Not Having Problems

 

You are not having problems.  You are thinking you are having problems.

Michael A. Singer

Most of us pray to God to solve our problems. But where are the problems?  In the mind only. 

That line above seems to be crucial to understanding things as they are.  Yet, most of us with our narrow focus on "me and my life" view the world through the eyes of our stored stuff.  That stored stuff or samskara layer (personal mind) gets triggered, arises, and distorts our perceptions of the world.  We react in turn. More "problems" seem to arise "out there" that we store "in here" and we assume it is the world that is the problem. 

It looks like the world is dirty and problematic when it is simply our mind that is. From this problematic personal mind we pray.  We pray, "I want this.  I don't want that. Please help me with my preferences." Hmmm! Our prayer, our relationship with God, is based on a self concept.

Why would you have a self concept.  You are the Self. You are the universe staring at this cage of your mind. 

Michael A. Singer

All is well. 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe (January 29, 2024) Exploring Prayer and Beyond. https://tou.org/talks/

Letting Things Flow Naturally...

Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don't resist them.  That only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in any way they like. 

Lao Tzu 

Speaking of flowing naturally....

I am sitting here trying to write through eyes that are swollen and constantly running while I reach for a tissue every two seconds. I can't see....the pressure in my sinuses is so annoying, even my teeth and jaws ache.  I caught a common cold...well by the fever and body aches maybe it is a flue...regardless I have a common virus making inself at home in my body. My mind tells me that it is not a good time for this uninvited guest to show up, in the sense I have important plans at work tomorrow ( the little job I have taken on two mornings a week)...Yet, I know unless it gets miraculously better by tomorrow morning, I will not be able to bring this into the school, nor will I be able to function effectively if I do. Much to mind's annoyance, I have to utter the dreaded words..."I am sick!"  Well let me rephrase that, "I am presently dealing with a cold or flue."  (We are not our temporary or even chronic illnesses, we are simply experiencing them). 

Anyway, I have learned through my practice to handle such bodily experiences.  Instead of resisting and pushing myself past symptoms, as I have done for years...I now stop, notice, allow, observe, and experience what my body is doing in response to things like this  initially "unwelcome" guest.  I get curious, almost fascinated at times. I observe and I experience. 

As Daniel J. Seigel writes in, Becoming Aware...observing and experiencing are two totally different actions of consciousness. When we observe we witness and narrate our way through, as if at a distance, and when we experience we allow and sense the entire illness. We  "become a conduit directing the flow [of sensation]into consciousness." page 5

I Observe

I begin by taking the "unwelcome" label away from this unplanned for visitation. I chose to refer to the virus as a "guest", and my body as the host while I simply observe the process. I do not resist it or deny its presence.  Afterall, I cannot change the reality of this situation. I cannot turn back the clock to the beginning of its incubation period and stop the exposure from happening. The reality is, I was exposed. The body may resist the invasion, as it is programmed to do, but "I" do not resist. I accept the fact that the virus found a way into this body and it proliferated through the prodromal period. And now, becasue of my very active immune system's intention to make my body inhospitable for this virus, the body is now experiencing the illness stage. I am aware the illness stage, like all phenomena in Life,  is only temporary and that there will soon be a stage of decline, followed by convalescence.  It is pretty darned interesting, don't you think?  "I" witness and observe the process with great curiosity. 

 Then I experience what this bug and my immune system are doing to this body "I" am in, without thought. I allow myself to feel the symptoms. When mind is not in the way of saying, "Oh no this shouldn't be! This is awful!" the experience is not so bad.  Not "pleasant", for sure, but I find, without resistance, the experience of acute illness goes from "unpleasant" to " almost "neutral".  (Not completely neutral for me yet, lol...but getting there). 

I am seeing through this observation and experience of a common ailment all human bodies are prone to, that I am learning to handle reality.  Everything in life, including illness, is a learning opportunity. What are we here to learn?  Everything...but mostly how to handle reality so we can evolve and go with the flow of Life while we are here. 

Wow!

All is well

Daniel J, Seigal (2021) becoming aware. New York: Tarcher/Perigee.

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe (January 29, 2024) Why We Ignore the Rest of the Universe. https://tou.org/talks/

Space Inside the Cup?

 

In order to learn about Zen, you must first empty your cup.

Zen Koan

There is an old story, relayed by Tolle and many others, about a university professor, well studied and versed in the Buddhist sutras and texts, who wanted to learn more about Zen from an actual Master. He visited Nan-in for an interview.

He was graciously invited in and, as was Japanese tradition, offered tea which he accepted somewhat reluctantly. He really just wanted Nan-in to jump in right away to give him more knowledge about this ancient Buddhist tradition that had become his learning obsession. But not wanting to offend his host, he sat himself down on the floor beside Nan-in and waited for Nan-in to pour the tea. Nan-in pulled up his long sleeve, picked up the steaming kettle, and began to pour tea into the professor's cup. He poured, and poured, and poured. Before long the tea, much to the professor's astonishment, was pouring over the side of the cup. Just as the tea was pouring over the saucer and onto the bamboo pad  beneath it, the professor shouted, "Stop! Can't you see the cup is full?  It can't hold anymore." 

Nan-in quietly and gracefully put down the kettle and turned to the  professor, "Yes", Nan-in said."It is just like your mind. It is too full.  It is flowing over.  In order for me to teach you Zen, you must first empty your cup."  

Wow!

How empty is your mind right now? Is it as full of thoughts, ideas, beliefs, assumptions, judgments, doctrine, dogma and learning as mine is? Most of our minds are already too full of information  to absorb more. Yet, many of us are on a never-ending quest for more knowledge to stuff into these minds. We fail to realize, we can not truly learn anything new ...especially about Zen, which is the understanding of Shunyata or emptiness/spaciousness....until we empty our minds to make more space in there.  Spirituality, in fact, is all about removing mind stuff...not adding to it.

Let's make space inside for what is truly important.

Hmm!  Anyway, love this little tale that Eckhart Tolle shared today.

