IN New York

In New York. Sipping Chai Tea Latte in Barnes and Nobles. yesterday, a whirlwind discussion with Linda. On packaging experience. a balance between spontaniety and order. new york.sipping tea. smell of the books. in the middle of a packaged experience of all the writers. New york. really makes me want to write a book. its flowing with an artsy energy which is waiting to gurgle into everyone and flush out a book..a film..art..any art..or an invention..anything that the aching heart can deliver without a C section.

smell the coffee

So begins another day. A few didn’t make it till morning. Of course, waking up is a curious phenomena. I seem to feel that we are always awake – but what we call waking up is really filling that awake space with our specific hard drive – with its pre set programs, memories, and virus. Instantly we have personalized this Universe when we wake up.
I wake up. I see the bright light, greens, a thought enters leading to a million others. Reality around me is quickly replaced. My eyes see but my mind does not. So it’s a strange seeing. Even what my eyes see is not fresh. Im not even sure if Im seeing the tree in front of me. Or is this an image that has been loaded into my brain – the image of a tree and I don’t see the tree in front of me. Is this the magic that the Impressionist painters discovered. Found a way in which they could fight back the inner images and capture a true seeing?
So what is reality – if everything is a personal interpretation? And who is experiencing the reality? Or is the experiencer the only reality? How do we go back to the experiencer? Where is the experiencer? Where did he come from ? When did he ( or I?) start experiencing? And what is experiencing for me? A sensation ? A feeling? An image? And why is there such an ache to find all this?

Is this the crushing pain that comes from realising that the reality on the basis of which we built a whole life is unreal? It’s a movie set l? Is it about freedom. Freedom from unreal? Freedom to know oneself and thereby live in dignity.

Interface with the illusion

There are moments when there is a clear sense of the separation from the "reality". Visual impressions seem to appear like projections in the inside of the head. Increaingly it appears that sensation is the key. Sensation without imagery. Imagery, it appears is the biggest villian and the biggest barrier to the understanding and "seeing". Consistent sensation seem to help to keep the images away - but it is so fascinating to see that without imagery the brain seem to have difficulty experiencing. Even in a massage, I see that the sensation of one's feet being massaged cannot be separated the image of the feet being massaged. Just experiencing the pure sensation of the massage seem so difficult. But once that barrier is crossed, sensation then opens up a new relationship to the reality around. The relationship with the body then becomes the sensation. I sometimes sense that this relationship with the body is really a small spot in the brain and the rest is made up of imagery.
Nisargadatta talks about a practice that we just have to belive that we are not the body. Gurdjieff says that we must use the imagination to intially practice that the reality is that I am. Stephen Jourdain says "The Central rivet of the hallucination is nothing other than the absolute belief in myself in the act of producing a thought of dreaming this or that. ….if people corrected the way they situate themselves they would eliminate 98% of their problems. Then they would be in the zenith of their dream and close to bursting it".
Then Dzogchen texts mentions - "But then, one might ask, how does samsara arise? How does one enter the dualistic vision that is the cause of transmigrations? If, at the moment the energy of the base manifests, one does not consider it something other oneself and one recognizes one's own state as the indivisibility of essence, nature and potentiallity of energy, the movement of energy self-liberates...understanding the essence that is the very nature of primordial enlightenment".

So it appears that the practice is to constantly plug into being in this space of sensation in the heart where one is constantly reiterating to oneself the "unreality" of things around us - visual, thoughts, emotions.

