Author: nakedom_qxyb03

You are not who nor what you think you are

You are not who nor what pretty much all of the world has told you, including the very personal voice in your head and the various emotions born of desire and fear that seem so real.

You are not what your various personal and impersonal experiences of pleasure and pain have told you.

You are not the healthy and unhealthy habits in which you indulge (neither the ones that you desire to stop nor the ones that you desire to continue; nor the ones that liberate you, nor the ones that bind you)

The truth of you cannot really be named or described only experienced, investigated, lived, and died.

While seemingly contradictory, light behaves simultaneously as both a stream of particles and waves, omnipresent and localized, separate and unified, digital and analog, directed and all-pervasive. This is as close to the truth of you as words can get.

Your habit of seeking results and attachment to things and people and circumstances often causes anger and misery for yourself and others.

Your mind can never know your TRUE intentions behind the actions that you perform, nor can your mind know the TRUE intentions behind the actions that someone else performs.

Your mind can never know your own nor anyone or anything else’s true impact or influence. (The mind can never know Truth.)

At some point, every goal must fall away, the words, the story, past and future, categories, preferences, and opinions of good and bad, self and other.

Your habit of striving to embody ideals and self discipline (yamas and niyamas) is a never-ending commitment and experience of successes and failures. This is perhaps the one thing that you should not give up, even though you will never achieve perfection in these things.

No matter how true you think your view of “how things really are” is, you must remember that it is merely one perspective among an infinite number.

An important thing to do is to break your mind of the habit of indulging in opinions.

Another important thing to do is to break your mind of the habit of acquisition and accumulation. Accumulating things, relationships, money, experience, all of it. This is contrary to the way of life that you have embraced, which seems to pervade so much of the planet right now.

The feeling of unworthiness that you try to erase by doing “things of value” will never go away, yet still you must participate.

The experience of anger, sadness, and disappointment when the fruits of action are manifest and then fade or aren’t what you expected is unavoidable.

There is no person or system or thing manifest that can truly give you permission to practice, eat, shelter, live, experience, be, create, destroy, and preserve.

Nothing in existence can completely absolve you of guilt, unworthiness, and shame.

Sometimes people (including yourself) will behave honorably, sometimes not. Sometimes their actions will appear to hurt your heart, and/or your gross or subtle bodies. Sometimes your actions may appear to hurt another’s heart and/or gross or subtle bodies. The only thing you can do is feel it, forgive, and proceed, even though it is perhaps one of the most challenging forms of non-attachment to attempt.

It is impossible to live in this realm and not be a hypocrite in some way, and it is advisable to keep trying and essential to keep forgiving.

You may never get beyond the “fake it till you make it” stage, but you must persist.

Seeing manifested circumstances clearly will often appear to cause anger and/or sadness to your mental/emotional state.

Your only real goal is Om. The only thing you can really do is make that one goal your priority and allow everything thing else to happen. Sometimes it means that you will experience pain and feel like things aren’t fair, and sometimes your heart will ache for Om. Sometimes you will experience the pain of “heavy existence”, and being around people who are deluded by “heavy existence” will be unpleasant. Sometimes you fall back into heavy existence also.

Do not cling to people nor push them away, no matter who you think they are.

Have you created a home or a prison? Sometimes you experience the manifest as a home, sometimes a prison. The experience of the manifest has and always will change.

The real secret of action is to perform what needs to be done, not attaching to liking or disliking the experience, present in the moment only, and not overly fixated on the result. The mode of action that prevails right now is effort leading to more effort, painfully, with ignorance. Action does not itself lead to freedom, but action is absolutely necessary. Be aware that to a certain extent, your participation in ignorant and painful action is unavoidable. You are not separate or special; we all create and share each other’s burden.

Feeling and living with the idea that you will always be a servant and will always be an aspirant has benefit.

Aspire to be a servant.

You wish love/ahimsa/practice/life was something that you could do and then complete. This desire subtly pervades much of your thoughts, feelings, and actions. Until you let go of that impossible and false desire, you will forever be disappointed.

Part of you does desire death, for many reasons, but a major one is because every aspect of life gets annoying at one time or another. You also fear death at the same time. Death, like everything else, is not lasting.

Ultimately, even seemingly unchangeable urges like food, sleep, sex, and self preservation are habits. It is worthwhile to learn how to embrace the experience of managing and experimenting with them with a compassionate spirit of ahimsa, tapas, and brahmacharya.

These are just thoughts; they are not absolute nor permanent. Remembering them and acknowledging them serve you at the moment, and at a certain point you may no longer need them.

