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One Shot vs. Multiple Shots

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Do you believe in a one shot God? Or like many people in the world, do you think in a multiple shot God? I’m not going to identify what religions identify with each of these perspectives. First let us all remember that the truth is what it is and not a matter of belief. However, what a person believes about this profound truth will have a significant impact on how they live and die.

If you believe that your soul only has one limited lifespan to make its mark on eternity, and what you believe and do in that one life determines your place in heaven or hell forever, then your choices in life and your psychology as you approach death will be impacted alot by this perspective . On the contrary, if you believe that your soul will re-incarnate again and again on a path of growth and development, your perspective on these issues will likely be quite different. A real example of this is the nation and culture of India. Here life and death are two sides of the same coin and totally out in the open

Finally, and probably more significantly, what kind of God do you envision, one who simply gives us one shot sink or swim, or one through profound forgiveness encourages us to grow in each lifetime but offers us multiple chances to evolve and grow into eternal life?

Think about it!

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The Fundamental Struggle!

Many philosophies and religions throughout history have described the human condition, both externally and internally as the struggle between good and evil. It is said that man’s inherent nature is a mixture of both. I guess from one perspective that is a legitimate way of viewing it. However this perspective arises basically from the egoic mind and as such keeps us all in a perpetual and endless circle of struggle. Certain religions then offer us salvation primarily in the so called next life or after life.By the way, what is an afterlife anyway? It seems to me that it is just the name for a new life since this life in its current form and incarnation ended.

Let me share a different view about the subject from my own experience. If we look at this deeply from the inside out, this struggle becomes about the limited thinking and emotions of the ego, versus the more profound and limitless intuitive knowing of the heart and soul.On a daily basis we are confronted in our minds by voices and choices. Some of these are originating from our conscious mind and thought stream, while others from a deeper place within our subconscious mind.

If we all continue to listen only to our ego’s never ending babble, we will certainly remain stuck in the struggle. However, if we are able to become silent through various means like meditation, that deeper voice can become stronger and stronger which then offers hope for liberation.This then is the true struggle. Ego versus Soul! Bondage versus Liberation. The journey may be very hard and full of obstacles, but well worth the trip!

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Vipassana

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This is a wonderful article written by Dr RBS Kushwah

 

Vipassana, which means to see things as they really are, is one of India’s most ancient techniques of meditation. It was rediscovered by Gotama Buddha more than 2500 years ago and was taught by him as a universal remedy for universal ills, i.e., an Art Of Living.

This non-sectarian technique aims for the total eradication of mental impurities and the resultant highest happiness of full liberation. Healing, not merely the curing of diseases, but the essential healing of human suffering, is its purpose.

Vipassana is a way of self-transformation through self-observation. It focuses on the deep interconnection between mind and body, which can be experienced directly by disciplined attention to the physical sensations that form the life of the body, and that continuously interconnect and condition the life of the mind. It is this observation-based, self-exploratory journey to the common root of mind and body that dissolves mental impurity, resulting in a balanced mind full of love and compassion.

The scientific laws that operate one’s thoughts, feelings, judgements and sensations become clear. Through direct experience, the nature of how one grows or regresses, how one produces suffering or frees oneself from suffering is understood. Life becomes characterized by increased awareness, non-delusion, self-control and peace.
There are numerous Centers in India and elsewhere in Asia/Pacific; ten Centers in North America; three Centers in Latin America; eight Centers in Europe; seven Centers in Australia/New Zealand; one Center in the Middle East and one Center in Africa

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Transcendence

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Awakening or enlightenment is ultimately about transcendence ! What keeps us bound in the world of samasra ( duality ) is our attachment to the forms of life including mental concepts and sticky emotions ! One of the greatest challenges and profound opportunities is when you fall totally in love with someone ! A love that makes you feel an inner flame and uncontrollable passion burning within your inner being. A love that makes you long to hear their voice , see their beautiful face and feel their bright abundant energy filling every pore and cell of your body and soul with the music of bliss!!! A love that brings you to the edge of losing your mind and hopelessly surrendering your total being to your beloved ! By passing through this most narrow of gates , you may find as you let go even of this love , that that love is not lost as you may intially fear ! You may find that that love is purified and tranformed !!! You may finally realize that that which is real cannot be lost ,and that which is not real , you never had anyway at all !!! Beyond that gate of total surrender lies a greater Love that has no opposite , That has no agenda or conditions of engagement , and has no stickiness to it whatsoever ! This is called compassion . Compassion happens when human love meets and surrenders to meditation ! It happens when you truly realize that all life is connected and divine ! It happens when you see the divinity within your inner being and recognize it in all of humanity . If you realize this connection , compassion naturally flows abundantly from your heart chakra into everyone you meet and all life that you see and encounter!!! The memory of life before this becomes an empty shell of useless existence , a kind of preliminary look into death . Life after this is then recognized as it is , eternal , and you are that !!!

