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CARLOS DWA (via Bob Maurer)

Seeing it all before keeps you
from seeing.

If you seen it all before
you don't see anything.

What you don't know is more
important than what you do know.

What you don't know
is the greater part of
what you know.

What you don't know that you know
is known by the
greater you.

Carlos Dwa (copyright, 1999)

_________________________________________________________________

LYNNE

Suffering, hurting, crying

I wash your feet guru with my tears

Why can't I be with you? I am you?

I love you.

Cry my beloved. There is much reason for crying and
rejoicing.
We have found ourselves, again.

so-so-so-so sorry
ha-ha-ha-ha happy
pay-pay-pay-pay pain

Ready to try again?

Love
Lynne (on the bus

__________________________________________________________________

JAN KOEHOORN


At first, there was Somebody, doing Everything
Then there was Somebody, doing Nothing
After that, there was Nobody, doing Everything
And later still, there was Nobody, doing Nothing

And AAALLLLLLLLLLL the time......
there was OOOOOOONLY ME!
Somebody, Nobody, Everything and Nothing
can all be seen by ME!
HaHaHa!

____________________________________________________________________

HARSHA

The wise say that the Tao that can be talked about is not
The Tao. Still Sages manage to indicate the Existence of
the Underlying Reality with words and without words. They
do it because it is their first hand knowledge and it is
their nature to do it. I am often reminded of the words of
Ramana Maharshi who used to say that the Reality must Always
be Real and therefore It must be Here and Now also. If it
is not Here and Now and is to be gained at some future time,
then it must be subject to loss also. What can be gained
can also be lost! Therefore that which is Real, Absolute,
Eternal cannot be gained. It is what You already Are. Can
we Accept This? What undermines the acceptance of our Own
Natural State?


_________________________________________________________________

MELODY

This morning a young girl, aged 13 or 14, told me she had
gotten in big trouble at school.


I asked her what happened.


She told me her story which ended with her being taken to
the juvenile center and being made to stay there for several
hours.


My response was, "I bet you were scared to death."


She nodded yes, looked me deep in the eye, and allowed the
beginning of a smile to open on her face.


And then she melted. She opened up the windows in her eyes
and invited me to see all of her.


It was an amazing moment that seemed to last forever.


Looking at that moment we shared, I realized that had I met
her with all my 'knowns'..... had I tried to impress upon
her the wisdom of my years and experience, we would have
missed that moment....that communion.


I realized, looking at that moment, how beautiful it was to
have been free of an agenda...without an itinerary.


Some moments I feel a bit uneasy about not having 'life' all
figured out (like I used to!). But this morning I tasted
again the beauty and freedom of being empty of 'ideas' and
'solutions'....especially about other people.


Yet the key to staying empty, I recognize, is to simply let
that moment flow by, and not try to create a new religion or
philosophy around it.


Easier said than done, isn't it? I usually try to bottle
and package those beautiful moments...those 'tastes'....
so that I can drink them over and over again, or, in a way,

make a formula by which other people can have a similar
taste.


It's hard to stay completely 'empty'....allowing for those
spontaneous moments of communion, without making a 'science'
and 'curriculum' of one's experience.
___________________________________________________________________

TIM GERCHMEZ

Notice the eyes closely? Do you see? There is no division
between "inner" and "outer." The two are one in the cat.


Unlike ourselves, the cat is not burdened with an analyzing,
intellectual mind that dreams up dualities. It sees reality
as-is, without the artificial division between "inside" and
"outside." The experiencer is not, in the cat, there is
only the experience.


MARCIA

A cat does not have the facility to be self-aware. Of the
four states of consciousness i.e. sleeping, waking sleep,
self- awareness, and cosmic consciousness, a cat can never
be self-aware or cosmically conscious. I agree that a cat
is usually more perfectly a cat than man is man because man
can evolve and doesn't while a cat is as evolved and perfect
as a cat will ever be.


----------------------------------------

PHIL BURTON

What is the "facility to be self-aware"? And how can one be
so sure what has or has not this facility? Do you get it
from a book? In other words, is it closed to the
illiterate?


These are socratic questions, dear Marcia. I know the
answer already.
Self-awareness is universal nature. How do I know that?
Because I am that. Since the "world" and all of its
inhabitants dwell in the self, are inseperable from the
Self, then self-awareness is one. The obverse is: if the
cat is not "self-aware" then neither are you.


