The Lamp of the Body

"Your Eye is the lamp of your body; 

when your eye is sound, 

your whole body is full of light; 

but when it is not sound, 

your body is full of darkness.

Luke 11:34

We think the world would be saved if only 

we could generate larger quantities of goodwill and tolerance. 

That's false. 

What will save the world is not goodwill and tolerance 

but clear thinking. 

Of what use is it to be tolerant of others if you are convinced that 

you are right and everyone who disagrees with you is wrong? 

That is not tolerance but condescension. 

That leads not to union of hearts but to division, because 

you are one up and the others one down. 

A position that can only lead to a sense of superiority on your part 

and resentment on your neighbor's, thereby breeding further intolerance.

True tolerance only arises from a keen awareness 

of the abysmal ignorance of everyone as far as truth is concerned. 

For truth is essentially mystery. 

The mind can sense but cannot grasp it, much less formulate it. 

Our beliefs can point to it but cannot put it into words. 

In spite of this, people talk glowingly about the value of dialogue 

which at worst is a camouflaged attempt to convince the other person 
of the rightness of your position and at best will prevent you from becoming 
a frog in the  well who thinks that his well is the only world there is.

What is clear thinking and how does one arrive at it? 

The first thing you must know is that it does not call for any great learning. 

It is so simple as to be within the reach of a ten-year-old child. 

What's needed is not learning but unlearning, 
not talent but courage. 

You'll understand this if you think of a little child 

in the arms of an old, disfigured housemaid. 

The child is too young to have picked up the prejudices of its elders. 

So when it snuggles in that woman's arms, it is responding 

not to labels in its head; labels like white woman, black woman, ugly, 

pretty, old, young, mother, servant maid, it is responding 

not to labels such as these but to reality. 

That woman meets the child's need for love and 
that is the reality the child responds to, not the woman's name
 and figure and religion and race and sect. 

Those are totally and absolutely irrelevant. 

The child has as yet no beliefs and no prejudices. 

This is the environment within which clear thinking can occur. 

And to achieve it one must drop everything one has learned 

and achieve the mind of the child that is innocent of past experiences and programming which so cloud our way of looking at reality.

What clear thinking calls for is not intelligence--

that is easily come by--

 but the courage that has successfully coped with fear and with desire, 

for the moment you desire something or fear something, 

your heart will consciously or unconsciously get in the way of your thinking.

This is a consideration for spiritual giants 
who have come to realize that in order to find truth, 

they need, not doctrinal formulations, 

but a heart that divests itself of its programming and its self-interest 

each time that thinking is in progress; 

a heart that has nothing to protect 

and owes nothing to ambition 

and therefore leaves the mind to roam 

unfettered, fearless and free, 

in search of truth; 

a heart that is ever ready to accept new evidence 

and to change its views. 

Such a heart then becomes a lamp that enlightens 

the darkness of the whole body of humanity. 

If all human beings were fitted with such hearts 

people would no longer think of themselves 

as communists 

or capitalists, 

as Christians 

or Muslims 

or Buddhists. 

The very clarity of their thinking would show them 
that all thinking, all concepts, all beliefs are lamps full of darkness, 
signs of their ignorance. 

And in that realization 

the walls of their separate wells would collapse 

and they would be invaded by 

the ocean that unites all people in the truth.

From The Way to Love by Anthony DeMello

Mercy!

NYPD officer photographed giving boots to barefoot homeless man melts icy hearts online

A photo of a New York City police officer kneeling down to give a barefoot homeless man in Times Square a pair of boots on a cold November night is melting even the iciest New Yorkers' hearts online.

On Nov. 14, NYPD officer Lawrence DePrimo, who was on counterterrorism duty in Times Square, saw the older homeless man without shoes sitting on 42nd Street. DePrimo, 25, left and then returned with a pair of $100 boots he bought at a nearby Skechers store.

