Holy Longing

Now you are going to ask me how to destroy this stark awareness of your self. You might be thinking that if you destroy this sense of your self you will destroy everything else too and you will be right. But I will answer this fear by telling you that without a very special grace from God and without a particular aptitude on your part, you will never be able to get rid of this naked sense of self. For your part, this aptitude consists of a robust and profound sorrow of spirit... ..Everybody has a special reason for grief, but the person who has a deep experience of himself existing apart from God feels the most acute sorrow. Once we have aquired this sorrow it not only purifies our souls, but it takes away all the pain merited by sin and thus makes the soul capable of receiving that joy which takes from a man all sense of his own being. If this sorrow is genuine, it is full of holy longing. Otherwise nobody could bear it.

from The Cloud of Unknowing

***

...full of holy longing, otherwise nobody could bear it. In sorrow we are purified, and, with loss of a sense of our own (small) being, we are capable of receiving great joy.

You are a Lion!

There was lion cub whose mother was killed. The little lion cub fell into the company of a herd of sheep. They took pity on him raised him among them. The young lion acquired the sheep's habits and behaviors. By and by for all the young lion knew he was a sheep, one of the crowd. In the mirror of the sheep herd the lion saw his reflection as a sheep, his identity was given to him in this mirror of social convention. In other words he was programmed and conditioned to be a sheep, to take on the identity of a sheep.

One day a mature lion shows up on the scene, and of course the sheep flee and the young lion goes running and screaming along with the rest of the sheep. The old lion looks and he can't believe his eyes, "What the hell?" He sees the young lion running and squealing like a sheep, jumping and leaping in fear, you get the picture. So the old lion captures the young lion. Can you imagine the young lion's fear? The old lion drags the young lion, kicking and screaming for his life, to a pond where he shows the young lion his reflection in the still water. The young lion sees an accurate reflection, not one given to him by the crowd, by society, by conditioning. The young lion sees his original face and realizes his true nature.

Love Poem

Sonnet 17

I do not love you as if you were the salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

~Pablo Neruda

In the Stillness

Our beautiful language,
spoken and written
points to the ineffable
which is You.

There is a stillness
within our communion
vibrant with life, but still -
exceedingly awake, but still.

Underneath thoughts
in between thoughts
in between words
is the canvas
upon which the whole of existence
is painted.

Blessings fall
on everything
perceived through
stillness.

The Grace in This

What is the Grace in this?

In this?

Even in this?

Even this.

And that, too.

Everything belongs.

Snow Day

Last week we had a snow day... I stayed home and just watched the snow falling - sometimes small flakes, and sometimes huge ones. It was so beautiful. Occasionally a tree bough burst from the weight, and suddenly dropped a load of snow onto the ground. Through the day I enjoyed watching the flakes fluttering down outside my windows, and observing for animal tracks through the snow and the birds at the feeder. Most of all, however, I enjoyed the great silence that accompanies a snowy day.

There is not only a great silence in the snow, but also a spaciousness... spaciousness surrounds each snowflake, and outlines the horizon as well as each small heap of snow. With the snow falling, and the jumping of the tree boughs, it is as though there is a symphony playing, with movement and dance, yet it can barely be heard. This silent spaciousness is inside of us, too. Between each thought and each movement, a great spaciousness exists. And in this spaciousness, we are silent. I sense the awakening of an alert presence in this silence, both outside my window and inside of me, too. There is a silent field underneath the words, underneath the snow, between the snowflakes. There are gaps here in which a great stillness is present. Stillness is here. So deep and so vast and so rich.

Freedom

When it touches you,
send that unnameable sound.
Let it carry to us in sunlight
and shade.

Let it float in the sky,
a white cloud
so we can feel it,
being that whiteness
forming and dissolving
in silence.

Send it to us
in the music of rain,
the softness of snow;
in cold, crisp winds
and blue sky songs
of silence.

Deliver its aloneness
in spreading clouds,
soundless chiming,
always slipping away;

in dropping temperatures
and rising steam -
that warm, moist,
silent face;

in footsteps
where we lose ourselves,
finding nothing
again and again.

Show your hidden longings,
love with vastness.

***
Golden stream,
red tail cry,
silent friend
under a blanket of snow.
You brought a gift:
warm tears,
softening heart,
in this vast field
of pure white
and final rest.

