Anything at All

Posted on by Alain Joly
‘Fenêtre ouverte sur la Seine’ – Pierre Bonnard, 1911 – Wikipedia

Isn’t it humbling to realise that whatever experience you or anybody may have, whatever experience there is anywhere, anyhow, from any thing, at any time, in any dimension of life, will come down to being just this, this pure and impersonal sense of being that is the source and essence of all selves and things. You may live a child’s experience deep in the Amazon forest or a tree standing proudly in the Californian air. You may be a woman or a man in Paris, Kathmandu, or a lost, forgotten village in Greenland. You may live rich and imbued with yourself or excruciatingly poor, sleeping on a pavement somewhere, forgotten from all. You may be an ant living the life of an ant, in a scrumptious colony of fellow ants, or a dignified elephant leading the herd, the matriarch in her world. You may be an expression of utmost violence or anger, or lingering in total peace and appreciation of the world. Or an energetic horse running in the morning dew, or a distant owl hooting quietly before falling asleep. Or maybe a wave crashing in the ocean, or a whale flapping the water, or a little anchovy swimming in the big silver mass of its shoal. Or a soaring eagle, or any wild flower of any wild mountain meadow, or that heavy stone there, resting in a river bed. Or the lamp at your bedside. You may be anything that stands, sits, lies, flies, swims, exists, loves, suffers, ages or dies. You may be the majestic suns and planets of the universe dancing around, following their laws and trajectories. You may be god himself, or the goddess herself. The thousands and thousands expressions of devotion towards the divine, any human being lost in prayer. You may be just a thought. One word ushered at a lover’s ear. Or a gentle wind. Or a wonder. Or a tear. Or a sigh. Or nothing at all. A dream. Empty space. Anything. You may be anything at all. — And this is eternity. And the infinite is at your door. Here. Now. Love expressing itself. Being being ignited. Sameness. God’s presence felt.

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Text by Alain Joly

Painting by Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947)

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Website:
– Pierre Bonnard (Wikipedia)

Suggestion:
Other ‘Ways of Being’ from the blog…

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4 thoughts on “Anything at All”

  1. and a shark who attacks and kills a 6 year old laughing and bouncing in the surf; a drunk driver who plows through a crowd of church goers; a politician who advocates for mass destruction of a race of people; a child born without arms or legs; a tsunami that kills 100,000. just read the “news” any day of the week, at any time in existence, in the world of duality (maya) in which we are enabled to exist, there is simply not one aspect without the other; and it’s all Brahman. Sameness. Love. Wholeness. The “ideal” or compassionate aspect of all of this lies in the fact that we are given the opportunity to experience life. That in itself is the grace and the love. Not necessarily the experience itself (which is governed by Maya), but the opportunity which is gifted us. (God is Love and Maya sucks) (Maya and God are One) Or, as was better said below;

    Please Call Me By My True Names
    By Thich Nhat Hanh in October 2004

    Don’t say that I will depart tomorrow—
    even today I am still arriving.

    Look deeply: every second I am arriving
    to be a bud on a Spring branch,
    to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings,
    learning to sing in my new nest,
    to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower,
    to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

    I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry,
    to fear and to hope.
    The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death
    of all that is alive.

    I am a mayfly metamorphosing
    on the surface of the river.
    And I am the bird
    that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.

    I am a frog swimming happily
    in the clear water of a pond.
    And I am the grass-snake
    that silently feeds itself on the frog.

    I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones,
    my legs as thin as bamboo sticks.
    And I am the arms merchant,
    selling deadly weapons to Uganda.

    I am the twelve-year-old girl,
    refugee on a small boat,
    who throws herself into the ocean
    after being raped by a sea pirate.

    And I am also the pirate,
    my heart not yet capable
    of seeing and loving.

    I am a member of the politburo,
    with plenty of power in my hands.
    And I am the man who has to pay
    his “debt of blood” to my people
    dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.

    My joy is like Spring, so warm
    it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth.
    My pain is like a river of tears,
    so vast it fills the four oceans.

    Please call me by my true names,
    so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once,
    so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

    Please call me by my true names,
    so I can wake up
    and the door of my heart
    could be left open,
    the door of compassion.

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  2. Joly Uplifting thoughts which are the messages of saints and sages I am an ardent devotee of Ramana Maharishi,Sri Aurobindo,Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa & Kanchi Mahan who lived in our time like a living god.

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