Be Well

Bhutanese Rinpoche sees well-being through Totality

I love this excerpt from the chapter on Bhutan in The Geography of Bliss: One Grump's Search for the Happiest Places in the World by Eric Weiner.

The Rinpoche gives away the "secret" when he mentions Totality.  That's exactly it. Totality is what I mean when I say "Drop into no-mind." In Totality, there isn't illusion of imbalances and polarities and there is no 'patient' out there and no 'me.' Totality! That recognition alone heals the perception of unwholeness, which doesn't exist. 

The Rinpoche's description is how I approach it as well: Drop into no-mind (i.e. rest in Awareness), and know that one seeking healing is immaculate and whole--just as Infinite created. That takes about two minutes tops--who knows it is Timeless. Obviously the 'trick' is knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt (and not about the wording) what is true... and yes, I was originally influenced by A Course in Miracles where healing means seeing beyond (or I see it as below) appearances of the overlay of disease, decay and death to the underlying Wholeness that is undying, unborn.

Okay, now the excerpt:

I ask him to explain what is actually happening in a healing, what is going on in his head. "I am concentrating on a deity, not the Buddha, but the totality deity. It's like a reflection in the mirror. We dissolve, the deity and me, and we become one."

A middle-aged woman enters the room. She has a giant sore on one leg, which she props up on a bench. The Rinpoche, eyes closed tightly, chanting, blows in the direction of her leg. Then he gives her water, which she swishes in her mouth. He is still chanting when she places her offering, apples and biscuits, on the altar.

I am again alone with the Rinpoche. He opens his eyes. "You know, for these people I am a last resort. First, they prefer hospitals and the highest technology. They go to hospitals in Bangkok and America. Then, they come to me." He tells me the woman with the swollen leg used to be much worse before she started seeing him. "You see, I have to experience my own actions, if not in this life then the next," he says enigmatically. I'm about to ask him what he means by this when I hear a strange chiming sound. I've never heard anything quite like it. It's coming from the altar, near the Rinpoche's feet, and it's getting louder every second.

"Sorry," he says, reaching down and switching off his cellphone. "Where were we?"

"You were talking about experiencing your own actions."

He tells me a story. It's about a man who referred to his servant as a monkey--"Get me some tea, you monkey; take out the trash, monkey." In the next life, the man was reborn as--you guessed it--a monkey.

I like the story, but I'm not sure what it means beyond the obvious point that we reap what we sow. I decide to broach a sensitive subject. I ask the Rinpoche if he has any doubts about this healing business.

"No, I don't. I have helped thousands of people. I helped and that has brought me true joy and happiness." I'm jotting down his comments in my small black notebook when he looks at me and says, "You are always writing, writing in your notebook. You need to experience. Really experience." I'm getting every word--"always writing... need to experience"--when the irony dawns on me. I stop writing and look up. I mumble something lame about old habits dying hard.

"You see, everything is a dream. Nothing is real. You will realize that one day." Then he laughs and returns to his quiet chanting.

awakening to the Self that is everything is nothing is whole

"It was the second day of the conference. For several hours Laura had been singing a childhood hymn, repeating it over and over. Suddenly the quality of her singing changed. She felt as though she were no longer singing. She was the song. She found herself lifted to her feet, her arms raised toward the sky, her head arched upward. She said her hands did not end at her fingertips, but continued into the air and sky. The air and sky were alive, and she and they were the same. Her feet seemed to disappear into the earth. Earth, feet, body, arms, sky, song, singer – all were one living being. Laura did not consider what was happening, it just took her. She was the experience.

"The next day her terminal liver cancer was gone. The grapefruit sized bowel metastasis that she had supported with her hand was gone. Three days later she realized that for the first time in thirty-eight years she hadn’t taken her daily insulin injections. In the ensuing weeks, all the secondary complications of her diabetes and cancer – kidney failure, fluid in her lungs, tumor-ridden lymph nodes, partial blindness, loss of sensation her hands and feet, addiction to pain medication – healed. Even a few recently broken toes were completely mended within days. She was radiant; a palpable presence poured from her body like a gentle flame and the whole understanding of her life was radically transformed.

