IDENTITY

(Photo taken from Sikh website)

There is a saying by myTeacher that "Truth uses everything available to point towards itSelf."  This can be seen through music, through movies, through daily interactions one has with life...well through everything in the world if one is paying attention (and even if one is not...it still will show up at the most unexpected of times).

The other day at a cellular provider a woman was taking a chip out of a cellphone and as she did she said "this is your identity, it has everything about you on it, and she took it out and then she placed it in another cellphone.  As she did this there was a recognition of the obviousness that the identity can not be who one is.  If it was then you couldn't just move it from one thing to another and if she lost the chip or broke it during the move from one phone to another, what was lost?  Just an accumulation of opinions, memories, photos, and videos?  

The brain is the SIM card, it does the same thing that the SIM in a cellphone does, only on a larger scale.  So you cannot be the information that is stored, you are not the brain.  Maybe one day they will be switching or designing bodies around the brain, then it will be more obvious that one is also not the body.  But if you are not the information/identity stored, if you are not the brain, if you are not the body...then "Who Are You?"  Go ahead ask "Who Am I?"  If I am not the identity, who I am Really?

This is where one can only point and always point if one is true to the Self.  You are what the identity appears In, but you have misidentified yourself as the identity, the accumulation of thoughts and beliefs.  Obviously there is nothing to get worked up about, since you have always been who you are...you just thought you were something other than who you are.  Now you can begin to relax into not knowing who you are, so it can be Revealed.

It may sound like one is saying the same thing over and over again, in different ways, any way that it shows up to put little cracks in "knowing."  That is because one is.  Do not be fooled by the power and strength of the mind/brain to continue to keep your true Self hidden.  Like a computer, it's job is to make you forget that everything that appears before you on the screen is an accumulation of 1s and 0s...the same is with the mind/brain...there is only 1 mind/brain and there is less than 0 that you are IN.

Repetition is the Gift.  

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THE GARDEN (Digging Up The "I" Thought).

There is a Garden here at the Ranch and there are also weeds...one of the things that has been shared is that if you don't want the weeds to come back...then you have to get them at the bottom...at the base of the root.  If you pull to hard or fast or the soil is not damp enough and don't get all the root at once...then the weed will grow back.

It seemed like a good analogy for how it is with the "I" thought (who most think they are).  It is like a weed that if you don't get it by the very core...it will just spread and grow out from what is left and if it is just left it grows wild and tries to overtake the Garden.  

Let's start by taking a look at words..."words" in themselves are not real...they are just sounds and letters that were made up and agreed upon to mean certain things ... that is all the "I" thought is.  It is just a word...it is just a letter.  But you say it all the time like it means something...don't you?  "I" like this and "I" like that and "I" am so good or "I" am so shitty.  But do you ever look to see what this "I" is that you keep saying you are?

If there were no words ... no sounds ... would you still be?

So maybe you are beginning to see that every time you say "I" you may not be telling the truth.  Don't take it from me...it's something you will have to investigate...however...it might be the greatest investigation you've ever been on...just like when you pull that weed up out of the garden and you see that you got the whole root and you know that it is not going to be coming back to that part of the Garden...and the Garden we are speaking of in the domain of the "I" thought is the Garden of Heaven.  

Now Heaven is just a loaded word because people have all kinds of fantasies about what Heaven is and who will be there and they imagine all kinds of things...but what if Heaven has been completely misunderstood and actual Heaven...is just the pulling out...rooting out the weed called "I."  

No "I" = Heaven.

The "I" thought says that everything should be some other way than how it is.  The "I" thought thinks it has to do all kinds of things to get where it already is.  The "I" thought thinks that Heaven is some other time than Now...but just because the "I" says all these things...doesn't make it so.  

Now depending on how much you have invested in creating this "I" you call "you," could make it hard to give up...the more important the "I/you" thinks it is...the deeper the root goes. So even though it can be dropped/pulled out/weeded in an instant...if you are like me...you don't get the whole root to come out all at once.  

One of the ways that you can begin to see that the "I" isn't real...is that it always is telling you about something that isn't actually happening. The "I" thought is past/future based.  It will say "I" am going to do this or "I" am going to do that...but all you have to do is look around ... just Stop...take a breath (deep one is always good for the body) and look around ... is there anything happening...right now...is there anything happening but these words being read?  All the things that "I/you" worry about that might happen or did happen...are not happening Now.  

Heaven = Now. 

The best way to begin to see the lie of the "I," is to begin to investigate what it is telling you.  The clearest way to see the non-existence of the "I" is to ask the only true question, the questions that all other questions are in avoidance of:

"Who am I?  Really."

