A Sliver of Reality - Kim Manly Ort

Our experiences and consequently our perceptions, gives us
a limited view of the world, a sliver of reality, if you will.
It's a valid sliver, but only a sliver.  Thought of in this way,
It's a wonder any of us can find similarities of experience
and understanding with others...

I'm all about seeing clearly, but each of us sees clearly differently,
depending on our identity (selected experience) and worldview.
For the past couple of years, I've been noticing what others
choose to believe and asking why.  I'm not exactly sure what to do
with some of the differences I have have difficulty understanding
or even how to talk to someone with a completely different
worldview.  I certainly have my own way of seeing and I find
some worldviews mind-boggling.  However, it's always a good
idea to question your own sliver of reality.

The Role of "Chance"

The musician and composer, John Cage, thought of "chance" as
something that happened to us, but also as something you could
invite into your life.  Why would you do that?  Because, if you
operate according to your own will or our story of how things are
or should be, you eliminate possibilities.

Cage invited "chance" into his life and [art].  The idea was to give
his will, his wants, his desired outcome a break and let "chance"
make a decision.  By using what he called "chance operations", he
could destroy his narrative, his particular point of view.  It's not that
his point of view wasn't worthy, just that it was limited and there
were a multiplicity of points of view he many not have considered.
It's a mindset where he let things be as they are without imposing
his own judgments on them.

Life is a dance with "chance"; always uncertain, often out of our
control, and this is scary.  We can embrace it, as John Cage did.
Whenever we feel our ego or rigid story is in charge, or we're
resisting reality and forming judgments, it's time to get curious
and ask questions like: "How else can I look at this?" or "What
other choice could I make?"  Why not let things be, invite "chance"
in, and explore the many possibilities that arise.

Kim Manly Ort
Writer, Photographer, Workshop Facilitator

~

"Life is like a box of chocolates,
you never know what you're going to get."

Forrest Gump

~

Personal Note:  What John Cage and Kim refer to as "Chance" I call
"The Mystery."  Some call it "Spirit", or even Intuition; tapping
into something greater than my self for Inspiration...  My husband
sees each day as a new life experience that offers a portal to Eternity,
if we let it, even the mundane, like mowing the lawn.  Sometimes he
will randomly choose from a list of possibilities for the day, or do
what he feels drawn to do that day.  Is that "chance" or opening to
the Field of "The Mystery" - or his own Intuition?  He says:
Intuition is the mainline to "The Universe."  It's how "The Universe"
communicates.  It's the flow of awareness that comes from
"The  Universe."

~

John Cage (1912-1992) was an American composer, music theorist,
writer, philosopher, and artist.  Cage studied Indian philosophy and
Zen Buddhism in the late 1940's, and the I Ching was a source of
reference for him, using it as a "random chance generator", as well
as a philosophical reference.

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
Moon and reflection in skylight 
a portal to eternity? :)

 

Wide Awake Fluidity

Over the last 10 years I have experienced many “awakenings” or “openings,” glimpses beyond the veil. For the last couple of months I’ve been experiencing a “call”, if you will, to “deepen”, although I have not understood what this means – deepen into what? Then last Saturday I experienced what Meg Hitchcock calls a “reality peel” – where you see beyond this reality into Reality. (See her posts: Brick Wall, William James & the Reality Peel, Further Musings on Enlightenment). And yet, it’s hard to put into words. So I’ve been waiting for the words to arise. At the very least it will make for an interesting blog post. :)

Internally I have been feeling as if I am in suspended animation, despite all the outward chaos going on in my life. In this suspended “state” it has felt as if I have been “waiting” for something, although that’s not quite the right word either. It’s a feeling of dynamic, restful suspension, as if I am waiting, but not like a person waiting for a bus to arrive, just an inward sense of waiting in Stillness, with no expectation, no anticipation, no *needing* for anything to happen, just feeling this pull into something deeper internally, while the surface chaos around me continues.

This past weekend there was an understanding that this “call” is a call to “return”, if you will, although it’s not really a “return” in the sense of two separate entities, one returning to the other, but more like something falling back in on itself, coming back around to itself, like coming full circle, being seen by itself. I remembered a phrase I’ve heard several times: “Enlightenment is really just the Self calling the Self back to Self” (or Itself). I resonate deeply with this. “We” are being called back to That which we inherently are! The Self becoming aware of Itself. Awareness aware of Awareness. It feels like the movement of the Self, waking up to Itself – the wave “returning” to the Ocean, and realizing that it *is* the Ocean. It’s a movement that just happens. It cannot be summoned, or created. It’s like all that is being lived outwardly is being called back to Itself – the in-breath after the pause after the out-breath. And in this there is deep rest. In this suspended “state” all the issues that my mind wraps around don’t really matter anymore: Mother issues, basement issues, Duality/Non-Duality, Enlightenment. They all become transparent, fluidly rising and falling within this spacious awake awareness. I have felt this before and yet the conceptual scaffolding always comes back into play – as it did this time.

For the past couple of weeks when I *look* at things they don’t seem like what they are. A window doesn’t *seem* like a window – although it is. It’s just an opening in a wall that is called “window.” As I sat in the living room Saturday I looked over at the couch, and that’s when the “reality peel” happened. I didn’t seek it, wasn’t meditating on it, was just sitting there and everything looked a little “different.” I realized that the couch *appears* as a couch, but it’s not really – a couch. The couch didn’t actually morph into something else, but there was a *sense* that it exists within a larger context of Existence; that there is a greater energy existing there/here. There was the sense that the things that we *see* are really a reality within Reality – within this Greater Context – not separate from It, but as *appearances of* It - appearances in/of the field of Awareness that *contains* everything that It is. It’s as if this field of Awareness, this Mystery, sees Itself *through* the seeing of this, through the awareness of this…

Every *thing* (including us) is really fluidly suspended in this Greater Context. From this perspective “things” are no longer seen as just objects, or just things – but appearances of Reality. Everything is surreal. Nothing is what it seems. It’s as if a sensory shift has taken place. It is a recognition of the fluidity of Being. It’s right here, behind what we *believe* in our minds to be real. Thought, feeling, emotion, objects, people all exist in a fluid dynamic of Oneness. And, it’s as if this Self/Being/Oneness *wants* to reveal Itself, wants to be *seen*, wants to be known – intimately – through the scaffolding.

Sweet Serenity ~~~~~

"What has been calling you throughout time.....is the flame of Consciousness

that is the essence of your being. When you meet yourSelf...

you are fulfilled, you are home.... to be home is simply to be here....

....discover directly for yourself this jewel that is alive within you."

Gangaji

The Diamond in Your Pocket

Funky Art :) - Christine