Written on December 9, 2009 by Tom Stine
By using the term “Half-Awake” I’ve probably given a somewhat false impression to many people. Saying half-awake almost implies that there are 3 states that a person can exist in:
Asleep
Half-Awake (or Half-Asleep)
Awake
However, as a few of you can attest, a schema such as this one would be grossly over-simplified and possibly inaccurate. Let me try to clarify a bit what I mean by half-awake and how it fits into what is experienced along the spiritual journey:
1. ASLEEP
The vast majority of humanity is sound asleep. When I say the vast majority, I mean to say 99.99% (and I may have left out a few 9’s). I don’t think I need speak too much about this part, because, well, everyone reading this article knows exactly what asleep is like. *grin* I also recognize that more than a few spiritual people will take offense at me characterizing the vast majority as asleep. I never said there was anything wrong with being asleep, because there isn’t. It’s just a phase consciousness appears to pass through. In fact, there really is no such thing as asleep, it is merely the appearance of asleep. More on that another day. However, asleep is what many, many people experience.
2. An AWAKENING occurs
For no apparent reason (really, that’s how it works out), a moment of “Ah-ha!” happens, a realization, a seeing through the veil of illusion, a moment of pure knowingness. “Ah, so THIS is what I am!” The delusion of separate identity is uncovered to be a lie. An awakening is like no other spiritual experience. It is not an experience, in fact. It is beyond all experiences.
In this moment of utter clarity, one knows beyond question that the “me” that defined them, the psychological sense of self, is empty, void, nothing. Instead, what you are is everything. And beyond.
Very often, an awakening is accompanied by the expression, “Well, I’ll be damned!”
That said, for the most part, an awakening is not permanent. It does not last. Some teachers like to use the expression “non-abiding” to describe this experience. The old psychological sense of self resurrects itself, and once again you find yourself being trapped by the very thoughts and beliefs that you had seen through. You know it isn’t what you are, and yet, there it is.
3. HALF-AWAKE
The experience I’m calling half-awake can take many forms, varieties and “percentages” of awakeness (although measuring one’s awake percentage would be silly and quite futile to say the least). But this half-awake state is what follows from above. A real, genuine awakening occurs, and yet the psychological self is still operating. You are able at times (quite often, in fact) to get lost again in the seemingly important thoughts and beliefs of the mind. You seem to be a someone who has many somethings “he” needs to do.
What I’ve noticed in my own experience, however, is that this experience of being half-awake has changed over time. I would speculate that what I’m calling half-awake is quite evolutionary, fluctuates and is not a single, unvarying state. It changes as one dives deeper and deeper into the mental structure and uncovers more and more of the belief system that held the asleep condition in place. It also changes because there is a natural movement inward toward greater and greater clarity.
After the first awakening, it seemed that I fell back asleep. I couldn’t forget what I realized, and yet, I felt somewhat lost again. And yet, much of my life was different. I couldn’t stay asleep for long without the memory of that awakened state touching awareness. It really was more a contrast between the awake state and my new half-awakeness. But after a month or two, it became apparent that “half-awake” was very different from asleep. There was a sense, however, of going “in and out” of awakeness, but never that full experience of awakening that I had.
In the past 6 months, something new has become apparent, something different from what I had been experiencing. Now, I can’t really say that I’m ever really asleep. There is no more sense of “in and out.” Presence, consciousness, whatever word you care to use for the reality of what we are, is always “just inside my perception,” if that makes sense to you. It is like I can see it just out of the corner of my eye. Not really, but that’s the sense of it. “It” is here, now, present, and doesn’t leave, even in the midst of being occupied by a thought, belief or problem. I’m never asleep, even though I’m not fully awake.
It feels as if I’m moving along a continuum, a line of increasing awakeness. On the far left of the line was asleep. Then came “awakening” followed by what I’m now calling half-awake, but in reality is still a continuum of awakeness. Maybe a diagram will help make this explanation a touch clearer:
4. ABIDING AWAKENING
Ah, here is the Holy Grail of the spiritual journey. I know there is inevitable disagreement about the meaning of every term in spirituality, but abiding awakening is what is most often meant by the “E” word, Enlightenment.
