ASM: Awareness Smilie Meditation (☯ Simplified)

Here the ☯ Wisdom Matrix has become extremely simple for you. This is the ☯ Tao of Simplicity and Balance. It doesn't become much simpler than this. If the following seems awfully complicated, it's likely that your brain has disconnected from its own natural root. Please reboot and return to the roots of nature to reflect on the essences and contrasts of life. You would find those ☻~☯~☺ basic smilies in the fabric and cycles of living nature again!

We all know of ☯ Nature's Flow across our ☺ Specifying Days and ☻ Unifying Nights, witnessed in the twin lights of ☺ Enlivening Sun and ☻ Soothing Moon. There rests our center of awareness and today's basic starting point, in here: ◄ ≡ ☺ Sun ≡ ☯ Balance ≡ ☻ Moon ≡ ► and ◄ ≡ ☻ Below ≡ ☯ Middle ≡ ☺ Above ≡ ► ...as they are reflected in countless combinations and variations in our lives.

These two ☻|☺ basic principles combine as the "double-smilies" of the ☻☻|☻☺|☺☻|☺☺ four seasons, four cardinal directions, four brain-lobes and four arch-influences. Then, there are the eight stations of ☻☻☻|☻☻☺|☻☺☻|☻☺☺|☺☻☻|☺☻☺|☺☺☻|☺☺☺ the natural human life-cycle, noted here as "triple-smilies". This is the path of conscious evolution at the foundation of countless natural, spiritual, human and universal models of holistic reconciliation.

☯ LOOKING THROUGH THE BALANCE MIRROR ☯

Let's not make it too complicated, though. There's really only one essential thing to understand and to keep in mind at all times. It is the ◄ ≡ ☻ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☺ ≡ ► natural and balanced center of all things. This simple principle is the ∞ timeless ☯ Middle-Way and the ∞ key of ☯ Mirror Zen. It is experienced as a mindful and joyful liberated presence in the reflective heart of reality. A mirror is like this:

OUTER CENTER OF BALANCE: ◄ ≡ ☺ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☻ ≡ ►

MIDDLE-WORLD OF BALANCE: ◄ ∞ ♥ ∞ ♥ ∞ ♥ ∞ ►

INNER CENTER OF BALANCE: ◄ ≡ ☻ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☺ ≡ ►

This is how you and your brains are naturally connected with the universe. This is an attempt to return to the very basic patterns of your awareness. If you fail to ☺ observe, ☻ understand and ☯ mindfully experience the basic patterns of your conscious mind, it follows that the rest of your mind-stream will become a pot of confusing and conflicted porridge. It's better to keep it ☻ true, ☺ clear and ☯ mindfully ☯ balanced!

☯ HOW THE WHEEL OF BALANCE IS CORRUPTED ☯

The true problems of the world emerge from a foul fountain of cravings and fears. We are fundamentally self-centered, seeking to ☻ take more than we "must" ☺ give. Without ☯ balance in the middle, the whole of humanity suffers from the manipulation of those who pursue lust and greed, orbiting their "my precious" ego-stations. Insatiable greed and pitless selfishness are the decomposing and morbid root of our collective inequality and suffering!

This natural ☯ "Balance of Mirror Mind" principle for naturally ☻ peaceful and ☺ joyful awareness is condensed into a lovely little "heart-string" of symbols, seen quite everywhere, that reads as follows...

◄ ≡ ☺ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☻ ≡ ► ∞ ♥ ∞ ◄ ≡ ☻ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☺ ≡ ►

This simply means that all opposites necessarily orbit a "loving" and reflecting middle-axis of balance. Then, all pairs and opposites should be selflessly united and reconciled in a ☯ Middle-Way of Balance. Here's ◄ ≡ ☺ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☻ ≡ ► one side above; and again ◄ ≡ ☻ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☺ ≡ ► another side below. When you're in the true ☯ middle, there is a vast space of ∞ ♥ ∞ equal love between every natural and universal pair. All is harmonized in the ☯ middle!

