awareness is the single mystery of

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The Mystery of Awareness=20

 

I remember the moment clearly. I had

escaped from my sisters, over the=20

rocks and around the point. I was barely seven. Above me, a rough escarpmen=

=3D=0D

t of boulders singing in the midday heat, at=20

my feet a rock pool of perfect,=20

inviolable stillness, and beyond, the=20

blue vastness of the South Pacific.=20

There was no other living creature. I=20

was by myself, barefooted, between the=20

cliff and the ocean.=20

 

As I squatted there, watching the=20

reflection of the wind in the unrippled

pool, hearing its exhilaration high=20

above me in the bright emptiness of the

sky, I became aware for the first time=20

of awareness itself.=20

 

I had no name for it, but I could almost

feel it, as if it had substance, like

the water in the rock pool, or breath,

like the shouting wind. I saw that I=20

was entirely by myself in a boundless=20

ocean of awareness.=20

 

In the same instant I understood that awareness is the single mystery of=20

life, that it enfolds all other mysteries,

even the secret of the separate self.=20

 

>From that moment I was indelibly=20

astonished, and I knew that all my life

I would be pinching myself and asking,

What is awareness? Nothing else would=20

ever command my attention so completely.

How could it? For nothing else mattered

next to the constant pressure, the=20

single compulsion of this mystery.=20

 

A quarter of a century went by, and one

day my teacher placed in my hands a=20

copy of Mukerjee's edition of the=20

Ashtavakra Gita. I had by then, in the ordinary course of my seeking, read =

=3D=0D

=20

a=20

great deal of scripture, enough to know

the truth of Ashtavakra's admonition,=20

halfway through his own Song:=20

My child, you can talk about holy books

all you like. But until you forget everything, you will never find yourself=

=3D=0D

..

 

Understanding the vanity of scripture,

I hardly expected Ashtavakra to solve=20

in a single epiphany the mystery of awareness.=20

 

And yet, as I read his spare and simple

verses, I felt that here at last were=20

words which in some measure consumed my astonishment. They spoke so directl=

=3D=0D

y,=20

and so modestly. They

seemed so austere, and yet so generous.

 

I found myself once more a child of=20

seven, tipped between the sea and the=20

sky, but hearing now in the wind's=20

exuberance a clearer music, touching=20

the heart of the mystery.=20

 

What is the rising or the vanishing of thought?=20

 

What is the visible world, or the=20

invisible? What is the little soul, or=20

God Himself?=20

 

Awareness. Pure awareness. The clear=20

space, the sky, the heart of awareness.

 

 

from Translator's Introduction of The=20

Ashtavakra Gita a dialogue b/w King=20

Janaka, the father of Sita and his guru Ashtavakra by Thomas Byrom=A0=20

 

http://www.swcp.com/%7Erobicks/gitaintro.htm=20

 

 

"When your understanding shall stand=20

firm and moveless in awareness of the=20

eternal Soul, then you will attain the

Rule." The Lord Krishna Spoke to=20

Arjuna from Bhagavad-Gita

 

k