Freedom

"To accept that our organism is a mere phenomenon, a fleeting emanation from the original source, something of no particular interest, whose individual destiny is quite insignificant, this is to be the originating source of everything."
Hubert Benoit, The Light of Zen in the West, 1955, p. 28.

There is liberation in realizing and accepting one's relative insignificance on the level of form.  The story of our lives is ultimately unimportant, no matter how grand or wretched; what does matter is this breath in this moment, the unfathomable fact of life itself.

The story-line, the content, of our lives can be honored, and we naturally will do the best we can on this level, as Eckhart Tolle says.  But to feel that the story of my life is all-important is to be lost in delusion.  I then overlook the infinite abundance of being that is actually the substance of everything that is.

Losing interest in the story isn't depressing but exhilarating. Consciousness is no longer so entranced by the spell of my-story, and it is freed to be conscious of life now and here.

An infinite sense of aliveness awakens.

~

A bird does not sing because it has an answer.

A bird does not sing because it has an answer.
It sings because it has a song.

Chinese proverb







I used to feel that a moment free from thought had no particular value. I used to feel that thinking was a better way to spend time than not thinking. I used to wallpaper every moment with a million ruminations.

Thinking felt productive, like it was getting me somewhere, finding answers, figuring life out. A blank mind, free of thought, was a wasted moment. It was zoning out, vegging out, goofing off, being frivolous. Thought was the vehicle to wisdom, understanding, and insight.

I was bound and determined to think-my-way to happiness.

And every thought took me away from the realm of no-thought that is happiness itself.


It has also been a surprise to discover that alert no-thought is actually more intelligent than thought. The space of no-thought is the source of any intelligence that shows up in thought. The no-thought that is "upstream" of thought is the source of creativity and wisdom.

While thought can be a beautiful and powerful tool, a lot of thought is unnecessary and destructive. Who doesn't have a merciless voice of internalized self-criticism? Or, even worse, a secret voice of thought that whispers hopes of personal specialness? Self-hatred and narcissism are two sides of a coin that have one thing in common: me, me, me. Which is the point of the bulk of thought: to conjure and perpetuate this huge fiction of separate me-hood. Thought builds up an imagined sense of me that must be constantly maintained and expanded. It is exhausting. It is a parasite draining life energy.

The me-image is fragile and flimsy and insecure by nature, as any image is a frail and evanescent thing. An image (especially the self-image) has a bottomless craving for attention, for without attention, where is the image? Poof! It is gone that easily.



These days there is a treasuring of the space of no-thought, whether thoughts are present or not. In the morning when consciousness opens its eyes on a new day, it savors the glint of silence between thoughts. So many of the thoughts that arise are recognized as unimportant, or as luring conscious attention towards hooking into some new drama of suffering, stirring up a new pot of pain.  Sometimes the unnecessary suffering cooked up by thought-stories is caught early on and the drama is side-stepped, nipped in the bud.  Other times I'm swept into the waking dream of thought lock-stock-and-barrel and ride out the storm.  Either way, all the while the space of no-thought gleams with fathomless presence. Attention opens from the thoughts to the space of awareness in which the thoughts occur. Such freedom here now in this space!

~
Gratitude for photo of Mourning Dove available at this link:
http://www.bird-friends.com/pics/MourningDove/MourningDove3LR.jpg

Is death a problem?

     Is death a problem?
     No, death is a natural and sacred occurrence.
     It is the way of all form to vanish.

     Only the mind makes up a story that death is bad.

     Why not question this story?
     I'm sure I will weep and feel intense agony when my loved ones die.  I will likely feel fear and great sadness when I approach my own death, and this is fine.  All of these feelings are fine, and they don't make death a problem.

~

What we want isn't found in the story.

Good does not come from the story.

Good doesn't come from good fortune, good doesn't come from things going my way. Good isn't found there no matter how hard we try to find it there.

We all know this on some level. The good that comes from the story is fool's gold. There is transient pleasure and gratification but not the lasting fulfillment that is longed for.
Yet we honor the story and do the best we can on that level, as Eckhart Tolle says. I prefer good fortune over bad fortune as much as anyone, all the while knowing there is no up without a down. Good fortune and bad fortune are inseparable sides of a coin, and the deeper good that we long for is not to be found there.

Good comes from Reality, the current of the ineffable that is always present.

Good is the substance of everything.
Good is the proton and the electron and the space in between. Good is everything that is seen, felt, heard, palpated, thought. Good is that which sees, feels, hears, palpates, thinks.

Good is the air and the lungs and the blood that receives the air and the heart that moves the blood and the cells that are nourished by the blood that carries the air.

Good is death and the dissolution of every appearance. Good is birth and the unfurling of form. Good are all the exchanges between forms. Good is the space that envelops it all with the lightest touch.

Reality is gold.

~