◄ ≡ ☻ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☺ ≡ ► ∞ ♥ ∞ ◄ ≡ ☺ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☻ ≡ ►

☯ SIMPLE EXAMPLES OF BALANCE AND BASIC PAIRS ☯

The ☯ Middle-Way of ☯ Balance and ☯ Equality is illustrated in the following examples; and there are many many more... In fact, if you become ☯ mindful and open your ☻|☺ two eyes in unison, not much more will remain to be seen! Everything is connected by a common root of ☯ Balance. When you're faithful to the ☯ Golden Median in all things, ☯ Equality and ☯ Selfless ∞ ♥ ∞ Love are your true companions in ☺ life and ☻ death alike!

☯ THREE BASIC TIMES OF BALANCE ☯

◄ ≡ ☻ Past ≡ ☯ Present ≡ ☺ Future ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Yesterday ≡ ☯ Today ≡ ☺ Tomorrow ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Before ≡ ☯ Now ≡ ☺ After ≡ ►

Instead of hovering in ☻ memories past and ☺ future dreams, seek to be ☯ Present ☯ Today and ☯ Now. There you can focus on the nature, beauty and illuminating essence of wisdom in the passing moments of your experience. When you quit hovering about like a hungry ghost, the simple experience of the ☯ Present instant becomes quite charming in its own right, uprooting the unnatural cravings that consume and clutter your troubled mind.

☯ THREE BASIC PLACES OF BALANCE ☯

◄ ≡ ☻ Below ≡ ☯ Middle ≡ ☺ Above ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Left ≡ ☯ Center ≡ ☺ Right ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Where ≡ ☯ Here ≡ ☺ There ≡ ►

Find your place in the ☯ Middle of the ☯ Center of ☯ Here. Here alone will anything be ever experienced. Whatever may be ☺ ahead or ☻ before you is meaningless without a ☯ mindful center. Always be ☯ Present ☯ Today and ☯ Now in the ☯ Middle of the ☯ Center of ☯ Here! You will surely develop a better attention span and more ☯ mindfulness for the ☯ wisdom that hides both within and right before your ☻|☺ two natural eyes.

☯ THREE BASIC STATES OF BALANCE ☯

◄ ≡ ☺ Beginning ≡ ☯ Middle ≡ ☻ End ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☺ Dynamic ≡ ☯ Quantum ≡ ☻ Static ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☺ Creation ≡ ☯ Continuum ≡ ☻ Destruction ≡ ►

☺ Beginning and ☻ End are only meaningful with a sustaining ☯ Middle that has a duration. ☺ Dynamic and ☻ Static are nothing without a united ☯ Quantum Potential. ☺ Creation and ☻ Destruction are non-existent without a ☯ Continuum of Sustenance. Living ☯ mindfully in the ☯ middle of the ☺|☻ basic potentials of each moment, yours is a ☯ Q-Continuum of harmonic existence in full freedom from self-inflicted friction and grief!

☯ THREE BASIC ETHICS FOR BALANCE ☯

◄ ≡ ☻ Taking ≡ ☯ Balance ≡ ☺ Giving ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Truth ≡ ☯ Healing ≡ ☺ Kindness ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Law ≡ ☯ Reconciliation ≡ ☺ Grace ≡ ►

A lack of ☯ Balance between ☺ Giving and ☻ Taking is a fairly obvious problem. Neither ☻ Truth nor ☺ Kindness are worthy without a ☯ Healing balance. ☻ Law and ☺ Grace are both worthless in absence of ☯ Reconciliation. Again, ☻ Taking should be ☻ Truthful and ☻ Lawful, and ☺ Giving should be ☺ Kind and ☺ Gracious. That's a simple and obvious ethical median for ☯ Balance and ☯ Healing ☯ Reconciliation. ☯ Embrace it!

