Notes From a Fellow Traveller

The Peak Experience

There are two ways that we gain knowledge of our self and world. As adults, our default approach is “memory knowledge.” From childhood on we accumulate experiences, learning from parents, schooling, and culture. We store all this knowledge in our mental file called memory. We draw upon this acquired memory-based knowledge, bounded by the reach and character of our life experience, to understand and navigate the inner and outer day-to-day world.

Although memory-based knowledge provides a quick, consistent, and predictable approach to life, it is limited by the scope of our past experiences. Our past automatically shapes new incoming experience to align with this prior knowledge. In this manner, our life unfolds with predictability. However, we miss the opportunity to explore and experience the many possibilities of life that lie beyond the scope of our personal past.

That brings us to a very different type of knowledge “being knowledge.” Being knowledge refers to the insights and understandings that naturally arise from a still state of being and presence. That foundational state-of-being is a moment-to-moment awareness that does not contain past history. It is an impersonal state-of-being in which the personal self and its content, which is memory based, cannot be found. The knower is a natural and unconditioned awareness absent any previously stored information. It is a unique and precious state-of-being that allows us access to full and clear knowledge and actions that lie beyond the grasp of our acquired memory-based knowledge.

It's like switching channels. One channel is our personal history channel and the other the ground of our being channel. Surely you have experienced the day-to-day personal self and its conditioned take on self and life. It has become our default, taking the place of our spaciousness and whole true self. But it is also likely you have experienced your inner self with its flow in the moment, minus a personal and historical commentary.

Can you remember a time in nature, intimacy, beauty, music, dance or nature when you suddenly felt a sense of flow, complete presence, well-being and wholeness. You likely didn’t notice that your personal self dropped away for a moment, allowing for the revelation of your natural and timeless presence. Soon enough your usual self pulled you back. But for a moment you switched channels and touched the vast well-being of your natural self.

You may have also noticed, in one of those natural and almost imperceptible gaps between two thoughts, that a fresh insight popped up. You might not know where it came from and how it arrived, but you will know that you have touched a profound truth that is not ascribable to or influenced by any memory or learned knowledge. That gap and the ensuing moment of presence and being, however brief it may be, allowed for the being knowledge to spontaneously arise, precise to the circumstance at hand

To access knowledge beyond the limits of memory is a great gift, as it opens vistas and resolves concerns that our ordinary memory based knowledge can only struggle and ruminate about. Having routinely relied on memory knowledge for our lifetime, we must learn how to access, trust, and be guided by being knowledge, the profound intuitive knowing of our inner self? We train ourselves in accessing this knowledge by discovering how we can reveal, with increasing stability, that ever present inner state of pure unconditioned awareness and being. For this we rely on an open awareness meditative practice called meditation without support.

Unlike meditation with support, which relies on a chosen focal point (for example, mantra and mindfulness meditation, breath observation, guided imagery, and so forth,) an awareness-based meditation without support brings our attention to an open and spacious awareness rather than a specific object. Any and all mental activity is allowed to arise in that open presence, but nothing takes our attention from the awareness. We allow all mental appearances (thoughts, feelings, mental images, and sensory experiences) to come and go on their own, as they do, absent our attention or entanglement. The resulting field of open presence and being is the ground in which being knowledge, in its own time, spontaneously arises as creative insights or realizations to offer the truth about self and life.

And you will know that the pure space of awareness, your being, the source of all precise and true knowledge is pervasive, timeless, ever present, and imperishable yet always available to you. It knows you and you know it. We can always dip back into our personal identity to navigate day-to-day life. But, we will know that the truth of our being and being knowledge is the source of a full and abundant life. It is the resolution to all of our searching and all of our questioning.

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The Vanishng "I"– Finding Freedom in Otherness

It’s not possible to hold two thoughts in the mind at the same time. Try it. Thoughts may follow each other in rapid succession but two thoughts, and even more so, two opposing thoughts cannot appear in the same moment. That offers an important observation. The quickest way to experience the personal “I” dissolving is to authentically be concerned about another. The focus on another cannot be held simultaneously with an absorption in self.

