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June 2003
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June 1st 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The Austerity of Sanity

As long as there is disorder, confusion and chaos within the self, the ego can hide out and maneuver and continue to run the show. When we go beyond ego, we discover a radical order in which things begin to deeply make sense. But there's a sacrifice to be made for this, and that sacrifice is the very confusion and chaos that the ignorance of the ego creates.

You see, we actually like all the confusion because it gives us a certain freedom. I call it negative freedom. The ego finds it suffocating not to have the freedom to be crazy and confused. And because of this, often people will rebel against the demand for true sanity. Why? Because we want the freedom to go crazy.

To be a sane human being requires a certain kind of austerity, and we don't want the austerity of sanity. So in this, what we're actually resisting is our own potential for wholeness and simplicity and sanity. And the degree to which we as human beings resist that potential is frightening, but it is true.

So when you hear the words renunciation and austerity, they refer to this -- the renunciation of the insanity of the ego. That's what has to be given up. And that's where true freedom is found.

Andrew Cohen

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 2nd 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The Mother Ocean

In the beginning, there was blackness. Only the sea. In the beginning there was no sun, no moon, no people. In the beginning there were no animals, no plants. Only the sea. The sea was the Mother. The Mother was not people, she was not anything. Nothing at all. She was when she was, darkly.

The Kogis

The first man knew her not perfectly: no more shall the last find her out. For her thoughts are more than the sea, and her counsels profounder than the great deep.

Sir. 24: 28-29

Treasures of revelation emerge from the Mother ocean ... Dive with abandon into her mystery. You will discover a new gem every moment.

Ramprasad

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 3rd 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- A Life Courageous

The enlightened person's life is a life courageous from the viewpoint of the average person. What I mean by "life courageous" is living not in confrontation with life, but in the full acceptance that change is the very basis of life.

Living life courageously means reconciling discipline with understanding, unity with diversity, order with spontaneity, sociability with individuality. The variety of experience and perception is seen in its wonder of diversity, together with the unity.

The enlightened person doesn't reconcile discipline with understanding, or combine order with spontaneity. It just happens, and therein lies the magic and wonder of it.

Ramesh Balsekar

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 4th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Surrender to What IS

The word "surrender" is a most misunderstood word. The surrender is merely the surrender of volition, surrender of personal doership. But it's interpreted by the average person to mean giving up all his material possessions. True surrender is purely and only the giving up of the idea that one has volition, accepting His Will in everything that happens....

The surrender can only happen with the understanding itself, that only His Will can prevail. It goes really deep down , you see. The fact of the matter is, it is His Will which has always prevailed. It is His Will which is now prevailing and it is His Will which will prevail in the future. That is a fact. The longer it takes one to accept that fact, the longer will one suffer.

Eventually, we arrive at the deepest conviction that there cannot be any real "me," that the "me" is an illusion. No "me" can persuade God to accept him. The "me" has to surrender and then God happens.

Ramesh Balsekar

When you surrender to what is and so become fully present, the past ceases to have any power. The realm of Being, which had been obscured by the mind, then opens up. Suddenly, a great stillness arises within you, an unfathomable sense of peace. And within that peace, there is great joy. And within that joy, there is love. And at the innermost core, there is the sacred, the immeasurable, That which cannot be named.

Eckhart Tolle

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 5th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The Awakening of Consciousness

The time-bound mode of consciousness is deeply embedded in the human psyche. But what we are doing here is part of a profound transformation that is taking place in the collective consciousness of the planet and beyond: the awakening of consciousness from the dream of matter, form, and separation. The ending of time.

We are breaking mind patterns that have dominated human life for eons. Mind patterns that have created unimaginable suffering on a vast scale. I am not using the word evil. It is more helpful to call it unconsciousness or insanity.

The beginning of freedom is the realization that you are not "the thinker." The moment you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated. You then begin to realize that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought, that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence.

You also realize that all the things that truly matter -- beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace -- arise from beyond the mind. You begin to awaken.

