December 3, 2013

Big long dream with many parts. Then I was in a room talking with Unmani and I was describing my recent shift and experiences to her but she didn’t seem to understand and was dismissive.  Then she said something that I didn’t understand so I had the thought that maybe she wasn’t really enlightened.  But on the other hand maybe she was just knocking me harder to wake me up.  My reaction was all ego. Perhaps that was her  Kyosaku – her Zen stick.

November 25, 2013

I was in a room with Adyashanti and a bunch of other people and he was talking.  I was walking around feeling light and kind of energized, scatterbrained, and in great spirits.  When he would say something I would say something about how that was not exactly true, and I was practically giggling.  But the main thing in the dream was that I was getting it, although I don’t get it now.  But in the dream it felt like I was seeing the truth clearly.  Adya would look at me each time with his mouth open but kind of smiling like he was thinking “what is going on with this guy” but like he’s knowing that of course I am right and nothing he is saying is exactly true.  Part of this was me imagining he’s thinking this, which is an ego thing and maybe I was even speaking up because I wanted him to see that I could see the truth.  On one level there was no ego there but on another level there was some tinge of ego.  But usually when I say things like that it’s because I sincerely want to share to help others to get it. But the neat thing is on some deeper level where this dream was being generated there seemed to be deeper understanding where I really did get it.  That was the best thing about the dream

November 15, 2013

I was meditating and letting everything; letting go of all my thoughts and then of all my perceptions and at one point it reminded me of dying where I have to let go of everything.  So I imagined letting go of my body and my life and my memories and everything I could imagine. There was also just the sense of letting my life BE as opposed to having any kind of attachment to it.  As I continued to let go there was a feeling of  traveling into a pure expanse of nothing, or of vast space, or of light.  It was a good feeling not in the sense of joy but in the sense of setting down a heavy burden.  I recognized also a kind of a trust in letting go, that it will be ok.  You don’t know if you will ever see this life or this body or anything you are familiar with ever again or even have any memories of this life at all.  You trust because the trust is that what you DO have is unshakable.  What you do have is something you cant lose.  It’s funny because you have no mental connection to it; you have no thoughts about it and no memory of it or anything.  You’re not believing in it or trusting it based on any kind of belief or thought.  It’s like you’re letting go of everything that you were holding on to but the one thing you’re not holding onto is not something you can even let go of.  It’s what you are.

The trust in that, because you are still in duality, is really like you are trusting something beyond you, like God, that has always got your back.  It’s always with you.  It might be taking you away, like a parent taking you away from the candy store, but at least you know you are safe; you’re in  in safe hands, and that even though you don’t get to be with the candy, it’s ok.  There might be a little tantrum there but ultimately you know that you are loved, and you know that’s more important.

November 9, 2013

There was a moment yesterday while washing dishes when I felt that everything was perfectly OK as it is.  But this was more than a feeling.  It was a momentary realization where I felt and SAW that this was the truth;  that everything was OK just as it is and that nothing had to be realized.  Funny, because this was a realization.  Certainly AFTER a realization nothing has to be realized.  My initial response was “is that it?” meaning: is that all there is to it?  So there was a truth noticed that quickly slipped away.  The noticing slipped away.  I can’t describe or convey this very well.  But in that moment it seemed so obvious and clear.  Like: “what was the problem anyway?”  Immediately after this I saw how, when some teachers express this truth and it sounds so lame, we have to imagine there is some deeply esoteric meaning in their words.  Even now as I contemplate this realization it seems too good to be true, too easy, and therefor impossible or untenable somehow.  I didn’t notice any sense of  “no self” in the realization, but the realization was just a glimpse of something. There was a “cleanness” and clarity.  Reminds me of my “peek behind the curtain” insight mentioned in my talk with Adyashanti.

Later: This insight expanded over the next few weeks into other insights and left me with the feeling that enlightenment is not such a big deal.  At the same time my movement toward knowing  the truth seems to have increased somehow.

