Love of Oneself

As I began to love myself, I freed myself of anything that is no good for my health —food, people, things, situations and everything that drew me down and away from myself. At first I called this attitude a healthy egoism, today, I know it is, “LOVE OF ONESELF.”

~ Charlie Chaplin

Thanks

Thanksgiving is a time to celebrate the people you are grateful for in your life. There will be time tomorrow to forget; celebrating objects and wealth again. Celebrate what you have, not what you will get. Shine light on black friday. It will help everyone see.

the usual seat

take the usual seat
sit, get ready, wait
it all unfolds as it is

Is it true?

Lost It

yesterday I lost it
nothing much, only ego
can't find it anymore

Clapping here

no thought no sound
one hand clapping here
breath by breath here and now

Right now

Today, right now, is a new beginning. Let go of yesterday. 
Now is time becoming timeless. 

Money < Value

"Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value."

The Self

I couldn’t live with myself any longer. And in this a question arose without an answer: who is the ‘I’ that cannot live with the self? What is the self? I felt drawn into a void! I didn’t know at the time that what really happened was the mind-made self, with its heaviness, its problems, that lives between the unsatisfying past and the fearful future, collapsed. It dissolved. The next morning I woke up and everything was so peaceful. The peace was there because there was no self. Just a sense of presence or “beingness,” just observing and watching.

-Eckhart Tolle's Enlightenment moment

Glass House

As I write this, I am writing a story. On the page to you; from the page to me. I am not editing this passage and that too is another story…

Keep with me here

So right now, you too are writing a story. You are reading the story, of my story, creating another story in your life. It’s the thousands of mirrors which you see when you look into multiple mirrors. Everyone is reading and writing a story; the infinite epic.

Crying Heart

the heart is right to cry
even when the smallest drop of light,
of love,
is taken away.
perhaps you may kick, moan, scream
in a dignified
silence,
but you are so right to do so 
in any fashion
until god returns
to you

~Hafiz

Sparknotes

Turn off the light

Your eyes will adjust to the dark. 

Get an injury

Your body will heal the wound. 

Meditate

Your practice will quiet the mind.

Be conscious 

Your spirit will be set free.

Afraid of the Light

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our Light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people will not feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone and as we let our own Light shine, we unconsciously give others permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.
-Marianne Williamson

Mandukya Upanisad - Commentary by Sridharan

According to Mandukya Upanisad, the fourth state of consciousness is the ultimate goal. It is also often called "Thoughtless Awareness", in Sanskrit "Turiya". Turiya is silence. Silence is not absence of sound. SILENCE IS THE AWARENESS OF THE CONTENT AND ILLUMINATOR OF THE ABSENCE OF SOUND.

Thoughtless awareness is paradoxical  in the sense that how can one be aware without thoughts? Vedanta (Upanisad) says that thoughtless is to be understood as destruction of impurities of the mind and not total destruction of mind.

It is brought out lucidly in the Upanishads that neither absence of thoughts is liberation (freedom) nor presence of thoughts is bondage. One should aim for fearlessness, detachment and purity of mind for enjoying the fourth state of consciousness.

Fourth state is living in the present. When one is capable of dropping all projections, memories and experiences, one experiences the fourth state. Talking or writing about Turiya is simple, but to make sure no thought enters the mind without permission (!) is a monumental task. Do you agree?

                                                             - Sridharan

Just This, Just That

Words are maps of reality and dreams
Words are not reality, not dreams
Better to stop now
Sit, walk around and breathe
Later, come back to the words
For words are the work of the world
Perhaps, the world would not exit without words
For, indeed, the "world" is a story we tell each other
Take away the story
What do you have left over
Just this, just that.
Engaging directly what is
Like a new born

Of Words

Of words, we don't need many.
Just a phrase, a sound,
can be enough
to suggest reality.

Instructions

Now, read the poem backwards.

Upside Down

Lost Generation

"I am part of a lost generation
and I refuse to believe that
I can change the world
I realize this may be a shock but
“Happiness comes from within.”
is a lie, and
“Money will make me happy.”
So in 30 years I will tell my children
they are not the most important thing in my life
My employer will know that
I have my priorities straight because
work
is more important than
family
I tell you this
Once upon a time
Families stayed together
but this will not be true in my era
This is a quick fix society
Experts tell me
30 years from now, I will be celebrating the 10th anniversary of my divorce
I do not concede that
I will live in a country of my own making
In the future
Environmental destruction will be the norm
No longer can it be said that
My peers and I care about this earth
It will be evident that
My generation is apathetic and lethargic
It is foolish to presume that
There is hope."

