William Samuel

William Samuel
William Samuel

Monday, April 24, 2017

Names and Labels





Excerpt from
The Awareness of Self-Discovery  
 by William Samuel 


ABOUT NAMES AND LABELS

What name is given this philosophy? What are these ideas called? Is this Christian Science? Is it Unity or Religious Science? Is it Taoism, Buddhism, Existentialism, Solipsism, Judaism? Is it The Infinite Way carried another step forward? Is this an Eastern philosophy or Western? Is it a combination of all of these or is it none?

"He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches: To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it."

This study is related to no organization. It has grown out of no religious group. This is not a special theology more related to one church than another, or more to one metaphysics than another. The Truth is the Truth is the Truth—not strained through any organization. It follows no particular line of teachers. The Truth does not come out of any faith, organization, teacher, philosophy or holy book. The Truth includes all that has ever been construed to be any and every teacher, philosophy or holy book. The Truth we are concerned with is the truth of the Single Selfhood being the awareness of these words. There is one Truth only—the fact of Identity—the truth I am.

Jesus said: "blessed are the solitary and elect, for you shall find the Kingdom...." That same enlightened mirror of my Self also said: "Many are standing at the door, but the solitary are the ones who will enter the bridal chamber....He who lives as the living one shall see neither death nor fear..." This study is a matter of Self-discovery—an individual, solitary action. But one does not have to forsake business, friends, family nor society and its organizations to pursue it. As Awareness, we are the Living one within whom the universe is included.

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A year ago, a European Rabbi told me that I was teaching the Essene philosophy of Judaism in its purest form. The same week an "authority" announced that these ideas are the essence of Taoism. Time and again, those who know have said they are an absolutely correct statement of Christian Science. A recent letter states that A GUIDE TO AWARENESS AND TRANQUILLITY accords with the spirit of Buddhism. Many teachers of Unity, Religious Science and New Thought have come here to Mountain Brook to learn and say that these principles coincide with the most absolute aspects of their teaching. And I know that all of these statements are correct because Truth is universal—single, alone, only and all.

"But you haven't answered my question," said a young man to me a few days ago. "What do you call this teaching? What is its name?"

Names are labels. Labels are the names for specific things. Labels are for parts, bits and pieces, not for the single, whole, universal all. Labels have us looking out at something else with which we may or may not identify. Labels are for groups, organizations and philosophies which have followers. But the truth we are has no limiting label on it—unless we would limit ourselves. The Truth we are is the Identity we are. It is self-defeating to hang a label on it. The moment we do, we have that name standing in contradistinction to all other names; we have established an exclusiveness rather than an inclusiveness; we see this Self-label as not that Self-label, which makes this self not the Self.

Regardless of the organizations, religious or otherwise, that we may belong to in order to avail ourselves of their intellectual instruction, camaraderie and kitchen facilities, our deepest and final study is self study, self discovery, self education and self acquaintance. It is defeating and dishonest to call ourselves by some limiting name which we are not.

It is well to remind ourselves that the awareness that reads these words or hears the sounds of labels is also the awareness that knows whatever is know of Judaism, Religious Science, The Infinite Way, Taoism, Catholicism, Christian Science, or the American Automobile Association. Those concepts do not exist outside this awareness we are. They owe their apparent existence to the awareness that is conscious of them. They are subservient to awareness, the selfhood I (Identity) am. The labels are for the included images and ideas, for the parts, for the bits and pieces, the qualities and attributes, "the ten thousand things," for the flowers in the garden—for the birds—but not for the one-I (we) am. Who can give the Deific Identity a name? By what name does the Nameless go?

We break with the notion of being a part, to be the whole, the "Living one." Soon we shall all see that we are not members of this or that label, but that every label exists as some aspect of this Identity we are. And listen, listen: this knowledge does not mean that we must fight with or break from the sundry organizations that may appear meaningful to us at the moment. As a matter of fact, the knowledge that a label cannot bind the Identity we are may very well appear as that particular labeled aspect of ourself becoming more meaningful than ever, in ways we never dreamed. And certainly, it means we would stop attempting to lower the boom on the rose just because it has thorns. We might even see that it was the rose's thorn that made us leap so high in the air we were able to see the whole garden of many flowers. 

