Taigu Ryokan - I watch people in the world

I Watch People In The World
I watch people in the world
Throw away their lives lusting after things,
Never able to satisfy their desires,
Falling into deeper despair
And torturing themselves.
Even if they get what they want
How long will they be able to enjoy it?
For one heavenly pleasure
They suffer ten torments of hell,
Binding themselves more firmly to the grindstone.
Such people are like monkeys
Frantically grasping for the moon in the water
And then falling into a whirlpool.
How endlessly those caught up in the floating world suffer.
Despite myself, I fret over them all night
And cannot staunch my flow of tears. 

Sutta Nipata

Let all beings be happy!

Weak or strong, of high, middle or low estate,

small or great, visible or invisible,

near or far away, alive or still to be born -

May they all be perfectly happy!

Let nobody lie to anybody or despise any single being anywhere.

May nobody wish harm to any single creature out of anger or hatred!

Let us cherish all creatures, as a mother her only child!

May our loving thoughts fill the whole world, above, below, across

- without limit; our love will know no obstacles -

a boundless goodwill toward the whole world,

unrestricted, free of hatred or enmity.

Whether we are standing or walking, sitting or lying down,

as long as we are awake we should cultivate this love in our heart.

This is the noblest way of living.

 —

 Sutta Nipata 1.18 in Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life, Karen Armstrong.

Sutta Nipata PDF

Eckhart Tolle - Words

photo Thomas Dawson

“Words, no matter whether they are vocalized and made into sounds or remain unspoken as thoughts, can cast an almost hypnotic spell upon you.

You easily lose yourself in them, become hypnotized into implicitly believing that when you have attached a word to something, you know what it is.

The fact is: you don’t know what it is. You have only covered up the mystery with a label. Everything, a bird, a tree, even a simple stone, and certainly a human being, is ultimately unknowable. This is because it has unfathomable depth…

Underneath the surface appearance, everything is not only connected with everything else, but also with the Source of all life out of which it came.” 

 https://www.eckharttolle.com/

Jan Frazier - Being Conscious

Being conscious occurs in the now.  (Even if your attachment to ego has ended, and you’re conscious as the norm, consciousness is experienced now.)  When you’re conscious, you’re aware of what’s happening in the now:  sensation in your body, what your body is doing, things directly observable in the immediate scene.  Consciousness is neutral, unresisting awareness of present-moment reality.  There are no mental filters, no inner narrative.  Simply awareness of what is, right now.

Consciousness is attention.  It’s different from thinking.  Thinking involves processing, labeling, visualizing, categorizing, projecting.  It causes emotion.  Attention is simple awareness.  It’s peaceful (whether or not the immediate scene looks peaceful).

If something is going on in your mind at the moment, being conscious means you’re aware that you’re thinking.  That is, you are not “lost in thought.”  Something is happening in your mind, and you’re aware of that.  It’s just the same as if you were using some other part of your body to do something:  if you are using your hands to slice carrots, you’re aware of that.  You are paying attention to what you’re doing, whether you’re doing it with your hands or your feet or your mind.

Being unconscious means you’re lost in thought, in the pictures and stories your mind is producing.  You have entered the made-up content of your mind and are occupying it as if it were reality itself.  Your ego is invested in this content as being real and important, and very likely as a result you are experiencing some kind of emotion (stirred up by the thinking).  You have forgotten that all of it is the product of your mind (even if its content appears to be true or important).  As a result, you are missing actual reality, what’s happening in the now — including that you are inventing the thoughts.

During a period of unconsciousness, the content of thought has become a replacement reality.  When you’re unconscious, your ego is completely running the show.  Nothing useful can occur in terms of spiritual insight or development.  Awareness is not in the picture.  Only egoic thought is occurring.  The ego cannot possibly be used to get out of its own way.  Only awareness can see in such a way to quiet the identification with egoic thought.

When you’re driving away from home and suddenly you don’t know whether you turned off the stove, it’s because you were thinking about something besides turning off the stove when you turned the knob (if in fact you did).  If you had been paying attention to what you were doing, when you did it, you would know for a certainty that the stove is now off.  If in fact you turned it off, you were unconscious at the time.  You were lost in the momentary replacement reality occurring inside your head.  You literally “weren’t there” when your hand turned the knob.  You were occupying the movie or soundtrack your mind was producing at the time.

