by Michael Mamas | Saturday, June 22, 2013 | Personal Growth, Spirituality |
I remember as a kid being inspired by a short essay Emerson wrote about circles. Every culture is a circle with a high and low end. Every religion is a circle. Every ethnic group is a circle… even every individual. There is no end to circles. Even the horizon goes around 360 degrees to form a circle.
All too often when generalizing about people, focus is placed upon the low end of the circle, as if that defines the entire individual or group. Implying this is demeaning, damaging and misleading.
Why not focus on the high end of every circle, but not blindly focused. That would be called denial. But lean in the direction of moving every individual, subculture, culture, nation, and all of humanity forward in the direction of the high end of the circle. This is called evolution. Proper discernment is of course, as with all things, essential.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
by Michael Mamas | Wednesday, June 19, 2013 | Spirituality |
Stringing crises together with moments of quiet trepidation between and calling that life is no way to live. It is as if everything is viewed as unstable and ready to pop at any moment. Periods of fear and worry between one turmoil and then the next.
Time to make the shift.
Imagine a life of contentment… stability. An inner knowing that all is well. Satisfaction. Knowing that there is a solid base that supports and sustains you day after day with an even keel. You are secure. Your life is supported. Your life works.
Walk through your day with confidence in this. What you feel you radiate. It permeates the walls and furniture in your home. It overtakes the clothing you wear.
What you expect is what you create.
Expect Happiness.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
by Michael Mamas | Tuesday, June 18, 2013 | Favorites, Spirituality |
Evolution is a journey, not an epiphany.
Truth is not a concept, rule, idea, law, principle or notion.
Enlightenment comes through a lifestyle, not an excursion.
Your karma lies within you, mostly as your thoughts and your emotions.
Spirituality is not emotional indulgence.
Spirituality is not intellectual derivation.
You can justify anything with the intellect, and people do.
The depth of life is simple. The web it weaves is complex.
The longest way is the short cut.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
by Michael Mamas | Thursday, June 6, 2013 | Personal Growth, Spirituality |
With the completion of so many homes, buildings, and cottages here at Mount Soma, I have learned a great deal about color.
First, I learned that samples of paint chips are nearly useless. Many times, a group of people would put their heads together to pour over paint chip samples and finally came to an agreement. After the paint went on the wall, everyone was amazed (and occasionally horrified) how different it looked.
Second, a color may look great on one wall and completely different on another, even in the same room. Throw in the different times of day, and direct or indirect sunlight, and you would be certain it is a different paint entirely!
A significant percentage of the population is colorblind. I count myself in that category, at least to some small degree. My experience is that I see all the colors. I know all the colors. However, it is as if the color receptors are just weak. In certain lighting, or up against certain other colors, a color can get somewhat ‘lost’.
To understand color and our relationship with it is to understand LIFE. We all have some types of ‘receptors’ that are weak. For some people, it is about dancing. Everyone can see what a good dancer looks like. But the integration of that in our own bodies may be weak. Knowing a good dancer when you see one does not make you a good dancer.
With others, it is as if the ‘intelligence receptors’ are weak. They know what logic is… but to follow along in a conversation and arrive at a logical conclusion evades them. Confusion, emotion, brain fatigue, or tangential thoughts take over. To be completely honest, I feel sometimes that my weak color receptors gave me the gift of understanding the weak ‘mental receptors’ that many people live with throughout their lives. It helps me understand how some are baffled by my inability to distinguish colors at times. It is indeed difficult for us to imagine what life must be like for another with a weak receptor in an arena where ours is strong.
Now, combine this with the second point above: In life, anything can be viewed from many different angles, perspectives, belief systems, and contexts. The possible combinations of situations are endless. How is it possible then to fathom the hue, tone, shade, feel, and truth of a particular color? How can one fathom their way through life?!
And trying to mix paints defies everything. To make your own custom colors is a mind expanding and humbling experience. No wonder creativity is so elusive for so many!
