The following is from A Course in Consciousness, by Stanley Sobottka:
http://www.faculty. virginia. edu/consciousnes s/
Chapter 18. Practices and teachers
18.1. Why practice?
On p. 8-9 of Mindfulness in Plain English (1994), Buddhist teacher Bante Henepola Gunaratana says,
"Go to a party. Listen to the laughter, that brittle-tongued voice that says fun on the surface and fear underneath. Feel the tension, feel the pressure. Nobody really relaxes. They are faking it. Go to a ball game. Watch the fans in the stands. Watch the irrational fit of anger. Watch the uncontrolled frustration bubbling forth that masquerades under the guise of enthusiasm or team spirit. Booing, catcalls and unbridled egotism in the name of team loyalty. Drunkenness, fights in the stands. These are people trying desperately to release tension from within. These are not people who are at peace with themselves. Watch the news on TV. Listen to the lyrics in popular songs. You find the same theme repeated over and over in variations. Jealousy, suffering, discontent, and stress. Life seems to be a perpetual struggle, some enormous effort against staggering odds."
Question: Does this paragraph remind you of anyone you know?
What is described in the above paragraph is not living--it is surviving. But spiritual practice can transform a life of survival into a life of peace.
Suffering is intrinsic to the dream because of the perception of pervasive conflict and potential war between the split pairs. From the point of view of the individual, the purpose of all spiritual practice is to awaken from the dream of suffering. Since the basis of all splits is the ego, or illusory "me", awakening means to see that there is no "me". However, expecting the ego to see this is like asking something that does not exist to see that it does not exist. Spiritual practice does not get rid of the ego because there is no ego to get rid of.
Awakening can only happen by seeing from outside the split that there is no split. Since the essence of the ego is the false sense of personal doership, awakening means to see that there is no doer and there is no choice. Paradoxically, awakening is usually preceded by considerable effort but it is never that of a doer. For practice to happen, intense earnestness and intention are usually necessary. (Of course, if they are supposed to happen, they will. If not, they won't.) An immediate and lasting benefit of practice is that, even before awakening, our understanding of suffering deepens, and this greater understanding is inspiration for further practice and progress.
One misconception that is common among beginners on the spiritual path is that suffering and sacrifice in themselves are useful spiritual practices. (This is undoubtedly reinforced by the biblical story of Jesus suffering for our sins, and the suffering of the Christian martyrs.) However, since separation is the basis of suffering, seeking to suffer in the hopes of finding spiritual truth in it can only increase the sense of separation, and thereby increase suffering. Only the individual can suffer. The one good thing about suffering is that its presence tells us that we are still identified, and a keen examination of it will tell us with what we are identified. In this way suffering is actually our guide to freedom from suffering. Every instance of suffering is another opportunity to understand it. The path towards understanding is the path towards liberation.
Question: Have you ever known anyone who thought that suffering and sacrifice in themselves were useful spiritual practices?
18.2. The importance of being aware
We are not individuals; we are pure Awareness/Presence (see Sections 9.3, 11.10, 14.3). It is because we transcend the ego that we can see that it does not exist, and we can be aware that the effort to see that it does not exist is not our effort.
Bondage and suffering are due to identification of Consciousness with the "I"-concept and all of its trappings, resulting in the illusory "I" and all of its problems. To be effective, any practice depends on the increasing awareness of these identifications. For this reason, spiritual practice is better termed awareness practice. When the seeker understands that suffering is the direct result of identification, there is a strong incentive to become aware of it. Thus, becoming aware of the connection between a specific suffering and the identification from which it springs is a valuable, even necessary, awareness practice and is the first step to becoming disidentified and free.
We saw in Chapter 11 that we can distinguish between three levels of identification. The first is identification with the body-mind organism, but without entityfication, i.e., without any sense of personal identity. This identification is necessary for the organism to function and survive, and causes no suffering because there is no entity to suffer. We are not concerned with this identification in this course--in fact, it is the state of being awakened. The second level is identification with the "I"-concept, which produces the illusory entity with a sense of personal doership. The third level is identification with various thoughts, images, and emotions, resulting in the sense of ownership of them, so they become "my" thoughts, "my" self-images, "my" emotions, and "my" suffering.
Disidentification at the third level means becoming aware of all of our thoughts, images, feelings, emotions, and sensations, and accepting them rather than resisting them. This is the key to the beginning of the end of suffering. This can happen while still retaining the image of the self as doer. Thus, at this level, it is unimportant whether the seeker still thinks of him/her self as the doer.
The first step in disidentification at the third level is to use a specific experience of suffering as the impetus to become aware of the real source of that suffering. For example, if "I" feel angry because "I" think "I" have been victimized by somebody, my first step is to become acutely aware of the anger and the associated thoughts, images, and body sensations. As was discussed in Section 11.7, anger at being victimized always comes from seeing an image of myself as being helpless, and another image of the victimizer as having some kind of power over me. Neither side of the polar pair can exist without the other. Both are nothing but mental images.
Exercise: Close your eyes and watch your thoughts come, change, and go. Look for the owner of the thoughts. Can you find one?
Now watch your feelings and emotions come, change, and go. Look for the owner of the feelings and emotions. Can you find one?
Now watch your body sensations come, change, and go. Look for the owner of the body sensations. Can you find one?
Now, where does a feeling of helplessness, which is the essence of victimhood, come from? It may come from the thought that there is something "wrong" with "me" for being so helpless. Thus, we see that this experience of suffering may have as its roots identification with a self-image of defectiveness. Clearly, defectiveness implies a doer that is defective. Without the concept of doership, there could be no victim and no suffering, not to mention no victimizer. But imagined doership is the problem in identification at the second level.
Exercise: Close your eyes and look for the thinker of your thoughts. Can you find one?
Now look for the feeler of your feelings. Can you find one?
Now look for the experiencer of your body sensations. Can you find one?
There are two important lessons to be learned from these exercises. The first is that the image I see of myself as victim means that I cannot be the victim! I am what is aware of the image, so I cannot be the image! This is the most fundamental step that anybody can take in disidentification. Whatever I am aware of cannot be me because I am what is aware! This one realization is enough to produce a gigantic crack in the bonds of identification.
The second important lesson is just a generalization of the first. Since nothing that I see can be me, there is no object, thing, or entity that can be me. I am not a person, not a mind, not a body, not a being, not a thought, not a feeling, not an emotion, not an image, not an observer, not anything. And most importantly, I am not a doer, not a thinker, not a decider, and not a chooser. Now we have progressed to disidentification at the second level.
If I am not anything, then what am I? The answer is simple: I am pure Awareness/Presence that is aware of all things and is present in all things. What could be more simple, and yet so profound and so liberating?
