Finders Keepers; and Other Notes from the Field

Animals played Finders Keepers until implosion, including the ones hiding behind clothes.

Change each creature’s name to:
   survivor.

To understand élan vital was magical thinking was to understand the concern Nietzsche had for the day humanity realized en mass:
  there was nothing like a God whatsoever! It was the death of advaita, satsang, religious authority and any form of spiritual ideation.
It was a bomb set to go off.

I like watching birds and imagining each one is crazy.

Friend could become enemy and enemy could become friend. It was all about respect, or not, for the desire creating the tension.

Social shame was a fear those seeking liberation overcame.
It was like being thrown out of the gene pool.

Not having children was the only way to end genetic conditioning. It was an act of complete selflessness.

Those who had children often called those who don’t ever want them selfish. It was the only way to deal with the frustration at not being able to rethink the whole thing.

All talk about a body as a separate thing was nonsense.

My love language is touch. I received hundreds of positive words from beautiful, kind people around the world and not one has ever really landed.
It is really kind of funny when I think about it.

All this love just hanging there in sound, shaped for a different kind of creature than I.

I struggle with my own relevancy and I accept that. I won’t be confident all the time.

That’s just life.

ps/smoh

Thought is the thought of thought. The thought does not want to come to an end....

One thing that interested me at a very young age in my life was: why they always tell me what I should want, what I should think. 

This was my basic question. 
Anything I want has to be what they wanted me to want. Anything I think has to be what they wanted me to think. 

And is there anything other than what they want me to want? 
What is it that I want? 

What I want is not what they wanted me to want, or what they wanted me to think. 
But it never occurred to me that what I want is no different from the wants they wanted me to want. 

I had no way of resolving this dilemma or the problem. Nobody helped me. 
Anyone who tried to help me, left me with this tremendous problem of finding out for myself, and by myself, what is it that I want? 

But it never occurred to me that this want is no different from any other want, or the wants they wanted me to want. I had no way of finding the answer for myself, and nobody helped me. 

So, even when I rejected all the external authority of everybody, still this haunted me. 

What is it that I want? I throw this question to everyone who comes to see me: 
‘What is it that you want? What do you want?’ and 
nobody comes out with a clear demand, 
‘This is what I want’. 

Something hit me like a lightening, or the shaft of a lightening, and that finished the whole thing for me. 

What I am left with is something very difficult to put across, or even give expression to. 

But whatever I want to say, can be expressed very easily and I don’t need a rich vocabulary. 

Three to four hundred words are enough to put across what I am trying to convey.

ps/smoh

"I care not so much what I am in the opinion of others, as what I am in my own; I would be rich of myself and not by borrowing."

If you form your self-esteem and self-image on the opinion of others, you are in trouble. 
Their opinions are many times uninformed, fickle, and just plain wrong. 
You have to know who and what you are deep inside, and allow other to think what they will.

There is so much about you that other people are not privileged to, such as your true character, honour, integrity, thoughts, and intentions. 
Without knowing these things, no one is in a position to know who or what you truly are. 
But, you should know.

Too many people don't even know who they are. 
They have never taken the time to think about the kind of person they want to be, or the kind of principles they want to live by; they just live. 

The true being should know who and what she/he is, and live so. 

ps/smoh

There is no awareness. It is. Nothing separate from it is aware of it, totally impossible. No one is in a dream. No one wakes up. It is and there is absolutely nothing that is not It.

There are two camps in this conversation.

One side says,

"Awareness is the ultimate/absolute and the objects are transitory."

The other side says

"There is only objects. Nothing is aware of it."

Both sides point to reading this comment.

The only difference is one of them has a reader and the other doesn't.
It looks the same either way.

The experience here is there is no awareness OF the One.

There is simply the One, thinking, writing, reading, laughing, dancing, eating, sleeping, etc.

Nothing separate from it knows it because there is nothing separate from it.
It is.

The challenge will always be the simple fact that what "life" is, is inherently not a word.

It cannot be known because it is already the constant way of it.

ps/smoh

Pierce the smokescreen of fearful indifference. Adventure heartily. Have faith in the shaping of what you cannot see...

A sense of who you are will not unfold if you go to sleep, lazily waiting for life to come to you. 