Sexual Desire

Sexual desire. This looks like a very fast centre. The sight of a woman, a pretty woman moves the “read-write” head of the brain to the sexual centre in the head and immediately releases a chemical that gives a sensation that is “agreeable”. I see sometimes that the stimuli is iconic. The shape of the woman, hair, even the voice automatically leads to this movement in the brain. Images from the brain stored from past memories, movies, and pictures are instantly fitted and the movement to the “happy centre of the brain” is made. This is so damn quick. It seems the hardwire is so strong.
Sometimes this is without stimuli. You wake up in the morning feeling this ache, this sensation. This appears to me as the ache of the soul wanting to know itself. When it is temporarily freed from the bedlam of noises or from the hammering of the self calming mechanisms we employ like smoking, drinking, movies, plays and so on that down its voice. So I wake up. And the ache is felt. The brain I have experienced immediately goes to the imagination centre and picks up a story, a face, a person to whom the attention is directed to and then a fantasy happens. Sometimes it leads to spent itself in sex or masturbation. Again this is so hard wired. I watch the brain quickly do this. It seems like a quick fix to get the ache to stop. I think each time there is an ache – do watch a movie, to have sex, to fall in love, it is the call. For me to respond to it as a responsible human being, I need to teach the brain to take the “read- write” head to the source of the ache. To put my ear close to that source and hear it. I cant be downing that noise with something louder. I need to be there. Stay with the ache. Not with commentary. Not with judgment. Just listen to it with my heart. Feel it. And try to understand its language. With complete attention.

Journey back to oneself - an actor remembers !

And so one embarks into this long journey. To find oneself. It’s a pretty hopeless start in the beginning. Especially when one begins at a point when one realizes that things one knew about oneself were not entirely true. Most of this was things people told us or what we believed without entirely verifying facts for ourselves. It sounds pretty strange. But I have a name. I have my parents. I have my memories. So what is this facts that I keep looking for? The startling realization that hits one that gets the journey started is the sense that one existed before one was born. Its bizarre. But it seems to be true. Its almost as though one discovers that one’s parents are not real ones. We have been adopted and we didn’t know it. And then one day someone tells us. And then the search begins for one’s origin. It’s a sense of completeness that one seeks for. Not that it negates the current “adopted parents” – they are as real. Yet one wants to know and meet one’s true parents. Same with identity. My identity as far as I remember comprises of my name, my parentage, then my memories, thoughts. Everything that I call and has a face, a visual reality. So when I realize that I existed even before all this, it means that my current face, this name, this parentage is only an external layer that covers something more real.
But it seems so difficult to comprehend this. So I try to understand this first with analogies. So the play analogy – Im an actor and I get so involved in my role that I forget who I was before I got on to the stage. Im in the stage. Now. I have another name, a character – into whose role I as an actor is performing with great élan on the stage. I have a family, a job, a wife, kids and I have ambitions, emotions, dreams and even memories. I have forgotten. Forgotten who I was before I got on to the stage. Mid-way through my performance I can remember something. Fleeting. That something’s not quite right here. Some faint memories. There is something uncomfortable. The scenario in the play does not give the sense of what I am or where I truly belong. I can sense that Im acting. There is something artificial here. But I don’t know what.
So Im in the middle of the play. And Im here on the stage. No clue as to where I can begin. I cant see the audience or the separation from me to the audience. If I could, then I would remember and take that leap from the stage to the audience. But right now im stuck in this situation where Im in the play and I not sure that Im this character in the play. But I don’t know where the audience is sitting. I don’t even know where to begin but I know if I find where the audience is then Ill remember by association. Ill remember how I reached here. Now that I remember that Im not quite the actor, my acting has been affected. When I remember Im someone else, Im “acting”. Othertimes, when I don’t remember Im a natural.
Now the play analogy is fine. But how do I know if this is for real. That Im not in play and that this is for real. My own sense is that it just happens. Like an old song that you suddenly remember. From nowhere.
So from where does the journey to remember begin? It appears to me that the first thing to do is to separate myself from the actor. Say physically first – do I walk, talk, behave like the actor? Suppose I suddenly stop doing this and act differently ? Say I smile when I have to cry or remain serious when there is something funny? Or the opposite of what the “actor” in me naturally does out of the conditioning of the role. Let me try that. When I try that, I am sure there is something that will happen. Don’t know what. Because when I stop acting as the actor, I will probably be able to experience what is it not being an actor. But I have to be cunning. And first find out what my “natural” reaction is to the situation and then act the opposite. I have to be fast or the actor will deceive me. My warning signal will be pain or discomfort. If Im acting in opposition to the “actors” reactions, then I will feel the discomfort, embarrassment, self consciousness even fear sometimes. So that becomes the first leg of the journey. That is the external layer of the journey. The biggest pitfall that would come in the way of smooth execution of this leg of the journey will be the constant internal commentary saying why this is such a stupid thing to do.
So what is the success criteria of this strategy of “stopping being the actor”? I think the success criteria would be the ability to remember to do this often enough and then experience fully in those moments what is it not to be the “actor”. It is possible that the audience may throw tomatoes – but that will only help more and maybe even point me to the direction from where they are throwing.
What are the other directions to the journey? Like the physical habits of the actor, the actor will have thinking habits and emotional habits. I think unlike the plan above where one acts different or opposite from the habitual physical reaction, it maybe difficult to do so with thoughts or emotions – say thinking opposite of what thought comes or feeling opposite of what comes. These come too fast and in the case of emotions I cant seem to “create” an opposite emotion inside. Cant create anger or happiness or sadness. So, in this leg of the journey, I will observe and register. Register what is the automatic thought reaction to a stimuli from the senses. Or in a situation. Similarly watch what emotions run inside the “actor”. As I observe, I hope to have a list of the actor’s emotions and thoughts. Im hoping that when I have the full data about the actor – his physical reactions, his thoughts and his emotions, I will truly remember who I was before I became the actor. Then maybe Ill go back to acting again – but then this time will always remember myself.

