Silence Is All I Can Say

Rumi speaks:

Listen to presences inside poems,
Let them take you where they will.

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Silence is the root of everything.
If you spiral into its void,
a hundred voices will thunder
messages you long to hear.

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Heart is the one who calls.
The sound of Heart echoes
on the mountain of body.
O the one who hangs on sound,
Be silent.
Instead, embrace the place
from whence sound comes.

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The silence that Love would tell to Love,
That would be a narration
Which would feed the Soul
And have no end.

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Be silent. That Heart speaks
without tongue or lips.

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We listen to words
so we can silently
reach into the other.

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“Keep silence,” be mute;
if you have not yet become
the tongue of God,
be an ear.

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You..You...You...& Me too...

Why is there always music in this house?
Ask the owner.

Idols inside the Kaaba?
Beloved's light in a pagan temple?

Here is a treasure this world could not contain.
The house and its landlord
are all pretext and play.

Hands off this house, this talisman.
Don't argue with the landlord;
he's drunk every night.

The dirt and garbage are musk and rose.
The roof and door are music and verse.
In short, whoever finds this house,
is ruler of the world, Solomon of his time.

Look down, Lord, from the roof;
bless us with your glance.

I swear, since seeing Your face,
the whole world is a fraud and fantasy.
The garden is bewildered as to what is leaf
or blossom. The distracted birds
can't distinguish the birdseed from the snare.

A house of love with no limits,
a presence more beautiful than venus or the moon,
a beauty whose image fills the mirror of the heart.

Zulaikha's female friends,
beside themselves in Joseph's presence, sliced their wrists.
Maybe a curl of his hair brushed their hearts.

Come in. The Beloved is here. We are all drunk.
No one notices who enters or leaves.
Don't sit outside the door in the dark, wondering.

Those drunk with Beloved,
even if they are a thousand, live as One.
But drunk with lust, even one is double.

Enter the thicket of lions unafraid of any wounds.
The shadows you fear are just a child's fantasy.

There is no wound and nothing to be wounded;
all is mercy and love.

But you build up thought
like a massive wooden door.
Set fire to the wood.

Silence the noise of the heart.
Hold your harmful tongue.

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

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

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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

As It Should Be

One of the ways we can know what is happening in these times is not to read channeled messages or news reports, but to extrapolate from our own experience. We are here as lightworkers and starseeds and what is happening within us, in terms of our energies and outlooks, surely reflects the intentions of those who are managing events.

There is one drawback and that’s that we only know what is happening within ourself alone, not what is happening within others, which is why we share in discussion groups. Our sharing makes our experience known to others and they make their experience known to us.

And doing this job, I receive your emails in which you say that what I wrote about is also happening for you. These too help construct a picture of what we’re all going through.

In the last three messages from the Boss, he’s said that he (or perhaps my guides, or even both) is gradually raising the kundalini and I feel the impact. So may you, since your guides are probably doing the same with you. Since I’ve begun watching in April, there has arisen an increased sense of joy, wellbeing and satisfaction. At the same time, there has also arisen a decreased sense of personality or personal-ness.

What does that mean? It means that, at exactly the time when I feel “better,” I feel fewer issues, desires, or preferences. “I” am disappearing. In fact “I want” is disappearing and surely that is the main obstacle to evolution or enlightenment, is it not?

It is “I want,” or what the Buddha called the cycle of desire, that has us remain on one plane rather than advancing to another, is that not so? Endless, endless desire, one desire satisfied succeeded by another, making us what Buddhists called “hungry ghosts.”

I’m becoming more fit to serve because “I” am getting out of my own way. And the same may apply to you.

But there isn’t a straight-line path up a divine incline. There is doubling back and standing still and walking from side-to-side. Habits assert themselves and confuse. I’m used to watching the odd TV program and I still turn on the TV. But I watch less and turn the TV off sooner. I imagine soon I’ll only watch it to catch up on the “news,” if what the mainstream media presents can be considered news.

I also feel drawn to meditate more and I do. But often it is not meditation as we’re used to thinking of it. I meditate actively sometimes, instead of passively. I’m meditating now as I work. The telling of the truth about myself is no hindrance to meditation. A statement of truth is no diversion, but a fulfilling of the inner impulse to be still.

Truth is still, is it not? It is known in stillness, as many sages tell us. King David is one:

“Commune with your heart upon your bed, and be still.” (1)

“Be still and know that I am God.” (2)

Or Lao-Tzu. Here he captures exactly how it’s becoming for me:

“Be still while you work
And keep full control
Over all.” (3)

“Touch ultimate emptiness,
Hold steady and still.” (4)

The same way of speaking can be found in modern-day sages like Adyashanti: “An attitude of open receptivity, free of any goal or anticipation, will facilitate the presence of silence and stillness to be revealed as your natural condition.” (5)

What Adya called an “attitude of open receptivity, free of any goal or anticipation” is exactly the frame of mind that I’m gradually finding myself in or moving towards. It isn’t true that I’m not following any discipline, because karma yoga or selfless service is a discipline. So I cannot say that all is simply the product of the rising energies.

I’m a seeker of truth (jnana yogin) who follows the discipline of selfless service (karma yoga). All paths, sincerely followed, lead to God. There is not one that is better or more fit than another.

I could fight the rising energies and not pursue a spiritual discipline. If I did, I assume that life would be getting progressively more difficult for me rather than easier round about now. To know about that we’d have to hear the shares of those who are in fact fighting the unfoldment that’s occurring and we probably won’t hear from them, at least not now.

But I’m not fighting them. I know what’s happening energetically behind the scenes, as do you, and I’m allowing it to work its effect on me, as are you.

So, in every way, we’re riding an escalator, a divine moving staircase to Heaven, to an expanded state, a higher vibration, a more umbrageous existence. It’s just that it’s happening slowly and without watching it and noticing the gradual expansion, we might not be aware of it. Or without discussing it with each other in discussion groups, or reading channeled messages whose mission is to alert us and reassure us about what is occurring, we might not be aware of the gradual rise.

Knowing this, I’m not alarmed to watch the falling away of desires and preferences. As I become stiller, I’m not fighting it or acting against it. No matter where it leads, I’m convinced that the outcome will be one I’ll be happy with. As I become stiller and stiller, I simply adjust accordingly. I let the things I used to do fall by the wayside in full trust that what is happening, since I asked for it in the first place, is as it should be.

Footnotes

(1) Psalm 3:4.

(2) Psalm 46:10.

(3) Lao-Tzu, The Way of Life. The Tao Te Ching. trans. R.B. Blakney. New York, etc.: Avon, 1975, 55.

(4) Lao-Tzu, WOL, 68.