Peacemaker

In memory, and in gratitude, to peacemaker, Tom Fox.

Silent Victory

Here is a tender portrayal of a journey to live a conscious life ---even when faced with a difficult challenge such as raising a child with autism.

Belovedness

Once, a kindly teacher pointed out my arrogance. Arrogance. It is a word I had never considered as an attribute of who I saw myself to be. The word stung with a piercing quality and remains within me as a little ache, a memory of a lesson learned, a challenge to survey my own ego and to grow in compassion. It surely has been one of the most difficult hills to climb to see the other side of arrogance. Even still, arrogance often looms large. Letting go of arrogance is an ongoing task. Meditation and spiritual friendship has been the most helpful in highlighting and moving away from arrogance, allowing light to radiate from my truest nature. Indeed, if the purest quality within us is illuminated, we, with honest humility, move from a place of love and kindness, of genuine compassion for others, eclipsing the otherwise incessant rise of ego or arrogance.

“No sooner had Jesus come up out of the water than he saw the heavens torn apart and the spirit, like a dove, descending on him. And a voice came from heaven: ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; my favor rests on you’”
(Matt. 3:16-17, Mark 1:10-11, Luke 3:21-22).

You are my Beloved. You are the Beloved. Spiritual friendship helps us to realize our own Beloved nature incarnate. There is a voice between words spoken in loving friendship that speaks from the mystery, whispering tenderly and clearly, “You are my beloved, on you my favor rests.” This voice rises above old voices that trap us by derogatory messages: “You are no good, bad, worthless. You must prove yourself.” Realizing the gift of honoring our own belovedness helps us to transcend these negative internal messages and, paradoxically, helps us to become more than we ever thought possible. In all our ordinariness, our simplicity, our truest nature of childlike wonder, we are so loved. We are able presence this for one another in friendship with a heightened capacity for intimacy. There is a freedom here, yes? We can offer to one another freedom from the call to social perfection, from striving, from even a pretense of ‘knowing’. In this, there is no longer a need for arrogance. We can simply let it fall away as we humbly lift our hearts to this gentle presence of love instead.

A Maitreya Ishwara teaching parallels this notion. “To grow and to enjoy life you need only to be consciously with what is so. There is nothing to do or achieve.” Maitreya Ishwara writes that “God is all there is, we are not separate from the Whole.” This understanding seeps in gradually, and slowly allows us to trust and accept ourselves as we are right now, helping us to realize that we do not need to live up to the ideals of any ego-based teaching. We can wordlessly rest in this awareness. Sitting silently with the empty fullness of a living Buddha, of Christ’s belovedness, we recognize that this amazing transformation of love and acceptance occurs within us too. A friend’s loving communion tenderly lifts us up into the warm and radiant light of consciousness beyond self-importance to true Self, where we are not separate.

The Blue Sky

"It is easy to suppose that few people realize on that occasion, which comes to all of us, when we look at the blue sky for the first time, that is to say: not merely see it, but look at it and experience it and for the first time have a sense that we live in the center of a physical poetry, a geography that would be intolerable except for the non-geography that exists there — few people realize that they are looking at the world of their own thoughts and the world of their own feelings."

— Wallace Stevens, The Necessary Angel

What remains?

Akilesh: Touching, tender, vulnerable, yes, kindness, warmth, letting go, love, fresh citrus, glittering sunlight on warm water, purple mountains, living outside of time yet smiling and hugging inside it, friendship in eternity - Is this possible? The question turns to wisp and spirals off into the ether. Big Sky treasure, which feels undeserved, is laid at our feet at every moment. We live in the gap. We love and let go.

Meredith: This beautiful brisk stream of consciousness paints itself upon our inner landscape today, however fleeting, only to be washed away with the in-coming tide.

What remains?

Perhaps this question, too, turns into wisps and spirals off into the ether.

Kiss of the Wind

This morning the trees in the field out my window are wildly moving with a magical energy. It matched something within me that is moving just as wildly. There is a gap here, too, in this moment now; the wind floats in through the window casing to remind me. We move in this rhythm, feel this breeze, and know. We know in the deepest sense that the magic in this moment is here for us always, always new in the next moment, fresh again and again and again. What sweet bliss to feel the kiss of the wind.

