' Stop dragging my heart around'......

Peace...

What is peace but the absense of fear..

Fear is the wall that the mind must climb..

Without fear, Love appears..

Love is the hand on the shoulder,

and voice that speaks gently of never leaving..

We search so long for something that has never been lost..

This search for 'Self' is a comedy of errors..

We keep searching and all the time,

we know that We are the Searched...


-namaste, thomas

It is sunday night...

While others are watching television 'programs'..

You are reading these words..

I have highlighted the word 'programs' for a purpose..

The powers that control the humans of earth cannot control seven billion humans by force,
they must control you by the power of your own mind..

They are 'programing', you..

They are telling you what they are doing according to Universal Law..

To be free from Karma, all requests must be accepted by the other entity..

You have accepted the role of slave to master..

"How much longer will you remain a slave within a dream ?"..

It is time to return to Reality..

You look upon the Dream as Consciousness and yet see Yourself as slave and wonder,
" How did this happen ?"..

This adventure into opposite can become painful..

Leave these beings of ego and return to the warm waves of Love..


-thomas

Awareness...

”There can be no consciousness without awareness,

but there can be awareness without consciousness,

as in deep sleep."



-Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

The pull of frequencies...

Tension is who you think you should be.

Relaxation is who you are.



-Chinese proverb

Ashtavakra Gita...

Janaka said:

He who by nature is empty-minded, and who thinks of things only unintentionally, is freed from deliberate remembering like one awakened from a dream. 14.1

When my desire has been eliminated, I have no wealth, friends, robbers, senses, scriptures or knowledge. 14.2

Realising my supreme self-nature in the Person of the Witness, the Lord,and the state of desirelessness in bondage or liberation, I feel no inclination for liberation. 14.3

The various states of one who is free of uncertainty within, and who outwardly wanders about as he pleases like an idiot, can only be known by someone in the same condition. 14.4


- from the Ashtavakra Gita..

Consciousness watches the Film...

Earth life is but a dream, lived out in a dream physical body amid dream environment.

Dream experiences are only ideas; during sleep-dream man sees, hears, touches, tastes, and smells exactly as he does during waking-dream.

Hence waking is but materialized ideas, but still ideas.

God's cosmic dream: all universal activities are but different ideas of God, divine ideation made material and thrown upon the screen of human consciousness.

The cosmic illusion is impinged upon man's sense and seen from within by Mind through consciousness, sensation, and bodily organ.


-- Notebooks Category 21: Mentalism >
Chapter 3: The Individual and World Mind > # 23
Paul Brunton

The Gospel of Thomas the Apostle...

(61) Jesus said,

"Two will rest on a bed: the one will die, and the other will live."

Salome said, "Who are you, man, that you ... have come up on my couch and eaten from my table?"

Jesus said to her, "I am he who exists from the undivided. I was given some of the things of my father."

<...> "I am your disciple."

<...> "Therefore I say, if he is destroyed, he will be filled with light, but if he is divided, he will be filled with darkness."



-From the Gospel of Thomas the Apostle..

' I will always love you '...

Alan Watts ...

Religion of the Vietnamese...

Buddhism was originated in India by Shiddharta (563-483 B.C.) or Gautama Buddha, which means the Enlightened One." According to Buddha, man was born into this world to suffer. The cause of suffering is the craving for wealth, fame, and power that necessarily brings about frustration and disappointrnent. In order to be free from suffering, man must suppress its ultimate cause: craving.

He must not be attached to anything in this "world appearance" and live a life full of virtue, according to the Eightfold Path. This core of Buddhist teaching holds that there are eight "right" ways to live virtuously: right views, right thought, right conduct, right speech, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness and right meditation. An individual's fate in this existence is determined by what he has done in his previous existence. This is the law of Karma, or cause and effect.


The soul does not perish at death, but reincarnates in another existence and this goes on and on. The Buddhist's goal is to be freed from the circle of reincarnation and reach Nirvana, which is a state of complete redemption and supreme happiness. Theoretically, any person may become a Buddha by suppressing craving and following the Eightfold Path, but those who actually attain Buddhahood are rare.

There are two branches of Buddhism: Hinayana (Little Vehicle) also called Theravada Buddhism, which nourishes in Sri Lanka, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, and Burma, and Mahayana (Great Vehicle) Buddhism which is found in China, Korea, Japan, and Vietnam. Most Vietnamese Buddhists belong to the Mahayana branch. The Theravada branch exists in communities of ethnic Cambodians and Vietnamese living in the Mekong Delta.


-Religion of the Vietnamese
by Huynh Dinh Te

Readers from different countries...

For the first time, I see readers from Vietnam..

How strange to think that those that once hated americans are reading my words..

I admire the Vietnamese for their courage..

I was an advisor to the Vietnamese Air Force during the War..

Therefore, I welcome my brothers and sisters from Vietnam..

We came to your land because the 'powers that be', decided it so..

We never hated the Vietnamese but many were taught to..

You have a great Buddhist culture, I hope that I can lead you to the next level..

Zen Buddhism is the next step..

Unity with Consciousness is the First Reality..

The Final Reality, we will speak of later..


-namaste, thomas

sorrow and suffering...

”When you see sorrow and suffering, be with it.

Do not rush into activity.

Neither learning nor action can really help.

Be with sorrow and lay bare its roots--helping to understand is real help."


- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

Divine light...

Look up first,

and when your eyes are charged with divine light,

then when you cast your glance on the world of facts you will have a much clearer vision,

the vision of reality.



From The Teachings Of
HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Selected & Arranged By
HAZRAT PIR VILAYAT INAYAT KHAN

From stillness to surrender...

He will understand the real spirit of meditation when he understands that he has to do nothing at all, just to sit still physically, mentally, and emotionally.

For the moment he attempts to do anything, he intrudes his ego.

By sitting inwardly and outwardly still, he surrenders egoistic action and thereby implies that he is willing to surrender his little self to his Overself.

He shows that he is willing to step aside and let himself be worked upon, acted through, and guided by a higher power.



-- Notebooks Category 23: Advanced Contemplation >
Chapter 7: Contemplative Stillness > # 238
Paul Brunton

Religions and Philosophies...

People may ask you of what religion, you 'belong' to..

The key word is 'belong'..

They do not ask you of your philosophy..

Religions were invented as a means of controlling the minds and souls of humans..

The rulers of these religions control you by controlling your mind..

They present you with the whip of fear..

Your own mind becomes the warden of your thoughts..

The Hell that they threaten you with is filled with earthbound souls that know nothing of Light and Love..

Of course within this low frequency of vibration, you experience pain by the absense of Love..

They, therefore, seek to re-enter the Dream by entering the human hologram by permission of the egoic desire within the Hologram..

When Jesus would force these entities of thought to leave the bodies of the insane humans,

the entities of darkness would scream in fear of the state of non-love called Hell..

Before, You leave this body, know the map to Reality...


-thomas

Three different paths...

"There are three different paths to reach the ideal,

the path of 'I', the path of 'Thou', and the path of 'Thou and I'.

According to the first, all that is, has been, or ever will be, is I myself.

In other words, 'I am, I was, and I shall be, to all eternity.'

According to the second, 'Thou art, O Lord, and all is Thine.'

And according to the third, 'Thou art the Lord, and I am Thy servant or Thy son.'

In the perfection of any one of these three,

God is realised."




Sri Ramakrishna
Teachings of Sri Ramakrishna
Calcutta: Advaita Ashram, 1997, p. 31

self-identification...

Harmony between the inner and the outer is happiness.

On the other hand,

self-identification with the outer causes
suffering.



- Nisargadatta Maharaj

` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
"I Am That"
Talks with Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
The Acorn Press, 1973

Short sight and long sight...

There are two views of life, which represent two different temperaments, and which may be compared to short sight and long sight, to the view at short range and the view at long range.

The former notices in detail and sees closely into the facts of material life, and the latter touches the furthest horizon.



From The Teachings Of
HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Selected & Arranged By
HAZRAT PIR VILAYAT INAYAT KHAN

The principle of Consciousness...

It is not the five senses which know the world outside, since they are only instruments which the mind uses.

It is not even the intellect, since that merely reproduces the image formed out of the total sense reports.

They are not capable of functioning by themselves.

It is the principle of Consciousness which is behind both, and for which they are simply agents, that really makes awareness of the world at all possible.

It is like the sun, which lights up the existence of all things.



-- Notebooks Category 21: Mentalism > Chapter 1: The Sensed World > # 56
-- Perspectives > Chapter 21: Mentalism > # 33
Paul Brunton

Bob Dylan ... 'Ring them Bells'...

The Thinkers are Awakening...

I spoke of the advent of new readers of this website and the doubling of readers and yet today,

I see the increase in readership is now four times more..

What is happening?..

Is the world experiencing a rebirth ?..

Are these strange words and concepts beginning to make sense ?..

I often speak in poetic verse because discovering Truth often requires the Consciousness to rise above words and into Thought, Itself..

But, enough with numbers and let us speak of importance..