(5) Adyashanti, “True Meditation,” 1999, downloaded from www.adyashanti.org, 2004.

~ Steve Beckow - http://stevebeckow.com/2011/06/as-it-should-be/

A Prayer for the Dying

Life,

Let them struggle to understand until there is only confusion,
and in the centre of that confusion show them their inherent clarity.

Make them courageous by taking away all of their hope,
and let them weep until their stomachs hurt,
until their tears melt into laughter.

Love them by destroying them.

And when they are more alone than ever,
show them an intimacy they cannot imagine.

Make them suffer until they are exhausted from fighting You,
make their pain great enough so that all their concepts turn to ash.

Let them never know what they are looking for,
but make them keep looking anyway,
as if their lives depended on it.

Give them time to read their books and listen to their teachers,
give them time to build up mountains of knowledge,
give them certainty and pride and a sense of security.

And then let their books rot,
and turn their teachers into hypocrites,
and make them doubt and forget everything they've learned.

Everything.

And make them stand alone, facing You,
naked and without protection,
and let them tremble,
let them piss and shit themselves with fear,
let all facades fall away.

And then let them into the great secret,
that they are loved beyond words,
in their nakedness, in their failure, in their ignorance,
in everything they were running away from.

That they are you.
That your face is their face.

That nothing ever happened at all.


~ Jeff Foster - http://www.lifewithoutacentre.com

Openhand: "Five Gateways"

Beautifully done guided tour through the stages of awakening and enlightenment.

More info at: http://www.openhandweb.org

Some End Game Thoughts - Dr. Stewart Bitkoff

By cosmic design, we are living in an age of tremendous social upheaval, technological change and abundance of destructive natural phenomena. Many are concerned that this is the end of days; an ever present fear of death grips their daily life.

Travelers forget that in every moment we live and die. This moment is here and then it is gone. Is this not a small death? The secret is to make each moment a celebration.

The celebratory journey begins by changing your world view and realizing we came here to experience this hour. On a journey, we are spiritual travelers who have come to this realm to experience it all, and help those we can. Embrace each moment. Use each opportunity to rise higher.

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Let us suppose for a moment, everything we see about us is an illusion; and the things we come in contact with will no longer be there when we awake from our dream like state.

What will we do? Will we cry or laugh? Will we be happy for this experience or will we want more? Will we have sweet or bitter memories? How will this multi-level experience prepare us for our real lives?

O traveler, give thought to this proposition; it is not very far from the Truth.

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As the hour glass drains
What is important to you?
Each grain is a precious moment
That cannot be reclaimed.

What have you left undone?
What else do you wish to accomplish?
Who have you forgotten to embrace?

Consider your answer well.
We are not promised another day.

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O the pain of death. The moment of bitterness as the soul separates from the body. What parent wants this for their child?

Yet, while the death of a loved one is a heart rending experience, we are not thinking in the proper way. In many respects, this life is a prison term for the soul and the moment of physical release is a joyous one. The soul is returning home. Also, learn to think of this release as a return to a greater freedom. For a moment, forget the worldly consciousness and focus on the transcendent.

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O traveler, of what are you Created? Flesh and bone is only part of the answer. Remember you are a child of Spirit and will wake-up one day to find you have joined the morning sun- shinning across the universe.

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Did you think this world of takers could go on forever? Governments and takers- lying to and stealing from the most helpless; takers filling their pockets with their neighbor's gold.

O spiritual traveler, you are on a journey; a grand adventure of sorts. Prepare for the next phase with its magnificent ports of call.

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When the potter is forming a bowl and it has a defect which cannot be repaired: what does the potter do? Keeping the clay, the potter starts anew.

O traveler, the hour of change is upon us. That which will be kept is essential to the new form.

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When the child cries, why must it be so? I have not been given the opportunity to reach my full potential. Answer with kindness. This destruction is necessary to the new form and that which you will be given will far exceed that which you lost.

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And so the Prophecy must be fulfilled. You did not create this world and are not responsible for its decay. Yet, you are a child of flesh and have participated in the pain.

And as you chose this life so have you wished for this cup. Drink deep, my fellow travelers, we helped press the grapes.

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You ask: why must it be so? I tell you our mind cannot understand. We must experience the answer; which is all part of the Creator's Plan.

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The book of your life is filled with many blank pages. You are free to write on them whatever you choose.

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Sit down and number all the things you are concerned about. Make a list and leave nothing out. These things, which make-up your list, are your gods. They are the things and people that fill your mind- instead of the Beloved.

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The hour of a traveler's death is fixed. What is not fixed is how we spend our life. Use these hours well. They are as precious as any treasure you will ever find.

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What bit of advice to offer your children? Love God and serve your fellow travelers.

~ Dr. Stewart Bitkoff - http://stewartbitkoff.com/

Authentic Inquiry

What is inquiry, really? This is a good question. And like most really good questions, it is very basic. Authentic inquiry is allowing yourself to care, to take on the weightless burden of caring. Everyone knows what it’s like to inquire out of intellectual interest—asking for the sake of asking or because you think you should. This is not caring. When you care about something, it gets inside of you. It gets inside the shell that keeps you from being affected or bothered, the shell that keeps anything really new from happening.

So in the beginning, to deeply inquire about anything, you have to care about it. You have to care enough to allow it to get inside that shell. What do you really care about? What pulls you into here and now, this minute? What is the most important thing to you? For real inquiry, it is important to be asking about something you sincerely care about. The question needs to be personal, not about a spiritual teaching or something that’s outside of your experience. It needs to be something that’s coming from the inside.

When you care, you care from the inside. Many people impose ideas from the outside upon themselves, but this isn’t inquiry. When you really care, you enter a love affair with what you care about. Sometimes it draws you into bliss, sometimes into confusion. You don’t know what to do. You don’t know where you are going. You feel a bit out of control. You’re letting this caring get under your skin. To find out that you care like this is the most important thing; otherwise you can spend your whole life caring about what someone else says you should care about.

Like many people, you may be afraid to find out how much you care because that caring could just steal you away. What is the one thing that will matter the most at the end of your life? Without it, you would say: “That’s what it was all about and I missed it.” If you had the best job, lots of money, the perfect lover, or whatever your ideal is, and suddenly your life was over, what would still be left undone? That’s what it’s all about.

When you find that kind of caring, inquiry has some power behind it. You also find your own inner integrity. You find something inside that’s stable. There’s a place inside you that is willing to be a little crazy—crazy enough to take inquiry seriously and hold nothing sacred. Holding nothing sacred means that nothing is assumed to be true and all of your assumptions are fair game. The more spiritual they are, the more they are fair game. Ultimately it is your most sacred and unquestioned assumptions about yourself, others, and life that are most important to question.

