Who Are You?

Something special

2011-11-13T12:12:00.000-08:00

There is a reassuredness that can come upon you anytime. A sense that everything is, well, as it is. That there's no need for anything to be different, but a knowing that it will be so. Everything will be different and yet everything remains the same in that life continues to be.
There's a sense of place, of restful purpose. As though one is being carried through life on a sedan chair. Always effortless, always flowing, always irresistible.
How to get there? Relax, enjoy, know that it's fine, wish others well, heck, wish yourself well. Expect it to be the best and have no idea what the best is. And after a while there is a stillness, a sense of space emerges. Hush.
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Here, now, love

2011-09-14T11:39:00.000-07:00

Every moment is actually a glorious moment, and not knowing how glorious it is in no way detracts from the glory, from the reality of this glory, which can always be felt and is instantly accessible. For, as they say, love is all around us, and it is not only around us, it is inside us, and not only that, it is us. And you have to work pretty hard to block the love, and there have been moments, so many moments when it has been blocked. What has to happen to let the love flow? Not then, not when, right now? This moment is for you.

Life is

2011-09-01T01:43:00.000-07:00

Life is not an outcome. If you think of the outcome of your life, what is it: The moment when everything is just perfect; Or when you get everything done; Or the moment just before you death, whenever that may be? If you had to choose whether an outcome is life or death, you would have to say it is like death, in the sense that someting is over. Life is not an outcome, it just is.
Life is not a process. It’s not even a million processes. They are all going on, responding to whatever they are responding to, being, doing. But the processes, where they persist, are mere guidelines, down which life channels, until life finds another channel.
Life is not something where we have to make stuff happen. Stuff is happening all the time, life does its thing.
So what is life? Well, the nearest we can get to it may be to say that it is life. Saying life is life may take us nowhere, but maybe staying here is the challenge. Calling life something else may give the illusion of progress without taking us anywhere either. At this level, words are just words, seen through the skein of our own interpretation: life is.

Magic moments

2011-08-20T02:02:00.000-07:00

This moment is magical, the one you are experiencing right now, and every other moment too, utterly magical. Yet existence is so easily taken for granted, it is after all, the way that it is. But the reason why existence exists is not obvious, and that is OK. It's an incredible mystery, and that is part of the process.
We don't need to say "It's God" or "It's random" or "It's something else", as though that would explain it; it doesn't explain anything. Anyway, connecting with it is so much more fun. Feel the life force flowing through you as though you are alive, as though it is alive, as though the whole thing is alive.
There is - or may be - no kingdom of heaven anywhere else. It is a right here, right now kind of thing. You are in it, I am in it, we are all here.

Shooting match

2011-08-07T13:35:00.000-07:00

And then there is, or rather here is, something absolutely amazing, and that is being. Just being, nothing more, it is enough, for it contains everything, it is everything and nothing more need be sought. It's the whole shooting match, dancing with itself until the end of time.
There is also this sense of something else, something beyond, something inside, and it can be tasted or at least sensed, and it is IT too, and it lacks nothing either. It is irridescent, it is life, it is just so.
And if it could speak, and it can, if it could speak it would say it's OK, it's happening, let it be. Sooner or later we will stop struggling and flow with something altogether greater. And then we will forget and then we will remember and then we will forget again. And this is life recognizing itself. We will love it, and it is love. Altogether a little bit dizzying.

A momentary knowing

2011-07-25T13:11:00.000-07:00

What if you knew that you were absolutely and completely protected at all times and in all places? Sure, you are, but what if you knew it, knew it in such a way that there was no question of a moment's doubt: how would your life be different, how would the experience of each and every moment change? And there is a space where you can know that this is true.
The evidence that you have been absolutely and completely protected at all times and in all places is that you are here now, reading these words. That's the evidence, and it is pretty compelling. Would you doubt it, and if you would doubt it, why would you do so? Your world is as complete as it is. It is evolving as it is evolving. It is coming to pass.
You could come to terms with it, you could love it as it is, and love it as it may become.

Ready, steady, breathe

2011-07-18T00:04:00.000-07:00

Always and everywhere I’ve been wondering, wondering and wandering. Thinking there must be something, imagining something and then feeling something, seldom noticing the miracle of existence itself. For here we are.
It seems that, take the view that there is nothing and nothing comes, take the view that there is something, and it emerges, inch by inch, into the day to day, the divine moment arrives. And yet it was always here, right here, right now, this being the time and the place, as it were, that one is. Welcome it, love it, say yes to what you don't know that you always knew.
Always, the only limitation is oneself, and that needs gentle and forgiving work. Ready, steady, breathe.

The Sieve of Yourself

2011-07-08T05:44:00.000-07:00

You know it is not about this or that, it is always about you and your relation to this and that. And the way you change your relation to this and that is by changing yourself, so either way it is about you.
Yet it is not about the you that you know to be you, amazing as it is, for you already know that. It is about the you that you do not yet know to be you, which is even more amazing, for in coming to know that, you come to know the gateway to everything, for you know everything through the sieve of yourself.
So life, real life, begins with you, and it begins anew in this moment. And life, real life, is available in all its glory in this moment, for it is not not-being: it is being. And you may have noticed that you are being. And it may feel that there is one multitudinous being, and you are part of that multitude, gloriously interconnecting in a myriad of ways, and yet simultaneously preserving its individuality. An extraordinary concoction, don't you think?

What do you know?

2011-05-23T01:09:00.001-07:00

What do we know? That we are, but if we don't know who we are, then we don't know the we that is. So itt may be truer to say that something is, and that provides a base for something more.
If we know that something is then at least three things are implied: there is a something, there is a someone and there is somespace, i.e. the space between the someone and the something, and somespace is occupied by the relationship of the someone and the something to one another.
These three elements in turn suppose a fourth; and that is the totality of the three; and if we postulate a pouch inside which they fit, then there is the possibility of something else over and beyond them, like other someones and somethings, which take us into the fifth and beyond. But when all this is said: what do we know?

Yours for the asking

2011-05-23T01:01:00.000-07:00

First, be thankful. In a sense, that's enough. Your thankfulness changes your relationship. Be thankful for what? By all means be thankful for this or that, which will change your relationship with this or that. Better, be thankful for life, for life is what you have. More than that, life is who you are. You are life, surrounded by life, relating to life. When you are thankful for life, you change your relationship with life.
Second, know that everything is evolving, or not evolving in the moment. Life continues to propitiate life. You may see some of it, a relationship, a flower, an opening out of your consciousness. Each of us sees so little, but the underlying truth can be seen. And what else would you see?
Third, ask for guidance. For there is what you are aware of and what you are not aware of. There is consciousness that you are conscious of, and there is consciousness that you are not conscious of, and there is a consciousness that is greater and vaster than the consciousness you routinely access. Yet you can at least ask for guidance, and you will be guided; you may even experience guidance. It is yours for the asking. And if there were such a form, if there were such a process, why would you not engage?
Thank you.

Gliding through the world

2011-05-02T00:54:00.000-07:00

There's a feeling of relief, to still be alive, not that I am aware of any impending challenge, it's just majestic. And I am grateful for this breath, and this one, even though in most moments, I don't remember to be thankful. It is enough to be connected and to remember the connection from time to time.
Where else is there to go? Wherever you go, you are you. What else is there to do? Whatever you do, you are you. And so we glide through the world, imagining it all to be real.
Who else is there to be? For that's the question. To be what you do not know yourself to be, to become what you have not yet discovered, but dimly sense, to become unbecoming, to cease, to be.

Not a jot, not a single thing

2011-04-08T03:36:00.000-07:00

Right now, right here and now, you need absolutely nothing that you don't have. You can check by imagining that you are missing something that you need and then travel forward a few seconds of time, notice that you are OK and that you still don't have it. So you don't need what you don't have.
And this also applies to every moment of your life so far. You always had what you needed for every moment and the evidence is that you are here now. So far, so good.
As for the future? Well it exists only in your imagination, so you might as well imagine one in which you have everything you need, you know; as always.
Life, who would have it any other way?

