The Sameness in All

 So the claim is that this sameness, this unity, this perfection-as we may call it-is not to be made, it already exists, and is here.  We have only to recognize it, to understand it. Whether we know it or not, whether this perception assumes the force and clearness of a sense -perception or not, it is there. For we are bound by the logical necessity of our minds to confess that it is there, else, the perception of the finite would not be. ...

Even the most logical and rational mind, hooked on concepts, knows and perceives at some level they may or may not connect to, that the infinite, the formless, the eternal exists in all. 

...the very fact of the consciousness that you and I are different brings to us, at the same moment, the consciousnees that you and I are not different. Knowledge would be impossible without that unity. Without the idea of sameness there would be neither perception nor knowledge. So both run side by side....

If we can perceive differentness...we have no choice but to understand sameness. If we see a right...we must see a left. If we percieve a front, we must perceive a back. If we have concepts and are full of "knowledge", we must also have within us that which goes beyond knowledge and concepts.

Thich Nhat Hanh used to teach, "neither different or the same; both different and the same." 

"Thus, seeing the same God equally present in all, the sage does not injure Self by the Self, and thus reaches the highest goal. Even in this life they have conquered relative existence whose minds are firmly fixed on this sameness; for God is pure, and God is the same to all. Therefore such are said to be living in God." 

We may be focusing on difference, but we can, like the  sage, focus on sameness. We can see the same pure God in all.

All is well.

Vivekananda (  n.d.) The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, page 217-231. Kindle Edition. 

Before It Finds You

 Find death before death finds you.

Eckhart Tolle

People have an essence and a personality...more rare for people to have more essence than personality these days. Did Ivan IIIyin say that first?  Well, I guess Christ said it first when He said we must die to be reborn. 

Finding death means being able to get beyond our form identity to our essence identity while we are still alive. Sometimes that form identity, and what we associate with it, is taken away from us. Whenever our identity is basd on form...we will suffer.  We need to get to the essence behind that form. We need to, at least,  de-emphasize that form identity,

All is well

Eckhart Tolle ( December, 2023?) Finding death before death finds you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmbVYaBVmHU

Get out of the Way

 Purity is what exists when you don't.

Micheal A. Singer

If we were not so much in the way of Life cleansing us, we would be pure. It is our grabbing and clinging that fills us with the junk and our resistance to Life that stops the junk from coming up and out. 

The soul is whole and complete within itself but there are blockages that prevent us from seeing that so we perceive incompletness and seek outward for completeness. 

We just need to let go of the grabbing. .

There is nothing to get...the process is one of releasing not finding, getting, controlling and manipulating. Singer

All is well

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( May 27, 2024) Nothing to Attain. https://tou.org/talks/

We Cannot Explain Awareness

 Even the deeply depressed feel a preciousness inside, that is why they are still here, and that preciousness is consciousness, ...formless essence. ...The Self is realized as formless and timeless but the mind needs to be told it cannot come to factual understanding about awareness, about that deep formless essence. We cannot gain "more" knowledge on this, we can only go deeper experientially. Form may then be perceived through this field of awareness. This creates a peace in us, but not necessarily a conceptual understanding. Pointers may arise in us that we can share and that may be helpful to ourselves and others but conceptual awareness of awareness will never expand. 

Eckhart Tolle (Paraphrased to some degree)

Eckhart Tolle ( May, 2024)The Mind's Limitation in Undersatnding Awareness. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrjHWpBQcFw

Neutralizing Negativity

  A weak base mixed with a strong acid neutralizes the acid to some degree. We can do the same with our thinking. We can neutralize the negativity with some realistic positivity. 

Me

This came to me a few mornings ago when I was waking up from  a bit of a restless sleep. And I was waking up with acid reflux.

Negative and Disrespectful

We do tend to focus on the negative, don't we? Here we are with this amazing expansive consciousness, focusing it down onto the tiny insignificant- in- the- bigger- picture drama of little me. We are obsessively concentrating on our thoughts and feelings at the exclusion of all else there is to shine on. On top of that we have the channel turned to "negativity" rather than "positivity". 

There are an infinite number of zeros in the universe and our consciousness is the 1 in front of those zeros. ( Singer, May, 2024) That then becomes the number of things our universe gives us to experience...Yet there we are narrowing and focusing our attention down onto a 0.001%. And out of that 0.001% we choose the negative.

We have cancer, disease, and death in the world, for example, and our attention goes there instead of the fact that over 99 percent of a lifetime there is health. There are these trillions of cells working together to keep us healthy in the face of all the stuff we are putting into them in terms of toxic substances and toxic thinking...(our fear and our doubt...our erroneous beliefs that we are meant to step in and control their processes). Do we honor and respect these cells for what they do for us without needing any assistance  from us at all? No, we just condemn them when they fail to keep up.

We do not respect the process of Life and even go so far as condemning it when it can't keep up with our expectations of how it should be. We choose to focus this amazing attention onto the 1 percent of time the body cannot keep up with what we are doing to it. We focus on the life processes that are not meeting our desires and expectations. Come on!! 

Once we realize that we are not the controller of these lives...but merely the experiencer, the Observer...we will naturally respect the process. Until then, there is something we can do.  We can start infusing a little positivity into our experiences in order to neutralize the negativity.

Respecting the Process with Positivity

What happens when you mix a strong acid that has the potential to burn and destroy with a weak base?  The strong acid weakens.  It becomes neutralized.  

In the stomach there is a very strong acid called HCL, Hydrochloric acid, that is there to break down proteins. Sometimes it, with other gastric juices, backs up  through the stomach's sphincter and seeps into the esophagus causing heart burn.  If left untreated  it can burn away at the esophageal lining causing permanent damage. If we, however, take a weak base in the form of a TUM which contains Calcium Carbonate, or a spoonful of Baking Soda, Sodium Bicarbonate, we can neutralize that acid and find relief. Consistently neutralizing the strong acid will prevent damage and will allow for healing.  

Like a strong acid, negativity has a tendency to seep into our minds and has the potential of burning away at our life experience. When we infuse our minds and daily experience with a bit of positivity, however, ...(and starting out after years of negative thinking  positivity  will be weak like the base in a TUM),... we can neutralize our negative focus. We can find relief. Once the negativity stops burning away at what is there, healing can take place. 

It will not be as simple as popping a pill into the mouth but it can be as simple as having some positive affirmations on hand to use before and after negativity starts to seep in. 

Realistic Affirmations Only!

I want to stress that the positivity needs to be in a "weak" form.  It has to be less potent than the acid so it doesn't cause an explosion. A Strong acid and a strong base together create a big boom. Even if they are not the strongest in the world, if they are equal in strength they cause a chemical reaction as well.   Have you ever made a volcano using Vinegar and baking soda? 

Our negativity, unfortunately, often tends to be on the strong end of the spectrum. Our negative thoughts are like very strong acids. If I am having some financial difficulty, I may be consumed with thoughts about becoming homeless. Strong affirmations that are strong and far fetched like... affirming that I have a 1,000,000 dollars in the bank when I am worrying about being homeless tomorrow.... will blow the top off of our volcanoes. It is ineffective and makes affirmations useless.  

Positive affirmations must be realistic and believable in a weakened form. I may affirm instead, "It is challenging to realize I do not have enough money in the bank right now.  That's okay though...I got by before, I will get by again.  All events in life: the challenges and the blessings flow in and out. This too shall pass." This base has positivity in it, but it also has a gentle acceptance of what is.  There is no resistance to what is which counters the effect of the affirmation. And it is believable. 

Fill your affirmation lists with realistic, believable truths about the nature of life, about who and what you truly are and you will reduce your mental heartburn, You may even find healing.

An affirmation list can look like this. 

Mental TUMS:

• It is challenging to realize I do not have enough money in the bank right now.  That's okay though...I got by before, I will get by again.  
• All events in life: the challenges and the blessings flow in and out. 
• This too shall pass.
• Nothing that is impermanent, ever-changing, and unpredictable is worth clinging to
• I am more than this
• I am not my problems, I am that which Observes this little me experience these so-called problems.
• What is important is how I am inside...I can clean out my insides and be okay with anything Life offers
• It is just amazing being able to be a part of this experience called Life, no matter what is unfolding in front of me. 
• The music isn't playing for  "me" but I do get to participate in this dance
• I have great respect for Life

All is well! 

