Monday, October 11, 2010

The Vedic Path to Enlightenment

How to Lead a Spiritual Life.

What is the path to attain liberation? Krishna makes the following suggestions. They are extraordinarily deep and merit study and reflection:

1. Perform actions as an offering to God. (Food that we eat, work we perform, prayer)
2. Singing songs and listen to devotional songs. Praising God.
3. Offering the body, senses and mind to God.
4. Reading Holy Scriptures to acquire transcendental knowledge.
5. Spend time in the company of the wise and enlightened

Labels: , ,

Saturday, July 17, 2010

How to Calculate Your Quality of Life

Want to know a quick and easy way to calculate your quality of life?

Here's how.

1. List the following seven aspects of life and give each one a number out of ten for the quality of that area of life for you.

Spiritual
Mental
Emotional
Physical
Financial
Vocational
Familial

Don't overthink this. Let the answer fall out.

2. Now, add up the numbers for each area of life. For example, if you gave yourself 1 out of 10 for your spiritual area of life, and 7 out of 10 fo rthe mental area of life, then add 1 plus 7 plus the other numbers you gave.

3. You will now have a number somewhere between zero and seventy that describes the sum of your quality of life. Now we're going to average it so we have a really simply picture of your exact quality of life.

The average (arithmetic mean) is the sum of the values divided by the number of values. So the sum of your seven areas of life, divided by seven, is the number you are after.

4. Round the number up to the nearest digit and you now have your overall quality of life, on a scale out of ten! Well done.

Next post we will discuss how to improve your quality of life.

Labels: , , , , , , ,

Tuesday, June 01, 2010

The Power of Kneeling


We need the power to live. Even the very finest quality of prejudices are still blocks to power and happiness.

The prejudice that I do not merit God's help and love and support to the fullest degree must go.

The prejudice that I can do anything that can make God have such a bad day that He will not help me must go if I can live.

Because when I need God most, when I've done the thing that disgusts or horrifies me, that's precisely when I cannot reject that idea in myself of power.

So I let myself get down on my knees when I wake and ask whatever runs the universe for help. I need power. And when I go to bed at night I get down on my knees and thank whatever that was for what just happened.

My life is how I demonstrate the spirit to myself, through actions that do so.

- Scott L.

Labels: , , , ,

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Five Subjects for Frequent Recollection

Thannisaro Bhikku's translation from Access to Insight



Age, sickness, death, impermance, karma - these 5 subjects we should contemplate frequently.


I am of the nature to age, I have not gone beyond aging.
I am of the nature to sicken, I have not gone beyond sickness.
I am of the nature to die, I have not gone beyond dying.
All that is mine, beloved and pleasing, will become otherwise, will become separated from me.

I am the owner of my kamma, heir to my kamma, born of my kamma,
Related to my kamma, abide supported by my kamma.
Whatever kamma I shall do, for good or for ill -
Of that I will be the heir.

Thus we should frequently recollect.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Saturday, April 24, 2010

The 25 Principles of Healing by Jon Mundy, Course In Miracles Workshop

The 25 Principles of Healing of John Mundy, received and revised by Alex Burtson at The Selfless Self

On a podcast from "A Cloud Does Not Put Out the Sun," they were discussing Jon Mundy's 25 principles of healing. Alex Burtson wrote them all down, simplifying and shortening a couple of them. Here they are:

One illness is not harder to heal than another.
The healer’s sole responsibility is to accept atonement for himself.
You heal by seeing past the patient’s ego and sick beliefs, as well as your own.
You heal by realizing that you don’t have to change the patient.
You heal by seeing the patient’s body and its sickness as unreal.
To heal, it is necessary to understand the mind’s purpose in making the body sick.
To heal, it is necessary to understand the fear of healing.
The patient is not a victim of a dangerous world, but is the commander of his situation, the dreamer of his dream.
The proper aim of healing is not the body, but the mind.
The patient is the same as you and one with you.
The patient is your equal.
You are not in a position to direct the process or judge the outcome. The Holy Spirit is the only healer.
You do not give the patient something from outside of her; you merely help her connect with the wholeness already within.
There is something in you that will tell you what each brother needs. You must not demand, decide, nor sacrifice- only listen and you will find the answer.
Do not doubt the power in you.
Healing occurs when, in a holy instant, you step outside your normal frame of reference.
You heal by forgiving the patient. The process that takes place in this relationship is actually one in which the therapist, in his heart, tells the patient that all his sins have been forgiven him.
You heal by aiding the patient’s own forgiveness processes.
Your true perception is what heals, not your behaviors, your words, your hands, or the energy you move around.
Calling on Jesus is part of the healing, but not because this is a magical invocation.
You heal through your happiness. Those who attempt to heal without being wholly joyous themselves call forth different kinds of responses at the same time, and thus deprive others of the joy of responding wholeheartedly.
Healing others is not a sacrifice- it is the road to happiness. There is a tendency to assume that you are being called on constantly called on to make sacrifices for those who come.
The healers reward lies not in demands or ingratitude but in the giving itself, which reinforces the healer’s own healing. An unhealed healer waits for something in return, and so he cannot give nor heal.
If symptoms persist, trust that the patient receives the healing- do not repeat it.
Self-doubt and self-concern represent a reliance on the false self.
All of the principles are simple- they are 25 different ways to say the same thing. This is basically what they say: There is no order of difficulty in healing, and you heal by knowing that you are the same, equal, and one with the patient. The mind is the focus in true healing, and the body is the focus in magic.You must forget the random judging of the ego and the belief in sickness, and instead be fearless and doubtless. You must not expect a result or make any demands (like money) or you will be unable to heal. You must understand that there is wholeness within each one of us, and that you must listen to the Holy Spirit that is within you if you want to perceive correctly. You know that we are not the victims but the commanders of our situations, and that you are able to heal through forgiving your false self and the false selves of others.

Labels: ,

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Celtic Poem - The Guiding Light of Eternity

O Lord that brought me from the rest of last night
To the joyous light of today,
Bringing Thou me from the new light of this day
To the guiding light of eternity.

O! from the new light of this day
Unto the guiding light of eternity.

Celtic Prayer.

Labels: , ,

Monday, February 08, 2010

Bushbuck




Notice the exquisite silence and sweetness in this Buckbuck's eyes?

Observe the lucid awareness in the shoulders, the way it is equally ready to flee or to approach?

Isn't that just so lovely?

Click on the title of this piece to see many more.

Labels: , , ,

Saturday, February 06, 2010

More about Samyama, 2 of 6


This is part two of six pieces on the highest state of mind training known as samyama.

One writer defined samyama as “the flowing of attention, awareness and energy.” I would like to look at that some more. Each of these three characteristics refer to very specific practices and states of consciousness that are cultivated separately first. Samyama therefore is the synergy of three distinct practices working together as one practice.

Samyama as a single practice that is greater than the sum of its three basic practices. By putting samyama in the technical and systemic context of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra’s, the precise nature and power of samyama becomes very clear:

Technically samyama is the simultaneous and synergistic practice of the last three of eight limbs of Patanjali’s yoga system. Individually these limbs are technically called “dharana”, “dhyana” and “samadhi”. For samyama to be understood by the mind for the amazing power it is, each word needs a precise definition. The trouble is, Sanskrit simply does not work that way. Its beauty as a sacred language comes precisely from the wide spectrum of potential meanings surrounding every major word. So instead of a definition, here are some synonyms:

Dharana: concentration, attention, focus, resolve, mindfulness.
Dhyana: meditation, awareness, witnessing, detachment, insight.
Samadhi: contemplation, energy, light, absorption into the object of meditation, bliss.

Can you catch a sense or intuition of the meaning of these words?

Much more precision can be gained from carefully looking and practicing Patanjali’s text. The first five limbs of yoga might be said to be the source of dharana, concentration. This is a state where the mind is still, clear, awake, and lucid.

Dhyana, meditation, is for Patanjali any focus on this concentrated attention. He lists a number of possible focuses and the consequences of a given focus in the form of various powers and experiences. Dhyana arises from the cessation of the movements of the mind; it is the state yogas aim at.

But Patanjali is an equal opportunity spiritualist; he doesn’t seem to care about theological matters except insofar as they support or hinder practice. He seems eminently practical in this. Meditation is mind practice, dhyana – no more, no less. What you practice the mind on is up to you.

In that context, then, samadhi is entering INTO the object of meditation. It is becoming that object. It is a pretty radical idea, but it is not just a becoming. It is a revelation also. The essence of a matter is revealed by samadhi on it.

