In this video teaching, Bentinho leads viewers on a guided realization experience of “die before you die.” If you give this teaching your full attention, it may take you into the depths of letting go so that you experience total release. If you’ve never been quite sure what “letting go” means, you might learn through your own direct experience as Bentinho guides you through “die before you die.”

The full audio is about 1 hour and 38 minutes long. Try to watch it when you can watch without other distractions.

FYI: Bentinho will be one of the facilitators at Awakening Together’s 2015 Fall Retreat in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Jan Frazier and Regina Dawn Akers will be the other facilitators. This retreat is a bit unique, because you can choose to come for one facilitator, two or all three.

 

Before these experiences happened I would have told you that I had very little fear. And what I discovered through this experience was just how good I had gotten at stuffing the fear down and trying to ignore it. Like the story about how if you try to push a ballon under water you can hold it under for awhile but it is always trying to push its way back up to the surface. This fear I hold is the same. I can push it down but eventually it will pop back up.

I became aware of a pilot light of fear I hold inside me. I call it a pilot light because it is a very small, unnoticeable flame. A pilot light is used in the world for things like gas stoves and fireplaces. It is a tiny flame you light once so that it is at the ready for when ever you want to use your stove top or your fireplace. The flame is lit already so when you want to use the stove you don’t have to relight it you simply add more gas.

When I have thoughts of fear I can feel the pilot light getting fed so that the flame is very large. You know this flame of fear. Either you still have it or you can remember back to what it felt like when you did.

I became very attuned to this pilot light of fear while I was at day six of a 10 day silent meditation retreat. I had completed about 50 hours of meditation in 5 days. During this sixth day I was going through a scanning technique where I scanned every inch of my body. This day I was sitting with my arms crossed over my body. As I scanned my left arm I was moving my attention down my lower arm to my hand. As I got almost to the hand I felt this fear feeling. I backed up and the fear feeling went away. Hmm I thought that was weird? So I started back doing the scanning down the lower arm toward the hand and again, there it is! that fear feeling. Hmm ok let’s just continue the scanning. So I got to the other arm and as I scan towards the right hand again, the fear feeling. So I repeated the backing up and continuing and again the fear feeling. I continued to observe the feelings, sensations in the body and discovered the feeling of fear wasn’t in my arms but in my solar plexus, my lower chest and it was always there. I couldn’t find any thought in the mind at the time that was causing it. It was just always on.

I was much more attune to the pilot light of fear during that time then I am during my normal life. I find that spending so much time in silent meditation tends to amplify my awareness to the present, to the sensations in the body, to the thoughts in the mind.

During Day 7 I noticed something that seemed odd to me that fed that flame. What I noticed was when I walked by my car during that day I felt the pilot light be fed. Really? My car feeds the pilot light of fear? I stopped and recalled what my thoughts were at the time. I had thought about how the car would take me home once the retreat was over. I found that I thought of my car as security, Then there was the thought “what if the car doesn’t start after 2 weeks of sitting here?” there goes the way home I had planned and the security I felt with my plan working out. And those were the thoughts that fed the pilot light of fear.

Weeks later, after I was back to life as usual, I needed to drive to the next town on business. I noticed that I held fear about my car breaking down during the trip home. My car was in perfect shape and there was no imminent reason to think it would breakdown, and it didn’t. But I started to look at why I feared the possibility of that happening. I saw that I had in my mind already decided what was supposed to happen. My car was supposed to work perfectly. And I saw that when I thought about my plan not working out, any derivation from what my plan was supposed to be was bad. I felt the pilot light of fear grow in me when I thought about my plan not working out.

It wasn’t until I read something in The Holy Spirit’s Interpretation of the New Testament (NTI) that I realized what the root of this fear was from. Why did I feel so much fear when I thought about my plan not working out? I saw my security and safety being destroyed. I would no longer be safe and secure.

What I read in NTI was Luke12. In (v 29-32) I came to paragraph 5 “Let Me lead you to both safety and security, which [security] is known through the knowledge of your safety. Safety comes from the guarantee of who you are. The knowledge of your safety takes away all images of fear. In knowing your Self you can know no fear.”

Ahhh yes, it clicked for me! I had been confused. I was believing my security comes from the outside world. I was believing my plan working out brings me security. I was believing my car working perfectly brings me security. But what Jesus is teaching me is that my security comes from knowing in my heart, knowing the truth to be, that my security comes from knowing who I am. That I am always safe. Only in my illusions of being something that I am not can I erroneously think I am not safe. That in truth no harm can come to me because I am the Son of God. I rest safely and gently in God’s mind.

I do believe that as I accept this truth, that my safety and security comes from my knowing and accepting and believing without a doubt that my safety and security are guaranteed in who I am that the pilot light of fear will be extinguished forever.

When I am aware of the pilot light of fear being fed I willingly remember my Self, that knowing of who I truly am brings me relief and squelches the pilot light of fear.

Here’s to living fearlessly!

Mad with joy, life and death dance
to the rhythm of this music. The
hills and the sea and the earth
dance. The world of man dances
in laughter and tears.

Why put on the robe of the monk, and
life aloof from the world in lonely pride?

~ Kabir

A persistent trap all along the path is pride in one’s spiritual purity. It’s a form of one-upmanship in which you judge others out of a feeling or superiority. This ultimately limits your spiritual awakening. You can see many people who are caught in this trap of virtue – for example, in the self-righteousness of some church goers. In the yoga scene in America there are many groups of people who dress in a certain way, eat in a certain way, are special in some way that gives them an ego-enhancing feeling of purity.

