These deaths I speak of are not a physical death. No, they are more of a metaphorical death followed by a glorious return to a whole new life. It is the death of one version of “I” and the beginning of a new “I”.

As I learned more about who I actually was, I discovered a great number of things I didn’t like about myself. More importantly, I began to develop a sense of who I could be.

Back when I was a miserable, isolated and lonely high school student, I made a lot of excuses for why I was the way I was. “I’m just different than everyone else,” I would tell myself. “It’s their loss for not taking the time to get to understand me.” I let my hopes become expectations and my personal delusions become my reality. I was depressed, constantly, and, to a lesser extent, angry with the world.

At the time, I didn’t know it, but that was all holding me back. Keeping me in my rut, steeped in an unhealthy darkness of mood and mind–blind to the similarities I shared with those around me.

That’s when I got my first glimpse of my Adversary… and of the beauty of the Universe.

In the gloom of my darkest hours, I began to notice things. I began to notice patterns in my life. To see that every time my life just plain sucked in one way, some other area would open up and be better than ever. Now, that other area wasn’t always my area of choice–which is why it was so hard to see back then–but when I did finally realize how interconnected everything was, the final pieces fell into place.

Before those pieces fell into place, though, they had to be shaken loose from the pile of crap they had been mixed in with.

In order to “deal” with all the pain and suffering of my middle school and high school experience, I had built up walls around myself. That’s a common defense against The Adversary that many use. The “Strange Me” I had cultivated was insulation against some of the suffering I felt I was subjected to. It was also a prison of my own creation.

The simple fact is, any construct–be it physical, emotional, mental or spiritual–that keeps something out also keeps something in.

As my walls built up, things piled up inside them. By the time I was graduating high school, I was up to my neck in crap. Crap that I had generated in my own mind. Crap that society had thrown on me (just high enough to get over the top of my wall). Crap that was very soon going to blot out any view I had of anything good in the world. Crap that began, in my internal wanderings, to take on a life of its own.

Without knowing it, I had given my Adversary the most fertile ground to thrive on it could ever hope for.

Within weeks of discovering the wonderful world of “not the place I grew up in” (also known as college), I had made some real friends and found a level of acceptance that I had never before known. I shared those first few weeks with a number of great people–most of whom had been outcasts in high school.

But inside, I was still the high school me. I was still almost over my head in crap, trapped inside the walls I had built. I could feel those walls becoming weak, being pressed well beyond their limits from both sides. I could feel the separation those walls were creating between the people I now cared about and myself. And on an even more terrifying level, I could feel something else within those walls struggling to get the best of me.

Like it or not, those walls were going to come down.

That’s when I got my first full view of my Adversary.

It was more than I could really handle on my own.

And so, a tentatively asked my new friends Chris and Sarah if I could talk to them for a bit.

They got to hear about everything that had been going on in my head. About all the dark things I knew I had running around inside me. About the little bits of Divinity I had glimpsed and the connections I felt among events.

I talked a lot.

To their credit, they managed to not look too freaked out. (I know I must have worried them a bit, though… it was pretty intense, even by my own standards.)

Suddenly, the world was a different place.

I was a different person.

Through telling the story–through sharing my burden–I dragged my Adversary out into the light. It was difficult to do. The thing wanted me to keep quiet about it, it’s power was mostly in getting me to isolate myself. Alone, it could taunt and tear one little bit at a time from my self control and happiness. The Adversary is always cunning and for a while I had been playing right into its twisted hands.

Once I got a good look at it, though, I could see how familiar it was. I could see that it was me.

In that moment of realization, I accepted it as a vital part of myself. My Adversary lost a lot of power that day… and I came out of the meeting a different person.

The old “I” was dead and gone. In his place was a completely different individual.

The walls that had been built up had collapsed and their rubble had settled into a new foundation. The useless, broken pieces were easy to discard after that break. I was able, for the first time since a weekend long hike in the mountains a couple of years earlier, to feel part of the Universe.

I had finally found stable, permanent happiness.

It lasted for a year and a half.

