Does the Path have a Heart? - Carlos Castaneda

You must always keep in mind that a path is only a path.
Each path is only one of a million paths.
If you feel that you must not follow it,

you need not stay with it under any circumstances.
Any path is only a path.

There is no affront to yourself or others in dropping a path
if that is what your heart tells you to do.
But your decision to keep on a path or to leave it
must be free of fear and ambition.

I caution you: look at every path closely and deliberately.
Try it as many times as you think necessary.
Then ask yourself and yourself alone this one question:
Does this path have a heart?

All paths are the same.  They lead nowhere.
They are paths going through the brush or into the brush
or under the brush of the Universe.
The only question is: Does this path have a heart?

If it does, then it is a good path.
If it doesn't, then it is of no use.

Carlos Castaneda

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
Inverted color

 

Questions for the Quest - Misc.

 

From the Web Telescope

[spiritually speaking:]

What is the deepest longing of your Heart -
that which is more important than anything else?

What in you is being called forward, seeking attentions?

What is the pull, what calls to you?

What is your own inner resource,
sanctuary, refuge?

What is it that you call upon
that helps you connect
with [the inner feeling of stillness]
and being at ease?

What wants to be felt,
acknowledged?

Be open to what reveals itself...

Kathleen Knipp
excerpts from a Yoga Nidra meditation

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As we embark on a "new" year -
I'm questioning again,
things like these...

why are you questing?
Or - why did you start questing so long ago?

What drew you to the Quest?
What are you trying to pursue?
What calls to you still and
compels you to keep questing?
What speaks to your Soul?

~

I know from my own experience

not to let others determine my "path"
out of obligation or obedience,
no matter what others may tell me the truth is -
or isn't.

I must follow my own "invisible" path
that only I know; the one that is true for me...

That will intuitively lead me Home...

Blessings to us all for a safe passage in the year ahead...