April 2013

I was at some event in what seemed like a gymnasium with lots of bleachers. I was sitting near the left end on the second row and there were  lots of people in front of me but few near me. It was some kind of seminar and someone was speaking. Adyashanti came in and sat to my left but on the floor instead of the seat next to me. I lean over and say to him “you know, I can talk about this stuff (non-duality, consciousness, and truth) all day long but I still don’t see it (no realization). He leans over and says “but you must have some awareness of it or you wouldn’t be able to talk about it in that way.” I sat up and thought about that.

Then this other guy comes over and sits down between Adya and me. He was wearing a reddish sweatshirt similar to one I have. He began heckling the speaker in a very loud, noisy, and disruptive way, like he was at a baseball game.  He paid no attention to anyone else and just kept commenting.  I turned to him and said “You need to be quiet” as I put my right hand on his chest. It felt like I was putting calming energy into him. I could feel a strong warm calming vibration, like a smooth hum, in my hand but I don’t know if it was from me or him.  He turns to me and says “I don’t have to be quiet!  I can talk as much as I want! Who are you to tell me to be quiet? It’s a free country and I can do whatever I want!” in the same loud and noisy manner. Then he turned back and continued being noisy.

I like this dream. On reflection it became clear that what sits between me and the Truth, represented by Adya, is a noisy mind, which I need to quiet, so I can see what I must already know.

March 2013

I was doing a daily self hypnosis to get insight into various physical conditions I had going on.  During the hypnosis I would imagine going down an escalator to deeper levels.  The final level was a forest and I would walk along a path that led to a Shamanic healing circle.  There were benches made of logs surrounding a raised area with a camp fire in it.  I would sit down and visualize what I wanted and give myself suggestions of discovery and transformation.  No one else was in the circle.  I did this daily for a month and one day I noticed someone sitting across from me on the other side of the fire.  He looked like and old man, maybe a shaman.  I ignored this.  I didn’t put him there and it was MY hypnosis after all!  The next day he was there again and again I ignored him.  But toward the end he got up and walked around and sat in front of me.  It was Ramana Maharshi and he looked at me and said “it’s time for you to wake up.”  Then he left.  Hmmm.  OK.  Of course there’s nothing I can do about it.

November 23, 2012

This was an astounding OBE (out-of-body-experience) but only the first part is applicable here.  I was dreaming and became lucid.  I immediately deepened my awareness using a palpation technique until I was 100% conscious.  I was in a place that looked like Chinatown in San Francisco, that was filled with people.  I rose up into the air to get my bearings and recalled my first plan of action.  I usually have at least three projects to carry out during an OBE.  I flew up fairly high and knew what I was going to do but as I looked in the distance I saw an ominous mountain perhaps only a few miles away.  It was like I was viewing it in the morning, just before the break of dawn, and it looked dark and bluish and had what looked like grey snow on the peak.  It seemed to grow larger as I looked at it. The main thing about the mountain was the feeling I got as I looked at it.  It was a feeling of power and deep meaning and it seemed that if I kept my attention on it it would pull me in.  It wasn’t frightening but more like ominous and overwhelming.  It seemed to represent something important but mysterious – it was the unknown.  I pulled back from it and turned around and continued with my plan to find Ana (the spirit name of my soul partner), not knowing she had recently passed away.  But that’s another story for another time.

The encounter with the mountain was brief but powerful.  I thought it represented God or oblivion or even possibly Ana, who I intended to contact.  It was over a year later that I was looking at a picture of Mt. Arunachala, Ramana Maharshi’s home, that I made the connection.  I had seen pictures of it before but ruled it out as the one in the OBE because it never has snow on it.  But I found a view where it looked similar.  Curious, I used Google Earth and found the right angle, and it was the same as what I saw! It’s just like the picture on Wikipedia. The grey snow was really trails and rock formations on one side as it might be seen in moonlight.  I guess the Truth was pulling at me.