"It was freezing out, and you could see the blisters on the man's feet," DePrimo, a three-year veteran of the department who lives with his parents on Long Island, told the New York Times. "I had two pairs of socks, and I was still cold."

The random act of kindness was captured by Jennifer Foster, a tourist from Florence, Ariz., who was visiting the city. Foster, communications director for the Pinal County Sheriff's Office in Arizona, emailed the photo to the NYPD with a note commending DePrimo.

"The officer said, 'I have these size 12 boots for you, they are all-weather. Let's put them on and take care of you,'" Foster wrote. "The officer squatted down on the ground and proceeded to put socks and the new boots on this man.

"I have been in law enforcement for 17 years," she continued. "I was never so impressed in my life. ... It is important, I think, for all of us to remember the real reason we are in this line of work. The reminder this officer gave to our profession in his presentation of human kindness has not been lost."

Foster's photo was posted on the NYPD's Facebook page on Tuesday, where it received more than 320,000 "likes," 77,000 "shares" and 20,000 comments—most of them praising DePrimo, who seems to have restored Facebook's faith in humanity.

"This is one hell of a police officer," Desiree Wright-Borden wrote.

"Wow," Jack Horton wrote. "It's nice to know there are still good people out there."

"Angels truly do walk on earth!!!" Charlene Hoffman-Pestell wrote.

Some commenters, though, were skeptical, saying the photo could have been staged.

"Clever stunt!" Louis Zehmke wrote. "The hobo is 'parked' at the entrance of a shoe shop."

But Foster claims DePrimo had no idea he was being photographed: "The officer expected NOTHING in return and did not know I was watching."

Scenes from a Sleepover

 Dear Santa, I want one of these.

 What happened

 to the rest of me?

 Wild Child

 Playing tag

 Hey!

 Where'd they come from?

 In Corndog Heaven

 Happy Face

 The requisite cookie

 He wanted gloves...

 The new tractor...Wow!

Tractor Family

Early Christmas present for all of us!

Consider the Lilies

Whew! 

This lesson feels like a breath of fresh air for me.

I forget to remember this, and yet, 

while reading it I am constantly thinking

"Well, of course!"

It's not that it's an easy lesson; it's that it is just so obvious.

Why would I ever resist something this obvious?

"Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious 

about your life...look at the birds of the air...

consider the lilies of the field."

Matthew 6:25

Everyone at some time or the other experiences feelings 

of what is known as insecurity. 

You feel insecure with the amount of money you have in the bank, 

or the amount of love you are getting from your friend or 

the type of educational background you have had. 

Or you have insecurity feelings regarding your health 

or your age or your physical appearance. 

If you were asked the question, 

"What is it that makes you feel insecure?" 

you would almost certainly give the wrong answer. 

You might say, "I don't have enough of the love of a friend" or 

"I don't have the kind of academic training that I need," or some such thing. 

In other words, you would point to some outside condition 

not realizing that insecurity feelings are not generated by anything 

outside of you, but only by your emotional programming, 

by something you are telling yourself in your head. 

Trust me here ...this is good news!

If you changed your program, 

your insecure feelings would vanish in a second, 

even though everything in the outside world remained 

exactly as it was before. 

MAGIC?

One person feels quite secure with practically no money in the bank, 

another feels insecure even though he has millions. 

It isn't the amount of money but their programming 
that makes the difference. 

One person has no friends, yet feels perfectly secure in the love of people. 

Another feels insecure even in the most possessive 
and exclusive of relationships. 

Again the difference is in the programming.

If you wish to deal with your feelings of insecurity 

there are four facts that you must study well and understand.

1. It is futile to ease your insecurity feelings by trying 

to change things outside of you. 

Your efforts may be successful, though mostly they are not. 

They may bring some relief, but the relief will be short-lived.

So it is not worth the energy and time you spend in improving 

your physical appearance or making more money or getting 

further reassurances of love from your friends.

