Noa Traylokya

Well, once again I've moved into new circumstances and find it appealing to start yet another livejournal.

So this will be my last entry, though I will put another entry with the new link to my new journal.

That said, I'm not entirely sure I'll be using livejournal as my primary blog. I think I'm going to make it my personal blog, and am investigating using a few new platform/websites for what will end up being a very active public blog.

The main thing I'm considering is how customizable livejournal as, as I wish to integrate the public blog into an overall one-spot web presence, where I can share photos, explorative essays, poetry, book excerpts and reviews, and music mixes with the public.

This will be an exciting era of my life... I sincerely feel this upcoming year will be the best year of my life that I've ever enjoyed, and my intention as I go through it is to create a lifestyle that is beneficial to those who make compassion (metta) and insight (vipassana) a priority in their lives... which essentially is saying those who are prepared to receive the benefit I hope to offer, those who are attracted to the gifts I seek to offer.

And one primary theme of this new era of sharing my live with others will be my observations, experiences, and insights into how to make intimate relationships function as an expression of Joy and Love and Peace. This will definitely include intimate sexuality.

My sexual history is ridden with repressed celibacy and recovering from a number of sexual traumas. So healthy sexuality is something I'm very passionate about as an individual, but as I have made my way out to interact and talk with many others on an intimate level, I have found that the challenges I've gone through are really not as uncommon as I thought... and really, they aren't as uncommon as I wish they were. Our culture definitely breeds destructive attitudes and behaviors toward healthy sexuality. So this is definitely one of those instances where an individual passion of mine synchs up with one of the primary causes for a lot of suffering in our Western culture.

And finally I'm in a position to write from actual flesh-and-blood experience, not just from meditative observation and theoretic conjecture. It is one thing to know in my heart that I am an amazing lover, not just physically... but in every other possible way--it is something else entirely to know I am an amazing lover based on actual experience. And since I'm beginning an era where my choice to speak openly about such things will have the resonance of experiential knowledge to it, I sense I will be able to be very beneficial for individuals and couples who are also dealing with sexual disappointments (e.g. lack of passion, lack of energetic zing, dysfucntions, communication challenges, etc...)

And on a spiritual level, I'm going to switch from Zen/Mahayana Buddhism to Vajrayana Buddhism, or what Americans call Tantric Buddhism. I will still keep the practice of zazen and the path of Bodhisattva as primary facets of my spiritual practice. But instead of simply sitting and observing (zazen), I will start practice harmoniz tantric breathing for the purpose of sharing and exploring the various jhana, or samadhi, states of being. To put it in lay language, instead of seeking to experience and explore the enlightened states of mind as an individual, I will be seeking to explore and share those enlightened states with my sweetheart. And instead of merely choosing the path of Bodhisattva, which is a primary path within Mahayana Buddhism, I will now choose to activate the path of Bodhisattva through the use of Buddhist archetypes, which is what attracted me to the precepts and practices of:

The Five Dhyani Buddhas, which can be considered the five manifestations of Buddha (The Awakened One) used in a practice of purification/meditation. Each of the five Dhyani (Meditative/Purifying) Buddhas are archetypal tools a meditative spiritual devotee can use to purify the mind of various defilements.

(See following link for a chart of the characteristics of each of the five Dhyani Buddhas: Chart on Five Dhyani Buddhas.)

Vajrasattva Buddha, which is the culmination of one who masters the use of the five Dhyani Buddhas. Vajrasattva is the embodiment of the five Dhyani Buddhas, as well as their chief.

And on top of all that, Vajrasattva is also a type of Bodhisattva, in that one can choose to intniate a practice toward the realization of the fruit of Vajrasattva Buddha's Eternal Wisdom.

So essentially, I will begin talking about walking the path of Vajrasattva, which is a specific type of Bodhisattva path.

So for those who have followed my spiritual journeys for a number of years now, this is the direction I'm heading toward, I just am not sure what it will look like and how I will go about it. I know next to nothing about Vajrayana Buddhism (the 3rd of the Three main divisions of Buddhism), but nonetheless, this will be the direction I go until it no longer suits me.

