Awareness cannot be taught, and when it is present it has no context. All contexts are created by thought and are therefore corruptible by thought. Awareness simply throws light on what is, without any separation whatsoever.
Interpretation
Awareness is innate and beyond intellectual constructs, illuminating reality without distortion.
This quote by Toni Packer emphasizes that true awareness exists independently of the thoughts and contexts we create. It highlights the idea that while our perceptions can be influenced by our thoughts, genuine awareness is clear and unobstructed, providing insight into reality without any judgments or separations imposed by the mind.
In practice
In a meditation class, this quote could inspire participants to focus on being present rather than overthinking.
The emergence and blossoming of understanding, love, and intelligence has nothing to do with any tradition, no matter how ancient or impressive-it has nothing to do with time. It happens on its own when a human being questions, wonders, inquires, listens, and looks without getting stuck in fear, pleasure, and pain. When self-concern is quiet, in abeyance, heaven and earth are open.
Life is a vast, unknowable movement of wholeness with no one separate from it and nothing outside of it.
Great fury, like great whisky, requires long fermentation.
There are but few proverbial sayings that are not true, for they are all drawn from experience itself, which is the mother of all sciences.
Receive wealth or prosperity without arrogance; and be ready to let it go.
God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things which should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other. This prayer was first printed in a monthly bulletin of the Federal Council of Churches and has become enormously popular. It has been circulated in millions of copies.
Why ask for truth," Ser Barristan said softly, "if you close your ears to it?
Without reflection, we go blindly on our way.
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