What Calls the Eye to See - Adyashanti

What calls the ear to listen or the eye to see
more than the surface facade that shrouds our essential spirit?
Parting the strata and dross, what is essential picks its way
through the manicured narrative of endless lives.  In each
moment of every day, Truth is not lacking or held in
abeyance for some later date; it is given in full measure,
and abundantly so.  Do not be afraid of what appears to be
chaos or dissolution - embrace the full measure of your life
at any cost.  Bare your heart to the Unknown and never
look back.  What you are stands content, invisible,
and everlasting.  All means have been provided for our
endless folly to split open into eternal delight.

Adyashanti
2012

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
Storm Cloud at Sunset

Passion for Being...

I want to walk through life truly seeing - truly Aware...
Awake to the Presence of the Eternal Being that lives this life...

- the Life that animates all life...

I want to See everything as Living Aliveness;

with the same innocent wonder and amazement
as I did as a child, as if seeing Life living for the
first time...

I want to be in Love with life again -
if I ever was...

Maybe loving, and living life in new ways...

I want to Hear
the laughter of Life

in my Heart.

I want to Experience the Euphoria of
Life ItSelf, living ItSelf
in all its unfolding luminosity,
in the every-day-ness of life...

I want to Embrace
every thought,
expression,
and feeling
as it arises
without
trying
to
confine it,
or suppress it,
or correct it
before it is expressed.

Let me be free from entanglements
of the mind that keep me compliant
and complicit with the world's ways...

I want to risk not following the rules,
the protocols, the agendas of others;
the well-worn paths.

Instead - rising above the familiarity
of any "path" to see what's really here...

May I have the courage to speak
with fierce grace to those who
would try to quell this passion,
to strip this enthusiasm, to
suffocate this spontaneity,
to dim the radiance and
clarity of
the

Passion of Being!

Mystic Meandering
Jan. 2011

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
reflection of stained glass on wall

(Holy Fire :)

Full Spectrum Experience - Jeff Foster

Don't judge your sorrow too quickly or too harshly, friend.  Honouring
the darkness within is not the same as 'wallowing'.  And cultivating
deep trust in all of life's movements does not equate to self-indulgence
or a 'pity-party'.  Please don't misunderstand this.  Find a space in your
heart for the unwanted, the unloved, the rejected aspects of experience.

If we refuse to plumb the depths we are left only half alive, however
'enlightened' we claim to be.  Artists, musicians, poets of all cultures
throughout the ages have understood this.  See your life as an art
gallery.  Embrace the full spectrum of experience, from the light to
the dark. Hold it all in your prayers, illuminate it all with the light
of loving awareness.  Be that awareness!

Perhaps your frustration just wants to frustrate itself fully and be
felt, fully.  Perhaps this moment contains no mistake!  Perhaps the
relief you will feel in time will be infinitely sweeter for having
suffered so deeply.  Perhaps your suffering is teaching you humility,
gratitude, quietude, and compassion - and trust - unbreakable trust
in life's strange processes.

Don't judge your sadness, your depression, your feelings [your illness].
And don't judge the process of another, for you really don't know
what's best for anyone, and you really don't know more than life itself.
  That which you reject (in another or yourself) may actually be
much-needed medicine, a misunderstood teacher, inviting you to an
 awakening deeper than you ever thought possible.  It may be a
threshold guardian, a gatekeeper of a forgotten kingdom. 
The glory of a life fully felt!

And to your demons say -

Namaste!

Jeff Foster

"No More!"...

I heard the voice of a young child as I was waking from sleep one morning back in 2015.  It yelled - "No More!"  The voice came from inside.  How strange, I thought.  I wondered if this was some kind of  "message" for me, or, if it was me screaming from the inside - "No More!" - enduring a particularly stressful time in my experience of life at that moment.  Or, was it my inner psyche calling out to a world gone mad; witnessing a species apparently turning against itself, apparently trying to destroy itself in so many different ways - or so it seems at times.  And the rest of us - onlookers - enduring the dance of darkness that plays itself out here - forced to face the darkness within and without.  I pondered this all day, turning my awareness inward to the fear inside - repeating the phrase internally - "No More!"  At the end of the day's reflection was the sense that sometimes all we can do is endure the way life is - day to day.  And I wondered why - why that is true, why is it that we must "endure" such pain, such heartache, such suffering, both within and without...  But there was no answer...

