The Reed Flute Wailing

Only by listening to the plaintive cry of the reed-flute 

while reading Rumi's poem that I was truly able to understand it.

I invite you to press play on the audio below, read the verses 

slowly, and let the song of the reed speak directly to your own inner fire.

Play: LM Ayrogh Veuchtitz

Now listen to this reed-flute's deep lament,

About the heartache being apart has meant:

Since from the reed-bed they uprooted me,

My song's expressed each human's agony.

To share my deepest secret is what I seek with you:

When kept from their true origin, all yearn

For union on the day they can return.

Amongst the crowd, alone, I mourn my faith;

With good and bad I've learned to integrate.

That we were friends, each one was satisfied,

But none sought out my secrets from inside;

My deepest secret is this song I wail.

Body and ears can't penetrate the veil:

Body and soul are joined to form one whole,

But no one is allowed to see the soul.

It's fire, not just hot air, the reed-flute's cry;

If you don't have this fire, then you should die.

Love's fire is what makes every reed-flute pine,

Love's fervor lends potency to the wail of the flute.

The few who hear the truth the reed has sung

Have lost their wits so they can speak this tongue.

When you're with us, you're friend beyond compare.

While ordinary men on drops can thrive,

A fish needs oceans daily to survive.

The way the ripe must feel, the raw can't tell.

Unchain yourself, my son, escape its hold!

How long will you remain a slave of gold?

You've tried to fit the sea inside a jug;

Shells only grow pearls when they are content.

Be joyful, Love, for sweetest bliss is you.

Love wants its tail to be told to everyone.

- Rumi

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Developing an Inner Taste

Gemini AI Generated Image

“As we progress in the work, we began

to develop inner taste, an inner sense or 

faculty that makes us realize when 

we are negative or identified.

By inner taste you can recognize that 

you are lying or in a negative state 

without difficulty, although you are justifying 

yourself and protesting you are not. 

Here the whole thing turns upon whether 

you possess inner sincerity or not. 

If not, then best to give up the work. 

Inner taste can be said to be the faint beginning 

of Real Conscience, because it is something 

that recognizes the quality of one's inner state. 

Self-observation and inner taste are not the 

same but my coincide. The more you understand 

the work, the more it is arranged rightly in your 

mind and its meaning seen, the more does it 

pass into Real Conscience. It is sometimes said that 

if we had Real Conscience the war would be 

unnecessary for we would know it already. “

Maurice Nicoll, Commentaries, 

“Concept of Conscience in the Work,” 

July 16, 1941, volume 1, page 41

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Thank You...

 

Ilaria Arpino

Thank you 

for the beautiful quote of Mervyn. 

I love the simplicity, 

the instruction on how to establish the relationship with God, 

“To talk to your Soul, Love or God, 

first be quiet and still". 

I also love "the Gods will communicate in their own way, 

embrace it". 

Reminds me of a time 

where I was so low in hydrogens, 

feeling so abandoned in a church. 

I knelt down and prayed for a hug. I got up, 

turned around, a homeless man was behind. 

He asked for a dollar. 

I gave it to him, 

and he threw himself on my shoulders and hugged me. 

Not the way I imagined. 

But the shocked lifted my hydrogens, 

reminded me I was in the presence of the highest, 

and had responded. 

The moment still feeds me. 

~T

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I Am...

 

"I am the vine,   you are the branches;

he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit"

~Jesus of Nazareth  

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My Machine...

 

AI Generated

My machine was looking for a perfect scenario. 

Even sitting outside while I’m on this meeting, 

a few so called imperfections. 

And somehow, I remembered this is the place to work. 

Here and Now with ALL AND EVERYTHING. 

Imagination is such a clear check if I’m working or not.

Today is Kathryn Hulmes birthday, 

and she has been helping me tremendously in the work recently. 

She was a student of Gurdjieff. 

And I recently read this excerpt that pertains to imagination. 

Another student named Wendy 

just received a toast from Gurdjieff 

and she responds: 

“I hope I fulfill your wishing Mr. Gurdjieff”. 

And he says “Not hoping…he picked her up quickly 

“Hope in my opinion is an evil thing, 

is why man is nearly not man any longer. 

Man must  use what he has, 

not hope for what is not!”

And the way I digested this thus far, 

is use what is Here Now. 

That is the most important thing. 

It is a thin line. 

Imagination is always looking to take our Attention. 

That’s why it is so useful to keep returning to it. 