Many people find their spirituality taking them outward. They think they are going inward because they have heard the spiritual teaching, “Inquire and look within.” Meanwhile, they are out in the stars somewhere looking for someone else’s experience, looking for the right experience, or looking for the experience they believe they are supposed to have. This is spirituality going entirely in the wrong direction. Inquiry is a means of taking you back to yourself, back to your experience.

When inquiry is authentic, it brings you into the experience of here and now, bringing you to the full depth of it, pulling you into it. The question pulls you back into the mystery of your experience. “What am I?” takes you right back into the mystery. If your mind is honest, it knows it doesn’t have the answer. You ask, “What am I?” and instantly, there is silence. Your mind doesn’t know. And when it doesn’t know, there is an experience right here, right now, that is alive. You bump into nothingness inside—that no-thing, that absolute nothingness which your mind can’t know.

The answer does not come in the form of a description or phrase; it is a direct experience. And this experience, your livingness, always transcends any words or intellectual answer. In fact, the truth of your being is eternally transcending itself. As soon as it projects itself out as something, even as a profound insight, it has already transcended it. So eventually the inquiry wears itself out. You wear yourself out. You wear your ego self out. You wear your spiritual self out. You wear it all out. You’ve inquired yourself out of this whole thing, and you’re disappearing faster than you can put yourself together.

As Nisargadatta Maharaj said so brilliantly and beautifully, “The ultimate understanding is that there is no ultimate understanding.” When it’s in the head, it’s an impressive piece of understanding; when it’s in the heart, as the Buddha said, it’s extinguished. You find a living experience of being, empty of content, empty of you. This is where spiritual awakening begins. This is the living answer of authentic inquiry.

© Adyashanti 2007

http://www.adyashan ti.org/index. php?file= writings_ inner&writingid= 32

And The People Stand Firm, Unafraid, and Listen

This is the essence of what is happening and unfolding, moment by moment. The only thing we can do is allow, breathe, accept, say "Yes." Life is in motion, coming into balance on its own, and we are moved by this naturally into awakening. And so it is.

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In the face of rising warmth and light, a flower opens to the new day's Sun.

In the face of rising light and love, a planet's population wakes from sleep emerges from control, and reclaims its freedom.

It wakes from fear, throws off paralysis, and reclaims its power.

It wakes from hate, throws off suspicion, and reclaims its love.

It wakes from violence, throws off control, and reclaims its peacefulness.

And the people stand firm, unafraid, and listen.

And all around, the forces that controlled them lash out with every weapon they possess – police, provocateurs, military, water cannons, tear gas, guns. They issue threats; warn of reprisals; unleash storms and earthquakes; rain chemicals from the air; disrupt their travel, business, education, families.

But the people join together not as citizens of Iran, Tunisia, Myanmar, or France; not as Hindus, Muslims, Christians, or Jews; but as citizens of the world. They recognize how they've been carved up into nations, classes, religions; had language differences and class divides imposed on them; and in every other way been divided and conquered. They reject all division and join together as one - men, women, and children.

They raise the banner of light and love, peace and harmony. They tell the truth and seek more of it. They declare the freedom of all people and the right to health and choice and learning. They reject the use of force and control, censorship and manipulation, indebtedness and impoverishment.

They set their faces against fear and hate. They refuse to harm or kill or cooperate with those who do. They lay down their weapons everywhere. They walk away from bombs and poisons, warships and warplanes.

They depart from organizations that produce pandemic viruses and tainted vaccines, plot to overthrow democratic regimes, issue threats and carry out assassinations, suppress new technologies, and pollute the Earth.

They liberate the halls of power, courts of justice, places of confinement, and mediums of communication.

And the people stand firm, unafraid, and listen.

They learn of their part in bringing on their own subservience and in throwing off their chains.

They wonder how this could have happened and what is next.

They hear how this new age has been expected and anticipated, fostered and nurtured. They learn how this awakening, emergence, and rebirth are supported by a cast of millions, who until now have worked in the shadows and behind the scenes.

They learn how these people are our families from other places, dimensions, and even ages. They learn how these people have come here to end our impoverishment, debilitation, and subjugation.

They learn how these people have seen to it that the light of freedom was never quenched or servitude imposed on us as a planet.

They learn how these people have in hand the means of abundance, freedom, and fulfillment and give it freely.

And the people stand firm, unafraid, and listen.

They hear how our controllers intended to depopulate the globe and retain a fraction of us to serve them. They hear how fear has been used to control and exploit us. They drop their anxiousness of terrorism, Armageddon, starvation, catastrophe, and annihilation.

They rejoice at what awaits us - freedom from suppression and control. They realize the future is ours to decide with no new master looming; They see that no one seeks to place us under heel but to liberate us.

They breathe in new energy, share new abundance, look upon new technologies, and see the Earth being newly cleansed. They realize the sleep of millennia is over and a new day has dawned, a day without barriers, fear, or control.

And the people stand firm, unafraid, and listen.

And the people laugh and shout for joy, in loving anticipation.

~ Steve Beckow - The 2012 Scenario

Of Black Hats, White Hats, and Mad Hatters

Excuse me while I slip outta this old paradigm and into something more comfortable.

The first law of wingwalking is: Never leave hold of one branch before taking hold of another. I now declare the first law of wingwalking null and void.

Again, the first law of paradigm shifts, as Thomas Kuhn suggests in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (or did he not suggest it and I just made it up?), is to allow cognitive dissonance to build until the old paradigm breaks under the weight of it, revealing the new.

I now declare the first law of paradigm shift as having itself been superseded. No new paradigm is visible; none has emerged; I look for none to emerge. We are the new paradigm.

Here I am, left without a dime, a paradigm or even a plugged nickel. Just as we cannot take anything with us into the afterlife, so we also cannot take anything of the old into the new world we face today, brave or otherwise. But I can laugh!

As a sovereign citizen of Planet Earth and a conscious co-creator, I let go of the branch called the old paradigm without having a hold on anything else. I know not truth or space. I am truth and space.

The new paradigm is to have no new paradigm – not if it’s conceptual, explanatory, a belief or a framework. It’s none of these.

Conceptual framework is superseded. Belief system is abandoned. Explanations have become outmoded..”

The new paradigm can only be lived and I can only describe it, dropping all pretense to “knowledge” and “explanation

Nothing I knew before can explain anything I will meet hereafter.

Wittgenstein said, “whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.” But he then stepped away from the mystery and entered an everyday world of which he doubtless felt he could speak. I face an everyday world that is rapidly becoming the mystery itself, whereof I cannot speak.

Ah, but my suffering is illusory! Goodbye to all that. I gladly take up the challenge.

Mad hatter, indeed!