Shantideva, a famous 8th-century Indian Buddhist monk, expressed that in the following words: "All the suffering in the world comes from seeking pleasure for oneself. All the happiness in the world comes from seeking pleasure for others." When we desire that others be free of suffering and attain happiness, we swiftly lose our ego-based-self-cherishing and self-centeredness. In that precise moment a spontaneous feeling of peace, connection, and contentness, no longer obscured by our personal “I,” reveals itself from the center of our being. It may be brief, but if we catch it we will know it by heart.

That is easier said than done. Our personal self develops early in life, evolving through a series of stages: the mere “I,” the seemingly independent individual or personal “I,” the self-centered self-cherishing “I,” the defensive and protective “I,” and the social “I” which completes our complex ego structure. We need a personal “I” to navigate human life. The mere “I” serves that purpose. It can know the facts and skills we need to move through the circumstances of daily existence. The next four levels offer little to nothing and are the source of the negative emotions that bring stress, distress, and suffering, obscuring our true nature and possibilities.

Letting go of these complex elaborations of our personal identity can be quite difficult. We are convinced that we are this convoluted “I” and we come to trust it to protect and manage our lives. It takes simple observational skills to ascertain that it does a poor job and takes us down many meaningless and painful rabbit holes. We can disassemble this convoluted “I’ through psychological development and the spiritual insights of meditation. As we do so, the obscurations of a complex “I” progressively drop away, revealing, over time, our deepest self.

Simultaneous to pursuing these paths of development we can also study and practice the skill and attitude of otherness. In the Eastern tradition the desire to care for others is divided into two stages – aspiration and engagement. The first, aspiration, is the intention to live one’s life in a manner that benefits others. Many of us already aspire to this in our families, work, and community life. And, we may notice that when this aspiration truly sits in our heart, if even for moments, our heart opens, inner stillness arises, and serenity prevails. In that moment, we touch our wholeness and essence.

Surely, we have noticed that when we are absorbed in this higher intention we feel revitalized. Yet, this aspiration may fall away moments later as our well-practiced personal “I” once again takes over. Expect this. Don’t get frustrated or disappointed. Over and over we re-assert our intention and allow it to be the center of our being. In time, a growing understanding of our illusory ego structure and the insights of meditation will return us quite naturally to the natural human focus on otherness.

The second stage of otherness is altruistic action. Here there are two levels: the actions of a loving-kind personal “I” and the natural love and compassion that emanates effortlessly from our true self. It is not so important to distinguish these two levels. Suffice it to say that as our actions towards others become increasingly altruistic the presence of a personal “I” becomes increasingly subtle. When we no longer seek self-satisfaction or any level of applause for our actions we will recognize that our personal “I” has dissolved and our actions are inseparable from our natural self. They are the perfume of who we are.

At this final level of development there is neither intention nor absence of intention, action or non-action, selfness or otherness. There is only a natural presence, being, and isness that is wholeness and love itself.

We begin with the aspiration, over and over, to be of benefit to others – what we call otherness. We cherish those spontaneous aspirational moments and seek to cultivate a long-term attitude of otherness. As our aspirations lead to actions that benefit others, we become aware of our increasingly “clean actions” – clean of our personal “I” seeking self-satisfaction and applause. At moments, we will drop onto our deeper self which is by nature interconnected and other focused.

We will discover that that the ageless wisdom Shantideva shared with us - "All the suffering in the world comes from seeking pleasure for oneself. All the happiness in the world comes from seeking pleasure for others." – is precisely how it is. The Dali Lama once said that the most intelligent human quality is the recognition that what I truly want in life comes to me in the very act of giving to others.

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Liberation on Arising: The Secret of a Still Mind

For most individuals – beginner’s, intermediate, or even advanced – stilling and maintaining a stable still mind is a challenging aspect of meditation. Initial efforts at maintaining a focal point, reciting a repetitive mantra, and guided meditation among other approaches offer temporary relief, but dissipate after the effort comes to an end. We discover that the most certain and long-term approach to stilling the mind is a wise understanding of how the mind works rather than a short-term technique or method.