Eckhart Tolle

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 6th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The Spirit of Wisdom

I am the Queen, source of thought, Knowledge itself. You do not know Me, yet you dwell in Me.

Rig Veda

Listen with inward ear to the music of her wisdom, teaching all creation. With inward eye visualize her brilliant name, Flowing across your heart in letters of molten gold.

Ramprasad

And the spirit of wisdom came to me ... I loved her above health and beauty, and chose to have her instead of light, for the light that cometh from her never goeth out. And all such things as are either secret or manifest, them I know. For wisdom, which is the worker of all things, taught me ... For she is the breath of the power of God, and a pure influence flowing from the glory of the Almighty; a drop of dew that at the morning cometh down upon the earth ... For she is more beautiful than the sun, and above all the order of stars: being compared with light, she is found before it.

Wisd. 7:7,10,21,22,25,29.

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 7th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- In a Relative Way

When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second. When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That's relativity.

Albert Einstein

There was a young lady named Bright, Whose speed was far faster than light; She set out one day In a relative way, And returned on the previous night.

Arthur Henry Buller

As I've said, a "me" called Albert Einstein was evolved for the theory of relativity. But for the theory of relativity only. For further evolution in science, other body-minds were created. Einstein was not ready to accept the subsequent development of the quantum theory. He was not able to accept Heisenberg's theory of uncertainty.

Einstein said this theory of uncertainty meant "God is playing dice with the universe." He said that he cannot accept that "God is playing dice with the universe." Niels Bohr responded, "God is not playing dice with the universe. We think God is playing dice with the universe because we do not have all the information which God has!"

Ramesh Balsekar

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 8th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Only Myself In You

God and I in space alone and nobody else in view. "And where are the people, O Lord," I said, "the earth below and the sky o'er head and the dead whom once I knew?"

"That was a dream," God smiled and said, "A dream that seemed to be true. There were no people, living or dead, there was no earth, and no sky o'er head; there was only Myself -- in you."

"Why do I feel no fear," I asked, "meeting You here this way? For I have sinned I know full well -- and is there heaven, and is there hell, and is this the Judgment Day?"

"Nay, those were but dreams," the Great God said, "Dreams that have ceased to be. There are no such things as fear or sin; there is no you -- you never have been -- there is nothing at all but Me."

Ella Wheeler Wilcox

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 9th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Deep Dreamless Sleep

You take a journey into the Unmanifested every night when you enter the phase of deep dreamless sleep. You merge with the Source. You draw from it the vital energy that sustains you for a while when you return to the manifested, the world of separate forms. This energy is much more vital than food: "Man does not live by bread alone."

But in dreamless sleep, you don't go into it consciously. Although the bodily functions are still operating, "you" no longer exist in that state. Can you imagine what it would be like to go into dreamless sleep with full consciousness? It is impossible to imagine it, because that state has no content.

The Unmanifested does not liberate you until you enter it consciously. That's why Jesus did not say: the truth will make you free, but rather: "You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free." This is not a conceptual truth. It is the truth of eternal life beyond form, which is known directly or not at all.

Eckhart Tolle

Consciousness which is always present because Consciousness is all is, is present in deep sleep. It is identified consciousness which is absent. The "me" is absent and therefore there is no conceptualizing in deep sleep. When conceptualizing starts, the dreaming happens.

Ramesh Balsekar

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 10th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Intransigent Nationalism

Patriotism is when love of your own people comes first; nationalism, when hate for people other than your own comes first.

Charles de Gaulle

There are no nations: there are only nationalisms. By 'nationalisms' is meant sentiments of a nationalistic character, perfectly imaginary and devoid of any kind of reality, and, by inference, large groups of individuals whose common feature is that they are a prey to this illusion.

Wei Wu Wei

I believe we are going to have to prepare ourselves for the difficult and patient task of outgrowing rigid and intransigent nationalism, and work slowly towards a world federation of peaceful nations. How will this be possible? Don't ask me. I don't know. But unless we develop a moral, spiritual, and political wisdom that is proportionate to our technological skill, our skill may end us.