... Laura was spontaneously awakened to what might be called her fundamental nature, a condition in which her cancer and diabetes were not the final reality. For most of her life she had identified herself as diseased, and in recent years as a person dying of cancer. Suddenly she saw this perception was a fiction. All her urgent efforts and her desire for health were an outgrowth of that fiction. The woman who was dying was not who she really was. The woman who wanted to live was equally unreal. For a little while, she experienced herself as pure Consciousness, and that realization transformed her.

... underlying all we do and are, there is a timeless, causeless dimension.

... To our ordinary awareness the world is full of disease and wrongness, but in the state of Realization we see that every individual, no matter what the circumstances, is already perfectly whole." --  from Richard M. Moss M.D., The Black Butterfly: An Invitation to Radical Aliveness

p.s. Listen to the  immaculate singer, Jackie Evancho.

imagination takes healing beyond appearances of the past moment...

I picked up a fictionalized version of Buddha's life story written by Deepak Chopra recently. Here's an example of imagination/healing. Hard to tell the difference, really. Imagination? Or healing? Or is it simply acknowledging Creation as it is--Whole:

"The new Buddha arose, adjusted his saffron robe, and began walking toward the road, the same road as on a thousand other days. Once he reached the road, he found it completely empty, even though the time was early morning, when farmers' carts should have been trundling to market. . . .

Buddha could be completely alone in the world. Why not? It was his world to do with as he pleased. He was the one dreaming it. . . .

His powers flowed from the other side of silence, where the mind can make anything happen. For a little while the new Buddha enjoyed himself, pulling the sun through the sky like a toy cart, swirling the winds around on the poles, shedding rain on a parched desert. This private diversion didn't last long. Buddha's world should have people in it whom he could care for. He recalled what Canki had said about a Golden Age--an age without suffering, where abundance was normal and scarcity forgotten in the dim past.

At that moment his vision was shattered by a scream. He saw a woman running toward him, her sari torn to shreds, her arms bleeding. In her panic the woman was blind to Buddha's existence until she was nearly upon him. Then her eyes registered him standing there, still and calm.

With a cry she rushed to throw herself into his arms, overwhelmed with relief. When she was two steps away, he held his hand up in blessing. The woman stopped in her tracks. She quivered with terror, her breast heaving.

"No more fear," Buddha whispered. "Give it to me."

She dropped to the road as if her body had melted and began to weep.

"All," said Buddha. "Give it all to me."

The woman became very still, the crying had stopped. Buddha erased the images of terror from her mind. He saw a knife. Teeth like fangs. A necklace made of severed fingers. The images were nightmarish. With the slightest touch, he made them go vanish. But one image wouldn't melt away--the body of her dead husband. He lay in the dust of the road, his throat slashed.

The woman was touching Buddha's feet now in supplication. Something inside of her knew who he was. She gazed at him through her eyes and said, "Please."

Buddha stopped himself from consoling her. He lifted the woman's head and met her gaze. "It is done," he said. She shuddered and fainted. After a moment, as Buddha stood motionless, a man rounded the corner driving an ox cart. Her husband. Buddha gestured for him to approach, and he sped up. Seeing his wife on the ground, the husband jumped down in alarm.

"What happened?" he cried.

"It will be alright. Let's put her in the cart." The two of them gently laid her in the straw behind the driver's seat. The husband had some fresh water in a goatskin bag; he wanted to splash it on her to reassure himself that she was all right. Buddha stopped his hand. "Let her wake up on her own. She may be surprised to see you, but calm her with loving words. You understand?"

The farmer nodded. By imagining the farmer alive and well again, he had erased the whole attack."

Hope and fear are both phantoms 
that arise from thinking of the self. 
When we don't see the self as self, 
what do we have to fear? See the world as your self. 
Have faith in the way things are. 
Love the world as your self; 
then you can care for all things. - Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

the world is whole...

“You don’t build a world that’s whole, because the world is whole. You just notice that.” - Adyashanti

Clean up the Gulf in you... a four-week online workshop on Ho'oponopono and the joie de vivre

CLEAN UP THE GULF IN YOU: Ho'oponopono and the Joie de Vivre
A four-week online workshop, accompanied by peer group email -- plus, private, one-on-one email consultations.

Join us August 29, 2010 (five-year anniversary of Katrina). (New classes starting every Sunday thereafter through October 17th, 2010.)

