The Voice in Your Head

Posted on by Alain Joly

There is a voice inside your head that is a true tyrant. It has an opinion on everything, always judging, evaluating, commenting — a gossip of the worst kind. It constantly informs you of its likes and dislikes, without you ever truly asking for it. Notice that most situations don’t fit its expectations, for it is a hard one to satisfy. But more than being a tyrant, it is cunning and deceitful. For it pretends to be the voice of an entity — the very person that you are. And it is a mentor so convincing and attractive, that you would follow it anywhere — anywhere, and at any cost — including at the cost of being unhappy, uncertain, fearful, dispossessed of your beautiful self. So please remove yourself from its spell. And do it now. For this voice is not your self. It is placed much too far ahead of yourself. This fake identity is a hesitant one, desirous, not grounded, forever running after its own projected, illusory, unreachable recipe for happiness.

This constant judging and seeking may look like a quest for happiness but it is not. You are not doing it well. This is not the way to happiness: to be a believer, a follower, gullible to the point of endorsing the first voice that comes up in your mind. But only observe it, and you will see that this voice is as thin as the blink of an eye, as barren as a thought can be when it pretends to be the self from which it derives its trifling existence. You have to rewind it all, back to a place of not knowing. For this voice’s pretentious knowing to which you have succumbed, diverts you from your goal, from this innate peace which is here, quietly dormant at home, in your self, as that which you are before all knowing, all judging, all beliefs, curled as your inborn, unsoilable innocence. This unborn stillness is your true self, innocent but all-knowing, still but with the activity of a thousand suns, unborn but bearing the life of a universe, vulnerable to your noticing, but whose presence is unbreakable and therefore immortal.

That one is a more trustable match if you ask me. That one doesn’t need a voice to represent itself. It is the unguarded one, that needs no protection and no incentive for being itself, wide-open, naked as no one and no thing ever was naked before, and will ever be. Its apparent vulnerability is the measure of its utter invulnerability. This inner being or presence is all that a thought, or a voice in the head, could never be. It is humble to the point of espousing the reality of everything, bright to the point of being transparent, undoubtedly present to the point of seeming not there, and so intimately woven in the now that it is overlooked and sought only in the future, which is nothing but a thought in your head. So leave your outer voice and remain as your inner being only. Or rather see that this assertive voice is rendered to its ridiculous and idiotic redundancy, when you observe it from the right perspective of being. So the voice in your head is found to be just a ghost. It never was there as the self you believed it to be. It is the empty shell of an absent being. But its mimicry is nevertheless hiding the voiceless, headless silent being that is your true and only self.

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Text and photo by Alain Joly

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Suggestion:
– Other ‘Reveries’ from the blog…

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Hidden Vastness

Posted on by Alain Joly
‘The Monk by the Sea’ – Caspar David Friedrich, 1808-10 – WikiArt

Infiltrated with your experience is hidden a vastness. Don’t let it be unseen, a thing lost, blind to itself, and yourself mistaken with merely a few passing sensations and some thoughts erring with little purpose. You’ve got to notice, just notice, quietly, almost inadvertently, that most of your experience consists of a shy, unassuming, happy presence that stands behind every single occurrence that proceeds proudly in and as your experience. That shy being is not to be missed or snubbed. That background blessing is of utmost importance in your life. It is everything to you, although you may not know it. So you’ve got to thin your experience out, and not let it be so loud, so invasive — maybe snub it for a while, to make it transparent to what is saturating it. This shy presence is in fact yourself wanting to be truly seen. It is yourself pushing the boundaries of experience, to befriend you. It is your lover who seeks to seduce you, and that you push away every time you give objective experience this undue, primary importance. So be attentive, sensitive to the discreet manifestation of presence. Don’t be so rude for once.

Let presence reveal its shining, pervading nature. See every appearance through. Notice the presence of your self through and behind every experience that forms before your eyes. You’ve got to give yourself all the attention you deserve, to see that you are everywhere, all at once, and that you in fact pervade the world. And the more you see yourself as you are, the more interesting will the world become to you. You will be in love with your fellow humans and with the world, and that love is nothing but the presence of your self pervading every experience, being one with it. To love is to witness the disappearance of your old, limited, worn out sense of self, and the discovery of a limitless, incorruptible, astounding self. A self with no substance, yet highly substantial, highly present, overwhelmingly so. A self that is the very hum of the world, and its vibrating essence. A self that is but the simple feeling of being when it is disengaged from the filter of experience. A self that is fresh, untamed, vibrant with its own innate innocence. So learn to simply be, in spite of all your so tantalising experiences. Life is solely composed of this one, single, ravishing experience of being. Stay firm with that fact.

