What does a mirror tell you?

There was once a monk who would carry a mirror where ever he went. This action drew the attention of a particular priest who grew convinced the monk must be misguided.

A priest noticed this repeatedly and thought to himself, "This monk is so preoccupied with the way he looks he has to carry that mirror all the time. He should not worry about the way he looks on the outside, it's what's inside that counts." The priest felt it made sense to take steps to guide the monk to the light.

So, the priest went up to the monk and asked "Why do you always carry that mirror?" The priest thought for sure the monk's response would reveal misplaced ego and guilt.

The monk pulled the mirror from his bag and pointed it at the priest. Then he said, "I use it in times of trouble. I look into it and it shows me the source of my problems as well as the solution to my problems."

What does a mirror tell you?

"All men should strive to learn before they die what they are running from, and to, and why."
-James Thurber

10 Ways to expand love consciousness

Many people contemplate the meaning of love. They may refer to what they have read in storybooks, heard in media or learned second-hand, though other people's life experiences.  They may also begin to link personal shifts in feelings to ongoing whispers about the possible impact of 2012. 

A complimentary view is to recognize your understanding of love is constantly expanding based on what you choose to feel. Your beliefs, perception and identification with different energy vibrations, all influence completeness or emptiness. Consider these 10 ways to expand love consciousness; 

1) Decide you do not mind what happens. Choose to be grateful for every situation you encounter. Learn to see blessings and advantages, regardless of where you perceive to be. You sense with fear or love.  You grow due to all of it.

2) Sense love constantly sends you messages.  Know that whatever energy you feel coming at you from outside yourself, love is always bringing you the best possible scenario. You just may not choose to recognize how good you have it now.

3) Choose to transcend limitation. Mindsets can only be overcome internally. You permit ego to keep you feeling trapped or experience what it means to dissolve negative assumptions.  This evokes an incredible lightness of being.

4) Know the ego does not control you. Each instance you choose not to judge, not to rationalize, not to go on the defensive and not to blame, you are consciously permitting love to prevail. You acknowledge no reaction is a powerful statement that tells ego who is in charge of your life.

5) Restore heart energy. Each occasion you choose not to retaliate, not to seek revenge, not to generate negativity, you are shifting to experience the feeling of compassion.  The result is you feel more alive even if the sensation defies words.

6) Detach from misplaced identity. As you stop efforts to reinforce what defines you in form, you distance self from identifying with physical things. You learn that by having less, you sense more. In another way, you undergo immeasurable expansion that is nurturing a much higher awareness.

7) Recognize the relevance of boundaries. The choice to permit energy to flow freely is not the same as accepting mistreatment and believing you are a victim. You never be a victim of your own choices. Fear compels you put on the breaks but so does love in certain situations for health and well-being.

8) Align with the power of the universe. Whenever you are tempted to view a feeling as a weakness, that is only temporary as you have yet to sense the reality of the strength of feeling as you do. How is each emotion good for you?

9) Learn the power of stillness. As you gain insight into what it means to quiet the mind through disciplined meditation and not think at all, you experience the awe of nothingness.

10) Appreciate formless experience. To begin to expand inner sight and senses, you awaken to the presence of different languages and frequencies of love.  You also validate multiple dimensions and realities. Love embraces you like wings of angels.  Sense its omnipresence echoes through everything.

Every quest is a metaphor

Every quest is a metaphor for steps required to transform the self from physical to spiritual being.  You are actually in the process of exploring options for what to do now and those things you foresee unfolding from apparent crises or tragedies.

In the midst of your visualisation, you discover inner power.  This triggers a series of revelations that encourage you to reframe circumstances and all the good that is communicating through new hopes and dreams.  How will this world surprise you next? Consider these points along your mission to align;

1) The physical body can transform on seen and unseen levels.

2) There is only one real you beneath all the masks and labels.

3) You can emerge and return to the body at will.

4) You experience out of body (OBEs) whenever you wish.

5) Every perceived imbalance invites you to rebalance energy.

6) Disruptions or crises in physical life are simply teachers. 

7) All you need is love.  Love is also all you are.

8) Knowledge does not arise from external sources.

9) Every thought brings you toward unconditional acceptance.

10) To learn compassion for others, is to grow to love self.

10 Steps to recall love as it is

Humanity has selective amnesia about the essence of love. This is not the feeling you learn about. Awakening and direct experience speak.  Explore these 10 steps to sense love as is; 

1) How does love guide your mission & how you treat others?

2) When you reflect, whom or what have you loved?

3) Who do you love deeply? How does hate teach you love?

4) Where and when have you felt true love?

5) What awakens love energy within you?

6) How does your body change through knowing love?

7) Why does love honour your physical journey?

8) What does it take to hold a vision of loving intent?

9) Who do you know who needs awaken to love gently?

10) How does love permit you to stop fearing the unknown?

“Love is patient; love is kind
and envies no one.
Love is never boastful, nor conceited, nor rude;
never selfish, not quick to take offense.
There is nothing love cannot face;
there is no limit to its faith,
its hope, and endurance.
In a word, there are three things
that last forever: faith, hope, and love;
but the greatest of them all is love"

-Bible

Rethink 4 blind men & an elephant

Several citizens ran into a hot argument about God and different religions, and each one could not agree to a common answer. So they came to the Lord Buddha to find out what exactly God looks like.

The Buddha asked his disciples to get a large magnificent elephant and four blind men. He then brought the four blind to the elephant and told them to find out what the elephant would "look" like.

The first blind men touched the elephant leg and reported that it "looked" like a pillar. The second blind man touched the elephant tummy and said that an elephant was a wall. The third blind man touched the elephant ear and said that it was a piece of cloth. The fourth blind man hold on to the tail and described the elephant as a piece of rope. And all of them ran into a hot argument about the "appearance" of an elephant.

The Buddha asked the citizens: "Each blind man had touched the elephant but each of them gives a different description of the animal. Which answer is right?"

This classic Zen story encourages you to reflect on deeper meanings in your own judgment, emotions and understanding about unconditional love.  Share some of your revelations.