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Nothing can mess with us more than our own mind. And here it is important to note that the mind is different from the brain in this context. The brain is the functional part, the mind is the thing that gets in the way. It drifts, it becomes fixated on certain ideas, it chatters incessantly about nothing, it jumps from idea to idea (generated by the brain or inspired by spirit). All in all, it’s more often than not just a whole lot of noise that needs to be filtered.

For most people, it doesn’t get much more serious than that.

For some, it gets a bit worse. Not only does the mind chatter incessantly, that chatter takes on a sinister tone. It becomes that voice in your head telling you you’re not good enough, the one that erodes your confidence by reminding you of all the times you’ve failed, by dredging up the most tenuous supporting “evidence” as to why you’ll fail again. Maybe that’s tone is being caused by a short in the brain (which can be treated in most cases). Maybe it’s being caused by a broken shard of your mind from past traumatic experience (which can also be treated, though not as surely as a physical or chemical problem).

For those who choose a spiritual path, things can go one step further.

As an initiate makes his way down the road of self-discovery, that voice can become personified. It can take on shapes and forms in visions. It can be reflected in those we interact with. And all the while it seeks only to undermine that desired progress.

It becomes The Adversary.

It can take many forms, an annoying trickster, a fickle ally, that dark voice in the back of your head telling you you’re not good enough. It can even show up as the main Big Bad who seems to be behind all things unpleasant. The Adversary is as cunning as it is insidious. It knows your every move, sometimes before you do. Always, it is there, waiting for a chance to muck things up. A chance to set you back.

The Adversary is everywhere at once. It lashes back at us when dealing with others who share our strengths and weaknesses. Using them, it reflects and amplifies everything we dislike about ourselves… and then clouds the actual source of the annoyance we feel at others.

It distracts us from our actual goals–by making us chase it, by presenting challenges that pique our interest more than the task we should be doing, by outright opposing us.

But there is no “us” against “them” here. The Adversary is a part of our whole self. It’s that dark part that we try to hide–and hide from. It’s those deep rumblings of untapped power and knowledge, looking to get out on their own.

It is an integral part of not just who we are, but who we could be.

For better, or for worse.

How we deal with our Adversaries can determine a lot. The natural reaction is to fight. To fight long and hard, expending tremendous amounts of energy trying to beat them into submission or to outright destroy them. Neither of those options is possible. The more you fight it, the more powerful The Adversary becomes.

The best you can do is use The Adversary as a guide. See it for what it is–a deep source of knowledge and insight into yourself. It can even be an ally, once you understand what it wants. Knowing it is part of you, you can assert some control over it. You can negotiate with it.

Encountering The Adversary for the first time during pathwork can be disconcerting. That encounter often happens unexpectedly and, sometimes, violently. If any encounter with The Adversary in the metaphysical realm goes poorly, things in the real world can also take a nasty turn. Because it is such a vital sub-section of ourselves–and because it so hates being hidden and suppressed in the background–it can sometimes “bleed through” into our own behavior, often without us realizing.

We become sullen, angry, quick to lash out. We lie, cheat and steal–sometimes going out of our way to hurt those around us. If that’s not what we normally do, it very well could be The Adversary’s influence coming through.

This is why we need to be cognizant of our actions, why we need to understand our patters. With that knowledge, we can spot changes in them. If those changes are taking a toll on our ability to function in the “real world”, then action must be taken.

What kind of action? It depends. For some, a deeper dedication to their spiritual path–more encounters and interaction with The Adversary as a separate entity–can help. For others, more “mundane” paths of analysis like therapists can help sort out the different threads that make us up.

The simple fact is, we all have a dark side… and even the most vile human out there has at least some small spark of light. The Adversary is always a twisted reflection of the person, the other part of the whole. Yin to Yang, Light to Darkness, when it comes down to it, The Adversary completes us. Balances us.

When we take control of that balance–when we accept the fact that there is no mythical purity within us–we have the power in the relationship with the Adversary. By accepting our faults and fears, we gain control over them. We become, consciously, a more whole person.

And The Adversary… becomes an ally.