All is well. 

Eckhart Tolle ( January, 2024) The Journey to Spiritual Awakening: Beyond Thinking. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3kcOM3eDDE

Ariel and Shyla Kane/Inspire Me Today ( November, 2014) The Zen Master and the College Professor: Letting Go of What You "Know". https://inspiremetoday.com/blog/zen-master-college-professor-letting-go-know/

Gloveworx (March, 2017) The Story of a Simple Cup of Tea.https://www.gloveworx.com/blog/simple-cup-of-tea-

Stop Personalizing...

 You are the one that is making it personal...

Michael A. Singer

Are you okay with what is?  Are you okay with what might or might not happen up ahead? Most of us are not okay with reality. We spend most of our lives creating and attempting to preserve this false little idea we have of who we are, assuming that the world out there should make us feel comfortable in here as we do that. The world cannot and should not live up to these huge expectations we place upon it.  We erroneously believe the world is here to serve  "me and my story"and when it doesn't we get upset. We think there is something wrong with the world.

Michael Singer reminds us that we will know that we have awakened when the world and all that is in it runs right through us. When we are not stopping it with our clinging or our resistance to what is and our foolish notion that the world is here to serve us, we will experience something amazing.  When we put away the personalization tendency and see, and accept the world as it is, we are awake. 

I was asked a question in the video exercise I have been doing related to this topic.  The main point I make in that video echoes what Singer shares in his podcast below..."Stop personalizing the Universe! It isn't here for "me".  

The "I" ,"I  am" beneath this notion of "me"....is simply here to experience everything about the small speck of universe it gets to experience.  Wow! How lucky we are to be able to do that.  We experience this Self when we stop focusing on this this little "me and my story!" and embrace the all of reality.

All is well. 

Michael Singer/ Temple of the Universe (January 25, 2024) During the Real Work for Spiritual Evolution. https://tou.org/talks/

One

 

"That which exists is One; sages call it by various names." 

A 9000 year old Indian phrase shared by Vivekananda in his Complete Works

Those are words Vivekananda stressed over and over again.  He wanted us all to know them.  They were written in a Vedanta text over 9000 years ago, at a time before man was "civilized as he is today", before man learned to cut the throat of his brother, or shed blood for the sake  of a belief system or religion.

What is so cool about this is, that One is in all of us...we are extensions of it. We are drops of the ocean of consciousness.  Every drop of ocean is the ocean.  Every drop of consciousness is consciousness. It doesn't matter what sages call it.  Some use God, or other names, even many names ( Indra, Mitra, Varuna)...what matters is the direct experience of it. We can all experience that One through Self realization.

Self realization is all about finding the secret of the whole universe. "Who are you and where do you come from?"  These are answerable questions but not to the mind, through direct experience. Singer

All is well. 

Vivekananda (n.d.) The Complete Works of Vivekananda. Kindle Edition.

Michael Singer/ Temple of the Universe (January 25, 2024) During the Real Work for Spiritual Evolution. https://tou.org/talks/

Concentrated Consciousness

Will is the power of consciousness concentrating.

Michael A. Singer

Though there are many forces at play in the movement of your arm up and down...there is one power beneath all that which is determining that motion. This power is not talked about in science because it it isn't biophysical.  That power however determines everything.  That power is will. 

Michael A. Singer eloquently defines and describes will in the below linked podcast.  It is certainly worth a listen.

Will is what happens when we take the high, elevating power of consciousness/awareness/attention and  focus it on something.  That something could be as expansive as the night sky or as narrow and small as the scratch on our car, a scratch we just happened to notice as we are staring up at the night sky.  When we look up at the stars in the sky our conscious lens is wide and we are taking in the vastness of the universe. We are probably not thinking too much of "me and my story" in those moments, or if we are, we are realizing how small and puny this "me and my story" is in the big scheme of things. When eyes drift down enough to notice the scratch on our prized possession, however, consciousness may automatically switch from a wide angle lens to a zoom one. The rest of the universe is blurred out while we stare at "me and my story" once again getting lost in it. We went from the focus of spaciousness, to the very concentrated focus of me...filled with thoughts, feelings , and the censored information we are taking in through our five senses. Hmm! We are using our will to narrow our awareness. What we see and experience in this narrowed view is so addictive. It becomes, once again, who we think we are. We become the car owner with a bunch of feelings and thoughts about this scratch and the unfairness of it.  When we get lost in the "me and my story" we forget the spaciousness that is still around us, and we forget the aware being that was once observing that spaciousness, and who is now focused in on this tiny scratch.  Same being, same scene, different focus. 

The thing is, we have a choice.  We, as this wise being (whether we know we are that or not),  can use our will to focus on the spaciousness or on the scratch.  It seems like we do not have a choice.  It seems like we were pulled against our will into the drama of life but that is just because we have somehow trained the mind to habitually focus down and get lost in these small things. It has become a habit.  Will created the habit and will can break the habit. We have the will to choose what we focus on.

This may require some practice.  Patanjali came up with three steps that can help us to use this will to focus on Self ( the spacious awareness) rather than on self ( "me and my story"). These limbs of Raja yoga include Pratyahara ( learning to eliminate distractions and what the senses take in); dharna ( learning to focus on a single thing other than this "me or my story" ), and dhyana ( meditating on the Self...on that conscious awareness that we are.)  It is a practice but a very worthwhile one.

All is well. 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( January 23, 2024) Consciousness and the Power of Will. https://tou.org/talks/

Getting Beyond the Thinking Mind

 ...Develop the ability to always have your presence, attention, anchored in the present moment rather than in your thinking mind.

Eckhart Tolle

That is what we need to do to transcend this sense of suffering so prevalent in most of our lives. We need to realize it is not the life situation causing the problem, but the thinking that is happening around it.  