_/\_

MM

~~~~~~~

 The pilgrimage is one that each must make alone...

to that boundary of space and time where
the mind and heart encounter the
"ultimate  mystery",
the known unknowable...

The quest will perhaps require more courage
than you or I can bear...

Chet Raymo
from: The Soul of the Night

A Non-Path Path :) - a meandering...

I am feeling the need to settle deeper into the interior, and 
rediscover a sense of the inner Truth of Myself; not by following
a particular external path - but by intuitively listening to the 
Inner Voice; by spending time in Quietude, and "The Silence"
(which I crave, but so easily avoid by getting distracted on
non-essential things.).

"The Quest" - for me then - is to discover the Deeper Reality of

Myself.  I have forgotten how to be ME!  In a sense, what I was
"designed" for; one could say my Soul's "calling"...   Some call it
the Self (or Higher Self), but I get hung up on those words, because
the big "S" Self is not another self hidden somewhere inside us with
a big S on it that we have to "become"/discover.  But it's the discovery
of, a remembering of, having a felt sense of, the authentic, natural
self, beyond mind, beyond religion, beyond "spirituality."  Who are
 we really?   What is the "Deeper Reality"? I thought maybe I knew, 
but I haven't really met Her - yet...  Hopefully I will find the Deep
Quiet of the Heart, and the Illuminating Light of the Soul.

The path of "Enlightenment"/"Awakening"/"Self-Realization",
particularly what is popularly known as "Non-Duality, wasn't
IT for me, with its attraction to the mind and its abstractions and
mind games. It is just another construct, a belief system.  I found
out that the "Emperor has no clothes!  And I'd rather not describe
Truth by a negative - with no-me, no-self, no other, no world - as
Truth  is all inclusive - including duality, me, self, other, humanity,
and the world.

Even if one follows a "spiritual path" (which can be any path), life
will not suddenly become easy or flowing with bliss, although there
may be little epiphanies and "awakenings" here and there. We won't
necessarily lose our personality with its quirks, and become an
emotionless automaton. We won't lose our conditioning, or our 
neuroses.  Our thoughts will not stop, neither will our surface
struggles, or our pain, or our stories.  Walking "a path" doesn't even
guarantee that we will actually *see* life differently, or suddenly
find our "purpose" - as if there is only one.  But no one tells you
this about "the path."  It has to be a self-discovery, even if we have
a "Teacher", a "Path", or use a "Teaching" to help point the way.

It is different for everyone, of course.  I'm only reflecting on my
own experience here...

Years of seeking, realization, recognition, and then forgetting, and
then seeking again, then remembering, and then forgetting again, etc.,
brought me to the realization that discovering (or rediscovering) the
Essence of who I am is, for me, through awareness of and deep
intimacy with "The Silence" within; through continually coming
back to "The Silence of Source" - the space of Stillness, and
innate Wisdom - which of course is wherever we are at the 
moment, not off in the distance somewhere.  It's not a place.
"The path" doesn't *go* anywhere.  There is no reward at the end.
It's an inner pathless path...  And that's my "path" - again :)
rediscovering the inner Silent Truth of Myself, directly;
experiencing the underlying Rhythm of Existence Itself, and
within that the Truth of Myself...

Mystic Meandering
April 2024

~

Wanderer, your footsteps are the road,
and nothing more;
Wanderer, there is no road.
The road is made by walking...

By walking one makes the road,
and upon glancing behind
one sees the path that will
never be trod again...

Wanderer, there is no road -
only wakes upon the sea..."

Antonio Machado

~

Empty yourself of everything.
Let the mind rest in peace.
The ten thousand things rise and fall
while the [inner] self watches their return.
They grow and flourish and then
return to the source.
Returning to the source is stillness,
which is the way of nature...

Returning is the motion of the Tao.

Lao Tzu

~~

Photo - Mystic Meandering
taken at the Denver Botanical Gardens

 

Just Walk It - a meandering...

Some people's nature is made for Silence and Solitude,
others - not...

I crave it...

that is - my body and soul crave it...

I am often overwhelmed by the stimulation
of daily living, being pulled by the externals,
needing to turn to the Inner Life...

There are many ways of accessing our "Inner Being"/Essence,
or "The Divine", or "Source" - however one calls it;
through being out in nature, thru Dance, or writing Poetry,
in Art, or Music, and Meditation; however we are naturally
inclined.  It's an individual thing and "The Divine"/Source/Life
meets us where we are, *as* we are...

There are no "shoulds" or "have to's" in intimacy with
"The Inner Silence."
You don't have to regurgitate what you have been taught
was the "truth"; what you are conditioned to *believe*