And I will conclude 

with what Jeanne de Salzmann keeps reminding me. 

Not to be at war with myself or imagination, 

but don’t let all my attention be taken by any of it. 

~S

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On The Detour...

 

Sharon Cummings

On the detour of seeking "perfection," 

there was a time in my life 

when I carried around inside myself 

a sense of shame that I was imperfect, 

that I made mistakes, 

that I couldn't get everything "just right." 

A very wise woman one day said to me 

"What right have YOU to be perfect?" 

And I thought about that deeply 

and how even my highest heroes had imperfections, 

and YES, those very flaws were what made them unique, 

human, personal. 

It was a Kairos moment for me. 

Giving up the HUBRIS of thinking I could be perfect. 

And yet there is something "perfect" 

which is willing to make its home in us, 

to grace us with miraculous happenings, 

if we can simply get these silly notions of "perfection" 

out of the way, 

that illusion 

that we can control everything (or ANYTHING!).

~J

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We Must Believe.......

"People must not be afraid to take second step.'

It seemed and still seems to have two sides. 

First of all, it seems connected with a quite 

new scale of attention, permanent attention, 

remembering all the time, as a continual state. 

We have to demand from ourselves. 

But it also seemed connected with the realization 

that quite new things are possible, that higher 

influences are much nearer than we thought, 

and that with their help our ordinary self, 

the machine, can actually be transcended. 

These two sides are inseparable, each impossible 

alone, but each making the other possible.

Only one has to believe that it is possible. 

The slightest breath of doubt, not only of those 

higher forces but of oneself, immediately seems 

to cut one off from new possibilities. 

Perhaps one has not only to believe new things 

possible, but to be sure that they will come." 

- Rodney Collin quoting Ouspensky in 

The Theory of Conscious Harmony

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My Sincerest Suggestion...

Salvador Dali

My sincerest suggestion 

to a “student of other worlds” is … 

LET THE OTHER WORLD IN. 

Do this by stopping thoughts or Imagination 

and allow the world of the Soul and the Divine 

to speak to you. 

Oh and a word of advice.... 

don’t let your mind get hold of it 

and turn it into Imagination. 

Keep the realizations of your Soul 

and the Divine to your Soul and the Divine. 

“Render onto Caesar what is Caesar’s 

and render onto God what is God’s.” 

In other words don’t let your machine 

run with the realizations of your Soul.

~Mervyn Brady

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St. Teresa...

 

Henri Matisse

St. Teresa reminds us of the love state 

that is available to us 

with the efforts that we are not stupid saints, 

we don’t look at the world and dismiss the events, 

that we stay present to the moment, 

as much and as long as we can, 

and in exchange we have the love of the higher.

It is also useful to look about the heavy lower hydrogens 

and find a small window and fly through. 

See the opportunities to fly higher 

if only to take a moment of peace and breathe. 

To be. 

Music, smiles, gentle touch, art, and reading, 

are all small windows.

~K

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Desire...

 

John Roddam Spencer Stanhope

“Desire is when you do what you want, 

will is when you can do what you do not want.”

― P.D. Ouspensky, The Fourth Way

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To Talk To Your Soul…

To talk to your Soul, 

Love or God, 

first be quiet and still, 

stay out of Imagination 

and act like you are in the presence of the Divine … because you are. 

The gods will communicate with you 

in their own way. 

Not in the way you imagine, 

but in their own way. 

Why not try to experience their way?

~Mervyn Brady,  "Thoughts on Imagination" 

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I Am Realizing...

 

I am realizing more and more 

that if I don’t create a separation from my thoughts, 

they will run me ragged. 

If I don’t allow a moment 

before an emotional impulse is acted out, 

to create a space to make a choice 

(and this is the most difficult), 

then I will be reacting willy-nilly all over the place. 

If I am not making constant efforts 

to remember myself, 

then I will be living in lower worlds, 

where there is no perspective 

from which to make an act from my will. 

The moment I see the identification creep in 

is a sort of threshold. 

I try to move across this threshold into my kings, 

where the vantage point is broader. 

This helps me.

~J

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Many Believe...

 

Michaelangelo

"Many believe - and I believe -

that I have been designated for this work by God.

In spite of my old age,

I do not want to give it up;

I work out of love for God

and I put all my hope in Him."

