A Dynamic Web

Newton’s universe was constructed from a set of basic entities with certain fundamental properties, which had been created by God and thus were

not amendable to further analysis... 

…In the new world view, the universe is seen as a dynamic web of interrelated events. None of the properties of any part of the web is fundamental; they all follow from properties of the other parts, and overall consistency of their mutual interrelations determine the structure of the entire web.

The Tao of Physics

Interpenetration, p. 287

Fritjof Capra

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Before I say anything, I have to admit that ninety percent of this book flies way over my windscreen. However, it is passages like these that draw my attention and I get a glimpse into the wonder of it all. At one time I saw myself as a separate entity… an island to myself with only transient connections to others as separate egos and thus, a drunk was a drunk, a thief was a thief, a murderer was a murderer and so on. I believe that all of these had no power to change… will-power be damned. Everything… every crime… moral accomplishment… good or evil… every failing could be explained in terms of self-centeredness (i.e., even Mother Teresa was getting something out of her good works)...  and that was the best we could do. Ironically, it was the concept of a Creator that sealed these conclusions and that so-called redeeming Creator was supposedly going to damn or bless us. However, once I saw things from the mountaintop my heart sensed that the Creator was as much a participant in the dance of creation as I was. And once I got this picture embedded in my consciousness by a powerful spiritual awakening, I was able to change.

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Burning Out Confusion

According to the Buddhist tradition, the spiritual path is the process of cutting through our confusion, of uncovering the awakened state of mind. When the awakened state of mind is crowded in by ego and its attendant paranoia, it takes on the character of an underlying instinct. So it is not a matter of building up the awakening state of mind, but rather of burning out these confusions which obstruct it. If the process were otherwise, the awakened state of mind would be a product, dependent upon cause and therefore liable to dissolution.

Chogyam Trungpapa:

Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism

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At one time I believed we ought to be masters of our own destiny. I worked hard to be independent and grew accomplished wherever I put my attention. I was naturally proud of what I’d done with what I had been given.  I bluffed my way into the big game with a hand holding a pair of deuces as though they were four aces. I look back on it now with a great measure of gratitude that my bluff was called… gratitude that I never climbed so high that I lost perspective on who I was so much that, when all my efforts failed, I hadn't far to go to hit bottom. On the journey down, however, most of my ego-centered delusions were stripped so that, in a moment of clarity, I looked within to find the Heart of Compassion shining through. From there I hungered for more… the addiction of the heart. Since then my soul’s desire is to swim in the ocean of grace that I once merely sailed over. The process of uncovering, discovering, recovering and seeing clearing the Spirit that saves me, isn't as difficult as I make it. It is amazing how sitting a few minutes each morning and breathing, opens up channels of grace unknown. That is how I start my day and my day goes well as a co-creator, with compassion I am propelled (rather than compelled) by, if I stay within the realm of the spirit of grace.

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Dogmatism & Make-believe Spirituality

Those of us who have spent much time in the world of spiritual make believe have eventually seen the childishness of it. This dream world has been replaced by a great sense of purpose, accompanied by a growing consciousness of the power of God in our lives…

…We have found nothing incompatible between a powerful spiritual experience and a life of sane and happy usefulness.

Alcoholics Anonymous, p. 130

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If I hadn’t seen the practical application of spirituality practiced by the old-timers in the Fellowship I might not have stayed. The young tend to fly off on tangents and embrace all kinds of fanatical notions, but they either change, grow or go elsewhere. It is sad to see the enthusiasm of newcomers warped into dogmatism or fantastic religionism (I just made up that word).  I know this to be true from my own experience because I might have remained sober forty years ago had not a profound awakening been so usurped by religious adherence to a childish make-believe world. These things could have been gotten by with if I weren't an addict or an alcoholic, but this disease demanded a humility that would resist diverting my attention to an unproductive spiritual dream-world. A practical and easily understood inner-revelation that would treat my addictions was all I needed and all I needed was what I got from paring away unnecessary beliefs and behaviors.

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Good Gut Instincts

“We lose the fear of making decisions, great and small, as we realize that should our choice prove wrong we can, if we will, learn from our experience. Should our decision be the right one, we can thank God for giving us the courage and the grace that caused us so to act.”
As Bill Sees It, p. 253

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Clarity of mind… the ability to see things as they are under duress… and training… muscle reflex: these are essential for good decision making. Do I think I know karate by watching a Bruce Lee movie? It takes training to come close to becoming adept at martial arts and good gut instincts to take that training to the next level. This business about becoming spiritually fit oughtn’t to overlook training and training is useless if it can’t be applied to everyday life. Fear that results in paralyses of analyses, or fear that compels bluff and blunder can be equally disastrous. In looking back on my past these two responses define most of my big mistakes. They caused postponement, denial or giant leaps to conclusions that had no ground in fact. I have stayed in relationships, jobs, old apartments and so on because I’ve been afraid of change. I have broken engagements, left jobs, and, like a bull in a china shop, became embroiled in conflict out of inappropriate reflexes… leaping before looking… because of fear that I would not have my way or that I would lose something I held dearly. Every one of my good decisions, jobs, relationships have come about out of a clarity that recognized good gut instincts. Because of these positive results I have been drawn to spiritual discipline and have committed myself to training.
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Without Grasping

Even the greatest yogi, sorrow and joy still arise just as before. The difference between ordinary person and the yogi is how they view their emotions and react to them.