Michael A. Singer / Temple of the Universe ( May 26, 2024) Living with Great Respect. https://tou.org/talks/null

The Greatest Service

The greatest service is to recognize the essence or the reality of the other person...who that person truly is beyond form.

Eckhart Tolle

True service isn't about form serving form, ego serving ego, as so much of our human service can be. It is about soul recognizing soul.

I have been thinking a bit about my need to serve and how I go about it when I happened upon this video from a very wise teacher. 

Over the last year or so, I have been so intent on giving and doing for those who I felt could benefit from my service. I have been spending hours here, hours doing up books and learning packages for others, hours doing what I can for loved ones. I have been giving all I have to my now dependent adult children, draining the bit I have in the bank, draining my energy, draining my time. And though I can be very much present and wrapped in being when I am with these people or "doing" for them...I can also be very egoic, lost in this idea of "me" as helper.  Service is, I realize, a form of redemption for me.  

Do you remember how I often refer to the ego twins: Shamer and Redeemer ego? Part of my psyche is full of stored shame and to keep that shame down in a place where it is contained, ego will often set out to redeem itself through what it does or through how it appears to others. It will seek to become the hero. Part, but not all, of my service here and there is to enhance my self image. I want to see myself as "the yogi that serves selflessly", "the mother who gives all to her children", and part of me, in some small way, wants others to see me in that light as well.That is hard to realize. There is still an ego seeking to redeem itself in me so I do not have to deal with the shame emerging. And of course, the shame is emerging.  The more I practice, the more those samskaras are coming up to the surface for release. My automatic reaction to those feelings of shame is to redeem myself. Redeeming my self -image  is a way of pushing the shame back down.So service is not just a expression of the energy within  using this vessel and mind as its conduit...it is also a game ego is playing. Sigh!

I have to realize when I get all caught up in this idea that I am spending or wasting my energy  in doing for others that:

You are not giving anything of yours because ultimately nothing is yours. The energy is not yours. It is just universal energy coming through.Eckhart Tolle.

There is, though, a genuine desire for this natural and pure expression of service to come out, as well. My serving  isn't all ego derived.  I do see now, more than I ever have, the essence and reality of the other person.  I see myself in them and them in me.  I see less "me". It just seems natural to give time and energy away in the way I do because I see that it doesn't belong to me. I do.

So there I am jumping from one foot to the other when it comes to service and helping others. Up on my tip toes  of one foot, serving to meet ego's needs ( to be seen by self and others as  selfless), and then down solid on the other foot, balanced and connected just allowing all that wonderful loving energy to pour through this body and mind. Then  ego calls me over again when shame emerges to be released..."This is too painful. Redeem yourself by doing  something helpful!" I am told so I go off seeking redemption in service again. Then my practice pulls me back to balance, connection and realization. I serve from there. Back and forth I go like I am doing some kind of funky dance. I am, however,  leaning on that solid leg more and more, spending more time in balance than in self image redemption. It is coming. My aim in service is to be more like the quiet listener Vasudeva, in Siddhartha.

While he was still speaking, still confessing, Siddhartha felt more and more that this was no longer Vasudeva, no longer a human being, who was listening to him, that this motionless listener was absorbing his confession into himself like a tree the rain, like this motionless man was the river itself, that He was God Himself, that he was the eternal itself. Herma Hesse, Siddhartha

Vasudeva did little to serve but be.  He was connected to the Source, the everflowing river of Life, and allowed that energy to flow through him. He did not seek to serve, nor did he seek to be praised or acknowledged for his service, he just was service. In this passage Siddhartha is recognizing his friend as  the essence beyond the form, that which was actually doing the serving. And then he began to see that same natural flow of serving energy in himself through recognizing it in the other. 

I am beginning to truly recognize it in the other as well. I am beginning to recognize it in the essence beyond this form I call "me". 

All is well in my world!

Hermann Hesse ( n.d.[book was written in 1922]) Siddhartha. Amazon.

Eckhart Tolle ( May, 2024) Eckhart tolle on the role of Service in Spiritual Development.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRESz_CpBVU

The Great Song of a Thousand Voices

 

Already, he could no longer tell all the many voices a part, not the happy ones from the weeping ones, not the ones of children from those of men, they all belonged together, the lamenation of yearning, and the laughter of the knowledgeable one, the scream of rage and the moaning of the dying ones, everything was one, everything was intertwined and connected, entangled a thousand times. And everything together, all voices, all goals, all yearning, all suffering, all pleasure, all that was good and evil, all of this together was this world. All of this together was the flow of events, the music of life. And when Siddhartha was listening attentively to this river, this song of a thousand voices, when he neither listened to the suffeirng or the laughter, when he did not tie his soul to any particular voice and submerged himself into it, but when he heard them all, preceived the whole, the oneness, then the great song of the thousand voices consisted of a single word, which was Om: the perfection. 

Herman Hesse, Sidhhartha (n.d., Amazon), page ?...no page numbers lol)

This was more or less what Singer was speaking of today in his podcast.

The psyche is so compelling and alluring.  It pulls us in and wraps itself around us so it is all we can see.  We feel and think the way it tells us to. We look out at the world through the foggy film it creates over our eyes making it all so dark and distorted. It limits our vision and our experience to the confinement it creates  and we come to believe this is it! We grasp and seek through this distortion for anything out there that might make this imprisoned experience a little better, and we push away anything we assume will make it more challenging...creating a mess inside that we spend the rest of our days trying to protect with our preferences. 

Hmm!

But it doesn't have to be this way. When we realize that we are getting lost in this distraction and  pull back a bit from the compelling drama of the psyche and what the world it creates has on us...just a bit back, without resisting any of it...without clinging to any of it...we could experience what Siddhartha in Herman Hesse's book experienced, what Jesus experienced, what the Buddha,"the other Siddharttha," experienced, what a truly enlightened and evolved soul experiences. We could be free.

Spoiler Alert! If you are intending to read the book, do not read the following paragraph: 

Hesse's Siddhartha represents all of mankind that is on a search for a truth that lay beyond words and conceptual knowing, to the truth that can only be experienced. Raised in the comfortable home of a holy man, he left his father's house to seek truer Self-directed holiness. He became a forest dweller...living a life as a renounciant and self punisher before meeting the Buddha whose wisdom touched him in ways he could not fully realize until the end of the book...Not wanting religion  or the preachings of a teacher to contaminate his quest for experiential knowledge, he left the Buddha and his much respected teachings behind and continued with his search for something more.  He went on to become a rich householder, "of child-like mind", falling in love, and getting caught in the trappings of what the sensual  material world had to offer. He, once pulled into this distraction, became filled with lust and greed and he began to cling to materiality in a way his nirvana driven  heart did not approve. Once he realized what he was doing, consumed with guilt and shame, he left that world behind to become a poor ferryman befriending the  humble tradesman who would teach him the craft of ferrying, and  who would,  unkowingly, prove to be his teacher all along. He is taught, as a ferryman, to listen and honor the teachings of the ever flowing river beneath the boat. Then he experiences something he never thought he was capable of experiencing...the true joy of a love attachment when his son comes to him and the sheer horror of human grief when his son leaves him. It is then, in that challenge of being human, that his listening takes on a deeper focus.  In a way he cound never do with his seeking, chasing, and preaching, he becomes truly enlightened through listening and being. Without leaving the Ferryman's shack he becomes an enlightened master. Without stepping out to teach, he teaches others with his mere presence. He recognizes how much he agreed with the teachings of the Buddha, for he too had reached Buddhahood.

Well that is what I got from it. It was a pretty cool book. There was so much that touched me and made me think.  But I will start with the quote above. 

Through listening to the river Siddhartha could hear all the voices of the world merging as one.  Judgement, preference, and duality fell away to show the sameness of it all. He was only able to hear when he stopped doing and talking; when he pulled himself back from the human distractions, put away his judgements and preferences and recognized from that distance, that there was a unifying essence that held everything and everyone together as one. 

We could learn to listen to the hum of the essenc on which the world flows as well, when we fall back away from the illusion of humanness and rest in the Soul. .

That which is watching the human drama through body and mind is not human.(Paraphrased from something Michael Singer said today in his podcast.)