At some point along the way, no one can say when, no one ever knows when or how, something within simply ceases. The psychological sense of self, the “ego” as it is often called, simply goes from the foreground of awareness to the background. It becomes irrelevant. It ceases to be of importance. The Buddha knew what he was talking about when he spoke of Nirvana, for that word simply means “cessation.”
What you are no longer is caught in the mind. It knows itself to be what it truly is. There is no “you” anymore in any real sense. There is just experience. What you are simply is.
I’ll be honest: I can sense this cessation. It is present in my very awareness, a sense that something will drop away, something will completely give way.
In the past 6 months I’ve had further glimpses of this shift. I guess we could say they’ve been “little awakenings,” although I have no idea what that really means. They’ve simply been deeper experiences of truth, further realizations of the Oneness of all things, the emptiness of what I used to see as myself. As so many before me have explained, there is emptiness and Oneness, simultaneously existing, no contradiction.
In the end, that’s all there is: deeper seeing. Even once you have ceased, once there is the experience of abiding awakening, this is still not the end. The spiritual seeking and spiritual journey may have ended, but there is further clear seeing to occur. Consciousness, if it has a purpose, wants to continually see things more clearly.
That’s why in the little diagram above, I put an arrow on the right end of the line. There is simply a continual movement of seeing all things more and more deeply, clearly, fully. Consciousness growing more conscious of Itself through the body called Tom or David or Sarah or Ellen. If enlightenment is anything, this further clear seeing is what it is.
And as long as there is a body that you, Consciousness (for that is what you truly are), seem to inhabit, there will never really be an end to looking and seeing. As my friend Davidya pointed-out in an email to me, there is quite likely always some arising of the psychological self, even in one who is what we might call enlightened. But it becomes a non-issue, arising and in the same instant falling away. Nisargadatta and Adyashanti both spoke of this occurrence, too.
I hope the above clarifies a bit more this experience I am calling half-awake. I’m sure there is still more to be said, and I’ll be happy to share it with you. Thanks for reading. Namaste.
Written on December 2, 2009 by Tom Stine
I strongly urge all of you to read Who Hears This Sound? Adyashanti On Waking Up From The Dream Of “Me” published a few years ago in The Sun magazine. Someone sent me a link to the article, and I found it to be one of the best and clearest presentations of Adyashanti’s teachings I’ve ever read. It is often hard to find succinct versions of a teacher’s ideas and thoughts, but the interviewer did a nice job of bringing greater clarity to an already fairly clear teaching. That’s one of the reasons I like Adya so much: he is extraordinarily clear for an awake guy.
Here are a few excerpts to read now to whet your appetite for the rather long and extensive interview:
Awakening is when you realize that what you thought you were was nothing more than a dream, and you perceive the reality outside the dream, what’s dreaming the dream of you. It’s not just a mystical experience. It is actually realizing the underlying unity of all things.
Simply because you’ve had an awakening, however, does not mean you stay awake. Enlightenment, in simple terms, is when you stay awake. If the awakening is abiding, that’s enlightenment. And most awakenings are not abiding — at least, not initially.
Enlightenment has nothing to do with the head or the heart. Certainly, the head and the heart tend to open up, but that’s a byproduct. Enlightenment is actually waking up from the head and from the heart. It’s waking up from the dream of “me” and seeing the oneness of all things. That’s what I mean by “reality”: that oneness. The truth is that you are that unity. You are not simply a particular person in a particular body with a particular personality; you are that one reality, which manifests itself as all these seemingly separate things.
Spiritual awakening doesn’t happen because you master some spiritual technique. There are lots of skillful meditators who are not awake. Awakening happens when you stop bullshitting yourself into continual nonawakening. It’s very easy to use disciplines to avoid reality rather than to encounter it. A true spirituality will have you continually facing your illusions and all the ways you avoid reality. Spiritual practice may be an important means of confronting yourself, or it may be a means of avoiding yourself; it all depends on your attitude and intention.
So life became my practice, and mistakes became my teacher. And once again I experienced failure after failure. It was humbling, even humiliating. I put myself in situations where my self-image would get crushed. Looking back I could easily say, “Boy, I made a lot of dumb mistakes.” But I needed to do it that way. I wasn’t going to let go of those identities on the meditation cushion. It would have been nice if it could have been contained in this safe environment — bowing and meditating and meeting with the teacher — but it often doesn’t work that way. Spirituality is much more of a bloody mess than we like to admit.
