“If you do not want to know God, never look within or stare at a blank wall, and certainly do not let them revoke your ticket to ride.”- j. senor
I have been riding on the biggest roller coaster (read my previous blogs to get a better idea of what I am referring to here) in the history of creation, and certainly it has been inundated with peaks and valleys (more like Mt. Everest and Death Valley, but that is “beside” the point- “laterally” speaking, ha… that is funny, in a very subtle way, but funny nevertheless, right?).
Anyway, I had this laminated ticket (mind) that allowed me access to the relative reality of the manifest world, or what I call the biggest roller coaster ride in the history of creation, and I have had it revoked.
Now, just so you know, I did not always enjoy having the ticket- the ride can make you sick sometimes and just when you feel like puking and want to get off, you find that the controller of the ride (Supreme Consciousness) has gone out for a double shot of espresso, but having it seemed, well, it just seemed like what you were supposed to have. That is, if you want to experience. And, isn’t that the point? I mean, the point of Supreme Consciousness manifesting a mind. You know, in order to experience itself in myriad form?
So, imagine my chagrin at having my ticket revoked. And, after all the trouble I went to of having it laminated. I didn’t want the ticket to get destroyed by the intensity and duration of the ride. Thought I was protecting the ticket… ensuring that it would always be there. After all, even in lieu of occasionally losing the contents of my innards, the roller coaster ride (manifest universe) is very exciting and worth riding, and riding several times. Plus, I have grown quite attached to it.
The thing is, ya gotta have a ticket. No ticket means no ride. Can’t hardly have a universe manifest (ride on a roller coaster) without something, call it mind (ticket), to manifest it. And, I don’t think you can sneak onto (or off of, for that matter) this particular ride. Simply got to have that ticket (mind).
Now, you’re probably wondering who the “they” are that revoked my ticket and how it was revoked. Me too.
My best guess is that the “they” are the techniques, the scientific methodology that the 8-limbed path of Ashtanga Yoga espouses that can take one from the illusory notion that we are only our mind and its contents to the Truth that we are at our essential nature not just the mind and its contents, but what is beyond the mind… Pure Consciousness itself.
The techniques are the culprits. They have revoked my ticket. They have taken me beyond the mind and into Pure Being itself.
Voila.
They work.
Oh, happy day.
Chagrin gone.
Revoke away.
That darn beautiful ticket (mind) had allowed me to continue riding the ride with its pleasures and pains and constant creative motion for a long, long time. And, I had embraced it and my attachments fully… that ride can be so much fun. (And, just so you know, I do find that laminated ticket sometimes… it hasn’t been hidden very well, and when I find it, how I do ride away).
But, the lamination may have been a bit much. I mean, this mind-manifested world of things (the roller coaster ride) is great, but so is what lies beyond it… the no-thing. And, in fact, isn’t that why we do our practice, i.e., to be in this world of manifestation, but not disturbed by it? To know the stillness and peace of Unity Consciousness while in manifestation? To know, no-mind?
Let us all, then, do the practice. Moving beyond the mind. Supported by Grace. Into Pure Being where tickets are, well… they are mute.
Shanti, shanti, shantihi, Aum.