I've rarely been mainstream before. I have for so long sought out the odd, the eccentric. From games to religions, I have deliberately chosen the obscure. I have indeed pursued exotic philosophies and taken tea with weird gods.
And why? Was it because I once agreed with a quote I read long ago that the majority is, more often than not, wrong, and that I have a greater chance of finding truth away from the beaten track? Or was it because by so doing and mastering such a subject, I could simply become a big fish in a small pond?
A different wind blows through me now and drives me to action. I renounce the position of outlier and rejoin the main bell curve. I turn away from the shallows to plunge into the main current. Yet at the same time I stay like the lotus, supported by the mud but bursting through the water into the sunshine - in the world but not of the world.
Why am I doing this? Because in the mainstream I find the most suffering; I find the greatest numbers of people that need help. And even if I can make only a small difference, I have a greater chance of making that difference. I know this may seem presumptuous to some, but where would be the compassion in turning my back?
"Water nourishes all things. Cold ice and hot vapour both withhold the gift. The way of warmth is the way of life." I know I have been fire and ice for too long and helped too few. It is time for me to leave the extremes. It is time for me to become as simple and as straightforward as water.
Monday 8 December 2008
Tuesday 2 December 2008
Kindness
There is a saying, coined by a writer exactly my age, "Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty".
I don't agree!
There is even a "Random Acts of Kindness Day" as an unofficial holiday celebrated every September 1 in New Zealand where people are asked to do random acts of kindness for strangers or people they know.
Random?! On one day a year?! What are people doing the rest of the time!?
Kindness is something that can pervade a whole lifetime. Given the choice, and most people have the choice most of the time, why would anyone want to do anything else?
I don't agree!
There is even a "Random Acts of Kindness Day" as an unofficial holiday celebrated every September 1 in New Zealand where people are asked to do random acts of kindness for strangers or people they know.
Random?! On one day a year?! What are people doing the rest of the time!?
Kindness is something that can pervade a whole lifetime. Given the choice, and most people have the choice most of the time, why would anyone want to do anything else?
Thursday 13 November 2008
Time to talk
"Water nourishes all things.
Cold ice and hot vapour both withhold the gift.
The way of warmth is the way of life."
So says the Kuan Yin Oracle once more. And how appropriate given the last entry two months ago. Perhaps it is time to talk again, without renouncing simplicity, as who will benefit from an eternal silence?
I read Solobill Laville's "11 Presentations on no-time: No past, present or future." I have never been drawn to meditating on time. But I am been prodded to do so it seems. First I read today a post on an email list claiming that suffering comes from clinging to the present, and now Solobill's essay. My instant reaction to each was disagreement, but why? Because I live in the Now. I do so because 35 years ago, a mahatma told me, as related here, that "If you can be happy now, you can always be happy." I found out how to achieve that... and it works, in seeing contradiction to the email list statement.
I started to frame responses in my mind to each. And then I thought better of it. Solobill has the gentlest way of putting things over and I am so often aware of the problems of words meaning different things to different people. I saw no use in sorting out the terminology separately in each case.
So I went instead to experience, to the all consuming Seeing as Being exercises described here and here (and plus/minus a few posts). I figured that if there is no sense of time or timelessness or no-time in that state, then it was either conjecture or not something relevant to my current needs.
And so I slip into Being Seeing. Raw power consumes me. And then I see, almost behind everything, layers - layers of existence of everything through time, like seeing an extra spacial dimension. I catch just an instant of no separation and then...
I am out of practice! I hold this only for a short span, but the consciousness continues a little and I see my hands typing this with the time dimension as space as extra dimensions overlaid on them... I think of vapour trails but it doesn't come close.
I will meditate on this experience. Perhaps I will touch the Core again and recreate it or investigate further. But it's perfectly possible, as I did when I made the switch from Seeing as Being to Seeing as an Enlightened Being, that I may say "Very nice but there's no point to this ('this' being Seeing as Being, whether looking at time or not) - not for me, not now. It neither removes my suffering nor does it help me remove anyone else's. And that's unlike when I engage in Seeing as an Enlightened Being, which has both practical use and is a consciousness possible and usable all the time."
Cold ice and hot vapour both withhold the gift.
The way of warmth is the way of life."
So says the Kuan Yin Oracle once more. And how appropriate given the last entry two months ago. Perhaps it is time to talk again, without renouncing simplicity, as who will benefit from an eternal silence?
I read Solobill Laville's "11 Presentations on no-time: No past, present or future." I have never been drawn to meditating on time. But I am been prodded to do so it seems. First I read today a post on an email list claiming that suffering comes from clinging to the present, and now Solobill's essay. My instant reaction to each was disagreement, but why? Because I live in the Now. I do so because 35 years ago, a mahatma told me, as related here, that "If you can be happy now, you can always be happy." I found out how to achieve that... and it works, in seeing contradiction to the email list statement.
I started to frame responses in my mind to each. And then I thought better of it. Solobill has the gentlest way of putting things over and I am so often aware of the problems of words meaning different things to different people. I saw no use in sorting out the terminology separately in each case.
So I went instead to experience, to the all consuming Seeing as Being exercises described here and here (and plus/minus a few posts). I figured that if there is no sense of time or timelessness or no-time in that state, then it was either conjecture or not something relevant to my current needs.
And so I slip into Being Seeing. Raw power consumes me. And then I see, almost behind everything, layers - layers of existence of everything through time, like seeing an extra spacial dimension. I catch just an instant of no separation and then...
I am out of practice! I hold this only for a short span, but the consciousness continues a little and I see my hands typing this with the time dimension as space as extra dimensions overlaid on them... I think of vapour trails but it doesn't come close.
I will meditate on this experience. Perhaps I will touch the Core again and recreate it or investigate further. But it's perfectly possible, as I did when I made the switch from Seeing as Being to Seeing as an Enlightened Being, that I may say "Very nice but there's no point to this ('this' being Seeing as Being, whether looking at time or not) - not for me, not now. It neither removes my suffering nor does it help me remove anyone else's. And that's unlike when I engage in Seeing as an Enlightened Being, which has both practical use and is a consciousness possible and usable all the time."
Tuesday 2 September 2008
Simplicity
"First a crystal, cold and brilliant.
Then a sheet, thin and brittle.
Ice forms - releasing your burden, unfreezing your simplicity."
So says the Kuan Yin Oracle. And so it is with Play as Being. In both cases, it's an apparent paradox. Ice forms, but something else becomes unfrozen. You seem to fill your life with more activity (with the "9 seconds every 15 minutes" Play as Being practice), yet your life becomes less cluttered. How is this?
Burdens become held in suspension. Perspectives become clearer. A sense of proportion based on what really matters takes over. But putting aside esoteric insights for a moment, it means, very simply, that you are more ready to face where you find yourself, day to day.
Then a sheet, thin and brittle.
Ice forms - releasing your burden, unfreezing your simplicity."
So says the Kuan Yin Oracle. And so it is with Play as Being. In both cases, it's an apparent paradox. Ice forms, but something else becomes unfrozen. You seem to fill your life with more activity (with the "9 seconds every 15 minutes" Play as Being practice), yet your life becomes less cluttered. How is this?
Burdens become held in suspension. Perspectives become clearer. A sense of proportion based on what really matters takes over. But putting aside esoteric insights for a moment, it means, very simply, that you are more ready to face where you find yourself, day to day.
Wednesday 27 August 2008
Simple words
Yes it has been a long time since the last update of this blog. That will happen, dear reader, from time to time. There are many reasons why this happens. Busy-ness is often a factor of course. Laziness (who me?) may be too. Complacency (surely not!) may be another.
Of these, complacency is the most interesting for me at the moment. But is it actually complacency? When, through one's practice, one reaches a level of experience and understanding that has far exceeded anything personally experienced in the past, and when one gains deep and lasting insight into what I can only describe as my true home - a state of enlightened being, sometimes the question becomes, "No rush. Being is all. What else is there to write about?"
And yet that is what I say when I'm not in that state, not when I am in it! When in that state of enlightened being - and I dwelt there for a while whilst writing this - I have a sense of clarity and deep purpose - perhaps pure will - that totally belies the apparent hippie-like attitude of the above!
There are many people who may read this and pick it apart for evidence of duality in the writing as a pointer to the writer's lack of pure experience. To that I say, "Crap!" Is it possible to write successfully about Being or the experience of Becoming? No. These are fingers pointing at the moon. And I will be the last to cloak my words in the impenetrable intellectual claptrap used by so many. They carve out a self-selecting audience and provide only the opportunity for mental masturbation. What use is that to the average reader? And since those words are futile to describe "what is", yet simple words will suffice to hint at paths and to encourage, why not stick with simple words?
I'll do my best. :)
Of these, complacency is the most interesting for me at the moment. But is it actually complacency? When, through one's practice, one reaches a level of experience and understanding that has far exceeded anything personally experienced in the past, and when one gains deep and lasting insight into what I can only describe as my true home - a state of enlightened being, sometimes the question becomes, "No rush. Being is all. What else is there to write about?"
And yet that is what I say when I'm not in that state, not when I am in it! When in that state of enlightened being - and I dwelt there for a while whilst writing this - I have a sense of clarity and deep purpose - perhaps pure will - that totally belies the apparent hippie-like attitude of the above!
There are many people who may read this and pick it apart for evidence of duality in the writing as a pointer to the writer's lack of pure experience. To that I say, "Crap!" Is it possible to write successfully about Being or the experience of Becoming? No. These are fingers pointing at the moon. And I will be the last to cloak my words in the impenetrable intellectual claptrap used by so many. They carve out a self-selecting audience and provide only the opportunity for mental masturbation. What use is that to the average reader? And since those words are futile to describe "what is", yet simple words will suffice to hint at paths and to encourage, why not stick with simple words?
I'll do my best. :)
Thursday 7 August 2008
Thoughts on ESBS
- The drowned kitty look is slowly receding! [See previous post.] The effects are still with me though and I am still only firing on 2 cylinders. This precious human form is so fragile. One part of me is grateful for the medications, and is resigned to the obvious dependency I now seem to have on them. But behind that, and overarching all, another part of me cruises through the illusion and continues to see things as they really are.