Consistently, and full-time, applying my own twist on a healing technique known as Ho'oponopono since 2002, I'd like to share these publicly for the first time. Essentially we will deeply delve into the hypothesis that everything "out there" is our own reflection "in here." In so doing, we will tap into inner and outer resources for joy and self-acceptance that will simultaneously heal the oil spill in the ocean.

We will work with symbols and archetypes represented in our individual current day-to-day situations as the prima materia in the alchemical transmutation of disease and decay into coherence and communion. For instance, oil represents the blood of the Earth, and the ocean waters the emotional body of the Earth. According to  Lise Bourbeau and others, blood disorders contain the symbolic message: "It may be that you have lost your joie de vivre because of a profound sense of something lacking."  A seeping oil leak represents vitality, joy, and life essence seeping out rather than robustly circulating life nourishment. Thus, we are being handed a solemn, collective yet intrinsically individualized message to live vitally.

In addition to personal reflection that the Gulf oil spill offers us as a profound opportunity to clear the past and embrace the present, each week we'll tailor the class to the specific ailments, illnesses, and stresses that are reflected symbolically in your very own life, and that of your inner circle of family and friends to pinpoint what and where we clean and clear now.

These techniques will teach you to self-liberate from any healthcare system, in the words of "Healer, heal thyself." (I was guided to these techniques over the course of several years, when I could no longer afford health insurance, or psychotherapy.)

About Evelyn Rodriguez: After a harrowing "vacation" in which she survived the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami that killed 300,000 people, she threw herself wholeheartedly into an experiment with post-traumatic growth as an alternative to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). On the beach immediately after the tsunami as she lay with a tourniquet around her left knee, she made a silent vow to attend to absolute Truth 100% full-time. She has not "worked" in any traditional, nor paid, manner since--devoting herself to the "invisble" work of healing and imagining the harmony of the world--beginning with herself.

One year later, she returned to the tsunami-ravaged coasts of Thailand and Sri Lanka for nine weeks to listen, share and navigate with fellow survivors how the event had changed them. In 2005, she co-founded a weekly "Daring to Live an Authentic Life" spiritual peer-group that met for three years. She discovered (re-covered) an "ordinary rapture" that is eternally available in 2006, where even a pauper's diet of tea and toast can became the quintessential feast when seen through fresh eyes.

In 2008, Evelyn relocated to post-Katrina New Orleans. She was in New Orleans on April 20, 2010 when the British Petroleum oil well exploded. She meditated at the Mississippi River, typically by the steps of the Moonwalk, every two to three days for the next month. She accepted that she allowed much conditioning and resistance since the 2006 awakening to "ordinary rapture" to dim the natural joie de vivre spark to a flicker. This summer she was hit with the epiphany of the blood of the earth symbolism and her/our responsibility for cleaning up the gulf. She continues to privately bless water, do Ho'oponopono, and recently facilitated a Gulf water blessing for the New York City chapter of Evolver.net on July 21, 2010.

As a "responsible" (a tenet of ho'oponopono) member of the universe, she is called to offer this course to those that are equally called to commit to clearing all barriers to living joyfully moment-to-moment.

BONUS: The workshop will also incorporate and derive from direct application of the following work and teachings: Carl Jung's shadow work and projection theories, The Work by Bryon Katie, Messages From Water by Dr. Masuro Emoto, The Energy of Prayer by Thich Nhat Hanh, Eckhart Tolle's pain body techniques, "Harmonization" as outlined in Emptiness Dancing chapter by Adyashanti, Lise Bourbeau, Louise Hay, A Course in Miracles, and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction. (No additional books or reference materials will need to be purchased. Everything needed for the workshop is provided in the online materials.) 

Pricing: Sliding scale from $79 to $199 per person. If you wish to sponsor a Gulf Coast resident to take this class for free, simply ADD an additional $20 to your contribution (and signify your sponsorship in the notes). If you would like to be on the waiting list as a Gulf Coast attendee, please email me or comment below. Checks accepted at: Evelyn Rodriguez, 415 Wilson Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11221.

Sliding Scale Fees

Workshop - starting scale $79.00 Workshop $99.00 Workshop $129.00 Workshop $149.00 Workshop $169.00 Workshop - end Scale $199.00

 

Nita Edwards: She could see herself whole.

