PULSES IN THE PATTERN A COLLECTION OF
NON-DUAL QUOTATIONS
Deepest Thanks To All Who shared These words of wisdom. ………… Thanks to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration - NASA And to the Space Telescope Science Institute - STScI For permission to use the Hubble Telescope Photographs
Deep down, Fundamentally, We are the 'Unborn'. We never came into being And We never go out of being. All of these Coming and goings Are just Pulses in the pattern.
Bankei
The Great Perfection Is Non-conceptual Awareness.
Non-conceptual, Ever-fresh, Self-shining Presence awareness.
Just this, And Nothing else.
Dzogchen teaching
Remember, We‟re All In This Alone.
Lily Tomlin
Enlightenment Is but a recognition, Not a change At all.
Helen Schucman
From within or From behind, A light shines Through us upon things And makes us aware That we are nothing, But the light is All.
R.W. Emerson
That which is, Never ceases to be. That which is not, Never comes into being.
Parmenides
Knowledge - What is to be known - And the knower - These three Do not exist in reality. I am the Spotless Reality In which they appear Because of ignorance.
Ashtavakra Gita
Peace, be still, and know that I Am God.
Peace, be still, and know that I Am.
Peace, be still, and know.
Peace, be still.
Peace, be.
Peace.
PeacePilgrim, and the Bible
This is It And I am It And You are It And so is That And He is It And She is It And It is It And That is That.
James Broughton
Be yourself. Life is precious As it is. All the elements For your happiness Are already here. There is no need To run, strive, search or struggle. Just Be.
Thich Nhat Hanh
Aware of the Waking, dream, and sleep states, We remain unaware Of our own Self. Nevertheless, The Self Is Here and now, And it is the only Reality. There is nothing else. So long as identification With the body lasts, The world seems to be Outside us. Only realize the Self And the things of the world Are not.
Ramana Maharshi
Emptiness Here, Emptiness There, Yet The Infinite Universe Stands Ever before your eyes.
Hsin Hsin Ming
This pure mind, Which is the source of all things, Shines forever With the Radiance of its own perfection. But most people are not aware of it, And think that mind is just the faculty that Sees, hears, feels, and knows. Blinded by their own Sight, hearing, feeling, and knowing, They don't perceive The radiance of the source. If they could eliminate all Conceptual thinking, This source would appear, Like the sun rising Through the empty sky And illuminating the whole universe. Therefore, You students of the Tao Who seek to understand Through seeing, hearing feeling, and knowing, When your perceptions are cut off, Your way to mind will be cut off And you will find nowhere to enter. Just realize that Although mind is manifested In these perceptions, It is neither part of them Nor separate from them. You shouldn't try to analyze these perceptions, Or think about them at all; But you shouldn't seek the one mind Apart from them. Don't hold on to them Or leave them behind Or dwell in them or reject them. Above, below, and all around you, All things spontaneously exist, Because There Is Nowhere outside the Buddha mind.
Huang Po
When the Ten-Thousand things Are viewed in their Oneness, We return to the Origin And remain Where we have Always been.
Sen T‟sen
Enlightenment is like The moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, Nor is the water broken. Although its light is wide and great, The moon is reflected Even in a puddle an inch wide. The whole moon and the entire sky Are reflected in Dewdrops on the grass, Or even in one drop of water. Enlightenment does not divide you, Just as the moon does not break the water. You cannot hinder enlightenment, Just as a drop of water Does not hinder The moon in the sky. The depth of the drop Is the height of the moon. Each reflection, However long or short its duration, Manifests the vastness of the dewdrop, And realizes the limitlessness Of the moonlight in the sky.
Dogen Zenji
The Path Is to Attend to „I am‟ And The Goal Is to Remain as „I am‟!
Sri Sadhu Om
Meditation Is not A means to an end. It is both The means and the end.
Krishnamurti
To be And Not to be – That is the Answer.
Douglas Harding
I think I think; Therefore, I think I am.
Ambrose Bierce
Your vision Will become clear When you look Into your heart. Who looks outside, Dreams. Who looks within, Awakens.
Carl Jung
Nothing in life is trivial. Life is whole Wherever and whenever We touch it, And one moment or event Is not less sacred Than another.
Vimala Thakar
Form Is Emptiness.
Emptiness Is Form.
Buddhist teaching
Being Is Becoming And Becoming Is Being.
D.T. Suzuki
The main thing is To understand The Infinite yet Finite, Finite yet Infinite.
D.T. Suzuki
The World Is Illusory; Brahman Alone Is real; Brahman Is The World.
