Finding
Adi Da > Chris Tong > Part IV (Waking Up) > C (Further Elements) > Chapter 8
8. The Bangles of the Goddess:
The Trap of the Lesser Samadhis
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| This is Part IV-C, Chapter 8 of Chris Tong's book, Finding the Divine In Person and Waking Up From the Dream.[1] | |
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Thus, in your relationship to me, the matter of intuitive recognition must become the principle of our play. You must recognize me in the form of your Condition, the Condition of all this arising, the real Condition of it, the Condition of conditions, the Condition of the body, the mind, the self sense, the very current of the being, and be rested in It constantly. When you do that, the Beloved takes off her garment. Her true Form, his true Form, the Beloved’s true Form begins to appear. That true Form is not transitory. But you must be adapted to the loving of the Beloved in eternal Form, because you do not have desires fitted to that Form at the present time. The desires you have are all products of adaptation to this limiting illusion of attractions. You are turned on by bangles and flesh. All this appearance is how you are attracted to the Beloved in this form here. Having recognized it, though, giving yourself up to the true Condition of this, your very Nature, then your desiring or the movement of the being itself becomes capable of enjoying the Beloved in eternal Form. Only in that case are you satisfied.
Cling to nothing, in any absolute sense. Love all. Delight in all of this. But let that love, that delight, be (all the time) Communion with That One, Communion with the Source in Which all of this arises, and in Which it all changes and disappears. You have no power to get any of it for yourself. Therefore, you have no right to glamorize yourself with it.
Use every circumstance, every good, every thing, every relation as a means of Divine Communion—Remembrance of the Giver, Remembrance of the Divine Source-Condition. Do this, and then you can be rightly associated with any of the pleasures of life—any good relations, any enjoyable and delightful presence, circumstance, condition, 'object.'
Danavira Mela — the Adidam version of Christmas — was where I first understood this matter of turning lesser samadhis into bridges to God. From when I was a child onward, Christmas has always been my favorite time of year. It was always Adi Da's favorite time of year as well! What He loved about it (as did I) was how people were able to let go of so much of their normal focus on self, and come together in a spirit of joy, celebration, giving, and community at this time of year.
And so Danavira Mela is Christmas, transformed into Divine Communion! "Danavira Mela" means "the Hero of Giving". As the human Incarnation of the Divine, Adi Da is always pouring His Divine Blessing Transmission on all beings to serve their Happiness and Liberation. But in addition to that non-stop Gifting, Adi Da created an exraordinary Celebration each year, in which He poured gifts upon His friends, His family members, and His devotees.
Danavira Mela also nicely exemplifies what can and can’t be turned into a bridge to God. For many years, Adi Da would allow devotees to relax their normal dietary restrictions at the time of celebrating Danavira Mela — allowing drinking and smoking. The underlying principle, though, remain the same: while one was imbibing, transform it into Divine Communion. For those of us who would spend Danavira Mela in Adi Da's physical Company, and would be drinking or smoking in His immediate physical Company, His Blessing Transmission would support this transformation in wonderful ways. . . it generally wouldd relieve us of any of the potential negative side effects (like hangovers, a toxified body, etc.) And instead of one's consciousness being reduced or impaired by drinking, everything got Brighter instead.
But that wasn't the case for all devotees around the world, who were not in Adi Da's physical Company. And a significant number of devotees could not "stop the partying" when the Celebration season was over, and would tend to extend the drinking and smoking for even months more. Seeing how we as a general community were not able to use this gift the way He had intended, Adi Da reluctantly withdrew the gift — no more drinking and smoking during Danavira Mela.
This is a good example of how sometimes boundaries must be drawn when turning lesser samadhis into bridges to God.
Music, movies/tv/Web
In general, there is no inherent problem with loving anyone or anything, when living the Way of Adidam. Loving something or someone becomes a problem if you forget God ahd fall out of Divine Communion while doing so. The Law is to love God first, then love all others.
Addictions, obsessions
One common sign of a lesser samadhi is the closing down of feeling-awareness: around a particular pleasure in the body; or on a thought in the mind; etc. So a useful discipline is to always keep the whole body in the field of awareness. This is a necessary component of setting aside the conceptual mind (i.e., where one stands as the whole body). But it is also a necessary element in "breaking into" lesser samadhis and converting them into bridges to God.
The gross body is, very simply, the food-body. The gross body (itself) depends on (and is made of) food. The quality and quantity of food largely (or very basically) determines the state and desire and action of the physical body and the sense-mind. If food-taking is intelligently minimized, and if the food selected is both pure and purifying, then the physical body (and, therefore, also the brain), and, thus and thereby, the entirety of the body-brain-based patterning of emotion and mind, passes through a spontaneous natural cycle that shows (progressive) signs of (first) purification, (then) rebalancing, and (finally) rejuvenation.
Deer park story