Thomas Merton

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 11th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- A Place Within

When Barykh came to those words in the psalm which read: "I will not give sleep to mine eyes, nor slumber to mine eyelids until I find a place for the Lord,' he stopped and said to himself: 'Until I find myself and make myself a place to be ready for the descending of the Divine Presence.'

Tales of the Hasidim

Let a man return into his own self, and there in the centre of his soul, let him wait upon God, as one who listens to another speaking from a high tower, as though he had God in his heart, as though in the whole of creation there was only God and his soul.

St Peter of Algantara

Therefore we said: If to anyone the tumult of the flesh has fallen silent, if the images of earth, water, and air are quiescent, if the heavens themselves are shut out and the very soul itself is making no sound and is surpassing itself by no longer thinking about itself, if all dreams an visions in the imagination are excluded, if all language and everything transitory is silent ... That is how it was when at that moment we extended our reach and in a flash of mental energy attained the eternal wisdom which abides beyond all things.

St Augustine

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 12th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Not Behind Shut Doors

If you want to practice this Way, you must do it in the creative evolution of yin and yang of heaven and earth, realize its experience in the midst of all things and all events, and practice it and hold it in the presence of all people.

This is work that is alive, effervescent, free, liberated, gloriously enlightened, true, and great. Do you think it can be attained by people who shut the door and sit quietly with blank minds?

Liu I-Ming

He is the real Sadhu, who can reveal the form of the Formless to the vision of these eyes: Who teaches the simple way of attaining Him, that is other than rites or ceremonies: Who does not make you close the doors, and hold the breath, and renounce the world: Who makes you perceive the Supreme Spirit wherever the mind attaches itself: Who teaches you to be still in the midst of all activities.

Kabir

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 13th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The Potential of Silence

Silence is the most powerful medium for transmission of deep knowledge, for deep knowledge to arrive intuitively. Silence is the most potent medium, but in many cases it is not enough.

In the spiritual evolution a certain amount of guidance is necessary, and for those who needed this guidance the Teacher would use various concepts.

Incidentally, silence doesn't mean not talking. Silence is silence of the mind. Silence is absence of questions, absence of thinking, true meditation. That is the most potent medium for this understanding to take place.

When the inquiring mind, intellectually creating problems, gradually comes to the understanding that the more problems it creates the more veils it creates between the Self and the understanding, then there is silence. Again, that silence can only arise at the right time, at the right place. You cannot bring about that silence.

Ramesh Balsekar

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 14th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Who Loves or Hates?

'Why do you eat so much grass?' asked the owl. 'Grass is an emetic.' 'I find it digestive,' the rabbit replied, 'and I love it.'

'Why do you not eat snails?' continued the owl. 'Because I hate them,' answered the rabbit.

'Impossible!' exclaimed the owl. 'Who is there to love what, and what is there to be hated by whom? The two most fatuous words in our language!' 'Any two of us,' the rabbit suggested, 'you and I, for instance.'

'Absurd,' continued the owl, 'how could we be two?' 'Why not?' inquired the rabbit.

'Because I am, and you are not,' concluded the owl. 'But in space-time ... ' suggested the rabbit.

'In no time,' snapped the owl, with a loud clack of his beak and an almost vertical swoop. 'Perhaps,' said the rabbit, as she dived into her burrow, 'but not this one!'

Wei Wu Wei

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 15th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- As a Mother Loves

The inhabitant or soul of the universe is never seen; its voice alone is heard ... It has a gentle voice like a woman, a voice so fine and gentle that even children cannot become afraid. What it says is, 'Be not afraid of the universe.'

Alaskan saying

My Mother is both within and without this phenomenal world ... Giving birth to the world she lives within it. She is the Spider and the world is the Spider's web she has woven ... The Spider brings the web out of herself and then lives in it.

Sri Ramakrishna

As truly as God is our Father, so truly is God our Mother ... to the property of Motherhood belong nature, love, wisdom and knowledge and this is God.

Julian of Norwich

Like a mother who protects her child, her only child, with her own life, one should cultivate a heart of unlimited love and compassion towards all living beings.

