Something I have never quite understood is that after we come to this realization of the one self that we are not our [the] body or the mind or the thoughts, then we see the body die what then? And what is the difference in the death of a realized one and a unrealized person?
What happens when the body dies? That is a question that has plagued mortal man from the earliest days. So much of religion is basically an attempt to answer that question, with enough theories of heavens and hells to keep us debating for the rest of our lives.
So let me start by saying what seems obvious to me: I don’t know what happens after the body dies. And neither does anyone else. If you say, “well, we go to _________ after death,” or tell me about other dimensions, etc., I’m going to ask you a very simple question: How do you know? Have you died and then experienced these things? No, of course you haven’t. So death is as yet a mystery to you. (As for past lives, let me write a follow-up article to deal with them.)
Even if you’ve had a near death experience, all you can do is tell me about that particular experience, but not the full experience of death (notice they are called near death experiences). There is absolutely no way to know what happens after the body dies until it actually dies and you find out.
Observations about death and consciousness
That said, we can make a few interesting observations, though, about what might happen after death if you have realized the truth about what you are, namely the One.
1. When you realize that you are not the mind, the body, thoughts, the ego, etc., you realize that the awareness (or consciousness) that you are, the “you” that is looking out of your body’s eyes, is the same awareness looking out of everyone else’s eyes. And the same fundamental beingness that is the house you live in, the Earth you are standing on, the sky, the stars, your thoughts, others’ thoughts, the very fabric of reality. All One, all the same, all conscious, all aware.
2. When the body dies, and the thoughts in it die, and when the energy contained in it dissipates, and everything ceases, what happens to the awareness contained within it? Ah, trick question, for the awareness/consciousness is not contained within it! We are so used to feeling “trapped” in the body that we think we are actually trapped in a body. But we are not. What I am is the beingness that is Everything. And this beingness, this conscious awareness contains the body.
Look-up from your computer right now and look around the room. Is not your body contained in the room you are in? Isn’t it a part of the room? And the room, isn’t it a part of the building? And the city or town in which the building exists? And planet Earth? And so on until we get that this body is contained in the Universe as a whole? And you are the Universe. The awake, aware, conscious, alive Wholeness of existence, the totality of the Universe (and so much more), that is what you are. So, the body is actually contained in you. You realize this fact, too, upon awakening.
3. So, when the body dies, the conscious awareness that appeared to be within it doesn’t go anywhere, for nothing at all has been lost to the Universe. It has merely started to change form. But the consciousness itself is still right where it was before: everywhere! Nothing leaves, dissipates, disappears, or goes anywhere. The One is still ever present Oneness.
4. As for what awareness/consciousness that formerly identified as Tom experiences at death, I have no idea, and as mentioned before, neither does anyone else. This is still true whether you are “realized” or not.
What’s the difference between the death of the realized and unrealized?
And finally, let me answer the last question: “And what is the difference in the death of a realized one and a unrealized person?” I believe it was Sailor Bob Adamson who said, “The only difference between someone who has realized the truth and someone who hasn’t is that the realized one knows that there is no difference.” Once you realize the truth, you don’t know any differences.
While other people will still look different to you, have different color hair, wear different clothes, etc., you will have no awareness that any of that matters. They will still be what you are. So at death, how can there be any difference? To the realized one, whatever is experienced at death is experienced by every aspect of consciousness. He knows himself to be that consciousness, so nothing to him has changed. The form has changed, but nothing else. Everything is still everything. Oneness is still One.
And for the unrealized one? Again, it is impossible to say. You will simply have to die to find out what happens. I know this answer won’t make a lot of people happy, and it would ruin sales of lots of books if it were widely accepted as the truth that it is. But it is still the truth. We can argue until the cows come home, but it won’t matter. You can’t know death of the body until it dies. And then you will discover what happens next.
A few months ago, I addressed the frequently heard question of spiritual inquiry: who am I? Although there are debates about what form the question should take (I personally prefer “what am I?), the point of the question is quite simple: asking the question encourages you to turn within, have a look, and see what you discover. If you’ve never tried it, the results may surprise you! (Hint: don’t be shocked if you don’t find “anyone” when you look.)
Let’s have another perspective on the question, “Who am I?” I invite you to once again give your attention to the great master from the sock drawer, Puppetji.
