Devote yourself to God (That Divinity which is nothing but your own Self) daily, give yourself to Him* daily, put Him first, rest upon Him in all things.
Guided by Him (who is the True Teacher or True Guru): surrender to Him, talk to Him, sing to Him, praise Him, move with Him, allow Him to guide you: guide your thoughts, move through you, speak through you and to replenish You;
Be with Him, in Him, with Him in You; Lovingly, take his lead, follow His lead;
For those who resonate, this is both the beginning, the middle, and end of the Spiritual Journey. For those who resonate, this is the Entire Spiritual Teaching and the Entire Spiritual Journey.
Do this with Genuine Feeling, with Spiritual Feeling, with Love in which all distinctions ultimately fade.
Become One with Him, Be with Him, Abide as Him, Be Him – You are He.
So that only Stillness (Subject-Self-Consciousness) remains.
All doubts, confusions and questions
Will gently fade away effortlessly,
By themselves,
Just through Being Still.
Have faith in your Self-Nature
(Or Guru or God),
Know you are One and All,
And armed with this Knowing-Faith-Intuition,
Surrender,
And Be Still
Once one starts to gain experience in Being Still/turning within,
All teachings that do not encourage stillness or turning within
To discover the Pure Subject-Self/Divine Essence,
Are seen to be utterly superficial, egoic
And of the nature of delusion.
The Simple Being
That is your own True Self or True Nature
(Also known by more grandiose terms
Such as ‘Ultimate Truth’ or ‘Thoughtless Reality’ or ‘God’)
Will be revealed as simply your own Being
Or Isness
Devoid of objective arisings,
Just through Being Still.
‘You’ will discover your own True Self,
which is naturally devoid of arising objective phenomena,
just through Being Still.
Suffering will slips away of its own accord,
there being nowhere for it to attach itself to,
just through Being Still.
Bliss overflows Infinity Dawns, Eternity Rises, Consuming all: One is thrust into Eternal Life-Joy-Bliss, One with Source (‘The Father’)
Just through Being Still
All duality is destroyed, And with it suffering and egoity also disappear, As the many waters of duality, Flow into the Ocean of Unity, (That is my Beloved Guru Bhagavan Sri Ramana, Who is Grace, Oneness itself)
Just through Being Still
Without Being Still, (Also known as Self-Enquiry, Self-Surrender, Abiding as Self, Being with God, Being with Guru, Residing in The Heart, Turning Within, Awareness Watching Awareness, Self-Attention, Parabhakti, Samadhi, Meditation, Yoga, Devotion, Loving Self/God Nididhyasana, Silence, Just Being), Without this Sadhana (Spiritual Practice), Know that ego-duality-confusion-suffering-samsara will continue potentially forever until the practice is undertaken.
Therefore, Be Still.
For those who find themselves unable to practice thus,
Contemplate deeply upon this:
What will bring Eternal Joy-Peace-Happiness-Bliss?
Attending to/paying attention to that which changes (ie. various objects that arise and fall)
Or paying attention to that which never changes (the Subject-Consciousness-Self)?
Contemplating thus,
Know that attending to objects/maya simply leads to more objects/maya,
And thus more ego & suffering.
Contemplate this deeply.
Contemplating deeply, and knowing thus, Discover what You Are: Abide as the Self, And Be Still.
Therefore
Be still.
Just be still.
Gently,
Without force,
Allow all thoughts to subside,
In their own time,
So that only Stillness (Subject-Self-Consciousness) remains.
The following is a translation of a poem attributed to Seng-ts’an, the Third Ch’an (zen) Patriarch. I could write more about it, but all I will say is that it is truly sublime and one of my favourites.
This version of the text has been translated by Richard B. Clarke
Enjoy
❤
Hsin Hsin Ming or Trust in Mind Sutra
Oxherding picture number 2: noticing the footprints
The Great Way is not difficult
for those who have no preferences.
When love and hate are both absent
everything becomes clear and undisguised.
Make the smallest distinction, however,
and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.
If you wish to see the truth
then hold no opinions for or against anything.
To set up what you like against what you dislike
is the disease of the mind.
When the deep meaning of things is not understood
the mind’s essential peace is disturbed to no avail.
The Way is perfect like vast space
where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess.
Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject
that we do not see the true nature of things.
Be serene in the oneness of things
and such erroneous views will disappear by themselves.
When you try to stop activity to achieve passivity
your very effort fills you with activity.
As long as you remain in one extreme or the other,
you will never know Oneness.
Those who do not live in the single Way
fail in both activity and passivity, assertion and denial.
To deny the reality of things is to miss their reality;
to assert the emptiness of things is to miss their reality.
The more you talk and think about it,
the further astray you wander from the truth.
Stop talking and thinking
and there is nothing you will not be able to know.
To return to the root is to find the meaning,
but to pursue appearances is to miss the source.
At the moment of inner enlightenment,
there is a going beyond appearance and emptiness.
The changes that appear to occur in the empty world
we call real only because of our ignorance.
Do not search for the truth; only cease to cherish opinions.
Do not remain in the dualistic state; avoid such pursuits carefully.
If there is even a trace of this and that, of right and wrong,
the Mind-essence will be lost in confusion.
Although all dualities come from the One,
do not be attached even to this One.
When the mind exists undisturbed in the Way,
nothing in the world can offend,
and when a thing can no longer offend,
it ceases to exist in the old way.
When no discriminating thoughts arise,
the old mind ceases to exist.
When thought objects vanish, the thinking-subject vanishes,
and when the mind vanishes, objects vanish.
Things are objects because there is a subject or mind;
and the mind is a subject because there are objects.
Understand the relativity of these two
and the basic reality: the unity of emptiness.
In this Emptiness the two are indistinguishable
and each contains in itself the whole world.
If you do not discriminate between coarse and fine
you will not be tempted to prejudice and opinion.
To live in the Great Way
is neither easy nor difficult.
But those with limited views
are fearful and irresolute;
the faster they hurry, the slower they go.
Clinging cannot be limited;
even to be attached to the idea of enlightenment is to go astray.
Just let things be in their own way
and there will be neither coming nor going.
Obey the nature of things
and you will walk freely and undisturbed.
When thought is in bondage the truth is hidden,
for everything is murky and unclear.
The burdensome practice of judging
brings annoyance and weariness.
What benefit can be derived
from distinctions and separations?
If you wish to move in the One Way
do not dislike even the world of senses and ideas.
Indeed, to accept them fully
is identical with true Enlightenment.
The wise man strives to no goals
but the foolish man fetters himself.
There is one Dharma, not many;
distinctions arise from the clinging needs of the ignorant.
To seek Mind with discriminating mind
is the greatest of all mistakes.
Rest and unrest derive from illusion;
with enlightenment there is no liking and disliking.
All dualities come from ignorant inference.
They are like dreams of flowers in air: foolish to try to grasp them.
Gain and loss, right and wrong;
such thoughts must finally be abolished at once.
If the eye never sleeps,
all dreams will naturally cease.
If the mind makes no discriminations,
the ten thousand things are as they are, of single essence.
To understand the mystery of this One-essence
is to be released from all entanglements.
When all things are seen equally
the timeless Self-essence is reached.
No comparisons or analogies are possible
in this causeless, relationless state.
Consider motion in stillness
and stillness in motion;
both movement and stillness disappear.
When such dualities cease to exist
Oneness itself cannot exist.
To this ultimate finality
no law or description applies.
For the unified mind in accord with the Way
all self-centered striving ceases.
Doubts and irresolutions vanish
and life in true faith is possible.
With a single stroke we are freed from bondage;
nothing clings to us and we hold to nothing.
All is empty, clear, self-illuminating,
with no exertion of the mind’s power.
Here thought, feeling, knowledge, and imagination are of no value.
In this world of Suchness
there is neither self nor other-than-self.
To come directly into harmony with this reality
just simply say when doubt arises, “Not two.”
In this “not two” nothing is separate,
nothing is excluded.
No matter when or where,
enlightenment means entering this truth.
And this truth is beyond extension or diminution in time or space;
in it a single thought is ten thousand years.
Emptiness here, Emptiness there,
but the infinite universe stands always before your eyes.
Infinitely large and infinitely small;
no difference, for definitions have vanished
and no boundaries are seen.
So too with Being and non-Being.
Waste no time in doubts and arguments
that have nothing to do with this.
One thing, all things;
move among and intermingle,
without distinction.
To live in this realization
is to be without anxiety about nonperfection.
To live in this faith is the road to nonduality,
because the nondual is one with the trusting mind.
Words!
The Way is beyond language,
for in it there is no yesterday, no tomorrow, no today.
What is the ego?
Will you accept my definition or find out for yourself?
Stop, be aware of what is happening:
Notice the content of your thoughts.
Notice the feelings that accompany the thoughts:
Is there tension and stress in a particular thought?
Or is there a freedom,
A space where thought is free to move,
Free to come and go as it pleases?
And what is the ego?
What does it feels like?
What kind of energy does it bring into the physical organism?
Be open to feel this ego:
Get a sense of what it feels like in its many guises.
Relax and let it in.
Notice a cascade of thoughts and feelings:
When they are believed in and invested in,
The egoic thoughts weave an apparently believable story line,
But when seen for what it is,
Inherently empty of any self,
Just empty thoughts coming and going,
With some associated sensations,
And perhaps an interpretive thought accompanying and interpreting what the ‘feelings mean’.
Notice there may be an urge to get out of the ego,
A movement of thought that attempts to end the ego may occur,
And notice that this is simply more of the ego,
More of this activity based on this false sense of self,
Based on this false notion of separation.
When things are seen for what they are,
And allowed to unfold as they are,
And illusion born of thought is no longer believed in,
What remains?
It is the belief in separation
That allows for the belief in doership.
Otherwise all there is is One-Movement.
There is not even one movement:
If we go by the evidence presented to us by experience,
There is only movement happening.
No evidence for a doer-entity,
No evidence for an entity with ultimate responsibility.
Instead there is just life happening,
From the point of view of a person,
A body operating and functioning,
Seemingly by itself,
With all the workings and humanity of the organism manifesting,
However it manifests.
As truth is seen,
Layers of deception and wrong thinking fall away,
And the Freedom that always was and is,
Is revealed.
Like the sun when the clouds parts,
Nothing needs to be attained,
Only the obscuring clouds of wrong notions,
Need to be seen through.
When the body is loose and relaxed,
When it is fed nutritiously,
When movement is fluid, safe and dynamic,
Physical wellbeing tends to manifest.
When the mind is relaxed and alert,
Not fighting this way and that,
Not straining and thirsting after temporary sense pleasures,
Not indulging in stories of self,
Not judging others as being better or worse,
Seeing things factually as they are,
Happiness manifests.
When happiness and wellbeing manifest,
We become receptive to that-which-is,
We become sensitive to life and its play,
And intelligence is enhanced.
And so life shifts,
From side to side,
Bobbing us up and down,
Mysteriously,
Intelligently,
Lovingly,
Nurturing us in the ways we need,
(not necessarily in the ways we want),
And life,
In its every action and happening,
Is gently ushering us home.
(Where else were we?)
Tom Das 