When it comes to the thinking...it is more our attachment to what we are thinking, our identifying with it, that leads to suffering...not the actual thinking  or challenge we are facing.  Life is simply doing what Life does.  The mind is simply  doing what the mind does. The "Me and My story", that you created around this life event and this accumulation of thought,  is not real. Awakening is not about changing Life and getting this or that out there in order to eliminate challenge or to enhance this "me-ness". It is all about transcending this identification we have with that which we created and called "Me and My Story." 

When you awaken spiritually it doesn't mean it is the end of challenges but you no longer transform the challenges of life into ...an unhappy sense of self...into a dissatisfied person. Eckhart Tolle

Two questions we need to ask, according to Eckhart Tolle in the below linked video, when we are experiencing a sense of suffering as we face a life challenge:

• Could it be that the narrative I created around this situation is causing the unhappiness and not the situation?  
• How would I experience this situation if I did not add the unnecessary burden of thoughts to it?

Hmm! Something to think about.

All is well.

Eckhart Tolle ( January, 2024) Navigating Life's Challenges with Spiritual Awareness. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUsxlR2RSeQ

Particularly Efficient Publishing Technology?

 Blogging is just writing-writing using a particularly efficient  type of publishing technology.

Simon Dumenco

Particularly Efficient?

I don't know about that.  It is efficient for writing, offering a quick way of getting ideas down and out there but for reaching readers? I don't know.  Well, at least not in my case and truth be told I do little here but the writing.  I am not actively trying to promote this blog. It is all on me.

Numbers spiking in the stats page, but only one viewer in the google analytics page. What do these bots do?  Do they take material? ( Why would they take material lol?) or are they just searching and crawling?  I have a lot of entries showing up read...is that because of this one person truly doing a read through of my blog?  Or is it bot activity randomly creeping?  The big numbers are from Singapore again and that is not showing up on Google...the second biggest is "Other" and I don't know how that would show up on Google. Then there is the random reader who may be actually reading...or maybe not? ...showing up on Google. How does one determine the publishing efficiency of the blogging experience ?  And does it matter?

I guess, my question is, how does one determine if the publishing technology is not only inefficient, but unwholesome for the writer.  Is it possible, as I ask every time I see this spike in numbers...that something less than wholesome is happening and I should do something to protect my material? Well, I know it is mine and I can prove it in a flash if it comes to copy right infringement but...I don't want to have that thought in my head as I come here everyday.  I just want to write lol. This is not the type of stuff a scraper would want is it? I don't know...it is all confusing to me. 

Regardless...beautiful day out there.  And I open up and come here every morning, regardless of the efficiency of this technology. 

All is well

He, Beneath it All

 God is still, established upon His own majestic changeless Self. You and I try to be one with Him, but plant ourselves upon nature, upon the trifles of daily life, on money, on fame, on human love, and all these changing forms in nature which make for bondage. When nature shines, upon what depends the shining?  Upon God and not upon the sun, nor the moon, nor the stars. Wherever anything shines, whether it is the light in the sun or in our own consciousness, it is He. He shining, all shines after Him. 

Vivekananda, Complete Works ( Kindle Edition) Location 6718

He who is the colouring in the wings of the butterfly, and the blossoming of the rosebud, is the power that is in the plant and in the butterfly. He who gives us Life is the power within us. 

Vivekananda, Location 6728

So Close! so Close!

 

The spiritual progress of the aspirant is measured by the extent to which he[she, they] receives inner tranquility.

Sivananda

Contemplating  where I am on this spiritual path is something I often catch myself doing. It seems to be a slippery slope I am climbing.  I want to go up as high as I can and reach the peak.  I do.  I see myself progressing upwardly, and I see myself slipping back into unconsciousness...I pull myself back up or away only to soon realize I fell back again and again. I do not know how close I am to the summit.

I practice all limbs of yoga, I do, committedly and devotedly if not perfectly. I study and listen.  I write and I teach (as a part of my practice...again imperfectly and without ever knowing to whom I am teaching or reaching with my words.) I serve in other ways...sometimes with ego ( I know it is ego when I say "I serve") and sometimes with Self ( I know it is Self when whatever I do happens naturally, despite "me",  as if I am pulled to do it without any attachment to outcome or this idea of "service"...like with what I do here.) I know what I want: to reach that summit and at the same time I know there is no reaching, no getting anywhere, because I am already there. It gets confusing.

Anyway, I had a dream last night.  And as I often dream, I dreamt about being in some type of school with some type of test to write.  (I, because I spent so many years in the school system, personally and professionally, often dream of school or relate my awakening process to the learning done in academia.) Someone next to me is showing me their test result that they are quite proud of...a "B-" , and explaining that they just worked on the take home exam a few hours before it was due and were not expecting such a mark.  They relay to me that the teacher is not  as difficult as we thought she was. In my heart, I know I am willing to put more work in and therefore get a better mark than B-, and at the same time I know, in the dream, it isn't about the mark...it is about the learning.  I am willing to try harder than this person beside me did because I truly want to learn. I also discovered from this person with the B- that I have a teacher that is not there to make my life difficult but  only to encourage my learning. Just as I realized that, I heard out of nowhere the familiar female voice that often speaks to me in dreams.  "You are so close!  You are so Close!" It was so clear and I instantly knew, as I do now, that the speaker was talking about my spiritual progress. 

Hmm! 

Spirituality isn't about getting somewhere else.  It is about falling back into that which was always there. It is not something "I" do.  It is something "I am." We do not need to go anywhere. The process is simply a realization and remembering the inner tranquility of who we are.  "Me" and its need to do, fix, control, climb, and get somewhere is often in the way. Without this "me" and its drama that pulls our consciousness down, we would realize that we are already at the summit; we have always been at the summit. We just forgot that because we were  looking down at that which we are not, becoming addicted to the play it was performing in, becoming identified with it. 

The spiritual process is about looking away and remembering that the "me" and its drama is simply an object of consciousness.  We are the consciousness that is staring down at it...we are not it.  When we fall back into this consciousness we will find the inner tranquility we are seeking .