as an established way of "believing" - a dogma...

Maybe we're just a dramatization/expression of
"Consciousness", or "The Source", or "The Ineffable";
Unique waves on the Ocean of Awareness.

No one person, religion, spirituality, philosophy or
institution *has* the "answer"...

The Real Source of "truth" is within, and transcends all
beliefs, unencumbered by religion, language, history, or culture...

Life unfolds differently for all of us.
And maybe it "happens" according to the way we "believe" -
who knows...

Go the way you feel pulled/called to go,
the path will change as needed.

Whatever your walk of Life,
whatever your nature,
whatever your path,
just walk it...

Mystic Meandering
March 15, 2024

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

A Meanderer's Way - a meandering...

Ever since I was a child I wanted to know God - a child's
understanding of a "religious" God, of course. I had a love
affair with Jesus, believing he would bring me to "God."
Then, as an adult, my search evolved and expanded to include
finding "myself", whoever she was/is :)  Then the search for
 Truth, Wisdom and Enlightenment - through Metaphysics,
Buddhism ( I was enamored with The Buddha, not Buddhism,
although there were many gems there that I have retained),
Advaita and Non-Duality, and Hinduism/Kashmir Shaivism.
with its many deities for all occasions. :)
I mean, what more could there be, right? 
While each had their own unique "Way", they
were really all the same "path," under different disguises,
with different emphases.

And now through all my many meanderings, I am feeling the
need to settle in, deepen into the Depths within myself and see
what's there; not by following yet another particular external
"spiritual" path - but listening deeply to the Inner promptings
 and opening to the Inner animating Life Energies, by spending
 time in the Great Silence - which has been difficult to do lately...

Being on a "spiritual path" has always felt like I was intentionally
going SOMEwhere, seeking "Some-thing" that I would find at
the "end" of my journey; like retirement after a life of working;
or the magical pot of gold at the end of the mythical rainbow; or
even the mystical "Holy Grail."   Or maybe even seeking an
"end" to suffering, pain, ignorance, my humanness, as I turned
 into  "Light" :), or even the end of seeking.  

But what if there is no such "path", no need for seeking the
 illusive big "S"-self that non-duality spiritual seekers are seeking? 
 I discovered for myself there isn't a big "S" "spiritual"-Self that
"we" become.  There is no other "Self" to "find/become." 
There's just our "Natural Self" or Essence that wants to be
discovered, recognized, known; that is playful, creative,
expressive and free...

The path of "Enlightenment"/"Awakening"/"Self-Realization"
(popularly known as "Non-Duality"), is much like all the other
paths I have taken throughout my life.  It's just another construct. 
 I found that the Emperor has no clothes!  And I'd rather not
describe  "Truth" by a negative - with no-me, no-self-, no-other,
no-world - as "Truth" is all inclusive - including duality, me, self,
 other, and world.

Even if one follows "a path" there is no guarantee that we will
discover what we are looking for, and life will not suddenly 
become easy or flowing with bliss.  We won't necessarily lose
 our personality with its quirks, our conditioning, or our neuroses.
The "ego" doesn't die! - gasp...  It's all part of the package, our
uniqueness.  Ego is an interface with the Natural Self/Essence.

Our thoughts will not stop, neither will our surface struggles, or
our pain, or our stories.  Walking "a path" doesn't even guarantee
that we will actually see life differently from either the mountain-
top, or with nose to the ground; or suddenly find our "purpose" -
 as if there was only one.  But no one tells us this about "the path.
  It has to be discovered for ourselves - even if we have a "Teacher",
or use a "Teaching" to point the way...  We still have to travel
our own unique way...

Years of seeking, realization, and recognition brought me to an old
realization that rediscovering the Essence of who I am, the Natural
Self within a Divine Cosmology, is through awareness of and deep
intimacy with the Great Silence within; (the 4th "key" that I found
on the way, although should probably be the first) through
continually coming back to the space of Silent, Still, Innate Knowing -
which of course is wherever we are, not off in the distance somewhere
It's not a place.  "The path" doesn't go anywhere.  There is no 
reward at the end.  It's an inner pathless path...  And that's the "path"
that I keep returning to :) - rediscovering this deep inner Silence
again and again - remembering the underlying Rhythm of the 
Cosmos ItSelf - humming in and through me...

Ommmmmm....

_/\_
Namasate

Mystic Meandering
updated Aug 18, 2023

It's never ending... :)

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

 

Unchangingness - Kathleen Knipp

Sustain your own refuge...
