To cure a weakling child

Karma (More correctly Phala as Karma is action and Phala is the fruit)
Reigns for the childish ego who wishes to do bad.

Reincarnation
A blanket for the childish ego which fears the end of false identity.

Ishvara
Any personal god such as God, Infinite Energy, or any other name given to an ultimate but especially one looked towards for support is parent or guardian for the weakling ego.

GuRu
Meaning DarkLight, the person to guide you from darkness to light, or any other middle man such as vicar, rabbi, spiritual leader is the ego admitting it is small but also stating that it one day wishes that, with help, it shall be proved valid.

Mantra
Any personal mantra from "Om" to "All is good" is a weak clinging of the ego to some false positive.

Satsang
The company of wise people is a weak ego looking for someone it deems better to pat them on the head and say "it's ok, you're ok".

Meditation
An ego entering a state it wishes to maintain during all acts. The ego refuses to accept change and flow as it is too fragile so pines for a place with no movement.

Religion
The childish ego wishing to realign with that which it was never separate.

Yoga
The childish ego wishing to yoke or rejoin with that to which it was never separate.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

great religions draw you not push

There was a man selling the Bhagavad Gita outside of the market today. When he attempted his sales routine I simply said that I had read it and I continued walking. My wife asked me what "sect" he was and I said he was a Krisna follower, part of Hinduism. She said 'why do people have to be this religion or that religion?' and I quipped that it allows them to know who to fight when the war comes.

I considered it as we walked on and as my wife went about buying the vegetables from the market I thought how good she was. She was born to a Buddhist family, but as the one family member who does not call herself a Buddhist, she certainly has the highest understanding of the Buddhas teachings. She has a firm understanding of the Dharma, the core message, but does not call herself Buddhist.

So one who truly understands Dharma is no Buddhist. No one who truly gets the Tao is a Taoist, no one who has grasped the teaching of Krisna would need to sell the Bhagavad Gita. All of these works and the teachings in them are of great importance, but the idea that one would need to carry the label once the teachings were understood is wrong.

For the Krisna seller, who sees suffering, he needs to re-read the book: To see that the deamons and the angels, the good and the bad are all Brahmans body seen through the mind and that to slay the mind, to reveal the non-changing, to see that we are that, would release him from his trap. The book he is trying to sell can set him free of the very need to save others.

The same for any religion I can think of, if you "get" the teachings, then there is no need, in fact it is a contradiction, to go about forcing it upon others.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Violent Religion

(This post just flopped off my fingers so it must have a reason to be)

Taoism, Buddhism, Zen, Hinduism (certain areas), and probably other examples fit this post.

Some people obviously resist elements of these teachings that are violent and/or are so direct as to penetrate to the true being. Wei Wu Wei said something like "For truth to hit home it must penetrate like an arrow, and that is likely to hurt".

The Tao Te Ching and other such works pull no punches. They do not invite the reader to lands of angels playing harps or ways to achieve financial or popular gain but unremittingly sledgehammer the reader over the head with reminders of how simplicity is both the way and the objective of this method. "Nature is cruel at times and treats things impartially, so too is the sage who treats people impartially". Most would read this and perhaps say 'ah, ok, the sage treats all people the same no matter who they are' and this is true, but it also means that the sage will also directly tell you if you are being a fool or out of tune with the way. Taoism also accepts angry outbursts, acts of violence and weapons as life. Again referencing nature the Taoist would state that nature is not always at rest and can produce storms; animals have claws and teeth, and we have our own teeth, fists and nails - weapons are but an extension of these. They then remind us how, while outbursts may come, they must also disappear as quickly as the sun floods back over the land after the storm cloud passes, and there should be no residue or wave carried from the event. Act, move on.

Zen masters will hit students with a stick. If the master did not hit them then students may demand a new master as they expect to be hit. Zen masters will shout at students to wake them from slumber and Zen as practiced by the Samurai, the martial artist, the Shaolin Monk is used to justify and give a law to acts of fighting to the death. (Although the Zen is predominantly included to focus the mind here, and sorry if I tainted your art with my shoddy knowledge).

