Journal of a Disgruntled Mystic

2972 Posts

Posted - May 18 2015 : 01:11:01 AM

It takes time. And the time cycles across space. And the space is held in the hands of the One. And the One is also Zero, which in turn is Infinity. And Infinity is a circle looping through itself.

On the river today, dragonflies hovered above the surface of the water, finally landing on the canoe. I nudged my pinky up to one, and it crawled on top, resting for a while. That made my day--by a long shot. That kind of fortune cannot be paid for or bought. That's just being in the right place at the right time, with stillness on your side. To commune with nature cannot be undervalued. To gain the trust of creatures is paramount.

We paddled by a few alligators. They looked so fierce, but calm too.

I'm not sure what else to write. And writing about being unsure is relieving, because it eases up on the pressure to be certain. And what can I be certain of? At this stage...only that the show goes on.

Now it's time quote some Whitman:

What do you think has become of the young and old men?
And what do you think has become of the women and
children?

They are alive and well somewhere,
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at
the end to arrest it,
And ceas'd the moment life appear'd.

All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses,
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and
luckier.

Those few lines are worth more than many big books in their entirety. Worth more than idle speculation, clever word games, illusions of attainment. Sure, I guess I could say that everything is equal, that all is valuable only in relation to the relativity of our perspective, and that's true, but still...some diamonds really glisten and sparkle with qualities that cannot be easily denied.

How lucky it is to litter this yellow digital page with ramblings and musings, and to have someone across the globe pay attention. What a stupendous gift to receive each other's attention, and to watch our attention become more enlivened by the passing of the infinite spacetime continuum. Giving and receiving, begging and catapulting, getting lost in the uncontrollable tendency to become better.

1625 Posts

Posted - May 18 2015 : 10:46:07 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Bodhi Tree

It takes time. And the time cycles across space. And the space is held in the hands of the One. And the One is also Zero, which in turn is Infinity. And Infinity is a circle looping through itself.

On the river today, dragonflies hovered above the surface of the water, finally landing on the canoe. I nudged my pinky up to one, and it crawled on top, resting for a while. That made my day--by a long shot. That kind of fortune cannot be paid for or bought. That's just being in the right place at the right time, with stillness on your side. To commune with nature cannot be undervalued. To gain the trust of creatures is paramount.

We paddled by a few alligators. They looked so fierce, but calm too.

Hi Bodhi,
Thank you as always for sharing your inspiring thoughts, or insights. Reading your insights, helps me, with mine, it resonates. They give openings to go beyond the elements.Time is something that intrigues me. Received from infinite mystic visions. Last year I was on a silence retreat and there it was again, time, crystal clear. Intriguing time.
Sometimes I can grab it and then it fades away again. Anyway I will not even try to write it down, because all my words can not describe the beauty of time.

Time Xxi by Kalhil Gibran,

And an astronomer said, "Master, what of Time?"

And he answered:

You would measure time the measureless and the immeasurable.

You would adjust your conduct and even direct the course of your spirit according to hours and seasons.

Of time you would make a stream upon whose bank you would sit and watch its flowing.

Yet the timeless in you is aware of life's timelessness,

And knows that yesterday is but today's memory and tomorrow is today's dream.

And that that which sings and contemplates in you is still dwelling within the bounds of that first moment which scattered the stars into space.

Who among you does not feel that his power to love is boundless?

And yet who does not feel that very love, though boundless, encompassed within the centre of his being, and moving not form love thought to love thought, nor from love deeds to other love deeds?

And is not time even as love is, undivided and paceless?

But if in you thought you must measure time into seasons, let each season encircle all the other seasons,

And let today embrace the past with remembrance and the future with longing.

on this side of the globe it is unimaginable to canoe and paddle by a few alligators....
Enjoy time, if time exists or not

Edited by - Charliedog on May 18 2015 11:01:09 AM

United Kingdom
791 Posts

Posted - May 18 2015 : 4:15:04 PM

thankyou for helping me to remember

2972 Posts

Posted - May 18 2015 : 5:07:31 PM

Love that poem, Charliedog. "And that that which sings and contemplates in you is still dwelling within the bounds of that first moment which scattered the stars into space." What a line. Great stuff.

I've never been to a silent retreat, but I bet that is something. Maybe one day. One of my AYP buddies told me about "dark room" retreats where they shut out all light and visual perception for extended periods. Apparently, that stimulates all kinds of inner scenery. When you can't see anything on the outside, I guess you have to look through the inside, naturally. It sounds kind of extreme, but interesting.

