' Self-Importance '...
By breaking down our sense of self-importance, all we lose is a parasite that has long infected our minds. What we gain in return is freedom, openness of mind, spontaneity, simplicity, altruism: all qualities inherent in happiness.
.................................Matthieu Ricard
' Yesterday and Tomorrow '...
There are only two days in the year that nothing can be done. One is called Yesterday and the other is called Tomorrow. Today is the right day to Love, Believe, Do and mostly Live.
...........................Dalai Lama
' The Ultimate Retreat '...
Ideally the ultimate retreat is to retreat from the past and the future to always remain in the present.
............................Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche
' Ordinary People '...
We must be willing to be completely ordinary people, which means accepting ourselves as we are without trying to become greater, purer, more spiritual, more insightful. If we can accept our imperfections as they are, quite ordinarily, then we can use them as part of the path. But if we try to get rid of our imperfections, then they will be enemies, obstacles on the road to our ‘self-improvement’.
.................................Chogyam Trungpa
' Information is Power '...
Information is Power. Think For Yourself. CAUTION: proper use of the brain is not endorsed by federal governments nor huge corporations involved in serious financial profit from a brainwashed and enslaved population. Mild discomfort may occur as confusing independent thought challenges popular views of the world.
.........................Timothy Leary
' Drifting from Truth '...
The further a society drifts from truth the more it will hate those who speak it.
........................George Orwell
' One Day '...
One day a long time from now you'll cease to care anymore whom you please or what anybody has to say about you. That's when you'll finally produce the work you're capable of.
............................J. D. Salinger
' Self-Knowledge is Humility '...
[To] know oneself is, above all, to know what one lacks. It is to measure oneself against Truth, and not the other way around. The first product of self-knowledge is humility . . .
...................Flannery O'Connor
' Raise your Voice '...
Never be afraid to raise your voice for honesty and truth and compassion against injustice and lying and greed. If people all over the world...would do this, it would change the earth.
.............................William Faulkner
' The Free exploring Mind '...
The free exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world.
.........................John Steinbeck
' Integrity '...
It's not what we profess but what we practice that gives us integrity.
......................Francis Bacon
' Desire '...
If any two men desire the same thing, which nevertheless they cannot both enjoy, they become enemies.
..............................Thomas Hobbes
' Morally Obliged '...
Any single man must judge for himself whether circumstances warrant obedience or resistance to the commands of the civil magistrate; we are all qualified, entitled, and morally obliged to evaluate the conduct of our rulers. This political judgment, moreover, is not simply or primarily a right, but like self-preservation, a duty to God. As such it is a judgment that men cannot part with according to the God of Nature. It is the first and foremost of our inalienable rights without which we can preserve no other.
......................................John Locke
' Finding Source '...
Gravity explains the motions of the planets, but it cannot explain who sets the planets in motion.
.......................Isaac Newton
' Remember '...
So remember to look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see and hold on to that childlike wonder about what makes the universe exist.
...................Stephen Hawking
' Being Honest '...
Being honest may not get you a lot of friends but it’ll always get you the right ones
....................John Lennon
' Love is all you Need '...
I still believe that love is all you need. I don't know a better message than that.
........................Paul McCartney
' Peace and Love '...
Let's make my birthday, July the 7th at noon, Peace and Love Day. Everybody go, 'Peace and love.' In the office, on the bus, wherever. It's still peace and love for me, I'm a product of the 60s and it was a very influential period in my life, and you know, my head was turned around a bit, my eyes were opened as it were. In fact, I even have it on my arm, 'Peace and love'. I see nothing wrong with peace and love.
.........................Ringo Starr
' Being Here '...
It's being here now that's important. There's no past and there's no future. Time is a very misleading thing. All there is ever, is the now. We can gain experience from the past, but we can't relive it; and we can hope for the future, but we don't know if there is one.
...........................George Harrison
' Falling into Line '...
Love yourself first and everything else falls into line. You really have to love yourself to get anything done in this world.
.............................Lucille Ball
' Hereafter '...
I spend a lot of time thinking of the Hereafter - each time I enter a room I wonder what I'm here after.
........................Tim Conway
' Laughter '...
Laughter gives us distance. It allows us to step back from an event, deal with it and then move on.
........................Bob Newhart
' Fear of Death '...
Once in a while, when I'm alone, I think about my age. I think, How many more years do I have on this earth? But I can't really conceive of dying. Somehow, in my head, I don't think I'll die. I know that everybody dies, of course. I just think that it'll never come to me. It's crazy, but there it is.
.............................Don Rickles
' Love Yourself '...
You might as well like yourself; just think about all the time you're gonna have to spend with you.
..........................Jerry Lewis
' Smart People '...
It doesn’t make sense to hire smart people and tell them what to do; we hire smart people so they can tell us what to do.
......................Steve Jobs
' Mistakes '...
Mistakes are normal and human. Make them small, accept them, correct them, and forget them.
.......................Carlos Slim
' Success '...
Success cannot be measured in wealth, fame or power, but by whether you have made a positive difference for others.
...........................Richard Branson
' Learn Up '...
Try never to be the smartest person in the room. And if you are, I suggest you invite smarter people... or find a different room.
...........................Michael Dell
' Suffering '...
Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.
.......................Khalil Gibran
' Visible Order '...
The visible order of the universe proclaims a supreme intelligence.
......................Jean-Jacques Rousseau
' Searching for Source '...
There is in every man a certain feeling that he has been what he is from all eternity, and by no means become such in time.
......................Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling
' Three Stages of Truth '...
All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
...............................Arthur Schopenhauer
' Death '...
Death accompanies us at every step and enables us to use those moments when life smiles at us to feel more deeply the sweetness of life. The more certain the end, the more tempting the minute.
.....................Theodor Fontane
' No More War '...
