SUFI-METHODS

Sufis stay in the centre,
because in meditation
they become mirrors.
The King can look at their faces
and see His original state.
Give the beautiful ones mirrors,
and let them fall in love
with themselves.
That way they polish their souls
and kindle remembering in others.
What is the mirror of being?
Non-being. Always bring a mirror
of non-existence as a gift.
Any other present is foolish.
An empty mirror and your worst
destructive habits,
when they are held up to each other,
that's when the real making begins.
That's what art and crafting are.
Your defects are the ways that glory
gets manifested.
Whoever sees clearly what's
diseased in himself
begins to gallop on the way.
There is nothing worse
than thinking you are well enough.
More than anything, self-complacency
blocks the workmanship.
Put your vileness up to the mirror
and get that self-satisfaction
flowing warp out of you!
Your stream water may look clean
but there's unstirred matter on the bottom.
Your shaykh can dig a side channel
that will drain that waste off.
Trust your wounds to a teacher's surgery.
Flies collect on a wound. They cover it,
these flies of your self-protecting feelings,
your love for what you think is yours;
let a teacher wave away the flies
and put plaster on the wound.
Don't turn your head. Keep looking
at the bandage place.
That's where the light enters you.
And don't believe for a moment
that you're healing yourself.
There are guides who can show you the way.
Use them. But they will not satisfy your longing.
Keep wanting that connection
with all your pulsating energy.
The throbbing vein will take you further
than any thinking.
Muhammad said: "Don't theorize
about the essence";
all speculations
are just more layers of covering.
Human beings love coverings!
They think the designs on the curtains
are what's being concealed.
Observe the wonders as they occurs
around you.
Don't claim them. Feel the artistry
moving through, and be silent.
Look carefully around you
and recognize
the luminosity of souls.
Sit besides those
who draw you to that.

Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi

 

When you realise the mystery of Oneness with
the Divine, you will know that you are no other
than God, and that you have always been and
will always be beyond every time and place.
Then you will understand that all your actions
are His actions, and your essence is His essence,
and all your attributes belongs to Him.
The soul that understands that
it does not see God through itself
but through God,
so that it is not the soul which loves God
but God who loves Himself.
The soul sees God in all beings,
But only because it is God who is looking.
He is loved and beloved,
seeker and sought.

Ibn‘ Arabi

 

During the seminars Burhanuddin offers moments of sohbet. This Arabic word means ‘being connected’ and it is the traditional way the Sufi masters use to sit and transmit the teachings and the secrets of the Way in a relaxed and open manner. Sohbet means 'being together', 'sharing'. It does not refer only to the external circumstances where the disciples sit in a circle, to listen to the Sheikh. It indicates also a particular inner event, which can occur only when the disciple is listening to the teacher and grant him the permission to work on him. It means being present, being one, to swim in the same waters. Only if the intention is the same, it becomes possible to visit the same regions.

Burhanuddin likes to guide the participants through few Sufi ancient methods, like “the mirror”. A simple and very powerful exercise that through the mirroring with a partner, brings the participants to look closer at themselves and to recognize the partner is not different from himself, but just another of the numberless aspects of the Oneness of Being.

Burhanuddin introduces as well the “red carpet”, a guided strong experience of death that the great master of the past Ibn‘ Arabi, the Pole of Knowledge, used to practised daily, lying on a red carpet.

Among the others, also an ancient meditation called Huwa”, designed to experience, through a guided journey, the different aspects of the Light of God. Huwa means “And He is”.

Dhikr
Literally means "remembrance of God", and it is the most known traditional Sufi practice, performed individually or in community, consisting in repeating some of the Most Beautiful Names of God, His 99 Attributes, with a loving and passionate heart. It is said the dhikr is the door to the Divine.
The more we remember God, the more we forget about ourselves, our ego (nafs, in the Sufi language), the troubles maker. If the ego is abandoned even if for only one single moment, then for that moment we become divine action. Because only God exists.
A Sufi tries to have constantly, whatever he is doing, working, sitting, walking, or lying down, the Names of God on his lips and in his heart. The constant repetition bring to a chemical transformation in our system and will pull us closer to the Source.
Burhanuddin, coming from the Naqshbandi tradition which is known to have great mastery into the secrets of the practice of the dhikr, is familiar with its science and applications. He is able to assign personally the most proper dhikr and the right amount of repetitions to each one of the participants, according to their dispositions and individual needs.


