Urban Guru your inspired guide to urban living

Had a real [experiential] (almost life altering) epiphany the other day.

All i did was add a prefix to every thing i thought about touched, felt experienced

the prefix was ‘divine’

and my divine-hand divinely-touched the divine-touch brush … etc… this almost joking play continued for a few minutes, and then it dawned on me, and i was stuck naked, in divine awe of; the divine i was in - the divine i am - the divine created illusion that we are journeying in and i both cried and laughed at the same time – the light was blinding.

Like a rabbit in front of oncoming headlights, I froze, grateful, humbled, unable to move, aware of being in the presence of the divine, that every moment a huge amount of energy was being provided to recreate every moment, a huge amount of love and patience. But that the divine, was not out there somewhere in some alternate (higher) consciousness, but right here, right now.

This was not like my previous ‘mystical’ experiences of loosing myself in the ONE, or the dissolving of self in the oneness of the universe. Here I was stuck in self but realising that everything, including my ‘self’ was actually divine.

If you’re alive and if you’ve ever taken a moment to think about the big questions, then you’ll probably admit that life is a little bit crazy.
After years of pondering this and other important questions, i’ve had one or two fairly cheesy but profound realisations:

Each and everyone of us has to activate a feeling of love within us and in every moment in life we are given new and different opportunities to love.

To love the people in our lives, including ourselves, to love the beings in our lives, to love the stuff in our lives and to love our lives.

The kind of love that I’m talking about isn’t theoretical or a general ‘isn’t everybody lovely’ fluffy feeling. What I’m referring to is a real, deep love, that is the kind of love we have for a child, or a sibling or a parent or a spouse.

Obviously all of those types of love are slightly different, but the feeling, the feeling of love is the same. I’m suggesting that we foster and nurture that feeling of love within ourselves and that we actively allow that energy to flow to the world and people around us.

Thus we transform ourselves and we transform the world.

In a place were there is love all are happy and at peace.

Stop running Way From Yourself !

I’ve always been puzzled by young, intelligent, movers and shakers in the Jewish community upping and moving to Israel, it seems so dualistic, and short sighted.

The primary motive they cite is that they don’t feel comfortable in the Diaspora and that they feel really Jewish in the Land of Israel even if they don’t keep any of the religious laws etc… What’s up with that?

Surely if you were more comfortable with your own identity why would you need to move to a country with millions of other people just like you? If your cultural identity is so important, why don’t you do something about it here and now? Why do you think that nationalism or in deed a ‘Holy land’ – where you can be yourself is really going to solve your deep problems?

The question isn’t just about Jews and Israel, its about all of us, why do we think that over there, in some distant future things are going to be ok, if I only had this or that, that then

I’d be happy? If I lived in a big house, or a small house, drove this car, or had that job, money, if I only had a boyfriend of girlfriend, a cat or a baby then all my troubles would be over?

In the messianic era the kabbalists teach us that the Holiness of the Holy of Holies will spread to the whole of the temple mount, that the Holiness of the Temple will encompass the Whole of Jerusalem, the Holiness of Jerusalem will spread to the entire biblical land of Israel and the Holiness of the Holy Land will spread throughout the entire world.

The Whole world will become as Holy as the Holy land.

Some great Kabbalists go further – they claim that the holiness of the Holy of Holies will in fact be accessible to each and every individual that the land we are standing on might be ‘Israel’ but we are in deed the Holy of Holies.

What i’m saying is that, happiness is not found outside of yourself. If you push off, happiness and bliss to some future time, you are destined always to be unhappy and miserable.

Also that the Messianic Era is here and now, it is a state of mind a state of enlightened being, one that is accessible now.

That running towards a better future, doesn’t always work, ‘progress’ is sometimes fuelled by stupidity, greed and emptiness.

Real spiritual, and personal progress comes from a place of contentment, happiness and a desire to spread that around.

Can you see the difference?

Separating the World from God is Suicide !

