The Seer

An ornithology student who’d worked hard at his books throughout the year, was dismayed to find that the main part of the final exam required him to recognise a number of stuffed birds which had been draped so that only their legs and feet were showing.

As he hadn’t made a detailed study of birds’ feet he found the task quite impossible, so he threw down his pen in disgust, handed in his paper and marched towards the door.

He’d almost reached it when the supervisor called, “Wait a minute young man, what’s your name?”

Turning to face him, the exasperated student pulled up the legs of his trousers to expose his pale shins and shouted, “You guess mate, you just guess!”

~ John Coleman

“I and the Father are one.” (Jn 10:30)

“Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him. Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me? The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.” (Jn 10:31-33)

Religion was taken very, very seriously in the Jerusalem of Jesus’ time. Indeed, it still is today, though the religion being taken so seriously will vary, depending upon which part of the ancient city or its holy places one may happen to find oneself.

In those days, when the Temple still stood, however, there was only one religion to speak of in Jerusalem, and its adherents had better be careful of what they said about it. The deity was monolithic and supreme, a jealous god, whose rules, injunctions, and demands covered every aspect of His people’s lives, and exhibiting a too-familiar attitude towards Him — and He was definitely a Him — was a serious offense.

Imagine, then, the outrage of the Jews of the Temple at hearing Jesus dare to announce himself, in their very midst, to be the son of God, and one with his Father! Such a claim was insufferable, heinous, and clearly deserving to be punished in the most extreme manner. Had the controversial young teacher not slipped away, he would have been stoned to death then and there.

A deity that is conceived to be so removed from humanity — accessible only through a privileged caste of priests or intercessors, who interpret for others the desires and requirements of said deity — is not so much a powerful divine being as a means for humans to achieve and maintain power over other humans.

Perhaps for the “establishment,” the most disturbing aspect of the teachings of this upstart prophet was that he offered the kingdom of heaven to all who followed him, offered them the same relationship to the Father that he claimed for himself, the same inheritance of divinity, the same eternal nature.

Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do. (Jn 14:12)

The concept of the almighty God as a loving Father was radical, but the idea that we could partake in the potency and nature of that divinity was far too radical, and dangerous to the status quo. And so the stage was set for a glorious tragedy.

The message of the kingdom of heaven, and the fatherhood of God, outlived the human sacrifice of Jesus, and the teaching of the Christ went forth to be taken up and propounded far and wide.

Sadly, human awareness being what it is, many who became the most vocal and overriding proponents of this teaching failed to understand it. A new religion arose, in the name of Jesus the Christ, in which faith and belief in the interpretations and pronouncements of his vicars upon earth became paramount, and the personal knowledge of the All-Father and the Divine Sonship within oneself became all but lost.

The revelation of the Divine to humanity is not static, however, not something that occurs once in time and space and must then be approached only through legend and belief. It is constant and progressive. In each age, each generation, there are those who listen to the voice of the divine — not from a burning bush, or in the clouds and thunder on a mountain top, but in the intimate chamber of one’s own heart and mind.

The Lord showed me, so that I did see clearly, that he did not dwell in these temples which men had commanded and set up, but in people’s hearts … his people were his temple, and he dwelt in them. ~ George Fox, 1624-1691, Founder of the Society of Friends (Quakers)

The message of the loving parent, the potent ruler of the earth, from whom the kingdom of heaven is inherited, and of the inner Being that is the true self of very self, the I Am that is part and parcel, one with that great One I AM — this message has been heard again and again, in many languages, in many ways.

Many have heard, have seen, have understood to the degree possible in their time and place, and have passed on to others their beliefs, their insights, their knowledge. Yet each generation must have those who think on the things they have been told, and listen for the still, small voice within that renews the covenant, marries created and creator, and advances the realization and awareness of the Divine I AM within humanity.

In the finite world of creation, there is no absolute truth, for all here partakes of the inherent duality of material existence. Yesterday’s truth is but a steppingstone to today’s, and upon today’s truth we shall rise to discern tomorrow’s truer vision.

It’s only when we can rise above our hopes and fears, our denials, dreams, and expectations, and bask in the inner light of the One I Am, that Being at the heart of us, of our humanity and our divinity, that we begin to find that we are — even as we are in that very moment — in Divine Perfection. And, like truth, perfection is progressive too! Walking in this holy communion with the Divine, we move each day into a greater expression of that Oneness.

