More about meditation

The real glory of meditation lies not in any method but in
its continual living experience of presence, in its bliss,
clarity, peace, and most important of all, complete absence
of grasping. The diminishing of grasping in yourself is a sign
that you are becoming freer of yourself. And the more you
experience this freedom, the clearer the sign that the ego
and the hopes and fears that keep it alive are dissolving, and
the closer you will come to the infinitely generous "wisdom
of egolessness." When you live in the wisdom home, you'll no
longer find a barrier between "I" and "you," "this" and "that,"
"inside" and "outside;" you'll have come, finally, to your true
home, the state of non-duality. 

        Sogyal Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying

Heart-mind

I find heart-mind a useful image for a part of myself. From various spiritual sources we can take it that we have a physical heart, an emotional heart, which is the source of our loving, and a a spiritual heart (referred to as heart-mind by Ram Dass) the place from which our soul connects. Some sources would have it that the second and the third are the same. The Hindus  refer to the seat of consciousness for heart-mind, which is has a parallel with what Quakers describe as "that of God within us" - the place from which we can experience the still, small voice of God.


Ram Dass describes the heart-mind as awareness turned inward or " the spiritual awareness within." In spite of what our ego tells us, it has an important function in our sense of self. If I asked who you are, you might point to yourself as you answer. And you would almost certainly point to your chest. Maybe that's because this is where our awareness really is - not in our minds. My heart-mind is where "I" am, not my mind.


It follows then that awareness is a heart-mind process, not a thought process. The start of my growth in awareness came when my identification started to shift to me heart-mind. 


Through paying attention to myself, and looking hard at my mind and body, I became aware that my mind is in some way controlling the various organs in my body, causing my heart to beat, my lungs to contract and expand, and my liver and kidneys to function.


As I watched this, noticing that the processes were beyond "me" (in that I couldn't observe the processes or the mechanisms) I became aware of the fact that if "I" tried to control any of these different functions I would be likely to expire in minutes. I have no power, or ability, to consciously control my body. It reminds me of early efforts to use a short mantra as an aid to meditation; as I became more conscious of my breathing, the timing started to go awry and I got to the point where it felt as though I was struggling for breath. I do not understand how my body parts work in order to keep me alive - yet somehow I cause them to function.


It seems to me now that the same is true of the workings of my heart-mind. It functions and seems to work at a place beyond the reach of my conscious mind. Of course, there is something I can do to interfere with its working - I can exercise my will, going along with my ego. But, without doubt my heart-mind functions best when left alone, without me trying to run any aspect of myself though conscious thought or rationalisation.

Rilke's insight into fear

Drawn by sympathetic notes in one of his poems, young people often wrote to Rilke with their problems and hopes. From 1903 to 1908 Rilke wrote a series of remarkable responses to a young would-be poet, on poetry and on surviving as a sensitive observer in a harsh world. This is one quote:

Perhaps all the dragons in our lives are princesses who are only waiting for us to act just once, with beauty and courage. Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence something helpless that needs our love.

 Letters to a Young Poet, Rainer Maria Rilke

Experience

If all we have is now, this moment. And all we have to experience this here and now are our senses. As we experience our lives in the present we often encounter things which don't please us. Then we start letting it bother us and we worry and start thinking about how we can change or improve - solve, maybe - this situation. And we are back to "suffering" which in time becomes unbearable.


The way out of this trap is acceptance - to grow to accept the world being exactly as it is at this moment. Now acceptance doesn't mean we have to agree with something in order to accept it; acceptance means that we face up to and acknowledge something - in a way, the opposite of denial where we try to banish something from our awareness. Nor does it imply a fatalistic endurance of the causes of what's causing us discomfort or pain.


As soon as we start to think about the situation we are in, we have made it worse. We're certain to face anxiety and dissatisfaction when we think what we see as difficulties. The epigram "Pain is unavoidable; misery is optional" talks directly to this - the more we think about our difficulties the sooner we become miserable. The thoughts distract us from actually experiencing our life, from being what we truly are.


If we are frightened, we have to experience the fear. If we're upset we have to experience being unhappy. When we think, we try to avoid the feelings which are bothering us and avoid the pain. By observing ourselves we increase our awareness of how we behave when we are discontented.


The more I am present in the now the more quickly I see my mistake. Uncomfortable feelings had the power to make me upset for weeks, if not months. As I practised living in the now, that time reduced. Sometimes - but only very occasionally - I can experience my upset as it happens without being distracted from the here and now. So that now it seems my difficulties are "carved" in the air rather than indelibly into rock.

Do you want to feel good forever?

Sorry, but it will never happen - trust me on this one. The first hurdle that will trip you up is your attachment, wanting to feel good. We constantly try to avoid pain by seeking pleasure, always trying to find something to add to our lives that will make us feel better; it's what the Buddhists call samsara - a lifetime of constant suffering. 


There's a problem at the other end of the spectrum too, in trying to find peace and quiet or freedom - or, my favourite, serenity. In pursuing this, we form another attachment to the ways we organise things to bring us the peace and quiet we seek. With an attachment, we find that every noise or intrusion disturbs us.


