tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-18177547034420491702024-02-03T03:56:11.456+11:00Power of AwarenessPlain talking on the experience of inner life and meditationPower of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.comBlogger37125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-3021663404463690732023-09-12T20:10:00.006+10:002023-09-13T11:40:54.939+10:00Online Meditation Sessions 3 - 5 October<h3 style="text-align: left;">Three one hour online meditation sessions </h3><h3 style="text-align: left;">3 - 5 October (Tuesday - Thursday)</h3><h3 style="text-align: left;">6.30 - 7.30 pm East Australian Daylight Saving Time </h3><h3 style="text-align: left;">Join from Anywhere</h3><div><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;">For more information and enrolment please visit this page on the Rocklyn Yoga Ashram website</span></div><div><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;"><br /></span></div><div><a href="https://www.yogavic.org.au/online-living-consciously-program/meditation-with-sw-anandakumar" target="_blank">For information and enrolment</a></div><p>There have been no new posts on this blog for some time. However, the hits keep on coming - plenty in the archive, always there. After all yogic knowledge is timeless, unlike worldly truths which are always changing. And more than ever don't we need to find a constant in life! The more that events and circumstances change around us and the more we are called upon to react, the more we may have difficulty in staying true to our inner nature. So now find a way to dedicate some time to detaching from the external life and turning inward to contact and nourish the inner nature.</p><p>In brief, w<span face="Calibri, sans-serif"><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;">e live life on two levels, the outer world of activity and interaction; and a much more personal inner world. These two worlds are not particularly familiar with one another. But they interact and influence each other continually even as we may be unaware of it. </span></span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 14.666667px;">For more on this:</span></p><p><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/1817754703442049170/7214362117865112215">Meditation and the Mind</a><br /></span></span></p><p><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;">Even if m</span></span><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 14.666667px;">ost of our attention is needed in outer life, for lasting satisfaction it is valuable to spend some time exploring this inner world more deeply. So take a break from external activity for some time and turn your attention back toward yourself, your inner self, true self. </span></p><p><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 14.666667px;">To be at lasting peace with oneself, to be in harmony, to achieve balance and equilibrium, then all dimensions of the individual nature have to be acknowledged and included, not just the bits we like, avoiding the parts that we don't like that also need attention </span></p><p><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;">Therefore you may be interested to join us for 3 classes either to continue with another step on the journey or kickstart an ongoing intention. </span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 14.666667px;">The classes are hosted by Rocklyn Yoga Ashram, Victoria, Australia - for enrolment please visit this page on the website </span></p><p><a href="https://www.yogavic.org.au/enrol-form/id/1632" target="_blank">Straight to enrolment</a></p><h4><span face="Calibri, sans-serif"><span style="font-size: medium;">Awareness is the only possible constant in life</span></span></h4><h3 style="text-align: left;"><br /></h3><h3 style="text-align: left;">Residential courses 2024</h3><p>You may also be interested to know that residential courses are being organised in Tasmania (5 days), New Zealand (3, 5 and 9 days), and Uruguay (9 days) from February 2024. These are residential courses, but one of the New Zealand courses will include an online element. More about dates, venues, and contacts in due course. Look again in this space</p><h4 style="text-align: left;"><br /></h4><p><br /></p><p><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 14.666667px;"><br /></span></p><p><br /></p>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-22232799335600055722022-08-10T12:49:00.003+10:002022-08-11T15:50:29.739+10:00What is Progress in Meditation?<p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">The question is often asked, sometimes expressed, sometimes just thought about: I've been practising meditation for x number of years and nothing really seems to have changed. It may not actually be a question but it sure sounds like one.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">First of all, what is it that's supposed to change? Maybe we have either been having the wrong expectation or looking in the wrong place. Meditation and spiritual progress are easily misunderstood, and no matter how much we know we shouldn’t have expectations, still we have them, and expectation muddies what should be clear water. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">Then how do you clear muddy water? Don’t touch it, don’t meddle, leave it alone and it will settle; try to settle it and it will stir it up all the more.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><b>Intent and Expectation are not the same</b></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">Well first, do we even know <i>why </i>we practice meditation? Because there has to be a clear distinction between intent and expectation. Consider this: Meditation is not about self improvement, it's about self awareness. Of course there is self-improvement but not necessarily of the sort that we expect when we start out.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">Intent is about having a purpose, an aim, a goal, a resolution - called a sankalpa. Having an aim is a positive intent, it galvanises and inspires. And it causes a focus on a sense of direction and therefore minimises distractions away from that sense of purpose. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">But an aim does not automatically confer an outcome. The aim makes sense and is do-able, but it takes time and effort, that’s why its called an aim. So have an aim, be inspired and make the effort, but have no expectation of the timing or the eventual outcome. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><b>A still small voice?</b></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">Meditation is about the inner life. We are much wiser in our inner life, but do we even have access, or hear, let alone listen to the still small voice within? Not really, and if we do, we soon take it to conscious thought, and then often find it unacceptable and reason it away. If this happens, and it happens a lot, we become a house divided - between our inner knowing self and our outer expectations. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">How can progress be made if we don't know how to hear our own inner self? Meditation is about discovering, hearing, listening to and trusting (in that order) the genuine inner voice. Then the question of intent and outcome resolve into one another. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><b>The right practice for the intent?</b></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">Then there is an essential but often overlooked question: Is the meditation practice the right one for the original intent? Because different meditation philosophies and practices have different outcomes. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">Without going into detail and just as examples, a meditation practice with a strong emphasis on focus will improve concentration, but it may have little effect on awakening compassion. And a practice of self inquiry into discovering and overcoming negative qualities to eventually arrive at a more positive outlook may not have much of an effect on concentration and focused attention.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><i>For more on this, please refer to the book The Science of Meditation by Daniel Goleman and Richard J Davidson, citing clinical studies at the highest level </i></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><b>Is there a right way to practice beyond the technique?</b></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">Then, even allowing for expectations - a hoped for outcome - have we even been going about the practice of meditation in the right way to achieve that hoped for outcome? </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">To put it straight, just to sit and recite a mantra by rote even on a regular basis may not actually change much without other qualities awakening concurrently. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">For genuine change to occur, what needs to happen in all meditation practice is the concurrent awakening of self-awareness - the ability to be a clear-eyed observer of my own experience, viewing all things equally without analysis or judgment, in the same clear light. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">This is not so easy, and it takes time and diligent practice, experiment and trial and error, to align the vision accurately. But if the vision does align accurately then the motivating force - the cause behind the effect that leaves a mess of memories and impressions in the mind, pain in the heart - that motivating force may eventually reveal itself and in so doing neutralise the limiting effect. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">What is not known from within has power over us, what comes to be known by continued accurate vision must eventually relinquish that power. </p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><b>And so it’s true you cannot release what you don’t know</b></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">Including an awakening awareness in any practice is the clearest way to quieting the noisy brass band in the mind and the accompanying rhythm section in the heart. To be able eventually to hear, at first a hint, then occasionally, then intermittently, then who knows… the sweet soft melody of the innate wisdom within. All else is just fooling ourselves.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><b>And three signs of change as a result of meditation practice</b></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">Desires generally get less and the strong desires gradually weaken their hold.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">The ability to move more and more easily between the outer and inner worlds so that there is a sense of the two connecting up, with less of differences between the two.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;">It’s not that there are no emotional peaks and troughs, but the speed of recovery from them increases with a spontaneous return to equilibrium.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana; font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 17px;"><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-67634603815427269782020-10-01T11:30:00.001+10:002021-08-18T09:08:03.027+10:00The Need of Awareness in Strange Times<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">It goes without saying that we are facing unique circumstances worldwide. There is no-one anywhere not affected by it. And it’s early days yet. Early days to tell what is going to happen over the next few days, weeks, months, years. But also early days to tell what kind of effect this is going to have on each one of us. This is a very substantial game changer in every way.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">I’m assuming that those of you who come to this blog have an interest in the value of the inner life which is at least equal to what we can achieve in outer life. Because although of course there is substantial change in our day to day life the change is potentially going to be even greater in our inner life. Let me explain.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">There is a growing suspicion, an unease, a hidden current of thought, a stifled cry of pain, that life as we know it has been becoming more and more unsatisfactory. In yogic terms the equilibrium necessary for life to flourish is getting increasingly out of balance. It doesn’t need spelling out here, the evidence is all around us, and it’s been becoming increasingly clear that it could not go on like it has.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">Nature is equilibrium! Nature does not tolerate imbalance from within. Nature is the arbiter. It is the external manifestation of the Divine. Nature is the universe; the sun, moon and stars; the mountains and oceans and forests and deserts; New York, Beijing, London and Sydney; art, music, writing and acting; Albert Einstein, Bob Dylan, the dear president of the United States, and of course you and me, and our pets, etc etc etc... and this virus. Nature is everything. </span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">And everything is divine, even if that is hard for us to see right now. Because we can only view Nature through our own eyes and with our own understanding, which is human and limited. Next to the Divine we have to accept that as true, unless we too consider ourselves divine. And of course the Divine and Nature do not ‘think’ with a human mind, like us. Nature is mysterious, inscrutable, ineffable. But one thing is for sure, Nature does not for long tolerate imbalance. Yoga calls the rectification of imbalance karma. But that’s another matter.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;"><i><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2018/03/karma-third-and-last-option.html">KARMA - The Third and Last Alternative</a></i></span></div>
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<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;"><span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;"><b>Existential questions</b></span></div><div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;"><span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">The virus is nature, absolutely neutral, which is why everyone is affected. It’s not subject to race, colour, country, sex, religion, culture or beliefs. The virus is lethal, but not excessively so, but still, enough to throw every mind back on itself virtually forcing a deeper look into places we might not have been to for a long time, if ever. </span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">It has brought existential questions from a long way back in our consciousness to front and centre, predicated on the one fundamental, Am I going to die; are those I love going to die? Not consciously maybe, but that is the undercurrent that no-one can deny except out of a kind of wilful self delusion. Agree or not, it still says it’s time to face these things: What is my life worth? What have I done? What do I do now? </span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">Then there are the necessary requirements to combat the virus. In a few words: separation, isolation, aloneness, loneliness, boredom; as well as challenge, opportunity (see the first lines of this piece), a kind of fruition. Many are now faced with time to ourselves, with ourselves, like never, that is never, before. What to do?</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">First of all let’s assume that there’s only so much TV, streaming, online surfing or chit chat one can take. There are two obvious ways, which can also be combined. </span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">The first is to operate profitably in the external life, however limited it becomes. Most essential: have a purpose - having a real life purpose is essential to a life of satisfaction - and it doesn’t really matter if it is significant, like actually working from home, or seemingly unimportant, so long as it is meaningful to you and you can lose yourself in it. Keep the conscious mind well occupied and it will not miss what boredom would say it’s missing.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">Exercise well. Find a way to use up excess energy by channeling it through the body, somehow. Be inventive and make yourself do it if you have to, because the rewards easily outweigh and outlast the effort by nautical miles. And of course this is the time when yoga asanas and pranayama really come into their own.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">Then we come to what this is really about, and the theme that runs through this blog, summarised by its title Power of Awareness. I’m not going to spell out the fundamentals, but here are other posts if you want to read them:</span></div>
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<a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2014/08/meditation-and-mind-part-1.html"><span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="font-size: large;">Meditation and the Mind Part 1</span></a><br />
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<a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2014/08/meditation-and-mind-part-2_18.html"><span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="font-size: large;">Meditation and the Mind Part 2</span></a><br />
