All Posts Tagged ‘enlightenment’

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Timelessness and Time

September 18, 2020
17 comments

We function in (and “as”) time. Time involves distinctive patterns in sequences. Thought/thinking is of time; thought/thinking is time. Distinctive, disparate patterns in (and “as”) time allows for conflict, friction, and discord to take place. Needless to say, a lot of friction and disharmony takes place in today’s world; just look at the newspapers to see plenty of that going on.

There is a nameless, sacred timelessness that exists at (or “as”) another dimension completely. It is not of conflictive patterns; it is not of sequences of discord; it is not of fragments involving disorder. It is coherent and is of a harmonious whole, beyond mere conflict and chaos.

Organized religions cannot take you there; organized religions are based on achievement, progress, and movement to goals (in time)… all involving calculated (man-made) patterns. That namelessness is beyond the cause-effect parameters of patterns; it is not some causally induced “effect achieved” or end result.

Thought/thinking, though oftentimes very necessary in functioning, cannot take you to that otherness. Thought can play all kinds of tricks but it cannot take you to where it cannot function… to where it has never functioned (and to where it never will function). (Thought/thinking can easily imagine that it is of wholeness and that it is in great silence and in the special quietness of “not being thought”… while — all the while — it is deceiving itself.) Thought/thinking is always conditioned, always in (or part of) a cause-effect sequence, always reactionary, always rather virtual, always fragmentary, and always rather secondhand. Well, that’s enough thinking for now.

Pale Green Assassin Bug, waiting with his different-colored bait … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2020
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The Limited Consciousness

September 11, 2020
15 comments

Can consciousness actually be in contact with the infinite when such a consciousness always functions with (and “as”) the limited? It cannot. The mind can think or feel that it is in contact with the infinite, but that is mere reaction and not the actuality. It is immensely easy for the mind to delude itself and trick itself into believing and thinking all sorts of things. A consciousness of fragmentation, for example, can convince itself that it is of wholeness and freedom… while, in actuality, that is not the case whatsoever.

Unfortunately, most people are quite content to merely — in very limited ways — accept the traditions and beliefs that were handed down to them. (Curiously, this is even the case with many of those writing on meditation or mindfulness in books, blogs, and such, as if they have transcended something, when fundamentally they have not.) Most people in limitation — which is of confinement — feel “safe.” They do not truly reexamine all that they were taught. They do not fully question what was spoon-fed to them. (Many assume that they have broken from the standard, run-of-the-mill consciousness but, fundamentally, they have not.) They, among countless others, were taught to conform, obey, absorb, accept, and adhere to all of the traditional outlooks and images. Is a consciousness raised in such a way, and programmed in such a way, much more than a bundle of reactions?

One reaction after another, in life, is limitation, is fragmentation. Holistic contact is much more than mere reaction, but far too many people are merely reacting and are not involved with (or “as”) what is beyond. It is beyond what they spoon-fed into you. It is beyond beliefs, conditionings, and symbolic, sequential thoughts and ordinary feelings (which are all limited reactions). Though the physical organism is important to maintain in time, the old “you” cannot merely psychologically exist (for that immensity and nameless eternity to visit).

Among the Coneflowers … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2020

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On Becoming Whole

September 4, 2020
24 comments

Recently, within the last week or two, one of the regular blogs that i visited, as part of a rather poetic posting that it had about things to accomplish, mentioned — among other things — “becoming whole.” Not wishing to criticize here, but that posting — like so many blogs that are similar to it by well-meaning others — has very good intentions but (one feels) misses the mark (so to speak). (Unfortunately — for others — people who write about wholeness and mindfulness, but who have never actually gone through deep and profound enlightenment — though their intentions are good — are like blind men writing about the beauty of good photography.)

To have the aspiration of “becoming whole” may seem well and good but it may actually have the unintentional backfiring effect of being quite misleading and misdirecting. For instance, do any of us deeply question “what” or “who” is going to be “becoming whole”? If what purports to become whole is some illusory “center” that one has accepted (via miseducation) as some kind of core controller in the middle of consciousness that is (supposedly) orchestrating things, then one may be wasting time with fictitious, barbaric paradigms. Frankly, as one has pointed out in numerous blogs (previously), there is no legitimate “center” that is in control. (And do not misconstrue this; this does not mean, because of a lack of a true center, that one should get all depressed about a lack of security and eternity in life; nothing could be further from the case. Security, order, and eternity are there in abundance with right understanding.)

If there is no legitimate center, and there isn’t, then what is it that is going to psychologically “become”? One may become a better cook, a better gardener, a better photographer (over time). These all have to do with physical improvements over (and in) time regarding fragmentary and sequential frameworks… and in such frameworks, they are quite valid. However, wholeness — real wholeness, not silly mental constructs and fabrications about what wholeness is — may be beyond the framework of time. Time, thought, and everything in time (including thought) is fragmentary and sequential. Real wholeness is a timelessness beyond all of this. And an illusory, petty little “center” — that one has blindly accepted from society (from your parents and educators) as being legitimate — purportedly thinks that it can progress (in sequential time) to what it says is whole. It cannot. An illusory fragmentation (as an accepted image of something “central”) cannot become what is pristine and what is beyond sequential, time-oriented paradigms.

It would be prudent, before proceeding on a quest for truth, to do so without carrying a heavy load of preconceptions/presumptions (i.e., a heavy load of baggage). And without the psychological baggage, it may be that there would not be a false, fragmentary network seeking what it could never be. And there is great beauty in that.

Not an Electrical Array … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2020

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Living and Enlightenment

August 4, 2020
32 comments

Note: (I’ve dropped out of blogging for a while because i’ve been very busy with other projects. I may — or may not — be doing much blogging in the future; it depends upon my time and some other factors. For those who are truly “inquiring” in all of this, what i have written is always there — and elsewhere — if you know how to look. Regarding the blogging, posting close-up nature pictures has always been a small part of my offerings, although the main focus has always been the philosophy. Followers who have primarily focused on the pictures have really missed the whole point; it’s like focusing on the tie that a good philosopher is wearing, rather than actually listening to what he has to say… which is sad in regard to the picture — or mere tie — lover. That being said, the number of insect species and other small species disappearing in the environment is alarming, to say the least. It breaks my heart to go picture-taking and seeing fewer wildlife species each year, and it is not just in our area; it is all over. Additionally, so many millions of people, such as in America, succumbing to heartless political propaganda — that includes indifference to the health of the environment — is equally cataclysmic… and, of course, the two situations are closely related.)

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So many of us have assumed that we are fully living. However, a person who has been through true satori (i.e., true visitation from that eternal, sacred energy) realizes that people are only “alive” and “living” to a very limited, fragmentary extent. Such so-called “living” is only a rather seed-like state that has never really blossomed whatsoever. To truly change fundamentally, the instrument that is looking is perceiving beyond distortion. That instrument is the mind (and perception of the mind is not separate from what the mind is). Before one starts “cleaning” the mind into what one thinks it “should be” one must realize that there is no separate “cleaner” or “changer” and that time is not a necessary factor. And the “should be” is a projection of the mind that may help create illusions of separation, such as (psychologically) the so-called separation between the “changer” and the “changed.” Thought takes time; thought is psychological time and is separative and fragmentary. A vast, whole, timeless intelligence does exist.

Covered in pollen… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2020
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Fundamentally Erroneous

June 16, 2020
31 comments

To be fundamentally wrong is one thing. But to be fundamentally erroneous with regard to the basic framework or essence of one’s whole psyche is extraordinarily significant. From the day that you were born, they coddled you with warm words that supported the imagery of a center… a central dominating “controller” that is at the core of consciousness dominating and running everything. However, as we’ve mentioned in past blogs, scientists have split the brain (via splitting the corpus callosum) and have created two separate fields of consciousness. The center is fictitious (yet everyone believes in it).

The repetitive operation of a fictitious center — that is not really central at all — creates much mischief; it is separative, illusory, fragmentary, and power-oriented; it depends upon separative borders; it creates a circumference around itself. It, additionally, is a waste of time and energy. Little wonder why there is so much human havoc in the world. We operate with distorted (mental) equipment. Most humans are “off the beam.” Look at the world around you. Look at the narcissistic, sociopathic leaders in America and the world.

How can stability and harmony deeply exist if the essence of consciousness is based on a false premise? We say things like, “I’m working at improving my memory.” You are your memory… and there is no you separate from memory (using it from a distance). Then we surmise that without a center, we will not be secure in eternity. On the contrary, it is the very clinging to a dominating, illusory center that negates the full and comprehensive understanding of beautiful eternity. Distortion cannot perceive the fundamental nature of eternity clearly.

Mr. Lightning Bug waiving Hello on the Fern Plant… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2020
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Eyes of Starry Nights

October 15, 2019
26 comments
 
 
 
Prepare the later afternoon of me myself—prepare my lengthen-
ing shadows,
Prepare my starry nights.   — Walt Whitman
 
 
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Being that
the perceiver is the perceived,
these soon to be starry nights
find themselves in your foreseeing eyes.
 
My long shadow and yours will coincide.
May we blend in a timeless wholeness
so very much vaster than mere ending
and so very truer than mere fragments.  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Grasshopper Shadow & Eyes … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019

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Meditation

October 11, 2019
20 comments

 

I’ve read statements by people, in blogs and elsewhere, where they say, for example, “I meditate for 20 minutes a day.”   

Please!

Meditation cannot be practiced.  It is a quietude of the mind that is not made by some projected image of a central controller.  There is no central controller, or “I,” or “me” that can cause meditation.  Meditation is not a mere sequential effect or event (in time) brought about by some predetermined cause (i.e., by some form of causality).  True meditation is timeless and is not what can occur by any methodology in (and “as”) psychological time.  If you think that you are causing so-called meditation to happen for a specified period of time (each day or whatever), it is —  unfortunately — a form of glorified self-hypnosis. 

Real meditation is not even what one can “know” is happening.  It is beyond the field of the known.  One can neither practice it nor know that it is happening… and that is its beauty.  But most people are so addicted to their need to categorize and “know” things that they feel frightened or insecure with not existing (mentally) as the known.  They perpetually cling to the apron-strings of the known.  They have to know that they are meditating or know that they are practicing meditation… all of which are not real meditation whatsoever. 