Unfolding, unfurling, like the lotus or the rose, our awareness extends to the infinite variety of experience within the One, to the nature of our communion with all beings, with all things, as the composite, the aggregate that is that One. Then, indeed, we encompass the humble receptivity of the creature, and the utter potency of the Creator, the completeness of the whole, opposites united in the sacred union of Self Supreme.

~ by (Rev.) Diana Young, from the Esoteric Christianity eMagazine

(Diana was ordained in 1980 in a non-denominational tradition having roots in personal gnosis, for many years she combined a life “in the world” with private ministry and spiritual study. Currently she resides in Northern California, where she leads a congregation, counsels, and teaches esoteric philosophy.)

In the Bible, there’s a story that graphically portrays the calm confidence of the spiritually mature person. Actually, it’s just a part of a much longer story and we can find it in the 2nd Book of Kings ch. 6, vs. 15-17.

“When the servant of the man of God (Elisha) rose early in the morning and went out, behold, a (hostile) army with horses and chariots was round about the city. And the servant said, “Alas, my master! What shall we do?”

“Then Elisha prayed, and said, “O Lord, I pray Thee, open his eyes that he may see.” So The Lord opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw; and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha.”

This is a wonderfully symbolic passage and illustrates clearly what it means to have, and abide in, spiritual ‘knowing’ or ‘gnosis’. The one who ‘knows’ in this case is Elisha … the master. His young servant doesn’t have the ‘knowing’ or insight that Elisha does, so when he goes out of the house in the morning and sees the beseiging army, he’s naturally alarmed and fearful. This is also the state of the spiritually unconscious person today who is constantly worried and fearful because of perceived threats etc.

In the story, Elisha isn’t at all concerned by his young servant’s frantic report about the surrounding army. He maintains his equanimity because he ‘knows’ something that the young man doesn’t. He knows that the only thing about us that really matters … our true Self, can never be injured or hurt by any ‘outside’ action. He knows that whatever the threat, the balance is always in our favour. Elisha expresses this certain knowledge when he says, “Those that are with us are more than those that are with them.”

He says this without even going out to check the size of the surrounding army … it wouldn’t have mattered how big the army was, the spiritual master always knows that despite appearances, that there’s really only one force that counts and that his true Self has nothing whatever to fear.

Perhaps he remembers the words of Isaiah, “When you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.” (Isa 43.2) Oh yes, the temporal body may be affected by an accident, an illness or ageing, and may even die in the end, but what we really are, the beingness that is inseparable from God, can never be touched by these things.

Elisha’s imperturbability in the face of all alarms reminds us of that calm, subtle, knowing smile given to nearly all statues and paintings representing the enlightened Buddha … that smile is the smile that knows that while the realm of forms (our world) matters, it doesn’t matter absolutely. The only thing that really matters, these symbolic images seem to be telling us, is being awake and seeing the full picture or the whole truth.

Nearly a month after (Fr.) Thomas Merton’s meetings with the Dalai Lama in India, and shortly before he would go to Thailand for the monastic conference which was supposed to be the reason for his journey to Asia, Merton was in Sri Lanka (then, Ceylon).

Along with another priest, he visited the Buddhist shrine at Polonnaruwa, but unlike the other priest who wouldn’t enter the actual shrine complex because of its ‘paganism,’ Merton took off his shoes and walked barefoot towards the enormous statues of the Buddha. What was about to happen to him was a pivotal, dramatic turning point of his life, a mystical moment. Merton’s own words say it best as he relives approaching the Buddhas at Polonnaruwa:

“Then the silence of the extraordinary faces. The great smiles. Huge and yet subtle. Filled with every possibility, questioning nothing, knowing everything, rejecting nothing, the peace not of emotional resignation but of madhyamika, of sunyata, that has seen through every question without trying to discredit anyone or anything… Looking at these figures I was suddenly, almost forcibly, jerked clean out of the habitual, half-tied vision of things, and an inner clearness, clarity, as if exploding from the rocks themselves, became evident and obvious…

“All problems are resolved and everything is clear. The rock, all matter, all life, is charged with dharmakaya … everything is emptiness and everything is compassion. I don’t know when in my life I have ever had such a sense of beauty and spiritual validity running together in one aesthetic illumination. Surely… my Asian pilgrimage has come clear and purified itself. I mean, I know and have seen what I was obscurely looking for. I don’t know what else remains but I have now seen and have pierced through the surface and have got beyond the shadow and the disguise.… a beautiful and holy vision.” (Asian Journal. pp 233 -236)

Returning to our story, Elisha does the only thing that can fully quell his young disciple’s fears … he invokes divine grace on the young man’s behalf and by this means, the servant is given the ability to see or know, what his master sees and knows.

