Posts Tagged ‘Buddha’
Tribute to Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh
“The past is gone,
the future is not yet here,
and if we do not go back to ourselves in the present moment,
we cannot be in touch with life.”
~ Thich Nhat Hanh
Thich Nhat Hanh
October 11, 1926 – January 22, 2022
Introduction and Explanation.
With deep gratitude for his teachings, this posting honors Buddhist Master Thich Nhat Hanh – renowned Vietnamese Buddhist monk, peace advocate, teacher, poet, and author.
Master Thich Nhat Hanh was particularly known in the West for teaching Buddhist mindfulness and active social and political pursuit of Truth, known as “Engaged Buddhism”.
This article includes below a culled collection of representative quotations from his voluminous writings, and an embedded recent Plumb Village documentary film – “A Cloud Never Dies”, narrated by actor Peter Coyote, a Zen Buddhist practitioner and priest.
The Plumb Village collective organization is the best online source for further information about Master Thich Nhat Hanh. And for your convenience a Wikipedia biography is both linked and attached as a pdf document.
May Master Thich Nhat Hanh’s long lifetime in the 20th and 21st centuries, continue blessing countless future generations, until we realize (as He observed) that “Reality transcends both birth and death.”
And so may it be!
Namasté!
Ron Rattner
“A Cloud Never Dies”
Quotations From Master Thich Nhat Hanh
“We are here to awaken from our illusion of separateness.”
“The notion of a separate self is like a tunnel that you keep going into. When you practice meditation, you can see that there is the breathing but no breather can be found anywhere; there is the sitting but no sitter can be found anywhere. When you see that, the tunnel will vanish, and there will be a lot of space, a lot of freedom.”
“Today is the most important day of our lives.”
“Waking up this morning, I smile. Twenty-four brand new hours are before me. I vow to live fully in each moment and to look at all beings with eyes of compassion.”
“If you think that peace and happiness are somewhere else and you run after them, you will never arrive.”
“In mindfulness one is not only restful and happy, but alert and awake. Meditation is not evasion; it is a serene encounter with reality.”
“Meditation is not to avoid society; it is to look deep to have the kind of insight you need to take action. To think that it is just to sit down and enjoy the calm and peace, is wrong.”
“Meditation is not meant to help us avoid problems or run away from difficulties. It is meant to allow positive healing to take place. To meditate is to learn how to stop—to stop being carried away by our regrets about the past, our anger or despair in the present, or our worries about the future.”
“Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor.”
“Silence is essential. We need silence just as much as we need air, just as much as plants need light. If our minds are crowded with words and thoughts, there is no space for us.”
“Guarding knowledge is not a good way to understand. Understanding means to throw away your knowledge.”
“People normally cut reality into compartments, and so are unable to see the interdependence of all phenomena. To see one in all and all in one is to break through the great barrier which narrows one’s perception of reality.”
“Birth is okay and death is okay, if we know that they are only concepts in our mind. Reality transcends both birth and death.”
“There is no birth, there is no death; there is no coming, there is no going; there is no same, there is no different; there is no permanent self, there is no annihilation. We only think there is.”
“The heart of the matter is always our oneness with divine spirit, our union with all life.”
“You are what you want to become. Why search anymore? You are a wonderful manifestation. The whole universe has come together to make your existence possible. There is nothing that is not you. The kingdom of God, the Pure Land, nirvana, happiness, and liberation are all you.”
“Be Yourself. Life is precious as it is. All the elements for your happiness are already here. There is no need to run, strive, search, or struggle. Just Be.”
“To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don’t need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself. When you are born a lotus flower, be a beautiful lotus flower, don’t try to be a magnolia flower. If you crave acceptance and recognition and try to change yourself to fit what other people want you to be, you will suffer all your life. True happiness and true power lie in understanding yourself, accepting yourself, having confidence in yourself.”
“The most precious gift we can offer anyone is our attention. When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers.”
“When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence. How can you love if you are not there?”
“If love is in our hearts, every thought, word, and deed can bring about a miracle. Because understanding is the very foundation of love, words and actions that emerge from our love are always helpful.”
“The essence of love and compassion is understanding, the ability to recognize the physical, material, and psychological suffering of others, to put ourselves “inside the skin” of the other. We “go inside” their body, feelings, and mental formations, and witness for ourselves their suffering. Shallow observation as an outsider is not enough to see their suffering. We must become one with the subject of our observation. When we are in contact with another’s suffering, a feeling of compassion is born in us. Compassion means, literally, “to suffer with.””
“When another person makes you suffer,
it is because he suffers deeply within himself,
and his suffering is spilling over.
He does not need punishment; he needs help.
That’s the message he is sending.”
“You do not suffer because things are impermanent. You suffer because things are impermanent and you think they are permanent.”
“People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.”
“Fear keeps us focused on the past or worried about the future. If we can acknowledge our fear, we can realize that right now we are okay. Right now, today, we are still alive, and our bodies are working marvelously. Our eyes can still see the beautiful sky. Our ears can still hear the voices of our loved ones.”
“Letting go gives us freedom, and freedom is the only condition for happiness. If, in our heart, we still cling to anything – anger, anxiety, or possessions – we cannot be free.”
“The desire to be a free person is very worthwhile. To be free means you are no longer the victim of fear, anger, craving, or suspicion.”
“Anger is like a storm rising up from the bottom of your consciousness. When you feel it coming, turn your focus to your breath. Breathe in deeply to bring your mind home to your body. Then look at, or think of, the person triggering this emotion: with mindfulness, you can see that they are unhappy and suffering. You can see their wrong perceptions. You’ll feel motivated by a desire to say or do something to help the other person suffer less. This means compassionate energy has been born in your heart. And when compassion appears, anger is deleted.”
“Around us, life bursts with miracles–a glass of water, a ray of sunshine, a leaf, a caterpillar, a flower, laughter, raindrops. If you live in awareness, it is easy to see miracles everywhere. Each human being is a multiplicity of miracles. Eyes that see thousands of colors, shapes, and forms; ears that hear a bee flying or a thunderclap; a brain that ponders a speck of dust as easily as the entire cosmos; a heart that beats in rhythm with the heartbeat of all beings. When we are tired and feel discouraged by life’s daily struggles, we may not notice these miracles, but they are always there.”
“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.”
“The greatest of all miracles is to be alive.”
“Because you are alive, everything is possible.”
“The buddha called suffering a holy truth, because our suffering has the capacity of showing us the path to liberation. Embrace your suffering and let it reveal to you the way to peace.”
“When you plant lettuce, if it does not grow well, you don’t blame the lettuce. You look for reasons it is not doing well. It may need fertilizer, or more water, or less sun. You never blame the lettuce. Yet if we have problems with our friends or family, we blame the other person. But if we know how to take care of them, they will grow well, like the lettuce. Blaming has no positive effect at all, nor does trying to persuade using reason and arguments. That is my experience. No blame, no reasoning, no argument, just understanding.”
“Some people live as though they are already dead. There are people moving around us who are consumed by their past, terrified of their future, and stuck in their anger and jealousy. They are not alive; they are just walking corpses.”
“Often we tell ourselves, “Don’t just sit there, do something!” But when we practice awareness, we discover that the opposite may be more helpful: “Don’t just do something, sit there!””
“Human beings are not our enemy. Our enemy is not the other person. Our enemy is the violence, ignorance, and injustice in us and in the other person. When we are armed with compassion and understanding, we fight not against other people, but against the tendency to invade, to dominate, and to exploit.”
“At any moment, you have a choice, that either leads you closer to your spirit or further away from it.”
“The organic gardener does not think of throwing away the garbage. She knows that she needs the garbage. She is capable of transforming the garbage into compost, so that the compost can turn into lettuce, cucumber, radishes, and flowers again…With the energy of mindfulness, you can look into the garbage and say: I am not afraid. I am capable of transforming the garbage back into love.”
“When we change our daily lives – the way we think, speak and act – we change the world.”
“Because of your smile, you make life more beautiful.”
“Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.”
