This Transition

In this transition and widening polarities, please know there is more love and support for your greatness than you can possibly imagine. It is real; it is here and it is yours.  

In these times, it is especially important to give your internal loyalty to what you know is most profoundly true within with all trust and faith.  It is the place within that is more real than anything else.  Be this place within and believe it with all your heart.  Believe it with peace, joy and love. Take tender care of that realness.  Give it all of you.  Then... it will no longer be small; it will be all of you. This is what you can always rely upon to guide you no matter what happens.   

Heart Portal taken on 11/28/12

This is a call to action.  There is and will be much coming in this world and it is important to be what I spoke of above.  Many things would have you doubt, be in fear or feel guilty.  There is a tendency in us to believe these thoughts and feelings, whether about ourselves or others. We live as if they are true. We are also fond of embellishing and distorting negative thoughts with lots of story, and believing that too.  Sometimes the sheer intensity and loudness of the feelings and thoughts can make the doubt, fear or guilt appear to be more real than anything else; more real than the quiet tender voice in your heart. 

Asking questions with the intent to discover what is true is always good. Following blind trust or belief leads to distortion, not to what is real or honest. Do not allow yourself to do this.  Also, do not allow others to do this around you.  Gently, let them go off and do it on their own time elsewhere.  Do not let them drag you down into their personal distortion.  Anything that would have you feel small or unworthy is not true.  It never has been, and never will be.

I am not advocating being only light and fluff, that is as much distortion as giving in to negativity.  Some on a light path are there out of avoidance, not wanting to be responsible for examining something within.  They would rather cover up than examine honestly.  I am advocating balance and letting go of anything you do not actually know is true.  I am advocating cleaning up messes we have created and then letting go--completely. We are accountable for how we choose to be in every moment of our existence. Use your life wisely.

People tend to be lazy or complacent about being honest with themselves. We try to cover up or hide from our internal dishonesty. We really do know when we are being dishonest with ourselves or trying to get away with something. Some of us get pretty fast though at tucking things away inside while hoping no one else notices we just did that. Whatever you hide from in yourself, simply comes up repeatedly in a different form until we get finally get honest.  This is one aspect of karma. This is one of the weirdest things we do as human beings.  Where can you possibly go to hide from yourself? It is not possible to hide from your self because you are your self. A refusal to be honest within will eventually destroy you. It is the equivalent of declaring war on yourself. The only way out is to be honest.

"If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you."  Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas

Even though it may be painful at first to be honest about our dishonesty, it really is much easier in the long run to be authentic. I have trained myself to look forward to discovering a lack of honesty, blind spots, things I do that don't work well, where I try to cut corners. In our willingness to be completely honest we begin to get back our eyesight. 

Be patient and kind with yourself.  Do not compare yourself with others. Do not compare where you are now with some idea of where you think you ought to be. This stops all flow, and comparisons are never actually true as they are based on perceptions, not what is real.

When I began to get honest with myself, at first all I saw was my frailty and coarseness. As I stepped further into this new way of being, I gently broke my own heart with my willingness to be honest. At first it appeared that everywhere I looked, I was dishonest with myself.  The most shocking revelation was that most of my life I had tried to get truth to change to fit me, instead of me changing to fit truth. I had built my entire life on one giant heap of illusion all centered around ME.  No wonder things had trouble working out. I was way out of alignment with reality and my higher self. After getting over the shame of how I had used my life so far, I slowly got better and better at gently being only honest within.  Yes, there are levels of internal honesty and I made many mistakes.  I still do.  I just keep getting up and kindly promising myself and those I love to do better.  

I have also discovered that the pain of life shows me what I cannot yet be with, what I cannot accept in myself and others. Pain shows attachment. The idea is not to shut out pain, but to let it in fully letting it pass through cleanly, not letting it be hooked by anything. So I see that to be highly evolved in physical form is to have the ability to be both with great joy and great pain in a wide open accepting way, in complete balance within. It is an important step to achieving what we came here for.

No matter how far astray we may wander, we can always come back to what is real. The pull of reality endures, Nothing is stronger. Even in madness, a way is still there. Even if the way is not seen until our last breath, it is still there. What is most real can never be lost because it is in your heart; it is you.

Peace and love......

Heather

The World has Shifted

I haven't written anything on my blog for six weeks. My foundation has been changing so fast that it has been impossible to write anything until now.  

The world has shifted in the past three weeks, almost everyone I have talked to can sense it, including the cashier at my grocery store and dry cleaners. For me, there is a sense of intensity and thickness like someone threw corn syrup in the air and I am now breathing it.  Sometimes it dissipates a little, but it comes back.  The world has changed, and we must change as well.  

I have a profound deep love for all who take the time to read my blog.  I take none of that for granted.  You mean everything to me. What I write comes from the love I have for you. It may be a bumpy road reading this today, so please hang in there.  The approach is first the bad news, then the good news.

"Approaching Storm"  12" x 15" watercolor and acrylic on canvas paper

People in this world tend to focus on what they cannot be, what they do not have, what is in the way, what is wrong, why they are wrong, and why life doesn't work.  In essence, there is no trust of life, and, therefore, no trust of self.  Any foundation built on this is made of quicksand.  Of course, we are not always this way.  Some of us have managed to eliminate life and self-invalidation to a large extent.  A rare few have irradicated it entirely.  Life for most people, however, is an experience of grappling punctuated with moments of happiness.  And, they believe that is just the way it is for them.