Exercise: This exercise is the essence of all spiritual practice. It helps us to identify with our true nature, which is Awareness, rather than with the mind, which consists of thoughts, feelings, emotions, sensations, and perceptions. When we identify with Awareness, we are immune from all changes because Awareness never changes. When we identify with the mind, we are subject to its constant changing whims.
First, become aware of anything in the mind that is changing, like a thought, emotion, or body sensation. Can you realize that, if it is something that you are aware of, then you cannot be it because you are what is aware of it?
Second, if you are what is aware of it, what are you really? Look and see!
http://www.faculty. virginia. edu/consciousnes s/
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Monday, April 5, 2010
OSHO - On Meditation
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My whole life I have been talking about meditation. There are one hundred and twelve methods of meditation; I have gone through all those methods—and not intellectually. It took me years to go through
each method and to find out its very essence, and after going through one hundred and twelve methods I was amazed that the essence is witnessing. The methods' non-essentials are different, but the center of each method is witnessing. Hence I can say to you, there is only one meditation in the whole world and that is the art of witnessing. It will do everything—the whole transformation of your being.
Whatever I am doing, my meditation continues. It is not something that I have to do it separately; it is just an art of witnessing. Speaking to you, I'm also witnessing myself speaking to you. So here are three persons: you are listening, one person is speaking, and there is one behind who is watching and that is my real me. And to keep constant contact with it is meditation.
So whatever you do does not matter, you just keep contact with your witness. I have reduced religion to its very fundamental essence. Now everything else is just ritual. This much is enough. And this does not need you to become a Christian or a Hindu or a Mohammedan or anybody, and this can be done by an atheist, by a communist, by anybody, because it needs no kind of theology, no kind of belief system. It is simply a scientific method of slowly moving inwards. A point comes when you reach to your innermost core, the very center of the cyclone.
The basic element running through all the methods of meditation is witnessing. You ask me: What is witnessing? Whatever you are doing. For example, right now you are writing. You can write in two ways. The ordinary way that you always write. You can try another method: you can write it and you can also inside witness that you are writing it. And you ask: Does that mean some kind of detachment? A detachment. You are a little distant, away, watching yourself writing. So any act, just moving my whatever you are doing, just remain a witness. If you have any ego, it will destroy it, because this watching is very much poisonous to the ego. It is not ego that watches. The ego is absolutely blind. It cannot watch anything. You can watch your ego. For example, somebody insults you and you feel hurt, and your ego feels hurt. You can watch it. You can watch that you are feeling hurt, your ego is feeling hurt, that you are angry. And you can still remain aloof, detached, just a watcher on the hills. Whatever goes on in the valley you can see.
So all the methods are basically different ways of witnessing. I have condensed them in a very simple way: First, watch your actions of the body. Second, watch your actions of the mind: thoughts, imaginations. And if you can succeed in watching all these three, and as your witnessing grows deeper and deeper, a moment comes that there is only witnessing but nothing to witness. The mind is empty, the heart is empty, the body is relaxed. In that moment happens something like a quantum leap. Your whole witnessing jumps upon itself. It witnesses itself, because there is nothing else to witness. And this is the revolution which I call enlightenment, self-realization. Or you can give it any name, but this is the ultimate experience of bliss. You cannot go beyond it.
This is the simplest. And because it can be done without in any way interfering with your everyday life, because it is something that you can go on doing the whole day. Any other method you have to take some time apart for it. And any method that needs one hour or half an hour to sit and do it is not going to help much, because twenty-three hours you will be doing just the opposite. And whatever you have gained in one hour will be washed away in twenty-three hours. This is the only method that you can continue around the clock. While falling asleep you can go on witnessing, witnessing, that the sleep is coming, coming, coming, that it is getting darker and the body is relaxing. And a moment comes when you can watch that you are asleep. And still there is a corner, a space in you which is awake.
When you can watch yourself twenty-four hours, you have arrived. Now there is nothing to be done. Then witnessing has become natural to you. You don't have to do it. It will be simply like breathing, happening to you.
This is my basic method. But there are other methods. If people feel that this is difficult for them, they can try other methods. All are available. I have returned from a movie show. It is surprising to see how much the light and shade photos projected on the screen captivate people. Where there is really nothing, everything happens! I watched the audience there and it felt as if they had forgotten themselves, as if they were not there, but the flow of electrically projected pictures was everything. A blank screen is in front and from the back the pictures are being projected. Those who are watching it have their eyes fixed in front, and no
one is aware of what is happening behind their backs. This is how leela, the play, is born. This is what happens within and without. There is a projector at the back of the human mind. Psychology calls this back side the unconscious. The longings, the passions, the conditionings accumulated in this unconscious are being continuously projected onto the mind's screen. This flow of mental projections goes on every moment, non-stop. The consciousness is a seer, a witness, and it forgets itself in this flow of the pictures of desires. This forgetfulness is ignorance. This ignorance is the root cause of maya, illusions, and the endless cycle of birth and death. Waking up from this ignorance happens in the cessation of the mind. When the mind is devoid of thoughts, when the flow of pictures on the screen stops, only then the onlooker remembers himself and returns to his home.
Patanjali calls this cessation of the activities of the mind Yoga. If this is achieved, all is achieved. To understand the mind, there are the three points: The first thing is tremendous fearlessness in encountering the mind; the second thing is no restrictions, no conditions on the mind; the third point is no judgments about whatever thoughts and longings arise in the mind, no feelings of good or bad. Your attitude should simply be indifferent. These three points are necessary to understand the perversions of the mind. Then we will talk about what can be done to get rid of these perversions, and go further. But these three basic points have to be kept in mind.
This is my observation of thousands of people: I see them carrying such great psychological luggage, and for no reason at all. They go on gathering anything they come across. They read the newspaper and they will gather some crap from it. They will talk to people and they will gather some crap. And they go on gathering. And if they start stinking, no wonder!
I used to live with a man for a few years. His house was so full of unnecessary luggage that I had to tell him "Now, where are you going to live?" And he would go on collecting any kind of thing. Somebody would be
selling his old furniture, and he would purchase it, and he already had enough. He had no time to use that furniture, and he had no friends to call. His whole house was full of furniture: old radio sets, and all kinds
of things. And I said "But, I don't see the point why you collect all this." He said "Who knows, any time it may be useful." One day we went for a walk and on the road. By the side of the road, somebody had thrown a cycle handle. He picked it up. I said "What are you doing?" He said "But, it must be worth twenty rupees at least, and I have picked up a few other things also—sooner or later I am going to make a bicycle!" And he showed me. He had one wheel, one pedal, that he had picked up from the roads. And he said "What are you saying? Soon you will see!" This man died. The cycle remained incomplete. And when he died, everybody who came to look was puzzled by what he was doing in this house—there was no space even to move.
