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Becky Windmiller wrote:

I met Greg yesterday for lunch and we had a wonderful conversation,
touching on several topics, one of which was therapy (psycho). It's an
interesting topic so I wanted to post a few thoughts.

I have found therapy to be of value. To me, the actual questioning of
the therapy process is its logical outcome and therefore, it's intrinsic
value. Perhaps that is the ultimate purpose of such a process and
hopefully, the therapist will be able to respond in kind.

This happened for me after 3 years of therapy. After all this time of
"making progress" something dawned on me. I told my therapist something
like this: "Look, I can continue to come to therapy for the next 10 or
20 years, bringing a new or old fear, trying to resolve each one, on and
on and on. What I want to know is why we never talk about ending fear
all together?" I was surprised really that this was not the ultimate
goal of therapy but I found, although the therapist was willing to
listen and explore, she had never before asked herself this question.
Can fear come to an end? I also remember saying to her , "why should I
listen to what you tell me?" She replied, "Because of my education and
experience" and I had to say "no, I can't do that".

A few weeks later, I went for a session and just sat there with
nothing to say. She said, "why don't you talk about your thoughts and
feelings" and I said, "what for? there is no need to talk about that".
This all started a discussion with her on thought and fear and
relationship, something I think she really yearned to know about. The
tables turned in that relationship in a way. There was no longer any
label of therapist or patient for me. I never again looked to her to
help me. I knew she couldn't. I did leave that therapy because I saw
how it was just another set of programming/conditioning. It did however
open the door for me to my own feelings. Later, I could look at how they
trapped me.

I think there are certain forms of therapy that do not necessarily
promote the idea of self improvement and self importance. I'm not an
expert but I have read some about transpersonal psychology. I also see
that I really needed to go through that therapy process in order to
question it and see it through to the conclusion. I would hope that most
people would see the obvious after a certain point and then shift the
focus onto the deeper problem. Actually, the ultimate "goal" of therapy
could be to turn people onto the truth. That is what I am really
interested in.

I read through Byron Katie's The Work and I found it to be somewhat
like a self-help approach except what I really liked was that she turns
everything back onto the individual so you can't get away with blaming
another person for anything. Her way of looking at it is very "western"
so it is interesting to see how it is communicated without the eastern
language or reference.

When I left therapy, I was really convinced that therapy was not the
way to go ... it was more conditioning, not truth, etc. That was the
reaction from the initial intense clarity I was experiencing and
seeing. I can't say what anyone else should do and I do see great value
in the process of therapy -- but it is not the end. Lately, I keep
remembering the words of a Tai Chi teacher from years ago: Never judge
another person because you do not know where they have been.

We are renovating our new house and last weekend we had a couple of
local Brooklyn guys working for us. One (or both) of them stole $180 out
of my wallet. I shouldn't have left it in view. Anyway, I see how the
kids are treated on my block, where these guys grew up. Lots of yelling,
swearing, poverty, nobody listens to these children. Then they grow up,
come to my house and steal and lie about. Never judge another person
because you do not know where they have been.

Becky
________________________________________________________________________

From: "Mirror" <mirror@universalmail.com>

Emptiness in the Nonduality Salon......
Everybody left.
No posts.
No discussions.
No arguments.
No fun.
Nothing happening.
The Salon is Empty.......

..............


Is this the absolute?

...............


(no wonder it made the world appear)



~Mira~
__________________


__________________

Petros:


Guess again.


The prophet has returned from the desert --
__________________

__________________


I don't know. Time passes at a different rate depending on where one is
and
what one is doing.

Petros
__________________


Life is empty of separateness
Everything is One

Love
Afra
__________________

Dave Mason:

hmmmm
"Life is empty of separateness
Everything is One"
what happens if we let go of this as well?

there is an old zen koan
'the ten thousand things return to the one
where does the one return?'

ok everybody
where does the one return??????????????
yehaaaaaaaaa
from
dave
__________________

There are as many numbers between zero and one
as there are between one and ten thousand.

andrew
__________________


To where or what can One return if One IS everything?
Everything is One

Love
Afra
__________________


everything
every
thing
one
won
de dum de dum de dum de dum.


the concept everything
used here like this
has no meaning
if we are talking about being swept
away by a tide of feeling truth and power
now
that I can relate to
but the concept / word everything
nah.

people reading this
if you know
then this is just whistling in the wind
if you don't know
watch out for words
like everything
every
thing.

another old koan
"one inch meditation
one inch Buddha"
bye
from dave
________________________________________________________________________


From: davemason@dial.pipex.com

"Van Gogh did not die of a state of delirium properly speaking,
but of having been bodily the battlefield of a problem around
which the evil spirit of humanity has been struggling from the
beginning . . . .Van Gogh searched throughout his life with a
strange energy and determination. And he did not commit
suicide in a fit of madness, in a dread of not succeeding. On
the contrary, he had just succeeded, and discovered what he was
and who he was, when the collective consciousness of society, to
punish him for escaping its clutches, suicided him".
Antonin Artaud
________________________________________________________________________


>Dan wrote:
.....So without moral outrage, I would
like to express concern and sadness. Certainly,
when anyone is hurt by stereotyping, prejudice,
violent assault - it is I who am hurt.

>Skye: Er...ok Mr. Dan not hurt.

Dan: You missed me, here, Skye. I feel the hurt involved
in this situation.
I don't feel morally outraged.
You can cover that base if it's for you.
My perception is that moral outrage, superiority,
and self-righteousness go well together - and
it's not for me. Those things can
cause as much hurt as misguided fundamentalism.
Ironically, moral outrage seems one of the very key
emotions that drives fundamentalism -
a reactive state of mind. How do we get beyond "reacting"
to "being" -- individually and collectively?
Just as through the generations, victim becomes victimizer
and the dance goes on...
I am the rage,
I am the hurt, I am the healing, I am the love - and I am beyond
these feeling states.
Taking the moral high ground doesn't "solve" anything for me,
thanks.

Love, Dan
________________________________________________________________________

Kristi:


the fire up here is awesome....it's licking at our heels

the sun was a neon ball of orange........glaring through the black
smoke, as
if to say....nothing you can do will hide me

they left 10 million dollars worth of "resources", trucks and cash and
generators and such, at one of the base camps they evacuated last
night.....nothing like fear of death to get one's priorities
straight....

it's a good fire.....will burn all that choked out underbrush and
rejuvenate
the earth...unless of course it burns down a town or two along the
way....point of view is everything, no?

pretty trippy stuff, this fire.....they move in and set up whole towns
overnight....showers, big white marshmallow tents with points like
circus
tents....brilliant yellow firefighter shirts and olive green forest
service
shirts,
35 states and 18 tribal nations, indians, mexicans, african-americans,
even
white folks, all working together.....awesome......they came from Maine
and
Wisconsin and Alaska and EVERYWHERE......

Love, Kristi

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