It is never "how" or "why" it is always "who?"

Before the "I," I Am.

ACHING

When you find yourself alone...with very few distractions around and an ache in your chest that won't seem to dissipate and you know that there is no one you can call that will make it feel any better because you have tried all those routes before and all they do is numb or  temporarily alleviate the ache...but the ache always returns and you find yourself crying but you are not sure why.  

Sometimes death will bring this ache...the death of a loved one or the death of a relationship or the loss of a job...some kind of significant even might bring about this ache.  But sometimes the ache just comes...and there is nothing outwardly bringing it about...you can play music or turn on the TV but it is still there...it makes everything seem dark and you begin to realize that you have always been this alone.  It is the times that we want to call out to someone...anyone to help us and we know there is no help from this ache...that we begin to see that we have always been this alone.

Even as a baby...when you cried out to your parents they would come and temporarily ease your discomfort...but even then you were alone in yourSelf.  If they did not come...if they were not able to answer your cry...you were alone and even when they came ... you are alone...but we go through life thinking that we are not that alone because it can be so scary...but everyone is that alone...we pretend that we aren't so that we can feel safe...but it is all make believe.

The longer you can stay with the aloneness...when it comes...the deeper you will get to know yourself...the more you will find that you are not who you think you are and that the ache that comes is calling you to Know yourSelf.  There is a saying ... many are called but few choose to listen.  The call is the pain.  The call is not to avoid the pain but to allow it to reveal to you the Gift it brings.

MOOOVING

Recently, I have been asked to move. I live in a remote setting and do not often see people in the physical form.

Fears have come up...all of them having to do with "I." Like "where will I go?" What if "I" cannot find a place "I" can afford? Why is this happening to "me?" Fear, protection, survival mode, will appear when the thought "I" feels threatened. Thoughts and feelings (especially ones of fear) feed off of each other.

When fear is seen as a lie (because it stems from the thought "I"), which we are beginning to see as the Ultimate and only lie <---sit with this a minute.

"I is a lie."

~Harrold the Aligator

You are becoming trained enough to know that when you hear "I/me" in the thoughts, that you are telling yourself a lie and it can always be verified with the questioning of yourself in asking "Who am I?"

So, after the fear subsides, and one finds oneself looking in the classifieds for a place and you get in your car and drive down the road...you may begin to notice that you aren't actually getting anywhere. That the world is coming towards you ... you are not going towards the world. MyTeacher gave a great example once of the screensaver you used to find on like Windows98 where the stars are coming towards you but you are just sitting and looking at the screen that has been such a Gift in seeing and experiencing beyond the intellect that one doesn't actually mooove :o)

Another good example of this is is Rumi a 1200 century mystic Sufi Poet:

“Keep walking, though there's no place to get to. Don't try to see through the distances. That's not for human beings. Move within, but don't move the way fear makes you move.”

~Rumi

(Special Thanks to Coleman Barks and the many others that have continued to bring Rumi's life to Light):

So each place I stopped at I began to get deeper and deeper hits that I am always in the same place. The faces and pictures may change...but verything is getting more familiar...not like I have been here before but that I am always Here :o) Now.

No matter where "I" move, I am always in the same Place, which is no place...I mentioned to my Friend this morning that (an this anaology has been used before but is a good enough one to repeat) we are in a car (the body) and we are sitting in the back seat and being driven all around but when we look to see who is driving there is no one there, yet the car still moves and we are just watching/Witnessing and with the realization of no driver the question comes again "Who's Driving" which can at first bring fear but not much if you realize also that just because you just found out you are not driving...it has always been this way and as such you are taken care of...you can Trust the Driver because you are proof that the Driver knows where it is going...so you relax sit back and now ask..."well if I am not driving...then Who Am I?" :o)))))

You may find yourself trying to figure it out...and if you can, remember to be kind to yourself...this is the one domain where being an idiot is the Gift and intelligence is the Block. You are not driving...that is the Good News...Relax like you would when you were a child and your parents took you somewhere in the car...you didn't worry about where you were going, or how long it took to get there, sometimes you would just doze off and wake up and find yourself at the beach or the park or the pool and you would rub your eyes and jump out of the car and play...this is how it still is now...the only difference is that you are finding out that your Parents are in the back seat with you.

Ok after all that driving around ...we again come to the place where we find out that we have not ever driven anywhere and that there is no driver and now we are finding that we have actually not ever moved and that the appearance of driving into the sunset...is actually the sunset driving into us. Wow that's something...You are what the world is moving towards.

