Life is a Stream - a meandering...

While lying in bed late one night, many years ago,
talking to my husband about "life events", groping
for perspective, recognizing how I continue to live
from habituated patterns, reacting to life events,
swimming up stream, trying to keep my head above
water, feeling drowned by the stream of life (which
I still do, especially all this past year), he made this
statement: "Life is a stream of events.  Events will
always happen.  Events come and go."  The context
of his statement was to say - if we see that life is
always a stream of events, or experiences, always
in flux, then we won't feel so overwhelmed by
them, they won't trip us up as much because we can
adapt and adjust and manage them.  Sounds a little
like the Tao to me - to see that no matter what
happens Life is Flow, and we are in that Flow as well.
It was helpful to begin to see a way to navigate my
way of going down stream...

In essence, he told me, what it is about is meeting life
as it comes by plugging in to the Cosmic Flow of the
Universe, of Life - meeting the "events"/experiences of
life through seeing the Cosmic Flow of all things,
and through all things; flowing with life as it happens,
not getting focused on the obstacles/events, or seeing the
events as obstacles. He said by seeing that everything is this
Cosmic Flow, we can be assured that it is flowing the way
it is supposed to - no matter what happens...  When you
don't fight it, you can begin to experience the harmony
of Flow.

B knows nothing of Taoism, but he intuitively "tapped in"
to "The Tao" - The Flow....

~

Empty yourself of everything.
Let the mind rest at peace.
The ten thousand things rise and fall
while the 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.

If you are willing to be lived by it,
you will see [the Tao] everywhere,
even in the most ordinary things.

Lao Tzu

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

The Elusive Present Moment - St. Augustine & Ostaseski

"Now" is neither in time nor out of time.
The elusive present moment is measured by the tick-tock time
of a clock, which we humans have invented, nor is it separate
from past or future.  There is no time line, at least not as we
conventionally think about it.

St. Augustine (paraphrased)
from - The Five Invitations

~

Hope....is not a wish to be fulfilled, or a plan to be formulated
and executed, but in how we meet the ever-changing moment.

The present moment could best be described as the flow of life.
We are continually being shaped by it and we are shaping it
through the way we meet and respond to it...

Frank Ostaseski
The Five Invitations

~

Photo - Mystic Meandering

 

Challenging the Fantasies - Daryl Bailey

Life is a moving, shifting, dancing event.
Forms [or beliefs] aren't the truth of existence.
The non-duality [Advaita] view is not the one truth view
of existence.  It is one of the mysterious expressions of
existence.  Existence is just happening.  The dance of thought
is totally automatic.

The "spiritual journey" is one long journey of disappointment
because you're gonna find you can't have endless pleasure,
can't have "understanding" of existence, can't have a sense of
"self", a sense of life where you're always secure and confident.
Life will present situations that are confusing.

Life is an event that is presenting itself and we are part of that
expression.  It's part of the movement of the universe; a dynamic
function. Life will play out the way it plays out;
it's all just happening.  Just acknowledge the movement - the event.  

Life takes care of itself - a formless happening as form, as story.
It is the Formless expressing itself.  You are being expressed in form.
It's all the dance of formless expressions of existence.  We are
the legitimate expression of existence, just as we are.  

The whole process that you think you are is just happening
and you're not making it happen.  There is just the happening of this
moment.  Awakening is a total fantasy.  Everything is just happening
on its own and we are an expression of that happening.
When we see that we can rest.

Spiritual traditions project ideas of what we're supposed to be...
Don't believe in the explanations, or that any of the explanations
have any real truth to them...

We don't have a perfect life with endless bliss.  We just acknowledge
this amazingly mysterious happening that nobody can
comprehend.

There are moments of joy, as well as sadness, or unhappiness.
You endure it in the way you endure it, in your own unique way.
It's just the way it is expressing itself; just the way it's expressing
"me."  The Flow of Life ItSelf...

Daryl Bailey

The Energy of Life - Naomi Stone

There is something wonderful
working in the world
and in the natural flow
of life...
an energy
that moves this existence
moment to moment...

Trying to name it or trying
to control it changes
the inner wisdom
and steals the wonder
of discovery...