An ordinary person will instinctively accept or reject them, and so arouse the attachment or aversion that will result in the accumulation of negative karma.

A yogi, however, perceives everything that rises in its natural, pristine state, without grasping to enter his perception.

Glimpse After Glimpse:

May 27, 2013

Sogyal Rinpoche

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In the fellowship I belong to, it is often advised that we practice love without strings. We hear people speak of this as though it is a simple thing to do. However, at least on my part, it hasn't been all that easy. This was especially true for me when my daughter told me that she no longer considered me her father. She might have said something else but that is what I thought I heard. I had to let go; and realize that, whatever my relationship with her was, she is now a temporary gift; no different than a moment of bliss or sorrow that comes and goes. Her relationship with me changed but mine with her did not. It can be one of those heart hardening experiences or it can be a softening source of enlightenment… a letting go. It isn't about being unattached to these emotions arising from loving deeply but that it is about loving even more deeply… as deeply as the Heart of Compassion loves.

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How to Pick-up Girls

Getting rid of one’s ego is the last resort of invincible egoism! ... This is why I am not overly enthusiastic about the various “spiritual exercises” in meditation or yoga which some consider essential for release from the ego. For when practiced in order to “get” some kind of spiritual illumination or awakening, they strengthen the fallacy that the ego can toss itself away by a tug at its own bootstraps. But there is nothing wrong with meditation just to meditate, in the same way that you listen to music just for the music. If you go to concerts to “get culture” or to improve your mind, you will sit there as deaf as a doorpost.
The Book:
So What?
Alan Watts
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When I was a young man with surging hormones (as is true with most young men), my interest in the opposite sex had me thinking about or chasing the chimera of sexual “conquest” most of my waking hours. There were all kinds of books on the subject of “How to Pick-up Girls” and those books had pathetic pick-up lines and all sorts of techniques for getting a girl’s attention in Laundromats, markets and bars. But, I was soon to discover that most of the time these techniques merely accomplished further isolation and frustration because they made a man too eager for anything but the most eager or manipulative women. After all, what woman of any self-worth wants a man constantly on the prowl? Of course, I was no more interested in a woman of self-worth than my own belly-button lint… so that was the result of my hunting expeditions along those lines. This crass example mirrors the attempts to find spiritual enlightenment or to meditate in order to make conscious contact with God. Letting go of the results, and just doing it for the sake of doing it, brings laughter and a lightness of being that was probably there all along.

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Pride in Humility

I will take pride in being humble. I will feel honored when chastised for doing God’s work. I will rejoice for any opportunity to give love for hatred.
Metaphysical Meditations
Yogananda Paramahansa

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Joan Osborne's Ladder (I’m gonna love you anyway), in which the lyrics say it all; “I wanted it to be easy… I wanted to make you tired… sometimes I get slow and lazy… sometimes I get so inspired…you wanted an altercation…” and it runs along to the end of that stanza with; “You show me the method now… I’m willing to take my time” and then the chorus, “I’m gonna love you anyway… each and every day… yay--- yay--- eh…!”
    She says it all in that song a bout human relations. It takes a commitment to love anyone without conditions. The song can be as much about God as it is about lovers, children, family, friends… and even enemies. To look past what I can’t accept to what I can accept is the trick I must learn to take pride in being humble… “each and every day,” like Joan. Besides, she has a great voice.
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Action/Study

One who studies and doesn’t practice is like a ladle in a soup pot. It’s in the pot every day but it doesn’t know the flavor of the soup. If you don’t practice, even if you study til the day you die, you won’t know the taste of freedom!
Ajahn Chah:
Taste of Freedom
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I have been blessed with an attention disorder, partially because of so many head injuries and then most likely because of years of alcohol and drug abuse. I say blessed because I have a hard time retaining what I study without immediately putting it into practice. I.e., I just got a new laptop and it came with the Windows 8 operating system. This damned program is so complicated to me… (Maybe there’s a Windows 8 for Dummies?), I get confused and can’t retain anything from the time I read the manuals to the time I put my hands on the keys and mouse. I have to act first… bumble about from one blind alley to another and then go to the manual for an Ah Ha moment. My experience with all the academic plundering of philosophy and study of theology is that I have retained little. I am grateful for all the academic instruction but I am humbled by the simplicity of the nature of truth. That is to sit down… look inward… let the mind quiet down… get up and go out into the world and practice mindfulness. The knowledge that the Heart of Compassion is with me is the nourishment that employs the sutras of life in my actions.

