(blog formerly know as) Luminous Heart

No Doubt

Doubt takes many forms. One is fear that you'll hurt yourself by going forward. Another form of doubt is feeling that you've misunderstood your life and that you're constantly making a fundamental mistake. Being without doubt has nothing to do with accepting the validity of a philosophy or concept. Absence of doubt comes from trusting in the heart, trusting yourself. Being without doubt means that you connect with yourself, that you experience mind and body being synchronized together. When mind and body are synchronized, then you have no doubt.

Chogyam Trungpa, from The Sacred Path of the Warrior

Found on This Moment. It was posted there sometime September 2004. Rediscovered (in draft posting status) this moment. Perfect timing all around.

Kundalini

Need I say more?

Lost

After my last post I went through a long period where I had nothing to say.

Now I'm on overload. I can't be still. I can't find any silence. I can't hear myself.

I'm sending out a tiny lovenote. Hoping I'll find my connection and be back soon.

Spirit Knowing Itself

Tom left this quote from Hegel in the comments box of my last post. I thought it was too good to be hidden away.

"Everything that from eternity has happened in heaven and earth, the life of
God and all the deeds of time simply are the struggles for Spirit to know
itself, to make itself objective to itself, to find itself, be for itself,
and finally unite itself to itself, it is alienated and divided, but only
so as to be able thus to find itself and return to itself. Only in this
manner does Spirit attain its freedom, for that is free which is not
connected with or dependent on another."

Ken Wilber, It's no fun having dinner alone

Pathways [magazine]: Why does Spirit bother to manifest at all, especially when that manifestation is necessarily painful and requires that It become amnesiac to Its true identity? Why does God incarnate?

Ken Wilber: Oh, I see you're starting with the easy questions. Well, I'll give you a few theoretical answers that have been offered over the years, and then I'll give you my personal experience, such as it is.

I have actually asked this same question of several spiritual teachers, and one of them gave a quick, classic answer:"It's no fun having dinner alone."

That's sort of flip or flippant, I suppose, but the more you think about it, the more it starts to make sense. What if, just for the fun of it, we pretend -- you and I -- blasphemously pretend, just fo a moment -- that we are Spirit, that Tat Tvam Asi? Why would you, if you were God Almighty, why would you manifest a world? A world that, as you say, is necessarily one of separation and turmoil and pain? Why would you, as the One, ever give rise to the Many?

Pathways: It's no fund having dinner alone?

Ken Wilber: Doesn't that start to make sense? Here you are, the One and Only, the Alone and the Infinite. What are you going to do next? You bathe in your own glory for all eternity, you bask in your own delight for ages upon ages, and then what? Sooner or later, you might decide that it would be fun -- just fun -- to pretend that you were not you. I mean, what else are you going to do? What else can you do?

Pathways: Manifest a world.

Ken Wilber: Don't you think? But then it starts to get interesting. When I was a child, I used to try to play checkers with myself. You ever tried that?

Pathways: Yes, I remember doing something like that.

Ken Wilber: Does it work?

Pathways: Not exactly, because I always knew what my "opponent's" move was going to be. I was playing both sides, so I couldn't "surprise" myself. I always knew what I was going to do on both sides, so it wasn't much of a game. You need somebody "else" to play the game.

Ken Wilber: Yes, exactly, that's the problem. You need an "other." So if you are the only Being in all existence, and you want to play -- you want to play any sort of game -- you have to take the role of the other, and then forget that you are playing both sides. Otherwise the game is no fun, as you say. You have to pretend you are the other player with such conviction that you forget that you are playing all the roles. If you don't forget, then you've got no game, it's just no fun.

....
Pathways Magazine interview reprinted in Ken Wilber's The Simple Feeling of Being.

Tsunami Healing Prayers

I am trying to gauge the interest level for gathering together to meditate and actively send healing energy to those who are suffering in this crisis. We would gather via a telephone bridge line. If you have a phone, you can join in.

I especially welcome those with Reiki and other distant healing experience. However, NO HEALING BACKROUND IS NECESSARY, just a willingness to hold heartspace and pray in whatever way feels right to you.

I am certain this is work we are already doing in isolation. It would be comforting to join together as a group. Certainly the resonant energy field would be strengthened.

FYI: The telephone number would be a toll call to the U.S. Everyone dials in at one time. We would meditate together for one hour. If there's enough interest, we could do this more than once.

Please leave a message in the comments section if you would like to participate. You can include days & times of day that would work for you in the comments. Also a bit about your backround if you like.