“When fear becomes collective, when anger becomes collective, it’s extremely dangerous. It is overwhelming… The mass media and the military-industrial complex create a prison for us, so we continue to think, see, and act in the same way… We need the courage to express ourselves even when the majority is going in the opposite direction… because a change of direction can happen only when there is a collective awakening… Therefore, it is very important to say, ‘I am here!’ to those who share the same kind of insight.” The Art of Power
“We are determined not to take as the aim of our life fame, profit, wealth, or sensual pleasure, nor to accumulate wealth while millions are hungry and dying. We are committed to living simply and sharing our time, energy, and material resources with those who are in need.”~ Thich Nhat Hanh
Dedication
This posting is shared with the deep aspiration and dedication that its spiritual teachings will inspire and help us live happily and compassionately – even during the current extraordinary era of warfare, deprivation, turmoil, violence and suffering.
And so may it be!
Namasté!
Ron Rattner
Seeing the World as “Nothing But Movies”
~ Ron’s Memoirs
“This earth is nothing but movies to me. Just like the beam of a motion picture. So is everything made of shadow and light. That’s what we are. Light and shadows of the Lord. Nothing else than that. There’s one purpose. To get to the beam.”
~ Paramahansa Yogananda-Autobiography of a Yogi, Chapter 30
“A wise man, recognizing that the world is but an illusion,
does not act as if it is real, so he escapes the suffering.”
~ Buddha
“This whole creation is essentially subjective, and the dream is the theater where the dreamer is at once: scene, actor, prompter, stage manager, author, audience, and critic.”
~ Carl Gustav Jung
“I regard consciousness as fundamental.
I regard matter as derivative from consciousness.
We cannot get behind consciousness.
Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.”
~ Max Planck, Nobel Prize-winning physicist
“Objective reality does not exist” …. “the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram”
~ David Bohm, quantum physicist
Swami Paramahansa Yogananda January 5, 1893 – March 7, 1952
Ron’s Introduction to Seeing the World as “Nothing But Movies”.
Dear Friends,
Today’s memoirs title was inspired by Swami Paramahansa Yogananda’s above quotation, and by my unprecedented state of mind, since miraculously recovering from near-death taxicab run-down injuries eight years ago.
I now often experience this life like a movie, with scenes of continuing synchronicities enigmatically arising from ever mysterious karmic causes and conditions. But this life-stage has arrived only after many decades of difficulties and experiential evolution, beginning before my mid-life spiritual awakening.
During childhood my entire life seemed very dreamlike, and – like my nocturnal dreams – I’ve forgotten most of it.
Thereafter, and until midlife, Earth life became my sole “reality”. Then following a profound midlife spiritual awakening and previously unimagined mystical experiences, I more and more have been blessed to self-identify as non-dual eternal spirit inhabiting a mortal body, in an illusory world.
Thus my life again seems quite dreamlike and synchronistic – often like a masterfully pre-scripted movie, in which I am currently playing a fleeting role as retired lawyer and spiritual philosopher, who is still learning and evolving.
Retrospective realization of the apparent perfection of my lifetime’s evolutionary history has instilled in me unshakable and irreversible faith in God and Nature, and unspeakable gratitude for their blessings – especially since my miraculous survival and recovery from near death injuries sustained eight years ago on being run down by a taxicab.
At almost age 90, as I contemplate my inevitable (and possibly imminent) physical death, I keep wondering how we can best ‘be in this world but not of this world’ while remembering that we are immortal spirit – not mere embodied mortals – experiencing unique lifetimes, karmically predetermined to help us learn and see our true self-identity. And how we can keep alert for constant potential lessons and blessings in our lives.
I have been blessed with unforgettable fleeting ‘peek’ spiritual experiences demonstrating that earth life is like a ‘light show’ – an illusory play of consciousness. Yet, I’m often deeply moved by the insanity, violence and suffering now rife on our precious planet, and often wonder how we can best address it.
Questions.
As we awaken from the illusion of our apparent separateness from each other and Nature:
Is it possible for us to live in this impermanent world of inevitable suffering, without responding compassionately and emotionally to the immense miseries and apparent injustices experienced everywhere by countless sentient beings?
How can we most skillfully and compassionately address ubiquitous world misery, injustice and suffering?
Discussion.
Each of us has a unique perspective with unique karmic causes and conditions. So I am unqualified to offer specific spiritual advice to anyone else. But, encouraged by my Guruji to share spiritual learning experiences, I offer the following views, in case they may help others.
I believe that even highly elevated incarnate beings cannot always live emotionally detached from ubiquitous misery and suffering. But that we can all best respond compassionately and intuitively, rather than react reflexively, while peacefully remaining self-identified as incarnate universal spirit, rather than as separate ego-minds.
Recently I learned that – even while experiencing transcendent states of consciousness – Indian Holy Man and Avatar, Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa, suffered bereavements on deaths of a nephew, older brother, and beloved attendant. Similarly Swami Paramahansa Yogananda experienced deep bereavement on death of his mother, and significant emotional trauma following a betrayal and lawsuit by his former trusted childhood best friend and assistant, Dhirananda.
Yet, Yogananda later explained in Autobiography of a Yogi, Chapter 30, his view that:“This earth is nothing but movies to me.”
But (except for psychopaths) aren’t we all often autonomically emotionally attuned with others when with them or thinking of them, and even in viewing videos, movies and plays?
Background
In my student days I learned of maniacs like Hitler in Nazi Germany, Mao in Communist China, Stalin in the U.S.S.R., Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and numerous other dictators who were then bestially causing untold murders and misery. Naively, I then believed that my country the U.S.A., and its Western allies, represented only virtues of good and democratic decency, and that after the demise of World War II era psychopaths, the world would be restored to a utopian age of peace and prosperity. But I was wrong.
I slowly realized that the U.S.A. was becoming a violent and totalitarian police state, rather than a socially benevolent democracy – especially beginning with the legally unprecedented and undemocratic U.S. Supreme Court selection of George W. Bush as 43rd US President (after patently flawed Florida elections).
Bush’s inauguration was soon followed by outrageous false flag terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, which purportedly justified a preplanned series of unprovoked and unlawful U.S. invasions of sovereign middle East countries on the fraudulent pretense that they threatened us with further “terrorism” because of (non-existent) alleged “weapons of mass destruction”.
So (like Professor Howard Zinn), I began feeling that I was living in an ‘occupied country’; that the so-called “American dream” of Presidents Ronald Reagan, et.al. had become a global nightmare of a rapaciously violent uni-polar empire threatening all life on Earth.
Current perspectives.
Never before did I imagine how far purportedly democratic world societies and the U.S. government ‘of by and the for the people’ would degenerate. Nor until recently did I realize that neither of the two dominant U.S. political parties provides an alternative to a rapaciously violent worldwide American empire threatening possible nuclear or ecologic or biologic catastrophe.
Optimistically, I believe that the present post-pandemic “new normal” era has been a “red pill” portent of the end of empire; that it is awakening a critical mass of concerned humans who will no longer tolerate current global hegemonic tyranny with unsustainable, unjust, immoral, and criminal exploitation of life on our precious planet; and, that we will at long last democratically and compassionately avert human caused calamity, by ending totalitarian governments by and for psychopathic billionaires, and replacing them with democratic governments by and for all people and all life on our precious planet Earth.
Aspirations.
May current global insanity and suffering soon awaken humankind to a new democratic era of compassionate concern for all life everywhere. Yet may it also inspire us to realize, like Swami Yogananda, that this world is “nothing but movies”; that it is an illusory mental projection of shadow and light displayed to help us “get to the beam” – which is the Eternal Light of LOVE.
Invocation.
Whatever happens in this ever impermanent illusory world of inevitable suffering, may we never forget our eternal oneness with Nature and all earth-life, and may we ever emanate universal peace and happiness, while realizing that this world is “nothing but movies”.
And so shall it be!
Ron Rattner
Words About Words
““No more words. Hear only the voice within.”
“Learn to speak by listening.”
~ Rumi
“We are what we think.
All that we are arises with our thoughts.
With our thoughts, we make the world.”
~ Buddha
“Better than a thousand useless words is one useful word,
hearing which one attains peace.
