Multiplicity and Unicity - Licata and Ruvinsky

The experience of multiplicity is just as holy, as valid, and
as "spiritual" [as unity]...  God itself has no bias toward
unity or multiplicity, oneness or differentiation, but rather
expresses itself through each of these perspectives to
disclose one of its qualities or fragrances.  We need not
take sides but only enter into communion with each of
these energies...

Matt Licata
From: A Healing Space:
Befriending Ourselves in Difficult Times

~

"The question doesn't even arise in Silence..."

Fred LaMotte
Uradiance

~

She ["God"] births herself as the many who interchangeably
play the roles of objects and subjects, reciprocally adapting,
each of the many, even in their individual forms,
embodying the One...

Joan Ruvinsky
From: The Recognition of Our Own Heart

~

Photo from the Internet

 

The World Shines Forth - Joan Ruvinsky

The world shines forth as the embodiement
of the Divine Mother;
the eternal Feminine -

the Ultimate Reality
never separate from
its Source.

~

She births Herself as the many...

even in their individual forms,
embodying the One,
the One who condenses into the mind...

She confines Herself by the limits
of space and time...

Contracting Her powers, She
explores limitations -
becoming ordinary, isolated
individuals...

She knows fully Her own play of
contractions and realizes Herself
as these.  Even by her descent into
contraction She recognizes
the Universe as Her own very Self.
Blossoming forth from her own Heart,
the play of the One and the many...

~

Everything becomes potentially
a doorway to the Infinite
since it is simply a coagulation
[contraction] of this Infinity.

Joan Ruvinsky

Center section is excerpts from the
Pratyabhijnahrdayam - an ancient Hindu
text from the Kashmir Shaivism tradition
meaning - The Recognition of our own Heart
(aka - The Recognition of the Self)

From the Joan Ruvinsky interpretive version,
in her book: The Recognition of Our Own Heart

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

The Real In You - Joan Ruvinsky

 ...Absolute Reality overflows spontaneously into denser and
denser myriads of interacting forms, [including human form]
 playfully forgetting the knowledge of their identity with Source. 
Then there is an inward-turning that reveals the primordial
 hum that surges at the heart of all things.  Pure Being reiterates
 ItSelf in the continuous interplay of creation and reabsorption,
simultaneously.

...[With this recognition] we stop pretending that we don't
know Who we are.  We are no longer fooled by our play
of ignorance.  The incandescence and the ordinary are
simultaneously present [in us].  We experience ourselves
to be in continuous dynamism with the Heart of Being,
surrounded and penetrated by Presence.

[We see that]...separateness is just another experience in the
field of unity.  These, too, are our co-creations with the Source.
It could be said that we are walking in God's shoes, [or Buddha's
shoes, or Shiva's shoes - however one knows that Presence].
We settle back into a seamless, timeless continuity [with Source]...

The game of hide-and-seek has found its own conclusion...

We are home...

Joan Ruvinsky
from her book: The Recognition of Our Own Heart

[brackets mine]

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

"Play" of Perspectives - Joan Ruvinsky

 Every philosophy [spiritual teaching] seeks to describe,
even explain, How It All Is.

...the various systems are simply roles that
Consciousness takes on, the way a person changes outfits
from day to day - same person, different look.

All different and divergent philosophical [spiritual] positions
are the outpourings of Consciousness at play.  
Any philosophical [spiritual] position, no matter what, is only
a partial viewpoint, in which only a fragment of the unitary
whole is described.

We can never approximate the capital-t Truth in words...

Joan Ruvinsky

From: The Recognition of Our Own Heart

[brackets mine]

~

Life is simply a Divine "play" of perspectives
that allows every expression/position to be played...

MM

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

Life size chess board in atrium of a nearby office building
(notice 2 pieces are missing)
Photo color digitally inverted to show perspective:
Black became White
White became Black
and shades in between

The Sandbox of Life - Joan Ruvinsky

 "Embodied liberation" means fully experiencing life as it
passes through us: Celebrations, catastrophes and all the
boring bits in between.  "This"- the Unspeakable - is
wholly present throughout the ups and downs, joys and
tribulations, work life, love life, whether monk or householder.

Thoughts do not have to cease, likes and dislikes do not
have to disappear, dress code, name and personality do not
have to change.  There is no particular image to which the one
who is "liberated' need conform.  Cultural trappings are not
necessary.  The West has often been impressed by the outward
image or appearance  of the co-called "enlightened being",
but had often judged its homegrown saints by false criteria.
Jeans and sneakers are fine.  Orange robes are fine. A business
suit is fine.  Who is to judge?  Who is to compare?  Even
saints eat ice cream.

The behavior of someone who is "liberated" in this lifetime 
is often unpredictable.  Consciousness, of her own inherent
spontaneity, manifests variously.  Personality characteristics
such as joy, warmth, compassion, and sympathy are not
necessarily foolproof markers of "enlightenment."

This bliss/joy of Consciousness is simply resting in what is.
It may not be obvious to an onlooker, as it is at a vibrational
level far above the ordinary perception through the five senses.
This bliss/joy abides regardless of what we are doing or
thinking...  It is unconditioned and ever-present.

We can play all we want in the sandbox [of life], but we
always know where home is.  Even at play, we are at home.

Joan Ruvinsky
From: The Recognition of Our Own Heart

~

Personal Note:  In my new found sense of  playful "freedom"
I do not feel "liberated" from anything, in the traditional
sense of the word, nor was it a goal that I was trying to 
achieve.  It just happened spontaneously, uncontrived, when
I started tapping into my Child-like Nature, aka our Natural State,
 - internally feeling "liberated" from the inner struggle
 to "figure it all out" - this "spiritual" thing that I've been
 doing for the past 37 years or more...

