For the rest of this week we are going to look at a writing called The Hsin Hsin Ming — Verses on the Faith Mind by Chien-chih Seng-ts’an, the Third Zen Patriarch. I would share it all, in this one post, but it is thirteen pages long and by the time I add my comments we could easily be looking at twenty plus pages. I am afraid that would be too long. I would not be interested in receiving a twenty plus page email, so I will not send one.

Let’s look at today’s portion of this writing:

The Great Way is not difficult

for those who have no preferences.

When love and hate are both absent

everything becomes clear and undisguised.

Make the smallest distinction, however,

and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.

If you wish to see the truth

then hold no opinions for or against anything.

To set up what you like against what you dislike

is the disease of the mind.

When the deep meaning of things is not understood,

the mind’s essential peace is disturbed to no avail.

It seems obvious to me that The Great Way refers to the path which leads us to a life filled with peace. I could not agree more that dwelling in a perpetual state of joy is simple when we release all of our addictions and preferences.

We must understand that life, as we see it, is governed by our history. This is why we can witness the same set of circumstances and you may interpret the details entirely differently than I do. We will each ‘spin’ what we see based on the filters created by our past. Our past has taught us to like some things and dislike others. The human mind applies these preferences to everything we observe, without any conscious effort on our part. To rise above this autonomic programming we must find a way to process sensory data without allowing our unconscious mind to filter the input.

To be fully present, to dwell in the magnificent, perpetual joy that living in the here and now offers, we must make the decision not to be controlled by our history, by the memories we own because of the life we have lived to this point. We must learn to look at everything with the eyes of an infant. When we are successful at observing life in this manner, everything is new, everything is exciting.

It is the nature of our brain to categorize and evaluate everything it sees based on the past and our preferences. It immediately, with no conscious intervention on our part, classifies what it observes into good or bad, right or wrong, possible or impossible, feasible or not likely, etc. If we are to live in the manner suggested by this insightful author, we must interrupt this automatic, natural ordering and learn to look at all of life with the eyes, ears, and imagination of a very young child. We must live as though life is new, in each NOW moment.

“Surely, Elliott, the wisdom we have gained in life is worth something.” I can hear some say.

To which I respond: “Yes, but when we allow our brain to compare what we are witnessing to our ‘like or dislike’ database, we rob ourselves of the opportunity for peace, every time  we encounter anything that falls into the dislike category.”

Does that make sense? In other words life is good, fun, or happy when things we call good are happening but life is bad when the opposite is true. The very idea of good and its opposite diminishes the likelihood of ongoing peace, because labeling anything automatically creates its polar opposite. This is simply the way the brain works. One thing is light and another is dark. One thing leads to happiness the other to sorrow. The brain really struggles with things simply ‘being’ with no object of comparison. Yet to be truly free we must reprogram this tendency to classify everything into some predefined, preexisting set of rules.

The one who is truly free to live in this Present Moment, is free of the restrictions imposed by a domineering brain.

The fully functioning person learns to use the brain to his/her advantage, not to be a slave to this classification tendency. Life is not as it appears when filtered through an unconscious person’s filters. As you grow in your conscious awareness you will know this to be true. Truth lies out beyond the field of autonomic interpretation of the facts, because these so-called facts are based upon one’s history and not on any sort of empirical data.

I hope that is clear. This is what these first two stanzas of this writing say to me and I wholeheartedly agree with this wisdom.

Because the examination of this writing has been so long, today, it may take us longer than the next four days to complete this evaluation. I know some of what I have written may seem redundant, but I needed to say things in slightly different ways to satisfy myself that I was being clear. Hopefully you are able to wade through it and find some wisdom in my verbosity.

Anyway, that is all for today. I am sure that some of the future writings will contain more of The Hsin Hsin Ming and less of my rambling.

To Love is to be vulnerable

I cannot really say, with any accuracy, how many times I have heard someone say, “I am never going to love again!” following some heartbreaking-breakup between this pained lover and some other person.