In this case he sees the ‘horses and chariots of fire’ which indicate that they aren’t just another army of the same kind as the besieging force, but a power of another dimension altogether. This is the One power apart from which, there can be no other despite all external appearances to the contrary.

We can’t be sure that the young man saw more than the horses and chariots of fire and grasped the sublime and subtle truth of it’s source and substance, but Elisha certainly knew … and we can know the truth too, as Jesus said, and the consistent knowing or seeing of that truth will make us free indeed!

So here’s a vivid illustration of how seeing or knowing can change us and in changing us … change everything else. It’s a classic example of how seeing is truly freeing … from fear, anxiety and every other form of mind-made suffering … the same suffering that afflicts so many of us today.

~ Pete Sumner

In the “Lord’s prayer,” Jesus is said to have taught his followers to ask God to “give us this day our daily bread.” (Mat. 6:11) These days, many who repeat this prayer, have few, if any, concerns about the necessities of life. But for more and more, this prayer represents a very real daily need.

In Jesus’ day there was also a wide disparity between the rich and the poor, which was a subject of his deep concern. Then, as now, many of the rich had turned their back on the plight of the poor. But Jesus had wealthy followers as well as poor, and his words were directed at each one of them. Since the rich were not taught a different prayer, what did he mean by “our daily bread?”

Bread was often used in the Bible to symbolize the necessities of life, but this request also speaks to deeper questions: who are we relying on to see that we get what we need? Do we think of receiving our needs on a daily basis, or do we focus on long range security?

Bread that we buy ready-made at the store and preserve in a refrigerator doesn’t hold the same importance it did in Jesus’ day. Fields had to be prepared, planted, tended and harvested. Grain had to be separated from the chaff, and only after it had been ground could the daily chore of making and baking the bread take place. During any phase, disaster could strike and hunger become a reality.

But instead of being anxious over necessities, Jesus encouraged a direct relationship with the Divine that would allow his listeners to put their full trust in the process of receiving what they needed each day. Although this message might sound like pie-in-the-sky to many, as an itinerant sage, Jesus lived as a model of his trust in the Divine. He was well aware of the very real problems that people faced, so he offered the only remedy he knew would succeed.

When a young man told Jesus he would follow him anywhere, Jesus explained what that meant when he said, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head.” (Luke 9: 58-61) Another man who had heard Jesus’ remark said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.”

It wasn’t that his father had died, or was even near to death. He wanted to go home because he was unwilling to live a life based on trust. Instead, he wanted the pseudo-security that came from necessities (and perhaps luxuries) that his family had stockpiled in advance. Jesus’ message of living simply, sharing with others and trusting the Divine to provide what we need hasn’t changed, but many have regularly twisted its meaning to suit their own desires and comfort level.

Jesus realized that when some hoard life’s necessities, others inevitably go without. And he also knew that it’s impossible to focus on self-interest and BE love. But the brain is expert on figuring out how to rationalize anything it, or the body, wants. This has become increasingly obvious as churches that preach a “prosperity” message grow by leaps and bounds.

“Prosperity Christians” feel sure that God is ready and waiting to fulfil even their most elaborate dreams of wealth and security. And when material success comes, it’s considered a blessing that demonstrates God’s special favour. Other Christians disagree, and of course both sides are armed with scriptures to prove they are correct.

But an important issue that’s affecting Christian countries was made in Time magazine in September 18, 2006. Among a wide range of Christians who were polled, 61% felt that God wants them to be wealthy and uses wealth as a way to bless and show favour.

What was surprising is that 63% thought that if they gave money to help the poor, God would not replace it. Using these figures, we could conclude that many Christians must feel if God blesses them with wealth, they need to hang on to it rather than share it with those in need.

Praying for our “daily” bread is very different than praying to stockpile bread, or money to pay for it, far in advance of our needs. And yet, stockpiling and trusting in ourselves is what we’re taught to do. Of course our form of stockpiling more often takes place in banks, but amassing piles of material things also attests to our belief in the need to secure ourselves by stockpiling.