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<a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2015/01/releasing-samskaras-it-gets-worse.html"><span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="font-size: large;">It gets Worse before it gets Better</span></a></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">With the catalyst of the underlying anxiety of a world gone wrong in general and this virus in particular, and then the ‘forced’ isolation, more unexpected or unusual thoughts during the day, and dreams at night, will almost certainly come into mind, eventually. You receive into conscious recognition thoughts, impressions, memories from deeper within, with their associated emotional baggage. Even so they are there for a purpose. Every memory is stored with the best intention, to be useful - this worked once so store it away, it might be useful again… </span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">Then long after their usefulness, they can get catalysed, like now, to return in a quiet moment to reaffirm their usefulness. You may get pleasant thoughts and memories, you may get unpleasant even horrible thoughts and memories, but they can all be accepted and treated equally, they are part of Nature and Nature does not judge. </span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">The actual power of awareness is the act of impartial self observation so that the imbalance of stored impressions are managed by observation, not by either indulging in them, or suppressing or rejecting them out of hand - both strong temptations, both to be avoided.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">So in your private space view all reactions equally, without hesitation. Be anxious, be overconfident, be suspicious, be paranoid, whatever it is, feel it fully without restraint. But above all be an observer of it at the same time. And then you'll find that what is seen, experienced and acknowledged in this way is understood more fully, and by that knowledge these things lose their power to influence, and the greater truth that lies behind is eventually revealed. It’s done by facing yourself, accurately.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">This may sound counterintuitive. But you set up an inner environment where whatever comes can be thought, fully; felt, fully; relived, fully, but without claiming them as my own. In this way think of anything as being in me but not who I am. Because in the bigger picture all impressions are temporary no matter how firmly fixed they appear to be. And when the awareness lines up accurately, the proof of that is seen by the observer itself, which is you - you are nearer to yourself as the observer than as an experiencer, even as both are fully present</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">This turnaround from identifying with all these things to viewing every experience as an observer is the active power of awareness. All that needs to be added is: it takes time, practice, patience, and putting up with myself, exactly as I am, for some time, maybe a long time. Or, although it's accurate, we end up 'proving' to ourselves it isn't. </span><span face=""trebuchet ms", sans-serif" style="font-size: large;">There never has been and never will be a short cut to self knowledge. </span><span face=""trebuchet ms", sans-serif" style="font-size: large;">So in this game the only failure is not responding to what you have realised to be inaccurate thinking. </span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">The upshot is, if we can make profitable use of this time to investigate our inner nature, to face and know myself more fully, then when we return to a more balanced status quo we will see things in a different perhaps wiser way, by understanding more deeply what a loss of balance is, and how everything is included in maintaining that balance, both individually and universally.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">Maybe you know all this, but reminders are necessary, particularly now, and just remembering is a substantial part of awareness. Because there's a significant difference between an intellectual understanding and putting it into practice. </span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">There’s no doubt we have to readjust the way of thinking that has brought us to the present state of society worldwide. Consciousness has to be raised first before substantial change can happen. Occasionally we have the choice to face the opportunity, or shirk the responsibility. This current situation is reminding us that we are all one in some fundamental way, as well as recognising we are all unique and inevitable in our own individual way. So are we in prison or in solitude? It’s just a way of thinking.</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;"><i>I’m a hesitant promoter (not because of any lack of vanity) but because times have changed, what is in this blog is going to appear more relevant and therefore be more accessible than before. This is ancient wisdom which I’m just passing on, and you can do the same by passing on this link to anyone you think might profit from it. </i></span></div><div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;"><span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;"><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><br /></i></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">I don't know about the accuracy of the science, but the signifier of the the times is that my wearing a mask does more to protect you from me than it does to protect me from you. In a word selflessness...</span></div>
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<span face=""trebuchet ms" , sans-serif" style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; font-size: large;">Stay safe and may we see the Divine in Nature, even in those places we least expect</span></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-8221164929116709692020-09-25T17:44:00.000+10:002020-10-03T10:26:54.536+10:00Waves and the Ocean<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Waves are the things that happen, from the smallest thought to world-changing events. The shit that happens.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>The Ocean is the Big Picture, the unity that is partly seen, or occasionally glimpsed. It is the mystery that cannot be explained. The substratum of consciousness.</i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There is the ocean. And there are waves on the ocean. If you see only the waves they are as we usually see the events of life. There is randomness and coincidence and an apparent capriciousness in how things happen. We may think about it and take it personally. There are times and places, some to be sought out and some avoided. We dodge and weave to avoid impact and seek out sheltered places. And possibly end up blaming god for his all-too-human careless nature.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But if you also include the ocean where the waves play on the surface, the waves themselves would look exactly the same but their impact and influence would be perceived differently. The waves do have their significance, but they are limited in perception to place and time. They come, they happen, they go. Storms and calm are a part of the weather cycle to be dealt with, or not, or accepted, or not. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There is a certain inevitability; an acceptance of experience to be had. Not being influenced beyond a certain point by the randomness of the waves and seeking out the inscrutability of the ocean is the learning, and there the wisdom is found. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Wisdom is not in the actual riding of the waves, no matter how magnificently we do it; but it is in riding the waves a certain way that we begin to see better the waves as part of the ocean. Riding the waves is incidental to the knowledge of the ocean on which the waves take place.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We experience the waves, liking and disliking as they come and go, but there is also some deeper understanding, which goes beyond endurance and desire, to wisdom acquired through ongoing wave-like experience. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The breath of air far away may have caused the storm; our place too apparently coincidental in the thick of it. No matter how the waves themselves might shape up, instead of accidents of nature and timing they are part of the uniqueness of the ocean, just as our experience in the same scheme of things is too. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We may accept this, in part, when we read about it, consider it philosophically and think about it. But when the waves are bigger, wilder, more unpredictable than ever before we have been able to deal with, then we lose balance and get tossed and thrown. And our philosophical viewpoint is also tossed and thrown out. But the actual experience of riding the waves can eventually bring us to the real knowledge. It depends on the point of view.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Every wave, every experience, is an opportunity to discover more the connection between wave and ocean, through mastering the art of riding the waves. The inevitability of waves is not random fate, even if it may seem so. But more even than just dealing with things we don’t understand, there is a purpose outlined in this existence for every participant in creation. To realise that purpose and put it into conscious practice is the goal of life. That’s what we’re here for. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Thoughts, hopes and actions of the individual will not suddenly change - even good people make bad decisions - but the end purpose of living will be found if the waves of individual nature are accepted and understood in relation to the ocean of consciousness. To reject it out of hand - usually as a result of the strength of the storm - is actually to lose sight of the purpose. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Waves without an ocean?</span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And that What-about-life question is also one of the waves; one that tries to define the ocean itself. It is an essential question, usually overlooked until that particular wave comes along. Even when ocean, consciousness or god, are rejected or neglected, the question about the vacuum that exists when you know there is nothing of permanence is the point of departure on this particular road of discovery: </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That waves arise out of the ocean and return to the ocean; that waves of every type and description are a part of the ocean and do not exist separately from the ocean; and that no matter how we arrange ourselves to accommodate it nothing changes the truth of that.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Once the goal, one’s personal aim in life, is known then the voyage begins. Waves will never stop. But if the measure and the movement is in keeping with the personal aim, the waves of the world and the waves of the mind will be understood and dealt with differently than before. There will be knowledge of when to advance, when to retreat; when to speak out and when to be silent; when to move and when to be still. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We make mistakes, many mistakes, continually. We hear our own advice and don't heed it; we take wrong turnings and go off track - sometimes even as we do it we know it. That’s part of the deal, </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">it's how we learn, so we travel on. Forgive yourself; forgive others. We have seen the chart. We have a compass. There is something to trust somewhere, a star to steer by. But most of all, in going forward where we are sure we must go - dealing with the random and surprising events of life as they turn up - the awareness of the all-embracing nature of the ocean is surely, gradually going to become clearer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Life is a meditation - meditation is life</span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is the real purpose of meditation. We may have the breath to fall back on; we may have powerful practices that awaken the energy; we may have the magic of mantra that dispels the darkness; we may have faith in external objects, people or forces that strengthen our practice. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But make no mistake, however we go about it, meditation will eventually bring us to see and confront all the waves in the mind in due course. But undeceived by thought about it. So that instead of waves causing attention to be wholly distracted by the ever-changing storm or calm, we may instead catch a glimpse, a glimmer of the vastness of the ocean. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If that happens, it will have been worth it to pursue it, what you had to do for it. So there remains the choice to do it that way or have life come and get you for the same purpose? Well, it does anyway, but that’s another matter.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">For a short story on the same theme, if you haven’t already, please go to <a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2014/09/lifes-purpose.html">Life's Purpose</a></span></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-89102925022457449062020-08-30T15:49:00.003+10:002021-08-18T09:16:01.599+10:00BEATLES UPANISHAD<p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><b>Spiritual Interpretations of Beatles songs</b></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span>I</span><span>n an interview Paul McCartney was once asked, 'What would you say was the lasting meaning of the Beatles?' Without hesitation he replied, </span><span style="font-weight: bold;">'All you need is love'</span><span>. There was a long pause, like he’d caught everyone off guard… Then he said, 'Shall I elaborate?' He said something like: It goes in and out of style, but you keep coming back to it. There are many things in life that are needed in a tough world, but everyone is searching for love. 'And in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make'. Which is the way it oughta be...</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">I always heard something more in the Beatles' songs than just the individual meaning on the surface. They were always open in their music to surprise themselves and catch the meaning later. Like that they kind of channelled something mysterious, something wonderful and enduring, because it resonated with some kind of truth. I think more than anything tangible, that was what lay behind their universal appeal. Their songs were my Upanishads (spiritual teachings) as I grew up.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Hope you find these interpretations of some of their songs interesting. Have another listen.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">While My Guitar Gently Weeps </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- The White Album</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Everyone must look around sometimes and wonder why is it like this? - does it have to be this way!? It may appear a matter of wishful thinking or idealism, but at any one moment there is so much that could be done for the benefit of others, which would be so simple, and would be such an improvement all round, oneself included. It is not a matter of equality, but of just sufficient compassion and concern that extends beyond one’s own individual cares and needs that take up most of our attention.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">From the spiritual point of view, it is a scientific truth that the thought, care and actions of a person who sincerely aims to benefit and help others serve also to help release the tensions and negativity that are in us and around us. Be positive, look for the good in others, find the best in yourself.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Strawberry Fields Forever </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- Magical Mystery Tour</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Nothing is real! So what is Strawberry Fields? In the Bhagavad Gita there is a chapter known as “The Field and the Knower of the Field”. The Field is the playing field of life if you like, and the Knower of the Field is the state of being able to view all that is happening, lightly as it were, as an observer, as if in a game, a play, not quite real - 'You know I know that it’s a dream’. The uncertainty of the verses expresses the position most of us find ourselves in of being aware of the state of affairs but not sure how to play, or how much of a game it really is.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Let It Be</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span><span face="" style="color: #282829;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">It’s all in the title of course. In its fuller expression it would be: Let It Be As It Is. There is a term in yoga known as Ishwara Pranidhana. It means that - whether a believer in god or not, it’s not important – there is at least a perception of an intelligence, a consciousness, a power operating in nature, in the universe, in us too, which is beyond the capacity of the individual mind to comprehend. But the capacity to accept that the intelligence of that consciousness is there, that there is a higher purpose and so, let it be.</span></span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">It’s amazing really that the human mind thinks it’s equal to understanding all the forces in the universe; to be qualified to judge unequivocally what is good or bad, what is right or wrong. Everyone must surely feel the need to surrender to <span style="font-style: italic;">something;</span> or is this mind the highest intelligence of all? And which is the better proposition?</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Rain - </span><span style="font-style: italic;">Past Masters</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">A statement of the truth that the vision of all things can be seen equally. By observing the two polarities of rain and sun, and accepting they are equal in purpose and experience, change is 'just a state of mind' because in the end 'everything’s the same' - the transcendence of duality concisely put. Of course, this is difficult to live by, but hearing words of wisdom leaves a resonant message that these things are worthy of intent.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Blackbird </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- The White Album</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Very often it is not the aim or the direction that is lacking but the means that are missing. It’s a mistake to want the gratification of arrival without having the trouble of making the journey. In order to fly, the broken wings have to be mended; in order to have the vision you have to have the eyes to see. Patience is needed. A journey takes time; it can take a long time, but with continuity of purpose not a step is wasted, and there will inevitably come a time when this becomes clear.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Tomorrow Never Knows </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- Revolver</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Taken indirectly, and loosely, from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, these verses are like shards of light giving paradoxical glimpses of reality. Spiritual thought often appears contradictory. This is because appropriate teaching varies according to the different levels of understanding at different times. Advanced teaching may appear counter-intuitive but is often on a level which is beyond the mind that at an earlier stage would not rightly be understood. At the same time, to an open mind, verses such as these have the effect of breaking the intellectual hold by their paradoxical nature.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Long Long Long </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- The White Album</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">The implication of this is one of coming home. After a long long long time, finally an important connection is made and there is release and an end to uncertainty. This is often the experience of recognizing a teaching or a teacher perhaps for the first time, perhaps after many years of searching either knowingly or unknowingly. And actually it is at this stage that the journey really gets under way; because no map or guide, no journey.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Here There and Everywhere </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- Revolver</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">The title and the dynamic it invokes transcend this as being only a girl/boy love song. Anyway does anyone know a boy/girl relationship that unconditionally fulfils these conditions not just for some time, but indefinitely? The title evokes the quality of bhakti which is a state of devotion to something you feel to be divine.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Bhava is the feeling of a direct relationship with that divine quality in a particular way, making it personal and therefore accessible. Traditionally these are the divine as a master, as mother or father, as a friend, as a child, even as an enemy. But the most intense and sweetest - and the most difficult – is as a lover, where the intensity of the love for the divine is as one feels for a beloved, which works the other way round also: the beloved as divine. And that’s not new in popular song - Venus in Blue Jeans - it can be highly elevated. It all depends how you look at it.