All is well in this world I erroneously refer to as "mine." 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe (January 18, 2024) Understanding Levels of spiritual Growth. https://tou.org/talks/

Out of the World of Relentlessly Ticking Clocks

 Although the rhythm of the waves beats a kind of time, it is not clock or calendar time. It has no urgency. It has no urgency. It happens to be timeless time. I know that I have been listening to a rhythm which has been just the same for millions of years, and it takes me out of the world of relentlessly ticking clocks.

Alan Watts

From Where We Desire

Three things are necessary for the salvation of man: to know what he ought to believe, to know what he ought to desire, and to know what he ought to do.

Thomas Aquinas

I am more inclined to believe that we need to know from where we desire.  Ego or Self?

Just as the universe does, humans participate in life's s desire to create. Desire is simply the wish, conscious or unconscious, to bring into the world of form something that was not here before.  The ego motivated desire differs from the Deeper Self's motivation.  Ego wants to get, and "Deeper I" wants to give.

Hmm! Where is your desire coming from?

All is well

 Eckhart Tolle (January, 2024) What is the True Nature of Desire? /Ego vs Presence with Eckhart Tolle. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p53Xet8fAT0

How High You Really Are

 

Thus, in this body the soul is reflected.  The soul is God, and every human being has a perfect divinity within himself, and each one must show his divinity sooner or later.

Vivekananda Location 6624

Michael Singer, and many of the great spiritual teachers of the past, teach that we are very high and  great beings staring down at something that is not so great. We are focusing all this amazing consciousness down on  the dramas of a self created "me" with all its thoughts and feelings, its endless  and fruitless quests to make everything "out there" okay so we can feel good "in here". We are constantly trying to distract ourselves from the mess we created and we erroneously believe those distractions that lift us up a tiny bit to be our "highs" in Life. We become so focused on our inner drama, our quests for distraction and more highs; we get so  pulled in by our thoughts and emotions, that we get lost  in them and start to identify with them,  

The amazing powerful and very high consciousness that we are gets narrowed and constricted to a tiny little beam of light as it looks down, way down, onto this tiny speck of a thing we are focusing on. We believe we are that which this light is shining on. We do not see we are actually the light that is shining. We do not see the natural, inherent high state within us, that which we are. Then something starts to wake us up.  We realize what we have been doing isn't working. We just can't stay high.

 As we start to wake up, we begin to want more and our quest becomes all about getting out of this low energy state...of moving up a bit from our conditioned way of approaching Life.  As we begin to move up and away from the mess, disidentifying with the drama of "me" a bit...we certainly feel better.  But there is still so much more to us that we cannot grasp or understand. 

It is isn't until we let go of this "me" and fall back into the seat of Awareness that we get to experience what we truly are.  What we truly are is so much more than what we imagine ourselves to be. Realizing Self  is a process, a beautiful process. 

Vivekananda puts the process of spiritual growth  this way (and it may or may not include a religious practice): 

First, we see God in the far beyond, then we come nearer to Him and give Him omnipresence so that we live in Him; and at last we recognize we are He. 

Once we reach this state we will experience Sat Chit Ananda ( which is also a name for God in some translations)- Eternal-Conscious-Bliss

All is well!

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe (January 14, 2024) Learning to Maintain Your Center. https://tou.org/talks/

The Complete Works of Vivekananda. Kindle Edition

Striking the Light and Cleaning Out the Mess in the Way

 The only way to realise the light above you is to strike the spiritual light within you, and the darkness of sin and impurity will flee away.  Think of your higher self, not of your lower. 

Vivekananda Location 6580. 

Why does life feel so dark and heavy?

You are having a problem with your mind. (Singer) It is focusing on the lower self...the personal mind and this entity we call "me." 

Say what, Crazy Lady? 

We are allowing our mind to run the show and the mind is just not capable of doing that. It is in the way of us experiencing the Light of the Higher Self.  

The personal mind is  a closet full of stored  junk ( all the sensory impressions we cling to, most of them very painful, emotional experiences we are doing whatever we can to not experience again.  And some of this junk is also made up of  very pleasant experiences or impressions we crave experiencing again).  This chaos of stored junk forms the personality, the sense of "me" that the mind is intent on protecting, the lower self,  and it is a mess! We, as awareness, or the Higher Self, jump behind this closet of junk. We identify as the "me" and say, "Okay protect me, be my shield! Only allow what I want in.  Life has to go through you before it gets to "me" ".  

We attempt to experience Life from there.  For the average, "normal" person...this  mind they allow to run the show is a completely disturbed mess, leading to great suffering. 

Besides being a complete mess, with a habit tendency of picking up more and more junk and stuffing it inside this mental closet, the mind is suffering from "delusions of grandeur."  It believes it can control, manipulate, grasp from and push away life events as they pass before us. It actually thinks it has that ability to control Life so we can feel comfortable inside. We fail to realize that  Life has been doing what it has been doing for billions of years before our puny little personal minds have come into existence.  We fail to realize that we cannot control Life!

The Buddha taught that we all suffer ( all of us) because we desire.  We desire how the world should be and the messy, and disturbed  mind we have given the reins to, tries to give us what we want.  So it constantly tells us, besides the stern instructions not to open the closet door more than a crack to stuff new things in,  we have to go out  and fix, manipulate, cling to the pleasant that soothes  the junk in this closet, and push away the unpleasant that rattles the junk in this closet. We are instructed to open the door only a crack for the pleasant, and bar it shut for the unpleasant. The mind's instructions creates a never ending and never successful mission for us. We suffer, suffer, suffer. 

If the door is closed most of the time and we are hiding behind it...how is Life and Light going to get through to our awareness.  How are we going to experience it? All we are going to see is the mess in this dark and heavy closet. We will become obsessed focusing on the "me" and the drama the mind creates by attempting to manipulate Life based on the junk in this closet. We will become so focused on what is in front of us...we will not see the Light that shines behind us. We will live in darkness.  We will suffer.

