BUDDHA IN THE MUD is a blog – a living book based on the Dzogchen teachings. Our teacher is life, and life is karma. We are all Buddhas in the mud of concepts.

What’s The Point Of Gurus?

What’s the point of Gurus?
What’s the point of spiritual groups?

If we see these questions as negative,
we lack confidence in realisation.

These are valid questions.
The whole point of these questions
is to see how they are answered.

We all have to start somewhere
to know what we are.

When we know what we are,
the world is our oyster,
our teacher.

We can do anything and go anywhere,
because everything and everyone is a reminder
of emptiness and compassion.

The point is now
to help others start their quest
… and then let go.

Acknowledging Evil

If we cannot acknowledge evil, we will never be able to acknowledge truth. How does evil exist, or does it even exist? Throughout human history, this subject has haunted us.

Evil is merely negativity in our mind that creates darkness, due to biased judgement. It is biased because that mind is already prejudiced so that it never sees the light or clarity of truth. Prejudice is the darkness that turns into many levels of evil thought and action, while feeling righteous.

The very moment we acknowledge a sense of heaviness in our mind, we acknowledge the light of truth. Unfortunately, due to habitual behaviour and lack of spiritual practice, that ‘light’ creates virtuous evil-good. We have seen this throughout history.

Seeing isn’t believing. Seeing is knowing and realising how we have been caught and held against our conscience.

When The Story Twists And Turns …
… the reader’s mind twists and turns.

As long as a reader is hooked and addicted, the story will continue.

The truth of any story is the reader, not the story. Who is the reader? Consciousness. What is consciousness? It is the pure state of being, before an observer pokes its nose in. If an observer (self) is present, it has already been captured by the story, and taken sides.

How do we know when an observer has taken over? Consciousness falls into either a state of vacancy (indifference) when what is observed is just a piece of entertainment, or consciousness becomes agitated, reactionary and overpowered.

Pure being does not twist and turn. It just sees, and isn’t led down the garden path. If down the garden path, they deceive you by making you believe something which is not true.

We oppose “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” by not believing everything we read, see or hear, standing back and take an overview to understand the general picture of where a story is leading us. We read between the lines to understand the real or hidden meaning behind the  superficial appearance of something.

When we believe, we become the story.

Sincerity And Boastfulness

Unconditional sincerity or truthfulness is the absence of pretence, deceit, or hypocrisy. If we say we have compassion, this must manifest with the absence of self. To be sincere, we have to be honest and trustworthy.

Smugness is looking pretty.

How to make a Buddha laugh?
Tell them how good you are!

Escaping Chaos And Confusion

People around us are in chaos and confusion because they believe in something or other.

To escape this madness, the answer is simple. That which sees this chaos and confusion is neither in chaos nor confused. Voilà! … there you are! Simple magic. That which just sees is pure consciousness, our original reality.

The real trick is staying free.

😀

You’re Not Making A Fool Of Yourself

You’re not making a fool of yourself;
your self is making a fool of you.

What is ‘self’, and what is ‘you’?
Self is consciousness, identifying with ideas.
You are silenced consciousness that is aware of these identifications.

We are constantly being fooled into identifying with this or that.
Being fooled more than once
means that we can be fooled again and again.

Until enlightenment, self will fool consciousness.

There Are Two Sides To Every Story

Depending on our mindset, we lean towards one side or another – and even when we have taken a side, we find another side presents itself, and so on.

These are the yanas, the levels we transcend until we reach total satisfaction of enlightenment. Our life starts off with us being indoctrinated with mundane thoughts but, with the right motivation, the supramundane dawns.

At certain moments, conflicts arise, and associations do not fit any more; we can no longer conform to expectations, and find that understanding is incomplete (although it may still satisfy others). Our experience and the required conformity no longer match up, fuelled not only by what is implied, but also by what is omitted.

A separation occurs, but it is important to realise that those who think differently are not now the enemy. This is where empathy must come in. We know what effect believing in one side as opposed to another has on our mind. One is not superior to the other: we just have to look at things in a different light in order to complete the picture. Shiva, Buddha, Jesus were not saying different things – they all had light, but their emphasis was unique, and for that moment.