Excellent interview. It is Adyashanti at his best. Again, the link is:
Who Hears This Sound? Adyashanti On Waking Up From The Dream Of “Me”
Enjoy. Namaste.
Written on November 19, 2009 by Tom Stine
One of my long time readers sent me some questions about my article To Be Half-Awake (and Half-Asleep). Here are his questions and my answers:
1. You wrote: “It is almost the same experience as awakening from a dream at night. Almost.”
What are the differences you observe?
Good question. Well, the big difference is that when you awaken from a dream at night, the dream world disappears and is replaced by the seemingly real world. As you awaken from the dream state as it is called, as you spiritually awaken, you find that you are still in the dream! But what a dream it is! It is still populated by the same people, the same things going on, but for some reason, it all seems good, even when it isn’t. Very unlike a nighttime dream.
2. Your wrote: “…no tendency to re-enter the dream state of separateness.”
How and why did this One consciousness enter into the dream state in the first place?
For at least 5000 years (our entire written history), mankind has been intrigued by this question. Many have tried to answer it. Gurus for centuries have given answers. And they all contradict each other in some form or fashion. They contradict each other for one simple reason: there is no answer to this question.
Let me be 100% clear: there is no answer to this question. Every answer given, no matter how high and angelic the giver of the answer has been, is in the realm of fantasy. And the reason is simple: the question, being asked from within the world of form, is being asked about something outside the world of form. You can’t know with the mind that which is beyond the mind.
Okay, that said, here’s a couple of things to consider: First, did this One consciousness even enter into the dream state? If the dream state is unreal, and the One is real, then how could something unreal even be created? Good question, huh? No answer to that one, either.
Second, my personal favorite description of the why question is that it is a game. Consciousness having fun. Of course, this description is not the truth, but it is a fun idea. I have a half-written article on the subject that I’ll finish and post some day.
3. I remember Jed McKenna says something like this in his books: I and Universe are the One… I don’t know what will happen in the next moment…
Since he = the One, why doesn’t he know what will happen in the next moment?
Because it’s a fun game to play! The One created a Universe governed by probabilities, ie, quantum mechanics and all that fun stuff. Everything in the Universe has a probability associated with it, every path, every seeming choice, everything. There is even a probability that my body will wink out of existence and appear in China. It’s all probability. So, there is no way to know what will happen next.
Again, none of the above paragraph is the “true” answer, because there is no “true” answer. However, it is what we observe about the world of form.
That said, there is also no need to know. If fear and death are eliminated from one’s psyche, then one doesn’t have a care in the world for the future. The next moment is the next moment. As a matter of fact, there is no next moment, just this moment experiencing change. Since Jed is experiencing this change with no investment in how it all turns out, why care? Why bother to know even if he could? He absolutely doesn’t care at all.
I have to tell you, it is very, very nice when concern for the future starts to drop away. Even though I can still get hooked into future thinking at times, quite often I’m just here, right now, and experiencing no thought for what comes next, no care or concern. And surprisingly, what comes next seems to be pretty nice most of the time.
I hope the above helps. Namaste.
Written on November 14, 2009 by Tom Stine
“I don’t want to belong to any club that will accept people like me as a member.” — Groucho Marx
As I mentioned in a previous post, To Be Half-Awake (and Half-Asleep), my experience of spiritual awakening has been to be in a state that I am referring to as Half-Awake. Moreover, as I discussed, there are others who are experiencing this strange state, including some of you reading these articles (and I heard from quite a few of you after the last one). It is a far more common state than we might imagine, while at the same time, not the experience of the majority of humanity.
Moreover, it has been my experience that the majority of spiritual teachers and even “enlightened gurus” are fellow members of the Half-Awake Club. Unfortunately, many of these gurus and teachers have either flat out told their followers that they are fully awake, enlightened, or have simply left a profound state of ambiguity around the matter such that their followers have made bold claims as to the “enlightenment” of their guru.
Lest you get the wrong idea, there is nothing wrong with being a member of the Half-Awake Club. For the majority who awaken, being half-awake is just part of the process. It is simply part of the path. No big deal, no shame, no problem. Condemning people for being half-awake would be like condemning teenagers for being “half-adults.” Ridiculous to say the least.
