the air shares its spirit

thank you, Jill 

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Rumi has a whole theory of language based on the reed flute (ney). Beneath everything we say, and within each note of the reed flute, lies a nostalgia for the reed bed.

Language and music are possible only because we’re empty, hollow, and separated from the source. All language is a longing for home.

Why is there not a second tonality, he muses, a note in praise of the craftsman’s skill, which fashioned the bare cylinder into a ney, the intricate human form with its nine holes?


—Coleman Barks
On Silence

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All things share the same breath - the beast, the tree, the man. 

The air shares its spirit with all the life it supports.

—Chief Seattle

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in(spiritus

   

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Ours is a planet sown in beings. Our generations overlap like shingles. We don't fall in rows like hay, but we fall. Once we get here, we spend forever on the globe, most of it tucked under.

While we breathe, we open time like a path in the grass.

We open time as a boat's stem slits the crest of the present.


—Annie Dillard

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Your breath is a bridge between you and your body. Constantly, breath is bridging you to your body, connecting you, relating you to your body.  

Not only is the breath a bridge to your body, it is also a bridge between you and the universe. The body is just the universe which is nearer to you.

If the bridge is broken, you are no more in the body. You move into some unknown dimension; then you can not be found in space and time. So, breath is also the bridge between you, and space and time.

Breath has two points. 

One is where it touches the body and the universe, and another is where it touches you and that which transcends the universe. We know only one part of the breath. When it moves into the universe, into the body, we know it. But it is always moving from the body to the "no-body," from the "no-body" to the body.

There are certain points in breathing which you have never observed, and those points are the doors.

Man is trying to reach further, from earth into space, and man has not yet learned the nearest part of his life [...]


—Osho
The Book of Secrets

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listen

   

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The flute of the Infinite is played without ceasing,

and its sound is Love.

—Kabir

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directions

   

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Pursue some path, however narrow and crooked,

which you can walk with love and reverence.


—Henry David Thoreau

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Make your own Bible.

Select and collect all the words and sentences that in all your readings have been to you like the blast of a trumpet. 

[…] 

Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. 

And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

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inspir(ation

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In the morning as the storm begins to blow away
the clear sky appears for a moment and it seems to me
that there has been something simpler than I could ever
believe

simpler than I could have begun to find words for
not patient not even waiting no more hidden
than the air itself that became part of me for a while
with every breath and remained with me unnoticed

something that was here unnamed unknown in the days
and the nights not separate from them
not separate from them as they came and were gone
it must have been here neither early nor late then

by what name can I address it now holding out my thanks


—W.S. Merwin (treasure)
Just Now

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in gratitude

  

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We kneel in gratitude
as the movements in love
disperse our sweet intentions
across the fictions
of Companionship-

two of the creatures
which You named Me


—Leonard Cohen

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shelter

 

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I know it's true
It's all because of you
And, if I make it through
It's all because of you

And, now and then
If we must start again
Well, we will know for sure
That I will love you

Now and then
I miss you
Oh, now and then
I want you to be there for me
Always to return to me

I know it's true
It's all because of you
And, if you go away
I know you'll never stay

Now and then
I miss you
Oh, now and then
I want you to be there for me

I know it's true
It's all because of you
And, if I make it through
It's all because of you

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part(icals

   

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The true person is

Not anyone in particular;

But, like the deep blue color

Of the limitless sky,

It is everyone,

everywhere in the world.

—Dogen 

Japan, 13th cent

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When I was the stream, when I was the
forest, when I was still the field,
when I was every hoof, foot,
fin and wing, when I 
was the sky
itself,
no one ever asked me did I have a purpose, no one ever
wondered was there anything I might need,
for there was nothing
I could not
love.

It was when I left all we once were that 
the agony began, the fear and questions came,
and I wept, I wept. And tears
I had never known
before. 

So I returned to the river, I returned to 
the mountains. I asked for their hand in marriage again,
I begged—I begged to wed every object and creature, 
and when they accepted,
God was ever present in my arms.
And He did not say,
“Where have you been?” 
For then I knew my soul—every soul—
has always held Him.


—Meister Eckhart 
Daniel Ladinsky version

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It is a lie, any talk of God that does not comfort you.

—Meister Ekhart

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an embarrassment

   

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“Do you want to ask the blessing?”

“No. If you do, go ahead.”

He went ahead: his prayer dressed up

in Sunday clothes rose a few feet

and dropped with a soft thump.

If a lonely soul did ever cry out

in company its true outcry to God,

it would be as though at a sedate party

a man suddenly removed his clothes

and took his wife passionately into his arms.


—Wendell Berry

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the idea of the good it(self

 

free course

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… the multiplicity of the perceptual world [unfolds]

as a seed bursts into a tree. 

—Eknath Easwaren

The Upanishads

(treasure)

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the light is the self

 

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Separateness arises from identifying the Self with the body, which is made up of the elements; when this physical identification dissolves, there can be no more separate self. 

This is what i want to tell you, beloved.

That which is above heaven and below earth, which is also between heaven and earth, which is the same through the past, present and future — that is woven, warp and woof, in space.

