“Everywhere transience is plunging into the depths of Being… It is our task to imprint this temporary, perishable earth into ourselves so deeply, so painfully and passionately, that its essence can rise again, “invisibly,” inside us. We are the bees of the invisible. We wildly collect the honey of the visible, to store it in the great golden hive of the invisible.”
—Rainer Maria Rilke, writing to his Polish translator about writing the “Duino Elegies”
“Why do we meditate?”
Suzuki answered with a laugh, “So you can enjoy your old age.”
Sit quietly. Be unheard. Do not even seek understanding of yourself. Sit and listen to the empty hum of the universe. Do not even listen. Sit as that empty hum.
“Meditation has served me well through the years, and continues to serve. And I don’t discourage anyone from doing it and doing it diligently. In fact, I have been practicing and/or teaching Vipassana meditation for nearly 30 years. What I am trying to express is that meditation cannot take you the last part of the journey. No spiritual technique can, because they are all based on the assumption that there is something missing in your life that they can supply and that they will ultimately lead you to transformation if you just persist long enough. While it is true that meditation can give you many things (e.g., blessed experiences, better physical and emotional health, calmness and peacfulness, deepening compassion, intense focus and presence), it cannot awaken you. The final realization is that there is NOTHING missing, nothing amiss, and that everything you thought confirmed your existence as a separate entity is an illusion. This truth about our inherent condition is not developed, earned, created, or even discovered. It simply IS. It has never been missing. It is in fact the very Source of our searching. It is NO-SELF. No technique is needed to discover this nondual Awareness which is the background and Source of all experiences. Only seeing with the eyes of the heart is needed. Ultimately, all spiritual techniques can become blocks to his final realization because they are experiences, not the background. Look through them to the screen on which they appear. This is your true nature. And it is ONE with all that is…and all that is potential in the universe.”
Richard Young, 2011
Every human is an artist.
The dream of your life is
to make beautiful art
~ Miguel Ruiz
“Treat every moment as your last. It is not preparation for something else.”
~ Shunryu Suzuki
“Creativity is the state of consciousness which you enter into the treasury of your inner most being and bring the beauty into manifestation.”
— Torkom Sarahydarian
“Even my parents, though the causes of my biological existence, did not create the unique core of my being, but rather discovered me as a newly unfolding mystery in their midst.”
— from ‘Merton’s palace of nowhere’ by James Finley
Will 2018 be better than 2017?
Stop just for a moment… Did you immediately look inside or out? Just notice.
Invent your own most satisfying answer to:
“Who Am I Really?”
Forego logic and evidence. A short burst of creative play.
JDSaward 