Why Bother?

[Jos3ph]

Fixation on the path (or what I believe is the path) will halt progress as surely as not walking the path.

There was one group I was involved with in which I experienced a magic and hope like never before. Deep down there was this tiny uncomfortable feeling that this was not my place BUT I couldn't let go because it was the greatest thing I had ever known. Eventually I couldn't hang on any longer, but it still took many years to fully let go. No. Yesterday I had to let go of something! No. Today I'm letting go of something!

Anyway, what I'm trying to express is that the heart will lead us in our path but very often we have entrenched ideas due to our experience the are near impossible to let go of.

Practically for me that means sometimes taking a break from Toltec, or Sorcery, or whatever you want to call it. I might study Buddhism or something else, not to take a different path but to see truths from a different perspective. My heart will confirm and connect those cores found within any system and thus I walk the path.

What that is meaning for me right now is standing on my own two feet, standing alone if necessary, trusting my heart to reveal the next steps (which means I don't know what's coming next), and not giving that responsibility over to any system or philosophy.

[glance left]

: )

For me, Sorcery and Buddhism go hand in hand. I practice both! Fixations on one or the other foster the perceived separation. They are both built upon enhancing awareness, fundamentally. The differences, IMHO, are simply mental constructs. Can be dropped......along with the thousand other things I drop on a daily basis : D. I’m becoming a pro at dropping the ball....for all the right reasons ; )

[Jos3ph]

Glance! That's exactly what came up for me today!!! Lol

I had a feeling to mention Buddhism when I wrote, so later I listened to a recording I have that talks about Buddhism. While I was listening to it, it came to me that I had a very fixed idea of what Buddhism is.

Really, any true system is at its core a method and support for the discovery of truth. I think the constructs are necessary for the mind to work with, but they shouldn't be confused with truth. That's the realm of the heart.

If religion was practiced from the heart the corruption would be thrown out...

That's what I'm getting at! Practice comes from the heart and expresses into form, not the other way round.

[glance left]

: D

[glance left]

So, personal interpretation of what you're saying.  With respect to finding the core between all these approaches.  

Unbending intent is finding and abiding in that abstract empty core (wooo!  wind picking up outside right now)....the direct experience of it....awareness that is persistent from that centralized state.  Sustained action is the spontaneous action that spring from that unfathomably deep well....springs up and out in to the world of manifestation....whatever that maybe.  

From Buddhist perspective.....particularly my the lineage that I tend to be partial to in terms of resonance.....Dzogchen.....its all about simply discovering innate rigpa.....or primordial awareness....and staying there.  For most of us, I'm guessing, the path is an approach of intermittent discovery that progresses until its unified....and then simply deepens as experience allows.  Action amidst manifestation.....1st attention....2nd attention....simply spontaneously emerges from that well spring.  

Now, again from personal perspective of a  preference in terms of how my reality is experienced....how I choose to perceive it....a preference from the Dzogchen view, overall.  It's all good.  All of it.  All experience, regardless how utterly deviated from that central state, is part of IT, so to speak.  It is.  All of it revolves around that central truth and, thus, cannot be separated...in spite of appearances.  Its how the universe.....how awareness itself.....is exploring itself.  Exploring unification vs diversification......realization/knowledge vs stupification/ignorance ( : D ) .  Straying away....and returning.  Becomes something individual and discrete.....and then reabsorbing to something fluid and connected.  In as such, and in my own personal trajectory.....I'm finding that there's great peace in just letting myself evolve in this context.  And that means allowing for all my stupidity/lack of heart (as you say), foolishness, failures.....which seems to vastly broaden the silent knowledge gained when reunification, connection, alignment recovers.  My overriding intent is to regain the totality of myself, ofc.  How that actually happens is up to infinity...and it seems that periodic/intermittent falling apart is (or at least has been) in the cards : )

[Jos3ph]

I agree with what you're saying however I'll also say that stupidity, foolishness, and failure can all be done with heart. Haha

Unfortunately (or fortunately ) I must leave it there for now. I gave it a go, but I'm not processing very well. It's taken me an hour to get this far!

[glance left]

We’re saying the same thing.  Both foolishness/stupidity/failure and impeccability/intelligence/success can be heart-ful.....and if the impression is otherwise, can be reflected upon in retrospect and restored to heart-ful-ness.  The recapitulation, from sorceric perspective : D

Later brah!

[Jos3ph]

I believe so! Words can be a maze, but one that can be great fun to walk through and try to find a way.

What I'm feeling is that I can go back and review to find the heart within those past situations where I currently perceive that it had been missed!

We all talked about breathing earlier and another readily accessable technique has come up for me and that is fasting.

There was a little drama in what I expressed about not mentally processing very well but it was also true. I'm feeling that what's going on for me is a process that I haven't before fully embraced. Not eating is clearing my head in a way I can't fully describe at the moment. It's like I feel more clear but at the same time less inclined to think all the time. I should mention too that previous to doing this I was feeling hungry all the time and really eating way more than was necessary in an attempt to sate that hunger. So I just went in the exact opposite direction.

[Jos3ph]

And the other thing that came up was that even necessary functions can become a habit.

[Jos3ph]

Things came to a head last night and what came out of it is how the sense of outrage and injustice I've carried waylays any capacity to move forward.

I've heard about self-importance since forever and a day but didn't really put it together that my outrage was grown out of self-importance. "What about me?"

When I think about it, in the moment of attack (or perceived attack) there is no outrage. That comes later when I have decided, "That shouldn't have happened!"

It's so pervasive! In this culture it is abnormal to not be outraged about something. To a large extent it's what moves us in our circles. I'm seeing that doing what has to be done simply does not require it.

And that is getting to the question: "What does it mean to ACT from the heart?" I've found that I can speak from the heart, but to act?

[Julio Juliopolis]

glance left wrote:
JJ, we'll be comparing bruises! Who got roughed up the most : D

I
It's funny. It feels like I'm getting roughed up, then I look down and don't see any bruises. What's getting bruised? Just my ego, and it's my own idiotic self-talk that's setting it up. I caught myself the other day using phrases like "I'm tired of" and "I'm sick of".... and I had to stop myself and ask what did I really mean? I was not physically sick because of what was going on. And I wasn't made physically tired either. So what would be an accurate way to say what I mean? Eventually, I realized what would be the actual accurate statement when I use those expressions is "I keep reacting with annoyance to...".

That accurate statement is quite useful. It focuses on what I do and allows me to change that rather than looking at things happening to me. So, I've been feeling "roughed up" by the schedule for deliveries I keep getting dispatched to me, as one of my more common complaints these days. But that's only because it doesn't match well with what I came up with as the schedule I'd like to work. So, I got annoyed and blamed others/fate for me not getting what I wanted, especially as this has been happening repeatedly. This strategy hasn't worked very well for me. Now, instead I'm attempting to just adjust to finding enjoyment in whatever schedule I end up having to work. Letting go of the tiller and just adjusting my position in the boat, so to speak.

[seer8th]

Silvio . have you practiced dreaming?

[Guest]