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Recognition & Awakening

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Recognition is the key to understanding who we are and what we are at the deepest level. If humanity’s problem is basically unconscious conditioned mental patterns that we have inherited for generations, that are buried in our subconscious, bringing those patterns and compulsive thoughts to the surface and recognizing them is extremely important. It is in the recognition of those patterns that the new awareness, or should we say a deeper awareness that is not part of the pattern, emerges. Therefore any spiritual practice, whether it is based on bodywork such as yoga,or different types of meditation, or spiritual reading or contemplation is designed to help us recognize. Recognition is like a spiritual shower that allows us to wash ourselves clean, or scrape ourselves clean of the obscurations that the ego has covered us up with. Another name for this recognition or scraping is the word Christ, and or Krishna. They come from the same root. Their meaning is to scrape. The Presence, Stillness, Conscious awareness within us that his divine, is there all the time. It is not something we need to strive for or become in the future. Spiritual development should not be looked on through the eyes of the egoic consciousness. We will never receive a diploma in the future proclaiming our enlightenment. Enlightenment or awakening is a continuous process of uncovering or unmasking that which makes us unconscious and unaware of our own divine nature. Everyone ultimately is already enlightened, yet not fully realized at this point. If we start from that place we can recognize the common ground of consciousness and its source that is within us all. This is the basis and the beginning of true compassion. This is the rising of divine compassion that has been waiting for thousands of years to boom and blossom on the face of the earth in all its glorious splendor. In order for you to participate in that process you simply need to recognize that which is real in you so that the illusion will fall away. From a different viewpoint,we could also say ,if you recognize that which is not real within you ,that which is real will emerge completely and fully. In a sense you don’t need to do or become anything more than you already are at your essential level. Therefore recognition is not a doing, it is part of being, part of the waking up process as we transmute the egoic consciousness of separation, division, deception, hatred and other ego based emotions into unity, clarity, compassion, joy, and even ecstasy. We were created for joy and ectasy!!!! Ultimately when we live from being which is our essential nature, we should experience the peace, joy, and even dramatic ecstasy emerging from the One Life that we all are at the deepest level. When this happens for all humanity, we indeed will be living in and on and new heaven and earth. This will be the time when all the ancient spiritual prophecies become fulfilled. When life itself wakes up from the illusion of form identity, and knows itself as pure conscious awareness ,or Divine Awareness. Awareness becoming aware of itself. We are all, everyone of us, part of that waking up process. That’s rejoice and be glad!!

