Just playing this morning

I am just playing right now... Don't expect anything.

It's not about seeking, nor destination

Rather discover:

Whimsy, Possibility, Heart, Reflection............ Awareness

within

Dance, Release, Pause, Merging................ Acceptance

In defining time: it limits the very practice.

Are you trying to

Break on through to ... ?

Of yourself? This make me laugh :) but now that is progress and a key of sort.

To releasing all pre-definitions.

be nothing for a change of pace: rather than any limitation or definition...

This is the secret to full Transformation

peace

Meditation Part 2

For many meditation ends up being a practice to learn how to pause.


...



I was just going to leave the post blank... but instead lets work this with "thought" to "remove thought" to get to a place of pause.

Imagine your mind as a still pond... the thoughts are as ripples.

For many: Meditation is a path of learning how to calm the mind, to let go of thought.

How do you do this?

You just let go. It's the letting go that takes seekers years to learn how to release...

So behind the letting go you have to examine why a person grasps on to thinking so hard...

Typically, the root reason for thinking too much is: something bothers you in life.

When being bothered by something, your mind constantly thinks about how to resolve the "issues"... To a Taoist all issues, are merely illusions of "red dust", of meaningless transient material aspects of life and attachments...

A Taoist instead learns acceptance... once acceptance is embraced, the reasons for spinning constantly in thought, just peel away, leaving one in the still pond. This is the Taoist path. Once embracing this, it's possible to drop into a meditative state without thought or hassle instantly and maintain it indefinitely. In this practice Meditation isn't a separate aspect of your life, you just naturally flow into a meditative state of mind. Once in this state, you can then direct yourself how you wish... However, on average, a Taoist , just maintains a state of awareness to surf and enjoy the wonder as it comes up and forth out of the froth in the surf of living.

So one form of Meditation could be said to be "letting go"... That's the yang path.

This means taking the path of yin: of "embracing acceptance" will yield the same results in your meditation practice.

So if you have problems letting go, flip it around, to try playing around with acceptance instead.

Peace

Meditation

I get the question:

How do you meditate?

To me that question is confusing. Since meditation is a tool, a practice used towards awareness, towards centering, towards acceptance, towards...

Ah there is the key word: towards... movement ... assistance within our path. Keep in mind for a Taoist it's never about the destination but rather: it's all about the journey. As such this means to a Taoist, meditation isn't a separate practice, it's part of the way I live and think all the time.

Back to the original question.

So the question is like asking:

How do you use a tool?

So I have to turn around and ask back:

What would you like to achieve with meditation?

I can't even count how many different variations to meditation exist. Each variation helps a person focus towards certain goals.

So when asking a person to learn meditation. First ask yourself... for what goal are you learning meditation.

More tomorrow...

Peace

Thru the Looking Glass

This blog entry is not linear in thought. Its based upon a musing and I apologize if it seems a bit disjointed. I am sharing it since I know a few friends will be interested in the road markers I am placing within it.

To go through the Looking Glass.

Is that a journey you would be interested to travel? Would you desire to be Alice?

To many, going through the looking glass would be a symbol of going to a different world, seen at angles to our own world.

• For some a place of fantasy,
  
• For some a place of escape,
• For some a place of dark dreams
• For some merely a metaphor
  

The reality is?

The Looking Glass is our society. Anyone and everyone can travel thru the medium. If you read Alice in Wonderland as an example, it's a story which very much was a statement about culture as Lewis Carroll saw it. Society is a reflection of all our actions, and since our actions are additive, the looking glass will always be askewed as it becomes a blending of all of us.

The looking glass is very real, very present and very human in scope.

Taoism and the Looking Glass

As a Taoist practitioner, a person has access to practices that aid in working with the actual looking glass.

Many Taoist Sages, step back from the looking glass. The swirl of human desires, drama and dreams makes it a place of distraction. The looking glass is a step away from reality as its reality has been filtered by culture human perceptions. A Taoist Master can and does travel in and out from the looking glass. This is important for surety of self is the strength of being a "true human" as the masters of old would say, over being a reflection of what culture would project over you.

Doors into and through the Looking Glass

Within Taoism you will come across concepts of "pause" and "inner stillness".

These are important doors for a person to find. It might seem counter intuitive to some, but achieving this state of stillness is very important for discovering your self surety. Ego tries to trick a person that their nature is to be measure against others and society. This is not so.

It's upon this state of pause becoming inner stillness that a person unfolds into a pure reflective being. This is a balancing point where outside influences from the Looking Glass reflect off of a person to become a freeing experience from outside addictions and dependencies. Likewise everything that you are, ripples back into the looking glass to help create peace back into the world.

It's not about change, nor measurement, nor achievements...

It's simply about "being yourself" in surety and peace.