Or they say such things as, “Well I am working on perfecting my meditation,”… or “I am practicing my meditation more and more each day.”  Who (or what) is this so-called “I” that is supposedly doing such things?  Really, if we are at all honest, it is a protrusion of thought (i.e., an image created by thought) that takes credit for being a central controller or central (mental) orchestrator, of which it is (in actuality) neither.  Most people — plain and simply — are afraid to transcend the false sense of security that the primitive notion of a central “I” projects as.   However, a false (fabricated) central “I” that thinks it is meditating is neither meditating, nor an actuality, nor truly central.  (Past blogs that one has written explain this more; read them if confusion exists at this point.) 

Real meditation may occur when the mind, without effort, is aware beyond superficiality.  That means that it is not merely attached to the field of the known.   The known is always limited; it is grossly circumscribed.  Wisdom is meditation, a non-concocted quietness, which may happen throughout the day without deliberate intent.  Then, perhaps, what is eternal, sacred, unlimited, and beyond words may enter.  But it does not enter if false notions, false practices, and false images are perpetually clung to.   

Real meditation can be a blossoming of the mind.   But if you (metaphorically) cling to fake, fabricated flowers all of your life, nothing profound will happen.

 

The Beauty of Real (not fake) Flowers. … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
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My Visit with T.S.Eliot

March 1, 2019
21 comments

 

 

 

Let us go then, you and I,
Eliot said, and so we went,
After the cups, the marmalade, and tea,
Beyond the porcelain, beyond the talk of you and me,
When the evening was spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
We went, we went through certain half-deserted streets.
We went to the bright retreats that muttered endlessly.

Some overwhelming question always had to ask,
Though it didn’t have to ask, “What is it?”
We went along and made our visit.

And at the first turning of the second stair
We turned and saw below, not far from the rose garden,
A familiar shape twisted on the banister
Under the vapor in the fetid air
Struggling with the business fool of the stairs who ascends
The deceitful steps of hope and despair.

At the second turning of the second stair,
We left them twisting, turning below;
At the third turning of the third stair
We finally went past all of the melodious distraction,
Music of the flute, stops and steps
Of the mind over the third stair,
Fading, fading; wisdom beyond hope and despair
Climbing and being the third stair.

We were the stairs,
We were the shapes and distractions,
And at half-past one,
The street-lamp sputtered
The street-lamp muttered,
The street-lamp said, “Regard that woman
Who hesitates toward you in the light of the door
Which opens on her like a grin.”
My visit with Tom in the rose garden never came to an end.

 

 

Jumping Spider in the rose garden, near the door we never opened. Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019

 

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Enlightenment

February 15, 2019
42 comments

 

 

Wanting to become enlightened — to be in nirvana or satori or whatever it is — is a form of avaricious behavior that depends upon thought and psychological time.  Desire and thought create psychological time.  This time is always limited and based upon the past.  (We are referring to psychological time, not necessary physical/chronological time, here.)  In (and “as”) a person (often), there is a gulf (i.e., a chasm) — psychologically — between what one is and what one wants to become.   Most of us do not mind such a gulf/chasm to exist psychologically; we were brought up and educated (or miseducated) to accept such a gulf fundamentally.  We don’t see anything wrong with it.  We don’t (ever) question it.

Additionally, there is often a tremendous gulf or chasm between “what one considers oneself to be” and “other people” or “other organisms.”   Many people look with separation and see “their race” as better, “their culture” as better, “their family” as better, “their species” as far better,  and “their being” as much better.  Others are “at a distance” and they are separated from “oneself” by a gulf (a chasm), much like the chasm mentioned in the aforementioned paragraph.

You know, it is so easy to be duped.  It is so easy to be deceived and defrauded to think that one is rich in the things of life.  Fragmentation and psychological time are one hell of an illusion (wholly grasped by restricted minds).  Be careful and attentive. 

 

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[Note:  My wife, Marla, is doing better following her recent shoulder surgery; she, however, will still require further surgery on that shoulder.]  

 

 

Snow Crystals … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019

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The Story of Lo Zu and the Young Firefly

July 13, 2018
32 comments

 

A young student asked Lo Zu, “When a firefly is full of light, does that mean that it is undergoing satori or full enlightenment?”

“No,” the sage answered, “Fireflies groom themselves often, making themselves orderly and spotless, but that is not enough for them — insects who live with separateness and competition — to receive immeasurable enlightenment.”

“What will happen if I receive such enlightenment?” the lad asked.

Lo Zu then answered, “If the limitless, unadulterated energy of the cosmos visits you and flows through you,  you will look slightly physically different but you will not physically glow and, additionally, the fingers of the hands may contract (making it difficult to move), but usually that visitation occurs when one is alone and not among others.”

“I see,” said the student.

“After the visitation,” said Lo Zu, “you will look just like everyone else and, of course, the hands will easily move again; however, your mind will be much different.  You will be glowing on the inside and will have seen.”

“Seen what?” the young lad enquired.

“Seen what is unseeable; met what is indescribable,” said Lo Zu.

“Is it the sacred?” the young boy asked.

With a tear in his eye and a concomitant smile on his face, Lo Zu answered, “Perhaps!”

Then Lo Zu graciously remarked, “Listen, Firefly, surpass fireflyness.”

 

 

Firefly Grooming Itself… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018

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That Eternal Visitor

May 11, 2018
19 comments

 

 

It came when we weren’t expecting it to come
             beyond the moonlit glow
It came when we weren’t expecting it to come
             beyond the realm of know
It came when we weren’t expecting it to come
             such bliss energy and love
It came when we were not existing separately
             that eternal immeasurability from above

 

 

 

Budding Beginnings… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018

 

 

 

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Thinking and Harmony

March 25, 2018
20 comments

 

[To find great Turkey Tail fungi, one must go deep into the woods.  To really understand truth, one must go very deep.  With the later, most people are not passionate enough regarding going there; they, unfortunately, are too fixated merely within the well-trodden paths and routines.]

 

Thinking and complete harmony: can the two exist together (as one) or are they what cannot ever be united?   There is a type of harmony of thinking in poetry.  Likewise, there is a type of harmony, involving thinking, in songs and music.  A truly wise man’s words, of course, can reflect a holistic harmony (to a limited point) in a very possibly pertinent sense (if one is intelligent enough to perceive the depth that is there).  However, no words can ever come even a little bit close to reflecting the whole. 

The tool of thought/thinking can try to point to the whole, try to point to the immeasurable.  However, it may be that thought/thinking is not (and never will be) a integral part of the true whole.  What is virtual, what is fabricated, (what is spurious in essence) may think and insist in (and believe in) all kinds of sensible and nonsensical things… but it cannot ever be one with what is truly whole.  

A mind of inattention, of self-delusion — such as what most minds consist of — cannot decide when to meditate.  The sloppy mind, the mind of disorder, cannot decide to be what order is.  True meditation is not the absurd result of a concocted will; it is never the result of a traditional, bourgeois ego or of a learned (spurious) central-self. 

When healthy and necessary things need to be done prudently, compassionately, with care and consideration, thinking is oftentimes very beneficial.  Other than that, it is usually indicative of inattention and non-harmony.  For instance, if one is walking through a park and the mind is chattering away about all kinds of silly things (as so many brains incessantly and habitually do)… that “thinking” is indicative of inattention/non-harmony/unintelligence.  The fragmentary nature of thinking has, as its intrinsic value, incompleteness (which is incapable of total harmony on its own).  A vast amount of human thinking consists of inattention/incompleteness/unintelligence.  Throughout the day, thinking — which is, more times than not, superfluous — is often a very good indicator that inattention and incompleteness are taking place.  If any movement of thinking, no matter what it is, is incapable of that immense intelligence beyond mere fragmentation, then any movement of thinking, no matter what it is, is indicative that holistic completeness is not taking place.  Though it might sound silly, “thinking per se” (in a very wise mind, throughout each and every day) can be an excellent gauge or indicator of incompleteness/non-harmony.  Thought (no matter what it is or consists of) can never really adequately point to the whole… because thought is limited, fragmentary, with a profound essence of delusion and disorder.   Additionally, the whole is not composed of united fragments… (fragments that the distorted mind has accepted at legitimate); the whole is not the mere opposite of any fragments.  For the whole to occur within the human organism, there can be no fragments.  Illusory fragments within the mind, however, do not prevent the whole from existing; illusory fragments are virtual (i.e., unreal) and the unreal doesn’t supersede truth in any real sense whatsoever.  

From old Confucius:    

“When the wise man points at the moon, the one who is unwise remains with the finger.”

 

The following is an excerpt from the poetry of R.D.Laing (whom one read way back in 1972)…I was appreciative of the poetry of Laing’s Knots but never read (or cared to read) anything else by him.  

 

A finger points to the moon

 

Put the expression

a finger points to the moon in brackets

(a finger points to the moon)

The statement:

‘A finger points to the moon is in brackets’

is an attempt to say that all that is in the bracket

(…………………………………………………………………… )

is, as to that which is not in the bracket,

what a finger is to the moon

 

Put all possible expressions in brackets

Put all possible forms in brackets

and put the brackets in brackets

 

Every expression, and every form,

is to what is expressionless and formless

what a finger is to the moon

all expressions and all forms

point to the expressionless and formless

 

the proposition

‘All forms point to the formless’

is itself a formal proposition

 

Not,

…….as finger to moon

…….so form to formless

but,

…….as finger is to moon

…….so

………….[all possible expressions, forms, propositions,

………….including this one, made or yet to be made,

………….together with the brackets]

…….to

 

What an interesting finger

let me suck it

 

It’s not an interesting finger

take it away

 

The statement is pointless

The finger is speechless

 

 

Turkey Tails (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018

Turkey Tails (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018

 

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Awareness

March 18, 2018
10 comments

 

 

‘Aware,’ in the dictionary, is defined as ‘having knowledge,’ or ‘well-informed.’   A mind that is aware just in terms of the dictionary’s definitions of awareness, is a rather mechanical, robotic mind (of which there are, unfortunately, plenty).  Awareness is so much more.  Awareness that exists within the superficial limitations of knowledge is a confined and reaction-oriented, mechanistic kind of consciousness.  Fortunately, there is an awareness that goes far beyond the realm of knowledge and memory retention.