If the dead could speak there would be no more war.
..........................Heinrich Böll
' Experience of Time '...
If the years of youth are experienced slowly, while the later years of life hurtle past at an ever-increasing speed, it must be habit that causes it. We know full well that the insertion of new habits or the changing of old ones is the only way to preserve life, to renew our sense of time, to rejuvenate, intensify, and retard our experience of time - and thereby renew our sense of life itself. That is the reason for every change of scenery and air.
..................................Thomas Mann
' The Eternal Present '...
There is not past, no future; everything flows in an eternal present.
.......................James Joyce
' Escaping '...
We do not escape into philosophy, psychology, and art--we go there to restore our shattered selves into whole ones.
.......................Anais Nin
' The Teacher '...
Men are tending to materialism. Houses, lands, and worldly goods attract their attention, and as a mirage lure them on to death. Christianity, on the other hand leads only the natural body to death, and for the spirit, it points out a house not built with hands, eternal in the heavens... Let me urge you to follow Him, not as the Nazarene, the Man of Galilee, the carpenter's son, but as the ever living spiritual person, full of love and compassion, who will stand by you in life and death and eternity.
.............. President James A. Garfield
' War '...
I never justify, sustain, or in any way or to any extent uphold this cruel, heartless, aimless unnecessary war.
........................President Franklin Pierce
' The Truth '...
The truth is the kindest thing we can give folks in the end.
..........................Harriet Beecher Stowe
' True to Self '...
I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others, rather than to be false, and to incur my own abhorrence.
.......................Frederick Douglass
' The Nazarine Speaks '...
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[New post] You were created as Life, as Love, as One with God.
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Jesus through John
You were created as Life, as Love, as One with God.
................... Through John Smallman.......................
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As you all continue to wait expectantly and enthusiastically for the great moment of your collective awakening, do let go of your doubts and anxieties about its certainty. It is God’s divine plan for those who chose to experience the totally unreal state of separation from Him that they awaken when they freely choose to do so, and that irreversible collective choice to awaken has already been made. Your awakening is assured, no other option is required or available. As you continue waiting, be in peace and be patient, as you become increasingly aware of the disasters that major corporate and political organizations are allowing to occur across the world, and as the frequency of extreme weather conditions and earth movements also appears to be increasing worldwide.
Just know that the divine plan is proceeding precisely as intended, and an age of most wondrous joy awaits you when you awaken. To awaken is your destiny, you all chose to be in human form at this moment in time to massively assist in and participate in this magnificent collective awakening process. Before incarnating you KNEW that the awakening would occur during this life time, your current or present life time, and you also knew that you would have a veil or cloak of forgetfulness drawn between you and this knowing in order for your participation to be fully a part of its complete and unexpected spontaneity.
The separation experiment that you collectively planned eons ago has been “very successful,” and has, as intended, enshrouded you in a sense of aloneness, abandonment, uncertainty, and unknowingness. You had a perception that you had no need of Mother/Father/God, that you could be a totally independent being, and you chose to build an unreal or imaginary environment in which you could experience that state. What you constructed was vast compared to the small and insignificant beings you found yourselves to be as humans in form within it. This sense of apparent smallness and insignificance then effectively provided you with a strong belief in your sense of unworthiness, of “not being good enough,” thus causing you intense fear. This has resulted in a strongly perceived need to seek and find love from another in order to give yourself even a modicum of hope that you are a valid and acceptable human being in this vast universe in which you truly do appear to be so small and insignificant.
This has, through the eons, led each of you to seek a superior being – a god – to whom you could turn for guidance and approval. This search is driven by the very faint memory you all have that you were created, brought into being, begotten for a purpose, a purpose that has meaning for you. Through this searching some of you have slowly been able, when resting or relaxing at peace and undistracted by the world or people around you, to reduce your attention on, your consciousness of your egoic sense of identity, and in that clear and empty space has arisen a deep knowing that you are indeed One with a divine Being of infinite Love and Wisdom. These ones have been sharing this inner knowing with all who were open to receiving it – initially not very many – although over the last few hundred years more and more have been finding themselves able to access this deep inner knowing. The result has been your collective choice to initiate your awakening process over the last few decades, leading forward to the present moment in which it is coming to fruition.
This choice has filled all of us in the non-physical realms with immense joy. We have constantly been lovingly nudging any of you who have shown any interest in discovering your true nature, any of you seriously seeking to know Mother/Father/God, towards awakening from this frightening and illusory perception that seems to be your domain, your reality. It delights us now to see the moment of your awakening about to burst into bloom around you.
This event will be a breathtaking and astounding occasion, utterly unlike anything the human collective has ever previously experienced, and will fill billions of hearts with jubilation and an intense need to engage in every kind of festivity imaginable, festivities that will delight and enthrall all of humanity, every ethnic, cultural, artistic, and spiritual community worldwide. What is coming down the pipeline is way beyond your ability to imagine, and there will be NO disappointments – ALL will be in a state of galvanized enthusiasm and motivation to engage with enormous energy in just being alive!
You were created as Life, as Love, as One with God, as immortal beings, beings without form, but with the infinite power in which you were created providing you with the ability to generate and propagate whatever you wished to create, just as your Father had begotten you. You had no needs because you were All. And then the tiny and insane idea of independence from Source, of the possibility of living without oversight or supervision, of hiding or disguising what you were generating, arose in your mind, and you constructed the state of unreality in which you seem to have been encountering pain, suffering, abandonment, and intense fear for eons.