What an even sweeter bliss to feel the presence of the Beloved Friend. You are here in this moment, and this one. And again. I hold you within as steady rhythm and a flow within me. You are a wild flow of warmth, energizing my every cell.

I sit in front of the window,
watching the tree's wind dance,
feeling the breeze blow through me, too.

I witness my Being in silence.
In this moving silence
is the fullness of Presence.

There isn't any other moment.
There isn't any other thing.
This silence is.

Sparkling Cascade

“…my heart is now a busted glass bead jar
spilling wildly across the floor....”


How delightful to hear this music:
a sparkling cascade of colorful glass beads
spilling wildly across the floor.

Spilling – allowing "self" to
spill out and disperse.
In the spilling, transformation.
Self appears from the background
into the foreground.
Little self disperses,
and the Self emerges -
its form simply energy, light, love,
and the glittering dance of glass beads
spilling wildly across the floor.

Where can this self be found now?
It is strewn across the universe.
And what are we?
The flow. The Flowing.
We are the flowing.
There is no permanent self here;
we have only thought there was.
Who we are is only the naked nameless
in the form steam rising from a cup of tea,
or of glass beads
dancing wildly across the floor.

Embracing this emptiness,
this no-thing, this vibrancy
is Self-realization,
the consciousness of no-thing,
is living in the gap.

So we rejoice, delighted,
smiling at the sound,
the spilling music of little glass beads
dancing wildly across the floor.


***
Dancing of Chris, Meredith and Aki

Invitation

Meredith: I continue to be hopeful that Presence can be felt by others simply in the presence of a person. If we are abundantly full, full to the brim and out over the top, empty of self and full of the Beloved One, even our silence can exude this presence. We want others to taste this, too. We want to make this flavor available to all who hunger. Like Osho said, so 'sweetly', "He pours forth the sweet honey in which he himself is drowning." We want that sweetness, and that fire in our hearts to spark other's hearts on fire, too.

I really want to expose my heart further. I want to open, open, and open some more. I want to meet other warm hearts who are in love with the Divine. People on the path of the heart are beautiful and they are poetry, they are pure and sweet in their loving. This is recognizing diamonds, yes?

Akilesh: Yes. Your intention to expose and open is strong. Now you may simply acknowledge that you are wide open already, and it is a matter of discerning the ways that the divine wants to express itself through you. And this happens moment to moment forever. This is what fidelity is about. You are faithful to yourself as Self. You see, you are no longer keeping your fidelity with self, with mind-identification, with ego-fixation, with personality focus; you are no longer subscribing to the notion that who you are is a self. Instead you are expressing your fidelity and devotion to yourself as Self, because that is where you find Self, right here, right now, on the spot where you are sitting. You don't find it elsewhere or at some other time when perhaps you are more evolved or pure or prepared. This never happens. Only Now, only Here.

Meredith: Right Now, right Here. My door to you and others is open. My light is on. I want to invite you in. I want to invite any who are thirsty, and to be able to offer that presence that is so refreshing and so fulfilling. I offer Presence. This is not a doing, it is a Being.

Akilesh: That's the spirit. That is what the spirit of love says through an awakened one: "My door is open, my light is on, I am awake. I invite you in. The river flows here. If you are thirsty, drink! I have found something so refreshing and so fulfilling. I am overflowing with Being. If you are thirsty, drink to your hearts content. I rejoice in your gladness, and in the quenching of your thirst. Namasté."

Open Window

I just opened the window…
I want to feel freshness pour in this morning. It is chilly, and yet this crispness reminds me of the edge, the gap, the in-between space where we do not exist separately, and the mystery suggests itself. The breeze, because we cannot see it but know it is present, is always a reminder to me of the Beloved. The breeze is sometimes delicate and sometimes a more energetic force and flow, which is always fresh and alive. We breathe in this aliveness; we literally swim in it. The mystery, the unknowing, I sit with this, I feel it. I love this aspect of our Existence.


Photo by Cindi Schick

Poisoning of Innocence

Meditation X (final) on Thomas Traherne's
"Your enjoyment of the world..." Quoted in Huxley's Perennial Philosophy

And so perfectly hate the abominable corruption of man in despising it that you had rather suffer the flames of hell (than) willingly be guilty of their error.

