Sunday, October 31, 2004

Still Basically Robots

Desire is not a reaction -- we may have quite varied reactions to it. Curiosity is not a reaction, but an external force. We are not that -- which was here before we learned it. Curiosity exists for the amoeba, and thus for every white corpuscle. And possibly for every cell in our bodies. It is planted in the unborn beings, and for want of a better word we call it instinct. It propels the new-born to look for food, and propels him so relentlessly that there is no chance for the food-seeking to have any origins in deliberate action. Desire is likewise implanted in the being before it is born, and it continues to propel us until the day of our death. It, too, is not something learned, or reasoned out.

Some of us may be generals, priests, or Indian chiefs, but we are still basically robots, hiding beneath elaborate robes the gears that are the signs of our slavery. While we pose as movers of planets.

Saturday, October 30, 2004

The Mind

we are in reality a string of luminous, colored flowers of light and brilliance, forming a general radiance called an aura, which with its chakras is more real than the body which we see. And once more, we find ourselves to be a group of something.

And the deeper we peer into transcendentalism, the closer we approach an inescapable paradox -- that is, if we are anything at all, we are somehow closely related to everything.

The Unmanifested Mind is not demonstrable. The technique for studying it is. If you would see the true source of illusion, instead of living vicariously on the screen of the theatre, follow the light back through the lens of the projector. When we observe the observer, we sense several things. One is that we have been in a dream state, and must return to a dream state as long as we are in this body. We observe also that the Dream State is very real, in that it is for us the only life for us until we awaken. And it is inescapable that we must deduce that dream-life is a real manifestation of some agency within ourselves that acts as a creator. It is as though we were born with a false face, which all through life we accepted as our true face, because it was all we knew as a face, and because our friends accepted it as true. The face would literally have to fall off by accident for us to know that it was not our true self.
http://www.tatfoundation.org/forum2002-07.htm#1

Friday, October 29, 2004

A Gateway Within


In the spiritual search, the quest for true self-definition, we soon come to the realization that our best efforts, and even our very selves, are mechanical and reactive. No matter how subtle or astute our meditation may be, we will never realize nirvana by using yet another facet of samsara. A different level of seeing is needed, a pure awareness that is not itself a product of the world or mind, but primary to the reaction pattern we call ourselves. A looking which is attentive, yet not reactive. A listening which is not affected by circumstance and the constant changes of the mind. Such an attention would lie outside of time and space, beyond circumstance, yet be aware of them as well as itself. Such a Listening Attention would also be directly connected to the formless inner realm of our True Self, and provide a Gateway to Within. www.home.mindspring.com/~bferge/gateway.htm

Wednesday, October 27, 2004

Road to the Divine

Door to Ways and Means on the Spiritual Path
The Search for Spiritual Truth can be an elusive and exhausting battle. The need for self-definition and self-knowledge is rare and seldom valued in today's society. In other words, we need all the help we can get. Through this site I hope to offer a few simple and effective tools for turning one's life into a living prayer : ways and means on the practical road to the Divine.
http://www.mysticmissal.org/

Tuesday, October 26, 2004

You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it will be yours for the entire period of this time around.
You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called Life. Each day in this school you will have the opportunity to learn lessons. You may like the lessons or think them irrelevant and stupid.
There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of trial and error: Experimentation. The "failed" experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiment that ultimately "works."
A lesson is repeated until learned. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can then go on to the next lesson.
Learning lessons does not end. There is no part of life that does not contain its lessons. If you are alive, there are lessons to be learned.
"There" is no better than "here." When your "there" has become "here," you will simply obtain another "there" that will again look better than "here."
Others are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects something you love or hate about yourself.
What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.
Your answers lie inside you. The answers to Life's questions lie inside you. All you need to do is look, listen, and trust.
You will forget all this. Cheri Carter -Scott

Monday, October 25, 2004

Knowing Source

I was told:
Recognise your source as being from Divine origin. When you do this with self, you will realise that all others have their deepest feelings nestled in Divine source. When compassion for all, and understanding of all, is achieved upon this plane, unconditional love will be for all creatures, and peace shall truly reign upon your planet.
When love is without duty, but purely from the heart, it is well towards becoming unconditional. Serving through love is Divine. Let your deepest feelings be your guide. Feel with your whole being. Do not block feelings. Let them exist and be. Acknowledge them. All feelings are part of the whole. All have their roots in Divine source. Allow the feelings which are deepest to emerge into the light and they will be transformed by the love of God.
Every creature seeks for love. That is the essence of all life. When total unconditional love is achieved, all things upon your planet will be healed. Give with your whole heart. There is naught you cannot achieve when you give with love. Love is a force stronger than any others. Compassion and love go hand in hand. Let understanding be your guide. Allow the light to enter all phases of your being and let it shine for all . .
http://www.blogger.com/app/post.pyra?blogID=8283638