The Ethics of the Fathers teaches that ‘If you are learning and meditating on God and you stop to look at a beautiful tree or a beautiful field you forfeit your life.’ That to me has always seemed a little harsh coming from the bastions of morality. Thankfully however, the great Kabbalist Rabbi Yaakov Yosef of Polnoye explains this teaching slightly differently, he says:

‘If one is learning and meditating on God and one stops – that is, one makes a distinction and does not continue to learn – when one looks at a beautiful tree, or field then you forfeit your life. If you do not see the divine within the world you subsequently make a separation between the holy and mundain then the separation you have made, separates you from the source of all life.’ “

I am a pissed off peaceful person, I don’t think that I can have a more honest reaction or approach to the nature of being human and particularly being Jewish in this day. I have a pure soul, I was a baby, and am still in many way, naive and confused about what exactly this experience, that everyone seemed to have so comfortable eased them selves into, called life, I found so utterly alien.

I still look at my hand, move my fingers and really wonder, what the hell, how can I do that? And what a weird trip to be in the world, to be alive, my underlying voice, is one of wonder, acceptance and confusion. I am always willing to say I’m wrong, to listen, to hear. I realise that I alone can never have all the answers, that truth, whatever that is, is something that is a collective reality. ‘An accurate description of what is.’ I feel in someway passive to this experience, it’s almost as if I’m just along for the ride, looking as a child, in a perpetual state of not knowing. Whatever it is I do know is just a small piece of the whole, and probably corrupted and misinterpreted by my own personal perception and crippling life experiences, that must undeniably filter and colour my view of what is.

Where have I been? in my search for my self, in search of some sense, trying to make sense, of this world, make sense of my life and experience of what is.

From early on I was attracted to ideas that tried to make sense of the whole thing, being Jewish, I liked to explore Judaism’s more mystical teachings, and my pure an holy soul, with honest and truthful yearning, lusted after a life that made sense, a life full of meaning, a life that had answers.

And for a moment or two I did find peace, or something similar to peace, being so preoccupied with doing what God wants, that I didn’t have a moment to think about anything, that I momentarily lost, that special twinkle in my eye, that wonder why. I lost myself in the undercover of God’s world, killing myself to be, this pure and pious Jew, to rebecome, a myth of a soul transcendent, embodied.

I dissolved myself in the rich velvet, of smothering, intoxicating Jewish mysticism. Unable to breathe, for dusty books, of messianic longing, entangled in my souls desire for a global utopia, to become the servant of Moshiach Consciousness. To mend this broken world, shattered shards of God’s divine light, redeemed and whole.

But as I learnt and internalised as best I could, the teaching of the Messiah Himself, The New Torah, my body and mind lifted themselves up from where they thought they had been. From this new place I could see much further, had begun to taste the future. He had glimpsed me a taste of truly forbidden fruits, of ideas so tempting, so utterly dangerous that the very fabric of everything I even thought I may have known, seemed to unravel itself at the seams.

He taught me things that I dared not utter, things and signs that blinded me, with its dark light. A whirlpool of maddening darkness, so utterly dark that it shimmered and shone.

Madness, everyone thinks I must be mad, to call the Rebbe a heretic, because the Rebbe is a righteous man, a Ztadik, and I just a mad, sad and stupid idiot – who, by my own admission, doesn’t know anything.

So my Rebbe is a smiling, Cheshire cat, Buddha-like Jewish heretic, he is my Rebbe, not anyone else’s, but mine. They say the Rebbe is a mirror and you see who you really are, call the Rebbe whatever you want, he is you.
But nonetheless, he showed me things that I, on my own could have never seen or even imagined.

It has been a long journey, so far close to fifteen years of trying to make sense of what the Rebbe said, what he meant, and how and who I am supposed to be and do with it.

I’m not intolerant, just slightly impatient, some things are so clear to me that I get frustrated when otherwise intelligent people show an absolute stupidity towards things.

Obviously every lunatic fanatic thinks that they are right, they are correct, that what they believe is so simple and so utterly obvious, and I’m probably no different.

They say that the Torah of Moses is Hevel (Breath/Nothing/Vanity) compared to the Torah of Moshiach. This I know from personal experience is true.

So much more to say, some other time…

We are sleeping giants,

Formed from dust by the great sky,

Our souls are more powerful than angels,

Our bodies shine brighter than the sun,

Our dreams now our destiny!

“We have seen it proved in practice that the greater a person’s trust and the more he looks towards his future with joy, the faster do these things materialise.”