Active attention

Active attention. A constant awareness of what is happening inside and outside. Then desire comes. There is just a watching of the desire. with curiosity even. And watch. The desire comes and goes. Our awareness is like watching trains come and go in a railway station. Im not going into any of the trains. I just watch them as they come in and then watch as they go. This "watching" is more a sensation, a tugging. What is this sensation I wonder. And where is it happening? Inside the body or outside?

Durkhiem on Meditation

All genuine meditation consists of two stages. It begins with concentration,
by means of which we collect ourselves with the help of our will and direct
the power of the ego onto whatever may be the theme and purpose of the
practice of transformation. Concentration is achieved through the powers
of the ego which is able to grasp thoughts objectively, differentiate between
them and activate the will. Thus in concentration we come to a closer
understanding o the theme of the meditation. By means of this effort
we are able to recognize the faults in our physical posture and the disturbing
factors that are at work within us. In addition it can bring comprehension
and a clear perception of the object chosen for mediation, no matter
whether this be a picture, a work the following of the breath or
some other theme. The whole process takes place within the tension
of the subject and object. Without such concentrated preliminary
tension. Without the attention that collects the whole person – at the
same time focused within the self and turned towards the object – no
meditation is possible. None of the foregoing, however, is as yet
meditation.
Mediation does not truly begin until that which the ego had
seized upon in turn seizes the ego and by this movements changes
rational analysis into synthesis. By this means the quality of
consciousness is transformed from the masculine, active state
which is, as it were, a chalice that is capable of being filled, as
from an inner well-spring, without the active help of the ego. Thus
action is transformed into passion, and doing into being,

The word meditation comes from meditari which is a passive
form of the verb meaning ‘ “being moved to the center”,
rather than the active which is “moving to the center”. But this
centre is not a fixed point on which we concentrate as would on
an object. Rather, the contrary can be said – that is itself concentrate
s us by drawing us inwards and collecting us there. This centre is,
after all, our own essence – our transcendent core. Eventually,
with practice, the centre is experienced as a particular state in
which the antithesis of the subject and object is gradually dissolved.
When this occurs the meditator has the sensation of being centered.
And so, step by step, essential being awakes and becomes an inward
knowing that experiences itself as a personal life center anchored
in Great Life. This forms the basis of a new consciousness of the
world in which we sense ourselves as being reborn.




 

The hundreth Monkey.

The Japanese monkey, Macaca fuscata, had been observed
in the wild for a period of over 30 years.

