The deathbed exercise… death nearing focuses the mind

The deathbed exercise… death nearing focuses the mind

There is a step in the 67 step program that wants you to look at what would be your obituary if you died today.

But there is a much better test, the test:

imagining yourself being on your deathbed: a thought exercise.

Until today I’d thought that what it drives up is all the things you haven’t done, all the things that are important and maybe you can do now… tell people you love them, and other trite things like that.

But today of all days I had an insight.

The insight came because I was trying to figure out what is in common in people who do the 67-step program well, and people who rush through it, skim the surface.

I was trying to categorize them, but I could not see any consistency.

While I was looking, I asked consciousness to look for me too. Continue reading “The deathbed exercise… death nearing focuses the mind”

Osho on the pathless path to enlightenment

Osho on the pathless path to enlightenment

THE ANCIENTS SAID:

“(SELF-)CULTIVATION TAKES AN UNIMAGINABLE TIME (WHILE) ENLIGHTENMENT IN AN INSTANT IS ATTAINED.”

IF THE TRAINING IS EFFICIENT, ENLIGHTENMENT WILL BE ATTAINED IN ONE FINGERSNAP.

IN DAYS GONE BY CH’AN MASTER HUI CHUEH OF LANG YEH MOUNTAIN, HAD A DISCIPLE WHO CALLED ON HIM FOR INSTRUCTION. THE MASTER TAUGHT HER TO EXAMINE INTO THE SENTENCE: “TAKE NO NOTICE.”

SHE FOLLOWED HIS INSTRUCTION STRICTLY WITHOUT BACKSLIDING.

ONE DAY HER HOUSE CAUGHT FIRE, BUT SHE SAID: “TAKE NO NOTICE.”

ANOTHER DAY, HER SON FELL INTO THE WATER AND WHEN A BYSTANDER CALLED HER, SHE SAID: “TAKE NO NOTICE.”

SHE OBSERVED EXACTLY HER MASTER’S INSTRUCTION BY LAYING DOWN ALL CASUAL THOUGHTS.
Continue reading “Osho on the pathless path to enlightenment”

Do you have an integrated life or a bunch of things you do?

integrated-lifeOne step in the 67 step program is to look what area of life isn’t integrated into your life… At first I could not think of anything, but then I had an insight: I started to look at what doesn’t get done… and I saw that anything that is not integrated into my life… doesn’t get done… or if it is, it’s a chore, drudgery.

cleaning, throwing stuff away, etc.

Why? Because your life has a purpose, probably hidden from your view. And that is your life, the life you want. The life you consider life, living… And everything else is death…

So before you integrate anything into your life, you need to be clear what your life is about.

If it is about doing what you want when you want it, then you’ll end up with a few minutes a day, at best, or life, and everything else is drudgery.

If your life is about pleasure: maybe a few more minutes, but the rest of it is drudgery, death.

My life is about causing humanity’s evolution to human being level: my work. My life, luckily, includes sleep as well. And brushing my teeth. And buying grocery, eating, reading, going to the chiropractor.
Continue reading “Do you have an integrated life or a bunch of things you do?”

Frustration… or pushing on a string

bang head hereMy dominant emotion is frustration.

Of course frustration lacks humility… frustration is when you are trying to force your will on reality.

things take as long as they do, people do whatever they do, and you’ll screw up, like everybody else.

But, of course, my soul correction is Forget Thyself… meaning allow life to unfold.

That, allowing anything, is the hardest thing for a human… And allowing and yet feeling powerful is even rarer.

We want to make things happen, rush things along, push, pull… and yell in frustration.
Continue reading “Frustration… or pushing on a string”

If nothing has worked for you… you are still as stuck as ever

If nothing has worked for you… you are still as stuck as ever

Let’s look at the role of discovery in growth… your growth… if there is no growth, there has been no discovery.

All the steps of the 67 steps program are nudges for you to discover something that you haven’t seen.

Of course, like with everything, your tendency is to go to your head for the answers, and not look at all outside of your head.

