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Beauty at Home

Apr 13th, 2011 by

Have been here in this place where they call Turkey, Istanbul for a few days now. It didn’t feel like I have left home, nor did it feel as if I am in a foreign country. Looking at my notebook where I had diligently listed down the places I had stated that I would visit, I realised that I visited not even 10% of them, yet visited those places which I thought I would not. In a very strange way, my plans were all ‘screwed’ up, but I did not feel that anything was ‘screwed’ up. I wake up in the morning, head upstairs to the terrace for the same breakfast that they serve every day, to be greeted by a lady there who serves as a chef (for breakfast) and also a cleaner at the hotel. She cannot really speak English, but she tries her level best to articulate so that I could understand her, and each morning, she would ask me, “eggs? Is one enough? It is small” she would tell me. And I would smile and tell her, “Yes, eggs, and one is enough.” Today, having been there for the third day, she stared at me for a little while more and told me, “You are lovely.” Such sweetness manifested. I smiled, nodded and said, “thank you”. It was pointless to argue with that, as those words would not have been expressed if she wasn’t lovely herself. It is always, always the lover meeting the beloved.

And as I sat quietly, enjoying the scenery provided by the terrace, I could see how it starts its storytelling… like how I am a woman, seated up a terrace all alone without a care in the world – either wishing the beloved was here, or grateful how this can be experienced, or how wonderful to stay here forever… and it goes on and on… putting a smile on my face as I simply, watched it as it is… how it finds its own storyline whichever way it decided to head, delicious.

After I left the entrance of the hotel, I didn’t know where I was heading. I just walked, and walked aimlessly, stopping occasionally for a picture or two, totally forgetting that I was indeed a foreigner there. I didn’t feel any different. It was as if, I was one of them, or just there, the perfect place in that perfect moment, nowhere else to be… until someone looks at me taking a picture, and then he asks me, “do you want me to take a picture of you?” offering his assistance to have my photo taken with the object of my photography experience and then I am suddenly the “the tourist” again.

As I sit here, lying on my bed typing this out, after replying an email to a friend on when I should be heading ‘home’, there seems to be a struggle, as if, not really wanting to be in the future, but merely savouring what is in the now, here… within awareness. It is not about Istanbul, or Malaysia, or even Hong Kong… it is simply being here, now and home within itself that there is contentment.

I have to share that I am never short of company too. When no one is around, then I know, no one needs to be around; and when I need a cup of Turkish tea, the kind receptionist offers to make me one and stays a little longer to have a chat with me, asking me what I do for a living and etc etc. And I’ve come to see, that this enlightened person, is also aware that it is ideas in the mind that makes one feel this or that about other people or a situation. It was like a kindred spirit meeting another. And then it was time to go back to the room, because the cup from which I was sipping Turkish tea for the second time is empty. No one was online, and there wasn’t much on TV. I lay in bed, just waiting and waiting for that voice to tell me what to do next. And it says, “Off all lights and go to sleep” and it was done what it was told.

What a wonderful story, unfolding again and again by itself. There is nothing to do, except to wait for it to speak and wait for it to respond. I didn’t have to be in charge anymore… or rather, it is liberating to know that I had never been in charge. And all this time, I am watching… she is so beautiful, in the way she flips her hair, how she listens, how she walks and stops and simply stare into space, smiling… it is total vanity… yet that is the truth, it is beautiful everywhere when it is beautiful in here.

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A Case of Every Crying Heart

