Oneness

With palms together,




Good Morning Everyone,







Our discussion group wrestled with the Faith Mind poem yesterday afternoon. The poem is quite a piece of work. I believe it should be read like a Teisho, an expression of the speaker’s Buddha Nature. It is a challenge to apply to everyday life unless one is willing to let go of thoughts about it.







Is it possible to be without preferences, distinctions, or ideas? Is it a worthy aim to reside that way?







As long as I am breathing, I will make a choice to breathe. I will breathe in order to live and will find meaning in that choice. What I must practice to do is practice. In the practice is the falling away of “self” and with this falling away, preferences and distinctions, reason and ideas. No preferences means residing in openness and receptivity.







The part that fascinates me is where the author says, in effect, that to reside in Big Mind is to realize its non-existence. Non-duality denies itself because when there is no duality, there is no oneness. Oneness requires something apart from it to make it sensible.







For those theists among us, this would also be true of God. If we were to become one with the Infinite, the Infinite would cease to exist because to exist it needs the finite.







This is what it means to say all dharmas are empty.







Be well.