Now the moment to dissolve this unreal environment is at hand. Continue, therefore, to go deep within yourselves daily, to your holy inner sanctuaries where you can offer an invitation to Mother/Father/God to enter your hearts and envelop you in Her infinitely loving embrace. Doing this strengthens your sense, your knowing of who you truly are, and amplifies and augments your sense of Presence, so that the Love that is God, and that is You flows through you and on out to all of humanity, greatly assisting in and empowering the collective awakening process. This is why you are presently incarnate, and what each one of you is doing as an individual can only be done by you. You are each essential and utterly irreplaceable instigators and prime movers of this astounding process.
When you awaken, as shortly you will, you will be astounded at the importance of the parts that you have each played in bringing this moment to its divine conclusion. Your joy and your knowing in the actuality of your divinity will occasion you intense and endless bliss.
Your loving bother, Jesus.
' The Mystical I '...
When the Spirit of the Lord is upon you, you are ordained, but you are not ordained to be set apart. You are ordained to heal the sick, to comfort, to feed, to forgive. That is the purpose of ordination~ not that you may be glorified but that you may be better equipped to give more abundantly, to share more freely, to understand more universally that it is not only the children of your flesh who are your children, but that all children of this world are your children, and you have an equal responsibility to share with them.
You must be able to look out upon this world and say unto it: "The Spirit of God in me is your Father. You may look to the Father within me for substance and sustenance. You, friend or so-called foe, may look to the Spirit of God in me, the fatherhood of God in me, for your care."
Then you will understand this relationship that has been kept secret from the world, the invisible bond that exists among all mystics. The visible and invisible mystics of the world who have recognized I standing at the door of their consciousness, are eternally united in consciousness, sharing with one another.
I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it.
~ Revelation 3:8
...................... Joel S. Goldsmith, The Mystical I
' Time '...
We said, there's another second gone, there's another minute and another hour and another day, when, as a matter of fact the second or the minute or the hour was never gone. It was the same one all the time. It had just moved along and we had moved with it.
.......................Clifford D. Simak
' The Universe '...
So the universe is not quite as you thought it was. You'd better rearrange your beliefs, then. Because you certainly can't rearrange the universe.
.......................Isaac Asimov
' Be Soft '...
Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let the pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place.
..........................Kurt Vonnegut
' Hypothesis '...
There are two possible outcomes: if the result confirms the hypothesis, then you've made a measurement. If the result is contrary to the hypothesis, then you've made a discovery.
..........................Enrico Fermi
' Laws of Nature '...
For me, the study of these laws is inseparable from a love of Nature in all its manifestations. The beauty of the basic laws of natural science, as revealed in the study of particles and of the cosmos, is allied to the litheness of a merganser diving in a pure Swedish lake, or the grace of a dolphin leaving shining trails at night in the Gulf of California.
....................................Murray Gell-Mann
' Authorities '...
Don't pay attention to "authorities," think for yourself.
...........................Richard P. Feynman
' Nuclear War '...
Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds. (quoting the Bhagavad-Gita after witnessing the first Nuclear explosion.)
.................................J. Robert Oppenheimer
' Silence is Truth '...
Silence is truth. Silence is bliss. Silence is peace. And hence Silence is the Self.
....................Ramana Maharshi
' Nobody Left Behind '...
You are incarnations of God, all of you. You are incarnations of the Almighty, Omnipresent, Divine Principle. You may laugh at me now, but the time will come when you will understand. You must. Nobody will be left behind.
.............................Swami Vivekananda
' Right Thinking '...
Out of right thinking comes right practice. It is not true that it does not matter what a man believes. It is not true to say, as many say, that a man's beliefs do not matter, it is only his conduct which is of importance; no lasting right conduct grows out of wrong belief. If you think falsely, you will act mistakenly; if you think basely, your conduct will suit your thinking.
............................Annie Besant
' Fear '...
If you come across fear, stare it in its eyes. Face it and you will notice that fear fades away.
................................Jiddu Krishnamurti
' Our True Nature '...
We are completely unaware of our true nature because we identify ourselves with our body, our emotions and our thoughts, thus losing sight of our unchanging centre, which is pure consciousness. When we return to our true nature, our thoughts and perceptions no longer appear as modifications of a single substance, they come into being and subside like waves of the ocean.
.....................Jean Klein
' Love and Separation '...
Separation is the absence of Love, and Love is the absence of separation.
.................Ramesh S Balsekar
' When I Look '...
When I look inside and see that I'm nothing, that's wisdom. When I look outside and see that I'm everything, that's love. And between these two, my life turns.
............Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
' What Remains ?'...
Thoughts come and go. Feelings come and go. Find out what it is that remains.
..........................Ramana Maharshi
' Not Enough Presence '...
All negativity is caused by an accumulation of psychological time and denial of the present. Unease, anxiety, tension, stress, worry - all forms of fear - are caused by too much future, and not enough presence. Guilt, regret, resentment, grievances, sadness, bitterness, and all forms of nonforgiveness are caused by too much past, and not enough presence.
............................Eckhart Tolle
' The Failing Scholar '...
The one who learns and learns and doesn't practice is like the one who plows and plows and never plants.
...........................Plato
' Personal Liberty '...
I have no reason to suppose that he, who would take away my Liberty, would not when he had me in his Power, take away everything else.
......................John Locke
' Source '...
By 'God', I understand, a substance which is infinite, independent, supremely intelligent, supremely powerful, and which created both myself and everything else [...] that exists. All these attributes are such that, the more carefully I concentrate on them, the less possible it seems that they could have originated from me alone. So, from what has been said it must be concluded that God necessarily exists.
..............................Rene Descartes
' The Language of Math '...
The laws of nature are written by the hand of God in the language of mathematics.
.......................Galileo Galilei
' The Gospel of Thomas '...