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You Are Too Clever

Half smiling, with imperturbable brightness and friendliness, the Buddha looked steadily at the stranger and dismissed him with a friendly gesture.
    “You are clever, O Samana,” said the Illustrious one, “you know how to speak cleverly, my friend. Be on your guard against too much cleverness.”
    The Buddha walked away and his look and half-smile remained imprinted on Siddhartha’s memory forever.
Herman Hess
Siddhartha
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We called it, “Too big for our own britches,” in my day. It happens that we respect, admire, or are sometimes intimidated by those who have a way with words and profound insights. I sometimes impress myself with such nonsense. This is especially true when I listen to spiritual gurus or preachers; but, it is the ones who speak clearly and are grounded in the simplicity of experience that change me. As soon as someone starts blabbing about things they have not experienced but expound on exotic theories based on conjecture, my ears turn off. This is particularly true with “new agers”: using spirituality to escape the reality of the desperation, alienation and confusion dealt to us from birth. Pseudo-science, astrology, crystals for every ailment, aroma therapy, and so on… I’m not saying that these don’t work for some of us but I have found, after racing around… chasing after the chimera of my own delusions… the truth is as simple as it is kind. The Heart of Compassion, or God, is easily accessible and within reach of all of us at all times… if only I would allow myself to be humble enough. All I have to do is kneel or sit a few minutes at the start of each day to bask in Compassion’s grace: Namaste.
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Toilet Spirituality (Not what we think)

TAKING A DUMP

In a sense everything is dreamlike and illusionary, but even so, humorously you go on doing things. For example, if you are walking, without unnecessary solemnity or self-consciousness, lightheartedly walk toward the open space of truth. As you eat, feed your negativities and illusions into the belly of emptiness, dissolving them into all-pervading space. And when you go to the toilet, consider all your obscurations and blockages are being cleansed and washed away.

Dudjom Rinpoche

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Why shirk at something as natural and universal as the simple act of taking a dump? Isn’t it a judgment call to think the act of elimination is beneath me (pun intended) when I am spending time on the toilet? I believe it was either Kurt Vonnegut or Günter Grass that noted in one of their novels primitive societies (we spent a couple million years as hunter/gatherers) people ate alone and dumped together. They were able to tell from their stools who was healthy, who was ailing and so on. If this is true then it was so-called civilization that gave us a prejudice against damned near every natural function of our bodies from the neck down. Most societies world-wide condemned our sexuality, and prohibitions against any form of it beyond the so-called missionary position, body odors (good clean sweat) and even the feeding of an infant from a mother’s breast became taboo… something to be done in private as though they are functions of shame. Dudjom Rinpoche puts it in proper perspective when he says that taking a dump is a function of elimination of toxins from our physical bodies and a metaphor for a spiritual dumping. A healthy attitude about my body, my spirit becomes part and parcel of my spiritual awareness when I look at these objectively.

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Truth to Poawer

I will speak the truth, but I will at all times avoid speaking unpleasant or harmful truths. I will offer no criticism that is not motivated by kindness.
Metaphysical Meditations
Paramahansa Yogananda
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When I was a young man I stood on the ramparts of social change and shouted out truth to power everywhere I could. This was what I believed to be my identity… my persona. History has proven that I might have been on the right side of change at times and completely misguided at others. My moral compass centered on what change I wanted to force on others (by hook or crook and the devil be damned in the details). I suppose that this rebellious attitude is the privilege of youth. This adage of another time applies: Any man that is not a socialist in his youth has no heart. Any man that is still a socialist after thirty has no brain.
   I still aspire to most of the ideals I held dear in my youth but with a more reserved perspective. This perspective came from the realization that there are no enemies as dangerous to my soul as the enemies within my heart. This realization’s heartbeat is; that it is better to bring harmony where there is discord… Love where there is hatred… faith where there is doubt…. hope where there is despair… light where there are shadows… joy where there is sorrow… to understand than to be understood… to love than to be loved… to forgive myself by forgiving others… this is where resonance with the Heart of Compassion resounds, like Louis Armstrong’s coronet, an instrument as clear and sharp as the syncopation of the universes jazz.
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Pain & Suiffering

We who are like senseless children
Shrink from suffering and its causes.
We hurt ourselves; our pain is self-inflicted!
Why should others be the object of our anger?

Sãntideva: Bodhicaryãvatãra 6.43

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I’ve heard it said, “Pain in life is inevitable but suffering is not.” It wasn’t something I wanted to hear because I had always considered pain and suffering came from outside, from others, by design or by accident. If they, pain and suffering, were from external causes and if I had no role in them…then I could be a victim of fate. This state of mind allowed me the excuse to blame others and my anger was justified. This also gave me permission to use whatever I wished relieve my suffering and pain. After all, I deserved a break. I even owed it to myself. So many popular revenge oriented movies tell me I’m not alone in this warped thinking (I'm thinking; Django and the Rocky franchise). Revenge and anger… going over and over in my mind what I could have said or done or would say or do… the last time or the next time occupied a lot of my thinking whenever I felt victimized. The pain or injury had long sense subsided but my thinking sustained the suffering. Thus, suffering led me to a dead-end where I could no longer take it and it was then, and only then, that I sought a solution to suffering.
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The Cat