Space, called Akshara, the Imperishable, is without limitation, without inside or outside. It consumes nothing and nothing consumes it. The Imperishable is the seer, though unseen; the hearer though unheard; the thinker, though unthought; the knower though unknown. It is in the Imperishable that space is woven, warp and woof.

When the sun sets, and the moon sets, and the fire goes out and no one speaks, the light is the self, for by that we sit, work, go out and come back. The Self, pure awareness, shines as the light within the heart, surrounded by the senses. Only seeming to think, seeming to move, the Self neither sleeps nor wakes nor dreams.

There is a state of consciousness, between the dream world of sorrow and joy and the Self, in which we are aware of both. In this intermediate state we make and dissolve impressions by the light of the Self. In this state we make up our own lotus ponds, lakes and rivers.

It is said of these states of consciousness that in the dreaming state, when one is sleeping, the shining Self keeps the body alive with the vital force of prana and wanders wherever he wills until returning to the state from which he began.

As a man in the arms of his beloved is not aware of what is without and what is within, so a person in union with the Self is not aware of what is without and what is within, and passes beyond sorrow.

In that unitive state, one knows without knowing for nothing is separate. When the physical identification dissolves, the Self gathers in all the powers of life and descends with them into the heart, becoming one. By the light of the heart the Self leaves the dream body, merging in consciousness.

Assume the Self.

Give All.

Love. 

Lessons from the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 

Eknath Easwaran version

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All this is full. All that is full.

From fullness, fullness comes.

When fullness is taken from fullness,

Fullness remains.

OM shanti shanti shanti 

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the highest teaching

  

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From joy all beings have come. 
In joy all beings are sustained. 
To joy all beings return. 

This is the highest teaching. 
This is the highest teaching.


—The Upanishads

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ripple in still water

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If my words did glow with the gold of sunshine
And my tunes were played on the harp unstrung
Would you hear my voice come through the music?
Would you hold it near as it were your own?

It's a hand-me-down, the thoughts are broken
Perhaps they're better left unsung
I don't know, don't really care
Let there be songs to fill the air

Ripple in still water
When there is no pebble tossed
Nor wind to blow

Reach out your hand if your cup be empty
If your cup is full may it be again
Let it be known there is a fountain
That was not made by the hands of men

There is a road, no simple highway
Between the dawn and the dark of night
And if you go no one may follow
That path is for your steps alone

Ripple in still water
When there is no pebble tossed
Nor wind to blow

You, who choose to lead, must follow
But if you fall you fall alone
If you should stand then who's to guide you?
If I knew the way I would take you home

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pray without ceasing

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Meditation must be unceasing even when one is engaged in work. 

Particular time for it is meant for novices.

—Sri Ramana Maharshi

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Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. 

I drink at it; but while I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away, but eternity remains. 

I would drink deeper; fish in the sky, whose bottom is pebbly with stars. I cannot count one. I know not the first letter of the alphabet. I have always been regretting that I was not as wise as the day I was born.


—Henry David Thoreau
Walden: Where I lived and What I lived for

 

.

 

 

 

on being a person here

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Be a person here. Stand by the river, invoke
the owls. Invoke winter, then spring.
Let any season that wants to come here make its own
call. After that sound goes away, wait.

A slow bubble rises through the earth
and begins to include sky, stars, all space,
even the outracing, expanding thought.
Come back and hear the little sound again.

Suddenly this dream you are having matches
everyone’s dream, and the result is the world.
If a different call came there wouldn’t be any
world, or you, or the river, or the owls calling.

How you stand here is important. How you listen for the next things to happen. How you breathe.


—William Stafford
Being a Person

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current to the light

 

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Paradise is having a connection — roots in the garden, stem from the branch, current to the light. 

To be unaware of the connection is to have one’s heart in the wrong place — far out in the fruit instead of within, in the tree.


—Alan Watts

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the branch might seem like the fruit’s origin: 

in fact, the branch exists because of the fruit 

—Rumi

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earth dweller

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… they [cosmic forces] move in masses, waves, currents constantly constituting and reconstituting beings and objects, movements and happenings, entering into them, passing through them, forming themselves in them, throwing themselves out from them on other beings and objects. 

Each natural individual is a receptacle of these cosmic forces and a dynamo for their propagation; there passes from each to each a constant stream of mental and vital energies, and these run too in cosmic waves and currents no less than the forces of physical Nature. 

All this action is veiled from our surface mind’s direct sense and knowledge, but it is known and felt by the inner being, though only through a direct contact; when the being enters into the cosmic consciousness, it is still more widely, inclusively, intimately aware of this play of cosmic forces.

—Sri Aurobindo

The Hidden Forces of Life

noosphe.re

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It was all the clods at once become
precious; it was the barn, and the shed,
and the windmill, my hands, the crack
Arlie made in the ax handle: oh, let me stay
here humbly, forgotten, to rejoice in it all;
let the sun casually rise and set.

If I have not found the right place,
teach me; for, somewhere inside, the clods are
vaulted mansions, lines through the barn sing
for the saints forever, the shed and windmill
rear so glorious the sun shudders like a gong.

