Awakening is the recognition of transcendent Value that easily surpasses anything the world has to offer. This would seem attractive to people who long for Satisfaction more than anything else. The problem is that the supreme Value of awakening is arrived at through a process of negation.
From a talk given by James in 2006
Q: What does it mean to see the body as a form of dependent arising?
James: It means to see the body consciously. It means to see the body as dependent on consciousness for its existence as opposed to an independently existing entity, a thing in itself.
To see this, you have to get really deep and really quiet. You witness the sensation in your body. What is the body but a field of sensation, in a way? Consider thought, feeling, and sensation. Have you ever had a tight place in your body and breathed into it and the tight place became fluid?
Is the world practical? Well, in itself, it’s just a meaningless birth-death machine, a cosmic meat grinder — or at least an extremely peculiar form of abstract art that we don’t know what to do with, like a bizarre Rube Goldberg device that endlessly cycles back on itself. But seen as a way to wake up, it is practical. It is the means to wake up. We must use it to get to the other side, as it were, then it makes sense — and only then.
Hello All,
Tonight is my last talk in Tucson, at least for the foreseeable future. I have enjoyed our time together and look forward to perhaps seeing you in other places, as I will be traveling more regularly. Please stay tuned for updates on future events. If you are interested in attending a talk in Tucson, tonight is your last opportunity to do so, at least for a while. For more information about talks, please visit the Talks page.
Blessings,
James
Saying you want to be free is like saying you want a bell to ring. And yet, the tighter we hold on to it, the less it rings. It’s not allowed to freely be, so it has a limited range of possibility. It’s even kind of ugly or pedestrian. Dead, like something you can’t feel. Like when you get an injection of lidocaine. Numb. Dead. Shut down. Less alive, less happy. Maybe even less sad, in a way. Like someone who’s drugged, who has a limited range, not allowed to feel, not allowed to express. So we have to let it go. What we let go of is a sense of self that’s at odds with what is.
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No thought matches Reality.
If you attach to a thought, it hurts, because you are leaving Reality in that moment.
It hurts to leave Reality, like leaving home.
In this case, however, it is your true Home of homes you are leaving.
Regular talks in Tucson will now be given the first and third Tuesdays of each month, 7:00-9:00 PM, on the University of Arizona campus at 1401 East 1st Street in the Little Chapel of All Nations (McCormick Building). The next talk will be on Tuesday, September 7th. Please see the calendar for details.
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