PHOTO: REUBEN WU

“There is a depth in each of us that has never uttered a word. It is a place of total aloneness. ‘ A path so narrow,” my teacher would say, ‘that two cannot walk abreast.’
“No matter how connected with community, family, friends, society, or nature we might feel, there is a deep silent aloneness in us all. We know that the experiences we have had, the secret moments of joy, beauty, or love, as well as the particular shades of our own sorrow, can be fully known only to ourselves. We may share events with others, but we are each on her own inner journeys, and each is completely unique.”
“For this very reason —the singular expression that we each are— aloneness is inevitable. The creative force of the universe does not make exact copies, even in clones, so there is no escaping the aloneness that is part of being an original work of cosmic art.”
“And yet much of human activity aimed at avoiding this very fact. People are often terrified of aloneness because they experience it as loneliness. They keep busy with work, stay in motion by traveling, or surround themselves with people at almost all times. They might use intoxicants, television, sex, or food to dull the awareness of deep aloneness…”
“In awakened awareness the experience of aloneness is not a cause for fear or despair. It is a sanctuary of silence, a private abode, ‘a room of one’s own’; the place loneliness cannot reach…”
“My teacher Poonjaji was a lion in his aloneness….His was a majestic aloneness, like that of the ocean or the sky. For me his aloneness is probably the most inspiring aspect about him. He lived in depth in which one can bring nothing and no one ‘no friends, no children, no spouses, no possessions….”
“I often refer to this majestic aloneness as ‘the mountain seat of freedom.’ It is as though one is resting on a mountaintop, quietly gazing into vastness, enjoying space in all directions. Welcoming whatever arises in the sky, one notices that thoughts pass by like clouds, feeling fades like rainbow colors, sensation flickr like birds twittering.”
“Here is only the luminous present, the open expanse of being, and whatever is passing through the sky right now. A sense of fullness prevails. No attention is paid to mental commentary about what should or should not be happening. There is just relaxation into what is—only such….”
“All mental activity activity effortlessly subsumes into the silence from which it arose… There is only the wind blowing through boundless awareness, the light shining in our eyes, and the sounds of life reverberating right through us.”
~Catherine Ingram from Passionate Presence: Seven Qualities of Awakened Awareness
 
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