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Ponder on This
"This universe of ours, what is it really? Here we are, centres of consciousness, surrounded by a buzzing confusion which we must try to understand. But we are of the selfsame stuff of the universe -- perhaps ultimately a cloud of energy interacting with other clouds of energy -- and on that account we are in the role more of participants than observers. We cannot distance ourselves from our ambient, hold it at arm's length for impartial scrutiny. This fact has been heavily underlined by modern physics since it sets limits to our knowledge. What we experience is not external reality per se but our interaction with it, so that in a very real sense we are constructing our universe from ourselves."
"Astrology is an art, rather than a science or a system of religious beliefs. But what, then, is art? The artist mediates between different dimensions of life. The images, sounds, words and forms which the artist utilises are languages which can communicate the meaningful patterns of levels of reality which would otherwise be incomprehensible or incommunicable to the rational mind. When we are affected by art, it is because the work speaks to us on many levels: intellectual, intuitive, emotional, visceral."
"People who dismiss astrology do so out of either ignorance or rationalism. Rationalists have their place, but their limited assumptions and methods must be kept out of the arts. Interpretation of poem, dream or person requires intuition and divination, not science."
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A Bit of a Bio:
Astro Inquiry is published in Washington State -- beaming out from Vashon Island. When I was 14 years-old, I made the dogged effort to write to as many astrologers in California as I could, seeing which, if any would take me on as a student. I lucked out with my teachers Ivy Goldstein Jacobson and Margaret Latvala, and studied with them through my high school years. A year later I became a member of Llewellyn George’s Educational Astrology organization in Los Angeles. I helped write, edit and publish the group’s quarterly newsletters... continues
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Consultations
Jack Kornfield on Meeting Nisargadatta
There’s something in us, in our nature, which compels us to
discover.
I remember a very powerful moment with the old guru who I studied with, Nisargadatta Maharaj, who taught the way of Nisarga Yoga. “Nisarga” means natural. The basic translation of his name was “Mr. Natural”. He was this 80-year old cigarette-smoking man. He had a little cigarette stand. He was kind of a combination like Krishnamurti and Fritz Perls. He would put you on the hot seat when you came in and ask you about your spiritual life.
One day we were in a room about this big. People were coming in and asking questions. Somebody came in and asked a question and was a little bit dissatisfied and left. And another person raised their hand and said, “Maharaj, what will happen to that person who came and asked that question and left? Is it all over for them in this life? They didn’t stay here. You are a great guru, and they weren’t interested, and they went home.”
And he twinkled at that moment, he really lit up, and he said, “It’s too late. Even the fact that they put their foot in this room, even if they hadn’t asked the question, means that somewhere in there there’s a seed of really knowing who we are and what this life is about. Not what you were taught in elementary school or what’s on TV or the newspapers, but a deep seed of knowing our true nature, that wants to discover; it’s like coming home. The fact that he just walked in the room means that that seed has started to sprout. And no matter if he tries to forget it and goes back and gets lost, sooner or later that will manifest in awakening.” Read more
Remember: At No Point of Time is the Actual the Remembered
“Between the remembered and the actual there is a basic difference which can be observed from moment to moment. At no point of time is the actual the remembered. Between the two there is a difference in kind, not merely in intensity. The actual is unmistakably so. By no effort of will or imagination can you interchange the two. Now, what is it that gives this unique quality to the actual? A moment back, the remembered was actual, in a moment the actual will be the remembered. What makes the actual unique?”
–Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj