Look back at a time when you were happy and notice how "you" were not really there.
This happy time does not have to be some ecstatic, divine experience of enlightenment—just a pure, simple happiness that might have come with the sound of laughter and smiles. This happiness you felt is a natural state of lightness and a care-free abandonment of the self. In it, there is no past story or worry for the future. There is nothing to really cling to. "Time flies" and you relax into the present moment of beingness—that is, not being a "you".
Some might call it an escape.
However, it is not that you really stop or escape from being "you". It is more of a natural realization that "you" and the "experience" are the same thing. "You" become that funny joke, a lover's eyes, a baby's smile, or a warm bed. The defining line of the physical body is relaxed and forgotten. Times stops, thought stops, the world falls away and you enter into the current experience openly and naturally. You feel at home. You feel peace.
Now, look back at a time when "you" were in pain or discomfort. This might have come from "loosing" the happiness just described. In this state, the sense of self is heavy, upfront, and in the foreground. There is a strong sense of the past and worry for the future. The object of your pain or "lost happiness" is firmly in mind as being separate from you, attacking you. Time creeps by in a dreadful procession of minutes, hours, and days. The present experience becomes constricted within the body, submerged in thought, and lost in a hard, finite world. You do not feel at home. You feel suffering.
Notice the difference?
Suffering arises when the self is felt as separate from the experience. There is a "you" and there is a "pain" which is attacking the "you". Two separate things.
This occurs in any form of discomfort—mild or severe. If you are "freezing cold" it is because you have subtly created a line where "you" are on one side, and the "freezing cold" is on the other—making "you" uncomfortable. The same could be said for a harsh break-up, job-loss, etc.
On the other hand, when there is happiness, that's all there is! There is no "you" when peace comes. You and happiness merge into one seamless experience of freedom—a freedom where the "you" is not really there.
Upon realizing this, many people unconsciously say, "I must learn how to not be me! I must forget me!" However, attaining this loss-of-self is impossible through "personal" effort. You cannot remember to forget yourself. You cannot end you. That is a paradox. Happiness is only revealed naturally when the present experience is accepted for what it is, and the activity of a "you" stops on its own.
Most people endlessly search for definitive ways to trick themselves into a loss-of-self or happiness. Very innocently, they seek for a "new" and "different" experience that is separate from them, in an effort to forget themselves. They think it comes with a new car, spouse, drug, spiritual book, or religious practice that is somewhere outside of them. But remember, suffering only arises when the self is felt as separate from the current experience.
There are no "tricks," "techniques" or "objects" that can bring peace—because peace is all there is. Underlying and permeating every experience of "suffering" is the peaceful space that allows it to be. You, who are really just peace, confuse yourself to be separate from that which is happening. This "confusion" is a freedom that peace inherently owns.
Peace is absolutely free to be anything, even momentary "confusion".
The "problem" seems to arise when peace ties itself into a confusing knot, forgets that it has done so, and seems to "suffer" because it wants peace back—all the while forgetting what it naturally is. A metaphor might be a rope that takes the form of a knot, but never ceases to be rope. A knot cannot be without rope—a knot is made of only rope. Just the same, "confusion" cannot be without peace—"confusion" is made of only peace.
It is only the negative connotations implied with the experience of "confusion" that causes suffering (AKA forgetting that you are only peace).
In this sense, there is nothing to really "do" about suffering. Striving for happiness is "suffering". Striving for suffering to end is "suffering". If there is any effort at all, it is a gentle acknowledgment that "pain" or "something" has arisen in awareness, letting go of the label, and moving into the experience without judgment. It is a subtle release.
In truth, there is no real "moving into the experience" or "letting go of the label". There is just that which is arising, a recognition of it, and a release—all in one movement. Anything more than that is a self-centered game that keeps the illusion of "suffering" in place.
There is nothing more self-centered than devoting your entire life to ridding yourself of personal suffering.
Look deeply at the underlying motive to gain "liberation" or "happiness", and notice how it is all about "you" and your separation from peace.
How would it feel to just be what is happening, right here and now?
Beyond words. Beyond you.
How does what's happening feel?
4/9/09
My Heart (The Intangible Depth of My True Self) Pt. 3
The evolution of humans on earth is for one purpose: love. This love is the genuine intention of the entire universe. Everything in existence is an affirmation of the impeccable accuracy and perfection of love's desire to be.
Consider human beings in all of our physical, intellectual, and emotional complexity. How perfect is the brain? The lungs? The eyes? How real and layered is anger, beauty, or even boredom? How far can math, science, and physics reach? How deep are relationships, society, and politics? All of these aspects of the human race are not bound within the perfection of physics. Rather, they are bound solely within the perfection of divine love.
We have evolved from basic matter into advanced social human beings as an apparatus for love to fully experience itself. We did not cause this to happen, and nor can we claim credit for any accomplishments we might experience in life. We are here so that the unknown can experience the inexplicable in greater depth. So that life itself can be surprised, awed, and marveled at over and over again.