Being conscious doesn’t necessarily mean your mind is quiet.  It means if your mind is doing something, you’re aware of that, rather than being lost in its content.  The more you become conscious that thought is occurring, during the times the mind is active, the less the mind will run all the time on its own.  The reason it runs non-stop is that you enter into its content as if it were real.  You don’t notice you’re thinking.  You notice what the thoughts are about.  If you keep giving yourself the impression that the content of your thought is reality itself — rather than observing that you are thinking — then your ego gets the message that you really must keep thinking all the time, because not to do so would be dangerous.  It would be threatening to the well-being of the ego, which seems to be what you are.  Thinking seems to be crucial to “your” (the ego’s) continued existence.

As soon as you notice that you are thinking — that you’ve been absorbed in the content as if it were reality itself — some of the steam runs out of the mental activity.  It’s only when you believe your thoughts are reality that painful emotions are generated.

Of course there’s such a thing as useful thought, the kind that has nothing to do with keeping the ego going.  Practical thought does not cause emotion.  It is applied to a purpose:  making a plan for a trip, studying a new language, figuring out how to repair something that’s broken.  (Of course, the ego can find all kinds of ways to get in an uproar while these episodes of practical thinking are occurring.  Like getting mad at the broken thing, or becoming frustrated because you can’t figure out how to fix it.  In which case, unconsciousness has taken over.  But it isn’t inevitable that it will always do so.)

You cannot decide to be conscious more of the time.  This is not something to be “practiced.”  (Spare yourself this cherished illusion.)  In any given moment, either you’re conscious (aware) or not (lost in thought).  You didn’t “decide” which to be; it just happened, in a spontaneous kind of way.  Even so, probably it’s the case that the more often you are conscious — the more often you are really here, and not suffering — the more consciousness will predominate, as a general trend.  Each time you’re thinking and you happen to notice that you’re thinking, something potent has occurred.  It’s just that you aren’t in charge of when that noticing happens.  Nature will, as ever, take its course.