There is a new sense of "freedom" to just be myself in this new
found playful attitude with life; accepting myself as I am, 
as I express my Natural Nature; tapping into the "magic" or
"mystical" side of life through playfulness - spontaneously
navigating my way through life as it is...

~

The bliss/joy of our Natural State allows us to feel "liberated."

Mitch Rosacker
Self Discovery Studio

~

Life is a playground.....
We must play, retiring at night
empty-handed and tired...

Ari Hanarvar

From: Rumi's Gifts

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

"Consciousness" is Vibration - Joan Ruvinsky

Kashmir Saivism (pronounced shaivism), specifically the
School of Recognition, assumes Consciousness, not matter
or energy, to be the basic stuff of the universe and that
manifestation is simply Consciousness vibrating at
grosser and grosser frequencies.  Spirit becomes Matter.
Divine Awareness solidifies from the formless through
denser mind and senses, all the way to the densest, most
basic elements of earth, water, fire, air and space.  The
world shines as the embodiment of the Divine Mother,
the eternal feminine - the Ultimate Reality...

Everything becomes potentially a doorway to the Infinite -
since it is simply a coagulation of this Infinity, in a play of
unfolding and refolding...

~

All manifestation, things, people, occurrences, effects and
affects are made of the self-same Consciousness [Infinite
Beingness] coagulated into form.

All pairs of opposites emerge from, are enfolded in and are
made of Pure Consciousness [Beingness].  Everything is
Consciousness[Beingness].  Everything happens.
Consciousness does not have a point of view.

Duality proceeds in non-duality.
It's not either/or - it's both/and.
The Infinite contains everything.

There is nothing that is not swept up in this fundamental
movement of Being-in-form.

~

"Consciousness" can also be called Awareness, Universal
Consciousness, Being, The Divine Feminine, The Divine
Mother from which manifestation materializes
according to the culture and background of Kashmir
Saivism.  It is also referred to as "This" - meaning
the Omnipresence of Ultimate Reality without
image or name.

~

Steep in the Unfathomable,
let the Mystery communicate ItSelf...

Joan Ruvinsky
Excerpts from -
The Recognition of our Own Heart
Pratyabhijnahrdayam

Love this book! :)

Read a "review" by Miriam Louisa Simons
at This Unlit Light

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
 Mandala Art

The Tendency Toward War - Gangaji

When you are called home, when you are somehow struck by
the absolutely mysterious and irrevocable desire to know the
truth of who you are, then you must be willing to put aside
every story of separation.  Every story of separation is a story
of war.

Human beings have been making war in every culture for a
very long time.  Culture is a reflection of the individual mind,
and the individual mind is a reflection of the cultural mind.
Since you are reading this, I assume you are interested in
peace in your own mind.  You are not waiting for "them"
to make peace.  This is good news, because war is fought
to get others to do it our way so that we can be at peace.
When you stop waiting for them, instead shift your attention
to your own mind, then you can recognize the tendency toward
war in your own mind, the tendencies of totalitarianism, hate
revenge, and holding on.  And you can recognize the suffering
that those tendencies continue to deliver.

Somehow, in the face of it all, you find you want peace.
You are sick and tired of the war within your own mind.
You only need to accept the invitation of your own heart,
regardless of outer or inner circumstances, and let
yourself sink into the peace of your innermost Being.

Unless all of us take responsibility for our own inner peace,
the wars will continue.  We cannot wait any longer for
someone else to change.  We cannot wait for someone else
to forgive us so that we can forgive them.  We cannot wait
for someone else to say they are sorry.
Peace cannot be postponed.

Gangaji

From - The Diamond In Your Pocket

via - The Beauty We Love

~

"Separateness is an experience in the field of unity."

Joan Ruvinsky
From - The Recognition of Our Own Heart

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

"The Hymn of Creation" - The Rig Veda

Then even nothingness was not, nor existence.
There was no air then, nor the heavens beyond it.
What covered it?  Where was it? In whose keeping?
Was there then cosmic water, in depths unfathomed?

There was neither death nor immortality,
nor was there then the torch of night and day.
The One breathed windlessly and self-sustaining.
There was that One then, and there was no other.

At first there was only darkness wrapped in darkness.
All this was only unillumined water.
That One which came to be, enclosed in nothing,
arose at last, born of the power of heat...

But after all, who knows, and who can say
whence it all came, and how creation happened?

The gods themselves are later than creation,
so who knows truly whence it has arisen?

Whence all creation had its origin,
he, whether he fashioned it or whether he did not,
he, who surveys it all from highest heaven,
he knows - or maybe he does not know.

~

The Rig Veda is one of the oldest texts [creation stories]
dating from somewhere between 4000 and 2000 BC

~

This version is from a wonderful book for the serious
explorer of the Truth of Existence called,
The Recognition of Our Own Heart:
Pratyabhijnahrdayam

by the late Joan Ruvinsky.

It is a modern day interpretive translation of
the Pratyabhijnahrdayam -
loosely meaning "Primordial Recognition" -
from the 11th century Kashmir Shaivism tradition.

The basic concept of Kashmir Shaivism is that an
individual's existence is the unlimited manifestation of
Universal Consciousness (the Luminous Unmanifest)
that embodies everything.
It is also available on Amazon here.