dwai

What can you add to that silent canvas to augment it? what can you remove from that silent canvas that will diminish it? The silent canvas IS wholeness. Everything arises in it, from it and dissipates back into it. Hindu tradition calls it “Purnam” — “complete”. Is the silent canvas longing? What is it that feels the lack? Experiences this unknown yearning/longing?

Just stay as that silent canvas. Just marinate in it. Forget about everything else during that period. For me it works best when I have/want nothing to achieve, no where else to be, nothing else to do. Drop all ideas about what meditation is (or isn’t), how many minutes/hours/days it’s going to take to meditate/become enlightened/etc etc. Just for the moment, be the silent canvas. That’s all. And again, and again. Moment to moment. If the monkey mind acts up, no problem — that’s already gone.

They are all the same teaching - because it is the same True Nature. I’m not teaching anything my friend — I’m just pointing. 🙏🏾

You have to recognize and rest in/as that which knows both the back and the forth. It is right there, under your nose, so to speak. Okay, try this exercise — “without thinking, can you tell who you are?”

Actually, the mind is also made up of THAT very True Nature. It is more a matter of where the mind's attention is. Conditioning diverts the mind towards objects (which are also appearances within THAT very True Nature). So, after realization, even if the mind goes towards objects, it is okay, because the identification with mind, body, objects has dropped. The conditioning doesn't take hold the way it used to before realization. How much we polish that mirror (clear the mind) is a matter of choice. In Vedanta, there are two categories of "self-realized". Those who has done the necessarily prerequisite work (called Krtopasaka) and those who haven't (called Akrtopasaka). The conditioning/dust gravitates towards the latter. And those are the ones who need to keep removing the dust (until they don't).

I wasn't suggesting one needs to be eschewed in order to get the other. I look at it from the perspective of "yoga/kundalini/Daoist meditation" is more like keeping the mirror clean. Once the mirror is clean, the true nature shines forth more directly in the limited mind. I used to think/say things like "the mind needs to be transcended to gain knowledge of the True Self/Nature", but really, I found out that the mind is the tool by which True Self operates in the localized context (body, mind, intellect, etc etc). So the mind is needed. What is needed is to drop the sense of identification (labeling - this is me, that is mine, and so on) -- so whatever is happening, continues to happen without any distortion/filters. For the identification to drop, realization is needed. For realization to happen, the cobwebs and dust of conditioning in the mind must be cleared. Conditioning is cleared via these esoteric practices, meditation, etc. Once the mind is clear, the true nature is recognized directly. But, in my experience, I found that for full integration of the true nature, we need the pointers -- which is via the teachings such as Advaita Vedanta, Zen, etc. And it is a continuous process, keep cleaning the dust off the mind, and let the unfiltered light of True Nature keep shining forth.

I’m pointing towards that which knows both the profound serenity and the absence of it. Turn your attention to that — find out where that one is.

This implies you are aware of a serenity that comes and goes. If so, who or what knows this serenity and absence of it? Is that one serene?

I write this as someone raised an important point recently — instead of battling over opinions about vaccines, theories about origins of the ongoing pandemic etc, why not share ideas and discuss how we’ve dealt with the prolonged isolation, fear, depression and sorrow that’s been going since the pandemic unfolded early last year? The sense of unease started for me around November 2019, when I sensed an energetic shift. It’s that feeling you get when something major is going to happen, but you don’t really know what. It’s like waiting for when the other shoe will drop (as that proverb goes)… Only this got worse with time…From a psychological and spiritual/energetic perspective, there was literally a heavy blanket of fear, depression, sorrow and anger all over North America in 2020. Maybe due to our internal/esoteric practices, my friends and I have ultra high sensitivity to this. The impact of a massive event like the pandemic brought to the forefront what used to come to me (and my close spiritual friends) intermittently before that — the intensity of emotions and it’s effect on (folks like) myself. I suspect that this is also the case for most bums here. Emotions such as extreme sorrow, suicidal thoughts, anger, fear was palpable (like it was in the very air itself). So what we did was, we started meditating on a daily basis on group phone calls and video chats in the first few months. It was like we built a safety net which would absorb and transform/disperse the overwhelming influx of psychic energy and emotional discharges in the collective subconscious. We would meditate together, merge our minds and energies and transmute and elevate our vibrational frequency to progressively higher levels. This was an opportunity for us to see how well our practices prepared us to face such a calamity. My friend’s father was in an ICU, on a ventilator for over two months, his mother was in and out of the hospital as well, due to Covid infection. Others lost cousins and loved ones. I lost an aunt, and other family friends. We supported each other and provided a combined bulwark of spiritual energy to withstand any onslaught we faced individually. Here are some takeaways — The power of satsangha was made apparent to us collectively we are stronger than individually in face of adversity even the most terrible/painful emotions can be transmuted to bliss/peace through meditation meditation in a group helps us overcome individual limitations praying for the welfare of the world is also a very spiritually uplifting practice Would love to read other stories and perspectives.

