Go Beyond - The Upanishads

We spend our days in the familiar world of our five senses,
but what lies beyond that, if anything - a vast world, perhaps,
waiting to be explored.  Most of us are happy to stay where we
are.  We may even be afraid to venture into the unknown.

Yet there are always a few who are not content...

Simply knowing there is something unknown beyond their
reach makes them acutely restless.  This is true of adventurers -
especially those who seek to explore Consciousness [Ultimate
Reality] itself.  They quietly slip out to see what lies beyond
 the topography of Consciousness itself [that] has an
illumination of its own...

We are meant to explore, to seek, to push the limits of our
potential as human beings.  The world of the senses is just the
base camp: we are meant to be as much at home in
[transcendent Reality] as in the world of physical reality.

It is our destiny as human beings to make this journey
ourselves.  Everything else is secondary...

Follow the path of the illumined ones...

...a familiar voice tugs at the edge of awareness...

~

The Upanishads are the recorded stories from Hindu sages
for whom the transcendent Reality called "God" was more
real than the world reported to them by their senses.  Their
purpose is not so much instruction, but inspiration -
an ecstatic snapshot of transcendent Reality.

The Upanishads tell us that there is a Reality underlying 
life which rituals cannot teach, next to which the things we
see and touch in everyday life are shadows (of the Real).

This Reality is the Essence of every created thing, and
the same Reality is our real self.  Each one of us is one
with the power that created and sustains the universe.  And
this oneness can be realized directly...  a Reality beyond
ordinary knowing...
It is the purpose for which each of us has been born...

From the Upanishads
Eknath Easwaran

excerpt from the Introduction

~

I had forgotten that I had already started this deeper
"exploration" :) back in 2019.  But there have been
so many distraction since then, that I feel called to
explore the depths of Reality again, although the
distractions weigh heavy.  Something deeper than
what I am living now calls to me - from the "edge of
awareness"...
There is always a "call" to deepen.

I want to live the true Essence of Life...

~

Photo - The Flammarion Engraving
from the internet

 

Rumi

Inside this new love, die.
Your way begins on the other side.

Become the sky.
Take an axe to the prison wall.

Escape.

Walk out like somebody suddenly born into color.

Dot it now.
You're covered with a thick cloud.
Slide out the side.

Die,
and be quiet.
Quietness is the surest sign that
you've died.

Your old life was a frantic running
from silence...

Rumi

~

Let yourself be silently drawn by the
stronger pull of what you really love...

Rumi

~

Longing is the core of mystery.
Longing itself is the cure...

Rumi

~

Photo - downpour in the sun

To Let the Light In - James George

What I'm coming to lately is an end-of-life conviction that
there is more to consciousness than what is produced in my
little head, or yours.  Both of us have the capacity, at times,
mysteriously, to get beyond whatever this small
consciousness is doing and telling us.  When we are able,
when we are sufficiently still and relaxed - letting it happen,
not doing it - we can receive a resonance from a greater
Consciousness.

...am I open to something that could be quite new, that is not
really coming so much from me as from this 'source consciousness'
that many traditions have called "I"?

I'm referring to the consciousness that manages to see what
things are, what I am, and to not get caught in the next reaction
or judgment or association - because all of these are functions;
and Consciousness is not a function.

Interviewer: When I experience an echo or hint of that
Consciousness, there's a distinct experience that something can
move through me.  And I even begin to feel impotent without
that sense of connection to a greater knowing.

JG: I think our entire culture has been rendered impotent by its
disconnection from that Consciousness, from anything that
we could really call sacred.

Without being in love with Consciousness, we can't reach it.
and it can't reach us while we're preoccupied with all that is
going on in our ordinary thought, our ordinary bodily habits,
sensations, movements, and our ordinary emotional reactions.
These are what I am calling functions.

It's as if we have two natures: a functional nature and what
many people have been calling a "spiritual nature" or soul.
But the language is suspect these days because we have been
so careful the last couple of centuries to separate from the
superstitions of the past that we have involuntarily cut
ourselves off from the sacred...