Gospel of Thomas, apocryphal (noncanonical) gospel containing 114 sayings attributed to the resurrected Jesus, written in the mid-2nd century. Traditionally ascribed to St. Thomas the Apostle, the Gospel of Thomas does not include any extended mythic narrative and consists entirely of a series of secret sayings ascribed to Jesus, several of which have close parallels in the New Testament Gospels. Although scholars are divided on the issue, some contend that certain elements of the Gospel of Thomas are among the oldest witnesses to Jesus’ words.
The Gospel of Thomas is grounded in gnosticism, the philosophical and religious movement of the 2nd century ce that stressed the redemptive power of esoteric knowledge acquired by divine revelation. Indeed, warnings against it as heretical were made by the Church Fathers in the 2nd–4th century. For the author, salvation consists of self-knowledge, and baptism results in restoration to the primordial state—man and woman in one person, like Adam before the creation of Eve (saying 23). Spiritual reversion to that state meant that nakedness need not result in shame. One passage (saying 37) allows it to be suspected that the early Christian followers of the Gospel of Thomas took off their garments and trampled on them as part of their baptismal initiation.
There are a few connections between this worldview and that of St. Paul and the Gospel According to John, but the overall theology of the Gospel of Thomas is so far removed from the teaching of Jesus as found in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke—in which Jewish eschatology is central—that it is not considered a major source for the study of Jesus. It is, of course, possible or even likely that individual sayings in Thomas or other apocryphal gospels originated with Jesus, but it is unlikely that it can contribute much to the portrait of the historical Jesus.
The Gospel of Thomas is known to have existed in Greek but, like almost the entire vast literature of gnosticism, was long believed to have perished with the exception of a few fragments. In 1945, however, it was rediscovered in a Coptic gnostic library near Najʿ Ḥammādī, Egypt, on the Nile about 125 km (78 miles) northwest of Luxor. The remarkable Najʿ Ḥammādī library also housed 13 codices containing Christian gnostic treatises in Coptic translations and thus richly supplemented modern scholarship...........................................
The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
'The Eightfold Path '...
The eightfold path is at the heart of the middle way, which turns from extremes, and encourages us to seek the simple approach. The eightfold path is Right Understanding, Right Intent, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, and Right Concentration. No doubt all of you are aware of the moral codes in other religious groups such as Christianity, the Jews, and Muslims........................
Noble Eightfold Path - Gautama the Buddha............. Wikipedia
' The End of Suffering '...
Chapter I: The Way to the End of Suffering
The search for a spiritual path is born out of suffering. It does not start with lights and ecstasy, but with the hard tacks of pain, disappointment, and confusion. However, for suffering to give birth to a genuine spiritual search, it must amount to more than something passively received from without. It has to trigger an inner realization, a perception which pierces through the facile complacency of our usual encounter with the world to glimpse the insecurity perpetually gaping underfoot. When this insight dawns, even if only momentarily, it can precipitate a profound personal crisis. It overturns accustomed goals and values, mocks our routine preoccupations, leaves old enjoyments stubbornly unsatisfying.
At first such changes generally are not welcome. We try to deny our vision and to smother our doubts; we struggle to drive away the discontent with new pursuits. But the flame of inquiry, once lit, continues to burn, and if we do not let ourselves be swept away by superficial readjustments or slouch back into a patched up version of our natural optimism, eventually the original glimmering of insight will again flare up, again confront us with our essential plight. It is precisely at that point, with all escape routes blocked, that we are ready to seek a way to bring our disquietude to an end. No longer can we continue to drift complacently through life, driven blindly by our hunger for sense pleasures and by the pressure of prevailing social norms. A deeper reality beckons us; we have heard the call of a more stable, more authentic happiness, and until we arrive at our destination we cannot rest content.
But it is just then that we find ourselves facing a new difficulty. Once we come to recognize the need for a spiritual path we discover that spiritual teachings are by no means homogeneous and mutually compatible. When we browse through the shelves of humanity's spiritual heritage, both ancient and contemporary, we do not find a single tidy volume but a veritable bazaar of spiritual systems and disciplines each offering themselves to us as the highest, the fastest, the most powerful, or the most profound solution to our quest for the Ultimate. Confronted with this melange, we fall into confusion trying to size them up — to decide which is truly liberative, a real solution to our needs, and which is a sidetrack beset with hidden flaws.
One approach to resolving this problem that is popular today is the eclectic one: to pick and choose from the various traditions whatever seems amenable to our needs, welding together different practices and techniques into a synthetic whole that is personally satisfying. Thus one may combine Buddhist mindfulness meditation with sessions of Hindu mantra recitation, Christian prayer with Sufi dancing, Jewish Kabbala with Tibetan visualization exercises. Eclecticism, however, though sometimes helpful in making a transition from a predominantly worldly and materialistic way of life to one that takes on a spiritual hue, eventually wears thin. While it makes a comfortable halfway house, it is not comfortable as a final vehicle.
There are two interrelated flaws in eclecticism that account for its ultimate inadequacy. One is that eclecticism compromises the very traditions it draws upon. The great spiritual traditions themselves do not propose their disciplines as independent techniques that may be excised from their setting and freely recombined to enhance the felt quality of our lives. They present them, rather, as parts of an integral whole, of a coherent vision regarding the fundamental nature of reality and the final goal of the spiritual quest. A spiritual tradition is not a shallow stream in which one can wet one's feet and then beat a quick retreat to the shore. It is a mighty, tumultuous river which would rush through the entire landscape of one's life, and if one truly wishes to travel on it, one must be courageous enough to launch one's boat and head out for the depths.
The second defect in eclecticism follows from the first. As spiritual practices are built upon visions regarding the nature of reality and the final good, these visions are not mutually compatible. When we honestly examine the teachings of these traditions, we will find that major differences in perspective reveal themselves to our sight, differences which cannot be easily dismissed as alternative ways of saying the same thing. Rather, they point to very different experiences constituting the supreme goal and the path that must be trodden to reach that goal.