What we are watching is just human drama, with its ups and downs and all arounds.  We do not have to fix it, or change it.  We do not have to filter through it for that which we like and that which we don't.  We just have to sit back and listen to the wonderful music it is playing. When we need to act we can act but we do not have to consumed by what and how we should do in this world.  We should be more concerned with listening.

All is well. 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( May 23, 2024) Handling the Big Stuff. 

Clever or Wise?

 Yesterday I was clever, and I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, and I am changing myself.

Rumi

I don't know about you but I am now on the path towards wisdom. (Not that I am very wise at this point lol)  It is challenging, though, to see the suffering in this world and not seek to change it. Hmm!

All is well.

Between Differentiation and Oneness

 The whole universe is a play of differentiation and oneness; the whole universe is a play of the finite in the Infinite. We cannot take one without granting the other. But we cannot take them both as facts of the same perception, as facts of the same experience; yet in this way it will always go on. 

Vivekananda, Complete Works, 1,4 Lectures and Discourses, page 213

All is well!

The Unconditional Peace of Spirit

Spirit loves Spirit.

Yogananda 

To get beyond conditional well being to unconditional peace, love, and joy is what I ask for myself and others. The only way to do that is cutting through the veil preferences create.

All is well.  

A Path of Freeing the Mind

 The mind can be the greatest trap or the greatest liberator.

I got taken away, for an hour or so, viewing videos I recently posted. Why?  Is it ego that wants to make sure that it look's okay to others? Am I still there? Yuck! But I am to some degree.  

I also felt compelled to listen to the message. I listen to the message...the message pours out of this vessel I call "me" when I do those videos...imperfectly sure...but the message is something meant for "me", as much as it is meant for others....probably more so. When I say meant for "me", I mean it is another thing that will help to dissolve this "me". I am on the path to liberate the mind. 

All good.

All is well in my world

Jnana Yoga and "This Mind"

"This Mind"

So infinite and blissful was This Mind,

pure and expansive as the sky,

shrunk down into a tiny form,

cramped and compressed, It cried. 

In strange and new confinement

It lay at Mother's breast,

while memories of the place It left

denied It of Its rest.

Even the sweetest  memories will not last,

and as morning turned to day,

in this strange new world, 

what was known slowly slipped away.

Desperate and lost in unfamiliarity

like a leaf caught in the breeze,

This Ray of Mind now longed for solidity,

and a certain sense of ease.

So, focusing all Its power, 

now so shaky and confined,

It willed the tiny dimpled hand,

when eyes were blue and blind,

to reach up into the darkness

for something solid It could grasp.

 Landing on the warm flesh of other,

It drew in tiny breath and gasped,

"This will be mine," It declared,

as  clumsy fingers dug deeply into skin.

"In this dark and noisy world, 

through flesh, I will begin." 

"This is mine. I am this. I am me." 

the tiny lungs exclaimed,

and reaching here and reaching there

The Mind began to claim  

anything of this earthly world 

It could use in Its defense,

and any bit of outer knowing

that would help the world to make sense. 

Resting in this delusion

The Mind's vessel closed its eyes

and a fleeting hushing lullaby eased

the desperation in its cries. 

The weary Mind fell into dream sleep

where It staid for much too long

while faded memories of what It knew

became a haunting song.

The form expanded as the years went by

but The Mind did not find much relief.

What was left of what It once knew

was buried in strangling belief.

Its focus became so pinpoint,

so contracted was its beam,

seeing only the me and its drama

in this never ending dream.

Its addiction to the world and its elixirs

greatly grew and intensified,

until all the grasping and the clinging

did little to end this nasty lie.

There was no end to suffering, 

The Mind sadly realized,

there was no escaping reality,

there was no real place to hide.

So yawning, Mind opened up its eyes

and began to truly see,

"There is no sustenance to that which I cling,

there is no solidity to "me".  

The Mind fell back and listened, 

to that which lay beneath thought and word

"This is not what you are here for,"

the Song's lyrics could be heard.

"Who is dreaming? Who is singing?"

the mind answered back in query. 

"Of this world and all its pain and pleasures

I am so bloody weary.

Let me remember what I knew before 

I took to lowly form, 

and narrowed this light I am seeing through

to shine on passing storm.

If I am the light, then who are You?

From where does this light  come?

Show me where the light begins and 

the  place of Source I come from."

The answer has yet to come to This Mind

that is slowly awakening,

but there is less holding on to flesh and form

as the world continues shaking.

No longer infant or child, Mind is expanding 

beyond Its earthly form,

and slowly, with gentle grace and ease, 

It is falling  back to Home.

© Dale-Lyn, May, 2024

This is what came out of me after listening to today's podcast on Jnana Yoga ( referred to as Gyana Yoga in the podcast). Such an imperfect poem in so many ways...Remaining ego, in "me",  says, "Are you crazy? Don't post that!!! It isn't good enough. You are supposed to only show parts of yourself that are a certain way that maintains this sense of self you created so the world likes you and is therefore willing to support you and protect you.   You are not supposed to express yourself in such an imperfect way. Man! When will you learn? Yet, this is what came out so it is here for others to scrutinize, judge, criticize, condemn, or possibly even get something from.  Other opinion is and always was beyond me...I was only supposed to put it down. All good.

All is well in my world!

Michael Singer/ Temple of the Universe (May 19, 2024) Gyana Yoga-Learning to Use Mind for Liberation.  https://tou.org/talks/

Learning from Nachiketa: Death is not the End

 

The intelligent atman is not born, nor does he die; he did not come from anywhere, nor was he anything, unborn, eternal, everlasting, ancient; he is not slain though the body is slain. 

Katha Upanishads Verse 1.2.18

Atman is soul.

I was reminded today of a beautiful story in the Katha Upanishads about the beauty of surrendering to what is...to all that is...even the hardest life experience.  

Our community was  hit with such  a tradgic loss this week.  We were  shook into silence by it. There was little news, little gossip heard since the incident on Sunday. People were even afraid to ask questions or speak about it.  A hushed whisper of what happened and what might be,  is all that could be  heard.  The community was full of a silent "if we don't speak about it, it isn't real" background hum. 

Accepting the reality of how impermenent and unpredictable life is; how it can strip us of the most precious jewels, our chldren, our peace; and how it can reach into any moment and take away that which we think it should never take from us, is somethimes too much for the collective mind to bear. Yet, impermanence, unpredictability,  is our reality as human beings. On top of that Life can do what it does in a blink of an eye. No time to prepare.

Sigh! That is hard stuff.  That, amongst other suffering I have been observing around me has left this psyche I call"me" quite disillusioned with this Life. I guess I really didn't like Life as a human being this week.  It didn't make a lot of sense to me. It just seemed to be full of suffering. Where was the joy? Or even the peace I have been prayng for, for all? More than most, I have had this urge and tendency to stick my head in the sand so I didn't have to deal with what is going on out there.  I had to shut out suffering or at least the knowledge of it. I closed myself off from so many suffering others over the years just to deal with what is in front of me. I was reminded of those I neglected as well this week and I felt shame and guilt. With everything coming together as a big weight on my shoulders, I felt overwhelmed. Life floored me with its heaviness.

How does one cope with such heavy reality?

The Story of Nachiketa and His Three Wishes (Ketha Upanishads)

Nachiketa was the son of a proud Brahmin by the name of Vajasravasa ( sorry no accents). Vajasravasa called himself a true renounciant and often preached how devoted he was. Nachiketa  was an observant boy and an honest one.  He often observed his father taking part in the  customary vedic rituals of sacrificing. One day, when he noticed how his father only took the old, and no longer useful animals to the fire to be sacrificed, he asked, "Since the cow gives no milk and is no longer of value to you,  Father, is it  truly a sacrifice you are making?" 

 This hurt his father's Brahmin pride, as truth will often do. He became very angry with his son and even more distant. To make matters worse, Nachiketa, full of faith (Sraddha), innocence, and honesty continued. " And since you propose to be a renounciant and obviously have no more use for me, where will you sacrifice me Father?"  

His father was furious and in his reactive  anger and haste shouted, " I will give you to Death. To Death, I give you!"

As soon the words left his mouth, the old Brahmin realized his error.  He did not mean what he said  but once spoken from the mouth of a Brahmin,  there was no taking this wish back. His grief became overwhelming.