But this is the situation of your head. I see cycle-handles, and pedals, and strange things that you have gathered from everywhere. Such a small head, and no space to live in! And that rubbish goes on moving in your head; your head goes on spinning and weaving—it keeps you occupied. Just think what kind of thoughts go on inside your mind.
Sometimes, sitting under the stars, you feel a bliss arising within your heart. It seems not of this world. You are surprised. You cannot believe it. I have come across simple people who have known many moments in their life which are Buddha-like, which belong to Christ consciousness, but they have never talked about them to anybody because they themselves don't believe that they were possible. They have in fact suppressed them. They have been thinking that they must have imagined them: How can it happen without any effort of my own? How is it possible that suddenly one becomes blissful? You can remember them in your own life—and in such moments when you were never expecting them—just going to the office, in the daily routine, the sun is high and you are perspiring, and suddenly something strikes home, and for a moment you are not the old you. Paradise is regained. And then it is lost again. You forget about it because it is not part of your style of life. You don't even talk about it, you think 'I must have imagined it. How are these things possible? And I have not done anything so how can it happen? It must have been hallucinatory, an illusion or a dream.' You don't talk about it. As I have observed thousands of people deeply I have not come across many people who have not found such certain moments in their life. But they have never talked of them to anybody. Even if they tried to, people laughed and they thought: You are foolish, stupid. They don't believe, they repress.
Not only has humanity repressed sex, has humanity repressed death, humanity has repressed all that is beautiful in life. Man has been forced to become like an automaton, a robot. All clues, all doors, have been closed towards the unknown. It is my continual experience of thousands of people that when they come for the first time to meditate, meditation happens so easily because they don't have any idea what it is. Once it has happened, then the real problem arises—then they want it, they know what it is, they desire it. They are greedy for it; it is happening to others and it is not happening to them. Then jealousy, envy, all kinds of wrong things surround them.
The inner world is a new world where you have not even looked, where you have never taken a single step. So I have to teach you how, slowly, you can step inwards. Even when I say to people to go inwards, immediately they ask questions which show how focused on the outside things they are. I say to them, "Sit silently." And they will ask me, "Can I do gayatri mantra?" Whether you do gayatri mantra or you read the newspaper does not matter, both are outside. I am telling you, "Sit silently." They say, "That is right, but at least I can repeat omkar…" It is pitiable. I feel sad for them, that I am telling them to be silent but they are asking me to fill their silence with something. They don't want to be silent. If nothing else, then omkar will do—anything will do.
In India people go on doing all kinds of things. They concentrate, they chant mantras, they fast, they torture their bodies, and they hope that through all these masochistic practices they will realize God. As if God is a sadist! As if God loves you to torture yourself! As if he demands that the more you torture yourself, the more worthy you become. God is not a sadist; you need not be a masochist. I have come across people who think
that without long fasting there is no possibility of meditation. Now, fasting has nothing to do with meditation. Fasting will only make you obsessed with food. And there are people who think celibacy will help them into meditation. Meditation brings a kind of celibacy, but not vice versa. A celibacy without meditation is nothing but sexual repression. And your mind will become more and more sexual, so whenever you sit to meditate your mind will become full of fantasies, sexual fantasies. These two things have been the greatest problems for the so-called meditators: fasting and celibacy. They think these two things are going to help—they are the
greatest disturbances!
Eat in right proportions. Buddha calls it "the middle way": neither too much nor too little. He is against fasting, and he knows it through hard experience. For six years he fasted and could not attain to anything. So when he says, "Be in the middle," he means it. About celibacy also: don't enforce it upon yourself. It is a by-product of meditation, hence it cannot be enforced before meditation. Be in the middle there too, neither too much indulgence nor too much renunciation. Just keep a balance. A balanced person will be more healthy, at ease, at home. And when you are at home, meditation is easier.
What then is meditation? Just sitting silently doing nothing, witnessing whatsoever is happening all around; just watching it with no prejudice, no conclusion, no idea what is wrong and what is right.
~ Osho
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -
My whole life I have been talking about meditation. There are one hundred and twelve methods of meditation; I have gone through all those methods—and not intellectually. It took me years to go through
each method and to find out its very essence, and after going through one hundred and twelve methods I was amazed that the essence is witnessing. The methods' non-essentials are different, but the center of each method is witnessing. Hence I can say to you, there is only one meditation in the whole world and that is the art of witnessing. It will do everything—the whole transformation of your being.
Whatever I am doing, my meditation continues. It is not something that I have to do it separately; it is just an art of witnessing. Speaking to you, I'm also witnessing myself speaking to you. So here are three persons: you are listening, one person is speaking, and there is one behind who is watching and that is my real me. And to keep constant contact with it is meditation.
So whatever you do does not matter, you just keep contact with your witness. I have reduced religion to its very fundamental essence. Now everything else is just ritual. This much is enough. And this does not need you to become a Christian or a Hindu or a Mohammedan or anybody, and this can be done by an atheist, by a communist, by anybody, because it needs no kind of theology, no kind of belief system. It is simply a scientific method of slowly moving inwards. A point comes when you reach to your innermost core, the very center of the cyclone.
The basic element running through all the methods of meditation is witnessing. You ask me: What is witnessing? Whatever you are doing. For example, right now you are writing. You can write in two ways. The ordinary way that you always write. You can try another method: you can write it and you can also inside witness that you are writing it. And you ask: Does that mean some kind of detachment? A detachment. You are a little distant, away, watching yourself writing. So any act, just moving my whatever you are doing, just remain a witness. If you have any ego, it will destroy it, because this watching is very much poisonous to the ego. It is not ego that watches. The ego is absolutely blind. It cannot watch anything. You can watch your ego. For example, somebody insults you and you feel hurt, and your ego feels hurt. You can watch it. You can watch that you are feeling hurt, your ego is feeling hurt, that you are angry. And you can still remain aloof, detached, just a watcher on the hills. Whatever goes on in the valley you can see.
So all the methods are basically different ways of witnessing. I have condensed them in a very simple way: First, watch your actions of the body. Second, watch your actions of the mind: thoughts, imaginations. And if you can succeed in watching all these three, and as your witnessing grows deeper and deeper, a moment comes that there is only witnessing but nothing to witness. The mind is empty, the heart is empty, the body is relaxed. In that moment happens something like a quantum leap. Your whole witnessing jumps upon itself. It witnesses itself, because there is nothing else to witness. And this is the revolution which I call enlightenment, self-realization. Or you can give it any name, but this is the ultimate experience of bliss. You cannot go beyond it.