I had the pleasure of interviewing a wonderful spiritual teacher, Larry Melton, who lives and teaches in Davis, California. Larry was a student of Adyashanti’s for a few years, and then after he experienced a profound spiritual awakening, he was asked by Adya to teach.
Our conversation is focused primarily on Larry’s experience of spiritual awakening, how that developed over the years he spent in spirituality, and what all of that has meant for his life. We also discussed awakening quite a bit, and it was fascinating to hear Larry’s perspectives and insights. I think you will agree. So click play below to listen now, or download the mp3 and take it with you on your iPod.
I know from my prior experience with videos that some of you may prefer to read rather than watch or listen. To accommodate everyone, I’ve had a transcript made of this interview. You can obtain the transcript by subscribing for free to my newsletter, Living from Consciousness. Enter your email address in the sign-up box to the right, and you will receive an email with instructions for downloading the transcript. Current subscribers will be receiving an email, too, with instructions for downloading.
I like to provide my subscribers with unique content not found here on the website, and this transcript is simply my way of saying thanks to my subscribers. Remember, the newsletter is free, and I respect your inbox and your privacy (but you knew that, right?).
In spiritual life there is no room for compromise. Awakening is not negotiable; we cannot bargain to hold on to things that please us while relinquishing things that do not matter to us. A lukewarm yearning for awakening is not enough to sustain us through the difficulties involved in letting go. It is important to understand that anything that can be lost was never truly ours, anything that we deeply cling to only imprisons us.
In my last article, I shared some ideas about the proverbial “enlightened guy.” As I mentioned, I prefer the term awakening as it has a little less historical baggage associated with it, but no matter, I think we all know at least something about the subject, no matter what we call it. As spiritual awakening is one of the primary topics of this site, I thought it would be good to have some more discussion about it. And interestingly, Adyashanti provided just what I needed.
Here is an excerpt from a satsang Adyashanti did at the April 2008 silent retreat of his that I attended. I’ll let him do the talking, then I will offer a few comments:
There’s awakening and then there’s awakening, isn’t there? There’s a moment that we can call an awakening moment… An awakening moment isn’t any old spiritual experience. As a matter of fact, it’s almost none of the spiritual experiences that we’re told that it is. But there can be a moment of awakening.
So there’s a moment of awakening, and then there’s actually being awake. And very often the moment of awakening, actually, it’s significant in the sense that something has fundamentally shifted, that you can’t go back on, even though you might re-delude yourself and lose sight of it and start a whole long process of struggling and then trying to maintain it. And all that stuff.
But ultimately something at the seat of consciousness has fundamentally shifted. Then there is the other awakening. It’s the other awakening that sort of is the process of awakening, which is that thing where it starts to dissolve the spiritual ego, dissolve the “me,” dissolve all those things that you immediately apprehend in the moment of awakening but doesn’t necessarily mean you are going to be living it a year later.
Then there is this dissolving away of all that which divides. And that for most people takes quite a bit of time. That’s the honest truth. Very few people are going to have, “Ah ha! Alleluia!” The lights turned on. And the lights are just going to stay turned on. Every now and then it happens, but usually it’s like, “Okay, now the other thing’s going to happen, and it’s going to be called the dissolving of you.”
Even though you’ve seen in that moment that there is no you, nonetheless the dissolving of you has now begun in earnest and you can expect it to continue in ways and to a depth that you never imagined. And that’s basically what it’s about.
And once that process has started, it doesn’t really need your help. It just can use you not hindering it. The “me” can’t help it along, but the “me” sure can kind of slow the whole thing down.
So, if we follow Adyashanti’s discussion, there is a moment of awakening, when what you are sees, truly sees itself for what it is. The illusion of a separate self disappears for a time, and you know yourself as One. Sometimes, this can be referred to as a “parting of the veil” of illusion.
But then, for most people, the process of awakening begins. Whatever parts of the “me” that are still hanging around, getting in the way of seeing Oneness in all places and in all moments, these parts will, seemingly over time, be dissolved. And, contrary to popular belief, this dissolving can be a process that takes years. Adyashanti has commented in other places that he has seen in take typically 3-15 years for most people.
Should we be surprised by the fact that there is awakening and then a process of awakening? Not really. For most people, that’s just the way it is. In the Zen tradition, the Sandokai says, “To encounter the Absolute is not yet Enlightenment.” Same basic idea. The veil parts, but then more is seen through over time. To be certain, this process has been my experience.
