Session Recordings

KNOCK.

And She'll open the door.

VANISH.

And She'll make you shine like the sun.

FALL.

And She'll raise you to the heavens.

BECOME NOTHING

And She'll turn you into everything.

--- RUMI

Form, changeable existence is only ever born of/from/through and AS the formless, changeless, ineffable Source that lies beyond, beyond, beyond belief. Directly encountering what is naturally, immovably, indivisibly at Peace right here and now, through all circumstances. That is the genesis of bringing peace into form. Into the world of existence. It is an opportunity to recognize that our lives are always and already Whole and inseparable from the fundamental Ground of Being. And an invitation to consciously, lovingly, faithfully cleave to this recognition. So that the Peace beyond understanding is made conscious, awakened to itself. And is then able to permeate the deeply conditioned body/mind. An intention of ever-more deeply discovering, embracing and embodying our inherent potential to live from and AS abiding, uncaused Love.

Surrender of “I’m not good enough”. Beyond unworthiness and specialness is true authenticity, true Power. Bringing the parts that are “cast out, unwanted, unapproved of, painful, seemingly broken" and realizing that they have never been , nor can they be, separate or outside of Love. Its like opening the curtains in order to realize that the sun has always been shining. Shifting one’s attention is like opening the curtains, knocking on the door.

A surrendering to Thy will Is done. That is primary. There can be no real Power until we relinquish the belief in unworthiness, the belief in separateness. All Power, potential and possibility is of Source. It comes through us but does not belong to us. Thoughts form but SOURCE Creates. Conscious Communion is born of the timeless, changeless, formless that is beyond lack/abundance, have/don’t have, worthy/ not worthy. Its beyond all notions of opposites or relationship. Deeper and deeper discovery and identification with at ISness, Present holy instant is the doorway to Creation, Genesis, the beginning/ending that IS. Primordial freshness of the Holy Instant, the Present that IS. Perennial fresh start, one can never be stuck. There is a Virgin wholeness, empty/fullness of each moment. Being comfortable with life/death, coming/going of all phenomena. Lifetimes end and begin with each and every breath.

Unworthiness very often leads to righteousness. Because the flip side of feeling unworthy is the need to feel special. And so we will begin to perceive our decisions, our realizations, our spiritual practices as making us somehow special or right. In relinquishing or unworthiness we also surrender our specialness. And our essential nature, beyond the narratives and compensations, begins to wake up in consciousness. And we are able to return HOME to THAT exquisite, shining extraordinary ordinariness .

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world.

—-Marianne Williamson

Why does the ego play roles? Because of one unexamined assumption, one fundamental error, one unconscious thought. That thought is: I am not enough.

--Eckhart Tolle

Who can tell what miracles. Love has in store for us. If only we have the courage. To become one with It? Everything we think we know now. Is only the beginning. Of another knowing that itself has no end. And everything we now can accomplish, Will seem trifling to us. When the powers of our divine nature Flower in glory and act through us.

—-Sufi mystic Allama Iqbal

The Universe is composed of gatherings of signs. Every being is a sign or symbol that points to the divine reality upon which it is based and which forms its foundation in the primordial beginning. It is to this beginning that each belongs and returns . I am in Love with myself. And my very separation is my union. I am my beloved and my lover.

I am my knight and my maiden.

--Ibn Arabi, Syrian poet born i

Some people look at the beginning and some look at the end. Those who look at the end are great and mighty for their gaze is toward the world beyond.

Those who look at the beginning are more fortunate. They say, "Why should we look at the end? If wheat is sown at the beginning, barley won't grow at the end."

There are other people still more fortunate who look toward neither the beginning, nor the end, but whose minds are absorbed in Allah (The Absolute) in the moment.

And there are yet other people who are absorbed in surface appearances, looking neither at the beginning nor the end. Being extremely forgetful, these people only sow misfortune for themselves and others.

---RUMI

I Will Give You

(Gospel of Thomas, Logion 17)

Jesus said,

"I will give to you:

Shapes that no eye has seen,

Sounds that no ear has heard

Sensations that no hand has touched

Thoughts and feelings

that have never appeared in the

mind and heart of humanity."

Heaven and Earth

(Genesis 1.1c)

The "heaven" in us vibrates through creation.

rising like a volatile mixture of fire and water.

The name of the Holy One vibrates word, light, and atmosphere

constantly telling us, even when we deny it,

that nothing is ever separate.

This "heaven" extends from a center that could be anywhere

to a border that may be everywhere.

It is part of what is created and at the same time

part of what is doing the creating.

