"I know I am nothing, no-thing, no-thing, not me, not me. I’m just a wild-assed spark of the Infinite functioning in the Finite! My viewpoint is that you surrender yourself to your deeper spiritual self, and be that spiritual self. Be who you are. And that’s what you are. You’re all God. You’re carrying around the generator of force within you. Use it. That’s what you got it for. You just needed some silly-billy like me to come along and mention it to you."
“Ignorance, the shadow, is the only obstacle that stands in the way of everyone in this room being fully realized right at this moment. Now, the first awareness might come to you in a moment when you are terribly frightened … Did you ever notice how clear everything becomes? You see all the details, just like that, because you have stopped this peripheral thinking and you have referred to the higher mind and consciousness, to that super-subtle state known as Buddhi. Now, that is right next door to Atma. If you have touched the Buddhi, or universal aspect, you are right next to touching Atma.”
~ Joe Miller (1904–1992) is one of the great “homemade” American Mystics of this century. He was recognized as an enlightened being by many spiritual authorities and revered as a mentor by many young seekers.
He and his wife Guin, best known for taking hundreds of people on their weekly walks through San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, were true torch-bearers of Love. They were hard to miss on the walk, two white-haired elders wearing T-shirts that read: “No Religion higher than Truth, no Power greater than Love” “Don’t bother just listening to the words, but try to get the feel of what I’m putting out! Realization can’t be taught, it can only be caught.” He would roar at his audience: “There are three things one needs for the spiritual path—common sense, a sense of humor, and more common sense!”
Joe’s quest received a great forward impetus when he met his fourth wife, Guin, a woman of his own age (for a change), an accomplished pianist. Together, they vowed to “grow geometrically” toward “falling awake” (a term they coined to express Enlightenment). His marriage to Guin provided Joe with the emotional equilibrium and spiritual camaraderie he needed to unlock that inner door. The key was love, unconditional love...
From then on, when others of their age had settled down to mahjong, Joe began to walk in the Golden Gate Park, singing and expounding to the many young people who came along. Always, balancing him beautifully, was his opposite and “better half,” his beloved Guin.
Without taking any titles, Joe was known among the Sufis as Murshid (Master) or Madzub (one crazy for God), among the Buddhists as Roshi or the “Sufi Lama,” and among the Vedantists as “Swami Joe.” Virtually every high Lama, Swami or Murshid visiting San Francisco would make their way to his door to pay their respects. The Ven. Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche called the musical meditations that Joe sang to his wife’s piano accompaniment “the first American mantras.” On his deathbed, the American Sufi Master Samuel L Lewis (a.k.a. Sufi Sam), entreated Joe to: “Take care of my disciples,” and for more thanJ twenty years, Joe lovingly fulfilled his friend’s request. But as Power writes: “Joe didn’t take any money for public speaking or private consoling. He absolutely refused the role of Guru or spiritual teacher. He referred to himself as ‘just a friend.’”
In Joe’s voice, “This isn’t something you can go to India and get, or the moon, or South America to get! It’s inside you. Just be still and find it and start living from there.” “The truth is, nobody can say it. You’ve got to be it!” Joe used his vaudeville flair: “You can get more stinkin’ from thinkin’ than you can from drinkin,’ but to feel is for real! And I Mean Really Feel!”. His advice on meditation was disarmingly simple: “Just take a gentle in-drawn breath into the heart and feel unselfish love flowing out. If you can do that you’re cooking on the big burner.”
Joe’s message was simple but powerful, direct but subtle: “Just be. But just be who and what you really are, in depth. Not what someone else tells you to be, or what you think you should be. Be. When you first wake-up in the morning, who are you then? When you say “I,” you put your hand to your heart, don’t you? Well, that’s headquarters, not in your head. Your head is just an outpost. You’ve got to get out of your cottonpicking mind! Go deeper.” Joe was always trying to break-up people’s fixed ideas and biases about how to get to the goal: Joe Miller“You’ve got to do it for you. No one can carry you piggy-back to the Reality. You’ve all got your own do-it-yourself kits. You don’t have to go to anybody else, pay out a lot of loot, do a hundred thousand gyashos, and contemplate your navel till it gets as big as a wash-tub. Just be still, be very still.”
~ http://ruhaniat.org/index.php/lineage/godparents/95-joe-and-guin-miller
Photo ~ Joe & Guin Miller
https://www.amazon.com/Great-Song-Life-Teachings-Miller/dp/0961891688
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