Saying For Today: We could say, God is I AM, and I AM by and in God - but, again, how can words do more than intimate Truth?
Everyone is Welcome Here
Living in Love beyond Beliefs
*A Ray of Sunshine, Angelasgorlon, Flickr
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All that is necessary to awaken to yourself as the radiant emptiness of spirit is to stop seeking something more or better or different, and to turn your attention inward to the awake silence that you are.
*Adyashanti
We do not get from separation to communion to Union, rather, already we are Union. Separation and communion is the play, the dance, of Oneness. We may, even after awakening to Union, have times of the dance of separation or communion. Now, we know this is the play of Grace, a play neither right nor wrong, neither true nor untrue, simply a manifestation of Grace. So, there is no need to resist separation or communion, but let them be, and they will dissolve again into the Union. Relax, watch the dance, the movement, and embrace these changing states. You know Union is not a state of body and mind, all passing, but the Source of the dance, the Dancer, eternal and infinite. Embrace the dance, and you embrace the Dancer. Love the dance, and you love the Dancer.
*Arem Nahariim-Samadhi
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For many years, I sought escape from life, and spiritual theory and practice was central to this blessed escape. Why blessed?
First, this was partly essential to survive and reconnect with Life and self, and others, in a new, healthier way. I came to realize that little boy, as a child, was different for a reason and that difference manifested a unique note in the Song of Life. To embrace oneself is a gift to others and yourself and is not selfish, but godly. Yet, some of us do not "fit in," and so, due to the misunderstanding and fear of others, come to soak in their messages that we are "un-fit," when we simply are not like most persons.
Then, a detachment from life and others was necessary to a new joining with others and life. Often we have to go through a painful separation, even isolation, or we find no other way, to go through the spiritual transformation that births into awareness the Self we truly are, not the personality that we have, or appear to have.
This Newness, now, I am learning to be, so to speak. I am learning that I am most known by others when I am not trying to make myself known to anyone. In realizing I am (and I am we are) Presence, not a mere person, or personality, or ego, that Presence shines of Its own nature:Self-divulgence. That is, Presence does not need the help of ego consciousness to appear: Presence is already, always present as Presence. I am learning from the felt-frustration of trying to be known by others - as though sharing information about myself is the way I am known -, I can only be known about in information, not known. So, it seems odd, but I find when I am quietly not trying to be known, simply letting Being be amid others, they seem to connect with me more. This is like saying the Sun shines, and through the shine, I know the Sun. The Sun does not try to shine, It does not try to make itself known. The Sun is the Sun, and that is enough to the Sun. The Self is, likewise, in that Presence Itself has inspired a transcendence of the felt-need to be known. We can, then, rest in that Presence, even while acting among others or sharing with others - then, this is simply Presence with Presence. So, when there is a pull outward to try to assert an understanding of myself onto another, a subject-object separation is formed, and I sense the frustration of this move away from simple Knowing. We are best known in and by Silence, and we learn that Presence moves from Silence and, so, Silence does not cease even when we are talking with others or acting with them.
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I, too, sense this in regard to my knowing others. Today, in worship, with relaxed body-mind, I had little interest in connecting with the message of what was being said and sung. Yet, I could sense a Connection with the persons taking part in ritual in worship, but not merely as personalities. That is, I was Knowing them - though I knew little about them, and most of their names I do not recall. And this Knowing comes into the mind with the association Beautiful. Yet, this Communion, Presence with Presence, is transpersonal and the word "Beautiful" is a word drawn into mind as an association with Something even more beautiful. We might point toward this, again ineptly, as the Beautiful. That is, the Beautiful happens in this meeting of Presence with Presence, or Presence knowing Presence in Communion. And, yet, This Itself does not merely transcend the duality of other and self, but arises from and awakens us to the Truth beyond Presence with Presence, and That is Presence. This Knowing is arising out of the singularity and simplicity of God, or Goddess, which I often call Grace or Presence.
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The summation of this writing is that the calling to a deeper and deeper Communion leads us to relearn how to live and act. And part of this is, we have known an egoic-self sense that is always wanting to be known and seeking to be known by asserting itself into others' lives like objects, and may complain that it is not being known, not loved, not this or that from others. Here, we are learning to relax and trust Presence to make Itself known as Itself, and that we are under no compulsion to make an agenda out of being known. Communion is not an agenda. Grace appears as Grace. I AM within the Presence that knows Itself-in-Itself. That Knowing, or Union, yes, seeks connection as Knowing-with-Knowing, or Communion. In this Sharing, Presence with Presence, there is Self-Divulgence naturally and effortlessly. We simply allow the mind, with its agendas, to move aside, like cloud mass from before the Sun. In some way, God wants to know God and, therefore, arises Communion. Nature itself is Communion, the play of God, or Goddess. We could say, God is I AM, and I AM by and in God - but, again, how can words do more than intimate Truth?
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The person surrendering to this way of Presence does not lose the ego. The ego is part of the self-consciousness that is integral to the human experience. The ego, then, through spiritual practice and conscious living, has to be reeducated to live, repeatedly, as we are drawn more intimately into Grace-as-Grace. And there is no textbook on how to do this. For each one of us, the way will be distinctive to the journey of God, or Goddess, within us each.