Hence, because of the differences in perspectives and practices that the different spiritual traditions propose, once we decide that we have outgrown eclecticism and feel that we are ready to make a serious commitment to one particular path, we find ourselves confronted with the challenge of choosing a path that will lead us to true enlightenment and liberation. One cue to resolving this dilemma is to clarify to ourselves our fundamental aim, to determine what we seek in a genuinely liberative path. If we reflect carefully, it will become clear that the prime requirement is a way to the end of suffering. All problems ultimately can be reduced to the problem of suffering; thus what we need is a way that will end this problem finally and completely. Both these qualifying words are important. The path has to lead to a complete end of suffering, to an end of suffering in all its forms, and to a final end of suffering, to bring suffering to an irreversible stop.
But here we run up against another question. How are we to find such a path — a path which has the capacity to lead us to the full and final end of suffering? Until we actually follow a path to its goal we cannot know with certainty where it leads, and in order to follow a path to its goal we must place complete trust in the efficacy of the path. The pursuit of a spiritual path is not like selecting a new suit of clothes. To select a new suit one need only try on a number of suits, inspect oneself in the mirror, and select the suit in which one appears most attractive. The choice of a spiritual path is closer to marriage: one wants a partner for life, one whose companionship will prove as trustworthy and durable as the pole star in the night sky.
Faced with this new dilemma, we may think that we have reached a dead end and conclude that we have nothing to guide us but personal inclination, if not a flip of the coin. However, our selection need not be as blind and uninformed as we imagine, for we do have a guideline to help us. Since spiritual paths are generally presented in the framework of a total teaching, we can evaluate the effectiveness of any particular path by investigating the teaching which expounds it.
In making this investigation we can look to three criteria as standards for evaluation:
(1) First, the teaching has to give a full and accurate picture of the range of suffering. If the picture of suffering it gives is incomplete or defective, then the path it sets forth will most likely be flawed, unable to yield a satisfactory solution. Just as an ailing patient needs a doctor who can make a full and correct diagnosis of his illness, so in seeking release from suffering we need a teaching that presents a reliable account of our condition.
(2) The second criterion calls for a correct analysis of the causes giving rise to suffering. The teaching cannot stop with a survey of the outward symptoms. It has to penetrate beneath the symptoms to the level of causes, and to describe those causes accurately. If a teaching makes a faulty causal analysis, there is little likelihood that its treatment will succeed.
(3) The third criterion pertains directly to the path itself. It stipulates that the path which the teaching offers has to remove suffering at its source. This means it must provide a method to cut off suffering by eradicating its causes. If it fails to bring about this root-level solution, its value is ultimately nil. The path it prescribes might help to remove symptoms and make us feel that all is well; but one afflicted with a fatal disease cannot afford to settle for cosmetic surgery when below the surface the cause of his malady continues to thrive.
To sum up, we find three requirements for a teaching proposing to offer a true path to the end of suffering: first, it has to set forth a full and accurate picture of the range of suffering; second, it must present a correct analysis of the causes of suffering; and third, it must give us the means to eradicate the causes of suffering.
This is not the place to evaluate the various spiritual disciplines in terms of these criteria. Our concern is only with the Dhamma, the teaching of the Buddha, and with the solution this teaching offers to the problem of suffering. That the teaching should be relevant to this problem is evident from its very nature; for it is formulated, not as a set of doctrines about the origin and end of things commanding belief, but as a message of deliverance from suffering claiming to be verifiable in our own experience. Along with that message there comes a method of practice, a way leading to the end of suffering. This way is the Noble Eightfold Path (ariya atthangika magga). The Eightfold Path stands at the very heart of the Buddha's teaching. It was the discovery of the path that gave the Buddha's own enlightenment a universal significance and elevated him from the status of a wise and benevolent sage to that of a world teacher. To his own disciples he was pre-eminently "the arouser of the path unarisen before, the producer of the path not produced before, the declarer of the path not declared before, the knower of the path, the seer of the path, the guide along the path" (MN 108). And he himself invites the seeker with the promise and challenge: "You yourselves must strive. The Buddhas are only teachers. The meditative ones who practice the path are released from the bonds of evil" (Dhp. v. 276).
To see the Noble Eightfold Path as a viable vehicle to liberation, we have to check it out against our three criteria: to look at the Buddha's account of the range of suffering, his analysis of its causes, and the programme he offers as a remedy.
The Range of Suffering
The Buddha does not merely touch the problem of suffering tangentially; he makes it, rather, the very cornerstone of his teaching. He starts the Four Noble Truths that sum up his message with the announcement that life is inseparably tied to something he calls dukkha. The Pali word is often translated as suffering, but it means something deeper than pain and misery. It refers to a basic unsatisfactoriness running through our lives, the lives of all but the enlightened. Sometimes this unsatisfactoriness erupts into the open as sorrow, grief, disappointment, or despair; but usually it hovers at the edge of our awareness as a vague unlocalized sense that things are never quite perfect, never fully adequate to our expectations of what they should be. This fact of dukkha, the Buddha says, is the only real spiritual problem. The other problems — the theological and metaphysical questions that have taunted religious thinkers through the centuries — he gently waves aside as "matters not tending to liberation." What he teaches, he says, is just suffering and the ending of suffering, dukkha and its cessation.
