For those of us who are perplexed by the problems of life - this site intends to collate and share some pointers, excerpts and writings that might be of interest. Most of the material is based on exposure from CFL and related spaces and people. A short URL tiny.cc/awaring redirects here.
I would like to make it very plain that these are learnings which have significance for me. I do not know whether they would hold true for you. I have no desire to present them as a guide for anyone else. Yet I have found that when another person has been willing to tell me something of his (her) inner directions this has been of value to me, if only in sharpening my realization that my directions are different. So it is in that spirit that I offer the learnings which follow. (Carl Rogers, "On becoming a person")
If you have any suggestions, or would like to have a dialogue with fellow inquirers on related topics or questions, kindly drop a note. Some additional content that is not part of this site can be accessed here.
Humanity is in a condition of public war of every man against every man, and private war of each man with himself (Plato, “The Laws, Book I”)
A human being is a part of the whole, called by us ‘Universe’, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.
The true value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure and the sense in which he has attained liberation from the self.
(Albert Einstein)
We’ve gotten to a point in human history when the sense of specialness (self) could actually endanger the continued flourishing of sentient life. (Robert Wright, “Why Buddhism is True”)
According to the teaching of the Buddha, the idea of self is an imaginary, false belief which has no corresponding reality, and it produces harmful thoughts of ‘me’ and ‘mine,’ selfish desire, craving, attachment, hatred, ill-will, conceit, pride, egoism, and other defilements, impurities, and problems. It is the source of all the troubles in the world from personal conflicts to wars between nations. In short, to this false view can be traced all the evil in the world. (Walpola Rahola, “What the Buddha Taught”)
I am, in microcosm, what’s wrong with the world. (Robert Wright, “Why Buddhism is True”)
Wellbeing means to be fully related to man and nature affectively, to overcome separateness and alienation, to arrive at the experience of oneness with all that exists—and yet to experience myself at the same time as the separate entity I am, as the individual. (Erich Fromm, "Psychoanalysis and Zen Buddhism")
Be a light unto yourself (attributed to Buddha)
The pleasure, whether it is for food, love, work or the search for god (or nirvana) is all cultural input. All conditioning. (UG Krishnamurti)
Question: How can I set right a tangle which is entirely below the level of my consciousness?
Nisargadatta: By being with yourself...by watching yourself in your daily life with alert interest, with the intention to understand rather than to judge, in full acceptance of whatever may emerge, because it is there, you encourage the deep to come to the surface and enrich your life and consciousness with its captive energies. This is the great work of awareness; it removes obstacles and releases energies by understanding the nature of life and mind. Intelligence is the door to freedom and alert attention is the mother of intelligence.
A quiet mind is all you need. All else will happen rightly, once your mind is quiet. As the sun on rising makes the world active, so does self-awareness affect changes in the mind. In the light of calm and steady self-awareness, inner energies wake up and work miracles without any effort on your part.
The real does not die, the unreal never lived. Once you know that death happens to the body and not to you, you just watch your body falling off like a discarded garment. The real you is timeless and beyond birth and death. The body will survive as long as it is needed. It is not important that it should live long.
(Nisargadatta Maharaj, “I am That”)
The authority of our past experiences, convictions, beliefs, insights, and hopes can be just as blinding and binding this instant as the attachment to the outside authority of spiritual teachers. Why do we need to lean on any authority in observing what is actually happening? (Toni Packer, “The Work of This Moment”)
Don’t accept anything the speaker is saying. Test it out for yourself.
You must become liberated not because of me but in spite of me.
If you really faced the world as it is, and tackled it, you would find it something infinitely greater than any philosophy, greater than any book in the world, greater than any teaching, greater than any teacher.
(J Krishnamurti, “To Be Human”)
Don’t take what happened to me as a model. None of what I am saying is going to be of any help. (UG Krishnamurti)
Is there a practice that leads to liberation, or does that very idea reinforce the illusion that there is someone who is bound and that liberation is “out there” somewhere in the future? (Joan Tollifson)
Don’t ask how. Find out for yourself. (Krishnamurti)
The next step would be to put into practice, to live it. (David Bohm, quoted in "The Unity of Everything")
The contents and pointers in this site are not intended as a substitute for professional psychotherapy, psychiatric or medical care, legal or financial advice. Please consult a licensed professional in these matters.