We are very undisciplined with ourselves and allow negativity to run rampant through our feelings and thinking. The result is we have actively created an unreality about who we are of staggering proportions. It has a huge impact on our consciousness, and physical, emotional and mental well-being. This unreality colors our entire perspective about what life is and can be for us.  The astounding thing is that none of it is real.  We do actually know that it is not real, and yet we give it power within us anyway.  For our own well-being, our sanity, we can't afford this kind of negative indulgence.  

There used to be time for taking a leisurely approach to examining oneself and life.  Things have shifted though in this world, even though I cannot yet say exactly how.  

Now is the time to let go of any thoughts that keep you feeling small, not good about life, or inadequate.  You being small is not real. It never was real, and it never will be. Not one tiny bit of it, especially the thought you just had.  If you look, there is nothing good that ever came from this, and there never will be.  What keeps us small is doubt, fear and guilt. I don't care what you have been or done; everyone is a worthwhile valuable human being.  So please obliterate doubt, fear and guilt.

All you have to do is let go.  Everyone knows how to let go, it happens every night when we go to sleep.  It really is that simple.  If there is something you need to clean up in your life then do so.  Do it now, and then let go of it.  Give it no more energy.  Please train yourself to stop whatever you are thinking if it has anything of doubt, fear or guilt in it.  

If none of this existed in your consciousness, what would be there in all of this empty space you created?  Would you then have peace.... joy.... love?  What if you were to shift your entire foundation to this and only this?  What would you be?  What would life be?  Would it be profoundly different for you?  What if you could trust yourself to have only peace, joy and love as your foundation regardless of what came at you?  What if you were unshakable in being peace, joy and love?  What if you could die with only peace, joy and love in all of you?  What if no matter where you looked that is all you could find? 

You can be this because it is you.  This is what is real.  You can be this, now.  You do have the ability to let go of everything that is not this.  You never again have to be any other way than peace, joy and love.  Give all your internal loyalty to this.  Never again, give your loyalty to anything else.  It can be done, you have the power to be all this. All you have to do is live it. 

It is done!   

"Peace. My peace I give you.

Peace I leave within your heart.

Eternal peace.

Peace that is of Home.

Peace existing in your core, 

The glue that binds your soul.

Evermore."

Azra'el Arcturus

Siradis Network Nations as channeled through AA Wolf

Love and peace......

Take Everything to Heart

"One Tibetan monk... who had spent more than 18 years in a Chinese prison labor camp... told me that on a few occasions he really faced some danger. So I asked him, 'What danger? What kind of danger?', thinking he would tell me of Chinese torture and prison. He replied, 'Many times I was in danger of losing compassion for the Chinese.'" --The Dalai Lama

There are multiple ways of seeing. Seeing with our eyes helps navigate through our everyday world. We also check out our thoughts to see what we think, and often give our thoughts more validity than anything else. Blind people see with their fingers and ears; red feels different than green. To see clearly and deeply both within and without, see with your heart. Without a completely open heart though your seeing will be like looking through half-closed eyes. If you close your heart even a little bit, your view will be distorted where you shut it down. The more you close it, the more distorted your view. In an attempt to manage heart pain, some people close so much of their heart they become one of the walking dead. 

"Heart Portal"  12" x 12"   Acrylic

It is only through kindness, softness, openness and honesty that we can go all the way into core heart reality. A wide-open, tender heart that has no need to protect or control what comes in will naturally surrender to what is most profoundly real within. It is only such a heart as this that will give the profound within free-reign to all aspects and levels of you, enabling you to become what it is.  

Opening your heart, unzipping it, in this manner may run counter to what you have told your self would ever be a prudent thing to do.  Others have probably advised you against this kind of vulnerability as well. If you look though you will notice that the second you go tight in your heart, even a little bit, everything you love within you instantly stops. You will no longer be able to see clearly within what you most love. It will remain illusive, out of your grasp and safe from what you cannot at that moment be trusted with. This is why you must match what you are being to what it is being, and why it will never match what you are being because it can't. If it ever compromised itself even once to match you, then the fabric of all existence would no longer be real, and that will never happen. It is not within its capacity to compromise, and that is one of the things we love about it. It is inherently trustworthy and we love that. Our actual desire is to match it.  The way to matching it is through kindness, softness, openness and honesty and then it is all there again, right where you left off.

I recently become re-acquainted with someone I knew 30 years ago. For 35 years this person has been helping people transform the quality of their lives. She is considered a master in this field. What I saw while watching her work is that in some ways she is fundamentally missing the boat herself, and hence, so are the people she works with. While it is possible to be successful at this line of work one can still be unkind to oneself and tight inside. So while a certain level of transformation may occur within herself, and for others, other areas cannot be addressed because of her internal imbalance, and, therefore, whatever transformation occurs is incomplete. This is why I say what you are being is most important and that every aspect of you has to move forward in balance.  

What you are being determines the quality of everything that you bring into form.  The form, quality, direction of what you do is always determined by the qualities of what you are being.  You are responsible for all that you are and your potential as a human being.  This simply means that you are in your care.  Take especially good care of your heart.

"Openness and softness of heart is the door to everything true within.  It is your most basic first beingness.  It requires no prior experience; it isn't dependent on who you are.  Your unconditionally being openness and softness of heart will change everything of who you are."  John De Ruiter

May we all shimmer light especially in the face of darkness.

God bless your heart in peace and love...

Coming Out of the Absolute, Part 2

To define meaning as used in these two posts:  We are in relationship to all we are aware of through the meaning of what we know.  Some meaning is inherent and some is assigned.  We are able to relate to the meaning of so many things because we first are meaning, even before being an individual.

To be here on this planet, you shifted your fundamental orientation, home base, to that of a self having a person and a life, and inwardly a being that knows.  In order to become this as awareness required a split within you.  

