The Return to Wonder - Chapter 296


CCXCVI


The devolving world humankind has fashioned,
Is so beyond anything anyone has any ability to control,
That it is not really even worth bothering about.
All anyone can do is try to be prepared
For anything and everything
When the gale hits.

* * * *
You had your cake and ate it, too, of course, duh.

* * * *
Inattention is a sure road to suffering.

* * * *
Pressed for time, how is that?

* * * *
Oh, sweet pain.

* * * *
It is all made up, there is no other, it is truly all you.

* * * *
Twisted monkeys.

* * * *
One and only, such a limiting concept.

* * * *
Are you trying to prove the point?

* * * *
For there to be such a thing as meaning, some must live a meaningless existence.

* * * *
Remember who you really are, and know that it is true.

* * * *
Do you seek comfort, or do you seek truth?
They may or may not be mutually exclusive.

* * * *
Are you plugged into the universe?
Or is the universe plugged into you?
Perhaps both, perhaps neither.

* * * *
Everything is in the mind.
Let go of it, and you are free.
More simple than you think, really.

* * * *
Lazier by the moment.

* * * *
Love your Self.
Invoke happiness in the greatest sense.
Agape, pure, simple, free.

* * * *
Slipping into Never-Never Land.
Foolish? Delusional? Crazy? Mad?
Or just paying close attention?

* * * *
Organized religion is just another outlet for vanity to play out its silly little games.

* * * *
So many minds mesmerized
By so many fabrications claimed true,
That the transparency of truth is perceived the lie.

* * * *
If this cosmos were not distracting you with its kaleidoscoping dreamscape,
Would you be bound by time and space, or any other dimensions?
Would you perhaps forever linger in one singular moment?
Or would you play witness to the entire universe and beyond?

* * * *
Steep in the wonder of it, in the mystery of it, and weep for joy
That you have touched upon the truth abiding within all and none.

* * * *
Prayer to this deity or that is nothing more than internal chatter.
Still the thoughts, and the eternal will make apparent the way.

* * * *
Quantum intelligence, the indivisibly singular foundation of all things great and small.

* * * *
Speak what can be heard,
Reflect what can be observed,
Radiate what can be smelled,
Nourish what can be tasted,
Tend what can be touched.

* * * *
To discern the truth within is to be eternally lost, never to be found.

* * * *
Experiences stream by,
Thoughts whizz to and fro,
And all the while, the witness,
The one and only observer,
Motionless in their midst.

* * * *
What a challenge it is to daily abide the absurdity, the inanity of this manifest dream.
One must sustain the aloofness of pure awareness to discern the serenity at its source.

* * * *
It is from the vast depths of the infinity prior to mind,
From which awareness bubbles into consciousness.

* * * *
No matter how exceedingly wonderful,
Or tediously mundane any given experience,
All are equally warehoused in the dusty,
Vague neuron trail of perception.

* * * *
Every aspect of human consciousness chock-full of pride in its own unique way.

* * * *
The corporeal body is a means to witness the mortal dimension.
An abundant feast for the minds of a chosen few,
Whose destiny it is to awaken.
Esoteric, indeed.

* * * *
No life form can withstand the onslaught of industrialized warfare upon its numbers.

* * * *
There is nothing to gain, there is nothing to lose.

* * * *
So much ponder a mere body does invoke to daily reconcile.

* * * *
Truly as still as any ocean, any mountain depths.

* * * *
Even gazillions of minds
Agreeing on one thing or another,
Can never make an untruth real, right, or true.
Delusion is a many-flavored concoction,
Beguiling to any lacking insight.

* * * *
Vanity can generally only be pried from cold, dead hands.

* * * *
Not likely many creatures suffer death lightly.

* * * *
Down the road a piece, not sure how far,
There’s a grave with your name on it.
If they can find the body, that is.

* * * *
Many things matter for awhile; many more do not for longer.

* * * *
If nothing is calling you, who is listening?

* * * *
Cry, baby, cry.
And, oh, by the way,
Welcome to hell on earth.
Best wishes.

* * * *
The Rubicon is crossed; there is no turning back.

* * * *
Nothing to do, really, but watch the show drift on by for whatever time remains.

* * * *
Another corner-office suit dreaming of world conquest
While he shuffles spreadsheets for another paycheck.

* * * *
To the perennial question: Who is the I that asserts I am? there is but one answer,
And one must cross all boundaries to clearly discern its source has ever been within.

* * * *
A vast ocean so infinitely full, so infinitely empty,
As to be the ageless upwelling of all consciousness,
Cloaked in every appearance the mystery can concoct.

* * * *
Be ye a harbor for truth and clarity, or for every imaginable deceit and delusion?

* * * *
From boxes, more box thinking.

* * * *
'Tis vanity that swings any sword or pulls any trigger.