Let novelty reign! The old strangeness is dead! Long live the new strangeness!

~ Steve Beckow - The 2012 Scenario

What is Beyond Consciousness?

The water of the mind, how clear it is!
Gazing at it, the boundaries are invisible.
But as soon as even a slight thought arises,
ten thousand images crowd it.
Attach to them, and they become real.
Be carried by them, and it will be difficult to return.
How painful to see a person trapped in the ten-fold delusions.

~Ryokan

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Watch yourself closely and you will see that whatever be the content of consciousness, the witnessing of it does not depend on the content. Awareness is itself and does not change with the event. The event may be pleasant or unpleasant, minor or important, awareness is the same. Take note of the peculiar nature of pure awareness, its natural self-identity, without the least trace of self-consciousness, and go to the root of it and you will soon realize that awareness is your true nature, and nothing you may be aware of, you can call your own.

When the content is viewed without likes and dislikes, the consciousness of it is awareness. But still there is a difference between awareness as reflected in consciousness and pure awareness beyond consciousness. Reflected awareness, the sense "I am aware" is the witness, while pure awareness is the essence of reality. Reflection of the sun in a drop of water is a reflection of the sun, no doubt, but not the sun itself. Between awareness reflected in consciousness as the witness and pure awareness there is a gap, which the mind cannot cross.

~Sri Nisargadatta

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The next time you feel extreme anger, anxiety, jealousy, or sadness, just notice each thought that is feeding that state. Let each thought fall away quickly, one after the other, like flashes of light. Then just rest with the full sensory and emotional experience in the body, without placing any agenda on it, without trying to think yourself out of it. In that moment, you stop mentally running from suffering.

~Scott Kiloby

~ ~ ~

Our personal viewpoints (self, other, world, duality) and impersonal viewpoints (no self, no other, no world, nonduality), are equal in that they arise and fall, leaving no trace. They only leave a trace if we follow one, thinking it is closer to truth or closer to our present experience. But nothing can bring us closer to our present experience. It's already here, appearing as the present viewpoint.

~Scott Kiloby

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Breath is Truth

Some people practice throughout their entire lives just by paying attention to breathing. Everything that is true about anything is true about breath: it's impermanent; it arises and it passes away. Yet if you didn't breathe, you would become uncomfortable; so then you would take in a big inhalation and feel comfortable again. But if you hold onto the breath, it's no longer
comfortable, so you have to breathe out again. All the time shifting, shifting.

Sylvia Boorstein

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POEMS by Alan Larus

Suddenly

Woke up in a play,
on a crooked way

Comedy from start
Much too big, my part
And in awe I am too small
Got a little light, that's all

Life's impossible to swallow
Like a closed door,
what may follow?
A coming oh so handily,
transformation of the alchemy.

I am the way and the truth and the life.
No one comes to the Father except through me.

http://www.ferryfee .com/bluesky/ Suddenly. html


In life to realise

At the end of winding road,
such a gift you gave to me
Tumbling down the mighty load,
in a white house by the sea

But my maker saved this spark
It is shining in the dark

Lesson learnt
Getting burnt,
where no shelter is

To the rays of bliss.

http://www.ferryfee .com/bluesky/ The_gift. htm

WHAT'S NEXT?

All We Can't Possibly Know

Perhaps our collective situation at present -- of waiting for the new to emerge -- is analogous to a kind of planetary Cloud of Unknowing during this apparent planetary Dark Night (of the World Soul).

Many of us can't help but sense ourselves to be waiting for something to happen that will usher in evidence of a radically new world from the ashes of the old, which otherwise seem to lay in smoking piles everywhere about us.

...and this especially in light of the endless messages received by various visionaries and channeled beings; in light of our individual dreams and visions; nay -- in light of our individual and sovereign core knowing of the living truth that we are here to witness and live through!

It may also be (paradoxically enough) part and parcel of the process we are involved in to find ourselves necessarily engaged in the activity of exhausting our ability to wait altogether.

Indeed, waiting, as an activity of time in relation to time, may be our final thing to learn to surrender and let go of.

Click here for more http://feelingthefuture.blogspot.com/

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

Losing Hope: The Final Attachment

Remember in the last update when I said...."if we can walk through this VERY narrow doorway, fully present and completely void of an agenda, we will experience a major shift on many levels"?

Well, not that I need to tell you, but we are still trying to squeeze our full-bodied selves through that very small opening. And our success rate...or the ease by which it happens... has everything to do with the "completely void of an agenda" part.

Truth is, most of us want through that doorway so badly that we are trying e v e r y t h i n g we can think of to bust down that door and get the hell out of Dodge.

We're being forced through sheer frustration to find our way out of this paradoxical box we've locked ourselves into...forced into surrendering to a new way of seeing and doing things, to accessing and using a whole new set of tools in an entirely new realm of human experience.

Click here for more:
http://consciousco-creationalcoaching.blogspot.com/2010/08/losing-hope-final-attachment.html

A Christmas Reflection

"Into this world, this demented inn, in which there is absolutely no room for him at all, Christ has come uninvited. But because he cannot be at home in it, because he is out of place in it, and yet he must be in it, his place is with those others for whom there is no room. His place is with those who do not belong, who are rejected by power because they are regarded as weak, those who are discredited, who are denied the status of persons, tortured, exterminated. With those for whom there is no room, Christ is present in this world."

~ Thomas Merton

"And the deepest level of communication is not communication, but communion. It is wordless. It is beyond words, and it is beyond speech, and it is beyond concept. Not that we discover a new unity. We discover an older unity. My dear brothers, we are already one. But we imagine that we are not. And what we have to recover is our original unity. What we have to be is what we are."

~ The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton

"A life is either all spiritual or not spiritual at all. No man can serve two masters. Your life is shaped by the end you live for. You are made in the image of what you desire."

~ Thomas Merton

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Many who come to non-dual "seeking" come from educated backgrounds. As I have stated before, many look at "enlightenment" as a crown to a "good" education. But what is in your mind does not lead to the truth. In some, perhaps many, circumstances, education can be a stumbling block to awareness. I have been a real advocate for the "simple seekers". People like Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection. A simple monk, shoe maker, and cook, Brother Lawrence was responsible for The Practice of the Presence of God, a small book of "Oneness" that is a classic of Christian Mysticism. Or St. Therese of Lisieux, who's The Story of a Soul is a testimony of a life of Love in action. Or look at Ramana Maharshi, or Nisargadatta Maharaj, or even the Christ. Simple earnestness, simple Love. These lead to understanding. These lead to Truth. You can study under well educated people. You can read all the spiritual literature you can lay your hands on. But living a life of service, trust and Love is what takes you to the Absolute. To be in "God's" presence, to "be" God's Love, is the Absolute. You can't learn it. You can only "live it".

