“If your flame of awareness is burning bright, you will know that sex is not just sex. Sex is the outermost layer; deep inside is love, and even deeper is prayer, and deepest is God himself. Sex can become a cosmic experience; then it is tantra.” – Osho
Beyond our mind-made labels of who we think we are as sexual or spiritual entities, beyond our concepts of sexuality of straight, bi, gay or any other identification we have, is Love. Osho knew this and elegantly shared it in the quote above.
To know thyself as Love, both as an individual and as the One, is the realisation we long for, even we do not yet know it.
It takes a lot of self-trust and courage to really let go into ecstasy – and someone to hold their own heart-space as they give unconditionally to you. Continue reading →
In July 2004 I was staying on Bainbridge Island, WA as part of a 2 week trip I was making to be with my new partner Isaac. My mother had shortly passed and this trip had been postponed a couple of weeks so I could go to her funeral. It was my first time on Bainbridge and we stayed a couple of nights with a dear friend of Isaac’s, Sara, who he had met in serendipitous circumstances. They hadn’t long known each other and yet were old soul friends who felt a familiar and loving connection with each other at a far deeper level than the few times they had spent together would normally suggest. Between Sara and I there was a deep connection too which beyond the personality level that I was open to knowing more about. Continue reading →
The weekend brought me to a new depth of understanding about living an authentic life; the absolute necessity of conscious NON CONFORMITY. Not that this is news to me, far from it as for years I’ve been breaking free of societal and imprinting and cultural programming. But this is now at a whole new level of understanding which is coursing through my body from the Earth itself.
I’ve been feeling like I’m encrusted in a shell of restrictive beliefs and imprinting that is making me feel both very angry and enlivened at times. Other times I feel the radiance of the Infinite Love within shining through, breaking up that false mantle of the self that comes quite with literally with the ‘turf’ of having a body. Continue reading →
“There is a fountain inside you. Don’t walk around with an empty bucket.”
Truth expressed beautifully.
Yet I notice that we don’t actually walk around with an empty bucket, for that is far too painful for most people to do. In fact, we so hate that feeling of emptiness we will do anything to avoid it. We find anything and everything to fill ourselves up with – and if we can’t find something that works, we will invent it! How creative we are at a-void-dance!
Addictions are birthed from this compulsion to fill ourselves up, to avoid feeling the void we believe is within us. Yet rarely does it feel good for long; that portion of chips on the side used to fulfill us for far longer… that new phone should have made us feel much happier … now we are like spoiled children at Christmas or birthdays and our gratification is very short lived.
Gratification is not as gratifying as it used to be!
Life experience!
We have begun to realise that our buckets have a hole in them and no amount of effort to fill from outside will provide lasting fullness (fulfillment). We are facing a hopeless situation as no matter how we try to fix things we find we are thwarted at every move. Eventually we begin to understand that there is no real workable solution to this ‘problem’ – there’s a song that describes this well.
“There’s a Hole in My Bucket” is a children’s song. The song is based on a dialogue about a leaky bucket between two characters, Henry and Liza. The song describes a deadlock situation: Henry has got a leaky bucket, and Liza tells him to repair it. But to fix the leaky bucket, he needs straw. To cut the straw, he needs a knife. To sharpen the knife, he needs to wet the sharpening stone. To wet the stone, he needs water. However, when Henry asks how to get the water, Liza’s answer is “in a bucket”. It is implied that only one bucket is available — the leaky one, which, if it could carry water, would not need repairing in the first place (from Wikipedia).