Better than a thousand useless verses is one useful verse,
hearing which one attains peace.”
~ Buddha
“In the beginning was the word
and the word was with God
and the word was God”
~ John 1:1
“The grass withers, the flower fades,
But the word of God stands forever.”
~ Isaiah 40:8
“True communication” is neither verbal nor mental –
but transcendental.
True communication is communion –
Heart to Heart.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“Speak little; say much.”
~ Ron Rattner (aka Swami Onandonananda)
Ron’s Introduction to Words about Words
Dear Friends,
Today’s “Words About Words” posting, is deeply dedicated to preserving, advancing and blessing all miraculous Earth-life with our compassionate and empathetic thoughts, words, and deeds, as co-creators of our perceived space/time reality.
With the foregoing apt quotations, “Words About Words” is a collection sutra-sayings and verses about words, and follwing explanatory comments which supplement other related SillySutras postings about silence, words, and thoughts.
These writings reveal important reasons (especially in these Orwellian post-pandemic times), for us to consciously consider how and why our thoughts, words and behaviors karmically cause our Earth-life experiences.
They accept ancient Eastern non-duality and karma philosophies as well as Einstein’s revolutionary scientific insights revealing that our world is a thought created mental illusion, like a wonderful mirage, where “reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else”. [George Orwell “1984”]
According to mystic masters, the more elevated and compassionate our thought emanations, the further and faster we advance our spiritual evolution. (See e.g. Thoughts About Thought) So this posting is deeply dedicated to thus elevating and advancing our spiritual awakening process, and to helping us live ever happier lives.
May these writings encourage and inspire us, as spiritually awakening beings, to ever emanate elevating word and thought energies of kindness, compassion and empathy which help transform the world, and advance our spiritual evolution toward ultimate Self-realization of our true non-duality identity and infinite Reality – as Universal Life, Light and LOVE.
And so may it be!
Words About Words
Words are thoughts.
Words are mind symbols uttered or inscribed
to denominate and communicate ideas.
Words are then,
Life is NOW.
Life is a word game:
Adding a few syllables to the Ineffable,
we play the word game of life
until we find and become THAT –
Silence that says ALL.
Language can be a ladder for ascent to the Ineffable.
With wisdom words
we implicate
that Truth
words never explicate.
Truth transcends wisdom:
Wisdom is primordial;
but,
Truth is pre-primordial.
There’s nothing to say, but words point the way.
So, let’s elevate our spiritual “lexi-consciousness.”
Cosmic contra-diction:
In the beginning was the Word,
but in the end Silence says all.
We maximize the impact of our words
when we minimize the number of our words.
The epigrammatic is most dramatic.
Better than any words is experience.
As the Bible says, “God” is a word – a noun –
with countless connotations,
different for different people –
all believing or disbelieving in “God”.
“God” is a word designating different ideas of a Transcendent Power.
Thus, “God” did not create man,
but man created the word “God” –
with thoughts from ruminations, revelations, intuitions, and speculations,
trying to identify THAT which is beyond words, beyond all thought.
When words are inscribed or uttered with deep insight
and heartfelt compassion, they can be very powerful.
Such words are imbued with the energy of their originator.
So, words from an ‘enlightened being’ are like sun rays;
they radiate the light of their Source.
Live laconically, and
Walk your talk:
Join “The Society of Laconic Walk/Talkers”, where –
The less we talk,
the further we go.
The further we go,
the more we Know.
The more we Know,
the less we say,
’Til as Silence we are the Way.
Ron’s audio recitation of “Words About Words”
Ron’s explanation of “Words About Words”
Our space/time world is an ever impermanent and illusory ‘reality’ in which everything and everyone is flowing energy. All supposedly separate forms and phenomena are energy vortexes or information systems constantly vibrating and oscillating within a continuum, field or range of frequencies. Most energies are imperceptible to humans. But some energy vibrations, like those of perceived physical matter, are slow enough for us to detect.
Thoughts and emotions are vibrating energy-forms which humans don’t normally see. They have a vibratory range from lower negative to higher positive. Negative thoughts of anger, anxiety or fear afflict us, while thoughts of kindness, compassion and love, bless us. Therefore, according to mystic masters, elevating our thought vibrations and emanations can be of fundamental evolutionary importance. Because:
We are what we think.
All that we are arises with our thoughts.
With our thoughts, we make the world.”
~ Buddha
Thus the more elevated our thought emanations, the further we advance our evolution toward realization of our true self-identity as Life, Light and LOVE. See: Thoughts About Thought
Thoughts from mistaken beliefs of separateness from each other and Nature cause slow vibrations and low emanations. As we evolve spiritually we gradually quicken and elevate our thought energies. And we thereby progressively transcend supposed separateness, and increasingly understand and experience our Oneness with all Life everywhere. Integral to a divine ‘design plan’, we are graced with infinite potentiality to collectively advance all life on planet Earth, through our loving and compassionate thoughts, words, and deeds, even while we still experience illusionary perceptual separation from Universal Awareness – our shared essence and ultimate identity as Absolute Reality.
It is with words that we mostly express and communicate our beliefs, thoughts and consequent mistaken concepts of perpetual separateness. So words are at the root of our thought-created illusionary space/time world and its inevitable karmic suffering. Thus, the Bible metaphorically tells us that
“In the beginning was the word”.
But, as destined, we inevitably evolve from thinking to loving; from living mentally, to Being consciously. In our evolutionary process, thoughts are obstacles if they muffle or mute our eternal inner voice of conscience, intuition and Love. And ultimately we learn experientially that, whereas in the beginning was the word, in the end it is silence that says all.
Also, we learn that as we gradually clear our conceptual conditioning, we may consciously communicate by various means other than words: that, without words or thoughts, we can powerfully communicate through gestures, touch, tears, smiles, music, and even telepathically.
And we learn that, however it is shared, LOVE is a ‘contagious’ blessing, for all Life everywhere. So, whereas in the the beginning we mostly communicate mentally to share our ideas and emotions, in the end we mostly commune silently to share Love; as we learn that true communication is neither verbal nor mental, but transcendental – that true communication is communion – Heart to Heart.
Thus, as spiritually awakening beings, we are ‘contagiously’ transforming the world by Being and emanating the Eternal Light of Truth and LOVE.
Dedication
The above sutras about words are shared and dedicated to advancing the human awakening process. They are especially important during current extraordinary polarized and turbulent times, when we must transcend fearful and hostile communications and emanations to avert impending calamity, and to co-create a blessed world of Peace and Love.
Invocation
May these Words about Words
encourage and inspire us,
as spiritually awakening beings,
to ever emanate elevating word and thought energies
of kindness, compassion and empathy
which help transform the world,
and advance our spiritual evolution
toward ultimate Self-realization
of our true non-duality identity and infinite Reality –
as Universal Life, Light and LOVE.
And so shall it be!
Ron Rattner
Pathless Paths
“The way is not in the sky. The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha
“As far, verily, as this world-space extends,
so far extends the space within the heart…”
~ Chandogya Upanishad 8.1.3
“I am the way, and the truth, and the life”
~ John 14:6
“In a conflict between the heart and the brain,
follow your heart.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
“Follow your heart – even if it contradicts my words”
“If there is love in your heart,
you don’t have to worry about rules.”
~ Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas
“Let us accept all the different paths
as different rivers running toward the same ocean.”
~ Swami Satchidananda
“The spiritual journey is the unlearning of fear
and the acceptance of love.”
~ Marianne Williamson
“Truth is a pathless land.”
~ J. Krishnamurti
If you don’t know where you are going,
any road will get you there.
~ Lewis Carroll
Ron’s introduction of “Pathless Paths”
Dear Friends,
Pathless Paths is a Q. and A. essay/poem, which is hereafter shared to help us follow our hearts so we lovingly and fearlessly respect and accept all other humans as Divine spiritual siblings, each on a unique ‘spiritual path’ to ultimate Self Realization of our common inner Divinity – as LOVE.
The “Pathless Paths” title was inspired by 20th century sage J. Krishnamurti’s core teaching explaining that “Truth is a pathless land.”
