tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-89401236826602824742024-02-07T22:35:53.764-08:00. . . tran.ZEN.dance . . .A forum for seekers of spiritual awakening through self-transcendence, irrespective of spiritual tradition, religious or non-religious background or affiliation.
.... Our goal is to walk with true spiritual seekers, and to provide encouragement along the path as these modern spiritual pilgrims quest for the holy modern grail --- a new state of consciousness and being ....Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.comBlogger143125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-88855005872693972372012-10-09T12:57:00.001-07:002012-10-09T12:57:57.931-07:00Self . . . An 'Imaginary Center' as the 'Cause of Suffering'<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="color: blue;">"As LONG AS (one's subjective 'self') is
centered in a phenomenal object, and thinks and speaks therefrom,
(one's) subject is identified with that object and is bound."</span><br />
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<span style="color: blue;">"As long as such condition (applies), the
identified subject can never be free—for freedom is liberation from that
identification."</span><br />
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<span style="color: blue;">"Abandonment of a phenomenal centre
constitutes the only 'practice', and such abandonment is not an act
volitionally performed by the identified subject, but a non-action (<i>wu
wei</i>) leaving the noumenal centre in control of phenomenal activity, and
free from fictitious interference by an imaginary 'self'."</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: blue;">"Are you still thinking, looking, living, as
from an imaginary phenomenal center? As long as you do that you can
never recognize your freedom."</span><br />
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<span style="color: blue;">Preface to "<a href="http://ebookbrowse.com/open-secret-wei-wu-wei-pdf-d94471853" target="_blank"><i><u>Open Secre</u>t</i></a>" by Wei Wu Wei </span></div>
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<b>self</b> / <i>n., adj. & verb</i> (<i>pl</i>. selves) <b>1</b> a person's or thing's own individuality or essence (<i>showed his true self</i>). <b>2 </b>a person or thing as the object of introspection or reflexive action (<i>the consciousness of self</i>). . . . <br />
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<b>ego </b>/ <i>n.</i> (<i>pl</i>. -os) <b>1</b> <i>Metaphysics</i> a conscious thinking subject. <b>2</b> <i>Psychology</i> the part of the mind that reacts to reality and has a sense of individuality. . . .<br />
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[Source: <i>Concise Oxford English Dictionary</i>.]</div>
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"<i>(An) event</i>," Wei Wu Wei points out, "<i>only occurs in <a href="http://spiritualblissblog.blogspot.ca/2011/03/beyond-perceptions-and-conceptions-to.html" target="_blank">the mind of the perceiver</a> of it, singular or plural as the case may be, and no event
could be anything but a memory when we know it. No event is anything but
a psychic experience. Events, or memories of events, are
objectivizations in consciousness.</i>"<br />
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Our lives, our histories - personal and collective - the "<i>who</i>" we identify as, are manifestations of consciousness. Indeed, as many physicists point out, at the most basic level, the entire universe must be manifested (or "<i>real</i>-ized") through an act of conscious observation, through an observing consciousness. Some, like the late David Bohm, might agree with Gary Zhukav's conclusion that "modern physics has become the study of <a href="http://spiritualblissblog.blogspot.ca/2011/02/all-is-one-where-physics-and-psychology.html" target="_blank">the structure of consciousness</a>."<br />
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Buddhist teacher, <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.ca/2012/04/buddha-nature-empty-cognizant-capacity.html" target="_blank">Tulke Urgyen Rinpoche</a>, would say that 'reality' ("<i>as it is</i>") - including the basic nature of a realized Buddha and that of ordinary sentient beings - is a fundamental and complete emptiness unified irrevocably with an infinite ability to 'cognize.' I suspect he would agree that the 'events' of our lives, and our 'memories' of those events, "are objectivizations in consciousness," albeit objectivizations that are misperceived because we are unskillful in realizing the unity of our empty and infinitely cognizant nature.<br />
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One must ask, given the 'misperceptions' of our own individual and collective group consciousness, just how functional we are as many billions of individualized 'selves.' How well does an overwhelmingly narcissistic, post-modern dualistic perspective work for us?<br />
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It is important, I feel, to realize just how much unnecessary mayhem, harm and suffering this misperception of separate individuality perpetuates <a href="http://spiritualnotreligious.blogspot.ca/2012/09/we-must-lower-our-egos-for-sake-of-one.html" target="_blank">if we are ever going to make the necessary efforts</a> to be free of 'self.'<br />
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"(I)t becomes obvious," writes spiritual teacher, Eckhart Tolle, "that the human ego in its collective aspect as 'us' against 'them' is even more insane than the 'me,' the individual ego, although the mechanism is the same. By far the greater part of the violence that humans have inflicted on each other is not the work of criminals or the mentally deranged, but of normal respectable citizens in the service of the collective ego. One can go as far as to say that <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.ca/2011/07/evolution-of-consciousness-global.html" target="_blank">on this planet 'normal' equals insane</a>. What is it that lies at the root of this insanity? Complete identification with thought and emotion, that is to say, ego."<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQnxNtmQTenGDbhrbYfmca4uGdYKsTkfgj6GvS-Fxm56mfRxopd-iu7SBxWgaecn31CuD9mLgppCVGfyN3ZJmvdj5WZ7M4w1dvF18wUKh3cLxSM5V1U1VzICBCJN4Z6UK5uGS1uxZuPJrk/s1600/tolle.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQnxNtmQTenGDbhrbYfmca4uGdYKsTkfgj6GvS-Fxm56mfRxopd-iu7SBxWgaecn31CuD9mLgppCVGfyN3ZJmvdj5WZ7M4w1dvF18wUKh3cLxSM5V1U1VzICBCJN4Z6UK5uGS1uxZuPJrk/s200/tolle.png" width="172" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.eckharttolle.com/" target="_blank">Eckhart Tolle</a>, best-selling author of<br />"<i>The Power of Now</i>" and "<i>A New Earth</i>."</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
"Greed, selfishness, exploitation, cruelty, and violence are still all-pervasive on this planet," Tolle observes. "When you don't recognize them as individual and collective manifestations of an underlyin dysfunction or mental illness, you fall into the error of personalixing them. You construct a conceptual identity for an individual or group and you say: 'This is who he is. This is who they are.'"<br />
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"All this," he notes, "is enormously satisfying to the ego. It strengthens the sense of separation between yourself and the other, whose 'otherness' has become manifested to such an extent that you can no longer feel your common humanity, not the rootedness in the one Life that you share with each human being, your common divinity."<br /><br />And, he points out: "Fighting (such) unconsciousness will (only) draw you into unconsciousness yourself. Unconscious, dysfunctional egoic behavior can never be defeated by attacking it. Even if you defeat your opponent, the unconsciousness will simply have moved into you, or the opponent reappears in a new disguise. <i>Whatever you fight, you strengthen, and what you resist, persists</i>." (Emphasis added.)<br />
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<div style="text-align: right;">
<a href="http://spiritualnotreligious.blogspot.ca/2011/10/when-you-dont-cover-up-world-with-words.html" target="_blank">Eckhart Tolle</a>, <i>"A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose</i>," pp. 73-75</div>
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As Wei Wu Wei asks: ""Are you still thinking, looking, living, as
from an imaginary phenomenal center?" "As long as you do that," he points out, "you can
never recognize your freedom."</div>
Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-59566301104026473052012-04-26T15:19:00.000-07:002012-04-26T15:56:31.662-07:00Buddha Nature: Empty Cognizant Capacity<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The following is condensed from Tulke Urgyen Rinpoche's "<i>As It Is</i>," vol. II, chap. 1 ("<i>The Inheritance</i>"): </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgajfT1KvOuGSILQAbrV940drcNua3yVKNQ4VnBug4phmltvWVeqQha1cCIqTdpz7kIZO582Y7V5rlRtF69G4HVVoOwd0CylyImaoLyljtKTwxPfB1UO5NwkXqibrP4S5be_ovOw6CCmVtf/s1600/tulkeurgyen.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgajfT1KvOuGSILQAbrV940drcNua3yVKNQ4VnBug4phmltvWVeqQha1cCIqTdpz7kIZO582Y7V5rlRtF69G4HVVoOwd0CylyImaoLyljtKTwxPfB1UO5NwkXqibrP4S5be_ovOw6CCmVtf/s1600/tulkeurgyen.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulku_Urgyen_Rinpoche">Tulke Urgyen Rinpoche</a><br />
1920-1996</td></tr>
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"We think, we remember, we plan - and the attention thus exerted moves towards an object and sticks to it. This mental movement is called thinking or conceptual mind . . . extroverted consciousness unaware of its own nature. This ignorant mind grabs hold of objects, forms concepts about them, and gets involved and caught up in the concepts it has created about them. This is the nature of samsara, and it has been continuing through beginningless lifetimes up to the present moment. <br />
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This dualistic structure, together with the disturbing emotions and the karma that is produced through them, are the forces that drive us from one samsaric experience to another. <br />
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(O)ur natural state is the indivisible unity of emptiness and cognizance. We miss the recognition because our mind is always searching somewhere else. . . . Shantideva said:"Unless you know the secret key point, whatever you do will miss the mark." The secret key point of mind is that its nature is a self-existing, original wakefulness. To identify the key point we need to receive the pointing-out instruction, which tells and shows us that: "The nature of your mind is the buddha mind itself."<br />
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Even though our nature is primordially enlightened, we are oblivious to that fact. Therefore we need to become re-enlightened. First, we need to recognize; next, train in that recognition; and finally, attain stability. Once we are re-enlightened, we no longer need to wander in samsara."<br />
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. . .</div>
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"The buddha nature is the very identity within which the body, speech, mind, qualities and activities of all buddhas are complete. . . . Our speech became wrapped within the movement of breath to become voice and words. It appears and disappears. Consciousness began to hold a perceiver as separate from the perceived. In other words, it became a fixation on duality, a stop-and-start process that arises and ceases each moment. Thoughts come continuously, one after the other, like an endless string. This endless string of thought has continued from beginningless time and just goes on and on. . . . While we are governed by this involvement in thought, we are truly helpless.</div>
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. . . If we truly recognize buddha nature, in that very same moment, any thought will vanish by itself, leaving no trace. This is what brings an end to samsara. . . . Once you recognize your own natural face, you have already transcended the six realms of samsara. . . . Receiving teachings on how to recognize the essence of mind and correctly apply them is called 'the Buddha placed in the palm of your own hand.' That analogy means that at the moment of being introduced and recognizing, you don't have to search for the enlightened state anywhere else.<br />
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. . . </div>