The harmful effect of this trap is not so much to one’s social relationships – though they may become strained from this display of subtle arrogance – but rather the effect on oneself. This feeling of specialness or superiority inflates the ego and feeds it with pride. The best antidote to pride is humility, which leads to compassion. The sooner one develops compassion in this journey, the better. Compassion lets us appreciate that each individual is doing what he or she must do, and that there is no reason to judge another person or oneself. Merely do what you can to further your own awakening.

~ Ram Dass

Note: This article was written by a student of A Course in Miracles (ACIM) and assumes some ACIM knowledge.

Before you decide not to read this, please give me one minute of your time.

Ok, set your timer, just one minute.   First off, I’m not talking about living in a cave, or giving up your life, I’m talking about the meditation that Jesus talks about in ACIM. Ok,  I have about 45 seconds.  For the rest of this minute I am going to ask you to be as brutally honest with yourself, as much as you can muster.  If you read the title and found a dislike, a judgement, an aversion to it then I would ask you to write down what that thought was, or it may be several thoughts.  Go ahead write them down.  Maybe the thoughts were something like …”It’s not necessary and a waste of time”, or maybe they were along the lines of “I would like to but I don’t have time”, or maybe it was something like “what would my friends think”, or maybe it was something like “oh I know how to meditate there is nothing else to learn here”. Whatever the thoughts were, they are precious to you right now.  They hold the key to your release!  Next I ask you, with all my heart because our salvation rests on it, with as much willingness you can find, go into a self inquiry with Spirit for each thing you wrote.  Work with each of those thoughts uncovering the thought below it until you reach that “Aha!!!” moment when you discover the root! Now with Spirit’s help ask to forgive yourself of that root, false belief and let it go and in the process heal our mind!  When you are done with that please join us back here if you want to. I think my minute is up now.

For everyone still here and those rejoining us, Welcome!

I have been interested in how meditation can be useful in my practicing what the Course is teaching.  In actually doing the Course. I wonder how important or helpful it is to my salvation.  I see that Jesus uses it in his teaching in the Workbook and it is referred to in the text and supplemental material.   If Jesus keeps bringing it up he must find it helpful, right?

By the way, as thoughts start to surface of not liking, judging or aversion please follow the step of self inquiry above because these are the blocks to Love’s presence which we are all trying to uncover! Congratulations you just bumped into one!

In the workbook Jesus starts us out early in the lessons closing our eyes and going inside. He starts us out for only a few minutes at first and then increases the duration as he goes, leading us to the point where we choose with Spirit how long to stay focused inside.  He calls it mind training. And with any training we know that we have to start out with what we are capable of at that time, with the understanding as we practice we will become capable of handling more. We each need to proceed at our own pace based on our own capabilities and willingness to progress.

The workbook starts out using a mediation technique of leading us through the meditation, using our mind or imagination.  In several places Jesus asks us to walk through the clouds of our misbeliefs to arrive at the light of Love’s presence.  Eventually he brings us to lesson 189 where he asks us to set aside every thought we have. He’s asking us to not use the mind or the imagination, he is asking us to come to this place of silence and rest, empty.   Where there is no past, there is no future, there is no guilt or fear, there are no things, or any thoughts.  In this place of awareness we observe ourself.  This is what Jesus is referring to when he talks about a clean slate in lesson 65:6:4 “on this clean slate let my true function be written for me.”

The Course teaches us that the goal in this place we find ourselves now is to be in our right mind, and to see the real world.  And if we talk about right mind then there must be another part of the mind. This is what the Course refers to as a split mind with the parts being the right mind and the ego mind. Please bear with me on this review here. It helps me to get it all straight so I can continue.

Actually this would be helpful to look at now.  In the clarification of term it says “consciousness is the receptive mechanism,receiving messages from above or below; from Holy Spirit or the ego. Consciousness has levels and awareness can shift quite dramatically, but it cannot transcend the perceptual realm.  At its highest it becomes aware of the real world, and can be trained to do so increasingly.”  Ok,  this is saying we have consciousness. We have a receptive mechanism receiving messages.  With  consciousness we  are listening or receiving messages either from Spirit or the Ego.  As we listen to Spirit our level of awareness of our true self is higher then when we are listening to the ego.  And our level of awareness can shift dramatically.  But what is it saying about the real world?  It says that we can become aware of the real world, and can be trained to do so increasingly.

Ahaaaa!!  This is where I think meditation can train my mind to be aware of the real world.  I’m not saying that this takes the place of all the forgiveness work the course asks us to do.Both of these trainings will lead us Home.  If we do both as Jesus is asking us to do we will get there faster.  Both of these can help us to recognize what the end goal is, and once we are skilled at it, will provide motivation for us to continue the work.

In lesson 66 it says:

“God gives me only happiness.

He has given my function to me.

Therefore my function must be happiness.”

When we have shifted, as the course says , to receiving messages from the ego we are at a lower level of awareness. At those levels of awareness we have the miracle of forgiveness to restore us to our function of happiness.

When we have shifted to receiving messages from Spirit we have the awareness of knowing who I am as our function which is happiness.

What does the course say about the real world? If we were aware of it,  what would it be like? The clarification of terms says in section 4 “where destruction was perceived the face of Christ appears, and in that instant is the world forgot, with time forever ended as the world spins into nothingness from where it came.”

