The Signposts to Self-Understanding
Mindfulness & Spirituality #4: An exploration of nondual awareness
Introduction
"Peace is meant to be our natural state. A whirlwind never outlasts the morning, nor a violent rain the day. Just as earth and sky return to peace, so should we." - Lao Tzu
Intention
The inspiration for this piece comes from a place of intense curiosity about the nature of being human and a fixation with the question: What is the nature of our mind?
As the late Irish poet John O'Donohue said, "it’s strange to be here. The mystery never leaves you." (On Being). Everyone approaches this question from a different background, identity, and belief system, so the places we come to certainly differ. My starting principles for this exploration were craving for deeper self-understanding and a keen interest in operationalizing spiritual practices to lead a more peaceful, fulfilling, and intentional life.
First and foremost, I want to thank the authors and people in my life that helped plant the seeds of self-awareness in me that kicked off this journey inward. Until I saw the following ideas established in text and made tangible through others' words and actions, this journey felt quite intimidating and foreign. To question one's deepest assumptions about the nature of being alive is a heavy task, and it touches every aspect of our lived experience. Harder still is finding a clear channel for introspection in the busy, chaotic world we live in, filled with competing agendas, relationships, and noise. Seldom can you find the time and place to still yourself and see the world through your own eyes, absent of any overlays or preconceptions.
This piece is intended to offer the reader a reprieve from the march of life and some time and space to ponder some of these fascinating questions. Who are we, and why do we do what we do? My journey to these topics consisted of a lot of fumbling between books, articles, and conversations that at first felt incoherent and left me more confused than when I started. But in time and with persistence, the concepts started to come into greater clarity. This piece is nothing more than a mirror to hold up to yourself, a toolbox for self-reflection and self-contemplation.
For those curious to explore the emerging science of spirituality and mindfulness. Transcend, The Hidden Spring, Waking Up, and The Awakened Brain are great places to start and may be the subject of another blog piece in the future :)
Much of this piece is a projection of Eckhart Tolle and Michael Singer's respective spiritual awakenings in which they take stock of the changes they experienced within. Their words resonated with me deeply as they held my hand on my own journey inward. My hope is to pull together some of their most valuable insights, among other teachings, to ideally present a clearer path toward self-understanding than I could find when I started out. I will let the excerpts that resonated with me speak for themselves. I found many of their analogies quite graceful and relatable.
These ideas may feel strange to sit with, so I urge you to skip around to find the words that resonate with you most. The beauty of all of this is none of these concepts will point to anything you don't already know deep inside. They point to an intuitive, core part of you. It is just a matter of finding the signposts that click best.
Context
To start, I figured it would be helpful to widen the mind's aperture a bit.
"To get some distance from this, you first need to get some perspective. Walk outside on a clear night and just look up into the sky. You are sitting on a planet spinning around in the middle of absolutely nowhere. Though you can only see a few thousand stars, there are hundreds of billions of stars in our Milky Way Galaxy alone. In fact, it is estimated that there are over a trillion stars in the Spiral Galaxy. And that galaxy would look like one star to us, if we could even see it. You’re just standing on one little ball of dirt and spinning around one of the stars" (Untethered Soul, 101).
Every outlook on life has to make room for the infinite mystery that is our universe….
Summary
This piece primarily explores dualistic mindfulness, which boils down to the following:
You are the unchanging awareness that rests behind the thoughts and emotions of your thinking mind.
Beyond this dualistic perspective (i.e. me vs. the world), it endeavors to point toward nondualistic awareness. The recognition that the subject (e.g. your mind’s eye) and the things it observes (e.g. people, emotions, thoughts, memories, future goals) are, in reality, indivisible.
There is no rider on the back of consciousness; there is just consciousness itself. Said another way, you have a unified conscious experience with no center or distinction from the things you experience. In this admission, the flow of life washes away identification with your story and subject/object duality.
If these ideas are intuitive to you, the rest of this piece will point to what you already know. While simple enough to read and understand conceptually, living these words in our hectic, mind-identified world is difficult. The place inside to which these words point is a place of intuition, clarity, and stillness. I like to think of it as an undercurrent of peace.
The key initial insight is seeing your awareness rest quietly behind all the objects of consciousness—thoughts, emotions, sights, sounds, memories, and aspirations. It is a place beyond your ego and self-identity. You don't need to go anywhere at all—awareness and tranquility are inherent to being conscious.
The bulk of the piece aims to characterize this distinction between conscious awareness and mind identification. With a better sense of dualistic mindfulness in hand (i.e. I am here, and my thoughts are there), the conclusive message is that the “I-ness” of this subject/object dynamic, upon closer examination, has no center or substance of its own. The subject and object are embedded into a single unified conscious experience with only the illusion of self-identity and separation from the objects of the mind. Nondualism can feel and sound confusing and counter-intuitive, so spending some time with the analogies below should help. All of this is intended to hopefully make your nondualistic mindfulness journey more intuitive and approachable.
Teacher and the Student
In my own, admittedly limited, experience with spiritual learning, what separates spiritual learning from traditional education is in school, we interrogate new ideas with existing frameworks and mental models, gradually integrating more ideas as we are exposed to more information. We go from a place of not knowing to a place of knowing.
On the other hand, with spiritual learning and self-discovery, you are discovering ideas and ways of being that are already known to you. They may be muddied and obscured by many years of compulsive thinking, but the further you go down this path, the more you realize that these spiritual lessons are all concepts and modes of being that are, at their most fundamental level, intuitive to you. They are all verifiable through your own direct experience.
What is being asked of you is to reacquaint yourself with the peace that has been within you your entire life. Reconnecting with this inherent peace is what gives you vitality and energy in your daily life. It is the source from which your happiness and joy flow, and it is the place from which you can appreciate the beauty of the world we live in. All of this is accessible within you by dis-identifying with your thinking mind and realigning yourself with the stillness within you.
In school, we are taught to intellectualize and approach every new idea with the mind and its concepts. Conversely, this fundamental awareness behind our thoughts and emotions is a place the mind cannot reach, so thinking about it more will take you further away from the goal. To know you are the awareness in you and not the thoughts you think is the primary objective. Adding more words and details, and frameworks is just more identification with the mind and its models.
Most of us are in this place of mind identification, so, at first, the words and ideas to explain these concepts are immensely helpful.
I will repeat this throughout the piece, but it is so important not to get overly attached to the words and concepts. Use them as a guide, and then discard them when you are done.
"The ideas and concepts presented here may be important, but they are secondary. They are no more than signposts pointing toward awakening. As you read, a shift takes place within you" (A New Earth, 21).
Candidly, the greatest teacher of presence and self-awareness is nature. Going into nature and listening closely for the stillness in-between the rustling leaves or watching an insect quietly perched on a branch will show you directly all you need to understand. The stillness you can recognize in the world will bring forth a stillness in you that is the calm and quiet we are all desperately craving in our hectic lives. It is there inside us all the time.
In my opinion, the coolest part of a piece like this is that we are talking about something that is intuitive to both of us. It is awareness speaking to awareness, consciousness speaking to consciousness about itself.
"There is nothing personal in this: I am not teaching you. You are consciousness, and you are listening to yourself" (Power of Now, 102).
“The teacher and the taught together create the teaching.” In any case, the words in themselves are not important. They are not the Truth; they only point to it" (Power of Now, 102).
A Primer
Before diving into the meat of this piece, here are a few words of advice and things to watch out for.
I urge you to watch your mind's reaction to these words as you read them.
If you feel yourself tighten up or hastily reject an idea, consider what inside you feels so strongly resistant and at odds with the words on the page. The source of this resistance is what these signposts are aiming to dissolve.
As I mentioned above, the words are just signposts. The fewer words and mental concepts you need to get the point, the better. The place we are aiming to go to is a place in you without words and concepts, just raw, unfiltered perception.
“The Flower Sermon was held near a pond during Buddha’s later years. When he held up the freshly-picked lotus flower—roots and all, dripping mud—the assembled crowd was silent, not understanding its significance. But after a moment or two, Buddha’s disciple Mahakasyapa smiled. He was the only attendee to receive the Buddha’s message that day….
…This story is a pillar of the Zen school of Buddhism, which focuses on direct experience rather than dogma or intellectual analysis. Meditation to reach formless consciousness… is favored over dwelling too much on doctrines, words or concepts." - Source
Before you pass any judgment on a concept or how it made you feel, I urge you to give yourself some space and time to let the words penetrate deeper than superficial labeling and knee-jerk reactions. These ideas are very intimate and strange to think about. It maybe feels that way already. Give yourself time to let the ideas marinate.
This piece will either induce a shift in consciousness in you, or it will do nothing at all. In the first case, it means that something inside you has glimpsed the place these words point to, and you are beginning to better appreciate their meaning.
On the other hand, if you leave this piece resenting its concepts, at odds with its ideas, or unmoved by its suggestions, then you are still mind-identified. That is totally okay. It can take many, many passes for these ideas to resonate, so give yourself time. This place inside will continue to wait patiently for you to meet it. You don't need to go anywhere at all. Just quiet your mind entirely, and it will come forth.
A final word of advice is to practice forgiveness as you read. That means forgiveness of others and forgiveness of yourself. Pulling away from mind identification, it is easy to look at the unconscious/conditioned behavior of your previously unconscious self and shudder in humiliation and disappointment.
How could I have been so rude? rash? mean? spiteful? jealous? anxious? scared? arrogant? self-indulgent?
"Forgive yourself for what you didn’t know before you learned it." - Maya Angelou
This is the hard part of this process, so I encourage you to bundle up all that self-criticism and let it wash down the river. Engaging with these self-critical thoughts directly to try to figure them out or point out your past mistakes is just introducing more mental models for how your life should be or should have been. Let it all go because it is taking you further away from the objective, which is awareness of the present moment.
"People take the mind to be real, try to fight it, and always fail. These fights against the mind are all mental activities which strengthen the mind instead of weakening it. If you want to get rid of the mind, all you have to do is understand that it is 'not me.'" - Annamalai Swami
"Struggle only gets us deeper into the very thing we’re trying to escape. This is a very important thing to know about egoic consciousness: The harder we try to get out, the deeper we dig ourselves in." - Adyashanti
"When you think about the mind, when you're thinking about the thoughts then you're giving it energy. When you just observe and just watch and leave it alone and do nothing where does the energy come from? There is no energy to give it. You ignore the mind by observing it." - Robert Adams
“The bad news is you're falling through the air, nothing to hang on to, no parachute. The good news is, there’s no ground.” - Chögyam Trungpa
My Hope
I hope that these words strike a chord with you and open up parts of you that you maybe did not know were there. This piece is my way of paying it forward by offering words to plant seeds of self-awareness for yourself. As best as you can, try and leave your preconceptions behind and approach these words without a filter.
Finally, my deepest wish is that this piece is a launching point for discourse. Far too infrequently do we talk about the nature of our inner experience despite spending all our time in there. If this piece planted seeds of self-awareness in you, let's talk about it!! No need to feel any reluctance to speak freely about any shift in consciousness or self-understanding.
It's an exciting journey waiting for you, so let's jump in and explore :)
The Signposts on the Path toward Self-Understanding.
Outline
First Steps
Existence beyond thought
The Conscious Receiver
Meditation
The Essence of Spirituality
The Single Lesson
You have been before
Satori
The Time Gap
Honey
The Spectrum of Consciousness
What is Consciousness?