When I sit in stillness and silence, it is me that needs to be still and silent. It is impossible to arrange the world around me to be completely still when I want it to be. Noises will always intrude, life will continue to go on around us. My situation is complicated by the fact that my hearing appears to have improved significantly. I don't know whether this is a result of being still and silent so much but I now find that I can hear much more than other people - so there is the irony of there being more to intrude on my stillness.


The way forward is to avoid preferring things happening - including stillness and silence, including peace. Everything is as it should be so we need to accept the noises and disturbance around us. If I start my meditation in a quiet house I have to accept my family turning on a TV in another room; on occasions I can even find stillness and silence in  busy train carriages, concentrating on my breathing and accepting what is going on around me.

Emptiness

Keep this in mind: to be full of things is to empty of God, while to be empty of things is to be full of God.

Therefore, if a heart is to be ready for Him, it must be emptied out to nothingness. So too, a disinterested heart, reduced to nothingness, is the optimum, the condition of maximum sensitivity.

When he wrote this, Meister Eckhart went on to suggest that this is what Jesus meant when he said: "Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

If this were a book ...

Then this would be the cover:

This is an artwork, I worked on a few years ago; it's made of archival photographs and montaged into a mandala attempting to integrate what Jung called the shadow-self, where much in my shadow is what my ego decided that it would have no use for. Jung wrote: 

Unfortunately there can be no doubt that man is, on the whole, less good than he imagines himself or wants to be. Everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is. If an inferiority is conscious, one always has a chance to correct it. Furthermore, it is constantly in contact with other interests, so that it is continually subjected to modifications. But if it is repressed and isolated from consciousness, it never gets corrected.

Carl Jung, Psychology and Religion

The mandala contains a Higher- and lower-self and a huge mass of "general, all-over me" spread across the middle; it points to the awakened spirit being aware of all of his or constituent characteristics - both good and bad. It also reminds me that the essence of me doesn't change; I still have all my character defects but in becoming aware of them, and allowing them to be a part of me, I now have little use for them. 

Some who have seen this picture attempt an explanation of the child in the middle. There is no conscious choice in that although I like to think of a T-shirt I was once going to have printed that read "INNER-CHILD MOLESTER" in protest at a new-age psychology.

See for miles

There's a sacredness which is not of thought, nor of a feeling resuscitated by thought. It is not recognizable by thought nor can it be utilized by thought. Thought cannot formulate it. But there's a sacredness, untouched by any symbol or word. It is not communicable. It is a fact.

A fact is to be seen and the seeing is not through the word. When a fact is interpreted, it ceases to be a fact; it becomes something entirely different. The seeing is of the highest importance. The seeing is out of time-space; it is immediate, instantaneous. And what's seen is never the same again. 

 Whenever I read J. Krishnamurti (quoted here) I am always struck by his description of the place. He is so clearly in complete touch with wherever he happens to be and he sees so much.

There is no 'time' in the present

This is all there is. What you are aware of around you is all there is. Our life is this unfolding present. It is absolute and it is here and now. It isn't - nor was it ever - some other place or time.


Now is timeless. Time can be used to measure the past and the future but never the present. "What time is it now?" has only one answer: "It is now."


Mystics in each of the spiritual traditions point to this principle - it seems fair to call it an inescapable truth. In Zen Buddhism we have the great question, "If not now, when?" Meister Eckhart, the Christian mystic, explained a problem "Time is what keeps the light from reaching us. There is no greater obstacle to God than time." And in Sufism we find "Past and future veil God from our sight." (Rumi)

Living by the rules

Always a big fan of paradox, I was intrigued to hear the advice that "If you want complete freedom, live by the rules."


The analogy the speaker used was driving a car. If you choose to speed in your car, you create tension and put pressure on yourself. At the very least you are on the look-out for cameras or police patrols; plus, the people who won't drive as fast as you will keep getting in the way, slowing you down, making you more. But if you slow down, you can concentrate more on driving itself - come back to the moment and the task at hand - and join in with everybody else at a slower speed.


I like this most particularly because it highlights a major - and continuing - character defect, something that is guaranteed to dislodge me from the present. I look at the world and my instinctive thought is to spot an angle or a wheeze that will make things easier for me: Is there a short cut somewhere? Or something I can do to make things quicker and simpler? 

The trouble with God

There isn't a problem with God, in itself, but rather with the word "God."


The trouble with the word itself is that is both inadequate and that it conveys too much. As soon as I say "God" you will assume that you know what I am talking about. But all you will have done is create a metal image of your own which will have little to do with what I may have said but will have been created by your traditions and your upbringing. A great many people go around using the word "God" as if they know what they are talking about - and a great many religious leaders will expect you to take on trust that they know of what they speak and you'd best take on trust what they're telling you. Equally, a large number of people argue that there is no God, as if they know what they are denying.


It seems that the only safe route forward is direct experience of a-God-thing. I don't know whether it is possible to see or know God directly, but I have my doubts. But I do know it is possible to have direct experience of a-God-thing; I have done it myself. That though hasn't put me in a position to describe or explain what I have experienced in any adequate way. I can give a general outline but it comes nowhere close to anything you would be able to relate to without direct experience yourself.


