Category: Spirituality (Page 3 of 19)

Dear Tom #1

November 12, 2013 / Tom

Dear Tom,

Sometimes even the most steady people in your life falter. They hurl stones, they throw tantrums. They create a spiral stemming from a tortured place in their mind to which you can be no cure. You become the trigger, and you become the cause of something that happened long before you existed in their life.

Forgive us, my friends, for we know not what we do. There will be times when I will hold the nails to your wrists and there will be times when you will hold them to mine. Forgive. Accept. Love. It’s the way to our enlightenment.

Understand as you lay on your cross that rarely is that nail creating a new wound. Rather, it is opening an old one, and the blood that pours out has pooled there since the dawn of your suffering.

Understand as you hold the nail firm in your angry torment that neither the hammer nor the nail are new. Rather, they’ve been bequeathed to you by countless souls that have knelt there before you. You have chosen to pick them up, and press them to the wounds of another.

Forgive. Let the blood flow and the hammer fall as a great testament to your love. Love yourself enough to become aware of this moment. See its effects now so that you may find the truth, and in that truth know that you have the power to experience whatever you want, and the power to choose how you see this experience now.

Accept. Know the beauty of the moment your skin opens and the blood flows. It is there you must shine the light of your awareness. You have chosen to bleed here and now. Are you the scar’s master or are you the slave to the story it tells? Which would you prefer?

Love. As you bring the hammer down find love in that space. You are allowing a great opportunity for the light of love to shine. Yet know you can decide to be the master of the hammer you now wield, or a slave to its weight. Which would you prefer?

Know now that your actions are nothing more than opportunities. Do not look at others now. Instead, focus and see the choices you have made to get you here. Study yourself and only use the actions of others as a chance to continue that self-study. Here you will know that you can either become the master of yourself or a slave to the stories you tell. Which would you prefer?

I wish…

October 29, 2013 / Tom

I wish I was more evolved, more understanding, more committed. I wish I better understood the toil, the turmoil, and the suffering. I simply wish…

I wish I knew then what I know now. I wish I could turn the hands of time to a moment when I was lost, point in a direction and say “you want to go that way!” I wish I could have brought the eternal knowledge of a million lifetimes into those moments when I knew not what I was doing and then forgive even the slightest of trespasses. I wish I could have seen the light when it was but a slight glimmer in the corner of my life, and I wish I could have then embraced those moments I can’t seem to let go of now.

I wish I would have told you more. I wish I could have shown you more. I wish that in the weakness of my darkest hours I could see the strength of the lighted path that was unfolding before me. I wish those stars I once gazed upon could have shaken me from my slumber before the end came, and I wish that I had simply been able to feel then all that I feel now. I wish I could have built on the laughs and the promises of things to come. I wish I could have known that each moment, each embrace, wasa countdown to an end my mind could not foresee.

I know it was not meant to be. I know it is as it has to be. I know that in the hidden tears of my heart the song of joy is sung loudly and with a chorus of a million seconds as they whiz by. I know that the memories and the pictures kept no longer turn my world to black even as they draw me to the wishing.well. Here, at this well, I do not draw on a want of something in the future but rather on the desire of a different past. Here the well does not quench my thirst but dries me out, leaving me wanting for something I cannot find and needing something I will never have.

I know I am not a victim, but a great procreator. I have given birth to each new path, each new step on this journey to the unknown. Here, the part of me grateful that I cannot change the past arises as a Warrior. I stand in a certain resolve not to suffer from the mist of the past, but rather be strengthened by it. It is no longer a fight to be won but a surrender to the experience of acceptance. Here I ride the wave as an active participant bent not on directing the water but rather surviving the ride toward the shore. Each tumble through the rough break strengthens my balance, each rough smash of skin and bone through the surface of the foamy abyss strengthens my stride as I swim toward the next swell. I will not stop, and I will not let the reefs or beasts of the sea keep me from my destiny.

It’s time, my friends, to rise and speak our labored truth. It’s time to dismantle the conditioning of our ancestors and to no longer seek the path already tread. It’s time we learn from our mistakes and turn them into the type of perfections that turn mere mortals into saints in the eyes of unknowing gods. It’s time to make new mistakes rather than to repeat the ancient ones, and it is time to find new cures to old ideas not in the hopes of not suffering, but rather in the real promise of becoming wise in the torment. If we must cry, let’s cry tears that create a wave taking us to new places. If we must feel pain let it drive us to new areas of comfort. If we must feel loss let us not grasp it but rather allow it to push us toward something true to hold on to.