My "teaching" is that we ARE unconditional Love. No person, no "God", just Love unfolding. The "nothingness" everyone talks about is seen as "everythingness" from here. I have uncovered the truth of my "faith" by living it, trusting it, and being it. A "teacher" lives his "teaching". Realize you are Love unfolding, and live accordingly. It is no more complicated than that!

~ Bill Lindley http://ahimsananda. blogspot. com/

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"There are so many people who live alone, crushed by their loneliness. It is obvious that too much solitude can drive people off the rails, to depression and alcoholism. More and more people seem to have lost their balance because their family life has been unhappy. There are so many who are lost, taking drugs, turning to delinquency; there are so many who are looking for a family and a meaning in their lives. In years to come, we are going to need so many small communities which welcome lost and lonely people, offering them a family and a sense of belonging. At other times, Christians who wanted to follow Jesus opened hospitals and schools. Now that there are so many of these, Christians must commit themselves to the new Communities of Welcome, to live with people who have no other family, and to show them that they are loved."

- Jean Vanier, founder of The L'Arche Communities

We are the Same One

If the only prayer your say in your entire life is
"thank you," that would suffice.

~ Meister Eckhart

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To Meet in the Play

I am officially no longer an 'Advaita teacher' or 'Nonduality teacher' - if, indeed, I ever was one. Life cannot be put into words, and however beautiful the words of Advaita/Nonduality are, they must be discarded in the end. I could never claim to be any sort of authority on this stuff. I will continue to speak, to sing my song to those who are open to listening, but gone is the need to adhere to any tradition, to use Advaita-speak to avoid real, authentic human engagement, to pretend that I am in any way more or less special than you, to kid you that I know more than you, to play the 'teacher' by refusing to meet you in the play, to stop listening to you because I see you as 'still stuck in the dream' or 'still a person'. This message is about love, in the true sense of the word - otherwise it is simply nihilism masquerading as freedom. The 'Advaita Police' reply 'Who cares?'. I say I do. I do.

~ Jeff Foster

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Getting enlightened is a great thing. I recommend it. But then what are you going to do? Are you going to love everybody and everything deeply and madly? If not, why bother with enlightenment. ..it would just be a
personal trip. Just go play the lottery...or take a lot of vacations...

~ Scott Kiloby

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Not knowing

I may not know my original face
but I know how to smile.
I may not know the recipe for the diameter of a circle
but I know how to cut a slice for a friend.
I may not be Mary or the Buddha
but I can be kind.
I may not be a diamond cutter
but I still long for rays of light
that reach the heart.
I may not be standing on the hill of skulls
but I know love when I see it.

~ Stephen Levine

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"...did any of your students ever become enlightened? "
"Sure. many of them"
"How can you tell?"
"Easy. They stop following me or anyone else, do not talk ceaselessly about 'teachers', 'teachings', 'spirituality' and other such matters, and they go on with their lives free from fears and pretenses.

~ Nasrudin

Deepened Entrenchment

It seems like it would be very easy for someone you’ve given some sort of authority to (even an unintended, projected authority) to say all the right words to you, all the right things to you, all the most comforting, ideologically satisfying terms and conditions when it comes to what you want to hear about spirituality. And the marketplace is geared for that. There is just about every single flavor out there for people to dive into. And they do. Those who say they are leading spiritual lives, and they are spiritual people, and so forth. There is very little challenging that goes on. And the challenging that does come about is a challenge more toward – well, deepening an entrenchment into identification, rather than a challenge in the opposite direction, of allowing to dismantle what’s allowing one to believe lies, to believe untruth, to believe what’s not the case in favor of what is totally the case, and always has been and always will be, in a time bound structure – and beyond. What is fascinating to see is just how completely riveted a spiritual seeker can be on thinking and believing that they are making “progress” because they have done so much “work” on themselves. And to see directly, while as perfect as that is – those are the trajectories that need to be followed – but in light of what they THINK are being pointed toward, it’s the exact opposite. It could not be more averse or unattuned. Now, in the broad scheme, sometimes you need to be duped for a long, long time in order to finally have the day come where the shackles come off and the scales fall from the eyes – and that’s why I say it’s perfect. What I’m merely trying to convey is that, to watch this going on – to hear this – to sort of see people becoming so entrenched, and being so caught up – there is a remembering of what that was like. And how caught up in the brambles one can be come in that situation. However, when it comes to Truth Realization, ultimately any sort of self development, self improvement like that, makes no sense. There is nothing you can do to any of that kind of a structure that’s going to have any bearing on Truth Realization. It’s slated or not slated from moment one. What working on the ego, self improvement, self development does is bury people even further into this tangled mess – yet at the same time they think all of this so-called development is “working”, and they listen to people who are telling them to do keep doing this – maybe even challenging them on those counts, but challenging them in the wrong direction. And how willingly our belief is suspended in that position – how willingly we allow ourselves to fall into that trap, to fall into that guise of progress, fall into somebody telling us, or “challenging” us to be better – while, when it comes to Truth, what they are actually often doing is moving us away, trapping us, or even burying us further into the muck than perhaps we have ever been.

Just Perception

Quotes from Adyashanti

Ego is basically the movement of the mind toward objects of perception in the form of grasping and away from objects in the form of aversion.

This fundamentally is all the ego is.

This movement of grasping and aversion gives rise to a sense of a separate "me," and in turn the sense of "me" strengthens itself this way.

It is this continuous loop of causation that tricks consciousness into a trance of identification.

Identification with what?

Identification with the continuous loop of suffering.

After all, who is suffering?

The "me" is suffering.

And "who" is this me?

It is nothing more than a sense of self caused by identification with grasping and aversion.

You see, it's all a creation of the mind, an endless movie, a terrible dream.

Don't try to change the dream -- trying to change it is just another movement in the dream.

Look at the dream. Be aware of the dream.

That awareness is It.

Become more interested in the awareness of the dream than in the dream itself.

What is that awareness? Who is that awareness?

Don't go spouting out an answer, just be the answer.

Be It.

~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~

One of the most beautiful inquiries is, “What does my life serve?” This is a big question. It’s not asking, “What form is my service taking?” It doesn’t particularly matter what form our service takes when we are serving the silence of the heart. The only thing that’s important is, “What is my life really serving?

~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~

"If you are a true seeker of liberation you've got to be willing to stand alone. At the moment of Liberation everything falls away...everything. Suddenly the ground beneath your feet is gone, and you are alone. You are alone because you have directly realized that there is no other, there is no separation. There is only you, only Self, only limitless emptiness, pure consciousness.

