THE oral teachings of Buddha were transcribed forming The Dhammapada, which means “the path of Dharma,” or Duty. Not meant to be a new religion, these were practical teachings anyone could understand and follow. In his first commentary Buddha emphasized that our thoughts have real creative power:
“ALL that we are is the result of what we have thought: all that we are is founded on our thoughts and formed of our thoughts.”
Depending on their source and intention, thoughts could also have destructive power, and the ability to deceive. They could either be directed to service and harmony, or cause confusion and harm — both emanating from conflicting aspects of the mind. This is why the mind, with its companion desire, is sometimes thought of as a ‘two edged sword.’
The Rajah of the Senses
In The Book of the Golden Precepts, loving, compassionate thoughts and intentions are called “eternal life’s pure waters, clear and crystal.” Such thoughts, it teaches, should not be mixed “with the monsoon tempest’s muddy torrents” — an allusion to our selfish desires — because they will be transformed into those desires, becoming powers of the mind which work to destroy our better nature.
This is especially serious for meditators or those attempting to energize mystic ‘Yogi powers’ like Kundalini. The ancient teachers called this power the “World-mother” and understood it to be “an electro-spiritual force” —
“… a creative power which when aroused into action can as easily kill as it can create.”
With any spiritual work, controlling the thought-producing mind is the first task. The Voice of the Silence describes the importance of discerning reality from illusion, or matter and form, from the reality of underlying energy.
“The pupil must seek out the rajah of the senses, the Thought-Producer…”
— because it is our minds that create our illusions.
Thus all true teachers, whether Krishna, Buddha, Laotse or Patanjali, always addressed this problem first. It means we should continuously watch and control our thoughts and emotions, because:
“The Mind is the great Slayer of the Real … let the Disciple slay the Slayer.”
“The Self of matter and the SELF of Spirit can never meet,” says the teacher in Fragment 1, “one of the twain must disappear — there is no place for both.” And further:
“Ere thy Soul’s mind can understand, the bud of personality must be crushed out, the worm of sense destroyed past resurrection. Thou canst not travel on the Path before thou hast become that Path itself.”
Zen Samurai
“Sow a Thought, Reap an Act;
Sow an Act, Reap a Habit;
Sow a Habit, Reap a Character;
Sow a Character, Reap a Destiny.”
-Upanishads
Dharana
“He who would hear the voice of Nada ‘the Soundless Sound,’ and comprehend it,” says the Voice of the Silence, “he has to learn the nature of Dharana.” The description of Dharana, a high meditative state, is provided by H. P. Blavatsky in a footnote:
“… the intense and perfect concentration of the mind upon some one interior object, accompanied by complete abstraction from everything pertaining to the external Universe, or the world of the senses.”
And quotes Krishna in Shrimad Bhagavat: –
“He who is engaged in the performance of yoga, who has subdued his senses and who has concentrated his mind in me (Krishna), such yogis all the Siddhis [powers] stand ready to serve.”
Sandy Frazier
And Nada or “The ‘Soundless Voice,’ or the ‘Voice of the Silence,’” she also says in the footnote —”Literally perhaps this would read ‘Voice in the Spiritual Sound,’ as Nada is the equivalent word in Sanskrit, for the Senzar term.”
Non-Identification with Perceptions
“Knowledge of the Supreme Spirit comes from identification with It,” writes Robert Crosbie (Bhagavad-Gita Notes, p. 204), not with anything of a lesser state.
“… realization comes from dwelling upon that to be realized.”
The power to perceive, Crosbie writes, “is the very essence of our being — our perceptions are not that power, they are the exercise of it.“
“… our perceptions are the bases of our actions — it is because we identify ourselves with our perceptions that we are deluded and bound by the actions that flow from them.”
The life of renowned author of The Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle, was revolutionized after his independent discovery of the Presence — effortlessly and easily. Later, he learned, this was the same truth taught by The Buddha, Krishna, Lao Tse, and other Masters of Wisdom. How the Universal Will arises through you, and you flow with it, harmonically. Miracles and synchronicities happen, you achieve things you could have never achieved otherwise.
Knowledge of the Supreme Spirit
(Krishna: Bhagavad-Gita Ch. 13)
“TRUE wisdom of a spiritual kind is freedom from self-esteem, hypocrisy, and injury to others; it is patience, sincerity, respect for spiritual instructors, purity, firmness, self-restraint, dispassion for objects of sense, freedom from pride, and a meditation upon birth, death, decay, sickness, and error.