[The] defilements are like a cat. If you feed it, it will keep coming around. Stop feeding it, and eventually it will not bother to come around anymore.
Ajah Chah; Still Forest Pool

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It is an easy enough thing to say I will stop feeding the cat but actually doing it is the hard part. My character defects are tricky... as attractive and hard to deny as a cat at the door; meowing, pleading, insisting that I feed them. I can ignore them but simply applying discipline and effort to do so takes more determination than I am capable of if I just sit around and think about them hoping for some sort of magical relief. I am one of those people who have had to take positive action to otherwise rid myself of their encumbrances. In most cases this involves reaching out to be of use to another human being. Whether it is taking the hand of another to offer whatever help I can give or it involves sitting and listening to a master, guru or preacher, I am taking positive action. Without even thinking of the cat (or hungry panther), my defects gradually fall away; sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly.
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Risk: "Work it out."

Dialogue from Bukowski’s Post Office… Caps are his.

“JESUS CHRIST!” he said, “I CAN’T GO TO NEW YORK AND SHAKE HANDS WITH THE PUBLISHERS!”
    “Look kid, why don’t you quit this job? Go to a small room and write. Work it out.”
    “A GUY LIKE YOU CAN DO THAT,” he said, “BECAUSE YOU LOOK LIKE A WINO. PEOPLE WILL HIRE YOU BECAUSE THEY FIGURE YOU CAN’T WORK ANYWHERE ELSE AND YOU’LL STAY. THEY WON’T HIRE ME BECAUSE THEY LOOK AT ME AND THEY SEE HOW INTELLIGENT I AM AND THEY THINK, AN INTELLIGENT MAN LIKE HIM WON’T STAY WITH US, SO THERE’S NO USE HIRING HIM.
    “I still say, go to a small room and write.”
    “BUT I NEED ASSURANCE!”
    “It is a good thing a few others didn’t think that way. It is a good thing Van Gogh didn’t think that way.”
    “VAN GOGH’S BROTHER GAVE HIM FREE PAINTS!” the kid said to me.”
POST OFFICE, p. 130-131
Charles Bukowski

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Excuses… the job… the money… the helping hand… all the reasons success evaded me in the past. I have taken the risks and I have stepped out into the shaky world of the arts. Acceptance tells me that this is part of the risk. If there was no chance for failure it wouldn’t be called a risk… so quit bitching about it, George, and get to work. That is the lesson here. I love the lonely artists who can’t afford paints but paint with what they have on hand. I have worked with artists who have used crumpled-up news-paper to draw on and coffee as ink. The drive to create doesn’t accept excuses, though most but the rare reclusive artists would like some fortune… at least enough to keep working... perhaps even some fame to fall their way… recognition enough to afford an extra jug of turpentine or ink for the printer. But driven to write in a small room is what keeps me going and being driven to write is what sharpens the pencil… hones the skill… as the craft begins to make sense of it. What if I never learn to write well enough to allow my inner voice free reign on the page? That is the risk. It is no mystery… writers write… painters paint… sculptors sculpt… musician play… composers compose… whether or not any of it comes to anything. Accept failure for failure but never accept it as defeat. Nothing of any value was ever created without risk.
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Aspirations Count

Even if you are a monk, if your practice of the Way is not intense, if your aspiration is not pure, how are you different from the layman? Again, even if you are a layman, if your aspiration is intense and your conduct wise, why is this any different from being a monk?
Hakuin: Zen Master Hakuin
From 365 Buddha
Compiled by: Jeff Schmidt
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I suppose that spiritual values and meditation always attracted me but my perceptions were off a bit. I’d always held back because I couldn’t think of going without alcohol or tobacco and still consider myself “pure” enough for a real shot at achieving anything at all along those lines. I would have had to escape to a mountain cave to do that… even then I couldn’t imagine meditating without some help from a toke of this or that.  I looked at, and tried a few disciplines, but my lack of purity on these two counts lent themselves to an arrogant denial of any path that would require such abstinence. Still, my hunger increased as I found myself in the grip of alcoholism and I could see no way out. I was driven, not so much by any aspiration for purity as I was compelled by circumstance, to escape the bondage of what turned out to be revealed as self-centered obsessions. Since then I have discovered that it was this intense aspiration of this kind of purity that put my feet squarely on the path and led me to wise conduct. Today I am encouraged by the miraculous intervention of Spirit that lifted the obsession to drink, once I got the point that I… I George… was completely powerless to do anything about anything on my own... including my addictions. It was a hard pill to swallow because I had been misguided to think I could pull myself up by the bootstraps. Maybe others could stop drinking, or smoking, or over-eating, and so on and on, anytime they wished but I found that I could not; at least not with any stability of mind or lasting affect. It turned out that my purity of aspiration hadn’t come about because I had quit drinking and smoking but that it was the purity of intention… the intense desire to be free… that does the trick on all accounts.
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Happiness