Sooner or later the pain of hopelessness will dawn upon us and the frustration of trying to fill the bucket will cause us to stop and take account of what is happening in our lives; we find ourselves in a place of not knowing, of surrender to the situation and circumstances of life that we are unable to change by our own mechanisms. Without this pain we are rarely motivated to look inside. Unless we feel it deeply we continue to look outside ourselves for salvation, be in relationship with another, food, more toys or a better place to live… etcetera, and to the point of ad nauseum! This is the point where we can choose though – we can choose to turn our gaze inwards and look within to fill the need for that gratification. It’s not a quick fix though – we won’t find any instant gratification because that is the realm of the subtle and imaginal so it will take some adjustment and process to appreciate the gifts here. It’s like having tabasco chili sauce on all your food and then stopping and eating your food without it. In the beginning you are not going to taste much and it will take a while for your taste buds to appreciate the natural flavour of food. Or having fireworks in the sky every night and then one day the fireworks stop and we are left with nothing but natural sounds and sights. It would feel strange and empty but sooner or later your ears and eyes would begin to notice things we couldn’t hear or see before and that increases day by day – we would soon notice that even those sounds and sights you thought were subtle and gross and you become aware of finer and finer sounds and experiences in the still quietude.
It’s the same when we turn our gaze away from the distractions. It is a deep alchemical process of self-care; – a journey into the unknown, through which we begin to understand and know ourselves as our own saviour. Many times we will circle around and make this journey and each time we go deeper into ourselves we find our blocks and patterns repeating themselves and have to let go again and again, and usually this process is not pain-free but because the pain of resisting is now greater, we choose the sensible option and become sensitive to our self. Interestingly, the Italian word for’ sensitive’ is ‘sensible’. Language reveals so much if we just look at it from a slightly different slant.
All this looking outside and looking inside can be exhausting! We are swinging from one extreme to the other as balance will happen. It can help to make the swings shorter so that the balancing act does not create so many wild roller coaster experiences. Developing a daily practice of taking time for relaxing, for being quiet, meditation or time alone is essential. Remember, meditation does not have to look like the traditional way of sitting down and trying to still the mind (something I’ve struggled with for years). Meditation can be active and this would be far more effective than getting frustrated with failure at lotus position ‘I’m so peaceful’ type of thing when you clearly aren’t. Try breath exercises if you are like this.
Simple things work best and you are far more likely to continue with them if they are not onerous. Taking 5 minutes to simply breathe and tune into your heart (Spirit) can be done anywhere, anytime, I find it helpful to do this when I get into my car and before driving off – even something so short will lead to a deeper and more peaceful existence. Connecting, walking in nature, especially around plants and trees has far more benefit than most people would give credit for. The effects are incremental and so if it doesn’t feel like you’re getting much benefit from it, try doing it for a few weeks and then stop and you will soon notice how less good you feel about yourself.
Nature is the best ways to remind us of our nature. Obvious really yet so many dismiss it because it doesn’t fill that void, it is too quiet and silent without enough distractions – maybe just plug the ears with music instead of feeling that emptiness! If we can just bear the discomfort for long enough we will become so much better at being human. We need to stop trying to avoid the un-comfortableness and just do something for ourselves – even 5-10 minutes makes a huge difference.
It is not what you do or how good you are at doing it. It is doing it that counts.
Seriously, a lot of folk get caught up with the perfection thing and give up in frustration because it’s not working the way they think it should. But that’s a common mistake because it’s not what or how well you can do your meditation or relaxation or breathwork that’s important as the most powerful part of doing it is the pure intention for self-care and carrying through with the physical doing-ness of it. That is by far the greatest part of any self-care practice. Once you start to practice self-care, the Universe shows up and creates more self-care and love for you, so it doesn’t matter in the slightest how perfect you now are at your breathwork exercises! The benefit is from your intention, and from your attention to whatever pulls you out of the present moment. Within this is the key to understanding our true nature, to knowing oneself.
There is also a deep wisdom to understanding that we do not need to repair our bucket, that we do not even need to fill it because we are never empty, we do not have a bucket, nor are we something to be filled, for it would be closer to the truth to say that we are simultaneously both the container and the water that fills it. We are not here to go with the flow, but to BE the flow. To know ourselves as the flow itself. There is not a moment when we are not the Source of All, so there cannot be a moment when we are empty of that – it just seems to be so sometimes. “There is a fountain inside of you” – well yes, because you are the fountain itself! Cease the activity of trying to fill up something that does not exist and you will know thyself to be the existence of All That Is.
I think we are meant to have a hole – we are holy (whole) exactly as we are.