The Buddha

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 16th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The Silence That Unites

I am the Invisible One within the All ... I am immeasurable, ineffable, yet whenever I wish, I shall reveal myself of my own accord. I am the head of the All. I exist before the All, and I am the All, Since I exist in everyone.

I am a Voice speaking softly. I exist from the first. I dwell within the Silence ... And it is the hidden Voice that dwells within me, Within the incomprehensible, immeasurable Thought, Within the immeasurable Silence.

Trimorphic Protennoia

Silence like sunlight will illuminate you in God, and will deliver you from the phantoms of ignorance. Silence will unite you with God Himself.

Isaac of Nineveh

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 17th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- A Terrible Tax

Guilt is the gift that goes on giving.

Garrison Keillor

Fear is the tax that conscience pays to guilt.

George Sewell

The Master was always teaching that guilt is an evil emotion to be avoided like the very devil -- all guilt.

"But are we not to hate our sins?" a disciple said one day.

"When you are guilty, it is not your sins you hate but yourself."

Anthony de Mello

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 18th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Someone Infinite and Absolute

The Presence he yearned for suddenly drew close. Across the silence of the Ultimate Calm, Out of a marvellous Transcendence came A body of wonder and translucency As if a sweet mystic summary of her Self Escaping into the original Bliss Had come enlarged out of eternity, Someone came infinite and absolute. A being of wisdom, power and delight, Even as a mother draws her child into her arms, Took to her breast nature and world and soul.

Sri Aurobindo

She is the innermost awareness of the sage who realizes that Consciousness alone exists. She is the life blossoming within the creatures of the universe. Both macrocosm and microcosm are lost within Mother's Womb ...

When anyone attempts to know Her, the singer of this song laughs. Can you swim across a shoreless ocean? Yet the child in me still reaches out to touch the moon.

Ramprasad

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 19th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- A Matter of Perception

It is not the eye that sees the beauty of the heaven, nor the ear that hears the sweetness of music or the glad tidings of a prosperous occurrence, but the soul, that perceives all the relishes of sensual and intellectual perfections; and the more noble and excellent the soul is, the greater and more savoury are its perceptions.

Jeremy Taylor

Had man not the Divine in him he could never, by any possible means, come to the true perception of God. And it is through the knowledge that God is within that he is finally led to this perception.

It is obvious that with the ethical growth of the individual the idea of God to him grows clearer; that as he finds himself, at the same time he finds God, and with the realisation of his own spiritual nature he comes for the first time to the idea of God as Spirit.

Not till he perceives himself to be a spiritual being can he have any just conception of the Universal Spirit from whence he derives his being.

Stanton Davis Kirkham

I no longer try to change outer things. They are simply a reflection. I change my inner perception and the outer reveals the beauty so long obscured by my own attitude. I concentrate on my inner vision and find my outer view transformed. I find myself attuned to the grandeur of life and in unison with the perfect order of the universe.

Daily Word

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 20th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The Beating of Wings

Like a beautiful white dove, That rises from the middle of the waters And comes to shake its wings out over the earth, The Holy Spirit emanates from the Infinite ocean of the Divine perfections and comes to beat her wings out over clear souls To distill in them the balm of love.

Cure D' Ars

The Holy Spirit is not only God but is also the immanent life of man -- is that for which he was created, the flower and fruit of that "Divine Seed," or "light within" him, which has always been his true Self.

Edward Grubb

The Spirit is beyond sound and form, without touch and taste and perfume. It is eternal, unchangeable, and without beginning or end; indeed above reasoning. When consciousness of the Spirit manifests itself, man becomes free from the jaws of death.

The Upanishads

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 21st 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Call on Him as Mother

Who can ever know God? I don't even try. I only call on Him as Mother. Let Mother do whatever She likes. I shall know Her if it is Her will: but I shall be happy to remain ignorant if She wills otherwise ...

The young child wants only his mother. He doesn't know how wealthy his mother is, and he doesn't even want to know. He knows only 'I have a mother, why should I worry?'