The Buddha does not stop with generalities. He goes on to expose the different forms that dukkha takes, both the evident and the subtle. He starts with what is close at hand, with the suffering inherent in the physical process of life itself. Here dukkha shows up in the events of birth, aging, and death, in our susceptibility to sickness, accidents, and injuries, even in hunger and thirst. It appears again in our inner reactions to disagreeable situations and events: in the sorrow, anger, frustration, and fear aroused by painful separations, by unpleasant encounters, by the failure to get what we want. Even our pleasures, the Buddha says, are not immune from dukkha. They give us happiness while they last, but they do not last forever; eventually they must pass away, and when they go the loss leaves us feeling deprived. Our lives, for the most part, are strung out between the thirst for pleasure and the fear of pain. We pass our days running after the one and running away from the other, seldom enjoying the peace of contentment; real satisfaction seems somehow always out of reach, just beyond the next horizon. Then in the end we have to die: to give up the identity we spent our whole life building, to leave behind everything and everyone we love.
' A Polished Mirror '...
"Dear friend, your heart is a polished mirror.
You must wipe it clean of the veil of dust that has gathered upon it,
because it is destined to reflect the light of divine secrets."
........................Al-Ghazali
in J. Fadiman and R. Frager, Eds.
Essential Sufism
San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1997, p. 124
' The Arrival of Enlightenment '...
Does enlightenment come all of a sudden? Or do we have to work slowly for it by degrees?
The answer varies with the case concerned. Most need time to fit and equip themselves for the glorious moment of insight, but a few receive it in a day.
It must be remembered that it does not actually happen in time but out of it, in the great Stillness.
The man does not know the absolute final truth a second before--and then it is all there.
How soon it can settle down in him will also vary with different persons--it was a few hours in one case but three years in another.
............................. Notebooks Category 25: World-Mind in Individual Mind >
Chapter 2: Enlightenment Which Stays > # 53 Paul Brunton
' Want Nothing Else '...
"The desire to find the self will be surely fulfilled, provided you want nothing else.
But you must be honest with yourself and really want nothing else.
If in the mean time you want many other things and are engaged in their pursuit, your main purpose may be delayed until you grow wiser and cease being torn between contradictory urges.
Go within, without swerving, without ever looking outward."
................................Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
' Powerful personality '...
Some folks hesitate to seize additional strength because they think it wrong or dangerous to be a powerful individual.
Somehow they have acquired the false notion that tyranny or dictatorship or cruelty are the outcomes of a powerful personality.
These characteristics are not power.
They are weaknesses disguised as power.
........................... Vernon Howard
' State of Happiness '...
Every Saint that I have ever studied has spoken about the time of Now,
being, the only state of happiness..
............................thomas
' Secrets '...
People who have no secrets from each other never want for a subject of conversation. They do not weigh their words, for there is nothing to be held back, neither do they seek for something to say. They talk out of the abundance of their heart, without consideration they say just what they think. Blessed are they who attain to such familiar, unreserved intercourse with God.
...................................Francois Fenelon
' Death of ego atachment '...
It is only by a total death to self we can be lost in God.
..........................Jeanne Marie Bouvier de la Motte Guyon
' Great Things '...
And it is not necessary to have great things to do. I turn my little omelette in the pan for the love of God.
......................Brother Lawrence
' Doubt All Things '...
If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.
.........................Rene Descartes
' The Order of Vibrations '...
Röntgen has familiarized us with an order of vibrations of extreme minuteness compared with the smallest waves with which we have hitherto been acquainted, and of dimensions comparable with the distances between the centers of the atoms of which the material universe is built up; and there is no reason to suppose that we have here reached the limit of frequency.
........................Wilhelm Rontgen
' The Field of Vibrations '...
We are just entering what may be called, 'the field of vibrations', a field in which we may find more wonders than the mind can conceive of
...........................Guglielmo Marconi
' The Habit of Thinking '...
The man who doesn’t make up his mind to cultivate the habit of thinking misses the greatest pleasure in life.
......................Thomas A. Edison
' Finding your Path '...
There is nothing more beautiful than finding your course as you believe you bob aimlessly in the current. And wouldn't you know that your path was there all along, waiting for you to knock, waiting for you to become. This path does not belong to your parents, your teachers, your leaders, or your lovers. Your path is your character defining itself more and more every day.
............................Jodie Foster
' Politicians '...
I don't trust society to protect us, I have no intention of placing my fate in the hands of men whose only qualification is that they managed to con a block of people to vote for them.
............................Mario Puzo
' Regret '...
Regret is useless in life. It's in the past. All we have is now.
......................Marlon Brando
' Striving for Perfection '...
Striving for perfection is the greatest stopper there is. You'll be afraid you can't achieve it. It's your excuse to yourself for not doing anything. Instead, strive for excellence, doing your best.
.........................Laurence Olivier
' Life is a Struggle '...
Life is an endless, truly endless struggle. There's no time when we're going to arrive at a plateau where the whole thing gets sorted. It's a struggle in the way every plant has to find it's own way to stand up straight. A lot of the time it's a failure. And yet it's not a failure if some enlightenment comes from it.
.............................Arthur Miller
' The Real Test '...
The real test is this one: When you're alone in a room, when you're in a private place and nobody else can see you, what do you choose to do? Eat well, or eat poorly? Exercise, or watch television? Practice something, or do nothing? The best version of the truth appears to you and you alone, when nobody else can see. This is the test of discipline, and it's what makes the difference in your life. It's what regulates your own system and guides it. The individual alone comprehends it.
..............................Georges St-Pierre
' Martial Artist '...
Face your fear, empty yourself, trust your own voice, let go of control, have faith in outcomes, connect with a larger purpose, derive meaning from the struggle.
..............................Kano Jigoro
' Intellectual and Moral Life '...
What matters at this stage is the construction of local forms of community within which civility and the intellectual and moral life can be sustained through the new dark ages which are already upon us. And if the tradition of the virtues was able to survive the horrors of the last dark ages, we are not entirely without ground for hope. This time however the barbarians are not waiting beyond the frontiers; they have already been governing us for quite some time.
...................................Alasdair MacIntyre
' The Best Teacher '...
My best teachers were not the ones who knew all the answers, but those who were deeply excited by questions they couldn't answer.
