Enlightenment: The Ego, what is it? How to transcend it.

[Guish]

Nothing can replace experience. Please read the following zen story.

Once upon a time, there were a father and a son of a family in a busy city. The father was a very skillful thief in the city. He was getting older and older and worried about his son, who was still rather young and knew nothing about his great art, would not be able to take care of himself and the great art will be missing when he dies. Afterall, the time was coming.

One late night, he made his son came along with him to a rich family at the center of the city. They hid themselves in a bush in the backyard of the rich family and were waiting until there were no more people by-passed on the street and all the members of the family were in deep sleep. And both of them started digging and digging and made a narrow and short tunnel passed under the wall and opened up inside the house. Both of them finally were in there. They saw many antique expensive things, and jewery, and diamonds, and gems... sitting on the desks in the treasure-room. The father took some jewery and diamonds, then quitely walked to the tunnel. The son was still picking up some more and did not know his father was gone until he was ready to be gone with him.

But there were many loud noises was made by his father outside the wall to wake up the people in the house. He was so upset with his father's actions but he could not do anything stop him.

Meanwhile, the homeowner lit up lamps and tried to find thieves. He knew he could not escape right away, and his eyes glanced around in seconds, he saw a big box with a lid on. Immediately, he opened the box and put himself in there and covered the lid gently to avoid making any noises. He kept himself as silent as he could in the box. When one of the people held a lamp coming close to him. He opened the lid, came out, blew out the lamp and ran back to the tunnel. People were running after him in his direction but he was faster than they were and he got into the tunnel quickly.

When he got out the tunnel and on the wayside he came to a well which he had seen before he got in the house. He picked up a rather big stepstone near the well and threw it into the well make a sound like a man falling into it.
People now got to the spot and thought that the thief should be falling into the very deep well and would be drowsy and dead in a short time and they got back into the house and got more sleep.

When the son was back to his house, his father was very glad to see his son back home in safe.
The son was still very upset with his father and complained:
-Why did you do that to me? You wanted me arrested there?
His father quietly said:
-Congratulations! My son. From now on you are able to take care of yourself. So, I will not worry about you anymore."

The art of teaching and learning in Zen is something similar to this art. No Scriptures, no Bible could help you in a situation like that. You are on your own in any situation you'd be in. At that moment you are wisdom and wisdom is you.

[Wind]

Everybody is invited to this bon fire.
Throw all your questions.
Throw all the answers as well.
Throw all your cares.
Have that much courage.
Say I have no time for answers anymore.
Put everything into this fire.
And do it now also.
This is the instant way.
Throw everything now.
No practice,
No philosophy.
But who can do it, you see?
Be willing to be completely empty.
Don't even be a woman.
Don't be a seeker.
Don't be anything.
Don't say any more prayers.
Don't chant any more mantras.
Don't go on any more pilgrimages.
Leave everything, because up till now even your seeking is an avoidance,
another excuse of your mind not to discover the ever-present truth.
Our minds want to say a lot about truth.
But nothing it says is true.
You are here before the mind.
You know it's ways.
This is why I say
throw everything in the fire right now.
It seems very drastic, my words,
but they are totally powerful.
Why keep walking around with the mind on your back?
Put him down and walk away free.

~ Mooji

[Guish]

Hi Friends,

Find an interesting article on the link below.

http://goodlifezen.com/letting-go-is...-as-giving-up/

[Wind]

"In a world of constantly changing scenes, fortunes, health, and relationships, a precious possession is the knowledge that there is the unseen Unchanging Real. Still more precious is awareness within oneself of ITS ever-presence."

"The mind interprets its own experience in a particular way because, owing to its structure, it could not do so in another way. But these limitations are not eternal and absolute. When, as in dream, yoga, death, or hallucination, they are abruptly loosened, then experience is interpreted in a new and different way."

"If he will try to perceive the mind by which he perceives the world, he will be practising the shortest, most direct technique of discovering the Overself. This is what Ramana Maharshi meant when he taught, "Trace the `I' to its source."

"Be still and know that I am God" is the key to the enigma of truth, for it sums up the whole of the Short Path. Paradox is the final revelation. For this is "non-doing." Rather is it a "letting-be," a non-interference by your egoistic will, a silencing of all the mental agitation and effort."

"If God is everywhere, as He must be, then He is in man too. This fact makes possible his discovery, under certain conditions, of a diviner element in his being which is ordinarily obscured."

~ Paul Brunton

[Wind]

I come to call you Home.
Those who resonate with my words and follow them internally,
will find that place and know It's completeness, its joy and fullness.
I have come to call you away from suffering,
from fear and from a life of sorrow and into your own, divine Being.

I did not come here to give you decorative stories, to excite your imagination,
or sign you up for some long program but to show you how available Truth is,
and to remind you that you are never separate from It.

No person on this planet is apart from the Truth in the Heart
and yet the world is so vast and varied in expression.
The greatest good and greatest evil is here.
In this forest of duality and complexity you must find your way Home.

You must win your Self back. Wisdom and trust will be your compass.
Many voices came to call us but we are here today because
we are freshly called by the voice of God, Love, Truth.
Do not come half way home, but fully home.

I know the voice that called you is true and Truth
and that where you are being called to is also Real.
It is inside your own Heart.
It is what gives me the strength to be here.

I love to see the beings being set free from the hypnosis of conditioning;
from fears, false projection and the grip of ego.
And I know that to be liberated is not difficult.

It requires only openness and the sincere desire to be free.
I don't need to hear anything about your past.
Your stories are of no interest to me.
That is not how I know you.

