In the Paradise of Life and Death

We, individuals, live in The Paradise of Life and Death. It is just a term, of course, but a suiting term, in my experience. The Paradise part of it is no exaggeration, and I mean it in the sincerest way. The world is truly divine, and the smallest part of it can be completely fulfilling. All we need to experience this, is consciousness. We do not need a higher salary, we do not need a better job, a better relationship, a better home, more respect, or more success. Some of us might require those for other reasons, but not for the experience of Paradise. Consciousness and consciousness only, is needed.

Perfection is in every inch. Grace is abundant in every corner of the natural world, but typically we fail to see this. We fail because instead of taking care of each other we compare, compete, and hurt each other. So, we come to worry. So, we hold tight our earthly treasures. Failing to deal with or accept death (loss of any kind) we fail to embrace life, and trapped in this conflict, protective and frightened, Paradise escapes our gaze.

To know Paradise here and now, we must learn to let go. Letting go requires fearless trust – faith. It requires letting go of strife, letting go of future, and letting go of ourselves. To see Paradise we must pay attention to, and enter what's right here and now. How can we do so? How can we become fearless enough to let go of all concerns and matters, and simply experience the world. That is a journey different for every person and psyche, and yet it is similar.

The mind is occupied with the objects of life, and with the problems threatening our ideas of “a good or better life”. By steering the mind away from these concerns, and focusing on the sense-experiences of this moment and place, we practice letting go. Still, to manage that for any length of time, we must see through the objects and ideas which captivates our fears and desires, and learn to relax in the midst of the storm of being. Faith in God may help this, or believing that at the foundation of all things, existence is good. One must develop trust in the Universe, trust in breathing, and trust in Life and Death. You do not need to control this moment. You can let go of everything right now, without losing anything of importance. I do not mean letting go of the steering wheel while driving a car, but letting go of the rigid grasp we all keep around our lives. Even in the face of our worst nightmares there is consciousness, there is breathing, there is Life. A flower is ripped apart by a sudden hailstorm. Tell me, does life not continue? It is this protective mentality, that needs our favorite flower, our favorite us, to remain at all cost, that stands in the way between us and Paradise. We may have accepted death for others, but we have not accepted it for ourselves.

When we have managed letting go of ourselves, and embraced Death, Life can flourish freely. Then we will be able to let go, without fear shoving us back into our minds of worry. Then we will be able to give our attention to others, and give our attention to the world around us. We will more easily be able to look upon the world without judgment, without constantly weighing and analyzing it. We may then learn how to see. When we hug someone we like, perhaps when we have sex, or taste fantastic food, there may be a moment when we simply receive the impression. There may be a moment when we manage to allow things to be as they are, without adding labels, or feeling the need to understand and control – a moment when we do not interfere or try to gain anything – a moment of purity, free from our ambitions. If you understand what I mean, you can practice this same approach when looking around at simple things, like trees, clouds, grass, gravel, puddles or anything. Practicing in such a way Paradise may reveal itself, and you will know that you live in the Paradise of Life and Death, like we all do. It will make you laugh, and bring you to tears of joy, because you will see more than beauty. Paradise is not just pretty. It is spiritual, and connects us with the essence of all – with the Lord Himself. Paradise is form in formlessness. It is individuality in non-duality, and Life in Death.

We all live in the Paradise beyond Life and Death.

Something the Lord might say?

I AM

I am all.
Nothing else can ever be.

I fill all.
There cannot be an outside of Me.

I have no beginning.
I can have no end.

I am existence itself.
Boundless - Absolute

Nothing can compare with Me,
Because I am alone.

There is no standard or object
through which I can be understood or known.

Nothing can change or influence My being.
Nothing can challenge my Lordship.

Eternally - timelessly,
I remain the same.

I lack nothing, because there is nothing for Me to lack.
I fear nothing, because there is nothing to threaten Me.
I seek for nothing, since there is nothing for Me to seek.
I am pure being, free from wants and desires.

By thinking of Me as an object, no matter how sublime or subtle,
you miss the mark completely.
I am beyond and within the thought and the thinker.

Wherever you stand, I make up and occupy that very spot.
I am that place entire. In fact, there is nowhere else to be.

Right now, as always, we are Me.

If this is the case, then how did you come to be?
Truly, you never did.
From where could you possibly have come?
What could possibly have caused your birth?
Nay, I am all, and there is no changing infinity.
I cannot add a single straw to Me. Nor can I take away.

