Month: July 2015
The domain of discovery is a magical one
Mark Twain once summed up his life. “I became a silver-miner in Nevada; next, a newspaper reporter; next, a gold-miner; next, a special correspondent in the Sandwich Islands; next, a roving correspondent in Europe and the East; next, an instructional torchbearer on the lecture circuit; and, finally, I became a scribbler of books, and an immovable fixture among the other rocks of New England.”
Attaining through ‘effortless effort’
So there are two ways to grow. One way is the way of effort, resolve labour. There you are the master. Whatever you do you are the planner. Then whatsoever you attain is nothing but your own game. Much can certainly be achieved through effort, through labour and resolve. But whatever you attain will be smaller than you. And whatsoever you attain is called the world. What you get through resolve and labour is worldly. Your ego is strengthened by it. – it is a search for your own ego.
Come home to yourself
Observe yourself. That’s why I said earlier that self-observation is such a delightful and extraordinary thing. After a while you don’t have to make any effort, because, as illusions begin to crumble, you begin to know things that cannot be described. It’s called happiness. Everything changes and you become addicted to awareness.
There’s the story of the disciple who went to the master and said, “Could you give me a word of wisdom? Could you tell me something that would guide me through my days?” It was the master’s day of silence, so he picked up a pad. It said, “Awareness.” When the disciple saw it, he said, “This is too brief. Can you expand on it a bit?” So the master took back the pad and wrote, “Awareness, awareness, awareness.” The disciple said, “Yes, but what does it mean?” The master took back the pad and wrote, “Awareness, awareness, awareness means — awareness.”That’s what it is to watch yourself. No one can show you how to do it, because he would be giving you a technique, he would be programming you. But watch yourself. When you talk to someone, are you aware of it or are you simply identifying with it? When you got angry with somebody, were you aware that you were angry or were you simply identifying with your anger? Later, when you had the time, did you study your experience and attempt to understand it? Where did it come from? What brought it on? I don’t know of any other way to awareness. You only change what you understand. What you do not understand and are not aware of, you repress. You don’t change. But when you understand it, it changes.
– Anthony de Mello
ONE TUSK 