Matter to Life

Matter to Life?

Chemistry in transformation
to life..
This is assumption
of science's aim today..
The research direction
begins with matter as
source:
Matter over Mind..
The new science
of Consciousness
clears the air:
Matter and Mind
this temporary duality
is not separate
from Consciousness...!

What is the recipe for life? If you were to build a cell from scratch, what ingredients would you need? And what kind of environment would you need to cook inanimate matter into a living cell? These are the questions that occupy Harvard biochemist Jack Szostak, as he imagines the dynamic world where life was born.

What Szostak is interested in finding out is how many different recipes there are for making life. How did life arise here on Earth, and might some other planet build life in a different way? Work in his lab is starting to yield some answers.

"We're looking at a very narrow slice of the whole problem," Szostak says. "We assume we have the chemical building blocks of life: the question we're looking at is what do we need to do to make these chemicals get together and work like a cell?" Szostak, despite his humility, is a formidable figure in biochemistry-- a Nobel laureate, Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School and a researcher at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Massachusetts General Hospital-- and the project he is engaged in is, as he puts it, "one of the most interesting problems in chemistry." "The transition from chemistry to biology,"-- from matter to life....

(excerpt from The Daily Galaxy)

Or
to express differently:
Matter is illusion
in seeming
independence..

Space of Awareness

Space of Awareness

Everything comes and goes within

our space of awareness..

Our troubles arrive in attaching

to that fleeting thing..

We have difficulties in believing

that our real Self is that which

is permanent and eternal

and between

all of those fleeting things...

Lapsing

Lapsing

The discovery of the

directness possibility in all of us

to reach new and joyful understanding

will be followed

by lapses

which turn our attention to

the old habitual remnants remaining

in body and mind..

Thus opens a lifetime of recalling

who we are and allowing the dissolving 

of our lapsing...

Polarity in motion

Polarity in motion

Our troubles now

stem from the

stuck and static

life of our many

polar contentions..

Meanwhile the truth

is found in motion:

Separation and

Consciousness

in continuing swirl..

A moment's realizing

Consciousness

seen as Separate

or

Separate 

seen as Consciousness

and at last:

Separation shines

only as

Consciousness...

Either/Or

Either/Or

This is our cultural software

our reality of zeros and ones..

Yet many now are upgrading

to new software: 

new reality negating

but also affirming 

either/or..

Our new software

changes our perspective'

either/or becomes object

shining within an

infinite point of view...

ACIM and Advaita

Essay: The Course in Miracles and the Advaita Vedanta

Guest September 19, 2011 Blog For Us!, Book Reviews, Essays
The Course in Miracles and the Advaita Vedanta: When Mystical Christianity meets Non-duality

“In order to find out who you are, You must disappear”. This is one of the most remembered quotes from Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj, one of the enlightened Masters in the tradition of Advaita Vedanta, a philosophy within the Hinduism that points directly to the “Self” as the source of “I am” the underlying field of awareness which is the primal field or source of creation. By realizing the Self, Advaita practitioners awaken to this unfathomable field of Awareness.

Advaita Vedanta teaches that is through a process called self-enquiry that the Self can be realized. Self-enquiry is encouraged as an inner process of enquiry or investigation in which the fundamental question is contemplated: “What am I?” Realizing the “I am” consciousness, according to Advaita is the sure path to unlock the mystery of existence and to unleash the indescribable gifts of utter Peace, Freedom and Joy in a pure state of Oneness.

Oneness is referred to as “Non-duality”, which in sanskrit is known as “Advaita”. This philosophy is contained within two jewels of the Vedic Scriptures: The Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita. Both scriptures are available in English and some of the most handy translations are given by Eknath Easwaran.

But, what is the relation between the Advaita Vedanta and the Course in Miracles? Well, for both the Advaita Vedanta and the Course in Miracles, Truth is contained and realized in a state of Oneness, which in the Course in Miracles is known as “the Atonement” and one which is shared in the “Sonship”.