The Desire of mind is the self-imposed prison that you exist within.

You desire happiness through objects and people..

You are walking the wrong path..

Would you not be surprised to learn that Happiness only exists within the mind of non-desire ?..

Walk within this Dream without any desires and you will breathe easily and walk within Grace..

You are the Consciousness that has left Home for quite awhile..

Return Home, with nothing..

All will be given to You...


-thomas

Mireille Mathieu singing La Marseillaise (with lyrics) ...

The Source of All...

That which really is, as opposed to that which appears to be, behind all the countless objects of this varied universe, is one alone, beginningless, endless, the source of all, the parent of the "I"-consciousness.

This truth provides the final hope for man.

Somewhere along his way he will discover it, act upon it, and be redeemed.

This will be his last conversion, his final salvation, his best quest.

Then only will the horrors he has contributed to the race's history begin to fade out. All else is utopian chimera based upon wishful thoughts and fanciful imaginations.


-- Notebooks Category 1: Overview of the Quest >
Chapter 1: What the Quest Is > # 97
Paul Brunton

Being Present...

This is really a vast topic and nobody understands it completely and I am not pretending to. Nevertheless, I have, without any doubt, been ushered into a state of miraculously enlivened consciousness and feeling, which reverberates in the One Divine Being. Through the uniquely activated bliss that begins to manifest as this Awakened Heart Consciousness, you can actually begin to transform the lives of many people just by your simple human presence.

I don't know how this happens. There will always remain many unanswered questions, even when you have the greatest meditative experiences. Even when you seem to abide effortlessly in a blissful condition that never fluctuates, there are still lots of questions. And I think that's okay.

I don't think we need to answer all the questions. I think you need to be present as this unconditional awakening and immense feeling, and begin triggering the lives around you, begin triggering many people through simple human relationships, relationships that are no longer either simple or merely human."



Quotation taken from the talk, "Reverberations within the Void," a talk,
by David Spero

The illusion of the material world...

The key to understanding that the material world is an illusion is to know that
all objects including ourselves are unlimited numbers of atoms that are actually
quite far apart..

they are small galaxies that appear to come together to form
objects..

this is the belief that we have formed in our consciousness and the
limited ability of our human senses to see and feel only limited frequencies..

Once you have traveled beyond the frequencies of the material plane, you will
realize that it is all just a projection of our thoughts on a screen..

This is
why it is so important to surrender the ego, so that you can experience Reality
as it Truly Is...


- thomas

There is no gender within Light...

This Duality of positive and negative, up and down , male and female..

Electricity speaks to you of grounding and the potential of voltage..

Light shines within all sight..

This slim feeling of non-materialization..

You have no body to perceive and yet, You do..

How difficult for the mind to understand that it is just a projector of sight..

This river of Love that You swim within is intoxicating..

Wisdom flows within this water and fills Consciousness with entertainment..

How much longer will you remain asleep,

before You swim again ?...


-thomas

' Ring them Bells '...

The group of thinkers' grow larger..

In the last four days, the amount of readers of this website has more than doubled..

How and why, is this possible ?..

Has the consciousness within the illusion suddenly decided to Awaken and seek a path ?..

There are so many points of consciousness within seven billion humans..

Why do they reach out ?..

Perhaps, Freedom is the bell that rings within the mind..

I believe that I will post a song about the bell of freedom..

We seek freedom from being imprisioned within a construct of thought called ego..

Perhaps, being the 'prodigal son' has some bearing..

The Father and Son are One and the same said Jesus..

" The ones that come after Me will do greater works than Me",

said the Nazarene..

Will you call Jesus a Liar ?..

"I and the Father are One",

said Jesus..

Are You less than the words that He has spoken ?...


-thomas

Do not be troubled...

As the lotus does not touch the water, so do not let
the world enter your heart.

Being busy in the world
is no trouble unless you are troubled being busy.

Then the only trouble is the trouble.


- Papaji

` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
"The Truth Is"
Sri H.W.L. Poonja
Yudhishtara, 1995

The separate identity illusion...

If all that we see in dreams is we ourselves,

then why do we see ourselves even in dreams as an identity separate from all other things before us in the dream?

The answer is,

"Because the soul
is deluded by our external form, and it recognizes this picture as `I'.

All other images and forms manifesting before it in the dream stand in contrast to this `I'."



From The Teachings Of
HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Selected & Arranged By
HAZRAT PIR VILAYAT INAYAT KHAN

All are equal ...

To me all [persons] are equal. Differences in appearance and expression are there, but they do not matter. Just as the shape of a gold ornament does not affect the gold, so does man's essence remain unaffected.

There is absolutely no difference between me and others, except in my knowing myself as I am. I know it for certain and you do not. The difference is only in the mind and temporary. I was like you, you will be like me.

My self and your self are one. I know it, but you don't. That is all the difference - and it cannot last.



-Nisargadatta Maharaj from I Am That

Walking up to higher ground...

Van Morrison will sing to you of 'higher ground',

this is the awakening into Reality..

You will meet many invitations to test your ego daily..

When the arrows of ego attack you,

there will be no 'you' to feel pain..

In this state of Consciousness,

You witness the futile attack and feel compassion,

You see the pain within the egoic-actor..

Compassion is the state of Love..

Love is the state of no-ego..

If there is no self,

who am I ?..

I have already given you the answer...


-thomas

' Higher Ground '...

Life is an opportunity...

Life is an opportunity given to satisfy the hunger and thirst of the soul.

Bowl of Saki, by Hazrat Inayat Khan
Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:

And what is life? Life is an opportunity. To the optimistic person the opportunity is a promise, and for the pessimistic person this opportunity is lost. It is not that the Creator makes man lose it, but it is man who withdraws himself from the possibility of seizing the opportunity.

If there is something that can be accomplished today, we need not wait for it to be accomplished tomorrow. For life is an opportunity, and desire has the greatest power, and perfection is the promise of the soul. We seek perfection, because perfection is the ultimate aim and the goal of creation. The source of all things is perfect. Our source is perfect, our goal is perfect. And therefore every atom of the universe is working towards perfection, and sooner or later it must arrive at perfection consciously. If it were not so, you would not have read in the Bible, 'Be ye perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.'

Kabir, the great poet of India says, 'Life is a field and you are born to cultivate it. And if you know how to cultivate this field you can produce anything you like. All the need of your life can be produced in this field. All that your soul yearns after and all you need is to be got from the field, if you know how to cultivate it and how to reap the fruit.' But if this opportunity is only studied in order to make the best of life by taking all that one can take and by being more comfortable, that is not satisfying.

We must enrich ourselves with thought, with that happiness which is spiritual happiness, with that peace which belongs to our soul, with that liberty, that freedom, for which our soul longs; and attain to that higher knowledge which breaks all the fetters of life and raises our consciousness to look at life from a different point of view. Once a person has realized this opportunity he has fulfilled the purpose of Life.

Distinctive thought...

"The root of delusion comes from the mind And he who knows the inwardness of the mind Sees that the clear light within neither comes nor goes.

And when the mind that is deceived by the appearance of outward things Has discerned the nature of appearance, It knows that there is no distinction between appearance and the void.

Again when the mind discerns the nature of meditation It also discerns what is not meditation, And that there is no distinction between the two.

For distinctive thought is the root of delusion And such thought has never been of the ultimate truth."


- Milarepa

Existing within Now...

In this moment here and now, letting go of past and future, seeking the pure consciousness in itself, and not the identifications it gets mixed up with and eventually has to free itself from--

in this moment he may affirm his true being and ascertain his true enlightenment without referring it to some future date.


-Paul Brunton

Joe Cocker at Woodstock 1969...

It is monday night...

How many people are still awake within the darkness of discovery ?..

The 'Boob tube' is turned off and gentle music enters the Dream..

We keep watching the antics of the ego and laugh at the failings..

But, We also weap at the failings..

This is the 'Balance of Justice'..

This 'Duality Dream' is a painful Dream of opposite..

How can we continue to desire a Dream of Pain ?..

And yet, we do..

We desire the continuation of existence because we fear Nothingness..

What 'Gift' from the pain of existence has ever been given you ?..

'Pain' is the 'gift' that has been given to you, so that you will acknowledge the alarm and seek treatment..

If ego did not create Pain,

You would continue to be Lost...


-thomas

Worshiping Satan...

To Worship means to keep a Thought within the mind..

Keeping a Thought constant within the mind is our means of creation..

This is why Mantras' are used..

We as humans have been taught as children to believe that the false personality of thoughts and memories called ego is actually our Real Self...

Keeping this false personality within our mind is Worship of Satan (ego)...

We may not be aware that this ego is so evil but this can be Realized when we have abandoned the ego and can finally see the duality and pain that ego creates...

The sacrifices that we give to this false god of illusion called satan are the thoughts and actions of selfishness and non-Love that we daily take part in...

You cannot serve two masters..

Choose thoughts of selflessness and You will be Worshiping God(Divine Consciousness)(Reality)...

Choose thoughts of ego and you will be worshiping satan (Duality)(selfishness)..