The very nature of awakening is such that no one can be blamed or criticized for where they are on the journey. As a matter of fact, you have no control over awakening, over going back asleep, over fully awakening, etc. It is a gift, the supreme act of grace from the divine. I am very clear that I did nothing to experience an awakening (or any subsequent awakenings). They just happened. Really, I kid you not. I’ll address this point more in future writings. But as Ken Wilbur likes to say: awakening is an accident; all we can do is make ourselves more accident prone.
On the one-hand, I have to say that I don’t really care what other teachers are up to. It’s their karma, not mine. But on the whole, the mass of spiritual seekers have acquired some wrong-headed ideas about enlightenment and awakening, and I think we need look no further than the field of half-awake spiritual teachers for a lot of misinformation. Their own self-deception has led to some crazy ideas about reality and awakening to it.
To be honest, we have to admit it is a sad state of affairs out there in the spiritual world. There are websites like Sarlo’s Guru Ratings where you can read reviews of your favorite guru. There are other sites like Jody’s Guruphiliac whose mission is to reveal the “self-aggrandizement and superstition in self-realization.” Would we need or even have these sites if the spiritual world had its act together? I think not. (Warning: if you follow these links, prepare to read some harsh critiques of some of the best known gurus and spiritual teachers in the world. These sites are not for the faint of heart. Your favorite guru may get slammed.)
A little dose of self-honesty would go a long way in the spiritual world. And believe me, the gurus discussed on both these sites aren’t just obvious frauds and hucksters. There are some truly spiritual dudes out there who simply are unwilling to look in the mirror, be honest with themselves and with their followers.
There is even an interesting book, Halfway Up the Mountain, that seeks to address this very issue of Half-Awake spiritual teachers. The irony of the book is two-fold:
1. Most of the experts interviewed are in the Half-Awake Club.
2. They more or less condemn the state of being half-awake.
Again, to repeat in clear terms: there is nothing wrong with being half-awake. One can be a very effective teacher, helper, counselor, etc, from this state. A Course in Miracles makes this point quite well:
Do not despair, then, because of limitations. It is your function to escape from them, but not to be without them. If you would be heard by those who suffer, you must speak their language. If you would be a savior, you must understand what needs to be escaped.
There really is too much to say about this subject for one article. I will get into this topic much more deeply in later articles as it gets to the very heart of spiritual awakening, what it is, how it flows, how it manifests in one’s life, how one’s life can change or not as a result of awakening, etc. And I’m also certain there will be the inevitable question: how do I know who is fully awake and who is not? I’ll just leave you in suspense on that one, with just this one comment: I don’t know for certain, but there are often telltale signs that one can look for, and even better, sense. A true light shines clearly for all to see.
Look for more in the coming weeks and months. Namaste.
Written on November 10, 2009 by Tom Stine
I am half-awake. Or half-asleep. Or even better, I am awake and asleep at the same time. It is a strange place to be, and I’m sure there are others who know what I mean. And I’m also sure there are spiritual teachers and writers who would say that such a state does not exist. But still, it is my experience.
What does it mean to be half-awake? The best way to explain it would be first to start with what being awake means. Being spiritually awake means the same thing as enlightened. I prefer the phrase “spiritual awakening” over enlightenment simply because it has less baggage associated with it. There is too much talk in the spiritual world about “enlightenment” and “enlightened gurus” for my tastes. And, as a bonus, awake is a nice description of what it feels like to awaken(although, to be fair, enlightenment really is quite accurate, too). It is almost the same experience as awakening from a dream at night. Almost.
Spiritual awakening, in its fullest sense, is the complete removal of delusion from consciousness. The Truth of your being, your reality as absolute consciousness, as the One consciousness that exists everywhere and is everything, is your natural state. For some inexplicable reason, the majority of humanity finds itself in what we could call a dream state, a state of consciousness characterized by a pervasive sense of individuality, a sense of “me” as a separate self, not connected to others, existing apart and alone from all other living beings and non-living things. Spiritual awakening is the reversal of this dream of separateness, a full, complete total reversal. Once one is truly awake, or as Jed McKenna would call “done,” there is no longer any doubt as to what you are and no tendency to re-enter the dream state of separateness. Even more, there is no “one” who is even awake, for the sense of individuality is gone. Consciousness has returned to a clarity, a clearness that is no longer deluded or confused.
