It's Not Personal

We must stop taking each encounter and thought personally. It no longer is about the personality or content of the mind. If you remember that thoughts are merely conditioning that we have identified with, then it is easier to see that whatever arises in consciousness, whether it looks to be outside in the world, or appears in our inner landscape, is to be considered a clue as to what is the next step in our collective healing. Approaching all content of the dream as markers that point to the unfolding of awakening, we see the direction we must go and the actions we must take. But it never is directing us towards further separation. The idea we should shield ourselves in any way, is entrenched in duality. In Oneness there can be no enemy.

That doesn’t mean we are required to play a part in the dream that would override our sense of integrity. Some behaviors and scenarios are dead ends and lead to further fragmentation. Since the goal of any organism is wholeness and coherence, we continue in that direction and avoid any enticement that would distract emotionally and pull us into drama. The “I” thought that differentiates, with its “own” values, perceptions, beliefs, etc. is the program, not the truth. We are Consciousness, aware of ITSELF, evolving through this dimensional dream world, and discovering its nature. It is always attempting to divulge its true nature, to look more closely and pierce the veil. It attempts this through us as its agents. So the invitation is to relinquish individuality, not to another belief system as presented by another teacher, but to LIFE ITSELF as it moves through us, breathing the new paradigm into existence.

There are always opportunities, more so now than ever, to surrender our personas of protection and become transparent and vulnerable to LIFE in its constant expression. Love is its language and would speak through action, not words. I do not mean action necessarily in the form of doing, but is more about the nature of Being. The intellect cannot reason out the manner in which the flow will appear, as each moment makes itself known completely fresh, neither encumbered by the past nor expectant of a future. It knows intuitively its directionality through time-space. It is like water, tumbling from stream to river as it seeks finally joining its mother, the ocean. It is inevitable. It is HOME.

When we enter this flow, surrendering control and entering the stream of alive Consciousness, we become instruments of harmony, joining the frequential and vibratory undoing of anything unlike the essential truth of Being, of Life ITSELF. We are the change agents as soon as we walk into a room. When you feel tension arising, know you have ushered in an invitation to freedom. There is nothing need be said, but Life’s presence through you will begin the adjustment necessary. It has nothing to do with you, so stay out of it. Be still. Allow. Love. That’s all.

Opinions and viewpoints are transitory and are constantly changing as we are upgraded in our understanding. Do not be a disseminator of viewpoints, please. Relinquish all viewpoints and join the infinity of Life’s awareness, which, of course, includes EVERYTHING in existence, including that which you cannot yet perceive. That means you cannot take a stand, anywhere. It is like an endless free fall, where you become accustomed to the inability to orient yourself to any reference point, where you finally stop trying to grab onto something to stop the sense of certain death. In fact, you stop trying to avoid anything, but instead become curious as to what it is you’ve been afraid of. It’s time to come to grips and get to know your inner terrorist, to face it head on and see what happens. When you’re ready, the universe will align with your intent, and your situation will morph to provide the perfect opening for you to transcend your self-imposed limitations.

True freedom is awakening from the illusion of everything you thought was true and encountering Truth directly, alive and always brand new as it moves through time-space moment by moment. It is the death of your fictional identity and the relinquishing of all desire to recreate a new one. It is not just getting off the carousel; it is leaving the amusement park altogether. What happens after that is anyone’s guess.

Love to All, Suzen

The Carrot and the Stick

By Robert Cinque
of Cinqueterra

The ego is born through an emotional recoil from its Origin.  This creates the appearance that God is distant and must be found.  The spiritual traditions of humanity are based on this search , this impulse for re-union with the Divine.  However, the search is based on an illusion of separateness and isolation, which reduces God to a carrot on an ego stick.

Throw away the stick. Eat the Carrot.

Creating the stick is an activity that produces “me” and then the “world”.    Authentic spiritual life is about recognizing this, not “overcoming the ego”, which cannot be done anyway because it does not exist in the first place, except in our imagination.  This practice is about Standing Prior to the birth of ego, not overcoming it after you created it.

Try picking up an imaginary rock, it’s impossible. The disease of egoity is self created and imaginary, too. When recoil is replaced with emotional intimacy, the ego is pre-empted and cannot form.

The spiritual traditions exhort us to overcome this fleshly “ego” and be more “spiritual” by identifying with our non-physical, “inner” being.  This so-called inner being is only yet another spontaneous patterning of this Infinite Consciousness, Whatever That Is altogether, but the inside of me is not the exclusive domain of truth, only That in which the inner being is appearing is the Domain of Truth, the Amphitheatre of the Heart.

I am in awe of This, I surrender in love to It. Ultimately, I am It, or rather, It became “me”.  Once it becomes clear that It is the basis of “me”, all dilemma disappears, all searching, all “other”.

Authentic spiritual life is about recognizing what is already true, not deifying my beliefs about it.  Conventional spiritual practice is like using a really excellent and detailed map of Detroit while you’re trying to find your way around Paris.  Conventional spiritual life places enlightenment at the end of the journey, the search is finally over, but authentic spiritual life places enlightenment at the beginning, middle, and end, as the very foundation of human life. It is based on heartfelt response ability, not belief, not technique, not method, not mythology, not search.

It’s about Discovery.

Jesus is reported to have said, “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a treasure a man finds buried in his field.”

Authentic spiritual life is about love, which is truth.  Truth, whatever it is altogether, is identical with Reality.  What Is, is True.  Find out What Is, prior to mind, prior to “me”, prior to “world”.  That is the knockout punch and is why “you” won’t survive the “journey” to “God”.

Conventional religious belief, from fundamentalism to New Age metaphysics, is based on this search, on the “great path of return” to God, to Unity and Wholeness. Sounds great, doesn’t it?  It’s exciting, adventurous, and romantic.  The only problem with it is the fact that you’re not actually lost, not actually separate from That which you seek.  The problem with conventional religious belief is that it supports and enables a carrot on a stick.  At best, ordinary religious beliefs prepare us for authentic spiritual life if only by providing an illusion to demolish.