Sri Ramakrishna

O my Mother Nut, Stretch your wings over me; Let me become like the imperishable stars, like the indefatigable stars. O Great Being who is in the world of the dead At whose feet is Eternity, In whose hand is the Always, Come to me O great divine beloved Soul, Who is in the mysterious abyss Come to me.

Egyptian inscription

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 22nd 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- I Who Am No Thing

'If you could say it simply,' observed the rabbit, 'perhaps I might understand.' 'Simply what?' asked the owl.

'Simply stated in a dozen words.' 'Eight would suffice,' snapped the owl.

'Well, eight then - if eight is enough.' 'Eight is too many, but you need them.'

'As you think,' sighed the rabbit; 'what are they?' 'I, who am no thing - am every thing,' said the owl.

'How can you be both when you are neither?' 'It is precisely because I am neither that I am both.'

'Then what am I?' 'It is because you think you are some thing that you are not anything.'

'So what?' asked the rabbit. 'So you suffer,' replied the owl, deciding to dine.

Wei Wu Wei

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 23rd 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Universal Love

Universal love is another name for the understanding of polarity, understanding that all objects, all human beings are objective expressions of that same universal Being.

When you tell someone to "Love thy neighbor" he may say, "Why should I love my neighbor, he's a nasty specimen. He kicks my dog, chases my cat up the tree. Why should I love him?" But when this understanding begins that all objective expressions are of the same Being, then love or compassion arises.

What the understanding produces is not just "Love thy neighbor" but "Love everything." Everything in this manifestation is your neighbor, indeed is your Self.

Ramesh Balsekar

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 24th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Psychological Time

"Psychological time," is identification with the past and continuous compulsive projection into the future.

You will not have any doubt that psychological time is a mental disease if you look at its collective manifestations. They occur, for example, in the form of ideologies such as communism, national socialism or any nationalism, or rigid religious belief systems, which operate under the implicit assumption that the highest good lies in the future and that therefore the end justifies the means.

The end is an idea, a point in the mind-projected future, when salvation in whatever form -- happiness, fulfillment, equality, liberation, and so on -- will be attained. Not infrequently, the means of getting there are the enslavement, torture, and murder of people in the present.

For example, it is estimated that as many as 50 million people were murdered to further the cause of communism, to bring about a "better world" in Russia, China, and other countries. This is a chilling example of how belief in a future heaven creates a present hell. Can there be any doubt that psychological time is a serious and dangerous mental illness?

Eckhart Tolle

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 25th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The Thinking and Working Minds

As the spiritual evolution is going on, the thinking mind gets less and less and more attention is paid to the working mind. The thinking mind, the "me," recedes further and further back, and the working mind takes over.

The thinking mind inhabits either in the past or the future. It dwells in its memory and projects into the future. The working mind is concerned with the present moment. That is the big diffrence. The working mind is not concerned with the past or the future, except insofar as the present work is concerned.

I'll tell you a story about the difference between the working mind and the thinking mind:

Winston Churchill had a horse and he was expecting to win the Derby with that horse. He didn't win. When he was asked what happened, he said, "I made a mistake. Before the race, I talked to the horse and I said, 'You win this race and for the rest of your life you won't have to work anymore. You'll have the company of the best females and you'll have nothing to worry about.' That was the mistake. The horse didn't have his mind on the job!" So, when you think of the possible consequences, good or bad, the working mind gets affected.

Ramesh Balsekar

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 26th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The voice in Your Head

Start listening to the voice in your head as often as you can. Pay particular attention to any repetitive thought patterns, those old gramophone records that have been playing in your head perhaps for many years. This is what I mean by "watching the thinker," which is another way of saying: listen to the voice in your head, be there as the witnessing presence.

When you listen to that voice, listen to it impartially. That is to say, do not judge. Do not judge or condemn what you hear, for doing so would mean that the same voice has come in again through the back door. You'll soon realize: there is the voice, and here I am listening to it, watching it. This I am realization, this sense of your own presence, is not a thought. It arises from beyond the mind.

