Uradiance

3 a.m. It's important to say that nothing matters but the one that is always already here, the gesture of a magnanimous hand sweeping through the void, the hand of Nobody. Being goes on without me. Surrender to what never sleeps. Abyss enfolds us with indescribable tenderness before we are created. Why not return here with every breath? No need to be reminded when there is no mind. Love is who I Am when I make no effort to be anything else. Inhalation begins, but no one is breathing. Rest in me, Beloved. I will rest in You. We were never not pouring into one another like currents of stillness. It is important to say that nothing matters but abysmal love. Collage of my words by Rashani

Perfectly at ease in a world of imperfections, Love feels no compunction to change what is constantly changing and dissolving anyway. This is all a net made of water. At the instant when formless Beauty takes the form of a leaf, a pebble, or a human face, She whispers this secret verse: "Just as it is, just as it is..." Why not listen to that whisper? After all, it is your breath. Every moment, millions of parched lips press the rim of your heart-chalice, thirsty for what pours down from the fountain behind you eyes, overflowing into the world. Why not be the fermenter of darkness, the wine steward of Christ-Consciousness? You are infinitely younger than your thoughts about time. If you drown in the unfathomable distance between one end of a raindrop and the other, you will hear the cries and songs of countless unborn children, whose bodies are like pollen suspended in sap. What can their tears tell you? How to float in a sea of wonder. What will you...

Happy birthday to the chubby boy with the wise old elephant's head riding on a mouse who nibbles everything in sight. The world could be saved by elder wisdom in a prankster, guided by the tiny energy of fur. ~ Have a blessed Ganesh Chaturtih

New Moon Meditation... Dark phase purity... Opalescence of perfect night... Only blackness gives birth to stars. Confession: I gave up going to meditation and yoga courses at the ashram. Not because I gave up meditation and yoga - not at a ll. But because I grew weary with the Cult of the All-Obliterating Smile - the one you wear to let people know how "spiritual" you've become - and the tyranny of compulsive celebration.   There are times when I don't need to smile or celebrate. Times when a tear contains tomorrow's sun. There's a time for the rigor and nakedness of the budless twig. Otherwise, there could be no blossom. There's a time when I honor the Being of emptiness, deeper than joy. At this very moment, golden alder leaves are falling... If we're not at home with weariness and sorrow, not comfortable around uncertainty or grief, then we haven't arrived on Earth. Light's cotyledon in darkness, seed of crepuscule in Aut...

Took these photos on a hike to one of my favorite secret shrines in nature,  where the spirit of the mountain blessed me in the form of a white moth,  and the goddess of beauty came in the form of a gold moth.  Om Ma Tahomaya Namah!     Each wing a mountain shimmering in emptiness, white moth, blue aster. Walked out in the alpine flowers to photograph this moth close up,  but it fluttered away. So I returned to the path and stood still.  The golden moth - was it the same one? - danced over to me,  right up to the camera, and settled on the nearest flower next to  my hand. Then she turned her back and posed her wings for me.  Nature feels and responds to our appreciation of beauty.         This vain golden moth posed on the nearest flower just to steal my heart...

In the beginning there were no temples, mosques or churches. Worship was never indoors. The sacred space was the garden, where the man and woman practiced rituals of holy agriculture, following the ceremony of the seasons. They planted, s ang seeds up, harvested, and danced the wine. Conceiving no difference between heaven and earth, they made no  sacrifices on an alter, but left generous portions of their harvest in the field for the poor and the wanderer. This was their offering. The inner sanctum of their sacred space was the heart, and the most holy sacrament was breathing, poured into the flame of divine love. Each woman a priestess, and every man a priest, each home a temple, and every breath a prayer; so in each would be increased the mystery that was everywhere.

My Higher Ego disciplines my Lower Ego under the angelic guidance of my Guardian Ego, and I have even had glimpses of liberation: the fully expanded Ego. Besides, I can always pray to my supreme Ego, whom I call God.... Ah Me! How do I know that my spiritual practice makes me a better person? Is there something in silence that dissolves my negative tendencies and nurtures my positive ones? Or will a bank robber who meditates just become a calmer bank robber? Surely the key is my intention . Intention is the link between the field of karma and the field of silence.  As Patanjali points out in his Yoga Sutras, there is a subtle technique called samyama . Samyama means that my awareness can form an intention just before I dissolve into formless samadhi . It is like holding a seed, then dropping it into a dark furrow. Samyama is the link between moral and spiritual practice. This is why the eight limbs of Yoga include the Yamas and Niyamas , the do's and don'ts of ethica...