Many Christians have somehow come to the conclusion that capitalism and Christianity are synonymous. As a result, many professed Christians feel completely justified living very well while turning their backs on the poor. In their sight, those who have not prospered in the capitalist economic system deserve their plight since they apparently don’t have God’s favour.

But in Luke 12: 13-31 a man approached Jesus and asked him to tell his brother to divide their inheritance. Instead of getting involved, Jesus told the story of a “rich fool” who was so greedy for more, he decided to pull down the storage barns he already had so he could build bigger ones and stockpile an even greater supply.

But God told him, “Fool, this night your soul will be required of you; and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?” Few of us think that this parable applies to us, but the real questions we need to ask ourselves is: how anxious are we over our own security? Who do we trust to supply our needs? How hard are we working to make sure we have more than our daily bread? Jesus made it clear what his priorities were when he said:

“Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in a steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Mat. 6: 19-21)

~ by Lee & Steven Hager, 2012. For more: Click Here

The concept of the name of God is one which has fascinated scholars and philosophers from the dawn of time. God reportedly revealed ‘His’ name to Moses via the burning-bush; as recorded in the book of Exodus 3:14. The name Moses heard was, Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh. Actually, it’s a phrase rather than a name, so what does it mean, and does it have any significance for us today?

In biblical Hebrew, Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh is a deceptively simple phrase consisting of the relative pronoun asher sandwiched between two instances of the first person singular of the verb hayah — to be. Ehyeh is most commonly translated as “I am.” Asher is a remarkable Hebrew word that can mean, that, who, which or where, but in this context, is most often translated as that.

Therefore, generally speaking, Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh, or I am that I am, can be taken to indicate the self-existence and infinite eternality of God as the Source of all. It indicates the unity between the formless Divine Nature and the essence of all forms.

As Abhayananda comments in his illuminating book, The Supreme Self‘: “I am is an immediately evident fact — perhaps the most evident of all facts. It is not necessary to think in order to be aware I am — Descartes’ assertion to the contrary notwithstanding. I am is self-evident and logically prior to thought, for it is the I of I think.

This I am (Sanskrit: Aham; Hebrew: Ehyeh) is synonymous with consciousness in humankind. It is the constant underlying background, which serves as witness as well as substratum to all possible mental states….

Consciousness is the immutable, static witness; what it witnesses is its own projection in the form of thoughts, feelings and images, as well as the impressions registered by the senses. Consciousness is the subject, the seer, and everything else is the object, the seen.

Consciousness never vanishes; it is the one unfailing constant witness to all the various mental states: for example, in the waking state, consciousness is the witness of two simultaneous levels of activity: the internal one of thoughts, imaginations, etc., and an external one of sense-data from the “objective” world.

In the dream state, consciousness witnesses only on the internal level, viewing the effusive activity of the imagination known as dreams. And in the deep-sleep state, consciousness finally gets a break, as there is nothing at all to witness — but Itself….

There is yet another state of consciousness besides these three already mentioned: that is the state wherein consciousness transcends the Self-imposed limitation of a separate ego-identity — the illusion of being confined to one particular body — and recognizes Itself as universal.

The I experienced in this state is not a different I from the one which has always been experienced; it is the same I, but happily divested of the wrong notion of who I is.

We may call this state nirvana, samadhi, satori, the mystic marriage, oneness with God or whatever we like, it is more precisely however, the startling experience of the expansion of one’s consciousness from its limited personal identification to an unimaginably pure and lucid awareness that knows: I am the one Consciousness of the universe! All this is my Self!”

Surely, it was this same lucid awareness that prompted Jesus of Nazareth to declare: “Before Abraham was, I am.” thus symbolically proclaiming the unity of the Divine Nature (Divine Light) with the consciousness of existence we all experience — a recognition that apparently was quite misunderstood by his hearers and only inspired antagonism.

~ To read the whole article: Click Here

In our lives we travel a long road. As babies and infants we’re the headless One unaware of Who we really are. We’re also the headless One unaware of being a special, headed somebody in the eyes of others. A friend’s young daughter brought home a photograph of her class. She named every child until she came to one: “I’ve never seen that child in my class!” Of course, she hadn’t — it was her!