In 1952, on the island of Koshima, scientists were providing
monkeys with sweet potatoes dropped in the sand.
The monkeys liked the taste of the raw sweet potatoes,
but they found the dirt unpleasant.

An 18-month-old female named Imo found she could
solve the problem by washing the potatoes in a nearby
stream. She taught this trick to her mother. Her
playmates also learned this new way and they taught
their mothers too.
This cultural innovation was gradually picked up by
various monkeys before the eyes of the scientists.
Between 1952 and 1958 all the young monkeys
learned to wash the sandy sweet potatoes to
make them more palatable.

Only the adults who imitated their children
learned this social improvement. Other adults
kept eating the dirty sweet potatoes.



Then something startling took place.
In the autumn of 1958, a certain number of
Koshima monkeys were washing sweet potatoes -
- the exact number is not known.

Let us suppose that when the sun rose one morning
there were 99 monkeys on Koshima Island who had
learned to wash their sweet potatoes.

Let's further suppose that later that morning,
the hundredth monkey learned to wash potatoes.

THEN IT HAPPENED!



By that evening almost everyone in the
tribe was washing sweet potatoes before
eating them.

The added energy of this hundredth monkey
somehow created an ideological breakthrough!

But notice.



A most surprising thing observed by
these scientists was that the habit of
washing sweet potatoes then jumped over the sea --

Colonies of monkeys on other islands and the
mainland troop of monkeys at Takasakiyama
began washing their sweet potatoes.
Thus, when a certain critical number
achieves an awareness, this new awareness
may be communicated from mind to mind.

Although the exact number may vary,
this Hundredth Monkey Phenomenon
means that when only a limited number
of people know of a new way, it may
remain the conscious property of these people.

But there is a point at which if only one more
person tunes-in to a new awareness, a field
is strengthened so that this awareness
is picked up by almost everyone!

Now lets marry this thought with the concept by Rupert
Sheldrake who mentions that the seat of thought
IS OUTSIDE THE BODY.

Does this mean that each of the hundred monkeys
added to this "pool of thought" and after a critical
mass, the pool of thought linked to the
common pool of thought of all the species of monkey?
As though the control centre of the monkeys really
not each indidivual monkey brain but out
somewhere.

What does that mean to us humans? Question of
where does a thought come from ? Is it from
inside the brain or somewhere outside?

What is the intelligence of that thought pool.
How does it decide which thought to send.
SOmetimes its easy, thoughts come from  associations.
But some come completely from the blue.
Even the first thought when we wake up.

Since thought leads to action, and action to destiny,
is getting to the source of this thought pool
the end of destiny ?
Or that is the beginning of a new destiny,
this time driven by Right action.
 

Right Action

What is right action ? In a manner of speaking what is the right action 
that the Universe wanted 
to be done through me ? Is this inquiry about therefore finding out 
the motivates behind my action?
It appears so because Ravi-ji says that an action externally can be 
the same yet its the motive
 behind those action that
truly determines if the action was SACRED ACTION.
In the Gita, the setting is even more dramatic - what can be a 
bigger question to be answered 
when you are facing your teachers and your cousins in a
 battlefield - what is the right action ?

Raviji mentions the distinction between force and violence. 
So Arjuns action can externally be
killing - yet what can be the motive that can make this a 
sacred act? Is this the dharma of a 
warrior who does not sit on judgement ? 

How does one then know what the right action is ?
 How do we know if the motivation is coming 
from the small source of the ego - from its fears 
or self importance? 

Ravi ji says We are all a mixed bag. So it is possible that 
we NOT ALWAYS will do the 
right action 
but by doing a actions and then watching our motivations
 maybe immediately afterwards or
maybe even later. And then as we watch we slowly get
 a sense of the right actions..
This is a great breakthrough because then we get a little
freedom and little space to manoeuvre.

My own feeling is that for most actions we take, we kinda 
know what the true motive is 
and what the right action is. This i guess is what they mean
by purification of our motives.