☯ THREE BASIC DILEMMAS OF BALANCE ☯

◄ ≡ ☻ Question ≡ ☯ Reality ≡ ☺ Answer ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Darkness ≡ ☯ Vision ≡ ☺ Light ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Death ≡ ☯ Living ≡ ☺ Birth ≡ ►

Every ☻ true ☻ question is connected with a ☺ brilliant ☺ answer, because ☯ Reality comes in integral pairs of balance. Neither ☻ Darkness nor ☺ Light alone have the power to give you a ☯ Vision of ☯ Reality! This ☯ Middle-Way is a ☯ Dance of ☯ Living Wisdom between the extremes of the ☻ Shadows of Death and the ☺ Brilliance of Life. The natural flow of the ☯ Tao-Way awakens your infinite ∞ ♥ ∞ heart of ☯ reconciliation!

☯ THREE BASIC PHILOSOPHIES OF BALANCE ☯

◄ ≡ ☻ Seen ≡ ☯ Seer ≡ ☺ Sight ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Matter ≡ ☯ Awareness ≡ ☺ Spirit ≡ ►

◄ ≡ ☻ Truth ≡ ☯ Omni-Axis ≡ ☺ Light ≡ ►

In the purified middle-point of ☻ Seen (darkness) and ☺ Sight (light), there is a translucent ☯ Seer-Witness of liberated awareness in "self-realization". There too is the universal ☯ Mirror of Awareness that reconciles ☻ matter and ☺ spirit. When all things are ☯ mirrored in all things, awareness whirls in cosmic dance with the ☺|☻ Alpha-Omega ☯ Omni-Axis of ☯ Median Bliss... and there unravels the metaphysical mind of perennial mysteries!

☯ TREE OF BALANCE IN THE CENTER OF BEING ☯

Since human beings are rarely satisfied with two basic options, things combine and become quite a bit more complicated. When the ☻ dark and ☺ light smilies combine around the ☯ middle, and where more is required due to ☻ material desire, there follow the double-smilies ☺☺|☺☻|☻☺|☻☻ as four possible combinations, and again the triple-smilies as ☺☺☺|☺☺☻|☺☻☺|☺☻☻|☻☺☺|☻☺☻|☻☻☺|☻☻☻ eight possible combinations.

These patterns are the essence of the Wisdom Matrix, written here in ☻|☺ black-and white smilies. We start at the peak of ☯ Balance and the matrix grows in sets of one, two and three basic combinations. You can write the pattern in both directions; it is mirrored in all ways, because it is one-rooted, symmetric and balanced. Here is the self-evident |☯| Tree of Life, providing fruits and options for every sentient being...

╔═══► ∞☯∞ ► ☻|☺
╠══► ☻☻|☻☺|☺☻|☺☺
╚═► ☻☻☻|☻☻☺|☻☺☻|☻☺☺|☺☻☻|☺☻☺|☺☺☻|☺☺☺

That's a total of 15 basic symbols of awareness to grasp and experience. It's 16 if you count the (∞) infinite space where our smilies of ☺ light and ☻ shadow are floating. We're now at "base-16" of existential balance, sounding all sophisticated with the basic bits of our being. I will write about the double and triple smilies later — but it's all pointless without a ◄ ≡ ☻ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☺ ≡ ► central heart of understanding.

☯ So much for here and today. I am hoping that all of today's writing has been clear and simple enough. I'd be grateful for your feedback on this text on the ☯ Middle-Way of ☯ Balance and ☯ Mindfulness — it will be valuable and much appreciated! If something is unclear, please ask a ☯ mindful ☻ question, and I will ☺ clarify in the ☯ simplest available terms. Thank you for your ☻ true and ☺ kind ☯ reflections!

◄ ≡ ☺ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☻ ≡ ► ∞ ♥ ∞ ◄ ≡ ☻ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☺ ≡ ►

Need more ☯? Please see Ananda Madhya Wisdom Matrix and...