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Playing Semantics With Ego

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The concept of the devil in today’s modern society is hard for many people to grasp.Is the devil real or is the devil the creation of the human mind. Certainly we see evidence of evil in the world .Humanity is dysfunctional on a daily basis Throughout the world so-called bad things happen even to so-called good people. But what is the origin of this dysfunction. Metaphorically speaking let’s look at this story of Adam and Eve. Metaphorically speaking let’s look at the story of our original human ancestors. It says that they lived in the Garden of Eden. There were two tree is in the Garden of Eden, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. There was also a serpent in the garden with our ancestors. We all know the story from here so I won’t go into the details. But let’s try to understand the deeper hidden meaning beneath the story. The tree of life in Buddhist terms represents nirvana, or the world of non-duality, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil represents samsara which is duality,. Good and evil, pain and pleasure, right and wrong, Birth and Death. I don’t want to focus on the process of how the story unfolds, there are many different opinions and perspectives in the theological community. We know the identity of the serpent was Satan, the fallen arch angel Lucifer. Let’s examine his mind before the fall. Lucifer was the angel of intelligence. He could therefore see that humanity was in the position of God’s children. He also knew that as an angel he would never be a child of God. This realization began his thinking or thought that if he could not be a child of God, then he would not allow our original ancestors to feel connected to the One life. That connection represents the tree of life. Now let’s play a little semantics here. Let’s replace Lucifer or Satan with the word Ego. We all know that the Ego is a fact of human life. It manifests itself on a daily basis throughout the world. What is the origin of the Ego. When Lucifer took the position in his mind to block our ancestors from the tree of life, this was the beginning of the Ego. The human mind became split between I and myself, split into two. The I side of being or awareness, and the myself side, being the Ego Because of the split mankind was cut off from the tree of life. Because of this duality the Ego has dominated and we can even call it Posessed the human mind. In other words humanity lost its true identity as children of God and became trapped in in the world of form alone .This is the world in the Buddhist terms of Samsara, the world of duality, good and evil. From the perspective of this world evil is real. When we view the world from the ego mind, evil is very real and manifest itself in countless horrific Ways From the perspective of nirvana, which is the non-dual, one life ,evil is an illusion, a creation of the ego mind which is ultimately not real. When we know ourselves as the I in the equation, or the awareness of the forms of our life, as opposed to being trapped in form consciousness or ego mind, we free ourselves and understand who we truly are as children of God, reconnected to the tree of life. I know a few people that I’m working with on their awakening who are angry At God and cannot understand how God can allow evil in the world. However, from this perspective God does not allow evil in the world. Evil manifest itself in the ego mind world because the human mind is still unconscious of its true identity. It is trapped in the condition thinking of the ego mind. So ultimately, evil is not a personal problem. Only when we believe and identify with the Ego do we then personalize any sin that we commit and feel guilty about it. This is how the Ego keeps us trapped. When a human being awakens to pure conscious awareness it is impossible for them to sin. In Buddhist terms that is called right thought ,right action for conscious living. That is why Jesus led a sinless life. When someone says they’re angry at God my response is “Who Said That?” If that thought comes into your mind ,asked yourself who is speaking through me. That mind is the same mind that Lucifer had in the beginning. The exact same mind, the origin of the ego. The original mind of man became separated from God. Do not split yourself into I and myself.. You are not your Ego! You are one awareness, connected to the one life and connected to all humanity at the level of super consciousness which we’ll share in the depths of our soul. God and I are one, no duality, no splitting of our mind into separate identities. If we have a strong belief in a conceptual God, we are still living in the world of samsara or duality. From that place we’ll never realize who we truly are, and we will continue to be cut off from the tree of life because we are still connected to the tree of good and evil in the world a duality,. If Lucifer was the arch angel of intelligence, and the ego has been dominating human consciousness ever since the fall, it makes total sense that we live in a world where intelligence, is thought of as primary. From the very beginning when a child grows up information is bombarded upon them from the Ego mind, the collective ego mind. If a child is smart he is raised up as an example and almost worshiped. If the child’s intelligence is lacking somehow the family ,the community, the society look down upon them as if they’re not totally human, or that they have some kind of fundamental problem.Our value system is all screwed up. Our educational institutions focus almost exclusively on developing human intelligence, and the more highly developed the human intelligence becomes, the more analytical it becomes, the more we lose touch with life, the flow of life ,the oneness of life. If you look in nature animals ,trees ,plants do not have an ego problem. They haven’t split themselves into two. They are pure and present living in the now. They do not talk about their past or worry about their future. Humanity on the other hand spends very little time in full conscious awareness of the present moment. They are lost in thought in either the past or the future, and they miss the vibrant life and oneness that is right under their noses.

In conclusion, the Ego is not your ego unless you identify with it. The Ego is another name for Satan, Lucifer, the fallen arch angel of intelligence. This little secret and has kept humanity in the darkness for thousands of years. And the time for that dominance is over. Humanity is moving towards nirvana, non-dual consciousness, one life connected to the tree of life. It is essential that it happens at this time because the Ego working with unconscious humans has the capacity to destroy the human race. Unless the values of the tree of life, the one life, the one super consciousness that we all share which manifests itself by compassion and living for the sake of others and for the sake of our Selves because when we live for the sake of others ultimately we are living for ourselves because we are all one life .There is no us and them. So those in the world who are examples of true compassion such as the Dalai Lama and many others are beacons of light shining in a very dark world illuminating our consciousness back to its true identity reconnecting us to the Tree of Life.