When one was in the fourth grade, one partook in an awareness that was not merely within the realm of knowledge and thinking.  It was an awareness beyond thought.  It happened spontaneously, without one ever being told about letting or making such a thing happen.  At the time, one immediately understood that it was something entirely different than normal (everyday) consciousness; one realized that it was something very special.  It, way back then, seemed rather instantaneous and did not seem to require time.  (One, back then, didn’t label it as anything because it didn’t require a label; really, it is beyond all labels anyway.)  Now, years later, at the age of 66, one is still very appreciative of it.  “Thinking,” indeed, takes time; “thinking” is sequential and is a series of conditioned responses.  “Thinking” is involved with information collection and information processing; thinking depends upon psychological time.  The other, that awareness, was (though rather indefinable) more about aliveness and holistic perception beyond limited boundaries.

The awareness that is beyond mere thinking is involved with sensitivity and understanding.  It is not aloofness (that so many, unfortunately, have); it is not indifference (that so many, unfortunately, have); it goes beyond the formulations and molds (of the past) that have structured the endless reactions of man.   A mind without such awareness is trapped in the virtual realm of thought/thinking, endlessly reacting somewhat like a programmed robot, endlessly seeing through preconceptions and presuppositions (which isn’t really seeing whatsoever).  A mind that merely recognizes according to what it has been taught is a very secondhand, automaton-like mind.

It is very simple, really.  To see the unlimited, the whole, the mind cannot merely remain in (and as) the limited.  The limited mind cannot, under any circumstances, make itself be beyond the limited.  Effort and will have nothing to do with it.  Effort and will are within the realm of thinking and sequential memory; besides, will is a fallacious supposition based on a fictitious (but highly “believed in”) center or controller.  (As was pointed out in previous postings, human brains have been surgically divided in living human subjects, leaving two separate — viable — fields of consciousness within one braincase.)  The sacred, despite what a lot of very self-deceitful and guileful people claim, may not at all be what thought/thinking can summon or conjure up.  The sacred is not what thought (which is virtual and limited) can ever grasp.  Thought/thinking — and all misconceptions about a “controlling center” or of a “‘me’ manipulating thoughts from a distance” — must come to an end for that sacred immeasurability and impersonal intelligence to be.  In fact, when it visits, it makes thinking extremely difficult and rather impossible… much like when the light of the brightest sun annihilates all dark shadows; other physical changes to the body also occur for a while, among other things… but don’t just take my word for it.  The sacred and what is secondhand and virtual do not meet and will not ever meet (or combine).  Those charlatans who claim that their thoughts, manmade temples, secondhand methods, and mantras (or any thoughts, writings, or sayings) are sacred… are full of drivel.

Beyond categorization, beyond mere recognition and reaction (such as what ideas are) there is a deep, immeasurable dimension (that is not a mere dimension).  It will not and cannot ever meet with what is false; the false must die for it to be; such psychological dying is real living.  It is not a mere fabrication of the brain.  Awareness includes compassion, sensitivity, real curiosity, love, caring, and perception beyond the secondhand garbage that people so easily swallow.

 

 

 

Crab Spider on Lichen (1)
Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018

 

Crab Spider on Lichen (2)
Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018

 

 

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Distorted Mirror Distorted Mind

March 11, 2018
11 comments

 

A perfect mirror has no distortion.  It shows what is really there.  Can the mind be like that?

A distorted mirror, just like a distorted mind, twists things around such that reality seems askew and misrepresentation and untruth run dominant.  Fortunately, most people realize what the situation actually is when they are gazing into an intentionally distorted (circus) mirror.  Unfortunately, many people perceive via minds that are of distortion, deception, and perversion, yet they continue to think that they see things rightly.  Many of us put up a facade, for others to perceive, of what we want them to think we really are.  Many of us deceive not only others… but ourselves.  Society tends to instill various forms of distortion into the minds that partake in its offerings, and such minds then zealously accept such distortions and falsities as the truth.

Many people are overly concerned about how they (physically) appear to others.  Few people are prudently concerned about perceiving themselves as they actually are… internally, without any distortion whatsoever.  A mind that is passionate about going beyond distortion is a very scientific and spiritual mind.  It seems that very few have actually done it (i.e., gone beyond distortion) to any very significant extent. (There are ways to test this out, for accuracy; however, we will not go into that here.)  Great clarity and immense understanding are needed to see the whole.  Most, unfortunately, still function with (and “as”) symbols and fragmentary parts.  If the tools and the processes of the mind are distorted and partial, then the outcome — the results — will be equally askew, equally incomplete.  Before we accept and cherish methods to get out of this distortion, we should question whether they are possibly an extension or continuity of the same-old fallacies, which most are.

Without method, without depending upon the process of psychological time, is it possible for the mind to observe without merely utilizing the past tools (of symbolic thinking, abstraction, analysis, and image-building)?  Can the mind perceive without always carrying the burden of past formulations?  It may be the influential formulations of the past that prevent pristine perception.  We can be choicelessly observing with an intense awareness that includes all of the senses working harmoniously together as a whole, without limited thoughts always interfering… (and all thoughts are limited).

A mind that goes beyond distortion sees deeply.  Such depth goes far beyond the ordinary, far beyond the mundane.  Many cling (knowingly or unknowingly) to the ordinary, yet wish to experience what is beyond the ordinary.  What is truly beyond the ordinary may not at all be what can be categorized or placed into the realm of “experience.”  If an experience is recognized (as most are), it usually consists (more or less) of a rather mundane occurrence that the brain “recertifies,” “acknowledges,” and “classifies” via (and according to) prior memory images, prior mental retentions, and symbols.  Recognition and the reaction to things have their place, but so does an unadulterated awareness beyond mere reaction and conditioned responses.  Full enlightenment/satori — should it ever occur as a blessed visitation by that ineffable, holistic energy to a human being — may be far too immense for any kind of full mental grasping, retention, or remembrance (by the brain) to take place.  However, should it actually happen — and don’t be foolish enough to crave what you suspect that it might be — the brain will have recalled small snippets of that profound event, though what is retained is rather like mere shadows of the actual occurrence.  Great wisdom, unlike distortion, never needs to ask about whether the sacred truly exists.

 

 

 

Polished Jurassic Dinosaur Bone, with crystal fortification, from Utah (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018

Polished Jurassic Dinosaur Bone, with crystal fortification, from Utah (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018

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Appearance matters…

May 14, 2017
14 comments

 

Appearance matters.  However, what is much deeper matters much more.  To look elegant and spectacular on the outside, yet to have an inside that is corrupt, uncaring, tainted, depressed, and disorderly… is a bit of a sorry waste.  Many wear fancy suits and ties or fashionable dresses that look sensational; however, sensations are one thing, real order and profundity are another.  To have a marvelous house, an impeccable lawn, a stunning car, and name-brand clothes is one thing;  to be internally rich, orderly, caring, perceptive, and sagacious… is another.  Most of us were groomed and tutored to chase after — and care about — the outward things.  Most were not deeply encouraged to care about the inward things.

Though many have riches, possessions, and fancy clothes, a huge number of them are not beaming with ongoing joy and compassion.  It may be that real richness, in life, has little to do with possessions and things; rather, it involves order beyond separation, accumulation, groping, and mere desire.  A profound, inward order cannot occur when the mind merely falls for outward appearances and ordinary values.  The real treasure is not out there “to get”; distance and time have nothing to do with it.  Why have so many of us depended, so heavily, on distance and time?  At the precise moment that the mind seeks pleasure… joy is gone.  We are not suggesting that one should not do pleasurable things now and then;  just don’t get mesmerized by a pursuit that may often not be necessary at all.

With the real ending of distance and separation — not the mere abstraction of an ending or intellectualization about ending — joy is blossoming, compassion is blossoming.  Then there is no striving for superficial things.  Depth does not cling to superficiality.  To see this, one must perceive beyond the surface.

 

Just beeing (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Just beeing (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

 

 

 

 

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A mind that is endlessly groping is of a certain kind of internal poverty…

April 30, 2017
14 comments

 

A mind that is not constantly groping may be a deeply profound mind, a sapient mind, not merely a mind that is lazy or unproductive.  Most of us pursue more and more entertaining experiences, more and more sensational things to see or partake in.  It’s our habit.  Once something is experienced, we usually then (eventually) get bored with it to one extent or another, and then want different experiences… further things to experience.  Few of us ever delve into this whole process and examine it deeply.  We were, for the most part, educated to strive for things the way we do, and we take for granted that that is the way everyone functions as.  

Of course, it is healthy and prudent to investigate into things, to have some interesting hobbies and interests to explore.  Few of us, however, perceive the wisdom that involves — in addition to striving and exploring — perceiving beyond mere experiencing and mental-cataloguing.  When he (or she) who is “experiencing” realizes that he (or she) is not really separate from the experiences… then a different kind of intelligence may be functioning.  That lack of separation may also involve, in a very sagacious mind, the cessation of time… (since it takes time to merely continue seeing things via separative psychological processes).  Psychological distance, for so many — such as between an ego and an object — involves psychological time… such as the time it takes to label or mentally categorize (i.e., recognize) an object from a so-called center, the time it takes to crave a certain ability, the time it takes to deal with (or come to terms with) a certain fear, or the time it takes to crave a certain pleasurable experience.   A mind that understands directly, without internally fabricated separation, is beyond these internal, contradictory sequences and, hence, is not merely involved in fragmentary, psychological time.  Ordinary psychological time always involves separative, fragmentary, mental constructs (that often grope, avoid, judge, resist, and pigeonhole).  A wise mind goes beyond these separative elements (internally) and often is beyond mere “reactions” and conditioned responses.  In such a mind, there is not always mere striving for more and more experiences, amusements, or entertainment; such a mind, being beyond mere separation and groping (which take time), may be what real bliss is.  This bliss has nothing to do with achievement, categorization, gain, or recognition.   

