Sunday, October 19, 2008

Some Random Pointers

Awareness is inseparable from phenomena and phenomena are inseparable from awareness - they are different aspects of Being.


There is no need to change anything that arises. Take refuge in Awareness. Awareness is always present. Rest there.


Regardless of what is happening, we are what Sees it. We can either rest as the Seeing or we can attempt to change, modify, argue, flee, accept, etc. - all ways of avoiding what we are. Relax and leave everything alone. Quit trying to create sculptures from clouds. One path leads to more and more entanglement and suffering; the other leads to more space and freedom. Another way of saying this is that we can either live as Velcro or Teflon.


When we can just rest, just relax with everything exactly as it is in this moment, we bring suffering to an end. The spaciousness in which all of this arises and plays out is Love. What we are is Love.


Jesus said (paraphrasing), 'Don't build your house on sand.' Most of us haven't really taken that to heart. From one perspective, the 'sands' he spoke of are the ever-changing phenomena of moment-by-moment experience that are constantly shifting, changing, and reshaping. Paradoxically, the most solid, most stable foundation for our lives is this complete spaciousness, this fertile emptiness that is without height, weight, width, depth, color, or mass in and as which everything arises. Yet, this is the very building material that is indestructible and is the foundation of everything with height, weight, width, depth, color, and mass. Our treasure lies in this warm womb of Emptiness, not in the world of form.


Don't make too much of this. In my experience, at least, there is no everlasting exalted state. All states, regardless of their character, are impermanent. What we are is the unknowable Seeing of all states. Rest as that.

Awareness cannot be 'accomplished.' There is no practice that can take you 'there.' What you are is what sees the striving, the frustration, the clarity. You are already It. It's just a matter of acknowledging what is already so.

Just relax. Regardless of what you are thinking, feeling, or sensing - leave it alone and relax. Rest. Rest as what you already are - it will teach you everything.

Take a look - is Awareness/Knowing ever not present now?

You don't need to change anything. You don't need to 'figure' anything out. You can just leave yourself alone, relax, drop the story (disregard the voice you hear narrating your life), and give all of it Space. You are this Space and Space is about as bothered by what arises within it as the sky is bothered by lightning.

Every thought, every emotion, every sensation - when we forget that we are the Seeing of them - becomes like a tiny room with a very tiny window through which we attempt describe and function in the world. As we relax as the Knowing of emotion, thought, and sensation, we realize that we were never really caught in the tiny room (there is no room!) - we just thought we were, and that made it so in our experience, but not in Truth.

We can't hold on to Awareness, just like we can't grab a handful of water. If you have ever tried to float, you know the harder you try, the quicker you sink! Instead, when you lean back, relax, and allow, you find that the water floats you. The same is true with what you really are - Awareness. Start by resting back, relaxing, and you will find you have never been separate from or other than the very thing for which you search - it is the 'water' being you!