http://sufism.org/category/podcast Weekly/Periodic discourses covering various topics including Sufism, Rumi's Poetry, Mevlevi Order, Islam and Quran. Wed, 22 Feb 2012 16:01:34 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=The Threshold Society Podcasts Here you will find audio recordings of periodic (often weekly) discourses by Kabir Helminski and Camille Helminski on spirituality and sufism. Kabir Helminski clean Kabir Helminski tech.whiz@yahoo.com tech.whiz@yahoo.com (Kabir Helminski) The Threshold Society The Mevlevi Order Sufism, Rumi, Mevlana, Islam, Quran, Love, Peace, Consciousness, Unity, Oneness, God, Allah, Hu, Muhammad, Ali, Shams Tabriz, Konya http://sufism.org/wp-content/themes/threshold/icons/rss.png http://sufism.org/category/podcast TV-G Watsonville, CA Weekly http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/resentment-sohbet-janury-14th http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/resentment-sohbet-janury-14th#comments Sun, 22 Jan 2012 00:13:34 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=14525 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/resentment-sohbet-janury-14th/feed 0 On the importance of clearing every trace of resentment from our hearts in order to attain communion with the Divine in meditation. On the importance of clearing every trace of resentment from our hearts in order to attain communion with the Divine in meditation. Kabir Helminski clean 51:59 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/sincerity http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/sincerity#comments Thu, 12 Jan 2012 03:56:11 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=14417 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/sincerity/feed 0 A discussion of the importance of "Sincerity" with Shaikh Kabir. A discussion of the importance of "Sincerity" with Shaikh Kabir. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/rumi-shams-and-life-of-the-heart http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/rumi-shams-and-life-of-the-heart#comments Tue, 15 Nov 2011 11:23:44 +0000 Camille.Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=14077 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/rumi-shams-and-life-of-the-heart/feed 0 A beautiful talk by Camille. Trees are metaphysical witnesses, prophets from all the traditions as well as suppliers of refuge and gifts for all of creation.   Rumi and Shams address surrender, satisfaction, remembrance, real Friendship, and contentment.  To be in Paradise, stop complaining; greet whatever comes as if it’s our greatest happiness.  Say, “It's just like that,” and keep going. The Friend is generous and wise, removing obstacles even if we don’t know it, providing our daily portion from His granaries in the mysterious world of the beyond.  We are not given too much all at once so we don't become rebellious and wayward.   We have two aspects.  One is forgetful.  It becomes wayward sometimes, absorbed with things that are pulling at us in the world.  The other has the capacity to be deeply intimate with the Beloved.  On God kneading the earth for forty dawns to create Adam, Mevlana notes how the kneading occurred at dawn.  If it had been at night, we would all be dark and heavy.  And if it had been in full daylight we’d all be so light.  But He did this at dawn, so that we are some of each.  Regarding the hadith “The faithful one is the mirror of the faithful one,” Mevlana says the word Mu’min is one of the names of God, but also applies equally to His servants.  “The mu’min is the mirror of the Mu’min,” means that God unveils Himself in the mirror.  Mevlana says when the sun shines in a mirror it can’t say anything but “I am the sun.”    Shams tells us that God asked from human beings surrender, satisfaction and remembrance.  Surrender is in acts of devotion.  Satisfaction is demonstrated through service and the seeker’s relationship to God.  Remembrance is knowledge of God.  If we wish to escape from hell, we should serve.  If we want to reach the garden, we should be obedient and surrender.  If we desire the intercession of the Prophet, we should make an intention.  God will show us His signs from the farthest horizon and within ourselves until we know the Truth. The mystic never tires of recollecting The Friend and can never have enough of that Friendship.  Signs of a mystic are:  a heart occupied with the thought of God, a body that serves God and an eye that attempts to see God.    In community we can see through each other and be seen by each other.  Knowledge consists of a tongue that mentions God, a heart that thanks him/her, and a body capable of patience.  Four precious things are a rich person who is patient, a poor person who is content with his portion, a sinner who fears God, and a scholar who knows how to abstain.  We are to guard our religion through generosity and good character.  We are to be aware of greediness in wealth, giving from our possessions only out of the longing for the Face of the Beloved One.   