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Now, I’m not going to get my hopes up too much just yet, but it does bode well for anyone hoping to earn a little extra money on the side by marketing their talents and abilities. That becomes much easier to do with a (slightly) decreased chance of immediately being laughed at. When you can cite the fact that Seagate Technology, Hollywood producers and other big-businesses tap into the metaphysical real and come out on top, people should be much more receptive to paying for your services.

At least that’s how I’m hoping it goes.

The first article talks about Patricia Day and others like her who offer their services to corporations and make a good living doing so.

It’s impossible to objectively judge psychic powers. Are psychics just good listeners who pick up enough clues from their clients to provide seemingly insightful answers? Are they making lucky guesses? “It’s kind of a dirty secret,” Day says of business people who use psychics like herself. She declines to identify most of her clients, and almost all who spoke to NEWSWEEK also requested anonymity out of concern for their reputations.

Day is one of a small but expanding cadre of corporate psychic consultants—the professionalized face of an occupation better known for hokey headscarves and crystal balls. Rebranded as “intuitionists” or “mentalists”—terms more palatable to mainstream America—psychic advisers in recent years have been crossing over into the world of legitimate business, where they are used by decision makers in law, finance and entertainment looking for an edge in a down economy. “I specialize in nonbelievers,” says Day, referring to her roster of “red-meat-eating, Barneys-shopping, Type A personalities.”

The second article is a little more snarky and less flattering, but equally interesting because it addresses the simple fact that no matter how much it doesn’t make sense, many people want to believe psychic abilities work.

Mayer’s quest took her into a world where the ordinary rules of time and space don’t apply—of dowsers like McCoy, who ordinarily searches for water underground but asserts he can find almost anything by tuning in to the “vibrations” that pervade the universe; of clairvoyants who claim to read minds over the telephone or to be able to see what someone else is looking at, hundreds of miles away; of laboratories where people stare at a pendulum, trying to slow it down with their minds. She compiled her research into a just-published book, “Extraordinary Knowing: Science, Skepticism and the Inexplicable Powers of the Human Mind,” that she finished just before her death in 2005, at the age of 57.

We do, indeed, live in interesting times. The world is, again, in flux with more possibilities being open and explored each day. Maybe soon we’ll be to a point where psychic phenomena can be better explained or quantified by actual science. (I’m not holding my breath for that, as it would require more serious scientific research into things many scientists just laugh at without thought.) More importantly, the people on the street and in the corner offices are starting to open up more to the possibilities around them. They do this out of necessity as their normal methods of coping and planning fail due to the chaos of the systems that surround us all.

Psychics thrive on the chaos. They are the ultimate pattern recognition systems, not being afraid to make those otherwise crazy jumps from point A to point B. They are the daredevils of cognitive process. And, even if what they do has no verifiable way of working, the simple fact is that it does work enough of the time for it to be useful.

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I’m not talking physical parts here–I’m talking the ethereal parts that are just as, if not more, important than our physical base. We have different moods, different hopes, different fears and different attitudes. And we don’t always want or need to share all of them with everyone.

And so we segment. And hide. And choose what we will reveal to whom and when we will reveal it.

We put on masks, adopt airs and do whatever we deem appropriate to present what we want to who we want when we want.

There’s really nothing wrong with that. It’s human nature. In fact, it’s even pretty darn sensible and makes “polite society” possible. After all, everyone doesn’t need to know about the results of Aunt Mabel’s colonoscopy. I think we can all agree that most people wouldn’t even want to know.

There are also things we hide not because we want to, but because we are not aware of them ourselves. These are natural and ensure that we always have more to learn about ourselves. (Anyone who thinks they know everything about themselves is either lying, misguided or incredibly enlightened—and I don’t know anyone that incredibly enlightened.)

Then, and this is the most annoying part for most people, there are the things we don’t know about ourselves—but everyone else does. Or at least they think they do.

This is all basic communication theory. So basic, in fact, it has made it’s way into a bunch of management texts, workshops and pop psychology as the Johari Window. It is a simplistic, though eerily accurate, overview of how much we disclose to ourselves and others.