A field of joy

2011-03-27T12:36:00.000-07:00

In every moment there is this connection, sensed or not, within which our consciousness drifts, not knowing where it has come from, what it is, or where it is going, clinging to the familiar, as though that provides meaning. And yet there is purpose, as life unfolds from an unawareness of its unawareness into an awareness of its unawareness, and then venturing into a field of joy.
And though the ego may shout "What about me?" if it would only still itself, it would hear the universe whispering back "There is so much to enjoy".
When we recognise that our thoughts are only our thoughts, our emotions are only our emotions and our obsessions are only obsessions, we may be willing to surrender them in the search for something more than being this little self, lovely as that may be.
So let it go. Yes, that and that. And when it is all gone, there You are.

If God is God then

2011-03-13T01:53:00.000-08:00

If God is God then God hears everything. If God hears everything then God hears you; always. And if God hears you, you are speaking to God everytime everytime you speak.
So if God is God then you can speak to God anytime. In fact, you would be speaking to God all the time, whether or not you are aware, whether or not you intend to do so.
So if you do not know whether God is or what form God would take, try talking to God mindfully. Some people may call it prayer. Be aware that you may be talking to God even in this moment, imagine you are talking to God in the moments to come, and look out for the responses that may emerge.
After all, what do you think this life is?

Little short of a ...

2011-03-07T06:47:00.000-08:00

There is a mystery that is all around us and inside of us waiting to express itself. Unnoticed, it persists, radiating magical life, for this is the miracle of miracles: life itself.
And you know who you are? You are life. This is it. You are the miracle, you are life expressing itself, you are life noticing itself expressing itself. You are the miracle watching the miracle.
And how does this feel, how does it feel to be part of the miracle, how does it feel to be its essence?
If we allow that there could have been nothing, nothing at all, then how unlikely is it that there is something? And more than something: this, in all its majesty.
We, who could perhaps have been nothing, are part of something utterly amazing: we are utterly amazing. There is icing on the cake too: that is to notice the miracle of being; and there is a candle.
Don't you just love this living thing.

Being heard

2011-02-27T08:30:00.000-08:00

You hear me, I know that. And because I know that you hear me, I know that you are there. To invert Descartes ("I think therefore I am"): you hear me, therefore you are. One knows when one is heard: and that is enough.
We cry out and we are always heard - whether we know it or not - every thought, every word, every action in every moment. In fact, there is no way not to be heard, there is no way not to resonate. We are always resonating, but resonating with what?
The splendid opportunity - the responsibility - is to develop your resonance. And then to speak, and having spoken to know that you are heard, and that is all.

The Other Path

2011-02-20T06:52:00.000-08:00

There is another path through life. But in order to see the Other Path it is necessary first to see that you are on a path and then to see that there is an Other Path.
The Other Path is not a path through the physical world. Such paths lead you everywhere and nowhere. There value lies in how they may change you, which is not a path through the physical world at all. The Other Path is neither visible nor physical but it is absolutely real.
The Other Path is neither the journey of the self into the world nor the journey of the world into the self.
The Other Path can be regarded as the Journey of the Self but it is more than that. It involves the transendence of the Self so that the Self is, to all intents and purposes, no longer the Self; at least it is not the Self you know. It is the path from the Little Self to the Greater Self and through the Greater Self to towards the whole. It is the journey into unity.
It is a journey into consciousness and through consciousness that into a greater consciousness, from little being, through becoming and into bigger being.

A little like love

2011-02-13T03:01:00.000-08:00

I have had a great time here, really - it's been a blast. So thank you for letting me be a part of it, thanks for more than letting, thanks for creation, thanks for life itself. I am hoping for more, looking forward to more, not counting on anything, but confident of something. Of what? A presence. Something utterly glorious, unseen but not unsensed. And lo and behold, it is you, or at least the tiniest aspect of you - a brush across my cheek. And so I float, gently, in this soup of being.
There's more than that: divine promptings accessible in every moment. As if I needed anything more.
On my own, I am ... well actually I am never on my own, for you are always here, and how can you not be here, and that is the glory of it. And there is so much more of you to know while I bumble around, and that is OK too, more than OK. It feels a little like love.

I feel therefore we are

2011-02-06T11:02:00.000-08:00

French philosopher Rene Descartes famously remarked that, "I think therefore I am". But he might as well have said, "I feel therefore I am". Thinking is no closer than feeling is to being.
Or better, he could have simply said "I am", though that would have seemed less logical. However, it is possible to build upon the "I am" statement, without restricting ourselves to the valley of thought.
As Ken Wilber has observed, having noticed that "I am" one can notice that as well as an "I" that is being noticed, there is a noticer who is - well - doing the noticing, and now, hey presto, we have the "subjective self" and the "objective self".
However, we can go further in a particularly interesting direction. Better than "I think therefore I am" or "I feel therefore I am" is "I feel therefore we are". To adapt the saying "beliefs divide, values unite", we have "thoughts divide, feelings unite" or even the mind analyzes, the heart encompasses.
Better still, would be to notice that there is "one that is" and one that is "noticing that there is one that is", even if the latter turns out to be part of the former.

A Bigger Truth

2011-01-31T10:04:00.000-08:00

Fore decades I thought "I am". This thought took many forms including "I am successful", "I am a failure" and even simply "I am". But this very partial truth is trumped by a more complete truth - "We are" - and this, in turn, is part of a bigger truth that "Life is". Even so, these words may not convey the majesty.
From the perspective of "Life is", the sentiment that "I am" represents the grossest shrinkage. One is not so much as a full-stop in a library; the narrow "one" is almost nothing.
Yet there is good news. Each one really is part of the whole, and the whole really is. So the whole is in you and you are in the whole, oh holy one.

Feel the Flow and Do it Anyway

2011-01-10T11:01:00.000-08:00

Susan Jeffers wrote a best-selling book Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway. Brilliant as it is, there is another view: Feel the Flow and Do it Anyway. There is Flow everywhere - in fact everything is flowing.
We could say there is nothing but Flow. But if that is so how come it doesn't feel that way? Because we let ourselves get in the way. You can notice yourself getting in the way when you are thinking about ... yourself.
A worry, for example, is usually a worry about yourself - "Will I keep my job?" "What will happen to me?" "What will they think of me?" But getting out of the way isn't so easy especially if, like me, you spent decades getting in the way. And resisting interference usually stimulates more interference.
This leads to the paradox of the self: the more you know you are nothing, the more you can connect with everything. And the more you feel you are something - especially something special - the more you disconnect. A lilttle qualification: the life force that is in you is absolutely amazing. It is, however, the same life force that is in everything else. It is life in all its abundance.
I spent years thinking "I am", a sentiment which is qualified by the bigger truth "We are", which is also part of a bigger truth "Life is". Even so, these words may not convey the majesty, for from the perspective of "Life is", the sentiment that "I am" is, well, puny.

Happy New Year

2011-01-05T10:10:00.000-08:00

A few things to say at the start of a year. First, congratulations on having survived the last one. You'll probably survive this one too. Second, welcome to this one - another awesome experience beckons. As we enter a new year, what's the point? When we are unaware, perhaps the point is to find it. So what's yours.
The start of the year may be a good time to review the blog. It has a new title - Reflections on Being - which has been popping into my mind recently. What the point of the blog? It is a means, not an end. At it's best, it may prompt you somehow. A slight shift in awareness. A clearer hearing of a deeper calling within. The fostering of inner space.
For me personally writing these short reflections is also an exercise in trust. A simple trust that words will flow nicely. That there is, after all, something to say, that a simple quality may adorn mere words.
Happy New Year.