As Gautama once said:" You are that which You think about all day"..

The purpose of the Spiritual Path is to learn that You are the Master of the Mind and You Create Reality..

The problem is that You as Consciousness believes that You are the body,mind,and ego..

As with all dreams, all You have to do is Wake Up...


- thomas

Christianity and Salvation...

First, we should define Christian..

A Christian is someone that is following a path towards Christ..

What is a Christ?..

It is someone that has conquered self-ishness and Realized that they are the Energy of Love..

A Mystic is someone that has surrendered the belief in separate egoic consciousness and Realized that they and God are One..

Salvation is the Realization that You and God have never separated but only the belief that You are separate(ego) keeps You from Salvation...


- thomas

' Tin Man '...

' Love '...

"Love becomes consciously infinite in being as well as in expression when the individual mind is transcended. Such love is rightly called divine, because it is characteristic of the God state in which all duality is finally overcome. In divine love, lust has completely disappeared. It does not exist even in latent form. Divine love is unlimited in essence and expression because it is experienced by the soul through the Soul itself.

"In the gross, subtle, and mental spheres, the lover is conscious of being separated from God, the Beloved; but when all these spheres are transcended, the lover is conscious of his unity with the Beloved. The lover loses himself in the being of the Beloved and knows that he is one with the Beloved. Divine love is entirely free from the thralldom of desires or the limited self. In this state of Infinity the lover has no being apart from the beloved: he is the Beloved Himself.

"One thus has God, as infinite Love, first limiting Himself in the forms of creation and then recovering his infinity through the different stages of creation. All the stages of God's experience of being a finite lover ultimately culminate in His experiencing Himself as the sole Beloved.

"The sojourn of the soul is a thrilling divine romance in which the lover — who in the beginning is conscious of nothing but emptiness, frustration, superficiality, and the gnawing chains of bondage — gradually attains an increasingly fuller and freer expression of love. And ultimately the lover disappears and merges in the divine Beloved to realize the unity of the lover and the Beloved in the supreme and eternal fact of God as infinite Love."



Meher Baba
Discourses
Myrtle Beach, SC: Sheriar Press, 7th rev. ed, pp. 402-403

Why is life so full of contradictions?...

It serves to break down mental pride.

We must realize how poor and powerless
we are.

As long as we delude ourselves
by what we imagine ourselves to be, to
know, to have, to do, we are in a sad
plight indeed.

Only in complete self-
negation there is a chance to discover
our real being.


- Nisargadatta Maharaj

` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `

"I Am That"
Talks with Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
The Acorn Press, 1973

" I am Awake...

The brahman Dona saw the Buddha sitting under a tree and was impressed
by his peaceful air of alertness and his good looks.

He asked the
Buddha:

"Are you a god?"

"No, brahman, I am not a god."

"Then an
angel?"

"No, indeed, brahman."

"A spirit, then?"

"No, I am not a
spirit."

"Then what are you?"

"I am awake."




-Anguttara Nikaya

Jivanmukta Realization...

When duality is blended with, and within, unity it is the true jivanmukta realization.

The One is then experienced as the Two but known to be really the One.


-Paul Brunton

Donovan...

Tomorrow is a new day...

Finish every day and be done with it.

You have done
what you could; some blunders and absurdities crept in;
forget them as soon as you can.

Tomorrow is a new day;

you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be
encumbered with your old nonsense.


- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Love is expansion...

"When you become more sensitive to the body, you have the impression that the inhalation-exhalation is no longer localised. It is all around you. It is important to see how we live mainly in our heads. Think with your whole body, feel with your whole body.

In the whole feeling, the global sensation, you go into your room and touch your whole room. You go outside and touch the clouds, the trees, the water. You do not live in isolation.

In your radiation you are in communion with all things. In this expansion there is no place for the ego because the ego is a contraction. Love is expansion, a feeling of spaciousness."


- Jean Klein

The ego vanishes...

During the gap--infinitesimal though it be--between two thoughts, the ego vanishes.

Hence it may truly be said that with each thought it reincarnates anew.

There is no real need to wait for the series of long-lived births to be passed through before liberation can be achieved.

The series of momentary births also offers this opportunity, provided a man knows how to use it.


-Paul Brunton

Saint Francis and Saint Clare..

FRANCIS OF ASSISI WAS BORN IN 1181 OR 1182 to Pietro Bernar­done, a wealthy cloth merchant, and his French wife Lady Pica. Pietro was away trading in France when his son was born and the child was christened Giovanni, but his father changed it to "Francesco" (the little Frenchman) on his return. Pietro had an affection for all things French, which Francis himself came to share: at his most joyful, he liked to improvise love songs in French and sing them to God. Francis was not much of a student, however, nor did he have any great enthusiasm for taking up his father's business.

In his youth Francis had a reputation as a playboy and a bon vivant, treating his friends to good times at his father's expense, though he was equally generous with the poor. He dreamed of distinguishing himself in battle, but at about age twenty he was taken prisoner in Perugia, and languished there ill for a year before being ransomed by his father. His convalescence back in Assisi was marked by uncertainty about his future, but eventually he made another attempt at a military career. This one ended when a dream turned him back to Assisi, and he withdrew from his former pleasures, embracing beggars and lepers and spending much of his time wandering the countryside in search of direction. He finally found it at a little, half-ruined church called San Damiano. Francis was kneeling before its Byzantine cross one day when suddenly the Lord spoke to him from it: "Francis, go and repair my house, which as you can see, is falling into ruin." Francis took this com­mand literally at first, and restored several derelict churches in the area before coming to understand that it was not churches he was meant to rebuild, but the Church itself.

The changes in Francis' life made him appear increasingly eccentric in the eyes of the citizens of Assisi. Relations with his father became more and more strained until eventually, humiliated and fed up, Pietro hauled his son before the Bishop of Assisi and demanded that he renounce his inheritance. Francis, in a gesture that has resonated through the centuries, took off his clothes before the bishop and assembled people. Handing what remained of his possessions to Pietro, Francis said, "Until now I have called you my father on earth, but from now on I desire to say only, 'Our Father who art in Heaven.'" The bishop took Francis under his care, and soon Francis was himself receiving followers, who joined him in renouncing worldly goods and nursing lepers, restoring churches and performing works of charity. Dressed in the clothing of beggars, Francis and his companions set out without money or supplies to preach repentance and the kingdom of God. The brothers took shelter where they could, and offered manual labor in exchange for food, but when work could not be found they accepted alms. The hunger, cold, sickness and the general physical misery they experienced were forgotten under the spell of Francis' charm. Their radical attempt to live the gospel initially made them objects of derision, but in time the scorn turned to respect and even veneration.

The movement grew rapidly: within ten years of having their Rule accepted by the Pope, they were able to draw some 5,000 friars and a further 500 aspirants to a Chapter held outside Assisi. The movement was widening as well. In 1212 Francis had received the vows of the eighteen-year-old Clare, who went on to found the Second Franciscan Order of Poor Ladies, known after her death as the Poor Clares. In 1221, the Rule of the Order of Penance or "Third Order" was accepted by the pope, opening the way for still greater growth by making room for people from all walks of life. Francis continued to travel around Italy exhorting the people, and ultimately traveled as far as Egypt where he preached the Christian faith to Sultan Malek al-Kamil. But by the time he returned to Italy, already infected with the trachoma that would leave him nearly blind, his Order was in disarray. Growth was making it increasingly difficult to remain true to the original vision of gospel simplicity, and the attempt to inject a bit of realism and prudence into the organization looked to Francis like compromise and betrayal. He resigned his head­ship of the Order and spent the remainder of his life trying to lead by example alone.

Like Christ himself, Francis alternated periods of preaching with times of seclusion and intense prayer. Two years before his death, he retired to Mount Alverna for forty days of prayer and fasting. Passing his time in solitude and meditation on the Passion of Christ, he asked two favors of the Lord: that he would know both the pain Jesus had experienced in his Passion, and the love that had compelled him to go through with it. This prayer was dramatically answered when Francis received the Stigmata: the five wounds of Christ's crucifixion impressed in his own flesh. His body already frail from poverty and self-denial, his eyes burning from trachoma, the Stigmata added to Francis' suffering. Yet he returned to Assisi and paid a visit to St. Clare at San Damiano where, in anguish and virtually blind, he dictated his magnificent hymn of praise, the Canticle of the Creatures. Less than a year later, Francis lay dying at the bishop's palace in Assisi. When the end was close, he asked to be taken back to the Portiuncula, the little chapel and settlement that was the cradle of his Order. There, faithful to Lady Poverty to the end, he lay naked on the ground surrounded by his brothers, and gave them his final exhortation: "I have done what was my duty to do-may Christ show you what is yours." He was taken at last by "Sister Death," whose praise he had sung in a verse added to the Canticle of the Creatures just before his death on October 3, 1226, at age forty-five. Francis was canonized by Pope Gregory IX in 1228, and his feast day is celebrated October 4th.