Throw away the book.


-----------------------------------------------------------

SKYE

To certain degrees all life has self awareness, but not self
reflection as mankind has.


A dog cannot recall joyful appreciation of his own state of
grace from a past comparison nor its anticipated future
recurrence. Animals do not have our degree of conscious
memory, the instinctive memory of the cells and organs
sustains them. They cannot voluntarily summon a memory. A
dog can remember where he saw his master last, but it is
triggered by biological urges. They do not have our
memory's capacity to, at any time, look back through
itself. The state of grace is unconscious in them, they
take it for granted. We can know its wonders consciously.


Self reflection is a unique characteristic of mankind. The
aware mind can change its beliefs with conscious thought and
rearrange perception and experience. With this consciously
"facility to be self-aware" we are to *realize* we are the
creators of our own reality.


-----------------------------------------

WILL

Beautiful...I perceive

Knowing
Emptiness
Vunerability
Grace

wordless

Pure Love

__________________________________________________________________


MIRROR AND SKYE

skye:
To certain degrees all life has self awareness, but not self
reflection as mankind has.


Mirror:
Good point skye. By reflection are you referring to
recalling remembered and registered events/feelings/states,
and the ability to evaluate memory? (Like thinking about
thought?)


skye: Yes, i also spy with my little 'I' something beginning
with; Consciousness attracts information like a magnet.
Information is ever reborn and reinterpreted through new
consciousness, it does not exist by itself. In other word
consciousness attracts the consciousness that is already
connected with the material *and* all the consciousness' who
understand it. Phew!!
Be it an atom a flower or a human bean :-).


skye:
A dog cannot recall joyful appreciation of his own state of
grace from a past comparison nor its anticipated future
recurrence.


Mirror:
Meaning that the dog doesn't experience desires for a
repeated recurrence to acomplish a desired state as a means
to experience (its already innate) happiness?
This would imply that the dog does not experience mental
suffering, and its natural happiness is not obscured by
mental projections.


skye: Not necessarily, the master who died is a deep
biological memory, grieved for at every habitual meal,
homecoming, habits of exercise etc. John F Kennedy jnr's
dog is suffering dreadfully. It's biology reminds it
constantly, of affectionate moments no longer shared.


mirror: As I see it, the natural state is not a state. A
state being something of the nature of an experience, but
with a longer duration (residing in a happy state, takes
longer than experiencing just a short moment of happiness).
The natural state however, is the emptiness in which this
experience occurs. It is also the emptiness in which the
remembering of this experience occurs.
To me, the natural state is not something that can be
recalled, but as you state yourself very clearly, the
experience of joy, is what can be recalled and reflected
upon.
Perhaps you are right stating that this reflective quality,
can only be found in the human species.


skye: We have burst into a dimension where the natural state
of grace is interpreted through a kaleidoscope of being. A
brilliant truth in new clothes, so to speak, clothes of
uniqueness and originality that no one could have given us
but ourselves. I'm speaking of recalling the joys of *this
dimension* for as you say (and i feel it to be so also) "To
me, the natural state is not something that can be recalled"
for (as it is with a dog), it is a natural state of grace
that we are always in, though at the moment human
Consciousness *seems* to be apart from it and able to
reflect.


skye:
Animals do not have our degree of conscious memory, the
instinctive memory of the cells and organs sustains them.
They cannot voluntarily summon a memory.


Mirror:
Can we? I could say yes, saying that I can now consciously
decide to recall last Christmas' Eve. Fine. Then, if my
memory still serves me well, I can indeed recall events from
last Christmas' Eve. But then, how did the decision to
recall that specific memory appear? Who's voluntary decision
was that?


skye :-) silence :-)


skye:
A dog can remember where he saw his master last, but it is
triggered by biological urges. They do not have our
memory's capacity to, at any time, look back through itself.


Mirror:
Perhaps I don't have that capacity either. Perhaps I only
think I do. Perhaps I only believe that I indeed recall
events that have actually occurred. Perhaps I even find
proof that they have, because of the situation as I find it
now. Perhaps this is all delusion. Perhaps thought is
perpetuating this illusion every milisecond again. Creating
a reality that I believe exists as a result of past
occurrences. Perhaps the mind is only clinging to this
believe in order to keep its ability to create time and
space enabled. Perhaps indeed, the dog cannot look beyond
that which is at hand NOW. Which is fine, by the way.
Because manifest reality takes care of itself. Every
milisecond again. Regardless of reflective qualities
enabled or disabled.


skye: Yes, perhaps :-))))

skye:
The state of grace is unconscious in them, they take it for
granted. We can know its wonders consciously.