Now, when somebody starts talking about my God or our God, I run for cover, especially when they move on to describe the "one, true God." And it's the same with those who try to convince me that there is no God. Because I find it impossible to imagine how these people have gained their confidence in either God or no-God.


It seems to me that the name "God," and to some extent the idea of God, are both hiding what they are meant to be pointing at - principally because so few of us can entertain the idea of God without our intellectual or cultural baggage. And if your family or some preacher has managed to scare you with the idea of God, then letting go just might be impossible.


I remain comfortable with the idea that "God is." But as soon as I start to put more in the sentence, I worry that I have started talking about things I know not.

Approval of others

I remember as a child finding my happiness in things that I have now discovered weren't good for me at all. I craved attention looked for appreciation and - by far worst of all - fought for approval. And I grew up, as many of us do, struggling to find these in any situation I was in. So I tried to be top of the class, get my name in the paper and was only content in my work when I was the boss. I chased prestige and power and I fantasised about fame.


To some extent, we are all guilty of looking for these things; and even if we don't, we can so easily be dreading its absence - in permanent fear of making mistakes, of being a failure or of being criticised.


As always, it pays to watch our feelings and behaviour when we encounter these negative situations. It shows us how we have become dependent on the opinions of others - whether we are looking for approval or avoiding disapproval. We are (in the phrase that neatly sums this up) "marching to the beat of another's drum."


Relying on others for support, encouragement or reassurance is a complete barrier to being awakened. With an awakened spirit, we come to realise that other's opinions of us have nothing to do with us. My well-being and happiness do not depend on what you think of me.


In trying to become independent of the opinions of others we soon become aware of our spiritual lack - of what I once heard brilliantly described as "that hole in me through which a cold wind blew." When we try to fill that void with something other than the good opinion of others, we too often turn in the wrong direction and look to the material world and acquire possessions to make us feel better about ourselves. 


All of which leads to inner conflict and somebody reminded me the other day that this is what separates us from the animal world. They do not have inner conflict; they might have fear but it will be about the situation they may be in. And they won't think about this - no rationalisation or analysis. And, most of all, animals don't lie around condemning themselves or feeling guilty. They just ARE.

Do you mind?

It is said of J Krishnamurti that he once stopped in the middle of one of his speeches and surprised his audience by asking, "Do you want to know my secret?" Of course they did, especially as many people had studied what he taught for many years but had gained just a small understanding.


The secret, he said was "I don't mind what happens."


Commentators have explained that Krishnamurti was referring to the "suchness of now" (another delightful phrase to add to the "nowness of now" which the writer Dennis Potter referred to as an unusual benefit of having terminal cancer) which I take to mean is the content of this moment - hence, do I mind what is happening now?"


As a sidebar, I was talking about this in the company of somebody who probably doesn't have much sympathy for teachings like this. Hearing Krishnamurti's secret she turned on her heel and snorted "I bet he wouldn't say that when he was being tortured."


The underlying principle is illustrated by one of de Mello's stories of a Master who was living next door to a family where the teenage girl was discovered to be pregnant. Rather that get her lover in trouble, she blamed the Zen Master next door when quizzed by her parents. The father confronts the Master with the fact that the young girl has confessed that he is the father. To which the Master replied "Is that so?"


When the child was born it was given to the Master to raise which he did, taking good care of the infant. Until years passed and the girl confessed the truth to her parents. They ruched to apologise to the Master and told him that their daughter has now confessed that the father of the baby isn't the Zen Master. "Is that so?" he replied.

When to give in

A saying that is used a lot in the battle with alcoholism and addiction is "The only way to win is to give in." There is no effective way to win the fight or the war until one admits it is un-winnable.


The harder I tried to change myself, the harder it became. It took a long time to realise that I was powerless to effect any change in myself. The reason it seems, is that the more I struggle against some problem the more power I give it, stemming a lot, I think, from convincing myself that something is wrong (and by implication, that I must be right). So when I stop resisting - accepting that this may not be wrong after all, the problem has less power.


And than I can relax. I can change or control so little in this world. The first change had to be acceptance of how powerless I was (am!). And I learned to give up fighting when I could see and accept it for the pointless activity it is.


Just as it's a mistake to try to fill the spiritual void in our lives with material things ... we cannot change our feelings by direct action. But I do take action, to try to develop a view the world that doesn't attach any importance to what is so that I grow to accept what comes and not struggle to change things.

Stop struggling

Some time ago, it would have been possible to characterise me as being tense and irritable. Today, I can still become tense and irritable but it doesn't last. Before, I was prey to self-pity - in fact, my two instant reactions when things didn't go my way were either indignation or self-pity. Today I can still sit and feel sorry for myself, but it very quickly passes.


When I get the idea in my head that I shouldn't be this way, that I should be at peace - serene, if you like - I get attached to the idea that this peace or serenity is necessary in order to be happy. And this means, of course, that I am keeping myself separated from the happiness I desire. There are no circumstances I have found in which my happiness arises subject to any conditions.


