Saturday, April 5, 2014

Devi & Shiva


DEVI SAYS:
O Shiva, what is your reality?
What is this wonder-filled universe?
What constitutes seed?
Who centers the universal wheel?
What is tbis life beyond form pervading forms?
How may we enter it fully, above space and
time, names and descriptions?
Let my doubts be cleared!

SHIVA REPLIES:
[Devi, though already enlightened, has asked the foregoing questions so others through the universe might receive Shiva’s instructions. Now follow Shiva’s reply, giving the 112 ways.]
1. Radiant one, this experience may dawn between two breaths. After breath comes in (down) and just before turning up (out) — the beneficence.
2. As breath turns from down to up, and again as breath curves from up to down—through both these turns, realize.
3. Or, whenever inbreath and outbreath fuse, at this instant touch the energyless energy-filled center.
4. Or, when breath is all out (up) and stopped of itself, or all in (down) and stopped—in such universal pause, one’s small self vanishes. This is difficult only for the impure.
5. Consider your essence as light rays rising from center to center up the vertebrae, and so rises livingness in you.
6. Or in the spaces between, feel this as lightning.
7. Devi, imagine the Sanskrit letters in these honey-filled foci of awareness, first as letters, then more subtly as sounds, then as most subtle feeling. Then, leaving them aside, be free.
8. Attention between eyebrows, let mind be before thought. Let form fill with breath-essence to the top of the head, and there shower as light.
9. Or, imagine the five-colored circles of the peacock tail to be your five senses in illimitable space. Now let their beauty melt within. Similarly, at any point in space or on a wall — until the point dissolves. Then your wish for another comes true.
10. Eyes closed, see your inner being in detail. Thus see your true nature.
11. Place your whole attention in the nerve, delicate as the lotus thread, in the center of your spinal column. In such be transformed.
12. Closing the seven openings of the head with your hands, a space between your eyes becomes all-inclusive.
13. Touching eyeballs as a feather, lightness between them opens into heart and there permeates the cosmos.
14. Bathe in the center of sound, as in the continuous sound of a waterfall. Or, by putting fingers in ears, hear the sound of sounds.
15. Intone a sound, as a-u-m, slowly. As sound enters soundfulness, so do you.
16. In the beginning and gradual refinement of the sound of any letter, awake.
17. While listening to stringed instruments, hear their composite central sound; thus omnipresence.
18. Intone a sound audibly, then less and less audibly as feeling deepens into this silent harmony.
19. Imagine spirit simultaneously within and around you until the entire universe spiritualizes.
20. Kind Devi, enter etheric presence pervading far above and below your form.
21. Put mindstuff in such inexpressible fineness above, below, and in your heart.
22. Consider any area of your present form as limitlessly spacious.
23. Feel your substance, bones, flesh, blood, saturated with cosmic essence.
24. Suppose your passive form to be an empty room with walls of skin – empty.
25. Blessed one, as senses are absorbed in heart, reach the center of the lotus.
26. Unminding mind, keep in the middle – until.
27. When in worldly activity, keep attentive between the two breaths, and so practicing, in a few days be born anew. [Lakshmanjoo says this is his favorite.]
28. Focus on fire rising through your form from the toes up until the body burns to ashes but not you.
29. Meditate on the make-believe world as burning to ashes, and become being above human.
30. Feel the fine qualities of creativity permeating your breasts and assuming delicate configurations.
31. With intangible breath in center of forehead, as this reaches heart at the moment of sleep, have direction over dreams and over death itself.
32. As, subjectively, letters flow into words and words into sentences, and as, objectively, circles flow into worlds and worlds into principles, find at last these converging in our being.
33. Gracious one, play the universe is an empty shell wherein your mind frolics infinitely.
34. Look upon a bowl without seeing the sides or the material. In a few moments become aware.
35. Abide in some place endlessly spacious, clear of trees, hills, habitations. Thence comes the end of mind pressures.
36. Sweet-hearted one, meditate on knowing and not knowing, existing and not existing. Then leave both aside that you may be.
37. Look lovingly on some object Do not go on to another object. Here, in the middle of this object — the blessing.
38. Feel cosmos as translucent ever-living presence.
39. With utmost devotion, center on the two junctions of breath and know the knower.
40. Consider the plenum to be your own body of bliss.
41. While being caressed, sweet princess, enter the caressing as everlasting life.
42. Stop the doors of senses when feeling the creeping of an ant. Then.
43. At the start of sexual union, keep attention on the fire in the beginning, and, so continuing, avoid the embers in the end.
44. When in such embrace your senses are shaken as leaves, enter this shaking.
45. Even remembering union, without the embrace, the transformation.
46. On joyously seeing a long-absent friend, permeate this joy.
47. When eating or drinking, become the taste of the food or drink, and be filled.
48. 0 lotus-eyed one, sweet of touch, when singing, seeing, tasting, be aware you are and discover the ever-living.
49. Wherever satisfaction is found, in whatever act, actualize this.
50. At the point of sleep when sleep has not yet come and external wakefulness vanishes, at this point being is revealed. [Lakshmanjoo says this is another of his favorites.]