.......................Brian Greene
' In String Theory '...
In string theory, all particles are vibrations on a tiny rubber band; physics is the harmonies on the string; chemistry is the melodies we play on vibrating strings; the universe is a symphony of strings, and the "Mind of God" is cosmic music resonating in 11 dimensional hyperspace.
.....................................Michio Kaku
' A Free Thinker '...
Be a free thinker and don't accept everything you hear as truth. Be critical and evaluate what you believe in.
...............................Aristotle
' Teachers '...
The saying "He who teaches others, teaches himself" is very true, not only because constant repetition impresses a fact indelibly on the mind, but because the process of teaching itself gives deeper insight into the subject taught.
........................................John Amos Comenius
' Money '...
The money you have gives you freedom; the money you pursue enslaves you.
..........................Jean-Jacques Rousseau
' The Constitution '...
A constitution defines and limits the powers of the government it creates. It therefore follows, as a natural and also a logical result, that the governmental exercise of any power not authorized by the constitution is an assumed power, and therefore illegal.
.....................................Thomas Paine
' Core Beliefs '...
My core beliefs revolve around the idea that we should live to the best of our abilities-we should live and let live.
............................Enya
' Constant Fear '...
I think people, unfortunately, do live in constant fear. I think the government - and people in general - create scenarios people fear, because ultimately through fear you can control people. I wish we could live in a world where there would be no fear, but it's a driving force in many decisions people make these days, whether it's personal, economic, or even job-related. A lot of people stay out of fear in a job they hate.
................................Marc Forster
' Find a Purpose '...
They say, Find a purpose in your life and live it. But, sometimes, it is only after you have lived that you recognize your life had a purpose, and likely one you never had in mind.
.......................Khaled Hosseini
' In the End '...
…In the end we are all just searching for truth, that which is greater than ourselves.
.............................Dan Brown
' War Is Hell '...
I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation. War is hell.
....................William Tecumseh Sherman
' Socialism '...
Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
..............................John Steinbeck
' Raise your Voice '...
Never be afraid to raise your voice for honesty and truth and compassion against injustice and lying and greed. If people all over the world...would do this, it would change the earth.
..............................William Faulkner
' The Pinnacle of Success '...
You have reached the pinnacle of success as soon as you become uninterested in money, compliments, or publicity.
...........................Thomas Wolfe
' Suffering '...
I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness and the willingness to remain vulnerable.
........................Anne Morrow Lindbergh
' Fluctuations of Consciousness '...
All speech, action and behavior are fluctuations of consciousness. All life emerges from, and is sustained in, consciousness. The whole universe is the expression of consciousness. The reality of the universe is one unbounded ocean of consciousness in motion.
..........................Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
' Wholly Relaxed '...
Like water which can clearly mirror the sky and the trees only so long as its surface is undisturbed, the mind can only reflect the true image of the Self when it is tranquil and wholly relaxed.
.........................Indra Devi
' Watch the Breath '...
Master your breath, let the self be in bliss, contemplate on the sublime within you.
........................Tirumalai Krishnamacharya
' Consciousness Expands '...
When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, all your thoughts break their bonds; your mind transcends limitations; your conscious expands in every direction; and you find yourself in a great, new and wonderful world.
..........................Patanjali
' Enjoy your Life '...
Enjoy your life and be happy.
Being happy is of the utmost importance.
Success in anything is through happiness.
More support of nature comes from being happy.
Under all circumstances be happy, even if you have to force it a bit to change some long standing habits.
Just think of any negativity that comes to you as a raindrop falling into the ocean of your bliss.
You may not always have an ocean of bliss, but think that way anyway and it will help it come.
Doubting is not blissful and does not create happiness.
Be happy, healthy, and let all that love flow through your heart.
.............................Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
' An Expanded Mind '...
A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions.
..............................Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
' Artificial Intelligence '...
It seems probable that once the machine thinking method had started, it would not take long to outstrip our feeble powers… They would be able to converse with each other to sharpen their wits. At some stage therefore, we should have to expect the machines to take control.
...............................Alan Turing
' Looking for Happiness '...
Looking for happiness is a sure way to sadness, I think. You have to take each moment as it comes.
...................Benedict Cumberbatch
' The Most Dangerous Condition '...
The most dangerous condition for a man or a nation is when his intellectual side is more developed than his spiritual. Is that not exactly the condition of the world today?
...............................Arthur Conan Doyle
' Experience '...
Good decisions come from experience. Experience comes from making bad decisions.
.....................Mark Twain
' The Nazarine Speaks '...
................Through John Smallman...................
You and I, we are One, and to be One is All that we need, because One is Mother/Father/God, Love, Source, from Whom All flows constantly and infinitely lovingly in the ever ongoing act of energetic creation. This is never interrupted or paused for even the most infinitely small instant that you can conceive of. God, Love, Source is forever and always flowing abundantly into and through each individuated expression of Herself in pure joy, because that is Her divine Will, which is always being extended in delight at the endless wonder that She is. Every sentient beingis an individuated or differentiated expression of God experiencing Herself in a ceaseless and eternal Relationship with Herself through each and every one of you, and it is very good.
Yes, each and every sentient being is an eternal and individuated expression of God. And, therefore, each one of you has your own totally and unconditionally free will. Those of you in human form have each personally chosen to play the game that is the illusory or dream state, where it seems that fear is the motivating energy of practically every player. The result is that you spend inordinate amounts of energy individually – physical and emotional – in order to defend or protect yourselves from the myriad possible threats to your bodies, which could seriously damage or destroy them if you let your guard down and failed to pay attention. Most of the time, when your lives are flowing relatively smoothly, you feel, and appear relaxed and at ease, but beneath the level of your conscious awareness your egos are ever on the alert ready to engage in “fight or flight” mode. However, your bodies are only temporary vehicles in which you have chosen to spend time experiencing either fear and limitation, or seeking love, states that can only be present while you are seemingly separate beings in form because, like the illusion, they are unreal. Only Love is Real, It is Who you are, and sensing that you lack It and then need to go searching for It is only possible while you are apparently separated from It while immersing yourselves within the illusory state of separation.