Now the first point, namely, sample paint chips. It is very challenging, if not impossible, to learn about life from paint chip samples. At best, it is knowledge with a small “k.” To find Knowledge within yourself is what life is ultimately about. Scholars are not scholars if they have not found Truth within themselves. Teachers are not teachers if they do not know their subject from within. Yet, so many go out into the world with their deck of ‘paint chip samples’ and believe themselves to be authorities, scholars, teachers, gurus, etc. They wear their paint chips as badges of honor, degrees of accomplishment, or licenses to practice.
Some may read all this and find it to be depressing, “How will I ever figure it all out?” But never forget, the beauty of life lies in its unfathomable, sublime, and elusive nature. It is something to be in eternal awe over. Beauty lies in the elusive nature of Maya, the Goddess, the Source.
The parallels of color with life are endless. Jyotish (the study of the interaction of the spectrum of variables that form life, existence, and its function and operation) is the study of color. “Jyotish” even means light.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
by Michael Mamas | Saturday, May 25, 2013 | Spirituality |
The challenge of Kali Yuga is that you are led to believe Kali Yuga does not touch you, but instead, is about everyone and everything other than you and the select few with whom you see eye to eye.
Most of your karma is in your mind and in your heart. It is a trance, a mirage, an illusion. To live better, you must look deeper, deeper, and ever deeper.
I am here… I can help you with that… if only you are willing to look beyond your current identity.
Look inside. Your potential is infinite.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
by Michael Mamas | Thursday, May 23, 2013 | Personal Growth, Spirituality |
Let’s be very clear on one point. When first stated, you may think you already know it, but let’s take a deeper look: The spiritual path lies within you. Let’s say it a few different ways: Evolution is an inner process. The battlefield of human evolution is within. The spiritual journey is an inner journey. Most of your challenges, most of your karma, lie between your ears and within your heart.
Now the all-important point #2: You take that inner landscape and project it out onto the world. You have challenges: financial, emotional, logistical, moral, intellectual, personal, political, social, etc. You have obligations. You have conflicts. You have irresolvable issues. You have needs. You have made mistakes. You have hurt and have been hurt. You have many fears. You have beliefs and convictions about all of these things. Now here is the tough one: I say again, you take your inner landscape and project it onto the outer world. You convince yourself that your challenges are not about you, but about the situation you find yourself in. You decide that it is what lies outside of you that is wrong or needs attention. Oh yes, if the outer world just had it right, then you would be fine. Then you could tend to your evolution and make some real progress.
My daughter is in France for 10 days on a class trip. She had typical concerns such as who she would have to sit next to on the plane, who she would be assigned to room with, etc. This is the first time she went so far from home for so long. I found myself reflecting on what few words I would most like to say to her before she left on her journey. My first bit of advice was to stay close to the group, which she somehow turned into a funny joke about her dad telling her to not flirt with the taxi cab drivers. The second was to have a good attitude. Be a ‘player.’ Keep a positive attitude and be flexible with challenges or situations that may not be to her liking.
This made me think of my students. There are those that seem to be eternally plagued with outer world, insurmountable obstacles that torment them. Then there are those that keep going forward without getting caught up in this or that disturbance.
You are climbing a mountain. Imagine you have partners to climb that mountain with. What would you like them to be like? What kind of person would you like them to be? What kind of attitude would you like them to have? What attributes would make them the best partner along the way? How would you like to see them deal with conflict, adversity, things being not just exactly how they want them at times, and how they deal with major challenges?
In all honesty, I know of no one that can better help you with the inner journey than I. And I say to you, be that person. Never stop. Keep your eye on the ball. Stay one pointedly focused on climbing that mountain. Do not be distracted by your preconceived notions or the outer world. People come up with innumerable reasons to not keep their priorities straight. Your number one priority must be your evolution.
Attitude is everything.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
by Michael Mamas | Friday, May 17, 2013 | Mount Soma, Spirituality |
Imagine being so caught up in a television program that you forget it is just a projection on a screen and believe it is real. That is exactly what you have done.
The ‘screen’ is consciousness. It is the silent witness. It has no opinion. .. no comments… no shades or hues. It is crisp… clean… all wise and all knowing. It is profound in it simplicity… in its very nature. This is the Shiva value… transcendental.