- Jonathan Reed

Moving

I practice love, I
learn compassion again
I remember
it is who I am

Moving, always moving
I rest in my heart
I let my mind drop into
my chest and
sweet release
washes me pure

True Science

Listen. Listen. Listen ever so deeply with your whole being. Anything less is a waste of time. But don't listen to me. Listen to what's inside you. You and I are constantly constructing a sense of the world. It's quite possible that what is called "one's world" is not that same as reality. So look deeply. Perhaps, you (and I) can get a glimpse of what's real beyond "my world" or even "our world". That would be true science, true wisdom. 

Lines of Conciousness

I fear my biggest regret upon dying will be that I underestimated myself.
That I somehow didn't realize I was my own Enlightenment.
That I was searching for me and missed me because I am me.
It's like this quiet knowing I can't explain.
I feel like even uttering it...And it's gone, or I've somehow made it less real with my human language.

Than it was; but ultimately I know it doesn't matter what I do. Not that I'm powerless, the opposite.
It is YOU! Infinitely shining energy, DO YOU UNDERSTAND? SEE YOURSELF!

Fear and anxiety are often wanting to be invited in for tea.
Come to the party, I say.
We have a chat with myself.
I talk to these faux feelings, we have a conversation.
I always make it through somehow because I remember what I had forgotten:

Do what makes you feel good and live in the heart.
The mind won't leave you when you wish to play with the tool that's as big as you make it.

As humans, we are energy manipulators.
We have the ability to channel emotions and thoughts in a remarkably beautiful or horrible way.
How do you treat ants? They annoy you; we kill them. Do you believe in a bigger God than you? What size? What capacity of intellect and compassion?
I try but cannot fathom.
You must constantly forgive yourself and accept.

You walk the earth, you feel love in your heart and you smile; a young mother with a child catches it and you see it spread--both lives, saved!
And you remember how much it hurt to find out YOU have a choice.
Little YOU has much more power than you who thought you were you ever imagined...

Be sure you are not suffering over your suffering.
Remember the SHIFT:
Have you made your suffering too comfortable? Is the deep jolt of shift, of happiness, worse than the deep pang of regret?

Torrent

Let's face it. Time is like a torrent of water rushing through our lives. Time cannot be stopped - and life cannot be separated from time until there is deep transcendence of all the cares and concerns of daily life. Few ever learn to live with abandon without attachment - at peace with it all passing. Yet, yet, and yet again - there's something within us that does not change. Something unchanged since we became aware of being here in our lives. Something so much more real than the passing fading torrent of time. 

Who Am I Today?

Who am I today? Who was I yesterday? Who will I be tomorrow? 

This little self, always changing. A bundle of feelings, thoughts, perceptions constantly looping back on itself.

There must be something “more”. It cannot be named without turning it into a something. It’s not something. It’s a nothing, a no-thing, that is infinite.

Fly Trapped In a Back Room

Sometimes a fly gets trapped in a back room, attracted to the glass windows. Eventually it dies, not seeing the way out through a darker hallway to an open window. Humans get attached to the bright lights, big billboards, loud sounds, and media distractions. Eventually they can't change of direction back to the quiet voice of truth. They die unfulfilled. 

"Today you are YOU, that is TRUER than true. There is NO ONE alive who is YOUER than YOU! " 

~Dr. Seuss

Let's Stop For It

That was an excellent nap. I found 'something' but I'm not sure that it's really the real 'it' we've been looking for this entire time

How can you be sure either way, Haku?

Ahhh. This is too hard. I give up looking! I give up running!
That's odd
I think I can see 'it' now

Yes. This will a difficult journey

Let's Run for It

Let's run for it!

What?

I said – let's run for it!

But what's “it”?

It's all that we've ever wanted since the day we lost our innocence.

But you can't name what “it” is!

That's the point, my friend. What can be named is not It.

So, here we are – two people running after that which cannot be named.

Yes! So, let run for It!

