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Barry Long

83 quotes

“I suppose the most radical part of my teaching at present is that love is not a feeling. Everybody suffers from love, or the fear of it, or the lack of it. Why? Why is love so universally and inevitably heart-breaking, whether it be through the end of a love affair, the death of a loved one or being locked in with the habitual casualness or grim indifference of a partner? The answer is because we've been taught and conditioned by the world to believe that love is a feeling.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Love is not a feeling; it's a sensation. Drinking water when you're thirsty is a sensation, not a feeling. Being in nature or swimming in the sea is a sensation, not a feeling. Lying down when you're tired is sensational, not a feeling, although you may say it feels good. Feeling is an emotional interpretation of experience and these sensations don't need interpretation; they are just good or right. Making physical love rightly is a sensation, not a feeling. So is the love of God. The same goes for joy and beauty; both are sensational.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“But in our ignorance we emotionalise joy, beauty and love. We make feelings of them, personal interpretations based on our old emotions. We put our personal past on the present with the result that joy, beauty and love don't seem to last. But it's our emotional substitutes that don't last and we become bored, discontented and unhappy again. The sensation or knowledge of joy, beauty and love is of course still there but it's overwhelmed by these coarser feelings.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Feelings are constantly changing. None is dependable for long. You can love someone intensely today, and tomorrow or next month not feel a thing. Except perhaps for the feeling of doubt or depression that what was so beautiful could change so quickly.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Okay, so you don't have drugs, alcohol and sex but you love someone, as a feeling. Then it won't be long before you'll be experiencing one or more of the painful feelings I've mentioned above - and thinking it's natural! Wait and see. Even in every day living you're continually interpreting experience via your emotions instead of being the experience direct. "This is good, that's bad," your feelings swing subtly to and fro all day long obscuring the reality, the sensational knowledge or gnosis that it's not bad at all; it's simply life as it is.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All feelings are false and deceptive. [...] Enlightenment is to be emptied (not empty) of feelings and thus at one with the pure sensation of divine being. And that pretty well sums up the whole spiritual process. But the spiritual process is so little understood that people don't realise their feelings are personal and false and have been misleading them all their life. If that's not true, why is humanity still unenlightened and basically unhappy after all this time - when enlightenment is the completely natural, sensational state of being every moment?”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“By disidentifying with your feelings you break your attachment to them. When that is done sufficiently you're back at the beginning, in pure sensation or unconditioned knowledge. You've been beating your head against the wall to get some feelings and all you've got to do is break the habit and get used to living anew without pain and conflict. But that's a mighty realisation, and a mighty simple one which few are going to accept - they'll be too busy defending their feelings! So, I guess I'll still be demonstrating this the day I die.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Incidentally, it seems to me that's why Andrew Cohen tells his students to be fearless and deadly serious. It takes that kind of one-pointed commitment to detach from the delusion of feelings and finally discover the blessing of the valiant; once freed of personal feelings the troublesome mind stops forever.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Enlightenment can't be pursued or sought after. [...] Truth is here now; no past, no future. People are unenlightened only because they believe in the truth of the past and therefore must look to the rewards of the future. To be enlightened, to return to the original state of life on earth, requires action now in the present with no reference to the past. What has to be done is to kill the old priest in you, starve out the traditionalist, the follower, the believer.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Action will happen in its own time. Action taken on strength of feelings inevitably leads to more feelings to correct the action previously taken - and so the feelings of discontent and conflict, and corrective actions go on and on repeating themselves.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If in your own experience you haven't yet learned the truth of the deception of feelings, then you just have to go on believing and thinking, having faith in the past and hope in the future, being happy today and unhappy tomorrow, but never being in command of your own life for long.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Love is the state of enlightenment and enlightenment is the state of love. You can't make any separation between them. Enlightenment is the state of no feelings and pure knowledge and so is love.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All your problems come down to love. Your love life is what your problem is, and everybody else's on earth. God in existence is man and woman. There's nothing else. And unless you have loved God in existence - your duality which is woman or man - unless you have united with that through love and devotion without going through your feelings of love, you're not going to be enlightened.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The love of man and woman is the beginning of the love of God. You can realise God within like many men have done. It's one of the rarest things on earth to realise God, but everybody seems to think that that's the end. Where I come from, realising God was the easy part of it. That God of love which is already here anyway - who wouldn't be able to realise it? The difficult part is to bring that God into this world where God or love is not, into that body listening to these words and this body speaking them. That's the task.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Yes, well I noticed that in your last issues' interviews with those Eastern teachers ["From light to Light," Jan. 1995], emptiness was mentioned a lot. I find that a wrong word. Because in God realisation and being one with God the Most High, the unspeakable one, there's no sense whatsoever of ever having done anything yourself. It is all done for you. It's by grace. And so it's not being empty, it's being emptied. There's a different emphasis or a different connotation to that.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Knowing Yourself - The true in the false, gradually strips away all self-delusion until all that remains is pure being.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“KNOWING YOURSELF means being able to separate the true from the false in yourself - love from emotion, joy from sentiment, Will from desire. No man can teach another self-knowledge. He can only lead him or her up to self-discovery - the source of truth.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You must not believe anyone in the search for truth; you have to find out for yourself. But although you are on your own, help will come when it is really needed.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You are either ready to discover yourself or you are not. Ready means you have been knowingly or unknowingly practicing self-observation.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You don't gather knowledge when you are getting to know yourself; you lose it. Many of your firmest ideas go out the window. You may feel naked, vulnerable, threatened, argumentative, angry.