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. . . Our buddha nature . . . is like a wish-fulfilling jewel. If we don't use this wish-fulfilling jewel, endless samsara lies before us. Isn't it just incredibly stupid to throw away our fortune - and troublesome too?<br />
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. . . </div>
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However, like Jamgon Kongtrul said:</div>
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<i>Although my mind is the Buddha, I don't recognize it.<br />Although my thinking is dharmakaya, I don't realize it.<br />Although nonfabrication is the innate, I fail to sustain it.<br />Although naturalness is the basic state, I am not convinced. </i></div>
</blockquote>
We need to understand what mind essentially is. . . . (I)n this world, mind is the most important, for the simple reason that it is the mind that understands and experiences. . . . In truth, there is nothing other than mind that experiences. . . . A sentient being is basically made out of nothing other than mind. Apart from the mind, no thing in this world experiences anything at all. <br />
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The mind essence of sentient beings and the awakened mind of the buddhas is the same. Buddhahood means to be totally stable in the state before dualistic thought occus. A sentient being like ourselves, not realizing our essence, gets caught up in our own thinking and becomes bewildered. Still, the essence of our mind and the very essence of all awakened buddhas is primordially the same. Sentient beings and buddhas have an identical source, the buddha nature<span style="color: blue;">.</span><br />
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<span style="color: blue;">Buddhas become enlightened because of realizing their essence. Sentient beings become confused because of not realizing their essence.</span><i style="color: blue;"> Thus there is one basis or ground, and two different paths.</i><span style="color: blue;"> </span><br />
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(Emphasis added.)</div>
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A buddha is someone who recognizes the essence itself, and is awakened through that. A sentient being is someone who doesn't, and who is confused by his or her own thinking. . . . Thinking takes place because of not seeing the essence of this mind itself. It thinks of something, makes thoughts and emotions about it - the process goes on and on . . . like beads on an endless string. This is called samsara.<br />
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It is the thinking that perpetuates samsara. Samsara will go on endlessly unless the thinking stops.<br />
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. . .</div>
(I)f in this life we don't attain realization by recognizing our own nature, we will continue again in some other state within samsara. If we recognize and realize our buddha nature, we can go upwards to enlightenment. If we are careless and ignore it, we don't have to try to go deeper into samsara - it happens automatically. Negative karma doesn't require much effort. the normal mind thinks mainly in terms of being against something, being attached to something and not caring about anything. This automatically creates negative karma, further perpetuating samsara.<br />
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True virtue, real goodness, is created through recognizing our buddha nature, our natural state. Recognizing our own nature is itself the path of enlightenment. Not recognizing buddha nature is itself the path of samsara. . . . The basis for these two is the same: it is buddha nature. There are two choices, two paths. One is the path of knowing, the wakefulness that knows its own nature. One is the path of unknowing, of not recognizing our own nature, and being caught up in what is being thought of, through the consciousness connecting with sense objects via the senses. This process continuously puts the wheel of samsara in motion. That is why the famous statement goes:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>To recognize is the path of nirvana;<br />Not to recognize is the path of samsara.</i></blockquote>
There is knowing. The mind of any sentient being is both empty and cognizant, and it is the cognizance that can recognize its own nature. In the very moment of recognizing, you see the empty essence.<br />
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Recognize your mind, and in the absence of any concrete thing, rest loosely. After a while we again get caught up in thoughts. But, by recognizing again and again, we grow more and more used to the natural state. . . . Through this process, our thought involvement grows weaker and weaker. The gap between thoughts begin to last longer and longer. At a certain point . . . there will be a stretch of no conceptual thought whatsoever, without having to suppress the thinking.<br />
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We need to train in slowly growing more and more used to the recognition of mind essence. This will dissolve our negative karma and disturbing emotions. In this recognition it is impossible to be tainted by karma and emotions, just like you cannot paint in mid-air.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i style="color: blue;">All sentient beings are buddhas,<br />But they are covered by temporary obscurations.</i></blockquote>
This temporary obscuration is our thinking. If we didn't already have the buddha nature, meaining a nature that is identical to that of all awakened ones, no matter how much we try we would never become enlightened.</div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-81806140231732888412011-10-31T08:58:00.000-07:002011-10-31T08:58:14.608-07:00Thich Nhat Hanh on 'The Five Precepts'<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimATEfrdq4IAj-KYl3TpdpC5CoGM2QUhZmN9TxvbglO51eVto9V5zaJV3hpJEZm7blCorY5CS42mYzcbbCKlDGexR4vwvzUAr3GbvIiqXseMe5ykG1kx2v8xQE0RceofuuGLzXoxAJOFPH/s1600/worldreligions3.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimATEfrdq4IAj-KYl3TpdpC5CoGM2QUhZmN9TxvbglO51eVto9V5zaJV3hpJEZm7blCorY5CS42mYzcbbCKlDGexR4vwvzUAr3GbvIiqXseMe5ykG1kx2v8xQE0RceofuuGLzXoxAJOFPH/s200/worldreligions3.png" width="165" /></a></div>One commentator observed that a fundamental difference between <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/06/syncretism-relevance-of-buddhism.html">Christianity and Buddhism</a> lies in the nature of their respective proscriptions. Christianity has the famous "<i>Thou Shalt Nots</i>" of the Ten Commandments, whereas Buddhism has the "<i>Refrain Froms</i>" or the "<i>Avoids</i>" of the Five Precepts that constitute Right Action. The defiant streak in human nature, the commentator pointed out, makes it tough for us to avoid the wrong actions covered by the Ten Commandments (or, at least, the milder of them). One might also point out that violation of the Ten Commandments can allegedly end one up in Hell, while it is through non-observance of the Five Precepts that we create a hell on Earth.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>One of the most comprehensive and astute renderings of the Five Precepts (avoid or refrain from killing, from taking what is not freely given, from sexual impropriety, from harmful speech, and from taking intoxicants) is set out in the following "Five Mindfulness Trainings" recommended by <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/09/thich-nhat-hahn-on-habit-and.html">Thich Nhat Hanh</a> in his helpful book "<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1573229377/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399369&creativeASIN=1573229377">Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames</a></i>," (Appendix B) pp. 209-212:<br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i> </i>"<i>The First Mindfulness Training:<br />
Reverence for Life</i></div><blockquote class="tr_bq"><div style="text-align: left;">Aware of the suffering caused by the destruction of life, I vow to cultivate compassion and learn ways to protect the lives of people, animals, plants, and minerals. I am determined not to kill, not to let others kill, and not to condone any act of killing in the world, in my thinking, or in my way of life.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The Second Mindfulness Training:<br />
Generosity</i> </div><blockquote class="tr_bq"><div style="text-align: left;">Aware of the suffering caused by exploitation, social injustice, stealing, and oppression, I vow to cultivate loving-kindness and learn ways to work for the well-being of people, animals, plants, and minerals. I vow to practice generosity by sharing my time, energy, and material resources with those who are in real need. I am determined not to steal and not to possess anything that should belong to others. I will respect the property of others, but I will prevent others from profiting from human suffering or the suffering of other species on earth.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The Third Mindfulness Training:<br />
Sexual Responsibility</i></div><blockquote class="tr_bq"><div style="text-align: left;">Aware of the suffering caused by sexual misconduct, I vow to cultivate responsibility and learn ways to protect the safety and integrity of individuals, couples, families,<i> </i>and society. I am determined not to engage in sexual relations without love and a long-term commitment. To preserve the happiness of myself and others, I am determined to respect my commitments and the commitments of others. I will do everything in my power to protect children from sexual abuse and to protect couples and families from being broken by sexual misconduct.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The Fourth Mindfulness Training:<br />
Deep Listening and Loving Speech</i></div><blockquote class="tr_bq"><div style="text-align: left;">Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful speech and the inability to listen to others, I vow to cultivate loving speech and deep listening in order to bring joy and happiness to others and relieve others of their suffering. Knowing that words can create happiness or suffering, I vow to learn to speak truthfully with words that inspire self-confidence, joy, and hope. I am determined not to spread news that I do not know to be certain and not to criticize or condemn things of which I am not sure. I will refrain from uttering words that can cause division or discord, or that can cause the family or the community to break. I will make all efforts to reconcile and resolve all conflicts, however small.</div></blockquote><div style="text-align: center;"><i>The Fifth Mindfulness Training:<br />
Mindful Consumption</i></div><blockquote class="tr_bq"><div style="text-align: left;"><i> </i>Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful consumption, I vow to cultivate good health, both physical and mental, for myself, my family, and my society by practicing mindful eating, drinking, and consuming. I vow to ingest only items that preserve peace, well-being, and joy in my body, in my consciousness, and in the collective body and consciousness of my family and society. I am determined not to use alcohol or any other intoxicant or to ingest food or other items that contain toxins, such as certain TV programs, magazines, books, films, and conversations. I am aware that to damage my body or my consciousness with these poisons is to betray my ancestors, my parents, my society, and future generations. I will work to transform violence, fear, anger, and confusion in myself and in society by practicing a diet for myself and for society. I understand that a proper diet is crucial for self-transformation and for the transformation of society."</div></blockquote></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-79127060142101961882011-10-19T12:19:00.000-07:002011-10-19T12:22:15.939-07:00William James: On 'Inner Religion'<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGAFljWEiF0u8QTUHLHP9NBOJfNKgD7Ri7ZQ81LBi0KF3Mx6hNmil3hwSPj9vT4TLlnARlno84wzZjPNs8cAYgKPuypfbtWDVuX337h0-4kITjJ3tETss5M5-pnyjiCuO0dh-xpOaFiD_r/s1600/WmJames.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGAFljWEiF0u8QTUHLHP9NBOJfNKgD7Ri7ZQ81LBi0KF3Mx6hNmil3hwSPj9vT4TLlnARlno84wzZjPNs8cAYgKPuypfbtWDVuX337h0-4kITjJ3tETss5M5-pnyjiCuO0dh-xpOaFiD_r/s200/WmJames.png" width="162" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_James">Wm. James</a><br />