Now I know why people worship, carry around
magic emblems, wake up talking dreams
they teach to their children: the world speaks.
The world speaks everything to us.
It is our only friend.


—William Stafford

 

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All that lives is spirit and all that dies is matter; 

and all that dies in spirit is matter and all that lives in matter is spirit.

—Hazrat Inayat Khan

The Mysticism of Sound and Music

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O Beloved, where is the Beloved?

 

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Every person, from morning till evening, is making invisible forms in space by what he says. He is creating invisible vibrations around him, and so he is creating an atmosphere.


—Hazrat Inayat Khan

The Mysticism of Sound and Music

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In truth, everything and everyone 
is a shadow of the Beloved. 

And our seeking is His seeking, 
and our words are His words. 

We search for Him here and there. 

While looking right at Him, 
sitting by His side, we ask: 
'O Beloved, where is the Beloved?' 

Enough with such questions! 

Let silence take you to the core of life. 

All your talk is worthless when compared 
with one whisper of the Beloved.


—Rumi

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blessings be

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My writing, when it hasn't been in defense of precious things,

has been a giving of thanks for precious things.

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Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.

Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.
Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years. 

Listen to carrion -- put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts. 

So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth? 

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.

As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn't go.

Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.


—Wendell Berry
Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

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Learn by little the desire for all things 
which perhaps is not desire at all 

but undying love which perhaps 
is not love at all but gratitude 

for the being of things which perhaps
is not gratitude at all

but the maker’s joy in what is made, 
the joy in which we come to rest.


—Wendell Berry
Leavings

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needful things

 

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All you need are these: 

certainty of judgment in the present moment;  

action for the common good in the present moment;  

and an attitude of gratitude in the present moment for anything that comes your way.

—Marcus Aurelius

Meditations 9.6

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yes

 

. 

For all that has been, Thanks.
To all that shall be, Yes.


—Dag Hammarskjöld

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know(ledge of the spirit

Hilma af Klint, The Swan (No. 17), 1914-15

Hilma af Klint, The Tail of the Swan, 1914

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So long as a symbol is a living thing, it is the expression for something that cannot be characterized in any other or better way. The symbol is alive only so long as it is pregnant with meaning. 

But once its meaning has been born out of it, once that expression is found which formulates the thing sought, expected, or divined even better than the hitherto accepted symbol, then the symbol is dead, i.e., it possesses only an historical significance.


—Carl Jung (1875-1961)

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Hilma af Klint’s paintings are diagrams of a spiritual plane that underlies the visual world. She was a member of a small group of women who would meet to access religious spirits with knowledge of the afterlife. 

Gregor, one of the spiritual masters she contacted during these meetings, said to her that the paintings represent “All the knowledge that is not of the senses, not of the intellect, not of the heart but is the property that exclusively belongs to the deepest aspect of your being […] the knowledge of your spirit.” 

Hilma af Klint (Swedish, 1862-1944) wanted to keep her paintings secret from the public until 20 years after her death. 

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the third thing

  

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The tension of the future is unbearable in us. It must break through narrow cracks, it must force new ways. You want to cast off the burden, you want to escape the inescapable. Running away is deception and detour.

Shut your eyes so that you do not see the manifold, the outwardly plural, the tearing away and the tempting. There is only one way and that is your way; there is only one salvation and that is your salvation.

Why are you looking around for help? Do you believe that help will come from outside? What is to come is created in you and from you. 

Hence look into yourself. Do not compare, do not measure.

No other way is like yours. All other ways deceive and tempt you.  

You must fulfill the way that is in you.

—Carl Jung

The Red Book

.

If a union is to take place between opposites like spirit and matter, conscious and unconscious, bright and dark, and so on, it will happen in a third thing, which represents not a compromise but something new.


—Carl Jung

.

 

 

notes to self

sea water

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Love with no object.
There is a way of loving not attached to what is loved.

Observe how water is with the ground, always moving toward the ocean, though the ground tries to hold water’s foot and not let it go.
This is how we are with wine and beautiful food, wealth and power, or just a dry piece of bread: we want and we get drunk with wanting, then the headache and bitterness afterward.

Those prove that the attachment took hold and held you back. Now you proudly refuse help. “My love is pure. I have an intuitive union with God. I don’t need anyone to show me how to be free!” This is not the case. A love with no object is a true love. All else, shadow without substance. Have you seen someone fall in love with his own shadow? That’s what we’ve done. 

Leave partial loves and find one that’s whole.

Where is someone who can do that? They’re so rare, those hearts that carry the blessing and lavish it over everything. Hold out your beggar’s robe and accept their generosity. Anything not coming from that will damage the cloth, like a sharp stone tearing your sincerity. Keep that intact, and use clarity; call it reason or discernment, you have within you a deciding force that knows what to receive, what to turn from.


—Rumi
Mathnawi III: 2248-80
Coleman Barks version

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To see materials as static is an illusion. If the human life span were a day, flowers might seem as enduring as rocks. 

If we lived a thousand years, rock might seem mobile. 

—Anne Whiston Spirn
The Language of Landscape

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There are materials that are out in the open 
and there are the things that are hidden. 

The real world has more to do with what is hidden. 


—Saul Leiter

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