Transcending Loss

One of the main precepts in the Buddha’s teachings was to end all attachments of any kind, because they can be loss in the waiting and loss brings our greatest sorrow.

The ancient Taoist adepts even advised detachment from life while still living.

But they also taught that within the negative can be found the positive. Great loss can bring great gain.

It’s human nature to fall in love with people, places and things. And if you can keep the attachments open and even without conditions, you can transcend any loss by seeing the gain.

There is no need for prolonged sorrow. Look for the gift of the gain.

There Was a Moment…

There was a moment so far back and long ago that is now far ahead and yet to come, but it will. 

This was before linear sequential time reference when what was used was only what was needed. And the only time reference needed was continuance.

Things continued as they were or discontinued as they had been and then continued anew. As compounded matter could discontinue as compounded but its parts continued either as individual or in another compound. But everything was a significant part of the quintessential whole, whether individual or compounded. So even the individual indivisible was a part of the whole. And the whole was quintessential continuance in quintessential balance.

This was when time was out of mind. When mind was perception not opinion, and what mind perceived was its significant relationship to the whole in balance.

The interaction frequency between mind and the whole is subtle. And at some inter-moment within the moment being discussed and for reasons unknown, except for the possibility that the unknown was the reason. Mind mutated and became preoccupied with the gross frequency stimulus of the physical senses. Which muted all subtle frequencies, thereby diminishing the contact bond with the whole and its continuance in balance.

That which loses contact with that which continues exists in a state of confusion.

I believe we live in a moment of a closed looped cosmos, nothing is added to or subtracted from the quintessential whole. There is no death, only molecular change, entirety is in the perpetual motion of continuance. There are no inanimate objects we simply can’t perceive their movement.

So the moment will come within the moment of moments when we will become simple particles. And once again have intimate contact with that which matters. The quintessential whole in a balanced continuance with the absolute absence.

Absolute Absence in Continuum.

Everything abides in a single vast expanse of empty open evenness.

Within this vast expanse which has no corners or edges and is beyond all dimensionality, emptiness embraces nothingness. Resulting in a single open evenness where there is no need for differentiation. There are no preferences, it’s beyond the need of choice.

Everything abides in supreme equanimity and therein lies its simplicity and completeness. Spontaneously ever present it’s the ground from which all phenomena arise and the ground in which all phenomena resolve.

It’s the absolute absence, empty but not void, it contains entirety in non-confinement.

Such an arrangement allows for the primordially pure ebb and flow of continuum where nothing is held captive by concept.

Even this.

The Space In Between.

There’s a space in between all that is and all that occurs. It’s so pervasive that it is all things and occurrences. Separate yet the same, as if existing in non-existence. 

Some people call this space God and offer prayers.

Some call it the Tao and conform to it.

Some call it Awakened Mind and live by it.

I call it the space in between.

Those that live in the stillness of being fall into balance with it’s rhythm, separate yet the same, and they experience a synchronicity with divine motion.  

This space can be known but never found, because looking for it gets in the way of ever finding it. Realization is in the heart not the conceptual mind, because the heart has eyes while the mind is blind.

We are forever investing a factitious self into factitious phenomena and then suffering the results of false perceptions. 

Because other than the space in between, perhaps there is nothing, nothing whatsoever. 

Which is the wonderment of wonders where wayfarers roam.

If I Were Asked…

It seems to be human nature to make things far more complicated than they are. I know, because there was a time when I was a master of complication. It seems to be human nature to do things the hard way. I know, because I was an expert in difficulty.

Everyone has a shot at redemption, mine came late in life so I had to take full advantage of the opportunities in divine grace.

And so if I were asked “are you religious?” I’d say “yes, my religion is simplicity because it’s fruition is joy, and joy speaks for it’s self.”

If were I asked “are you spiritual?” I’d reply “yes and my spiritual practice is to contemplate the Presence and my spiritual belief is to don’t know.” Because trying to confine God in a concept is like trying to confine water in a clenched fist.

If I were asked “are you a teacher?” I’d say “no, what’s to be taught?”

And if I were asked “is there a self?” I’d say “whose asking?” 

There’s a wonderful story about a debate between a Zen master and a Tibetan Master of Dzogchen to see who was the most enlightened. The challenge took place in front of a large gathering of Buddhist monks, which was common in days gone by. The Zen master reached into the sleeve of his black robe and produced an orange. And with great flourish held it inches from the Tibetans nose and loudly said “What’s this!?” The translator relayed the question to the Tibetan, who just stood there not saying a thing. So with even more drama the Zen master waved the orange in the Tibetans face yelling “What is this!?” At which point the Tibetan whispered in the translators ear. The translator then turned to the Zen master and said “He wants to know what’s the matter with you, haven’t you ever seen an orange before?”

Such is the freedom in an unfettered mind.

Wreaking Havoc With My Convictions.