Knowingly or unknowingly every human being is on an illusionary metaphoric round trip journey originating from an indescribable inner “pathless land” beyond space/time duality ‘reality’.
On our destined return, we learn we never left – and melt into an Infinite ocean of Universal Awareness – as LOVE.
Although each person’s life-form and each pathless path is unique, this Pathless Paths posting (with above quotations and following comments) helps explain why for all humans
“The way is not in the sky. The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha
May these writings help hasten our timeless return within to THAT – mythical ‘destination’ we never left – as infinite LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Pathless Paths
Q. What are “spiritual paths”?
A. “Spiritual paths” are unique pathless paths
to everywhere/nowhere/NOW.
They are symbols of how
each unique earth person evolves
to transcend his/her entity identity,
Merging with the universal Way or the Tao.
Unlike earthly paths, spiritual paths
do not lead to space/time destinations,
But to transcendence of earthly limitations.
So “spiritual paths” are ways
in which we become the Way.
Ron’s audio recitation of “Pathless Paths”
Ron’s explanation of “Pathless Paths”
Dear Friends,
The foregoing key quotations and “Pathless Paths” essay/poem emphasize the spiritual importance of following the wisdom of our Heart with love and empathy.
These writings are especially important in current pivotally troubled times when most humans are polarized and fearful of existing or imminent threats of war, catastrophe, death, disease and/or deprivation of necessities and God-given rights.
Unknown to most people, Humankind are now suffering globally from unconscionable and obscenely immoral top-down psychopathic domination by far fewer than 1% of our total population. However, by spiritually raising human consciousness, we can transcend this fear and suffering, and collectively enjoy unprecedented elevation of the human condition.
To advance our spiritual awakening, this posting can help remind us of key perennial wisdom truths and principles which (when remembered and followed with faith and wisdom) can enable elevation of Humankind:
1) Our thought-created earthly perception “reality” is an unreal ego-illusion – maya or samsara.
2) Beyond perceived samsara, our true inner Reality and Self-identity is immortal and Eternal Divine LOVE.
3) By fearlessly, intuitively and lovingly following the wisdom of our Heart – we shall Self-Realize our true immortal identity as Divine LOVE.
Though our unreal projected perceptions, as supposedly separate mortal entities in time and space, are individually unique, spiritually we commonly share a universal matrix of infinite Reality – Cosmic consciousness from which we can morally resolve and transcend all mental perception problems.
Like Mahatma Gandhi, and his most famous disciple Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., we can actively resist and refuse to obey immoral “leaders” who are causing malignant misery and dire threats to our planet, people and all other life-forms.
Dedication
Thus this “Pathless Paths” posting is deeply dedicated
to our fearlessly and faithfully following
the timeless intuitive wisdom of our Heart
to morally elevate Humankind beyond its current sufferings.
Invocation
With abiding faith in Self, Nature, and God,
May we continuously follow the wisdom of our Heart
By living lovingly and morally
With respect for all other humans
as Divine spiritual siblings,
Each on a unique ‘spiritual path’ to Self Realization
of our common inner Divinity – as Eternal LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Time Cycling
“Space and time are not conditions in which we live,
they are modes in which we think.”
“The distinction between past, present, and future
is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
~ Albert Einstein
A wise man, recognizing that the world is but an illusion,
does not act as if it is real, so he escapes the suffering.”
~ Buddha
Tao and Zen
are NOW,
not then.
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“Life can be found only in the present moment.
The past is gone, the future is not yet here,
and if we do not go back to ourselves in the present moment,
we cannot be in touch with life.”
~ Thich Nhat Hanh
“Remember then: there is only one time that is important – Now!
It is the most important time
because it is the only time when we have any power.”
~ Leo Tolstoy
“I have realized that the past and future are real illusions,
that they exist in the present,
which is what there is and all there is. ”
~ Alan Watts
“You have no cause for anything but gratitude and joy.”
~ Buddha
Introduction to “Time Cycling”
Dear Friends,
The following “Time Cycling” sutra poem was composed long ago as a reminder that in space/time duality “reality” serial time is an unavoidable mental illusion. It is today republished (written and recited) on Black Friday, the beginning of an unprecedented 2021 year-end holiday season, when more than ever before many people are consciously suffering and worrying about their Earth-lives.
Many people with remaining money or credit are shopping in stores and online for Black Friday bargains. Others are protesting and demonstrating because of politically instigated divisiveness, turbulence and violence. A much smaller but growing number of spiritually aware humans (like Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Catherine Austin Fitts) are determined to nonviolently disobey unlawfully evil edicts of our “leaders” and “rulers”. which they see as giving us a choice of “slavery or freedom”. (e.g. “We’ll Never Give Up” – Protests Erupt Across World over Government COVID Tyranny)
The “Time Cycling” poem is not intended to disrupt anyone’s enjoyment or perspective of this year’s holiday season.
As explained in comments after the poem, it has been published as a reminder for all of us to always be grateful and happy, as we remember our true spiritual immortality and Reality as ONE timeless LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Time Cycling
Beyond time
In time
Take time
Make time
Fill time
Kill time
Find time
Lose time
Spend time
End time
Out of time
No time
NOW!
Ron’s audio recitation of “Time Cycling”
Ron’s comments on “Time Cycling”
Dear Friends,
Over forty years ago, I began questioning the ‘reality’ of serial time after experiencing many ‘mind-blowing’ pre-cognitive synchronicities during a 1977 week in New York City. (See Synchronicity Story: An Amazing Experiment With Time )
Ultimately after reflecting on these and many more amazing synchronicities, and upon teachings of mystic masters, I became persuaded that Einstein accurately described space/time/duality reality as “merely a persistent illusion” arising from our thoughts rather than “conditions in which we live”.
Nonetheless, I’ve learned that it’s impossible for us to live timeless Earth lives, but that we are often reminded by synchronicities that time is a cosmic illusion, because the synchronicities are emblematic of Reality beyond time.
The above “Time Cycling” poem arose from the insight that common English vernacular ‘programs’ our unthinking mental acceptance of the supposed reality of time.
I hope you’ll enjoy its whimsical words without being ‘brainwashed’ by them as you read and listen to my mp3 oral recitation of “Time Cycling”.
The “Time Cycling” poem is not intended to disrupt anyone’s enjoyment or perspective of this year’s holiday season.
As explained in above introductory comments and quotations, it has been published on an unprecedented “Black Friday” as a reminder for all of us, whatever our unique perspectives about these times, to always be informed, grateful and happy.
May this poetry, and above quotations and explanations about illusory temporal “reality”, inspire ever more timeless happiness and gratitude in our lives as we remember our true spiritual immortality and Reality as ONE timeless LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Perennial Permanence Puzzlement
“This existence of ours is as transient as autumn clouds .
To watch the birth and death of beings
is like looking at the movements of a dance.
A lifetime is like a flash of lightning in the sky,
rushing by like a torrent down a steep mountain.”
~ Buddha (563 – 483 BC)
A corporeal phenomenon, a feeling, a perception, a mental formation,
a consciousness, which is permanent and persistent, eternal and not subject to change, such a thing the wise men in this world do not recognize;
and I also say that there is no such thing.
~ Buddha (563 – 483 B.C)
“In the beginning was Atman; the one without a second.”
“We are like the spider.
We weave our life and then move along in it.
We are like the dreamer who dreams and then lives in the dream.
This is true for the entire universe.”
~ Aitareya Upanishad of Rig Veda
“In this ever-changing space/time world,
nothing is immutable,
but much is inscrutable.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Perennial Permanence Puzzlement
Is there anything permanent
in Heaven’s vast firmament?
Is there a Perfection
beyond all conception –
a Cause of all that’s so?
Is there a force –
an Eternal Source –
that we can ever know?
Is it our task, to seek and to ask,
and so to ever grow?
‘Tis a Perennial Puzzlement!