Maybe the voice was from a dream I didn't realize I was having, as if looking through a blurred window.  And maybe that really is what life is - a dream we don't know we're having - that we must endure for as long as the dream lasts, until we are awakened from the dream by a voice saying "No More!"...?   I don't know...  I cannot presume to know anything anymore - either spiritually or temporally...  It's all a mystery - looking through a glass dimly...   

~~~

Mystic that I am, and usually focused on the inner "spiritual" world, looking for a "spiritual answer", I am frankly encouraged, and impressed, to see articulate, intelligent young people across this country, but especially those from Parkland, Florida, speaking up, rising up like waves out of the Ocean of Being ItSelf, to say "Enough!"  Taking passionate action that may possibly end a cycle of violence and suffering in this country.  This too is the Tao - the movement of Life.  This too is Infinite Beingness moving like a wave in the hearts of fearless young people to give voice to their passion and pain.  Everything is allowed - both passion and pain - and - the waves of passionate action.  We just never know HOW "The Infinite" is going to express ItSelf in each of us...  We do not have to squelch what arises in us, limiting our expression, hiding behind words of conceptual dogma, or lofty "spirituality."  Like the storms at sea, the Ocean is still, but the waves crash and churn in response to the chaos of the storm overhead...  It's all allowed...  The calm and the chaos, the beauty and the destruction, the light and the dark, all serving the unknown purposes of a greater Mystery... Or so I'd like to believe...

~

Oh, and one more thing... Pardon me as I seem to be tapping into my little "activist" here in my passionate self-expression. :)  It occurred to me that when the heart opens the mind, one can no longer detach oneself with abstract, conceptual ideas and forms of "spirituality" that shield us from the suffering of humanity in this manifest world; pretending it doesn't exist, taking the position that this existence is unreal, or even some saying that the person doesn't exist; even if on an Absolute level of Pure Being that may all be true...  The true measure of the Heart, it seems to me, is not intellectual or emotional detachment, but how we see and respond to another Being - turning inward to the Heart of our own True Being and responding authentically from there...

There is a famous saying that goes:

"Before people want to know what you know,
they want to know
that you care."

Namaste

_/\_

Infinite, Self-aware Consciousness (Awareness) is the unlimited, open,
 empty field in which all experience appears, and out of which all
 experiences arise.  Remaining established as the Infinite Being that
we are doesn't mean we don't deal appropriately with
whatever.....arises. We deal with whatever presents itself, at a
relative level, and remember to remain established in Infinite Being,
 which is our Self.
There is only Infinite Being... 
We are a modulation, a vibration of that Infinite Being.

Rupert Spira

Contemporary Non-Duality teacher

~

Photo - Shadows on a wall, color altered

Trust Your Vision - Ivan Granger

So often we pour ourselves intensely into life's purpose without
actually pausing to consider why we are doing what we are doing.
How is it a reflection of who we truly are?  How does it express
our specific qualities and role within the larger panorama?  What
does it imply about the fundamental nature of reality?

Rarely in the modern world are we encouraged to discover our
vision and dedicate ourselves to it.  To the prevailing mindset,
one's vision is thought to be intangible, suggesting something
that is a fantasy whose pursuit is narcissistic or even delusional.
The focus of life must be practical with goals that are approved
and easily measured.

That approach, while seemingly reasonable and safe, is
devastating to both the individual and to society as a whole.
While we certainly must live effectively within the physical
and social worlds that require a certain level of practical purpose,
we are not such stunted creatures that exist only on that level.
We are magical beings, here to embody immensity and love and
the will of the universe as it expresses itself uniquely through
each of us.

Vision is the way we discover our personal path through the world.
