Don’t just do something—sit there!

 Modern society admires goal-getters. In Europe, only the toughest survived the elements during the ice age. In the New World the motto of the settlers became, “grab as much land as you can and do something constructive with it!” We may still have some admiration for Diogenes who lived in a barrel and still managed to argue with Alexander the Great, or the Indian rishis, but we also abhor homelessness. It makes us scared.

Purposeful action seemingly beats sitting on the couch, but what if that action that we consider purposeful is still recycled pain. Is Greta Thunberg a product of her cause? Was Gandhi a product of British oppression? The point is that creation does its thing, and the ones who participate in it will naturally get more limelight than the one sitting it out, but what about our spiritual evolution? The key is to become aware of our pain-body and learn to let go.

The Bhagavad Gita distinguishes three energies—dull, driven and serene. The opportunity for “tamas” is to look through the depressed energy and get moving; for “rajas”, to discover the serene energy in the action, and for “sattva”, to find enlightenment in being. We all contain all of these energies at different stages in our life. Modern man tries too hard and should not be embarrassed to sit it out sometimes.

If you see an opportunity for reform in the outside world, do something about it. If you spot a pain-body on the inside, just sit there and wrap your arms around it until you get to the bottom of it. Reform on the outside, healing on the inside—those are the cornerstones for serene living. Don’t just do something, sit there until inspiration finds you.

#spirituality #awakening #activism

Resting in the eye of the storm

 It’s early in the morning. Something seems off. Thoughts are rushing through me—a feeling of inadequacy, past regrets, worries about the future. This is unusual, typically I am always completely still in the early morning hours. A tune of lost love is humming in my head. I notice a pain-body inside. It’s not specific. It’s the cause of all the regrets, concerns and ill-feelings but it is not subject specific at all. It interrupts the free flowing of energy that I am so used to. I let it envelop me. The temperature is getting warmer. I am inside and the painful feeling stops. It’s like being in a womb, in the center of a storm. Even the humming of the sad tune is getting weaker until it stops. Complete silence, you could even say there is a feeling of well-being. It feels cozy there. I rest in this silence for ten minutes or so and come out of it refreshed. The storm has passed!

Learning and transformation along a spiritual quest

 Whether you like it or not,

whether you know it or not,

secretly, all nature seeks God

and works towards Truth.

Meister Eckhart (1260-1328)

Before we address learning and transformation we have to ask, is there a spiritual quest? Everyone is on a spiritual quest—consciously or subconsciously. Even if we strive for power, meaningless sex and material riches, we are on a subconscious journey that is bound to demonstrate sooner or later that these things also don’t make us happy. Everyone searches for the inner Bliss.

We may call those who look for a new way to be on a conscious spiritual quest, but nobody is “better” or “worse” than the other. Our perceived identity is the interference that gives us the feeling that we are away from Home, whether it is the identity of the greedy CEO who abuses people and the environment or the spiritual seeker. Everyone is just one insight away from the realization that we are Home.

The missing step in the Home-coming is to look through the apparition into the essence of things. There is no one around after the coin has dropped! A Course in Miracles writes, “All of his miscreations can literally disappear in the ‘twinkling of an eye’ because they are merely misperceptions.” That is true. The breakthrough is a new way of seeing, but the subject-object-knowing connection disappears with it. 

Take the sea that is visible to the traveler in the desert or the rope that got mistaken to be a snake. Is the observer who was fooled before learning or transforming if even his existence was never real? Learning and transformation belongs to a lower plane of consciousness that the spiritual seeker aims to leave behind altogether. In the “body-mind-world matrix,” the “learner” aims to see the rope while realizing his own non-existence too!

The transformation is the switch from mind-centered living to heart-centered and the learning opportunity is to see through the illusions of pride, greed, lust, jealousy and anger, but be mindful of the identity of the spiritual aspirant which might be growing with every break-through. The direct path is understanding that there is no learning nor transforming; in fact, there is not even a spiritual path. We are part of That in which body, mind and the world appear.

Letting go of the story of “me”

 I had a dream the other day, I was in a soccer competition and twice managed to steal the ball from my opponents and scored, advancing to the next level each time. The rush I experienced felt familiar. I spent my youth as a soccer player and afterwards used academics and the financial industry as an outlet to compete with the best, intellectually this time around.

That’s how the notion of the “me” gets programmed. We perceive the highs as us and want to see the lows as the outlier and wish it away. The spiritual quest is the letting go of this conditioning and the insight that life’s ups and downs don’t define us. We realize that the story of “me” was not real and we are free to let go of this story altogether.

