The Time Before Death
Friend, hope for the Guest while you are alive.
Jump into experience while you are alive!
Think… and think… while you are alive.
What you call ‘salvation’ belongs to the time before death.
If you don’t break your ropes while you’re alive,
do you think ghosts will do it after?
The idea that the soul will join with the ecstatic
just because the body is rotten —
that is all fantasy.
What is found now is found then.
If you find nothing now,
you will simply end up with an apartment in the City of Death.
If you make love with the divine now, in the next
life you will have the face of satisfied desire.
So plunge into the truth, find out who the Teacher is.
Believe in the Great Sound!
Kabir says this: When the Guest is being searched for,
it is the intensity of the longing for the Guest
that does all the work.
Look at me, and you will see a slave of that intensity.
Kabir
translated by Robert Bly
Wisdom
You want constant interaction and entertainment. You view this as a right.
Let me tell you what has not likely occurred to you: some valuable experiences will not unfold if you interact with them.
The ancient sages watched closely the animals. From the animals, man learned movement and technique that he emulated, a step in mastery of the earth.
Further refined, the sages refined these techniques into the animal styles of martial arts, of dance.
Had these people yelled out, approached the animals, the animals would have fled, and the movements and ways would not have unfolded.
The insights and techniques that man learned resulted from his employment of one of the most basic of skills: quiet invisibility.
You let fly with your loudly voiced opinion as soon as the action begins, and you alter it. The performer, like an animal, begins to observe you warily. The performance, if it doesn’t cease outright, will likely be affected.
Lao Tse advices us, simply, yet deeply: “In action, watch the timing.”
To further explain: Know when to act, and when not to.
Quiet observation is an action of considerable worth.
Sentence diagramming: modifier and article
Can you anticipate my lecture?
Sentence diagramming: The basics
“Let’s quickly review the last eleven years of your education…”
Kingsley Andersen 