Yoga teaches we do not need to live this way. Without the junk filled closet in the way we can experience an amazing life. All we have to do is open the door, "strike the light" and clean up the mess in this mind.  We cannot, of course, keep stuffing  more in if we want a clean closet. We need to put away our preferences, our meager and fruitless attempts to fix it out there, so it suits us in here,  and accept and allow Life as it is.  We need to stop stuffing and clinging to the good, the bad, or the ugly. Let it all just pass by. If we stop stuffing more in, the stuff inside will keep rolling out until someday the entire closet is clean and purified. Until there is no junk between Life and who we are. 

Without the mess, all there is is light. 

Our desiring and expecting the world and Life to be the way that soothes the disturbed mind is not the way to go . To end suffering...let it go. We don't want to get what we want...we need to get rid of the reason we want so we are healthy and okay no matter what. (Singer)

Explore the essence of your being. This is the spiritual path.  Spend your life purifying and freeing yourself from this messy closet mind. You are not the disturbed and messy mind. You are not the events it is trying to control. You are the One behind, observing it all. Stop focusing on the dark and heavy in front of you.  Light the match that will allow you to focus on the part of you that is okay no matter what...the higher Self, not the lower. Clean out the mess inside...purify...and be free!

Heaviness and darkness belong to the messy mind, not the Light of who you really are.

If the room is dark, do you go about beating your chest and crying, "It is dark, dark, dark!" No, the only way to get the light is to strike a light, and then the darkness goes. 

Vivekananda, location 6580

Michael A. Singer/ Sounds True ( January, 2024) Everyday Gets Lighter When You Let Go of Yourself./ Michael Singer Podcast: New Year's Special Season 3: Episode 6 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Qd_oz0krVI

Vivekananda (n.d.) The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda. Kindle Edition.

Sitting in the Deeper Seat

Spirituality is simply sitting in a deeper seat within and observing Life from there...how can anything be a problem...all that is asked of you is to be aware of it..you don't have to do anything...everything is happening by itself ...

Michael A. Singer (Somewhat paraphrased)

Hmm!  I want to remove the woo-woo from the word spiritual.  I have always had a bit of a problem with the connotation that people tend to attach to that word. They either see it, (and the person who talks about it),  as religious, (even evangelical).  And they, if they are not religious, or evangelical, shut down and resist. Even if they are religious, they judge the person talking about the spiritual  as being blasphemous or crazy  if what they are saying differs greatly from the doctrine or dogma of their religion. Or they see "spirituality"  as referring to the supernatural, magical, and mystical..,dealing only  with things that are "non-scientific miracles"  like astro-projection, talking to ghosts, or reading people's energies. I am not saying these things are not possible...not at all ...but they do not define the word spirituality,

 Spirituality is just a word used to describe something that isn't woo-woo or "mambo-jumbo" as Singer, in the below video describes the way it is erroneously thought of as. It is simply the process of viewing the world and experiencing Life from from a deeper seat of consciousness, from a higher awareness. It isn't restricted to  supernatural phenomena  It takes place in the everyday natural world. It isn't a one time happenstance  experience.  It is an everyday practice of developing a greater understanding. A so called "spiritual" person  is simply committed to observing the outerworld and the inner world and noticing how the two are relating. 

They ask these questions: 

"What is happening inside this " me",  when that is happening outside this "me"?  Why? "

"What is happening outside of this "me", when this happens inside this "me"? Why? "

Yoga is a spiritual practice that isn't woo-woo or "mambo-jumbo".  It is not there to teach you how to leave your body so you can float around the room ( though it could lol...but a true yogi doesn't seek those powers or cittis).  It is to teach you to live peacefully  and with a sense of Oneness. It is going to teach you to live life freely, undisturbed by any of it....as you allow it to be exactly what it is. It can show us that Life is not the problem, how we respond to it is. And if we learn to stop reacting and resisting it...we can be at peace and be free. 

Spirituality is a solution to the problematic way of living like we have to fix, control and do so much in order to find peace inside.  It teaches us we do not have to do anything but "be" as we observe and experience  this amazing and miraculous Life we have been given. 

All is well! 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( January 12, 2024) Seeing Past It All. https://tou.org/talks/

What We Are Truly Longing For

Without knowing it people are longing to become free of themselves...there is a longing...and this is built into the evolution of the human being. This longing for self transcendence is built into the evolution of human consciousness. Every person experiences this but they look for the solution for this longing in the wrong way, in completely the wrong places. 

Eckhart Tolle

Eckhart Tolle echoes what I have been saying about the need for getting beyond the personality in the below linked video. Not that he has been listening to me and regurgitating what I say, lol, but I over the course of my long awakening, have been regurgitating what I was learning, and assimilating after  listening to him and many others. It just so happened that what I wrote in the last few weeks was echoed in this video that came out yesterday, and that I happened upon today.  All in perfect timing. You may not listen or trust what I say, (and that is truly okay) but I am sure when it comes from Tolle, it  will resonate with you. 

Self transcendence involves taking our obsessive attention away  from our conditioned focus on  what the little me, the "surface I" , the problematic personality is experiencing to what the Deeper I is experiencing.  It involves going from our obsession with focusing on thought, emotion,  word, and object to noticing the space that surrounds these things of form. It involves removing our fixation  from the clouds in the sky, so we can see the blue sky behind them. It involves recognizing that this surface I is just a little ripple on the ocean of Deeper I. It isn't who we are.

As the quote above reminds us what we really want, what we are on a mission to attain whether we know it or not, cannot be found out there.  It can only be found in here.  Many of us are trapped in this identification with the personality and spend our lives trying to serve it by getting from the outer world what we assume it needs to be comfortable and safe.  We fail to see beyond the personality which is built on thought, and conditioning...to that which is real and can only be experienced. Awakening is all about falling back from the grip of personality with its problems, needs and incessant seeking...to the only thing that is truly real and important ..higher consciousness or what Tolle refers to often in this video as "space consciousness." 

Hmm! Have a listen.

All is well.

