ABOUT US

KATE'S BIO

(Primary Author, Fractal Artist)

Since I was a young child I have been fascinated by the notion of God.  This was not exclusively in a religious context, though I have attended a variety of church services (various different Protestant sects, Catholic, also Jewish Conservative and Reform Temples) with many of my friends, but more in a general sense of curiosity and wonder.  My mother introduced me to mythology at a young age and I became fascinated by the gods and goddesses of Greek, Roman, and Norse mythology.  Around age 10 I started reading science fiction and fantasy novels (a great way to be exposed to alternative spirituality) which, along with mystery novels I still enjoy to this day.  As an adolescent I also became curious about the occult and read a little about various aspects of that too.  I have always been interested and curious about both science and the world of the unknown (the mysteries of god, religion, spirituality) and always saw them as two sides of a coin, two aspects of human nature, rather than as “belief competitors.”  At the age of 15 I had my confirmation ritual at a small liberal Congregational church in rural upstate New York.  Due to a very open minded and progressive pastor that I liked very much, I was active in that church, though I never again have been in any other. 

For many years my spiritual interests were in the background of my life while I went to college, got a B.S. in Mathematics and went on to be a programmer and software engineer.  Then in 1984, for some inexplicable reason, I felt this amazing urge to pursue my spiritual curiosity at a deeper level.  You could call it a type of spiritual awakening and from that time onward my life focus shifted towards studying, exploring, experimenting with and contemplating numerous spiritual and metaphysical philosophies and practices.  Around 1988 I thought to “legitimatize” my spiritual career at the professional level by attending a seminary and getting myself an M.Div.  Despite not considering myself especially Christian even though I had been confirmed, I read up on Christian history and various forms and aspects of Christianity and thought maybe I could be a Unitarian minister.  Then I attended a weekend preview at one of the seminaries I was interested in attending.  The presentations by students and teacher were all fabulous and it was a lovely spiritual weekend!  However at the end of it I knew something for sure.  I was most definitely not a Christian any longer, if indeed I had ever truly been one.  That was a powerful inner turning point for me and finally gave me the inner permission I needed to be the fiercely independent spiritual freethinker that “God” made me.

In the late 80’s I also finally left my professional career as a software engineer and decided to simply let my spirit guide me.  Some have wondered why I felt the need to leave my profession, as many others shift into a more spiritual mode and do not make that radical of a change.  Though I couldn’t have explained that at the time, I later realized that I needed my mind to be my own, to be free to contemplate and think it’s own thoughts in it’s own fashion.  In a professional job, one’s mind is quite necessarily heavily occupied with one’s professional matters.  After all that’s what they’re paying you for.  My solution, as I was not independently wealthy and needed to make some sort of living, was to become an administrative assistant for science-oriented companies mostly working via temporary employment agencies.  That turned out to be an excellent choice for me, giving my brain more inner freedom on a daily basis and allowing for contemplative periods between work assignments.  It was also very educational, giving me the opportunity to develop a diverse set of practical skills and to learn more about business side of things (which I have enjoyed), and helping me to stay grounded in the “real world.”

I knew that some day I would start writing about the concepts and ideas that have been simmering and stewing in me from all the years of spiritual study and exploration.  In recent years I have become more focused on my writing and learning how to better express my spiritual ideas.  This website represents one aspect of the results of my studies and spiritual interests, and in the near future I will be putting up a sister website to present another aspect of my spiritual interests.

BOB'S BIO

(Web Master, Fractal Artist, Contributing Author)

My spiritual education began as a child, where I was exposed to religion at a variety of (mainly Christian) churches. My family attended various churches ranging from high Episcopal to informal Unitarian parishes. I also enjoyed going to my friend’s churches, and attended a neighbor’s Baptist bible school, joined a Methodist youth group and attended services at another friend’s conservative Jewish temple.

Somewhere along the line I figured out that I could pursue my spirituality independent of a religious structure. A large part of this spiritual awakening was triggered by the death of my father in 1986, who, I later learned, had been exploring an eclectic spiritual path of his own. This led me to meditation and wide variety other spiritual and metaphysical explorations.

I have a BS in Computer Science and work as a software engineer. In a sense I consider this work to have a spiritual side as well, as I crystallize my mental visions and watch them come to life. I'm also an amateur musician and guitarist, and combine music with my spiritual path as part of a men's spiritual song circle.

Omnism appeals to the engineer in me, as it gives each of us the freedom to design our own Path according to our background, life circumstances and spiritual needs. I look forward to helping this web site evolve and to learning from the contributions of others.

KATE & BOB

We met at a course called “The Mathematics of Consciousness” in the fall of 1986.  From there Bob and several other men from the course got together with me and some female friends to form a creative, free-spirited meditation group which met weekly for two years.  At that time we were just friends, each dating other people.  We stayed friends and stayed in touch over the years and finally at the close of 1997 something shifted and we fell in love.  We were married in a small civil ceremony in early 2002 but plan on having a larger marriage celebration with family and friends in the summer of 2003.  Naturally we will create an Omnist ceremony and plan to include the details of that on this site later this year.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We'd like to give special thanks to each of our parents for their ongoing support of our intellectual independence and spiritual development.