Practice Notes...

No matter what I am doing, or where I go in my mind, I cannot get away from the reality of my ‘physical’ body.  Well, I might be able to escape it for a while, but it always comes back as an ‘object’ of awareness that I must 'deal' with at some point.

This week has helped me to realize that I have not been staying in the moment as well as I would like to think, however, that in and of itself is progress, b/c the actual 'pain' of the moment, when I am paying attention, causes me to focus on my breath, and makes me more aware of the areas of my body that I need to address.  

I hold so much tension in my body when I am ‘doing’ stuff, and it has been very difficult for me to learn to relax the ‘body’ while it is in motion, allowing the body, mind, and spirit to connect as a whole.  I spent several hours yesterday working on a song.  I had gone to yoga class, learned some new positions that freed my breathing and so I was able to sing without the usual strain.  It was a song that I had written on the keys a little over 3 years ago, and I was transposing it to the guitar, as well as having to re-learn the words.  I found my-self feeling gratitude for ‘linear time’ that allows for such things, and basically was enjoying the process, but underneath there was this desire to ‘get the video’ ‘right’, so I could then upload it to utube and post it on my blog to find out what you guys thought of it...LOL...I forgot the last verse and was very tired from all my practicing so I decided to shelve the ‘idea’ for another ‘time’...

Finally I got to sleep, and when I woke up I could not breath...what my ‘body’ was telling me, is that I had over done my practice session or at the very least did not stretch my muscles out afterwards...I am learning that I ‘over-do’ everything it seems, especially where my physical body is concerned.  I get ‘caught up’ in the ‘feeling’ of the moment and forget to pay attention to what my body and breath is ‘screaming’ at me...LOL...years of ignoring the'physical' and escaping through the mind and/or spirit is forefront in inquiry at this time...

Music has an energetic affect on me and can take me to awesome highs, but then I pay for that with unusually low ‘lows’, energetically speaking, but ‘knowing’ this can help me find balance.  

As I sit here typing this I am reminded to ‘breathe’ through the tension from the top of my head to the souls of my feet and everywhere inbetween....  I am realizing how I ‘hold’ everything in tense positions which does not allow for relaxation.  My Tai Chi instructor told me that I just need to learn how to relax...since my ‘body’ has learned to be tense, this has to mean that it can also learn to be relaxed...I know this b/c there have been many times that I can remember being totally relaxed.  Now it has just become a matter of learning to be relaxed while my ‘body’ is in motion...

Something else that I continue to notice is that I tend to take in more air than I exhale so I am currently paying attention to that as well, and I am also realizing that I ‘don’t breathe’ at all much of the time...holding my body in a total freezing and tense postition...LOL...no wonder I’m so tired...

In working with the meditation in a still and relaxed position, it is easy to imagine myself healthy, and breathing freely and have that 'happen' instantaineously...harder to do when I am involved in the actual experiencing of life in the ‘lived’ sense...i still tend to hold my body in unhealthy ways, but being aware of that continues to reveal the knowledge of that moment needed to adjust what it is I am doing and let go of the tension and breath through the pain...my mind gets involved in whatever I am focused on and I forget to include my body and connect with it in breath...go figure!

I am reminded that it is only when I am willing to confront these ‘self’ imposed and ‘conditioned’ limits and 'pay attention', that the knowingness of now reveals itself in this space and time allowing for...Being as Bliss!

always, star...

 SPRING 2009

Davidu

Balder

Starlight

                WINTER 2009
Davidu
1.  TSK Course Two - Time (Thoughts, Stories, Self)
2.  Week Two - Thoughts that Establish
3.  I'm Telling (TSK Unit 2, Week 3)
4.  Unit 2, Week 4 - Defining Stories
5.  Models, Stories and Self - Week 6
6.  The Founding Story of the Self (week 7)
7.  Imposing Reality & the Cycle of Seeing, Week 9
Balder

