Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
We must control the tendencies within our being that are destructive, when we want to slam somebody else, hurt them, injure them, or push them out of the way. A reverence for life needs to be developed, in which all things are sacred.
Greed, fear, lust, hate, jealousy, these are part of reality too ... bundles of consciousness wrapped tightly, barbs on which you can injure yourself, volatile energies that serve as separations between yourself and perfect stillness.
When you start your meditation, picture a beautiful blue sky without any clouds in it. Feel that your body is growing lighter. Visualize that you are floating in the sky and that all tension, fatigue, worry and problems have left you.
The universe is made up of an endless ocean of life itself. It is an endless ocean of itself. And for a time it binds itself together in particularized forms. Those forms have perception and they perceive themselves as being separate.
They reach the point where they feel, "I can go into samadhi now. I can do everything on my own," and that's exactly where they stay, in the lower samadhis. There are many, many people on this earth who can go into salvakalpa samadhi.
We forget about the space between the stars, the pure and perfect space that's also the eye of God. To penetrate the mystery is to become the mystery; to penetrate infinity is to become infinity; to penetrate light is to become light.
A walk in the woods can reveal many things, and it is a good time to practice transcendentalism. Look at a tree and realize it's not just a tree, its roots may go into the ground but it may also go into other worlds, other eternities.
There are views. And what we see in a view is not necessarily what is in the view, all that is in the view. We have to separate, to some extent, the perceiver from that which is perceived or we have to lose all distinction whatsoever.
Most people simply go through life. They feel that they're making choices in their lives that cause destiny to move in certain ways. I would suggest that they have no control of their lives, all their choices are really made for them.
Old Zen was very funny; there was a great deal of humor and happiness. Zen today seems much drier. While there's a certain amount of humor, it seems to lack that total intensity because humor is one of the primary tools for liberation.
Be aware of the dark side of others that seek to interfere with our evolution. Keep distant and closed to such beings, recognizing that they are part of the universal process too, but not a part that we need to be open to at this time.
To not follow the dharma, either intentionally or through lack of awareness, creates a very low level of attention. In this low level of attention we make all kinds of mistakes and we are unhappy no matter what good fortune befalls us.
Ramakrishna didn't suddenly become enlightened. We had years of him meditating, seeking, crying to Mother Kali, going in and out of samadhi; but after many years of this process, he was enlightened. He was no longer a finite individual.
We erase ourselves; we go away. But we don't really go away, and we don't really erase ourselves, since we were never there to begin with. We weren't there to begin with in that what we are, or conceive of ourselves as, is a perception.
Happiness only comes when you let go of who you think you are. If you think you're wealthy and powerful and noble and truthful or horrible and demonic, whatever it may be, it's all a waste of time. Take it from the Zen Master. He knows.
People in the West sometimes have these marvelous visions of India and Tibet. They assume that there are all these sadhus walking around and everybody is breathing enlightenment. Forget it. Don't look at it through rose-colored glasses.
Just like there are different roads that lead to different places, so there are different levels of awareness that lead to different places and we shift in and out of them. These are the ten thousand states of mind that we study in Zen.
Mindfulness is paying attention to what is going on. Just look at beauty. Not just the beauty of things you see with your eyes, but beautiful feelings, beautiful awareness. There is no such thing as reality. Reality is what you make it.
It's like looking at the sun, that's how infinity is. You can't look at it for too long or you dissolve. The bands of your attention break. But if you look at it in specific ways, you can become something or someone much more conscious.
There's many kinds of kundalini, just as there's a spectrum of light. Put light through a prism and you get different gradations. So there are different gradations of kundalini. Some gradations of kundalini are darker, some are lighter.
You start meditation as an average human being who is filled with vagueness and not much purpose or definition, who is controlled by their desires, your mind spins all over the place, your senses spin all over the place, out of control.
Self-discovery is realistic. It's not built on ideas and philosophies. It's what works. Philosophies are nice if you like philosophies. But self-discovery is predicated on something that really brings you into enlightened states of mind.
When you draw from the endless awareness of nirvana, you are no longer a slave to fortune. When pleasant experiences come your way, you can enjoy them. But if pain and misfortune befall you, you can rise above them and remain unaffected.
I was very fortunate, and have always been, that the women I met and fell in love with were exceptional, from my first girlfriend to the woman I married when I was 21, to all the remarkable women I have known as either friends or lovers.
When I began to play Frisbee, I would play with my friends and we used to do difficult things. We would stand in front of lines of trees that were parallel. We would spend hours throwing frisbees back and forth between these tight spots.