Here is what it looks like.  As awareness, you continue breathing as you have always done. The breathing goes from your self as your home base into your person and your life and then back out into the self.  It stops there.  You don't have to think about this; it just occurs.  There is another breathing as awareness, which is also from your home base as a self.  It goes out toward being meaning, and then back into your self.  In both, the breathing is generated from the self, one moving outwards and the other moving inwards.  This is the split within.

Even though your home base is as a self, you can relate to being meaning because it is what you once were.  As a self, you can partially relate to being meaning going all the way back to coming from the Absolute, but it is tethered to the self.  What you experience as being meaning in the tiniest subtle ways, while connecting to the Absolute, benefits the self and the orientation that you have become.  It all belongs to your home base, the self. We are almost unable to even consider another home base.  

While there isn't anything wrong with all this, you actually are able within your awareness to completely shift your home base.  You are able to be what you once were, while being here, in form, as a person.  You have the ability to be the Absolute that breathes, instead of you that breathes.  You have the ability to take up where you left off, to continue, breathing as the Absolute in form.  You have the ability to be what It is in form.  

This is why I have been saying in all these posts to give everything of you to what you first are, not for you, but for what It is.  None of this is for you to have to keep for your self.  Everyone of us can do this.  It isn't hard.  It isn't far away, or even close.  It is inseparable from what you are.  You cannot get rid of it; it is what you are at the core, in your heart.  It is as natural as your breathing.  

In your development there is much more that is possible.  We can't even imagine what lies in store for us, you might re-read the post "An Experience that Changed Me Forever."  That is only one possibility as a future self.  The more you let go and shift your orientation as a self, the more that can open for you as the Absolute that breathes.

As you give all that you are to being the Absolute that breathes, as you become grounded in that, giving it all power within then the split within your heart heals.  Then what is next becomes possible.  The work you have done enables you to just barely sense more than being a self.  

What is next is being a being, which is completely other than anything to do with your experience of being a self.  We know what being is, but not being a being.  We cannot try to be this or even move toward it. It is like trying to hold onto something you do not yet know.  In your awareness you might know there is something there that is other than, and you might faintly resonate with it, yet you do not know what it is. 

To be able to know the beginning of what this is requires someone who can be an example of what this is in form, someone who lives from this and no longer lives from their self, although they have a self.  There are very few examples here on this planet.  My teacher is one such individual.

The first step however, is to build a solid living, breathing, internal foundation based on openness, kindness, softness and honesty--all heart.  From there be the Absolute that breathes; you being meaning.

Lastly, a question:  If you give yourself over to living a superficial life of comfort, a life just for you, would you be willing to die without ever really knowing what your life is for just so you could preserve your comfort?  You heart knows the answer.

Peace and love...

Coming Out of the Absolute, Part 1

I offer the following for how we came into form, out of the Absolute.  This is pretty dense stuff, so hang onto the guardrails, and just let it resonate.  See what is true for you.  I bring this up now as we are running out of time to leisurely consider our own development. Extraordinary changes are about to occur, and we will need every available resource both within and without.  

What we are now as a person is based on what we have realized and chosen while moving out from the Absolute until fully landing here as a person.  We are no longer moving outward so much into more form, rather our focus is to now move inward, going back, realizing what we are and have originated from.  We are coming full-circle, being everything that we truly are while living here as a person in this world.  

"Losing Forms"  12 x 16   acrylic, watercolor, acrylic ink on canvas board

Our movement inward is like realizing a vast internal ocean, a vast holy ocean appearing as streams of beingness. In our movement back to the Absolute we lose internal forms.  We find that we are both here in form and losing our old identification with it. These inner forms might be called inner coverings over what we first are.  As we let go, we begin to identify with what is more than us.  This enables us to see more of ourselves, and each uncovering allows us to see a new level of meaning.  As we go back in our awareness, we see that we more than let go, we actively respond to what is next.

*  *  *  *  *  

In first coming out of the Absolute, Source, you did so as a response to an available form, taking you as meaning into its first form--the very beginning of I.  Your very first movement, first breath and expression out of the Absolute was meaning knowing meaning. There was no ability to reflect on anything because there was no self yet. At this stage you could only be meaning knowing.

What follows is a movement out and then a movement back, much like breathing.  Each movement back is less than the movement out. First, as meaning you breathed in form and became what you breathed in.  You first movement breathing in was meaning knowing.  You next movement was to breathe out, all the way back to being meaning that has no need to know. There is now a pattern that has begun and your response is to breathe in the next level of form. This form is being knowing. Beingness has been added as a form. You could now be knowing, a new form. After this inhale of form, you exhale back to being meaning, but this time you move from being knowing into just knowing, and then into being meaning. You had to move through a level of form into another level of form, into meaning.

From here, you breathe in and out through more and more forms because of the pattern that has begun and because there are always more forms.  You move into a self and then into a person. Each time you exhale, return, you are more aware of your ability to move.  You realize there is a power to move, to choose to move almost all the way back to the Absolute. You also realize that as awareness you might be able to have more, and you also realize you can direct the more. You now have an ability to relate to creating more as a self, instead of the next true more. You can now use your awareness to alter, even distort, the rhythm.  

In our power to distort, we change our awareness, our home base that we come from.  It shifts from being meaning, to knowing, and later being and even later self.  The breathing in and out always continues.

What matters here is that as awareness how far back do you breathe out, and then as awareness how far do you breathe into form. You home base changes because you have the power to make that happen, and that shifts your fundamental orientation until what you create is a self. You become a self that has a person and a life.  At the same time, you are also a self that inwardly has a being, and knowing.  There is more than that, but it is almost unconfrontable.