When you become something, all stands revealed. All doubt is resolved, and nothing is left to say or do. Samadhi is high-seeing (sama = summit, dhi = seeing). Dhyana is insight as a vehicle (dhi = insight, yana = vehicle). Dharana is (clearly) seeing a (material) form (dha = seeing, rana = material form).

All depends on the context here. If I were to present these notions in modern language, I would say that dharana means sound reality testing and freedom from neurotic imprints and emotional chaos; dhyana means meditative experience and skill with the abstract nonlinear content of mind that generates perceptual dualities, thereby giving rise to categories and conditional states of consciousness; and samadhi means direct experience of the context in which mind arises as a consequence of witness awareness. But the downside with all this modern jargon is that it dates fast, while Patanjali’s words remain.

Labels: , , , , , , , ,

Monday, January 18, 2010

On Samyama, 1 of 6


Samyama is defined as “the flowing of attention, awareness and energy”, “integration”, “the inner part of yoga”, “meditative absorbsion”, or even “beginner’s mind”. The word originates from the great spiritual teacher Patanjali.

I like to think of samyama like this:

When you set out to achieve something wonderful, you soon discover the mind is impeded through various arbitrary and conflicting positions of the ego. You might set out to get fit or change jobs and find many inner qualities which stop you going forward. If the inner sense of certainty is lacking, then the goal feels out of reach. How do you find the inner certainty? Through samyama.

And even when you achieve the goal, you may remain uncertain in yourself. You might find yourself feeling doubts about other goals, or discounting the value of your efforts in the past. This uncertainty is only resolved at the level of consciousness through the experience of samyama, which bring absolute certainty. For example, samyama on strength and optimism might bring to you the absolute certainty that something wonderful is unfolding.

Then on achieving the goal you learn that part of the benefit of setting and reaching goals comes from the resolution of these inner positionalities through samyama. You become one with the truth that you are an unlimited and empowered being through samyama. It is not the goal that brings peace and serenity; it was the state of consciousness that brought the power. Samyama, the state of consciousness, brings peace, serenity, and power.

It is difficult unaided to see that the source of all happiness and achievement arises solely from this the ability of consciousness to become absolutely peaceful, serene and empowered. Patanjali clearly says that from samyama arise all achievements and powers; he is referring to this state of certainty, power, resolution, and peace.

This is the first of six short talks about the power of samyama. I find they are the most complete collection of this empowering knowledge online or in print. Finding nothing online or in books that satisfied my interest, I created this and hope you will also benefit from it.

Labels: , , , , ,

Saturday, April 04, 2009

On Spiritual Awakening

Spiritual awakening is the waking up in you of that which is inspired.

Inspiration and happiness go together, because the breath of inspiration gives birth to the freedom of happiness.

Spiritual awakening is just like physical awakening.

Waking up is not caused by an alarm clock or by someone shaking you gently; it is caused by your having had enough sleep. The kind of awakening that comes from externals waking you up is unreliable - that is, if you depend only on the alarm clock, you generally end up sleeping in. The kind of awakening that comes from being ready to stop sleeping is stable and happy.

Just as waking up the body naturally is reliable, so waking up the spiritual naturally is best. In other words, it is best to avoid occult gyrations and mystifications which might just as well be dreams (or nightmares) as genuine presagers of awakening.

When it has had enough sleep, the body wakes. When they have had enough drama, the emotions become habitually stoic. When it has had enough thinking, the mind becomes silent.

Why make this a matter right or wrong when it is clearly a matter of ready or unready?

But the spirit becomes awake when it knows it is free. Freedom is the nature of the spirit, just as meat is the nature of the body and energy the nature of the emotions. The spirit that knows itself as free is happy. And being happy, it is awake.

Do spirits go back to sleep? Yes and no. A spiritual awakening is a personal quality which awakens in a specific person. That awake quality may be enhanced thoughtfulness and kindness; it may be a heightened dedication to a code of conduct; it may be a deepened sense of instutional or collective commitment; or it may take on the various mystical facets of selfless service, devotional feeling, or meditative solitude. But each awake quality is not better or worse than another. They are all awake to the person who experiences that quality. So, to answer the question of whether spirits go back to sleep: no, because there are different kinds of awakening suitable to different types of people, therefore what to one person is a state of sleep is to another a glorious awakening; but yes, because kinds of awakening are different in degree, and while one is not better than another, some kinds of awakenings are more complete and rich, as judged by their results, than others.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Sunday, April 06, 2008

[Masturbation, Tantra and Self-love, by Margo Woods]

This article is obscure but I think important and deserving a wider audience

[Bruce's comment: It is okay to be sexual. Sexual energy is not only beautiful and valuable, but it's also a way to experience God, or Tao. This book provides an extremely effective to experience this - to make love to oneself, without shame. It is the key to healthy society and healthy relationships between men and women. It is an alchemy that is needed to open the heart and creates the love: not only the self love, but the love of any kinds.