As a dolphin once said to me “Turn yourself inside out Lynn”. We could not do this if we were not a hole. We are designed to be constantly turning inside out and outside in. There is nothing to fill. This is a source for contemplation, perhaps something to ponder on during a nice walk through the woods.
Be in peace, be in Love.
Blessings, Lynn.
A diagram of a tube torus – said to be the shape of consciousness itself. For more on that visit:
A bit of rain is falling this morning, and being a bit of a fair weather freak, I wonder how wet I will get if I go for my walk. I go anyway and find it soft and gently warm outside. Contrast to yesterday when it was so bright. Today I find myself more introverted and feel that instead of looking for something, I will let things comes to me instead.
I set off up the wee road and before going far realise that I have a script running in my head: It’s like I’m rehearsing for this blog, like a fly on the wall documentary, jeez – it’s just a blog for God’s sake! Why do I get into this energy of contriving so easily? I resolve to set it aside and continue.
It comes back very quickly and I catch myself plotting what I will say in the blog. I have to laugh at myself really – fighting with this will only produce more of it. I let go again and decide to take another path in the woods. A few yards further and I come across this little scene:
I wonder what this is … I peer at it and see the garden chairs, the traffic cone…hmmmm… very interesting!
I consider the merits of taking photos of this to share. I take them anyway – after all, the idea is to share what I find interesting on my walk. I could do with being less interested in the value of something, I thought.
I moved closer to the little woodland hide-away, fascinated by the consciousness that would think to drag a metal barrier fence, a traffic cone and other bits and pieces into the woods to construct a habitat (of sorts):
The mystical shining light is the reflective white band on a traffic cone.I love the sign “Woodpoint House B&B” that has been appropriated.
I checked out the empty beer cans. A picture started forming in my head, the chairs are side-by-side facing a pallet, behind which were more than a few empty beer cans. Only the TV was missing.
Some house-keeping is needed…
I contemplated on the desire, the effort and the people who constructed this and spent time here. A fair amount of effort was needed. But why want to be in the woods and then leave your trash around? Pondering on these simple questions could reveal much about the workings of human consciousness and the state of the world. I’m not judging, I’m wondering, pondering and contemplating as I find it fascinating to unravel the workings of the mind.
I found what they’d one with this piece of wood and tree interesting. What was it there for?
I left the little domestic scene and continued. The path ran out and I had to make a new one, feeling slightly guilty about trampling the bluebells as I went. I blessed them. These woods are extraordinary to me – for some reason I am so enamoured by so may different things here… it’s impossible agin to stick with only taking 4 photos so I revise my commitment and think perhaps I will just do the blog once a week instead and include more photos.
I loved the energy of this tree – this is what was in front of my eyes when something about it just stopped me in my tracks. It was magnetic.I usually see a white feather on my walk. It kind of feels like a sign of en-couragement. It may be a simple walk, but it is going far deeper than that in my consciousness. I am using this morning walk as a therapy, even a rite of passage.Another tree that made me look at it. A gorgeous, huge beech tree. The trunk and bark remind me of elephants. Not that elephants bark. but you know what I mean. I thought I couldn’t get across it’s magnificent size and splendour in a photo, so I almost didn’t take the shot, but the tree told me it could transmit it’s essence to you in a picture, so tune in and find out for yourself if it was telling the truth:~)This white flowered plant is known as Pignuts. You can eat the root. Dig it out, wash, peel and slice it – eat raw or cooked. A bit of effort but it is nice. You’d need to get a few for a decent meal, but perfect as part of a wild-food salad.
I took another new path off the main path, it went sharply uphill. It came to a point where it split like a Nexus with many paths going in many directions. I followed one which finished in this little sweet space. I was sure I could hear the fairies singing…
Sweet spot off the beaten track.
I came out off the woods at a different point on the road – a place where one of the house-owners has garden-ized a bit of the land at the side of the road. This tree made me stop and my resolve melted. I took its picture. The little plants growing on it are Penny Wort, or Navel Wort (they look like tummy buttons) and they are edible, in a salad, with a slight mushroomy flavour and like a succulent, very juicy.
