Thank you Shiv, so profound! This is exactly where I am at the moment. Many years ago I thought I had my life and spirituality sorted out. Nowadays I realise I know absolutely nothing and right now this terrifies me. I worry about health, my own and those I love; I worry enormously about death and dying. Everything often seems dark and hopeless and I am definitely in a tailspin! I’ve felt like this for a few years now, ever since my sister died suddenly and unexpectedly. How do I see the miracle of life and not the terror? How do I make the freefall feel free like you describe? Does it just come out of the blue, or are there practical things I can do? Much love 🙏
Thank you for sharing that with me Paul. I have taken the liberty of responding to your question via my latest post. It appears as a paid article and I don't know if you are a paid subscriber and have access to it. If you aren't, please send me your email address so I can email the full essay to you.
Here it is, top of page 230 of the 2000 Oxford Press paper back edition of Evans-Wentz’s translation (with copious notes & commentary) of “The Tibetan Book of The Great Liberation” c. 1954
“This realization is likened to that of a crow which, although already in possession of a pond, flies off elsewhere to quench its thirst, and finding no other drinking-place returns to the one pond.
Similarly, the radiance which emanates from the One Mind, by emanating from one’s own mind, emancipates the mind.”
… as dear old Joe Miller (c.f. Miller Archives at sftslodge.org) would often add, “this is a do not seek & ye shall find…”. “It can’t be taught, only caught…” 🌬️♥️♥️
Oh indeed… that surrender is but an acknowledgment that I/we/none of us have “control” of what occurs in the entire Universe & certainly not in our lives here on Earth - it’s all by grace… when we realise this, we can actually live! And i owe you a quote: dang, I moved the book again…
This free fall which you are speaking of I think can become very apparent despite being in the midst of it all if we stop distracting ourselves. I tend to use the screen to avoid this even though I know it is inevitable.
Thanks for helping me see the miracle of it all. For with this beautiful text helping me see that the mere existence of it all sure is a miracle.
I am always impressed by how you manage to keep the same thread and over and over again hitting the same tone through the whole text. It is a little like a dance, always getting back to where you first started out.
Striking post [as usual] Shiv. I want to ask a question regarding this statement you made “Social expectations, values, meaning and morals have no influence over me.”.
I can see how social expectations have little influence on you. And I can even see how meaning can not influence you because I’ve directly witnessed both of those not influencing me.
But, values and morals? I sense between choosing to lie to get a material gain or not lying and losing that material gain, you would choose the latter. I sense you do things that most Americans would consider moral even when no one is looking or would know. I know from my direct experience it wouldn’t be impossible for me to commit an extremely immoral act as most people would consider. All I know it would currently feel like going against my nature.
Are you saying that values and morals are a level of abstraction and narrative that is meaningless at the level of reality or phenomenology you primarily operate at? I’ve tried an experiment where I went against my morals or values and while I could do it, it just felt contractive and dissociative. That discourages me from straying from them because it’s punishing. For me, most of the time it’s not even like I’m consciously trying or maintaining what values or morals I believe I have. It feels more like I’m aligned with them based on my current beliefs or model of reality.
I’m trying to understand how you are not influenced by morals or values. Are they not just certain articulated beliefs as determined by your conscience or your nature? Or your saying that these morals or values you follow are only so your sociable to humans?
Tawsif - my morality, if we can call it that, emerges spontaneously as an extension of my own nature. I am not honest because it is “right” to do so according to some social standard - I am honest because I find it a more coherent way of being than dishonesty. Perhaps, if dishonesty provided me a sense of coherence I would choose it. In fact, that was the case when I was a child. I used dishonesty in order to cope with the harsh and often senseless expectations society had of me. Living a “double life” was a way of protecting the coherence of my personality. It is only when I grew older that I learned that there are deeper forms of coherence than that of the personality. And to align with that - all aspects of life including thought, speech and behaviour must also cohere. So, my honesty is not an outcome of morality but empirical truths.
I derive all my values in the same way. Through stress testing them against my own experience and in accordance with my own nature. Not because somebody said so.
So obvious now but for some reason I never fully “got” the free fall analogy. Now I do and it’s created a big shift here. Why take ANYTHING soooooo seriously???