(1842-1910)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>In <i>The Varieties of Religious Experience, </i><a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/05/william-james-religious-experience-and.html">William James</a>, one of the acknowledged "fathers" of modern psychology, distinguished between outer and inner religious faith. To him, "outer religion" was the province of rituals, sacraments, vestments and bells, while "inner religion" was a state of consciousness. In the true sense of the word, he viewed "inner religion" (from the Latin <i>ligare</i>, meaning to 'tie' or 'unite') as a state of natural, unitive and <a href="http://spiritualblissblog.blogspot.com/2011/03/beyond-perceptions-and-conceptions-to.html">acceptive consciousness</a> in which "religion comes to our rescue and takes our fate into her hands."<br />
<br />
"There is a state of mind, known to religious men, but to no others," he observes, "in which the will to assert ourselves and hold our own has been displaced by a willingness to close our mouths and be as nothing in the folds and waterspouts of God."<br />
<br />
"In this state of mind," he notes, "what we most dreaded has become the habitation of our safety and the hour of our moral death has turned into our spiritual birthday. The time for tension in our soul is over, and that of happy relaxation of calm deep breathing, of an eternal present, with no discordant future to be anxious about, has arrived. Fear is not held in abeyance as it is by mere morality, it is positively expunged and washed away."<br />
<br />
"This enchantment," he points out, "coming as a gift when it does come - a gift or our organism, the physiologists will tell us, a gift of God's grace, the theologians say - is either there or not there for us, and there are persons who can no more become possessed by it than they can fall in love with a given woman by mere word or command."<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5MXfypUhxLDS5vzAJMjcjSySTsz1vNb-En1Zlgq9wGa0jyc8QolHFUaaJWiPXGkfeeycIRsBjRcowaUDAgDgZiYOpDgcSihyGxQ9KMM8QnSYQWKD289JQxd657c9KSq12S1BaWNMkL8Yu/s1600/meditationBlacknWhite.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5MXfypUhxLDS5vzAJMjcjSySTsz1vNb-En1Zlgq9wGa0jyc8QolHFUaaJWiPXGkfeeycIRsBjRcowaUDAgDgZiYOpDgcSihyGxQ9KMM8QnSYQWKD289JQxd657c9KSq12S1BaWNMkL8Yu/s200/meditationBlacknWhite.png" width="185" /></a></div>"Religious feeling is thus an absolute addition to the Subject's range of life," he concludes. "It gives him a new sphere of power. When the outward battle is lost, and the outward world disowns him it redeems and vivifies an interior world which otherwise would be an empty waste." "There are plenty of men," he adds parenthetically, "in whose religious life this rapturousness is lacking. They are religious in the wider sense; yet in <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/05/enlightenment-is-not-complex.html">this acutest of all senses</a> they are not so."<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">[Wm. James, "<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1463518935/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399373&creativeASIN=1463518935">The Varieties Of Religious Experience</a></i>," pp. 47-48.]</div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-24067084202269606622011-10-16T09:17:00.000-07:002011-10-16T09:17:16.036-07:00Aldous Huxley: On the Perennial Philosophy and the Ground of Being<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><blockquote><div style="color: #e69138;"><i>" . . . (T)here is a hierarchy of the real. The manifold world of our everyday existence is real with a relative reality that is, on its own level, unquestionable; but this relative reality has its being within and because of the absolute Reality, which, on account of the incommensurable otherness of its eternal nature, we can never hope to describe, even though it is possible for us directly to apprehend it."</i><span style="color: #e69138;"><br />
<br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #e69138;">-- Aldous Huxley --</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #e69138;">("</span><i style="color: #e69138;">The Perennial Philosophy</i><span style="color: #e69138;">," page 33.)</span></div></blockquote>Just to the extent that we mistake our "relative reality" with "absolute Reality" do we suffer. That is the nature of <i>samsara</i>, the unawakened life. Our identification with the unawakened "self" of our normal, workaday consciousness obscures the consciousness of the true "Self" which is co-extant with the Ground of Being. The object of the Buddha's 'Eight-Fold Path to the End of Suffering' - the fourth of the Four Noble Truths - is, like all true spiritual teachings, to bring us to a unitive knowledge of this Ground of Being.<br />
<br />
In his Introduction to "<i>The Song of God</i>," a translation of the <i>Bhagavad Gita</i> by his frineds Christopher Isherwood and Swami Prabhavananda, the polymath author and philosopher, Aldous Huxley, outlines "the Perennial Philosophy" underlying the world's great spiritual traditions, a philosophy which points to our ability to realize the ineffable Ground of Being.<br />
<blockquote><blockquote><i>"At the core of the Perennial Philosophy</i>," Huxley observes, <i>"we find four fundamental doctrines.</i>"<br />
<blockquote><i> "First: the phenomenal world of matter and individualized consciousness - the world of things and animals and men and even gods - is the manifestation of a Divine Ground within which all partial realities have their beginning, and apart from which they would be non-existent.<br />
</i><br />
<i>Second: human beings are capable not merely of knowing </i><i>about the Divine Ground by inference; they can also realize its existence by a direct intuition, superior to discursive reasoning. This immediate knowledge unites the knower with that which is known.<br />
</i><br />
<i>Third: man possesses a double nature, a phenomenal ego and an eternal Self, which is the inner man, the spirit, the spark of divinity within the soul. It is possible for a man, if he so desires, to identify himself with the spirit and therefore with the Divine Ground, which is of the same or like nature with the spirit.<br />
</i><br />
<i>Fourth: man's life on earth has only one end and purpose: to identify himself with his eternal Self and so come to unitive knowledge of the Divine Ground."</i></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote> "Direct knowledge of the Ground (of Being) cannot be had except by union," Huxley notes, "and union can be achieved only by the annihilation of the self-regarding ego, which is the barrier separating the "thou" from the "That."" The ego, or smaller "self" is, thus, the face and identity of the "relative reality" which obscures our higher consciousness, while "the Self" of the divine "Ground of Being" is the higher consciousness which enables us to experience (although not describe) true "Reality."<br />
<br />
"Thou art that," we read over and over again in the Upanishads, and in other Scriptures. <i>"Tat tvat asi."</i></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-49177267600780977162011-10-12T16:01:00.000-07:002011-10-12T16:04:17.598-07:00Rumi: "The Other Thing"<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><u>The Other Thing</u> <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJQs5B2G5AQDDw-_c0Jb2yq1gcTpkrMi3IR7iG6OvvSDsbVlKrZH6MRAGomExv4vKdR-jXUFaZjdKaFtETuexxQCD-w65kJ_4oIAtzElleeJOtGX44AIQoMDPD78HyChlmnef-Dz4vhAGW/s1600/star.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJQs5B2G5AQDDw-_c0Jb2yq1gcTpkrMi3IR7iG6OvvSDsbVlKrZH6MRAGomExv4vKdR-jXUFaZjdKaFtETuexxQCD-w65kJ_4oIAtzElleeJOtGX44AIQoMDPD78HyChlmnef-Dz4vhAGW/s400/star.png" width="230" /></a></div>There are few resistance pockets left,<br />
patches of shade the sun has not struck,<br />
but mostly this universe is transformed.<br />
Every star has become the evening star.<br />
<br />
Every soul, a king with no flag or parapet<br />
to shield him from direct light.<br />
<br />
Go within and discover this land<br />
where everyone is a living soul<br />
under a wide, sky-field with a king entering<br />
from the other side, a jubilee, a singing<br />
where wine and dessert and <i>the other thing</i><br />
are given away.<br />
<br />
Last night I was out of myself.<br />
If I were that way again, I could finish<br />
this poem, but I'm not.<br />
<br />
My poet-self is a protective pawn<br />
put before the king, who is Shams,<br />
whose light changes every being to an ocean,<br />
and every body to a coral reef.<br />
<br />
-- Jalalludin Rumi --<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: right;">[Coleman Barks, "<i>The Essential Rumi</i>," pp. 310-311.]</div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-69725662630750682892011-10-09T06:16:00.000-07:002011-10-09T06:16:45.371-07:00Viktor Frankl: On Suffering and Life's Meaning<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpujxoJHaGBZlWMR6KxDUJOWEtuGJydXKxGn-Efk7f3KRGTo600zV5HZpoOYCEzkWRavPRP5iO7-GzmTdt1LqGXtI9kY8EO_zshCTqq3TZUmNwjfXJLjwrqZyrYe7RY9u99vyLIYf9Y2EQ/s1600/suffering2.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpujxoJHaGBZlWMR6KxDUJOWEtuGJydXKxGn-Efk7f3KRGTo600zV5HZpoOYCEzkWRavPRP5iO7-GzmTdt1LqGXtI9kY8EO_zshCTqq3TZUmNwjfXJLjwrqZyrYe7RY9u99vyLIYf9Y2EQ/s200/suffering2.png" width="200" /></a></div>To psychoanalyst <a href="http://spiritualblissblog.blogspot.com/2011/10/viktor-frankl-finding-meaning-in-life.html">Viktor Frankl</a>, an Auschwitz survivor, the test of life lay not in overcoming suffering and thereby achieving enlightenment, but rather in how one finds meaning in suffering itself. "If there is a meaning at life at all," he observed, "then there must be a meaning in suffering."<br />
<br />
"Suffering," he pointed out, "is an ineradicable part of life, even as fate and death. Without suffering and death," he observed, "life cannot be complete."<br />
<br />
This very humanistic viewpoint is, of course, quite opposite to the transcendental teachings of <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/07/three-causes-of-suffering.html">the Buddha</a>, who demonstrated and taught that suffering can, in fact, be overcome even in this life. Nonetheless, there are similarities in the two teachings. Both identify, for instance, the central role that man's relation to suffering plays in shaping the course of the individual's life. And both identify suffering as the great potential teacher of mankind.<br />
<br />
"The way in which a man accepts his fate and all the suffering it entails, the way in which he takes up his cross," wrote Frankl, "gives him ample opportunity - even under the most difficult circumstances - to add a deeper meaning to his life. It may remain brave, dignified and unselfish. Or in the bitter fight for self-preservation he may forget his human dignity and become no more than an animal."<br />
<br />
"Here," Frankl observed, "lies the chance for a man either to make use of or to forgo the opportunities of attaining the moral values that a difficult situation may afford him. And this," he declared, "decides whether he is worthy of his sufferings or not."<br />
<br />
To what end, then, are we going to use our <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/03/we-all-suffer.html">suffering</a>? Are we to use it to face the worst in life and overcome it? Or, are we to go beyond embracing suffering - a necessary first step, perhaps - and use it as a catalyst to transcend self and strive for enlightenment? Are we worthy of our suffering?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">[Excerpts from Viktor Frankl's "<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0807014273/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399369&creativeASIN=0807014273">Man's Search for Meaning</a></i>," p. 88.]<br />
<br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/OaQH-xACGK4" width="420"></iframe></div><div style="text-align: right;"><br />