Do you know the story of the scorpion and the holy man? A passer-by sees a man rescuing a scorpion but the moment he lifts the scorpion out of the water he gets stung and drops it in agony, only to rescue it again a moment later. When the passer-by asked him what was going on, he shrugged his shoulders and said, it’s the nature of the scorpion to sting and my nature to save!

Our nature is not written in stone—or in the dna in this case—it’s something to be mindful of as it gets activated but it doesn’t define us. The dissolution of self is the realization that body, mind and world are One; the observer is the observed. Everything that life confronts us with is a stepping stone to leave the conditioning behind as long as we acknowledge its existence.

The holy man got hung up on his holiness title that’s why life put him in a painful time-loop to encourage him to let go—of the scorpion as well as his holiness. Likewise, I acknowledge my competitive conditioning but no longer feel compelled to participate in the story of “me.” Universal Consciousness is in charge. There is a time to “win” and a time to “lose”.

#spirituality #awakening #competition 

Have you still not found what you are looking for?

 You might say unhappiness is the number of unfulfilled desires divided by desires fulfilled, and that’s what humanity focuses on. Reducing the perceived unhappiness by fulfilling as many desires as possible.

“When she becomes my wife, I will be happy.”

“When I have children I will feel fulfilled.”

“I am one promotion away from happiness.”

“This house will stay with our family for generations.”

“Retirement is like riding into the sunset.”

Life doesn’t work that way—it only appears that way. A desire creates a tension in our system and its fulfillment releases happiness hormones, but the system is only at rest for a little while, then a new desire is born. In the depth of our being is a feeling of “I still haven’t found what I am looking for!”

Naturally, spirituality has the answer to the problem statement. Buddha, and many others have solved this problem for us which was nicely summarized by David Bohm in a conversation with J. Krishnamurti, “Desire is a thought producing feelings.” Spot the root cause of this thought and the game is over.

We have two areas we can tackle in order to get to the root of our never-ending discontentment. One, notice the games we play with ourselves on the thought level and two, zoom into the pain body that creates artificial desires to voice its presence. Find it, get your arms around it and let go!

You still haven’t found what you are looking for? Work on the outer as before, but dig into the inner until the realization hits, the inner is the outer, and restlessness and unhappiness can be resolved once and for all. 

Stop doing what takes “you” away from That!

 Look through the illusion!

To keep attention on your being is not to do anything.

It is to stop doing what takes you away from it.

The sense “I am” is not a practice.

It is your original knowing before thought divides the moment.

Remain with that.

Not the words “I am”—but the silent clarity they point to.

Not a mantra. Not an idea. Not a position.

Just the felt, immediate knowing that you are.

Before body. Before mind. Before identity.

This is not concentration.

It is relaxation into what is already effortlessly present.

(Emily Snow, The I Am That Needs No Effort)

I have a love-hate relationship with non-duality. Love because every word is true. The direct method is so easy—we are a manifestor of the “Field of Infinite Possibilities” as long as we manage to leave our conditioned mind outside of it. It’s an energy that flows through us. No thought comes to the surface as we allow life as is free reign.

The drawback of the direct method is that it leads to projection. When you approach the present moment with the attitude “I am That,” you have already polluted the free energy flow. Emily Snow offers a solution though, stop doing what takes “you” away from it! We can feel, sense and see when the conditioned mind takes charge of a situation. Be mindful!

“Be still and know that I am God” is the guiding principle of life and when conditioned mind throws a wrench into the works of life as is practice there is always Viktor Frankl’s practice to fall back on: “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.

A conditioned mind is helpless investigating its nature, but in the presence of “I Am,” the conditioned mind surrenders to an overwhelming energy circuit. We are able to see, sense and feel when the conditioned mind is active. Our power lies in the “neti, neti” approach. Not this and not that. Take a pause. Look through the illusion and reconnect with what always is. 

Open up to the “Field of Infinite Possibilities”

 J. Krishnamurti once concluded that “Truth is a pathless land,” implying that any attempt to consciously approach the “Field of Infinite Possibilities” will be in vain. The reason for that hopeless reaching is simple enough, the entity reaching for Truth is the interference!

Spirituality is paradoxical at times. Another spiritual truism is the insight that “what you are looking for is looking for you!” We are walking magnets and all we have to do is to polish it and the limitless attraction of the “Field of Infinite Possibilities” will do the work for us.

Spiritual living is the feat to connect with the “Field of Infinite Possibilities” before the body, the mind and the event is. It’s a natural state that is our birthright, and if the conditioning kicks in just as the clouds cover the sun, we can spot them, get to their roots, and watch them pass.

The “Field of Infinite Possibilities” is intelligent beyond comprehension. Every interference that appears in our life has its destruction already built in. Viewed from the perspective of the “pathless land” it was the interference that brought us here. We are That! Realize this fact and the quest is over!