Semantic tricks to equate the comfortable old label of yore with the unnameable identity-we-are will ultimately be abandoned. We are all prone to slam the door in the face of certain labels as surely as we are to pucker at the taste of green persimmons or sigh at the sight of a little girl giving a flower to her daddy. We are here to find and live the whole Self we are and speak of that. This is why we search for a simplified, universal language that has neither crystallized nor been anchored to labels—and this study is proving itself capable of reaching every group we are being. Just today a letter arrives from one of the world's authorities on religion, Zen in particular, saying in essence that our messages are identical. 

So, who can name this "way"? Who can label this single Selfhood except the Self "you" are? "...And I will give him...a white stone, and in the stone a new name written which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it."

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Asked the same question, Laotse answered: "I do not know Its name. If I must name It, I call it Tao and I hail it as supreme."



A FINAL WORD ABOUT MARRIAGE AND "ORGANIZATION"

Reader, you have seen many marital difficulties solved as you stopped pointing the finger of guilt to the other half "out there" and began to see that one as an aspect of the Self you are. Now, watch the happy wonders that will happen in your marriage as you stop thinking of yourself as a member of the marriage institution! To believe that is to yield yourself a servant who can be smothered by it. The Awareness that includes the organization has the dominion, not the organization. You are not a member of the marriage institution even though it may appear so. That institution is your member, an aspect of yourSelf. This is to see that the institution of human marriage does not have the authority to make us either happy or miserable, whether part of our experience or not! 
Now, be cautious lest you let the intellect look on this as a threat to itself, under the guise of a threat to "home, family and marriage." The dominion of Allness is not a threat to itself, nor to anything that is real—and there is nothing real but Allness.

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We do not belong to an organization no matter how many of them include our names on their roster of members. Rather, the organization, institution, fraternity or whatever, "belongs" to us, included within and as the Consciousness we are. 

How can life belong to an idea it includes within itself? While the tangible point in time and space (called Bill or Mary) may "belong" to this or that organization for intellectual or social purposes (and there is nothing wrong with that!) that does not mean that identity-I has surrendered its heritage. Our slowly arrived-at knowledge of this fact is the start of the conscious recovery of our holy Birthright. In Truth, it has never really been surrendered except in the binding, blinding belief that there is a medical fraternity, a scientific or religious organization, a marriage institution, a business and financial institution, a human society or body organization to which we are subservient members and, therefore, supposed to bow down, salaam three times and do what "they" say or pay the consequences "they" dictate.

The dominion is ours. "And God gave man dominion ..." "Know ye not that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are...?" The New English Bible puts it: "You know well enough that if you put yourself at the disposal of a master, to obey him, you are slaves..."

Now, does this mean that we are to do battle with the appearances of "principalities and powers" "out there"? Not at all. It means that we see the Power here as I, not there as that. And then act in accord, and then act in accord.

"What if the institution will not permit me to act in accord?" Then we are forced to live (in order to know) that the institution has no authority to prevent the Self-all-is from being the Self-all-is. This is what is going on in the world of appearances right now. The only institutions that will survive the growing turmoil are those that yield up their pseudo-authority to let ISNESS be the Authority. 

Now hear this: That yielding is not done out there with the appearance of the institution. It is done here as this awareness we are! Do you see this?

If you would like further guidance in understanding any of William Samuel's work based on Self discover you are welcome to contact me, Sandy Jones - samuelandfriends@gmail.com - Ojai, California -   

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Sunday, April 23, 2017

Childlikeness and Simplicity



Celestial Song 
Excerpt from 
The Awareness of Self-Discovery   
by William Samuel 



THE CHILD

I would tell those who have found the Child within, that pure pristine, holy Child you are, to maintain your simple credulousness and sensitivity by living your Child likeness and Simplicity. Hold this grand awareness close to the Heart because, in Truth, it is the Heart. Love this love you have found yourself to be. See it in everyone and everything, because the everyone and everything are but mirrored images of your Self. Do not worry about Identity being raw and sensitive in the face of the world. Its defenselessness is its strength. Who would harm a child? Those who have the courage to remain the newly revealed Child find that this is so.

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And to be the child does not mean forsaking a job or an organization necessarily, because the Child's view of those activities is sharp and perceptive. The Child we are cannot be fooled. We see and enjoy the real, leaving the rest alone. 

Ego shed is Identity discovered.

And this is so!

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It is inevitable that there will appear to be the dissolution of all that stands between ourselves and a full knowledge of the Truth. Inasmuch as the world appears to reside within the awareness-we-are, the dissolution that began within appears outwardly as the world's search for freedom and the upheaval it brings. Our inner turmoil never ends until we reckon Identity as already arrived and then end our attempt to lift an incorrect self-concept up to the real.