Dealing the the disparity between what we know about ourselves and what we show to others is a big part of spiritual development and, more generally, growth as a person. Delving into our own blind spots and taking in what others think they know about us—both very difficult things in their own right—require us to come to terms with unpleasant surprises about ourselves and how people see us.

And then we have to decide what to do with all that information.

This is where the idea of Reconciliation comes in. The particular type of Reconciliation I’m talking about isn’t the kind that occurs between oneself and others—it is an entirely internal thing. Until we can resolve, or at least quiet, the disparity inside ourselves, there isn’t much we’re good for when it comes to other people.

Three Big Questions

For those who have chosen to live to serve others and those walking a spiritual path, attaining a decent amount of Reconciliation is incredibly important.

We have to know three things:

1. Who were you?
2. Who do you want to become?
3. And most importantly, who are you now?

Who we were will always be important. Our past serves as either the foundation or the fertilizer for who we are and who will become. There is nothing about who we were that we should ever be ashamed of. After all, we are not that person any more. We learned from those situations (be they good or bad) and made choices to either continue on the same path or to change our direction.

Who we want to become is important only in that it give us a goal to reach for, a light to shine on the path we walk. Without an idea of who we want to become, we can very easily get distracted and end up walking in circles through the forest of confusion.

Who we are now is by far the most important thing to know. If we do not know who we are now, we can not put into perspective who we were and we do not know how far we have to go to become who we want to be. Who we are now is who we have to live our day to day lives as. It is who other people have to interact with.

If we are fractured and fragmented, bent, broken and twisted, we may not have a clear picture of who we are. It takes time to put the pieces together. It takes courage to ask the hard questions. And it takes balls of steel to own up to the stupid things we all do.

But if we want to find real, deep and enduring happiness, we have to do it.

Along that path, though, there is something waiting for you in the shadows. It will try to stop you, scare you, misdirect you or otherwise prevent you from reaching your goal. It is the most difficult enemy you will ever face. It knows everything you know about yourself—and more.

It is The Adversary and it is something that many people don’t know much about until they face it in their quest for reconciliation.

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The classic soothsayer predicting victory or death, the traveling Gypsy turning the cards and seeing the future, even the Biblical prophets passing on notes from the Divine to people who don’t always get quite what they mean at the time, these are all well known examples.

In the real world, things don’t always work out quite so nicely. True prophecy is a rare thing (which, really, is probably for the best). And fortune telling has gotten a bad rap due to both scientific scrutiny and a number of high-profile charlatans who more than happily take people’s money.

That negative frequently overshadows the positives that exist.

There is no denying that divination is far from an exact science, at least in the ways it is most commonly practiced and presented. In someone’s life, there is simply too much going on–too many variables–to account for them all. Humans, being the fickle creatures we are, can be swayed by the most nonsensical things, deflected from a planned course by some shiny object or random idea, completely breaking from any predictable pattern, oblivious to any destiny we may have.

What, then, are the positives of divination?

There is skill. A good practitioner of any form of divination, be it Tarot cards or casting the bones, spends years honing the skills and knowledge necessary to interpret the symbols of their particular method. That teaches focus and builds awareness. For the diviner, regardless of the accuracy of any given divination, there is the chance for deep personal growth. Without a doubt, that is a positive.

There is awareness. Interpreting the symbols of the tools is only one third (at best) of a good divination. Another large part is awareness. The practitioner must be aware–aware of their client, aware of their own state of mind, aware of how things are currently going in the world their client exists within. Without this awareness, there is no context. Without context, any information presented by the divinitory tools is virtually useless. There are few who would argue that increased awareness is a bad thing.

There is creativity. It is the sole responsibility of the practitioner to bring symbol and context together into a coherent whole that speaks to the concerns of the client. This requires creativity–an ability to connect disparate and sometimes contradictory bits of information into something more than the sum of its parts. A good practitioner tells a good story about the client and the forces he or she has at work in his or her life. Creativity works the mind in different ways than pure logic and opens the door for more creative thought. If that can be shared with someone seeking solutions–if they can become just a little more in tune with the idea of creativity–this is a good thing.