Vision is the way we come to know ourselves, allowing us to be as
we are, showing us how to act with strength and creativity in
service to our true [vision].

A vision is not the same as some fantasy or daydream.  A true
 vision is the voice of nature, the intention of the universe,
uniquely tuned to our soul.

The word "vision" can trip us up because we think of seeing
things that are external to our physical bodies, so we often
consider a vision to be external to us.  But vision in the
spiritual sense is the conscious mind's way to assign meaning
to the deep recognition of self as a harmonious expression of the
self-aware universe. In other words, vision is not so much about
seeing as it is about being.  A vision is a challenge to ourselves
to be more fully ourselves.  Vision is a vocation, the calling of
the soul to its true role.

The first question is, how strongly do we want to see?  And then
we must answer the second question, do we dare live the truth
seen?  Then again, what's the point to any other path but our own?

Ivan Granger
commentary on the poem
"Trust Your Vision" by Stephen Levine
Poetry Chaikhana

~

Photo - Sunset digitally enhanced...

Keeping Quiet - Pablo Neruda

Now we will count to twelve
and we will all keep still.

For once on the face of the earth
let's not speak in any language,
let's stop for one second,
and not move our arms so much.

It would be an exotic moment
without rush...
we would all be together
in sudden strangeness.

Fishermen in the cold sea
would not harm whales
and the man gathering salt
would look at his hurt hands.

Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victory with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and walk about with their brothers
in the shade, doing nothing.

What I want should not be confused
with total inactivity.
Life is what it is about,
I want no truck with death.

If we are not so single-minded
about keeping our lives moving,
and for once could do nothing,
perhaps a huge silence
might interrupt this sadness
of never understanding ourselves
and of threatening ourselves with death.
Perhaps the earth can teach us
as when everything seems dead
and later proves to be alive.

Now I'll count up to twelve
and you keep quiet and I will go.

Pablo Neruda
re: slowing down and living in peace with each other
English version Alastair Reed

~

Photo: Meditating Monk
Painting: "Canyon Spirits"
2013

see - "Canyon Spirits" - The Evolution of a Painting

The Ferocity of Your Own Being - Aisha Salem

Stop running from the ferocity of your own Being...
Burn off all your own games to that in you which is
Pure Intensity...
When you meet the very Core of your Being
become completely loyal to the deepest passion in you
and allow no more waste of time - find that devotion
to Reality [Truth] within yourself...

Aisha Salem

~

Photo - Reflection of sunlight from
fireplace insert on carpet :)

Turn Your World Red - Danna Faulds

Cardinal calls me from the
railing of the deck.  "Turn
your world red," he says,
insistent, beckoning.  "Risk
life outside your hard-earned
walls and windows.  Cast
aside caution, propriety,
and your too small sense
of what you can and cannot do."

Fly!

I tell you that the
sky knows no constraints.
All your are or can be comes
clear in the near approach of clouds.

Fly!

That which you
fear the most holds your
deepest teaching.  Let your
spirit be the bridge between
safety and release.  Soar to
the far end of what is known
from dawn to twilight, then
throw yourself at the whim
of the wild night winds.
Turn your world red, and
live with no regrets.

Fly!

[.....]

Danna Faulds
From: Poems from the Heart of Yoga

~

Photo - Drip painting...
If you look real close you can
almost see a little red bird
sitting on the thick vertical line
in the middle near the top - very unintentional :)

The Earth Is Not A Dream - Czeslaw Milosz

Hope is with you when you believe
that earth is not a dream but living flesh,
that sight, touch, and hearing do not lie,
that all things you have ever seen here
are like a garden looked at from a gate.

You cannot enter.  But you’re sure it’s there.
Could we but look more clearly and wisely
we might discover somewhere in the garden
a strange new flower and an unnamed star.

Some people say we should not trust our eyes,
that there is nothing, just a seeming [an appearance].
These are the ones who have no hope.