How can we fight this darkness within ourselves. First of all you cannot fight darkness. As soon as you fight you have become the darkness yourself. The only way to transcend darkness is to Shine the light of truth and pure conscious awareness onto that unconsciousness and awaken our true nature, tapping into the deep compassion that comes when we realize we are one. The ego mind is about separation, envy, jealousy, hatred. The ego mind cannot survive in the present moment. Present moment awareness will suffocate the Ego mind. Life is only now, anything unreal or illusory cannot exist in the now. We must begin to live from being. We are not human doings ,we are human beings. When we truly realize this profoundly , then we will have reconnected ourselves to the tree of life, and the direction of our energy will flow from our life Chakra up through our seven chakras and out into humanity. In other words the movement is up and out through our pure consciousness as opposed to the ego consciousness where our energy is sucking everything into a bottomless endless hole, grasping, polling ,looking for the next thing, pulling everything into us like a vortex into the bottomless pit of total unsatisfactoriness, never finding peace or joy, because the ego is not real. Our energy movement must flow out of the depths of our being. We must reverse the direction of our energy flow from grasping, polling, sucking into ourselves to a 180° different direction. The only place to find the source of energy that can begin to reverse that direction is in the now. The Ego doesn’t pay any attention to the now ,hates the now, and wants to distract you from the now by trapping you in the delusion of past and future. Let’s all get reconnected through the now. The now is not this little fleeting moment . It is one eternal moment. It has endless depth. Now is forever and forever is now. Then we can truly rest in that awareness and began life again connected to the tree of life

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Returning To Tao

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The beginning of life from conception originates from the primordial energy of the Tao. This is the celestial energy of creation that comes from nothing and manifests into the myriad forms of life including the human form. From birth through infancy , childhood, adolescence and adulthood the unified celestial energy wanes and the dualistic mundane energy emerges as the child learns about reality through the conceptual mind . They see and conceptualize this from that, up from down , right from left, as well as many of the other seeming dualities in life. This divided mental framework causes the illusion of isolation and separateness in the consciousness.
This creates a separation and gap from the celestial pure original mind and from Tao itself. Most humans continue on that path until death. They have been trapped in the mundane mind and have never realized or known the original place from which they came . Subsequently, the process starts again with a new birth and the cycle continues. However this cycle does not have to be repeated again and again. It can be interupted and reversed by spiritual awakening and the process of enlightenment. Enlightenment is not some kind of magical experience available to only a few exceptional human beings. Ultimately it is the destiny of everyone. This process is a scientific process of returning back to the original Tao. The Tao mind is one of total purity and unity. It perceives reality as it is . The seeming illusion of the duality of the mundane starts to wane and is replaced by the celestial mind and energy of the original creation and beyond. It is a unified energy that transcends both being and non-being, both nothing and thing, both void and form and both heaven and earth. Reversing the process of samsara or the mundane is a scientific spiritual journey which can bring total self realization and heaven, nirvana or immortality, whatever you may like to call it. In the totally realized state, the last delusion is recognized and the division between the Tao and the self dissolves.This is the meaning of returning to the Tao!

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Self realization

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Some religious people have the perspective that self realization is self-centered. They believe that to be truly religious one must totally deny the evil world including the self. However, in this attitude or posture they fail to realize one critical reality. God created and is living in the self. God is the true Self. Self realization is God realization ! When one becomes totally Self realized , the last delusion is recognized. The delusion that there is a separation between God and the self.
Life is one ! The human being does not exist and cannot exist as a separate entity . The essence of the creator is at the core and center of each expression of life including humanity. If the mind looks for or projects God outside of the self, that is a conceptual God which is an illusion. This type of egoic mental projection is the basis of religious difference and strife. In somes cases it is the basis for violence and war! Without individual Self realization , there can be and will never be true and lasting peace in the world! Violence, war, civil strife, crime, domestic violence or any other form of non-peace in the world originates in the egoic consciousness of the un Self realized human being. True Self realization happens when the egoic mind is recognized for what it is , a mental illness and illusion. As the illusory mind is transcended and the divine mind wakes up and is realized, this becomes the basis for peace. Any attempts or efforts for peace , however noble , that don’t rest on this foundation , ultimately are futile and will end up in collapse and frustration. These efforts are like a physician dealing only with the symptoms of disease and ignoring the root cause. Individual Self realization is the basic foundation or building block for true and lasting world peace. The individual is a microcosm of the cosmos. The divine Self realized human is what connects heaven and earth. When the delusion of the egoic mind has been transcended , and each human being is at peace not only outside themseves but more importantly within their essential being, world peace will be finally realized ! Otherwise the illusory egoic consciousness will continue it’s reign of terror and violence over humanity !

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