LEAN JUST BEYOND YOUR EDGE (the eternal free fall of home... in love with this phrase)

Once you are honest with yourself about your real edge, it is best to lean just beyond it. Very few  have the guts for this practice. Most either settle for the easy path or self-aggrandize themselves by taking the extreme hard path. Your insecurity may cause you to doubt yourself, and so you take the easy way, not even approaching your real edge or your real gift. Alternatively, your insecurity may lead you to push, push, push, seeking to become victorious over your own sense of lack.

Both approaches avoid your actual condition in the moment, which is often fear. If you are stressfully avoiding your fear, you cannot relax into the fearless.

Your fear is the sharpest definition of your self. You should know it. You should feel it virtually constantly. Fear needs to become your friend, so that you are no longer uncomfortable with it. Rather, primary fear shows you that you are at your edge. Staying with the fear, staying at your edge, allows real transformation to occur. Neither lazy nor aggressive, playing your edge allows you to perceive the moment with the least amount of distortion. You are willing to be with what is, rather than trying to escape it by pulling back from it, or trying to escape it by pushing beyond it into some future goal.

Fear of fear may lead you to hang back, living a lesser life than you are capable. Fear of fear may lead you to push ahead, living a false life, off-center, tense and missing the moment. But the capacity to feel this moment, including your fear, without trying to escape it, creates a state of alive and humble spontaneity. You are ready for the unknown as it unfolds, since you are not pulled back or pushed forward from the horizon of the moment. You are hanging right over the edge.

By leaning just beyond your fear, you challenge your limits compassionately, without trying to escape the feeling of fear itself. You step beyond the solid ground of security with an open heart. You stand in the space of unknowingness, raw and awake. Here, the gravity of deep being will attend you to the only place where fear is obsolete: the eternal free fall of home. Where you always are.
Own your fear, and lean just beyond it. In every aspect of your life. Starting now.

THE TRUTH OF MEDITATION

The truth of meditation
is very different
from the dream of meditation.

We often go into meditation
expecting bliss, joy, unending peace,
an end to all pain.

But meditation has its own intelligence,
its own way.
Sometimes doubt, sorrow, even heartbreak
want to dance with us in meditation.

Let them in. Give them space.

Let meditation be a giant field
in which EVERY thought, sound, sensation,
urge, impulse, fantasy
is allowed to come, stay for a while, and leave.

Let the dream of meditation shatter.
Let the plans crumble.
Let the expectations fall away.

Let meditation be what it is:
an all-embracing space,
a vastness allowing all,
as the sky allows the weather,
as the Sun shines
on the 'good' and 'bad' alike,
making no distinction,
giving freely its Light.

The dream of meditation is control;
the truth of meditation is love.

This picture just broke my heart... with it's honest vulnerability

Questioner: What is the difference between awareness and sensitivity?
Jiddu Krishnamurti:I wonder if there is any difference? You know, when you ask a question, what is important is to find out for yourself the truth of the matter and not merely accept what someone else says. So let us find out together what it is to be aware.

You see a lovely tree with its leaves sparkling after the rain; you see the sunlight shining on the water and on the gay-hued feathers of the birds; you see the villagers walking to town carrying heavy burdens, and hear their laughter; you hear the bark of a dog, or a calf calling to its mother. All this is part of awareness, the awareness of what is around you, is it not? Coming a little closer, you notice your relationship to people, to ideas and to things; you are aware of how you regard the house, the road; you observe your reactions to what people say to you, and how your mind is always evaluating, judging, comparing or condemning. This is all part of awareness, which begins on the surface and then goes deeper and deeper; but for most of us awareness stops at a certain point. We take in the noises, the songs, the beautiful and ugly sights, but we are not aware of our reactions to them. We say, "That is beautiful" or "That is ugly" and pass by; we don't inquire into what beauty is, what ugliness is. Surely, to see what your reactions are, to be more and more alert to every movement of your own thought, to observe that your mind is conditioned by the influence of your parents, of your teachers, of your race and culture - all this is part of awareness, is it not?

The deeper the mind penetrates its own thought processes, the more clearly it understands that all forms of thinking are conditioned; therefore the mind is spontaneously very still - which does not mean that it is asleep. On the contrary, the mind is then extraordinarily alert, no longer being drugged by mantrams, by the repetition of words, or shaped by discipline. This state of silent alertness is also part of awareness; and if you go into it still more deeply you will find that there is no division between the person who is aware and the object of which he is aware.