╔═► 11-11: Day of Balance ~ 11-11 FB Page ~ 11-11-11 Event ~ Website
╠══► Living Hobo Wisdom ~ Rock Bottom 4x Balance Median
╚═══► A Holistic System Definition ~ Spirituality and Wisdom Grid

◄ ≡ ☻ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☺ ≡ ► ∞ ♥ ∞ ◄ ≡ ☺ ≡ ☯ ≡ ☻ ≡ ►

...and for those of you who thought this was way too simple and obvious, please move straight on to the ☺☺☺ Sahasrara Celestial Lifecycle Harvester. It's likely that your natural mind is simply waiting for a ☺☺☻:☻☻☺ regenesis impulse for rewiring a lifetime's worth of congested patterns under ☺ Sun and ☻ Moon in ☯ Balance...

Be sure to wear a gold-striped silver foil hat before watching the Tao-Tao blast above...

Metric Soul and Divided Minds & Divinities

"A one-hundredth part of a hair's tip, and again split into hundred,
this fragment is the living self or soul, also conceived of as endless."
(Svetasvatara Upanisad, 5.9)

The following text is drawn and expanded from my reply to a friend's query on the Upanisadic descriptions of the soul being the size of a ten-thousandth of the tip of the hair, and at the same time pervade the body; in general, the diverse depictions of the soul to be of a particular measure can come across as confusing. The second half of the post discusses the greater "divided spirit" issue of God and soul.

Oxymoron of Metric Soul

The soul, if we choose to believe in one that is, being an immaterial spirit-substance, cannot have a scale of comparison with matter. It is no more the size of a proton than it is the size of a hamburger or a Polish truck-driver. It is neither proportionate nor disproportionate to the object it appears to animate, for it has no proportion in common with inanimate matter.

Of course one might compare the soul to a lamp and the pervading of the body to its rays in a room, and that's a rather appropriate analogy as long as we forget about our attempts to pin it out on the metric scale. Both the lamp and the rays are finite objects, as are the individual jiva-soul and his field of awareness; hence the metaphor works in this application.

Technically speaking, the soul pervades and animates the body through the conscious mental functions (citta) filtered through the medium of ahankara conjointly with Antaryamin, the Inner Regulator or the so-called "super-soul" (paramatman). The antaryamin is variously identified as Ishvara (Supreme God) or Atman (Supreme Self) in differing schools of thought.

Atisayokti - Literary Exaggeration

Everything in the scriptures is a mixture of literal and metaphorical. There is svabhavokti or statement (ukti) reflecting or object's own (sva) nature (bhava), and there is atisayokti or excessive (atisaya) statement. All the four standard atisayoktis in the alankara-shastra (e.g. Alankara-kaustubha: 8.23), or the classical Indian corpus of books on  literary composition and criticism, feature departures from the literal or face-value meaning.

The third excessive metaphorical statement, where the impossible is being stated, is the one we are primarily after at the moment, for the soul has no material scale. Therefore, the statement of comparison is an impossibility. The two first atisayoktis are comparisons to other objects (and I suppose taking this as a hyperbolic diminutive would be every bit as valid), the other overt and the other covert, and the fourth features effect as simultaneous with or preceding the cause.

If we were to indeed indeed pursue this literally, as fundamentalists frequently do, we would have to first ask whether this proverbial hair is Afro-American, French or Vedic Indian — perhaps the sage in question split his own hair tip into 10,000 pieces and compared it to his soul, discovering it was an exact match under his microscope? Did he split it with a Vedic hair-splitter? Perhaps everyone's soul is 10,000 tip of their own hair? This again is problematic for men with thinning hair or baldness; their souls must be approaching limbo...

