Category: Stephen Mitchell

AND SO IT IS… "...poems of fulfillment." September 3, 2020

9/3/2020

AND SO IT IS…
…NAKED IN GRACE
POSSESSING CONSCIOUSNESS

STILLED ON THE TARMAC
PURRING/WAITING
FOR
THE TOWER’S
DECLARATION OF “CLEAR!”
FOR
FINAL FLIGHT
ew
3:33 AM-9/3/20

Returning to the source is serenity …
~ Lao Tzu

Returning … to the Source
Empty your mind of all thoughts.
Let your heart be at peace.
Watch the turmoil of beings,
but contemplate their return.

Each separate being in the universe
returns to the common source.

Returning to the source is serenity.

If you don’t realize the source,
you stumble in confusion and sorrow.

When you realize where you come from,
you naturally become tolerant,
disinterested, amused,

kindhearted as a grandmother,
dignified as a king.
~ Lao Tzu

Immersed in the wonder of the Tao,
you can deal with whatever life brings you,
and when death comes,
you are ready.

Lao Tzu

All Photos for today's OceanSpeak from: Sept. 3, 2018
UNSULLIED UNFETTERED CORE "...the Quiet Answer..." "... luminous clarity..." September 3, 2018
CtrlClick above Title (or below) to open above OceanSpeak
https://dorotheamills.weebly.com/oceanspeak-youthanasia-sanctarii/unsullied-unfettered-core-the-quiet-answer-luminous-clarity-september-3-2018

AFTERNOON

LIVE AS THOUGH IT IS SO
BECAUSE WHATEVER IT IS
---IN UNSULLIED, UNFETTERED CORE---
IS SO
∞
BE LIVED, MOVED BREATHED BY THAT!
ALONE WITH THE ALONE
IN/OF/AS THAT WHICH CANNOT CHANGE*
ew
3:03 AM-9/3/18
*Rather than focus on what needs changing…
turn attention to what cannot change.
Wu Hsin
Solving Yourself
Aug 19

Your Three Greatest Treasures

Some say that my teaching is nonsense.
Others call it lofty but impractical.

But to those who have looked inside themselves,
this nonsense makes perfect sense.

And to those who put it into practice,
this loftiness has roots that go deep.

I have just three things to teach:
simplicity, patience, compassion.

These three are your greatest treasures.
Simple in actions and in thoughts,
you return to the source of being.

Patient with both friends and enemies,
you accord with the way things are.

Compassionate toward yourself,
you reconcile all beings in the world.
~ Lao Tzu

(some of the) Lao Tzu above poems are excerpted from
The Enlightened Heart …

...in the Foreword, Stephen Mitchell, the editor says
“… Most of what we call religious poetry is the poetry of longing:
for God, for the mother’s face.

But the poems in The Enlightened Heart are poems of fulfillment.
They were written by the Secret,
who has many aliases.

Sitting or dancing,
all these poets have found themselves inside the circle--
some of them a step within the circumference,
some far in,
some at dead center.

Looking out from the center,
you can talk about the circumference.
But really, there is no circumference.
Everyone, everything, is joyfully included …”

Poems of Fulfillment by Lao Tzu
https://www.stillnessspeaks.com/poems-fulfillment-lao-tzu/?utm_source=Stillness+Speaks+Newsletter&utm_campaign=36945b21dd-NL_2020_9_2_LT.PoF-AHA.LU-C&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_f5958d3327-36945b21dd-19977997&ct=t(TRK-NL_2020_9_2_LT.PoF-AHA.LU-C)

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NO-PATH OPPORTUNITY-BEYOND THE TELLING August 15, 2020

8/15/2020

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THE MIND/BODY’S ATROPHYING
IS NOT A PROBLEM TO BE HUMANLY Rx’d
BUT RATHER
A NO-PATH OPPORTUNITY
FOR
DIVINE GRACE TO TOTALLY POSSESS
=
BEYOND WORDS & THOUGHTS
∞
A CONDITION BEYOND THE TELLING
∞
ew
2:21 AM-8/15/20

(I AM ONLY-ONELY)
∞
THE GREAT NOTHING
BEYOND
ALL
TELLING
∞
ew
6:48 AM-8/15/20

Pure prayer begins at the threshold of silence.
It says nothing, asks for nothing.
It is a kind of listening.

The deeper the listening,
the less we listen for,
until silence itself
becomes
the voice of God.

― Stephen Mitchell
A Book of Psalms: Selections Adapted from the Hebrew

The great Way is easy,
yet people prefer the side paths.
Be aware when things are out of balance.

Stay centered within the Tao.

When rich speculators prosper while farmers lose their land;
when government officials spend money on weapons instead of cures;
when the upper class is extravagant and irresponsible
while the poor have nowhere to turn—
all this is robbery and chaos.

It is not in keeping with the Tao.

― Stephen Mitchell, Tao Te Ching

So if you are thinking,
words are very bad.

But if you are not thinking,
all words and all things that you can see or hear
or smell or taste or touch
will help you.

So it is very important for you
to cut off your thinking
and
your attachment to words.”

― Stephen Mitchell
Dropping Ashes on the Buddha: The Teachings of Zen Master Seung Sahn

The less we cling to one side of reality
—betting on either or or, arguing for for or against--
the more we can be aware
of the exquisite counterpoint of things.

Everything matters:
how we vote,
how we tie our shoelaces,
how we respond
to the faintest whisper
of a thought.

And nothing matters,
because (look!) it’s already gone.