Every little thing

2010-12-21T09:45:00.000-08:00

What if everything were provided for you? Absolutely everything. Well, here's the thing. It is. Every breath you take, every mouthful of food, every drop of drink. Every thought, every emotion, every great idea.
Even you. For you who did not create yourself have been created, and are part of all that has been created. You are - of course - the recipient of everything you receive. You are a vessel of that which flows through you as the temporary feels the eternal, if only for a moment; and another, and another.
So there is a never ending dance of life and change and death. And you get to experience the changing. And yet you can also get to sense the unchanging, poised as you are, a bridge between one and the other.
I mean, really, you couldn't make this up.

Why You Are Here - Briefly

2010-12-20T10:11:00.000-08:00

"Why You Are Here - Briefly" has recently been published by O Books. 100+ bite-sized dialogues to prompt you on your journey through passion and purpose, meaning and mission, life and death.
This feels like a good place to say something about the book. People have asked how long it took to write? One answer is no time at all, because most of the dialogues came to me out of the blue. Walking idly through a park I would notice a dialogue pop into my awareness and scurry off to my PC. I got quite excited - probably overexcited - at the form, the short snappy dialogues, which was new to me.
But the title took ages to emerge. I struggled with bizarre titles like "Rimi and Klep" and later the more workmanlike - if prosaic - "Signposts for Searchers" and during this period, several years ago, approached a handful of publishers without a flicker of interest, so I left it to gather dust, so another answer to the how long did it take question is about seven years.
Once the title "Why You Are Here - Briefly" came to me I presented it to O Books who snapped it up. You can view a sample at Amazon.
I remain interested in simple formats that may prompt understanding and hope more will emerge.

In Summary - Living In Flow with Everything

2010-12-03T05:56:00.000-08:00

What is life, real life: Living In Flow with Everything. And as you live in flow with everything the boundaries - that are only part of our paradigm - dissolve, and you start to see clearly what is. And what is that? Call it what you will, call it Isness, and you have moved away from it into labelling, but what else to do?
Just be? Let's go with connect. You cannot be yourself - the self we are attempting to describe - without connecting with it. And what is that self? We could say it is the greater self, not the fragment that most of us experience. But let us go further and say that it is not a fragment of the whole: it is the whole.
So who are you? The whole thing; which is not to say that the fragment is the whole - the fragment is only a fragment - it is to say that you are not merely that fragment. You are in the whole and the whole is in you: there is no difference here. In the sum of all things there is only the sum.
That tiny little self you have known, the one that blinks into and out of consciousness, and that in less than a century - much less - will be nothing, is the tiniest undulation. You, on the other hand, you are Living In Flow with Everything.

The Breath of Life

2010-12-03T05:43:00.000-08:00

And so thoughts begin to turn to the next year. If you are still breathing, you are still in this game, this great and glorious game called life, where you get to be an aspect of it reflecting life back upon itself. And what is life? A process of change, for without change there is no life, and with change there is life. The change may feel comfortable or uncomfortable, it may feel like forward or backward movement. In any event it is life.
As well as the life that you observe, there is the life that is you, and they are really two aspects of the same, and as soon as you have the internal and the external you have the relation between the two: three in one, the divine trinity.
So there is no other, only your brother. And we are ...

The happening engine

2010-11-27T09:40:00.000-08:00

When you notice that what is happening is just what is happening, and that there is an isness that is informing all that is happening, through - as it were - a happening engine, you can start to connect with something that is utterly amazing.
In the centre is the stillness and as you swirl closer you get stiller, if not dizzier, and where would you rather be? Come to that, would you rather not be?
However, pure being, or isness, gets occluded in the generality and specificity of doing and having. The melodrama of life. When you do, you aren't still. When you have, you aren't so free simply to be.
Being has nothing. Being is everything. To be or ...

The whole shmoodle

2010-09-26T10:09:00.000-07:00

So there is something beyond that which we currently understand, our understanding may expand any time. We may reach for a connection with a deeper truth and we may allow it to reach us, it comes bidden. And alongside that arising awareness is a keener awareness of the mystery of everything, and that mystery is in everything, crinkling gently.
The thing is it is alive; the whole thing. And we are not separate from that life. We utterly depend on it. We are something that life flows through, we are vessels of life. Nothing more, nothing less. Yet it is even closer than being a vessel. And when we are done with this life, the consciousness that was here will have gone, and yet consciousness remains. We continue, without that sense of I. And you can embrace some of that now, and in that embrace you are embraced.
One life, world without end.

Great leaders are following something

2010-07-20T00:26:00.000-07:00

First of all, I do not wish to be a leader. First: I wish to be a follower. What star, then, am I following? I aim to follow what I will call the divine star. The divine star stands for all that is glorious in creation, for what is unfolding, the best that is yet to come: it is potential in a nutshell.
The Christians among us will recognise the language Thy will be done: what is thy will? And what is thy will in each situation? Without attempting to sense thy will, asking for thy will to be done is a pious hope. Great spiritual leaders sense the divine will. Their only wish is to be in accord with it.
Let me go further and say that all leaders, certainly all great leaders, must be followers. What is it that they are following? They are following their vision. They see how things are not. They see how things can be, and they set off in that direction.
A great leader who is not following such a vision is merely contemplating, getting ready for the off. That leader may be waiting for the vision to come. But a leader who is leading others who does not have such a vision is bereft, and may lead their followers onto the rocks.
Get your vision. And if you haven’t yet got a vision, what are you waiting for?

Love is all around you

2010-07-19T04:53:00.000-07:00

Can you get it? Love is all around you. It always was, is and shall be, and the only blockage was ... well, you and me. We tap into it sometimes because it is there waiting for us. What an extraordinary experience this being thing is. It's searching, searching for something, searching for love.
What else were you looking for?
And the love is in you. Look for it there, and there you will find it. And the love is all around you, let is launch itself upon you, ravishing your heart, as it would. It's waiting, waiting, right there.

Thy will be done

2010-07-16T12:47:00.000-07:00

So the wish is that thy will be done. And this will transcends one's own will. It provides shape and circumstance to life, blessing one's being with glorious moments. It is provenance. It is leadership and it is being led, separation ends here.
Everything shifts from the self to the Self.
You can taste the difference. When your wish is to align your will with the divine will there is an endless stream of opportunities, and all of them are so aligned. There is so much, then, not to worry about. It is in the here and now, it is the here and now, it sustains everything; the all-in-all.

Really happening

2010-07-10T02:42:00.000-07:00

So this is really happening, right? Really happening. For a short while anyway. And yet it feels like it is happening again and again, same old, same old. Have I come to this point before? How could I know?
Yet there is the strongest feeling that there is something that I don't know and that this whole thing is deeply familiar. A remembrance of things past, lived again. Half-experienced skirmishes with being.
To what end? To no end. Some kind of giant circle. A spiral to nowhere. As I say, this is really happening, right?

The Symphony Proceeds

2010-06-30T04:46:00.000-07:00

Alright, you are energy, I am energy, and energy is all there is. Energy expressed as consciousness, energy expressed as matter, oodles of energy. And yet there is awareness, awareness of the energy, and in that awareness there is separation, there is twoness, subject and object, self and matter, one and the other.
I see you and you see me, and this is a convenient construction obscuring a greater truth. There is but one in a guise and another disguise; that's you and me.
And so the whole symphony proceeds. Light and dark and everything inbetween. That's you and me too.

One's company, two's a crowd

2010-06-22T09:57:00.000-07:00

When the self searches it discovers that what it thought was the self is not the self, and the self that it did not know heaves into view. But you cannot gain this new self without losing the other one: one's company, two's a crowd.
Losing one self and gaining another, yet not gaining; simply being. And in the being is everything. In truth, in reality, there is nothing that is not being, there is only being, the rest being a fanciful chimera.
All thinking, all doing, all having, has its source in being. And when the music stops, everything returns to being. So let us take a moment, there are so many, simply to be.

