The Light of Enlightenment

Relationship is the giving and receiving of energy in the form of love, light and power.
Every interaction is an exchange and every exchange is energetic. While love is the primary form of that energy when the heart of the self is unblocked and whole, the second form the energy of the self takes is that of light. But what do we mean by light?

Imagine yourself in ancient Greece, sitting around the fire, under the stars, late at night, with friends and family. The young ones are listening to the elders as they pass on the 'light' of their wisdom through myth, legend and their own experiences. It is this wisdom of right understanding, right thinking and right living which 'enlightens' the next generation, maintaining the balance and harmony of society and right relationship with nature.

Not far away, there is another group discussing why the world is the way it is, why people do what they do. They are trying to work out why there is a marked increase in conflict and suffering. They are the philosophers in a process of inquiry, seeking to understand how the world and the universe works. One day, a few philosophers become tired of all the talk and intellectual toing and froing, and they decide to 'do something'. They begin to study the material world in all its forms and variety of phenomena. They start to fathom the rhythms of nature and the movement of the planets in an attempt to find meaning and purpose. They ask questions like 'why does water fall down and not up, why is grass green, why does a flower have fragrance?' Scientific research is born and wisdom gives way to the gathering and exchange of the 'light' of knowledge about the world.

The discovery of over one hundred elements, the development of electricity and, several hundred years later, the appliance of science spawns technology. Knowledge gives way to information as we develop the ability to send huge amounts of information in the form or packets of light across vast distances in seconds. In only of a few short decades, everything that can be quantified and measured is reduced to set of digits, a form of data, and fed into a machine for lightning transmission in massive quantities from one side of the world to the other, almost instantly. Information gives way to data. We now evaluate the worth of many modern organizations according to their 'data resources'. From wisdom, to knowledge, to information, to data - this is progress . isn't it?

Each day we need to make hundreds of decisions. Most are small, occasionally some are large and life changing. The commodity we need in order to make the best decisions is not data, it is not information, not even knowledge - it is wisdom. Yet it is wisdom that is now in shortest supply in the world. If you were to look at the currency of exchange across all your relationships today, at what level do you exchange 'light' - is it as data, information, knowledge or wisdom? Which one do you exchange the most?

For most people it is 'information' as we talk mostly about what others are doing (gossip), and what happened yesterday (news). If we are to increase our resource of wisdom it makes sense to mix with people who are exchanging energy (light) at this level. This will only happen when we decide to see life itself as the school, our self as a student, and consciously embark on a journey of continuous learning. If we don't learn we don't change. If we don't change we don't grow. If we don't grow we diminish.

This makes all your relationships opportunities to learn and grow in wisdom. If you are having difficulty in any particular relationship it is never the others fault, it is the way you are responding, which derives from the way you perceive the other. It means your responses are not being informed and shaped by a deep enough wisdom - the wisdom of compassion, the wisdom of forgiveness or the wisdom of understanding is missing. So every relationship is a teacher, a facilitator, a space in which you can grow in wisdom, nourish with wisdom and be nourished by wisdom. The wisdom cycle might look likes this - experience, followed by reflection upon experience, generates insight, followed by application, creating more experience, for further reflection. If you are a meditator then you will likely know that you have within you an innate sense of 'what is true', and you are able to allow that 'knowingness' to refine the wisdom that you grow in your life.

Like good wine wisdom matures with age. Hence the natural wisdom that can be accumulated in a long life. However, unlike wine, which sits still for most of its life until tasted, all of life must be actively faced and tasted! Only then will you see the dullness and emptiness of all data and information, and how unnecessary it is to accumulate yet more knowledge about the world. Only then can you fully taste and appreciate the wisdom that is distilled from taking risks, rising to new challenges, engaging fully with others and then silently reflecting on the whole process of living.

And unlike a battery whose power runs down when used to light up a room, your wisdom becomes brighter and deeper the more you use it to 'enlighten' the relationships that you form and the world that you live in

Sleep and Death

To be or not to be, that is the question;
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing, end them. To die, to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to — 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep, perchance to dream. Ay, there's the rub,
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause.

“Hamlet” (1948)



"One short sleep past, we wake eternally..."