Our life is like a painter who creates painting after painting after painting to no end. How many possibilities are there in a blank canvas? Does this amount ever truly diminish throughout a painter’s life? Will there ever come a time when a blank canvas has no option? Why does the painter continuously paint? For love. For nothing but love does anyone act. Even acts of fear, hatred, and violence are misconstrued attempts to regain or heal a love that is seemingly gone or damaged.
Love is the first cause of every action. At a glance, this is an intellectual paradox. How can all the faults, evils, and mistakes of the world be initiated by love? Because all life comes from and returns to love. How do mammals procreate but through some loving exchange? How does anything in nature survive but through some symbiotic relationship to something else? How infinitely perfect do all the conditions have to be for even the simplest of processes to take place? This absolute perfection is divine love and it is completely present throughout the entire living cosmos. In a word, the entire living cosmos is love itself. It is the eternal living Word of God. The Logos.
I can only hear this perfect word within the silence of my true heart. In fact, my heart knows no other word but this one. I cannot speak this word because all of my complex intellectual language is contained within it. I can only point…and even that is insufficient because I cannot point to the middle, when I am standing in the center.
Consider human beings in all of our physical, intellectual, and emotional complexity. How perfect is the brain? The lungs? The eyes? How real and layered is anger, beauty, or even boredom? How far can math, science, and physics reach? How deep are relationships, society, and politics? All of these aspects of the human race are not bound within the perfection of physics. Rather, they are bound solely within the perfection of divine love.
We have evolved from basic matter into advanced social human beings as an apparatus for love to fully experience itself. We did not cause this to happen, and nor can we claim credit for any accomplishments we might experience in life. We are here so that the unknown can experience the inexplicable in greater depth. So that life itself can be surprised, awed, and marveled at over and over again.
Our life is like a painter who creates painting after painting after painting to no end. How many possibilities are there in a blank canvas? Does this amount ever truly diminish throughout a painter’s life? Will there ever come a time when a blank canvas has no option? Why does the painter continuously paint? For love. For nothing but love does anyone act. Even acts of fear, hatred, and violence are misconstrued attempts to regain or heal a love that is seemingly gone or damaged.
Love is the first cause of every action. At a glance, this is an intellectual paradox. How can all the faults, evils, and mistakes of the world be initiated by love? Because all life comes from and returns to love. How do mammals procreate but through some loving exchange? How does anything in nature survive but through some symbiotic relationship to something else? How infinitely perfect do all the conditions have to be for even the simplest of processes to take place? This absolute perfection is divine love and it is completely present throughout the entire living cosmos. In a word, the entire living cosmos is love itself. It is the eternal living Word of God. The Logos.
I can only hear this perfect word within the silence of my true heart. In fact, my heart knows no other word but this one. I cannot speak this word because all of my complex intellectual language is contained within it. I can only point…and even that is insufficient because I cannot point to the middle, when I am standing in the center.
4/7/09
My Heart (The Intangible Depth of My True Self) Pt. 2
My true life sits in the present moment perfectly balanced between the heart and the intellect with a complete realization of their simultaneous existence.
My intellect is the peephole on the door to the unknown, and my true life is looking through it on both sides. Everything that I know now was once unknown, and it will one day return to that great mystery.
My intellect must have some sort of affirmation to continue in the direction of the unknown, otherwise it will attempt to change course. This affirmation is guided by attention and intention. By examining the words themselves I realize the quality of their truth and where this intellectual affirmation can be found. At-tention tells me to look at something. While in-tention tells me to look within. Attention is focused on what is known and seen, while intention on what is unknown and felt. A true affirmation--one that brings the heart and intellect into balance--can only be found by a combination of genuine intention and focused attention.
To realize the heart in this lifetime—to make it a living reality—I have to place my intention into what is unknown. Focused attention is of the intellect, and this can be a useful tool to pacify it so that it subsides enough and allows my heart to be realized. To keenly focus on one thing is a great way to realize the heart, because instead of falsely claiming truth of everything, my intellect only claims truth of one thing and it explores it with greater depth. In this meditative focused state, my throbbing pulsating heart of the unknown is realized in that which surrounds and is also contained within my object of attention. In this way, I train the intellect to mostly subside, which can possibly allow my true heart to enter. Because of this unknown presence of heart and the known benefits it yields, we are programmed to believe that focused attention towards one or two objects (such as a spouse, or career) will create true peace and fulfillment. While this is true to some extent, it is rare to provide lasting peace because it has the potential of causing unending pain if the object is ever lost or changed--which intellectually speaking, it will certainly be lost at some point. Secondly, if this focused attention is absent of affirmations of the heart, it will be difficult to maintain and fully realize in every aspect of life because of the intellect's greater purpose of explaining everything that is not known. By itself, my intellect cannot stay focused on one thing forever because it will eventually claim it as known and then move on to the next. It cannot sit still for a lifetime. It must keep going. So to focus it on the heart, the unknown depth of life itself, requires a genuine intention to not waiver and some sort of true affirmation to continue on that path.
If I place genuine intention into any action, the result is secondary, inconsequential, and unknown from the beginning. Intention is not of the intellect, it is completely of the heart. It cannot be gauged, documented, or even seen. It is my loving faith. This genuine intention is the realization of the unknown by its own existence within my humanity. It is intentional action that makes us fully human.
How do I know my intention? I do not.
I can only feel my intention in ways that are not of the intellect. My intention cannot fully be described in words, thoughts, or actions--it can only be realized in the heart and seen afterwards as affirmations which are known.
But if my heart is unknown, how do I know that my intention is genuine? I realize this by the true affirmation that genuine intention is reality.
Everything is intentional. This means all of life is guided by intentional action. So to align my life with reality, I must align my intention with that of life. I must fully believe in the un-known to have genuine intention. To place my faith in the mysterious wonder that life is full of unknown qualities to be explored to infinity by the intellect, is the most genuine intention I can offer. My genuine intention is a conscious choice to place my focused attention on the heart with total abandonment of what came before or what I think the result should be. To be lived in the present moment by my intention is the realization of my true heart. It is the realization of God.
This is deeper than just “trying my best”, moral laws, or being passively kind and gentle towards the life I see. It is beyond any word that can be placed on it. It is reaching through to the very depth of the fact that I even have a life to begin with. To have a life at all is the genuine intention. It is not an intellectual intention, because, literally speaking, my intellect formed many years after my life began. In the center of my senses, in the core of my being, something is saying yes to me being here--something that I am not in control of. My heart is saying yes. My physical heart was beating long before I could open my eyes, breathe, speak, or think. Even now, I can close my eyes, slow my breath, choose my thoughts, plug my ears and so on...but the heart has no choice. To stop the heart is death--and to stop the true heart of life is impossible. My true heart is saying yes to the entire universe and is carrying it out through infinite intentional action. The choice I am intellectually faced with is a continuous question of acceptance or denial. The true answer to this question--in practical daily life--can only come from my intention.
To illustrate this further I consider a piano a good metaphor. The genuine intention of a piano is music. Music is not limited to the piano, and nor is it an end result of the piano. Music came before the piano as a genuine intention to be played and will eternally exist--even if the keys are never touched. Even if all pianos are obliterated--never to be made again--the genuine intention remains; a piano is made for music. Any song that comes from a piano is simply an affirmation of the original intention.
Said differently, the genuine intention of a human is Life. Life is not limited to the human, and nor is it an end result of the human. Life came before the human as a genuine intention to be lived and will eternally exist--even if the Life is never truly lived. Even if the human race is obliterated and never reborn, the genuine intention remains; a human is made for Life. Any true Life that comes from the human is simply an affirmation of the original intention.
This does not mean my life is planned. A plan only comes after the intention. My plans are temporary intellectual steps to achieve an expected result, only after the genuine intention is realized by my heart. I can only plan to learn the piano after the intention of music has brought the piano into existence. Plans are useful tools, but the genuine intention is what makes the plan possible and will remain even if or when the plans fall through.
My intellect is the peephole on the door to the unknown, and my true life is looking through it on both sides. Everything that I know now was once unknown, and it will one day return to that great mystery.
My intellect must have some sort of affirmation to continue in the direction of the unknown, otherwise it will attempt to change course. This affirmation is guided by attention and intention. By examining the words themselves I realize the quality of their truth and where this intellectual affirmation can be found. At-tention tells me to look at something. While in-tention tells me to look within. Attention is focused on what is known and seen, while intention on what is unknown and felt. A true affirmation--one that brings the heart and intellect into balance--can only be found by a combination of genuine intention and focused attention.
To realize the heart in this lifetime—to make it a living reality—I have to place my intention into what is unknown. Focused attention is of the intellect, and this can be a useful tool to pacify it so that it subsides enough and allows my heart to be realized. To keenly focus on one thing is a great way to realize the heart, because instead of falsely claiming truth of everything, my intellect only claims truth of one thing and it explores it with greater depth. In this meditative focused state, my throbbing pulsating heart of the unknown is realized in that which surrounds and is also contained within my object of attention. In this way, I train the intellect to mostly subside, which can possibly allow my true heart to enter. Because of this unknown presence of heart and the known benefits it yields, we are programmed to believe that focused attention towards one or two objects (such as a spouse, or career) will create true peace and fulfillment. While this is true to some extent, it is rare to provide lasting peace because it has the potential of causing unending pain if the object is ever lost or changed--which intellectually speaking, it will certainly be lost at some point. Secondly, if this focused attention is absent of affirmations of the heart, it will be difficult to maintain and fully realize in every aspect of life because of the intellect's greater purpose of explaining everything that is not known. By itself, my intellect cannot stay focused on one thing forever because it will eventually claim it as known and then move on to the next. It cannot sit still for a lifetime. It must keep going. So to focus it on the heart, the unknown depth of life itself, requires a genuine intention to not waiver and some sort of true affirmation to continue on that path.
If I place genuine intention into any action, the result is secondary, inconsequential, and unknown from the beginning. Intention is not of the intellect, it is completely of the heart. It cannot be gauged, documented, or even seen. It is my loving faith. This genuine intention is the realization of the unknown by its own existence within my humanity. It is intentional action that makes us fully human.