Saint Clare of Assisi (1193-1253)
Favarone and Ortulana, Clare's parents, were of the noble class in Assisi. Their inter-generational residence in the upper part of the town was adjacent to the Cathedral of San Rufino. When Clare was a small child, the political situation in Assisi became so dangerous for the women and children of the noble class that they fled to nearby Perugia. The merchant class of Assisi was forcing its way into power, thus crippling the feudal system. New city-states began forming throughout Italy. During the first decade of the thirteenth century, the social order in Assisi stabilized enough for the young Clare to return to the city with her mother and her two sisters.

Clare had made a private vow of virginity. A local nobleman, Lord Ranieri, testified that many knights had wished to marry the beautiful Clare, but she was determined to dedicate herself to the service of God by remaining in her home, living a life of prayer, and helping those most in need. She also decided to divest herself of her entire inheritance and to give the money to the poor. Francis had heard of Clare's holiness and she had heard Francis preach in the cathedral. Francis came to meet Clare and subsequently Clare, accompanied by a companion, met frequently with Francis.

Whatever happened between Francis and Clare, on Palm Sunday, 1212, Clare took a dramatic, irrevocable step on her spiritual journey. The noblewomen of Assisi, dressed in their finest clothing, paraded through the town to receive the blessed palms at the altar of the cathedral. Clare stood aside from this group. Nevertheless, Bishop Guido came to her and placed a palm in her hand. That night she slipped through the door of her family home and down the winding streets of Assisi to leave the town and to meet Francis at the Portiuncula. There he gave her the tonsure and a drab tunic as her religious garb. When the knights sought Clare the next day to carry her back home, she was found safe in the sanctuary of the Benedictine nuns at Bastia. After a week there, Francis and a few friars walked her to a residence of penitential women living at Panzo. After a few weeks, when all was in readiness for her life at San Damiano, the small church outside Assisi where Francis had received his call from God, she moved there with the women who chose to join her.

For forty years, Clare and the women lived a life of prayer and simplicity outside the city walls, close to leper colonies. These "Poor Ladies" strove to live the Gospels in a way that they had not been lived before. They did not "shirk deprivation, poverty, hard work, trial, or shame and the contempt of the world." Clare, like Francis, considered all persons to be equal. During her lifetime, her reputation became well known as a woman of prayer and one who possessed the gift of healing. A few of her writings remain that provide a glimpse of her rich spirituality. Clare modeled her life on the humanity of Jesus. By gazing upon the image of the crucified Christ, Clare came to identify with his poverty, and this became the foundation for her own practice of poverty. Because Jesus was born poor and naked in the crib and died poor and naked on the cross, the only way Clare knew to imitate him was to be poor also.

Francis of Assisi died the evening of October 3, 1226. The mourners carried his body to San Damiano on their way up the hill to Assisi so that Clare and the women might see his remains and bid him their last farewell. Clare lived for twenty-seven more years offering support and guidance to Francis' earliest companions. During those years she experienced tension with the papacy over the form of life she desired to live. Three different popes gave her "new rules" to live by. When Pope Innocent IV made an effort to give her a Rule in 1247 that did not include the Privilege of Poverty, she began to write her own form of life which was closer in spirit to that of Francis. Clare's form of life was finally approved while Clare lay on her deathbed in 1253. The Poor Clares today follow this Rule of Saint Clare.

-- from the Sisters of St. Francis, Rochester, MN

Emmy-Lou Harris...

Non-existence is Reality...

Emmy-Lou Harris sings of the green rolling hills of beauty..

Do you not see that she seeks a Heaven of beauty ?..

When we attempt to look for beauty , we look at Nature..

Because, Nature is God, It appears Beautiful..

Once again, we must look into the eyes of God..

At this point within the Illusion, you see from eyes of distortion..

You see the material instead of the invisible Thought..

You keep looking for mountains, when All is Light..

When 'You' Awaken,

'you', will no longer exist...


-thomas

Power, Wealth, and Fame...

These are the desires of humans that seek to be president of this nation..

Can you choose within these egoists ?..

Who lies to you the most ?..

Is the devil that we know, better than the devil that we do not know ?..

Why is it so difficult to find Love within humans that desire Power ?..

The egoic desire, desires nothing but self interest..

Life and Death do not matter to Egoic Power..

So many wars have been fought using your name..

Will you be fooled again this time by smiling faces and hugs ?..

Will you vote upon gender instead of comprehension ?..

I could write an hour about the illusion of egoic desire,

but, I will leave you with the desire to seek that which seeks only Truth...


-thomas

The God of four words...

Every
Child
Has known God,

Not the God of names,
Not the God of don’ts,
Not the God who ever does
Anything weird,

But the God who knows only four words.
And keeps repeating them, saying
“Come Dance with Me.”
Come
Dance


- Hafiz

` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
The Gift"
Translations by Daniel Ladinsky
Penguin/Arkana, 1999

The original state of wholeness...

Stand in your original state of wholeness, the state before you were
born when there was no knowledge "I am" and therefore no need or want of any kind.

All suffering
will end as soon as you stand in pure Awareness.


-Ramesh S. Balsekar

Consciousness is the Reality...

In the ordinary man's cosmic picture any one object is separate from any other object.

In the scientist's cosmic picture they are also separate, but intellectually he may have arrived at the point of holding them together in the idea that they are all different forms of one and the same ultimate Energy.

But this remains only an idea.

In the philosopher's picture, the ordinary man's and the scientist's are both included, but there is an addition, namely, he knows by his transcendental experience that these two are projections of Consciousness and that this Consciousness is the reality.


- Paul Brunton

Gary Clark Jr...

Intuition and Imagination...

In order to make the intuition clear,

the best thing is to stop the imagination.



From The Teachings Of
HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Selected & Arranged By
HAZRAT PIR VILAYAT INAYAT KHAN

Catch your thoughts...

Catch your thoughts and release them.

You don't need to bang them on the head and try to kill them before throwing them back.

You can just acknowledge each thought and then let it go.



- Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche

Total Presence is Required...

Presence is needed to become aware of the beauty, the majesty, the sacredness of nature.

Have you ever gazed up into the infinity of space on a clear night, awestruck by the absolute stillness and inconceivable vastness of it?

Have you listened, truly listened, to the sound of a mountain stream in the forest? Or to the song of a blackbird at dusk on a quiet summer evening?

To become aware of such things, the mind needs to be still.

You have to put down for a moment your personal baggage of problems, of past and future, as well as all your knowledge; otherwise, you will see but not see, hear but not hear. Your total presence is required.


- Eckhart Tolle, from Practicing the Power of Now,

Deep into the morning...

Why do I write deep into the darkness to speak of Light ?..

Time gives me the gift of forgetfulness..

Strength carries me on the journey..

The Spirit of Sleep keeps telling me that I must enter Her room..

Wakefulness tells Sleep that I now walk with Him..

How strange, that I find myself again within two divisions..

I know that I am the 'Observer',

but, I still play the role of seeker..

Perhaps, this is the problem that we,

that keep walking upon this road, face..


-thomas

To love your enemy...

Who is your enemy?..

It is the ego that does not agree with your ego..

this is
the life and activity of the ego..

do not expect it to be anything else..

It is
testing us and giving us the opportunity to surpass it and rise above it..

It is
doing the job that it has been assigned..

Are we doing the job that we have been
assigned?..

Our job is to extinguish our own illusion of ego..

Do not concern
yourself with the ego of others, that is their concern..

The ego is an illusion
of non-Reality, Unselfish Love is the only Reality..

This is the teaching of All
Spiritual Masters..

Love is the Recognition of the Divine within the illusion
that we call Creation..

Are we strong enough to be Humble?..

Are we strong
enough to be Christlike?..

Strength comes from Unselfish Love, Strength comes
from God...

It is your Free Will that decides what You entertain within Your
Mind..

Are the thoughts of Love or ego?..

Jesus found that Thoughts of Unselfish
Love quickly cause the ego to leave the mind and Peace and Understanding enter..

As Jesus said;" Those who have eyes to see, will see and
understand"...


- thomas

Crucifixion...

The eyes and skin appear different...

The Hologram presents many images to solve..

We, as Consciousness appear within many forms..

We see ourselves as different and yet seek Oneness..

Shall we wake up into Reality ?..

The ego speaks and says, that we are different and better than the others..

How much foolishness can we absorb without feeling fools..

By now, you have Awakened into the journey into intelligence..

Supreme Intelligence will lead you back Home..

What is Home ?..

I can only tell you that Home contains no thoughts of distinction of human..

There is no human within Home..

There is only Intelligence and Love..

There is no 'you',

There is only God...


-thomas

Intuition...

Intuition can be described as a glimpse of knowledge that one has stored within oneself, that comes at a time when it is needed.

It is a disclosure of one's own spirit that unveils all things.

It is by seeing the cause of every fault in oneself that one is able to have insight into human
nature.



From The Teachings Of
HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Selected & Arranged By
HAZRAT PIR VILAYAT INAYAT KHAN

' The Source '...