Three in one, One in three

2010-05-28T00:55:00.000-07:00

In the whole is the truth of everything, then there engine room of creation, and then there is creation itself. The abstracted whole is perfectly still and unchanging. Creation itself is continuously vibrant and undulating. And then the engine room of creation connects one to the other. A glorious trinity.
God, soul, person; Father, son, Holy Spirit; and one we go.
And where, exactly, are you? In the alive part, sure. But also in the engine room. And at your core, you are in the abstracted whole. In the end, there is no separation. Welcome to the whole schmoodle.

Being our cake and eating it

2010-05-14T03:16:00.000-07:00

We are deeply engaged in the process of reunification; or at least the illusion of the process of reunification. For we are already unified, and within this context we are also engaged in being separate with the blessing of the process of having it our own way. And that is deeply OK.
This is being our cake and eating it. Being separate and together, singing in unison and harmony: one song, for ever and ever. Dancing with life as the orchestra hums. It's all unfolding. And we wouldn't have it any other way.
For in the separation is all the variety one could want. So much choice. And in the unity is all the love one could ever want. So much feeling. And that is the way we are. What a ride!

Your self should know

2010-05-06T07:42:00.000-07:00

What to do when you don't know? Ask yourself. Ask who? Ask yourself who you are asking. Ask yourself who you are being. The self is always available. On hand to provide dollops of wisdom. So what are you asking for?
This greatness is beyond your grasp. Actually it is ungraspable. It is in the moment. It is on your shoulder. Behind your ear. In your heart. Ever aware yet flickering into and out of awareness. Take a low breath and notice: can you feel it?
There is no gap there. There is no gap between you and universal consciousness. You do not sit outside its awareness. It was never not there, never not here. It's the simplest thing you could imagine: imagine that.

A bit of a set up

2010-05-03T12:02:00.000-07:00

Well, here's the thing. So far as I know, I did not create myself. That makes me part of that-which-has-been-created, rather than the creator or that-which-creates, though on an ongoing basis it feels like I am creating. If I am merely part of that-which-has-been-created, then I have to say I am massively grateful, because this life, well life itself, is frankly amazing; I am beside myself with wonder.
Alternatively, I did create myself, in which case I may have been at this life thing for rather a long time. Do you ever get the feeling that you are going round the block, and round the block again, life after life. In this case, thank you, or whoever I was being for setting this whole thing up. I am beside myself with wonder (again).
And then maybe, both are true, depending on who I think of myself as being, and for that matter having been. Alternatively, we could try to imagine that neither are true. I have not been created and I did not create myself. I am just, well, beyond time. Part of the great dance of life with life. Hush, I hear music.

One for all

2010-04-25T10:04:00.000-07:00

In the oneness is everything, and there is nothing that is not in the oneness, and there is nothing in the oneness that is not being. One and being are united in one being.
All is one, and the one is knowing itself. And you are the one. You are the one you have been searching for. Who else could it have been? And I am the one. I am the one I have been searching for. Who else?
And yet the self we are discovering is the self that is, was and will forever be. It is beyond the world of fragmentary beingness, it is not simply hither and thither, it simply is. So we want a little more depth.
Yet we can linger in the languid shallows, and many do, and depth may not appear to be so inviting, yet something resonates, and one notices the years going by, and there is something to do, to be, to realise, and in that realisation is everything.
That step, it's right here.

Knowing oneself

2010-04-21T09:35:00.000-07:00

Of course, there is no me and you, meaning a separate me and you. There is only me and you meaning a together me and you; and there is more than this, for there is me and you and a together everything else.
"Are we together?" As they say in some places. Meaning do we understand one another, but what if we understand that there is no other. There is only the self, the whole self and nothing but the self. And what if, as we understand there is no other, we also understand that there is no self, meaning the sense-of-separate self; our separate identity, our own consciousness. There is nothing except for everything, that is the reality. How could any of it be different?
So we have come to this. We don't need to get that we are we - whatever we mean by that - and God is God, - whoever we mean by that - we need to get it that there is only ONE, not simply one God, one being which embraces us, not merely embraces us in the sense of wrapping God-like arms around us, but embraces us because it can do no other: it is one. How could it be otherwise? How could we be otherwise?

You, honestly

2010-04-17T00:23:00.000-07:00

What is the truth? What is, that's the truth. Can we ever describe it? sort of: to describe it is to reduce it to words, and it is not words, so every description is nothing more than a cartoon.
Who is the truth? You are, you are being the truth, you are the truth. And the truth - or if you like being the truth - will set you free. You always were, you are and you always will be, until the end of time, and when is that?
Time is present while doing is happening. We see that doing brings life, of a sort, to being, and so we are. Without doing in some shape or form, time has come to an end. Being may be, but it is not persisting through time, we are outside of time. And of course we always were.
So let us live this truth of our being: we are here, we have turned up, we are engaging in something so utterly amazing that the gloriousness of it passes us by.

A place inside a tent

2010-04-02T07:02:00.000-07:00

When the self searches for the self, it finds that it was the self searching. When the self searches for love, it finds that it is love. Nothing more or less.
So life is as you find it to be. So what is the self? A fiction. When you get right down to it there's no self: there's a breath, a wave, an undulation of the whole. A place inside a tent.
What is there? Each imagined self imagining its separateness, and to that extent being separate, but that passes. In the end there's a circle, and you are right back where you started: Not being separate. Yet wasn't this whole helter-skelter thing something quite amazing. Mhmm, there goes life.

A taste of life (the search for the self continues)

2010-03-27T01:56:00.000-07:00

That's the one. No-one else, just you, but can you find it? If it has the quality of continuance then, and we might as a shorthand reference call that the "continuing self", then it is not the stream of thoughts that pass across the screenplay of your mind, not those bubbling emotions that arise and subside, nor even the food that becomes your body. The continuing self is something else.
One way to look at it, not that you can actually look at it, is to notice that the seer is not the seenery (sic), in others words, you are not that which you see, or for that matter taste, smell or whatever, so perhaps you are the taster. But what is the taster? On closer inspection there is just the practice of tasting, an associated sensation and perhaps a thought like "That tastes OK". And then it passes, but what of the you that remains?
Suppose you can see the seer doing the seeing. Now that quality of seeing has dropped into the seenery too. And what is left? Nothing, and now you are getting close.

The tiny miracle of existence

2010-03-21T08:41:00.000-07:00

Surrounded as we are by miracles, the greatest miracle of all is existence itself, the miracle of being. Though that merits amazement, there would be nothing to be amazed without the transcending miracle of being conscious.
Now we can be aware of being conscious. We can notice that. We can feel the life force that courses through everything. We can notice that we are a part of that. And in the knowing of no-separation is the glory of everything. Here we are and where are you?
None of this had to be. You did not have to be. And yet you are. Quite a revelation.

I'm only dancing

2010-03-08T04:49:00.000-08:00

Like a drunk who has forgotten his true nature, that which is not quite itself grapples with that which is itself. Being befuddled, the drunk does not quite understand it. In stupor, the drunk has forgotten who he is: a strange and beautiful being beyond his current understanding; thank God.

So gradually - and there are so many years to do this - its sense of itself expands. The darker self gets to know the lighter self by becoming it. The little self encounters the greater self and gets to know it by becoming it. It becomes one.

The space it enters feels something that resembles like a light space, where nothing heavy remains, and all is light. And there it flies and is free. And there is the dance of life. And there was no darkness, only the blinking of your eyes. Now, shall we?