Notice there is no need for actual metaphysical intervention. There is no need for grand psychic powers or deep and dark magickal powers. There is only need for knowledge, awareness and creativity. Because of this, anyone can practice divination in it’s most basic–and generally useful–form.

At its root, divination is a way to gain perspective and a way to explore new solutions. With a moderate amount of training and solid ethics, anyone can begin helping themselves and others.

The real problems begin when a practitioner leaves those ethical concerns behind him. When they put their own well-being ahead of that of their clients, they can twist and manipulate the knowledge they have. They can use their awareness to cut deep and their creativity to warp and influence the decisions of their clients. They can, without a doubt, easily and completely take advantage of many, many people before being caught.

This is the double-edged sword of many skills.

This is why a key component of any metaphysical practice is deep thought on ethics and responsibilities.

When used properly and with good intent, divination can be a very good thing. The addition of an actual metaphysical component can add to awareness, but is not necessary to change people’s lives for the better.

Divination does not predict the future, it merely looks at that which is often ignored in the past and present and follows it to a possible outcome. The idea of that journey, when shared with a seeker, can be more powerful than any supposedly predestined event or preconceived notion.

That is where the true power of divination is: not in seeing the future, but in helping others to create the future they want.

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I won’t argue the fact, and, if you ask, I’ll be the first to tell you that yes, I actually am arrogant. But only in some circumstances.

There are a number of things I was apparently born good at or at least took to at an early age. Getting a quick feel for people, bouncing back from problems, thinking my way through problems, picking up new information, telling stories (both fact and fiction, for good or ill)… things like that I’ve been doing for most of my life.

Other things I’ve worked hard to become good at. Thinking (in general), really relating to people, finding things, digging to the root of problems, planning for the best results (mostly in business settings), organizing information, making things easier for other people to understand… some of it I went to school for, other bits I’ve picked up on my own.

Through finding out what I’m good at, though, I also discovered what I wasn’t good at.

Right there is the double-edged sword of self-knowledge.

You will never find me arguing in an arena I know I’m not at least above average in. Unless everyone else involved in the argument is even worse at whatever it is than I am. Thankfully, that doesn’t come up all that often.

Stepping up to lead is something I don’t particularly like to do. I’ll do it if I need to–to get something done, or to stop something from going too terribly wrong–but rarely will I volunteer or pursue such a thing from the start.

Why? Because while Pride may be my sin of choice, Vanity most certainly is not.

I don’t generally like being the center of attention. It causes too many problems in the long run. It sets up expectations that can’t always be met. And, perhaps most importantly, it puts my arrogance on display for all to see–and puts me in a position where I may lose what credibility I have when it comes to those things I am good at.

(That may sound like a fear of failure, but it’s not–it’s a fear of success. If I do very well and they know about it, people expect that to continue regardless of other circumstances. By staying out of the spotlight, any failures–be they my own fault or caused by others–remain low-key, too, don’t raise those expectations to impossible levels.)

Pride and Vanity often walk hand-in-hand. They inflate the ego and push their respective negative behaviors to stratospheric excess. The Vain call attention to themselves, parade their Pride for all to see. “Look at me!” they say. “See how good I am at this. See how pretty I am when do that.”

And when they stumble, everyone sees and everyone cheers.

Through taking careful stock of myself and by working to keep my ego in check, I’ve separated the two, sealed off my Pride from the fuel of Vanity. Oh, it still burns and urges me in bad directions at times, but it does not blaze and will not destroy me.

Yes, I can be arrogant. More often than not, it is that cousin of arrogance that so many don’t understand: self-confidence. Self-confidence is arrogance that has been earned. Pride, for sure, but without the sting an pomp of Vanity–instead, it is fed by the virtue of Knowledge.

Pride and Vanity have been the downfall of many on a spiritual path. They lose sight that, while they may be better at some things, they are not better at all things. They forget that the more people they show themselves to, the more they have to live up to. They forget that those who stand tallest and shout loudest about how great and beautiful they are are the first targets for those (often equally full of Pride and Vanity) with the opposite opinions.