Dialogue Circle

O wondrous capacity
To sit in circles
Speaking, singing, listening
Watching meanings, feelings
Moving through one another
As if one mind, one heart

Today Will Not Be The Same

Today will not be the same
Today will not be the same
All past resolutions
All failed promises to Self
To stay awake, to allow grace
Let it be
Let it be Now
Forever Now

Under Pressure

Meaning of Life: Get the Prize

“What's the meaning of life?” This question was asked of people from nine to seventy-five years of age.

I asked a nine year old boy. 
He said, “To get the prize?” 
“What do you mean?”, I said.
“When you win the race, you get the prize!”

“The meaning of life” implies THE meaning of life; but, there are many “meanings” of life. Meanings of life change according to people’s age. 

Two Birds

Two Birds with fair wings, knit with bonds of friendship,
in the same sheltering tree have found a refuge.
One of the twain eats the sweet Fig tree’s fruitage;
the other eating not, regardeth only.

The Rig Veda [1]

Light shines upon all. Yet, we “fall” into fascination with glittery objects – forgetting the source light. Seeing only objects, not the light.

---

[1] Book I, Hymn CLXIV, Verse 20 from Sacred Writings, Hinduism: The Rig Veda. Translated by Ralph T. H. Griffith. Book-of-the-Month Club, New York, 1992.

True Dialogue Brings Meaning

True dialogue brings meaning to life. It expresses profound love. We are born to sing, gesture, and talk with each other. Our group survival depends on that. To love one another and love the whole of creation is our destiny, purpose. Opening up to “fields of new possibilities”, becoming wildly creative, like children, and joining the play of creation. Each of us knows so little; others may help us gain a greater view. Adjusting worldviews - incorporating greater information, knowledge, and wisdom. A perfect dialogue leads into a silence that feels complete in itself.

Short Stop

There's a saying in a negative situation which is usually offered up by a loved one in the intention of solace or hope, "the grass is always greener on the other side." We have all experienced this feeling of finally obtaining what we yearned for only to find that it wasn't what we imagined it to be. It's a terrible and hopeless feeling after wanting something for so long. Yet, continuing the cycle, another dream surfaces and now there is a whole new patch of grass to spy on. It becomes clear that these are all just fields of dreams. Ultimately, you yearn or morn the loss of something you only imagined to be true. How powerful the mind; how fickle.

I'm not too sure if it's actually greener on the other side. I could be wrong though; I've never been able to get onto that field.

Silence Almost Irrefutable

Found on the wall menu of Berkeley's beloved Cheeseboard Pizza.

Inner Scientist

Look for what is real for you

Be an inner scientist!

Explore your thoughts and feelings. Come to stillness often
          Engage reality on gross, deep, and subtle levels

Read these passages as an internal experimental science
          Use them to find your own understanding of reality

If you find truth for yourself, then you own it
          Truth is timeless; our work is to disclose the truth already here

Time and Eternity

Time and eternity meet in the Now.
We are in the world, but not of the world
We are free and not free

New Moon - July 8th

Free me into the morning light

One more time, one more day

Knowing that this, this moment

Is the true beginning and end

Of All That Is

Backside

Backside of Giorgi Gallery in Berkeley, California.

When You Fall in Love

When you fall in love
You recall over and over again the face and name of your beloved;
God smiles within the face and name of the beloved

As you love
Your life begins to join the one you love
Eventually you unite with your beloved
In a mystic union of effortless intense devotion

If you love money, you become like money
If you love time, you become like time
If you love life, you become life

Be Love Now

“Falling in love you remain a child; rising in love you mature. By and by love becomes not a relationship, it becomes a state of your being. Not that you are in love - now you are love.” 
~Osho

At Large

Stacking dead papers into the sky, continuing to work without knowing why. I wanted to see what was above the hours clocked and dollars earned, though terrified of what I'd find in return.

I built a ladder into the sky, made of paintings and novels; some which make you laugh or sometimes made you cry. The things which only through our humanity can they live and do they die.

As I climbed I began to dream, of freedom and peace as I gripped at the seams. Dreams which made the world below look shaken and obscene.

Taking a final step onto the papers that darkened the sky, I shuttered with uncertanty of the answers to why. Expecting the worse I slowly began to open one eye.