Let's talk about death

2010-03-04T01:48:00.000-08:00

Having recently passed fifty, I have come to a stunning realisation: death - in the sense of passing out of this world - is coming, and is merely a matter of time. The personality known as Nigel Linacre won't last forever, no!
Well, that may seem obvious. But it turns out that the fear around death comes from resisting it, even being in denial about it: "It won't happen to me!" Denial causes great discomfort, release comes in acceptance.
In our youth death is easily and perhaps happily overlooked. but we are expected to be sad about death. But maybe that is just a learned response. True we could be sad about our loss. On the other hand, if we take the view that they have gone to a better place, we could be delighted for their gain: free at last! My own experience has been that I have become even closer to friends and family after they have gone. They have felt as close as my shoulder, so no sense of loss there.
There is something quite magical here: once you get that it is coming, it can become something of an adventure in prospect. And it sure as hell - sorry - sharpens your sense of being in this world: so much to do, so little time; this time around anyway, or maybe there isn't so much to do, maybe it was only ever a matter of being.
If you have only this one life - and as the personality you currently inhabit, it rather looks that way - what will you be while you are here? How gloriously will you manifest?
Death is hardwired into life and vice versa, and all change is both, and life is change and death is change. Your cells are constantly being born and dying, your thoughts are always being born and dying, and so you trudge.
And if this life is the great adventure, a greater adventure awaits.

Leadership in an uneasy age

2010-02-23T05:16:00.000-08:00

As a leader, where are you walking? What is your purpose and how do you sense when you are acting on purpose?
Leadership isn't easy. It is more demanding than followership. By definition, you are charting unchartered territories, though others may have traversed similar terrains, and you may have traversed enough to know that there is always a way through, there just is.
As an amazing leader, you can sense the promised land. You know that the prmised land can be reached. As a spiritual leader, you know that the promised land is at hand. There is nowhere else to go but to find that you are already here. And as a teacher, you may enable others to experience that too. Hello, we have arrived.

Getting over death

2010-02-18T04:00:00.000-08:00

If you are sitting comfortably, let's talk about death. While there's resistance to discussing death or even nodding to it's approach, not talking about it doesn't help.
Actually, one can't be sure consciousness does not continue beyond this lifetime. And as there is no point planning for nothing, the only eventuality worth planning for is the one where consciousness does indeed continue. What about that?
Buddhist belief that the mental-emotional state you are in after passing is very similar to the state you are in beforehand finds an echo in the Catholic absolution of sins. Move beyond what confines you: death is distinctly liberating. About as liberating as you can get.
The pain comes in not looking forward to it. Death involves moving beyond all fears, even those that have been clung to for a lifetime. And this would be true even for those who did not think there was anything to come.
However you look at it, this is the time to get your act together.

Change and the world changes with you

2010-02-04T13:06:00.000-08:00

What if you could change yourself so that everything changes? It all looks the same. But it all feels different because you are different. Wouldn't that be absolutely amazing? And you know, you can do that. Going to a new place helps to do that. But you could change right where you are.
The only thing you can directly change is yourself. You have no other vehicle. Everything else changes because you have changed. Nothing can change when you don't.
So it has been said, be the change. And that is you: you are a swirling vortex of change. This is the path and there is no other way. Statis is not possible. Bye-bye Kansas.

The shadow and the life

2010-02-02T11:06:00.000-08:00

The life you think you are having is but a shadow of the life you were born to lead, and your purpose is to come out of that shadow and into a fuller knowledge of yourself, which we will summarise as life in abundance. the way to know that glorious life is to experience it: there is no other way. Even though everyone's experience has subtle differences of trajectory: the way to experience it can now be made clear.
That way is not the provenance of any one religion or of atheism. It cannot be owned. It cannot be boxed without losing the essence of itself. It cannot be reduced to words, though they may point the way.
So let us start with some good news. The Good News is, the Good News is that you are not alone. You never were alone. There is one-who-walks-beside-you and that one-who-walks-beside-you was always beside you, is beside you now and will always be beside you, until the end of time.
This one beside you may apparently take many forms or remain formless. The form does not matter. But you can tune into this form in the here and now. There is absolutely nothing to prevent you from doing so, save the chimeras that even now are dissipating. Glory is all around you. You are glorious.

Will you walk a little further?

2010-01-31T10:06:00.000-08:00

It isn't what you do. It isn't even how you do it. It is who you are. And you are becoming who you are. And how, exactly, does that happen? You come to realise who you are, and as you realise who you are, you come to experience it. There is no other way.
This is the way. This is life. And you are walking it. So come, walk a little further and experience even more of what you already know to be true. This is the place to be. How else would you have it?

Who are you, baby?

2010-01-29T00:00:00.000-08:00

"I think therefore I am", said the much-admired French thinker Rene Descartes. But he could have said "I feel therefore I am", and avoided narrowing the focus of fellow philosophers ever since.
At the risk of sounding like a mystic, he could have simply saying that "I am", without focusing on any one particular sense. That would have been enough.
Or even more illuminating by remarking that "I notice that there is a thought and a thinker who is having the thought" and he could have got game set and match if he had noticed that there is not only a thought and a thoughtholder but there is also someone or something who is noticing the process. That's you, baby.

Purposefully on purpose

2010-01-24T05:40:00.000-08:00

You cannot help yourself: you are born into this, you fly through it, and then it is no more; or rather you are no more in it. Actually, it carries on very nicely, so where are you?
Rejoicing in your temporary sojourn, gnashing your teeth that it is all so brief, or avoiding the question. But you know, you have to face it sooner or later; the here and why question, for without purpose there is only happenstance. Would you want to leave it until the last minute to discover what it was that you are here for?
A whole life lived off purpose is not so easy to explain. Or maybe you are hoping there will be no need to explain anything. Just banking on oblivion. But if you did live your life on purpose, what purpose would that be?
There's a time to live and a time to die, and this is the time to live.

The myths of your life

2010-01-20T00:21:00.000-08:00

You are imagining all kinds of things: Telling yourself your story and then living it out. But it's hard to change the story, and anyway it's quite nice the way that it is. In my story, I am fighting demons only to discover they aren't really there. Then imagining they are within and saying hello to them here. In time, discovering they weren't really here either; just figments.
But it's hard not to be sucked back into the story, and even when you escape from one, there's another bigger story. In my bigger story, I am a Knight riding to the rescue of something. If there were no story, what would there be? Just what is: no interpretation, like the purest ice-cream with nothing added. Just a space to be glorious. For now, we are living the myth.
In my story, I am fighting demons only to discover that they aren't really there. Then imagining they are within and saying hello to them here. In time, discovering they weren't ...

The riddle of life and death

2010-01-18T07:59:00.000-08:00

You cannot have life without death and you cannot have death without life. Destruction begets creation and creation begets destruction.
Each cell's death precedes another's birth, each new thought ushers out an old one, and each life has a beginning and an end.
With change there is death. Without change there is no life. For life is change. And therefore, life is death.
Yet, and yet, throughout all of this, as you pass through every fire, is you, glorious you. Thoughts come and go, your cells are born and die again and again, and yet you are, the core of you is. Mind changes, body dies, sprit remains, constantly recreating.
Of course everything changes, and the part of you that is changing is constantly being born and dying, but you bestride like a collosus.

Whole lotta soul

2010-01-16T07:26:00.000-08:00

What is the soul? And can you encounter it? Let's proceed from what we know to what we are about to discover.
The part of you that you encounter in this life is a constant vortex of change, a shimmering shard of consciousness gliding through the world. At any moment in time it exhibits only some aspects of you.
Even looking at this life as a whole, it still manifests only a part of the totality that is you. However big you are currently being, you are only being a slice of the bigger cake.
You may regard the soul as being that part of you that has not incarnated into this life, or for that matter into any other life. It stands above the you who you are routinely experiencing. It knows you in this life, it knows you always. Now, here's the thing: you can get to know it. It's ready, what has to be present for you to be ready? And that's OK.

