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Counterpoint to Reality: A Personal Journey

Counterpoint to Reality: A Personal Journey
Written by Stephen John O'Connor

1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (3 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
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My personal journey exploring the parallel path our spirit/soul takes, hidden behind the chaos of our lives. Light Energy whispers and nudges us in new directions that fulfill our life-path, giving us meaning and focus and allowing us to follow the route we have chosen before our births. I relate personal stories about initiations into esoteric orders, meeting my guardian, exploring past lives and their influences and gifts, ayahuasca and the Santo Daime church of Brazil and much more.

Stephen John O’Connor has spent his life Stephen has followed in his two main passions: music and spirituality. He has been involved with many organizations dedicated to the pursuit of spiritual knowledge and has been initiated into the following Spiritual groups: Knights Templar C.I.R.C.E.S. Order of Pythagoras Order of Melchizedek Rosicrucian Order AMORC Martinist Order Stephen has studied and involved himself with Kabbalah, Numerology, Qi Gong, Yoga, the Western Esoteric Tradition, Shamanism and Mysticism. Stephen is an accomplished and well-known musician. He has written music for Universal Studios, Warner Bros., The San Diego Symphony, The Republic of China, Toyota, Chrysler, Jeep, Disney, Sea World, The Atlanta Summer Olympics, World’s Fair in Seville, Spain, to name just a few. As a jazz guitarist Stephen has worked with many popular and well-known names in Music: Red Mitchell, Bob Magnusson, Charles MacPherson, Bob Mover, Jim Plank, Ronny Ogden; The Joe Farrell Big Band (featuring ex-Chick Corea band saxophonist Farrell), Mike Wofford, Don Menza, Frank Rosolino, Russell Farrentes (of Yellow Jackets fame); Oscar Brashear and John Gurin of the L.A. Express; and Joni Summers; plus many more. Stephen John O’Connor was born and raised in Southern California and now makes his primary home in Mexico, in a small village north of Puerto Vallarta.

CounterPoint to Reality: A Personal Journey by Stephen John O’Connor was an easy read for me. As O’Connor relates his personal stories, there was for me a sense of familiarity: - not with the specifics of his journey, which is his alone, and unique but, with the overall direction through the ‘matrix of life’, as he calls it. We are all on similar but remarkably different journeys along the path. As O’Connor says “Overall, what I have learned, and am still learning, is that there is a Path. It’s not outside of us. There is no one who can truly guide us into the Path or help us along its way.”

O’Connor’s path is a truly fascinating one. A musician and composer, he engaged with various esoteric schools earlier in his life including AMORC. Yet, although he saw signs and bizarre things during his time working in the occult and with magic – some of which are recounted in the book – it seems as if these simply set the scene for personal explorations with Ayahuasca and meeting the Mother Daime later in life. It is through these deep and, at times, painful experiences that he arrives at an appreciation of life and the Path. “The Path,” he says, “has no path. It can only be travelled as it unfolds within one’s spiritual domain.”

What we are treated to in the book are a series of incidents, realizations and pointers experienced by Mr. O’Connor. These are interesting and well written in their own right and make the book an easy and fast read. Through these snapshots and experiences, we are given some pointers in terms of how he sees reality. There is the ego ‘I’ and the Self. We can dream our way through life as the ego ‘I’, or wake up to the light and towards re-integration with the Self. This is the Path where everything experienced happens for a reason ‘urging us towards awakening’. Mr. O’Connor points the way forward and it is by quieting the chatter of the mind, listening to the Higher Self and following the Path of no paths. For Mr. O’Connor, each of us has set out our course before we were born and now have to awaken to it again. Unless we do as a species in general, he sees dire longer-term consequences for the Earth.

I really enjoyed this book. It is well written and thought-through and the experiences and situations it describes are fascinating. Although pointing to the way, he does not specify anything beyond looking for the signs, the synchronicities in life and stilling the mind via quiet contemplation or meditation. Beyond that, each of us has mapped our own course. By attempting to show us his, Mr. O’Connor has provided a personal example of the way.


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