Nachiketa was swept through the portal between life and death. Fearless and full of sraddha he said, "of many I go the first, of many I go midmost, what is there for death to do that he can now do by me?" (Verse 1.1.5) "...like corn, decades the mortal, like corn, is born again."(Verse 1.1.6)

He was taken  from the world of Life to wait three days in the mansion of Yama in the after life for Death's return. (Yama ( Death) was in the world of the living  collecting other souls when Nachiketa landed there.)  Through that three day wait  there was no entity there to greet him and therefore no water to soothe the fire of death, but Nachiketa remained very fearless, and faithful, willing to accept and surrender his life as the perfect sacrifice.  

When Yama returned he was very impressed with Nachiketa's level of purity and devotion. He told him he could have three boons/wishes for being so faithful/

The first wish from Nachiketa was, " May Guatama[his father...'great sage'] be freed from anxiety, be calm in mind, not wrath against me, that he may recognize and welcome me let go by you-is, oh Death, the first of the three boons I ask." ( Verse 1.1.10)

Nachiketa knew that his father would be suffering great grief for losing his son, as any parent would. He wanted to ease that grief and alleviate any remaining anger his father might be living with...knowing that anger creates suffering for the holder.  He also wanted to ensure that if he were to return, likely in another carnation, his father would recognize him and welcome him. That was his first wish. 

I see how the belief in reincarnation can add peace and a sense of soothing relief in those parents who lose their children.  They could be left with a  sense that their children  are not gone...just transformed . Hindu tradition teaches that reincarnation happens in the same ancestral pool so the ancestral karma can be burned off. In which case, we may meet our loved ones again in another body.

Just knowing your loved one is okay in the after life would be such a peace making experience.  Parents who go to psychics and are told that their child is okay where they now are, are often left with so much peace. 

This is the peace Nachiketa is asking for for his father. 

His second wish was for Yama to teach him how to transcend the fear of death and attachment to worldly things including his own body. 

His final wish was to know what happens after death.

"This well known doubt as to what happens to a man after death-some say he is, and some say he is not-I shall know being taught by thee. This is the third of the boons. " ( Verse 1.1.20)

Yama desperate not to have to explain that which even the gods sometimes do not understand, tried to dissaude Nachiveta from making  such a wish his third. He encouraged him to want all the riches, fame, lonegvity the world could offer instead of this. Nachiveta was not dissauded.

"Man is not to be satisfied with wealth, if wealth were wanted, we should get it, if we only see thee. We shall also live, as long as you rule. Therefore, that boon alone is fit to be craved by me." (Verse 1.1.27)

In other words, Nachiveta was saying that all the things of the world are impermanent and unpredicatable, they will disappear as long as Death is around to claim them and that man only lives so long. Earthly things are of little value, then, compared to the ultimate knowledge of Life after death. 

"What decaying mortal living in the world below and possessed of knowledge, having reached the company of the undecaying and immortal, will delight in long life, knowing the nature of delight produced by song and sport. "( Verse 1.1.28)

We as mortals are already dying and decaying...only here for a brief flicker of candle flame. Nachiveta, now in the company of immortal Death, realizes how temporal and unsatisfying that flicker is he left behind.  Nothing of this world can bring to man what true knowledge and enlightenment can. He is choosing eternity and  enlightenment over the temporal illusions. 

In the remainder of these Upani Nachiveta what he wants to know. He gives him a mirror to tell him what he sees is not real. What is within is real: Atman/Soul.  He explains there is no birth, so there can be no death for this Atman.There is an eternal Self within that can not be sought and found.  It finds us. There is no "self". Just this Self  which reveals itself through itSelf. "To him, this atman reveals its true nature." ( Verse 1.2.24) 

It will take me forever to go through all these verses but there is one that brings a bit of peace to me during this heavy reflection of what seems like untimely suffering and death. I hope that its truth can someow penetrate the grief so many are experiencing now. 

Subtler than the subtle, greater than the great, in the heart of each living being, the atman reposes. One free from desire, with his mind and senses composed, sees the glory of the atman and is absolved from grief.  (Veres 1.2.20)

Hmm! How I ramble.

May all beings know:

All is well! 

S. Sitarami Sastri/Wisdom Libray (Last udpated: Fenruary , 2021)  Katha Upanishads with Shankara's Commentary.(1928) https://www.wisdomlib.org/hinduism/book/katha-upanishad-shankara-bhashya/d/doc145164.html

Dr Katie Jane/ Embodied Philosophy (April 17, 2021) Katha Upanishads- The Secret Teachings of Death-Embodied Philsophy. https://www.embodiedphilosophy.com/kat%CC%A3ha-upanis%CC%A3ad-the-secret-teachings-of-death/

Dis-ease in the Gut

 

All dis-ease begins in the gut.

Hippocrates

After all the years of a twisting turning gut reaction to stress...my gut is sick. 

Sick?  I thought you said there was no sickness?  

On the vertical plane, in the true reality that exists beyond this superficial world of maya that we walk through...there is no sickness.  On this horizontal physical plane, where most of us are consciously stuck,  there is a belief in illness, therefore the signs of illness. My body is showing those signs.  

My gut has probably always been more active (and reactive) than my mind ever was. I tend to  perceive life first through my gut. Encounter a situation the gut likes and I feel a flutter of butterfly wing in there or a pleasant swooshing before the mind even knows what is going on. If I encounter a situation or person the gut doesn't like...there is an instant  drop, a sudden pull of energy downward, the same feeling one gets on the ferris wheel when it is dropping down.  Sometimes, when my gut is overwhelmed and confused it feels like a whirlpool in my abdomen ...churning, swirling, splashing against my insides like mighty ocean waves resisting the rocks in front of them. 

My gut resists my life...or resists the fact that I am not listening to the way it is telling me to approach or make peace with this life.  My gut reacts to stress. Big time.

I spent my life ignoring my gut. I was so busy straining to hear what my brain had to say about what was going on, I couldn't hear what the Brain's southern cousin, much wiser in many ways, had to say. I didn't take the time to listen to its wise messages, to follow its advice and it is not happy.  So I now have a rock in my gut, it seems, all the time.  I have chronic heartburn that is barely controlled by the medication I am on, and I am having other issues as well.  Constant discomfort. A constant inconvenience to my daily life. Sigh! The gut is protesting my neglect of it.

That is what I am experiencing now, on top pf protests from other body areas.  The billion gut cells (mostly migrant workers in the form of microbs) have unionized and are now standing in front of me with their placard signs shouting into bullhorns so loudly I have no choice but to listen. "Change Your Approach to  Life! Change Your Mind! Protect and listen to us or we are out for good!"  

Is it too late to make peace with them and my life?

I hope not.

All is well. 

Fall Back

Belief is of the mind; knowledge is direct experience. Spirituality is about your relationship with God. You are consciousness...God is the Infinite Consciousness. So, you are the drop that, once it pulls its attention away from the object of consciousness and  falls back into the Ocean,  has the potentional to merge.  The Source of Consciousness is another name for God. 

Paraphrased or indirectly quoted from Michael A. Singer

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( May 13, 2024) Spirituality-The Journey to theSource of Consciousness. https://tou.org/talks/

A Pure Spring World

The world will change if we change; if we are pure, the world will become pure.

Vivekananda

The first glimpse of the outside world I had this morning...was a peak of blue sky  through my yoga studio window  when I was stretching up into sun salutations. Then when I came up here I caught a glimpse of blossoms emerging on the cherry trees and I just had to sigh.  I may have only slept a few hours...this pain is constantly speaking to me at night waking me up or keeping me awake...but it is all good when I look outside and see spring and its amazing light spalshing across my yard. I am also warmed when I hear the music of bird song. It is all good.  It is all so pure. It is all so very good. 

All is well in my world.

Weary of the World I See

 I have forgotten It, and do not know where I am going, who I am, or what it is I do.  Remind me, Father, now, for I am weary of this world I see. Reveal what You would have me see instead.

-ACIM-W-224:2:2-4

I am reminded of these words today at a time I am contemplating the suffering I see as the world unfolds  around me. I see this suffering in those I live with and it is so in my face. I see the suffering of people who have lost their beloved pets. I see the suffering in the homeless people that walk the streets of this little city in numbers now.  And I see the suffering of parents and an entire community waiting to see if a child survives a life threatening accident. ( I see,as well, the suffering that I imagine will be never ending  in the person who was behind the wheel). Sigh! I am weary of this world I see. 

