Conversations with Avant-garde Sages

I will be on the radio show, Conversations with Avant-garde Sages on WCOM 103.5 FM Chapel Hill and Carrboro, NC on Tues Nov 15th from noon to 1pm. They stream the broadcast online as well. They have shows every Tuesday, schedule here. Enjoy!

The most radical expression of spirituality

The most radical expression of spirituality is ordinariness. I met the sage John Troy (also known as The Wizard) yesterday. You can read the details of his life story here and he also makes his books "Wisdom's Soft Whisper" and "The Human Gospel of Ramana Maharshi" available for free here. I am reading the Human Gospel now. In it, John shows the human side of Ramana. Some who would choose to worship him as something super-human didn't like the book that reveals an ordinary man with an extraordinary understanding.

I have met some "spiritual superstars" who radiate an air of specialness. You can tell when they walk in a room by the way that they hold themselves that they are "different". With John, there were no airs of superiority or fronts, there was just sitting together and sharing and a deep sharing it was. Some people, by their open presence embody oneness. It is not a "you and me" or an "us and them" duality game that is being played but a simple basking in the universal awareness that is the true source and heart of life. I am that. You are that. It ALL is that.

Thank you John. I only found out about you a week ago but being with you, your wife and companions was like being with a group of life-long friends. I say "yes" to your message of true spiritual equality--non-duality.

Death, obsession of the ego

Death is an endless object of fascination for the ego idea. Interestingly enough, death isn't an object and, in an honest examination, we can't state authoritatively that there is such a thing as an object at all. Death and decay are one of the transitional forms of appearances as are birth and growth. Every form comes into appearance at some point and disappears at another. This is readily observable in life. By what trait or capacity is this known? Consciousness.

Some say that consciousness is the eternal principle. Obviously it isn't as transient as the perceptions that appear within it but still consciousness (in the traditional understanding of that word) gives way to unconsciousness.What is this entire process known by? THAT is the absolute. That within which all experiences arise and fade. It is that which gives rise to the appearance of life and death and is beyond both. Only appearances are born and die. Life is the timeless show of the infinite.

Advaita is not complex

All that is ever being pointed to is the simple fact of being--the presence that all experiences and sensations appear in. It is impossible to lose this. At this moment, fingers are typing on a keyboard and I glance out of the window at the brilliant colors of changing leaves. This is the way being is appearing at the moment. Now, in this moment, something different is appearing but only because consciousness is present.

The ever changing colors, forms and other perceptions are the way the absolute sees itself. The absolute is that which registers all--pre-conceptual and self illuminating. There is nothing apart from this. Where ever "you" are is only where this is. Without this, nowhere, no one or nothing would manifest.

More stores

Blessed Disillusionment is now also available from Barnes and Noble and Buy.com.