Be the vast holy ocean of awareness within you. Go home. Be home, give it all that you are at every level.  What you know of reality will be so much more. I am That I am.  I am This I am.

"Each one has to find his peace from within. And peace to be real must be unaffected by outside circumstances."  -- Mahatma Gandhi

"You always get what you are willing to settle for."  --Werner Erhard

Some of the above comes from notes of a conversation with John De Ruiter.

Peace and love...

Thresholds Within

As we begin to awaken, we have a sense of, and a pull within to other realities.  We all have thresholds in the self that keep us safe from wondering beyond what we can be responsible for in the present. The wonderings I refer to are about other realities that exceed our current ability to relate to such complexity and awareness. Thresholds keep us grounded here, and also require that we integrate the self so we do not move too quickly.  

Integrating thresholds enables us to realize at a deeper level within how to move, how to be, and use what we already know.  A pure heart allows us to relate to our self and to this world in a way that is true.  

"Thresholds"   11 x 14 in.   watercolor & white acrylic on paper

"Without integrating what you can see, how can you possibly integrate realities that belong to you that you can't see?" - John De Ruiter 

The voices within us are a reflection of our different levels of self.  They have a complexity and tend to pull us about until we begin to relate to the voices as simplicity while in the midst of everything that comes at us in life.  We then begin to notice there is a difference between us and all these different levels of the self.  The thresholds in all these levels of the self make integration necessary.  It helps us to learn simplicity within complexity.  

What then arises is an awareness that you are much more than you thought.  You develop the ability to move beyond a simplistic approach.  Heart understanding is of greatest value here.  Your heart gives you a capacity to hold everything together with no limitation.  Heart understanding allows you to move within your awareness as living knowledge, direct knowledge.  This heart understanding prepares you for being more than just moving within the various levels of the self.  Heart understanding enables you to realize that you are more than just a self, that beyond the self there is what you are as a being.  It is a very very subtle touch of beingness within the self.

This awakening to what you are as a being beyond a self gives you the ability to know deeper complexity within from a vantage point of simplicity.  The complexity isn't about levels of self, but something more subtle.  It is about a beingness that moves through you, affecting all levels of the self.  It can affect all levels of the self because it precedes what the self is.  It is a container for the self.  As you recognize and realize this, you won't just be a self any longer.  You will have the ability to discern different levels of beingness, and not just moving in them but grounded in them as living knowledge.  You will be more than a self. As you become more than a self you will discern and integrate these new subtle levels of complexity of what you are. 

It is then that you will begin to resonate with and relate to other realities, which are not known solely as a self. You will not just resonate with living knowledge, you will be grounded in it, deeply rooted in it. It will have you incorporating the much more of what you are.  You will have new seeing within real heart understanding and that makes you ready for more, what you truly are as a being.

In what you are as a being, stay close to, resonate within to other realities and you will begin to realize these realities as what you are.  It is realness appearing as a result of awareness moving into knowing.  

"Awareness gives knowing certainty." -John De Ruiter

Please note:  If you are not clear in your self then your learning will be fairly basic.  The finer your awareness becomes, deviation from your clarity will not be tolerated in reality almost at all.  As you operate in such clear awareness and knowing, there is less tolerance for not getting it right.  At these levels the stakes are much higher.  You can get away with nothing. On these levels the smallest shift will bring great change in your self.  There is less and less room for deviating, even by mistake from your awareness being and moving as knowing.  Your foundation becomes alive, moving as living and real knowledge.  This will give you the ability to understand what you are as a being and how to move within, and through life as all that is profoundly real.

If you know someone who is being this, stay close to them.  

Pitfall:  Do not allow yourself to be enticed by anything, a way of being, or a want as that is moving into limitation.  Do not  attach to any particular feeling or experience as that will instantly remove you from being it. When you get caught by this, you are in an old pattern.  Stop everything and gently go back to giving everything you are to being it, because of what it is and not for any other reason. 

I've stepped into every pitfall there is of course, so I know the pain of it.  When that occurred I felt so empty, even desperate, because I knew better. Finally, I stopped thinking there was something for me to get from life. I just let go, and let go more, one thing at a time, and then I just let go completely. At first, it was a scary place to be; there was nothing to hold onto that used to be there. What I found is, and always will be, is what I know and a most wonderful I.  

Then, from what I know, I discovered the ability to be streams of being.  This means the ability to move without using the self.  Being able to move in levels within that are deeper than the self.  

As you become this, you will be living knowledge, which is generated from both within and without you.  The deeper you go into the self, as you are being a being, the rules change.  

Stay close to your heart, move close to all this by being heart-forward.  Lead with your heart.  The heart is pure and real.  

You will find the eternal continuity of all things, in form and non-form.  Once you know, you can never again say you do not know. Give it everything of you, let it become you. Turn into what it is.

"The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes."   -Marcel Proust

Parts of this post are based on notes from a conversation with John De Ruiter, my teacher. 

Peace and love...

Loving Balance Within, Part 2

A reminder:  do not believe what I say is true unless you know for yourself it is true.  Ask yourself, "Where am I looking from to know it is true, or not true?" 

When the self creates the perception of separation from God, Source, and believes it, what remains is the individual, which then has to become more important than anything else.  Oneness and deep grounding in truth evaporate to be replaced by a desperate need to survive, and self-interest, self-importance or even self-absorption.  Some people find it very difficult to find their way out of this, to let go, to stop strangling their life with their ego.