- Had a long chat about ESBS with Piet Hut last night. It's amazing how experience unites us but words can separate! It's easy to jump on the limitations of a metaphor as though that's what the speaker really means, when actually they don't. When two people have one experience, something that is indivisible, it's expression... well, I'm falling over myself already! There's more work to do here. Piet and I have arrived at the same experience - maybe - by complementary routes. Or have we? Ha ha! Being can itself guide that next step.
- There's a box on the floor in the middle of the kitchen. Its contents are wonderful, amazing, - I've sampled them several times - and ... I keep on walking round the box the long way. Skirting it. Acknowledging its presence but putting off opening it again. Dancing around it. Jumping over it. In fact doing anything else other than sitting on the floor beside it, opening the lid and diving right inside. The label on the box says, "ESBS". What is stopping me? It's only partly comforting to know that the person who sent me the box also, on occasion, does the same dance! What is going on?
- When Being sees, there are no edges. No longer can I point to a separate thing. Neither is there an I to point. I thought of the lenticular cloud. It appears solid and stationary. You think you can point to it and say, "It's there!" But it is constantly dissolving on its trailing edge and being added to on its leading edge. Its presence is an illusion everyone can see. Click here to see an animation of a lenticular cloud.
- I previously touched on seeming to have the awareness of the thoughts of other enlightened beings while in the Enlightened state. Rarefied stuff eh!? Now I wonder whether that was because I shared the same mental continuum or mindstream with these other beings. If so, what does that make me?!
Tuesday 5 August 2008
ESBS 2
I am so tired today. I feel as though I could sleep for weeks. Perhaps it's a result of a recurrence of laryngopharyngeal reflux disease, itself due to running out of lansoprazole, and in turn due to my doctors' surgery being closed all yesterday, which is finally in turn due to a strange peculiarity of Scottish society, namely, that there exist special public holidays that are limited to one city or town, and that are difficult to predict if you're not a local and your daily work takes you across several boundaries. [pause for breath]
- My head feels as though it is stuffed full of wet papier-mâché. The superfine awareness of ES is there - somewhere - but I can hardly feel it. The blunt tool of BS is also accessible. And my body registers the effects of these two consciousnesses. But my mind can scarcely acknowledge anything.
It seems an important point to note about the physical body and how it reacts so strongly to what we're tuned into, often more so than the conscious mind. Even if I feel "I don't want to meditate, too tired to do prostrations..." (substitute whatever practice you get up to), I am still going to reap at least one benefit.
Reminds me, in a way, of water divining, or more generally dowsing. Mental attunement using faith as a switch simply works. The body responds. The tools - the rods etc. - are mere mechanical amplifiers. How does it work? Don't know. Doesn't matter. It just does. It's harmless and useful. You keep the enabling attitude and the response bypasses your consciousness straight into the physical effect.
- Don't expect too much else of me today. I now have the lansoprazole, but I still feel like the picture at the top.
Monday 4 August 2008
ESBS 1
What is ESBS? Basically another extension of Play as Being. YSBS was "You Seeing Being Seeing" - what I have called "Seeing as Being" in this blog. ESBS is "Enlightened Seeing Being Seeing". As Piet says, "Briefly, the idea is to explore in a kind of fantasy or imagination how it would be if you had a fully enlightened way of looking at the world around you, as ES replacing YS; and then to contrast that to BS. Are they the same or not? If not, what is the difference?"
Well yes there is. Drawing on today's experience and the experience of the last couple of weeks, Being Seeing does not appear to be interested in the small individuals as there are no individuals. We are just thoughts of being, as are the stars and galaxies. It's amazing to see dimensions and distance fall away when Seeing as Being.
So it would have been the presumption that the enlightened being sees as Being. And yes indeed they can. And it's a necessary step for them. It's a realisation. It's life changing. But it seems to me only a prelude for what comes next. Because when one can more or less reliably get to the point of Seeing as Being, what comes next is a choice. And it seems a choice reminiscent of one in Buddhism: the way of Hinayana or the way of Mahayana. BS or ES?
Seeing as an enlightened being brings clarity of seeing, clarity of thought, clarity of motivation. You can see as Being and that brings the knowledge that you can at any moment become Being (or be become by Being). You can see the illusion and you can wear that illusion and duality lightly. Yet you also have the clear communication of the commonality of purpose with other enlightened beings. You are acting in concert with them.
It makes sense but it's not what I expected. I actually prefer it this way!
- So I finally get round to my first try at this. I am at work, so I start with "You Seeing" anyway as I've found that is a good way to focus. Then, to transition to "Enlightened Seeing," I simply say, "I am an enlightened being" and the now familiar power rises in me. My mind becomes completely clear. Somewhere I hear myself say the words from a Buddhist prayer "I have the clarity of the yidam". I had expected to be carrying the "history of me" as a kind of personalisation - as an enlightened being awoken from ignorance - but I find none.
So I switch to "Being Seeing" and there is hardly any difference. Hardly but there is something. I think later maybe there was no individualisation at all as Being, whereas ... so hard to describe ...
Minutes I try quickly to go back to ES and find that it is the difference between seeing absolutely clearly and seeing only oneself everywhere. Perhaps that's just a play on words but there's a subtle difference in feeling.
And now I feel that last hop in and out of ES has left me reeling - my head a little blown apart - and 'normality' hurts. I think that Enlightened Seeing is the place to be, permanently. That's where I'm going. And I can see how far along the road I am already.
- I read Adam's blog for the last few days. She is way ahead of me. Very inspiring! She has done ESBS a few times and I see similarities with my own experience. [I later add two comments to her blog, one for the 3rd and one for the 4th.]
I slip straight into "Enlightened Seeing" and feel that powerful clarity, and... I feel this is my home, there is really no need for me to see other than this, be other than this. I skip "Being Seeing". I have no need. Now as I am typing this I think I am still solidly in that Enlightened Seeing consciousness.
A colleague passes by - a conversation about a book - an enquiry - some advice given - we joke ... and all the time I maintain the enlightened consciousness and see a worldly emanation of me interacting in the physical and social world.
Then I finish typing. An email notification pops up - a twinge of... what was that feeling? - and I am still floating a little above the normal awareness.
- Into Enlightened Seeing as I am sitting late at work, pretty much alone. The clear uncluttered thought of asking and deciding what to do right now. The motives of an Enlightened Being are mine.
- Enlightened Seeing. I see all that Being is. And I can feel the thoughts and minds of those others who are enlightened. We have a role to play in our illusory separation. I choose that way. It is to be done... Later I remember the esoteric astrology quotes for Capricorn and Pisces: "Lost am I in Light Supernal, yet on that light I turn my back," and "I reach my father's house, and turning back, I serve."
Well yes there is. Drawing on today's experience and the experience of the last couple of weeks, Being Seeing does not appear to be interested in the small individuals as there are no individuals. We are just thoughts of being, as are the stars and galaxies. It's amazing to see dimensions and distance fall away when Seeing as Being.
So it would have been the presumption that the enlightened being sees as Being. And yes indeed they can. And it's a necessary step for them. It's a realisation. It's life changing. But it seems to me only a prelude for what comes next. Because when one can more or less reliably get to the point of Seeing as Being, what comes next is a choice. And it seems a choice reminiscent of one in Buddhism: the way of Hinayana or the way of Mahayana. BS or ES?
Seeing as an enlightened being brings clarity of seeing, clarity of thought, clarity of motivation. You can see as Being and that brings the knowledge that you can at any moment become Being (or be become by Being). You can see the illusion and you can wear that illusion and duality lightly. Yet you also have the clear communication of the commonality of purpose with other enlightened beings. You are acting in concert with them.
It makes sense but it's not what I expected. I actually prefer it this way!
Monday already?
But that means my last blog entry was ... two clear weekdays and a weekend ago! [shakes head in disbelief]
Well, what to report? I had fun constructing a so far unnamed building and gardens on Second Life. I first started the design on Wednesday, did a prototype build on Thursday and found that the normal duplicate/drag/copy/undo/rotate technique I've been using on Second Life for a while wasn't exact enough to produce the building I wanted. On Friday, I thought of how to do the peripheries. On Saturday I redesigned the proportions, then I spent over nine hours building it, aligning each part exactly by eye and hand, and landscaping the whole area in tune with it. [photo above - unfurnished] Then on Sunday morning I added some basic seating and it was ready to show to people.
Come to think of it, that didn't leave a whole lot of time for anything else!
Wednesday 30 July 2008
Seeing as Being 6
- First I see as me. I see my computer screen. I see a plane on short finals into Glasgow airport and the caterpillar tracks of a digger. And I switch to... ha! did I really think I could instantly switch to Seeing as Being today? And yet my sensitivity heightens enormously. I hear every minute sound - the cacophony of office noise and the rapid typing of two of my colleagues. And I perceive strongly their intent on feeling separate and in control. And there is a brief sense of irony as I slip past that into Seeing as Being and their separation disappears. Later I feel the bodily tingle as though I had just taken a brisk walk.
- As I am working, out of nowhere comes the sudden strong thought, "Everything is Emptiness". And I am instantly plunged from typing at a keyboard into an intense meditation where waves of energy flow through me as I become, and I emerge into a place where there is no Being and no non-Being.
- A confused mass of meditations and realisations came so fast I can't put write about them clearly. I really do have to trust that they shape me as I will not remember them. Emptiness, Seeing as Being, experience of power, knowing also that I am so close and have still to let go of something to reach Awakening - these are all part. Even the ideas of Being, of Emptiness, of becoming - these must go too. Again - bring back to the point!
Tuesday 29 July 2008
Goals and un-goals
Something different...
"What do you want to be doing in 1 year's time, 2 year's time, 5 year's time?" This is a familiar question on company appraisal questionnaires. For years I had thought the ambitious forward looking person should have answers to at least some of those questions - at least that's what I had been told for so long. Modern society demanded it. Management training demanded it. Without goals I would be branded as dull, lazy or shiftless. And indeed I have made up answers to satisfy querulous managers in the past when in reality I have had none.
None? Really? No goals? No ambitions? Not quite. I have always wanted to be NOW. And it is hard to want to be something other than you really ARE. How do you tell your boss that "becoming a Buddha for the benefit of all" just about sums it up!? Or that your spiritual quest overrides any ideas of promotion? People like me are a problem for managers. They find us hard to motivate. And those that constantly feel the need to control everything find us unmanageable.