There was a time when I was confined by a conditioned mind and traveled in linear sequential time wreaking havoc with my convictions; the impasse to spiritual awakening.

I dismissed the essential to embrace the folly of phantom thought that tends the unnecessary and cultivates the meaningless building an incomplete life of hollows that can haunt you forever.

The conditioned mind is an undisciplined mind narrowly fixed on its self generated thoughts racing you back and forth from one mundane event to another. Powered by hysteria, it robs you of your spiritual vitality and leaves you franticly searching for that which you already have, but can no longer find or take solace in.

But we can diminish this mind by carefully examining its every whim and refuse to act when it beckons, and restore the original celestial mind with its open emptiness. So that when the robbers of negative thoughts and emotions try and enter it, it will be like the Eminent Sufi Mystic Jelaluddin Rumi said, “as if thieves are entering an empty house.”

Observations of the Mind in Solitude.

In the awakened mind of primordial original intent, the intellect and intuition worked in mutual dependence, creating a symbiotic modality for optimum being. In the modern mind, intuition has been eclipsed by a discursive mind that has digressed to a desultory thought process, which has difficulty staying focused on the simplest of tasks. Productive mystical contemplation requires a single pointed focus that’s not easily achieved with such a mind and amidst the distractions of the worldly world, the difficulties are compounded.

When I took my intellect and intuition out of civilization and into the wilderness, they each responded differently and a transformation occurred. The intellect started losing its grasp on mind dominance and the intuition became elated. Solitude in nature is an openness in simply being because the need for social maneuvering, which takes up a great deal of mental activity, is suddenly gone.

The intellectual self  begins to realize its insignificance in an environment where it really isn’t needed. As being a being begins to yield to the experience of being, you begin to realize the fictitious existence in a being. The intuition doesn’t have any difficulty in this transformation because its always only needed to be. But the intellect has always needed to know, and this transformation threatens the intellectual known.

I call the point where the intellect stops and the intuition begins the cosmic dot of significance, and when a mind remains in the simplicity of solitude in nature, the dot moves. The intuition gets stronger and begins to eclipse the intellect by becoming involved in directing physical activities in an environment where it’s more proficient than intellectual direction would be.

At such a time the intellectual mind becomes totally exposed, it has nowhere to go. There aren’t any distractions or the complexities of conventional living for it to be involved in, and because the nature of mind is to think, it’s forced to think about the only thing left to think about, itself. This becomes the impetus for deep introspection that sets the stage for spiritual clarity.

The Spiritual Experience.

The spiritual experience is not static it’s forever dynamic. The deeper you go, the deeper it gets. The more that’s put in, the more that comes out. This never ends, so you are never there, because there is forever moving in the dynamic flow of continuance. The power of understanding is in the movement. God is the motion in the movement of you.

Many distrust the intrinsic beauty of randomness and the ambiguity in the mystical, because it renders the intellect unnecessary. And the center isn’t always in the middle.

There is a Knowing.

There is a knowing, it is not transmitted by language, it is not perceived by thought. A whisper, a hint of suggestion, passes through a receptive heart and results in clarity. The knowing becomes known and no explanation is needed.

To diffuse into the undifferentiated wholeness of the vast expanse of being, that which has no corners or edges, is to shatter the confines of space. But to convince the mind of this we must first convince the heart. With a whisper, a hint of suggestion.

There is a continuum of absolute absence that pervades all places and all things, because it is all places and things. I see this by the simple observation of it’s many manifestations. It has been called by many names. But it is not to be belittled by concept, personage, doctrine or dogma. It has existed long before the conscious mind. It was a pure and simple experience. This was back when time was out of mind and the wholeness of being was perceived through innate knowing. And contemplated with the primordial intuitive mind. A mind frequency seldom used today. A mind that knew without learning and was without being.

It was a mind that remained empty because only emptiness can occupy no space. Which is the the only thing that can be nowhere everywhere, which is the domain of God, a continuous absolute absence.

The mystery in the mystical isn’t that it exists or can not be defined. It’s that we can become one with absolute absence and the result is absolute presence. It’s the coming together of that which perceives and doesn’t need to know, and that which knows and doesn’t need to perceive. And when that happens, mouthfuls are spoken through silence.

The Gift of the Gain.

I have found over the course of many years and experiences that with every loss there’s a gain. When I lost some physical mobility due to polio in 1951. I gained the joys of contemplation that accompanies a slower paced life. I’ve never had to be told to slow down and smell the roses, because I’ve never been capable of reaching a speed that required slowing down. When you can’t keep up with the crowd you avoid the stamped and discover the joy in being left behind. You discover the best way to catch something is by not chasing it. And I have never been at the wrong place at the wrong time because by the time I got there the wrong had long left. 

I discovered that steeping yourself in sorrow simply made for a bitter tea and instead of asking “why me” ask “why not me.” That’s a question that brings far greater wisdom and if you can’t gain speed you need to gain wisdom. It’s the gift of the gain.