"Creative Power Within"  22 x 28 acrylic on black paper

Even if one small part of you is not included in the whole of you because of self-interest or picking and choosing then what you came here for is suffocated.  As more of your life is led by self-interest, and personal survival of the ego then you will not see what you came here for.  To realize what you came here for you can't make your life about what you want.  It can't be made into something that is not real and pretend differently.  If you know you are missing something within then you know what is actually real, but it will never be what you want. It will only be what it is.  

You also cannot use truth to try to make what is real within into something you want, nor can you use it to make something real that is not real.  This way of being has no balance to move anywhere within; it can only lead to more imbalance.  From this place whatever little bit you are actually able to see of truth you will not be able to use because it will be distorted and you will know that. Justifying your actions will seal the blindness.

Balance is found by first seeing where you have created imbalance within.  Do not gravitate toward or move away from any part.  Just notice gently what is there.  Shift into seeing the whole from your highest awareness then you will be able to hold the whole.  When you find you are moving toward or away from aspects of you, gently stop and be the whole of you. Exist for the very highest in you and you will be able to hold the whole.  Love being the whole of you, there is no effort in any of this.  If you begin to identify with a particular part of you, whether positive or negative, simply go back to loving being the whole of you.  Being the whole is easy because it is what you actually love.  If you experience effort or frustration then you are looking from a part of you to see what is true, simply let go and go back to being the whole.  If you justify the effort in anyway then you are blind again.

Remain on the highest and finest level.  While being that, see the ways in which you are not being the highest and finest levels within.  Be gentle with you, see everything you are being without protecting anything. You can only become, tun into what you most love, by being gentle and honest with you.

Watch where you try to get way with something, cut corners, within.  In gentleness within come back to being the whole of you.  If you are not gentle with your self then you can still see and know what is true within, but it will be on a coarse level.  You can't turn into what you first are, God, without gentleness within.

It is easy to be gentle within while in stillness.  Practice being gentle within through all parts of you as you move through your day.  This cannot be done unless you are balanced inside.  As you become more balanced, your seeing with be finer and the love of that fineness will show as a love of balance, all moving into form.

You will discover many loves within.  You will find a deep love of what is real, of moving forward, of being still, of being clean inside.  Love of balance enables everything to work well.  The more loves you have the deeper your joy.  The deepest joy and sense of freedom is that everything is one, not just as an intellectual thought, but as your everyday reality.

Your calling cannot manifest, nor does it matter, until you are whole.  Don't worry about trying to get it right, just be balanced within and you will be on the right track.  The power of the whole is the same as being at one.  Realize that in every part of you and be it on the highest level you know.  

"You can't know God without turning into God and there is no status in Godhood."  -John De Ruiter

"The cost of not being whole and balanced is that it costs the whole of the universe when you are not whole."  -John De  Ruiter

There is no actual veil between form and non-form, except what you have put there for your own comfort.  When you are completely trustworthy as a being and with your entire life, when you are entirely whole then the other side opens.  Beforehand, we get glimpses and we know there is more to this life than what we can presently see.  There is so much more than just this life.  

Be the other side, on this side.  Be non-form while in form.  This does not mean go to the other side for a nice visit.  It isn't about going back and forth, or in and out.  It is about being it always.   It is also not about letting it wash over you.  It is about letting it wash into you, and not like a flash flood that inundates and then is gone.  Let the other side wash into you like a deep clear pool, healing.  

What you love and what you know is true are not always the same thing.

Peace and love....

Loving Balance Within, Part 1

Can you step back from your own mind and thus understand all things?  -Lao Tzu

Open your heart and everything opens. At the core of your heart is the taste of love, be that with everything that you are.  A the core of your heart is the sound of love, be that with everything that you are.  What awe comes from, be that with everything that you are.  Being qualities such as these brings up childlikeness and a sense of wonderful freedom while in the midst of knowing holiness, a sense of oneness.

"Open Heart"  11 x 13 inches acrylic ink on paper

Oneness, merging with your innermost, will have all the parts of you moving together in balance while functioning from a higher knowing. Nothing of you or your past is to be gotten rid of; it is all to be integrated in balance, all your patterns, your person, mind, thoughts, feelings, personality.  You cannot make your self the center of this, or you will experience separation and not able to see.  You will be blinded.  You can only bring all of you to this in balance.  

You will find your holiness within all that you are when you are completely trustworthy of not misusing anything.  If you cannot include,or need to escape anything of your self then you are still not trustworthy with your self. To exclude anything of you, except what is not true, is to exclude a particular expression of the Absolute.  The higher you move as awareness, the more that must be integrated or there will be imbalance. 

You can no longer blame any part of you, you can only now take good care of all parts of you.  If you are being less than completely true it will show up as blame in one of the parts of you.  If there is blame then you will know you are being untrustworthy.  When you blame a part of you, trying to exclude it in someway, then you know you are trying to get away with something and making it okay to do that.  Shame will come up when you recognize you have been trying to get away with something and making it look like you aren't doing that, within yourself or to others.  

This leads to an experience of being fragmented within.  If this is happening in form then it is assuredly happening within truth.  This is you requiring truth to change instead you changing to fit truth.  You cannot pick and choose what aspects of yourself to bring forward or leave behind.  You cannot choose only some aspects of truth to integrate, while leaving others behind.  You cannot make what you are being that is untrue into something that is acceptable and true when it is not. You cannot pick and choose, or everything will be thrown out of balance. When you are living cleanly within, then you are learning.  You are training your self.   You will be getting to know all parts of you at a finer level.  Love learning, love balance within.  Love including all your parts, love truth.

