Pointers

What is it, right now, that you don't have to attain?

*****

There is no one there to "accept" or "receive" awareness. Those are false actions regarding a false self. Awareness is what you are, and not something that you can "merge" with.

*****

Peace is totally beyond any steps you think you have to make toward it.

*****

Why strive for "one-pointedness"? You won't get it that way. Simply see that one-pointedness is your natural and present state.

*****

Something never moves from being what it is. What is that something?

*****

Becoming "enlightened" is like seeing water in the desert. The water is a mirage. You will never reach it. For the moment you give credence to the notion that awakening is progressive or just ahead of you someplace, you are bound for disappointment.

*****

To say that one liberates oneself is still too much. It is simply a seeing or recognition that "liberation" is your very nature. For awareness is totally without limits or qualities, and you never move from being precisely That.

*****

This understanding has nothing to do with anything that is visionary, ecstatic, mystical, or heavenly. Neither are such occurrences prerequisites for self-knowledge.

*****

True love is always boundless. You can't help but smile and gaze at that person, as well as want to touch and be near him or her. Your entire being is overwhelmed with feelings of warmth, laughter, joy, and gratitude. There is just a natural pouring forth of those feelings, with little regard to one's self-image or perceived individuality.

-----

News & Info

Rodney's new book, Fully Present: Daily Reflections on Nonduality, is now out. It is $18.95 for the paperback (excluding postage). You can order it directly from the publisher right HERE.

~~~~~

The paperback version of Fully Present is now on AMAZON! It can also be purchased at Barnes & Noble, and is available through bookstores nationwide.

~~~~~

For the Kindle edition of Fully Present, go here: AMAZON.

~~~~~

And go HERE for the press release for Fully Present.

~~~~~

For Tami Brady's review of Fully Present in TCM Reviews, go HERE.

****

"Fully Present is an elegant addition to the growing literature on nonduality as it is being uncovered, lived and understood in the modern West."

--Philip Goldberg, author of the best-selling American Veda: From Emerson and the Beatles to Yoga and Meditation--How Indian Spirituality Changed the West. Philip's Web site can be found at www.philipgoldberg.com.

****

"Rodney Stevens opens his daily life and thoughts to us in these immensely natural and pleasant ramblings of one who is fully engaged in life, love, nonduality, and cinnamon muffins."

--Catherine Ann Jones, award-winning screenwriter, spiritual workshop leader, and author of The Way of the Story: The Craft and Soul of Writing. Her Web site is www.wayofstory.com

~~~~~

Rodney is also the author of A Vastness All Around: Awakening to Your Natural State, a powerful and elegant collection of essays, discussions, interviews, and powerful pointers. It can be ordered directly from the publisher at Lulu Press.

~~~~~

For the book's Press Release, click Here.

~~~~~

Check out Rodney on YouTube talking about "The Fundamental Thing."

~~~~~

Feel free to read a review of the Kindle Edition of Vastness on Amazon.

~~~~~

Nonduality Magazine has published a discussion with Rodney about his work and book. The extensive and wide-ranging interview was done by John LeKay, the magazine's editor.

~~~~~

"I like your approach in A Vastness All Around. The stories, thoughts and vignettes of your life seem wonderful ways to make people stop and pay attention to where they actually are right now, rather than in some imagined past or future. They show that you don't have to be some specially qualified person, preferably with a title and a name in Sanskrit, to pursue the spiritual quest. Your message comes across particularly well in such pieces as 'Sheerness of Being.'"

--Valerie J. Roebuck, Ph.D., Honorary Research Fellow, University of Manchester (England)

~~~~~

I am now doing phone consultations via Skype! Each conversation will take about an hour, and a $25 donation will be greatly appreciated.

I am also scheduling teaching events at this time. If you would like to arrange something in your area, you may email me at: writerguy (at) fastmail (dot) fm

~~~~~

This blog is generally updated every Sunday afternoon, Eastern Standard Time.

Q&A: The Right Track

Question: In a recent blog entry, you say to "Simply bring your attention to the spaciousness in which the I-sense comes and goes, and you will be on the right track."

Rodney: That's correct.

Q: Could you say a bit more about what you mean by "attention"? I'd always thought of attention as being a mental function of the character or person. Presumably you're using the word attention in a different sense.

Rodney: Again, you presume correctly. :)

Q: Right, because the spaciousness that you're speaking of isn't a thing or object that "I" can place my attention on in the same way that I give my attention on a piece of music or a book, for example. So presence-awareness is undeniably present, but how can I put my attention on it?

