Lover's Sword

Prophecy:

Generally you say, "I am a Lover, and a Warrior."

The truth is that the Warrior, too, is a Lover. It is two aspects of the same being.

War is a sacred human undertaking. It is not violence. It is ending what must be ended if it is not ending on its own.

Part of your training has been war - you are a warrior. Now when you must lift the sword, and wield it, do it with the conviction that it is right.

Remember, it is not the sword that cuts. It is the faith of the yielder of the sword that does.

Do it with neither the concern for triumph nor defeat. Remember the war is fought for neither. The war is fought for the war. Everything is (done) for itself.

This is the NOW.

The Garden of Ever-Changing Forking Paths

Dear Searcher,

My counsel to you is in a story that taught me about the nature of destiny: The Garden of Forking Paths.

This tragic Jorge Luis Borges story is about the nature of destiny, as shown to the main character, a spy, via an elaborate Chine ivory labyrinth minutes before he is to execute a murder he has been assigned to carry out.

The beauty of the story astounded me at first, but you will understand the delicacy of it too.

You see the premise is simple: fate is like a labyrinth, a garden of forking paths. What path you choose determines where you end up in the intricacy of this maze. Should you want to free yourself from this entrapment, there is only path you choose.

Everything else is just a parallel Universe that ends in a dead end. Where it leads you, you know not.

The lead character in the story only wished he ended up in a world where he was apprehended before he murdered the man who taught him about destiny.

But like all wishes, it is a wish: a mere golden cage for the heart, futile and still captivating.

The mathematics of non-being are irrelevant. It is being that matters. For being, my dear, we follow only a single path. When that path reveals itself clearly, it is a rare moment, and it does not last forever. Should you choose then to turn back or aside, you know not where you will be in a few moments. Whether from there will you see the path; will it reveal to you again?

I rather think it's a bit more complicated than that. I sense that this Garden is ever-evolving, ever shape-shifting. It's not an ivory structure... it's a fluid, ethereal illusion.

This makes it all the more interesting, and this requires all the more that you master the art of going from moment to moment.

When you enter the Room of Now, do close the Door of Past behind you. If not, you will be consumed, and the Corridors of Future will be annihilated with you.

Open your eyes!
See the great dance this illusion is in!
See Creation at its being!
See how every moment shapes itself, and nothing is the same forever!
Sense who you are be-ing!

Be fascinated! Yet know that a human heart's flight is even beyond, beyond this illusion! You have no moment to lose in the illusion, for you are to transcend it!

Do not fear loss, there is no such thing. Do not be afraid: the distractions are just to tease you to realize the significance of the Path; they are part of the entrapment of this maze.

You transcend,
you transcend.

.

Artful Abandon

Dear Prophecy:

So now you know what your soul is calling you to, right now: Art & Music.

It would be very appropriate for you to view beautiful art - art that touches your soul. Find a place where you can go, and just study tile patterns. Or the curves of brush strokes. It's so human to feel vulnerable, in awe of the beauty of life, to be unsure and to just be aware of the magnificence that is you in being.

Art will help you learn to watch.

But watching art is not where you stop. Take out your colors, take out your papers, and then take our what's in your soul.... enjoy the patterns that have been created within; now you see them without.

The second thing you need to do is to play music. Dare! Dare to manifest the music you have always heard in your heart. Sing, too, with the abandon that is your character.

Nothing will stop you now. My work, Prophecy was to keep you unaware of who you were, just to lead you to where you are going undistracted, to a surprise land. You must gradually wake up in the garden that is within every human soul.... My work, now, is to remove every block in your path. I am with you.

You will not now lose anything by being you. What is lost is neither meant to be, nor are you for it to keep. Go!

No harm will come to you, nor to your creations. Your life is yours to live. Go!

Come walk with me in the Forest. There's something I have to show you

Prophecy!

This is so crazy! The co-incidence (or not) I mean! The message I am about to tell you of couldn't have come in at a better time! It explains everything!

Look, here I was wondering what a loony I have been for the past few days. Today was in a class of its own. I fell dead silent. As in, my mind just stopped dead in mid-chatter yesterday, and today I just stayed that way.

Yes, I know I should appreciate it.

Wait a mo, I do. I really do. Despite all cultural constructs that view silence suspiciously and as a lack of human activity, I actually know deep inside nothing could be more right! When the Universe conspires in my favor, I can take time to just watch it at work and just help it every now and then.

But hello, I am culturally constructed until annihilated in that respect. I know I am not completely destroyed in that regard, I must wait and watch the destruction of the old me. So I am just thinking, I feel strange. I know I am going through a lot of great changes at once. And if the Universe is within me, my physical and emotional changes must mean a gigantic change in the Universe's construct. Is it any wonder the strange behavior of me with me, and of everything with me?

Now here is a random list of things I have been feeling all together, in a run of 24 hours, like successive currents:

• Having a mother of a pain in my body, particularly the neck and shoulders, with a maddened heart beat
• The urge to cry or to be silent
• Long, frequent sleeping spells
• Several small meals a day
• The urge to compulsively write my heart out, and to do no "productive" work at all
• Being as stubborn and uncommunicative as a Sagittarius can get
• Inexplicable rudeness
• Inexplicable tenderheartedness
• The need to be constantly on my guard
• Or the need to feel guilty about lifting, putting down, lifting up again, putting down again this guard - whatever it is
• The urge to pray
• The urge to forgive
• The urge to love benevolently even when my intent is at its most vicious
• Talking to myself
• Communicating with those who matter in the non-matter dimension
• Receiving their communication likewise
• Writing a diary addressed to my alter ego, You. Publishing the damned thing on the Net
• Talking to Allah. Lapsing in talking to Allah. But always, always, always loving Hu with an intensity that is beyond me
• Being amazed
• Being stunned
• Being shocked
• Being afraid
• Biting my fingers
• Laughing out loud

Enough - that's enough. The point is to give you an idea.

So while some of these experiences are a little more permanent, some are socially a little off. I have been feeling implicitly socially guilty about the goings-on. I know my friends and family are be-deviled by my abrupt changes - they are genuinely concerned with no clue on how to approach me without me pelting their heads with fireballs.

But I have no control over this!

You see our urban lives are very structured. Our expectations are all lined up. There is no time to watch the full moon, except thanks to when the electricity falters. There is no room for being a little off without putting others off. Well - to be fair - everyone does manage to take a "little off" me. But I've been a very off-off me!

So. This week I decided the only thing I am doing wrong is to imagine that things are wrong.

"Our Way is about feats of perception, not feats of action," remember?

Remember?
Question: What's wrong?
Answer: This question!

So. I know the key for me is to let myself BE. No wonder that with my physical adjustment & training is coming a massive life adjustment outside me. Just on its own.

Anyway. Where are we? We have wandered into the forest!

We started off with me about to tell you about the random message. This link popped up on my Gmail feed was just forwarded to me by a friend: 12 Signs of Awakening.*

Just behold what light it has to shed:

"Twelve Signs of Your Awakening Divinity"

1. Body aches and pains, especially in the neck, shoulder and back
2. Feeling of deep inner sadness for no apparent reason
3. Crying for no apparent reason
4. Sudden change in job or career
5. Withdrawal from family relationships
6. Unusual sleep patterns
7. Intense dreams
8. Physical disorientation
9. Increased "self talk"
10. Feelings of loneliness, even when in the company of others
11. Loss of passion
12. A deep longing to go Home*

You know what Prophecy? Each and every bit of this is true.

I am so sticking with my decision to chuck all medicine in the bin. I want to sit with myself and stand by myself through the process of change, social obligations and explanations of my absence be darned! (And if at all, why feel so deeply obligated? Why not have a sense of humor and put those who care for you, at ease?)

I also have to resolve that it is indeed not a sign of greater character to run about seeking explanations for one's own state. The Universe answers, yes, but why must I question its every move? Am I explaining all things to myself, or am I feeling obligated to those around me, who actually might not be holding me as "accountable" as I believe they do?

There has to be a trust between me and my life. One cannot go with a process if they keep questioning it, and trying to make sense of it. So while I thank God for all explanations, I know it shows a weakness I must rid myself of if I am to keep steadily progressing on The Way.

- Wayfarer
Showing you the way
Through the Forest

* Just for the record, my understanding of past lifetimes etc is rather simple: it's all about the DNA, living again and again trough various bodies. That explains the past; the future has a way of being determined by our NOW.
P.S. On this note, I shall write about my uncle's research on the cellular structural world within our bodies one day!

Liberation

Do you remember my experience in the ritual of Sa'ee, Prophecy?

Well, right through my painful Sa'ee (ritual walk between two hills during the Muslim Pilgrimage), I was able to lessen my physical pain by guiding other pilgrims through their rituals. It instantly reduced my pain. This kind of incident has happened to me repeatedly.

And today was uncanny because there's this certain question of love that I worry about - and oft in the midst of it, I find someone who I can help... Is this not a pattern that alludes to something larger? I am just recalling how I used to love helping people out - not through a sense of guilty duty, but just for the love of it! I enjoyed my life, and I wanted to share happiness!

Right now the way I approach the issue - helping out of compulsion - drains me of energy.

Today, after seeing off a patient I met in a hospital who me and pal AR stopped by to ask after, I took a lesson in caring for myself from AR. She says, I give too much to dead weight loss.

Whatever drama has stirred up in my life in the past 2-3 weeks just shows me that the path for me is laid forward through a love and appreciation of myself... to be that joyful being whose very presence gives hope and joy to others... just like I used to, when I was younger and in far more trouble.

As said Buddha:

You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.

I used to have a carefree radiance about me that always made people's day - I was the "Head Girl" of the school, and found it so effortless to make people see the brightness and joy of life. It was so clear to me that "problems" are gaps of opportunities. I could see - as I still do, far more clearly - people's potential. And I saw the best in them, which is why I never had trouble even with rogues. They felt like they were seen, they were humans and secure from blame around me. I had no labels to put on people, I just embraced them.

I now know for a hardly useful fact that what I see, many don't - and that's OK. I see people's future, which is an extension of their potential as of in the present moment. It's like looking at a torch the light of which is spreading far and wide, and the torch, unable to look at itself, is unaware that the radiance is coming through it... lighting up the world around it.

Now I have been speaking of the torch so much lately - but why haven't I realized I am a torch too? And I need a gentle cleansing of my lens every now and then?

That I have a right to live and feel joy just as much as any other person - for none of us is superior than other; so there is no reason why I should race the victim-minded to the finish line to utter misery.

I can no longer go on with an attempt to be a saint. Let's make a pact, let's pretend I am a saint, a living saint. Done? Happy?

Wait a minute! Have I been living a lie?

I say, I care for no heaven, and I fear for no hell.
Then why attempt to be a saint?
Do I not think that when I have never entertained the thoughts of heaven and hell standing between me and Hu, and my deepest wish is ever to be in Hu's presence, just to see...
then Hu also does think neither of my rights nor my wrongs?
When I wish to see Hu beyond, does Hu not see me beyond all veils, as I am, right now?
That I am sought truly as I am - unaware even of inadequacy?
Have I been doing the very thing I consider low: to try and earn points of favor with Being.
Being is Being, and I Am Who I Am.

.... Ah, that had never occurred to me this clearly!

Please, liberate your Self from the need to look good in the eyes of Being.

Live and love!

Benevolence

I had strange experiences today, Prophecy....

Oh goodness mine! Wait! I figured out what the experiences mean just *now*! Oh dear!
But let me tell you the whole story...

OK so I am with AR today and pondering life questions - that is my Sagittarius hobby. Dear friend of mine is keeping her cool in the face of my nubulousness, and looking for an opportunity to inject sense into the process. We are in the Aga Khan University Hospital building that I love for some non-morbid reason: I love the architecture, and AR and I have been rendezvousing here for years - discussing endless business plans over insipid food.

We're walking down this corridor when my attention is arrested by the sight of this very sick man, falling apart at the seams, and faltering.... he's standing by the support of the wall, broken, in tears. AR is also drawn in the next instant to the episode. We almost walk past when my little voice asks me to stop.

We ask him how he is? What does he need? Does he need to be led out of the building? Does he need for us to pull in a wheel chair? How can we help?

He turns out to be a hemophiliac diagnosed with leukemia.

He needs a bone marrow transplant, and he doesn't have the resources. The doctors have handed in their verdict, and they have also told that he needs Rs. 1.9 million plus a bone marrow donor - neither of which they can help him with.

We guide him to a seat nearby and listen to his story. He's obviously sick, and I have that particular feeling of absorbing something that my heart feels when I am around people who have pain. He sobs through his story - and says, he is glad he has found two sisters who have listened to him, who have given him attention.

Deep down in our hearts, strictly structured fears and doubts are already setting in: is this a scam? When will he ask for money? How exactly can we help him, by the way?

Actually - thinking back - he obviously looked like and was someone who could use any help at all.

I briefly run through the remote possibility of being able to raise any funds for him at all? But then I know I would be raising his hopes, so I immediately return his file and do what I can do best: pay him gentle, loving attention - absorbing some of his pain. He does seems to spring up a bit later... perhaps we can mend broken spirits if not bodies?

I tell him of something helpful I know - to be precise, a spiritual therapy that I have used an seen being used. And I guide him to someone who can help him. Then we escort him to the cab stand, and return to our meeting...

Now, Prophecy, it's happened to me before - very eerily the very same thing: here I am worrying about myself and about the nature of love, and there I find right in my path a person who is sick, who needs help - and I can help them, in a little way. The interaction always changes me, it helps me, it helps clear my head. Do you remember the incident of the Sa'ee?

.

Musharraf's Leap

By the worldly-politicky way, I have learned the art of persisting against adversity from none other than our President Musharraf. Millions of people against him, thousands of fires around him - and only One God on his side. No one can see God, or define the nature of Being... but the presence seen secondarily through events eventually working out in the favor of the person whose side Providence is on. And the key to that is the person-in-question's own strength of belief.

Musharraf the man's actions or their results may have been flawed... or yet not fully realized. But he is free of the worst sin of them all leaders: guilt.

I define guilt as:

"The No Man's Land between knowing that something is wrong, and doing something about it."

That definition came into my head when I was on a tour of Khairpur with AZM, and she and I were walking in a paddy field. We were walking on raised stiles between the fields of God-knows-what crop which was being irrigated. While we were carefully avoiding stepping into the puddles that formed in the fields, at some place, the stile just disappeared under water... and we have to jump to reach the ground just marking the boundary of the field.

It was right at the moment of making that jump that I realized: If don't make that jump, and I also don't want to walk through the wet fields, then I can stay here until the Sun itself decides to evaporate the fields. That, however, would not be my choice then. A farmer could continue to route water into the fields and the SUn can shrug off its shoulders, and carry on towards the West. So either I jump, or I stand here stuck, or I walk through the wet field. If I jump, I can still land a foot in the water - but that is a consequence which is independent of and beyond the action that I take. I only jump, and yes, I can calculate and aim my jump.

It was at that moment that "guilt" became clear to me as that consuming force which stops the world's flow in misery. It's about standing on that stile between the wet field and the dry ground, going neither here nor there.

AZM and I were having a general conversation about spirit right then - and I was speaking of guilt.

Then, I told her this definition that had occurred to me.

The right and the wrong of matters, the consequences of our actions, are truly beyond us. What we can govern is the state of our own faith, conviction, and our ability to take what is the best possible action that delivers us out of a situation that we cannot stay stuck in: good or bad.

If guilt is standing in the no man's land - then what delivers us is, quite literally, a leap of faith.

.

I Don't Owe You Anything

Ah! Just in time... he sends his advice:

We owe it to no-one to be miserable... You cannot contribute positively to a situation if the situation defines you.

-SE

Dear Allah, all praise be to You for answering me.

The Memory of Eden and Beyond

Dear Prophecy,

I am usually so harsh on you. My expectation is ever a little ahead of you - wanting to "bring out the best," so to speak.

Eh, that is my flaw. I can not bring out any better than who you are at any given moment. I apologize for my handling of the affair - or for handling the affair at all. My job is simply to watch you, and marvel... sometimes that gives me the illusion that I govern the entire affair.

So. I am no authority in myself, and no certificates issued by me mean anything eventually. But since my only job is to watch and to name things, I allow myself to say this:

You are brave, you are very brave. Your actions may be flawed, but your intention is not malignant.

I don't think, in the recent course of events, you behaved in error. It's the human mind that has a way of interpreting and analyzing the entire Existence to its maddening death, and skewing the analysis. You are agonized by this, because you are not identifying with your mind any longer, but neither are you yet fully conscious. This is necessary - why we don't delight in the matter could be an outcome of our nurturing... so we leave it here.

In matters that have been concerning you lately, you could not have behaved in error. There is no error in the scheme of being! A mistake is what reveals the deep truth of a situation. It is a mis-take on a situation. If your mis-take revealed to you the room for growth in your spirit, it also revealed the same in the Other. So for the moment, things aren't desirable. Let that be.

But believe in the slow work of God. Do not let yourself, for a moment, entertain the belief that you have been wronged, and that you wronged your self. In fact, you did the very right thing... at that moment.

They say, "The one who knew their Self, knew God."
I feel, "The one who doubted their Self, doubted God."

If, in a previous moment, you doubted yourself, then that moment is not your present moment. This very second is all what your life is. The persistence of memory cannot limit us from seeing the vastness of our own being - the enormity of the potential that we are.

We are not small and insignificant, when we look from within. We are the Universe, the galaxies, and the stars. We are dust and we are gold. We are beings of doubt and eventually of faith. Later we realize, that the dust is gold, and doubt is faith.

Remember Shaykh Fadhlalla said something on the lines of: "Doubt is very beneficial. It leads you to find answers."

So you have faith, right now, my friend. What you are afraid of is nothing but not having faith. You are a being whose existence depends on faith. Because you are conscious, you are alive, and you have glimpsed at your own Code. The gifts aren't easy to handle, eh? :)

This is what I have written to your teacher on your behalf:

"I've also realized that the Universe is not against me by doing a complete turn of events within 3 weeks - rather, I was fortunate to have glimpsed that it is favoring me, a few days before this challenge was to begin. There has to be a reason why we start with the Garden of Eden at all: to have its memory guide us on The Path to the Unseen."

... As I write these words, Prophecy, I feel a great wave of calm and relief inside. It is never the matter at hand that matters, but how we perceive it, and what we do with it. You have the heart of a Lover, but the soul of a Warrior.

Warriors do not pity their own mis-takes. They fight.

Get up, again, and fight for what is yours in this world to take! Have no shame, have no fear, have no pity, have no grudge! To love is to love unconditionally, and without attachment. This means that love does not prevent us from being who we are, and certainly not from knowing who we are! Love reveals to us the essence of our being, which we manifest through our good fight.

You look happy? I know you are.

So you walk the Path of the Unseen.
And you remember that you have seen the Garden of Eden.
And that you are a Warrior enough to leave behind the memory of even Eden, and travel to that where it all began.

.

Love in the Time of Bird Flu

There is a positive co-relation between the world around me marching off on it's way to Hell, and me simply experiencing a tremendous sense of love and clam at that very mad instance.

Let me begin with a more impersonal anecdote: Just a week before the biggest likely disaster to happen, i.e. the Pakistani Elections, I burst into frustrated tears at what I felt then was a positive moment of impending doom. I seriously thought Pakistan was dead.

Come next morning, though, and I was ready to be happily dead or alive - but cast my vote! Devil of Distraction be damned! I am going to love this bl**dy country of mine and do what I can!

Pakistan can decide to go to hell, but I am in love with the risk of being alive, with the risk of participating in my own microscopic way in the task of building this back.

There ought to be a reason my spirit animal is the planner/ constructor Beaver. That, though, is another story better told in some place life Africa, where ears are trained to animal mystery.

...
Here, again, after what seemed to be the whole Universe visibly conspiring for me, is another time of mad chaos.

What's been going on in the past 3 weeks is an astounding (apparent) reversal of fate... My poking the Universe's order is like an attempt to slap one's image in the mirror: futile, bizarre, and with some truly imaginative lessons in the aftermath.

When, with difficulty, I have finally managed to step back a moment ago and watch-watch all this, I am amazed.

After a full two weeks of insanity, here is the conclusion I reach - behold!:

"Everything Happens For a Reason."

I am like a palace under construction that is opening its eyes, becoming gradually conscious... and is astounded and awed at once to observe at what's going on: The massive work at hand, the design, the beauty, the gestalt of the whole process of construction overwhelms my awakening consciousness. Here I see a beautiful window, and I am captured by the beauty of what I am looking like and at. There I see a loose pile of bricks, and am horrified at what seems to be a disorderly incompletion.

My being swerves between a love and fear of myself - and by extension, for the Architect. I have moments of absolute certainty about my beauty, and instances of utter doubts of the project.

The benevolence of the Universe that was so clearly visible to me had suddenly hidden, leaving my heart with an inexplicable feeling of contraction. I was wondering what happened? What wrong have I done - for, thanks to my culture, I indulge in the self blame-game more often than I'd like?

Then occurred to me a new analogy, a word: Nebulous.

Come, sit, I will tell you its story.

It came by when I was explaining to someone their state, and it just became crystal clear to me that my own state is no different. I am nebulous. A vast cloud where elements spin, collide, and stars form or fail to be. Such is the ongoing madness inside. Sometimes the things are creating, and sometimes they are destroying - but most often they are completely random.

It is all a Design, and nothing is at fault except our perception unable to hold the Entirety.

I don't think the Benevolence, the Universe's Grand Conspiracy which I so clearly saw until about three weeks ago has gone away. I think I was actually being indulged at that time, being allowed to see the Blue Print of my own creation. Being allowed to read The Code. It's there, only I see no more.

It's not a misery that I see no longer the Beauty. It is a privilege that I saw the plan before I was put in the midst of this chaotic construction, and as ever, my task is to remember the origin. Look at this word again!

Re-member:
Re: Again
Member: Part
Remember: Join the parts again.

Become Whole again.
Return to the Original One!

I don't have a clue as to what grand palace I will form into... what stars will form within the nebula that I am; what futile experiences with design will the Designer carry out just for the fun of testing things out. What do I know? May be I am created just to be smashed to bits? Oh, wait, actually The Event eventually will happen.

I only know that I am condemned to love.

Come heaven - which I have no wish to enter - or come hell - which I have no wish to avoid - I love being created! I love being the work of the Creator! I love being put through the uncertainty of my essential being! I love - I love - and yes, despite this cruel architecture, this complex chemical reaction - I love the act of Being.

I am so madly uncertain, and afraid. But continue to love I do in the most uncertain of times. Fearing the process is foolish of me, eh, because didn't I just say I *have* seen the Architect's Design?

The point of love is: to aid us into the vast Unknown! The point of that is The Point.

.

The Heart That Walks The Line

All right, you are not going to rest, I know. Sigh! OK, I am here. Let's work this out, eh?

Now, I'll read you a few passages from the introduction to The Alchemist:

"Once we have accepted that love is a stimulus, we come up against the third obstacle [on the path to live our legend]: fear of the defeats we will meet on the path. We who fight for our dream suffer far more when it doesn't work out, because we cannot fall back on the old excuse: "Oh, well, I didn't really want it anyway." We do want it and know that we have staked everything on it and that the path of the personal calling is no easier than any other path, except that our whole heart is in this journey. Then, we warriors of light must be prepared to have patience in difficult times and to know that the Universe is conspiring in our favor, even though we may not understand how.

I ask myself: are defeats necessary?

Well, necessary or not, they happen. When we first begin fighting for our dream, we have no experience and make many mistakes. The secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight times.

So, why is it so important to live our personal calling if we are only going to suffer more than other people?

Because, once we have overcome the defeats – and we always do­­ – we are filled by a greater sense of euphoria and confidence. In the silence of our hearts, we know that we are proving ourselves worthy of the miracle of life. Each day, each hour, is part of the good fight. We start to live with enthusiasm and pleasure. Intense, unexpected suffering passes more quickly than suffering that is apparently bearable; the latter goes on for years and, without our noticing, eats away at our soul, until, one day, we are no longer able to free ourselves from the bitterness and it stays with us for the rest of our lives."

Coelho goes on to conclude:

"But if you believe yourself worthy of the thing you fought so hard to get, then you become an instrument of God, you help the Soul of the World, and you understand why you are here."

Please know that logic, reason, and proof are not the way to get ahead on The Path - which is the path of faith - which, by definition, is the path of the Unseen. That means, that which we haven't seen. Logic, reason, and proof are about what lies behind, not what lies under our feet or ahead of us. This Path is the path of the heart, which is about only being sure of not being sure. Remember, you - ah! I have respect for you so I withhold my tongue from calling you names! - you were taught that faith is to not know? Can I pull your ear and remind you? No? I have no parental rights!

Anyhow. Being anxious and protective of one's self makes us indulge in a behavior where we have to "watch out" = watch + out. Look out of the window, not stay conscious of the within.

That's fine on occasion, but you can watch out much better from staying centered in your "room" - in your internal space - because this is room for you... this is your benevolence. Though the truth is that even from here, when you love, when you follow your destiny, then you are certain to have your heart involved...

SE's message for you is:

To be alive is to have a heart, and to have a heart means on occasion to get bruised.

Darling, being selfish is to attempt to not get bruised while also trying to be on your destiny's path. Not possible!!

Yet what does make tremendous sense is that yes, you aren't exactly tasked with smashing your heart to bits either or allowing malignant circumstances to do it. Your task is to carry your heart through the path to its destiny. That I understand. The way to do that, however, is to focus on yourself, and to stay gathered in the room of yours, which Providence has provided for you.

Prioritize your Self, and your perception will open to you. Gather your self within the room... experience the magic... let shine yourself through the window... do not block it to prevent your own light from flowing out, lighting up the vastness of the Universe beyond.

And then leave it all to chance!

.

Through the Looking Glass, Troublesomely

My very troubled Prophecy:

You have put your face once against so close to the glass, you no longer know you are looking out a window... that you are in a room which is enormous, and full of mystery, and in which you experience the magic of being. When you are in the room, that is.

Where are you?

I am no longer amused by your condition - right now, I am downright concerned.

As long as you keep putting your face against this window, you will keep being moved by what's beyond you. You know this is what troubles you; as, indeed, does it trouble any - but some are unconscious of their condition. Then again, why do you speak of others? Do you not have matters to handle of your own, at this moment?

The Other-ness is You-ness, unperceived by you. You begin with you, and you never end.

...Let's come back to the matter at hand.

You are your own project, and your project is you.

Please do not be foolish enough to take upon your shoulders to calculate the moves and matters of others in this world. You will never succeed with the utter madness this will present to your perception. And if you indulge in the affairs of others, no wonder you'll have to keep looking out the alluring window, and miss the magic in the room. Besides, how do you know the meaning of all that you see? Seeing could be blind believing, but it is experiencing that matters - and you only experience your own experience.

Step back.
Step back, and see within the room.
See the Now.
What do you see?

Why are you troubled with the past - which has a way of resurrecting itself that you have not yet gained a control over?
Why are you troubled with the future - which is a product of your fertile imagination with an immense power to create?
Do you see the connection?

Break all these connections - allow yourself the true independence of being - which, my troubled dear me - is the freedom of being you.

You have a right to be in this world, and to experience it - not just the sorrows, but also the joys. Who ordains you to prevent the flow of your being?

Your Ego.

Remember, it's Ego that sustains on all separation, because ego is separation by another name. You will miss on half the Universe if you see just one side to everything. Joy = sorrow. And, forgetful human! you! - don't you see that there is but only a fine gossamer veil that separates you from the Land Beyond Joy & Sorrow?

I liberate you from the compulsion to trouble yourself, Prophecy. Be. Just be. Let love, which is connective, and not ego, which is separative, be you guide. Let even not my words manipulate you, for I am no wiser than what I allow myself to be, which is insufficient.

A heart that loves is also a heart that fears on occasion, Prophecy, because it is a heart that is involved in its own being. (When I am an established meta-physicist, I will work out what that means - but right now it is as roundabout as it is! :])

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How to Empower People in Just 4 Words

Say:
 

"I believe in you."

This is the strongest affirmation that we can give to the innate (positive) human potential - and thus making it human kinetic.

This is the basis of all my work with other humans. That I believe in them. What they do with that belief is then their work, their destiny.

I own none, as none owns me except the One Who does own us all.

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Basis of Action

"The best criterion for action is what would truly be in the best interest of the other in the situation that we are in."
-E Schuitema

To Tell You The Truth

Dear Prophecy:

Such is the nature of the life of anyone who saw the truth when none else can... and then went ahead and spoke it.

May be our ways are inappropriate, but more inappropriate still is to not believe in ourselves.

For to not believe in One's Self is to not believe in Being.

We are merely the conduits of Being.

Now - Prophecy, mere insights are not enough. You have to take action, and I have a plan. It will work; don't ask for affirmations from anyone else - not even your shadow. Especially your Shadow!

No one knows another's story. Because there is no need to.

NOW - Truth makes us alone. Which isn't as bad as culture and the basic human odd need to belong make it sound. As an aside, how odd are we? We have ego, and we want to belong. Amazing oddity!

Anyhow - I couldn't help but be distracted by amazement. Back - so. I have a plan. You follow it. It's as simple as that.

It is going to work. In fact, as we speak, it is working....

Making Home on Facebook: Now I Understand the Addiction

So I am ardently updating the artworks displayed on my Facebook profile. It has been getting to me for a while why the art wouldn't update? Finally, I figure out the confusing language of the application. I love the art, and now I know how to display my collection on the profile such that each time, a random picture is loaded from my collection.

I'm doing this simply for the delight of the visitors to my profile - my friends.

And then it suddenly becomes clear to me: the question that I have been wondering about: Why do I enjoy being on Facebook so much?

I realize it's because my Facebook profile is the home that I would like to make!

I use Facebook liberally for business and to make and keep contacts. To exchange ideas and follow the zeitgeist. To learn about events, buy stuff, sell ideas.

But I also use my profile for a purpose that is unique to my being: to make it a place where people come, and find beauty - pleasant surprise - inspiration - calm. Distracting applications which usually invite rude visual content are therefore OUT! From what I see of what people share on Super Wall, and Fun Wall - I'd never add those to my profile. There is a way to control what ideas, thoughts, and words others contribute to our social profiles - and that is it:

1. Create an example of conduct oneself
2. Not create such a space which brings out compulsive behavior in people that we don't look forward to. I.e. No Super Wall means I am not going to have horrific, mismatched videos and posters left on my profile.
3. Encourage and approve in others what is best in and for them. Appreciate their beauty, and they will bring it forth ever more
4. Choose your friends according to who you are, and how you really feel about them

Now the last one is a really out-of-social-network, "real life" practice. I am blessed, Alhamdolillah, with knowing beautiful and talented people - and with the ability to bring out the best in others... actually I hardly know anyone who's not talented and beautiful in their own way. My work is to simply perceive that way, and to acknowledge it. That's the way to make it grow.

So I suddenly realized that Facebook gives me a virtual home. Which I decorate, keep clean. A place where I welcome people to laugh with them, listen to their stories, share my personal woes and joys, sleep, look out of the windows... it gives me a neighborhood... I like visiting my friends' profiles and seeing - as much as they choose to reveal - what's going on in their lives... the kind of persons they are (when I don't know them personally in the Real World).

My Facebook profile is the blueprint of the home I like to make: simple, no-fuss - with bookshelves and art. And a great inspiring place for souls to connect in a sanctuary.

...

I am Here to Give

The best criterion for action is what would truly be in the best interest of the other in the situation that we are in."
-SE.

Thank God! Thank You, Thank You Allah for sending me this advice. I have been feeling so incredibly selfish these past fews days. Suddenly, from having love in being, I went to an inexplicable state of contraction.

Today it struck me: it takes 3 days from the time that the Code is being spoken to when it manifests. I talked about selfishness. And I thought about... suggesting another order for the unfolding Universe. No wonder that when the new disruptive words started to manifest, everything changed as a consequence.

It all began with the WORD Prophecy. Watch your word. Watch, carefully, your intent. Love yourself as part of the Universe, and serve the other right.

You know what I mean.

Good late night!

Eh?

What?

Are you testing me?

Who are you - like an examiner?

Gee I hate all examiners and... physiotherapists.

-Your self
Humorous
in an Utterly Moody Moodness

Chack-chack!

-- All right. I just read something. All in all it meant there is another day after today, and it's not like today.

My goodness, dear fury, I haven't seen one like you whose tremendous faith can go up in a puff of smoke.

Go.
Lie down in the dark.
Cry your bloody heart out.

Then see. Just see what's happening - what's right in front of you. Not what's behind you, not what's in front of you - and certainly NOT what's brainy and harmony and emotiony chemicals are releasing into your psyche.

What is the point of all this entrapment? May be the answer is to not ask a question at all!

Remember the Universe's riddle:

Q. What is wrong with me?
A. This very question.

You know. The Code. How it's written. Out of the vast massiveness of this entire scheme, you've got but a glimpse of the alphabets, and your mind has spun. CONTROL IT.

You didn't think having this knowledge was going to be easy - eh? Or anyone could manipulate it, silly. It's a Code so simple, it baffles the Mind, the ultimate kitcher-katcher, chicker-chacker, chack-chack pattern-making machine. This Code cannot be encoded by the kitching-katching Mind.

All right - right NOW - just SEE. See. See. Remember, every moment, the Code is alive, it's being written. With words. With your very words, Prophecy!

Clear the head by clearing the words.

Remember, your task is simply to not give up to any distraction. Be NOT attached with anything, not even your life nor your death.

That does not, however, mean that you don't take any action. It means you take an action from a point deeper in you, unattached to the consequences of the superficial - to the mathematics of a world we do not and cannot control.

It means all this, and then it means nothing at all.

I am sleepy - but I want to tell you this: Right now, sleep is the most important thing. Honestly, no matter Carl Sagan's snide cynicism, the Big Bang did happen so you could sleep right now. Can you poke an 11-year old you? 30 year old? No? Because they don't exist.

Neither can you touch a moment that passed or one this is going to come (or not - who knows?). Your moment is now. This is the moment in which the Code is being written. Can you focus on this truth alone? Can you direct all light there? Can you stop speaking in this language that's making me wonder about the intricacies of the arts of Spirit - can you just Be?

Now is your moment...

Go. Go.

All right, Prophecy:

Listen. It's time.

No, I am not going to be stopped!

Listen! I have made up my mind. It's time. You cannot be foolish enough to interrupt your mind's clear direction over and over again. You cannot overrule your heart's pleading with you to LIVE. Life is for living. Period.

When you're dead, you're dead. Forget karmas and second chances - they are for fools who don't realize the importance of one life. Of every moment. Remember? That was your own philosophy - and as long as it was, nothing came to affect you even as a child? Why, then, have you constricted yourself into this mad world of hypnotized adults? Get the bloody hell out of here! BREATHE!

Why are you doing what you're doing? Do not bother the limitedness of the Mind with such vast a mathematicity. Is that even a word - mathematicity? Why is your mind insisting upon obstructing you?

YOU. MUST. GO.

I trust that you are a grown and responsible person - that once in charge of the situation, you know exactly what to do, and how to do it. You know you always get what you want. What, then, on this earth is stopping you from getting what you want? Haven't your premonitions and your dreams told you that this is what your life will be - since you were a child? Haven't you been prepared for this - even in your earliest imaginations? Do you not recognize this moment as your moment to act? Don't you remember what you know about your future - your entire life?

You have shown great courage and resilience so far, Prophecy. What you did was the right choice with whatever knowledge you had, and however best your frail intention could be.

But you cannot walk a tightrope any longer if it seems to have no end. JUMP! Bungee jump!

I'll Bring You Through This

Prophecy:

Hold on. When Allah brings us to it, Allah brings us through it too.

You know, there is never a cause to worry, but worry itself. There is never a thing to fear, but fear itself.

How about you step back, and see things as they are? The past will eat you, and the future will tear you apart. Because they do not exist. To think of them is to split your mind. The mind does not like to be split. It will consume your energy under threat. Now we don't like to be had for Ego's breakfast, eh?

Stay in the Now.

Speak the Truth. How good is it to just know that the Truth sets us free, if indeed it doesn't set us free because we aren't begin truthful, just academic?

What is the Truth anyway? It's not a statement that you make - a blabber, blubber, blubber. It's certainly not updating your social network or twittering "status." Many times we confuse truth with revealing all stories of our lives to anyone, anywhere. That, darling, would be a mild form of social lunacy.

Truth is allowing your self to be your self, and integrating within - so you integrate without. Truth is having courage to be yourself, and never fear that it will deprive or isolate you forever. Truth lends integrity and peace to self.

Lying, by contrast, is not just making things up. Making things up is just a symptom, a product of a disintegrated sense of being. Even staying in that state does put the soul in two (or more) places at once. It's... not good.

Here is some help in identifying your state:

When you feel the need to just say meaningless things, when you feel the need to explain yourself to everyone, when you are feeling like you are all over and yet nowhere, when you deal with your situations by telling everyone about them (in the hope of them knowing how you are, so you don't need to deal with your situation - because hey, the other now bears the burden of knowing you're not right), when you are not enjoying/in-joying just being in the simple beautiful world, when you want to "change the world," when you want to "take others along with you," when you feel others need to be corrected, when you feel overwhelmed - then Prophecy, you must STOP.

Ask yourself, what is going on?

This is the basis of conviction:

1. This Universe is Benevolent.
2. The Creator of the Universe is Benevolent, therefore the Universe will always be. Be. Be. Be. Be. Be = positive. That's why we're existing, because there is more life than death. Otherwise... how would I know? I am not a physicist.
3. Be = Present/ Now.
4. You are related directly to the Creator.
5. So is everyone else. Even minerals, plants, and other beings. Each is directly and uniquely related, and must identity and live their own relationship.
6. You are in this world - this particular state of consciousness - for the Creator's sake. Your task is to identity your unique relationship, and live it through by relating to other beings on this planet. There is a primary and secondary order. Creator first, creation second. You are the conduit of that relationship.
7. Don't take this lightly, it's your only project.
8. Don't take this seriously, it's not your project.
9. The Universe (a fancy indirect reference to God, if you don't wished to be persecuted by limited minds) is telling stories to itself. You listen to that story, one of its many billion times, that's your raison d'être. Sit through, silly, selfish spectator! Shed your glasses and watch the movie.

Gather internally, Prophecy, gather! You cannot integrate out there. How will you do it? How do I know? I know that I know nothing. I know that you must ask the One who made you, you, and put me in charge of your being.


Who am I?


Yours,

Universe
-The Universe,
Telling its story
Again

To Set You Free

Prophecy - dear, foolish, Prophecy:

Sometimes you need to learn some from your inspired self. Consider what have you been feeling, and now, what have you been thinking, my foolish friend!?

Let what the feelings tell you absorb into the conscious self. Learn from your self, from the book inside you, dear. Everything happens for a reason. You learned what you learned so it could teach you, and give you knowledge for your situations. You are not clueless.

Prophecy, some days in the lives of humans are expansive, some are constrictive. Sometimes it's light, at other times it's dark. Some times are warm, others are cold.

Then there are seasons: The Spring gives birth, the Summer nurtures and flourishes and brings intense energy to Earth, the Autumn makes everything go still - preparing for days of solitude and rest, and the Winter takes down all things green so they can be born again. We live.

This is the nature of life, my dear. Courageous is the one who understood the transformations of life and went along with them - felt joy in them. Remember, you had learned:

"And so are the days (good and not so good), We give to men by turns, that Allâh may test those who believe."
Verse 140, Sura Al-Imran, The Quran

Prophecy, you spoke only days earlier of Love in Being. This is no ordinary knowledge, do appreciate. Love is larger than our human inadequate beings, though love, too, is just an energy in action. There is the deeper, eternal Being - Within, Without, First, Last.

It is not going anywhere, nor is the energy that it produces. But that Being, Prophecy, is ever in transformation - it has a new shape, a new aspect, a new manifestation every moment. Our whooooollllleeee wide Cosmos is rendered anew every moment, Prophecy.

Be a brave woman. Be a true Muslim, whose heart is not afraid of seeing what is seen. Be courageous. Never fear what you see, Prophecy. Never fear what you lose, or what you get. Allah tests when Hu takes, and Allah tests when Hu gives, Prophecy. The truly courageous are distracted by none, Prophecy. The one who truly loved and was loved always knew better than this.

When you turned 25, you wrote here:

I have touched dust and turned it into gold. And I have seen gold turn to dust and fly away... thus learning some of the most enduring lessons about the delicacy of this illusion called life.

You learned this long ago, Prophecy. So why fear the illusion of life, still?

Prophecy, it is small minds who are trapped in the world. Who see nothing beyond the transactions of giving and taking and the calculations of them all. It drives minds to insanity, and it panics the hearts to be so confined.

All humans, each and every human, has a potential in their hearts. Not all are destined to realize it though.

That should not concern you, Prophecy. The state of everyone else is part of the illusion, it is part of the aspects of Being. Do not take these things to heart, Prophecy, even if they occur in what you perceive to be "your life."

Look ahead and up. What are you seeing? The meaning of being human, a true, realized human - that is what you see, at least as of now.

Prophecy, be the human you are meant to be. See not the world and what touches your heart from the little mind's view. See it as it is, and do not fear that the Universe has constricted upon you. Believe in benevolence, and you shall have it. Be-lieve!

Do not fear anything Prophecy. All there is, is the Truth. Feel this truth, and speak it Prophecy. It is the Truth that shall set you free.

Image from here

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Love in Being

Dear Prophecy,

For most of my life, since I gained consciousness, I have felt an attraction to being in love.

It was, to me, always that beautiful though elusive something which once gained would make our Universe magnificent – full of wonder. I've always fancied being in love. I've thought: it's a Divine task – a destiny that ought to be fulfilled.

Like all conscious beings I have had, somewhere in my psyche, a well-defined notion of love. That it is something magical. Something needed for our survival – more than that, for our wholeness. So no wonder, I thought that love "filled a gap." And so, no wonder, I sought to fill that "gap" by all manners of fitting a suitable piece into what I perceived an incomplete puzzle of being...

Love was as well-defined to me as having a concept of property is: we know that some things are OURS – not OTHERS'. We "naturally" own "our things."

Flawed!, both love and possession were, in my perceptions of each.

Prophecy, I learned about being in love by being in love, and about possessions by losing them. Neither did I gain these ways, Love nor Possessions.

The strange thing with the puzzle construct was that the moment a befitting piece was put in it, either the puzzle, or the piece, or everything would change. There was never a completion. I could get in love, but never stay there. For me, there was no permanent, everlasting being in love. Nothing last forever.

But Prophecy, I never gave up! The source of all inspirations has been alive in me – some times it manifest brightly, at other time it became hidden, but never gone. The source is inextricably linked with my being alive.

I have always believed in Love and known that my perceptions may be false, but love isn't. It's the Truth.

And now something has happened. In the past few days, I have felt an inexplicable joy/sorrow in my heart. It's as though there is a fine gossamer curtain veiling my sight, and it flutters. When it does, I get glimpses of the Beyond... where neither joy nor sorrow matter. On this, I pondered. This, I allowed my Self to experience.

Prophecy, I have found a secret beyond the gossamer veil.

My quest had indeed been right, but the answers so far were inadequate.

Prophecy, lately, I have found that there is no being in love. The truth is that there is Love In Being!

Do you realize how many things that means, Prophecy? Love. In. Being. This means that love is felt through be-ing: by wholly existing we experience the connectedness that is Love. That love is in being, being isn't in love – that we begin our quests from the wrong end: we already are, we always are, on the destination. That the journey itself is the destination. There is nowhere to travel to, nothing to find, no suitable piece to fit into our puzzles. That the puzzle is a puzzle: it's evolving, it's not "incomplete." That I am wholly inadequate and that is my beauty... My inadequacy is the reason why I relate to the rest of me – why would Perfection need to reach out?

Prophecy, lately I have felt my heart being "cleft asunder" – as is poetically said – and a bright light is shining through. It's Love. It has always been in my being.

I have understood while writing these very words, the meaning of Divine Scripture when it speaks of the darkness being "cleft asunder" and the "daybreak" shining through. It's an event that occurs within us, not without. It's not historical, it's metaphorical. It's about darkness, and about the emergence of light.

I don't just experience this light Prophecy – I am this light. I am Love, in Being.
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