Reality is a Verb

Posted on by Alain Joly
‘The Gray Tree’ – Piet Mondrian, 1911 – WikiArt

Here is a reminder inspired from the words of Rupert Spira. It is necessary and terribly efficient to look into these matters for ourselves. This is why I like to share here the parts of a spiritual teaching that sounds like ‘something to do’, something to experiment and verify for ourselves:

‘Instead of giving attention to the known object — thoughts, feelings, sensations and perceptions, give your attention to the knowing of your experience. Neither the knower, nor the known — just the knowing of your experience. Feel only in terms of verbs. Instead of thinking ‘I know such and such’, feel ‘There is only knowing and I am that’. Instead of thinking ‘I love you’, feel ‘There is only loving and I am that’. Instead of thinking ‘I see the tree’, feel ‘There is only seeing and I am that’…’

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Further exploring on the subject:

“When there is the awareness of the tree there is no evaluation. But when there is a response to the tree, when the tree is judged with like and dislike, then a division takes place in this awareness as the “me” and the “non-me”, the “me” who is different from the thing observed. This “me” is the response, in relationship, of past memory, past experiences. Now can there be an awareness, an observation of the tree, without any judgement, and can there be an observation of the response, the reactions, without any judgement? In this way we eradicate the principle of division, the principle of “me” and “non-me”, both in looking at the tree and in looking at ourselves.” 
– J. Krishnamurti (‘Awareness’ – ‘The Urgency of Change’)

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“We don’t really know or come in contact with an object, called a mind, a body, or a world. All we know is the knowing of our experience. And this knowing is not known by a separate object – the knower — this knowing knows itself. […] In the seeing of a tree for instance, there is no seer and there is no seen. There is no inside ‘I’ that sees and there is no outside ‘tree’ that is seen. The ‘I’ and the ‘tree’ are concepts superimposed by thinking onto the reality of the experience, which in this case could simply be called ‘seeing’.”
~ Rupert Spira (Presence, Vol.2)

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“The natural effortlessness of knowing, and the fact that it is always present, clearly prove it to be really the nature of the self; because this knowingness does not come and go like the other functions and does not part with the ‘I’-principle, even for a moment. […] A function should necessarily have a beginning and an end. Knowledge has neither of these, and so it cannot be a function. It serves as the background of all functions, lighting and co-ordinating all of them and their experiences.”
~ Atmananda Krishna Menon (‘Notes on Spiritual Discourses’ – 82 & 175)

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“Knowing Self,
mind empty and at peace,
the sage lives happily,
seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, eating.”
– Ashtavakra Gita (Bart Marshall – 17.8)

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“Do not see God as having ever created anything but rather as being in every moment a different configuration that sometimes seems to reveal Him and sometimes seems to conceal Him, without any conditions, because He is the first and the last, the apparent and the hidden and He IS knowledge of everything.”
– Balyani (‘Know Yourself’)

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“In True Meditation all objects (thoughts, feelings, emotions, memories, etc.) are left to their natural functioning. This means that no effort should be made to focus on, manipulate, control, or suppress any object of awareness. In True Meditation the emphasis is on being awareness—not on being aware of objects, but on resting as conscious being itself. In meditation you are not trying to change your experience; you are changing your relationship to your experience.”
– Adyashanti (The Way of Liberation)

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“Only if your knowledge of your own Self is correct, can you hope to know anything else correctly. It is our experience that our physical activities do not stand in the way of our thoughts and feelings. Similarly, it is possible for me as witness to be always knowing – even when the body, senses and mind are functioning. Merely note this fact and become deeply convinced of it. Don’t attempt to objectify the witness by thought.”
~ Atmananda Krishna Menon (’Notes on Spiritual Discourses’ – 288)

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“In the beginning, 
The very first thing, 
The primary experience, 
Is pure knowing being. 
And that becomes 
— Or rather seems to become
Flesh.
This knowing takes the form 
Of seeing,
And seems to become 
The seen world, 
The object, 
The known.
In fact it never actually 
Becomes flesh. 
It always remains 
Pure knowing being.”
– Rupert Spira (‘The Language of Non-Duality is only Verbs’)

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Bibliography:
– ‘Presence’, Vol. I & II – by Rupert Spira – (Non-Duality Press)
– ‘The First and Last Freedom’ – by J. krishnamurti – (Rider Book)
– ‘Notes on Spiritual Discourses of Shri Atmananda: Volumes 1-2-3’ – Shri Atmananda (Krishna Menon) (Taken by Nitya Tripta) – (Non-duality Press)
– ‘Know Yourself: An explanation of the oneness of being’ – by Balyani – (Beshara Publications) 

Websites:
– Rupert Spira
– J. Krishnamurti
– Adyashanti (Wikipedia)
– Atmananda Krishna Menon (Wikipedia)
– Ashtavakra Gita (Wikipedia)
– Piet Mondrian (Wikipedia)