51. In summer when you see the entire sky endlessly clear, enter such clarity.
52. Lie down as dead. Enraged in wrath, stay so. Or stare without moving an eyelash. Or suck something and become the sucking.
53. Without support for feet or hands, sit only on buttocks. Suddenly, the centering.
54. In an easy position, gradually pervade an area between the armpits into great peace.
55. See as if for the first time a beauteous person or an ordinary object.
56. With mouth slightly open, keep mind in the middle of tongue. Or, as breath comes silently in, feel the sound HH.
57. When on a bed or a seat, let yorself become weightless, beyond mind.
58. In a moving vehicle, by rhythmically swaying, experience. Or in a still vehicle, by letting yourself swing in slowing invisible circles.
59. Simply by looking into the blue sky beyond clouds, the serenity.
60. Shakti, see all space as if already absorbed in your own head in the brilliance.
61. Waking, sleeping, dreaming, know you as light.
62. In rain during a black night, enter that blackness as the form of forms.
63. When a moonless raining night is not present, close eyes and find blackness before you. Opening eyes, see blackness. So faults disappear forever.
64. Just as you have the impulse to do something, stop.
65. Center on the sound a-u-m without any a or m
66. Silently intone a word ending in AH. Then in the HH effortlessly, the spontaneity.
67. Feel yourself as pervading all directions, far, near.
68. Pierce some part of your nectar-filled form with a pin, and gently enter the piercing.
69. Feel: My thought, I-ness, internal organs—me.
70. Illusions deceive. Colors circumscribe. Even divisibles are indivisible.
71. When some desire comes, consider it. Then, suddenly, quit it.
72. Before desire and before knowing, how can I say I am? Consider. Dissolve in the beauty.
73. With your entire consciousness in the very start of desire, of knowing, know.
74. 0 Shakti, each particular perception is limited, disappearing in omnipotence.
75. In truth forms are inseparate. Inseparate are omnipresent being and your own form. Realize each as made of this consciousness.
76. In moods of extreme desire, be undisturbed.
77. This so-called universe appears as a juggling, a picture show. To be happy look upon it so.
78. 0 Beloved, put attention neither on pleasure or pain but between these.
79. Toss attachment for body aside, realizing I am everywhere. One who is everywhere is joyous.
80. Objects and desires exist in me as in others. So accepting, let them be translated.
81. The appreciation of objects and subjects is the same for an enlightened as for an unenlightened person. The former has one greatness: he remains in the subjective mood, not lost in things.
82. Feel the consciousness of each person as your own consciousness. So, leaving aside concern for self, become each being.
83. Thinking no thing, will limited-self unlimit.
84. Believe omniscient, omnipotent, pervading.
85. As waves come with water and flames with fire, so the universal waves with us.
86. Roam about until exhausted and then, dropping to the ground, in this dropping be whole.
87. Suppose you are gradually being deprived of strength or of knowledge. At the instant of deprivation, transcend.
88. Listen while the ultimate mystical teaching is imparted: Eyes still, without winking, at once become absolutely free.
89. Stopping ears by pressing and rectum by contracting, enter the sound of sound.
90. At the edge of a deep well look steadily into its depths until — the wondrousness.
91. Wherever your mind is wandering, internally or externally at this very place, this.
92. When vividly aware through some particular sense, keep in the awareness.
93. At the start of sneezing, during fright, in anxiety, above a chasm, flying in battle, in extreme curiosity, at the beginning of hunger, at the end of hunger, be uninterruptedly aware.
94. Let attention be at a place where you are seeing some past happening, and even your form, having lost its present characteristics, is transformed.
95. Look upon some object, then slowly withdraw your sight from it, then slowly withdraw your thought from it. Then.
96. Devotion frees.
97. Feel an object before you. Feel the absence of all other objects but this one. Then, leaving aside the object-feeling and the absence-feeling, realize.
98. The purity of other teachings is as impurity to us. In reality know nothing as pure or impure.
99. This consciousness exists as each being, and nothing else exists.
100. Be the unsame same to friend as to stranger, in honor and dishonor.
101. When a mood against someone or for someone arises, do not place it on the person in question, but remain centered.
102. Suppose you contemplate something beyond perception, beyond grasping, beyond not being, you.
103. Enter space, supportless, eternal, still.
104. Wherever your attention alights, at this very point, experience.
105. Enter the sound of your name and, through this sound, all sounds.
106. I am existing. This is mine. This is this. 0 Beloved, even in such know illimitably.
107. This consciousness is the spirit of guidance of each one. Be this one.
108. Here is a sphere of change, change, change. Through change consume change.
109. As a hen mothers her chicks, mother particular knowings, particular doings, in reality.
110. Since, in truth, bondage and freedom are relative, these words are only for those terrified with the universe. This universe is a reflection of minds. As you see many suns in water from one sun, so see bondage and liberation.
111. Each thing is perceived through knowing. The self shines in space through knowing. Perceive one being as knower and known.
112. Beloved, at this moment let mind, knowing, breath, form, be included.