- Rabbi Menachem M. Scheerson

Classic Cartesian views of reality have fallen away from my sight, effervescent, oscillating glittering fireworks of divine energy pulsating so fast that, it appears to be joined up,

each gap in the in-between of coming into existence from the source of nothingness, seems to be longer than the next, where the possibility of falling through the silence between frames seems all the more possible.

who brings every minuscule of existence into being in complex shapes and constructs? into existence every moment. we do. the very essence of being co-directing my own ‘reality’ every moment from the absolute blank nothingness of pre-existent reality (gOD),

I choose to remember, to perceive, to be the person’ality that i seem to be, moments are disjointed, the force which brings into being, literally ‘creates’ existence, my existence, is my true self, not me, but me, us, you, I, my me, your you.

Our culturally conditioned worldview is merely a shell, a shallow wrapping, which simplifies, sterilises, contaminates the eyes that see. I have chosen to come into existence, to flesh myself, to become body, to embody, to flesh out my dreams, our dream, to explore, and discover who I am.

I am the great unknown. the thick darkness that separates you from me, me from me. The great unknown that will always remain so utterly hidden that we never become aware of it’s existence, it is the unknown that fills the in-betweens, each dot of energy, from between this point and that, the silence between notes.

It is the thickness of unknowing that keeps us apart, that keeps us happy in our bliss, our everydayness, in the lightness of being.

spiritual - means beyond time and space - and what we normally see as physical, isn’t actually physical it is in fact beyond time and space, by virtue of its (multiple) quantum oscillating core. It comes in and out of existence 10×26 per second.

Blessings are metered by OUR ability to receive, not the Universes ability to give. It’s almost like, the Universe would like to give us everything but it is us that says no.

In some sense, as a friend suggested, sometimes it’s our ‘personality’ which gets in the way of blessings. And that sometimes we need to let go of our selves, put our sense of ‘Self’ to one side to simply allow God’s blessings into our lives.

Some say that we have to make a “vessel” a way and a path, for the Universe to bless us. But I believe, more important than the creation of a mere ‘vessel’ or conduit of divine blessing, we ourselves, must become spiritually able and willing to receive blessing into our hearts and into our lives.

The questions we are forced to ask are; are we open enough, receptive enough, willing enough to allow the divine to give us everything and more? Are we ready to accept bliss into our every moment of our lives?!!!?

Say to yourself; “I’m sorry for having previously been a barrier to receiving blessings, I forgive you for the past, I now allow you to accept all blessings into your heart with joy and love. I allow the source of all blessings to flow through me, so that peace is my very being and the abundance of blessing my inheritance!”

I got chatting to the ex-nun that lives next door (as you do) about the benefits of going to confession. And although I’m not Catholic by any stretch of the cosmic canvas (not even in previous incarnations it seems) I was still attracted to the idea of coming clean about who you really are, exposing your darkest and deepest thoughts and issues, to someone that isn’t gonna tell your mum or dad, or broadcast it on national TV.

That’s probably why counselling and psychotherapy was invented, to give us non-Catholics a little bit of a chance of getting into heaven, or at least sorting our own shite out before we die?

And it got me thinking about how we all see ourselves, am I a sinner or am I righteous?

I know that for the most part, most people think that they are right, correct and that everything they do, everything that we do is justified.

However, on a deeper level many people don’t seem to be truly happy, deep down they don’t feel righteous, but probably consider themselves bad, wrong, stupid, dumb, fat, ugly, sinners.

Not that everyone has a Catholic soul and should feel like a big bad sinner, but from a more humanistic perspective each of us is in some way guilty of at least one sin, the sin of not truly fulfilling our innate divine potential. We are guilty of not living our dreams, of not trusting life, of ultimately letting ourselves down.

The bible says that Noah, (the guy with the boat and the animals, “2 by 2”) was ‘righteous in his own generation’, (cite) which seems to imply that his ‘righteousness’ was a ‘relative’ rather than an ‘absolute’, righteous-dudeness.

Which leads me to this; most people’s conscious mind, for the most part, thinks they’re right and justified. Their unconscious mind however knows the truth.

Heartfelt confession or being truly honest with yourself brings the two minds together, the unconscious mind teaches the conscious mind what the true situation is.