I thank everyone who has followed my blog up to this point. I will make my new blog address and so on available as soon as I can, but I've reached the end of this livejournal blog as my primary place for public blogging.

Namaste, dearOnes.

*bow*

Nonlinear Online Study Session Today

From Chemical Bonds To Electro-magnetic Mechanics To Cellular Function To Genetics

So... I'm being a geek. I'm studying cells--how they bond, how they reproduce, how they break down.

I have no fucking clue why I'm studying this. I wanted to understand cellular bonding first, which led me to the physics of what are called dipoles, which led me into both electric and magnetic dipole moments.

In physics, evidently a moment is defined (in my own words) as "something the generates momentum," or "something that sets energy into motion, especially in an organized pattern around an axis."

Somehow this got me looking at hormones, which is nothing more than a chemical messenger from one cell to another that induces a set of chemical reactions using ligands (proteins on a cell's membrane that initiate a chemical reaction in receptors) and receptors (proteins that react to "effector" molecules). So when the human body is experiencing various subjective reactions to its environment, the glands of the organism produce hormones into the bloodstream, which then signal chemical reactions in the cells of the organism. And those reactions happen by the combination of proteins that combine in a pattern of cause-effect molecules.

( Read more... )

---

Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth.
I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.

For I have come to turn:

a man against his father,
a daughter against her mother,
a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law--

a man's enemies will be the members of his own household.

Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me
is not worthy of me;
anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me
is not worthy of me;
and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me
is not worthy of me.
Whoever finds his life will lose it,
and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. --Master Jesus, from St. Matthew, chapter 10.

Examining Falling In Love As An Event In My Spiritual Development

Well, I suppose I'm feeling brave. I'm choosing to write, to do my bloggin' thing, and to me that's a brave choice.

I'm not yet in Dallas, so I'm outside of arm's reach of my heart's companion. And when she touched me while we were together in San Diego, something opened up in me that made me even more hyper-sensitive to what is going on around me. So I'm all mushy inside, as if I've entered into a new realm of aliveness in my world. The winds, the birds, the emotional states of my natal family here, all of it touches me far more vibrantly... which makes my emotional state sorta heightened.

Those who are seriously-devoted spiritual practitioners might recognize what I'm saying. It seems that every so often you go through these breakthroughs that open you up to the world in a new way, as if there's this whole radio frequency of emotional energy that you were completely ignoring, and all the sudden you hear it (feel it) and now you can hear it all the time all around you, in everything you see, hear, touch, taste, or feel. It feels like things become more alive speaking to your heart with greater vibrancy... literally things vibrate faster.

And the arms and gaze of my sweetheart make me feel so safe, so secure... as if with her, I really know who I am. So in that sense, being away from her has me feeling shaky about things, cause I'm feeling things with so much more intensity, but my body is not sure of who it is cause it's away from the body of my sweetheart.

So for me, writing right now is a brave choice. It's taken me a while to find the courage to speak when I'm not in the presence of my sweetheart.

So I'd like to talk about the experience of falling in love, but not from a romantic perspective--though there certainly all sorts of romantic moments. I'd like to talk about falling in love from the perspective of it being an event within my spiritual development.

Falling In Love As Both an End and a New Beginning

In my own observation and experience of my spiritual practice, this experience of falling in love is an event for which my entire spiritual practice has prepared me. It's the culmination of many lines of development, and the birth of a whole spectrum of new lines of development. And what I've found is that what is beneficial for me before I fell in love is no longer beneficial. It's as if the whole foundation of the line that separates what is harmful to me versus what is beneficial for me flips upside-down.

Before I trained to need nothing. I let go of things and roles. I chose to walk away from true participation of the career path I was on in corporate America. I let go of my possessions. I let go of my bank accounts. I let go of needing to do things, like go out and be social; or to be a certain person for other people; or to trying to fix the opinions or reactions of others toward me, instead just choosing to be authentically me, regardless of the preferences or demands of others. I let go of my phone, as it was stolen from me. So I lost nearly all my phone numbers, and was without a phone for a while. Now I have a phone, but it only has 18 or so phone numbers in it. I used to have around 100 phone numbers in my phone.

