Mindfulness Isn’t A Tool
Meditation isn’t a tool, as we often say it is in the West. It isn’t a tool but rather it is that state in which we no longer see the relevance of using tools, or the need to do so. The meditative state is that…
The Trap You Can’t Ever Tell Anyone About
‘Eternity is the prize’, we might grandly say, speaking of the fruit of our inner work, our spiritual practices. This is misleading, however – if there is a prize then this means that there is ‘an attaining’ and if there is an attaining then there…
The Devices By Which We Are Ruled
Our basic sense of security in the world comes from the formula ‘If I do X then Y will happen’ and this – of course – equals control. If we control successfully then this gives rise to euphoria (which is the good feeling that I…
False Identity
The False Identity’s idea of heaven is a world that exactly matches its expectations of what it wants (or what it likes). This is pretty much inarguable, certainly its idea of heaven doesn’t involve anything else apart from what it wants or likes! What we…
Not Clever To Be Clever
We wear out the shoe of samsara by walking on it, says Chogyam Trungpa. This is a very radical statement and completely contrary to mainstream Western spirituality, it is contrary to how most of us would see ‘spirituality’ because ‘wearing out the shoe of samsara…
Subtler Than Thought
When we’re ‘thinking all the time’ this has the effect of making us fundamentally insincere – it makes us insincere with other people and it also makes us insincere with regards to life itself. It might seem a bit much to say this but when…
Detachment And Intimacy
Oddly, ‘detachment’ and ‘intimacy’ turn out to be the very same thing. We wouldn’t normally think that this could be the case but it is. Detachment (in the Buddhist sense of the word) may be thought of as distance (or separation) from the ego-construct. It…
Spinning The Wearisome Wheel
The continued existence of the self-concept is facilitated by the turning of the wheel of illusion. If that wheel didn’t turn, and didn’t keep on turning, then there could be no self. The identity needs illusion just like a fire needs fuel. The turning of…
Too Much Self
What we succeed at can’t add anything to who we are, and what we fail at can’t take anything away. This said, why is it that we feel so great when we succeed and so very terrible when we fail? Why is it – indeed…
Two Views of Mental Health
There exist two diametrically opposed (and therefore incompatible) views with regard to what mental health is or is not and which view we hold depends upon whether we are in Being Mode or Doing Mode. Doing Mode – When we are in this modality our…