* * * *
The infinity of the mystery
Cannot be limited by any form,
Distressed by any reverie,
Bound by any notion.

* * * *
The truth of mortal fare,
The truth of all beginnings,
Is that all must inevitably cross
One finish line or another.

* * * *
The vanity over form,
The vanity over formlessness,
No difference, really, no matter the concept.

* * * *
Push-pull, pull-push: The eternal wrestling match inspired by duality's dreamtime game.

* * * *
Fat, fat, fat ... Everywhere, fat minds, fat bodies.
Affluent times inevitably breed hells of their own.

* * * *
Any given awakening has the capacity to fall back into deep sleep.

* * * *
What a garden of thorns all times that have come before
Have bequeathed upon the unfolding future.
What have we wrought
For those innocent of all claims?

* * * *
To those who would be one with the mystery within,
Do not falter, do not hesitate, do not doubt.
Enough of false humility, just do it.

* * * *
The essence of awareness is not easily tamed.
At home with the dark as it is with the light,
What can earth-wind-water-fire-ether,
Ever do to control or delude it?

* * * *
A dream world of manifest proportion.
So much suffering to be endured
Before what end may come.

* * * *
See it all, and want none of it.

* * * *
Your fear of the other,
Entirely imagined,
Completely unwarranted,
Naught but your own fabrication.

* * * *
Return to the singularity within.

* * * *
Cast your Self adrift, and float in oblivion.

* * * *
Behind those eyes, a universe playing itself out.

* * * *
It is as plain as day for those whose destiny it is to go all the way.

* * * *
Who can more than speculate
How unhinged the inevitable die-off will be?
How tumultuous the descent into the endgame paradigm,
Whether lesser or greater, only the future knows.

* * * *
Can't we all just get along?

* * * *
Words can only tell.

* * * *
What many claim to be, and what they are, are often fields apart.
Hypocrisy is the undertow for many an idealist and so-called saint.

* * * *
The madness of pretending you exist, what an absurd thing to do to your Self.

* * * *
How can anyone be saved from their own vanity?

* * * *
The greater the wisdom, likely greater the fool who endured the climb.

* * * *
How fascinating that anyone
Would choose some twisted, delusional fantasy
Over the reality of the way it is.

* * * *
Yet another face in the streaming mirage.

* * * *
A world of judgment can be very harsh on any soul if they deign to allow it.

* * * *
Freedom is a quality of mindfulness empty of all constraints.
Put it all beyond you, and wander alone, unburdened by time.

* * * *
Oh well, so well.

* * * *
Very religious, or very dogmatic?

* * * *
All very silly, really.

* * * *
Revenge may have
A long memory,
But it is a great weight
For those who long sustain it.

* * * *
Rest content, free of any and all claims.

* * * *
So, what is it you really need to know, again?

* * * *
You may well be happy beneficiary, or hapless victim,
Of all that history has brought forth in the human paradigm.
Enjoy the entitlements, endure the consequences.
They are ultimately very much the same.

* * * *
We devastated the earth for this?
And you are positive about what?

* * * *
It is not rocket science to be reasonably compassionate to all things great and small.

* * * *
We are all merely fabrications of each other’s imagination.

* * * *
Easy come, hard go.

* * * *
Something happens, nothing happens, every moment, and only you remain.

* * * *
There is, indeed, god; there is, indeed, no god.

* * * *
The streaming of a dreaming.

* * * *
To see it all as nothing is a momentary challenge to which relatively few feel called.

* * * *
Reclaim the birthright that is all you really are.

* * * *
Live now, die now, it is ever the same.

* * * *
You are awareness caught up in a sensory dream.

* * * *
To what would any delusional mind have to compare it?

* * * *
You would not bother with all these words if you were truly done with it.

* * * *
Discerning your universe, one seamless breath, one seamless moment at a time.

* * * *
It is only suffocating if you do not remember to breathe.

* * * *
Just doing whatever comes to mind.

* * * *
Nature is nothing but what it is.

* * * *
Choose your absurdity.

* * * *
In a league of your own.

* * * *
Many are called, and fools are rarely chosen.

* * * *
You will not discern your immortality in the world

* * * *
Just another entry in this stream of consciousness.

* * * *
You are not responsible for what anyone thinks or does.

* * * *
If you know you wouldn't do it again, then regret has done all it can do.

* * * *
What is so hard about being totally free inwardly?

* * * *
Ultimately, there is no answer but you.

* * * *
It is not your dream, or my dream, it is the dream.

* * * *
See which way the wind stills.

* * * *
Quantum menagerie.

* * * *
Be true to your Self.

* * * *
How free is free?

* * * *
You are all potentials.

* * * *
Good aphorisms, like good wine,
Best linger a bit on the tip of the mind
To fully extract and distill their finest points.