I regret I don't have time at this moment dig up scientific evidence supporting non-local healing. (A quick "google" on Elizabeth Targ may turn up something. She was very involved in this kind of research before she passed away a year or so ago.) I can only tell you that evidence does exist and some of my own clients have had medically measurable healing from our work together.

I am confident that we can do something REAL for these people.

I think this will be worthwhile even if there are only a few of us. But, I have to tell you, the bridge line I would rent can hold up to 125 people. I would love to fill it with people coming together to meditate and send healing prayers.

Let me know if you would like to join in and kindly spread the word.

Tsunami Aid Resources

http://tsunamihelp.blogspot.com also know as SEA-EAT, South East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami Continually updated extensive news and information blog about resources, aid, donations and volunteer efforts.

Medicins Sans Frontieres -- Doctors Without Borders.

My original intent was to keep updating this list. However, there is plenty of this information available so I will not spend time re-inventing the wheel.

As staggering as this tragedy is, I am touched by the outpouring of compassionate action across the globe. If you're feeling bleak, check out Tsunami Help Offered. Reach into your wallets, roll up your sleeves, and see what you can do.

Duality, Nonduality & Spooky Things That Happen At A Distance

Duality: The world of form, which is characterized by seeming separation of objects (reflected in conceptual dichotomies such as "this/that," "here/there," "then, now," or "you, me"). This perception of limitation is produced by the senses because of the restriction implicit in a fixed point of view. Science has finally gone beyond the artificial dichotomy of observer and observed characteristic of 17th-century Cartesian duality, and now assumes that they're one and the same. The universe has no center, but is continually expanding equally and simultaneously from every point. Bell's Theorem* helped to demonstrate that this is a universe of simultaneity -- rather than Newtonian cause and effect over distance in an artificial time frame. Both time and space themselves are merely the measurable products of a higher implicit order.

*Bell's Theorem expresses the non-local quality of reality, something Einstein called "spooky action at a distance."

Nonduality:[...]When the limitation of a fixed location of perception is transcended, there's no longer an illusion of separation, nor of space and time as we know them. All things exist simulatneously in the unmanifest, enfolded, implicit universe, expressing itself as the manifest, unfolded, explicit perception of form. In reality, these forms have no intrinsic, independent existence but are the product of perception (that is, man is merely experiencing the content of his own mind). On the level of nonduality, there's observing but no observer, as subject and object are one. You-and-I becomes the One Self experiencing all as divine. [...] The physical body is a manifestation of the One Self who, in experiencing this dimension, had temporarily forgotten its reality, thus permitting the illusion of a three-dimensional world. The body is merely a means of communication; to identify one's self with the body as "I" is the fate of the unenlightened, who then erroneously deduce tht they're mortal and subject to death. Death itself is an illusion, based on the false identification with the body as "I." In nonduality, consciousness experiences itself as both manifest and unmanifest, yet there's no experiencer. In this Reality, the only thing that has a beginning and an end is the act of perception itself. In the illusory world, we're like the fool who believes that things come into existence when he opens his eyes and cease to exist when he closes them.

Definitions from the Glossary section of Power vs. Force, The Hidden Determinants of Human Behavior by David R. Hawkins, MD, Phd

The Sound of One Dog Barking

You made popular in this country the expression "don't know mind." Could you say what that is?

Human beings understand too much. But what they understand is just somebody's opinion. Like a dog barking. American dogs say "Woof, woof." Korean dogs say "Mung, mung." Polish dogs say "How, how."

So which dog barking is correct? That is human beings' dog barking, not dog barking. If dog and you become one hundred percent one, then you know sound of barking. This is Zen teaching. Boom! Become one.

From Boom! An Interview with Zen Master Seung Sahn Tricycle. Winter 1996 (Be sure to check out the Zen Master Seung Sahn link. The biography is quite wonderful.)

For Robert, who asked Do dogs have Buddha Nature?

[Experiencing inexplicable technical difficulties on a variety of fronts. Will have to fix tomorrow as I turn into a pumpkin at midnight.]

Desire

My desire for knowledge is intermittent; But my desire to commune with the spirit of the universe, to be intoxicated even with the fumes, call it, of that divine nectar, to bear my head through atmospheres and over heights unknown to my feet, is perennial and constant.

--Thoreau

Discovered on Whiskey River just after telling Meredith that I might be overly attached to these kind of states, but I didn't really think so.

Healing Change

I'm in the process of changing the way I offer my energy healing work. And while I'm admittedly a bit nervous, I'm also thrilled beyond belief by the possibilities.

