Biomes Blog

Biomes Blog

Daily Mediation for Wednesday:

While the Tathagata, in his teaching, constantly makes use of conceptions and ideas about them, disciples should keep in mind the unreality of all such conceptions and ideas. They should recall that the Tathagata, in making use of them in explaining the Dharma always uses them in the semblance of a raft that is of use only to cross a river. As the raft is of no further use after the river is crossed, it should be discarded. So these arbitrary conceptions of things and about things should be wholly given up as one attains enlightenment. -Buddha

Looking up the Tathagata it seems to be a state of the Buddha referring to himself in that which was been written. That is, he speaks presently upon past teachings and must refer to himself as giving those teachings as another person. Methinks the person he is today is not who he was yesterday and the teachings from today are different then the teachings of yesterday and the change in both the man and the teachings is reflected as different entities. Thus it is not a static message but ever evolving and growing.

There are things that take us there. To that place of knowing and knowledge and wisdom and enlightenment. It is when we cling onto those things those tools that we get caught up in something other then the enlightenment. The tools are the means not the ends and must be released. Holding on we are not able to "fully concede to our innermost selves". It is in the letting go we are free. Throughout time men are giving words as guidance, sign posts to follow along the way leading along the path to a way of being higher then that known before. Do not gather up the sign posts and strap them to your shoulders to carry along with the journey. Weighted down with what will become constraints we become tired and worn from a journey that should be light and free. The words become weights instead of feathers. Take the words as feathers and put them together to create wings. Use the wings of enlightenment to lift us up to the heavens. Oh yes, "The Zen Cat meditates knowingly, that there are also feathers on the word enlightenment."

I think this is key today. Thinking of self as a conduit. a hollow bone, a bridge-keeper. Helping peoples to the other side along journeys of knowledge. Strange then that being on one side of the bridge perhaps myself not having crossed but showing the way. The coffee cup of wisdom said today "Everyday is a leap of faith". It is the leap that allows us to cross. The journey begins with single step and that first step is really a leap of faith. Go forth into the world on this fine day and leap and bound in faith and love. Leap into the hearts of those you touch. Leap and fly upon your new found wings!

Daily Meditation for Tuesday:

The worst taint is ignorance. Destroy this one taint and become taintless. - Buddha

Indeed. Bliss perhaps. They tell us ignorance is bliss in order to pacify the masses. Ignorance of the law does not make breaking the law acceptable. Oh yes, what is a taint. It calls to mind a kind of surface paint or stain. A dark layer that coats the psyche. Ignorance is the stain put upon the bare wood of the soul. Time for some stripper. If I were a woodworker instead of a glassblower I am sure I would be able to continue the analogy without any trouble, as it is I am ignorant in the ways of wood.

That was funny.

Enlighten the mind. Read. Listen. Meditate. Pray. Seek. Act. There is no try. How to dispel ignorance? Think. Do. Who was it that said knowing that one does not know is really more important then knowing?

Keep up the good works.

Daily Meditation for Monday:

In this world the wise one holds onto confidence and wisdom. Those are the greatest treasures; all other riches are pushed aside. - Buddha

The material world is necessary. Food, clothing, shelter allow us to move up in the Bloom's Taxonomy. Taking care of the base needs for survival we are able to grow and change and evolve. The material world provides for us those necessities and also provides a desire for more. In our culture the pursuit of more is overpowering casting a shadow upon most of everything. More, bigger, better, never enough. There is always more. There comes a time when all of that is no longer the pursuit. Granted we still need and desire and want to live a live that is full and comfortable. Not many want to be out on the streets wanting for their rice bowl to filled by the comfort of strangers.

The wise holds onto wisdom. interesting. Confidence and wisdom. To know confidence. To know we are each capable of becoming what is desired. Confidence in who we are and where we are going and confidence in our relationships with ourselves, our families, our friends, our mentors, and the universal spirit. Confidence and faith seem to go hand and hand. Confidence and faith are connected in that confidence is a faith within ourselves and faith is a confidence in that higher power. Confidence in our actions and thoughts seems to gain strength and comfort when that faith in the spirit is nurtured and sought. Confidence in the self without the ego involved. The conceit and narcissism that comes from a confidence in the self that is not tempered with the faith. Lines are parallel and the results are similar but the lives touched and the impact of the actions are so much different when one glorifies the self and one glorifies the spirit of the universe.