However, this unselfconscious freedom doesn’t last long. As we grow up we learn to identify with our appearance (and dismiss our native headless viewpoint as unreal or mad). We become profoundly convinced we’re the headed one we see in the mirror, the one that others see when they look towards us. As a child I learn to imagine that face over there in the mirror to be here above my shoulders. (Imagine, not see.)

Framing myself in this way, imagining what I look like from several metres through the eyes of others and imposing that regional appearance on this central Reality, I come to believe I am, in my own experience, a separate person, and assume others are in the same condition — for themselves headed, separate and mortal. Now I’m no longer headlessly and timelessly Alone, the Centre of my world — as I was as a baby.

Now, as an adult, I’m ‘one amongst many’, a ‘cog in the machine’, here today and gone tomorrow. I’m the One who has forgotten Who I am, the Prodigal Son lost in the Far Country, the Faceless One become a face in the crowd. Normally we assume this is the end of the story, that this must be as good as life gets. It seems growing up is about finding out who I am as a person and then doing the best with the cards I’ve been dealt. But this needn’t be the end of the story.

But, on looking within and seeing my faceless Reality, I discover I’ve been dealt the highest card in the pack — a sure-fire winner! Taking this Vision seriously, accepting it, saying Yes to it at deeper and deeper levels, a new and exciting chapter of life begins unfolding — the chapter that makes sense of the whole story to date.

Without this chapter I’m like a rosebush that sprouts from the ground, grows stem and leaves and buds, but then fails to bloom. If I don’t see Who I am, I’m not fulfilling my natural potential.

Sometimes people think that when you see Who you are, you’ll no longer identify with being a person. I don’t find this. Of course, it depends what you mean by ‘identify with’. But, seeing I have no head now, am I oblivious to the fact that you see it? Of course not. Do I act in the world as if I don’t have a face? No. Realising I have neither name nor abode, have I now forgotten my name and address? I hope not.

What does change, then? I see that my human identity isn’t central. My face and everything else aren’t here at my centre but ‘out there’ on my periphery — in mirrors, in photographs and videos and in others, just as others are here in me. Living in awareness that privately I am the One whilst publicly I’m Richard, I live a two-sided life.

I have the best of both worlds. I’m like a king in disguise who is no longer fooled by his own mask. Though I appear outwardly as an ordinary citizen, I’m aware of my inner regality. All is within me, all obeys my royal will. As a Sufi dervish once said (according to Rumi) when asked how he was:

“How should that one be, according to whose desire the work of the world goes on? According to whose desire the torrents and rivers flow, and the stars move in such wise as he wills; and Life and Death are his officers … No tooth flashes with laughter in the world without the approval of that imperial personage.”

But as soon as I forget to see, as soon as this Awareness goes out the window — as soon as I overlook this Open Window I’m looking out of — I feel and think and act as if I’m again a two-eyed victim. I have traded my fortune for a pittance. To align myself again with the truth, I must see again — I must see now, returning again to my Eternal Home, the Home I never really left.

Yet even this rhythm of forgetting and remembering arises within the unchanging Self. Nothing has gone wrong. The person who never leaves home doesn’t really know home for he has nothing to compare it with. But the person who has travelled abroad and then returns, now sees home and all who live there with fresh eyes — and loves it, and them, all the more dearly.

What good fortune to awaken to Who we are. I wouldn’t disagree with you if, in spite of acknowledging all the suffering and evil in the world, you felt you’d arrived in heaven — or rather, that heaven had arrived in you. We’ve stumbled upon a wonderful truth — the truth that makes the world go round, the truth that heals and guides and frees us, the truth that is Love.

~ Richard Lang, author of: Seeing Who You Really Are. (Richard will be giving workshops in Byron Bay, Sydney & Perth in March & April. For more deatails, call Sam on 0412 039 050 or go to: >>>Richard’s Site.

Toward the end of the Sunday service at a small Pentecostal church, the pastor asked, “How many of you have forgiven your enemies?”

80% of the congregation held up their hands.

The pastor looked searchingly around, then repeated his question. All responded this time … except one man, a white-haired old fellow named Wally Barnes, who came occasionally with his daughter — a regular attender.

“Mr. Barnes, it’s good to see you here today. Aren’t you willing to forgive your enemies?”

“Don’t have any,” he replied gruffly.

“None at all, Mr. Barnes? That’s quite unusual. How old are you, if I may ask?”

“Ninety-eight,” he replied proudly.

On hearing this, the congregation stood up as one and clapped loudly.