</div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-69317864079783947032011-10-03T08:37:00.000-07:002011-10-03T08:49:38.295-07:00The End of Suffering<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9EaQIkhTdqHgk4NNzpPN6bYVjo9Ificc-sKEy3t1kiVMfCuc7C_yNVhI1XKZQ6iJFJrwRsD1X7EaNsnXY4vY2Lnj0MbUvJAxlwg68ORJoQd9RW5PkI31TU6LDvlYo8iTg4Qtwn_44x0xq/s1600/buddhaBlackandWhite.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9EaQIkhTdqHgk4NNzpPN6bYVjo9Ificc-sKEy3t1kiVMfCuc7C_yNVhI1XKZQ6iJFJrwRsD1X7EaNsnXY4vY2Lnj0MbUvJAxlwg68ORJoQd9RW5PkI31TU6LDvlYo8iTg4Qtwn_44x0xq/s200/buddhaBlackandWhite.png" width="187" /></a></div><div style="color: #bf9000;"><i>"When you can't stand the endless cycle of suffering anymore, you begin to awaken."</i></div><div style="color: #274e13; text-align: center;"><div style="color: #bf9000;">-- Eckhart Tolle --</div><div style="color: #bf9000;">("<i>A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose</i>")</div></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">"To the unawakened mind, life is suffering," <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/lama-surya-das-buddhas-path.html">the Buddha</a> taught. This First Noble Truth was the prime basis of all the Buddha's teachings. Turning his back on his own practice of self-induced suffering (he was born a wealthy prince) the Buddha sat beneath the Bodhi Tree determined not to move from that spot until he had achieved enlightenment. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">It is said that during the four watches of the night he consecutively realized (a) that ordinary life is suffering, (b) that there are specific causes of suffering, (c) that there is an end to suffering by eliminating these causes, and (d) that there is a path to eliminating these causes. Thus, the Buddha's own enlightenment is evidence, as Tolle notes, that the beginning of awakening is unendurable suffering.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Moreover, it is taught in some schools that this realization, some 2,500 years ago, was the first turning of the <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/lama-surya-das-buddhas-path.html">dharma</a> wheel, the first realization of the true nature of being, and the first realization of nirvana. If this is so, then Tolle's observation is all the more pertinent. The Buddha's awakening was then, indeed, the beginning of the end of "the endless cycle of suffering" - the beginning of the end of both individual and collective suffering.<br />
<br />
"Suffering is a wonderful teacher," Tolle observes in the video (below) on "The End of Suffering. And for some people it is their only spiritual teacher he points out. "Suffering deepens you. It gradually erodes the mind-made human sense of self, <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/fictitious-self-or-ego.html">the ego</a>. And for some people the point arises where they realize, "I have suffered enough."" This, he points out, "is the end of living in the state of suffering."<br />
<br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/Deq_1lg9Dlo" width="420"></iframe></div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-38899229976271414682011-10-02T04:51:00.000-07:002011-10-02T04:51:00.416-07:00Enlightenment Takes No Time At All<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhw30-s6H_ajneDjP922W6U-HkWsWQzcckEHR6rF5iEVT7tu2aW1ghu1zF8LUey0XoTywvfMEqE4VJU9PQ96O8gZdVFfvf_Oo4hyyK1K37IqFbURm-dIPKr-4QON0dJEVJMysWggDC4Z7mL/s1600/nebula4.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhw30-s6H_ajneDjP922W6U-HkWsWQzcckEHR6rF5iEVT7tu2aW1ghu1zF8LUey0XoTywvfMEqE4VJU9PQ96O8gZdVFfvf_Oo4hyyK1K37IqFbURm-dIPKr-4QON0dJEVJMysWggDC4Z7mL/s1600/nebula4.png" /></a></div>Spiraling, spiralling,<br />
out through space-time<br />
the stars and all their planets<br />
ever whirl.<br />
<br />
I look about and all I see<br />
is star dust.<br />
<br />
Enlightenment takes no time at all.<br />
Being eternal it is beyond space-time,<br />
which can only denote and thereby sever it.<br />
<br />
Even the finest wine turns to vinegar in time.<br />
Therefore, imbibe now!<br />
<br />
If eye could see all this from without,<br />
would not the universe itself be an infinity<br />
of swirling vortices congealing out of the void?<br />
<br />
And yet,<br />
when we envision that within which is every being, how still and empty does it seem?<br />
Such illusory stillness is the stuff of which some far off heaven's made.<br />
<br />
<br />
</div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-81577664579859928182011-09-30T13:20:00.000-07:002011-09-30T13:20:57.027-07:00Dying to Self<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEPCEpsWSwZSt1nbvAqZQLuO_jO_W3gOqMOckTJrXCrYY8o_yNeyCP0q4Rh4EPkq02ei9X4EH2Wa7YYEGeJsZiE2Tx4nUKxye4-kF85-CjoQp1FtXwMDcupbHGAZOi78OojHMl8JEUt0S7/s1600/zenImage1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEPCEpsWSwZSt1nbvAqZQLuO_jO_W3gOqMOckTJrXCrYY8o_yNeyCP0q4Rh4EPkq02ei9X4EH2Wa7YYEGeJsZiE2Tx4nUKxye4-kF85-CjoQp1FtXwMDcupbHGAZOi78OojHMl8JEUt0S7/s200/zenImage1.png" style="background-color: #38761d;" width="189" /></a></div><i><span style="color: #38761d;">He who knows men is clever;</span><br style="color: #38761d;" /><span style="color: #38761d;">He who knows himself has insight.</span><br style="color: #38761d;" /><span style="color: #38761d;">He who conquers men has force;</span><br style="color: #38761d;" /><span style="color: #38761d;">He who conquers himself is truly strong.</span><br style="color: #38761d;" /><br style="color: #38761d;" /><span style="color: #38761d;">He who knows when he has got enough is rich,</span><br style="color: #38761d;" /><span style="color: #38761d;">And he who adheres assiduously to the path of Tao is a </span><br style="color: #38761d;" /><span style="color: #38761d;"> man of steady purpose.</span><br style="color: #38761d;" /><span style="color: #38761d;">He who stays where he has found his true home</span><br style="color: #38761d;" /><span style="color: #38761d;"> endures long,</span></i><span style="color: #38761d;"><i>And he who dies but perishes not enjoys real longevity.</i><br />
</span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #38761d;">-- Lao Tzu --</span><br style="color: #38761d;" /><span style="color: #38761d;">("</span><i style="color: #38761d;">Tao Te Ching</i><span style="color: #38761d;">")</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Verse 33 from the <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/09/on-great-way-tao-of-nature.html"><i>Tao Te Ching</i></a>, above, like teachings from all the world's great wisdom traditions, identifies the great metaphysical challenge for all men and women: to know, and then overcome, their own narrow "selves." For in every one of us <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/lower-self-higher-self-no-self.html">a separate ego-self</a> arises, but in only a very select few is it overcome. <br />
<br />
"It is by self-forgetting," St. Francis of Assisi affirmed, "that one finds. . . . It is by dying (to self) that one awakens to Eternal Life." Or, as <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/thomas-merton-birth-of-man.html">Lao Tzu</a> put it, "(H)e who dies but perishes not enjoys real longevity." Thus, not only is being born a second time a great spiritual goal, but perhaps more so is dying to one's self while remaining in the world. It is the loftiest of goals, only to be achieved by disciplining the mind that has created the second self of the ego.</div><span style="color: #38761d;"></span></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-60018796931983521152011-09-26T11:47:00.000-07:002011-09-26T11:47:48.829-07:00The Tao of Non-Resistance<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">The spiritual path is a path of non-resistance - <i>i.e.</i>, a way of <a href="http://spiritualblissblog.blogspot.com/2011/03/beyond-perceptions-and-conceptions-to.html">accepting what is</a>. In electronics, a resistor heats up, and if it isn't cooled off it is liable to burn out and fail. A conductor, on the other hand, allows the current to flow through it. The best conductors are those that exhibit the least resistance. The sage allows circumstances to flow in, around, and through him and, in turn, flows through life without resistance. That, the following suggests, is the secret of acting in accordance with the Tao.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">* * * * * * * * * * * * * </div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9U9VSBrU15U80OomN6dReyWEpLIrNRQspWy3jt7JKAl8WZd0DGDepbA9VKi_zb5W-pC8b_9komGWCwHQrdpQiUWOYt4ElPQkYsZdth7aUv19HP7v9mFdsput9elxqtawlpuY1cEmbhtEr/s1600/taoimage3.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="193" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9U9VSBrU15U80OomN6dReyWEpLIrNRQspWy3jt7JKAl8WZd0DGDepbA9VKi_zb5W-pC8b_9komGWCwHQrdpQiUWOYt4ElPQkYsZdth7aUv19HP7v9mFdsput9elxqtawlpuY1cEmbhtEr/s200/taoimage3.png" width="200" /></a></div> <i>Act through nonaction.</i><br />
<i> Handle affairs through noninterference,</i><br />
<i> Taste what has no taste,</i><br />
<i> Regard the small as great, the few as many,</i><br />
<i> Repay resentment with integrity.</i><br />
<br />
<i> Undertake difficult tasks</i><br />
<i> by approaching what is easy in them;</i><br />
<i> Do great deeds</i><br />
<i> by focusing on their minute aspects.</i><br />
<br />
<i> All difficulties under heaven arise from what is easy,</i><br />
<i> All great things under heaven arise from what is minute.</i><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSI_qSfzH-ttIbPETB61J1GR-e9ctUFvyp-ec3hmM5syoujJCyikdBl1vMmJXwzMZdb_43LNd-IgOL95RxX20tZehpV3OL_gVToaUHYvKJ73VW8EH9wS348onXFvxCqmAtEhPA7dfgP1a2/s1600/zenImage1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSI_qSfzH-ttIbPETB61J1GR-e9ctUFvyp-ec3hmM5syoujJCyikdBl1vMmJXwzMZdb_43LNd-IgOL95RxX20tZehpV3OL_gVToaUHYvKJ73VW8EH9wS348onXFvxCqmAtEhPA7dfgP1a2/s200/zenImage1.png" width="189" /></a></div><i>For this reason,</i><br />
<i> The sage never strives to do what is great.</i><br />
<i>Therefore,</i><br />
<i> He can achieve greatness.</i><br />
<br />
<i> One who lightly assents</i><br />
<i> will seldom be believed;</i><br />
<i> One who thinks everything is easy</i><br />
<i> will encounter much difficulty.</i><br />
<br />
For this reason,<br />
Even the sage considers things difficult.<br />
Therefore,<br />
In the end he is without difficulty.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: right;">[Lao Tzu, "<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/055334935X/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399377&creativeASIN=055334935X">Tao Te Ching</a></i>," Victor H. Mair trans., p. 33.]</div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-63200549990769521062011-09-25T04:11:00.000-07:002011-09-25T04:11:02.824-07:00Simon Small: On the Inner Path and Contemplative Life<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><blockquote><div style="color: #0b5394;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBA-HHoWKIW3Mqn2BUnSrqwMRZh9DJnq00rqPrYXWQypV-4KoDTSDClyTWRzfa2KwNiNmp1TiDNUVn8DFINPHsswrjtFDPRqOJYcUqWZ8ND6WDZ-xhoe-Xmr99YXEqgRyVNrdV15-HmWaU/s1600/nightStars.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBA-HHoWKIW3Mqn2BUnSrqwMRZh9DJnq00rqPrYXWQypV-4KoDTSDClyTWRzfa2KwNiNmp1TiDNUVn8DFINPHsswrjtFDPRqOJYcUqWZ8ND6WDZ-xhoe-Xmr99YXEqgRyVNrdV15-HmWaU/s320/nightStars.png" width="109" /></a></div><i>"I stand at the bottom of the pond as the fulcrum of limitless space, within and without, a gateway to both, an icon that joins the two. But who am I, so small and insignificant yet at the heart of existence? As I ponder this question, infinite space reveals itself once more. For as hard as I look, I cannot find myself. I can only find thoughts, memories, fears, beliefs and concepts that constantly arise and cease. But whoever I am does not arise or cease. I am who I have always been. Different thoughts and a new body, but I am who I am. And as my mind stills consciousness expands without limit. There is a deep sense that, indeed, it has no limit. It too is infinite, a vibrantly alive space. As I stand at the bottom of the pond, I am the still center of awesome space, but so is every other human being. And, in its own way, so is every animal, plant, virus, bacteria and living cell. And in some far distant galaxy, on another insignificant lump of rock, at the bottom of another pond, stands another still center of space staring uswards and inwards, filled and humbled by the mystery of existence."<br />
</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: #0b5394;">-- Simon Small --</span><br />
<span style="color: #0b5394;"> ("At the Bottom of a Pond")</span></div></blockquote>In a recent interview (attached below) Iain McNay, co-host of ConsciousTV, sat down with Rev. Simon Small, an ordained Church of England clergyman and author, to explore the latter's journey from run-of-the-mill modern materialist businessman to a Christian contemplative. Small's inner journey of self-inquiry led him from spiritualism, through <i>A Course in Miracles</i>, to Theravada Buddhism and back to his Church of England roots, revealing to him the spaciousness and interconnectedness that is at the heart of all the world's great wisdom traditions.<br />
<br />
Small describes the fruits of the inner path in the following terms: "One begins to experience a taste that one is not separate to everything else, that this hard sense of being separate and cut off from all of this, and just relating to it, is actually just a perception, and that whatever I am is flowing out of the source of everything, just as this table is, and this room, and everything outside."<br />
<br />
