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awareness
November 2009 
The Danger of Doing Nothing
Posted on Sep 23rd, 2009
by 
Centria
Centria
So you want to be spiritually enlightened? Home to your original self? Sitting within the faceless face of that which never births or never dies?
What to do, what to do?
You have two choices today. You can do nothing. Or you can do something. Pick your choice carefully. Although some will laugh and say: it doesn't matter. (And that, too, will be true if you spin the kaleidoscope far enough.)
Let's say you decide to do nothing. To do nothing you must gauge where you're beginning. Are you beginning in the place where you are asleep, in the collective trance of our humanity? Are you sleeping? Are you hypnotized, sleep-walking, reaching randomly here and there, grabbing and avoiding, yawning and stretching, doing the same things day in and day out? Are you free? Can you choose? Are you happy? Do you have a sense of a hard self that judges, limits, cuts off, separates?
Many of us are half-way between sleeping and waking. Sometimes we're aware that we're dreaming. Sometimes we recognize shafts of light which ignite a dim half-buried memory of Knowing. Most of the time we're drowsing in night-time blankness. An automan, a robot, a slave of thoughts and feelings. A feeling comes through and we act on it. A thought comes through and we believe it. We're like puppets. Pull our strings and we dance. (But, oh, can we dance when our strings are pulled! And the more crazily we dance we're liable to insist, "We're free! We're already free! Look at us move!"
Some people will say, "Do nothing." Do you have to do something to wake up? Do you need an alarm clock? You'll wake up, all right. And that may be true. You may wake up. Now or in six hundred lifetimes from now, you may awaken and remember the truth of your essential nature.
Let's say you're dreaming and something kindles a desire within you, like striking a match. You want to awaken. A desire is born! You want to awaken to your true nature. Now here's where it gets tricky. Oh so tricky. Because you ARE already awake. And you TRULY do not need to do anything. Even the spark of that desire is not really "true".
If you realize this truth implicitly, down to your bones, down to your dancing cells, down to your tingling toes, fine and good. There is nothing to do. You will know the truth.
But if you only partially awaken, if there's still sleep in your eyes, you may have to do something in order to realize the implicit ringing truth of "do nothing". And so, what is that something that you might do?
For many of us, that something involves mindfulness training. Meditation. Stilling the roaring river of our thoughts and emotions. Or, as Don Juan of Carlos Castaneda fame put it, "stalking the assemblage point." Honing awareness. Honing awareness to a pinpoint of recognition of the Moment.
For some of us, that something involves learning to flow like the river. To be fluidity. To leap into the air like a gazelle as needed. To move without rough boundaries limiting us, without harsh edges damning up the waters of a separate self. We learn to shape shift. We learn to recognize our fluidity so acutely that we move from mask to mask to mask and yet know that we are none of the masks we've utilized. We are that which utilizes the mask but does not own it. Don Juan called this awareness "dreaming". Others call it fluidity.
Somewhere, dancing between the two energies of stalking (meditation) and dreaming (flowing) is the knowing that You are Already Awake. But to recognize that utter truth, we often need to work with energy. We need to hone our stalking or dreaming. Because we're all different fingerprints, we all come into this world with different amounts of energy, different degrees of stalking and dreaming. We have different orientations.
Don Juan once said something like this (and I am roughly paraphrasing): "Do you want to know the secret of infinity, of power?" Then he moved his arms around widely, taking in everything, "Here it is! It's here, in this moment, right now. It's yours!" Carlos stared at him blankly. Don Juan shook his head, "You don't have the personal power to realize this yet."
So our Doing Something often involves courting Power. I am reading a book called "Power" by Thich Nhat Hanh right now. He discusses this in Buddhist-language, but I doubt Don Juan would disagree. What exactly is Power? Power is the ability to be so infinitely free that we can twirl on a dime yet remain absolutely fixated in awareness simultaneously. You can spend a lifetime courting power. It's a process of letting go, letting go, letting go. And perhaps building up emptiness. You have spent years claiming a personality; now you release yourself from its shackles.
This is why it often takes years and years of "work" to realize that there's nothing to do. Years and years of releasing, opening, learning to integrate the energies. Years and years of listening when to reach and when to pull back. Years and years of listening to recognize when to flow and when to hone awareness. Years and years of building and surrendering a self.
And in the end, when you realize there's no such conflict as time, no such conflict as doing or not doing, no such conflict as self or not self, then you can sit back and relax and realize that it's all being done through you, anyway.
But in the meantime, listen deeply to your inner self. Whenever we believe only one pole of this world of duality such as "do nothing" or "do something" then we're often not flowing. We're stuck. We're believing an ideal of what someone has uttered, and not our inner essence which already knows perfectly.
So when someone says "Do nothing", beware. If we're being prompted internally to do something, that heeding may need to be followed. We may need to meditate. To practice mindfulness. To gain insight. To clear away that which blocks the river of our flowing. On the othe hand, when someone says "Do something", beware. If our deepest inner self sees that the river flows freely, that our awareness is steady, then surrendering and relaxing into that which already Is can awaken you in this instance, now, not a second too early or too late.
What to do, what to do?
You have two choices today. You can do nothing. Or you can do something. Pick your choice carefully. Although some will laugh and say: it doesn't matter. (And that, too, will be true if you spin the kaleidoscope far enough.)
Let's say you decide to do nothing. To do nothing you must gauge where you're beginning. Are you beginning in the place where you are asleep, in the collective trance of our humanity? Are you sleeping? Are you hypnotized, sleep-walking, reaching randomly here and there, grabbing and avoiding, yawning and stretching, doing the same things day in and day out? Are you free? Can you choose? Are you happy? Do you have a sense of a hard self that judges, limits, cuts off, separates?
Many of us are half-way between sleeping and waking. Sometimes we're aware that we're dreaming. Sometimes we recognize shafts of light which ignite a dim half-buried memory of Knowing. Most of the time we're drowsing in night-time blankness. An automan, a robot, a slave of thoughts and feelings. A feeling comes through and we act on it. A thought comes through and we believe it. We're like puppets. Pull our strings and we dance. (But, oh, can we dance when our strings are pulled! And the more crazily we dance we're liable to insist, "We're free! We're already free! Look at us move!"