Only God Exists and You are not separate from It.That’s the truth that sets the heart free, not that I need to be saved from Original Sin or that I can have and do and be anything I want, that happiness can be found in the manifestation of my desires. Happiness cannot be found because it is not lost.

Happiness is the nature of Reality already and our spiritual obligation is to realize it, not believe in it, not seek it in pleasure or in the fulfillment of need and desire. Happiness is prior to pleasure and need and desire, and everything else. 

See for yourself.

To read more, CLICK HERE.

Waking Up Hurts

by Robert Cinque, Contributor

Finding out that my life has been based upon lie after lie is sickening and painful.  I threw up, like Neo in the movie The Matrix, when he discovered that his so called life was a dream, a nightmare of horrors, lie upon lie.

His awakening was bloody and painful. He did not greet it with a smile, he had to recover from it, his own awakening!  The truth is so massive, so crushing, no one can endure its weight.

The Truth literally crushes you to death, and that is why Awakening is about It, not “me”.   Your identity as a separate entity will not survive the journey to enlightenment. The Truth hurts, but it’s still the Truth, still Life Giving. There is no need for beliefs when you have the Truth, or rather, when It has you.

In our world, it’s not only the tyrants who lie their asses off, it’s the priests and doctors too, unwitting administrators of torture and falsehood.  They promote lies they sincerely believe.

But does the truth care about my beliefs about it? No. Do my ideas affect the truth?  No.

Maps are not the Territory.  Menus are not the Meal.

Eat the Real, Live the Territory.

The Territory is the Radiant Conscious Field of Intelligent Light, the Impossible Wonder of the Presence of Life.  The Meal is the ecstatic Whole Body Enjoyment of this undeniable Truth: the entirety of Reality Itself is your most fundamental identity now, we are absolutely inherently identical to Whatever the Fuck It Is that became us, little ole you and me, go figure.  When we finally come to grips with the mind shattering reality of our Actual Condition, now, we will be able to manage our lives and this planet without conflict.

The Map is a compilation of our scientifically materialistic, religiously psychotic, politically constipated, culturally anemic ideas about It. Our job is to move from the Map to the Territory.

In my last essay, Whatever Destroyed the Towers Could Power the Planet, I identified 3 lies, 3 social memes that infect the body of Humanity and regulate its behavior just as surely as our genes rule our bodies.

Here is one more, the most basic lie of all, the one that most enables our domination by the Matrix.

Ego.

The so-called ego is born from an assumption.  It is not an entity, but a belief in one, a belief in a separate self, one that is marooned on an island of flesh.  Belief in the ego is the result of a confusion about uniqueness, where individuation becomes the equivalent of separation. The ego is a belief, a primitive superstition, a cult of one, an emotional recoil dramatized as abandonment and betrayal.  Every ego is a fundamentalist, a fascist, and a tyrant in a drama of perpetrator/victim.  I call it the Poor me/Fuck you syndrome.

The truth is, I don’t have an ego and neither do you!  We have a belief in ego, an assumption about our state that has no basis in Reality itself. A belief in something doesn’t make it true, no matter how devout we are, no matter how dedicated we may be to that belief.  Pious devotion to falsehood turns people into fools.  When you unpack your “self” and all its contents, it turns out to be just a pile of old books and dirty laundry.

The One who did the unpacking, That’s Who I Am. You too.

There is only one Reality, not two. The One became the “two”.  Still, no “objects” actually exist, only Consciousness Exists.  You are That, showing up like a Fish in the Ocean.

You are the Ocean, the Fish, and the Observer, all at once.  How can this be?  No one knows.

It just is.

To continue reading CLICK HERE .

CLARITY

By Nathan Gill

"...That was it! Suddenly it was absolutely clear to me that these experiences - I call them transcendental events or experiences - actually have nothing to do with clarity. A transcendental experience can last a few seconds or ten years or maybe even the rest of your life, but a transcendental experience is just that. An experience. Many people have had these experiences and then the experience is gone and often the person is left with a desire for more of it. They think they have been given a taste of 'enlightenment' , when all that has happened is that they have had a transcendental experience. Walking down the street is an experience, but it's an ordinary one so you don't go looking for more of it.

The confusion was gone. I knew what I am without any doubt and it was obvious that I already had been that all my life. I no longer required any transcendental experience to prove it to me.

The whole of my 'spiritual' search had been added on to what I already am and I also understood why people are confused around this whole issue. Why they confuse 'spirituality' with clarity. This recognition of my true nature was not associated with any transcendental event or experience. It was clear that a transcendental experience of any kind is easily confusing if it occurs before you recognize with clarity your nature as Consciousness.

It is obvious that the transcendental event that was experienced had nothing to do with clarity of recognition. The occurrence of the event brought my confusion to a head and allowed me to see clearly how I had been subtly waiting for an event as permission to be what I already am.

I see now that no transcendental event has any significance in the light of the plain, ordinary, everyday clarity of what you really are."

Read the entire book HERE.

Be Yourself.

"Be yourself, everyone else is already taken."

~ Oscar Wilde

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When anybody laughs, he has no mind, no thought, no problem, no suffering.

~ Papaji

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You impose limits on your true nature of infinite being. Then you get displeased to be only a limited creature. Then you begin spiritual practices to transcend these non-existing limits. But if your practice itself implies the existence of these limits, how could they allow you to transcend them.

~ Ramana Maharshi

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To complain is always nonacceptance of what is. It invariably carries an unconscious negative charge. When you complain, you make yourself a victim. Leave the situation or accept it. All else is madness.

~ Eckhart Tolle

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"Who cares if you're enlightened forever? Can you just get it in this moment, now?"

~ Byron Katie

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Be still. It takes no effort to be still; it is utterly simple. When your mind is still, you have no name, you have no past, you have no relationships, you have no country, you have no spiritual attainment, you have no lack of spiritual attainment. There is just the presence of beingness with itself.

~ Gangaji

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For a day,

Just for one day,

Talk about that

Which disturbs no one...

And bring some peace

Into your beautiful eyes.