As my spiritual teacher once wrote, ‘the heart is the portal to the transcendent’ it is through our heart, that we are able to be honest, to marry our deepest part of ourselves with our everyday state of mind.

And it is in that union that we learn that, if we listened more closely to our true inner voice, we would make better choices in our lives, we would become righteous in the deepest resources of our very being.

So that unlike Noah we can strive to become more than just righteous in comparison to the generation, culture and society we live in, that is ‘righteous in his generation’ but on some much more profound and substantial level that we actually become beautiful through and through.

It is my wish that this inner beauty and righteousness become manifest within you, because it is who you are already righteous and beautiful, but nobody told you.

In truth each of us are already truly enlightened. Call it buddha, moshiach, God or whatever you like. Only when you or I completely surrender to our divine nature do we begin to live a life that fulfills all of our potential.

what does that even mean?

I’ve got an idea about what I mean, what place that this stuff comes from.

We all have ideas and beliefs about ourselvles and who we think we really are. Most people have bought into the theory of evolution and just think that they are little furry monkeys on a tinny spinning planet in some distant backwater of the milky way.

But that is just an idea, which trys to make sense of this world we live in, to give us some wider perspective on the human condition.

But what i’m suggesting is that by limmiting ourselves to a purely mechanistic, darwinian worldview, we limit our potential for growth , for developemnt and for discovering the Unknown within us, everyone and the entire world.

What’s the point of discovering the Unknown within us? Call it buddha, moshiach, God or whatever you like.

- to help you decome a better, happier and more inspired, responsive, gentle, caring, awesome furry monkies of course.

Life can sometimes present us with lots of different challenges, they are of course, all there to help us grow and become deeper and better people because of them.

But I believe that it is our resistance to, what is, to the unfolding of life, the universe and everything, to the day-to-day stuff that happens in our life, it is that friction which ultimately wears us down.

I don’t mean always being an easy pushover on every occasion, because indeed, sometimes Life wants us to rise to the challenge, speak up, act and react, out of pure righteous indignation.

But often it is the less important elements of life that we get caught up with, the daily stresses that gently grinds us down until we fall to pieces.

It is these daily recurrent events, stresses, feelings and thoughts that I’m suggesting we stop and let go of.

I believe, not based on too much fuzzy new-age science, but from watching myself, that it is our resistance to life, the everyday resistance, our feelings of dislike, being upset about whatever it may be that actually ages us, both emotionally and physically.

So if and when you notice yourself becoming tense, or feeling even the slightest bit cross, let it go! Stop resisting, just relax, and allow whatever is, to be.

What does that mean?

It means that when you notice yourself resisting life, before you even make yourself ill, stressed or upset, just let it go.

Learn to recognise that your default mode is one of tranquillity and warm quiet inner stillness and peace.

Everything that moves your attention away from that sense of calm is a distraction; it is a form of mild idolatry.

Your task then is to focus your attention on that river of peace that runs through your veins.

In the strange and sometimes manic but perfectly peaceful personal utopia that I inhabit and co-create, there are occasions when I dialogue with local sages, mystics, high priests and priestesses and even groups of young trainee rabbis.

On one such occasion debating the benefits of rigorous study over the comforts of staying in bed. I was willed, and this is not the first time such a statement has ushered forth from my lips, in a almost Krishnamurti-like utterance; “All I’m suggesting is that you take your life seriously! What you do from then on in is your business.” I continued.

Of course as with any discussion with students of the Talmud, it couldn’t have been left alone, the entire statement had to be dissected, analysed and proved to be utter stupidity, before they were to even hear what it is I was trying to convey.

“What does serious mean?” one asked. They concluded that language itself was problematic because “serious doesn’t mean anything” they insisted.

Anyways, I bravely tried to explain what the opposite of “serious” was and how living a life of frivolity and merry foolishness was not particularly good. (Although ironically, I usually advocate increased merriness and frivolity for most of my life-coaching clients.)

Eventually, when they did agree that it was a good idea to take their life more seriously, they started speaking of ideals such as ‘Truth’ and the inevitability of the search and discovery of ‘Truth’, if one was to take their life seriously.

I reiterated, what I’d said before, (in these circles you’ve got to repeat yourself over and over for them to actually listen) I’m not interested in what happens after you start to take your life seriously, just take it seriously, it is a state of being, a state of mind, a mindset that I’m suggesting you adopt in order that you make the most of your life and make the most of your time stuck in rabbinical school!

