Posts Tagged ‘Hafiz’
Vernal Equinox Blessings
“To every thing there is a season,
and a time to every purpose under the heaven.”
~ Ecclesiastes 3:1
“The winds of grace are always blowing,
but you have to raise the sail.”
~ Sri Ramakrishna
Ron’s introduction to Vernal Equinox Blessings
Dear Friends,
I first learned of Chapter 3:1-8 of the Book of Ecclesiastes on hearing a popular 1960’s folk song written by Pete Seeger called “Turn! Turn! Turn!” quoting the biblical passages verbatim beginning with: “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.” I then sensed the importance of those passages (attributed to King Solomon), but never deeply reflected upon them until after my 1976 midlife spiritual awakening.
Until then, I was largely insensitive to the symbolic importance of time cycles, and I had little inner inclination to celebrate or commemorate new years or new seasons. Only afterwards did I begin learning about importance of astronomical and astrological sciences with increasing appreciation of ancient pre-Christian cultures which recorded time through solar, lunar or lunisolar calendars, such as Persian, Mayan, Islamic, Vedic, Hebrew, Chinese, and Tibetan.
Paradoxically, since my midlife change of life I have become increasingly aware of the importance of earth-life seasons and cycles in time, while realizing that cosmically Albert Einstein was right when he told us: “the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion”; and, that “space and time are not conditions in which we live, [but] modes in which we think.”
Thus I have realized and written that “time is how we measure NOW”.
Yet, this posting (on the March 19th, 2024, vernal equinox) is sincerely dedicated to inspiring our understanding of how auspicious earth-life cycles and seasons can help us bless and transform this world, until together we remember and realize that as timeless Divine souls we are the Eternal light of Universal Awareness as LOVE.
Vernal Equinox Blessings and Opportunities
The vernal equinox is a traditionally important astronomical event which can mark an especially auspicious new life phase for everyone everywhere, and for all earth-life. Especially in Northern climes spring is considered a season for spiritual renewal and rebirth; a time for recognition of our cyclic transition from darkness to light – of both inner and outer illumination. And this can be an especially auspicious time for political progress everywhere on our precious planet.
Thus, as awakening spiritual siblings we can collectively resolve critical interpersonal and international planetary problems, which threaten all earth-life, and which can be solved only through our awakened awareness of how and why we humans alone have caused these crises.
Whatever our cultural conditioning, or our spiritual, religious or ethical traditions, we can NOW join together in identifying and symbolically discarding old defilements, so as to continue earth-life with a fresh clean slate – a process exemplified by the ancient vernal equinox New Year tradition of Zoroastrianism, which is observed by millions people worldwide as Nowruz.
Many religious historians believe that Zoroastrianism is the oldest of the revealed world-religions, and that it may have influenced humankind, directly and indirectly, more than any other single faith; that it has influenced the major Asian religions, and that many beliefs of the Jewish, Christian and Muslim monotheistic religions were derived from Zoroastrianism.
Zoroastrianism teaches that Life’s purpose is to renew the world; to help the world progress towards perfection. And, that Happiness in Life comes to those who live for the happiness of others.
Key Zoroastrian tenets are:
“Good thoughts, good words, good deeds.”;
“Do the right thing because it is the right thing to do,
and then all beneficial rewards will come to you”; and
“There is only one path and that is the path of Truth.”
Like many Westerners I first learned of the wisdom of the Persian mystical tradition through the poems of the great Persian Sufi mystics Rumi and Hafiz, some of which are posted on the SillySutras website. Rumi’s poetry is so superlatively beautiful and mystically insightful – even when translated from Farsi – that he has been recently called the “most popular poet in America”, over seven centuries since his death.
And just as many Western people keep copies of the bible in their homes, many Persian and Iranian people keep copies of Hafiz’ writings which they consider the pinnacle of Persian literature. The poems and sayings from Rumi and Hafiz quoted on SillySutras are the amongst the most beautiful and deeply insightful postings on the entire website, and I commend them to your attention. See here and here.
If like countless others you are inspired to help the world through infinite opportunities for transformative blessings for everyone everywhere enhanced by this auspicious equinox earth-life cycle, it is important to remember that such blessings are not automatic but depend on our loving thoughts, words and deeds. The principle was succinctly stated by 19th Century Indian holy man Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, who reminds us that:
“The winds of grace are always blowing, but you have to raise the sail.”
Conclusion
We are living in extraordinarily turbulent times with immense dangers and opportunities. But we are encouraged by Rumi’s consoling wisdom:
“Do not be sad.
For God sends hope in the darkest moments.
The heaviest rain comes from the darkest clouds.”
~ Rumi
May we collectively view what is happening environmentally and politically as disintegration of an old world paradigm that has become painfully and harmfully obsolete, to make way for a more enlightened and elevated new age that can and will bless all life on our precious planet.
And let us each from our unique perspectives, and with our unique propensities, lovingly ‘raise our sails to the winds of grace’ which will hasten a new golden age of peace on earth and goodwill for all.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
“Turn! Turn! Turn!” – Video.
From Darkness To Light
“And God said,
“Let there be light,”
“And God divided the light from the darkness.”
~ Genesis 1:3-4
“I wish I could show you
when you are lonely or in the darkness,
the astonishing light of your own being.”
~ Hafiz
Into my heart’s night
Along a narrow way I groped;
and lo! the light,
An infinite land of day.
~ Rumi
“The night is as bright as the day.”
“Darkness and light are both alike.”
~ Psalms 139:10-11
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness;
only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate;
only love can do that.”
~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
“Do not be sad.
For God sends hope in the darkest moments.
The heaviest rain comes from the darkest clouds.”
~ Rumi
“See, I will create new heavens
and a new earth.”
~ Isaiah 65:17
The people who walk in darkness
Will see a great light;
Those who live in a dark land,
The light will shine on them.
~ Isaiah 9:2
For nothing is hidden,
except to be revealed;
nor has anything been secret,
but that it would come to light.
~ Mark 4:22
The trumpet shall sound,
and the dead shall be raised incorruptible,
and we shall be changed.
~ 1 Corinthians 15:52
“Light is the real essence of everything.
This earth is not “earth” as you see it;
it is light.”
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
From Darkness To Light
Dear Friends,
We are immensely privileged to have incarnated on Earth at a rare time in modern human history, as a “critical mass” of Humankind pass from violent, fearful and dark times to an age of lasting peace, light, and Love.
During ages of ignorance and darkness we’ve unknowingly and unwittingly been imprisoned and exploited by ego-bonds of belief in a simulated mental matrix from which we are at long last escaping and ascending incorruptible and awakened to the Divine eternal light of Universal Awareness.
