Superficial Life

Palms—so narrow and closed in—have been

poured over people’s limbs. But countless

worthless things keep crashing in, blunting their

cares. During their lifetimes they see such a

little part of life and then they are off:

short-lived, flying up and away like smoke,

totally persuaded by whatever each of them

happened to bump into while being driven

one way, another way, all over the place. And they

claim in vain that they have found the whole.

Like this, there is no way that people can see or

hear or consciously grasp the things I have to teach.

But as for you: because you have come aside here, you will learn.

Mortal resourcefulness can manage no more [1]

These were preparatory words a great Greek master wrote for his disciple Pausanias. His name was Empedocles (490–430 BC) and he belonged to the Pythagorean tradition. His teaching, always expressed in poetry, embraced psychology, cosmology, biology, astronomy, medicine and chemistry, contributing to the inception of the modern science, and consequently, the modern world. But unlike contemporary thinkers and scientists, he understood humans are asleep, that a special attitude and perception are required to live lucidly...What Empedocles had to say about that will be the theme of the next post.

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[1] Translation by Peter Kingsley, quoted in the book Reality.

The Inner Song

What does it mean to live in harmony with life?

Years ago, when the economic recession started to become obvious for everyone, a man went outside in a very cold morning and walked along a small Irish town, hoping to find a temporal job. And right after leaving his details in a library, something within moved him to walk up to a shelf and browse a very little book. He opened it at random and read:

EACH NOTE, by Rumi

Advice doesn't help lovers!

They're not the kind of mountain stream

you can build a dam across

An intellectual doesn't know

what the drunk is feeling!

Don't try to figure

what those lost inside love will do next!

Someone in charge would give up all his power,

if he caught one whiff of the wine-musk

from the room where the lovers

are doing who-knows-what!

One of them tries to dig a whole through a mountain

One flees from academic honors

One laughs at famous mustaches!

Life freezes if it doesn't get a taste

of this almond cake

The stars come up spinning

every night, bewildered in love

They'd grow tired

with that revolving, if they weren't

They'd say, "how long do we have to do this?"

God picks up the reed-flute world and blows

Each note is a need coming through us,

a passion, a longing-pain

Remember the lips

where the wind breath originated,

and let your note be clear

Don't try to end it

Be your note

I'll show you how it is enough

Go up on a roof at night

in this city of the soul

Let everyone climb on their roofs

and sing their notes!

Sing loud!

The man suddenly realized it was still more important to find himself, once again. And he left the library with an inner smile. Words charged with truth had come out of the blue. Reality was singing for him.

Send not to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee, wrote John Donne. How many will have the courage to find and follow their inner song for the sake of BEING?

The Shift Is "Now"

The present is a consequence of the past, and the future a result of the present. So, if one does not change right now, tomorrow will be like today. Therefore, the shift starts with the awareness of how we are and what we are now, not tomorrow.

Given the fact of endless conflicts, it's quite an irony that a man was sending this message decades ago at the so called "United Nations". Meanwhile, the change keeps waiting on the level of individuals, and never on the mindset of race, tribe, nation or any other kind of social label.

An Ever New Hope

Is it possible to feel hope in a planet full of uncertainties and dreadful miseries?

A story tells that one day Abba Anthony of Egypt, Father of the Desert asked:

Lord, how is it that some die when they are young, while others drag on to extreme old age? Why are there those who are poor and those who are rich? Why do wicked men prosper and why are the just in need?" He heard a voice answering him, "Anthony, keep the attention in yourself..."

Where do we focus our attention?

Why are we so attached to negative thoughts and emotions?

May we allow a different kind of attention by using all the senses, now?

A loving Witness waits to connect us to the World of the Soul, a dwelling beyond time, source of freedom and bliss, where all becomes possible.

Revising The Divine

Man´s relation to God probably has to undergo a certain important change: instead of propitiating praise to an unpredictable king or the child's prayer to a loving father, the responsible living and fulfilling of the divine will in us, will be our form of worship and commerce with God.

His goodness means grace and light and His dark side, the terrible temptation of power. Man has already received so much power that he can destroy his own planet.

Let us hope that God´s good spirit will guide him in his decisions, because it will depend upon man´s decision whether God´s creation will continue.

Nothing shows more drastically than this possibility how much of divine power has come within the reach of man.

C.G.Jung, 1956

Fragmented Heart Mirrored Outside

Today humanity, as never before, is split into two apparently irreconcilable halves. The psychological rule says that when an inner situation is not made conscious it happens outside, as fate. This is to say, when the individual remains individed and does not become conscious of his inner contradictions, the world must perforce act out and be torn out into opposing halves.

C.C.Jung, 1959.

Watching The Inner Moon

The Moon, like the thoughts of our ordinary mind, does not have its own light, it just reflects that of the sun. Where is the sun, then, inside of us?

Here we have an inspiring and beautiful poem by Kabir (1440-1518), a Sage, poet and musician from India, who taught in a very Socratic way, considering all human beings equally, beyond any differences of religion, sex, caste or race. This is one of the translations made by Rabindranath Tagore:

The moon shines in my body, but my blind eyes cannot see it:

The moon is within me, and so is the sun.

The unstruck drum of Eternity is sounded within me; but my deaf ears cannot hear it.

So long as man clamours for the “I” and the “Mine”, his works are as naught:

When all love of the “I” and the “Mine” is dead, then the work of the Lord is done.

For work has no other aim than the getting of knowledge:

When that comes, then work is put away.

The flower blooms for the fruit: when the fruit comes, the flower withers.

The musk is in the deer, but it seeks it not within itself: it wanders in quest of grass.