Glad to be sharing this time with you.

quote:
Originally posted by kumar ul islam

thankyou for helping me to remember

Blanche

USA
859 Posts

Posted - May 19 2015 : 07:07:29 AM

Thank you for sharing, Bodhi!

One can hear the silence moving with your canoe

2972 Posts

Posted - May 19 2015 : 10:15:09 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Blanche

One can hear the silence moving with your canoe

That's what amazes me about the dragonflies--how they can hover in the air with such stillness, even though they are beating their wings incredibly fast. Another living paradox.

2972 Posts

Posted - May 25 2015 : 5:16:09 PM

Was laying flat on my back, looking up at the stars, on a wooden dock with the Gulf of Mexico below me. Far away from the city, the stars shine brighter and clearer. Saw a meteor streak across the darkness for a split-second. That never gets old.

In a nearby cove, I heard a dolphin thrashing loudly. The sound had a smooth rippling effect, like the water was being torn with great skill. The dolphin was probably herding mullet and taking advantage of the low tide, when the space gets smaller.

Next morning an osprey flew overhead carrying a sizable branch for a nest. Fiddler crabs scurried into sand holes and out of sight. The steady breeze was substantial enough to keep the mosquitoes from chewing on me. Otherwise, when the wind is slack, they feed voraciously. Sometimes I enjoy watching their little pouches fill up with blood. Slowly, like a balloon of red density, they expand. Then, depending on my level of compassion, I pop the bubble or let them go.

Later, in the yard, my cousin came across a 5-foot black snake. He texted me a picture because I had left by then, and I silently wished for him to leave it alone, which he probably did.

Now I'm under fluorescent lights, much more contained and sheltered from the outside. Instead of a vast expanse of sky to look at, I have pictures on my desktop wallpaper. There is no steady breeze, but there is an air conditioner to keep it cool. There are no far-distant stars twinkling--only the monotone haze of electricity.

Something about the wildness will keep calling me back, until I can merge with its teeming life and all the planets.

Dogboy

USA
2201 Posts

Posted - May 25 2015 : 8:35:18 PM

quote:
Now I'm under fluorescent lights, much more contained and sheltered from the outside. Instead of a vast expanse of sky to look at, I have pictures on my desktop wallpaper. There is no steady breeze, but there is an air conditioner to keep it cool. There are no far-distant stars twinkling--only the monotone haze of electricity.

The mosquito bites are your reminder that you were there, and by closing your eyes you are skyward again, awaiting the next scratch of suicidal stone.

2972 Posts

Posted - May 25 2015 : 10:42:00 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Dogboy

The mosquito bites are your reminder that you were there, and by closing your eyes you are skyward again, awaiting the next scratch of suicidal stone.

Deep and cryptic!!! Love it.

2972 Posts

Posted - Jun 01 2015 : 12:15:44 AM

We can make these words dance, these vowels of sensuality rolling off ribbons of muscles and tongues tied into mysterious puzzles. Not that anything needed to be solved, but to be saturated with noble essences and mischievous glances.

Oh, the eyes! How the eyes penetrate and receive simultaneously! How the glimmering truth won't stop barraging Herself and expressing Herself and loving Herself. And I don't care how foolish we have been; I only care how magical we become.

Ancient as the stardust swirling in the pyramids of the desert. Fresh as the gust of wind that breathes life into the trees and its branches. Ominous like a storm cloud brewing powerful thunder to announce its presence.

Boom! Here we are, and we are wild and yet fragile. We are sacred and special. We are worth every last breath that crosses the nostrils and into the lungs and expanding the belly to breathe deep swells of comfort and knowingness.

If I could cry continually, I would be a river of joy watering the body of your fertility.

Edited by - Bodhi Tree on Jun 01 2015 12:16:12 AM

1625 Posts

Posted - Jun 02 2015 : 02:37:16 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Bodhi Tree

Boom! Here we are, and we are wild and yet fragile. We are sacred and special. We are worth every last breath that crosses the nostrils and into the lungs and expanding the belly to breathe deep swells of comfort and knowingness.

2972 Posts

Posted - Jun 07 2015 : 5:57:16 PM

Walt Whitman...

Grand is the seen, the light, to me--grand are the sky and the stars,
Grand is the earth, and grand are lasting time and space,
And grand their laws, so multiform, puzzling, evolutionary;
But grander far the unseen soul of me, comprehending, endowing all those
Lighting the light, the sky and stars, delving the earth, sailing the sea,
(What were all those, indeed without thee, unseen soul? of what amount without thee?)
More evolutionary, vast, puzzling, O my soul!
More multiform far--more lasting thou than they.