Watch a child exploring
his world.
Touching...tasting...squealing
with delight starting
at the beginning

We are seldom taught
to trust it
because someone
wants to pay you to live
their ideas and answers...
or charge you for learning
them by luring you away,
away from the gift
of your own gloriously
divine heritage...

Suddenly...
you are entrapped...
doubting who you are
in a world where
everyone seems
to think they have the answers...

Live the awareness of the flow
and infinite portals
ever opening
around and within you...

Naomi Stone
Original title: "Spiraling Energies of Creation"

~

Art - Craypas oils
done with fingers
2012

Let it go - Danna Faulds

Let go of the ways you thought life
would unfold; the holding of plans
or dreams or expectations - Let it
all go.  Save your strength to swim
with the tide.  The choice to fight
what is here before you now will
only result in struggle, fear, and
desperate attempts to flee from the
very energy you long for.  Let go.
Let it all go and flow with the grace
that washes through your day whether
you receive it gently or with all your
quills raised to defend against invaders.
Take this on faith: the mind may never
find the explanations that it seeks, but
you will move forward nonetheless.
Let go, and the wave's crest will carry
you to unknown shores, beyond your
wildest dreams or destinations.  Let it
all go and find the place of rest and
peace, and certain transformation.

Danna Faulds
From: Go In and In
2002

In the Core of the Contradictions - Matt Licata

At some point, how you thought it was all going to turn out
will crumble away into dust.....all that remains is your raw
burning heart...

It is the nature of form to take birth, to dance, to play, and then
to fall back into the unknown.  This is not some sort of cosmic
error, but the way of things - creative, intelligent, and a reflection
of universal flow.

Relationships, work, family, friends, our health ... ideas about
ourselves, others, and the world.  What we thought would
provide ongoing meaning and purpose. Even what we were so
 sure about just a few days ago - the great realizations, discoveries,
 and insights about who we are, what is most true, what will
 provide lasting peace... no longer quite as convincing.  A dream
 has vanished and has not yet been replaced by a new vision.
 But inside the shards of the broken world, pure

life awaits.

All form must end, departing through a portal into darkness, so that
new forms may emerge from the crucible of clear space.  But what
is emerging in the womb of Now is not knowable ahead of time,
and is not subject to our hopes, fears or fantasies of control.
While the mind will struggle with the wrathful nature of this truth,
the heart knows... the body knows...

See that the death of form is filled with erupting particles of life,
with magic, and with the fragrance of the holy.  You can relax...
and rest inside the core of the contradictions.  Here, the chaos
and the glory are one.

Matt Licata

The Formless Happening - Darryl Bailey

All things are changing, flowing.  They're passing appearances
of a great unformed, and inexplicable happening - an event,
a presence - call it whatever you have to.

If we sit quietly, making no effort, life expresses itself clearly;
it simply happens on its own.  There'e nothing else to get.
The great truth is obvious.  The heart beats, the breath comes
and goes.  Vibrations, pulsations, twinges, feelings, thoughts,
and emotions rise and fall.  Urges rise and pass; some become
 actions, others do not; and so life flows.

Sitting quietly, making no effort, all is revealed; a vibrant,
pulsing, formless happening, simply happening.  There is no
goal in this, no final point; there is only what expresses itself
in this moment, and whatever it appears to be now is unavoidably
on its way to some other appearance.

There are many ways of pointing to this vibrant, formless happening.
Some have called it the Great Spirit.  Some call it the river of life,
or the ocean of existence.  Some call it the flow of nature.  It's been
compared to clouds and water, having no particular shape.  Some
say it's movement.  Some call it God, Tao, or Atman.  Some call it
Mind.  Some call it "original nature."  And some just call it the
universe, which literally means "undivided turning."

Daryl Bailey

Tao Te Ching (Lao Tzu) - Heysinger

The way that can be over trod is not the Eternal Way.
The name that can be named is not the Everlasting Name,
which Nameless brought forth Heaven and Earth,
which named, if any may,
the Mother of all myriad things of time and space became.
Thereby we sound eternally the mystery divine,
but only without desire to sound,
for if desire abide,
the portals of the issuing host our baffled sight confine.
And deep within the eternal veil
the mystery shall hide.
These two, the Nameless and the Named,
they differ but in name.
For in their vast progression from
the deep they are the same.
The deep of deeps, from whose eternal
gate all spirit came.