How do I know my intention? I do not.
I can only feel my intention in ways that are not of the intellect. My intention cannot fully be described in words, thoughts, or actions--it can only be realized in the heart and seen afterwards as affirmations which are known.
But if my heart is unknown, how do I know that my intention is genuine? I realize this by the true affirmation that genuine intention is reality.
Everything is intentional. This means all of life is guided by intentional action. So to align my life with reality, I must align my intention with that of life. I must fully believe in the un-known to have genuine intention. To place my faith in the mysterious wonder that life is full of unknown qualities to be explored to infinity by the intellect, is the most genuine intention I can offer. My genuine intention is a conscious choice to place my focused attention on the heart with total abandonment of what came before or what I think the result should be. To be lived in the present moment by my intention is the realization of my true heart. It is the realization of God.
This is deeper than just “trying my best”, moral laws, or being passively kind and gentle towards the life I see. It is beyond any word that can be placed on it. It is reaching through to the very depth of the fact that I even have a life to begin with. To have a life at all is the genuine intention. It is not an intellectual intention, because, literally speaking, my intellect formed many years after my life began. In the center of my senses, in the core of my being, something is saying yes to me being here--something that I am not in control of. My heart is saying yes. My physical heart was beating long before I could open my eyes, breathe, speak, or think. Even now, I can close my eyes, slow my breath, choose my thoughts, plug my ears and so on...but the heart has no choice. To stop the heart is death--and to stop the true heart of life is impossible. My true heart is saying yes to the entire universe and is carrying it out through infinite intentional action. The choice I am intellectually faced with is a continuous question of acceptance or denial. The true answer to this question--in practical daily life--can only come from my intention.
To illustrate this further I consider a piano a good metaphor. The genuine intention of a piano is music. Music is not limited to the piano, and nor is it an end result of the piano. Music came before the piano as a genuine intention to be played and will eternally exist--even if the keys are never touched. Even if all pianos are obliterated--never to be made again--the genuine intention remains; a piano is made for music. Any song that comes from a piano is simply an affirmation of the original intention.
Said differently, the genuine intention of a human is Life. Life is not limited to the human, and nor is it an end result of the human. Life came before the human as a genuine intention to be lived and will eternally exist--even if the Life is never truly lived. Even if the human race is obliterated and never reborn, the genuine intention remains; a human is made for Life. Any true Life that comes from the human is simply an affirmation of the original intention.
This does not mean my life is planned. A plan only comes after the intention. My plans are temporary intellectual steps to achieve an expected result, only after the genuine intention is realized by my heart. I can only plan to learn the piano after the intention of music has brought the piano into existence. Plans are useful tools, but the genuine intention is what makes the plan possible and will remain even if or when the plans fall through.
4/6/09
My Heart (The Intangible Depth of My True Self) Pt. 1
The whole truth is not in front of me—this is inarguably certain. If I were to find meaning solely in what is seen, then I conclude that life is rarely more than passing time, momentary pain, momentary pleasure, hope, and unavoidable death. My experience would be that a fulfilled life is attained through physical, mental, and emotional safety—all of which would provide me a temporary insulation to the fact that one day it will all be gone. My whole existence would be necessary survival and luxurious escapes from slowly becoming non-existent. Beauty, love, and truth would be absolutely temporary. The purpose found here is that material possessions, nature, religion, relationship, and society all provide comfort, familiarity, and foundations for me to feel safe before annihilation. Inherently, any threat towards this familiarity reveals my greater fear, anxiety, pain, etc. Peace would be the absence of war. Love, the absence of hate. Life, the absence of death, and so on. The seemingly “good” would be completely dependent on its relation to the opposite.
In this sense, time is the ultimate menace and all of life is reduced to what can be gained, avoided, and experienced before it runs out. My morality and ethics would stem from this root fear, and depending on my understanding, they would consist of an obligatory agreement to behave in such a way so that the greatest amount of comfort could be achieved and prolonged—for my primary benefit and then secondly for the whole. Social imitation, scientific methodology, and chance would no doubt provide me the necessary tools to live in temporary synthetic peace.
This has been my programming. This is what is seen.
The real truth is in the unknown--the unseen. Like one gigantic sign-post, my entire lifespan is mercilessly pointing to the one place I have never been and cannot explore. Although I am permanently fixed in its direction and I am obviously hurdling through space at great speeds towards it, I avoid it at all costs. I subtly flinch and shutter on a daily basis with the underlying knot of fear that the unknown is certainly right in front of me. No matter how secure or seemingly in control I may feel, deep down, I understand that very soon I will be forced to venture into that place I cannot imagine.
This is absolute terror to my intellect.
Yet, here I sit, emphatically stating I will permanently do just that! I have realized--meaning made real--that there are two aspects of myself working independent of each other. There is my intellect (or the known, the seen) and my true heart (the unknown, the felt). To fully realize the heart--the unknown truth that surrounds what is seen--is now my primary intention and it is the main focus of this discussion.