If you do not have the open heart nor the willingness to experiment; or if you are irritated by the idea of masturbation, please simply skip this page and go back to the previous level. But I promise you that if you dare to experiment following this book, the return will be miracle.]



"Some Statistics according to Kinsey's research in his book "Sexual Behavior in the Human Male" (Alfred Kinsey, 1948), a true eye opener:- 35% of all American males had sexual relationships with other males at some point in their live; 65% of all females masturbate - and more frequently, as they get older; 94% of all males had masturbated at some time in their lives, and that the other 6% was obviously Baptist ministers who lied to save their necks; Even at age fifty, over half of the males are all masturbating during the course of a single week; Some respondents whacked off twenty-three times a week in early adolescence; and even at age fifty, a few hardy souls were putting in two dozen shots a month. "

"You cannot truly experience love without having experienced self love."

"We all have our favorite masturbation stories, and favorite almost-got-caught stories. The wonderful thing about masturbation stories is that they give us full range to our fantasy for. "

"I cannot spot the difference between the act of intercourse and the act of masturbation, except for the delicious presence of another person."

"If this is nothing else to be learned from this book, it is that self love - without shame, with good humor, with a willingness to experiment - is the key to a healthy society and healthy relationships between men and women."

"Love for the self can be translated into a means of achieving energy release, spiritual growth, and a method of plumbing new artistry in thinking, feeling, writing, and growing. It's an alchemy that is needed to open the heart and creates the love: self love or any other kind."

"First, working with the sexual energy in this way helps the inner child to grow up and to have more strength to break the parent-induced patterns. It also gives him/her a sense of confidence, centering, and personal identity which are necessary to become a whole person. Secondly, my experience with opening the sexual energy in myself and others is that it is not a handicap in relating to other people, but rather an asset. I have become more loving and more powerful and more attractive. I have not been rejected on account of my heightened sexuality, nor am I crazed or horny all the time."

"If you delay your orgasm and raise the energy up in your body, you will eventually reach a level of energy at which orgasm does not bring you down. And in the meantime you will benefit from the effects of that energy flowing through your body whether you have orgasms at the end of your sessions or not."

"The Sexual Revolution has begun. Everyone, or almost everyone, know it's OK to be sexual. Human beings are sexual and passionate by nature, and it is not difficult to remove the negative conditioning and allow the natural human being to replace the conditioned one."

"Sexual energy is not only beautiful and valuable, but a way to experience God.

"To make love to myself, to masturbate, and to stop at the point just before orgasm, put my attention in my heart, and let the energy go up to my heart. The exact point to stop is the point where I know that one more stroke will make me come. "Just take your hand away, and let the energy go up to the heart." After each rush of energy to the heart I was to resume masturbating, repeating the cycle, until there seemed to be no more energy, or I felt like stopping. There was no prohibition against orgasm, only the requirement to delay it, letting the energy go to the heart first. Delaying my orgasms in this manner, I found, made them more intense."

"Exercise every day and makes it a part of my life. The simple exercise has proven to be a method of internal alchemy, a method by which I have begun to make changes in my psycho-physical system and thus changes in my states of consciousness."

The heart-opening experience: What I mean by that is, the experience of being in love but without another person to be love with, "Pure Love." In other words, I was in love with everyone and everything, felt totally at peace and physically beautiful. I was loving and clear and loved. I became Love Itself. My heart was clearly opening bit by bit. I became more loving, and more able to express love to others, more patient, more open, and less afraid of other people or their disapproval. I began to see my heart as a psychic organ as well as a physical one. I could put my attention in my heart when talking to a friend or client and know, in some inexplicable way, what they needed from me and how to give it to them."

