David H/Behind the scenes

[Guest guest]

Re: David H/Behind the scenes

>David Hodges <dhodges

>Re: Introduction/ Digest Number 142

 

David Hodges wrote:

>"The process is like staying behind after the last performance of a play to

watch the stage crew strike the set. Bit after bit, wall after wall you see

what was oh-so-solid come down to be revealed to be flimsy canvas stretched

over light wooden frames, all designed by a master of trompe-l'oieul. If

you then look (still in the witness) over the stacks of canvas you might

see the designer's faint signature on the back of what once appeared to be

a solid wall."

 

Gene: Very nice, David. Very nice.

 

I hope to avoid diluting your amazingly pure and simple statement, which I

recognize as one of the finest descriptions of 'reality' that I have ever

had the pleasure to read. I can say, "Yes, David, that is also my

experience".

 

In having this discussion with others, in trying to explain how I see

things, I have said that I see the signature of the permanent upon the

impermanent; that as we let go of the compulsion to 'fix' the world-dream,

by the process of endless discriminations, that we may 'train' the

discriminator to discriminate between the permanent and the impermanent.

 

Typically, folks assume that the impermanent is to be 'disposed of', once

it has been recognized. I say that instead, we may relax about the whole

issue, because the impermanent is the creation of the permanent; those

factors are actually one, there is not 'waste' or 'garbage' to be disposed

of. To take this one step further, the common error of the 'seeker' is to

assume that there is the possibility of a move, into a realm of 'pure'.

This, the world-dream, samsara, IS the realm of the pure; this vision

depends upon willingness to let go of the assumption that 'something is

wrong', or that there is something to do or to have happen, that will 'fix'

what is wrong.

 

It also is needed to be understood that there is nothing wrong with seeing

that something is wrong. What is needed is to keep on allowing the vision

that something is wrong, without trying to fix. It is the _reaction_ to

fix, that prevents the recession of the observer all the way 'back' to the

point of view of original creation.

 

Allowing what is, to be what it is, without trying to fix it, is a very

powerful and difficult discipline, maybe the most difficult discipline we

can confront. But this discipline, imposed upon oneself, can allow the

space for the vision of what actually is. It is a matter of 'being still',

and watching, so to speak.

 

To allow oneself to move to fix, is to assume the same position as the

classical mythic 'Satan', who decided that something was wrong with God's

creation, and moved to fix it, and for his trouble was cast into hell.

 

I propose that it is our movement to fix, which creates any hell that we

experience. Of course, in hell, there is plenty to fix, so that the desire

to fix, will be endlessly fulfilled.

 

Perhaps the way to escape from hell, is to be still, and to restrain the

desire/impulse to fix. If the definition of Heaven is that there is

'nothing wrong', perhaps one who is in hell, can then go to heaven, by

restraining the impulse to fix.

 

To turn the 'discriminator' to the process of discriminating between the

impulse to fix, and the possibility of _abiding_, may be a redeeming

process, especially if that is the _only_ purpose that we allow the

discriminator to engage in.

 

This is what I mean by 'abiding', and it is what I have always meant when I

have said 'abiding'. For me, 'abiding' is the process that you refer to

here, David. It is a personal matter, an inner process, and it has to do

exclusively with our process of our relationship with ourselves. To allow

abiding in the face of apparent 'wrongness' is to allow oneself to receed

all the way back to the point of view of original creation. The issues of

conscience which are operative in the world-dream, have mainly to do with

our relationship with 'other', while the issues of conscience which are

operative in 'nonduality' have to do with our relationship with ourselves.

 

This is the arena of creation itself. To experimentally decide to abide,

and to abide our vision that something is wrong, and to abide our impulse

to fix, is to arrive at the 'zero-point', the center of creation itself,

which is Self.

 

I am greatly humbled as I live in this manner, for I must admit that I did

not do all of this, it was all done for me, and I am here, participating

and enjoying and also, yes, suffering. That I did not do all of this, that

I do not know 'who' did all of this, that it was all given to me, is to

bring myself to the point of accepting the gift of what has been given to

me. If I accept this gift, this all of what is, as is, without assuming

that I am to fix anything, I am breathing in Grace.

 

It is in Grace that I live, and by Grace that I live. This is all a gift to

me, which I accept. This is the point of balance, the zero-point, in which

I can see the greater overall harmony of creation, and it is only from this

point that I can see that 'nothing is wrong'. By accepting the gift, _the

gift IS that nothing is wrong_. That nothing is wrong, shows me how it was

my assumption that there is something wrong, that was the clue that

something was wrong.

 

The only thing that was wrong, was my movement to fix. By restraining that

movement to fix, I accept what is, as is, and thus, by accepting the gift,

have the actual experience that nothing is wrong. This is Heaven.

>"A child said _What is the grass?_ fetching it to me with full hands;

How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more than he...

....I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,

A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,

Bearing the owner's name someway in the corners, that

we may see and remark, and say _Whose?_"

 

- From "Song of Myself", Walt Whitman, _Leaves of Grass_

 

I especially appreciate this poem. It has huge significance for me, and

this realization is a major marker for me, of how far I have come on my

'path'. Terror has diminished to watching. "The man who paints the

pictures, will catch you if you fall".

>David

 

Thank you, David.

 

==Gene Poole==