return.
• Be a channel of love, not wanting to own.
• Look for the beauty everywhere, even in adversity.
• Remember that every being is a manifestation of the Beloved.

Love Is the Way

Love is not a destination, it’s the journey itself. The one who loves is already walking on the path.

Rûmî whispers to us again: “Yesterday I was clever, I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, I am changing myself.”

Because love begins within us. He is the key that unlocks all doors. He’s the answer to all questions.

And you, on this path of love, where are you?

– Mariam Davids
via Facebook
February 20, 2025

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• The Sufi Way
• A Precise Metaphysical Claim
• Sufism: Way of Love, Tradition of Enlightenment, and Antidote to Fanaticism
• Sufism: A Call to Awaken
• Sufism: A Living Twenty-First Century Tradition
• Inayat Khan and the Sufi Message
• “Like a Stream Running Into the Ocean”
• Inayat Khan and the Heart of Sufism
• Inayat Khan on Mysticism
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Kabir Helminski
• As the Last Walls Dissolve . . . Everything is Possible
• Clarity, Hope, and Courage
• “Joined at the Heart”: Robert Thompson on Christianity and Sufism
• Doris Lessing on the Sufi Way
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Doris Lessing
• The Gorgeous One
• Saaxiib Qurux Badan and the Winged Heart
• Held in the Presence of God
• The Act of Surrender
• The Journey Home
• Living From the Heart
• Bismillah
• The Road to Love: An Exploration of Coming Out in the Islamic World
• As the Last Walls Dissolve . . . Everything Is Possible

Related Off-site Links:
Recalling Hazrat Inayat Khan and his Universalist Sufism – James Ford (Patheos, February 5, 2022).
Inayat Khan and Universal Sufism – Filip Holm (Let’s Talk Religion, December 8, 2024). The Sufi Concept of “Fana” – And Why Modern Psychology Is Only Just Catching Up – Ahmad Fatahillah (Medium, May 22, 2026).

Image 1: Subject and photographer unknown.
Image 2: Paulo Pascoal as photographed by Francisco Martins.

Wednesday, October 07, 2026

Quote of the Day

Above: An Israeli runs to a shelter in Ashkelon on October 7, 2023.
(Photo: Tamir Kalifa/The New York Times/Redux)

This day is profoundly painful for so many New Yorkers. It marks three years since the horrific war crimes of October 7. On that day, Hamas killed more than 1,100 Israelis and abducted 251 others. We grieve alongside our many friends and neighbors who still carry that unthinkable loss.

The suffering did not begin nor end that day. It instead continued through the Israeli government’s devastating, ongoing genocide in Gaza, in which it has killed more than 74,000 Palestinians – including more than 21,000 children. Even since the so-called ceasefire, more than 1,400 Palestinians have been killed. That suffering has intensified with every Israeli bomb dropped on ambulances waiting outside hospitals, every drone strike targeting a residential building or journalist, and every shipment of food aid turned away at a border crossing. Many New Yorkers are reckoning with this unbearable grief, and we mourn alongside them – all while knowing that our tax dollars fund these war crimes.

Three years later, we must refuse to accept a world in which occupation and apartheid continue, where war crimes are met with impunity, and our federal government continues its complicity with every arms shipment.

To honor the dead, we must fight for a world in which every person can live with freedom, safety, and dignity.

– Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani
New York City
October 7, 2026

Related Off-site Links:
NYC Mayor Mamdani’s Statement Marking 3 Years Since October 7 Attacks Calls Out Israeli Government’s "Ongoing Genocide" – Jesse Zanger, Ali Bauman (CBS News, October 7, 2026).
Israeli-American Council Criticizes NYC Mayor Mamdani’s October 7 Statement – Amanda Castro (Newsweek, October 7, 2026).
Zohran Mamdani’s October 7th Anniversary Statement Causes Unwarranted Controversy – David Doel (The Rational National, October 7, 2026).
October 7: The World Must Stop Starting the Story in the Middle – Mohammed Altaj (Common Dreams, October 7, 2026).
The Problem With Israel Goes Much Deeper Than “Netanyahu’s Extremist Government” – Eric Ross (Common Dreams, October 7, 2026).
Gaza Genocide “Not Over,” Says U.N. Expert as Israel’s Onslaught Enters Fourth Year – Brett Wilkins (Common Dreams, October 7, 2026).
Israeli Activist Maoz Inon Lost His Parents on October 7, Decries Israel’s Ethnic Cleansing of Gaza – Democracy Now! (October 7, 2026).
After October 7, I Learned That Movements Need Grief Spaces – Alison Avigayil Ramer (Waging Nonviolence, October 6, 2026).