1.  TSK Online Course (Unit 2)
2.  Watching Thoughts (TSK Class 2, Unit 2)
3.  Telling Stories (TSK Unit 2, Week 3)
4.  Telling Stories 2 (TSK Unit 2, Week 3)
5.  Personifying Thoughts, Embodying Space (TSK Unit 2, Week 5)
Starlight
1.  Adventures with Time, Space, Knowledge
2.  Noticing Thoughts - TSK Exercise
3.  once upon a time...tsk exercise
4.  restoring multidimensionality...tsk exercise week 4
5.  Memories, Models, Stories, Immediate Experience...TSK Exercise...
6.  self interpretation...models...tsk exercise...
7.  core self...tsk exercise...wk 7
8.  self and world given...tsk exercise...wk. 8
9.  Creating My Reality...TSK Exercise...wk 9...
                 FALL 2008
Davidu
1.  Layers of Mind with TSK
2.  Exploring Layers of Mind with TSK 
3.  Space of Memories of Layers and Contexts
4.  Expanding with TSK
5.  Expanding - Revealing the Field
6.  Condensing Experience with TSK
7.  Week 7, Generating Space
8.  Tracing the Tendency toward Solidity
Balder
1.  Layers of Mind (TSK Practice Notes)
2.  Deepening Layers of Mind
3.  Week Three: Exploring Space and Form
4.  Week Four: Expanding Layers of Mind
5.  Subject-Object Reversal (TSK Class 9)
Debyemm
1.  Layers of Mind (TSK Practice Notes)

N. GA Mountain Sunrise

on the edge of time...

on the edge of time

where being dances free...

the preciousness of form...

is breath's reality...

opening up to space...

the harmony of time...

knowing streams...unties itself...

and frees the tangled mind...

embodied...being...human...

magic...energy...

dancing on the edge of time...

myriad possibility...

playful and creative...

beautiful awe and bliss...

appreciating experience...

grateful for what is...

the knowing of such being...

that dances ever-free...

experiencing the flow of all...

this space and time to be....

starlight dancing...

practice notes...

what i have noticed these past few days, is that when i am able to ‘lose’ me in this moment of being, not controlled by my thoughts or my thoughts about my thoughts, time is alive and free and filled with myriad possibilities.  this ‘Being’ on the edge of time allows for the presentation to present itself without judgments or feelings concerning it...there is just this sense of Being, free and open, allowing for what is to dance in harmony.  time flows instead of being ‘timed’ out...being dances with beauty and appreciation of what is, and since ‘what is’ is flowing, it is not stagnant and there is no need to try and figure it out to make it better for what can be better than blissful being dancing in harmony through various form?  awareness is sharper in the sense that there is no desire to change anything and total attention is given to the presentation that being is a part of...there is also no thought of not being able to breath...LOL...there is no thought of ‘linear time’ as such, just the joy of being in time and space and the knowing that is allowed...

it’s amazing when i am able to experience the freedom that this tsk perspective allows; what is even more amazing is the knowing that it is always there, which causes me to contemplate what exactly it is that prevents or allows awareness of it, which is my perspective.  i seem to ‘get stuck’ in time, or my awareness gets sucked into whatever i am focused on at the moment, and the aliveness of time becomes an object that i then try and manage or control to get what i need or desire, which in the process prevents time from flowing and being from being open and free...it is difficult to dance when you’re stepping all over your own toes...lol, and that is exactly what i have been doing.  

these past few days have been amazing!  so much as happened, or maybe it is just that there is more clarity of awareness, and quality of ‘being’ in this Great Time that tsk has opened up to experience...it’s awesome!  what can i say?  the magic of the real...lol

i love these tsk practices that work with time...i really do well with them; in a sense they rocket me into the open space of being and there is presence and active knowing that is not a knowing of my own...but one that is presented like a dance in everything around and that i am blessed to participate in...i am very appreciative and in awe of tsk...

always, star...

PRACTICE NOTES TABLE OF CONTENTS

Fall 2008 - Unit One: Inquiry, Space

October 6 - December 5, 2008
Davidu
1.  Layers of Mind with TSK
2.  Exploring Layers of Mind with TSK 
3.  Space of Memories of Layers and Contexts
4.  Expanding with TSK
5.  Expanding - Revealing the Field
6.  Condensing Experience with TSK
7.  Week 7, Generating Space
8.  Tracing the Tendency toward Solidity

Balder
1.  Layers of Mind (TSK Practice Notes)
2.  Deepening Layers of Mind
3.  Week Three: Exploring Space and Form
4.  Week Four: Expanding Layers of Mind
5.  Subject-Object Reversal (TSK Class 9)