Following the December 21, 2023 Winter Solstice, we are about to emerge from eons of outer darkness to a new age of awakened inner eternal Light; from an era of collective fearful psychoses threatening God given human rights and freedoms, to an evolutionarily “enlightened” age free from suffering and deprivation.
On our precious planet Earth, time is inescapable. We cannot live timeless lives, in dense 3D relative “reality”. So until we transcend illusory ego mind beliefs of separation from Divine Source, every Earthly ending is a new beginning. And the ending of eons of human bondage is an extraordinarily historic turning point, with infinite opportunities for our transcendent Self realization as Divine LOVE.
Thus, in this new Earth age many souls will be blessed to ascend to previously unknown awakened levels of awareness, by fearlessly emanating and radiating harmonious heart levels of loving serenity and calmness. However such ascension will require Humankind to consciously receive Divine Grace.
“Love cannot be learned or taught.
Love comes as Grace.”
~ Rumi
“The winds of grace are always blowing,
but you have to raise the sail.”
~ Sri Ramakrishna
For humanity’s “critical mass” ascension to elevated states of awareness, we must individually and collectively radiate heartfelt loving energies, without ego-mind thoughts and emotions of fear, anxiety, aggression or hatred, that invariably perpetuate our perceived illusory separation from each other and Nature.
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness;
only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate;
only love can do that.”
~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
So let us experience current insane space/time events like a projected movie or “Light Show”. And may we thus elevate our energetic emanations by realizing that these dreamlike dark and dystopian times cannot threaten or harm our true immortal SELF identity and Reality as Eternal LIGHT, LIFE and LOVE.
Conclusion
This is a pivotal turning point in human history, when much of humankind will energetically ascend from darkness to light and loving levels of consciousness and spiritual freedom.
We are immensely blessed to participate in thus raising humanity’s collective consciousness, as we awaken to BE inner Source ultimate Reality.
Invocation
Whatever happens in this ever impermanent illusory world of inevitable karmic suffering,
May we never forget our eternal immortality and spiritual Oneness with Nature and all Earth-life.
And may we ever emanate and widely radiate universal peace and happiness,
While realizing that this world is like a projected movie or “light show” –
Just a dreamlike ever changing illusory play of Universal Awareness.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Everyday Thoughts For Thanksgiving
“To be a presence of perpetual thanksgiving may be the ultimate goal of life.
The thankful person is the one for whom life is simply one long exercise in the sacred.”
~ Sr. Joan Chittister, OSB from The Psalms: Meditations for Every Day of the Year
“Thankfulness is the soul of beneficence …
For thankfulness brings you to the place where the Beloved lives.”
~ Rumi
“Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues,
but the parent of all others.”
~ Cicero
Ron’s Introduction to “Everyday Thoughts For Thanksgiving”
Dear Friends,
For everyone’s Thanksgiving happiness every day, I’m again publishing the following perennial wisdom quotations about thankfulness.
Thanksgiving became my favorite holiday long ago, when I realized that thankfulness is a universal blessing uplifting everyone everywhere, regardless of their cultural, spiritual, secular or religious attitudes or beliefs.
Now at age ninety one, I’m unspeakably grateful for still being alive, aware, ambulatory and interdependently-independent – especially since miraculously surviving a deadly taxi rundown nine years ago. Thus, I’ve learned that continual thankfulness is a state of Divine Grace – that every day’s a bonus, and every breath a blessing, not just during Thanksgiving holidays, but always!
May every day be a day of Thanksgiving, for everyone everywhere.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Everyday Thoughts For Thanksgiving
“Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.”
~ Rumi
“Join me in the pure atmosphere of gratitude for life.
Join my eyes and soul in their divine applause.”
~ Hafiz
“You have no cause for anything but gratitude and joy.”
~ Buddha
“It is not joy that makes us grateful;
it is gratitude that makes us joyful.”
~ Brother David Steindl-Rast
“If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you,
it will be enough.”
~ Meister Eckhart
“I awoke this morning with devout thanksgiving for my friends,
the old and the new.”
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
“At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.”
~ Albert Schweitzer
“Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn’t learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn’t learn a little, at least we didn’t get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn’t die; so, let us all be thankful.”
~ Buddha
“I thank God for my handicaps for, through them, I have found myself, my work, and my God.”
~ Helen Keller
“O Lord, who lends me life, lend me a heart replete with thankfulness.”
~ William Shakespeare
“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
”A grateful mind is a great mind,
which eventually attracts to itself great things.”
~ Plato
“The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude.”
~ Friedrich Nietzsche
“Gratitude is the sign of noble souls.”
~ Aesop
”Gratitude bestows reverence,
allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies,
those transcendent moments of awe
that change forever how we experience life and the world.”
~ John Milton
“I am grateful for what I am and have.
My thanksgiving is perpetual.
It is surprising how contented one can be
with – only a sense of existence.”
~ Henry David Thoreau
“Gratitude is heaven itself.”
~ William Blake
“No longer forward nor behind
I look in hope or fear;
But, grateful, take the good I find,
The best of now and here.”
~ John Greenleaf Whittier
“Make a joyful noise unto the LORD, all ye lands. Serve the LORD with gladness: come before his presence with singing. Know ye that the LORD he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name. For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations.”
~ Psalm 100
“When you allow your heart to open to the universe’s flow of love, gratitude comes with that flow. Gratitude for the people that you love, and for those who share your life. Gratitude for the Creation of the beautiful Earth as our home in this great cosmos. Gratitude for the Sun that gives us life. Gratitude for being alive, for just existing, for being in the flow of the wonder of life.”
~ Owen Waters
“Gratitude flows unimpeded from an open heart. When you allow it, gratitude will flow as freely as the sunshine, unobstructed by judgments or conditions.”
~ Owen Waters
“Every day should be a day of Thanksgiving for all the gifts of Life — sunshine, water, the luscious fruits and greens,
which we receive as indirect gifts from the Great Giver.”
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
“To be grateful is to recognize the Love of God in everything He has given us – and He has given us everything.
Every breath we draw is a gift of His love, every moment of existence is a grace, for it brings with it immense graces from Him. Gratitude therefore takes nothing for granted, is never unresponsive, is constantly awakening to new wonder and to praise of the goodness of God.
For the grateful person knows that God is good, not by hearsay but by experience. And that is what makes all the difference.”
~ Thomas Merton
“The worst moment for the atheist is when he is really thankful
and has nobody to thank.”