* * * * * * * * * *

The Return to Wonder
Field Notes from the Unknown
© Michael J. Holshouser 2009
World Rights Reserved

The Return to Wonder - Chapter 295


CCXCV


Some say it is all nothing, and others, all everything.
Not much middle ground for vacillators,
But there are those
Who claim both to be true, too.
Challenging, indeed, to grasp the ungraspable.

* * * *
Entitlement will cater to fools as long as there are fools.

* * * *
Chameleon: a changeable or inconstant person.

* * * *
Truth is the gold mined by relatively few.

* * * *
You are nature, you are the garden, full of thistles and thorns, as it is.

* * * *
Yay! Another way to suffer!

* * * *
Dead with a pulse.

* * * *
You are as young, and far more ancient, than the most distant stars.

* * * *
From death, eternal life springs.

* * * *
Where would you be if you did not exist?

* * * *
It does not matter who else wakes up it you do not.

* * * *
That we are all one, together, alone, is a fact, not an esoteric notion.

* * * *
The infinity of the eternal stillness is everywhere and nowhere within.

* * * *
The challenge is not to forget, and continue drinking the punch.

* * * *
Another useless medal in the grand dust storm.

* * * *
Heed the call, or continue on as you are, it really makes no difference at all.

* * * *
The greatest story never told.

* * * *
Nothing to do, nothing to be, except perhaps to fathom what it is to truly be free.

* * * *
Madness beyond the pale.

* * * *
What is the body but a biological cesspool of bones and goo.
Mind? Heart? Soul?
Pffffft!

* * * *
Right here, right now.
There is no place like home,
No home but the awareness within.
The stillness before time is the lotus throne.

* * * *
Into the dustbin of history, all things forever dissolve.

* * * *
Those who earnestly seek truth with every fiber of their being
Will ascertain true Self, the essential nature of all that is and is not,
And forever become the choiceless, nameless, indivisible one.

* * * *
Nothing else to do but give lip service to saving a world that cannot be saved.

* * * *
What does it say when your best friend is a dog?

* * * *
Live your lie, or fess up and take the red pill.

* * * *
Power has many means, but one intent.

* * * *
Whether saddled with a humble ego, or the Full Monty version, all die the same.

* * * *
No place to be but now.

* * * *
It is all you: Take it, own it.

* * * *
The You that you truly are, is, has always been, will ever be.
Be free of all obligation; there is nothing your have to do.
Freedom is in every moment its own gift of absolution.

* * * *
Too much of anything,
Even the most discerning things,
Is sure to bring about one bother or another.

* * * *
Awakening does not come to pass all at once.
It takes many adventures of every variety
In the unfolding process of Self-discernment.
Patience, humility, moderation, discipline, humor,
And other sustaining qualities are well worth cultivating.

* * * *
Oftentimes it takes awhile for some things to process,
To distill into something clear and genuine.
Integration is a puzzle, a riddle,
Few truly long to solve.

* * * *
People like giving money to great causes.
It assuages guilt and appeases vanity.
And few pass on the tax deduction.

* * * *
Say it how you will, the point is the same.

* * * *
Of what use have you for a world that does not seek the real you out?

* * * *
For every up there is a down, unless you die at the peak.

* * * *
Wisdom: A fool’s errand.

* * * *
The usual cravings.
Oh, yawn.

* * * *
Ignore the mind; be the tranquility of totality.

* * * *
Always something of a drag when others expect something to which you did not agree.

* * * *
Told in words, as only words can tell.

* * * *
Epiphanies are the gold standard of the mind.

* * * *
Most live for the ever-changing dreamtime the manifest world offers.
Few look within to investigate the changeless reality
From whence all dreams are born.

* * * *
There is no point to it; that is the point.

* * * *
Hell hath no bounds but the ones each in vain imagination creates.

* * * *
Gravity does not bind the Soul.

* * * *
Nothing, going on and on.

* * * *
Self taught.

* * * *
Be free.

* * * *
Serenity is the bliss.

* * * *
Simple enough for ye, Pilgrim?

* * * *
Both products of the same mind in time, are dread and hope really all that different?

* * * *
Organized religion is for those who lack level and compass.

* * * *
Not again, please.
Haven’t we had enough of all the absurdity.
Time to wake up, and work on getting back to the garden, tarnished as it is.

* * * *
Any translation is only as accurate as the mind of the translator.

* * * *
To be nothing is somewhat contrary to the biological imperative.
It requires great detachment to realize that you are not the body.

* * * *
When you are completely alone,
There is no need to continue all the pretending.
Let go all the desires, all the fears,
Forget everything.

* * * *
Silly as it is.

* * * *
The vapor of mind,
The fog of perception,
The cloud of consciousness,
The ocean of awareness.

