Click here to go to the next issue
Highlights Home Page | Receive the Nonduality Highlights each day
How to submit material to the Highlights
Nonduality Highlights: Issue #3170, Sunday, May 18, 2008, Editor: Mark
More Range
We're friends with one who kills us,
who gives us to the ocean waves. We
love this death. Only ignorance says,
Put it off a while, day after tomorrow.
Don't avoid the knife. This friend
only seems fierce, bringing your soul
more range, perching your falcon on a
cliff of the wind. Jesus on his cross,
Hallaj on his - those absurd killings
hold a secret. Cautious cynics know
what they're doing with every moment and why.
Submit to love without thinking, as
the sun this morning rose recklessly
extinguishing our star-candle minds.
Rumi, version by Coleman Barks, The Soul of Rumi, posted
to Sunlight
In reality only the Ultimate is. The rest is a matter of name and
form. And as long as you cling to the idea that only what has
name and shape exists, the Supreme will appear to you
non-existing. When you understand that names and shapes are
hollow shells without any content whatsoever, and what is real is
nameless and formless, pure energy of life and light of
consciousness, you will be at peace - immersed in the deep
silence of reality.
- Nisargadatta Maharaj, posted to ANetofJewels
By being constantly and effortlessly aware of life without
thinking about it, this awareness soon continues to function even
when there are thoughts floating through the mind just as clouds
floating through the sky leave no change in the space.
- Ramesh Balsekar, posted to ANetofJewels
The Heart's Wisdom
The truth is that which opens the Heart. This capacity to sense
the truth is something we all already have. We all have a Heart
that is already accurately showing us how true things are.
Anything that puts you in touch with more of the truth opens the
Heart. This is a literal and experiential description of truth.
When your experience is bringing you more truth, there is a sense
of opening, softening, relaxation, expansion, fulfillment, and
satisfaction in the Heart. This can be most directly sensed in
the center of the chest, but the Heart of all Being is infinite
and therefore actually bigger than your entire body. So this
opening, softening, and expansion is actually happening
everywhere; we just sense it most clearly and directly in the
center of the chest.
When you encounter truth, the sense of your self opens, expands,
softens, fills in, and lets go. The me, the sense of your self,
is no longer felt to be so limited or small. It becomes more
complete and unbounded. The boundaries soften and dissolve, and
any sense of inadequacy, limitation, or deficiency is lessened or
eliminated.
As a side effect of being in touch with more of the truth, your
mind gets quieter because you simply have less to think about.
Even knowing a simple truth like where your car keys are gives
you less to think about. And when you touch upon a very large
truth, your mind becomes even quieter, like when you see the
ocean for the first time: The truth or reality you're viewing is
so immense that at least for a moment your mind is stopped and
becomes very quiet.
In contrast, when your experience is moving into a diminished or
smaller experience of the truth and of reality, the Heart
contracts. The sense of your self gets tight, hard, contracted,
and feels incomplete, bounded and limited. It can feel like you
are small, inadequate, or unworthy. The smallness of the truth is
reflected in the smallness of the sense of your self. The result
of being less in touch with the truth is that your mind gets
busier as it tries to figure out what is true.
Fortunately, your Being is never diminished or contracted, only
the sense of your self. Just as blocking your view of the whole
room by partially covering your eyes makes your sense of the room
smaller without actually making the room smaller, an idea or
belief that's not very true is reflected in a small sense of your
self without actually limiting or contracting your Being.
This opening and closing of the Heart in response to the degree
of truth you're experiencing is not something you need to
practice or perfect. Your Heart has been accurately and perfectly
showing you how true your experience is all along. If you start
to notice your Heart's openings and closings, you'll discover
that you already have everything you need to determine what is
true. The Heart is the true inner teacher, the source of inner
guidance we all have as our birthright. You don't need a
spiritual teacher or spiritual books to show you what's true,
just your own Heart.
There are many subtleties to the movement and workings of your
own Heart which can make the complexities of life challenging to
sort out. Yet, right now, if you start listening, feeling, and
sensing the movement of your Heart-your most intimate sense of
your self-you already have the key to knowing everything there is
to know and realizing everything that can't be known, everything
that's beyond the mind.
- Nirmala