So when you listen to a thought, you are aware not only of the thought but also of yourself as the witness of the thought. A new dimension of consciousness has come in. As you listen to the thought, you feel a conscious presence - your deeper self - behind or underneath the thought, as it were. The thought then loses its power over you and quickly subsides, because you are no longer energizing the mind through identification with it. This is the beginning of the end of involuntary and compulsive thinking. When a thought subsides, you experience a discontinuity in the mental stream - a gap of "no-mind."

At first, the gaps will be short, a few seconds perhaps, but gradually they will become longer. When these gaps occur, you feel a certain stillness and peace inside you. This is the beginning of your natural state of felt oneness with Being, which is usually obscured by the mind. With practice, the sense of stillness and peace will deepen. In fact, there is no end to its depth. You will also feel a subtle emanation of joy arising from deep within: the joy of Being.

Eckhart Tolle

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 27th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- The Ultimate Understanding

You cannot hasten the process of elightenment, and you cannot stop it either. So this climbing keeps on happening, and as I say, you do get glimpses of the progress.

And when there is at least a glimmer of the understanding that 'you' are not making any progress, that the progress is 'taking place,' then a certain amount of freedom takes over, freedom from the "me" that wants to hasten it. Then you know that it is an impersonal process. It must take its own time.

If the number of steps you have to climb is one hundred and thirty, then from the one hundred and twenty-fifth to the one hundrred and twenty-ninth step you may see the light coming in. But at that moment you also have the understanding there is no "me" involved. So the sense of freedom has already started.

The step from one hundred and twenty-nine to one hundred and thirty is always sudden, because you did not know there were one hundred and thirty steps. That is why awakening is always sudden. The ultimate understanding is always sudden.

Ramesh Balsekar

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 28th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Stop Creating Time

If you no longer want to create pain for yourself and others, if you no longer want to add to the residue of past pain that still lives on in you, then don't create any more time, or at least no more than is necessary to deal with the practical aspects of your life.

How to stop creating time? Realize deeply that the present moment is all you ever have. Make the Now the primary focus of your life. Whereas before you dwelt in time and paid brief visits to the Now, have your dwelling place in the Now and pay brief visits to past and future when required to deal with the practical aspects of your life situation.

Always say "yes" to the present moment. What could be more futile, more insane, than to create inner resistance to something that already is? What could be more insane than to oppose life itself, which is now and always now? Surrender to what is. Say "yes" to life -- and see how life suddenly starts working for you rather than against you.

Eckhart Tolle

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 29th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Looking Within Happens

So, as understanding grows, the working mind (Consciousness) becomes more and more operative and the thinking mind becomes less and less operative. The working mind is looking within. So looking within is happening.

And the basis of all that is just the understanding, which comes by reading, or thinking, or attending seminars, or listening to someone. All that is part of the process which brings about, and deepens, the looking within.

Looking within is the absence of the thinking mind. It is the thinking mind which looks out, looks in the past and projects the future. When the thinking mind becomes less and less operative, the looking within is automatic. There is no "you" who can look within. As the thinking mind, looking out, becomes less operative, the looking within happens spontaneously. It is the same thing really, two sides of a coin.

Ramesh Balekar

--- Anthologist and Mentor - Peter Stafford Sumner

June 30th 2003

From the OmniRead Treasuries -- Here Where I Am

'My absence is what I am,' said the owl, 'and it has been called "the Void".' 'Yes?' commented the rabbit, toying with a savoury thistle.

'When I am absent the universe is present,' continued the owl, 'and even you would be welcome.' 'How delightful!' the rabbit replied, skipping politely. 'But where?'

'Here,' the owl snapped conclusively, 'absolutely HERE.' 'And where exactly is that?'

'Where I am, which is where I was, and always have been,' snapped the owl. 'Then where will I be?' the rabbit inquired anxiously.

'Here, HERE, of course! Where else could you be?' 'But where will there be room for both of us where you are?' asked the rabbit innocently.

'You will be present in my absence,' the owl explained patiently. 'I do not see how that can be,' replied the rabbit.

'You will, you will!' assured the owl, preparing his absence. 'I will see to that.'

Wei Wu Wei