- Hypnos and Thanatos,Sleep & Death by John William Waterhouse, 1874.

Hypnos and his twin brother, Thanatos; or, Sleep and his twin brother, Death.

It's interesting that the ancient civilizations thought of death and sleep as related. As sons of night (Nyx), they embodied the moment between the conscious and unconscious state. It didn't matter if a person was lying down to sleep for the night or if they were closing their eyes on a battlefield. In the end, the body was just as calm.

The picture on depicts sleep and death sitting next to each other, reclined, as if to take an afternoon nap. It is interesting to note that this artist chose to put death in the darkness, whereas sleep remains in the light.


- The Angel of Death (L'Angelo della Morte) (1896),Simeon Solomon

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou thinkst thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be
Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow
And soonest our best men with thee do go
Rest of their bones and soul's delivery.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppies or charms can make us sleep as well
And better than thy stroke. Why swellst thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die! - "HOLY SONNET X"
by John Donne



. . . if we admit the existence of a higher or permanent Ego in us -- which Ego must not be confused with what we call the "Higher Self," we can comprehend that what we often regard as dreams, generally accepted as idle fancies, are, in truth, stray pages torn out from the life and experiences of the inner man, and the dim recollection of which at the moment of awakening becomes more or less distorted by our physical memory. The latter catches mechanically a few impressions of the thoughts, facts witnessed, and deeds performed by the inner man during its hours of complete freedom. For our Ego lives its own separate life within its prison of clay whenever it becomes free from the trammels of matter, i.e., during the sleep of the physical man. This Ego it is which is the actor, the real man, the true human self. But the physical man cannot feel or be conscious during dreams; for the personality, the outer man, with its brain and thinking apparatus, are paralyzed more or less completely. -- Transactions of the Blavatsky Lodge, p. 50

Sleep and death are brothers, according to the old Greek proverb. However, they are not merely brothers, born of the same fabric of human consciousness, but are in all verity one, identical. Death is a perfect sleep, with its interim awakenings of a kind, such as in the devachan, and a full human awakening in the succeeding reincarnation. Sleep is an imperfect fulfillment of death, nature's prophecy of the future death. Nightly we sleep, and therefore nightly we partially die. Indeed, one may go still farther and say that sleep and death and all the various processes and realizations of initiation are but different phases or operations of consciousness, varied forms of the same fundamental thing. Sleep is largely an automatic functioning of the human consciousness; death is the same, but in immensely greater degree, and is a necessary habit of the consciousness in order that it may gain for the psychological part of the constitution a resting and an assimilation of experience.




Initiation is a kind of temporary 'death' of all the lower man, a 'sleep' of the lower psychological nature, and a magical awakening to an intense awareness of the higher psychological part upon which is then radiating the inner light of the man's monadic consciousness. Thus it is that initiation comprises both sleep and death and uses these functions of consciousness in order to free the 'inner man' for the marvelous experience on inner planes that initiation brings about.



Poppies have long been used as a symbol of both sleep and death: sleep because of the opium extracted from them, and death because of their (commonly) blood-red color. In Greco-Roman myths, poppies were used as offerings to the dead. Poppies are used as emblems on tombstones to symbolize eternal sleep.

Anyone who has stood at the bedside of one who is dying must have been strongly impressed with the extraordinary similitude between the coming of death and going to sleep. The sole distinction between death and sleep is one of degree. Precisely as in death, the consciousness during sleep becomes, following upon a brief period of complete unconsciousness, the seat or active focus of forms of inner mental activity which we call dreams.




In sleep, the psychological or personal part of man is non-manifesting through the physical brain; in point of fact, it is this absence, this temporary disjunction of the intermediate nature which is the efficient cause of sleep. The body sleeps because the personal man is no longer there. When we go to sleep at night, we slip into a state of complete unconsciousness only because we have not yet learned during the daytime to become self-conscious in the higher parts of us.

As a rule, the physical body is guarded during sleep by an akasic veil -- a condensation of the substance of the auric egg itself, naturally thrown forth from the body as it sinks into repose -- which usually prevents hurt. This is well exemplified in the case of sleepwalkers. There are other contributing agencies likewise, one of which is seen in the interesting fact that most animate beings do not touch with intent to injure a body which is quiescent. And even 'inanimate' nature is so constructed that there seems to be a corresponding response in it of peace and quiet. Still other factors are involved here, but the main one is the veil or wall of akasa surrounding the sleeping body which, however, is effective only in proportion as the life is pure.



