Crossing the Threshold
“We are here and it is now. Further than that, all human knowledge is moonshine.” ~ H. L. Mencken
We may stand peering across the ocean without expectation and all the while reaching out wanting to touch the answer. We’ve waited to hear it and have given up waiting, having listened for a life time for just the ‘right’ words. All the words that tumble from our lips with such ease are not it. They too sink into the abyss enveloped by the silence. Stillness makes sense; shakes me loose from this long established perception that the horizon is a line between the earth and the sky.
And sometimes when I sit with you, hear you tell me about the various complexities of life that create this feeling of ‘going no where’ I want to show you that the door for you, is always open; that you can cross that threshold as easily as you inhale and exhale. If you follow the breath you will find your self exactly where you want to be without anxiety, worry or unnecessary drama. The inhale and exhale happen and have nothing to do with the mind. Our movement through life, our living life, has nothing to do with the mind. The mind relishes the past. All of our thoughts are based on the past. Judgment rises from what we think we know. Glorious the moment that I know ‘nothing’ then, I appreciate the moment, observe it without thought; come to rest.
“This instant is beyond time. Time is also a notion of the mind. The mind is also a notion, like a wave rising from the ocean. That ocean of eternal peace is you. What is the difficulty that we suffer from? It is that we seek peace elsewhere and do not experience that we are peace incarnate itself.” ~H.W.L. Poonja (Papaji)
Listen, as you stand in this moment open to all directions and bending to the wind. I am a tree, not minding as thoughts shake loose and are scattered, skipping along the pavement no matter what the season. Their imminent demise a liberation.
Listen, as the rain becomes a torrent. Together we cascade over earth and rock. I am the rock, the mountain; standing oblivious to the earth that rises to a peak, to touch the sky, imperial blue, I am the sky. No matter the direction I face nor the element I meet, ‘That’ I am and all joyfully descending to the sea where silence quenches my thirst. I drown in ‘not knowing’ and relinquish the thought, I am not ‘This’.
I peer into this large breakfast bowl filled with bits of this and that and see the world swimming there. There is harmony in spite of all the various shapes and sizes, differentiation of color, all united, all destined for ingestion and integration. Oblivious though to the ‘process’ of ingestion and integration.
Simply floating in the sea from which they arise. ‘We’ are the observers observing our selves and rest in knowing That.
With these eyes I see that all that passes before me are expressions of something that the mind cannot comprehend. Yet the mind interprets—we need not listen to mind. With these ears we hear a symphony. The mind wants to analyze. If we focus on any particular instrument or a specific segment we may lose the magic and the mystery of the whole. Let the mind come to rest and we miss nothing, All continues to unfold with grace.
In the summer months when there may be many moments of gazing at the ocean and deeply immersing oneself in infinite possibility, often there is a loss of identification with the body mind, the self, and a sense of Being, peace and oneness. The line of separation between all things melts and we are free!
May we embrace the moment and fall into silence.
Be Still 