Simple things that mean a lot

I woke up kinda grumpy today.... but upon goingto my garden, lo and behold I saw the bloom of this lotus flower and it struck me that divine lessons are found just about everywhere, it just needs us to take awareness to see them and comprehend them through the Heart's eyes and the Mind's heart. I realised that:

" A blossoming flower teaches us a wonderful life's lesson! A beautifully colored flower brings Joy and Peace to all who sees it. It reminds us that to find happiness, we must have the courage to rise above the darkness of soil and earth to greet the Sun in order to receive its nurturing Love and Light.

As the Sunlight of Divine Love bathes, soothes and nurtures us, we grow within and blossom with virtues of Love, Kindness and Harmony and we in turn become a true blessing for others to behold. Question is are we a flower or are we a pesky weed?"

What is Love, What are Blessings?

Love.... is wanting the one whom we love to be happier than ourselves. When we want to be more happy than the one we "love" then it is no more love but posessiveness and selfishness. People are not user friendly products, they are not there to serve our every emotional need just because we need it. They are there for us to serve THEM, in order for us to LEARN how to truly love another.

Blessings are a downpour of Divine Love and Compassion by which it helps to accelerate our spiritual progress or expands our hearts and minds, towards the development of virtues and benevolent natures.

What happens when Tiaras hold weird stuff and not gems?

I had a really strange dream last night. I dreamt that I was face to face with a statue of Kuan Yin, but she was wearing a really weird looking tiara! It had humanoid heads, Animal heads, arms , legs, hooves and a myriad of other things jutting out of it instead of gem stones. It is not uncommon to see an image of Kuan Yin , Avalokitesvara with 11 Heads as in the 1000 armed 1000 eyes form, or with multiple layer of heads that faces various directions like the Ekhadasamuka Lokesvara form. But seeing one with arms and legs and a load of weird stuff justting from her tiara threw me for a loop. In the dream I was kind of rude, I strolled up to her and asked " Kuan Yin.... why do you look like THAT????"

Then as if being in a large concert hall with the most perfect accoustics, the Divine Statue spoke!!!! She said, " My forms are plentiful, as many as the blades of grass and leaves found in the fields and forests of the world. Each form that i take, will be beneficial to an individual who has an affinity to it. My forms are beyond intellectual comprehension and yet within each movement shown, each expresssion, each gaze and each pose, I have embedded many sacred teaching for you to unlock and discover within you. To unlock, all you have to do is sit and observe, to understand and to ponder, thus will the teachings unfold unto if you apply the key of mental contemplation"

Then she goes on to ask me, " Are you ready to fathom the true sight of seeing Niang? Are you ready to still your mind in order to reveal the beauty found within a tranquil lake? Are you ready to discover?"

I boldly interrupted, "... but ..but Kuan Yin Pusa... what do you mean by true sight? How do I know if the sight I see is true or just my brain playing tricks on me?"

With a warm smile, she touches my face with her palm, I almost broke down in tears as just being in her presence was sooooo.... indescribable! She said, " My true form is not dependent on sight, sound, texture, facets or color.... it is Beyond the boundaries of Words or Description. My true form is found within an Experience!"

Kuan Yin then added, " If you want to perceive my true form, all you need to do is experience it! Experience it when your heart glows with Happiness upon observing a Kind act done among fellow men for one another. Experience it when your heart feels and embracing peace while watch a Deer grazing in a meadow, Experience it when your heart rejoices upon seeing a family reunited in throes of war, confusion and disaster! These are but a fraction of the experiences you will see and feel througout your life and with each warm touch of the heart, THAT is when you are able to perceive a glimpse of the true form of Niang Niang."

"It is from these pure experiences of the heart that the myriad forms of Niang Niang has evolved and manifested into a physical image. And within these images hold the secrets to developing those experiences and vitues of the heart and mind. These images are meant as a quiet teaching to be bestowed upon those who seek and to be granted to those who make worthy themselves. For those who seek not knowledge but come to me in faith and trust, my images are to bring about the very self same experience that cannot be described in words, but to be experienced by the hearts of those faithfuls. It is to bring an awakening of inner peace, inner harmony and Inner joy."

" This is a chance for you to Listen with your Eyes and to See with your Ears. Within this line brought to you many autumns ago holds a many gems of wisdom waiting for you to unlock its treasures. It will unfold to you many a forgotten knowledge, and offer you new hope, new insights and new awakenings. "

" Remember, Niang's true form is present within 10,000 thinsg of the world. It may be a Majestic Redwood Tree that has braved the ravages of time, or a Beautiful Fullmoon that casts its calming serenity of light and even in a simple blade of grass found spanned across the world... within all these, I am there. My child, To truly fathom my true form, you will need to see the world with eyes of flesh but comprehend it with the heart of love. Om Om Om, Sri Sri Om, Om Sri Hum"

And then when i wanted to query more, i woke up from annoying phone call that was a wrong number!!! grrr. The dream left me in a warm state of mine throughout the day, a kind of inner heart smile... i do hope I have more of these... hahaha

Tough Times

Take courage! Draw Hope! Find Faith!