To make affirmations of abundance expresses lack.  To pray for strength confesses weakness.  To ask for healing is to be sick.  Simply to embrace what is may be a deeper prayer.... I embrace 'poverty,' I expand into emptiness, I don't ask for 'more.'  Is the universe not born from a boundless vacuum?  Not fearing the void, I ripple with wealth. I confess that I am powerless in utter surrender.  To abandon striving is to discover pre-existent fullness,  immoveable strength, nearer than the next breath... I accept my dis-ease, I welcome brokenness, I hug this body.  In non-resistance, unity; in unity, healing. This very moment I refuse to generate conflict  by changing suchness into 'should.' I nestle into wholeness,  and little things begin to happen majestically. All that greens with nectar, all that buzzes with life,  emerges from what Is.

Happiness and sorrow are ripples on the surface of existence. But the depth of Being is deeper than happiness, deeper than sorrow, beyond loss or gain. The ripples of loss and gain, happiness and sorrow, represent 0.00001% of existence. The rest is an ocean of silence. We desperately expend most of our energy seeking gain and avoiding loss. Gain only brings loss, as the wave brings the trough. Gain is temporary, but loss is a portal to eternity. Gain is relative, but loss is the way to the absolute. The absolute is the bliss of silence. Ananda, or bliss, is as distinct from joy as from sadness, though it may bubble up through either, as laughter or tears. Bliss is not a gain, an acquisition of anything. It is the embrace of no-thing. Bliss is the profundity of loss, abysmal and without hope of regaining what has been abandoned. Bliss abandons even the story called "me," with its past and future. With the loss of "me," what sinks beneath the joy-sorrow ripples ...

From a distance, Truth may be defined and turned into a concept. But when actually lived, Truth is the radiance of subjectivity, the energy of Presence. Truth that can be explained is second-hand Truth. But living Truth,  first-hand Truth, is an incomprehensible explosion of transparency, shattering all concepts, precipitating particles of the universe as ashes of wonder. Better than any religious or political belief is to live at the center of that explosion, in the chaos of delight, beyond explanations. I hope that I have made this clear without giving you anything to believe in.

For just a moment, let's breathe down and settle our awareness in this body, to experience our own atoms, photons and neutrinos. Who among us is not made out of the same sunlight, the same star stuff? Race, culture, sexuality, religion are significant waves playing on the surface of our life, but in the depths of the heart, humanity is one golden Radiance. This is not an esoteric secret. It is the experience of every child.

Perfection is very small. Imperfection is vast. This is the dance. When we feel anxious about the state of the world, it is because we look through too wide a lens. The universe is not painted with a large brush, but with the tip of a hair. Usually they tell us to see the big picture. I say, break down the big picture into its tiniest pixels, and see perfection everywhere. Each moment, a thousand opportunities for small acts of kindness surround us, the sacraments of which a whole world may be composed. The most infinitesimal photon, though existing for a fraction of an instant, is virtually infinite in charge. This is a fact of quantum energy. Your body is made from pure radiant dust-motes of infinity. See the world as a Pointillist painting by a master Impressionist. When in doubt, reduce creation to the Ayn Soph, אין סוף, the dimensionless dot at the heart of every particle. Look under a blade of grass into the kingdom of the ladybug. Gaze at a raindrop on the tip o...

There was no Golden Age in the past. There will be no Golden Age in the future. That is just a desperate mythology enabling us to live vicariously through our dreams. The wavering mind likes to wander into fantasies about time. The only age is Now. Our own awareness chooses whether to turn this moment into Gold or Stone.

Very intelligent people spend a great deal of their lives feeling offended and outraged. They call this "politics." Could the world survive without my feeling offended? What would I do with my abundant energy and spacious heart if I simply dropped my outrage?

The heart is not just a blood pump, but an energy field whose center is this breath, whose circumference expands beyond the stars. Use it to embrace both beauty and conflict. Use it as a touchstone to transmute the lead of anger into the gold of love. This world needs the alchemy of your heart. When anger flashes up, it is always in the present moment. I can choose to embrace it and erase it. I can taste its energy in my body, then let it go. Or I can upload my anger as a concept, a file in my mental hard drive. In this instant, anger is a useful surge. Passing through my nerves, anger can be energize. The danger is not to feel anger. Even Jesus felt it flare up and dissolve. The danger is, to hold onto anger and nurture it. When I feel it without resistance in the present moment, the pure smokeless flame of anger leaves no toxic residue. Anger converts to free energy, the clarity of awareness.