I ask, Reveal what you would have me see instead. 

Sigh! All of this is Life just doing what Life does, following laws my mere mortal brain will never understand. I don't want to look away from suffering. I want to look upon it with compassion and kindness and love.  I do want to see more than suffering though too....so there is balance. Show me both sides.  

As I say that I know I am being shown  everyday the beauty and joy that is Life as well, but my mind so often directs my gaze downward locking in on sorrow and suffering.  It fails to see the what you would have me see instead. 

What I should be asking is: give me, all of us,  the strength to offer presence to suffering and then to be able to lift our eyes away from its pull, to see the joy and beauty that we are also here to experience. 

All is well.

Happy Mother's Day.

 

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mothers day to all mothers out there,  This day honors the maternal instinct, the caring and nuturing that is so often selflessly offered to the world. It doesn't really matter whether your children are skinned or furred! May you, of loving heart  be blessed with peace and love. 

All is well.

Embracing the Optimal Zone of Difficulty

 The human brain loves a challenge, but only when it is within an optimal zone of difficulty. 

James Clear, page 231

The Goldilocks rule states we reach our highest motivation when we work on tasks that are right at the edge of our current abilities. We are really motivated in what we are doing when what we are setting out to accomplish is just like Goldilocks experience at the Three Bear's house: not too easy, not to hard, just right. 

We reach that Goldilocks zone, that flow state where we lose track of time and the  optimal state of arousal that exists midway between anxiety and boredom (Yerkes-Dodson law), when the task is 4 % beyond our current ability.  We feel intensely motivated when the task  is  taking us a small step beyond the comfort zone but only a small step.  Too big of a leap and it might too difficult leading to overwhelm rather than achievement.  Too small, and it leaves us bored and not growing.

The two little books I am working on now are hitting that 4 % perfectly.  I have never written about the writing process for children before; I never wrote about phonemic awareness before ( infact I didn't know much about phonemic awareness until I started writing this book...it was a means to learn for me just as much as it was a means to teach). I am in the zone when I am working on them...hours go by and I would swear it was only minutes.  I am not too  bored and I am not too anxious! I am just right! 

Hmm!

We can, also, be motivated to grow and expand in life spiritually when we embrace the challenges ahead of us.  Let's make the most of those life challenges that are 4 % beyond what the mind is comfortable with. Take a small step out of the comfort zone you are stuck in. Challenge yourself to go a little deeper everyday. Learn in that optimal state of difficulty.

All is well.

James Clear ( 2018) Atomic Habits. New York: Avery

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( May 12, 2024) Using Life for Your Ascent. https://tou.org/talks/

Questions On a Bad Mind Day

"I am just having a bad mind day!"

Michael A. Singer

I was sitting here writing this morning and listening to Michael Singer. Someone pointed out that his message is the same thing everyday. In a way it is. His message is something I have actually heard many, many times before I was even introduced to him.  It is an ancient message he is sharing.  He just does so in a way that resonantes with me.  

Truth is Truth!

It resonates with me because his methodology appeases my scientific and practical mindset. It also resonates because it a thought stream others have been suggesting to me repeatedly...over and over again...since I began this journey.  Heck, it is a thought stream that was already imprinted into my mind before I was even born. Truth is truth! Reality just is!

Cracking the External Wall

My ego built a wall over the knowledge I was born with. The outside teachings were tap, tap, tapping at that thin wall that existed between the external and internal knowing for decades. All it takes is a certain tap from a certain pick to crack the wall open wide...so, voila!...the external teaching can match the internal knowing. This wall in me  may not be completely open yet but Michael A. Singer certainly put a big crack in er ( as we would say in my part of the world. :) 

A Bad Mind Day

Anyway, a day ago I was having a bad mind day. I wrote about a "me-me" thought that kept emerging during meditation and other parts of my day, a thought I don't want to keep supressing and repressing. I was left with this question:  Is this thought coming from  Self or self, spirit or ego, Higher universal mind, or personal mind, outside the wall that is left in me, or inside it...and what do I do about it?

That is a pretty profound question.  No wonder I tend to push the thought back down as often as I do. Answering this question and deciding what to do requires a coming together of the deeper stuff with the superficial stuff, the Soul's purpose with the ego's in order to do what is best for my Higher Self, for the world.  That is a big responsibility. It is much easier to simply focus on what me wants. 

It Isn't All About "Me".

There is a problem though. It isn't about what little me wants. Is it? Heck, I don't even know what little me, as a human, wants anymore. 

Well, Singer reminds us in the podcast linked below, that we are not human beings. We are simply observing Life through a human being. We are the consciousness, the One consciousness, that internal mind, observing what is unfolding in front of us; observing how this personal  mind and heart are responding or reacting to it. 

Just a Concept

The problem is we, as consciousness,  have been staring at all the human stuff so long and so hard we have identified with it. Human drama has thusly been imprinted on this consciousness. We created a self concept, an idea of me with it.  We forget that "Me" and all its dramas, its joy and its woe, its heart and its mind...is just an idea, a concept.  It isn't real.  No concept can be real. Reality is free of concepts. This knowledge that exists on the inner part of the wall knows that, is that. 

Not Here to Serve Me

So when I asked if a relationship is serving 'me', I got it all wrong. Relationships...Life in general...is not here to serve me and give me what me wants. (Remember there is such a mess inside I don't honestly know what me wants anymore.) Life is not here to give "me" ( a concept) the perfect relationships where everyone and the things they do match all the samskara junk I have stuffed inside, so nothing ever gets triggered or bothered by these relationships. That is crazy. First of all "me" is just a mental construct. Second of all, how can anything or anyone match this very unique  pattern of clinging and storage, likes and dislikes I have inside me, my psyche, all the time.  Impossible.  Others have their own patterns, creating the sum of their learned experiences, their psyches.  What are the chances the stored patterns of two or more people will line up exactly all the time so neither ever gets triggered by the other? Next to impossible. What are the chances that Life...a process that has been going on for billions and billions of years, with an infinite number of variables in it that lead up to the particular moment that is unfolding in front of you, is going to be exactly the way "me" thinks it should be? You do not have to understand statistics to understand the probability of that. Yet, we honestly believe in our me identification, that the moment should be here to serve us. Come on, isn't that crazy?

The moment is not supposed to be what you want...you are supposed to be the highest being able to accept, learn, grow, appreciate, honor and serve this moment in front of you. 

The Answer to My Question

When I close my eyes to listen for an answer, this is what I hear coming from the cracks Singer and many others have made in my wall. 

What You are Not

This understanding starts with understanding that you are not the drama you are addicted to staring at. You are not your thoughts or your emotions. You are not your mind, your, heart, your body. Heck you are not even the human walking around on this planet that is stirring up all this drama.  You are not, therefore, the person asking the question, "What do I do about this relationship?"

What You Are

You are the Being inside the human, that is observing Life through it. 

You are Consciousness, the One Consciousness that is in all things, looking out through those eyes on your head, hearing the world through your ears, feeling sensation through your skin. 

You are the undisturbed One Mind that stares at that disturbed personal mind it has created as it makes sense of the information the body is picking up, as it judges it, stores it, pushes it away. 

You are that amazing Light that contracted itself to a narrow beam in order to stare  for much too long at that which was bringing It down. 

You Are That which clings to those things that  block Its flow through you and into the  world.  

You are the ever flowing joy that exists beneath your blockages. 

You are the Truth, the Only Reality,  hidden behind the wall ego created. 

You are hearing the tap, tap, tapping of inner truths externally offered. Do not resist them . Let that wall crack open. Allow your inner Self to be free.

This is what I hear when I truly ponder that question. It is a truth that is offered to me and a truth I offer to you. My relationship question seems so unimportant now, doesn't it? 

All is well. 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( May 9, 2024) Exploring Distraction, Identification and Liberation. https://tou.org/talks/

Samatha and Vipassana

 Wings

Oh beautiful bird with expanded wing,
carry me away,
to the kingdom my Self longs for,
a place where I can stay.
I put away my running shoes,
my need to hide, to  grasp, to seek  
and close my eyes and wait for you
 to clasp me in your  beak.
Lift me up with gentle ease,
 and save me from my fear.
Take me to that special place
 that exists nowhere but here.

