heart : song

Find your vacation.

We live our lives day to day, and we live in many ways for tomorrow. We look forward to our vacations. We often say, "we live for our vacation". But, if we come to understand the true nature of our being, we can live permanently on vacation.

"Vacation" comes from the root "vacate" ... which means to leave empty. We need to look at our lives, the roles we play, the misconceptions we hold and our thoughts and feelings. If we choose to "vacate" these things, we find that the "emptiness' that remains is not a "void", and it is not "nothingness". What remains is  our awareness, our compassion and our intuitive knowledge. What is gone however, is our suffering and our unhappiness to a large extent.

When we "vacate" all of our self delusions, the luminosity of our loving being is there and it is quite wonderful.

Here are some of the practical things that I suggest you try to enjoy your permanent vacation.

1. Refrain from the news and the media.

The big world will get along without you and people will tell you the really important stuff you need to know anyway. Stepping away from the grid of information will bring the life you actually have to live to the forefront. You will not be distracted into the dream world of the news and the media.

2. Practice right  speech.

Do the very best you can not to say anything that could be interpreted as being hurtful to someone else.  I find this is  kind of  "sandpaper" for your soul.  If you can catch yourself from expressing judgments and only speak in kind terms, it begins to smooth out your approach to the world. This helps to transform your actions into acts of loving kindness. This will bring you great joy. The Dalai Lama advises us that if we cannot help the world today, at least , we can do no harm. Practicing right speech is very helpful in refraining from harm.

3. Ask how can you serve ?

If you approach every situation with the thoughts, "how can I help ?" , you will have very little time to be worried about your own needs. You will get tremendous joy from helping others. And by doing this you will really begin to live your life as a saint. If your only actions are that of helping and loving, the energy you will receive back from others will only be positive. And even when people are negative to you, you will know that your actions and heart are in the right place, and these judgments from others  are not very consequential. If you know that the foot print of your actions are true, ... you will come to realize the limitless wealth of your soul.

If you approach your life this way, you will be on vacation and your life will be filled with joy.

your are love, so live that way

You were born into this world, and then many circumstances have come your way. And you have made a lot of choices about what you would do and who you have become. And this story you have in your head, and the way you behave day to day,  is really just a made up thing. Your karma and your choices have made this collection of concepts you call "me".

We say things like, "I am an American, a certain kind of religion, a tennis player, a chocolate lover, a parent" .. the list is very long. But we are really none of these things at all. We are acting out these roles only.

If we start to toss out all of these things and go back to the most essential essence of our beings, I think we find something very simple. Each of is a loving being, each of us is a quiet awareness. This  is who you really are, and this is who we must reveal. I think was what Jesus and Buddha were telling us.

Our actions need only reveal our essential love and that essential awareness. When we live in this "moment of love", we reside in real joy, in real happiness. When our love, joy and happiness are truly alive through our actions, it finds it's way to others. You are not the roles you thought you were , but rather you become a force of love that transforms the world.

You are not the small story, you are the big story of love .. I encourage you to live and an embrace who you truly are.

freedom and love

Most often we define ourselves by what we believe, but equally, often we disassociate ourselves from what we do. We know that certain precepts are proper, like "don't harm other sentient beings". But then, we might go out for a steak dinner. We say we love someone, but then when our feelings are hurt, we behave in a less than loving way.

What we actually have to do in life, is disassociate ourselves from our beliefs and realize that our "our actions are our only true belongings".  This is a teaching from Thich Nhat Hanh, and it is so very true. We have to realize that things like truth and love exist not because we believe in them, but because we bring them into existence through action.

We must  become "truth" and we must become "love"  as opposed to being just believers in these things.

An old joke about faith goes like this.

Little Johnny is in church and the preacher says , "Johnny what is faith ? " . And Johnny says "Faith is believing in something you know ain't true".

We each need to know what is true and false and about ourselves, and we do this by honestly evaluating the actions we take. When we actually "love" and actually are "truthful" we experience real freedom.

loving jah

Bob Marley was a mystic and a teacher. And he taught so much through his music and how he performed it.

Here's a beautiful clip of him singing a beautiful mantra "we'll be forever loving jah"

Remember to turn the music player off on the right side of the page before you play the video

enjoy.