The human was very disappointed with God, and God was quite disappointed with the human. So they decided to meet personally and work out their issues. This is the story of their meeting. It was person to person, but it lasted thousands of years. From our point of view, we call it "evolution." The human was disappointed that God hadn't taken better care of her, and God was disappointed that the human hadn't shown more response-ability for herself. When they met, the human complained, talking constantly for several thousand years. This she called "prayer." God listened patiently to the prayer, but did not reply. Finally the human ran out of words, sighed deeply, and said, "OK, God, now I guess you can speak." The human waited uncomfortably for centuries in silence, but God said nothing. Finally the truth dawned on the human, who exclaimed, "My God, you are mute! All this time we made up stories about your Word, your Gospel, yo...

My words rendered visually by Klaus Ostendorf . Thank you, Klaus.

The gleam of every smile is refracted through a tear, yet every tear reflects the light of countless suns. This is the mystery of Earth dwelling. Earth is a plane where energy vibrates midway between heaven and hell, light and darkness, joy and sorrow, where the balance of opposites offers constant opportunities to awaken and choose. Gods wait for aeons to be born here as human beings, for earth is the only plane that offers liberation from the bondage of clinging to one extreme or the other. Here I walk the razor's edge, free to decide with each breath whether to fill my hearts with love or anger, compassion or despair. Here I participate in the radical revolution, the revolution that happens when I realize that just one person is responsible for my misery, just one person is responsible for my happiness. And my happiness, or my misery, is a drop that flavors the whole ocean of the world. The crisis of earthly existence forces me to give up waiting for a savior, or...

Given the opportunity to practice the effortless and graceful technique of transcendental meditation, many spiritual seekers try it and reject it, not because it fails to work , but because it works so well. We are tempted to reject TM because it is too impersonal . By this, we really mean that we do not want to transcend our mind completely. We are afraid to transcend all thinking. We wish to settle down into a comfortable rest, but at the same time hold on to our most delicious thoughts. Yet it is the total transcendence of all thought that opens our awareness to the Infinite Being. If we hold onto even the most delicate tissue of thought, the floodgate of Being will not open, and we will still remain attached to the relative. We won't surrender and plunge into the Absolute. Other meditation practices cling to some faint thought, some remnant of relative mind. It may be the thought of one's Guru, the feeling of devotion, the name and form of our favorite deity,...

My argumentative, reactive, karmic mind resists the truth that sets me free. At my core is Being: eternal, self-luminous, untainted by external circumstance. Whatever happens, Being remains boundless, immaculate and free. The nature of this Being is pure love. Truly, the world is 0.000001% activity: the rest is stillness. Opening my awareness to the stillness of Being is the most crucial step I can take to save my world from disaster. I need not travel anywhere to find it, for Being is nearer than my next breath, blossoming in divine silence before I think one thought. Even before 'I' am, the fullness of Being is. https://www.facebook.com/TMmeditation?hc_location=timeline

Even though the people are in mourning, Hafiz wanted us to keep this tavern open all night long.   I've come to teach your wolves how to howl; I've come to teach screeching and frolicking to your alley cat souls.   I've come bearing loss in a full cup - drink it down.   We stumble on a body at the tip of every shadow in this brief world;  Some die of pain, some of ecstasy; it's the choice we make, the reason we are here.   Lord I love this bee-mused vine-tangled abandonment land of berry cobbler topped with a scoop of vanilla moon.   I was already drunk when I arrived, but I still care who takes me home.   Have you been saving your seven bottles of love wine just for tonight?  We can handle them, dear, if we work together.   You're thirsty, I'm thirsty, God is thirsty too; but it's all one Thirst.

The gnat said to the caterpillar, "Don't waste time in a cocoon. Teach yourself to fly like me." But the caterpillar felt a strange longing: the cry of imaginal cells from her womb. So she wove a cocoon of weeping and faith, then sank deep into the myst ery of silence. The gnat said, "She's doing nothing in there." Then the gnat curled up and died in the frost on a withered weed. After a timeless swim through the void, a quiver arose on the tip of a twig, an ugly bundle of hardened mucus cracked and burst like an old wound, and a double rainbow of glistening April unfurled its pure idea of flight. She awoke wondering, "Who is moving, these wings or the sky?" She imagined her translucent body as the world, and so it was. She imagined the world as her translucent body, and so it was. And so it is. Never say that nothing happens in the deep cocoon of meditation. Silence is infinite transformation. But when you come out, you must not ...