"I became more magnetic and more satisfied with the ease and pleasure of my sexual experiences. It seems that the most important ingredient of sexuality if that personal magnetism, that magnetic attraction. With it, sex is easy. Without it, sex becomes a hassle and a chore. The masturbation exercise, without a doubt, increases one's personal magnetism. I also began to see that my vitality, my aliveness, and my enthusiasm were increasing noticably. Friends remarked how wonderful I looked, how alive I was. I began to learn that I could direct the energy to any part of my body, not only my heart, and began using it for healing, directing it to any place in my body that wasn't feeling right."

"Work with the heart center first. For one thing, you will probably not be able to generate enough energy to make it all the way to the head at first, but the most important thing is that the heart is a great safety valve. If the heart is open, even a little, there is no tendency to heart oneself or others. Love wishes everyone well."

"The problem that I see with many people who are taking this spiritual path is that they try to work on the upper centers before they work with the body and the heart. Work on your heart first. When you start to feel yourself loving the people in the supermarket and crying at parades you will probably be ready to work on the other centers. One of the most interesting aspects of this process has been that I have developed an unshakeable sense of identity and Oness about ourselves. This is the self love which is talked about so much in books and workshops these days. Have you ever asked, "How?" when the workshop leader said that it is important to love yourself?"

"The way of using the sexual energy produces self love more intensely than any other exercise I have ever tried. **One learns to love oneself by making love to oneself. I want to give you enough in this book that you can duplicate all of the experiences of myself and my students and learn for yourself how simple and easy and joyful sex can be. Love your body. Realize that what you don't like is not only conditioned by a Play-boy/Playgirl image of what is beautiful, but is one of the many ways you keep your body frozen and incapable of transmitting sexual energy. In so far as you don't like your body, you freeze your sexual energy. Realize also that you can change your body if you want to. Take a long baths, relaxing, and washing yourself tenderly with your bare hands. Give extra attention to the parts of your body you don't like, massaging them gently and lovingly."

"As for the masturbation exercise, the only thing to remember is that it is extremely simple - raising the body's sexual energy almost to the point of orgasm, and instead of letting the energy go out into the orgasm, allow it to come up in the body, up to the heart. It happens that, at the point just before orgasm, there is a channel open in the body, nad if you rest at that point and put your attention in your heart, the energy which has been generated will flow naturally upwards toward the heart. You don't have to do anything; it just happens. Don't worry about what it feels like, or if it is happening, just do it! Begin and adventure with yourself to see what your sexual energy is all about. Rediscover the physical system you were trained to ignore. "

"If you have difficulty talking yourself into a masturbation session, or in making love to yourself regularly, remember that you are conditioned away from that activity. Take the position that masturbation is now your meditation."

"Start your session by touching and loving yourself with your hands or soft fabrics all over your body before you go for your genitals and other erotic zones. You may have an orgasm at the end of a session if you like, or you may find that you come by accident, and that will probably end your session for you. Men particularly will need to stop each round far short of orgasm till they learn what the point of no return is for them."

"The idea that a man must have orgasm or risk physical pain is erroneous. It certainly does not happens to men who are moving the energy upwards. The biggest problem you will have with this exercise is not how to do it, because it is extremely simple, but your own training against masturbation."

"The pleasure you experience will do more to work against your negative conditioning about your body and your sexuality than anything else you can do or think."

"I suggest you have a session with yourself every day, as a meditation, for three months, and see what the results are for yourself."

"It is necessary to include a word about sexual fantasies. I can't imagine making love to myself without fantasies. They seem to create the experience for me. I suspect that much of the problem and lack of enjoyment people have with masturbation, in addition to their belief that is wrong, is that they do not use their fantasies. All of us have a potentially rich fantasy life. So go on with your fantasies. They won't hurt you - not even the weird ones."

Labels: , , , , ,

Froglessness, a poem by Thich Nhat Hanh

Froglessness



The first fruition of the practice

is the attainment of froglessness.



When a frog is put

on the center of the plate,

she will jump out of the plate

after just a few seconds.



If you put the frog back again

on the center of the plate,

she will again jump out.



You have so many plans.

There is something you want to become.

Therefore you always want to make a leap,

a leap forward.



It is difficult

to keep the frog still

on the center of the plate.



You and I

both have Buddha Nature in us.

This is encouraging,

but you and I

Both have Frog Nature in us.



That is why

the first attainment

of the practice –

froglessness is its name.



Thich Nhat Hanh.

Labels: , , ,

Technorati Profile