From the Editors

   Enza Vita                        Leo Drioli

Adelaide issue 10 & Sydney issue 3

"What's wrong with right now unless you think about it?

How much of what we perceive of the moment is not the moment? Stop for a second and be with where you are right now...watch how long it takes before a thought enters...keep watching...pretty soon you'll be on your way down the stream of what appears to be, remembering the past and fantasizing about the future. What happened to right here, right now?

Nothing really. This moment always is, it's only our identification with the content of our minds that makes it seem that we are not present. So much of our time is spent in this projection of expectation and judgment onto the screen of what's really here and now, that we miss out on the miracle of what's  before us.

Have you had the experience of stepping onto an escalator that isn't moving and try as you might, you simply can't remove the strange expectation of travelling on a moving escalator even though it's really stationary? You've probably found yourself feeling the eeriness of the "ghost" sensation of the moving escalator, superimposing itself over you as you are walking up a stationary set of steps. This is how much our memory and anticipation of what  is, affects what is.

And yet, as the teachers of awakening  are here to remind us...even the content is OK, so long as we cease seeking an identity in it.

"What's wrong with right now unless you think about it?" is a very precise question and the title of a wonderful book by Sailor Bob Adamson, an Australian teacher based in Melbourne. Visiting him recently confirmed the sneaking suspicion that right here, right now is fine just as it is - there's not a lot we really need to do to get it. But we do need to be willing to end the search...to stop falling back into being the seeker...and surrender to the self-evident truth that already is...always is... right here, right now.

"If there is no thought, what is wrong with right now, if you're not thinking about it! If everything is just as it is - unaltered, unmodified, uncorrected - what is it?" Sailor Bob asks. "It is just as it is! Just one, as is."

It is so simple to say...so simple to do...yet so very easily eludes us. This is the beauty and the challenge that meets us all at every turn, until we finally come to the place where we've simply had enough of the search...and then the  wonderful opportunity to drop back into truth awaits us.

If we are willing, teachers and teachings are everywhere. This world mirrors our journey and every day is another opportunity to meet the truth.

Gangaji was in Australia recently and we were fortunate enough to attend a retreat with her in Byron Bay. Her approach is to  gently help us to remember and return to the deep being that we already are, beneath all the clothes of our stories.

We witnessed person after person going up and sitting with her, and in a matter of minutes, she was able to skilfully guide each one  out of their story and into the light of their  own true nature, always available in the truth of the here and now.

"The simplicity of the truth is what keeps it out of reach of any concepts which might be used in the moment to point to it. It is out of reach," Gangaji reminds us "because it is too close to be reached. Concepts of the mind are distant compared to the closeness of the truth of who you are.
"At a certain point you recognize that you don't understand a thing, and you experience a moment of surrender. The paradox is  that, as soon as you surrender the need to understand, you do understand; and the moment you think you do understand, you don't understand.

"In your willingness right now, in this moment, to relinquish all understanding, all that you ever searched for through understanding is revealed."

This moment is a blessing. Step into it no matter what it may be for in it is the truth and the presence that we have sought for so long. Are you still asking how?

"Come to a Full Stop!" Sailor Bob reminds us. "What's wrong with right now unless you think about it!"

With love, Leo and Enza.

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