This violence is external and outward but is reflected also in the inward teachings. Yogis and other elements of the Hindu system will starve the body and force lines of inquiry so deep and so solid as to shatter the supposed self. This is also echoed in Zen and Buddhism as direct and forceful methods to the core of our being. Methods to expose the truth can not be softly softly all the time if they are to bear fruit with all practitioners.

It is the case with many people who wish to discover the truth that they will solidly refuse to cast off previous beliefs. Taoism and the others also tell you to unlearn all that you have come with before attempting to learn afresh otherwise the person will taint the new ideas with the old and will be unable and unwilling to go with new lines of thought. We see this with some initiations where masters leave the prospective student out in the cold, give them hard tasks and menial work to test resolve. These stories come to us from Hinduism, Buddhism and Taoism.

When I say to a Christian friend that there is "Simply no room for God" they end the conversation. When I ask someone to put aside learning and text book replies they will lose footing and speak of this conversation now having no room for reason. When I say that the truth is out of the bounds of reason they accuse me of faith in the unprovable. When I say that there is no room for faith as who is it with faith and what is there to have faith in, they demand themselves to have reality and for this line of conversation to be called void as it now enters the metaphysical and can not be proved one way or the other.

These are all defense mechanisms employed to reinforce the fake I. Tools of the ego which will do anything to hold on to reality.

Unwilling to let go of the side of the pool they can never float and this makes further exploration, as the above is only initiation, impossible. To ask them to meditate and surrender to what they find they will get no further than closing their eyes. They will reason every point with preset ideas and never leave the fake self. The ego is a very cunning and very persistent beast that will pretend to be the self. You will hear voices of how the goal has been met but this is really the ego still present and faking it. Ego too will expect reward from inquiry and will be hard to shove when it realizes that the goal is its own end.

This is what these methods must have an impartial, cruel, violent and direct nature that exposes the weaknesses and pokes at them. While someone can relate the philosophies to daily existence it takes true power to truly know the self.

"Mastery of others takes power, Mastery of the self......"

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

How long would it take for your computer to work out ...

How long would it take for your computer to work out how big it was?

and what it was made of?

and who made it?

It would need sensors far outside of it self, and right near it. It would need to invent a unit of measure and a nervous system that could report back information of its surroundings.

It would not know, even if it worked out the size of its box, if it were huge or small. It would be unlikely to say it was the size of its box as it feels information coming through wires and over wifi and more.

A super smart computer may say "OK, i seem to be mainly this CPU, RAM and HD, I have a box too, which is very much me as it contains my core, also many important veins are attached here. But I sit on a table, and if that table were not there, then I would not be here, so that table is me too. So given this basic layout, I must be infinite." = Mystic computer.

A dumb computer would follow and measure each wire, out of the house, along to the energy sub-station, out to the power station. It would measure the distance that wifi signals came in, and then from the source to the next transmitter. It would follow an endless number of pathways out into the world and many that bounce off satellites over head. It would sit with many measurements and make grand predications over the layout of its surroundings, it would make assumptions about how it came to be this way. It would draw conclusions that are way above its station. = Science Computer.

Another may fearfully state that it can not be alone here and there must be others, it would wonder who made it and sit writing its ideas as to who made it and why. When it found its box it would build a fortress to keep other boxes out, it would dedicate resources to worshiping the creator of its programs and box. It would set up so many falsehoods that its quest for the answers would be forever hindered. = Religion Computer.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Quote Myself

"Where Zen and Buddhism will say the truth, enlightenment, and so on can be reached through dedicated meditation and practice, a Tao master may sip some wine, fart, and go to sleep."

There I was innocently surfing the web, hoping to find some pictures of boobs on a Taoist website, and I happened across someone quoting me(!) - I googled the quote and found that 2 people have quoted it on separate occasions so I dug out the old quote that was hidden in a long waffley piece I wrote some time ago and have placed it here for the benefit of my ego. The piece ended with this:

"So look and learn but don't force anything, don't try to adopt things that just don't fit together with you. Don't get so tied to one shore that you miss the next beach. Don't get too comfy under one tree. Don't carry a pile of books around where there is loving living and dancing to be done."