Now, what does it mean to be sensitive? To be cognizant of colour and form, of what people say and of your response to it; to be considerate, to have good taste, good manners; not to be rough, not to hurt people either physically or inwardly and be unaware of it; to see a beautiful thing and linger with it; to listen tentatively without being bored to everything that is said, so that the mind becomes acute, sharp - all this is sensitivity, is it not? So is there much difference between sensitivity and awareness? I don't think so.

You see, as long as your mind is condemning, judging, forming opinions, concluding, it is neither aware nor sensitive. When you are rude to people, when you pick flowers and throw them away, when you ill-treat animals, when you scratch your name on the furniture or break the leg of a chair, when you are unpunctual to meals and have bad manners in general, it all indicates insensitivity, does it not? It indicates a mind that is not capable of alert adjustment. And surely it is part of education to help the student to be sensitive, so that he will not merely conform or resist, but will be awake to the whole movement of life. The people who are sensitive in life may suffer much more than those who are insensitive; but if they understand and go beyond their suffering they will discover extraordinary things.

I don’t know....

It is in moments like this when I think of him

When plans fall through

The floor shatters beneath me

And I’m falling away from the anticipated excitement of possibility

Disappointment makes me dream of him

It keeps me company when no one else will

The thing is I don’t know him, yet

I don’t know the creases mapped on his palm

I don’t know the story of the scar etched in his shoulder

Or the freckles speckled across the primer of his nose

I don’t know the soft, thick waves of his hair—a hand-me-down from his mother’s father

Or the imprint of his sandals in the dirt

I don’t know that he puts on his socks before his pants

I don’t know that he laughs inappropriately when he should be quiet

I don’t know that he doesn’t know how to let the discomfort pass without a need to escort it loudly away from the moment

I don’t know that I will teach him how to do that—to let go and just be silent

I don’t know that he loves hot sauce on everything except ice cream

I don’t know that he hates the smell of lavender

I don’t know that when he touches me I’ve never felt safer

I don’t know yet that he lives for the joy of his family

I don’t know that he sends his friends hand written letters because he wants them to know he cares

I don’t know that his heart is as fragile and sensitive as mine

I don’t know yet that we’ve both suffered the same sufferings and we’re scared

I don’t know that we are equally terrified of plans falling through so we decide not to make plans at all

I don’t know that he’s sitting somewhere feeling a rise in his throat

It’s scratchy

He’s trying to clear it

He’s drinking water or getting up to stretch to get rid of the nagging

I don’t know that we both tell ourselves the same thing—I’m better off alone

Trying to convince that aching knowing that there is a her to his him, and a him to my her

I don’t know that we both ignore the agonizing wisdom that the days are rushing by and we won’t ever make it to our 50^th anniversary even though we both thought that’s how it was supposed to be

I don’t know that he’s thinking about her right now

I mean, that he’s thinking about me right now

He doesn’t know that I’ve looked for him in hundreds of hims

I don’t know that he’s done the same and is about to give up

We don’t know that we are both right here, together

Separated by a wall of time

We don’t know that we are both wondering—When? 

When will I meet her?

When will I meet him?

I don’t know

I don’t know.

WHY YOU CANNOT GO WRONG

In reality, your world is set up so that nothing happens to you, but everything happens for you - for your awakening, for your growth, for your inspiration, for your exploration, and ultimately for your healing - even if you forget that, or cannot see it, or sometimes fall into distraction, despair and disillusionment.
When there is no fixed destination, you cannot ever lose your destination, so you cannot ever lose your path, so nothing that happens in your life can take you off your path. Your path IS what happens, and what happens IS your path. There is no other.
Everything is a gift on this unbreakable path that you call your life - the laughter, the tears, the times of great sorrow, the experiences of profound loss, the pain, the confusion, the times you believe you'll never make it, even the overwhelming heartbreak of love - even if you forget that sometimes, or cannot see that sometimes, or lose faith absolutely in the entire show sometimes.
But even the loss of faith in the show is part of the show, and even the scene where 'something goes wrong' is not indicative of the movie going wrong, and so you are always exactly where you need to be, believe it or not, even if you are not.
Life can be trusted absolutely, even when trust seems a million light-years away, and life cannot go wrong, for all is life, and life is all.
Understand this, know it in your heart, and spirituality is profoundly simple, as simple as breathing, as natural as gazing up at the stars at night and falling into silent wonder.
The universe is more beautiful than you could ever imagine.

You are willing to give your heart to others and to this world, for you are seeing that this is why you have come here.