"Join a monastery!" I hear you say. No - here's a bigger challenge. Be like a lotus: in the world but not of the world. Wear your worldly clothes lightly. (Ring any PaB bells?) And so, when the needs of raising a family were paramount, I was able to be a very high earner and still have no attachment to ambition. Now, with family long grown and independent, it's almost as if I have "un-goals" where I progressively discover and peel away what is not real, to leave... to leave what?
... To leave only what is real, only what is worthwhile. And what is that? When all delusion has gone, what is left? Something wonderful! :)
"What do you want to be doing in 1 year's time, 2 year's time, 5 year's time?" This is a familiar question on company appraisal questionnaires. For years I had thought the ambitious forward looking person should have answers to at least some of those questions - at least that's what I had been told for so long. Modern society demanded it. Management training demanded it. Without goals I would be branded as dull, lazy or shiftless. And indeed I have made up answers to satisfy querulous managers in the past when in reality I have had none.
None? Really? No goals? No ambitions? Not quite. I have always wanted to be NOW. And it is hard to want to be something other than you really ARE. How do you tell your boss that "becoming a Buddha for the benefit of all" just about sums it up!? Or that your spiritual quest overrides any ideas of promotion? People like me are a problem for managers. They find us hard to motivate. And those that constantly feel the need to control everything find us unmanageable.
"Join a monastery!" I hear you say. No - here's a bigger challenge. Be like a lotus: in the world but not of the world. Wear your worldly clothes lightly. (Ring any PaB bells?) And so, when the needs of raising a family were paramount, I was able to be a very high earner and still have no attachment to ambition. Now, with family long grown and independent, it's almost as if I have "un-goals" where I progressively discover and peel away what is not real, to leave... to leave what?
... To leave only what is real, only what is worthwhile. And what is that? When all delusion has gone, what is left? Something wonderful! :)
Monday 28 July 2008
Seeing as Being 5
In case anyone asks, yes the "Seeing as Being" is the same as Pema's "You Seeing Being Seeing". Why the different nomenclature? I think because I like the extension from Play as Being, and that it fits nicely onto one margin contents line! Anyway, after a pause, some more notes...
- I am at work, with that slightly disjointed awareness that comes from seeing colleagues as separate individuals who may at any moment attempt to interact with me. I slip into "You Seeing" and then quickly into "Being Seeing". The air becomes thick with me! Still close to the transition, I see something new - I see Being seeing me seeing! - and the thought comes, "Illusion." And then momentarily, I get the "parallel mirrors" effect as part of Storm is not immersed but observes the experience, then observes the observing... and I catch it after three reflections... and then feel the power of Me once again, and the light-headed feeling settles... and I, as Being, am absolutely still.
Two monks were arguing about a flag. One said: `The flag is moving.'
The other said: `The wind is moving.'
The sixth patriarch happened to be passing by. He told them: `Not the wind, not the flag; mind is moving.'
Mumon's Comment: The sixth patriarch said: `The wind is not moving, the flag is not moving. Mind is moving.' What did he mean? If you understand this intimately, you will see the two monks there trying to buy iron and gaining gold. The sixth patriarch could not bear to see those two dull heads, so he made such a bargain.
Wind, flag, mind moves.
The same understanding.
When the mouth opens
All are wrong.
~ The Gateless Gate, Koan 29.
A small miracle and a slight mishap
I have been away at a Buddhist festival and so have been unable to post anything here. However I am deeply humbled that anyone should find this simple blog worth a glance. So before I start again on the theme of the last week, please let me tell you a little about the festival and then two stories from the weekend.
I found the festival deeply meaningful. In fact it is still going on without me as I am strapped for vacation time. But I did manage to attend an empowerment of Thousand Armed Avalokiteshvara and teachings on Universal Compassion by my Root Guru, his commentary on Geshe Chekawa's Training the Mind in Seven Points. Whoa... sorry for the Buddhababble! :)
Between sessions I went to a group meditation. The objects of this meditation were the history of Avalokiteshvara and cultivating a determination to follow in his footsteps. During the meditation I felt a strong thought arise: "Take out your pendant!" To explain, I wear a silver pendant of Kuan Yin (Avalokiteshvara in female form) and it is always next to my skin. I felt for the pendant... and I found that it was already exposed and worn over my clothing, something that I did not do!
On driving home through a long forested Scottish valley, my rear tyre exploded at 70 mph and ripped through my car's metalwork. How it missed the fuel tank and how I managed to easily keep control of the car I don't know - it was quite a mess. I could not remove the tyre and waited two hours in the increasing dark for rescue services to do it for me, during which time I was food for midges! But I must have taken the Lojong training from the festival to heart, for I applied the teaching and felt only a clear mind. This stuff seems to work!
I found the festival deeply meaningful. In fact it is still going on without me as I am strapped for vacation time. But I did manage to attend an empowerment of Thousand Armed Avalokiteshvara and teachings on Universal Compassion by my Root Guru, his commentary on Geshe Chekawa's Training the Mind in Seven Points. Whoa... sorry for the Buddhababble! :)
Between sessions I went to a group meditation. The objects of this meditation were the history of Avalokiteshvara and cultivating a determination to follow in his footsteps. During the meditation I felt a strong thought arise: "Take out your pendant!" To explain, I wear a silver pendant of Kuan Yin (Avalokiteshvara in female form) and it is always next to my skin. I felt for the pendant... and I found that it was already exposed and worn over my clothing, something that I did not do!
On driving home through a long forested Scottish valley, my rear tyre exploded at 70 mph and ripped through my car's metalwork. How it missed the fuel tank and how I managed to easily keep control of the car I don't know - it was quite a mess. I could not remove the tyre and waited two hours in the increasing dark for rescue services to do it for me, during which time I was food for midges! But I must have taken the Lojong training from the festival to heart, for I applied the teaching and felt only a clear mind. This stuff seems to work!
Thursday 24 July 2008
Seeing as Being 4
- At home I can short cut this and go straight to Seeing as Being. Here at work, that's perhaps too ambitious, and the initial stage suggested by Piet, of first being conscious of my own seeing (the "cone" of vision), seems to be essential preparation. That must say something about the consciousness I have at work! I hold onto this thought a little to type it later (so that I can maybe offer some more thorough signposts to others also treading this way) and I hover between the two awarenesses, neither in one totally nor the other, feeling the sense of perspective that Seeing as Being brings, but not with same immersion as yesterday. And yet, as I type this, it still feels as though the top of my head has lifted off! So that gives me a choice in future runs of Seeing as Being. Do I try to maintain this non-immersed approach so that I can remember more? Or do I go for full immersion and risk not remembering everything? Answer: I'll go for the full immersion, because without that, what will I really have to write about anyway?
- Today, I feel like a lightweight (so far) compared to other days on this! The first stage of me-Seeing does its job for me again as I'm still at my normal place of work. Good. As I switch to Being-Seeing I feel the awareness and power emerging and rising up through me, brushing aside the petty me, and... oh! I lose it in observation - observation of the experience (classic meditation separation), and observation of my surroundings (is person X approaching me to chat or are they just passing by?). Mere seconds pass. But, once again, it still feels as though the top of my head has lifted off. (Dear reader, you will be becoming bored by that phrase!) And, once again, that feeling lasts for a long time - way past the next 15 minute interval.
Wednesday 23 July 2008
Seeing as Being 3
- OK. This works. I am at work again, somewhere midway between trepidation after yesterday's experiences at work, encouragement after yesterday's experiences at home, and commitment to go through with the experiment. What I see as Being is vast: this world and worlds far beyond, with the events of this small life, labelled 'Storm', as very small in proportion. Then Being turns its gaze on the beings scurrying in their self-contained separateness and a deep feeling of sadness emerges. Somewhere Storm sees the drivers in their cars and shoppers at the mall and recognises the sadness as the same compassion that came with a direct experience of Emptiness. Then I am pulling out of this and I feel the transition start to hurt, as it did yesterday, and instead I go back briefly to the Seeing and ride the experience more naturally and slowly out, like a surfer on an incoming wave. I am back. And my boss has a question for me.
- Connected? No. That still implies separation. Become. One. All that was connected is me. And returning, hovering back on the edge, all my concerns are trivia, and this blog is nothing in proportion.
- Listening as well as Seeing... What am I, as Being, doing?! It is like being on an aircraft: all the noises. The air-conditioning sounds like the efflux roar of jet engines. The hum of fluorescent lights sounds like a cockpit buzzer constantly alarming. Why have I created this? Because the parts of me yet to be aware need it at the moment. Storm stays half in and half out of this awareness for some time.
- Before Playing as Being, a tree is a tree and a mountain is a mountain. While Playing as Being, things become a little confused. After Playing as Being, a tree is a tree and a mountain is a mountain. ;-)
- Back home again. 1:15pm SLT. In the Pavilion in Second Life. The bell rings. I see as Being. Separation disappears. Form disappears... Minutes later, I am surfing back to the conventional view and rejoining the crowd in the Pavilion with a clear thought: whoever wrote the Heart Sutra has been here too.
- (I observe that it now takes nearly a full 15 minutes to experience Seeing as Being and write a blog entry. And then the bell goes again!)
- (This is between Seeings. I missed 1:30pm SLT. It is now 1:35.) I feel different. It is more than poise. I'm trying to describe it without saying the words I know I am going to say anyway. Which I shall now say. I feel "in command", quietly and calmly in command. Of my bodily movements. Of my mind. Of my place as part of Being. It is almost an imperious control. A feeling of power, directed power, that knows where and why is being directed: Wisdom and Power combined. Words are such poor tools! The more I say, the more I take away from the experience. A further 15 minutes and the feeling has partly faded. But this all from a few seconds 40 minutes before. Enough of commentary! Back to experience!
Tuesday 22 July 2008
Seeing as Being 2
- I am at work, sitting at my desk in an almost empty open-plan office, starting the exercise of seeing as Being. As I engage, from somewhere a turbulent mind objects to the sudden depth. And I listen to that mind, hearing its common sense, allowing it to persuade me that a wet face in the office may not be a 'good' thing, and I hover on the edge of seeing as Being, only lightly becoming it, and I feel very calm.