Tao Te Ching
Lao Tzu
Translation by I.W. Heysinger - 1903

Lao Tzu was a famous Chinese Philosopher
who founded Taoism.
Taoism is about living in harmony with
the flow of Life ItSelf, in tune with your True Nature...
 intuitively.

The Timeless Moment - Bodhipaksa & Hesse

Time was no longer a path with the past behind me
and the future before me, as we commonly conceive of it.
Instead there was a sense of an eternally unfolding present moment.

Rather than time being a journey along a linear path, change
 appeared to be mandala-like.  It seemed to be like a flower
 seen from above, endlessly unfolding from within,
 or like a kaleidoscope's image forever rearranging itself.

It struck me as highly misleading to think in terms of there being a
 past behind us and a future ahead of us.  Instead there was only
 this one present moment, eternally unfolding, according to its
 nature. I found myself in an eternal, timeless present...

Bodhipaksa - Living As A River

via: Markings

"I would like to live like a river flows, carried by the surprise
of its own unfolding"
John O'Donohue

~

Have you learned that secret from the river;
that there is no such thing as time?
That the river is everywhere at the same time,
at the source, at the current, in the ocean, and
in the mountains,

 everywhere...

And that the present only exists for it,
not the shadow of the past, nor the shadow of the future.

Herman Hesse
Siddartha

via: Love Is A Place

~

Top Photo: Mandala art digitally altered
2nd Photo: An Aurora Borealis in Yellow Knife, Canada
 - a "river" in the sky :)
Sent to us by a friend

The Flow of Life - Matt Licata

We are always in the flow of life.

It is the idea that there is some "us" on one side
and something called "flow" in some other place,
that is a great trance that seems to be unique
to the human experience...

Usually when we talk of being
"in the flow,"
we mean that we like the feelings,
sensations, and experiences
which are arising in our experience.
If there are more
vulnerable, intense, groundless, unresolvible,
or unideal feelings,
then we this as clear evidence that we are
"out of the flow."

And so the war begins.
The dream of abandoning the non-flow
to return to the flow as quickly as possible.

Perhaps it is only in the willingness to fully participate
in our immediate experience, exactly as it is,
that the nature of the flow will be revealed.

It is not something you will get to one day,
as some sort of acquisition,"
when you line up all of the right experiences,
when you successfully abandon and replace
what is here for something else.

The flow is right here,
utterly inseparable from what you are,
and is revealed in your unconditional commitment
to the truth of your immediate experience.

When you are willing to bring your embodied curiosity,
openness, acceptance and presence
to whatever is arising in the immediacy of now,
the question of how to feel more flow ceases to arise.

In this embodied openness the path is everywhere,
even in those places we least expect.
What you are left with is what you are,
which is love itself.

Allow love to astonish you...
Allow it to craft you
as a vessel of aliveness,
in which it can pour out
into this world.
There is no flow separate from that.

Matt Licata

(Matt's words, my format)

Ebb and Flow - Ivan Granger

When the face of Ever-Presence is known,
all concreteness spontaneously fades away...
Kelsang Gyatso

The vivid appearance of the external world can become a trap
for the distracted mind.  We can get caught in constant reaction,
running after pleasure, running from pain.

In the truly natural state, awareness is at rest, perceiving without
tension, encountering reality without an overlay of stories,
without attraction or repulsion.
In that Pure Awareness, life becomes a flow of events and
interactions, not pushed by the self-will of likes and dislikes.

We are simply as we are...
Events simply unfold...

...life experience; its waning and waxing is simply its natural flow.

Ivan Granger
Poetry Chaikhana

~*~

Our lives are like rivers.
Eventually they go where they must,
not where we want
them to...

From the movie - "Empire Falls"

Existence Unfolding...

“…Existence is just unfolding out of Itself

 spontaneously, naturally, unplanned.

Similarly, your true life unfolds in the same way…
start enjoying the cosmic play…”

Mooji

“And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry void,
image of mystery,
felt myself a pure part of the abyss.
I wheeled with the stars.
My heart broke loose on the wind…”

Pablo Neruda

“…the timeless dimension of our Being
is awaiting realization.”