To the mind, the ego, this appears terrifying. When the mind looks at limitlessness and infinity, it projects meaninglessness and despair. To the ego Absolute Freedom can look terrifying. But when the mind is let go of, the view changes from meaningless despair and fear to the unending joy and wonder of Liberation.

In Liberation, you stand alone. You stand alone because you need no supports of any kind. You need no supports because you have realized that the very notion of a separate you no longer exists; that there is nothing to support; that the whole ego experience was a flimsy illusion. So you stand alone but never, never lonely because everywhere you look, all you see is That, and You are That."

~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~

This innocence waking up, realizing that everything is itself, even all the confusion and all the ignorance and everything....this is the dissolving of confusion, of ignorance, of karma.

~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~

Enlightenment is perceiving not through the lens of ego. It is not an unending satori experience, unending awakening experience. This misunderstanding will create
more tail chasing than it is dreamed possible.

It is not the quality of "aha" that will sustain because it will not sustain itself. Next week you may be going to have another "aha" that is bigger.

True practices or useful spiritual disciplines, if there is any, is a way not fueling the egoic consciousness.

The liberating truth is not static; it is alive. It cannot be put into concepts and be understood by the mind. The truth lies beyond all forms of conceptual fundamentalism. What you are is the beyond—awake and present, here and now already.

To be here, all you have to do is let go of who you think you are. That’s all! And then you realize, "I’m here." Here is where thoughts aren’t believed. Every time you
come here, you are nothing. Radiantly nothing. Absolutely and eternally zero. Emptiness that is awake. Emptiness that is full. Emptiness that is everything.

http://www.adyashanti.org

The Simplicity of What IS - Joan Tollifson

Liberation is not about having the answers or having an experience. It has nothing to do with belief, but is rather the absence (or transparency, or seeing through) of belief. Waking up does not happen in the past or the future, only Now. Liberation or enlightenment is not something you find or acquire like a new car. It is not some dazzling or exotic experience like being permanently high on ecstasy or LSD. Liberation is seeing through the ubiquitous fabrications and mirages of conceptual thought, including the whole idea of liberation and the one who supposedly needs to be liberated.

Ultimate Reality is hidden right in front of our eyes in plain view. It is showing up as breakfast dishes, laundry, sunlight on leaves, the barking of a dog, sound of traffic or rain, the humming of the computer, the taste of tea, the shapes of these words, and the awareness being and beholding it all. And only when we describe all of this in words does it seem as if "awareness" is one thing and "the taste of tea" is something else. The non-conceptual actuality of this breathing-hearing-seeing-being is undivided, without center or periphery. No inside, no outside. No subject, no object. Simply this, just as it is.

And then perhaps a thought: "There must be more to life than this," or "What is the meaning of it all?" or "What about final enlightenment?" or "Isn't this all just the phenomenal manifestation, and isn't that an illusion?" Thought creates imaginary problems and tries to solve them. The complex human brain has an astonishing ability to conceptualize, imagine, remember, project, and think about things that have no actual reality. Yet even these thoughts are nothing but a momentary dream-like shape or expression of the One, undivided, boundless Whole.

Thought labels, categorizes, evaluates, and reifies the ever-changing perceptions that appear. Conceptual thought creates the hypnotic, mirage-like illusion of solid, persisting, independent things (including "me" and "you") -- the illusion of duality and separation. Thought imagines "me" as a separate character on a journey through time. It conjures up goals and stories of success and failure. It even creates the image of "me" as a serious spiritual person dedicated to getting rid of the "me." But without thinking, where is the "me"? What am I, really?

***

Is it possible that the peace and well-being we seek (that longing at the root of all our more superficial desires), cannot be found or satisfied by answers or attainments or experiences of any kind? Is it possible that the very search for it "out there" is precisely what prevents us from noticing that what we are seeking is the very essence of Here and Now?

And what is that?

It is nothing you can take hold of conceptually, and it's not any particular experience (as opposed to any other experience). It is the beingness, the groundlessness, the IS-ness of this moment -- this that is undeniably present beyond all doubt, requiring no proof or belief, impossible to deny -- before and after and even during all the grasping and searching and experience-seeking. The words (beingness, groundlessness, IS-ness) are only pointers. What they point to is nothing you can get hold of as an object. In fact, there really are no solid objects because everything is thorough-going flux. This no-thing-ness (or emptiness) is all there really is.

And this no-thing-ness is vibrantly alive, aware, conscious, awake, present. The grasping, searching and thinking may seem to destroy the wholeness of being or the spaciousness of presence-awareness, but can anything really destroy awareness, or the present moment, or beingness? Doesn't everything appear Here and Now, in awareness? And doesn't everything appear altogether at once as one diverse but seamless whole?

(Click here to read more)

THE POWER OF EMPTINESS

This excerpt from Elijah Crow's Silence of the Mind is just a taste of a tome so absolutely clear.....well....you'll just have to read the whole thing yourself. Beautiful....

The book can be downloaded and read here:

http://www.scribd. com/doc/34607176 /Elijah-Crow- The-Silence- of-the-Mind

Enjoy!

The Power of Emptiness

The "void" or " psychological emptiness" is a strange phenomenon,
It appears spontaneously, in the pause between two thoughts,
As the old thought ends its course and disappears,
Its end is the gate, natural silence ensues.

Insist in being with it, as much as you can,
The mind is completely silent, we are attentive – a clear consciousness,
All meanings, boundaries disappear – us and the Infinite are "One";
Practically, we have a new mind – always fresh.

Being in the pause – I become infinite!
It separates two worlds. I leave the limited world
And enter Boundlessness, through total melting;
The whole being is calm – a constant sparkle.

There is no time, no space – just everlasting Eternity;
I move in direct contact with life, in a permanent present.
I am Pure Energy, without motivations,
The simplicity of existence integrates us completely.

We really encounter Life only through this "now",
Free from the old, we are able to embrace the new.
All this beauty vanishes, when another thought appears,
It comes from the knowing mind – an old recording.

Let it play its game, do not oppose any resistance,
Encounter it as it is, without any purpose,
It will certainly disappear, and "emptiness" ensues again,
Another opportunity to encounter it practically.

We find the real meaning of Life through this "void",
It is a boundary line between the two worlds:
On the one side the limited, where the "ego" is the master.
On the other, the Infinite, where Love is the master.

Emptiness also separates Light from the darkness,
The permanent chaos through struggle, contradictions and conflicts,
From the harmonious being, equilibrium and joy;
The whole egocentrism perishes, by encountering the void.

Peace, divine order becomes our nature
It changes our way of being, without effort or will,
Only through this psychological void, we become honest and humane,
The Purity of the Energy – makes titans out of pigmies .