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Spiritual Halflife

Like many things in a cyclic world there seem to be half lives. It is perhaps the nature of the fractal or our very slight view on the ultimate reality of pure stillness that bring about apparent motions of decay where things spin away, to an apparent future, in an apparent idea of time, apparently before our eyes, and so we say are real -- that we see nuclear like effects from the micro-scale playing before our eyes in the macro - "HEY THIS IS REALITY" he says confidently to mask the truth, so he can play out the game of life in the way it seems so real.

The formation of reality is such a part of us that we forget, but when macro life plays out like science we see in the micro, the patterns link and the oneness of all is seen and because the patterns on no matter which scale are all acting, from the one stillness, where there is nothing, then life as we see it is demonstrated to be just a dream that is to be enjoyed. Why all the stress and strain?

The strain of everything taught as "the new way forward" or acted out as the 'new best thing' or any 'dreams,' and so actions, built from a desire to have 'more this' or this new that, are chasing the trails of patterns playing out in waves and forming the very reality that they are acting out.

Chasing them forms the action of them running away and so it perpetuates.

Half lives as seen in nuclear physics act out also in medical research, behavioral studies and most branches of thought. You drink tea and 2 hours later you are high, 14 hours later the half life is over. You have of course re-topped-up the peak and so extended the time until the half life would regress but had you not the half life would keep on decaying. Every 14 hours you'd be closer by half to being ever free of caffeine. Notice you can never be 'ever free' as there once was a was.

Again action leads to the event in time, and that relates to a perceived event in the future, the mix forms apparent time as an effect.

Harmony and right action leads to a better way and forced reactive living scrapes and scrawls its way along, making more fuss and bother.

'Harmony' - "being the way and the objective" is the way of Tao, and half lives and harmony are seen in science life and nature. What we also clearly see is disharmony in life and it's self-perpetuating, rude, rumble, through dreamworld.

There is no need to upset the dream and have any suffering, at all, not one bit: but the bare-bottomed, small-brained, blast through a few thousand years of history, has made it so, and it is rattling on from Phd's being written over "a better world of unity, globalism and prosperity" where they can not pass the subject without quoting so many others that not one original thought exists, to a populous obsessed over this or that.

All we have to do is sit back, chill Winston, take a breather, and it will all sort out. The people we can't relate to, those who go to war, those who incite war, those desiring leadership or change, are effects of the drum solo being played out in the dream reality - it is bad manners. They will rattle to a halt soon enough.

So here we go onwards, keep the spiritual half life well from decaying, strive on! Sit down, for a lifetime.

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Read That is That by Wu Wu (only if you want, of course)

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

True or loud. Right or eloquent.

This was on a computer blog about how we do not need people shouting how good something is as the best computer system for you is just that. A Ferrari may well be better, louder, faster, redder than a VW Golf. But when the kids have to go to school the ... well the bus is better than both.

Labels: I like to meet a person so free as to have none. This is one reason I would love my wife even if she were not wonderful in every other way - she is so un-phased by anything - as if she were immune to peers, society or any idea of making herself look "right".

She will be completely honest and this is wonderful.

I love people like that. I have a tendency to find balance, most often this is my position, that I do see balance, two sides and so on, but it is also the case that I wish to avoid upset. In style to this notion I do not feel this is a good or bad quality ;)

More and more, this has been the case all my life, but it becomes more and more correct the more I see it in action - I see we must remove prejudice and labeling. I used to like to say I have no religion. "religion: none" I had also said on may occasions "religiously un-religious" but these are labels in themselves.

I noted of late that I love religious people. I love people of all mindsets as they always make me recheck myself - "am I as bigoted as that but in my own way?" - "Is there a ridiculous thing I think that I have not done a full investigation of?" It is always a good reminder and nudge to further the path to complete and total non-bondage.

But in answer to those questions: No I'm not as foolish as any one of them. This path of mine may run along a similar paths to religious characters such as the Buddha but only in the fact this is a one person route to casting it all aside, to meet the beauty of non-bondage. Non-attachment - as when you have your mind on nothing in particular, you have it all.