Some months ago, a friend had an intensely complicated life situation and I could "see" obstructing karma all around it. (A significant amount of my healing work involves working with karma from Buddhist, energetic and Shamanic healing ways.) This woman is very dear to me, that rarest of rare soul friends. I didn't hesitate for a moment to say here's what I see, here's what we can do, if you want this I would like to offer you some of my healing work.

We did a long distance healing session a few weeks later. It took two, possibly three hours to work through the all the layers. I saw karmic healing in my friend and karmic clearing in the other people involved. The healing shifts were enormous and very beautiful. I was happy for my friend and I basked quietly in the joy of being part of her healing change.

This woman is a person of great integrity and generosity. I knew, sooner or later, she would raise the subject of paying me. When she did my reply was fully prepared. The healing session was given out of love, I said. I repeated how much we give each other through our remarkable friendship. At the same time -- knowing my work, my spiritual practice and my financial state -- if she wanted to support me, I told her I would be happy to receive any donation she might like to make.

She sent an exceptionally generous check (actually 2 checks) a few weeks later.

Two weeks ago, my friend received a call out of the blue from the key "other" involved in our karmic healing work. Instead of grasping and anger that person had found peace of mind. Instead of threatening legal action that person offered gratitude. My friend and I marveled at the change. I could feel her breath fully in her.

What was unique about this work was not the power of the session or the outcome. The healing was huge because my friend really wanted it and was completely open to it. My clients make me look gifted, but everything depends on them. Truly.

What was unique about this work is what didn't happen. I didn't check the mail to see if payment had come in time for the session. Didn't wonder if the client would cancel at the last minute (not because it wasn't a possibility, but because it didn't matter.) I didn't worry that this person was expecting me to "fix" them, which is totally draining to me and completely unsuccessful for them. And I didn't question for even a moment if my regular fees were too high or my sliding fees too low.

In other words, I completely let go of every concern that was outside of what I had to bring to the healing work.

The freedom was unparalleled.

This is the way I want to work. This is the way I need to work. Healing as a complete love offering. Healing for people of absolute integrity. Healing for people who need or want change and are ready to reach for it. Healing for people who recognize and value it.

Healing in exchange for donations.

Compassion Practices Study

Participate in an unpaid, but otherwise exceptionally rewarding 40-day study on practices to generate feelings of compassion and loving-kindness.

The 40 practices have been written under the guidance of one of the world's most revered Tibetan Buddhist masters, but are presented in a way that is completely non-religious, non-foreign, simple to understand, and easy to do.

Each day you will be sent via email a short mental exercise designed to generate feelings of compassion and asked to write a short journal entry describing your experiences using that practice.

Time requirement: 5 minutes a day using the practice and 5 minutes writing reflections on your experience.

Complete confidentiality guaranteed. Option of allowing some or all of your reflections to be included in an upcoming book based on these practices. Additional option of sharing your reflections with others who are participating in the study.

Contact: tana.pesso@verizon.net

.....................

Tana Pesso is a consultant, and a beautifully dedicated friend in Dharma. I just received the introductory questionaire and I'm excited to begin. I hope some of you will feel called to participate in the study, too, so we can share experiences. Kindly, also, spread the word.

By Way of Thanks

Stop me if you've heard this...

There's a story of a very pious old man who spends his whole life deep in devotion to God. One day, flooding rains come to the land where he lives. But he isn't worried. He just sits down in his chair and begins to pray.

The flood waters climb higher, so he scrambles up to the 2nd floor of his house to escape them. But he isn't worried. He just continues to pray.

While he's lost in prayer, someone comes rowing by in a rowboat. "There's plenty of room. Climb on into the boat with me and I'll save you my friend." But the old man says no thank you. "I've spent my whole life in devotion to God," he says. "God will save me." So he sends the rowboat on its way.

The waters, unbelievably, keep rising. Unconcerned, the old man simply climbs onto the roof of his house and continues to pray. And, unbelievably, another rowboat comes by. This time there are a few passengers in it, but no problem, there's room. "Climb into the boat with us and we'll save you my friend." But the old man answers, "No thank you. I've spent my whole life in devotion to God. God will save me." And he sends the second rowboat on its way.

The rain keeps coming down. The floodwaters rise so high that the old man has to stand on the peak of the roof of his house, just to keep his face above water. Still he keeps on calmly praying. Amazingly, a helicopter flys overhead and sees the old man. A rope is lowered down for him. "There's room for you in this helicopter, old man. Climb up the rope and I will save you." But the old man replies "I've spent my whole life in devotion to God, God will save me. No thank you, go on your way."