------------------------------
All that I can know of my heart, is that it is un-known. It cannot be seen through the eye of the intellect. There is no idea that can contain it, so therefore it safely remains just outside the known. In this respect it is eternal--it cannot be reduced to passing time. No matter how strongly my intellect reaches for the heart, it cannot be gauged, grasped, or intellectually claimed as known.
The unknown is true peace because my heart is permanently separated from the drama of the known. So however tirelessly my intellect searches for peace, it will never find it by its own accord. For me to obtain even the smallest realization of the heart, my intellect must subside. I can be told in very practical language that love and forgiveness are the essential keys to true peace. I can repeatedly imitate these practices with great precision, and no matter how much they are fully realized in my heart, they remain but a past memory to my intellect. They are known only in unclear terms that are difficult to define because my intellect has only falsely claimed them after-the-fact.
My heart is wrongly labeled through intellectual language. Joy, light, peace, life, God, etc—are terms that might imply my heart, yet by themselves, these words only lessen it’s true meaning because of the dualistic nature of the intellect. I must remember that what is intellectually “known as good” is completely dependent on its relation with the opposite.
To my intellect, these words are inadvertently tied to pain, dark, war, death, devil, etc. Either side is no more than the absence of the other. So when I speak of my heart, the intellect either takes control, resists, or subsides. It can only hear the heart in a muffled whisper and from a great distance, because the truth is not found in words alone. Words are the intellect’s primary language, while silence is the primary language of the heart.
Silence is the unknown.
My intellect is not flawed—no matter how much it tries to convince itself otherwise. It is not at fault, imperfect, or even skewed. Like an advanced robot, it impeccably functions—in developmental stages—according to the conditions it is placed in. It is purely innocent in that it knows nothing beyond its function. It knows that it does not and cannot hold the complete truth, and yet, its sole purpose is to endlessly search for it. My reasoning is in a perpetual state of documenting, referencing, calculating, and duplicating what is known.
My heart is unknown.
Placed in the right conditions of affirmation and pleasure, my intellect will glorify it's self to the very end, falsely claiming it has found the truth. Conversely, if it is placed in the conditions of negation and pain, it will eventually turn itself into its own worst enemy in an attempt to escape what is known—even up to the cost of it’s own existence.
My intellect is not an enemy, nor is it righteous. My intellect is simply viewing the stage of the known. If the known is absent of pain, my intellect detects joy and vice versa. My intellect has no preference of what is known, it merely searches for what is unknown within the direction that it is facing. It’s purpose is to continuously explain the unexplained, which is inherently impossible, but keeps the intellect in continuous self-propulsion until death.
Like an excited dog chasing its tail, my intellect has spun my life through repeated actions and with such force that my dizziness was confused for truth. It has dominated my reality with the expense of my heart and at the cost of great time and pain. This is the imbalance I now seek to heal by fully realizing the true depth of my unknown heart.
In this sense, time is the ultimate menace and all of life is reduced to what can be gained, avoided, and experienced before it runs out. My morality and ethics would stem from this root fear, and depending on my understanding, they would consist of an obligatory agreement to behave in such a way so that the greatest amount of comfort could be achieved and prolonged—for my primary benefit and then secondly for the whole. Social imitation, scientific methodology, and chance would no doubt provide me the necessary tools to live in temporary synthetic peace.
This has been my programming. This is what is seen.
The real truth is in the unknown--the unseen. Like one gigantic sign-post, my entire lifespan is mercilessly pointing to the one place I have never been and cannot explore. Although I am permanently fixed in its direction and I am obviously hurdling through space at great speeds towards it, I avoid it at all costs. I subtly flinch and shutter on a daily basis with the underlying knot of fear that the unknown is certainly right in front of me. No matter how secure or seemingly in control I may feel, deep down, I understand that very soon I will be forced to venture into that place I cannot imagine.
This is absolute terror to my intellect.
Yet, here I sit, emphatically stating I will permanently do just that! I have realized--meaning made real--that there are two aspects of myself working independent of each other. There is my intellect (or the known, the seen) and my true heart (the unknown, the felt). To fully realize the heart--the unknown truth that surrounds what is seen--is now my primary intention and it is the main focus of this discussion.
------------------------------
All that I can know of my heart, is that it is un-known. It cannot be seen through the eye of the intellect. There is no idea that can contain it, so therefore it safely remains just outside the known. In this respect it is eternal--it cannot be reduced to passing time. No matter how strongly my intellect reaches for the heart, it cannot be gauged, grasped, or intellectually claimed as known.
The unknown is true peace because my heart is permanently separated from the drama of the known. So however tirelessly my intellect searches for peace, it will never find it by its own accord. For me to obtain even the smallest realization of the heart, my intellect must subside. I can be told in very practical language that love and forgiveness are the essential keys to true peace. I can repeatedly imitate these practices with great precision, and no matter how much they are fully realized in my heart, they remain but a past memory to my intellect. They are known only in unclear terms that are difficult to define because my intellect has only falsely claimed them after-the-fact.
