There is an appearance of multiplicity. But behind the appearance are clues pointing to oneness. . .

Sunday, September 21, 2008

Monday, August 11, 2008

Award!

Billie over at Camera Obscura at has graciously bestowed an award on this blog.

Thanks very much Billie!

Monday, August 4, 2008

Lighthouse Path and Flowers

Longleaf Light

The assumed separate person


Our mind, based on misunderstanding, assumes we are a separate person apart from reality. Then we seek a path, practice, goal and so on. But the problem is a creation of thought. Without the thoughts, is there a problem!? The concept on which all other troubling concepts is based is the notion of the separate “I”. The one with the problem (the “I”) is the problem itself! Until this is seen, the seeking, suffering and doubts cannot help but go on. How can an illusory character let go of an illusion which is, in fact, itself? - John Wheeler

Duck Pond

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Porter's Creek

Little River Dogwoods

Tremont Spring Colors

You do not create the next thought. . .


If you look closely at thoughts moment by moment, you will see that the thoughts are not generated by a conceptual "I" at all. "You" actually do not create the next thought. It appears and the mind steps in and erroneously interprets that the thought was generated by the phantom character called "I". There is no such entity present. John Wheeler

Strange Tree

The ego is a concept. . .

The ego is a concept, an assumption. It is merely an idea. What is that idea? It is the notion that you stand apart from the deeper reality of things as an independent and autonomous self, a limited being. As you look into this matter, you find that this assumption proves to be entirely false. So the ego simply evaporates due to discovering its non-existence. There is no “ego death” needed or possible, because there is no ego present to die. - John Wheeler

Porter's Creek in Spring

Little River Spring

Monday, April 28, 2008

You are not a seeker. . .


See what you actually are, not what you think you are. You are not a seeker, a person, an unadvanced soul or any other concept proposed by mind. You are nothing short of the non-dual reality here and now. The answer is not in the mind and cannot be approached by any definition, concept or thought. Before the next thought appears, you are. Your being and its aware nature are fully evident. Your identity as that is clear now, if you take a few moments to verify this. - John Wheeler

Purple and White

Spring Creek Colors

Tremont Rapids

Sunday, April 6, 2008

Letting go of dualities

See the perfection. . .

Spring Storm Skies

Spring Flowers, Light and Clouds

Wisteria Hysteria

Glorious Redbud

Spring Lake Sunset

The third thing


Not effort or
the absence of effort,
neither choice nor
the impossibility of choice,
neither self nor not self,
neither nothing nor something,
neither emptiness nor form,
neither unborn nor born,
the third thing... - John Astin

The great ego. . .


The great ego turns out to be a lifeless jack-in-the-box. Even more, when you look inside, “Jack” is missing! When you look into the mind, all you find are a few thoughts, feelings and perceptions. You do not find a defective, limited person — only the space of pure knowing and being, or the non-conceptual, ever-fresh presence of awareness itself. Now you know you are THAT. That is the main point. All the suffering and seeking was only believing in a thought about someone who never existed. - John Wheeler

Distinctions

Black and Pastels

Layers of Colors

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Monday, March 10, 2008

Rhododendron and Fence

In the absence of the person


No wonder "you" cannot see this : This is a freedom that a "person" will never see.


How could a "person" ever accept that everything happens spontaneously, of its own accord, in the absence of the person?


The Tao (or Oneness, or God, or Life, or Spirit, or Emptiness…) has no centre, no mind, no personal volition. It appears as everything, but itself is nothing. Nothing manifesting as a world, as everything there is and is not. And there is only the Tao, which is to say there is no Tao at all.

And even to speak of it, even to think of it, even to do that is to lose it forever.


And yet the thinking and the speaking are fully the Tao; there is nothing that it is not.



It is the no-thing by which everything appears. And it’s not even that, because it’s not an “it” at all.

When speaking of the Tao, silence is the only way… - Jeff Foster

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

Hawksbill and Clouds

Concentration


Why does it matter
where I look,
or how long my gaze
remains there
when everything
I behold is That,
this unspeakable
Mystery
that lives
as everything? - John Astin

All bets are off


I have not overcome suffering, because such a statement presumes there is an “I” who has attained such a state. However, a looking did not happen to find the “I”. No such thing was found to exist. All belief in it ended precisely then. Not for “me”. The belief just ended. I make no claims about what “I” have attained. If I ever find an “I”, I might be able to say something about it. Until then, all bets are off! - John Wheeler

Grandfather Awakens

Pink and Blue

Day Fades

Thursday, February 7, 2008

Sunday, February 3, 2008

Grass, Trees and Fog

Lake Storm Breaks

Setting Sun, Trees and Water

Belief in self centered thoughts. . .


