A mindset that tightens the belly: detached, nervous, unsentimental, on edge, ready to die. Basically the mind of a warrior.

One's art is just one's effort to wed oneself to the universe,
to unify oneself through union.
—Robert Motherwell

Stay on your toes

The writer must be universal in sympathy and an outcast by nature: only then can he see clearly.

—Julian Barnes

poets remain true to an unsaid

I never get lonely when alone. I get lonely when I'm with people who aren't with me.

I’m not really into religion. They’re all macrocosms of the ego. When man began to think he was a separate person with a separate soul, it created a violent situation.

—Harry Dean Stanton

sacrum is your plumb

MEDITATION
first settle down
then lighten up

silence : healing

Get a grip (on yourself)
This is mind in dantian

a ludic mind

a lucid mind

Truth
(by its very nature)
disturbs

Awareness is its own action.
—Harry Dean Stanton

My teacher, bless him, taught me that a worthy life is one devoted to (researching) spirit, and this is the one I have endeavoured to live. And as I get deeper in I realise that the three great mysteries of life – consciousness, spirit, love – are basically the same thing.

Conscious of the unconscious mind

If God (the tribal God) is collective spirit
then Satan (the devil) is collective ego

Strange isn't it that despite all the listening, some people just cannot hear. To hear we must get the self out of the way.

I work on the surface
but am aware that the spirit is often hidden within
like a shadow in the darkness.

Love is an ancient way to break the wall down.
To be loving is to be in contact with our inner spirit.
—Roger Ackling

Someone asked recently the difference between energy & spirit, and on reflection all I could say was – not a lot. When I look back on the times my teacher commented on how good my energy was, it was always times my spirit was up.

Energy is spirit sustained.

Spirit requires freedom: instinctive spontaneity.
Energy requires a mind focused enough to intend.

Rituals performed in private
can change the world.

—Andrei Tarkovsky

When the spirit makes progress, don't be surprised if you get sick. The gods of Taiji are jealous, is how the Chinese put it. It's just the body struggling to keep up.

Spirit changes everything. When it rouses & rises you are effectively plunged into heightened awareness and the world vibrates with energy.

Love, in its essence, is spiritual fire.
—Emanuël Swedenborg