~ Dante Gabriel Rossetti
I thank you God for most this amazing day
for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky,
and for everything which is natural
which is infinite
which is yes….
I who have died am alive again today
and this is the sun’s birthday;
this is the birth day of life and of love and wings…
~ e. e. cummings
“When we develop a right attitude of compassion and gratitude,
we take a giant step towards solving our personal and international problems.”
~ H.H. Dalai Lama
It’s not our longitude
Or our latitude,
But the elevation of our attitude,
That brings beatitude.
***
So an attitude of gratitude
Brings beatitude.
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Remember with gratitude,
Life is beatitude –
Even its sorrows and pain;
For we’re all in God’s Grace,
Every time, every place, and
Forever (S)HE will reign!
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Dedication
The foregoing quotations and thoughts For Thanksgiving are dedicated to encouraging, inspiring and guiding us to enjoy ever growing gratitude, on Thanksgiving holidays and every day.
May every day be a Thanksgiving day for everyone everywhere.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Happy Thanksgiving Day – Every Day!
Enjoy! – Beautiful Gratitude Video
Narrated by Brother David Steindl-Rast, a now 97-year-old Benedictine monk
New Paradigm-ism
“I consider myself a Hindu, Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, and Confucian.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
“I have learned so much from God
That I can no longer call myself
a Christian, a Hindu, a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Jew”
~ Hafiz
“Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu, Buddhist, Sufi or Zen.
Not any religion, or cultural system. I am not from the East or the West,nor out of the ocean or up from the ground,
not natural or ethereal, not composed of elements at all.
I do not exist, am not an entity in this world or the next,
did not descend from Adam and Eve or any origin story.
My place is placeless, a trace of the traceless. Neither body nor soul.
I belong to the beloved have seen the two worlds as one and that one call to and know,
First, last, outer, inner, only that breath breathing human.”
~ Rumi, ‘Only Breath’
“Wherever I look, I see men quarreling in the name of religion — Hindus, Mohammendans, Brahmos, Vaishnavas, and the rest.
But they never reflect that He who is called Krishna is also called Siva, and bears the name of the Primal Energy, Jesus, and Allah as well–
the same Rama with a thousand names.
A lake has several ghats.
At one the Hindus take water in pitchers and call it ‘jal’; at another the Mussalmans take water in leather bags and call it ‘pani’. At a third the Christians call it ‘water’.
Can we imagine that it is not ‘jal’, but only ‘pani’ or ‘water’?
How ridiculous! The substance is One under different names, and everyone is seeking the same substance;
only climate, temperament, and name create differences.
Let each man follow his own path. If he sincerely and ardently wishes to know God, peace be unto him!
He will surely realize Him.”
~ Sri Ramakrishna, The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna
“The religion of the future will be a cosmic religion.
It should transcend personal God and avoid dogma and theology.
Covering both the natural and the spiritual, it should be based on a religious sense arising from the experience of all things natural and spiritual as a meaningful unity.”
~ Albert Einstein
“Today, … any religion-based answer to the problem of our neglect of inner values can never be universal,
and so will be inadequate.” . . .
“[T]he time has come to find a way of thinking about spirituality and ethics that is beyond religion.”
~ Dalai Lama
“Irrevocable commitment to any one religion is not only intellectual suicide; it is positive unfaith because it closes the mind to any new vision of the world.”
~ Alan Watts
“The constant assertion of belief is an indication of fear.”
~ J. Krishnamurti
“If there is love in your heart you don’t have to worry about rules.”
~ Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas
“Your task is not to seek for love,
but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself
that you have built against it.”
~ Rumi
“Follow dharma, not dogma.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Ron’s Introduction to “New Paradigm-ism”
Dear Friends,
Soon after my midlife spiritual awakening I began wondering with concern why Western monotheistic fundamentalism had often resulted in religious crusades, inquisitions, and jihads against alleged heretics or nonbelievers in a supposed one true Messiah or God.
And I soon learned that some Eastern religions have violent fundamentalist sects. [see https://sillysutras.com/monistic-musings-reflections-and-questions-on-god-and-divinity/]
The following sutra essay/poem (with mp3 recitation) is about our need for a new societal paradigm of universal kindness and compassion beyond religion.
Composed long before launching of the SillySutras website, it was later posted online with the above quotations, encouraged by publication of the Dalai Lama’s book Beyond Religion: Ethics For A Whole World.
On composing and later posting this sutra/poem, with quotations, I was concerned about unjust racist, religious, political, and economic ideologies, which are explained in the poem, and in my following dedication comments urging that humankind harmoniously live together as LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
New Paradigm-ism
Let’s get beyond
Catholicism – Protestantism – Judaism – Mohammedanism –
Hinduism – Buddhism – Taoism – Confucianism – Shamanism
And all other belief “isms”.
It’s time to end
religious ism schisms.
It’s time to blend religion-ism
with syncretism.
So, let us transcend
Ism dogmatism
And live ismlessly as
LOVE!
Ron’s audio explanation and recitation of “New Paradigm”-ism
Ron’s explanation and dedication of “New Paradigm”-ism
As explained in the above Introduction, “New Paradigm-ism” was first posted with concern about evils perpetrated in the name of fundamentalist religious beliefs.
And as a deeply dedicated social justice advocate I’ve long been bothered by
unjust racist, religious, political, and economic ideologies, that also foment ignorant fears and violence, because (as wisely written by Dr. Martin Luther King while wrongfully jailed in Selma, Alabama), “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
This is so because:
In religion and politics people’s beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without examination, from authorities who have not themselves examined the questions at issue but have taken them at second-hand from other non-examiners, whose opinions about them were not worth a brass farthing.
~ Mark Twain, Autobiography
Thus this posting is respectfully dedicated to inspiring our compassionate beliefs and behaviors, learned from our unique life experiences, that advance humankind’s inevitable transcendence of unjust racist, religious, political, and economic ideologies, so we may harmoniously live together as LOVE.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Solstice Salutations and Quotations
~ For a Happy World
“Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life,
the whole aim and end of human existence”
~ Aristotle
“The purpose of our lives is to be happy.”
~ Dalai Lama
“A disciplined mind leads to happiness,
and an undisciplined mind leads to suffering.”
~ Dalai Lama, The Art of Happiness
“Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle,
and the life of the candle will not be shortened.
Happiness never decreases by being shared.”
~ Buddha
“The world is so unhappy because it is ignorant of the true Self.
Man’s real nature is happiness. Happiness is inborn in the true Self. Man’s search for happiness is an unconscious search for his true Self. The true Self is imperishable; therefore, when a man finds it, he finds a happiness which does not come to an end.”