Ramana Maharshi
There Is Neither Creation nor destruction, Neither Destiny nor freewill; Neither Path nor achievement; This is The Final Truth.
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There is no becoming, No destruction, No one in bondage, No one having desire to be released, No one making effort (to attain liberation) And no one who has attained Liberation. Know that this is The absolute truth.
Ramana Maharshi
Fear not What is not real, Never was And Never will be. What is Real, Always was And Cannot be destroyed.
Bhagavad Gita
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Transformative spirituality, Authentic spirituality, Is revolutionary. It does not legitimate the world, It breaks the world; It does not console the world, It shatters it. And it does not render the self Content, It renders it Undone.
Ken Wilber
You live in illusion And in the Appearance of things. There is a Reality. You are the Reality But you do not know it. If you wake up To that Reality, You will know that You are nothing, And, Being nothing, You are everything. That is all.
Kalu Rinpoche
A person is not a Thing Or a Process But an Opening Through which The Absolute Manifests.
Martin Heidegger
Does the rose have to do something? No, the purpose of a rose is to be a rose. Your purpose is to be yourself. You don't have to run anywhere to become someone else. You are wonderful just the way you are. This teaching of the Buddha allows us to enjoy ourselves, The blue sky, and everything that is refreshing and healing In the present moment. We already have everything we are looking for, Everything we want to become. We are already a Buddha So why not just take the hand of another Buddha And practice walking meditation? Just be. Just being in the moment in this place Is the deepest practice of meditation. The Heart Sutra says that there is "nothing to attain." We meditate not to attain enlightenment, Because enlightenment is already in us. We don't need to search anywhere. We don't need to practice to obtain some high position. We can enjoy every moment. People talk about entering nirvana, But we are already there. Aimlessness and nirvana are one. We have everything we need To make the present moment the happiest in our life, Even if we have a cold or a headache. We don't have to wait until We get over our cold to be happy. Having a cold is part of life. I am happy in the present moment. I do not ask for anything else. I do not expect any additional happiness. Aimlessness is stopping and realizing The happiness that is already available.
Thich Nhat Hanh Stay with that Which lovingly Allows For everything to appear, In peace that cannot be disturbed. Allow it to show you The depth of its void And the fullness Of its emptiness.
John Greven
Our original nature is, In highest truth, Devoid of any atom of Objectivity. It is Void, omnipresent, Silent, pure; It is Glorious and mysterious Peaceful joy - And that is all. Enter deeply into it By awakening yourself.
Huang Po
The Perfect Person Employs The Mind As a Mirror. It neither Grasps nor rejects; It receives But does not keep.
Chuang Tzu
There is no Past And there is no Future - There is Only Now.
Eckhart Tolle
Row, Row, Row Your boat Gently down The stream…. Merrily, Merrily, Merrily, Merrily! Life is but
A dream. Nursery rhyme
Outwardly In the world of Good and evil, Yet without thoughts Stirring the heart -
This is meditation.
Inwardly Seeing one‟s Own True Nature And not being Distracted from it -
This is meditation.
Hui-Neng
Know The One.
Love The All.
T‟ao-Shan
You can‟t grasp it, But you can‟t lose it. It winds its own way. When you are silent, It speaks. When you speak, It is dumb. There are no obstacles. The great gate of love Is wide open.
Yung-chia Ta-Shih
I have returned to The root And effort is over. From the first There has been No one To see or hear Anything. There is nothing outside My true home. Rivers quietly flow And red flowers bloom.
Kuo-an Shih-yuan
I AM THAT I AM.
The Bible
One perfect nature Pervades and circulates Within all natures.
One all-inclusive Reality Contains and embraces All realities.
One moon is reflected In every expanse of water. Every reflected moon Is the one moon.
Yung-chia Ta-shih
Every bird That cuts the airy way Is an immense World of Delight Enclosed by The five senses.
Blake
Moment after moment, Everything Comes out of Nothingness. This is the True Joy Of Life.
Shunryu Suzuki
Forgetting Self, The Universe Grows I . Zen Saying
Contentment and resentment. Pleasure and pain. Hopes and regrets. Feelings and thoughts. Action and repose. These opposites are sounds From the same instrument - Fleeting forms Of the universal Being.
Master Qui
When there is no more Separation Between “this” and “that” It is called the Still-point of the Tao. At the still-point, In the center of the circle, One can see the Infinite in all things.
Chuang-Tzu
Everything vanishes, falls apart, Doesn‟t it? Nature is always the same But nothing in her that appears to us Lasts. Our art must render The thrill of her permanence, Along with her elements, The appearance of all her changes. It must give us A taste of her Eternity.