So we can train our minds to forget the world, time, and remember only our Self, the one who has a mechanism for hearing called consciousness.  As Jesus asks us in Lesson 189, “Simply do this: be still and lay aside all thoughts of what you are and what God is, all concepts you have learned about the world, all images you hold about yourself. Empty your mind of everything it thinks is either true or false or good or bad, or every thought it judges worthy and all the ideas of which it is ashamed. Hold onto nothing. Do not bring with you one thought the past has taught , nor one belief you ever learned before from anything. Forget this world, forget this course, and come with holy empty hands unto your God.

One way I found to practice lesson 189 using meditation is I quiet my mind by sitting comfortably in a quiet uninterrupted place.  I let my mind contemplate who am I.  I contemplated who I am if I had no arms. I am still me, nothing of who I am changed. As I didn’t have any arms, I am the same in truth. And if I had no legs, the same. I did not change, I’m not any less. And as I let go of the trunk and the head I still do not change. So what am I? I let go of the thought of language. Did I change? No, I am still me. The concept of house and stuff I seem to have, letting go of all that and still I am unchanged. I let go of time, of the past and of the future.  Did I change?  No, I am still complete.  I let go of all thoughts, and still I am still who I am.  As I sit with a quiet mind I come to see that I am the one who is awareness itself.  And I sit here watching my Self.  There is nothing here but my expansive Self.  If I become aware of a thought I let it go, I don’t get involved I go back to watching my Self.

Try this for yourself, practice it as often as you can.  As you practice what do you discover? What do you feel?  As with any training your skill develops over time.  I know that as you practice this what you discover will bring you the motivation that Jesus talks about in the introduction to Lesson 181-200, 2:5 “your motivation will be so intensified that words become of little consequence. You will be sure of what you want, and what is valueless.”

I don’t want to say too much or be a spoiler because I want you to discover the truth about yourself, so that when you do discover it you will know it came from Your Self.

For more instruction on the meditative process of awareness watching awareness please see the book The Most Direct Means To Eternal Bliss

Adapted from The Human Gospel of Ramana Maharshi by John Troy

Perumal Swami was a tough guy with a robust body and a rough demeanor. He came to Ramana Maharshi when Ramana lived in Viru-pak-sha cave in 1914. His first meeting with Ramana left him awestruck. He accepted Ramana as his guru, decided to be the protector of Ramana and chose to beg for food for Ramana in the streets of the town.

Let’s look at the character of Perumal through several short stories about him. The character of Ramana Maharshi shall also become evident through these stories.

Once, when Perumal and another Swami were away in the town leaving Ramana alone in the cave, a group of fierce-looking men from a particular Hindu sect arrived with swords and spears. They said, “We are from the Vind-ya hills, the kingdom of the Sidd-has. The head of the Sidd-has told us that at Arunachala, there is a ripe soul who needs the final initiation. He commanded us to bring him there. Whether you accept it or not, we are going to physically remove you to the Vind-ya hills.”

Ramana sat silently, unmoved.

Some of the shepherd boys heard the commotion and felt that something troublesome was happening. They rushed to Perumal Swami. He ran back to the cave, and in one look sized up the situation. He cleverly told the men, “I come from a nearby village. Last night I had a dream, in which the head Sidd-ha of the Vind-ya hills appeared and said, “My disciples will be coming to Viru-pak-sha cave tomorrow. You go there and ready a cauldron of oil, fry them in that cauldron, and bring their fried bodies to me.” Then he ordered the shepherd boys, “Hey! Go and bring the firewood. I will go into town and bring a cauldron and some tins of oil, so that we can fry these people.”

And that is the end of the first story. Let’s look at some others.

Perumal Swami had managerial qualities. However, his being a robust, forceful man had its drawbacks. When Ramana‘s mother came to stay at the cave, Perumal disliked it and shouted, “You get out! You cannot stay here.” He may have felt that women didn’t belong. Though deeply hurt, she obeyed. Tucking her one sari or so in a bundle under her arm, she walked out in sadness. Ramana, who was seated outside, got up, and with tender affection, took the bundle from her and said, “Come, let us go away from where we are not needed.” Perumal fell at Ramana‘s feet and requested them to stay.

When Ramana moved to Skanda Ashram at the request of devotees in order to be closer to a water source, Perumal also went along with the others. Among the many attendants that gathered in the Ashram, there was one Yaz-pani from Sri Lanka. (Sri Lanka was known as Yaz-pa-nam, so this devotee was nicknamed Yaz-pani.) He was a scrupulously clean person. He would sweep the ashram daily and keep everything spotless.

Once, Yaz-pani spread a paste of cow dung on the rough, soft earth of the ashram, to make the ground smoother and harder. When Perumal, who was the self-appointed manager of ashram, came and saw it while it was still wet and slippery, he became livid and shouted, “Yaz-pani, get out of the Ashram!”

Yaz-pani was a very sincere devotee. He could not leave Ramana, but also wanted to obey the orders of the manager. Being a clever man, he tried to find a way out. There was a tall coconut tree inside the ashram that protruded outside the ashram grounds. Quickly he got onto the tree, climbed to the top of it, and stayed there. Now he was technically “out” of the ashram without leaving it! Everyone pleaded with him to come down, but he refused. At lunch, Ramana noticed that Yaz-pani was missing. The other devotees then related what had happened. Ramana got up, went toward the coconut tree and gently said, “Yaz-pani, you may come and share the food.” He spoke so softly that this man came down like a child, and started eating his food.