God and Souls - Divided Minds

A related field of paradox is in the supposed division that exists between the Jiva-Atman and the all-pervasive Brahman or ultimate God. From where I look at things, Advaita-vedanta is quite right in insisting that the atman (which is equated in the realization-stage with the brahman although brahman and brahman alone was the atman was all along) cannot be factually divided into individual soul-units, and that the individuality in question is only a temporary illusion rooted in Avidya or primal ignorance. This is naturally solved with the acquisition of Jnana or knowledge proper.

Let us assume the presence of an individual "soul fragment", a separate conscious unit. Fragments by definition cannot have the same quality as an unbreakable whole, for they differ in the quality of being fragmentable. Again, if the great whole can be divided into fragments, a second is thereby posited next to the non-dual, leading to a number of questions on the unique nature of the supposed one and the greatest non-dual spirit proclaimed across the Upanishads.

The Theory of Simultaneous Difference-Nondifference

Gaudiya Vaishnavism proposes an inconceivable symbiotic difference-cum-non-difference solution to the issue under the heading of acintya-bheda-abheda. Aristoteles would insist things either are or are not, for they cannot be both. A follower of Jiva Goswami's would then employ the acintya-shakti defence: You need to believe that God has the power to not make sense to make headway with the dilemma.

All too often, the inconceivability card is a handy answer to each and every equation that doesn't exactly add up because a transcendent object is beyond logical derivation and accessible perception. This leaves me wondering whether this God does not become irrelevant altogether, stretching entirely out of our objective human grasp and contact as he does.

Of course we also have the standard explanation with the shakti-vada and the nonduality between the energy (shakti) and the energetic (shaktiman), the former of which would include all of us and the inanimate world. Not the least of the problems is the fact that shakti-vada has nothing to do with Vedanta and everything to do with the tantric tradition.

Setting aside doctrinal purism and strict Vedanta interpretation for a moment, the tradition of Kashmiri Saivism which is the root of the shakti theory also features an extensive existential grid, in many ways unique, and in many others parallel to the Vedic Sankhya and its model of causal derivation.

All of that notwithstanding, the problem of evidently divided consciousness between us and God remains. I for one do not possess all the knowledge of God, indicating we are clearly separate units of consciousness. There is little practicality to the proposal of the every-day experience of me being one with a personal and actively omniscient God.

Like Sun and Sunshine?

Omniscience indicates a flawless and all-pervading entity or state of being. This one, all-knowing and all-encompassing God is all that is. Shakti cannot be classified as a second separate unit, even as dependent and subordinate, for this would be introducing dualism, the existence of a second beside God; assuming the non-duality of God and creation, one would expect us souls to share of the same pristine strata of undivided and omniscient existence.

The simile of the sun and the sunshine should be understood for what it is: a simile. A simile does not constitute proof in and of itself, it is a manner of illustrating a more abstract principle. The problems we run into applying this to the case at hand are manifold.

The most obvious of all is the fact sun and sunshine do not feature a known conscious property, whether unified or divided; both are mechanical, passive factors incapable of decision-making, unlike soul and god. Independent decision-making and limited or unlimited fields of awareness, in turn, are the very factors begging the question to begin with.

If a simile is employed in illustrating simultaneously one and different consciousness(es), and especially in the capacity of proof, it should be a comparison of strict equals.

A Monistic Angle

There is a very vivid and distinct duality here, indicating we need to either admit to the non-reality of duality and divided consciousness, labeling them as a mere illusion (and moreover an illusion occuring in Brahman with no existence to its occurence), or do away with an undivided and omniscient, yet eeriely antropomorphic God.

Advaita-siddhanta considers Isvara (personal god) to be the most you can see of the nondual absolute through the veil of maya; as ajnana or individual ignorance is dispelled, the ignorance concerning duality is dispelled, and the one atman alone remains aglow. The doctrine of atman then becomes a de-facto doctrine of anatman, for there was no everlasting individual soul to begin with.