http://janfrazierteachings.com/

Nisargadatta Maharaj - Final talks

CONSCIOUSNESS
AND
THE ABSOLUTE

The final talks of
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
Edited by
Jean Dunn

~~~~

May 1, 1980

 
Questioner: How does a jnani see the world?

Maharaj: A jnani is aware of the origin and the value of consciousness, this beingness, which has
spontaneously dawned on him. This same consciousness plays a multitude of roles, some happy,
some unhappy; but whatever the roles, the jnani is merely the seer of them.

 The roles have no effecton the jnani.
All your problems are body-mind problems. Even so, you cling to that body. Since you identify
with the body-mind, you follow certain polite modes of expression when you talk. I do not. I might
embarrass you; you may not be able to take what I say. I have no sense of propriety.
You are bound by your own concepts and notions. Actually, you love only this sense of "I";
you do everything because of this. You are not working for anybody, 

nor for the nation, but only for
this sense of "I" which you love so much.

Q: But I like to act; I like to work.

M: All these activities go on, but they are only entertainment. The waking and deep sleep states
come and go spontaneously. Through the sense of "I", you spontaneously feel like working. But
find out if this sense of "I" is real or unreal, permanent or impermanent.
The "I" which appears is unreal. How unreal it is I have proven. The moment the "I" is proven
unreal, who is it who knows that the "I" is unreal? 

This knowledge within you that knows the "I" is unreal, that knowledge which knows change, 

must itself be changeless, permanent.
You are an illusion, Maya, an imagination. It is only because I know that I'm unreal that I know
you also are unreal. It is not like this: Because I am real, you are unreal. It is like this: 

Because I am unreal, everything is unreal.
Consciousness depends on the body; the body depends on the essence of food. It is the
Consciousness which is speaking now. If the food-essence is not present, the body cannot exist.
Without the body, would I be able to talk?
Can you do anything to retain this sense of "I"? As it came spontaneously, so will it go. It will
not forewarn you by announcing, "I am going tomorrow."
A doubt has arisen and you are trying to find the solution, but who is it who has this doubt?
Find out for yourself.

May 10, 1980

Maharaj: How did I get to the truth that I prevail everlastingly? 

By meditating on the meditator, by "I Amness" merging into "I Airiness". Only then did I understand what my true nature is. The great Sages meditated in the same way. 

Nobody had told me how to do it. I did not seek this knowledge
externally. It sprouted within me.
I meditated like the Sages and saw a vision. Initially, there was space, and in the space I saw
the principles embodied. Actually, they have no bodies, but in my vision they had bodies. I called
them Prakriti and Purusha, the male and female aspects of cosmic consciousness.
Until the union of Prakriti and Purusha, the dynamic, all-pervading consciousness lay in a
dormant state. In the union of the male and female aspects, emissions were planted in the female of these figures. When these emissions merged in the womb they started taking form. After nine
months of gestation, an infant was delivered.
That consciousness which was planted in the womb was the causal body, the "lingadeha". In
that "lingadeha", the knowledge "I Am" was in a dormant condition. 

This is what I saw in meditation.

Questioner: How did we lose this pure consciousness state?

M: Every being experiences the Isvara state, either directly or potentially, but he is so wrapped up in this objective world that he loses his identity. You must know what this "I Am" principle is. It
appears spontaneously and with its appearance begins the riddle of conceptual life.

Q: How do I start this search for my Self?

M: Start from the very beginning. In this gross world I began with my parents, because I knew full
well that my principle was already dwelling there in the collection of their bodily elements out of
which I emanated. But I came to the conclusion that I could not be that principle 

which came from the mother's body.
There is nobody here who is 100 years old. 

Does that mean that 100 years ago you did not exist?

Q: I don't know.

M: The one who said, "I don't know" must have been there; in short, you were not like this, but you must have been something. You must comprehend this correctly. 100 years back I was not like this; so, the one pointing this out must have been there. You did, and do, exist unto eternity.
What I am expounding does not relate to worldly knowledge. You do not want to give up
either worldly knowledge or so-called spiritual knowledge, and yet, through these worldly concepts, you want to understand the riddle of your existence, 

and that is precisely why you are not able to understand.
In truth, your state is one of Absolute bliss, not this phenomenal state. In that non-phenomenal
state you are full of bliss but there is no experience of its presence. In that state there is no trace of misery or unhappiness, only unalloyed bliss. What am I talking about?