- This is hard to do at work. I am merging, submerging, becoming and unbecoming... and trying to deal with emails, and people, and... ! So what's different from Play as Being practice? I said yesterday it wasn't different, but it is. The extent to which I am losing me and being Being seems much greater. It is actually exhausting to snap back into limited awareness and deal with what others demand of me. I'm not sure I can keep making the transition backwards and forwards. It's the transitions that are causing the damage. So I have four options: (1) Abandon the practice, (2) Continue for a while to see if things sort themselves out, (3) Restrict the practice to when I'm in less chaotic surroundings, or (4) Do the practice all the time - really! I'm going to try option 2 for a bit longer. Then we'll see!
- Made it through another exercise. Phew! Feeling a little disoriented on return. Eyes moist.
- Much later. At home. 1:15pm SLT. In the Pavilion in Second Life. The bell went off. And... I SAW as Being. A wave of power swept into me. I WAS that power. Merciless power. Power that could wipe all trivia aside. Vajrapani-like power... I'm back now and I'm safe. And happy. I can do this. :)
- Another bell. And more power. It seems to stay with me this time. I am surrounded by my friends in Second Life, yet I feel as I could sweep my hand slowly and build and destroy universes. Vastness.
- I have a better description for the power. It may sound pretentious. Chapter 11 of the Bhagavad Gita describes the vision of the cosmic form of Krishna. It is possible to BE that vision. This may not be what Oppenheimer meant when he spoke his famous quote, but now I know the experience.
Monday 21 July 2008
Seeing as Being 1
This is a progression from existing Play as Being practice. Piet Hut has suggested this extension, but actually it turns out that this is pretty much what I've been doing all along so far anyway! (Is that an "Oops! Sorry - jumped the gun!" or a "Good! Hooray - I've been getting something right!" :) More details of this when the Play as Being Wiki has been updated with details of this extension. At the moment it is only publicly in the chat log here.
- I feel solid. Everything feels solid. But not physically solid! And not separately solid. There seems no boundary between me and everything else. "I" seems inappropriate. And yet there seems a flow of one thing into another, one part of this "Being" into another, like an ocean current.
- Being is breathing. Being is seeing... myself. Everywhere: me.
- Have you ever let someone else look through your eyes? I have. Even with someone you trust it's exhausting and it feels strange. This doesn't feel strange. I sit in a darkened room in front of a window. It is night outside. In the window I see the reflection of myself, illuminated by the screen of my laptop. My reflection seems separate and 8 feet away from me, and then suddenly I become it, we merge - it is powerful. I am Being, looking in, looking out. I feel tears run down my face.
Tuesday 15 July 2008
Cohort
Eeek! Three days without a blog entry! And no, that is fake angst: I am not really bothered!
So what have I been doing? If I said "being", would that be too glib? If I said playing as being, would that be too predictable? If I said building stuff and generally helping on Second Life, would that sound too ephemeral? If I said studying Dharma and accumulating merit, would that sound too self-involved? Well these things are not presented for anyone to judge! But do let me tell you of one thing...
I have the good fortune to have a fabulous fiancée. We met on Second Life. We have met many times in Real Life. We both practise the same Buddhist tradition. And we are currently awaiting completion of a US visa petition. That's because we currently live more than 4,000 miles apart and want to be together! It's a lesson in patience for us and hopefully in six months time things will be sorted out.
We both attend Dharma classes in our currently separate cities, and both classes are taking summer recess. And yet we love to study. Moreover, we love to study together. And so one of the things we are doing, during the summer and for this year only while we still have to be apart, is to set ourselves a book to read. We read a chapter at a time and discuss it over Skype. Wonderful!
So she is my cohort. Or together we make a cohort, marching together towards...
...well, why do people travel together? For support. For company. For pleasure. For inspiration. To share teachings. To help each other reach the shared goal. To reach that goal faster and more surely than alone. These are some of the benefits of Sangha. No wonder Sangha is one of the Three Jewels!
So what have I been doing? If I said "being", would that be too glib? If I said playing as being, would that be too predictable? If I said building stuff and generally helping on Second Life, would that sound too ephemeral? If I said studying Dharma and accumulating merit, would that sound too self-involved? Well these things are not presented for anyone to judge! But do let me tell you of one thing...
I have the good fortune to have a fabulous fiancée. We met on Second Life. We have met many times in Real Life. We both practise the same Buddhist tradition. And we are currently awaiting completion of a US visa petition. That's because we currently live more than 4,000 miles apart and want to be together! It's a lesson in patience for us and hopefully in six months time things will be sorted out.
We both attend Dharma classes in our currently separate cities, and both classes are taking summer recess. And yet we love to study. Moreover, we love to study together. And so one of the things we are doing, during the summer and for this year only while we still have to be apart, is to set ourselves a book to read. We read a chapter at a time and discuss it over Skype. Wonderful!
So she is my cohort. Or together we make a cohort, marching together towards...
...well, why do people travel together? For support. For company. For pleasure. For inspiration. To share teachings. To help each other reach the shared goal. To reach that goal faster and more surely than alone. These are some of the benefits of Sangha. No wonder Sangha is one of the Three Jewels!
Friday 11 July 2008
Half-birthday
No it's not my half-birthday today. That would have been five months ago. Ish. But I remember my half-birthday from last year, 17 months ago, distinctly.
What's a half-birthday? It's the date exactly 6 months from your birthday. I encouraged them in my family, partly because two of my daughters had birthdays exactly 6 months apart. Half-birthday presents are fun. They are about sharing. For example, give someone half a box of chocolates and eat the other half yourself! You get the picture... :)
So what happened 17 months ago? It was a particularly difficult time for me with great upheavals in personal circumstances looming. But I was given the blessing of a new relationship with someone who was to become my partner in every way, including spiritually. And right at that time, when life-changing decisions were being taken, I found it was my half-birthday. And it set me thinking.
I remember having dinner with one of my daughters that night. I described to her whom I had met and how amazing it was. And I mentioned it was my half-birthday today but that this one was special. I told her that some years ago I had had a vision of my own death. In that vision I was 91 years old. Today I was 54½ years old and I had realised that that was exactly halfway between 18 and 91 years old. In Britain, the 18th birthday marks the start of recognised adulthood, so today I was exactly halfway through my adult life. Far from being 'over the hill', I told her, it was all in front of me.
Now zooming out to see this life of one of many, I see the opportunity I have day by day to make a difference, to my future and to the future of others. Not too old, never too old, to make the most of every day on the road to Buddhahood, to become a Buddha for the benefit of all. All part of the continuum. The vision of 91 years could have been wrong and today could be the last - for now - but [shrugs] so what? Today could be the day!
In Living Meaningfully, Dying Joyfully, my teacher - Geshe Kelsang Gyatso - says:
What's a half-birthday? It's the date exactly 6 months from your birthday. I encouraged them in my family, partly because two of my daughters had birthdays exactly 6 months apart. Half-birthday presents are fun. They are about sharing. For example, give someone half a box of chocolates and eat the other half yourself! You get the picture... :)
So what happened 17 months ago? It was a particularly difficult time for me with great upheavals in personal circumstances looming. But I was given the blessing of a new relationship with someone who was to become my partner in every way, including spiritually. And right at that time, when life-changing decisions were being taken, I found it was my half-birthday. And it set me thinking.
I remember having dinner with one of my daughters that night. I described to her whom I had met and how amazing it was. And I mentioned it was my half-birthday today but that this one was special. I told her that some years ago I had had a vision of my own death. In that vision I was 91 years old. Today I was 54½ years old and I had realised that that was exactly halfway between 18 and 91 years old. In Britain, the 18th birthday marks the start of recognised adulthood, so today I was exactly halfway through my adult life. Far from being 'over the hill', I told her, it was all in front of me.
Now zooming out to see this life of one of many, I see the opportunity I have day by day to make a difference, to my future and to the future of others. Not too old, never too old, to make the most of every day on the road to Buddhahood, to become a Buddha for the benefit of all. All part of the continuum. The vision of 91 years could have been wrong and today could be the last - for now - but [shrugs]
In Living Meaningfully, Dying Joyfully, my teacher - Geshe Kelsang Gyatso - says:
"The Kadampa Teachers say that there is no use in being afraid when we are on our deathbed and about to die; the time to fear death is while we are young. Most people do the reverse. While they are young they think ‘I shall not die’, and they live recklessly without concern for death; but when death comes they are terrified.
If we develop fear of death right now, we shall use our life meaningfully by engaging in virtuous actions and avoiding non-virtuous actions, thus creating the cause to take a fortunate rebirth. When death actually comes we shall feel like a child returning to the home of its parents, and pass away joyfully, without fear."
Why did I write all this? Because I read about Bunan Unsui's practice in his blog "A Year to Live" and was inspired. I applaud him in his endeavour and I shall follow it with interest. May it benefit all sentient beings.Thursday 10 July 2008
Reality check
Sometimes I look at my own progress and think I'm not making much headway. This can be in Play as Being, or it can be in one of several Buddhist disciplines that I am engaged in. Or I can be taking a long hard look at myself, seeing my weaknesses, and seeing how much I sometimes lack the determination to address those weaknesses.
There's a trap here that's easy to fall into in a society that is becoming increasingly obsessed with monitoring and evaluation. That trap involves relying on other people's judgements, both of how we're doing and - much more important - of what we should be working on anyway. Even if I had ever wanted to be like them - and believe me I don't - their judgemental attitude is corrosive; it can wear you down and seep through your skin.
Sometimes it helps to see the petty priorities of others, not as a threat, nor as an excuse for one-upmanship, but as a indicator that - actually - I AM making progress. It's a reality check. Their anger and stress is not for me, no matter how much I might think I want their money! I can opt out of the priorities they want to judge me by.
It bears reminding myself of a quote by motivational speaker Susan Fowler Woodring. The first time I read this I was deeply shocked; its truth pierced me deeply. "People without goals will be used by people with goals." That also means that without a clear view of ourselves we will be manipulated by others who want to impose their distorted views of us, on us.
And perhaps I should also start believing more of what dear friends and loved ones have been saying to me for years! They don't have to encourage me as they do, yet they still do. That can be a very pleasant reality check!
There's a trap here that's easy to fall into in a society that is becoming increasingly obsessed with monitoring and evaluation. That trap involves relying on other people's judgements, both of how we're doing and - much more important - of what we should be working on anyway. Even if I had ever wanted to be like them - and believe me I don't - their judgemental attitude is corrosive; it can wear you down and seep through your skin.