Many people, although not that many when compared against the backdrop of 6.5 billion human beings, have experienced something rather profound, a spiritual awakening. They have experienced a realization of the truth of their being. They find themselves, for a moment, a minute, an hour, day, week or even year, as no longer this supposed separate self. They know at the depth of their core, all the way to the bottom, that the “me” they thought they were was merely a phantom, a psychological sense of self, no more real than any other thought, a figment of their imagination. And for that moment or hour or day, they are awake, utterly awake, as if they were never asleep in the dream state of delusion.
For most that have this experience, however, it doesn’t last. While much of the old psychological self, which many refer to as the ego, may have been blown out of the system by the experience of awakening, much may still remain. This psychological sense of self, the beliefs, thoughts, feelings, ideas, etc, that give it a sense of reality, has a certain weightiness, a certain momentum or inertia, that will continue to function after the experience has passed. And it may take many years for the inertia of this false self to wind down and eventually cease, like a pendulum that, once swinging, will swing and swing and swing until it finally comes to rest in perfect stillness. Cessation (the actual meaning of the term “nirvana”) is the eventual fate of the egoic self, but it almost always takes many years for that fate to come into full bloom.
This is the state I find myself in. Something happened to me that can only be described as miraculous, a gift from the divine. At some point, I will have to share that experience with you, because I think it might prove helpful to others. But as happens to the vast majority of people who experience a true spiritual awakening, the egoic self resurrected itself and came back in. I, too, experienced a pretty incredible “blowing out” of a lot of psychological baggage, but the material that was left came back with a vengeance! For over a year and a half, while there have been many amazing changes in my experience, there have been some old, buried items that have been raging in me at times, things I thought were over and done with 10 or 20 years ago.
There have been swings from fear to courage, from bliss to suffering. The dominant psychological pattern for most of my life, anxiety, has ebbed and flowed. While I became permanently free of panic attacks prior to this awakening, other forms of anxiety still plague me, and at the oddest times and places. All in all, I have to say it is simultaneously amazing and bizarre.
One of the hallmarks of the awakening process is the increasing inability to deny anything. You simply become incapable of hiding from any psychological issues that you repressed, denied or buried deep in your subconscious. You can no longer lie to yourself, and when you try, well, have you ever thrown a boomerang? The few times I’ve thrown one I’ve always ended up jumping out of the way of a rapidly spinning piece of wood itching to whack me upside the head. A whack upside the head is exactly what happens every time I attempt to lie to myself these days. What worked wonders 5 years ago is pointless, futile and outright foolish these days.
So, while I know the truth of what I am, while I can feel it, experience it, often see it in others, know it beyond question, I still am not fully aware of it yet. The description of enlightenment as “abiding non-dual awakening” is not my experience. Some days it is as if my awareness is on a roller coaster, going up then down, over then under and around. Moments of utter clarity then moments of delusion. And as I have come to realize, it is a perfect way to be, just as perfect as any other way of existence, lacking nothing. Like I said, it is strange.
Maybe a few of you are members of what I’m going to call the “Half-Awake (Half-Asleep) Club.” Most probably are not, and that is okay. It is a club that some of you will join soon, some will join at some point in this lifetime, and all of you are destined to join during some non-existent future life. Even a few of you may have “graduated” beyond the club. I’ll write more about the other members of this club in a few days, as there are quite a few of us. A sneak preview: most of the “enlightened gurus” and “spiritual teachers” floating around the world are fellow members. There is much to discuss about the strange existence I’m calling Half-Awake, and I’ll be saying more about it. Until then, I would suggest you read (or re-read) the article on Adyashanti’s View of Awakening…. Namaste.
Written on July 11, 2009 by Tom Stine
My good friend Takuin Minamoto has asked a question over at Takuin.com that I felt deserved an answer. First, let me re-print Takuin’s question, and below I will give the answer I left in his comments. I encourage you to read the other fabulous comments at his site. I think he has started a theme that I will be coming back to increasingly over the next few weeks. First, Takuin’s question:
This is a question for fellow writers of spiritual matters, but anyone is free to comment below.
I have noticed a trend – and it is nothing earth shattering – in this world of spiritual teaching:
A man or woman may come to a realization, perhaps only a realization on a superficial level, or perhaps something deeper, then they begin to ‘teach’ it. Not that there is necessarily anything wrong with this. But it makes me wonder if enlightenment, the way that term is used by the masses, is nothing more than conformity to one’s ideals of enlightenment.