Tough times in life are but preludes to a gateway of wondrous blessings from our Divine Mother. Just as a blacksmith places a raw piece of metallic ore in a raging forge, to shape it into an artifact of Pristine Beauty; so too does our Divine Mother allow tough times to burn through the ravages of our body, speech and mind to remove the outer impurities to reveal to all the treasure hidden within.

As a community of Kuan Yin's children, citizens from the temple of Love and Light, we should be as the blacksmith's tongs and hammer that hold the ore and help the Blacksmith in their forging endeavor. Like those tools, we should be a community that lends Support, that gives Courage and we strengthen each other's faith that the forging period is passed with better comfort and ease! When we are able to help each other and everyone else selflessly, that is when the blessings bestowed to us by our Divine Mother transforms us into co-workers of The Divine Mother's Love and Light

Om Shri hum

A quote by Shantideva

"When you know a problem can be solved.... why worry?

When you know a problem cannot be solved... why worry?"

- Shantideva,
Bodhisattvacaryavatara

Reactors and Responses

Challenges that we face in our daily lives can be either a horrible curse or a character building gift dependingon how we apply them. When we are entangled and plagued by life's problems, whether we choose to REACT or RESPOND will determine if we Suffer in Pain or be feeling the Pain but Not Suffer. Whats the difference between reacting and responding?

To react is based on one's habitually nurtured instinct... which isn't always very good. To react is to instantly lash out, blame, shout or begrudge everyone and everything around the problems that we are going through, and usually the energy that comes back at us is also one of agression. Most of us who are reactors...are truly Nuclear Reactors... awaiting just the right prod or trigger and BOOM! Explosion! Problem is most of us do not realised that most times we are authors of our own suffering, disappointments or problems.

To respond is somewhat like being aware of our little voice of conscience. We take a step back at the moment of "trauma" and evaluate the best course of action and the necessary steps needed at that time to improve the situation or at least not to worsed the matter. This is especially important when we are dealing with the likes of other people.

If we are reactors, letting go of all forms of mindfulness , awareness or understanding, life will be like constantly walking in a nuclear mine-field, awaiting only the right conditions or triggers and our whole lives at that pointin time blows up in our face. If we are respondents, what may seem like a despairingly futile situation can only potentially be transformed into an enriching experience for us to learn, to strengthen, to learn, to improve and most of all to grow in life's experiences.

Question is which one of the two are we????

A Spiritual Lighthouse

To be a true Spiritual Seeker is to be a Lighthouse for the fellow travellers of the Life's Ocean of Challenges. A lighthouse Reveals but Compels not, a lighthouse Guides but Meddles never. A lighthouse's beams are shared by all who are willing or need to receive it, it will brighten the path of a merchant boat or a pirate ship alike. It is all embracing, and discriminates not.

To truly travel upon the spiritual path, one must first be firmly still in order to move and be peacefully calm in order to be radiant. When our mind is firmly stilled in mindfulness and calmed by a peaceful heart, we then can move in order help others along the way and radiate kindness and care to those just like ourselves, the ones that seek kindness and care.

May we all soon BE a Lighthouse to the needs of others who are sailing upon the dark oceans of uncertainty, that even by being seen from a distance, may we be a Beacon of Hope, a Beam of Peace and a Spark of Love to one and all.

Video Games, Potholes and Bumps

Life is a journey travelled with many others but experienced alone. The journey is really a collection of lessons, of life's victories and of losses. It is apt to remember that each event that occurs in our lives is a necessary step to ensure another erg of wisdom is learnt and experienced to make our travel more enriching and that life is truly a story written in the fullest! With colored pictures even!

Each pot hole, each bump and curve along the road is a reminder for us all, whether we travel by a 2 wheeler with its immense speed , a 4 wheeler with its greater capacity or even by threading step by step, that these imperfections were not meant to be a hindrance to our lives, but really an opportunity for us to grow wiser, more knowledgable and confident for our future. Should the road we eventually discover in the future be wracked with more potholes, then the apparent obstacle is thus transformed into challenges that serve to evoke an excitement to improve ourselves even more!!! Of course, we don'tgo asking for problems, but live life and face life as its experiences come our way for they will arrive when we are good and ready.

Like when we were kids and playing those "driving style" video games, after playing for hours or days on a level considered an "easy" road... we get bored, and attempt to play the next level up... at the start although we may not make it to the Winning line, excitement wells up within our hearts again, adrenalin surges and we are thus "revived" to take the more difficult track as a challenge and to TEST our learned skills from the Previous level and refine them.

So... every pot hole and curvey corner in our lives if taken with confidence is like "clicking" ourselves to the next level in life's video game, to get to the eventual ULTIMATE CHAMPION level. Along the way its okay to fail, its ok to hit the lamp post... we feel a bit bad, but we should also motivate ourselves to try and try again, like the story of the spider making it's web in heavy duty winds. What's the worst that can happen? If things are rock bottom, the only way left to go is up... Just reset the game and try again ... All we can do and expect from ourselves is to be the best that we could be, and to learn what needs to be learnt in order to do that which needs to be done. Then life's journey becomes an adventure of learning, of understanding and of giving and receiving Hope.