Who I am...cannot be anywhere other than where it is and it is Still, unmoving. There is no where in the world you can go to get away from It because you and everything in the Universe...is in It (and it's not an It).

It (not it :o) is always Home and in that, whereever you find yourself...you are at Home. So each moment is just each moment...there is nothing new happening and yet everything is brand new and the more accepting of Paradox you become the easier and lighter life is...but you cannot do it...all you can do is see the Paradox and not engage with how it is. Paradoxes are not for solving they are for relaxing the minds grip on knowing anything.

Paradox is the Ultimate Gift to the mind.

~The Happy Idiot

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DEATH (Melancholia)

This morning on my walk the body was very tired, this isn't a common occurrence any more, although it used to be.  So I only made it half way and turned around and came back home...at other times, I may have pushed myself to make it...suck it up and just get it done...but my walks have shifted quite a bit over the years and there really is no point in the walking...it is just walking...there is no where to get to and no reason for doing it (though I used to think there was) just simply walking .

When these things happen, becoming that tired...I am much more aware that things will eventually end.  I have, even as a young child, been acutely aware of death.  Sometimes I have been drawn to it as an escape and have had made attempts to "get out" of this world that way.  There have also been times that I have been extremely scared of death and the bodily pain that maybe associated with the experience.  One time I was pretty freaked out about it my Teacher said, "well, one thing you do know is that it will end."  That took some time to sink in...and now...there is a knowing that no matter how painful something is (not only painful but any emotion or state) eventually it will end and in that knowing...is a release of the fear and a recognition of this moment, one where there is not pain and no need to be afraid that pain may come at some other time.  A redirection of the attention, if you will, to what everything is showing up In.

Death and Fear are actually the same thought...because neither can really be experienced...you can be afraid of death...but you cannot experience it … so if you cannot experience Death than what is there to be afraid of....they are both ghosts.  If you are dead...who is experiencing it?  (Once again...one is pointed to the question of "Who am I?")  Who dies?  The body cannot experience death...it is either alive or dead.

Really the reason, at least for me, that death has been so scary, is because it reveals to the mind that it does not have control...you know you don't have control over death...even if you suicide...you know inside that you are only doing it because you are afraid of death...you are afraid that you are not in control of your life...which you are not.  However, you could just relax in that knowing instead of being afraid.  You haven't ever been in control, you just think you have and your thoughts actually come after action.  You may think that they come before you do something but you have been wrong...you may not like to hear that but it is so...the action happens and then thoughts appear and you think you did something.  You are watching a movie called "my life" but you are not the director or even the actor...you are just the watcher and as you slow down and allow this to be revealed to you...you smile a lot more.

So there has been a fascination with death for me....I have experienced many losses in life, physically lost people very close to me and have gone to some pretty deep depths of despair at times.  The undoing of what I believed has been quite emotionally painful at times although I wouldn't change a thing...not if I could.

So this morning I got home pretty exhausted and which made it perfect to take some time out and watch a movie that my Teacher recommended that he had recently watched called "Melancholia."  I snaggled into the couch with some blankets and turned on the Roku and got onto Netflix because it is an instant play film and made some tea and let the body rest as I watched the movie.  And it is very good...it is visually beautiful and Kirsten Dunst does a really good job...actually all the actors did a really good job. 

One of the things that came up for me was purpose...you know many people say that things happen for a reason and we all seem to be working to get better or improve life … but what if nothing means anything...that everything that you "think" you are working towards or for...is just for nothing...there is no meaning at all...you have just been (in one sense) killing time (which doesn't exist anyway).

Does it really make a difference what you are doing in this life?  I'm not saying this in a depressing sort of way...maybe in a way that you can look and just see … "what am I doing?"  I mean if you are just wasting time anyway...what are you wasting it on.  Possibly you can relax in yourSelf more and more as you see that this is all going to end and there is no rush to get anywhere.

Sometimes at first, you may become scared and go through the process that you are going to die (you as you think of yourself … are going to die) and then you will possibly begin to relax into the fact that everything does...we are just seemingly floating in space on a giant composter.  We are on the Cemetary Planet...everything here dies and is born...but who you are isn't born and doesn't die...who you Truly Are...the planet is in.  This is the beginning of seeing Heaven on Earth.  Heaven is looking out of you...and everything, however, one must begin to question who they are to begin to See.

Anything that pushes one closer to the Present moment, where nothing, no thing is happening...is a Gift.  And so Melancholia the movie...is that gift to me today...another reminder that this will all come to an end and a Pointer to what doesn't.

Rest in Peace.
  ~Joysters