~ Hafiz

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There is no profound knowledge. There are no good words. Everything you've been told is a lie. The only truth that exists is your self, but who is the self? The self is you, just the way you are. The mistake most people make is they want to change themselves. How can you change yourself? You think you've got problems, or you think you've got a bad mind, or you think something is wrong and you want to change that. Those things don't exist. There is nothing to change. That's what I mean when I say, "Be yourself, just the way you are." Yourself, just the way you are, spontaneous, live in the now, has no time to worry or think. When you are yourself you are God, you are consciousness, you are absolute reality. You are always yourself. You never were anyone else. You never were anything else. Your nature is divine. You are not what you appear to be. The only thing to remove is the appearance, or the belief in the appearance, for the appearance is false.

~ Robert Adams

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Nothing is born, nothing is destroyed.

Away with your dualism, your likes and dislikes.

Every single thing is just the One Mind.

When you have perceived this,

you will have mounted the Chariot of the Buddhas.

~ Huang Po

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"I can walk on the clouds!" says a child.

But if she reached the clouds,

she would find nowhere to place her foot.

Likewise, if one does not examine thoughts,

they present a solid appearance;

but if one examines them,

there is nothing there.

That is what is called

being at the same time

empty and apparent.

Emptiness of mind

is not a nothingness,

nor a state of torpor,

for it possesses by its very nature

a luminous faculty of knowledge

which is called Awareness.

These two aspects,

emptiness and Awareness,

cannot be separated.

They are essentially one,

like the surface of the mirror

and the image which is reflected in it."

~ Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

Peace, Love, Compassion

Nothing I say can explain to you Divine Love

Yet all of creation cannot seem to stop talking about it.

~ Rumi

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Love is seeing

the unity

under

the imaginary

diversity.

~ Nisargadatta

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The whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all these living beings, which are all part of one another, and all involved in one another.

So instead of loving what you think is peace, love other [people] and love God above all. And instead of hating the people you think are warmongers, hate the appetites and the disorder in your own soul, which are the causes of war. If you love peace, then hate injustice, hate tyranny, hate greed – but hate these things in yourself, not in another.

~ Thomas Merton

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Don't look for peace. Don't look for any other state than the one you are in now; otherwise, you will set up inner conflict and unconscious resistance.

Forgive yourself for not being at peace. The moment you completely accept your non-peace, your non-peace becomes transmuted into peace. Anything you accept fully will get you there, will take you into peace. This is the miracle of surrender.

When you accept what is, every moment is the best moment. That is enlightenment.

~ Eckhart Tolle

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The truth is that a whole new state of consciousness already exists, that every part of your experience that’s unfolding right now is already enclosed within absolute stillness, absolute ease. And so there really isn’t

anywhere to go or anything for which to search. Struggle only gets us deeper into the very thing we’re trying to escape. This is a very important thing to know about egoic consciousness: The harder we try to get out, the deeper we dig ourselves in.

~ Adyashanti

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We try to grasp something strange and mysterious because we believe happiness lies elsewhere. This is the mistake. The Self is all-pervading. Our real nature is liberation, but we imagine that we are bound, we make strenuous efforts to become free, although all the while we are free. Birth and death pertain only to the body, they are superimposed upon the Self, giving rise to the delusion that birth and death relate to the Self. The universe exists within the Self. Discover the undying Self and be immortal and happy. Be yourself and nothing more. Thoughts change but not you. There is neither past nor future; there is only the present. Yesterday was the present when you experienced it; tomorrow will also be the present when you experience it, therefore, experience takes place only in the present, and even the present is mere imagination, for the sense of time is purely mental.

All that is required to realize the Self is to be still. What can be easier than that? Your true nature is that of infinite spirit.

~ Ramana Maharshi

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Enlighten your desires.

Meditate on who you are.

Quit imagining.

What you want is profoundly expensive,

and difficult to find,

yet closeby.

Don't search for it. It is nothing,

and a nothing within nothing.

~ Lalla - 14th Century North Indian mystic

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The Ineffable Mystery of Being

What I have discovered through my spiritual practice is an increasing self-intimacy. ..a sense of authenticity and real-ness, that has become the cornerstone of my daily life. I cannot imagine how I could have lived without this living presence and sense of emerging fullness.

Our awareness is incredibly powerful at enabling the unveiling of ourselves, revealing a fuller picture, illuminating our experience, but only if we are willing and committed to knowing the fullness of what we are.

I find as I continue noticing and encountering this awareness in my life what comes into view is both particular and vast, discordant yet harmonious, life sustaining yet challenging and not necessarily easy. This active engagement demands my courage and honesty, this is no walk in the park.

As I continue, the sense of congruence and authenticity begins to sprout and this self-intimacy becomes the rule, in time. Although it is not as though there is one mode of being, that of self-intimacy, no, it is more like that a dance has begun.

This dance, fueled and enabled by the openness and desire of wanting to know myself, is both exhilarating and liberating and, as I develop trust in the unfolding, I soon begin to recognize that any ideas or desires for Awakening need not concern me....it no longer is of interest as my life has filled up with a delicious fragrance of authenticity.

I no longer care for anything other than supporting what has taken root within me…if the self concept or ego continues I don't care, the teachers and teachings tell me this and that and I don't care, life is its usual mix of struggle and strife, joy and love, and I no longer care...why would I care when I know the golden key is within? Why search for anything when the very fabric of experience is the path of unfolding. Everyday experience reveals this once we get a little more familiar with ourselves and stop trying to awaken, stop meddling with our experience long enough to notice what is.

At some stage there was a key realization, one among many, when I realized I can let go of all concepts about the teaching and just feel comfortable in everyday experience without any framework or concepts about how it ought to be. Is their a doer? Is there an ego? Is there an awakening? Are we perfect? None of these conceptual frames of reference are important. Instead I relax and notice that all that stuff is just ideas about...about the ineffable mystery of being.

~ Rob Matthews

Freedom "To" vs. Freedom "From"

...And this myth that I can rest in some assuredness. That I will  never again feel insecure or feel fear, or feel doubt, or feel those emotions we don’t want to feel. If I'm truly enlightened I will never feel those emotions.
Forget it. That’s not it. That's the pipe dream. That is the opium that is sold to the masses. And they eat it up and they never get there and they end up disillusioned.