And yet. And yet, is that even true? While it may appear that a process is occurring, it also seems, to those who reach the endpoint of this process, as if the process never occurred. That which is awake is awake, now, forever, always. How can it ever be asleep, for it is the fount from which springs everything of form? I’m sorry to say it, because it can sound to the mind like I’m hedging, but awakening is filled with paradoxes. No way around it.
Of course, I will have more to say on the subject of spiritual awakening in future articles. I look forward to your comments! Namaste.
The other day I wrote a little article commenting on Eckhart Tolle and Oprah. A reader left some comments concerning Eckhart and the general issue of enlightenment, and rather than reply in the comments, I thought I would do a short article in response.
I think it is safe to say that my reader and I may not see eye to eye on the subject of enlightenment. I won’t try to summarize his point of view, but I encourage you to read the comments on that post.
Let me being by saying that I’m not really into the term enlightenment, so I will use the word awake or awakening. Just a matter of preference. Less baggage for me associated with the term awakening.
The only “criteria” I have for awakening is seeing, truly seeing, beyond the self, the “I”, the “me” that everyone thinks they are. When that is seen through, completely through, it is as if one has awakened from a dream, a dream of self. One then knows oneself as the Unborn as the Buddha would have said. Or we can say Emptiness, Spirit, the Formless.
However, as one great Zen master pointed out, “to encounter the Absolute is not yet enlightenment.” This awakening has to penetrate the entire being. When it does, the person knows through and through the truth: there is only One. Wherever they look, they see One. And this One has the appearance of form but is in fact Formless, Empty. When they look inside themselves, they see Nothing, Emptiness, the Absolute. All is Emptiness, all is One.
This whole awakening, then, is about identity. In my experience, it has nothing to do with experiences. One can have profound experiences of bliss, and even experiences of awakening, but that in and of itself is not it. When the sense of self has gone, that is it. No Self. Over and over, that message comes at us in spiritual literature (well, at least in “the good stuff”).
As for those who have awakened, in my experience, there are plenty. Eckhart for certain. They come in all shapes and sizes. I personally know a few that don’t look anything like the popular image of “an enlightened one.” The outer form means nothing. Absolutely nothing. Life expresses itself in all manner of forms. And in awakening, too. Here are a few examples of some well known and not so well known folks:
Ramana Maharshi (pictured left), who by anyone’s definition would meet the tests of “enlightened” sat around in a loincloth and asked for nothing (except a newspaper and food). And yet he had a strange obsession with a mountain. Go figure. He “looked the part” of the great enlightened one, partly because of his particular experiences and partly because he was living in India.
Nisargadatta Maharaj (pictured right), again someone who passes almost anyone’s “tests”, smoked cigarettes like a chimney and owned a little store (where he sold cigarettes amongst other things). He was a common man, uneducated, but as awake as could be. He certainly didn’t look enlightened. He even would shout at his visitors in his passion to bring the truth to them.
Okay, one more: my favorite is a man who currently plays banjo at the Grand Ole Opry and tells silly hillbilly jokes on stage. He is billed as a “banjer funnyman” yet when he has done satsang, the beauty of the truth in him echos from his voice. He is vibrant, alive, amazing. And yes, he was on Hee Haw 20 years ago (I’m not making this up, I promise!). His name is Mike Snider, and you can find out more about him here.
All awake. All aware of the Truth.
These are some examples. I know of others. As a matter of fact, I’m going to be posting an interview I did recently with someone who has realized the truth of who he is. He is a delight to speak with, but again, he won’t look like the common conceptions of “enlightened guy.” Which to me means those conceptions are probably quite mistaken.
To be honest, it is probably best to throw away these beliefs about enlightenment, and we should probably begin with the term enlightenment. Too much baggage as I said before. In point of fact, probably the best way to express it all is to simply say, “one who has realized the truth of who she is.” Much better. Because it isn’t any more complicated or exciting than that.
Again, as I mentioned above, that realization can’t simply be “oh, yeah, I get it.” It must penetrate deep, it must be thorough, it must be through the entire being. But don’t worry. You’ll know. Believe me, when the truth dawns, you won’t have any doubts. You probably won’t be able to stop laughing for a while.
As an addendum, I would like to thank Vern over at aimforawesome.com for getting this discussion rolling. He has a terrific blog with great articles and killer images. He writes from his experience, which is rare in the world of spirituality. Again, thanks Vern.