Cezanne
All distinct beings are temporarily Differentiated from the Whole, And their destiny is To return again To the Whole, Which has always been Their essential Nature.
Life terminates in a sleep That is followed By a new awakening.
Life is the cause of death.
That life and death could be aspects of each other Seems unbelievable to most people. Will this ever change? I doubt it! You haven‟t been able to prevent your birth, And you won‟t be able to prevent your death.
The alternation of life and death Is as predestined by Heaven As is the rotation of day and night.
When beings return to formlessness at death They retain reality without place And duration without time. This is the nature of Tao - The cosmic Oneness.
At the moment of dissipation, if your spirit is strong, You may escape the influence of Heaven and Earth And merge with the great Whole.
Chuang Tzu
I died a mineral, And became a plant. I died a plant And arose an animal. I died an animal And I was a man. Why should I fear? When was I less by dying? Yet once more I shall die as man, To soar with the blessed angels; But even from angelhood I must pass on. All except God perishes. When I have sacrificed my angel soul, I shall become that which No mind ever conceived. O, let me not exist! For Non-Existence proclaims “To Him we shall return.”
Rumi
See the Eternal Beyond The Impermanent.
Lao Tzu
Death is not Extinguishing The light; It is Putting out the lamp Because Dawn has come.
Tagore
Barn‟s Burnt Down.
Now I can See The Moon.
Masahide
Do not stand at my grave and weep, I am not there, I do not sleep. I am in a thousand winds that blow, I am the softly falling snow. I am the gentle showers of rain, I am the fields of ripening grain. I am in the morning hush, I am in the graceful rush Of beautiful birds in circling flight, I am the starshine of the night. I am in the flowers that bloom, I am in a quiet room. I am in the birds that sing, I am in each lovely thing. Do not stand at my grave bereft I am not there. I have not left.
Mary Frye
In order to arrive there, To arrive where you are, To get from where you are not, You must go by a way Wherein there is no ecstasy. In order to arrive at What you do not know You must go by a way which is The way of ignorance. In order to possess what You do not possess You must go by the way Of dispossession. In order to arrive at What you are not You must go through the way In which you are not. And what you do not know Is the only thing you know And what you own is What you do not own And where you are Is where you are not. T.S. Eliot
That which is, Is peace. All that we need do Is to keep quiet. Peace is our real nature. We spoil it. What is required is that we cease to spoil it. If we remove all the rubbish from the mind, The peace will become manifest. That which is obstructing the peace Must be removed. Peace is the only reality.
Ramana Maharshi
Someone seeking Learning Knows more and more. Someone seeking Tao Knows less and less - Until things Just Are what they are.
Lao-Tzu Neither ignorance nor illusion Ever happened to you. Find the self to which you ascribe Ignorance and illusion And your question will be answered. You talk as if you know the self And see it to be under the sway of Ignorance and illusion. But, in fact, you do not know the self, Nor are you aware of ignorance. By all means, Become aware, This will bring you to the self And you will realize that there is neither Ignorance nor delusion in it. It is like saying: If there is sun, how can darkness be? As under a stone there will be darkness, However strong the sunlight, So in the shadow of the "I-am-the-body" consciousness There must be ignorance and illusion. Don't ask 'why' and 'how'. It is in the nature of creative imagination To identify itself with its creations. You can stop it any moment by Switching off attention. Or though investigation.
Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
A perception, Sudden as blinking, That subject and object are one, Will lead to A deeply mysterious Understanding; And by this understanding You will awaken to the truth.
Huang Po
I am good to the good And I am good to the bad, Because it is good To be Good. I trust the trustworthy And I trust The untrustworthy, Because I trust in Trust.
Lao-Tzu
Within you There is a Stillness And a Sanctuary To which you can Retreat At any time
And be yourself.
Herman Hesse
You ask why I make my home in The mountain forest, And I smile, And am silent, And even my soul Remains quiet; It lives in the other world Which no one owns. The peach trees blossom, The water flows.
Li Po
In the entire ten directions Of the Buddha‟s universe There is only one way. When we see clearly There is no difference In the teachings. What is there to lose? What is there to gain? If we gain something, It was there From the beginning. If we lose something, It is hidden nearby.
Ryokan
All you want is to be happy. All your desires, whatever they may be, Are of longing for happiness. Basically, you wish yourself well. Desire by itself is not wrong. It is life itself, The urge to grow In knowledge and experience. It is the choices you make that are wrong. To imagine that some little thing - Food, sex, power, fame - will make you happy Is to deceive yourself. Only something as vast and deep As your real Self Can make you Truly and lastingly happy. ……………………..
