Here is Brenda’s reflections on what she refers to as the permeable being.
I don’t know which came first, the sense that time isn’t consecutive or the understanding that there is vast space when ego-voice stops trying to run the show.
A couple or more months back I was stuck. You know the place, – that morass of doubts and resentments, where it is so easy to get bogged down. I heard in my head, You stand in your own shadow. Look inwards. To my shame my first response was irritation, a kind of I don’t know how, and even if I did, what use would it be, and then, to my surprise it became, albeit grudgingly, Alright then, I’ll try. Not exactly a whole hearted response but the Eternal is patient and somehow it freed things up.
In Rules for Meditation it says, Look inwards and advance directly along the road that leads to the Mind. At one level I understood what this was pointing to, but then there was the stubborn ego-me who tried to work out the how’s and why’s and wanted there to be a logical explanation, a kind of road map. It always seemed that the Inward space would be limited and when I tried Looking in a literal way it was like coming to a dead end. And then something remarkable occured. It was as if the questioning voice left and the ME that you and all the monks are talking to, guiding, – the Buddha-me I guess – could come into its’ own so to speak. Going inward just happened and I saw limitless space and I realised that there was no inside or outside. In a manner of speaking neither was there a me.
Given the unreliability of my memory I wrote the following as each thing showed itself so that I wouldn’t forget.
The “Space” outside and the “Space” inside is not different.
I do not have to go “outside” in order to move,
nor is going “inside” a not moving.
This being is permeable.
There is neither “Inside” nor “Outside”.
All is one.
Later I added the next bit. It kind of came up to be looked at. It feels OK but still, I’d like you to check it.
IT is not out there to be aimed for, reached for, searched for.
IT is already here, inside, waiting to be found.
I don’t attain IT, like a prize,
IT gives Itself freely, to all beings,
Including me.
With Bows,
In answer…I’ve not much to say to be honest. We have talked in person, you have taken Refuge, which is good. As with everything that comes, and especially insights into fundamental truths, it’s so important to just keep on a goin’. While at the same time, and this is especially important, not dismiss what comes to you as being the product of an over active imagination. So what does one do, what does anybody do with such insights? File away for a rainy day to get out and have beautiful memories? We both know that isn’t what’s good, of course. My advice is to just keep on going, and don’t look back. And when you do seem to, remember it is just the past coming into the present – to teach.
