Ram Dass Now

If you would like to know what I was up to here in this post, read the disclaimer at the bottom first – bt 8/26

The text editor will not allow me to maintain the form of the free form poetry I wrote (go figure…. ha). Lessons are everywhere if you are looking for them. To see the original post in the form I wrote it, click this >>> Intuitively-Valid1

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Intuitively Valid

- blake tedder

see blake grappling for authenticity always, never valid

so many phases

…/mother/turtles-ninja/skateboard/guitar/academia/women/turtles-regular/yoga…

getting truer and truer

…>garcia >marley >mccartney>lennon>harrison>…

…yes… but…

hurting more and more

I think. or a new kind of hurt. deeper.

each strata of rock under more pressure. denser. older.

…

phase … ahhh… is this all?… hmmmm

quick! next thing that will make me undying for a moment?

phase… ahhh… is this all?… hmmmm

quick! next thing that will make me undying for a moment?

phase…

…

Is this all?

…

just realized I have been wishing ginsberg. that valid m(_)therf***er… wait. can’t be ginsberg. he wrote like this (in here) but not like this (here). he was he and i am i. inside same. Form = formless. alwaysdifferent alwayssame fraught with paradox. he fought with validity. as a queer. beat. genius. i see the big orange book. his collection. alright allen. inspiration…dig it. comparison…watch it.

…

un-valid. invalid. not valid. anyway you put it = fear. dead FEAR dying. fear.

…

to a friend I said, “don’t you ever feel you just have to awaken?”

until I am awake, …I… won’t give in, i said

The Pulling has gotten me this far… to the awareness

remembering yoga and the work I’ve been doing for eons

but the pulling and grasping and gnashing of teeth is no way to awaken

that’s all resistance to what has to be done

… is being done.

%$$$uRRe&()eR… S-Ur_ReND8Er…. S%RrrEnder… surrender…ahhh

…

blackcrows crrraahh craahhh craaaaahhh. wake up. anymomentnow… nowmoment. incense burning past fir tree. dog chewing loudly on the present. fingers clacking.  as the crow flies… nearernow. CRRAAhhhh. i see him in the tree. a table-to-foot-sensation. hips tight. chest a little sunken. release the jaw. breath in breath out. shoulders melting. were tense.        there.        is some loneliness. i remember my childhood now. don’t want to admit it. i love my folks.    there.   lonely kid with these thoughts and this heart. lonely 25 too. oh i have friends. it’s not social lonely. it’s lookatthestarsandweep lonely. deep. I saw fullmoon for the first time last night. vowed to do it forever. how sweet it is to live just to die. the way it’s supposed to be. totally valid. even the part that doesn’t want it to be. oh, blackcrows have moved to someone else’s trees.  don’t I have appointments to keep today?

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originally at the beginning, I thought that this disclaimer would have colored your thoughts about what I wrote:

By the nature of these pages in BHN 15-21, being about touching the place inside me that is “intuitively valid”, I want to break out of form and put out there what needs to come out, largely unedited. Because although, yes, I am conditioned to tailor it so you’ll like me (even though I don’t even know you), it’s more of a evolutionary practice for me for you to be confused at what I say and maybe even not like it at all. I have struggled with speaking my truth in my life, especially when my truth is a complete mystery to me. What a great arena for practice! Whew… here goes nothing…

boloboloram

- bt -

(P 14) “NO ACCIDENTS!” “It’s all determined.” “It’s just your vantage point that you’re sort of . . . stuck in.”  Relinquishing control over this moment is not the same thing as angrily judging the moment, then tossing it aside; far from it. “Going beyond” the judgment, beyond the paradox, beyond the ego IS the freedom. Except you don’t ‘go’ anywhere. Where would you go?

In these pages, we see messages of being moved through fire, drawn though transformation. The first time I felt that ‘pull’ of God, I was about 5 years old in North Carolina, wide open and trusting the church my family attended. For some reason, one day at church, I felt pulled to sit close, not in the mezzanine with my family. Then, when the minister asked for anybody who felt called to Baptism to come forward, I found my 5 year old body moving forward. It was one of the most powerful moments in my life. In that moment, I was a moth drawn to the light of God. A 5 year-old volunteered. Sometimes I forget that feeling, that draw. Again, I am so grateful for the teachers that come into my life and remind me (Ram Dass, bloggers on this site, friends that have been on my path, the special Angels in my world). Y’all are the light.

Here’s the thing: Maybe I’m still the goo in the cocoon (see other post below) before becoming the moth/butterfly. What can I do about that? Nada, nothing, zilch, zero. So I hang out beyond the expectations by accepting whatever I am, wherever I am, as best I can in that moment. I am not limited by the expectation that I should be a moth, or if I am a moth already, that I should be drawn into the flame just yet. For now, I just love all of this light–the big fires from each of you, and the smaller lights of fleeting circumstances.

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So many ways to put words on all of this. And so many ways to interpret it all!  Please visit www.gatehealing.com/blog and www.twitter.com/gatehealing for other perspectives, thoughts, and meditations. And as always, please read the comments on all of our posts on this site (simply click on the “3 comments” text at the bottom of each post)–there are so many beautiful teachers out there who are sharing here. You can also see our discussions with each other. Also, friend me at www.facebook.com/gatehealing
~~Jon

I am sitting on the couch with my 4-week-old baby, Canyon, asleep in my arms. As I close my eyes in this moment, I can just feel the Love of God, the Love of the Universe, pouring through me. “I am the bliss of the Universe, Everything am I”. I am here, now, and isn’t life just beautiful…

My 2 year old, Clavey, wakes up, crying for mommy. All of a sudden it feels like I had been floating on a cloud of bliss in the sky and then catapulted at an amazing speed back into “reality”.

I go in to get my son out of bed, and he is not in a state of harmony. I try to help him regroup, but he pushes me away. He is 2. He can do everything by himself. How did I forget this? Meanwhile, my 4 week old is crying to nurse. I try to nurse him, but my 2 year old throws a fit because he wants me to play with HIM. I feel lost. Where did God go? Why am I not floating in the clouds anymore? All I can think about is how to make it through the rest of the day, and then I remember page one…

SURRENDER

I realize that is why I feel no God-presence in moments like these. Instead of opening up, letting the energy come in, I go in lock-down mode. But once I throw up my arms and rip open my heart, ahhhh. The fussing continues, but ahhhh. I can handle this now.  I ask Clavey if he wants to have “mommy milk” with Canyon. Problem solved. Once again I find myself on the couch, one child in each arm, nursing both of them back into harmony…and finding my own harmony at the same time.

This is how it is with my children. One moment is up, then the next down. I know that it is not this way simply to test my patience. It is this way because they live so intensely in the moment. For them, this moment is all there is. As I see both of them so absorbed in the Now, I can’t help but go back to page one…

“Except ye be converted and become as little children, ye shall not enter the kingdom of Heaven”

It comes so naturally for them. Me, I have to really work on it. But as I sit with them, becoming as they are, seeing the Universe through their eyes, my whole being feels full of light. My heart is open, and God comes in. Residing in my heart cave, my hridayam, the next tantrum doesn’t make me want to run. Instead of the feeling of frustration running through my veins, I am able to look at Clavey and Canyon with…

UNBEARABLE COMPASSION

…and say “this is hard sometimes, isn’t it?” This whole life thing is tricky at times. But the great thing is, we are all here together, just figuring it out.  Sometimes, this whole surrendering business is easy. Other times, my ego takes over and the idea of surrender is off in some far away land. But the more I work on it, the more natural in becomes. And with these two beautiful boys, I get PLENTY of time to work on it. My children. My little guru’s.