They think that the moment we turn away,
the world, behind our backs, ceases to exist,
as if snatched up by the hands of thieves.

”Hope” - by Czeslaw Milosz

~*~

The only “dream” we “awaken” from/to
is the dream of separation from
our True Divine Nature…
The Light of our True Being…

Mystic Meandering

~*~

“Nothing short of direct experience
of ‘The Divine’
will ever satisfy our needs
for wholeness, fulfillment,
and completion…”

Author unknown

~

Photo: from the internet
photographer unknown

Divine Fire...

I want to walk through life
truly *seeing* - truly Aware…

Awake to the Truth of Existence

Open to LIFE…

I want to See *everything* as the expression
 of Divine Beingness;
every leaf that drops,
or snowflake that falls,
every being…

with the same innocent wonder
and amazement
as I did as a child;
as if truly *seeing* Life
for the first
time.

I want to be in love with Life again…
if ever I was…
Maybe loving Life in new ways…

I want to hear
Divine laughter

In my
Heart
and
experience
Divine
intimacy
in
my
being

Let me be free from the entanglements
of the mind
that keep me compliant
and complicit
with the world’s ways…

Let me embrace
every thought,
expression,
and feeling
as it arises
without
trying
to
confine
it
or
suppress
it

Life
 is a passage,
endless pathways,
and I want to risk
not following
the rules
of
the well-worn
paths.

Instead,
rising above
the familiarity
of “the path”
to feel
the Essence
of Life
that lives
this
life
that
”I”
am

/

The
Divine
Fire

Mystic Meandering
meditative writings
2012/14

~

Photo: Amaryllis flower
 radially blurred

Hubby's Passion :)

Ever since B started his new job last November I have been seeing more of this:

And this:

And this:

He loves his job, for which we are grateful, and has been putting in a lot of his own time.  At 62 he feels he has finally found his “dream job.”  Good thing! J  I feel his contentment, his dedication, and commitment.  It inspires me…  At 64 I know what my deep passion is…  I just don’t know how to make it my life’s work… Do they pay Mystics? J

A couple of weekends ago B created this low tech (on purpose),  hands-on, interactive, communication tool (below) to help inspire the people on his team to *engage* in dialogue and discussion – making the long scroll by hand.  It took him at least 8 hours to create, and was evidently a big hit, as it spawned many “workshop” like meetings to clarify and hone the direction of the work project.

His passion is not in making the scroll obviously, or even in working in the corporate world again, but is to facilitate people, particularly with regards to a business environment, to find their vision and direction, to bring clarity to the bigger picture, using his mutli-dimensional technical expertise.  That has always been his passion.  And after many years of honing his professional skills and gathering personal wisdom, he feels he now has the wisdom to put what he loves into practice in a business environment.  How often do you hear of that happening at this age!

And so I would imagine I am going to see a lot more of this:

And this:

And even this again: J

 How about you?

What is your life’s passion?
  And how are you making it your life’s work?

The Sacred Adventure...

“True adventures start with an inclination to enter the unknown.”

Sarah Ban Breathnach

Life is asking me to redefine “the path,” – again - to deepen into a new adventure – a new way of seeing, being, and living.  I am embarking on what feels like a “Sacred Adventure” – a new step into the unknown, opening to new directions, new perspectives, new attitudes, new awareness. Being open to what is really living this Life called “me” – and – at the same time, allowing myself to just be who I am.  As Ramana Maharshi said to those who were searching for the Truth – “Be as you are…”   I didn’t realize how freeing it was to allow myself to just be myself…  I don’t have to strive to know the Truth, to be “spiritual” or “non-dual” – or “enlightened.”  I can just be who I am – as that is who Beingness IS.  Imagine that! :)  I don’t have to be self-conscious about using words like “I”, “me”, “my” – in pseudo non-dual awareness – because it’s all just Awareness, all Consciousness expressing Itself – no distinction needed.  Imagine that :)  I don’t need to worry about whether I’m coming from the ego-self (“little me self”).  I only need to BE and let BEingness reveal ItSelf, express ItSelf, live ItSelf – through “me.”  