Ravi uses this amazing phrase "I wishes" as though this
wish is coming from a level that
is higher not " I wish" from my smaller self.

The walk with Ravi at the Theosophy

Feb 2nd was magical. Here I was, walking with Ravi ji on the shores of the ocean outside the 
theosphical society at Adyar. And Ravi-ji mentions to me that 20 years ago, Krishnamurthy and he walked the same route. It was an overwhelming moment and that short walk across the beach, over the bridge and to the end of the bridge. Raviji points to a section of the bridge, just ahead, a section that is just widened and says " the last time I was with him, just a year before his death, he stopped that spot and then bowed in all four directions." that I thot was a poignant moment.  

Tales stranger that fiction

Durckheim. What can I say. So many subtle insights.  magnificient when he talks about 
search not being finding a place where phew! finally ! there is eternal rest. He talks about
search not being something that you use to "calm" yourself.
So the search is to find an inner space using which we can dive into life. Experience the pain and the joys in a manner that is free from fear, anxiety and all the other emotions that we want to avoid. This means freedom from the grasp of the artificial personality, that's grasping hard to maintain itself intact by making you avoid all the unpleasantness. And as you have the courage to experience that by opening to all the things we have been trying to avoid all the time, its not as disastrous as we thought..in fact the very opposite of having a sense of freedom..from one more shakle that limited us. its the courage to then use the experience of this freedom to take more steps till one realises the "fictionality" of the ego. THis then allows us to truly align to what the Universe got us into the universe in the first place. Our job as human beings actually only begins then. It must be a great moment to experience in a true sense the discovery of the fictionality of the ego. And it amazes me that as i write this, I still cannot see the fictionality of the ego. There is an image
and a personality that is writing this. Still caught in the personality. While knowing that true action is that which is aligned to the will of the universe, continues action that comes from a small source like the ego. Still knowing that the voice from inside can be heard if one listens quietly and without movement, continues to hear bedlam from the personality and acts on it. Such is the human tragedy. We continue operating this body and in the universe, without knowing a thing about this machine or about ourselves. Like idiots. Maybe this is what they should have taught us in school?

Mix n Match

The mix. That's what this looks like. Apparently we are only pure awareness. Somewhere along the way the pure awareness gets mixed up with the body. Now the awareness cannot un-engtangle itself from the body. And then lives the life of the body- with its pain and its limitation. Builds an innner image based on the body and converts its, as is said infinite existence, to a finite existence. For me personally, the biggest issue with this mix-up is death. The finite self, the body and the mind which is the product of the body is made of food and of the planetary elements and have to die. The pure awareness does not die - so, we, the pure awareness supposedly immortal, losing sleep over death! So how do we un-entangle ?
The Masters talk about going back from where we came. Nisarga talks about "birth" - what is being born mean? is it the day we got identified with the body ..somewhere in our childhood? were we pure awareness before that? say when we were born..just existing ? so how can we exist ..now ? Maybe witnessing ..because witnessing allows for separation. It seems witnessing is the key - but remembering to witness and having the strength to witness and not react is a challenge. This would mean buidling an energy pool - so that whole sadhana is about building that energy pool that allows witnessing and then slowly the un-enganglement.
There is still the question of who is doing all this...and therefore is there need for effort or will it happen all by itself..when the time is right..now, I wonder if that is a real question. If one is not satisfied with life and its see saw of joy and sorrow..or even the concept of death..then it doesnt matter ..a way has to be found out of this.

Stephen Jourdain

Some incredible exerpts of Stephen Jourdain's conversation with Gilles Farcet



SJ


All that is a dream! Every instant, everything we designate outside our consciousness that appears real to us, endowed with a reality that’s autonomous and exteriour to our own consciousness, everything we perceive outside outside though the window of our thought all that is hallucinatory. This hasn’t one atom of reality. It’s a purely imaginary phenomenon. They’re subjective effects that your sleeping consciousness surreptiously turns into a reality that’s autonomous and separate reality from you. That’s the nature of the hallucination. To sense your past, the past in general or the future or Paris or the cosmos as something real as realities separate from you is to hallucinate like a madman who walks down the street talking to a phantom interlocutor. This fellow has lost his marbles because he has turned a purely subjective and unreal effect into objective reality. All this should show you the extent of what must be eradicated. All this also shows you the immensity of what must be put back into the heart of consciousness to be dissolved there.

