Old newbe!!!

[Cybermonk]

Aloha to all you cybermonks,

I'm Kimo and my physical body is in Hawaii, under the lee of a volcano.
Lots of jungle and all that goes with it. My wife Malia and I have a small
farm and we try to be self sufficient.

Many years I've traveled the paths to "being all I can be" and each
journey has taken me a bit closer to staying in the state of being always
in the "now".

So... when I meditate, eat, blog, play music, exercise and so on, I have
a reference point of awareness, or a seat in consciousness, I keep using
as a viewpoint of existence.

I was exposed to this viewpoint many years ago by a Dzogchen master
by the name of Namki Norbu, he basically focused himself strongly in
this state of awareness and a contact high happened to a bunch of us
travelers. I knew instinctively this viewpoint had always been there, like
the nose on my  face.  As time passed, I came to realize that philosophies
of most everything in existence, go to and come from this point of awareness.
What exactly is this point? All I can say is, well it just"is". Personally, I think
its our immortal self's.

Robert Frost, a poet, said it well; "There is no life, there is no death, only
eternity and the games we play to keep ourselves amused".

So... I'm done for now. Next time I'll try to report on what I found on some
Ukrainian cybermonks and some links to their OBE research.

Party on,
Kimo

[Jhanananda]

Welcome Kimo, good to hear from you again.  I read Chogyal Namkhai Norbu's book on Dzogchen. It reminded me a great deal of Advaita Vedanta in a Buddhist context.  I find the idea of being in the now a central aspect of my success in meditation. 

The concept of being present in the moment-to-moment keeps coming back time and again.  The present version would be Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now.  Before Eckhart Tolle, there was Baba Ramdas' Remember, Be Here Now; and before that was C'est la vie = French for "that's life!." And, the idea goes back at least as far as Advaita Vedanta and much further.  I find maintaining a still mind is central to success in the contemplative life, and being in the present moment, instead of dwelling upon the future or the past, makes for success in stilling the mind.