I just long to make it all meaningful and worthwhile. I wish to honor the loss with a great discovery. I wish to find the truth in the midst of the great lie. I wish to know the wisdom in the throes of my own ignorance. I no longer wish to read your book but rather write my own. I want to redefine my experience not just from this moment on, but from the beginning. I no longer want to know the sunrise through your eyes, but rather create it from my own.

I love. I love you. I love you all. Peace.

Reflection

September 17, 2013 / Tom

We are all reflections. Of someone. Of some thing. We are a story of the mind, the mind of others and the mind within our selves.

Our minds create the glass on which we see ourselves, as well as the characters we create that dance along the mirrored pillars of our lives. We focus on the surface of the waters on which we sail, our vessels churning according to the ripples that we see, our visions distorted by the fog of our own design as we wretch helplessly in the storms we ourselves give rise to. This world, this existence, is ours, and we have given it over to the greatest demons ever made.

Ourselves.

We are the victim and the abuser, the tortured and the torturer. We are a reflection of ourselves somehow believing we are powerless to change the story. We kneel before false idols of our own creation and then wonder in bewilderment when they crush us. We worship a paper god we have created in our own image and we allow it to master us instead of the other way around. We give the power that defines us over to others, and then rebel against the very thing we have forgotten is ours.

It’s both empowering and frightening when you swallow the red pill. It’s no wonder so few of us choose to take it. We like the idea of something else being in control, of some divinity guiding our lives. We love the idea that our choice ends at following some rules set upon us by some power other than ourselves. We want to feel in control while actually not being in control, helpful while helpless, sane while practicing the very definition of insanity.

It’s hard to claim full responsibility for the story. It’s difficult to realize the power we are, the power we have, as the truth. We’ve been lulled into such a sense of security that we don’t want to give up our blankies in exchange for the real power of who we are. So, we bury ourselves deep in the fabric, hoping that the warmth we feel never ends without ever truly realizing it is our own heat we are feeling.

Yes, it’s scary. This security comes at a price. We call that price stress, suffering, and disease. At some point some of us must ask, “is that price worth it?”

I’m sick of the stress. I’m sick of the suffering. I’m sick of the disease, as ironic as that sounds. Most of all, I’m sick of the legacy I am leaving my children. Do I curse them with the same old suffering created by the same old insanity? Do I give them the lessons taught to me by my parents and my society that have never, ever, ever worked?

Or do I try to teach them something else, something pretty well untried in a society where success is measuring by things and thriving is measured in dollar signs?

I believe that the next American revolution may very well be a bloodless one where the individual recognizes his own power, reclaims it, and rebels against the shackles we have allowed others to place on us.The next “shot heard around the world” may very well be a silent one where the shooter lives minimally and the target is those things that keep us stress-free. The forward lines in the next battle may be drawn between those selling it all and those giving it all away.

“So you think that money is the root of all evil? Have you ever asked what is the root of money?” ~ Atlas Shrugged

I am taking a hard look at what is creating suffering in my life. Attachment. Adherence to a vision not mine. Worshipping false idols (or worshipping any idol for that matter). I’m diving deep beyond the glass, beneath the surface, trying to find the root of the root. I don’t want to suffer anymore and, more importantly, I want to give my children a basis for non-suffering in their own lives. So, I’ve begun dumping my tea into the harbor, and I’m preparing for the only revolution that matters, the one within me.

It all comes down what I want to see when I look in the mirror and what I want to find on my open sea. Once I have that realization it will time to unfurl the sails and let the wind take me away.

Peace.

It is the Sunrise

June 12, 2013 / Tom

There is a vile moment in your experience when you realize, for the first time, that she is not the woman you thought she was. The antidote for that poison is the awesome realization that you are not the man she thinks you are. The smile that crests your lips is the Sunrise.

There is that sickening moment when you realize that the one you’ve trusted most knows your every weakness, and is suddenly allied with those parts of you. There is relief in that beautiful moment when you realize that your weakness has always been your greatest strength. The tear that trails down your face is the Sunrise.

There are those moments when you miss the ones you love and you’d give anything for one more hug, one more kiss, one more “I love you.” There is comfort found when the ones who love you hug you tightly, kiss you with joy, and scream to the listening world “I love you!” That comfort is the Sunrise.

There are those moments when you look back at certain times in your life filled with sadness and despair and begin to feel them again. There is joy when you return to this moment and find it was all worth it. That joy is the Sunrise.