Rodney: Very nicely put. If you remain with this line of insights, you won't need me at all!

Q: Well, the insights stop right there, unfortunately. And I'm just left with that all-consuming question--how do I place my attention on awareness?

Rodney: By recognizing that it is present. It seems easier to give your attention to a piece of beautiful music or writing than to awareness because--in those examples--you are naturally and habitually utilizing your hearing and seeing. You don't even think about it. Because awareness is not an object, you have to bring your attention to it in a completely different manner. One of the ways of doing that is with the following question: What is it that is fully present that you need no senses to see?

Q: Ah, yes...I can feel the stillness within that question.

Rodney: And that peripheral stillness is pointing to your ultimate stillness. They are actually one and the same. Just take a close and easy look at the pause itself, keeping in mind that this is not a mental action at all. No thought or action will help you at this point. It is staying with the pause that's paramount. And if done correctly, you will discern that this moment of quietude is actually the presence of awareness to which all the great sages and teachers have spoken. There may appear to be a "shifting" to a kind of immensity or depth. But really, it is more of a discovery, a recognition--indeed, a coming home.

Q: Thank you, Rodney. I want nothing more than that.

-----

News & Info

Rodney's new book, Fully Present: Daily Reflections on Nonduality, is now out. It is $18.95 for the paperback (excluding postage). You can order it directly from the publisher right HERE.

~~~~~

The paperback version of Fully Present is now on AMAZON! It can also be purchased at Barnes & Noble, and is available through bookstores nationwide.

~~~~~

For the Kindle edition of Fully Present, go here: AMAZON.

~~~~~

And go HERE for the press release for Fully Present.

~~~~~

For Tami Brady's review of Fully Present in TCM Reviews, go HERE.

****

"Fully Present is an elegant addition to the growing literature on nonduality as it is being uncovered, lived and understood in the modern West."

--Philip Goldberg, author of the best-selling American Veda: From Emerson and the Beatles to Yoga and Meditation--How Indian Spirituality Changed the West. Philip's Web site can be found at www.philipgoldberg.com.

****

"Rodney Stevens opens his daily life and thoughts to us in these immensely natural and pleasant ramblings of one who is fully engaged in life, love, nonduality, and cinnamon muffins."

--Catherine Ann Jones, award-winning screenwriter, spiritual workshop leader, and author of The Way of the Story: The Craft and Soul of Writing. Her Web site is www.wayofstory.com

~~~~~

Rodney is also the author of A Vastness All Around: Awakening to Your Natural State, a powerful and elegant collection of essays, discussions, interviews, and powerful pointers. It can be ordered directly from the publisher at Lulu Press.

~~~~~

For the book's Press Release, click Here.

~~~~~

Check out Rodney on YouTube talking about "The Fundamental Thing."

~~~~~

Feel free to read a review of the Kindle Edition of Vastness on Amazon.

~~~~~

Nonduality Magazine has published a discussion with Rodney about his work and book. The extensive and wide-ranging interview was done by John LeKay, the magazine's editor.

~~~~~

"I like your approach in A Vastness All Around. The stories, thoughts and vignettes of your life seem wonderful ways to make people stop and pay attention to where they actually are right now, rather than in some imagined past or future. They show that you don't have to be some specially qualified person, preferably with a title and a name in Sanskrit, to pursue the spiritual quest. Your message comes across particularly well in such pieces as 'Sheerness of Being.'"

--Valerie J. Roebuck, Ph.D., Honorary Research Fellow, University of Manchester (England)

~~~~~

I am now doing phone consultations via Skype! Each conversation will take about an hour, and a $25 donation will be greatly appreciated.

I am also scheduling teaching events at this time. If you would like to arrange something in your area, you may email me at: writerguy (at) fastmail (dot) fm

~~~~~

This blog is generally updated every Sunday afternoon, Eastern Standard Time.

Pointers

Simply see what it is that has never been absent.

*****

Who is standing apart from awareness? You certainly are not. All that's happening is that there is a thought saying that you and presence are somehow separate.

*****

Awareness can't be experienced. It isn't an object or something new that comes into being. It can only be known or understood to unequivocally exist. Allow these words to resonate within you throughout the day, if you are so inclined. Such contemplations have to be absolutely natural and unforced to be effective.

*****

You can't get any closer to what you are right at this moment. Even when your understanding occurs, there will be no attainment of anything. You will simply perceive that awareness has always been abundantly present, and that you were/are That. There is just a clear and beautiful seeing of all this.

******

Your natural state is your natural state. It never moves from being absolutely there.