How do we make sense of this?

The "earth" in us offers a unique gift

to the rest of the cosmos,

descending like fixed fire

toward a definite end and purpose.

We came for a reason:

there is no other like us.

This uniqueness reminds us of

the preciousness of what we are,

the opportunity of what we can be.

Community. Individuality.

Wave. Particle.

Heaven. Earth.

The first outpouring of sacred reality

expresses itself in these ways,

in beginningness full of mystery

present then, now, and in the future.

As long as man has someone or something to which he can cling, he will not find God. [You can substitute Miracles/Uncaused Love for God]. Whatever man knows or is able to know with his human mentality—whether a thing or a thought—is not God. No one is going to find God while he has anything on which to stand, anything to which he can hold, or anything about which he can think. Startling and unbelievable as this may seem to be, nevertheless it is true.—-Joel S Goldsmith

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,

there is a field.

I’ll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass,

the world is too full to talk about.

Ideas, language, even the phrase ‘each other’

doesn’t make any sense.

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you

Don't go back to sleep

You must ask for what you really want

Don't go back to sleep

People are going back and forth

across the doorsill where the two worlds touch

The door is round and open.

Don't go back to sleep

——RUMI

We must offer ourselves to God like a clean, smooth canvas and not worry ourselves about what God may choose to paint on it, but at each moment, feel only the stroke of His brush. — Jean Pierre de Caussade

“The crucifixion of the self is accomplished when there is nothing left for which you wish to pray.”——Joel S. Goldsmith, The Thunder of Silence

I have told you these things, so that in me you may have PEACE.

In this world you will have trouble. But take heart!

I have overcome the world.

John 16:33

“One changes the world by virtue of what one has become. Rather than what one does.”—-Dr. Hawkins

Conscious communion AS the natural state. Responsive Immediacy. And changing the world through what we ARE. Which is what we Love.

There is no greater power than the power of Love. There is no greater happiness than the happiness experienced AS Love. We experience Love when the individual ego end and hearts unite as one. Love is the ultimate realization of seeing others as ourselves or as God. It is time for us to build this bridge of Love and friendship. In this way may we be able to realize a world-family of unbounded love——AMMA

When the mind functions as an instrument of Source it is unconditioned. This is out beyond right and wrong, good and evil. There is nothing good or bad in and of itself. There is only the one power that permeates all of existence as a whole. This is not the same thing as glossing over evil with a coating of “its all good”. There comes a time for every purpose under heaven. A time for effort, a time for rest, a time for speaking, a time to be quiet, …..but these movements are governed by the One Source of Power in its purity and the law of harmony rather than by judgement and fear. In the world, meaning not in denial of reality, but not believing in form/intellect/belief as the essential source of power. There is only one Source/Creator/Power. And we evoke this Power, Divinity in any situation to simply erase the limited conditioned old-programming that is playing out in consciousness. We let loose of it, that it all returns to Love. Transmutation.

There is no saying of “I am doing God’s work. Good work.” There is only the saying of “God’s work IS done”. It is a giving way. One cannot take any credit as the doer. So therefore there is infinite energy. And plenty of time for all things under heaven. Awakened mind plus compassion = Power.

Miracles are not born of the world of cause and effect, good and bad. That is the definition of a miracle. An expression that is beyond the laws of gravity, physicality. Beyond time, horizontal reality.

Nothing is “causing” anything else. Everything arises of its own accord as everything, each moment. Where would we start with cause? Every expression is caused, ordained by the ONE CAUSE, the first beginning, the breath of Totality, the unfolding of infinite potentiality each instant.

A receptive willingness, a responsive immediacy KNOWS when something is moving in a disharmonious, limited direction and the recognition that “all things are possible in Source” moves the expression towards —-“I”m sorry, please forgive me, thank you, I love you”. It is beyond wishing and hoping for another reality or another expression that one then tries to co-create or manifest. The mind remains silent, empty, hollow, other than response-ability, “I’m sorry, please forgive me, thank you, I love you.” One knows/trusts that infinite potential exists here and now AS here and now. One no longer resists evil by trying to replace it with good. One recognizes/remembers that Reality exists only AS an expression of SOURCE, which is Love and Joy without cause. So any other perception is simply a case of mistaken identity. Of conditioned belief over-layed upon the fullness, wholeness, completeness of God.

“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so”—Shakespeare, (Hamlet)

A rose is a rose is a rose it is neither good or bad it is simply perfect in that it exists in the image of Allness, fullness and completeness. As do we. And all expressions.