The shell must be cracked apart if what is in it is to come out, for if you want the kernel you must break the shell.

And therefore, if you want to discover nature's nakedness, you must destroy its symbols, and the farther you get in the nearer you come to its essence.

When you come to the One that gathers all things up into itself, there your soul must stay.



- Meister Eckhart

" I and the Father are One "...

In the early stages of enlightenment, the aspirant is overwhelmed by his discovery that God is within himself.

It stirs his intensest feelings and excites his deepest thoughts.

But, though he does not know it, those very feelings and thoughts still form part of his ego, albeit the highest part.

So he still separates his being into two--self and Overself.

Only in the later stages does he find that God not only is within himself but is himself.




-- Notebooks Category 23: Advanced Contemplation >
Chapter 7: Contemplative Stillness > # 300
Paul Brunton

Led Zeppelin...

' Stairway to Heaven '...

The singer tells you of the 'Long Path'..

This is the teaching of the major religions..

This is taught, to keep you locked within the prison of Reincarnation..

How can the 'ego' even achieve a state of Perfection ?..

The ego that travels within these mental dimensions is an illusion of desire,

Therefore, the ego is the Prisoner within the Prison of Desire and Confusion..

But, You Awakened a while ago and can see with new eyes..

You are watching the ego seek Freedom but can only help with words..

The ego must understand that as long as it desires existence,

it will remain trapped within desire..

As the Nazarene once said;

" Is it not written, that You are Gods "..

He was speaking of the ability to change the Dreams ..

He was speaking of returning to Reality by the path of wisdom..

As He also said;

"you must die, to be Born"...


-thomas

Each broken heart...

Heartsick, heartbroken -
To know love is to know pain.

What could be more common?

Even so, each broken heart
is so singular
That with it we probe the divine.


-Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi

Within the Dream ...

Persistent self-centered stories arise within the dream of thought, including stories about being a victim, being unloved or unworthy and a host of other stories. The list is endless. These stories are triggered in everyday experiences and relationships. There is a tendency to try to fix these storylines through thinking, mental analysis, strategies or self-help techniques. But thinking is precisely the cause of these stories. The stories are just “me” thoughts entertained on a regular basis.
Spiritual awakening is not about fixing thought-created problems with the same mind that creates the problems. You cannot fix the dream from within the dream. Awakening is available only when there is a seeing of what you are beyond these stories.

“Beyond” is such a funny word because it sounds as if you have to find some place “beyond” where you are now—some future moment. That just is not true. “Beyond” means that there is an awareness right here, right now—prior to each of these stories. This awareness is here regardless of whether there is thinking or no thinking. In fact, this awareness is what allows thinking to arise.

By simply noticing the stories when they arise, and resting as the awareness that is looking at those stories, the stories lose their power. It is realized that what you are is already free of the stories. No amount of thinking about thinking can provide that degree of clarity and peace.



Scott Kiloby,
Reflections of the One Life:
Daily Pointers to Enlightenment

The true self of man...

The true self of man is hidden in a central core of stillness, a central vacuum of silence.

This core, this vacuum occupies only a pinpoint in dimension.

All around it there is ring of thoughts and desires constituting the imagined self, the ego.

This ring is constantly fermenting with fresh thoughts, constantly changing with fresh desires, and alternately bubbling with joy or heaving with grief.

Whereas the centre is forever at rest, the ring around it is never at rest;

whereas the centre bestows peace, the ring destroys it.


-Paul Brunton

James Taylor...

The snow has melted ...

The freezing of life and the material experience has returned to the state of life called new creation..

It is the 'State' beyond thirty-two degrees and below two hundred and twelve degrees fahrenheit..

The human hologram exists between these degrees of frequency..

Your life is so fragile and that is why you seek 'security of life'..

This is the bait that has trapped you..

You give the reward of your labor to those that promise you this dream..

The only safety within Existence is Knowledge..

To Know the end of the 'Story' is Knowledge..

You must first discover if You are the Hologram or the Observer of the Hologram..

It is the meaning of Life..

The rest of this discovery is left to you..

I leave this discovery to you because,

You desired adventure...


-thomas

Do people speak to each other ?...

Perhaps, we are talked out..

Perhaps, we have found that listening brings more knowledge..

Perhaps, the hopium of Knights on White Horses do not amaze us anymore..

Perhaps, Truth and Reality needs no words but only thoughts..

Perhaps, Fear of speaking and being mocked forces the ego to be silent..

There are so many 'Perhaps',

Perhaps, that is why I only write a paragraph...



-thomas

Alan Watts ...

Living skillfully in the world...

Whatever comes, let it come, what stays let stay, what goes
let go, always keep quiet, and always adore Self:

This is the
essence of living skillfully in the world of appearance.

During
all activities of life always know that you are the Self.

The
way to live a happy beautiful life is to accept whatever comes
and not care about what does not come.


- Papaji

` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `

Sri H.W.L. Poonja
Yudhishtara, 1995

Cause and Effect...

The universe is like a dome; it vibrates to that which you say in it, and answers the same back to you; so also is the law of action we reap what we sow.

Bowl of Saki, by Hazrat Inayat Khan
Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:

Every thing and being on the surface of existence seem separate from one another, but in every plane beneath the surface they approach nearer to each other, and in the innermost plane they all become one. Every disturbance therefore, caused to the peace of the smallest part of existence on the surface, inwardly affects the soul. Thus any thought, speech or action that disturbs peace is wrong, evil, and a sin; if it brings about peace it is right, good, and a virtue. Life being like a dome, its nature is also dome-like. Disturbance of the slightest part of life disturbs the whole and returns as a curse upon the person who caused it; any peace produced on the surface comforts the whole, and thence returns as peace to the producer.

Man forms his future by his actions. His every good or bad action spreads its vibrations and becomes known throughout the universe. The more spiritual a man is, the stronger and clearer are the vibrations of his actions, which spread over the world and weave his future. The universe is like a dome: it vibrates to that which you say in it, and echoes the same back to you. So also is the law of action: we reap what we sow.

The picture itself inspires the painter. As it progresses he sees that in a certain place there ought to be a different color. This is not right; that is not right, and so on. And as he looks at the picture, he sees its faults, and so he alters it here and there. So it is with each life. ... As we sow, so we reap. All that we do, we see in its reaction, and the reaction changes our life. The painter sees he must finish the picture differently, and so our actions tell us whether we ought to act differently.

The source of wisdom and power...

The source of wisdom and power, of love and beauty, is within ourselves, but not within our egos.

It is within our consciousness.

Indeed, its presence provides us with a conscious contrast which enables us to speak of the ego as if it were something different and apart:

it is the true Self whereas the ego is only an illusion of the mind.



-- Notebooks Category 8: The Ego >
Chapter 1: What Am I? > # 2
Paul Brunton

Time...

Time is only a concept.

The future moves into the past leaving no time for the present.

When the relativity of time is understood as merely a concept for the measurement of apparent change,

then there is only the present moment, which is eternity itself.


-A Net of Jewels
Ramesh S. Balsekar

The liberation of the mind...

"Once you know your mind and its miraculous powers, and remove what poisoned it-

-the idea of a separate and isolated person--

you just leave it alone to do its work among things for which it is well suited.

To keep the mind in its own place and on its own work is the liberation of the mind."


-Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

The Infinite...

All things - all beings and all activities, no matter how ordinary - are equal expressions of the Infinite. There is no more or less Infinite, no higher or lower Infinite. Therefore, all attempts to either find or hold onto the Infinite are based in illusion. And illusion itself is none other than the Infinite.

The Infinite uses all measures in order to awaken in all the various forms in existence. It uses birth, life, death, happiness, sorrow, clarity, and delusion in order to awaken.

All of your seeking is in reality the activity of the Infinite as well. No matter how far astray or deluded you become, you can never get a single step away from the Infinite's embrace.

If you could all at once stop believing your dreaming mind and be completely still right in the midst of your present state, the Infinite would effortlessly present itself.


- Adyashanti

' Jackson Browne...

These Days...

Living in a world of conflict, hatred, greed, and constant warfare,

It is easy to find oneself within a bubble of solitude..

The world wants you to feel alone.

The egoic-desire wants a separation called 'false self'.

It is false because it is not Real and contains nothing but the thought of adventure..

It is a Dream and journey into the fantasy of Non-Love..

We find Self trapped within the false-self, waiting to Awaken from the Dream.

Few of us Awaken because the sub-conscious mind has been controlled by 'Desire'..

The sub-conscious mind is your Soul.

Desire is the generator of Dreams..

Desire is the bait within the prison of Reincarnation..

Love is the only guide to free You from this Prison and Dream..

But, you have been told this,

many times before...


-thomas

The Beloved...

"The Beloved is all in all, the lover only veils Him;
The Beloved is all that lives, the lover a dead thing.

When the lover feels no longer Love's quickening,
He becomes like a bird who has lost its wings. Alas!

How can I retain my senses about me,
When the Beloved shows not the light of His countenance?

Love desires that this secret should be revealed,
For if a mirror reflects not, of what use is it?