Neither duality nor nonduality are entirely satisfactory for a philosophical answer. I don't have an exact answer for the way all stuff works, though I do have some cool ideas I need to explore a bit further. The citta-matram doctrine of the Yogacara-school of Buddhism, the theory of an unified mind-field and repository consciousness or alaya-vijnana, comes across as rather fascinating to me, and also correlates with some of my experiences.

Summa Summarum

My preferred approach to the question, independent of any scriptures, is to conceive of a single mental field in which both the Ishvara and the jivas are fluctuation in greater or smaller degrees. The only factual omniscient potential is in the universal mind-field, an uninvolved, egoless all-containing entirety, where no catalyst (ahankara) for individuality exists; hence seeing without a seer is actualized. The concept appears to make seamless sense to me, independent of conformance to any ancient or contemporary theories.

In the end, fiddling with lofty philosophical formulations amounts to little more than an entertaining mind-game fulfilling our intellectual urges. Otherwise, assumptions of mastery of a theory may help one to comfort himself and bring order into the surrounding chaos, or to command and conquer existence through comprehension.

Nirvana and God remain lurking in the fabric of the harmony, peace, clarity and joy of an independent nature we discover within ourselves through personal experience, introspection and natural immersion. Even if we all have our respective philosophies and mythologies with diverging particulars, it really doesn't matter a damn thing as long as you arrive at the conclusive non-dual One-Zero paradox at the end.


Related satire from Dissociated Press: Hare Krishna Swami Loses Soul - Downtown Helsinki (DP)

Dichotomy of Light and Darkness

Winter solstice, past by a mere moment now, marks the transition from darkness to light, from death to new life. Yet one more cycle in the grand order of nature has rolled its course and revolves anew, the time of renewal is at hand. While the Indians were also very aware of the peaks and transitions in the universal cycles, especially so in the ancient Vedic times, it was in the North where the extremes stated their presence.

Many of you may have been following Uma's series on the old pagan celebration of Yule, the rebirth of Mother Nature, later remodeled into a grand Christian celebration with an eerie abundance of pagan symbols and practices. While the celebration of these transitions of universal reach indeed has its place in the mesocosmic sphere, a natural turn in the human fabric of old, it is not those I write of today. I'm about to dig deeper into the superficiality of the good-evil duality often imposed on worlds of light and darkness.

The Ancient Aryan Divide

The division into good and evil is regrettably not as clear-cut as God versus Lucifer or Christ versus Antichrist, a lesson well learned from the ancient Indian evolution of religion. Vasistha was among the leading Vedic seers, while for the Zoroastrians he was among the villains. While asuras were the bad guys for the Vedic seers, Ahura-Mazda (or Asura-Maya in Sanskrit, a close relative of the Avestan language of the Parsis) was the lead monotheistic deity of the Zend-Avesta scripture.

These two polar religions came to plant the seeds of two very different religious traditions. Zoroaster was a grand-ancestor for the doctrines of a dual god and anti-god, the expectance of a messiah and a linear approach to the cosmic order. The Abrahamic tradition, or Judaism, Christianity and Islam, evolved in a mixture of Zoroastrian ideals and the ongoing evolutions in Egyptian and Middle-Eastern native polytheistic systems.

A whole different branch and orientation of religion, the greater part of which goes under the loose label of Hinduism in the contemporary world, evolved from the root of the ancestry of Vedic seers. Hinduism as we know it is a loose amalgamation of distinct traditions that evolved under shared cultural premises, a most heterogeneous compilation held together with unitarian texts such as the Bhagavad-gita.

The fact that the two religious divides forming the vast majority of the Earth's population is on a deep level divided almost as deep and fundamentally as the grand cosmic order of the ancient cultures is every bit as exciting as it is scaring. It is then little wonder that the Abrahamic dualist heritage has always sought to reform all known cultures and peoples into the faith of the one true savior, one supreme deity and one word of god, or a succession of subsequent revelations in the case of later traditions.