There was a sadhu living at the ashram who was called Se-poy Swami. (Se-poy means “soldier,” and he was called so because he was a retired army man.) He had a tendency toward military etiquette. Totally devoted to Ramana, he expressed his devotion by guarding Ramana, and felt it was his duty to be Ramana‘s guardian. Thus, whenever Ramana was seated at the ashram, he would come with a long stick that was supposed to be his rifle, and stand in attention next to him. Every minute that Ramana was seated there, he would stand guard, silently, not looking at anybody else, completely immersed in meditation next to him.

One day, Perumal got vexed with him and shouted, “What are you doing? Are you enacting some drama here? Get out of the ashram!” This man wanted to obey, but could not go away from Ramana. So he stood outside the ashram, guarding Ramana from outside, just like he had been doing from within its walls.

Though Perumal disliked Ramana‘s mother, when she passed away in 1922, it was he who, along with others, carried her body to the present site of Ramana Ashram. After putting the body down, he went into town and got all the ingredients necessary for her burial. However, Ramana, after a while, began staying in the present ashram location near his mother’s burial site instead of the previous ashram location where Perumal acted as manager. When Ramana began staying there, Perumal did not like it. He also intensely loathed Ramana‘s brother, Chin-na, who managed the new ashram by their mother’s burial site. Although the new ashram was nothing but a straw hut next to their mother’s grave and nothing to be jealous about, Perumal went to court and filed a suit against Ramana and tried to pull Ramana into court. He even created a statue of Ramana, started another Ramana Ashram in town and then proclaimed it as the real Ramana Ashram! Further, he declared himself the secretary of this institution!

Whenever mail arrived at the post office for Ramana Ashram, there was always a tug-of-war between Perumal and Chin-na regarding which ashram was the true ashram and who should take the mail. Then Ramana solved it very simply. He said, “Let all the letters go to Perumal. Whatever he wants to take let him take, and whatever he does not want, let us take. Where is the need to quarrel?”

Ramana also sent word to Perumal through another devotee: “Tell Perumal Swami that he should not swerve away from spiritual practice.” Perumal did not listen, but Ramana never gave up on him. When Perumal lost the court case and felt humbled, he fell ill. He sent word to Ramana: “I want to come and apologize. I have committed a sin.”

The rest of the people in the ashram said, “No! He is the person who went against you. He should not be allowed to come inside the ashram.” When Ramana heard this, he said, “Why do you say so? He is our Perumal Swami. Let him come.”

When Perumal came, everyone looked at him with acid eyes. He broke down before Ramana and said, “I have committed such a terrible sin. I will surely go to hell.” Ramana smiled at him and said, “Perumal Swami, will I not be with you even there?”

That was a turning point for Perumal. He chose a small cave and started living there in meditation and contemplation. Even after Ramana dropped the body, he felt he must have [spiritual food] from Ramana Ashram. Hence, devotees came from Ramana Ashram with food for Perumal twice a day. That is how he continued to be taken care of. He may have been rough-edged, but Infinite Love took care of him.

Magdi will be a retreat leader at the Awakening Together Satsang Retreat in Santa Barbara from September 12-14, 2014. In preparation for the retreat, I am sharing a couple of conversations he has had with seekers. Click here to read the first conversation. Here is today’s conversation:

Questioner: I will try to describe what happened to my consciousness this week. I traveled to my origin town. Every night i went out to see the beauty of the desert, where there are palm trees and mountains as well as vast space where there are no houses, only a far space.

Reply: Lovely.

Questioner: In the night i saw a lot of stars with such clarity! They seemed to be bigger than I can ever imagine. So in those moments I see the whole space of consciousness without any thought interfering.

Reply: Yes. That is very beautiful

Questioner: I sense my ignorance! It is as if the whole universe is made of one thing and yet it appears as many different forms. I feel that i know nothing, i do not even know my thoughts. I’m just here, without really knowing what this is all about. Is it normal to feel ignorant this way?

Reply: Yes, That’s OK. Very OK. When the mind becomes innocent, it loses its structures and becomes ‘not-knowing’ and it is in awe in front of the magical fantasy of the universe. Simultaneously, there is presence and wonder. This sort of not knowing is not familiar as the mind is sort of ‘on hold’ and does not like it. There is nothing wrong with you. Enjoy this openness. Become familiar with it. It is the screen out of which the mind appears.

Questioner: it’s so unfamiliar.

Reply: Yes, it is unfamiliar to the mind as the mind is sort of absent. The knowledge of the mind is very limited.

Questioner: It’s like feeling that i do not know anything.

Reply: That is the mind that comes back and wants to grab the attention. The Self needs nothing, it is all knowing. The mind argues with ‘not-knowing’. That is fine. Don’t let it bother you. You know yourself as nothing and as everything. Nothingness is Presence and it is OK. It is out of the nothingness of Presence that everything appears.

Questioner: Yes.

Reply: Consciousness is nothing and everything. Like gold can be a ring or a necklace and it can also be an ingot with no specific shape.

Questioner: Yesss

Reply: The mind gets attached to a ring or a necklace. The mind is stuck in worldly knowledge but not the knowledge of the Self since the knowledge of the Self reveals that the mind is a hologram, a set of images, but not the real deal.

Questioner: We forget that it’s all made up of the same thing Gold?

Reply: Yes

Questioner: There is one other question. I feel that i’m a person searching for some truth ! but at the same time i do not know who is this person searching for that truth! Is the dream character the one searching ?