You wondered if as you healed, if as you awakened, you would feel less. But you are seeing that love continues to ask you to feel more. There was an idea that as your heart opened, you would be less vulnerable, less naked, and less exposed – but you are more raw and tender now than you’ve ever been. 

You wondered if as you transformed and stepped fully into the here and now, you would be more detached, not care quite so much, and rest as the ‘witness’ of your life from beyond it all. But, alas, you care so much you are burning up inside. 

You know that things will never be the same, but you still don’t know what is coming next or even where you are, or what is truly being asked of you. This unknowing groundless ground is your home now, and the intelligence and creativity here can feel unbearable. You are being guided by the unseen, the unheard, and the unknown, but this guidance is occurring outside the dense environment of the mind. You are unable any longer to find any sort of reference point from which to orient. 

Look carefully. Stay very close. For this is a sacred disorientation.
The colors, the fragrances, and the sounds of the phenomenal world – it is almost too much. The purples, the blues, the rose, and the birdsong – they have arrived from the other world. It feels like if you allowed the beloved fully inside you that you would fall to the ground in pure astonishment. Yet you long for him or her to fill you. 

As you look up into the morning sky – or into the vastness of dusk – you can’t help but notice that things are colored by a certain tinge of sadness. But this is not the sadness of the mind where something is missing. It is a sadness which is pouring out of your overflowing heart. This sadness is your only yoga now. You are willing to give your heart to others and to this world, for you are seeing that this is why you have come here.
Somehow, by some outrageous grace… the dream of postponement has come to an end. You are here. Now.

A lovely read! May everyone feel this love and connection and so it is!

Dear Soulmate, I have always loved you.

Many may find this strange.
But those who have experienced it will understand completely.
You see, I’ve always loved you.
Always.
Way before I knew you, before you even thought of me and before I even thought of you, I already knew you.
And when I saw you for the very first time, I recognized you instantly.
I puzzled for a while, questioning where I’d saw your face and slowly it came to me.
You were with me all along.
Every small footstep, each long and winding road, every mountain I struggled to climb, was synchronized with each path you were taking.
Though at the time my mind was not alert and I did not pay attention, as I was concentrating on surviving each day—I can see now that nothing was ever in vain.
I will never forget the first words you spoke to me and how your voice resonated deeply inside my chest.
I thought my heart would break through to get to you, but we’d only just met—have patience, sweet organ, I know you’ve been waiting a life time, but, please, beat slowly and keep me calm.
I knew in an instant that I loved you.
I didn’t know whether you drank tea with no sugar, whether you liked honey on your toast or whether you talked sometimes in your sleep.
Neither did I know if this connection would last a moment nor a lifetime, but I did not care, I submerged in how it felt to be in your company, familiar, yet with so much to learn and unravel.
My imagination is wild, but I never dared to believe in someone such as you.
Our electricity connected and you turned me on.
I saw myself for the first time when I looked into your eyes. And you saw us.
You had strengths where I had weaknesses and your weaknesses built up my assets.
You knew me better than I knew myself. You never faltered, you had faith allowed me beyond your surface.
You cracked your heart wide open and you allowed me to freely step in.
We are one and the same, although, so entirely different.
When our fingers met we made our first love right there, without a care for the world, that continued around us.
You touched me in places I never knew existed, I surrendered to your love and I allowed myself to fall.
I gave you everything and you gave me myself in return.
You held out a mirror and I was no longer afraid to look, I could not see me without knowing you first.
Our fragmented pieces smoothly slid firm into place.
You fearlessly drove and you never once doubted our love.
You ran through each bone in my body and then printed your name on my heart.
My veins pulsed wildly when you tenderly showed me your love.
You gave me it all.
And I loved you more.
I had no choice.
There is no reason nor no explanation for love.
You were always the one and I have always loved you.
I waited and you waited and we finally arrived together.

original article here

Sufism

The perfect mystic is not an ecstatic devotee lost in contemplation of Oneness, nor a saintly recluse shunning all commerce with mankind, but “the true saint” goes in and out amongst the people and eats and sleeps with them and buys and sells in the market and marries and takes part in social intercourse, and never forgets God for a single moment. 




 Everything in the world of existence has an end and a goal. The end is maturity and the goal is freedom. For example, fruit grows on the tree until it is ripe and then falls. The ripened fruit represents maturity, and the fallen fruit, freedom. The final goal is returning to one’s origin. Everything which reaches its origin has reached its goal. A farmer sows grain in the ground and tends it. It begins to grow, eventually seeds, and again becomes grain. It has returned to its original form. The circle is complete. Completing the circle of existence is freedom.