I know you only through your Heart.
That is my true connection with you -
the living power of God.
It is That which I respond to in you
and it is only This that I know.

I can only keep reminding you of It by pointing you again and again to the obvious in yourself.
Now you must respond to my pointing.
This will complete this yoga of seeing.

Find and be one with That which is imperishable.
Be merged in the Absolute.
Don't go to sleep.

~ Mooji

[Wind]

"When one is up against an especially difficult situation for which no immediate solution can be found, it will help him if he will use the time while waiting for the change--which will come--in order to deliberately cultivate greater patience and forebearance, as well as a more objective attitude."

- Paul Brunton

[Wind]

You ask, ‘What breaks this spell of delusion? Is it determination?’
No. The Self does not need determination.
You don’t need some extra strength, courage or blessing.
You don’t need anything, for you are perfect and beyond need.
You are Truth itself, but presently you cannot step out of what you always thought of as your self,
your constructed self-image or self-portrait.
Your mind is not accepting that it is already done.
It is not even done.
It is neither finished nor unfinished.
It just Is.

~ Mooji

[Guish]

The perfect action occurs without an intention.

Guish.

[bodhii71]

Panache Desai - Buddha at the Gas Pump Interview ( I found this interview intriguing if for nothing more than a mention of Matrayia... an indirect allusion that Panache may indeed be that person. The interview itself was worth a watch. Panche states his purpose for being here is to break apart the systems of control that are dominating and manipulating mankind and to be a fore bearer where in the future enlightenment will be commonplace.)

Those unfamiliar with Buddha at the Gas Pump can find over 200 interviews, well worth the time to check out.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=fQrgP83qdII

[greybeard]

Tony Parsons
The Open Secret

An interview on Conscious TV

A very direct and humorous discussion---very enjoyable.

Chris

There are subtitles, not in English, though the talk is.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=pL3aIolKCmA

[Wind]

"Think! What does the "I" stand for? This single and simple letter is filled with unutterable mystery. For apart from the infinite void in which it is born and to which it must return, it has no meaning. The Eternal is its hidden core and content."

- Paul Brunton

[Wind]

"The knowledge got from metaphysics, the intuitive peace gained from meditation, must now be accompanied by practical work done wisely and altruistically in the world to express both. The student must evoke the strength to descend into this sharply contrasting activity. The quest is not a single-track but rather a triple-track affair. He must travel along it with his intelligence, his intuition, and his deeds. "All speak of the Open Path, only rare ones enter the complex path," wrote Shah Latif, the eighteenth-century Sufi poet.

When rational thought and mystical feeling and self-alienated action are thus integrated into one, when life becomes a sincere and successful whole, it becomes philosophic. It may be that such a combination of qualities has been rare in the past, but it is certain that it will be necessary in the future. The world will need men and women as leaders who have their roots deep down in the life of the divine self but who have their intellects very much alert, their hands very much alive, and their hearts very much expanded.."

- Paul Brunton

[Wind]

If there is an ‘I’ who can ‘get it’,
there will be an ‘I’ who can ‘lose it’,
and this ‘I’ is nothing but thought.
It is the most costly thought when believed in,
for it exchanges your innocence for complexity
and your spontaneity for inhibition.

~ Mooji


"When thinking comes naturally to its rest, either because he has felt his way through intense reverence to the higher power or because he has apprehended the truth by the subtlest and sharpest perception, then stillness is born. It would be an error to continue either the feeling or the thinking beyond this time. The utter stillness must take their place, and he must humbly yield to it. At such a moment, the ego is withdrawn; the knowing intuition, the great Peace, alone remains."

- Paul Brunton

[Grizz Griswold]

Douglas Harding and his unique perspective.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=jcDMJvO6aHU

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=b0okQCx9108

barry

[greybeard]

The Douglas Harding videos brought to mind this one of Ramana Maharshi with Harding being the main contributor.
Thanks Barry

Chris

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=NSNEib2RDl8

[Wind]

"We complain that there is no response to our prayer for uplift or light. But that is because there is no propriety in our approach. The intellectually gifted comes with his arrogance and the artistically gifted with his vanity, while each man comes with his pride. The correct approach was described by Jesus: Become as a little child; for then we become humble, feel dependent, and begin to lay the ego aside. With that the door to the Overself opens and its grace begins to shine through."

- Paul Brunton

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=a6kYLLQJgWc

We don’t have to close down the active world, the senses don’t have to shot down to make way for the Self. Let everything play. Don’t pursue anything. And yet at the same time whatever needs to be done gets done, what needs to be left gets left. Your life does not become a life of strategy and techniques. You are the natural Self.

~ Mooji

[Skyhaven]

Very funny, I don't get it, but funny it is.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=NMHcak07pmE

[Shadowman]

Posted by Skyhaven (here)
Very funny, I don't get it, but funny it is.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=NMHcak07pmE

I laughed like a hyena during my first few satori's,

the first realization of eternal being just completely releases

all the ego baggage of worry, fear etc. You really do lighten up, lol.

but when the final jump happened it was profound beyond description.

Completely AWESTRUCK,

With Love,
tim

[Wind]

Father Lord,
Thank you for the experience of life, for the joy of being,
for the field of harmony, grace and this deep contentment inside my Heart.
And beyond all this, thank you for the knowledge and unbroken experience of unity with you as the immutable One.

~ Mooji

[greybeard]

Every stream ends up in the ocean.
It finds to its surprise the ocean is identical to it self. Water is water.
That which thought is was a stream now finds itself, in Truth, the Ocean.

Chris