Song Of The Day: Us And Them / Pink Floyd
Word Of The Day: Agravic / Having no gravity; relating to the condition of zero-gravity.
I'm up in Seattle girlz, at the Integral Weekend (I-WET). It's truly killer. Amazing group of attendees, and it's always an extra bonus to be around when Diane Hamilton conducts Big Mind process. Diane is one of Genpo Roshi's senior students, and she is the Kosmic Shit, yo'. We are having a blast, and tonight II have a show to boot, at the Tractor Tavern in Seattle, so we're all going to end the weekend with an auditory embrace. Hey, is that someone grabbing my auditory ass? Mmm, feels nice.
Back to the Big Mind Blog.
Facilitator: I'd like to speak to another voice now. I'd like to check in with the Controller again at this point.
Controller: OK.
F: Controller, I just want to touch in with you and make sure everything that going on is still OK with you. We've spoken to a few voices now, The Skeptic, Great Doubt, The Pervert, The Fixer, and I am simply checking back with you to let you know I appreciate the access to these voices. I'm going to want to speak with more voices, so is all well with you?
Controller: Yes, things have been just fine so far.
F: How do you feel about the process so far?
C: I think it's fine.
F: OK. I'm going to ask to speak to another voice now. I'd like to speak to the voice of Wonder.
Wonder: WHAT'S UP??!! YEAH! I'M SO FUCKING JAZZED YOU ASK TO TALK TO ME! THIS IS AWESOME!
F: Hello Wonder.
Wonder: Hello!
F: Tell me about yourself.
W: First of all, I think this process is amazing. It blows my mind. I feel this explosive sense of wonder, I am simply transfixed by what you're doing here. I mean, this is not our parents Zen! I am deeply moved by the way Genpo Roshi has conceived this method, instead of villainizing the self, and all the aspects of a human being that make up an ego, or a soul, Roshi has actually turned Zen 180 degrees on its head, and decided to TALK to the ego, instead of trying to kill it, and I will tell you with all sincerity in my heart that is a miracle. It is a miracle in the work of Love which is going to help thousands and thousands of people wake up. I'm captivated in wonder at how this works. It's a whole new dimension to spiritual practice in the West! It's inclusive, engaged- it's truly wonderful.
F: Wow. Well, that's great to hear you're so enthusiastic about this. What else can you tell me as Wonder?
W: This life is a miracle. To become human, or any type of being at all, to simply come into being in this world is a completely divine occassion, and I am deeply, utterly in communion with that miracle at all times. I am the eye which recognizes and experiences the Ineffable Presence which abides in every sacred form, from atom to Galaxy, from bacteria to human being. I am a sense without filters, without aberrations, without prejudice or assumptions. I am beginner's mind, first thought, first taste, and I am alive with the exuberant miracle that is everywhere in everything.
F: What about some of the more difficult things. What about things like famine, disease, and the myriad types of suffering that plague humans and all beings.
W: I see them for what they actually are. The poet Hafiz once said something to the effect that Light has painted all things in the same likeness, and that is very close to the way I experience suffering, joy, misery, or freedom. There is a miracle in each one, and I am attuned to the way in which they Mystery uses decoys and tricks of perception. When I see suffering, it's not that I don't feel the anguish of that which suffers. But I am also in contact with the way that suffering can open its subject, I am very much attuned to the way in which God is closer to that pain than we can imagine, feels it before we do, more deeply than we do, without conditions or aversion, and experiencing the presence of that Mysteryious love fills me with a sense of wonder. I am the pusling, thriving heart of open love, discovery, and surprise.
F: Say more about surprise. What do you mean you are surprise?
W: Nothing has ever, ever existed the same way from one second to the next. There is no such thing as two identical moments, from its inception, this Universe has morphed, unfolded, and flowed into an ever-new, spontaneous emergence in each aspect of its being, and I AM UTTERLY PRESENT TO THAT REALITY. Since it all began, I have danced, played, and remained in wonder at each moment, and every aspect. Whatever it may be that we consider -a star, a human body, the emotional life of a Racoon, or the atomic structure of dirt, the context and constitution of each discrete item is always ushered into a new Reality in each moment. It is impossibly, inconceivably miraculous, to glimpse even a tiny bit of the infinite wonder that is creation, that is existence, life, animate and inanimate unfolding. I encounter that living Reality in a flower, in the rythym of Stuart's breathing, in the pattern of stars in the night sky, in the way that light bounces off the desk in this hotel in Seattle, in the sound of the air conditioning system, in the contour of a human body, the taste of coffee, and anything which arises.
F: Even that which vexes you?
W: What is it to be vexed? Feeling vexed is an interpretation of an event. I don't interpret events or assign qualities to them.
F: But you say it's all a miracle, isn't that an interpretation? Isn't a sense of wonder a sort of filter itself?
W: The bare, unmediated nature of my experience is itself pure wonder. There is no filter, no interpretation, and that naked, unflinching engagement is what reveals this native capacity which is Wonder. It is not acquired or built, but is innate, and revealed. When there is truly a Beginner's Mind, when there is truly a direct apprehension of Reality as-it- Is, there is simply an incredible experience of wonder.
