31 October 2015
The first stage is quietening the mind. The second is awakening spirit. Most never get beyond the first stage: they either endlessly struggle with a seemingly unpacifiable mind or they become lulled by the refuge of inner peace, and stubbornly refuse to even countenance that the intense activity, and the attendant responsibility, of spirit may actually be where they should be heading.
Why do we so stubbornly refuse to change, even when that change is obviously for the best? Because we hold onto a childish conviction that the world has a responsibility to love us as we are, and when it so clearly doesn't we become resentful and indignant, and hold on all the more strongly to a misguided sense of right that comes to dominate and control every aspect of life and being. To break through this barrier takes years and years of carefully directed work, most of which can only be done alone.
30 October 2015
The bourgeoisie (ego) will always find itself trapped between an underclass (unconscious) that it represses and exploits, and an overclass (superego) that it exalts and obeys. Guilty of being both bully and victim. And resenting everything: the poor for the dignity of their suffering, the rich for their callous inability to empathise, and themselves for their puerile prejudices.
29 October 2015
28 October 2015
27 October 2015
26 October 2015
In Taiji we do something because we mean to. Initially this meaning comes from the mind: I perform a physical action because my mind tells my body what to do. Then the Taiji Form takes on an exactitude – an incision and precision – that is obviously from a mind in clear control. Eventually this becomes boring, not just to perform but to be in the presence of too. It is clear and exact but lacks passion, feeling and heart. The next stage though is only possible on completion of this first stage, which conditions the body – makes it ready – for energetic flow. The next stage introduces the heart, unifies heart and mind, heart and intent. It goes something like this: the mind relaxes down into the root in order to produce an upward flow of energy which is released and directed outwards by a joyful heart. The difficulty here, and this takes years to master, is for the mind to leave the energy alone, in the far more capable hands of the heart. The mind, ever the control freak, wants to direct everything, but by so doing ruins the flow of energy.
Heart-mind is the organ of intent: the part that makes things happen and gets things done. Two components: cooperating and contesting, decongesting, without which there is no energy, no spirit. Mind releases into a source of energy: a muscle, a root, the core, ancestors, memory, beliefs, traditions – effectively anything that has power, and the heart releases into the task at hand: the work, the lover, the enemy, the other, the future. Then energy will flow in the direction of heart. The difficulty is in preventing the mind from following the energy. If it does then I lose the source and energy dies. I must be mindful of origin and heartful of destiny.
24 October 2015
23 October 2015
22 October 2015
21 October 2015
World peace. The only arena where this is neither tautology nor oxymoron is the internal. This is the first principle of spiritual work: external springs from internal; external peace is a consequence of internal peace. My first responsibility is to attend to my own peace of mind, and then, if only by example, the world – my world – has a chance.
20 October 2015
A mind made up is a hard mind, fit only to be used as a coarse weapon – a battering ram. It will never uncover or arrive at truth. Truth can never be known, only intuited or felt, for brief moments. It is like a faint scent on the breeze, a whisper in a tongue unknown. Its touch is the touch of grace, destined to leave my heart enriched but my mind empty at best, confused at worst. This is why discipline is so important: I meditate not because I have decided to but because I don't allow myself a choice. A subtle but crucial distinction. I must become a man capable of keeping promises. A man of his word.
Suffering is inevitable. So we choose our suffering: we either suffer to change or we suffer to resist change and remain the same. And the only real change, we propose, is a change of heart, a change to heart, towards heart. In this sense, heart is the vast ocean of wisdom and compassion awaiting the world beneath the jealous, petulant, fearful guard of my selfishness.
19 October 2015
18 October 2015
Graffiti on a local wall this morning:
STOP HATING!
This, when you consider it carefully, is the main spiritual directive: to turn away from ego with its universal will to power (always at the other's expense) and start operating instead from the heart (the only viable alternative) with its aching desire to exchange sameness for otherness.
STOP HATING!
This, when you consider it carefully, is the main spiritual directive: to turn away from ego with its universal will to power (always at the other's expense) and start operating instead from the heart (the only viable alternative) with its aching desire to exchange sameness for otherness.
Meditation is the alignment of an erect spine with the field of gravity for a certain duration, for the sole purpose of generating an awakening. External resistance – the refusal to practise – we call laziness. Internal resistance – the mind's resentment – we call stubbornness. It takes time – an age/ing – for the mind to dissociate from itself and realise that ego is not, in reality, of itself, is, in fact, something entirely foreign, alien, which has been keeping the true mind prisoner inside its own house. This is the awakening we are patiently awaiting. Then the mind can return to the heart and life can begin.