Q: Ananda (bliss).

M: Because you want some satisfaction according to your own concepts, you try to qualify
unalloyed bliss. The term "ananda" has significance only when it signifies that the bodily beingness is available to experience it. When you are in deep sleep and you start to see forms,

 you are actually dreaming. Aren't those dream forms coming from your own beingness? 

Whatever you see, even in the waking state, 

doesn't it come from your own beingness which is dwelling within the body?
In deep sleep, consciousness was in a dormant condition; there were no bodies, no concepts, no
encumbrances. Upon the arrival of this apparently wakeful state, with the arrival of the concept

 "I Am", the love of "I Am" woke up. That itself is Maya, illusion.

Q: Does Maharaj mean that the experiencer of the three states is the Self?

M: That is the Saguna Brahman state; because of your beingness the other states are. The dream
world is very old, it is not new. You see old monuments in your dreams.

 Your beingness is very powerful.
The emergence of this beingness itself constitutes time. Everything is beingness, but I, the
Absolute, am not that. In meditation, there was space, when suddenly two forms appeared out of
no-form, Prakriti and Purusha, and the quintessence of these forms was the knowledge "I Am".
There were no forms, then suddenly forms appeared, just as in the dream world.
You as a dreamer are sleeping on the bed, but in your dream world you see a body and you
think it is you, and you are doing everything through this dream body. In that same way, bodies are created in the so-called waking state.
The Prakriti and Purusha state has no form and is eternal, having neither a beginning nor an
end. But from it come the five elements, and with them, simultaneously, the body is formed at the
moment that time is first experienced. This process is ever continuing, with the body-form merely
indicative of the opportunity to experience time. This explanation will not reach home to everyone.
At the moment of so-called death, with what identity would you like to depart?

Q: As Parabrahman.

M: The Absolute, which I call Parabrahman, what is it like? What you are doing is multiplying
words with more words, concepts with more concepts.

Q: Maharaj must take me out of this.

M: Can you define what you are?

Q: I must have your blessing to understand what I am.
M: You are very adept at word-games. While I am talking about knowledge that is beyond this
phenomenal world, you are trying to understand through worldly concepts and words. Give up all
these concepts and inquire into the nature of your beingness. How did you happen to be?

 Ponder it!
The real blessing of the Guru comes when your knowledge itself sprouts inside you.

Continue reading/download the book in PDF  HERE

Shri Shri Madhava Radharani Kunjhbihari by parwandra

Jagjit Singh - Kabir

Hari Bin Kaun Sahaye

Ibn al-‘Arabi - Religion of Love

My heart has become capable of every form:
It is a pasture for gazelles
And a convent for Christian monks
And a temple for idols
And the pilgrim’s Ka’ba
And the tables of the Torah
And the book of the Koran.
I follow the religion of love:
Whatever way Love’s camels take,
That is my religion and my faith’.

Maghrebi - We left it all behind us

Maghrebi, a Sufi of the 14th century, who expressed in poetical terms what Ibn al-‘Arabi taught in his many books, recited the following poem for his murshed Isma’il Sisi. He was delighted by the poem and praised his disciple for composing it. The Persian text comes from A Critical Edition of the Divan of Muhammad Shirin Maghribi; ed. By Leonard Lewisohn; Tehran and London; ghazal 122; pp. 253-4. 

At the moment we saw your sun, we left all particles of dust behind us
On account of that Essence we left all attributes behind us.

All the world is but a stage, displaying the signs of Being
So we have left the search of these signs behind us.

Do not talk to us about revelations and miracles
As we have left such talk behind us.

Do not boast about your many mystic states and stations
As we have left these states and stations behind us.

We have escaped from the Sufi centres, monasteries and convents
As we have been liberated from litanies and we left time behind us.

We have fled from school, lessons and discourses
As we have left obscurities, doubts and questions behind us.

And the ka’ba, the idol temple, the Christian cincture and the cross
And the wine shop and the lane to the tavern of ruin, we have left it all behind us.

We spent some time as an ascetic in our retreat
But even the seven heavens, seen in true dreams, we have left it all behind us.

We saw it all in our sleep and in our imagination,
So like true men, this sleep and imagination, we left it all behind us.

O, shaykh! If this is all you have realised in the field of perfection,
Then rest at ease, as this perfection, we left it all behind us.

All of this is nothing more than difficulties on our path;
These difficulties, thanks to God, we left it all behind us.

We in our search of lights, yes, even the most oriental of all lights:
Maghrebi, the ‘glittering star’, and the ‘niche’, we left it all behind us.

 