Consciousness as a Skill
Levels of Consciousness
Level 1: Heighten Awareness
Level 2: Ordinary Unconsciousness
Level 3: Deep Unconsciousness
Observations in this Framework of the Mind
The Ego
Characterizing the Ego
The Ego believes resistance will always bring about a desirable change
Problems are woven into identity
Defensiveness
The Ego always makes room for itself and its mistakes
Time and Mind
Pain
What is psychological pain?
How does it manifest? The Pain Body
Resistance is us choosing pain
The Thorn: Protecting ourselves from reality
Pain is the price of the freedom
Transcending the tendency to avoid pain
Mental Models to Filter Reality
Tiger in a Cage
Limits of our own cage
Constructing mental models for how things should be
Why did you build the mental model in the first place?
Constructing a Self
Psychological Clinging
Buffering Reality
The Castle of Psychological Sensitivity
Consequence of holding on
Intentional Erosion
Procedure
Constantly centering your awareness
Simply relax and release
Embrace change at all times
Don't go into the cloud of lower vibration
Make a game out of relaxing in the face of melodrama
Freedom to ignore the mind
Relinquishing Control
When you reach your psychological edges
Search for Silence
It won't be easier to let go later
Falling behind mind activity
Inner listening and watching
Challenges
Hard to keep things straight at the level of the mind
Expanding the time gap between thought and action
Signs of Progress
The distinction between mental activity occurring and identifying with it
Ever Expanding Comfort Zone
Persistent Pain Bodies
How does it feel when you drift up?
Turn your eyes upward and relax your heart
Ego Death
Visualizations
A house standing in the middle of an ocean of light
Transparent to Negativity
Submerged in the Lake
Movie Goer
Blue Sky
Reintroducing the Mind
The mind is a blameless tool
The Tao
The Tao is a dynamic equilibrium for all dimensions of life
Sailing
Harmony of balance points forms the Tao
Four Fundamentals of True Spirituality
The Way of the Tao
Subtly of the Tao
Implications
Internal and External Games
Subtler Laws of Letting Go and the Spiritual Ego
Dealing with the heavy things in life
Provenance of your mental activity
Unconditional Happiness
Listening
Arguments
A fully conscious person
Self-Acceptance
Close
More Signposts
First Steps
Existence beyond thought
In order to appreciate that there is more to you than your mind and its thoughts, all one needs to understand is that "you are not the voice of the mind—you are the one who hears it" (The Untethered Soul, 9).
“Boredom, anger, sadness, or fear are not 'yours,' not personal. They are conditions of the human mind. They come and go. Nothing that comes and goes is you.” - Eckhart Tolle
The Conscious Receiver
"If you go very deep, that is where you live. You live in the seat of consciousness. A true spiritual being lives there, without effort and without intent. Just as you effortlessly look outside and see all that you see, you will eventually sit far enough back inside to see all your thoughts and emotions, as well as outer form. All of these objects are in front of you" (The Untethered Soul, 28).
"You go so deep that you realize that’s where you’ve always been. At each stage of your life you have seen different thoughts, emotions, and objects pass before you. But you have always been the conscious receiver of all that was" (The Untethered Soul, 28).
Meditation
Meditation is a common entry point to spiritual practice. In its purest form, it is the practice of being still. We heighten our awareness of our passing thoughts, and bodily sensations, and self-referentially our awareness, to bring forth the stillness of deeper essence. Meditation is awareness of awareness.
“Wow, I went into this deep meditation, and for the first time my thoughts completely stopped. I was in a place of complete peace, harmony, and quiet.” If you are in there experiencing the peace that occurs when your thoughts stop, then obviously your existence is not dependent upon the act of thinking" (The Untethered Soul, 26).
The Essence of Spirituality
"You simply stopped projecting your sense of self onto that particular object of consciousness. You woke up. That is spirituality. That is the nature of Self. That is who you are" (The Untethered Soul, 37).
"When Buddha said that all of life is suffering, this is what he was referring to. People do not understand how much they are suffering because they have never experienced what it is like to not suffer" (The Untethered Soul, 89).
The Single Lesson
"Once you have understood the basic dysfunction, there isn’t really much else that you need to learn or understand. Studying the complexities of the mind may make you a good psychologist, but doing so won’t take you beyond the mind, just as the study of madness isn’t enough to create sanity" (The Power of Now, 47).
"When the Indian sage Atmananda Krishna Menon was asked how to know when one is established in one’s true nature, he is said to have replied: ‘When thoughts, feelings, sensations and perceptions can no longer take you away." - Atmananda Krishna Menon
“Be the silent watcher of your thoughts and behavior. You are beneath the thinker. You are the stillness beneath the mental noise. You are the love and joy beneath the pain.” - Eckhart Tolle
You have been before
These ideas may feel very abstract, but I argue that the place within you to which they point is a place you have been before. The term satori from the Japanese Buddhist tradition explains this intuitive knowing well. It translates to comprehension, understanding, or a "flash of enlightenment." It illuminates the distinction between knowledge and what one knows intuitively.
Satori
"Zen masters use the word satori to describe a flash of insight, a moment of no-mind and total presence. Although satori is not a lasting transformation, be grateful when it comes, for it gives you a taste of enlightenment. You may, indeed, have experienced it many times without knowing what it is and realizing its importance. Presence is needed to become aware of the beauty, the majesty, the sacredness of nature. Have you ever gazed up into the infinity of space on a clear night, awestruck by the absolute stillness and inconceivable vastness of it? Have you listened, truly listened, to the sound of a mountain stream in the forest? Or to the song of a blackbird at dusk on a quiet summer evening? To become aware of such things, the mind needs to be still. You have to put down for a moment your personal baggage of problems, of past and future, as well as all your knowledge; otherwise, you will see but not see, hear but not hear. Your total presence is required" (The Power of Now, 95).
The Time Gap
"You were probably unable to see the fundamental difference between the perception, the thoughtless awareness of beauty, and the naming and interpreting of it as thought: The time gap was so small that it seemed to be a single process. The wider the time gap between perception and thought, the more depth there is to you as a human being, which is to say the more conscious you are" (The Power of Now, 97).
Honey
A similar distinction between the unfiltered perception of your experience and the mind's interpretation of the events is tasting honey.
"You can study and talk about honey for as long as you like, but you won’t really know it until you taste it. After you have tasted it, the word becomes less important to you. You won’t be attached to it anymore" (The Power of Now, 108).
While a simple example, the distinction between direct experience versus the mind's interpretation of reality sits at the essence of identifying with the thoughts of your mind and is key to letting that identification go.
The Spectrum of Consciousness
What is Consciousness?
"Consciousness is a dynamic field of awareness that has the ability to either narrowly focus or broadly expand. When consciousness concentrates narrowly enough, it loses its broader sense of self. It no longer experiences itself as a field of pure consciousness; it begins to relate itself more to the objects it’s focused upon" (The Untethered Soul, 128).
How it works the way it does and where it comes from I won't even begin to interrogate...
Consciousness as a Skill
I like to think of an individual's level of consciousness or awareness as any other attribute they possess (e.g. height or intelligence). What is notable is that consciousness is an attribute independent from intelligence which is to say that someone's intelligence has no bearing on their level of self-awareness. In fact, some of the brightest people I have had the privilege to meet are simultaneously the most unconscious.
What makes one's level of consciousness distinct from other attributes is it is not fixed. It is dynamically adjusting depending on one's self-observation. We all oscillate between heightened consciousness (e.g. the state produced from a deep meditation) and mind-identification/unconsciousness (e.g. complaining about the weather, defensiveness in an argument, anxiety in a high-stakes moment).
The other remarkable aspect of consciousness is it is a skill that can be improved. It is a recognition of your true resting awareness beneath the noise of your mind, and every one of life's moments, peaceful or stressful, is an opportunity to exercise self-awareness and dive deeper into the nature of your conscious experience. Next, I'll break out the levels of consciousness that we all tend to fluctuate between.
Levels of Consciousness
"What does it feel like to identify more with Spirit than with form? You used to walk around feeling anxiety and tension; now you walk around feeling love. You just feel love for no reason. Your backdrop is love. Your backdrop is openness, beauty, and appreciation. You don’t have to make yourself feel that way; that is how Spirit feels. If you were asked how the body normally feels, you might say that it’s generally uncomfortable about one thing or another. How about the psyche? If you were being totally honest, you’d probably say that it’s generally full of complaints and fears. Well, how does Spirit normally feel? The truth is, it always feels good. It always feels high. It always feels open and light" (The Untethered Soul, 174).
Level 1: Heighten Awareness
"That’s what the Self does. Awareness does not fight; awareness releases. Awareness is simply aware while everything in the universe parades before it." - Michael Singer
"That’s where your work is. From that place, you let go. Once you’ve let go, every minute of every day, year after year, then that’s where you’ll live. Nothing will be able to take your seat of consciousness from you. You’ll learn to stay there. After you’ve put years and years into this process, and learned to let go no matter how deep the pain, you will achieve a great state. You will break the ultimate habit: the constant draw of the lower self. You will then be free to explore the nature and source of your true being—Pure Consciousness" (The Untethered Soul, 66).
"Watch the thought, feel the emotion, observe the reaction. Don’t make a personal problem out of them. You will then feel something more powerful than any of those things that you observe: the still, observing presence itself behind the content of your mind, the silent watcher" (The Power of Now, 55).
"Persistently centered consciousness is the seat of Self. In this state, you are always conscious of being conscious. There is never a time when you’re not totally aware. There is no effort. There is no doing anything. You’re just there, aware that thoughts and emotions are being created around you, while the world unfolds before your senses" (The Untethered Soul, 97).
To be in a state of heightened awareness, your perception of the present moment is primary and any resistance to the present moment is absent. In this state of mind, the distinction between your resting awareness and thinking mind is unmistakable. This state feels light, still, peaceful, intentional, aware, and alert. Heightened awareness can be characterized by the calm you feel by opening your eyes after meditation. It has a quality of lucidity, clarity, simplicity, and bliss that is incredibly enriching and energizing.
An important point is that this place of heightened awareness is not necessarily a place without the mind. In this place, the mind is a tool you use to navigate the world, plan, problem-solve, communicate, and reflect. The important distinction, however, is that the egoic mind does not exist in this place.
The ego emerges when the mind looks into your past memories, relationships, identifiers, and social context to build your identity and looks into the future to define your aspirations and goals. This mind form covers up the present moment with your past and future, so you lose out on the only real thing you have, right now.
In this place of heightened awareness, your mind is nothing more than a tool to facilitate your moving through life. You don't make an identity out of its thinking. This striving to quiet the egoic mind is the point of spirituality. With practice, the reflex to identify with the mind's thoughts withers, leaving you in bliss and at peace in the present moment with your mind as a helpful servant to enable you to act on the world.
"Your mind is not the guilty party. In fact, your mind is innocent. The mind is simply a computer, a tool. It can be used to ponder great thoughts, solve scientific problems, and serve humanity. But you, in your lost state, told it to spend its time conjuring up outer solutions for your very personal inner problems. You are the one who is trying to use the analytical mind to protect yourself from the natural unfolding of life" (The Untethered Soul, 95).
“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honours the servant and has forgotten the gift." - Albert Einstein
Level 2: Ordinary Unconsciousness
You have mistreated [the mind] by giving it a responsibility that is incomprehensible. Just stop for a moment and see what you have given your mind to do. You said to your mind, “I want everyone to like me. I don’t want anyone to speak badly of me. I want everything I say and do to be acceptable and pleasing to everyone. I don’t want anyone to hurt me. I don’t want anything to happen that I don’t like. And I want everything to happen that I do like.” Then you said, “Now, mind, figure out how to make every one of these things a reality, even if you have to think about it day and night.” And of course your mind said, “I’m on the job. I will work on it constantly” (The Untethered Soul, 91).