17 October 2015
13 October 2015
The poor student doesn't listen. They may hear but what they hear is something that has already formed in their mind before real listening has taken place: they hear their own reactions, their own opinions.
The mediocre student listens, is momentarily inspired and enthused, and then quickly forgets. The impetus of his enthusiasm does not have the energy to escape the gravity of habit. He then needs to be told again, ad nauseum.
The good student listens, hears, recognises a line of flight – an opportunity for transformation – leaps onto it never to go back, and is changed forever.
The mediocre student listens, is momentarily inspired and enthused, and then quickly forgets. The impetus of his enthusiasm does not have the energy to escape the gravity of habit. He then needs to be told again, ad nauseum.
The good student listens, hears, recognises a line of flight – an opportunity for transformation – leaps onto it never to go back, and is changed forever.
12 October 2015
Why are happy people generally so obnoxious? It's because, on average, happiness is being full of oneself. People are happy when they are getting their own way: when their body is largely free of pain, when they have all they want, and when they have successfully turned away from the needs of the Other.
11 October 2015
10 October 2015
There are two vital places we lose touch with as we become more and more imprisoned in ugliness, in ego. These are: the centre of gravity (the dantien) and our skin – that beautifully sensitive interface between us and the other. When the centre of gravity becomes a reality, rather than just another mathematical concept, then the person takes on a definition, an incision, an acuity, distinction and simplicity that lends their actions a power and clarity which most lack because of flabby indecisiveness. But developing the dantien doesn't come easy. It requires an inner tension, a ruthless detachment, a constant contraction into solitude. And yet it is only through such work that my skin has the support to relax and become effectively porous, giving and receiving, communucating, with the world beyond it. Only by being ruthlessly cool and centred can I enter into truly compassionate action and become something other than the selfish nonentity my ego constantly strives to make me.
09 October 2015
Most of what passes for activity is an excuse to escape the pain of the present moment. When I do I am in the doing rather than in the space that doing occupies – I can no longer effectively listen. Taiji attempts to strike a better balance between active and passive by wresting activity away from the clutches of ego and handing it back to pure spirit. This, again, is Central Equilibrium.
08 October 2015
Remember when you were a kid, waiting for some treat, and time would pass so slowly, causing your impatience to rise and rise until it was almost unbearable? You were effectively being forced to witness the passage of time, to count the seconds; a passive subject. And this is meditation: the counting of seconds; but without the impatience.
07 October 2015
I have a neighbour who practices really good yoga on the lawn outside. I saw him on his bike yesterday, and hailed him:
Hi, where are you off?
To my yoga class.
Are you the teacher?
No! I've only been doing it a year.
Well you look very professional.
Oh, yoga, it's all style – looking good – you know, fake it till you make it...
Hi, where are you off?
To my yoga class.
Are you the teacher?
No! I've only been doing it a year.
Well you look very professional.
Oh, yoga, it's all style – looking good – you know, fake it till you make it...
The head is ever standing back in order to discern, judge and categorize. The world then becomes sorted and ordered; segregated into numerous hierarchies. But the real world, always beyond such vanity, retreats and hides as soon as the mind flairs into activity. The real world, the heart world, needs to be seduced before it comes out to play.
06 October 2015
04 October 2015
Everything is connected, continuous – without discretion. Yet, at the same time, in itself, singular, unique – out of the ordinary. But only when its relationship to time is both eager and expectant. Like the hunter or the prey. In the intensity of the hunt they both sense a witness to their interaction. The intensity and quality of their relationship calls forth a usually hidden (hiding) pitch of reality, which we call death.
03 October 2015
Our struggle is to reconnect: to our own energy through increased awareness, to the Earth by releasing hips and sacrum, and to the Other by opening the heart. None of this is ever achieved with force. It is a simple matter of putting in the hours of practice, day by day, year in, year out. A practice based on faith, respect, perseverance, patience and humility.
We know from mathematics that the negative of a negative is positive, so when a negative person or group is negative about you, or your spiritual endeavours, take it as affirmation and confirmation that you are probably on the right path. And, believe me, there is nothing quite so negative, in this respect, as modern bourgeois society, with its inverted values and its absolute inability or refusal to see beyond itself.