Even if you conclude that life is meant to be about fun and excitement, at least be serious about it! Stop being wishy-washy, and get serious! If fun is what it’s about then have serious fun!

This wasn’t going down too well, so I started talking about everything being ONE. And believe it or not that got more resistance, than me telling them to take their life seriously.

I tried to explain that if they were to take the idea of everything being ONE seriously then their life would be completely different. I ended up having to explain that this idea was is actually one of the fundamentals of Judaism and the Kabbalistic tradition, but they found the entire concept very difficult to assimilate.

Anyway by this time, I thought I’d cut my losses and hit the road, I chuckled to myself about the irony of me lecturing to a bunch of very well behaved student rabbis about the virtues of being serious and the experience of ONE.

But if you’re going be serious about anything it’s best if it’s about the Oneness of All Existence.

There’s a telling Italian saying: “When the wine goes in, the secrets come out!’ and another one that goes something like: “You can’t have a full bottle of wine AND a drunk wife!” But I’m not sure which one is more accurate?

A relatively modern school of mysticism (a subtle reference to the Urban Guru and mates) believe that being slightly inebriated is actually a vehicle for self-discovery and enlightenment. Of course, when you see the entire world, as an ongoing form of Group Therapy, everything, even being paralytic once in a while, is part of the ‘healing’ process.

The amazing thing is about being off-your-face is that it’s not an intellectual exercise, it is an experiential experience!

You’ve got an excuse to let go and be yourself completely, without guilt or any form of societal repression, judgement or shame. Getting drunk reveals who you really are underneath the cosy façade of ‘normality’. But because we often aren’t really in touch with our inner selves or with our true feelings, stuff comes out that we choose to blank out and would rather forget.

But if we go beyond that juvenile form of emotional therapy and embraces the deeper lesson that this ancient liquid intelligence is teaching us, we will soon learn that; 1. Being drunk is ultimately a state of mind. 2. Us being ourselves fully and completely is actually a good thing. 3. Many of societies inhibitions and cultural norms are inventions of deeply unhappy people. 4. You do actually love everyone. 5. You’ve just not realised how sexy and beautiful almost everyone is!

“I’m praying for rain in California, So the grapes can grow and they can make more wine!”

Get in touch with your inner-drunk and tell everyone you love them!

Stop! Just wait a moment, there is a little lie that you believe; that you are somehow completely separate from the universe, from the whole. That you are just a little furry monkey trying desperately to hold on to this tiny spinning planet, in some forgotten Wild West Corral at the edge of this dusty galaxy, but that’s not the case.

You are actually an integral part of a responsive and intelligent, feeling universe. You are made of the very same substance as the Big Bang and the very same stuff as whatever preceded Space and Time. You are a little bit of God! (I’m a Guru I’m allowed to say that).

The problem is that you believe that the Gold/God/Wealth and Happiness are found ‘Out There’ in those them there hills, but the truth of the matter is that the source of all of the wealth and bliss in your life is not found outside of yourself, but deeply within.

If you are to discover and claim the material wealth in the world outside of you, you must first discover the mountains of ‘gold’ that you already contain.

You must claim wealth, prosperity and spiritual happiness as your birthright and become a gold-digger in the mines of your heart, and uncover the infinite that you have within you.

If you intend it with all of your internal power, if you begin to imagine it, to feel it, then it must come into being. Even if this means that your cosmic soul has to travel back in time, to the beginning of the Universe and form the very gold that you are about to find in the hills and mountains of the open market.

It is you and your intention, your divine will to manifest your infinite potential in any way you choose. You are a creator of the life you are living; you manifest and create wealth and success in your life.

You are the goose that lays the golden eggs!

——————————————————

This was first published in the Sep 2007 edition of EN Magazine

I’m not sure if I’ve told you but the ‘Urban Guru’ is simply a myth, it is a realm of enlightened tranquillity and transparent awareness that exists in a state of potential within each and every urban dweller. It just happens to be that the Urban Guru in me has become manifest that I use the honourable title.

