Tuesday, March 30, 2021

Attention..

 











Attention..

Appears to be a directed perceiving of what

Shows up in line of sight..nothing startling

About that boring clarity..until we consider:

Attention demands a viewer and an array

Of objects asserting themselves..and we may or

May not notice sitting quietly in a dark corner

An assumption of separation..a quiet deception..

Dissolving the deception..nothing remains

But playing appearances..entering and

Departing from seemingly nowhere..and an 

Aroma of real and not real..solid and not..

Also..entering the playground are thoughts of

Attention and a viewer and an array of

Objects..this new trio of players..front and center..

Arriving from nowhere...

Monday, March 29, 2021

No Mind..(Nathan Gill)

 






No Mind - Nathan Gill

Q: So there is this body-mind and a thought arises - for instance, ‘I am hungry’ - and the brain reacts to that thought.

A: No, it's simpler than that. There's no cause and effect. There is a play of images being presently registered. A body is appearing, simultaneously with a sensation of hunger, and also simultaneously with the thought, ‘I am hungry’.

Q: So what's doing the registering then?

A: No-thing is registering every-thing. This registering, or no-thing, is what the concept 'awareness' points to.

Q: It can't be the ‘I’ thought because the ‘I’ thought, the person, doesn't exist anyway.

A: The ‘I’ thought is part of the content, part of what is being reg-istered. No-thing is registering.

Q: So are we trying to understand this with the mind?

A: There is no mind. The term 'mind' is used in a somewhat confusing way to represent the thoughts appearing and disappearing presently in awareness, and so seeming to constitute a stream of thoughts. This apparent stream of thoughts - when seen objectively as single images appearing and disappearing - is not problematic, but when labelled 'mind', it is presumed to constitute an actual entity. It is a phantom. No thought can understand anything. Thoughts are merely inert images - message balloons.

Q: Where do they arise from?

A: It's a complete mystery, as is all of the arising content. They simply appear within awareness as part of the content.

Q: The difficulty of course is that the mind shifts these thoughts together into a time sequence and so spins its own story, doesn't it? Is that how it is?

A: There is no mind. The mind is the succession of thoughts, so there is no mind as an entity that could do anything with thoughts or spin a story. The apparent succession of thoughts is already the story.

Q: So the thoughts are doing the weaving - it's the other way around?

A: The thoughts aren't actually doing anything. They are merely images, arising in succession and so appearing to form a story.

Q: And we don't know where the thoughts come from - it's a complete mystery.

A: Yes.

Q: So we're on a hiding to nothing really! But who strings the thoughts together?

A: When the ‘I’ thought - the primary thought - has been assumed, then the succession of arising thoughts appears to form a continuous solid entity called 'mind'. It's like a propeller: when it's still, it's seen as two or three blades, but when it's whirling around - the apparent succession of thoughts - then it appears as an entity.

Q: The story.

A: Yes. This is what we're calling 'mind', but in fact mind has no existence - it's just an apparent succession of arising thoughts. The story formed in thought is no more real than a story formed by a succession of messages strung together to form a novel. There can be involvement in a novel, but only when it's picked up and read. It could just be left on the shelf.

Q: Can you say also that there's actually no control over whether there is mesmerisation or not — it just happens?

A: That's right, yes.

Q: And the apparent unfolding - you have no control over that either.

A: No, there is simply unfolding.

Q: So to say that you’re going to do something or not do something... 

A: That's the thought story. But it's not 'your' thought story - it's just the thought story presently appearing or happening.

Q: So you just let it all happen.

A: 'You' don't let it all happen - it's already happening. Maybe the ‘I’ will be undermined, maybe not.

Q: This is all heard over and over and over, but it still occurs that doing takes place. And that feels wrong.

A: All of this is the thought story - maybe it appears within this play that it seems to need to be heard over and over again. That is the nature of these talks. There is simply this continual reminding of our true nature, that there is only already awake-ness, oneness.

Return to list of topics in Discourses by Teachers and Writers .
See the list sorted by Topic.
See the list sorted by Author

Source: http://www.advaita.org.uk/discourses/teachers/nomind_gill.htm 
This web page was saved on Monday, Mar 29 2021.

Solidity..

 













Solidity..

Of a stone cliff..a weighty anchor nods 

To separation..but reissuing in chunks and flakes 

As this..and more..exploding as prismatic light..

These fluid dispersions erase to no-thing

Rendering transparent and weightless and

Formless in a crescendo of liquid insight..

But then reassembling...as gravity would  

Seem to have it..without separation's guise..

Solidity in freedom..expressing spontaneously 

And in rich variety..as this... 

Sunday, March 28, 2021

Journeys..(Palm Sunday)

 














There are appearances of many journeys..but

Let's imagine that there is only one..

It is the journey inward..and not inward..to

Discover that which can never be discovered on

Any journey..as goalposts dissolve in the tears that flow 

And burning flames leap..behind and ahead..

Nothing deforming..

 














The pavement and the bicycles

Skateboards and feet falling..on a malleable  

pavement..gathering the excitement of children 

Looking for thrills of more risky routes..and of 

Adults sensing the sinking of their soles.. 