When we understand this, we’re home free.
― Stephen Mitchell,
The Second Book of the Tao

Because the practices of lovingkindness and compassion
can lead to excessive attachment to the way things ought to be,
their tender warmth needs to be balanced with spacious equanimity.

But evenhanded equanimity
can lead to excessive detachment,
so its coolness needs to be balanced
with loving care and compassion.

Learning this balance is essential
for a steady heart.
~Jack Kornfield
https://makebelieveboutique.com/2020/08/15/33005/

All Photos for today's OceanSpeak from: August 15, 2018
FULLTIME NAKED GRACE "...womb of creation..." "...open awareness..." August 15, 2018
CtrlClick above Title (or below) to open above OceanSpeak
https://dorotheamills.weebly.com/oceanspeak-youthanasia-sanctarii/fulltime-naked-grace-womb-of-creation-open-awareness-august-15-2018

AFTERNOON

BE STILLED FOCUSED AWARE
AS WHEN BEING GAZED THRU CAMERA LENS
<
ORIGINAL SILENCE
UNFETTERED AWARENESS
FULLTIME NAKED GRACE
ew
4:54 AM-8/15/18
https://dorotheamills.weebly.com/oceanspeak-youthanasia-sanctarii/fulltime-naked-grace-womb-of-creation-open-awareness-august-15-2018

GREAT BREATH OF LIFE & DEATH
IS ONLY LIFE….
NOTHING MORE – NOTHING LESS
(a Whisper from approx.
May 2018..Ocala, Fl
https://dorotheamills.weebly.com/oceanspeak-youthanasia-sanctarii/fulltime-naked-grace-womb-of-creation-open-awareness-august-15-2018

Nature reaches out to us with welcoming arms,
and bids us enjoy her beauty;
but we dread her silence
and rush into the crowded cities,
there to huddle like sheep
fleeing from a ferocious wolf.
Khalil Gibran
https://dorotheamills.weebly.com/oceanspeak-youthanasia-sanctarii/fulltime-naked-grace-womb-of-creation-open-awareness-august-15-2018

All things in this creation exist within you, and all things in you exist in creation;
there is no border between you and the closest things,
and there is no distance between you and the farthest things,
and all things,
from the lowest to the loftiest,
from the smallest to the greatest,
are within you as equal things.

In one atom are found all the elements of the earth;
in one motion of the mind are found the motions
of all the laws of existence;
in one drop of water are found the secrets
of all the endless oceans;
in one aspect of you are found
all the aspects of existence.
- Kahlil Gibran

Every thing [sic] in nature bespeaks the mother.
The sun is the mother of the earth and gives it its nourishment of heat;
it never leaves the universe at night
until it has put the earth to sleep to the song of the sea
and the hymn of the birds and brooks.

And this earth is the mother of trees and flowers.
It produces them, nurses them, and weans them.
The trees and flowers become kind mothers
of their great fruits and seeds.

And the mother,
the prototype of all existence,
is the eternal spirit,
full of beauty and love.

Kahlil Gibran

We who live amid the excitements of the city
know nothing of the life of the mountain villagers.

We are swept into the current of urban existence,
until we forget the peaceful rhythms of simple country life,
which smiles in the spring,
toils in the summer, reaps in autumn, rests in winter,
imitating nature in all her cycles.

We are wealthier than the villagers in silver or gold,
but they are richer in spirit.
What we sow we reap not; they reap what they sow.

We are slaves of gain, and they the children of contentment.
Our draught from the cup of life
is mixed with bitterness and despair,
fear and weariness;
but they drink the pure nectar of life’s fulfillment.
Kahlil Gibran

My God state is sustained by the beauty
you behold wheresoever you lift your eyes;
a beauty which is Nature in all her forms.

A beauty which is the beginning of the shepherd’s happiness
as he stands among the hills;
and the villager’s in his fields;
and of the wandering tribes
between mountain and plain.

A beauty which is a stepping-stone for the wise
to the throne of the living Truth.
Kahlil Gibran

I heard the brook lamenting
like a widow mourning her dead child and I asked,
"Why do you weep, my pure brook?"

And the brook replied,
"Because I am compelled to go to the city
where Man condemns me and spurns me for stronger drinks
and makes of me a scavenger for his offal,
pollutes my purity,
and turns my goodness to filth."

And I heard the birds grieving, and I asked,
"Why do you cry, my beautiful birds?"
And one of them flew near, and perched at the tip of a branch and said,

"The sons of Adam will soon come into this field
with their deadly weapons and make war upon us
as if we were their mortal enemies.

We are now taking leave of one another,
for we know not which of us will escape the wrath of Man.
Death follows us wherever we go."

Now the sun rose from behind the mountain peaks
and gilded the treetops with coronals.
I look upon this beauty and asked myself, "
Why must Man destroy what Nature has built?"
Kahlil Gibran

Would that you could live on the fragrance of the earth,
and like an air plant be sustained by the light.
But since you must kill to eat,
and rob the newly born of its mother’s milk to quench your thirst,
let it be an act of worship.

And let your board stand an altar
on which the pure and the innocent of the forest and plain
are sacrificed for that which is purer
and still more innocent in man.
Kahlil Gibran

All Above Gibran Quotes in this font from:
http://www.alhewar.com/Gibran_Eco.htm

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AND SO IT IS… "...poems of fulfillment." September 3, 2020

NO-PATH OPPORTUNITY-BEYOND THE TELLING August 15, 2020

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