THREE SECONDS

“Be here now!”
Say the Zen Masters –
Because the past’s already gone
And the future’s not yet arrived.

This is the point of “no time” or “eternity”
Which is where we’re all trying to reach.

But, wait, just what, and where, exactly, is that?


According to Galen Strawson, a second generation Oxford Philosophy Professor,
It’s a “hiatus free period of thought or experience” – a few seconds at most –
Because our eyes and minds are always “jumping” –
In fact, the latest scientific research shows that this experienced “Now” is not actually a point,
but an extended period – of up to three seconds.

So, when the Buddha tilted his head back, opened his eyes and saw the morning star –
His own “hiatus free moment of enlightenment” – suddenly, he could understand everything.

Everyone can have a similar experience!

That is, if you can just get past your gabbing, obsessive-compulsive telling stories
and producing mental films of yourself as a “star” or “hero” of your creative imaginative/dream productions –

After which, getting past all that – and opening up your eyes and heart
You accept what you are seeing and experiencing – at that moment.

Then, trusting your mind and heart as to what to do next – and do it –
That is, what your “true self” knows needs to be done.

Seeing through this open window – at reality itself – and then acting!

That is “enlightenment-plus.”

Both the Buddha and Jesus emphasized that one needs to act upon what one sees or experiences
In that spiritually-open moment.

This is what it means to be a human being who thinks, experiences, and acts as God does –
Jesus, the Buddha, and Mohammed repeatedly illustrated this to us –
Not to show how great they were – but how great the potential of each single human being
on the planet actually is!

REALITY AT ALL LEVELS

How can we see like Jesus could see –
As fully human and fully God?

He saw with two eyes – one a human’s and one God’s.

A real human eye is found only in a “true self” –
Like the eye of an infant – where everything is fresh and new –
And, as the scientists say,
Pure uninterrupted experience is limited to three seconds,
But is never found in the head of a wooden puppet – like Pinocchio
As an “ego” or a “false self.”  

God’s eye is different –
It sees through time (eternity) and space (infinity) –
Set within the four cardinal points of love, truth, justice, and beauty –
With the lines meeting at the top of a spiritual pyramid –
Love meeting truth, truth meeting justice, justice meeting beauty,
And beauty resting on love –
All conjoined at the tip – where God lives.

Two eyes – one a human being’s and one God’s.

Jesus could see through a child’s eyes
Balanced by those four spiritual attributes of God.

When those two eyes exist in a single head
They see reality – and at all levels.

GOD HAD AN IDEA

God had an idea –
It was so beautiful
God decided to release it out into the void
Where it took flight
And became everything.

It would take eternity
To appreciate everything in detail
So why not take a single thing – or person –
Taking as much time as you need
And, after a while, some more time –
Waiting for the surprise about what you, at first, hadn’t glimpsed.

Yes, it’s time that makes things (and people) more beautiful –
Just when you’re starting to get impatient – not seeing anything new –
It comes down like glory – drenching you.

Where did this surprising beauty come from?
Was it hiding inside ourselves all along – just waiting for a touch –
Or a light of love
To cleave one’s heart like a gentle sword?

Oh, God, give us a lot more beauty
Than we’re able to, at first, see –
And then give us time to wait for this unknown beauty to open –
Time to discover the “pearl”
That is us!

“LOOK AT ME, LOOK AT ME”

 “Mr. Personality” gets up onto the stage
And shouts: “Look at me, Look at me!”

This act verges on the hysterical –
A part he’s always wanted to play.

Someone living inside one’s personality has no imagination
Since they could actually be living inside a much larger Being.

For example, instead of “going small” –
Expressing oneself as a modified (but hopefully better) “self”
On some small stage or downtown square
One could go all the way.

Way past the gold-painted alters
Or soaring baroque spires –
All the way up to Heaven –
To God.

Instead of possessing a “personality”
One could decide to take up residence inside God’s body –
God’s illumined mind
Or God’s thrumming heart.

Then you would be able to say God’s truth
Through your own mouth –
Feel God’s love
Through your own human heart –
See far out to infinity and think about eternity
While engaged in singing God’s universal song –

It goes something like this ….

TIME IS NOT REAL

The past and future are not “real” – but simply “mental bookkeeping” –
True reality is present only in the “Now” –
The sole “eternity” that exists
And where God, in fact, actually lives.

This “Now” is experienced, ordinarily, only when we get “out of our minds” –

However, when we experience life mainly “inside” our minds,
Real life will continue on in its spontaneous and colorful way – on the outside –
Totally ignoring our inner obsessions.

This “outside” life could be ours – all the time –
If we ever decided to “wake up”
And start sharing life with God in the “Now.”

HOLY CORRESPONDENCE

Some poets enjoy exploring beauty in nature –
While others prefer “punching out” big ideas.

Some poets muse about where we came from –
While others look ahead to where we might be going.

Some poets get depressed and lie down in their cups –
While others become, and sometimes remain, righteously angry.

But the greatest poets – the truly great ones –
Look right into the face of divine nothingness
And express the inexpressible.

The truly great ones fall so deeply in love with the Holy
That they write shy “spiritual letters” to eternity
Which sometimes provoke surprising responses from God
And anyone fortunate enough to stumble upon this holy correspondence.

JESUS DID IT FIRST

After, spiritually, we’ve fallen fast asleep –
Suddenly, God will open a door
Where, apparently, there had been no door –
And, with a good-natured chuckle, surprise us back to life!

Inside God’s voice may be heard another – more distant voice –
We hear it by being able to glimpse a face
Behind the face of society’s accepted quotidian “God.”

At times, though, it can seem like we’re a leaf floating downstream – just being carried along –
Sometimes exhilarated, at other times, getting stuck –
No matter how fast we go, however, usually we’re pretty passive –
So that what seems to us like “action” – is more like being a stone flung up into the air.

Given this, how much work and courage would it really take
To become fully conscious and fully alive –
To even start such an effort?

It might be easier than you think!
First, just wake up –
And then wake yourself a second time to your highest state of “awakeness” –
Walk to the nearest window
And look out –
If you’re fully “awake” by that time – more than you’ve ever been before –
At that very moment, you’ll get hit “right in the puss” with joy –
Human beings’ natural state.

It takes only a single moment to pass into eternity
Where we come to “life” without passing through a womb –
Avatars call this “life beyond life” –
Jesus called it pretty much the same thing – “being born again” –
But no one has described, specifically, what it’s really like.

Jesus lived through these peak experiences many times –
Especially, and finally, when singing the 22nd Psalm on the cross –
“My God, my God, why ….”

A touch of joy in death – unimaginable –

But Jesus did it first.