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Text by Alain Joly

Painting by Caspar David Friedrich (1774–1840)

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Websites:
– Caspar David Friedrich (Wikipedia)
– The Monk by the Sea (Wikipedia)

Suggestion:
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The Flame without Smoke

Posted on by Alain Joly
©️ Krishnamurti Foundation India

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“Love is the only flame without smoke.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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The flame and the smoke is an analogy Krishnamurti referred to sometimes. For him, the flame is this burning centre of being that “can never be expressed with words”, that “is beyond the clutches of time”, and that is often expressed as love. The smoke is of the mind. It is “the smoke of envy, of holding, of missing, of recalling the past, of longing for tomorrow, of sorrow and worry; and this effectively smothers the flame.” The smoke is often what we take to be the flame but is not. It is all that is passing, all the thoughts, feelings, perceptions — the smoke that we have gathered to form experience, and that we take to be ourself, our centre of being. This wilful, separate, time bound, suffering self has appropriated the feeling of being when it is in fact the very smoke that is veiling our true nature. Being only is that flame without smoke. It is our true identity and “the source of all happiness”.

I have gathered, over the years, on social medias, many of the most striking quotes by Krishnamurti, that popped up on my screen. These, I found, acted on me like little koans, that had the power to pierce the smoke of the mind, and reveal the subtlest truths. They are like candies which, when chewed upon carefully, reveal the flame of what we truly are. They are short and easy, but need to be taken seriously. They can crack open our resistance, and show us that flame without smoke. I share them here with you…

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“Do not pursue what should be,
but understand what is.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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“Love is not at the end of time.
It is now, or it isn’t.
And hell is when it is not…”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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“Thought is never free because it is based on knowledge,
and knowledge is always limited.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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“It is essential to understand the seeker,
before you try to find out what it is he is seeking.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

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“The ego is a ring of defence around nothing.”
~ J. Krishnamurti

[…]

Discover more of this selection of quotes by Jiddu Krishnamurti… (READ MORE…)

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A Cathedral of Grace

Posted on by Alain Joly

We always want to be at a distance from experience. In fact, we keep behind, we don’t get involved — at least not entirely. We are aloof. We keep experience at bay. That allows for a certain safety, we think. But that distance is the distance we keep from ourself. This is the chasm we have opened, through which we have numbed ourself. So we had to fill this chasm with a belief in separation, with the idea of a being separate from other beings and things. In this chasm is born our loneliness, and the vast field of our search for happiness. This search is but our desperate attempt to fill the gap we have created and nourished. And this chasm is how we have been made to think ceaselessly about ourself. How we have been made to judge, hope, project, regret, complain, expect, believe. These are — we think — the measure of our control in life. But they are in fact the loss of our innocence. For this chasm or distance is what our suffering is made of. It is the way we have found to not be wholly being — being appearing to be a dangerous flame, of a consuming nature. So we have stepped safely aside. In this keeping away from the flame, in this refusal to die, is our chasm, our whole precipice of pain.

But this flame of being is in fact our fountain of peace. It is what makes us present, uncompromisingly one with experience, with nowhere to go but ourself, and nothing to be but that which we already are. In this place of being, we are not allowed distance, and time is proscribed. There is nowhere to go in being. Nothing to be but being. This flame of being will cancel the distance that was your safety. It will devour you, digest all your hopes and projections, burn your regrets, crush your fear, and debunk all idea of separation. You are thus crashing in being, and are consumed in its flame. Experience is now revealed to be nothing but the experiencing of your self within your self. You are given no room for separation, and are discovering yourself to be the sublime core of all that can possibly exist. You may look all you want, you won’t find yourself anywhere, for the simple reason that there is no location for you to be in. And you will find no space for a self to have experience, for the experiencer has dissolved in experiencing. This merging of your self with experience is how suffering is made impossible. This is how you are made present here and now, one with everything and everyone. And this is how you are made to feel in awe with what you see, hear, and touch. You are ravished to just be, and are suddenly placed at the teeming heart of your self, unable to not fully, gorgeously be. You are entering a cathedral of grace, and are placed in a well of light, amongst songs of glory.

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Text and photo by Alain Joly

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

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