Eckhart Tolle (January 10, 2024) Transcending the Ego for Lasting Fulfillment/ Eckhart Tolle Wisdom. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_wTckHOyeE

Snow Day

Nature is our greatest teacher of surrender, of allowing, of simply being....This moment, this present...this is where Life is.

Alexandra Domelle

 Getting our first real snow storm, which is a latecomer in this Canadian climate. It was a snow day at school.  I had forgotten how much I love snow days. It is like nature is whispering, "It is okay.  You don't have to go out and "do" today.  You just have to stay comfortable and warm inside ( that is until you have to go out and shovel and snow-blow lol) .  For now, just be!"

There is just such comfort in surrendering to the what is of  nature.

All is well.

Challenge the Mind: Not a Reliable Friend

Life is 10 % what you experience and 90%  how you respond to it.

Dorothy Neddermeyer

I am presently coaching (that word sounds so strange here) someone I care about, who is dealing with major depression, to go from a state of very unhealthy inactivity to a state of a healthy activity. We are working on getting one walk and one 20-60 minute yoga session in a day.  It is challenging considering that somedays getting from the bed to the shower is a challenge for her.  Seems like such a small task for most of us but for those with a  mind that is constantly saying "Down! Too tired!  Too dark!  Too heavy!! Too scary out there! Not worth the effort! Just stay here!" It isn't easy. 

Most of us listen to our minds,  don't we? We believe everything they tell us.  They say "sit"...and we sit.  They say "jump"...and we ask, "How high?" They tell us to respond to the world based on what they and their cousin "heart" are saying...and we do. Sigh! How well is that working for us?

We erroneously rely on the mind and heart to guide us, using thoughts and feelings as a metre to point us in the right direction.  But do they? In the case of depression, that obviously doesn't work? 

The mind is an amazing tool that sincerely wants to help protect this sense of me we built up over the years but how reliable is it when it becomes overidentified with  that which is unfolding in front of us or through us. We are not that "me" we built up, are we? We are not the experiences we are having, are we? We are simply the Observer of it all.  If this me is identified with depression, assuming it is depressed, then the mind will protect the depression, won't it?   The consciousness behind the mind, that which does the observing, will be so focused on the mind's experience of depression, the mind's  over identifying with it, it will not see the possibility of healing with movement.  We will start saying things like "I am depressed.", rather than "I have depression" or "I am experiencing depression." 

One of the things I keep reminding her to do is, "Ignore the mind, or at least don't believe everything it has to say. Sometimes it is going to do its best to convince you that you do not have the ability to get up out of bed. Don't believe it.  But when you do believe it, following its advice, it is going to tell you how much of a loser you are for not getting up...Don't believe it then either. The mind  may mean well, but it isn't a reliable friend." It is very mixed up.

I also tell my loved one that she is not depression.  She is simply watching her sense of "me" deal with depression.  Depression is not something we are, it is simply something we have or are experiencing at certain time.  The mind tries to convince us otherwise.  We know though that it isn't a reliable friend. We do not need to believe it or follow its demands. 

Recognizing this truth...that we are not that which the mind tells us we are is a crucial first step in moving ourselves from stuck positions. The second, is detaching  bit from the story we are being told. We are not depressed...we are simply observing the mind dealing with a period of depression.  The mind, in depression, often resists that which could alleviate some of that pain because it takes effort it is convinced we don't have.  The next step then, is to push past tis position. I tell this person, "When you feel the urge to resist a walk, or a yoga session, or some activity that will ease the mind...don't.  Don't resist. Push past this resistance temptation  and do exactly that which the mind is telling you, you can't do because you are too depressed: 

Move the body! 

Well it has only been 8 days...but she has put in eight practices and eight walks...and she even had a smile on her face through some of them. I think that is amazing!

All is well 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( January 8, 2024) Keeping Your Bearings on a Spiritual Path.https://tou.org/talks/

A Constitutional Necessity of the Human Mind

 Many thought the case hopeless and the cause of religion lost once and forever. But the tide has turned and to the rescue has come what? The study of comparative religions. By the study of different religions we find that in essence they are one.... I studied,   the Christian religion, the Mohammed, the Buddhistic, and others, and  what was my surprise to find that the same foundation principles taught by my religion were taught by all religions...What is the truth? ...We know that man has a body, eyes, ears, and he has a spiritual nature which we cannot see. And with his spiritual faculties he can study these different religions and find that whether a religion is taught in the forests and jungles of India or in a Christian land, in essentials all religions are one. This only shows us that religion is a constitutional necessity of the human mind. 

Vivekananda 

These words were taken down way back in 1898. How many of us have opened our minds to do what this great sage has done. 

I often tell people that I am in the process of discovering the unifying truth in all religion.  Like Vivekananda, I do believe there is one. Doing so opens my mind and my heart and it helps me to see so much more clearly. 

I wasn't always this open. I was raised with this ideation that the only real religion was Christianity and the only real Christian church  was the Roman Catholic church.  After highschool I went to a university that was considered "Catholic". We were required to take at least one religious studies course...with the intention that all Catholics would take courses related to Catholic theology.  There was one course on the agenda, however,  that was different from all the potentially boring courses taught by the priests.  It was called "Religious Experiences: East and West." I took that.  Not because I wanted to study comparative religion like Vivekananda had done....I just thought it would be different.  So I sat in class throughout that term to simply escape boredom.  I brought my conditioning, my closed mind into the lecture hall with me.  I got very little out of  the class even though the professor, who was like the Ram Dass of the university-probably even hung out with him at one time-  was excellent and the material was so interesting.  My conditioning closed my mind.  Part of me, even thought that it was a sin that I was studying other religions.  I couldn't even tell my father about it. Imagine! 

Wind forward 40 years and here I am just totally immersed in the process of understanding these religious experiences east and west. I have done some serious deconditioning and have opened up to see things much more clearly.

Hmm! I am reminded of a line I read in a translation of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras by Swami Satchidananda: "Truth is One, Paths are many." 

The messages that are coming down to us from the prophets and holy men and women for all sects and nations are joining their forces and speaking to us with the trumpet of the past.  And the first message it brings us is: Peace be unto you and to all religions.