Let this "psychological emptiness" be your guide,
In everything you encounter on your spiritual path.
If it is not the starting point, we easily get deceived,
Only through emptiness – we become Love!

IF YOU KNOW HOW TO RELAX, NOTHING CAN DISTURB YOU

Osho:

LIFE WITHOUT IS A CYCLONE -- a constant conflict, turmoil, struggle. But it is only so on the surface -- just as on the surface of the ocean are waves, maddening noise, constant struggle.

BUT THIS IS NOT ALL OF LIFE. Deep down there is also a center -- soundless, silent, no conflict, no struggle. In the center, life is a noiseless flow, relaxed, a river moving with no struggle, with no fight, no violence. Towards that inner center is the search. You can get identified with the surface, with the outer. And then anxiety and anguish follows. This is what has happened to everyone: we are identified with the surface and with the struggle that goes on there.

THE SURFACE IS BOUND TO BE DISTURBED; nothing is wrong in it. And if you can be rooted in the center, the disturbance on the surface will become beautiful; it will have a beauty of its own. If you can be silent within, then all the sounds without become musical. Then nothing is wrong in it; it becomes a play.

But if you don't know the inner core, the silent center, if you are totally identified with the surface, then you will go mad. And everyone is almost mad.

ALL RELIGIOUS TECHNIQUES, techniques of yoga, meditation, Zen, ARE BASICALLY TO HELP YOU TO BE AGAIN IN CONTACT WITH THE CENTER; to move within; to forget the periphery; to leave the periphery for a time being, and to relax into your own being so deeply that the outer disappears completely and only the inner remains.

Once you know how to move backwards, how to step down into yourself, IT IS NOT DIFFICULT; it becomes as easy as anything. But if you don't know, if you know only the mind clinging to the surface, it is very difficult. Relaxing into one's self is not difficult: but clinging to the surface is.

I have heard a Sufi story.
Once it happened that a Sufi fakir was traveling. It was a dark night and he lost his way. It was so dark he couldn't even see where he was moving -- then suddenly he fell into an abyss. He was terrified. He didn't know what was down there in the darkness or how deep the abyss was. So he caught hold of a branch and started praying.
The night was cold. He cried but there was no one to listen, only his own voice was echoed back. And the night was so cold that his hands were becoming frozen, and he knew that sooner or later he would have to leave the branch -- it was going to be difficult to keep on holding it. His hands were getting so frozen that they were already slipping from the branch. Death was absolutely near. Any moment he would fall and die.
And then the last moment came. You can understand how terrified he was. Dying moment-by-moment, then the last moment came, and he saw the branch slipping out of his hand. And his hands were so frozen that there was no way to hold on, so he had to fall.
But the moment he fell he started dancing -- there was no abyss, he was on clear ground. But the whole night he had suffered...

This is the situation. YOU GO ON CLINGING TO THE SURFACE, afraid that if you leave the surface you will be lost. REALLY, CLINGING TO THE SURFACE YOU ARE LOST. But deep down there is darkness and you cannot see any ground; you cannot see anything else than the surface.

All these techniques are to make you courageous, strong, adventurous, so that you can STOP THE HOLDING ON AND FALL WITHIN YOURSELF. That which looks like an abyss, dark, bottomless, is the very ground of your being. Once you leave the surface, the periphery, you will be centered.

THIS CENTERING IS THE AIM. Once you are centered, you can move to the periphery but you will be totally different. The quality of your consciousness will have changed altogether. Then you can move to the periphery but you will never be the periphery again -- you will remain at the center.

AND REMAINING CENTERED AT THE PERIPHERY IS BEAUTIFUL. Then you can enjoy it; it will become a beautiful play. Then there is no conflict; it is a game. Then it will not create tensions within you, and there will be no anguish and no anxiety around you. And any moment that it becomes too much, too heavy on you, you can go back to the original source -- you can have a dip. Then you will be refreshed, rejuvenated, and you can move to the periphery again. Once you know the way...

And the way is not long. YOU ARE NOT GOING ANYWHERE ELSE THAN INTO YOUR OWN SELF, so it is not long. It is just near. The only barrier is your holding on, holding to the periphery, afraid that if you leave it, you will be lost. The fear feels just as if you are going to die. Moving to the inner center is a death -- death in the sense that your identity with the periphery will die, and a new image, a new feeling of your being will arrive.

So if we want to say in a few words what Tantra techniques are, we can say that they are a deep relaxation into oneself, A TOTAL RELAXATION INTO ONESELF.

YOU ARE ALWAYS TENSE; that is the holding, the clinging. YOU ARE NEVER RELAXED, never in a state of let-go. You are always doing something: that doing is the problem. You are never in a state of non-doing, where things are happening and you are just there not doing anything. Breath comes in and goes out, the blood circulates, the body is alive and throbbing; and the breeze blows, and the world goes on spinning around -- and you are not doing anything, you are not a doer; you are simply relaxed and things are happening. When things are happening and you are not a doer, you are totally relaxed. When you are a doer and things are not happening but are being manipulated by you, you are tense.

YOU RELAX PARTIALLY WHILE YOU ARE ASLEEP, but it is not total. Even in your sleep you go on manipulating; even in your sleep you don't allow everything to happen. Watch a man sleeping: you will see that he is very tense, his whole body will be tense. Watch a small child sleeping, he is very relaxed. Or watch an animal, a cat -- a cat is always relaxed. You are not relaxed even while asleep; you are tense, struggling, moving, fighting with something. On your face tensions are there. In dreams you may be fighting, protecting -- doing the same things as when you were awake, repeating them in an inner drama. But you are not relaxed; you are not in a deep let-go.

THAT'S WHY SLEEP IS BECOMING MORE AND MORE DIFFICULT. And psychologists say that if the same trend goes on, soon the day will come when no one will be able to sleep naturally. Sleep will have to be chemically induced because no one will be able to fall naturally into sleep. The day is not very far. Already you are on the way towards it because even while asleep you are only partially asleep, partially relaxed.

MEDITATION IS THE DEEPEST SLEEP. It is total relaxation plus something more; you are totally relaxed and yet alert; awareness is there. TOTAL SLEEP WITH AWARENESS IS MEDITATION. Fully alert, things are happening but you are not resisting, not fighting, not doing. The doer is not there, the doer has gone into sleep. Only a witness is there, a 'non-doer alertness' is there. Then nothing can disturb you.

IF YOU KNOW HOW TO RELAX, THEN NOTHING CAN DISTURB YOU; if you don't know how to relax, then everything will disturb you. I say everything. It is not really something else that disturbs you, everything else is just an excuse. You are almost always ready to be disturbed. If one thing doesn't disturb you, then something else will; but you will get disturbed. You are ready, you have a tendency to get disturbed.

