Words of Power: Secrets of the Bodhisattva

Sunday, July 27, 2014

Secrets of the Bodhisattva

Kahlil Gibran - The Silence

The simple truth is that "freedom" is an ever-receding horizon. It is always some distance away. You never actually reach the horizon. You travel toward it, and then suddenly you are beyond it, and yes, there is another horizon stretching out before you. When you are truly free you realize there is no "true freedom," or rather, that "true freedom" is not what you imagined it to be.

Because one of the elements of "true freedom" is utter clarity of mind. But what this "utter clarity of mind" reveals is that "you" are bound up with the fates of everyone and everything everywhere. The sinews and ligaments of this responsibility are as palpable as the sinews and ligaments that bind together your physical body itself. When you tear one or the other there is pain and injury. Nevertheless, knowing what this "true freedom" really is, you do not dissuade others from seeking it.

Because even though "true freedom" is no freedom at all, it is imbued with a primal joy, that primal joy hitherto associated with the goal of "true freedom," and you want the others to experience this primal joy for themselves. And if they do, they will, in turn, gratefully accept the grave responsibility and all-devouring interconnectedness that it reveals. This is one of the secrets of the Bodhisattva.

The other is that the Bodhisattva returns again and again not just to alleviate human suffering, but also because this life is a blast, this life is where it's all happening, this life is the place to be for however long the opportunity presents itself.

-- Richard Power

My new (ninth) book User's Guide to Human Incarnation, The Yoga of Primal Reality is available now from Amazon.com.

About Richard Power

Richard Power is a writer, speaker and yoga teacher. He offers workshops, classes and private instruction in yoga and meditation. He is the author of 14 books, most important are Wyrds of Power: New Languagee for A New Reality (2017), I, the Dragon: Chronicles of An Epic Life Among the Humans (2018), and Secret Engine of the World: Further Notes on Primal Reality, Gaian Politics & the Arc of Human Evolution (2021). For more information on all of Power's other books, visit his author's page on Amazon.com.

For much of his life, Power worked in the fields of security and intelligence. He delivered briefings and led training in forty countries, and was an adviser to governments and corporations. His views have been featured in interviews on CNN, PBS, NPR and the BBC, and quoted in mainstream news media, including Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, New York Times, Washington Post, Reuters and Associated Press.

This blog explores new language for the truths of the ancient future, and reflects insights into Vajrayana Buddha Dharma, Kashmir Shiva-Sakti philosophy, Hatha and Tantra Yoga, the Shamanic path, and other aspects of the world's collective mystical heritage. It also offers commentary on art, music, literature, human rights, sustainability, independent journalism, economic justice and the Climate Crisis.