* * * *
Happiness, if it is essential to you, is right now, not some future when.

* * * *
Assume everything, assume nothing.

* * * *
Trust intuition, trust consciousness, to play out the body as it does all forms.

* * * *
Another trail of bread crumbs
Left scattered along the pathless path
For the many dreamers whose time it is to awaken.

* * * *
How many ways temptation
So easily pulls you this direction or that.
The innumerable pleasure buttons of the mind and body
Are challenging to hold in moderate reign.

* * * *
Self, that reality which is prior to all things manifest,
More ancient than the stars, ever new, until future’s end.
All the same ever-present now in ways relatively few
Will ever be commandeered to fully comprehend.

* * * *
No place to go, nowhere to be, nothing to do, but be as free as you were meant to be.

* * * *
Self-worth is an intrinsic given.
The exterior is but an ever-changing façade
To the reality of the source within.

* * * *
What a meaningless, time-bound weight, this fabricated sense of self-importance.

* * * *
Free will transformed into destiny in every given moment’s passing.

* * * *
Sensory delusion from the get-go.

* * * *
You will learn everything you need to know to live this life, to complete this fate.

* * * *
Such a reverie it is, has ever been, will ever be.

* * * *
Desire, what is that, anyway?

* * * *
So alone as to completely dissolve.
Existence, what was that about, anyway?

* * * *
When you heed your calling, life will still be filled
With the predictable agonies and ecstasies,
But perhaps the regrets will be fewer
Than for those who played it safe.
Give into it just to see what happens.

* * * *
A gift freely shared in random fashion
Can perhaps be less easily undone
By those who would deign use it
For foul or meager purpose.

* * * *
What courage it takes to be detached enough to be your true Self.

* * * *
So over it.

* * * *
Immortal, until you awaken to another day in the life, such as it is.

* * * *
Chaos rules.
Order is for the prissy sissies,
Unless, of course, you wake up and realize
Chaos is the order.

* * * *
Surrender to the serenity of beingness.

* * * *
This dream into which the nothingness
Is fashioned again and again, forever again.
A ceaseless stream in a matrix beyond compare.

* * * *
It is your own delusion that you must allow to dissolve
Into the truth you truly are, have ever been, will ever be.

* * * *
There are some things about which mum lips are the best policy.

* * * *
You are not the body, you are not the mind.
You are not anything or anyone under any sun.

* * * *
The indivisible swimmingness prior to all,
Is that from which the seed of consciousness
Flowers into the beingness of imagination.

* * * *
You must be that which is eternal,
Otherwise, how could you be present
In the given, unfolding day-to-day?

* * * *
Ultimately not all that different from any other biological whim.

* * * *
A mystery afoot, indeed.

* * * *
A spent shell.

* * * *
Mother Nature,
She is a pitiless beast.
She is all things Eden, even you.

* * * *
The challenging thing about change is remembering it was once different.

* * * *
How easily good intentions can be perverted by those with different purpose.

* * * *
Time and space will always manage to pass
Without any aid from you, whatsoever, guaranteed.

* * * *
Suicide is just taking taxes out of the ‘sure as” equation.

* * * *
Give it up, compadre, nothingness reigns supreme.

* * * *
Even an enlightened scorpion is still a scorpion.

* * * *
Vanity is not worth saving, even if you could.

* * * *
Besides rotting away their source,
Judgments have a way of blowing back
In a variety of unforeseen ways.

* * * *
Take the personal out of the equation, and what have you got, really?

* * * *
Questions of ten gazillion dreams.

* * * *
The streaming of a dreaming, likely as real in one mind as it is in any other’s.

* * * *
Independent and unaligned.

* * * *
Lost in space, found in time.

* * * *
The inner eye is the awareness
That witnesses the dream of consciousness
Playing itself out in the frontal lobe.

* * * *
Nothing makes some content.

* * * *
Only in awareness are you immortal.

* * * *
Another mind off out in the deep end of wacko.

* * * *
Be as simple or complex as you please, it is the same.

* * * *
The drama of ants will out.

* * * *
Every ear, every mind, its own translation.

* * * *
Nothing matters, everything matters.

* * * *
Alone again, naturally.

* * * *
Anything and everything is samadhi, yoga, union.

* * * *
It is all you, and you it, so what need to think about it?

* * * *
What matter the vanities of this world, or any other?

* * * *
Find the deepest desire, the deepest fear, and erase them.

* * * *
Prior to all cause and effect, you are.

* * * *
Dissolve within.

* * * *
What truths, what lies, imagination endlessly weaves.
The incessant chatter of consciousness is unyielding.


* * * * * * * * * *

The Return to Wonder
Field Notes from the Unknown
© Michael J. Holshouser 2009
World Rights Reserved