Rest in your inner sanctuary when the storm hits...
Be pulled toward your own North star...

Access whatever it is that helps you to feel at ease,
to feel safe, to let down your guard, to experience
equanimity...

Use imagery finding your way home...

The path becomes very intuitive, and profoundly resting...
Contracting thoughts, emotions and somatic sensations
happen against a backdrop of unchangingness...

Kathleen Knipp
Excerpts from a Yoga Nidra meditation

~

If you're looking for a little sanity in this insane world,
in these challenging times, you might find these Yoga Nidra
meditations by Kathleen Knipp, of Pathless Yoga, helpful in
sustaining your equanimity and sense of peace...

https://pathlessyoga.com/listen/

scroll down to see Kathleen's audio meditations

~

The last time I checked, the rest of the Universe is in 
good shape.  It's just Earth that's got the problem...

Neil deGrass Tyson

 

Pathless - Fred LaMotte

 I breathe in darkness, breathe out light, but pranayama is
not my way.  I bend and bow and honor the tides in my
spine, but asanas are not my way.

I savor the name of God, but the Word is not my way. I
honor the Guru, but my path has no master.

Though I listen to the songs and suras of the wise, I follow
not the Vedas, the Torah, the Qur'an.

I give to those in need, but the path of seva is not for me.  I
surrender, Lord, but even You, even You, are not my way.
Parasam Gateh, "beyond the beyond," is where I am right now.

With no chant, no altar, no eucharist or puja, I wander in the
forest, offering the silence of cedar, trillium, fern.

At midnight, soundless owl wings, bright knives of un-knowing,
slice through the glory of darkness.  Coyote howl is my song.

And because the light of primeval stars is only now arriving
in my body, I am awake.

Each electron bathes in the glory of its origin.  Every photon
collides with the darkest particle of its other self.  I follow the
wordless path of this breath Om.

But my way is not a journey, it passes neither in nor out, but
shatters every window between seer and seen, sinking every
vessel in the ocean of transparency.

I have trillions of eyes, gazing into the well of eternal aloneness,
where past and future kiss, annihilating time.  This very
moment is the diamond of my awakening.

I achieve the beatific vision of celestial mansions, simply by
gazing at the motionless explosion of a rose.

Every religion a blood-colored petal of this, but I would offer
the whole flower, the wounded bud which opens in all directions
at once.

Where I Am there are no steps, no degrees of initiation, no levels
one to seven: only fragrances, only dissolving.

Each lineage of masters is a pollen mote, but I have sticky feet. 
I visit the center, where the nectar is made in secret darkness.

Down where the pistil and stamen touch in a throb of stillness.
Come, drink.....

Fred LaMotte
Uradiance

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

Soul Windows - John O'Donohue, Ram Dass & D.H. Lawrence

When your soul awakens,
you begin to truly inherit your life.
You leave the kingdom of fake surfaces,
repetitive talk and many weary roles,
and slip deeper into the true adventure of
who you are,
and who you are called to become.

The greatest friend of the soul is the unknown...

Yet we are afraid of the unknown because
it lies outside our vision and our control.
We avoid it or quell it by filtering it
through protective barriers of
domestication and control.

The normal way never leads home...

John O'Donohue

~

The spiritual journey is individual, highly personal.
It can't be organized and regulated.

It isn't true that everyone should follow one path.
Listen to your own truth...

Ram Dass

~

However smart we may be,
however rich and clever or loving and charitable
or spiritual or impeccable,
it doesn't help us at all.

The real power comes to us from the beyond,
the unseen, the unknown.

D. H. Lawrence

~

Photo from the Internet

Wandering Free...

Wandering the woods without a trail,
my focus on finding The Truth
is realized as a self-made illusion.

Not needing to find yet another belief system;
no longer a need for a specific path
cut by others; nor the illusion of
future "enlightenment" through practice,
discipline, or self-control...

Finding comfort in loosening the
constraints of the "spiritual cocoon"
that I wrapped myself in for so long;

even the mantel of meditation
has become too heavy and is unraveling -
becoming frayed... like an old prayer shawl.

Reborn from the Chrysalis of my comforting beliefs,
finding freedom in just BEing ME,
without suffocating concepts or a defined
"spiritual image"; instead finding my true Face...

Breaking free from the conceptual "spiritual"
constructs; the scaffolding of beliefs and ideas
about "spirituality" that propped "me" up;
caged in spiritual ideals, unable to fly...

Freed now from the cage of my own making,
I can breathe, I can LIVE
intuitively, being moved from within,
listening for what calls to me...
discovering freedom in being open to where life goes,