When you love nothing in particular your love has no bounds. When you have no compassion for these people or these, your compassion is to all life, life itself and it's source.

The Energy and the stillness, the everything and the nothing, the everynothing. Ah a label!!

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Extremist Taoism

The Hua Hu Ching states in its opening passage;

"My teachings are simple; if you try to make a religion or science of them, they will elude you."

and Taoism is at its best a philosophy, famously stating in the Tao Te Ching "The Tao that can be told is not the Tao" so by ruling out any religion or set method to its discovery. I recommend sitting by a lake over reading any book explaining Tao.

Yet even against the intent and strong statements in nearly all Tao literature that Tao should not form a religion - Taoism as a religion exists, it is a religion based around the Tao and has all the rubbish of all religion attached to it such as worship of deities and so on.

If we accept that anything that can lead to a religion will eventually give rise to extremist action and "us VS them", then wouldn't it be fun to set up a sect that was extremely lazy?

Take all the lines we can such as; "The sage, by doing nothing, does nothing wrong." and adapting the lines slightly like that to give them a real leaning towards the slacker.

We would then, in not too long have a Tao of absolute laziness loved by stoners, students, slackers and co - hopefully with time a member would take the teachings and see them as an undisputed truth that must be stood up for. With their leadership the whole group will be crystallised around the teachings and they will be seen as the word of God.

When the inevitable happens and the new extremist Tao is seen by its members to be being encroached upon by another group of people, politics or lawmakers, they will fight back.

Being the religious extremists they are they will go to the letter of their doctrine and fight their cause by staying in bed a lot, showing up late for everything, being religiously disorganised and aiming to fail.

The end result being a religious war where a group of disorganised folk don't really get much done. I'd say the body count would be very low.

So if anything, even when not intended to become a religion, even in stating it shouldn't, still does - we then by encouraging passivity, disorganisation and laziness, make for a very laid back group of extremists come the revolution.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Icke Interview

This guy takes a beating for his views but his way of seeing reality is very much more healthy than everyday people and society. This interview tells you how he sees the way the world is controlled but also how he sees what reality really is and why...

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

My religion says I can't work

It crossed my mind some years ago to take on all religions so that I could have lots of days off work and lots of holidays. My friend invented his own religion called COJ (the Cult of John) with it's own holy book the Bibble, I have not asked him yet but I'm pretty sure that if I joined his cult he'd give me as many days off as I liked. - But why when I can have my own?

I find the hours we keep and days in seven's to be quite out of sync with my natural rhythms; so I state from here on in that I am now a tax exempt, work exempt, Wowist priest. Wowists do not recognise days of the week or time, so are exempt from everything.

When I meet you I (may) say the word wow in conversation and this should be seen as reverence to the great wow, you should respond by not really noticing and this shall be the way we honour the wow. I will wear wowist clothing which will be just like normal clothing so that anyone wearing normal clothes will too be stating love of the wow.

I may also like a bowl of ice cream, so I'll see to that myself now. - Apart from that, all will be about the same but I won't be paying tax or working again.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Buddhist Science of Happiness

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Where Tao is nothing to do with Buddhism

Hinduism is so ingrained in Indian culture that it can not truly exist outside of India. It left India as Buddhism - As Allan Watts said: Buddhism is Hinduism stripped for export.

Buddhism hit Tibet and was integrated into the existing religion so that it survives to carry the interesting complexity it has in that land. It hit Thailand, Burma and so on and integrated with the folk religions where the ideas of spirits, spirit houses and the ancestor worship of Confucianism are intertwined. It hit China and exploded.

Where Buddhism enveloped the cultural preference of most nations it was different in China. The Buddhists and the Taoists had very strong respect for each other and with similarities and a great wisdom in each canon one could not make way for the other, the mixture lead to Chan.

There are ancient tales of the Buddhists, Taoists and often Confucian's playing for the favour of the then emperor plus signs in their classic texts of confrontation. It must be said that the Confucians lost here very quickly as the brunt of the jokes of the Taoists. A number of Taoist texts are simply pointing fun at the strict Confucians.

