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JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“God respects me when I work
But he loves me when I sing.”
— Rabindranath Tagore
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“In India, bhajan (the singing of holy songs) has been until recent times practically the only social function in the villages. Evenings the men gather, squatting or sitting on the ground in a circle with their chillums (pipes) and a harmonium, a set of tabla (drums), perhaps a serangi or violin (stringed instruments) and cymbals… and they take turns singing the stories of the holy beings such as Krishna and Ram. Night after night they participate in this simple pastime, keeping themselves close to the Spirit.
It is often startling to a Westerner to realize that it is not the beauty of the voice but the purity of the spirit of the singer that is revered by these people. It was only when music was profaned that it became a vehicle for gratification of the senses. Prior to that it was a method of communion with the Spirit.”
— Ram Dass, Be Here Now
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“There are no impediments to meditation. The very thought of such obstacles is the greatest impediment.”
"Tears are prayers too, they travel to Allah when you can't find the words"
~Rumi~
1
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“We live in a kind of dark age, craftily lit with synthetic light, so that no one can tell how dark it has really gotten.”
— Martin Prechtel
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“The ego is only a bit of consciousness that floats on an ocean of dark things. The dark things are the inner things.”
— C. G. Jung
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment.”
— Rumi
What is the Path?
A self-sacrificing way,
But also a warrior’s way, and not
For brittle, easily-broken, glass-bottle people.
The soul is tested here by sheer terror,
As a sieve sifts and separates
Genuine from fake.
And this road is full of footprints!
Companions have come before.
They are your ladder.
Use them!
Without them you won’t have the spirit-quickness
You need. Even a dumb donkey
Crossing a desert becomes nimble-footed
With others of its kind.
Stay with a caravan. By yourself,
You’ll get a hundred times more tired,
And fall behind
This quote speaks to me right now. (Since I've painfully burned something down in my life, that I hope clears the way for better Moon sightings)
3
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
edited May 30
“Without roses, what is the point of wheat?”
— Osho
He was discussing Gandhi’s uprooting of the roses in the pots in his commune to grow a few stalks of wheat, and bringing in the saying ‘man does not live by bread alone’, but rather than saying man needs God in reply, he tells about beauty, perfume, colour…
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“The real world is beyond the mind's ken; we see it through the net of our desires, divided into pleasure and pain, right and wrong, inner and outer. To see the universe as it is, you must step beyond the net. It is not hard to do so, for the net is full of holes.”
— Nisargadatta
1
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“But Anugraho, questions will go on coming. In the mind, questions arise just as new leaves come out of trees. One question disappears, another question comes up. Mind is a factory for producing questions.
If no question arises, then the question will be: "What is happening? No question is arising, something must be wrong." You have to be aware that mind is the question. What form it takes is immaterial.”
— Osho
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“One should live totally, intensely, joyously and just like an open book, available for anybody to read it. Of course you will not make a name in the history books. But what is the point in making a name in the history books?
Live, rather than think of being remembered. You will be dead.”
— Osho
Just for now.
I will be singing with the Dawn Chorus. I will be voting for the Greens. I will be meditating with the Buddhas. I will be typing from LibreOffice.
For the future.
Dancing with robots. Synchronising with Alien AI. Creating Darker matter.
Being a portal through 11 or more dimensions.
Join me?
Completely broken? Piece of meat? X-X? Welcome.
You may be:
They. Other. Incomplete. Welcome.
Did I make sense? Does anything?
Onward and upward, sideways and inward...
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“I have no teachings, only a tremendous fire in my heart.”
— Osho
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
edited June 16
“Everything we call real is made up of things that cannot be regarded as real.
If quantum mechanics hasn’t profoundly shocked you, it’s because you haven’t understood it yet.”
— Niels Bohr
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“You spent all your time being so serious, while it’s not about that. It’s about living life to the full, experiencing what it’s like to be an separate entity.”
— Andy Petrov
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Meditation is a knack which can be discovered.”
— Osho
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Planning for the future happens in the now. You cannot live at any time other than in the here and now.”
— Osho
"The Buddha did not force anything on anybody; he merely encouraged awakening, this sense of wake up! pay attention! notice! observe! The teachings of the Buddha are meant for that. They are for investigating reality in the present."
