Patrick Sweeney - Realizing Ordinary Mind

Patrick offers a beautiful discussion of nondual consciousness, the nameless, effortless, self-liberating quality of awareness in which all distinctions between self and other, this and that, inside and outside fall away completely, leaving only the brilliant clarity of this very Moment, exactly as it is. Although this "Ordinary Mind" is and always has been the ever-present condition of consciousness, the separate self somehow rarely seems to notice that which it always already is—in fact, it is fair to say that the majority of our actions and intentions as human beings are in avoidance of this simple recognition, with all its ego-shattering implications. However, we have all experienced this radical One Taste many times in the course of our lives, if even for the briefest of moments. Patrick mentions accidents, orgasms, and death as typical moments of spontaneous and profound realization, but these experiences tend to occur whenever the normal continuity of life becomes suddenly disrupted—during which people tend to report radically altered states of experience, including a sense of time dilation, an overwhelming feeling of peace or oneness with the world, and everything simply becomes much more vivid, vibrant, and present. Unfortunately, it can be all too easy to miss these experiences without a stable contemplative practice, which helps train our capacity to be persistently aware of ourselves and our environments, making it much easier to recognize our own Original Face whenever it chooses to reveal itself.



nondual

Interesting opinions on the nondual path. But red flags wave
anytime someone dangles a carrot to his audience claiming
that 'this is the best or the only way'. silly really. One would think
that at this juncture in the consciousness movement we could
all dispense with such inanities.

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ordinary mind

Is there any good reason the zen tradition is never explicitly mentioned in the promotion or text of this clip? It looks a lot like just another middle-class American rip off of ancient wisdom dressed up for a new market, hoping (and doing nothing to diasbuse the notion) that they will know little better and take the holons crew at face value. i would have expected better.

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