~Michaelangelo

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Naivety and Denying Force

Cat & Dragon Tatoo - Credit to Whoever credit is due

 

I have been studying denying force for many years in my own life because early in the work I realized that a feature of naivety prevents me mechanically from seeing denying force (for example ‘reading the room,’ seeing other peoples reactions, pausing, not just blundering on ahead blissfully ignorant). Mechanically we can try to map out something—for example if I do A then B or C will happen. But if we cannot see our own mechanics, our part in the play from the position of ‘the observer’ or ‘the witness,’ then we are under the law of our own actions and their effects. I try to introduce intentional awareness into daily life. In the past many problems occurred, making self remembering and staying in the present moment difficult as there were many surprising, unexpected, and difficult events. One memorable photograph from Mervyn was a short conversation we had that I remember years later.
Mervyn: “Beth, you think everyone can self-remember don’t you.”
It was a statement not a question.
Beth: “Oh yes Mervyn, of course I do.”

By understanding our mechanical reactions it's often a very individual process. Some denying force is natural for all.

Reducing denying force can reduce inner considering, imagination, fear, and mechanical tendencies that cause identification and loss of presence.

Everyone has their own personal denying forces that can be thought about and planned for in advance. So knowledge of the mechanics can be important to reduce and allow for denying forces, increasing the likelihood of keeping presence in the moment. The Buddha was quoted to have said “When you eat, eat. When you sleep, sleep. When you walk, walk." In presence, moment by moment.

We often clearly see what is denying force for others, and they see it in us, but seeing the denying force we create in ourselves is more difficult. This is where photographs offered by other students can help. Maybe not at the time, but later a friendly text, email, or phone call may come. They give us a great gift when they feel able to pass on a photograph that will be received with gratitude.

 

Exerpts from Chatzy Sunday Global Meeting Feb 2026 by MK 

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I Think...

Roy Lichtenstein

I think we can think of identification 

in terms of strength, frequency, 

and duration of the identification. 

If I don't make efforts 

to divide my attention throughout the day, 

all those will be long and breaking away from them, 

very difficult. 

Being a good householder: 

making efforts to divide our attention, 

to feed our soul, 

will make it easy to walk away 

from a moment of identification.

~T

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Identifying...

 

Rene Magritte

"Identifying or "identification" is a curious state 

in which man passes more than half of his life. 

He identifies with everything: 

with what he says, what he feels, what he believes, 

what he does not believe, what he wishes, 

what he does not wish, what attracts him, 

what repels him. Everything absorbs him, 

and he cannot separate himself from the idea, 

the feeling, or the object that absorbed him. 

This means that in the state of identification 

man is incapable of looking impartially 

on the object of his identification. 

It is difficult to find the smallest thing 

with which man is unable to "identify". 

At the same time, 

in a state of identification 

man has less control over his mechanical reaction 

than at any other time. 

Such manifestations as lying, imagination, 

the expression of negative emotions, 

and constant talking need identification. 

They cannot exist without identification. 

If man could get rid of identification, 

he could get rid of many useless and foolish manifestations."

~P.D. Ouspensky

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The Tempest

The Tempest - John William Waterhouse, 1916

O! I have suffered. With those that I saw suffer! 

- Miranda- William Shakespeare

Do not pray for strength 

Pray to be pierced 

Pray to be opened 

And willingly offer your pain 

In exchange for the birth of your Soul. 

No quarter must be given.

Mervyn Brady

"When we suffer, it is as though we are on a stormy ship at sea. 

In an ordinary state of mind, it is hell, the waves are relentless. 

Men are thrown overboard, the ship threatens to sink. 

Hopelessness sets in. Feelings of doom. 

No one can help. We withdraw into tears of sadness, 

wanting to be left alone in a pool of pity.

Surrender and yield to the natural flow of your life. 

Stop resisting.

Your pain arrives like a dark cloud, resting as a 

heavy weight on your chest. Take a moment. 

Breathe in the crisp air of suffering. Let it fill your lungs. 

Allow it to infuse every cell of your body. 

The philosopher knows he or she cannot do much against nature. 

This is the Tempest, the dark night of your soul."

(...)

"You begin to realize that you are here and present. 

Feelings of hope awaken within...Like the weather, 

life in the creature world is ever changing. One day soon, 

the clouds will dissipate; rays of sunlight begin to peer through. 

Eventually the storm quiets, silence sets in. The calm after the storm.

Tears of joy fill your eyes. Your heart fills with love of 

God and mankind. You have nothing left, yet you 

have everything. You are blessed to be alive. 

With radiance from your heart and soul you desire 

to share your joy with others."

~Lauren - excepts from a hand written note

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