Ordinary unconsciousness is the mind state that nearly everyone is in. We all mistake ourselves for the identity our mind describes to us.
The name I was given is Alex. I have had experiences that have told me I possess xyz qualities. People describe and think of me in xyz way. I relate to the world around me in xyz manner. It is a narrative we have all woven for ourselves to make relating to the world and the people more automatic and intuitive.
"You are the one who was lost, scared, and confused because you focused your awareness away from your awareness of Self. In this panic, in this lost state, you learned to cling and hold onto the thoughts and emotions that were passing before you. You used them to build a personality, a persona, a self-concept that would allow you to define yourself. Awareness rested itself on the objects it was aware of and called it home. Because you have this model of who you are, it is easier to know how to act, how to make decisions, and how to relate to the outside world" (The Untethered Soul, 130).
From when we are little, we attach our awareness to the building blocks of the psyche that our thinking mind creates and sustains. In this identification with our story, however, we are implicitly asking reality to behave moment to moment when we resist the present in order to sustain our self-concept.
For example, when someone says to us that they don't like the way our shirt looks. Our mind immediately springs into action cooking up a rebuttal to put our antagonizer in their place. We reject their comment, assuring ourselves that they just have bad taste or they are having an off day and don't mean what they say. That moment of pain has come and gone and yet we breathe life into the past to protect the concept of ourselves from being damaged. We will go to extreme lengths even violence at our worst all to deny the fact that our shirt may not look good.
While this is a facetious example, it is true of most of our behavior. Our minds consistently resist and reject the present moment to protect our weaknesses and our insecurities.
This instinct is natural. We are pain-adverse creatures. If you stub your toe, you are unlike to do it again. Similarly, when the world hurts your ego, you will try to avoid the conditions that brought that pain upon you whether that means avoiding the bully who offends you, sitting across the room for the kid that is smarter than you and makes you feel inferior, or avoiding the pretty girl at school because she makes you feel ugly. It is ingrained in us to avoid psychological pain.
To better characterize ordinary unconsciousness:
"Ordinary unconsciousness means being identified with your thought processes and emotions, your reactions, desires, and aversions. It is most people’s normal state. In that state, you are run by the egoic mind, and you are unaware of Being. It is a state not of acute pain or unhappiness but of an almost continuous low level of unease, discontent, boredom, or nervousness — a kind of background static" (The Power of Now, 72).
"You may be surprised when you first become aware of the background “static” of ordinary unconsciousness and realize how rarely, if ever, you are truly at ease within yourself" (The Power of Now, 74).
Static is a super apt analogy for this very common mode of being. It is a lot like an AC unit that is running constantly. You become accustomed to it and forget it is there entirely.
Our minds build a model of the world, and we want reality to fit within that model. When reality, which we have nominal control over, does not behave how we hoped it would, our mind writhes in pain, complaining, pouting, arguing, worrying, and more.
"On the level of your thinking, you will find a great deal of resistance in the form of judgment, discontent, and mental projection away from the Now. On the emotional level, there will be an undercurrent of unease, tension, boredom, or nervousness. Both are aspects of the mind in its habitual resistance mode" (The Power of Now, 74).
A key indicator of ordinary unconsciousness is our need for symptom relief. All we know is the mind and its incessant optimization. In an effort to escape the mind's constant chatter and worrying, all we know to turn to is more thinking. The spiral continues. We are forced to settle for band-aid solutions to get away from the irritating background noise that is the thinking mind.
"Many people use alcohol, drugs, sex, food, work, television, or even shopping as anesthetics in an unconscious attempt to remove the basic unease. When this happens, an activity that might be very enjoyable if used in moderation becomes imbued with a compulsive or addictive quality, and all that is ever achieved through it is extremely short-lived symptom relief" (The Power of Now, 73).
Moreover, the mind needs your past to be able to identify itself, and it projects your happiness into the future as goals and aspirations.
... Once I get the promotion, I'll be happy...
...Once I put the kids through school, I'll be happy...
...Once I retire, I'll finally be happy...
"'Large-scale waiting' is waiting for the next vacation, for a better job, for the children to grow up, for a truly meaningful relationship, for success, to make money, to be important, to become enlightened. It is not uncommon for people to spend their whole life waiting to start living" (The Power of Now, 85).
Level 3: Deep Unconsciousness
Deep unconsciousness is the lowest level of awareness. In this place, you are completely identified with your emotional pain bodies, and they are living through you. A pain body is any object of pain that takes up space within you (e.g. jealousy, anger, frustration, irritation, anxiety).
"Deep unconsciousness often means that the pain-body has been triggered and that you have become identified with it. Physical violence would be impossible without deep unconsciousness" (The Power of Now, 73).
When our pain body is living through us, it is looking to resonate with something in the outside world, so people living their pain will either victimize others or themselves to find that resonance. An example of this is someone who is living their anger pain body and happens to be accidentally bumped on the sidewalk. Immediately, they explode into a rage and punch a person who made an honest mistake. In this mode of being, pain is right beneath the surface, moments from boiling over. There is no space for patience or reasoning, simple cause and effect.
Observations in this Framework of the Mind
Above I have aimed to describe the way I like to think about the hierarchy of awareness. Each of the levels I have described is a point on a spectrum. Individuals unacquainted with the resting awareness within them that enables heightened awareness will typically oscillate between ordinary unconsciousness and deep unconsciousness, spending most of their time at Level 2. Practicing mindfulness and self-awareness, one can break into heightened awareness and will oscillate between heightened awareness and ordinary unconsciousness. It is very difficult to stay in heightened awareness all the time.
Our ego has woven itself into nearly all of our thoughts, so it is very easy to get sucked back into ordinary unconsciousness even if you do not intend to. Spirituality at its core enables you to spend increasing amounts of time in heightened awareness, amplifying the peace, clarity, and intention in your life to levels that were previously inaccessible.
Meditation is the practice of no mind. Meditation asks you to quiet the mind to let your awareness come forth. Meditating centers your awareness, increasing the space between the mind and your awareness and making heightened awareness more easily accessible day to day.
The other critical reason why heighten awareness is so empowering is for the first time in your life you can truly break your conditioning and choose how you want to behave from moment to moment. When you are completely identified with your mind, it is like you are living a script. You behave very much like a machine. With these sets of inputs and my desires, I will produce a given output. It is almost automatic. Practicing heightened awareness, you create some space between the thought and whether or not you give it life. When living your conditioning, you have a reaction but there is no space for you to choose if that is how you want to behave.
By turning your awareness partially inward as you move through the world, you are offered a brand new sense of agency. You will see your mind's conditioning arise as life unfolds before you, but you now have a choice if you are going to "follow the script." It is alarming to first observe this gap between thought and action, and equally alarming to see the conditioned behavior of those around you. Meditating, being present, dissolving the past and future, and turning your awareness inward will grant you more ready access to the place of heightened awareness, where the mind is simply a tool, not an identity.
The Ego
Characterizing the Ego
"Because of its phantom nature, and despite elaborate defense mechanisms, the ego is very vulnerable and insecure, and it sees itself as constantly under threat. This, by the way, is the case even if the ego is outwardly very confident" (The Power of Now, 43).
"The most common ego identifications have to do with possessions, the work you do, social status and recognition, knowledge and education, physical appearance, special abilities, relationships, personal and family history, belief systems, and often also political, nationalistic, racial, religious, and other collective identifications. None of these is you" (The Power of Now, 45).
"Ego is the unobserved mind that runs your life when you are not present as the witnessing consciousness, the watcher. The ego perceives itself as a separate fragment in a hostile universe, with no real inner connection to any other being, surrounded by other egos which it either sees as a potential threat or which it will attempt to use for its own ends. The basic ego patterns are designed to combat its own deep-seated fear and sense of lack. They are resistance, control, power, greed, defense, attack" (The Power of Now, 181).
The Ego believes resistance will always bring about a desirable change
"The ego believes that through negativity it can manipulate reality and get what it wants. It believes that through it, it can attract a desirable condition or dissolve an undesirable one" (The Power of Now, 187).
"Why did the mind create it? Because it holds the unconscious belief that its resistance, which you experience as negativity or unhappiness in some form, will somehow dissolve the undesirable condition. This, of course, is a delusion. The resistance that it creates, the irritation or anger in this case, is far more disturbing than the original cause that it is attempting to dissolve" (The Power of Now, 191).
Problems are woven into identity
"Some people get angry when they hear me say that problems are illusions. I am threatening to take away their sense of who they are. They have invested much time in a false sense of self. For many years, they have unconsciously defined their whole identity in terms of their problems or their suffering. Who would they be without it?" (Power of Now, 66).
Defensiveness
"To the ego, death is always just around the corner. In this mind-identified state, fear of death affects every aspect of your life. For example, even such a seemingly trivial and “normal” thing as the compulsive need to be right in an argument and make the other person wrong — defending the mental position with which you have identified — is due to the fear of death" (The Power of Now, 43).
"Watch out for any kind of defensiveness within yourself. What are you defending? An illusory identity, an image in your mind, a fictitious entity. By making this pattern conscious, by witnessing it, you disidentify from it. In the light of your consciousness, the unconscious pattern will then quickly dissolve" (The Power of Now, 44).
The Ego always makes room for itself and its mistakes
“She doesn’t care for you anymore. That’s why she hasn’t called. She’s going to break up with you tonight. I can feel it coming; I just know it. You shouldn’t even answer the phone if she calls.” After thirty minutes of this, the phone rings and it’s your girlfriend. She’s late because it’s your one-year anniversary and she was preparing for a surprise dinner. It was definitely a surprise to you, since you completely forgot the anniversary. She says she’s on her way over to pick you up. Well, you’re very excited and your inner voice is chatting about how great she is. But haven’t you forgotten something? Haven’t you forgotten about the bad advice the inner voice gave you that caused you to suffer for the last half hour?
What if you had hired a relationship advisor who had given you that terrible advice? They had completely misread the entire situation. Had you listened to the advisor, you never would have picked up the phone. Wouldn’t you fire them on the spot? How could you ever trust their advice again after seeing how wrong they were? Well, are you going to fire your inner roommate? After all, its advice and analysis of the situation were totally wrong. No, you never hold it responsible for the trouble it causes. In fact, the next time it gives advice, you’re all ears. Is that rational? How many times has that voice been wrong about what was going on or what will be going on? Maybe it’s worth noticing whom you’re going to for advice" (The Untethered Soul, 94).
Time and Mind
"Beware of Destination Addiction—a preoccupation with the idea that happiness is in the next place, the next job, or with the next partner. Until you give up the idea that happiness is somewhere else, it will never be where you are." - Robert Holden
"You always trying to get somewhere other than where you are? Is most of your doing just a means to an end? Is fulfillment always just around the corner or confined to short-lived pleasures, such as sex, food, drink, drugs, or thrills and excitement? Are you always focused on becoming, achieving, and attaining, or alternatively chasing some new thrill or pleasure? Do you believe that if you acquire more things you will become more fulfilled, good enough, or psychologically complete? Are you waiting for a man or woman to give meaning to your life?" (The Power of Now, 58).
"In the normal, mind-identified or unenlightened state of consciousness, the power and infinite creative potential that lie concealed in the Now are completely obscured by psychological time. Your life then loses its vibrancy, its freshness, its sense of wonder. The old patterns of thought, emotion, behavior, reaction, and desire are acted out in endless repeat performances, a script in your mind that gives you an identity of sorts but distorts or covers up the reality of the Now" (The Power of Now, 59).