This isn’t merely about having a different opinion. We have genuinely outgrown what we previously adhered to. Those crutches just dropped away, and we now walk with a fresh confidence, and are happy!

Being independent, communication now relies upon seeing other sides to truly be of benefit to others, rather than being concerned with self-aggrandisement.

When we take sides, we alienate one another and become divided. That provides an opportunity for ego to arise, and evil to manifest. ‘Evil’ is ego, clinging to likes and dislikes. Evil is no big deal, but it does exert a hold on us, making us righteous and creating enemies. The more righteous we become, the more annoying we are 🙂

We are all good and evil, light and dark, positive and negative, objective and subjective, confused and wise.

The secret:
We are free in the moment of seeing.
– Tulku Urgyen, a Tibetan master.

Darkness is only possible
by the presence of light.
It’s all one.

When we cling to a side, we miss the whole point.
That’s what evil likes.
😀

A Few Random Thoughts
Random: happening without method or conscious decision.

Be Grateful For Not Being A Perfect Human Being
There is more to us.

We Can Never Find Pure Consciousness
We are that which we seek

Don’t Change Your Mind
Change the way you see.

We Can Never Find A Self
The self is merely make-believe in the mind.

It’s A Relief To Be Happy
Happiness is none other than relief.

Relief: alleviate. From Latin alleviare – ‘lightened’,
from ad- ‘to’ + levare ‘raise’, influenced by levis ‘light’.

Our Temple Of Worship Is Our Mind

Worship: acknowledgement of worth.

The mind is where we contemplate and meditate, creating the template for our life. Our temple is a place to moderate our temper. If we make too much noise, those sounds reverberate and evoke images, memories and emotions.

Our mind is the holy land watched over by consciousness. Thinking that a holy land is somewhere else is turning the atemporal (independent of time) into the temporal (governed by time).

Mind is a place of confusion and enlightenment.
They are one and the same.

When we realise our true worth of pure consciousness,
any emotion is freed in that moment.

Truth Is Before And Beyond Words

Repetition of words rather than direct experience
relies on second hand information,
and trivialises meaning.

Direct experience has no words.

When we let go of all concepts, we see clearly.
Freedom begins when presumptions end
and all associations are dropped.

The words we adopt cast a spell over us,
and a persona is born;
it’s a sort of dressed-up conjuring trick.

Direct experience is naked.

Uncultivated Wakefulness

The hardest thing is dropping our fixations

Through realisation of our innate nature that is the only reality, we notice that we don’t over react or panic as we once did. We stop shouting at the ‘radio’ 😀 Emptiness is standing back so that consciousness sees clearly, and is able to adapt. Then situations can be dealt with in a cool way, rather than getting overheated.

The interesting thing is that the same goes for pleasant situations; we don’t over react. This might sound disconcerting as we may expect to feel elated and happy, but there is just quiet satisfaction in a cool way. The satisfaction drops away as there is always the next moment to deal with.

We may appear to be a cold and unmoving person, but the warmth is there, just not an ostentatious way, not dressed up to impress.

Uncultivated wakefulness isn’t being something that we are not. We are a rich rawness. We have explored our self and let go of any hint of a pretence of being wise.

Result = uncultivated relaxation.
Life can be fruitful;
we just have to arrived at a conclusion sooner rather than later.

Can Spiritual Teachings Have An Opposite Effect?

Spiritual teachers often talk about love, compassion and carefreeness, but this can manifest as an opposite effect. Reality lies in a pure heart, rather than in ideas and theories in the mind.

We have an idea about love, compassion and carefreeness, but that isn’t the reality.

The reality of love, compassion and carefreeness is what we are, and the way in which that is displayed.

When something evolves into a doctrine – a belief that’s held and taught – people become uptight and neurotic, displaying repressed nervousness, irritability or anger; they are unable to give expression to feelings or to empathise with others who may not see the doctrine in the same way.