Freedom is never freedom "from." If it's freedom "from" anything, it's not freedom at all. It's freedom "to." Are you free enough to be afraid? Are you free enough to feel insecure? Are you free enough not to know? Are you free enough to know that you can't know? Are you free enough to be totally comfortable, to know that you can't know what's around the next corner? How you will feel about it? How you will respond to it? That you literally can't know? Are you free enough to be totally at ease and comfort with the way things actually are? That's freedom.
 

~ Adyashanti

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You are not "in the now"; you are the now. That is your essential identity--the only thing that never changes. Life is always now. Now is consciousness. And consciousness is who you are. That's the equation.
 

~ Eckhart Tolle

If this were your only spiritual practice, it would be enough: to withdraw identification from opinions, positions, thoughts.

~ Eckhart Tolle

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Not to know is profound; to know is shallow. Not to know is internal; to know is external. 

~ Chuang-tzu

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To one who knows naught it is clearly revealed. 

~Meister Eckhart

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Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment; Cleverness is mere opinion, bewilderment is intuition. 

~Rumi

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Rejoicing in nothing and knowing nothing are the true rejoicing and the true knowledge. 

~ Lao-tzu

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All I know is that I know nothing. 

~ Socrates

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When you’re blind to your own nature, the Buddha is an ordinary being. When you’re aware of your own nature, an ordinary being is the Buddha.
 

~ Hui Neng

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Enlightenment is not about becoming divine. Instead it's about becoming more fully human. . . . It is the end of ignorance. 

~Lama Surya Das

Marked Eternal: There Is NO SELF

This is the simplest, most logical; most obvious truth- there is no such entity as self. There is no self at all, no nothing, but life flowing freely, all is one reality, one life. Life just IS.

It is so simple, that it's most difficult to see. Thinking that we all have a special separate self that is in charge of our lives it's nothing else, but unquestioned assumption. It's a core belief, through which a human sees life. The feeling of separation persists in everyday life, making one always stressed, depressed or seeking for more. There is deep constant feeling that something is wrong, that there is something to find out, that life is not full, not abundant, stressful.

Of course there is something wrong! There is this feeling that something is wrong. It rises up from deep and keeps us searching for answers.

The answer is simple- there is no self! There never was. We are not doing anything in life, life is happening as us. There is no manager involved that decides what, when, with who, why. Life just happens, by itself, for no other reason. It's life alive. It's Life-ing.

The big question is how to see that there is really no self in reality at all. If you accept this as a belief, without testing, nothing will change. You will have one more belief running in the system creating more conflicts than before. To see the truth of it you need to look.

Looking is also very simple- one just needs a clear intention to finally see the truth, no matter what distractions stand in a way. It's not scary, it is not magic. One just needs to start thinking for himself and answer some precise questions with whole honesty like never before. 

When you start looking first thing to do is clear the path. This can be done by writing. You can have somebody guiding you or just do it yourself! Take nothing for granted, question everything. There is nothing at all that you need to know to start digging. Just begin writing and clarify stuff for yourself. No one can do the looking for you. Don't even think about that.

(Don’t start just yet. Read the whole thing to the end, then start)

I came up with these steps as a result of seeing what really works for most people. 

CLICK HERE to continue reading......

Reality As You Know It Does Not Exist

THRIVE - What On Earth Will It Take?

THRIVE is an unconventional documentary that lifts the veil on what's REALLY going on in our world by following the money upstream -- uncovering the global consolidation of power in nearly every aspect of our lives. Weaving together breakthroughs in science, consciousness and activism, THRIVE offers real solutions, empowering us with unprecedented and bold strategies for reclaiming our lives and our future. THRIVE is being released online on 11.11.11 at http://thrivemovement.com.

THRIVE contains interviews with several prominent activists, journalists, and authors, including Duane Elgin, Nassim Haramein, Steven Greer, Jack Kasher, Daniel Sheehan, Adam Trombly, Brian O'Leary, Vandana Shiva, John Gatto, John Robbins, Deepak Chopra, David Icke, Catherine Austin Fitts, G. Edward Griffin, Bill Still, John Perkins, Paul Hawken, Aqeela Sherrills, Evon Peter, Angel Kyodo Williams, Elisabet Sahtouris, Amy Goodman, and Barbara Marx Hubbard.

Effortless Freedom

Enlightenment absorbs this universe of qualities.
When that merging occurs, there is nothing
but God. This is the only doctrine.

There is no word for it, no mind
to understand it with, no categories
of transcendence or non-transcendence,
no vow of silence, no mystical attitude.

There is no Shiva and no Shakti
in enlightenment, and if there is something
that remains, that whatever-it- is
is the only teaching.

~ Lalla

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"If you want God and you chase God, God will be out of your reach. If you stop and drop every concept of God, you are enfolded in the Living Presence of God."

~ Gangaji

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seeker of truth

follow no path
all paths lead where

truth is here

~ ee cummings

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Acceptance is your inherent state, non-acceptance is artificial, fabricated.

~ Jean Klein

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There is no island of bliss to which we finally arrive post-awakening. The experience of Silence is always available, of course, and it is the background of all experience, but it does not REPLACE or NEGATE experience. It remains the birthplace of personal experience, which goes on just like before but without the personal attachment that used to make it so joyful or painful. We must keep our eyes open and move forward into whatever life presents from moment to moment, even as we rest as that Creative Silence. Such radical courage is what reveals that we are also Life Itself.

~ Richard Young

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There is another, sweeter power available to us all, regardless of how many words we know. It starts in the heart and is effortlessly spoken through the eyes. Sometimes, just for perspective, take a break and hear the music.

~ Gangaji

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Listen to your life.
See it for the fathomless mystery that it is.
In the boredom and pain of it
no less than in the excitement and gladness:
touch, taste, smell your way
into the holy and hidden heart of it,
because in the last analysis
all moments are key moments,
and life itself is grace.

~ Frederick Buechner

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The Treasure Chest of the Body

Everything we have ever fled from, as separated consciousness, is here, right here in our body, in our nervous system. We don't have to travel far to know ourselves, to meet ourselves.