as I wander the woods without a trail...

Mystic Meandering
Nov. 18, 2019

~

With gratitude to Debbie whose email inspired
this poem and her phrase: "wandering the woods
without a trail."

Carving out a "Path"...

Life is asking me to redefine "the path" - again - to deepen
into a "new" way of seeing, being and living.  I am
embarking on what feels like a new step into the unknown,
carving out a "path" for myself, opening to new directions,
new perspectives, new awareness.  Being open to what is
really living this Life called "me" - and - at the same time,
allowing myself to just be the way I am.  As Ramana Maharshi
said to those who were searching for the Truth of their being -
"Be as you are..."  In letting go of the need to look through a
particular "spiritual" lens, I realize how freeing it is to allow
myself to just be myself...  To not strive to know the Truth,
but to let it reveal ItSelf; to not strive to be "spiritual" or
"non-dual" - or "enlightened."  I can just be who I am  -
as that is who my true "Beingness" IS.  I don't have to be
self-conscious about using words like "I", "me", "my" - in
some kind of pseudo non-dual awareness - because...  It's all
just Beingness, pure Awareness, pure Consciousness, Source,
God, etc., expressing ItSelf.  There's no need to make a
distinction between self and Self.  It's all The Self...
Imagine that :)

I don't need to worry about whether I'm coming from the ego-
self because it's part of the whole package, part of the
wholeness that we are.  I only need to BE, and let
BEingness reveal ItSelf, express ItSelf, live Itself as "me."

It's not about "me" being "enlightened", or spiritualizing
everything, but seeing the True Nature of myself and
being authentic...

I continue to gradually shed the conceptual frameworks that
have defined and informed my "path" so far - the boxes of belief
that have tended to constrain this authentic expression of Self,
extricating my sense of self from the life dramas that have
preoccupied my mind.  This shift in consciousness may take
some time, and I don't know where I will land, realizing that
Life is truly a Sacred Adventure of just Being, and adventure
in lightness and boldness; of letting go of the sack of
insignificant items/beliefs that I've been carrying for so long...
It's a never-ending exploration...

Namaste
Mystic Meandering

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

Santiago - David Whyte

The road seen, then not seen, the hillside
hiding then revealing the way you should take,
the road dropping away from you as if leaving you
to walk on thin air, then catching you, holding you up,
when you thought you would fall,
and the way forward always in the end
the way that you followed, the way that carried you
into your future, that brought you to this place,

no matter that it sometimes took your promise from you,
no matter that it had to break your heart along the way;
the sense of having walked from far inside yourself
out into the revelation, to have risked yourself
for something that seemed to stand both inside you
and far beyond you, that called you back
to the only road in the end you could follow, walking
as you did, in your rags of love and speaking in the voice
that by night became a prayer for safe arrival,
so that one day you realized that what you wanted
had already happened long ago and in the dwelling place
you had lived in before you began,
and that every step along the way, you had carried
the heart and mind and the promise
that first set you off and drew you on and that you were
more marvelous in your simple wish to find a way
than the gilded roofs of any destination you could reach:
as if, all along, you had thought the end point might be a city
with golden towers, and cheering crowds,
and turning the corner at what you thought was the end
of the road, you found just a simple reflection,
and a clear revelation beneath the face looking back
and beneath it another invitation, all in one glimpse:
like a person and a place you had sought forever,
like a broad field of freedom that beckoned you beyond;
like another life, and the road still stretching on.

David Whyte
From Pilgrim

via No Mind's Land

~

Photo from In The Garden of the Beloved Facebook

Into The Forest Alone...

"The Forest" traditionally is a threshold symbol of entering
the unknown, the deeper nature, or the spiritual world.  In
fairy tales it usually represents a passage though difficulties
and an opportunity for "transformation" of some kind.  I also
see it as a sanctuary, refuge, a place of deepening.  This
entering the "Dark Forest" happens sometimes when I have
lost (intentionally or otherwise) the framework which gives
structure to my life, when I must find my own way, and be
true to the call of Self,  Shamans, poets, holy men and women
sought refuge in the forest, as a healing place.  Going into
The Forest represents a return to the Primordial Self - beyond
societal, cultural, conceptual and spiritual frameworks.  In a
way, it is like returning to the child's heart of innocence -