Whatever joy there is in this world
All comes from desiring others to be happy,
And whatever suffering there is in this world
All comes from desiring myself to be happy.
Shantideva

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I thought that all this spiritual jive was about my bliss and happiness. I remember one of the first universal tenets proposed in philosophy 101 was: all people wish to be happy. This seemed true, even under close scrutiny, because all the examples of horrible atrocities seemed to be the result of misguided ideals about what brought happiness. Closer scrutiny revealed that some seek more to avoid suffering than they seek happiness; i.e., a Marine that throws himself on a grenade to protect his brothers does so out of a desire to preserve their life and limb, and should he fail to do so, he couldn’t live with the failure. My philosophy professor, Dr. Timothy Fetler, would then point out that in avoiding suffering our Marine’s happiness is at stake. Like a dog chasing its tail, this rule does seem to be universal but that to pursue happiness for myself, disregarding the happiness of others, is the best way to stay miserable.

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Diamond Crystal of Resentment

KNOW GOD; KNOW PEACE

It is plain that a life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness… But with the alcoholic, whose hope is the maintenance and growth of a spiritual experience, this business of resentment is infinitely grave.

ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS, p. 66



Know God;
Know peace.
No God;
No peace.

Daily Reflections, p. 144

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For so many years I lived as though my life depended on resentment… a deep resentment held deep in my heart that I wouldn’t let go of. I had been hurt badly; and, not only would I not; but, I could not, let go of it. It became like a rock… crystalline pure… a beautiful diamond… the key to my existence. I was obsessed with the thought that; until I avenged, or somehow resolved the suffering, (the excruciating pain of it) I could not be free. I am ever so grateful that the grace of the Heart of Compassion touched me at the bottom of this despair and brought my soul to the humility, the willingness and honesty to let go of it; just enough to let go of it. As my heart opened to receive the grace of God, the diamond rolled out and sat before me… I saw it for what it was and I forgave. It was an experience that took a long time and it was resolved… nothing all that dramatic… but after I’d seen and admitted my part in it, the diamond softened as I allowed myself to reveal in detail the nature of this resentment to another human being. Gradually, it dissolved in the light of compassion. I couldn’t deny that I still held the resentment but it was now before me in the light of day instead of within a darkened corner of my heart. It is gone now and I don't miss it: even though at times I get a glimpse of it when I forget where it took me; I then flee to the protection and care of the Heart of Compassion.
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My Will

Through meditation I will stop the storm of breath, mental restlessness, and sensory disturbances raging over the lake of my mind. Through prayer and meditation I will harness my will and activity to the right goal.
Metaphysical Meditations, p. 59
Paramahansa Yogananda
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Don’t misunderstand my intention; I am not discounting Paramahansa Yogananda’s meditation by extracting the word, will, out of this meditation . I am simply proclaiming “I stop” and “I harness”. It is preferable to extract will out of the equation because when I say, “I will stop” and “I will harness”, I am admitting I haven’t tried it yet, promising… but I will… I will. Instead, without a will of my own stuck in there it affirms the effectiveness of meditation as a universal tool. I.e., anyone can use it: meditation stops. Through prayer and meditation I've come to understand that my will is a useless tool in harnessing itself against itself. Instead, I find it more valuable to surrender my will to that of a Power greater than my own if I am stop the storm of breath, mental restlessness and sensory disturbances to come anywhere near the “right goal.” Once my will has be utilized to meditate at all... I surrender it.
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A Faith that Grows

“The right method of philosophy would be this. To say nothing except what can be said, i.e. the propositions of natural science… My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who understands me finally recognizes them as senseless, when he has climbed out through them, on them, over them (he must so speak throw away the ladder, after he has climbed up on it.) He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the world rightly. Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.”
Wittgenstein,
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
From: The Book
By Alan Watts
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Here I am going against this advice, but then again, I see the world rightly only in glimpses. I do have my own experience and it is more important that I stay with it and avoid any speculation about things of which I have no experience. If I am truthful, I cannot promise good things to anyone else if they persistently practice meditation and adhere to certain moral principles. My experience is that even prayer is a fifty-fifty proposition. I can’t say that there is anything but compassion for others personified by our beliefs. The Heart of Compassion is a humanization of that which is impossible to have any sure knowledge of by using the intellect. I have found that it is not merely a reflex to fall back on to salve doubt. God, in this light, is not so much a concept as compassion is a living experience. To me, Compassion is not something that comes out of a philosophy but perceived through the heart as a greater Self connected to all of us. Whether or not the universe is bound together, molecule to galaxy, by Compassion is another story. However, I have had direct experience with a mountain-top experience where I saw love in action and I can, I must, speak of that in a world pining for faith. In a troubled world this grows my faith in the big picture and grants me faith in you.
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The Conflict is Within

Always recognize the dreamlike qualities of life and reduce attachment and aversion. Practice good-heartedness toward all beings. Be loving and compassionate, no matter what others do to you. What they will do will not matter so much when you see it as a dream. The trick is to have positive intention during the dream. This is an essential point. This is true spirituality.