"Unease, anxiety, tension, stress, worry — all forms of fear — are caused by too much future, and not enough presence. Guilt, regret, resentment, grievances, sadness, bitterness, and all forms of nonforgiveness are caused by too much past, and not enough presence" (The Power of Now, 60).
"If all your problems or perceived causes of suffering or unhappiness were miraculously removed for you today, but you had not become more present, more conscious, you would soon find yourself with a similar set of problems or causes of suffering, like a shadow that follows you wherever you go" (The Power of Now, 60).
Pain
What is psychological pain?
"Basically, all emotions are modifications of one primordial, undifferentiated emotion that has its origin in the loss of awareness of who you are beyond name and form. Because of its undifferentiated nature, it is hard to find a name that precisely describes this emotion. “Fear” comes close, but apart from a continuous sense of threat, it also includes a deep sense of abandonment and incompleteness. It may be best to use a term that is as undifferentiated as that basic emotion and simply call it 'pain'" (The Power of Now, 27).
How does it manifest? The Pain Body
"Resentment, hatred, self-pity, guilt, anger, depression, jealousy, and so on, even the slightest irritation, are all forms of pain. And every pleasure or emotional high contains within itself the seed of pain: its inseparable opposite, which will manifest in time" (The Power of Now, 31).
"However, it’s more important to observe it in yourself than in someone else. Watch out for any sign of unhappiness in yourself, in whatever form — it may be the awakening pain-body. This can take the form of irritation, impatience, a somber mood, a desire to hurt, anger, rage, depression, a need to have some drama in" (The Power of Now, 37).
Resistance is us choosing pain
"If somebody says something that we don’t like, obviously our resistance won’t stop them from having said it. What we’re really resisting is the experience of the event passing through us. We don’t want it affecting us inside. We know it is going to make mental and emotional impressions that will not fit with what’s already in there. So we assert the force of will against the influence of the event in an attempt to stop it from passing through our hearts and minds" (The Untethered Soul, 150).
"It is not life’s events that are causing problems or stress. It is your resistance to life’s events that is causing this experience. Since the problem is caused by using your will to resist the reality of life passing through you, the solution is quite obvious—stop resisting" (The Untethered Soul, 151).
The Thorn: Protecting ourselves from reality
Imagine that you have a thorn in your arm that directly touches a nerve. When the thorn is touched, it’s very painful. Because it hurts so much, the thorn is a serious problem.... This thorn is a constant source of disturbance, and to solve the problem you only have two choices. The first choice is to look at your situation and decide that since it’s so disturbing when things touch the thorn, you need to make sure nothing touches it. The second choice is to decide that since it’s so disturbing when things touch the thorn, you need to take it out. Believe it or not, the effects of the choice you make will determine the course of the rest of your life.
"This is what people do. They let the fear of their inner thorns affect their behavior. They end up limiting their lives just like someone living with an external thorn. Ultimately, if there is something disturbing inside of you, you have to make a choice. You can compensate for the disturbance by going outside in an attempt to avoid feeling it, or you can simply remove the thorn and not focus your life around it....
...If you want to go for a walk in the woods, you’ll have to thin out the branches to make sure you don’t brush against them. Since you often roll over and touch the thorn when you sleep, you’ll have to find a solution for that as well. Perhaps you could design an apparatus that acts as a protective device. If you really put a lot of energy into it and your solution seemed to work, you would think that you had solved your problem...
....So you announce to everyone, “I have solved my problem. I am a free being. I can go anywhere I want. I can do anything I want. This thorn used to run my life. Now it doesn’t run anything.” The truth is, the thorn completely runs your entire life. It affects all your decisions, including where you go, whom you’re comfortable with, and who’s comfortable with you. It determines where you’re allowed to work, what house you can live in, and what kind of bed you can sleep on at night. When it’s all said and done, that thorn is running every aspect of your life....
...You end up so psychologically fixated on the problem that you can’t see the forest for the trees. You actually feel that because you’ve minimized the pain of the problem, you’ve solved the problem. But it is not solved. All you did was devote your life to avoiding it. It is now the center of your universe. It’s all there is" (The Untethered Soul, 83).
"Notice that you aren’t asking how to get rid of the problem; you’re asking how to protect yourself from feeling it. You do this either by avoiding situations or by using people, places, and things as protective shields. You’re going to end up just like the person with the thorn" (The Untethered Soul, 84).
"This is what people do. They let the fear of their inner thorns affect their behavior. They end up limiting their lives just like someone living with an external thorn" (The Untethered Soul, 85).
"This is what people do. They let the fear of their inner thorns affect their behavior. They end up limiting their lives just like someone living with an external thorn. Ultimately, if there is something disturbing inside of you, you have to make a choice. You can compensate for the disturbance by going outside in an attempt to avoid feeling it, or you can simply remove the thorn and not focus your life around it" (The Untethered Soul, 85).
“As you grow spiritually, you will realize that your attempts to protect yourself from your problems actually create more problems. If you attempt to arrange people, places, and things so they don’t disturb you, it will begin to feel like life is against you. You’ll feel that life is a struggle and that every day is heavy because you have to control and fight with everything” (The Untethered Soul, 72).
Pain is the price of the freedom
“You will come to see that any behavior pattern based upon the avoidance of pain becomes a doorway to the pain itself. If you are afraid of being rejected by someone and you approach that person with the intention of winning their acceptance, you are skating on thin ice. All they have to do is look at you sideways or say the wrong thing, and you will feel the pain of rejection. The bottom line is that since you approached them in the name of rejection, you’re going to be dancing on the edge of rejection throughout the interaction” (The Untethered Soul, 100).
"In truth, pain is the price of freedom. And the moment you are willing to pay that price, you will no longer be afraid. The moment you are not afraid of the pain, you’ll be able to face all of life’s situations without fear" (The Untethered Soul, 106).
Transcending the tendency to avoid pain
"You must learn to transcend the tendency to avoid the pain" (The Untethered Soul, 104).
"You must be willing to be present right at the place of the tightness and pain, and then relax and go even deeper" (The Untethered Soul, 105).
"When you feel pain, simply view it as energy. Just start seeing these inner experiences as energy passing through your heart and before the eye of your consciousness. Then relax" (The Untethered Soul, 105).
"You must be willing to accept pain in order to pass through to the other side. Just accept that it is in there and that you are going to feel it. Accept that if you relax, it will have its moment before your awareness, and then it will pass. It always does" (The Untethered Soul, 105).
"Real transformation begins when you embrace your problems as agents for growth" (The Untethered Soul, 81).
"In order to grow, you must give up the struggle to remain the same, and learn to embrace change at all times" (The Untethered Soul, 81).
Mental Models to Filter Reality
“Every fragment of self-talk is a little story in the head that goes around, and then you look at reality through the lens of the little story.” - Eckhart Tolle
Tiger in a Cage
"Imagine that you’re having a great time until you see a tiger inside a small cage. This causes you to contemplate what it would be like to live the rest of your life in such tight confinement. The very thought is extremely frightening to you. But in truth, the confines of your comfort zone create just such a cage. This inner cage doesn’t limit your body; it limits the expanse of your consciousness. Because you are unable to go outside your comfort zone, you are, in essence, locked in confinement" (The Untethered Soul, 122).
"Most people have the second reaction when it comes to the limitations of their psyche. They want to stay in there and feel safe. They don’t say, “Get me out of here! I’m locked in this tiny world in which everything has to be a certain way. I have to worry about what everybody’s doing, what I look like, and everything I’ve ever said. I want out.” Instead of wanting out, they try to keep their cage stable" (The Untethered Soul, 122).
Limits of our own cage
"When you truly awake spiritually, you realize you are caged. You wake up and realize that you can hardly move in there. You’re constantly hitting the limits of your comfort zone. You see that you’re afraid to tell people what you really think. You see that you’re too self-conscious to freely express yourself. You see that you have to stay on top of everything in order to be okay" (The Untethered Soul, 122).
"The tiger knows the limits of his cage when he hits the bars. You know the limits of your cage when the psyche starts to resist. Your bars are the outer boundary of your comfort zone. The minute you come to the edge of your cage, it lets you know it in no uncertain terms" (The Untethered Soul, 122).
"If you approach your limits, you begin to feel uncomfortable and insecure. Those are the bars of your cage. As long as you stay inside of it, you cannot possibly know what is on the other side. The boundaries of this cage are what make your world appear finite and temporal. The infinite and eternal are just outside the limits of your cage" (The Untethered Soul, 123).
Constructing mental models for how things should be
"If anything happens that challenges how you view things, you fight. You defend. You rationalize. You get frustrated and angry over simple little things. This is the result of being unable to fit what’s actually happening into your model of reality. If you want to go beyond your model, you have to take the risk of not believing in it. If your mental model is bothering you, it’s because it doesn’t incorporate reality. Your choice is to either resist reality or go beyond the limits of your model" (The Untethered Soul, 120).
"This mental model has become your reality. You must now struggle day and night to make the world fit your model, and you label everything that doesn’t fit as wrong, bad, or unfair" (The Untethered Soul, 120).
"You can devote your whole life to the process of making sure everything fits within your limited model, or you can devote your life to freeing yourself from the limits of your model" (The Untethered Soul, 122).
“If you want to understand stress, begin by realizing that you carry around with you your own set of preconceived notions of how things should be. It is based upon these notions that you assert your will to resist what has already happened” (The Untethered Soul, 152).
Why did you build the mental model in the first place?
"Have you ever built your whole world on a model of life predicated upon another person’s behavior or the permanence of a relationship? If so, have you ever had that foundation pulled out from under you? Somebody leaves you. Somebody dies. Something goes wrong. Something shakes your model to the core. When this happens, your entire view of who you believe you are, including your relationship to everyone and everything around you, begins to fall apart. You panic and do everything you can to hold it together. You beg, fight, and struggle to try to keep your world from collapsing. Once you’ve had an experience like that, and most people have, you realize that the model you’ve built is tenuous, at best. The entire thing can fall apart. The whole model and all that it’s built upon, including your entire view of yourself and everything else, can start to crumble" (The Untethered Soul, 120).
"What you experience when this happens is one of the most important learning experiences of your life. You come face-to-face with what made you build the model. The level of discomfort and disorientation you experience is frightening. You struggle just to get back some semblance of normal perception. What you are really doing is trying to pull the mental model back around you so that you can settle down into your familiar mental setting" (The Untethered Soul, 120).
"See what happens to you when you don’t do the things that make you comfortable. What you’ll see is why you’re doing them" (The Untethered Soul, 121).
Constructing a Self
"In the midst of the expanse of empty mind, by clinging to passing thought objects, you make an island of apparent solidity" (The Untethered Soul, 129).
"Just as a fish can pass through water but not through ice, which is simply concentrated water, so mental and emotional energy patterns become fixed when they encounter concentrated consciousness. The very act of differentiating the amount of awareness focused on one particular object over any other creates clinging. And the result of clinging is that selective thoughts and emotions stay in one place long enough to become the building blocks of the psyche" (The Untethered Soul, 129).
Psychological Clinging
"Clinging is one of the most primal acts. Because some objects remain in the consciousness while others pass through, your sense of awareness relates more to them. You use them as fixed points to create a sense of orientation, relationship, and security in the midst of constant inner change" (The Untethered Soul, 129).
"The only things in there are your thoughts, emotions, and movements of energy, none of which are solid. They are like clouds, simply coming and going through vast inner space. But you keep holding onto them, as though consistency can substitute for stability. The Buddhists have a term for this: “clinging.” In the end, clinging is what the psyche is all about" (The Untethered Soul, 127).