 Place me on  the graceful wing
where time is hushed and stilled
 and where mind and body stop to breathe
as nature surely wills.
Upon your feathery pinion,
I will stretch out in passive form
giving up my struggles and my fight
to resist each passing storm.
I will surrender graciously,
as we glide through spacious sky,
and I will notice just how blue it is
while the grey clouds pass us by.

I will have faith in you my friend
to shelter and protect,
as I let go  into the sureness of your strength,
my view you will correct.
As you hold me on your wing,
and we skillfully swoop and glide,
I will know that where you're taking me
is nowhere but inside.
And as I breathe in each precious breath,
I will observe  each internal knot release
from  the twisted  pain of wounded cells
to settle into peace.

Then when there is no longer in me
a place for fear and grief to hide,
I will crawl so gratefully over you
to the wing on the other side.
There, I will lie and look about;
the wonders of the world, I will see
and understand so perfectly
the way it was and the way it's meant to be.
And without a noise of flapping wing,
you will gently set me down
in the home of Self where I never left
and where peace always can be found.

Dale-Lyn  May 2020

I was reminded of this poem after listening to the one person in the world I would have likely made my guru if he were still in flesh...Thich Nhat Hanh.  I think, but I am not sure, it was a Plum Village talk when I first learned of samatha and Vipassana (sorry no accents). When I heard this man speak today...a beautiful recording from Plum Village with amazing cinematography...I was reminded of this poem. Hmm! I wrote this very imperfect poem then because I was realizing how much I wanted to heal.  That desire still brews in me. Healing comes with stillness, silence, and resting in Self.

It is possible for us to live every moment of our life in such a way that every moment becomes a moment of healing. 

Stop running. Let yourself be healed. 

All is well.

Thich Nhat Hanh/Plum Village.( February, 2024) Stop Running/ Teaching by Thich Nhat Hanh. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qch5ISD9Bxo

Objective Observation Witnessing a Thoughtful Question

 It matters that you accept things that have nothing to do with you. [and most things in Life have nothing to do with you.] ...Practice letting go of the personal.

Michael A. Singer

I am by no means a perfect meditator, far from it.  I go down to my studio every morning, pop a squat on the floor, pick up my mala, and I close my eyes as I move my fingers from one bead to the other but my mind seldom stops completely. Nor do I ask it to.  My goal is not to transcend the mind into some mystical consciousness reality, but  to simply fall a bit back away from mind and what it naturally does, to observe it from the place of Objective Observer.  

The mind thinks, that is its nature. The hyperactive, busy -world-conditioned personal mind...thinks a lot. I have one of those lol. I have learned not to ask my mind to be something it isn't. 

So when I, in meditation practice (and it is a practice for a reason...no perfection expected, just learning), find myself in a state where I am back in the Seat of the Observer witnessing this busy mind attempting to take me off the rails... even if that witnessing is only for a minute of the 20 plus minutes I am seated...that, to me, is a succssful practice. Every moment that I am not lost in the personal nature of my dramatic thought streams, is a moment of grace. Every moment where I catch myself watching myself getting lost or about to get lost or coming back from being lost...is a timeless moment spent in the Seat of the Objective Observer again.  It is a notch on my belt indicating growth and success where we all need it the most. I may not stay there, in witness consciousness, long but every second of that experience is special to me.  I even have  been having moments in that Seat where I am aware that I am aware of having no thoughts.  It is like the both the thought stream and time freez. I find myself observing the world in that pause. Mind will, before long, bring me back from that and into a flow of thought but every microsecond of thoughtless awareness is so cool. I find myself saying at those times, "Wow! I am in the Seat again!" That, of course, is a thought that can pull me back into the stream of thinking.  I am hoping to get to the state where I just realize... without thought or explanation...that I am not just in the Seat, I am the Seat.

Today, when I was seated my mind was busy with one thought in particular...a thought that has been nagging at me for years now, rising up to stir up the muddy waters of an already disturbed mind. :) It is a thought that I generally push down as if it were a rubber duckie I want no one else to see. I have been holding it and all the feelings of confusion it creates down with it for so long.  It is, I am discovering very challenging and energy draining to hold such things down when they want nothing more than to be on the surface. I just don't know how I would  deal with it if it were to come up and float freely on the surface making its reality  obvious to all, especially to me. It would mean, possibly, some major life changes that I am not sure I am ready to make with everything else I have going on. Sigh! It would mean hurting others I do not want to hurt. It would mean enduring great loss myself and an unpredictable future. This thought is a truth I don't want to deal with. It is a truth others do not want to deal with.

There were moments when I relaxed my downward hold on this thought. I began, then,  to express this truth to others...gently, subtley, with compassion and respect as well as a collection of truthful grievances that I had hoped would support my arguement for a need for change ...but the others, all but the counsellor I speak to once a month, basically told me to stop thinking that thought. That, at my age, it wuld incur a change that would make no sense. Other people's reaction triggered shame in me (without anyone meaning to) for even having such a thought. I felt I was being unkind, selfish, playing the victim, over dramatic, creating issues where no issues existed. The person or people involved in this thought stream were so good and well loved by everyone...how could I have a problem with them? It is true, there is not an an ounce of malicious intent, a heck of a lot of unconsciousness and a lack of a thoughtfulness, but no malice or ill will. How can I find faultt with that when I too am unconscious at times?  So, I did what I was conditioned to do. I pushed  it all back down and leaned into the hold.

Still, every now and again...especially when I see evidence of how one sided and draining this thing seems to be  for "me", up it pops again. The thought will arise, "What about you and your happiness and wellness? You have been so drained by this. You have put so much into this, given so much, so much is expected of you, and what are you getting back? Very little. Don't you deserve the same effort, kindness, thoughtfulness,  and compassion you give? And will you get it here like this? You know you won't!  This is not, nor was it ever, what others want to believe it is...what you may have wanted others to believe it was ...what you wanted to beleive it was...and you know it!" 

How does the mind counter that? "Well are you not all about getting rid of the personal? So what if the "me" is being drained and its needs are being neglected? Isn't this what your journey is all about? To get rid of me and its neediness?"   This idea of letting go of the personal is another reason why I keep  pushing these thoughts and feelings  down. Sigh! It gets confusing.

I don't want to supress and repress what I am thinking and feeling.  I don't want to feel shame for feeling what I am feeling either.  I do not want to spend my lfe serving the me and its needs.  I am fully aware that nothing out there, no one out there, is responsible for making me happy or unhappy  but me.  Maybe, this situation is a part of my karma...a learning environment I have been given to help me gain the mastery of being undisturbed and peaceful no matter what, to find joy from within no matter what is happening and who I am with. That is what I pray for.

So the question that arises from this thought that keeps popping up is, "Do I continue to give, give, give knowing that I will get nothing back in return but an opportunity to learn how to remain undisturbed? Is that enough? "

I don't know.  What I do know is, regardless if it is personal mind or higher mind bringing this thought up, that so wants to be explored, for me to deal with,  I need to stop pushing and holding it down. Repression and suppression, I know, are the answer to nothing but misery.

This is what the Objective Observer witnessed today in my meditation practice. It certainly wasn't thoughtless, but it was powerful, just the same. 

All is well, 

Doing What Comes Natural

 

Whenever you feel authentic and genuine you are heading in the right direction.

James Clear, page 225

In determining where to spend your energy remember that which comes easier to you while bringing a sense of joy is a place you might want to explore.  Clear lists a series of questions to ask yourself  when deciding on what goals to set/ what tasks to pursue:

• What feels like fun to me, but work to others? Studying, writing, sharing what I learn is fun to me while others seem to dread it.
• What makes me lose track of time? Studying, writing, sharing...I lose track of time.  I am putting together what I have learned so far about teaching literacy to EAL students into books. I have no idea why but spending hours on it, losing all track of time.
• Where do I get greater returns than the average person? Well...I am not getting many external returns but I am getting a lot of intrinsic reward from what I do. I keep dreaming though about tying off all my years studying by finishing a Masters and possibly a PhD?  See myself writing a Thesis and possibly a dissertation. Imagine! Weird I know, at my age.
• What comes naturally to me? Studying, writing, sharing..teaching. Hmmm! No one ever said I was normal, lol

All is well! 

PS: eye sight has been a little less than perfect lately so I have been making oodles of typos.  Sorry about the distraction.