I recently received an email from Ariel Bravy that I really enjoyed and couldn’t wait to answer. With his kind permission, I’m going to answer it here. Ready? I’m going to break the email down section by section and respond to each part. Here we go:
Hey Tom,
You seem to be a pretty spiritually advanced seeker as well and I was wondering
if I could bounce some ideas off of you. Perhaps you could help bring some
clarity to something I’m looking at…
I’m going to start off with one of the first things Ariel mentions, not because I’m nitpicky today, but because it is something that I feel should always be addressed. And that is the idea of “spiritual seeker.” While I’m grateful for the compliment I’m given, I also want to point out that letting go of the spiritual seeker is an important thing. We spend so much time seeking that we rarely find. So much of the spiritual journey requires that we stop, just stop, right where we are, and let what is be what it is. No seeking. No pursuing. Just stopping and looking at what we’ve already found.
None of which addresses Ariel’s email, but still, it is important to make this point over and over again as it relates ultimately to spiritual awakening.
Following the self-inquiry of Who am I?, I’m finding that there is no decision
maker. With that understood, how does decision making and free will operate?
You got it, Ariel. There is no decision maker. I know that will be a tough one for lots of people to accept, but that has been a central teaching of Buddhism, for example, from the beginning (and many other -isms for that matter). It just keeps getting brought to our awareness century after century. And yet, a careful looking within will always demonstrate this simple fact: there is no self. Self-inquiry is such a marvelous tool. Useful in more ways than just for spiritual awakening.
The way I see it now is that the ego is like an automated process that takes in
all data, memories, desires, experiences, and so on in order to calculate the
most likely choice which will lead to egoic satisfaction and pleasure.
Ariel, you are a lot more generous to the ego than I am. To be honest, I don’t know how the ego works. I simply know that thoughts arise, they pass through my awareness, and then they are gone. The vast majority of them have virtually no useful purpose as they simply are commentary on my experiences.
You know, I love what Eckhart Tolle said about the ego: “It is no more than … identification with form, which primarily means thought forms.” In other words, the ego is simply a thought about who I am, what I am, a placing of my identity in things and thoughts. If that is true, which I submit it is, then giving the ego any attributes or characteristics doesn’t quite work for me. I prefer to see it for what it is, a chaotic, conditioned collection of mostly subconscious thoughts, and then always look beyond it, realizing it is nothing more than the “noise in my head.”
The higher self, on the other hand, doesn’t really make decisions either. It
simply knows the “best” path to walk to head towards the highest truths. It’s a
knowingness, not a decision, per se.
Okay, to be honest, and again this idea won’t be palatable to some, I don’t believe in a higher self. I go with Ramana Maharshi on this one: there is only Self. Period. Who is looking out of my eyes right now? Who is typing these words? Who is thinking my thoughts? Who am I? Self. One Self. Undivided. One with everything and everyone. Self. One without a second as Ramana used to say.
Now, that Self can appear to be unconscious as it expresses itself as Tom Stine, Ariel, Madonna or George Bush, but it is still the same Self, One, whole. I know that this seems contradictory, but my experience would say that it is true. Always One Self. Spirit. Life. God.
And this, my friends, points to what spiritual awakening is all about. It is awakening from the delusion that I am a separate self, an ego, a Tom Stine that is a body in this world. That is the sum and substance of all of spirituality right there: awakening from the dream called “me.”
Let me go further with Ariel’s email before I discuss further the points he makes above.
The ego may consider listening to the higher self if it is understood that by
following this process, one could reach the bliss, joy, freedom, and security
associated with enlightenment, again using practices such as releasing or
surrender for its own egoic desires.
Again, given what the ego is, a collection of conditioned thoughts filled with misplaced identity, I don’t think the ego “listens” to anything. It just reacts. It is a gigantic reaction to what is being experienced.
The Self that I am, that which you are, the One, is simply being deluded in a sense by placing attention on these condition thoughts. What we are is temporarily lost in thought you could say. Lost in a dream of judgments and reactions.
So there is no decision maker making decisions. There is a higher self as well
as a false mentally projected self who has the thoughts and emotions of the
mind attached to it.
Who is ultimately the decider of how we use our free will? Who decides if we
listen to our egos or our higher selves?
Any ideas?