My heart is wrongly labeled through intellectual language. Joy, light, peace, life, God, etc—are terms that might imply my heart, yet by themselves, these words only lessen it’s true meaning because of the dualistic nature of the intellect. I must remember that what is intellectually “known as good” is completely dependent on its relation with the opposite.
To my intellect, these words are inadvertently tied to pain, dark, war, death, devil, etc. Either side is no more than the absence of the other. So when I speak of my heart, the intellect either takes control, resists, or subsides. It can only hear the heart in a muffled whisper and from a great distance, because the truth is not found in words alone. Words are the intellect’s primary language, while silence is the primary language of the heart.
Silence is the unknown.
My intellect is not flawed—no matter how much it tries to convince itself otherwise. It is not at fault, imperfect, or even skewed. Like an advanced robot, it impeccably functions—in developmental stages—according to the conditions it is placed in. It is purely innocent in that it knows nothing beyond its function. It knows that it does not and cannot hold the complete truth, and yet, its sole purpose is to endlessly search for it. My reasoning is in a perpetual state of documenting, referencing, calculating, and duplicating what is known.
My heart is unknown.
Placed in the right conditions of affirmation and pleasure, my intellect will glorify it's self to the very end, falsely claiming it has found the truth. Conversely, if it is placed in the conditions of negation and pain, it will eventually turn itself into its own worst enemy in an attempt to escape what is known—even up to the cost of it’s own existence.
My intellect is not an enemy, nor is it righteous. My intellect is simply viewing the stage of the known. If the known is absent of pain, my intellect detects joy and vice versa. My intellect has no preference of what is known, it merely searches for what is unknown within the direction that it is facing. It’s purpose is to continuously explain the unexplained, which is inherently impossible, but keeps the intellect in continuous self-propulsion until death.
Like an excited dog chasing its tail, my intellect has spun my life through repeated actions and with such force that my dizziness was confused for truth. It has dominated my reality with the expense of my heart and at the cost of great time and pain. This is the imbalance I now seek to heal by fully realizing the true depth of my unknown heart.
4/4/09
5 Quick Experiments for Uprooting the Ego
I think that any discussion of ego-debasement should come with a big warning label that says: CAUTION! Any success in this matter will completely change your life. 180 degrees. If your life-view is generally strong, sound and comfortable, please read no further--for this will only change things.
That said, I assume that anyone who is genuinely interested in this discussion probably enjoys seeing life change.
I should also say that any method, exercise, or technique geared towards uprooting the ego should be seriously viewed as nothing more than a temporary experiment. That is, this should not become a belief-system, formal religion, thought-process, extended practice or long-term goal--because all of these manifestations ARE the ego. These 5 little paragraphs are meant to be viewed as nothing more than experiments:
ex⋅per⋅i⋅ment: (-noun) 1. a test, trial, or tentative procedure; an act or operation for the purpose of discovering something unknown or of testing a principle, supposition, etc.: a chemical experiment; a teaching experiment; an experiment in living.
These are not to be believed, gained, defended, accumulated, labored over, or kept. They are to be experienced, lightly evaluated and then laid aside for that which lies beyond.
1. Stop looking at "yourself".
The absolute perfect love that you are has never been seen through the veil of the ego. Not once has the ego seen who you really are. However, the practical aspect of this experiment is very easy and very effective in removing the veil. Simply stop looking at yourself. Stop staring every time you brush your teeth in the morning, walk by a mirror, enter a glass door, get into the car, pass by a window, or in any other situation where you catch a reflection. Stop looking at photos and videos of yourself. If you need to fix your hair, by all means, use a mirror to look at your hair. If you have something in your nose, use a mirror to look up your nose. But put a full-stop to looking at reflections of "yourself" and thinking that is you. That is NOT you! It is a piece of reflective glass and nothing more. It is ink on paper. It is pixels on a screen. The thought that the reflection is you is a dream. You can never truly "see" yourself as you really are. Just try it! It's impossible. You can look down and see hands, legs, and feet...but you cannot see you. The ego has told you a lie for far too long that you are reflections. It's a game of smoke and mirrors. Take a break from it and learn to see yourself in things other than glass. Whether you think you are cute, fat, average, stunning, skinny, old, tanned, or indifferent, simply forget what the reflections show you. Stop looking at reflections, and see who you really are. Simple.
----------------------------------------------------
2. Stop "choosing".
You did not choose where you were born. You did not choose your parents. You did not choose your sex, skin color, body-type, or how big your feet are. You did not choose the life-defining events that happened during the first few years of youth. You did not choose who you think you are. You did not choose what you find funny or how smart you are. You did not choose your name or whether your friends love you. You did not choose your personality. You did not choose what kind of food you like or what turns you on. You did not choose your last heart-beat, breath or thought. You did not choose those memorable "kodak moments". Nor did you choose the painful events of your worst nightmare. Simply put, you did not choose the story of you. But the problem is not choice, the problem is that there is no you to choose! Stop pretending you have a choice and life becomes exponentially simpler. Seriously ask, "What have I ever really chosen?" Choice only arises when there are two. But when the ego is seen through, there is only one. The illusion of choice is the ego's merry-go-round. See what happens when you stop "choosing".