There are those moments when you are filled with anger and your thoughts are focused on vengeance and retribution. You find strength when your breath returns and the gates of your heart open widely to let the love return. That strength is the Sunrise.

There are moments when you feel so lost that you are not certain you will ever find your way again. Find peace in the moment you realize just how found you are. That peace is the Sunrise.

Before every Sunrise comes the darkest part of night. Don’t wake up for the Sunrise, wake up for the darkest part that makes the Sunrise explode into your soul. Feel the coldest part of night before the warm light touches your skin. Know the dead silence of night before you hear the songbirds of the brand new day. There is so much beauty in those places we think are oh so ugly.

And the beauty we find? Well, that is the Sunrise.

Peace.

I. Love. Just. Being. Me

June 5, 2013 / Tom

There was once an ideal so great it seemed indestructible to me. It stood tall in the landscape of my life, and dominated my horizons even in those moments when I felt small and cold in its shadow. I measured my worth in its presence, often wondering if I could ever stand as tall as the person who had dominated my life.

Ultimately, I failed her and her me. It is remarkable what one can discover when the velo di amore is lifted from the eyes and replaced with la nebbia di avidità.

That is often where we find ourselves when a great promise becomes a lost ideal. I found myself a rudderless vessel unsure of each footstep and lost in an abyss of yesterdays, tossing and turning in a vast sea of uncertainty often sailing against the winds of my own heart. The very moment when you watch everything you once cherished and idolized become consistent with everything you wanted to remove from your life is the very moment when the ideal is lost, and often the very moment when you realize your life is no longer the dream you once held dear.

I had no idea what I was in for in that holy instant when the rains came and the flood waters descended upon my world. The walls closed in on me, and my heart sank into the black depths of despair. Gone are those who said you were their son. Gone are those who only hours before had said they loved you. Gone are those who called you brother, and gone is the one who promised you an eternity.

Everything goes. Everything vanishes. Everything returns to the dust on which it was built. Your life ends, or so you think.

I felt as if I was helpless, alone, and that I’d been left hanging in a place of which I had never been, in a way in which I had never experienced. I cried tears so salty that they dried my body of its substance, and sobbed so loudly that I had stirred the gods from their deepest slumber. I searched for reasons, and although I was told why from her, I realized that nothing I had ever believed in was real. I soon lost my sense of who I was and what I was doing.

It is, however, a moment of great opportunity. Some of us seek distractions and support from religion, others seek the same in substances. I simply wanted to watch and to learn. I wanted to seek out the illusions I had constructed in my life and end them. I wanted to suffer in order to end my suffering. I wasn’t going to find my joy in a Bible, or in a bottle; no I would have to find my joy in a place few of us journey into deeply in a way I had never tried before.

That is what I had decided to do. Search. Watch. Learn. Most of all I worked hard at not interfering with the process. Soon I began to see patterns that failed to serve me at my highest place. I saw my consistent need to blame myself for the failures. I saw the mistakes I made in not standing up for who I was and what I wanted in my life. I saw the error of not loving myself, and in not simply accepting my fears, my desires, my needs and my loves as wonderful manifestations of who I am. I allowed myself to be suckered into living a lie; her lie, their lie, and my lie. I followed my heart that said “I love you” without testing the waters in her mind to see if they were too shallow, too cold, or simply not aged enough to dive into. I allowed myself to believe her lie, and soon began living it as if I owned it. Worse, I began admitting to it as if it had really happened.

I began seeing the pedestal I had constructed to place her and them on. That pedestal was a dangerous construct, it puts others in a place of being worshipped unjustly while placing me in a place of worshipping others unfairly. I failed to see my worth, my value and my sense of divinity. It was no wonder I couldn’t see them for who they were.

Mere dust. Nothing more.

There came a time, though, when the proverbial flood waters receded and my ark came to rest on a mountaintop. The rainbows appeared and I let my cargo go free to wander those places I had never seen. It is there that the veil itself begins to unravel, and it is there that the pedestals crumble and the dust blows away. I began to see less with my heart and more with my mind all the while beginning to see it all with something I once searched for but had never truly found.

That part I was always seeking was, truly, that part that was always seeking me.

