Why are enlightened people so attractive?

Q: Why are enlightened people so attractive? Why are people so
attracted to them?

Linda: It’s a bit like the feeling you get when you see a baby. You’re instantly attracted to them. There’s a purity about them, an almost childlike quality – a realness. Also, you see your own potential in someone who is enlightened. There’s a recognition of who you really are, and it’s quite beautiful when you see who you really are. Why are you attracted?

Q: Well, I think it has a lot to do with the energetic presence of a
teacher. It seems to satisfy something very deep in someone who is spiritually open. I guess one thing you need to guard against is
attachment to the teacher.

Linda: You have to be aware of it, but I don’t know about guarding  against it, because the mind comes into it then. There almost needs to be an attachment to the teacher. I was very attached to my (first) teacher, but it helped me. It was painful, but it really did help me.

Linda Clair
from her book, "What do you want?", p. 77

“Who Am I?” – By Puppetji

I love puppetji, while his messages are funny they always seem to have  an element of good old fashioned truth in them. His sock-sangs are pretty good. 

Listing The Stepping Stones

Please see the previous post, Progroff recommends that the first stepping stone on your list be, “I was born.” This simple opening statement acknowledges your physical, emotional, and spiritual birth into your body, your family, your culture, your society, your world.

You may choose to list your significant life markers chronologically, or they may come to you in random order. It doesn’t matter. It is helpful, though, to put them in chronological order after you are through with your list so that you can get a sense of the underlying pattern of your life.  Without knowing anything else about this person below, we can begin to sense the drama and hardship of their life.

1. I was born
2. My father left
3. My mother died
4. My father returned
5. I left home to get married
6. I had my daughter
7. I raised my kids
8. My husband left
9. I followed my heart
10. I am being reborn

Can you begin to see the themes develop and take shape? When the stepping stones are broken down in this way, new dimensions begin to take form.

The Steppingstones: A Technique To Bring Together Past, Present and Future

The stepping stones technique is one of the most valuable contributions made to journaling therapy by Dr. Ira Progroff. “When we speak of the stepping stones of our life, we are referring to events that come to our minds when we spontaneously reflect on the course our life has taken from it’s beginning to the present.” Progroff writes; “they are significant points of movement along the road of an individuals life.”

He created techniques for uncovering an inner destiny and describes the journal method as a continuing confrontation with one self in the midst of life, and a psychological laboratory in which personal growth is recorded and studied to bring the outer events and inner parts of one’s experience into harmony.

Let’s imagine that you’re hiking in the mountains. Your trail ends at a shallow stream and then picks up on the other side, You and your friends decide that crossing the stream is no problem; you’ll just step on the stones, one at a time, until you’re across. If you think of the stream as a whole ongoing movement of your life, how did you get from where you were to where you are? Which stones did you select? And so the stepping stones of your life are the markers of your life, places where you paused, times when you said to yourself, “My life is never going to be the same again.”

Now we go back to the metaphor of the stream. As far as the stones are concerned, you could be a small child playing. You could have slipped and cracked your head. The white water could be up, and you could be pulled by the current. Or your could be trout fishing , for all the stones care. The stones are completely neutral; they are unmoved by any emotion significance you attach to the event.

Limit your selection of stepping stones to about 12 or 15. The point being to select those life events which seem to have significance within the context of how you are living your life today. Out of all the experiences you have had from birth until now, let only a dozen or so come into the foreground. These are the stepping stones of your life.

Who Is God?

The worshipper in a temple or mosque or church holds within his mind a picture of what he believes God to be. That picture is purely a metal image and he is worshipping that image, not Reality. This image has come down to him by tradition through hundreds of years, perhaps, and backed by the force of the great organised religions though it may be, still it is only an idea passing though his mind, a picture which he has held because other people have suggested it to him.

Because he is worshipping an idea, something which by its very nature is not eternal, but comes and must eventually go , as all ideas must, he has not found Reality, and from the standpoint of deep enquiry  he is even worshipping an illusion, if by the word “illusion” we mean that “which is not real”, and if by “reality” we mean “that which is true and eternal and abiding.”

It may seem like an appalling statement to say that millions of people have been worshipping their own idea, which they take to be God. Surely, you will point out that, in religious buildings we often feel a holy presence. How is that we are awed in such a place, and that these religions have, during their best days cast a spell over the people?

It is because the power which man has found in religion, the power to help him and lift him up, has come from within himself. He himself has given himself the guidance, help, exaltation, and spiritual consolation which he believed he found in his church or in his faith or in his idea of God. When man has learnt to build a quiet church inside his own heart and to be a ministering priest to his own self, religion will have done its true work.

Man has unconsciously deceived himself into thinking that an external power, something outside of himself  has come to his help or guidance. This was his only belief, man himself through his own inner resources and concentration drew out from within himself, from his own spirit, that which he thought came from God whom he believed to be outside of himself.