For so many, experience is like a carrot hanging by a string, attached to a pole; and the donkey endlessly keeps going after the carrot.  However, the donkey never perceives that the pole is attached to the donkey — that there is no real separation there — and that the donkey and the carrot are not separate whatsoever.  Groping and experience are splendid, at times, but so is not groping and not being a mere puppet to endless experience.  So many of us, though, are so immersed in the habit of experiencing and groping… that we are at a loss for existing as anything else.

Resting (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Resting (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

 

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You can’t be one with Everything if you are a greedy, old image…

April 2, 2017
9 comments

 

Integrity, in the dictionary, means wholeness, soundness.  Wholeness is being complete.  Wholeness is not one fragmentary image involved with thinking that it is related to other fragmentary images.  A fragmentary image that maintains, with a series of ideas and imagery, that it is “one” with other fragmentary images (that it sees out there) is merely deluding itself… and is still reinforcing fragmentation.  Wholeness is absolute.  One definition for absolute, in the dictionary, is “unconditional.”  Though the truly sacred is what cannot ever be thoroughly defined by limited words, it is — nevertheless, for what we must use here to communicate — inherently unconditional.  All words are symbolic and limited, and there is a supreme sacredness beyond all words, beyond all man-made, clever attempts at silence, beyond all the divisive religions that separate man (and lead to war).

Its unconditional beauty is beyond the limited patterns and clockwork paradigms of this universe.  Few are ever visited by it, for it is not what inhabits separation, fear, jealousy, indifference, and falsities.  A practiced or calculated silence designed to “get it” will only manifest false, self-created manifestations, not that profundity. The conditioned — no matter what technique is used, no matter what expert is followed — will never bring about the unconditioned.  Conditioning must end (through uncharted, non-concocted understanding and natural self -awareness), and not “to get something.”  Sitting cross-legged (with your eyes shut) in order to achieve something “special” merely reinforces acquisition and the greed of the self.  If observing takes place naturally, quietly, without always trying to achieve, without learned separation and abstractions, without merely always groping to get… then, perhaps, that sacred, eternal movement may explode through the organism; if not, it simply doesn’t.  One must be indifferent about whether or not it comes; that can only take place if the mind is whole and sound… (and that timelessness, that sacredness need not appear just because the mind is whole and sound).  The ending of conditioning occurs when awareness exists beyond mere acquisition, beyond mere symbolism, beyond limitation, and beyond the mere glorification of a fallacious, psychological center.  The repetitious notion of a controlling center is a misrepresentation, and is a furthering of the conditioning actually taking place; it is an extension of erroneous conditioning.  Few of us realize about the real joy of psychologically dying to an inner psychological center, to inner psychological greed; the image of a central controller (i.e., a central boss that dominates) is a big part of (primitive, inelegant) greed.  Going beyond that is real wisdom and joy.  Such joy is bliss without motive… and it is not a mere result… is not a mere reaction.

Vertical Climbing (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Vertical Climbing (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Vertical Climbing (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Vertical Climbing (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

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Can one decide to meditate?…

March 19, 2017
21 comments

 

One has read blogs (recently) wherein those composing them write about meditation as if it is something that one can make one’s mind do… as if one can decide to do it (like turning a light switch on or off).   Real meditation is not what one can decide to do.  The accumulation of knowledge, as the past, cannot (under any circumstances) decide to be what it is not.  Any planned or deliberate meditation is not real meditation.  Charlatans abound, however, who are all too willing to tell you how to meditate.   (It must be very easy to mesmerize yourself, in a rather self-hypnotic way, and then be all too willing to encourage others to do the same with themselves.)  There is no “how” to real meditation.  If it takes place, it is like a sudden spontaneous silence or quietude that was not (in any way) preplanned and brought about by a mental blueprint or calculated procedure.  It may happen when one is walking through a wooded area, or when moving occurs from one room to another, or when sitting (without motive) takes place for a while on the back porch steps.  When a bundle of memories, as the accumulated past — called thinking — decide to meditate, what they strive for is loaded with reactions of motive and acquisition.  Whatever they reacted to become is an obtrusion of thought that projects with — and reinforces — a learned reaction constituting an image of “me” or “I,” which is itself another extension of thought/thinking.  Deciding to sit down and meditate (for any motive), via a learned procedure, merely strengthens the fallacious “I” and its supposed ability (which it really does not have) to alter consciousness to a true and profound silence.  The known cannot decide to be the unknown.  Conditioned reactions, even sophisticated ones, cannot decide to be the unconditioned.

Awareness can — without the separative nonsense of an “I” apart from and controlling “its” thoughts — function with thinking, and if intelligence functions without calculated, separative psychological nonsense, then perhaps real meditation, without effort, may actually (naturally) occur.  However, one cannot decide to meditate any more than one can decide to have — or be — an insight.  Neither can one decide to be what humility is.

Another thing that people have been posting about is how they are so sure that everything in their world will turn out to be rosy and wonderful.  Fanciful ideas!   Because of underlying fears, many have an indoctrinated belief (either on the surface or deeper in their psychological unconscious) that a deity somehow is benevolently pulling the strings for things that go on in their world.   Their security blankets, born out of fear (stemming from thinking and psychological time), are their beliefs.  Fear, in people, is often buried in the hideaway of concocted belief.  These beliefs, unfortunately, often encourage waiting for some future after-death utopia or some external power (to make things better in time).  I am suggesting that we grow up (from those blankets), face the fears without separation, and not presume that God created this universe (and continues to manipulate it); (one is not suggesting that the sacred does not exist… on the contrary!).  Additionally, if you actually want real security, perceive (without mere imagery) what is actually taking place, and act (don’t merely react) with intelligence and care.   Perhaps you could write (like i have done many times) to governments, asking them to curtail nuclear armaments, fossil- fuels, and wars.  Do environmentally friendly things, join the Sierra Club (or other such environmental groups), work for a more peaceful, environmentally cleaner world, do more and more green things, actually help life, and then maybe things will be truly wonderful.

Only in pairs (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Only in pairs (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Only in pairs (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Only in pairs (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

 

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We need to evolve beyond having “leaders”…

March 17, 2017
1 comment

 

Look what having leaders has gotten us so far!

***********************************************************

 

 

At the forefront of all the political drivel

            kingsize greed and the lust for power

            reigned supreme

 

While(elsewhere beyond “will be”)supple intelligence 

            innocently perceives without the cadaverous trappings

            of frigid and oblivious experience

 

The more one gropes for it,the more it eludes

            and our complex and fearless leaders(full of fear)

            are too disconnected to simply see it

Ice cold bureaucrats (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Ice cold bureaucrats (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

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Awareness beyond the “me and mine”…

February 26, 2017
6 comments

 

In real mindfulness, in profound awareness, there is an eternal simplicity (i.e., an uncomplicated movement) beyond excessive and needless mental ornamentation.  Then there is not a separate watcher apart from the observed… perceiving from a so-called center.  In profound awareness, there is no separate center that is perceiving thoughts or emotions that “it has.”  One is the thought or thoughts (or emotions) as they occur; the idea that something separate “has” them is just another pattern of thought (that is primitive and fictional).  That so-called center, invented by the other thoughts, is not only unnecessary… it is what leads to needless conflict, friction, and separation in (and “as”) the mind.  This internal friction then extends out into society.  Awareness of the illusory self need not take place if there is no projected, illusory self.  In profound awareness, one cannot “know” that one is deeply aware, nor does one care to; profound awareness exists beyond mere measurement (and that is part of its beauty).

When the real beauty of awareness exists beyond all of the unnecessary complexities and friction, then needless patterns (of thinking) do not take place.  Such an occurrence is not a lack of intelligence; on the contrary, it is supreme intelligence (that goes beyond repetitive, second-hand reactions).  Without effort, awareness beyond all of the superfluous patterns goes beyond mere disorder, mundane experience, and recognition.  A learned, isolated, fallacious center would be incapable of understanding the depth of what the aforementioned sentence means.

Winged (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Winged (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Winged (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Winged (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

 

 

 

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It May Be Wise To Be Different

February 12, 2017
17 comments

 

True and profound insight is like a rare jewel that very few ever partake in within (and “as”) life.  Profound insight is not what someone can merely — through effort — acquire or obtain.  Insight is not like a materialistic possession; one cannot merely “have it”; one cannot merely decide to “get it.”  It would be erroneous, for example, to say that “I have an insight.”  Profound insight, besides not merely being what one can possess… is beyond the limitation of a fragmented, so-called central “I” or controller.  The so-called central regulatory agent may think it has something… but what it has will not likely be profound insight.  Real insight may come when the mind is intelligently empty (and not merely filled with the crass, fragmentary patterns of others). 

Unfortunately, profound insight eludes most minds.  The fact that most minds operate via fractional conflict, a fallacious (isolated) center, and operate via mostly mere details and function (with and “as”) separative patterns, has a lot to do with this.  Correct education can help us to go beyond our limited ways.  Before that can happen, educators themselves must change positively.

No doubt, most people who read this blog posting will merely reduce insight into an abstraction, to another idea.  However, doing so is like never having the passion to really look at nature; it’s like going through life with an empty heart… never really feeling.  

It may be wise to be different. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

It may be wise to be different. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

It may be wise to be different. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

It may be wise to be different. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

 

 

 

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Beyond the ego…

January 8, 2017
9 comments

 

A mind without that false center — without that fictitious, dominating middle point — is (unlike most) highly aware and perceptive.  There is, in such a person, no psychological radius from a center to a periphery.  Most people cling to a fictitious center in one form or another.  There is limited space — in such a mind — between the so-called controller (or center) and what it presumably controls.  If the central controller is (in fact) just an image, which it is, then it is just another one of the thoughts and is not something that is purely genuine or real.  (Do not make the mistake of becoming depressed regarding this; eternity and beauty can still exist for us, without the interference of fallacious centers.)

Oftentimes, when people think, they think in auditory terms which simulate their own (individual) voice (when talking).  This internal (psychological/rather parasitic) voice mimics one’s actual speaking voice.  It (one’s thinking) isn’t an actual voice; it is a copied template… a simulation.  These simulations and their associated images presume (because of what they were taught) that they are being controlled by a legitimate center.  This center, as was suggested, is another one of the manufactured images.  The mind can function much better without the manufactured image of a center or central regulator.  

