The Craft Of The Wise

[Rev. Magus Adam]

True Zen comes from the no-minds of Gautam & Lao Tsu, Bodhidharma making the connect when he went from India to China.

There really is no Zen Buddhism, cause religion is of the mind, and Zen means beyond mind. There is no philosophy cause philosophy is of the mind.

Was Jesus a Christian? Was Gautam a Buddhist? Seems the students make the religions after the Master is gone.

"Mind is only thought...Take away thought, where is mind?"

The reason Zen is suited to combat is that combat is a NOW thing...Every thought is of past or future. There is no time for thought in combat. The mind is of no use NOW.

Ever been in a car wreck? Happens fast, we usually don't remember the details.

In sword play, as all martial arts, the training 'speaks' for itself. There is no thought.

If you touch something very hot, do you have to think about moving away from the heat?

If a weapon is fast approaching your sphere of energy...No time for thought!

This is what Gautam and Lao Tsu discovered. If you shut off the chattering mind, truth remains. And your training remains, in Martial and other Arts.

Thought is the 'dust on the mirror' that clouds our vision. No matter how Grand the thoughts...still dust clouding our vision.

Tibetan Buddhism says;

1. Truth IS.

2. Mind is the barrier(dust).

3. No-mind is the door.

Why do we need to invent stuff. We must be careful...Like Edgar Cayce said, "Mind is the maker." Isn't our Truth, our connection to each other, our Love, enough?

If you shut off the mind, Truth is not gone. It is what's still 't/here'.

"Nothing real can be threatened,

Nothing unreal exists.

Herein lies the Peace of God."

Gautam said;

'The fletcher whittles his arrows,

The farmer tills his fields,

The wise direct their mind."

Maybe we can direct our mind AS we till the field, and whittle the arrows!

"A thought is the smallest particle in the universe...Also the largest, cause the universe is made of it."

Namaste

Samdhi...

[Himitsuko]

I am intrigued that lawyer implied that living in the Now allows the spirit to wait patiently prepared for those things which life will bring us. Much of the lives that people lead are based in personal perception. Two people may have very different ideas of what is real and valid and what is not and one of the early lessons in the practice of Witchcraft is to understand that the world we percieve exists, in large portion, only in our individual imaginations. This is not to say that true facts are not available to us, or that there is no physical world with which to reckon, but once we realize that much of our percieved reality is based not only on our observations which can be flawed, but also our own interpretations and the prior interpretations of others, then we see that we are already experts in creating illusions.

At that initial stage, the first challenge is to seperate and identify individual illusions, mass illusions, and that which is real and present. Each of these states must be dealt with differently and thus it is paramount that the differences between them are seen and dealt with clearly and with reason. Fear of Witchcraft often stems from the idea that people are running around out there changing things willy-nilly without thought to the larger reprecussions of fiddling with things not understood. But one of the secrets of effective Witchcraft is to first understand a situation both as it is percieved to be and as it actually is before moving to create changes, for how can we know the right thing to do if we are limited in our comprehension of the problem?

What has this to do with living in the now? Well, an awful lot and unfortunately it's one of the hardest hurdles to jump for some. Living in the past, or in one's pipe-dreams of the future, or even being stressed and preoccupied about the end of the day, are all states of imagination where the Present is brushed aside in favor of speculation. If we are to understand, we must also push aside our personal illusions which often control us in annoyingly persistant thoughts of, if only, and wouldn't it be nice.

In effect, you are being asked to literally live "beyond mind" where personal and mass perception can be observed without being accompanied by reactionism.

Here is a situation that hopefully may demonstrate the point more clearly.

A young couple marries both fully aware that one of them is conservative with money while the other is careless. Eventually, the careless partner spends several hundred dollars knowing it has been earmarked for rent. For a week, embarrassed and afraid, the careless partner lies and evades, hoping to replace the missing $$'s before getting caught. Well, let's say it doesn't go down that way. The meticulous partner finds out about the shortage while trying to pay the bills. Well, most people would react immediately and emotionally. All at once, the meticulous individual who by nature carefully guards against such occurences may feel betrayed, and as a result, quite angry, not to mention afraid and anxious because now the rent cannot be paid. These reactions are all considered well within normal parameters. But if the meticulous partner is also trained in one of several mystic paths or perhaps a similar technique gained from psychotherapy, then he or she may not find himself in the position of not needing to react at all. Rather, the incident is observed, and the problem evaluated based only on the facts, rather then addressed with stress or fear or anger. Now we are approaching a realm which is beyond individual insecurities and care, where there is no "mind", but merely reasonable and decisive action to address the problem at hand. Compassion and love rule out retaliation, and the meticulous partner can forgive quickly without resentment while taking the realistic steps necessary to prevent a future occurence. There is no judgement, just a need to deal with the situation exactly as it presented as each moment unfolds itself.