Buffering Reality
"Who have you ever allowed directly into your true inner self without the protection of your mental buffer? Nobody, not even yourself" (The Untethered Soul, 131).
The Castle of Psychological Sensitivity
These words, if you allow yourself to approach them with an open mind, should feel like a battering ram knocking down the gates of your ego's structure. We reject reality when it doesn't align with our mental model of life.
A nice visualization of this structure we build is a castle made of mental objects with a foundation constructed of the core building blocks of self (the need for belonging, the need to feel competent, the need for love, etc). The goal worth striving for is to let life erode away our castle, and, in its absence, surrender to the flow of life.
"Many of us no longer lack food, water, clothing, or shelter; nor do we regularly face life-threatening physical danger. As a result, the protective energies have adapted toward defending the individual psychologically, rather than physiologically. We now experience the daily need to defend our self-concepts rather than our bodies. Our major struggles end up being with our own inner fears, insecurities, and destructive behavior patterns, and not with outside forces" (The Untethered Soul, 59).
"But our society considers psychological sensitivities normal. Because most of us don’t have to worry about food, clothing, or shelter, we have the luxury of worrying about a spot on our pants, or laughing too loud, or saying something wrong. Because we’ve developed this hypersensitive psyche, we constantly use our energies to close around it and protect ourselves. But this process only hides the problems; it doesn’t fix them. You’re locking your illness inside yourself, and it will only get worse" (The Untethered Soul, 60).
"You will see that if you focus on these mental images, they become part of a complex structure where there was none. You will see events that took place when you were ten years old that you’re still holding onto. You will see that you’re literally taking all your memories, pulling them together in an orderly fashion, and saying that’s who you are. But you are not the events; you’re the one who experienced the events" (The Untethered Soul, 133).
Consequences of holding on
"You will get to a point in your growth where you understand that if you protect yourself, you will never be free. It’s that simple. Because you’re scared, you have locked yourself within your house and pulled down all the shades. Now it’s dark and you want to feel the sunlight, but you can’t. It’s impossible. If you close and protect yourself, you are locking this scared, insecure person within your heart. You will never be free that way" (The Untethered Soul, 61).
"Ultimately, if you protect yourself perfectly, you will never grow. All your habits and idiosyncrasies will stay the same. Life becomes stagnant when people protect their stored issues. People say things like, “You know we don’t talk about that subject around your father.” There are all these rules about things that are not supposed to happen outside because they could cause disturbance inside. Living like this allows for very little spontaneous joy, enthusiasm, and excitement for life. Most people just go from day to day protecting themselves and making sure nothing goes too wrong. At the end of the day, when someone asks, “How was your day?” a normal response is, “Not too bad,” or “I’ll survive.” What is that telling you about their view of life? They see life as a threat. A good day means you made it through without getting hurt. The longer you live like this, the more closed you become" (The Untethered Soul, 61).
"You will end up building an entire protection structure around the closure. If you have the clarity to watch this happen, and understand the long-term consequences, you will want to be free of this trap. You will never be free, however, until you get to the point where you are willing to release the initial pain instead of avoiding it" (The Untethered Soul, 61).
"Once you close, your mind will build an entire psychological structure around your closed energy. Your thoughts will try to rationalize why you’re right, why the other person’s wrong, and what you should do about it" (The Untethered Soul, 104).
Intentional Erosion
"You’ll get to the point where you like this because you don’t want to keep your model. You’ll define this as good because you are no longer willing to put any energy into building and solidifying your façade. Instead, you will actually permit the things that disturb your model to act as the dynamite to break it up and free you" (The Untethered Soul, 134).
"The only way to inner freedom is through the one who watches: the Self. The Self simply notices that the mind and emotions are unraveling, and that nothing is struggling to hold them together" (The Untethered Soul, 135).
Procedure
Constantly centering your awareness
"Because the tendency to get drawn in[to mind identification] is constant, the willingness to let go and fall behind has to be constant" (The Untethered Soul, 66).
Simply relax and release
"When you feel the pull, like somebody pulling on your heart, you just let go. You fall behind it. You simply relax and release" (The Untethered Soul, 66).
Embrace change at all times
"So let all of your blockages and disturbances become the fuel for the journey. That which is holding you down can become a powerful force that raises you up. You just have to be willing to take the ascent" (The Untethered Soul, 80).
Don't go into the cloud of lower vibration
“It begins when you get pulled down into the disturbed energy. You end up exactly where you don’t belong. The last place you want to put your consciousness is down there. But that’s where it will get pulled. Now, as you look out through your disturbed energy, everything is distorted by the haze of your disturbance. Things that looked beautiful now look ugly. Things you liked, now look dark and depressing. But nothing has really changed. It’s just that you’re looking at life from that seat of disturbance" (The Untethered Soul, 76).
Make a game out of relaxing in the face of melodrama
"You don’t fight the mind. In fact, you don’t even try to change it. You just make a game out of relaxing in the face of its melodrama. You simply learn how to release the tendency for getting drawn into the energy. The root is where the consciousness is aware of the pull of these energies" (The Untethered Soul, 66).
Freedom to ignore the mind
"When you think about the mind, when you're thinking about the thoughts then you're giving it energy. When you just observe and just watch and leave it alone and do nothing where does the energy come from? There is no energy to give it. You ignore the mind by observing it." - Robert Adams
Relinquishing Control
"You will be aware that there is no solidity and you will become comfortable with that. You will be aware that each moment of each day is unfolding and you neither have control, nor crave it. You have no concepts, no hopes, no dreams, no beliefs, and no security. You are no longer building mental models of what’s going on, but life is going on anyway. You are perfectly comfortable just being aware of it" (The Untethered Soul, 152).
When you reach your psychological edges
"Nothing can ever bother you except your edges, and now you know what to do with them. You end up loving your edges because they point your way to freedom. All you have to do is constantly relax and lean into them. Then one day, when you least expect it, you fall through into the infinite. That is what it means to go beyond" (The Untethered Soul, 126).
Search for Silence
"Even if there is noise, there is always some silence underneath and in between the sounds. Listening to the silence immediately creates stillness inside you. Only the stillness in you can perceive the silence outside. And what is stillness other than presence, consciousness freed from thought forms? Here is the living realization of what we have been talking about" (The Power of Now, 103).
“Every sound is born out of silence, dies back into silence, and during its life span is surrounded by silence. Silence enables the sound to be. It is an intrinsic but unmanifested part of every sound, every musical note, every song, every word. The Unmanifested is present in this world as silence. This is why it has been said that nothing in this world is so like God as silence” (The Power of Now, 136).
"You cannot pay attention to silence without simultaneously becoming still within. Silence without, stillness within" (The Power of Now, 136).
It won't be easier to let go later
"The law is very straightforward: When your stuff gets hit, let go right then because it will be harder later. It won’t be easier if you explore it or play with it, hoping to take the edge off. It won’t be easier to think about it, talk about it, or try to release only part of it at a time. If you want to be free to the core of your being, you must let go right away because it will not be easier later" (The Untethered Soul, 74).
Falling behind mind activity
"When you start to see this stuff going on inside, you just relax your shoulders, relax your heart, and fall back behind it. Do not touch it. Do not get involved in it. And do not try to stop it. Simply be aware that you are seeing it. That’s how you get out. You just let it go" (The Untethered Soul, 96).
Inner listening and watching
"In any thought activity, make it a habit to go back and forth every few minutes or so between thinking and an inner kind of listening, an inner stillness" (The Power of Now, 126).
Challenges
Hard to keep things straight at the level of the mind
"There’s just too much happening at once to follow the cause and effect relationships between all of our different thoughts, emotions, and energy levels. As a result, we find ourselves struggling just to hold it all together. But everything keeps on changing—moods, desires, likes, dislikes, enthusiasm, lethargy. It’s a full-time task just to maintain the discipline necessary to create even the semblance of control and order in there" (The Untethered Soul, 127).
"In truth, the very responsibility of having to hold it all together is itself a form of suffering" (The Untethered Soul, 127).
Expanding the time gap between thought and action
"When you have had your first few glimpses of the timeless state of consciousness, you begin to move back and forth between the dimensions of time and presence. First you become aware of just how rarely your attention is truly in the Now. But to know that you are not present is a great success: That knowing is presence — even if initially it only lasts for a couple of seconds of clock time before it is lost again. Then, with increasing frequency, you choose to have the focus of your consciousness in the present moment rather than in the past or future" (The Power of Now, 72).
Signs of Progress
The distinction between mental activity occurring and identifying with it
"There is nothing wrong with feeling the energies of fear, jealousy, or attraction. It’s not your fault that such energies exist. All the attractions, repulsions, thoughts, and feelings don’t make any difference. They don’t make you pure or impure. They are not you. You are the one who’s watching, and that one is pure consciousness" (The Untethered Soul, 66).
Ever Expanding Comfort Zone
"Imagine a comfort zone that is so expanded that it can easily fit the entire day, no matter what happens. The day unfolds and the mind doesn’t say anything. You simply interact with the day with a peaceful, fully inspired heart. If your edges happen to get hit, the mind doesn’t complain. It all just passes through. This is how great beings live" (The Untethered Soul, 126).
Persistent Pain Bodies
"When you start to disidentify and become the watcher, the pain-body will continue to operate for a while and will try to trick you into identifying with it again. Although you are no longer energizing it through your identification, it has a certain momentum, just like a spinning wheel that will keep turning for a while even when it is no longer being propelled" (The Power of Now, 39).
How does it feel when you drift up?
"How does it feel when you drift up? You don’t feel as much anger, fear, or self-consciousness. You don’t feel resentment toward people. You don’t close or get tight as often. Things still happen that you don’t want to happen, but they don’t seem to touch you as much. They can’t reach back to where you are because you’ve drifted behind the part of you that reacts to things. These are actual experiences, not merely something you were told about. It’s just what naturally happens when you let go of the lower vibrations of your being. You drift in and up to the deeper vibrations" (The Untethered Soul, 174).
Turn your eyes upward and relax your heart
"No matter what happens below you, just turn your eyes upward and relax your heart. You do not have to leave the seat of Self in order to deal with the darkness. It will purify itself if you let it. Getting involved in the darkness does not dispel darkness; it feeds it. Don’t even turn toward it. If you see disturbed energies within you, it’s okay. Don’t think that you don’t have blockages left to release. Just sit in the seat of awareness and never leave. No matter what goes on below you, open your heart and let it go. Your heart will become purified, and you will never know another fall.
If you fall along the way, just get up and forget it. Use the lesson to strengthen your resolve. Let go right then. Do not rationalize, blame, or try to figure it out. Don’t do anything. Just let go immediately, and allow the energy to go back to the highest center of consciousness it can achieve. If you feel shame, let it go. If you feel fear, let it go. All of these are the remnants of the blocked energy that is finally being purified.
Always let go as soon as you’re aware that you didn’t. Don’t waste your time; use the energy to go up. You are a great being who has been given a tremendous opportunity to explore beyond yourself" (The Untethered Soul, 78).
Ego Death
In moments of psychological turmoil, you have to let the part of you that wants to be right or to be pretty or to be unique or to be respected or to be important or to be validated wash away. You have to relinquish your model and expectation of life that reality is disagreeing with. To be free of the mind, you must bear witness to your ego's dissolution in every dimension of your life. Through this process, a deeper understanding of your true, ever-present, unchanging self will begin to crystallize.
"Death is a stripping away of all that is not you. The secret of life is to “die before you die” — and find that there is no death" (Power of Now, 46).