The phrase “liberation on arising” describes the natural life-cycle of mental activity. What is liberated and what from what? Ordinary mental appearances – thoughts, feelings, visual imagery, and sensory experiences – are liberated from the mind’s tendency to grasp onto, objectify. elaborate, and extend over time the ebb and flow of routine mental activity.

Close your eyes for a moment. Allow the ongoing appearance of mental activity. Notice the seductive energy of random thoughts, feelings, and sensations, Observe how they pull your mind towards them. Notice how you get enmeshed with mental activity. Your capacity observe your mind is lost as you identify with and merge into mental activity. Your enmeshment causes mental activity to extend its lifespan from a brief moment to minutes, hours, and sometimes longer. This is called fixation and reification.

We then, drawing upon memory, elaborate this mental activity with a story drawn from past experience. “Oh, this reminds me when …” This is then further elaborated with an associated emotion. What was simply a mental bleep now becomes an extended story line that only resembles the initial mental activity. We are now lost in our mind, missing other experiences that are actually occurring, now. Sound familiar? It is easy to verify this from your own experience. 

Immersed in a conditioned story that occupies our mind and attention, we are quite distant from the initial mental appearance. And, while absorbed in this story we miss what is actually happening in the moment. We live in the past, not in the present. We suffer a concocted story rather than experience what is actually happening in the now.

Let’s return to the phrase “liberation on arising” and our question “what is liberated from what.” The natural life span of a mental appearance – thought, feeling, mental image, or sensory experience –is in the range of 200 milliseconds, a mere blip. The moment our attention catches and works with it the appearance is stuck in place and fixated in time. What would likely be unnoticeable becomes our life and indirectly our bodily experience for an artificially extended time. 

What is liberated is the simple mental appearance.  What it’s liberated from is the entrapment in our mind, the result of our grasping and elaborating it. When we cease engaging, identifying, fixing, and elaborating mental appearances they natural come and go on their own. When we cease our desire to unravel every though and feeling they leave on their own. Mental appearances are liberated from the conditioned reactivity of the mind and our mind is liberated from its preoccupation with transient mental activity. The result is mental stability and stillness is.

It is not that appearances cease occurring. As long as we occupy a human mind and body, memory and our sensory system will function. But when we cease to entangle ourselves with every passing mental movement, they will come and go without leaving a trace. In the East they say that we usually deal with mental appearances as if our finger was writing our name in concrete, it lasts. Or perhaps, if we hold on less, it’s like writing on sand so that impression lasts for less time. However, if we understand the transient and meaningless nature of mental experiences, its like writing with one’s finger on water. The moment you stroke the water the impression arises, abides, and dissipates in essentially the same moment.

Neither distraction, suppression nor other methods, or techniques can result in a stable still mind. When we understand how the mind works, mental appearances, good and bad, come and go and that is perfectly OK. We remain underneath in our natural and unchanging stillness. It is that simple, that effortless, and that profound. And, that stable stillness is the source of a deep unchanging serenity, truth, wisdom, love, and freedom. That is “self-liberation on arising.” That is meditation.

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This Precious Life

We are born with an expansive consciousness that is spacious and unconditioned, allowing for the unfettered expression of the multitude of human possibilities. Early in life that fullness of possibilities meets the dilemma of human existence. Confronted with the unavoidable challenges of daily life, we are compelled to develop an ego-based identity. That cherished identity progressively reduces our vast possibilities to a constricted set of beliefs, perceptual patterns, reactive behaviors, and patterned ways of living.

The psychologist William James compares the effect of human existence on consciousness to a “reducing valve.” Like a mechanical valve that is progressively closed to limit flow, so does the ‘civilization” of the young child close off the full possibilities and flow of an untamed and untrained consciousness. As a result, we adapt to the demands of culture and its definitions of success and achievement, but we are left as individuals operating with only a fraction of our innate capacities.

