Not mine

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Nothing is mine.
I did not create
This world,
This body,
Or this mind,
With its thoughts.

They were all given to me.
Yes – even my thoughts were given to me.

None of it has anything to do with me.

Then I look at the ‘me’:
There is no me.
Only this,
None of it mine,
All of it moving.

Free webstream talk: ‘Freedom from Suffering’

Do you want to watch me talk about this stuff? This Thursday I’ll be doing a live (and free) webstream with Conscious 2, find out more below:

http://www.conscious2.com/freedom-from-suffering/

http://www.conscious2.com/teachers/tom-das/

TomDasFreedomFromSufferingLIVEstream.jpg

 

Roadmap to enlightenment: a (fairly) comprehensive guide to spiritual practices

This is one of a series of introductory articles – please see the homepage of tomdas.com for more introductory articles. Also see:

In Brief: how to attain Liberation

The entire path explained: the Path of Sri Ramana (Parts 1 and 2; PDF downloads)

This is one of the most important posts I have written – it condenses years of spiritual seeking which has involved exploring dozens of spiritual teachings, reading hundreds of books and texts from spiritual teachers and spiritual traditions across the world, undergoing all sorts of spiritual practices and meditations over the years, entering samadhi’s and experiencing visions of infinite oneness, and a genuine realisation of the Freedom-that-already-is.

The aim of the post is to guide you to a Freedom beyond words, but also stay concise. For all those people who have asked me: ‘That’s all very well but how do I actually become enlightened? How can we free ourselves from suffering? What do we do?’, this is for you, and others like you.

Continue reading

Dzogchen: Self-liberation in the fundamental nature

supreme-source

Here are some more verses from the Kunjed Gyalpo (The Supreme Source), one of the most important texts in Tibetan Buddhism and Dzogchen. These words point the reader directly towards Enlightenment. See my earlier posts on the Kunjed Gyalpo here and here.

In the except below the first section initially directs us to listen to these teachings and realise the inherent liberation that is already present ‘without needing to alter anything’.

The second section indicates there is no need for special practices, or to speak or act in a particular way in order to get this.

In fact, as per the third section below, in trying to find your ‘authentic condition’ (which is self-liberation), you deny it and prevent liberation manifesting itself.

Listen!
As I am in the authentic condition,
all phenomena self-liberate in the fundamental nature.
Without needing to alter anything,
the teacher self-liberates in the fundamental nature.
Without needing to alter anything,
the teacher self-liberates in the fundamental nature.
Without needing to alter anything,
the retinue of disciples, too, self-liberates in the fundamental nature.

Listen!
As all self-liberates,
there is no need to correct the body posture or visualise a deity.
There is no need to correct the voice or speech.
There is no need to correct the mind through meditation.

By correcting oneself,
it is not possible to find the authentic condition,
and without finding the authentic condition,
one cannot self-liberate.
In this way one does not achieve the state of equality of the fundamental nature.

Excerpt from The Supreme Source (Kunjed Gyalpo), Chapter 29

So, what are we to do? We are essentially told that ‘you are already realised’ or ‘you are already whole’, but perhaps we don’t feel realised or whole.

We are told that no practice can take us to where we already are, but then what do we do?

The Kunjed Gyalpo exhorts us to listen to these teachings, absorb them, and see their truth directly!

But how to do this, the spiritual seeker asks.

There is no how, for in asking how you have already posited and given reality to the separate self that is looking for answer, that is looking to get somewhere. By asking how, there is already the implication that this is not it. But this is it!

The Supreme Truth and the way to it cannot be described. Only wrong ways can be described, hence the language is of negation – ‘no need to correct’….’By correcting oneself…one does not achieve’. The scripture tells us what not to do, not what to do.

The ancient method is to first listen (sravana) to the teachings repeatedly, then secondly to contemplate them and think them over (manana). This helps to develop an intellectual understanding of the teachings first, following which meditation and integration of the teachings (nididhyasana) can occur. This can occur gradually, or perhaps suddenly, without warning, a moment of clear seeing arises and the teachings that were once theoretical suddenly spring to life.

Being fearless

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Being fearless,
The body becomes wide open,
The heart sensitive and vast:
All thoughts, feelings and sensations are welcome here,
Even fear.

Completely open
We truly feel.

Willing to feel,
We are truly alive.

Not resisting,
We feel whole, connected.

Not knowing what will happen next,
Isn’t this true freedom?

We don’t have to define reality

Leopard

We don’t have to define reality
We don’t even need to see things as they are.
We don’t need to do anything.
Just this.
That’s it.

Naturally,
We already see things as they are,
Effortlessly,
It’s our natural intelligence,
(It’s not ‘ours’)
And wrong concepts are naturally dropped,
(Or maybe they are not).

Reality shines through all of this.
How could it not?

Krishnamurti’s Method

krishnamurti

The following is an excerpt from a talk of Jiddu Krishnamurti that took place in Hamburg, Germany on 5th September 1956. For those of you who are familiar with Krishnamurti’s teachings, you will know that he abhorred the idea of a set method for liberation. However, in his talks he often outlined something that could be called a method in the wider sense, so I have rather cheekily titled this post ‘Krishnamurti’s Method’ 🙂

“So a serious person must surely ask himself this question: is it possible to experience something…beyond the fabrications of the mind? And if it is possible, then what is one to do? How is one to set about it? Continue reading

Eckhart Tolle: Your true self

Lake sunset

‘You find peace not by rearranging the circumstances of your life, but by realizing who you are at the deepest level.’
Stillness Speaks by Eckhart Tolle p. 52

The truth is that you cannot know your true self. You are your true self – already. It’s difficult to put into words, but when you know who you really are, it is not the same as knowing how tall Mount Everest is or knowing what your favourite colour is. These worldly things are known with the mind, with thought, with the intellect. These things are known by ‘you’, the ego who knows, the false non-existent self. Your true self is not known in that way.
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Guru

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Do you really think a spiritual teacher can teach you anything?
How can the guru really know what is right for you?
Every word of his leads you into further illusion,
Concept upon concept,
A field full of traps
– do not walk there!
– do not listen to him!

Continue reading