The path of kundalini, meditation and energy will purify the mind. The mind purified, Self knowledge will be directly known, once the pointer is presented. A muddled mind cannot grasp the subtlety of Self knowledge.

Well said!

It’s just one person’s opinion. Why take it so seriously? Take precautions and wait it out until you can take a well educated, delineated decision. History of vaccinations has always been like that. It has taken decades to achieve immunization for the majority.

Is there really a war going on? Or is it just a conflict within the confines of our own minds? If the war is in the mind, then the solution also can be found in the mind itself, right? For the poisons of anger, distrust and conflict, the antidote is only love.

Thought this brief talk might be germane to the topic.

Why wouldn’t there be? Spirit doesn’t care about opinions, actions, conflicts etc etc. We all are essentially One Spirit — your True Self is also the True Self of us all. Imho, we need to have group meditations — where we can share our awareness without discrimination. That’s the way to transcend conflicts.

Can relate. Having realization doesn’t mean the dream has ended yet. Only one is lucid in the waking dream. It takes time to operate in the lucid dream…

In the context of Advaita Vedanta, ananda is not a bliss one experiences, because if it is an experience, it is not the "real" thing. I know it's hard for our minds to wrap around such a statement -- because how else do we know something normally, if not from experience? There are many ecstatic experiences that one might experience - deep bliss, joy, etc. But the bliss (ananda) of Brahman/Atman, is not experienced that way. Because it is only due to syntactical reasons, we say "Bliss of Brahman/Atman", but really, Brahman/Atman is Bliss itself. How can bliss experience bliss? All bliss can do, is simply be bliss. It's like asking, "how does one know that one has eyes?"

It is not really the physical heart. The spiritual heart has its center in the middle of the chest (to the right of the physical heart), but when it’s fully open, it expands to encompass everything (and eventually, the entire universe). Once I was told “sarvasya Hridayam, sadaiva hridayam” — the heart is infinite, the heart is eternal. Took me almost 15 years to understand what that meant… As far as bliss is concerned, our true nature is bliss itself. So all the blissful states borrow from the bliss of the Self. What else is Self? It is awareness itself, which makes all knowing possible. It is existence itself, from which all objects borrow existence. How does one experience this Self? One doesn’t (not in the way one experiences other objects). The Self is our Real Nature — so we are always and already that. All it needs is a shift in perspective to realize it. But the shift in perspective takes as much effort as is required (which varies from individual to individual). For some it is a moment, for others lifetimes.

Yes that which knows the Chidabhasa is Brahman

Can you TL;DR please?

According to Ayurveda dark chocolate increases pitta (fire). Increased pitta can cause bleeding. https://www.banyanbotanicals.com/info/blog-the-banyan-insight/details/signs-symptoms-of-pitta-imbalance/

The word "Spirit" means different things for different people, depending on their socio-cultural/ethnoreligious background. The word's root lies in the Latin word "spiritus" which means "breath". It is used in the context of "Life breath" -- that which animates the body. So, the term "spiritual path" should mean, the path by which one reconnects with, purifies, and strengthens their life-breath. This life breath has been called by various names -- prana, qi, ki, etc. How hard does one have to strive to reconnect with their own life force? That which animates them? Or conversely, how easy should it be to do that? I find the same conundrum in terms of the "Self" -- how hard or how easy is not a correct approach to the process of "Self-realization". Papaji, the 20th-century non-dual master, a direct disciple of Ramana Maharshi, would often ask his students -- "How far do you have to go, to be your Self?" "How hard do you have to try, to be your Self"? Existing is the necessary and only condition to connect with the Spirit and to be the Self. "To connect" is also incorrect -- because if there was no "Spirit", one would cease "to be". So what IS cultivated in many of the spiritual traditions? Is it some substance that gets transmuted into "spirit"? Or is it essentially a process of dropping of the veils that obscure our true nature as this "Lifeforce" or "Spirit"? Where does such a veiling occur? In the mind of course. So, is the cultivation therefore a process by which the mind is made to become transparent, such that the "Spirit" is recognized? Feel free to share your thoughts here

This is of relevance to this discussion —

I’ve been watching Ragnarok on Netflix — a very fascinating spin on Norse mythology. Anyone has any good background info on Norse “alchemy”, spiritual concepts etc? Would be interesting to learn more about it.

I’m not sure I understand