Radical Acceptance As a Lifestyle Practice

I trained toward radical acceptance of others. I trained to not have a preference in how others manifested themselves to me in a given moment. So if they were moody, or rude, or cruel, or lovingkind, or peaceful, or whatever they were in a given moment... I trained to just accept those choices as the creative choice of god manifesting through that individual. And the only acceptable reaction to that manifestation--whether considered rude or kind--is radical acceptance.

I learned through practice and meditation that in order to create a lifestyle that is based on radical acceptance of the choices of others, you must then be very choosy as to who you let into your inner world. I learned that the human psyche is pretty much a slave the conditions to which it is repeatedly exposed. So if the human psyche is continually exposed to lovingkindness and compassion and forgiveness and joyful celebration, then the psyche will naturally interact with the world/environment around it with a lovingkind, cheerful attitude. And if the psyche is continually exposed to judgmetnalism, abrupt moodiness, heartless scrutiny, and miserly withholding of affection, then the psyche will naturally interact with the world/environment around it with pessimism, condemnation, narcissism, demanding attitude.

( Read more... )

Well, I'm entering yet another evolutionary phase of my blogging life. I started blogging publicly in Dec 2000, I do believe. And over a period of time you start to notice that your blogging goes through cyclical phases where you keep your personal life more private, and then through phases where you put your personal life on more public display. And then phases where you put it out more privately.

Now part of this process has been the expansion of the internet itself. There was a time when you could blog about very personal things, and because things like myspace and other major cyber communities that has people reaching deeper into the lives of complete strangers... due to the phenomenon of being introduced to a complete stranger, and that stranger has an online presence on a few different cyber venues, you can actually get very intimate with a near-stranger without them even being aware you've done it.

To the point that things you blogged about a number of years ago then show up in a court hearing as evidence. This sort of event was unheard of when I first started blogging, which was pre-9/11, and the whole heightened awareness of what people are talking about on the internet. I have had friends be investigated by the secret service, as far as even interviewing all their close friends and having a direct multi-hour interview with a couple secret service agents. All this as a direct consequence of speaking an opinion publically, and a complete stranger (lurking cyber "reader" completely unknonwn to the blogger) reported what they read to the secret service, who has a policy of investigating all reported threats to the president or other key figures and operations of government.

So at some point, offering certain kinds of opinions in a totally public way, even on a personal blog, became very much a public event that could have consequences years after the fact.

So this really changed the culture of blogging. Now those of us with controversial views tend to network privately, out of public view. Still having conversations--which we tend to recognize could be viewed by anyone who REALLY had a bone up their ass to view it--but out of the view of various paranoid extremists who know enough to put certain kinds of information into certain hands in a way that could actually fuck with your life and livelihood.

But there was a braver time, when blogging was about speaking the rawest totally bullshit reactions you have in your day-to-day life. And those who blogged like me, who wrote for very public forums (cause a lot of us had very active public presences on various discussion forums), we all knew we were a bunch of crazy motherfuckers... who discovered we were all suffering from the same symptoms of dealing with this fucked up society and world, where we essentially made up some disgruntled group of misfits in a culture and society where we felt no bond, except that we all had similar wounds from dealing with its various apparatuses.

( Read more... )

"Old friends pass away, new friends appear. It is just like the days. An old day passes, a new day arrives. The important thing is to make it meaningful: a meaningful friend -- or a meaningful day." ---His Holiness, The Dalai Lama

---

Words On Friendship

I've not been updating as much lately, I know. Most my interactions have been via email and in the form of one-on-one interactions. To those who have opened their heart to me, and allowed themselves to share of their love and life and experience in those interactions, I express my humble gratitude for your willingness to deal with what makes me the challenging individual I am.

That said, I have felt a yearning to write things for more-general consumption. Things not just to these few dearOnes, but also to the larger number of those who I've cunningly beguiled into listening to my silly ramblings. (Yes, I am being playfully silly...)

I've been connecting with my spirit guides, lately. It seems each day that passes, the last couple weeks, I'm just slightly more aware of their presence, and I feel just a tad more confident that even if they are psychological delusions, they are benevolent delusions that really are leading me along my life's destined pathway back Home, while holding as many of my dearOnes as will allow me to hold them along the way.