I am not against anything they are doing, and I cannot sit here and say I ‘know them’ in any intimate way. But is this all we have to look forward to? We go to listen to someone speak on a podium, we may have or may not have a realization, then we go and speak on a podium.
My big question is, In what way is this helpful to humanity?
Don’t take it as, “I am expecting there to be something or nothing there,” because that is not it. I really want to know.
How do you see this?
My responses in no particular order:
1. In response to your main question: “In what way is this helpful to humanity?” I think I’ll start with the most obvious response: I don’t know. None of us do. Part of the beauty of this Life we are is that so much is a mystery. As long as we are open to what is coming through us, and we are even remotely honest with ourselves about where we are, then Life will just have its way, and then we get to watch it unfold.
2. Another immediate response I get to your question is: “Who cares?” I mean that literally and in its more “advaita” sense. Why does the question even arise for you? Do our actions need to benefit humanity? I don’t really know if they do. Although, I have to add, that the more we “open” to Life, the more our actions DO seem to benefit humanity, or at least they tend to move in that direction. But that is an observation, not a statement of necessity. We don’t NEED to benefit humanity. But it sure seems that we do.
3. I suspect that as many have remarked, most people do not enter the role of teacher as they awaken to the truth. That is my experience at least. There may be an inclination to share, but not to truly teach as a “profession.” Look at the people Adyashanti has asked to teach. Most of them only do it part time. They have other functions in life, like therapists and, as in the case of my friend Larry Melton, scientists. Funky, huh?
4. I have to say that way too many people go into the spiritual teaching gig than seems warranted. That’s at least is how it SEEMS. Maybe it is just the right number. Actually, I guess that is true… the number is just right else…. there would be fewer. That said, some of these teachers are such ego maniacs as to not even be funny. What a delicious contradiction, eh? A teacher of “enlightenment” who is so obviously stuck in the muck of his own ego! Life is TOO FUNNY!!!!! Maybe that’s the point, to make us laugh uproariously? Or to cry profusely?
5. As has been observed by others, some of us just can’t help but teach. My experience mirrors theirs: I can’t avoid teaching. It just happens. People are always asking me questions as if I KNOW something they don’t. Maybe I do. Doubt it. But nonetheless, I answer, and they go away satisfied. LOL See, life is funny. But yes, some of us were just born this way, like a genetic condition. Or more likely childhood conditioning. So we just do what we are meant to do, and we do our utmost to clean out our own crapola so that we are hopefully as clear an instrument as possible. But teach we must.
6. Interesting to me that you would ask this question now, as I’ve felt very much led in recent months to “get busy” as it were and move forward in a big way with the whole spiritual teaching gig. So, I guess the question just became more “personal” in a sense: In what way will Tom Stine be helpful to humanity? No idea how to answer that one. I guess I’ll find out!
7. It has become clearer to me that quite likely the most practical thing a person can do is pursue enlightenment. It sure seems to be of great benefit to an individual human organism to have some level of realization occur. While that is not always the case, it seems to beat the hell out of every other “self-improvement” process out there. I know, “self” improvement is the last thing that one can say about awakening, but there you go: the apparent individual often as not has a corresponding improvement in “his” life as he realizes more and more that there is no self. LOL My God, Life has one hell of a sense of humor, huh? But I’ll stick by my basic assertion: the pursuit of enlightenment is the most practical thing you can do. (Contradictions in that assertion conceded.)
8. As someone wiser than me once observed: there is a teacher for everyone at every stage of the journey. Even the most seemingly screwed-up individual can serve as a great teacher for someone. I’m reminded of someone that I met at a Sedona Method retreat who, when I met him, seemed like a “train wreck” of a person. After seeing this person at a few retreats, I remarked upon him to one of my friends. My friend’s response: “you think he is a train wreck now, you should have seen him a few years ago!” Whoa. But lo and behold, as I let go of my judgments about this person, and got to know him a bit, I discovered that he was a very successful coach who helps a lot of people, all the while still having the outer appearance of “train wreck.” His clients love him and swear by him. Who’d a thunk it? So… while I can’t say with certainty, it appears that humanity benefits from even the worst of the lot in the teaching/coaching/self-help movement. I’m gonna get myself in trouble with this next comment, but did you ever notice what a great impact Osho had on people? Drug addiction and Rolls Royces not withstanding.