Real (fundamental) compassion doesn’t often take place when a fictitious center sees others through (and from) a radius of distance and separation.  A man or a woman without such a fictitious center exists beyond such a radius; then real compassion often manifests.  Order of the mind does not exist as long as a fictitious center exists.  Such a so-called center is associated with a false sense of control and dominance.  A false psychological distance is involved with such a mind.  False psychological distance often means that one’s relationship to fears, desires, plants, animals, people, and sensations is of conflict born out of fallacious separation.  Fallacious separation is not of intelligent compassion… is not what will bring about real order and harmony in the world.

[Note:   This little green plant was discovered growing — in the cold, snowy winter weather — within a small, lawn (crystal ball) solar light in our yard!   All of the other outdoor green plants had already died from the bitter cold, but this one was still going strong in its little makeshift greenhouse!  Nature always finds a way!  🙂   ]

Green plant growing in lawn solar light! Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

Green plant growing in lawn solar light! Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017

 

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Pristine Order

December 23, 2016
4 comments

 

When pristine order

            spreads out to apparently be disorder

well,we’ll be in the disorder then

            even though the spreading out

really is not separation

 

When the winged bird 

            spreads her wing feathers

well,we’ll be the flying then

            even though the wing feathers

do not dwell as separation

 

When the present time

            spreads out to apparently become the future

well,we’ll be the movement then

            even though the past and future

do not dwell as separation

**********************************************************

[Note:  We need to look at existence in totally new ways, ways that are intelligent (and no longer primitive) and that reflect real discoveries about reality and time.  Time is not what we have preassumed it to be.  One, personally, has realized this stuff decades ago.  This, spiritually and philosophically, has very deep implications.  It may very well be that the past is not just gone or that the future does not yet exist.  Take the time to watch the video that is at the bottom section of this posting (following my photos), please.  Additionally, there is a fuller version of this documentary; go to YouTube, and look up “The Illusion of Time, Full Documentary.”]

Well, we'll be the flying then (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Well, we’ll be the flying then (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Well,we'll be the flying then (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Well,we’ll be the flying then (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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In the Pursuit of Color

December 2, 2016
15 comments

 

In the pursuit of color

               levelheaded snapshots happened twice

at the heartflower of everything

               feathered sirens sang their song

 

Simply sweet as nature’s grace

               they nurture beauty and joy

far from apathy and indifference

               implicit order moves along

 

Not overwrought with stilted lies

               but beyond the obtuse pool

lone in the plush prairie preludes

               pristine charm transcends war

 

Here as there is nowhere

               beyond cold space’s creed

just as now always was

               the flower’s passage widens perceive   

The Flower's Passage (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

The Flower’s Passage (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

The Flower's Passage (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

The Flower’s Passage (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

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Timelessness Revisited

November 27, 2016
13 comments

 

I’ve written about timelessness in the past.  Some people, one has noticed, have mistakenly abstracted that “timelessness” to be a static thing… an inert thing.  On the contrary, the beauty of timelessness is not of the lifeless, the dormant, nor the comatose.  Stagnant minds — as so many, unfortunately, are — cannot be in a relationship with it.  It is too dynamic, too alive and energetic to be in direct relationship with the listless, cold, and lackadaisical.

Most of us never question things deeply and intelligently.  Most of us never wonder about whether or not existing in (and “as”) patterns (and experiences, which depend on mere patterns) is the only way in which to go through life.  Our religions, our politics, our everyday mundane routines in life are all based upon patterns and sequential cause and effect paradigms.  Need one just be that?  (If so, is one then merely a series of reactions?  Merely existing as a series of reactions may be what stagnation is… may be what a kind of death is.)  Most never ask about this.  Most never go beyond the limited domain that was handed over to them.  It’s like a fish bowl in the vast ocean… and the fish (within) never (ever) going beyond the confines of the bowl.  That bowl, that we have accepted and remain in so diligently, is limited, is confinement.  That limited bowl, for humans (who evolved from fish, by the way), consists of thought, fragmentary reactions, and conditioning. If you wish, stay there.  

All of the isolated governments, all of the standard, separate religions and traditions of the world keep you there, in what is limited.  Going beyond the limited doesn’t take time.  However, they’ll be more than happy to give you oodles of methodologies (that take time).   

Antennae on the lookout! (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Antennae on the lookout! (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Antennae on the lookout! (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Antennae on the lookout! (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Poem That May Not Be About a Rose…

November 18, 2016
13 comments

 

Within life’s is(this immortal love

                    shouldn’t have been)but joyfully was

beyond barbarism’s wretched hoopla

                    between time’s gobbledygook of because

 

Not shoddy(jaded)mentally faded

                    ifs chattering through imaginable maybes

Not ordinarily common in obdurate rigidity

                    witless whens and wishwashy crazies

 

Not apathetically apart from pristine forever’s nows

                    Not merely immersed in cool November’s leafy falling

though blind gravity pulls the weeping rain down

                    pompous and proud in its feigned bawling

 

Raindrops keep fallin' on my head... (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Raindrops keep fallin’ on my head… (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Raindrops keep fallin' on my head... (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Raindrops keep fallin’ on my head… (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

 

 

 

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It’s not something that can merely be attained…

November 13, 2016
25 comments

 

If you are truly innocent and perceptive (without motive), the mystery of the universe will come to you (and pursue you)… you won’t have to seek it.  Many others, out of boredom, out of groping for more, come up with methodologies for coming to the sacred.  Unfortunately, their mechanical blueprints, their dead systems, their fallacious fantasies, make an impression on others… and more and more mischief and nonsense ends up getting hammered into others.  

Having a humble, quiet mind is beneficial, as it enables perception to occur without being jaded and tainted by the fabrications of others.  However, unlike what many believe, a quiet mind does not bring about that which is sacred and illimitable.  That illimitability is far too dynamic to merely be brought about by way of silence (or by way of anything else).  A quiet mind is important, but no petty actions, inactions, reactions, methodologies, systems, absurd prayers or incantations, practices, or fabricated schemes can conjure it up.  Yet, it may visit a mind that is orderly, sane, innocent, living, and whole. 

Beware of those who tell you exactly how to find it or who write or talk about their struggle to come upon it.  It may not be a product of any methodology; it may not involve struggle or effort whatsoever.   Order of the mind is not a mere calculated product; it is a living, profound thing.  An orderly, living mind is not the result of some concoction or blueprint.  The result of some dead blueprint or mold is not living.  Any purposeful meditation generated or fashioned intentionally by the mind… is not meditation whatsoever.

Jumping Jack Flash (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Jumping Jack Flash (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Jumping Jack Flash (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Jumping Jack Flash (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Story Time… Koan Time…

November 11, 2016
16 comments

 

An enlightened man — one of only a few in this

particular solar system —

walked across the street.

He didn’t particularly care much for the pavement;

it was hardened, callous (like many, uncaring people),

and it covered a place where there used to be

lush, living things of great (soft) beauty.

There was awareness of the distant, oncoming traffic, but

unnecessary thoughts were (intelligently) not there;

there was no center, no authority to

merely see with (and “as”) separation.

As the street was being crossed, a wren came flying by.

Awareness was that little wren… not something separate from it,

(not something seeing it as being separate).

After the crossing of the street, a few steps were climbed.

As the steps were climbed, a curious squirrel was seen in a tree.

Curiously, that beautiful squirrel climbed the steps,

though it never left the tree.

What U R 2. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

What U R 2. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

What U R 2. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

What U R 2. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Go Beyond most people

November 6, 2016
27 comments

 

Thought and thinking, though very useful at times, is a form of resistance.  Thought originated, in mobile creatures, such as invertebrate and vertebrate animals, in order to acquire and manipulate… and in order to struggle against and contend with (or dominate) other organisms.  Most people, having evolved from (and “as”) the aforementioned developments, would tend to think that it is errant and reprehensible to suggest that one move beyond thoughts and thinking.  When immersed in the framework and network of thought, it — for most, unfortunately — seems ludicrous to deeply consider going beyond that realm (that actually is what they exist as).  In Socrates’ Parable of the Cave, those who believed in shadows and who took shadows to be reality — thereby existing as shadows — scoffed at those few who suggested perceiving beyond the shadows.

Most people are rigidly set in their ways; they will cling to these ways, in comfort, without question.  They exist in (and “as”) fractional, symbolic thoughts and mental constructs.   However, when you fervently accept limited ways, without question, you are what limitation actually is; you are of blockage and restriction… not something separate.  The wise man (or woman) conversely, has perceptual range.  In perceptual range is liberation, real freedom (not the phony, orchestrated appearance of freedom that so many cling to and think that they enjoy).  The wise mind transcends boundaries; in doing so, mental constraints vanish, separation and hate end, confines of thought’s images disappear, and even the limitless may magically happen.  When boundaries are truly transcended, one goes beyond mere robotic reactions (and all reactions are intrinsically robotic).  Our reactions and inherited beliefs — which occur as conditioned responses — are what separates us, what divides us.  In going beyond them, one is no longer of the fractional, conditioned ways that divide people; then one is global; then one is truly universal.  Such a universal individual doesn’t merely belong to little, separative races, regions, or any one country; such a universal person doesn’t belong to one of the many fragmentary religions that separate people.   Most people do not want to go beyond their inherited and accumulated beliefs; they would much rather cling to and fight over the reactions that they have absorbed from others.  We can live in peace and harmony if we (worldwide) go beyond inherited beliefs and fabricated boundaries; however, many do not care about doing that.   Beliefs (and primitive, separative identifications), for many, are more important than actual peace.  In the light of perception, one stops fighting over mere shadows; for that to happen, one must see the shadows as shadows and transcend beyond them; or you can see what was promised in (and by) the shadows by others… and live in (and “as”) the shadows forever… forever clinging to them and forever fighting over them.  However, is that really seeing?