Sound Quality:  Good Camille.Helminski clean 58:54 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/the-seeker-will-appear-in-the-sought http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/the-seeker-will-appear-in-the-sought#comments Sat, 22 Oct 2011 18:25:42 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13928 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/the-seeker-will-appear-in-the-sought/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. We often attempt to deepen in a Reality that may seem fragile, distant or not there at all.  Experiences of devotion come easily within certain external frameworks, like holy places in Turkey, the Mevlevi Tradition’s homeland.  The challenge is to sustain some of that orientation every day.   In speaking about Hajj, the Mevlevi Tradition says the Kaaba is the heart of the perfected human being and that the Kaaba is potentially in our hearts.  Mecca, Medina, the Dome of the Rock, Sultan Ahmed Jami, Mevlana’s turbe, Shamsi’s masjid–-all Realities–-are within us. Sometimes we have to discover our heart through something outside ourselves.  In this manner, we build the inner masjid, the inner turbet, the inner tekke.   We’re lucky to be in this situation:  our work helps humanity as well as ourselves. Breathing with awareness benefits us.  We can qualify the breath with the names of God.   The breath touches all levels in a human and through it we can experience all  levels of Reality.  The seven levels in humans are:  (1) a trust in God as our foundation and with that trust, knowing no fear; (2) nurturing the sensory side of our being, loving it, keeping it within the context of the Divine Reality, and mastering it so we can be at home in this body, in this natural world; (3) having a healthy sense of life purpose that is in service; (4) using the heart’s capacity for unconditional love and openly embracing life, relationship, the imperfect, and the unlovable; (5) expressing that capacity creatively, appropriately, in relationship and in devotion; (6) a sense of  vision connecting us to everything beyond time and space–-a very refined, vibrational knowing where we perceive meanings, envision possibilities and glimpse our sense of Unity, even beyond unconditional love.   The seventh level is virtually inexpressible.  Like the Fount of Abundance, it flows upward and outward to Infinity, into the Higher Dimensionality of which we are part. Mevlana beautifully advises us to repent, to start fresh or open–-or to open more.  Repentance creates a framework for devotion.  In our spiritual practices, we dip into the Higher Dimensional Reality of which we are a part for a little while.  The perspective of that other Reality–-Haq, the Creative Truth–-remains.   Everyday life is experienced within the context of Devotion to the Dost–-that Higher Dimensional Reality known as the Beloved or the Beloved Friend, which is loving, harmonizing, healing, and redeeming. Shams tells that “the seeker raises his head also amid The Sought.”  A Quranic  passage shows the murid being the seeker and also the one who is wishing, desiring, longing for Unity and then becomes the murad (the one who is willed by God.)  Shams tells us the one who is useful to others is doing what needs to be done.    Mevlana’s It is Thou tells there is “never room in this house for two I’s.”   Painting: Big Red Heart by Paul Tokarski Sound Quality:  Good Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/it-no-longer-remains-this-world http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/it-no-longer-remains-this-world#comments Mon, 19 Sep 2011 18:28:32 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13934 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/it-no-longer-remains-this-world/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/unite-with-the-living http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/unite-with-the-living#comments Sat, 27 Aug 2011 08:12:59 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13713 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/unite-with-the-living/feed 0 Kabir and Camille read Rumi passages taken from the new day book.   A connection is  made with the perspective arising from the passages by thinking a little bit  about every day life and our everyday concerns. Kabir and Camille read Rumi passages taken from the new day book.   A connection is  made with the perspective arising from the passages by thinking a little bit  about every day life and our everyday concerns.  A brief discussion about the things that preoccupy our hearts and minds helps really appreciate what Mevlana is saying and what he’s offering.  This begins with a recognition that most of us spend a lot of time each day trying to meet our responsibilities, doing the work we have to do, keeping up the communications we have to keep up. We ask questions like “Am I doing my job right?”   “Am I fulfilling my responsibilities?” “Am I doing my work as well as I should/could do it?” This is the focus of much of our everyday consciousness.  The passages clarify that there is much more than this. Mevlana takes us far beyond our everyday concerns by putting them into a perspective that’s quite shockingly different from the way we often see things.   What’s shockingly different is that upon entering that dimension, that Reality, all the questions are answered and put into the perspective of trust and faith.  We can even say a kind of bliss results.  If we know that we are of that other dimension, and if we in fact experience that Dimensionless Reality–which is pure abundance, guidance, beneficence and love– we can suddenly see differently all the things that we’re so prone to be distracted by, to worry over, to be fearful about, to try to strategize, to try to plan. Sound quality: Good Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/we-fell-in-love-with-lowliness http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/we-fell-in-love-with-lowliness#comments Sat, 13 Aug 2011 18:34:33 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13516 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/we-fell-in-love-with-lowliness/feed 0 Our essence, at the core of each of us, is not static and fixed for all of life. It is transformed through our daily experiences, every joy, every grief we suffer, within a context of awareness of divine presence, mercy, and guidance. - Our essence, at the core of each of us, is not static and fixed for all of life. It is transformed through our daily experiences, every joy, every grief we suffer, within a context of awareness of divine presence, mercy, and guidance. As our spiritual awareness grows so does our awareness of our own limitations and helplessness, yet we must not allow that awareness to separate us from God. The advice of the Qur'an, Ibn Abada, Rumi and all the saints of this path is that our primary jihad (struggle) is to remember God, to trust God, to call God's presence and see God as our companion in all our states -- in our weakness and in our strength. That becomes our abiding awareness of the Mercy that is the essential characteristic of the universe and will not leave us in a state of helplessness forever. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/we-are-integral-to-this-truth http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/we-are-integral-to-this-truth#comments Sat, 06 Aug 2011 18:38:25 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13518 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/we-are-integral-to-this-truth/feed 0 The key points on the project of spiritual development describe a dynamic, very complete process that takes in every aspect of life.  The discussion frame consists of four parts.  An anonymous passage called The Many Forms of Fasting marks the beginning. The key points on the project of spiritual development describe a dynamic, very complete process that takes in every aspect of life.  The discussion frame consists of four parts.  An anonymous passage called The Many Forms of Fasting marks the beginning.  Stories from Ibn Husayn Sulyami about ascetic Sufis who lived before there were Sufi orders set the context for understanding the ongoing evolution of Sufism.  Excerpts from Kabir’s Living Presence include words a teacher of his wrote on the back of a napkin when asked while having a coffee in a diner what the work is aiming toward.  Three Rumi quatrains–The Dog of Ego, To be Erased and Yourself without Yourself–are the fourth border for the conversation.  The latter concisely package the Astringency and the Mercy of spiritual endeavors. The spiritual practice of fasting has more than just a physical level of experience and the additional level is the most significant part.  We ask to fast from all that Allah does not love for us, to feast on what the Beloved loves for us, and to fast from thinking that we have any existence separate from Allah. A book on adab by Sulaymi from the earliest period of Sufism has stories about Sufis who lived before there were Sufi orders and who were mostly isolated, solitary, often wandering, ascetics.  The focus is on self negation, a prerequisite for the unfolding of love. After this early period, beginning around the twelfth century, a whole new energy entered Islamic spiritual life.  It manifested in tekkes and zoweas.  Ibn Arabi, as well as others in the thirteenth century, made this revelation more explicit than ever.  The Sufi path is framed in terms of love. Times and human conditions continue to change.  Now we live in a world where more choices and possibilities are presented to human beings than ever before.  This requires us to find some realistic and appropriate form of spirituality so we can go deep and be liberated from that from which we need to be liberated. Passages from Living Presence describe how cultivating conscious awareness makes the difference between being nominally alive and being alive abundantly.  Conscious awareness can develop all our faculties.  The body-mind-and spirit ecology becomes an interconnected whole.  When a harmonious relationship exists among all of these, we have abundant life.  The first steps in this process may be intellectual.  However, we must never forget that Reality or Truth is beyond anything we can say or formulate, and yet as human beings we can realize ourselves more completely if our ideas are in harmony with our possibilities.  