Vivekananda Loc 6446

All is well!

Swami Vivekananda ( n.d. 1889??) The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda: Volumes 1-9. Kindle Edition.1.4 Lectures and Discourses.

When they say "Complete Works"...they are not kidding lol.  I have been reading from this book every night for close to six months now and I have yet to get past 10% of the reading, less than halfway through Volume 1.

Tzu-Jan: The Natural Spontaneity of Life

Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes [Tzu-Jan]. Don't resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like. 

Lao Tzu

The inspiration for today's entry was sparked by hearing Michael A. Singer mention Tzu-Jan and explaining that it means "that which happens by itself".

I love the idea of embracing the flow of Life, what Taosist might refer to as the Way, trusting that this flow knows what it is doing...that it is far greater and wiser than our puny little minds with their very limiting "me-me" focus.

Life is happening all around us and we are only focusing on such a tiny little speck of the life that  just happens to be unfolding in front of us.  We are so focused on this speck...putting all our energy into trying to control it, fix it, make it work for this "me" we assume we are, that we miss out on all the rest. We get so caught up in our efforting and struggles to do, that we  lose the spontaneity and naturalness of the Life experience. We lose Tzu-Jan. We resist what is and we suffer. We suffer when we do not live in the Tao. Wu Wei, effortless action or no action, is often associated with the term Tzu-Jan.  We lose the sense of that as well. We fail to see that we do not need to interfere with Life.  When will we realize that our way of doing and being is not The Way to go? 

Sitting in stillness, allowing, embracing, and honoring the flow of Life...trusting that after billions and billions of years, it knows what it is doing, would be very freeing for all of us. We do not need to interfere with the flow of Life...we can simply lay back and float in it, honoring all of it. 

Hmm! Anyway, that was on my mind today.  All is well.

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( January 7, 2024) Why personal decisions are so difficult?https://tou.org/talks/

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe (January 4, 2024) You are the Light of the World. https://tou.org/talks/

Liu Xiaogan ( June 28, 2008) On the Concept of Naturalness (Tzu-Jan) in Lao Tzu's Philosophy. In the Journal of Chinese Philosophy. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/j.1540-6253.1998.tb00523.x

 Sorry. Lost my cover photo and feel so lost without it lol. I was trying to remove the Facebook link and accidently took the pic out.  Don't know quite how to get it back. Will figure it out.  Have an amazing day. If you can't find me here...I am over on Medium: Practicing Sitting Quietly. All of humanity’s problems stem from… | by Nancy Daley; Waking Up with Mindful Serenity Yoga | Jan, 2024 | Medium

The Two Sided Mirror of the Mind

 On one side of the mind the external world, the seen, is being reflected, and on the other, the seer is being reflected.

Vivekananda (on Patanjali's Sutra 22/Book 4)

So the mind is reflecting the external world that we have been conditioned to see as everything, and at the same time , on the other side of it, it is reflecting the Seer.  We just need to focus a little more on the Seer side and from there the mind will become conscious of everything.  We will see what we are doing and how it doesn't work.  We will see how the  inward side holds the answers to everything we perceive as a "problem" on the outward side.   We can make the mind wise.

Colored by the seer and the seen the mind is able to understand everything.

Vivekananda (n.d.) Complete Works.  Kindle Edition

The No Body; the No-Self

There is no self but there is the cycle or rebirth, there is inter-continuation and the nature of all inter-continuation is inter being 

Tenant 32  for Plum Village/Deer Park Monastery- as taught by Thich Nhat Hanh

Tathagata is a term used in Buddhism to refer to 'no identity' or 'no-self'. There is no self.  Do you believe that or are you still caught up in Descartes axiom that " I think therefore I am"? 

In this amazing dharma talk from Thay Phap Luu of Deer Park Monastery, the idea of no-self is discussed based on Thich Nhat Hanh's teachings and the above tenant 32. In reflection on this tenant we are asked not to argue or debate the idea of there being a no self but of concentrating on it by understanding the impermanent nature of the five skandhas (form/body, feelings, perceptions [of solidity, concepts,place and ownership,time,andSelf], mental formations[thoughts,emotions,moods,and mind state], and consciousness).  Please note that in yogic philosophy consciousness is eternal, not impermanent.

Concentrating on the Impermanent, Ever Changing Nature of Things

Concentrating on the ever changing nature of these skandhas can help us realize that we are not a permanent self. A permanent self is just an idea we have and we do not need to be on hyper alert all the time to protect this idea, like so many of us are.  In fact, our identification with self and its story as perpetuated by the five skandhas , as I mentioned many time before, obscures the reality of what is in this present moment. Infact, in direct contrast to Descartes' "I think therefore I am," a Buddhist would say, " I think therefore I am not really here."

Questioning Descartes' Assertion: "I think therefore I am."

Though thinking is simply a part of one of the five skandhas and all skandhas are impermanent ...coming and going, ever changing...part of the never ending cycle of rebirth, Thay Pap Luu focuses a lot on the impermanent nature of thinking and perception to help us to see that  we are no-self. He questions Descartes' assertion and wonders how the conclusion of "I am" can be drawn simply from the fact that thinking is taking place and we are observing it. Thinking he says is a process just like raining is.  Just because it is raining, does there have to be a rainer?  It is our perception that creates the Rainer (the cloud)...the Rainer is just a mental  concept or construct.  It isn't real. And like all things it is ever changing. This "Rainer"  is also going through several transformations from the fluffy white cloud we see in the sky, to the rain it produces, to the water in the river that flows to the water in the ocean, which gets evaporated and becomes the mist that goes back into the cloud and once again the cloud.  There really was no "cloud", no "rainer"...just this ever changing process. 

Is the self a thinker? Does there have to be a Thinker?