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Come Together </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- Abbey Road</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">The verses, without ever once being specific or attempting to nail it down, reflect the diversity and contradictions, often senseless, of living only in a material world. It is somehow subversive and upbeat at the same time. It is literally meaningless but we seem to sense what it means - 'One thing I can tell you is you got to be free'. This is not a political statement, but something more transcendental. Then the chorus comes, which says effectively all this diversity is brought to one point and transcended. The Me, as in “over me” is the point, not separate from oneself, where duality ends and there are no contradictions left.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Eleanor Rigby </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- Revolver</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Loneliness and fear go together. Here in the people mentioned there is loneliness because there is fear; and it is there in the chorus, which seems to imply everybody. The loneliness is a product of the contraction of the individual nature to the point where there is no longer any genuine connection - with people, the environment and life, and inevitably oneself. It is the more sad because people don’t realize how lonely they are, not knowing any alternative - 'I think I’ll jump in the Mersey, but it looks like rain.’ Everything that takes place is some form of escape from reality - she ‘lives in a dream’. Even death is mistaken as an entry into greater loneliness rather than a release from it. A beautiful but very sad song.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Nowhere Man </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- Rubber Soul</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Nowhere Man is a song that accurately and honestly reflects the ‘lostness’ of self-delusion. A spiritual path often begins from a state of disillusionment and frustration - the realization of all this effort, seemingly going nowhere. In the Bhagavad Gita the first chapter is known as the yoga of despondency, and it is only when we’re up against it that the essential questions get to be asked. Like now?</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">A spiritual path is not passive, it needs real effort. But it is not the kind of effort we are usually accustomed to, more one of intent, of earnestness of purpose, of sincerity and consistency, along with the ability to let things develop as they must, in their own time – a sort of effortless effort.</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">And Your Bird Can Sing </span><span style="font-style: italic;">- Revolver</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Everyone is conducting a lifelong experiment called The Search for Happiness, enduring happiness. You may try many directions, or one direction for a long time, and think, Ah now 'your bird can sing'. But without including one other essential quality all effort will continue indefinitely. How do we interpret that one thing - the Me in the song as in, You don’t get Me? 'When your prize possessions start to wear you down', only then the search begins to look in My direction. The wise have always spoken of a Something Within, something beyond just the pleasures of the body, the articulation of the mind. It has many names - Atman is one that does not exist as a definition. It’s only by including that essential quality within us as part of the equation that enduring can happiness ever be found. It's always calling, but quietly...</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Because </span><span style="font-style: italic;">-</span><span style="font-weight: bold;"> </span><span style="font-style: italic;">Abbey Road</span></span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Why?</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Because…</span></p><p class="q-text qu-display--block" style="box-sizing: border-box; caret-color: rgb(40, 40, 41); color: #282829; direction: ltr; margin: 0px 0px 1em; overflow-wrap: break-word; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">All You Need is Love </span>- <span style="font-style: italic;">Magical Mystery Tour (of Life)</span></span></p><p><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" /></p>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-46044024093027072262019-07-04T16:01:00.003+10:002020-06-27T14:27:15.432+10:00We Want to Know, but Hesitate to Know<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b>There is a spirit of adventure in self discovery</b><br />
<b>Adventure is when you don't know what will happen next</b><br />
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I’ve been teaching 5 - 9 day meditation courses, held mainly in silence, for nearly 10 years now. They aim to define a time, create the right environment, and give guidance for the best opportunity to go deeper into the inner world and go further on the path of discovery and self knowledge. <span style="font-kerning: none;"></span></div>
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It takes something to take a slice out of your life to spend some time away from everything with the sole purpose of becoming more exposed to yourself and discover… who knows what? Anyone who attends one of these courses usually has a clear intention and is aware they are taking a definitive step in that direction. However, every time, it comes up somewhere in the course that, though I want to know, I do, I hesitate to know, and I do, at the same time.<span style="font-kerning: none;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Or to put it more directly, you discover something in yourself that is clearly inaccurate, built on false premises, and proven in some personal way to be so, but when push come to shove, still we hesitate to make the change. Why is that?</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>To change or not to change?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">It is very difficult to change something in the mind that has been established there for a long time even though, whether it was originally accurate or not, it might well have passed its use-by date. Times, events and people change, but these well established states of mind do not change easily even when the evidence is against them and in spite of the sincerity of our desire to do so. This is a fact, often intuitively understood, but easily overlooked, and it is wiser and in the end easier and much less complicated to accept it as quickly and as fully as possible.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>Prefer the familiar</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">It is just so much easier to slip into autopilot and let things go on in the same old way. There’s no actual harm in that, is there? Everybody does it. And no-one condemns you for being the same today as yesterday. In fact people are more comfortable with that. We like people to be sound, reliable… meaning, like me, and like you’ve always been. And if we change, those we know well will have to accept that too, or not. But everyone has the right to change don’t they, and if the time is right there’s nothing to stop you from moving on is there?</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>Laziness</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Change is definitely the harder task, requiring more effort in every way. It’s not just that it’s easier to stay this way, than to go that way, it’s actually a whole nest of problems with knock-on effects all down the line to effect substantial change. Many of history’s worst decisions have been made as a continuation of plans already made that are just too much trouble to change even in the face of new evidence and changing circumstances - like walking into disaster. Much of the First World War, for instance, if you’re interested</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>Fear of the unknown</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Then, what are we going to come across when we do go inside and look deeper? We really don’t know... Or do we? There is always some intuitive insight at work somewhere that knows what we will have to face, what we know is in us. It’s the still, small voice inside, and amongst the clamour of other things, it’s got to be a particular decision whether to listen to it and act on it or not. And until we do decide, it’s that fear of the unknown, or the partially suspected that gives pause, and causes the hesitation. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>So much already invested</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Built on supposition though it may be, I have invested so much in what I have come to believe in myself as real and permanent. Is it real, isn’t it real - or forget about it? Because maybe my view of myself, and then my career, my relationships, my deeply felt beliefs, hopes and dreams, in the end may turn out to be unsupported and unreliable after all. It’d be like selling out, even if the investment is no longer bringing in the expected returns. But that would be a heaviness that eventually gives way to lightness.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>Proud of my ignorance</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Of course this doesn’t apply to you or me, but boy is there a lot of it about. Well if I’m not gonna change, might as well make a virtue out of it - the right to be honoured not for the quality or accuracy of belief, but for the tenacity with which I hold it and hold onto it, even if it is a fantasy. Some people will do anything for a little attention, but present a different face to the world, and you end up believing it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>No fun in it</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">There’s no doubt that if there is a deeper insight into the inaccuracies of life then a realignment of viewpoint is sure to follow. And it may seem as if there is going to be less fun to be had out there, even as it also becomes clear that the ‘fun’ from before was unreliable as a lasting proposition for happiness. I knew someone once who said that he wished he hadn’t learnt what he had through his own spiritual aspiration, because life was easier and less complicated and more fun before. There is a lot of fun in truth, but it’s a different kind of fun than fantasy, more like an adventure</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Even if the path of self knowledge is pursued sincerely and diligently for some time, where’s the guarantee of a worthwhile outcome? Those who have gone before assure us that there is, but who believes such things these days? Caught in the middle of the journey when the highway has turned from three lanes at the beginning into two lanes, and then into a steep and rocky road with hidden obstacles, there is a temptation to turn back for a better road, regardless of the destination. But can’t you have arrival without the travel.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">It is testing and trying, but there is one thing that is overlooked, the quality that keeps the eye on the road and the destination in mind: faith. Faith is naivety isn’t it? Who believes in anything you can’t test and satisfy in your mind first? Well, that’s a Catch 22 right there: if we are clear about it, we find it’s that same mind we tend to trust for everything that proves itself unequal in this particular matter. It's good in the material world, but in the inner life, accurately knowing one’s true nature, that’s outside its jurisdiction. Missing that catch will lead to a lot of problems.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">There’s so much more to this than meets the eye. There are people, places, philosophies and practices that can awaken faith and keep it alive. But you have to begin to question long held beliefs and get away from the ongoing influences for some time to get access to it. But when internalised, tested though it may be from time time, it is the most valuable thing we can call our own, because in the end it proves itself to be very much our own.</span></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-81320486773644458152018-11-26T16:13:00.001+11:002018-12-25T15:32:44.482+11:00Not Actually Meditation, Actually<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;">Or Meditating with a really stubborn mind</i></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Although I’ve been practising meditation for about forty years now, I’ve not actually been practising meditation in the way it’s usually understood. Let me explain. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Meditation: have mantra, take mala (a string of 108 beads), sit comfortably, close the eyes, breath normally, or rhythmically. Repeat mantra mentally, in sync with breath, or not, as you wish. With each repetition of the mantra turn the mala one bead. Practice one mala (about 12 minutes) two malas, four malas, whatever. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">I tried that once, for a while, but it didn’t work. Why? Lack of focus, impatience, wandering mind - what most people experience after the first taste of euphoria and enthusiasm has worn off. But looking back there was another reason which is why I’m writing this now. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>More than this</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Ever since I can remember, looking around I had always thought, there must be more than this; this can’t be it, and occasionally, this can’t be real. I was blessed with a rich inner life and cursed with an out of control imagination. What it amounted to was that I came to value the inner life above all else, because it seemed that’s where I wanted to be it, where it was really at, but had little control over it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Everything around me seemed so normal, in the pejorative sense. Fortunately I was born at time when that normality was about to be turned upside down. It would be no surprise to discover that when marijuana came around I took to it enthusiastically. It offered a way to deepen the inner connection. In the course of time though I discovered that, while it might help open the door, and occasionally kick it in, the experience itself was also a kind of distraction. Once inside it’s better to look out for yourself unaltered so to speak.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Coincidentally, when leaving the marijuana habit I was initiated into meditation with a mantra. At first that was like having the door kicked in too, where you could also float around on cosmic clouds. But what I really wanted to know was what could you do for yourself when you got in there, where does it lead to, where does it all end? Because cosmic clouds are all well and good but it’s just fluff, another form of distraction really.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">From there things moved on a bit. I knew I had access to the inner world, valued it and tried to look after it, in what seemed like a maddeningly insecure unhelpful world - there, all the values and priorities seemed to be out of alignment, which sort of seemed like it could be so easy to fix if only we’d… So I had to get away from all that. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>Inner world preeminent</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">So now the story relates, if I can talk about it, to the inner world. Starting point: an erratically sensitive but very independent mind - I have to find this out for myself. What is ‘this’? Some kind of truth that never finds itself compromised by contradiction. Where is truth? The real truth, it’s only inside. So that’s where you have to make the effort. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Over the course of time it became clear to me that the source of all the contradictions are in the mind itself, no matter how much we might struggle with that. Real life is within, but it goes deeper than just the mind. How to come to that? By stubbornly trying every possible avenue that I came across trying to bend truth to my will. And I was calling that meditation. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">So what was happening? Long story made short. Access to inner world was usually not difficult. Mantra helped, at first, but with some experience I found I could get in there pretty easily - just close your eyes and wait for something to happen, because there is always something happening. And here’s the interesting part, mantra is usually understood as a support, something to return to to know where you’re at. But when inside, the mantra seemed to be a distraction and I just wanted to go on on my own. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>Being there</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">The long hard road, where all the mistakes are made, is getting to a vantage point of being able to watch the mind from some place that is itself not influenced by the mind. We call that awareness. Is that a part of the mind? At first it seems yes - where all the mistakes are made. But by way of making and then hopefully eliminating all those mistakes one day the way eventually becomes clear to see the mind like from the outside, and then you can just let it be. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">If that can be done even if only briefly, temporarily, then the perspective on all those things that are observed there changes, sometimes quite radically. Which is the long path to self knowledge - long because there is so much we don’t know about ourselves, and it takes long time and continuous application. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Now here’s the thing. If the mind is accepted as being inconsistent. And if the awareness can be trusted as something special, separate from the mind, then you can enquire more deeply into those inconsistencies. It can be done through choice, or recognising inconsistencies as they arise, in meditation, or in daily interactions. It can be done formally or casually. It can be done anywhere, anytime. It can be done as often as the inconsistencies keep on coming.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">So you could say that the practice of meditation is like a training ground to know how to make the inner connection and to allow the relationship to flourish unhindered, to be a good observer of oneself. Because then the same can be applied, perhaps with a little difficulty at first, in daily life and interactions.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>Condition of wisdom</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">The more still and confident the sense of being an observer becomes the deeper the inner knowledge can go. But it’s not a gradual progression. Sometimes it all seems to be working according to plan, and then all hopes and expectations fly out the window. Because we have all our own untruths, half-truths, misconceptions and misdemeanours to meet with, acknowledge and address before we get a good look in to our inner wisdom. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">And wisdom most assuredly is there, but access to it is conditional upon harmony in every sphere of experience, now known and not yet known, before that access is vouchsafed. This is so important for patience and persistence, because you can’t arrive without making the journey. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">So meditation is not necessarily a matter of trying to stay at one point- if you can do it, then do it - then losing it and trying repeatedly to return to it, but better to let the mind go free and follow its behaviour very closely, but without interference or prejudice. Then one fine day the focus will come, spontaneously, effortlessly, and then there is a chance for those things beyond the mind’s jurisdiction to begin to manifest. That’s how awareness works in meditation. </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><b>What helps</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">So one interesting question: what is the constant? What puts up with all the bullshit, the intensity, the multiple sensations of realising how wrong you can be, and goes on being, it never seems to end…? </span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">It’s simple: the desire above all else to know what is that truth, where to search for it, and how to go about it. If you have that you can’t help yourself. And for some, even if it puts you in a very small minority, that goal is the only thing worth working for, no matter what you have to do, what you have to put up with, or how long it takes. It’s like a friendship for life. </span></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-48935413669039763822018-03-02T09:20:00.001+11:002019-07-10T21:27:36.273+10:00KARMA - The Third and Last Alternative<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="s1"><i>One of the great mysteries of life: Why is it like it is? Why does it have to be this way?<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></i></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Everything in life is explicable up to a point. Cause and effect is sustainable all over the place. From, if you touch fire it will burn; to, an apple falls, planets orbit the sun due to gravity; to, the atom can be split – I may not understand that but I know the evidence of it. These things satisfy the mind - from what I can see with my own eyes, what I understand from experience, what evidence persuades me to believe, even what a trusted person tells me is true, as in quantum physics and therefore the computer<i> </i>I’m using.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">But there comes a point when this breaks down. On the earliest maps of the world there would be intricate detail of what was then known, then drifting off into uncertain space, often there would be written "There be dragons". And there we may fear to tread.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>The most enigmatic question</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Why is it that I can work up success for 20, 30 years and then have someone embezzle everything? Why does a successful relationship fall apart in acrimony. Why is someone less talented than me becoming famous and I'm still struggling with a daytime job? Why is it that some horrible rich kid is given all the perks and advantages in life and then squanders them. Why is an apparently healthy child suddenly struck down with a lifelong sickness with no support? Why do things happen that are patently so unfair?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">These are examples of the kind of question in every life that go on defying a satisfactory answer: why do these things happen? These are difficult questions. And we do ask them, but usually only when they relate to me and mine personally, not as a speculative exercise. Then it looks too… something. It turns into an emotional issue because the mind can't or won't go there because… there be dragons.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">If we try really hard to satisfy the mind finally with an explanation for the seemingly irreconcilable, there are three usual possible explanations. Maybe we try two, and then give up.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>First explanation</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">It's all random, there is no ultimate sense or logic in the universe, no power in control. It’s all chance. But maybe things that we don’t understand just don’t have enough quantifiable data… yet. In the meantime random says there is no ultimate sense in the universe, no original cause to the effect. You and me - we are an accident not waiting to happen. We come in, exist for some time; then it’s over, end of story.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">There is no integrated reason for any action which, because there are no ultimate consequences to our actions, reduces everything to a struggle for survival of the fittest in true Darwinian fashion, to get what we can out of it while we can while we’re here. So if things go well I say I’ve earned it. If things go badly then someone, something, anything else must be to blame. That's just the way it is. Sound familiar?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">No one with a scientific way of thinking could accept this. Every action sets up some kind of reaction, this is the practical foundation of logical thought. There is an effect to a cause, and also a cause to any effect. Random, chance does not sit comfortably. Why else are billions spent on scientific research and discovery? Because deep in the human mind-set, with things as we’ve got to know them so far, this randomness is not acceptable. There has to be a reason for, or theory of… everything.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>Second explanation</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Then there <i>is</i> a force in the universe which controls everything, which we call God. This can be a delicate matter, but one thing is clear, whether we accept god, or not, every interpretation of any god will be confined within the limitations of human perception, and not the thing itself. It would actually be way beyond what we could think of it, logically or emotionally. But still it seems to be common among those who claim God to be the ultimate cause (and effect): They know what God thinks!<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">God is represented almost like a person, endowed with superhuman qualities to be sure, but we infer that He thinks just like us, just on a really Grand Scale. He (it usually is a he) has judgement and preferences. And as a true believer I know what those preferences are and how to interpret those judgements. And then as a final explanation, beyond what we do claim to understand, the hands are thrown up: "God works in mysterious way".</span></div>
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<span class="s1">As a result, there is either a turning away from religion, because that would be the 'enlightened' reaction, on the one hand; or on the other a more determined, more certain, more rigid interpretation; because at a certain point the mind gives up trying to reason and think it through, and comes to depend on a prescribed set of precepts, even though the same mind claims to know what God is, and what he wants.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">This is not meant either to negate or affirm God. Lord Buddha provided the best answer for modern times. He was not an atheist: He simply said, this mind is not presently adequate to know, understand or interpret what is god, so stay with the task at hand and know and understand yourself completely first. Then the light of God will shine in you, and no explanation will be necessary.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>Third explanation</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Then there is a third explanation, sometimes muttered under the breath, as a resignation, an accusation, as a last resort: Karma… And this is like going off the map, so here too, there be dragons.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Suppose just for a moment with the impartial vision and insight of possibility: a person is not <i>just</i> a body, and not <i>just</i> an individual mind; that a person at the core is more than both of these and is potentially not limited to anything definable in normal terms. And we would aspire to know that. There is a term for it: Atman.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>The Atman</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">The Atman is a constant not limited to time or space, and not limited to one body or mind. It is as the constant self within. If we take that to be so, not finally dependent on a body and mind to be my self: we were, before this life; and we will be, after this life. Birth was not the beginning and death will not be the end. Therefore what happens in this life carries some weight. And what happens in life are of two fundamental types: what happens to me, which is the effect, of some previous cause. And what we do in reaction, which becomes a cause to a subsequent effect. That in simple terms is the nature of the working of karma.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">It's central to ancient cultures; and implied incidentally but quite often in modern cultures, for example: what goes around comes around; how you behave with other people is very influential on how other people will behave with you. My father, who didn't even know about karma, told me when I was learning to drive: you know it's a funny thing, but if you're polite to people on the road you find that people are polite to you.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">It can be seen to operate in one lifetime, sometimes very simply, that what I do today comes back to me tomorrow. But that is too simplistic and doesn't finally add up. But when there is the possibility of more than one lifetime, of an accumulation of experience, over many lifetimes, there begins to emerge an inner logic that gels into a unified theory without contradiction. It's the only one that can do that, so it's worth thinking about.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">I come into this life as an embodied form directly as a result of past learning: my parents, my body, mind, everything. However, I am not without free choice. And within all my choices, there is a constant, ever present, which is whether I identify myself as just a body, mind, a person, family member, eye colour, race, culture, religion, or whether the true identity is something more than any or all of these - Atman</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Karma is the medium of the learning of the truth of this. When we misidentify and go on misidentifying, it is the force of equilibrium, which is inherent in karma, which reminds us of mistakes we have made, not as a random or arbitrary force which chooses why, who, how, and when; but as something so finely calibrated as to be an absolute wonder to try to understand. They say that if you truly know and understand karma you would know everything.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>Karma as opportunity</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Every life is an opportunity to learn the fundamentals. Everything in life is a medium, because everything is an agent of karma, to learn the hidden lesson that karma is inexorably teaching us. That also includes everything we consider usual, like family, relationships, profession, ambitions and desires - especially ambitions and desires. Check out the movie Groundhog Day... again and again, and again and again…!</span></div>
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<span class="s1">I have my situation, who I am, what I take myself to be. Into that mix things happen, sometimes as hoped for, sometimes as expected, sometimes surprisingly, and sometimes disastrously. These all describe not necessarily the actual events, but my reactions to them. Therein lies the seeds of future karma.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">How I react will determine my learning. If I react personally and take credit for all that I want and apportion blame for all that I don't want, the wheels of karma will turn and return in time – karma is very patient – to remind me that this is not accurate thinking, which throws things out of alignment and balance - and it will insist I keep trying until I get it. Groundhog Day again.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">If I assume responsibility for my karma up to this day - that is, all that I have experienced, (which may just include time before this life on the learning curve) - my reaction will be more one of understanding and acceptance, and my behaviour will be one of forward momentum by trying to find/maintain the balance through appropriate action and less of impulsive reaction.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">But, we may still ask, yes, that’s all very well, but why bother? What's the point?</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>The three karmas</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Once we have accepted that we have taken on influence from more than just this one life, we understand better why we may have come into this life within certain parameters. These parameters come out of our storehouse of karma, known as Sanchita Karma. These parameters also include the environment, inner and outer, for the lessons we have to learn. These lessons are already coming at us. There is no avoiding them. They are like arrows released from a bow; there is no recall, they will hit their target. This is known as Prarabdha Karma.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Our free will determines how we experience these lessons that are coming toward us according to the choices we make and attitudes we adopt. And experience them we must. Then when we make contact, how we behave at that moment will determine our future karma. This is known as Kriyamana Karma. If we react according to a previous disposition (very likely in a habitual state of mind) we will set in train the karmic process which will at some stage remind us yet again that there is a lesson to learn, until we learn it – Groundhog Day… again.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">On the other hand, if we can transcend instinct and react with a deeper understanding, that our events are a product of karma and that our actions at any moment will influence the outcome of experience further down the track - all judgement is off the table, court is adjourned for a retrial.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">It’s as well to keep in mind that karma is absolutely neutral, and definitely not arbitrary. There is no such thing as bad or good karma, only tough learning or valuable opportunity. The key word is equilibrium. Karma indicates correction to the balance, and so seeks to find harmony. It can be very kind or quite ruthless in its way to achieve that, it all depends, but its influence is inevitable.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Of course this doesn’t make it easy; it’s counterintuitive, or just plain crazy. Whichever way you go with karma philosophically, you have either to accept it totally or not at all. It’s a complete system, so you can’t take a bit of karma here and a bit there and then overlook it for the sake of convenience - that begins to look like a selective god. If you accept it, it stays integrated and maintains its integrity universally. And if you reject, you reject it totally which takes you back to random and then you also have to accept all the implications of that, completely.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>Introducing dharma</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Managing karma could be said to be the central aspect of our life, whether we know it, or accept it, or not. And to complete the picture it really helps to bring one more idea into play: a sense of purpose in this life; a sense that there is a part to play, and to play it well, continually; a sense of doing what we believe to be right. It's called Dharma. Dharma is our path in life, and if it is accurately chosen it will not falter when the vicissitudes of karma put us to the test. It lessens the impact because in aligning ourselves with dharma the karmic lesson is already half-learned.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Dharma and karma are the two forces that taken together make life make complete sense, from top to bottom. A mind ruled by strongly held opinions will find this difficult to accept. But after analysing impartially, intelligently, one thing following another, there is an inherent logic, scientific if you like in its elegance, which cannot be bettered by any other philosophy.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Incidentally incarnation is not limited to the body as we know it. It can be anywhere in any form according to the state of evolution, because evolution only goes so far in the physical realm. There is also evolution at the karmic level which only begins to be recognised in the human form (or not as the case may be). There’s a whole universe to choose from, and infinite forms. There is no return in evolution, just slow learning. It's the fishing in the past for I-was-an-Indian-prince-or-princess idea that gets incarnation a bad name.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">This is a big ask, but it adds up. Mind can bend over backwards to get any answer it wants, or refuse to see what it doesn’t want, prompted by emotions stretched beyond the power of acceptance. You can argue with it intellectually, you can argue with it emotionally, but if the possibility is accepted that you were before this life, and you will be after this life, the logic of karma is irrefutable. So the question remains: which would I rather, a philosophy I understand that works perfectly in limited circumstances, or a philosophy that fits perfectly even if I don't understand it at all? Did I mention Groundhog Day?</span><br />