This is the simplest. And because it can be done without in any way interfering with your everyday life, because it is something that you can go on doing the whole day. Any other method you have to take some time apart for it. And any method that needs one hour or half an hour to sit and do it is not going to help much, because twenty-three hours you will be doing just the opposite. And whatever you have gained in one hour will be washed away in twenty-three hours. This is the only method that you can continue around the clock. While falling asleep you can go on witnessing, witnessing, that the sleep is coming, coming, coming, that it is getting darker and the body is relaxing. And a moment comes when you can watch that you are asleep. And still there is a corner, a space in you which is awake.
When you can watch yourself twenty-four hours, you have arrived. Now there is nothing to be done. Then witnessing has become natural to you. You don't have to do it. It will be simply like breathing, happening to you.
This is my basic method. But there are other methods. If people feel that this is difficult for them, they can try other methods. All are available. I have returned from a movie show. It is surprising to see how much the light and shade photos projected on the screen captivate people. Where there is really nothing, everything happens! I watched the audience there and it felt as if they had forgotten themselves, as if they were not there, but the flow of electrically projected pictures was everything. A blank screen is in front and from the back the pictures are being projected. Those who are watching it have their eyes fixed in front, and no
one is aware of what is happening behind their backs. This is how leela, the play, is born. This is what happens within and without. There is a projector at the back of the human mind. Psychology calls this back side the unconscious. The longings, the passions, the conditionings accumulated in this unconscious are being continuously projected onto the mind's screen. This flow of mental projections goes on every moment, non-stop. The consciousness is a seer, a witness, and it forgets itself in this flow of the pictures of desires. This forgetfulness is ignorance. This ignorance is the root cause of maya, illusions, and the endless cycle of birth and death. Waking up from this ignorance happens in the cessation of the mind. When the mind is devoid of thoughts, when the flow of pictures on the screen stops, only then the onlooker remembers himself and returns to his home.
Patanjali calls this cessation of the activities of the mind Yoga. If this is achieved, all is achieved. To understand the mind, there are the three points: The first thing is tremendous fearlessness in encountering the mind; the second thing is no restrictions, no conditions on the mind; the third point is no judgments about whatever thoughts and longings arise in the mind, no feelings of good or bad. Your attitude should simply be indifferent. These three points are necessary to understand the perversions of the mind. Then we will talk about what can be done to get rid of these perversions, and go further. But these three basic points have to be kept in mind.
This is my observation of thousands of people: I see them carrying such great psychological luggage, and for no reason at all. They go on gathering anything they come across. They read the newspaper and they will gather some crap from it. They will talk to people and they will gather some crap. And they go on gathering. And if they start stinking, no wonder!
I used to live with a man for a few years. His house was so full of unnecessary luggage that I had to tell him "Now, where are you going to live?" And he would go on collecting any kind of thing. Somebody would be
selling his old furniture, and he would purchase it, and he already had enough. He had no time to use that furniture, and he had no friends to call. His whole house was full of furniture: old radio sets, and all kinds
of things. And I said "But, I don't see the point why you collect all this." He said "Who knows, any time it may be useful." One day we went for a walk and on the road. By the side of the road, somebody had thrown a cycle handle. He picked it up. I said "What are you doing?" He said "But, it must be worth twenty rupees at least, and I have picked up a few other things also—sooner or later I am going to make a bicycle!" And he showed me. He had one wheel, one pedal, that he had picked up from the roads. And he said "What are you saying? Soon you will see!" This man died. The cycle remained incomplete. And when he died, everybody who came to look was puzzled by what he was doing in this house—there was no space even to move.
But this is the situation of your head. I see cycle-handles, and pedals, and strange things that you have gathered from everywhere. Such a small head, and no space to live in! And that rubbish goes on moving in your head; your head goes on spinning and weaving—it keeps you occupied. Just think what kind of thoughts go on inside your mind.
Sometimes, sitting under the stars, you feel a bliss arising within your heart. It seems not of this world. You are surprised. You cannot believe it. I have come across simple people who have known many moments in their life which are Buddha-like, which belong to Christ consciousness, but they have never talked about them to anybody because they themselves don't believe that they were possible. They have in fact suppressed them. They have been thinking that they must have imagined them: How can it happen without any effort of my own? How is it possible that suddenly one becomes blissful? You can remember them in your own life—and in such moments when you were never expecting them—just going to the office, in the daily routine, the sun is high and you are perspiring, and suddenly something strikes home, and for a moment you are not the old you. Paradise is regained. And then it is lost again. You forget about it because it is not part of your style of life. You don't even talk about it, you think 'I must have imagined it. How are these things possible? And I have not done anything so how can it happen? It must have been hallucinatory, an illusion or a dream.' You don't talk about it. As I have observed thousands of people deeply I have not come across many people who have not found such certain moments in their life. But they have never talked of them to anybody. Even if they tried to, people laughed and they thought: You are foolish, stupid. They don't believe, they repress.
Not only has humanity repressed sex, has humanity repressed death, humanity has repressed all that is beautiful in life. Man has been forced to become like an automaton, a robot. All clues, all doors, have been closed towards the unknown. It is my continual experience of thousands of people that when they come for the first time to meditate, meditation happens so easily because they don't have any idea what it is. Once it has happened, then the real problem arises—then they want it, they know what it is, they desire it. They are greedy for it; it is happening to others and it is not happening to them. Then jealousy, envy, all kinds of wrong things surround them.
The inner world is a new world where you have not even looked, where you have never taken a single step. So I have to teach you how, slowly, you can step inwards. Even when I say to people to go inwards, immediately they ask questions which show how focused on the outside things they are. I say to them, "Sit silently." And they will ask me, "Can I do gayatri mantra?" Whether you do gayatri mantra or you read the newspaper does not matter, both are outside. I am telling you, "Sit silently." They say, "That is right, but at least I can repeat omkar…" It is pitiable. I feel sad for them, that I am telling them to be silent but they are asking me to fill their silence with something. They don't want to be silent. If nothing else, then omkar will do—anything will do.
In India people go on doing all kinds of things. They concentrate, they chant mantras, they fast, they torture their bodies, and they hope that through all these masochistic practices they will realize God. As if God is a sadist! As if God loves you to torture yourself! As if he demands that the more you torture yourself, the more worthy you become. God is not a sadist; you need not be a masochist. I have come across people who think
that without long fasting there is no possibility of meditation. Now, fasting has nothing to do with meditation. Fasting will only make you obsessed with food. And there are people who think celibacy will help them into meditation. Meditation brings a kind of celibacy, but not vice versa. A celibacy without meditation is nothing but sexual repression. And your mind will become more and more sexual, so whenever you sit to meditate your mind will become full of fantasies, sexual fantasies. These two things have been the greatest problems for the so-called meditators: fasting and celibacy. They think these two things are going to help—they are the
greatest disturbances!