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This material is from Zen Flesh, Zen Bones: A collection of Zen and Pre-Zen writings. It is compiled by Paul Reps and transcribed by Nyogen Senzaki and Paul Reps.


PDF HERE

Friday, April 4, 2014

Jiddu Krishnamurti - The First and Last Freedom


What an extraordinary thing meditation is. If there is any kind of compulsion, effort to make thought conform, imitate, then it becomes a wearisome burden. The silence which is desired ceases to be illuminating; if it is the pursuit of visions and experiences, then it leads to illusions and self-hypnosis. Only in the flowering of thought and so ending thought does meditation have significance; thought can only flower in freedom not in ever-widening patterns of knowledge. Knowledge may give newer experiences of greater sensation but a mind that is seeking experiences of any kind is immature. Maturity is the freedom from all experience; it is no longer under any influence to be and not to be. Maturity in meditation is the freeing of the mind from knowledge for it shapes and controls all experience. A mind which is a light to itself needs no experience. Immaturity is the craving for greater and wider experience. Meditation is the wandering through the world of knowledge and being free of it to enter into the unknown.



Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Jackson Peterson - Final Resolution and Total Relaxation in Dzogchen


In the Dzogchen phase of practice known as Trekchod or "cutting through tension", there eventually comes a sense of completion: no more practice, no searching and no effort to "stabilize a state".  When it is recognized that Awareness or Beingness is naked of any particular flavor or form or "feel", that Awareness is then known to be the Knowing within all experience.  All experience is equal in this case or sometimes known as "same taste" in Dzogchen or Buddhist Mahamudra.