9. My last point: I am very clear that there is no answer to the question “What’s the point of all this?” Nor do I see any purpose when I look for one to anything that goes on, including all this spiritual teaching stuff. And yet, there is an appearance of a purpose, and that appearance, in my eyes, seems to be: to see more clearly. If there is any benefit, then, to humanity, it is the gradual opening of its collective and individual eyes. That would be the appearance of a purpose for all this teaching that goes on. People become clearer and clearer on what is real, what is true.
Written on June 20, 2009 by Tom Stine
The further along I go with this awakening that has happened and continues to unfold, the more it becomes apparent that the real key to waking up is wanting to wake up. I know it is a radical idea, but it just so happens to be the truth of the matter. Technique is almost always given top billing in the world of spirituality, but the “how” will always come whenever you are truly willing. But willingness, that’s the crux of the issue.
You may already think you are willing. That’s why you meditate, read books by the spiritual giants, read this blog, talk to your friends about spirituality and awakening and enlightenment, go to retreats, all that good stuff. You have a very convincing case to prove how willing you are. But the truth is, if your willingness were electricity, you wouldn’t have enough to power a night light. A firefly could outshine you. Sorry, but it is true.
Look inside for a moment. Feel into this subject of willingness. Can you feel the resistance? Can you feel how much “you” don’t want to really wake up? Something inside of you knows this awakening thing is going to be different, really, really different, and it is frightened about that. Something inside wants to feel better about life, but it doesn’t really want what awakening entails.
Why not? Because the “something” resisting all of this, the “something” that is not willing to awaken, is the very thing from which one awakens! The resistance you are feeling, the UN-willingness, is simple the energy of thought, the “mind” as it were, resisting what is its eventual undoing. Well, maybe undoing is too harsh. Let’s just say that the mind gets to go from being the dominant player in your awareness to being second fiddle.
So there is a massive resistance to awakening. The natural question to ask at this point is “what do I do about it?” Ah, good question. But the question itself is just more resistance. Notice that the question is about doing and about “I”. The “I” is the very thing doing the resisting! The doing is how it resists.
Going beyond this resistance, becoming more willing, is the simplest of things: let it happen. What you are wants this awakening to happen. It is what is waking-up to itself. It IS awake, and is looking for this awakeness to transform everything. So, simply pause and let it happen. It will anyway.
As far as “you” are concerned, I think cooperation would almost be a better focus for the mind. Cooperate. Don’t fight what is happening. Give in. Allow. I think you’ll find this mindset to be a better one. It is far more in alignment with what is really happening anyway. Remember that whole “not in control” issue I’ve discussed many times? You aren’t in control, so why not just let that realization sink a little deeper. Cooperate with the inevitable, and you will find your willingness going up, up, up.
Be well. Namaste.
Written on March 18, 2009 by Tom Stine
A reader sent me an email letting me know that a statement of mine in my last post I Want to Be Like Jed sounded like I was claiming that I’m enlightened. The line in question was a bit misleading, so I’ve changed it. However, the line in question did cause me to think of something that I want to share with all of you before heading to bed.
So, how would you know if “I” am enlightened? How would you know if anyone is enlightened? What’s great about these questions is that (1) they are questions that most spiritual people ask about various teachers and gurus and (2) they are so misguided as to be a bit comical.
First of all, you have absolutely no way of knowing if someone is enlightened or not. Period. No way. Zero. Zip. Nada. How can I be so utterly certain? Because you can’t know anything about another. All you can do is have an experience of them. You may have an experience of where their consciousness is at (ego or One, let’s say). You may see their behaviors. But to know if they are awake? Nope. I feel I have a pretty strong sense of where someone’s consciousness is at, where their “focus” is. But I could be seriously wrong. And beyond that? No clue. And moreover, I don’t really care.
Secondly, questions like this inevitably come back to some pretty fundamental things about enlightenment. For instance, who is it that is enlightened? Is Tom Stine ever going to be enlightened? No, he isn’t. Tom Stine is just a body and mind playing around in the dream state. But is Tom that which will ever awaken to the truth? No.