Eat in right proportions. Buddha calls it "the middle way": neither too much nor too little. He is against fasting, and he knows it through hard experience. For six years he fasted and could not attain to anything. So when he says, "Be in the middle," he means it. About celibacy also: don't enforce it upon yourself. It is a by-product of meditation, hence it cannot be enforced before meditation. Be in the middle there too, neither too much indulgence nor too much renunciation. Just keep a balance. A balanced person will be more healthy, at ease, at home. And when you are at home, meditation is easier.
What then is meditation? Just sitting silently doing nothing, witnessing whatsoever is happening all around; just watching it with no prejudice, no conclusion, no idea what is wrong and what is right.
~ Osho
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Thursday, March 4, 2010
Enlightenment is Irrelevent
Here are some entries from the blog of Jacqueline Hobbs:
http://jacquelinehobbs2.blogspot. com
No-one there
If there is no-one there, enlightenment is irrelevant. We spend so much time searching for the right thing to do, to make realization happen, that we neglect to think about who it is doing all the searching. Who is this that wants enlightenment so badly? A false sense of an existent self. Nevertheless, whether we like it or not, that sense of self is there. All we can do is remember that actually, there's no-one there. We are taken, as appropriate, when the time is right, to what needs to happen to see that false sense of self be slowly released. It always happens in a different way for each one of us and the mechanics of that is not under our control. Ultimately, given that there's no-one there, there's nothing that needs to be done. Realization only comes into existence for some, "one" but if there isn't any "one", the whole business never arises.
When the mind ends
When the mind ends, there is Silence. Mind is ego. If the mind ends though, it is usually temporary. The ego has to disappear completely for the absence of mind to be permanent. All spiritual techniques aim for a permanent end to the mind. Once we realize that "we" do nothing and nothing is within our control, the ego function becomes so thoroughly weakened, in the end it passes away. Self-inquiry is another means by which the mind is finished with. Here, rather than trying to stop the mind, we go beyond it, to where it does not exist. Devotion or surrender to a guru is exactly the same as all these techniques. We accept everything exactly as it is: completely accepting it as the guru's will. By fixing on the guru, we focus entirely on what is beyond mind. Whichever technique we pursue - and this is only three - only when there is no longer any mind motion and thinking is entirely absent, will the ego die. Of course by this time we realize that the ego was never there. And all of this is predestined and not a matter of us "making" it happen. We can't. It either will or it won't. How it happens, or the merit by which it happens, is not for us to judge either. None of it has anything to do with us: this is the only way that the mind truly gives up.
Did you notice?
Did you notice what the person with your name did today? What he or she felt? What they thought? What they said (and didn't?) Did you notice what feelings that person had today, what emotions arose, when? Did you register what and how that person is feeling about life right now. ... Do you realize that's not you? You are so taken up with that person with your name, you never stop for a moment to focus on what it is that functions through that person, looks straight through their eyes, has the ability to register and take part in all that gets said and done. Focus instead on yourself. By that I mean, become aware of what "you" are: awareness itself. Stop stock still and don't wander outwards. Stay absolutely still and focus - "rest" - in that awareness. This reference point is all that you have. It is the gateway "in": away from the person, the ego-centre, thoughts, feelings and life experiences ... into the Heart.
http://jacquelinehobbs2.blogspot. com
No-one there
If there is no-one there, enlightenment is irrelevant. We spend so much time searching for the right thing to do, to make realization happen, that we neglect to think about who it is doing all the searching. Who is this that wants enlightenment so badly? A false sense of an existent self. Nevertheless, whether we like it or not, that sense of self is there. All we can do is remember that actually, there's no-one there. We are taken, as appropriate, when the time is right, to what needs to happen to see that false sense of self be slowly released. It always happens in a different way for each one of us and the mechanics of that is not under our control. Ultimately, given that there's no-one there, there's nothing that needs to be done. Realization only comes into existence for some, "one" but if there isn't any "one", the whole business never arises.
When the mind ends
When the mind ends, there is Silence. Mind is ego. If the mind ends though, it is usually temporary. The ego has to disappear completely for the absence of mind to be permanent. All spiritual techniques aim for a permanent end to the mind. Once we realize that "we" do nothing and nothing is within our control, the ego function becomes so thoroughly weakened, in the end it passes away. Self-inquiry is another means by which the mind is finished with. Here, rather than trying to stop the mind, we go beyond it, to where it does not exist. Devotion or surrender to a guru is exactly the same as all these techniques. We accept everything exactly as it is: completely accepting it as the guru's will. By fixing on the guru, we focus entirely on what is beyond mind. Whichever technique we pursue - and this is only three - only when there is no longer any mind motion and thinking is entirely absent, will the ego die. Of course by this time we realize that the ego was never there. And all of this is predestined and not a matter of us "making" it happen. We can't. It either will or it won't. How it happens, or the merit by which it happens, is not for us to judge either. None of it has anything to do with us: this is the only way that the mind truly gives up.
Did you notice?
Did you notice what the person with your name did today? What he or she felt? What they thought? What they said (and didn't?) Did you notice what feelings that person had today, what emotions arose, when? Did you register what and how that person is feeling about life right now. ... Do you realize that's not you? You are so taken up with that person with your name, you never stop for a moment to focus on what it is that functions through that person, looks straight through their eyes, has the ability to register and take part in all that gets said and done. Focus instead on yourself. By that I mean, become aware of what "you" are: awareness itself. Stop stock still and don't wander outwards. Stay absolutely still and focus - "rest" - in that awareness. This reference point is all that you have. It is the gateway "in": away from the person, the ego-centre, thoughts, feelings and life experiences ... into the Heart.
Monday, February 15, 2010
The Connection Between Lifestyle and Disease as Related by Two Medical Doctors
This is such important information, so supportive of the Truth of the actual workings of the body and how to take care of it and heal it. Your body has natural protection mechanisms built into it to protect it from harm, and your primary emotions are meant to signal you as to whether your choices are leading towards complete physical, mental, and emotional health or disease and addiction. Your sense of spirituality and of wholeness are no more and not less than the body and mind giving you positive feedback for your life choices. When all is in balance the evolutionary spiral is complete, and you are living in the vibratory frequency of harmony with all of Life.
This excerpt is from the alternative news show Democracy NOW! with Amy Goodman (which I highly recommend over FOX or CNN).