Chuang Tzu - Perfect Tao

The non-action of the wise man is not inaction.
It is not studied.  It is not shaken by anything.
The sage is quiet because he is not moved,
Not because he wills to be quiet.
Still water is like glass.
You can look in it and see the bristles on your chin.
It is a perfect level;
A carpenter could use it.
If water is so clear, so level,
How much more the spirit of man?
The heart of the wise man is tranquil.
It is the mirror of heaven and earth
The glass of everything.
Emptiness, stillness, tranquility, tastelessness,
Silence, non-action: this is the level of heaven and earth.
This is perfect Tao. Wise men find here
Their resting place.
Resting, they are empty.

From emptiness comes the unconditioned.
From this, the conditioned, the individual things.
So from the sage's emptiness, stillness arises:
From stillness, action. From action, attainment.
From their stillness comes their non-action, which is also action
And is, therefore, their attainment.
For stillness is joy.  Joy is free from care.
Fruitful in long years.
Joy does all things without concern:
For emptiness, stillness, tranquility, tastelessness,
Silence, and non-action
Are the root of all things.



translation by Thomas Merton

Voltaire - Meditation

Meditation is the dissolution of thoughts
in Eternal awareness
or Pure consciousness
without objectification,
knowing without thinking,
merging finitude in infinity.

Chuck Surface - Your Heart In Mine

Mother, the great teachings say,
To avoid the dangerous trap
Of magical powers. 

But please, Beloved,
Grant me just one power… 

To awaken Love. 

Take a piece of your Heart,
A touch of Your Grace,
And place it in mine. 

So that like an errant child,
I may give Your Treasure away,
To all who notice its glimmering. 

Mindless of karma,
Mindless of conditionality,
Mindless of causality. 

If only I can squander it all
Before you catch and chide me
For shattering the Laws of Creation… 

Filling every Heart,
Everywhere,
Forever. 

http://gardenofthebeloved.com/ 

Huang Po - Sermons and dialogues

From: The Chun Chou Record of
the Zen Master Huang Po (Tuan Chi)



A collection of sermons and dialogues recorded by P’ei Hsiu while in the city of Chun Chou.

 The Master said to me: All the Buddhas and all sentient beings are nothing but the One Mind, beside which nothing exists.  This Mind, which is without beginning, is unborn and indestructible.  It is not green nor yellow, and has neither form nor appearance.  It does not belong to the categories of things which exist or do not exist, nor can it be thought of in terms of new or old.  It is neither long nor short, big nor small, for it transcends all limits, measure, names, traces and comparisons.  It is that which you see before you - begin to reason about it and you at once fall into error.  It is like the boundless void which cannot be fathomed or measured.  The One Mind alone is the Buddha, and there is no distinction between the Buddha and sentient things, but that sentient beings are attached to forms and so seek externally for Buddhahood.  By their very seeking they lose it, for that is using the Buddha to seek for the Buddha and using mind to grasp Mind.  Even though they do their utmost for a full aeon, they will not be able to attain it.  They do not know that, if they put a stop to conceptual thought and forget their anxiety, the Buddha will appear before them, for this Mind is the Buddha and the Buddha is all living beings.  It is not the less for being manifested in ordinary beings, nor is it greater for being manifest in the Buddhas.

*

Q: From all you have just said, Mind is the Buddha; but it is not clear as to what sort of mind is meant by this “Mind which is the Buddha.”
A: How many minds have you got?
Q: But is the Buddha the ordinary mind or the Enlightened mind?
A: Where on earth do you keep your “ordinary mind” and your “Enlightened mind?”
Q: In the teaching of the Three Vehicles it is stated that there are both.  Why does Your Reverence deny it?
A: In the teaching of the Three Vehicles it is clearly explained that the ordinary and Enlightened minds are illusions.  You don’t understand.  All this clinging to the idea of things existing is to mistake vacuity for the truth.  How can such conceptions not be illusory?  Being illusory, they hide Mind from you.  If you would only rid yourselves of the concepts of ordinary and Enlightened, you would find that there is no other Buddha than the Buddha in your own Mind.  When Bodhidharma came from the West, he just pointed out that the substance of which all men are composed is the Buddha.  You people go on misunderstanding; you hold to concepts such as “ordinary” and “Enlightened,” directing your thoughts outwards where they gallop about like horses!  All this amounts to beclouding your own minds!  So I tell you Mind is the Buddha.  As soon as thought or sensation arises, you fall into dualism.  Beginningless time and the present moment are the same.  There is no this and no that.  To understand this truth is called complete and unexcelled Enlightenment.
Q: Upon what Doctrine (Dharma-principles) does Your Reverence base these words?
