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#3419 -
Wednesday, January 21, 2009 - Editor: Gloria Lee
The Nonduality Highlights - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NDhighlights
The mere intellectual recognition of this Oneness of Mind is no more sufficient to make it real to us than the mere intellectual recognition of Australia's existence will suffice to make Australia real to us.
- Paul Brunton, Notebooks posted to Wisdom-l by Mark Scorelle
"Many spiritual seekers
get "stuck" in emptiness, in the absolute, in
transcendence. They cling to bliss, or peace, or indifference.
When the self-centered motivation for living disappears, many
seekers become indifferent. They see the perfection of all
existence and find no reason for doing anything, including caring
for themselves or others. I call this "taking a false
refuge." It is a very subtle egoic trap; it's a fixation in
the absolute and all unconscious form of attachment that
masquerades as liberation. It can be very difficult to wake
someone up from this deceptive fixation because they literally
have no motivation to let go of it. Stuck in a form of divine
indifference, such people believe they have reached the top of
the mountain when actually they are hiding out halfway up its
slope. Enlightenment does not mean one should disappear into the
realm of transcendence. To be fixated in the absolute is simply
the polar opposite of being fixated in the relative. With the
dawning of true enlightenment, there is a tremendous birthing of
impersonal Love and wisdom that never fixates in any realm of
experience. To awaken to the absolute view is profound and
transformative, but to awaken from all fixed points of view is
the birth of true nonduality. If emptiness cannot dance, it is
not true Emptiness. If moonlight does not flood the empty night
sky and reflect in every drop of water, on every blade of grass,
then you are only looking at your own empty dream. I say, Wake
up! Then, your heart will be flooded with a Love that you cannot
contain."
- Adyashanti posted to Wisdom-l by Mark Scorelle
photo by Dave Mason
Holding on to beliefs limits our
experience of life. That doesn't mean
that beliefs or ideas or thinking is a problem; the stubborn
attitude
of having to have things be a particular way, grasping on to our
beliefs and thoughts, all these cause the problems. To put it
simply,
using your belief system this way creates a situation in which
you
choose to be blind instead of being able to see, to be deaf
instead of
being able to hear, to be dead rather than alive, asleep rather
than
awake.
Only in an open, nonjudgmental space can we acknowledge what we
are
feeling. Only in an open space where we're not all caught up in
our
own version of reality can we see and hear and feel who others
really
are, which allows us to be with them and communicate with them
properly.
We already have everything we need. There is no need for
self-improvement. All these trips that we lay on ourselves--the
heavy-duty fearing that we're bad and hoping that we're good, the
identities that we so dearly cling to, the rage, the jealousy and
the
addictions of all kinds--never touch our basic wealth. They are
like
clouds that temporarily block the sun. But all the time our
warmth and
brilliance are right here. This is who we really are. We are one
blink
of an eye away from being fully awake.
~Pema Chodron
From: http://sufimystic.net
posted to Allspirit Inspiration by
Gill Eardley
Not-Self
Central to the Buddha's teaching is the doctrine of anatman: "not-self." This does not deny that the notion of an "I" works in the everyday world. In fact, we need a solid, stable ego to function in society. However, "I" is not real in an ultimate sense. It is a "name": a fictional construct that bears no correspondence to what is really the case. Because of this disjunction all kinds of problems ensue.
Once our minds have constructed the notion of "I," it becomes our central reference point. We attach to it and identify with it totally. We attempt to advance what appears to be its interests, to defend it against real or apparent threats and menaces. And we look for ego-affirmation at every turn: confirmation that we exist and are valued. The Gordian Knot of preoccupations arising from all this absorbs us exclusively, at times to the point of obsession. This is, however, a narrow and constricted way of being. Though we cannot see it when caught in the convolutions of ego, there is something in us that is larger and deeper: a wholly other way of being.
--John Snelling, Elements of Buddhism
WILD COMMUNION
I have read that,
There is an East African tribe that say,
"That, although God is good
And wishes good for everybody,
Unfortunately,
He has a half-witted brother
Who always interferes with what he does."
In my half witted days,
When beliefs and gurus were still big,
I colluded in torturing scriptures,
Extracting false confessions
As to meaning and purpose.
I walked through Argillen Castle gardens
Surrounded by Latin named flowers and roses,
Believing that 'real' "knowing"
Must be through the Latin
[Sean Martin – May 2007]
From Tony Parsons website
posted to Wisdom-l by Mark Scorelle