Once this enormous conversion takes place theres nothing wrong with jiggling a marionette and playing. But one must absolutely perceive that my future, my death, me producing the thoughts im in the process of producing etc are nothing but marionettes jiggled by the mind by virtue of a horrible spiritual sickness that pounced on me a billion years ago; my soul no longer feels its own fingers jiggle the marionette and treats it like a stranger.Thus, you must deny the undeniability everywhere it rages that is to say, the totality of your preceeptions.


SJ

The destruction to be accomplished is phenomenal. One cannot attack the dream in fragments. When one wakes in the morning the dream disappears all at once. Thus it is necessary to annihilate everything to pierce all eyes of thought in discovering at the same time that one has never seen with any other eye than the eye of the thought. That, therefore, is the work I would demand you do and its imperative you do well. For either this work is accomplished and you become who you are – your own truth, the infinite value in the heart that was once called God.


SJ

The universe is nothing but a bubble that my soul is blowing. Thus its necessary to blow the bubble. The life of the person caught up in the state of ordinary consciousness unravels at the centre of the subjective bubble he never ceases to blow above his head, a forgery of the universe that includes the thinking subject. He evolves in the interior of the thought of the self. When things click, this bubble bursts like a soap bubble. In reality the uusual state of consciousness has no solidity and can burst any moment.


SJ


In order to reabsorb the hallucination, bringing back what is only thought to the source of thought in such a way that it appears in its true mental nature, that is to say as nothingness, a first method would consist of making an attack at the very heart of the dream. The Central rivet of the hallucination is nothing other than the absolute belief in myself in the act of producing a thought of dreaming this or that. ….if people corrected the way they situate themselves they would eliminate 98% of their problems. Then they would be in the zenith of their dream and close to bursting it.


SJ

The sun of awakening that rose for the adolescent Jourdain has since continued its course and modified its glow. After forty years, I no longer have a body. By that I mean I am no longer situated in the body. Evidently, if someone mentions my foot, Im not going to confuse it with the table! But my body, as an experience no longer exists; the fundamental modification has taken place. Its accompanied moreover by a modification of spatial perception. In the same manner, I no longer have a spirit. It has been a good thirty years since “my spirit” in the usual sense of the term totally disappeared. And about a year ago, I said to myself, “ Shit, I no longer have a spirit, no longer have a body. How in the hell will I be able toe explain all that to someone who has a spirit and a body and who to boot snoozes? Ive got to remember what its like to have a spirit and a body. Thus, I made a great effort, all alone in the kitchen, and suddenly remembered – once again I found myself incorporated, I became once again a spirit in a body. That only lasted a few seconds but I almost croaked !
 

Mid Leap

It’s a difficult choice. It appears that one needs to maintain consistent efforts – neither too much or too less. Then the waiting. Conscious waiting seems impossible. When one is conscious there seems to be an urge to always try something - be in sensing the body or watching the breath. Then how do we allow the other energies to participate and even enter if we are so engaged in "doing" . My own fantasy is that effort continues and when the energy is all spent, awarenss vanishes and deep sleep takes over. In a way, that sleep allows no resistance and thereby allow higher energies to come and visit. And maybe unexpectedly a deep insight will arise. Like cultivating the field and then waiting for the rains and the rain god to arrive. I sometimes feel that even the trying and the Working is not something that I do – its been done thru me. It’s the wanting to have a quick closure or the frustration on not reaching that space that comes from a lower part around my presenses. That needs vigilance. And see what is in me that wants a quick closure. Or a wanting a permanence.