Dr. Gabor Maté: “When the Body Says No: Understanding the Stress-Disease Connection”
The Vancouver-based Dr. Gabor Maté argues that too many doctors seem to have forgotten what was once a commonplace assumption—that emotions are deeply implicated in both the development of illness and in the restoration of health. Based on medical studies and his own experience with chronically ill patients at the Palliative Care Unit at Vancouver Hospital, where he was the medical coordinator for seven years, Dr. Gabor Maté makes the case that there are important links between the mind and the immune system. He found that stress and individual emotional makeup play critical roles in an array of diseases.
Dr. Lorraine Day's Story About How She Healed Her Own Cancer (Click Here to Link to Video Interview)
Faith or Doctors? You Choose!
When we are facing the statistics that 1 in 3 of every US citizen will develop cancer of some sort, you may want to turn to Dr. Lorraine Day for education, guidance and practical wisdom. At 69 years young on the day we interviewed her, Dr. Day is a living testament to creating health and healing through natural means.
Lorraine trained as an orthopedic surgeon and was head of the department in San Francisco General. She has investigated the source of the AIDS virus and has challenged conventional wisdom, her colleagues and the medical establishment. A strong and determined woman, Lorraine tells it like it is, so if you have someone in your family that has a medical condition and you don't trust what you hear, you may want to pay very close attention to this interview.
Her official products site contains natural healing products, CD's and DVD's that won't cost nearly as much as your next prescription. If you have anyone in your family that has cancer, please urge them to listen to this interview.
This excerpt is from the alternative news show Democracy NOW! with Amy Goodman (which I highly recommend over FOX or CNN).
Dr. Gabor Maté: “When the Body Says No: Understanding the Stress-Disease Connection”
The Vancouver-based Dr. Gabor Maté argues that too many doctors seem to have forgotten what was once a commonplace assumption—that emotions are deeply implicated in both the development of illness and in the restoration of health. Based on medical studies and his own experience with chronically ill patients at the Palliative Care Unit at Vancouver Hospital, where he was the medical coordinator for seven years, Dr. Gabor Maté makes the case that there are important links between the mind and the immune system. He found that stress and individual emotional makeup play critical roles in an array of diseases.
Dr. Lorraine Day's Story About How She Healed Her Own Cancer (Click Here to Link to Video Interview)
Faith or Doctors? You Choose!
When we are facing the statistics that 1 in 3 of every US citizen will develop cancer of some sort, you may want to turn to Dr. Lorraine Day for education, guidance and practical wisdom. At 69 years young on the day we interviewed her, Dr. Day is a living testament to creating health and healing through natural means.
Lorraine trained as an orthopedic surgeon and was head of the department in San Francisco General. She has investigated the source of the AIDS virus and has challenged conventional wisdom, her colleagues and the medical establishment. A strong and determined woman, Lorraine tells it like it is, so if you have someone in your family that has a medical condition and you don't trust what you hear, you may want to pay very close attention to this interview.
Her official products site contains natural healing products, CD's and DVD's that won't cost nearly as much as your next prescription. If you have anyone in your family that has cancer, please urge them to listen to this interview.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Be at Peace
I have been reluctant to write anything for a long time....so many are so much more articulate than I and I am a horrible typist as well. Every time I have a revolutionary thought, it is swept clean so quickly, and I am back to no-mind before I know it...
If there was anything of value that I could say, it would be that whatever you are thinking is true, let go of it as quickly as possible and come back to HERE. All of thought is a secondary notion, a borrowed contrivance, a story believed. Awakening is an unraveling, an undoing of all that was and is, a return to the delight of pure emptiness.
And this is exactly what is happening in the world, and it is so interesting to watch the scrambling for position, the attempt to hold on to the melting icicle of an illusionary world with no substance. It is like an actor who has so succumbed to his role that at the end of the movie he cannot remember the truth of who he was before the story began. YOU ARE NOT YOUR STORY!
The fear and tension only comes because you have so identified with this earthly coil that the Truth of you seems to be a fantasy...but there was a time not so long ago that you saw through the veil clearly and let it fall away. The dream is fading now....just let it, allow it to go....you came here to awaken so let it happen!
The events in the world are the natural result of humanity's decision to be free....like the butterfly breaking from the chrysalis, or a child being born, there is discomfort and struggle. But the result is inevitable and ultimately joyous. Find a quiet place to sit with a few good friends and enjoy the ride!
We are here in Costa Rica, evolving community, allowing it all to unfold....
There is no way to define this by any prior definitions as the moment unfolds itself...and here words fail and I am again rendered speechless....
Be at Peace, All is Well...
Suzen
If there was anything of value that I could say, it would be that whatever you are thinking is true, let go of it as quickly as possible and come back to HERE. All of thought is a secondary notion, a borrowed contrivance, a story believed. Awakening is an unraveling, an undoing of all that was and is, a return to the delight of pure emptiness.
And this is exactly what is happening in the world, and it is so interesting to watch the scrambling for position, the attempt to hold on to the melting icicle of an illusionary world with no substance. It is like an actor who has so succumbed to his role that at the end of the movie he cannot remember the truth of who he was before the story began. YOU ARE NOT YOUR STORY!
The fear and tension only comes because you have so identified with this earthly coil that the Truth of you seems to be a fantasy...but there was a time not so long ago that you saw through the veil clearly and let it fall away. The dream is fading now....just let it, allow it to go....you came here to awaken so let it happen!
The events in the world are the natural result of humanity's decision to be free....like the butterfly breaking from the chrysalis, or a child being born, there is discomfort and struggle. But the result is inevitable and ultimately joyous. Find a quiet place to sit with a few good friends and enjoy the ride!
We are here in Costa Rica, evolving community, allowing it all to unfold....
There is no way to define this by any prior definitions as the moment unfolds itself...and here words fail and I am again rendered speechless....
Be at Peace, All is Well...
Suzen
Channeling by David Wilcock
READING -- JANUARY 5, 2010 -- "BE AT PEACE WITH THE COMING CHANGES"
The reason you are up in the middle of the night asking yourself these questions is very simple. We have an agenda to perform. The simplest requests are often not heard by you, so it takes diligence and patience to perform some of these operations.
You know as well as I do the stakes that are involved. Nothing less than the survival of the human race as it goes through this critical transition. Therefore, be at peace with the coming changes and allow yourself to rectify that which is not understood in the glow of honest acceptance of that which is.
What we have for you is a new view of humanity from this clear perspective that speaks only of love and light.
For in love and light is a vista of consciousness that opens the door to mastery.
That has always been the way it works. Spirit melds with matter and produces majesty. All is revealed in a nanosecond to those who are ready for it. The law of love approaches the law of infinity, and there is a merger of the mortal with the sublime and limitless.