A bit of belief goes into the reference point of the separate self and the thoughts about that entity are assumed as true. In this, the natural state, which never departs, is overlooked. Nothing is wrong or lost at any time. You will see that with this basic insight, less and less energy is capable of going into the mind and its beliefs. You are always the light of awareness illuminating whatever appears. Look at this mechanism of suffering until it is clear. You cannot be free of something that is not understood. So make sure all this is clear. Then the root of suffering is resolved. Essentially suffering is believing in self-centered thoughts. The remedy is to remove, through clear seeing, the belief in the self center. All other beliefs hang on the belief in that core concept. It is as simple as that. - John Wheeler

Pine Savannah in Fog

Poplar Point Fade

Clarifying who you are. . .


Clarifying who you are and resolving suffering are the same movement, two sides of the same coin. All experiences (thoughts, feelings and objects perceived) arise as appearances. But there is something in you that does not arise or appear. Yet it cannot be denied because it is what you are. Initially this is simply pointed out as the sense of being, which is present and aware. Notice this as the constant presence through which all experiences naturally flow, like a river. Then you are no longer being swept along by the current of events. You remain rooted in a solid source. Suffering and problems are seen for what they are — mental phenomena, mere images passing through the light of awareness. Your home is in and as that non-conceptual awareness. You no longer experience yourself as a limited self bound by imagination and concepts. - John Wheeler

Monday, January 28, 2008

Grass, Pine Trees and Lake at Dusk

What are we to do?


Ah, we would if we could! Isn’t that the game that is the spiritual search? To give up? To surrender, to relax into Being, to plunge back into the no-thing?

But here’s the point: it’s always turned into a doing, isn’t it? “I need to give up! Why haven’t I been able to give up yet!?”. And so the game goes on. The mind will turn anything into a doing. It will even turn a not-doing into a doing, and spend the rest of its life trying to do that! Trying to do nothing! Oh, the wonderful games the mind plays, trying to save itself. It really doesn’t want to die. And so it creates all these terrifying stories about death. And it keeps itself going. Always seeking, always wanting, always hoping. Always fleeing from an illusory past, aiming towards a made-up future. - Jeff Foster

Rainbow Water, Sky and Rocks

Twisted Trees

Unconditional


That which we seek is, by definition always something else, is it not? Whatever we are looking for is always some other time, always some other place. We are never seeking the state we are for that state is already present! And though we traverse the inner and outer worlds in search of that elusive “something else,” there will never be a “something else.” There will always be only this. . .

Now, it would be easy to hear such a message and then try to put an end to all the searching. But of course, the effort to not look for something else is to look for something else. The struggle to be free of the search and “accept what is” is, ironically, to turn away from what is, to turn away from the experience of “not-accepting.” But turning away from what is and seeking out some other experience or state of mind is to simply seek out some other experience or state of mind. In other words, it is not actually a problem. It is simply the way life moves, simply what is. . .

So, what would become of the search if there were no effort to end it? What would happen to the experience we call “seeking” if all the spiritual manipulations and strategies to make it disappear were to cease? . . . - John Astin

Lake, Creek and Sunset

Goodnight, Jordan Lake

Sunday, January 20, 2008

Winter Wonderland

On a Winter's Day

"Powerful" experiences


. . . So-called “powerful” experiences are really no more important or worthy of attention than seemingly less powerful or significant ones. The mind’s tendency is to divide the world up, to split reality into what it likes (and thinks is worthwhile and desirable) and what it dislikes (and sees as less worthwhile or desirable). There are those experiences mind deems to be meaningful and extraordinary and those it considers to be quite ordinary, maybe even meaningless. But presence or awareness - the mystery that is awake - does not see the world this way. It is radically and unconditionally open to things and experiences, as they are, regardless of their particular taste, texture, or feel. This that is Awake sees beyond the mind’s preferences. It recognizes that every moment is a gift, every moment the miracle, not just the ones that match our particular preferences and desires. - John Astin

Frozen Forest

Snowy Pines and Grass

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Fog, Water and Trees in Winter

Swamp Colors in Winter

Teaching you to become something


All the teachers are doing is teaching you to become something.

All teaching is about becoming something, becoming still, becoming whatever. And always you're going to become it, you never are it, but you're going to become it. If you try a bit harder, you'll get there. That's crap, that's just crap. You are there, you are this, This is it. . . - Tony Parsons

Trees, Water, Sky

Spiritual work is not a prescription


It may well happen that your life will be of arduous spiritual work but one single moment of clear seeing puts an end to it. Also, it may be revealing to know that that conclusive freeing insight or understanding has been recorded to happen through people who are not spiritually conditioned at all — people who are not in any kind of 'spiritual way'. This alone reveals that what we call spiritual way is simply a conceptual construction and not a prescription for one to follow. This insight alone may make the belief in the self-center crumble and leave you bare and free as you are. - Felipe Oliviera

Branches, Sky, Reflection

Archives

Counter