Apr 13th, 2011 by

Hearken to the reed-flute, how it complains,
Lamenting its banishment from its home:-
“Ever since they tore me from my osier bed,
My plaintive notes have moved men and women to tears.
I burst my breast, striving to give vent to sighs,
And to express the pangs of my yearning for my home.
He who abides far away from his home
Is ever longing for the day he shall return.
My wailing is heard in every throng,
In concert with them that rejoice and them that weep.
Each interprets my notes in harmony with his own feelings,
But not one fathoms the secrets of my heart.
My secrets are not alien from my plaintive notes,
Yet they are no manifest to the sensual eye and ear.
Body is not veiled from soul, neither soul from body,
Yet no man hath ever seen a soul.”
This plaint of the flute is fire, not mere air.
Let him who lacks this fire be accounted dead!
‘Tis the fire of love that inspires the flute,
‘Tis the ferment of love that possesses the wine.
The flute is the confidant of all unhappy lovers;
Yea, its strains lay bare my inmost secrets.
Who hath seen a poison and an antidote like the flute?
Who hath seen a sympathetic consoler like the flute?
The flute tells the tale of love’s bloodstained path,
It recounts the story of Majnun’s love toils.
None is privy to these feelings save one distracted,
As ear inclines to the whispers of the tongue.
Through grief my days are as labour and sorrow,
My days move on, hand in hand on anguish.
Yet, though my days vanish thus, ‘tis no matter,
Do thou abide, O Incomparable Pure One!
But all who are not fishes are soon tired of water;
And they who lack daily bread find the day very long;
So the “Raw” comprehend not the state of the “Ripe;”
Therefore it behoves me to shorten my discourse.
Arise, O son! Burst thy bonds and be free!
How long wilt thou be captive to silver and gold?
Though thou pour the ocean into thy pitcher,
It can hold no more than one day’s store.
The pitcher of the desire of the covetous never fills,
The oyster-shell fills not with pearls till it is content;
Only he whose garment is rent by the violence of love
Is wholly pure from covetousness and sin.
Hail to thee, then, O LOVE, sweet madness!
Thou who healest all our infirmities!
Who art the physician of our pride and self-conceit!
Who art out Plato and our Galen!
Love exalts our earthy bodies to heaven,
And makes the very hills to dance with joy!
O lover, ‘twas love that gave life to Mount Sinai,
When “it quaked, and Moses fell down in a swoon.”
Did my Beloved only touch me with his lips,
I too, like the flute, would burst out in melody.
But he who is parted from them that speak his tongue,
Though he possess a hundred voices, is perforce dumb.
When the rose has faded and the garden is withered,
The song of the nightingale is no longer to be heard.
The BELOVED is all in all, the lover only veils Him,
The BELOVED is all that lives, the lover a dead thing.
When the lover feels no longer LOVE’S quickening,
He becomes like a bird who has lost its wings. Alas!
How can I retain my sense about me,
When the BELOVED shows not the light of His countenance?
LOVE desires that this secret should be revealed,
For if a mirror reflects not, of what use is it?
Knowest thou why thy mirror reflects not?
Because the rust has not been scoured from its face.
If it were purified from all rust and defilement,
It would reflect the shining of the SUN of GOD.
O friends, ye have now heard this tale,
Which sets forth the very essence of my case.

~ The Mathnawi, The Spiritual Couplets of Maulana Jalalu-d-din Muhammad I Rumi ~

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Where it Came from

Apr 12th, 2011 by

A tear can be ego and anger can be compassion.

Anger can be ego and tears can be compassion.

It depends on where it arises from.

~ if not now, when?, Chapter 03 Peace + Anger, Tsem Tulku Rinpoche  

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Relinquishing the Ego in Relationships

Apr 11th, 2011 by

As long as the ego runs your life, most of your thoughts, emotions, and actions arise from desire and fear. In relationships you then either want or fear something from the other person.

What you want from them may be pleasure or material gain, recognition, praise or attention, or a strengthening of your sense of self through comparison and through establishing that you are, have or know more than they. What you fear is that the opposite may be the case, and they may diminish your sense of self in some way.

When you make the present moment the focal point of your attention – instead of using it as a means to an end – you go beyond the ego and beyond the unconscious compulson to use people as a means to an end, the end being self-enhancement at the cost of others. When you give your fullest attention to whoever you are interacting with, you take past and future out of the relationship, except for practical matters. When you are fully present with everyone you meet, you relinquish the conceptual identify you made for them – your interpretation of who they are and what they did in the past – and are able to interact without the egoic movements of desire and fear. Attention, which is alert stillness, is the key.

How wonderful to go beyond wanting and fearing in your relationships. Love does not want or fear anything.