Everything we are is Source, the fundamental maintaining, sustaining principle of Creation. “ “I” and the Parent of ALL are One”. I has been recognized AS THEE. The personal will is an illusion, a belief system, a mistaken identity. THY will IS done.

Experience occurs. Its the waves on top of the water. Sometimes Whipped into a frenzy, or calm or somewhere in between . Its very changeable. Characterized by change. As we allow these changes and we settle in and just watch. We let experience just be. In mediation we reorient to the constant in the midst of all the change. This constant is not an experience so its challenging at first. Because it can’t be found in the usual way. How do you experience something that is changeless? But you have an intuitive regard. You sense that something besides the stream of changing experience is here. The common denominator in every experience is me or I. But what is this constant this thing that experience seems to happen to. what never ages. So you start to see that something remains, you curious about what is remaining rather than what is changing. You become engaged with the what am I? What is this? What is here? And you begin to realize that you can’t find “me”. You can’t objectify it.

So what’s here? Simple, obvious awareness. The awareness that gives rise to, sees, and experiences all the events. The clear, open, spacious, awareingness. It can’t be understood or known or analyzed like an object or phenomena. It IS. even your attention is seen. You know when attention has wandered or moved. What knows this? Awareness is the clear space in which phenomena are perceived. It lights up attention. It lights up knowledge. It lights up analysis.It lights up confusion. it lights up clarity. Its not experience. it lights up experience. It lights the world. So we lend our attention to what isn’t changing. Its all-ways here. Its prerequisite. And its the nature of our being. So no matter what the experience happens to be it is perfect for recognizing awareness. Because awareness is inherent no matter what the experience is. Busy mind. Restless body. Grief. Sorrow. Bliss. Whatever. So we aren’t fixing ourselves. We aren’t unworthy or not fit in any way. We can’t earn who we are. Any relative experience will do. Self improvement is a very important task. But at retreat we are lending our curiosity to something other than a psychological process. So realize who you are and then lend that realization to the psychological process. And then one is operating from and AS love. Rather than from unworthiness and lack.

If you say “the witness” it implies a noun an object. But the truth is that witnessing IS. Completely, inherently impersonal. No-one owns it. We have a hard time conceiving of the truth that witnessing simply IS. it wakes up to itself. There is no one aware of awareness. No one has awareness. No one brings awareness to a moment. No one moves awareness. Awareness doesn’t become. No one controls awareness. It IS. all-ways and already. You rest in this. Why am I searching for what is always here, what I always am. When I rest in this truth, this acknowledgement. And it starts getting very quiet and very bright, very present. Awareness isn’t a groovy concept. As you rest in this you realize the emptiness, the non-object, can’t find or lose it. You realize that nobody is doing awareness. Well who is aware of awareness? That is an assumption that something or someone possesses awareness. The only thing aware of awareness IS awareness. What is there in the presence of all the questioning. You aren’t the one that is aware. You simply are awareness. That realization changes everything. But then the danger is chasing after the realization and wanting to happen over and over. And a person will think they have lost something. “life seems so ordinary”. Yes, yes it does. You can’t lose the always and already. So the direct recognition of context gets you in the door. It is the first essential shift. The beginning of disidentification of thought stream and narrative. It evolves into this bright, formless, open , aware , nothingness. And if one stays with it. Keeps letting go of experience and stays curious and questioning. Another deeper movement begins to happen. The new identity that has been formed around being awareness begins to be relinquished. And as this is recognized and this other movement begins to be very curious about the phenomenal world. The witnessing collapses into that which is witnessed. And the heart begins to flower. And Unity unfolds. Everything is seen as everything. All is nothing and all is everything. The one sees the one. Collapses the subject/object relationship. ISNESS IS. Life is experiencing life. Wholeness is experiencing wholeness. New perceptual world. And this is a time of fire. All the little separate bits come back to be forged in the fire of the universal heart into their originality. Returned. All the personal conditioning, all the ideas of separateness come into consciousness. And then the real freedom begins. Am I free enough to embody uncaused Love, joy and peace? Can you live the realization of nothing as everything? You perceive that something and nothing are exactly the same. Its beyond this idea of oneness. Its not one and its not two. Its whole. Holiness..

RETREAT TALK , October 3, 2021

On the subject of transcend and include we can be open to assistance on all levels of consciousness. So at the level of reason and logic. Numbers, statistics, physical reality, we can be open to assistance like medical interventions, pharmaceuticals, technological advances, intellectual invention. that kind of thing. At the level of divine origin and divinity intervention we can be open to that level of assistance with all of the bodhisattva and enlightened beings and the divine mother herself. We can also be open to the level of loaves and fishes. Absolutely no lack or deficiency of any kind. THY WILL IS DONE. Its done. That’s the only will that’s ever done. All is possible in God. Belief is a veil upon TRUTH. It's a matter of levels of consciousness and capacity.