Tara Brach

Photo: Windows Into Infinity Mandala
Rotated and Zoom Blurred

A Burnt Peas Kind of Day...

Yesterday was a “burnt peas” kind of day. I literally burned the peas. My usual fare for breakfast is peas and steamed fish. I changed my routine and put the peas on to boil first and then went to the computer to check blog comments and emails figuring I could check everything within 5-6 mins – pea boiling time. Not… I got so engrossed I forgot the peas, until I smelled them burning. And it was all down hill from there, playing catch-up with time the rest of the day – never feeling like I had enough time. I seem to be living that way lately – time oriented, time bound, trying to catch up to time, always falling behind time, running out of time. I’m always pressing forward - *in my mind* - but my *heart* wants to live out of time. My True Heart and mind are out of sync – needing a little tune up. And so it’s time to take a time out and assess why I’m measuring myself by the clock and why it feels like time – and life - keep slipping away… into that time funnel…

This is not to say that time structure isn’t good. I love structure. I have my lists of things to do. And some days that are structured seem to flow better. Time is unavoidable. But it’s the mind grasping for and fixating on time that I’m talking about – like the rabbit in Alice in Wonderland who’s always checking his watch exclaiming that he’s running late… Racing against the clock as a measure of my worthiness, seeing how much I can accomplish, doling out tidbits of time and never really accomplishing anything – never finding time for what’s really important – the Silence of Life beyond time…

Relative time is self containing, and self contracting - a container for the self - like bookends on your life; putting a beginning and end on life, attempting to contain life that wants to flow naturally. Time fixation doesn’t allow for the natural awareness of anything other than time. The Universe is not time constrained however – have you noticed. :) It is endless and open. We seem to know this naturally in childhood through play – which flows freely unless someone tells us it’s time to come in. Nature rests outside of time – clock time – naturally cyclical on its own time – unconstrained by artificial time – and yet flourishes wildly and beautifully.

So who would I *be* if I didn’t live by the clock, losing the vision of the larger Life beyond time? What if I loosened my grip on time, and lived life according to my natural rhythm – the rhythm of the Heart? What would happen if I returned to that lovely groundless state of innocent no-mind, to the easy flow of life – not lost in the eddies of no-time - but living congruently in the harmony of being and doing – attuned to Life Itself. Not fighting against my natural rhythms, which is maybe why I lag behind – in time – resisting the constraints of time… What if I didn’t prescribe life by time, but remained open to its natural unfolding… I mean I’m not getting to the things I *really* want to do anyway, even with the self-imposed structure of time. Instead I’m measuring myself by the clock and what I’m not getting done – feeling like I’m missing out on life, missing out on really *living*. It seems there needs to be a resetting of the “mind clock”…

When I sit at the open window at night in Silence and look out into the semi-darkness – time dissolves. I become aware of the Silence of Life, within and without, through the smell and feel of the cool night air, the sight of the silhouetted stillness of the trees, the sounds of living in the distance that occurs within the vastness of Silence... And - I am undistracted and undisturbed by time. The “mind clock” quiets, and I am aware only of the flow of Life behind time, underneath time - where Life lives. When my “mind clock” isn’t running my life, then I am at peace, more mindful, aware. Time flows fluidly and I don’t burn the peas.

In the not doing
everything gets done…

Lao Tzu


~


Photo
Reflection out my living room window
in the face of the clock...

~

Read this wonderful post
at Sparks and Mirrors
on Slowing Down to the Pace of the Soul

"Cave Writings" - Sacred Flow

Aliveness
constantly flows,
emerging as every day life
from its primordial womb of Silence.

This Flow curls and swirls
constantly transforming Itself,
constantly renewing Itself,
constantly unfolding Itself.