This fleeing the body is what keeps us bound. And now we have an even more sophisticated form of leaving ourselves - the use of spiritual concepts. How frequently the mind tries to chew on these , in one more valiant, exhausting effort to get away from the 'ouch' of life, from what we are actually feeling, from the discomfort, the waves of angst that rise in the body.

Discomfort arising is a gift. It is the body's way of defrosting itself, of integrating the massive amount of old shock, separation energy that is stored there.

Don't deny your experience, even if you know at some level it's not real. Imagine telling an upset baby it doesn't exist. Where and how could that land. Let your experience become truly unreal by giving it the reality
and attention it first needs. It is through this body of ours that we come to realize we are not the body.

Presence and sensation with no ownership of any of it. Our sanctuary, our favorite resting place, our true resting ground.

~ Mags Deane

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in time of daffodils

in time of daffodils(who know
the goal of living is to grow)
forgetting why,remember how

in time of lilacs who proclaim
the aim of waking is to dream,
remember so(forgetting seem)

in time of roses(who amaze
our now and here with paradise)
forgetting if,remember yes

in time of all sweet things beyond
whatever mind may comprehend,
remember seek(forgetting find)

and in a mystery to be
(when time from time shall set us free)
forgetting me,remember me

~ ee cummings

Colin Drake - The Razor's Edge

It has long been held that following the spiritual life to its goal, complete awakening, is very difficult, like walking along a razor's edge. This article addresses this and attempts to show that, whilst experiencing the first awakening is very simple and easy, to live this awakening requires great vigilance like walking a tight rope.

Let the wise merge the speech in the mind, and the mind into intelligence (philosophical reason); let him merge intelligence in the great self (pure awareness), and that great self into peace.

~ Katha Upanishad - 1.3.13

This signifies recognizing that thoughts (mind) and sensations (speech in this case) appear in (and are seen by) awareness i.e. are merged in that. This is to be discovered by 'direct seeing' which is informed by intelligence. Then by the same process one can discover that awareness, being always totally still and utterly silent, is always completely at peace. This is all fairly straightforward and easy to 'see' as the appendix, from Beyond the Separate Self (and A Light Unto Your Self) attempts to show.

Arise, awake, enlighten yourself by resorting to the great (teachers),
for that path is sharp as a razor's, difficult to tread
and hard to go by, say the wise.

~ Katha Upanishad - 1.3.14

This next verse says that the path of 'direct seeing' is sharp as a razor's edge and thus we should abandon this and resort to the great teachers. However, this advice itself is very difficult to follow for the modern sceptical Western mind which does not trust anything that lies outside its own experience or 'direct seeing'. Also the teachings of the great are often difficult to follow being somewhat cryptic and needing interpretation. resulting in different opinions leading to schisms and the formation of sects. From this also comes tribalism based on 'our teacher is the best' or 'our interpretation is the correct one' and the whole sorry saga of division and competition is perpetuated!

So based on this I think, on balance, we are better off following Buddha's final teaching which was that one is to become 'a light unto yourself'. This can be achieved by the 'direct seeing' of our essential nature by self-inquiry or 'investigation of our moment to moment experience' - see the appendix.

This results in an 'awakened moment' when one sees that deeper than thoughts (mind) and body (mind) one is pure awareness and the ramifications of this seeing can be amazing. However, due to our habitual identification with the body/mind one soon 'drops off' again requiring a further awakening by self-inquiry or investigation of experience. So to become 'totally awake' requires absolute vigilance and commitment, akin to walking a razor's edge.

However, this is not a problem, for as the periods of 'wakefulness' (which are totally carefree) increase so will the commitment to identifying with the level of pure awareness. This will lead to more reflection and investigation, resulting in further awakenings which will continue the process. To call it a process may seem a misnomer for when one is 'awake' there's no process going on, but the continual naps keep the whole thing running.

This does require us to be more interested in being awake than in our own 'personal story', and to prefer peace to mental suffering. It is amazing how many people identify with these and seem to actually enjoy them in a masochistic fashion. Assuming that this is not the case one can use mental suffering to be a wake up call that one has 'nodded' off again and return one to 'awareness of awareness'. So although staying awake is like walking a razor's edge it is very easy to see when one has slipped off this and to hop back on again!

There is another danger for those that feel that they have 'awakened' and that is spiritual pride based on the thought that "now I've really got it" and thus cannot fall off the edge. It is easy to see that this thought "now I've really got it" is dualistic involving a 'me' that's got something (else). This is the difference between thinking 'now I've really got awareness' and directly seeing that one is awareness itself. Any thought that objectifies the 'I' is to be avoided, for awareness is not an object but the constant conscious subjective presence. Once again vigilance is the key .

Thirdly for those of us who attempt, in our own feeble way, to point to awakening there is another greater danger, which is believing that we are (separate individuals) pointing . This belief can easily be strengthened by the appreciation that we receive by those who experience awakened moments based on this pointing. As 'awakening' is the most profound seeing that can occur, often with momentous implications, the gratitude expressed is often of the most lavish proportions. So we need to 'walk the walk' by continually realizing that we are ephemeral manifestations of That (consciousness) , through which pointing is taking place, and that no separate 'pointer' exists!

In conclusion, 'awakening' is straightforward and available to all but is quickly countered by nodding off again. So we need to constantly reawaken by becoming aware of, and identified with, awareness itself. In this respect it is like walking a razor's edge, but it is not painful and hopping back on again is simplicity itself, by the relevant shifting of attention from thoughts/sensations to the awareness that sees these.

Appendix

Below follows a simple method to investigate the nature of reality starting with one's day-to-day experience. Each step should be considered until one experiences, or 'sees', its validity before moving on to the following step. If you reach a step where you do not find this possible, continue on regardless in the same way, and hopefully the flow of the investigation will make this step clear. By all means examine each step critically but with an open mind, for if you only look for 'holes' that's all you will find!