My response to him...

A brief hesitation, nestled somewhere in my chest, did not cease to reach my fingers
Though, for a brief moment in time, the trailing thought of doubt arrested the motion.
But the motion persisted without much care or concern for what might touch the page,
as the page is touched with me, half-falling asleep into a stupor--retaining clarity
on the edge of vibration.

You are almost more alive than the people before my very eyes
No, you are more alive, without question, not even almost.
Not that we've done anything wrong, or right, but that we've done our best
As best we could.

I wonder, seeing the reflection holographic, mimicking and mirroring your strategy
What will become of the long trail behind our sojourn into the changing nexus?

Half-asleep and drowsed into submission,
I send this note especially to you, on the verge of channeling the next transmission.

United Kingdom
791 Posts

Posted - Jun 08 2015 : 03:27:38 AM

ayam tuned in send me your next transmission

BillinL.A.

USA
375 Posts

Posted - Jun 08 2015 : 10:34:07 AM

The Grail's grog quaffed,

Whitman and Bodhi Tree lightly lick their lips,

then spew their Love.

2972 Posts

Posted - Jun 08 2015 : 5:12:40 PM

quote:
Originally posted by kumar ul islam

ayam tuned in send me your next transmission

The radar-sonar-beaming-beacon is fully functioning.

quote:
Originally posted by BillinL.A.

The Grail's grog quaffed,

Whitman and Bodhi Tree lightly lick their lips,

then spew their Love.

Coming constantly.

2972 Posts

Posted - Jun 12 2015 : 10:26:10 PM

So much has been built. Wood from the trees, metal from below the ground, electric charges pulsing between the walls. The water is routed and re-routed, flushed and filtered, drank and disposed of. We have a massive infrastructure, whose parts are totally dependent on each other and that require constant vigilance and maintenance. All of this has occurred on the razor's edge of survival, where collaboration and competition conspire to form something resembling harmony and balance.

At times, what is man-made is clearly delineated from what is not. Other times, artificial synthesis mimics and deceives the organic eye. A flower can be made of plastic and look very close to a real one composed of living, breathing chlorophyll. A woman's breasts can be filled with silicone, devoid of cellular growth. A recorded sound can be played from a computer—nearly indistinguishable from its native instrument.

Do we change the definition of what is authentic, what is genuine, what is real? How do we capture, coexist with, and learn from, nature (or what we consider to be natural)? These questions are being asked everyday, and answered everyday. Evolution is an ongoing line on inquiry into efficiency, creativity, and integrity. The change is persistent.

At any given moment, our awareness can be used like a magnifying glass, a telescope, a panoramic camera—zooming in and out of focus, depending on our preference and desire. The scope and magnitude of consciousness seems to have no limit. If there is a limit, perhaps it hinges upon our mortality, our vulnerability, our weakness. And even those flaws are pushing us further and further to find out what is beyond.

Walt Whitman wrote:

I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the beginning and the end,
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.

There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.

Urge and urge and urge,
Always the procreant urge of the world.
Out of the dimness opposite equals advance, always
substance and increase, always sex,
Always a knit of identity, always distinction, always a breed
of life.

To elaborate is no avail, learn'd and unlearn'd feel that it is so.

Sure as the most certain sure, plumb in the uprights, well
entretied, braced in the beams,
Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,
I and this mystery here we stand.

Clear and sweet is my soul, and clear and sweet is all that is
not my soul.

Lack one lacks both, and the unseen is proved by the seen,
Till that becomes unseen and receives proof in its turn.

Showing the best and dividing it from the worst age vexes age,
Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while
they discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself.

I guess that will do...for now...

Edited by - Bodhi Tree on Jun 12 2015 10:28:04 PM

United Kingdom
791 Posts

Posted - Jun 13 2015 : 05:18:54 AM

The unreal never is.the real never ceases to be .the conclusion about these two is truly perceived by the seers of truth .lord Krishna .and thank you bodhi .

2972 Posts

Posted - Jun 13 2015 : 08:03:07 AM

quote:
Originally posted by kumar ul islam

The unreal never is.the real never ceases to be .the conclusion about these two is truly perceived by the seers of truth .lord Krishna

Ahhhh...I like that very much. Thank you for the affirmation, kumar.

Love. Radiance. Wisdom.