UPDATES: “There Must Be Room to Mourn Every Single Life,” Mamdani Says of October 7 Attack and Genocide That Followed – Jake Johnson (Common Dreams, October 8, 2026).
To Speak the Truth: On the Mediated Obscene – Abby Zimet (Common Dreams, October 10, 2026).

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• “Nothing About Today is ‘Unprovoked’” (2023)
• Phyllis Bennis: “If We Are Serious About Ending This Spiraling Violence, We Need to Look at Root Causes”
• A Year of War Against Children (2024)
• Anti-Genocide Presidential Candidate Jill Stein Reflects on the First Anniversary of Israel’s Genocide in Gaza
• “This Is a Tragic, Heartbreaking Moment in the History of Humanity”
• Why What’s Happening in Palestine – and Our Response to It – Is So Important
• Two Years of “Indescribable Horror” (2025)
• No Justice, No Peace
• The Architecture of Settler Colonialism
• Do Nation States Have the “Right” to Exist?
• Chris Hedges: “The Genocide in Gaza Is the Beginning. Welcome to the New World Order”
• Jonny Rashid: Quote of the Day – August 10, 2026
• Genevieve Fraser: Quote of the Day – August 26, 2026
• “One More Destruction of Our Collective Humanity”

Image of Mayor Mamdani: Yuki Iwamura / Associated Press.
Image of October 7 third anniversary vigil in New York City: Photographer unknown.

Sunday, October 04, 2026

Choosing to Understand

In continuing with the Wild Reed’s series commemorating the 50th anniversary of the publication of A Course in Miracles, I share this evening a quote from Marianne Williamson, one of the most well-known teachers of the Course. Her 1992 book, A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles, remains one of the most popular and beloved writings on the Course.

Williamson recently shared the following via social media under the title, "Light: What Is It That We Don't Understand?"

____________

In A Course in Miracles, light is defined as “understanding.” To live in spiritual darkness is literally to “not understand.”

What is it we don’t understand? That what we see with our physical eyes is never the whole picture in a situation. The bodily level of things is rarely the ultimate reflection of what people are actually feeling and thinking. Our love, the essence of who we are, is often covered over by layers of fear, defensiveness, and emotional armor. To “see the light” is to understand that, to extend our perception beyond what the physical eyes can see to what the heart knows to be true.

That’s the real meaning of forgiveness: to recognize the light in someone, to remember who they really are, even when their mortal self is expressing fear. All of us are tempted to forget who we are sometimes, and through forgiveness we are reminded. In a space of misunderstanding, we can choose to understand.

– Marianne Williamson
via social media
October 5, 2026

NOTE: Marianne Williamson will be teaching a new seven-week online seminar devoted to the 50 Principles of Miracles as presented in A Course in Miracles. As she writes online:

If you’re ready to get serious and go deep, this seminar will help you. It begins on October 13 and you can learn more and register here. I hope you’ll join me. Come ready to change.

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• A Course in Miracles: A Gift of Peace
• Why A Course in Miracles Is Not “New Age”
• Mysticism and Miracles
• Gifts of Abundance
• I Am One With the Beloved
• Being One With the Beloved, the Source of All Things
• Your Peace Is With Me, Beloved One
• Dwelling in Peace
• The Peace of God
• You Are My Goal, Beloved One
• Be In My Mind, Beloved One
• Stepping Out of Time and Resting Your Mind
• Resting in the Presence of the Beloved
• In the Stillness and Silence of This Present Moment
• The Beauty and Challenge of Being Present in the Moment
• Today I Will Be Still
• I Need Do Nothing . . . I Am Open to the Living Light
• Aligning With the Living Light
• An Expression of Humility
• Choosing to Awaken
• Chadwick Boseman and That “Heavenly Light”
• The Light Within
• Shining On
• Like the Sun

Image 1: Marianne.com.
Image 2: Michael J. Bayly.