“Mr. Barnes,” the pastor continued, “would you please come down in front here and tell us all how you’ve lived ninety-eight years and don’t have an enemy in the world?”

Waving aside his daughter’s offered arm and supported only by his walking-stick, Wally came down the aisle with a slow but determined gait.

Stopping in front of the pulpit, he turned around, faced the congregation, and said with a grin, “I outlived the bastards!”

~ Sent in by Marg Coombes-Pearce. Thanks Marg.

The fully open heart rests in sweet unknowingness, safe in its own embrace, rushing to meet its own perceived need that dissolves in the grace swallowing it. Dancing its tender dance of sheer delight in its own loveliness, merging with itself everywhere, only this, exquisitely so.

This may sound far off for some people, a place unattainable, a state made available only for a few, but I can assure you that it doesn’t require you to change or to become different at all to know this firsthand. It only requires a willingness to stop. The more we stop and the more we let go, the more our consciousness naturally opens.

The more we question our conclusions, the more the doorway opens for us to have a wider and wider vision. The deeper we see into the reality of things, the more our heart opens to include everything, because if we’re really feeling into our deepest reality and truth, the heart isn’t something that would want to escape from what is here and now; rather, our hearts are already embracing everything. We can allow our hearts to be big enough to be broken.

My teacher called this world “the great heartbreak”. When we really begin to wake up to our true nature, we become more conscious of the suffering around us. We feel the people and the events of our lives more profoundly, not less profoundly. We become more present here and now.

What we see is that, even though our vision may have expanded, even though we may have woke up not just to reality, but as reality, still we can’t control anyone. Everything and everyone has their own life to live, and we can’t just wipe away their suffering because our hearts are open. Although we would love to have everyone wake up and be happy, part of the heartbreak is accepting this moment, this world, just as it is.

Another one of my teachers said, “All true love sheds a tear. It’s bittersweet,” and I’ve found this to be more and more true. The more deeply I love, the more I taste the bitterness with the sweet. It’s not a negative bitterness, it’s a bitterness that makes the sweetness even more sweet. Life is beautiful not just because of beautiful mountaintop vistas and the pristine, clear environment of a high mountain lake. Life is also beautiful in each and every moment.

There is nobility and beauty even when human beings are suffering. Our hearts do not want them to suffer; we want to save them, but the heartbreak is that we can’t do that. The quality of our love, the openness of our heart, still does have a profound effect on the world and others in it. Our hearts just can’t control it — nor would they ever want to.

But don’t ever think that your presence here — your physical, material, individual presence — doesn’t have a great impact on everyone around you, because it does. You can’t ultimately control what’s going on around you, but you do have a great impact. This is the gift we have to give other: this gift of oneness, of union, of a true open heart that comes when our mind opens.

Yes, it will be heartbreaking, and when our hearts break, it will be asked to open even wider, so wide that there’s nothing and nobody to hold onto the heartbreak. But the heartbreak also moves through the transparency of consciousness. If we’re willing to open that wide, to where we’re willing to not just transcend this world, but to inhabit it and embody it, then we become the answer for which we’ve always been looking. Then we become the peace that all beings are seeking.

Sometimes it is disturbing to realize that we’ve been holding onto a pocketful of dreams, but ultimately , it’s liberating. We can let our hearts break; they are that big. Illusion never brings peace, never brings happiness. When we’re done being disturbed by our own illusions, then we start to become astonished — astonished that we aren’t just our illusions, that we’re something so vast and unexplainable.

We’re not something that exists within Heaven or even in the great mystery of being, but we actually are the great mystery of being. One Zen master said, “The whole universe is my true personality.” This is a very wonderful saying: “The whole universe is my true personality.” If you want to see what you truly are, open the window, and everything you see is in fact the expression of your inner reality. Can you embrace all of it?

~ From: Falling Into Grace. by Adyashanti.

~ If you’re new to Adyashanti’s teaching, we recommend viewing his Basic Teachings on the Video page of Adyashanti’s Cafe Dharma.

Many of our negative feelings are the result of beliefs that we’re unconscious of, that is, beliefs that we arn’t aware we’re holding or possibly even thinking. When that’s the case, we just feel bad, and we don’t know why.

Inquiring into, or examining, these feelings by allowing them to be there but not acting on them can lead to uncovering the limiting beliefs that underlie the feelings. That takes a certain commitment to working with one’s feelings and to freedom from the suffering and limitation those feelings may be causing.