2972 Posts

Posted - Jun 18 2015 : 8:04:13 PM

An image of the past, stored safely where no intruder can reach, comes to mind. The continuous thread, which is me, has tied an apparition of its memory to the present. I am the thread. I am the glue. I am the substance. All moments revolve around me, disappear from me, return to me.

Nothing can deter me, sway me, dislodge me from being persistently eternal, even as all my forms scramble and deteriorate and get tossed about on the waves of change.

I am the ego, and not the ego. I am the soul, and not the soul. I am the world, and not the world. I am all of it, and none of it at all.

You, who lament over the lineage of cause and effect, do you not see me? Here I am, holding the treasure chest of your memories, projecting the light beam of your visionary future, fostering stewardship of all creatures who re-create themselves simultaneously, consecutively, serendipitously. Why do you worry that all may go to ruin? It can never be so, and never has been so.

Carry on with your whittling and inevitable mistakes. Strip the bark off my trunk and marvel at the rings of time that encircle my center. Pick up the conch shell and follow my spiral into vast recesses of hidden sound. Explore your body as if it were a territorial map of my mind, and my mind will in turn respond to your inquiry.

If you are not satisfied, there is always more. Forever more. And if you want less, there is plenty of less too.

I am your testament, and you are my testimony.

2972 Posts

Posted - Jun 22 2015 : 01:57:45 AM

Tonight I saw Mad Max: Fury Road in the theater, by myself. What a film. So much artistry and craftsmanship, not to mention a ridiculous amount of action and violence. The film epitomizes the industrial aspect of mankind. Gasoline, muscle, metal. Water and greenery are scarce in the apocalyptic desert landscape. There is a desperation among the lower class, and a cruelty in the barbaric rulers.

Nevertheless, there are spiritual implications in the movie. And there is actually a celebration of the divine feminine. The main female character is a bad-ass woman who is shepherding a small group of damsels in distress towards safety and liberation. She is aided by the rogue Max, who begrudgingly helps in the beginning, but ends up caring for them all as the plot progresses. That was kind of how I felt too: skeptical at first, then hopelessly falling in love with the troupe of goddesses.

It definitely got my blood pumping and hyped up my bhakti. I tried to use all the adrenaline rushes as emotional vortices to absorb whatever sincere or genuine devotion might have been swirling around in the body/mind/soul at the moment.

I don't know...how much of me is an escapist, and how much is pointed towards something tangible, achievable, realistic. The lines get blurred, which is okay, I guess. The problem is that I believe that so much is possible, and I can't seem to shake that belief. Yes, I love peace and contentment with the mundane, but the adventurous streak keeps calling me, calling me, calling me. Sometimes demonic, sometimes undoubtedly pure. It's all whole. It's all one: at varying stages of expression.

I understand the narcissist just as much as the martyr, the proud as much as the humble, the rebel as much as the conformist. Blah, blah, blah.

Time to sleep, and to melt into the miracle.

1625 Posts

Posted - Jun 22 2015 : 03:36:43 AM

Can you watch and only see the artistry and craftsmanship? If I see violence, I feel it physically, and can not forget the images of violence.
It made me make a choice years ago not to see series and films with violence anymore.
Then part two of Broadchurch started, and I decided to watch it. Because I saw part one, and liked the drama and characters.Yesterday I saw the last part of serie two, and at the end a girl and a child were murdered. Is it my imagination? am I over sensitive? It was really disturbing my practice this morning. It makes no difference to know it is not real.

Edited by - Charliedog on Jun 22 2015 05:59:59 AM

United Kingdom
791 Posts

Posted - Jun 22 2015 : 07:09:46 AM

i dont want to know about evil i only want to know about love .john martyn.

1625 Posts

Posted - Jun 22 2015 : 08:48:47 AM

quote:
Originally posted by kumar ul islam

i dont want to know about evil i only want to know about love .john martyn.

Yes Kumar,this was a reminder to myself, I know about evil, but do not have to watch it

United Kingdom
791 Posts

Posted - Jun 22 2015 : 10:57:01 AM

since starting my practice i really have tried to steer clear of anything not sattvic ,foods ,films ,situations ,and my life is much happier i am not oblivios nor ignorant of the pitfalls of man but feel that to dwell or have theses impressions reaffirmed is not good for my path ,there are too many wonderful and inspiring things to watch see do that anything that does not lead me to light i keepaway from ,it is just one part of my practice to live a life looking at the clouds and not the television but this is for me and i wouldnt tell anybody else what to do,all impressions on the canvas of our minds stay but some leave a hangover depending on how sensitive you are many blessing to you