Some people will say, "Do nothing." Do you have to do something to wake up? Do you need an alarm clock? You'll wake up, all right. And that may be true. You may wake up. Now or in six hundred lifetimes from now, you may awaken and remember the truth of your essential nature.
Let's say you're dreaming and something kindles a desire within you, like striking a match. You want to awaken. A desire is born! You want to awaken to your true nature. Now here's where it gets tricky. Oh so tricky. Because you ARE already awake. And you TRULY do not need to do anything. Even the spark of that desire is not really "true".
If you realize this truth implicitly, down to your bones, down to your dancing cells, down to your tingling toes, fine and good. There is nothing to do. You will know the truth.
But if you only partially awaken, if there's still sleep in your eyes, you may have to do something in order to realize the implicit ringing truth of "do nothing". And so, what is that something that you might do?
For many of us, that something involves mindfulness training. Meditation. Stilling the roaring river of our thoughts and emotions. Or, as Don Juan of Carlos Castaneda fame put it, "stalking the assemblage point." Honing awareness. Honing awareness to a pinpoint of recognition of the Moment.
For some of us, that something involves learning to flow like the river. To be fluidity. To leap into the air like a gazelle as needed. To move without rough boundaries limiting us, without harsh edges damning up the waters of a separate self. We learn to shape shift. We learn to recognize our fluidity so acutely that we move from mask to mask to mask and yet know that we are none of the masks we've utilized. We are that which utilizes the mask but does not own it. Don Juan called this awareness "dreaming". Others call it fluidity.
Somewhere, dancing between the two energies of stalking (meditation) and dreaming (flowing) is the knowing that You are Already Awake. But to recognize that utter truth, we often need to work with energy. We need to hone our stalking or dreaming. Because we're all different fingerprints, we all come into this world with different amounts of energy, different degrees of stalking and dreaming. We have different orientations.
Don Juan once said something like this (and I am roughly paraphrasing): "Do you want to know the secret of infinity, of power?" Then he moved his arms around widely, taking in everything, "Here it is! It's here, in this moment, right now. It's yours!" Carlos stared at him blankly. Don Juan shook his head, "You don't have the personal power to realize this yet."
So our Doing Something often involves courting Power. I am reading a book called "Power" by Thich Nhat Hanh right now. He discusses this in Buddhist-language, but I doubt Don Juan would disagree. What exactly is Power? Power is the ability to be so infinitely free that we can twirl on a dime yet remain absolutely fixated in awareness simultaneously. You can spend a lifetime courting power. It's a process of letting go, letting go, letting go. And perhaps building up emptiness. You have spent years claiming a personality; now you release yourself from its shackles.
This is why it often takes years and years of "work" to realize that there's nothing to do. Years and years of releasing, opening, learning to integrate the energies. Years and years of listening when to reach and when to pull back. Years and years of listening to recognize when to flow and when to hone awareness. Years and years of building and surrendering a self.
And in the end, when you realize there's no such conflict as time, no such conflict as doing or not doing, no such conflict as self or not self, then you can sit back and relax and realize that it's all being done through you, anyway.
But in the meantime, listen deeply to your inner self. Whenever we believe only one pole of this world of duality such as "do nothing" or "do something" then we're often not flowing. We're stuck. We're believing an ideal of what someone has uttered, and not our inner essence which already knows perfectly.
So when someone says "Do nothing", beware. If we're being prompted internally to do something, that heeding may need to be followed. We may need to meditate. To practice mindfulness. To gain insight. To clear away that which blocks the river of our flowing. On the othe hand, when someone says "Do something", beware. If our deepest inner self sees that the river flows freely, that our awareness is steady, then surrendering and relaxing into that which already Is can awaken you in this instance, now, not a second too early or too late.
Access: Public
Be(a)ware of everything!
tee hee. There you have it, Janet! Be Aware of Everything! laughing…
Following our inner bliss; today I will do this…letting the divine flow within and through…it's always a surprise ~ what we will do.
Jeannie, dear, if we have that inner bliss as a companion…what more is necessary? I suspect your companion guides you perfectly with its divine flow!
Kathie, I know this is going to sound odd, yet I'm actually quite serious and dont mean to ridicule or anything like that although … ok..ok…. laughing is allowed..eh..eh. ..may be even preferred cos I dont practice indifference in the sense that I'd rather see you smile then cry , myself included of course. Ok I'm drifting off, what I was going to say is that I kind of find bliss at times in.. squeezing pimples…Now the odd thing is…I dont really have any…but there's something about standing in front of the magnifying mirror and then cheering like a child whenever I find the tiniest dot of black spot that remotely resembles a pimple in the proces of becoming, and then the sheer bliss when I succeed to plooopp it out….
Forgive me, but why for heavens sake do I bring this up here in your beautiful spiritual blog.
I have been wondering about these magnifying mirror sessions, for believe me, those dont reflect the prettiest details, and it came to me just the other day that it is some kind of perfect meditation for me, I somehow seem to find a perfect equilibrium between doing and not- doing. I'm just doing nothing but staring in that mirror, quite blankly actually, (while I might have a thousand things waiting for me to do, God knows I need to sweep the floors) and at the same time I'm in upper attentiveness, I'm watching my thoughts drift by, trying to be nonjudgemental about my judgements of what reflects me, seeing the oddness of it all, being in the moment and totally at peace, I dont know what it is but somehow it always gets me into a blissfull state and isn't that what it's all about?! Somehow it easy for me to become kind of empty that way, yet totally being here.
Ok I know I'm not the body but all is one and it's not really about the (non)pimples, so the body is included somehow in the All That Is at some level, otherwise we wouldn't even be talking here right, so I cant' help wondering everytime I cheer for having squeezes out a little nothing what part of me did I just let go off…?!
So what does this have to do with courting power. Dont ask me how, but somehow it's being in the balance and flow of resting and attentiveness at the same time.
Ah well I warned you at the beginning it was going to be a little odd but you might try it once although doing the dishes might work just as well.
What I really mean to say of course It's always here, no matter what we do or don't do, we just have to notice I guess.
