buddhism

Our beliefs shape how we perceive reality to be, and the belief that shapes our current perception of reality was adopted by the worldview of Newtonian physics, which asserts that reality is objective__hat there is a material universe existing outside of our experience. But this isn__ true; there is no material universe outside of you; the Universe takes form through you.

When we perceive the stars, the stars are the object of our perception__hey exist within us. When we perceive the ocean, the ocean is also within us. The idea that things exist outside of our Consciousness is an illusion. Ancient wisdom traditions have known this for centuries, and even modern science has recognized that our sense organs merely receive information and project it within our own minds. Vision does not take place in the eye, but in an area located in the back of the brain. Everything that we perceive to be __ut there_ is being experienced __n here.

Examples of fractals are everywhere in nature. They can be found in the patterns of trees, branches, and ferns, in which each part appears to be a smaller image of the whole. They are found in the branch-like patterns of river systems, lightning, and blood vessels. They can be seen in snowflakes, seashells, crystals, and mountain ranges. We can even see the holographic and fractal-like nature of reality in the structure of the Universe itself, as the clusters of galaxies and dark matter resemble the neurons in our brain, the mycelium network of fungi, as well as the network of the man-made Internet.

In Advaita Vedanta, and in many other ancient wisdom traditions, the world is said to be an illusion. This illusion is commonly referred to as maya, a Sanskrit name which refers to the apparent, or objective reality which is superimposed on the ultimate reality in order to generate the phenomena of what we call the material world. Maya is the magic by which we create duality__y which we create two worlds from one. This creation is an illusory creation__t is not real__t is an imaginary manifestation of the one Universal Consciousness, appearing as all of the various phenomena in objective reality. Maya is God__, or Consciousness__, creative power of emptying or reflecting itself into all things and thus creating all things__he power of subjectivity to take on objective appearance.

You are not limited to this body, to this mind, or to this reality__ou are a limitless ocean of Consciousness, imbued with infinite potential. You are existence itself.

All of Nature follows perfectly geometric laws. The Ancient Egyptian, Greek, Peruvian, Mayan, and Chinese cultures were well aware of this, as Phi__nown as the Golden Ratio or Golden Mean__as used in the constructions of their sculptures and architecture.

True Love is when you are able to see yourself in another, when you recognize that there is no separation between you and any other Being in the Universe.

Have you ever had a dream that you were certain was real, only to wake up and realize that everyone and everything in the dream was really you? Well this is how many mystics describe the nature of our reality, as a dream in which we think we are individual personalities existing in the physical universe. But eventually, like in all dreams, we will wake up. Except in this dream we do not wake up to realize we are still in the world, we awake from the world to realize that we are God.

The most expected thing you can expect is what's unexpected.

To have some deep feeling about Buddhism is not the point; we just do what we should do, like eating supper and going to bed. This is Buddhism.

Jesus recognized that God within him and became Christ - so did Siddhartha Gautama and became Buddha - so did I - and so can you.

If we ask a random orthodox religious person, what is the best religion, he or she would proudly claim his or her own religion to be the best. A Christian would say Christianity is the best, a Muslim would say Islam is the best, a Jewish would say Judaism is the best and a Hindu would say Hinduism is the best. It takes a lot of mental exercise to get rid of such biases.

Christ did to the Jewish orthodoxy, what Buddha did to the Hindu orthodoxy.

The afterlife is mostly a dream state where you confront the good and evil within you. The text repeatedly explains that the images the deceased sees and the sounds one hears are hallucinations created by one's own thoughts.

Eventually, it boils down to two choices _ do I wish to experience this physical reality primarily through joy or do I want to experience it through suffering? That__ all there is to it. And since each person eventually works their way toward the realization that conscious expansion can happen through joy rather than suffering _ enlightenment is a natural byproduct.

When I missed the physical body of my partner, I meditated on its parts, tossed by the waves, torn, dispersed, and deteriorated. When memories of our lives together became acute and intense, I breathed. I breathed through each wave of yearning, of regret, of guilt, of what-could-have-been. Every time I asked him, __here are you?_ A quiet voice immediately responded, __ am here. I have never left you._ I did not only lose a partner. I lost my childhood all over again. I lost my soul mate. I lost the accepting father and the gentle mother that he was to me. I lost the dream of a __ormal life,_ which I had tried so hard to achieve. Now I had to face my own mind.

To forgive does not mean to condone.

Understanding the true nature of things, or seeing things as they really are, is the ground of wisdom.