Thank you Shiv, so profound! This is exactly where I am at the moment. Many years ago I thought I had my life and spirituality sorted out. Nowadays I realise I know absolutely nothing and right now this terrifies me. I worry about health, my own and those I love; I worry enormously about death and dying. Everything often seems dark and hopeless and I am definitely in a tailspin! I’ve felt like this for a few years now, ever since my sister died suddenly and unexpectedly. How do I see the miracle of life and not the terror? How do I make the freefall feel free like you describe? Does it just come out of the blue, or are there practical things I can do? Much love 🙏
Thank you for sharing that with me Paul. I have taken the liberty of responding to your question via my latest post. It appears as a paid article and I don't know if you are a paid subscriber and have access to it. If you aren't, please send me your email address so I can email the full essay to you.
Thank you Shiv, I have just messaged you 🙏
Here it is, top of page 230 of the 2000 Oxford Press paper back edition of Evans-Wentz’s translation (with copious notes & commentary) of “The Tibetan Book of The Great Liberation” c. 1954
“This realization is likened to that of a crow which, although already in possession of a pond, flies off elsewhere to quench its thirst, and finding no other drinking-place returns to the one pond.
Similarly, the radiance which emanates from the One Mind, by emanating from one’s own mind, emancipates the mind.”
… as dear old Joe Miller (c.f. Miller Archives at sftslodge.org) would often add, “this is a do not seek & ye shall find…”. “It can’t be taught, only caught…” 🌬️♥️♥️
Oh indeed… that surrender is but an acknowledgment that I/we/none of us have “control” of what occurs in the entire Universe & certainly not in our lives here on Earth - it’s all by grace… when we realise this, we can actually live! And i owe you a quote: dang, I moved the book again…
👌
This free fall which you are speaking of I think can become very apparent despite being in the midst of it all if we stop distracting ourselves. I tend to use the screen to avoid this even though I know it is inevitable.
Thanks for helping me see the miracle of it all. For with this beautiful text helping me see that the mere existence of it all sure is a miracle.
I am always impressed by how you manage to keep the same thread and over and over again hitting the same tone through the whole text. It is a little like a dance, always getting back to where you first started out.
Striking post [as usual] Shiv. I want to ask a question regarding this statement you made “Social expectations, values, meaning and morals have no influence over me.”.
I can see how social expectations have little influence on you. And I can even see how meaning can not influence you because I’ve directly witnessed both of those not influencing me.
But, values and morals? I sense between choosing to lie to get a material gain or not lying and losing that material gain, you would choose the latter. I sense you do things that most Americans would consider moral even when no one is looking or would know. I know from my direct experience it wouldn’t be impossible for me to commit an extremely immoral act as most people would consider. All I know it would currently feel like going against my nature.
Are you saying that values and morals are a level of abstraction and narrative that is meaningless at the level of reality or phenomenology you primarily operate at? I’ve tried an experiment where I went against my morals or values and while I could do it, it just felt contractive and dissociative. That discourages me from straying from them because it’s punishing. For me, most of the time it’s not even like I’m consciously trying or maintaining what values or morals I believe I have. It feels more like I’m aligned with them based on my current beliefs or model of reality.
I’m trying to understand how you are not influenced by morals or values. Are they not just certain articulated beliefs as determined by your conscience or your nature? Or your saying that these morals or values you follow are only so your sociable to humans?
Tawsif - my morality, if we can call it that, emerges spontaneously as an extension of my own nature. I am not honest because it is “right” to do so according to some social standard - I am honest because I find it a more coherent way of being than dishonesty. Perhaps, if dishonesty provided me a sense of coherence I would choose it. In fact, that was the case when I was a child. I used dishonesty in order to cope with the harsh and often senseless expectations society had of me. Living a “double life” was a way of protecting the coherence of my personality. It is only when I grew older that I learned that there are deeper forms of coherence than that of the personality. And to align with that - all aspects of life including thought, speech and behaviour must also cohere. So, my honesty is not an outcome of morality but empirical truths.
I derive all my values in the same way. Through stress testing them against my own experience and in accordance with my own nature. Not because somebody said so.
🙏
Dear Shiv,
Beautiful piece!
I love this: "In order for things to collapse they have to first exist. And this very fact of their existence is a miracle."
And this: "In the midst of a collapsing mind and a collapsing life - I found freedom."
And this: "For freedom does not come from transcending the limits of reality. But from seeing reality for what it is without cowering from it."
Thank you for sharing as always!
Love
Myq
PS I'm reminded of this quote:
“The bad news is you’re falling through the air, nothing to hang on to, no parachute. The good news is, there’s no ground.” ”
― Chögyam Trungpa
So obvious now but for some reason I never fully “got” the free fall analogy. Now I do and it’s created a big shift here. Why take ANYTHING soooooo seriously???