Zen is the name Chan took when it hit Japan so we have the commonly known name Zen Buddhism which would make more sense as Zen Taoism but anyway. In the Zen book "Transmission of the Light" the Zen masters try to say how Tao was great but the Tao masters failed to point to the absolute clarity reached by the Buddha. The Taoist response was how the Buddhists, like all others, were failing by both looking for perfection "elsewhere" and also by formalising their path.

Where Zen and Buddhism will say the truth, enlightenment, and so on can be reached through dedicated meditation and practice, a Tao master may sip some wine, fart, and go to sleep.

Lately it has become hard to find Tao as separate to Buddhism. As Zen and Chan carry the Tao Te Ching and quotes thereof in their canon many can miss there is even a separation between the two, when in fact there is very much so. People coming to find interest in Zen and Tao may intermingle and pick and choose - great! (but)

While I think it is great to pick up wisdom from any source be it book, tree or calamity and mix them up, find what is good and what is not: - I do also think it very important not to think "I like this cake, I will eat the whole shop", especially when you can not see where one shop joins another. The point being that people meeting Tao may then try to take on too much Buddhism without proper separation or enquiry and instead see it all as one big yummy cake.

You may well find wisdom in one teaching but to then try to adjust your whole being to integrate the whole thing, then, it is just not Wu Wei. Remember that all of these systems have come about of a time and a place, they do all have masses to teach you but in the end you must have your truth, a truth that is now not when or then.

There is nothing to look for, only to see the obvious.

So look and learn but don't force anything, don't try to adopt things that just don't fit together with you. Don't get so tied to one shore that you miss the next beach. Don't get too comfy under one tree. Don't carry a pile of books around where there is loving living and dancing to be done.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Wu Wu - That is That - [no longer Free] ebook

The book can be summarised in this short poem:
"The way of Tao Wow".

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That is That is a free ebook by WuWu and it delves into some of the issues met by everyday people such as love and death and some of the things on the path of the spiritual seeker such as enlightenment, what to do after enlightenment, and more.

Download That is That by Wu Wu The free ebook to keep or print. (The free period is over and the book should now be purchased from this link)

It begins;

"It is enough to accept that all is bliss and that anything else is a misinterpretation"

...and it refuses to allow you to have restrictive thoughts such as religion, political position, ideas of right or wrong as they are traps keeping you from the ultimate reality.

"If you take true spiritual truth and try to make a science or religion from it then you will fail."
- Hua Hu Ching

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Tao Wisdom

Tao is Wisdom

Taoism is religion

If it is not clear yet then let me state I am not religious and I feel religion to be a failure in the person.

Wisdom is everywhere and it happens that some of the purest recorded wisdom comes in the Tao Te Ching. To feel though that the 81 verses are all perfection and that nothing exists outside of them is error and understanding of the first chapter is clarification of this.

"The Tao that can be told is not the Tao."

Tao was the term Lau Tzu came up with when he backed himself into a corner and decided that, if pushed, he would call it Tao. Truly, and the way I see, there is and can be no name.

I would like to use another name, this is the trap of language, we kind of need a name to communicate, yet communication can not carry Tao.

Truth is FUUUUUUU!!!!!! WOW!! and then a calm deep intake of breath.

That we can have !!!! here, this - look I can touch, feel, see a reality, there is an indication there is a me, and a you, and so many of us, animals creatures, love, hair, feelings, bam! infront of us.. us, wow! that is incredible.

To conceptualise reality (what you do all the time and the next 80 chapters of the Tao Te Ching) is error.

There is absolute magic!

The atheist, the nihilist, the day to day person, is not wrong, they just deny or miss the magic.

The religious person any form of "-ist" or "-ism" is not wrong they just feel there is somewhere they have to find "it" - not wrong, they are just looking not seeing.

Teaching and wisdom points, that is all.

It seems so many, even though they can quote "finger pointing to the moon" still are hung up on the finger.