Sometimes it helps to see the petty priorities of others, not as a threat, nor as an excuse for one-upmanship, but as a indicator that - actually - I AM making progress. It's a reality check. Their anger and stress is not for me, no matter how much I might think I want their money! I can opt out of the priorities they want to judge me by.
It bears reminding myself of a quote by motivational speaker Susan Fowler Woodring. The first time I read this I was deeply shocked; its truth pierced me deeply. "People without goals will be used by people with goals." That also means that without a clear view of ourselves we will be manipulated by others who want to impose their distorted views of us, on us.
And perhaps I should also start believing more of what dear friends and loved ones have been saying to me for years! They don't have to encourage me as they do, yet they still do. That can be a very pleasant reality check!
Wednesday 9 July 2008
Short staffed
Shuzan held out his short staff...
Mumon said, "If you call this a short staff, you oppose its reality. If you do not call it a short staff, you ignore the fact. It cannot be expressed with words and it cannot be expressed without words. Now say quickly what it is."
Mumon said, "If you call this a short staff, you oppose its reality. If you do not call it a short staff, you ignore the fact. It cannot be expressed with words and it cannot be expressed without words. Now say quickly what it is."
Physical sensations
I sometimes take for granted the kinds of physical sensations that the 9 second Play as Being meditations bring. I've only mentioned the depth of relaxation and the sense of poise occasionally before.
Sometimes we filter out these simple things and instead we only express the profound - or at least we try too. Yet for those who exist in a physical envelope, these simple things can be important too.
So why not report the sense of energised tingling I'm feeling right now, as though I had just done a short run or other bout of intense but not exhausting exercise. Yes. I think I'll do that!
Sometimes we filter out these simple things and instead we only express the profound - or at least we try too. Yet for those who exist in a physical envelope, these simple things can be important too.
So why not report the sense of energised tingling I'm feeling right now, as though I had just done a short run or other bout of intense but not exhausting exercise. Yes. I think I'll do that!
Thursday 3 July 2008
Play as Being 95
- If I am Being, then I am Being here, but also I am Being on the other side of town, simultaneously. And I become that Being, one, in those places together, at the same time ... and my head seems to explode.
- Today I destroyed a building I had built, a place of strong memories and poignant feelings, a place built in love, for love. I was sad and, by my own simple test, I was suffering a delusion. The love continues and the illusion fades. Yet how many people have done this where the love has also faded? "The fact of the matter is that this world is not our home. We are travellers, passing through. We came from our previous life, and in a few years, or a few days, we shall move on to our next life. We entered this world empty-handed and alone, and we shall leave empty-handed and alone. Everything we have accumulated in this life, including our very body, will be left behind. All that we can take with us from one life to the next are the imprints of the positive and negative actions we have created." ~ Living meaningfully, dying joyfully, (Introduction), Geshe Kelsang Gyatso.
Wednesday 2 July 2008
Nice guy
It's not every day that a member of the British Royal Family walks into your office. Genuinely nice guy too. But while here, something made me open second sight. Oh! Surprise.
In Buddhism there are beings that we perceive with our physical (or spiritual) eyes that are sometimes very different than they seem. These can be emanations of another being, perhaps of a Buddha. Well...
I thought at first I had just seen an emanation. Or something like it. But no, actually I hadn't. Kuan Yin tells me this was more like one being controlling another. And I could see the being that was doing the controlling. And it wasn't a Buddha.
Oh boy. The problems of being a seer. But that's what you get for looking.
In Buddhism there are beings that we perceive with our physical (or spiritual) eyes that are sometimes very different than they seem. These can be emanations of another being, perhaps of a Buddha. Well...
I thought at first I had just seen an emanation. Or something like it. But no, actually I hadn't. Kuan Yin tells me this was more like one being controlling another. And I could see the being that was doing the controlling. And it wasn't a Buddha.
Oh boy. The problems of being a seer. But that's what you get for looking.
Play as Being 93
- (In that state of self-generation, playing as being Being...)
I CONTROL. - There is a member of the British Royal Family in the building as I write this, coinciding with a 9 second meditation. And the thought came spontaneously through - a rather Buddhist change to the oft quoted line from the Christian Bible: "To whom much is given, much is taken away."
Monday 30 June 2008
Thursday 26 June 2008
Play as Being 87
- Outside my window is the same estate as yesterday. But now it is morning. Everyone is away at work. No shields. No clamouring thoughts. No emotions rending the invisible air. No separateness. The sunlight and the earth have reclaimed it and it is all one Being again.
Wednesday 25 June 2008
Play as Being 86
- Blackbird sings. Ash keys sway in the breeze. I can stretch out and touch them without moving.
- The estate (US: subdivision), on which I live, is a monument to separateness. On the separate houses with their separate walls, each roughcast with a harl of a million or more separate shell fragments, there stand separate TV aerials, each sucking in the outside world to tuners that separate out the channels for the individual and separate family audiences. And in each home, the family members inside see each other as separate, often keeping their own 'space', feeling their own pain and fleeting pleasures, and doing anything to stop themselves wondering, "Why?" ... ENOUGH! It doesn't have to be this way! I refuse to see it that way any more.
Tuesday 24 June 2008
Thinking aloud
When I Play as Being, I am exploring; I am on a journey with few tools and no signage. I stumble upon things, I make discoveries, I have realisations. In this randomness, the best thing, I have found, is that I share realisations with others and I share in their realisations. The Play as Being cohort moves on and shares and we all grow. But...
Life is short. Perhaps. At least this one is for sure. Do I have the time for such exploration? For every step towards the goal - whatever that may be - there are twenty stumbles, dead ends and simply general randomness . Such indirect meanderings are luxuries I cannot afford. Though I will continue to walk this path with my friends, I know I cannot rely on it alone.
Fortunately for me, I don't have to rely on the exploration of Play as Being alone. I have a Guide that knows the path well. It is well laid out and well trodden. There is no risk of meandering. It is direct and it works. I just follow that Guide's comprehensive instructions and I forge ahead.
But what of my comrades? Who can tell what is best for them? What will become of them? For some I see a flowering and the discoveries they make with Play as Being are leading to other things. Again, neither I nor they leave the practice of Play but instead we are inspired to explore outside the play. And some will in time, no doubt, find their own Guides and thence their own direct routes.
The odd thing, if it is odd, about all of this is that the core Play as Being technique has existed for a very long time. For centuries it has been known by different names and has been described in different words. The 9 seconds in 15 minutes is new, sure, but it is not the core practice, only a method for applying the practice. The actual practice of Playing as being Being is very old.
So the compassion in me reaches out. I am wondering whether the subversive nature of perception that playing as being (by whatever name) can potentially bring can exist safely for people in isolation from any encompassing practice. Many find it stunning, life changing and even disturbing to see, for the first time, what is actually beyond what convention calls reality. To suddenly glimpse the scale of the delusion we have been labouring under can be a massive shock. The assumption of peace or elation may be counterbalanced by the perception of all that needless suffering.
So I am starting to wonder what extra support Play as Being practitioners may need. I am wondering what extra instruction they might benefit from. On the other hand, I know full well that that would run counter to the idea of scientific experiment and the areligious basis on which the project is founded. Yet the only support environments I know of for this are religious, and I know that making a point of those would doubtless be off-putting to many and cut down the potential diversity of the cohort...
Well, I am just thinking aloud.
Life is short. Perhaps. At least this one is for sure. Do I have the time for such exploration? For every step towards the goal - whatever that may be - there are twenty stumbles, dead ends and simply general randomness . Such indirect meanderings are luxuries I cannot afford. Though I will continue to walk this path with my friends, I know I cannot rely on it alone.
Fortunately for me, I don't have to rely on the exploration of Play as Being alone. I have a Guide that knows the path well. It is well laid out and well trodden. There is no risk of meandering. It is direct and it works. I just follow that Guide's comprehensive instructions and I forge ahead.
But what of my comrades? Who can tell what is best for them? What will become of them? For some I see a flowering and the discoveries they make with Play as Being are leading to other things. Again, neither I nor they leave the practice of Play but instead we are inspired to explore outside the play. And some will in time, no doubt, find their own Guides and thence their own direct routes.
The odd thing, if it is odd, about all of this is that the core Play as Being technique has existed for a very long time. For centuries it has been known by different names and has been described in different words. The 9 seconds in 15 minutes is new, sure, but it is not the core practice, only a method for applying the practice. The actual practice of Playing as being Being is very old.
So the compassion in me reaches out. I am wondering whether the subversive nature of perception that playing as being (by whatever name) can potentially bring can exist safely for people in isolation from any encompassing practice. Many find it stunning, life changing and even disturbing to see, for the first time, what is actually beyond what convention calls reality. To suddenly glimpse the scale of the delusion we have been labouring under can be a massive shock. The assumption of peace or elation may be counterbalanced by the perception of all that needless suffering.
So I am starting to wonder what extra support Play as Being practitioners may need. I am wondering what extra instruction they might benefit from. On the other hand, I know full well that that would run counter to the idea of scientific experiment and the areligious basis on which the project is founded. Yet the only support environments I know of for this are religious, and I know that making a point of those would doubtless be off-putting to many and cut down the potential diversity of the cohort...
Well, I am just thinking aloud.
Monday 23 June 2008
Emanations
A new koan: "When one being emanates as another, how can you tell who is emanating whom?"
Saturday 21 June 2008
Not really here
Storm is away at an empowerment retreat.
It's just possible you are imagining this blog entry.
It's just possible you are imagining this blog entry.
Wednesday 18 June 2008
Play as Being 79
- They believe so much is at stake, these people around me who are separating and judging, minute by minute, generating their own stress and anger and holding on to it. It is so easy to resonate to their perceived reality, but instead I let it wash over me and wash away. Then is the time for faith: faith that I am in good hands, not their hands.
- Browser versions arise and they pass away. How like so many other things! These blog entries may look marginally different with Firefox 3.0 but the experience is the same.
- The image of Kuan Yin hangs, laser-cut, in the crystal block perched above my desk: an illusion of her form within an illusion of form.
- I am making a record: ink or graphite on paper, or twists in the magnetic pattern of a rust covered disc many thousands of miles away from where I sit by the River Clyde. I think "Why am doing this?" and I am reminded of the Akashic records that are already supposed to be recording every thought, word and deed. How can that work? "Easily," I think, as Being pervades all and is all.