The riches of the world are a glossy coating. Like a photograph that has lost its shine and luster over time the gathering of things around us does not keep us satisfied. The objects of desire on this day do not last. They fulfill us but for a moment. The desire is filled and then another object is sought to fill a desire. Maybe the desire that is sought is not for objects and things but is translated poorly in our minds and actions and the desire is really something needed to be connected to ourselves and others and spirit. It is perhaps a transference. Desire leads to suffering. Cessation of the desire.

Wisdom. Impossible to speak intelligently on wisdom when one has none. Wisdom of the ages and of the sages. Wisdom comes also from that faith that devotion. Wisdom to know the difference. Courage to change. again it is all about faith and confidence. I never really considered confidence in this light before. I think I am liking the new definition and outlook. Always before confidence was something I did not know I had. Lacking it not in the extreme but lacking it to a degree. No more.

Daily Meditation for Friday:

Nirvana is the utter extinction of all that is base in us, all that is vicious in us. Nirvana is not like the black, dead peace of the grave, but the living peace, the living happiness of a soul which is conscious of itself and conscious of having found its own abode in the heart of the Eternal. - Gandhi

Nirvana. We only know it as a band. We hear the word and think of it is the place of afterlife and once departed from this world we achieve that place of eternal bliss. I must be rid of the negative. I must cleanse myself of the thoughts and manifestations which hold me back. I must allow myself to be myself regardless of the conventions of society? It is not that I do not fit in this world I am just not sure how to be in the world. That may be it. I am not conscious of myself. I do not know myself, how if not knowing myself would it even be possible to share my life and existence with another. How can I be me without self knowledge? How can happiness follow, or come into my heart without preparation. So begs the question how does one go through life for nearly 39 years and not know the self? Have i always been unaware? Why did the awakening that took place in June also make known the unknown? Not knowing the self was not an issue. Wandering through life in bliss unawares. Why would an awakening of the spirit bring also this about. Perhaps I knew before but now I question? I have questioned in the past. Questioned my path and direction. Question my life and method of living. Question and accept? Oh yes, and change. I have not had to question in a long time. Just sitting and waiting and letting life occur. Questioning the presence. Questioning the ability. Questioning the necessity. Questioning the material. What is needed, what is desired, how to live and serve. Happiness in service to another. not serving another but serving the self? Removal of the self, the ego, from the process to be pure in the attitude. And so misery is a state of being reflecting only the desires that go unfulfilled. Happiness from the connection with the spirit, connection with others, and connection with the self. Release the desire. Release the unobtainable. Release that over which we have no control. Live life today in this moment.

Daily Meditation:

Past and Future are a duality of which Present is the reality. The now-moment alone is eternal and real. - Why Lazurus Laughed by Wei Wu Wei

The now. Current. The past is not real, the future is not real only this moment and it is eternal. The future is what gets me. It is the gig. What is to come about? What future pain will be endured? What pleasure will come? How is it possible? Living in the present looking always to the future state of what might be and lost then is the moment. Just so with the past. It is past. Gone. Hardly a memory as not much is remembered any longer. But the haunting of the past. Those incidences that return to mind and consume. The past as a specter of doom. Consumed by a thousand forms of fear. Current - Interesting. The river is the current. The stream from the spirit is also the current. Current, right now this moment. The same river twice because when we step out of the river we are stepping out of the current and into either the past or future. River current sweeping us along and carrying us to a destination of love. Let yourself go to be consumed and wrapped up in the current moment the stream of universe. Drifting in the current with faith.

Grace. I want to speak on grace. It for now is the word that resounds within my mind and speech. Walk in beauty and grace. Act with grace. Each movement we make filled with grace. The Grace of the spirit fills us and permeates our being. The grace. Tell me about grace. When action contains grace there is no self. "Full of hope, full of grace is the human race." I do hope there is more on grace to follow.