just following the longing of the Heart once again; trusting
that I will emerge from "The Dark Forest" with clarity.  As a
child I often went into the forest next to our house as a place
just to sit, to listen and commune with nature, and write
poetry.  It was a place of directly experiencing what I knew
then to be "God."  Now known by other names...

And, since I don't have a "Dark Forest" handy, and I am spooked
by the things that go bump in the night, my Forest will have to
be that interior space of Silent Awareness - navigating the inner
Forest of the Unknown - as well as the unknown difficult
practicalities of everyday living.

I am willing, I say inwardly, to enter the Unknown - the Forest.
To trust Intuition to take me through.  I am ready to step over
the threshold and see where the Unknown takes me...

Care to join me :)  Are you willing...

~

"The familiar horizon has been outgrown;
the old concepts, ideals,
and emotional patterns no longer fit.
The time for the passing of a threshold
is at hand.

You enter the forest at the darkest point,
where there is no path.
Where there's a way or a path,
it is someone else's path;  each human being
is a unique phenomenon.

The idea is to find your own way..."

Joseph Campbell

~

Midway upon the journey of life
I found myself within a dark forest,
for the straightforward pathway
had been lost...

Dante Alighieri
The Inferno

~

Also see my post The Pathless Path

What Draws You? - Rumi

Artist: Puisi - ambua.id

There are two types on the path, those who come against
their will, the blindly religious, and those who obey
out of love...

The former have ulterior motives.
They want a midwife near because she gives them milk.
The other love the beauty of the Nurse.

The former memorize the proof-texts of conformity
and repeat them.  The latter disappear into
whatever draws them to God.

Both are drawn from the Source.
Any motion is from the Mover.
Any love from the Beloved.

Rumi
From: The Book of Love
translations by Coleman Barks

~

Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull
of what you love...

Rumi

~

A baby pigeon on the edge of the nest hears the call
and begins her flight...
How can the soul not fly
when a message arrives saying,
"...come, come back to me!"

What is the secret that opens the door?

The key is the flutter of the heart's wings
and its endless longing.

When the door opens,
walk on the path...
where everything old becomes new,
and never look back...

Rumi

~

On Dec. 17, 1273 the great Sufi poet and mystic, Rumi,
died in Konya Turkey.  He was universally loved by
Muslims, Jews, and Christians.  It was called his
"wedding night" because death to him (and the Sufis)
was the ultimate union with God.

May it be so for all of us, when the time comes,
no matter "who" we know God to be...

Truth is an Oasis - Jinendra

Truth is a pathless Oasis
Who can show you the path?
Have faith in yourself...
And begin the inner walk

To experience Truth
Put all aside
All that you have heard
All that you have ever read
All knowledge of scriptures
and the philosophical tenets
Put them all aside

[.....]

Just simply be Aware
Of the Reality within you...
Observe through your Inner Eyes

As the inner walk progresses
Awareness of space
and time ceases

Always remaining Equanimous
Alone you walk ... ...
and walk ... and ... walk
To the deeeeeepest depth
Of your mind and heart
To arrive at the Whole Truth

To live truthfully
Let each moment of Truth
Bring you to the next moment
of Truth

And so, from this moment's Truth
to the next moment's Truth
From Truth to Truth ... to Truth
On this pathless path you move
Until you finally arrive
In this pathless journey
To the Oasis of Truth

As you continue your "inner walk"
The observer merges with the observed
In a flash is revealed the Unknowable
The Truth - the Self is now Known
Beyond all doubts

[.....]

Now don't hold on
to your preconceived ideas and beliefs
Let go of all your old conceptions
You will understand and see
the meaning that hides behind these words

The Truth brings total synthesis...
Inward-Outward you now exist
In total peace and harmony

Be aware and perceive rightly

Then the words come alive and become meaningful
If not, they are like writings on water
Soon to disappear into meaninglessness!

Jinendra
Center for Sustainable Happiness

Photo and text via No Mind's Land

The Compass Of My Soul - Chuck Surface

I've read so much of the Great Paths,
Resonating here, with this,
Finding myself uneasy there, with that,
Until setting each tome aside...

'Twas You I found, wordless, within.

I've traveled far, to famed teachers,
Being uplifted here, by this,
Finding myself disturbed there, by that,
Until, leaving those places...

'Twas You I found, speechless, within.

I've sojourned in the villages of faith,
And in each discovered jewels,

In the rubble heaps of dogma,
But always, my sandals caked in mud...

'Twas You I found, Sparkling, there.

Beyond the safe harbors of orthodoxy,
In the deep waters of The Great Mystery,