When the teaching becomes a doctrine to which we want to belong, we feel vulnerable as that isn’t our complete reality. Lacking in confidence and feeling insecure, we are compelled to return for more teachings, and end up in a vicious cycle of existence, going round in circles hoping that the next retreat will give us the answer 😉

If we become dependent, we lack confidence and remain subtly aggressive. What starts wars? Belief. Love, compassion and carefreeness are in abundance in the presence of true confidence. This is fearlessness and hopelessness, and we can deal with anything.

The Moment Before We Think That We Are Awake

The moment before we go into our old routine, our behaviour, is the moment of ordinary, original, pure experience of pure consciousness. That is the moment when we are awake, before we start relying on memory to name and judge everything. The more familiar we become with this pure moment, the longer we stay awake, which has an effect on the following moment when our reactions and judgements kick in: recognising the moment of pure consciousness loosens those reactions and we are more measured in our responses.

It’s so simple, but we have become so complex.

When we just go straight into our old routine, we miss this moment of pure experience and, instead, delve into our play-world of projections and comments. We lose our peace as our world is full of woes.

We can give this pure moment fancy Latin or Sanskrit or Tibetan names, but ordinary, pure experience is before all those proclamations.
From Latin proclamatio(n-), from proclamare ‘to shout out’.

Shout out? You mean puff ourselves up! 😀

Ordinary, original, pure experience is so much more fun. It’s bright, fresh, inspiring, creative when needed, scary … scary? Scary in a sense of not knowing, but knowingness of pure experience is, itself, present. The moment of all possibilities and potential.

I installed a new shower … hoping it would work … turned the water back on … heard a hissing sound … a moment of confusion … emptiness … fear … can I cope? … knowledge … “That’s water, that is” … “Water inside the wall!” … blankness … emptiness … despair … knowledge … “I’ve put a screw through a pipe!” … resignation … resolve … “Do it again”!

Result: every time I have a shower, I listen, and wonder! 😀

Meditation has the same effect; in a moment, we are awake to all possibilities and potential.
Nothing is fixed, and we are ready to repair.

Compassion Is Compatibility

Compatibility: To be able to exist or occur together without problems or conflict. Able to have a harmonious relationship; well suited. Consistent with another.
From medieval Latin compatibilis, from compati ‘suffer with’.

In order to be compatible, we have to know how another feels, and be able to adjust to their mind, rather than taking them to be an enemy. Everyone has the same pure heart, but their minds are in conflict with the minds of others.

The only way to realise happiness is to be compatible, without irritation, without an idea of how others should be. Everyone is learning at their own rate; even the Buddha couldn’t speed up this process. It is up to each individual to realise their true heart … with a little support from a compatible heart.

We all have compatible hearts.

There is little progress made
if we follow a spiritual path while remaining indifferent,
shunning others because we see them as an irritation.

Through our karmic response,
others are our teacher.

Relaxing In A Troubled Mind

Relaxing a troubled mind in a troubled world.

Sitting quietly watching the breath, consciousness doesn’t follow thoughts or impulses to do things; the feeling to be active will be there but just let that go. You can do it later. This is the discipline of concentration and, in that way, the mind comes to silent, still awareness.

The troubles out there are still awaiting us but, for now, we rest in perfect equanimity. We may even notice that thoughts or the impulse to get up and go are stronger, but this isn’t so. We’re noticing more – we’re more aware, and it may even feel uncomfortable, but this is merely breaking our pattern of behaviour, and ego doesn’t like it. Ego is a word for consciousness clinging to ideas, based around a constructed concept of self. The more we notice, the more we are in control, and the more confident we become, the more inner peace is established.

Gradually, throughout our busy troubled day, we will be reminded of this inner peace – our natural state – and relax. This is the holy place of sanity, heaven, nirvana.

The world around wants us to be busy and involved, intent on blaming and complaining. This is all justifiable, but we cannot make the world better; even Krishna, Jesus and Buddha can’t do that. They can only inspire us to realise our inner world of light and delight. If we all did the same, the world will get better. As it is, we just have to play our little part and not take our troubles so seriously. The only thing we can do is note what is happening and, by doing so, be free.

When we know we are facing the right way, that’s all that is needed to progress towards enlightenment. Our mind is only troubled because the world is troubled, and we are picking trouble up from one another.

