The State of Things

‘Self-portrait’ (detail) – Rembrandt, 1658 (Frick Collection, New York City) – WikiArt

.

It is crucial in life to have a clear view of the state of things. Not to be left behind with an erroneous understanding or interpretation. For there are wolves out there, that want you to go astray. They will lure you to adopt their own inherited beliefs. They will push you in the direction of your fall. So be watchful of everything you don’t fully understand.

They will want you to believe that you are surrounded by people or others. That these ‘others’ are objects of fear, pain or pleasure, that you will be drawn to either avoid or use for your own happiness. Nothing could be more remote from the truth. At no time or place will you be asked to meet anybody but yourself. Your own glorious self who happens to be also the self of all apparent others. People are but the varied and beautiful expressions of the one being that stands as your being too. In consequence, they will become colleagues, partners, sharers of that same one being, and therefore beloveds. You will see them as blooming flowers that belong to the same aware field of consciousness. This field is the only self there is, present in everyone and every being as your very own being too. This, truly is the state of things.

You will be pressed to believe that your thoughts define you. That they represent a judge and a censor inside your skull, who is the chooser and decider in your life. Nothing could be more remote from the truth. Most of your thoughts define only what you are not. They are the leftovers of everything in you that is unclear or confused. You will not find in them an identity for your self. That true and only identity is to be sought in your deepest being, who happens to be the bearer of the qualities of peace, happiness, love, beauty, and freedom. Since the main purpose of your thoughts and illusory self is precisely to forever and failingly seek happiness, they are redundant. Trust your primal being in matters of peace and happiness. That transparent being is a self in itself. Its reliability is total. Relieve your thoughts from the burden of an identity. There is no existing self separate from that unlimited, aware presence. You are pure, unfathomable being. This, truly is the state of things.

And you will make yours the notion that your suffering or happiness are dictated by the circumstances of your life. Nothing could be more remote from the truth. Are you so brittle as to render your well-being dependent on the weather of life? Circumstances around you are the real poor things, forever imprisoned by the causes and hazards of existence. They are the ones needing your loving support. Your presence has a rock-like solidity that nothing can come to disturb or weaken. Your being is an infinite expanse of peace that nothing can break, unless a resisting thought rises to take the blow of hurt. Your fragility resides wholly in your saying ‘no’ to what is, and in the mistrust it implies. Nobody fancies being rejected, so life bounces back at you with its revengeful pang. But you have at your hand, as simple as a ‘yes’ to every aspect of existence, the solution to your so dearly sought-after happiness. Trust the invulnerability of your being. Remain in the quiet imperturbability of your self. The quality of its aware presence has been designed for your own peaceful, harmonious life. This, truly is the state of things.

And you will be brainwashed to believe that you are but a body in a wild wild world. What a terrible limit to impose on oneself. Nothing could be more remote from the truth. You are bigger and wider than that. You have been blessed with a presence that is way before the presence of any particular body. This silent watcher has no location to abide in. It is itself a location and an identity for every body and every apparent individual self. It is lending its own ethereal structure and being to the structure and being of the world. It has a universe as its ever moving and dancing body. This pure, dimensionless consciousness — the silent watcher — is the only being present in all things and selves, in every mountain soaring above any restless ocean, in every apparent atom of every apparent matter-like structure that your eyes have been blessed to contemplate. So don’t be so malleable as to adopt such petty and misleading views about yourself. Your being is nothing but the glorious, knowing, eternal and ethereal presence of god. They will want to hide it from you. Silent that pack of wolves. Be certain that you are simply and wholly, majestic being. This, truly is the state of things. This, truly is the state of things.

.

~~~

Text by Alain Joly

Painting by Rembrandt (1606-1669)

~~~

.

Rupert Spira spoke beautifully of this self-portrait by Rembrandt in this YouTube dialogue with Henry Shukman…

Websites:
– Rupert Spira
– Rembrandt (Wikipedia)

Suggestion:
– Other ‘Reveries’ from the blog…

.

Back to Pages

.