Like you, I am searching for who I am, and by now I know I am
not going to find an answer in my functional machinery, ticking
away automatically, but in my essential mind, just aware attention...

It is so important to understand awareness as a connector to
something greater than me, to my source, really.  My presence
is the doorway to that, even at the moment that I acknowledge that
I don't know who I am and see I my lack of presence.  But that is the
beginning of a real wish for it, a wish to Be...

And when I have that wish, then maybe something can reach me
that is of an absolutely different quality.  I may perceive it as an
axis of Light running down my physical body, which has a
different origin.

We have such resistance to even the theoretical idea that we
could, right now, be breathing an air charged with omnipresence
of Consciousness, the omniscience of Consciousness.  We've all
had, perhaps rarely, a direct experience of a moment when I knew
everything at once and I was aware, not just of what I'm calling
this present moment, but of past, present, future as one eternity.

These are just words at this moment.  But I remember it wasn't
just a word, it was a flash of light, of electricity from the top of
my head to my toes.  And it changed something in my cellular
structure that persists today.  I feel that now.

We really need to see ourselves as we are - not trying to change
anything...  How do I include all of me: mind, body, feeling?  All
the functions have to be integrated.  It's not a search to escape
from this altogether wonderful system of functions...

For a moment, stop thinking, start sensing and feeling, so as to
integrate all the parts.

When the mind becomes aware, there is clarity,  When the body
becomes aware, there is the sensation of life.  And when the
feelings become aware, there is the presence of Love.

So I let go, sense and listen, until something relaxes enough to
let the light in from a crack in my shell...

It's not a mental conception, but a deeper conviction that could
draw everything and everyone together...

James George
Excerpts from: To Let the Light In, A Conversation with
James George
in Parabola Magazine
To read the whole article click here.

James George is a retired Canadian Diplomat who served as
High Commissioner to India, and Ambassador to Nepal and Iran.
He has known many important spiritual teachers of the 20th century.

~

Photo - Light coming through the fingers of my hands
held together.  Photo turned on its side.

Heart Summons - Rumi

In the silence between your heartbeat
bides a summons.
Do you hear it?

Name it if you must,
or leave it forever nameless,
but why pretend it is not there?

Leave that which is not,
but appears to be.
Seek that which is,
but is not apparent.

Rumi

What in your life is calling you,
when all the noise is silenced,
the meetings adjourned...
the lists laid aside,
and the Wild Iris blooms
by itself
in the dark forest...

What still pulls on your soul?

Rumi

Primordial Intimacy...

“The key is constantly ‘returning’ your awareness to the awareness of Primordial Consciousness, Primordial Presence, Primordial *Life* before form.  We are constantly challenged to wake up and remember this…”

This came out of a conversation with my husband the other day, in the face of life’s challenges that are currently occurring here on an ongoing basis that I lament about and feel pulling me away from this deeper sense of Awareness.

However, I also know that intentional and conscious awareness of Primordial Silence is the key to “remembering” – for me.  The Primordial Silence of Life calls to me, like and old friend – inviting me, waiting for me to respond, to come and be still – to be aware.  All I need do is consciously turn within and *meet* It - the Primordial Life *in* everything, the Primordial Silence that *is* Life - and feel It, experience It, open up to It.

I’ve been trying to put a *face* to this Primordial Silence that just IS – with names like Spirit, or The Infinite, or The Divine, or God, when in Truth, it is the vast nameless Unknown – and even that is still an attempt to name it, to bring into focus what is simply Divine Simplicity - Awareness that cannot be “person-ified.”

Intimacy with the “Divine” (Primoridal Consciousness) is what we are “made” for – stripping everything else away, all resistances, all ideas and names *about* what that is, or thoughts *about* what it should look like, and allowing the veils that keep us from this Divine Communion of Silence to drop away…  Letting Primordial Silence/Presence permeate every cell – rather - *recognizing* that it permeates every cell – that IT is WHAT we are, and have never been separate from.  This *awareness* of Primordial Silence is the medicine, the elixir of Life – dissolving everything that has allowed us to believe in separateness from this Divine Intimacy that is eternally present in ItSelf – in us.