Ron’s recitation of Perennial Permanence Puzzlement
Ron’s Comments on Perennial Permanence Puzzlement
Dear Friends,
The foregoing written and recited sutra verses were initially inspired by actor Yul Brynner’s legendary performance of the song “A Puzzlement” in the award winning Rodgers and Hammerstein musical “The King and I”. In that song Sri Oscar Hammerstein’s spiritually insightful lyrics emphasize the inevitable uncertainties about our beliefs and behaviors in an ever changing world. For example:
“There are times I almost think
Nobody sure of what he absolutely know”
“And it puzzle me to learn
That tho’ a man may be in doubt of what he know
Very quickly he will fight
He’ll fight to prove that what he does not know is so”
So (like Hammerstein’s lyrics) the above verses emphasize inescapable uncertainties in this ever impermanent duality reality. They all ask rationally unanswerable rhetorical questions, in a world of “Perennial Puzzlement”.
But beyond rational thought, all sutra verses point to immutable Eternal Awareness ever imminent in everything/everyone everywhere.
Thus, with above quotations, they are deeply dedicated to hastening Humanity’s awakening to That Eternal Source.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
From co-dependent exploitation,
to co-creative realization
~ A rare turning point in Human history
“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won.
There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible,
but in the end they always fall — think of it. Always.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
“Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood,
and I — I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.”
~ Robert Frost – The Road Not Taken
Dear Friends,
We have reached a rare turning point in modern human history. Confronted by apparent dire threats to survival of life on Earth as we’ve known it, our species is awakening to a prophesied new enlightened Earth age. After eons of imagined darkness, we are now realizing our infinite potential as timeless wholeness and Oneness with Source – as LOVE beyond comprehension, imagination or description.
Thus a “critical mass” of Humankind will soon be energetically (not spatially) uplifted to a compassionate new world, dynamically harmonious with Nature and all life everywhere – a “new reality” foreseen for millennia by non-materialist mystic seers.
Accordingly this essay is dedicated to inspiring our awakened inclusion in that uplifted “critical mass”.
Historic Background
Throughout recorded history, in order to evolve, human societies have been compelled to abandon previously cherished inflexible beliefs about “reality” (our cosmology, religion, science, philosophy etc.) which limited learning, impeded progress, and facilitated evil and harmful behaviors.
How could we have advanced believing that the earth was flat, or that it was the center of our solar system? And now, because of unprecedented anthropogenic threats to survival of Earth life as we’ve known it, we are again urgently compelled to transcend cherished beliefs about our perceived (three dimensional) illusionary “reality”.
Refusing Ruling Class Exploitation
Human societies have mostly been undemocratically governed by self-proclaimed elite rulers. But for eons our earthly human societies have been secretly dominated and energetically exploited by psychopathic “leaders” representing a few unimaginably malevolent and unknown astral “rulers”.
Thus, until now we’ve lived unaware of our existence in addictive codependent relationships with our “leaders” and “rulers”, which relationships are parasitically exploitive and dysfunctional. And so far this tiny ruling class has cleverly and selfishly used their understanding of our subliminal Oneness with Source (and all other perceived energy forms) to successfully exploit us.
Currently, using controlled mainstream media of mass deception, they have subliminally “brainwashed”, indoctrinated, and inculcated most of humanity into erroneously and fearfully accepting parasitic servitude to them. Such subliminal servitude has precluded us from realizing our infinite power to fearlessly co-create elevated energetic realities, beyond all domination or exploitation, and thereby to fulfill our deepest evolutionary aspirations.
But in recent “new normal” times our ruling “leaders” have enacted immoral laws, orders and edicts which are so flagrantly outrageous that they are painfully awakening many people to our innate human rights and freedoms. Accordingly, those people are resisting and refusing to follow such insanely immoral and unlawful decrees, rather than degenerate into a locked-down Malthusian global 3D society of unprecedented and insidious human control and enslavement by a few malignant psychopaths.
Thus by their civil disobedience and adamant moral refusal to bear such insanity, a critical mass of humankind are about to be energetically uplifted to co-create a wonderful new era in human history.
Though we appear separate, we are all One with Source
“Human beings are made of body, mind and spirit.
Of these, spirit is primary, for it connects us to the source of everything,
the eternal field of consciousness.”
~ Deepak Chopra
All is a play in consciousness. All divisions are illusory.
You can know the false only. The true you must yourself be.”
~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
“You are awareness, disguised as a person.”
~ Eckhart Tolle, Stillness Speaks
Although each human is unique in apparent physical form, (like hexagonal crystalline snowflakes) we all subliminally share the same mysterious spiritual Source, which is inconceivable and indescribable. Because we are so subliminally connected we are all affected by a lack of harmony or morality anywhere in our perceived 3D “reality”. Therefore, we are awakening globally to resist immoral edicts which wickedly violate our innate human rights and freedoms.
Until now our subconscious oneness with all Earth life has permitted subliminal matrix control over our species. But growing human awareness of such Oneness with Source is paradoxically enabling us to irreversibly escape from our current codependent bondage in an imperceptible matrix “prison”.
The following quotations and explanations are about how and why we can soon escape:
Escaping from co-dependent exploitation, to co-creative realization.
“When fear becomes collective, when anger becomes collective,
it’s extremely dangerous. It is overwhelming…
The mass media and the military-industrial complex create a prison for us,
so we continue to think, see, and act in the same way…
We need the courage to express ourselves even when the majority is going in the opposite direction…
because a change of direction can happen only when there is a collective awakening…
Therefore, it is very important to say, ‘I am here!’ to those who share the same kind of insight.”
~ Thich Nhat Hanh, The Art of Power
“The choice that frees or imprisons us is the choice of love or fear.
Love liberates. Fear imprisons.”
~ Gary Zukav
“Deep down, at our cores, there are only two emotions:
love and fear.
All positive emotions come from love,
all negative emotions from fear.
From love flows happiness, contentment, peace, and joy.
From fear comes anger, hate, anxiety and guilt.”
~ Elisabeth Kubler-Ross & David Kessler – When You Don’t Choose Love You Choose Fear
“There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear” . . .
~ 1 John 4:18
Discussion: Until now parasitic lower realm entities have been able to subliminally exploit third dimension humans, only by cleverly fomenting widespread divisive beliefs, fears, anger and other negative emotions. Without such fears and emotions these evil entities can not exploit us. They cannot function in energetically loving dimensions. Fear and Love can’t coexist. And love is “contagious”.
So provoked by outrageously immoral orders and edicts, and aided by unprecedentedly propitious Earth energy cycles, we are now remembering and choosing our true Self identity as Divine LOVE, beyond comprehension, imagination or description.
And as we realize that as eternal LOVE we have nothing to fear, but fear itself, we will inevitably irreversibly escape from captured codependence to fearlessly co-create a wonderful new era in human history.
Methods which are hastening our escape from matrix imprisonment:
1) Living lovingly and gratefully
“Love Is The Law Of Life:
All love is expansion, all selfishness is contraction.
Love is therefore the only law of life.
He who loves lives, he who is selfish is dying.
Therefore, love for love’s sake,
because it is law of life, just as you breathe to live.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
“It is not joy that makes us grateful;
it is gratitude that makes us joyful.”
~ Brother David Steindl-Rast
“Thankfulness is the soul of beneficence …
For thankfulness brings you to the place where the Beloved lives.”
~ Rumi
2) Becoming mindfully conscious of eternal LOVE
“By the definite science of meditation known for millenniums to the yogis and sages of India, and to Jesus,
any seeker of God can enlarge the caliber of his consciousness to omniscience to receive within himself the Universal Intelligence of God.”
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
“Meditation is one of the most direct and powerful ways to awaken to who we really are and to experience happiness as a state of consciousness that already exists within us.”
~ Deepak Chopra
A focused or stilled mind is crucial to spiritual evolution. With stilled minds we access intuition and imagination, and are uplifted beyond darkness of negative emotions.
With stilled minds we telepathically ‘hear’ and follow our Sacred Heart’s message of Love.
With stilled minds we follow our heart – not our ego.
With stilled minds we instinctively reject dark “leaders” who’ve betrayed and ‘imprisoned’ us.
“The heart has its reasons that reason does not know.”
~ Blaise Pascal
“Faith is a knowledge within the heart,
beyond the reach of proof.”
~ Kahlil Gibran
“The way is not in the sky.
The way is in the heart.”