I guess I don't know what I was expecting to see, a man in a black suit watching TV? Clearly someone wasn't watching over me. Mabye a machine made of cherries and eights, spitting out money and spreading more waste.

It was light! Like the sun bouncing off the front of a white page.

With just one of my eyes, this blinding light was all I could see, so I opened them both and saw something very dear to me. It  WAS  a new and beautiful fresh page, like the ones I remembered from back in the day. I could use this one to write new stories and draw, I could even use it as a stage to perform what I felt and I saw.

With all this new space to be free, from all the work that has been plauging me, I began to write of my most recent journey. I began from how it started to become filled with dead pages, thoughts and feelings of being in cages, even illustrated shadows of pie charts dwarfing the sages.

I continue to write as these words unfold, creating new chapters and posting quotes which I feel need to be told. I guess this makes me a philosopher too, always building, making something that is alive and new.

Making a Living is Not Living

There's profound confusion between money and life. I grew up with the expression "making a living" - which means making enough money to stay alive - as if money is life. True: money is not life. Life is life. Life is love. Love is working together. Life is freely given to us because we're embedded within the matrix of all life on earth. And, all life depends on sunlight. Yes, the sun is life too. Does the sun need money? Who/what needs money - only humans. Why? Because there's not enough love, trust and faith among us collectively to feed each other in our extreme interpersonal specialization within our civilizations. I hope we learn to rethink, re-feel the way we are in our world together. Our greatest need is not money, but the creation and re-creation of enlightened good societies on our precious earth. 

Avalanche

When the Dali Lama was asked what surprised him most about humanity, he answered,

"Man. He sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived."

-Tenzin Gyatso 14th Lama

Being First

There's too much "to do".
Undo the to-do.  
Put "being first" on the "to do" list. 
All the doing will take care of itself.
  

Beyond Good and Bad

Times are good. They will pass!

Times are bad. They will pass!

Strive, strive!

Go beyond good and bad. 

X-Ray

“I look at you

and see all the ways a soul can bruise, 

and I wish I could sink my hands into your flesh 

and light lanterns along your spine 

so you know that there’s nothing but light 

when I see you.”

-Shinji Moon

Deepest Practice

the deepest spiritual 
practice is just
being here with all
one's being. indeed
one's being is just
here-ness. It can't
be anywhere
else

(You may wonder about the "form" of these sayings. They are poetry and not poetry. They are prose and not prose. They start out as writings on small scraps of paper.) 

Open the Doors

Take it away
Move this feeling of doubt away
Open the doors of perception
One more time. Free me
Into this moment

Locket

'Open your heart knowing that there’s a chance it may be broken one day, but in opening your heart, you experience a love and joy that you never dreamed possible. You find that being vulnerable is the only way to allow your heart to feel true pleasure that’s so real it scares you.'

-Bob Marley

Born in the Azores Islands

Born in the Azores Islands

From people of the land

Tip of the lost continent of Atlantis

A mythical place of high technology

I grew up an immegrant far away

Life spent in the high technology

Worlds and universities of Northern California

Dreaming of truth; realizing truth

Not in equations or propositions, but

In deep silences of Being 

Oneness

World & self are not-separate
World & self are not-one
World & self are one & not-one
That's divine oneness

Can oneness be included in duality?
I think so. It's like the yin-yang symbol

Within darkness is a point of light

Within lightness is a point of dark

Home, Free

Sliding into the great quiet again
Like a pool of space and comfort
Without bottom, sides, or ceiling
It belongs to no one, but to everyone
   
   When you get there
   You are no longer there ...
   At home, free 

Joyful Love

As if lifted by 
ocean mists
to an unspoken heaven 
of joyful love

Chess

Individualism is something which is taken for granted. In a game it generally takes two people to play. Being the red player makes it so that you are that color in the game yet, you are still playing the game as a whole, even on a different team. Relationships can be a type of game in it is two individuals yet, there is a deep connection as one unit. There are times though when one person needs the other in order to have fun, even if they don't really want to play anymore. It is in these moments that codependency arises. The person forgets that you can still be apart of a relationship, even if they are not there. They can still have fun on their own; playing a crossword puzzle or even solitaire. It's funny, playing solitaire doesn't mean you are alone.