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is a little known fact that truth cannot be memorized. Truth has to be discovered now, from moment to moment. It is always fresh, always new, always there for the still, innocent mind that has experienced life without needing to hold on to what has gone before.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Absorb what is said as you read but endeavor not to hold on to it or think about it. Read in the moment and each step will take you closer to complete self-knowledge.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You must not believe me. You must realize it in yourself know it, for it is beyond words and thinking. And it has to be experienced without recourse to drugs or insanity.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To believe what another says about you is unconscious, robot thinking. Nothing is true in self-discovery unless it is true in your own experience. This is the only protection against the robot levels of the mind.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Truth does not need argument, agreement, theories or beliefs. There is only one test for it and that is to ask yourself 'Is the statement true or false in my experience?”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Truth cannot be taught but it is quickly recognized by the person ready to discover it.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is the conscious man or woman who finds the secret of happiness and contentment; and that, surely, is the ultimate success.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To listen, to learn, your mind has to be still. Have you ever observed that you can have only one thought in your mind at a time?”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When self-knowledge reveals the answer it will be a living fact in your own experience. At any time you wish to experience the answer it will be there, just as you can say 'It is night' or 'It is day'. You will know, while the rest of the world is arguing and speculating.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The only way we can ever get through to the truth is by finding out what we are not. We do that by looking, by observation.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“This process of self-discovery is scientific and the invariable rule of science has to be applied - experiment and observe. The experiment is to ask the question; the observation is to look at yourself and see what happens. Being a science the law cannot vary. Any apparent variation is in you: you will have stepped off the way of facts into conclusions. The sun is either shining or it is not. You do not have to conclude; you just look.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When you observe yourself you must not condemn or approve what you see. If you tell a lie there is no need to judge your-self. The judge cannot be the judged, and even to accept is to judge.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Your object is to see yourself exactly as you are. Self-knowledge is the discovery of the new: it looks beyond the world that has all the answers and no solutions.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The truth is that once you discover something is false you lose interest in it. Man no longer treasures what he thought was genuine once he discovers it is false. In this way truth is its own solution. Self-knowledge is the discovery of the false. You do not have to find what is true: when the false is discarded truth is there. It always was. Just keep observing the fact and the change will come automatically and will he lasting.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Love is beyond description; but not beyond demonstrating. Love is beyond the mind because it is always new. Any product of the mind is a reaction of the past, a synthesis of what is old. So the mind is a modifier, a reactor; a renovator, but it cannot create the new.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When the robot mind is mastered, undisciplined thinking ceases and is replaced by awareness. Awareness can know love. You can only experience the new when you are aware, when you are without thought.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“IF YOU LOOK at life's totality you will notice that every living thing exists for something else. The failure to give and receive is followed first by unconsciousness and then death.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Man conscious is man immortal. Man conscious gives to the creation as no other thing can give and is beyond death. But it is no use my just saying this. You must discover it, realize it for yourself.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Worry is a purely selfish expression. The fact is that to worry or suffer mentally you have to have an opinion. You have to say 'That is bad in relation to me.' The opinion will prevent you from seeing the truth.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“THE STATE OF AWARENESS is the state in which you see things as they are: the precious facility that life has given man to escape the mastery of the robot. It is the habit of the mind to destroy the state of awareness as quickly as possible. It does this by judging, for judging is thinking.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is only one thing in your life YOU can be sure of. That one thing is this moment, now. The last moment has gone forever. The next moment has not come. YOU can become fully conscious only when you are living in the moment. To begin to live in the moment you have to know it exists and understand it. To understand it you have to observe it in relation to yourself and in relation to life. When you understand it, when you become conscious, you will see it is all that exists. To see this is to glimpse reality.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The more you observe life in relation to yourself the more you will see the fact that you are hardly ever correct when you think about something in the future. The future exists only in imagination; and that is why, no matter how hard you try to imagine it, you will not be able to predict the future with total certainty.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The moment is your only duty. Your duty at any time in your life is to do what you have to do from moment to moment. What you have to do is what you cannot avoid doing. What you cannot avoid doing is what you do.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is only because you are a machine that you suffer; and the purpose of suffering is to wake you up.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The moment is God's will. Life reveals itself only to the conscious. The disharmony is in the robot mind's desire to control life to suit its individual interests - an impossibility; but you keep trying.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We can rarely see things from the point of view of another person because we look at the facts through the screen of an impression or an interest which distorts our view; and then there are accusations, quarrels and misunderstanding.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You will become more conscious if you use the moment of being rebuked or blamed to observe your reaction. You will observe yourself making an excuse, giving a reason.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Each moment provides a challenge to you to become conscious. The game is to be waiting, and aware.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You can predict exactly what a machine will do if you have sufficient knowledge of it. A machine cannot go beyond the limitations of its design. The man-machine fears death because a machine cannot see beyond its own destruction.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“One of the greatest steps in self-discovery is to see that you are a machine. Only the few who have real knowledge will admit to being machines.”
Barry Long (1926–2003) said by 2003 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source