How Big is the Now?

[can uludag]

What's Next After Now?Post-Spirituality and the Creative Life 
"Our search for understanding has been defined for millennium as an ever expanding construction of more and more complex concepts. Since the beginning of recorded history we have asked questions suggested by our natural world and the increasingly intricate social structure we have created as human beings. We have mythologized the expansion of understanding as a never-ending quest for the ultimate answers, as if we had the capacity to ask the ultimate questions. What this myth could not take into account is the possibility that our understanding would come to the end of its own capacity, and that understanding itself, not just its content, must undergo a transformation..." --from the book 
 
hi Eric
 
After reading your words i wanted to recomend you another cool book : What's Next After Now by Steven Harrison.
 
best,  Can

> Date: Thu, 10 May 2007 10:02:24 -0400> From: elilius at halhinet.on.ca> Subject: How Big is the Now?> To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU> > Harrison wrote> ...................> And then, of course, if you want to get into some interesting > philosophical, esoteric, not to say weird waters, you might ask yourself > – How Big is Now? Could be a very small Now, in which case the > opportunities and the responsibilities of infinitesimal. On the other > hand, that NOW could be huge – like the whole Cosmos. Talk about > opportunity and responsibility! Boggles the mind! Probably not worth > thinking about!!> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------> Harrison,> > The title of your book, "Expanding the Now", which I have never managed > to find, points the way to how big NOW actually is.> The Buddha, Zen masters, mystics in all traditions and more contemporary > enlightened beings have pointed to the NOW as being all there really is.> Eckhardt Tolle has written a book "The Power of Now" . His book is full > of little exercises to expand the now.> > The following paragraph spoke volumes to me.> > "If you no longer want to create pain for yourself and others, if you no > longer want to add to the residue of past pain that still lives on in > you, then don̓t create any more time, or at least no more than is > necessary to deal with the practical aspects of your life. How to stop > creating time? Realize deeply that the present moment is all you ever > have. Make the Now the primary focus of your life. Whereas before you > dwelt in time and paid brief visits to the Now, have your dwelling place > in the Now and pay brief visits to past and future when required to deal > with the practical aspects of your life situation. Always say “yes” to > the present moment. What could be more futile, more insane, than to > create inner resistance to something that already is? What could be more > insane than to oppose life itself, which is now and always now? > Surrender to what is. Say “yes” to life—and see how life suddenly starts > working for you rather than against you. "> > One of the great teachers in my life, Douglas Harding, spent his > lifetime getting people around the world to experience the boundless > nature of their true being. His most famous book is titled : "On Having > No Head". There is a wealth of material at a website dedicated to the > work that he shared.> http://www.headless.org.> The simple exercises that Douglas shared are there as well as many > quotations from many traditions that point to way..> > > Here is his description of what he came to term his re birthday.> > "The best day of my life—my rebirthday, so to speak—was when I found I > had no head. This is not a literary gambit, a witticism designed to > arouse interest at any cost. I mean it in all seriousness: I have no head.> > It was eighteen years ago, when I was thirty-three, that I made the > discovery. Though it certainly came out of the blue, it did so in > response to an urgent enquiry; I had for several months been absorbed in > the question: what am I? The fact that I happened to be walking in the > Himalayas at the time probably had little to do with it; though in that > country unusual states of mind are said to come more easily. However > that may be, a very still clear day, and a view from the ridge where I > stood, over misty blue valleys to the highest mountain range in the > world, with Kangchenjunga and Everest unprominent among its snow-peaks, > made a setting worthy of the grandest vision.> > What actually happened was something absurdly simple and unspectacular: > I stopped thinking. A peculiar quiet, an odd kind of alert limpness or > numbness, came over me. Reason and imagination and all mental chatter > died down. For once, words really failed me. Past and future dropped > away. I forgot who and what I was, my name, manhood, animalhood, all > that could be called mine. It was as if I had been born that instant, > brand new, mindless, innocent of all memories. There existed only the > Now, that present moment and what was clearly given in it. To look was > enough. And what I found was khaki trouserlegs terminating downwards in > a pair of brown shoes, khaki sleeves terminating sideways in a pair of > pink hands, and a khaki shirtfront terminating upwards in—absolutely > nothing whatever! Certainly not in a head.> > It took me no time at all to notice that this nothing, this hole where a > head should have been was no ordinary vacancy, no mere nothing. On the > contrary, it was very much occupied. It was a vast emptiness vastly > filled, a nothing that found room for everything—room for grass, trees, > shadowy distant hills, and far above them snowpeaks like a row of > angular clouds riding the blue sky. I had lost a head and gained a world.> > It was all, quite literally, breathtaking. I seemed to stop breathing > altogether, absorbed in the Given. Here it was, this superb scene, > brightly shining in the clear air, alone and unsupported, mysteriously > suspended in the void, and (and this was the real miracle, the wonder > and delight) utterly free of "me", unstained by any observer. Its total > presence was my total absence, body and soul. Lighter than air, clearer > than glass, altogether released from myself, I was nowhere around.> > Yet in spite of the magical and uncanny quality of this vision, it was > no dream, no esoteric revelation. Quite the reverse: it felt like a > sudden waking from the sleep of ordinary life, an end to dreaming. It > was self-luminous reality for once swept clean of all obscuring mind. It > was the revelation, at long last, of the perfectly obvious. It was a > lucid moment in a confused life-history. It was a ceasing to ignore > something which (since early childhood at any rate) I had always been > too busy or too clever to see. It was naked, uncritical attention to > what had all along been staring me in the face - my utter facelessness. > In short, it was all perfectly simple and plain and straightforward, > beyond argument, thought, and words. There arose no questions, no > reference beyond the experience itself, but only peace and a quiet joy, > and the sensation of having dropped an intolerable burden."> > "When you eventually see through the veils to how things really are, you > will keep saying again and again, This is certainly not like we thought > it was! "...Rumi> > I use the title of your book as a simple cue to release myself from the > natterings of the future and the weight of the past and for that I thank > you.> > Eric> > -- > http://www.haliburtonfolk.com> http://www.environmenthaliburton.ca> ----------------------------------------------> `·.¸ ><((((º> .·´¯`·.¸.·<º))))><¸.·´¯·.¸> `·.¸.·´¯`·.¸ ><((((º> ¸.·´¯`·.¸><((((º>> <º))))><·.¸.·´¯`·.¸><((((º>·.¸¸.·´¯`·.¸> ·..·´¯`·. <º))))><.¸.·´¯`·.¸.·<º))))>< > > Eric Lilius> Box 27> (1563 Eagle Lake Road)> Eagle Lake, ON K0M 1M0> CANADA W78.34.12/N45.07.09> 705-754-9859> 705-754-9860 (fax)> --------------------------------------------------------------> > "When Jesus said 'I and the Father are one,' he meant that he was > connected to the raw data feed of pure experience."> Tim Boucher> > *> *> ==========================================================> OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU> ------------------------------> To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options,> view the archives of oslist at listserv.boisestate.edu:> http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html> > To learn about OpenSpaceEmailLists and OSLIST FAQs:> http://www.openspaceworld.org/oslist
_________________________________________________________________
Explore the seven wonders of the world
http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=7+wonders+world&mkt=en-US&form=QBRE
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.openspacetech.org/pipermail/oslist-openspacetech.org/attachments/20070510/1bdd388d/attachment-0016.htm>