Scenes of completion and perfection in 

Walking along...


Saturday, March 27, 2021

The store window pane..

 











The store window pane..

Reflecting the bustling traffic and

A backdrop of sky and tree..allowing

It all..as nothing appearing as lights and

Honking..and stops avoiding and not avoiding

Catastrophic interruptions of movements

With sky and tree unaffected..and all 

Reflected indifferently in the window pane...

Chipped paint on the curb..

 




Chipped paint on the curb..

The paint is losing its grip while

Speaking of a forgotten past summer's

Work..a labor of correctness..of edges

On an edgeless pathway..or of no pathway

At all.. 

Thursday, March 25, 2021

Awakening...(Nathan Gil)

 











Awakening..

Could it be this simple..?

Allowing life as it is

Not to worry about the "I" as unawakened

Allow that unawakened I to do as it pleases

Perhaps walking down a path seeking to

Find what seems to be missing..

All of these appearances..appearing in 

What is marvelously happening...


The allowing of life as it is – rather than any efforts to be rid of thought or ‘I’, or to become ‘enlightened’ – allows seeking to fall naturally away. Within the play, all efforts to be rid of ‘I’ merely reinforce identification with it.
You are Consciousness. Whatever Your present appearance, it is already perfect, including any play of identification as ‘I’, and also any seeking to be rid of ‘I’. Life as the character is simply the play of appearances in awareness and has no requirement for awakening. There is only already awaken-ness.
Nathan Gill~

Wednesday, March 24, 2021

The Prism...(Nancy Neithercut)...

 



















"You were the looking for certitude, the fear of unknowing, the fear of disappearing in this love dance with which you long to merge. You cannot merge with it as you are it. You have never been separate from what’s going on, this beautiful flow of life, this fleeting wind ballet that seems to embrace you and push and pull you along.
You are the pushing and pulling, the trying to hold it to capture it to make permanent this magic that you sense lies behind your shadow. But there is nothing painting your shadow, no one fills your shoes and sweeps you across the dance floor. There is no floor to stand on to dance on to lie upon when you die.
You are the prism between the imaginary known and the unknowable pouring color and light into the dream. Flooding the pages of your story with love and beauty that disappear the moment these words paint you. Just like this, as it has always been yet never was nor ever will be, you are this ever emerging ever wilting blooming flower of life feeling it’s own tender vibrant aliveness through the symphony of perception and its inseparable recognition.
Painted with watercolor tears in the river of song, written with sky in sky, with your very breath and heartbeat life sings you as you sing these very words within which you emerge."
— Nancy Neithercut


as steam rises and curls unfurling in the morning sun streaming through my window the space within the swirling is not separate from the space outside space only seems to be woven within the dancing, enclosed and then released so is this life without edges or borders woven into intricate patterns with itself yet never becoming tangible like a dreaming streaming timeless flowing a dance within a dance and we are the flowing our lives bleed into the lines the edges that never have been and we were never separate we are the dancing itself we are the universe flowing into itself words streaming through and around themselves appearing to create a reality that can never be known an edgeless emptiness this jeweled garment is woven from space itself and is marvelously transparent the threads the beliefs of who you believe yourself to be unravel and you are skinless utterly naked unadorned yet the jewel that is you remains as life knowing itself and the sweetness of emptiness like hearing a birdsong echoing in the canyon it comes from everywhere and no where marvelously unfindable the song describes the vastness the edgeless beauty like shadows swirling around shadows words softly kiss what cannot be kissed like a warm breeze caressing your cheek like the flight of a butterfly describes the space in which it flies a touch so soft only the memory is felt clouds reflecting the sun after it has set remembering a taste of a song you never heard this unending awe is a most precious jewel this gem of unknowing tugs at my heart like finding my long lost lover everywhere i turn and doing nothing everything is undone and going nowhere everywhere is home
~~Nancy Neithercut


I see you’ve bought a new instruction book on enlightenment. Can’t wait to get it home and start reading. Maybe underline a few parts. Maybe write out your favorite bits.... Doing that makes you feel safe doesn’t it? Like you’re going somewhere, getting something... All the instructions you read there will only perpetuate the painful illusion of separation. They say do this do that don’t do this don’t do that. It’s even logical how this would empower the illusion of a doer isn’t it? But you want to feel empowered. No one would want enlightenment, really. No one would choose to have all they feel is true about them selves and their world and all ideas about truth and meaning and enlightenment shattered, including that there is someone to have a world. And as you are those ideas, that illusion how you gonna erase it?
~~Nancy Neither

Friday, March 19, 2021

Compromising and Uncompromising..