~ Ramana Maharshi
Solstice Salutations and Quotations For a Happy World
Dear Friends,
Happy Summer Solstice!
With a new summer solstice sunlight zenith, let us envision the dawning of an Aquarian age of divine light, peace, compassion, and joy everywhere on our precious planet and beyond.
May we thereby rededicate ourselves to the Eternal Light of LOVE within and beyond everyone and everything on Earth; to THAT universal spirit of eternal light, love, harmony and happiness, which is the unseen Source of the worlds we see.
And as we optimistically envision a new season of previously unimagined planetary peace and joy, may we be infused with unprecedented illumination and inspiration for harmoniously healing our beautiful blue planet and all its life-forms.
To help inspire us, hereafter posted is a collection of wisdom words about finding timeless happiness. Please enjoy and accordingly consider these inspiring quotations.
Perennial Wisdom Words About Finding Happiness:
“Seek first the kingdom of heaven,
which is within.”
~ Matthew 6:33; Luke 17:20-21
“Happiness is your nature. It is not wrong to desire it.
What is wrong is seeking it outside when it is inside.”
~ Ramana Maharshi
“Happiness comes when your work and words
are of benefit to yourself and others.”
~ Buddha
“The happiness of one’s own heart alone cannot satisfy the soul;
one must try to include, as necessary to one’s own happiness,
the happiness of others.”
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
“One great question underlies our experience, whether we think about it or not: what is the purpose of life? From the moment of birth every human being wants happiness and does not want suffering. Neither social conditioning nor education nor ideology affects this. From the very core of our being, we simply desire contentment. Therefore, it is important to discover what will bring about the greatest degree of happiness.”
~ H.H. Dalai Lama
“I believe that the very purpose of our life is to seek happiness.
That is clear. Whether one believes in religion or not,
whether one believes in this religion or that religion,
we all are seeking something better in life.
So, I think, the very motion of our life is towards happiness…”
~ Dalai Lama
“True happiness cannot be found in things that change and pass away.
Pleasure and pain alternate inexorably.
Happiness comes from the Self and can be found in the Self only.
Find your real Self and all else will come with it.”
~ Nisargadatta Maharaj
“There is only one life and one world, and this one life and one world is appearing to us . . . . like a dream. . .You do not live in your dreams. The dreams come one after another; scene after scene unfolds before you.
So it is in this world of ninety per cent misery and ten per cent happiness. Perhaps after a while it will appear as ninety per cent happiness, and we shall call it heaven. But a time comes to the sage when the whole thing vanishes, and this world appears as God Himself, and his own soul as God. It is not therefore that there are many worlds; it is not that there are many lives. All . . is the manifestation of that ONE.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
“He who has not looked on Sorrow will never see Joy.”
“We choose our joys and sorrows long before we experience them.”
~ Kahlil Gibran
“Find ecstasy in life;
the mere sense of living is joy enough.”
~ Emily Dickinson
“I do not think of all the misery, but of the glory that remains.
Go outside into the fields, nature and the sun,
go out and seek happiness in yourself and in God.
Think of the beauty that again and again
discharges itself within and without you and be happy.”
~ Anne Frank
“The root of joy is gratefulness…
We hold the key to lasting happiness in our own hands.
For it is not joy that makes us grateful; it is gratitude that makes us joyful.”
~ Brother David Steindl-Rast
“We are formed and molded by our thoughts.
Those whose minds are shaped by selfless thoughts
give joy when they speak or act.
Joy follows them like a shadow that never leaves them.”
~ Buddha
“People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be.”
~ Abraham Lincoln
“When you are suffering, when you are unhappy, stay totally with what is now.
Unhappiness or problems cannot survive in the Now.”
~ Eckhart Tolle
“Happiness does not depend on how the furniture is arranged –
it depends on how I arrange my mind.”
“When you change the way you look at things,
the things you look at change.”
“Simply put, you believe that things or people make you unhappy,
but this is not accurate.
You make yourself unhappy.”
~ Wayne Dyer
“The surest way to be happy
is to seek happiness for others.”
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
“Joy comes not through possession or ownership
but through a wise and loving heart.”
“If one speaks or acts with a pure mind,
happiness follows like a shadow.”
~ Buddha
“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion.
If you want to be happy, practice compassion.”
~ Dalai Lama
“Happiness resides not in possessions, and not in gold,
happiness dwells in the soul.”
~ Democritus
“The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more,
but in developing the capacity to enjoy less.”
~ Socrates
“Happiness belongs to the self sufficient.”
~ Aristotle
“The essence of philosophy is that a man should so live
that his happiness shall depend as little as possible on external things.”
~ Epictetus
“Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not;
remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for.”
~ Epicurus
“Cultivate compassion; harvest happiness.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“Joy is not in things; it is in us.”
~ Richard Wagner
“I am happy even before I have a reason.”
~ Hafiz
“The superior man is always happy.”
~ Confucius
“Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness.”
~ Chuang-Tzu
“By letting it go it all gets done.
The world is won by those who let it go.
But when you try and try,
the world is beyond the winning.”
~ Lao Tzu
“What is the worth of a happiness for which you must strive and work?
Real happiness is spontaneous and effortless.”
~ Nisargadatta Maharaj
“He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity’s sun rise.”
~ William Blake
“Always be joyful. That is the only truly saintly state.”
~ Teresa of Avila
“Joy can be real only if people look upon their life as a service,
and have a definite object in life
outside themselves and their personal happiness”
~ Leo Tolstoy
“I slept and dreamt that life was joy.
I awoke and saw that life was service.
I acted and behold, service was joy.”
~ Rabindranath Tagore
“Somehow not only for Christmas
But all the long year through,
The joy that you give to others
Is the joy that comes back to you.
And the more you spend in blessing
The poor and lonely and sad,
The more of your heart’s possessing
Returns to make you glad.
~ John Greenleaf Whittier
“Sanity and happiness are an impossible combination”
~ Mark Twain
“For every minute you are angry you lose sixty seconds of happiness.”
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow,
it only saps today of its joy.”
~ Leo Buscaglia
“Some cause happiness wherever they go;
others whenever they go.”
~ Oscar Wild
Closing Invocations:
May we consciously and cooperatively participate together in co-creating an ever better world – Happy, Harmonious and Peaceful – as we intend and envision it to be.
May we so become infused and used as instruments of Light and Love for everyone and everything everywhere – on Solstice Holidays and Always!
May everyone everywhere be happy!