*****

All pointers are conceptual. Yet, the best ones aim away from themselves, to awareness itself. You can't remain with ideas and concepts, and expect to come to this understanding. The same applies with repeating mantras and engaging in practices; for with those activities too you are existing on a dualistic and conceptual level.

*****

You don't have to do a single thing, except recognize what is already present.

*****

You're searching for air when air is all around you. Just breathe in, i.e., recognize that there is a quiet presence of peace and spaciousness directly within and before you. You never move from being this bare whatness and plenitude. So try taking note of how things are constantly changing throughout your daily life, and you just may discern that which isn't changing in the least.

-----

News & Info

Rodney's new book, Fully Present: Daily Reflections on Nonduality, is now out. It is $18.95 for the paperback (excluding postage). You can order it directly from the publisher right HERE.

~~~~~

The paperback version of Fully Present is now on AMAZON! It can also be purchased at Barnes & Noble, and is available through bookstores nationwide.

~~~~~

For the Kindle edition of Fully Present, go here: AMAZON.

~~~~~

And go HERE for the press release for Fully Present.

~~~~~

For Tami Brady's review of Fully Present in TCM Reviews, go HERE.

****

"Fully Present is an elegant addition to the growing literature on nonduality as it is being uncovered, lived and understood in the modern West."

--Philip Goldberg, author of the best-selling American Veda: From Emerson and the Beatles to Yoga and Meditation--How Indian Spirituality Changed the West. Philip's Web site can be found atwww.philipgoldberg.com.

****

"Rodney Stevens opens his daily life and thoughts to us in these immensely natural and pleasant ramblings of one who is fully engaged in life, love, nonduality, and cinnamon muffins."

--Catherine Ann Jones, award-winning screenwriter, spiritual workshop leader, and author of The Way of the Story: The Craft and Soul of Writing. Her Web site is www.wayofstory.com

~~~~~

Rodney is also the author of A Vastness All Around: Awakening to Your Natural State, a powerful and elegant collection of essays, discussions, interviews, and powerful pointers. It can be ordered directly from the publisher at Lulu Press.

~~~~~

For the book's Press Release, click Here.

~~~~~

Check out Rodney on YouTube talking about "The Fundamental Thing."

~~~~~

Feel free to read a review of the Kindle Edition of Vastness on Amazon.

~~~~~

Nonduality Magazine has published a discussion with Rodney about his work and book. The extensive and wide-ranging interview was done by John LeKay, the magazine's editor.

~~~~~

"I like your approach in A Vastness All Around. The stories, thoughts and vignettes of your life seem wonderful ways to make people stop and pay attention to where they actually are right now, rather than in some imagined past or future. They show that you don't have to be some specially qualified person, preferably with a title and a name in Sanskrit, to pursue the spiritual quest. Your message comes across particularly well in such pieces as 'Sheerness of Being.'"

--Valerie J. Roebuck, Ph.D., Honorary Research Fellow, University of Manchester (England)

~~~~~

I am now doing phone consultations via Skype! Each conversation will take about an hour, and a $25 donation will be greatly appreciated.

I am also scheduling teaching events at this time. If you would like to arrange something in your area, you may email me at: writerguy (at) fastmail (dot) fm

~~~~~

This blog is generally updated every Sunday afternoon, Eastern Standard Time.

So What Is It That You Feel?

Breakfast on the long, sectional table from Ikea: Cinnamon muffins (from Zagara's Marketplace), organic blueberries, double-pulp orange juice, Three Beans coffee for me, and piping black tea for her (the pot neatly in its cozy).

We periodically stare out at delicate flurries of snow through the nine, multi-pane windows of her dining room. She lives here now, in this dark brick, two-story 1916 Colonial Revival house. A trio of kitties that remembered me within 10 seconds (after having not seen me for over a year) brush gracefully against my legs, marking me again and again. I reach down stroking them as they do.

"So what is it that you feel?" she asked. This is the first direct question that she has ever asked me about this understanding since my coming to it in the spring of 2007. "Is it like contentment?"

"No. Contentment is a feeling that is easily altered. What is felt here is a deep presence of peace and spaciousness that never changes, even with the arising of strong emotions. It is always the same because it is my natural state. It's yours, as well. And that's all that nonduality is teaching or pointing to.

She sips her tea and gazes out the window. "I should have asked you that a long time ago," she finally says.

"Thanks, but no 'shoulds' are needed. Your curiosity is simply at the level that it is. It may deepen, and it may not. You can't push someone to have an interest in self-knowledge. Nor should you." Benign silence.