Thank you as always for your delightful blog and insights, again and again a treat to visit,
huggies,
Lucienne
Lucienne, girlfriend, you have found it! In squeezing pimples!! (bowing deeply to you…seriously…no laughing now..!!) It's just what you said, that equilibrium between doing and not-doing. Whoooo hoooo!!! Happily grinning right now.
You know where I find that space? In driving. When the Mind finally becomes silent, it's just like you said. Attentive and totally at peace as the scenery goes by. That's exactly when awareness “woke up” on my birthday. During driving. How odd is that? No odder than squeezing a pimple.
Or doing dishes, or picking one's nose, or taking a pee or reading scripture. There's no moment when we can't be aware. No moment when we can't achieve that place where we let go and do simultaneously.
It's not religious…it's a balance or equilibrium perhaps where everything becomes perfectly clear. Dont ask me how, but somehow it's being in the balance and flow of resting and attentiveness at the same time.
So agreeing with your words. Movement and rest, a friend once said. Doing and not doing. Being and not being. A place where the polarities dissolve.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for sharing this! I love it!! Big smiles & joy (and especially because I was just witnessing the thought arising “You don't know anything, Kathy, just quit writing, just quit saying all this shit until you're perfectly enlightened and you KNOW.” But, on the other hand, a huge rush of energy insisted this be written, and I was only the typist, as usual.)
Now I am giggling, giggling at the beauty of it all.
Btw I can really relate to what you said about driving. Now I dont have a car here and haven't driven in ages but even sitting in the front passenger seat on long rides through the country, especially at night I love that, naturally the driver must be a relaxed and competent driver. I also find it sexy somehow..giggle …of course that has do do with who's driving as well.
And dont you dare to quit writing gurl.
You know what you just said about witnessing that thought rising: “You don't know anything, Kathy, just quit writing, just quit saying all this shit until you're perfectly enlightened and you KNOW.”
When I read that a copple of things come up to me.
1) it's just a thought, a self imposed programming;
2) I recognize that kind of thought, how often did I tell myself something
similar, it's actually a kind of self defeating pattern that keeps us from
believing and acknowleding our truth Now. It's a projection of our
perfection in some future, instead of in the now. It's a bit awkward though
because acknowledging the thought of being enlightened is not to be
confused with the realisation. Yet here it's where it starts.
3)The writing is your inner guidance, it's your glimpses of truth expressed
into the dimension of this world. Trust it, it is not separate from who you
Are. Sometimes it's an immediate realization, sometimes one finds years
later that its time has come. You're not only the typist, you're whats being
written as well….you are nothing of it and all of it.
Jeezz, this energy is contagious, is the moon out there or something…?!
Oh Lucienne, the craziness of our thoughts! A million of 'em pass through, don't they, and how many are “true”? The thoughts ARE self-imposed programming, they ARE self-defeating patterns, they ARE so often blatherings that keep us from the Now.
So many of them are easily perceived as untrue, as fleeting blips. But others of them are more challenging for us because they are so intertwined with our emotional programming. Oh, haven't we all seen this? I am pretty much able to recognize about 80% of these kind of thoughts as just…nothing. But 20% (or 10% or 5%, better not get me going trying to figure out percentages, ha ha or you would die laughing at THAT craziness!) seem to still be hard concrete thoughts, thoughts attached to a separate self.
Oh, Lucienne, your words “you are not just the typist, you're whats being written as well..” WOW! Double WOW! That just leapt way up to the heavens.
Oh you're write. I mean, right. Thank you for that ! (and you can believe those words, honest.)
PS. have I told you lately…?
hugs
I once read a little book ~ the art of doing nothing
Walking in the outdoors is full of spontaneity ~ doing nothing of course
When I stop doing ~ things happen, nature unfolds right before my eyes ~ the wonder and the splendor overtake me ~ I am home, and that's where I am going
I'm gonna have to read this blog at least twice more. I don't even begin to “understand” it, though I think eventually I'll recognize it….. You might be saying something I've never heard anyone attempt to put into words — or I might recognize it……
I sooooo appreciate the challenge, LOL !!!
I agree with what Lucienne said. You are the typist, and what is being said.
Kinda like a saying that came to me once: I am the Lover. I am the Beloved. I am the Loving. I am the Love.
Love,
OM Bastet
thank you for this post …..
food for “thinking”, but should be food for “acting” too!
I think “power” in this place, as spirit, is seeing anything you want to see. It is the freedom to be anywhere by observing and occupying that space. Along that path we understand and become more of God.
Power as a human can be pushing one's viewpoint out into space. Instead of looking we have others look at us. That is a game but not growth because one is not seeing “new” space.
So “doing something” that keeps one inside one's own reality, by operating mechanisms of life, is not spiritual growth. Looking and being willing to see is. It means being willing to know what you did not know existed and adding that new item to your reality. This might take some practice, but is doable. Once that door is open anything is possible.
Thank you, sweet Lucienne…
Jeannie, what you said sounds so beautiful. You sound like you're in that place where doing-nothing flows effortlessly. That works for some people, and it sounds like it works for you. I bow deeply to you… Today I opened into that space too (driving home from work!) and the do-nothing space opened up and there was only the unfoldment. Oh joy! But I had to do something to do nothing. It didn't happen yesterday because I was too full of thoughts…so the doing involved a surrender from that which filled up the space and blocked off the flow.
OM, it sometimes feels like nit-picking to describe this level of energy. To recognize the FEEL of energy through our bodies and how it works on the most intimate level. To describe it in words that our inaccurate. Because what we're trying to describe is a FLOW. And it points (the ultra-detailed looking) into where we might be stuck. Writing this blog helped me so tremendously because I articulated where I knew I was getting stuck. Not relaxing into the flow of do-nothing. So I know now what I must do to surrender. Do you see how it's a dance of these energies which we want to insist is one way or another? It's do something/do nothing! Anything that claims it's one way or another is often clouding up the mirror. Unless, as I've stated before, you're already in that space. Then why bother with words at all??
before the star became a seed…oh what a lovely name! Thank you for reading and bringing in the word ACTION!! Because if we don't move beyond thinking about things into bringing it into our next movement, why even bother? :)
Kevino, what a great point! If “doing something” keeps us within our own reality, we're still limiting ourselves. There's so much more out there than our inventory. There's infinite reality. When you said “This might take some practice, but is doable”…that's the exact kind of doing I've been describing. Practice to open the door and look beyond!
in learning to find life's daily flow ~ in doing ~ when I am open to the outcome of things, not seeking one in particular ~ a stream of conciouness waters the thoughts in the garden of my mind and be~comes recieving ~ the higher energy becomes the driver
Oh Jeannie, that's a beautiful way of saying it! You've married what looks like opposites in that sentence. I love how you've brought them together ~ love & blessings to you in this marvelous awareness!!