(Click here to continue reading....)
(Click here to continue reading....)
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
YOU ARE ALREADY THAT
Because you were never unclear there is no change required. You simply instinctively recognize that you have always been clear. The term 'lack of clarity' becomes meaningless. Lack of clarity is recognized to be impossible.... "
Indestructible Clarity
www.greatfreedom. org
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The Nature of Things
Seeing the emptiness of the phenomenal world relieves us of the heavy notion of things being solid or intrinsic. When we understand that nothing exists independently, everything that does arise seems more dreamlike and less threatening. This brings a deep sense of relaxation, and we feel less need to control our mind and circumstances. Because the nature of everything is emptiness, it is possible to view our life the way we would view a movie. We can relax and enjoy the show.
~ Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, from "The Theater of Reflection"
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Nisargadatta
Questioner: Why so much insistence on relinquishing all desires and fears? Are they not natural?
Maharaj: They are not. They are entirely mind-made. You have to give up everything to know that you need nothing, not even your body. Your needs are unreal, and your efforts are meaningless. You imagine that your possessions protect you. In reality they make you vulnerable. Realise yourself as away from all that can be pointed at as 'this' or 'that'.
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I recall meeting a spiritual teacher once. She complimented on my necklace. Without thinking I took it off to offer it to her. She quickly stopped me, but did something I will always remember... She had us hold the gift of intention, and release it to God, to Consciousness that surrounds everything. All was suddenly experienced as the Love of Gratitude, even though no physical gift was given.
~ Cathy Rosewell Jonas
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Student: Letting go of our egocentricity so we can experience awakening -- do you suppose it is peeled off us the way we peel an orange?
Adyashanti: Peeling is like having a dream at night in which you dream you are going to a therapist, and you start feeling better and better, and you feel like you are getting somewhere.
Awakening is as if you are sitting on the couch telling your story, and you are still a mess -- haven't gotten very far. Then all of a sudden you realize this is a dream, this isn't real, you're making it up. That's awakening. There's a big difference.
Student: I've made up all of it?
Adyashanti: The whole thing. But the awakeness in you is not dreaming. Only the mind is dreaming. It tells itself stories and wants to know if you're progressing. When you shift into wakefulness, you realize, "Wait, it's a dream. The mind is creating an altered state of reality, a virtual reality, but it's not true -- it's just thought." Thought can tell a million stories inside of awareness, and it's not going to change awareness one bit. The only thing that's going to change is the way the body feels. If you tell yourself a sad story, the body reacts to that. And if you tell yourself a self-agrandizing story, the body feels puffed up, confident. But when you realize it's all stories, there can be a vast waking up out of the mind, out of the dream. You don't awaken, what has eternally been awake realizes itself. That which is eternally awake is what you are.
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After Forty Years
After forty years
A few quietly spoken words
Have led me irrefutably to know
That hidden in the constellation I call
Mind, or
Heart
There truly is
The home
I never dared believe
Could be.
~ Jack Cain
Thursday, January 14, 2010
What is Mind?
And what is mind
And how is it recognized?
If I clearly draw
In sumi ink, the sound
Of breezes drifting through pine
Is all that is seen.
~ Ikkyu Sojun (1394-1481) ~
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Let Experience In
The practice of compassion means letting experience in. A Japanese poet, a woman named Izumi who lived in the tenth century, wrote:
"Watching the moon at dawn, solitary, mid-sky, I knew myself completely. No part left out."
When we can open to all parts of ourselves and to others in the world, something quite extraordinary happens. We begin to connect with one another.
~ Joseph Goldstein ~
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Suffering seems real because we don't have a clear understanding of our true nature. Instead, we believe the passing thoughts, such as 'I am no good, 'I am not there yet,' 'I am stuck' or whatever the thought may be. Eventually we understand that we are not those thoughts. Once our real self is pointed out, the suffering loses its grip.
~ John Wheeler ~
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It's not possible to have a problem without believing a prior thought. To notice this simple truth is the beginning of peace.
~ Byron Katie ~
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"Forgiveness means giving up all hope for a better past."
~ Lily Tomlin ~
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"Oh soul,you worry too much.
You have seen your own strength.
You have seen your own beauty.
You have seen your golden wings.
Of anything less, why do you worry?
You are in truth the soul, of the soul, of the soul."
~ Rumi ~
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"The Way is not something which can be studied. Study leads to the retention of concepts and so the Way is entirely misunderstood. Moreover, the Way is not something specially existing; it is called the Mahayana Mind - Mind which is not to be found inside, outside, or in the middle. Truly it is not located anywhere. The first step is to refrain from knowledge-based concepts. The Way is spiritual Truth and was originally without name or title. It was only because people ignorantly sought for it empirically that the Buddhas appeared and taught them to eradicate this method of approach. Fearing that nobody would understand, they selected the name 'Way.' The Way of the Buddhas and the Way of devils are equally wide of the mark."
~ Huang Po ~
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For the Sleepwalkers
Tonight I want to say something wonderful
for the sleepwalkers who have so much faith
in their legs, so much faith in the invisible
arrow carved into the carpet, the worn path
that leads to the stairs instead of the window,
the gaping doorway instead of the seamless mirror.
I love the way that sleepwalkers are willing
to step out of their bodies into the night,
to raise their arms and welcome the darkness,
palming the blank spaces, touching everything.
Always they return home safely, like blind men
who know it is morning by feeling shadows.
And always they wake up as themselves again.
That's why I want to say something astonishing
like: Our hearts are leaving our bodies.
Our hearts are thirsty black handkerchiefs
flying through the trees at night, soaking up
the darkest beams of moonlight, the music
of owls, the motion of wind-torn branches.
And now our hearts are thick black fists
flying back to the glove of our chests.
We have to learn to trust our hearts like that.
We have to learn the desperate faith of sleep-
walkers who rise out of their calm beds
and walk through the skin of another life.
We have to drink the stupefying cup of darkness
and wake up to ourselves, nourished and surprised.
~ Edward Hirsch ~
Friday, December 25, 2009
Return to Silence
Silence is the language of God, all else is translation
-- Rumi
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"I have a capacity in my soul for taking in God entirely.
I am as sure as I live that nothing is so near to me as God.
God is nearer to me than I am to myself..."
-- Meister Eckhart
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"The silence of a quiet mind is the essence of that beauty. Because it is silent and because it is not the plaything of thought, then in that silence there comes that which is indestructible, which is sacred. In the coming of that which is sacred then life becomes sacred, your life becomes sacred, our relationship becomes sacred, everything becomes sacred."