"Contemplation," he notes, "is an ancient Christian word for a universal experience. (It) describes what happens when we have those moments . . when suddenly our very small world that we are living out in our head almost seems to dissolve and suddenly there is this vast mystery there in the moment. We all have experiences like this. Many of us have them out in nature. We will be walking along and there will be a moment when the sunlight coming through the branches and hitting the leaves just stops us in our tracks. There is a sense of time almost stopping as well, and there is almost a sense of resonance in the moment so that we are no longer separate to the sunlight and those leaves. There is something vibrating there that is vibrating in us as well. We all have these moments."<br />
<br />
A life of contemplation may not, however, be for everyone. The fruits of the inner path and contemplation are very rich, Small notes, but they come at a price, a price that many people are, perhaps, loathe to pay.<br />
<br />
"At first, (contemplation) is a wonderful experience," he points out, "because you have never quite tasted anything quite like it. It is like the finest wine you have ever tasted, and you become aware. . . . Suddenly life has gone to colour from black and white. But then very quickly," he warns, "one begins to realize that if you are going to pursue this you are not going to be able to live the same way anymore in the world. Things that you used to value, you won't value anymore. And you will begin to value things that you have never dreamed of before."<br />
<br />
Small's advice to those who wish to explore the contemplative way is: "Enter stillness. Try and taste the wonder of being. Go out into nature, (into) whatever it is that brings this sense of wonder into your life. And then as you are experiencing that quality of consciousness, hold the question: Where do I go from here?" The answer will come, he notes.<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/NLvKkNUYI_o" width="560"></iframe></div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-52199163755887873832011-09-22T14:38:00.000-07:002011-09-22T14:38:07.317-07:00On the "Great Way" - The Tao of Nature<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVMTWwns9o-Tm0POGuG9XFW2Z5PwR0PA6aRR6CDCQ0svQ8nhIbDmZ2LCt8oX0lrk2GzdUxzP63Z8OIOGTwoJQ5l40HDR5URKnccGBYOBI40JRDq6g8lP9SXwyJTRPgQZ1xLTKfvhiAoUd8/s1600/nebula.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVMTWwns9o-Tm0POGuG9XFW2Z5PwR0PA6aRR6CDCQ0svQ8nhIbDmZ2LCt8oX0lrk2GzdUxzP63Z8OIOGTwoJQ5l40HDR5URKnccGBYOBI40JRDq6g8lP9SXwyJTRPgQZ1xLTKfvhiAoUd8/s200/nebula.png" width="200" /></a></div><i>There was something featureless yet complete,<br />
born before heaven and earth;</i><br />
<i>Silent - amorphous - <br />
it stood alone and unchanging.<br />
<br />
We may regard it as the mother of heaven and earth.<br />
Not knowing its name,<br />
I style it the "Way."</i><br />
<i>If forced to give it a name,<br />
I would call it "great."</i><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRuaH1rSfK82IgIwjr3ia_ZLWOpHLUW2-BrXAceMD2nw3bln9RqEq-xM-bgw7SomW0tj2TNZnxJsCill0SqapWAn1x1lI032uexnGjEsSBzsi-HOEFVyrAlNS_IKf2rjAXODtD74K2OfTZ/s1600/riverValley.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="185" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRuaH1rSfK82IgIwjr3ia_ZLWOpHLUW2-BrXAceMD2nw3bln9RqEq-xM-bgw7SomW0tj2TNZnxJsCill0SqapWAn1x1lI032uexnGjEsSBzsi-HOEFVyrAlNS_IKf2rjAXODtD74K2OfTZ/s200/riverValley.png" width="200" /></a></div><i>Being great implies flowing ever onward,<br />
Flowing ever onward implies far-reaching,<br />
Far-reaching implies reversal.<br />
<br />
The Way is great,<br />
Heaven is great,<br />
Earth is great,</i><br />
<i>The king, too, is great.<br />
<br />
Within the realm there are four greats,<br />
and the king is one among them.</i><br />
<br />
<i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9JyV7RXX_7HCmLlFf_4467WXodqXVr-Za1MWXPT9Kdi5l36-bU2_1YgmOQP1H8O5nuO4w8yUOTM7qNF7dlockHfHurwPlic9ojhS-p5MvgfinrKDgTFP1OXYSKU0yTP6VUObod6SdBBs1/s1600/taoTemple1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9JyV7RXX_7HCmLlFf_4467WXodqXVr-Za1MWXPT9Kdi5l36-bU2_1YgmOQP1H8O5nuO4w8yUOTM7qNF7dlockHfHurwPlic9ojhS-p5MvgfinrKDgTFP1OXYSKU0yTP6VUObod6SdBBs1/s200/taoTemple1.png" width="200" /></a>Man<br />
patterns himself on earth,<br />
Earth<br />
patterns itself on heaven,<br />
Heaven<br />
patterns itself on the Way,<br />
The Way<br />
patterns itself on nature.</i></div><br />
(Lao Tzu, <i>"<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/055334935X/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399377&creativeASIN=055334935X">Tao Te Ching</a></i>," Victor H. Mair trans., p. 90.)</div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-29882847096053776942011-09-20T08:49:00.000-07:002011-09-23T06:44:15.963-07:00Bhikku Bodhi: "An End to the Future"<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-rStNtDt__cqgkfzzDQxgfVavfoBL1_tdOW4EXcbsR_cRv859CmICobpqS39Gkf9tCvw9-L_t859M6A99MJ7UPiq3hfXGZ6-QPESBVfu_VZP_thIMslUYQcfvGpFNYoHTC5G4lp5X2kSq/s1600/BhikkuBodhi.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-rStNtDt__cqgkfzzDQxgfVavfoBL1_tdOW4EXcbsR_cRv859CmICobpqS39Gkf9tCvw9-L_t859M6A99MJ7UPiq3hfXGZ6-QPESBVfu_VZP_thIMslUYQcfvGpFNYoHTC5G4lp5X2kSq/s200/BhikkuBodhi.png" width="152" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhikkhu_Bodhi">Ven. Bhikku Bodhi</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>We live in perilous times. War, poverty, hunger, accelerating climate change and obtuse, unresponsive governments constitute a <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/07/evolution-of-consciousness-global.html">global crisis</a> which threatens the prospects of humanity's future, as the <a href="http://www.bodhimonastery.net/bm/index.php">Venerable Bhikku Bodhi</a> points out in the attached Google TechTalk.<br />
<br />
"An end to the future, at least to the human future, is now easily imaginable," Bodhi observes. "Even if the end point of the future doesn't occur in our own lifetime," he warns, "there is a very real danger that it might occur at some point in the present century, even during the lifetimes of your children or grandchildren."<br />
<br />
"During our daily lives when our attention is involved in our day-to-day tasks and projects," Bodhi notes, "these kinds of thoughts normally don't trouble us. But if we step back for a few moments and reflect, we can easily see that these claims are not exaggeration. The dangers are very real, and when we take them seriously, as we should take them, they can send a chill down our spines."<br />
<br />
All living things are interconnected as parts of a unified field, Bodhi points out in a <a href="http://www.tricycle.com/feature/need-hour">recent issue</a> of <i>Tricycle</i> (Fall, 2011), and such interconnectedness "bids us consider the long-term effects our deeds exert on other people, on all beings endowed with sentience, and on the entire biosphere."<br />
<blockquote>"In minimal terms," he asserts, "this means that we cannot tolerate behaviour that endangers vast sections of the world's population. We cannot use <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/in-his-best-selling-environmental-study.html">the earth's resources</a> in ways that result in the mass extinction of species, with unpredictable results. We cannot spend billions on the fratricidal activity of war, while a billion people suffer from hunger, sleep on the streets, and die from easily curable illnesses. We cannot burn fuels that irreversibly alter the climate, or discharge toxic substances into our water and air, without initiating chain reactions that will eventually poison ourselves."</blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisXlGRHiHdpTAOQYstK8kdI_6YCS4M7mtNt57No-YwfddlYenajhEz_6KqFQti-LtpIHQ5ULcxFYALCZ6UhDXyWKCxSIC_Q80RUpz7uAhJ_YPFDTblTpc6ZwmslpTz0V43u9fHDd3Ry0iW/s1600/compassion.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisXlGRHiHdpTAOQYstK8kdI_6YCS4M7mtNt57No-YwfddlYenajhEz_6KqFQti-LtpIHQ5ULcxFYALCZ6UhDXyWKCxSIC_Q80RUpz7uAhJ_YPFDTblTpc6ZwmslpTz0V43u9fHDd3Ry0iW/s200/compassion.png" width="161" /></a></div>"For the spiritual life to unleash its full potential as a fountainhead of grace and blessings, the wisdom of selfishness on its own is not sufficient," Bodhi points out. "Wisdom has to be joined with another force that galvanizes the will to act. The force needed to empower wisdom is compassion. Both wisdom and compassion shift our sense of identity away from ourselves toward the wider human, biotic, and cosmic community to which we belong." <br />
<br />
In addressing his audience at Google, Bodhi asserts that the existential problems and challenges we face may be seen as "many manifestations of a deep and hidden spiritual malignancy that is infecting human society. And the common root of all these problems," he notes, "might be briefly described as a stubborn insistence on placing narrow, short-term, self-centered interests above the long-range good of the broader human community."<br />
<br />
"What is needed above all else," he points out, "is a new orientation . . . a kind of <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/07/gerald-heard-conscious-evolution-as.html">universal consciousness</a> that will enable us to regard others as being essentially the same as oneself. We have to learn to reject the demands of self-interest and acquire this universal perspective from which the welfare of all appears to be just as important as our own good. That is, we have to outgrow the narrow egocentric and ethnocentric attitudes to which we are normally committed, and instead embrace a worldcentric ethic that gives priority to the well-being of all."<br />
<br />
"Such a worldcentric ethic should be moulded upon three guidelines," he suggests. "First, we have to overcome exploitative greed with global generosity, helpfulness and cooperation. Second, to replace hatred, suspicion and vengeance with a policy of kindness, tolerance and forgiveness. And third, we have to recognize that the world is an interconnected whole such that irresponsible behaviour anywhere has potentially harmful consequences everywhere."<br />
<br />
"These guidelines," Bodhi points out, "can constitute the nucleus of a global ethic to which all of the world's great spiritual traditions could easily subscribe, without requiring any kind of exclusive adherence to Buddhism."<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/PVKC5FuGjsI" width="420"></iframe></div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-44827744523168312052011-09-15T12:25:00.000-07:002011-09-16T16:54:59.322-07:00Thich Nhat Hanh: On Habit and Mindfulness<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><blockquote><div style="color: black;">"Our habit energy is what causes us to repeat the same behaviour thousands of times. Habit energy pushes us to run, to always be doing something, to be lost in thoughts of the past or the future and to blame others for our suffering. And that energy does not allow us to be peaceful and happy in the present moment."<br />
<br />
"The practice of mindfulness helps us to recognize that habitual energy. Every time we can recognize the habitual energy in us, we are able to stop and to enjoy the present moment. The energy of mindfulness is the best energy to help us embrace our habit energy and transform it."<br />
<br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: black;">-- <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/chuang-tzu-and-butterfly.html">Thich Nhat Hanh</a> --</span><br />
<span style="color: black;">("</span><i style="color: black;">Beyond the Self: Teachings on the Middle Way</i><span style="color: black;">")</span></div></blockquote><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYQyF2uyVZU17-LbCMo-vyVdXi5BWESoD8F7TJzberKCZ3IZ0n5j6F6Hc-ahI_S90d4bjlKOzyV1KkGbI4uK00FI2NDZBrHaf9_SicI7mF8Wz7Eq6wWgEqlEvNmtgxeGnDNSuE1hOV2L6I/s1600/zenImage1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYQyF2uyVZU17-LbCMo-vyVdXi5BWESoD8F7TJzberKCZ3IZ0n5j6F6Hc-ahI_S90d4bjlKOzyV1KkGbI4uK00FI2NDZBrHaf9_SicI7mF8Wz7Eq6wWgEqlEvNmtgxeGnDNSuE1hOV2L6I/s320/zenImage1.png" width="303" /></a></div>In the <i><a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/tao-of-understanding-and-mystery.html">Tao Te Ching</a></i> we read:<br />
<br />
<i>The sage has no mind of his own. He takes as his own the mind of the people.<br />
<br />
Those who are good I treat as good. Those who are not good I also treat as good. In so doing I gain in goodness. Those who are of good faith I have faith in. Those who are lacking in good faith I also have faith in. In so doing I gain in good faith.<br />
<br />