Now we come to the heart of Ariel’s email. Who decides, then, how to use our free will? Who decides? Well, first of all, I have no free will. You have no free will. It isn’t that free will doesn’t exist. It is just that “I” don’t exist and “you” don’t exist. There is no separate self. There is no one here. If you do inquiry, and look within, and discover there is no decider, there is also no self. No one home. In Buddhism it is called the Doctrine of No Self.
So who decides? The Self, which is synonymous with Life, the Universe, God, Spirit, Buddha Nature, whatever you want to call it. The entire totality of Life, that is what makes the decisions. The fundamental ground of being, that’s the decider.
But even calling it decision making is missing the mark somehow. It isn’t really decision. Life simply flows. It arises from itself. It gives forth. It loves. It experiences. I think you could really say “It Operates,” but that doesn’t seem poetic enough. It simply IS.
But then, is there free will? Well, not in any human sense can it be said there is free will. But does the Self have free will? Does Life have free will? I think the question to ask would be “free of what?” Life is all there is. From what is it free to make decisions? It IS all decision making. There is nothing outside of it. It not only makes the rules, it IS the rules!
Answering your email, Ariel, was fun, and I’m deeply grateful for not only the questions but allowing me to answer them publicly. I hope all the above is clear to you and to everyone. And I hope I answered your questions! If not, hit the comments and let me know. I would love to hear from everyone. I always enjoy answering more questions. Namaste my friends.
A short and sweet article for today. I simply want to state my gratitude to Eckhart Tolle and Oprah Winfrey for what they’ve given us with their collaboration a few months back in the excellent series of webinars on Oprah.com. And what have they given us? A populace buzzing with interest in our passion: spirituality. And not just any old spirituality, not your garden variety spirituality that sounds like the humdrum world of church and religion. No, I’m talking the kind of spirituality that ultimately leads to spiritual awakening.
You see, Eckhart Tolle’s book, A New Earth, is really about spiritual awakening. He never says it in his book, for quite likely good reasons, but nonetheless, that is the purpose of it. When the ego fades, when that which we are realizes that it is not a separate self living a life of separation from the rest of life and humanity, we call that spiritual awakening. The Buddhists call it enlightenment. But in contemporary terms, I prefer to think of it as an awakening, a waking up from the dream that we are separate.
By bringing this book to the awareness of millions of people, Eckhart and Oprah have put spiritual awakening on the playing field. No longer is it the province of eccentric spiritual seekers, Zen students and residents of ashrams. It is in the mainstream consciousness of the world.
I’ve been hearing stories, from friends, from people I meet on trips, in the media, everywhere, of people picking-up A New Earth and being changed by it. One friend in particular has reported a dramatic change in her otherwise conservative, devout Catholic mother, a change that has resulted in a happier person. I even saw a woman reading A New Earth at my son’s taekwondo school (and, if you recall, I live in the Bible Belt!).
If you visit Barnes & Noble or any large bookstore, you will notice that the books on spirituality, Eastern religions, new age metaphysics, etc, have grown in number. The end caps are filled with books about “the universal field,” consciousness, The Tao of Peeling Potatoes, Zen for Dummies, you name it. It really is astounding. Maybe the Age of Aquarius has finally arrived?
So, no matter what you think of Eckhart Tolle’s book (or Oprah for that matter), you cannot deny that they both have done you and me a service. Spritual awakening is out of the closet and in the consciousness of the world. So, thank you Eckhart and Oprah, and a deep bow to both of you. I think the “future” of our planet might turn out better than anyone could expect. Namaste.
Those who awaken never rest in one place.
Like swans, they rise and leave the lake.
On the air they rise and fly an invisible course.
Their food is knowledge.
They live on emptiness.
They have seen how to break free.
Who can follow them?
Now that I’m back and have had a few days to reflect upon my experiences, let me share with you my overall impressions of the retreat. Actually, I should say retreatS as I also did the 3 day Level 2 Coaching training following the 9 day retreat. Yes, 12 days of nothing but Sedona Method. Well, that isn’t quite true, as you will see in a moment. Here, then, is a list of my impressions, in no particular order:
1. At First Glance, It Seems that the Sedona Method Has Evolved
When I first began the Sedona Method, the material that was presented was all about “releasing,” which you quickly discover is a process for allowing any unwanted emotion to dissolve or leave your experience. Sounds good, doesn’t it?