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<span class="s1">We may think we never think about this, but somewhere deep inside there is a core belief system that operates and influences throughout life. Examined closely it will probably show itself to be one of the three options outlined here. It's really worth thinking about and getting to know what is the inherent motivating force we carry with us. Then only can we operate according to free will, the unique gift of humanity. We have to use it responsibly.</span></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-41342854014325938312017-11-09T20:46:00.002+11:002017-11-12T14:55:20.522+11:00Real Love Won't Ever Let You Down<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: initial;">There’s only one thing that truly matters: Love, and love only<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></b><span class="s1"></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Not what you generate yourself but what you can connect with that is already there, deep inside. It’s that ineffable something in everyone<i>.</i> It’s the natural state, where you don’t choose who to love. You don’t <i>give</i> love, in the end you <i>are </i>love. And we are the first beneficiary. But we need to discover it first, because it’s not what it’s taken to be, it’s not so easy to find.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Everything we do is a means to that end, a search for something real and lasting. Sometimes something valid and positive, sometimes something distracting and inaccurate, until we find the balance, experience the harmony and get it right. Love is the natural state which is discovered when there is stillness and peace, when opinion is not so strong, when misplaced trust is reconciled, when there is acceptance and forgiveness.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>Not what it’s taken to be<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">With love one is never lonely, never in need of another to become complete. But it’s not such an obvious thing. It’s not what it’s taken to be from nearly every influence we have been subjected to. Love is free from decision, equal in everything, it doesn't separate anyone from you, or you from anyone. Love begets respect, and respect is given equally.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Everyone is continually searching for the source of their own happiness, something you can be sure of that will never change. It’s not very fashionable to speak of love in this way, because who believes in it? But where there is derision there is pain and fear, and where there is pain and fear there is defensiveness and aggression. And that is the main cause of unhappiness, not a material lack, not a shortage of philosophies, but some inarticulate cry for love that takes many a strange and unpredictable form to fill an empty space.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>Love is of the heart not in the mind</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">The real rule of love is that when you give, love comes to you. And that’s a matter of the heart, not of the mind. If we can tap into the universal store of the heart, the natural state, the same is generated around us and in others. Maybe it takes time, and maybe not in the way we might anticipate, but isn’t that how it works? But who is really comfortable with giving without getting something in return?<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">It’s a catch-22. You know, in Ireland they say that there are fairies, but that you can only ever see a fairy if you believe in them first. But of course no-one is going to believe in fairies until they’ve actually seen one. So there you have it. The basis of faith is believing first and holding to it through the onset of hesitation and doubt. And it does work, <i>if</i> what you believe in is real.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">And therein lies the problem. There are many things that stand in for the real thing, like inaccurate religious teaching, half-complete or half-baked philosophies, private fantasies, gods and goddesses, or even fairies, but surely everyone is searching for a something precious that won’t ever let you down. If love really is the answer you only have to look inside and go to the heart of the matter, which is where all the spiritual masters of all time have always said is where the long search finally comes to rest. In the end it might be the last place to look, but in the final end there’s only one thing that truly matters…</span></div>
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<span class="s1">There’s a song about it - please try it with headphones:</span></div>
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<a href="https://soundcloud.com/power-of-awareness/with-love-in-your-heart">With Love in Your Heart</a></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>With Love in Your Heart</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Sometimes words can say so much</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Sometimes nothing at all</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Sometimes you just want to stay in touch</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Sometimes the silence calls</span></div>
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<span class="s1">When you look around what is there in</span></div>
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<span class="s1">A world of pleasure and pain?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Looking for something to believe in</span></div>
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<span class="s1">You know will never change <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">CHORUS</span></div>
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<span class="s1">With love in your heart<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Can you be lonely?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">With love in your heart</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Can you want more?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">With love in your heart</span></div>
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<span class="s1">It’s love and love only<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Love and love only<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">That makes you so sure</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Love is not such an obvious thing</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Not what it’s taken to be</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Love is equal in everything</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Doesn’t separate you from me</span></div>
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<span class="s1">CHORUS</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Who would climb the highest mountain?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Who would ford the darkest stream?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Who would bathe in the coldest fountain</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Waking from a dream?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">CHORUSES</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>A last thought</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">In an interview Paul McCartney was once asked, 'What would you say was the lasting meaning of the Beatles?' Without hesitation he replied, 'All you need is love'. There was a long pause, like he’d caught everyone by surprise… He said, 'Shall I elaborate?' Then he said something like: It goes in and out of style, but you keep coming back to it. There are many things in life that are needed in an uncompromising world, but when it comes down to it everyone in their own way is searching for love. 'And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make.'</span><br />
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<a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.in/2017/07/time-to-explore-heart-more-fully.html">Going more deeply into the Heart</a></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-64017979508434638532017-09-25T13:10:00.000+10:002018-05-31T06:28:49.203+10:00I don’t know what I think until I've thought it<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span class="s1"><i>Do I think a thought or does the thought come to me?</i></span></div>
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<span class="s1">In the ashram on a Sunday after the morning’s duties the afternoon was often free. It was my habit to retreat to my room, rejoice in not having to answer to anyone or anything for a few hours and maybe read a little. But what I was really after was to find my way into a peaceful inner space where I could just watch my own thoughts. If it didn’t happen straight away a little yoga nidra relaxation was usually enough to get it started.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">In that space time starts to bend. Short times can seem longer and a long time can become surprisingly short. Einstein was right, time is relative. A good afternoon and it could pass by in a flash. What made that happen? If you let your mind go completely free and yet remain with it as an interested observer sooner or later it will sort of open up and reveal and express itself. It is your own presence and lack of judgment of it that sets it free. In this way you can learn interesting things about yourself you didn’t know before.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">One Sunday I was doing this and things were going well and the attention to what was going on in my mind was pretty good. I began to become aware of time bending in a very specific way. At a certain point the thought process slowed right down until I knew I was observing just one thought in very very slow motion. And it took on a cartoon-like quality.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Imagine a hundred numbered balls suspended in a row (like in a TV lottery). When that one particular thought arose it triggered the release of the hundred balls in a sequence, which was a visualisation of the thought taking place - the thought in the process of coming into being as it were. As the balls are released they drop. As they are dropping you don’t actually know what the thought that they represent will be. Only when all the balls hit the bottom do you know what the thought will actually be. You know the thought is there before you know what the thought will be. Like, wow.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>Thought is not that you think!</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">What I learned from that was not what I expected. The thought itself was nothing significant, long forgotten. What was interesting was that the balls dropped in a random order which was maybe why I did not know what the thought was going to be until all the balls had arrived at the bottom and assembled themselves so to speak and hey presto I know what I think. Now maybe the balls dropping randomly like that was a particular feature of my mind. Do they normally drop in numbered sequence 1 - 100, or randomly, I don’t know?</span></div>
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<span class="s1">But just watching the balls drop actually revealed the really interesting part, which was that that there had been an entirely separate quality just quietly observing the whole process taking place. The observer me had no part in how that thought had come into being, took place as a thought, and passed on. Remember this usually happens so quickly that thought is rarely seen as a sequence but as a single cognition, and so we possess it and make it mine.</span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>Is there more than one of me?</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">At first it seems like there must be two people, one having thoughts arising randomly and another that is entirely separate from those thoughts, just watching. What became absolutely clear (at least to my own satisfaction) is quite simply that a thought, any thought, does not represent me. Even the aggregate of all the thoughts in the mind do not make up who I am, have nothing to do with me, if I remain a distinct and discrete observer of them. In that slo-motion moment I knew that for sure. If this turns out to be true, who actually is thinking? Just think of the implications.</span></div>
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<span class="s1">Thoughts, ideas, opinions, philosophies are like guests passing through - there for some time, but their residence is only ever temporary. Sometimes they may stay a long time, seeming to take up permanent residence. And then they can take on the attributes of a personality. And then it’s only a short step to seeming like that is who I am. But that is illusory. A powerful illusion to be sure, which is why it takes a certain seriousness of intent to manage the powerful forces that lead to all kinds of self-deception.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> Try this for a few possibilities:</span></span><br />
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases">Cognitive biases</a></div>
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<span class="s1">If you look around in the world the capacity for self-regulation - which is absolutely not possible without self awareness - is a very rare quality, yet most corporations, companies, governments, institutions, and of course people, everyone in fact, will claim that capacity for themselves. But it is rare indeed to see it maintained constantly and consistently. As a historical example, that much was understood by the Founding Fathers of the United States, when they built the checks and balances into the three divisions of government - executive, legislative and judiciary - of the American constitution.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1"><b>Change of metaphor</b></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Imagine a large country house. There are many guests staying there. The host has a different relationship with all his guests, but in the tradition of hospitality is unfailingly attentive and generous to all the guests equally. They are honoured guests. Now obviously some of these people are going to be very welcome; some will be neutral, part of a more formal relationship maybe; and some the host would really rather not have to entertain but there they are.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">Invariably the welcome guests will know the appropriate behaviour and will know also to a nicety the appropriate moment to leave. Whereas unwelcome guests will invariably be the last to leave. With these people sometimes the host is able, without in any way losing hospitality - like attentiveness, politeness, tolerance - to make it clear in a certain reserve of manner that the time has come to depart. It is essential that parting should be honourable between host and guest or there will almost certainly be repercussions later. In every case the parting should be clean no matter how difficult the last guests can be.<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></div>
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<span class="s1">The host represents the awareness and the guests represent all the different thoughts, ideas and opinions that crowd in around us in the social gathering of our mind, taking up the host’s time and attention. Some are most welcome, some neutral and some distinctly unwelcome and maybe drawing a lot of attention to themselves. But the awareness remains hospitable but knowing, friendly but detached, wise but modest.</span></div>
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There has to be that separation somewhere in being a knower of oneself, that there is some time between a thought and the observer of the thought. All else follows from there. And we can become first class hosts to all our guests until it's time for them to leave, which they will when they come to understand that they are just guests and the right time has come.<span class="s1"></span></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-40135999774737953712017-07-09T12:42:00.003+10:002019-07-27T17:14:08.202+10:00Going more deeply into the Heart<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There’s a practice we do on the 5/7/9 day meditation courses which goes like this. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Think of a question, something that is relevant in your life right now. It doesn’t have to be the Big One, but you should identify with it at a personal level. When you have it clear, watch the breath for a little while, a neutral space, leaving the question for the time being. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">First the mind</span></b></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then focus at the eyebrow centre and using the breath as a vehicle enter into the space behind the eyebrow centre. When you have found your way into the space you can drop the breath and begin to become accustomed to the space of the mind (known as chidakash) where you are now. The language of the mind is thought. See how the mind manifests itself in the form of thoughts. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When you can observe the activity here as thoughts, drop in that question/inquiry you had decided on. Watch the mind react to the question without in any way trying to influence the outcome. Just be interested to find out where it goes. You may get an answer, you may not, but you will know what you think. That you can store quietly away to recall in a little while. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then you leave the mind space, and return to the neutrality of normal breath awareness. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then the heart</span></b></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">After a little time again the breath becomes a vehicle but now the point of entry is a portal at the centre of the chest. You will then find yourself entering a different space behind the front of the chest, the heart space (known as hridayakash). Then begin to discover the language of the heart, which is emotion, pure and simple. There is no thought here, only direct experience of emotion and feelings. Get accustomed to the language of the heart. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then drop in the same question from the beginning, only this time feel the emotional reaction without any interference of thought. After some time you will know what the reaction has been, and you can store that quietly to recall later. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Leave the heart space and return to normal breath awareness without any distraction. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What do you find?</span></b></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then leave the breath and in that neutral space recall the reaction to your question you had in the mind in the form of thought. Once you know that put it aside and recall the reaction in the heart in the form of emotion. When you have that, then put both side by side: reaction in thought, reaction in emotion and compare the two. Then ask yourself these questions. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Are the two reactions the same, or different?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If different, which do you think more accurately represents you? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And again if different, which one are you likely to act on when push comes to shove?</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Here’s the point</span></b></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Now although that’s a fairly lengthy description, it may not work at the deeper level the first time without some supplementary guidance. But here’s the point. A quick survey every time this practice is done shows that the large majority always say there is a difference between head and heart; and usually it comes as something of a surprise. And the majority always say it is the heart that most accurately represents Me. But there is some uncertainty as to which is likely to be influencing the action that will follow.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Also if the answer is the same you can rest assured that on another question on another occasion, in nearly every case the division of head and heart will eventually show itself. So best to accept it. Those who consistently deny the differences in head and heart have invested too closely in one over the other for too long, usually the mind over the heart, but the other way round happens as well. Besides, seeing into the inconsistencies like this can act as a wake-up call to start a meaningful inquiry.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What we can conclude</span></b></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So without lingering on why’s and wherefore’s, here’s what we can conclude. Generally speaking we do not know our own heart. We do not know, unless we stop long enough to look, what we really feel about... a lot. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is because the mind is usually the predominant force in life - it’s what we hear nearly all the time, and in the end almost automatically follow. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Because when the mind is that predominant we do not feel the heart even if it is aching to be heard.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So if that is true, when we do make the heart connection it comes as something of a surprise. And even if we do recognise it as representing Me more accurately we may have been in thrall to the mind for long enough to be unable to respond to the heart straightaway. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What does heart actually mean?</span></b></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One thing needs to be clear to remove any lingering ambiguity. When we use the word 'heart' it can refer to a number of different levels of understanding and meaning:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">1 Heart as a physical organ, keeping circulation going and keeping us alive into the bargain. This obviously is not the seat of emotion. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">2 Heart as mind masquerading as emotion. They are not really emotions at all but thoughts looking emotional to achieve an end - like nearly everything on TV. Not the seat of emotion. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">3 Heart as emotion, but the everyday and mostly temporary emotions that we hope will smooth the way. Like 'I love you so much', which I do feel and mean… until something better comes along. Not very reliable and not to be confused with:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">4 Heart as hridayakash, the space of the heart, the seat of emotion. These are the emotions in their original and natural state. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Emotions in their natural state</span></b></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We digress at this point to explain the natural state of emotion in the heart. Imagine original pure light, transcendent and perfect. Now imagine a crystal or a diamond. The light enters the crystal and refracts and breaks up the pure white light into all different colours of the spectrum. The colours represent the spectrum of emotions. And incidentally the analogy goes further because different emotions align with different colours being different frequencies of the same energy, which can be visualised in meditation along with the associated emotion.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Emotions are forces of energy. The original energy is pure and perfect, like the transcendental light. And when that energy is broken by our individual nature </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">up as it were</span>, like refracted light, the sum of those different emotions in a way express who we are. Like some of us have more red or orange, some less blue, or yellow or magenta etc. But although we take them personally, they should still be understood as different, less than perfect, expressions of the original pure energy. I hope that’s clear. The trouble is we are so attracted to the pretty colours that we miss the pure light from which they come: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">'The colors are appealing </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And nothing is revealing </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The pure light </span><br />
T<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">hat comes from god-knows-where.'</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What it comes down to is that in hridayakash all the emotions can have a measured expression. They can be felt fully, but also observed impartially, because all emotions have the capacity to be transformed and return to their original pure state. In life there are positive emotions to express and negative emotions that need to be managed, in hridayakash all emotions are considered and can be expressed equally. And you can see there’s a certain kind of freedom in this.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Finally, back to where we started this digression, this can only happen with a clear and accurate connection with hridayakash, not with the lower expression of emotions in daily life, which are not consistent and give inconsistent and inaccurate readings.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Heart at the highest level</span></b></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">5 There is one more where Heart is used at the highest level (better with a capital 'H'). Here Heart is the place or space where all mundane qualities are left behind, where there is no division, or uncertainty of conflicting emotion. It is still, at peace, at rest - the kind you'd never want to disturb. It is also represented in hridayakash, at the very centre, beyond the emotions that surround it. It is present in every one of us and it can be visualised as a beautiful transcendental golden flame. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Summary</span></b></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So exploring hridayakash loosens the somewhat tyrannical control of the mind, takes us nearer to how we more accurately perceive ourselves, gives a measured expression to lost or suppressed emotions, as well as providing a way to see beyond this transitory nature through the medium of that most personal of all experience, the field of emotion. In the meditation courses this practice is just the introduction to others that explore the heart space more fully. Hridayakash is worth getting into, it's <i>very</i> near to your self.</span></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-39551359719585806292017-01-14T23:11:00.000+11:002017-01-16T20:45:57.624+11:00The Carpentry of Meditation<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Meditation will only really work if you take the long-term view</i><br> </span><br>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Suppose a carpenter is to hammer in a nail. Consider these three elements: the intention - to hammer in the nail - requiring focus and awareness; the tool or tools of the job - the right size nail and hammer; and the carpenter to hammer in the nail, presumably you in this case. So these three: Intention, Tools, and the Carpenter. Of these three easily the most important is the carpenter. Without the carpenter there is no intention, and then the tools also remain inactive without the carpenter to handle them. But how often, for example, does the carpenter underestimate the intention, or more to the point think too much about the tools and not enough about the skill of the carpenter?</span><br>
</div></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2017/01/the-carpentry-of-meditation.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-3137925705041613582016-09-28T18:18:00.000+10:002016-09-28T18:18:05.156+10:00Most of Our Thoughts are Out of Date<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Our thoughts and reactions to what happens in day to day life, in the present, are mostly a product of what has gone before. Discover why that happens and you get to transform the way you see yourself.</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Imagine the milk shelf in a well run supermarket. All the milk containers have a use-by date on them. The milk is on sale until the use-by date and then any containers remaining on the shelf are removed and thrown out and the shelf is restocked. The milk on sale is aways fresh. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Now if things don’t work so efficiently, instead of the old containers being removed they get pushed to the back of the shelf to make way for the new stock. After some time the milk which is old and now out of sight goes off and begins to smell. And if something isn’t done to rectify it the smell of the old milk informs the new milk with the same impression of being off to a passing buyer. To them new milk is the same as old. Better shop elsewhere!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"></span></div></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2016/09/most-of-our-thoughts-are-out-of-date.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-8259961645632468272016-05-29T11:21:00.000+10:002016-05-29T12:05:21.163+10:00Is Thought an Illusion? <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">How <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">much <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">of <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">what <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">our <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">mind <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">tells <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">us <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">is <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">accurate? </span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></i><br>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One day in 1978 before I left UK for good I was visiting a friend who I respected very much. He was the first person I'd met who’d actually spent some time following a spiritual path. He seemed very wise. On the shelf in his room he had a picture of a very kindly face. One day I picked it up and asked who is this. He told me Ramana Maharishi. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I didn't think much more about it until some time later when, after a few quick decisions, I had arranged to go traveling with some friends in India. When I told my wise friend about this he just laughed and said, "You… in India?" Of course I found out later what he meant by that little laugh. But he said, "…if you're going to India then you have to visit…" and he gave me the address of Ramana Ashram in Tiruvannamalai in southern India.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is how I was introduced to the teachings of Ramana Maharshi. I spent some time in the ashram, in southern India. I didn't really understand anything very much at all but someone inside seemed to be listening and absorbing. And as it turned out from then on my life changed and seemed to take a course of its own.</span></div>
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<h3 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></h3></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2016/05/all-thought-is-illusion-isnt-it.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-68868821935368244412016-04-19T07:49:00.000+10:002016-04-24T21:14:26.465+10:00Watching Duality at Play<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">To understand more about oneself through self-observation it helps to have something in particular to focus on. </i><br>
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">There's a lot here so go slowly. It starts with the basics then gets interesting later on. </i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><br></i></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Every moment in life is a play between dualistic forces, and the dualistic nature is why what we experience is always changing. Even when <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">things</span> seem to <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">stay</span> the same for some time, there is always momentum, and where there’s momentum there’s always potential for change.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><br></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><b>Prana</b> - vital energy; life force</i></span></div>
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><b>Nadis</b> - channels in which the pranic energy flows, primarily in:</i></div>
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><b>Pingala</b> - one half of the duality of personal prana: positive polarity, masculine, hot, solar force. Relates to extroversion, action, linear thought. In the right side of the body-mind</i></div>
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><b>Ida</b> - the other half of the duality of personal prana: negative polarity, feminine, cold, lunar force. Relates to introversion, concept, holistic thought. In left side of the body-mind</i></div>
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><b>Sushumna</b> - the so called spiritual force, transcending ida and pingala, through which kundalini passes when ida and pingala are balanced and harmonised.</i></div>
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><b>Samskaras</b> - Impressions from experience stored up in memory. They have energy, and a strong influence, often unrecognised, on character and personality.</i><br>
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<h3>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Prana - the life force</b></span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"> </i></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">All creation, all life, is multiplicity, seeming many forms. In the yogic view, multiplicity is considered to be the outcome of the play of duality - a po<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">tential for</span> infinite outcomes between two polar opposites.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">To understand better the underlying presence of duality, you can look more closely at a well recognised dynamic in yoga. It relates to prana, the life force, and the energy cycles in the mind-body. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There are two active forces that influence both the body and mind, which are known as ida and pingala. The way we experience everything in life has something to do with the outcome of the interplay between these two forces in the personal energy field. So experientially, they are very much a part of us, part of our life, all the time.</span></div>
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<h3 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></h3></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2016/04/watching-duality-at-play.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-2216745824727953862016-03-15T11:05:00.000+11:002017-11-23T10:15:49.889+11:00Take a Walk on the Dark Side <div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<h4 style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Put a little light on it</span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">'Think positively. Be positive.' What’s that mean? What’s positive? What’s not? To start with, to think positive there has to be the concept of a negative. You can’t have a positive without its dark side, the negative. So what is negative? And are these absolute values where if you <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">call it</span> a positive or a negative just once will it always be so, in any circumstance? Then faced with this Either / Or situation, can you take a negative and turn it into a positive by thinking its opposite? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br></span></div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">To think positive there has to be an acceptance of a negative. Simply to 'think' positive is useless, in fact worse than useless, it’s self-deluding because, for the appearance of a short-term gain, it will only exacerbate the problem in the long run by giving the illusion of change when the nature of the problem has not been identified let alone addressed. Of course changing a negative quality by the cultivation of a positive quality can be done, but only if the nature of the negative has been identified in some way and then properly addressed. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This may not be so easy as it sounds. To begin with there can be a real reluctance for us to be willing to go there, to actively turn and look into what we would rather not know <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">about </span>too deeply. And even if willing, when facing up to it, it may not go the way we want or expect. So wouldn’t it be much easier to let these things hide out, slide by, lurk at one remove, so we can continue to convince ourselves of what we’d prefer to believe? Yet at the same time there we are still searching for this elusive positive, which, when it comes down to it, will also continue to hold its distance in exactly the same proportion as the negative we have not yet acknowledged. Or, alternatively, we can decide, turn, and go directly and look <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">into</span> our own negative… and take a walk on the dark side.</span><br>
</div></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2016/03/take-walk-on-dark-side.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-34886963279207534832016-02-15T11:12:00.001+11:002020-04-29T10:07:18.507+10:00So What Is Self Inquiry?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"><i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">J</span>ust</span> for a moment suppose that everything you think about yourself is inaccurate. </i></b><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><br /></i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If you note that it’s not about what you think, but what you think about yourself, then it’s not so strange as it sounds at first. <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Even so</span> we are so used to accepting or just not questioning that everything we think about ourselves is accurate… <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">u</span>ntil, that is, someone, or events, or circumstances show that what we had <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">previously</span> accepted to be true irrefutably </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">just ain’t so. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">How we react at<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> just such moments </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">is</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> an indication</span> of<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> our actual interest in</span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">go</span>ing further into self inquiry. Because honestly it’s very tempting either to deny it, to ourself, <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">to</span> anyone, shove it to one side; or go on to the next paradigm and take that to be irrefutabl<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">y so</span> until there is another paradigm shift and the thing has to be reviewed, reluctantly, again, </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">because we know change will come</span>. In <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">any</span> case here we are </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">w</span>aiting for the unexpected to happen and, when it comes, </span>impelled from a passive state into a reaction<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> and handling it</span> as best we can.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What is the mind qualified for?</span></h3>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We’re talking about the most fundamental question in life: Who am I? One that we are trying to answer in some way every day of our life. But, maybe without ever consciously ask<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ing</span> the question directly. <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And to be clear, w</span>e are not talking about all our acquired knowledge<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> of</span> the world or the skills we acquire to deal with it. All of that, the whole compass of it, is exactly what the mind is supposed to be used for, as an instrument, as a tool<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> toward <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">a</span> chosen purpose.<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span></span></span></span></span> </span></div>