They mistake Pride and Vanity for self-confidence and knowledge. They fool themselves into thinking that they really are that good, all the while falling further and further behind. Show takes presence over substance. Complexity obscures actual truth and usefulness. Eventually, all is lost in a spectacular failure that all the world gazes upon in wonder that it did not happen sooner.

There is a beauty in subtlety. A nuance that is lost in the flash of Vanity, blown away by the hot air of Pride.

We can all be humbled by that idea. And most of us probably should be.

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More often than not, that becomes the case.

The spiritual and the physical, while not actually opposing forces, are often seen as such. This creates conflict, especially in our modern world where extreme factions of both sides seek to eradicate the other extreme.

If this is so, why would anyone willingly choose to walk a spiritual path?

The answer is Salvation.

How that word is defined differs from generation to generation and culture to culture, but at its root is the quest to end (or reduce) suffering. For yourself. For others. For everyone.

The whole point of Jesus’ Service and Suffering was to forge a new bond between the Hebrew god and his people. A renewed–and more basic–covenant that what had been put forth in the Old Testament stories. A new covenant for a new era.

Obviously, things didn’t quite go completely as planned in the ensuing two millenniums.

But Jesus did what he did because he thought it would, eventually, make life better for those around him and for his people as a whole. If nothing else, he believed–as did many others–that his life and death fulfilled a number of prophecies. He wanted to make the world a better place and he wanted those who followed his example to do the same.

His one new major commandment was one of the most direct and simple statements ever handed down:

A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. (John 13:34)

Somewhere between then and now, it seems most of that sentiment has been lost, twisted or outright ignored by people who claim to follow the same fate.

That’s the thing about Salvation–it can work very well on a small scale. You, as an individual on a spiritual path, may be able to make a small number of people’s lives better. You, on your own, may be able to show people the wonder they can find on their own spiritual path. You may even discover, as you walk your path, that you can forgive yourself for the shortcomings you have simply because you are flesh and blood.

On a large scale, the idea of Salvation tends to fall apart. There are too many competing interests (which are rarely as in opposition to one another than the opponents believe) and too many people with different definitions of what Salvation actually is. Human nature and inconsistency muddle things and warp messages.

Unless you truly are chosen by the Divine (and, perhaps, even then), it is best to focus on your own ideas of Salvation and work them on the small scale. With enough people working locally with the same mindset–and with the same ideas of Service and Sacrifice–each of them can go forth into the world and educate others.

This is what Jesus did with his Apostles. He tried to groom them to be the foundation for the new covenant. In the end, he had some doubts about how successful he was, but after the resurrection–after shedding his mortal coil and transcending his limitation–he was able to more directly affect his followers. The greatest effect, though, came from them having suffered his death and rejoiced at his return, in fulfillment of the prophecies they all held dear.

Always remember that while Salvation is a noble goal, it is not something we, as men and women, can dole out as we please.

Salvation is a goal that must be work toward mostly on an individual basis. You can inspire, you can educate, you can proselytize and preach, but if someone isn’t ready to be saved, you can’t force it on him.

The best we can hope for is to attain the state of mind and grace that allows us to look back on our own path–our own trail of Service and Sacrifice–and be content with what we see along it.

The only person we can truly save, is ourself.

And that little bit of Salvation comes through forgiveness and acceptance.

We must Love ourselves and one another as we Love the power which we serve.

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For those on a spiritual path, the sacrifices start out small and sensible.

Your old world views are offered up, making way for clearer sight. Your old self is cast to the four winds, making space for the new you. Your material possessions may even be dispersed to clear the chains of physical clutter from your spiritual development.

With true dedication to a path, the final grand sacrifice may be your Self–giving over everything to the power which you serve or for the cause you trumpet.

Without a doubt, Service and Sacrifice are inexorably intertwined.

During the last day of his life, Jesus gave up everything he had.

Like many other spiritual figures, he ended his life virtually alone, betrayed and killed by his own people.

In his final moments, he proved to be quite human. He questioned his patron, “Why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34)

Even as we serve and sacrifice, we do not fully grasp what those words mean until we are pushed to our limits and pass them.