Well, it sounded really good to me at the time, because the book and audio program, as well as the marketing materials, explained that releasing unwanted feelings would change almost every area of my life for the better. And at the time, I needed some change! And, as I discovered, it was true.
However, when I attended my first retreat over 2 years ago, there was a lot of talk by Hale Dwoskin, the owner and teacher of the Sedona Method, about topics more spiritual in nature. So, my impression at the time was that the Sedona Method had a strong spiritual side, too, in addition to its more public self-help face.
As time has passed, the self-help face has changed. The retreats are strongly spiritual in nature, and the Advanced Retreats are almost exclusively so. Hale is very firmly grounded in the non-duality tradition most associated with the likes of Nisargadatta Maharaj, Papaji, Ramana Maharshi, Robert Adams (with whom Hale sat for a time), and a host of others.
Interestingly, as I’ve discovered personally, the non-duality teachings that are being used are actually far more effective at releasing than the original techniques taught in the book and audio program. While those methods are effective and still used at the regular 7 day retreats, they pale in comparison to doing self-inquiry. Let me illustrate:
Using the regular Sedona Method techniques, if you were experiencing some fear, you would work with it as follows by asking these questions:
Could you first welcome the fear as best you can?
Could you then let it go, set if free?
Would you let it go?
When?
Believe it or not, these questions, applied over and over, can tremendously reduce a feeling such as fear. I’ve done it many times, as have thousands of others.
But using the non-dual process of self-inquiry, you can quickly cut through the issue. Once you have the proper framework, which Hale teaches at the retreats, you can move quite quickly by asking one simple question:
Look inside, past your memories and body, and see if you can find the one who is experiencing the fear?
While it would take a few pages to explain the ideas behind the question, the basic results are phenomenal. Because when you look inside for the experiencer, the one feeling the fear, the one suffering in the moment, you can never find him. He doesn’t exist. The person you think you are simply isn’t. Amazing, huh?
I remember distinctly the first time I tried this process almost 2 years ago. I knew that someone had handed me the secret, the SECRET, to being free of anything. But is was a secret so obvious that it had suffused my entire life experience up until that point, but I had never noticed it before. The secret was so obvious: the “me” that I thought I was didn’t exist. How cool is that?!
2. The Sedona Method Was Always Intended to Be a Path of Spiritual Awakening
Well, as Hale fully revealed to us, the Sedona Method was never meant as a self-help process. It is a self-help process, and highly effective as many know, but that was never its purpose. From the moment that Lester Levenson created it, the process was intended to be a path of spiritual awakening, or freedom as Lester described it.
Lester had experienced a complete awakening in 1952 after being faced with his impending death from heart disease. It was do or die, literally. He knew from this awakening that the only way that anyone in the world would ever be happy was to realize the truth as he had. Maybe not in the same way, but they had to do so to ever experience peace, joy and happiness. There was, to Lester, no alternative.
After spending a number of years teaching to small groups on various aspects of spirituality, he, along with others, created the Sedona Method. Interestingly, to those involved with the method in its early years, the Method was something to be worked at diligently, in a very forced and contrived manner, to clean out every square inch of their mind/ego in order to achieve freedom.
But according to Hale, the Method as it was practiced then and is presented to the public at large, is just the first step. Letting go works, and is a wonderful process, but it really doesn’t substitute for looking at the fundamental truth of what we are: unitary consciousness or presence, never separate, always One. And the realization of that was always the fundamental purpose of the Sedona Method.
3. I Came to Spirituality Through the Front Door, Left, and Then Came Back in Through the Back Door
I first experienced spirituality in a very front door, direct way. I was told to get a spiritual life by a wonderfully MD 18 years ago, and so I did (someday I must write about that experience, mustn’t I?). I did the full frontal assault method, going after the spiritual goal with gusto. And after 12 years of that, I wore myself out. I somewhat gave it up.
But along came the Sedona Method, which I saw as a great way to fix some of my problems and un-screw my screwed up head. But as I observed above, it took less than a year before the method had me firmly back on the spiritual path. Well, not really on the path, but definitely seeing more clearly what it was all about it. And I mean ALL about.
4. The Sedona Method Is Excellent at Helping Solve Problems
No matter what form of the method you use, it is still very effective. I know that in a certain sense doing spiritual inquiry isn’t really about problem solving, but when you consider that the belief in the false sense of self is the root of every problem, then seeing through that is clearly the ultimate solution. It is truly remarkable how it changes everything.
