Standing In Reality

Q: I have seen some of your videos on YouTube and because they have touched me, I have read your book "From I Am to  I Am with Love". Thank you!

C: You are very welcome! And thanks for purchasing a book. It all helps to keep the message Live and On Line.

Q: You wrote that there are two sides: 1. Absence of a separate "I". I understand that. I have investigated and search for an "I" but I haven't found one. It is obvious that there isn't one.

C: So far so good my friend... THAT IS the KEY Insight!

Q: 2. I am Presence-Awareness. I understand that. E. g. I receive the picture at the wall. I am aware of it. Without this awareness the picture wouldn't exist. So the picture and all is awareness. I understand that (but just with my mind).

C: See below.

Q: You wrote: "Do you exist? Are you aware? That simple awareness of being is "IT".. your true nature". I don't understand the point. :-( My mind says: "so what? OK, I am aware and I exists but so what?" :-((

C: First off:  These are pointers to SEE beyond language that indeed, EXISTENCE IS AND NO ONE CAN POSSIBLY DISPUTE THAT! Secondly, I address "the mind further below:

All the while that "your mind" says "so what" (and a whole lot of other irrelevant stuff) YOU remain, as You ARE, Present and Aware. That Presence-Awareness is empty, meaningless, and clear. All the words, thoughts, mind-stuff, emotions, strong sensations and feelings occur IN that Present Awareness. You identify as a word, thought ... namely "I" or "me"; that is the ONLY error. Stay with That which allows everything and anything to appear, come into being, remain a while, and fade away. You are That which allows all the manifestation t appear. Take your stand as That!

The "I" (mind) is a mere fiction, yet so long as the energy of belief goes into that concept it will appear (ONLY appear!) solid and separate from Totality.

There is nothing that the "I" (or "me") need do; indeed there is nothing it CAN do (remember that it is a fiction!) The natural unfolding of the seeing consists in the absence of that energy of belief in the fictional "me" or "I"; and that can only happen as a functioning of the Totality, which is happening there (clearly). Only other suggestion I might make is, relax and allow this to happen as it happens without goal, resistance or striving ... as best you can.

You say you understand with mind. Take away that qualifier "with mind". The Understanding IS THERE.

The simplicity is that YOU ARE. Period. Full Stop. That You-Are-Ness is forever aware of all relative states, waking, dream, deep sleep. I repeat, take your stand THERE, in what is Eternal and absolutely unchanging. THAT never changes. You are That. That's all!

The Pathless Path That Leads Nowhere

It would seem to the "seeker" - on initial investigation - that there are specific well-defined "paths" ... proposed by any one of a great number of "Gurus" leading to the promised yet ever-elusive "personal-Realization. The notion that IF one just is led to the "right" path and follows step by step that path (usually one the Guru was led onto) that THEN "I will attain Realization". But after 10 or 20 or 30 or more years of great effort, sincere practice in accordance with "the path", and highly disciplined actions of a "personal will", there has been no such Realization of the Ultimate Isness for the person, the person may well come to see (rather reluctantly to say the least) that NO specified and prescribed path leads to home. Then there may well be "much weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth."

Then when the seeker finally understands that there is NO prescribed path but rather only the pathless trek through the appearance which is given NOT by a Guru but by Totality itself there comes a kind of effortless surrender to What Is, and the fact that as a "person" there is no possibility of attainment since the elusive Realization of Reality is "person-less", at that juncture there arises the natural knowing that indeed, all is well and perfectly unfolding in accordance "not with 'my' will but Totality's no-will of a profound Play of light and shadow with no end or beginning and no intrinsic meaning whatsoever!

This Play lifts and leads the individual collection of energy-cells on a merry chase in the same way a tornado uproots, lifts and moves and leads a tree on a wild and utterly unpredictable path, and the collection of cells called a 'me' has no more volition to enact or resist what occurs than the tree Yet the assumption, the premise, that the typical organism is imbued with is "I am the master of my fate". That assumption requires a profound dishonesty!

As an example of what I am pointing to, recently I had planned to be in my home in Enid, Oklahoma indefinitely, yet a series of events arose that uprooted the old charlie-body-brain thing and it is now awaiting a new home in Reno, Nevada. Some tornado! My point is, to assume we have ANY control or will in the arising of what happens in this dream-life is really, really foolish. The Is will take the seeker and all the rest of this dream-content of Awareness) right where it will. Control is a persistent yet plainly false premise.

"Control" is pure illusion. So is "Path"

There is no control, no path, no goal, no seeker, no Guru. Life is but a dream.

And YOU are the simple Presence-Awareness, the pure non-conceptual BEING, IN which (and AS which) the dream appears.

It's Not Complicated!