For a very long time, I've tried to keep my "faith" (for lack of better word, perhaps "knowing" is closer) a secret. It works up to some extent until lately it's been evident by circumstances in my life that it is not going to work to stay hidden. So, yesterday, as I pass the Iron Rail Collective I randomly walk in and pick up a free book. It's about a young girl whom has a random accident and finds herself rather quickly dying of myelitis, a creeping paralysis that eventually seizes the heart and lungs too.

I don't want you to think this blog is about evangelism. It is about wholeness, and that is ultimately what Mark Buntain's "Miracle in the Mirror" is about. In the true tale, Nita the crippled girl is exasperated by a pastor whom continues to pray for her and visit her: "But if he wanted to believe, that was his business. He would learn soon enough that her case was hopeless."

It is much later in the book where she is instanteously healed. The key was certainty -- "She could see herself whole."

"She could see it already in her mind's eye. She could see the gnarled fingers and toes straightening. She could see her hands growing strong and healthy. She could see these miserable skinny legs filling out and straightening. She could see the bloated stomach shrinking to its normal size. She could hear her voice returning. She could see her vision coming back. She could see movement. She could see herself walking.

She could see herself whole.

It was no problem to see it all. It required no imagination, no mental talent. She was very sure."

Paul Levy: shaman allows themselves to be "dreamed up" in and of and by The field... arching to balance

From Paul Levy "We Are All Shamans in Training":

"A fully cooked shaman, in internalizing the illness in the field, allows the sickness to fluidly move through them without getting stuck in them, which is the mark that distinguishes an accomplished shaman from a novice.

By embracing, assimilating, and metabolizing what has gotten triggered in them, however, the shaman is able to heal themselves and in so doing non-locally sends healing to the whole “community.”

... An accomplished shaman... allows themselves to be “dreamed up” by whatever the situation in the field requires so as to help the field to get back into balance and harmonize."

Reminds me of my favorite chapter in Adyashanti's Emptiness Dancing: Harmonization.

art credits: Dream of the Shaman, by AlicePopkorn.

Healing is...

"As Warren, one of my teachers, said, Healing is not something you do--its something you are." - from Froud Oracle card, Singer of Healing

 

art credits: Mossy Dryad Girl, by PlastikStars

The Velveteen Rabbit: "Now you shall be Real to every one."

"Wasn't I Real before?" asked the little Rabbit.

"You were Real to the Boy," the Fairy said, "because he loved you. Now you shall be Real to every one."

Read The Velveteen Rabbit (complete tale available online).

Yes, throughout the story, you may substitute Healed for Real, and vice-versa.

Not sure everyone would agree, but I found reading the story as a adult the other day to be a powerful parable of The Real, Enlightenment, Ascension, Transfiguration and much more.

If you desire any type of healing, please fill out the request.

art credits: "When I Am Reborn", by jandruff

mother-goddess blue-starfish "...we should begin to wonder if perhaps we were created for another world" - C.S. Lewis

If we discover a desire within us that nothing in this world can satisfy, also we should begin to wonder if perhaps we were created for another world. - C.S. Lewis

I am in this world but not of it.

A few days ago, a geographically distant friend confided he had had a dream where I was a mother-goddess from a foreign world. I explained that all dream characters are really facets of ourselves - most often a facet wishing expression at this time.

It was a message both for "him" and for "me" as ultimately we reflect each other.

He said that the foreign species came to "reclaim her [their mother goddess] because they need her guidance and wisdom" which I immediately interpreted to mean that we're collectively reclaiming the mother goddess within and balancing the polarities of masculine/feminine, light/dark, formless/form or whatever terminologies we wish to use.

"You were busy stirring a pot of some sort of magical concoction. And when I looked at your back the blue starfish symbol appeared," my friend wrote.

"In Christian symbolism the Starfish represents the Virgin Mary (Stella Maris which means Star of the Sea) who lovingly creates safe travel over troubled waters and is also seen as an emblem of salvation during trying times. The star as well as the Starfish are seen as celestial symbols and as such, they represent infinite divine love. In addition to love, the Starfish also holds characteristics such as guidance, vigilance, inspiration, brilliance and intuition." - from Animal Love Symbols and Their Meanings, by Avia Venefica

If you desire any type of healing, please fill out the request.

art credits: Blue Sea Star, or Starfish by toastforbrekkie.