Worldly troubles are like a virus:
our job is to spread the virus of inner peace.

Realise inner peace first,
and then our world realises peace.

Inner peace is the light of a candle
passed on to other candles.

It is all light, but each candle
has its own unique display.

Be happy.
Little flames torch 😀 others.

“Health And Safety”

The slogan ‘health and safety’ saw the beginning of project fear, with people losing their ability to use common sense. An assessment of danger had to written up for practically everything we did.

We were bombarded with this phrase, and jobsworths (those who uphold petty rules even at the expense of humanity or common sense) would go around checking that we were do it ‘right’.

Now health and safety is our jailer, with lockdowns, arrests and lockups. “Keep your distance, cover your face, disinfect your hands, follow the arrows … ”

The pressure to conform is overshadowing our common sense, and this has created confusion, chaos and suffering, which has consequences for the future.

Our common sense is pure consciousness,
which is common to all.

When we lose sight of this commonality,
we lose empathy and compassion.

Journey Into Self

The journey to nowhere.
Our self is an illusion, a wannabe – an imitator!

Our feeling of self is a projection of acquired ideas with which we identify, and that creates and maintains our behaviour. All the while, consciousness – our actual being of pure consciousness – looks on.

There is an ancient saying:
“Two birds sat in a tree.
One pecked of the fruit
and the other sat and watched.”

We are like that.
The body needs food.
Consciousness doesn’t.

Our problem is that we are so used to pecking at everything that merely watching sounds boring. We fail to realise that doing nothing is the pure experience of ultimate joy.

Feeling the wind, watching leaves shimmer and rustle, sunsets, sun rises, moon light, bird song … tasting, smelling, realising inner peace, inspiration, insight, love of being, being in love …

we are actually doing nothing, totally open before we are caught up and held by our desires and fears.

Pure consciousness just experience. We cannot be what we see, and this is extremely important to realise. When we look at our self, consciousness is actually looking at our mind’s collection of associations and memories. It is full of trauma, wounds, beliefs, hopes, fears, doubts, fixations, obsessions about creations that have no permanent existence – no reality. This self moves, talks, and interacts in a collective dream state inhabited by fellow believers.

All the while, pure consciousness sits and watches.
Pure consciousness is full of richness, and perfectly unsullied.

Our journey into self is a journey to nowhere.
Just now, here.

The mistake self makes
is that it thinks it’s getting somewhere.

We Have Bought Into A Model Of Life

To be accepted in this world, we tick the ‘right’ boxes to fit in. We learn to think inside the box, and consider ourselves decent people. If we do not buy into this belief system, we become an outsider.

Industry may say it wants innovators to ‘think outside the box’, but that’s only to sell more products; innovators don’t allow themselves to wonder if those products are actually needed.

Conscience may feel a conflict between right and wrong, but we hold on tightly to what we think we have, squeezing ourselves into a totally mundane world. As things don’t feel right, we lack confidence and might become hostile to any suggestions that there may be more to life. Basically we don’t know what to say because we have only learnt what we are told.

What a relief not to be a part of hostilities!

Words Are Symbolic

Words are symbols that convey an idea,
but before the idea is experience.

When we realise what is having the experience,
we will understand what the Buddha meant by,
“Don’t take my word for it … ”.

Life Is A Memory

Life is memory,
except for the present moment
that goes by so quickly that we hardly catch it.
This is how we live; in a dream world.

Because life is a memory,
we are destined to repeat ourselves,
and so we are predictable.

Catching the present moment is a breath of fresh air,
revealing inspirational magic.

Memory is our mechanical backup plan;
it’s the plan we fall back on to recycle existence.
From Latin: exsistere, ‘to come into being’

This present moment is the foundation of the next.
That continuity is reincarnation
– the cycle of birth and death and rebirth.

In life, there are gaps or ‘deaths’.
These moments of empty clarity are where change can occur
as no memory is present.

While resting in emptiness,
there is nothing known other than knowingness itself.

The Real Great Reset

‘Reset’ means either to adjust,
or take back to an original state.

The ‘Great Reset’
is to adjust humanity’s thinking through social engineering
wanting us to be created in their image.

