Thanks for sharing this with everyone — as each person experiments with their own approaches to these things, it is very helpful to have a few people speak up about their experiences. That way we all gain some insight from the sharing. Appreciated! It would be very interesting to hear about how your mind suggests that you might ruin your life doing this. What is your mind suggesting might be lost (or gained) here? I think this is an important thing you’ve brought up, because people often fear they will lose important elements of their current life (passion, emotion, aspirations), while others decorate awakening up in so many colors that they are sure to miss it and chase the colors instead. I’d love to hear your thoughts sometime! =)

Sweetwater,
Kenton

Just last night I saw a documentary on a wildlife channel, that portrayed a journey of an elephant. That particular elephant, was a mother with a 20 month old calf. She was injured in a dominant attack by another herd of elephants. Her leg never healed and one day she was again caught by another herd of elephants, which tried to kill her, but didnt. She eventually never recovered, despite being treated by the documentary makers. Needless to say she died.
Looking at that scene, I couldnt help but feel a deep sense of choking, and sadness. It also reminded me of your previous article “And a deer dies.”, where you explained that we cant really change anything, except our perceptions. We are no one to judge someone else’s suffering.

The misery lies in our minds. And if we carefully observe our minds, we find that every single action in the outer world has a reaction in our minds, and that reaction in our minds, using the plethora of our lifelong beliefs as a basis, causes the misery. I am not qualified enough to comment, as I’m still learning how to cope up with my mental reactions, but the more I try to let go, I realise that I’m getting more and more peaceful. (Though my mind tells me that I’m gonna ruin my life doing this. It has a deep longing to making a stand, you see.)

That is not to say, that I’m becoming indifferent. But more accepting. Osho wrote an article stating that life is a mirror. Everything that we see in our outer world is a reflection of our thoughts.
I feel life is nothing but a paradox, where we create something in the outer world, and use that to create ourselves, and thus create something else. And the cycle continues.

We cant really explain anything, and you are right when you say that all the articles on your site are merely pointers. We just need to wake up, and see life for what it is, just as it is. I just wish it wasn’t so darn difficult, or maybe I’m making it out to be.

Well said! I must say again that the sort of question that you asked is so important. As you noted, any ‘description’ of non-dualism is going to contain contrary elements — paradoxes, or suggestions which go against our normal way of thinking. It is so easy to make these descriptions into new ideas, and those ideas have the potential to lead people to rejecting non-dualism, or lead them into attempting to create new behaviors, such as simply ignoring all the ‘problems’ of the world. When I write an article, I am taking a certain ‘slant’, and it’s when someone like yourself comes along and questions the contrary aspects of the slant that the pointing of the article can be clarified for everyone. Without such questions, the article sits ‘as is’, and may miss the mark for many of the readers.

Both you and Albert of urbanmonk.net have asked me to post this as an article, and I think I’ll take your advice. Again, thanks for setting this all into motion! =)

Sweetwater,
Kenton