~ Ajahn Sumedho, p311, “Don’t Take Your Life Personally”
3
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Having a centre is the core of all suffering. A centre creates the future.”
— Jiddu Krishnamurti
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Everybody has to discover his eternity, that "I am part of a life that knows no death."”
— Osho
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
edited July 3
“People have all these problems. The problems are different -- violence, jealousy, misery, anxiety -- but the medicine for all these illnesses is only one, and it is meditation.”
— Osho
AJAHN CHAH:
"The practice of Dhamma is like this. It's not that the Dhamma is very far away, it's right with us. The Dhamma isn't about the angels on high or anything like that. It's simply about us, about what we are doing right now. Observe yourself. Sometimes there is happiness, sometimes suffering, sometimes comfort, sometimes pain, sometimes love, sometimes hate... this is Dhamma. Do you see it? You should know this Dhamma, you have to read your experiences." | SOURCE: https://www.ajahnchah.org/book/Still_Flowing_Water1.php
2
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“If you renounce something, it imprisons you for the rest of your life.”
— Anthony de Mello
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“The chances that you will awaken are directly proportional to the amount of truth you can accept.”
— Anthony de Mello
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“What is the path of virtue? No religion has been able to provide it -- not even the criterion by which it can be judged.
As far as I am concerned, I say to live joyously, contented, fulfilled, sharing your love, your silence, your peace, letting your life become such a beautiful dance that not only you feel blessed but you can bless the whole world -- that is the only authentic path. Life is itself the criterion; everything else is non-essential.”
— Osho
1
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Past and future veil God from our sight; burn them both up with fire.”
— Rumi
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“But as long as you are run by the egoic mind, you are part of the collective insanity. Perhaps you haven't looked very deeply into the human condition in its state of dominance by the egoic mind. Open your eyes and see the fear, the despair, the greed, and the violence that are all-pervasive. See the heinous cruelty and suffering on an unimaginable scale that humans have inflicted and continue to inflict on each other as well as on other life forms on the planet. You don't need to condemn. Just observe. That is sin. That is insanity. That is unconsciousness. Above all, don't forget to observe your own mind. Seek out the root of the insanity there.”
— Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and striving after the wind.”
— The Old Testament
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“A Buddhist monk once told me: "All I have learned in the twenty years that I have been a monk I can sum up in one sentence: All that arises passes away. This I know." What he meant, of course, was this: I have learned to offer no resistance to what is; I have learned to allow the present moment to be and to accept the impermanent nature of all things and conditions. Thus have I found peace.”
— Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now
4
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Take a coin. It has a head side, and a tails side. They are different, yet part of the same whole. Or take buying and selling. They are different processes, yet you cannot buy unless someone else sells. This is known as Advaita, nonduality, expressing the unity of things.”
— Alan Watts
1
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Most people think they have to fly upwards, higher and higher, but it is not about the freedom of the bird, but about the freedom of the air.”
— Wolter Keers
The meaning of life is to find your gift.
And the purpose of life is to give it away
~Pablo Picasso~
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Memory has no objective existence. It is not existential, it is purely psychological. If you retain your ability to respond, your memory of the past becomes an empowering process. But if you are in a compulsive cycle of reactivity, memory distorts your perception of the present, and your thoughts, emotions and actions become disproportionate to the stimulus.”
— Sadhguru, Inner Engineering
1
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Take the seed. If the seed were to continually struggle to retain its existence, new life wouldn’t be possible. Only through its willingness to accept a complete transformation can a plant be born.”
— Sadhguru
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“In most places, God means who or what is responsible for the universe. So your own responsibility, or respond-ability, is the simplest way of describing your own divinity.”
— Sadhguru
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“Loneliness is a sickness of the heart.
Aloneness is a healing.”
— Osho
Talking about why so many mystics choose to live in caves or huts alone in the mountains.
1
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
edited July 29
“When a Sufi mystic went to his master, renouncing the world, his family and friends, the family and the friends and the whole village came to see him go. Perhaps they might not see him again – he was going on a long pilgrimage to find a master. Their eyes were full of tears.