Life's a gift. Then you live

2010-01-14T06:28:00.000-08:00

Another extraordinary year and more. So far as I know, I did not create the year, for I did not even create this life, which makes it a gift, and I am the receiver. Boy, am I grateful, for it has been great.
And you know what? Another one has started. A big, hunkering 2010 is approaching, and I sense it could be amazing, even more than this one. Wouldn't that be glorious?
It's taking shape already.As receivers of all of this gloriousness, how can we not live up to it, by giving, giving, giving. What else to do with it all? Keeping it is obviously impossible. Time is forever slipping through our fingers. Nothing can be held in this space. Give everything before it is snatched from you.
All one can do is love every moment. Love it and let it go in this dynamic, supercharged, light-electric world.

Oooh, it's alive

2010-01-12T12:28:00.000-08:00

It really feels like the whole thing is alive. Not just every thing that surrounds us but the whole darn thing. One life surging around us. One life inside us.
A part of the whole discovering that it is not apart at all; nor even really a part; it never was. But separation had its own delectable joy and sorrow: The ups and downs of an exciting if not quite sustainable separation. So much drama along the way. It's fun making this up.

Objectifying the Self

2010-01-10T06:01:00.000-08:00

What if you just feel good anyway? Suppose you can call up any negative feelings that you may have picked up along the way, and thank them! And as you thank them for having been there, you notice you feel good because you are experiencing thankfulness, the elixir of happiness. The negativity that you thought was in a negative feeling only existed in your response to it.
Now the negative feeling has apparently lost its power, because you - the subject in this little drama - have, as it were, objectified it. And as you objectify everything, mind, body and even spirit, you gain an awesome freedom to feel fabulous.
You are no longer wedded to who you thought you were, because you are discovering a little more of who you really are. It's enough to be, enough already.

Ready, steady, here

2010-01-06T05:14:00.000-08:00

What if you were absolutely and completely and divinely protected every step of the way. If all of your life you were learning to make this faith walk, until you could make it effortlessly, for it is effortless.
Everything else requires effort: seeking and striving. Trusting requires just a little attunement. Surrendering to the moment is so easy that it can seem unreachable.
Viewed from a trusting perspective, life is soooo easy. Reach into the knowing. It's coming for you as soon as you are ready. Ready, steady, here.

There's something about leaders

2010-01-04T12:51:00.000-08:00

Leaders stand for ... what was it? There's something about leaders. You may not know where you are, but you sense they know where they are.
And that is because they are deeply connected with the world around them. They sense the world's sufficiency and its insufficiency, and they respond.
You may not know where you are going, but you sense that they know where they are going. Whether or not they have made it known, you sense that they have a purpose. Otherwise, why would you follow a purposeless person, even or a moment?
And whether or not it is yet known by a soul, they know that there is a way. How do they know? Because there is always a way. There are as many ways as there are moments, and there is an infinity of those.

This and thatness

2010-01-03T02:47:00.000-08:00

The Hindu sages have a saying: "I am that, you are that, this is that, and that is all there is". That's true as far as thatness goes, and it helps to understand that there is only one soup, and we are all in it.
However, as well as that - the object - there is this - the subject that is viewing the object. Philosophically speaking, we have the seer and the seen, or if you like, the seer, the seen and the process of seeing. In Christian terms, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
How can you apply this in the moment? When you see your hand, who do you sense yourself to be: the hand, the observer of the hand, the process? You can see yourself as the seer - this - and soften your attachment to the unseen, as you unclench your hand. Whatever you can see is not you. As the unseen seer, and with the greatest of respect to the Hindu sages, we could assert that: really, there is only this.

Loving the one who needs it most

2010-01-02T04:50:00.000-08:00

How do you see yourself? You can love or not love the self that you see; your self-image.
But what if you are not the self that you see? What if, instead, you are the seer of the self. Now you can view that self-image and give it what it needs, which is usually love.
So when you aren't feeling good about your self-image, don't try to change it! Don't even try to change how you feel about it. Focus instead on your real self, the part of you that is beyond the ups and downs of the world.
And so the soul comes to love the ego: the human condition; a perfect marriage.

Another day, another decade

2009-12-31T04:14:00.000-08:00

So what was all that about? If your next decade is to be really amazing, how is it starting to shape up in your inner world. Dare you ask for what you really want?
I look upon this next decade with a sense of anticipation, confident in a continuation of consciousness and the playground that surrounds us; for what else is there to do but play? We play out our hopes and fears and the world responds inviting us to play a little more. And we respond to its calling?
For this is the dance that you are engaged in, you can vary the tempo and strike a new note, but the dance continues, an endless revelry. So stride forth glad confident morning. Bring yourself on. What can you do but be?

Eyes wide open as you walk into

2009-12-30T01:19:00.000-08:00

Let's take a walk into the next decade. As you imagine yourself walking flowingly through a beautiful 2010, what comes up for you professionally, personally, in the rest of your life? What do you see, how does it feel and what if it gets even better: what a bit more specific?
Make a little more time and walk into 2011 ... 12 ... 13 and on and on. Does it get bigger, brighter, more beautiful? What makes you feel the best? There, that's it. And now it's time to go there.

The Christ light

2009-12-27T12:54:00.000-08:00

And the Christ light is born, where? In each of us. Where exactly? In our hearts. And how does that come about? Love recognises love, and knows that it is, and everything else ebbs away.
You can feel this love in any moment. It's always here, promising to envelope you. So why did he come? To show us the way. And which way is that? It is the way of your life.
Are you ready to take a little walk?

The power of a droplet

2009-12-23T01:06:00.000-08:00

Ho, hum, we prevent ourselves from swimming with the flow that is all around us, even feeling it. We imagine ourselves to be separate, and that has its own piquancy, but it also stimulates resistance, and there's the rub.
We imagine that what is out there is out there and what is in here is in here, when actually, there is just one big soup.
So there is something wonderful to look forward to: the best of both worlds. Seeing a world of apparent separateness yet sensing the connection. "Being in the world but not of it." Feeling the power of the ocean yet retaining the power of a droplet.

Love, actually

2009-12-22T00:40:00.000-08:00

Who are you here to be? You are here to be love. And when you are love you are in love and love is coursing through you, and where would you rather be. And when you are love you have the qualities of love. You are unconstrained, without limit, floating in this soup of beingness. And how would you rather be?
So this, exactly this, is your calling. So what is the mystery? We could say that it is how long it takes us to get that, but hey, what a beautiful journey. Would you not have walked this way?

The permeable and the impermeable

2009-12-20T06:56:00.000-08:00

Here you are floating through the miasma. It's all around you, energy everywhere infusing everything. And it is in you too, you are part of it, and you cannot get out of it and you cannot get it out of you.
Yet at another level, you are the observer of all of it. Nothing touches you. The permeable and the impermeable.
And as movement meets stillness there you are on the cusp. One touching the other. The other touching one. Rather delicate, wouldn't you say?

Love it all

2009-12-20T05:14:00.000-08:00

Most especially of all, love the bits of life that you don't like! The people who irritate you. The Government that got on your wick. Without your love, they can't change. They just remain stuck. But love changes everything. It thaws the fixedness and enables this and that to rejoin the flow of live.
That's why it makes great sense to love our enemies, if we ever had any. So get yourself into that loving space, the place from which love can be sent, and then let it emanate hither and thither. Happy Christmas.

Playing in tune

2009-12-09T07:23:00.000-08:00

Like footballers energetically disputing a referee's decision, we resist the world. But the referee never changes his mind and sometimes books the disputants. Now, we dispute the way the world is every time we resist it, and we don't need to do so. In fact, it is completely counterproductive. Just love it exactly the way that it is. And love the disputants too!
Having deeply accepted the present moment, you can let go of it - it's not you - and let go of your attachment to it that has been helping to keep it the way that it is. Whatever you don't like, love it and let go of it, and it will fade away. Fret about it and it will stay, confused by your attention, seeking a resolution to the dischord that is in you. Lovingly surrender - no-one else has to know you are doing this - and you can play in tune.