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<h3 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What the mind is not qualified for</span></h3>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It’s like a computer, where skills and knowledge are the software which is installed or downloaded in order to run a program<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, or </span>achieve a particular end or aim. And that knowledge and those skills go on evolving irrespective of any deeper existential question. <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But t</span>he mind as we know it, that instrument of knowledge and skill, is not sufficient in itself to understand the motivating force that drives our aims and desires. Can a computer understand its own motivations and actions, the why of it all?</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So</span> outsid<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">e</span> all of that there still remains</span> the fundamenta<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">l quest<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ion<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">,</span> what is that pu<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">rpose<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">?</span></span></span></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Sorting out the difference</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And this is where we get into trouble because, without really looking into it or without really understanding what’s at stake, the mind will begin to speculate where it has no real jurisdiction. Well, speculation is one thing, but we tend to believe <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">what the mind </span>tells us… until we don’t. And that’s the point where we came in. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Isn’t it true that we are all looking for the source of our own happiness? If I think that happiness is acquiring and profligating large sums of money, then if I put my knowledge and skills into action to achieve that, then I will be happy. The same is true of artistic ability in pursuit of fame, or just the pursuit of fame itself; or sexual conquest; or more honourable pursuits like a career or family; or even the celebration of suffering as a means to an ulterior motive; and so on. But remember it’s the mind that is telling us what makes us happy, and so, drives us into action.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Now life, as they say, is brief, but it takes long enough to live. And during that time having achieved or partially achieved any aim or goal in the pursuit of happiness, we may come gradually to discover - through someone or events or circumstances - that something we had always accepted to be <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">so</span> is shown irrefutably to be just not <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">like that</span>; that happiness no longer lies where we thought it did. So we reassess, and now, I used to be like that but now I’m into this… and another attempt to find irrefutable happiness<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So returning to the original premise, if we accept that though the mind is highly qualified in dealing with knowledge and skill, it is not qualified to answer the questions that lie behind the motivating force in life. Is it then so strange to say, Hey wait a moment, suppose in that one specialised field - who am I, what am I here for, with what purpose, what is really my unqualified aim? - just suppose for a moment that everything I’ve ever thought about<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span>in that way could be wrong, or inaccurate, or not-thought-through, or wait a minute, I never thought about it before anyway, or… fergedaboudit! But before you do say, forget it, check this out from a previous post which slots right in here so no apologies for including it again:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A salutary tale</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A team of road builders set off to build a road between two places in the forest. They were an elite group and each of the men brought a particular skill which was respected by the others. Their morale was high and there was a tightly knit sense of comradeship. The clearing of the forest was under way and the road was begun. They worked hard and obstacles were overcome through good leadership and teamwork. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There was one among the men a young chap who didn’t seem to quite fit in. He didn’t join in the heavy social evenings when the day’s work was done. He always seemed to be thinking differently from the others and they didn’t understand him. The other men were friendly enough but as he continued holding himself aloof they began to look on him with less affection and soon were implying in their tone of voice things about his usefulness because he didn’t actually seem to be doing very much.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One day when the project was well under way the young fellow shinned up the tallest tree on the highest ground. When he came down he looked satisfied. There was a meeting of the managers and foremen going on when he got back and he boldly interrupted it, 'Wrong forest,' he said, 'we’re in the wrong forest, the road's in the wrong forest' </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There was a strange stillness for a moment and then everyone started going on just as if they hadn’t seen or heard the young fellow. He couldn’t understand it. Wasn’t this the single most important piece of information for the whole project? Finally he got to talk to one of the men who was a bit more friendly. 'What’s happening? You know we’re building the road in the wrong forest?' 'Yes,' the other man replied, 'but it's a really good road.' So they went on building the road just as before.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So what is self inquiry?</span></h3>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So what is self inquiry? It means wanting to get some kind of perspective on the whole life, so you can come out of it at the other end and say yes, I pursued what I knew I was searching for, as accurately as I could, and to the best of my ability. This is not some unfashionable moral twe<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">et</span>, but a way of accurately aligning the ability with the vision. Not building a really good road in the wrong forest.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It really gets under way practically when you become pro-active in looking into the mind’s presumptions as deeply and as accurately as <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">possible</span> - you want to find the inaccuracies and be glad of it when you find them, instead of just waiting for events or the turmoil of life to compel confrontation with uncomfortable truths - which they do sooner or later. It means celebrating (in some small unembarrassing personal way of course) when something reveals that something in your own philosophy is inaccurate and you can throw it out and move on up to a higher understanding without hesitation or looking back. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We all have a philosophy, even though we may not call it that. And we may not recognise it very well (even if we do think we got one) because, whaddya know, it keeps on changing, according to mind, according to circumstance, and according to convenience. So, really, no philosophy? And the measure of an accurate philosophy? What is true, what holds good, in any circumstance. This is where self enquiry begins. Because everything that follows after is predicated on that one thing<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> - what remains accurate in any ci<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">rcumstance.</span></span> So the question I ask myself is, How can you know that you know this, that you are not what you think you are, and not want to do something about it. Build a really good road... but in the right forest.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And in the end…</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The illusory power of the mind is fascinating. In meditation just try questioning the validity of any thought you like. Hold it up to the light and acknowledge it, observe it. It’s real enough, yes, but how real? Really real? Will it be there in the same way tomorrow, a week, a year, twenty years? Does that change the way you observe it? C<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">h</span>eck a<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ny<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">thing you <i>really</i> believed in <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">when you were younger and see if it's still the same. </span></span></span>Can the temporary nature of any thought define who I am? Among so many other thoughts? Really? Question who is having these thoughts.<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So w</span>here then does<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> the</span> identity li<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">e<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">? </span></span></span></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Thoughts<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, impressions <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">and memories are in you but they <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">do not ultimately define</span> w<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ho</span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">you are</span>.</span></span></span></span></span></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-59549401176361944122015-12-30T22:29:00.000+11:002016-04-22T08:58:35.492+10:00Blink and You Miss It<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>The </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>inner </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">world<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">may</span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">seem <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">quite separate <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">from <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">normal <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">life, </span></span>but <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">it <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">is interacting<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">and<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> being <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">influenced <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">by it</span></span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">all <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">the <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">time. <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">question <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">is <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">how <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">much <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">do <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">we <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">know <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">what <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">is <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">going <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">on</span></span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">there.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></i> </span></span></span></span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There is</span> a kind of threshold of attention. Below it <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">most </span>things go unnoticed, unobserved, and <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">therefore, as <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">we <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">perceive <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">it,</span></span></span></span></span> it doesn't <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">actually</span> appear to happen<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. O</span>r we dismiss it unconsciously, thinking something like, that’s not really me. <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But g</span>o above the threshold and suddenly it becomes an <i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">i</span>ssue</i>, grabbing all your attention.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">T</span>here are signals going on all the time, in sensations in the body, in the mind and feelings, as well as outside from others, but which fall below the attention threshold. Either we do not notice them at all, or we phase them out because they are<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span>considered to be either too trivial or too much to manage<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">.<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> O</span></span>r we do notice them, misinterpret them, the mind starts working them over, and we end up in trouble. In any case the result is the same - we go on accumulating those little experiences as memories leaving impressions as samskaras, little time-bombs in the mind.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What is happening in the present moment?</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Somebody says something to <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">you <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">which <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">you <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">don't quite like</span></span></span></span>. <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It </span>creates a subliminal reaction. Do you notice your slight change in posture, the slight change of expression, the one eighth of a degree change inside? That moment - when we usually blink and miss it - is <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">catc<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">h</span></span>ing <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">it</span> in the present moment. And then being inwardly still, not reacting, remaining the observer. The aim is to catch it then, because it may be quite different from what becomes rationalized a moment later, <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">when <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">the <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">first <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">perception </span></span></span></span>gets dismissed out of hand and <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">trivialises </span>it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What you find in practice when you observe closely is that while it looks like you're moving in one direction the momentum may actually <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">be moving</span> in a different direction. (That's a bit cryptic but it is concisely accurate.) What also puts people off is that the intensity of experience increases at first - well it will if you pay more attention to it - but that intensity <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">observed by</span> the stillness of awareness takes you to the nucleus and then reveals stuff you had no idea of before. And when revealed, untouched so to speak, it <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">has</span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">n</span>o <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">f</span>urther <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">i</span>nfluence.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">That all begins with catching it in the present moment. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Keep in mind that <i>nothing</i> is trivial <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">to the</span> o<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">bserv<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">er</span>, to the awareness. E<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">verything is <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">seen equally. Because the smallest <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">change </span></span></span></span></span>is an indicator<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, </span>the beginning of further changes <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">t</span>hat we do not yet know of. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Miss it and it’s gone.<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> And then </span></span></span>everything just seems to remain<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span>at the <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">same </span>level of normal perception. And then we may even ask why nothing ever seems to change.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Choose the direction, choose the Intensity</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">As you go deeper into the inner world and the quieter you can remain, you can actually hunt the stuff down - choose the direction, choose the Intensity<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> - t</span>hat's <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">called</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> self inquiry.</span> Then even if you do notice it well and <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">become </span>a keen investigator, the mind may still not know well enough how to leave alone. It's a very personal skill. You practice at it, continually, for a long time. It’s all related to the present moment; and there's no judgment there. The observation of the mind in this context is a meditation in itself, the essential one that is often overlooked. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Trust for an instant in the absolute certainty of consciousness, a force or presence within as real as can be, as the underlying <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">substratum, <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">your <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">true <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">self</span> - <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ever <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">present, <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">quite <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">still, <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">at <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">peace, <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">and <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">totally <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">untouched <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">and <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">unaffected <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">by <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">anything <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">it observes</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span>. Why not? You can at least suppose for a moment. <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It</span> changes everything. <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span>Then you need not mind <i>anything </i> the mind brings to notice, however it may originate. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">How we see is how we ex<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">perience. </span></span>And that’s the way out. Just be patient… and observe... just observe. Watch and wait… watch and wait…</span></div>
