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#2819 - Monday, May 21, 2007 - Editor: Gloria Lee
One: Essential Writings on Nonduality http://nonduality.com/one.htm
Nondual Highlights
Video http://www.globalcommunity.org/flash/wombat.shtml
A reader's contribution by n.m. rai
The emperor of China asked a renowned Buddhist master if it would be possible to illustrate the nature of self in a visible way. In response, the master had a sixteen-sided room appointed with floor-to-ceiling mirrors that faced one another exactly. In the center he hung a candle flame. When the emperor entered he could see the individual candle flame in thousands of forms, each of the mirrors extending it far into the distance. Then the master replaced the candle with a small crystal. The emperor could see the small crystal reflected again in every direction. When the master pointed closely at the crystal, the emperor could see the whole room of thousands of crystals reflected in each tiny facet of the crystal in the center. The master showed how the smallest particle contains the whole universe. True emptiness is not empty, but contains all things. The mysterious and pregnant void creates and reflects all possibilities. From it arises our individuality, which can be discovered and developed, although never possessed or fixed. The self is held in no-self, as the candle flame is held in great emptiness.
--Jack Kornfield, A Path with Heart
There are those like Amma who literally see God in everyone. We think, "Well, they must be some kind of saint or something, because I still see differences, and I still have preferences, etc...", but that's why we do sadhana, to see clearly what is already the case, because there is truly NOTHING BUT GOD, NOTHING BUT LOVE.
Dogen said, “Although everything has Buddha nature, we love flowers, and we do not care for weeds.” This is true of human nature. But that we are attached to some beauty is itself Buddha’s activity. That we do not care for weeds is also Buddha’s activity. We should know that. If you know that, it is all right to attach to something. If it is Buddha’s attachment, that is non-attachment. So in love there should be hate, or non-attachment. And in hate there should be love, or acceptance. Love and hate are one thing. We should not attach to love alone. We should accept hate. We should accept weeds, despite how we feel about them. If you do not care for them, do not love them; if you love them then love them. Usually you criticize yourself for being unfair to your surroundings; you criticize your unaccepting attitude. But there is a very subtle difference between the usual way of accepting and our way of accepting things, although they may seem exactly the same. We have been taught that there is no gap between nighttime and daytime, no gap between you and I. This means oneness. But we do not emphasize even oneness. If it is one, there is no need to emphasize one.
Dogen said: “To learn something is to know yourself; to study Buddhism is to study yourself.” To learn something is not to acquire something which you did not know before. You know something before you learn it. There is no gap between the “I” before you know something, and the “I” after you know something. There is no gap between the ignorant and the wise. A foolish person is a wise person; a wise person is a foolish person. But usually we think, “He is foolish and I am wise,” or “I was foolish, but now I am wise.” How can we be wise if we are foolish?
But the understanding transmitted from Buddha to us is that there is no difference whatsoever between the foolish man and the wise man. It is so. But if I say this people may think that I am emphasizing oneness. That is not so. We do not emphasize anything. All we want to do is to know things just as they are. If we know things, as they are, there is nothing to point at; there is no way to grasp anything; there is no thing to grasp. We cannot put emphasis on any point. Nevertheless, as Dogen said, “A flower falls, even though we love it; and a weed grows, even though we do not love it.” Even though it is so, this is our life.
In this way our life should be understood. Then there is no problem. Because we put emphasis on some particular point, we always have trouble. We should accept things just as they are. This is how we understand everything, and how we live in this world. This kind of experience is something beyond our thinking. In the thinking realm there is a difference between oneness and variety; but in actual experience, variety and unity are the same. Because you create some idea of unity or variety, you are caught by the idea. And you have to continue the endless thinking, although actually there is no need to think.
Emotionally we have many problems; they are something created; they are problems pointed out by our self-centered ideas or views. Because we point out something, there are problems. But actually it is not possible to point out anything in particular. Happiness is sorrow; sorrow is happiness. Even though the ways we feel are different, they are not really different; in essence they are the same. This is the true understanding; transmitted from Buddha to us.
Who is blind to the One, is completely blind to all. Who sees the One, has vision of all - and at any rate is removed from their vision, and in the vision of all becomes, and outside of all he is. Inside the One he sees everything, and while being in everything nothing of any thing does he see.