Do not follow a particular way of thinking, follow a way of being guided by a love of truth.  Following what you think will produce tradition.  Follow a way of being because of the truth and realness you see in it.  Loving this way of being has love become that way of being.  Then it will all become real in you, as you.  God living in form.  Remember... getting rid of any part of you will leave you blind where that part used to be.

It has to be whole, or you will experience parts of you as outside of you, separate.  We have been used to examining parts separate from the whole, and we view them as distinct pieces, not integrated as the whole.  As you begin to realize the wholeness within you it will come together slowly at first.  As more and more of it integrates clearly then the learning comes very fast.

Also, allowing what you are being to be guided by a particular experience or feeling is not an accurate way to know what is true. Your experience may not match what you are being and know is true.  If you look into your past you can see times when your experience was not congruent with what is true. Be wholeness, it is wonderfully freeing, complete.  

Give all of you to your innermost. Let go, coming completely apart ,and then coming back together in a fundamentally new way that at first you may not recognize, or understand, but know  is true.

A flower that grows between two rocks requires the rocks for it to grow between.  Flowers don't know it is difficult to grow between rocks; they just grow.  It is all possible within the whole.  

"There is profound responsibility in being Love,’ …more than the mind could imagine or hold up under. If most human beings truly realized the impact that they have on the whole, they’d be crushed by the realization of it."  -Adyashanti

"Life is like music for its own sake. We are living in an eternal now, and when we listen to music we are not listening to the past, we are not listening to the future, we are listening to an expanded present."  -Alan Watts

Love and Peace...

Glimpses Into the Future

We all get glimpses into a possible us, what we can be and do in this life.  These glimpses are like a lighthouse beacon in the dark reminding us to pay attention and take good care of what we are. With life shouting for our immediate attention we can dismiss these glimpses, but they always come back. They cannot leave because they are us in this life. Most would say these glimpses resonate in their heart. They get our attention and we are likely to remember them far into our future. They are an invitation to be, and as such have a realness different from our normal way of seeing. We may not understand what it all means or might entail, but they get our interest in uncommon ways. They indicate something we are to accomplish. We all have these and it shows as a pull or drive toward something asking to be fulfilled. They will either be realized or not; it is our choice.

"Deep Life" 8 x 10 inches acrylic on paper

This is different than healing the mis-perception that we can be separate from God. It is different than deeply and intimately giving all that we are at every level to God within and staying there. However, this oneness with God is the prerequisite for manifesting in form what you truly are to be and do, enabling you to shine forth in ways not yet imagined. This is not to say that before oneness with God within we do not manifest aspects of what we are here for, we do, in fact we cannot help it. But to fully be and then do, you must first surrender to what you first are within. There can be no ego in this, or you will be like someone running whose one foot is nailed to the floor. There is movement and it might even feel like there is momentum, but are you really going anywhere?

 When I was 16 years old, I had a most disconcerting realization. I saw that what I was here to accomplish would not happen until I was old and fairly wrinkled. I tried ignoring the thought.  I tried to say it was a lie, but it just would not change or go away. The kinds of questions I asked myself were, "Assuming this is true, what do I do with my life between now and then? Am I really supposed to wait around my whole life for something to happen that I am not even sure what it is? What if it doesn't happen, will I have wasted my life because I should have been doing something else? What if I don't recognize it when it finally arrives? What if I get old and then don't care about it?

 So, here I am at age 63 never having spoken about this to anyone until about two years ago. It is only in hindsight that I can see a direction in my life towards something I've always known.  I also see both the wayward off-track movements, and the clear choices supporting what I needed for growth and development in my character and being. There has been pain, fear and joy just like everyone else's life, but I never gave up on what I saw when I was 16.

As I got older though I knew I was missing key elements in my self-awareness. My foundation was incomplete, but I didn't know exactly what was missing. I couldn't see it because I had become controlling, tight inside, self-important (when you don't know who you are, it has to be covered up that you don't know who you are). I had ways of being that I just didn't need, but in my blindness I didn't know that. I didn't know it was okay to be vulnerable, soft, open, kind and core-splittingly honest, patient and humble.  It took 10 years with my teacher to let go, and then let go more. The letting go never stops.

 It is a strange experience to know that whatever is occurring as my life is just "grist for the mill", an aspect of whatever I need to be prepared for in what is to come. I have spent 55 years in this space. I have tried to be a good student of life and am honored to do my small part. Interestingly, I still don't know exactly what my small part is, except writing this blog is a part of it. I'm just still paying attention.

 It seems appropriate to tell you about a dream I had about 18 years ago. It begins 29,000 years in the future on this planet. I'm facing three beings living here. Everything is grayed out behind them so I cannot see it. They said one sentence to me. "The time in which you live you are not remembered for what what you did to each other, but for whom you are trying to become." This has been a awesome message of hope for me, that it all turns out even though it looks very bleak when we treat each other so badly and treat our planet so badly.

I was allowed to see one thing because it couldn't be helped. We shimmer around the edges and have lost some mass because we have learned to photosynthesize, get nutrition from light. We literally become light beings.

 ... fundamentally, most people want to remain separate and in control. Simply put, most people want to keep dreaming that they are special, unique, and separate... more than they want to wake up to the perfect unity of an Unknown which leaves no room for any separation from the whole. --Adyashanti

 There is no longer a mind, so-to-speak.
There is no longer a you or a me.
There is no longer a universe or a world.
There is no longer a question of liberation.
There is no longer a question.

