When the stains from old habits are exhausted,
the original light appears, blazing through
your skull, not admitting other matters. Vast
and spacious, like sky and water merging during
autumn, like snow and moon having the same
color, this field is without boundary, beyond
direction. Magnificently one entity without
edge or seam.
-- Hongzhi (1091-1157)
Terry Murphy on SufiMystic
the following is from "Consciousness
Unfolding," Joel S. Goldsmith pp71-72
Have you ever stopped to think how much time
you spend trying to find some truth, or wishing
that you might know some particular truth? You
do not have to do that at all. If you can
realize the Master's saying: "I am...the
truth," then, you will have it all. "I am the
truth!" And when you have that, you do not have
to look for some truth which I already am.
Have you ever thought how much time you spend
seeking love? It is time wasted because it is
always to be found where you never think to
look for it. It is within your own being: I am
life, truth, and love. I am love. I am the only
love there is in the world. I am all that God
is; all that the Father hath is mine. Our
mistake is that we look for love in or from
some person. There we shall never find it -
never. The love we find in a person is a
counterfeit of love. We shall find love only
when we discover it as the reality of our
being.
In the same way, how often do we look to
somebody for justice, for mercy, or gratitude.
We cannot find these qualities in any person
because they are not there to be found.
All these are qualities of your own being. If
you do not find them within you, and if you do
not find them very much in expression, do not
look for them outside. But if once you do find
that justice, mercy, kindness, benevolence, and
gratitude are qualities of your own being, and
that you are allowing them to come into full
expression, then you will not look for them in
anyone else ever again. You will not have to,
because they will be reflected back to you from
the rest of the world, but always what is being
reflected back to you will be the qualities of
your own being.
Please remember this: You will never get
anything from this world, except the quality of
your own being. Therefore, anything which comes
to you will come only by reflection. It is as
if you stood in front of a mirror and saw
whatever stands before the mirror. There is
nothing in the mirror to be seen: What you see
is your own selfhood reflected back to you.
This is a law and a principle. The quality,
whatever its name or nature, is in our own
being. When someone expresses it to us, he
merely reflects our own being back to us. It is
our own quality which has been reflected.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kheyala Adventures at Rasa Ranch # 107
[This story is dedicated to Mazie and b]
3/23/03 "It's All About Love"
This morning something was bugging Ananda. She
was incessantly pestering me and the baby and
was also asking me to do many things for her
that I knew she was capable of doing herself.
This behavior of hers was bugging me pretty
bad, too. When I showed her some of my
irritation she asked me to hold her. But she
didn't just ask. She whined. It had the quality
of craving in it, much like the yearning for
any addictive substance, and it made me want to
scream. I felt a strong, but familiar piercing
feeling in my heart and my whole body and mind
resisted this. When I became aware that this
resistance was present all I could do was
surrender to that fact, and that, by grace, was
enough to stop me from reacting in the anger
that I had certainly been feeling. Even in
clarity, however, it didn't seem right to give
her what she was asking for, or in other words,
to give her a "fix."
So I told her I would hold her but not right
that minute and her instant negative reaction
confirmed my intuition. I took a deep breath
and asked her what else she wanted. Ananda told
me that she wanted *everything* and then began
naming things, to which I simply nodded and
listened and said "okay." But then, after a
pause, she whined again that she wanted me to
hold her. Voila! There was that zinger again in
my heart and my utter resistance, but then also
the awareness of it coupled with the lack of
(by grace) fighting with it. I took a deep
breath and told her I would hold her soon, but
not quite yet. Spontaneously it occurred to me
to ask her why she wanted me to. "What would
you get?" I asked. It didn't take long for her
to answer. "Love."
"Do you mean to tell me you don't have love
now?" I asked skeptically. She told me she
didn't but I didn't believe her. I moved my
face closer to hers but she turned away. "Is
that really the truth?" I asked. I put my
finger under her chin and lifted and turned her
face to meet mine. She squinted her eyes shut,
refusing to meet my gaze. "You tell me
something that's true," I said, "and then I
will hold you." She paused for a moment and
then looked right up at me and stated, "I do
have love."
The great thing about this is that she honestly
didn't say it like she was giving me the answer
I was looking for. She said it like she had
just discovered something fresh for the first
time.
"Yes! You do!" I exclaimed with joy and
sparkles that I knew she could see in my eyes.
She started to smile and I eagerly picked her
up onto my lap. While her arms were still
wrapped around my neck in a big embrace I asked
her if she knew why she always had it. "Why?"
she asked, and I whispered to her ear, "Because
you ARE it."
Then suddenly she jumped up and said, "You know
what I want to do now? I want to make beautiful
pictures for everybody! Don't tell Daddy. It
will be a surpwise." And then she was off.
It's an hour later now and she is still at it,
working on her own, and giving us "pwesents"
made with enthusiasm and pride by her own hand.
photo of Ananda at age five
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Terry Murphy on SufiMystic
The old sufi phrase says, "you must die before you die." Lest you
think I invented the idea.
As far as having the material handy, most of it I had posted in the
last week, as though I had been expecting the question. Grace is very
convenient, always having things at hand.
I respect you for being honest, but you should consider a couple of
things. The "I" that you don't want to die is an illusion in any
case. And whether or not you want this illusion to continue, it will come
to an end when the meat wears out, if not sooner.
There is an old story about Yudhisthira, Arjuna's (from the Bhagavad
Gita) older brother, the eldest of the Pandava clan. After the Great War
(the Mahabharata, which book this story brings to an end), which serves as
the backdrop for the Bhagavad Gita, comes to an end, the Pandavas, burnt
out, decide to make the final journey into death, which in those days was
conceived of as a walk up Mount Everest, and somewhere along the trail you
were expected to expire. The brothers together began to ascend the
mountain, and one after another were ensnared by some illusion and died,
only Yudhisthira arriving at the gates of paradise, somewhere along the
line having picked up a stray dog that had attached itself to the family.
Before Yudhisthira could enter paradise, he had to answer a series of
questions correctly, and the final question was, "What is the very
strangest thing about human beings." Without hesitation, he responded
that, "No matter how many persons that people see dying all around them, no
one really believes that they themselves will truly die." The gatekeeper
assented to this, and began to open the gate, off-handedly saying, "Oh by
the way, the dog has to stay outside." At this Yudhisthira refused to
enter, saying that even if he went to hell for it, he would not abandon a
creature which had put its faith in him. Instantly the dog was transformed
into the personification of Dharma (in this case, Dharma in the sense of
Duty). All of Yudhisthira's brothers re-appeared, restored to life, and
everyone moved on into heaven.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gill Eardley on Allspirit
Peace is a Woman
How do you know
peace is a woman?
I know, for
I met her yesterday
on my winding way
to the world's fair
She had such a sorrowful face
just like a golden flower faded
before her prime.
I asked her why
she was so sad?
She told me her baby
was killed in Auschwitz,
her daughter in Hiroshima
and her sons in Vietnam,
Ireland, Israel, Lebanon,
Bosnia, Rwanda and Chechnya.
All the rest of her children, she said,
are on the nuclear
black-list of the dead,
all the rest, unless
the whole world understands --
that peace is a woman
A thousand candles then lit
in her starry eyes, and I saw --
Peace is indeed a pregnant woman
Peace is a mother.
~Ada A. Aharoni
http://listserv.ac.il/~ada/home.html