Just notice that you are, aware, and present. before the next thought you are, aware and present. Before the next feeling, you are, aware and present. The ancient Tibetans called this uncomplicated presence "Dzogchen", meaning, "The Great Perfection", which is then defined as "Non-conceptual, ever-fresh, self-shining, presence-awareness, just this and nothing else."

That's a lot of words. But what is it that sees-hears-knows the words? What is that which IS, before, during and after the word-sounds reverberate in consciousness?

You. As You Are. Aware and present. This is what always is, the just-so of radiant being, which energizes and illumines the entire appearing totality of what looks separate and distinct yet is in fact All One (AlOne)!)

So let the simplicity of what is pointed to here "sink in" and rest as what you are, letting the words and pictures come and go like the sun, clouds, moon, dark night, mountains, and rivers, all come and go is What never has/never will change ... YOU.

This is the Home we never actually left. It's free and clear, and that thou art. Loving to BE.

A Perfect Servant

An ancient and profound Zen saying goes, "The mind is a perfect servant, but a terrible master". What does this imply? First off, it is altogether too common (in my view) to 'make the mind wrong'; to dismiss the wondrous power of mind which is in fact the perfect expression of Totality ItSelf, as something undesirable which must be got rid of for the transformation of what it is to be human to arise or more accurately, to be unconcealed. This state of affairs is very common in so called "spiritual circles.

Make no mistake: The mind is a necessary and powerful part of the human organism; it allows for unique possibilities of pure creativity to be invented, and magnificent structures to be designed and built. Who cannot but gaze with wonder at the Eiffel Tower, or the New York (or the Singapore) skyline, realizing that the gifts of the servant-mind are indeed magnificent and nearly infinite?

That said, to give the mind's UN-natural propensity for limiting and corrosive statements about the human organism and the life occurring for and around that organism is to allow the mind to take over YOUR job, which is to all a gentle creative spirit to be expressed. There is a unique possibility here that I invite you to try out for yourself: The possibility of being that Self-Shining Awareness-Presence AND living a created life, a life in which you have a say about how things occur for you simply because YOU say so.

Now before the "non-duality police" jump all over this and deliver there cherished beliefs that this is just dualistic as hell, let me be absolutely clear: We live BOTH as unbounded Presence-Awareness AND the duality of the world-appearance of which we are an integral part. The non-dual and duality are NOT TWO! Try THAT awesome paradox on, my dear friends....

Here is my invitation: To observe the mind, and refuse to allow T to declare who you are. Because NO identity is inherently free and open. To state even "I am Consciousness and Bliss,) as some proponents of Eastern religions or philosophies suggest, is to impose a limit while what I ask you to see for yourself is that you are the Space in which ALL "identities", huge or tiny, arise in language.

Further, I sincerely invite you to engage is the glorious and shining possibility that it is our birthright to live creatively, to invent a life worth living, moment by moment, stepping outside the mind but then re-engaging it on YOUR terms, rather than it's false ideas, phony assertions, and - lets face it - damn lies regarding who you are and what is possible in living this wonderful dream called The Universal Totality of What Is.

The invitation is here. Now you are free to accept, and play with this with fun, ease and power, or decline and allow the mind to rule the roost.

A hint? the former is a devoid of suffering.

Have fun with this, if you like, and feel free to write or call and share whats happening for you.

As always, I Love You.

“What is called the ‘mind’ is a wondrous power residing in the Self. It causes all thoughts to arise. Apart from thoughts, there is no such thing as mind. Therefore, thought is the nature of mind. Apart from thoughts, there is no independent entity called the world. In deep sleep there are thoughts, and there is no world. In the states of waking and dream, there are thoughts, and there is world also. Just as the spider emits the thread (of the web) out of itself and again withdraws it into itself, likewise the mind projects the world out of itself and again resolves it into itself.” ~Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi

Simplicity, Just That

Everyone knows the one simplicity: I AM. This I AM is NOT the concept, not the word, but That Space of open Awareness IN which the words come and go.

Juts keep noticing that this open space, the aware presence, NEVER changes, and as the sages have pointed out from time immemorial, You Are THAT, that open space-like Presence which is never missing and never not fully here now. To have this deepest possible understanding that You Are That is all there is to this ... it is simplicity itself; YOU are that Simplicity, just That and nothing else. That Non-dual Is-ness is unavoidable, inescapable and ... indescribable. These words are pointing to that which registers and observes the words in Natural Peace that cannot be disturbed by any appearance that arises in It.

If doubts arise come back to what you know beyond doubt: I AM. Then seek the source of that I AM feeling, the beingness; look gently in the space called I AM for a separate thing-entity called "me". Where is a "me?" Find out that there is and never was one! This is enlightenment ... for no one.

THAT is already always SO. Thusness and suchness - Simplicity! 

This is Love, loving-to-be all that is. This is Home.