Thursday, August 20, 2015

oOo...OM...oOo

“Om is not just a sound or vibration. 
It is not just a symbol.
 It is the entire cosmos, 
whatever we can see, touch, 
hear and feel. Moreover, 
it is all that is within our perception 
and all that is beyond our perception. 
It is the core of our very existence. 
If you think of Om only as a sound, 
a technique or a symbol 
of the Divine, 
you will miss it altogether. 
Om is the mysterious cosmic energy 
that is the substratum of all the things
 and all the beings of the entire universe.
 It is an eternal song of the Divine.
 It is continuously resounding in silence
 on the background 
of everything that exists.”
  ~Amit Ray

oOo...OM...oOo

Driftwood Coral Zafu Meditation Cushion 

oOo...OM...oOo

Wednesday, August 19, 2015

open our eyes so we may see right...

~)(~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"The world is full of magic things,
patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper."
~ W.B. Yeats
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~)(~

Sit, breathe, pay attention...
 (click caption for more information 
about the zafu and ringong pictured above)

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

simply sit and disengage the mind...

"A way to purify oneself 
is through a letting-go process 
of simply sitting, 
and disengaging the mental mind. 
What a wonder!"

~)(~

 Meditation Cushion 
Cream with Lavender Bouquet Zafu
and other cushions available at ZafuChi.etsy.com

Monday, August 17, 2015

the divine shines through all the time...

~)(~
"We are living in a world that is 
absolutely transparent, and 
the divine is shining through 
it all the time." 
~Thomas Merton
~)(~

Meditation Cushion.  

Buckwheat Hulls. Zafu. Pouf. Floor Pillow

this and more unique and consciously made zafus available at ZafuChi 

 

Friday, August 14, 2015

our desires and existential restlessness...

"Can you accept your desires graciously? When you sit on the cushion 
and see one desire after another and feel how consuming each is—
if you remain on your cushion, then you are graciously accepting them.
 It may not feel gracious on the inside. But when the bell rings and the desire 
 suddenly dissipates, we recognize how little it actually means to us. 
Often it was just a temporary distraction from the pain or boredom
 that was coming up. Developing a gracious attitude toward our
 obsessive desires is what Zen practice is about. 
Seeing the nature of desire is the beginning of spiritual liberation."
~Tim Burkett, 
Nothing Holy About It: The Zen of Being Just Who You Are

~)(~

Pascal said, “All of humanity’s problems stem from
man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”

~)(~

noticing “existential restlessness”
Existential restlessness requires us to confront our yearning
 to fill the void of waiting on God with all manner of stimulation:
 intellectual insight, relationships, companionship,
or even the lower pleasures of delicious food or an afternoon cappuccino.
The problem, however, is that this wandering attention runs the small self,
the egoic operating system. What is needed is to just sit,
and to face the boredom and the “noon-day demons”
of attachment to thoughts and emotions.
Centering Prayer helps a person to gain enough being present to be nothing.
This is liberation.

~)(~

Meditation Cushion - available at ZafuChi on etsy

~)(~

https://www.etsy.com/shop/ZafuChi
https://www.tumblr.com/blog/zafuchi 
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Zafu-Meditation-Cushions/130822403614723

Thursday, August 13, 2015

beyond expectations and disappointments...

Suffering, beyond physical and emotional pain, 
can be caused by our attachment to expectations.  

"When we are disappointed by a pleasure 
which we have been expecting and which comes, 
the disappointment is because we were expecting the future, 
and as soon as it is there it is present. 
We want the future to be there without ceasing to be future. 
This is an absurdity of which eternity alone is the cure."
~Simone Weil (1909-1943)

 ~)(~



~)(~
 

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Sunday, July 19, 2015

identifying with the specificness of you and embracing the universality of you...

"The specific, meaning what you call the body, will not disappear but it will not fascinate you anymore. You will not choose to view anything from its standpoint anymore. And it will be your body but so will the petal of the rose, and so will the wall, and so will the tree and so will much more of the Kingdom of Heaven that isn't registering with you right now be recognized by you as part of your infinite being.