Kathy, Kathy, you are so amazing, just loving this flow…
“Inventory” is a great way to put it. I may have to steal that!
Hey Nicole! And loving watching you flow in and out. I'm making salsa right now, hotter than hot salsa (for Barry, too hot for me!) and watching an inner dialogue form around the subjects of doing/not doing. The not doing part of reality began to snarl at the doing part of reality, “You are so wrong!” and the doing part said, “no, I'm not!” and Kathy just kept making salsa, listening to the inner voices try to insist that their point of view was the correct one. Just witnessing. Those voices can talk forever claiming that one part of the spectrum is correct, but there's no “correct” here, is there? There's only chopping tomatoes, and onions, and green pepper and a dash of vinegar here! and cumin here! and garlic there! Which one is right? Which one is correct? Why do we have to choose? Salsa comes from all of it mingling together, right? Whoo-la-la!! (thank you for allowing this momentary commercial for awareness & salsa….LOL….)
Kevino, I think maybe you're not stealing it from me. Don Juan used to talk about our personal inventory to Carlos Castanada. You know, those books still speak to me a lot. There's some great wisdom hidden between the pages of the dozen or more books, although if you listen with your logical mind you'll end up crazy. You have to listen with your dreaming mind, and doors keep opening…
Wisdom is the viewpoint just over the horizon. Too near is over-familiar and too far is unreal. That is the reason to be open to what comes up, but not “push”. A fine discrimination, no?
Kathy,
an interesting association you're making about mixing the salsa: all mingling together, yes why choose?
I was just emerged in a link Lars (Fast Dart) put on his status Autumn violins, really beautiful, it was almost hypnotic to watch those beautiful scenes and reading the poetry, alsmost like I was walking there. And the last verse was about cycles and my mind made an associative jump it was this what brought me here back to this blog.
Just like thoughts come in and out, -they will always be there more or less- as part of living in this dimension, so are the life cycles and the change of seasons and you see it every day on your walk, you are so close to it, a much closer witness every day than I am.
So just like the salsa, it's all part of the whole, you dont have to choose, life has its natural rhymths, of doing and undoing, winter where everything rests, could be like undoing, yet at the core rests the life that is going to be burst out in spring, a lot of doing. We are already part of that flow, we just have to unlearn coming in between all the time, and simply allow it.
I dont know it's just a thought, it's so interesting to see how our minds work, the associations, the feelings and how this becomes such a beautiful sharing here.
The last verse of that autum symphony goes:
life moves itself in cycles
to make and to undo,
that feelings go with the wind,
that burning hot passions cool,
that all glory is ephemeral…
but…
the cycles make possible the return of the hope
- and this one, yes, is lasting…
- it is perpetual in all the human hearts…
Oriza Martins
oui, chere Lucienne, les cycles de faire et defaire, magnifique! bisous
Oh, Lucienne, how beautiful! What a wonderful poem, and loved the way your awareness flowed between the beautiful images, the poetry, the salsa and beyond. Here's what is flowing now: In awareness…we never have to choose…awareness itself chooses! If we still think we're a separate self, well then maybe we need to choose what to put in the salsa, tomatoes or cilantro or both? Tomato paste or a dash of cumin or both? In awareness, making salsa is effortless, a flow of a dash of this and a dash of that. When we think we're separate from the tomatoes, cutting them up can be a LOT of work.
Chere Nicola, no speaka de French, but it sounds oui magnifique!
Oops, Kevino, must still be asleep…missed responding to your comment. You are so right. A FINE distinction between being open and allowing, and not pushing. And that fine distinction is often what keeps us thinking we're separate, yes?
Bisous, Nicole!
Oh I love how this thread is flowing, just watching it go wherever it goes by what each of us put in. Another remark, another choice and it could have gone quite a different direction and probably would have been just as fascinating.
Talking about choices, Kathy when I was a young girl sometimes it was hard for me to make choices, I even remember talking about it with a psychologist who insisted that making choices was a sign of growing up. Now I'm not in denial of that statement but to me it's only relative to living in the 3- dimensinal world.
Making choices was hard for me because somehow I always saw the other side of every choice which could hold just as much truth. I wasn´t conscious at the time that in some way I was perceiving wholeness, it merely confused me because the world told me to choose. And perhaps it wasn´t so much the choosing that confused me as it was some unspoken rule that particular choice was supposed to represent the truth. I knew something wasn´t quite right about that, I was on to something but didn´t consciously understand it yet.
Of course we choose all the time, and that is perfectly ok and even necessarely for life to continue flowing, creating, it´s just our attachments to right or wrong that gets in the way of our perceiving wholeness.
So YES please …put in lots of cilantro, I LUV cilantro as well as cumin.
I guess just put your heart in it and it will be a perfect salsa!
I was doing some AUM chanting this morning while I was cleaning up the kitchen and it´s amazing to watch the thoughts run wild trying to distract me, but I just shrugged my shoulders and kept chanting and doing whatever I was doing, knowing all is right for now.
Lucienne, I've done gone & flowed into another blog that is starting from the opposite angle: from surrendering into doing nothing and simply flowing! Oh how I love this…the ALL…putting your heart into it and then dipping the chips into lots of luscious salsa. LOL.
I can feel/hear your AUM chanting and the prayers of everyone doing the 9:09 prayers (or whatever they are called) and the Universe is singing and zinging and stretching and yawning and delighted in itself!