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Honoring God’s “Holy Fools”
~ Ron’s Memoirs
“For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight.”
~ 1 Corinthians 3:19
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart,
and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.”
~ Deuteronomy 6:4-5
“Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyone that loves is born of God, and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.”
~ 1 John 4:7-8
“Full of love for all things in the world;
practicing virtue in order to benefit others,
this man alone is happy.”
~ Buddha
“Your task is not to seek for love,
but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself
that you have built against it.”
~ Rumi
“Love is the highest, the grandest, the most inspiring,
the most sublime principle in creation.”
~ Paramahansa Yogananda
“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
“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
Honoring God’s “Holy Fools” ~ Ron’s Memoirs
Introduction
Dear Friends,
Prior memoirs have recounted my midlife transformation from “Secular Hebrew” social justice litigation lawyer to “Born-again Hindu” devotional-emotional lover of God, and then to “Uncertain Undo” seeking ‘relief from belief’, because ‘on the path of Undo, we’ll never be through, ’til we’re and undone ONE!’.
[See e.g. Crying For God and other ‘Kundalini Kriyas’]
This memoirs chapter tells how, as a newly awakened ‘lover of God’ (Bhakta), I’ve discovered and honored “Holy Fools” – rare ascetic and eccentric lovers of God, who don’t live in ordinary worldly ways.
I’ve learned that throughout human history there have been very famous “Holy Fools”. Only after first ‘discovering’ such famous “Holy Fools”, did I later learn that in all human societies there are countless more unknown God intoxicated “Holy Fools”; and that they timelessly bless this world as LOVE.
In some Eastern societies they are called “masts”, a word which originates from the Sufi term mast-Allah, meaning “intoxicated with God”.
In Hindu societies they are called Avadhutas, who are overwhelmed with inner love for God. For millennia India has honored Avadhutas, as self-realized bhakti mystics living beyond worldly ego-mind consciousness and concerns, and without adhering to accepted social standards. (See e.g. Advadhuta Gita)
To help you understand why I have honored spiritual “heretics” and “holy fools” as lovers of God, here is a summary of my devotional history:
Ron’s Devotional history
Until my profound midlife spiritual awakening, I hadn’t shed tears as an adult. But then I cried for twenty four hours. Thereafter, I began wondering why I was crying so much. But soon I realized with amazement that I was crying with intense longing for God. (See Beholding The Eternal Light Of Consciousness.) And I became and remained an extremely devotional, and frequent crier for God – often ecstatically longing and calling for the Divine.
After meeting my beloved Guruji, Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas, and receiving his shaktipat initiation into the path of kundalini yoga as “Rasik: one engrossed in devotion”, I gradually learned that my continual longing and profuse crying for God was an immense transformative blessing – recognized not only in the bhakti Hindu devotional tradition, but also in:
1) Sufism epitomized by enlightened Muslim mystical poets Rumi and Hafiz who realized that all appearances in our seemingly complex earthly “reality” are manifestations of ONE eternal LOVE; and
2) in the Orthodox/Catholic “gift of tears” tradition of St. Isaac of Ninevah, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. Francis of Assisi, and St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina.
Thus, when not crying I often had what I called ‘alternative LSD experiences’ of spontaneous (and sometimes ecstatic) Laughing, Singing, and Dancing. And even as an octogenarian “Uncertain Undo” I still often privately experience spontaneous outbursts of laughing, crying, and calling to God.
Guruji’s explanation was that:
“There are two kinds of kriyas, one is for purification and the other for the manifestation of joy. ..
Whenever one experiences great joy or bliss, this also manifests physically as crying or laughing.”
~ Shri Dhyanyogi Madhusudandas
Learning about devotional spirituality
Not until my 1976 spiritual awakening, did I begin learning about spirituality.
On moving from Chicago to San Francisco in 1960, I was ignorant about spiritual subjects, or religions other than Judaism.
I knew nothing about Christian saints, or core Christian teachings. I didn’t even realize that my new “San Francisco” home city was named for history’s most popular Christian saint. Moreover, apart from Christianity, I was ignorant of Eastern spiritual and religious teachings.
Growing up in Chicago, I had become familiar with Judaism’s core teachings:
“ Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is One”; and
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart,
and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.”
~ Deuteronomy 6:4-5
However, I had no idea of their supremely profound sacred significance.
But my midlife spiritual awakening experiences triggered an unprecedented interest in spiritual subjects. Initially – sparked by inner experiences and amazing synchronicities – I experienced great curiosity about Saint Francis of Assisi, and about Christian teachings which inspired him.
Later I began reading hagiographic stories about other Eastern and Western saints and sages. Gradually, I learned that – apart from Jesus and a few other world-famous paragons of Divine LOVE – the Divine devotional path has been followed by countless unknowns, especially in certain societies which for centuries have honored and emphasized devotional Love.
And gradually I became inspired by genuine “lovers of God” as exemplars of an important spiritual tradition, with which I had instinctively joined.
Lovers of God as “Heretics”
On discovering Rumi’s poetry, I learned that Muslim culture has long encompassed all aspects of love, culminating with Sufism’s mystical Self-realization as Divine LOVE as life’s ultimate goal. And, similarly, that Sufi philosophy has so honored eccentric lovers of God that it has specifically identified many of them as “masts” – persons so overwhelmed with love for God, that they appear externally disoriented.
Also, during my 1982 pilgrimage to India I learned that for millennia India has honored avadhutas, self-realized bhakti mystics living beyond usual egoic consciousness and worldly concerns, without adhering to accepted social standards. (See e.g. Advadhuta Gita, and Avadhuta – Wikipedia)
I indelibly remember seeing a peacefully smiling elderly man sitting stark naked on a rock in freezing temperatures midst ice and snow near the Himalayan headwaters of the holy Ganges river.
Like Sufi “masts” and Indian avadhutas, worldwide there have been countless unknowns societally honored as God intoxicated ‘holy fools’ with extraordinarily unconventional behaviors inconsistent with social norms.
Famous “Heretic” Prophets
Supremely eminent Greek philosopher Socrates, who taught the Delphic oracle’s fundamental transformative spiritual maxim “Know Thyself”, was considered an heretic and was sentenced to death after being unjustly tried and convicted for allegedly corrupting the youth of Athens. He was an archetypal wise ‘fool’ whose distinctive teaching method consisted in exposing foolishness of the world. For example, just before Socrates died of a coerced suicide, by drinking hemlock, he declared that fear of death was fear of the unknown.
In Western Christianity Paul the Apostle proclaimed that
“The wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight.”