The sage in his attempt to distract the mind of the empire seeks urgently to muddle it. The people all have something to occupy their eyes and ears, and the sage treats them all like children.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">* * * * * * * * * * * * *<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">In the attached two-part video, the renowned Buddhist teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh, takes the viewer through a mindful movement and breathing meditation:</div><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/oWerJwf3-3I" width="520"></iframe><br />
<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="390" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/y1H7i0m_cuE" width="520"></iframe></div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-18237286582266807262011-09-14T13:32:00.000-07:002011-09-14T13:32:15.203-07:00Thomas Merton: Eastern Musings<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div style="color: black;"><u>T<span style="font-size: small;"><i>he Lion</i></span></u></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZqvzIAkLoDB8LlYAWCVOxuPBUjVbiGrh5Fg2zyul1xykAekWnm22BfDQIulNiBIDKkE20PWgkIVOzRhQreqYz66IpS2N0xAwGeNvce3ghEpINqqeLP6FtN5rzDSmKdWBI5kkESo5cRRLH/s1600/chineseLion.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZqvzIAkLoDB8LlYAWCVOxuPBUjVbiGrh5Fg2zyul1xykAekWnm22BfDQIulNiBIDKkE20PWgkIVOzRhQreqYz66IpS2N0xAwGeNvce3ghEpINqqeLP6FtN5rzDSmKdWBI5kkESo5cRRLH/s320/chineseLion.png" width="240" /></a> </i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>From alien heavens</i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Where there are no fabled beasts </i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>No friendly histories</i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>And passion has no heraldry.</i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><br />
</div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>I have nothing left to translate </i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Into the figures of night</i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Or the pale geometry </i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Of the fire-birds.</i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>If I once had a wagon of lights to ride in </i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>The axle is broken</i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>The horses are shot.</i></span></div><div style="color: black;"><br />
</div><div style="color: black;">-- Thomas Merton --</div><br />
<br />
The iconoclasitic Benedictine Monk, Thomas Merton, was above all a poet, a poet who shook his worldview loose from old forms, as <i>The Lion</i>, above, amply demonstrates. The spare, stark images of the wagon of lights, the broken axle, and horses that have been shot suggest the growing influence that Zen and Taoism had on his worldview, an influence that can be seen in the following selections about Nothingness and the Void taken from his later work, "<i>Cables to the Ace</i>."<br />
<br />
"For (Merton) solitude was his desert where he had to face death and Nothingness. As he explored the Asian religious traditions in the 1960s, he sought to integrate this Nothingness into his Christian theology. Buddhism and Taoism had long found in Nothingness or the Void a creative, even joyful, reality that was in harmony with Being. But Western thought only recently began to face the challenge of Non-being." -- Alan Altany --<br />
<br />
(For more of Alan Altany's informative and delightful summary of Merton's poetry, see "<a href="http://www.thomasmertonsociety.org/altany1.htm">Thomas Merton's Poetry: Emblems of a Sacred Season</a>," on the <a href="http://www.thomasmertonsociety.org/">thomasmerton</a>.org website.)<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="345" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/_4rU_shFL48" width="560"></iframe><br />
<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="345" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/IUlzVOrNUrs" width="560"></iframe></div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-89365960824828412092011-09-13T04:51:00.000-07:002011-09-13T04:51:34.614-07:00Don't Drink the Ego's Kool-Aid<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTruDH5S0le0VNAnE3oALs6inbqhae_hJPu6fM1sE8Rv5eB84FyxNTFVITqen8M-VOGWJxacfTAIAw9EXtWxRW7USa2B6uc0S-jFIWEVXNoqkoNWnfJ2S11UhlHXHy1K2UvvlhQlzPvMRa/s1600/kool-aid.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTruDH5S0le0VNAnE3oALs6inbqhae_hJPu6fM1sE8Rv5eB84FyxNTFVITqen8M-VOGWJxacfTAIAw9EXtWxRW7USa2B6uc0S-jFIWEVXNoqkoNWnfJ2S11UhlHXHy1K2UvvlhQlzPvMRa/s200/kool-aid.png" width="199" /></a></div>The spiritual quest can become an <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/fictitious-self-or-ego.html">ego trap</a>. Instead of diminishing and letting go of the separated sense of 'self' the ego can quite easily flip and appear to cooperate in its own diminishment. "You want to be spiritual," the ego says, "then watch just how spiritual I can be!" Perhaps it is this reverse egoic thinking that leads to the demise of many of the so-called 'gurus' and self-proclaimed messiahs who rise, crash and burn. The trouble is not only that all too many drink their kool-aid, but even more critically, that we are all too prone to mix and take our own. <br />
<br />
Having learned that there is such a thing as <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/05/enlightenment-is-not-complex.html">enlightenment</a>, and finding out that literally thousands of books have been written on how enlightenment might be achieved, the ever-voracious ego sets out to gain more and more knowledge. However, once one has read even a few of these books one knows that it is only practice and experience, rather than intellectual knowledge and beliefs, that will do the trick. But, oh, how attached the ego can become to more spiritual knowledge!<br />
<blockquote>"In one way or another," writes Ram Dass, " all of the practices of jnana yoga work with our intellectual faculties and with different levels fo the mind to get to something that is finally beyond the mind's grasp. It's called higher wisdom, and higher wisdom is a different thing altogether from knowledge. . . . Knowledge is a function of the intellect; higher wisdom goes <i>beyond</i> mind and intellect."<br />
<br />
"The intellect," Dass notes, "is like a siddhi, a yogic power, and like all such powers, it's very seductive. It's easy for us to seduced by all the fascinating things we can know <i>about</i>. But our knowing isn't wisdom - it's knowledge; and all of that fascination with knowing things can end up drawing us outward rather than inward."<br />
<br />
"We get trapped in the world of knowing," Dass points out. "We busy ourselves collecting more and more worldly knowledge, and focus on the matrix of the rational mind instead of openining into our deeper wisdom. And then the very tool we're trying to use to escape becomes our trap, because with knowing there's always still a "knower" and a "that which is known.""</blockquote>"Only when the knower and known become one," writes Dass, "does that One get through the door. Nobody who knows anything gets through the door - which means that the ultimate sacrifice for the <i>gynani</i>, the intellectual, is giving up everything."<br />
<div style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">[Ram Dass, "<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1400054036/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399369&creativeASIN=1400054036">Paths to God</a></i>," pp. 74-75.]</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"></div><div style="text-align: center;">* * * * * * * * * * * * *</div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgw4IVlW4Grbu3pRFKWKILn91dvg4toy1NOpJAY7bzC38rqGC0Nr-0geTV5fdPQ_51iHy0CFOlaT6Z5v6K9wTYIwe3zxgD33l1umi8s9E0Wkye5pNwMmGhKWT3-Yfv-qUW9wD3271jLMbnp/s1600/books.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgw4IVlW4Grbu3pRFKWKILn91dvg4toy1NOpJAY7bzC38rqGC0Nr-0geTV5fdPQ_51iHy0CFOlaT6Z5v6K9wTYIwe3zxgD33l1umi8s9E0Wkye5pNwMmGhKWT3-Yfv-qUW9wD3271jLMbnp/s200/books.png" width="190" /></a></div>"<i>Today, like every other day,</i> <i>we wake up empty<br />
and frightened. Don't open the door to the study<br />
and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument.</i>"<br />
<br />
"<i>Let the beauty we love be what we do.<br />
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.</i>"<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">* * * * * * * * * * * * *</div><div style="text-align: left;">"<i>Sell your cleverness and purchase bewilderment</i>," Rumi advises us.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">[Coleman Barks, "<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003V1WUNA/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399373&creativeASIN=B003V1WUNA">The Essential Rumi</a></i>, p. 36.]</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-23878613517679285462011-09-09T09:58:00.000-07:002011-09-23T06:45:16.519-07:00On Attachments<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">One cannot go through the world without <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/ego-identification-and-attachment.html">attachments</a>, and yet all such attachments - to our pets, to our children, to our spouses, to our vocations, to our possessions, to our various 'identities' <i>etc.</i> - are all bound to create suffering, either in the short-term or the long-term. What is one to do?<br />
<br />
The <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/tao-of-understanding-and-mystery.html"><i>Tao Te Ching</i></a> seems to suggest that we recognize but neither "assert" nor "abide in" such attachments. It recognizes that unfettered enjoyment of such temporary attachments as "extravagances" which prevent us from living in accordance with "the Way."<br />
<blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8Bbx3nMTuv4GDglNQi7RFLBKRvPGBqRnDhrQmSG2Y9O0kuFudgjkDqBdQIrYV8efLhYg3PNaaHOYrZGvx2ic-9czf2cZXJJ89hbRh5fQ2hiopTWvmKCDteh01S2VDrxyiObBb8tIfqbrG/s1600/chinesePorter.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8Bbx3nMTuv4GDglNQi7RFLBKRvPGBqRnDhrQmSG2Y9O0kuFudgjkDqBdQIrYV8efLhYg3PNaaHOYrZGvx2ic-9czf2cZXJJ89hbRh5fQ2hiopTWvmKCDteh01S2VDrxyiObBb8tIfqbrG/s200/chinesePorter.png" width="200" /></a></div><i>"Who is puffed up cannot stand,<br />
Who is self-absorbed has no distinction,<br />
Who is self-revealing does not shine,<br />
Who is self-assertive has no merit,<br />
Who is self-praising does not last long.<br />
<br />
As for the Way, we may say these are<br />
"excess provisions and extra baggage."<br />
Creation abhors such extravagances.<br />
<br />
Therefore,<br />
One who aspires to the Way,<br />
does not abide in them."</i></blockquote><br />
In the two related dharma talks (below), Buddhist teacher, Ajahn Brahmili explores our deep-seated attachments and how we can move beyond them to live a more liberated and awakened life.<br />
<br />
We need to create an inner refuge, separate and apart from our attachments, Ajahn suggests, if we are to begin the task of moving beyond attachments and the innate suffering that comes with them. In this way, it is possible to live in the world of attachments, but not be wholly attached to that world. <br />
<br />
Creating such an inner refuge, he points out "is really a path of beautifying the mind, of making the mind more bright, and of having an internal source of happiness."<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="345" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/NTJHmmUNRRw" width="560"></iframe><br />
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<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="345" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/L50xVM7wwss" width="560"></iframe></div><br />
</div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-2007744292905979442011-09-04T08:42:00.000-07:002011-09-04T08:48:15.749-07:00Karma, Harm and Harmlessness<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">The law of karma is inexorable and found in all traditions, and not just Hinduism and Buddhism, from which the notion of karma arose. The well-known saying, "As you sow, so shall you reap," which we read in the <i>New Testament</i> at Galatians 6:7, is clearly an expression of the universal law of karma. <br />
<br />
"Every sin must be paid for, (and) all karmic debt must be paid," points out the late Unity minister, <a href="http://spiritualblissblog.blogspot.com/2011/07/eric-butterworth-discover-power-within.html">Eric Butterworth</a>. "However," he notes, "the choice is ours whether we work it out in the cycle of retribution, through profound suffering in the 'furnace of affliction,' or whether our payment of debt is through the discipline of rising above the consciousness from which the act was committed into the freedom of spiritual understanding where we go forth and 'sin no more.'"<br />