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Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-66760402445886865312015-12-11T19:18:00.000+11:002018-03-18T15:09:01.921+11:00Life's First Impression<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>Are we a<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> blank slate, a<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">n empty space</span>,</span> when we come into life? Or are there tendencies and inclinations that come in with us? Either way what is th<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">at</span> fi<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">r</span>st i<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">mp</span>ression when the curtain goes up and we make our entr<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">anc<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">e</span></span>?</span></i> </span><br>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In 1979 I was travelling in Sri Lanka taking the first steps on a long search. I ended up staying in a vipassana retreat centre for two weeks. It was very austere. There was total silence and no eye contact with anyone. Male and female were divided, of course; we had a small cell each about 8' x 6'; the bed was just a concrete step, with no mattress or pillow. The day started at 4 o'clock with a hot drink; there were two meals a day, breakfast and lunch, which were completed before midday, then no food until the next morning. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The whole day was taken up with meditation. The actual practice, to begin with was breath awareness. Just watch the breath, that's all, all the time. Lose breath awareness, when you know you've lost it, return to breath awareness. Repeat. Continue.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There were four scheduled sittings of one-hour each; the rest of the time was either for private meditation in your cell, or walking meditation around the veranda to relieve the body of sitting. The walking was done very slowly, eyes down, with full awareness of movement, and we were not supposed even to look up at the sky or the surrounding countryside.</span></div>
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</div></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2015/12/do-you-know-very-first-impressions-of.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-21859300368464716552015-11-12T21:50:00.000+11:002016-04-22T10:05:37.928+10:00Meditation and the Beatles<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If meditation seems to be the cause of difficulty, it is also the solution</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>A historical example</i></span></h3>
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<span style="text-align: justify;">I</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;"> grew up with the Beatles, literally. I was 11 when it started, and 19 when it was all over. They were the sound track of the times, the Sixties. It’s impossible to summarise here the changes that took place, but it has all been well documented. What we are interested in is the shift in consciousness that took place then. Because that was what lead to all the accompanying psychological, social, political and spiritual changes. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">In the West, there was a spiritual <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">vacuum</span>. Christianity was in decline as the all-embracing spiritual guideline it had been until then. And until that time there was no 'Eastern' philosophy, no yoga or meditation, no ashrams. And no understanding of energy, ecology, conservation or karma, etc. All that rushed in to fill the vacuum. Of course that didn’t make everything all right, but it was an optimistic time and change was in the air, so it seemed that way at first. No-one realised yet that it was going to take earnestness, application and consistency to get meaningful results.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">The Beatles did not create this change of course. They understood that, even as they knew they were a measure of it. They rode the crest of the wave of the time, reflected it and gave it a voice and a soundtrack. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">The Beatles as spiritual seekers</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">And, they were spiritual seekers. If it had a basis in a shift of consciousness, they were also in some measure a catalyst for it too. Their music reflected this - and because at first they were beginners, the same as everyone else - they were edging their way toward it and what they were saying was almost universally acceptable… at first…</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">Then they got serious about it. And they followed their spiritual path in the public eye, and took it seriously enough eventually to find and follow a spiritual master and then go to an ashram in I<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ndia </span>for a time of sadhana, meditation practice, and retreat. And by all accounts they did a lot of meditation practice for an extended period of time. Anyone who has ever done anything like that - a week, a month or more - will tell you this is not trivial stuff. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">And it divided opinion; it still does. At the time many commentators were in shock over this strange behaviour - the meditation shit and gurus and ashrams. Beatles had lost their marbles. And many later historical commentators still take a similar view in that it was the main blot on their unblemished record as 'artists', their later falling out notwithstanding. </span></div>
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</div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2015/11/meditation-and-beatles.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-61547382919529853272015-10-03T09:12:00.000+10:002020-04-29T10:33:22.520+10:00About Priorities in Life<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-style: italic;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There is always time for what you really want to do</span></span></span><i>. </i></span><br>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">God made the world in six days. On the seventh day he and the guys were hanging out congratulating themselves on a job well done – they had a sign up: Mission Accomplished! They were reminiscing about some of the cool moves - mountains, rivers, the seas, the oceans. And then, coolest of all, the people - a work of art, in his own image. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Some way into the proceedings one of the girls looked up at God at the head of the table and said, 'So, what’s it all for?' 'What do you mean, what’s it all for, it’s great,' said God. 'Yeah I know, but I mean, what's the point? Why bother? Everything was stable, in equilibrium when it was unmanifest, so why shake the balance?' God started to think about this and after some time he said, 'Yes, that’s a good point, there has to be a purpose. If there's going to be choice in the world then there has to be something that motivates a good choice from a bad one.' </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So a silence followed while all the guys started thinking what could be the purpose. Well, pretty soon they realised what was needed was a search for something, a trial, a quest - something like the holy grail or the golden fleece - and the prize would be the Ultimate Truth, the meaning of it all. Okay that much was clear. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Next they began to think where to hide it. Now this exercised them a bit more. There were suggestions like the bottom of the deepest ocean, the top of the highest mountain, the middle of the hottest desert, Antarctica, and so on. But God dismissed all suggestions. 'Too easy,' he said. 'I mean we gave these guys an adventurous spirit and they’ll soon get to all these places. No, it has to be somewhere they’ll never think of.' </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When another longer silence had fallen on the group, one of the older boys, a gnarled old fellow who hadn’t participated much in the general discussion, made his way round to God's side and started speaking in his ear. As he did so God began to smile. 'Yes,' he said, 'I think you got it. I know where to hide it'. The old boy at his side was sniggering away, hardly able to contain himself. 'Okay, I’ll tell them,' God said, 'We’ll hide it in every single heart. They’ll never think of looking for it there. Because, if they do, they’ll think it can't possibly be the real thing if everyone can have a go at it.'</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">You are pure consciousness - oh yeah?</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There is absolutely nothing preventing anybody from having a direct experience of the Truth. Of course, as a general principle we may well accept this, but why then is it so difficult? </span></div>
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</div></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2015/10/get-your-priorities-straight.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-15849480551252632022015-09-01T11:06:00.000+10:002015-09-03T08:15:15.350+10:00Changing the Inner Dialogue<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">There was once a wise man. He had been visiting for some time the city of Asyufindit. In his time there he had seen everything and observed it all impartially, but knowingly. One day the wise man left the city. He was a traveller by nature, and by travelling he met many people and learned many things. When he had been going for some time he met a traveller coming in the other direction. They stopped and chatted a while as travellers do. 'Tell me,' the traveller said, 'I have heard many things about Asyufindit'. 'What have you heard?' the wise man asked. 'Oh I’ve heard it’s a wonderful place. That the people are welcoming and friendly, that business is honest, play is joyful and sport is fair.' </span><div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">The wise man was watching the other man carefully but discreetly for a few moments. 'Yes that is true,' he said, 'you will enjoy your time there very much. And if you decide to settle there I’m sure you will be very happy.' The traveller was very pleased to hear this and smiled happily. 'Here, let me offer you some food, I’m sure you must be hungry. I was fortunate enough to be given a package of food in the last village.' 'Yes I’m not surprised,' the wise man said somewhat enigmatically. They shared the lunch, and, both well-fed, they said their goodbyes and went their respective ways.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Further on down the road, the next day, the wise man met another traveller coming in the other direction. They stopped and greeted one another. 'Tell me,' the traveller said, 'I have heard many things about Asyufindit'. 'What have you heard?' the wise man asked. 'Well I’ve heard that the people are not very friendly. In fact you can’t trust anyone and you have to take great care, particularly if you do any business, they’ll rob you blind. And as for…' </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And while the traveller was talking the wise man looked him over carefully, and when he had finished speaking, the wise man said, 'Yes what you say is true. You will find the people unfriendly and you will have quite some difficulty in having honest dealings with anyone.' The traveller was actually gratified to hear this, just as he’d heard, he thought, and being forewarned is forearmed too. Just then the wise man said he was hungry and asked if he had a little food he could spare. The traveller said he was afraid he had just enough for himself and could not spare any. The wise man said he understood completely. And so they parted and went their opposite ways. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;"></span></div></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2015/09/changing-inner-dialogue.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-82504292610920509772015-05-14T22:21:00.000+10:002017-10-18T16:49:25.795+11:00Taking out the Trash - A Way to Forgiveness<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">For three months earlier this year I was in southern India effectively living in solitude. Meaning that I did not talk to anyone except for the essentials of maintenance. For many days I would hardly see anyone nor speak when I did. It becomes a state of mind eventually. Within that I was practising my meditation every day. I’d practise between maybe two and four hours each day. I did not have a specific routine because I discovered the enormous benefit of solitude. That is the feeling, knowledge, experience of continuity that went on unbroken all the time. So I sat when I felt like it, which was usually three to five times a day.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I might be working on a project from time to time, but in the background, unbroken and undisturbed by the activity, was the awareness of a thread that ran from one meditation sitting to the next. That tended to level out expectation and increase faith in an ongoing process that was looking after itself, if only I did not disturb it. Sometimes I would wait before sitting because I could feel something coalescing and I would have a notion of what direction the next sitting would take and let it take clearer form - because awareness is intelligent, in a different way from my intelligence. Watching for the direction is not the same as expectation, but expectation can be mistaken for awareness. Think about that.</span></div>
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</div></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2015/05/taking-out-trash.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-43217728546978216932015-04-26T22:12:00.000+10:002015-04-26T22:12:32.951+10:00When the Past is Too Much in the Present<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Meditation has always been about self-knowledge, not self improvement. It’s as well to understand this because in the end meditation will come down to self-knowledge, and as the mind opens up that can come as a bit of a surprise if not prepared for it. But paradoxically if meditation is practised with self-knowledge as the purpose, then self-improvement automatically follows. Whereas if self-improvement is pursued for its own sake, that does happen but not so easily or spontaneously. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">It's like if you have to climb a mountain, but to get to the mountain first you have to get over a hill. The hill is no obstacle because the mind is set on the challenge of the mountain. Whereas if the aim is only to climb the hill, the mind has a different attitude. The hill becomes a greater challenge than if it were just something to handle on the way. While being realistic, the higher the goal the greater the personal achievement. And there is no limitation on anyone anywhere being able to discover more about themselves and benefitting immensely from that. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">To know ourselves more deeply, to understand ourselves more fully, we have to turn away for some time from the world out there and find a way into the complete, infinite and mysterious world within. That inner world is with us all the time but we just don’t seem to pay that much attention to it and, even if we want to go there, we may not know how to do it. There are four conditions for successful and satisfying meditation experience: voluntarily detaching from the magnetism of the active outer life for some time; knowing how to turn inward; knowing what to do when you get there; and facing up to it as you begin to discover yourself more and more.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"></span></div></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2015/04/when-past-is-too-much-in-present.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1817754703442049170.post-40091334660370179372015-01-26T22:34:00.000+11:002016-06-20T19:00:36.646+10:00Releasing Samskaras - it gets Worse before it gets Better<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Samskaras:</b> Impressions from experience stored up in memory. They have energy, and influence character and personality. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Although usually considered to be positive or negative, really they are neutral. </span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If we observe closely we will notice that the actual moment of recognition of inner change occurs in an instant. It is like the blink of an eye. One moment we are seeing something in the usual way, the next, in a blink, there has been a change, perception has shifted or altered. Of course because it happens so quickly we may miss it, but that’s another matter.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It’s like a bubble rising from the bottom of a deep lake. There may be some time between the moment of release at the bottom <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">and</span> the moment it arrives at the surface, but when it breaks through at the surface it happens in a moment. In the same way what has been 'bubbling under' in the mind for some time breaks through from the unconscious to the surface of the mind in an instant.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Even when something appears to dawn on us gradually, if we could slow down time we would find that this gradual recognition is a series of instant moments one after another that add up to what we later call recognition.</span></div>
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</div></div><a href="https://powerofawareness108.blogspot.com/2015/01/releasing-samskaras-it-gets-worse.html#more">Read more »</a>Power of Awarenesshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07324327690898384215noreply@blogger.com1