It is a conscious endeavor to remember that no matter what is going on, there is always Intimacy with Primordial Silence – the Ground of Being, of Existence and all that exists.  I just need to keep re-turning to It: the awareness of Primordial Intimacy with Life ItSelf!

Photo: raindrop on screen
digitally colored

Life As "Sabbatical"...

July 1^st became the beginning of a refocus of life and direction, becoming clear that I must re-discover what is important for the Spirit within to thrive; what is important for this expression of Being to feel enlivened; getting clear on how IT wants to move through life.  I’m still “getting clear.”  It’s an imperative that I can no longer ignore.

The word that came up that day was “Sabbatical”, the theme: “life as sabbatical.”  Just the sense of this enlivens me!  Much like the word “Sanctuary” did back in April.  There is something pulling me towards “sabbatical” as a way of life. It has been all my life actually, and I must pay attention.  It’s like a deep need that *needs* to be met, like the body’s need for air and water.  Without it you shrivel and eventually die.  It’s like knowing that you were born a different gender than your true gender, and you also know you cannot thrive unless you allow the Truth of who you are to be lived.  The same thing is true for the life of Spirit: to live in a way that honors and expresses the Life of Spirit within, that otherwise would shrivel.

This does not mean that I am going to take a sabbatical *from* life, or go on an endless retreat, or live as a saddhu in a cave, as much as those ways of living appeal to me ;)  It is much deeper than that.  It is more being devoted to the Inner Life, contemplatively, creatively, and meditatively in a way that LIFE/Spirit/Being shows me, following the intuitive movement of Life lived as “sabbatical.”  Just as the wave does not move separately *from* the Ocean, but can only move as the Ocean moves *it* - that, to me, is “life as sabbatical.”  Not a sabbatical *from* life, but *within* life - *living* from the Inner Flow of Spirit within, from the Heart of the Infinite Abiding Spirit, or Lotus of the Heart…  I know that some of you are already living this way.

“Sabbatical” as I am using it here, for me, is really an “inner path”, an inner “sabbatical” – following the inner Truth of one’s True Being, one’s Essence, or True Nature – not one’s ego-needs, wants, or desires, or wranglings of the mind in constant philosophizing *about* the Truth.  It is about *living* the deeper inner Reality of Being – intentionally, experientially, consciously, which so far I have been distracted from – by life J, but which still deeply calls to my Heart.  It is a way of living that is vitally *aware* of the Abiding Inner Spirit – continuously.    It is about deepening *into* this Inner Abiding Spirit of Being.  And I have no idea how this will take shape, or what it will look like.

The dilemma is, how to live this “sabbatical life” *without* withdrawing from life to follow this inner Pull of Consciousness, but creating an environment and lifestyle conducive *to* a “sabbatical life” (contemplative life) within life – relieving the burden of daily obligations and external distractions; living the Truth of the Heart according to the Rhythm of the Infinite.  I believe this *is* the Heart “Calling.”  For me this means to deeply experience the Essence of Life, of Being, the Spirit of Life, in a contemplative way; to be meditatively devoted to the Infinite within; to recognize it, to feel it, to *know* it – intimately.  THIS – intimately communing with the Infinite that we *are* in the Eternal Now, and allowing That to live me is - “Sabbatical.”

Photo:  The camera went off by mistake
while “under the hood” J leaving this blur of color.
I digitally enhanced it by adjusting the “levels”
on Adobe Fireworks.
To me it looks like a woman celebrating Life
with arms in the air.
But that is most likely my projection
as I move into a new way of Being
in the world. J

Change of Venue

Like the season, I seem to be transitioning. I am in a place of “not knowing” at the moment.