Sometimes when one is on the verge of an insight there is a sense of even impending disaapointment - as though if the search is over there is no longer any more meaning in life. It is indeed frustrating to be mid stream - the bank left behind does not appeal and the bank ahead is only faintly visible.



 

Place of I

So many unknowns. So many mysteries. Reading Stephen jourdain’s experience clearly shows that the source is the reality. Everything – the body, the thoughts this universe all emerge from this source. Its as though an instant second creation happen and abrograted the true original creation. Stephen says and it sounds so true..humans are like vegetation. Like grass and trees.
It appears that the truth cannot be known unless the “I’ is placed outside of one;s current identity. Only then a taste of the truth can be experienced. This is what probably Nisarga data maharaj says – just keep dwelling in the I AM.
He says such beautiful things about memory and time. My memory of the past is NOW. My memory of the future is NOW

Happy Birthday

Nisarga Datta says What is Born is either aware or asleep or awake. So what is born? Its such an amazing question. What is Born? Something limited out of an unlimited? Is being born being identified with this body and limit myself to this confines? So being born becomes the day I start identifying with the body? The baby on birth is not identified with the body. It continues to exist as a wide expanse. Then its conditioned to beleive - or in a way we stuff a baby into a body. And an immortal being is bestowed with mortality !! So is REMEMBERING ONESELF all about remembering how it was when one was born? before this whole identification happened? and then get the whole flood of experience to remain in that state for eternity?

Chimera...

The last couple of days have been days of healing. Here I was lamenting on my distance..such a vast distance from the Divine..or the so called Objective understanding of the universe..and at some point in time even questioning my need for closure of this search..(where is this need coming from in the brain? is it the rational centre that needs closure..can there be completeness without closure..?). And then i read Keats and Wordsworth..after so many years..actually first time in the mind numbing school where the poetry was taught in a manner so brutual..and then in college..
and these poets seem to have gone through the same pain im going thrru right now..this pain of being touched by something and then losing it..

(Excerpts from Ode to a nightingale)..keats

“ ..Thou was not born for Death, immortal Bird
No hungry generations tread thee down
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path
Through the sad hear of Ruth, when sick for home,
She stood in tears amid the alien corn…
……Adieu! Adieu! Thy plaintive anthem fades
Past the near meadows, over the still streams
Up the hillside; and now ‘tis buried deep
In the next valley-glades
Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
Fled is that music:- Do I wake or sleep?


Ode on a Grecian Urn

Thou unravish’d bride of quietness
Thou foster-child of silence and slow time
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme
What lea-fring’d legend haunts about thy shape
Of Dieties or mortals or of both
In Tempe or the dales or Arcady
What men or gods are these ?What maidens loth?
What mad pursuit?what struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstacy?

Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard
Are sweeter;therefore, ye soft pipes, play on:
Not to the sensual ear, but more endear’d
…..
With forest branches and trodden weed
Thou silent form dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: cold Pastoral
When old age shall this generation waste
Thou shalt remain in the midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to who thou say’st
“Beauty is truth, truth beauty”, - that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.



From Prelude : WordsWorth

“….ye presences of Nature in the sky
And on the earth! Ye visions of the hills!
And Souls of lonely places! Can I think
A vulgar hopes of yours when ye employed
Such ministry, when ye through many a year
Haunting me thus among my boyish sports,
On caves and trees, upon wood and hills,
Impressed upon all forms the characters
Of danger or desire; and does did make
The surface of the universal earth
With triumph and delight, with hope and fear..”

Danse cerebre

I am sitting at the poolside of Tanglin club. A colonial slice in the middle of the bustling and exploding Singapore. There almost seem to be an immediate relief from the outside. The severity of the precision in Singapore – the way the traffic moves, the very precise way of people walking, even the trees look so precise the way they stand and the way they are shaped. A complete lack of spontaneity. Monastic. And with all these precision and symmetry there is no beauty. What is missing is movement. Beauty comes in movement. Precison is death. Its frozen. There is no place for anyone else. There are no surprises. There is no flowering. The club is a worm hole in the space-time continuum. You go back to a time where there was neither a rush nor a need for precision. A time of repose and watch the clouds pass by. There is order without precision. There is time for a dance. Like dance with its steps yet all the room in the world for a personal expression.