James Clear ( 2018) Atomic Habits. New York: Avery/

Heeding the Internal Restlessness

 Siddhartha was thus loved by everyone. He was a source of joy by everyone. He was a source of joy for everybody, he was a delight for them all. But he Siddhartha was not a source of joy for himself, he found no delight in himself. Walking the rosy paths of the fig tree gardens, sitting in the bluish shade of  the grove of contemplation, washing his limbs daily in the bath of repentence, sacrificing in the dim shade of the mango forest, his gestures of perfect decency, everyone's love and joy, he still lacked all joy in his heart. Dreams and restless thoughts came into his mind, flowing from the water of the river, sparkling from the stars of the night, melting from the beams of the sun, dreams came to him and a restlessness of the soul, fuming from the sacrifices, breathing forth from the verses of the Rig Veda, being infused into him, drop by drop, from the Old Brahmans.

Herman Hesse, Siddhartha, page ? no page numbers lol

How beautiful is that writing!!! Man.

All is well

Making it Painful

 

The more immediate the pain, the less likely the behaviour.

James Clear, page 206

I suppose there are so many habits that are not necessarily wholesome in my life that I could change or break.  My procrastination habit being one of them. My messiness habit another.  My avoidance of the submission process is a fairly big one that gets in the way of me  getting published. There is my evening  Netflix binging and sweet consumption  to consider, or my tendency to go to bed too close to midnight. Many people will tell me I spend way too much time on the computer in the morning and see that as a habit that should be modified.  Hmmm!  There are a lot of habits I am repsonsible for that may be standing in the way of me living a healthier and freer life. So why am I not so concerned about breaking them? Should I be? 

If I were inclined to break these habits and if it got so far as me writing down on a piece of paper: " I will break the habit of eating sweets at night", for example, I would break this habit.  I am notorious for doing what I set out to do...but the thing is...I do not care if these habits get broken or not. Hmm!

James Clear, in Atomic Habits, outlines that habits can be broken by  ensuring that they are the opposite of the habits we may want to build. We have to make the habits we want to break invisible, unattractive, difficult or even painful, and unsatisfactory. Hmm. 

Make it invisible?

Yeah, no sweets in the house. If there were no sweets visibly in front of me I could not binge on them.  Sigh.

Make it unattractive?

Does that mean I have to buy sweets that taste like crap? No, not necessarily.  But that would work like Antabuse works for the alcoholic...making me sick on sweets. Or maybe I just have to see how I am gaining weight...those rolls in my belly are not so attractive and either are the fillings in my mouth. Hmm! The prospect of health related issues from a high sugar consumption...not attractive  and neither are the hypoglycemic crashes that follow a chocolate binge. 

Make it difficult? 

If an alcoholic had to drive five miles to the store to get alcohol every time they had a craving...keeping alcohol out of the house would make it difficult for them to drink, wouldn't it? Thus curbing the habit, at least a bit. If I had no chocolate bars in the house...I probably wouldn't drive to the store at 8 O'clock at night to get some, would I? Going to the kitchen to whip up a batch of banana chocolate chip muffins may not be a difficulty I'd not be willing to put myself through either. ( Heck...who am I kidding?  I have seen me whipping up a batch of something at Nine O'clock at night to curb my craving. Besides, if I had chocolate chips in the house I'd be eating them from the bag. lol)

Make It Unsatisfying?

Man, why does chocolate have to be so satisfying? Some would say, "Well choose the dark stuff, the stuff with a high cacoa concentration.The taste is a little bitter and less satisfying"...but I just eat twice as much of that because I convince myself it is good for me lol

So I guess my habits are not creating enough obvious pain in my life right now or otherwise I would be stopping them.  The key phrase is right now....  What is the long term effect of these less than wholesome habits? Hmm.  If I continue binging on Netflix and eating sweets I am going to keep gaining weight which will have a negative effect on my physical and mental health. I am depriving my mind and body of other things that could nourish it...maybe I am setting myself up for contamination and degeneration of the mind and body?  If I keep procrastinating finishing writing projects and sending them off I may never get published again.  And maybe, just maybe, the world needs what I have to offer in some tiny form and I am depriving those needy beings  of it? What pain does my procrastination cost the world?  (Okay...that is a stretch lol)

A Habit Contract

Regardless, Clear offers a pretty feasible solution to assisting us with breaking "bad" habits.  He calls it a Habit Contract. A Habit contract is a written  declaration of what you intend to do and the consequence for not following through. For example, I might write, "I will refrain from eating high calory sweets at night. If I eat a chocolate bar, I will need to take a quick jaunt around the block regardless of time or  weather."  I can see that being a healthy consequence, can you? 

That would work for me. Once I write a declaration on paper, I usually stick with it.  Hmm! 

So, are these habits I have listed here in need of a habit contract? Am I at the point where I consider them worth the effort of changing?  I don't know yet but I will get back to you when I have an answer. (I am a procrastinator, remember.) 

All is well. 

James Clear (2018) Atomic Habits. New York: Avery

Still Being Thrown Off Balance?

 We must ask ourselves how far we can be acted upon by the external world, and how far we can stand on our own feet, in spite of all the forces outside us.  When we have succeeded in preventing all the forces in the world from throwing us off balance, then alone we have attained to freedom, and not before. Vivekananda, Complete Works, 1.4,  page 213

Are you still being thrown off balance by the world around you? I know I am.  Trying though to stand on my own two feet despite everything going down around me. It isn't always easy but I am making some progress I think, albeit slowly. I am working on getting past "me" in hope that I can become and remain undistrurbed and unattached to whatever Life throws my way; so that  I can become and remain absent of the need of the good opinion of others; and so I can become and remain free.

Like I said, I am no longer depending on things around me changing. It is I that must do the changing whether or not things around me change and become better or not.  It would be great if they did though, wouldn't it?

Change the subject, and the object is bound to change; purify yourself, and the world is bound to be purified. 

Vivekananda,1.4,  page 213

All is well

The Complete Workd of Swami Vivekananda. Kindle Edition

Soul Scientist Remaining Undisturbed Without Hope?

 

The answer is not to get what you want. That is not what spirituality is about, what life is about.

Michael A. Singer

I was laying in bed this morning thinking about what I really want with the remaining Life I have. I was realizing how different I am now.  I used to have dream boards around me...On those boards I had pictures of a big beautiful house by the ocean, me signing books as a successful author, money in the account, my children all happy and healthy around me, a PhD on the wall behind me, and my body fit and in excellent health etc.... Looking at those boards used to take me away from the pressure of my present life situation. The thought of attaining any of those things was like a light that shone through the heavy darkness. It gave me something.  It gave me escape through hope. 

I don't have  those boards anymore and I do not operate with hope.Without the  sense of hope that external  things will get better,  I don't visualize life circumstance in my mind getting better.  I am no longer pulled by hope. I don't try to manifest a better life situation.  I don't pray that Life get better for this "me".  It is strange, not living with that hope that something in my life will change dramatically to remove some of this heavy pressure off my shoulders that seems to have been sitting there for so long. Hmm! This living experience seems a bit dark and heavy without the light of hope. Sometimes I even feel stuck. Still, I know that I don't need hope.  I simply need the willingness to accept and appreciate what is.  That is yoga.

Yoga has taught me not to be attached to the fruit of my actions, not to get  pulled into activity by the potential for reward.   Life is now...not in the future...the reward is in the doing and the being now. I write like crazy these days but no longer so much to get published. This idea "publish or persih" is no longer pulling me along.  I see myself as a writer because I write. There is an effortless ease to most of my writing now.  Things are coming out of me and it is like, "Why the heck am I writing this?" I recognize a need or a lack somewhere and I just go about filling the holes. I just continue with the process because it is easy. It is not about "me" and I what I will gain from it.  It is about what I can offer with this bit of skill I might have.

I learn and study like crazy , have all kinds of university credits, but only one degree. The learning is coming to me.  It isn't even expected or asked for sometimes.  Just plop...there it is...another opportunity...another finished learning adventure...another piece of paper saying that I learned something. I have a feeling the postgraduate degrees may come but if they do it won't be becasue I desperately went after them.  It will be becasue the opportunity came to me.I have become a student of life.  

I don't dream about getting more money, any more, just so that I can have some semblance of financial peace.  I accept that finacial challenge is possibly just a part of my karma and instead of struggling against that reality, I simply embrace it. I can have peace now without money. It is the peace I always erronously believed the money would bring that I want.  