Never confuse conscious effortlessness with unconscious laziness. There will be angels and helpers, but they cannot do the work for you. 

They just remind you of what you already know. 

The rest is up to you. 

Finding your way home requires a spirit of adventure. 

It does not mean that you always have to do. It means that whatever you are doing, or not doing, is experienced as a spiritual inquiry, an information gathering, an active exploration of reality. 

Sitting still can be a profound adventure if you are present and inquisitive.

Did you know that many are not at peace with their path because they are constantly being seduced that they need to "find" one?

Thus invalidating the simple fact that a Soul cannot be separated from path, peace comes when there is no conflict, correct?

And in this case, the conflict is entirely mental and suggested by the lie that we are not, at our very root, peace.

Touching that heals all else.

Yes, that is often true- the idea that we are entirely perfect in this moment but I do also believe that there is magnificence and deeply sacred purpose that lives at the heart of each birth, one that brings people great peace with path when they can clear through the misidentifications  and obstructions and find it.

I am still trying to find the words to express this seeming duality.

ps/smoh

Respecting Each Other...

Each of us loves to create in a particular way and when we celebrate, rather than fear that, all our work becomes collaborative, rather than competitive.

It is not that we become a single unit. 

Although there are curious possibilities for how technology and biology are going to interface as both explorations advance, 

the reality is that we don't have to plug into the competing narrative. 

We can remain open to hearing the music come through our hearts, rather than our senses.

I left because I had an ethical question about the entire nature of sharing and the only way I could figure it out was to destroy it and really dive into the question:

"Does the one who shares keep the ones who searches searching?"

The answer to this is no. 

The nature of organisms is such that "intelligence" seeks to adjust to threats to the structure. If the self-identity evolves the ability to probabilistically examine possible futures through comparison of objects stored in memory, it is going to encounter the possible reality of the body's death.

This leads to an inherent anxiety in the nervous system because no matter what it does, it knows it is going to die. 
The mental feature of constructing a safety net concept is not a hoax. It is an adaptation. The hardest part of how it is packaged is most people who share are asserting to possess something beyond belief. 
The only thing that can obviously be beyond belief is the direct experience happening right now. 
This is literally unbelievable because we don't fully know what it is yet. It is apparently in motion.

What I discovered was that as long as I am upfront, it is all good. 

I experience us to be a Presence that has no actual substance at the centre.
I do not assert it as absolute fact. It is simply the most probable interpretation of the nature of my experience and so 
I share it as a possibility because, and this is where the "intelligence" comes in, when someone is hurting, they look for a way to stop the pain. 

Narrative pain is no different than physical pain. 
When we tell a story that hurts, it sucks.

Telling the truth about how we feel and think is the only thing we can do here besides lie about how we feel and think. 

We don't have to agree to respect that we exist as creative beings. 

In this spirit, I welcome your perspective any time you feel moved to share it. 

ps/smoh

What is difficult is assuming consistency means understanding.

Awakening is the end of needing to be logical, since what is awoken from is the confines of linguistic logic. I am not a word, a sentence, or any particular position. Awareness is endlessly playful, open and creative. 

After 2008, it was clear awareness truly has no preference. This has allowed me to play, test, tinker with and jam some riffs with the programmatic possibilities. I wanted to get to the bottom of a question that arose shortly after the night on the deck and that question was:

Exactly how does belief dictate experience?

What I have learned from these unhindered test runs is quite amazing to me. A mind will respond positively to praise of the premise it already supports, and defend any opposition to this premise. What this means is that the premise is controlling the mind. Whatever I believe becomes my experience. When I stop believing, there is literally just pristine awareness. 

I have been playing for three years with how wide open and boundaryless a mind can be once it has been freed. It is really amazing. The conclusion, and it can't really be that, is simple:

1. Awareness has no preference, no memory and never moves.

2. The mind is not tethered to any particular premise or belief once it has been freed from the confines of the linguistic-logic. 

3. All premises can be tried on like costumes: Oneness, separation, I am only the brain, I am Consciousness, energy exists, non-duality, duality, God is real, no one here, I Am, free will, no free will, etc.

4. Identity is either: the premise running the mind, or untouchable awareness. These are the only options.

If there is any take-home wisdom from the last three years of experimenting it is this:

Whatever premise is running, awareness does not give a shit. 