Debyemm
1.  Layers of Mind (TSK Practice Notes)

Winter 2009 - Unit Two: Thoughts, Stories, Self

January 12 - March 13, 2009

Davidu
1.  TSK Course Two - Time (Thoughts, Stories, Self)
2.  Week Two - Thoughts that Establish
3.  I'm Telling (TSK Unit 2, Week 3)
4.  Unit 2, Week 4 - Defining Stories
5.  Models, Stories and Self - Week 6
6.  The Founding Story of the Self (week 7)
7.  Imposing Reality & the Cycle of Seeing, Week 9
Balder

1.  TSK Online Course (Unit 2)
2.  Watching Thoughts (TSK Class 2, Unit 2)
3.  Telling Stories (TSK Unit 2, Week 3)
4.  Telling Stories 2 (TSK Unit 2, Week 3)
5.  Personifying Thoughts, Embodying Space (TSK Unit 2, Week 5)

Starlight
1.  Adventures with Time, Space, Knowledge
2.  Noticing Thoughts - TSK Exercise
3.  once upon a time...tsk exercise
4.  restoring multidimensionality...tsk exercise week 4
5. Memories, Models, Stories, Immediate Experience...TSK Exercise...
6.  self interpretation...models...tsk exercise...
7.  core self...tsk exercise...wk 7
8.  self and world given...tsk exercise...wk. 8
9.  Creating My Reality...TSK Exercise...wk 9...

Spring 2009 - Unit Three: Conducting Time and Knowledge

March 30 - May 29, 2009

Davidu

1.  Objects of Desire - TSK Class 3, Unit 1
2.  The Edge of the Future - Class 3, Unit 2

Starlight

oh the wonder and magic of breath of being,

dancing on the edges of time...

breathing rainbows into space

and peace into the mind...

open at the very heart...

allowing love to feel...

vibrant; glowing, and alive...

even; being still...

dancing in the sun rays...

as night gives birth to day...

breath shines its light, in the voices of spring...

allowing for flowers to play...

bees buzzing to make their honey...

birds singing the day into tune...

trees swaying and whispering that change is a dance...

as sky makes room for the moon...

knowingness smiles and laughs with joy...

and endlessly opens al-ways...

amazed at it’s own magic...

breath creates it’s maze...

infinite forms it dances...

an adventure of beauty and bliss...

sprinkling the night with twinkling stars...

in the awe of all that is...

energy plays on the edges of time...

and knows of the all it can be...

the magical wonder of being form...

still knowing, Being free...

StarLight Dancing...

Letting go of old ideas that tend to trap and bind...

Sets the energies of peace, free within the mind...

Hanging on to all past pain makes mind and body ache...

Keeps Being from experiencing the beauty of awake...

Feel the stream within you flow, overflowing out...

A deeper knowing with no who to analyze about...

Let wonder fill your body from your head down to your toes...

The journey of compassion with a wisdom now that knows...

Energy within--without...heaven is...all-ways...

Contemplation with no judgment, bliss neither goes nor stays...

Allowing awe to blow about, or notice that it’s still...

Deep appreciation for the magic of the real...

Whomever that i thought i was has melted into space...

It dances now with all of Being, as time changes its face...

Breath Divine, that breathed the stars; holds moon and sun in place...

Created Earth to move and flourish...with life and human race...

The giver of Awareness; precious gifts of form and feel...

All of life a treasure chest...the magic of the real...

Empty what you think you are and awe will fill you up...

As it opens itself inside out...light and love erupt...

This is what you are dear one...this is your true home...

Through all of your experiencing...you’ll never be alone...

Being dances into space caressing the energy of time...

The magic of the real is knowing you are this Breath...Divine...

StarLight Dancing...

Time...Past...Present...Future...

Ok, time is not what we think...the present is always shaped by the past, and in that sense can never be experienced as the present, b/c the instant we experience it and then put it into ‘concrete’ avenues of interpretation through the witness that witnesses, and the narrator that tells the story, it immediately becomes the ‘solid’ past...the future on the other hand, never comes into being for it is always on the edge of presenting itself, kinda like how i use to joke around and say that ‘tomorrow never comes, b/c when it finally arrives it is always today!”  Once we can actually wrap our minds around this, then what?

