
Plant your banner, firmly in the desert sand.
-Sufi saying, quoted often by Dave Holland

“Since everything is but an ‘apparition’,
Perfect in just being ‘What It Is’ ~ as it is.
Having nothing to do with ‘good’ or ‘bad’,
‘acceptance’ or ‘rejection’ –
You might as well just burst out laughing!”
~ Tibetan Dzogchen master Longchenpa, 1308-1369 AD

“Wisdom Is The Great Observer”

So your friend does something you were not expecting.
Where’s the surprise?
I wondered for years why if TW was so effective nobody was as “advanced” as KT was even though there’s now been people doing TW for decades. One day I understood that we were all chasing the end of the rainbow. That day I “graduated.” It was a quiet ceremony. Nobody was informed. I did not receive a special certificate. If I had to put what I learned that day into words it would read like this:

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It doesn’t end.
It’s just not a problem that it doesn’t end.
That’s the freedom.
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The most amazing thing I learned that day was just how much I was like everyone else:
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I
I’m just as fucked up as the man next door,
I just don’t beat myself up about it as much as he does.
That’s the enlightenment I know.
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And sometimes
I notice he beats himself up much less than I do.
Those days he is the enlightened one
and I’m proud to call him
Teacher.
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II
Deep forgiveness for our apparent imperfections.
Deep compassion for our apparent flaws.
A knowing that it’s okay to be just like this.
Even as I try to be a better man with time.
Perfection and Imperfection in perfect harmony.
That is the enlightenment that I know.
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III
Anything that I can compare myself to
Is imagined.
Why would that be a fair standard of comparison?
Better to spend my time appreciating
How much of a good friend
I can be to myself.

It’s not because I’m invincible that I’m reliable
It’s because I’m vulnerable and I know it.

1. There is no shortcut
2. Not resisting is the shortcut

Don’t just taste the food
-Bathe in it.

I will mirror your move

There is a Freedom regardless of conditions.
Even as I’m covered with mud, I taste it.
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When people ask me
Wanting to know what that’s like
I tell them that it’s like when they go for a walk with a dear friend
And share from the heart.
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It’s exactly like that.