(1 Corinthians 3:19)
So, Christianity has at times rejected as foolishness “the wisdom of this world”. And it has endorsed the ‘Imitation of Jesus Christ’ – who preached “Love your neighbors” and even “your enemies”. And ‘heretically’ repudiated socially condoned hypocrisy, brutality, greed, and selfish desire for worldly power and gains; forgivingly endured crucifixion, mockery and humiliation from ignorant crowds; and even audaciously proclaimed the ultimately ‘forbidden mystical Truth’ – that “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30).
In learning about Jesus’ “heretic” teachings – especially his Sermon on the Mount – I instinctively recognized him as an outspoken social justice reformer, and Truth telling political and religious nonconformist. And I intuitively honored him as a paragon of virtue, like prophets of other great religions, but not as God’s “only Son”.
I always conceived of “God” as ONE universally immanent nameless, formless, nonjudgmental Supreme Power. So I rejected any idea of a personal or judgmental God, and considered the Bible a collection of metaphoric legends – not as ‘the word of God’ who spoke only through special messengers.
And just as I always rejected Torah teachings about Jews as “chosen people”, I could never accept Christian dogma that Jesus was God’s “only Son” because he declared “I and the Father are one”.
Nor – like Gandhi – could I morally accept non-egalitarian Hindu scriptures justifying socially stratified caste systems, with some people deemed “untouchables”.
But I accepted that especially in historically dark and threatening eras of rampant world materialism, decadence, and violence, there have often appeared renowned sages or incarnate avatars to prophetically guide Humankind to societal and spiritual renaissance. And as religious nonconformists and social dissidents these famous reformers – like Jesus and Socrates – often were considered as “heretics”, and severely punished by contemporary worldly authorities.
‘Discovering’ Saint Francis of Assisi and Sri Ramakrishna as heretic “holy fools”.
Most famous Christian emulator of Jesus was Saint Francis of Assisi who in midlife – as an unconventional apostle of Love – renounced and relinquished all his worldly possessions and privileges as son of a wealthy merchant, to live reclusively in the Umbrian countryside; and later to establish an exemplary order of Franciscan Friars who gave away all possessions and survived only on alms while preaching in the streets to common people. Francis so completely identified with Jesus that, near the end of his earthly life, he became the first saint in history to miraculously receive crucifixion stigmata.
St. Francis of Assisi
Perhaps the best known Indian saint of the nineteenth century was Indian Holy Man Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa – an extraordinarily charismatic and eccentric ascetic, sometimes compared to St. Francis of Assisi.
(See Sri Ramakrishna and St. Francis of Assisi, by Sister Devamata, 1935)
Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa
February 18, 1836 – August 16, 1886
After my midlife spiritual awakening, I felt increasing egalitarian affinity and harmony with people living unconventionally ‘from inside out’, rather than with outer-directed worldly and conventional people.
And in learning about many famous saints and mystics, I felt most affinity with Saint Francis of Assisi and Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa.
Both of them were extraordinarily charismatic ascetics, having relinquished and renounced all worldly pleasures and privileges, to live in utter simplicity. Both were remarkably unconventional and seemingly “God intoxicated” exemplars of Divine Love and devotional faith – blessed with the ‘gift of tears’ and of spontaneously praying, singing, conversing and calling to the Divine, which as egalitarians they beheld everywhere and in every being. Both saints eschewed punditry and were simple, unschooled and unscholarly, yet with vast innate wisdom imparted conversationally and recorded by others.
Both historically helped to reform world religions by charismatically living their teachings. And both were so eccentrically unconventional that they were even considered insane by some worldly people, including a few friends and relatives.
Perhaps I found exceptional rapport with both St. Francis and Ramakrishna because my own private devotional tendencies and unconventional behaviors seemed similar to theirs, and especially because of inner and synchronistic experiences, including amazing and unforgettable déjà vu of their still palpable divine energies (shakti) during pilgrimages to India and Assisi.
Later, I learned that that renowned mystical poet-masters Hafiz and Rumi, were Supreme exemplars of the Sufi-Persian path of love. But that even in their societies which honored Love, they were considered by Moslem authorities to be “heretics” or “holy fools” because – like Jesus – they realized and truthfully proclaimed their mystical self-identity as Divine LOVE – a fundamentally forbidden heresy to ruling mullahs. Thus, though Hafiz was not executed, his remains could not be entombed in a Moslem cemetery in his beloved birthplace and cultured home city, Shiraz, Iran.
LOVE as the unseen Source of the worlds we see
Following the midlife spiritual rebirth and awakening, I’ve gradually discovered that LOVE is all that is, was, or will be; that LOVE is our true SELF-identity, and the unseen timeless Source of all worlds we see.
So I’ve realized that all God’s “holy fools” bless this world as living LOVE. And that their eccentricities and ‘heresies’ can help reveal that societal sanity requires radical reform of orthodox worldly rules and beliefs.
Dedication and Invocation – Love for all, Hatred for none!
This memoirs chapter is deeply dedicated to inspiring a critical mass of humanity increasingly to honor each other and all life as ONE LOVE – beyond the endless ego-mind illusion of a space/time duality universe
And let us ever remember that we are the unseen Source of all worlds we see!
So let us love GOD with all our heart and soul and with all our might.
And with firm faith, may our guiding motto ever be
‘Love for all, Hatred for none!’
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Biophilism
“Beyond atonement theology,
Let us BE at-one-ment Reality –
as Eternal LOVE.”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
“Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries.
Without them humanity cannot survive.”
~ Dalai Lama
“There is a temple, a shrine, a mosque, a church where I kneel.
Prayer should bring us to an altar where no walls or names exist.
Is there not a region of love where the sovereignty is illumined nothing,”
~ Rabia of Basra
“I have learned so much from God
That I can no longer call myself
a Christian, a Hindu, a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Jew”
~ Hafiz
“Not Christian or Jew or Muslim, not Hindu, Buddhist, Sufi, or Zen.
Not any religion, or cultural system. I am not from the East or the West, nor out of the ocean or up from the ground, not natural or ethereal, not composed of elements at all.
I do not exist, am not an entity in this world or the next, did not descend from Adam and Eve or any origin story.
My place is placeless, a trace of the traceless. Neither body nor soul. I belong to the Beloved have seen the two worlds as one and that one call to and know,
First, last, outer, inner, only that breath breathing human.”
~ Rumi, Only Breath
“I consider myself a Hindu, Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, and Confucian.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi
“Your task is not to seek for love,
but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself
that you have built against it.”
~ Rumi
Ron’s Introduction to “Biophilism”
Dear Friends,
“Biophilism” is a poetic essay which declares our urgent need for a universal religion of LOVE.