It may not be possible or necessary to say what Absolute Truth is, but truth for the human being is something like this.  We are integral to the Truth not separate.  Not a mere part, but integral.  And we can experientially realize this. Sound Quality:  Good. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/community-call-jul-31-2011 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/community-call-jul-31-2011#comments Sun, 31 Jul 2011 21:00:23 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13300 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/community-call-jul-31-2011/feed 0 Audio recording of the community conference call held on Jul 31, 2011. Audio recording of the community conference call held on Jul 31, 2011. Kabir Helminski clean 43:56 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/zikr http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/zikr#comments Fri, 22 Jul 2011 09:18:44 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13362 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/zikr/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean 1:09:47 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/seeking-the-beauty-of-the-pir http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/seeking-the-beauty-of-the-pir#comments Sat, 09 Jul 2011 09:16:05 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13358 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/seeking-the-beauty-of-the-pir/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean 1:09:41 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/words-and-meaning http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/words-and-meaning#comments Sat, 25 Jun 2011 18:25:16 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13509 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/words-and-meaning/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/the-meaning-of-life http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/the-meaning-of-life#comments Sat, 18 Jun 2011 20:30:02 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/wp/?p=12717 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/the-meaning-of-life/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/adab http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/adab#comments Sat, 11 Jun 2011 20:27:51 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/wp/?p=12715 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/adab/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/the-word http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/the-word#comments Sat, 04 Jun 2011 16:50:35 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/wp/?p=12695 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/the-word/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/become-what-you-love http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/become-what-you-love#comments Sat, 28 May 2011 16:47:46 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/wp/?p=12691 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/become-what-you-love/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/enlightenment-happiness-peace http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/enlightenment-happiness-peace#comments Sun, 15 May 2011 16:43:39 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/wp/?p=12687 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/enlightenment-happiness-peace/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/al-qayyum-the-axis-of-reality http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/al-qayyum-the-axis-of-reality#comments Thu, 05 May 2011 16:40:11 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/wp/?p=12684 http://sufism.org/sufi-lodge/al-qayyum-the-axis-of-reality/feed 0 Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Recording of weekly sohbet with Shaikh Kabir and Camille Helminski. Kabir Helminski clean http://sufism.org/podcast/london-retreat-2011/awakening-the-divine-names-day-1-session-1 http://sufism.org/podcast/london-retreat-2011/awakening-the-divine-names-day-1-session-1#comments Sat, 30 Apr 2011 05:06:17 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13386 http://sufism.org/podcast/london-retreat-2011/awakening-the-divine-names-day-1-session-1/feed 0 Friday evening introduction with Kabir and Camille; loud and silent zhikr with Ya Lateef; nasheed by Zehra Naqvi; zhikr with Ya Waddud Friday evening introduction with Kabir and Camille; loud and silent zhikr with Ya Lateef; nasheed by Zehra Naqvi; zhikr with Ya Waddud Kabir Helminski clean 1:29:13 http://sufism.org/podcast/london-retreat-2011/awakening-the-divine-names-%e2%80%93-day-2-session-1 http://sufism.org/podcast/london-retreat-2011/awakening-the-divine-names-%e2%80%93-day-2-session-1#comments Sat, 30 Apr 2011 04:43:19 +0000 Kabir Helminski http://sufism.org/?p=13390 http://sufism.org/podcast/london-retreat-2011/awakening-the-divine-names-%e2%80%93-day-2-session-1/feed 0 Saturday morning Wird with Camille Saturday morning Wird with Camille Kabir Helminski clean 29:34