2. This fact will lead you to tackle the problem 

where it really is, inside your head. 

Think of the people who in exactly the same condition 

that you find yourself in now would not feel the slightest insecurity. 

There are such people. 

Therefore the problem lies not with reality outside of you 

but with you, in your programming.

3. You must understand that this programming of yours 

was picked up from insecure people who, when  you were very young 

and impressionable, taught you by their behavior and their panic reactions that every time the outside world did not conform to a certain pattern, 

you must create an emotional turmoil within yourself called insecurity. 

And you must do everything in your power to rearrange the outside world--

make more money, 

seek more reassurances, 

placate and please the people you have offended, etc., etc.--

in order to make the insecurity feelings go away. 

The mere realization that you don't have to do this, 

that doing this really solves nothing, and that 

the emotional turmoil is caused solely by you and your culture--

this realization alone distances you from the problem 

and brings considerable relief.

It's workable...

4. Whenever you are insecure 

about what may happen in the future, just remember this: 

In the past six months or one year you were so insecure about events 

which when they finally came you were able to handle somehow, 

Thanks to the energy and resources that that particular 

present moment 

gave you, and not to all the previous worrying which only made you 

suffer needlessly and weakened you emotionally. 

The doing is always in the present moment; 

it can't be done anywhere else!

So, say to yourself: 

"If there is anything I can do about the future, right now, I shall do it. 

Then I'm going to just leave it alone 

and settle down to enjoy the present moment, 

because all the experience of my life has shown me 

that I can only cope with things when they are present, 

not before they occur. 

And that the present always gives me 

the resources and the energy I need to deal with them."

It's important to have something else to focus on in the moment,

something that you delight in doing or something that 
takes you out into Nature and the larger world.

The final disappearance of insecurity feelings will only come 

when you have attained that blessed ability 

of the birds of the air and the flowers of the field 

to live fully in the present, 

one moment at a time. 

The present moment, no matter how painful, 

is never unbearable. 

What IS unbearable is 

what you think is going to happen in five hours or in five days 

and those words you keep saying in your head like, 

"This is terrible, 

this is unbearable, 

how long is this going to last," 

and so on. 

Birds and flowers are blessed above humans in that 

they have no concept of the future, 

no words in their heads, and no anxiety about 

what their fellows think of them. 

That is why they are such perfect images of the kingdom. 

Of the promised land of joy and peace...

eternal, abundant LIFE

right here and 

NOW!

So do not be anxious about tomorrow, 

tomorrow will look after itself. 

Each day has troubles enough of its own. 

Set your mind on God's kingdom

It's happening right here, right now, don't miss it.

 before everything else

 and all the rest will come to you as well.

Yes!

It's the only way and not Polyanna at all.

It is absolutely logical and in the natural order of things.

It is WHAT IS...

already allowed and bearable!

In this context worrying makes absolutely no sense at all.

It is totally worthless, wasted energy, 

accomplishing nothing except 

to create hell on earth!

And you are free to do it, or not,
for the rest of your life.

Happy angel!

Thanks, Coco, for this new addition 

to the mantel...

Is it Winter yet?

 Last evening's moon bringing in the cold front...

and early morning evidence that it arrived!

Can it be?

Holiday Faces

Little Lottie

 Oh so thankful for her pepper

and oh so tired!

Fire on the Earth Part 2

Now is the time to see that 

absolutely nothing outside of you 

can bring you lasting joy. 

Every now and then, I think I get it...a glimpse of this freedom.

But the moment you do that 

you will notice that a fear arises in your heart. 

Perhaps it is this fear that clouds the promise.

That fear that if you allow the discontent to be, 

it will turn into a raging passion that will grip you and cause you 

to revolt against everything that your culture and your religion hold dear; 

against a whole way of thinking and feeling and perceiving the world 

that they have brainwashed you into accepting. 