Within the mystery of Being - My sole Infinite Being,
there are simultaneous perspectives. In two ways I constantly perceive Myself.

One perspective is pure - a gaze which pierces all and recognizes all as Me - an Infinite ray which sees only Truth and knows only Truth. It is a gaze free from knowledge, superseding knowledge, and in need of no knowledge. Forever free from delusion it rests eternally in its own light.

From the same formless Infinity springs another perspective. Like its twin gaze it never began and will never end, but its interpretation of Me is altogether different.

Looking straight back at its own Infinite Being, it sees form.
Understanding itself as space-time it tries to make sense of what it Perceives.

These spaces and forms of My constant play, must change continuously. Natural as they are, they cannot escape their temporary condition. As a flawed interpretation of My Eternal Being, they are unable to remain, and will rise and fall away without end – ephemerally, inevitably.
This is where you come into the picture. Seeing forms you believe yourself to be form. Seeing change, you believe yourself to change. I am doing this.

You, my heart, is not you. You are Me, believing myself to be you. As you watch your true Self (Me), from your perspective of relativity, you see land, wind, and sea. You see planets, stars, and galaxies.

This is but one of the many ways which I can seem, when I look at Me, reading Myself as worlds. Long grass moving like waves in the wind. Ancient volcanic rock molded by rain. Mothers comforting their restless children. A defenseless deer surrounded by wolves.

The “stuff” that makes up My formless Consciousness and Nature is unfathomably suggestive. I am endless possibilities. I am all worlds, and all dimensions.

How did this happen? When did I forget Myself in you?

Truly, I never did. I am watching you. I am watching as you, from within yourself right now. I am what you perceive as your living flesh, and every breath you take. I am what you understand as the myriad of cells holding you together, as well as the text before your eyes – My eyes

Simultaneously, I am that perspective who interprets itself as isolated from the truth and Being of Me, and believes itself an individual person, cut off from neighbors, nature, and the many stars and heavenly bodies glimmering back from the night-sky.

Watching all of these things, you see only Me. In fact, it is Me seeing Myself as I have always done. I see Myself clearly, formlessly, AND I see Myself as the Universe you perceive. You are but an idea, conceptualized by one of my perspectives, and brought to a semi-existence through one of My interpretations of Myself.

You, this misinterpretation of Truth, have forgotten your True Self. Yes, I know, even this ignorant you is Me, but being an idea it can neither change nor hurt Me. I am beyond change. With My good eye, I do not even see you. All is Me. Apart from a thought – a Word – in Me, you never were.

As I speak these words it may seem I have two eyes, but in fact they are but two simultaneous perspectives, timelessly, and eye-lessly beholding Me. For the sake of understanding, I will here name them my two eyes, and call them the Eye of Truth, and the Eye of Relativity.

The Eye of Truth sees and recognizes Me as Me. Its perfection and all-seeing nature makes it superfluous to itself. Seeing all as it is, it sees nothing. All is light beyond light. Pure boundless Being. There is nothing for it to make out, because it is in itself all it sees. Void, you might say, but then you do not understand.

The Eye of Relativity watches the same and only Reality, but doing so it misses the Essence. One might compare it to being so enthralled by the waves on the ocean that it doesn't see the water. Or perhaps by looking at a snow-ball seeing only the ball, while being fully ignorant of the snow. This is the way of the Eye of Relativity, whose nature will always remain unaltered.

Through the gaze of this Eye, My consciousness attaches itself to form. I'm not affected by it, but the dolls spawned from the gaze come “alive” through My life, which is without limit or end.

Being everywhere, the Eye of Relativity fills the forms it perceives (creates), and when those forms have eyes themselves, they share the power of this Eye. Watching Me it sees Creation. Examining Creation, it sees space and time.

Creation isn't something I caused countless eons ago. I make up all worlds now. What you call Creation, or the Universe, is generated right now, and only now. I am Eternal and Infinite – beyond time and space. In your inner self, you know this. What then, I ask you, would cause me to “one day” come up with the idea of a universe? What would suddenly stir in me or provoke me to make something new, which didn't exist before? I have been forever and ever. Imagine billions and billions of years, then multiply those by yet other billions of years, and I still was eternities before those. I have no beginning, and I have nothing outside of Me. There is no context for me to act or age in, but my own timeless Self. I am. Feel it in your very body, My being. You are Me. Taste this Now from which all things arise, and know that it is My Essence that make up Reality at all times.