Tuesday 17 June 2008
Play as Being 78
- Launching off the edge into space, why should I fear? Either I catch myself, or a I fall into the arms of unlimited loving compassion. With either model of the universe, I am safe! Safe in that faith, I find I am battling years of wrong faith: the faith of separation.
- "If something can be remedied, why be unhappy about it? And if there is no remedy for it, there is still no point in being unhappy."
~ Shantideva, 9th century CE - Being in a Play!
- Such deep, intense relaxation. Seeing myself in many mirrors.
Monday 16 June 2008
Saturday 14 June 2008
Achoo!
You normally gets enough forewarning of a sneeze to allow you to take appropriate action, to pinch your nose to prevent it, or to cover your mouth to stifle it. Today I sneezed with no warning at all and had no chance to do any of those things. Unique and very strange.
A few hours later, I realised what had happened. Incredibly it was my Dharma Protector who had made me sneeze, with no warning and with no time for any action, and so bring my dear Teacher out of an overlong meditation!
A few hours later, I realised what had happened. Incredibly it was my Dharma Protector who had made me sneeze, with no warning and with no time for any action, and so bring my dear Teacher out of an overlong meditation!
Friday 13 June 2008
Play as Being 74
- A row of dancing trees by the roadside. Cars pass not noticing. I am in every car.
- A confluence of coincidences. A delay. A book. A message. And an opportunity to take up, once again, a meditation practice last enjoyed many centuries ago.
Thursday 12 June 2008
Wednesday 11 June 2008
Play as Being 72
No post for over a week. Has Storm lost interest? No! Storm in his recovery from illness instead lost all notion of time.
- This morning, I feel the bliss that we talked about last night at the tea house. Pure. Calm. Embracing. And it persists. There is no attachment. Only what is real. A place where faith is not a strained attempt to believe but a deep certain knowing.
Tuesday 3 June 2008
Playing at Believing: "Why not?"
Last Saturday, on the same day I tried the "DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME" experiment, and in the same place, I was discussing things in Dharma class with a colleague. We recalled that Buddha Shakyamuni had said, "Whenever anyone develops faith in me, I am present," and they expressed to me that this was a difficult stumbling block for them.
I mentioned that one's own faith is a kind of switch. If you believe you are in the presence of a Buddha, you will receive the blessings of a Buddha. If you believe you are in the presence of a frail human teacher, you will receive the blessings of a frail human teacher. And there is no doubt you can feel the difference!
I told them that the secret might be just to say, "Why not?" and just experiment and give it a go. I had developed all sorts of abilities simply by being immersed in environments where people took it for granted they could do this or that thing I aspired to but that I had previously thought was beyond me. It was almost like giving myself permission to try it. Why not play as being that way for a while?
I told my colleague about Piet's Play as Being project and drew similarities for them. Why not just play at believing, I suggested? Just for a while? Suspend disbelief. No one else need know. Nothing to lose. Everything to gain.
I later told this story to my fiancée Michele. It had a profound effect on her. And afterwards she wrote the following:
I mentioned that one's own faith is a kind of switch. If you believe you are in the presence of a Buddha, you will receive the blessings of a Buddha. If you believe you are in the presence of a frail human teacher, you will receive the blessings of a frail human teacher. And there is no doubt you can feel the difference!
I told them that the secret might be just to say, "Why not?" and just experiment and give it a go. I had developed all sorts of abilities simply by being immersed in environments where people took it for granted they could do this or that thing I aspired to but that I had previously thought was beyond me. It was almost like giving myself permission to try it. Why not play as being that way for a while?
I told my colleague about Piet's Play as Being project and drew similarities for them. Why not just play at believing, I suggested? Just for a while? Suspend disbelief. No one else need know. Nothing to lose. Everything to gain.
I later told this story to my fiancée Michele. It had a profound effect on her. And afterwards she wrote the following:
"After an insightful conversation with Storm about faith and trust, I have done a great deal of soul searching. The way I understood him was to ask the question why not? Why not have faith beyond what we can experience with our worldly senses? Why not open ourselves up to possibilities beyond our wildest imagination?
"Along with my beloved Storm, I know a few (very few) people who see, hear and understand Beings that are totally out of my experience (in this lifetime at least). I sometimes ask Storm to ask a certain Being about a pressing problem I might be having. His response is usually, 'Ask them yourself. You can!'
This latest discussion with Storm has opened me up somehow. Why do I think I can never be in the presence of such beautiful, other worldly Beings? Why am I so different? With my practice of Buddhism now, I am told over and over that yes indeed the Buddha and all the Buddhas are with me during my practice and yes I WILL see them when I have eliminated enough of my delusions.
"One of my biggest delusions is fear. I have feared it. Why? Maybe I was not ready. I did not trust. Now it is clear that I am on the right path and am committed to becoming the most compassionate and loving person I possibly can be. There is no longer a need to fear anything! I no longer must fear somehow being sucked into the dark side. I am headed for the Light!
"So I have been meditating on what it would be like to be free of all delusions, to be stripped clean of any and all of them. What is on the other side of delusion? I have never thought this way before. I have no idea of what being without delusion would really be like, but I trust more and more it WILL all be revealed to me. I will see Buddha and all the Buddhas one day. I will see the other side of delusion! I will experience emptiness! I will know what it is like not to be separate, to be one with whole of everything. I am more open and trusting than I have ever been!
Saturday 31 May 2008
DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME
This is perverse and heretical. It could cause you a lot of damage. Please be careful. I'm not recommending you do this. But if you go ahead and do it anyway, please make sure you do it in a safe and protected environment. I did it this morning in a Buddhist gompa during a ritual. And in the chequerboard of my strengths and many weaknesses, it's just possible I'm strong enough to cope with this anyway.
What am I talking about? A perverse corruption of the 9 second Play as Being practice. First a recap about what Play as Being is about at its core. Instead of assuming that all is solid reality around us, we experiment by thinking that somehow the appearance of everything we perceive is presented to us by... well, by "Being". Whatever that means for us. And that during those 9 second meditations, we play as being Being ourselves, the thing that is doing all that presentation of appearances.
Now I'll go back to my first post in this experiment. I wrote, "It seems more accurate to say that the rest of the time is Playing as Non-Being". And Piet Hut, the founder of this project posted a comment saying, "You might say Being is playing as non-Being. And by reversing the roles, we may wake up to the mistake that was involved."
So now for the perversity. I said to myself, "What would happen if I turned this on its head?" Supposing that instead of deliberately spending 9 seconds playing as Being, I deliberately - REALLY deliberately - tried playing as NON-Being.
Now you might think all that would happen is I would just have my day-to-day consciousness. Isn't that what I was just talking about? No. That would be what happens when through laziness or ignorance we don't focus on anything else. Instead what I did was use all my powers of focus, the same laser beam focus I'd been using playing as Being, but this time focused on playing as non-being, imagining what I saw to have objective separate self-existence that I was no longer part of.
The result was horrible. It was like switching meditation from good to pure evil. I was filled with such a revulsion that I didn't know it was possible to feel. It was an insight into Hell, perhaps quite literally. I was almost lost for words. This was way beyond my current daily experience, and I'm glad I'd drawn a 9 second limit because more than that would have been far too painful.
What did this tell me? I have a whole jumble of thoughts that I need to reflect more on. But first look says we are headed in the right direction with Play as Being and also indeed I am personally with my normal religious practice. Where we've come from, it seems, is a truly dark place. And that place is inhabited. I feel we need to shine a light and throw a rope for anyone who wants to escape the sheer open-wound agony of that place.
I'll not do it again. And I don't recommend you try this at home. But more than 12 hours later I'm still reeling from the intensity of what non-being is truly like.
What am I talking about? A perverse corruption of the 9 second Play as Being practice. First a recap about what Play as Being is about at its core. Instead of assuming that all is solid reality around us, we experiment by thinking that somehow the appearance of everything we perceive is presented to us by... well, by "Being". Whatever that means for us. And that during those 9 second meditations, we play as being Being ourselves, the thing that is doing all that presentation of appearances.
Now I'll go back to my first post in this experiment. I wrote, "It seems more accurate to say that the rest of the time is Playing as Non-Being". And Piet Hut, the founder of this project posted a comment saying, "You might say Being is playing as non-Being. And by reversing the roles, we may wake up to the mistake that was involved."
So now for the perversity. I said to myself, "What would happen if I turned this on its head?" Supposing that instead of deliberately spending 9 seconds playing as Being, I deliberately - REALLY deliberately - tried playing as NON-Being.
Now you might think all that would happen is I would just have my day-to-day consciousness. Isn't that what I was just talking about? No. That would be what happens when through laziness or ignorance we don't focus on anything else. Instead what I did was use all my powers of focus, the same laser beam focus I'd been using playing as Being, but this time focused on playing as non-being, imagining what I saw to have objective separate self-existence that I was no longer part of.
The result was horrible. It was like switching meditation from good to pure evil. I was filled with such a revulsion that I didn't know it was possible to feel. It was an insight into Hell, perhaps quite literally. I was almost lost for words. This was way beyond my current daily experience, and I'm glad I'd drawn a 9 second limit because more than that would have been far too painful.
What did this tell me? I have a whole jumble of thoughts that I need to reflect more on. But first look says we are headed in the right direction with Play as Being and also indeed I am personally with my normal religious practice. Where we've come from, it seems, is a truly dark place. And that place is inhabited. I feel we need to shine a light and throw a rope for anyone who wants to escape the sheer open-wound agony of that place.
I'll not do it again. And I don't recommend you try this at home. But more than 12 hours later I'm still reeling from the intensity of what non-being is truly like.
Thursday 29 May 2008
Playing at Knowing
Piet made a great comment to my "Saying only what I know" entry. And he's right. In fact we both know this is akin to standard Tantric practice and is usually called some variant of "Generation" or "Self-Generation". It is very powerful technique, and no wonder Piet chose it when forming the central practice of what he calls Play as Being.
I remember the lead up to the kensho. After preparatory meditation and teachings, my teacher demonstrated simple truths, ways of seeing, that were impossible to ignore but somehow, by convention, on a day-to-day basis, we do. I was left to ask the "what if"s myself. And I did. Because of had gone before, I was led to inescapable conclusions, that in turn became experiences. I felt as though I was falling ineluctably into a gravity well. And at the bottom, I saw for myself. Emptiness.
