rhinoceros and parrot

"simple aloneness is nondual. trying to escape aloneness produces duality. we produce the illusion of something that is other than us, so that the other can entertain us constantly."

"if you are really properly lonely, you might recognise that situations are indivisible. they can't be divided up into this and that or you and other. it's not that everything is one. everything is zero."

the present moment

"daily problems and the pain of daily life may often feel almost poisonous. however, meditative awareness can help you to convert that poison into medicine, the medicine of cheerfulness. you begin to develop the ability to transform difficulties into delight, something delightfully workable. this transformation comes from appreciating your life, including its irrittations and challenges."

"in order to work with difficulties from a mindful perspective, you need to be present in your life. so it is important not to dwell too much on your memories. you may have good memories or bad ones. whatever has occurred, whether pleasurable or painful, you can't reside in that memory, or you will be stuck in the past. the basic thrust is to live in the present situation."

"the present is direct and straightforward. when you are mindful of your breath in meditation, when you are mindful of your thoughts, or when you are mindful of going from the practice of meditaiton to dealing with the kitchen sink, al l those situations are in the present. you don't borrow ideas from the past and you don't try to fundraise from the future."

"we can be much more present if we don't pay so much attention to the past or the expectations of the future. then, we might discover that we can enjoy the present moment, which is always new and fresh."

meditation and the fourth moment

"the fourth moment is the state of non-ego - knowledge of egoless insight. the experience comes at you rather than you searching for it"

"regard our practice and journey as experiential rather than as being based on programmed stages of development"

"we have no way of knowing how we are doing on the path of meditation, but we do know that we started on a journey, that the journey is continuing, and that the journey takes time and requires real commitment to our individual experience"

"experience cannot happen unless both black and white, sweet and sour, work together. otherwise you are just absorbed into the sweet, or you are absorbed into the sour, and there is no experience. you have no way of working with yourself at all"