Vows in the Inner Temple

Neville's Inner Vision

See the psalm as a map of your inner life. The house is the I AM, the living temple of awareness you enter when you withdraw from outward seeking and attend to the presence within. The vow you pay is the decision to release the old self at the altar of consciousness, not a ritual to be performed apart from you. The burnt offerings of fatlings symbolize burning away appetites and beliefs that keep you identified with lack; the incense of rams stands for the rising, fragrant power of imagination when you acknowledge the state as real in feeling. The bulls with goats symbolize the increasing intensity of your mental images to prevail in every scene. When you were in trouble, you spoke a future you intended to realize; now revise that memory by living the vow as already fulfilled. The sacrifices are thus acts of inner acceptance and steadfast loyalty to the state you choose. Practice: return to your inner temple, assume the state of the vow in the present, and let gratitude become your felt-reality.