It all happened in minutes. The biggest spiritual leap in a lifetime. But why only me and not the other people in the room? And why not me before? Because of the right conditions being brought together. The right place. The right teacher. The right words she used. For me. And how many things unknown and unseen?
My Root Guru teaches many techniques. One is a visualising technique that we can use when generating Bodhichitta. It is a kind of generation practice where we transform into Buddha Shakyamuni, and he calls it Bringing the Result into the Path. It is very powerful, but when we reach the next stage of enhancing Bodhichitta using the Practice of the Four Immeasurables, he reminds us to put away our spiritual pride. If, after all, we are still on the path, we are not yet at the destination; we are not yet enlightened even though we visualised ourself to be.
So it is possible to Play, to say "what if", and to become - and to encourage others to do so. These are valuable, even indispensable, practices. But I can still see the difference between when I know and when I am playing at knowing. And if I open my mouth at that stage, I'm sure all but the most credulous can see it too! And only when I truly know with direct experience, do I feel qualified to start saying what I know, rather than playing as if I know.
I remember the lead up to the kensho. After preparatory meditation and teachings, my teacher demonstrated simple truths, ways of seeing, that were impossible to ignore but somehow, by convention, on a day-to-day basis, we do. I was left to ask the "what if"s myself. And I did. Because of had gone before, I was led to inescapable conclusions, that in turn became experiences. I felt as though I was falling ineluctably into a gravity well. And at the bottom, I saw for myself. Emptiness.
It all happened in minutes. The biggest spiritual leap in a lifetime. But why only me and not the other people in the room? And why not me before? Because of the right conditions being brought together. The right place. The right teacher. The right words she used. For me. And how many things unknown and unseen?
My Root Guru teaches many techniques. One is a visualising technique that we can use when generating Bodhichitta. It is a kind of generation practice where we transform into Buddha Shakyamuni, and he calls it Bringing the Result into the Path. It is very powerful, but when we reach the next stage of enhancing Bodhichitta using the Practice of the Four Immeasurables, he reminds us to put away our spiritual pride. If, after all, we are still on the path, we are not yet at the destination; we are not yet enlightened even though we visualised ourself to be.
So it is possible to Play, to say "what if", and to become - and to encourage others to do so. These are valuable, even indispensable, practices. But I can still see the difference between when I know and when I am playing at knowing. And if I open my mouth at that stage, I'm sure all but the most credulous can see it too! And only when I truly know with direct experience, do I feel qualified to start saying what I know, rather than playing as if I know.
Wednesday 28 May 2008
Play as Being 58
There are no blog entries describing or inspired by the "9 second every 15 minutes" Play as Being meditations today. This is quite deliberate. I'm being wilful.
"Bad monk! No biscuit for you!"
Let me explain. I've had two hours sleep in total in the last two nights. And Cal wanted me to swap guardianship with her so I have to stay awake for at least another hour and a half. If I actually engage in these meditations, I shall relax so much that I might fall asleep and miss the guardian session entirely. So instead I went and started a mangrove swamp and built a Bar in the middle of the sea!
Sound weird? Yes I am! :)
"Bad monk! No biscuit for you!"
Let me explain. I've had two hours sleep in total in the last two nights. And Cal wanted me to swap guardianship with her so I have to stay awake for at least another hour and a half. If I actually engage in these meditations, I shall relax so much that I might fall asleep and miss the guardian session entirely. So instead I went and started a mangrove swamp and built a Bar in the middle of the sea!
Sound weird? Yes I am! :)
Tuesday 27 May 2008
Saying only what I know
We had clichés back then. Perhaps all youth cultures do. I said them myself, those well-meaning and aspiring but ultimately hollow words. Until finally they spawned a so-called New Age movement (or rather 'fashion') and they became something to gently ridicule. "We're all one, man!" was a favourite, I remember, said in later lampooning years with conspicuous peace signs, fake awe and a vacant expression.
How ironic that more than thirty years later, I should actually gain first hand experience of the truth of that favourite. Perhaps a little kensho on the way to enlightenment. Or a life-changing direct experience of emptiness. I remember holding my teacher's arms with my face streaming with tears and somehow saying, "I had no idea..."
Since then I have tried to be true to my realisations - those encountered and those still to come - by saying only what I know. Piet Hut was kind enough to write a comment to my last blog entry and it reminds me of other clichés I used to say and hear about the illusory nature of time. I rejoice in his insight but I have learnt my lesson; I will humbly wait till it is part of my personal experience before I will say aught about it.
How ironic that more than thirty years later, I should actually gain first hand experience of the truth of that favourite. Perhaps a little kensho on the way to enlightenment. Or a life-changing direct experience of emptiness. I remember holding my teacher's arms with my face streaming with tears and somehow saying, "I had no idea..."
Since then I have tried to be true to my realisations - those encountered and those still to come - by saying only what I know. Piet Hut was kind enough to write a comment to my last blog entry and it reminds me of other clichés I used to say and hear about the illusory nature of time. I rejoice in his insight but I have learnt my lesson; I will humbly wait till it is part of my personal experience before I will say aught about it.
Monday 26 May 2008
Play as Being 56
- All things must pass. Even samsara!
- Now I have a question. Are bacteria sentient beings? If they are then it's my particular challenge to have compassion for each and every one of them. If not, then hooray for antibiotics!
Saturday 24 May 2008
Play as Being 54
- So we are sick, my fiancée and I. We were planning to go to a Buddhist festival with 3,000 other people this weekend but we have stayed away. We didn't want to make anyone else sick, especially our dear 77 year old teacher. If anyone asks me whether I am disappointed, I will reply by asking how can one be disappointed if one knows one is doing the right thing.
- Lying in bed in the dawn light. Looking out of the window and seeing the Mayflower. Feeling the cycles of nature come and go as the world turns. Why would Being present the appearance of cycles? Possibly because it throws the exceptions into sharp relief. They are surprises. And as I Play as Being I realise I love surprises!
- This the first time I've ever felt it. And such a warm surprise. So touching. I suddenly felt as though I were in a Buddhist ritual somewhere. I thought at first as though it could be one of those I am missing today. But it was 8:28 am - too early surely. And then I understood. We were in a ritual. Someone - one of our ordained Sangha friends - was including us in their prayers. My heart melted.
Wednesday 21 May 2008
Play as Being 51
- Waiting brings opportunities.
Sift through what you have and what you are.
Pull out the weeds - strengthen the needs.
~ Kuan Yin Oracle, poem 76 - see also Hints for Piet Hut's Play as Being - Whenever I am with others
May I think of myself as the lowest of all
And from the very depths of my heart
May I respectfully hold others as supreme.
~ Eight verses for Training the Mind, Verse 2, Langri Tangpa - Does Consciousness ring a bell?
(Perhaps every 15 minutes for 9 seconds!)
What are you feeling now?
(Feeling: A mental factor whose function is to experience the pleasant, unpleasant, or neutral objects that are the ripening of one's karma.)
Monday 19 May 2008
Play as Being 49
- A sea of threads in this sticky web. But now I see milestones and signposts. I learnt with joy that Kyabje Trijang Rinpoche, great teacher both to my own Root Guru and to the 14th Dalai Lama, was once incarnated as Geshe Langri Tangpa (1054-1123 CE). That name may not mean much to most people. He was often known as 'Grim Face' because of his stern expression that reflected the suffering he saw around him. He wrote a very famous Mahayana Buddhist text called "Eight verses for Training the Mind". Together with Atisha before him and Chekawa after him, he brought Lojong practice (training the mind) to a central position in Tibetan Buddhism. The way out of the web is now imprinted on the web itself!
- I have received journey reports from the path ahead. The route is strewn with boulders rolled there by a most unlikely source, but they are surmountable in the long run. And the view from further along the road is well worth the effort!
- I added a tail-piece edit to my story "My leader is a holy man".
Friday 16 May 2008
Play as Being 46
- The web is sticky. Whatever we call it - Indra's net, Wyrd, or anything else - it is easy to be beguiled by its beauty, to wonder at its synchronicity, to be fascinated by the depth of its interconnectedness, to admire its tentacles, and to be utterly and completely lost in it. It is already there, we are already stuck fast, dew drops on the web, reflecting the others, evaporating in the morning warmth, coalescing in the evening cool. Such tragic beauty, such a song of suffering, this sticky web has claimed us all. I am so grateful to know there is a way out.
- Seeing the web in action - once again - is mesmerizing! This time my posting a comment to a recent Dharma the Cat brought a new contact and another exercise in upaya.
Thursday 15 May 2008
Play as Being 45
Continuing with Piet Hut's fascinating Play as Being project.
- Connections. Roots intertwined. A web or tapestry. Interconnectedness. Only ignorance keeps me from constantly seeing.
- In his hands, he holds a wish-fulfilling jewel. What one wish shall I wish for? What aspiration is worthy of his attention? Only one.
- I MANIFEST. I SEE.
Wednesday 14 May 2008
Play as Being 44
- When you're in the right place with the right person doing the right thing, it feels wonderful! But wait... no matter what I feel, I am ALWAYS in the right place with the right person; my choice is simply whether or not I will do the right thing, say the right thing, and think the right things.
- The question arose, "Why would Being present this appearance of non-Being?" Perhaps this is one of those "unknowable things". I don't need to know; I just need to KNOW.
Tuesday 13 May 2008
Play as Being 43
- Meditating when you have a migraine aura flashing away at you is an unusual experience. It arises and it passes, but while it is there it warps your vision and distorts your perception of conventional reality, like an old computer monitor that needs de-gaussing.
- Each adrift in rocky boats on a rocky ocean. Hit Home key. Fly!
My leader is a holy man
All the world sees my leader is a holy man. His name is known far and wide. He has done many good things. He has fought for many noble causes. He understands many things I do not. So I trust him. How can he be wrong?
Now he says he wants to cleanse our religion and remove a tradition hundreds of years old. He's very serious about it, so we all have to swear oaths – not just monks and nuns, but everyone. Not only that we won't take part in that tradition again but that we won't “share religious and material amenities of life” with those who refuse to swear.
Did you see what happened to those monks who refused to swear? No wonder they got thrown out. Now they can't even get power and food to where they're staying because companies refuse to give them the material amenities of life. Don't they know my leader is a holy man? How can he be wrong?
And that old woman! She didn't know you get an ID card when you swear the oaths. Did she really think that shops would serve her food and the basic material amenities of life if she couldn't show them that ID card? She certainly found out when the police took her away!