My advice is always the same and it goes something like this: “What is the use of living if you choose to live without risk?”

Consider these well known words from C. S. Lewis’s book, Four Loves:

“Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken’ it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.”

Closing our heart off, in an effort to keep ourselves from experiencing the pain associated with disappointment, is like killing a part of ourselves off. It is impossible to be fully alive and to have one’s heart closed down. Besides, what real harm comes from having your “heart broken?” Does our heart really break?

Of course not! In fact all of the world’s leading metaphysicians insist that exactly the opposite is true. It is by keeping our imagined heart closed, out of the fear of some perceived hurt, that we cause the physical heart to literally shut down. No one has ever died because of disappointment, but people die all the time from hardened arteries, a possible physical manifestation resulting from a hardened heart.

Even if there were no physical problems caused by the refusal to take the risk of loving another, what quality of life can a person afraid of loving possibly experience?

Without the ability to love, I would have no desire to live. It is through loving and being loved that life is worth living.

The safest way to love is to learn to fully and completely love ourselves. Then we are free to be completely vulnerable to everyone else with no risk of feeling devastated when the other being fails to return our love. We can learn to become so full of love that we have no needs for others to fill.

What is remarkable about learning to love ourselves in this manner is that the minute we have no need of love from external sources, an abundance of love, which is everywhere present around us, becomes available to us. It’s one of life’s many paradoxes. When we need love from others we find it very hard to obtain, but when we are whole and complete, filled with the Love which flows, unimpeded, from the Universe, in and through our hearts, others find it very easy to love us, just as we find it easy to love them.

Love becomes a complete circle, blessing everyone whom it graces.

If I could draw I would show it graphically with Love coming from the Field in which we are perpetually immersed, filling us up, and flowing out from us to everyone we meet. Then in a boomerang fashion, that which we give, returns to us so that we are never depleted.

There is absolutely no risk involved with truly loving another. The only risk that is ever felt is when we have strings attached to the love we share. And that is not love at all. It is a misidentified idea of love which bears no resemblance to Divine Love.

Neediness is only attractive to other people who are also needy. This type of connection is fraught with disaster.

True Love erases all need.

And that says it ALL.

Irish poet and philosopher John O’Donohue had a strong influence on me in the early days of my spiritual journey. When I read or listened to him read his words, I felt them move straight into my heart without bouncing around in my head or my ears. That was not a typical experience for me.  Every word I ever read from this insightful, illumined Being inspired me, almost feeling as though they had been written just for me.

Today I am going to share his Blessing for a New Day, from the book To Bless the Space Between Us, one of his many writings which touched me in ways that defy description.  May these ideas bypass your mind and find a home in your heart, as they have in mine.

Blessing for a New Day
by John O’Donohue

May the light of your soul guide you.
May the light of your soul bless the work
You do with the secret love and warmth of your heart.
May you see in what you do, the beauty of your own soul.
May the sacredness of your work bring healing, light and renewal to those
Who work with you and to those who see and receive your work.
May your work never weary you.
May it release within you wellsprings of refreshment, inspiration and excitement.
May you be present in what you do.
May you never become lost in the bland absences.
May the day never burden you.
May dawn find you awake and alert, approaching your new day with dreams,
Possibilities and promises.
May evening find you gracious and fulfilled.
May you go into the night blessed, sheltered and protected.
May your soul calm, console and renew you.

I wrote this blessing out on a 3 x 5 card and read it to myself every morning, first thing, upon rising. This established a powerful intention for my whole day. I strongly urge you to consider finding some way to experience his loving message, either utilizing my method or selecting any other option which feels right to you. If you choose to follow this advice, I am confident that you will feel John O’Donohue touch your soul, from the eternal sphere where his Spirit now resides.

Have an amazing Independence Day if you are in America or an equally enriching weekend if you do not.

Know that you are forever Loved, just as you are, because you are LOVE itself.