“wake up and see ourselves and the world as we truly are”
The essays in this book synthesize some of the most profound insights experienced by many extraordinary people over a period of thousands of years. They show that we must come together as one harmonious global community in order to transcend our false-self conditioning and embrace the Truth of a perfect Creation and our own True Self.
“Churches, Orders, theologies, philosophies have failed to save mankind because they have busied themselves with intellectual creeds, dogmas, rites and institutions … as if these could save mankind. … [They] have neglected the one thing needful, the power and purification of the soul. We must go back to the one thing needful, take up again Christ’s gospel of the purity and perfection of mankind, Mahomed’s gospel of perfect submission, self-surrender and servitude to God, Chitanya’s gospel of the perfect love and joy of God in man, Ramakrishna’s gospel of the unity of all religions and the divinity of God in man, and, gathering all these streams into one mighty river, one purifying and redeeming Ganges, pour it over the death-in-life of a materialistic humanity … so that there may be a resurrection of the soul in mankind and the Satyayuga [golden age in which humanity is righteous and devoid of wickedness] … return to the world.”[i]
Insight # 110 comes to us from Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche (b. 1962). He is the head of the Shambhala lineage and Shambhala, a worldwide network of urban Buddhist meditation centers, retreat centers and Naropa University.
“We are saying that perfectly endowed, complete enlightenment begins with our motivation to regard everything we experience right now—and the whole world—as perfect and pristine. We call this the motivation of great purity and great quality … [and] we are asked to develop the motivation to wake up and see ourselves and the world as we truly are.”[ii]
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Additional Reading:
- Transcendence, The ABC’s of Simple Reality, Vol 2
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[i] Johnson, Clive [ed.], Vedanta. An Anthology of Hindu Scripture, Commentary, and Poetry. New York: Bantam, 1971, pp. 254-255.
[ii] Rinpoche, Sakyong Mipham. “Seeing the Essence of Phenomena as Wisdom.” Shambhala Sun. Boulder, Colorado, May 2004, p. 46.