Knowest thou why thy mirror reflects not?
Because the rust has not been scoured from its face.

If it were purified from all rust and defilement,
It would reflect the shining of the Sun of God.

O friends, ye have now heard this tale,
Which sets forth the very essence of my case."



Rumi
_The Masnavi_, Book I, Prologue
Translated and abridged by E.H. Whinfield, [1898]

The Seer's Discernment...

The seer's discerning of the condition of those before him and away from him is likened to the process of eating and digesting.

The mouth distinguishes between sweet and sour, vegetable and cereal, but once food is swallowed, then what is felt about it is the feeling, not the outer distinctions but the inner essence.

Therefore the seer re-analyzes something which the person whom he sees has analyzed with his mind.

He becomes one with another person, experiencing
what his mind has experienced, and likewise with his soul.



From The Teachings Of
HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Selected & Arranged By
HAZRAT PIR VILAYAT INAYAT KHAN

Abandon memories and expectations...

Your mind is steeped in the habits of evaluation and acquisition, and will not admit that the incomparable and unobtainable are waiting timelessly within your own heart for recognition.

All you have to do is to abandon all memories and expectations.

Just keep yourself ready in utter nakedness and nothingness.



- Nisargadatta Maharaj, from I Am That

The obsession of self...

What's forgotten is that state of simplicity. That paradox of the immensity of existence, of life here and now. The fullness of it and the absolute emptiness of it. It's that quiet immensity. I was reading an old journal of mine from the mid 1980's and in it was this wonderful quote from, actually quite a few wonderful quotes from Thomas Merton that I had written down.

I used to love reading Thomas Merton. But he had this very beautiful, this one line this one description and he called it the abyss of freedom. And I loved that because he's linking that very paradoxical words that only someone who's experienced that abyss of freedom will know what he is talking about. That abyss of freedom.

Everybody wants freedom, not everybody wants the abyss. The emptiness of freedom. The disappearance to just a simplicity, a quietness that takes paradoxically because I am speaking but takes the words away from us. In other words takes away the inner dialog away from us and we actually begin to live in that abyss of freedom rather than to talk to ourselves about that.

And so when you stop looking in the high places for truth but look in the low places, the places that are obscure, the places where nobody pays any attention. That's where you'll find what you are. That's where it will become obvious. When you start to pay attention to what you don't usually pay attention to, what's quiet.

Not clamoring inside of you for attention. What's not insisting. What's not trying to take some sort of spiritual stance. That in you which does not have a theology whether it's dualistic or nondualistic. That simplicity. That very simple shining emptiness. Very easy to forget that that's what its about. That's what brings self-liberation. That's what takes us beyond our own self-obsession. Wakes us up from the dream cause that's the awakening.

Suddenly you're awake from the dream of being obsessed with yourself. Past, future. You awaken even from the obsession with being a self. Because that's all being a self is, it's an obsession. One thought obsessing on another thought obsessing on another thought obsessing on another thought until it spins the illusion of a self into existence.


-Adyashanti, Mount Madonna retreat 2009

Ending Karma...

Whoever acts by becoming so pliable as to let the Overself hold his personal will, must necessarily become inwardly detached from the personal consequences of his deeds.

This will be true whether those consequences be pleasant or unpleasant.

Such detachment liberates him from the power of karma, which can no longer catch him in its web, for "he" is not there.

His emotional consciousness preceding an action is always enlightened and characterized by sublime composure, whereas the unenlightened man's may be characterized by motivations of self-centered desire, ambition, fear, hope, greed, passion, dislike, or even hate--all of which are karma-making.


-Paul Brunton

So, I could find my way...

We are Dreams from the mind of God...

When you read this blog, you will encounter words unknown to you..

Do not run away, the meanings will become apparent..

I speak of Duality and the Dream of separation..

Therefore, We will enter your sub-conscious mind of memory..

The sub-conscious mind forgets nothing, It is your Soul..

The Soul is the Dream from Divine Consciousness that desires entertainment..

You, pretending to be separate and a character called ego is found within this Play..

This word 'Play' as used within childish movement and Dramatic Theater is the Dream..

So let us see and be seen within this 'Play'..

Our time upon the stage is short..

After eighty years the body begins to dissolve into Nothingness..

We came from Nothingness and will return to Nothingness..

We are Dreams from the mind of God...


-thomas

Pure Wakefulness...

The experience of the non-dual awareness of rigpa is quite wonderful. It is freedom from the restless striving of the samsaric mind.

It is not a dull peace, but the opposite. It is pure wakefulness. It is light, open, radiant, and blissful.

When we are no longer preoccupied with self-centered pursuits based on the insecurities of the illusory self and its desires and aversions, the world arises in the purity of the natural state in a vivid, pristine display of beauty.

For the practitioner stable in rigpa, all experiences arise as an ornamentation of the nature of mind, rather than as a problem or delusion.



- Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche, from The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep, posted to DailyDharma

The Real Present...

There is the real present but there is also the illusory present.

To live in the past is to die,

to live in the future is to dream,

but to live in the real present is to be awake, enlightened.




-- Notebooks Category 19: The Reign of Relativity >
Chapter 4: Time, Space, Causality > # 142
Paul Brunton

The Anti-Christ...

To achieve the level of Christhood, you must defeat your Ego and
become the opposite of Ego , which is Love..

the Supreme
Intelligence is composed of Love..

Therefore, the Anti-Christ has
always been with us,

It is the selfish ego that most of us still

worship everyday...


- thomas

' Walk with Us'...

Rumi and Jesus walk with Me into the light of Consciousness..

We see no difference between One..

Love appears to be a 'Play' of Thought..

To see one, you must see the other..

Why does Love desire to see the opposite ?..

Perhaps, a mirror asks, "why does it exist?"..

We walk within words and speech, wondering if anyone is listening..

He walked upon water, I only walk upon soil, but, We wear the same shoes..

The purpose of these words are to Awaken you..

We ring the bell..

If you have grown tired of Lies,

walk with us...


-thomas

The Breathe of Life and Death...

Leonard Cohen, the poet and author of the words and song called Hallelujah..

I have already spoken to you of the meaning of the word..

Why do I revisit this road and continue to walk?..

This 'Breathe' of life and death is a powerful teacher..

We continue to move within illusions and try our best, not to think of the future..

But, the past and future continue to haunt us..

Fear is the King that lives within past and future..

Reality is Now..

Keep your mind within this moment..

Do you sense Freedom ?..

Keep your mind within this moment falling into minutes,

do you not feel Eternal Freedom ?.

Within hours,

You will be a Saint...




-thomas

Leonard Cohen...

Two different roads...

"Piousness and the path of love are two different roads.

Love is the fire that burns both belief and non-belief.

Those who practice love have neither religion nor caste."




-Abu Saeed Abil-Kheir
Nobody, Son of Nobody: Poems of Shaikh Abu Saeed Abil-Kheir
Renditions by Vraje Abramian
Prescott, AZ: Hohm Press, 2001, p. 9

' You '...

Lord, you exist
as me. Your power moves,
and I start walking.


A prior impulse is the only difference
between us.

Other than that,
everything I am, is You.



- Lalla
14th Century North Indian mystic

` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `

From "Naked Song"
Versions by Coleman Barks
Maypop, 1992

Sometimes...

Sometimes I feel like a king,
sometimes I moan in my own prison.

Swaying between these states,
I can't be proud of myself.

This "I" is a figment of my imagination.



- Rumi

What is in the Garden ?...

Van Morrison sings you words of wisdom,

he speaks of the 'Holy Spirit'..

The 'religions' do not teach you much of the Holy Spirit..

That is done for a nefarious reason that the teachers do not discover..

Therefore, we will walk beyond the standing teachers..

When entering Reality, you are entombed within a sphere of non-egoic energy called Love..

This second of time between Darkness and Light is quite a trip..

This Energy of Light and Love is called the 'Holy Spirit'..

There is so much Energy within 'Spirit', that the body is thrown upon the ground..

You awaken as Light, Love, and Consciousness..

"What a Dream", You exclaim, and then begin to relax within the flowing Energy of Love and Light..

How strange, that an Energy and Flow of Wisdom enters the Circle..

This is why, You are experiencing the Dream,

You desire Entertainment within sleep...


-thomas

' In the Garden '...

" I and the Father are One"...

What shall we speak of while within snow and frigid temperatures?..

We could speak of the weather as two souls that fear connection..

We could speak of the desire and hope of the future..

Or, we could be brave enough to speak of the unknown..

We speak to each other and to God as an outsider..

And yet the words of the Nazarene stay within your mind,

" I and the Father, are One"..

Do you actually believe that He is the only Child of God ?..

You must believe this myth as you have made my friend a God..

He also said that those that come after Him will do greater works..

How do I dare to speak of God in such a familiar manner?..

Perhaps, it is because,

" I and the Father are One "...


-thomas

A stage of evolution...

There is a stage of evolution in one's life when one arrives at a state when every question in answered by the life around him.

