Going Our Own Way
Part 1 of 6, The Tao
Coming from a space of emptiness, what shall arise?
When we think we know, then are we in greatest danger; then are we vulnerable to all we don’t know, blinded to it by our supposed knowing. It’s funny how, as one progresses on the path, though knowledge is added along the way, one knows less & less. Hard to explain, perhaps impossible. Yet, on encountering one who also knows they know nothing, one is somehow understood. Very strange.
It is such a joy to be retired, able to use my time as I like, with none to interfere, to demand my presence here or there. One has more freedom, then, to empty out, to step back from it all & just observe. It’s surprising, how lightly I hold my university degrees. Honors & all, they are as nothing to me, now. They are irrelevant.
CHILDREN & EDUCATION
Learning for the sake of learning can be a real joy — this, the children know. When left to go their own way, they won’t forsake learning, & what they learn they’ll retain better than what they are taught. Teachers forget the unwisdom of answering the the unasked question. Better said, to teach by answering questions is the better way, allowing the children to be inspired, to ask meaningful questions, to guide their own acquisition of knowledge & wisdom.
To take the children away from themselves is the way of today’s school.
To force them to sit quietly & listen to random knowledge, unrelated to their inner spark, their life-force, is to divorce them from themselves. Meanwhile, our teachers teach to the test, for students’ better rote performance garners better employment reviews.
Schools have much in common with jails, where permission must be sought to use the bathroom, to talk, to move from room to room. All day long they must answer to the bells, to sit in neat rows, to listen rather than asking questions. Curious questioners are often treated as troublemakers. Sad.
We look down on our children, folks, treating them as those who must be molded by us, those who know nothing worthy of our inquiry. Some have long seen through this regimented treatment, such as Maria Montessori, who created an environment for self-directed learning.
When we don’t respect ourselves, we respect the children even less. This is the danger in thinking, in believing that we know, that we’re the wise ones, teaching the ignorant. How misguided this is!
HOW WE TREAT OURSELVES
We treat ourselves this way, as well, valuing knowledge, valuing seeming surety in an unstable world. We allow good things to be used for bad purposes & knowledge to be perverted in its use. We seek knowledge the better to destroy. We build dastardly weapons & bombs, allocating large portions of our budget to be thus ill used against our brethren, for we are Humanity.
Yes, maintain defenses, but don’t use them offensively! It’s insane. We’re humanity, & we’re killing ourselves, rather than seeking ways to get along, to nurture peace, which we could well do, absent our current governments. We’ve created endless challenges for ourselves by acting in offensive ways, not just against other lands, but against the people, here at home.
We’re now taught that endless, intrusive surveillance is just the way of it, encouraged to accept it as inevitable. While some of it is obvious, there’s 10 times more behind the scenes, held in secret by those who benefit from it, their purposes cloaked & disguised as “useful” services, “useful” apps & the like.
In the USA we live in a realm where everything is either marketed or marketable, drowning in a sea of commercialism. It sucks us in, vampirizing our attention, our energy, our dollars, often pulling us into the game to develop commercial businesses & ways, ourselves. Then we no longer have the necessary, more objective distance required to discern what’s taking place.
We want to sell things to people, ourselves, be it products, ideas, or our very self, seeking to position ourselves as desirable or enviable within this phony world — so we conform. We take on its (Matrix) values as our own. Where’s the wisdom in that?
Have we gone nuts, that we could so abandon our inner selves to play this game?
Thus do we see the dark wisdom in “teaching” children in such a way that distances them from who they really are, what they want, from the direction they want to go. It grooms them to fit into the commercialized world. Most write & share, not for the joy of it, but to make their work desirable to the largest number, to bring in the reads or sales, by which we rate “success.”
We judge by numbers & not by worth.
Who also sees that we are somehow lost, conforming as we do to all of this? Who feels separated out from herself? Who seeks to awaken from the daze, rather than be a slave to it? That may be most of us — I don’t know, as I can only speak for myself.
Most of us seek fullness in life, chasing wealth & possessions at the expense of our inner life. As we awaken to the internal e m p t i n e s s, these things stand out in sharp contrast to the ways we then adopt. The emptiness shows us its beauty, its inestimable value, enabling us to break the chains of conformity, of following anyone or anything.
Now we begin to learn by not studying, to know by not knowing — to enter an amazing humility that holds nothing for itself, expects nothing from others as it goes its own inscrutable way. This way cannot be attained, cannot be discovered or taught through study of other people’s knowledge & ways.
Grasping is not the way in, but rather releasing, an endless letting go, subtracting rather than adding.
I find it delightful that this way makes not a lick of sense to the mind, often laughing at thought’s efforts to attain it. Being unattainable, it is discovered as we let go, parting with our grasping ways.
Seeking peace & fulfillment in the world, we find it not — seeking nothing, it comes to us. So very strange. We could read the Tao te Ching a thousand times as we empty out & find something new in each reading.
Our clarity increases the further we stand back from things, the more we allow the self to be the empty vessel. Only empty vessels are useful, & their utility is in their emptiness. You can’t add to a full cup.
LET US AWAKEN!
Let all who desire awakening find in the empty Now the perfect vessel for that. We will not tout our wisdom, seeking to teach others, for we well know that our way applies only to us, & that emptiness has a far higher value than fullness, whether of knowledge or of possessions. Our service will be to simply radiate, our Inner Being shining brightly, passing on all that’s useful in our silence.
The silence can speak — words can arise from there, mysteriously.
Even in these words, seemingly ours, we’ll know that we don’t know, being just as much the hearer as everyone else. We share as the rose perfumes the air, not needing the presence of others. We’ll understand the impartiality in knowing that the sun shines on the just & the unjust, alike. We’ll be natural, once again, taking our cues from Nature, finally able to receive her wisdom.
WE ARE LOVE, ITSELF
Love is the way, friends. Love is the proving of our way, the divine signature, the blessing of our path. We don’t have to perceive the Self as Love to enter into the flow of that. It is there, ever available. Only as we empty out do we provide the useful vessel for the allness, pregnant with the finest gifts.
SOCIETY’S SECONDHAND VALUES
Society has things basically inverted, such that these words make no sense in its world. Our virtues, our knowledge, our values, themselves, are all handed to us by others. They cannot be true & real in themselves if they are got at secondhand; thus they are useless on our Heart trek. It will take each one pulling back, pulling out of the tangled web of the Matrix, to find the empty non-self at the core of being.
Let us discover with great delight what comes of our willingness to go our own way, to boldly take this trek, even if we’re the only one among our acquaintance doing so. As these things cannot be explained, let us make a friend of silence, not trying to shout from the rooftops what we know. We know nothing, & the further along we are in our trek, the more sure of that do we become.
We have nothing to shout. Our way applies to us, their way to them — all are equal in this. All must find their own way. We can enjoy walking with another awakening one, but they will come & go in our experience, so we never cling, trusting the Tao to wisely guide all who are available to that. It does. It will.
Namaste
~♥~
10:47 am, Saturday 2017/11/25, 1st, Mayan day 10 Sun / Ahau