So today, if I'm tense I just observe the tension in me. If, I'm irritable I look for what I have done to get that way. This way I don't get tense trying to relax. Through this practice I can begin to relax even though everything around me may be tense and I start to find peace even where there is noise outside. When I focus on being present I can accept what the world is going through at that time, what is happening around me.


A great Japanese saying applied to this kind of situation: "When you cease to travel, you will have arrived." When I stop struggling to achieve awareness it comes.

Watching the thinker

A slightly different approach to observing ourselves is contained in Eckhart Tolle's instructions on freeing ourselves from our mind. 


Most of us can relate to a voice that seems to be in our head (or several, if you're unlucky like me: I had a shitty committee in my head). At its worst it's something that Freud labelled the superego - a constant critical monologue. At best it may just be idle daydreaming, creating idealistic scenarios that we might be dropped into some time in the future. This voice is at its worst when it's critical but still pretty crippling when it's judging, complaining or comparing. At these times it separates us from reality. Worse still it keeps us detached from the present because it is always reviving the past or imagining the future.


This voice, however we label it, is a construct of our conditioned mind. It ensures that our view of the present is contaminated; it ceases to be real. It can then sometimes seem that the only role our present experience has is to increase the ammunition that the voice can call on to hobble us and keep us from the present moment.


The way to be free of the voice is to listen to it. Pay attention to what the voice is saying, especially where themes reappear. Avoid judgement at all costs - that's just the voice in a different guise - just be what Tolle calls a witnessing presence. The voice will quieten after a while and have less impact. And eventually you will become aware of something different, something new - that you are listening to this voice ... that you are "watching the thinker" and with that you will have an experience that comes from beyond the mind. You will have a degree of separation that will allow you to break free.

One day at a time

The mantra of the twelve-step movement was the brunt of one of the (supposedly) funniest jokes at the 2011 Edinburgh festival: ‘People say, “I’m taking it one day at a time.” You know what? So is everybody. That’s how time works.’

That said, I love Joe Walsh's song One Day at a Time which, if you're not in AA, gives some insights. And if you are in AA it's probably better watched with tissues handy:

You tube link (won't embed)

Well, time works moment by moment so that's how we should be taking it. But daily routines have been a significant factor in my spiritual development. 


Now, many of us in twelve-step programmes rush to straighten everybody else out (thus avoiding looking at ourselves) and we seize the thought that the twelve steps will work for everybody. With such arrogant thoughts, it is encouraging to find aspects of the programme in other spiritual disciplines. In The Art of Happiness the Dalai Lama recommends a routine that is at the core of the twelve-step programme - a daily review. He suggests that, before bed, we review our day, asking whether we had used it as we planned. If we can say yes, then we can rejoice. If it went wrong, we can regret what we did and critique the day. He maintains that this method will strengthen the positive aspects of the mind.


It is significant that no specific action is recommended. His Holiness is suggesting observation, watching what we do. And with no specific proposal to make direct changes but rather noting that change will come over time.

Changes two

Another aspect of change that disconcerts me is trying to bring about change in myself. For example, I know that my intolerance is toxic but I cannot just will away my intolerance or morph into a person who tolerates everything with massive doses of loving kindness.

It took a long time to realize that trying to change to remove bad habits was a bit like rearranging the furniture during an earthquake - well, about as much use. Even if I can succeed in changing my behaviour, I won't have changed me. So it's inevitable that the behaviour will return, sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly, but it will always return.

The only way to achieve lasting change is to become aware of the conditions that have created my behaviour - the brainwashing, sleepwalking if you like - observe my cultural conditioning and see it for what it is. It is through awareness and understanding that I change. Through observation I come to see the world for what it is, shed the illusions that my conditioning or selective memory feed me and stop clinging to to power, prestige, success and all the other illusions.

To change my behaviour I start by changing my actions, not by eliminating the actions I want changed but by taking very different action. I watch and I learn about myself and through this process my attitudes start to change and when I approach the world with different attitudes my relationship with the world changes and my "bad" behaviours stop.

Wonder

Concepts create idols. Only wonder comprehends anything; wonder makes us fall to our knees.                                   St Gregory

Go compare

I have just seen a reference to research on happiness; unfortunately no source was given so I cannot be sure that the research itself has merit. But I was taken with what is supposed to have been shown.


A sample was asked to rate how happy they felt. One half was asked to write a list of people that they were glad not to be; the other half was asked to write a list of people that they wished they were. When people wrote a list of people worse off than themselves, their "happiness" improved; when writing a list of people they envied, their "happiness" reduced.


I normally avoid any comparison but there seems to be merit in looking at how things could be worse to gain a better sense of perspective. This sits well with a technique frequently encouraged in Twelve-step programmes - writing a gratitude list.


The research results underline the fact that our moment-to-moment happiness is determined by how we view what ids happening to us not by what is actually happening. To be happy we need to be satisfied it seems. If we can be accepting, we can be happy; but wanting more (or better or even just different) will invariably lead to unhappiness.

