"Rain" by Sandy Jones

Excerpt from The Awareness of Self-Discovery

By William Samuel

CHAPTER 1

The Secret Of Communication

This afternoon I held a smooth stone in my hand that existed before a single word had ever been uttered.

Which is more significant: the smooth stone or the words that describe it?

ABOUT WORDS

Dear Mary,

Very often we give too much importance to words. Those who are most devotedly looking for the Truth are frequently the ones most hung up on "This is relative or that is absolute." How many times have you heard that? I was the world's worst. As a renegade metaphysician traveling over the universe from sage to Guru to Prince to Practitioner to apostate, no one ever became more entangled in the intellectual concern for words and their precision than I.

Pretty soon I found myself with certain expressions I did not dare use in the presence of some people because I was sure my words indicated my level of comprehension. Bosh!

Subtle restrictions of expressions—thousands of them—abound within the judgmental framework of coming-to-comprehend the Light rather than being the Light.

In our studies here in Mountain Brook, the first thing we do is to look into the matter of words, thence to come down from that ridiculously lofty and arid plateau of "absolute" versus "relative." All words are relative. No word is absolute. The absolute that Isness is exists in a dimension as much beyond words as a melody is more than a sheet of music or the principle of arithmetic more than a numeral.

There is an intellectual aspect to Truth, of course, and words play their part in that but the Real contains an infinity of subtle essences that is more than words, greater than words. The awakening to these is often precluded in our wrestling matches with semantics.

LITTLE BOY LOST

Pondering the enigma of communication one day out in the back country of my hills, I witnessed the happy reunion of a father and his five-year-old son who had been lost in the woods for many hours. I knew the boy would be found—and I knew I knew—but despite the positive knowing, I was unable to allay the father's fears or bring him to understand the Truth I saw. Then, even as I wondered—even as I asked about this inability to communicate when it seemed so important to do it—I saw the little boy and the father find each other.

Oh, such a reunion! A barefoot ragamuffin came running out of the woods shouting with all his might, "Daddy! Daddy!" and I saw the father, unashamedly sobbing, sweep the child into his arms. All he could say was, "Hallelujah! Praise God!" again and again. "Hallelujah! Praise God!"

Then and there, it was my joy to see the communication was ever so much more than fancy words, proper grammar and intellectual nuances; more than education and cultured sophistication. I saw uninhibited enthusiasm say more in an instant than all the words of the encyclopedia heaped upon all the words of the Bible. I saw uninhibited being, stripped of its world-be possessor. In the twinkling of a "Praise God" and a "Daddy, Daddy," I learned that words are just words. Too many are a clutter, and pompous ones a waste. Simple, unpretentious, tender childlikeness—honesty—stirs the Heart and overthrows the intellect, leaving the child-we-are in the Father's arms.

Since those days, I have been a child again wandering along the back roads and river banks, enjoying, enjoying... Since that time I have known that the intellectual, philosophical presentation of words is not the all-fired important thing I had made of it before. Then and there I determined, as best I could, to end my own use of pompous metaphysical language and attempt to say whatever might be necessary to say in the tender, simple way so natural to us all.

This is a portion of the simplicity you and I have discovered, dear reader. It tells the Story to the first and the last alike.

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"Ah, but what of our dignity if we act so simply?" someone asks.

There has never been more Dignity in all the world than the child who runs to his Father and whispers, "I am home again! I am home again!"

THE CHILD IS UNDERSTOOD

We find a new measure of immediate peace when we end the excessive struggle with words—either ours or the other fellow's. How many time have we listened to the faltering words of children as the poured out their hearts? Didn't we understand all that was necessary to understand? Of course we did! We heard through the stutters, the wrong tenses, the misplaced syntax and the mispronounced words. We heard straight through to the simple, honest, tender HEART. It is the Heart that gives utterance to the words we see and hear in the first place, and it is the Heart that understands.

So as you read these pages, sit easy and look at the paragraphs and chapters in their completeness, in their singleness, in their totality; then, listen to the Heart. It is the Heart that instructs, not the words. The Heart goes beyond words and cannot be fooled. "Behold, I give thee a wise and understanding heart."

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Laotse, the grand old sage of the East wrote: "The Tao (Absolute) described in words is not the real Tao. Words cannot describe it. Nameless, it is the source of Creation; named, it is the mother of finite images. The Absolute is a vast immeasurable void. Looked for, it cannot be seen; listened for, it cannot be heard; reached for, it cannot be touched... Tao is absolute and nameless—an endless circle ever returning. Serenity is its goal.

"The truly wise man accepts the dualisms of nature and words diligently without allegiance to words...Music and good food will stop the passing stranger, but the Absolute given by way of words seems tasteless and unappealing..."

Then the venerated sage makes what surely must be the understatement of the millennium: "Straight words can seem very crooked."

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Some years ago I was honored to be the first American student of a renowned teacher in India. For fourteen days a group of us sat at the feet of this "Master," during which time he spoke not one word—not so much as a grunt—until the final day when he bade us farewell and assured us we had learned much.

And to my surprise, I had. It took months before the seeds of those silent days began to sprout one by one, revealing that there are indeed many things for which the uptight, recondite babble of books and teachers is more hindrance than a help.

There is no one reading this book to whom the Truth has not been revealed many times and for whom the Truth needs only to be lived. Additional enlightenment and its tangible experience called "healing" come with the LIVING—that gentle meadow of soft grass just beyond the wailing wall of words.

Who built this wall? The same impostor whose role we play as a self hood apart from Allness.

There is much power in this message. If you will, you can feel it. How much MORE is the Life of YOU!

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 -