When my path wanders away from the center, doubling back to where I've been before, and I gaze with mysterious compassion at the one walking beside me in the opposite direction, just for a moment, before the Way sweeps me off into aloneness again, to be infinitely near and infinitely far from You, then I remember that everywhere I go is a detour, every detour is a perfect spiral, and every footfall lands at the center of this flowering omnipresent heart. All my walking, then, is the gentle breath of Presence, step by step dissolving any notion of a path, into the space where I Am, always already here with you.

I offer whatever I do, and let it go. Letting it go is what turns the world. Not the effort, but dropping the effort in the action, like a finger writing on water. I do not know if what I do could move the world, or change anything, or if the world is a great circle, ever returning. I do know that each of us is a butterfly wing, moving a breath of air that lifts a wisp of pollen and blows it away, to fall on its dust-mote-mate in a distant meadow, spawning a flower that will be given to a lady, who will glance into a pair of longing eyes and reconsider his soul,  and fall in love, conceiving an infant who  will grow up into a farmer, whose wheat will nourish a poet who will inspire a teacher to  empower a child to become a doctor who will save  a baby's life, that she might grow into a spiritual  teacher, who could move the world a little closer  to its heart.

What is written in tongues of fire cannot be burned. The tragedy of every great religion is mistaking the Word of God for a book. In truth, the divine Word is never written on paper or scroll. What is written is only a shadow of the Word, and what is translated from the ancient language is but the blurred reflection of a shadow. The real Book of Life is the luminous vibration of consciousness in its own eternal silence. And to comprehend true scripture, we must take our awareness to the Spirit that inspired it. Hidden in the mystical teachings of all great religions is the knowledge that the real revelation of scripture is not found in any book, but is written in the fiery silence of the void before anything is created. In Christianity, this Word is the pre-existent Logos, eternally vibrating in the ocean of consciousness before God speaks, "Let there be light." This Word may become flesh in Jesus, then in us. The Bible itself says that the image of God on earth is i...

We could end war by dissolving the tension, the enmity in our own nervous system, that we project onto others, turning them into the "enemy." This message from Maharishi is meant not for the defenders, but for the aggressors. It is the agg ressors who are the most fearful, stressed and unhappy of people. A stress-free nervous system acts spontaneously in harmony with the laws of nature, and in harmony with the environment. Then mind is clear and unclouded as a mountain stream, with no extraneous thoughts. But stress in the nervous system clouds and distorts thinking in the mind, which is projected onto the world as "enemies" and "barriers." Our world is as our consciousness is. The world is filled with projections of our fear and aggression because our nervous systems have become weak and stressed. The aggression of Israel and the U.S. arms merchants is a sign of their weakness, not strength. Harmonious nervous system reflects clear self...

The nature of mind is this: there is only one thing happening in the world, and it is a bad problem. The nature of reality is this: there are an infinite number of things happening in the world, some are problems, some are moments of great beauty.... But for the most part, all over the earth, people are performing their daily tasks in peace. Mothers are nursing babies. Kids are kicking soccer bal ls. Birds are singing in forests. Families are gathering to pray and eat and laugh. Young scientists are inventing new sustainable energy technologies. And billions of creatures are sleeping under the silent stars. Despite the constant barrage of terror generated by the images of corporate media, the vast majority of places on earth are bathed in the light of the ordinary, and at any given moment are at peace. At this instant, a thousand possibilities for kindness surround each of us. Yet, due to the nature of mind, we focus on our toothache, and magnify it, sharing our su...

Could the solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict be something so simple that it does not demand governments or political treaties? Could it merely be our willingness to sit in a circle on the sacred land, which belongs to both peoples, and breathe together? Breathe the same breath, the same Spirit. Breathe the name of God, "Allah-Elohim." Not a gathering to argue, but to listen in silence to the Spirit-song, the breath of the heart, cleansing past and future trauma through intense Presence. When there is conflict, we have three choices. We can ignore the conflict. We can identify with the conflict, taking one side or the other, and fueling the fire. Or we can choose a third way: Embrace the conflict. When we embrace the conflict, we hold both sides in one light, the light of the heart. Then we become the field of conscious energy that diffuses the polarity. The choice of the third way is always available. But too often, we don't want to do this work of heali...

Pay attention to the river of light inside every breath. It will carry you to the sea of silence. Beauty heals in the dark. Just before they close, wounds gleam.