The depth of conditioning of a soul is deep. The development of toxic conscience, of guilt and fear as a means to control the defenseless child, is an abomination. We are conditioned to accept a delusionary structure of self and to fixate upon it to such a degree that it eclipses our divinity and becomes the biopsychosocial nexus of our universe. It becomes conventional reality, a fundamental distortion. This constitutes corruption of the human spirit, and remains a self-perpetuating abomination fostered by every social institution -- state, church, family, educational system, media... This conditioning takes a divine being and locks her in a delusion of separateness, engendering immense suffering for self and others. Healthy ego structure is functional and utilitarian but it occupies the position of master in our lifescape. In this capacity it eclipses the experience of our original face, the awareness of our original nature. Ego fixation veils seeing. The heart, the totality of your being is the true master but has been relegated to the background. There it remains as ego pretends to the throne -- a pretense, fake, false, phony. And the ego knows it is artificial deep down, hence the deep existential fear, anxiety and resistance. In silence, in meditation, ego dissolves, withers, moves into the back seat, and heart moves into its rightful place as master. Only with clearing, with absence, with dissolving, with openness and receptivity and trust will the heart move into the foreground. Ego has to move out to make space for the heart to move in. Ego takes up all the space.

Social convention goes rolling on supporting ego fixation because it profits from keeping the individual a slave, a sheep, a minion, in fear and guilt, compliant, anxious, wanting, consuming, performing, feeling unworthy and trying to get worth outside of itself, and thus drives the individual to be outer focused, and most important to the vested interests, makes the individual controllable, the individual is able to be controlled with want, guilt and fear. But you cannot control a joyful spirit, you cannot dominate an ecstatic. How can you control her? She is fed by the great mother, she dances in the beyond to a music you cannot hear; she sings songs of love, peace and contentment. She is filled with an abundance so vast that you cannot tempt her. The beyond showers on her from everywhere. She is fed from a secret table. She breathes the atmosphere of innocence, drinks from the spring of trust. Your so-called treasures cannot compare with the treasure house of this queen. How can that which you covet compare with her bounty? She feasts on light and bliss in the herenow. She is not seduced by some promise of a fantasy kingdom in the future, some heaven realized after death. She has her cake of freedom and enjoys it in the now.

What do you have to offer that can turn her attention from the treasure she has found within? Diamonds and emeralds, financial solvency, cars, boats, houses, careers, university educations, knowledge, skill and expertise, the promise of heaven, wealth, power and influence, fame, collecting exotic experiences, relationships, entertainments of all kinds -- she knows all these are temporary and provisional. She is human, but more than just human, she is a divine being, she has realized her divinity. She moves in the company of universal monarchs, the kings and queens of divinity. She is in possession of a largess you can not imagine even in your furthest flights of ego fantasy. She is free, freedom itself. There are no boundaries to her being. She experiences herself and others as divine. She shares the consciousness of all those who have sought and found the wellspring of divine bliss. She walks in an eternal springtime, among blossoming trees; hearing prayerful songs echoing in soundless space. You cannot lure her or bind her with anything of the material world. She is beyond. You cannot catch her or hold her. She is moving in the stream, as the stream; she is in the song of the skylark, as that song; she is in the fragrance of flowers, in the silver of starlight, and in the wetness of a rainstorm. She is stillness, yet she moves from pole to pole, from light to dark. Duality is reconciled within her.

She is water moving easily from sky to earth, from drop to ocean and back again. She is the moving, the flowing river, the incessant surging of salty tide, the running child, the hum of a bee, the deep vibration of desert sand, the musical dripping of water in a storm drain. You can't corrupt her. She has passed through the fire of corruption, and risen from the ashes. She has done her work. She has embraced her death. She now abides in the realm of the unborn and undying. You can not possess her but you can love her, join with her, merge with her. She will allow. She will not refuse you. Her realization can be found at the foundation of your being. She is the truth you seek; she is the loving hand turning you back again and again to your own treasure. In her light, in those loving eyes, just a small look within and you can feel your own treasure reflected. You can fall in love with her, trust her, dissolve into her. But you cannot get your mind around her and possess her. Get close to her warmth and you may ignite. In that blessed fire you may burn to the ground. Or you can bring your thirst to her, drink in her deep well, and discover a bubbling spring within your own heart; discover water, the source of rejoicing, in your own being. Above all you can rejoice in her presence because she is pure joy, pure awakened bliss. Her words, whispered or shouted, in verse or song, carry the threads of prayerful rejoicing. A common weed or insect embodies the sacred in her pure eyes. Illuminated in the light of those eyes, the world is drenched in the sacred; the ground of being is saturated with her luminosity. Here is the realm of miracles. In her blessed vision that which is bent is made straight, that which is broken, is healed. The hungry are fed in her light.