Changes

There are two aspects to change that give me pause. The first is change in the outside world. One of the biggest mistakes I ever made was in trying to find happiness though changing the world and what was happening in it; no, correction, I also tried to change the way people behaved.


I was trying to find contentment and all I got for my troubles was a sight more frustration - I was unable to change a damn thing. Then I learned that I needed to find total acceptance - to be able to accept that the world was exactly as it should be. I struggled for a long time with this, only to be frustrated by the fact that as soon as I learned to accept something ... it changed, seemingly often to something that I would find harder to accept.


The lesson I finally learned was that I needed to learn to accept change> That way I discovered the consolation that everything is transitory - even the screen on which this text is displayed, one day it will be dust again.


I am grateful that I don't have the attitude of somebody I overheard in a cafe bemoaning the fact that they are getting more and more miserable because they want things to stay exactly as they are.

Is there a difference between happiness and inner peace?

Yes. Happiness depends on our circumstances being perceived as positive; inner peace does not.                               Eckhart Tolle

Our conditioned self

How much of what you do is a reaction - by which I mean something without conscious input? If we watch ourselves for a time we soon learn that many of our reactions are impulsive; we seem to react to so many situations without any conscious thought. This is particularly true for me when what is happening affects my sense of self, when what is being done or said makes me feel somehow "less than."


Also, I have been constantly surprised by how much of what I say is a reaction rather than a considered response. I came from a study session once, challenged to write down a mission statement for myself, and wrote "Today, I will be me - no more, no less." It was the start of trying to avoid adding something to myself (my sense or image of myself) or subtracting something from myself. I tried to stop impressing others by being bigger or grander and also to stop thinking less of myself. 


In searching for an authentic "me" in all of the hustle and bustle I was bringing to my life I had to fight my conditioning. It was a long list and pervaded every aspect of my life: I had a supposed national identity (being British, don't you know) which I have shed; an idea of what it meant to be a man, husband and father; the approval of my peers and friends - a desire to be liked, even popular; and a large chunk of prejudice that came from just not thinking about what I was being told by much of the press for example. All of these combined to make my response a conditioned one - a reaction where little of me would be visible.


The biggest burden that I had to shed was my "memory" of the past; I had to learn to ignore what had gone before and been processed by my thinking into a perverted variant of reality -  to realise that the story I told myself about my life and what people had "done to me" was false, a filtered version of the truth viewed from a self-centred perspective. 


A story about my relationship with my brother is a good example of this. I had spent a good deal of my adult life in conflict with my brother; it was all unspoken and motivated by a belief that he didn't care much for me, which I overlaid with projections of selfishness. I was driving to a party for his birthday, which was held in his village hall, where I would know few people and be dependent on my brother's attention to feel welcome, attention I "knew" wouldn't be forthcoming. I meditated on why this was always the same when we met, that I always became angry and disappointed with him. And a sudden realisation struck me - that it needn't be like this and that it was me bringing the problem to the relationship, not him. I realised that if I removed - or ignored - the imagined sense of hurt I felt, then things would be better. I resolved to wipe the slate clean and to start again with him that very night. The promise of enjoying myself and having a good time with him and his family came true and we experienced a new closeness which has lasted.

Once in a lifetime

A Buddhist saying tells us that we can never cross the same stream twice. The stream may look the same but the water is constantly changing. The lesson for me is to assume that I am in touch with what's really happening when I am actually disconnected.


So, when I woke this morning next to my partner I did so for the first time today. Now it would be easy to see waking in my own bed as the same old thing I do every morning. But then I would miss the opportunity to experience the moment as a unique moment and I would soon be drifting off into daydreaming my way through the day, disconnected with reality, not noticing what was really going on.


It can be the same when we describe things; we can become separated from reality. Because our words and ideas don't capture reality at all. One of my most pronounced spiritual experiences was in our local park in late Spring. I was struck by the realisation that all the leaves on the hundreds of trees that I could see could each be different. Not just "leaves" as a concept but hundreds of thousands of individual leaves, each of which could be experienced in its own right.


Awareness comes from experiencing things directly - not from filtering reality from words and ideas


Because of this,  I don't talk much about God or about how I experience God.

What is going on?

By which I mean what is really going on? How much of what I believe is happening is really happening?


To answer this question  we need to  understand fully how much filtering and censoring of our world we're involved in - how we refuse to see things as they really are. That's assuming we can manage to keep the past and the future out of the way - to keep our head free of the "oughts" of what went before and the "ifs" of what's coming next. Feeling bad about the past is a guaranteed way of keeping us from seeing what's happening here and now. Worry about the future has the same effect. We are kept from seeing life as it is by our emotions and our conditioning


Even if we are here in the present, all too often we complicate our vision by the illusions we cling to - believing what we're told by our mind. Happiness comes from realising our desires, right? Actually, no ... it just brings and illusion of happiness that disappears as soon as another desire comes into our heads.