Spaceman

2009-12-09T07:06:00.000-08:00

Always and everywhere there is a space. It is inner space. You carry it with you wherever you go and you can access it now. It is in front of the inner you, beside you and behind. You can rejoice in this unchanging spaceness. Philosophically speaking, that's it.
So while all around you are losing their heads, you are impermeable, imperturbable, and vaguely impertinent. The world can do its thing and you can dance with it or watch it waltz by.

Flickering in the Winds of Change

2009-12-05T09:35:00.000-08:00

Well, life is all around and death too. One embracing the other as lovers do. In every moment there is creation, and creation also implies destruction. What wasn't is and what was isn't, and life continues on the fly. And yet permeating through all the changing remains the unchanging. Still, so still.
Beyond the cycle of life and death, is simply being. And this is still conscious. It just is. And yet it expands from perfection into the undulations of activity, and there ... there are promise and demise, flickering in the winds of change.
Wha! What a space to be in. What a way to manifest! Be this, be that, and at the same time, know you are neither. You are neither the dust you infuse with life nor the shambling personality you have hired for a while.
So there is a way to be free even while you are here. Let it all flow, surrender to the knowing, give it all up and rejoice in the texture of the world, while you may.

A Loving Return

2009-12-01T09:25:00.000-08:00

A miracle. Conscious again. Noticing what I am noticing and sensing more of the flow of the world. You know it will carry you where you want to be carried? In fact, it does. That's what it is always doing. Now you can resist the flow, go with the flow, or co-create the flow, and the latter is so much more, well, flowy. And how do you do that?
Treat the world gently, even lovingly and it whispers to you. It also, surprise, surprise, loves you back; and like a lover it loves to delight you. And this is here now.

Transcending the Energetic Connection

2009-11-22T07:35:00.000-08:00

Everything depends on the quality of being; even doing. Do your doing from a wonderful place of being and quite different results unfold, for everything is energy. And the evergy of everything you create reflects your own energy at the moment of creation.
You can create and recreate and recreate for you are creating and recreating in every moment. You cannot not do this. It just goes on and on, one in one. There's really no way out of this process. You are a creator. You can not not be a creator. So you might as well get in the swing.
You can get it that you are not that which you create. Nor are you that which is around you, though in some sense you are energetically connected.
Yet you can break that energetic connection in the present moment. Simply by choosing not to go there. Just let it be, and as you let it be you are free. And now you can choose something different.

A Worldly Orchestra Plays

2009-11-18T05:24:00.000-08:00

However wonderful it gets to be developing inner awareness, there is also that wonderful world out there, awaiting the opportunity to combine with your own energy and produce amazing results. Can we not be amazed even simply by existence? And then we add a drop or two of intent and the orchestra plays, day after day, on and on.
How would you have it otherwise? That is the question to continually ask, and then, that's it, that's where you go, following the intent out into the world. If this isn't a mystery, I don't know what is. And yet it can be, to some extent, understood, or if not understood, it can be felt, the rythm that underpins and courses through everything, right through the core of your being. Really altogether a bit magical. And all you have to do is ... show up.

Perpetually being

2009-11-12T13:22:00.000-08:00

You are in the middle of life because you are life. And you are creating life. There is nothing in you that is not life. And life is. Always. In fact you are life observing life; the subject and the object. Consciousness and creation, consciously and unconsciously recreating, with every thought, in every moment, perpetually being.
You are forever doing, for example breathing, and you are always having, for example awareness, yet underneath the twin aspects of life is simply being. Can you go there?

A little light leading

2009-11-05T00:33:00.001-08:00

What is it that a leader has? A deep connection with the self, others and the environment. They are aligned, as though they are virtually one.
A deep connection with the present moment, the fields of possibilities, and the navigation through the rapids; here, there and getting there. These also combine as one flow. A knowing that all of these things are transitory so new realities can always be created, a willingness to step into them, and a sense of purpose, which evoke a response in others.
An inclination to listen, reflect and act; sensing, being and doing, in something like that order.
And when you get it, that this is all flow, that there is nothing which cannot be created, that everything is, actually blessed, there are no limits to that which you can be, save yourself.

It's life, but not as we know it

2009-11-03T10:18:00.000-08:00

Yesterday's beautiful funeral makes the transitory nature of this life a little more plain. It was profoundly moving, and I may miss my dear friend George greatly, but right now, there's no sense of loss. Instead, there's a sense of his presence. It's as if he's everywhere.
The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying takes a Buddhist view that departed souls hear our thoughts of them for 49 days, which may feel a little over-precise; but what do I know. So you can assume they don't hear your thoughts or assume that they do, and the latter may feel more prudent. Even if you don't sense anything, you don't know that they won't hear you.
Many won't allow the possibility of communing with those who have passed, and have not done so. The great thing is we don't have to guess. Experience is the best teacher.
Why be afraid? There is only love. Life is here to be known, in all its fullness.

A little light fantastic

2009-11-01T14:19:00.001-08:00

It turns out that there is a source of consolation and even joy that is available 24/7, and it's free. Access is mainly a matter of turning inward, upward, and of getting oneself out of the way, that's the sometimes tricky bit. Yet the prize exceeds every other prize.
Surely there must be more to it than that? There is a gradual process of what we might call softening, that enables the obstacles to be cleared and the light to peep in; so you have to walk a bit. And once that happens, well it's all a bit shiny.
There remains the possibility of sadness, and occasional more heart-felt loss, but even that is somewhat sublime. And so we tiptoe into the light, or more precisely the light tiptoes into us.

No change, no life

2009-10-28T03:05:00.000-07:00

Where are you exactly? Are you in your head, your heart or your gut. Take a moment to notice where you really are, and as you notice you may sense yourself to be the noticer who is barely noticing, closer to the unchanging core than the changing self you see around you. It dances with the world but you are more akin to a conductor, orchestrating the flow that is all around you and inside you now.
The objective self lives, the subjective self simply is, the objective self does, the subjective self simply exists, but, and here's the twist, the subjective self only experiences itself through the change created and responded to by the objective self. No change, no life.

Snoozing Behind the Objective self

2009-10-11T05:25:00.001-07:00

Once upon a time, wo-man, blessed with self-consciousness, mistakes self for the self heshe observes, and mistakes the rest of the world for what is not himher, and the sense of the other is born. Apparently, wo-man has become what heshe is not, confused with and suffused by the objective self.

Then wo-man starts to awaken and notices that what was being seen, the objective self, was no more self than the rest of the world; just a giant canvass, a cucoon in which one dreams, enjoying a rather engrossing Truwoman show.

But you are not the cuccoon, though cuccooned you may be, and you aren't the canvass, though you may be painting in swooshes, and there is refreshment further afield, and infinite resource to call upon. Come, let's fly.

Welcome to the isness

2009-10-11T02:14:00.000-07:00

A lot of the time we feel stuck in the past, the future and the physical. Like me, as I sat here. Untaken paths, possible paths and physical paths distract us from the real path, which is simply being. Temporally, this can feel like being and becoming, but there is really no becoming, just becoming aware of what is.
And it's really easy, unavoidable even, to start becoming aware of the isness, because the isness has marked itself out in contrasts, in order to be seen and felt, and yet the parts are all, of course, parts of the whole.
But now, and here's the clever part, you are part of the isness too, you are not separate from it, even as you observe it; observer, observed and the process of observation are really three in one, a glorious trinity. And this is the isness.

Everything must go

2009-10-05T00:39:00.001-07:00

As another quarter begins, a moment to reflect on direction and energy, and how you know you are going with the flow; where do you feel it? And how do you know when you are resisting? So you know there's more to you than meets the eye - in fact you are anything but visible - and so much to sense: where are you headed as you imagine 2010 and beyond.
Life begins in every moment. It sprouts forth in abundance, it has no option, elegantly when not resisted; but don't resist the resistance. Let that flow too, and as you let it flow you let it go, and that is a sign of life, for life is change. Everything must go, and as it goes more arrives. You can stifle your experience of the flow, but the flow goes on.