– Stillness Speaks, Relationships, Eckhart Tolle

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Living the Miracle

Apr 10th, 2011 by

I hate to contradict one of your favourite slogans, but “expecting a miracle” is not always helpful. Sometimes you think you need a miracle, but all you need is a little common sense. Sometimes, you are certain you need a miracle, but all you need to do is walk through your fear.

I’m not trying to suggest that there is a shortage of miracles out there and that you must save them up for special occasions. On the contrary, there are miracles happening everywhere, but you often don’t see them because you are expecting fireworks.

When you are doing the best that you can in your life, you are making miracles constantly. When you are moving through your fear, seeing your projections, and reaching out lovingly to people who are dispirited or afraid, you are a miracle worker.

But if you are smart, you don’t call yourself a miracle worker. You don’t call attention to yourself. You let others whom you empower and uplift to take the credit: “You see what you did with God’s help… isn’t that fantastic!” You help people build up their confidence so that they can learn to make their own miracles.

Some of you think that God does all the work. But I hate to disappoint you. You do 90% of the work in every miracle that transpires. God does just 10%. God inspires you and guides you, but you do the work. Yet you cannot take credit for the work you do in God’s name. You need to give God the credit, even though you did 90% of the work.

Why is that? Because you do not want people to become attached to you. You want them to understand that the God that lies within their own hearts is the one who makes everything happen. Then they will begin to listen. And when they feel divine inspiration within, they will act on it. They will put all of their energies behind it, and so they will make their own miracles and pass them along to others.

I could have taken credit for the healings that happened in my presence, but I did not. For I was just the force that catalyzed these movements of healing and forgiveness. The faith that people had in me they learned to find in themselves. I gave people back to God. I did not ask for a following.

Nor do I want one now. Please don’t go around saying “Jesus says this and Jesus says that.” Forget Jesus. Just be a loving, accepting presence, and others will come home to the true Self through you.

You see, it does not matter who the door is. It could be me. It could be you. It could be another brother or sister. The door does not need to be celebrated.

When the door needs to be celebrated, it ceases to be a door. When people grasp the finger pointing to the moon, they can no longer tell where it is pointing.

Don’t make yourself important. Let the glory go to others and you will be glorified truly. You will experience the ecstasy of being the door that opens when people knock. And I assure you there is no greater ecstasy than that.

When you do not call attention to yourself, you become capable of working deeply in every moment. No one interferes with your work. Indeed, only the most discerning notice what you do.

It is a rare person who can go about her work without calling attention to herself, without seeking publicity, without building an organisation around her. It is a rare person who inspires without taking credit, who heals without charging a fee and gives without asking anything in return. You may seek her, but you will find her only if you are prepared to walk in her footsteps.

The greatest teachers are the most humble, the most loving, the most empowering to others. If you wish to find such a teacher, you must look beyond appearances. Find the man or woman who promises you nothing, but loves you without hesitation. Find the teacher who makes no pretension to fix or to teach, yet who opens your heart when s/he looks into your eyes.

When you think of great teachers, you think of glitter, flowing robes and great crowds of people gather together. But none of these trappings are required. Indeed, they often get in the way. The focus goes onto the Guru, instead of onto the aspirant. But it is the aspirant who must wake up, not the Guru.

One day, I am going to create a rest home for Gurus. I’m going to call them to a beautiful spot in the Andes, or the Himalayas, where they can keep busy playing bocci or shuffleboard and stop causing so much trouble.

Without authority figures out there to inspire or validate you, you will have to pay more attention to your own experience and guidance. You will have to stop looking for fireworks and work with the warp and woof of your life. You will learn to accept the unfolding tapestry, mistakes and all.

No matter how tuned in, accomplished, or holy you are, life is not going to unfold the way you expect it to. Sometimes a hidden challenge will surface and require all your love, patience or attention. At other times, an unexpected gift may arrive like a hummingbird appearing magically at the feeder outside your window.

There are ups and downs on the journey. But the ups are not always up, and the downs are not always down. Buddha Knew this. And you will learn it too. Just stay steady in your life.