Upon reaching this point, all places within he looking glass become available for exploration and truly a Wonderland as Mr. Carroll termed in his book.


Peace

Just Morning Taoist Ramblings Before Having Enough Tea: Or Even Taoist's can Get Grumpy Over Social Issues First Thing in the Morning.

I was drifting off into a deep sea of breath this morning. This following silliness is what came out.

Tides of Life: Two different views

---

A Taoist Perspective:

Receding back into a sea
Towards the depths
To float into
a breath

... tao ...

a breath
To float out
upon an eternal moment
Walking upon flowing waters of life

---

A Western Materialistic Perspective :

Fighting against a tide.
to stay on top
of the depths
while sinking
...

The desire is to have a perfect moment, to express a turn of phrase to un-twist a twisted life, to make everything OK. This is an eternally missing part of our own poem which is life, the missing emptiness where we all desire to write magic within. Instead it feels as if everything breaking, life, family, hopes, desires, dreams. The initial reaction might be to embrace tighter these familiar flotation devices of family, poetry, science, religion, exercise... all to build upon supposedly solid ground. All in a vain attempt to hold on to something, so not to get lost in the seas of eternity. Perhaps to build something so high, so never to lose one's bearings, no matter how far one wanders. This letting go, is not the tide rather it's a false tide. The first and last warning given before an incoming upcoming terrible tsunami of emotions. It will come, smashing back in upon freight trains of waves, destroying all structures, to wash back to the sea anything that dares to stand against it. To reveal everything just written: is the same as so much garbage, floating in the sea as plastic coke can connectors strangling the sea turtles and seals down, down into the depths of the sea.

The point, as a point must exist right? : all of this has nothing to do with me, but still a desire exists to make this all about me. This is the empty space, the point of focus of a life. So people assume it must be filled, have something. So we busily fill it up with words, actions , entertainment: this all gets jammed into a hollow space, into that point, to expand it out make it feel worth while. This is the place where people whine and dine upon their very soul to fill "ourselves" up with "ourselves" in order to be more. To be so big, that a person can stand upon the floor of the sea and still be tall enough to break the surface to breathe safely. Then only to flounder as there never is a sea floor to stand upon... since it wasn't even an ocean to begin with...and then it all gets lost.
...

To rush out
of the unknown
into known qualities
Of being back in the fray
Working towards the expectation
just to make it one more day to tomorrow.

I accept the Taoist point of view, but I also have lived in the West long enough to understand the Western view point.

But this posts illustrates why people have so much trouble understanding the Tao:

Accept and you become whole,
Bend and you straighten,
Empty and you fill,
Decay and you renew,
Want and you acquire,
Fulfill and you become confused.

The West tries to fulfill with knowledge and then it becomes a hard path trying to lose all those lines upon lines upon words upon words of description and experience when the larger answer is as simple as a breath. The West concentrates on the ten thousand things, while a Taoist simply accepts the Tao.

Peace

Mornings, Cats and Dance

A few days ago I was taking my normal morning meditation soak in the tub. My allergies pile up over the night during the wetter moldy months, so when possible I take a 45 minute hot soak mixed to meditation to re-balance my spirit and body to be pain free.

Anyways Ishtar (A Grey tabby cat who travels with me) is walking along the edge of the tub.

I remember thinking, hmm shes going to slip. (she never has to date of years of doing this, but today felt different) So I partitioned part of my mind and meditation to be aware towards Ishtar.

Now these morning soaks are not a true meditation session, as the extremely hot water
does put my body into a semi sleep state. Over the years I have learned how to separate my mind from body, to let the body sleep while the mind can stay aware and slightly active. It's a strange half state to be in, but it's handy at times.

So anyways, countless moments later, the Cat slips big time and goes flying across the tub, hits the other wall, she bounces off that wall, twists in mid air..

And in perfect harmony I lifted my hand from the water so she could leap onto that, which she did, to then safely leaped from my palm to the floor.

And then I went back to my peaceful meditation.

Life is such a dance.

We can be aware and flow. Enjoy the constant unfolding. Or one can struggle and thrash about.

I think it's more fun to dance every moment as living, even if the partner is a flying cat.


Peace

Breath

To fly...

is to breathe

Peace

Meditation

A meditation I practice is:

A Mantra of Silence.

Surrounding sounds form the mantra of my silence.

Surrounding sights spin around as a vision.

Sight, sound, smell, taste, touch
trying to define an uncarved block of me.
The illusion of pressure is resisting
a larger truth of having no shape.

Letting go into silence...
as the world tumbles past me...
as quietly as snow falling in the forest.

Revealed within an inner peace of acceptance.

A Mantra of Silence is simply: Acceptance.

I have started to write a new section about meditation and this post is a starting place for my notes right now.

It's no surprise how something so simple as meditation can take so long to learn in a culture based upon noise :)


Peace