Something that’s a little easier to do than this and possibly an easier place to start in freeing ourselves from negativity is to simply notice how the thoughts that you’re aware of make you feel. A good question to ask is: “Does this thought make me feel relaxed, loving, and at peace with life or the opposite? Does it allow me to drop into Essence or does it keep me ensnared in the egoic state of consciousness?”

We often actually choose to dwell on and get more involved in thoughts that make us feel contracted and ill at ease in life, as if doing so has some benefit to us, while all this really does is magnify and sustain an unpleasant feeling and reinforce the mistaken belief, judgment, or fear that gave rise to that feeling. It’s important to examine the effect your thoughts have on you and on your relationships and not just accept them because they’re your thoughts.

Do negative thoughts and feelings, such as resentment, hatred, anger, jealousy, fear, worry, or blame serve you? Do they serve life? Negative feelings not only feel bad, but they often lead us to act in ways that create more negativity, more bad feelings, for others. Does acting out or even expressing such feelings serve you, serve others, or serve life? The result usually only adds to our collective pain as human beings.

Negative feelings are valuable only as signposts that point to a mistaken belief or misunderstanding we’re holding. We can ask ourselves: “What did I just tell myself that caused me to feel this way?” Negative emotions are red flags that show us we’re out of alignment with the whole truth and aligned, instead, with the ego’s (idea of) truth. The ego’s perspective is generally self-centered, self-serving, and narrow, leaving out a bigger, truer perspective. The ego’s perspective often makes us feel bad if we agree with it.

Believing the thoughts that come from the egoic self (the complaining, judgmental, dissatisfied voice in our head) leads to unhappiness, and that unhappiness is unnecessary (we only have to stop believing those thoughts). When we’re aligned with a more complete perspective, with Essence’s perspective, on the other hand, we feel at peace and in love with life, which is how we would all like to feel.

Wanting to feel good in this way is not a selfish act; feeling good is a benefit to not only ourselves but others, because when we feel happy, we are kind to others and we act more effectively and more authentically (more spontaneously from Essence) than when we are unhappy. Happiness is not only our birthright, but our natural state, and a state that allows others we touch to flourish as well.

We can become adept at managing our emotional state by becoming more aware of the thoughts that run through our mind and how these thoughts are affecting us. Some thoughts are neutral, some are practical, but many are judgments, fears, desires, stories, beliefs, and other ideas that are just part of our conditioning or that are the ego’s perceptions and don’t have any real value for life as it is arising in a particular moment. All they do is make us feel bad about ourselves, others, or life in general.

When you begin to examine your thoughts and notice how many of them cause you to feel contracted, fearful, and separate from or opposed to others, you can begin to free yourself from the negativity they can cause within yourself and in your life. You don’t have to be a victim to your thoughts. Once you realize that thoughts that lead to negative feelings come from the ego and have no value, you can choose to not get further involved in them, to not add more fuel to them or speak them.

This isn’t always easy to do, but it does get easier the more you practice it. Isn’t it great that we have the ability to free ourselves from negative emotions? This is our spiritual work.

~ by Gina Lake.

An interview with Eckhart Tolle by Andrew Cohen

AC: What exactly do you mean when you say that the purpose of the world lies in the transcendence of it?

ET: The world promises fulfillment somewhere in time, and there is a continuous striving toward that fulfillment in time. Many times people feel, “Yes, now I have arrived,” and then they realize that, no, they haven’t arrived, and then the striving continues. It is expressed beautifully in A Course in Miracles, where it says that the dictum of the ego is “Seek but do not find.” People look to the future for salvation, but the future never arrives.

So ultimately, suffering arises through not finding. And that is the beginning of an awakening—when the realization dawns that “Perhaps this is not the way. Perhaps I will never get to where I am striving to reach; perhaps it’s not in the future at all.” After having been lost in the world, suddenly, through the pressure of suffering, the realization comes that the answers may not be found out there in worldly attainment and in the future.

That’s an important point for many people to reach. That sense of deep crisis — when the world as they have known it, and the sense of self that they have known that is identified with the world, become meaningless. That happened to me. I was just that close to suicide and then something else happened — a death of the sense of self that lived through identifications, identifications with my story, things around me, the world.