A: Why seek a doctrine?  As soon as you have a doctrine, you fall into dualistic thought.
Q: Just now you said that the beginningless past and the present are the same.  What do you mean by that?
A: It is just because of your SEEKING that you make a difference between them.  If you were to stop seeking, how could there be any difference between them?
Q: If they are not different, why do you employ separate terms for them?
A: If you hadn’t mentioned ordinary and Enlightened, who would have bothered to say such things?  Just as those categories have no real existence, so Mind is not really “mind.”  And, as both Mind and those categories are really illusions, wherever can you hope to find anything?

*

Q: Illusion can hide from us our own mind, but up to now you have not taught us how to get rid of illusion.
A: The arising and the elimination of illusion are both illusory.  Illusion is not something rooted in Reality; it exists because of your dualistic thinking.  If you will only cease to indulge in opposed concepts such as “ordinary” and “Enlightened,” illusion will cease of itself.  And then if you still want to destroy it wherever it may be, you will find that there is not a hairsbreadth left of anything on which to lay hold.  This is the meaning of: “I will let go with both hands, for then I shall certainly discover the Buddha in my mind.”
Q: If there is nothing on which to lay hold, how is the Dharma to be transmitted?
A: It is a transmission of Mind with Mind.
Q: If Mind is used for transmission, why do you say that Mind too does not exist?
A: Obtaining no Dharma whatever is called Mind transmission.  The understanding of this implies no Mind and no Dharma.
Q: If there is no Mind and no Dharma, what is meant by transmission?
A: You hear people speak of Mind transmission and then you talk of something to be received.  So Bodhidharma said:



The nature of the Mind when understood,
No human speech can compass or disclose.
Enlightenment is naught to be attained,
And he that gains it does not say he knows.



If I were to make this clear to you, I doubt if you could stand it.

~ 

From: The Wan Ling Record of
the Zen Master Huang Po (Tuan Chi)

A collection of dialogues, sermons and anecdotes recorded by P’ei Hsiu during his tenure of the prefecture of Wan Ling.

Q: If our own Mind is the Buddha, how did Bodhidharma transmit his doctrine when he came from India?
A: When he came from India, he transmitted only Mind-Buddha.  He just pointed to the truth that the minds of all of you have from the very first been identical with the Buddha, and in no way separate from each other.... Whoever has an instant understanding of this truth suddenly transcends the whole hierarchy of saints and adepts.... You have always been one with the Buddha, so do not pretend you can ATTAIN to this oneness by various practices.
Q: If that is so, what Dharma do all the Buddhas teach when they manifest themselves in the world?
A: When all the Buddhas manifest themselves in the world, they proclaim nothing but the One Mind.  Thus Gautama Buddha silently transmitted to Mahakasyapa the doctrine that the One Mind, which is the substance of all things, is co-extensive with the Void and fills the entire world of phenomena.  This is called the Law of All the Buddhas.  Discuss it as you may, how can you even hope to approach the truth through words?  Nor can it be perceived either subjectively or objectively.  So full understanding can come to you only through an inexpressible mystery.  The approach to it is called the Gateway of the Stillness beyond all Activity.  If you wish to understand, know that a sudden comprehension comes when the mind has been purged of all the clutter of conceptual and discriminatory thought-activity.  Those who seek the truth by means of intellect and learning only get further and further away from it.  Not till your thoughts cease all their branching here and there, not till you abandon all thoughts of seeking for something, not till your mind is motionless as wood or stone, will you be on the right road to the Gate.

[Translator’s footnote:] These words recall the admonitions of so many mystics – Buddhist, Christian, Hindu or Sufi – who have committed their experiences to words.  What Huang Po calls the total abandonment of hsin – mind, thought, perceptions, concepts and the rest – implies the utter surrender of self insisted on by Sufi and Christian mystics.  Indeed, in paragraph 28 he used the very words: “Let the self perish utterly.”  Such striking unanimity of expression by mystics widely separated in time and space can hardly be attributed to coincidence.  No several persons entirely unacquainted with one another could produce such closely similar accounts of purely imaginary journeys.  Hence one is led to suppose that what they describe is real.  This seems to have been Aldous Huxley’s view when he compiled that valuable work The Perennial Philosophy.

Eckhart Tolle - "Spare some change?"

A beggar had been sitting by the side of the road for thirty years.

One day a stranger walked by. 

"Spare some change?" mumbled the beggar.

"I have nothing to give you," said the stranger. Then he asked: "What's that you're sitting on?"