If all the causes are withdrawn from you, even then you will get disturbed. You will find some cause, you will create some cause. If nothing comes from without, you will create something from within -- some thought, some idea -- and you will get disturbed. You need excuses.

ONCE YOU KNOW HOW TO RELAX, NOTHING CAN DISTURB YOU. Not that the world will change, not that things will be different. The world will be the same. But you don't have the tendency, you don't have the madness; you are not constantly ready to be disturbed. THEN ALL THAT HAPPENS AROUND YOU IS SOOTHING -- even the traffic noise becomes soothing... if you are relaxed. Even the market-place becomes soothing. It depends on you. It is an inner quality.

AND THE MORE YOU GO TOWARDS THE CENTER, the more the quality arises; and the more you move towards the periphery, the more you will be disturbed. If you are too much disturbed, or if you are prone to be disturbed, that shows only one thing: that you are existing near the periphery -- nothing else. Simply this. It is an indication that you have made your abode near the surface. And this is a false abode -- because your real home is at the center, the very center of your being.

~OSHO

BALANCING ACT

Beloved Master,
The peaks are getting pretty wonderful, but the valleys are deeper and darker than ever. Finding balance seems impossible. What to do?

Osho:

There is no need to do anything. YOU ARE NOT TO FIND BALANCE; BALANCE WILL FIND YOU. You simply move. When the valley comes, you go into the valley. WHEN DARKNESS SURROUNDS YOU, ENJOY IT; feel blissful in the velvety touch of it. Move into it, into the infinite magnificence of it. Darkness has a soothing quality which no light can have. And the valley is a rest: like the night, like death.

NO NEED TO TRY TO FIND BALANCE, THE BALANCE WILL FIND YOU. You simply move into the valley. When the valley comes, you accept it. You not only accept it, you welcome it. You enjoy it, you delight in it -- darkness is beautiful. And when the valley goes and you move towards the peak, that too is perfectly beautiful. That is beautiful: the light, the morning, the sun.

But don't cling to either. CLINGING CREATES TROUBLE. Through clinging, comes anguish. If you cling to the peak and you say, "I would not like to go to the valley again," then you will be in trouble. Then at the very peak, you have created the valley. Then, already, the suffering has started. You are afraid: the fear has entered, the agony is already there. You are no more happy in the valley; you have destroyed the peak.

And when you are in the valley, you will suffer that "now the valley has come." You will suffer the valley, and you will not be able to enjoy the peak. This is the ordinary situation.

WHEN YOU ARE HAPPY, YOU BECOME AFRAID: Is this happiness going to stay, or will it be gone? Now fear eats away at your happiness like a worm and poisons it. You are happy, and yet you are not happy. Something is already dead: you have become apprehensive of the future. And when you are unhappy, of course, you are unhappy. When you are happy you cannot be happy, so how can you be happy when you are unhappy? The whole life becomes a vicious circle of unhappiness.

Now, listen! WHEN YOU ARE AT THE PEAK, DANCE! I know, and you know, that the peak is not going to last forever; there is no need. Because if it lasts forever, it will be such a tension you will not be able to tolerate it. It will be such an excitement that you will not find any rest in it. It will be dangerous, it will kill you. No need for it to last forever. But while it lasts, dance, enjoy, and sing it -- KNOWING WELL THAT IT IS GOING TO BE LOST AGAIN. But knowing it, one has to enjoy it more before it is lost.

And remember, THIS IS THE MIRACLE: WHEN YOU ENJOY IT MORE, IT LASTS LONGER. When you are happy in it and dancing, it forgets to go away from you; it lingers with you. When you don't cling to it, it clings to you. This is the whole secret.

And when it is gone, then too it is not gone. It has given you such a deep blissfulness, that now go into the valley and you can rest in darkness. THEN THE VALLEY BECOMES RELAXATION AND THE PEAK BECOMES ENJOYMENT. Then the peak becomes the day, and the valley becomes the night; then the peak becomes activity, and the valley becomes passivity.

ONE HAS TO ENJOY THE NIGHT ALSO. That is the only way to enjoy the day. And if you enjoy the day, a great night comes with great rest -- refreshes you, rejuvenates you.

And remember always: GREATER THE PEAK, GREATER WILL BE THE VALLEY. Otherwise how the peak can be greater? If you go to the Himalayas, then you will find the greater the peak the greater the valley. If you are afraid of the valley, then don't ask for the peaks. Then move on plain ground. There will be no peak and no valley.

THAT IS THE MOST MISERABLE LIFE: where there is no peak, no valley. One simply vegetates. It is not a life. One simply drags. It is a monotony. It is not a dialogue; it is a monologue. A dialogue needs duality, a dialogue needs contradiction, a dialogue needs polarity, a dialogue needs paradox. And within the paradox, you move from one pole to another.

Don't be worried about balance. Balance will seek you: I will see that balance seeks you. You simply do this much: while on the peak, dance; while in the valley, rest. ACCEPT THE VALLEY; ACCEPT THE PEAK. Both are parts of the one whole, and you cannot deny one part. They are two aspects of the same coin.

Remember, ONE WHO ENJOYS MORE IS BOUND TO SUFFER MORE -- because he becomes very sensitive. But suffering is not bad. If you understand it rightly, suffering cleanses.

If you understand rightly, SADNESS HAS A DEPTH TO IT WHICH NO HAPPINESS CAN EVER HAVE. A person who is simply happy is always superficial. A person who has not known sorrow and has not known sadness, has not known the depths. He has not touched the bottom of his being; he has remained just on the periphery. One has to move within these two banks. Within these two banks flows the river.

And I tell you, balance will seek you, if you accept both and you live both. WHATSOEVER HAPPENS, YOU WELCOME IT. Suddenly, one day you will see balance has come. And when balance comes to you, then it is something totally different than that balance that you can force upon yourself.

IF YOU FORCE THE BALANCE, IT WILL BE A SORT OF CONTROL. And a control is always artificial. And a control is always ugly. And a control has a violence in it. It is forced, artificial. When balance comes to you, it is a happening. Suddenly it descends on you. Heavens open and the spirit of God, like a dove, descends in you.

ALL THAT IS GREAT ALWAYS COMES. All that YOU make is always small, petty. It is never great. All that you do is going to be lesser than you. ALL THAT IS GREAT -- YOU HAVE TO ALLOW IT. Balance will find you. God will find you. You just be ready.

And this is readiness: to ACCEPT WHATSOEVER COMES, to ACCEPT IT WITH GRATEFULNESS. Even sorrow, even sadness, even the valley... dark.

OSHO
Come Follow To You
Vol 2, Ch #8