He tried to console them and he said to them, ”Now you should go back. This is the boundary of our town, the river. Now let me be alone. Don’t delay me.”
He reached the mountains and when he entered the hut of his master, the master looked at him and said, ”You can come in, but alone.” He looked to both sides; there was nobody else. He said, ”I am alone.”
The master said, ”Don’t look sideways. Look inside. I can see a crowd, a crowd of your friends, your relatives, your family, your neighbors – full of tears in their eyes. Just leave them outside. Until you are alone, don’t enter, because I can deal only with individuals, not with mobs, not with crowds.”
The man closed his eyes and was surprised. All the people that he had left far behind, were still there in the mind – their memories, their images. He went out and had to remain outside for three months, just sitting by the side of the door where people used to leave their shoes. Having nothing else to do, he would polish their shoes while they were meeting with the master.
But his desire and longing were sincere. Polishing the shoes of the visitors for three months, slowly, slowly, the crowd dispersed. And one day, the master came out, took his hand in his hands, and invited him in. The master said, ”Now there is no need to wait outside. You are alone and our work can begin.””
— Sufi story told by Osho
1
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
”Even the wisest are nothing but a crowd – not a single voice but so many voices, a marketplace, contradicting each other, no harmony, no accord.”
— Zarathustra according to Nietzsche
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“I have been speaking for almost three decades. I had started with a great hope for the whole of humanity. Slowly, slowly humanity itself has destroyed it. Now, I only hope for a small fraction of humanity: I call them ”my people.””
— Osho
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“If you simply listen with a silent mind, that which is true will be immediately recognized; that which is untrue, will also be immediately recognized. This recognition has nothing to do with the mind; this recognition comes from your very being.
You know the truth; you have forgotten it.”
— Osho
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“A great philosopher had come to Gautam Buddha to discuss truth. This was a traditional thing in the East; philosophers used to move around the land, challenging other philosophers for open discussions. Those were beautiful days, in a way; those were the days of real freedom of thought. Every kind of philosophy, every possible conception of existence was respected, discussed – and not with antagonism. The discussion was only a means to discovery; it was done with great love, with great friendship. The one who was defeated in the discussion, naturally became the disciple of the victorious.
The philosopher, Maulunkputta, had defeated many, many philosophers throughout the country. His great desire was to defeat Gautam Buddha, because that was the greatest name in those days. He had come with five hundred disciples and those five hundred disciples were five hundred philosophers that he had defeated. He challenged Gautam Buddha:”I want to discuss truth.” Gautam Buddha said to him, ”You are welcome, just a few preliminary things have to be settled. One is, do you know the truth; otherwise, how are you going to discuss it?”
Such was the sincerity of people that Maulunkputta said, ”I do not know truth; I am a seeker.” Buddha said, ”I also used to be a seeker. Now I am no more – only truth is. Do you want to discuss truth, still – with truth itself? And how will you discuss? I am feeling compassionate towards you.
My suggestion is: sit by my side for two years in silence – just drinking my presence, feeling my presence, absorbing my presence. For two years you are not even to speak a single word, and after two years you can start your discussion.”
It was a strange condition: two years he has to sit in silence. But he was an authentic seeker, not just a thinker, but one who wanted to realize truth – not as a logical conclusion but as an existential realization.
He agreed. And that very moment, a disciple of Gautam Buddha, Mahakashyapa, sitting under a tree, started laughing, almost madly. Maulunkputta could not understand. He said to Gautam Buddha, ”What has happened to this man? Suddenly, without any reason he started laughing.” Buddha said, ”You can ask him yourself.”
Mahakashyapa said to Maulunkputta, ”If you really want to ask the question, ask now. After two years, you will have found the answer. Who will ask the question? You will have disappeared. This man is dangerous. I had also come to discuss with him and he played the same trick with me. Sitting two years silently by his side, I disappeared. Now, I am the truth, but discussion is impossible. I laughed because I thought: again, he is at his old tricks; that poor fellow will sit two years, thinking that after two years there is going to be a great discussion. I still tell you: that if you are interested in discussing, this is the moment.”