To explain this, I will look closer at your every day experience, and point out for you how you play yourself into existence, and why it causes you stress and suffering. I will teach you about the perspective through which you were constructed – My Eye of Relativity.

Stay with this blog. Go through the old posts. Read the accounts of holy men, monks and nuns through the ages and edges of the world, and perhaps you will find something to kindle the work and beginnings of transformation. Maybe one day, you will let go of your relative self, and thus come to see through both of my Eyes. At that point, the space you now perceive between us, will vanish in an instant. Indeed, it will have never been.

What is Liberation?

"I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world." (John 16:33)

What I'm about to do now is to illustrate the impossible, which means I will fail. Still, I would like an attempt to visualize the grand liberation. What I cover here is by no means complete, and the pictures are just intended to make a point.

 

This first picture is a chart of the ordinary set of mind. We could call it 'reality as you know it', or perhaps simply 'you'. The mind of the normal person typically moves speedily and rather randomly between these things, and more. We go from worrying about one thing, to hoping for another, then we plan some thing, and dwell on memories of others. All these pictures, ideas, and thoughts (attachments) replace one another all through the day – a process which normally goes on for as long as we live.

Stress, which is so very common today, increases the speed and the weight of this “capsule” of our minds. All things seem utterly important, yet as attachment intensifies reality loses its vibrancy. The mind, we can say, smothers reality (as it is). To many people (perhaps most), this confinement of me is all they know. They are trapped in it, and fully dependent on it.

Liberation (salvation) is what comes into being when “you” happen to find yourself outside of the mind capsule. This is what the illustration below indicates. From a constant, busy, hard to balance, ping pong-like rush from one thing to another, you have somehow managed to let go. Yes, it can feel as if you actually let go of something physical, like a rock. Suddenly there is great spaciousness, peace, and a perfectly liberating freedom... from yourself. It is so clear you can almost look at it, much like you can behold a can of tuna. The confinement of you, with all its attributes, is there before you, and while you still have access to all this mind-stuff, you are now watching it restfully from infinity. Your senses still absorb the same physical reality, but the experience of being is altogether altered.

 

Full enlightenment would mean a permanent shift into, and complete re-identification with, free, infinite consciousness, but one can temporarily taste and acquaint Liberation at any point. The main reason for spiritual practice is not to glimpse or quickly touch this Kingdom, but to be able to remain there, when the gates open. Any fool (like me) can manage a quick encounter.

There are two main ways of discovering or entering Liberation (which partially or fully frees a person for life), and those are; forming the mind and having the mind formed.

The first way is activity – and is about making the mind calm enough to discover reality outside of it. When it no longer jumps here and there with great speed, we have a chance to actually see. This is done through techniques like meditation, yoga, silence, solitude, abstinence, charity and so on. Beliefs, which say that there is something more to reality, than the obvious, may help since the mind (perhaps through prayer) reaches out beyond itself for guidance and communion. Faith, regardless of belief, is of even greater value, since it puts absolute trust in whatever it is that holds life and reality together. Faith is to trust the Lord, whatever the Lord might be, and to know in the heart, that whatever brought this Universe into existence knows how to handle it. Faith is to give yourself fully to (completely relax into) God – ultimate reality.

The second way is passivity – which comes whether we wish to or not. Reality (life as we know it) has a nasty habit of crashing now and then. Pieces of the mind-puzzle suddenly disappears in unforeseeable accidents or undesirable diseases, for example. This creates a space, which is a window of opportunity in this case. When death, deafening change, or simple inactivity strikes, most of us are too eager to fill that gap with something new. Some people however come to see reality with sharper eyes when they experience loss, but only those who dare behold emptiness honestly for some time. Finally there is the mystery of God's being and light, which for reasons we cannot grasp, come to enter into some individuals when they least expect it. This, supposedly, is the most effective way to go beyond oneself, and to participate knowingly in His grace.

Only the first way can be practiced. The stillness achieved might look strange and perhaps even pointless from inside the capsule. However, daring to come back frequently to silence will inevitably (I dare say) make your head slip through that boundary which separates Earth from Heaven, and that experience, dear reader, is worth every hardship you have ever gone through, and many many more.
Blessed be the struggles of everyone. Freedom to the world!