Friday, October 02, 2026

Inayat Khan and the Sufi Message of Oneness

My exploration of – and walking on – the mystical path of love known as the Sufi Way continues with my sharing this evening of an excerpt from Caravan of Souls: An Introduction to the Sufi Path of Hazrat Inayat Khan, the 2022 updated edition of the 2013 book compiled and edited by Khan’s grandson, Pir Zia Inayat Khan. Caravan of Souls is a guidebook to the Sufi path of Hazrat Inayat Khan (1882-1927), a spiritual philosophy/school (the Inayatyya) of love, harmony, and beauty. This excerpt is from a foundational writing by Inayat Khan entitled “The Sufi Message.”

Note: “Hazrat” is an Arabic and Turkish honorific title used to show respect to a righteous person, prophet, and/or teacher. It is commonly used in India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Iran, and Afghanistan. It is comparable to traditional English honorifics addressing high officials, such as “Your Honour” (for judges), “Your Majesty” (for monarchs), or “Your Holiness” (for clerics). “Hazrat,” the Persianate pronunciation of ḥaḍra), is also a common takhallus (pen name) for Muslim poets in the Indian subcontinent. “Pir” is a title for a Sufi spiritual guide.
_________________

The Sufi message is not for one nation, race, or community; it is for the whole of humanity. Its one and only object is to bring about a better understanding between the divided sections of humanity by awakening their consciousness to the fact that humanity is one family. . . . The Sufi message, therefore, is a call to unite in wisdom. . . . The Sufi Movement is a movement intended by God to unite humanity in kinship and in wisdom.

The present-day Sufi Movement is a movement of members of different nations and races united together in the ideal of wisdom; they believe that wisdom does not belong to any particular religion or race, but to the human race as a whole. It is a divine property which humankind has inherited; and it is in this realization that the Sufis, in spite of belonging to different nationalities, races, beliefs, and faiths, still unite and work for humanity in the ideal of wisdom.

[. . .] By the process of Sufism one realizes one’s own nature, one’s true nature, and thereby one realizes human nature. And by the study of human nature one realizes the nature of life in general. It is is self-realization that the mystery of the whole of life is centered. It is the remedy of all maladies; it is the secret of success in all walks of life; it is a religion and more than a religion. And at this time when the whole world is upset, the Sufi message conveys to the world the divine message. What is wrong with humanity today is that it is not itself, and all the misery of the world is caused by this. Therefore nothing can answer the need of humanity save this process of the sages and the wise of all ages, which leads to self-realization.

Life, human nature, the nature around us, are all a revelation to a Sufi. This does not mean that a Sufi has no respect for the sacred scriptures revered by humanity. On the contrary, the Sufi holds them as sacred as do the followers of those scriptures; but the Sufi says that all scriptures are only different interpretations of that one scripture which is constantly before us like an open book – if we could only read and understand it.

The Sufi’s object of worship is beauty – not only in form and line and color, but beauty in all its aspects, from gross to fine.

What is the moral of the Sufis? Every religion, every creed, has certain moral teachings: that this particular principle is right, and that particular principle is wrong. No principle is labelled by a Sufi as either; it is its application which makes it right or wrong. The light which guides the Sufi on the path is his or her own conscience, and harmony is the justification which guides the Sufi onward step-by-step to his or her idealized goal. To harmonize with oneself is not sufficient; one must also harmonize with others in thought, speech, and action; that is the attitude of the Sufi.

The highest heaven of the Sufi is his or her own heart, and that which humanity generally knows as love, to a Sufi, is God. Different people have thought of the Deity as the Creator, as the Judge, as the King, as the Supreme Being; but the Sufis call God the Beloved.

[. . .] What Sufis strive for is self-realization, and they arrive at this self-realization by means of their divine ideal, their God. By this they touch that truth which is the ultimate goal and the yearning of every soul. It is not only realization; it is a happiness which words cannot explain. It is that peace which is yearned for by every soul.

And how does one attain it? By practicing the presence of God; by realizing the oneness of the whole being; by continually holding, every moment of the day, consciously or subconsciously, the truth before one’s vision, in spite of the waves of illusion which arise incessantly, diverting one’s glance from absolute truth [i.e., Love]. And no matter what may be the name of any sect, cult, or creed, so long as the souls are striving towatd that object, to a Sufi they are all Sufis. The attitude of the Sufi to all the different religions is one of respect. The Sufi’s religion is the service of humanity, and the Sufi’s only attainment is the realization of truth.