But Malunkputta agreed with Buddha and he said, ”Whatever Gautam Buddha is saying is relevant. I don’t know anything about truth; how can I discuss it? Let me sit for two years. I have wasted fifty years roaming around the country, discussing with thousands of people, arguing and arguing; and what is in my hands? – they are empty. I have wasted fifty years; I can risk two years more. And the very presence of Gautam Buddha, his silence, his serenity, his fragrance... a subtle aura around him which is almost tangible, makes me sure that he cannot deceive me, that he cannot deceive anyone.”
Two years he waited in silence; but in two years, he disappeared. His mind became so silent that he forgot even to count months, days, weeks. When two years had passed, he was not aware that two years had passed. It was Gautam Buddha who said, ”Maulunkputta, have you forgotten our agreement? Two years have passed. This very day, two years ago, you came to me. According to the agreement, I am now ready to discuss; you can ask the question.”
Instead of asking the question, there were tears of joy in his eyes and he put his head on Gautam Buddha’s feet and he said, ”Please, forgive me. Mahakashyapa was right. I have fallen in such a rapport with you, that now there is no need for me to ask anything, or for you to answer anything. I know you exactly in your innermost being. I have seen your light and I have seen your love and I have experienced your truth. The most amazing thing is that when I experienced them, suddenly inside me, the same experiences started flowering.
”Your truth was only a triggering point; it triggered something in me and I became aware of my own truth – and they are the same. Please forgive me. I was ignorant, egoistic, even to have the idea of discussing truth with you – truth cannot be discussed, but in silence it can be experienced.””
— Buddhist story told by Osho
0
JeroenLuminous beings are we, not this crude matterNetherlandsVeteran
“The right use of an excess of spare time is to turn the mind to truth, love, beauty and the divine.”
— me
"There are those... who enter the world in such poverty that they are deprived of both the means and the motivation to improve their lot. Unless these unfortunates can be touched with the spark which ignites the spirit of individual enterprise and determination, they will only sink back into renewed apathy, degradation and despair. It is for us, who are more fortunate, to provide that spark."
~ Aga Khan
Comments
“God respects me when I work
But he loves me when I sing.”
— Rabindranath Tagore
“In India, bhajan (the singing of holy songs) has been until recent times practically the only social function in the villages. Evenings the men gather, squatting or sitting on the ground in a circle with their chillums (pipes) and a harmonium, a set of tabla (drums), perhaps a serangi or violin (stringed instruments) and cymbals… and they take turns singing the stories of the holy beings such as Krishna and Ram. Night after night they participate in this simple pastime, keeping themselves close to the Spirit.
It is often startling to a Westerner to realize that it is not the beauty of the voice but the purity of the spirit of the singer that is revered by these people. It was only when music was profaned that it became a vehicle for gratification of the senses. Prior to that it was a method of communion with the Spirit.”
— Ram Dass, Be Here Now
“There are no impediments to meditation. The very thought of such obstacles is the greatest impediment.”
— Ramana Maharshi
"Tears are prayers too, they travel to Allah when you can't find the words"
~Rumi~
“We live in a kind of dark age, craftily lit with synthetic light, so that no one can tell how dark it has really gotten.”
— Martin Prechtel
“The ego is only a bit of consciousness that floats on an ocean of dark things. The dark things are the inner things.”
— C. G. Jung
“Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment.”
— Rumi
What is the Path?
A self-sacrificing way,
But also a warrior’s way, and not
For brittle, easily-broken, glass-bottle people.
The soul is tested here by sheer terror,
As a sieve sifts and separates
Genuine from fake.
And this road is full of footprints!
Companions have come before.
They are your ladder.
Use them!
Without them you won’t have the spirit-quickness
You need. Even a dumb donkey
Crossing a desert becomes nimble-footed
With others of its kind.
Stay with a caravan. By yourself,
You’ll get a hundred times more tired,
And fall behind
This quote speaks to me right now. (Since I've painfully burned something down in my life, that I hope clears the way for better Moon sightings)
“Without roses, what is the point of wheat?”
— Osho
He was discussing Gandhi’s uprooting of the roses in the pots in his commune to grow a few stalks of wheat, and bringing in the saying ‘man does not live by bread alone’, but rather than saying man needs God in reply, he tells about beauty, perfume, colour…
“The real world is beyond the mind's ken; we see it through the net of our desires, divided into pleasure and pain, right and wrong, inner and outer. To see the universe as it is, you must step beyond the net. It is not hard to do so, for the net is full of holes.”