The most troublesome illusions I have found involve my self-image, particularly that my worth or value comes from being loved or appreciated. Wrong again, my desire to be liked and respected is just another illusion. Being in relationships with people on this basis means I have given power over me to another person - with this attitude my happiness depends on what they do. If I look for my happiness in other people , then I'm equally likely to find unhappiness there.


People can only have power over us if we let them, only if we give them the power. We have everything we need to make us happy here and now. But we don't see that when we add something to our external reality instead of just experiencing our lives as they happen - moment by moment, breath by breath.

My favourite meditation

Islam is traced back to revelations from God to the Prophet, Mohammed. One of its central principles is Ihsan, which requires each Moslem to worship God as though they see Him.


Sufis, - more accurately described as an aspect or dimension of Islam rather than as a sect - are mystics who aspire to be close to God. The various methods of worship include chanting, singing (Qawali is one example)and dancing, which includes the Dervishes. There are also Sufis who meditate, with some groups active in the UK.


Sufis are emphatic that knowledge should be learned from teachers and not exclusively from books and can trace their teachers back through the generations to the Prophet himself. Modelling themselves on their teachers, students hope that they too will glean something of the character of the Prophet and his state when the revelations were originally given.


I studied for some time with a group based on meditation techniques and was fortunate to meet their spiritual leader, Shaykh al-Tariqat Hazrat Azad Rasool.


His teachings include a meditation on the heart, normally practiced by the group after prayers at sunset. The meditation should last one hour and is formed around a single thought. One concentrates on the thought: "I turn my attention to my heart and it turns its attention to the Holy Essence." Throughout the meditation one concentrates on one's heart (the centre of loving in the body, situated in a man about three inches below the left nipple and in a woman at the bottom of the left breast where it rejoins the body). Throughout the meditation we "watch" the heart in its process of loving God.

If I had just one wish

What I am about to share is the 'punchline' of a three-wishes story, where the person cannot decide on the ultimate wish ... so you can make up your own version that leads to the illuminating ending.


If I had only one wish that would be granted, I would wish to be happy no matter what happens.


Happiness has no cause; it just is. The good feeling we get from people, from success or from anywhere outside ourselves isn't true happiness. That feeling comes from gratification, from a selfish need to have our desires satisfied. And the reason it isn't true happiness is what happens when our desires aren't satisfied: we become irritated and discontent. 


It is too easy to become dislocated when we try for an awakened spirit, when we practice moving away from desire and attachment. We run the risk of replacing fear and anxiety with apathy and boredom. I often have to remind myself that it is "easy to be a monk in a monastery" (at face value, a perverse judgement on a way of life I know nothing about). I use this phrase to describe being removed from outside annoyances, to be living at peace where others are trying to do the same. This carries with it the risk of not engaging with others or with life, and of finding dissatisfaction resulting from lack of interest. In my experience, this feeling is easy to maintain as a pretence of contentment. But there is no happiness in it. So, I have to be engaged but not attached - involved but not desiring outcomes to suit my self-seeking.

And now some Socrates...

The idea that attachment to possessions is a bar to having a spiritual life is well illustrated by this story* about Socrates - another reminder that the problems in our lives are not about reality or about what happens but about our attachment to people, things and ideas.

Socrates believed that a wise person would intuitively lead a frugal life; he went so far as to refuse to wear shoes. Yet he constantly fell under the spell of the marketplace and could often be found there looking at the range of magnificent wares on display. A friend once asked him why he was so attracted to the market. "I love to go there," Socrates replied, "to discover how many things I am perfectly happy without."

*From  Anthony de Mello via The Spirituality of Imperfection

Thicht Nhat Hanh interview

I always keep being led back to Thicht Nhat Hanh; much of what he teaches involves the things that have become most important to me - mindfulness, the present moment and the emphasis on breathing and awareness of breath.


In this interview (with Ram Dass, would you believe?) he outlines a practice to help us deal with strong emotions. The technique is a variant of another which I have already mentioned HERE

Is it a lifeless, soul-less existence?

When describing some of what I think I've learned to somebody, they took the view that the existence I'm describing must be pretty soul-less. 


It's just possible they are projecting their way of dealing with life in the moment on me. Describing a life where nothing matters.


I am not describing a detachment from life itself, but rather a detachment from what might happen - from the outcomes of my action. I want my football team to win, but I'm certainly not going to be upset when they don't. I can take enjoyment from watching them - feel the joy of their playing well and winning and feel the disappointment of their playing badly and losing.


It is right that we should have desires; it would be foolish to just suppress them and pretend that nothing matters. Thinking about that, if we try to suppress our desires then they assume importance and we will become attached to the idea of having no attachment.


I have preferences, but my happiness doesn't depend on any of them. The outcomes of my actions - what happens in my life - can give me pleasure or pain. Neither of these is the source of my happiness or the reason for me being unhappy. If I can learn to accept life is supposed to be exactly as it is. If I can accept the truth in what Confucius said: "The one who would be constant in happiness must frequently change." I can have no fixed position or views; I have to learn to accept change. Then maybe I can be content in this world where the glass is half-empty and half-full at the same time; I can accept that everything is exactly as it should be, right here, right now.

