What is meditation? Really? Full attention. Full attention is always present. There is no method for finding reality. Methods, in fact lead one away from what is there. Methods are aligned with becoming what you are not. 

Full attention, like a lamp,  exposes the truth that there is no self at the center. Full attention exposes the love which is always there like the scent inside a flower. The concept of a self at the center has displaced love. Whatever forces one to embrace full attention is mighty. A thunderstorm. A snake. A thrill. A death. A death

can reveal “I have been living without loving that person who has gone away”. This has been known to happen when the deceased was a perfect stranger, especially when the deceased was a poor, lonely, forgotten bum. Something there is about a perfect stranger sheds light upon another stranger closer than the veins in one’s neck. 

Full attention is enlightened being. Love, which has always been, seems to burst forth for such people. It is everywhere. All there is is love! A monk hiding away in the desert avoiding people never finds this. What this is is the silence inside noise. Not the silence found in the absence of noise. This life we have is all so perfectly natural.

 Observation Only

To observe without observer

at some point where there is nothing 

I’ll meet you there

And know together

Who we are.

Immensity.

This does not come about

They have lied to thee

Some observer wanted you not to be free

In the same room with is, was, will be.

No congratulations please.

Cannot pin a medal on an absent observer, you see?

Do not fall back on “my mind will not let me stay here”
You are the consciousness of all humanity.

Is, was, will be.
 

 PRISONS AND PALACES AND TAKING YOUR CHANCES

Even a Palace can be a prison. If a human be given it all there will remain an empty longing that wants to take chances. That has been called the soul of man. Jesus, it is told, advised a rich man to give it all away not to deny himself but to be free. He added, what is it going to profit you to gain the whole world and lose your soul? Free means, really, when all the bull is taken away, as I am. There is no way one can add to that! Adding is denial. The Kingly Man is the Unknown Stranger. Draws all unto himself by staying far away from wealth and honor. 

If a human be given it all can he add to that?

 

 ON SUSTAINING A WAY OF LIFE

You might ask, “Why am I not able to sustain my commitment to self fulfillment from within me like an artesian well of energy leading ever onward to a deeper and more adventurous experience of life as magical existence?” 

Why do you want that sustaining? Let us consider what is an ordinary life?  Is there such a thing? Have you considered it? Could it be that your wish to sustain some thing you like is your real problem? Can anything that is real be “sustained”…need it be…ever? Is that not hogwash?

Is it not so that sustaining anything is mere “thought” and one more attempt to control according to your self interest what is uncontrollable ? Why have we divided life into “ordinary” and “magical”? By thought? Again, what is an ordinary life as opposed to a “magical” life? Is a “magical” life to you a thing you want to sustain because somebody told you that you can have that?  Or, is it because you have discovered for yourself the true nature of life is “magical”? Which? If the latter, of what possible use can be an effort to sustain? It is real! We humans have merely concocted a “magical” life and then have challenged ourselves to have it. Most religions teach you can only have that in an after life. But if you discover life itself to be “magical” you need not await an afterlife to have it. That is what this has been all about. Life. Here. Now. 

Anyone who is postponing the full attention to life as it is now in reliance upon an afterlife can be said to be busy dying, don’t you see? Anyone considering through thought an “ordinary” life is thinking about life. Is “life” a thing that is acquired through practice? Or some psychological exercise? Or, is there “life” and "life" only?

 Everybody do what you want!

Hey, that’s a good idea, let’s organize along those lines.

How can you organize “everybody do what you want”? What would it be like if a rose needed to know it is a rose to smell as sweet? They would be sent to school?

Perhaps the true definition of “organize” is “to take away freedom, compassion and all its many joys”. Better take care of compassion.

To have compassion one must only lose the desire to show everybody you can “make it” inside an organized game that is a set of arbitrary rules made and enforced by “the company’s men” and includes a religious belief that in another life you will be free in order to attract followers. That is quite a heavy dose of fraud!  Little wonder it requires rockets, bombs, satellites, computers, light bulbs, books, movies and television to keep it afloat!

People who promote the organized way of living want you to blindly assume that the only alternative is to return to a caveman lifestyle. Little do they know that the alternative would flower into a garden of existence now only crudely imagined. The Garden is here now. Only the fertilizer, love and courage, are missing and both of those are inside the hearts of all human beings.

 The Myth of Sisyphus

For those mortal there’s birth, life, and death. Sisyphus was not happy. He wanted immortality. As the Supreme Trickster of the realm, Sisyphus tricked Hades, chained him up, and gave man immortality. Nobody on Earth would die with Hades chained up in Hell. War was going to be boring. The Gods were angry.

So, they devised a suitable punishment for him. He was made to push a rock uphill everyday for eternity which rock was enchanted to suddenly roll back down the hill just before reaching the top requiring Sisyphus to repeat the task everyday with no chance of success. Does this sound familiar in your life as you have experienced it? It sure does to me.

By this punishment the Gods are revealing to Sisyphus that immortality for one such as he is useless because his life as he is living it is monotonous without lasting meaning. Death is his friend. He was better off as a mortal. At least his misery had an end.

Looking at it, I see that Sisyphus’s punishment seems grave to us because we have acquired a desire to succeed in our labors. Should he be able to end the sorrow stemming from his failed labors he would thereby be both immortal and happy.  What is required of the Trickster Supreme, then, is to end the source of his suffering, the impossibility of success, and thereby to end his suffering. He can end his suffering. So can you and I. By seeing the fact that he, Sisyphus, is the sorrow he feels the sorrow will fade away and he will be free of suffering and immortal which is what he wanted to begin with. These gods certainly loved Sisyphus. 

It can be seen that as Gods who are always going to do good these Gods actually gave us the answer to life’s riddle without the necessity to trick Hades or anybody else. For any mortal on Earth who sees the futility of a life attached to success and the avoidance of failure there is a revelation that opens a door to freedom from suffering. Whatever one does thereafter will be joyful! Which is better, a temporary success or an eternal life in joy doing only what you really want to do for no hoped for result? Easy answer. But who knows? You may wish to suffer awhile longer.

When there is no longer a reason to strive to find happiness all will be done joyfully, including death, which, if eternal, means only that we will be happy forever. And if death is not eternal, we will be happy forever! That Myth is worth its weight in the gold of real treasure!

Suppose I love making fine shoes. And I make them because I make them and not to succeed in a shoe business. I create a beautiful pair of shoes. And another and so on as long as I am enjoying doing so. Will you, Sir, have need of money to buy shoes when you have such a friend as me? I do not want your money. Have no use for it because of my many friends. And what about all the rest of it? Financial concerns would just be a nuisance. If I love to play the guitar I simply play. Someone will listen and  want to play with me. What is the problem? Is it not obvious the ones who promoted the money game were after power? What is power to me? I am happy forever.

 

These three-birth, life, and death. Birth has happened. In life there is much confusion. At death all confusion ends. Creation is all about a possibility. Can anyone end confusion before dying? If so, what a life! That makes it worthwhile. Can you?