I am done experimenting now. 

I am very grateful to have had the opportunity to explore the nature of mind and now it is time to simply share the clarity of awareness with as many beautiful hearts as possible.

ps/smoh

The wild freshness you are is released from the cage of comparison." When you are ready to feel it, the open air awaits you."

(•_•)
<) )>
/ \   Once you wake up from language, which you will if you listen closely, then you have to wake up from colour.
There are no colours.
Which means these letters are mirages.
All matter is a thought-sensation, my dearest, dearest Self.

What is amazing is how this totally destroys "awake" being anything visual. It doesn't matter what someone looks like.
Self is not an appearance.
I haven't gotten there yet, but I am on my way...

I am only at language and colour.
I can say I really didn't know what I talking about completely.

I have a feeling there is a lot more to learn on this trip and it would be better for me to simply speak from what I know and not make conclusions.
I have to say, it is wonderfully humbling.

When you listened carefully, and woke up from language, what did you hear?

The listener, which isn't even silence.

If we were a word, or any string of words, or a letter, or any team of letters, that is, if we were a sound or a symphony of sounds, there would have to be a single point in which all these sounds arise from, or these sounds would have to be the single point, arising.

"All I need to do is remember my true Self," is just one kind of sound, like, "Or are you the infinite radiance of consciousness..."

If we type "consciousness" into Google translator and then go down the list and hit the audio button for Russian, Chinese, Finnish, Portuguese, French, Japanese, Spanish, Italian, etc, and we hear it read in the highlighted language, many different sounds will come out. If we assume each sound "refers" to the same thing, confusion arises. If, however, we simply listen to the sounds as they are, there is no confusion whatsoever.

This can illuminate the trouble with assuming there is any way to talk about what we are and actually be right.

After all, there are 7,000,000,000 + people making all kinds of sounds, not to mention the other species of animals and plants and insects and birds and fish, and not to mention the rain, and the wind and the volcanoes and the ocean waves, etc.

If we conclude this means we are silence that is obviously just another sound. "I am Silence".

Without the desire to conclude, the entire issue of searching for what we are explodes.

ps/smoh

You have to be the most trustworthy person that you know....

(•_•)
<) )>
/ \    Imagine for a second you are alone on an island full of wild animals that simply want what they want. It's not good or bad. 
It's just the way it is.
Now, instead of being afraid of this being the case, notice you are one of them. Rather than feel fear there is no one to trust, imagine, like you're on Survivor, that you have to REALLY trust yourself.

Feel that feeling completely,
"I have to trust myself above everyone and everything else."

Then, instead of fearing the people in the world, have compassion for how hard it is to feel completely trusting of the only person who never leaves.

You are not an accordion of yesterdays. 
You are not on trial for a single action ever attributed to you. 
There is no jury and no judge. No one on earth is in charge of you. 
The name tag is blank and the face is a mask. 
Remembering who you are is as simple as remembering you are not relative to anything. 

You are Absolutely Free.!!!!!

ps/smoh

Once you discover your light, it becomes your response-ability to shine! Our hearts know the way

Sensitivity is a sign of life. 

Better hurt than hardened. 

I bow to those who keep their hearts open when it is most difficult, 

those who refuse to keep their armour on any longer than they have to, and 

those who recognize the courage at the heart of vulnerability. 

After all the meat-eaters eat each other, the open-hearted will inherit the earth.

HERE'S to all my 'too sensitive' siblings in the world.

I own it... 

I'm proud of it... born that way, staying that way!!!

Who it should be is who it is. 

What it should be is what it is. 

When it should be is when it is. 

Where it should be is where it is. 

Why it should be is why it is. 

How it should be is how it is. 

Go outside and watch the perfection roll, walk, crawl, ride, and blow by. 

Existence is exactly as is.

ps/smoh

Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; but remember what you have now was once among the things that you only wished for.

It seems to be human nature to never quite be satisfied. 

Soon after we obtain the thing that our heart desires, our heart and mind lock in on something else that they want. 
This cycle can become vicious as it continues to leave you unsatisfied with what you have and always craving something that you don't have.

While it is fine to have goals and to want nice things, these desires should not keep you from being happy in the present moment. 

Enjoy what you currently have and be grateful. 