During the age Atlantis, there were only several hundred thousand people living on our planet. They lived in a sublime state of harmony with nature. At that time, because of the purity of the earth's aura, it was much easier to meditate.
I have found in the world of film many movies including Beyond Rangoon, The Crow, Gandhi, Doctor Zhivago, and The Big Blue, a French film, convey similar understandings. I'm sure the list is endless. These are just a few of my favorites.
If you pursue meditation with a non-competitive attitude, with a hopeful and helpful attitude, without violence, then you will find that you will become a very benign and powerful being, one who is at peace with himself and the universe.
A great deal has been written about personal power by Carlos Casteneda, and I find his first four books valuable. Of the experiences themselves, who knows? But the principles that are presented are quite valuable for one who seeks power.
There are dimensions of power, there are dimensions of knowledge, and there are dimensions of confusion. The universe is a very, very big place. To think the universe is only composed of the physical universe is to be rather shortsighted.
The dialectical change of mind that occurs in Buddhism is not simply the assimilation of a new philosophical basis or religious basis for viewing and interpreting experience. Rather it is the complete structural revision of that which is.
Qualityless simply means there is no way to discuss it. There is no way to pin it down. It could be anything at any given moment since infinity is not bound even by itself, nor the words that human beings choose to try and talk around it.
Whether it's a fully enlightened Christ or Buddha, or just a more aware Martin Luther King, Kennedy or Gandhi, what did they do with them here? They shoot them, crucify them, and get them out of the way because people are afraid of truth.
Hundreds of thousands of years ago a very powerful civilization lived in what we now call North America. They congregated around power places - interdimensional vortexes where it is very easy to shift from one plane of reality to another.
All of the systems that present different worlds, planes of being and energy centers ultimately fail if you try to make them all-inclusive. They are symbolic representations of something that lies beyond the world of thought and analysis.
A teacher of knowledge and power gives you experiences in other dimensions. They show you that the universe is much bigger and more fascinating than you had ever imagined. They give you direct and immediate experiences in other realities.
Now imagine that you are going beneath the surface of the ocean. Below the surface all is calm, silent, and serene. As you visualize yourself going deeper and deeper into the depths of the ocean, feel that a profound peace is entering you.
Eve was blamed for the fall of man, and in return all women to come were to inheret her karmic responsibility for the so-called "fall of man". Their punishment was to experience pain in childbirth, and never be trusted by man or God again.
I first went into samadhi when I was 19. I was meditating in the mountains and had been meditating on a daily basis for several years. Suddenly there was no time or space or life or death or myself or the Universe. I was absorbed in light.
Pick a profession that will give you enough money to give you economic freedom. It is nice to pick a career that really taxes your mind. Use your mind in new and creative ways. You will find that your mind will develop and become stronger.
One of the wonderful things about the computer is that it allows us to sit at home and either write a book or a computer program. Then we can send that program or book to companies that specialize in reproducing them and distributing them.
At the time of birth an ordering takes place. The awarenesses come together; they become specific until a person dies. At that point all those awarenesses, all that you have ever been or will ever be, go back again, into the great unknown.
Don't become a spiritual bigot. Don't feel that just because you meditate and you are striving for enlightenment that you are in any way superior to any other person. Be even. Be easy. You will last longer on the pathway to self-discovery.
Sit down and get out a piece of paper and start making lists. Ask yourself, are you in harmony with the things in your life? Are you adopting superficial values? Are you giving your being enough room? Are you doing new and creative things?
If all the members of a team have synchronized their energy and they have all subordinated their egos to success of the team, then we have a functioning unit. If we have a lot of hotshots who want attention, you won't really play that well.
Buddhism is the study of the way the mind works. One has to be able to hold a large number of relational concepts simultaneously in the mind. It is necessary to grid, to literally unlock realities and dimensions with the power of your mind.
The source of their motivation ranges from what you might expect - from the seeking of money and publicity, to those who genuinely suffer from chronic personal problems and have fixated on me as the cause of their frustrations and failures.
One should feel that one's friends, the people who meditate around you, who seek, are likewise pligrims on a journey. They're traveling to eternity also. You should love them. Whenever you see a good quality in them, you should repect them.
Chaos is not disorder. Chaos is the totality of existence. You could call it God. You could use the term, the Tao. I like chaos. It means more to us in English. Chaos is all things, wild and wonderful, connected perfectly by the life force.
You may not need a teacher or you may be drawn to one - everything is individual. But the main thing you need to do is meditate and learn to stop your thoughts and enter into the ocean of infinite awareness. You will be directed from there.