I love getting massages. They’re physical therapy, encouraging the connection between mind and body, and getting rid of tension and stress that gets backed up through the day. For years I’ve been seeing the same massage therapist who works out of a wonderful metaphysical bookstore with a goal of encouraging healing and growth. But I have never talked to her about much going on in my spiritual life until this time.

This time, it’s December, and it’s hitting me hard – and I can’t imagine that it’s any easier for her, as a store owner, trying to handle the huge volume of sales as well as getting ready to hit the accounting books come January 1st, and deal with the energies of the dark side of the year. But I’m here for a massage, and so we chat a little bit, and she does something new for me: instead of focusing on parts of my body that hurt, because fewer parts hurt this time, she has me smell some essential oils to find out what smells best, what my energy needs today. Today, we work on my crown chakra, working toward spiritual healing.

I flounder when faced with the spiritual. Energies have called to me for a long time, and because I don’t know how to interpret or interact with them, I feel their call… and I let them go.

This time, my massage therapist recommended a book to me, and being in a bookstore, and me actually having a job this time around, I got it: The Mystic Foundation by Christopher Penczak, a well-known author. I tend to be suspicious of well-known authors in pagan circles, but I trust this woman to not recommend something overly pushy and narrow-minded, and she said it’s recommended reading for all of the book store staff as well.

I’m two chapters in and I love it. It’s not about one path, one way to do things, which many, many books are. It’s about how all the mystic paths are just trying to find the right words to describe the indescribable. It’s not about which path is the right path, only which one resonates with you, because that’s how you are going to understand the ineffable.

I’m encouraged, reading this, to continue my quest: that maybe my frustration with the paths I’ve encountered so far is not whether or not the thing I’m searching for exists, but that I just haven’t found it yet in the language I understand. And that that is the most important part, as we all conceive of the abstract differently, and our language just can’t grasp it.