Only just been introduced to you and Robert Saltzman. What a fantastic rabbit hole! I loved this passage you shared. I'm finding the concepts you both share reachable but still just out of my grasp. I'll be buying this book the second it hits the shelves. 💚
She (and Saltzman) is pointing to what is always available/present before the concepts are overlaid upon it. You can't grasp it because anything you could grasp is already in the conceptual realm. You already ARE it, so it's too late to grasp anything. :)
I'm glad you loved it. But rabbit hole? Interesting way to describe what I would describe as anything but a rabbit hole. But maybe the term no longer means what I think it does. I'm really not aiming to share concepts for the intellect to grasp, but rather, to point beyond concepts, to what is ungraspable but actually unavoidable. My friend Robert and I have significant common ground but also some differences. And FYI, I have 5 already published books, of which Nothing to Grasp might be the best introduction: https://www.joantollifson.com/books-joan-tollifson.html 🙏
Thanks for your reply. To clarify. My own definition of a rabbit hole is a new avenue of learning previously unseen or investigated. 🙂
As for grasping. I'm associating that word with understanding. Or maybe I just need to unlearn much of what I've been told up until now. What remains is simply what you're describing?
'Nothing to grasp' is on its way to me. Thank you 🙂💚
Hola ¡ quan ens expressem qui ho fa soc jo un immens misteri vestit de personalitat social cultural jo tu elles ells tot
De que parlo, que parlo, com ? d'aquesta Vida, de la Vida, amb personalitat
Aquí així ara ,, ? si et pares si t'encantes si marxes de tu . No es explicable, sols un una persona cosa més, com tu com jo tant diferents en el fons tant iguals ... tant canviant i que sembla igual...
Thank you for this enticing peek into your forthcoming book Joan!
It struck me when I read this that if in every case what comes after "this" should be omitted - because we don't actually know what that thing is, as you so often remind us - then we are left with "this." This seems enough, or what do you think? This wouldn't leave a teacher much to say, however. 😊
For reference, this is an excerpt from your excerpt:
"this cup of tea, this spring breeze touching the skin, these sounds of the freeway, this dance of light and color," etc.
Just checking if my truncated rendering is moving in the right direction?
Yes. However, I name specifics in order to point people to the actuality of ordinary life. If I only said "THIS," people might imagine something exotic and outside their immediate experience. But however we point to this, it can always be misunderstood, and no map is ever the territory.
Thus, some teachers do fall silent. But because consciousness gets lost in its own fabrications, we humans suffer a great deal psychologically, and we often completely overlook or don't see the beauty and joy that is right here. Of course, in the absolute sense, even that overlooking is also "just this." But because it is painful and leads to more pain, teachers, teachings, books, retreats, practices and so on arise in response to that, much as white blood cells arise in the body to respond to diseases.
Both the white blood cells AND the viruses are ALL expressions of this one reality, but that doesn't mean the white blood cells should stop doing their work, or that doctors and medicines are of no use. And it seems that, because delusion is so deeply habituated and often addictive, we need to hear these basic messages again and again. And sometimes the medicine creates its own new problems!
At some point, we may find we no longer need or want to hear these messages. Or we may continue to enjoy them. Or, reading the menu can become a kind of addictive avoidance of actually eating the meal. These are all possibilities. And for sure, for those of us engaged in writing or talking about this, it feels as if we are saying the same things over and over again. And we are, but what really liberates is the ever-fresh presence, the awareness, not the words. 🙏
Thank you very much for your kind and considered response, Joan, much appreciated.
Yes, I can see all the pitfalls you point out, and also why teachers have to repeat their insights so many times. It is a source of amazement to me that you still find fresh words to say the same thing again. The virus-white blood cells metaphor is great! So is your pointing out that the medicine can have side-effects.
Thank you Joan ❤️ This was exactly what I needed to read this morning as I start a week of moment-by-moment awarenesses. Something that has alluded me in spite of trying for years. Your expressions of This help a lot.
Happy to hear. I'd say that, in my experience anyway, there is no such thing as being mindfully alert 24/7. By its nature, the mind wanders and dreams and thinking happens. Delusion happens. We may begin to see that certain habitual patterns are painful, but we can't force them to stop happening. However, the more they are seen (the more awareness of them there is), the more they lose their grip and their power. We can also begin to discover the beauty in ordinary life: a cup of coffee, a beautiful tree, a piece of tissue, the light on the wall...even the sounds of traffic or trash on the sidewalk...things we'd learned to think of as unpleasant or ugly. The more this beauty is seen and enjoyed, the more it happens. But TRYING to make it happen tends to have the opposite effect, because it tenses the body and reinforces the thought-sense of a deficient separate "me" who needs to improve, get better, or do it right. ❤️
i love this message: "What do I most hope to convey in this book? That you are okay just as you are, that everything is sacred, that simply being alive is enough, that the perfect path is exactly the one you are on, that nothing could be other than it is in this moment, that it is possible in any moment to wake up from thought-induced suffering and find the joy in life as it is, that there is immense freedom in no longer needing to know what this is and in simply being what you actually cannot not be—this one bottomless moment, here-now, just as it is."
I was going to go back and copy this exact excerpt to include in my comment thanking Joan for this upcoming book. Happy sacred Sunday of enough-ness to you:)
"This isn't about going somewhere else or getting something that's missing. Truly, nothing is lacking." If we could all just grok this on a fundamental level, what a difference it would make in our world.
As someone who has been ‘feeling the feels’ of clinical anxiety and depression for the last 30+ days (OK, maybe 45!), I took a lot of comfort in your first paragraph. I don’t know you personally, and I can’t promise you much, except for this. You are going to sell at LEAST one copy of this book. Cheers!
Thanks for sharing, Joan. Wonderful to read your writing almost in the making and I am looking forward to the completed book. What I love about your books and your writings in general, is your ability to bring this difficult subject into daily life and into our mutual human confusion, thereby alliviating - if only temporarily - that veil that has clouded our view. For me the greatest enjoyment is your beautiful novelist handling of the written language. It is rich, complex, and quite unique. It has this unmistaken, deeply introspective descriptive flow, which is a dance in and of itself, revealing ordinary life and nondual understanding in one seamless whole.
Thank you Joan.❤️
Only just been introduced to you and Robert Saltzman. What a fantastic rabbit hole! I loved this passage you shared. I'm finding the concepts you both share reachable but still just out of my grasp. I'll be buying this book the second it hits the shelves. 💚
She (and Saltzman) is pointing to what is always available/present before the concepts are overlaid upon it. You can't grasp it because anything you could grasp is already in the conceptual realm. You already ARE it, so it's too late to grasp anything. :)
I'm glad you loved it. But rabbit hole? Interesting way to describe what I would describe as anything but a rabbit hole. But maybe the term no longer means what I think it does. I'm really not aiming to share concepts for the intellect to grasp, but rather, to point beyond concepts, to what is ungraspable but actually unavoidable. My friend Robert and I have significant common ground but also some differences. And FYI, I have 5 already published books, of which Nothing to Grasp might be the best introduction: https://www.joantollifson.com/books-joan-tollifson.html 🙏
Thanks for your reply. To clarify. My own definition of a rabbit hole is a new avenue of learning previously unseen or investigated. 🙂
As for grasping. I'm associating that word with understanding. Or maybe I just need to unlearn much of what I've been told up until now. What remains is simply what you're describing?
'Nothing to grasp' is on its way to me. Thank you 🙂💚
Hola ¡ quan ens expressem qui ho fa soc jo un immens misteri vestit de personalitat social cultural jo tu elles ells tot
De que parlo, que parlo, com ? d'aquesta Vida, de la Vida, amb personalitat
Aquí així ara ,, ? si et pares si t'encantes si marxes de tu . No es explicable, sols un una persona cosa més, com tu com jo tant diferents en el fons tant iguals ... tant canviant i que sembla igual...
"—excerpted from a forthcoming book"
Whoa, spoilers!! ;)
Thank you for this enticing peek into your forthcoming book Joan!
It struck me when I read this that if in every case what comes after "this" should be omitted - because we don't actually know what that thing is, as you so often remind us - then we are left with "this." This seems enough, or what do you think? This wouldn't leave a teacher much to say, however. 😊
For reference, this is an excerpt from your excerpt:
"this cup of tea, this spring breeze touching the skin, these sounds of the freeway, this dance of light and color," etc.
Just checking if my truncated rendering is moving in the right direction?
Yes. However, I name specifics in order to point people to the actuality of ordinary life. If I only said "THIS," people might imagine something exotic and outside their immediate experience. But however we point to this, it can always be misunderstood, and no map is ever the territory.
Thus, some teachers do fall silent. But because consciousness gets lost in its own fabrications, we humans suffer a great deal psychologically, and we often completely overlook or don't see the beauty and joy that is right here. Of course, in the absolute sense, even that overlooking is also "just this." But because it is painful and leads to more pain, teachers, teachings, books, retreats, practices and so on arise in response to that, much as white blood cells arise in the body to respond to diseases.
Both the white blood cells AND the viruses are ALL expressions of this one reality, but that doesn't mean the white blood cells should stop doing their work, or that doctors and medicines are of no use. And it seems that, because delusion is so deeply habituated and often addictive, we need to hear these basic messages again and again. And sometimes the medicine creates its own new problems!
At some point, we may find we no longer need or want to hear these messages. Or we may continue to enjoy them. Or, reading the menu can become a kind of addictive avoidance of actually eating the meal. These are all possibilities. And for sure, for those of us engaged in writing or talking about this, it feels as if we are saying the same things over and over again. And we are, but what really liberates is the ever-fresh presence, the awareness, not the words. 🙏
Thank you very much for your kind and considered response, Joan, much appreciated.
Yes, I can see all the pitfalls you point out, and also why teachers have to repeat their insights so many times. It is a source of amazement to me that you still find fresh words to say the same thing again. The virus-white blood cells metaphor is great! So is your pointing out that the medicine can have side-effects.
The timing of this writing couldn’t be more “perfect”…I so appreciate your mind..your words instantly active open awareness🪄✨for me🥹🙏🏻
PS..I CAN’T WAIT FOR THE NEW BOOK‼️🤩
Love this. Especially the first paragraph of your book excerpt. So accessible.
Thank you for sharing this Joan. I eagerly anticipate reading your book but in the meantime I will spend my time enjoying each moment.
Thank you Joan ❤️ This was exactly what I needed to read this morning as I start a week of moment-by-moment awarenesses. Something that has alluded me in spite of trying for years. Your expressions of This help a lot.
Happy to hear. I'd say that, in my experience anyway, there is no such thing as being mindfully alert 24/7. By its nature, the mind wanders and dreams and thinking happens. Delusion happens. We may begin to see that certain habitual patterns are painful, but we can't force them to stop happening. However, the more they are seen (the more awareness of them there is), the more they lose their grip and their power. We can also begin to discover the beauty in ordinary life: a cup of coffee, a beautiful tree, a piece of tissue, the light on the wall...even the sounds of traffic or trash on the sidewalk...things we'd learned to think of as unpleasant or ugly. The more this beauty is seen and enjoyed, the more it happens. But TRYING to make it happen tends to have the opposite effect, because it tenses the body and reinforces the thought-sense of a deficient separate "me" who needs to improve, get better, or do it right. ❤️
Thank you again. So profoundly helpful.
Wonderfully stated, 💯
dear joan,
thank you for sharing this!
i love this message: "What do I most hope to convey in this book? That you are okay just as you are, that everything is sacred, that simply being alive is enough, that the perfect path is exactly the one you are on, that nothing could be other than it is in this moment, that it is possible in any moment to wake up from thought-induced suffering and find the joy in life as it is, that there is immense freedom in no longer needing to know what this is and in simply being what you actually cannot not be—this one bottomless moment, here-now, just as it is."
much appreciated!
love
myq
I was going to go back and copy this exact excerpt to include in my comment thanking Joan for this upcoming book. Happy sacred Sunday of enough-ness to you:)
"This isn't about going somewhere else or getting something that's missing. Truly, nothing is lacking." If we could all just grok this on a fundamental level, what a difference it would make in our world.
As someone who has been ‘feeling the feels’ of clinical anxiety and depression for the last 30+ days (OK, maybe 45!), I took a lot of comfort in your first paragraph. I don’t know you personally, and I can’t promise you much, except for this. You are going to sell at LEAST one copy of this book. Cheers!
❤️
It's always amazing how you use words to successfully point us beyond words! Thank you again.
Thank you for sharing this. It’s beautifully written and just what I needed to read today. I’m looking forward to your new book!
Thanks for sharing, Joan. Wonderful to read your writing almost in the making and I am looking forward to the completed book. What I love about your books and your writings in general, is your ability to bring this difficult subject into daily life and into our mutual human confusion, thereby alliviating - if only temporarily - that veil that has clouded our view. For me the greatest enjoyment is your beautiful novelist handling of the written language. It is rich, complex, and quite unique. It has this unmistaken, deeply introspective descriptive flow, which is a dance in and of itself, revealing ordinary life and nondual understanding in one seamless whole.