Well, finger to you, middle that is, there is bliss and WOW here and that is all I am here for.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Filling a form

Religion: None.

"No religion Sir?"

"That is right."

"So you don't believe in any God or have you not made up your mind?"

"I have gone through it all, thank you, I am awake."

"Then what is all this?" (the man makes an open gesture at the world and reality around him)

"This is bigger than God" I smiled.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Bloody Buddha

There were Buddha's previous to Buddhism. Hinduism and probably Vedism[*] carried the term Buddha as meaning one who is outside of and not requiring religion. One who is so right in themselves that the many tools offered in the multifaceted Vedas were not required.

That aside, the Buddha we all know of set us a problem in this new adaptation where Buddhism became a religion. He by being a Buddha made us all, like it or not, Buddhists. When one person becomes such a thing then everyone else defaults to not that. He also left some challenges behind that we have to get through to become Buddha and not Buddhist (secure in our self and not seeking).

So like it or not you are either a Buddha or a Buddhist. You have to solve the issues he left us or not. Everyone is a Buddhist to some degree and as that is measured in awareness then the worst ones don't even know it. And now for a quote that struck me recently;

"When I was a Buddhist my family and friends became so tired of me. Once I was a Buddha we were perfect together."

While being a Buddhist, especially when not in a culture of Buddhism, then you are a pain to be around. You ask all the toughest questions, won't let anything go, constantly trying to get your self right and asking others around you to do the same. "Hey mum why don't you try meditation" "Hey friend just let it go, why not read this book?".

But once you are a Buddha you let it all go, you are right, life is right, you have no intention to alter another as you know why they are who they are. Once you are at peace with yourself you don't rub people up the wrong way, or ask too much of them, you act right and all benefit.

end.
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*[I have an idea that the world of maybe 250,000 years ago was almost all land, the sea was far far less deep and the people of those times were very advanced (spiritually, and not in the way we may think of advanced in pointless plastic technology). I think that the seas rose so much as to bury that world and leave only remnants on very high ground, the tips of which are today's separate continents with separate yet related cultures. This is why the Tibetans are so unique on their plateau as they were always the high up spiritual meditators and India just happens to be the place that the knowledge was best preserved. It was at some kind of point where the race was split by the rising sea, but high in knowledge, than South America and Egypt got its highly advanced, similar yet separate, structures, writings and so on and the world now has tiny fractions of an incomplete puzzle sitting, separated by phobias, and spread over the land separated by seas.]

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

The Importance of Satori

Satori is not the goal at the end, it is the begining of the path. I was on my bicycle nearly 4 years ago, riding through a forest with no other people and thinking how this was my forest, this was my earth, everyone was welcome to share in the pleasure of nature here but only I was choosing to. Most were obviously somewhere else, at home in front of the TV, doing things, perhaps working, shopping, driving, I was there with nature. My mind was opening up to the reality of life behind the curtain and I stopped under a particular set of trees that I can picture now, I looked at one very unimpressive tree, soaked with the rain from an hour before, some branches broken by snow or wind, no leaves, and I saw its perfection - I thought the very strange thought of "trees don't ask why". And then I had my most clear moment of Satori where I saw life as it really is, as one, in perfection.

After this time I took more and more interest in explaining the state, I had no idea it was Satori only that I could explain it to no one not even my self, but it was life changing, unique and very important to me. I felt noticeably different in my actions, body and mind. I had to find similar people and it was after that time that I came to find book after book of clarification of the event.

I bought a ticket to India, it would be my second visit and I was intending to take meagre funds just to meet a friend for a short trip. I bought 6 books all about New Physics, the mind, nature of reality and on arriving in India I sat in a hammock for 7 weeks reading and what turned out to be meditating. (I bought books, swapped old for new, constantly throughout the trip.) I decided I would not be rushing home and when my friend showed up we spent a little more time where I was, I realised I had spent 2 months in a pair of shorts, nothing else, not even foot ware and I had a very new perspective on life. I lent him my books and we set off with his girlfriend across India. I got very ill on a boat crossing to the Andamin Islands, it was a disgusting boat and we were on it for 3 days, I had not been wearing shoes still which was very stupid in India. We befriended an older Scottish guy who just happened to be very well read in the some of the authors that came up in my book list, my state of awareness was unlike the me of old, illness and all I was in states of minor hallucination and spending time in deep conversation and meditative states.