The answer to his question comes as the re-echo of the very question.

For every thought of a sage, everything becomes an accommodation, to help it to resound; and in this resonance there is an answer. In point of fact the answer is in the question itself.



From The Teachings Of
HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Selected & Arranged By
HAZRAT PIR VILAYAT INAYAT KHAN

The ego is a Dream...

There is only one mind and all such names as cosmic mind, over-mind, and so forth are merely imperfect and partial concepts of that ultimate single mind which philosophy puts forth in order to help students advance to a higher stage.

These concepts are not false, however. They represent aspects of the same ultimate mind as seen from different standpoints. As these standpoints are not the highest they do not yield the final truth. It will be well therefore for him to accustom himself to the highest standpoint and to remember always that there is but one mind, one reality, one principle, one substance, one being only.

All things are forms or shapes which it appears to take temporarily. The key to the understanding of these admittedly difficult points is to think of the universe seen during dream and then to remember that that universe itself, its seas and continents, its peoples and animals, its happenings in time, its distances in space, do not exist apart from the mind of the dreaming person;

that even if millions of people exist within that universe they are nothing else than ideas passing through the mind of the dreamer; and that their ultimate stuff or reality is mind although to the dreamer they appear real, as do also water, fire, gas, and even the ninety-odd chemical elements.

Now he must try to regard the waking universe in the same way, with this difference: that because the ego is one of the dreamed-of figures in the waking dreams it must be eliminated if one is to break through the dream and ascertain that it is a dream in the universal mind.


-Paul Brunton

Sharing Truth is not a competition...

If we are always trying to be "clever" and show off our knowledge, and one-up the insights or wisdom that are coming through another, we are not really interested in the truth. We are interested in getting attention.

We make the mistake of thinking that wisdom belongs to someone. But wisdom does not belong to anyone because it belongs to everyone!

We all already have all the wisdom we will ever need. So it is not really a question of us "giving someone else the truth" anyway. When we hear someone else speak wisdom, we recognize it precisely because it is already within us. Otherwise, we would never even be able to hear it.

It does not really matter who speaks the truth. We can be very glad when we hear someone else speak with wisdom. We can rejoice in that. It is beautiful. There is no need to be jealous at all and try to compete with the truth speaker. Sharing truth is not a competition.

A lover of the truth will love the truth and rejoice when it is shared, no matter what mouth-piece it comes through.


-Francis Bennett

The Gospel of Thomas...

These are the secret sayings that the living Jesus spoke and Didymos Judas
Thomas recorded.
1
And he said, "Whoever discovers the interpretation of these sayings will not
taste death."
2
Jesus said, "Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find.
2
When
they find, they will be disturbed.
3
When they are disturbed, they will marvel,
4
and will rule over all."
3
Jesus said, "If your leaders say to you, 'Look, the (Father's) imperial rule is
in the sky,' then the birds of the sky will precede you.
2
If they say to you, 'It is
in the sea,' then the fish will precede you.
3
Rather, the (Father's) imperial rule
is inside you and outside you.
4
When you know yourselves, then you will be
known, and you will understand that you are children of the living Father.
5
But
if you do not know yourselves, then you live in poverty, and you are the
poverty."
4
Jesus said, "The person old in days won't hesitate to ask a little child seven
days old about the place of life, and that person will live.
2
For many of the first
will be last,
3
and will become a single one."
5
Jesus said, "Know what is in front of your face, and what is hidden from you
will be disclosed to you.
2
For there is nothing hidden that won't be revealed.


- Thomas the Apostle

Stand...

Waiting is futile...

All waiting is futile. To depend on time to solve our problems is self-delusion. The future, left to itself merely repeats the past. Change can only happen now, never in the future.

Action delayed is action abandoned. There may be other chances for other actions, but the present moment is lost, irretrievably lost. All preparation is for the future - you cannot prepare for the present.

Once you realize that the body depends on the mind, and the mind on consciousness, and consciousness on awareness, and not the other way round, your question about waiting for self-realization till you die is answered. It is not that you must be free from the "I-am-the-body" idea first, and then realize the self.

It is definitely the other way round - you cling to the false because you do not know the true. Earnestness, not perfection, is a precondition to self-realization. Virtues and powers come with realization, not before.


-Nisargadatta Maharaj from I Am That

The Short Path...

Recognition is a prominent feature on the Short Path.

The Overself is always there but only those on the Short Path recognize this truth and think accordingly.

The world is always with us, but only those on the Short Path recognize the miracle that it is.

In moments of exaltation, uplift, awe, or satisfaction--derived from music, art, poetry, landscape, or otherwise--thousands of people have received a Glimpse; but only those on the Short Path recognize it for what it really is.



— Notebooks Category 23: Advanced Contemplation >
Chapter 1: Entering the Short Path > # 114
Paul Brunton

Conscious will...

As long as you believe that you have conscious will—the ability to choose—then the spiritual search will continue. The mind believes that it can make choices and exercise control in an effort to bring about future results. The future result could be a “better you,” a new car, or even enlightenment.

This belief in conscious will keeps you searching like a hamster on a wheel. The mind is looking for some future moment. Searching is mind movement towards future. It is based on the idea that you can choose to take action now in order to bring about something later. Is that idea true? Can you know what your next thought, emotion, or body movement will be before it arises? If you cannot, do you really have the ability to choose?

There is nothing you can do to reach enlightenment. But you can notice what is already being done. Thoughts, emotions, reactions and body movements are happening beyond your control. These things are a product of your genetics and conditioning.

Notice that life is already happening and that you have no choice in the way it happens. Paradoxically, in seeing that there is no free will, real freedom is possible. This is the freedom to be who you are right now and to allow life to happen exactly the way it is happening. That realization ends the search permanently.



-Scott Kiloby, Reflections of the One Life: Daily Pointers to Enlightenment

What is it like to live an awakened life? ...

While the world is trying to solve its problems and everyone around you is engaged in the same, you’re not. While everybody around you is trying to figure it out, trying to arrive, trying to “get there,” trying to be worthy, you’re not. While everyone thinks that awakening is a grand, noble, halo-enshrouded thing, for you it’s not. While everybody is running from this life right now, in this moment, to try to get there, you’re not. Where everybody has an argument with somebody else, mostly everybody else, starting with themselves, you don’t. Where everybody is so sure that happiness will come when something is different than it is now, you know that it won’t. When everybody else is looking to achieve the perfect state and hold on to it, you’re not.

When everybody around you has a whole host of ideas and beliefs about a whole variety of things, you don’t. Everyone on the path is getting there; you haven’t gotten anywhere. Everyone is climbing the mountain; you’re selling hiking boots and picks at the foot in the hope that if they climb it and come back down, they may be too exhausted to do it again. When everybody else is looking to the next book, to the next teacher, to the next guru to be told what’s real, to be given the secret key to an awakened life, you’re not. You don’t have a key because there’s not a lock to put it in.

When you’re living what you are in an awakened way, being simply what you’ve always been, you’re actually very simple. You basically sit around wondering what all the fuss is about.

When everyone is sitting around saying, “I hope that happens to me,” you remember when you did that. You remember that you didn’t find a solution to that. You remember that the whole idea that there was a problem created all of that.

When you’re being what you are, when you’re living the awakened life, there’s nobody to forgive, because there’s no resentment held, no matter what.

The truth of your being doesn’t crave happiness; it could actually care less. It doesn’t crave love, not because you are so full of love, but because it just doesn’t crave love. It’s very simple. It doesn’t seek to be known, regarded highly, or understood. When you’re living what you are in an awakened way, there’s no ideal for you anymore. You’ve stepped off the entire cycle of suffering, of becoming; you’re not interested.

It’s a curious life you find yourself in. You find yourself… where you are. Not where I am, where you are. Where you really are. Where we really are. It’s a curious place to be (especially in the beginning) not to be driven by anything—pleasure or displeasure, helping or hurting, loving or hating. The only thing that will move you (and I don’t mean to be too poetic about this) is the same thing that moves a leaf hanging from a tree. It’s simply because the breeze blows that way. So you always know what to do: The breeze blows that way, and that’s the way you go. You don’t ask questions anymore. You don’t evaluate why the breeze is blowing that way because you know that you don’t know why. And you know you can’t know why. There’s never been a leaf anywhere that knows why the wind blows that way on that day at that moment. That breeze changes the orientation of your life, moment to moment to moment, simply because that’s the way life’s moving. And when you’re living in your awakened self you have no argument with the way it’s moving because it is the same as you are.

And you know that the breeze was always there, from the very beginning, and that it wasn’t reserved for special people. If you didn’t notice it at some point in your life, you know it was because you weren’t listening, or because you thought you had to figure something out before you could listen, or because you thought there had to be some conclusion before you could just listen so deeply, so without agenda, so without hope of a better future that you would feel the movement.

Many of you know what I’m speaking of.

Truth never explains why it’s moving that way at that moment. And if you ask, it won’t give any information. It would be like a leaf asking the wind, “Why are you moving that way right now?” The question doesn’t make any sense to the wind.