Edited December 9, 2008 by Himitsuko

[Rev. Magus Adam]

I am intrigued that lawyer implied that living in the Now allows the spirit to wait patiently prepared for those things which life will bring us. Much of the lives that people lead are based in personal perception. Two people may have very different ideas of what is real and valid and what is not and one of the early lessons in the practice of Witchcraft is to understand that the world we percieve exists, in large portion, only in our individual imaginations. This is not to say that true facts are not available to us, or that there is no physical world with which to reckon, but once we realize that much of our percieved reality is based not only on our observations which can be flawed, but also our own interpretations and the prior interpretations of others, then we see that we are already experts in creating illusions.

At that initial stage, the first challenge is to seperate and identify individual illusions, mass illusions, and that which is real and present. Each of these states must be dealt with differently and thus it is paramount that the differences between them are seen and dealt with clearly and with reason. Fear of Witchcraft often stems from the idea that people are running around out there changing things willy-nilly without thought to the larger reprecussions of fiddling with things not understood. But one of the secrets of effective Witchcraft is to first understand a situation both as it is percieved to be and as it actually is before moving to create changes, for how can we know the right thing to do if we are limited in our comprehension of the problem?

What has this to do with living in the now? Well, an awful lot and unfortunately it's one of the hardest hurdles to jump for some. Living in the past, or in one's pipe-dreams of the future, or even being stressed and preoccupied about the end of the day, are all states of imagination where the Present is brushed aside in favor of speculation. If we are to understand, we must also push aside our personal illusions which often control us in annoyingly persistant thoughts of, if only, and wouldn't it be nice.

In effect, you are being asked to literally live "beyond mind" where personal and mass perception can be observed without being accompanied by reactionism.

Here is a situation that hopefully may demonstrate the point more clearly.

A young couple marries both fully aware that one of them is conservative with money while the other is careless. Eventually, the careless partner spends several hundred dollars knowing it has been earmarked for rent. For a week, embarrassed and afraid, the careless partner lies and evades, hoping to replace the missing $$'s before getting caught. Well, let's say it doesn't go down that way. The meticulous partner finds out about the shortage while trying to pay the bills. Well, most people would react immediately and emotionally. All at once, the meticulous individual who by nature carefully guards against such occurences may feel betrayed, and as a result, quite angry, not to mention afraid and anxious because now the rent cannot be paid. These reactions are all considered well within normal parameters. But if the meticulous partner is also trained in one of several mystic paths or perhaps a similar technique gained from psychotherapy, then he or she may not find himself in the position of not needing to react at all. Rather, the incident is observed, and the problem evaluated based only on the facts, rather then addressed with stress or fear or anger. Now we are approaching a realm which is beyond individual insecurities and care, where there is no "mind", but merely reasonable and decisive action to address the problem at hand. Compassion and love rule out retaliation, and the meticulous partner can forgive quickly without resentment while taking the realistic steps necessary to prevent a future occurence. There is no judgement, just a need to deal with the situation exactly as it presented as each moment unfolds itself.

Yana yoga....

[RevMichaelCarbone]

As a Reiki Master/Teacher I believe that Reiki can be used on anyone and you will not be interferring in their Karmic Lesson or their freewill if stated like I do, that Reiki is only for their highest good if appropriate. This way if they have a karmic lesson to learn Reiki will not interfere with that lesson. If what ever ails them is part of a lesson they have to learn, then Reiki will not interfere with that either. If their lesson is over then Reiki can help them to either 1 of 2 things, 1-recover from their ailment, 2-help them to have a peaceful crossing over.

My spouse had the AIDS Cancer KS, the doctor couldn't explain why he had it, according to what they all know his t-cells were high enough so he should not have had the cancer. They did chemo on him and I hesitated on doing Reiki out of fear of interfering with Karma for him if that was the case, or any lessons this may have been for, or if this was just meant to be. So I sent him Reiki if it was for his highest good and appropriate. The KS went away after a few months. Strange part of it was that his t-cells had dropped so low that the KS should have still been around. The doctor's are still confused, though his nurse and I both know what had happened. His nurse was a Reiki practitioner as well.

In my faith, you can send healing energies of anykind to anyone in need and state as long as it's for their higher good, will not interfere with any karmic lessons or their freewill. The healing will either work, or it won't. We just use reiki or any other healing to channel the healing energies of our creator if it is allowed to happen, no more and no less.

Just my thoughts and opinions of this.