Please understand that There is only one thing To be understood, And that is That you are the Formless, Timeless Unborn. ………….. Greater than the Greatest Good In life Is to know who you are. ..……………
There is no need of a way out! Don‟t you see that a way out Is also part of the dream? All you have to do is See the dream as dream …Wherever it leads you, It will be a dream. The very idea of Going beyond the dream Is illusory. Why go anywhere? Just realize that you are Dreaming a dream You call the world And stop looking For ways out. The dream is not your problem. Your problem is that You like one part of your dream And not another. Love all, Or none of it, And stop complaining. When you have seen The dream as a dream, You have done all That needs to be done.
…………………
Experience, However sublime, Is not the real thing. By its very nature It comes and goes. Self-realization Is not an acquisition. It is more of the nature Of understanding. Once arrived at, It cannot be lost.
Nisargadatta
Omniscience Omnipotence Omnipresence
The Absolute Consciousness Alone Is Our Real Nature.
Your duty is to be, And not to be this or that.
There are no stages in Realization, Or degrees of Liberation. There are no levels of Reality; There are only levels of experience For the individual.
If anything can be gained That was not present before, It can also be lost, Whereas the Absolute is eternal, Here and now.
It is not a matter of becoming, But of Being.
Remain aware of yourself And all else will be known.
The ultimate truth is so simple; It is nothing more than being in one‟s Natural, original state.
There is no greater mystery than this: Being Reality ourselves, We seek to gain reality. It is false to speak of Realization; What is there to realize? The real is ever as it is.
All that is required is To cease regarding as real That which is unreal. That is all we need To attain wisdom (jnana).
Ramana Maharshi The Universe Exists within The Self. Therefore, it is real, But only because It obtains its reality from the Self. We call it unreal, however, To indicate its Changing appearance And transient form, Whereas we call the Self real, Because it is changeless.
Ramana Maharshi
What appears will also disappear And is therefore impermanent. The Self Never appears and disappears And is therefore permanent. It is the Only reality.
Realization is nothing to be gained anew. You are the Self. You are already and eternally That. There is never a moment when the Self is not; It is ever-present, here and now.
If realization were something to be gained Hereafter, There would be an equal chance of it being lost; This cannot be Liberation, which is eternal. Realization consists of getting rid of The false idea That one is not realized.
Self-inquiry leads to Self-realization By removing the obstacles which make you think That the Self is not already realized.
It reveals the truth that Neither the ego nor the mind really exists And enables one to realize The pure, undifferentiated Being, Which is the Self or the Absolute.
Be what you are. Be yourself and nothing more.
That which Is, is ever present. Even now you are It, And not apart from It.
I Am That I Am…. Simple Being is the Self.
Ramana Maharshi
ALWAYS ALREADY
Events happen, Deeds are done, But There is No Doer
Thereof.
Buddha
How can infinite consciousness cease to be? The person is nothing but infinite Consciousness. Who dies and when, To whom does this infinite consciousness Belong and how? Even when millions of bodies die, This consciousness exists undiminished. ……………………… The one never became many, O Rama. When many candles are kindled from another, It is the same flame that burns in all candles; Even so, The one Brahman appears to be many. Sage Vasishtha
Never did eye see the sun Unless it had first become Sun-like And never can soul Have the vision of The First Beauty Unless itself be beautiful
Plotinus
Those who see worldly Life as an obstacle To Dharma (Reality) See no Dharma In everyday actions; They have not discovered That There are no everyday actions Outside of Dharma.
......
The true person is Not anyone in particular; But like the deep blue color Of the limitless sky, It is everyone, Everywhere in the world.
Dogen Zenji
Lead me from The unreal To the real. Lead me from Darkness Into light. Lead me from Death To immortality.
The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad
Out Beyond ideas Of wrong-doing And right-doing There is a field. I‟ll meet you There.
Rumi
To study the Buddha way Is to study the self. To study the self Is to Forget the self. To forget the self Is to be Enlightened by all things.
Dogen Zenji
Coming empty-handed, Going empty-handed- That is human. When you are born, Where do you come from? When you die, Where do you go? Life is like a floating cloud Which appears. Death is like a floating cloud Which disappears. The floating cloud itself Originally does not exist. Life and death, coming and going, Are also like this. But there is One thing Which always remains clear. It is pure and clear, Not depending on life and death. What is that One pure and clear thing?