The title “Biophilism” was derived from “biophilia”, which means “love of Life”. It’s interpretation is suggested by the above key quotations and by my following explanatory comments.
This essay is closely related to my Reflections on Religious Beliefs, which tell why humanity can no longer survive without universal ethical behaviors beyond conflicting religious beliefs.
Ron Rattner
Biophilism
The new millennium demands a new universal religion –
A religion of Love.
So, let us curb our dogmas
and park our hierarchies.
Let us leave atonement theology,
and live at-one-ment Reality.
Let us transcend our ism schisms
and live a Universal ism —
Biophilism –
The love of Life.
Let us live life
as love of Life.
Let us let go, and
let Life live us,
as
LOVE.
Ron’s audio recitation of “Biophilism”
Ron’s explanation of “Biophilism”
Dear Friends,
Many years ago the then obvious threat of nuclear war catastrophe inspired composition of the foregoing poetic essay, envisioning a new universal religion of LOVE.
After the horrendous 1945 US atomic bombings of the civilian populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, and especially since the ‘miraculous’ resolution of the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis between the USA and USSR, I have been deeply concerned by obviously insane dangers of a nuclear war catastrophe which would end earth life as we’ve known it. So I’ve long realized the urgent need to abolish all nuclear weapons, and all wars.
The “Biophilism” poetic essay was composed after my midlife spiritual awakening, long before the doomsday clock of the bulletin of atomic scientists was moved to 100 seconds to midnight. Since then we’ve experienced increasingly violent and politically polarized times, beyond those which motivated this essay. So the essay’s message is more urgently imperative now than ever before.
In order to avert current catastrophic threats to Life on our precious planet, humanity needs egalitarian societal organizations – beyond hierarchical religious organizations; we need democratically participatory organizations which promote and practice coexistence, compassion and cooperation over insanely autocratic domination and unsustainable exploitation of people and other lifeforms.
Though countless people have benefited from religions, it has become obvious that survival of Earth-life as we’ve known it urgently requires universal human ethics of empathy and LOVE, transcending current insanely polarized violence and turbulence.
Thus, today’s essay declares our urgent need for a new universal religion of LOVE. Although some may consider this declaration impractical or Utopian, I deem it not just feasible but evolutionarily imperative that we end and transcend current human warfare insanity.
As lovers of God and Nature, let us communally remember, envision and experience our true spiritual Self-Identity, which is Universal and Eternal LOVE!
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
Let Life Live Us As Love
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart,
and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.”
~ Deuteronomy 6:4-5
“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
Love has befriended me so completely
It has turned to ash and freed me
of every concept and image
my mind has ever known.
~ Hafiz
In the end these things matter most:
How well did you love?
How fully did you love?
How deeply did you learn to let go?”
~ Buddha
“The foundation of the Buddha’s teachings lies in compassion,
and the reason for practicing the teachings is to wipe out the persistence of ego, the number-one enemy of compassion.”“Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries.
Without them humanity cannot survive.”
~ H.H. Dalai Lama
“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”
~ Albert Einstein
“The identification of pure awareness with the mind and its creations causes the [ego] apprehension of both an objective world and a perceiver of it.”
~ Patanjali – Yoga Sutras
“Free of ego, living naturally, working virtuously, you become filled with inexhaustible vitality and are liberated forever from the cycle of death and rebirth.”
~ Lao Tzu
“Your task is not to seek for love,
but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself
that you have built against it.”
~ Rumi
“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
“Let us let go of ego, and
Let Life live us as LOVE!”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Maitreya – The Next Buddha
“Let Life Live Us As Love”
Einstein revolutionized Western science with his groundbreaking theory of relativity establishing equivalence between all matter and energy in the universe, quantifiable by the simple equation e=mc2.
Since then, for over a century, Western science has more and more shown what ancient shamans, seers, and indigenous societies have known for millennia:
That there is a cosmic web of life connecting everything and everyone in Nature from the greatest galaxies to the tiniest sub-atomic particles; that we are each an integral inter-connected part of Nature’s web of life – not separate from it; that as Einstein observed:
“Our separation of each other is an optical illusion of consciousness.”
Though Einstein’s insights revolutionized quantum physicists’ views of space/time “reality”, most humans haven’t yet changed our way of thinking about such “reality”. Until now, most people mistakenly keep behaving as if we are separated from each other and from Nature, and not part of it. This behavior has resulted in continuing selfishness, cruelty, wars and unsustainable exploitation of our precious planet.
But gradually we are awakening. From seeing everyone and everything as discrete and separated by apparently immutable boundaries, we are more and more realizing that everyone and everything are ever-changing energy phenomena appearing from a common immutable Source of Infinite Universal Awareness, which is LOVE.
All of our selfish, disharmonious and unsustainable behaviors have arisen from human ignorance of the true non-dual nature of the Self and all phenomena as Love; and from consequent mental mis-identification with the illusion of physical separation from each other – called “ego”.
Thus, the ancient Vedic seers told us in the Rig Veda that
“ Ego is the biggest enemy of humans.”
Only rare Buddha-like beings, are said to totally transcend ego identification. So we all experience some degree of separate self-identification. But all humans are in various stages of an ultimately irresistible evolutionary process of ego attrition and transcendence.
In this world of cause and effect, Nature – not ego – is in charge and determines everything. But, while believing ourselves separate from Nature, we exercise apparent free will and seemingly make non-predestined choices.
Depending on whether we are in harmony or disharmony with Nature, these apparent choices hasten or impede our evolution, and create or mitigate crises, sufferings and problems. So, let us ever aspire to be harmonious with Nature:
Ever mindful of our ONENESS with all Life on our precious planet, as Universal Awareness, let us live with loving-kindness and compassion for everyone and everything everywhere.
Ever mindful that in space/time Nature is our nature,
let us see and cherish Nature in everything and everyone everywhere.Ever mindful that Universal Awareness, as Love,
is our ultimate identity and Source:
Let us let go of ego, and
Let Life live us as LOVE!
And So Shall It Be!
Ron’s comments and explanation of “Let Life Live Us As Love”
Dear Friends,
On moving from Chicago to San Francisco in 1960, I was ignorant about spiritual subjects, or religions other than Judaism. Growing up in Chicago, I had become familiar with Judaism’s core teachings:
“ Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is One”; and
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart,
and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.”
~ Deuteronomy 6:4-5
But initially, I had no idea of the supremely profound esoteric importance of those teachings, or of devotional Love as crucial in all enduring religious and spiritual traditions. Not until my 1976 spiritual awakening and rebirth did I begin experientially learning about spirituality.
