Autumn
Rafa Redondo writes:
My dear friends,
It has been a while since my last newsletter. The existence of each and every one of us has changed somewhat. After nearly two years, I find myself in the body of an 80-year-old man in a delicate state of health that is affecting my capacity to receive people and remain active. I am being treated by charming, young, expert neurologists who talk to me about a degenerative disease, but to be honest, being frightened of something degenerative at this great age is something one can laugh at.
However, THERE IS SOMETHING THAT DOES NOT CHANGE, IT SUSTAINS YOU, DRIVES YOUR SOUL AND AFFECTS YOUR BODY. I am referring to the Source of Life, I am talking about the strength of the wind of the Spirit that drives every living thing.
It is something permanent and unborn that crosses the thinking mind from north to south. Something that remains present in my consciousness regardless of the ups and downs of time. Something that cannot be seen or thought, but which leaves me in no doubt that it is immediately evident, or rather, self-evident. Something that continues after the birth and death of millions of events. Something that becomes and is displayed as a sense of being. It is what prompted Master Ramana to say “I am”, and Jesus to say before Abraham was, I am. That, THAT which is before the world was. That self-evident and immediate Self that refuses to get lost among the objects of my mind. Something unchanging and unsayable, but which can be experienced, and which turns into Presence while you are reading, and while I am writing. The Self without form, our original face before our parents were born. A Something that is freely accessible to every born being, regardless of schools and teachers, Something that cleans, caresses and heals whenever it becomes transparent during daily meditation, and which can last 24 hours. And in tears of gratitude you express thanks, you express thanks… because it is Life itself.
“I have finished the race, I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7 ESV). Like Paul, I feel: “O death, where is your victory?” (1 Corinthians 15:55 ESV).
I open myself up to receiving that which springs forth when I lay myself down. I open myself up to the nothingness of this same blank page on which I am writing, which drives me towards openness, to the sparkle of a flash from that You that shines when I turn away.
(Rafa Redondo, teacher and friend of Ipar Haizea, free verse of forms along the path to the Source of Life)
(Translated by Sarah J. Turtle)