The real great reset
is realising our natural original reality of pure cognisance
that is in no one’s image.

Our choice … if we know that we have a choice.

Happiness Is Realising The Problem

When we know what the problem – any problem – is, we can then solve it through personal investigation of the causes behind that problem, until we arrive at the ultimate realisation.

The common problem behind it all is a ‘self’ identity that judges others through bias. Consciousness itself has no bias; it just sees. When the problem is known, there is no mystery, no fear.

Information is a belief and, if we continually adhere to information, we will therefore know nothing. When we put the information into practice, however, we know, having experienced the problem for ourselves in order to solve it.

For example:
If we are installing a shower in the bathroom, we read the instructions. There is no knowing taking place at this time. Once we begin to actually install the shower, we then find irregularities, and this is when we start learning and knowing. Having completed the job, we can then help others. If we get an expert to do the job for us, we pay for not knowing.

Likewise, in our spiritual life, there are thoughts and emotions that cause us problems; we may experience anxiety, stress, depression, confusion, worry. Having faced these conditions and realised their source, we may be able, through empathy, to be of benefit – and the more problems we encounter and address, the more we can listen to others with confidence and kindness, without judgement.

Spiritual engineers are able to adjust to all conditions.

Wearing Our Self Out

Our self is like an old coat that we hold on to tightly.
‘We’ is consciousness.

Through meditation, consciousness becomes tired of self
(its habitual pattern of behaviour) and drops this old coat.

Pure consciousness is naked awareness, without ideas or concepts stitched to it.
Until full enlightenment, we will have remnants attached.

Those remnants become our teacher. 😀

Conscious Awakening And Non-Dual Awakening

In our life, there may be a growing feeling that all is not well; some work hard at making life feel right, while others find that is pointless.

If everything seems right, we just continue on our way. If, however, everything doesn’t seem right, we ask questions, reasoning why everything appears to be wrong.

Being led to believe things – clever stories and songs – no longer satisfies us. We used to think that was all normal, but now we wonder if there more to life. Is there more to me? All around us is dogma – do’s and don’ts that are for the many but not for the few. Why are we so divided?

We start to awaken to a world of deception, one where we aren’t told the complete truth. Suddenly, this isn’t all right any more, and we recognise that we are being being lulled into a dream state, an illusion of reality. That is the beginning of awakening of consciousness from the collective dream.

Actually, everyone feels uncomfortable but ignores this – “That’s just life!” Is it really? If we question this collective dream, we become outsiders or oddballs as others haven’t registered that life is a charade masking our true reality.

Have we been concealing our fear, as there aren’t many people we can talk to about this? We now search for others who (more or less) feel the same. Did we seek out a path, or did it come our way? Karma can work for us 🙂

This is when we come upon some sort of meditation group. Meditation is not about feeling good about ourselves. It’s about seeing, experiencing, understanding and realising what is, in fact, the truth.

The truth has always been with us.
We are and have always been that which we seek.

The dreamers don’t tell you that
because they want you to stay like them.

As there are many sorts of meditation, there are many levels of experience and realisation, each complete in its own way; as we ascend, both the meaning and the value of the meaning changes. Our world changes, but not the world of others.

This is where empathy and compassion come to the fore. We are not just consciousness having an experience; we are consciousness itself, before the experience – and even before realisation. We awaken to non-duality, and no longer dream or believe.

That is the real conscious awakening.
No one can deny us that
… but they still try …

😀

It Doesn’t Matter What We Do …

When we personally realise something,
it may not seem as amazing to others
and so remains a mystery to them.

It doesn’t matter what we do, pure being (pure consciousness) is always present as it’s what we are. Like space, there is nothing that can be done to stop it. Even in sleep, consciousness is still present, although unnoticed. When we realise that we are pure consciousness, that understanding in itself is unconditional empathy, compassion, and love. The only problem for pure being is that it can be distracted and thus moves away from non-duality (perfect reality) into a relating duality (a reality of desire and judgement).

It has been said that God is empathy, compassion and love but, like pure consciousness, these are expressions that come after the experience of non-duality. Non-duality does not relate to anything whatsoever. As humans, we only relate to function; our choice is whether to relate all the time or relate only when necessary.