Visualizations
A house standing in the middle of an ocean of light
"Your house was finally finished, and you were very excited to be living out there. You loved the openness of the field and all the light and beauty of nature. But most of all, you were enamored with the house. You had put your heart and soul into every aspect of the design, and it showed—it was truly 'you'....
....Your sense of inner sanctum was supported by the fact that when the shutters and blinds were locked in place they blended like paintings on the walls, and you never even considered risking going outside to unlock them...
...That is the visual: you are inside a house, totally sealed off from natural light, and the house is sitting in the middle of an open field full of brilliant light. But what is your house made of? What are your walls made of? How can they seal off all that light and keep you locked inside? Your house is made of your thoughts and emotions. The walls are made of your psyche. That’s what that house is. It is all your past experiences; all your thoughts and emotions; all the concepts, views, opinions, beliefs, hopes, and dreams that you have collected around yourself. You hold them in place on all sides, including above and below you. You have pulled together in your mind a specific set of thoughts and emotions, and then you have woven them together into a conceptual world in which you live. This mental structure completely blocks you from whatever natural light is on the outside of its walls. You have walls of thoughts thick enough, and closed enough, to where nothing but darkness is inside that structure. You are so entranced into paying attention to your thoughts and emotions that you never go beyond the borders they create....
...Eventually you will realize that darkness is not what’s really there. What is really there are the walls that are blocking the infinite light. When you’re looking for light, that is a crucial distinction. If you see a wall and it is protecting you from unending darkness, you will not want to go there. But if you see a wall that is blocking the light, you will want to go there in order to remove the wall...
...Your awareness can expand to encompass vast space instead of the limited space in which you dwell. Then, when you look back at that little house you built, you will wonder why you were ever in there....
...You can get out simply by letting everyday life take down the walls you hold around yourself. You simply don’t participate in supporting, maintaining, and defending your fortress" (The Untethered Soul, 117).
"Imagine your house of thoughts standing in the middle of an ocean of light from a trillion stars. Imagine your awareness trapped inside the darkness of that house, struggling daily to live off the artificial light of your limited experiences. Now imagine the walls crumbling down, and the effortless release of consciousness expanding into the brilliance of what is and always was. Now give that experience a name—enlightenment" (The Untethered Soul, 117).
Transparent to Negativity
"As an alternative to dropping a negative reaction, you can make it disappear by imagining yourself becoming transparent to the external cause of the reaction" (The Power of Now, 192).
"Somebody says something to you that is rude or designed to hurt. Instead of going into unconscious reaction and negativity, such as attack, defense, or withdrawal, you let it pass right through you. Offer no resistance. It is as if there is nobody there to get hurt anymore" (The Power of Now, 193).
Submerged in the Lake
"Having gone beyond the mind-made opposites, you become like a deep lake. The outer situation of your life and whatever happens there is the surface of the lake. Sometimes calm, sometimes windy and rough, according to the cycles and seasons. Deep down, however, the lake is always undisturbed. You are the whole lake, not just the surface, and you are in touch with your own depth, which remains absolutely still" (The Power of Now, 195).
"When you slow it down, then you find your rhythm, and when you come into rhythm, then you come into a different kind of time.... I think there are these zones within us. There is surface time which is really rapid fire, over-structured, stolen from you. Now you imagine the surface of the ocean which is all restless, and then you slip down deep below the surface where it is still and things move slower. If you take time not as calendar product but as actually the parent or mother of presence, then you see that in the world of spirit, time behaves differently." - John O'Donohue
Movie Goer
You can imagine yourself as the one in the movie theatre watching life’s movie unfold on your screen of consciousness. You would not identify with the characters on screen, nor would you castigate the person sitting next to you in the theatre (another human), mistaking them for the villain on-screen.
"The world is painted on your screen of consciousness and is entirely your private world. Once you realize that the world is your own projection, you are free of it." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
“You are not the character of the part in the play, you are the witness of the entire play (consciousness).” - David Byerly Sr.
Blue Sky
You are the persistent blue sky that watches the storm clouds (thoughts and emotions) pass by.
"Remain the sky (the awareness) & allow the clouds (the thoughts and emotions) to come & go. You are the awareness noticing the thoughts. Suffering arises when we identify with the thought." - Eckhart Tolle
Reintroducing the Mind
We need the mind to navigate the world and reach our goals. To be in absolute inward awareness all the time would mean meditating 24/7, which seems unreasonable. The challenge is to reintroduce the mind and thinking to your life while being mindful that your ego is woven into all your thinking activities.
"Imagine what fun life would be if you didn’t have those neurotic, personal thoughts going on within you. You could enjoy things, and you could actually get to know people instead of needing them. You could just live and experience your life, instead of trying to use life to fix what’s wrong inside of you" (The Untethered Soul, 93).
"Your daily life can be like a vacation. Work can be fun; family can be fun; you can just enjoy all of it. That does not mean you don’t do your best; you just have fun doing your best. Then, at night when you go to sleep, you let it all go. You just live your life without getting uptight and worrying about it. You actually live life instead of fearing or fighting it" (The Untethered Soul, 93).
The mind is a blameless tool
"When you are present, you can allow the mind to be as it is without getting entangled in it. The mind in itself is not dysfunctional. It is a wonderful tool. Dysfunction sets in when you seek your self in it and mistake it for who you are. It then becomes the egoic mind and takes over your whole life" (The Power of Now, 48).
The Tao
The Tao is a dynamic equilibrium for all dimensions of life
"In the Tao of sailing, the balance point is not static; it’s a dynamic equilibrium. You move from balance point to balance point, from center to center. You can’t have any concepts or preferences; you have to let the forces move you. In the Way, nothing is personal. You are merely an instrument in the hands of the forces, participating in the harmony of balance. You must reach the point where your whole interest lies in the balance and not in any personal preference for how things should be. It’s that way with all of life. The more you can work with the balance, the more you can just sail through life. Effortless action is what happens when you come into the Tao. Life happens, you’re there, but you don’t make it happen. There is no burden; there is no stress. The forces take care of themselves as you sit in the center. That is the Tao. It’s the most beautiful place in all of life. You can’t touch it, but you can be at one with it" (The Untethered Soul, 171).
Sailing
"We’ll begin by going sailing when there’s no wind. That’s one extreme, and we’re not going anywhere. Now let’s go sailing when there’s tremendous wind but there’s no sail. That is the opposite extreme and, again, we’re not going anywhere. Sailing is such a good example because there are many forces interacting together. There’s the wind, the sail, the rudder, and the tension of the ropes on the sail. There is a tremendous interplay of forces. What happens if the wind is blowing and you hold the sail too loosely? It doesn’t work. What if you hold it too tightly? You tip over. To sail properly you must hold it just right. But where is just right? It is in the center point of tautness of the sail against the force of the wind—not too much, and not too little. It’s what we call the “sweet spot.” Imagine that feeling when the wind hits the sail just right, and you’re holding the ropes just right. You take off with a perfect feeling of balance. Then the wind shifts and you adjust to it. You, the wind, the sail, and the water are one. All the forces are in harmony. Should one force shift, the others shift at the same instant. This is what it means to move in the Way" (The Untethered Soul, 170).
Harmony of balance points forms the Tao
"First you have to realize that since everything has its yin and yang, everything has its own balance point. It is the harmony of all these balance points, woven together, that forms the Tao. This overall balance maintains its equilibrium as it moves through time and space" (The Untethered Soul, 167).
Four Fundamentals of True Spirituality
"Here are the four fundamentals of true spirituality: recognize simplicity, cherish purity, reduce your possessions, diminish your desires" (Tao Te Ching, 19).
The Way of the Tao
"Like water, it ever seeks the lowest place, the place that all others avoid. This is the way of the Tao. For a dwelling it chooses the quiet meadow; for a heart the circling eddy. In generosity it is kind; in speech it is sincere; in power it is order; in action it is gentle; in movement it is rhythm. Because it is always peaceable, it soothes and refreshes" (Tao Te Ching, 8).
Subtly of the Tao
"When looked at, it is not much to see; when listened for, it can scarcely be heard; but when put into practice, it is inexhaustible. The world will go to those who seek the Tao; they will find contentment, peace, and rest" (Tao Te Ching, 35).
Implications
Internal and External Games
With fresh eyes and a clear heart, you now get to define your external game that is largely cleansed of egoic desires. To pursue things in the physical world that are an end in themselves. For me it is technological innovation, cherishing my loved ones, and enjoying the beautiful things in life. From this perspective, the world comes into focus, and you can take every step with far more conviction and intention, radiating clarity, peace, and simplicity every step of the way. Implicitly, you will draw closer to your internal goal of inner peace and tranquility.
Subtler Laws of Letting Go and the Spiritual Ego
"This is the beginning and end of the entire path—you surrender yourself to the process of emptying yourself. When you work with this, you start to learn the subtler laws of the process of letting go" (The Untethered Soul, 94).
"Ego is constantly attempting to acquire and apply the teachings of spirituality for its own benefit." - Chogyam Trungpa
Be wary, the ego will try to pull you back into mind identification...
Dealing with the heavy things in life
"You can be fine, deep inside, even in the face of a deep sense of loss. There’s nothing wrong with being peaceful and centered as long as you are releasing the energy, not suppressing it. Ultimately, even if terrible things happen, you should be able to live without emotional scars and impressions. If you don’t hold these issues inside, you can go about your life without getting psychologically damaged. No matter what events take place in life, it is always better to let go rather than to close" (The Untethered Soul, 68).
Provenance of your mental activity
"It stays constant and simply watches all of it. The consciousness experiences the creation of thoughts and emotions, and it has the clarity to see where they came from" (The Untethered Soul, 64).
Unconditional Happiness
"This path leads you to absolute transcendence because any part of your being that would add a condition to your commitment to happiness has got to go. If you want to be happy, you have to let go of the part of you that wants to create melodrama" (The Untethered Soul, 143).
"This choice to enjoy life will lead you through your spiritual journey. In truth, it is itself a spiritual teacher. Committing yourself to unconditional happiness will teach you every single thing there is to learn about yourself, about others, and about the nature of life" (The Untethered Soul, 144).
Listening
"That takes attention away from thinking and creates a still space that enables you to truly listen without the mind interfering" (The Power of Now, 128).
Arguments
"The moment you start to argue, you have identified with a mental position and are now defending not only that position but also your sense of self. The ego is in charge. You have become unconscious" (The Power of Now, 159).
A fully conscious person
"When you live in complete acceptance of what is, that is the end of all drama in your life. Nobody can even have an argument with you, no matter how hard he or she tries. You cannot have an argument with a fully conscious person. An argument implies identification with your mind and a mental position, as well as resistance and reaction to the other person’s position. The result is that the polar opposites become mutually energized. These are the mechanics of unconsciousness. You can still make your point clearly and firmly, but there will be no reactive force behind it, no defense or attack" (The Power of Now, 182).
Self-Acceptance
"If you looked in the mirror and did not like what you saw, you would have to be mad to attack the image in the mirror. That is precisely what you do when you are in a state of nonacceptance. And, of course, if you attack the image, it attacks you back. If you accept the image, no matter what it is, if you become friendly toward it, it cannot not become friendly toward you. This is how you change the world" (The Power of Now, 217).
Close
What is waiting for you when you have drifted far enough back...?
God, divine consciousness, or maybe just an undercurrent of peace.... Whatever you wish to call it. Unmistakably, this place, beyond concept and thought, is the target of our internal game: durable inner peace.