Whoever sees in the One through the One, sees clearly himself
and all men and all things, and hidden inside the One, he doesn't
see anything of any thing.
---St. Symeon the New Theologian
source: here
Ben Hassine on AwakenedAwareness
from The_Now2
(The
following transcription of an Adyashanti talk comes from a five
minute excerpt at the Feb 2007 Asilomar retreat. It is on Monday
Feb 26, 2007 and is Disc 1 Monday, Track 10 (and part of Track
11). Emphasis was given to convey in some form the emphasis
that was given in spoken form. Enjoy.....Peter)
As soon as there is a gap in the thoughts, there is the nameless,
already conscious, already awake, already complete within itself.
It can't get more of itself, or less of itself, totally adequate.
That which is nameless, name it whatever you want, just don't
believe the name you give it.
In the Zen tradition they would ask "who were you before your parents were born?" And its, there is no reason to sit around thinking about it because thinking is no use in this sense. But just imagine, if your parents aren't born than you're not born. That's what's important, no parents, no you.
Before you could think of
yourself, imagine yourself, conceive of yourself, before you
could define yourself as your feet and your toes and your
thoughts and your feelings, and your past and your memories,
before any of that existed.
[Pause]
And what you were before any of that existed is exactly what you are right now.
No different; not enhanced because there is the appearance of toes, and feet and fingers, and thoughts, and not diminished.
So you as yourself as you truly are, are wordless. Call that what you want.
Nothing. Nothing that's not just nothing. Expressing itself as everything you could ever experience.
[The following said as in a refrain, rhymically in prose:]
That which is not an experience expresses itself as all experience.
That which is not a thought expresses itself as all thoughts.
That
which is not a feeling expresses itself as all feeling.
That which is not a sight,
seeable, expresses itself as everything you'll ever see, and so
it goes.
So we begin by looking at the first thought the thought of me and
I, that is the most important one, it holds up all of the
others. If you've seen through the thought, if you've woken
up from yourself. Because that is what awakening is, that's
what it feels it feels like, you've woken up from yourself.
The nameless has woken up from name.
The formless has woken up from form.
The nobody-ness has woken up from somebody-ness,
shaken off the sleep, feeling completely relieved, ahhhh [long
sigh after the ahhhh expression]
And when you've done that, and if, and when you've done that, then there is just the possibility, the further invitation to see that none of the thoughts that may arise are true.
None of them.
None of them.
None of them.
None of them.
They are just your mind telling itself a story, talking to itself, like some grandfather around a campfire spinning a tale to scare the kids.
What comes out of that wordless space is extraordinary, especially when it is no longer hypnotized, in a trance, what flows out is extraordinary, what flows out is the whole world, the entire universe. That's the flowing out.
People want to see how do I look today, they look in the mirror, they see one face, oh I look blah, blah blah, blah blah. If you want to see how you look today open the damn window, don't look in the mirror.
I'm windy today I'm cold today and I'm sunny, I'm hot. I'm water and trees and wind and birds. And none of that all at the same time.
[The following said as a refrain
rhythmically]
I'm the wordless in all words.
I'm the sightless in everything seen.
I'm that which is not a feeling in
everything felt everywhere by everybody.
No need to keep limiting it to one particular location, that is part of the hypnotism.
So you see maybe why we start each
day and end each day with silence* with the wordless, its an invitation
to the wordless, to that
awakeness ,
consciousness-ING ,
but don't get stuck on those
words, don't grasp them. Ultimately , it's the wordless.
Its an awake Word-Less-Ness.
And so we start each morning and end each day with Word-Less-Ness.
And remember, and look for yourself, that Word-Less-Ness doesn't care if there is lots of words flowing through your head, It doesn't care if there is thoughts, it doesn't care if there is no thoughts, it is not disturbed.
It has no agenda. It solves everything by solving absolutely nothing.
*(referring to Adyashanti's retreat practice of meditation or
"in silence" at the beginning of the day and the end of
the day to serve as the container and invitation and reminder of
the most important thing: silence)
http://www.ferryfee.com/bluesky/shores/17th.htm and http://www.ferryfee.com/bluesky/shores/May17_too.htm
Alan Larus - Here Comes the Sun
http://www.ferryfee.com/bluesky/shores/201.htm
http://www.ferryfee.com/bluesky/shores/202.htm
http://www.ferryfee.com/bluesky/shores/203.htm