Emergence beyond patterns (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Emergence beyond patterns (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

Emergence beyond patterns (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Emergence beyond patterns (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

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Mental Residence…

October 30, 2016
25 comments

 

Do you take up residence in the antiquated, fabricated, and absorbed patterns of man?  Or are you sagaciously swifter and more dynamically prudent than that, where they can’t (no matter how hard they look, with their old-fangled ways) ever find you?  Though it’s really not a mere place, are you where they can’t ever know you?  Concrete images of self are much of what they cadaverously exist as.  Concrete images of self are what they taught you to absorb, and such images and devised schemes of inner dominancy are petrified and calcified.  The solidified, isolated center of inner self-ish-ness (which really isn’t a center at all) is endorsed and condoned by ruthless others (who, themselves, absorbed from conditioned others).  To go beyond conditioned ways, significantly, requires that the mind shed its primitive caterpillar/chrysalis ways and, instead,  soar (as a fresh butterfly) free from all the inertness.

The beautiful butterflies and the colorful flowers of this marvelous earth are not separate things.  Please don’t merely yank the flowers out of the soil and shove them in cold vases; please look at them where they grow (and connect with them).  Please don’t net radiant butterflies and coldly stick them in framed wall-display-mounts; please enjoy them as they vibrantly fly (and please soar higher too).  Please don’t try to isolate yourself in a dark, dead little corner (of self, of “me”) and think that you are somehow separate from (and different from) the living whole.  Please blossom and open up your wings beyond mere stagnant (enclosed) ways.

We are each other (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

We are each other (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

We are each other (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

We are each other (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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That Nameless, Eternal Immensity…

October 9, 2016
17 comments

 

That nameless, eternal immensity that is beyond mere labels and symbolic words, rarely presents itself to humans.  Too many of us are of violence, separation, distortion, and fallacies to be open to visitation from that enormity.  Our psychological demarcations, which promote false, separative, supposedly dominant centers (i.e., the many obtrusions of “me” and “I”), tend to nullify any possibility for that boundlessness to be revealed.  Mental superficiality and illusion negate clear perception.  A false center builds a wall around itself and there is nothing much seen beyond the limited confines of that wall.  Too many of us have accepted limited viewpoints, patterns, boundaries, and methodologies… and to those we cling.  Fortunately, it is beautifully possible to emerge through the rigidities of miseducation and stiff falsities.

Fruiting Bodies (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Fruiting Bodies (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Fruiting Bodies (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Fruiting Bodies (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

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Beyond the Sedentary Way

September 30, 2016
20 comments

 

Wonderfully then

                    came upon now

beyond images of “I”

                    beyond everything anyhow

 

Magically beyond wish

                    floated limitless dying

finishing dead symbols

                    in an alive not just trying

 

Sweetly far from measure

                    burst a timeless moving

not of stale thoughts

                    not of physic’s proving

 

Beyond the Sedentary Way. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Beyond the Sedentary Way. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Beyond the Sedentary Way. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Beyond the Sedentary Way. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

 

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Holistic Mindfulness and Meditation

September 18, 2016
42 comments

***********  This writer would just like to say, “thank you!” to those of you who have been liking and/or commenting on my posts, while being open-minded about it.  Of course, to go beyond the superficial, one goes beyond my photos; we are well aware that many are merely satisfied with the photos; it’s not (fortunately) just about the photos.  A lot of what is written here, we know, is way beyond the norm; thank goodness for that!  Many of the best scientists have said that reality is likely way different than what we have been lead to believe up to this point… way different than what we can imagine.  (That is for sure!)  I am very appreciative of those of you who stick with this and continue to read, even though, at times, it must be very difficult to swallow or stomach.  I’ve always deeply cared about the truth, no matter how uncomfortable the answers may be, no matter what was revealed.  Those who do the same, this movement deeply admires.  (Truth is beautiful, and there are real treasures if one is open, independent, passionate, honest, and not afraid to go beyond the primitive, antiquated ways.)  Too many of us are like clay that (over time) hardens after it has been molded by (equally desiccated) others.  *************

Thinking — as a process — is fractional and sequential.  Thinking involves a sequential series of patterns; these patterns are always symbolic, limited, and (unless rare insight occurs, influencing them) merely dependent on banal, past memories and ordinary experiences.  Patterns, in a sequence, constitute time; thinking and time are not two separate things.  Experiencing, in most minds, is dictated — as to how it takes place and manifests — by implanted, past memories.  When, as it does with most people, a learned and supposed static self-image seems to be claiming (from a supposed psychological distance) to have control and be dominant over moving, rearranging, sequential, symbolic thought-patterns that thought/thinking considers such a self-center to have power over via managing and authoritatively manipulating… deception takes place.  If the supposed central image is not — in reality — central at all, and if it is merely another one of the images (which it is), then things are not as they appear and there must be a significant paradigm shift; otherwise, all kinds of misbehavior and distortion occurs.

A dominating center that — in reality — is not truly dominating and not, in any way, central… creates a tremendous amount of havoc for the (unfortunate) mind miseducated to contain (and “be”) such an array.  The havoc involved manifests as needless inner friction, inner conflict, fabricated space, needless dominancy, false glorification, and needless separation.  When one segment claims to be dominant and “in control” of other sections (from a fallacious distance)… inner tyranny, friction, struggle, and pseudo-power-control materialize; these often manifest (outwardly) as conflict, outward dominance, and violence in the external world.   Additionally, such a false center inevitably leads to the cultivation selfishness, jealousy,  and competition; it fosters inner self-aggrandizement, indifference, and isolation.  The supposed center is considered permanent, most important, and lasting, while the other thoughts and feelings are considered subservient, more or less temporary, and as something to be used.  Surgeries on the corpus callosum within the brain, resulting in two fields of consciousness, are indicative of the falsity of a permanent center.  Yet, psychiatrists and psychologists still promote antiquated methodologies which continue to constrain the mind into practices promoting a fallacious center.  

A true and intelligent paradigm shift would transcend these false bonds and conceitful ways.  A genuine, beautiful psychological transformation would occur when the mind acts — not merely reacts — as a whole without false separation and delusive, fallacious space.  Then, when reflection takes place, one is not something separate from the reflection; then, when compassion occurs, one is not something separate from compassion.  Since so many thoughts are fractional, limited symbols… the holistic mind would often intelligently go beyond them; the whole is more than the sum of the parts.  In this, no crude, dominating part would exist to stupefy, tyrannize, manipulate, or intervene.  In this lack of friction and loss of falsity are bliss and integrity.  In such wholeness, wisdom manifests, eternity manifests.   

Looking Downward (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Looking Downward (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Looking Downward (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Looking Downward (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

 

 

 

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When this What If…

September 16, 2016
15 comments

 

When this WHAT IF

                                                               rumin

8ed on what MIGHT BE,

a

                                            f

ear

interrupted and re

                        main

ed

as some

                                                        thing unpleasant

2 be elimin

                                                                    8ed

by what considered 

                      itself

2 besomewhat sepa

                                                         r8ed from the

f

                       ear

that thought thoughtithad

                                     & also con

sidered it

                                                 self

separatefrom(&controlling)

images projecting the

                                                                 possible future

&                                                                   also

separate from the

                                                                              whole of

                                                   time

toc

tic

Mommy Shortlegs. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Mommy Shortlegs. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Mommy Shortlegs. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Mommy Shortlegs. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

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Resting in the Holographic Universe…

September 11, 2016
16 comments

 

It is good to be proficient in life; it is good to be adept at getting things done (and then resting afterward).  Merely getting things done for oneself alone (or merely for some small, immediate family) may be rather small-minded and narrow in outlook.  Similarly, getting things done while concomitantly harming the environment may also be rather petty and narrow-minded.  A wise, highly aware, dynamic mind is compassionate, considerate, and does not put itself first.  It gets things done while loving the whole… not loving some silly little self-image or merely those who care for (and reward) that self-image.

Inner proficiency — in (and “as”) the mind — is to exist without needless conflict, without needless friction.  A mind full of limited, separative notions and perspectives (internally) is a jumble of friction, clutter, disorderliness, and disarray.  Such a disorderly mind will consist of many fractional images and ideals, all of which are limited, symbolic, partial, and which reinforce isolation and separation of a so-called “center” as being (supposedly) in charge of the “other” thoughts, (conflicting ideals and desires), and images.  When the mind is jealousy manifesting… jealousy is what you are; it is not something that some fictional center “is having.”  How can a learned — though fictional — and concocted center efficiently and proficiently get rid of the jealousy, when (all along) the center is an accumulated delusion whose very isolated manifestation supports feelings such as jealousy?  Inner separation and segregation extend from an internally disorderly mind into the outer world; indifference, conflict, hatred, jealousy, war, ruthless competition, and exploiting others are often results.

A beautiful mind of the humility of emptiness and of intelligent wholeness, with real inner order and with inner images in a harmonious relationship with each other, beyond delusion, will express itself in the external environment in ways that are cooperative, compassionate, considerate, wise, environmentally sound, empathic, and non-fragmentary.

Resting in the holographic universe. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Resting in the holographic universe. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Resting in the holographic universe. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Resting in the holographic universe. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Meditation and Un

September 9, 2016
8 comments

 

Upon which this once became a twice

and twice became trillions

because why not and many so between

floating eternally silently divine

 

Happily nothing within when’s nowhere

devoid of stale musts rotten shoulds

placid endlessly wondering alive always

beyond savage ugly and hurtful war

one little how. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

one little how. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

one little how. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

one little how. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

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Order of the mind…

August 28, 2016
18 comments

 

Order of the mind is a sane, truly intelligent person’s responsibility.  Real order involves integrity and purity.  How can the mind remain pure if it is merely sullied by the old-fangled values and archaic systems of the past?  One must have a clear, untarnished mind.  For that to occur, it may be that one’s mind must be open, young, and beyond mere influence.  Only profound silence beyond old systems and methods can do that.  That means not merely depending on others.  That means not merely depending on inner thoughts… that were likely implanted in one by (and “as”) others.  That means not merely depending upon time.  (Psychological and so-called spiritual methodologies — dreamed up by man — stem from the past and require time.)  Timelessness involves existing beyond one’s inner conditioning (a conditioning that is the accumulation and extension of the old patterns of others).  Most of us habitually depend upon others; most of us are afraid to stand empty, alone, and open.  “Standing alone” goes beyond psychological security and imitation.  Many go through life imitating and copying; fear has a lot to do with it.   For many, it is far easier to copy others and “go through the motions,” rather than to independently perceive and think for themselves.  (And their so-called leaders are often mentally unsound.)  Too many of us are second-hand human beings.