The vital thread of life and consciousness still vibrates in even the physical brain of a man during sleep, producing dreams, some that delight him and others that harass and perplex him. The thread of radiance remains unbroken, so that the ego, which has left the lower mind and the body behind and is soaring out into the spaces, is able to return along this luminous thread linking the monad to the astral-vital brain of the sleeping body. When a man dies, it is exactly like falling into a very deep sleep, utter, sweet unconsciousness, except that the vital cord is snapped and then, instantaneously, like the sounding of a soft golden note, the soul is free.



What happens to a man during sleep is an adumbration of what will happen to him at death. The personal ego goes into oblivion and its consciousness is withdrawn into the spiritual part where it rests and has temporary peace. During sleep, certain parts of man's inner constitution wing their way into the spaces of the solar system. The migration of course is very short; sometimes like a lightning flash, where one has slept only a few moments. But time to pure consciousness does not exist; time pertains to material existence. Some men go to the moon when they sleep, some to their parent planet, others to the sun. And another part of the constitution flashes forth and back to its parent star. Certain other men visit the elemental world, go to the center of our own globe, for instance.



To sleep: perchance to dream;
ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what
dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause.

William Shakespeare. - Hamlet act 3. sc.1


During sleep and after death, each individual goes to those places which he has earned for himself by his thought and his aspirations, or lack of them; in other words, it is all a matter of synchronous vibration -- a man goes to his natural home, whether high or low. The cause of such peregrinations inheres fundamentally in the psychomagnetic attractions to these different localities in the solar systems, which are 'stations' along the devious routes of the circulations of the cosmos; and since the consciousness is accustomed to these routes through long ages of habit, each of the various parts of the human constitution follows its own particular direction in these circulations.

There is not only a close analogy, but an identity -- both of process and of fact -- between the dreams had during sleep and those of the after-death state. Dreams depend upon two main factors: (a) the mechanism of the psychic consciousness, and (b) the two kinds of forces impinging upon this mechanism, which control the direction and guide the operations of the psychic consciousness of the dreamer. Of these forces, the first kind is the solar, lunar, and planetary influences under which an individual is born; and the second is the automatic reaction to the events and experiences that had occurred during the waking state.



"Sleep, those little slices of death; Oh how I loathe them."
- Edgar Allan Poe

The astrological influences under which an individual is born are the conjoined action of all the solar, lunar, and planetary powers in the solar system; but in every case certain powers predominate because of their swabhava -- this swabhava coalescing with the man's own swabhava because of identity of origin; and it is this identity of origin or of powers which causes these forces or influences to act most strongly upon him. Therefore, while all human beings have dreams which are more or less alike, everyone has dreams of his or her own characteristically unique type.

To phrase the matter in other words, every man is more particularly the offspring or under the influence of one of the twelve logoic forces of the solar system. Now as each such solar logos finds its own especial focus of action in one of the twelve sacred planets, we see how the planetary as well as the solar influences come into play in the psychic consciousness of the sleeping man. Also, as all human beings have a 'lunar body,' i.e. a 'lunar layer' in their auric egg, the moon likewise plays upon the mind of the sleeper; indeed, in most cases the lunar influences are by far the most powerful upon the sleeping man.



When asked what dreams were, H.P.B. answered that it depended upon the meaning attached to the term:

You may "dream," or, as we say, sleep visions, awake or asleep. If the Astral Light is collected in a cup or metal vessel by will-power, and the eyes fixed on some point in it with a strong will to see, a waking vision or "dream" is the result, if the person is at all sensitive. The reflections in the Astral Light are seen better with closed eyes, and, in sleep, still more distinctly. From a lucid state, vision becomes translucid; from normal organic consciousness it rises to a transcendental state of consciousness. . . .

There are many kinds of dreams, as we all know. Leaving the "digestion dream" aside, there are brain dreams and memory dreams, mechanical and conscious visions. Dreams of warning and premonition require the active co-operation of the inner Ego. They are also often due to the conscious or unconscious co-operation of the brains of two living persons, or of their two Egos. . . .

