One who knows does not speak; one who speaks does not know.
When I’m speaking, I can’t really think. When I’m thinking I can’t really know. Only when thinking ceases does knowing emerge. Thinking is, after all, just speaking to myself. Thus, One who (thinks) does not know…. must also hold true.
Knowing lies beyond words whether spoken or thought. At a moment of knowing, all the ‘pieces’ fall into place. Thought is an act of assembling bits and pieces of ‘knowing’ after an event of knowing has occurred. Speaking is an act of remembering (out loud) what I have thought about.
True knowing is like true love. Indeed, I see them as synonymous. I can only feel it when I set aside all discriminations. Use the light, But give up the discernment. [see ch. 52]. Both speaking and thinking require me to differentiate reality. Knowing, on the other hand, integrates and connects me to reality.
Thankfully most of my life reality exists out of my thinking range. My being knows.
Block the openings;
Shut the doors.
Blunt the sharpness;
Untangle the knots;
Soften the glare;
Let your wheels move only along old ruts.
This is known as mysterious sameness.
When I look back on my life I realize that my wheels have always gone along old ruts. However, I didn’t know the rut. I was always looking beyond, seeking that greener grass. I have come to know and value the rut. I want to Let my wheels move only along old ruts. Modern life makes this somewhat of a challenge, with all its distractions and variety.
I sense a mysterious sameness that’s present whether I’m happy or sad, healthy or sick. It’s a constancy that has been with me since I can remember. It is, maybe, the essence of consciousness (not the content!) It is the rut. I sense it as that which I have in common with all of existence.
Mysterious sameness is like water. It takes the shape of whatever vessel it occupies, but it is not the vessel. I feel communion with all past and future ‘vessels’ when I’m in communion with the mysterious sameness.
Mysterious sameness is like the deep ocean waters, with the choppy waves of individual existences ebbing and flowing on the surface. Deep water and surface waves are the same (water) yet appear different. What is the reality of this apparent difference? Fleeting. Sameness holds the deeper reality, though that doesn’t feel like it when you’re bouncing around on the surface. No wonder it feels mysterious.
To sense the mysterious sameness is similar to sensing the calm depths of the sea while I’m being bounced around on its choppy surface. I can get a deeper sense of it only when I Block the openings (of my senses); Blunt the sharpness (of my cleverness); Untangle the knots (of my learning); Soften the glare (of discerning differences);
Hence you cannot get close to it, nor can you keep it at arm’s length; you
cannot bestow benefit upon it, nor can you do harm to it; you cannot ennoble it,
nor can you debase it.
Therefore it is valued by the empire.
Whenever I choose sides I become entangled in conflict. Yoga Scripture speaks of the sorrow caused by both attraction and aversion. Of course, life demands a certain degree of such bias. The secret for me is to keep such ennobling and debasing at an absolute minimum. Simply put: bias increases stress while balance enhances peace. Thus, I attempt to ‘pick my battles’ very carefully.
What is it? It is like the Buddha nature that underlies all individuals in creation. It’s easy to be swayed, initially, by quick surface emotional judgments. However, I find it’s possible to get beyond much of this when I look deeper to perceive the It essence. It’s like looking beneath the waves to sense the still waters of the deep.
I notice two main features of life. First there is connection where I become conscious of ‘that’—something in my environment. Following this is the content where I get close to or keep at arm’s length, benefit or harm, and so on. By taking such content ‘with a grain of salt’ I’m able to deepen the connection. My it connects with that it, or as Yoga Scripture states ‘Thou art that’.