1. Consider the following statement: 'Life, for each of us, is just a series of moment-to-moment experiences' . These experiences start when we are born and continue until we die, rushing headlong after each other, so that they seem to merge into a whole that we call 'my life'. However, if we stop to look we can readily see that, for each of us, every moment is just an experience.

2. Any moment of experience has only three elements: thoughts (including all mental images), sensations (everything sensed by the body and its sense organs) and awareness of these thoughts and sensations. Emotions and feelings are a combination of thought and sensation.

3. Thoughts and sensations are ephemeral, that is they come and go, and are objects, i.e. 'things' that are perceived.

4. Awareness is the constant subject, the 'perceiver' of thoughts and sensations and that which is always present. Even during sleep there is awareness of dreams and of the quality of that sleep; and there is also awareness of sensations; if a sensation becomes strong enough, such as a sound or uncomfortable sensation, one will wake up.

5. All thoughts and sensations appear in awareness, exist in awareness, and subside back into awareness. Before any particular thought or sensation there is effortless awareness of 'what is': the sum of all thoughts and sensations occurring at any given instant. During the thought or sensation in question there is effortless awareness of it within 'what is'. Then when it has gone there is still effortless awareness of 'what is'.

6. So the body/mind is experienced as a flow of ephemeral objects appearing in this awareness, the ever present subject. For each of us any external object or thing is experienced as a combination of thought and sensation, i.e. you may see it, touch it, know what it is called, and so on. The point is that for us to be aware of anything, real or imaginary, requires thought about and/or sensation of that thing and it is awareness of these thoughts and sensations that constitutes our experience.

7. Therefore this awareness is the constant substratum in which all things appear to arise, exist and subside. In addition, all living things rely on awareness of their environment to exist and their behaviour is directly affected by this. At the level of living cells and above this is self-evident, but it has been shown that even electrons change their behaviour when (aware of) being observed! Thus this awareness exists at a deeper level than body/mind (and matter/energy[ 1]) and we are this awareness!

8. This does not mean that at a surface level we are not the mind and body, for they arise in, are perceived by and subside back into awareness, which is the deepest and most fundamental level of our being. However, if we choose to identify with this deepest level - awareness - (the perceiver) rather than the surface level, mind/body (the perceived), then thoughts and sensations are seen for what they truly are, just ephemeral objects which come and go, leaving awareness itself totally unaffected.

9. Next investigate this awareness itself to see whether its properties can be determined.

Firstly what is apparent is that this awareness is effortlessly present and effortlessly aware. It requires no effort by the mind/body and thoughts and sensations cannot make it vanish however hard they try.

10. Next, this awareness is choicelessly present and choicelessly aware. Once again it requires no choice of the mind/body and they cannot block it however they try. For example, if you have a toothache there is effortless awareness of it and the mind/body cannot choose for this not to be the case. You may think that this is bad news but it is not so: can you imagine if you had to make a choice whether you would like to be aware of every sensation that the body experiences? In fact be grateful that there is no effort or choice involved for awareness just to be - such ease and simplicity - which is not surprising for you are this awareness!

11. It can be seen then, that for each of us this awareness is omnipresent; we never experiences a time or place when it is not present. Once again be grateful that the mind/body is never required to search for this awareness; it is just always there, which of course is not surprising for at the deepest level we are this awareness.

12. Next, notice that this awareness is absolutely still for it is aware of the slightest movement of body or mind. For example, we all know that to be completely aware of what is going on around us in a busy environment we have to be completely still, just witnessing the activity.

13. In the same vein this awareness is totally silent as it is aware of the slightest sound and the smallest thought. Therefore awareness is always completely at peace as to be absolutely still and totally silent is to be completely at peace.

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[1] The theory of relativity, and string theory, show that matter and energy are synonymous.

http://nonduality.org/tag/colin-drake/

Your Own Heart Is Waiting For You

There are still many gifts unopened from your birthday.

~ Hafiz

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Late Ripeness

Not soon, as late as the approach of my ninetieth year,
I felt a door opening in me and I entered
the clarity of early morning.

One after another my former lives were departing,
like ships, together with their sorrow.

And the countries, cities, gardens, the bays of seas
assigned to my brush came closer,
ready now to be described better than they were before.

I was not separated from people,
grief and pity joined us.
We forget -- I kept saying --
that we are all children of the King.

For where we come from there is no division
into Yes and No, into is, was, and will be.

We were miserable, we used no more than a hundredth part
of the gift we received for our long journey.

Moments from yesterday and from centuries ago -
a sword blow, the painting of eyelashes before a mirror
of polished metal, a lethal musket shot, a caravel
staving its hull against a reef -- they dwell in us,
waiting for a fulfillment.

I knew, always, that I would be a worker in the vineyard,
as are all men and women living at the same time,
whether they are aware of it or not.

~ Czeslaw Milosz

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"Immobility and silence are not inactive. The flower fills the space with perfume, the candle -- with light. They do nothing yet they change everything by their mere presence."

~ Nisargadatta Maharaj

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"This pure mind... shines forever with the radiance of its own perfection. But most people are not aware of it, and think that mind is just the faculty that sees, hears, feels, and knows. Blinded by their own sight, hearing, feeling, and knowing, they don't perceive the radiance of the source. If they could eliminate all conceptual thinking, this source would appear, like the sun rising..."

~ Huang-po

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Whatever you've been doing, you're using your mind to do it. And your mind will always fool you. It will make you believe you're getting somewhere. You're becoming something great. But it's really the ego. It is the ego that is controlling the mind.

~ Robert Adams

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The entire conversation around awakening, awareness, satsang, advaita, enlightenment, nonduality, etc. was a huge distraction from Love. It is only when I saw, very recently, the pride of "wanting to be special" that I realized how lost I was. I cannot be special. I can only be kind, loving, generous, honest, loyal, humble and diligent in my effort to distinguish the difference between Love and fear.

~ Benjamin Smythe

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Your own Heart is waiting for you when you're sick and tired and done scouring the landscape of illusion for the substance and love it can never give you.

~Mags Deane

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Oh lovers, where are you going?
Who are you looking for?
Your beloved is right here.

She lives in your own neighborhood.
Her face is veiled.
She hides behind screens calling for you,
While you search and lose yourself
In the wilderness and the desert.