<div style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">[Butterworth, "<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0061723797/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399369&creativeASIN=0061723797">Discover the Power Within You:</a></i>," p. 137.]</span></div><br />
Addressing the corrosive effects of bad kharma (or action), the great sage, <a href="http://spiritualblissblog.blogspot.com/2011/09/yoga-and-concentration-of-mind.html">Patanjali</a> observed:<br />
<blockquote>"The obstacles to yoga - such as acts of violence and untruth - may be created or indirectly caused or approved, they may be motivated by greed, anger or self-interest, they may be small, moderate or great, but they never cease to result in pain and ignorance. One should overcome disturbing thoughts by remembering this." (Yoga Sutra II:34)</blockquote>"Everything we do, say, or think, or even indirectly cause or passively sanction," writes Swami Prabhavananda, "Will inevitably produce consequences - good, bad, or composite - and these consequences will react in some measure upon ourselves."<br />
<br />
"Our most secret ill-wishes towards others," he continues, "our remotest permission of evil done to others, can only end by hurting us, by increasing our own ignorance and pain. This is an absolute law of Nature. If we could remember it always, we should learn to control our tongues and our thoughts."<br />
<br />
Again, Patanjali observes:<br />
<blockquote>"When a man becomes steadfast in his abstention from harming others, then all living creatures will cease to feel enmity in his presence."</blockquote> Elaborating upon this concept of <i>ahimsa </i>(or, harmlessness), the inevitable corollary of karma, Swami Prabhavananda notes that we have become so used to using the word "harmless" in a deprecating and even "derogatory sense" that "it has become almost synonymous with ineffectual." "Yet," Prabhavananda points out, "the perfected harmlessness of the saint is by no means ineffectual, it is a positive psychological force of tremendous power."<br />
<br />
"When a man has truly and entirely renounced violence in his own thoughts and in his dealings with others," Prabhavnanda remarks, "he begins to create an atmosphere around himself within which violence and enmity must cease to exist because they find no reciprocation."<br />
<div style="text-align: right;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">[Prabhavananda and Isherwood, "<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0874810418/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399369&creativeASIN=0874810418">How to Know God</a></i>," pp. 146-148.]</span></div><br />
<br />
Thus, what we sow with our thoughts <i>and in our consciousness</i> has the potential for either harm or good, and "as we sow, so shall we reap." It is not just what we say or do that brings about <a href="http://spiritualblissblog.blogspot.com/2011/07/blocking-out-god-obstacles-to-yoga.html">"bad karma,"</a> but rather who we <i>are</i> in our inner Being.<br />
<br />
</div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-8417215634440168822011-09-02T01:12:00.000-07:002011-09-23T06:46:04.397-07:00Suffering and the End of Suffering<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">The central teaching of Buddhism is that to the unenlightened being life <i>is</i> suffering, that there are specific causes of suffering, that there is an end to suffering if these causes are overcome, and that there is a specific path to the working out of these root causes and thus to the ending of suffering. Called the Four Noble Truths, this teaching of the Buddha is perhaps the earliest and most explicit teaching of how suffering works as the soil and water that nourishes spiritual growth. As one famous spiritual writer put it: 'When we are suffering we are really being blessed, but we do not recognize it at the time.'<br />
<br />
"You won't be able to surrender," notes preeminent spiritual teacher,<a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/04/tolle-and-oprah-new-earth-webinar.html"> Eckhart Tolle</a> (in the video, below), "unless you are completely fed up with suffering, (unless) you have had enough suffering, and at some level you recognize that most of your suffering is self created."<br />
<br />
"Suffering is a wonderful teacher; (it) is most people's only teacher," he points out. "Suffering deepens you. It gradually erodes the mind-made sense of self, the ego. And for some people the point arises where they realize, "I have suffered enough.""<br />
<br />
Not only is the message of suffering and the end of suffering the central tenet of Buddhism, Tolle notes, it is also a central teaching of Christianity. "Finding the Pearl of Great Price, finding the Kingdom of Heaven that is within you, here and now, as Jesus says, is of course the ending of suffering. So one could say that you need suffering for you to realize, to come to point of realization, that you do not need to suffer anymore."<br />
<br />
That one needs to suffer in order to come to the realization that one no longer needs to suffer, is as Tolle puts it, the "great paradox" that drives spiritual growth. One finds in time, however, that one can sincerely strive to live a life of the spirit without the necessity of constantly being bludgeoned into that position by painful struggle. That, Tolle would probably agree, is the beginning of the end of the small, <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/08/ego-identification-and-attachment.html">ego-self</a>.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="345" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/5_eASmGTd00" width="420"></iframe></div><br />
</div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-76531479265729166042011-08-31T09:43:00.000-07:002011-09-23T06:48:06.927-07:00One-On-One with Adyashanti<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtfGIvCVUskbzBysmxuseRjuhN5UCnRf2tvmp0qJUrZwuZtpi7AkcoHgDVmKEt8qzUlGDZiFHzafMrvOqg_wlFQeA9F_-XemDoZnMm0OF-pCaVOWhcttl5q-kRvOGVkVPcStAu8culs_kX/s1600/zenGarden2.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtfGIvCVUskbzBysmxuseRjuhN5UCnRf2tvmp0qJUrZwuZtpi7AkcoHgDVmKEt8qzUlGDZiFHzafMrvOqg_wlFQeA9F_-XemDoZnMm0OF-pCaVOWhcttl5q-kRvOGVkVPcStAu8culs_kX/s200/zenGarden2.png" width="135" /></a></div>In a far-ranging, in-depth interview Renate McNay, co-host of <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/conscioustv">Conscious TV</a>, explores the life and experiences of neo-Buddhist teacher Adyashanti. Starting from his childhood spiritual inklings, McNay draws out the story of this popular author and teacher's ongoing spiritual awakening.<br />
<br />
Particularly interesting, for those who may have experienced their own awakening and yet continue their search for ultimate enlightenment, <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/05/enlightenment-is-not-complex.html">Adyashanti</a> describes a plethora of ever-deepening experiences after what he calls "the honeymoon of awakening" wore off. Not for the faint-hearted, perhaps, Adyashanti explores the depths that exist beyond "the perfume of self" and describes (as far as such experiences can be described) what happened to him as he entered into what McNay describes as "the Divine Coma."<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPP5kpaMBOp4YVNMPJOEiiHu8bc8AtznNdiBfEaLunkdT88FT5S8GTFdSJ2zK0XFl0ajHoPRPaEEULcOkXU02kSTeVAFl3f1PWikhZJ0MDv3X03ey1BQa9VNgSD_BUkzrDT7VAAU1CVHz9/s1600/spiritualPath.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPP5kpaMBOp4YVNMPJOEiiHu8bc8AtznNdiBfEaLunkdT88FT5S8GTFdSJ2zK0XFl0ajHoPRPaEEULcOkXU02kSTeVAFl3f1PWikhZJ0MDv3X03ey1BQa9VNgSD_BUkzrDT7VAAU1CVHz9/s320/spiritualPath.png" width="213" /></a></div>Trying to illustrate what happened when "consciousness completely woke up," Adyashanti describes it as being "like the 'knowing' that was dawning then was that 'knowing' arises from 'this,' (then) that 'oneness' arises from 'this,' (and then) that 'knowing of oneness' arises from 'this.'" It is, he says, as if one experienced an infinity of nothingness and then got rid of the nothingness itself.<br />
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"What I would call the ultimate," says Adyashanti, "is that which is inconceivable, unexperiencable, it cannot come into any of the categories we usually put it in."<br />
<br />
"If you take something and you then you take absolute emptiness, nothingness, and then you go really completely outside of duality - something and nothing - what," he asks, "is there when there is not even nothing?" Neither mind, nor experience, nor imagination can go there, he notes. But yet, he notes 'it' is there. "If there is a defining characteristic," says Adyashanti, "it is the 'unknowability' that is the defining characteristic."<br />
<br />
And yet, Adyashanti points out, having realized this ultimate <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/03/we-all-suffer.html">ground of being</a>, the experiences of an ever-deepening understanding do not stop. "'It' itself has an infinite capacity to reveal itself," he notes. "We can call that revealing of itself 'deepening,' 'never-ending,' or as the Buddhists would say, 'always being, always becoming.'" "There is," he concludes, "never more nor less of it."<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="460" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/lUTF8n_WJko" width="560"></iframe></div><br />
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</div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-1100315013077724022011-08-29T17:21:00.000-07:002011-08-29T17:21:36.627-07:00Lower Self, Higher Self, No Self<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeuCKrSZ4FulZRxkbBsSdZcu7UA31SaZBMvR2Gg3ZPk_ylWEICDw21CT82qWlE7brlZQxbOM-JO8_E1dZa9e6GXR9H368aZ1rQl-HUl7fOffOHZKqX2SLEWeq0a_72jWpxelLkpT9-LwR3/s1600/zenImage2.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="305" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeuCKrSZ4FulZRxkbBsSdZcu7UA31SaZBMvR2Gg3ZPk_ylWEICDw21CT82qWlE7brlZQxbOM-JO8_E1dZa9e6GXR9H368aZ1rQl-HUl7fOffOHZKqX2SLEWeq0a_72jWpxelLkpT9-LwR3/s320/zenImage2.png" width="320" /></a></div><i>Thirty spokes join at the hub;</i><br />
<i>their use for the cart </i><br />
<i>is where they are not.</i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
<i>When the potter's wheel makes a pot,</i><br />
<i>the use of the pot</i><br />
<i>is precisely where there is nothing.</i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
<i>When you open doors and windows for a room,</i><br />
<i>it is where there is nothing</i><br />
<i>that they are useful to the room..</i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
<i>Therefore being is for benefit,</i><br />
<i>Nonbeing is for usefulness.</i><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><i>-- Lao Tzu --</i><br />
("<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0062502166/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=trazendenthep-20&linkCode=as2&camp=217145&creative=399369&creativeASIN=0062502166">The Essential Tao</a></i>")<i></i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><b>* * * * * * * * * * * * *</b></div><br />
<div style="text-align: left;">"The image of the wheel that is not too tight on its axle and not too loose," says Allan Watts, "that is really <i>with</i> the axle, is the Zen principle of not being attached, not being <i>sticky</i>. It is very difficult for us to function in that way," he points out, "because we have been brought up to believe that there are two sides to ourselves. - one the animal side, and the other the human and civilized side." <br />
<br />
"These are expressed," he observes, "in what Freud calls 'the pleasure principle' which he classifies with the animal side, the Id, and the other the 'reality principle' which he puts on the side of society and the Super-Ego. And man is so split, that he is in a constant fight between these two."<br />
<br />
"Theosophists," Watts notes, "sometimes speak of our having two selves: the Higher Self which is spiritual, and the lower self which is merely psychic - the ego. And therefore the problem of life is to make one self, the higher one, take hold of the other like a rider takes charge of a horse."</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkVMFI5H4cPxxHlX5UUu048aftgwYjVJncetEGnJiefxrg-pW3r7Tu5GgNsBIxc-bELa6Kc9-ThCB1glNYNojGcSHDyXndyrNYnaYSo3uoNFsQvYZIC919m63m1WABsi6_Y2I_L3K14OlX/s1600/zenImage1.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkVMFI5H4cPxxHlX5UUu048aftgwYjVJncetEGnJiefxrg-pW3r7Tu5GgNsBIxc-bELa6Kc9-ThCB1glNYNojGcSHDyXndyrNYnaYSo3uoNFsQvYZIC919m63m1WABsi6_Y2I_L3K14OlX/s320/zenImage1.png" width="303" /></a>"(However) in Zen," he points out, "a duality between higher self and lower self is not made. Because if you believe in the higher self, this is a simple trick of the lower self. If you believe that there really is no lower self, that there is only the higher self but that somehow or other the higher self has to shine through, the very fact that you think it has to try to shine through still gives validity to the lower self."<br />