Zen teaching
Therefore, Ananda, be ye Lamps unto yourselves, Be ye a refuge to yourselves. Betake yourselves to No external refuge. Hold fast to the Truth as a lamp; Hold fast to the Truth as a refuge. Look not for a refuge in anyone Beside yourselves. And those, Ananda, Who either now or after I am dead Shall be a lamp unto themselves, Shall betake themselves to No external refuge, But holding fast to the Truth as their lamp, And holding fast to Truth as their refuge, Shall not look for refuge to anyone Beside themselves - It is they who shall reach the very topmost Height. But they must be anxious to learn.
Buddha
Life and death are of Supreme importance. Time swiftly passes by and Opportunity is lost. Each of us should strive to awaken. Awaken. Take heed, Do not squander your life. Dogen Zenji
Wisdom is knowing I am Nothing, Love is knowing I am Everything, And between the two My life moves.
Nisargadatta Maharaj
Through one word, Or seven words, or three times five, Even if you investigate thoroughly Myriad forms, Nothing can be depended upon. Night advances, The moon glows And falls into the ocean. The black dragon jewel You have been searching for, Is everywhere.
Dogen Zenji
If you cannot find the Truth Right where you are, Where else Do you expect to find it?
Dogen Zenji
One popular human strategy For dealing with difficulty Is autosuggestion: When something nasty pops up, You convince yourself it is not there, Or you convince yourself It is pleasant rather than unpleasant. The Buddha's tactic is quite the reverse. Rather than hide it or disguise it, The Buddha's teaching urges you to Examine it to death. Buddhism advises you Not to implant feelings That you don't really have Or avoid feelings that you do have. If you are miserable you are miserable; That is the reality, That is what is happening, So confront that. Look it square in the eye without flinching. When you are having a bad time, Examine that experience, Observe it mindfully, Study the phenomenon And learn its mechanics. The way out of a trap Is to study the trap itself, Learn how it is built. You do this by taking the thing apart Piece by piece. The trap can't trap you if It has been taken to pieces. The result is freedom. ………………………………….. “Discipline” is a difficult word for most of us. It conjures up images of somebody Standing over you with a stick, Telling you that you're wrong. But self-discipline is different. It's the skill of seeing through The hollow shouting of your own impulses And piercing their secret. They have no power over you. It's all a show, a deception. Your urges scream and bluster at you; They cajole; they coax; they threaten; But they really carry no stick at all. You give in out of habit. You give in because you Never really bother to Look beyond the threat. It is all empty back there. There is only one way To learn this lesson, though. The words on this page won't do it. But look within and watch the stuff coming up- Restlessness, anxiety, impatience, pain- Just watch it come up And don't get involved. Much to your surprise, it will simply go away. It rises, it passes away. As simple as that. There is another word for self-discipline. It is patience.
Henepola Gunaratana
Without leaving the house
I know the whole universe.
Lao-Tzu
1.Get enough food to eat, and eat it. 2.Find a place to sleep where it is quiet, and sleep there. 3.Reduce intellectual and emotional noise until you arrive at the silence of yourself, and listen to it. 4.
Richard Brautigan
The birds have vanished Into the sky, And now the last cloud Drains away. We sit together, The mountain and me, Until only the mountain remains.
Li Po
Take time to listen To what is said without words, To obey the law Too subtle to be written, To worship the unnameable And To embrace the unformed.
Lao-Tzu
Enlightenment Is Intimacy With all things.
Dogen Zenji
With the drawing of this Love And the voice of this Calling We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive Where we started And know the place For the first time
T.S. Eliot
The Great Way has no gate; There are a thousand paths to it. If you pass through the barrier, You walk the universe alone.
Wu-Men
Consciousness Is All.
All Is One.
All Is Well.
The purpose of a fish trap is to catch fish, And when the fish are caught The trap is forgotten. The purpose of a rabbit snare is to catch rabbits. When the rabbits are caught, The snare is forgotten. The purpose of words is to convey ideas. When the ideas are grasped, The words are forgotten. Where can I find a man Who has forgotten words? He is the one I would like to talk to. ……………………………………
Wisdom is Knowing When To stop speaking, Because Language Is inadequate.
Chuang-Tzu
When you are deluded And full of doubt, Even a thousand Books of scripture Are not enough. When you have realized Understanding, Even one word is too much.
Fen-Yang
He who Knows Does not speak. He who Speaks Does not know.
Lao-Tzu
OM Completeness is that, completeness is this, From completeness, completeness comes forth. Completeness from completeness taken away, Completeness to completeness added,
Completeness alone remains. OM Peace, peace, peace!
Ishavasyopanisad – From Swami Dayananda‟s Interpretation