[That which dreams is] generally the physical brain of the personal Ego, the seat of memory, radiating and throwing off sparks like the dying embers of a fire. The memory of the Sleeper is like an Aeolian seven-stringed harp; and his state of mind may be compared to the wind that sweeps over the chords. -- Transactions of the Blavatsky Lodge, pp. 58-9



The nature of a man's dreams is determined almost wholly -- yet by no means entirely -- by his waking life. The little child, for example, has no positive dreams of any kind; its experiences are still too trifling. Its mind, even its brain, are not yet set or fully formed; nevertheless on occasion it will have frightening dreams, but these are usually caused by automatic psychologic reactions in the child's sleeping brain to some disturbance that it has experienced when awake.



Most of us have dreams which are neither very delightful nor very terrifying, but which often are mixed -- inchoate and confused. The reason is obvious, for our dreams are but reflections of our waking hours. Sometimes our mind is bent to the things of the spirit and the ways of beauty and harmony, and at other times gives way to thoughts of a completely opposite character, which at night (or after death in the karma-loka) return to us in our dreams.

It is thought that makes all dreams. The evil man, one who is so selfish, and whose imagination and feelings are so restricted and imprisoned that a kindly impulse seldom if ever enters his consciousness, feels the unfailing reaction: when he dreams, which is frequently, he is in an emotional and mental hell. His thoughts haunt his brain like avenging ghosts, and afflict his dreaming consciousness. Contrariwise, the man who yearns to help his fellows, is impersonal, of lofty thinking, very rarely has evil dreams; if he dreams at all, he has dreams that the gods might envy.

The above equally applies not only to the dreams of the devachan but also to those of the karma-loka. The cause is the same: mental deposits or thought impulses arising during the life of a man, and so affecting his mental structure that they automatically begin to act upon his consciousness. Thus thought and feeling not only make character throughout the evolving ages, but likewise bring happiness and peace or the nightmares of the karma-loka.



Dreams of any kind are the earth-side of a man's character coming into pictorial action again in the mind, and therefore are 'effects' and not 'causes'; and this is why the devachan is called the sphere of effects and our earth-existence, wherein originate the causative life-impulses, the sphere of causes (cf. The Mahatma Letters, pp. 47-8).

This does not mean that earth-life is the only sphere of causes; the statement refers only to incarnated human beings, and the effects produced after death by their thoughts and feelings and actions while imbodied. Thus, neither in the devachan nor when a man is dreaming at night does he originate any positive or inventive courses of action, although it is occasionally true that the dreams of a man, by reaction on the mind, may consciously or unconsciously somewhat influence the thoughts of the waking man.


- Death Awakening Sleep (1896), Simeon Solomon

There is a certain danger, however, in putting too much importance upon the matter of dreams and their interpretations. Occasionally dreams are prophetic, but to a large extent they 'come true' because they are the foreshadowings of the automatic working of consciousness, i.e. of what the consciousness itself, because of its biases and tendencies, will bring to pass in the future. Therefore, it could very plausibly be argued that if an observer of a dreaming man were quasi-omniscient, he would be able to discern in all the dreams of the man what his future would be. But it is obvious that there are very few such perfect soothsayers or dream-interpreters!

Truly prophetic dreams do not occur in the devachan, but can do so during sleep because they arise in the stored knowledge of the reincarnating ego, which latter attempts to impress the sleeping brain with a 'radiation' of prophetic foresight. This does happen upon very rare occasions, but one should examine such dreams very suspiciously and not automatically look upon them as guides in life. In general, it is far better to ignore one's dreams, for very few people indeed are sufficiently awakened inwardly to know whether a dream is of a prophetic character or one which is merely an ordinary psychic reaction of the usually erratic and confused brain-mind.*




* Many dreams, again, while not truly prophetic, nevertheless can tell the one who studies his own mental and vital processes something at least, and possibly much, of what his character is. Very often the body, or the passions and feelings, react upon the sleeping brain producing pictures therein, and the one who knows how to read these dreams from careful self-examination, without morbidity, may get useful warnings or reminders that his life and emotions are not just what they should be.

But, as said, it is far wiser to forget dreams of all kinds, unless they be of such immensely vivid character, and so impress us when we are awake, that we have the intuition that we had better hold such dreams in mind.



If a man can -- and will -- study his consciousness during the day as well as the reactions upon his percipient mind to the various impacts of the daily events, he will have a master key to knowing precisely what will happen to him, as a center of consciousness, both during sleep and after death. If he desire to know how he will feel or what he will cognize at the moment of death, let him grip his consciousness with his will and study the actual processes of his falling asleep -- if he can! No man, however, at that precise instant knows that he is lapsing into sleep. For a time he seems to himself to be thinking, and the more intensely he thinks the farther is sleep from him -- and then he is off, he is asleep! Instant unconsciousness supervenes at the critical juncture, and it may or may not be succeeded by dreams.

Death is identical with this process of falling asleep. It matters not at all how we die: whether by age, by disease, or by violence. The instant of death always brings for a period the unutterable peace of perfect unconsciousness, which is like gliding into a beginning, a foretaste as it were, of the devachanic bliss, just as the careful observer will find to be his experience when falling to sleep.



Finally, I venture to call attention once more to the point that the mind will automatically go on functioning along the exact lines of thought which one had preceding either sleep or death. Hence the extreme importance of having one's mind in order and peaceful before going to sleep -- or before dying; to refuse entrance to any thoughts of dislike, hatred or evil. As the great Pythagoras taught in the verses attributed to him by his disciple Lysis, which form a part of the so-called Golden Verses of Pythagoras:



Admit not sleep to thy drooping eyes,
Ere thou hast well reviewed each one of the day's deeds.
In what was I remiss? What did I do? What duty was not fulfilled?

(From Fountain-Source of Occultism by G. de Purucker. Copyright © 1974 by Theosophical University Press)

FLOW

IS it...?
Someone said - your sacred space is where you can find yourself..


On the other note, i have at most of the times, this strong inquisitive desire to search for things of the past, of unsual nature, like an old song, sometimes just humming the tune, and desperately looking for the word, well most of us have this feeling...
here is one of such searches being fulfilled,
the ending song of 'Mahabharat' Mega Teleseries of the early 90's...I was looking for it for a long long time, hope it puts an end to this search..at least till the next time.

Video with courtesy of Youtbe:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5Te7HXshlI
and
the Audio(in MP3) @ the Mediafire link:
http://www.mediafire.com/file/fomct2kbiap7g2f/MAHABHARAT%20ENDING%20SONG.mp3
http://www.mediafire.com/?fomct2kbiap7g2f

No matter what...I'm feeling GREAT!

Do YOU Have an Open Mind?

Pick up a pen and curl your hand around it with palm of your hand face down. Then open your hand, release the pen and watch it fall to the floor. It’s gone. Now pick up the pen, grasp it again, but this time with palm facing upwards. Now open your hand and notice the pen remains. Yet the tension of grasping has gone, your hand is relaxed and the pen is still there when you need it.

This perfectly describes what we do in our mind with almost everything and everyone in our life. While we can use our hand to physically grasp occasional objects we use our mind to grasp the images of objects, ideas, other people, memories, beliefs, hopes etc. And just as there is tension in the muscles of a grasping hand so we create ‘mental tension’ when we grasp and attempt to hold to anything with our minds. In fact this is where all our tensions, which means all our fears, have their origins, in our grasping minds.

Mental (and physical) relaxation and renewal will not be possible until we learn to ‘hold openly’, without grasping, in our mind whatever needs to be held at any given moment. Good decision making will be difficult until we release our mental attention from its habit of grasping and make it available to a wider and deeper awareness.

When we are ‘busy’ grasping the pen within our hand all our physical energy travels to grip the pen, all our attention surrounds the pen and we see only what may threaten to remove the pen from our grasp. This shuts down our awareness of what’s going on around us, behind us, above us, in front of us. When we are busy grasping our awareness diminishes and it’s as if we ‘shrink’ our self around what we grasp. Our universe becomes small and limited by what we grasp.

