What is known is only relative to our position, to our experience. We think we know the colour of something, yet someone else sees it slightly differently. We think we know the speed of something, yet from a distant nebula, that speed is something else. We think we know the view of the great Milky Way, yet we only look from one tiny perspective.

Spiritual bypassing is like painting over rust: it may look fine on the surface, but the corrosion continues underneath. True spirituality isn't an escape route from life's challenges or a licence to neglect responsibilities. It's a deep engagement with reality, in all its messiness.

Life will show you where you are hiding, where you are running from life, where you fear the end of life and risk ignoring the outcome then continue to pursue ignorance. Realisation awakens you from the dream of ignorance, which means simply not to know, or even to know but to ignore the fact.

The realisation of impermanence is not a philosophical one. It is embodied at the cellular level of our being and experienced with such finery that it serves to shift our dimension of seeing in such a way that any rigidity is carried into the river.

Abiding in the present moment is abiding in the presence of the moment. It is a living radiance, a vibrancy that can happen nowhere else. The only place where you will ever be alive is this present moment.

Just as an actor assumes many roles throughout their career, we each don an array of identities throughout our lives. These identities, like the costumes of an actor, change according to the scenes we play out on the stage of life.

When you enter into this presence, it starts to work on you. It’s a purifying process, like submerging in freshwater and scrubbing yourself clean of yourself. There is no effort needed on behalf of your intelligence or body. It happens by itself when left alone, without your involvement, without your interference.

When all fades away, what is left is the ground of being. Its ground is groundless. Its language is wordless silence. And its movement is stillness.

With nowhere to stand, the immensity is evident. Seeing no end to its essence, one expands in all directions.

What is it to gaze out upon the invisible with emptiness in your eyes? 

Stillness and freedom, short musings by Jayaji

Many people seek meditation today for what it can do for them, for its effects and affects. While it may present a smorgasbord of benefits, seeking meditation for benefits sake is missing the point.

It takes a keen eye to discern the mirage in the desert. So too, it is not without its challenge to raise ones awareness to see through the veil of the illusory self. We all have an illusory self that we call I and me. It follows us like a shadow. We are stubbornly willing to fight for it and do everything in our will to justify it.

Mind is like the open sky, when you truly see there is only empty space. No end, no beginning; not high nor low; no length, no distance, no edge, no center. Therefore nothing truly to grasp which is why grasping for ephemeral things, objects and passing thoughts adds to the notion of unsatisfactoriness and an unskillful approach to being.

Natural mind is resting the mind. 

If mind is agitated, rest.

If resting the mind feels impossible, rest in the impossibility.

If it feels easy, rest with effortlessness.

After the mind goes searching for this why and that why, chasing thoughts and dreams, let it rest as it is.

If there is fear, relax into the fear. If there is anxiety, relax into anxiety. If there is joy, relax into joy. If there is peace, relax into peace.

If you experience doubt, difficulty or aversion in meditation then rest into the state of doubt, difficulty or aversion. There is no way around this great awareness.

Become absorbed into the vast nature of presence and then remain. Remain without aim. Remain without question. Allow concentration to settle into itself and become aware of its action as effortless.

All moments are born from one moment. Look closely, perceive this and see that a moment is also an eternity. Like this, enter this present moment as if entering into a room without walls. Sit down and contemplate that not only are all moments born of one moment but all moments are present in this moment.

The nature of presence is the presence of nature. We enjoy time in nature because it reminds us of our own true nature. Our essential nature. It is in harmony. Harmony is when our inner world is in accord with the external environment.

In order to know the quintessence of the Great Mystery one must relinquish all that they know. What one knows cannot truly be known, therefore the wise surrender themselves before the Great Unknown. It is the unknown that holds all that is known. The unknown is unknowable because there is no one to know it.