Nothing impedes or hinders the work in this sacred world. How can she go back now? To what? The trance of self-identity, the corruption of living unconsciously? A life of want and fear and ignorance? A dull, safe life of comfort and security? A life based on survival? Such a choice would be worse than the flames of hell.

What is the error this ecstatic speaks of? Discern that and live. Discover, uncover that and awaken. You're already in heaven. Uncover your eyes and see the celestial light; open your ears and hear the subtle, timeless refrains of blissful music; unclench your fist of control and feel the soft, curved spaces of divinity which are all around you at this moment. Find the error and all at once you are the truth.

The world is a mirror of Infinite Beauty, yet no man sees it. It is a Temple of Majesty, yet no man regards it.

What prevents man from seeing this infinite beauty? What keeps him from seeing through the clear mirror of his being? This mirror is before you right at this moment, luminous inside and out, yet you are entranced, preoccupied with a self and cannot see it. A mirror reflects the red rose perfectly. It does not distort it. It does not add anything to it. We think about the rose, through the filter of mind identified self. With this conceptual thinking we corrupt an experience of divinity and turn it into a plastic, conceptual rose. We seem to prefer eating the menu, hardly tasting real food.

The secret bliss is hidden in the wide-open. Burn your self-identification and when the ashes grow cold -- see. Dissolve your self like sugar in water and become the clarity. Drop the seer and be the seeing. Drop the viewer and be the viewing. The secret view lies exposed in the herenow, naked on the bare ground. The Temple of Majesty rises before you, yet you ignore it, placing your attention on the temporal and material; valuing the false, ignoring the true, chasing the unreal, dismissing the real as worthless or not even seeing it; preferring a prison of concepts to the freedom of the open sky.

It is a region of Light and Peace, did not man disquiet it. It is the Paradise of God.

But for the dominion-by-default of the mind identified self and the sociocultural support and fostering of this construct, "the region of Light and Peace" would be revealed to us this instant. Entering this region is a matter of losing something that you are clinging to, dropping something that you are attached to. It is a matter of letting go of something, releasing, letting go of everything. Men in their "disquiet" cloud the pristine clarity of the cosmic mirror. This disquiet is mind chatter, the stream of thinking, incessant mind, emotion and body activity that eclipses the Light. Where is your attention now? Your bare attention, your naked innocence, your receptive love and your open trust -- these are the gifts you bring to the gate. These are the offerings you can bring to existence. But the ego is geared for protection and defense. Self-deception is one of its powerful tools to distract. Quiet, silence, stillness, meditative awareness is interpreted as death by the ego. It will go to extreme lengths to keep the mind in "disquiet," in preoccupation, distraction and entertainment. Positive or negative does not matter. Either distraction will do to keep the ego from what it senses as complete annihilation. That's why it's been said that you have to expose yourself to the forces of annihilation, to fear and death, to doom and despair, to the dark night, in order to pass through the flames, to pass through death to resurrection; to enter the region of Light and Peace, the Paradise of God.

It is more to man since he is fallen then it was before.

Having passed from birth to the unborn, from death to the undying, your individuality emerges, your being, your freedom and your bliss. Your life has been earned. Your meaning has been created out of ashes. Falling through the flames of fear and annihilation, all that which is inessential is burned and that which was indestructible arises. Out of ego's falling, crashing and burning, out of falling into nothing, into the abyss, you surrender and realize your original face shining before and within you. The journey had to be made, from will to surrender. Will brings you to the gate. Surrender melts the ice chains of ego, and you are pulled into the waiting arms of the beloved.

It is the place of Angels and the Gate of Heaven...

Enjoy. Celebrate. Rejoice and every moment you awaken at the Gate of Heaven. There is no inside or outside to this gate. It is a Zen gate, no fences at all anywhere. Just a gate swinging both ways -- in and out, just like the breath. Rejoice, you are the beloved, and you are here now.