<br />
On the other hand, he notes: "If you think you have a lower self or an ego to get rid of and then you fight against it, nothing strengthens the delusion that it exists more than that. So this tremendous schizophrenia amongst human beings of thinking that they are rider and horse, soul in command of body, or will in control of passions wrestling with them, all that kind of split thing simply aggravates the problem and we get more and more split."<br />
<br />
"And so," he points out, "we have all sorts of people engaged in an interior conflict which they will never ever resolve. Because the true self, either you know it or you don't. If you do know it, than you know that it is the only one, and the other so-called lower self just ceases to be a problem.<i> </i>It becomes something like a mirage, and you don't go around hitting them with a stick or putting reins on them, you just know that they are mirages and walk straight through them<i>."</i><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><br />
<b>* * * * * * * * * * * * *</b><i><br />
</i></div><i><br />
</i></div><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="443" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/nwHI-CJWsFk" width="540"></iframe></div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-86446804774815973722011-08-28T10:14:00.000-07:002011-08-28T10:14:30.725-07:00The "Fictitious Self" or Ego<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPDVjQTly12fZT2lNZfsZ-kdig1ahnsC14_-Wwxp8WgglwKggzu2ZdWgjlKCELa3LuNShVhtOexeh5hzpAloGgMousOfhBwwDr-0L_f2pgXzle8SCsLROz1PxafSFQmBBufIav9Rfi5HFA/s1600/buddha4.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPDVjQTly12fZT2lNZfsZ-kdig1ahnsC14_-Wwxp8WgglwKggzu2ZdWgjlKCELa3LuNShVhtOexeh5hzpAloGgMousOfhBwwDr-0L_f2pgXzle8SCsLROz1PxafSFQmBBufIav9Rfi5HFA/s200/buddha4.png" width="153" /></a></div>The greatest insight in human history, according to spiritual teacher and best-selling author, <a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/04/tolle-and-oprah-new-earth-webinar.html">Eckhart Tolle</a>, may have been when the Buddha recognized that the "self" is an illusion. Calling this egoic sense of 'me' and 'mine' the "fictitious self," Tolle illustrates how this seeming separation of one from another is a form of "<a href="http://spiritualtranzendence.blogspot.com/2011/06/carl-jung-religious-experience-and.html">collective insanity</a>" and the source, as the Buddha recognized, of all suffering.<br />
<br />
"But there is a level within yourself," Tolle notes, "where you are already a full expression of the one life. You are already complete on the level of the timeless, the essence of your own being."<br />
<br />
"It is quite a relief," he observes, "to realize that the world cannot make me happy. To demand that situations, people, places or attainments should complete me or make me happy is bound to be frustrating, whether I attain or I do not attain."<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPOLSxS3mmY5464KTF1xI-5_S7ZvtrACKph_tLC3bx-K0RKOKk5ZeQtzme5heNIOWKtKBzW4qAot8s7fUFBSveyFkUuivY6vX_BF202U7GQzzcEvJhq6gbBUHJKyBfTkbdNR6PmTO2RBTK/s1600/zenGarden2.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="133" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPOLSxS3mmY5464KTF1xI-5_S7ZvtrACKph_tLC3bx-K0RKOKk5ZeQtzme5heNIOWKtKBzW4qAot8s7fUFBSveyFkUuivY6vX_BF202U7GQzzcEvJhq6gbBUHJKyBfTkbdNR6PmTO2RBTK/s200/zenGarden2.png" width="100" /></a></div>"(Life) loses its frustration," he notes, "when you do not look to the world anymore for your satisfaction or for your 'self.' When you give up demanding that people, places, (and) situations should make you happy and fulfill you - when you don't demand it anymore - then suddenly the ability arises to allow the forms of this moment to be as they are."<br />
<br />
"Because life at this moment," Tolle points out, "already always is as it is."<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">* * * * * * * * * * * * *</div><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="345" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/aeaWC6y0jFc" width="560"></iframe><br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="345" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/_bRy8GonFrE" width="560"></iframe></div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-86716441052747463832011-08-25T05:01:00.000-07:002011-08-25T05:12:34.859-07:00The New Biology: Where Mind Meets Matter<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio6LnpyMfRlUe8E45mkN8vAjttzpANfGcm6SUmTGjpWN0INyCQjo2mp3ev8BILmtqp0XXcU7iwkFSh4MAgvdTQO5HjC2SmXdWD8kExszfmjViuGPRfNRgFitCmXCoWZN0CT1RQq87xnbok/s1600/evolution+of+Consciousness.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio6LnpyMfRlUe8E45mkN8vAjttzpANfGcm6SUmTGjpWN0INyCQjo2mp3ev8BILmtqp0XXcU7iwkFSh4MAgvdTQO5HjC2SmXdWD8kExszfmjViuGPRfNRgFitCmXCoWZN0CT1RQq87xnbok/s320/evolution+of+Consciousness.png" width="257" /></a></div>The attached two-part lecture by <a href="http://www.brucelipton.com/">Dr. Bruce Lipton</a> will fundamentally change your understanding of the human body, the process of evolution, and perhaps your life. It is that powerful.<br />
<br />
Dr. Lipton, a prize-winning cellular biologist, is a pioneer in the field of epigenetics - the study of heritable changes in gene expression or cellular phenotype caused by mechanisms other than changes in the underlying DNA sequence. <br />
<br />
That we are not simply the product of our genes, but rather the product of our perceptions of the world is a crucial point that Dr. Lipton demonstrates by taking us through the entire cellular and biological mechanisms understood by "the New Biology" - a field informed by quantum rather than classical mechanics. The all-pervading consciousness that exists within our enviroment, it turns out - in biology as in physics - plays the central role in shaping our world, including our bodies.<br />
<br />
Clocking in at roughly three hours, the attached video lecture is nonetheless a truly must-watch documentary, as Dr. Lipton clearly and lucidly explains how changes in the scientific paradigms of biology itself are impacting everything from neo-natal care and disease prevention, to the role of Big Pharma, to the role that spirituality has in optimizing the health and well-being of the individual.<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="427" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/cLl7X5TkF_Q" width="520"></iframe><br />
<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="427" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/LQuSY-eT02Y" width="520"></iframe></div></div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8940123682660282474.post-82689805618058095332011-08-23T15:13:00.000-07:002011-09-23T06:49:17.922-07:00"Right Livelihood" versus "Right Living"<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">What is "right livelihood"? When first exposed to the teachings of the Buddha and the dharma of the Eightfold Path, I was under the assumption that "right livelihood" referred solely to the means by which one made one's living. For example, working as a hangman or in a slaughterhouse, or working as a pimp or pornographer, would be "wrong livelihood" as a result of the harm that such occupations causes to other beings as well as to the state of one's own being. Now, however, I wonder if "right livelihood" does not extend far beyond the mere way one <i>earns a living</i>, but rather extends to the totality of <i>how one lives</i>.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnnOYTiogiaNnhCk1JRCqyYOUQkfkOuoougouDncE-W32nF_nRsNt3Qux2yoQQ_tnBl8npXPPZKYyt_WMrnZJcPq7c8NZURtEUDcUrtQr4ADdMc8nD_FE7W_FTeVq-CkCzLZeCXAnVSlkq/s1600/traffiJam.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnnOYTiogiaNnhCk1JRCqyYOUQkfkOuoougouDncE-W32nF_nRsNt3Qux2yoQQ_tnBl8npXPPZKYyt_WMrnZJcPq7c8NZURtEUDcUrtQr4ADdMc8nD_FE7W_FTeVq-CkCzLZeCXAnVSlkq/s320/traffiJam.png" width="320" /></a></div>In the face of pollution, global warming and a man-made environmental crisis that has resulted in a thousand-fold multiplication of the rate at which whole species become extinct does not the whole impact of how one lives become relevant? If one commutes 100 kilometres a day just to work, does this not speak to whether one has right livelihood? If one eats food that is imported from countries thousands of kilometers away does this not impact others and constitute an unwise way of living? Certainly, these and so many other examples of daily activities that are essential to maintaining our "standard of living" in the West (and increasingly in the East) must impact whether or not we are living wisely.<br />
<br />
There is, of course the traditional dharma strictures on "right action" which consists of avoiding killing, stealing, lying, sexual improprieties and ingestion of intoxicants, but are there not many gray areas that are very much a part of our day-to-day existence that fall outside of these traditional strictures? Perhaps, therefore, it is more relevant in the increasingly interrelated lives we live today to talk of "right living" instead of merely "right livelihood."<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2AdaQF-kNnbMMPY2DZX5NcspjOHomsoCptN5SQbrHxzMlvpLOZqdcgQig1N3J3CUYfn64j6Bo1L6cRI1SA6eDpieVunpLYq2TSSPIDqcdWQqwA1C_qLgLUjFVrSAuI1RkzNCxAE6YKiJM/s1600/UrbanSprawl.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2AdaQF-kNnbMMPY2DZX5NcspjOHomsoCptN5SQbrHxzMlvpLOZqdcgQig1N3J3CUYfn64j6Bo1L6cRI1SA6eDpieVunpLYq2TSSPIDqcdWQqwA1C_qLgLUjFVrSAuI1RkzNCxAE6YKiJM/s320/UrbanSprawl.png" width="320" /></a></div>Living simply in harmony with one's local environment, it would seem, is the key to "right living." Taking public transport rather than one's own vehicle, or walking or bicycling rather than taking public transit, it would seem, is one factor to promote harmony and balance. Living in a small space, rather than a large house is another. Eating locally and organically would be a third of many wise strategies one might uses to maximize a truly wise way of living. Reducing, reusing and recycling the materials one uses is an obvious fourth. Yet, how differently we in the West typically live.<br />
<br />
This is not a wholesale rejection of our modern, technological way of life. As Robert Pirsig observed in his classic work, "<i>Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance</i>:"<br />
<blockquote>" . . . (F)light from and hatred of technology is self-defeating. The Buddha, the Godhead resides quite as comfortably in the circuits of a digital computer or the gears of a (motorcycle) transmission as he does at the top of a mountain or in the petals of a flower. To think otherwise is to demean the Buddha - which is to demean oneself."</blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHXWPtOBlk9A7wdBuSIx6LjEM8wsMKPfrqRAAsEo__65CjXfwVttdzUWEurUJLJPUwOsz8a4eWA3mII1bqJWdkPEZcQAovlA6NEZoJbExF84HAoseYINJeX5csfdWj4Zwut9Oy5Ucj9wBI/s1600/AloneInaCrowd.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="234" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHXWPtOBlk9A7wdBuSIx6LjEM8wsMKPfrqRAAsEo__65CjXfwVttdzUWEurUJLJPUwOsz8a4eWA3mII1bqJWdkPEZcQAovlA6NEZoJbExF84HAoseYINJeX5csfdWj4Zwut9Oy5Ucj9wBI/s320/AloneInaCrowd.png" width="320" /></a></div>When facing the existential crisis that would impel me forward on a spiritual quest for meaning in my life - a path that would open me to the dharma teachings of Buddhism, Taoism and the Advaita Vedanta, along with other spiritual traditions - I was sure of only one thing: unvoiced, I nonetheless I sensed that I wanted to "walk gently through the world and leave only shallow footprints." Yet, how difficult it is, I have found, to live up to that ideal. <br />
<br />
When even the traditional strictures on "right action" and "right livelihood" prove difficult to live up to in this fast-paced, fast-lived, fast-food culture, making a vow to strive for radical "right living" is indeed challenging. Nevertheless, the necessity of a radical change in lifestyle if we are to survive the current existential problems we face makes such an individual (and eventually collective) intention seem inevitable. </div>Bhuddinihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04582636577048530680noreply@blogger.com0