~ Buddha
“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift,
and the rational mind is a faithful servant.
We have created a society that honors the servant
and has forgotten the gift.”
~ Albert Einstein
3) Practicing nonviolent Gandhian civil disobedience.
“Satyagraha means resisting untruth by truthful means”
“It is a religious duty to fight untruth.
If one remains steadfast in it in a spirit of dedication,
it always brings success.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
Those of us who already realize how humans are being psychopathically dominated and immorally imprisoned in an invisible ‘matrix’, must now morally and truthfully act to preserve inherent human rights and protect our planet and progeny. With righteous courage, we must speak out and nonviolently disobey unlawful and immoral edicts.
4) Being the change we wish to see.
“[T]he world will not change if we don’t change.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
“If we are to make progress,
we must not repeat history but make new history.
We must add to inheritance left by our ancestors.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
“We are what we think.
All that we are arises with our thoughts.
With our thoughts, we make the world.”
~ Buddha
“The world is a projection of our collective consciousness.
If our collective consciousness reaches that place of peace, harmony, laughter and love,
it will be a different world.”
~ Deepak Chopra
Energetically we live in a labyrinth of thoughts, intentions, feelings and behaviors which create our “reality”. “Whatever we think, do, or say, is changing this world in some way.”
Accordingly, as we prioritize our intention to mindfully radiate loving and forgiving thoughts, behaviors, and emotions we are inevitably and irreversibly elevating and enlightening our earthly “reality” beyond malevolent darkness.
5) Turning off mainstream media.
“Propaganda is the executive arm of the invisible government.”
~ Edward Bernays
“Propaganda works best when those who are being manipulated
are confident they are acting on their own free will.”
~ Joseph Goebbels
“The propagandist’s purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human.”
~ Aldous Huxley
“All propaganda is lies, even when one is telling the truth.”
“The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.”
~ George Orwell
All mainstream information media have become propagandist instruments dishonestly dominated and controlled by our “leaders”. Whenever possible we must turn them off, even if they seem to publish information with which we agree. We must not be diverted or confused by information or speculation, which is published with insidious motives.
If we seek information (not speculation) about purported current events or history, we need to investigate non-mainstream sources, especially those which are ridiculed, slandered or censored by mainstream media – like Robert F. Kennedy’s Children’s Health Foundation. However, in reviewing such alternative information outlets we must carefully consider their facts and sources, and not assume their accuracy or credibility.
6) Mindfully recognizing that this world is a mere mental illusion
“A wise man, recognizing that the world is but an illusion,
does not act as if it is real, so he escapes the suffering.”
~ Buddha
“…this separation between man and man, between nation and nation,
between earth and moon, between moon and sun.
Out of this idea of separation between atom and atom comes all misery.
But the Vedanta says that this separation does not exist, it is not real.”
“Your own will is all that answers prayer,
only it appears under the guise of different religious conceptions to each mind.
We may call it Buddha, Jesus, Krishna, but it is only the Self, the ‘I’.”
~ Swami Vivekananda – Jnana Yoga
“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”
“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”
~ Albert Einstein
“What appears to be a stable, tangible, visible, audible world, is an illusion.”
“Objective reality does not exist” …. “the universe is fundamentally a gigantic … hologram.”
~ David Bohm, Quantum Physicist
“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won.
There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible,
but in the end they always fall — think of it. Always.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
We now exist in a perceived relative “reality” where everything is energy (e=Mc2), and suffering is omnipresent. But enlightened mystics and scientists remind us that our “reality” and its seeming separation of perceived thought forms is merely “an optical illusion of consciousness” and that we avert suffering by “recognizing that the world is but an illusion.”
As we consciously identify our comparative “reality” as merely an illusion, we will transcend suffering from negative intentions, actions, thoughts and emotions. And thereby we’ll live with ever growing kindness, and with compassion for others who are still suffering.
Inevitably our kindness will quicken and elevate our subtle energy emanations, until we irreversibly experience our lives from higher dimensions where there is no suffering, just oneness with Source – as LOVE.
Like Gandhi and other great souls we’ll then perceive this world like a metaphoric good versus evil “movie” in which Divine Truth and Love always prevail.
7) Laughter and humor are always uplifting
“When you realize how perfect everything is
you will tilt your head back and laugh at the sky.”
~ Buddha
“Sing because this is a food our starving world needs.
Laugh because that is the purest sound.”
~ Hafiz
“What is soap to the body, laughter is to the soul.”
~ Yiddish Proverb
“Time spent laughing is time spent with the Gods.”
~ Japanese proverb
“I laugh when I think how I once sought paradise as a realm outside of the world of birth.
It is right in the world of birth and death that the miraculous truth is revealed.
But this is not the laughter of someone who suddenly acquires a great fortune;
neither is it the laughter of one who has won a victory.
It is, rather, the laughter of one who; after having painfully searched for something for a long time,
finds it one morning in the pocket of his coat.”
~Thich Nhat Hanh
“If a person can laugh totally, wholeheartedly, not holding anything back at all,
in that very moment something tremendous can happen
because laughter, when it is total, is absolutely egoless,
and that is the only condition in which to know God, to be egoless.”
~ Osho
“If honesty were suddenly introduced into American life, the whole system would collapse.”
“That’s why they call it the American Dream, because you have to be asleep to believe it.”
~ George Carlin
Invocation
At this unprecedented turning point in modern human history,
may we mindfully recognize and intentionally radiate
truth of our common Self-identity as LOVE.
May we thereby be part of an irreversibly uplifted “critical mass” of Humankind,
which will co-create a prophesied compassionate new world,
dynamically harmonious with Nature and all life everywhere.
And so shall it be!
Namasté!
Ron Rattner
Life Is NOW, Never Then!
“That which is timeless is found NOW.”
~ Buddha
“Life can be found only in the present moment.
The past is gone, the future is not yet here,
and if we do not go back to ourselves in the present moment,
we cannot be in touch with life.”
~ Thich Nhat Hanh
“People .. who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.”
~ Albert Einstein
Tao and Zen
are NOW,
not then.
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Introduction to Life Is NOW, Never Then!
Dear Friends,
After my mid-life spiritual awakening, which began a new life phase of previously unimagined interest in spiritual evolution, I began to regularly and reflectively walk alone by San Francisco Bay, as an informal spiritual practice.
While walking by the Bay, I synchronistically began “channeling” spiritual sayings, rhymes and poems. Often, too, I’d spontaneously sing original melodies to accompany my poems and rhymes. As I walked, I regularly wrote the words that came to me. But, mostly I forgot the melodies, which I couldn’t write.
One of the few songs with melody that I remembered, I called Life Is NOW, Never Then!
It was telepathically transmitted and received as I joyfully experienced being in the precious present moment – the NOW.
After composing the Life is NOW song I rarely sang it, and it wasn’t otherwise performed or known to others, except for a few of my friends. Later, upon launching the SillySutras website, I recorded and posted an mp3 version of the song.
Also, Rob Tobias, a talented Oregon musician/songwriter/singer and videographer, and longtime partner of my niece Janice Medvin, started filming me for a biographical documentary record of eccentric Uncle Ron’s spiritual journey from litigation to meditation and beyond, which he titled: “Walks With Ron (A Spiritual Memoir)” . During the filming process, Rob heard and liked the Life is NOW song, and ultimately this year he professionally performed and recorded his version of the song.
Embedded below are both my original recording and Rob’s current professional recording of the Life is NOW song. Please enjoy the written and recorded versions of the song, and reflect deeply on their fundamental spiritual message.
May they inspire our spiritual evolution and growing happiness in life, by encouraging our being Here NOW in each precious present moment.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Life Is NOW, Never Then!
Life is NOW
Ever NOW
Never then.
Life is NOW
Ever NOW
Never then.
Life is NOW or never,
Life is NOW forever,
Life is NOW
Ever NOW
Never then.
Past is history,
Future’s mystery;
But, life is never then.
Life is NOW or never,
Life is NOW forever,
Life is NOW
Ever NOW
Never then.
Time is how
We measure now.
But, life is never when.