Humanity’s collective awakening is the process that you have finally and collectively chosen to engage with in order to make your way Home to God with Whom you are eternally One; a Home which you have never and never could be separated from or leave. That is why the process in which humanity is presently fully engaged is referred to as your “awakening.” You have not gone anywhere! You have just been asleep. When you awaken, as very soon you will, you will delightedly find yourselves at Home, where you always are and always have been, present in the infinitely loving Presence of Mother/Father/God. In the joy of that Presence you want for nothing, you have no needs or requirements of any kind, and you are utterly free to engage most wondrously and cooperatively in relationship with all the myriad individuated expressions of yourselves, the One Who is All.
Life is a constant state of most joyful abundance or fullness that you have chosen temporarily to forgo while presently and temporarily incarnate to assist most graciously and munificently in the collective awakening process. Remember, once you are incarnate you have no memory of your true nature, although you do have a sense that life in form as a human must have a purpose. And having searched for one special to yourself that offers you value, meaning, and joy in the physical environment and not having found one that is completely satisfying, you then look within to see if you can discover what it is that is motivating you to keep on searching.
If you grew up in a culture that embraced a particular religion you might find that faith in the promises of that religion were sufficient. If they were not, or you grew up without any religious orientation, you might seek meaning in other beliefs, or conclude that human life was a onetime event to be engaged with to the best of your ability while it lasted. Most people eventually cease searching, as doing so seems to offer no solution to the quandary that everyone experiences – what is my purpose, do I even have one? – and they attempt to avoid thinking about death because the thought of complete termination of life is not a particularly enticing one.
But there is no death. Your bodies have a life expectancy, an expected span of time during which you experience life in form, and as the time passes they grow from infancy to mature adulthood and then begin to deteriorate, until they can no longer support the energy of the infinite beingness of life that you each are. You then lay them down and return to the full and formless state of existence in which you were created, and at that moment you have a choice to make, either to fully and joyfully accept your return to wakeful and aware Oneness, or to maintain a far less aware state in which you cling to the beliefs that you came to accept as ‘reality’ while you were embodied. You are always free to choose how you will experience life, no-one else can make that choice for you, not even God. In the latter case a being can spend much time, i.e they can continue to anxiously experience separation and confusion about their life purpose, although disembodied. But do not worry about this possibility befalling you, because all will choose to awaken. As I have told you before no one can remain asleep endlessly, and when a being does choose to awaken from the unreality of separation, utter and complete joy will envelop and embrace him, as he finds himself once more in the eternal Presence of Mother/Father/God, a state from which he now knowshas never departed.
So I would once more remind you that life is forever, you are all eternal beings momentarily experiencing human life in human form. Just by being, right now and in every moment, while you – everyone, without any exceptions,presently incarnate – live your lives in form, you are greatly and most beautifully assisting in your own and humanity’s inevitable and unstoppable awakening. For doing this you are all most highly honored, and on your awakening your joy that you chose to participate in this magnificent and miraculous event will absolutely flood your awareness with unimaginable bliss. You all most definitely have a divine purpose on Earth at this moment, and you are all fulfilling it perfectly.
Your loving brother, Jesus.
' Knowing and Mastering '...
Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power.
.......................Laozi
' The Value of Life '...
One's life has value so long as one attributes value to the life of others, by means of love, friendship, indignation and compassion.
.....................Simone de Beauvoir
' Self-esteem '...
Persons of high self-esteem are not driven to make themselves superior to others; they do not seek to prove their value by measuring themselves against a comparative standard. Their joy is being who they are, not in being better than someone else.
...............................Nathaniel Branden
' Human Rights '...
The government was set to protect man from criminals-and the constitution was written to protect man from the government. The Bill of Rights was not directed at private citizens, but against the government-as an explicit declaration that individual rights supersede any public or social power.
....................Ayn Rand
' The Overself '...
The other part of the answer is that the Overself is always here as man's innermost truest self.
It is beginningless and endless in time.
Its consciousness does not have to be developed as something new. But the person's awareness of it begins in time and has to be developed as a new attainment.
The ever-presence of Overself means that anyone may attain it here and now. There is no inner necessity to travel anywhere or to anyone in space or to wait years in time for this to happen.
Anyone, for instance, who attends carefully and earnestly to the present exposition may perhaps suddenly and easily get the first stage of insight, the lightning-flash which affords a glimpse of reality, at any moment.
By that glimpse he will have been uplifted to a new dimension of being. The difficulty will consist in retaining the new perception.
For ancient habits of erroneous thinking will quickly reassert themselves and overwhelm him enough to push it into the background.
This is why repeated introspection, reflective study, and mystical meditation are needed to weaken those habits and generate the inner strength which can firmly hold the higher outlook against these aggressive intruders from his own past.
.............................. Paul Brunton
' The Absurdity '...
Man frees himself from the world,
its ills,
its suffering, its chaos,
simply by seeing
the absurdity of it all.
- Ramesh S. Balsekar
' Before '...
Before you react, think. Before you spend, earn. Before you criticize, wait. Before you quit, try.
...............Ernest Hemingway
' Here and Now '...
Do not wait for life. Do not long for it. Be aware, always and at every moment, that the miracle is in the here and now.
............................Marcel Proust
' Back to Source '...
The darker the night, the brighter the stars, The deeper the grief, the closer is God!
.....................Fyodor Dostoevsky
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