Up to that point, we have doubts and missteps. We find our burdens must sometimes be carried by others. We find that sometimes we can not do as we wish, be it because of prior obligations or because of the actions of others.

Again and again we arrive at our limits, unable to press ourselves further. Unable to complete our tasks we have chosen for our service. Unable to give what we don’t know we have.

Even in his moments of utter humanity, his moments of doubt and his brief flashes of anger, Jesus remained true to the path he believed he was on. He fulfilled the prophecies.

He, of course, had those prophecies to use as a map to guide his actions. Most are not so lucky (or, perhaps, not so unlucky) and must discover the edges of their path on their own.

And still, they will become frustrated when those edges block them from achieving their goal, when those limits prevent them from serving their cause.

That is when the greatest sacrifice comes in.

The ultimate sacrifice is not of our lives–we forfeit them eventually regardless of our path–but of our limitations.

True Sacrifice leaves us transcendent in our Service.

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At the absolute least, we’re all stuck on this ball of mud together, so we should probably make the best of it.

On a slightly less wry level, cooperation has definite survival benefits for critters that aren’t the biggest or strongest around. Our primitive ancestors relied on combined brain power and coordinated efforts to survive in an environment a bit more hostile than what we’re accustom to now.

But the idea of Service goes above that. It’s not just cooperation. It’s going a little bit out of your way–expending some of your resources–in order to do something that doesn’t directly benefit you. It’s action with a purpose. Action in the name of a cause.

According to the stories told, on Holy Thursday Jesus and his core group of friends and students gathered together. He told them many things. One thing he made very clear was that he was as much a servant as anyone. He shows this not only in his words, but through the action of washing the Apostles’ feet–a job commonly done by slaves in richer households of the time. He tells them, “A slave is no greater than his master, nor is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.” (John 13:12-17)

If one chooses to travel along a spiritual path, one chooses to serve a higher power. However that power is conceptualized or personalized, it is something that exists above and beyond normal experience. It is also intrinsically tied to the most mundane of experiences. At one time or another, everyone plays the part of servant, just as surely as they play the part of master. No matter the path they walk.

At the Last Supper, Jesus also makes it very clear that he knows his life is coming to an end. He knows he will be betrayed by one of those trusted twelve, he knows he will be denied by another. And he tells them this.

The path of Service is not always an easy one. People will hate the servant as they hate the master, they will punish the messenger for the message he was sent out to deliver. They will take more than is offered and withhold what is needed. This is base human nature. It is that dark side of humanity that lead to the final events of Good Friday.

The hardship of the choice to walk such a path is increased if you are cursed with prophecy. Jesus knew his death would not be pleasant. In Gethsemane, he asked if he could be released from his service. At that point, it was too late and his fate was sealed with a kiss.

He accepted the fate his path had lead him to, and he told those he left behind to remain true to their pledge of service. (Matthew 26:36-56)

Jesus and his disciples were not the first to walk the path of service, and the most certainly were not the last. Their prophecies and their god differed in many ways from others who served just as painfully and brought about just as much change in their respective times.

Without those who serve willingly, others would suffer all the more.

This is one of the lessons of this story.

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Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday are the reason there is a Christian religion. Sure, Christmas may be the best known and most liked and there most certainly wouldn’t have been much “Christ” in Christianity without it (or at least not Christ of the Jesus variety), but without the Sacred Triduum, there would be no true foundation for the faith.

The story–be it myth of historical fact–that makes up the progression of these days is one of the best known and most re-told tales ever. Even if you’re not Christian, you know parts of it. So deeply does it touch on important spiritual truths that it has persisted and wound its way deeply into Western culture as a whole. It echoed many traditions and tales that came before it, but wrapped many of them up in a much more succinct and poignant narrative than any that came before.

These basic and important spiritual points are Service, Sacrifice and Salvation.

All three are integral to life, so it should come as no surprise that this story coincides with the Jewish Passover celebration and the turning of the seasons from winter to spring.

If you’re not familiar with the story of the final days of Jesus, you can read multiple translations of the Bible verses here: Matthew 26, Mark 14, Luke 22, John 13.

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