----------------------------------------------------
3. Forget the names of everyone you "know".
Does your loving pet care what your name is? Does he even know it? Probably not, and yet he loves you just the same. The ego, however, is drowning itself in a sea of conceptual character names. Every person the ego meets needs to be properly labeled--and it most certainly needs everyone to know it's own label! This keeps everyone, including you, under it's control, neatly defined, and firm within it's little fantasy world. It's the starting point for building all the conceptual stories about who everyone is and how they compare and contrast to you. Stop with the name calling! Just be with your friends, family and co-workers without the conceptual names, roles and labels. Let go of the whole story you invented (good or bad) that goes along with those names, and just be with them. Instead of having dinner with your conceptual sister Mary, just go to dinner with that person exactly as she is, in that exact moment. The truth of who she is cannot be appreciated in the four little letters; M - A - R - Y. In fact, her true name is far too long for you to even speak. One small aspect of her might be that she is your sister, but that is definitely not who she is in every waking moment. Not in the slightest! Nobody is who you think they are, because you are not who you think you are. This could be called forgiveness, or letting go of the past. It might seem abstract, but simply strip the names from those you "know" and see who they are without them--see who you are without them.
----------------------------------------------------
4. Remember that every "stranger" you see is real.
Every single person you have ever seen pass by is completely real. They are reality. It is most helpful to remember this and experience it daily. This experiment is essentially an inversion of the third experiment. In the above example, we were attempting to forget the make-believe stories of those people we supposedly "know", whereas here we are attempting to intimately know those we call "strangers". This does not mean you need to talk to every person and hear their story--that would be an impossible ego game. You don't even need to see them walk by (although it helps). You are simply recognizing the fact that every single "stranger" has a complex, conceptual story that is just as vivid and seemingly real as the ego thinks yours is. From the grotesque up through the sublime, in that recognition, you undermine all stories and move beyond them. The millions of details, fragmentations and differences do not matter, but the fact that you are fully capable of embracing all stories is of infinite value. It means anything is possible and you embrace it all. Standing in a crowd of thousands of people and realizing that everyone there is perfectly real will dwarf the ego to the dot of an i. That older lady walking by at the park is a widowed mother of three with a great sense of humor, and she is wondering what to make for dinner. We do not need to hear about her life, but there is a part of us that fully allows her to be, just as she is. In that awareness, she remains as infinite potential. In that awareness, we are all One. She allows your story to be, and you allow hers. In truth, that awareness swallows both stories up and all that remains is loving compassion. It's easy to do, just remind yourself that every "stranger" you see is completely real.
----------------------------------------------------
5. Forget everything you "know".
You do not know where you came from, where you are at, how you got here, or where you are going. You do not know what you believe in or why. You do not know what happened this morning, and you do not know what is happening now. You do not know what the world is, where it is, or what's in it. You do not know what humans are. You do not know what death is, and you do not know what life is. You do not know what food, dreams, sex, and time are. You do not know what anything is, but above all, you do not know what you are. That's the biggest question of all, and you do not know the answer. You will never "know". What a big fat relief! Just consider yourself to be a huge, ambiguous question mark and everything you "know" is just outside of you. You are completely separate from all of it. Every last detail. How can a huge, ambiguous question mark know anything? The instant you know something you are no longer a question mark. But how can you not be what you are? It's an impossible dream. Everything you "know" is the ego. It's not good, bad, or any shade in between--it's just not you. Forget everything you ever learned, said, read, saw, dreamed, or hoped for and be what you are. Simple.
That said, I assume that anyone who is genuinely interested in this discussion probably enjoys seeing life change.
I should also say that any method, exercise, or technique geared towards uprooting the ego should be seriously viewed as nothing more than a temporary experiment. That is, this should not become a belief-system, formal religion, thought-process, extended practice or long-term goal--because all of these manifestations ARE the ego. These 5 little paragraphs are meant to be viewed as nothing more than experiments:
ex⋅per⋅i⋅ment: (-noun) 1. a test, trial, or tentative procedure; an act or operation for the purpose of discovering something unknown or of testing a principle, supposition, etc.: a chemical experiment; a teaching experiment; an experiment in living.
These are not to be believed, gained, defended, accumulated, labored over, or kept. They are to be experienced, lightly evaluated and then laid aside for that which lies beyond.