Post by Akilesh

Pure Space

When you have emptied all the content — thoughts, desires, memories, projections, hopes — when all is gone, for the first time you find yourself, because you are nothing but that pure space, that virgin space within you. Unburdened by anything, that contentless consciousness, that's what you are! Seeing it, realizing it, one is free. One is freedom, one is joy, one is bliss.
~Osho

Enjoying the World

Akilesh's meditation IX on Thomas Traherne's quote,
"Your enjoyment of the world..." printed in Huxley's Perennial Philosophy

Yet further, you never enjoyed the world aright, till you so loved the beauty of enjoying it, that you are covetous and earnest to persuade others to enjoy it.

The beauty of enjoying it, the world, of awakening in heaven. There is the world, then with vision soaring like a cloud, there is enjoying the world. Then there is an additional blessing showering -- beauty. There is a second layer of icing on the celebration cake of life, on the world. Enjoying is present, then the beauty of enjoying. But wait, there is yet another layer of delicious icing -- love. "... till you so love the beauty of enjoying it..." This is the ecstatic, this is the song of the adept who has gone beyond, the fragrance of the mystic who has immersed herself in the warm pool of fathomless bliss. This is one who has found the wellspring within her own heart and who is now nourished by the beyond. She moves in the stream of the Tao. Open, receptive, with vast trust, basic trust, unconditioned, not based on any external condition or circumstance, she is living in the radiance of divine love. This warmth radiates from within her own inner lamp, a heart of centerless space. She embodies the space of the whole. Inside and outside have merged in sacred union, in ecstatic bliss. She is nourished by this bliss food. She rides on the wind, the energy wind of her awakening. In authentic presence she dances with the patterns of energy that come out of pure consciousness. She dances with being. Her heart guide is awake. Now all that was formerly dominant in her life, her thinking mind, rationality, emoting, the bodily senses, all are expressions of awakened heart. Mind identification, thinking, ego fixation have been seen through, and the light of primordial consciousness is able to shine through her being with unimpeded clarity. This light shining is her blissful food, it is what sustains her unlike any ordinary food. Now the light shines in ordinary food and drink as well, and imbues it with an energy of subtle and indescribable delight. The light shines now in the most common of behaviors and thoughts. Every thought and act and feeling is now infused with this background light of wakefulness. This is the embodiment of transformation. The ordinary becomes extraordinary in the transforming light of consciousness. This is where the ecstatic lives, within an open secret; within a secret bliss where the ordinary is transmuted automatically in the light of awakening.

Life becomes a life of dance and song -- you so love the beauty of enjoying. And this celebration simply stands alone in open space. You abide in a space of love, beauty and enjoyment, not based on anything. You so love the beauty of enjoying the world, that you dissolve and the world disappears into you. Words fail here, but what is left is vastness, the beyond, pure consciousness. And in the light of this consciousness is love radiating, is beauty manifesting in a most mysterious and miraculous way.

When this rejoicing beauty and love fill the world, merging into your body, dissolving into your soul, the ocean pouring into the drop, you want to share it. You no longer know who or what you are. You feel vast, a luminous presence. Centerless, the center of the whole has become your center. Light is pouring, like a dam has broken and light is radiating out from an endless stream. You are immersed in the Tao. The existential light is showering and you're dancing, rejoicing in secret movement; you're listening to an infinite silence, in reverence, in secret ambient ecstasy. The words are just bits of prayer-laughter, just the notes of a bird's song, ephemeral vehicles of bliss, sound bits of ecstasy, indecipherable by the mind, food to the tender heart. Words become no more than body parts moving in a dance incomprehensible to the rational mind.

What could these movements mean? The questions begin rotting and dissolve into the earth where they are transformed in silence, in darkness, into that which brings forth brilliant flowers, beautiful primordial dances of wordless love and joy. The ecstatic loses herself in this dance, immerses herself in the light showering, in the calm, warm and clear pools of light coalescing in empty space; immerses herself in the stream of this light coursing through empty space. And she so loves the beauty of enjoying it, she is so full of love, of the beauty of living in joy, that she must share it.