Then what does awaken? That which is already awake. Oh, isn’t this stuff just crazy to actually see in print? That’s why you gotta take all spiritual literature with a grain of salt. None of it is true. At best, it is an attempt at expressing some form of truth to encourage the reader to find out for himself or herself what all the fuss is about. Never take any of it as a statement of the truth. Find out for yourself what is true!
I think it was Yogananda who said, “Anyone who claims to be enlightened isn’t.” I don’t think he got it quite right. Better to say, “Anyone who believes he is enlightened isn’t!” For enlightenment is beyond any belief as it is beyond the mind.
Just some late night thoughts for you. Namaste.
Written on January 24, 2009 by Tom Stine
“Making your way in the world today takes everything you’ve got.
Taking a break from all your worries, sure would help a lot.
Wouldn’t you like to get away?”
Funny the thoughts that will rattle through one’s head, completely unbidden. I awoke this morning and kept hearing the Cheers theme song playing in my mind. I could see Norm sitting on his bar stool quipping one-liners that never failed to make me laugh. One of my favorites:
Woody: How’s life treating you Mr. Peterson?
Norm: Like I just ran over its dog.
If you are asking, “what does this silliness have to do with spirituality and awakening?” then I’m afraid I haven’t got a good answer. In a certain sense I’m not trying to make a pithy comment on spiritual awakening. But I will say one thing: all moments of genuine awakening are in fact the only break you will ever get from all your worries. Awakening is the only answer.
If awakening is the only answer, then what does this mean for all the programs, courses, techniques, etc., that are supposed to help free us from all our worries? What about things like the Sedona Method that I have promoted right here on this website? Don’t they work, too?
Well, in truth, they really are only a step in the right direction. All these programs, courses, techniques, etc., get us to start questioning all of our assumptions about life, so they have a place and often can prove helpful. But in the end, like everything else in this world, they prove to be unsatisfactory.
In the end, to find true relief for what ails us, we might find ourselves, if we are lucky, stuck. The old ways don’t seem to work any more. The old techniques have us feeling lost. We have no idea what to do. And so, out of desperation, we do the only thing we can do: we sit, we reflect, we look within, and we begin to question.
We do what Nisargadatta Maharaj did. We do what Adyashanti did. We do what Ramana Maharshi did. We question. We investigate. We wonder if all of our old assumptions are true. Ramana questioned one assumption: death. Nisargadatta was told by his guru, “You are the supreme ultimate reality. Now go discover that for yourself.” So he sat and sat and sat until he saw through everything that said otherwise.
So simple. So utterly simple. Sit. Question. Let the truth be revealed to you as you question that which is false. And here’s a little hint: no thought, no belief is true! Now go find that out for yourself. And when you do, you will take a permanent break from all your worries.
Namaste.
Written on December 4, 2008 by Tom Stine
I’ve recently written quite a bit about the topic of control. Over and over, as I look at my life, as I watch others experience their lives, I keep coming to the same simple realization: we don’t have control over our lives. We are lived by something, a force that operates through our bodies and conditioned minds. We are lived by LIFE itself. And whatever “we” are goes along for the ride.
Interestingly, as I was in the midst of writing my recent posts on control, I got to travel to San Francisco to hear Adyashanti give a weekend workshop. And guess how he started his first talk? Yes, of course, he started discussing control. I smiled when he mentioned control that morning. It was a wonderful talk, and as so often happens, I remembered almost nothing from it, even though it had a profound impact upon me. A good spiritual talk is memorable for its effects, not for its words.
Fortunately for me, I ordered a recording of the weekend, and after it arrived the other day, I began to listen again to the talk on control. It was even better the second time! Let me share a bit with you:
You’re not in control, but your desperate efforts to keep control actually does alter the way existence moves for you. It doesn’t move in the way your controller wants to, but it does have an effect on existence, your effort to control it. It doesn’t have the effect you want it to have, but it does have an effect. And you only know that when that control is totally let go of. Because when it is totally let go of, and you are no longer putting that energy out to existence or to consciousness, then existence starts to change.
Yes, of course, our efforts to control do effect the events of our lives, but not how we want them to. That explains so much. But as we let go of attempting to control, life then begins to flow. Ah, yes, perfect. It makes complete sense to me. Nothing to be but let go of one simple false belief: that we have control over our lives. So easy to say. So difficult fun interesting to do.