We bundle up and get into the car for sight-seeing. We drive through some of the most beautiful enclaves of Cleveland--Shaker Heights, University Circle, Little Italy, and her own Cleveland Heights. The houses are mammoth, ranging in styles from Federal and Tudor to Georgian and elaborate Queen Anne. They were mostly built in the early 20th-century, when the rich made their living spaces large.

We then make delicious forays to Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, Heinen's, and On the Rise Artisan Breads, where we get a loaf of oven-fresh Country Sourdough for "Cousin Amy," where we are going for dinner that afternoon.

Amy and her family of doctors: Her husband is a psychiatrist, and their two sons are, respectively, an internist and an orthopedic surgeon. And each has children who love to descend upon this rambling, two-story lake house. A freezing drizzle quickens as we pull into the drive. The amber-lit windows are adorned with warmth, movement, and people wanting to meet me.

But as I get out the car, I am thoroughly paused by the stormy and seemingly endless expanse of Lake Erie. "Make my apologies," I say and run to the long, deeply angled steps leading down to the beach. "Rodney!" she yells. But I'm gone, holding tightly on to the wooded railings. Still, I slip three times on the icy steps, but manage to right myself during the slow, perilous descent.

The beach is tiny and cluttered. Wave-flattened stones, tree limbs, boat garbage, and coyote tracks predominate. Four black, partially-submerged, metal groins stave off the house's eventual tumble into the bone-chilling waters. The air reeks of oil, rot, and fish. And far out, the grey, gelid churning of the lake melds with a turbulent sky. I turn and gaze upward to the house. And there they are--women at the window, staring down, protectively.

"So what is it that you feel?" she asked. Utter vastness and gratitude.

-----

News & Info

Rodney's new book, Fully Present: Daily Reflections on Nonduality, is now out. It is $18.95 for the paperback (excluding postage). You can order it directly from the publisher right HERE.

~~~~~

The paperback version of Fully Present is now on AMAZON! It can also be purchased at Barnes & Noble, and is available through bookstores nationwide.

~~~~~

For the Kindle edition of Fully Present, go here: AMAZON.

~~~~~

And go HERE for the press release for Fully Present.

~~~~~

For Tami Brady's review of Fully Present in TCM Reviews, go HERE.

****

"Fully Present is an elegant addition to the growing literature on nonduality as it is being uncovered, lived and understood in the modern West."

--Philip Goldberg, author of the best-selling American Veda: From Emerson and the Beatles to Yoga and Meditation--How Indian Spirituality Changed the West. Philip's Web site can be found at www.philipgoldberg.com.

****

"Rodney Stevens opens his daily life and thoughts to us in these immensely natural and pleasant ramblings of one who is fully engaged in life, love, nonduality, and cinnamon muffins."

--Catherine Ann Jones, award-winning screenwriter, spiritual workshop leader, and author of The Way of the Story: The Craft and Soul of Writing. Her Web site is www.wayofstory.com

######

EVENTS: I will be giving a weekend talk on nonduality at OneCircle in Silver Spring, Maryland on February 10-12, 2012. For the flyer, go HERE. I will also be signing books, as well as answering questions. Feel free to contact OneCircle for more information.

######

Rodney is also the author of A Vastness All Around: Awakening to Your Natural State, a powerful and elegant collection of essays, discussions, interviews, and powerful pointers. It can be ordered directly from the publisher at Lulu Press.

~~~~~

For the book's Press Release, click Here.

~~~~~

Check out Rodney on YouTube talking about "The Fundamental Thing."

~~~~~

Feel free to read a review of the Kindle Edition of Vastness on Amazon.

~~~~~

Nonduality Magazine has published a discussion with Rodney about his work and book. The extensive and wide-ranging interview was done by John LeKay, the magazine's editor.

~~~~~

"I like your approach in A Vastness All Around. The stories, thoughts and vignettes of your life seem wonderful ways to make people stop and pay attention to where they actually are right now, rather than in some imagined past or future. They show that you don't have to be some specially qualified person, preferably with a title and a name in Sanskrit, to pursue the spiritual quest. Your message comes across particularly well in such pieces as 'Sheerness of Being.'"

--Valerie J. Roebuck, Ph.D., Honorary Research Fellow, University of Manchester (England)

~~~~~

I am now doing phone consultations via Skype! Each conversation will take about an hour, and a $25 donation will be greatly appreciated.

I am also scheduling teaching events at this time. If you would like to arrange something in your area, you may email me at: writerguy (at) fastmail (dot) fm

~~~~~

This blog is generally updated every Sunday afternoon, Eastern Standard Time.