Pushing Forward

A man helped a friend start his car by pushing it for two blocks. The driver stopped at the 2nd block and rolled down his window. "Thank you my friend, but you really didn't have to work so hard. The engine did the work after the first few yards." His friend replied, "Why did you let me push so hard for the rest of the way?"  The driver answered: "You were pushing so hard, and bent over so far, and so intent on helping that you didn't hear me say let go.  I was afraid if I accelerated, you would fall down."

Life is like this in another way. We think we are pushing the whole engine of life forward. If we stand back we can glimpse how effortlessly it unfolds without our help. Sometimes those who can see our needless efforts, must stand back and let us have our way.

Is There Any "Thing" Out There?

Sometimes, we can get stuck in all the nonduality talk about the obviousness of "no objects" out there. That can put the mind to work proving or disproving the reality of separate objects. That is the opposite of obvious! Though this line of thinking has apparently been useful for some, it can also create endless mind work for others.

"In here" and "out there", are also a mental concepts, points of view, when it comes  to it. Instead, go directly to what can be seen immediately.  And that is, whatever appears, it appears as experience, experience of which you are aware.  We can also just call that awareness. But no need to call it anything. No need to prove either that it's part of you or that it is not part of you. The "you" part of that can also start another search for some "thing."

Nothing in the universe has ever occurred outside your awareness of it. If something hasn't been part of your physical experience, memorized history, personal memory, news flash, etc. it doesn't exist to whatever you are.  Even the sense of your own physical body is a sensation, or a feeling, that arises to your own awareness of it.

So if it doesn't make sense to you that a chair, a tree, another person, "is you,"  or "is all one" just let that go. Rest in the simplicity of what arises before you. The bits of light and color we call a tree shows up in awareness. If you touch the tree, that sensation occurs in your awareness. Whether a word pops up that says, "tree, elm, mine, dead, needs trimming, etc." even those words just float into your awareness and then fade out. Come back to the simplicity of what is before you without trying to make it in to something. Don't try to label it "one" or "Unity" or non-duality. Though there is no proof that  it is all "one," it does show this absolute consistency --  it all shows up in awareness.

Who's Living?

You are not living a life. Life is living and spinning out the idea of you.