The most used dhikr is: La ilaha illa ‘Llah (there is no divinity, but God).
By divinity is meant all our ideas, judgements, wishes, fears. The Sufis approach God through many divine Names that express His various attributes, but the Name Allah‚ combines and transcends them all. Allah is the Supreme Reality. The word expresses the Oneness of Being and the Nothingness. God embraces all opposites.

 

Wherever you find yourself,
whether in worship
or in ordinary life, contemplate God
– in what you eat,
what you drink, whom you marry,
always aware that
he is both the Contemplated
and the Contemplator.

Abd Al-Kader

 

No one anywhere can keep us
from carrying the Beloved
wherever we go;
No one can rob His precious Name
from the rhythm of my heart -
steps and breath.

Hafiz


Getting doors open
one after the other
is the essence of prayer.
Every door is a passage,
another boundary we have
to go beyond.
We squeeze ourselves through,
and then go.
Farther.
After all,
the purpose of the Prayer
is not to stand and bow
all day long.
The purpose is to possess
continuously
that fragrant state
which appears to you
in prayer.
Asleep or awake, writing or reading,
in every state never be empty
of Remembrance.
Be rather one of those moving
constantly
within prayer.


Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi

 

Praying sincerely
is a high risk venture.
You must wager your self
and hope to lose.
When you strip off
your self-image,
there is no devotion or devotee.
Lover and beloved
are united,
in the light
of your eyes.

Mahmud Shabistari

Prayer
It is the easiest and straightest way to connect with the Absolute. When you are in prostration your heart is higher than your head, so the heart energy can finally drown the mind. Burhanuddin, during the seminars, explains the inner meanings, the beauty and the depth of the prayer, step after step according to the tradition of Islam, which means  ‘to entrust the divine will’.

I have prayed so much thats
I myself turned into prayer.
Everyone who sees me begs
a prayers
from me.

Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi

Breathing
One of the basic method taught by Burhanuddin during the seminars, is the Sufi breathing. He combines the breath with the absorption of the Light and the repetition of the Sacred Names. A very effective way to balance the whole being, in just few breaths.

 

There is a way of breathing
that‘s a shame and a suffocation
and there‘s another way of expiring,
a Love breath,
that lets you open
infinitely.

Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi 

A man in the upstairs apartment yelled to Mulla Nasrudin downstairs, "If you don't stop playing
that clarinet, I will go crazy." "Too late now,"
said Nasrudin. "I stopped an hour ago, Sir."

Mulla Nasrudin's young wife, recently returned from her honeymoon, was complaining to her friend about her husband's drinking habits.
"If you knew he drank, why did you marry him?" her friend asked. "I did not know he drank,"
said Nasrudin's wife, "Until one night
he came home sober."

Mulla Nasrudin sat fishing in a bucket of water.
A visitor, wishing to be friendly, asked,
"How many have you caught?
"You are the ninth," said Nasrudin.

Sufi Stories
The Sufis love to convey their message also through traditional and modern stories. They often gather together and share their love for God also in this way, sitting relaxed in an open circle in front of a cup of tea. A Sufi story, when used for teaching purpose, has different levels, they say at least seven levels of understanding, and every time you listen to it, it is never the same story and offers you a deeper teaching.

One morning the Sheikh of Istanbul, looking for a successor, sent his disciples forth to get flowers to adorn the lodge. By late morning all of them returned, holding in their arms big bunches of the most beautiful and exotic flowers, spending all their little fortune over it. But only one disciple was missing. The sun was setting but yet he was not showing up. Finally, late in the night, he returned, holding in his hands a small, withered flower. When asked why he didn‘t bring anything worthy of his master, he answered, “Well, I was looking and looking, but all the flowers I saw around were busy in recollecting God, singing “La ilaha illa ‘Llah, La ilaha illa ‘Llah….”. How could I interrupt this constant prayer of theirs? So finally at the end of the day I saw a little withered flower. That flower had finished its prayer. That one I brought”. It was he who became the next Sheikh.