Tuesday, July 18, 2006

a solution for the latent; developing images

Today, the sight of whitecaps out on the lake and a boat under sail caught me completely off guard and swept me into a longing for the water. Sitting by the lake for awhile eased the pain, but there's still something wonderful about being out there.

Some posts by Trev and Andrew reminded me of something else I wanted to talk about, or rather, share some observations on. One was Sk8er Boi's second post in the "Why be good" series. (Special attention to his last paragraph in the post, as well as to some thoughtful comments in response.)

It's essentially this: An effortless, integral unity seems to be important.

Here's a quote from the comments in one of Trev's "Why be Good" series:
Compassion as a choice?
If ya gotta choose, you're doing it wrong. I mean...
If I am in the right place, there's no choosing. Just knowing right action, right time. No question, no mind. Flow like water.


Call it what you will; integration, unity, centeredness. Being, living, drawing from, a place that is that. That creates a void, which makes space for the most interesting things to happen. People are drawn in. Some doors only open under negative pressure.

Now I reach a difficulty. I don't really want to set terms for the conversation, but some definition of the concept is helpful in conversing about it. But if you are a solitude, you know it, nobody can tell you otherwise; the experience is self-authenticating. And I feel academic in trying to describe anything.

Unity seems to have a gravity. It draws others in. Can repel them, too. It seems to amplify what already is.

Unity is self-identifying; it knows others when it sees them. Fracturedness, disunity, seems to read more as a lack of unity than as anything unto itself.

It also tends to be self-righting. I wrote to my father about centeredness, comparing learning it to learning to be a good helmsman while sailing. From overcorrection to proper correction, to noticing earlier that correction is needed, to seeing the wind, seeing the waves, knowing how the boat will move, knowing not just effects but causes. Last; moving from correction to working with all this in perfect unison; perfect control.

It is complete in itself; it is its own solitude.

The meeting of solitudes is synergistic, dynamic. What moves between them is wonderful.

As oneness grows, is there a disunity growing elsewhere? On the planet, an alternate universe? Are we all better off with a moderate amount of disunity? I don't know, only know what I notice going on around me. People are drawn in. For myself, I have a preference for centeredness over fracturedness. I wonder what might change as more people are drawn in. Certainly the people and things that enter my perception.

    Rest in this silence, stillness, oneness. Your only task is to rest. You'll learn how to be without leaving there, how to engage without leaving there. It's possible because nobody told me otherwise, so I made it be possible.
    It is not just connecting to "one" "other" but the depth and breadth of one-with-all. I see increasingly; it manifests increasingly.
    You are not isolated and yet you are completely alone. All is one if you let it.
    If you are there you can draw others in. Stay there.




Recommended listening: heard last week Adyashanti's brief recording, "The power of unified consciousness," downloadable here. Slightly different way of framing my observations, but still true to them. I mean... if you're interested in how I see things. I listened to another one more recently but forget which; will add the link later.

5 comments:

isaiah said...

The "experience" we seek, the feelings and emotions that become addictive (I want to feel good, I want to feel bad) come to us dressed in layer upon layer of excess.

We "live" into a shedding of the heavy layers until we discover the center is as empty as our experiences are.

When we accept each layer is being necessary but understand they envelop emptiness- how freer can we be?

We move beyond experiences into ‘simply being.’

All the ways of seeing, experiencing (solitude, unified, fractured, centered) are simply layers themselves- still resting at the core is emptiness.

Eventually, each of us will ‘live away’ all our excesses and come to recognize who we truly are.

There is no wrong way or right way to ‘live away’ into this being.
Even our fractured way of experiencing is as precious and complete as our whole- being…there simply isn’t anything less than our whole being…shrouded in layers we must shed.

We are the emptiness, centered at our core.

anonymous julie said...

We are the emptiness, centered at our core.

A comment I made to a friend:

Also the idea [in quantum physics] that we can guess at what goes on by observing the effects of the event - although the event itself cannot by nature be observed. I am forming an idea of what I really am by watching what goes on around me.

So - my observations support your assertion.

(I don't need to tip my whole hand, then it's just one more object for study...) Perhaps better words to identify the thing I'm trying to talk about in the post is just that - emptiness - not cluttered with or attached to anything. Tried to be clear, though deliberately incomplete - you know what I'm talking about, so see the rest of the picture.

Andrew said...

"Your only task is to rest."

Ah, that's it exactly. So difficult, yet so simple.

CE said...

What is perfect control?
Who is in control?
When there is no movement away from confusion, confusion will cease to be confusion.

anonymous julie said...

Andrew, thank you for understanding what matters in such a contorted entry.

Imemine, that's true. Perfect control is no control; I guess it might be better called perfect Tao. Moving together. Didn't do well picking words for this, did I? Maybe I'll say the whole thing again when I figure out how.