Mirror:
We are the consciousness that is aware of its wonders. I
agree that this "awareness of awareness" is grace in itself,
experienced as bliss.

skye:
Self reflection is a unique characteristic of mankind. The
aware mind can change its beliefs with conscious thought and
rearrange perception and experience. With this consciously
"facility to be self-aware" we are to *realize* we are the
creators of our own reality.

____________________________________________________________________

TIM GERCHMEZ

Could someone explain the meaning and origins of the term
"Cosmic Consciousness?" All it brings to mind here is a
picture of a hippy on LSD wearing a headband, with asteroids
rotating around his head :-)


Sounds like some sort of new-age hokum. Does "Cosmically
conscious" have anything to do with the natural state
(realization), or is it something Timothy Leary cooked up in
a test tube in the 60's? :-)


-----------------------------------------------

BRUCE MORGEN

My first exposure to the term was via Maharishi Mahesh
Yogi's early TM movement literature.
"MMY," as TMers call him, claims lineage back to Shankara,
so perhaps it is his English rendering of a term from
Shankara's canon. I no longer have a handle on a
definition, but I recall it as clearly related to
"realization" as discussed here -- I'm just not sure eactly
how....


---------------------------------------------------

DAVID HODGES

Actually, Tim, the term "Cosmic Consciousness" doesn't come
from Tim Leary, it is the title of a book published in 1905
called "Cosmic Consciousness: A Study in the Evolution of
the Human Mind" by Richard Maurice Bucke, M.D. The book is
still in print and is very readable. Using case studies
from the experiences of people including Walt Whitman and
Ralph Waldo Emerson, Bucke discusses the potential within us
for expanded states of consciousness, within the context of
his theory of spiritual evolution. It was a very
influential book. I read it some years ago. I remember the
chapter on Whitman being especially interesting and forever
changed the way I read his poetry.


------------------------------------------------------------

TIM HARRIS

Rather than take the 'obvious' poke and say it is just
another 'label' and you have stated clearly that you have no
interest in these labels (Labels?! We don't need no
'stinking' labels! ... Ren and Stimpy?)...


The concept or idea of 'cosmic consciousness' is the very
thing that you describe however, unlike your own 'self'
ideas it is one that embraces the 'whole' that includes
beyond your self... in other words, your world, my world
and every 'others' world as a function within the whole.


-----------------------------------------------------

RAINBO

Responding to the digest which is no longer in the list of
emails, but this term, "cosmic consciousness" originates
beyond what I've been able to source, there are roots in
translations from an occultist of the sixteenth century by
the name of Janduz (this was a nom de plume) who was
translating occult symbols used by the Arabs and the Greeks,
including Teuchros the Babylonian in AD 50, which includes
degree symbols and which the first century Manilius based
his own work on.
From there it reappears in Alfonso el Sabia (Alphon the
sage) and d'Abano who knew each other in 13th century
Spain. I first ran into this from a relative who had access
to the Vatican library.



____________________________________________________________________

XAN

excerpts from Talks with Ramana Maharshi:



From the Guru's outlook the Guru is only Self. ...
Is not then the Self your Guru? Where else will Grace come
from? It is from the Self alone.
Manifestation of the Self is manifestation of Grace and vice
versa. ... Nothing is external to the Self.


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


The guru is both interior and exterior. From the exterior
he gives a push to the mind to turn inward; from the
interior he pulls the mind towards the Self and helps the
mind to achieve quietness. That is Grace. Hence there is
no difference between God, Guru and Self.


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


As long as you seek Self-Realization the Guru is necessary.
Take Guru to be the Real Self and your self as the
individual self. The disappearance of this sense of duality
is removal of ignorance. ... You are the Self and so is
the Guru.


student: How can know whether a particular individual is
competent to be a Guru?


By the peace of mind found in his presence and by the sense
of respect you feel for him.


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


You imagine [Guru] to be like yourself. Because you are
with a body you think that he is also a body in order to do
something tangible to you. His work lies within. How is
Guru gained? God, who is immanent, in his Grace takes pity
on the loving devotee and manifests Himself as a being
according to the devotee's standard. The devotee thinks
that he is a man and expects relationship as between
bodies.
But the Guru, who is God or Self incarnate, works from
within, helps the man to see the error of his ways, guides
him in the right path until he realizes the Self within.