Mind you, as I said, as this happens you will also be becoming aware of the infiniteness of you and your attention will shift from body identification, from identifying with the specificness of you and embracing the universality of you. When this shift occurs into the universality of you being the vantage point from which you experience All That Is, the body won't disappear but it won't be important to you anymore. It's in that sense that you could say your body will disappear because it will no longer be present in the function that you had been using as you are in this moment today."
posted by Trisha Darrenger
Small Zafu Meditation Cushion by ZafuChi on etsy
 

Saturday, July 18, 2015

Pure Imagination...

"Beloved, You are what you Imagine you are. Nothing, not one thing in your life is Real except for that which is imagined into being. I am not speaking of fantasy here, but Pure Imagination emanating from your divine Soul. Nothing that is, is before it is imagined. Imagination is Infinite, therefore the substance of all things is Infinite. You, my love, are Infinite.
Make your dwelling be in me, where all Power, where all Wisdom and all Love abide in Infinite potential of unfolding grace. I command you to command Me, ask whatever you will in the Essence of Pure Imagination and it shall be done unto you.
You are Pure Imagination, let us create something magical together."
~I Am
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

There is profound miraculous power in the words above. These words were gifted me while I was experiencing a profound miracle. I had a small stroke in my right eye, the outer ocular nerve had stopped working. I had terrible double vision, a painful condition for an artist. This condition had lasted a number of months. The words above came to me as a healing balm, I believed into them. As a direct result, I was led to a beautiful healer, she laid her hand on my eyes without saying a word. Days later my vision returned. Pure Imagination!

May I make a beautiful suggestion? Find some lovely paper and envelopes. Write out the message above. Mail it to several friends with the return address being only, ~I Am. Make sure to mail one to yourself. You may begin finding miracles before you find your pen.
You are Loved,
~Keith Allen Kay (facebook link)

~)(~

Zafu Meditation Cushion - available at ZafuChi on etsy

Saturday, July 11, 2015

Thursday, July 9, 2015

Our work is Loving the world....

Messenger
~Mary Oliver
My work is loving the world.

Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird—

          equal seekers of sweetness.
Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.
Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?

Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me
          keep my mind on what matters,

which is my work,

which is mostly standing still and learning to be
          astonished.

The phoebe, the delphinium.

The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.

Which is mostly rejoicing, since all the ingredients are here,


which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart

          and these body-clothes,

a mouth with which to give shouts of joy

          to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,

telling them all, over and over, how it is

          that we live forever.
~)(~

Art Deco Tattoo Bird Girl 

Photomontage Print Instant Digital

available by ARTDECADENCE on etsy

also follow the artist on facebook

 https://www.facebook.com/artdecadence?pnref=story

~)(~


 Blog owned and maintained by Sarah Nolt


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Wednesday, July 8, 2015

focal point of consciousness...

~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
Q. “I find it hard to grasp what exactly you mean by saying that you are neither the object nor the subject. At this very moment, as we talk, am I not the object of your experience, and you the subject?”
Maharaj “Look - my thumb touches my forefinger. Both touch and are touched. When my attention is on the thumb, the thumb is the feeler and the forefinger - the self. Shift the focus of attention and the relationship is reversed. I find that somehow, by shifting the focus of attention, I become the very thing I look at and experience the kind of consciousness it has; I become the inner witness of the thing. I call this capacity of entering other focal points of consciousness ‘love;’ you may give it any name you like. Love says, ‘I am everything.’ Wisdom says, ‘I am nothing.’ Between the two my life flows. Since at any point of time and space I can be both the subject and the object of experience, I express it by saying that I am both, and neither, and beyond both.”
I Am That - Chapter 57
~)(~
Zafu Meditation Cushion by ZafuChi on etsy  
 Zafu Meditation Cushion. White Cotton Twill Fabric. 
Hand decorated with Sharpie pens. Buckwheat Hull filled. 
Ready to Use. HANDMADE USA

Sunday, June 28, 2015

harmony and balance...

“There are two aspects of individual harmony: 
the harmony between body and soul, 
and the harmony between individuals. 
All the tragedy in the world, in the individual 
and in the multitude, comes from lack of harmony. 
And harmony is the best given 
by producing harmony in one's own life.”
~ Hazrat Inayat Khan
~)(~
 "Life is about balance.
Be kind, but don’t let people abuse you.
Trust, but don’t be deceived.
Be content, 
but never stop improving yourself."
~ Nishan Panwar
~)(~

"Harmony"

available on etsy by BentEdgeAlchemy 

 

~)(~

 Blog owned and maintained by Sarah Nolt

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Saturday, June 27, 2015

someday we may truly access the benefits of solar...