And my own son far away. I spoke to him on the phone last night. He hasn't sworn. He says he won't. How can he be so selfish? He knows I can't let him come home ever again if he doesn't. None of my neighbours would talk to me again. None of the shopkeepers would serve me. He keeps muttering about not have learned the lessons of the 1930s. But why can't he see my leader is a holy man? How can he be wrong?
This is no joke. If you're reading this far away then make no mistake, this is happening right now. First
(Written as a continuation of The Rabbit's Tale and Horror.)
Edit: Monday 19th May 2008. Just to clarify a few things arising from correspondence stimulated by this story:
- The situation described does affect me personally.
- However, this holy man is not actually my leader. I have written this story from the point of view of one of his followers.
- Nevertheless, apart from that bit of storyteller's licence, everything else is absolutely true.
- You can choose whether or not you would wish to be in that follower's position. Perhaps you already are.
Monday 12 May 2008
Play as Being 42
- Day 42 - a day on which to find The Ultimate AnswerTM? :)
- It all counts. Nothing is wasted.
- I look down at the palm of my hand and I see signs of age. What do I feel? Fear? No. Urgency? No. I start to study the lines and recall how 30 years or so ago I was an expert palmist. What changes do I see now in those lines that mirror the immense changes in my life? But I've let myself be distracted, so back to, "What do I feel?" ... Inevitability. Yes.
Horror
I don't know what to say or how to say it. The Rabbit's Tale does not even begin to describe the horror of the situation. Despite its reducing a real-life situation down to some essentials, I am almost embarrassed by the story now after learning, over the weekend, of the full scale of the persecution taking place and the deep and wide-spread suffering that is following.
I have to work out a way to tell the story. Please bear with me for a few days. I'm sure many will not believe. Many will not want to believe. Some will be upset. And I may end up cast off the hill myself. (If only it were that easy in real life for those that are suffering right now.) Why are the lessons of history so often ignored?
(I have since tried to tell the story in My leader is a holy man.)
I have to work out a way to tell the story. Please bear with me for a few days. I'm sure many will not believe. Many will not want to believe. Some will be upset. And I may end up cast off the hill myself. (If only it were that easy in real life for those that are suffering right now.) Why are the lessons of history so often ignored?
(I have since tried to tell the story in My leader is a holy man.)
Friday 9 May 2008
Connection down
In a push-button society, one gets kind of used to instant gratification. And sometimes with Play as Being, I can't always seem to instantly drop the charade of everyday concerns to be with the Is-ness in the way I've grown used to. Instead, at those times, my awareness feels thick and separate. I am suddenly thrown back on myself, rather like when my Internet Service Provider goes down.
What can one do when that happens? Just get on with other things. Happily I have no TV so those other things can be productive! Whether it is my ISP connection or my PaB connection, perhaps I can take it as a message from the Universe that I need to be getting on with something else right now. I'm tempted to say, "Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible." But who can ever tell?
What can one do when that happens? Just get on with other things. Happily I have no TV so those other things can be productive! Whether it is my ISP connection or my PaB connection, perhaps I can take it as a message from the Universe that I need to be getting on with something else right now. I'm tempted to say, "Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible." But who can ever tell?
Thursday 8 May 2008
Of honey and cleaning glass
Inspired by Dakini's blog post.
As with many people who were used to flawless vision in their youth, the onset of presbyopia in middle age came as a bit of a shock. With that came the necessity of wearing glasses for reading and working at a computer. And like Dakini's windscreen, the glasses need regular cleaning, usually to rid them of greasy smears.
Can you imagine what my glasses would be like if I never cleaned them? Perhaps I would still be able to see through them but discerning reality would get harder and harder. Perhaps I would start confusing what was real with what was simply stuck on the glass! So to give myself comfortable vision, I need to clean them once a day.
Once a day. Hmm... Play as Being 'imposes' a 1% time tax in the form of 9 seconds in each 15 minute period. But how about over a whole day? It turns out that 10 minutes over a waking day is also 1%. If Play as Being is cleaning my windscreen, perhaps my 10 minute morning altar offering ritual is cleaning my glasses. Both leave me deeply refreshed and energised. Both leave me cleansed. And that's before the possibility of adding extra 'formal' meditation time.
So add them up and it's 2% of my time. Now the big question. What about the other 98%?
Let me tell you a secret. Take a cup of water, add a teaspoon of honey, and stir. Does the water taste sweet? You bet it does! Yet it's 98% water and just 2% honey. In the same way, that 2% of my time spent 'cleaning glass' sweetens the whole of the rest of my day!
As with many people who were used to flawless vision in their youth, the onset of presbyopia in middle age came as a bit of a shock. With that came the necessity of wearing glasses for reading and working at a computer. And like Dakini's windscreen, the glasses need regular cleaning, usually to rid them of greasy smears.
Can you imagine what my glasses would be like if I never cleaned them? Perhaps I would still be able to see through them but discerning reality would get harder and harder. Perhaps I would start confusing what was real with what was simply stuck on the glass! So to give myself comfortable vision, I need to clean them once a day.
Once a day. Hmm... Play as Being 'imposes' a 1% time tax in the form of 9 seconds in each 15 minute period. But how about over a whole day? It turns out that 10 minutes over a waking day is also 1%. If Play as Being is cleaning my windscreen, perhaps my 10 minute morning altar offering ritual is cleaning my glasses. Both leave me deeply refreshed and energised. Both leave me cleansed. And that's before the possibility of adding extra 'formal' meditation time.
So add them up and it's 2% of my time. Now the big question. What about the other 98%?
Let me tell you a secret. Take a cup of water, add a teaspoon of honey, and stir. Does the water taste sweet? You bet it does! Yet it's 98% water and just 2% honey. In the same way, that 2% of my time spent 'cleaning glass' sweetens the whole of the rest of my day!
Play as Being 38
- In Second Life, I would often wander round thinking, "How many prims in that building or object? How did they build it?" Later I might try and emulate it. Then I would find myself looking around in Real Life and doing something similar, thinking, "If I were to build a replica of that object in Second Life, what prims and textures would I use?"
Today I thought something else. I walked to my car and it felt that I was walking on a landscape of real prims. I could feel their hollowness and, as I drove, I wondered at the repertoire of prims that Being used to present that appearance. It was like a secret discovery, unmasking the perpetrator behind a huge fraud, and yet being able to share silently in the joke. - I feel a lightness and poise, as though I could sweep my hand gracefully across my computer screen and it could pass right through, as though the molecules of one could dissolve into the other with no beginning, end or separation. Instead, I choose convention, and sip from what I choose to believe is a cup of ice cold water. So refreshing!
Wednesday 7 May 2008
Play as Being 37
- I am perched on the skin of an apple, incredibly thin, immensely vulnerable, fragile and accepting, knowing this could be all, now, today, and never else, seeing separation and feeling none, extending awareness under the icy blue haze of a Scottish sky, going home, coming home, undoing, and being all.
- "I used to be clairvoyant, but I could see no future in it..." :)
Tuesday 6 May 2008
Play as Being 36
Continuing Piet Hut's Play as Being practice after a break. Why not try it?
- A 9 second break. I shed all stress like slurry. All aspiration towards non-virtuous objects ceases. Attachment disappears. I AM. No stories. No dissertations. No musings. Just Being. What a blessing!
- In the clear consciousness of a 9 second meditation, I have a feeling: this is a great time, an important time, where many changes flow together. It is a time of great knowing. A moment, in many senses of the word.
- "Come to the edge."
"We might fall."
"Come to the edge."
"It’s too high!"
"COME TO THE EDGE!"
And they came,
and he pushed,
and they flew.
~ Christopher Logue, English poet (1926- )
Monday 5 May 2008
A rabbit's tale
Once upon a time there was a hill full of rabbits. This particular hill had a king rabbit. One day the king rabbit called a meeting and all the other rabbits who lived on that hill came along.
"This meeting is about the food we eat," said the king rabbit. There was a murmur of excitement because rabbits love their food.
"All of us eat lettuce," said the king rabbit, "but some of us also eat carrots." The other rabbits nodded at each other in agreement. They could see they had a wise rabbit for a king.
"I used to eat carrots," continued the king rabbit, "but now I have stopped. Carrots are bad for me. I don't like them any more. Therefore I want you all to stop eating them."
There was a sudden shocked silence, and then many of the other rabbits began talking at once.
"But we like carrots! ..."
"They keep my family healthy! ..."
"I never need to wear glasses because I eat carrots! ..."
"My father taught me to eat carrots! He taught you too, remember? ..."
"We've eaten carrots on this hill for 300 years and they've never done us any harm! ..."
The king rabbit heard the commotion and he spoke again.
"Let's have a vote," he said. "I want you all to sign this piece of paper - twice."
All the rabbits crowded closer.
"First of all you have to sign your name saying whether or not you want to keep on eating carrots," said the king rabbit.
"Then," he continued, "you have to sign saying whether or not you want all the carrot eating rabbits thrown off the hill!"
Now aren't you glad you're not a rabbit. Or are you?
(This story is continued in Horror and My leader is a holy man.)
"This meeting is about the food we eat," said the king rabbit. There was a murmur of excitement because rabbits love their food.
"All of us eat lettuce," said the king rabbit, "but some of us also eat carrots." The other rabbits nodded at each other in agreement. They could see they had a wise rabbit for a king.
"I used to eat carrots," continued the king rabbit, "but now I have stopped. Carrots are bad for me. I don't like them any more. Therefore I want you all to stop eating them."
There was a sudden shocked silence, and then many of the other rabbits began talking at once.
"But we like carrots! ..."
"They keep my family healthy! ..."
"I never need to wear glasses because I eat carrots! ..."
"My father taught me to eat carrots! He taught you too, remember? ..."
"We've eaten carrots on this hill for 300 years and they've never done us any harm! ..."
The king rabbit heard the commotion and he spoke again.
"Let's have a vote," he said. "I want you all to sign this piece of paper - twice."
All the rabbits crowded closer.
"First of all you have to sign your name saying whether or not you want to keep on eating carrots," said the king rabbit.
"Then," he continued, "you have to sign saying whether or not you want all the carrot eating rabbits thrown off the hill!"
Now aren't you glad you're not a rabbit. Or are you?
(This story is continued in Horror and My leader is a holy man.)
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