I continue to gradually shed the conceptual frameworks that have defined and informed my life so far – the boxes of life that have tended to constrain this authentic expression of Being; extricating my sense of self from the life dramas as well.  This shift in consciousness may take some time.  But some days it feels like I am waking up to a new adventure of Life in which I am finding an incredible sense of Aliveness, peace, adventure, laughter, lightness and boldness – a new passion for Life living Itself through this mechanism called “me.”   Realizing that Life truly IS a Sacred Adventure of Being…  Hope you come along…

“You’ve got to make a conscious choice every day to shed the old -
whatever ‘the old’ means for you -
old issues
old guilt
old patterns
old responses
old resentments
old rivalries
[old beliefs]

We no longer have the luxury of wallowing
in what’s held us back;
the emotional baggage…
[spiritual labels and definitions]
[misconceptions, mis-identifications]

Both authenticity and adventure require
the willingness to shed what’s safe
and predictable
in order to
embrace
a new
passion,
your authentic life…”

Sarah Ban Breathnach
Something More
Excavating the Authentic Self

And so I have been asking myself: what is it that allows this Beingness that I am to come Alive within?  What is it that allows this Passion of Being to come alive and really live ItSelf here, *through* this vehicle called “me” – and what I have called the “me-mechanism.”?  What allows me to experience this Aliveness that is inherently my Inner Being?  I didn’t *try* to experience it. I can’t explain it.  It is just there!

And how about you?  What inspires you to walk *toward* Life?; to walk into the unknown?; to *live* the  Passion and Aliveness of your Being? 

“…question and quest beyond the distracting entanglements…towards the pure light of understanding.”

Uma – Secret Notebooks – WildPages

Passion for Life...

I am re-posting this piece of prose poetry from Friday’s post (with a little different ending) because it really sets the tone for July - Passion!  I am feeling an emergence of passion for Life again - something I haven't felt in a long time.  I'm turning a page, leaving old dramas behind, and returning to a passion for living again.   I know it’s full of “I wants” but it's not about this "little self wanting." There is something welling up deep inside that wants to express, to live, to BE.  So just know that those “wants” come from the deepest yearnings of this Heart and a deep passion for what is True…

I want to walk through life
truly *seeing* - truly Aware…
 *Awake* to the Truth of Eternal Being…

Open to Life –
 not with mental judgments, opinions, and interpretations
 of what is happening,
 or what should be happening,
 or what I wish would happen,
  but with receptivity,
 openness,
 acceptance,
 allowing.

I want to See *everything* as Living Beingness;
 every leaf that drops,
 or snowflake that falls,
every being -
 with the same innocent wonder and amazement as I did as a child
as if seeing Life living for the first time…

  I want to be in Love with Life again –
 if I ever was…
  Maybe Loving Life in new ways –

I want to Hear
the laughter
in my
Heart

I want to Experience
everything
with curiosity
and equanimity

I want to Notice…
every thought,

expression,
and feeling
as it arises
without
trying to confine it,
or suppress it
before it is expressed;
or correct others
in their expression.

Save me from the arrogance of
thinking that I know what others need,
or how to “help” or “fix” them;
allowing others to be who they are,
trusting that Life is taking
them where they need to go,
just as It is me…

Let me be free from the entanglements
of the mind
that keep me compliant,
and complicit,
with the world’s ways…

Life is a paradigm of endless pathways,
and I want to risk not following the rules,
the well-worn paths.
Instead - rising above
the familiarity
of “the path”
to see what’s *really* here…

I want to live
in
the simplicity
of
the
ever-unfolding
luminosity
of

Truth.

And may I have the courage
to speak with fierce grace
to those who would try to
quell this passion,
to strip this enthusiasm,
and suffocate this spontaneity
for
the radiance
and
clarity
of


the


Passion


of 


Life

Mystic Meandering
Meditative Writings
January 1, 2011
revised July 1, 2012