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Saturday, May 5, 2007

vessels

What does this mean?

Vessels are physical things; they hold material. In the famous parable, Christ said that you cannot pour new wine into old bottles; this "old bottle" of our Being as it stands is unable to take in and contain "new wine." So, in order to take in anything new we must find a new Being within ourselves.

It's easy for us to understand the idea of a vessel as the body. After all, this body is the physical tool we use to receive impressions of life. If "things"- impressions, new wine- are going to flow into anything, it must be the body- correct?

Perhaps.

Then again, perhaps we could understand it a bit differently.

The vessel into which the world flows is not the body. To limit it to the confines and parameters of this piece of flesh, this "bag of skin and bones," is to lose sight of the essential character of experience, the essential nature of the receiving of the material into the vessel.

The vessel into which the world flows is, rather, consciousness itself. Our consciousness, our Being, is a container of what it receives.

Enough words. I will leave you to ponder this, and respectfully ask that, as you do so, you take good care.

I am off to China tomorrow, which will hopefully afford some opportunities for more active blogging.

Monday, May 7, 2007

On the nature of vessels

The essential nature of vessels is found within their emptiness. We identify vessels through their outer form- which may give us an indicator as to their purpose- but it isn't the outer form that determines what a vessel is. A vessel is, at its heart, only one thing, and that is a container.

Containers come in varying sizes. One container may be used to hold air; another, a liquid, and yet another something solid. The character of some vessels is to produce resonance; for others, to offer repose. Still others become crucibles for reactions.

Whatever the character and purpose of the vessel, its chief defining feature ought to be seen for what it is: emptiness.

We can all easily see how silly it would be for the jar to think it was the wine, or the pot the corn; yet don't all of us make that same mistake? In the process of what Gurdjieff called identification, our consciousness habitually mistakes itself for its contents. Buddhist non-attachment is chiefly a practice of trying to find repose within the emptiness of the vessel, rather than engagement with its contents.

We are not what flows into the vessel. We are the experience of what flows into the vessel. In understanding this we see that our essential nature is one born of, and built on, relationship itself, and not the results of relationship. Results of relationship are secondary. It is the very movement into and out of relationship itself that creates what we call Being.

This simple truth is a difficult hurdle. We are so committed to being the event that we fail to participate in the event of Being.

I am back in China now, and off to Ningbo and Hangzhou this morning.

May your flowers bloom in this morning's sun, and your nectar flow abundantly!

Wednesday, May 9, 2007

some thoughts on repose

It's more difficult to work under conditions of jet lag- the body is of course not functioning according to norms-, but one must try.

So, in the mornings, I have been trying to study the inner condition in relationship to the question of repose. Below some thoughts gleaned from this effort.

We must work very carefully, I find, with a specific kind of inner attention, on the study of the intersection between our inner and our outer conditions.

By inner conditions is meant the state of our organism, including the tensions and receptivity of our organism.

By outer conditions is meant this immediate set of inflowing impressions, or, these immediate conditions.

In seeking a state within these immediate conditions, first we must find ourselves within immediate conditions. If there is no active inner correspondence to immediate conditions, then there is no state. So first we attempt to find ourselves within these conditions, according to the intentions and inner availability of the organism. .

This effort is the dividing line between Being and lack of Being. To find and observe one's self within the vibration of immediate conditions is called Seeing.

Once we see that we are in fact within these conditions, we can ask ourselves what it means to be within in a state of relationship to the conditions.

State is dependent on organism. Connection to the organism offers the possibility of another state.

Within the organism is the possibility of repose within immediate conditions. We could also call this inhabiting the conditions. Inhabiting the conditions is an organic function, which our psychology, our mentation, distracts us from.

One of our mistakes is our tendency to try to understand our psychology instead of our organism. This is like trying to understand the car only from the point of view of the speed it travels at. The target is ephemeral and transient, an effect, not a cause.

Psychology is a product of the organism. Only in the most abstract sense possible is the organism a product of psychology. If we seek the organic origins of psychology we may penetrate at the root, instead of trimming the leaves.

Repose is a function of both peripheral sensation and the collection of intelligent sensation within the organic centers. The more we return to this, the more we cultivate repose.

In repose, more seeing is possible, because impressions penetrate deeper into the organism.

There are inherent qualities discoverable in the act of investment in repose that can be fed through breath and a precise inner attention. These qualities consist of varying rates of vibration.

Repose deepens the question and allows us to study those vibrations, where they arise, what feeds them, in greater detail.

Above all we wish to receive our life, this daily bread. Repose is an assistant in this matter.

May your trees bear fruit, and your wells yield water.