I began to see that there is truly nothing more valuable to a human Being as the relation I have with my Self. I began to see the things I once held so dear as nothing more than illusions. I began to let go of those swirling dust-devils I once held as gods upon a pedestal and they, in turn, began revealing their truth. I was never what I was told I was, and I was never what I wanted to be. Because I wanted to be it so badly I believed it so easily. In the end the lie was revealed, as was the truth. There is only I, and I am beautiful in every way.

They are just people, and not always just people. They are having their own experience as they have every right, and I have no real need to interfere with that which does not interfere with me. I don’t need their love to feel love, and I don’t need their acceptance to feel accepted. That was a losing proposition that I started years ago, and the faux me could never live up to the ideal that the real me had never agreed to.

So, now all I promise is me…in the flesh and in the spirit without pretense and without some false sense of what you want. You will either love me or not, and I don’t pretend to be able to make that choice for you. I love me, sincerely and without hesitation, as a man with perfect faults and incredible potential. I love what I am doing right now; taking a whirlwind of feelings, translating them into words, and sharing them with anyone who has the fortune of reading them. I love exploring parts of me that were once oppressed and hidden living up to ideals not mine and am often ecstatic about what I find in the process. I love jumping out of proverbial airplanes and free-falling, often unsure if the parachute I packed will ever open even while being sure that I was the one who packed it and no one else. I love being alone when I want, in great company when I can, and in exploring the liberation I’ve found in the broken shackles that now lay littering the place where the pedestals once stood. I. Love. Just. Being. Me.

Period.

I love writing about what I want to write about without worrying about being censored by someone who doesn’t accept me and who will never defend what she can’t accept.

I love that I am no longer afraid.

I love that I can experience this life in the way I wish to experience it without caring about the judgment of others.

I love that I no longer see the “old me” as bad because I no longer see the old me at all.

I love that I can now live in the present moment whenever I choose, undaunted by the desires of others to resign me to the box they created years ago.

I love that I can explore my journey while looking in the rearview mirror, unafraid of the judgments some will place on my experience, and without needing their approval.

I love the fact that sometimes I am deeply saddened by missing those I once called “family” even as I am extremely happy in the knowing of the love I have for them.

I love my children and the relationship I am forging with them. I love that they love me, and that I am acutely aware of the awesome miracles that they create in so many moments, in so many ways.

I love the friends I have discovered, both new and old alike. I love seeing the world with them, and in having our experiences together when the present themselves.

I love that I can be alone for days without worry and without despair.

I. Love. Just. Being. Me

Oh yeah, I said that already. Oh well, I hope to say it many more times before my time here is through. After all, there is no better proof that I love myself then in my ability to love you even if I can’t be “with” you. I love the fucking rain. I love the humidity. I love the cool breeze now lightly caressing my back through my open sliding-glass door. I love my cat who is now rubbing her body on my leg. I love the other one who is watching to see if I’ll pet his sister (they are competitive that way).

I love the fact that I am pro-peace and not anti-war. I love the fact that my oldest wants me to teach her meditation. I love the fact that I love.

And, of course, I. Love. Just. Being. Me.

As you can see, the experience of suffering can be a great friend. Losing something you love can also be a wonderful experience. Seeing what others are doing while also seeing who they are can be a wonderful experience. You soon see that they are just like you, having an experience, and even if you don’t like how you feel in what they are doing you can always find love for them because they are just like you. Even if they pretend to be better.

Take care of yourself and let them go. Those who don’t serve your purpose will drop away like rotting fruit from the tree to serve another purpose. Remember, that fruit is only rotting to you, to others that fruit will be a deserved feast, a welcome meal.

In the end what will only be real is the love you have for you. In the end, the only reality you will have is that you are a wonderful part of the Universe designed to manifest Its beauty. Adore yourself, and become your best friend.

Peace.

A Warrior’s (Writer’s) Prayer

May 28, 2013 / Tom

Ah, the night, that time when the mind refuses its call to slumber, that time when rants and raves fill the heart with a desire unique to the tortured soul. Alone we stand even in good company, tired and crestfallen in our belief that we are deserved of something more rather than openly embracing that which we have chosen to ignore. It is here I pray, and in here I find the answer.

I beg of you, be silent you tortuous bastard! Let the body rest and let my flower bloom. Let the stars align and remove the clouds that hide them from my eyes. Clear me a path to heaven’s gate and do not stand in my way. Allow me in, and let me make a mockery of it all with the snap of my finger as my eyes open and reality once again sets in. Let me know that in the great God’s absence I am the Creator, and let such blasphemy fall upon the ears and lips of those too afraid to step outside of their cave. Let the light be seen by all, and make such fear blow away with the clouds that keep me from my Moon’s sweet light, and my risen Sun.

