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| In stillness all things can be known. Step 9 |
STILLNESS
OF MIND ALLOWS A GREATER MIND TO EMERGE and to reveal its Wisdom. Those who
cultivate stillness with a desire for Knowledge will be preparing themselves
for greater revelation and true insight to emerge. The insight may emerge
during practice or during any normal activity. The important aspect here is
that the preparation has been made.
TWICE
TODAY PRACTICE YESTERDAY’S PRACTICE OF STILLNESS, but practice without the
expectation of a result. Do not use this practice to ask any form of question
because you are practicing stillness, in which all speculation, all questions
and all searching end. For 15 minutes, twice today, practice stillness once
again.
PRACTICE
9: Two 15-minute practice periods.
Picture: Lake Michigan beach at Two Rivers,
Wisconsin December 6, 2011
From the journal: Step
7 – Review
The journal for this day is not directly related to
Step 8, but is more about unburdening, continuing on when sick and trying to
get the bigger picture of what Greater Community Spirituality is:
9:30
a.m. Sunday, August 27, 2000
The
summer is nearly over. Had some bad dreams about work – --- too tired to
interact. I closed my eyes – then couldn't open them – I was so fatigued.
Leaving the building finally – I decided to submit my resignation for June 30 –
about – 9 months away – and do something other than regional cooperation.
Things
are not that bad – but the place will go broke soon.
If higher
levels of management create regions/regionalize operations for coordination/cooperation
among units in service delivery, they should work to foster community, since
community precedes cooperation.
9:55
a.m. We seem to have conquered our world. The built-environment of pretty
suburban homes – a high-tech world – but it is equally harsh, if not more so,
than the wilderness in which tribes interacted. Who/what can survive there?
5:40
p.m. Slow day. Gut still not good. No lawn mowing. No productive time. If – I
believe what I want to believe – how is the GCS message anything but another
belief system?
9:15
p.m. Back porch – very cool for August. Watched again “The 6th Sense."
There is not a clear clue that Bruce Willis had died – thus it's only at the very
end after the boy told him to speak to his wife when she was asleep, that we
the audience knew.
So –
at age 53 – life begins to look quite different than I believed.
GCS
appeals to me because it is beyond culture. Relationships I have? – Where will they
end up?
Major questioning; this seems to be continuous in
this study. Let us continue. Also consider the first year’s posting.
To answer the question about stillness/meditation it is
best to go with The Teachers themselves:
“Practicing stillness of mind is really a prerequisite for gaining in
touch with the real undercurrent of what is going on with you and what is going
on around you. Steps to Knowledge teaches you how to think about things
in a very constructive way. We call this contemplation. It is different from
meditation. It is contemplation. You are going to contemplate a question about
life. You are going to contemplate something, not simply to come up with
exciting answers, but really to try to penetrate it. Going deeper than the
surface where everyone is so caught up. And your stillness practice is really
your meditation because it enables your awareness to go deeper and to connect
with Knowledge, which knows. And throughout Steps
to Knowledge you set the stage for this inner connection, and you have the
opportunity to build this connection every day in little increments. And your
life begins to change and your values begin to change and you become more
connected to yourself and you realize that you really want quiet more than
stimulation, and you realize you really want integrity more than thrills, and
you realize you want relationships that have real strength and real direction
rather than just exciting interludes with people. This is all the result of
refocusing your attention and redirecting your activities and exerting your
power to do this.”
NNC
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