Life is NOW or never,
Life is NOW forever,
Life is NOW
Ever NOW
Never then.
Life is NOW
Ever NOW
Never then.
Life is NOW
Ever NOW
Never then.
Life is NOW or never,
Life is NOW forever,
Life is NOW
Ever NOW
Never then.
Ron’s singing of “Life Is NOW, Never Then!”
Rob Tobias’s professional performance of “Life Is NOW”
Dedication
May the Life is NOW song lyrics and recordings inspire our spiritual evolution and growing happiness, by encouraging our being Here NOW in each precious present moment.
And so may it be!
Namasté!
Ron Rattner
Everything’s Holy
“The more we grow in love and virtue and holiness,
the more we see love and virtue and holiness outside.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
Ron’s Introduction to “Everything’s Holy”
Dear Friends,
Today’s “Everything’s Holy” posting includes a visionary sutra-poem, a quotation collection about “Holiness”, and an explanatory commentary about THAT transcendent “miraculous” and mysterious Divine Reality beyond illusionary space/time duality reality. Also embedded is an inspiring video performance by Louis Armstrong (with lyric captions) of his legendary song “What A Wonderful World”.
This posting was inspired many years ago after I was emotionally moved and uplifted by Peter Mayer video performances of his song “Holy Now”. (See https://sillysutras.com/holy-now-by-peter-mayer/ ) Since imagining and composing the “Everything’s Holy” sutra-poem, I’ve gradually transformed to a “holy” state of being, with virtually constant gratitude and awareness that all Life is Divine and Holy.
Thus, I’ve learned from life that we can evolve, from just hearing about “holiness”, or observing “holy days” or ‘holy seasons’ with ‘holy songs and scriptures’, or visiting rare ‘holy places’, holy people, or holy artifacts, to always experiencing the Divine Holiness of everyone, everything, everywhere.
And I’m sharing these ‘holiness’ writings and Wonderful World song with the heartfelt aspiration that they may advance our inner evolution from seeing everything everywhere as separate and impermanent manifestations of mortal matter, to realization that all phenomena are reflections of Eternal Holy Spirit – that all Life is an endless gift of God’s Grace and LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Everything’s Holy
Everything’s a miracle:
E=mc2 – all manifestation is miraculous.
Everything’s Whole:
Mind and manifestation are ONE!
Everything’s Holy:
All matter manifests from Mystery,
and melts to merge with Mystery –
The mystery of Divinity.
So essence of everything is Divine Mystery, and
Everything’s Holy.
Ron’s audio recitation of “Everything’s Holy”
Quotation Collection about “Everything’s Holy” and “Holiness”
“For everything that lives is Holy,
life delights in life.”
~ William Blake – The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
“The more we grow in love and virtue and holiness,
the more we see love and virtue and holiness outside.”
“This perfection must come through the practice of holiness and love.”
“Every step that has been really gained in the world has been gained by love; criticising can never do any good, it has been tried for thousand of years. Condemnation accomplishes nothing.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
“There comes a holy and transparent time
when every touch of beauty opens the heart to tears.
This is the time the Beloved of heaven is brought tenderly on earth.
This is the time of the opening of the Rose.”
~ Rumi
“If you put your soul against this oar with me,
the power that made the universe will enter your sinew
from a source not outside your limbs, but from a holy realm
that lives in us.
~ Rumi – “That Lives in Us”
“A holy spirit lives within you.”
~ Leo Tolstoy
“The wisdom of the Holy Spirit is much greater than the wisdom of the entire world. Within the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, silence prevails; the wisdom of the world, however, goes astray into idle talk.”
~ Isaac of Nineveh
“Everything is interwoven, and the web is holy.”
~ Marcus Aurelius
“Even the merest gesture is holy if it is filled with faith.”
~ Franz Kafka
“Holiness consists simply in doing God’s will,
and being just what God wants us to be.”
~ Saint Therese of Lisieux
“Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy.”
~ Abraham Joshua Heschel
“However many holy words you read,
However many you speak,
What good will they do you
If you do not act on upon them?”
~ Buddha
“Many good sayings are to be found in holy books,
but merely reading them will not make one religious.”
~ Sri Ramakrishna
“The mind, unless it is pure and holy, cannot see God.”
~ Seneca the Younger
“What the world needs today is neither a new order, a new education, a new system, a new society nor a new religion. The remedy lies in a mind and a heart filled with holiness.”
~ Shirdi Sai Baba
“One need not scale the heights of the heavens, nor travel along the highways of the world to find Ahura Mazda. With purity of mind and holiness of heart one can find Him in one’s own heart.”
~ Zoroaster
“The most holy and important practice in the spiritual life is the presence of God –
that is, every moment to take great pleasure that God is with you”
~ Brother Lawrence
“One should hallow all that one does in one’s natural life. One eats in holiness, tastes the taste of food in holiness, and the table becomes an altar. One works in holiness, and raises up the sparks which hide themselves in all tools. One walks in holiness across the fields, and the soft songs of all herbs, which they voice to God, enter into the song of our soul.”
~ Martin Buber
“To the poet, to the philosopher, to the saint, all things are friendly and sacred, all events profitable, all days holy, all men divine.”
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Everything is holy! everybody’s holy! everywhere is holy! everyday is in eternity! Everyman’s an angel!”
~ Allen Ginsberg
“If God gives you an abundant harvest of trials, it is a sign of great holiness which He desires you to attain. Do you want to become a great saint? Ask God to send you many sufferings.
~ St. Ignatius of Loyola
“Many people are so imprisoned in their minds that the beauty of nature does not really exist for them. They might say, ‘What a pretty flower,’ but that’s just a mechanical mental labeling. Because they are not still, not present, they don’t truly see the flower, don’t feel it’s essence, it’s holiness-just as they don’t know themselves, don’t feel their own essence, their own holiness.”
~ Eckhart Tolle
“Throw away holiness and wisdom, and people will be a hundred times happier. Throw away morality and justice, and people will do the right thing. Throw away industry and profit, and there won’t be any thieves. If these three aren’t enough, just stay at the center of the circle and let all things take their course.”
~ Lao Tzu
“I disbelieve all holy men and holy books.”
~ Thomas Paine
“I studiously avoided all so-called “holy men.” I did so because I had to make do with my own truth, not accept from others what I could not attain on my own. I would have felt it as a theft had I attempted to learn from the holy men and to accept their truth for myself. Neither in Europe can I make any borrowings from the East, but must shape my life out of myself-out of what my inner being tells me, or what nature brings to me.”
~ Carl Jung
“There are only two ways to live your life.
One is as though nothing is a miracle.
The other is as though everything is a miracle.”
~ Albert Einstein
“And as to me, I know nothing else but miracles.”
~ Walt Whitman
“Do you realize the unimaginable greatness, the holiness of what you so casually call ‘consciousness’? It is the unmanifest Absolute aware of its awareness through the manifestation, of which your mind-body is presently a part.”
~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
“Do you realize the unimaginable greatness, the holiness of what you so casually call ‘consciousness’? . . . . How can you ever forget the basic truth that consciousness is the very expression of what-we-are. It is through the stirring of consciousness that the unmanifest Absolute becomes aware of its awareness through manifestation, and the whole universe comes into existence.”
~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
”When all the false self-identifications are thrown away, what remains is all-embracing love.”
~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
“Only if one knows the truth of Love, which is the real nature of Self, will the strong entangled [ego] knot of life be untied. Only if one attains the height of Love will liberation be attained. Such is the heart of all religions. The experience of Self is only Love, which is seeing only Love, hearing only Love, feeling only Love, tasting only Love and smelling only Love, which is bliss.”
~ Sri Ramana Maharshi
“Mind and Manifestation are One”
~ Mary Saint-Marie
Ron’s Reflections on “Everything’s Holy” and “Holiness”
Dear Friends,
The Louis Armstrong video below and the foregoing ‘Holiness’ quotations and sutra-poem are shared with the heartfelt aspiration that they may further our inner evolution from seeing everything everywhere as separate and impermanent manifestations of mortal matter, to realization that all phenomena are reflections of Eternal Holy Spirit – that all Life is an endless gift of God’s Grace and LOVE.