Suggestions:
– Fleeing to God (other pointers from the blog…)

– A Day at Brockwood Park (Homage to J. Krishnamurti)
– The Householder Sage (Homage to Atmananda Krishna Menon)
– The Song of Ashtavakra (Homage to the Ashtavakra Gita)

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The Tail of the Tiger

Posted on by Alain Joly

Here is a reminder from Robert Adams. It is necessary and terribly efficient to look into these matters for ourselves. This is why I like to share here the parts of a spiritual teaching that sounds like ‘something to do’, something to experiment and verify for ourselves:

“You’ve got to realize you are greater than you think, and you’ve got the same power within you as everybody else does. It may appear to be asleep, but as you work on yourself, work on yourself, work on yourself, you will awaken it, and one day it will become stronger than you are and take you over completely and you’ll be free. But you’ve got to keep on working on yourself, and stop putting yourself down. That’s the worst thing you can do is to put yourself down. That’s blasphemy because you’re putting God down. Think of yourself as a higher person, love yourself, worship yourself, bow to yourself. You are greater than you think.”

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Further exploring on the subject:

“Increase and widen your desires till nothing but reality can fulfil them. It is not desire that is wrong, but its narrowness and smallness. Desire is devotion. By all means be devoted to the real, the infinite, the eternal heart of being. Transform desire into love. All you want is to be happy. All your desires, whatever they may be, are expressions of your longing for happiness. Basically, you wish yourself well.”
~ Nisargadatta Maharaj

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“Hold on to the tail of the tiger, don’t let it go, because you will see if you hold on, you will enter into quite, totally a different dimension. But if you let go, you know it is like coming back to living in the beastly life of struggle and conflict and battle with each other.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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“I think the best way to live in this world, the most important thing, is to explore and to recognise who we essentially are. And having recognised who we essentially are, or as we are engaged in this exploration, to think and feel in a way that is consistent with our understanding of ourself. And to act in a way that is consistent with those thoughts and feelings. In other words, our knowledge of ourself, our understanding of ourself, is the most important aspect of life, because everything we do, everything we think, all the relationships we engage in, we think and feel and act and relate on behalf of ourself. And therefore, everything depends on our understanding of ourself.”
~ Rupert Spira

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“O soul, seek the Beloved, O friend, seek the Friend,
O watchman, be wakeful: it behoves not a watchman to sleep.”
~ Rumi

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“You always have two choices. One choice is the familiar one: to sacrifice this mysterious awakeness for something else. The second choice is not to sacrifice this that’s awake and present, whatever you happen to be. You can choose not to sacrifice this for the next promise of a better moment, a better event, or a better experience. This is your choice — to be true to what’s true or not. And this is the Fire of Truth. This that is awake now, as you, in you, reveals the utter irrelevance of every other argument, whatever that may be. This that is awake to itself renders everything that is not true irrelevant. This silence burns the grasping for anything else and frees the life that you are, to live itself without negotiation. Feel the immediate visceral invitation of this that is awake, to put down everything else. The invitation asks you to cease bargaining with life, with the moment, yourself, your teacher, your friend, your mate. Just stop. This fire is unseen and unknown, and yet it burns everything other than itself.”
~ Adyashanti

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The picture is by Susann Mielke / Pixabay

Bibliography:
– ‘Silence of the Heart’ – by Robert Adams – (Infinity Institute)
– ‘Being Aware of Being Aware’, – by Rupert Spira – (Sahaja Publications)
– ‘I Am That‘ – by Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj – (Non-Duality Press)
– ‘Krishnamurti’s Notebook’ – by J. Krishnamurti – (Krishnamurti Publications of America, US)
– ‘The Essential Rumi’ – Translated by Coleman Barks – (HarperOne)
– ‘Falling into Grace: Insights on the End of Suffering’ – by Adyashanti – (Sounds True Inc)

Websites:
– Robert Adams (Wikipedia)
– Rupert Spira
– Nisargadatta Maharaj (Wikipedia)
– J. Krishnamurti 
– Rumi (Wikipedia)
– Adyashanti

Suggestion:
– Fleeing to God (other pointers from the blog)
– A Day at Brockwood Park (Homage to J. Krishnamurti)
– Rumi (Homage to Rumi)
– Khetwadi Lane (Homage to Nisargadatta Maharaj)

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The Paradox

Posted on by Alain Joly

“You run into this amazingly beautiful paradox 
that there is no ‘I’ at all and ‘I’ is everywhere, 
and both of those are true simultaneously. 
It’s about as much fun as you could possibly have. 
There isn’t an ‘I’, and 
the only thing that exists is one big ‘I’
shining out of everything.”