Seems the only thing we can truly inhabit, is the present, but what exactly is ‘the present’, and are we truly able to ‘inhabit’ it?  We can say that the ‘present’ is determined by its content, iow, if I am sitting here eating a bowl of oatmeal, that is proof that I am present in my present, and yet the moment I finish the oatmeal, am I still not present in that present moment too?  Which has nothing to do with the ‘content’ that I am eating oatmeal?  What is it that makes me present?  What is it that makes the past the past and the present the present?  Can I really have a ‘present’ without an interpretation of ‘my’ ‘past’?  And if that is so, would not that interpretation of ‘my’ past continue to bind me to it?  Not allowing for freedom of movement in a present that is not influenced and bound by the past?  How can the present be anything other than a manifestation of the past?  Does this not make the present already ‘spoken for’?  Already created?  How can we truly be free in the present?  Can the ‘present’ be anything other than a continuing of the past?  Are we really free?  Can we be free of our own conditioning?  What about the future?  Since it never takes form, as it is always the future, is not whatever takes form already decided by the past, and in that sense already the past?  True enough, it might not be the exact same as the past moment before it, but is it not shaped by the past just the same?  Does it not ‘come to life’ because of the past?  If we were to single out a point in time where ‘we’ began, would that point in time not logically have a past?  Would that past accumulation of prior ‘moments’ be strung out over ‘time timed out’ and brought forward to this moment here and now and only then be called the ‘present’?  Then where would it go from there?  Once it is labeled as present does it not then too become past?  Where oh where is the future?  Swallowed up  by a past that is always presenting itself over and over again?  How can we escape this timed out, predetermined, existence?

PRACTICE NOTES...

The purpose of these exercises and practices is to see if we can experience time in another way; a more open way, but also, it helps us see how we confine our experience,   by allowing ourselves to only experience time in a linear fashion.  When we are able to 'see' our conditioned reactions and patterns 'in action' then we are able to actually do something about them...When we can open up to TSK and inquire into our experience, our perspective opens up and is freed from the dictates of identity or a self that has been created from the past and ‘times out time’ with all the expectations and desires of a limited ‘self’.  While we still can be aware of things that we have to do, our needs on the physical level, those limits do not have to limit our Being and our experience as such...Being can open to Space which allows for appearance of ‘all’ things.  Being can also open up to the dynamic of Time that allows for the 'aliveness' of experience.  Just ‘Knowing’ this is freeing in and of itself, and yet the goal is to experience this at a deeper level, allowing for surfaces to be transcended, and ‘ideas’ that are solid to unfreeze, which then allows for that momentum of ‘The Dynamic of Time’ to be connected to and experienced, or embodied...without any ‘self’ to experience it...it becomes just a presentation of Being, where the line between subject and object is blurred, and what is experienced is the momentum of Time itself...alive and free...creating out of the 'uninhibited' future-present, without a solid past to dictate...where aliveness is felt, and every possibility is available...

Again, I do not want anyone to think that this practice is a rejection of ‘time being timed out’...or ‘life on life’s terms’...it is an opening of that experience...every limit we come in contact with, whether it be one of everyday life and our circumstances or the idea of the ‘self’, can be opened up to Time, Space, Knowledge...opening up inquiry concerning our beliefs and ideas about anything and everything, opens up our perspective, or that focus we have on awareness, and allows for more freedom of Being in this space and time...more freedom of Being allows for more Knowing, b/c what is participating in this knowing is not confined to any limits of a knower or a certain kind of knowledge to be known or obtained...this does not mean we stop thinking, it means we are able to think with more clarity, in more useful ways that are not limiting, or that is 'open-ended'...and even if we do reach another limit, we can understand that it need not be solid, and we can inquire into it...and open it up as well...

While practicing ‘Being’ on the edge of Time, there has been a deeper freedom felt from the actual stories of the past...and yet, I have been working closely with my ‘stories’ for in recovery they are my tool kit of experience, strength and hope that I can share with others when necessary...

