ATTD News Letter number 18
Saturday, November 08, 2003



Q & A

    Question: ...I am too exhausted, and the brain-fog is too extreme…! I also don't know what to do anymore…kind of… (And the realized 'persons' continue to claim that there is nobody there anyway…so: Nobody does not know what to do anymore…)

    There is a fear that you guys are all con-artists… (Enlightenment = End of suffering?!) ((Now don't tell me there is no one to suffer anyway.))

    What is the difference between 'There is suffering' or 'I do suffer'??? Where is the difference?! Both is hell! I can't see any difference at all! Or maybe >I< am a con-artist , and just projecting it onto you…!

    Answer: Either everybody throughout the ages got it wrong or you are looking in the wrong place. Perhaps you are looking for something without realizing that the jewel is in the invisible looking itself. You are asking what is the difference between suffering and someone who suffers. You already give the answer you do not want to hear: ("Now don't tell me there is no one to suffer!")

    So if you do not like the answer, here are a few questions:

    • What is the difference when watching a movie, believing it is all real and knowing it is only a movie?
    • What is the difference between seeing a mirage in the dessert, believing it is a lake and knowing that it is a mirage?
    • What is the difference between seeing a magician on stage sawing your lover in half, believing it is real and knowing it is a simple trick?

    We can say 'no difference' because whether we know it to be an illusion or not, we see the same thing. We can say that it makes all the difference because there is not the same investment in what is seen.

    Have a look and and see if you can find the one who is doing the suffering, or perhaps see that there is something that remains untouched; 'something' that is aware of the suffering.
Painting by Kem Meyer Jr. 'The Power of Agony'
Visit him at: http://www.kenmeyerjr.com/misc/agony.html

If or when you have a question you'd like to see answered in this newsletter mail to:
author@awakeningtothedream.com

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From the book 'Awakening to the Dream.'

    When we clearly see that all desire and its resulting suffering originates in the belief that there is a separate individual identified with a body-mind, we may be more receptive to the view that we are not the body.

    The body is false,
    And so are its fears,
    Heaven and hell, freedom and bondage.
    It is all invention.
    What can they matter to me?
    I am awareness itself.    *

    The trick is to refrain from turning this notion into yet another strategy to escape undesirable moods and the fear of extinction. Believing or hoping that one is not the body usually gets translated into the idea that one is an immortal soul temporarily confined in the body; but this is not what this text suggests. What it says is that you are not exclusively the body in the same way that the ocean is not exclusively a single wave. You have identified with this mortal and time-bound appearance to the extent that you have apparently forgotten the bigger picture.

    The bigger picture is that the body-mind is the infinite having a finite experience. You are the infinite, and the body resides in you the same way that a star resides in space.
The paperback is available at: http://www.awakeningtothedream.com/purchasebook.html
The eBook can be found at: http://www.awakeningtothedream.com/purchase.html

*The Ashtavakra Gita (2-20) Translated by Thomas Byrom. Shambhala Publications: ISBN: 1570628971
  Tarot Card from 'The Self-Arising Tarot' at: http://www.calweb.com/~queribus/newcards.html

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Amazing Grace

    I'm at work. It's midterm week. Big week. After my morning classes finish, I call mom. She's had a fall, is surrounded by broken glass. I arrange to leave work and go over to her place. There is blood all over the place. I take her to the ER. We spend the next eleven hours there. She has three broken ribs and a deep cut in her hand, but is otherwise fine.

    The ER is having a very busy day. Car wrecks, gunshot wounds, heart attacks--these folks come by ambulance and are brought in through another door. Those of us deemed less urgent are seated in a waiting room. We wait. Hours go by.

    A crazy man wearing an oxygen mask screams over and over that he doesn't want to go back to Vietnam. A woman with newly broken leg gives me a quarter for the vending machine. A toothless 87 year old woman stands right in front of me, inches away, then lifts up her shirt and pulls down her pants to show me the shingles outbreak all over her body, then she sits in the chair next to me and leans into me, talking and talking and talking, story after story, breathing on me. My body recoils; I am not Mother Teresa, but I love this old woman, too.

    Finally they call my mother's name. We enter the sanctuary. We have a cubicle. A nurse gets us settled--she is a radiant and rock steady woman who exudes genuine heartfelt love and calm. I feel we have been ushered into God's Kingdom. A handsome young medical student comes to check my mother over. He flirts with her. Asks her out on a date. They play together.

    The woman who heads the ER comes over eventually. A large woman, solid, no bullshit--pure Chicago--she uses her fingernail to peel apart the wound on my mother's hand, checking for shards of glass. Later when the shift changes, the young medical student goes home--he comes to say goodbye and wish us well--and a male nurse takes over. Another radiant being, he immediately begins talking with Mom about how "all is One." He asks me what I do. I say I teach college English. My mother pipes up and says I write spiritual books. He asks me what kind. I say, "Nothing systematic, just what is. Just this." I say, "This right here is my idea of spiritual." He lights up. Yes, he sees it that way too. Later, he comes over with the blood pressure equipment, wraps the cuff around Mom's arm. "We have to pretend I'm here for some reason," he says.

    The Beloved was everywhere. Is Everywhere. Is Everything. The overflowing Nothing dancing its Cosmic Dance. Galaxies exploding in the night sky. Sheer beauty. Amazing grace.
This story was mailed to me by Joan Tollifson.
She is the author of 'Bare-Bones Meditation' and
'Awake in the Heartland.'
Visit her at: http://home.earthlink.net/~wakeupjt/

Amazing Grace painting by: Merrill C. Peterson
Visit him at: http://hometown.aol.com/ars%20longas/page/

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Awakened Poetry


Under the Silver Moon by James Tan
http://www.artincanada.com/jamestan/gallery3.html

    Two short poems By Bunan, 17th Century Japanese Zen Master

    1
    The moon's the same old moon,
    The flowers exactly as they were,
    Yet I've become the thingness
    Of all the things I see!


    2
    Die while you’re alive
    And be absolutely dead.
    Then do whatever you want:
    It’s all good.



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Quote of the moment!

And if you would understand what I am, know this:
all that I have said I have uttered playfully,
and I was by no means ashamed thereby.
I Danced.

Jesus Christ/Acts of John


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Smile of the moment!





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