~ Adyashanti 

 

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Photograph by Jerry Katz

Quote by Adyashanti

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Read ‘Jerry Katz: Let the Scene See You’ on Paula Marvelly’s blog ‘The Culturium’.

F73D470C-C4EC-42C3-A2BB-BBAC3CBF363CJERRY KATZ has been interested in human consciousness since childhood, and has investigated many spiritual teachings. He is also a landscape photographer. For him, “photography is a journey toward honesty, beauty and self-discovery.” Jerry is the creator of the website ‘Nonduality: The Varieties of Expression’. He also founded ‘Nonduality Salon’, a forum that recognizes and welcomes both the ‘impossible’ and the ‘worthwhile’ expressions of nonduality. Since 1998, Jerry has published a free daily email letter, ‘The Nondual Highlights’. He lives in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Bibliography:
– ‘One: Essential Writings on Nonduality’ – by Jerry Katz – (1st Sentient Publications Ed)
– ‘Emptiness Dancing’ – by Adyashanti – (Sounds True Inc.)

Websites:
– Nonduality: The Varieties of Expression (Jerry Katz’s website)
– Nonduality Salon (Jerry’s group on Facebook)
– Adyashanti

 

Be Still and Know

Posted on by Alain Joly

This was our last retreat there. In the old mansion that we so dearly loved. Amongst the rolling hills of Wales. Here we have listened and felt. Here we have known what needs to be known. We have felt our heart sing and thrive beyond measure. 

Here we sang together for the last time. A small improvised choir. A last song that is like a hymn for future days. Its lovely tune I cannot convey to you. But the words. Oh the words… Only listen and feel the heart of it. It goes:

“Be still and know that I am God
And there is none besides me”

The first injonction is ‘be still’. It’s a call. There is a wild world out there. Don’t run after every seducing thought. Don’t follow every glitter of experience. Be disinterested for once. Turn your head away. Say: I don’t want you! Try it.

Don’t let the world eat you. If anything, swallow it yourself! But do it softly. Let it go and disappear of its own accord. Be gentle. We don’t want to upset it. It needs to tell you more. Wait a little longer. You will be surprised.

Put yourself together. Find the place of togetherness in you. Stay there. See how good it feels. Be reunited with your own self. Make it happy. Make yours its sweet presence. Hear its heartfelt cry resonating. You’re here. At last! […]

Continue unraveling these verses from a song… (READ MORE…)

 

The Aloneness of Being

Posted on by Alain Joly

‘The Aloneness of being’ is a phrase borrowed from Krishnamurti. Here are a few quotes to celebrate Aloneness…

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“Aloneness is the purgation of all motives,
of all pursuits of desire,
of all ends.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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“We walked up the steep bank of the river and took a path that skirted the green wheat-fields. This path was a very ancient way; many thousands had trodden it, and it was rich in tradition and silence. It wandered among fields and mangoes, tamarinds and deserted shrines. There were large patches of garden, sweet peas deliciously scenting the air. The birds were settling down for the night, and a large pond was beginning to reflect the stars. Nature was not communicative that evening. The trees were aloof; they had withdrawn into their silence and darkness. A few chattering villagers passed by on their bicycles, and once again there was deep silence and that peace which comes when all things are alone.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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“One must be willing to stand alone — in the unknown, with no reference to the known or the past or any of one’s conditioning. One must stand where no one has stood before in complete nakedness, innocence, and humility. One must stand in that dark light, in that groundless embrace, unwavering and true to the reality beyond all self — not just for a moment, but forever without end. For then that which is sacred, undivided, and whole is born within consciousness and begins to express itself.”
~ Adyashanti

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“Aloneness is indivisible and loneliness is separation. That which is alone is pliable and so enduring. Only the alone can commune with that which is causeless, the immeasurable. To the alone, life is eternal; to the alone there is no death. The alone can never cease to be.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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“Walking, surrounded by these violet, bare, rocky mountains, suddenly there was solitude. Complete solitude. Everywhere, there was solitude; it had great, unfathomable richness; it had that beauty which is beyond thought and feeling. It was not still; it was living, moving, filling every nook and corner. The high rocky mountain top was aglow with the setting sun and that very light and colour filled the heavens with solitude.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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– J. Krishnamurti’s excerpts are from ‘Krishnamurti’s Notebook’ and ‘Commentaries on Living: First Series’.

– Adyashanti’s excerpt is from: ‘An Inner Revolution’, by Adyashanti

– Picture by Alain Joly

Bibliography:
– ‘Commentaries on Living: First Series’, by J. Krishnamurti – (Quest Books,U.S.)
– ‘Falling into Grace: Insights on the End of Suffering’, by Adyashanti – (Sounds True Inc)

Websites:
– J. Krishnamurti
– Adyashanti

Suggestion:
– Fleeing to God (other pointers from the blog)
– A Day at Brockwood Park (Homage to J. Krishnamurti)

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