Rumi... A couplet

Both our sets of eyes became drunk, Utterly intoxicated by the promise of Union. O my God! What is this union of eye to eye?! ~Rumi

In a language unspoken...

An awakened human can touch the heart of the man/ woman they love without touching them, just by opening their soul and whispering their name. And even then, it’s not the words. The heart can convey expressions of love without anything being said. There is a silent language that two people in love understand, and neither time nor distance is a barrier. When two souls that are meant to be together, meet, their senses are heightened, energy flows, and a deep intimacy is formed, as if the two have known each other from eternity past. That’s the power of the soul and love at work.

I love you and me... Life

When we love with expectations,
we impose ourselves on the other.

Our wants,
our desires,
our pain,
our past,
our thoughts on the way things should be
are imposed on the other.

These things only exist within us,
not in the other,
and they prohibit us from loving freely.

Instead, when we release our expectations
and love freely from our hearts,
we are able to truly enjoy what is.
Who we are.
And who is in front of us.

This kind of love,
free from expectations and desires,
free from ego,
is divine love.

This divine love is naturally within us.
And this is how we experience heaven, indeed.

Fears of being taken advantage of
do not come from a place of love.
If we truly love ourselves,
we will not accept situations that are
not for our highest good.

What we can no longer accept, we can change.

When we come from a place of divine love,
free from expectations and desires,
in a beautiful and fascinating way,
the other responds in a positive way.

The more freely we love, the more life
responds to us in a loving and positive way.

The Sacred Masculine (Shiva) and Feminine (Shakti) : an interesting read

Our fullest potential is found in the weaving and balancing of the Divine Feminine and Divine Masculine energies within ourselves.  Both men and women carry feminine and masculine wisdom and tools.  However, sometimes one or both of these energies is out of balance, silenced, wounded, misunderstood or disrespected.  Men and women throughout time have been both the oppressor and the oppressed. Often it is the self-created oppression of our feelings, wisdom, power, beauty, truth or love that is the ultimate betrayal.  Regardless of your past experiences and choices, you always have the option of embracing each of these energies where they are, and understanding what they need to become more whole and integrated within you for a more balanced Divine version of yourself.

 

The Healthy Divine Feminine offers tenderness, wisdom, patience, nurturing, flexibility and fertility.  Feminine intuition is one of our most powerful tools for guidance, and we all have it.  “She” leads us in the right direction every time.  Who couldn’t benefit from some sound reliable advice in life? When something needs attention or is out of balance, she communicates through the body, the emotions and our thoughts.  When we are not listening or heeding her warnings, the voice gets louder and our discomfort grows.  Out of balance and ignored, she loses self-respect, discernment and the ability to love herself. Could you improve your listening skills to honor this aspect of yourself?

“Her” nature is to love you, guide you, honor you and nurture you.  Can you allow this in?  Where can you be more loving, honoring and nurturing to yourself?  She is creative and playful and loves to be in nature.  Your Divine Feminine is also the midwife to all that you are here to birth-ideas, businesses, children, art, books, products, systems +++.  She supports the whole process of seed planting, germination, incubation, nourishment and harvesting.  Everyone is here to birth something! If you work together, your Divine Feminine will help you connect with your Divine seed and steward you and the seed through the birthing process with ease and grace. In connecting with this wise and caring aspect of yourself, you will feel more peaceful, nourished and supported.

 

The Healthy Divine Masculine is fearless, courageous and loyal.  “He” is our guardian protector.  When in balance, the masculine protector does no harm.  His gentle strength brings harmony and peace to where there was conflict and separation.  He knows his power but does not abuse or misuse it.  Are you using your power (words, actions, dollars and resources) in ways that unite or separate, create or destroy? He is a leader and is not afraid to speak the truth even if others disagree.  He is courageously fierce in standing for what is right. What do you stand for?  Are your choices in life reflecting this?

The Divine Masculine is not afraid of the unknown.  He enjoys adventure and exploring new territory.  He believes in himself and knows he will succeed if his intentions are clear and actions aligned.  The unhealthy masculine is stagnant, stifled, afraid to fail or an overpowering bully.  When you heal those parts of “him” that are hurt, stifled or misunderstood and you team Him with the love and wisdom of the Divine Feminine, the combination is pure perfection.

