Quote

I started to think more about becoming peace rather than fighting for peace, and the contradiction in terms, and the anger and violence that we were prey to and involved in to some extent in those days.

Surya Das

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Surya Das
Age: 73
Born: 1950
Born: December 26
Poet
Writer
New York City
New York
Fighting
Anger
Rather
Terms
Peace
Becoming
Think
Involved
Thinking
Started
Violence
Prey
Days
Contradiction
Term
Extent

More quotes by Surya Das

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Spirit is love, spirit is connection, inclusive, and that's what I'm interested in, and that's what moved me. That's what I got more and more into as I grew up and as I was in college in the 60's with consciousness raising and other kind of things, gestalt psychology etc.
Surya Das
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Well Buddhism, 'shmoodism', I didn't go to India looking for Buddhism. I was looking for truth, or God, or a better way of life or happiness, fulfillment, meaning, purpose. And a way to become peace in the world and not just fight for peace, as we had in the 60's.
Surya Das
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I always thought he gave me that name because I have a kind of outgoing or sunny disposition. And in those days I was kinda blonde and bearded and had an afro and was bushy like a sun. So I don't know, he named me Surya Das but who knows.
Surya Das
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Everyone has values, and values their family, values their health, their sanity, their safety and security, and their families, their parents, their children, their pets, their environments, well-being in general.
Surya Das
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The heart is an organ of perception.
Surya Das
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So we're all living spirit. It's not about isms and schims or religions. Religions are almost like political institutions, but the heart of it is the spirituality.
Surya Das
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Spiritual joy is devotion, it's like a virus you know? It's a benevolent virus, but it spreads. It's infectious. Ram Dass was like a mentor in those days.
Surya Das
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On the other side, is a substantial, more materialism, everything is real long to the extent we can see or measure it, and things are as real as I think they. That's way too materialistic or substantialist, because things are not really what they seem to be.
Surya Das
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Embracing our environment is a good direction, a very spiritual direction. It's too Aristotelian to separate man from the animals and man humans from the environment.
Surya Das
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When the sunset of life arrives, and its twilight shadows fade away while dreams of the next begin to appear more vividly may the inner-light essence of the Buddha, and all the radiant awakened ones, continuously guide us onwards and upwards, on the path of spiritual enlightment.
Surya Das
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We learn by doing, not just by thinking. So I feel like beyond Buddhism, or Hinduism, or Judaism, or Christianity we need today to think about a global spirituality. We need to make it very personal and transformative for one self, and each other, together for those who are interested.
Surya Das
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But you know, eventually that does kind of veneer, chemical veneers that you apply, they sink in. For better or for worse, so it's good to think about what kind of veneer you shellac yourself with. How superficial it may seep into your skin and into your blood stream and totally take over your heart, your brain, everything.
Surya Das
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Breath by breath, let go of fear, expectation, anger, regret, cravings, frustration, fatigue. Let go of the need for approval. Let go of old judgments and opinions. Die to all that, and fly free. Soar in the freedom of desirelessness. Let go. Let Be. See through everything and be free, complete, luminous, at home -- at ease.
Surya Das
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Other people can’t cause us to be impatient unless we let them do so. In other words, others don’t make us impatient. We make ourselves impatient, through our expectations and demands, fixated attachments and stuckness.
Surya Das
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Everything passes, nothing remains. Understand this, loosen your grip and fine serenity.
Surya Das
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Taking the decision-making process away from people disempowers them. It also makes them much less likely to buy into the decision, however right it may be. One’s own conscience remains the ultimate arbiter.
Surya Das
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Our lack of compassion stems from our inability to see deeply into the nature of things.
Surya Das
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One-half plus one-half does not equal one one whole plus one whole equals relational wholeness.
Surya Das
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Spiritually speaking, everything that one wants, aspires to, and needs is ever-present, accessible here and now - for those with eyes to see.
Surya Das
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The secret, or innermost, level of wisdom is pure intuition, clarity, lucidity, innate wakefulness, presence, and recognition of reality. This transcendental wisdom is within all of us—it just needs to be discovered and developed, unfolded and actualized.
Surya Das