Sunday, October 24, 2004

True Love

True Love is when we let all things pass through us without judgement, in total acceptance and allowance. It is through this that we learn to love ourselves unconditionally, and thus we learn to love all that is around us, all people and things that are within our light as we radiate it outwards to the world.
We often criticize and fault others because we feel unworthy ourselves and we try to fault others to make them feel unworthy too. So many of us are brought up with criticism, which makes us feel worth-less. We are children of God and as such are worthy of Love. We have to realise our worthiness and we will come to realise our full potential and why we chose to incarnate when we did, and also why we chose our own particular circumstances. We will then begin to learn the lessons in life we came to learn.

Saturday, October 23, 2004

Seeking God

Intelligence has created life for a purpose. I believe we are born into this world to learn to evolve spiritually into our true nature. Every experience we have, we are learning in some way. We are all part of the Intelligence which is called God. There are many names which are used to describe this intelligence - God, Source, Universal energy, the Universe, the All-That-Is and many others. Whatever you call this Oneness with Source, it matters not. We are all part of It. We are as much a part of this Source as any other human being or, in fact, any part of nature or the planet, or the universes themselves. Everything that exists is God. There is nothing that is not God. You may find this hard to accept if you were brought up with a religious background, seeing God as a separate being sitting on a throne in heaven, but the great masters throughout time have told us that all life is experience of God Source.

Spiritual Selves


Before we come into this physical dimension we were spirit. Our souls have always existed as part of the Creative force. They were from the beginning of the world, and will be still when the world has passed away. We are far more than our physical bodies!. We are told we have lived many, many lives, and each time we die in the physical sense, we are given an opportunity to view our past mistakes. We see what we failed to do, or how we may have hurt someone, or infringed on their free-will through trying to control them or bend them to our ways. Sometimes the omittance of doing something is the greater error. To make amends for these past 'mistakes' we are given an opportunity to be born into circumstances which allow us the chance to alleviate our 'wrongs' and so give our soul another chance to grow into its true oneness with itself. The circumstances we are born into, reflect the amount of learning we have completed in life.
http://www.gla.ac.uk/~gbza22/ench1.html

Friday, October 22, 2004

Where are You going?

Do you think you will automatically go to a spiritual place after death? Will you have the drive and capacity to determine your fate and direction when the body/mind dissolves? Do you know yourself that well? What will you have for guidance? Or will the unconscious desires and fears of today, which you may not be aware of or admit to, control your fate?
After our death, we may not find ourselves in Happy Heaven, as we might wish, but instead in a place formed by our true motivations, whether we were conscious of them or not. Instead of getting an eternity at The Warm-Fuzzies Fun Park, the more accurate scenario may be akin to when we fall asleep at night, letting go of our so-called conscious control and helplessly entering the world of dreams. This could be likened to the Tibetan concept of the bardo, with the experience of lucid dreaming (knowing we are dreaming while in a dream) thrown in to boot. In other words, if you can't wake up to Reality now, what makes you think you ever will? This dream world or bardo you may find yourself in would become the current dream or 'reality' in which you again act out your previously formed nature. Whether any of this is fact or fiction isn't the point. What is being asked is, do you know and trust yourself well enough to face death and what it might bring?
http://home.mindspring.com/~bferge/id27.htm#the_hi_jacking_of_thought_the_paradox

Accept the pain of the ego in its fear of death, and look at its root. Look at the fear, the need to run away into distraction and thought. Stay focused, quiet and brave, and allow yourself to be in the moment. After a time, you will come to know this direction, the way within, and will come to look at your troubles as opportunities for further meditation. The sense of being the doer or subject will fade, the attention will be freed, and thought will be seen for the reaction it is. Motion and mind will no longer be your 'self', and listening with attention will be valued more than plotting. This is true meditation, and the road Home.