But you, also have the ability to create a serene personal utopia, within your current life, to become your own Urban Guru, to travel within the city without moving, to swim in an ocean of pure cosmic intelligence, to realise the divine nature of your very being with every single moment, with every single breathe.

But there is a bloody war on; it is a spiritual war to free or keep captive, the Urban Guru within you. To allow yourself to become all that you are destined to be, or to remain in a state of dull, stressed, mediocrity.

This battle has been prophesised by many cultures and it has been given different names; Holy War, Jihad, Shamhhala, Amalek, Armageddon, but ultimately all the mystical traditions explain that the great battle is a personal spiritual war.

One of these noble traditions explains that in order to create your personal utopia, the campaign you must wage is for the annihilation of your own internal cynicism.

Internal cynicism is the only thing stopping you truly living the life of your dreams, of becoming extremely successful, of living in your own version of heaven on earth.

To annihilate cynicism, you must become a something of a Jedi Knight, Sámi-Warrior and Buddhist monk, finding peace and stillness within, trusting the unfolding of life, armed with a powerfully loving heart and protected by a potent psychic shield.

Learn to relax, give yourself permission to trust and believe in yourself completely. Give yourself the opportunity to be open to the unknown within you, to all that is good and innocent in you.

When you reach that place you will realise that; You are the Urban Guru!

——————————————————

This was first published in the Aug 2007 edition of EN Magazine

PEACE

Conflict or anykind cannot be resolved by more conflict,

Anti-war marchs just increase war,

Boycots just add spritual fuel to the problem

I’d just learn to focus

To breathe,

to spend time developing a mediative practice

even if it’s for a few mins a day

Breathing in and out

saying words like, Love, Peace, Relax, Calm, Bliss, Happiness, God, Divine, Tranquility, etc…

to yourself quietly.

Imagine a bright white healing light entering your lungs, filling your entire being with love and bliss,

see yourself as a being of calm healing light

a supernova of divine energy

smile inwardly to yourself,

say I allow myself the chance to be free, to be truly free,

happiness is my birthright, etc…

become the sourse of love, peace and blessings in your own life

don’t worry about office conflicts

if you can rediscover peace within yourself - the entire world will stop fighting

within you is the divine, the power to change, the power to create, to influence, to manifest your dreams

make sure your dreams are hopefilled and love filled.

wishing you much love
the Urban Guru

It’s not the clothes you wear,

It’s not the car you drive,

The house you own,

The things you have,

It’s not a cigar,

A panty liner,

Mobile phone,

Or your bullet-proof helicopter,

Confidence is not the money you have in the bank,

It’s not a sawn off shotgun,

It’s not something you can buy,

But it is something you can learn,

Not by realising how powerful you are,

Not by the practice of putting other people down,

Not by learning Kung Fu,

But by letting go of yourself,

Not letting yourself go,

By realising that your sense of separateness is an illusion,

By realising your oneness with all,

By realising your unity with all,

By becoming aware of the All,

The air you breathe,

The body you are,

The life you live, are all an expression of the One Intelligent Being which is everywhere equally.

Once a farmer had an unruly donkey, who ran around his fields and never did what he was supposed to do.

The farmer was at a loss and offered a reward for anyone who could tame his wild donkey.

Many people tried but failed, they tried shouting at it, tempting it with carrots, etc… but noting seemed to work.

Then one day a wondering traveler heard of the reward and decided to try and tame this wild donkey.

The traveler picked up the largest plank of wood he could find and whacked the donkey between the eyes, he then whispered something in his ear, and from then on the donkey was cured.

But the farmer was horrified and frankly appalled and refused to give the traveler his reward “if I wanted someone to whack my donkey between the eyes i could have done it myself”

- “ahh” said the traveler, “but that was just to get his attention!”

Our little boy Jacob has only slept through the night on about 4 occasions in the past 6 months, and for whatever reason it is my responsibility most nights to settle him back to sleep with a little 3 am pat or the occasional hug.

As I’ve previously mentioned I can conclusively prove that long term sleep deprivation and disturbance really does affect ones mental abilities and spiritual agilities.

And if I’m being totally honest with myself and you, the Urban Guru has really not been on top form. I’ve been writing a monthly column for EN magazine as you’ll probably been aware of, but that’s been about it.

My energetic focus has been on my family and launching my ONE THI