A Stream of Surprises

2009-09-25T12:04:00.000-07:00

Life continues to bring the most interesting blessings and challenges. The apparent consequences of one's actions mingle with what the world has to offer, providing a stream of surprises, as well as something of what one intended.
Yet one can be thankful for every moment, feeling every moment, swimming through the flow, mavigating the rapids, joyfully.

The pathway to everything

2009-09-16T00:55:00.000-07:00

What could be greater than oneself?

One's greater self, the soul, the higher self, the pathway to everything. Invisible yet knowable, it transcends the personality. It knows everything that you know and so much more.

The unchanging core of you. It knows, it is. It is everything. And it is available to you right now, gently listening. And if you are interested, it is calling gently (and if you are not, it isn't).

And what is your path? It is the soul itself, the pathway that connects you with everything else. This greater self is the pathway and you are the explorer, occasionally coming up for air. Breathe deeply.

Going to a ball

2009-09-03T06:35:00.000-07:00

Get your internal antennae out, we are going to a ball!

Within certain wavebands, we have become very good at seeing and hearing - though we smell and taste less - outside of them, we are blind and deaf. What we don't see and hear, we assume does not exist. Yet for all we know, there are whole unseen and unheard worlds. At the very least, we can have fun expanding our wavebands, and noticing just that bit more.

And as you explore natural environments, in the softer lights of dawn and approaching dusk, suddenly the unseen, or some small part of it, is there, glimmering, as though a gift for you. Now, at this point, you may notice that something is going on, and you may shudder slightly, but if you stay your hand and remain balanced, and even express thanks, you may see it persists.

You are moving out of that world and into this one, out of darkness and into light, balanced there at the cusp, on the brink of a wonderful adventure. Step lightly.

Envelope of light

2009-09-03T06:24:00.000-07:00

There's a force of love all around you, an envelope of light, and it stands ready to embrace you; actually you are always within it, there is nowhere else to go. By and large, the noise of the world, and if not the world, the noise of the mind, prevents it from being sensed. But if you get still enough, you may just catch a glimmer of what has always been there, you can know what you have always known, that you are love and loved, and bask in sublime light.

Curiously, and this may be a little unnerving, you may start by imagining its existence, or at least accepting that it is there, and even welcoming its intrusion into your consciousness. The tendency is to imagine that what we have not seen does not exist, with a few exceptions like radio waves, and yet there is so much that is available now to experience. In this subtle world, there is nothing but that which radiates, flows and is.

You have been waiting, it has been waiting, and the time is now.

Sunlight

2009-09-01T03:03:00.000-07:00

After some time trudging, you enter into the blistering sunlight. You realise, you deeply realise, that every worry was just you doing your old thing.
You feel weightless because you are weightless, floating through the world, observing from within your way of being. And each gentle gusts reminds you of who you are. It feels like you have awoken from a dream, you have more energy and vitality, and all of the silt slips away.
Ha, what it is to be alive this glorious day. Welcome September, clear those branches, the life continues unperturbed within, for life is life, and none can say otherwise. Unextinguishable. Lipping the very edges of existence.

Sing your tune

2009-08-24T08:11:00.000-07:00

In every moment there is flow. Heck, the whole thing is alive. And not only is it alive, it is constantly growing, and not merely that, it is responding to you. The whole thing is responding to you and you and me. It cannot not do so. So tune in and sing your tune. Or hum it gently, as though you know it is all happening right now.

Life becoming

2009-08-14T06:31:00.000-07:00

We spend most of our time looking out when we would be better off looking in, at least occasionally, for there is all munificence. There is pure being, there is life becoming.
Where is that? It is really nowhere, but it may help to focus your awareness on your brow, and then pull it back an inch and a half; right there, see how that feels. And from that space you can notice other spaces near and far. Interesting, you.

Unbidden

2009-08-09T10:45:00.000-07:00

And so we pause, and in that pause we may discover a space, and in that space we may discover something or nothing. A little breeze. And in the spaces in our journeyings we may notice a semblance of a smile, coming from over our shoulder, stealing upon us, unbidden but always entering into the stillness.
All we ever have to do is stop and feel the presence, the glorious presence in every moment, in every when. That's it, right there, right here, right now. It never goes away.

Getting back into the flow

2009-08-04T06:16:00.000-07:00

It's harder to notice when you are out of the flow. The world is a little harsher, everything feels a bit clunkier, the physical is accentuated, like a TV with an overdone contrast. And yet, little by little, one can notice that one has dipped below the surface, and one's thrashings are accomplishing so very little.
From there it is only a shorter step to let oneself simply float to the surface and take a breath, or perhaps a gasp, of the life force. Welcome back to wonderful life.
It's so easy when you don't know how, and you aren't even trying to know how, because knowing how is not necessary. Knowing that is better, knowing that you are, knowing that you are real, knowing that you are part of the flow, and a part of the flow that does not need to stand apart from the flow. Floating beautifully.

A worldle

2009-07-25T11:07:00.001-07:00

Thank you

2009-07-24T11:40:00.000-07:00

Expressing my thanks to those of you who have given me encouragement brings us to thankfulness, far and away the most reliable way to uplift your spirits any time, as well as the recipient of your gift.
There is no need, however, to limit your thankfulness to the people you see, you can express thankfulness to those you do not see, silently, from your heart to theirs, and they will get it, they will receive your love, though they may not know its source. This is probably the best way to make a better world.
So give up the struggle and let thankfulness flow.

Divine Chaos

2009-07-20T10:36:00.000-07:00

E.M. Forster famously wrote that we had to "only connect". Not only can we connect both the divine and the temporal, we are the connection of the divine and the temporal. We stand, as it were, with a leg in each camp, listing one way and then the other, experiencing our inner and outer senses.
There is all the difference in the world. When we lean towards the world, sooner or later, a feeling of chaos ensues. When we lean towards the divine, sooner or later, bliss surrounds, like a benign fog.
There remains a place for chaos. From the perspective of the divine, even the chaos is not chaos, just a point in time. For while the temporal, confusing drama, is so noisily passing, the consciousness of the divine quietly suffuses. As gently as you like.

Riding the thermal

2009-07-16T09:06:00.001-07:00

There's just so much flow. It seems to be everywhere. This being the case, all one needs to do is get into the flow and, well, it all flows. One is carried gently along on a loving wave.
Yet we struggle and thrash, like someone who does not know that they are actually bouyant. There has always been bouyancy in life. It's rather like a gentle undercurrent, or a thermal, that drifts everything upwards. It's around you now, awaiting your gentle embrace.
Oh and it is a fret-free and completely sustaining. Just waiting, bidding, right there.

Being here, being now

2009-07-11T09:05:00.001-07:00

It's not there, it's not there at all. It's here, right here, just within reach. Being is where it is at. It's not then, not then at all. It's now, right now, right inside this moment. Being is when it is at. It is not them, not them at all. It's me, just me, right inside me. Being me is being who I am.

There is no where else to be, no when else to be, no-one else to be. That's about it.

Exploring Inner Space

2009-07-08T00:17:00.000-07:00

The inner space is invisible and inaudible, yet there is a sense of space. And that space may be felt. When you are there, your inner surrounding have an altogether different quality. The thoughts that come have a different tempo.
There is nothing unique about this. You can explore the space within you, and the more you explore, the more there is. In fact, everyone has access to inner space. It's as easy to learn to access well as learning to ride a bicycle. A nice push off gets you started, then stay balanced and calm, and you glide effortlessly. Nothing to it, really.

Eternal life

2009-07-07T03:41:00.000-07:00

Eternal life? Every moment the cells in your body are dying and others are replacing them, life and death and new life intermingled in every breath. Thoughts come and go, bursting into life and receding, like waves on a seashore. Emotions similarly ebb and flow. And yet, in the midst of the storm of life, there is a you that continues through every breath.
And when you cease to breathe physically, there is change, and that change is life. And there you are. Still you.