 


















Sent to a friend..
Thought processes are necessary, it seems, as an entry to nonduality,
but the question arises: What is a thought?  A thought is an object, 
more subtle than a chair..but still a thought.  Thoughts get settled 
as beliefs, and beliefs settle as identities and addictions. Spiritual 
traditions and religions have recognized this for a long time, so names 
are brought into use, such as God, Consciousness, Awareness, 
plus others, which point to that beyond thoughts and objects.  However,
as you can see, there remains a split, a duality, in these usages.
 Nonduality recognizes this dilemma, the difficulty of using language, 
yet the need to use language!  There are "teachers" who have approaches 
which start with a seeker's strong association with duality, and by gentle 
steps attempt to coax out the nondual understanding. (Rupert Spira appears 
as one of these.).  Another approach is uncompromisingimmediately 
dismissing the personal "me," attempting to show how a person's 
thinking, and questions, all involve an assumption of separation. This 
is the Direct Path.  (Tony Parsons is the example.). The Direct Path boils 
down to: "Nothing (No-thing) appearing as everything."  That's it!  
Or..Nothing being everything (being, not becoming).  The simplicity 
tends to mask what already is. Some say that a "shift" occurs. But, 
the main thing is the realization of the illusory nature of separation 
as an independent reality.  


Monday, March 15, 2021

Progressive paths..(Tony Parsons)

 










Finding what is lost..

Separation is the deceiver

Who seems innocent because

After all..things seem different

And bounded and special..

A suggestion otherwise seems

To mug common sense..but that

Nagging lack seems to

Hang on..and we overturn 

Those separate things for relief..

The deceiver is elated and celebrates

Each of these new leases on life..

And the search continues in many

Villages..large and small..for that

Which has never been lost...


“Doctrines, processes and progressive paths, which seek enlightenment, only exacerbate the problem they address by reinforcing the idea that "the apparent self" can find something it presumes it has lost. It is that very effort...that investment in self-identity, that continuously recreates the illusion of separation from oneness. This is the veil which we believe exists. It is the dream of individuality.”
~ Tony Parsons ~

Sunday, March 14, 2021

Polarity in play..

 








Polarity in play..

No-thing appears as polarities..

Appearances are invitations

To play..allowing the polarities to

Dance..and carry on in  freedom

In any way they wish..this gift of

Nothing..is the breaking of the 

Links by which polarities have 

Never been chained...


 

Wednesday, March 10, 2021

Real and Fake..?? (Miranda Warren)













Nonduality

Seems to be at a fork in the road..

Whether to be a late blooming religion..or not..

As a religion there is the claim..stated in many forms

Of an offering for the progress of the dedicated one

Toward enlightenment..awarding eventual freedom..

Without this religious containment..the other fork

Recognizes that both forks appear as the balm

To all seeking..liberation...



Miranda Warren

As more people listen to and speak of nonduality, it seems to happen that people with a sense of a separate self will adopt nonduality as a new belief system for the “me.” As Kenneth says, “it’s mostly taken on as another paradigm, another concept, and people say then 'I’m no longer a me.'” It’s easy for anyone to sound as if there has been a loss of separation. I receive messages every week asking how one can tell who is truly speaking from the perspective of separation and who has seen through it.

But this can only matter if there is something specific being offered, a path to somewhere and someone to get it. When this is seen, there is no one who has anything that someone else does not, as there is only what is always here. Whether nonduality is taken on as a belief or not, whether there is speaking from a perspective of no-self or a self deciding it is not a “me,” there is simply what is happening.

This is unknowable, and it is not in any one appearance more than any other. The distinctions between a true message and a false message, between “real” nonduality and “fake nonduality” disappear when separation disappears, and ultimately become as meaningful as asking which cloud in the sky is truly embodying “cloudness” and which one is simply pretending to be a cloud. 

Tuesday, March 9, 2021

Already are..(Tony Parsons)

 















Already..

This word is found sometimes as a startling announcement..
Stop looking it says..what you are looking for is here now and
Has never not been already anywhere you really looked..
It is the disappearance of what you thought you were looking for..
And an amazement that the fleeting something for which you looked
Could not be reached and grasped and soon eluded even your looking..
Already it was an appearance of That for which you were really looking...







"You can’t do anything because you can’t do what you already are. You are the light, which allows creation to be. Look, it is happening right here, right now, in everything that’s taking place for you. Simply let it be there…no questions, no judgments, no wish to change anything or make it better.
Fall in love with this. Fall in love with it intimately, and everything else will “emerge". And don’t stay fixed with one thing. Let whatever arises come to the forefront and fall away back into emptiness.”
Tony Parsons -

Wednesday, March 3, 2021

Spontaneity..

 













Spontaneity..

The wind paddles

Rotating in a gentle wind

Seem as time wheel until

We recognize: There is 

Spontaneity on display in the

Paddle and wind and sunshine..

Spontaneity introduces 

No-thing as that which

Appears in this small

Episode out of time... 


Monday, March 1, 2021

Unicity..(Nancy Neithercut)





















"Once the recognition of unicity hits it's like a freight train
Flattens ya
Erases all ideas of effort and achievement or any doing at all
Or next or better or other
This undeniable clear pure centerless light of equalness and evenness subsumes all and everything
It was always on merely not noticed
It is beyond conception
Or imagination or belief
It is intuited
It is an all consuming sky like brilliance"
~~Nancy Neithercut