"God" Talk

The word "God" is dangerous to use in mixed groups. “God” is more personal than talk of sex, money, news, and general gossip. Often “God” is simply dismissed as if the word is meaningless and vacant. Baseball, stock prices and kitchen remodels appear more real and significant. We have sanitized “God” by replacing it with terms such as Ultimate, Truth, Reality, Love, etc. The big problem is that there's this idea of “God” as an old gray haired man up in the clouds. Not many people believe in that “God”. Nor do I. Sometimes we have to say “God” with disclaimers, as when we say: "God is the ultimate underlying reality expressed by physics." Belief in “God” gets confused with words not reality - as if we can choose to believe or disbelieve in Reality.

Sun is New Everyday

Somewhere, a long time ago, I read that Heraclitus, an ancient Greek pre-socratic, said: "The Sun is new everyday!" A beautiful way to look at the sunrise today. A wonderful way to live each day of our lives. Today is a new day. This moment is a new moment. Our lives, our bodies, our worlds are always changing. We may want to hold on to what is now - but it must slip away, no matter how good it is. More keeps arising. The present moment is like the burning tip of a candle fame. That's the moment of the breath-in and breath-out. We cannot not stop that without death. Life means breath-in and breath-out. Life means constant change. Yet, there is a bigger sense of life. Of Life beyond just life. This is the sense of Life we intuit with our wisdom eyes; as we rise to a wider vision of what this is all about. 

Child of Reality

All the old gods have lost their flavor
Where do I turn to now while waiting
For endless songs of relief from endless waiting
They call it grace - an unexpected surrender to Reality
O Reality - what is that?
Sometimes I see it in my reflection
As a child of Reality

Don't Know Much

We don't know much. The world is too vast. Everything opens up again and again to deeper levels of mystery. Important to become comfortable with mystery - to respect the unknown. What do I know? Can I predict exactly what I will think, feel, or do an hour from now? Not really. Everyday, we awake up to new variations, possibilities, and actualities never seen before. 

Earth Needs You

Earth needs you
Don't go away on a journey somewhere else
Walk down to the river bed -
Alone with your thoughts, memories, and feelings
Deep inside Life is your first Love


(Note: These days, as founder of Philosopher-at-Large Blog, I find myself feeling free to really be a philosopher-at-large. That means writing or talking notes here and there - eventually sharing them. I hope this encourages you to be freer in your own speculations and insights.)

Out There

I love it when I see that sparkle in your eyes;

that uninhibited pure joy

that total presence of wanting to be here

with you. all the sudden

I am overwhelmed, I feel

there is so much out there!

I feel so little, I feel so young

and there is nothing to say.

There is so much 

and there is nothing to say.

Because out there, out there

I am afraid of seeing it

of feeling the vastness

it must all be here

it is all here, already here

to accept it

to remember.

Love it, 

nourish it 

encourage its being

because 

I 

do 

not

know.

all I know is I am here

somewhere 

and I am working;

striving, practicing, trying to see you

and to understand

the meaning.

.

.

.

Desires are breathless 

I finally feel you

that connection.

Thank You

Rain For Us

“Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life.”


-Hermann Hesse

Poetry

“Poetry is nearer to vital truth than history.” 
~Plato

My Poem on this Mother's Day

Why
Would I Not Know
the Color
of My Own
Hair?

Brown
   to
Grey,
What would
My Driver's License
Say
If I went to the DMV
Today?
Young
   or
Old,
Where am I
on this Continuum
Today?

When my Heart Glows with Love,
I am Forever Young,
Timeless,
The GrandMother of Everyone.
                    (Diane; May 12, 2013)

Anger

it really is up to you, what it will be.
are you going to fly in skies so blue
or suffer and slump in misery?

is your heart where you are, honored one?
breathe and remember, breathe and remember,

there is prayer for the soul's journey.
Sun meditations keeping your heart's rhythm
for you,
'you, who are the source of all power,
whose rays illuminate the whole world,
illuminating also my heart
so that it too can do your loving work.'

Dimensions

If all time is eternally present 

All time is unredeemable. 

What might have been is an abstraction 

Remaining a perpetual possibility 

Only in a world of speculation. 

What might have been and what has been 

Point to one end, which is always present.