Cease looking for flowers,
There blooms a garden in your own home.
While you go looking for trinkets,
Your treasure house awaits you
In your own being

There is no need for suffering, God is here!

~ Rumi

Unstructured, Contentless and Ineffable

An Interview of Peter Fenner, Ph.D. by Alex Dijk for BewustZijn magazine

.....We set standards for our physical wellbeing that place a huge cost on the environment. We spend enormous amounts of money on our appearance: wearing the right clothes, trying to look young and attractive. In some weird way we want to be in optimum health, right up until the moment of our death! Globally, we expend vast amounts of energy and spend huge sums of money trying to retard the aging process and prolong life.

What a great asset it would be if we could just let ourselves age, for example, without holding on to some notion of agelessness or immortality. No one really believes that we can remain young forever, and still the illusion motivates us to spend enormous resources on trying to forestall the aging process.

The ecological alternative here is to discover how we already have everything that's needed to be fulfilled in the most comprehensive way possible. This isn't just a fanciful idea. There are hundreds of thousands of great spiritual masters throughout the ages that have shown us that this is possible. There are sages who lived in 'great bliss' in severe environments without any heating or air-conditioning, without the latest gadgets, and without the security of knowing that quality medical care was close at hand.

The ultimate benchmark that these sages offer us is the possibility of making the journey through aging and dying without losing a connection with the supernal bliss of unconditioned awareness. For these sages, death itself was a non-event. As the 16th Karmapa of Tibet said on his deathbed in 1981, 'nothing happens.'

....But more significantly, we can make our own experiment right now. Here we are. We've come together in this moment. How do we discover, first-hand, the very same reality that allowed the sages of the past and present to remain unperturbed in the face of the very same experiences that throw us into confusion, obsession, anger or fear.

The remarkable news is that nothing is needed in order to make this discovery. We don't need 'more time,' to be somewhere else, to receive a superior teaching, or engage in a special practice. All that's required is to see that we can be-that we are, in fact-already fulfilled. In this moment we don't need anything more. We don't need more money, a different body, a different partner-not in this very instant.

This moment-right now-is giving us everything we need just to be here; unassumingly, effortlessly, being 'no one' in particular, and with no need to be anywhere else. That's the magic of this moment. This moment is perfect. Why? Because don't need anything more. Here we are-you and me-in this tight, quite unique, perhaps slightly weird, but effortless conversation. We started with my observations about Buddhism and it's relevance to ecology, and here we are, not asking for anything more. This moment is giving us everything we need just to be here, in the simplest way possible. We don't need to be entertained, right now-enough is happening. We don't need a flashy car-we're not in it! In this moment, we don't need a different standard of living, or a better return on our investments- we are clothed, fed and comfortable. We have everything we need, in order to rest with 'what is.'

The beauty of this moment is that it's effortless and uncontrived. The magic of this moment is that it's ungraspable and ineffable. We can't say what 'this' moment is. It leaves without a trace or history. In the very same moment that it arises, it disappears. We can't say where it comes from, or where it goes. We can't even say 'where' this is, except that 'this' is where it is: where ever that is! We can't think about 'this' because there is nothing to think about. This is exactly what the sages mean when they say that 'this' is ineffable.

And now we can also see that if we are 'here' at the moment of our death, we have no fear. If we were to remain in this state, our death would be uneventful. The process of dying is nothing more than a continual letting go of everything at the conditioned level: our body, our friends, our possessions, our memories-in fact, the entire known world. At our death we say goodbye forever, to everything that we know and we never return. If we are here-resting in unconditioned awareness-everything can drop away with no grasping or attachment.

Read more of the article here:
http://www.nondualt raining.com/ nondual-ecology- interview- of-peter- fenner/

Listen to Your Life

If someone says, “To be enlightened you must fast and pray all night,”
Have dinner and go to bed.

If you see a sign, “This way to salvation,”
run the other way.

If someone says, "This book is the truth, you can buy it from me,"
Take your money and buy grapes and roses.

If someone says, "He’s talking tonight, thousands will be saved,"
Go for a walk… listen to the birds and watch the clouds, and leave your backpack, your Bible and your Buddha under a tree and hope they will be gone when you return.

Where we are going you can't carry anything, not even your name.

~ John Squadra

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Listen to your life. See it for the fathomless mystery that it is. In the boredom and pain of it no less than in the excitement and gladness: touch, taste, smell your way into the holy and hidden heart of it, because in the last analysis all moments are key moments, and life itself is grace.

~ Frederick Buechner

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Mysteriously they entered, those few minutes.
Mysteriously, they left.
As if the great dog of confusion guarding my heart,
who is always sleepless, suddenly slept.
It was not any awakening of the large, not so much as that,
only a stepping back from the petty.
I gazed at the range of blue mountains,
I drank from the stream. Tossed in a small stone from the bank.
Whatever direction the fates of my life might travel, I trusted.
Even the greedy direction, even the grieving, trusted.
There was nothing left to be saved from, bliss nor danger.
The dog's tail wagged a little in his dream.

~ Jane Hirshfield

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Every day we slaughter our finest impulses. That is why we get a heartache when we read those lines written by the hand of a master and recognize them as our own, as the tender shoots which we stifled because we lacked the faith to believe in our own powers, our own criterion of truth and beauty. Every man, when he gets quiet, when he becomes desperately honest with himself, is capable of uttering profound truths. We all derive from the same source. there is no mystery about the origin of things. We are all part of creation, all kings, all poets, all musicians; we have only to open up, only to discover what is already there.

~ Henry Miller

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As soon as the non-dual language becomes a strategy to manipulate, to try and get away from something, it has become something else. It is no longer on behalf of Truth. Content is nothing. The words are nothing without the Love they spring from. Love has no formulas. It can say anything or nothing, a little smile. It is not about the words.

~ Ramana Spencer

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You made me without name or trace, like the heart and soul.
And You made me hand-clapping without hands, like joy.
I said, "Where am I going, since my soul is in no place?"
You made me without "place" and moving like the spirit.