In order to be established in the state of Oneness, according to the Advaita Vedanta one must awake to the pervading field of Awareness. For this to be attained, the Self must be realized. The Self is the essence, the primordial nature of “I am”, our true identity in other words. Similarly, in the Course in Miracles we learn that “the goal of the curriculum, regardless of the Teacher you choose, is know thy-Self”. …”There is nothing else to seek.”

The all pervading field of Awareness pointed to in the Advaita Vedanta is none other than “The Kingdom of Heaven” in the Course in Miracles. “Seek ye first the Kingdom of Heaven”…”But seek this only, because you can find nothing else”. If nothing else is to be found , then the Kingdom of Heaven must be the underlying field of existence or pure “Awareness” that the Advaita Vedanta points to as well.

But, what keep us from realizing the Self or from awakening to the Kingdom of Heaven? Identically, both teachings assert that the sole obstruction to that is the Ego, which is the false idea of what/who we are and through which we, for the most part, experience the world. Since for both teachings the ego does not really exist, because is just a thought powered by our belief system created around it in our minds, the ego can and it must disappear.

The disappearance of the ego for both the Advaita Vedanta and the Course in Miracles requires a resolved determination to undo and to unlearn all our dearest beliefs that support and sustain the ego existence. Mere curiosity, or scattered attempts to “question everything you learned about yourself” (from the Course in Miracles), will not be enough to dissolve the ego.

In order to go through the process of dissolving the ego, the Advaita Vedanta stresses the importance of finding a Teacher. In the Course in Miracles, the Teacher presents himself already as the “older brother” Jesus Christ.

The promise of both Teachings (Advaita and the Course in Miracles), is that the ego can be dissolved -It’s just a thought!- in an instant. Furthermore, the Course in Miracles explains that the notion that this is a “process” that “takes time” is but an Illusion because time is nothing but the outward projection of the Present into the future by the false idea that there are obstacles to learning that need to be removed “in time”. “Fear not this Holy instant in which you remember what you have always been”: -says the Course in Miracles-, Unbounded Truth beyond belief, timeless and changeless, free from the ego, indestructible and beyond measure.

Two clear paths that lead to one clear indivisible Truth by departing from a limiting and unbelievable ego. This is the heritage that Masters and Sages alike embodied and reminded us about and whose promise of attaining it is total Freedom from the World. Only one choice is to be made in this moment of now, says the Course in Miracles: “Would you be hostage to the ego or host to God -Truth-?”

By Oscar Petit, member of ABC’s Spiritual Book Club

Awaken indeed

Awaken indeed

from our dream of separation
to heed grace's call
to find the peace
and the happiness
which we seek
in all the
wrong
places...!

“Your inner purpose is to awaken. It is as simple as that. You share that purpose with every other person on the planet - because it is the purpose of humanity."     Eckhart Tolle

Perfection

Perfection

Proud graduation moment

in morning news..

Planning the perfection

of simultaneous energies

celebrating graduation joy..

Momentary joy with warning:

In separation there are

glimpses of perfection

fleeting but injurious

when expected

again and again

in separation...

Light-Based Computers

Scientists Just Automated Designing Light-Based Computers

Written by

JORDAN PEARSON

STAFF WRITER (CANADA)

May 28, 2015 // 04:09 PM EST

Your computer ferries data around using electrons and conductive wires; for now, anyway. The age of electronics could soon end, maybe even within the next decade, thanks to an algorithm that can automatically design components that use light instead of electrons.

Currently, sending electrons around a computer using conductive wires consumes up to an estimated 80 percent of a computer’s processing power. Basically, wires are a bottleneck when it comes to processing speed. Sending data with light, similar to fiber optics but at a micro-scale, would allow computers to process much more data, and much faster.....

(excerpt from website: Motherboard..)

Entanglement

Entanglement

It is quite prophetic
that science is finding
reality explanations
through new lenses
integrated and holistic..

Entanglement is here
the lens of note..
non-local connecting
 each universal point
with all others
describes the field
of our Awareness..
From which we Now
holographically project
gravity's constrictions
in our 3D world..

Yet we might continue
with a realization
that these projections
as the hologram
are really just coloring
and modulating
our infinite field
of Awareness...!

Emergence of Spacetime --"Built by Quantum Entanglement"

Spacetime

A collaboration of physicists and a mathematician has made a significant step toward unifying general relativity and quantum mechanics by explaining how spacetime emerges from quantum entanglement in a more fundamental theory. The paper announcing the discovery by Ooguri, with Caltech mathematician Matilde Marcolli and graduate students Jennifer Lin and Bogdan Stoica, will be published in Physical Review Letters.

Physicists and mathematicians have long sought a Theory of Everything (ToE) that unifies general relativity and quantum mechanics. General relativity explains gravity and large-scale phenomena such as the dynamics of stars and galaxies in the universe, while quantum mechanics explains microscopic phenomena from the subatomic to molecular scales.

The holographic principle shown in the image  below is widely regarded as an essential feature of a successful Theory of Everything. The holographic principle states that gravity in a three-dimensional volume can be described by quantum mechanics on a two-dimensional surface surrounding the volume. In particular, the three dimensions of the volume should emerge from the two dimensions of the surface. However, understanding the precise mechanics for the emergence of the volume from the surface has been elusive. 

Now, Ooguri and his collaborators have found that quantum entanglement is the key to solving this question. Using a quantum theory (that does not include gravity), they showed how to compute energy density, which is a source of gravitational interactions in three dimensions, using quantum entanglement data on the surface. This is analogous to diagnosing conditions inside of your body by looking at X-ray images on two-dimensional sheets. This allowed them to interpret universal properties of quantum entanglement as conditions on the energy density that should be satisfied by any consistent quantum theory of gravity, without actually explicitly including gravity in the theory. The importance of quantum entanglement has been suggested before, but its precise role in emergence of spacetime was not clear until the new paper by Ooguri and collaborators.

Quantum entanglement is a phenomenon whereby quantum states such as spin or polarization of particles at different locations cannot be described independently. Measuring (and hence acting on) one particle must also act on the other, something that Einstein called "spooky action at distance." The work of Ooguri and collaborators shows that this quantum entanglement generates the extra dimensions of the gravitational theory.

The Daily Galaxy via University of Tokyo

Intervals of Time

Intervals of Time

A cosmological thought
that the vastness of 
our expanding universe
contains time intervals
in which observers
observe the out there..
This dualistic view
seems as destined to
lose its limitations
as clearing arrives:
Time is thought
and viewing of truth
does not come
in intervals...!

"There are only certain intervals of time when life of any sort is possible in an expanding universe and we can practice astronomy only during that habitable time interval in cosmic history."

John D. Barrow, Cosmologist, theoretical physicist, and mathematician, currently Research Professor of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Cambridge.

(from: The Daily Galaxy)

You Will Be Amazed

You Will Be Amazed

If you could sense the spaciousness of the sky
and the dramatic beauty of shape-shifting clouds
if you could feel the dark magnificence of mountains
and the calm sentience of trees

If you could sense that the world isn't mechanical and inert
but gloriously alive with soul-force
and if you could feel this force inside you, as the essence of your being
and so sense that you’re not separate after all
but part of this magical communion

Then your restlessness and dissatisfaction would cease.
Your sense of frustration and emptiness
your craving for success and power
your hunger for love and affirmation
your need for diversion and excitement
your desire to own and conquer -
these crazy traits would simply fall away
like the pains of a wound which has healed.
​
One day you will be amazed
at how easy it is to be alive
and how right it feels to be in the world

  

Dr Steve Taylor is a senior lecturer in psychology at Leeds Beckett University, and the author of several best-selling books on psychology and spirituality. For the last three years he has been included (this year at #31) in Mind, Body, Spiritmagazine’s list of the ‘100 most spiritually influential living people.’ His books include: Waking From Sleep, The Fall, Out of the Darkness, Back to Sanity, and his latest book The Meaning. His books have been published in 18 languages, while his articles and essays have been published in over 40 academic journals, magazines and newspapers.