The idea of God is something to which we relate, and relating is a duality rather than the direct oneness of non-duality.

There has to be pure consciousness present first in order to relate to something else. Being at one means there is no other – no graven image. It doesn’t matter what we do, pure consciousness is always present. The more we realise this, the more stable we are. Conversely, the more distracted we are, the more unstable, needy and dependent we become. Just look at our collective karmic history …

Exaggerating Our Spirituality

When we exaggerate our spirituality by thinking we are doing something special, we are, in fact, exaggerating our self-image, which is the very thing that causes our suffering, and which we want to transcend. It’s our attachment 😀 If we feel a little tetchy (irritated) about this, we’ve lost sight of the path. In acknowledging this irritation, we discover that we are indeed on the right path, but we’re now noticing that our path has more problems and confusion than we thought. 😀 This is part of our progress – noticing more.

If we feel that we want to be beyond ‘normal’ and don’t want to be like everyone else, we’ve simply fallen into the common trap of spiritual materialism.

Spirituality isn’t about not being human. It’s concerned with the true state of being human, acknowledging that we are, in fact, pure consciousness embodied in a human form and engaged in human activities. This state is beyond words, rituals and materiality, but not separate from these.

Spirituality is truly being at one with the material world, rather than feeling we have to keep ourselves apart from it. Interacting with others is a catalyst that brings about faster progress, although there will be times when we need to keep ourselves apart to recharge our batteries.

When we exaggerate our spiritual life,
we generate an atmosphere that closes the door to others.

An open door embodies true compassion.

The Planet Of Fear and Hope

We are governed by fear and hope. Can I go on holiday? Is it safe? Am I safe? Will life get back to normal? What is this new normal? What is the great reset? What is build back better? Is it to do with the new world order?

Fear and hope govern our mind, but the basis of these two negative emotions is ignorance or indifference to our actual reality rather than the one we have adopted.

If, through meditation, we only took the time to look and see, we would experience for ourselves the distractions and, in doing so, let go of them, revealing our true reality of pure consciousness, pure being.

If we are kept in the dark about our true reality, we can be led around in this darkness believing we are going towards the ‘light’ (freedom). All we have to do is realise that our life has never been ‘normal’. When people become anxious because life doesn’t feel right, the media/psychologists will happily lead us back to ‘that state that was never normal’, and round we go again.

You see, this all depends on
what the media/psychologists assume is normal.

Another word for hope and fear is ‘Samsara’,
which is this vicious cycle of existence
chasing after a false security and happiness.

All we have to do is look at our reactions, and we are free in that moment of seeing. Unfortunately, we don’t value that freedom because we are stuck in expectations that life should be a certain way, due to not knowing our true reality of clarity. We prefer to squabble by accepting or rejecting whatever we are told.

How do we deal with this squabbling?
By expanding the space of inner peace.

Sadly, this can be annoying to those with inner angst (fear),
so the inner peace of expansion has to remain in quiet love

In the immediate moment now,
we are alert to both dangers and potentials;
that is merely being aware.

“Hiding Your Light Under A Bushel”

A bushel: a measurement of weight ... or ideas!

If our life is only concerned with gain and loss / hope and fear,
the inner light of compassionate, pure consciousness will remain hidden.

Being obsessed, the light is hidden.
Being aware of being obsessed, the light shines.

Karma Is Our Perfect Teacher

Karma is the residue of our past judgements held in the mind, which are echoed in our behaviour. The path to enlightenment is dealing with this inner echo – our sticky residue.

Our attitude to life depends on the acknowledgement of this karma, be it pleasant or unpleasant. Our reaction to others tells us everything we need to know about ourselves; rather than condemning others – who, incidently, are trying to cope with their karma – we enlist the qualities of the six perfections (generosity, patience, morality, discipline, concentration and transcendent wisdom).

Our reactions are our perfect teacher as they are with us all the time, and are shaped by our background. Until perfect enlightenment, karma will be with us. To be a perfect student in order to ascend the levels, we acknowledge that we have to face our karma as it becomes increasingly subtle – and the teacher becomes stricter.