learning for the day

• knowing oneself, as eckhart tolle writes, is not an outcome of psychoanalysis alone. a five-thousand-page dossier on your life reflects merely facts that are about you, not the truth that is you. it is not the content of our lives that defines us - not what we perceive, experience, do, think, or feel - but our inner space of consciousness. knowing oneself is being oneself, and being oneself is precisely ceasing to identify with that content.
• the mental labels of good and bad are illusory. this is illustrated in the story of a wise man who won an expensive car in a lottery. his family and friends were happy for him and came to celebrate. "isn't it great!" they said. "you are so lucky." the man smiled and said, "maybe." for a few weeks he enjoyed driving the car. then one day a drunken driver crashed into his new car at an intersection and he ended up in the hospital, with multiple injuries. his family and friends came to see him and said, "that was really unfortunate." again, the man smiled and said, "maybe." while he was still in the hospital, one night there was a landslide and his house fell into the sea. again his friends came the next day and said, "weren't you lucky to have been here in the hospital." again he said, "maybe." the lesson? the passage of time and the uncertainty it brings with makes it futile to judge anything that happens. it is best to accept and so enter into conscious alignment with the higher order of the cosmos.
• the joy of being comes not through any form, possession, achievement, person, or event - through anything that happens. that joy does not come to you - ever. it emanates from the formless dimension within you, from consciousness itself and thus is one with who you are. further, there is no limit on the joy one can emanate if one tries. there is limitless joy to be found in every moment, in every now. one need only be present.
• nietzsche wrote, "for happiness, how little suffices for happiness! ... the least thing precisely, the gentlest thing, the lightest thing, a lizard's rustling, a breath, a wisk, an eye glance - little maketh up the best happiness. be still." indeed, true happiness lies in simple, seemingly unremarkable things. one avails of this happiness when one allows the inner consciousness to breathe in its space.
  
• jesus said, "whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours." your goal or vision is already a reality within you - you cannot manifest what you want; you can only manifest what you already have.
• "to die before you die" - a saying attributed to the prophet mohammad - stresses the importance of the annihilation of the ego. only if we allow our ego to die before we encounter physical death can it be possible to realize our spiritual awakening. "blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth" is what christ said to the same end (as purported). the "meek" are those who have been able to suppress the egoic mind.

(nb: i'd like to clarify that i haven't read the teachings/works of all the people i quote here. my reading for the day was a new earth by eckhart tolle, and these were some of the quotes he had included that i found enlightening. am not nearly as well-read as all that, that's all.)