Something arose at that moment that was a sense of deep and intense stillness and aliveness, beingness. I later called it “presence.” I realized that beyond words, that is who I am. But this realization wasn’t a mental process. I realized that that vibrantly alive, deep stillness is who I am.

Years later, I called that stillness “pure consciousness,” whereas everything else is the conditioned consciousness. The human mind is the conditioned consciousness that has taken form as thought. The conditioned consciousness is the whole world that is created by the conditioned mind.

Everything is our conditioned consciousness; even objects are. Conditioned consciousness has taken birth as form and then that becomes the world. So to be lost in the conditioned seems to be necessary for humans. It seems to be part of their path to be lost in the world, to be lost in the mind, which is the conditioned consciousness.

Then, due to the suffering that arises out of being lost, one finds the unconditioned as oneself. And that is why we need the world to transcend the world. So I’m infinitely grateful for having been lost.

The purpose of the world is for you to be lost in it, ultimately. The purpose of the world is for you to suffer, to create the suffering that seems to be what is needed for the awakening to happen. And then once the awakening happens, with it comes the realization that suffering is unnecessary now. You have reached the end of suffering because you have transcended the world. It is the place that is free of suffering.

This seems to be everybody’s path. Perhaps it is not everybody’s path in this lifetime, but it seems to be a universal path. Even without a spiritual teaching or a spiritual teacher, I believe that everybody would get there eventually. But that could take time.

AC: A long time.

ET: Much longer. A spiritual teaching is there to save time. The basic message of the teaching is that you don’t need any more time, you don’t need any more suffering. I tell this to people who come to me: “You are ready to hear this because you are listening to it.

There are still millions of people out there who aren’t listening to it. They still need time. But I’m not talking to them. You are hearing that you don’t need time anymore and you don’t need to suffer anymore. You’ve been seeking in time and you’ve been seeking further suffering.” And to suddenly hear that “You don’t need that anymore — for some, that can be the moment of transformation.

So the beauty of the spiritual teaching is that it saves lifetimes of –

AC: Unnecessary suffering.

ET: Yes, so it’s good that people are lost in the world. I enjoy traveling to New York and Los Angeles, where it seems that people are totally involved. I was looking out of the window in New York. We were next to the Empire State Building, doing a group. And everybody was rushing around, almost running. Everybody seemed to be in a state of intense nervous tension, anxiety. It’s suffering, really, but it’s not recognized as suffering.

And I thought, where are they all running to? And of course, they are all running to the future. They are needing to get somewhere, which is not here. It is a point in time: not now — then. They are running to a then. They are suffering, but they don’t even know it. But to me, even watching that was joyful. I didn’t feel, “Oh, they should know better.” They are on their spiritual path. At the moment, that is their spiritual path, and it works beautifully.

AC: Often the word enlightenment is interpreted to mean the end of division within the self and the simultaneous discovery of a perspective or way of seeing that is whole, complete, or free from duality. Some who have experienced this perspective claim that the ultimate realization is that there is no difference between the world and God or the Absolute, between samsara and nirvana, between the manifest and the unmanifest.

But there are others who claim that, in fact, the ultimate realization is that the world doesn’t actually exist at all — that the world is only an illusion, completely empty of meaning, significance, or reality. So in your own experience, is the world real? Is the world unreal? Both?

ET: Even when I’m interacting with people or walking in a city, doing ordinary things, the way I perceive the world is like ripples on the surface of being. Underneath the world of sense perceptions and the world of mind activity, there’s the vastness of being. There’s a vast spaciousness. There’s a vast stillness and there’s a little ripple activity on the surface, which isn’t separate, just like the ripples are not separate from the ocean.

So there’s no separation in the way I perceive it. There’s no separation between being and the manifested world, between the manifested and the unmanifested. But the unmanifested is so much vaster, deeper, and greater than what happens in the manifested.

Every phenomenon in the manifested is so short-lived and so fleeting that, yes, one could almost say that from the perspective of the unmanifested, which is the timeless beingness or presence, all that happens in the manifested realm really seems like a play of shadows.

It seems like vapor or mist with continuously new forms arising and disappearing, arising and disappearing. So to the one who is deeply rooted in the unmanifested, the manifested could very easily be called unreal. I don’t call it unreal because I see it as not separate from anything.

AC: So it is real?

ET: All that is real is beingness itself. Consciousness is all there is, pure consciousness.

~ To read the complete interview: >>>Click Here