--Krishnamurti
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You are not what happens; you are the space in which it happens. You are not your thoughts; they come and go. You are the vastness in which these thoughts appear and disappear because underneath all your thinking there is the stillness of pure being,... pure consciousness, the timeless dimension of yourself.
- Eckhart Tolle
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"Choose silence, and love is apparent.
When we choose silence, we choose to give up the reasons not to love,
which are the reasons for going to war, or continuing war, or separating,
or being a victim, or being right. In a moment of silence, in a moment of
no thought, no mind, we choose to give those up.
This is what my teacher invited me to.
Just choose silence. Don't even choose love. Choose silence, and love is
apparent. If we choose love we already have an idea of what love is.
But if you choose silence, that is the end of ideas. You are willing to
have no idea, to see what is present when there is no idea, past,
present, future. No idea of love, no idea of truth, no idea of you, no
idea of me. Love is apparent."
--Ganga Ji
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When we are empty of ego we, too, can carry on in calm acceptance of
life's varying events. When we cease making prejudicial distinctions -
gentle or harsh, beautiful or ugly, good or bad - a peaceful stillness
will permeate our mind. If there is no ego, there is no agitation.
-- Master Han Shan
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Live in your Unborn Buddha-Mind. Then there's no regression. No need for advancement. Any idea of wanting to make progress is already a regression from the place of the Unborn. A man of the Unborn has nothing to do with advancing or backsliding. He's always beyond them both.
Since the Buddha-Mind takes care of everything by means of the Unborn, it has nothing to do with Samsara or Nirvana. Seen from the place of the Unborn, both are like shadows in a dream. There can be no death for what was never born.
The marvelous brightness of the Buddha-Mind, by means of words, is able to enlighten people and deliver them from their illusions one by one. And when someone hears these words, understands and affirms them, he will know for himself that the Buddha-Mind' s wonderful brightness surpasses even the brightness of the sun and moon.
What an incalculable treasure is your Buddha-Mind!
--Writing: The Unborn: The Life and Teachings of Zen Master Bankei
Translated by Norman Waddell
-- Rumi
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -
"I have a capacity in my soul for taking in God entirely.
I am as sure as I live that nothing is so near to me as God.
God is nearer to me than I am to myself..."
-- Meister Eckhart
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -
"The silence of a quiet mind is the essence of that beauty. Because it is silent and because it is not the plaything of thought, then in that silence there comes that which is indestructible, which is sacred. In the coming of that which is sacred then life becomes sacred, your life becomes sacred, our relationship becomes sacred, everything becomes sacred."
--Krishnamurti
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -
You are not what happens; you are the space in which it happens. You are not your thoughts; they come and go. You are the vastness in which these thoughts appear and disappear because underneath all your thinking there is the stillness of pure being,... pure consciousness, the timeless dimension of yourself.
- Eckhart Tolle
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -
"Choose silence, and love is apparent.
When we choose silence, we choose to give up the reasons not to love,
which are the reasons for going to war, or continuing war, or separating,
or being a victim, or being right. In a moment of silence, in a moment of
no thought, no mind, we choose to give those up.
This is what my teacher invited me to.
Just choose silence. Don't even choose love. Choose silence, and love is
apparent. If we choose love we already have an idea of what love is.
But if you choose silence, that is the end of ideas. You are willing to
have no idea, to see what is present when there is no idea, past,
present, future. No idea of love, no idea of truth, no idea of you, no
idea of me. Love is apparent."
--Ganga Ji
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -
When we are empty of ego we, too, can carry on in calm acceptance of
life's varying events. When we cease making prejudicial distinctions -
gentle or harsh, beautiful or ugly, good or bad - a peaceful stillness
will permeate our mind. If there is no ego, there is no agitation.
-- Master Han Shan
------------ --------- --------- --------- --------- --------- -
Live in your Unborn Buddha-Mind. Then there's no regression. No need for advancement. Any idea of wanting to make progress is already a regression from the place of the Unborn. A man of the Unborn has nothing to do with advancing or backsliding. He's always beyond them both.
Since the Buddha-Mind takes care of everything by means of the Unborn, it has nothing to do with Samsara or Nirvana. Seen from the place of the Unborn, both are like shadows in a dream. There can be no death for what was never born.
The marvelous brightness of the Buddha-Mind, by means of words, is able to enlighten people and deliver them from their illusions one by one. And when someone hears these words, understands and affirms them, he will know for himself that the Buddha-Mind' s wonderful brightness surpasses even the brightness of the sun and moon.
What an incalculable treasure is your Buddha-Mind!
--Writing: The Unborn: The Life and Teachings of Zen Master Bankei
Translated by Norman Waddell
Saturday, December 12, 2009
Stranded on the Bridge
Sanai: BUT I AM FRIGHTENED
LEST YOUR IGNORANCE AND STUPIDITY
LEAVE YOU STRANDED ON THE BRIDGE.
Osho: But remember one thing... Each and every master has said it, because the problem is there on both the paths. The problem is, one can be stranded on the bridge. The meditator may become so addicted to meditation that he may be stranded on the bridge. The lover may become too much addicted to love, then he will be stranded on the bridge. Love is a bridge, meditation is a bridge. And you have to go beyond the bridge.
In the ultimate state, the meditator has to drop his meditation and the lover has to forget all about his love. Otherwise you will just be close to the door but you will not be able to enter into the temple. The method has to be forgotten.
Buddha said that each method is like a raft, like a boat: use it to go to the other shore, but then leave it there and forget all about it and go on your way. There is no need to carry the raft on your head. If you carry the raft on your head you are just stupid. But this is what is happening: millions of people become too addicted to their method. And the method CAN be addictive because it gives such beautiful experiences. The last barrier is the method, the last barrier is the bridge.
Just see the point -- it is very paradoxical. The bridge takes you to the other shore: certainly it is a help, and you should be grateful to it, and you should be thankful to it. But it can become a problem.
You may fall in love with the bridge and you may make your house on the bridge. And if you start living on the bridge, you are neither of this shore nor of that shore; you are in a kind of limbo. And many so-called religious practitioners live in a kind of limbo -- they are neither of this world nor of that. They have become addicted to the bridge.
And the bridge IS beautiful! Hence the fear of Sanai. Sanai says:
I AM FRIGHTENED
LEST YOUR IGNORANCE AND STUPIDITY
LEAVE YOU STRANDED ON THE BRIDGE.
ALL methods are methods, all means are means. And if you want to reach the end you will have to drop all means and all methods. That is the only way to enter into the ultimate. The lover will have to forget all about love, and the meditator will have to forget all about meditation. Yes, there comes a moment when the meditator does not meditate, because he has become meditation himself; now meditation is not a separate activity. And there comes a moment when the lover does not love, because he is love himself.
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