And I feel guided to talk a bit about what I feel friendship is, both for the purpose of giving myself the experience of allowing the information to flow through me for myself, but also to provide that information for others, who might actually come up with the courage to be my friend.

The X Factor: What Is A Friend?

During a conversation I had around two weeks ago, I had cause to consider what, really, is a friend.

I found that X factor in that moment. I found that one factor that sorta says... "If X is here, then this is a friendship; if X is not here, then it is not a friendship."

X Factor = Attention

The absence of attention is a word I'm going to now simply allow myself to coin---ignoreance.

The same way attentive is a derivative of the word attention, I'm re-adding the E into the word 'ignorance' to make it the noun form of the verb 'ignore.'

The absence of attention is ignoreance. The presence of ignoreance is the absence of attention.

And what I'm saying is... the X factor of what makes a friendship a friendship is whether one gives their attention to the friend, the other involved in that friendship. If one does not give their attention to the friend, the other involved in that 'friendship,' then it is not a friendship.

( Read more... )

So as some know, I went through and removed around 60 of my friends (on myspace) off my list around a week ago or so.

I was terrified of it. It's so hard to let go. When mom and dad used to go away and leave me and my brothers for a weekend, I was the one who cried when they left and cried when they returned. At sixth grade camp, I was the one that was so homesick I had a hard time wanting to do much. (Only in the evenings... when I paused long enough to remember I wasn't going to see my family that night.)

I have a very hard time letting go. But I'm beginning to get better at it. I have let go of dear friends recently, people who I loved dearly at one time or another, but whose lives went a new direction.

So I was nervous... I wasn't sure how this whole purging thing was going to affect me.

I thought I would be racked with guilt, or feel judgmental; but I don't. I thought I would miss them even more; but I don't. I thought they'd hate me for making the choice; and some have.

Regardless, the first result of the purge is I had the chance to interact with a few people about things that had been left unsaid for far too long. They spoke their mind. I spoke mine. And frequently that was that.

But I don't miss them. I'm glad to no longer be clinging to them while they aren't treating me kindly. I don't miss the drama. And you know what else... they really didn't give me as much in my life as I thought they did. I thought I kept them around cause I was so thankful for all they bring to my life. And it IS true that they gave me a gift. It is true that I was blessed. But that's not why I kept them around. I kept them around cause of my own issues about being kicked out of homes, and kicked out of lives when I'm not useful, and being kicked out of whatever...

I feel like I'm kicking them out. And to someone outside, that's a fair way of putting it. But for me, in my own heart, I'm simply choosing what I allow into my heart, and what I don't allow to occupy my heart. And that's all it is.

So in short... letting go wasn't as bad an experience as I thought it would be.

Some people are ENORMOUSLY SEFLISH and narcissistic. It isn't wise to project my good nature onto them and expect them to be grateful for me the way I'm grateful for them. Accepting someone for what they are doesn't mean giving them full access to me or my life.

Yes, if you call them on it, they will complain. They will gripe. They'll call you names. But you'll have more peace in your heart. And if you miss them, you can find ways of reaching out to them without contacting them.

And I'm always open for reconciliation. My intent isn't to separate myself from an individual, but rather from a thought pattern, or a personality style, or a lifestyle.

And it's been a far better experience than I thought I would be.

*bow*

When you ask for security, you become insecure. The more you ask, the more insecure you will be, because insecurity is the very nature of life. If you don't ask for security then you will never be worried by the insecurity. As trees are green, life is insecure. If you start asking that trees should be white then there are problems. The problem is created by you, not by the trees; they are green. And you ask them to be white They cannot do it, they cannot perform in that way.

Life is insecure, love is insecure. We are in emptiness, in tremendous nothingness. And it is good that it is so, otherwise we would be dead. Life can be a security only if you are dead; then everything can be certain.

( Read more... )

I was looking at some of my older poems, and found this one. I'm re-experiencing this now, in a totally new circumstance. And it was immensely blissful to re-experience my words about this experience.

So I'm sharing it. I'm experiencing this with someone I call Leela, even though she hasn't accepted that name. I sorta know her as that in my meditations, cause she reminds me that love is not all work, it is also playful. (I get so serious and focused when I hit my own barriers that come up in a more-intimate relationship. I need those reminders to smile and enjoy the process. HEHE)

So, for Leela...