Give me strength to press on even in the darkness of my illusion. Let me shine the only light I see into the frayed corners of these darkened rooms and under those places where I pretend to rest at night. Give me the power to fly above the valleys of my own creation toward those great heights that await me, and do not give me cause to rest when there is so much work yet to be done. Harden in me that which is soft, and soften in me that which has hardened.

Let words be my sword and experience be my shield. Allow me no safe passage where none exists, and allow me no safe harbor in those dry lands of my own design. Let me not pass my cup to others unless it is their will to quench a thirst of which I have no judgment. Allow my shoulders to be strong to carry the crosses I chose to bear, and allow my hands their strength to shed that wood that no longer serves me well. Give me strength to suffer in silence when I must, and the power of voice to scream a prayer when it serves the fires burning deep within my soul.

This I beg. Allow this warrior to not pass without his mark clearly stamped. Let not his body rot lest it feed a forest, or his blood be spilled lest it find a meaningful place to land. Make his sweat that holy water of legends, and his story a fabled treasure for those who have lost their drunken minds.

I accept it all with an open mind, an open heart and a waiting soul.

Amen.

Lessons Learned in Letting Go

May 25, 2013 / Tom

It felt good to let go, to watch her walk freely into the world on the path she had chosen for herself. Her smile was evidence of a just Universe, her life since then proof of something wonderful. Yes, beautiful things can come from the ugliest of places.

Letting go wasn’t easy for a man who loved her so. Her soul spoke to him in a language he had never heard before but, somehow, easily understood. His heart beat out her name not only in the most silent of moments but also in the middle of the storms they had created together. It was their minds, however, that could not reconcile to the music they were hearing.

He had become a willing student of observation and what he observed in the process of letting go was a formidable truth. He could see the tricks his ego would play on him, the anger his mind would create as a method of self-protection. He could also hear the requests of his heart and feel the pulsing glow of a love that was true from the moment he saw her. The choice, he knew, was his. He could listen to either.

What he believed she had done became irrelevant after a while, replaced by a simple belief that all things spoke a truth all of their own. What had bothered him as their minds battled one another wasn’t her, it was the truth that in the divine trinity of human love their minds simply were not meant for one another in this lifetime. He could love her deeply in his soul without hesitation. He could caress her in his heart for eternity. He could not, however, dance with a mind that was hearing a different song.

She was not wrong. She was not at fault. She was her perfect self whose mind danced to a beat of a song he could not hear. Her dance was perfect even if he could not follow the moves, and it was perfect even if he found it impossible to learn. As the dust swirled around him he lost touch with her soul and could no longer hear her heart beating in his chest and anger filled the vacuum. He was angry with himself, falling to the common ledge of self-loathing and doubt. He filled the void in the only way he knew how, and he could feel his mind and body slowly falling into the ego’s trap of fear. He began to resist everything, and in doing so he began to attract even more things to resist.

Life had taught him to observe, and it had also taught him the value of experience. He knew he needed this experience even if he could not say why it was necessary. So, he simply went where the currents took him and watched. He could see what was making him unhappy. He could see where the weakness was, and even if he decided not to change his condition in the moment, he was discovering the value of the experience. No tear was wasted, no moment of anger was spent in vain. He knew that one day he would tire of walking in shoes that never seemed to fit on a path that was either too rocky, too narrow or too boring for him to enjoy.

Sadness was created for the experience of joy. Once we experience sadness we understand the value of joy and we can choose which path we wish to take when presented with the option. This expression we call “life” is nothing more than a series of options given to provide us with experience, and we are the Master of our own destiny; the Creator of our own reality. We often fail to realize our own power as Master and Creator, but once we not only realize that power but observe it in action we begin to see the error of blame and judgment. As he began to observe his own dance and how perfect it was, he began to see hers as perfect too. As he began to see the value of his own independence, he began to see the value in hers. As he began to see the perfection of his own needs he began to see the perfection in hers.

What he discovered was probably the greatest discovery of his life up to that point. Letting go is not about forgetting. It is not about anger, or fear, or hatred. It is not about being wrong, or being right. It is about remembering. It is about love. It is about acceptance.