Remember, the things that have become commonplace today, were once the things which you wanted with a passion at one time.

Keep pushing to better yourself and your life, but at the same time be thankful for the life that you have. 
Don't let your new desires rob you of today's joy. 

Enjoy and be thankful for the things that you have in your life, while you continue to work towards achieving your new goals. 

Life is in the journey, not the destination.

ps/smoh

Another between-the-eyes straight from the hip zinger!!!

(•_•)
<) )>
/ \    
Who it should be is who it is.
What it should be is what it is.
When it should be is when it is.
Where it should be is where it is.
Why it should be is why it is.
How it should be is how it is.
Go outside and watch the perfection roll, walk, crawl, ride, and blow by.

Existence is exactly as is....and that is what is looking right now.

What happens, happens.
What is liked cannot be helped.
What is disliked cannot be helped.
Nothing can be helped.

It is perfection appearing to unfold as a universe.

The universe illuminates you and you illuminate the universe.
This illumination does not discriminate, even against discrimination.

Everything you see is pointing right at you like a child playing peek-a-boo.
"I seeeeeeeee yooooou."
Doesn't matter if it is the compost bin, the garbage truck or the sunrise.

Illumination is ceaseless.

That choiceless aspect is the most fun...and playful.

ps/smoh

Don't doubt your value. Don't run from who you truly are.

You are on this planet for a very specific reason. 
You can't even imagine your value in the overall scheme of things. 
You are unique and one of a kind. 

Just as every single snowflake is different, every single human is different and unique. 
And each has a very special reason for being on this planet.

You may not know what that reason is, but it is there nonetheless. 

It may be to help just one person that nobody else could help, or it may be to help millions. 

The point is, you have ultimate value in this life for someone or some thing. 
You are here for a very special reason. 
If you spend your time trying to be someone else or refusing to do what you spirit guides you to do, you are dropping the ball.

Just as a million dollars has a lot of value, 
but is basically useless if you don't use it, 
your special gift must be used if it is to be of any use in this world. 

Look for ways to use it, and be yourself, that is where the ultimate power lies. 

If you run from who you truly are, you are running from your true power.

ps/smoh

Juggle yourself. Go for it. It is so fun.

The Universe is all you have!

I suffer to the degree I think the Universe has to listen to what I want. I am free to the degree I can appreciate the honesty of the Universe. 
One thing is for sure, the Universe is the boss/teacher.

There is nothing anyone can give you because there is nothing you are missing.

The class is self-taught and self-directed because I can't hold your hand all the time.

The most you can do is get what you want. 
The least you can do is be left wanting. 
These are your options.

Self-deception is the hardest thing to avoid because the one who could check against it is the one in question.

You can do whatever you want. 
You are the Source.

There is nothing you can do to fuck up your life. The worse thing that can happen is going to. Enjoy what you can while you can. 
It's all going to go.

The personality is a momentum, like the body. You can enjoy the quips and quibbles of how you happen to be without taking it personally. 
To do so is the beginning and the end of self-love.

It doesn't take much to see there is no "we". 
There is I and I and I and I...each with a unique vantage point and momentum all to it's own. 
When you try to speak for "we"
You just express how scared you are to accept that you are alone. 
It's true, you are. 
So you might as well own it.

Dancing in "I have no idea" is much easier than shlepping through "I know."

to Marisa N Ring

ps/smoh

When I meet people where they are, rather than overtly or covertly trying to change them, the result is standing in heaven together.

Looking forward to when that is automatic, in the meantime, sorry everybody.

It arises less and less. 

I know this because I am crying more at more at the simple beauty of the world.

The urge to change someone is protection. 

When I can find what I am trying to protect myself from, almost always it comes down to the fear of Loving, and STOP resisting it, nothing changes in the other person and I see them as if they were God. 

This is the gift of the world. 

It continues to present itself just as it is, and I get to learn how to open my heart to it wider and wider and wider, until the whole thing is inside it.

Who needs labels like hell or heaven? 

To welcome the moment as it appears without labelling, comparing or judging is never hell or heaven, it is at it is .

Sometimes painful, sometime full of joy - LIFE in different expressions , nor THIS neither THAT.

I'm a puddle on the floor, melting

ps/smoh

"I can't die!" comes from the same place, "I can't wait to get into bed and sleep," comes from

 All thoughts come from the same place, no matter which language it is.