Befriending

Befriending

Can we befriend

what is foreign and strange?

Only it seems

in knowing the light

of the common..

and then..

the foreign and strange

electrically

are gifts with

friendship born...

That which is seemingly exterior

That which is seemingly exterior

On a walk

the sun setting 

clouds asserting 

after passing rain..

Many objects distinctive

state their separation..

Until remembering

to bring them inside..!

Memorial remembering

Memorial remembering

On this day's

devotion to those

dying on foreign fields

we pause to remember

war's separations

estrangements from Self..

So the remembering

most useful today

is our common connection

with those who have passed

and those passing

in ignore-ance 

of each our one Self...

It from Bit

Robert Lawrence Kuhn is the creator, writer and host of "Closer To Truth," a public television and multimedia program featuring the world's leading thinkers exploring humanity's deepest questions regarding the cosmos, consciousness and a search for meaning. Kuhn is co-editor (with John Leslie) of The Mystery of Existence: Why Is There Anything At All? Kuhn contributed this article, based on two recent "Closer To Truth" episodes (produced/directed by Peter Getzels), to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

What are the basic building blocks of the cosmos? Atoms, particles, mass energy? Quantum mechanics, forces, fields? Space and time — space-time? Tiny strings with many dimensions?

A new candidate is "information," which some scientists claim is the foundation of reality. The late distinguished physicist John Archibald Wheeler characterized the idea as "It from bit" — "it" referring to all the stuff of the universe and "bit" meaning information. 

But here's how physicist Paul Davies, director of BEYOND: The Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science at Arizona State University, frames the question: "Historically, matter has been at the bottom of the explanatory chain, and information has been a sort of secondary derivative of it," Davies said. Now, he added, "there's increasing interest among at least a small group of physicists to turn this upside down and say, maybe at rock bottom, the universe is about information and information processing, and it's matter that emerges as a secondary concept."

(excerpt from the web: space.com)

The Sphere

Becoming the Sphere

This Now
pulls all external fragments
into itself along with
a joyful realization
that the fragments were
never outside...

It was but yesterday I thought myself a fragment quivering without rhythm in the sphere of life. Now I know that I am the sphere, and all life in rhythmic fragments moves within me.

~ Khalil Gibran 
Image: SpiritMountain via DeviantArt

Sunrise

Sunrise

burns away the dark of night
and this transformation
corresponds to the realization:
the dark and I
have always been
made of Sun...

The INVITATION (Amazon review)

I have known Frannie Rose for many years, and know that her personal struggle early in life has inspired many people. Her suffering through seventeen bedridden years is the bedrock for her spiritual teachings.  Hers is a spirituality which is Experiential, a characteristic often missing in modern religion, and in reality, in most of us.  The subtitle of her new book is "Uncovering God's Longing to be Heard," which I found as an exhilarating reversal of the usual meaning of longing.  This is truly a message from Grace, which Frannie has answered in a most inspiring way, and her experience has become a treasured gift for many.

The book contains several graphics, which Frannie uses in her retreats, and which augment  her words in a beautiful and emphatic way.  She also uses some quite distinctive metaphors, such as the Mind Prison, to facilitate understanding.  Her simple "We" goes far in explaining the need for new Awareness of our true identities as spiritual beings. 
The book is also the result of her years of experience hosting an annual series of retreats by One Simple Voice, the nonprofit organization which she founded. My hope is that this book, and Frannie Rose, find the attention of many more who are struggling in this modern age, and who can identify with this simple, yet profound, and uplifting voice..!  
Undoubtedly Five Stars and More..!

The Cavern

The Cavern

A swirling darkness

captures and holds

our paths in time

constant changes

our senses perceive

but on occasion

time stands still

time enlarges and

a new substance

of being arrives

containing the path

the darkness

and time

no..not containing

the new substance

is all...

