Layback Lani | Philosophy of Liberation

  The Illusion of Effort: A Himalayan Lesson   In the 1970s, I lived in a small stone hut beside a clear stream flowing from the  Dhauladhar  range in Northern India.  I had chosen this particular sanctuary because the land was an abundant laboratory of sacred medicine.  Doob grass ( Cynodon   dactylon ), revered in Ayurveda for its medicinal properties, grew in thick carpets, and Brahmi ( Bacopa  monnieri ), the creeping water hyssop, was everywhere. Brahmi is a crucial  component  of  Medhya  Rasayana  -  a category of brain-rejuvenating medicines used by sages and yogis to stabilize the intellect. For sustenance, I gathered wild  Kilmora  berries ( Berberis asiatica ) and the vitamin-rich hips of the Himalayan Musk Rose ( Rosa  brunonii ). It was a place of shocking beauty, where the massive peaks of the Himalayas towered above, serving as a constant, inspiring reminder of the Absolute.   Nearby...

  Great Ch'an Master Nothing  The Zen of Non-Dual Awareness   I Know Nothing   To arrive at the conclusion that one knows no “thing” is not an admission of ignorance, but the highest pinnacle of philosophical clarity.  In a non-dual reality, the very concept of a “thing” is a decorative fiction  maintained  by a restless mind. We must split the word "nothing" into " no-thing " to properly understand that in  the Absolute , there are no discrete objects, no separate entities, and no independent phenomena. There is only  a seamless , radiant continuity  of emptiness .  Because things only appear to a conscious mind, one can turn those things off by turning off the mind itself, thereby withdrawing the power consciousness gives to mental projection and leaving only the pure awareness of being.   This realization is  perhaps most  easily grasped in the state of deep, dreamless sleep. In that darkness, there are no  “ ...