Daily Meditation:

I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together. - The Beatles

We each of us comes from dust and to dust we shall return. Regardless of culture, regardless of training, regardless of believe in the divine whatever occurs we come into this world and we depart from this world. Everything in-between is life and living and dying. Measure our existence in love. Create and give and grow in love. Foster love in your heart and soul and give to each a measure of love worthy of return. Is love pain? How can the love in the heart hurt so very much? Bitter. Like a strong pulled shot of double espresso that was roasted for a minute too long. Bitter.

My friend Ed lost his father this morning. They were all together on the Cape for a visit. Being an old man where better a place could one want to go and die. If you would please lift up Ed and his family today in your prayers. Greatness is not so much in deed. Father and son reconciled before death. Forgiveness on both parts.

Once in a dream, remember I do not know my dreams often. I saw a place a place of bright white lights streaming through darkness, traveling in space it seems. Coming together and coalescing. Great comfort in knowing this too was in that we are all one bound in a fabric of light. We all each of us has within a divine spark. Bright light within that shines forth. Let your light shine through your eyes, the windows to your soul.

Wondering. A day of wondering. Thought just now of suffering. The nature of suffering. The theory states that energy can not be created or destroyed. There is suffering in the world. the world has all the suffering it will ever have. We accept and take on the suffering of the world. In taking on the suffering, we alleviate and lessen the suffering of another. The law of the conservation of energy also states that energy can change forms. Therefore it seems that suffering can be transmuted into love and love into suffering.

Keep the peace of the divine in your heart today. Share it with all to whom you come in contact. Know the peace of happiness and joy and love.

What is a real man? Define. By society and self.

Daily Meditation:

The Void is not of the nature of a black abyss or a bottomless pit. Rather is its nature 'vast and expansive like space itself'. It is apprehended as 'serene, marvelous, all-pure, brilliant and all-inclusive'. Above all does it partake of the nature of light. And it is not anything. For Void is Mind Itself, and Mind Itself is Void. - Ask the Awakened by Wei Wu Wei

The void. at this time the void is like a hollow place in my stomach and heart. A vast expanse that heaves with the pain of a wound being left open. The void of the self and the knowledge that one day the void will be healed and whole again just for myself. And so we make the journey to the edge of the abyss and must take the leap of faith to jump. Standing at the precipice the light is bright and nothing else can be seen. Stepping off into darkness or stepping off into light we enter a place of faith within ourselves. Choosing in the past to take a leap of faith from the lions head...Choosing to trust in God. Choosing to walk guided by the spirit. Why then take back the walk, why recant?

The void of the universe. The void of the spirit. Filled with everything and filled with nothing. The void containing the essence of life. The void containing all of that which is impossible to define and control. The void which is understood at a base level. Knowledge of the void and its being truly innate. Like putting your hand in a flowing stream of pure crystal waters. Feeling the flow of the cool blood of the earth coursing. Knowing too that is the feeling of the spirit washing over and through every cell and fiber of being. Knowing the peace that comes from being at one. Why then is this so elusive. Why then do I not stay in that place and dwell in the comfort of the spirit all the time. why is it necessary to take back and destroy that connection? Why interrupt the flow. Building dams in the streams. Why block that which is natural and good and healing. Why accept the pain and suffering when the solution to the pain and suffering is so easy so right there so grand. One step. One baby step.

Peace.

Daily Meditation:

Living should be perpetual and universal benediction. - Why Lazurus Laughed by Wei Wu Wei

I forgot this idea over the past week. Not really forgot but lacked full practice. I have spent a week in pain and depression. Spent time feeling sorry for myself and in pity for losses. People lost, pets lost, family lost, position and place lost. Set adrift without mooring. Forgetting the eternal bond to the spirit. Tied to the dock of the universe as it were. The ocean waves washing and trashing even close to port. Safe harbor of the lord. An appeal for help. Oh god I am in need of your healing touch. I am need of your guidance and care and grace. Give myself to you, all of me. I seek and do your will in my life today. Make be a vessel, a hollow bone. Work through me and in me this day. With every step with every breath allow me to remember to look toward you.