For there is no one left to ask a question.
There is no one left to have an experience.
There is no one left to see the world.
There is no one left to have a problem.
You become an embodiment of total joy.
You actually do not become an embodiment of total joy because you never existed.
Total joy just is.
It isn't this and it isn't that.
It just is. --Robert Adams

Peace and love...

1970: Military, Rock Bands and Psychic Phenomena

I got married to my high school sweetheart in 1967 at the young age of almost 18. Six months before we married John joined the U.S. Air Force as a ploy to avoid being drafted by the Army and then immediately shipped off to Vietnam.  He was assigned to Nellis Air Force base in Las Vegas, Nevada, and that is where we lived from 1967-1970.  The Vietnam War was full steam ahead, and to many folks it appeared that we might win.  No one knew exactly what winning was supposed to look like, but we were assured it would be worth the effort.   Vietnam was the first television war and the graphic coverage never meshed well with our daily dose of assurances and anti-war demonstrations were a natural outcome of this disparity, however, there were no anti-war demonstrations in Las Vegas.  The thought of a demonstration never seriously occurred to anyone; not with the mafia, Nellis Air Force base and heavy-handed police force all at their visible apex of power.  It was generally agreed that drawing attention to oneself as anti-establishment was a terrible idea  almost certainly resulting in a violent outcome. 

"Chaos Theory"  24 x 36 inches mixed media on canvas

John was never actually at Nellis itself.  He instead took a daily 60 mile bus ride to Indian Springs, a tiny temporary auxiliary base in the middle of absolutely nowhere that coincidentally was also on the way to the Atomic Energy Commision's underground bomb site.  The AEC had a nasty habit of exploding atomic bombs underground about every six months, which also frequently blew out the windows in John 's office about 40 miles away, and rocked every building in a 100 mile radius--including our apartment.  The public was enthusiastically assured this was all entirely safe, except once when personnel at the military base were told not to drink milk from local cows.  No one else in Las Vegas was supposed to know about that and it was not reported in any of the newspapers.

 Anyway, the base had been established in 1945, and was designed to last five years.  Not much happened there, ever, and it was considered semi-isolated.  No one was supposed to be stationed there more than a year.  John, however, had a friend in the transfer room at Nellis and every time his name came up, he would simply re-file John to the back of the list and so John stayed put for three years.  As the base draftsman, boredom was John's chief emotional state because nothing had been drafted in many years except door signs and birthday party invitations, but it sure beat going to Vietnam.  For that he was boringly grateful.

On weekends he got together and played music with friends.  Eventually a band formed and some good songs were written.  John was elected to manage the group as he was somewhat lacking in musical talent and everybody else was skimpy on discipline.  The band played a lot in Las Vegas and opened for "Canned Heat" and the "Doors".  This naturally meant that they should then go on a 1970 summer tour in Europe along with almost every other decent rock band in the U.S.  So, John got out of the military and off they went with much fanfare and hope for international renown.  

I was to follow three weeks later with two other friends, but there was one minor issue. The band's itinerary changed and no one knew where they were.  All we could piece together was they were either in Osnabruck, Germany, or Copenhagen or somewhere in-between.  So the departure date arrived, and with that information we left for London.  

Now it would be logical to ask, "What were you thinking" or "Did you have any kind of a plan?" The answers are I wasn't, and no.

We fooled around and went to museums in London for a couple of days and then hopped a ferry leaving Dover.  On the ferry we split-up because I wanted to go to Copenhagen and they felt drawn to Osnabruck.  

After landing in France, I hitch-hiked to Amsterdam having gotten a ride with a gentlemanly, Austrian, truck driver with a cargo of white wine.  I flew the rest of the way to Copenhagen and then took a train from the airport to downtown and waited in the station for the local hostel to open.  I had not slept since leaving London 48 hours earlier, and was literally asleep on my feet.  I met some other English speaking kids who were also waiting for the hostel to open, so I simply followed them to it as I had lost all ability to function coherently.  After sleeping for five hours, I went downtown. In 1970, people traveling could receive mail and leave messages for people at the American Express office, so I did that.  Then I just wandered around for awhile wondering how I was going to find John in a city of one million people, if he was even there.  Eventually, I went back to the train station and waited for the bus going to the hostel.  It arrived and left, but I did not get on. I was not thinking of anything in particular, but I had a pull to go instead across the street to Tivoli Gardens.  I went in, wandered around a bit and then stopped, turned left and stopped again directly in front of a bench.  John was sitting there, and I said, "Hi."  Stunned was hardly the word for the look on his face.  

What are the odds of that happening?  I was in a city of one million people, plus we had to be in the same place at the same time, and... I didn't even know if he was in Denmark.  It was astounding and still is.  

Even stranger, it happened again 10 days later with our friends who had gone instead to Osnabruck.  John and I were sitting on a bench on the Stroget, a walking street in downtown Copenhagen.  It was after business hours and no one else was on the street, then we saw them and sat quietly waiting for them to discover us.  Literally, there was only the four of us on the entire street. They went berserk.  They had bought a van and only just arrived in Copenhagen 10 minutes earlier.  So this synchronicity happened not once, but twice.  

Even stranger than that, never once did it occur to me that I would not find John.  It never occurred to our friends either.  No family member taking us to the airport, or calling to wish us a safe trip questioned us about anything regarding our plans if we didn't find the band. Everything played out as if a meticulous travel agent had taken care of every detail for a successful trip to Europe.  

Of course, at the time I had no understanding at any level about how these kinds of things occur, but I knew for sure that reality was very very different than anything that had previously occurred to me.  I realized I had no idea what reality actually was, nor did I understand almost anything about how it worked, or my place in it.  I now know a little more, but it still isn't much considering what is possible that I am not yet aware of.  The more I know, the less I know.