Every thought is an impression upon that which cannot be impressed. Call it consciousness, awareness, blah, blah, blah. It doesn't matter because even these labels are an impression.

Imagine the sky over the house right now. The sky is not affected by the clouds, no matter what shape, density or ferocity they take. An airplane, a meteor, a bird turd, even a blast of electromagnetic particles from a sun fart does not affect "the sky" in the same way galaxies colliding do not hurt the space they crash in.

Thoughts are things, this one no different, that appear and disappear in "the sky of awareness". Again, there is not a word for what is reading these letters so all labels are placeholders, like "zero" and "no-thing".

The fact that there is not a word for it does not mean there is not an obvious LISTENING to these sentences. Included in listening to the eyes read these words, do you notice you are hearing with your eyes?, is any thought that may arise in "your head".

These labels of "head", "brain", "mind", "love", "space" etc. are more attempts at describing that which cannot be impressed. 

This is why the conversation has continued for thousands of years, rather than simply dying out at the first instance of "impasse". Innocently, and yet dis-functionally, a label is taken seriously as "IT". 

This is also why spiritual debating is really silly. The terms are the only things that can be debated and none of them actually apply! Ha! What an amazing silliness!

So when the thought, 
"I am afraid to die!" arises, and by thought I mean the entire energetic impression that happens in the field of possibility: increased heart rate, the feeling of anxiety, sweating, etc. it comes from the exact same place as the thought, 
"I can't wait to fall asleep," 
which generates a different energetic impression than the previous one.

All thoughts generate an impression WHEN THEY ARE BELIEVED. 
Meditation is the art of listening without believing, and dear God, don't believe me. 
If it resonates, find out for yourself that you cannot actually be harmed by any thought that arises UNLESS you believe what it is implying.

The intention of the post is to highlight the inherent confusion in simultaneously fearing and wanting total absence.
While the tension this creates is a natural phenomena of "nature at play", so is pointing it out, obviously.

There is no way to make a mistake. You can only learn what is and is not relaxing to believe.

ps/smoh

Look deep into nature, then you will understand everything better. Albert Einstein

Life lessons can be found everywhere, especially in nature. 

If you will take the time to examine nature, 
you will discover much about life. 

Humans beings are not exempt from the laws of nature any more than the plants and the animals are. 

If you seek a deeper understanding of the way things truly work, 
look deep into nature.

Tomorrow's life is too late, live today.

Don't put off living life to the fullest until tomorrow; 
tomorrow may never come. 

Live the life you want to live today! 

It is the ultimate grand illusion to think that you can put off living until things settle down, your finances get straightened out, you have more time, etc. 

For most people, life never settles down.

All of those things are simply your life. 

You must work around them and live your life to the fullest now; 
tomorrow is too late and in fact, may never come. 

Today is the day to live life to the fullest.

ps/smoh

Namaste'.

The past is past and has nothing to do with you. 

It has nothing to do with Right Now. 

Do not let anything from your past inhibit you in this Present Moment. 

Start over. 

Start Fresh. 

Each day. 

Each hour, if it serves you. Heck, each minute. 

Just get going. 

But the past is how we arrived at this point in time. 

Every event, 

emotion, 

conversation and 

person that has come into your life is why you are who are and why you are where you are. 

Understanding this helps me give gratitude for all of life blessings- even the difficult ones. My past has everything to do with me because I am my past living in the now.

And in each moment you can make a new choice no matter what your past has been. The present moment is the only place where you have power and connection to Source. 

True in the Context of Time, but for a moment if you detach yourself from it,

Just not think about anything, 

you can observe past is existing only in your mind, 

where thinking happens for sure I hope you know that You have mind but you are not mind, 

you can make it silent or calm by being in a state of silence n through Meditation, if so you are left with utter silence that means NOTHING where anything and everything is right there, 

You can be anything you want as you don’t have any influence of past,
 still you are existing
still you are experiencing
still you are breathing and
still you can lead your life only thing you don’t entertain or give importance to your dead thoughts past or frozen thoughts future.

This just taking birth all over again each sec as you don’t remember anything about your past life GOD has deleted all data n given you free n fresh memory!

ps/smoh