We Are What We Are

We can keep the windows open, but the wind comes in on its own- we need to be aware of what is possible for us, we have to keep an open mind and heart- but it happens when it will. Before and After, and always now, we are what we are.

1. Happiness is not something that happens- you need to work twenty-four hours at it:

"Not long ago, I was traveling with the Dalai Lama across Japan and another journalist came into our bullet-train compartment for an interview. “Your Holiness,” he said, “you have seen so much sorrow and loss in your life. Your people have been killed and your country has been occupied. You have had to worry about the welfare of Tibet every day since you were four years old. How can you always remain so happy and smiling?”

”My profession,” said the Dalai Lama instantly, as if he hardly had to think about it."

- Pico Iyer, Happy Days Blog.

2. Faith moves mountains, and sees God in walls- "Jesus’ image seen at factory wall in Ukraine"- Russia Today

3. The rule of law, even that of dictatorship gibes more freedom than lawless freedom, even that of a community based on love- George Orwell has an insightful, and indeed, liberating take on liberty:

This [passage] illustrates very well the totalitarian tendency which is implicit in the anarchist or pacifist vision of Society. In a Society in which there is no law, and in theory no compulsion, the only arbiter of behavior is public opinion. But public opinion, because of the tremendous urge to conformity in gregarious animals, is less tolerant than any system of law. When human beings are governed by 'thou shalt not', the individual can practise a certain amount of eccentricity: when they are supposedly governed by 'love' or 'reason', he is under continuous pressure to make him behave and think in exactly the same way as everyone else.

— George Orwell, Politics vs. Literature: An Examination of Gulliver's Travels, October 1946

- via The Barefoot Bum

4. Siris is for me, a window to a different world. In this post, Brandon, the author, discusses Piers Plowman, where I found this-

'Do Well is to dread God, Do Better is to suffer,
And Do Best springs from both..."

Apparently, "We are to learn, teach, love our enemies. To learn is to Do Well; to teach is to Do Better; and to love is to Do Best." Please read the blog, I found this an illuminating post.

5. Your mind is the infinite space on which you meditate- Craig Bialick's TwitWall has a great quote from Shabkar:

Kunzang Shenpen went on, "That being the case, when one is remaining in the nonmeditation samadhi that is like a continuous stream, what should it be like?"

I replied:

One must remain in a vivid, lucid openness,

Like looking out

Into the reaches of the boundless sky

From the peak of a mountain open to every direction.

The lord of siddhas, Jetsun Tilopa,

Directing his gaze toward the sky,

Said to the great pandita Naropa:

What supports the sky? On what does sky rest?

The Mahamudra of one's mind has nothing to rest on.

If you loosen the bonds, liberation is certain.

Remain at ease in primordial simplicity.

The nature of mind is the sky beyond the contents of thoughts.

Remain thus at ease,

Not holding on to some thoughts,

Or pushing other thoughts away:

In true Mahamudra mind is undirected.

The unsurpassable fruition

Is simply to preserve this state.

Thus, through Marpa Lotsawa,

There will come many sky-like yogins,

Sons of the lineage of the great panditas Naro and Maitri.

The great awareness-holder, Shri Singha,

Pointing his finger toward the heart of a cloudless sky,

Told the Lotus-born Guru:

Ever empty, ever empty; ever void, all void;

This crucial absolute truth is a treasure

Which shines everywhere- above, below, between, in all directions-

Shri Singha made it spring from the perfect vessel:

Action inseparable from view.

And with this he dissolved into vajra space.

In the same way the omniscient Longchen Rabjam said:

In the infinite sky, there is neither meditation or non-meditation.

This is the vast expanse that is Samantabhadra's wisdom.

It is also said in the Miscellaneous Sayings of the Kadampas:

The place for practice must be open and spacious;

One's view must be vast and open, too;

Even if the whole of samsara and nirvana were placed within it,

It would remain as unfilled as ever-

Such should be the immensity of the view.

-Shabkar

(1781-1851)

Be Happy.