Thursday, October 21, 2004

The Blanket

I joined classmates about 5 years ago when there were only 20 people from my class at bonita,and no one from gladstone yet!I just upgraded it to the paying membership,and have gotten in touch with quite a few long lost friends from glendora,as well as la verne.People like the girl whos mom was my babysitter two doors north of us on prospero drive,denise ..she told me her mom had passed away in 1995,but still talked about how tall and handsom I had grown up.I hadent seen denise since I moved away in 1971,but the years melted away.We got to talking,and then she sent me a suprise package she thought I would like..It was a handmade afghan quilt her mom had made,one of two unsed in a box that she had after her sisters death..I wrapped myself in it and felt the love of this women still in it,and around me..and cried..you see,her mom had gotten sick of denise and I fighting over my blue blanket,she cut it in half,and gave each of us 1 half..I was mortified,and my mom was pissed..But I guess we got over it,cause were both still here,and I never realized what a good thing that women did for me till then,stopping a boy from carrying around a comfort blanket,just like linus did in the peanuts charicters.Denise hadent even rememberd the incident,just thought I was the one person on the planet that could appreciate the quilt besides herself..She never knew how right she was! I loved her mom Vivian,and feel this was a gift from her across the eons of time!Thanks to both of them for making me a better person.. and for this gift of love from both of them.

Nobility

true nobility is not about being better than anyone else -- it's about being better than you used to be.
http://www.drwaynedyer.com/articles/

Tuesday, October 19, 2004

tibetian book of the dead

The Bardo,translated as The Tibetan Book of the Dead, for centuries it was passed down orally. This ancient text was first put into written form by the legendary Padma Sambhava in the 8th century A.D. Translated, Bardo Thodol means "liberation by hearing on the after death plane". The book acts as a guide for the dead during the state that intervenes death and the next rebirth.
This scripture (The Bardo Thotrol) from Tibetan Buddhism was traditionally read aloud to the dying to help them attain liberation. It guides a person to use the moment of death to recognize the nature of mind and attain liberation.
It teaches that awareness once freed from the body, creates its own reality like that of a dream. This dream projection unfolds in predictable ways in ways both frightening and beautiful. Peaceful and wrathful visions appear, and these visions can be overwhelming. Since the awareness is still in shock of no longer being attached to and shielded by a body, it needs guidance and forewarning so that key decisions that lead to enlightenment are made. The Tibetan Book of the Dead teaches how one can attain heavenly realms by recognizing the enlightened realms as opposed to being drawn into the realms of seduction that pull incorporeal awareness into cyclic suffering.
An interesting sidenote: Some of the concepts in the Tibetan Book of the Dead can be found in The Gospel of Mary Magdalene.

a guide to visiters

Once a month, A Guide To Visitors presents a curated selection of real life stories. You know those stories you hear at bars or dinner parties, from friends or strangers? The ones that haunt you for days? We spend all month finding these stories and then present them to you. On stage, not by actors, but by the people themselves. Each month, you get a half dozen stories served up fresh n' piping hot!
http://www.aguidetovisitors.org/about.html

Monday, October 18, 2004

flying free

Flying Free
Can you feel the sun
Feel it beat down on your face
If you got some time
We can leave this world without a trace
At our own pace
Feeling like a newborn child
Just cut the chains of routine
Look my way and I’ll show you how to fly
If you hunger for new freedom
Wanna breed a new season
Leave away your self-tragedy
We’re gonna be flying
Gonna be flying free
Can you feel your soul climb
Climbing through the misty moonlight
Reaching a new high
Viewing the world from a whole new sight
Such a delicate fright
Swinging from the edge of irony
Break off from the blind herd
Tough a nerve and you’ll never have to die
So you hunger for new freedom
Wanna live for a new reason
Forget the burned self-imagery
We’re gonna be flying
Gonna be flying free
Can you feel the need
The need for a sense of knowing
Is it fantasy
Or will the hope just come flowing
Ever so glowing
Soaring through the sounds of yearning
No longer bound by common rule
We are free and we know how to fly
So you hunger for new freedom
Had to end your mind’s treason
Look around you can you see
For we are now flying
We are now flying free
©1994 Astral Plane
http://www.joerenzetti.com/main.html

