"...How lovely and true are Sri Ramana's words to the questioning
student/visitors. Always, his humor, patience and love are expressed
as genuine caring rather than superiority and he always gently guides
the student back to their own understanding of their own heart,
experience and inner knowing...for that is how a true teacher leads a
student to comprehend a greater truth and to find understanding...we
can all be shown a thing or technique in a book, but until that
lesson or thing has been made "alive" within us, it has no truth...it
has no fixed reality and it never becomes a part of us.

It is funny to me that Americans often ask, "What do you think about
so and so?" rather than to ask, "What do you feel about so and so?"
as the latter form invites them to engage in a deeper emotional
process of validating the truth and also examining one's heart.


My Dear, Dearest Zenbabaji,

Oh yes! Is it not so ... Sri Ramana's humor, oh so endearing and so
sweetly put forth, like this part below which always makes me laugh
right out loud with Bhagavan, and brings such chuckling about ... at
myself! -


(Questioner: Sadguru is necessary to guide me to understand it.Sri
Ramana Maharshi: The sadguru is within.Questioner: I want a visible
Guru.Sri Ramana Maharshi: That visible Guru says that he is
within.patience, love and genuine caring are so evident, so moving,
and with you, I feel his words, feel what he's pointing to if I truly
listen and really hear what's being spoken or written.)


.... "a true teacher leads a student to comprehend a greater truth and
to find understanding...we can all be shown a thing or technique in a
book, but until that lesson or thing has been made "alive" within us,
it has no truth...it has no fixed reality and it never becomes a part
of us."


This is so, indeed Zenbabaji, have we not found it to be the actual
case based on our own life experiences and evidenced out in our
sadhana's offering and receiving, of Peace. While in L.A. at one of
the lectures given by Brother Achalanda who is senior monastic at
Lake Shrine, he said just what Sri Ramana said, in the words of
Paramahansaji. The truth he speaks of and writes about in his books
and lessons must be made "alive" within us. He said that practice of
Kriya Yoga alone would not bring about the ever-increasing thirst for
our so long searched for and so fervently longed for, Peace. It must
be done with devotion. Devotion along with Kriya Yoga makes the truth
come "alive" within oneslef by actually finding out for oneself the
validity of it. It then becomes a part of us through
Self-Realization. It becomes a reality ... the validity being the
Peace which one is saturated in, which one is drowned in via Grace,
Devotion, Surrender and Vigilence to Inquiry - Who Am I?

This Peace which comes after and during the sweetness of tears which
sometimes flow in devotion to the Guru is not mistaken for the actual
truth of realization of the Self, for experiential wisdom, for more
often than not it's actually just a lofty form of hyper-emotionality.
The old "let's have a holy moment," let's relive and repeat that
experience which felt so sweet and felt as a divine succor to the
Heart by wishing it were the case, by drumming up emotionality ...
will never give a glimpse of the reality of what Sri Ramana and
Paramahansaji indicate and relay. It's merely the waves of
consciousness in motion making motions for peace while not having an
actual notion nor understanding of Peace, of the actual experience of
Peace (which paradoxically is beyond the understanding of It.)


"If we talk of knowing the Self, there mustbe two selves, one a
knowing self, anotherthe self which is known, and the process
ofknowing. The state we call realisation issimply being oneself, not
knowing anythingor becoming anything. If one has realised,one is that
which alone is and which alone hasalways been. One cannot describe
that state.One can only be that. Of course, we looselytalk of
Self-realisation, for want of a betterterm. How to 'real-ise' or make
real thatwhich alone is real?"~ Sri Ramana Maharshi, "Be As You
Are"The Teachings of Sri Ramana MaharshiEdited by David Godman

"There is one other picture of Yogananda that I love...it is of him
playing the autoharp and looking like a delighted young boy...despite
the fact that he must have been 55 or 60 in the photo! perhaps you
have seen this? I have his recordings somewhere...packed away of
course. Must dig them out. Always enjoyed the "Divine Mother" and
"Blue Lotus Feet" chants best of all."


Paramahansaji had such a youthful countenance. When asked once by a
group who were attending one of his early lectures, (in the
twenties), how old he was, he asked them how old they thought he was.
Some of the guesses were given as, "A hundred," "Seventy-five,"
"Thirty," and even "A thousand." His answer was something like this:
"I am only one. I was never born." Now, how to bear the Beauty of the
Truth he speaks? ... by bearing witness to the Self. By deep
meditation and inquiry one finds the truth within of what our Great
Friends have indicated so patiently, so Lovingly.


"The Self alone is real. All others are unreal.The mind and intellect
do not remain apart from you.The Bible says, 'Be still and know that
I amGod.' Stillness is the sole requisite for therealisation of the
Self as God."