Tossed in Dread Tempests of Unknowing,
Unanchored, Rudderless, Adrift...

'Twas You I found, the Compass of my Soul.

Chuck Surface

Garden of the Beloved

Facebook

~

Photo from Chuck's FB page

The Pathless Path - reloaded...

This post was originally written in 2011
but is still timely for me...

I find the older I get the more I want to experience Truth directly,

and leave the many trodden "spiritual paths" that I've been on all my
life behind.  Even as a child I wanted to know "God" - a child's
understanding of God.  Then my search evolved and expanded to
include finding "myself" - whoever that was :), the Truth, Wisdom,
peace of mind, and last, but not least, the search for "Enlightenment."
They are all the same"path" under different disguises.  And now,
through all these many paths, I am feeling the need to settle, deepen,
and re-discover a sense of inner Truth; not by following a particular
external path - but by intuitively listening to the voice of my Heart;
experiencing Inner Beingness directly, through spending time in
Silence (which I avoid so easily).  Now if Life would only cooperate
and provide a less chaotic, disruptive, distracted life!  Just kidding -
maybe...  :)

 Being on a "spiritual path" implies that one is going somewhere,
seeking "Some - *thing*" at the end of the journey - like
retirement after a life of working; or a magical pot of gold at the end
of the mythical rainbow; or even the mystical "Holy Grail."  Or maybe
one is even seeking an end to something, like suffering, pain,
ignorance, their humanness, or the end of seeking.  But what if there
was no need for "a path",, no need for seeking the illusive big
"Some-thing" that spiritual seekers seek?  I find myself in this place
of questioning - again...  I have been down the "seeking road" -
many times.

The path of "Enlightenment"/"Awakening"/"Self-Realization",
particularly the path of what is known as Advaita or "Non-Duality",
has lost its luster, its pull, its certainty for me - much like the other
paths I have taken throughout my life.  It's just another construct.
  And I'd rather not describe Truth by a negative - with no-me, no-self,
 no other, no world - as Truth is all inclusive - including duality,
 me, self, other, world.

Even if one follows "a path" (which can be any path) there is no
guarantee that we will discover what we are looking for, and life will
not suddenly become easy or flowing with bliss.   We won't necessarily
lose our personality, with its quirks, our conditioning, or neuroses. 
Our thoughts will not stop, neither will our surface struggles, or
 our pain,  or our stories.  Walking "a path" doesn't even guarantee
 that we will  actually see life differently from either the mountain top,
 or nose to the ground;  or suddenly find our "purpose" -
as if there's only one. But no one tells us  this about "the path."
 It has to be a Self-discovery - for ourselves -  even if we have a
"Teacher" or follow a "Teaching"  to point the way.

Years of seeking, realization, recognition, and then forgetting, and then
remembering, and then forgetting again - brought me to the realization
that discovering (or rediscovering) this Being Self/Truth that we are,
 is through awareness of and deep intimacy with The Silence within;
through continually coming back to the Heart of Being - the space of
Silent, Still, innate Wisdom - which of course is wherever we are at the
moment, not off in the distance somewhere.  It's not a place. 
"The path" doesn't go anywhere.  There is no reward at the end. 
It's an inner pathless path...  And that's my "path" - rediscovering
 this inner Silent,  Aware Wisdom.  It's an inner pathless path
 of remembering; remembering the underlying Rhythm of
 Life ItSelf -

Ommmmmm...

"A mystic is content with nothing less than
to touch the Truth in its most universal purity"

Ivan Granger
Poetry Chaikhana

~

Empty yourself of everything.
Let the mind rest in peace.
The ten thousand things rise and fall
while the Self watches their return.
They grow and flourish and then
return to source.
Returning to the source is stillness,
which is the way of nature....

Returning is the motion of the Tao.

Lao Tzu

~~

Photo - taken by my father
1952/53

Ordinary Enlightenment - "G", Shinzen Young & Jeff Foster

There are many different definitions of mysticism, but a narrow
description of mysticism is known as the "perennial philosophy",
or "perennial wisdom."  [That Truth is Universal & Eternal].
In this sense, mysticism indicates the dying of the illusion
of selfhood into the greater reality of God, Nirvana, Dao, or a
number of other concepts representing the deathless and
indefinable part of us that is often called the Void. [or Emptiness].

It is the "death" [dissolution] of the individual ego into the
indescribable that characterizes the perennial wisdom. [Or rather]
it is the giving up of identifying with being the individual ego/self.

God, as the mystic understands the term, does not correspond at all
to the commonly held beliefs involving an anthropomorphic deity
gazing down on humanity from on high.  For the mystic, God is
much more subtle and immediate.  In mysticism, God is not a
separate being to us, rather the very "being-ness" that lies
 at the heart of everyone. 

The mystical process, whatever traditions or methods it uses, is
ultimately aimed at breaking through the prison of mortality into

freedom of what both the Buddha and Japanese Zen Master Bankei
called the Unborn.  Living as the Unborn we are no longer tied to
[attached to] a false sense of ego/self... but are liberated as the very
Awareness that is the heart of every being in the universe.

Excerpt from: "Buddha and Religion: Mysticism"
Buddha Space
Read the full article here

This blog also has other interesting topics!

~

Even for a deeply "enlightened" person, the experience of contact
with Flow and Emptiness does not necessarily go uninterrupted.  It
may happen frequently during the day, but not necessarily continuously.
Even a very liberated person still spends a lot of time experiencing
the world in the ordinary way.

What then is the difference between an ordinary person and a liberated
person?  The difference is a matter of freedom.  An "enlightened"
person has the ability to experience self and world as a Source wave.
And when they are not experiencing things that way, they understand
why that is the case. It is just because they are not paying close
attention...

Shinzen Young - The Science of Enlightenment: How Meditation Works

via Markings

Pay attention! :)

~

There is no fixed path to enlightenment.  Enlightenment is not a
destination, a goal, a final resting place at the end of a long journey -

that's the mind's version of enlightenment.  Nobody is the authority
on your path - no teacher, no guru, no religious leader.  Nobody can
tell you the right 'way' for you...

Jeff Foster

via The Dawn Within

~

Photo from the Internet

Our Concept of "Reality" - Bohm, LeShan & Brunton

Reality is what we take to be true.
What we take to be true is what we believe.
What we believe is based upon our perceptions.
What we perceive depends upon what we look for.
What we look for depends upon what we think.
What we think depends upon what we perceive.
What we perceive determines what we believe.
What we believe determines what we take to be true.
What we take to be true is our reality.

David Bohm
Quantum Physicist

~

The trouble is we have a basic commitment to the *idea*
that there is one true, valid concept of reality
(ours, of course) and that all others are primitive,
childlike, mythological or pathological.
[or false].

Lawrence LeShan
Psychologist
From: Landscapes of the Mind:
The Faces of Reality

~

There is no single path to enlightenment.
Life itself is the great enlightener.
Do not submit to the pressure of those who say
there is only a single way.....the way they follow
or teach.  Do not let the mind be trammelled or
narrowed.  The truth is that the ways are many,
are spread out in all directions, and are individual.

Paul Brunton
Mystical Philosopher

Wholeness - Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee

You search to find what the heart has always known, that there
are no boundaries to love.  Finding this leaves us on the edge
of our own expectations unaware of the simplicity of the
unknown.  For so long we have searched hoping, expecting
to find something - a realization that was longed for.  Always
you thought there was something to seek, a journey to make.
Now you stand on the precipice looking over the horizon of
your self.

Here there is no seeking, no looking, nothing to reach for, no
path to follow.  But within there is an answer, not in form, but
in substance.  There is a bigger wholeness hidden, waiting,
watching from behind our thoughts.

The wholeness has an unexpected purpose.....from across time
and beyond space.  There is another presence, another pattern,
not hidden, but unrevealed.  There is a tender sense of Silence.
In the moment of our own silence we are welcomed.  We need
to allow the Presence to become present, not in defined
moments, but in a flow.  The river is here.  The Silence,
unbidden, is always present; nothing is defined or captured.
This world is infused with this "other" - steeped in timelessness.

In that Isness, everything is included.  You, The Beloved,
the object of your prayer, and the will to unfold the Eternal
into the present, to cross the borders of time and space, and
saturate the now with Eternity.

Yet there is no "other."
You waited for someone to come, always you waited;
always waiting at the bus stop for the bus that never comes,
because there is nowhere to go.  You are fortunate to
disbelieve everything.

The world spins around a place of Silence.
You need to enter that Silence, and wait in the
Eternal Presence, for The Eternal that is already here,

amused with our seeking, with our thinking God is "other."

We only struggle with our self...

Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee

Sufi Mystic

Take from: Fragments of a Love Story

~

Photo - glass ball with bubbles