Autobiography of a Yogi

(excerpt from Chapter 26)

The Woman who Never Eats   

"What we eat is radiation; our food is so much quanta of energy," Dr. George W. Crile of Cleveland told a gathering of medical men on May 17, 1933 in Memphis. "This all-important radiation, which releases electrical currents for the body's electrical circuit, the nervous system, is given to food by the sun's rays. Atoms, Dr. Crile says, are solar systems. Atoms are the vehicles that are filled with solar radiance as so many coiled springs. These countless atomfuls of energy are taken in as food. Once in the human body, these tense vehicles, the atoms, are discharged in the body's protoplasm, the radiance furnishing new chemical energy, new electrical currents. 'Your body is made up of such atoms,' Dr. Crile said. 'They are your muscles, brains, and sensory organs, such as the eyes and ears.'" Someday scientists will discover how man can live directly on solar energy. "Chlorophyll is the only substance known in nature that somehow possesses the power to act as a 'sunlight trap,'" William L. Laurence writes in the New York Times. "It 'catches' the energy of sunlight and stores it in the plant. Without this no life could exist. We obtain the energy we need for living from the solar energy stored in the plant-food we eat or in the flesh of the animals that eat the plants. The energy we obtain from coal or oil is solar energy trapped by the chlorophyll in plant life millions of years ago. We live by the sun through the agency of chlorophyll."

~)(~

"Summersweet"

artwork by leahjayart on etsy

~)(~

 Blog owned and maintained by Sarah Nolt

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Tuesday, June 23, 2015

Sanctify the place you are in-radiance is everywhere.

"The divine manifestation is ubiquitous, 
only our eyes are not open to it. Awe is what moves us forward.
Live from your own center. The divine lives within you.
The separateness apparent in the world is secondary.
Beyond the world of opposites is an unseen, 
but experienced, unity and identity in us all.
You must return with the bliss and integrate it.
The return is seeing that the radiance is everywhere.
The world is a match for us. We are a match for the world.
The spirit is the bouquet of nature.
Sanctify the place you are in."
~ Joseph Campbell
~)(~

"Radiance"

artwork by Yellena on etsy 

~)(~

 Blog owned and maintained by Sarah Nolt

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Saturday, June 20, 2015

about to leap...

~)(~
"I died as a mineral and became a plant,
I died as plant and rose to animal,
I died as animal and I was Man.
Why should I fear? 
When was I less by dying?
Yet once more I shall die as Man, 
to soar With angels blest."
~ Rumi
~)(~

"About To Leap"

artwork by faefactory on etsy 

~)(~

 Blog owned and maintained by Sarah Nolt

https://www.etsy.com/shop/ZafuChi
https://www.etsy.com/shop/MoiPochette
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Friday, June 12, 2015

the sound of the rain needs no translation...

~)(~

"If you really understand Zen, 
you can use any book. 
You could use the Bible. 
You could use Alice in Wonderland. 
You could use the dictionary, 
because the sound of the rain
 needs no translation."

~ Alan Watts

~)(~

Ballet Dancers in Watercolour Rain - on etsy
~)(~
 
 Blog owned and maintained by Sarah Nolt

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Saturday, June 6, 2015

finding our center again...

~)(~
"Our culture made a virtue of living only as extroverts. 
We discouraged the inner journey, the quest for a center. 
So we lost our center 
and have to find it again."
~ Anaïs Nin
~)(~
"Our real journey in life is interior: it is a matter of growth, 
 deepening, and of an ever greater surrender
 to the creative action of love 
and grace in our hearts."
~ Thomas Merton
~)(~
Sit, be still and know...
available at ZafuChi on etsy
~)(~
 Blog owned and maintained by Sarah Nolt

https://www.etsy.com/shop/ZafuChi
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Wednesday, June 3, 2015

Tuesday, June 2, 2015

we are merely dust in the wind...

"I close my eyes only for a moment, and the moment's gone
All my dreams pass before my eyes, a curiosity
Dust in the wind, all they are is dust in the wind
Same old song, just a drop of water in an endless sea
All we do crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see
Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind
Now, don't hang on, nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky
It slips away, and all your money won't another minute buy
Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind
Dust in the wind, everything is dust in the wind."