What is it about trees with splits like this low down that I love so much?
In the shower I was thinking about values and our habit of placing a value on everything. I wondered about all the stuff we own, all the things, the experiences, the teachings, the giveaways. I wondered if we value anything we don’t need.
My mind wandered to an instance where I gave away some energetic tools as an experiment to see if other people found them useful. I was pretty sure they were not still being used. Something arose in me that was uncomfortable but I couldn’t place it – I just couldn’t see what it was but it caused my adrenals to kick in (this is what happens to me now-a-days, due to menopause I suspect, and a refining, a redefining of my energies, I get a reaction in my body that is in direct relation to something that I have thought or seen. My inner interpretation, or filter system recognises it and it is interpreted as a threat.) It was about the value or interest in things, like this blog – truly it could only be interesting and of value as long as I was not trying to make it so. The moment we try to make something in a particular way, the purity is lost and the thing is now less than it could have been.
What if I were to simply let go of any idea of value or worth, to stop looking at things or people, or experiences and assigning a perceived value to it? I suspect peace is the answer.
And, isn’t it interesting how we have constructed a world where value is everything: “How much is he worth?” is a common question. “He’s worth a fortune”. Is he now???
“How do you earn your living?” (You mean we have to pay to be here? Why?)
And isn’t it interesting that we call the value of money charged as ‘interest’ when we loan or borrow it?
One night, in the sometimes passed, I wrote this. Some who know me may be quite astonished to read this, never having guessed I am anything other than the person they know me as. But I am a very private person… well, I was until very recently. It was a terrible night when I wrote this and now I’m glad I did put it to paper, though typing it out today does take my full attention to remain centered even now. It has brought me to a place of peace… a place where time has simply disappeared and there is only now. I called it Dark Knight because these aspects of us are incredibly dark but they also contain our salvation, if we could but see and accept it. The problem always must contain the solution… indeed, how could it be any other way?
I sit and ponder
the meaning of my life.
Why.
Why, is always the question with no answer. At least no adequate, lasting answer.
I ponder the inadequacies of myself. Always that unavoidable collision of despondency and depression which can only birth a new and fresh approach to inadequacy.
Only possible now to feel it even more deeply – even more ‘exquisitely’.
Exquisitely inadequate. Yes, that is me.
Deepening now, going further into the feeling.
Exquisitely inadequate… Yes, it has always been true!
Devotion to the cause will always pay dividends!
Searching, looking, seeing the feeling come to life.
Seemingly without end.
Exquisitely inadequate. No, it is not a happy feeling this one, taking me backwards through time, evaluating, judging … then condemning myself.
Tomorrow will be no better.
Changing now, for the sake of sanity, pretending that this too shall pass. Too scared to be what I desire, endlessly comparing myself to others. They are good, they are bad… they are better, they are worse…
Always, inevitably ending in exquisite inadequacy.
Desire, death, destruction… feelings flitter by. Some take root and grow, tying me into an endless cycle of ego driven morality. Tasting like honey at first but soon that too falls away… leaving only the bitter taste of disgust and the anguish of exquisite inadequacy.
Self-doubt insidiously gnawing its way through my consciousness once more. It knows where to go – the path long since worn into patterns of belief within.
Within, a half-existence.
A Half-hope, a hidden hope… secret, not daring to emerge …too precious to examine.
Once more dashed, destroyed ‘forgotten’ as the sensation of being exquisitely inadequate re-asserts its forbidden hold once more.
No need to explain.
Very necessary to hide.
Keeping it very secret.
Hopelessness.
Will it always be like this?
The beauty of life lies beyond belief… the terrible heat of the words arises and they quickly burn themselves into my mind; a black fear spreading quickly throughout my consciousness.
Too late now for peace. Going deeper now into darkness – what else is there to feel? Nothing now is left – passing obliquely away.
Leaving only an open wound. Unable to heal myself.
Exquisitely inadequate.
Beyond life lies the beauty of belief.
Beyond belief beauty lies.
and beauty always lies…
No More. No More. No More.
What choice is available really for the inadequate self?
Where Angels Fear to Tread? 