Judge and be judged

Meditating on people's heavy use of self-esteem as a major factor in their lives. I realised the extent to which it has ceased to be a factor in mine.


Self-esteem or self-worth: where do they exist? And do they have any real meaning or value? It seems to me that there is a myth that our happiness is tied up to having high self-esteem. It cannot be because our attachment to our "goodness" will create dissatisfaction and disappointment ... which leads inevitably to unhappiness. (This is not to be taken to imply that people with "low self-worth" won't be unhappy though.) 


Now what do we use to measure self-worth - Success, wealth, being popular? If our self-worth is a reflection of us in other people's eyes - if it comes from others' opinions of us - then it can have no value. Because we are basing our opinion of ourselves on another's judgement - for it really is a judgement.

If you judge people, you have no time to love them. Mother Teresa

I am convinced that this is true. People who show us love do not judge us. So if we are getting our self-worth from others we are getting it from people who do not love us. And the same applies when we have an opinion of ourselves then - it is not coming from love but from somewhere else. So, in observing myself and my actions, I must be careful not to judge myself. When I see myself doing something that inimical to my spiritual growth - day-dreaming for example - I note what I'm doing and bring myself back to the present. No need for analysis or worse still brooding on where I "keep going wrong."


We do not need to have a view of ourselves, much less have somebody else's into our minds. Our lives are absolute - we just are. My life or my living of it are not better or worse than yours - or his, or hers. Nor is my life or my living of it better or worse than it used to be.


True happiness comes from not becoming attached to any view or image of myself. When I get used to just being I can observe myself without the need to rush to judgement. I can accept that I am just being - and not necessarily doing a good job of it.

Pretence

 Kurt Vonnegut Jr. wrote somewhere:

Be careful what you pretend to be because you are what you pretend to be. 

Seems to me like the flip side of: Your life is what you pay attention to

Are we there yet?

How will I know when I have an awakened spirit? What's it like?


St Thomas of Acquinas said "About God, we cannot say." We can talk a lot about what isn't God; but we cannot talk with any confidence about God - whatever God may be. The Cloud of Unknowing has the thesis that we can never know God so we have to work with our unknowing where God is not "not God."


In the same way the world of the Spirit is beyond us. God, truth, love and spirit are there all around us. And yet they remain beyond us. The world of the spirit exists then in everything we do. And it seems that if we attend to the present, we can get in touch with it.


The original question is better answered when we realise that we already have an awakened spirit but we're just not aware of it. Maybe we get glimpses, fleeting but enormously effective. So, to be gnomic, we know when we know.


Dealing with the subject in this way reminds me a lot of the saying - those who know do not say and those who say do not know. Which makes not knowing - or unknowing - a good place to be.


In love and light ...

Loving-Kindness

I believe these are words from the Buddha:

Animosity does not eradicate animosity. Only by loving-kindness is animosity dissolved.

Loving-kindness (or metta) is the desire to provide for the welfare and happiness of the world; literally it means benevolence; its natural way is promoting friendliness; to achieve it we have to see with kindness. When it succeeds it eliminates ill-will; when it fails it degenerates into selfish desires. (From  sources)


The Buddha is said to have demonstrated this by interposing himself between two men who were fighting with swords - care for their well-being with no regard for his self.



The Dalai Lama has demonstrated it with his refusal to condemn China, a country which ravaged his homeland and murdered his people. He simply said "They too are human beings who struggle to find happiness and they deserve our compassion." When asked how it is possible to hold such a position, free of anger and with no desire for revenge, he describes his meditation where he allows all the suffering of his people and of their oppressors to enter his heart and be transformed into compassion. 


What a tall order. It shows me how small my own efforts at loving-kindness are - and reminds me how easily I am thwarted by an inability to manifest unconditional love for all. But I can try by doing what I can ... and by meditating on love or loving-kindness.

Jesus as metaphor

Some time ago I read The Jesus Mysteries which asked whether Jesus was a Pagan. It is a plausible but highly unlikely account. But its real significance for me was presenting Jesus's sayings and teachings as metaphor. 


So when Jesus talks about being reborn, perhaps he wasn't referring to physical death but rather to a spiritual rebirth in this lifetime. Which insight allowed me to make a lot more sense of what Jesus said, without having to rely on much of the later re-writes* which turned him into "the risen Lord and Saviour" of modern Christianity. With the metaphorical view of Jesus, there is the possibility of heaven on earth and a system that doesn't rely on payback in the afterlife. Most of all I love the statement "The Kingdom of God is at hand" with this slant on it; it's here, now.


And I have recently found - in  a sermon by Meister Eckhart of all people - an extension of the idea of metaphor. Which examines the use of the word "virgin" to describe somebody free from all outside ideas, empty according to God's will. Then links this to the use of the word "wife" to describe somebody in whom God is conceived. Giving us the opportunity to look at the virgin birth as the creation of Jesus himself as metaphor.


* A book whose name I cannot recall gave a fascinating analysis of what Jesus actually said and separated it from what are generally believed to be later additions. In essence, when the early Christians needed a Messiah and son of God they wrote about one and that was added to the story.