Love and AUMMMMMMMMMMMM's to you in your doing and not-doing. :) Love, Kathy
I don't know what the exact mechanism for “separate” is, or even if there is one that applies to all. My recent path has involved about 20 hours of Idenics counseling, then reading “The Elegant Universe” by Brian Greene. When I understood relativity from that book, I realized we are pieces of God, stepped out of this universe, got total rightness, that whole bit. I suspect we can move along the path of love or focus or understanding as God manifests in this place through those three, but likely we must incorporate all of them to keep the wheels turning. I am up on the understanding level so working on love and focus seems a good idea for me. Life is interesting, to say the least.
The last few posts above have begun pointing at what might be my challenge with your blog here, Kathy. I still haven't slowly re-read it, and I think I can today, but I think my challenge has something to do with the possibility you were implying some choosing on the part of the human self which was somehow NOT the Awareness choosing that you just articulated.
There is what I call an implosion that happens when we “get” that every choice is a choice by Awareness. Thus, doing and non-doing are both choices by Awareness, therefore, they have no particular implications for whether one or the other is more likely to trigger Realization of Awareness. Realization comes from a choice by Awareness to Realize, not from human choice to do or not do.
So, there is an implosion of any dilemma or need for choosing. EXCEPT with respect to Quality of Life. Some seeming choices are conducive to higher or lower QoL, and we can — to the extent that we experience being at choice — make those choices. We do EXPERIENCE being the chooser, which is Awareness choosing to experience the human self as experiencing being the chooser, until that experience falls away as an illusion, and there is only The Flow.
[Edited in: So even there, an implosion goes on at Realization: There is nothing but Awareness choosing. So, now that that matter is settled, what does Awareness as me want to choose? This was described beautifully just above: Choosing/doing a bit more cilantro, please, and yeah, heavy on the cumin. Yeah yeah!!]
Best I can do for now. Thank you all for evoking so many experiences through your electronic squiggles here!!!
Love, OM
I think it is perception we choose, it certainly changes things ~ Tuning into what Is ~ Reception
Hi Centria and all,
I just found this thread and enjoyed reading through it. The sharing is wonderful to see. What caught my attenion in your blog were two things. The first was ”Honing Attention.” The second was…
'You can spend a lifetime courting power. It's a process of letting go, letting go, letting go. And perhaps building up emptiness. You have spent years claiming a personality; now you release yourself from its shackles.”
These words point to an ancient practice called self-emptying. You give a beautiful description of self-emptying in the story of your preparing the salsa.
“…I'm making salsa right now, hotter than hot salsa (for Barry, too hot for me!) and watching an inner dialogue form around the subjects of doing/not doing. The not doing part of reality began to snarl at the doing part of reality, “You are so wrong!” and the doing part said, “no, I'm not!” and Kathy just kept making salsa, listening to the inner voices try to insist that their point of view was the correct one. Just witnessing. Those voices can talk forever claiming that one part of the spectrum is correct, but there's no “correct” here, is there? There's only chopping tomatoes, and onions, and green pepper and a dash of vinegar here!…”
In self-emptying, we become witness to what's happening within us without judging, labeling or otherwise identifying with what's happening. Instead, we simply remain present and aware without falling prey to the story unfolding within us. (Honing Awareness) In my experience, this practice leads to the unfolding of sensate awareness. In sensate awareness, we sense/feel what's happening in, through and around us without depending or relying on mental interpretations. (That chatter may still arise, but I don't have to identify with it.) Again, in my experience, as sensate awareness and intelligence develops we begin to understand things at a much deeper level. We learn to sense and feel the essence of things. We feel the fullness and emptiness of each moment.
One practice that I find helpful in developing sensate awareness is to focus my attention on the empty space in each moment …to reach out and feel with my being the empty space between my thoughts, my feelings and all the goings on. I utilize this practice because I have been habituated from birth to notice forms and phenomena but to ignore the space. Thus, as I learn to sense and feel the space and let go of the habit of labeling I come into a fuller experience of the present moment.
Be well.
I love the “empty space” idea, thanks.
Well said, but not what you say.
=}
Jeez, I don't know what blog to respond to first: The Danger of Doing Nothing or the Futility of Doing Something. Let's dive into the nothing first and then surface up there in the something. ha ha…
Kevino, the incorporation of All! Yes, yes, I think you've got something there. And so the wheel keeps turning between all these apparent dualities. Let's see where Awareness wants to turn and choose today.
OM, oh yes to all your thoughts. How beautifully articulated. The implosion of awareness. Yes. On the other hand (sorry, can't just leave it there because Awareness is off & running!) when we THINK we're a separate self, perhaps everything is viewed as a mirror reflection. (I did not obviously write that, because I only have a vague idea what it might mean.) You know how everything appears…and this is the key word “appears”…different on different levels. Didn't Wilber or one of those guys have theories about different levels of perception? So when we're still at a level where Ego is operating and not yet realizing that Awareness is operating, then it APPEARS as if Ego has to do something. I do agree with you at the larger level, but when we're still operating at the level of a separate self, then that separate self thinks it has to do something. While it might be helpful for some people to leap right into the flow, for most people still in the rocky stream, doing needs to be done. The doing of not-doing. Meditation, deconstructing thoughts, whatever. At that place it's often counter-productive to say “do nothing”. Somebody often has to do something to realize the flow. Call that somebody “self” or “awareness”…does that matter to a person who hasn't realized awareness yet? Just thinking. ((And, to complicate matters more, oh dear God, I don't think we're an individual “self” ever…we're a cluster of energies moving through…and some of those energies may be perceiving at a level of Oneness and some at a level of separation… arrhghghghh!!!)
Jeannie, how I love how you condense everything so simply. The heart sighs in relief reading: I think it is perception we choose. And reception to what is: ahhh, there's the flow… Thank you so much. P.S. I hope you read the blog about the flow…is it like the flow you experience?
Bob, yes, yes, yes to your comments and description of self-emptying! The doing of emptying. Remaining present without attaching so harshly to the stories. Fullness AND emptiness in each moment. Doing AND not-doing in each moment. The empty space practice is a wonderful practice…thank you so much! Blessings to you. I remember reading your book and there was something in there which was so perfect in the moment…something which deepened insight and understanding about all of this.