~ Rumi

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We are, what are we?
We know not, what we are!
For a moment we are blessed
For a moment we are accursed
Some moment we pray and fast
Some moment we are free spirits
Now we declare, 'Only we exist'
Now we declare, 'We don't exist'
For a bit, our heart is calm
In a bit, we weep rivers
Now we say, 'We are self-realized'
Now we ask, 'Who are we?'
'Sachal' we are only That eternally
What other contracts can we make here?

~ Sachal Sarmast

No Agenda Needed

The Self is not attained by doing anything, but remaining still and being as we are.

~ Ramana Maharshi

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Lighthouses don't go running all over an island looking for boats to save: they just stand there, shining.

~ Anne Lamott

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I think 99 times and find nothing. I stop thinking, swim in the silence, and the truth comes to me.

~ Albert Einstein

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Strenuously seeking truth
by investigation and concentration,
one will never appreciate
the unthinkable simplicity and bliss
that abide at the core.

To uncover this fertile ground,
cut through the roots of complexity
with the sharp gaze of naked awareness,
remaining entirely at peace,
transparent and content.

You need not expend great effort
nor store up extensive spiritual power.
Remain in the flow of sheer awareness.

~ Tilopa

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Listening, non-directed attention, is the natural, the inbuilt functioning of the brain.

~ Jean Klein

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The Truth is the only thing you’ll ever run into that has no agenda. Everything else will have an agenda. Everything. That is why the Truth is so powerful. Give up your agendas and continue to expose yourself, and harmonization will naturally occur.

~ Adyashanti

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Real fearlessness is the product of tenderness. It comes from letting the world tickle your heart, your raw and beautiful heart. You are willing to open up, without resistance or shyness, and face the world. You are willing to share your heart with others.

~ Chogyam Trungpa

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When there is a wound deep inside a person, he will try to share that with other people. What else can he do? You just recognize: "Oh, he needs compassion." Compassion is the only medicine. Unconditional love is the only treatment.

~ Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

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Your purpose is to be at peace, to love all beings, and to know who you are. This is the purpose of life. Slowly you will know this and get through.

~ Papaji

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Ah, not to be cut off,
not through the slightest partition
shut out from the law of the stars.
The inner -- what is it?
if not the intensified sky,
hurled through with birds and deep
with the winds of homecoming

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

Be Silent

Sit quietly and listen for a voice that says, 'Be more silent.'

~ Rumi

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The role you play on the world's stage has no meaning other than the clear-sightedness with which you play it. Don't lose yourself in your performance - this only blurs the vision of your inner being.

~ Jean Klein

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Student: How did I end up with this role?

Master: No one else wanted it.

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In most of our human relationships, we spend much of our time reassuring one another that our costumes of identity are on straight.

~ Ram Dass

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I wish I could show you,
when you are lonely or in darkness,
the astonishing Light of your own Being.

~ Hafiz

*********** *********** ***********

When I was the stream, when I was the
forest, when I was still the field,
when I was every hoof, foot
fin and wing, when I
was the sky
itself,

no one ever asked me did I have a purpose, no one ever
wondered was there anything I might need,
for there was nothing
I could not
love

It was when I left all we once where that
the agony began, the fear and questions came,
and I wept, I wept, And tears
I had never known
before.

So I returned to the river, I returned to
the mountains. I asked for their hand in marriage again,
I begged – I begged to wed every object
and creature,

and when they accepted,
God was ever present in my arms.
And he did not say,
'where have you
been?'

for then I knew my soul – every soul -
has always held him.

~ Meister Eckhart

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Walking Out the Door

Has someone ever come up to you, thinking they know you, and started chatting away about people and events you have no knowledge of. You wonder who they're speaking to. Suddenly, they wake up and realize that they don't know you, that you only looked like someone they know or knew.

This is happening to me now. People are writing and speaking to me as if they know me. They don't. I wonder who they think I am. I wonder who they're speaking to. I wonder why they aren't more present with themselves, and me.

It is quite common, isn't it, to assume that we know people, because their name and face and voice are familiar. But we have to be careful, because something may have happened in their hypocenter, the place where earthquakes start. Without our noticing, their entire identity, history, and being may have shifted so suddenly and totally as to make them a new person. Not the old person with new ideas, experiences, and beliefs, but a new person, one we've never met. This can happen to anyone, to all of us. It's often why we undertake personal and spiritual growth work - to become something utterly new.

If we are to serve and support each other in our growth, change and transformation, then we must approach each other with care, especially those closest to us, those we think we know. If we are not careful, our knowing will create a prison for them and us.

Can we approach each other with this level of care, being willing to both know and not know, suspending easy and habitual projections, in order that we may all truly have the opportunity to grow, change, and transform?

Whatever the answer to this question may be, we each ought to be true to who we are, who we've become, who we're becoming. You know as well as I do what it feels like to pretend to be someone you're not, to accept and cooperate with the projections of others. It makes you feel sick, doesn't it? Self-betrayal leaves a bitter taste in one's mouth.

I love Rainer Maria Rilke's poem, "Sometimes a Man":

Sometimes a man stands up during supper

and walks outdoors, and keeps on walking,

because of a church that stands somewhere in the East.

And his children say blessings on him as if he were dead.

And another man, who remains inside his own house,

dies there, inside the dishes and in the glasses,

so that his children have to go far out into the world

toward that same church, which he forgot.

A few months ago, I stood up during supper and walked out the door. The children of my past do not know me.

On August 7, 1974, Philippe Petit, the French high-wire artist, walked across a wire he had strung between the two World Trade Center towers. He was on that wire, a quarter mile above ground, for 45 minutes. It was such a catastrophic enterprise, so beyond imagining, a feat of such daring that he walked from one life to another. When he was finished, he left his past. No one could follow him. He had become someone else on that wire.

I wonder what might happen if we were to truly let go of the self we were, and let go of the images we hold of others? I wonder what might happen if we stood up at supper, or breakfast, and walked out the door. I wonder what might happen in 45 minutes, a quarter mile above ground, with nothing but self-surrender to steady us and keep us safe, if never the same.

~ Robert Rabbin