 

When working in harmony, the Sacred Union of the Divine Feminine and Masculine can unite, heal and create ANYTHING!!!  The synergy created by this balanced union catalyzes the forces of creation into manifestation.  The love that is possible when birthed from this union is that of the unconditional sacred heart of Divine Source.  By balancing, healing, honoring and integrating our Divine Feminine and Masculine energies, we write a new future for ourselves, humanity and this planet.

 

 

The beautiful Stranger speaks...

Okay, I plead guilty...

I noticed you before you did me. How could I not? Your being just took my breath away... your smile, the way you tucked that unruly strand of hair behind your ear, the way you stood aside to let someone else go before you... yes, your beauty, but it was more than just what you looked like that stirred my heart. I felt your soul, your light... your shine sparkled, even the sunshine seemed to dance around you... I could just not look away. 
 I kept staring at you, willing you to turn around and look at me and you did!
I could see your anger, see that (as you said) you were livid with me. I could see that this one exchange of glances changed your life... because it changed mine as well. If you felt like you were mine, I felt it too. That we belonged together, that we had always been together, maybe on a distant star.

I longed to just walk up to you and hug you, just pull you gently in to my arms and just hold you forever. I wanted to create a beautiful world just for you, a world where your smile would always be safe. I wanted to be the reason behind your joy, your happiness, your pleasure in life. I wanted it all to be because of me. 
I know, dearest heart, that you look at me from the corner of your eyes, simply because I am doing the same. 

Let us just acknowledge this feeling, this love between us and give it up to God. If it is meant to manifest, it will. Know that it already is and always will be.

Till then, know that I walk with you, in all your moments, as I know you do with me, holding each other in loving thoughts and clear intent.
...

Peace Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy;

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

A Dream Within A Dream - Poem by Edgar Allan Poe

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

I choose to love you in silence,
for in silence I find no rejection.

I choose to love you in loneliness,
for in loneliness no one owns you but me.

I choose to adore you from a distance,
for distance will shield me from pain.
I choose to kiss you in the wind,
for the wind is gentler than my lips.

I choose to hold you in my dreams,
for in my dreams, you have no end.
~Rumi

You are an ocean, you are an ore.

If you are me and I am you,
What is this separation between you and me?

We are the light of God, we are God‛s mirror.
So why do we struggle with ourselves and with one another?

Why does one light escape from another?
Come, release yourself from this ego.
Live in harmony with everyone;
Be friendly with everyone.
If you are by yourself,
You are only one drop, one speck;
Whereas when you bond and unite with everyone,
You are an ocean, you are an ore.
~ Rumi

THE JOY OF DESIRE...paradox of divinity and humanity

It's not wrong to want. 

Spiritual awakening, enlightenment, liberation, is often framed as the total annihilation of human wants, desires, needs.
This is a terrible misunderstanding that keeps so many people stuck, numb, bored, disconnected, at war with their bodies.

You'll be free from desire when you are a corpse.

The Buddha tried annihilating his desires, remember. It didn't work. Eventually he gave up and embraced them instead. This is the Middle Way.

Wants do not disappear in awakening. In fact, no thought or feeling does. It's your relationship with them that radically shifts. 

Now, you recognise yourself as the ever-present vastness in which ALL wants, urges, impulses, thoughts, sensations, feelings, sounds, can come and go; the unending sky in which the weather doesn't need to 'disappear', but can flourish. Come rain, come shine, come desire, come sorrow, come joy, come despair, you remain, as the wide open space that holds it all.

No more numbing wants, or denying them in order to appear 'spiritual'; yet no need to rush towards their fulfilment either, always running towards the future, fleeing a sense of lack. There is a deeper fulfilment, rooted in your own presence, that notices wants, bows to them, listens to them, yet is not their slave.

You see, you are the paradox of divinity and humanity, absolute and relative, formless and form:
You want nothing but can deeply honour your wants.
You need nothing but can learn to bow to your needs, see their sacredness.
You desire nothing but can hold desire, play with it, see its beauty, its intelligence; and know that all desire, deep down, is really the desire for Self.

As a little one, it was healthy to want food, to need love, to desire objects, to explore your own boundaries, test your limits, feel thwarted, then vindicated, then frustrated, then relieved, taste your own power, learn to honour your powerlessness, touch your freedom and your physical limitations. 

Desirelessness is a numb state, a state where you are afraid of desire and become its slave; it is not freedom.

And wanting the end of wanting is the biggest want of all.

You deserve love, little one. You deserve all the spiritual riches of life. You are precious, and all the mountains and trees and oceans and stars bow to you as you walk, for they recognise themselves in you, share your power, feel your heart.

Jeff Foster

Remember By Christina Rossetti

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