Because of the change in season and the colder night weather, I have had to change venues for “window sitting.” I have had to return to the comfort of “the cave” – my regular meditation space. It has been a difficult adjustment. There has been a lot of unexpected restlessness and unsettledness in changing spaces. I miss my window. But I don’t like sitting there with the window closed, as the open window has been a big part of my experience – leaning into the Night – smelling the fresh smells - hearing the sounds of Nature. The pull of the window is no longer there. This pull has been missing for a couple of weeks now, which I interpret to mean that there is a need for change. So I am being available to that change, to the awareness of what needs to change, to where the pull of Consciousness wants to go…

I have tried “window sitting” in the morning at a different window, sitting in the sun. But it’s not the same. I’ve tried “the cave” at different times to see if that made a difference. But no… It’s as if the “window” has been closed inwardly as well… And I’m beginning to feel a little alarmed. Maybe this change of venue is about a change in “seeing” – in the way I *see* that needs to change. And maybe this restlessness and inability to settle in to “the cave” is resistance – resistance to going deeper, to entering more deeply into the cave within. Maybe it’s resistance to seeing those remaining hidden shadows that continue to dance on the walls of my mind – particularly fear. It’s a very deep neuronal groove in this brain that needs to be deeply seen and met.

So I’m trying to nest again – to settle into “the cave.” I find lately that I just like sitting there, in the dark, sometimes only a candle on, (floor cushion is no longer an option) – just sitting in the cave of Silence, deepening into the breath and the space of deep inner Stillness. It seems to be just what is needed at this time.

And what is noticed is that there is also a sense of transition in my “spiritual experience” as well. I recently realized that I am tired of all the “structures,” the conceptual structures of being, even the so-called ‘non-duality’ conceptual structures. There is a need to just be in the Spaciousness of Existence – absent any kind of construct – constructs of philosophy, religion, belief, words language, mental and emotional constructs, and frameworks of interpretation; just sitting with awareness of what is Aware, in the fluidity of not knowing – exploring “the cave” and seeing what might be written on its walls…

~*~

Noticing Thoughts Window

Every night at the Window is a different noticing it seems. Lately I’ve been noticing the movement of thoughts.

Initially when I sit I usually notice a tangible sense of Calm and Peace, as was the case a couple of nights ago. Then I noticed that “I” was being distracted by thought, accompanied by a subtle visceral sense of contraction in different places in the body – fear thoughts here, anger thoughts there. When I became aware of this, I would bring my awareness back to the space of Calm and Peace and then once again notice that over a matter of a few minutes thought had somehow pulled my awareness away again. This happened several times in a slow rhythm of awareness from one to the other. This was even noticed in the movement of the eyes as I sat with eyes closed. When I was *resting* in Calm and Peace the gaze was inward. Sometimes it was towards the window to my left, as if listening to the Calm at the window – “out there” – external. When I became aware of thought, it was noticed that my eyes were directed upward and to the right – as if thinking was “up there” somewhere.

A thought became a chain of thoughts, which then became a “swarm” of thoughts (this word borrowed from a friend, but is also what I experienced.) And it was noticed that I had no control over these thoughts. I could not stop thinking, as some teachings suggest. This is what the mind does. It thinks. All I could do was bring my awareness back to the Space of inner Peace and Calm.

It was experienced that there is a pull of Consciousness, the *Space* of Calm and Peace, and a pull of thought in a subtle rhythmic movement as awareness seemingly shifts between the two. Attention gets focused on thought, then, with awareness of that, there is a shift in awareness to Calm and Peace. But I had to consciously keep bringing the focus to the space of Calm – and not get entangled with thought.

In this *natural* movement it was realized once again that thought cannot be stopped, or controlled. I had to consciously choose not to follow thoughts out into infinity, to not indulge in speculation about the future, or resentment and regret about the past. I had to continually bring awareness to the inner space of Calm – the only Now there is. Some nights were more successful than others.