Quaker Faith and Practice

Quakers have no creed; there is no set of beliefs holding The Society of Friends together. As a side issue - but something that interests me deeply - is that it has no hierarchy. There are servant leaders but without authority to govern.


The closest Friends come to having guidelines as such are Advices and Queries where much of what is written is in a questioning format. These two have featured a lot in my spiritual growth.

3. Do you try to set aside times of quiet for openness to the Holy Spirit? All of us need to find a way into silence which allows us to deepen our awareness of the divine and to find the inward source of our strength. Seek to know an inward stillness, even amid the activities of daily life. Do you encourage in yourself and in others a habit of dependence on God's guidance for each day? Hold yourself and others in the Light, knowing that all are cherished by God.

7. Be aware of the spirit of God at work in the ordinary activities and experience of your daily life. Spiritual learning continues throughout life, and often in unexpected ways. There is inspiration to be found all around us, in the natural world, in the sciences and arts, in our work and friendships, in our sorrows as well as in our joys. Are you open to new light, from whatever source it may come? Do you approach new ideas with discernment?

How we change

The central thesis of Awareness by Anthony de Mello leads to a growing awareness of our awakened spirit. There is no route map nor any indicator of success - we know when we get there. As we identify less with the "I" we become more at ease with others and with situations we used to find difficult. We become increasingly aware of the fact that most of the problems in our lives stemmed from what we thought of as "other"; we also miss the fact that people who are mean to us or who seem not to like us are actually dealing with their image of us.


Unless and until people are awake, they are simply accepting or rejecting an image of the other. Which brings us to the "me" doing the thinking - and it's capable of doing some pretty poor thinking most of the time. But when I watch me, I can see the projections and the censorship - and then "you" don't seem too bad.


And slowly I get to realize that the external "otherness" doesn't have power over me. And there is a growing sense of "Oneness." This feeling was reinforced by a reading from Julian of Norwich which points to finding a position of detachment.

"We need to realize the insignificance of creation and see it for the emptiness it is ... "

And at a seminar yesterday with Tony Parsons I listened to an extreme position on this - from an exponent of non-duality whose message could be summed up as "Basically, this is all there is. Everything yet nothing. Nothing yet everything." Wherever you are now, whatever place you are in ... that is all there is.

Good or bad?

In a Zen temple two students were going to the hall to meditate. Along the way, they passed some trees  and argued with each other about the trees. One remarked, "Why is that tree so green?" The other remarked, "But why is this tree so large?" And then an argument arose between them. It was about which of the trees was better, the greener one or the larger one. They could not agree with each other, so when they entered the hall, they approached the Master and asked him which of the trees was better. The Master asked them back, "Which one do you both think is good, then?" They started arguing with each other again. One said, "The green tree is better" and the other said, "The large tree is better."

By coincidence, a novice entered into the hall. The Master asked the novice the same question. The novice replied, "We should not be bothered about such issues. ." The Master said, "That is right answer. We should not be bothering ourselves with this. Everything has cause and effect. Whatever, we see, hear and think has its cause and effect.


from Awakenings by Anthony de Mello

From a position of love

It is not by your actions that you will be saved, but by your being. It is not by what you do but by what you are, that you will be judged.                                    Meister Eckhart

Leaving aside the religious overtone, this cuts to the quick. If we act any way other than from love, we are coming from negative feelings. We need to be sure of our "being" before we take action. (From Socrates if you like:  To be is to do*)


But if we are not awakened, if we are still asleep, then we generally take action based on fear guilt, or anger. We can drift through life as if in a foul mood seeing darkness and negative stuff all around us -  and then drift back the next day in a better mood and see only sweetness and light.


But when we come from a position of love - all is good.


If we remember the four steps to wisdom:

1. Getting in touch with your negative feelings
2. Understand that these feelings are in you; they are in your mind and are not real
3. Stop identifying with these feelings
4. Change things by changing yourself

We keep repeating this as we go along and we discover that when we change everything changes. We learn to start from a position of love; It helps us to empathize more, and to be more considerate, kind, and forgiving. We also learn to appreciate others more, concentrating more on their positive qualities and less on their faults. We learn to be more patient.

It is not something we can manufacture; we can’t actually make emotions happen. So there's no point in trying to generate love. We will fail and become disappointed because we don’t get the expected result. 

Here's a useful exercise to create the right conditions, based on the principle of self-observing:

• Sit quietly, and take your awareness into your body
• As best you can, relax each muscle as you bring awareness to it
• Bring your awareness to your heart area, and see what emotions are present, smile, and watch what happens
• Whatever emotions you are feeling (good, bad, or even neutral) are fine. You can work with those emotions, but you can only start from where you are
• Bring yourself back to the outside world

Now, if you know you feel good, that you can come from a position of love, you can go ahead. But if your feelings are bad, then pause. 


*Which gives rise to the great philosophers' joke:
To be is to do -Socrates
To do is to be - Sartre
Do be do be do - Sinatra
(Which has real significance for me because Kurt Vonnegut is credited with creating it)