And so it is with our mind. It’s here that we create and grasp at the images of things, people, places, positions, memories, ideas, beliefs. It is here that we attempt to ‘hold on’ to the things we fear losing. And so we create ‘mental tension’, narrow and shrink our awareness and limit our capacity to see more broadly and with greater depth the big picture of life as it happens around us and within us. Our attention and awareness are not free to support our intellect which is where we make our decisions and choices. Our awareness is not open to receiving and passing on to our intellect whatever insight or wisdom it requires to create those decisions.

Returning to the ‘pen in hand’ metaphor, if we do not relax our grip of the pen it cannot be used by anyone else. And if the pen continues to fill the space of our hand it means our hand is not free to receive and hold anything new. And so it is with our mind. When we use our mind as a way of grasping and holding on to things, people, memories etc. our mental space is not only tense but it is always occupied, busy being closed around the ideas and images of what we are grasping. So we close our self to the river of life itself, which is continuously bringing ‘the new’ towards us in the form of new opportunities, new relationships, new ideas and, from within, new insights. Being so busy grasping we make our self oblivious to what is attempting to enter the universe of our awareness.

This is why so many of us regularly get that feeling of ‘stuckness’. The feeling that nothing is changing in our life. It seems that we are just going through the same monotonous patterns each day. If you feel this then take a moment and look behind this feeling, this pattern, and you will likely see something that you are habitually grasping within your mind. You will likely notice that’s what is closing down your awareness which means your ability to be open and to see and receive ‘the new’.

Sometimes we may complain of the dullness that comes with a sense of ‘stuckness’ but fail to see this deeper mental cause. While we may say we long for the new, for the different, for something to ‘break’ the patterns of a predictable life, in truth, it’s more likely we have wedded our self to the very circumstances we bemoan. Otherwise we wouldn’t complain, even to ourselves, but would act enthusiastically to seek, invite, invoke, attract, create a new way forward. Instead of standing guard at the gates of our comfort zone, in which we are probably tolerably uncomfortable, we would be flinging those gates open and inviting the river to flow through and into our vast and unlimited mental space. Hence it takes a little courage to see and consciously release what we habitually grasp with our minds. Only then can you allow your awareness and your vision to be filled with new possibilities.

Conversely, and somewhat paradoxically, many do say that they are ready for change, that they crave for the new job, the new way of life, the new opportunity, that this in itself becomes what they attempt to grasp mentally before it shows up in reality. So that when it does show up they are still too busy grasping the images of possibility they are not able to recognize and embrace the reality of new opportunities when the river of life does bring it their way!

Hence the wisdom that we all seem to know in our heart of hearts – grasp nothing, relax your grip on everything, stay open, be free, embrace whatever and whoever enters the gates of your awareness and maintain the faith that the river of life itself will bring exactly what you need at each and every moment. Remember, the river flows in both directions – from outside in and inside out!

June!

There is a part of you that is perfect and pure. It is untouched by the less-than-perfect characteristics you have acquired by living in a less than perfect world. This part of you is a still and eternal star. Make time to reach it and this will bring you untold benefit.

manali

Wisdom in a Wilderness of Waffle!

In our media driven world it is becoming genuinely hard to discern the truth from a thousand voices of distortion, spin, obfuscation and often downright deviousness. Perhaps it’s not surprising, as much of the information that we need to assess, weigh, clarify to make our daily decisions comes in bite size chunks. But the fogginess and fuzziness of what we hear goes much deeper.

It seems that in both political and corporate worlds in particular it is often quite hard to find honest voices. Smokescreens, spinning, deflecting and denying now appear to be the conditioned responses to the call for accountability. Power is being protected, personal agendas pursued and it’s hard to see the difference between the political and the personal.

In sport the idea of playing the game for the sake of the game is dying fast. The prize is paramount, and participation is often relegated to the level of necessity in order to collect the cheque. The ‘joy of playing’ is a distant echo of sporting times gone by. Money does the talking and almost every individual sport is now being reduced to a business. And business is seldom playful.

In the exploding areas of health and well-being there are so many opinions in a jungle of conflicting views. It’s almost impossible to work out what’s good or bad for your body. Some say drink lots of water others say no need, some say take vitamins and supplements others say it’s a waste of money, some scientists say we all might have BSE, others say nonsense, some say cholesterol kills, others say it is essential for good health. We can believe all too easily and unwittingly the loudest or most recent voice and then cry victim of propaganda and the agenda of commercial interest when we hear contradictory views.