The “trick”, if there is one, seems to be to learn to rest the awareness in the internal Space of Calm (or however you want to call it). Just be there - *aware* of the movement of thoughts and feelings; aware of what is awareing this; allowing - not trying to wrestle oneself from the mind, but gently bringing awareness to this aware space of Eternal Rest again and again - entraining with this Still Space that is only Now…

~*~

“By ‘Here’ I don’t mean this present space.
Here is somewhere within where mind cannot reach.
Presence is always here and you are always That.
Here is not the opposite of there.
This here is nowhere.
It is your Heart.
…it all comes back to the Heart.”
Papaji

The Pull of Consciousness Window

For the last month I have been experiencing a huge pull from within; an intense version of the “Inside-Out” experience that I referred to in the “Inside-Out” post. It is what a friend called “the pull of Consciousness.” I have described it in my journal as a “pull to Freedom.” It’s as if Consciousness ItSelf pulls ‘self’ into ItSelf, essentially reclaiming Itself. Consequently there is a sense of collapse of the ‘outer’ into the Inner, or the outer dissolving *in* the Inner.

This “outer” expression – self - is losing its sense of separateness from the “Inner” and seems to be collapsing *into* that which doesn’t have a name: into Unknowable Beingness - into the Mystery - into the NO-thing-ness - into Existence prior to expression; sinking into the space of Awareness – dissolving – falling into Freedom, the recognition of the Freedom of Awareness. Well almost. :) It feels a little like alchemy. There’s a process going on here – a process of recognition, of Seeing how things really are: That it is not that *I* am ‘That’, but that *That* is all there is! – undisturbed Aware Consciousness… Whew, what a ride!

Although this may all *sound* wonderfully blissful, this “pull of Consciousness” vortex actually feels like a death – a death that is also a birthing. There is a *deep* sense of surrender – of succumbing actually - to this inner pull of Awareness; not necessarily to the “present moment”, or to “life as it is”, but to the Tao – the Flow – the movement of Aware Consciousness within, and how *It* wants to Flow. There is a willingness here to move with this pull of Consciousness on a day-to-day, moment-to-moment basis; a willingness to not be able to see where I’m going or how I’m getting there; to not seek relief – but to just be with this experience and allow it to go where it does until it pulls ‘me’ (Itself) all the way through...

And it’s not so much the death of ‘self’ (me) as it is death of the *perception* of self – a dissolving of orientation, of thought patterns, of identities, of attachments. It’s a “surrender” - a “succumbing” - of all that was held in this system of separation before. It is not “awakening,” it is a dying into Reality.

This “death” is like the famous metaphor of the wave sinking back into the Ocean - finding The Rhythm again, finding the calm resonance within the Rhythm of the Ocean of Awareness – Home. The wave cannot move *except* for the Rhythm of the Ocean within. So I follow the pull into quiet Awareness – most of the time :).

For brief moments, here and there, there is a dissolving of perceptions, where I recognize that I am not the body-mind. But patterns of the body-mind, of the “me,” are still working themselves through. They are rising to the surface. And there is a tendency to want to suppress them. But the need to be swallowed up by Awareness – to fall into Freedom is greater – most of the time :).

Abandoning the *idea* of a separate ‘self’, the scaffolding of the ‘self’, for THIS, this spacious Awareness that dances *through* conceptual reality is Freedom. Yet, there is not the *sense* of being freed *from* anything. There is only the recognition, however brief at the moment, that the pull of Consciousness is a pull to Freedom – inner Freedom. It is recognizing that Awareness is Freedom; that Consciousness aware of ItSelf is Freedom.

~*~

“…pure Consciousness will pull you back. It is not that you will enter it… but when It pulls you It has made the choice to pull you Home…..This is Home, the holy company of the Self. The most holy association is to be as you are [the Self] – this is Freedom.” Papaji

~*~


FunQi Art™ - Christine

I can’t take full credit for this art looking like it does.
The original is a beautiful shade of blue,
(which I will post on the next blog post). When I took the picture,
with a light shining on the picture and the flash of the camera,
this is the way it came out! Almost ethereal… Amazing…
I was awestruck. My husband explained the science of it:
The picture is only a mirror of the light that shines on it.
It can only reflect the light that comes to it…
Hmmmmm….