It keeps on raining. The water rises over the old man's head. And he drowns.

Because he was such a pious and devoted man, he goes right up to heaven. Not only that, he is granted a personal interview with God. So he goes in and bows, looking very humble and devoted. And God says, "Because you were so devoted to me on earth, now that you are in heaven you may ask me anything you wish."

And the old man says, "Well, if I may..." And he tells God his story of the rain and the flood and the rising waters and his death by drowning. "So I just have to ask you because I'm so confused. I was your faithful servant, I just kept praying and believing in you. And you let me drown. I don't understand. Where were you when I needed you?"

And God looks back at him, even more confused and says "I don't understand either. I sent you two rowboats and a helicopter."

....................................

By way of thanks, because I CAN see God (or Buddha?) in two row boats and a helicopter.

Rock and a Hard Place

Posted my previous posts and took a spin around the blogosphere. I'm laughing out loud. All your posts of thanksgiving, family, unity and cheer. And what am I writing about?

Cave-dwelling hermits.

I didn't have a traumatic Thanksgiving. Honest. I had a quiet one. Which was my choice.

And not entirely my choice. I'm going another round with the limitations of my head injury and how things that create warm memories for most people create cognitive meltdowns for me.

The beauty of your blogs is that I get to know the love that is still in the world. The sadness is, I'm reminded it's out there and I'm not.

Hermit of Go Cliffs

I renounced a home, the king of attachment and hatred,
renounced food and wealth, the kings of craving,
and renounced relatives, the kings of grasping and fixation.
Now I aimlessly roam the land.

I don't want a companion in the secular life.
When wherever you stay is understood as a holy place,
do what you want with all these homes!

When contentment dawns from within,
do what you want with all this food and wealth!

When the living beings of the six realms
are recognized as your parents,
do what you want with all these relatives!

Godrakpa, The Hermit of Go Cliffs
Timeless Instructions From A Tibetan Mystic

Contemplation

From this moment on, with no sense of a loss,
I donate my body, and likewise my wealth,
And my virtues amassed throughout the three times
In order to help all beings, my mothers.

There's a strong part of me (validated by friends who know me well) that believes the place I offer the most benefit is through deep practice and prayer. This is the life of a yogi, an honored title I cannot claim for myself. But it's also the life of a shaman, a title I do claim out of both ability and responsibility.

I'm beginning to struggle again with the knowledge that this work doesn't receive enough of my time. As simplified as my life is, too much energy is taken up by things that don't matter.

Just to let you know, for me that includes a lot of what most people call "life." I've always had a strong contemplative streak. This seems to only have been increased by my head injury. One person's weekend activities would take me months to organize, weeks to complete, and days to recover from. Experiences that are fun for you are overstimulating and exhausting to the point of tears for me. All the more reason to settle into a cave somewhere.

But caves (and monasteries) aren't quite the right fit. Neither is what I have at this moment. And I don't know how to reconcile what calls my heart so insistently with what I have the brain capacity to accomplish.

Earth By Night

Earth by Night

Sparkling points of light across the earth fill me with hope. The image is available as an art poster. Click the photo for details.

Conscience in Falluja

Kevin Sites is the freelance cameraman who videotaped a US Marine shooting and apparently killing a wounded Iraqi prisoner in a Falluja mosque.

He recently posted this personal account of the events on his weblog.

I'm greatly disturbed by the death threats made against him, and the insistance that this information should rightfully have been hidden. I wandered through blogs full of angry rhetoric, saddened again by the direction some "American values" have taken.

I wanted to leave comments, but decided to stay silent. Sometimes there's wisdom in silence when you know you can't be heard, when what you say will only fan the flames of anger. But I'm uneasy with that wisdom.

The next few posts (below) are the journey I made with that discomfort in heart and mind.

Thomas Jefferson, Tyranny & Silence

All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.

Thomas Jefferson, 3rd US president, principal author of the Declaration of Independence, 1743-1826.

Real Silence, Katagiri Roshi

The opportunity to experience real silence occurs when we have been driven into a corner and simply cannot move an inch. This seems like a situation of complete despair, but this silence is quite different from despair, because in the area of despair, the conscious flame of human desire is still burning. But real silence is the state of human existence that passes through this despair. How can we experience this silence? Without everyday life, it is impossible to experience silence.

Dainin Katagiri Roshi, Returning to Silence
Zen Practice in Daily Life