He had discovered that when one finally accepts himself he cannot help but accept others. He had discovered that when one finally loves himself he cannot do anything but love others. It all began to make sense to him finally. The Jesus of the New Testament did not command us to “love one another” for the neighbor’s sake, he did so for our own. He did not “so love the world”, he so loved himself that he could not help but love the world. All of it. Even the tax collectors. If we choose to see God as “Love”, then the Jesus written about certainly was God’s son sent to remind us that we are, too, Love’s children.

It seemed that what Buddha had found was not the rejection of attachments as a path to enlightenment. Instead, we find peace when we accept everything. That’s real love. Forgiveness is not an act of loving someone else despite themselves, it is in loving yourself despite yourself. Self-love is not a sin, it is a wise mastery of everything around you. Self-mastery is not about discipline, it is about acceptance. Forgiveness is nothing more than an act of acceptance, of love, and soon it all becomes one big non-thing.

It all becomes about selfishness. No, not the type your parents warned you about. Instead, this type of selfishness revolves around the focus on self. He had found that when he was happy he had great ability to make others happy. When he was not, he could ruin the best of moods. He began to see himself as the pebble and the universe around him as the lake. He could create ripples, and he could change the Universe around him with one thought translated into one action. He could ruin a field of bluegrass with one dandelion, or he could plant the daisies that brought the world to life. So he began to focus on self, to become more selfish, because his experience and his Universe depended on it. He began to see the meaningless of his human condition even if he wanted to experience it. He could choose which he would experience and which he wouldn’t, and as he began to change his mind, he began to change his world.

There is great strength in each of us, a great power that often goes unrealized in this experience. We don’t just use only 10% of our brain, we also seem to use only 10% of our power and most of that is often wasted on living in the dreams of others. You will begin to see this the moment you decide to be selfish and to take control of who you are and the life experience you are having. The Sun does not have such great power because it is trying to be the moon, and you will never find yourself in the hearts, minds, or opinions of another.

He could remember the moment he had found her soul again. He could feel her heartbeat once more when he closed his eyes and felt the silence all around him. He could see her smile and laughter in his mind’s ear and he knew everything was perfect. It was at this moment that, with a slight exhale, he let go. Not of her, but of that part of him that held on to the egoic ideal of what should have been. As the smile and laughter of hers blended into a smile and laughter of his own, he knew. He had let go of everything in that moment, a moment worth remembering.

If it is true that one cannot add to a cup already full, he was happy for the experience as he emptied his own. Experience is nothing if never exercised, so in letting go he also found the desire to move on. He had smelled the flower whose fragrance would forever remind him of possibility. A wave retreats to make room for another, and he had found the desire to splash in the surf again even if he would enter the water as if for the first time. With that he entered in the direction of the Sun a place greatly affected by the moon knowing that he was exactly where he wanted to be.

Peace.

Love is NOT Within You

May 12, 2013 / Tom

Let’s face it. Love is not within you. It can’t be. To think that something as powerful as love can be contained by the flesh or defined by the boundaries of your skin is to not know love at all.

We may find love there…but in truth love is everywhere. It is behind you, above you, below you. It is you. It is not you. It’s in the sudden twitch of pain that we feel when the end comes. It’s in the joy we feel when we hug our children, in the sadness we feel when they no longer wish to hug us, and in the rebirth of joy when their embrace returns. It’s in the sunrise, the sunset, and the moments between.

You don’t exist. An idea of you exists, but you don’t. No, you are an idea posed to separate you from me, me from you, us from them. You are the idea created so you can find love, simply by looking within yourself, without ever paying attention to the fact that you only exist in love. You are nothing but dust without love. Love does not exist because you do, you exist because love does.

So, when you think you’ve found love after closing your eyes and meditating check yourself. If you can only find love in there, it isn’t love. It’s when you open your eyes and see love everywhere that you have truly found it. Then you no longer have to look within to find love. Love becomes you and you become love, and then you find that you and love are one in the same. Soon you see love in everything, and you realize that you no longer exist. Only love exists, and then you realize that you are the tree you are leaning on, and it is you. You become the ground you walk on, the grass you lie on, the fruit you depend on. When the Earth bleeds you bleed, and a mortal wound inflicted upon the Earth is a mortal wound inflicted upon you. You realize you are the stars, and they are you. You are the emptiness of space and the matter that gives space life. You are the eternity of the cosmos and the limitless potential of the smallest spark of energy. You fail to see failure, and you define success one breath at a time.

