May 31, 2014

Kranti Ananta was talking to someone trying to help him understand meditation and she said “In meditation they tell you to become the witness but you already are the witness. So it’s developing the knack of watching the mind”.  And I got it on another level.  The mind isn’t watching awareness in meditation. You might think in meditation that you are putting your attention on awareness itself and being “the watcher” But the mind is just a cohesive conglomeration of thoughts, stories, and programming that has infiltrated and co-opted awareness creating the illusion, in awareness, that there is a separate self. The mind is not you. The aspect that creates the identification with the mind and body is the ego. The ego is the sense of identifying as a separate self. In this capacity it is like a virus in pure consciousness. The ego even thinks it’s the one on a spiritual path. A path, by the way, that leads to it’s own dissolution. It’s all happening in awareness. A stunning illusion I must say.

So how do we stop the Ego-virus? Well, Captain Kirk said it best in “The Immunity Syndrome”: “An-ti-bod-ies, an-ti-bod-ies!”  So what’s the antidote?  Be the antibody!  Watch the mind. Ignore the mind. Disregard the mind.  Do not let it seduce you and lead you back to sleep.  Stop the mind and be free.

May 26, 2014

I heard Adyashanti talking about how awakening is about fully grasping the present moment – that it can only happen NOW –  and I had a deeper understanding of this than before. I realized that in meditation I have been somewhat distant from NOW – wow.  But of course that’s so, because I’m asleep! So we are either awake or asleep and I don’t mean awake in this moment or asleep in this moment – forget this moment. NOW isn’t actually this moment. I say that because we normally think of NOW as a moment in time. But NOW is beyond time altogether, and “awake” is eternal. But in the realm of thinking and doing we say “be awake NOW, be fully present NOW”. Then we shed the skin of “time”. Time functions as a confusion factor, obfuscating the truth until it’s seen through. I’ve heard it said many times that spiritual practice is not so you can wake up at some other time. It’s where you have your face pressed against the window of reality to see what’s there NOW. You’re not waiting for a future event. THIS moment is the moment of liberation. There isn’t any other. Everything serves to hide NOW from us, like a movie hides the movie screen. When you can ignore the movie and see the screen, that’s NOW.

May 24, 2014

All the teachers I read and listen to are feeling like the same teacher now, which is the truth itself in different forms hitting me from different angles. These teachings aren’t things to believe, just different questions and perspectives.

I was listening to a Mooji video and he said he was no longer excited hearing about people’s “glimpses” of the truth. “How can there be a glimpse of awareness? They happen IN awareness!” to paraphrase. I saw his point and realized my glimpses were both wonderful and pitiful. Like I knocked on the right door, but the door didn’t let me in.  I’m hearing all the teachings in a new way all the time, and it’s like subtle layers of smog are dissipating. Feels like someone is washing a big window and I am a tiny spot on the window and soon they will wash me off!   “Oh nooooo!”    to quote Mr. Bill.

May 22, 2014

Every experience is floating in space and there is no self present so I might say that I am the space.  Kind of spooky.  I get this sense occasionally now but it fades out.  I realized this would be the end of suffering.  Shortly after that I started experiencing lots of back pain. Like the universe hitting me with a Zen stick.  But it IS encouraging me to meditate more and better.  Something’s fogging up the window.  Frustrating.  I try to surrender.  Feels like death.  Only recently have I really gotten a sense of the essence of awareness, the emptiness.  I feel like I have to fold inside out, or like that will happen when I finally let go.

March 30, 2014

I went to see Adyashanti speak in Sacramento today. I sat in the front row almost right in front of him and as he talked I was trying to sense something from him but didn’t get much so I just listened and contemplated reality. I entered the “world being” perspective and suddenly felt a sense of extreme ultimate aloneness which had a crushing feeling about it tinged with loneliness. The aloneness was just seeing the reality that there was nothing there but the totality – no people, no Pip. The loneliness was some unconscious reaction to that, probably linking to all my times of being very alone, and was the only thing that made the aloneness uncomfortable. But I could see how this aloneness rendered everything – all thought, all knowledge, everything – moot; especially thoughts and thinking which depend on relationships for meaning. When there’s only “one”, there are no relationships. I felt like I was looking in a mirror and the mirror was about to crack and when it shatters I don’t know what will happen – that’s where surrender comes in. So I just sat there in surrender. Just let it go, let it happen, let that be. That’s when I felt like something was going to happen and I remembered the dream from a few nights ago. But everything didn’t explode into white light, as far as I recall.  :  )  Since I’m so familiar with Adya’s ideas I don’t remember much of what he said as nothing stood out as new; except that I did get a sense of some power in his delivery which I can’t put my finger on but which I never picked up watching his videos. Like there was a steel blade behind his words. Then during the Q and A the first question was about aloneness and surrender. Interesting. I didn’t have any questions.

Most of the other questions were really just expressions of gratitude. Later outside I was walking away but had the urge to go back and sit in front of the building for a bit where there was seating around the trees, so I did. I noticed a lady sitting to my right and our eyes met and there seemed to be a connection. Then I realized she was one of the people who had talked with Adya during the Q&A period, and had talked about her spiritual transformation. So I debated for a moment and went over and introduced myself and asked if I could talk with her. There was a moment where I seemed to know that I had to sit on the other side of her so I did (some intuition there). We shared our stories briefly. She had experienced an awakening some time back which she referred to by saying “I died”. Which I took to mean her ego died. I tried to see what I could sense from her while she told me her fascinating story. She was very expressive facially and had some lively energy but I sensed no games even though there was a bunch of programming rolling around in her. This energy seemed to not be controlling her or bothering her, which was interesting and mysterious. I don’t know if she was enlightened but it seemed like her consciousness was not being influenced by her personality much. Kind of magical.

Here’s her story: She was depressed and in some existential crisis a few years earlier and listening to Adyashanti, doing meditation, and trying to wake up. She didn’t seem to be getting anywhere and was feeling desperate, so when she heard of a guy who claimed to help people awaken using LSD she was interested. After some communication with the guy she decided to employ his services and met him one weekend at some forest location. She said the drug experience was like being in Hell – a totally living nightmare. She did not awaken and was very angry at the guy afterward . She did not ever want to experience that again. But then something changed – it was like something had gotten released or healed during that experience and she felt the urge to try it again. The second time was completely different and she said she had a real spiritual awakening. She then saw the guy a third time and she said the LSD had no meaningful affect at all, and she knew she was done. I’ve never taken LSD and to do so feels like cheating to me for some reason. But I have used marijuana and found it to be very helpful and insightful in a lot of ways.

March 27, 2014

I did some meditation right before sleep. After several dreams I dreamt I was talking to someone in a satsang or something, perhaps Adyashanti, and I was meditating.  Then I said to the guy “wait a minute; something’s happening and I was in a suspenseful state.  He just looked at me in curiosity.  But I couldn’t tell what it was.  It was almost like nothing was happening.  Then it was like I was seeing complete, total emptiness as a very bright white light.  As I was seeing this everything started to disappear and I became the white light. As I became the white light I can’t say there was pleasure or bliss or anything – or any pain or problem either.  All I can say is that the vibrations of being out of my body started and became very intense, but I didn’t try to go anywhere or control anything.  I just let it happen, and it seemed to go on and on.  It was probably only for a few seconds but it seemed a lot longer. There was some confusion and then I came out of it and was in bed awake.