The step (Step 5) where the homework is to list what you see about poor people and rich people is a great step to show your relationship to growth.

If you think you are rich, you go and tell me how what you do, how you think, how you feel is the way to be rich. No looking, no discovery.
Continue reading “If nothing has worked for you… you are still as stuck as ever”

Sometimes it’s hard to see past the trouble in front of you

Thoreau_what-mattersSometimes it’s hard to see past the trouble in front of you

I heard this sentence in a Netflix film… and wrote it down quickly. 1

Anything that threatens your well-being, anything that threatens your reputation, anything that threatens your self-image shows up as trouble, and fixates your view, in an ever narrowing way on the threat. And you stare at it, and see it with the exclusion of everything else.

The challenge is to just look, and allow the urge to do something, to run, to say something, to explain, justify, fix, to just be there…

When you can do that, when you can just look, you are able to bring conscious awareness to what you see.
Continue reading “Sometimes it’s hard to see past the trouble in front of you”

Would you come to my funeral if I died?

funeral-test-2I am a little under the weather.

It’s not a cold… it’s more like… let me tell you what happened.

As you know I put myself into this daily wakeup call, daily “knock you conscious” program, the 67 steps.

This past week, I don’t remember which day, the question was: how many people will be at your funeral when you die? Or that is what I heard.

I think it was more like: Have you passed the funeral test… anyway, I have been dealing with that question. Not well.

I am a hermit. The few people I actually know, would not come to my funeral… probably would not even know about.

So if I needed to measure the value of my life in passing the funeral test, I have all the reason to get depressed.
Continue reading “Would you come to my funeral if I died?”

How to become worth a damn?

how to become worth a damnCan someone who listens to an audio, watches a video, reads a book, or even comes to one of my workshops, change?

Long sentence, eh? The answer to this question is this: it depends.

NO input can cause change by itself. The change comes from trying to apply what you read to yourself. Even if the application is just answering one question that requires you to look.

I am finding, that the program I so love, the 67 steps, is completely and absolutely wasted on you, unless you do the looking it takes to answer the one or two or three questions that come with each session.

Why? Because looking, attempting to answer the question, causes a state change. 2 The state inside which you listen is: I agree, I like it, I knew that, interesting, etc. Narrow cone of vision. Sitting in what you already know… undisturbed, untested. Sitting in who you already know yourself to be… undisturbed, untested.

Attempting to look to answer the question from your own life is where the magic happens. When you have to widen your cone of vision to include what you never look at.

It is happening to me in spades. I am at segment 19… Continue reading “How to become worth a damn?”

How can you get to do what you most love to do for a living?

do-for-work-what-you-love-to-doI had today, being Sunday, my Sunday call, the one I’ve had for 9 years now.

We’ve spoken about a lot of things. One of them will be of special relevance to you.

That is, why people want to change.

It all came out of both of us watching the first few sessions of the 67 steps, excellent, by the way. But what’s most interesting is that what he is getting out of it, and what I am getting out of those sessions, the 67 steps, are so different: it is hard to believe that we are talking about the same program.

The biggest issue the program brings up is deserving. And I think that is the biggest issue, the biggest missing issue for almost anyone I know, except professional marketers.
Continue reading “How can you get to do what you most love to do for a living?”

Powerful, powerless… how can you tell?

being-an-adult or being a sissyI have been getting attachments. I am noticing, they come mostly on the weekends.

So the sender or senders are working slobs… and tormenting people is their hobby.

They are, I think, using voodooo techniques: making a model of me, and pushing pins in the model.

The reason I think it is a voodoo doll, because they are getting very precise, whereas a healer who intends to heal, is very sloppy, otherwise why would they connect to another they intend to heal in their eyes, throat, of sinuses… would make no sense.

So yesterday I had four attachments on my head, in a straight line, like a mohawk head dress, and by this morning they added a fifth, smack in my Tangerine Spot.

I must be standing in the vertical dimension, because there is no anger, no anguish, no fear, no hurry… nothing. Just headache.

Now, I am sharing this for two reasons:
Continue reading “Powerful, powerless… how can you tell?”