Just Me: oh goodness, what did I say or not say? Between this blog and the next one, it just about covered everything, didn't it? Or did it cover nothing at all? tee hee…. Perhaps the third blog should simply be silence.
The “doing” of the “D” in the word, DEFINITION
I know folks have been busy writing on what I think of as the third “D” in the title of this amazing thread (see above).
It makes me think of the double “d” I expanded to after my son, but especially after my “d”-“daughter” was born, much to my amazement also!
Here's to Kathy!
Hey diddle diddle,
The cat and the fiddle,
The cow jumped over Kathy's full moon,
The little dog laughed to see such creativity and inspiration,
And Centria ran away with the spoon……
All delightful, all delightful. Today awareness is nearly completely self-aware in all my cells, a process years in the making. What I feel other than very light wrt gravity, is: drenched in Love. Soaked in Love, waterlogged with Love.
Re your response to my response: By all means, if the ego-self/identity which operates within the illusion of separation feels to DO, then there's nothing to do but Do. [I DIDN'T SAY THAT. IT MADE ME SAY IT. LMAO.]
IOW, the implosion is that it's Awareness choosing to do or not do, so it's not a big deal what the human does. And this doesn't require a higher level of awareness except to be able to say that. If the human self thinks it matters whether it does something or does nothing (haha) then so be it, that's just part of what Awareness is doing as that person. Implosion again.
I don't say “Do nothing.” I always recommend that people do what they feel to do, whether it's something or nothing!!! Adyashanti does the same. The smart ones (I say that with humor) figure out that if it doesn't matter which they do, then in fact, their doing of anything, whether it's something or nothing, is a nothing !! Implosion again.
So you agree with me at the larger level, and I agree with you at the smaller level. “And Centria ran away with the spoon….” – full of salsa!!!
You said:
when we THINK we're a separate self, perhaps everything is viewed as a mirror reflection. (I did not obviously write that, because I only have a vague idea what it might mean.)
And I too have only a vague idea, so I'll let it percolate.
I'm losing track of which blog says which, so will just add here a response to your comment that preferences have less emotional charge than judgments. Basically, I agree. But emotional charge isn't the same, to me, as intensity. Emotional charge is that fear is involved, an ego-need is involved, ego-identity is at stake, down at the root of it all. Passionate preference doesn't have these, but it can still be pretttttty darned intense !!!!! Archangel Michael is especially know for this quality.
We hop from philosophy to spirituality to silliness to sensoriness (I just made up that word) in doing and nondoing. “…. like little children. For such is the Kingdom of Heaven.”
Love, OM
Silent sleeping they think the little children, for such is the love of Kingdom of Heaven to let them wake when they will.
In the mornings when we rise,
we greet the tide of many things ……
May the earth be solid to support you,
and the wind be under your wings……
May you be wise in your doing,
or non-doing while the bird of your heart sings…..
OM, I just wanted to say your words transmit. They teleport me to the state you're coming from when you write.
The differences between your transmissions and, let's say Adyashanti's or Wilber's, exist only in slight nuances of variations in form, not in essence. Receiving this is directly communicating essence to essence, and I feel it as a most satisfying kind of extremely subtle bliss.
Beautiful poem Metta Girl!
Hello all you doers and not-doers! Hello all you separate selves and awareness itself! All of your words are like music. OM, just what you said, YES> The All knows that space which you described so delightfully and the truth of it and the dance of it! Awareness doing its own thing…what joy! No need to do anymore, merely to surrender into what we feel we must do. How I/it loves that place, that knowing! We are teleported there, we like it, It likes it, there is only Oneness.
In that Oneness, there are often ways the Ego resurrects to say that there are “lesser” ways of perceiving. So subtle, so subtle.
Back to the nursery rhyme so delightfully added by before the star became a seed:
Here are ways Awareness itself might react to the word “definition”. (and the way awareness/I did in the last eighteen hours):
1) first, no reaction. Silence. Not understanding. Unable to move deeper.
2) second: ahhh, that's what is trying to be expressed, perhaps
3) the trouble with defintions is that people sometimes intellectualize and can't run with the energy behind them. They don't know how to leap beyond the words into movement, into flow, into action.
4) witnessing Awareness aware of the discussion of defintion.
5) Poem rising spontaenously in response:
Humpty
Excuse me, the computer cut short the poem.
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall
All the kings horses and all
the kings men
couldn't put humpty together again.
The yolk and the white applauded!
Awareness ate scrambled eggs.
6) Bliss/Joy/Delight
7) How to describe #7?…an energetic allowing that allows all the realizations without making any of the previous six states into “something special”, “lower”, “higher”, “lesser”, “more”. That whatever arises: a self or Awareness can be just what it is. Doing can be OK. Not-doing can be OK. Bliss can be OK and pain can be OK. Poetry can be OK and not understanding can be OK. Silence and speech OK.
I am not trying to say that any of you are expressing anything differently or disagreeing with anyone; perhaps just attempting to articulate something I perceive in myself. A desire to only label the “bliss” as IT. To only label the Awareness perceiving Awareness as IT. To label a higher state and a lower state as IT and NOT IT.
We watch the river of flow/bliss arise and there's still so often a subtle grasping in me/us. We become the arm of the other or the other itself and there's still a feeling of separation because we can't become the foot or the heart. We create and yet don't allow it ALL.
And even the perception or state of thining we're not allowing the All is something else to allow.
That's all. Words are trickling to a sandstill now. Please feel free to add more words under this thread but Awareness seems to be getting tired of words again for a little while.
Love to all you pieces of stars. Glimmer on, glimmer on, all of us…
Definition provides context. Context is useful in displaying a viewpoint, which is the means we use to move around in this place. As one “grows” things begin to happen!
But prior to definition is the intention to understand. Some, for whatever reason, are not in an understanding mode. I realized while reading your post that complete acceptance of another viewpoint is likely to create that understanding at some point. When a viewpoint is accepted where it is, it can move from that spot. Defense is no longer necessary. And of course reticence may not be defense, simply what the individual chooses. Regardless, it can be accepted, so thank you!
The layout of this place is understandable. Some will go at it with intellect, some with focus, some with love. Intellect likes patterns and routes. While there may be only one absolute rule here, there are plenty of patterns and subordinate routes. And definitions. They all lead to the same place, I believe.
Full understanding ultimately does the trick. That means occupying space. That means taking viewpoints, a la Mr. Einstein. There is no viewpoint unworthy of understanding, to the bottom. Every picture tells a story, and every story expands awareness. How you look is up to you.
Hello Kevin, Excellent points, excellent, so how ,how to understand that even defence is in part of the understanding. Not part of a defence to keep out, but move inward to understand it right to the bottom.
Working from here, the bottom up instead of the top down and potentially crushing with weight some may not be ablt to bear. Learning then understanding how best to lift it we just may see what resides in these bottoms, and their yet undiscovered self willed strenght, of that bottom, sphere. A sphere unlike yet part of the same space we are.
How to lift not crush, as gravity never stopped us from flying, just made sure we did it when ready to soar, and taught down those with wax wings.
Thanks
Thank you Just Me. Very nicely and poetically put! I think we are all working from the bottom up! But to address HOW to work from the bottom up, let's say reality is that group of viewpoints a person is “willing” to see. One sees from only one viewpoint at a time, but one is wiling to see others. You may not be in your car but you are willing to drive.
Inside that collection of realities are incompletely understood realities. One may be willing to drive, but be afraid of other cars. One may be willing to date, but have a secret belief no one could offer love. These are 'bottom up” issues. In order to move into outside realities, some of these inner reality items may need to be addressed. Which means moving into the space of the not understood issue. That usually is therapeutic, so much we call it therapy. One moves into the spaces of things we don't understand to the point where we do understand. At that point no one is wrong for any of it and we can step outside of the issue with perspective. That would be full understanding. Better understanding may be sufficient to begin the move into viewpoints fully outside one's reality.
This viewpoint is of course pretty cut and dried. It is a blueprint of the setup. Life tends to be quite more emotional. The blueprint is intended to give an overall understanding while working through the tough stuff so that one can see there is a solution and a means of working through.
Hello Kevin, much food for thought there, thank you and well spoken. I will so to speak let it digest.
I would appreciate in doing this to know what you mean or see as view point from your… view point.
Thanks again
J.M.
I resonate with the blueprint language/ perspective, a creative process, building, shaping the suroundings yet requires certain base knowledge to fully get off the ground. Does/ is that base knowlegde universal?, and if so why are we triing to undo what cannot thus be undone, and simple as it may seem, be what has always been and will always be. Full understanding and complete acceptance without the need for judgement, but the comfort and self knowing an ever increasing knowledge base.
Anyway I better go off and think about this and if nothing else it has been delicious. Kevin, oh pass the gravy please.
J.M.
=}
Consider it passed!
A viewpoint is simply a place from which to view. It is a space, or point, inside the physical universe. One can occupy a space or not at will unless for some reason one cannot. The reasons we cannot so occupy a space, see from it, have perspective from it, are why we are here with the relatively limited perspective we have. If you consider at some point each of us could walk the length of the universe in an instant, then we have accomplished some pretty good compression here!
None of that is “wrong”. It is simply what we have done. To move out, to open up options, is a choice we each make. Why you do it or not is up to you.
I think there is a setup to this place that is from our perspectives, universal. But it is not “rule”. In other words one does not have to follow any of it so long as one has perspective outside. However that perspective is likely to be pretty sizable. The one rule we cannot break is our intention to split into “pieces” of God, which means that we are not God in this place. We are individually limited. Trying to be God will put you at loggerheads with the game, but you are free to try. Other than that, anyhing goes, meaning we can do anything we please. How we got to this point and how to re-attain greater perspective is the object of the blueprint and of course a thousand million other ideas. All of which probably have some merit so long as you keep perspective that no one has the answer for you but you.
Loving all this. Thank you for the feedback, Mascha. I am not sensitive enough to be aware how others receive/perceive my output, so feedback is much appreciated. MUCH.
Love talking about changing realities. I agree it is what we believe it is. Some things I learned from some spiritual teachers I had long time ago: Reality you experience as such isn't your beliefs. It is, whatever you regard as REAL. And from within a reality, every other reality seems dangerous, insane, impossible, or inconceivable. This constitutes quite a barrier to changing realities, haha !!!!
But, it can be done, in some ways Kevino mentions.
Kathy, you said
We watch the river of flow/bliss arise and there's still so often a subtle grasping in me/us. We become the arm of the other or the other itself and there's still a feeling of separation because we can't become the foot or the heart. We create and yet don't allow it ALL.
And even the perception or state of thining we're not allowing the All is something else to allow.
Can we sense the implosion if we re-word this “accurately?”
Awareness watches the river of flow/bliss arise as itself, and there's still so often a subtle grasping it creates in and as me/us. Awareness realizes it is the arm or the other itself, and it also creates a feeling of separation from awareness of being the foot or the heart. Awareness has the ability to create and yet not allow full awareness of itself in some of what it creates.
And even Awareness's perception or state of thinking that as us it's not allowing the All, gives it something else for it to allow.
Implosion, implosion, implosion. Inescapable. Eventually it all gets quite boring, and one makes salsa without the questions and irrelevant thoughts because they are sooooo irrelevant to what Awareness is aware of.
I long for that day, for me. More than moments, or minutes. But then I laugh. Who's impatient? Awareness! Who thinks she's not “there” yet? Awareness! Who feels she's inferior for not being “there yet”? Awareness. OK OK. Relaxing…..
Thank you all.
OM
One of the great pleasures as a human is to be able to give confirmation and receive it back. Holy confirmation. Saying Yes, you are That! Just exactly as you are now, you are the one and only reality. Call it Awareness, Suchness, essence or god - all words belong to That.
“He who has all names”, that's who is talking here, and that's who is talking back. To experience this must be the crowning achievement of god-knows-how-many lifetimes, but here we are, experiencing this, together, over the net.
Amazing. Intoxicating… and yet I'm so sober, I could also do my taxes in this, as That.
My teacher's teacher used to say you need to go to an honest and highly qualified appraiser who will tell you the truth about the diamond in your pocket and what it is worth. Confirmation from Self to Self that instantly penetrates through bone and marrow can't be given often enough, if you ask me. It's the best game in town, hands down.