Om

Somewhere in the space and silence between the thoughts and feelings of desire and fear that disturb and often torture me (and others), I AM ok.

And that is where I truly am, regardless of what gross or subtle experience (good, bad, or mixed) is happening, regardless of how it appears to myself or others. The space-silence is who, what, where, and when I truly am. That is where healing is, that is where love is. That is where I long to reside, not attached nor averse to the golden cage of illusion that seems to exist all around, the luxury and fake beauty that demands more and more of our time, effort, and attention for its maintenance.

And so,
I continue to strive for Nakedness
shameless
naked
simplicity
to accept the bitter as it is, without needing to change it
to accept the sweet as it is, without trying to hold on to it or repeat it
to accept the obstacles, the bondage and the golden cage as they are, without needing their destruction, transformation, or preservation
to accept space and silence as they are, even when they seem to be so polluted that they are difficult to find
to give equal weight to the abstinence and indulgence, accepting that both are necessary
to attempt true and universal love through sacrifice which does not require any return

What I truly desire can never be fully achieved in the manifest or unmanifest, only pursued with earnest effort and non-effort, endlessly desiring and attempting to sacrifice for true love,
desiring and attempting to live by the law of love,
which knows when to indulge and when to abstain
when to create and when to destroy
when to hold and when to let go
when to fight and when to surrender

“The world” (nature-civilization) does not owe me
happiness, pleasure, or safety;
owes me absolutely nothing,
regardless of what I have deluded myself into believing that I have sacrificed to it or endured for it.

So what.
I have endured pleasure and pain
they come and go
people, things, states of being come and go
and I appear (even to myself) to do and experience things,
but it’s not really true.

So what.
Talents
and virtues and vices
and things of beauty and ugliness
and healing and injury
love and hate
happiness and sadness
rational and irrational
fair and unfair
honest and dishonest
(innumerable varying degrees of opposites)
have happened around me
by me
and to me.
I have spent a considerable amount of time and effort trying to pursue and own the things that I like or am proud of and avoid and disown the things that I don’t like or am ashamed of.
But truly,
ownership is only something that the mind has made up.
I own absolutely none of it and
I own absolutely all of it..
Life happens, death happens, the illusion happens
blah blah blah

“The world” as I perceive it is merely a mistaken view of reality.
“I” as I perceive it is merely a mistaken view of reality.

I do not expect truth from “the world” or my mind
nor do I expect them to make sense
or change
or remain the same
or reward me or punish me in any particular way
at a certain point, causality and blame do not apply.

Consciousness is not true peace nor happiness;
Consciousness just happens
and in truth, there is absolutely nothing personal about it

creation
destruction
preservation

tamas
rajas
sattva

Om

I realize that all I am trying to do is make the words that I write true by living them and manifesting them through action and being.
I know (but sometimes forget) that I will never be able to fully achieve them;
and I confess that many of my past, present, and future actions are not in line with them
and I often struggle with (and try to avoid or deny) the shame, anger, sadness, and hypocrisy that seem to be an inevitable part of the experience
fortunately, I at least sometimes remember that all I can do is give an earnest and honest attempt,
striving for love beyond likes and dislikes,
trying to move beyond the pleasure-pain/desire-fear motivation,
having the human experience of balancing the primal urges and divine desires.

I don’t see any end to the cycle of births and deaths (goals, effort, manifestation, fruits, disillusionment) as I will always desire (and attempt) to do just one fucking true thing motivated purely by love.

When the false way that I experience and perceive things subsides, I must admit that others are doing the exact same thing, regardless of outward appearances of beauty or ugliness, pleasure or pain, virtue or vice, yogic or non-yogic practice, or tamasic, rajasic, or sattvic awareness. The limited perception of “me” (mind-ego) can never know the true motives behind an action (even its own), nor anyone or anything’s true influence or purpose. I am thankful for the mercy in the world that allows us all to attempt our paths regardless of how messy it gets or how it may appear to my limited personal perception.

I confess that I say that I want Truth and to perform a “true sacrifice” for love, but I still find myself wanting to run away and/or resorting to familiar modes of avoidance and denial when I am experiencing the gross and subtle pain of illusion. I often attribute the pain to living life with other people in the modern world, but it also happens when I am alone, and a more primitive or natural way of life would present its own set of challenges which would appear to cause some kind of pain or unhappiness and discontentment. For the person “me”, the pain seems to be inevitable experience of mind that manifests on various gross and subtle levels. My mind may always have a habit of judging other people, things, experiences and beings, desiring and liking some, fearing and disliking others based on the pleasure or pain that it associates with them. It may always hate itself for various failures of self discipline like overeating,various acts of gross and subtle violence, laziness and not being more content and more loving. It will probably also always be prone to experience bouts of strong feelings of anger and hatred which will distort its view of things and prevent clarity and sanity.