The Andamin Islands then were beauty beyond words, we became used to crystal clear seas, empty paradise beaches, fresh coconuts falling from trees. With little to do besides enjoy nature and snorkel the coral, we decided to fish one day. The only fish caught was on my friends hand made line, the hook was too big for the fish and on seeing the little fish struggle as I attempted to release it, I chopped of its head brutally with a coconut splitter. -- I decided to go vegetarian for 3 days to say sorry, but due to a further development in the way I see life I have not eaten meat since.

After the Andamin Islands we crossed back to India on the 3 day boat of poo with more friends and left some others behind, the friends recommended a Yoga Ashram - I disliked the idea. I disliked how people could structure a path to "god" and when I saw the Ashram had lots of money I disliked how they were profiteering from the same. But I settled in, it had a nice atmosphere, some very good teachers, good people and I was there over a month. I ignored all the god stuff, singing and praising but took a lot from the talks and the various levels of knowledge other people there had, in particular elements of the Hindu Vedanta and the path of Zen.

We ate pure vegetarian food, learned breathing techniques and did Yoga Assana's twice a day. The Ashram was in the middle of nowhere and the best place for Assana was by a large lake with a forest all around. I was in deep state of relaxation when a Lion, yes a Lion, in a far off reserve called out with a deep long roar - I had my second most incredible state of Satori, feeling the power and beauty of what I was coming into touch with, what I truly was.

After the Ashram my illness that had subsided began to return, we travelled a lot and were in place that is very very hot, a rock desert, I began to not be able to eat or even drink. I was unable to hold food or water for 2 weeks and in that time we moved out from the desert to the coast, We arrived at Om beach. We found a guy with a vat of pure LSD and he dropped a large drop on the back of each of our hands. As a token effort we licked our hands but the LSD was already soaked into our bodies, in not too long the sky drew in, the clouds illuminated in colour the sand took the texture of ..well it is too much to explain.. the sky darkened for night and the stars were all within reach, they were in a 3D pattern occupying my closed field of vision, I could touch them. Later I was in a ball, my empty stomach was reacting to the lack of food and the LSD combined with my poor state of health took me on a journey.

I was on Om beach, the very sacred place for Hindus. I met Krisna, Buddha, even Gaia, I traveled out of my body, experienced body death, ego death, death. I died. I ..can't explain.. It was magical and I wish I could sell it to you. Krisna, was an old man with his wife and he showed me some things he was carving from wood, Gaia complained about the plastic pollution in India but otherwise had little to say, and most importantly for me, Buddha and I just sat in silence, facing each other, and I knew that having nothing to say and no questions to ask was a very very clear indication of how correct this experience was. Plus I forgot to say, I also met the snakes and reptiles, they for a time made up all the solid matter around me, walls floors and items were made of writhing snakes. Magical only, not scary or negative at all. The rest of the experience was non-solid and made only of motion and distant light.

The next day I found I could eat and began a slow journey of recovery, feeding my thin body, we moved on and travelled north. On my journey I picked up a copy of the Tao Te Ching, a book I had until then only seen quoted in other books, I had found the closest written work to the truth to date and I study it still now. -- After some time in the mountains, feeling healthy and happy, 6 months in India had passed, and my visa was at an end. I still did not want to go home and I headed for Thailand.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Small vehicle

I like the idea of the Grand Vehicle of Buddhism in that there will be suffering until the last person attains enlightenment, it is a fine compassionate model, but I feel the practicality of the Small Vehicle has benefits.

With the Small Vehicle it is sufficient to cure yourself and this works on 4 levels I can identify even without trying too hard;

1) The grand vehicle is looking to humanity and will never know the state of beings in other dimensions or levels of perspective/awareness to humanity so could never fully know if the goal had been achieved.