We have to be alert that we don't have a subtle definition of Awareness that colors its empty, nakedness.  That means we , by mistake, make Awareness into a particular state of experience.  That would be like:  "Awareness is a clear openness that is spacious and serene" or "a sense of awakened-ness" or "transparency" or "bliss" or "love" etc.  We then have defined Awareness  and by doing so we have made it possible to lose the "state of Awareness".  When we aren't feeling that "clear openness that is spacious and serene" we feel we have lost Awareness. But Awareness has no definition, all experience is the experience of Awareness.  Awareness has no form or state of its own. That then allows Awareness to be every state, every feeling,every emotion,every thought, every identity sensation, every perception. That being so, what is there left to achieve?  Every experience, happy, sad or neutral is the appearance of Awareness. We give up completely the notion that Awareness has to have some particular flavor or color. Oh my god, we can finally really relax! Its over!  Every experience is equal in Awareness! What could you possibly practice?  You are already aware, so you don't need to become aware.  Everything is already happening however its happening, so there is nothing special to do. No special "state" to attain!  If you experience a special state, that's  fine, but it will never become stable.  The only stability is your unchanging perceiving of whatever is experienced. That unchanging perceivingness is Awareness, the heart of the Dharmakaya (Pure Primordial Being).


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Monday, March 31, 2014

Nisargadatta Maharaj - You are not yet here...


You are not yet here...I am here...Come! - - Nisargadatta Maharaj
Q: I agree that the world I live in and the God I believe in are both creatures of imagination.
But in what way are they created by desire?
Why do I imagine a world so painful and a God so indifferent?
What is wrong with me that I should torture myself so cruelly?
The enlightened man comes and tells me: 'it is but a dream to put an end to', but is he not himself a part of the dream?
I find myself trapped and see no way out.
You say you are free.
Of what are you free?
For heaven's sake, don't feed me on words, enlighten me, help me to wake up, since it is you who sees me tossing in my sleep.
Nisargadatta Maharaj: When I say I am free, I merely state a fact.
If you are an adult, you are free from infancy.
I am free from all description and identification.
Whatever you may hear, see, or think of, I am not that.
I am free from being a percept, or a concept.
Q: Still, you have a body and you depend on it.
M: Again you assume that your point of view is the only correct one.
I repeat: I was not, am not, shall not be a body.
To me this is a fact.
I too was under the illusion of having been born, but my Guru made me see that birth and death are mere ideas -- birth is merely the idea: 'I have a body'.
And death -- 'I have lost my body'.
Now, when I know I am not a body, the body may be there or may not -- what difference does it make?
The bodymind is like a room.
It is there, but I need not live in it all the time.
Q: Yet, there is a body and you do take care of it.
M: The power that created the body takes care of it.
Q: We are jumping from level to level all the time.
M: There are two levels to consider -- the physical -- of facts, and mental -- of ideas.
I am beyond both.
Neither your facts, nor ideas are mine.
What I see is beyond.
Cross over to my side and see with me.
Q: What I want to say is very simple.
As long as I believe: 'I am the body', I must not say: 'God will look after my body'.
God will not.
He will let it starve, sicken and die.
M: What else do you expect from a mere body?
Why are you so anxious about it?
Because you think you are the body, you want it indestructible.
You can extend its life considerably by appropriate practices, but for what ultimate good?
Q: It is better to live long and healthy.
It gives us a chance to avoid the mistakes of childhood and youth, the frustrations of adulthood, the miseries and imbecility of old age.
M: By all means live long.
But you are not the master.
Can you decide the days of your birth and death?
We are not speaking the same language.
Yours is a make-believe talk, all hangs on suppositions and assumptions.
You speak with assurance about things you are not sure of.
Q: Therefore, I am here.
M: You are not yet here.
I am here.
Come in!
But you don't.
You want me to live your life, feel your way, use your language.
I cannot, and it will not help you.
You must come to me.
Words are of the mind and the mind obscures and distorts.
Hence the absolute need to go beyond words and move over to my side.
Q: Take me over.
M: I am doing it, but you resist.
You give reality to concepts, while concepts are distortions of reality.
Abandon all conceptualisation and stay silent and attentive.
Be earnest about it and all will be well with you.