I frequently struggle with strong feelings of anger, usually regarding the bondage of work, home and social commitments. It seems that the anger is an indication of the fact that I still have attachment to and expectations of the world, other people, or myself based on sacrifices that I feel I have made or simply because what I see and experience is not what I personally like or deem appropriate or just. I may never really understand its purpose or its message. Part of me really just wants it to go away, but for Tom it seems to be an inevitable part of participating in the never ending birth-death cycle (hope, imagination, effort, fruits, disillusionment).

I often (usually) feel like a failure at love, to the point where I hesitate to even talk about it, because I feel like I don’t really know what it is. I don’t like to talk about love too much or even say “I love you” to people because I feel like a liar. I feel that I can only attempt to do things that show it, like endure some kind of pain and give some of the fruits of that pain away. What happens is that I consume some, share some and try to save some. Whatever I have done in ignorance accumulates and eventually explodes and causes some kind of pain or turmoil. I try sometimes to change the pattern, but self effort only goes so far. I don’t see that I will be able to change that pattern, and I don’t know if it’s my place to decide that.

Sincere and intense conviction.

Recently, and at the current moment,
I am not aware of any particular expectation that I have for our time together.
not healing
not erotic
not sensual
not giving
not receiving
not pleasure
not pain
not emotional
not dramatic
not sacred
not profane
not experiencing any particular type of connection on any particular energetic or physical level

What I truly desire is not to be found in anything manifest, no matter how gross or subtle or exquisite or sublime the experience or thing may be.

This desire, which lies at the root of all others,
is what I have come to value most
it is what motivates me to play with body, breath, mind and ego and pursue simplicity, nature, nakedness, renunciation and nonattachment
it is what brings on the spontaneous tears when I feel it in my heart
it is what brings tremendous rage when I feel the chains that bind me and seem to prevent me from experiencing it fully

And so, I say now
that I am just here to attempt to share some time of nakedness, knowing that I can only aspire to do so, as neither I (nor anyone, no matter how wise or noble) can ever be completely certain that I am free of expectation and attachment until the fruits of the experience are manifest, and even then the limited view of mind-ego cannot know for sure

I can only attempt to let the bitter and the sweet results happen, experiencing them and sharing them with some form of equanimity and then let them go as they eventually pass

P. 349

Q: is it not natural to be active?

M: Everybody wants to be active, but where do his actions originate? There is no central point, each action begets another, meaninglessly and painfully, in endless succession. The alternation of work and pause is not there. First find the immutable center where all movement takes birth. Just like a wheel turns round an axle, so must you be always at the axle in the center and not whirling at the periphery.

Q: how do I go about it in practice?

M: whenever a thought or emotion of desire or fear comes into your mind just turn away from it,…. Just turn away, look between the thoughts rather than at the thoughts. When you happen to walk in a crowd, you do not fight every man you meet — you just find your way between.

P. 348

Immobility and silence are not inactive. The flower fills the space with perfume, the candle — with light. They do nothing yet they change everything by their mere presence. You can photograph the candle, but not its light. You can know the man, his name and appearance, but not his influence. His very presence is action.

For me, the urge to blame is a difficult habit to attempt to stop, especially in close personal relationship. When the mind is experiencing pain of anger and passion, bondage, and delusion, it searches to find a cause in order to find a way to escape or stop the pain. Upon close examination, I find that my mind is ultimately the cause of its own bondage, and at least some of it is unavoidable.

It is difficult to constantly remember that there is no goal and that life is its own purpose and that seeking results eventually leads to anger and sadness.

It is difficult to remember that what appears to bind the mind/body does not bind who I truly am.

It is difficult to remember that all of this serves the supreme desire; the mind/ego cannot see it; the mind/ego is not designed to see it.

I know that I will always desire that which cannot be found in the manifest, that which cannot be earned or acquired. It is this desire that causes me to search eternally for simplicity, renunciation, nature, prana, nakedness, spontaneous erections, solitude, silence, the state between inhale and exhale, the delicate and elusive state between manifest and unmanifest, and the simple feeling of desiring. It is to this desire and this desire only that I surrender.