"To see god is to be God. There is no allapart from God for him to pervade. He alone is."
"God, who is immanent, in his grace takespity on the loving devotee
and manifest himselfaccording to the devotee's development.
Thedevotee thinks that he is a man and expects arelationship between
two physical bodies. Butthe Guru who is God or the Self incarnate
worksfrom within, helps the man to see the error ofhis ways and
guides him on the right path untilhe realises the Self within."~ Sri
Ramana Maharshi, "Be As You Are"The Teachings of Sri Ramana
Maharshiedited by David Godman

"Well, must trundle off to sleepy land as I have had restless sleep
all week. Cannot explain why, as I am usually always a very sound
napper."


Isn't that interesting, my DearHearted Friend ... for this past week
has given little respite in rest, of that nourishment which is
afforded in deep sleep, (or samdhi ... or fainting, or death). I
cannot explain why either, but I too have had only snatches of deep
sleep, and the napping which I also like to do has not come this past
week. (What comes to mind now is a bhajan I used to chant called,
"Wink Has Not touched My Eyes.") This bhajan can be had through this
link:

http://www.yogananda-srf.org/ -

I WILL SING THY NAMEDevotional Chants Led by Monks of Self-Realization Fellowship
View larger image
No: 2207
Compact Disc $19.50

Now Available as a Digitally Remastered CD
Two CD Set — includes six new chants
"Sound or vibration is the most powerful force in the
universe....Music that is saturated with soul force is the real
universal music, understandable by all hearts."—Paramahansa Yogananda
In this recording more than two thousand voices join Self-Realization
Fellowship monks, generating an atmosphere of reverence charged with
the joyous presence of God. Previously released as a cassette, this
digitally remastered double compact disc set includes six new chants:
Who Is in My Temple?, In the Valley of Sorrow, Swami Ram Tirtha's
Song, Divine Gypsy, Search Him Out in Secret, and Wink Has Not
Touched My Eyes, as well as the existing chants: I Will Sing Thy
Name; Deliver Us From Delusion; Spirit and Nature; Hare Krishna, Hare
Ram; He Bhagavan; Light the Lamp of Thy Love; Jai Guru / Radha Govinda
Jai; and the Om Chant.https://www.srfbooks.com/Item.asp?id=1956or this
link: http://www.ronroth.com/home/Vocal.cfm -

I WILL SING THY NAME, devotional chanting led by the Monks of
Self-Realization FellowshipSelf-Realization FellowshipCD131 2CD's
$19.95 $18.50
ONE OF OUR FAVORITE CD'S FROM OUR SEDONA INTENSIVE IN MARCH 2005,In
this recording more than two thousand voices join Self-Realization
Fellowship monks, generating an atmosphere of reverence charged with
the joyous presence of God. Previously released as a cassette, this
digitally remastered double compact disc set includes six new chants:
Who Is in My Temple?, In the Valley of Sorrow, Swami Ram Tirtha's
Song, Divine Gypsy, Search Him Out in Secret, and Wink Has Not
Touched My Eyes, as well as the existing chants: I Will Sing Thy
Name; Deliver Us From Delusion; Spirit and Nature; Hare Krishna, Hare
Ram; He Bhagavan; Light the Lamp of Thy Love; Jai Guru / Radha Govinda
Jai; and the Om Chant.


I listen to this particular CD and chant along with the song
"Deliver Us From Delusion" for hours each day. Japa Yoga is intensely powerful,
found out through personal experience if practiced with intensity, (not tension).
As with meditation, Japa Yoga must be practiced and done with intensity and
not tension, not with the feeling of being tense and tightened.

I used to fight insomnia, and there was where my peace ended. When I listened
to the body and did what it was indicating ... "Get up!" the peace became the
modus operandi of my mind's grand showing.

What I wanted to do, (continue sleeping), when sought and bargained for, defeated
my peace; but when I ceased balking and barking at the tree because of its bark,
(Get up!) and when I got up and meditated or prayed or chanted, the natural state
of calmness and Peace was its own surcease from restlessness. The best times for
meditation, at least for me, are in the hours of predawn, between three and five
A.M. ... and at the hour preceeding and during the sun's setting; and in the midnight
hour reached between 11 P.M., and that magic time of empowerment over
restlessness and mind-contraction enactments. Meditation is the most
potent form of purification in this world of manifestation, making mankind's
inclinations to rush and run, hush ... as we turn inward toward the Self,
God and the Guru.



"Who tells me Thou art dark, O, my Mother Divine?
Thousands of suns and moons in Thy Body do shine.
Who tells me Thou art dark, O, my Mother Divine?"

(A wonderful bhajan I've chanted for 25 years).



"This way and that wayI tried to keep the pail of water
together,hoping the weak bambooswould never breakBut suddenly the
bottom fell out:no more waterno more moon in the waterand emptiness
in my hand!"
~ Chiyono


Much Love & Peace,

Zenbabaji


Dearest, my Brother ... and much, so much Love and Peace for you, and
extended to you, you whom I so truly honor and cherish. Be well,
DearHeart, Dearest Zenbabaji.
"Well versed in the Buddha Way,I go the non-WayWithout abandoning
myOrdinary person's affairs.The conditioned andName-and-Form,All are
flowers in the sky.Nameless and formless,I leave birth-and death."~
Pang Yun, Two Zen Classics, p.263

As I Am,
Mazie