Glimpse After Glimpse

Chakdud Tulka Rinpoche

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In light of current events… kidnapping, mad men using guns against children and terrorist bombings, I have wondered what the boundaries are between self-preservation, abuse and loving kindness? Can I practice compassion towards others and still protect myself and loved ones in extreme circumstances? It is one thing to be all Mahatma Gandhi when I am considering myself and others of agreed upon passive-resistance principles; but, what about the defenseless children or loved ones who are not aware of, innocent of, nor consented to, a similar commitment to non-violence? I.e., would I practice passive resistance against home intruders? Would I choose helplessness as a defense for protecting my family against rape, murder or a gunman in a school or movie theater? I think not. However, if I am to take up arms I am to do so compassionately, without rancor and with no more, nor less, concern for my life than for the intruder's. Beneath the dreamlike quality of life is an ultimate reality. After all, my enemy has a Higher Power too. Today, Mother's Day, is a good day to consider that my enemy had a mother and was nurtured at one time before all this shit went wrong. Here, where lesser abuses and all sorts of violence are always in our faces, can I act on positive intention and seek the balance of a martial artist, a samurai that is well practiced in the uses of a sharp sword? Applying no more resistance than necessary and acting respectfully with a utilitarian compassion, can I then be at peace with myself? Or, as in Jungian psychology, the dreamer is all the characters in a dream... for good or bad... it is all me and the conflict is within. Where there is no battlefield there is no battle.

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A Complete Break

To meditate is to make a complete break from how we “normally” operate, for it is a state free of all cares and concerns, in which there is no competition, no desire to possess or grasp anything, no intense and anxious struggle, and no hunger to achieve: an ambitionless state where there is neither acceptance nor rejection, neither hope nor fear, a state in which we slowly begin to release all these emotions and concepts that have imprisoned us into the space of natural simplicity.

Glimpse After Glimpse

Sogyal Rinpoche

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Logic tells me that this state is a noble ambition and thus; as Alan Watts would put it, it is a double-bind.  I will meditate until I’m not meditating at all. These conflicting ideals are the center of meditative practices… the yin and the yang… the paradox of ambitionless ambition. Nonetheless, I sit. I sit until I’m not waiting any longer. I listen until I’m not hearing anything by hearing everything. I sit no matter what my brain comes up with and the arguments stop. Sometimes a flash of openness makes room to be enveloped from within by the Heart of Compassion… and I breathe. I breathe from the center of my being that I call my heart and that heart beats a rhythm that my soul dances to. It is the dance of creation that stays with me throughout the day ahead: Om ah hum… vajra guru padma siddhi hum!!! I try not to think about it… try 27, or 54, or 108 repetitions, if you will (that’s what beads are for)… the essence of past, present and future opens.

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The Path of the Heart

DEVOTION

    The absolute truth cannot be realized within the domain of the ordinary mind. And the path beyond the ordinary mind, all the great wisdom traditions have told us, is through the heart. This path of the heart is devotion.

Glimpse After Glimpse

Sogyal Rinpoche

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… and I can’t add to that, so I won’t.

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Air, Light, or Food

Those of us who have come to make regular use of prayer would no more do without it than we would refuse air, light, food or sunshine. And for the same reason; when we refuse air, light or food, the body suffers. And when we turn away from meditation and prayer, we likewise deprive our minds, our emotions, and our intuitions of vitally needed support.

Twelve Steps and 

Twelve Traditions, p. 97

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I first prayed out of desperation. I had no faith or hope that there was anyone or anything on the other end of it. Still, I prayed because there was nothing else to do and no one else to call on… at least, no one that could have helped. So I prayed… not even knowing what to ask for or whether or not I was asking for anything at all. Humiliation put me in a place where I could hear that still small voice from within and humility grew from that humiliation. This simple act of humility became the foundation of my sobriety and began a relationship with the Heart of Compassion that endures beyond the Fellowship of AA or any other human organization. From there, as I acted on that voice, a relationship grew… and as this relationship grew I became determined that I wasn’t going to fog it up with the dogma of beliefs of which I had no personal experience. Humility mutes the old tapes running in the background telling me I am less than, or more than, anyone else. Although I receive tremendous support from the Fellowship and even more confidence as I work the Steps, it is in the quiet… the stillness of heart… the dropping of facades that my spirit is revived… it alone is the air, light and food that nourishes me: one day at a time.

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A Sense of Warmth

Once you have realized a sense of openness, confidence, and unlimited potential, then qualities of joy --- what I call warmth --- can naturally arise. It is only from this warmth that creativity, finally, will freely manifest. The third condition for connecting with your creative nature, therefore, is to notice and nurture a feeling of warmth.
 


Shambhala Sun: Nov. 2012, p.37
The Great Perfection of Creativity
3: NURTURE A SENSE OF WARMTH
Geshe Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche

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It is important that I express creativity beyond the arts into my daily affairs. One of the most demanding aspects for creativity is to practice compassion. Railing against one thing or another because I care deeply about it lacks creativity. It is easy to be against something and to look down my nose at the behavior of the uninformed Cretans. Creativity in practicing love requires that I steer away from tired formulas and cold analysis causing little more than a knee-jerk reflex... falling  back on old tapes... arguments, demands and excuses. Creativity takes on another aspect... compassion resides in the heart, not the head. I think of how creative and lasting the legacy of Martin Luther King in the culture has been compared to some of the angry protests against injustice of equal passion by others of the Civil Rights era. People are moved when the heart is appealed to and it is the warmth of heart that attracts others as a vehicle of change. Today I sit to make contact with the Heart of Compassion to allow the warmth of compassion to overcome the steely resolve of self-righteousness. Compassionate folks attract and encourage compassionate folks towards love. Angry protests against oppression attracts and encourages angry protesters towards oppression. We are likely to turn the snake of anger to devour itself if ever our demands are met and we attain social or political power motivated by anger, distrust, divisiveness and fear.
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Open Your Potential

So the second step toward unleashing a free flow of creativity is to cultivate and connect fully with that awareness and sense of unlimited potential. Once you do so, you can come to realize that not only are you more than you had always thought you were, but your entire world is full of positive alternatives. Nothing is missing in your life; you are complete.

Shambhala Sun: Nov. 2012
The Great Perfection of Creativity
Geshe Tenzin Wangyal

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This is the opening… the awakening of consciousness that moves me today. I am one of those people who need to connect with my inner potential each morning before I do anything else. It is a hunger that gets fulfilled each time my butt hits the cushion and I sit quietly. Truthfully, I am aware that I am only getting a glimpse that unlimited potential in store for me. A curtain opens and closes, wafting with the breeze of consciousness… it appears and disappears… and there are times I step through the portal and stay awhile… like when I write, sculpt or paint… or when I sit and listen to a hungry soul like myself… or when I hold a child in my arms, mesmerized by the wonder of its eyes… or when I embrace my beloved through sickness and health… These are the precious moments that give my life purpose because it is in a thousand moments like these that I know I am so very blessed to be here today.

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Cumulative Openness

Whatever practice you use, the point is to discover a place of spaciousness within. Give time not only to clearing obstacles but also to become familiar with what opens up as a result. Every moment you spend in a state of openness is cumulative and supports your ability to be in the flow. Let go, rest in the openness, and become familiar with it. Cultivate confidence in the realization that your true inner being cannot be changed by any force.

Shambhala Sun: Nov. 2012

The Great Perfection of Creativity, p. 34

Geshe Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche

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I began writing, for a friend, my views (from our AA meditation book, Daily Reflections and expanded from there) over fourteen years ago. I needed to put on the blank page (subjectively); my fears, my hopes, my opinions and my ambitions. I thought I was helping him but I found that I was honing long dormant writing skills and improving my own outlook on life. Of course, had I known what I was up against at the time, I might have given up in frustration at the long struggle ahead on both accounts. I stuck with it one day at a time and this regular practice expanded my awareness to the extent that I began to meditate before I sat down to write. As I practice meditation, I realize how beneficial it is and it becomes a part of my daily routine each morning. In meditation, reflection and writing, my attitudes become more spacious and obstacles to growth gradually drop away. Emotional balance comes to me as I rest in the cumulative openness and the peace of knowing and sitting with myself.

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Bathing the Baby Buddha or Jesus

Feelings, whether of compassion or irritation, should be welcomed, recognized, and treated on an absolutely equal basis; because both are ourselves. The tangerine I am eating is me. I plant with all my heart and mind. I clean this teapot with the kind of attention I would have were I giving the baby Buddha or Jesus a bath. Nothing should be treated more carefully than anything else. In mindfulness, compassion, irritation, mustard green plant, and teapot are all sacred.

Thich Nhat Hanh;

Miracle of Mindfulness

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Sometimes I read a text or a meditation that says it all…. Yet, this exercise in writing every morning is so important to me that I am compelled to write something… anything. So, I sit until it comes to me. It comes to me as I drop my expectations and open my mind to what I’ve read. I allow feelings to surface… the so-called good and the bad. In this case, the discipline of writing every morning turns into devotion. When I am hitting the mark my spirit is lifted as are my insights. I rise above the mundane and even in the mundane I see things as they are…sometimes it comes extemporaneously and sometimes in the task of correcting words and phrases to make more sense. So, today, I pray that my words and actions are as mindful as bathing the baby Jesus or Buddha. Today, I pray that mindfulness is in everything I do.

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Listening to You/to God

  

Listening is a far more difficult process than most people imagine. Really to listen in the way that is meant by the masters is to let go utterly of ourselves, to let go of all information, all the concepts, all the ideas, and all the prejudices that our heads are stuffed with. If you really listen to the teachings, those concepts, which are our real hindrance --- the one thing that stands between us and our true nature --- can slowly and steadily be washed away.

