The Life-Death continuum

" People are born many times , so they die many times.
Life and death continue endlessly.
If you realise the true meaning of the unborn,
You will transcend both gladness and grief "
Old Zen saying.

Can Life and Death be separate?
Everyday, millions of cells in our bodies die and are replaced by new cells.
We are constantly dying and being reborn...physically, mentally, emotionally.
From the moment of birth, we are moving towards death...an inevitable process.
All Nature is a cycle of Life and Death and Rebirth...matter and energy changing form in an endless dance.
The real question is " Who or what is born and who or what dies?"
Once I find who I really am, neither birth nor death is real....both are just part of the endless movie projected by the ONE.
I am that One. You are that One. Mountain and stone and ant and sea and galaxy and atom...all ONE.
That is all there is - eternal, blissful and tranquil.
When I clear my illusions, I dissolve into that ONE.
Nothing more to say!

Crucifixion and Resurrection

Easter is here...spring begins the new life. The trees wear brilliant new green leaves and multitudes of blossoms...as dormant Nature awakens again .
On Good Friday, we remember and share in the crucifixion of Christ. He who forgave even those who crucified him. And, on Easter Sunday, we celebrate His resurrection...awakening again into Life eternal.
What does this mean for us regular human beings? What is the secret meaning of this great re-birth?
It reminds us that every human being has a choice: to stay lost in the illusion of this brief human existence or to "die"...and so awaken to one's true blissful and divine Being.
The crucifixion of the ego-mind complex...which is an illusion anyway...leads to the resurrection of the eternal Self, Brahman, Sat-chit-ananda...the ONE true and eternal spirit that is the source and the substance of all things.
The Self always was , always is and always will be...shining like the sun in the cave of the Heart in every human being. The illusion of the ego-mind complex , like the monsoon clouds, hides this Sun.
Once we turn the attention inwards, seek the source, the illusion disappears...this is the crucifixion, painful only because of our attachment to our treasured illusion.
When we let go , the eternal Sun of the Self shines forth in its true glory.
Happy Easter! :)

Dropping my story

Everyone has a story: a motley collection of memories, fantasies, inventions that become "true" over time.My story is totally unreal and non-existent...I keep it alive because I have made it my identity.This is me...this is my life!
I nurture my story with great care. Endlessly I repeat the incidents, the memories, the people, the actions,the achievements, the happenings...partly based on the past that actually was, partly embellished by me with suitable imagination to look and sound good in the telling. After a while, even the embellishments become real to me...repetition gives them reality of sorts.
So what's wrong with my building a story and identifying with it? After all, it gives me character, personality, makes me who I am...gives me something to talk about at the party or the cafe...jokes and funny happenings and adventures and excitement that I can impress my listeners ( and myself) with. The older I get, the more I cling to my story...old friends shudder when I repeat that incident in the bar in Germany for the umpteenth time.
Finally, battered by Life's roller-coaster, I realise that my story is a willow-the-wisp, a mirage. And this mirage is keeping me from truly living...fresh and new and aware in each new moment of each new day.
Yet, even after I discover this tremendous truth...how hard it is to drop my story! Because this means - " I' must DIE!
I must cut off my head, destroy my carefully crafted and nurtured self-image, say goodbye to Mickey forever!
It takes a lot of practice..and self-awareness...to clearly see that killing good old Mickey is the ONLY real choice I can make...if I truly want to BE. This story I have clung to all my life is choking me, strangling me, encasing me in a shell of armour that cuts me off from magic, from Life.
When I manage to escape from this shell, if only for a few moments, I taste the vastness, the bliss, the peace of infinity and the pulsing energy of Love that pervades everything around me.
 I experience being tree and mountain and ocean, the great expanding cosmos, the whirling atom and the blossoming flower.
Mr Drop tastes being Mr. Ocean...who wants to be drop anymore?
Goodbye, story...off with his head!
Enough is more than enough.

Wave or Ocean?

At the edge of a vast ocean,the waves make endless love to the land.
Each wave begins as a tiny swell, slowly rising higher and higher, finally curling in upon itself before crashing back down into the ocean it arose from, flattening up and spreading over the beach in a flurry of foam before retreating to mother ocean.
 And so again and again...in timeless rhythm, primordial perfection.
My life is a wave...being born, growing,reaching a peak, finally returning through death back into the vast ocean I was born from.
At any point in time-space, is the wave ever separate from the ocean?
Does the wave have a unique, individual existence apart from the ocean? Or is it a brief expression of the ocean, creating a temporary illusion of individuality?
And, if my life-story is one wave, and yours is another, are we not the same at core, born from, formed of and returning to the same ocean?
Wait a minute! Who am I? Wave....or ocean?
Who would I rather be?

The Zombie

There are two states any human being can be in: awakened human or zombie.
We are born in the first state. By the time we are two years old, the second state begins to creep over us. Before we know it, we are trapped in the state of the zombie.
A zombie is a dead person who walks and talks and moves.
As long as we are trapped by the ego-mind complex, this is how we all are...dead people, somehow stumbling through life, seeming to walk and talk and act, but not truly experiencing real life....except for some brief, rare moments when ..through shock or intensity..we briefly escape our zombie shell.
We all know at least a few such moments : Aha! moments filled with awe and wonder and totality and raw, magical Being.
I've been a zombie for close to 50 years ...apart from a few magical moments of freedom. So I understand very well how dangerous and all-pervading this state can be.
Do you find life depressing, difficult, boring, painful? Do you wish you were dead sometimes? Do you make your way by habit through day after boring day? Do you ensure your mind is constantly numbed by words or talk or sound or Television or crowds? Are you mostly dwelling on the past or worrying/fantasising about the future? Do you go through your whole day without ever stopping to truly see or feel or experience anything?
These are some of the symptoms of being a zombie.
The greatest tragedy is the loss of your most precious treasure: your humanity and the priceless moments of your human life.
There is only one way to break the iron shell of the zombie state: to free yourself from the tyranny of your ego-mind complex.
Which is a bit like cutting off your head.
All it takes is tearing up your story, ending your movie, shifting your attention from head to heart or solar-plexus.
Being here and now...experiencing the world directly, not through the filter of the mind.
Once you can do this all the time, you have escaped from the zombie state.
You are awake at last...aware, alive, free!
Once you can be this, all you experience is magic!

Eternal Sunrise

The sun never rises or sets...just an illusion caused by the rotation of the earth.
The Sun of Clear Mind shines eternally...it was inside me before I was born and will be after I die.
Only the clouds of false knowledge and conceptual thought obscure it...like thick dark monsoon clouds, but with even less substance.
When I turn my perception to the inner background, all the clouds disappear, revealing the shining perfection that always is.
This is my true home, my place of Being, my Buddha-nature.
This is real...all else is cloudy illusion.
Once I know this , there is nothing left to know, nowhere to go.
Just perfect, loving radiance that flowers so joyously....how did I ever let myself forget this?
That is the true mystery.

Snake-skin

The snake sheds its skin naturally...when the time is ripe.
My ego-skin drops naturally...when my time is ripe.
When my eyes are awakened to the emptiness of all form.
When I experience...totally...the underlying One reality of everything.
When I find that all that I ever sought is right here in me.
When all hunger, need, desire melts and disappears like dew before rising sun.
When the peace and love and joy in the Heart expands and swallows the universe.
When the drop finally lets go of all fear and clinging and falls willingly back into the ocean.
No more "I".
Then...just rise and fall with the waves.
What else is there to do?