Sex Machine

So what is sexuality..what is the feeling..? where does it pop up from when you see a hot body floating past? where does it pop up from in the middle of the night or in the middle of a meeting?
Does the eye pick up an object and switch on a gear inside that starts off the whole process of desire..then aquisition and then quenching the desire..and then the desire just vanishes! pop! and then even when the hot body makes its mandatory and (relentless?) appearance there is no desire..no feeling..
it probably means that the simuli that comes from the eye ..needs some kind of an accumulated fuel to burn..it seems that once the desire is quenched the fuel is burnt and therefore nothing for Round2 till there is an accumulation of the fuel. It feels so silly looking at the whole thing like a machinery.takes the romance out of my passion..! but then in Mid Summer Shakespeare very nicely brings about the absurdity of the emotion of love..it doesnt really matter if the object of your passion is a donkey..its the chemicals inside that really cause all that passion..
The human machine seems to love repeating moments of pleasure..the burning of the fuel brings in the pleasure and therfore the pattern is set..
So the question is - DO I burn this fuel quenching the neeeds of the body..? what if i dont burn this at all?? what happens to the fuel? will it get burnt elsewhere? say imagination? or anger..??
its so frustrating not to know the workings of this body..! isnt there a manual somewhere..then..when the hotbody comes..the desire is quenched ..but the fuel is intact.. perpetual motion between celibacy and consummation.

Trishanku...reality sandwitch.

Before i really start let me ay homage to the food gods for a fantastic dinner at Lara Djong Grand in Jakarta. Two divine places in Jakarta - Oasis and now Lara DjongGrand. Thanks to Buddha for being in the restuarent and starting vacantly as I ate. Also a nice reminder of the real distance between us. He with nirvana..me half way between hapiness and nirvana. This probably is the worst place to be. When One is firmly planted on the ground. It really dosent matter. When one is in Nirvana it really effin doesnt matter. And when ur in the middle...your ground below is as far away as the sky above.
I have learnt not to reach up any more. i guess if its important for the universe, nirvana will probably happen anyways. If it doesnt i guess too bad for the universe. Maybe at best I will stare at death in the eye and not just go out kicking and screaming. But the sight from here is not pretty:
The mind-body seems to be some kind of a processing unit where various energies enter for some proocesses. Some energies enter thru the senses ..esp the eyes..and some enter thru the head..and they just battle it. I sometimes watch the battle from a distance..whatever the processes and all that pain and sensations. For some reasons even though I watch at a distance I hurt too...and i will continue to hurt till or if..."the energy level changes and I go so far away that finally the battle doesnt touch me"..I wonder if this "search" is some kind of a bondage..where the search keeps u in perpetual bondage of sadhana..Work..or whatever...beg plead..besech the universe to spot me..and grant me grace..the grace of eternal distance from the battles..grace of immortality..
its not in my hands..all i have to do is wait..and hope i get the pick of the draw..the awarness comes and goes..of its own voilition...i have no say in the matter..and so does my going to sleep happens..all on its own..i wonder what the hell is my role in all this..wonder why I am? is universe short of witnesses that they need people to just "witness"???
So when I am up in the morning..and my body is burning with a hunger for a touch of feminine energy, this awareness comes up that this feeling is because my energy levels have "docked" in a part of the brain that activates the sexual centres and will seek release from there. So then its got to be undocked and "channeled" into this "bank" of awareness that will in future tell me that when im horny next that I need to undock it and channel it to bank of awareness that...
What happened to the good old wank?? what happened to just seducing or being seduced and just let the kink take over?
So while i sometimes think im not the body..or sometimes I think fuck man..i am not supposed to be the body..im supposed to be this being-awareness..and with the knowledge that im not this who im supposed to be and i dont know whaT im all about..i continue to exist..like a man who's lost his name and woke up in a strange country