Glimpse After Glimpse

Sogyal Rinpoche

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   There are times when I sit in meditation with a head full of worry or just plain monkey chatter. I rise from my cushion feeling as though I haven’t accomplished anything at all. I go about my daily business… make coffee, put a bagel in the toaster, perhaps pay some bills, wash up whatever dishes are in the sink from the night before and, voila, there it is… the answers come when my own house is in order! 

   Stilling the mind is also more difficult I ever imagined… to really listen. Once, while in a conversation with another person, I was thinking of what I wanted to say while she was talking… I was already prepared with an answer to something I thought she was saying… I was stopped midstream “How can you hear what I’m saying when you are always interrupting?” The truth was that I hadn’t said anything yet. She'd read my mind… Wasn’t that how I often pray?... asking…, busy with worry… interrupting God as the Heart of Compassion is handing me the solution… the answer to my prayers before I prayed at all… but I am not hearing because my mind is too busy interrupting.
 
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Drowsiness

Standing, or going, seated, or lying down, as long as one is free from drowsiness, one should practice this mindfulness. This, they say, is the holy state here.
Sutta Nipãta 151

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What is this mindfulness business if it isn’t paying attention? Paying attention is the price for admission into mindfulness and all sorts of wild ideas have come about attempting to stay awake enough to practice it… standing or going, seated, or lying down. In the end I have to ask what the results of my practice are. When Karl Marx called religion the “opiate of the masses” he wasn’t off the mark all that much. Mediation is not a practice devised to put me to sleep thinking I am finding peace. Meditation ought to best be employed to awaken me. Awaken me to everything, for everything is God. Awakened to the call of the Heart of Compassion is to free myself from drowsiness. The process is to first become aware of my own body and the body has ways of getting my attention… pain and discomfort calls me to make a choice… obliterate all consciousness of the pain with drugs, or to embrace pain with awareness. Of course, proper medication for pain is sometimes necessary; and, I wouldn’t want to go into surgery without anesthesia. But once the pain is managed, why would I need drugs if it isn’t to escape reality?
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An Even Plane

 LIGHTING THE DARK PAST

Cling to the thought that, in God’s hands, the dark past is the greatest possession you have --- the key to life and happiness of others. With it you can avert death and misery for them.

ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS, p. 124

No longer is my past an autobiography; it is a reference book to be taken down, opened and shared. Today as I report for duty, the most wonderful picture comes through. For, though this day be dark --- as some days must be --- stars will shine even brighter later. My witness that they do shine will be called for in the near future. All my past will this day be a part of me, because it is the key, not the lock.

DAILY REFLECTIONS, p. 131

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I tell myself to just be honest and refrain from the temptation to exaggerate the facts. Such embellishment is where the ego takes over to make my case look extreme enough to be the cause of all my past troubles. Early on I heard one sage say; “We are not bad people getting good… we are sick people getting well.” Isn’t it enough that I might have a genetic predisposition to alcoholism? Humility doesn’t demand that I be the best of the best or the worst of the worst… that I spilled more booze on a weekend than some of these youngsters could have drunk in their lifetimes. To be straight forward about who I am takes a thorough inventory of the good and the bad in my past without blinders. Isn’t it better to know who if I am to be clear about myself and to be able to relate to you on an even plane? The ego is a con artist and will justify just about anything but it can’t stand up to an honest evaluation of the motives used to compel dishonest evasiveness. I am not a saint; however, in this light, I know that you're not trash either.

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Creativity

Whether you are trying to compose a symphony, write an essay, find a job, cook a meal, or express an opinion, you cannot achieve your goal if you are not creative. But the fruits of your efforts will depend, in good part, on how you define creativity. According to the Dzogchen (Great Perfection) teachings of Vajrayana Buddhism, true creativity has to do with more than just ability or skill, or even actions or behaviors. While those play an important role, creativity ultimately has to do with our state of being.

    Creativity can be seen as a state of natural flow, one that spontaneously and effortlessly gives birth not only to manifest form, but to all experiences of body, energy and mind. This flow, which has its roots in openness, occurs only in the absence and fear. It is naturally joyful, peaceful, compassionate, expansive, and powerful.

Shambala Sun (Nov. 2012)

The Great Perfection of Creativity, p. 33

Geshe Tenzin Wangyai

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One of the best things I can do when I feel stymied by writer’s block, a painting gets stuck, or any other creative adventure hits a dead-end, is to give up hope for the outcome. This idea sounds absurd to those of us who have been told all our lives that hope is a good thing. However, when a Buddhist thinks of hope it is more about dropping expectations and entering into the realm of play… like a child in a sandbox. Like a child in a sand-box there is no career or goal to attain, I can take advantage of the tools and toys at hand but I go there to play. This includes the practice of meditation. If I am trying to achieve anything at all in meditation… like peace of mind or healing, I am thwarting the free-flow and movement of spirit that connects me with peace of mind or healing. In this sense this slogan says it best; “Dance like no one is watching.”
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