Dear ones, it IS such a pleasure to read and resonate with all these shimmering viewpoints and processes and beings. Thank you. All of your input and all of these words have helped me move into a feeling-space of greater love and acceptance for the river of what IS.
Sometimes, Mascha, I feel like I say Yes, you are That! Just exactly as you are now, you are the one and only reality. But sometimes it feels I move way too quickly into the opposite. Saying “yes, but…this TOO is true.” This too is YES. Suddenly, today, I feel that it's just OK to relax into the one “separate” individual self that is the only reality in this moment. No need to move into the opposite and embrace it as well.
It also feels hard on these long blogs with comments to resonate deeply with what each person is saying. I get over-loaded with words and start skimming over content, no longer able to connect with the preciousness of each individual thought and diamond. (Not beating myself up about this; actually the opposite. Embracing in a bear-hug that part of self that feels inadequate and gets overwhelmed.)
But also more deeply recognizing the need to slow down and simply acknowledge the preciousness of “the one and only reality” which presents itself. And Mascha, when you said the words “I could also do my taxes in this” that's really funny because one of my day jobs is a tax collector…so I do taxes in this every single day.
Love and so deep appreciation for all the aspects of awareness, dancing in and out. It is the best game in town, hands down. The only game?
When awareness calls nothing is mudane.
Jeannie, isn't that true? Nothing at all! Beautiful awareness, beautiful love.
Ah, yes. Nothing is mundane in This.
And have you noticed that when words come flowing out of This, everything you say is right? I was recently talking with a friend about this marvelous experience of freedom where whatever is said, however partial, needs no correction or addition or even the slightest qualification anymore. It can stand there by itself like a jagged edge and then dissolve on its own accord, because both parties know they are coming from that ultimately wordless source which contains all expressions in seedform.
Freedom here means you can entertain the most outrageous, seemingly unconnected thought and still know its perfection because it also comes from god.
Oh, and Kathy, you are actually working part time as a tax collector? See, this is one of the extreme, outrageous contrasts I was babbling about being effortlessly reconciled as soon as you even get a taste of That. Behold Mrs. Kathy: the continuously awakening tax collector…
Dayyum, how wild is that?
Mascha! I read your first comment last night (didn't read the second comment til just now, what a hoot! YES! You get it; I love it!) Your first comment filled me with such feelings of joy and almost tears last night. Because…in the place where I fall back asleep (or seem to) into confusion and not-knowing the jagged areas feel like knives and that communication is still not happening and we're not realizing that we all can entertain our most outrageous selves. Because their seems to still be inner and outer judgment and pushing away.
But in awareness, oh my!, in awareness what you said is such TRUTH that I wanted to fall on my knees in a huge YES while reading it. And yesterday, for the whole day, nothing arose in consciousness that couldn't be embraced. Not tax collectors or people saying things that didn't resonate, or inner condemnation. Everything can have its say. Which is what I've been trying to say, and feeling so futile in the attempting of it.
Today we might be back to pushing away the allowing of Everything, but even that's OK if we are aware of it, if we hold that pushing away in a circle of love and say, “You too can live. You too can live. I love you.”
Oh, Mascha, thank you. Thank you for expressing just that. Thank you awareness for all of us holy in yourself.
Your response brings tears to my eyes. Tears that carry a taste Self-recognition. Words always fail to encapsulate This… this… thisherenow-just-as-it-is.
Words are too small. And yet, whatever you think or say, Kathy, from hereon out, it can instantly be recognized as the word of god. Isn't it funny that god can be so friggin' wrong sometimes and still be right? And that god never speaks the ultimate or final word on anything but just goes on babbling, inventing new words to praise Hirself while using our forms - well, that just keeps throwing me for loops and somersaults. So what if I just cursed and hated some expression of my beloved self? Big deal. Allowing can become so big that it allows all contrariness. Spaciousness itself is so pure, it celebrates and delights in gross impurities!
Mascha, from the lips of god unto this blog. I bow so deeply to you. :)
That's why I think Neale Donald Walsh's Conversations with God is such a ridiculous hoot. He coulda equally well have been talking to the corner grocer, isn't that so????
Love, OM
just floored by the holy-moly- flowy exchange going on here – THIS is truly marvelous–THIS IS ! ! !
bowing deeply to you ALL …
OM, God isn't the corner grocer? ha ha ha ha !!!
Victoria, HOLY MOLY! And now you're here too! What could be more perfect??
Yes, just in case anyone misunderstands what I meant. God IS the corner grocer. Anyone who knows they are God, qualifies for being in a famous conversation, haha. The royalties must be fabulous!!
And anyone who knows everyone is God, could talk to anyone – even themselves, for Pete's sake – and accurately call it Conversations with God.
Thass whass funny.
Of course, some Gods are more God than others. LMAO.
OM
Heh heh, it's all self-talk. And when I truly get that, there's such a sensation of lightness and ease, I can't, for the life of me, remember what was so frightening or unacceptable before. Whatever was possessing me? But then again, god comes heavily camouflaged in most cases, and it is an amazing grace to see through the disguises at least some of the time.
I like my gods plain and upfront about it, you hear? (pounds table with divine fist for emphasis.)
god
OM, thanks for the clarification…especially for the parts of ourselves/Awareness that haven't yet realized that we/they are gods/goddesses. Or who downright think that's blasphemy. (Oh you parts! We love you too!)
Mascha, self-talk! YES! That's what I was trying to say so hard (Not with lightness and ease all the time last week). It's all self-talk. I learned that lesson to the core when first “doing” voice dialogue. That was such a profound doing/non-doing. I saw that it was just energies coming through us. The energy of the controller, the energy of the lover, the energy of the mother, the energy of the 1,000,000,000 things. And we are all of them! And they reflect back to us from the external world.
tee hee…it's so easy when one of your inner voices is saying, “You are dead wrong, it's this way, you idiot” and you can almost smile and say, Yep. Of course. But when someone externally says it's sometimes easy for forget that we're all really one self. And our hackles sometimes go up, don't they? Or, should we say, the hackles of one part of the self come up?
amazing grace, indeed…