Some of what I know is that reality can only show up in accordance with what I am being, or in some way have set in motion. That's obvious.  For instance, my reality cannot show up as yours without a complete disconnect for you from everything you rely on as real. 

I have also come to know that we are to realize and merge with the context that awareness comes from.  We are to realize we are all of what is, not just an aspect of it, or a part of it.  There is so much more to us than just our personal experience, and there is more than the  impersonal self.  When we no longer experience, in any way, that we are just a part of something larger that instead we are all of it, then all separation melts away ever so gently and we are what we hold most dearly in our hearts.  Then events like the above, finding someone on the other side of the planet becomes natural and not at all surprising.  What formerly looked chaotic suddenly snaps into view with awesome clarity and we instantly see our place in the all of It.

Peace and love....

In the Flow During Difficult Times

It is easy to be grounded and in the flow when life is still and smooth. When we are confronted with coarseness in ourselves or someone else, there is a natural draw to an old orientation, an old mechanism. However, if you remain in what you know is true within, you can shift into an authentic orientation giving you new resources, which will change your self and your foundation.

 "In the Flow" is 24 x 36 inches on canvas using acrylic paint, inks, and iridescent powders. 

While in the midst of coarseness take an internal inventory. Any place within that you are tight, judgmental, hard, or closed-down will cement your own coarseness. When you find yourself in these kinds of spaces gently go back to what you know and stay in kindness, softness, openness and honesty within. This will bring you back to a good stable foundation. Stay vulnerable and let go of any need to be controlling, and... don't confuse being in control with being controlling.

Be and stay clear as glass inside. Give the coarseness nothing to grasp onto, just be clear. If it has nothing to hold onto then it has no choice, but to move right on through having touched nothing of you. Things like this must keep moving because of their distortion, they must search for a place to attach. It cannot stay in you unless it has a place to land. Give it nothing.

While in the midst of difficulties it is easy to see the state of our foundation. This is when it is most apparent what there is to let go of, and be responsible for. We all fall down at times, and that is really okay. What matters most is what we are being as we get up.

The roots of our foundation must run deep to the core of our being. We have to be unshakable in giving all internal power only to our innermost. If you do not develop deep roots within then you will be like a young tree; any strong wind that happens to come along will blow you over. You will fly with the wind and your roots will have left the ground they were moving through. We then find we are being something we really do know we are not, and we also know we are compromising our consciousness.

*  *  *  *  *  *

People are not very comfortable with the idea of cost, but it is unavoidable. There is always a cost to everything, even your next breath. To be everything, costs everything. This is especially true about spiritual development. There is no free spiritual lunch. And yet, many people think awakening should be miraculously bestowed upon them. In 99% of the cases this just doesn't occur. This has been the hardest work I have ever done, and most of the time it was like trying to see the back of my own eyeball. Now it doesn't have to be hard, it is actually easy. It just all depends on the depth of one's attachments and what you are willing to let go of. Hopefully you are a faster learner than I have been. So I have a question of you:

When you die what kind of life are you willing to have had? Will you have been what you came here for, or will you have missed the boat? You can already see where your life is headed.  Remember, either way there is a cost for what you have accomplished or avoided.

Peace and love....

Taste of the Beyond

"There is no coming conscious without pain. People will do everything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own soul. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious." -Carl Jung

You are the only one who can open your door. A teacher can show you the door and say what it takes to open, and then enter it. The teacher can do no more, or they would be doing your work for you, and you cannot enter the door without doing the work. How could you recognize the door without the awareness to see it for what it is? You can see it for what it is by seeing the same in you, as you.  The work is you developing your foundation, being and integrating the entirety of your foundation. Then the door opens, and there are many many doors to what is beyond.

Once you know the taste of what is beyond, you cannot turn away from it, nor can you turn your mind away from it. You can only be with the taste, facing it in what is beyond. You are not to run into it, nor run away from it. The taste is just there and yet there is also direction into it. You cannot make this yours. It is not for you. It is simply letting true choice move. It is letting heart consciousness move into being only what it knows.

There is no true real flight unless you are being the very very tip of the arrow. If you have anything of your mind in front of you then there is no flight. You are stuck. You cannot place your own comfort in front of you. When you seek your own comfort everything stops. Any comfort within you isn’t for you; it is for others, for you to give them not to get for yourself. Others are then comforted by you being what you know. You are an example. Such comforting draws them to be what they know. Comfort is only for those that have something in front of them. And the comfort is there to take them to what they know, beyond what they are dealing with.

You can have nothing of your mind in front of you. It is you being completely out in front of your entire mind. It is you being what you know, moving into what you know. The energy of that, the energy of what you are being, moves through the whole arrow transforming it and enabling it to function. It functions in ways that you know are possible, but that you cannot grasp. As soon as you recede past the very tip of the arrow where there seems to be nothing, then you are being something that you know you are not, an actual compromise within consciousness, and consciousness knowing it has been compromised.

There will always be very many reasons for this compromise, but there is never a single excuse and that is because you actually know what is true. You know what knowing is. You can only be knowing without using the support of mind in front of you.

By being solidly in your foundation, you’ll find the key to the door, and the key is not for you to have or use. It is for you to be. You are the key. When you are completely and solidly grounded in your foundation the key opens the door within. It opens you. What was previously in the dark is now a living being within you, but that only takes place by you being it. Your foundation will match what you are being.

It begins by facing the taste. The way is clear; you are not allowed to give up.

Part of the above is loosely paraphrased excerpts of a conversation with John De Ruiter in 2003.

" You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens "~Rumi