The fundamental delusion of
humanity is to suppose that
I am here and you are out there.
- Yasutani Roshi
All of this a union vast and
spacious,
And all those skilled in realizing this
Do not see consciousness, they see pure wisdom,
Do not see sentient beings, they see buddhas,
Don't see phenomena, they see their essence,
And out of this compassion just emerges.
- Milarepa, a Song of Realization
posted to Daily Dharma
Abhinavagupta:
Here, bliss is not like the intoxication of wine or wealth, or
even like union with a lover. The emergence of the light of
consciousness is not like the light produced by a lamp, by the
sun, or by the moon. The happiness of release from accumulated
differentiation is a joy like the removal of a burden. The
emergence of the light of consciousness is the recovery of a
forgotten treasure - the abode of complete non-duality.
You are undoubtedly here, present.
The only commonality of a lifetime of experience has been this
always-here-ness, this presence. Everything else has changed, the
body, the thoughts, the feelings, emotions,
sensations....What-you-are is just simply HERE. There isn't
anything else to say about it. It cannot be described, because
it's not objective like the rest of it, like all experiences. It
isn't an experience. It's just your presence. It's just the
present activity of knowing. It's going on right now. It's here.
It's unmistakably and obviously here. It's how the world is
known. It's how the body is known. It's how thoughts are known.
It's how anger, frustration, sadness, and every other feeling or
emotion is known. It's not objective. It's not an experience.
It's the experiencING. The knowing. Can you deny that? Are you
ever without it? Does it leave? Does it change? Does it come and
go? No. It does not. It's not difficult. It doesn't require
searching. It's that IN WHICH the search takes place, the idea of
seeker takes place. It's not personal - the personal is the
quality of the body, of thoughts. You are THAT which knows the
personal. It's not individual - the individual is appearance -
objective - quantifiable, measurable, changing. It's just this
present knowing - this subjective "I"-ness. It's always
here. You are looking FOR your true Self, when all the while you
are already looking FROM your true Self. Just notice.
Without self-realization no virtue
is genuine.
It is only when you arrive at the deepest
conviction that the same life flows through
everything, and that you ARE that life, that
you can begin to love naturally and spon-
taneously.
- Ramesh S. Balsekar
posted to Along The Way
Although the pure truth has never been
stated, nevertheless it has never been lost.
Its existence does not depend upon
human statement but upon human sensitivity.
In this it is unlike all other
knowledge.
— Notebooks of Paul Brunton ..........
If you can think about, it's not the truth.
- Robert Adams
posted to Wisdom-l by Mark Scorelle
("Less
Talent, More Skin" -- a CNN headline about the Miss America
pageant)
No More Clichés
Beautiful face
That like a daisy opens its petals to the sun
So do you
Open your face to me as I turn the page.
Enchanting smile
Any man would be under your spell,
Oh, beauty of a magazine.
How many poems have
been written to you?
How many Dantes have written to you, Beatrice?
To your obsessive illusion
To your manufactured fantasy.
But today I won't
make one more Cliché
And write this poem to you.
No, no more clichés.
This poem is
dedicated to those women
Whose beauty is in their charm,
In their intelligence,
In their character,
Not on their fabricated looks.
This poem is to you
women,
That like a Shahrazade wake up
Everyday with a new story to tell,
A story that sings for change
That hopes for battles:
Battles for the love of the united flesh
Battles for passions aroused by a new day
Battles for the neglected rights
Or just battles to survive one more night.
Yes, to you women in
a world of pain
To you, bright star in this ever-spending universe
To you, fighter of a thousand-and-one fights
To you, friend of my heart.
From now on, my head
won't look down to a magazine
Rather, it will contemplate the night
And its bright stars,
And so, no more clichés.
p.183 