"Nothing, " replied the beggar. "Just an old box. I've been sitting on it for as long as I can remember.

"Ever look inside?," asked the stranger. 

"No," said the beggar. "What's the point, there's nothing in there."

"Have a look inside," insisted the stranger. The beggar, reluctantly, managed to pry open the lid.  With astonishment, disbelief, and elation, he saw that the box was filled with gold.

I am that stranger who has nothing to give you and who is telling you to look inside. Not inside any box, as in the parable, but somewhere even closer: inside yourself.

From The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment

https://www.eckharttolle.com/

Rabindranath Tagore - This harp of my life

I drive down into the depth of the ocean of
forms, hoping to gain the perfect pearl of the formless.

No more sailing from harbour to harbour
with this my weather-beaten boat.
The days are long passed when my sport was to be tossed on waves.

And now I am eager to die into the deathless.

Into the audience hall by the fathomless abyss where swells up the music of toneless
strings I shall take this harp of my life.

I shall tune it to the notes of forever,
and, when it has sobbed out its last utterance, lay down my silent harp at
the feet of the silent.

-Gitanjali, translated from original Bengali by Tagore

Gitanjali (excerpt) PDF

Lao Tzu - Save the world

picture Kopp Delaney

"Would you like to save the world
from the degradation and destruction
it seems destined for? 
Then step away from shallow mass movements
and quietly go to work on your own self-awareness. 
If you want to awaken all of humanity,
then awaken all of yourself. 
If you want to eliminate the suffering in the world,
then eliminate all that is dark and negative in yourself. 
Truly, the greatest gift you have to give
is that of your own self-transformation."

Bob Fergeson - Back of Beyond

There is a place of Quiet
back beyond your hopes, fears, your dreams.
Don't listen any longer
           to those thieves.
                               They lie,
as they keep you gazing stupidly at the patterns
                bouncing about your fevered mind.

           Listen instead for Silence,
quieter than a tiny bug crawling through dry leaves somewhere behind your fear.
           Listen to your Self,
answering your own prayers back beyond thought,
in the silence behind your head,
before your memory, after your death,
beyond your dreams and desires,
                     and your anger at their coyness.
Be still, there's no need to hurry.
We will all meet again,
in the quiet peace before our names were born ...
                                                back of beyond.

The Place of No Concern - PDF 

http://www.nevernothere.com/bob-fergeson 

Larry Davis - Poems

Beyond

When time brings its own message
That the way to truth is there,
The feeling is not to be found
The sight cannot be sought.
The void of time and thought
Brings its own clarity
The way is not there, not here
It is all things, every moment.
The joy of finding it
The bliss of knowing it
Dissolves into infinity
Along with the seeker.
Beyond all knowing and seeing
Where self cannot reach,
Living in the still void
We exist for all time.

Love

Common love is an illusion,
It wants us to possess that which gives us pleasure,
It tells us to pursue the object of our desire,
It does not see beyond itself.
True love has no object, no goal:
It is just love.
The love where there is no "me"
and "you" is the rest of humanity.
Love that is not borne of self
Touches everything and yet nothing in particular.
This all-encompassing love
Frees us from the confines of self.
Once set free we can travel,
Protected from the harshness of life
Carried along on the wings of love
We consume ourselves in its wondrous flame.

~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

source http://tatfoundation.org/index.htm

Corina Bardasuc - Stop

I turn around and round
The self
Like a dog
Chasing its own tail.
Trying to sniff out
My very soul.
My senses lead me
Astray
Most of the time.
My hearing wasted
On the song of birds.
My taste sense wasted
On many hardened bones.
My eyes hardened
By the chase of many fleeting
Things.
But yesterday I think,
When I was circling yet
Again,
I caught the scent
Of a thought.
Unlike the other thoughts.
It simply told me
Stop.

 http://tatfoundation.org/index.htm

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St. John of the Cross - Grace

‘What is grace?’ I asked God.

And He said,
‘All that happens.’

Then He added, when I looked perplexed,

‘Could not lovers
say that every moment in their Beloved’s arms
was grace?

Existence is my arms,
though I well understand how one can turn
away from
me

until the heart has
wisdom.’


–St. John of the Cross
Love Poems from God
Daniel Ladinsky

Rumi ♡ ‘Who’s at the door?’

     You said, ‘Who’s at the door?’
     I said, ‘Your slave.’

     You said, ‘What do you want?’
     ‘To see you and bow.’

     ‘How long will you wait?’
     ‘Until you call.’

     ‘How long will you cook?’
     ‘Till the Resurrection.’

     We talked through the door.
     I claimed a great love and that I had