So that – with opened Hearts in “a holy and transparent time” – we may realize all space/time phenomena as appearances of Divine Holiness.
Yet, as we are blessed to perceive this Wonderful World as holy, let us always remember that our space/time perceptions are like an ego-mind projected movie – an unreal and illusory play of Universal Consciousness in which nothing’s really Real but Divine LOVE.
“Only if one knows the truth of Love, which is the real nature of Self, will the strong entangled [ego] knot of life be untied. Only if one attains the height of Love will liberation be attained. Such is the heart of all religions. The experience of Self is only Love, which is seeing only Love, hearing only Love, feeling only Love, tasting only Love and smelling only Love, which is bliss.”
~ Sri Ramana Maharshi
”When all the false self-identifications are thrown away,
what remains is all-embracing love.”
~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
And so shall it be!
Namasté!
Ron Rattner
“What A Wonderful World” sung by Louis Armstrong with captioned lyrics
Why The Choir Was Late
~ an Amazing Synchronicity Story
“Synchronicity is an ever present reality
for those who have eyes to see.”
~ Carl Jung
“Every good and perfect gift is from above,
coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights,
who does not change like shifting shadows.”
~ James 1:17
“Synchronicity is choreographed by a great, pervasive intelligence that lies at the heart of nature, and is manifest in each of us through what we call the soul.”
~ Deepak Chopra, Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire
All things appear and disappear because of the concurrence of causes and conditions. Nothing ever exists entirely alone; everything is in relation to everything else.
~ Buddha
“As I look back upon my own life, I see how many events – which at the time appeared horribly painful or unnecessary – contained remarkable lessons which I sometimes did not understand until many years later. Now life appears to me – more and more – as a gorgeous Persian rug. Seen from underneath (that is, from the ordinary human viewpoint), it may be a mess of loose strands, knots, pieces of wool hanging in a disorderly manner; but seen from above – from another level of perspective – what perfect order, harmony and beauty!”
~ Pierre Pradervand
Why The Choir Was Late: Introduction
When the West Side Baptist Church in Beatrice, Nebraska, was demolished by an explosion on Wednesday, March 1, 1950, fifteen people were supposed to be there. But miraculously the church was empty and no one was injured.
Choir practice at the church always began punctually at 7:20 p.m. on Wednesday evenings. Choir members were usually prompt and ready to sing by 7:25 p.m. But at 7:25 p.m., when the explosion occurred, nobody was there.
The blast collapsed the church, caused power outages which forced a nearby radio station off the air, shattered windows in surrounding homes and could be heard around the town.
Miraculously not one of the people who should have been present had yet arrived when the building collapsed. Every one of the choir’s fifteen members escaped injury, saved by an astonishing fortuitious “coincidence”. For different apparent reasons, all were late for practice that night.
Though amazing, this story actually did happen. See e.g. Snopes. Also see Beatrice Daily Sun article commemorating the sixtieth anniversary of the explosion entitled: “Church explosion 60 years ago not forgotten – Remember the miracle”
Embedded below is an excellent and accurate video portrayal of the story. Watch it after reading the story.
The following article telling the story originally appeared in the March 27, 1950 issue of Life Magazine, was reprinted in the June 1950 issue of Reader’s Digest, and in the 1951 30th Anniversary Reader’s Digest Reader. And it was republished in 1991 by Time-Life Books in World of Luck: Library of Curious and Unusual Facts.
Why The Choir Was Late by George H. Edeal
It happened on the evening of March 1 in the town of Beatrice, Nebraska. In the afternoon the Reverend Walter Klempel had gone to the West Side Baptist Church to get things ready for choir practice. He lit the furnace – most of the singers were in the habit of arriving around 7:15, and it was chilly in the church – and went home to dinner. But at 7:10, when it was time for him to go back to the church with his wife and daughter, Marilyn Ruth, it turned out that Marilyn Ruth’s dress was soiled, so Mrs. Klempel ironed another. Thus they were still at home when it happened.
Ladona Vandegrift, a high school sophomore, was having trouble with a geometry problem. She knew practice began promptly and always came early. But she stayed to finish the problem.
Royena Estes was ready, but the car would not start. So she and her sister, Sadie, called Ladona Vandegrift, and asked her to pick them up. But Ladona was the girl with the geometry problem, and the Estes sisters had to wait.
Mrs. Leonard Schuster would ordinarily have arrived at 7:20 with her small daughter, Susan. But on this particular evening she had to go to her mother’s house to help her get ready for a missionary meeting.
Herbert Kipf, lathe operator, would have been ahead of time but had put off an important letter. “I can’t think why,” he said. He lingered over it and was late.
It was a cold evening. Stenographer Joyce Black, feeling “just plain lazy,” stayed in her warm house until the last possible moment. She was almost ready to leave.
Because his wife was away, machinist Harvey Ahl was taking care of his two boys. He was going to take them to practice with him, but somehow he got wound up talking. When he looked at his watch, he saw he was already late.
Marilyn Paul, the pianist, had planned to arrive half an hour early. However, she fell asleep after dinner, and when her mother awakened her at 7:15 she had time only to tidy up and start out.
Mrs. F.E. Paul, choir director, and mother of the pianist, was late simply because her daughter was. She had tried unsuccessfully to awaken the girl earlier.
High school girls Lucille Jones and Dorothy Wood are neighbors and customarily go to practice together. Lucille was listening to a 7-to-7:30 radio program and broke her habit of promptness because she wanted to hear the end. Dorothy waited for her.
At 7:25, with a roar heard in almost every corner of Beatrice, the West Side Baptist Church blew up. The walls fell outward, the heavy wooden roof crashed straight down like the weight in a deadfall. But, because of such matters as a soiled dress, a cat nap, an unfinished letter, a geometry problem and a stalled car, all of the members of the choir were late – something which had never happened before.
Firemen thought the explosion had been caused by natural gas, which may have leaked into the church from a broken pipe outside and been ignited by the fire in the furnace. The Beatrice choir members had no particular theory about the fire’s cause, but each of them began to reflect on the heretofore inconsequential details of his life, wondering at exactly what point it is that one can say,
“This is an act of God.”
Unsolved Mysteries – Lucky Choir
Conclusion
After reading the story and watching the video, consider how such an amazing synchronistic event might have happened.
Though various choir members gave various explanations for being late for choir practice that night, was there an underlying common Cause for all of them fortuitously missing death or injury in the church explosion?
Were all of the choir members subliminally guided from a deep level of higher consciousness – a level at which everyone and everything is connected?
Were they unconsciously entrained with and guided by what Einstein calls “Universal Intelligence”?
Was it predestined that all of them would live unharmed; that none would die?
We can only speculate on answers to these questions, or on other possible explanations. But whatever our views, such marvels and blessings can infuse us with awe and gratitude for our miraculous life in this wondrous world and with abiding faith in the eternal mystery of Divine Love –
its Source.
And so may it be!
Ron’s Reflections on “Why The Choir Was Late”
Dear Friends,
From a long life of learning, I have gratefully discovered a mysterious Divine Power which is Source of everything that appears or happens in our universe. And with abiding Faith in THAT Power, I’ve realized that life always gives us whatever experiences we need for spiritual evolution, often through ‘miraculous’ synchronicities. [ see e.g. I’ve Found A Faith-Based Life ] So synchronicities can be important spiritual experiences.
Of all SillySutras “Synchronicity” stories probably the most miraculous and Faith inspiring is Why The Choir Was Late. More than any other posting, I believe it can help encourage us to surrender ego illusions of separation from immortal SELF; and, to abandon and transcend our physical fears and worries of death, disease or suffering, which are now everywhere exacerbated in this unprecedented “new normal” era.
Can you intuit the deep significance of this story? Was it “luck” that saved fifteen lives, or was it destiny, or Divine Love?
Perhaps you’ll share my perspective that the choir story instills total Faith in our immortal SELF? As a lawyer I’ve granted general power of attorney to THAT Power to guide my life.
In all events, may our inner reflections on this miraculous story help bring all of us ever increasing happiness and peace of mind.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
