Re: one question for today - Andy

[Guest guest]

Dear Rosemarie.

You wrote, (So, that says that I need TIME to understand that

there is NO TIME .... crazy ...:-) !!!!)

*****There is TIME. But only *now*. Now. NOW. It's really, really

important to see that, to grasp it AND its ramifications. Just that

much insight will make a very profound shift in how life is held, is

lived. There is ONLY " now. "

" NOW " you can turn on the television.

" NOW " you can scratch your ass.

" NOW " you can embrace your lover.

" NOW " you can hit the DEL key and end this dialogue. (You really

CAN'T do this in the past, can you?...hit the DEL key? Nor can it be

done in the future either. Can you SEE that? Can you SEE

how " time " -- other than N.O.W. -- as we normally conceive it, is an

abstraction, and thinking it is " real, " is as much a confusion as

looking at a map of France and thinking " Oh, so that's where France

is, that's what it looks like! " LoL)

Everything else is the dream of the ego, a collection of thoughts

(past tense of the infinitive verb " to think " ).

Whatever happens, happens N.O.W. never any other " time. "

Well, but there is one question -

so let me ask just this one of you, today:

What does the *thought* " There is no past, nothing ever has

existed except the present moment " mean to you personnally ?

*****I don't know how to answer that. It's like asking me, " What

does it mean to me personally that the sky is above me and the ground

is beneath me? " No, seriously. " Mean " to me. It's what IS. That's

all. It is evident. That's all. All the other stuff that used to

be of concern, what was, what will be, ... has as much realness as

the tooth fairy or Saddam's WMDs. If you dwell (in thought) about

the past, you miss the one very real, very alive, very vibrant, very

miraculous moment you have to live your life: N.O.W. Ditto if you

submerge yourself in worries and concerns about the future. Of

course the dwelling on the past and the worrying about the future are

occuring " N.O.W. " also, since that is the only time they can occur.

But in the process of being swept up by such mind-events, what is

going on right in front of your sweet nose is missed.

It's like you're walking along a path, see a bright, red rose,

beginning feeling really nice and warm about right now, then there

arises a memory of other roses, other times in the past when roses

were associated with some painful event. Now, all of sudden, the

warm glowing feeling which was arising is replaced by the

recollection of the pain born in the past. Sure, that pain

happened. But not to you.

Does it give you a feeling of calm and comfort ?

*****It can. But it primarily functions like all Advaita pointers:

it cuts off the horizontal involvement in the mental gymnastics, the

cognating psychodrama which generates all the hoopla. It is a clear

reminder of what is, and what is not. Sometimes that is calming and

comforting. But not always, however. I know of nothing that is

calming and comforting always (except, perhaps, being in a coma,

which it seems to me is how some mindbody mechanisms operate).