profound pointers & other stuff

[Balance]

"The world is given to me only once, not one existing and one perceived. Subject and object are only one. The barrier between them cannot be said to have broken down as a result of recent experience in the physical sciences, for this barrier does not exist."
                                                         
-Erwin Schrodinger, Quantum Physicist

[Greg108]

Questions to Eckhart Tolle:

Question:  What do we experience when we connect with our real self?  How does that experience change the way we live our own life?
 
Answer:  You no longer create suffering for yourself.  Anger, resentment, regret, grievances, anxiety, guilt, etc, which are all inseparable from the egoic state of consciousness, no longer arise.  And when you no longer create suffering for yourself, you no longer create suffering for others.  You have deep empathy, not only with other human beings, but also with nature and all life forms.  You see all life forms as manifestations of the one formless and eternal Life, which is what you are in essence, and you can sense that essence not only in yourself, but in all beings.  In other words, everywhere you encounter yourself.
 

Question:  Wouldn’t it be more encouraging to set ones goals and try to fulfill them?  That could also give us a strong purpose in life…  What is the difference between the two approaches?

Answer:  There’s nothing wrong with goals and trying to fulfill them – as long as the main focal point of your attention remains the present moment.  It’s like being on a journey and knowing where you want to get to, but realizing at the same time that the entire journey ultimately consists of one step – the step you’re taking at this moment.  That one step is all there ever is, and so you give it your fullest attention.  In other words, the step you’re taking now is primary, the destination – the goal – is secondary.  If the destination becomes primary, you will become stressed and anxious and you will miss life.  You will suffer, and the destination will not make you happy even when you get there, when you attain your goals.

[Balance]

When there's exclusive identification with the content of awareness, with the story of 'me' as an imagined entity, there's a tendency for the awareness aspect of Consciousness to be objectified as 'the beyond', a state or realm which once attained will offer oneness, lasting peace.

But in actuality there is no beyond, nothing to be attained 'ultimately'. There's simply this as it is: simple presence. This is already that 'realm'. Consciousness (awareness and the presently appearing content of awareness) is already one or whole, and when the story of 'me' - of identification - is seen as just a play, a movie, then all pursuit of oneness, all pursuit of the beyond or whatever, quite naturally becomes obsolete.

-Nathan Gill

[Balance]

"Renunciation is not giving up the things of this world, but accepting that they go away."

~Shunryu Suzuki

[Balance]

"Only the incomprehensible gives any light."

~Saul Bellow

[Balance]

"Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
I am large, I contain the multitudes."

~Walt Whitman

[Anthem]

Only the formless can fulfill or satisfy, all else comes and goes and dissipates into nothingness.  Life is an ever dancing play of forms on a background of emptiness. What Is inside me, is in you, is in a tree, is in the wall. Of course!

[Balance]

Know that in this way there are myriads of forms and hundreds of grasses throughout the entire earth, and yet each grass and each form itself is the entire earth.

The study of this is the beginning of practice.

When you are at this place, there is just one grass, there is just one
form; there is understanding of form and no-understanding of form; there is understanding of grass and no-understanding of grass.

Since there is nothing but just this moment, the time-being is all the time there is.

Grass-being, form-being are both time.

Each moment is all being, is the entire world.

Reflect now whether any being or any world is left out of the present moment.


~Dogen

[Balance]

All things are like this...

When dharma does not fill your whole body and mind, you may assume it is already sufficient. When dharma fills your body and mind, you understand that something is missing. For example, when you sail out in a boat to the middle of an ocean where no land is in sight, and view the four directions, the ocean looks circular, and does not look any other way. But the ocean is neither round nor square; its features are infinite in variety. It is like a palace. It is like a jewel. It only looks circular as far as you can see at that time. All things are like this.

Though there are many features in the dusty world and the world beyond conditions, you see and understand only what your eye of practice can reach. In order to learn the nature of the myriad things, you must know that although they may look round or square, the other features of oceans and mountains are infinite in variety; whole worlds are there. It is so not only around you, but also directly beneath your feet, or in a drop of water.


~Dogen

[Balance]

Moon Reflected on the Water


Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken. Although its light is wide and great, the moon is reflected even in a puddle an inch wide. The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in dewdrops on the grass, or even in one drop of water.

Enlightenment does not divide you, just as the moon does not break the water. You cannot hinder enlightenment, just as a drop of water does not hinder the moon in the sky. The depth of the drop is the height of the moon. Each reflection, however long or short its duration, manifests the vastness of the dewdrop, and realizes the limitlessness of the moonlight in the sky


^^Dogen

[Balance]

To study the Way is to study the self.

To study the self is to forget the self.

To forget the self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand things.


~~Dogen

[Balance]

Because the mind is free ~~
Listening to the rain
Dripping from the eaves,
The drops become
One with me.


^^~Dogen

[Balance]

When we truly enter the mountains,
           birds, bugs, beasts and blossoms
radiate supernatural excellence
           and take great delight in our presence


^~Dogen

[Balance]

There are mountains hidden in jewels.

There are mountains hidden in marshes,

Mountains hidden in the sky.

There are mountains hidden in mountains.

There's a study of mountains hidden in hiddenness.


^Dogen

[Balance]

When the ‘I’ thought - the primary thought - has been assumed, then the succession of arising thoughts appears to form a continuous solid entity called 'mind'. It's like a propeller: when it's still, it's seen as two or three blades, but when it's whirling around - the apparent succession of thoughts - then it appears as an entity...

...This is what we're calling 'mind', but in fact mind has no existence - it's just an apparent succession of arising thoughts. The story formed in thought is no more real than a story formed by a succession of messages strung together to form a novel. There can be involvement in a novel, but only when it's picked up and read. It could just be left on the shelf.


-Nathan Gill