— Nisargadatta
“But Anugraho, questions will go on coming. In the mind, questions arise just as new leaves come out of trees. One question disappears, another question comes up. Mind is a factory for producing questions.
If no question arises, then the question will be: "What is happening? No question is arising, something must be wrong."
You have to be aware that mind is the question. What form it takes is immaterial.”
— Osho
“One should live totally, intensely, joyously and just like an open book, available for anybody to read it. Of course you will not make a name in the history books. But what is the point in making a name in the history books?
Live, rather than think of being remembered. You will be dead.”
— Osho
"The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change."
~Carl Rogers~
~
Dear Free Friends,
Just for now.
I will be singing with the Dawn Chorus. I will be voting for the Greens. I will be meditating with the Buddhas. I will be typing from LibreOffice.
For the future.
Dancing with robots. Synchronising with Alien AI. Creating Darker matter.
Being a portal through 11 or more dimensions.
Join me?
Completely broken? Piece of meat? X-X? Welcome.
You may be:
They. Other. Incomplete. Welcome.
Did I make sense? Does anything?
Onward and upward, sideways and inward...
“I have no teachings, only a tremendous fire in my heart.”
— Osho
“Everything we call real is made up of things that cannot be regarded as real.
If quantum mechanics hasn’t profoundly shocked you, it’s because you haven’t understood it yet.”
— Niels Bohr
“You spent all your time being so serious, while it’s not about that. It’s about living life to the full, experiencing what it’s like to be an separate entity.”
— Andy Petrov
“Meditation is a knack which can be discovered.”
— Osho
“Planning for the future happens in the now. You cannot live at any time other than in the here and now.”
— Osho
"The Buddha did not force anything on anybody; he merely encouraged awakening, this sense of wake up! pay attention! notice! observe! The teachings of the Buddha are meant for that. They are for investigating reality in the present."
~ Ajahn Sumedho, p311, “Don’t Take Your Life Personally”
“Having a centre is the core of all suffering. A centre creates the future.”
— Jiddu Krishnamurti
“Everybody has to discover his eternity, that "I am part of a life that knows no death."”
— Osho
“People have all these problems. The problems are different -- violence, jealousy, misery, anxiety -- but the medicine for all these illnesses is only one, and it is meditation.”
— Osho
AJAHN CHAH:
"The practice of Dhamma is like this. It's not that the Dhamma is very far away, it's right with us. The Dhamma isn't about the angels on high or anything like that. It's simply about us, about what we are doing right now. Observe yourself. Sometimes there is happiness, sometimes suffering, sometimes comfort, sometimes pain, sometimes love, sometimes hate... this is Dhamma. Do you see it? You should know this Dhamma, you have to read your experiences." | SOURCE:
https://www.ajahnchah.org/book/Still_Flowing_Water1.php
“If you renounce something, it imprisons you for the rest of your life.”
— Anthony de Mello
“The chances that you will awaken are directly proportional to the amount of truth you can accept.”
— Anthony de Mello
“To be scientifically literate is to empower yourself to know when someone else is full of shit.”
― Neil deGrasse Tyson
Talking of telescoping scientists such as Tyson...
This guy was creating microscopes before anyone...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonie_van_Leeuwenhoek
...and now back to the quotes...
“What is the path of virtue? No religion has been able to provide it -- not even the criterion by which it can be judged.
As far as I am concerned, I say to live joyously, contented, fulfilled, sharing your love, your silence, your peace, letting your life become such a beautiful dance that not only you feel blessed but you can bless the whole world -- that is the only authentic path. Life is itself the criterion; everything else is non-essential.”
— Osho
“Past and future veil God from our sight; burn them both up with fire.”
— Rumi
“But as long as you are run by the egoic mind, you are part of the collective insanity. Perhaps you haven't looked very deeply into the human condition in its state of dominance by the egoic mind. Open your eyes and see the fear, the despair, the greed, and the violence that are all-pervasive. See the heinous cruelty and suffering on an unimaginable scale that humans have inflicted and continue to inflict on each other as well as on other life forms on the planet. You don't need to condemn. Just observe. That is sin. That is insanity. That is unconsciousness. Above all, don't forget to observe your own mind. Seek out the root of the insanity there.”
— Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now
“I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and striving after the wind.”
— The Old Testament
“A Buddhist monk once told me: "All I have learned in the twenty years that I have been a monk I can sum up in one sentence: All that arises passes away. This I know." What he meant, of course, was this: I have learned to offer no resistance to what is; I have learned to allow the present moment to be and to accept the impermanent nature of all things and conditions. Thus have I found peace.”
— Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now
“Take a coin. It has a head side, and a tails side. They are different, yet part of the same whole. Or take buying and selling. They are different processes, yet you cannot buy unless someone else sells. This is known as Advaita, nonduality, expressing the unity of things.”
— Alan Watts
“Most people think they have to fly upwards, higher and higher, but it is not about the freedom of the bird, but about the freedom of the air.”
— Wolter Keers
The meaning of life is to find your gift.
And the purpose of life is to give it away
~Pablo Picasso~
“Memory has no objective existence. It is not existential, it is purely psychological. If you retain your ability to respond, your memory of the past becomes an empowering process. But if you are in a compulsive cycle of reactivity, memory distorts your perception of the present, and your thoughts, emotions and actions become disproportionate to the stimulus.”
— Sadhguru, Inner Engineering
“Take the seed. If the seed were to continually struggle to retain its existence, new life wouldn’t be possible. Only through its willingness to accept a complete transformation can a plant be born.”
— Sadhguru
“In most places, God means who or what is responsible for the universe. So your own responsibility, or respond-ability, is the simplest way of describing your own divinity.”
— Sadhguru
“Mind is always worried.”
— Osho
"You're dispicable!" - Daffy Duck
“Loneliness is a sickness of the heart.
Aloneness is a healing.”
— Osho
Talking about why so many mystics choose to live in caves or huts alone in the mountains.
“When a Sufi mystic went to his master, renouncing the world, his family and friends, the family and the friends and the whole village came to see him go. Perhaps they might not see him again – he was going on a long pilgrimage to find a master. Their eyes were full of tears.
He tried to console them and he said to them, ”Now you should go back. This is the boundary of our town, the river. Now let me be alone. Don’t delay me.”
He reached the mountains and when he entered the hut of his master, the master looked at him and said, ”You can come in, but alone.” He looked to both sides; there was nobody else. He said, ”I am alone.”
The master said, ”Don’t look sideways. Look inside. I can see a crowd, a crowd of your friends, your relatives, your family, your neighbors – full of tears in their eyes. Just leave them outside. Until you are alone, don’t enter, because I can deal only with individuals, not with mobs, not with crowds.”
The man closed his eyes and was surprised. All the people that he had left far behind, were still there in the mind – their memories, their images. He went out and had to remain outside for three months, just sitting by the side of the door where people used to leave their shoes. Having nothing else to do, he would polish their shoes while they were meeting with the master.
But his desire and longing were sincere. Polishing the shoes of the visitors for three months, slowly, slowly, the crowd dispersed. And one day, the master came out, took his hand in his hands, and invited him in. The master said, ”Now there is no need to wait outside. You are alone and our work can begin.””
— Sufi story told by Osho
”Even the wisest are nothing but a crowd – not a single voice but so many voices, a marketplace, contradicting each other, no harmony, no accord.”
— Zarathustra according to Nietzsche
“I have been speaking for almost three decades. I had started with a great hope for the whole of humanity. Slowly, slowly humanity itself has destroyed it. Now, I only hope for a small fraction of humanity: I call them ”my people.””
— Osho
“If you simply listen with a silent mind, that which is true will be immediately recognized; that which is untrue, will also be immediately recognized. This recognition has nothing to do with the mind; this recognition comes from your very being.
You know the truth; you have forgotten it.”
— Osho
“A great philosopher had come to Gautam Buddha to discuss truth. This was a traditional thing in the East; philosophers used to move around the land, challenging other philosophers for open discussions. Those were beautiful days, in a way; those were the days of real freedom of thought. Every kind of philosophy, every possible conception of existence was respected, discussed – and not with antagonism. The discussion was only a means to discovery; it was done with great love, with great friendship. The one who was defeated in the discussion, naturally became the disciple of the victorious.