Gender confusion

Gender confusion

feminine and masculine

principles

these two poles

inextricably dancing..

each of these

has its own 

polarity identity

female and male

demise of one pole

shatters the other

holographically...

An Inquiry

An Inquiry

We all need be

duality detectors..

That may seem

quite easy:

the world out there

all of those objects

are indeed

the duality we

seek to detect..

But now question 1:

How am I

aware of this

duality so found..?

A step inward

locates an observer

which seems as

 question 1 answered:

observer and object

a married pair..

But now question 2:

What is aware

of this married pair..?

Yod

Yod

A small letter

dot or iota

a brief pronouncement

concerning the universe

end to end..

This small yod

lodged in your heart

and you the center

contrary to maps galactica..

The yod a spirited mover

it is not here and not there

but only found

in the Now and Here

and Everywhere...

Real Self

The Sense of "I am" (Consciousness)

When I met my Guru, he told me: "You are not what you take yourself 

to be. Find out what you are. Watch the sense 'I am', find your real 

Self." I obeyed him, because I trusted him. I did as he told me. All 

my spare time I would spend looking at myself in silence. And what a 

difference it made, and how soon! 

My teacher told me to hold on to the sense 'I am' tenaciously and not 

to swerve from it even for a moment. I did my best to follow his 

advice and in a comparatively short time I realized within myself the 

truth of his teaching. All I did was to remember his teaching, his 

face, his words constantly. This brought an end to the mind; in the 

stillness of the mind I saw myself as I am -- unbound. 

I simply followed (my teacher's) instruction which was to focus the 

mind on pure being 'I am', and stay in it. I used to sit for hours 

together, with nothing but the 'I am' in my mind and soon peace and 

joy and a deep all-embracing love became my normal state. In it all 

disappeared -- myself, my Guru, the life I lived, the world around 

me. Only peace remained and unfathomable silence.

Nisargadatta Maharaj

I AM

Soup, Salad & Scripture

May 18th, 2014

Centering Prayer based on Psalm 46:10:

Be still and know that I AM God

Be still and know that I AM

Be still and Know

Be Still

BE

Reflection 1
on above.

How are you? 

Concerns?

Scripture:  Romans 8:22-27 (NRSV)

Future Glory

18 I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; 20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 

22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; 23 and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. 27 And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.

28 We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. 29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn within a large family. 30 And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified.

Questions:

1.  What is the meaning these themes to you:  Pentecost, Holy Spirit, Salvation,

Hope, and Suffering?

2.  What do you know about Pentecost and the birthday of the church?

3.  How does the Holy Spirit move, or not move, in your life? 

4.  What does Paul mean when he says that in hope we are saved?

5.  Do you agree with the idea of salvation "according to the spirit" rather than "according to the flesh?"

6.  If salvation comes by grace, why shouldn't people just "continue in sin in order that grace may bound?"

7.  What difficulties do you experience in studying Paul?

Meditation

I don't think Paul ever intended for people to feel that their bodies are bad. After all, God took on a human body in Jesus! Paul does not use the word soma, which literally means "body." He is trying to introduce another idea and unfortunately uses a word that has caused untold confusion in Christian history. The closest alternative translation we could use might be the word "ego" or even the Freudian word "id." I think what Paul means by sarx is the trapped self, the small self, the partial self, or what Merton called the false self. Basically, spirit is the whole self, the Christ self that we fall into by grace. We are saved by a larger mystery in which we can only participate as one abiding member. The problem is not between body and spirit; it's between part and whole...(Richard Rohr meditation, April 10, 2015)

Rejection

Rejection

A cultural choice

to stay on a searching path

tightly anchored in time..

Composing each morning

a day of schedules

no other choice it seems..

Not knowing these habits 

are to reject the Now..

A brief contemplation

might reveal a

reality brand new:

experience of Now

floods time and schedules

calms the morning

searches are closed

real work is done...