Reply: The dream character is not real. All the dream characters and all the dream events are not real. Believing that you are a person limits you to a body mind experience. Let go of that belief and allow the me sensation to dissolve in the space and the sense of limitation will dissolve.

Questioner: who is believing that he is a person ?

Reply: The I-thought is the me. The I-thought and the separate self are one. There is no actual separate self. We refer to the I-thought as the separate self impression, since the me-sensation at the body level accompanies the I-thought.

Questioner: Yes, is it me the person that should let go of that belief ?

Reply: The person is not real. The I-thought and the me-belief are the play of consciousness.
Think of it as a play. The separate self is on the stage. The choreographer is consciousness. The one and only reality. The dream character on the stage is not real. It is a role. The play becomes unhappy when you identify with the role the actor is playing. But that is part of the enjoyment in the play. The suspense.  But none of that is real. When you dream of a pink elephant, the pink flying elephant in your dream is not real. It is consciousness that dreams all the characters.
yet, when you believe it is real, the dream becomes serious and unhappy.

Questioner: So it is consciousness that hears and see, the person is only like a phantom that we see as real ?

Reply: Yes. The person is like a phantom. Like a mirage It is a play.

Questioner: So, I am actually myself every moment and I dream that there is a person who is doing what he is doing! while actually i’m just the awareness believing i’m a limited body mind?
Reply: Yes. Awareness is not personal. It is One Universal Awareness across the board.

Questioner: So, is what it means to let go of thoughts or contractions ? Is it just a play?

Reply: A contraction is a mind event in the body. A dream event that seems real because the dream character is believed to be real. It is the play of consciousness.

Questioner: And I’m identifying my self with that dream character which is a body mind. There seem to be a feeling of wanting to know the truth in my consciousness and yet no one is responsible for wanting to be free! I keep looking for the seeker and i cannot find it. The person who is talking to you know is it talking by freewill or is there something entirely different?

Reply: There is no free will for the dream character. There is only one reality and that is the reality of consciousness. There is no person.

Questioner: What are the other realities that people imagine ?

Reply: The person … people are an I thought and the realities they imagine are dream realities … as only the reality of Consciousness is real. It is through the reality of Consciousness that everything we know is known.

Questioner: Only a thought?

Reply: Yes, as well as a feeling. People do not think. People are thought of, imagined by the I-thought that Consciousness is dreaming.

Questioner: Ahh! Is everything a thought ?

Reply: Consciousness is the only reality. Things are thought and mind events that are separated out of the fabric. It is the play of Consciousness.

Questioner: This consciousness … what is it made out of ? What is it ?

Reply: The reality of Consciousness is not made out of anything. Yet, all seeming things are made out of it. The substance of consciousness is consciousness and there is no other substance, no other reality. The substance of reality is reality and not something else.

Questioner: What is the relationship between me and consciousness? Even though i don’t know what ‘me’ is really !

Reply: it is the relationship between the dream and the dreamer.

Questioner: Is the dream inside the dreamer?

Reply: The dream is a thought that the dreamer is having. There is no real dream character, no real ‘me’ that can have a relationship with consciousness. Consciousness is its own relationship.

Questioner: So consciousness is a thought i am having ?

Reply: Consciousness is having the thought ‘you’ and is having all thoughts out of itself.

Questioner: What is the relationship of Consciousness with myself ? I’m to who they appear ?
Reply: The relationship between the dream and the dreamer. The dream appears to consciousness. There is no real relationship between the dream character and consciousness. The only real relationship is between consciousness and itself. But that is relatively speaking.

Questioner: And I am Consciousness?

Reply: The only reality. You ARE. Are you not real?

Questioner: yes, I am REAL.

Reply: The reality of consciousness is eternal and does not die.

Questioner: How am i to recognize that?! There is a sense of not seeing that reality.
The dream seems so real! the world and everything seem so real!

Reply: What perceives? That that perceives is real.

Questioner: That which perceive i cannot know.

Reply: You are that. It cannot be know via the mind. But you are it. You are the consciousness that reads these words. You are that reality.

Questioner: Yes, it feels so real because it is here now.

Reply: Turn your attention to the source. That you are. Not perceived. But all perceiving.

Questioner: Yes. I will do that more! Turning my attention to that which perceive and not perceived. What will i find there ?

Reply: That there is only one reality, the reality of consciousness that is not personal.

Questioner: I understand now. Thank you. I will contemplate and turn my attention inward to the source.

Reply: Good night.

(Taken from Magdi Em Be Facebook page)

Magdi will be a retreat leader at the Awakening Together Satsang Retreat in Santa Barbara from September 12-14, 2014. In preparation for the retreat, I am sharing two conversations he has had with seekers. Here is the first conversation:

Friend: Thank you Magdi for conscious connection, greetings from the Gold Coast.

M: Lovely to connect with you…

Friend: And you my friend, love your posts, I am a Joel Goldsmith student

M: Joel is wonderful… a new discovery for me… He speaks from the divine place of the heart.

Friend: Realizing who I am and that life is but a DREAM.

M: Life can be such a sweet dream. Full of beauty, love and happiness…. and play-full

Friend: Yes absolutely. I have so much still to be aware of, remembering there is no human beings only God Being

M: You got it… remove these old dark lenses and the beauty shines…

Friend: Yes God is, nothing else is real. I’m getting it. Sounds like your consciousness is very pure already.

M: Yes, God is! and God is everything … I have been blessed by the divine… Grateful to share and explore with dear friends who love the truth.