Though I truly want all around me to be well and happy, I no longer put so much energy into trying to fix  "broken" loved ones. I don't invest in hope  for change just so I can be free of the sorrow that comes with watching them. This too is my karma, this too is their karma, I believe. I accept it.  Though I will do what needs to be done that is truly helpful, I am doing my best to let go of the worry and living on the wisps of hope that if I do this or that they are getting better. Maybe they will.  Maybe they won't. It is not up to me. This is the reality now. 

My goal is not about manifesting a better life! My goal is  to to be okay with what is...I mean truly at peace with whatever Life hands me.  I truly, truly know , as a yogi, a soul scientist, that Life doesn't have to change to soothe my personal mind. My personal mind is not that important. What needs to change is "me". It is an inside change that is needed, not an outer one. I need to cut through what is left of my personal mind  to get to the intellectual and creative mind behind it, and embrace that. 

Life isn't about "me".  It is about so much more and I get to be a part of it all. 

What I want is to be open and undisturbed no matter what Life hands me, now and in the future.  That is what I want more than anything else in the world. 

All is well! 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( May 5, 2024) Using Every Moment to Free Yourself https://tou.org/talks/

The House Work Habit

 

Housework can't kill you but why take a chance.

Phyllis Diller

I have this thing about housework!  I really, really do not like it and it is at the bottom of any priority list that exists in my mind. Though I like a clean house, a tidy well organized house is not that important to me ( at least until I cant find what I am looking for when I am in a hurry that is.) I do clean to some degree. I do maintain some upkeep but it is obvious not enough, in comparison to other people's houses. So, I have been carrying around with me for most of my life, this sense of internal shame and embarrassment over the state of my house, in comparison to others. I have this core belief that there is something wrong with me because I don't follow the pull to house keep like others do.  Instead of doing something about it, I do my best to avoid and repress the sense of shame. I can walk over anything instead of picking it up. 

 I would really like to put an end to that self-shaming tendency in relation to housework once and for all. A part of me  tends to believe that a house that is cleaner, fresher, easier to look at will solve the problem. 

Will it? 

Of course, I am evolved enough to know that the shame is an internal samskara that is there for a host of reasons that go beyond housework. The visible lack of house maintenance simply triggers it. Many people have this internal sense of shame, especially women but, unlike me,  they set out to "fix" the trigger and devote countless hours to tidying and cleaning their houses, creating clean and orderly environments.  They feel a certain amount of anxiety when things are out of order, (samskara being triggered), so they are committed to dealing with that anxiety through  a consistent practice of cleaning and tidying.  It is a practice that I just cannot seem to commit myself to in the way they do. That leads to a realization of my comparison-shaming. I feel some shame when I don't clean enough but not anxiety.  I am sure I could walk over a rotting carcass without feeling the need to do something about it ( joking of course...as soon as the dead body starts to stink I will usually take it out...joking!!!). That is until, the door bell rings and some unexpected company shows up. I, sensing my not enoughness in regards to housekeeping, do have that samskara activation and  anxiety then at the thought of being judged by others. Otherwise, a messy house with a certain degree of a  "minimal pass in a public health inspection" level of cleanliness is okay with me. 

So, anyway this is taking me back to Atomic Habits. I want to explore why the habit of consistent housecleaning is hard for me to stick to and what I should do about it or if I should do something about it.

In order to build healthy habits Clear tells us repeatedly throughout the book, behaviours need to be obvious, attractive, easy, and satisfying. 

So, the behaviour of cleaning and tidying more consistently has to be obvious.  I do leave all my cleaning supplies out in the open. Brooms, mops, vacuums, and dusters  are  always visible and easy to reach.  (Please note: I do use these things just not as much as the people around me seem to do.). And the need for cleaning and tidying is more often than not highly visible.  With three dogs and two cats upstairs, I have dust bunnies some times the size of tumble weeds rolling past me. It gets quite obvious.I tend though to be more invested in the motion of cleaning (preparing and planning how I will clean) than the actual action of cleaning. Motion can become a form of procrastination.(page 142-143) Like right now, as I contemplate way I don't clean and how I should ( motion), I could actually be cleaning and getting things done( action).  

It has to be attractive. Hmm! That is a tuff one for me because there is nothing about housekeeping that is attractive.  I know where that stems from.  I grew up in a very traditional family where the women were taught to be subserviant to the men.  It was the woman's job then to look after the house and the man's job to do work outside the home.  My mother, a brilliant woman with both teaching and nursing diplomas, literally had to ask my father if she could pick up a shift outside the home.  If she worked a night shift at the hospital she felt it was her duty to come home and clean the house from top to bottom while looking after 11 children before ever considering the need for sleep. When she died my father then turned to my sisters' and I to fulfill the housekeeping duties.  I always wanted to be outside working with the boys.  I resented having to clean after and cook for my brothers just because I was female.  That became a samskara in me that also gets activated at the thought of having to do housework. 

Still, a nice clean house is attractive to me.  My mother always kept a sparkling clean home. The thought of not meeting her expectations is a part of this "not enough" samskara that is stuffed inside me. I love the look of my house after I clean. It is attractive.

It has to be easy. Is it easy to maintain the cleaning behaviour? No, only because I tend to let things go too long. So by the time I do clean, I have an all day adventure. It could be so much easier by following simple principles like "resetting the room" page 156 and by creating gateway habits that lead to bigger habits page 163. For example, I could put things back when I am finished with them...creating a place for everything to go back to. I can also break habits down into the first tiny step forward.  Like if I am going to vacuum, I begin by taking the vacuum down and plugging it in. ( I do practice this one.) I do not have to clean the whole house in one day either.  I can simply do one room a day. ( I tried that several times as well but wasn't able to stick with it.) 

Finally, the cleaning and tidying needs to be satisfactory. In all fairness, sometimes it is.  If I blast the music in the background or play a podcast while I am cleaning, it can be a satisfactory expereince.  I also note that I am getting my steps in as I clean. More importantly, when I am done I am rewarded with a satisfactory experience of looking about a clean home.  That may last a few hours or  a day...but then the dust begins to roll again and I am back to the drawing board.

Will explore this more at a later date.(Am I procrastinating even thinking about housework lol?)

All is well 

JAmes Clear ( 2018) Atomic Habits. New York: Avery. 

Getting Through without the 'Woo-Woo'

 You go through what you need to go through to get through. 

Michael A. Singer

When you hear the word 'spirituality', how do you react?  Well, if you have been on this site more than once, it may not bother you, but many people will have a pull back type of reaction. 

I honestly believe we need to take the "taboo" and the "woo-woo" out of  this belief we have about 'spirituality'. Spirituality is not what most of us think it is.  It is simply a very subtle and deep but at the same time very practical way of approaching life, of learning how to handle it. There are, in reality,  very many ways of viewing life and handling it: psychology, biology, science, art, philosophy and religion.  All are spiritual! Why? They have the potential to take us to a greater and higher understanding. They all have the potential to help us live better lives. They are, therefore, spiritual! 

Spirituality is not all about going to church, temple, or synagogue; about renouncing all worldy possessions; about joining a monastery or ashram, about studying scripture and adhereing to ever word, nor is it all about meditating, or praying even.  These are all tools that can help us deepen our understanding about life and why we are here but the most important part of spirituality is brought about through processing through everyday life and observing how we do it and why. 

My spiritual practice has little to do with these things though I may practice some of them. I do meditate, for example, but not like a true Rishi would by any means.  I am not trying to get anywhere through my meditation, at this point, but to a relaxed, calm, clear and peaceful state. I read so much scripture and doctrine but only to get to an understanding it is pointing to that exists in me already: Why are we here?  How do we best live these lives we are given? Most importantly, how do we get through the suffering? 

Most of my practice occurs off the mat, off the cushion, out of church, away from the books...I simply observe my mind, heart, and body as I respond to the things Life is given me. Who observes? That is the most profound question. The spirit...that which I am at the deepest level, consciousness...that which we all share is the Objective Observer spirituality takes me too.  Hmm!

Anyway, I realize as I do so that we are all going through what we are going through in Life  simply to get through. Doing it well, is spirituality. 

All is well in my world. 

Michael A. Singer/ Temple of the Universe ( April 2, 2024) Life- Your Perfect Teacher. https://tou.org/talks/