I worked on several personal issues, ranging from more tangible things like an allergy to cats to more intangible ones like some seemingly deep seated psychological tendencies. The 3 day coaching training made it not only possible but necessary to work on issues since we were each others clients on 5 different occasions of practicing the skills we were learning.
It was fascinating to watch people who were relatively unfamiliar with inquiry use this approach to help with practical issues. For instance, with the cat allergy, while I don’t remember our dialogue word for word, it went something like this:
Tom: I have a horrible allergy to cats that is really a pain because most of my friends have cats. I can never go to their houses!
Coach: Can you see that what you said is just a memory about the past, but isn’t here right now? It is just a story you are telling yourself.
Tom: Yes, I can see that. (A shift occurs in the body, along with a decrease in anxiety and tension.)
Coach: So, what is actually here right now?
Tom: Nothing, just a feeling of peacefulness. But I worry that I will have this problem again.
Coach: And who is it that is worried? Can you look inside and find the one who is worried?
Tom: (Quietly looks inside, finds nothing. Peacefulness washes over him.) No, I can’t.
And the dialogue continued. And when it was over, I honestly had no concerns whatsoever about cats. I right now I have very little if not none. I may encounter a cat tomorrow, I may sneeze and my eyes water, but I don’t feel as if it really matters. I don’t really care. And then again, I may not have the problem. The interplay between the nervous and immune systems is to extensive that a simple process of reducing tension in the entire bodily system may in fact create relief from the allergy. But so what? The peace I feel is of far greater value.
5. We Are Already Awakeness
The entire topic of spiritual awakening is a tricky one. From the very notion of awakening to the whole conceptual framework that people build around it, awakening can get many, many people quite confused and lost, myself included.
The bottom line issue, it seems to me, is the whole notion of what awakening actually is. Awakening implies someone is asleep. Who is asleep? And who wakes up? Ah, there’s the rub. Who. The fundamental realization of anyone who experiences a clear seeing of the truth is that there is no who because there is no “me” or “I” or self involved. There never was one, and that’s the realization. And not an intellectual realization, but one that goes beyond the confines of the mind and that penetrates every level of being (whatever those levels may be, if there are any). It is a seeing through and through.
And when all this stuff starts to really become your experience, you start to realize an almost inescapable truth: everyone is already awake. Well, that’s not even true because there are no “everyones” to be awake. Rather, the essence of awake, awakeness, is what everyone already is. You may be totally asleep, completely blind to the truth of who you are, and yet, from the perspective of awakeness, you already are awake(ness).
If at this moment you are scratching your head and going, “huh?” don’t worry, you are in good company. I had the same struggle. But at this retreat, I realized in a much deeper way the truth of this idea. Or rather, that this is not an idea, but it is true. I began to “see” in a certain odd sense that everyone around me was this awakeness. They were alive with it, buzzing with it. It was amazing. Not a full experience of it, but a strong knowing of it. What a cool thing.
6. And a Ton More Stuff
I can’t possibly share all that I understood, gained and realized at this retreat. I will save some of it for future articles, as some of the things I realized are beyond a summary. But, just to tease you a bit, I will share a couple of interesting ones:
Every thought you have is just energy spinning, looking to take some shape and form. And that is about as significant as a thought is.
Everything you see is just energy spinning, having taken some visible form, but composed of nothing more than that fundamental energy.
No one has the slightest idea what energy is or what the word means. Not even our wonderful scientist who use the word daily.
Bad news: you have absolutely not one iota of control over the events of your life. As a matter of fact, it isn’t even your life. You don’t own it. It owns you!
If there is a purpose to life it is for the One to become more conscious of itself so that it can express love more fully. But, there may not even be a purpose to life.
As you can tell, my two weeks in Sedona were wonderful. Sedona itself is a fantastic town to visit. And the retreats that Hale Dwoskin puts on are fantastic. I’ve enjoyed them immensely, and this latest one was a true blessing. I’m glad I went.
I suspect that in the coming weeks and months I will be writing more about the topic that I like to call awakening but that others will call enlightenment or realization. I’ve really begun to see how awakening is an incredibly practical thing. Even small tastes of it are quite transformative in terms of one’s experience of the world. As Lester Levenson realized, the only way to every experience happiness in the world is to realize the truth of what you are.
It is good to be back with you. I look forward to hearing from you in the comments below. Namaste.