If we are to see the world scene disclose the underlying, overlying Harmony "that is even now spread over the whole face of the land," we must make this re-identification in fact and end the nonsense of acting out from the position of a sponge trying to soak up wisdom. To do what? To steadfastly reckon Self from the standpoint of Perfection. No other view will bring Peace so quickly to the human scene.

LIGHT IS LOVE
The "final days" (and this is all that is significantly meant by those ominous words) is the arrival of the world's final enlightenment. These days are in progress already. The light is dawning because it is already here. New ideas are coming into focus and old landmarks are passing away. Cherished notions, some of them the very pillars of society, are being shaken to the roots. We are finding most of them built on foundations of sand. Many institutions charged with the revelation of God, Truth, Reality, are found not to be giving freedom to their charges but withholding it; not dispensing Light, but darkness; not unbinding men, but shackling them; not seeking out the new Rays of Light and investigating them impartially, but, for conscious or unconscious reasons of self-preservation, doing everything in their power to keep new Light from being seen—for fear, say they, their present Light will be adulterated. As if the Truth need protecting! 

Oh, but let it be understood, these very institutions are a blessing and they are serving a most necessary purpose. How would we know that Identity is Omniscience itself without first attempting to place that omniscience "out there" in a bible or institution or philosophy? How would we learn beyond all doubt that Light itself is being our Identity without first living the futility and impossibility of a weary traveler trying to reach the Light?

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So now, to make this statement from still another direction: We come to see the Light which reveals that we are the Light. I have found that acting this Identity "on faith" first helped disclose the Light-I-am that removes every doubt. and this Light of Self-discovery blooms in illumination and insight—fragile, fragrant, a flowery display of beauty and love divine. Sparks!  Enthusiasm!  Zest!  Strength and youth flooding back!  The bloom of Light divine—the simple Love that is Identity, revealed.


If you would like further guidance in understanding any of William Samuel's work based on Self discovery - you are welcome to contact me, Sandy Jones --  sandy@ojaimail.com  --  - Ojai, California -   







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Saturday, April 15, 2017

A Basic Point



Excerpt from 
A Guide To Awareness and Tranquillity  
 by William Samuel 

About the "Old Man" Who Is to Be "Put Off " 
and Exactly How to Do It
We have examined Awareness to discover it includes all things. Awareness is the function, the activity, of Mind, Consciousness—but whose Mind? Whose Consciousness? Here is the crux of the matter! Whose Awareness is this? Who owns the Awareness that is presently reading these words? Is it yours? Mine?
Ask these questions and answer them for yourself before reading another word. Stop; put the book aside and consider this Awareness. Have you been considering it "yours"? Have you been acting on the assumption—perhaps unconsciously—that this consciousness is "mine"? Have you been thinking of it as the activity of your own mind? Be completely honest.
The perception of this point was basic in my comprehension of Reality, so I want to make it very clear to the reader. I ask you to look at the table across the room or at the blue sky outside your window. This "seeing" is Awareness in action. By now we surely understand that the blue sky and the table, like images on the television screen, are "within" this Awareness that is aware; but listen closely; have we not thought of this consciousness as a personal possession?—as "mine," "yours," ours," "his"? Reader, this is precisely what mankind believes; this is the position from which he has acted since the beginning of time; this is what religion, philosophy and education have taught to this very moment, but it is not true! Such a concept is entirely false, and it is upon this false premise that the trials and tribulations of humanity are constructed.
Understand this: this Now-awareness is neither yours nor mine. it does not belong to someone called "me" or "us." It does not "belong," period! Awareness (Life) IS!
But who are we?
Awareness is who we are! Awareness itself! We are not the ego, the personality or body, who says Awareness is "mine." THAT is the incorrect identity, the "old man," the "liar from the beginning" the "deceiver," the devil himself. THAT is the one to be "put off." That is the one to "come out from . . . and be ye separate."

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Listen carefully: The basic building block for our entire personal belief in an inharmonious human experience is the incorrect assumption that our present identity is one who owns-possesses-contains-the awareness of these words; The belief that Awareness is the function of “our “ personal mind; That we are the custodian of Consciousness; That we are the recipients of Life. As long as we believe we are the container of Awareness, we identify ourselves, not as Awareness itself, but as an empty ego; as the one who attempts to have Awareness show us the things we want, the way we want them. As long as we believe this, we are acting a role outside the realm of the Real, attempting to make a servant, a slave, a lackey of God's own consciousness of being!