-TS Eliot 

Content

Content.
Looking at the pigeons kiss
  fly above rooftops
Cats resting on each other
  fur glistening in the hot sun
Sandalwood smoke rises.
I sit here
Myself teaching me to be.

Cook Book

Melting down is an experience which happens to everyone from time to time. It's a breaking point. Whether it builds over a long period of time or just happens all at once, it breaks us down and melts us to the most basic of ingredients. At the time, they seem to be negative ingredients such as fear and despair yet, even these break down into the building blocks from which we are solidified. The fear melts down and becomes surrender. Surrender melts down and becomes peace. Peace then melts down to become harmony. Once we are in harmony, we are one with everything; we are whole. We are solidified again yet, this time with different ingredients because we remember the bitter taste of fear. It's like adding too much spice to a dish. Next time, you know to add less and counter balance it with another spice. Take what life dishes out; fulfill your hunger and be full again.

Tablets

Isn't it funny, how the things that I think,

  feel like they're written in permanent ink.

But a lie is a lie, is a lie, is a lie,

  and the truth is unbounded like the wide open sky.

The past, it is gone and the future's unknown.

  I'll switch to a pencil and stop chiseling stone.

-Brian Sweeny

Dream

Sit with lovers and choose their state.
Do not stay long with those who are not living in the heart.

Rumi

Three to Five Servings

"Imagination is the real and eternal world of which this vegetable universe is but a faint shadow."


-William Blake

Spy Glass

Without emptiness
How could you find space?
Without noise
How could you find silence?
Without want
There is nothing left to be found

We

Freedom will bring truth;

Truth will set you free

Through the act of meditation

We effortlessly seek truth

We effortlessly find wisdom

Though wisdom

We realize

We are already free

A Poetic Contribution to "V Day: One Billion Rising"

Woman-Child of Mother-Earth

The sense of something
Echoing inside of me,
Wanting, longing to be free
To express
What is me,
And let all see
The Womanliness
That I possess.

The Heart is all
The power that be.
Let me love
Passionately;
And soft, tenderly—
   The mother towards the child;
And sweetly, innocence—
   I, myself, the child.

May my heart of Love
And my passion of fire
Unite—
The warm furnace hearth
Burning in me,
Protecting me
From the harm
The spirit can receive
If it steps out
Into our man-world
Too meekly.

The fire and the passion
Heat my heart.
My heart burns
With the fire-love
Of a mother
Fighting for the life
Of her child.

I am fighting for the life
Of the Child
Of the Mother
Of the Earth.

This Earth-Child,
In my, our, custody,
And all of us, her daughters,
Armored messengers be.
Our heart-power
Is not available for the fight—
Our armor is too tight.
We cannot leap flames
From our Hearts,
Until we start to unpeel
His armory from us, from me.

My weapon is
My burning, flaming heart.
My protection is
The Earth’s flow within me,
And the Universal Light around me.

My soul is with the All.
My human heart,
God/dess’ messenger,
The flame
That I must allow free
So we all can join
Life’s family,
And Earth can simply be.

The Amazon Warrior
Armed with Love,
Nothing more,
Begins her conquering.

Please, come join me/us.
Time is running short.
Our Gaia is crying.
Our Love can set her free,
And in so doing,
You and me.

                                 (Diane Shavelson 1991)

For Information: V Day: One Billion Rising

Usefulness in nothing

Thirty spokes converge on a single hub,
  but it is in the space where there is nothing
    that the usefulness of the cart lies.
Clay is molded to make a pot,
  but it is in the space where there is nothing
    that the usefulness of the clay pot lies.
Cut out doors and windows to make a room,
  but it is in the spaces where there is nothing
    that the usefulness of the room lies.
Therefore,
  Benefit may be derived from something,
    but it is in nothing that we find usefulness.
~Lao Tzu Tao Te Ching

In Light I'm Meant

Traditionally, it was said that rolling boulders up hills or carry pales of water helped one achieve a state of enlightenment. These things are props for the mind to play with while it settles; like putting a baby to sleep with a rattle. Yet, these props soon start to feel empty and all that's left in the end is you. You might feel naked without them but take solace; you are meant to be naked in this light. Enlightenment is as simple as a baby's rattle. Can you hear it?

Star Light

Sometimes, the most important lessons are understood by the silence within.