     given up what the world gives, to be in that love.

     ‘You said, ‘Such claims require a witness.’
     I said, ‘This longing, these tears.’

     You said, ‘Discredited witnesses.’
     I said, ‘Surely not!’

     You said, ‘Who did you come with?’
     ‘The majestic imagination you gave me.’

     ‘Why did you come?’
     ‘The musk of your wine was in the air.’

     ‘What is your intention?’
     ‘Friendship.’

     ‘What do you want from me?’
     ‘Grace.’

     Then you asked, ‘Where have you been most comfortable?’
     ‘In the palace.’

     ‘What did you see there?’
     ‘Amazing things.’

     ‘Then why is it so desolate?’
     ‘Because all that can be taken away in a second.’

     ‘Who can do that?’
     ‘This clear discernment.’

     ‘Where can you live safely then?’
     ‘In Surrender.’

     ‘What is this giving up?’
     ‘A peace that saves us.’

     ‘Is there no threat of disaster?’
     ‘Only what comes in your street, inside your love.’

     ‘How do you walk there?’
     ‘In perfection.’

     Now silence.
     If I told more of this conversation,
     those listening would leave themselves.

     There would be no door, no roof or window either!

Art Ram Onkar

Anthony de Mello - The Salt Doll

A salt doll journeyed for thousands of miles over land, until it finally came to the sea.
It was fascinated by this strange moving mass, quite unlike anything it had ever seen before.
“Who are you?” said the salt doll to the sea.

The sea smilingly replied, “Come in and see.”
So the doll waded in. The farther it walked into the sea the more it dissolved, until there was only very little of it left.

Before that last bit dissolved, the doll exclaimed in wonder,

 “Now I know what I am!”

 

Art Maia Walczak.

Sailor Bob Adamson - "What wrong with right now, unless you think about it"

Q: Bob, what is the bottom line?

Bob:
Right here, right now
You are present and
You are aware of being present.
Realize that you are that
One-without-a-second,
Pure presence-awareness
And be what you are.

What you are right now is awareness or the sense of beingness. It is totally free, completely at peace and utterly and finally attained, even at this moment. Not being clear on this that we are, the mind has imagined separation and built a set of beliefs and identities upon this unexamined concept. When you get exposed to this type of teaching, several things begin to happen.

First you get a glimpse of what your true nature is. It is pointed out, perhaps repeatedly, until you see it and know it for certain. This the most important insight to start with. Your actual being, is radiantly present and alive as that which is knowing your thoughts right now, is the truth that is being pointed out. There is no other understanding or realization beyond this. In fact, you know this now. You exist and you know that you exist. All a teacher does is assure you with the greatest conviction that this is it. 

Most of us have had a lot of baggage in the form of beliefs about what this understanding is, how it is supposed to happen and so on. This type of teaching helps to expose those erroneous beliefs, not to mention the beliefs we have about ourselves. It is only these unexamined beliefs that generate suffering and our sense of being apart from the peace we are seeking.

Everything happens as it happens. It is only from the limited view of mind and it's beliefs that we judge "right" and "wrong". All evaluations are in the mind. From the point of view of what we are, everything is just a manifestation of the deep harmony of what is, just an arising and ceasing in the light of awareness, which is ever at peace and free. This is true for you right now, once you clear up the confusion about your real nature. This does not take time; there is no path to this; and no practice required. It is just seeing that truth of things. 

Everything arises and sets in the light of your being. Nothing is separate from that. Forms appear and disappear, but nothing is ever lost or gained. Everything that appears arises from that, exists upon that, and subsides into that. In spite of the appearance and disappearance of people and things, there is a luminous, ever-present background that sheds a fragrance of perfection that permeates everything. That is your birth-place, your true home. 

Know yourself clearly and all this begins to make sense. It becomes your direct experience. If you are resonating with this type of teaching, then this understanding is already opening up for you. Just follow your heart and let the understanding unfold. Your own deeper being will lead you where you need to be and will reveal to you what needs to be known. Then you will realize that life is perfect here and now and that you have never left the peace and truth that you are seeking. 

Stay with the pointers. Savour them like fine wine. Let the pointing unfold within your own heart. Most of all, see your own true nature as it is. All the pointers are only to reveal this.

~"What wrong with right now, unless you think about it" Sailor Bob Adamson

~Quoted on p. 36,37,38 of John Wheeler's book, "Awakening to the natural state"

 

http://www.sailorbobadamson.com/