1. Stop looking at "yourself".
The absolute perfect love that you are has never been seen through the veil of the ego. Not once has the ego seen who you really are. However, the practical aspect of this experiment is very easy and very effective in removing the veil. Simply stop looking at yourself. Stop staring every time you brush your teeth in the morning, walk by a mirror, enter a glass door, get into the car, pass by a window, or in any other situation where you catch a reflection. Stop looking at photos and videos of yourself. If you need to fix your hair, by all means, use a mirror to look at your hair. If you have something in your nose, use a mirror to look up your nose. But put a full-stop to looking at reflections of "yourself" and thinking that is you. That is NOT you! It is a piece of reflective glass and nothing more. It is ink on paper. It is pixels on a screen. The thought that the reflection is you is a dream. You can never truly "see" yourself as you really are. Just try it! It's impossible. You can look down and see hands, legs, and feet...but you cannot see you. The ego has told you a lie for far too long that you are reflections. It's a game of smoke and mirrors. Take a break from it and learn to see yourself in things other than glass. Whether you think you are cute, fat, average, stunning, skinny, old, tanned, or indifferent, simply forget what the reflections show you. Stop looking at reflections, and see who you really are. Simple.
----------------------------------------------------
2. Stop "choosing".
You did not choose where you were born. You did not choose your parents. You did not choose your sex, skin color, body-type, or how big your feet are. You did not choose the life-defining events that happened during the first few years of youth. You did not choose who you think you are. You did not choose what you find funny or how smart you are. You did not choose your name or whether your friends love you. You did not choose your personality. You did not choose what kind of food you like or what turns you on. You did not choose your last heart-beat, breath or thought. You did not choose those memorable "kodak moments". Nor did you choose the painful events of your worst nightmare. Simply put, you did not choose the story of you. But the problem is not choice, the problem is that there is no you to choose! Stop pretending you have a choice and life becomes exponentially simpler. Seriously ask, "What have I ever really chosen?" Choice only arises when there are two. But when the ego is seen through, there is only one. The illusion of choice is the ego's merry-go-round. See what happens when you stop "choosing".
----------------------------------------------------
3. Forget the names of everyone you "know".
Does your loving pet care what your name is? Does he even know it? Probably not, and yet he loves you just the same. The ego, however, is drowning itself in a sea of conceptual character names. Every person the ego meets needs to be properly labeled--and it most certainly needs everyone to know it's own label! This keeps everyone, including you, under it's control, neatly defined, and firm within it's little fantasy world. It's the starting point for building all the conceptual stories about who everyone is and how they compare and contrast to you. Stop with the name calling! Just be with your friends, family and co-workers without the conceptual names, roles and labels. Let go of the whole story you invented (good or bad) that goes along with those names, and just be with them. Instead of having dinner with your conceptual sister Mary, just go to dinner with that person exactly as she is, in that exact moment. The truth of who she is cannot be appreciated in the four little letters; M - A - R - Y. In fact, her true name is far too long for you to even speak. One small aspect of her might be that she is your sister, but that is definitely not who she is in every waking moment. Not in the slightest! Nobody is who you think they are, because you are not who you think you are. This could be called forgiveness, or letting go of the past. It might seem abstract, but simply strip the names from those you "know" and see who they are without them--see who you are without them.
----------------------------------------------------
4. Remember that every "stranger" you see is real.
Every single person you have ever seen pass by is completely real. They are reality. It is most helpful to remember this and experience it daily. This experiment is essentially an inversion of the third experiment. In the above example, we were attempting to forget the make-believe stories of those people we supposedly "know", whereas here we are attempting to intimately know those we call "strangers". This does not mean you need to talk to every person and hear their story--that would be an impossible ego game. You don't even need to see them walk by (although it helps). You are simply recognizing the fact that every single "stranger" has a complex, conceptual story that is just as vivid and seemingly real as the ego thinks yours is. From the grotesque up through the sublime, in that recognition, you undermine all stories and move beyond them. The millions of details, fragmentations and differences do not matter, but the fact that you are fully capable of embracing all stories is of infinite value. It means anything is possible and you embrace it all. Standing in a crowd of thousands of people and realizing that everyone there is perfectly real will dwarf the ego to the dot of an i. That older lady walking by at the park is a widowed mother of three with a great sense of humor, and she is wondering what to make for dinner. We do not need to hear about her life, but there is a part of us that fully allows her to be, just as she is. In that awareness, she remains as infinite potential. In that awareness, we are all One. She allows your story to be, and you allow hers. In truth, that awareness swallows both stories up and all that remains is loving compassion. It's easy to do, just remind yourself that every "stranger" you see is completely real.
----------------------------------------------------
5. Forget everything you "know".
You do not know where you came from, where you are at, how you got here, or where you are going. You do not know what you believe in or why. You do not know what happened this morning, and you do not know what is happening now. You do not know what the world is, where it is, or what's in it. You do not know what humans are. You do not know what death is, and you do not know what life is. You do not know what food, dreams, sex, and time are. You do not know what anything is, but above all, you do not know what you are. That's the biggest question of all, and you do not know the answer. You will never "know". What a big fat relief! Just consider yourself to be a huge, ambiguous question mark and everything you "know" is just outside of you. You are completely separate from all of it. Every last detail. How can a huge, ambiguous question mark know anything? The instant you know something you are no longer a question mark. But how can you not be what you are? It's an impossible dream. Everything you "know" is the ego. It's not good, bad, or any shade in between--it's just not you. Forget everything you ever learned, said, read, saw, dreamed, or hoped for and be what you are. Simple.
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