*bow* ---Noa

---

Our Garden of Affection
by: Noa Traylokya

05/19/2003


as we plant these seeds
our hearts are filled with hope
for now this ground is fairly barren
but oh! so fertile and soft
as it flows from loving hands
and the sun is glorious
glistening on the droplets
forming on our warm skin

so we plant with great affection
flowers here, fruit trees there
we kiss the seeds then lay them down
covering them with blankets of supple soil
and sing songs of grace,
mixed with giggles and smiles
then walk back begrudgingly
each to our separate lives

we come back and visit often
and in time—a magic moment!
the seeds peek through the earth
green buds of tender caring
rise up to meet our eager eyes
and we embrace and celebrate the sight
we fall down next to each other
sobbing for joy, and our flowing tears
mix into a muddy mess, and
our departures become wrenching

this has become our sweet garden
here we escape our empty drudgeries
our reunions here are always ecstatic,
and over time we realize
this garden has changed us
we carry more and more of its love
back into our separate lives
the garden’s passion flows out our smiles
its melody sings into our voices
we begin to carry its spirit
to lives lived away from this sanctuary

here we are surrounded by baby trees
the earth is lush and green,
and we spend many nights here
quietly enjoying togetherness
the night is bright with vivid dreams
the spirit of our place imbues our souls
connecting us to this love felt here
our garden is felt by others through us
and yet, eagerly anticipate a moment
still ahead, when we will finally
taste the fruit of our affections
will it be as blissful as we’ve hoped?
and if so, how will it change our lives?

Giving it back to myself... and those who aren't on myspace.

---

Please Forgive Me, dearOne
by: Noa Traylokya

a note to my dearOnes:

can you forgive me a fault?
can you carry a small burden in our friendship?

i have dysfunctional memory recall.
i don't just misplace pens and keys,
i also misplace your lovingkind heart.
and just like standing cold and keyless
    outside my warm home's locked door,
i sometimes feel like a stranger
    locked out of your compassionate heart

can you overlook my mental dys-ability,
    even if some of it is of my own creation?
can you be gentle with me
    as i re-train my mind to better re-member
        the timeless love flowing through my heart?

i completely own the cause of my dysfunction;
i completely avow my response-ability for this defilement.

and i bow myself down before you, dearOne
asking for your patience and your forgiveness
for the difficulty my dysfunction causes us both
as we walk our path, returning Home.

i love you.
one day i will be whole.
i devote myself to supporting your return to wholeness,
as part of creating wholeness within myself,

i love you.
one day we will be whole, together.

may it so be, starting here, starting now,
amen.

---

This poem, written in response to a struggle I have in my closest friendships, expresses something I am feeling as a friend of all my friends. So I offer it as a metta-comment offering to all my friends.

~bhaktyupahritam~

*bow*

Noa Traylokya

Link: Six Parmitas (I just found this, so I thought I'd include it.)

I found this in a dude's blog, and wanted to keep it mainly cause he included the Sanskrit words for each of the four practices and the two mind states of the path of bodhisattva.

---

A bodhisattva is someone who has taken on the sole task of meeting the needs of others regardless of the difficulty involved. What are the signs of a bodhisattva?

Here's a list of perfections (parmitas in sanskrit) that a bodhisattva must cultivate in order to attain buddhahood. Here they are:

1) Generosity (Dana paramita in sanskrit) - Selfless and impartial generosity;

2) Discipline (Shila paramita in sanskrit) - Observance of the ethical regimen;

3) Patience (Kshanti paramita in sanskrit) - Patient endurance of difficulties;

4) Energy (Virya paramita in sanskrit) - Zealous energy in perseverance;

5) Meditation (Dhyanna paramita in sanskrit) Mindful absorption in meditation;

6) Wisdom (Prajna paramita in sanskrit) - Wisdom of transcendent light;

7) Right method;

8) Vows;

9) Manifestation of 10 powers;

10) True understanding of all laws (dharmas in sanskrit).


Now, if you come across someone who meets the above conditions, presto, abracadabra, you've met a real bodhisattva!