2) Both vehicles require the self to be corrected first and so the work done there is beneficial either way, the Grand Vehicle has no standing over the Small in this case but the Small sets a realizable goal.

3) Once enlightened then the enlightened being sees all as enlightened so the job is done at that point. Once the person has come to the full realization then there are not even any other beings to enlighten as all is one. In suffering or ecstasy they are all faces on the one jewel. Certainly the enlightened being is not contributing negatively to any situation so is in no wrong. Even selfishly ignoring war and suffering is not bad in this case as the perspective is different, no harm is done, and it could be seen that the state of the individual could even be helping cure the world even by apparent non-action. Non-interference in matters in this case is a high attribute. "I know how to leave it alone". "The grass grows by itself". "The water settles not by playing with it". "Bombs don't stop bombs and shouting does not end an argument".

4) Compassion for all is a nice notion but can your perception ever be so encompassing and still accurate? It is tough to put yourself in the shoes of another and certainly impossible to do that for 7billion people. We can feel compassion for those in war-torn parts of the earth but is it for us to suffer for their suffering? I think not for two reasons and yes for one obvious one. Obviously we feel for them, this takes no explanation but the two reasons we can put it aside are that 1) If we were them we would handle it, so we must trust them to do the same. Also if we were suffering greatly we would not want others to mourn us, we would want them to enjoy life. A cancer victim would rather have happy people around them than mournful souls. 2) We can not fully know their feelings or intentions, we may offer up a solution that misses their true needs or we may misunderstand their wishes or ways of reasoning.

So the Small Vehicle is enough I believe as it makes enlightenment realizable and as a bonus it could lead to the grand realization of the Grand vehicle if all beings awaken, it does not stand in the way of that goal only facilitate. It is not restricted by suffering outside of our control and it reminds us of the fact that self realization is the key. All can not be awake if you are not first awake and we can not awaken others on their behalf. When we are awake then we are more useful to the world than when in bondage. This key to fixing the self and ultimately the world lies then with the Small Vehicle.

And the Small Vehicle does nothing against the Grand Vehicle only facilitate the goal.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Kymatica

Loads of good stuff here and I do see this as a good movie from the stance that it requires you to have already been out there looking and learning to get the full benefit from the film. This is not a video for all where you get a kindergarten level introduction to one tiny concept (e.g. The Secret), this is instead a movie talking to the seeker about concepts they will have encountered and helping to form a more unified perspective, one that will, when fully realized, fix the self and thereby the whole.

Kymatica means that pertaining to waves, in this case waves of energy that form life as we see it and often, much deeper, as we don't. I feel this a very good modern anthology of fine thought, not claiming to be an answer but a tug on the ropes; "hey, this way, and while you are waking up to possibility and realization, can you please take responsibility for yourself?".

The world is waking up to the fact that for 1000's of years we have been duped by our own ego, manipulated by groups who saw to expand the position of ego, had the ego massaged so it felt it could "get there" and now, with great apparence, the great fake illusion is falling apart.

The ego is a fake, you will never make it happy, society is ego based so it will never come to anything. The illusion is perpetuated by those who understand it, whipping the horse so it keeps driving the machine. You are acting the donkey here, it is time to wake up and re-connect to the source.

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao

Wow is beyond that god dude.

A follow up from the great Who Whistled? post.

Now to add a little about this God dude too. God to those who claim him to exist is always something separate to them, someone who can look over them, make decisions, have will, guide, bless. This is not infinity. If they say it is infinite then then must drop the qualities, they wont so can't.

This is like a + worshipping a - and missing the electricity of it all. Nothing exists to be worshipped, on worshipping anything a split is made, infinity is lost and the realm of fallible human mind is entered.

To delimit infinity to a named entity with qualities fails. It is simply giving name to the limit of your imagination. Nothing, not anything, not you, not the whole, is worship-able. The act sets up a duality, a split of mind and rubs dirt in the eye of perfection.

No god, get over it people, the truth is beyond such separateness. The truth is more than can be named and so I call it not name, but reaction, wow!

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Tao Wow | Daily Cup of Tao