Whereupon, gradually I became inspired by “love of God” as a key spiritual tradition, with which I had instinctively joined in frequently crying and calling for the Divine. And ultimately I became convinced that our true nature and identity is LOVE.
That in space/time “reality” everyone, everything, everywhere is an ever-changing energy phenomenon appearing from a common immutable Source of Infinite Universal Awareness, which is LOVE.
So as Rumi profoundly tells us we need not “seek for love, but merely .. seek and find all the barriers [we] have built against it.” Those barriers are mistaken ideas about our true identity, which we can only discover and transcend by looking within.
This process of finding and letting go of ego-mind barriers to experiencing ourselves as LOVE is explained in the foregoing profound quotations and essay/poem.
May they remind us of our common Self-identity as Love with all Life on our precious planet.
And may they encourage and inspire us to live with loving-kindness and compassion for everyone and everything everywhere.
And so may it be!
Ron Rattner
Is Earth-life Purposeful?
“One great question underlies our experience,
whether we think about it or not:
what is the purpose of life?”
~ Dalai Lama
“Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life,
the whole aim and end of human existence.”
~ Aristotle
“What are we here for?
We are here for freedom, for knowledge.
We want to know in order to make us free.
That is our life; one universal cry for freedom.”
~ Swami Vivekananda
“The world is so unhappy because it is ignorant of the true Self.
Man’s real nature is happiness. Happiness is inborn in the true Self.
Man’s search for happiness is an unconscious search for his true Self.
The true Self is imperishable; therefore, when a man finds it,
he finds a happiness which does not come to an end.”
~ Ramana Maharshi
“Our purpose is process –
evolutionary process.
Gleaning meaning in matter,
we learn all that matters –
we learn all that matters is LOVE!”
~ Ron Rattner, Sutra Sayings
Here is the test to find whether your mission on earth is finished.
If you’re alive, it isn’t.
~ Richard Bach
Is Earth-life Purposeful?
Q. Is Earth-life purposeful?
A. Yes! We are here to learn and evolve.
Though some Eastern mystics may call this ever changing “reality” a dream, maya, samsara,or illusion, it is a marvelous and miraculous mental creation.
So how can anyone ever imagine Earth-life to be without purpose?
Our purpose is process – evolutionary process.
Like unique facets of an infinitely faceted jewel,
each Earth being has a unique perspective, but a common Source [*see Footnote] – which transcends this world, while everywhere immanent herein.
So, our purpose is harmoniously to realize and experience,
and to actualize from infinite perspectives,
our ONE transcendent Self identity.
As long as we believe ourselves to be seemingly circumscribed
and separated from each other the rest of our reality,
We incarnate to realize and to actualize
our common spiritual Self identity.
We learn until we leave.
But, we don’t leave until we learn –
LOVE!
Footnote.
*Innumerable names – God, Love, Nature, etc. – may be used to signify that Source or any of its infinite aspects. Or as in the Jewish tradition it may be acknowledged that no name can denominate “That” which is beyond conception or expression – since naming limits the illimitable and ineffable Infinite Reality.
Ron’s Comments on Life’s Purpose
Dear Friends,
Have you ever reflected on whether human life is purposeful – individually or collectively?
Or have you wondered:
“Why was I born? Why am I living?”
Or “What is the meaning of life?”
According to the Dalai Lama “What is the purpose of life?” is the “one great question [which] underlies our experience, whether we think about it or not”. And since my midlife change of life, I’ve found that reflecting about our life’s purpose, if any, has sparked a very helpful process of finding ever expanding happiness.
So today I’m sharing the foregoing quotations and essay/poem to help us consider perennial questions about ‘purpose’ or ‘meaning’ of life.
Background
Not until my midlife awakening did I ever wonder whether Earth-life is purposeful.
But since then I’ve continued to reflect and write about it.
Tentatively, I’ve hypothesized that, as students matriculating on the ‘Earth branch of the great cosmic University’, we’re learning to let life live us as LOVE, until ultimately we realize that LOVE is our common Self-identity and Universal Reality; that beyond this conceptual space/time relative reality, there are no philosophical questions or concepts or purposes, just infinitely potential Cosmic Consciousness as a ‘maha-matrix’ Source of all samsaric illusory mirage-like ‘realities’.
While growing up in 20th century America – like millions of others – I greatly enjoyed popular New York musical theater songs. Many of my favorite lyrics were composed by Master lyricist/librettist Oscar Hammerstein II, mostly in collaboration with great musical talents like Richard Rodgers with whom he wrote Oklahoma!, Carousel, South Pacific, The King and I, and The Sound of Music.
Until midlife I understood Hammerstein’s lyrics to encompass only worldly subjects, like romantic love. But, after spiritually awakening, I began to realize that Hammerstein’s lyrics often esoterically encompassed mystical perspectives. And I started referring to him as “Sri Oscar Hammerstein”.
When I was born in 1932, one the “top ten” popular songs was “Why Was I Born”, for which Hammerstein (with composer Jerome Kern) had written lyrics in 1929, beginning with these perennial questions: “Why was I born? Why am I living?” “What do I get? What am I giving?” And Hammerstein’s lyrics concluded with this enduring answer: “Why I was born? To love you!”
Fifty years after Hammerstein’s composition of the “Why Was I Born” lyrics, I began to realize that as an ultimate goal of Human life Hammerstein’s lyrics esoterically could refer to Divine LOVE, beyond just romantic love – e.g. to the ecstatic devotional spiritual path exemplified by Sufi-Persian Mystic Masters Rumi and Hafiz.
So with poetic license I pluralized Hammerstein’s lyric questions and edited his answer to suggest our true Earth-life purpose:
Q. Why were we born? Why are we living?
What do we get? What are we giving?
A. Why were we born? To love THEE!
Thus I’ve learned that reflecting on life’s purpose, can help us gradually realize that we are not who or what we were taught or ‘labeled’ to be by society, or by our mistaken mental reification of our projected-perceptions:
That we are not merely our mortal bodies – their genders, features, colors, religions, beliefs, emotions, habits or stories, or the ‘voices in our heads’. We are non-dual immortal spirit experiencing fleeting Earth lives from infinite perspectives in transitory physical vehicles. But ultimately ‘under the hood’ we’re all the same Cosmic Consciousness. We are all Eternal LOVE.
Invocation
May we help transform and transcend this world of suffering,
by realizing and compassionately actualizing our common spiritual identity, as LOVE.
And so shall it be!
Ron Rattner