Life no longer means living. Joy is no longer defined by sadness, happiness is no longer defined by suffering. Wealth is no longer measured in currency or things, but by the very essence of who you are. Your skin ceases to be the boundaries of who you are. Your story ceases to be written and your song is no longer sung even as your endless book is opened and your music is heard. You begin to know so much more than you were ever taught.

You close your eyes to sleep but you remain awake. You can see the truth in the lie, the laughter in the tear, the life in the death all around you. You see the tiny sprout poking through the hardened lava and the dove returning through the darkened storm clouds. You can embrace it all because you hold on to none of it. You are always home despite never residing within any walls.

There is no within you because when you look there you are actually look way out there. There is no self except in the mind you’ve created to keep yourself in pieces. Be in love, and never forget who you are.

Peace.

Give to Live (Lent Post #1)

February 14, 2013 / Tom

So I’ve made this commitment to write something every day of lent as part of my “Give Something, Don’t Sacrifice, for Lent” thought. Rather than sacrifice, say, ketchup for lent, I decided to share my ketchup with you as a way that I’ve decided to celebrate lent. Yet, I used to be Catholic, so perhaps this is one way to assuage my conditioned guilt complex while, at the same time, not give in to it completely. Actually, it truly seems to me to be just something that lets me honor the tradition of lent while doing so in my unique (but not completely different) relationship with the Universe (what some of us call “God”). Maybe the parts of me that want to attract the positive have decided that sacrifice and rejection only breeds suffering and more rejection whereas the embracing attracts the very things we are searching for. In the immortal words of Sammy Hagar in the song “Give to Live”:

If you want love you’ve got to give a little

If you want faith you just believe a little

If you want peace turn your cheek a little

Oh, you’ve got to give, you’ve got to give, you’ve got to give to live

And let’s not forget that you will always get what you ask for. So, if I want you to laugh at me, I have to be first willing to laugh at myself. If I want you to love me, I first need to love myself. The beautiful art of giving is not about rejection or sacrifice, it is first about being willing to accept it all. You can’t give what you don’t have, so you first must gain the very thing you want to give and that only happens when you are willing to ask for it, accept it and, yes, expect it. I can’t feed the hungry if I have no food, and I can’t love you deeply and passionately if I have no love within me.

So the idea of sacrificing something as a method of honoring Love, God, Universe, Being (whatever you want to call It) seems silly in my unique (but not completely different) relationship with It. I need to EMBRACE and ACCEPT things even if my non-attachment to those things means I can easily give them away. The idea is to not focus on the “sacrifice” but on the acceptance. Don’t “sacrifice” chocolate for lent, instead readily accept it but then give it away.

Therefore, I decided to not “sacrifice” writing for lent but to readily accept each and every moment of inspiration and then give it away. I know, that is not something unusual for me, but it is evidence of the beautiful dynamic between the acceptance and the sharing, of the getting and the giving, that makes the gift and the giver One. In order for the Universe to bestow Her wonderful gifts on us all we must not only be expectant of such gifts but must also be completely willing to accept them all. I must be willing to expect these moments of inspiration. I must then be willing to accept them. Then I must be willing to not have them flow to me, but through me. I can take what I need and then let the rest go to those who can use it.

Maybe that is what the season of lent should be about. Maybe it should be about not sacrificing anything but rather about practicing the letting go of attachments we have to things we don’t need. Maybe it should be about the flowing through, not to. Abundance should not stop with me, it should come to me with whatever I don’t need making its way to others who do have a need. Well, I am wondering what would happen if 4 billion people all did this type of practice. Stop sacrificing things as if having them is some kind of negative to begin with. Instead, accept those things and then give away what you don’t need. Hhhhhhmmmmmm, that sounds like an idea Jesus himself could certainly get behind. At least the Jesus I know.

Peace.

Shavasana

August 7, 2012 / Tom

A slight breeze swept across the flow of sweat that had covered my body.

The sweet torture of the work magnified even the slightest movement of air across my skin, highlighting the beauty of nature’s hand in every corner of my Being. Inhaling deeply I set myself to another set, another round, and the sweetness of the work my body was doing to cleanse my mind and renew the understanding of this, my physical self.

No judgments beset me as the sweat poured off of me to the ground below. Surely the grass beneath me found the salty taste of my work not to its liking. Surely the Earth would reject the bitter effect of my labor even as the Universe within embraced each and every moment. Surely as my muscles strained and my body shook in the heat of the Sun all that is in this moment would see a value to it all. The Universe knows Itself in such a challenge; when utter devastation wreaks creation, where utter chaos offers itself to the beautiful order of things.