The ecstatic shares like a mother bird with her chicks in the nest. The young birds are famished from birth, from the experience of first light. But they have no context for this experience of wakefulness. So the mother bird, who is so full, disgorges her burden, the predigested nourishment deep into their eager throats, into their famished bellies. This food that descends from blue sky in feathered warmth, is received in innocence and utter trust, with a primordial trust not based on anything at all. And the mother bird is blissfully grateful to the young birds for relieving her of her burden. She had feasted on the bounty of the earth, sky, water and sun, the bounty of the beyond, of freedom, and now she is about to burst. Descending from empty sky to the nest, the sacred circle of birth, the waiting mouths, the perfect fit, the mutual needs, triggers a living ritual, the ancient process laid down in heart memory -- the passage of nourishment. This nourishing process, to the mother bird, is a joyful unburdening. At the same time, with the unburdening of the mother bird, something transpires in the young birds. A warmth flickers in their bellies, they remember their awakening, the first glimpse of luminous blue overhead. With nourishment, a faraway longing for something stirs in the core of their feathered hearts: the freedom of flight, the realization of their full potential and purpose, their original nature. The nourishment and nurturing that comes from the mother bird unburdening herself assists the growth and ripening of the young birds so that eventually they are able to stand on their own two feet, on nests edge, and let go. That let go will be their moment of truth and glory, and the fulfillment of mother bird's work. The first time the young bird will fall toward earth in terror, but just before he hits the ground, his wings open and the whole sky becomes his. His joy will be immeasurable, and will reflect the same joy living in the heart of his mother.

There will be many more let go's, a whole life of letting go, and each time the vastness of the sky will open up to meet the open, trusting heart. The sky never fails. You can fall into it and it will catch you. It will never say no to your leaping trust, never forbid you the space to let go into. It is trustworthy. The ecstatic, like the mother bird overflowing with joy, overflowing with nourishment, radiating love, points out the trustworthiness of the sky to others and encourages them to move through their fear and let go into it. The spiritual friend is not doing anything. She is simply radiating the energy of her wakefulness and the love that is bursting from her heart. She can do no other. It is showering there, like an overfull rain cloud. She is in a showering let go. You can look up, open your mouth and be refreshed, and something might transpire in you. Transformation may happen in the blissful radiance of the spiritual friend. But it is not the friend doing something. Rather it is your trust, your openness and receptivity that creates the clearing for the benediction to occur. It is the space you open up inside that allows existence to pour into you. It is up to you. You have to open your own eyes. The friend can't open them for you. Opening your eyes, you see the light shining. But most are living with eyes closed, cradle-to-grave, insisting on living a small life of sleepwalking within the trance of self.

With trust, love and a little courage you can open, open your heart and soul. The spiritual friend is there shining in the light of her being, and that may encourage you to let go into the open sky, into the beyond that exists in your own heart. Letting go into this sky you merge with the friend, and you're no longer separate but one vast ocean. You have dissolved into the ocean. Now you share the oceanic experience of the friend; you're nourished by the same great mother; you have entered the stream. How can you not share what you have experienced -- the way of transformation -- with others who need it? It streams from every pore. It rises like the eastern sun in your being.

Post by Akilesh

Freshness

Akilesh: It is so fresh this morning; reminding me how every moment is fresh. There are not even things you can call moments, there is just freshness, freshness you can feel. It is true, you have no control with this freshness, and there is no past or no future in it. That can feel odd and disconcerting to those soundly asleep. But to be asleep with unconsciousness is to reside far from freshness. It is true, living with freshness is risky. One does not get to predict or control so tightly, to avoid pain and pull pleasure to us. But the pain is only put off, but not avoided, and the pleasure quickly fades and another seduction is there. We reach out with eager hands, time and again. Until, that is, we let go; smile and let go of control, of self, of the stale dominion of rationality; until we let go into the here and now, into free floating freshness, into freedom.

I send freshness your way this morning.

Meredith: This is so lovely, Akilesh. Thank you for this fresh greeting. I am aware of this enlivened fragrance of freshness this morning, too. And it is just in this moment now, and now, and again now. We enjoy our wakefulness to this delightful quality of freedom. I am not so aware of the riskiness you mention, only just this moment of loving vibration. Thank you for sending freshness - its quality resounds so clearly in your essence.

With a happiness in my heart, I receive your freshness.