More Signposts
Here are more quotes that all point to the same place. Explore at your own leisure :)
"Unless you have made a clear decision to turn your back on samsara, then however many prayers you recite, however much you meditate, however many years you remain in retreat, it will all be in vain. You may have a long life but it will be without essence. You may have a long life, but it will be without essence. You may accumulate great wealth, but it will be meaningless. The only thing that is really worth doing is to get steadily closer to enlightenment and further away from samsara." - Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
“Rather, nonduality may be said to be the place where mysticism and atheism shake hands. The cosmology may be identical, as there are no puppet-masters pulling the strings of our reality. Yet the stage is now a cathedral.” - Jay Michaelson
"The knower of the mind is just a witness. He does not interfere in anything. Don't be a customer to your mind concepts." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"The impersonal stands behind the illusory personal, irrespective of whether one understands it or not." - Zen Fi
“I and my Father are one” (John 10:30) and “…the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.” - Michael A. Singer
"Just as rain makes you wet and fire makes you warm, so you can know the nature of God by looking into the mirror of your transformed self. This is not a philosophy; it is a direct experience." - Michael A. Singer
"Mandela said what are afraid of is not so much out limitation but the infinite within us." - John O'Donohue
"To know what you are, you must go beyond the mind. Awareness is the point at which the mind reaches out beyond itself into reality. In awareness, you seek not what pleases, but what is true." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"Landscape recalls you into a mindful mode of stillness, solitude, and silence where you can truly receive time
An awful lot of urban planning particularly in poor areas has doubly impoverished the poor by the ugliness which surrounds them, and it is understandable that its so difficult to reach and sustain gentleness there." - John O'Donohue
"The experience of being present in each moment will become your natural state. You won’t be fixated on certain things or caught up in thoughts about the opposites. As you get clearer, life’s events will actually seem to unfold in slow motion. Once this happens, events will no longer seem confusing or overwhelming, no matter what they are." - Michael A. Singer
"The world is always larger and more intense and stranger than our best thought will ever reach." - John O'Donohue
"You naturally begin to center more and more on the spiritual part of your being. You do this not by reaching for Spirit, but by letting go of the rest. There really is no other way. The personal self cannot touch Spirit; you must release the personal self. As you release it, you drift back. As you go further back, you get higher. You get higher in vibration and higher in the amount of love and lightness that you feel. You just begin to soar. This happens in an ever-increasing, continuous progression." - Michael A. Singer
"The more you know yourself, the more clarity there is. Self-knowledge has no end - you don't come to an achievement, you don't come to a conclusion. It is an endless river." - Krishnamurti
"Silence is the ocean into which all the rivers of all the religions discharge themselves." - Ramana Maharshi
"All streams flow to the sea because it is lower than they are. Humility gives it its power." - Lao Tzu
"The ego is like the worm which leaves one hold only after it catches another. Its true nature is known when it is out of contact with objects or thoughts. You should realise this interval as the abiding, unchangeable reality, your true being." - Ramana Maharshi
“The individual perceives that Life is happening to him, whereas The One who has Relinquished his individuality Perceives that life is Merely happening. This is the state wherein Tension cannot arise.” - Wu Hsin
“The flute is totally empty. It is the breath that flows through, sings and dances. To be empty is not emptiness." - Rumi
"Refuse all thoughts except one: the thought ‘I Am’. The mind will rebel in the beginning, but with patience & perseverance, it will yield & keep quiet. Once you are quiet, things will begin to happen spontaneously & quite naturally, without any interference on your part." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"What I love in this regard is my old friend Master Eckhart… One day I read in him and he said: ‘There is a place in the soul that neither time nor space nor no created thing can touch’…. What it means is that your identity is not equivalent to your biography, but there is a place in you where you have never been wounded, where there is still a sureness in you, where there is a seamlessness in you, and where there is a confidence and tranquility in you. I think the intention of prayer, spirituality, and love is now and again to visit that inner kind of sanctuary." - John O'Donohue
"The Universe is only expanded Self. It is not different from the Self." - Ramana Maharshi
"When you breathe in, your mind comes back to your body, and you become fully aware that you are alive, that you are a miracle. Everything you touch could be a miracle. The orange in your hand, the blue sky, the face of a child. These wonders of life are available in the here and the now." - Thich Nhat Hanh
"Looking at living beings with eyes of compassion." - Thich Nhat Hanh
"Who is asking ‘why am I not enlightened yet’? It is the mind, asking about a state it cannot experience." - Zen Fi
"Life is suffering. The cause of suffering is craving. The end of suffering comes with an end to craving. There is a path which leads one away from craving and suffering." - Buddha
"Q: What does it mean to know myself? By knowing myself what exactly do I come to know?
Nisargadatta: All that you are not.
And not what I am? Nisargadatta: What you are, you already are. By knowing what you are not, you are free of it and remain in your own natural state. It all happens quite spontaneously and effortlessly." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"There is the pure awareness that is with you all the time, just awaiting your recognition." - Robert Adams
"Your job is to save yourself. If you find yourself in a burning building, you do not stop to admire the pictures on the wall, you get out of the building as fast as you can. So, when you know you have a short time in this existence you do not stop to play games of life, you try to find yourself and become free as fast as you can." - Robert Adams
"Our true nature is stillness, all movement (objects) are illusion." - David Byerly Sr.
"By learning to die daily, you open yourself to Life." - Eckhart Tolle
“[F]rom that fullness, which is also utter emptiness, God reappears, and the self reappears as well -- only now as masks, perspectives, ways of seeing, modes of speech. Some masks are more real than others; some are merely imaginary. But that becomes a subject for a different conversation. In silence, all disappears. From silence, all is born.” - Jay Michaelson
"Only humility can destroy the ego. The ego keeps you far away from God. The door to God is open, but the lintel is very low." - Ramana Maharshi
"Q: If I am eliminated, what will remain?
Maharaj: Nothing will remain, all will remain. The sense of identity will remain, but no longer identification with a particular body. Being—awareness—love will shine in full splendour. LIBERATION IS NEVER OF THE PERSON, IT IS ALWAYS FROM THE PERSON/
Q: And no trace remains of the person?
Maharaj: A vague memory remains, like the memory of dream, or early childhood. After all, what is there to remember? A flow of events mostly accidental and meaningless. A sequence of desires and fears and inane blunders. Is there anything worth remembering? The person is but a shell imprisoning you. Break the shell." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"This is Love: to fly toward a secret sky, to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment. First to let go of life. Finally, to take a step without feet." - Rumi
"The subtle silence of everpresent joy. That is my True form. For I am everywhere yet nowhere to be found." - Karla
"Enlightenment or awakening is not the creation of a new state of affairs but the recognition of what already is." - Alan Watts
"Silence is also conversation." - Ramana Maharshi
"I didn’t arrive at my understanding of the fundamental laws of the universe through my rational mind." - Albert Einstein
"Why should you trouble yourself about the future? You do not even properly know about the present. Take care of the present, the future will take care of itself." - Ramana Maharshi
"You must realize yourself as the immovable behind and beyond the movable, the silent witness of all that happens." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
“When another person makes you suffer, it is because they suffer deeply within themselves, and their suffering is spilling over. They do not need punishment; they need help. That’s the message they are sending.” - Thich Nhat Hanh
“DETACHMENT is not that you should own nothing. But that nothing should own you.” - Ali ibn Abi Talib
"Thoughts come and go. Feelings come and go. Find out what it is that remains." - Ramana Maharshi
"Have a mind that is open to everything and attached to nothing." - Tilopa
"The happy man is satisfied with his present situation, no matter what it is." - Seneca
"Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself in your way of thinking." - Marcus Aurelius
"You are an aperture through which the universe is looking at and exploring itself." - Alan Watts
"Know yourself for who you are. Never put yourself down. Never compare yourself with anyone else. Never be judgmental. Learn to leave everything alone. Do not come to a conclusion about anything. There is no ultimate answer. Do not search for reality. Do not search for answers. You will be searching for eternity." - Robert Adams
"Whatever you experience you're going through, whatever the experience may be, I can assure you that it has absolutely nothing to do with you." - Robert Adams
"I find that somehow, by shifting the focus of attention, I become the very thing I look at, and experience the kind of consciousness it has; I become the inner witness of the thing. I call this capacity of entering other focal points of consciousness." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"A being whose mind has become motionless, whose mind has become calm, relaxed, peaceful, begins to reflect their own divinity. When you sit in Silence, it will come to you." - Robert Adams
"With the pincers of truth I have plucked from the dark corners of my heart the thorn of many judgments. I sit in my own splendor. Wealth or pleasure, duty or discrimination, duality or non-duality, what are they to me?
What is yesterday, tomorrow or today? What is space or eternity? I sit in my own radiance. What is the Self or the not-Self? What is thinking or not thinking? What is good or evil? I sit in my own splendor. I sit in my own radiance and I have no fear.
Waking, dreaming, sleeping, what are they to me? Or even ecstasy? What is far or near, outside or inside, gross or subtle? I sit in my own splendor. Dissolving the mind or the highest meditation, the world and all its works, life or death, what are they to me?
I sit in my own radiance. Why talk of wisdom, the three ends of life or oneness? Why talk of these? Now I live in my heart." - Ashtavakra Gita
"Acceptance simply means to stop resisting what is - once we surrender to things we cannot control, we are free to focus on creating meaning from what IS and taking resourceful steps to create change over what we CAN control.
We cannot change anything when we are in denial or resistance or attachment to a specific outcome." - Rebecca Baldwin
"When you realize that what you react to in others is also in you, you begin to become aware of your own ego." - Eckhart Tolle
"Be the silent watcher of your thoughts and behavior. You are beneath the thinker. You are the stillness beneath the mental noise. You are the love and joy beneath the pain." - Eckhart Tolle
"Expectation is the root of all heartache." - Shakespeare
"When you get up in the morning, let the world wait. Defy it a little. First learn something to inspire you. Take a few moments to meditate upon it.
And then you may plunge ahead into the darkness, full of light with which to illuminate it." - Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
"Struggle only gets us deeper into the very thing we’re trying to escape. This is a very important thing to know about egoic consciousness: The harder we try to get out, the deeper we dig ourselves in." - Adyashanti
“Regardless of the circumstances of your life, you are the writer, director, and producer of your mental images. … Your circumstances do not determine what your life will be; they reveal what kinds of images you have chosen up until now.
Once your thoughts reflect what you genuinely want to be, the appropriate emotions and the consequent behavior will flow automatically. Believe it, and you will see it!" - Dr. Wayne Dyer
"Whatever you believe is wrong with your life or with someone else's life, there's nothing but an unfoldment in consciousness, and it's necessary for your evolution. If you understand this, you will not react to whatever happens. You will simply smile, observe.
There is nothing in the universe that can hurt you. The substratum of this universe is divine love. It is pure consciousness. It does not know the meaning of hurt or evil or sin. Those are just words that human beings make up." - Robert Adams
"When you sit quiet and watch yourself, all kinds of things may come to the surface. Do nothing about them, don't react to them; as they have come so will they go, by themselves. All that matters is mindfulness, total awareness of oneself or rather, of one's mind." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"Admitting that you are wrong is an infinitely more valuable skill than forcibly proving that you are right." - Unknown
"Love is the only reality and it is not a mere sentiment. It is the ultimate truth that lies at the heart of creation." - Rabindranath Tagore
"Your inner purpose is to awaken. It is as simple as that. You share that purpose with every other person on the planet - because it is the purpose of humanity." - Eckhart Tolle
"Never cease to stand like curious children before the Great Mystery into which we were born." - Albert Einstein
"True human strength doesn’t lie in bursts of energy but in indestructible calm." - Leo Tolstoy
"Grace is not something to be acquired from others. If it is external, it is useless. All that is necessary is to know its existence in you." - Ramana Maharshi
"Silence is always the best policy. And it's in the silence that your problems just dissolve. Try it, it really works. When you keep still, your problems will dissolve by themselves.