Chaos is nothing more than the mind playing tricks with what it cannot understand.

Beyond the human mind chaos does not exist. This I see in the effort I am in as my mind creates havoc in the burn and the stretch while the Universe simply allows it to be. It is as it must be everywhere but in my mind, and as the Soul’s river works there flows a beautiful sound that suggests I am alive. The stillness after the effort allows me to hear that river flow majestically through the forest of my mind into the valley of my Soul. Out of chaos comes order, and out of experience we find there is no chaos at all.

As I gazed upon the Earth in this pose I noticed everything. I saw a tick crawling toward my firmly stationed hands as my sweat rains down all around it. My mind screamed “get away!” as I focused on this predator. It’s hungry. It needed nourishment just as I do. It smelled the sweetness of my blood through the air and it thirsted for a bountiful meal. My mind suggested that I was too good to be this lowly being’s meal. It could hurt me, it can could me pain. Who taught me that? Certainly not the Universe. Certainly not the tick. No, someone somewhere along the way taught me that ticks were horrible beings, that they must starve if we are to survive. Maybe it was through them that I learned the same thing about people.

I can remember having ticks pulled off me as a child, and burned. I remember wondering if they felt pain as the flame enveloped their tiny being. They looked so ugly, yet so delicate as they perished, my blood still coursing through the body I saw. Somehow I was one with them, and they one with me. We were inseparable, and as they vanished from this place a part of me vanished with them. Yes, there was a remorse in this cycle of nature that only a being who could see it would feel. This tick was just doing what the Universe demanded. It had no choice, it had no alternative. I did.

I raised my head and look at the trees in front of me, the approaching tick no longer a concern. If it could get me it could have me, and is I should see it I would remove it and let it go on its way. Yes, I had a choice, and my choice would be to not harm anything in this moment, not even the grass now supporting my weight. The Universe had decided to challenge me in many ways during this asana, and in one challenge it was to push the envelope of my mind toward acceptance; to make order out of the chaos. I smiled as I changed poses in time with my breath, the sweat now heading in the same direction but from a different place. I looked up at the cloudless sky and felt myself go there, following my outstretched hands to the very ends of my understanding.

“I am alive.”

I noticed birds soaring high overhead as I melt into the pose. A hawk circled high above me, perhaps believing I am nothing but a next meal. What did it see? A man working to hold a pose in the high heat of a summer day? A man struggling to understand himself in the valley of his life? A dead man not quite in the knowledge of his end? I wondered as I wished I could talk to this magnificent bird of prey. Tell me, my friend, what do you see when you look at me from your perch in the sky? What do you see when you see any of us men scurrying aimlessly about? How could you help me be more like you and less like me?

I switched back in time with my breath. My mind seemed to be screaming at me that there must have been a million ticks now aiming for various part of my body. In the pose I settled the drunken monkey back to more meaningful tasks. I could feel the sweat run down my head and drip off my face. I could feel it run like a morning dew down my arms which were now supporting all of me. I could sense nearly ever stream, every drop, every bead of me run down like water from a stone. My mind suggested that the grass was screaming at me to get away from it. How it hated the stringent taste of my work. How it despised holding my weight where I deemed it must. My Soul suggested something different. The grass beneath me loved me more than my mind did. It accepted my sweat with joy. It took on the weight of my struggle with an acceptance my mind could never fully comprehend. The grass wanted the experience of me even as much as my mind seemed to reject it. Yes, the yoga here wasn’t just me and my body, or me and my Soul, or me and my mind. It was a simple understanding that everything is yoga, everything is united and only separated by the drunken monkey those who killed ticks taught me was the only thing that mattered.

“I am alive.”

Switching to the other side and gazing back up at the sky I noticed the hawk had flew away. Or perhaps he never existed to begin with? All I knew is that he was no longer there. Maybe he had decided that I was not among the dead or dying yet, and that there were easier things to munch on. Perhaps in his yoga he had seen that his needs could be met elsewhere, or everywhere, or nowhere. Either way, I followed my outstretched hand once again beyond the bright blue sky into the space. I could almost see the light come out of my fingertips and flow freely out there, toward a place I so wanted to visit. I wanted to see what the Sun saw, but I also wanted to see the Sun as just another dot in the horizon.

I wanted to know the entirety of this place and the smallness I could see that allowed me to understand the enormity of who I was.

Someday, but for now my body screamed at me to end my practice, and to find peace in the work I had done.

Shavasana.