Welcome to Week 13 of Beyond Self 2012 in SunnyRoomStudio. Based on my study of Zen last summer, this informal spiritual retreat may be only a beginning for some of you. For others, this retreat has been a good refresher.
Where are you at in your spiritual evolution?
Was there a catalyst that led to a decision to follow a spiritual path in life, or was it more of a gradual awakening?
Or are you still waiting for the right moment, the right opportunity, to delve into spiritual matters more purposefully?
Still round the corner there may wait, a new road or a secret gate.
~ J. R. R. Tolkien
WEEK THIRTEEN: Beyond Self 2012
Week One: Extend Your Gaze
Week Two: Always Evaluating
Week Three: Being Brevity
Week Four: Entanglement
Week Five: Beyond Attachment
Week Six: Eternal Nature
Week Seven: If Only
Week Eight: Nonresistance
Week Nine: Caught Up
Week Ten: Daily Life
Week Eleven: Just Look
Week Twelve: Transcendence
It is great wisdom to know how to be silent and to look at neither the remarks, nor the deeds, nor the lives of others.
~ St. John of the Cross
During the second half of our retreat, we are sitting on the bench of enlightenment. We are considering ourselves in the context of silence. And we are finding peace in meditation. But, undoubtedly, you are encountering points of resistance along the way. Places where your conditioned mind springs into action. Times when your thoughts won’t let you rest. When your attachment to your own ideas clouds your vision and impedes your willingness to look beyond self for spiritual maturity. How have you handled those points of resistance?
Are you growing in awareness?
Do you see yourself more clearly now? Or are you still surprised when those habitual reactions surface, often when least expected? But even with that, are you beginning to notice how your automatic mind reactions cause you to suffer needlessly? Or are you still enamored with self, with the resistance you seem to bring to everything?
At some point, the illusion breaks down and the opening for the start of the spiritual quest commences. The quest turns from without to within and the search for answers begins. ~ David R. Hawkins
- This week try to simply focus on awareness. Pay attention to thoughts and ideas that are no longer useful to you. This is a great time of year to practice this. During the holidays, it’s especially easy to revert to habits of old. To become totally absorbed by the expectations of a conformist society, to let family or friends dictate priorities. To revert to an “unconscious state,” per Eckhart Tolle.
- Where is the liberation you seek?
- When you find yourself not understanding something … it’s a good sign. You may be moving beyond self, becoming free of the cultural identity you thought was you all these years. Stay with the process. Let silence via meditation be your guide.
Be master of mind rather than mastered by mind. ~ Zen Saying
Thanks so much for being here.
I look forward to seeing you next Friday for Week 14 of Beyond Self 2012.
I hope you are following with a journal,
as comments are closed during this retreat.
Strive to understand the world via experiences that serve as lasting catalysts for profound inner exploration. ~ D.A. Hickman, Kindred Spirit Quotes
Blog posts by DazyDayWriter @ work in SunnyRoomStudio: all rights reserved.