"When I heard the learn’d astronomer;
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me;
When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them;
When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick;
Till rising and gliding out, I wander’d off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars."

-Walt Whitman in 1865

Mind Games

The wind, it is blowing

from where? I don't know.
It's bringing a change,
who knows where to go?
Do we fight to keep our ways?
Do we fight to make them change?
How do we know what's for real,
and what's just in our brains?

Is there a god?
A big man with a plan?
Or is it all up to us,
to do what we can?

I've never met a person,
who knew anything at all.
We pretend to have answers
so we don't feel so small.

The birds in the sky
and the mice in the shed,
have much more to offer
than the stuff in our head.

-Brian Sweeny

Concentric Circles

“You will walk differently alone, dear, through a thicker atmosphere, forcing your way through the shadows of chairs, through the dripping smoke of the funnels. You will feel your own reflection sliding along the eyes of those who look at you. You are no longer insulated; but I suppose you must touch life in order to spring from it.”

-F. Scott Fitzgerald from his novel Tender is the Night

Drew Dellinger: Hieroglyphic Stairway

A long term perspective based on responsibility to our great great grandchildren. A stunning recitation by a powerful poet.

---

Text 'Messages'

"It's acceptance; complete surrender.
I fully believe that God is in control and that I am powerless.
It's a relief in some ways to not be responsible.
Not that I'm good at this.
I struggle every day. Every moment of every day to not give up.
But really throwing a fit and saying I can't do this anymore isn't productive.
I really have no other alternative. I HAVE to go on.
And surrendering to God makes it possible.
I also try to remember not to fight against "it" but fight for what I find the most challenging.
Like peace, sanity, acceptance.
I cannot do this life on my own.
I have to turn it over to God.

Do the action and your heart will follow."

-Laura Manzani in a text message protaining to life's stuggles

Gandhi's Embark

'What you are seeing is a large statue of Gandhi by the Embarcadero in San Francisco. The people there are poets. I love the feeling of Gandhi walking into the distance.'

Janice Haugan's Photography

The Phoenix

 From the ashes I will rise
 Finding the fire deep inside
 Using it to be my guide.
 Beautiful
 when I burst into flames
 Discarding an old life
 Destroying names
 Ultimate
 Return
 From which I came.

Proverb

If there is light in the soul,
there will be beauty in the person.
If there is a beauty in the person,
there will be harmony in the house.
If there is harmony in the house,
there will be order in the nation.
If there is order in the nation,
there will be peace in the world.

You-niverse

Each moment, each moment, each moment.
Each moment is new,
is yours.
This is all-
for you.

There is no room for regret without a past.
There is no room for worry with no future.

       so what's here?
You-niverse.
       what will I do?
Be.
       how do I be?

Perhaps this is the end of seeking.

    where will I go?
Anywhere.
    what will I do?
Anything.

Perhaps this is the end of believing.

    what will I have?
Me.
    what will I be?
Free

Whispers

“There's no vocabulary

For love within a family, love that's lived in 

But not looked at, love within the light of which 

All else is seen, the love within which 

All other love finds speech. 

This love is silent.”

T.S. Eliot

Give it away

"Love can only stay love,
if we give it away."
     -Unknown Source

Preface

"The artist appeals to that part of our being which is not dependent on [traditional] wisdom; to that in us which is a gift and not an acquisition—and, therefore, more permanently enduring. He speaks to our capacity for delight and wonder, to the sense of mystery surrounding our lives; to our sense of pity, and beauty, and pain; to the latent feeling of fellowship with all creation."

Joseph Conrad

Be Here Now

"What keeps you from that place that gives you that total feeling and experiencing and knowing of fulfillment is all of this posturing, all of your thoughts, all your way of organizing your world, all your plans, all your games you're exploring."

-Ram Dass

Choose

I want to be
the very best I can be
it is a choice
and it is up to me

Treasure Hunt

I remember it. 

That feeling of being whole. Nothing needed to fulfill me besides me. No one needed to love me besides me. The ability to feel sadness and anger without the fear of pain. The feeling of joy as time ticked away transforming every moment into a new experience. Smelling December. Seeing the electric lines as I drove by. Hearing the rumbling sound of an airplane as it flew across the sky.

These memories are the road map to my beginning.