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


The Guru is quiet and peace prevails in all.
His silence is more vast and more emphatic than all the
teachings put together.


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


There is a stanza in Kaivalya which says, "O Guru! You have
been always with me watching me through several incarnations
and ordaining my course until I was liberated," The Self
manifests externally as Guru when occasion arises; otherwise
He is always within, doing the needful.
____________________________________________________________________

The Pathway of Nonduality

by Raphael

Chapter 14

The Siddhis (concluded)


This concludes the book. What I plan to do with it is
insert chapters in appropriate places throughout the
Nonduality Salon website. Hope you've enjoyed parts of it.
This last one is pretty interesting.


Jerry
--------------------------------------------------------------
Q. You said before that a power is a faculty which
influences the environment. What difference is there
between this influence and that of the Saint?


A. The difference is great indeed. The influence of a
power acts:


(1) upon the psycho-physical plane; (2) upon the plane of
force-energy; (3) within the field of subject-object
duality; (4) upon the plane of the ego's will; (5) in order
to obtain a physical or psychological advantage.


The influence of the Realized one operates:


(1) upon the spiritual plane; (2) upon the plane of
'innocence', of non-resistance. The influence of the
Realized one is irradiation that expands naturally, like the
fragrance of a flower; (3) within the field of pure Subject,
because it does not pay any attention to the object. The
Realized one does not try or seek or desire to influence
others.
(4) Upon the plane of non-will, non-desire, because it has
no selfish aims; (5) therefore, upon the plane of
'donation', of pure Love, since it is his own particular
consciousness vibration that resounds.


Thus, while psychic powers operate in the sphere of
individualized existence, spiritual power acts within the
sphere of the supraindividual or the universal.


The influence of the Realized one becomes a 'magnetic field'
at the centre of the world, while that of the psyche is a
simple relationship between a single subject and an object.


Q. Can we say, therefore, that the Realized one 'vibrates'
sat-cit-ananda, while the person who has psychic powers must
use a force, a faculty in order to obtain cerain effects?


A. Yes, indeed. The Realized one is pure Consciousness
without superimposition, he is Being, while the person
having psychic powers is an individuality speaking to other
individualities by means of tools of 'persuasion'.


Q. Can power be used simply out of vanity?


A. Yes. This is the less harmful of possibilities, even if
the most fleeting. Vanity is one of the many psychological
'advantages' that one may receive from the exercise of a
power.


Q. Are power-faculties mere accidents of prakriti after
all?


A. Yes. Instead sat, cit, ananda are not attributes or
accidents or Being, but are nature of Being. The are
consubstantial with Being itself.


Bliss-fulfilment is not a psychic power; Intelligence or
Consciousness is not a psychic power. A psychic power is
the faculty to perceive sensorially, behind which operate
the Universal Intelligence, Being and Consciousness.


Power represents the exercise of a faculty which can come
into being and die, can exist or cannot exist. It operates,
as we have already said, upon the plane of duality,
therefore, on the plane of non-being. Sat-cit-ananda is
Being, it is ever-existent since it belongs to non-becoming.


Power operates upon the plane of necessity, while
sat-cit-ananda acts upon the plane of freedom.


Material or psychic wealth is needed to acquire something
that one does not possess; he who possesses everything
within himself does not seek either material or psychic
wealth.


Q. Does the metaphysical pathway oppose such powers?


A. It cannot oppose them, as they are powers and faculties
that belong to prakriti itself. It cannot, obviously, agree
with the use that is often made of them. Even Jesus made
use of similar powers and these were not only used with
understanding but we can say that they did not belong to the
psychic sphere as this sphere represented just a channel of
the universal Will. The universal Consciousness was making
use of 'phenomena' for certain, and obviously
non-individual, purposes.
-------------

end, The Pathway of Non-duality

____________________________________________________________________

JAN BARENDRECHT

Olde Fart: It is said that animals, as all sentient beings,
have buddhanature.


Jan: What one can have, one can lose. Such a buddhanature
is rather worthless. But if the essence is buddhanature,
there is just one buddhanature and having/losing does not
apply, nor the question "who has...?" and "who doesn't
have?".

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