Do not think, "I am getting rid of my problems," because that enhances the problems. Do not think about the problems at all but work on yourself to see your own reality, and in reality there are no problems." - Robert Adams
"There is no happiness in worldly objects. Because of our ignorance we imagine we derive happiness from them." - Ramana Maharshi
"Half of life is lost in charming others. The other half is lost in going through anxieties caused by others. Leave this play. You have played enough." - Rumi
"When you know beyond all doubting that the same life flows through all that is, and you are that life, you will love all naturally and spontaneously." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"The enlightened man has no friends, no enemies, but only a pure love, unaddressed. He is ready to pour into anybody’s heart who is available. That is real authentic friendliness." - Osho
"With life as short as a half taken breath, don't plant anything but love." - Rumi
"Observe your thoughts, don't believe them." - Eckhart Tolle
"Since no desire or fear enters my mind, there is perfect silence." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"When you see a homeless person on the street you think, "Poor guy I'm glad I'm not like that. I'm glad I have this nice car to drive and a home to live in and food to eat. I feel sorry for that person but I'm glad I'm not that person." In truth, you are that person. That person is you, all this is going on within you and your beliefs, your thoughts simply are about yourself. Everything that you think about others is about yourself. For there is only the one Self and we are all that Self. The beginning of wisdom is when you stop seeing the world as separate from yourself. For you begin seeing yourself as all, as everything." - Robert Adams
“Paradise is where I am." - Voltaire
"You see the empty nature of experience. There is no essence to anything. Everything is dreamlike. You can't grasp it. It is like grasping air. It is very freeing to actually see that.... There is a trouble there called clinging to emptiness where people just bliss out in that state because it is so freeing and it feels so good.... The full insight is when you notice that form, appearances, and everything that arises in emptiness such as anxiety, being a person, and everything pedestrian sounding is inseparable from this emptiness. You are not fulling integrating the insight. You are still stuck if you are stopping before, and so then you come back into the world. But you can still retain the insight that everything is empty. There is immense freedom to actually fully engage and be inspired to move and dance and create and interact with people. It is not coming from any type of lack or trying to get somewhere to finally become good enough. It is coming from the fundamental freedom to fully express yourself in the world." - Christofer Lovgren
"Words exist because of meaning. Once you've gotten the meaning, you can forget the words. Where can I find a man who has forgotten words, so I can talk with him?" - Zhuangzi
"He that is discontented in one place will seldom be happy in another." - Aesop
"How much better to heal than seek revenge from injury. Vengeance wastes a lot of time and exposes you to many more injuries than the first that sparked it." - Seneca
"When the sages say that God is within us, they don't mean it like an inanimate object or an image. They mean it more like a lightbulb. God is in there shining out. It's light—real light. It's the life force made visible, the light of life. It's YOU. That's what you are." - M. Maciel
"When you realize the true peace, the peace that you have never lost, that peace will remain with you, for it was never away." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
“Spiritual maturity is being ready to let go everything. Giving up is a first step, but real giving up is the insight that there’s nothing to be given up, since nothing is your property." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"The ego is just like a ghost - it has no real form or its own. If you see what the ego really is by enquiring ‘Who am I?' it will simply run away." - Annamalai Swami
"Love is not what you do. Love is what you are." - Sadhguru
"Enlightenment is nothing more than the complete absence of resistance to what is." - Adyashanti
"Peace doesn't require two people; it requires only one. It has to be you. The problem begins and ends there." - Byron Katie
"Have only love in your heart for others. The more you see the good in them, the more you will establish good in yourself." - Paramahansa Yogananda
"Self-realisation is not a state which is far from you, and which has to be reached by you. You are always in that state. You forget it, and identify yourself with the mind and its creation. To cease to identify yourself with the mind is all that is required." - Ramana Maharshi
“Don’t try to steer the river." - Deepak Chopra
"Do you realise that as long as you have a self to defend, you must be violent?" - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop." - Rumi
"How is it possible that a being with such sensitive jewels as the eyes, such enchanted musical instruments as the ears, and such fabulous arabesque of nerves as the brain, can experience itself anything less than a God?" - Alan Watts
"Be quiet in your mind, quiet in your senses, and also quiet in your body. Then, when all these are quiet, don't do anything. In that state truth will reveal itself to you." - Kabir
“Spiritual opening is not a withdrawal to some imagined realm or safe cave. It is not a pulling away, but a touching of all the experience of life with wisdom and with a heart of kindness, without any separation." - Jack Kornfield
“Change alone is eternal, perpetual, immortal." - Arthur Schopenhauer
“The voice of beauty speaks softly; it creeps only into the most fully awakened souls.” - Friedrich Nietzsche
“The idea of being a person, an ego, is nothing other than an image held together by memory.” - Jean Klein
"Man worships an invisible God and destroys a visible nature, unaware that this nature he’s destroying is this God he’s worshiping." - Hubert Reeves
"The mind exists in two states: as water and as honey. The water vibrates at the least disturbance, while the honey, however disturbed, returns quickly to immobility." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"The mountains in silence nurture the spirit." - Basho
"The biggest challenge for most spiritual seekers is to surrender their self importance, and see the emptiness of their own personal story. It is your personal story that you need to awaken from in order to be free." - Adyashanti
“Once you have this vision that all is divine, you start looking at things in a new light. Then the world is no more puzzle, no more a problem, no more a question – not a question to be solved but a mystery to be lived.” - Osho
"I don't mind what happens. That is the essence of inner freedom. It is a timeless spiritual truth: release attachment to outcomes, deep inside yourself, you'll feel good no matter what." - Jiddu Krishnamurti
"The only thing that doesn't appear in the mirror is the mirror itself, you are the mirror." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"My brain is only a receiver, in the Universe there is a core from which we obtain knowledge, strength and inspiration. I have not penetrated into the secrets of this core, but I know that it exists….
…The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena, it will make more progress in one decade than in all the previous centuries of its existence.” - Nikola Tesla
"You clean your mind by watching it relentlessly. Inattention obscures, attention clarifies." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"The soul always knows what to do to heal itself. The challenge is to silence the mind." - Caroline Myss
"How beautiful the world was when one looked at it without searching, just looked, simply and innocently." - Hermann Hesse
"We are the Self, dreaming that we are a person searching for the Self." - Mooji
"Remember to take life easy. Do not struggle in the world. There is nothing against you. Nothing wants to hurt you. All is well. Om shanti." - Robert Adams
"Recognize Teachers Everywhere “In the end, everyone is our teacher, on one level or another. The child is our teacher, our friends, our family, the stranger on the street. Every experience is a challenge; a teaching is always hidden in it.” - Rabbi David Cooper
“When there is no more separation between “this” and “that” it is called the still-point of Tao, at the still point in the center of the circle, one sees the infinite in all things.” – Chuang Tzu
"Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle." - Philo of Alexandria
"Beware of reactions. Be entirely self-determined and ruled from within, not from without. Merely giving up a thing to secure a better one is not true relinquishment. Give it up because you see its valuelessness.
As you keep on giving up, you will find that you grow spontaneously in intelligence and power and inexhaustible love and joy. You have to give up everything to know that you need nothing, not even your body. Your needs are unreal and your efforts are meaningless.
You imagine that your possessions protect you. In reality they make you vulnerable. Realise yourself as away from all that can be pointed at as 'this' or 'that'. You are unreachable by any sensory experience or verbal construction. Turn away from them. Refuse to impersonate." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
"Breath is the bridge which connects life to consciousness, which unites your body to your thoughts. Whenever your mind becomes scattered, use your breath as the means to take hold of your mind again." - Thich Nhat Hanh
"What I'm leading you to is the following: awareness of reality around you. Awareness means to watch, to observe what is going on within you and around you. 'Going on' is pretty accurate: Trees, grass, flowers, animals, rock, all of reality is moving. One observes it, one watches it. How essential it is for the human being not just to observe himself or herself, but to watch all of reality. Are you imprisoned by your concepts? Do you want to break out of your prison? Then look; observe; spend hours observing. Watching what? Anything. The faces of people, the shapes of trees, a bird in flight, a pile of stones, watch the grass grow. Get in touch with things, and look at them. Hopefully, you will then break out of these rigid patterns we have developed, out of what our thoughts and our words have imposed on us. Hopefully, we will see. What will we see? This thing that we choose to call reality, whatever is beyond words and concepts. This is a spiritual exercise—connected with spirituality—connected with breaking out of your cage, out of the imprisonment of concepts and words." - Anthony de Mello
"Forgive others, not because they deserve forgiveness, but because you deserve peace." - Jonathan Lockwood Huie
"No thought has any power. You have power. And when you identify and believe in the thought you give power to the thought." - Mooji
“Realize that silence comes from your heart and not the absence of talk." - Thich Nhat Hanh
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." - George Bernard Shaw
"Just stay quiet and empty. Let Life play." - Mooji
“To learn what the path to Buddhahood is - is to learn what the True Self is. To learn what the True Self is - is to forget about the self. To forget about the self is to become one with the whole universe.” - Dogen Zenji
“I am but a guest in this world. While others rush about to get things done, I accept what is offered. I drift like a wave on the ocean. I blow as aimless as the wind.” - Lao Tzu
“We either drown in the splits and confusions of our lives, or we surrender to something greater than ourselves. The water of our deepest troubles is also the water of our own solution. In surrender, we descend down to the bottom of it and back to the beginning of it; down into what is divided in order to get back to the wholeness before the split. Healing, health, wholeness: all hail from the same roots.” - Michael Meade
“Compassion is the awareness of a deep bond between yourself and all creatures.” - Eckhart Tolle
"When you know beyond all doubting that the same life flows through all that is, and you are that life, you will love all naturally and spontaneously. But when you look at anything as separate from you, it is hard to love it, for you can fear it.” - Nisargadatta Maharaj
“Don't look for peace. Don't look for any other state than the one you are in now; otherwise, you will set up inner conflict and unconscious resistance. Forgive yourself for not being at peace.” - Eckhart Tolle
“The only way to make sense out of change is to... join the dance." - Alan Watts
“Know then that the body is merely a garment. Go seek the wearer, not the cloak." - Rumi
“Again, after I understand that the Earth revolves around the Sun, I won't look upon a sunrise or sunset in the same way. Eventually that cognitive understanding may morph into an experiential realization of Earth moving and Sun staying still.
Buddhist meditation -- Harris favors the Dzogchen variety -- surely is a proven way of experiencing more fully the reality of no-self. Simply living life with eyes wide open is another way. I doubt that sitting at the feet of a Dzogchen master is necessary to realize there is no self or soul inside my head.” - Source
"Enlightenment is not reserved for gurus or available only after years of practice or seeking. It is your birthright. It is not a special state, experience, thought, or emotion that one has to find or maintain. The word “enlightenment” is merely a label pointing to the direct and immediate recognition of timeless awareness. This awareness holds the key to your real identity. It reveals that there is no separate self. It reveals that all boundaries are illusory including the boundaries between people, religions, programs, paths, groups, and nations." - Scott Kiloby
“Question your thoughts. Question your stories. Question your assumptions. Question your opinions. Question your conclusions. Question them all into utter emptiness, stillness and joy. The keys to freedom are in your hands. Use them." - Adyashanti