– Inayat Khan
From “The Sufi Message” in Caravan of Souls:
An Introduction to the Sufi Path of Hazrat Inayat Khan
Second Edition, Suluk Press, 2022
pp. 5-8

See also the previous Wild Reed posts:

INAYAT KHAN
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Inayat Khan
• Inayat Khan and the Sufi Message
• “Like a Stream Running Into the Ocean”
• Inayat Khan and the Heart of Sufism
• Inayat Khan on Mysticism
• Inayat Khan on the Art of Selflessness
• Inayat Khan: “There Must Be Balance”
• Inayat Khan and the Fountain of Happiness Within
• Inayat Khan and the Alchemy of Happiness
• A Light That Will Always Shine
• A Living Light
• A Perpetual Fire Within
• One Wisdom
• Awakening and Turning

THE SUFI PATH
• A Precise Metaphysical Claim
• The Sufi Way
• Sufism: Way of Love, Tradition of Enlightenment, and Antidote to Fanaticism
• Sufism: A Call to Awaken
• Sufism: A Living Twenty-First Century Tradition
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Kabir Helminski
• As the Last Walls Dissolve . . . Everything is Possible
• Clarity, Hope, and Courage
• “Joined at the Heart”: Robert Thompson on Christianity and Sufism
• Doris Lessing on the Sufi Way
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Doris Lessing
• The Gorgeous One
• Saaxiib Qurux Badan and the Winged Heart
• Held in the Presence of God
• The Act of Surrender
• The Journey Home
• Living From the Heart

ONENESS
• “Everything Is Saturated With the Sacred”
• Michael Morwood on the Divine Presence – Part 1 | Part 2
• We Are One
• Jesus: A Revelation of Oneness
• Forever Oneness
• The Most Sacred and Simple Mystery of All
• In the Garden of Spirituality – Wendy Benning Swanson

See also the related Wild Reed posts
• Christ Consciousness: The Inner Flame of Divine Self
• Marianne Williamson on Cultivating Stillness
• In the Midst of the “Great Unraveling,” a Visit to the Prayer Tree
• A Season of Listening
• Eckhart Tolle on Silence and Stillness
• Eckhart Tolle on Going Beyond the Thinking Mind
• Eckhart Tolle on Being “Conscious Without Thought”
• To Be Still
• Stepping Out of Time and Resting Your Mind
• In the Stillness and Silence of This Present Moment
• The Beauty and Challenge of Being Present in the Moment
• Today I Will Be Still
• Resting in the Presence of the Beloved
• Active Waiting: A Radical Attitude Toward Life
• I Need Do Nothing . . . I Am Open to the Living Light
• A Sacred Pause
• Aligning with the Living Light
• Mystical Participation
• Keeping the Spark Alive
• Awakenings
• A Course in Miracles: A Gift of Peace
• Seven Principles for Living with Deep Intention
• Thoughts on Christian Meditation – Part 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Related Off-site Links:
Recalling Hazrat Inayat Khan and his Universalist Sufism – James Ford (Patheos, February 5, 2022).
Mystic Inayat Khan’s Legacy: Music, Sufism, and a Celebrated Spy Daughter – Nishtha Gautam (The Quint, February 6, 2019).
You know British Spy Noor Inayat Khan Who Hitler Executed. Her Father Has a Story Too – Raghav Bikhchandani (The Print, July 5. 2022).
Remembering Sufi Mystic Hazrat Inayat Khan – Syeda Farida (The Hindu, July 25, 2016).
Inayat Khan and Universal Sufism – Filip Holm (Let’s Talk Religion, December 8, 2024).
Hazrat Inayat Khan: A Sufi Maestro in Moscow – Ajay Kamalakaran (Open, May 1, 2021).
The Sufi Concept of “Fana” – And Why Modern Psychology Is Only Just Catching Up – Ahmad Fatahillah (Medium, May 22, 2026).

Opening image: A 1916 portrait of Inayat Khan. (Photographer unknown.)

Thursday, October 01, 2026

The Most Magical Month of the Year

Welcome to the most magical month of the year. October exists in a realm of its own – a time when the everyday transforms, and believing in the unexplained feels natural.

Light the candles. Make wishes on the first evening stars. Take the scenic route home when the dusk settles. Say yes to spontaneous plans that pull you off course. Hold space for good omens, fortunate timing, ancient superstitions, and the idea that life still holds surprises.

For these 31 days, expand your capacity for wonder. Magic remains everywhere; October simply arrives to remind us to see it.

– Collective World
via social media
October 1, 2026