Sunday, October 17, 2004

The illusion of self

The world is but a show, glittering and empty. It is, and yet it is not. It is there as long as I want to see it and take part in it. When I cease caring, it dissolves. It has no cause and serves no purpose. It just happens when we are absent-minded. It appears exactly as it looks, but there is no depth in it, nor meaning. Only the onlooker is real, call him Self or Atma. To the Self, the world is but a colourful show, which he enjoys as long as it lasts and forgets when it is over. Whatever happens on the stage makes him shudder in terror or roll with laughter, yet all the time he is aware that it is but a show. Without desire or fear, he enjoys it, as it happens.
http://www.nonduality.com/asmi9.htm
There comes an end time when our creators will supposedly return - Jesus - aliens - among others depending which program of thought you follow. At this time there will be a judgement - balance needed after which the souls move on - into another reality of light and higher frequency of thought and understanding - where the emotional nonsense that drives people crazy in the third dimension - ceases to exist and all is understood. We sense that time approaching.
http://crystalinks.com/atlantisellie.html

Saturday, October 16, 2004

True Wisdom

Wisdom tells me I'm Nothing.Love tells me I'm Everything.Between the two my life flows. Nisargadatta

Friday, October 15, 2004

Phantom Limb Pain is another name for rsds,which is what I am fighting!

A Phantom Arm & A Bizarre Experience My right leg seems trapped in time and space, at a day and place long ago. Along the leg runs a large scar that always tingles in the background of my consciousness, and which tightens into fear whenever I focus attention there. Yes, it is unmistakable fear, in memory of the event itself, and it is localized at the scar. How can fear be in a scar? I don't know. I can only tell you that's where it is. If anything touches the scar, my leg wants to pull away from the touch. This occurs and over-rules my reason. It simply happens. It is all a phantom of the mind.Such phantoms are not unique to me. People have experienced them for thousands of years, but they received a name only in the Nineteenth Century. The Civil War was a gruesome conflict. My ancestor, Captain David Stewart, 28th Iowa Volunteer Infantry, spent part of the war as a field surgeon. He reached a point when he could no longer look at another gangrened leg, or another soldier quite literally biting the bullet to keep from screaming in pain as a limb was sawn through. Preferring being shot to cutting off another leg, Captain Stewart asked for a transfer to combat. I understand why. I have seen the saw he used for amputation. Its teeth could as easily cut through a tree limb. After the Civil War, tens of thousands of soldiers had amputated limbs and told doctors of strange experiences. Silas Weir Mitchell, a Philadelphia physician, coined the phrase "phantom limb" shortly after the conflict, and did so to explain the phantoms that the veterans described. Fearing ridicule from colleagues, he published anonymously in a popular magazine, Lippincott's Journal, wherein he described the phenomenon. In the century and a half since, phantom limb syndrome has become part of medical and psychological literature.Older medical journals contain hundreds of fascinating case studies. Some of the described phenomena have been confirmed repeatedly and still need an explanation. In one case, a patient experienced a vivid phantom arm soon after amputation, which is normal, and in a few weeks he developed a peculiar, gnawing sensation in his phantom, which is not normal. He was quite puzzled by the these new sensations and asked his Army doctor about them, but the physician couldn't help. The veteran finally asked, "Whatever happened to my arm after you removed it?" The doctor told him to ask the surgeon.The veteran did just that. The surgeon replied, "Oh, we usually send the limbs to the morgue." The man asked the morgue and asked, "What do you do with amputated arms?" They replied, "We send them either to the incinerator or to pathology. Usually we incinerate them." "Well, what did you do with my arm?" They looked at their records and said, "You know, it's funny. We didn't incinerate it. We sent it to pathology."The man asked the pathology lab. "Where is my arm?" They said, "Well, we had too many arms, so we just buried it in the garden, out behind the hospital."They took him to the garden and showed him where the arm was buried. When he exhumed it, he found it crawling with maggots and exclaimed, "Maybe that's why I'm feeling these bizarre sensations in my arm." He took the limb and incinerated it. His phantom pain disappeared permanently.
There are two points here. One is that the mind, the psyche, this body of feeling and thought and so on, which is peripheral to Who I am, doesn't necessarily vanish at death. The evidence is overwhelming that it may hang around in time.... In any case, it's rather brief, and I would say, at the end of Douglas's shelf life, enough is enough. Let me off being that one.
On the other hand, Who I really am has no future and no past. One is eternal now. One is not in time at all. This is the Timeless. This is what one is.
However, it is the nature of Timelessness to manifest in time, and I suppose the idea of reincarnation has a certain amount of truth in it -- that the One Who I really am is forever incarnating and will continue to do so. But that's all I can say. I'll report further when more evidence comes in!
I think of death very frequently. One has to die daily. The skillful thing is that you put in a lot of homework before you actually find yourself on your deathbed. You'll need it then.
http://www.selfdiscoveryportal.com/gtViews.htm
Douglas Harding