September 8, 2012

There was a huge war that was an ultimate showdown of some kind.  Before the war there was a very anxious time, like a huge threat hanging over my head – it seems like it’s more than just MY head.  So in this war I stage this battle apparently  – but that’s unclear too (that I staged it).  But the battle was staged and an army of martial artists, like Ninja super kung fu warriors appear in this area, about a hundred of them dressed in gis. They seemed … I can’t say – the atmosphere kept changing from gold to dark tan.  The warriors were all on a platform under a large pagoda, and as soon as they appeared, ready to fight (no other army was in sight) there was a blast of darts seemingly from out of nowhere.  They were all hit by several darts and they all died instantly. It was like when I looked to see where the darts came from, I saw they all came from one guy who was standing behind me on a raised platform.  He was like a super ultra martial artist, dressed in a white gi.  As I’m looking at him standing there I’m suddenly not sure if he is my enemy or on my side and I don’t know if the army was my army or the enemy.  I have no idea and it’s baffling.  At some point I’m talking to someone or in some way got the idea that the army was all of my identities and that this whole thing could be about enlightenment. In the end the “one” won out.  But there was some more consideration like: was the battle really over and was there going to be another battle. And I had the question of whether the One had higher warriors on his side.  I questioned what did it mean that he won and I still didn’t know where I fit in.  Now as I think of it there might have been the idea that I could change sides since I didn’t know which side was my side why not be on the side of the One.  However I wasn’t sure that the One wasn’t evil.  It seemed that one of these sides had to be evil.  At one point there was even an uncertainty that the Ninja army was actually dead.  There was a body of water and they were all floating like dirt clods in the water.  It reminded me of all the Asian lady bug larvae on my plants in my garden where it looked like there were dozens of dead ones but they had only shed their skins, and many were pupating.  I decided that no side is the right one, no path is the right one, and I even have to let go of the “One” and surrender to the truth.  The uncertainty represented letting go of my beliefs and attachments.

[[As far as identities go we are all shifting identities all day.  We all have hundreds of identities: father, mother, brother, friend, a different friend for each friend, boyfriend, girlfriend, shopper, walker, car driver, meditator, tv watcher, exerciser, book reader, and we have hundreds of them and they are just states that we shift into, all programmed in some way.  Some are very stuck and others very flexible and they are just disguises we wear to accomplish various things all day and they all have their various purposes and functions but they are not us.]]

The thing to work on in this dream is there was a kind of deep worry which I can’t describe.  It’s deeper than that like ‘what’s gonna happen?” as if this could be a terrible disaster but I have no clue what this disaster might entail but there is nothing I can conceive of that could play out as a disaster.  But something is terribly worrisome like if I lost (remember,  I didn’t know which side I’m on) it would be a huge mistake with dire consequences.  I cant say I would die or lose something or anyone else would die but there is the feeling of death in here.

[[This dream is actually more than a metaphor of my spiritual path.  Someone I have a strong spiritual connection to was dying during this time but I was unaware of it as I had no communication with her for many years.  I had several dreams about her dying but didn’t try to contact her.  She died a few weeks after this dream. I’m sure that’s what the “anxious time” and the “worry” represented.]]

April 2012

Adya was having me nail him to a cross.  We were both laughing.  It didn’t work and the wooden cross kept falling apart until we finally gave up.  So he said we were going on a trek.  We were dressed like yogis in India.  I thought the trek would be through some exotic desert lands but we were walking through residential neighborhoods.  Our path was like a maze.  I was a bit confused but he seemed to know where he was going – actually it was more like it didn’t matter and he was amused that I was concerned.

February 2012

I dreamed I was lying in bed and I saw Adyashanti’s head floating above me.  This may have been an OBE but I don’t recall being fully lucid.  So Adya looks around and says:

“You don’t just repair computers.  Your secret life begins today!”  And I woke up.

Although my main job is counseling, I do rebuild computers as a hobby for extra income, and my home often looks like a computer shop.  I have been listening to Adyashanti for several years on YouTube, read his books, and had a conversation with him all before this dream.  I guess he was checking me out.  Secret life?  Just being on the path?  Today?  Don’t know.  But it’s always now.