Contemplation 54

“The Now is called “The Present” as it is a gift.”

“Time isn’t precious at all, because it is an illusion. What you perceive as precious is not time but the one point that is out of time: the Now. That is precious indeed. The more you are focused on time—past and future—the more you miss the Now, the most precious thing there is.”

                                     - Eckhart Tolle, 

There she was standing on the shore with the majesty of that sanctifying sea, her feet inviting and welcoming the christening waters into the great peace and the great journey ahead. On the horizon the canvassed vessel coasted with the current and wind carrying her dreams.

The witnessing prodigal pilgrim wondered:

What knocked me off course? When did I lose that innocent joy where living in the present wasn’t questioned and being and living were one and the past was not regretted nor the future feared? Am I too easy to let storms or even prospective squalls distract me from being?

On the eve of the eighth anniversary of the second chance dance the season he had hoped seemed to evaporate.

However, however… that vision of the bloodline innocent present on the gateway to paradise reinvigorated his own spirit with gratitude, humility and commitment to letting go and being.

Be Here Now – George Harrison

https://youtu.be/He2yrzwgTtI

Looking For My Life – George Harrison

https://youtu.be/SBov2x9L3UQ

* Tomorrow Never Knows – ChoirChoirChoir – The Beatles

https://youtu.be/xgZKTC0gqM4

Turn off your mind, relax and float down stream

It is not dying, it is not dying

Lay down all thoughts, surrender to the void

It is shining, it is shining

Yet you may see the meaning of within

It is being, it is being

Love is all and love is everyone

It is knowing, it is knowing

And ignorance and hate mourn the dead

It is believing, it is believing

But listen to the colour of your dreams

It is not living(Leaving?), it is not living (Leaving?)

So play the game "Existence" to the end

Of the beginning, of the beginning

Of the beginning, of the beginning

Of the beginning, of the beginning

                                                     Of the beginning, of the beginning

* George Harrison questioned whether Lennon fully understood the meaning of the song's lyrics:

You can hear (and I am sure most Beatles fans have) "Tomorrow Never Knows" a lot and not know really what it is about. Basically it is saying what meditation is all about. The goal of meditation is to go beyond (that is, transcend) waking, sleeping and dreaming. So the song starts out by saying, "Turn off your mind, relax and float downstream, it is not dying."

Then it says, "Lay down all thoughts, surrender to the void – it is shining. That you may see the meaning of within – it is being." From birth to death all we ever do is think: we have one thought, we have another thought, another thought, another thought. Even when you are asleep you are having dreams, so there is never a time from birth to death when the mind isn't always active with thoughts. But you can turn off your mind, and go to the part which Maharishi described as: "Where was your last thought before you thought it?"

The whole point is that we are the song. The self is coming from a state of pure awareness, from the state of being. All the rest that comes about in the outward manifestation of the physical world (including all the fluctuations which end up as thoughts and actions) is just clutter. The true nature of each soul is pure consciousness. So the song is really about transcending and about the quality of the transcendent.

I am not too sure if John actually fully understood what he was saying. He knew he was onto something when he saw those words and turned them into a song. But to have experienced what the lyrics in that song are actually about? I don't know if he fully understood it.^{[4 (The Beatles Bible)}

With gratitude and love for the First Member of The Band and our recent reunion on stage.

AMDG

Copyright 2016 @ JF Sobecki LLC

An Auld Lang Syne Dialogue

                                                       (Click image to play)

                                                   scene from "Midnight in Paris"

 

nos·tal·gia

 1: the state of being homesick : homesickness 2: a wistful or excessively sentimental yearning for return to or of some past period or irrecoverable condition…

"Remembrance is a form of meeting." ~ Kahlil Gibran

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

                            ~  George Santyana

(The following is a transcript from a secretly taped meeting of a seeker's sanzen  with a Zen Master)

The seeker asked,

“Is it really wrong to dream about another time and another place?”

The teacher soberly responded….

“That all depends on one’s motivation for the yearning. It also depends

on what one is yearning for. I guess.”

“You guess? You guess? Don’t you know any more than guessing”

“Well, you could say it’s a good guess, then. You see the term nostalgia can find it’s origins from Homer and the painful aching neurotic almost obsessed desire to get back home, to a place and time of safety, good times, peace and happiness. This of course is a fantasy or a state of selective memory that is created to avoid the fears of dealing with the current moment or dealing with the ambiguity of the future. Many Swiss soldiers and soldiers in the American Civil war were often labeled with a disease called “nostalgia.”  Soldiers in World War I and in World War II were also diagnosed with this disease and sent home to be treated for their “homesickness.”

“Yeh, but weren’t they all just afraid of death and the unknown?”

“Yes, that’s quite possible. There are volumes written about retreating to the past ,  locus of control and intolerance of ambiguity as well as the basic fears of death and dying. But personally I believe much of the aching to get back home or to the past has a lot to do with avoiding being present to the current experience …now.”

“Don’t you think that some folks can just have fond memories about certain times and places? Don’t you think that certain songs, pictures or selective possessions can conjure up fond emotions with a smile about a specific period, person or place from the past ”

“Of course memories can be quite joyful. But if we get lost in living in the past then it might be important to explore what is driving the perceived need to exist in the past . Let me explain further.”

“Please do because now I am completely confused.”

“Sometimes it is selective memory that surfaces our desire and fondness for a certain time or period in the past. If we had a digital video of our life history we may find that the certain fond memories are edited episodes that are only minutely accurately anchored in a small iota of truth. Sometimes we may have had a very delightful experience in the past and our recollection fires up that positive emotion again and the memory fuels the flame to be a little greater than of the original experience.“

“Yeh , I know I have some friends who remember our attending school together as a wonderful experience and I don’t see it that way at all.”

“Well, remember sometimes it is all a matter of personal perspective and how was that time or place for them and how is it or isn’t it consistent with your experience or view. Also, what is driving them now to fondly remember that particular time?  It is not a bad thing to consider and reflect fondly on the past…friends, lovers, or occasions. It can be quite comforting. Even recalling one’s who have passed on can be healthy. What I am saying is remembrance is good but just not necessarily healthy to get mired down in the desire “to live” in the past. It is all not black and white, you know.”

“Yeh ,well you may be right. I love my fifty year old guitar and the music of the 60’s and delight in the great books and artists and poets of the early 20^th century.  I feel like I fit in some other time or place….”


The teacher attempted to console the seeker ...

“ I know what you mean. I really do. But it seems to me that sometimes we need to be grateful for whatever and wherever we are and have some faith and trust in the universe that we are the right road at the right time. They haven’t invented time travel yet to jump into the past or future. Nobody really knows what’s next. I know you know the saying…

‘The clock is running. Make the most of today. Time waits for no man. Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That's why it is called the present.’

So, the best we can really do is to do is to love another and do whatever we can to learn how to savor the moment.”

“Hey, I just wrote about that perspective on life in my journal”

“What’s that?”

“Loving another and savoring the moment”

“Well then...”

amdg