Ponder this basic fact. Once the Truth of it is felt, we do not long continue to identify ourselves as the "old man" who must be put off or as the mortal who must die. Rather, we claim Awareness itself—Life, Reality, Truth, Infinite Intelligence itself—as the sole and only Identity.
The Awareness that sees these words is this Identity! The Awareness-being-I includes the Universe entire! We can never actually be the one who claims to possess, contain, imprison, enslave and make a servant of Awareness. When we believe ourselves to be that one, we live as "a house divided," in bondage to our own false sense of Self.

 Reader, you are not one who is aware. You are Awareness!

If you would like further guidance in understanding any of William Samuel's work based on Self discover you are welcome to contact me, Sandy Jones - samuelandfriends@gmail.com - Ojai, California -   

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Friday, April 7, 2017

Infantry Soldier Overtone






CHAPTER ONE

MANKIND'S SEARCH FOR TRUTH

Da Shan, Mythical Mountain of Seeking and Finding


THE INFANTRY SOLDIER OVERTONE

  In the book A Guide To Awareness and Tranquillity, I wrote briefly of my time in warfare and one of the grand lessons about judgmentalism it afforded me. Over the years people have said how much that story meant to them, perhaps more than all the stories I have written. To the Western set of mind there is a certain incongruity about an old soldier being one to whom a measure of Light has been revealed. I can understand that.

  Many singular events that I have never written about occurred during those days. I was, after all, a captain of infantry in two long wars. I lived with Chinese infantry troops in the field for nearly three years—subsisting with them, nearly starving with them. The few American soldiers in China had very little support from the United States during World War II. We were at the end of the world's longest supply line, and anything that reached us from home had been flown over Japanese occupied countries, over the great Himalayan mountains into Kunming, thence to be trucked and packed in by animals to us, wherever we might be. I didn't live very well during those years. My last year in China, as the great war came to an end, I joined Chinese troops who were actively engaged against the Japanese and fought in the battles that recaptured Ishan, Liuchow and Kwelin.

  In Korea, less than ten years later I commanded King Company, 279th Infantry Regiment, 15th Division, during the final months of that awful war. I also commanded Heavy Mortar Company, 279th Infantry Regiment. Things were much harder for me in Korea's combat than in the long, strange war in China. Being older didn't help me in Korea, nor did I have wise old Mr. Shieh at Korea's great Sandbag Castle or at Vulture's Roost on the 38th Parallel.

  It is interesting that I've never written about those days, even though I've told of the learning events to seekers who have come to visit here in Alabama. I especially relished telling such tales to the metaphysical "absolutists" or to the young zealot idealists who arrived expecting only gentle words of peace from a Godly teacher. Since stories of strife, warfare and suffering are the last thing those people expect to hear from a "metaphysician," that's often what they got. Show me a revelation and I'll show you a traumatic event from which that Light emerged. Show me a true vision of heaven and I'll show you a descent into the anguish of hell wherein that vision was tried, tested and found faithful. " "Prove me now herewith, saith the Lord....” “Put all things to the test,” Paul echoed.

  And now, having written nearly everything necessary for the final book, I sit me down on yet another memorial Day to remember my soldiers who fought with me in many battles. Let me write a Glimpse or two from those days.

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  First, harking hack to China, Mr. Shieh and I, with five American teammates, were being pursued by a Japanese combat patrol. We were "retrograding;" bringing up the rear of our little patrol, trying to get back to the safety of friendly lines. We were close to being captured. In those days, neither the Japanese nor Chinese "gave quarter." That is, we took no prisoners. I knew that if I were taken by the pursuing Japanese, it meant certain death. On the other, hand, Mr. Shieh might successfully pass himself off as a Chinese peasant.

  Oh, I cannot write this story! At this minute it is enough to remember Mr. Shieh seeing and pointing out the beauty of those purple blooms on the distant mountain we had yet to climb. I marveled at a man who could see beauty under such oppressive circumstances. I marvel more that he helped me learn to do it.

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  During the Korean War, an artillery round burst among my men on the left flank. Several bodies were hurled about and I ran to see the extent of the damage and whether the platoon leader was still effective. Sick to my stomach at the sight, I sat down among three of the bodies sprawled along the slope. I became aware of a visual "Presence" hovering beside them. A misty, blue-white light of sorts. A different kind of light, primal, persuasive and powerful. I could not explain what I saw then, nor can I now, but with the sight, and because of the sight, I was absolutely certain within myself I was being shown evidence of the deathlessness of Life—the survival of the Child, the Soul of men. I felt a marvelous sense of relief, almost gratitude, concerning those men and everything happening that day.