But your argument with the way the truth would move—whatever that way is—is no longer there for you. You’re no longer arguing with it. You’re no longer trying to figure it out. Mother Mary didn’t figure it out. Buddha didn’t figure it out. Ramana didn’t figure it out. None of them figured it out. They just became That. Simple. Ordinary—in the same way a leaf is ordinary.

When you’re living in your awakened being and living in an awakened way, power on any level is not an issue for you. It’s not interesting. The power to control another human being is not interesting. Intellectual power is not interesting. The power to control yourself is not interesting. The power that people want to give you is not interesting to you—not because it shouldn’t be; it’s just not. What would you want to do with it? You see that there’s nothing you want to do with it.

You realize, in the truth of your being, that you are the totality itself, but you have no interest whatsoever in doing anything with that knowledge, with using that knowledge.

Finally, you realize that you really don’t want to change anybody, not because you shouldn’t want to change them, because you just don’t. You might not want to be around everyone, but still you don’t want to change them.

None of this is an ideal—it’s the end of ideals. None of this is holiness; it’s the end of holiness. It’s the beginning of wholeness. None of this is something to achieve, because it’s not achievable. It’s simply what is in the truth of your being. It’s just what is. You can’t attain what’s naturally so. And nobody anywhere can ever tell you when or why, or to what degree you’ll let go of untruth; you will let go when you let go, usually when nothing else works.

When you’re living in the awakened way, in the awakened being that you are, you’re alone, and you’re finally comfortable with it. You’re alone, but you’re not lonely at all, because the only one who was ever supposed to meet you where you are—the only one who ever could meet you where you are one hundred percent—was you. Nobody else could ever fully meet you where you are—maybe ninety percent, maybe ninety-five. Nobody can meet you fully but you. When you finally do, then you don’t need anybody else to do it for you. Then you’re alone, more alone than you could ever imagine. And strangely—very strangely—you are more connected, more intimate, more at one with everything. More. And you would have never thought that those two could in any way be together: total aloneness and total oneness. You would have never guessed that that’s the way it would end up. But it does, and it always has.

And finally, when you’re just living in the awakened way that you really are, you’ll never form an image again of what it’s like. Even as it’s happening, you won’t form an image because you’ll know they’re all images, dust. The way it was yesterday won’t be the way it is today...


- Adyashanti..

' The Cowboy Junkies '...

Living in a Nightmare...

So many young humans that speak to me of no fear of death..

Has life become so painful and stressful, that the soul desires death?..

Perhaps, these thoughts of non-existence are good..

Do they prepare the 'soul' to the sacrifice of 'attachment' ?..

You, mystics ride within these thoughts..

I speak directly to Heart..

Is there anything else within Heart but the Energy of Love?..

"Love is the strange word that we ascribe to the desire of want and happiness"..

How can we relieve ourselves of want?..

This is the 'Question' that has always been presented to you..

What is your answer ?...


-thomas

The Highest Perfect Knowledge...

"Even the smallest thing is not known or perceived there,

therefore it is called the highest perfect knowledge.

Free from self, free from being, free from life, free from personality,

that highest perfect knowledge is always the same...."


-Gautama the Buddha
VAGRAKKHEDIKA or The DIAMOND-CUTTER, 22-23

The Tao...

Returning is the motion of the Tao.

Yielding is the way of the Tao.

The ten thousand things are born of being.

Being is born of not being.


- Lao-tzu

` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` ` `
Tao Te Ching
Translation by Gia-fu Feng and Jane English
Vintage Books Edition, September 1989

The sacrifice of self...

The wise man, by studying nature, enters into unity through its variety, and realizes the personality of God by sacrificing his own.

Bowl of Saki, by Hazrat Inayat Khan
Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:

It may be said that the personality of a man is quite comprehensible, since his actions exhibit him as a single individual, whereas God's personality has no clear identification of its own. The answer is, that variety covers unity.

Hidden things are manifested by their opposites, but as God has no opposite He remains hidden. God's light has no opposite in the range of creation whereby it may be manifested to view. (Jalaluddin Rumi)

The wise man by studying nature enters into the unity through its variety, and realizes the personality of God by sacrificing his own. 'He who knows himself knows Allah' (Islamic Saying). 'The Kingdom of God is within you' (Bible). 'Self-knowledge is the real wisdom' (Vedanta).

Life starts by distinguishing between the two; life starts us in this way. If we did not distinguish between the two and we arrived at that conception of unity of which I have spoken, we would be missing a great deal in life. It is after distinguishing these that, without becoming congested, we may come to the idea of unity which raises us above it all. For instance, when a person says, 'I will not look at the fault of another' and closes his eyes, he has missed a great deal. But the one who has seen it and risen above it has really closed his eyes; he is the person who deserves to close his eyes from the other side.

The purpose of our life on earth is to come and see all the distinctions and all the differences, but not to be congested by them and so to be thrown downwards. We should go on rising above them all, at the same time experiencing them all. For instance a man may say, 'I have never thought about anyone who has done me any good, and I have never considered any harm that has ever come to me from anyone; I have always had just that one idea before me and after that idea I kept going'. He may be advanced, he may be spiritual, he may be pious, and yet he has missed a great deal. But the one who has received all the good that has come to him with grateful thanks and felt it, and who has also felt the harm done to him and forgiven and pardoned it, he is the one who has seen the world and is going beyond with success.

The meaning of Hallelujah...

Hallelujah is the sound of the last breath of life before You enter Divine Consciousness..

It is a statement of One Word that signifies surrender and Love..

It is the end of the Dream of separation and egoic desire..

It is the agreement between illusion and Truth..

It is returning Home..

The rest of this journey is found within Love..

The Path beyond is completed by the Realisation that You,

are what you have always sought..

That Reality called Truth...


-thomas

Hallelujah...

Truth always existed...

"What we now call the Christian religion existed amongst the ancients,

and was from the beginning of the human race,

until Christ Himself came in the flesh;

from which time the already existing true religion began to be styled Christian"



-Retract., I, xiii, 3
St. Augustine of Hippo

Look within...

It is by seeing the cause of every fault in oneself that one is able to have insight into human nature.


From The Teachings Of
HAZRAT INAYAT KHAN

Selected & Arranged By
HAZRAT PIR VILAYAT INAYAT KHAN

The Grace of the Short Path...

The virtues he attempted to acquire on the Long Path,

and too often attempted in vain,

come to him of themselves by the magical grace of the Short Path.




— Notebooks Category 23: Advanced Contemplation >
Chapter 1: Entering the Short Path > # 161
Paul Brunton

Attachment breeds fear...

I have no shape, nor name. It is attachment to a name and shape that breeds fear. I am not attached. I am nothing, and nothing is afraid of no thing. On the contrary, everything is afraid of Nothing, for when a thing touches Nothing, it becomes nothing.

Reality is neither subjective nor objective, neither mind nor matter, neither time nor space. These divisions need somebody to whom to happen, a conscious separate centre. But reality is all and nothing, the totality and the exclusion, the fullness and the emptiness, fully consistent, absolutely paradoxical. You cannot speak about it, you can only lose your self in it. When you deny reality to anything, you come to a residue which cannot be denied.

No relation [between Reality and its expressions]. In Reality, all is real and identical. As we put it, saguna and nirguna are one in Parabrahman. There is only the Supreme. In movement, it is saguna. Motionless, it is nirguna. But it is only the mind that moves or does not move. The real is beyond, you are beyond.


-Nisargadatta Maharaj from I Am That

A mere cinema show...

Ignorance will not be eradicated
except in those who,

through the power of Self-inquiry
conducted assiduously within the heart,

have attained the victorious absolute vision
in which the whole panoply of manifestation
is transcended,

being seen as a mere cinema show.



-The above Muruganar quote is from the book
The Seven Steps to Awakening.

Unsoiled by the world...

As a lotus flower is born in water,

grows in water and rises out of
water to stand above it unsoiled,

so I, born in the world, raised in
the world having overcome the world,

live unsoiled by the world.



-Gautama the Buddha

Is God a concept ?...

Is God a concept? What is God? Can the answer to that question be anything other than a concept? The mind can only think about God, entertain a conceptual definition of God, or hold a belief about God. Is God a concept?

When God is reduced to a concept, there is automatically separation between you and God. “You” are a mental concept who is looking for a union or a better relationship with another concept called “God.” Do you see how the mind can only think of “you” and “God” as separate mental concepts? Can you see how this is a recipe for a sense of separation from God?

Simply notice the concept “God” as it arises. As the concept is seen, notice the spacious awareness that is looking at the concept. Do you see that the mind has reduced God to an image? The timeless awareness that sees that image is your true nature.

There is no separation except in the mind. Do not go to the mind to find God.

The word God has always been pointing to presence—the essence of who you are prior to the time-bound, thought-based self you take yourself to be. That essence is already at one with God. They are not two.

Another way of saying this is that the concept “God” is not independent of the presence from which the concept appears. That is the end of the illusory separation between “you and God.”


-Scott Kiloby