Thinking is real...we can observe thinking taking place; it is a process; but just because there is thinking does there have to be a thinker? The "thinker" is this idea of a me or self  who thinks...this perception, this belief there is a "self" doing the thinking when really there is just the process of thinking ever changing, impermanent thoughts. It gives us the false perception of solidity and permanence. Who is this so called  thinker of these thoughts, the maker of these perceptions? The body? Just like the cloud  is a process, forever changing, every minute we are in a new body. The body is  constantly going through the process of rebirth.  You are not in the same body now that you were in forty years ago, nor are you in the same body you were in forty minutes ago. There is a profound saying that applies here. "No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it is not the same river and he is not the same man." ( Heraclitis). So the body cannot be self, can it?  

Perceptions, feelings, mental formations, can not be self either, can they? Now the question of  consciousness being Self is a little murky for me in this perspective.  The Buddhists teach that consciousness too is ever changing and impermanent, so therefore there is no self while the yogis teach that Self is  eternal consciousness bliss. For that reason, I will not embrace the concentration on the skandha of consciousness here. Though I do equate, in my mind, the inter-continuation from the tenant with consciousness.

Clinging to the Story of "me"

I like to think of it this way. The (little) self is the idea of me we adhere to and seek to defend and protect throughout our lives.  It is a perception, a concept, a thought. It is what we might call our personality. It is not who we are.  And this idea of self and its story gets in the way of who we are and in the way of us experiencing reality for what it is right here and right now. We are too stuck in our heads trying to figure out how to protect and keep this thing alive, filled with stress, anxiety, and worry, taht we seldom settle down into life to experience it completely and fully for what it is. As self, I see other and I do not see the interconnection between me and the other, I do not see the inter-continuity of life. I miss out on so much. Thay Phap Luu reminds us that sticking to the story of self and what should be for self restricts so much of what we could potentially experience if we were free of it, if we would simply flow with life.

Letting go of the story of "me", of self is what will free us. 

When we are able to reflect on and see the ever changing and inter-continuity of nature, of all forms and see ourselves as a part of that nature rather than the observer of it ( again...this interferes a bit with my yogic understanding of things) we will will feel deep calm, deep ease, deep peace and joy, according to this teaching.

We need to let go of this "me" and its story in order to embrace what is. Instead of focusing on our perceptions, our thinking, our reactivity...we can change our focus to something as simple as breath or body sensation.  We can feel the feelings as they arise and observe the thoughts as they pass by like driftwood floating on the river of our minds.  We do not have to follow them or get all caught up in them. We can simply be. 

Hmmm! That was my study practice for the day. So grateful for all these amazing teachers I have the honor of listening to.

All is well. 

Joseph Goldstein (2013) Mindfulness: A Practical Guide to Awakening. Boulder: Sounds True (Pages 169-202)

Thay Phap Luu/ Deer Park Monastery (2023) (Class #32), The Concentration of No-Self https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxsmVc2Adyg&t=4178s

 

Inner Growth: the Day for the Introspective Sage

What all beings consider as day is the night of ignorance to the wise, and what all creatures see as night is the day for the introspective sage. 

The Bhagavad Gita Chapter 2, Verse:69

Huh? What is that suppose to mean, crazy lady? 

Well maybe this makes more sense:

Getting what you want is so overrated it is ridiculous; avoiding what you don't want is so overrated it is ridiculous....What you are needing is not outside!

Michael A. Singer

Man, I cannot get over how much on the same page Singer and I seem to be.  I write about certain things I have been reflecting on and almost immediately after that I open up a podcast where  he is talking about that exact thing. It feels so serendipitous. Rationale minds says..."Duh!  It is all about Yoga and we are both yogis ( him, I am sure, much more of a yogi than me).  What we share, then, is bound to correlate from time to time."  But still, it gets me everytime. I like to think it is serendipity at work  so that I can once again validate that what I do here has meaning.  :)

When we talk about why we are unable to tap into that "river of joy" that is inside us...why we are so unhappy...we have to realize, as hard as it is to, that we are responsible for blocking that flow with our distractions. That we are responsible for following the antics of the personal mind/personality/'little me' with our attention and responses. Our resistance to what is (our avoiding, pushing away, suppression, repression, preferring and clinging) in an attempt to compensate for the not okayness we feel inside, is blocking that River of Joy, Yogananda talked about.  Our attempts to get what we want and avoid what we don't want is not the way to this river.  This outward seeking and avoiding  pulls us away from the river of joy, from our true nature:  Sat Chit Ananda. It distracts us away from truth. It  blocks the flow and prevents us from experiencing "eternal, conscious bliss". 

Yogis know growth  is an inside game, not an outside one . A Yogi knows that the scraps  of  love, peace, and joy we have been grasping or clinging to from the outside world in things and other people, may be  what people here adore, but it is not universal truth. They are just compensatory mechanisms.  There is so much more hidden in the darkness of what we have yet to see. This "outer growth approach" that the average person would call reality, the day, is the night of ignorance to the yogi. 

The personality is an accumulation of these distractions and consciousness is often distracted by the personality . We need to see that what we are needing is inside us already, and instead of spending all our energy fruitlessly trying to compensate for a lack of inner okayness "out there", we need to go inside, past the personality's pull,  and work with the energies from there. We must learn to approach Life like the introspective sage does.

All is well!

Note: I felt compelled to open up a page on Medium and I am going to be moving many of these posts over there.  I will not close this site.  It feels too much like my kitchen table now and though it never really gave me the opportunity to get to know who I was chatting with over tea, (or if I was just talking to my cats and dogs...like I tend to do),   I do feel at home here. Writing is easy here..maybe because I never know for sure if I have a readership, so there is little "performance anxiety" etc. Anyway...I just don't want to get up and leave completely. Oh, I don't know...I am just spreading my wings, I guess, in this new year...I may fly right into a brick wall lol but off I go anyway. Once I get settled over there and then figure out how to, I will invite you over for tea on  my Medium page. :) 

Namaste

This translation of the Gita from https://www.holy-bhagavad-gita.org/chapter/2/verse/69

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( January 1, 2024) Outer Growth and Inner Growth.https://tou.org/talks/