Friend: Wow, that’s wonderful always open to Grace’s guidance and truth

M: As you remain open to Grace, Grace graces you with its guidance. Leads you to your True Nature, that is free and happy. It can be as simple as that… Open to receive the divine message … In this openness, we can hear. The mind is still, and the heart wide open.

Friend: I sense you are to explore something with me but not quite clear, had Huge challenge over time that I have had to not believe. Yes I just so love God and to see the perfection of everyone who may not know it.

M: There are no coincidences for those who are on the path with their gaze set onto the truth. Loving God… God loves you tenfold. She is quite a lover, you know. She adores loving…. In ignorance we love the me character and me-stories… In ignorance we turn away from God and only give her lip service… Patiently, she waits for us to recognize her and turn our attention to her.

Friend: Yes that is the awareness to realize.

M: There is no higher realization that the realization of the universality and reality of Consciousness. That is the divine revelation, no matter how one puts it.

Friend: It is. I just want to sit with God all day and forget the world.

M: First, you forget the world and remember God in the absence of the world. And then you remember God in the presence of the world… after all, the world is God’s creation.
First, you negate the me and the world and you realize you are divine consciousness in the absence of the world. Then you realize you are divine consciousness in the presence of the world. The divine establishment is in the absence as well as in the presence of the world.

Friend: Yes I’m opening up to this.

M: The screen is unaffected by whatever images and whatever forms it takes… Water remains water whether it is ice or steam.

Friend: About 2 years ago, I heard deep within the word, “every need is met within me”.

M: That is a divine message. A peak in the divine nature that you are. An invitation.

Friend: Yes that is the message to take to others, I think.

M: Only when the fruit is ripe is it sweet.

Friend: The kingdom of God is within. So I am a work in progress,

M: The blossoming of the kingdom of God dissolves all distinctions and reveals the reality, eternity and infinity of Consciousness.

Friend: So you and I are One so open to that realization now. Too easy.

M: When the world no longer moves you … when no thought, no perception and no sensation gets you unhappy… the realization is established … It is the complete dissolution of the separation at the mind and at the body level. When ignorance is completely removed out of the system, God reveals herself in her full glory and gives you a seat in the Kingdom.

Friend: Yes that’s the shift I am going through.

M: That is your heart’s deepest desire. Remain on the Holy path…

Friend: No other desire only this yes. It’s been very hairy.

M: The screen is untouched by whatever arises on it. The sky remains infinite even when a tornado passes by.

Friend: The journey that is has been very difficult.

M: The weather does not affect consciousness. Where is the journey this very instant? Only a thought. Presence does not travel. Sometimes difficult dreams are part of the reminder for us to wake up…

Friend: Yes I know now it was all unreal. Im so grateful.

M: When we follow the me-illusion that is seeking happiness in the world, God tells us that is not the path. When we do not listen, she pinches us… Then if we continue to ignore her, she pinches a bit harder… Then… we may listen… or not.

Friend: Yes how true.

M: The wise listen. They pay attention and discriminate between the beliefs that the ‘me’ is where it is at and Consciousness.

Friend: I so hope I don’t go off track I only want to live God’s will.

M: Slowly they realize that the ‘me’ is a belief that has also become a me-feeling … the belief that consciousness is contained in a body mind is a virus that they start to investigate. Love the truth and God will provide you with her guidance. Keep company with good friends who are God lovers.

Friend: Yes I will and to stay connected to truth and love, I am so grateful for your wisdom.

M: Much love to you.

Friend: Yes much love to you Magdi, my brother in God, thank you so much, will connect again soon,

M: Anytime.

(Taken from Magdi Em Be Facebook page)

Timothy Conway will be a retreat leader at the Awakening Together Satsang Retreat in Santa Barbara from September 12-14, 2014. He will also lead a Satsang at the ‘Soak in the Beauty’ retreat at the same location from September 14-18, 2014. In preparation for the retreat, I am sharing a series of questions answered by Timothy. To read the full series, click here. And now, here is today’s question:

Marshall writes:

Timothy, something has happened. I found your wonderful reply yesterday on my email and absorbed some of it through tears of joy and gratitude. The presence of true God in you and this light and love are so filling. Last night as I laid down in bed I took a copy of this reply and read it slowly and absorbed as much as I could. It was feelings and expansions and peace.

Today I am in a new state… something has happened. If this lasts for another minute it will have been enough. I will test this, if it is real it will endure and flourish. Whatever happens I am profoundly, deeply, infinitely (beyond words) in love with what you have done for me just by being you. I do not know what to say…. I can only project to you my profound open heart for you, myself, and every particle and potential of created and non created Source and Creation. WE are indeed ONE. I cannot claim, only experience. I will write again. At your service.

——-

Timothy responds:

Thank you for your really kind words!

Now: let’s hone in very, very deeply on the Divine Truth underlying all of us and our passing, transient states of consciousness. You already know this, but this Timothy fellow is going to presume to say it anyway…. 🙂

Marshall, you wrote: “Timothy, something has happened. […] Today I am in a new state… something has happened.”

Marshall, nothing has happened! There is only God—changeless, eternal, infinite, vaster than vast, Absolute Being-Awareness-Bliss-Peace-Love. All that can come and go is of the dream—transient, fleeting. Even states of mind that feel “realized,” blissful, peaceful, clear. All of this is to say that, by Divine Grace, all sorts of wonderful happenings will happen—but the Divine One, formless and invisible and unexperiencable (as an object), the one Subject beyond all subject-object experiences, is always right HERE and NOW “underneath” the play of persons and their experiences of the Divine. Our deepest, deepest, subtlest, subtlest Divine knowingness-gnosis-jnana-prajna [Vedanta and Buddhist terms for “wisdom-knowing”] knows ItSelf by being ItSelf (this Self of Absolute Awareness), before and beyond the mind and its experiences.