Real perception, empathy, and compassion, emanates from a superb, selfless mind that is beyond mere imitation and dependence.  Real compassion comes from the heart; it does not emerge from a robotic mind that merely imitates and follows orders.  In real compassion comes real action (not just reaction).  Reaction belongs to imitating, conditioning, and second-hand minds (many of whom are indifferent and puppet-like).

Red-Spotted Purple (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Red-Spotted Purple (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Red-Spotted Purple (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Red-Spotted Purple (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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8 x 8 = 64

August 26, 2016
23 comments

 

When i was a child, i was the scissors, the paste, the glue, and the papers.  

We were instructed to (each one of us) cut out a small paper kite and attach it to a big pegboard on the schoolroom wall.                                                                                                                                The teacher stated that whoever learned their multiplication tables to a certain                                                                                                                                                                 level would be allowed to raise their kite higher to a corresponding level.                                                                                                                                                                              I cut my kite into a grotesque shape.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     Our teacher asked me why (while i was good at art) i made my kite so distorted                                                                                                                                                           and “out of shape.”                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         I told her that i did not want to have a nice kite that would appear to soar higher                                                                                                                                             than the kites of all of my friends.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        I refused to learn the multiplication tables.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        I remember, at that young age, thinking that my teacher was very crude and                                                                                                                                                         unrefined for asking us to compete in such a way against each other.                                                                                                                                                                                   After a couple of weeks, the teacher allowed me to learn the multiplication tables                                                                                                                                                       without having to place my kite on the bulletin board.                                                                                                                                                                                                           Years later, as a young adult, i visited (and worked for 6 wonderful months) in Perth,                                                                                                                                                   Ontario, at a magical place called “Family Pastimes.”                                                                                                                                                                                                                 They, at Family Pastimes, are caring vegetarians who make and sell cooperative (non-competitive) games.                                                                                                         Play together, not against each other.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     When i was a child, i was the ringing of the school bell, the giggling of boys and                                                                                                                                                                 girls, and the accordion-like, crushed paper coverings for plastic straws.

[Familypastimes.com]

64 flower stigmas, more or less. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c.2016

64 flower stigmas, more or less. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c.2016

64 flower stigmas, more or less. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c.2016

64 flower stigmas, more or less. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c.2016

 

 

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Many of us value rather cadaverous things…

August 21, 2016
21 comments

 

Many of us value rather cadaverous things.  So many value fancy possessions and excessively large houses that they are fond of showing off to others.   It is likely, however, that the intrinsic intelligence of the vast universe doesn’t give a rat’s behind about fancy possessions and elaborate, ostentatious houses.  Real value is in what is free… like integrity, compassion, and pristine, uncorrupt perception.  However, so many of us were miseducated to neglect those “deep and profound” things and, instead, were taught to chase after rather superficial things that must be “earned and acquired over time.”  (They are valuable-garbage-things; in other words, they are “valuable,” but they are — if you are of deep perception — essentially worthless garbage.)  Aspects of the real beauty of integrity, compassion, and uncorrupt perception are that they are beyond the greedy clutches of grasping and “earning” and so are (in a big way) beyond time.  Most people chase after the contrived, superficial shadows while failing to see the true value in what is timeless and alive.  They are caught — while the real jewels of life elude them — in showing off their dead, shadowy treasures to each other… trying to impress.   

Before i retired, i had, as one of my students, who — though having mental retardation and though being severely multiply handicapped, including being blind and having paraplegia — had a great sense of humor and a very caring disposition.  He never displayed any hatred or malice toward anyone.  He often stated, “I love everyone.”  He never displayed any pretentious behavior; he never — though handicapped, he was more gifted than most of the other students — flaunted his abilities, and he never wanted much, but he was always happy, always joyful and caring.  He would always joke around a lot — he was a great member of our Royal Order of the Moose Club (similar to the Royal Order of Racoons on the Honeymooners show) — and he would often laugh and be zestfully living. He recently passed away.  I spoke at his funeral service to those who attended.  Many attended… because he was so genuine and pure.  He was my teacher (in a big way too); i learned a lot (about goodness and about value) from him.

Miseducation magnifies false values, portraying them to be precious.  It also often overemphasizes competition rather than joyful cooperation.  Real education goes beyond false values and transcends separation, vanity, conflict, pride, imitation, racism, hatred, competition, environmental indifference, and fractional perception.  

 

[Note:  Many years ago, when i was young, i visited, worked at, and spent a lot of time (6 months) at Family Pastimes in Ontario, Canada.  The people there live in a marvelous, very beautiful rural area (with wild bear and beavers), are vegetarians, and they make and sell cooperative (non-competitive) games.  They have been making and selling exclusively cooperative games for over 40 years.  Check out their website sometime; you will be glad you did!  www.familypastimes.com]

Spicebush Swallowtail (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Spicebush Swallowtail (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Spicebush Swallowtail (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Spicebush Swallowtail (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Upon this earth a here transpired…

August 19, 2016
23 comments

 

Upon this earth a here transpired

between all rabbits and everything inspired

 

Miraculous rambling after the tidings of dawn

beyond bourgeois commercials that boringly yawn

 

You’re not the world around you,you’ve learned assuredly

but seeing yourself apart perverts so luridly

 

To blossom past superficial darkness quite superb and transcendent

not the separative space of a shadowy pretendant

Part of the blossoming. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Part of the blossoming. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Part of the blossoming. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Part of the blossoming. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Butterfly Poesy…

August 12, 2016
24 comments

 

What is oneself?

          Is one a vibrant, compassionate movement involving wholeness and integrity?

Or is one a fractional collage of mundane symbols,

          stale ideas, and bourgeois reactions?

 

Is one a radiant, superb dynamic that exists as freshness and real change?…

          Or is one a secondhand repeater of stagnant thoughts

and antiquated ideas?

 

Is one free like a splendid, magnificent butterfly?…

          Or is one a jaded prisoner of static miseducation

and barbaric, indoctrinated values?

 

The listless chrysalis always bursts into gliding

           if it leaves the secure confinement

of its own limited space.

Female Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (1). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Female Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (1). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Female Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (2). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Female Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (2). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Beyond being bourgeois…

August 7, 2016
28 comments

 

Love is not of limitation.  It is endless; as such it goes beyond the rather false boundaries concocted by man.  Too many of us exist — not wholly, not globally —  in fractional modes that inevitably contribute to friction, conflict, war and separation in the world.  Too many of us cling to separative religions, governmental groups, isolated (fictional, man-made) regions, and old, polluting routines and addictions (which we merely accept).  These things are an extension of our inner fractional and disjointed psychology.  Too many of us think that there is a separate center that is internally apart from what is perceived.  (A so-called separate center inevitably projects selfishness; it is folly and it is deception.)  Too many of us were miseducated and we apperceive and function through (and “as”) this separative miseducation.  This can change.  The world can become whole, safe, and clean.  For that to happen, each of us is responsible for getting the mind whole, safe, and clean.  Clean means unpolluted.

 

Damsel in distress (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Damsel in distress (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Damsel in distress (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Damsel in distress (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

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So many… dwelling in the past…

July 31, 2016
21 comments

 

A brain that is constantly and habitually churning along as symbolic thoughts and recalled patterns — as most brains, unfortunately, are — is a brain that may be (within its own superficial and limited framework) satisfied and content.  However, such a brain is always (in one form or another) an extension from (and “as”) the absorbed and learned past; being from the past, it always has (and is constituted of) elements of what is inherently old.  Be that constantly — if you wish — but be aware of the possibility that the past is usually rather stale, second-hand, and musty; it is not the fresh, new, spontaneous, living now.

The patterns of the past can help us, at times, to avoid danger and to get food, clothing, shelter (and health) in ways that are easier and proven to be fruitful.  However, to carry patterns of the past — reacting over and over again — in (and “as”) our minds, unceasingly, may not be prudent or “alive” in the least.  If you are a good (and sane) gardener, you don’t take the hoe into your living room at night and continue hoeing.  Similarly, a mind that uses thoughts (which are symbolic tools) endlessly — as so many foolishly do — is rather absurd.  It is ludicrous to be like a broken record, repeating things over and over (even if it is somewhat rearranged).  Who can profit from merely existing in the past?  No one can, and no one should.  Little wonder why so many get bored and need to go on finding exciting things “out there,” as if true happiness lies outside of oneself.

We can, not merely to get or attain anything, just be quiet — at times throughout the day or night — not needing to robotically (constantly) function as thoughts (all of which are merely symbols).  Then real, joyful, insightful life might actually happen, and not merely some old, stale representations and dead tokens from (and “as”) the past.   There is no legitimate technique or methodology to go beyond these thoughts; any technique or method is an extension of the absorbed patterns and — as such — is essentially fallacious.  

It's OK to be eating our day-lilies! (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

It’s OK to be eating our day-lilies! (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

It's OK to be eating our day-lilies! (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

It’s OK to be eating our day-lilies! (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

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Beyond time’s deception…

July 29, 2016
23 comments

 

When

                                                          magically

the

                          crisp breeze

of pink summer

eclipses all thoughts

                                                                                blossom

                                            beyond the deception of time

to where energy bursts

                                            without measure

and compassion gives

                                                                               a damn

Bursting (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Bursting (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Bursting (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Bursting (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Silence beyond mere thinking…

July 24, 2016
24 comments

 

When i was very young, in grade school, i — one day, without motive — went into a profound silence beyond thinking and had the insight that doing so was a wholly different, wonderful form of consciousness.  “Form,” in the aforementioned sentence, is rather misleading because going beyond thinking is of no real form or pattern, otherwise it is just standard “thinking.”  Back then i didn’t name this “meditation” or “mindfulness” or anything whatsoever because such words were — at such a young age — foreign to me.  I did have the insight that this is a “very special” way of being; it continued to take place on occasion now and then for a long time.  It was only later, in college, when one began seriously enquiring into the mind and into spirituality, that words for this (as inadequate as they are) began to take place.