Don’t expect a miracle. No, no, no. Don’t expect anything. Just be with what happens as best you can.

~ Miracle of Love, Staying Connected to Love, Paul Ferrini ~

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A Little More…

Apr 9th, 2011 by

The illusion attempts to create an illusion making an illusionary illusion to make you illusionarily think that there is a closest matter you hold in the heart – memories, a person, a thing – ANYTHING – to prevent reality. It is as if, you are right at the door, and the next step forward is IT – where there you would arrive; yet it is clever and builds enticing, delicious storylines, hence making what seemed trivial – big, lovely – fearful, near – far, unconditional – conditional; creating a sense of lack and emptiness so to speak to prevent you from moving on.

The illusion gives illusionary reasons why you are not ready, illusionary reasons to have you believe that you have illusonarily not yet fulfilled what is also illusionarily thought were not fulfilled. And it has you illusionarily think you had illusionarily thought – still merely illusionary thoughts fed by the illusion, the very illusion itself, luring you to illusionarily believe that indeed there is still a illusionary tiny weeny bit part of the illusionary you that you illusionarily had not yet done or not yet accomplished, thus illusionarily incomplete.

But if you could, surrender that illusionary ‘incompleteness’ which is in truth fabricated by lies to hold you back and surrender too, all the other illusionary reasons that it conjures which you illusionarily might think it is thought by you that supports why you should not surrender, and surrender too, that part of you which you think you cannot let go, and even surrender to the not wanting to surrender… you are free once again in that moment, to take the next step, which is in fact no step at all, but merely reinstated to where you have always been.

It is just that little bit left…

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Not a Twist of Fate

Apr 8th, 2011 by

There are no coincidences or accidents as the Cosmos merely acts to meet your choices based on your fear needs or love choices. There are no physical or emotional accidents unless there is a fear need. Every act or incident that is perceived by you as negative should be construed as an attempt by the Creator to surface your fears in an attempt to reunite you, the proverbial lost sheep in your state of oneness with Him.

~ IRAH’s Book of Healing, Irah

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The Immature Mind

Apr 8th, 2011 by

The mind is pretty immature in itself, always wanting to lure its head towards anything to fulfil itself, forgetting that what it has right here, right now is perfect. It is always contacting something outside of itself through a thought, when believed to be real and thus as if permission is granted, goes forth scheming, manipulating to seek out what it wants. Even already with understanding that nothing outside can fulfil itself, it goes out anyway, to attempt its plan, permuting reality as it is. Such a strange, strange mind.

It is as if it has this very nature of liking to torture itself without ever considering the consequences. Yet when even it starts to consider the consequences, it begins to hold with resentment what it cannot have or fear to have and starts to look for loopholes to quietly sneak in from one lily pad to another when the perceived ‘predators’ are not around. It thinks that it is trying to escape from booby traps, not realising it, in itself is a booby trap, only waiting for the precise moment to be ticked off, and *BOOM!!* bursts out into flames.

Seldom is the mind in a wholesome state for a decent period of time, yet in unwholesome state, it is too perfect due to the fluctuating conditionings of the past to the present, save except when what it is, acted out, thrown to the world, only to have it echoed back to itself; much like a boomerang thrown out and returned back to the owner.

Then what about past learning, understandings and realisations? What turned out to be a revelation with freedom as its end can also turn out to be the very thing that bites you back when not addressed properly, when hung on to unconsciously from defiled intentions. Defiled intentions here do not mean anything bad or wrong, except for an error unseen, unknown propelling conditions that results in the consequences one experiences.

The cultivation and taming of the mind starts with understanding its nature – observing it as it is. At times, it comes with frustrations because the situation seems to be prolonged, yet the frustration is due to impatience of what one is experiencing and also with a defiled intention of wanting to get out of the experience. As the saying goes, ‘learning through experience’, but an experience experienced for the sake of enjoyment, you reap nothing out of it – except enjoyment and when not careful, the pleasure derived from the experience can lead to pain due to the yearning of the same experience hence trying to revive the very same experience of enjoyment. Such an experience too, can be of great learning grounds if and only if, one starts to mould the mind towards the path of learning. In these learning, the mind matures through observations, experiences and realisations.