So where are we to find the wisdom that we need to shape our decisions and guide our life. Ultimately the wisest voice is our own. Unfortunately so many of us have become so busy engaging with the world, pursuing more work, connecting with more and more people, we have lost the art of ‘listening in’ to our own wisdom and our own intuition.

Serene

When the silence beckons,
And the day draws to a close,
When the light of your life sighs,..
And love dies in your eyes,
Only then will I realise,
What you mean to me.


"ANATHEMA" is the band

Happy Holi

May God gift you all the colors of life, colors of joy, colors of happiness, colors of friendship, colors of love and all other colors you want to paint in your life…

The questions are diamonds you hold in the light. Study a lifetime and you see different colors from the same jewel. The same questions, asked again, bring you just the answers you need just the minute you need them. People observe the colors of a day only at its beginnings and endings, but to me it's quite clear that a day merges through a multitude of shades and intonations, with each passing moment. A single hour can consist of thousands of different colors. The soul is covered with the color of its leisure thoughts.

Have a colorful Day in life…

Freedom!

To be acknowledged for who and what I am, no more, no less. Not for acclaim, not for approval, but, the simple truth of that recognition. This has been the elemental drive of my existence, and it must be achieved, if I am to live or die with dignity. ~ Bicentennial Man

Bicentennial Man


The song of life plays it tunes and the body moves in synchrony with it. There is no need to think to do the right movements. The more we feel the rhythm without thinking, the easier and delightful the body movements will appear. The ears will listen to the sounds the mind will interpret those sounds and the body moves to them. There is no further thought involved.

The song of life plays its own tune. It is a tune of freedom. Freedom means to break from everything which is known. To feel free the “known” must be gone.

As we dance in joy of the sounds of music, likewise; we learn to move according to the different rhythms played by life itself. The more flexible I become through my own practice and experience, the greater my range of motion and thus my ability to move in synchronization with the tunes of life.

Life unfolds its beauty when I am ready to try. The bird wants to fly. To open the cage of comfort is an act of courage which allows us to feel the power of our own wings. Its true capacity.

To be honest with your own nature of innocence, freedom and enjoyment and to go beyond any boundary, any preconception, any mental wall in such a way as to experience the experience and to express the best of it, is to transform yourself.

Self transformation is a practical matter where life plays a tune and we move unlike anything we have done before. The tune cannot be the same if the CD of life is moving forward. The tempo of the songs of life will vary; at one time it will be salsa, another a jazzy tune and perhaps then a disco tune will appear. My dancing steps cannot be the same, for sameness means dullness, my steps need to change; I need to listen to the tunes without a further thought, break the schemes of what is a “proper dance.” The tunes play and I move. Life has given me experiences as a way to practice my own dancing moves. I have practiced many times those moves, but … I can only use them when the song is appropriate; then beauty and harmony will be experienced, it will be seen. That beauty is authentic.

Sometimes life will play an “AC\DC” tune. It is not for me to catalog the song as “good” or “bad,” since it is just another tune… another song. I can choose to dance and enjoy it or to let the song change my mood and stop my dance. Life is not a “rock and roll” song. Many songs will be played, but the good dancer knows how to move and enjoy every tune; every time.

The critic is outside, seeing the scene of life comfortably seated in a chair. Just like sitting in a Discotheque without dancing and without enjoying how others dance, but just to catalog what is “good” and what is “bad.”

The critic will be afraid of moving to the tunes of life since his own “good” and “bad” formula only works when others are dancing and not when he is the one on the dance floor. Knowing is to know yourself and nothing else.

Life is about experiencing and expression. The experience makes us grow as long as we don’t play the “good and bad” game. We can only express beauty when our experiences are beautiful.

When we look at a tiger we can catalog that animal as “good or bad.” However, our own limited perception cannot disagree about the beauty and majesty of a tiger, for beauty is beyond good and evil.

Beauty can only be expressed when we go beyond the stigmas, the stereotype, the judgments… when there is freedom from the known.