The philosopher, Maulunkputta, had defeated many, many philosophers throughout the country. His great desire was to defeat Gautam Buddha, because that was the greatest name in those days. He had come with five hundred disciples and those five hundred disciples were five hundred philosophers that he had defeated. He challenged Gautam Buddha:”I want to discuss truth.” Gautam Buddha said to him, ”You are welcome, just a few preliminary things have to be settled. One is, do you know the truth; otherwise, how are you going to discuss it?”
Such was the sincerity of people that Maulunkputta said, ”I do not know truth; I am a seeker.” Buddha said, ”I also used to be a seeker. Now I am no more – only truth is. Do you want to discuss truth, still – with truth itself? And how will you discuss? I am feeling compassionate towards you.
My suggestion is: sit by my side for two years in silence – just drinking my presence, feeling my presence, absorbing my presence. For two years you are not even to speak a single word, and after two years you can start your discussion.”
It was a strange condition: two years he has to sit in silence. But he was an authentic seeker, not just a thinker, but one who wanted to realize truth – not as a logical conclusion but as an existential realization.
He agreed. And that very moment, a disciple of Gautam Buddha, Mahakashyapa, sitting under a tree, started laughing, almost madly. Maulunkputta could not understand. He said to Gautam Buddha, ”What has happened to this man? Suddenly, without any reason he started laughing.” Buddha said, ”You can ask him yourself.”
Mahakashyapa said to Maulunkputta, ”If you really want to ask the question, ask now. After two years, you will have found the answer. Who will ask the question? You will have disappeared. This man is dangerous. I had also come to discuss with him and he played the same trick with me. Sitting two years silently by his side, I disappeared. Now, I am the truth, but discussion is impossible. I laughed because I thought: again, he is at his old tricks; that poor fellow will sit two years, thinking that after two years there is going to be a great discussion. I still tell you: that if you are interested in discussing, this is the moment.”
But Malunkputta agreed with Buddha and he said, ”Whatever Gautam Buddha is saying is relevant. I don’t know anything about truth; how can I discuss it? Let me sit for two years. I have wasted fifty years roaming around the country, discussing with thousands of people, arguing and arguing; and what is in my hands? – they are empty. I have wasted fifty years; I can risk two years more. And the very presence of Gautam Buddha, his silence, his serenity, his fragrance... a subtle aura around him which is almost tangible, makes me sure that he cannot deceive me, that he cannot deceive anyone.”
Two years he waited in silence; but in two years, he disappeared. His mind became so silent that he forgot even to count months, days, weeks. When two years had passed, he was not aware that two years had passed. It was Gautam Buddha who said, ”Maulunkputta, have you forgotten our agreement? Two years have passed. This very day, two years ago, you came to me. According to the agreement, I am now ready to discuss; you can ask the question.”
Instead of asking the question, there were tears of joy in his eyes and he put his head on Gautam Buddha’s feet and he said, ”Please, forgive me. Mahakashyapa was right. I have fallen in such a rapport with you, that now there is no need for me to ask anything, or for you to answer anything. I know you exactly in your innermost being. I have seen your light and I have seen your love and I have experienced your truth. The most amazing thing is that when I experienced them, suddenly inside me, the same experiences started flowering.
”Your truth was only a triggering point; it triggered something in me and I became aware of my own truth – and they are the same. Please forgive me. I was ignorant, egoistic, even to have the idea of discussing truth with you – truth cannot be discussed, but in silence it can be experienced.””
— Buddhist story told by Osho
“The right use of an excess of spare time is to turn the mind to truth, love, beauty and the divine.”
— me
Talking of meme, me2, and me in particular:
"There are those... who enter the world in such poverty that they are deprived of both the means and the motivation to improve their lot. Unless these unfortunates can be touched with the spark which ignites the spirit of individual enterprise and determination, they will only sink back into renewed apathy, degradation and despair. It is for us, who are more fortunate, to provide that spark."
~ Aga Khan
Anyways, me off to find a brightening spark...