As long as the immature mind runs, the game of suffering has to go on.

Until, it is seen through; again and again; in completion.

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The Awakening Mirage

Apr 7th, 2011 by

Dreaming
To be awaken

Awaken
In the dream
Still

Awaken once more
From a dream
Yet

Still in a dream
To be awaken
From another dream
In another dream

Awaken
From the dream
In the dream
Of the dream

Still dreaming
To be awaken
Fully
Once more
All over again

Until
Finally
Awaken.

Phew! What a Dream!

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The Magic of Touch

Apr 6th, 2011 by

Have you ever wondered how you can diffuse a situation in the presence of another who is in a defensive mode of being weary, angry, confused, or sad? I’ve come to see, or even realised in my own experience and in observing others that the magic of touch is one.

Do you remember watching movies when people fight, and one of them just daringly walks up to the other and hugs the other tightly until the person surrenders to that act? Or have you ever experienced that during an argument with a loved one, while the person is shouting, crying, rambling away and all you did, was take that step forward and to give the person a hug, even when the person doesn’t seem approachable in your perception and may even struggle away from you for a while, and after some time of holding on to the person in that hug, that person just melts into your embrace? As if that pattern of anguish is being broken down. There can be much crying after that, but what turns out in the end is a sweet surrendering where vulnerability is allowed. It is as if, the defence is broken – Broken Open.

But what stops us from making this move? It is that fear of rejection, of judgment of what others think of us. It is strange, isn’t it?

A loved one was expressing how his date with this girl did not turn out well as she was going through something which she did not wish to express, and the whole night of dinner cum movie was experienced in some silence with occasional talks. His concern for her led him to ask her if she wanted to talk about it as clearly she was all closed up and going through some inner suffering as if the whole world has crushed upon her with no one to express it to. She declined his request and I asked him if he attempted to give her a hug. He said no. And when I asked him why, he simply replied because he didn’t know what she’d think of him, that hug itself or if she might push him away. And this happens to most of us. Afraid of how we’d feel upon the others’ response, not so much of another’s well-being.

Of course, a hug is not really necessary or a must, but it does help to diffuse the situation. Even if she may not have responded to or spoken up after the hug, at least she’d known that no one, or in this case, he was not there to judge her or the situation that she was in. In this, trust and comfort is then present, though in some instances it may take some time; but soon, she will come to see that it is ok to let someone into her world to have someone listen to the inner turmoil she was going through. It is truly a wonderful initiation of a healing process for both parties.

Although the inward journey is very much a lonely and alone journey and no one can really walk it for us, but it helps to comfort the one to know that she is supported and safe. In times of inner turmoil, it feels scary, lonely and the world becomes somewhat of a threat. For that, there is an illusionary cut off from the world.

A touch, a hug, a kiss – all feels good, especially when there is a pure intention to uplift. I remember when I was really sick some years back and was feeling really low and someone just came and gave me a kiss on the forehead and immediately I felt better. As a matter of fact, when I was helping my teacher come up with this card about hugs, and experiencing it myself, I found indeed it is a powerful act when done out of sincerity. A hug with no intention is merely an act out of nothingness; yet one with a pure intention to love, uplift or with well wishes brings about tremendous support, consolation and healing to the receiver and also the giver. I used to ponder on why this Amma, also known as the hugging saint could go hugging people all around the world, and people all around the world would flock to see her, just to be hugged. It is comforting what a hug can do. It is truly a magical act that can be performed in this human-bodily dimension for each other.

Some examples that came to mind is when a mother and a child sleeps, the child holds the hand of his mother and falls to sleep, a husband and wife in bed ready to fall asleep and having one of their foots slightly touch each other, a friend merely holding another friend’s hand in the midst of her woe.

J puts it rightfully in the Course that the body is used as a learning device. Other than that, an instrument to allow what is greater to come through, and a magical touch is part of that too.

For those who possess conditionings of conservativeness, do you wish to hold on to that conservativeness, or take this step forward to experience what miraculous things can happen out of this magical act?

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