The Indic tradition, on the other hand, unsubscribed from an ontology that assigned them among the evil, in both its root movements. While the direct descendant of the brahmana-tradition, the heritage of the Vedic seers, maintained a sense of duality evident in the legends of the Puranas, it was against a canvas of higher, nondual ideas evolving from the old Upanishads, tense and often asystematic philosophical discourses that sought the deepest essence of the Vedic sacrifical religion. The Sramana tradition, to which the Buddhists and the Jains are the only surviving heirs, sought to eliminate the realm of duality altogether, and in doing that went so far as to do away with the supreme deity himself.

The roots of the ancient good-evil divide appear to lie in an ancient conflict tearing apart a single cultural heritage, a world where the devas and the asuras dwelled together. Mitra and Varuna, a dual deity of whom the latter is well known as an oceanic deity in the Puranic lore, are in fact among the asuras of the Rig-vedic tradition — asuras receiving oblations just as the devas did. The details of the evolution effectively reduce the concept of an absolute, primordial divide into a partition much more complicated and human, into the internal disagreements of an ancient sacrificial, fire-worshiping culture.

Powers of Light and Darkness

Neither light nor darkness possess inherent ethical value; they are neutral potentials reposed in their own nature. As darkness clouds, creates mystery and brings towards unity, light unveils, explains and exposes a vast arena of plurality prior to growing so bright as to grow all-engulfing, thereby becoming essentially one with darkness again, a field of a single, undivided nature containing all of reality in its ever-vibrant lap. (Udesidning: An ancient Nordic way of integration in darkness.)

Nothing is good or evil of its own nature; all depends on the application, and moreover the applier. Magic is neither good nor evil owing to its technical procedure of conjuration, whether born of light or darkness, white or black. The divider of good and evil is in the human choice between benevolence and malevolence, between sacrificing and feeding the egotic drive consuming its objects to grow stronger.

A transcender of duality wields light and darkness with equal might, regardless of his preference, a preference that in its fundamental essence is only a latent sensation of the past, a game or an amusement of sorts, unbinding to the player who has ascended from a participancy to entertained spectatorship. Having seen the pinnacles of light and darkness under the ancient egotic drive, one evolves into a seer of non-duality, experiencing the inherent voidness of reality as we know it.

With the diffusion of apparent essence and substance into ethereal streams, one transcends stereotypic moral assessments and dwells in a lasting perception of inherent and foundational unity, even while an adept conventionalist as needed in the common world. The art of life has now been mastered.

The Old Pagan Approach

While the philosophical sophistication of Indic traditions is often lacking in ancient native religions, they do an amicable job in the practical transcendence of duality in living in a seamless harmony with nature and gods in their own world of mythos. In fact, many ancient native traditions supersede the seclusion-seeking Indic mystics in their ability to interact with plurality in a state of active integration, perhaps with a flavor of the smooth and flowing natural Tao of the Chinese — a quality I've always been in tremendous awe of!

The action-in-knowledge tradition also found its exponents among the Buddhists with the gradual evolution of Buddhism first into Mahayana, and onwards into an admixture with the tantric tradition especially prominent in Tibet. In the Tibetan model, Hinayana and Mahayana, or the lesser and the greater vehicles, are stepping stones into the highest dimension of vajra-sattva, the lightning-strata, where one becomes a wielder of cosmic powers, conquering and subjugating the energetic release produced in the meeting of the fundamental dualities of nature, the energetic bases of archetypal male and female energy, personified as the man and the woman of the human world.

Transcending and mastering the fundamental fabric of existence, the conscious being evolves into a god-like state of integration with the flow of the cosmos, unveiling the infinite peace and inner ecstasy ever-present in the ultimate non-dual god-experience. Consciousness employs a third strata beyond light and darkness, the infinite halls of existence itself. Night turns into a day and day yet again into a night. Winter falls over the fertile summer fields, spring awakens Mother Nature to life anew. Light and darkness rise and fall time and again of their own accord; the wheel of existence revolves forevermore.