It cannot be enlivened because it is eternally awake. Yet your awareness of it can be enlivened. That awareness changes everything, yet changes nothing. Existence remains exactly the same, just totally different. It is pure consciousness. It birthed everything. It is God’s consciousness.
Trying to ‘fix’ your life, or another’s life, by rearranging the surface is futile… temporary at best lest that rearrangement enlivens your awareness of It. Doing personal process or self-help without that understanding is sweeping the dust under the rug in an attempt to make your house clean.
This is not so difficult to understand intellectually, but to really know this is quite another matter. Do you really know it? Just take a look at how you live your life. There, you will find the answer to that question.
My purpose is to awaken you to It. I am creating a place that is so enlivened with that value that to live there is to just naturally come to know It over time. Yet your addiction to the images on the surface, on the ‘screen’, have so overtaken you, that you cling to the images and continue to look for Truth there… on the surface… as fleeting as time itself. That is your habit, your addiction. You are lost in the illusion, in the mirage. You continue to insist that it offers what you long for, what you need, what the world needs. You are lost to the illusion of time.
To awaken to ‘It’ is to awaken to that which exists beyond time. Time stands still there. Nothing is happening there. It is within ‘It’ where your life comes together. It is the water that feeds the root of life… the fountainhead, the source. It is the foundation you long for… the unification of all that is. To find it, you must go beyond the illusion of time. Yet to go beyond time, you must go through time. To vanquish the dragon of a dream, you need the sword of a dream. You must use time wisely to free yourself from the bindings of time… to see beyond time. Only then will you find what you long for.
It is called ‘Bliss’.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
by Michael Mamas | Saturday, May 11, 2013 | Favorites, Spirituality |
It is really very simple. When the body dies, the mind does not… just that simple.
When the body dies, your dreams become your reality. If your mind was habitually in the gutter before death, that is what you get. If you have been living in denial, your bluff is called. If your mind has been habitually transcending (as with proper meditation), you go to the highest heaven.
‘Just that simple.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
by Michael Mamas | Thursday, May 9, 2013 | Favorites, Spirituality |
Enlightenment is no small thing. Most everyone reading this likely believes they know that. But do they? Do they really?
Great saints have attained their sainthood by steadfastly overcoming incredible obstacles… one after another, after another. Quite simply, they were willing to endure whatever it took to attain enlightenment… year after year of relentless one-pointed devotion.
When you look at most people, even ‘spiritually aware’ individuals, it is quite a different story. They may feel a little purification (as roughness) at a long meditation retreat and decide they will never do that again. They may see that they do not really have many friends going to a particular class, so they decide not to go. They may have a little conflict with someone and therefore decide to ‘throw in the towel’. Maybe the bathroom accommodations were not quite to their liking. Maybe Starbucks is just a little too far away from the monastery for their liking!
So I ask again… Do you have the right stuff? What are you devoted to… really?
Someone once said that they did not want to do the Ashram Program because they wanted to stay in ‘the real world’. I responded by asking them if they really believed that the pinball machine they lived in was ‘the real world’. It is not. It is merely the illusion that keeps you hooked… lifetime after lifetime… chasing that mirage, that dangling carrot, like a dog chasing its tail.
Time is running out. Re-evaluate your priorities. Bliss awaits you, but you must do what it takes to become free of your addictions.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
by Michael Mamas | Wednesday, May 1, 2013 | Favorites, Spirituality, World View |
“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it–always.”
– Mahatma Ghandi
There is a very profound message here. Namely, that what underlies all of life, all of existence, is the Unified Field. It is a field of infinite harmony and perfection. It is the foundation upon which everything rests, just as the depth of the ocean supports all the waves on the surface. Everything comes from that and returns to it. That which is not in harmony with that, loses the support of that foundation, and is short lived.
One country may overtake another in battle, but in time, the people of that land renew their rule of that land. Every person, every nation, every thing has its own essential divine nature. To eventually come to rest in that is the course of all of life.
Nature supports.
© Michael Mamas. All rights reserved.