I have been working with someone that is very early in recovery, and yet just in a few short weeks, it is as if she has been transformed and is a seasoned veteran, or what we call an ‘old timer’ in the program...she is experiencing that sense of joy that comes in early sobriety if and when we surrender to that power greater than our ‘self’...and she is showing great clarity of awareness after having 'opened-up' her past and looked at it with an honest heart...It has been good for me to witness her sense of being flourish, and I have been filled with even more peace and joy than I could ever have imagined possible, and yet my awareness of my own limits seems to be narrowing in deeper ways, bidding me to open them even more...so at another level, I am restricted even more in the very act of giving these limits more attention or awareness...however, It amazes me that when I decide to see things from a new and more open perspective, and put those thoughts into my awareness and into action...my life changes in very wonder-filled ways...and yet, all that really changes is my perspective...when it opens, there is freeing...when it focuses or closes in on a solid point, no matter what that point may be, my experience becomes confined and limited until I once again choose to open it...surrendering even the limitation of my own unknowing...over to the mystery of the magic of the real...

always, Star...

The picture I chose was from RAINCROW'S ARTWORK...check her out, she is amazing!

PRACTICE NOTES TABLE OF CONTENTS

Fall 2008 - Unit One: Inquiry, Space

October 6 - December 5, 2008
Davidu
1.  Layers of Mind with TSK
2.  Exploring Layers of Mind with TSK 
3.  Space of Memories of Layers and Contexts
4.  Expanding with TSK
5.  Expanding - Revealing the Field
6.  Condensing Experience with TSK
7.  Week 7, Generating Space
8.  Tracing the Tendency toward Solidity

Balder
1.  Layers of Mind (TSK Practice Notes)
2.  Deepening Layers of Mind
3.  Week Three: Exploring Space and Form
4.  Week Four: Expanding Layers of Mind
5.  Subject-Object Reversal (TSK Class 9)

Debyemm
1.  Layers of Mind (TSK Practice Notes)

Winter 2009 - Unit Two: Thoughts, Stories, Self

January 12 - March 13, 2009

Davidu
1.  TSK Course Two - Time (Thoughts, Stories, Self)
2.  Week Two - Thoughts that Establish
3.  I'm Telling (TSK Unit 2, Week 3)
4.  Unit 2, Week 4 - Defining Stories
5.  Models, Stories and Self - Week 6
6.  The Founding Story of the Self (week 7)
7.  Imposing Reality & the Cycle of Seeing, Week 9
Balder

1.  TSK Online Course (Unit 2)
2.  Watching Thoughts (TSK Class 2, Unit 2)
3.  Telling Stories (TSK Unit 2, Week 3)
4.  Telling Stories 2 (TSK Unit 2, Week 3)
5.  Personifying Thoughts, Embodying Space (TSK Unit 2, Week 5)

Starlight
1.  Adventures with Time, Space, Knowledge
2.  Noticing Thoughts - TSK Exercise
3.  once upon a time...tsk exercise
4.  restoring multidimensionality...tsk exercise week 4
5. Memories, Models, Stories, Immediate Experience...TSK Exercise...
6.  self interpretation...models...tsk exercise...
7.  core self...tsk exercise...wk 7
8.  self and world given...tsk exercise...wk. 8
9.  Creating My Reality...TSK Exercise...wk 9...

Spring 2009 - Unit Three: Conducting Time and Knowledge

March 30 - May 29, 2009

Davidu

1.  Objects of Desire - TSK Class 3, Unit 1
2.  The Edge of the Future - Class 3, Unit 2

Starlight

use me oh awareness...i am, in fact, your child...

breath gave birth to all of earth, and being was endowed...

how magical your magic...how mystic your mystery...

appearing in such precious form...space-time reality...

the knowing of unknowing is a knowing that’s complete...

like a circle that reveals itself without a place to meet...

how endless is your ecstasy...and yet i get displaced...

a wonderer that cannot find, till first i lose my way...

adventure of adventures...this life given to live...

struggling with opposites...then melting into bliss...

you dare not let me rest to long till you reveal again...

deeper levels of yourself open from within...

no wonder many are in awe of the beauty that you are...

they’ve often given you the name of the one, true, loving God...

it’s been said that you are light...perfect equanimity...

and that this path of human being is the journey into free...

it’s said that heaven’s your domain...yet you dance Maya’s light...

the kingdom’s door is our own breath, it’s open day and night...

thank you for this garden that you’ve given to play in...

and the ability of new perspectives...time and time again...

you dance within the all of us...the all of everything...

you are the magic of the real...sweet mystery you sing...

StarLight Dancing...with RainCrow...