Yikes! This is heavy stuff...brainwashing?! Think "marketing"

This devouring flame will cause you not just to rock the boat 

but to burn the boat to ashes. 

I will not be manipulted!

Suddenly you will find yourself living in an altogether different world, 

infinitely removed from the world of the people around you

Oooooh, that feels like separation. 

from everything that others hold dear,

even more separation 

everything they are crying their hearts out for; 

honor, 

power, 

acceptance, 

approval, 

security, 

wealth, 

is seen for the stinking garbage that it is. 

Oh, that world! The world of cheap thrills and illusive security...

It disgusts and nauseates. 

DeMello is obviously not speaking from a non-duality perspective. 
Non-duality would suggest there are no separate worlds, 
just different ways to be in the world, no judgement.
Hmmm...I'll need to ponder this one. 

And everything others are forever running away from 

holds no terrors for you anymore.

Hmmm...what would that be?  

Not having enough, not being prepared, not knowing 

You have become serene and fearless and free, 

for you have stepped out of your illusory world and into 

the kingdom.

And here is a parable of that kingdom: 

It is like a treasure lying buried in a field. 

The man who found it buried it again, and for sheer joy went 

and sold everything he had and bought that field. 

It's not the so-called "buried treasure" we thought we had to have; it's allowing--

treasuring 

the WHOLE FIELD of life, of experience, 

of whatever may come in each and every moment 

that brings eternal joy and peace!

It's not down there somewhere, to be sought and dug up;

it's already here

everywhere.

If you haven't found the treasure as yet, 

don't waste your time searching for it. 

It can be found but it may not be searched for. 

Sounds like a riddle, eh?

You don't have the slightest notion what the the real treasure is. 

All you are familiar with is 

the drugged happiness of your present existence. 

the thrill-seeking, contentment-longing "wild ride"

So what would you search for? 

And where? 

No, search rather in your heart for 

the spark of discontent 

and tend the flame till it becomes a conflagration and 

your world is burned down to a heap of rubble.

Get into a genuine, full-fledged flame-feeding frenzy.

Young or old, most of us are discontented 

merely because we want something--

more knowledge, a better job, a finer car, a bigger salary.

Our discontent is based upon our desire for "the more."

It is only because we want something more 

that most of us are discontented.

I find myself wanting less and less 

and being more and more content with enough...CHECK!

But I am not talking about that kind of discontent. 

Oooops...you're not? I thought I had that one taken care of.

It is the desire for "the more" that prevents clear thinking. 

Because we just reflexively replace the discontent with 
the next thing we think need more of--the fix. 

  

(But) If we are dissatisfied, not with anything in particular but with 

everything, 

then we shall find that 

our discontent brings clarity. 

Ah!

When we don't accept or follow, 

but question, investigate, penetrate, there is 

an insight out of which comes 

creativity, 

joy.

The Divine Detour 

Mostly the discontent that you feel comes from not having 

enough of something--

you are dissatisfied because you think you do not have 

enough money or power or success or fame or virtue or love, or holiness. 

This is all "fixable"!

This is not the discontent that leads to 

the joy of the kingdom.

It's all temporary. 

Its source is greed and ambition 

and its fruit is restlessness and frustration.

The Vicious Cycle 

The day you are discontented 

not because you want more of something 

but without knowing 

what 

it is you want; 

when you are sick at heart of 

everything that you have been pursuing so far 

and you are sick of the pursuit itself, 

then your heart will attain a great clarity, 

an insight that will cause you mysteriously to delight in 

 everything 

and in 

nothing.

It's no longer a matter of 

something other than what already is!

And out of that very present place comes 

clarity and peace of mind 

and joy of spirit,

where CREATIVITY flourishes.

It's Nature's way.

From: THE WAY TO  LOVE by Anthony DeMello

While "experts" debate, "children" are doing this!

Knowing

is a small planet

in a vast universe of

not knowing.

 Mercy

is the atmosphere

that holds it all together.