  Within a few minutes of that incident, my regiment, and my part of the line in particular, was hit by an enormous wave of shell fire and oncoming Chinese troops. Hell erupted in a manner that no one can sufficiently describe or picture for another. One simply must experience something like that to fully understand.

  But, to the ongoing Glimpse I'd like to write here if I can. In the early moments of that terrible onslaught wherein everything that moved was slaughtered ten times over—advancing troops, men, women, children, dogs and chickens and every moving creature caught at that place at that time—I was suddenly unable to hear. My world went silent and I was enveloped in an immeasurable calm. In the midst of that horrendous din of exploding bodies and shells, I could hear nothing but my own voice. In some marvelous way, I was caught up in a quiet, tranquil dimension, separate, but attached to the carnage at hand, I had not been wounded. I felt as well as one could be expected to feel under such circumstances. I could hear my own voice and even my breathing quite clearly, I went from gun position to gun position and heard myself giving calm encouragement to my troops. I could see their mouths move in reply and gratitude—and terror—but I couldn't hear them. I heard myself but couldn't hear the shells bursting in my face. I was beset with a wonderful enwrapping calm that let me move fearlessly to do whatever the moment asked me to do, as hideous as those moments were.

  Perhaps a man can so detest a situation that his body produces the chemicals which, in turn, erect a barricade between himself and the galling situation. But as this was happening for me on that long day in Korea, there was a clear perception that a superlative Reality stood just behind the events: that there is another Scene just above this one, surrounding it; that Reality was bursting through that corridor of chaos into my own conscious recognition. I walked with a detached courage, as if the mortal body couldn't be and wouldn't be hurt. I ran from soldier to soldier, gun to gun. I was knocked down, spun around and stung with rocks and earth, feeling nothing but a calm, clear sense of Life's dominion over the sights and sounds of the world; as though, with the Presence I had sensed and seen moments earlier among the first bodies felled, I was SEEING and FEELING Life, eternal Nature, even in the face of death. Perhaps this was the beneficent calm Mr. Shieh had felt those years earlier when he saw the blossoms on the distant mountain.

  That particular hellfire and damnation in Korea lasted four nights and three days without sleep for my troops and me. I have never forgotten the different time frame and the enwrapping inner peace nor how I was held and supported during that time—or non-time. More significant, that Peace has not forsaken me since those days, at least not when I was mindful of It nor when the chips were down and I called for It. How do I call for It? I bring forth the Child of Me.

  Why I write this now after all these years, I really don't know, but on this Memorial Day when I feel everything necessary for the book has been written, I sit me down and write something that might tell others, like Janice and Bill, that there are times when the anguish of the lesson is absolutely necessary—that leaving the anguish may not be the answer. Now, with absolute assurance, I can tell people, old and young, their lessons can be learned under the most difficult and trying circumstances. Better that we leave our nets after we've learned their lessons. Better that we call on the Child because the Child knows what to do. The Child and the Presence are the same one Presence and It is right here where we are, transcending this world's time and space.

  The final tone in this Overtone: The day I moved King Company onto line in Korea, I was given the Order of Battle of the "enemy" opposing me just across the valley on the next mountain. Facing my regiment, and me in particular, was the Chinese 60th Army, the same troops I had lived with and trained for two wars in China. We met again, eight years later, in a terrible and senseless slaughter.

  In the apparent world, our friends and enemies are the same—and, sometimes, needlessly, insanely, we try to destroy one another, thence to find that Life is eternal. Like Arjuna, in awful combat, I was instructed in certain of the Mysteries and learned the sense of senselessness.

Memorial Day, 1985

  Making sense of this world of appearances has much to do with understanding the nature of Light/light, space, energy and time. Especially time.

TIME AND COSMOLOGY


  "A new clock is soon to be turned on in the world of time and space:" said old Han, talking to the group at the pond. "There is something that must be understood about time. The metaphysician's insistence that matter isn't what it seems to be and that time isn't real is only half right. I think that time is to be understood very soon.”


If you would like further guidance in understanding any of William Samuel's work based on Self discover you are welcome to contact me, Sandy Jones - samuelandfriends@gmail.com - Ojai, California -   


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