“It is an exemption from self-identifying attachment for children, wife, and household, and a constant unwavering steadiness of heart upon the arrival of every event whether favorable or unfavorable. It is a never-ceasing love for me alone, the self being effaced, and worship paid in a solitary spot, and a want of pleasure in congregations of men―this is called wisdom or spiritual knowledge — its opposite is ignorance.
“He who seeth that all his actions are performed by nature only, and that the self within is not the actor, sees indeed. And when he realizes perfectly that all things whatsoever in nature are comprehended in the ONE, he attains to the Supreme Spirit.”
“This Supreme Spirit, even when it is in the body, neither acteth nor is it affected by action, because, being without beginning and devoid of attributes, it is changeless. As the all-moving Akâsa by reason of its subtlety passeth everywhere unaffected, so the Spirit, though present in every kind of body, is not attached to action nor affected.
“As a single sun illuminateth the whole world, even so doth the One Spirit illumine every body. Those who with the eye of wisdom thus perceive what is the difference between the body and Spirit and the destruction of the illusion of objects, go to the supreme.”
The Mystic Fire
“Before the ‘mystic Power’ [Kundalini, the 'Serpent Power' or mystic fire] can make of thee a god, Lanoo, thou must have gained the faculty to slay thy lunar form at will,” says The Voice of the Silence.
“This ‘Path’ is mentioned in all the Mystic Works,” Blavatsky wrote. “As Krishna says in the Dhyaneswari:
“When this Path is beheld . . . whether one sets out to the bloom of the east or to the chambers of the west, without moving, O holder of the bow, is the travelling in this road. In this path, to whatever place one would go, that place one’s own self becomes.”
“‘Thou art the Path’ is said to the adept guru and by the latter to the disciple, after initiation. ‘I am the way and the Path’ says another MASTER.
The Fire Yogi
“No Self, No Problem”
“The Self is the Friend of Self and Also Its Enemy”
- W. Q. Judge
Esteemed Tibetan Buddhist Scholar and Teacher Anam Thubten Rinpoche’s Message of Infinite Love Resonates in Turbulent Times.
“If we are still wondering how to awaken, I suggest that we meditate now and then and focus on the following question:
‘What is holding me back from realizing my true nature, my Buddha Nature?’
“This is a very powerful inquiry. I am sharing this based on my own meditation practice. This is one of my favorite meditations because it always takes me to the place where I cannot blame anybody or anything for my lack of awakening.
“When we open our hearts and let go of all of our theories and speculations, when we are not distracted even by spiritual fantasies, when we simply wholeheartedly and courageously inquire into what is holding us back, that is all that we need to do.
What’s Holding Us Back?
“Or we can just ask the truth, ‘What is holding me back from awakening right now?’ Either way we can’t find any answer because there is nobody there. There is nothing holding us back and that’s why we never really find any answers.
“Next we might ask, “If there are no obstacles holding me back, then why am I not awakened right now?” And when we look we realize that we are attached to our thoughts.
“That’s all that is happening. Samsara is nothing more than our identification with thoughts. That’s all there is. There is nothing there except thoughts.”
—from “No Self, No Problem” by Anam Thubten, edited by Sharon Roe, published by Snow Lion Publications.
Interviewed by Tricycle Magazine Book of the month club:
“The Courage to Feel“
“In the Uttaratantra by Maitreya, it is said that our recognizing our buddha potential is like a man living in poverty discovering that buried beneath his home is a priceless treasure. It is like discovering a jewel buried in the mud.
Rob Preece
“If our buddha potential is like a golden statue wrapped in filthy rags, the golden image can never be tarnished by the rags–it is merely obscured by them. When I was younger and my understanding of Buddhism was relatively poor, the images that came from this text had a profound effect on me. They gave me an intuitive sense of my intrinsic value in a way that I had never felt previously.
“The influence of religion in my early years had left me with the belief that I was essentially a sinner and that at the root of my being was an innate badness that I had to overcome. It left me fundamentally unable to trust myself because to let go would be to open up my innate badness.”
“When I met my Tibetan teachers and they spoke of my buddha nature, I felt a huge sense of relief. Perhaps I was not so bad after all, and perhaps when I allowed myself to relax a little and open up, I would find my true nature as something whole and wonderful rather than something to be feared and suppressed.”
–from The Courage to Feel: Buddhist Practices for Opening to Others by Rob Preece, published by Snow Lion Publications
All Will Be Well
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Keep posting goodaritcle.
Thank you for publishing this great website with its wide variety of presentations of the Ancient Wisdom.
OM
Your website and Theosophy Watch is so beautiful to subscribe to. I enjoy your message very much and only hope to learn even if a small amount of teachings it may one day come to pass my self will become more aware of this special love and compassion you try to teach your subscribers. Thankyou very much. Peace.