A light that shines without force. Radiant luminosity. Illumination.

When we relinquish the trance of not-good-enough we return to innocence and joy.

In fullness we are no longer trying to find the rights and wrongs. We are a still point at the bridge between all apparent opposites. (Corpus callosum. Rainbow bridge. Razor’s edge.) Bridging connectivity and harmony.

Realization of the Still Silent essence is really the only pointer. Silence begins to permeate conscious experience. Everything then unfolds out of and into the Silent ground. Allow everything to be as it is. keep it simple.

We can’t perceive the fullness of universal love from the orientation of not-good-enough. Because unworthiness needs positions. Positions of defense and survival. Positions of right and wrong. Uncaused love is only experienced in unknowingness, meaning innocence, in the still point of right here and now without narrative or description. Then the apparent opposites come into wholeness. A this-and-that that arise together as a completeness.

What originally feels like "before". Falling back into innocence, originality, prior-ness. We experience it like that, in time. It feels like going back or the "before". But in the timeless Present, the realization, the experience of "before" ripens into the always and already. Timelessness. Past, present, future......ALL ONE.

Innocent joy brings a richness to life that bubbles up even in the midst of uncertainty, fear, hardship. Its the smile of a small child when it discovers something fresh and new. Innocent joy is beyond reason and explanation.

Please Call Me by My True Names – Thich Nhat Hanh

Don’t say that I will depart tomorrow —

even today I am still arriving.

Look deeply: every second I am arriving

to be a bud on a Spring branch,

to be a tiny bird, with still-fragile wings,

learning to sing in my new nest,

to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower,

to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry,

to fear and to hope.

The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death

of all that is alive.

I am the mayfly metamorphosing

on the surface of the river.

And I am the bird

that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.

I am the frog swimming happily

in the clear water of a pond.

And I am the grass-snake

that silently feeds itself on the frog.

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones,

my legs as thin as bamboo sticks.

And I am the arms merchant,

selling deadly weapons to Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl,

refugee on a small boat,

who throws herself into the ocean

after being raped by a sea pirate.

And I am the pirate,

my heart not yet capable

of seeing and loving.

I am a member of the politburo,

with plenty of power in my hands.

And I am the man who has to pay

his “debt of blood” to my people

dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.

My joy is like Spring, so warm

it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth.

My pain is like a river of tears,

so vast it fills the four oceans.

Please call me by my true names,

so I can hear all my cries and my laughter at once,

so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

Please call me by my true names,

so I can wake up,

and so the door of my heart

can be left open,

the door of compassion.

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At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless; Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is, But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity, Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards, Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point, There would be no dance, and there is only the dance. I can only say, there we have been: but I cannot say where. And I cannot say, how long, for that is to place it in time.---T.S. Eliot

-------------------------------------

We carry all the ingredients to turn existence into joy.

Mix them, mix them, mix them.

How did the rose ever open its heart and give to this world all its beauty?

It felt the encouragement of light against its being.

Otherwise we all remain too frightened.

The Earth has disappeared from beneath my feet.

It fled from all my ecstasy.

Now like a singing air creature, I feel the roads keep opening.

What is the root of all these words?

One thing: LOVE.

But a LOVE so deep and sweet, it heeds to express itself with

sense, sounds, colors, that never before existed.

Let us be like falling stars in the day sky.

Let no one know of our sublime beauty

As we hold hands with God

And burn into a sacred existence

That defies, that surpasses,

Every description of ecstasy and LOVE

---Hafiz

-------------------------------------------------

I speak

Because every cell in the body is

reaching out

For GOD.

If you think I'm having more fun than anyone on this planet

You are absolutely correct.

But Hafiz is willing to share all his secrets

on how to befriend GOD.

If the falling of a hoof ever rings the temple bell

If a lonely man's final scream before he hangs himself

And the nightingale's perfect lyrics of happiness

All become an equal cause to dance

Then the sun has at last parted its curtain before you

GOD has stopped playing child games with your mind

And dragged you backstage by the hair

Shown to you the only possible reason

for this bizarre and spectacular existence.

Go running through the streets

creating divine chaos

Make everyone and yourself ecstatically mad

For the friend's beautiful open arms

Go running through this world

Giving LOVE

Giving LOVE

Giving LOVE

---Hafiz