You also wrote: “If this last for another minute it will have been enough. I will test this, if it is real it will endure and flourish.”

The mind may try to reassert itself or it may have, in fact, irreversibly relaxed its grip and sunk in full surrender to its Source, Our Lord of Love, the Divine One, the One who ALONE IS, the Self of all, the transcendent-immanent Spirit. Regardless… be very careful not to look for fulfilment, completion, or closure on the level of the mind and being able to sustain a state, any state, of mind. There’s a great old Zen story, which i actually have at the Zen Humor page of my website which goes as follows:

A student went to see his meditation teacher and said, “My situation is horrible! I feel so distracted most of the time, or my legs ache, or I’m repeatedly falling asleep. It’s terrible.” Said the teacher matter-of-factly, “It will pass.” A week later, the student returned to his teacher. “My meditation is wonderful! I feel so aware, so peaceful, so alive!” “It will pass,” replied the teacher.

Now, Marshall, you already know all this. For you have written:

>Whatever happens, I am profoundly, deeply, infinitely (beyond words) in love with what you have done for me just by being you. I do not know what to say….

Marshall, there is nothing to say—and everything to say—and, as our Zen friends put it, “no mouth is big enough to utter It.”

You wrote: I can only project to you my profound open heart for you, myself, and every particle and potential of created and non created Source and Creation. WE are indeed ONE. I cannot claim, only experience.

Yes. The Divine has come up with a way of experiencing Itself as experiences, forms, phenomena, body-mind-soul states. And yet there is nothing really happening but the one, changeless, absolutely empty-full Divine Being-Awareness. O what wonder, O what miracle. To this One (Who is no one and everyone) we can always spontaneously and with such gratitude thank and praise….

Love to you always, dear Marshall (the One Alone!)

Timothy

Adapted from www.enlightened-spirituality.org

Timothy Conway will be a retreat leader at the Awakening Together Satsang Retreat in Santa Barbara from September 12-14, 2014. He will also lead a Satsang at the ‘Soak in the Beauty’ retreat at the same location from September 14-18, 2014. In preparation for the retreat, I am sharing a series of questions answered by Timothy. To read the full series, click here. And now, here is today’s question:

“Marshall” writes:

Dear Timothy, … I have passed your website on to many of my friends and have just read about your criteria for authentic spiritual realization. It is a beautiful work. I have a sense of the abiding presence of God that is within and yet beyond, I can “feel” the reality of love that includes the other that is not really the other, BUT I have much restlessness and many fears and anxieties that betray my inner divisions. I am selfish and fall too easily into anger. I know that these things are happening to me and am aware even as they are happening. This often leads to disappointment and a bit of despair at my own lack. I feel that I have been at this place of “looking in” but not entering before (other lives) and it is so easy to pull back due to attachments to a glass of wine, a day of diversions, a plunge back into the “life-style to which I am accustomed”. As St. Paul said, I know better, but the flesh is weak and I do that which I do not want to do.”

I sense in you a possible answer, you have probably already given it on your website, I already know it, but I need help.

A friend who sends you love and energy, “Marshall”

Timothy responds:

Hi Marshall. Thank you for your kind words about the website and for referring your friends to it.

You so very honestly wrote: “I have a sense of the abiding presence of God that is within and yet beyond, I can “feel” the reality of love that includes the other that is not really the other, BUT I have much restlessness and many fears and anxieties that betray my inner divisions. I am selfish and fall too easily into anger. I know that these things are happening to me and am aware even as they are happening. This often leads to disappointment and a bit of despair at my own lack.”

Marshall, all these states (restlessness, fear, anxiey, disappointment, despair) are NOT who you are as Awareness. As Ramana Maharshi would say: These things are of the mind, and you are not the mind–your real nature is this Pure Awareness or Self (the pure I Am that Am even before the “i”-thought). Now, there has been an apparent momentum of identifying with these finite mind-states. This momentum can seem like a formidable force. But the truth is that every night in dreamless sleep, and probably many times throughout the day, these mind-states don’t operate. They are not permanent or solid. What is permanent or solid is the fundamental Awareness that you ARE. In time (and time is nothing in eternity), your own real nature as solid, seamless, infinite-eternal Awareness affirms ItSelf as Witness and, in a forceful, uncompromising way, “sees off” all these various mind states as impermanent (actually vanishing, moment by moment), hence insubstantial, hence not worth indulging. This Witness function that sees and dissolves and vanishes all passing states can come Alive quite suddenly, or else gradually. In any case, sooner or later, you wake up to this Superior Principle of Awareness, in Whom we (the egomind and body) “live, move and have our being” [as St. Paul wrote about our essential being in God].

This awakening to Truth is inevitable!–because Divine Being-Awareness-Bliss is the real nature of everyone and everything–the only true Reality! (The early Christian teaching on apocatastasis is relevant here. The apocatastasis teaching is that God’s Love is all-powerful and all-accomplishing; therefore, this Divine Love will ultimately “retrieve” all “self-exiling” souls, no matter how lost or evil they seem, from their private hell-states and then merge these souls back into the Divine Presence. All will realize God because ultimately there is only God–the Divine Spirit is the Essence of each and every soul.

