nico1089 wrote:

hi folks, i do not trust myself at all. If i seem to want to go with my gut it usually means i am hungry for something. Intuition resonates too much with "nature" and self-preservation, so i don't trust it either. The touchstone of discrimination is the love of god, usually the opposite of self-advantage. If love of god is there, we are always moving in the right direction--all things will work for the good. The good of all, not what seems best for self at the time. We cannot decide by "what is best for me" without putting ourselves before god, and that would mean leaving the spiritual path.--nicolo

Hi Nicolo! It's good to see you. The way I see it is that loving God and putting Him first in one's life is indeed ongoing surrender to His will. With total surrender we let go of everything we think we know. In the silent stillness, in that "cloud of unknowing", we unite and become one with God. We are born again in His likeness: "I live, yet not I but Christ in me". That, I think, is what we come to trust and become more and more grounded in. We are still the same person and God is still the same Unknown, but how we see and relate to the world changes because we are, in a sense, seeing through His all-loving eyes where no thing is separate.

wonderment wrote:

Hi Chiyo, How I love Thich Nhat Hanh! His ability to articulate, in plain language, the nature of the universe is remarkable. The passage you provided is an excellent example.

Here's another passage from "Understanding Our Mind":

"In order to unlock the door of reality, we have to observe, look deeply, and discover and put into practice the principle of interdependence. Once thing can manifest only by relying on everything else. A flower can manifest based only on the requisite conditions - the rain, sunshine, soil, and other factors which make its manifestation possible.

"When we are able to perceieve things in the light of interdependence, one day the true nature of reality, or the nature of ultimate reality, will reveal itself. The key that unlocks the door and reveals ultimate reality is looking deeply with the eyes of interbeing."

Yes, yes, you understand exactly what I was talking about. How nice it is to meet a fellow pilgrim journeying along the same path. Gassho. :D

nico1089 wrote:

hi folks, yes, god is the way i know myself. The old philosophical adage--"to know yourself, know god. to know god, know yourself."--nicolo

Yes, the lines separating the two become so blurred as to seem non-existent!