Fortunately, when one was in high school, one became interested in hypnosis and self-hypnosis.  I was wise enough to realize the dangers and limitations of self-hypnosis and saw that it tended to constrain and curb the mind, keeping it in a narrow and circumscribed area.  While away at college, when attending yoga meditation events given by people from Asia — who claimed to be gurus offering special mantras — i quickly realized that this (i.e., what they were offering) involved (and was) a subtle form of self-hypnosis, which i did not wish to have anything to do with.   Anything you repeat over and over again to “get spirituality” is not legitimate as far as i am concerned.  Repeating a series of words, no matter how “special” they are claimed to be, is just rather mechanical and is a mesmerizing waste of time.  Even repeating silence, within (and “as”) the mind, to “get spirituality,” is also likely a big waste of time.  Grasping and effort never lead to true spirituality.  It is like trying to catch the wind.

Thoughts are always symbolic, always fractional and piecemeal.  The intelligent mind uses thoughts often, efficiently, and prudently.  Thoughts, all thoughts, however, are merely tools.  They are limited patterns and symbols to solve problems and to help one to function well in life.   Merely remaining as the tools, accepting them as the essence of what one is (as so many do), however, would be foolish.  Going beyond these tools, not merely to “get spiritual,” not to “get or attain anything,” may be a sagacious, brilliant way of functioning.  Then silence is silence (not “for” something); it is beautifully what it is without ulterior motives or aspirations.  Then one does not fabricate mere outer or inner symbols into what one calls “spiritual”; deception is unlikely for a mind of true insight, true silence.  Thoughts, for so many of us, are like habitual repetitions… not, in actuality, so very different from what self-hypnosis entails.   The wise mind goes beyond this circumscribed (hemmed in) state of unbeing.   

Ready to launch (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Ready to launch (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Ready to launch (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Ready to launch (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Beyond the intelligence of ignorance…

July 22, 2016
19 comments

 

Fragmentation

                        is the scientists’ piecemeal 

way of ripping everything

a

     p

          a

               r

                    t

        to perhaps \mathbf{j} = \frac{-i\hbar}{2m}\left(\Psi^* \nabla \Psi - \Psi \nabla \Psi^*\right) = \frac\hbar m \mathrm{Im}(\Psi^*\nabla\Psi)=\mathrm{Re}(\Psi^* \frac{\hbar}{im} \nabla \Psi)one day understand everything.

The true wise man,however,abandons

                   chopping things up,abandons dissecting things

little by little.

The wise man clearly sees beyond the bits and segments

         because his consciousness is devoid of mere bits and segments.

That is why he timelessly understands the whole better

         than any sequential calculation wearing thick glasses.

In flight (1). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

In flight (1). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

In flight (2). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

In flight (2). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

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Fearlessness

June 12, 2016
18 comments

 

To be valiant, to be courageous in the deepest sense, may not involve merely following orders as part of some mechanized, calculated structure.  Instead, it involves the deep and profound freedom of standing alone, away from all of the contrived patterns of others, away from all of the concocted and separative systems promising security.   To truly — not feigningly — go beyond the ego (i.e., the central self or “I”) involves vast courage and penetrating insight from a realm of freedom.  A mere follower cannot — and will not — do it.  Too many of us run and cling to our little structures that we have absorbed and learned from others, without ever standing alone while seeing and thinking about things deeply for ourselves.  It is easy to be told what to do; it is easy to be influenced by commercials, by propaganda, by so-called authorities, by words.  

The mind can go beyond them.  The mind can go beyond the ego and the so-called central controller or central self.  The mind can go beyond what merely clings to one experience after another.  The fearful, afraid mind will not care — among its modes of indifference and of being frightened — to have anything to do with this to any significant extent.   When an experience or when fear occurs, the mind is not merely separate from the experience or from the fear.  Freedom is in neither.  Both are inexorably limited.

Ailanthus. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Ailanthus. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Ailanthus. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Ailanthus. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

 

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Pain…

June 5, 2016
33 comments

 

Most of us avoid and run from pain.  Our habit, as we were taught, is to run from pain and to seek pleasure.  Most of us accept this as the way to react and perform.  Commercials add to this tendency of ours, portraying pain as something horrible to avoid; additionally, they tempt us to go after exotic vacations, possessions, and fancy (though polluting) automobiles.  The relationship that a truly intelligent and wise mind has to pain may be quite different than the relationship that most people have (or do not have) with pain.  As long as it is not too unbearably intense, the intelligent mind may not merely detest it, avoid it, and flee from it.  The intelligent mind doesn’t come to pain with all of the prejudices, judgements, and ingrained reactions that so many face pain with.  Similarly, the intelligent mind doesn’t just approach certain races, ethnic groups, and certain classes of people with (and through) all kinds of preconditioned prejudices and judgements; they are seen simply as they are (without a mere separative viewpoint).  There is much beauty in that; even pain can — and often does — have elements of beauty to it if one looks without mere condemnation.   One can come to terms with pain in an intelligent, harmonious way.

We avoid pain so readily, so quickly, so mechanically.  Avoiding pain goes back eons into our evolutionary past and does have its place.  However, remaining in thought — and the limited (which is what thought is) — as so many of us inevitably do, is (in a big way) a real form of suffering and pain.  It is like a man clinging to shadows and wholeheartedly taking the shadows to be what reality truly is.  It is also like an organism taking a mere tool to be the essence of what it is.  Very many of us cling to concepts, mental images, beliefs, and to our authoritarian leaders (who themselves are as lost as we are).  So many of us have a central authoritarian leader whom we each call “me” or “I.”  Yet this so-called central figure (purporting to be some sort of central authority) is what was conditioned into us (from others with the same syndrome); we continue, day in and day out, to look at the world with separation (yet we think we are healthy).  Distortion isn’t healthy.  Even though it may claim to be fine, it causes suffering and causes havoc in the world (directly or indirectly).  You can’t intelligently come to terms with pain if there is not proper relationship to it and to other aspects of life, both psychologically and physically.  When one is separate from what is experienced or thought, then fear, distortion, and suffering take place.  (Very many think that they are separate from their thoughts, fears, and from others who are suffering.)  When the mind acts without mere dependency upon what others have taught, then physical pain (personally) isn’t always so bad; and then the mind isn’t merely immersed in the pool of psychological suffering that so many accept as normal.  Such a mind transcends (and helps to transcend) suffering.  Such a mind doesn’t mind undergoing a lot of pain and discomfort (and lack of pleasure) in order to help others.  Compassion negates pain (not necessarily in one’s so-called personal self).  If wholeness and integrity aren’t there — they’re not two separate things, by the way — neither is true joy, deep intelligence, and profound bliss.

Feeling Slowly.(1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Feeling Slowly.(1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Feeling Slowly (2). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Feeling Slowly (2). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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Butterfly Answers

June 3, 2016
15 comments

 

Wherefore we alight upon these mineraled grounds

                    far from the dainty blossoming stores

with their nectar prizes all too pure and sugary seeded?

 

To extract something tangible and something intangible

                    must occur together as a unified whole

in and out of the recurrent clockwork of time that was needed.

The Cabbage Butterfly Club. Video by Thomas Peace c. 2016

The Cabbage Butterfly Club. Video by Thomas Peace c. 2016

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All the world’s a stage…

May 29, 2016
16 comments

 

“All the world’s a stage,” wrote William Shakespeare in “As You Like It.”  That stage, too, is the mind and the perceptions of (and “as”) the mind.  Whatever characters — as the thoughts and mental images of the mind — that make an appearance on that stage are inevitably what was absorbed from imitating others or from copying and taking mental snapshots of the external world.  How these snapshots were taken and how they become rearranged, recognized, and recalled in (and “as”) consciousness has always involved learned and inherited processes.  Snapshots and thoughts are of a partial, piecemeal, fragmentary nature; they are never the complete essence of that which they try to capture.  The usage of supposed volition regarding the manipulation of these thoughts and images is itself sketchy and quite questionable, since — if truly intelligent observation is taking place — the “I” or supposed center that is allegedly manipulating is likely itself another specimen of the learned (sequential) images or thoughts.  Mentally, whatever appears upon the stage (of consciousness) is fundamentally old and of the past; this is because it comes from stored memory (which is always of the accumulated past).  Most of us are mentally existing as these images and thoughts (brought out and rearranged) from the past.  Most of us are living in the past.  

That stage — of consciousness — can exist (some of the time, anyway) without the components of the past making their appearance upon it.  Then there is no spurious volition; then there are no obtrusions from (and “as”) the past… neither in the form of thought-oriented symbols nor imagined visual (or auditory) snapshots.  Technique and practice have nothing to do with this, as techniques and practices are all extensions of the old, dead past.  Then the stage is not the same-old stage anymore.  

When the stage is truly empty naturally and intelligently, without having willed anything, or thought anything, or practiced anything, then it may be beyond the concocted, the old past, the symbolic, and the partial.  When that takes place, the stage is not of mere experience, partial images, learned symbols, and jaded characters.  You know, a limited little stage, with superficial dimensions, is what anyone can recognize and fill with the old and ordinary.  However, a living, dynamic, whole, uncorrupt, limitless (immeasurable) stage is another thing altogether.  Such a stage (in life) is beyond measurement by the antiquated patterns of the hoarded past.  

The learned image of self (or “me”) creates an intrinsic radius (from a center) and a circumference around itself… with limited space between what is considered the central “me” and that which is observed.  It is this learned image and absorbed space that helps manufacture a stage of limitation.  Such a stage,  with its concocted (or learned) center and a radius and circumference, is full of absorbed demarcations/boundaries.   Compassion can take place when the falsity of that stage is wisely perceived.   Such compassion involves eternity; it goes beyond the many limitations.  If it is not perceived with (and “as”) wholeness and integrity then there will not be much compassion.  There is no wholeness in a limited, false center (thinking that it is the center of the stage); such a center is partial and learned; neither does the limitless (which is not something that can merely be learned) manifest for such a center.

Two Together. Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016

Two Together. Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2016