Shortcuts on the Spiritual Journey
+ Special Bonus
FREE
Subscribe and receive a special bonus as a thank you for joining. If you find yourself on the spiritual journey, then you know from experience the road is often unclear and the directions are vague. These Shortcuts are designed to help you find your way more effectively. You will receive one per week for one year.
The you that you think of as you (and that thinks of you as you, and so on) is not you, it’s just the character that the underlying truth of you is dreaming into brief existence. Enlightenment isn’t in the character, it’s in the underlying truth. Now, there’s nothing wrong with being a dream character, of course, unless it’s your goal to wake up, in which case the dream character must be ruthlessly annihilated. If your desire is to experience transcendental bliss or supreme love or altered states of consciousness or awakened kundalini, or to quality for heaven, or to liberate all sentient beings, or simply to become the best dang person you can be, then rejoice!, you’re in the right place: the dream state, the dualistic universe. However, if your interest is to cut the crap and figure out what’s true, then you’re in the wrong place and you’ve got a very messy fight ahead and there’s no point in pretending otherwise.
But beauty, real beauty, ends where intellectual expression begins. Intellect is in itself a mode of exaggeration, and destroys the harmony of a face. The moment one sits down to think, one becomes all nose, or all forehead, or something horrid. Look at the successful men in any of the learned professions. How perfectly hideous they are! Except, of course, in the Church. But then in the Church they don’t think. A bishop keeps on saying at the age of eighty what he was told to say when he was a boy of eighteen, and as a natural consequence he always looks absolutely delightful.
Intelligent practice always deals with just one thing: the fear at the base of human existence, the fear that I am not. And of course I am not, but the last thing I want to know is that.
Q: Since all is pre-ordained, is our self-realization also pre-ordained? Or are we free there at least?
A: Destiny refers only to name and shape. Since you are neither body nor mind, destiny has no control over you. You are completely free. The cup is conditioned by its shape, material, use and so on. But the space within the cup is free. It happens to be in the cup only when viewed in connection with the cup. Otherwise, it is just space. As long as there is a body, you appear to be embodied. Without the body you are not disembodied — you just are.
So the most important thing to realize is this: Your life has an inner purpose and an outer purpose. Inner purpose concerns Being and is primary. Outer purpose concerns doing and is secondary…. Your inner purpose is to awaken. It is as simple as that. You share that purpose with every other person on the planet – because it is the purpose of humanity. Your inner purpose is an essential part of the purpose of the whole, the universe and its emerging intelligence.
Buddhism stands unique in the history of human thought in denying the existence of a Soul, Self or Atman. According to the teachings of the Buddha, the idea of self is an imaginary, false belief which has no corresponding reality, and it produces harmful thoughts of ‘me’ and ‘mine’, selfish desire, craving, attachment, hatred, ill-will, conceit, pride, egoism, and other defilements, impurities and problems. It is the source of all troubles in the world from personal conflicts to wars between nations. In short, to this false view can be traced all the evil in the world.
Same is true of mind, "I", self, consciousness, etc. :-) || RT @Kalieezchild RT @Jyakunen: you will never find an "ego" -- absurd concept. 3 weeks ago
RT @Takuin If someone is hateful to you, or if you have been insulted, you may feel some kind of pain. But who, exactly, is being hurt? 2010-08-05
Spirituality: 6.7 billion caterpillars insisting they know what it's like to be a butterfly. Why not just become a butterfly and find out? 2010-07-27
If everything you thought was true turns out to be nothing but smoke and mirrors, what then? 2010-07-25
RT @Takuin What if you woke up tomorrow and the search was gone? If nothing were left, what would you do? || Eat ice cream. Duh. :-) 2010-07-25
RT @AkebonoJishi Objective fact is just a notion -- like "Emptiness." || Beautiful, isn't it? 2010-07-23
RT @Takuin packing it in @ 3250 meters. || Very cool! I can't wait to see it next summer. Definitely coming to Japan. No climbing, tho. :-) 2010-07-16
Why is everyone so intent on silencing the mind? Just leave the damn thing alone and it shuts up all by itself! Make some tea, sit, and rest 2010-07-16
RT @noah8423 Either Truth is awake in you, or not. ... the thinking must stop to make room for that light. || Why MUST thinking stop? 2010-07-16
So many people know. Yet how many know that they don't know? ☺ 2010-07-14