It’s so very helpful to realize that all mental-emotional-bodily states arevanishing, moment by moment. They get re-created as apparently solid by the mind in each moment, but the truth is that they are not solid. Moreover, at the beginning of each moment, and actually during the “duration” of each moment, we are always ever and only Free as this gloriously open-empty-full Substratum of Awareness.

To speak metaphorically, our real nature is like the projection screen on which is displayed a wild, wacky, violent movie. The movie-screen is never for a moment tainted by the projected images–there’s not a single bullet hole or drop of sweat or blood to be found on the screen before, during or after the projection of the movie. So, if you feel fear or despair, as you so honestly and candidly mentioned, Marshall, what is it that is aware of the fear or despair? This Awareness is itself neither fear nor despair, not at all tainted by the “movie” of fear, despair, etc.–rather, this Awareness is the “Unfelt Feeler of feeling,” to paraphrase India’s old Brhadaranyaka Upanishad. Awareness is the one Divine “Host”-Space in which happen all “guests” (phenomena in the form of sensations, perceptions, emotions, thoughts, etc.). This “Host” that you really are is intrinsically open, free, pure, untaintable, unimprovable–Divine.

You wrote: I feel that I have been at this place of “looking in” but not entering before (other lives) and it is so easy to pull back due to attachments to a glass of wine, a day of diversions, a plunge back into the “life-style to which I am accustomed”. As St. Paul said, I know better, but the flesh is weak and I do that which I do not want to do.

Marshall, this is old conditioning. Instead of trying to resist it, why not get very curious–with a consummate, affectionate amusement–at what this “ego” is up to? If you were taking a dog for a walk, wouldn’t you be wonderfully curious about how the little canine friend operated and functioned? Bring the same benevolent curiosity to what the ego-mind is up to, moment by moment, and what happens is that ego-tendencies are simply seen for what they are and any old unnecessary tendencies sooner or later fall off. When you’re coming from true Awareness, so much will fall off. As Dogen Zenji said: “Shinjin datsuraku–Body-mind fall off!” Another way of saying, “letting go, letting God.”

We need not make a problem out of ego tendencies. In Zen they say “don’t make anything at all.” My dear old enlightened friend Sunyata used to endearingly refer to ego as “ego-ji,” as in “Baba-ji” or “Swami-ji”! The ego-mind is like a rambunctious puppy dog, playing out all sorts of conditioned tendencies. There’s no need to reify (thing-ify) these tendencies, and no need to indulge them, and no need to try to suppress them, either. Just penetratingly witness them and “see them off” as passing dreams, and they can’t get a grip on you or drive you into misery.

Thus, being the simple, boundless, Divinely-natural Awareness that we always already are allows the powerful Divine Light to illumine all apparent “darkness” and slowly or suddenly transform everything into Light. There is only this Divine Light, through and through. All else is imagination. And one day, by Divine Grace, even that imagination (which is “God’s original whim”) is purified and transmuted into Divine Essence–pure Love-Bliss-Peace.

So… right now breathing is happening, a mind is functioning, life is unfolding. No problem. Only God…. Only God….. Only God. (Allelujah!)

Love from your brother,
~ Timothy

Adapted from www.enlightened-spirituality.org

Timothy Conway will be a retreat leader at the Awakening Together Satsang Retreat in Santa Barbara from September 12-14, 2014. He will also lead a Satsang at the ‘Soak in the Beauty’ retreat at the same location from September 14-18, 2014. In preparation for the retreat, I am sharing a series of questions answered by Timothy. To read the full series, click here. And now, here is today’s question:

Q: I feel lots of energy coming through me and certain powers. How can I become a “co-creator” with God?

This question arises when one believes that there are two Selves, God’s and “mine.” But there is only the nondual Self. Sagely tradition argues here for total humility, clarity and transparency to preempt narcissism, pride, and megalomania. All that is meant to appear will spontaneously happen in and through the various selves as the Self’s play. One need not push the river or add legs to a snake, as Zen says.

Q: I feel an expanded sense of Awareness in meditation and especially here in satsang/therapy, but then I lose it at other times, like at work. I feel I’m only aware of being Awareness some of the time, not all of the time. How to have more consistency?

This very common concern presumes that Awareness is a special state of mind coming and going in time and can somehow be made “constant” by some special discipline, when in fact Awareness is timelessly/always the Constant Substratum of the dream or movie of life. Our Real Nature is this Self-evident, Obvious ISNESS, the only non-changing aspect of our life. All else changes but THIS. And, as Shankara and Ramana Maharshi frequently pointed out, people already know they are constantly the Self and really don’t doubt it. Otherwise, if they were only their changing mind-states with no continuity, they would be incessantly shocked, over and over, moment by moment, by the sudden re-appearance of discrete, discontinuous bodymind states.

So we all know, deep down, subconsciously, that we are the One Self-Awareness. All that’s “needed” is to stop presuming that we are the changing, limited states of the bodymind and stop searching for some special new bodymind state called “enlightenment.” The only way we miss Spiritual Truth is by searching for it on the “object”-ive level of body, mind or psychic-soul.

The fact is that the God-Self—Infinite, Unborn Awareness—is equally present in human confusion and clarity, struggle and ease, failure and success, misery and joy, just as present as when one is on the meditation-seat, the car-seat or toilet-seat. Where else could God be but right HERE? When could God be but right NOW?

Wisely knowing-being this grand yet simple Truth is what allows for deep relaxation, real freedom, blissful peace, and all-embracing love.

www.enlightened-spirituality.org