The Lady's Bluebells

whence cometh the shining,
whence cometh the silent midnight breeze?
whence cometh the heaven's comets,
whence the prophet's tale of god?

thence, my lady, come the seeds of love and grace
thence the bluebells, tender, sweet and soft
thence the wonders, sparks of mother great divine
thence the pixie dust, ambrosial rains of heaven's flavor

whence cometh the shadows,
whence cometh the berserk, savage rage?
whence cometh the lords of pandemonium,
whence the darkness of the human mind?

thence, my lady, grow the roots of fear and terror
thence the eerie shrieks of darkest night
thence the devils, rays of samael the dark
thence the night of devastation, wrath and fury of demise.

Chaos and Logos

A sudden and inexplicable burst of madness led me to decorate my left arm with a tattoo at Grasshopper Studio in Thamel, Kathmandu, owned by a friend of mine going by the name Bikash. The ink runs as follows:


The joint symbols of infinity / logos / emptiness / light / wisdom and space / chaos / form / darkness / ignorance, linked to each other by a bubble of cosmic mystery, are a symbolic caption of the fundamentals of our existence.

Drawing from the concept I drafted together one foggy evening at Om Tara, Bikash did a few touches and tweaks, arriving at the final product shown above.

* Bom Shankara, Baba Bolenath, Hara Hara Hara Mahadev *

Bheda-abheda - Duality and Unity

Posted 26th of May, 2008 @ Vraja Journal.

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One of my gripes for a good while, even while amidst the official Gaudiya Vaishnava ranks, was with the extent to which the advaita-aspect was underexposed. Of course, in an environment where any sense of ultimate non-duality is regarded as an offense unto the personal deity, and where even acceptable non-dual concepts are relegated to the lowest rung of god-relationship, there is little to do in the way of balancing the presentation.

For all practical purposes, Gaudiya Vaishnavism subscribes to dvaita-vada — regardless of doctrinal nuances hidden away in the dusty pages of books unread by most practitioners, obscure references a scholar might point to. It goes without saying that thorough, systematic and sensible explanations of acintya bheda-abheda-tattva are hard to come by. The possibilities of advaitic realization hidden in the more esoteric practices of this hybrid vedanto-tantric tradition, in the attainment of unity of nature and awareness with the shakti-aspect of the universal duo, go either overlooked or wholly unobserved.

Dvaita generates bhakti, owing to the fundamental emphasis of the lasting separation between the servant and the served. Advaita generates mukti, owing to the integrated experience of unity it generates, dissolving the triputi of the seer, the sight and the seen, eliminating any sense of fundamental reality that could be attributed to either the objects or the enjoyer-self.

In absence of self-integration and dissolution of barriers between the individual and the universe, the dvaita-solution to craving, and very pointedly so in the raganuga-tradition, is the imposition of a greater craving, indeed an all-consuming craving, that overshadows non-deity-centered sensual and mental cravings. With this, however, the problem of craving has never actually been properly dealt with and dissolved. It has merely been suppressed.

Gaudiya Vaisnavas could benefit a great deal from integrating wisdom-contemplation into their routine practice. On the Buddhist side of generating wisdom there are numerous vipassana-techniques of meditation, and on the Advaita-side the classical tripartite jnana-yoga-sadhana of sravana-manana-nididhyasana, which seem to me to carry the same essential impact when put into practice.

Dhammam ehipassikam — the laws of liberation and the principles of practice exhort you to personally observe their reality through experiment and experience. Observe the short-term and long-term results of your devotional practices on one hand, and knowledge-wisdom-rooted contemplations on the other hand, and mold your ongoing practice on the basis of your direct experience of the utility of the diverse methods, rather than clinging to a certain set of practices on the mere merit of their supposed orthodoxy.