So if man wishes to awaken, if he wants to understand himself, he must face the the fact that the real avenue to contact with God is not outside himself, but within, directly inside. He must find his own way to God through and within himself. That is, if he seeks God, there is no other way, but if he is looking for ideas, concepts or mental images, then he can take what orthodox religions and cults offer him. And because most people have been content to let others do their thinking and their questioning for them, they have been satisfied with these answers.

Once Upon A Time

According to an old Hindu legend. There was once a time when all human beings were gods, but they so abused their divinity that Brahma, decided to take it away from them and hide it where it could never be found.

Where to hide their divinity was the question. So Brahma called a council of gods to help him decide. “Let us bury it deep within the earth,” said the council. But Brahma answered, “No, that will not work because humans will ding into the earth and discover it.” Then the council said, “Let us sink it into the deepest ocean. “ But Brahma said, “No, not there, for they will learn to dive into the ocean and  find it. “ Then the council said, “Let’s take it to the top of the highest mountain and hide it.” But once again Brahma said, “No, that will not work, as they will eventually climb up every mountain and once again take up their divinity. “ Then the council gave up and said, “We do not know where to hide it, as it seems there is no place on earth or in the sea that humans will not eventually reach. “

Brahma thought for a long time and then said, “Here is what we will do. We will hide their divinity deep in the centre of their own being, for humans will never think to look for it within. “

The council agreed that this was a perfect hiding place, and the deed was done. Since this time humans have been going up and down the earth, digging, diving, climbing and exploring and searching for something that is already within them.

Author Uknown

Noticing The Gaps

In the first moment of seeing something or hearing a sound and more so if it is unfamiliar, before the mind names or interprets what you see or hear there is usually a gap of attention in which the perception occurs. That is the inner-space. It’s duration differs from one person to another. It is easy to miss because in many people those spaces are extremely short, perhaps only a second or less.

This is what happens: a new sight or sound arises, and in the first moment of perception, there is a brief cessation in the habitual stream of thinking. Consciousness is diverted away from thought because it is required for sense perception. A very unusual sight or sound may leave you “speechless” – even inside, that is to say, bring about a longer gap.

The frequency and duration of those spaces determine your ability to enjoy life, to feel an inner connectedness with other human beings as well as nature. It also determines the degree to which you are free of ego because ego implies complete unawareness of the dimension of space.

When you become conscious of these brief spaces as they happen naturally, they will lengthen, and as they do, you will experience with increasing frequency the joy of perceiving with little or no interference of thinking.

Inner space also arises whenever you let go of the need to emphasize your form-identity. That need is of the ego. It is not a true need.

Here are some ways in which people unconsciously try to emphasize their form-identity. If you are alert enough, you may be able to detect some of these unconscious patterns within yourself: demanding recognition for something you did and getting angry or upset if you don’t get it; trying to get attention by talking about your problems, the story of your illness, or making a scene, giving your opinion when nobody has asked for it and it makes no difference to the situation; being more concerned with how the other person sees you than with the other person, which is to say using other people for egoic reflection or as ego enhancers, taking things personally, feeling offended; making yourself right and others wrong through futile mental complaining; wanting to be seen, or appear important.

Once you have detected such a pattern within yourself, I suggest that you conduct an experiment, Find out what it feels like and what happens if you let go of that pattern. Just drop it and see what happens.

De-emphasizing who you are on the level of form is another way of generating consciousness. Discover the enormous power that flows through you into the world when you stop emphasizing your form identity.

Eckhart Tolle, “A NEW EARTH”

Hang On Tightly, Let Go Lightly

In ancient Japan, there once lived a solitary monk in a monastery high atop a mountain. One day a woman in the town below become pregnant by a local fisherman. Wanting to protect her friend, she accused the monk of the deed. Following the baby’s birth, the villages to him to the monk and said, “Here! It was you who did this. You must now become responsible for the child.”. After a short pause, the monk simply bowed his head and said, “Ah, so.”

Although he had been used to living alone, the monk soon developed a fondness for his new companion and become a good parent to him. One day the boy’s mother become gravely ill. As she lay dying, she confessed to the wrong she had done. Once more, the townspeople took the long walk up the mountain and spoke to the monk. “A mistake has been made. You are not the real father of the child. Although you have dutifully cared for him all these years, now  you must give him up.” After a moment of reflection the monk bowed and replied, “Ah, so.”

Our lives are constantly changing. People and things come and go. All situations that we create are only temporary. By viewing life from this larger perspective, our monastic friend was able to face both loss and gain with peace and tranquillity. It is not always easy to be detached, especially when we must release a situation or a person we hate. But the new always rises to replace the old. And sooner or later you toll will arrive at the point where you, too, can smile and serenely say, “Ah, so.”