Recognizing ItSelf
in the face of another,
in the voice of another,
in the eyes of another…

…as the Essence of all life…

It is the Natural Rhythm of Life,
unfolding Itself into form…
Thriving…

…a palpable inner Rhythm of all that exists…

In the luminous Sacred Flow
everything is real,
vibrant and fluid ~
a living, breathing
Reality of Aliveness…

And we, like curious discoverers and explorers,
try to find this Natural Rhythm,
to experience its Harmony,
to hear its Flow
and follow its Sound ~
Not seeing that this Mystery is here,
pulsing in us…

Effulgent Flow ~

…in the everydayness of living…


~*~

Mystic Meandering
copyright
December 5, 2010


Photo ~ Fun-Qi Art™ ~ Christine

Synchronicity ~ The Call of the Heart

The Taoists say there is an underlying Flow to all Life, a seamless Flow of Existence that is in all life – in all beings – that *is* Life. There is an interaction of the currents and eddies of this Flow in synchronistic “coincidences” and circumstances of living that bring us what we need and not necessarily what we want. The synchronicity of circumstances of this Flow “awakens” us, or awakens something *in* us, like a homing call. It seems no matter what our experiences in life, our Being is calling us “home” *through* these seemingly synchronistic life experiences – the Self calling the Self back to Self - the call of the Heart.

Strangely my husband and I are not synchronous. Our inner rhythms and timing are very different, often causing conflict on the River. We are like a confluence of seemingly disparate currents within the larger Flow, both returning to the Ocean in our own way. However, he is often the vehicle of synchronicity. He is often the one who brings me the wisdom I need to “wake up”, either in the words that fall out of his mouth, (that I share here sometimes), or in books he finds, and of course in the dynamics of relationship as teacher. Last weekend he brought home a 2 CD set series he picked up at the library for himself called: “Meditations for Emotional Healing” by Tara Brach; subtitled: Finding Freedom in the Face of Difficulty. He thought I might be interested as well. I read the back. It lists the meditations: Arriving in Natural Presence (hmmm, liked those words); The “Yes” Meditation (yes, intriguing); the “RAIN” Meditation (ooo – I like the rain, remember? :) and “Calling on Love – a heart-opening meditation for taking refuge in unconditional love.” And there it was again – the heart-quaking that I’ve been experiencing lately. I was drawn to the words: “heart-opening” and “taking refuge in unconditional love.” The call of the Heart? Synchronicity?

Tara Brach is a practicing Buddhist as well as a psychologist. She also wrote a book called: Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life with the Heart of a Buddha. My heart leapt at the words “Heart of a Buddha.” With my new love for “the Buddha” I felt drawn in by the words as if there was something there for me to see or know. I’ve been feeling what I call the “call” of the Buddha, the call of the awakened Heart within. So when I read the words I knew it was a must have book. The local book store had it and I had a 30% off coupon – heh, heh, heh – synchronicity?

Sunday afternoon I settled in on the couch and started listening to the CD’s. She says there is an energy in us that draws us to the truth, to love, to the *awareness* of our “Natural Presence: that awake Beingness within that is listening and looking through our eyes. And what our hearts long for most is love, awakening, truth…” As I listened it started: the heart quaking – literally skipping beats, my whole being quivering, and an antsy, unsettledness running through my body that I’ve been experiencing lately. I knew I was on to something that was *needed* just by my body’s visceral response. It wasn’t as if the words she was speaking were new to me, but they stirred something deep inside – awakening a raw, tender vulnerability of the Heart; causing a deep quaking in my being as I felt the resonance of the words calling me inward to the Heart – to “Natural Presence,” or Buddha Nature.

She tells a story about a well-known ancient statue of Buddha in Southeast Asia. Apparently the statue was made of clay. But there were cracks in the clay and a curious monk took a flashlight and peered through the cracks to see if there was anything underneath. He evidently saw a flash of gold inside the statue. They discovered that there was a gold statue of Buddha *inside* the clay crust. The clay was applied to the statue to protect it from harm during times of conflict. I have seen glimpses of this shining Buddha within myself. I have felt this Presence in many forms, and called it different names. Yet there is apparently a cracking of the exterior constructs of protection occurring here, so that this True inner Being can be fully revealed.

I started reading her book. And it started again – the deep heart-quaking. My mind fogged up. I had to go back and keep re-reading; not because the content was intellectual, or esoteric, or so profound, but because I wasn’t ready to let the words in. Avoidance strategies were kicking in: the antsy-pants, the numbing, and the “hungry ghost.” I had to put the book down. It appears I’m in for a little excavation into the heart of things, layers of old patterns that have cracked open revealing the vulnerability of an open Heart that I don’t feel prepared for, but it’s evidently where the Tao is calling me… Synchronicity – the call of the Heart…

~*~

photo - christine