Welcome

"Greetings. We bow to your divinity."

This greeting beautifully reflects the spiritual journey, which is about discovering and then living out of our spiritual essence. Deep inside, we all yearn to have our sacred essence recognized. We want to be seen for who we are and we want to know who we are. The spiritual journey is about knowing our sacred self intimately, bowing to its presence, and allowing our lives to be an expression of its beauty and truth.

The journey is a process of disengaging from limitations imposed through human conditioning and releasing our soul's potential to express love, creativity and wisdom. The soul's fulfillment is a wonderful mystery, we can only listen and let it express itself, discovering as we go.

Deep in our hearts we long to be free. Unless there is rigorous inquiry into truth, as adults, we tend to identify who we are with our life circumstances and personal history. We take the superficial aspects of our lives to be our core. What makes this so is that we unconsciously believe that who we are is a somebody with a particular history, personality and body all those ideas and images that we think define us. Inevitably, we are also primarily identified with our physical bodies, experiencing and believing them to be who we are.

In the depths of our hearts, we know this is not true. We cannot be limited by things that happen nor by the conditions under which we were raised. Yet the mind is convinced and subconsciously holds dearly to its beliefs, as evidenced by the way we defend our mental positions. We may think that we have matured beyond our conditioning, but if we do not see thoughts for what they are we are misleading ourselves. Until we recognize that we are spiritual beings having a human experience, we suffer from a case of mistaken identity.

To be free is to realize that we are much more than our body/minds, to literally know that we are consciousness itself. When we experience the loving presence of awareness, we know unquestionably that we are more than what we appear to be. We can see that, as a natural result of the growing up process, we innocently misunderstood who we are. Recognizing our essence, we know that we are precious, inseparable from all of life.

Miracles happen when we realize that we are sacred expressions of the One Unity. The flame of the truth of who we are is ignited in us. It begins to burn away our misunderstandings, including the ways we cause ourselves to suffer. The flame warms our hearts and is the source of great joy. Our souls are then free to express love, creativity and wisdom, thus actualizing our human potential, moment by moment, day by day.

There is no greater meaning in life than to willingly participate in the fulfillment of your soul's purpose. This website was created to support your soul's journey. Our reading room is a huge treasure chest of wisdom. We whole-heartedly invite you to spend some time browsing there.

We also invite you to join us in a workshop or retreat. For the past several years, we have hosted many retreats. Taking retreat heals and realigns our lives to the guidance that we receive in profound silence. We know of no other format more powerful for becoming aware of the loving presence of awareness and becoming conscious of the ways, through our ignorance, that we have caused ourselves to suffer.

Blessings, Rick and Mary NurrieStearns

Mary NurrieStearns

What has happened to you doesn't define you, the truth of who you are is discovered anew with every breath.

Mary NurrieStearns has meditated and practiced yoga since 1991. An advanced level yoga teacher, Mary says, "The yogic path is incredible. It weaves its way through the body, mind and spirit, and leads us into the realization of who we are as spiritual beings. Along the way, we discover true contentment and acquire a healthy body." She tells her students, "Be faithful to your practice and yoga will transform your life." Mary has discovered that being relaxed feels wonderful. While this may sound obvious, as one of the many who has suffered from anxiety and emotional trauma, she didn't know what it was like to be at peace deep inside. Then yoga grew strong roots in her and changed all that.

Mary has over four decades of professional experience in mental health and maintains a counseling practice in Tulsa Oklahoma. She is author of numerous articles on psycho-spiritual growth, co-author of "Yoga for Anxiety," "Yoga for Emotional Trauma", "Yoga Mind, Peaceful Mind" and co-editor of "Soulful Living". Former editor of "Personal Transformation" magazine, she has produced transformational audios on the healing practices of compassion and meditation and educational video's on yoga for emotional trauma and anxiety. She teaches yoga, mindfulness and meditation, presents seminars across the United States and co-leads, with her husband, transformational meditation and yoga retreats. A long-time student of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh, she credits the meditative practices of yoga with profound healing.

A quiet person at heart, she lives in a wooded area near Tulsa with her husband and pets, amidst the animals of the forest.

Rick NurrieStearns

Deep within your heart is a profound stillness that reveals the essence of who you truly are.

Rick has been immersed in consciousness studies for more than four decades and is a long-time student of Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh. For over twenty years he was involved in publishing spiritual and transformational books and magazines. He was the publisher of the magazines "Lotus: Journal for Personal Transformation" and "Personal Transformation," co-editor of the book "Soulful Living," co-author of "Yoga for Anxiety," "Yoga for Emotional Trauma" and "Yoga Mind, Peaceful Mind." Along with his wife Mary, he leads transformational meditation retreats.

He is nourished by silence, loves the wilderness and simple living.