Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star...

Sitting in deep Silence in “The Cave” – Awareness flows. By Silence I mean the deep space of Awareness, the space of Existence in which existence exists – The Emptiness, Consciousness, the Primordial Womb of Stillness that is beyond the sense of “me”, beyond the mind of fear and trembling, beyond construct, label and concept. It is the knowing Stillness of ISness. It is the deep space where everything that is, is just allowed to be. It is the space from which life and life experiences spring… It is the space of True Mind, True Nature, The Great Mystery, Love, and Light beyond light… And in this Silence you know yourself as That…

In deep Silence everything exists in suspended animation within deep knowing Awareness – all of it originating from and reflected in Its Emptiness – like some grand reflecting pool. The “me”/body-mind that we believe ourselves to be exists (ephemerally) within this context of this Space of Aware Knowing, like a cloud that exists within the context of the sky-space. The cloud is suspended in the spaciousness of the sky, and is not just an “appearance” appearing *on* it, as if super-imposed on the backdrop of sky, as if the sky were a flat screen, but is actually suspended in the depth of the sky – surrounded by sky-space. During the day the sky *looks* flat, except for the clouds that also appear to be flat against the sky. At night it become obvious that there are many stars suspended *in* space. It becomes obvious that the sky-space has dimension, has substance – has life. Space is literally full of ItSelf. :)

Several years ago my husband and I went to an observatory late at night out in the middle of a forest. We both were awed when we realized that what we can actually see with our naked eyes is only a fraction of the multitude of stars and planets that actually exist in this spacious Space of deep Silence. Deep Space is *alive* with millions and billions of light-generating substance. This realization is enlivening. Nothing is flat. Everything is suspended in Spaciousness. What we see and experience is only the surface. Remembering this now has brought home to me how I live, for the most part, only at the surface of life, at the edge of Reality – unaware of Its depth; unaware of the *Life* that is at the *depths* of Being – just being.

In deep Silence it becomes obvious that life is not a movie against a flat screen. We are not flat “objects against a backdrop of Awareness.” Awareness is not a “backdrop”, not a flat movie screen on which a movie of life is projected. Awareness is alive spaciousness that flows through as Life – a generative Aliveness. Everything is being lived. Life/Awareness/Presence is living ItSelf here *as* this life, *as* this existence, as this “me” – evanescent as it is. Life is not “just this” – in the sense of just what you can taste, touch, smell, see, hear. It is ‘THIS’ – this Alive, Conscious, Awareing Silence - the life blood of “just this.” It is the Intelligent Living Awareing Reality that “just this” is. Do I hear heart giggles echoing in the distance? :)

In the deep Silence, Existence (capital E) sees/knows/recognizes everything as ItSelf. It does not see separate objects floating within itself. Everything that exists is in suspended animation - Life suspended in ItSelf – like the stars, planets and clouds mysteriously suspended in space. And it’s not that Awareness “sees” like some objective distant observer out beyond the universe, but is intimately aware of its own existence, its own expression, as this expression is happening within ItSelf – as Itself - like a hologram – reflected out into Infinity.

In the deep Silence, Pure Awareness has no concept of “duality” or of anything being other than ItSelf. Non-duality and duality are concepts that only exist in the mind, in comparison to each other. Everything always was and is an expression of One Aware Consciousness. No comparison is made in the expression – as the *expression* is not seen as something *separate* from ItSelf. The conceptual framework, the structure through which we *see* becomes confining and needless – except to the mind of course. And yet we continue to play our duality/non-duality game – making distinctions where there are none…

I read recently that after a long period of deep Silence, when the Buddha opened his eyes and saw the morning star on the day of his enlightenment, he realized that he was the star he was seeing – he realized that he was the same pure nature as the star, and that all beings are endowed with this pure, radiant brilliance… A Mystery. We are the stuff of stars. Twinkle, twinkle…

~*~

Photo ~ From The Invisible Universe
by David Malin

~*~



“The Void is a mirror…
Creation is an image…
Man is as the eye of the image,
reflected in the mirror.
The One who is reflected in the image
is hidden in the pupil of the eye.
Thus ‘He’ sees ‘Himself’…

What you see around you is
not other-than-you.
All and everything is the existence
of the One…

See ‘Him’ in everything
as yourself
and the non-existence of yourself.
This is Truth.
There is only the One/Self/Essence…
The reflection of man in the mirror
is the same as that
which is being reflected -
and the words of the image
are the reflected words of
the Real One.”

From the writings of
Sufi Master Ibn’ Arabi
From Grace Is Now