In Eastern traditions, the second phase of life, following the completion of household responsibilities, is dedicated to spiritual growth. This stage of life offers an opportunity to rediscover and embrace the fullness of life's possibilities—possibilities that were necessarily set aside earlier in life. The focus shifts inward rather than outward, emphasizing "being" over "doing." During this time, the inner self is progressively recognized as the true essence of who we are, transcending the surface identities we temporarily adopted to navigate the demands of adult life.

At first glance, this shift might seem straightforward and easy. While it is undoubtedly welcome, it is far from simple. Human existence is rooted in the mind and body, and early in life we form an identity closely tied to this physical and mental self. This identification becomes the framework through which we navigate the challenges of life. The surface self provides a sense of security, comfort, familiarity, and a repository of learned responses. However, this attachment comes at a significant cost. Caught in cycles of pleasure and distress, we remain unaware of the stable serenity and happiness we lack, as well as the untapped possibilities that lie beyond the boundaries of our personal identity.

How do we transition from our outward-focused self to the vast expanse of our inner self? It begins with a pivotal moment—the proverbial “crack in the egg.” Whether through fate, grace, trauma, suffering, or some other wake-up call, we must first awaken to the realization that life extends far beyond the confines of the small “I.” Recognizing this truth and committing to the devotion and discipline needed to transcend it, is what Joseph Campbell described as the “Hero’s Journey.” This journey is the adventure of a lifetime. As the poet T.S. Eliot so beautifully writes, that adventure is “the last of earth left to discover... that which was the beginning”—our primal consciousness, our inner essence, our true self.

There are many paths to turning inward, but contemplative meditation is a common thread among them. Despite their variety, all forms of meditation share two fundamental goals. The first is to quiet the overactive mind, creating an inner space that fosters a calmer, more balanced, and healthier way of living. The second, more traditional aim of meditation, is to transcend ordinary thought and experience, allowing us to discover the true nature of self and reality. This profound realization of who we truly are is the only genuine and lasting solution to life’s distress and suffering. It is the sole path to enduring happiness, serenity, wisdom, and freedom.

Years ago, I attended a teaching in a meditation hall in Nepal where the teacher spoke of the mind/body in seemingly contradictory terms, describing it at times as “dirty” and at other times as “precious.” That paradox puzzled me. The teacher explained that the distinction lies in awareness. In the first instance, an individual remains unaware of their intrinsic nature, leading to harmful actions toward themselves and others, which contaminate the mind/body. In the second instance, the individual awakens to the extraordinary potential and essence of the mind/body, cultivating a life of compassion and wholesomeness. This, he said, is what makes a human life precious—a state we can aspire to by turning inward to uncover the true nature of self and existence, which, as Plato described, reflects “the true, the good, and the beautiful.”

As the teacher unraveled the apparent contradiction that had puzzled me, it became clear that each of us faces a choice. We can either awaken to create a precious, conscious life or drift through life in a state of unawareness. The key lies in our decision to break free from the confines of our personal identity, to expand our consciousness beyond the limitations of ordinary existence, and to uncover the true essence of ourselves and reality. This is what defines a precious human life.

In modern times, we don’t need to wait until midlife to begin awakening. We are fortunate to have the freedom early in adult life to explore our inner world and gradually shift our focus inward. Today, we have abundant resources at our fingertips—books, visual media, teachers, retreats, and spiritual teachings—all of which support this journey. We can start by bringing more preciousness into our daily lives through acts of kindness, patience, compassion, generosity, and fostering healthy relationships. Adding mindfulness and contemplative practices deepens this transformation.

By doing so, we not only enrich our own lives but also contribute to creating a more compassionate and precious world. I now see that the teacher’s use of paradox was a deliberate tool to challenge us and raise our awareness. His question, though unspoken, was clear: What will you do with this one life you are given? Wf

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The Gap: Glimpses of Essence

We have spoken many times about the two selves – our natural essential self of unconditioned awareness and our acquired personal self (our ego). The former is present at birth and the latter is gradually shaped as we leave infancy and mentally construct a personal identity to meet the challenges of human life.

The personal self progressively reduces the scope of our consciousness from our inheritance of a simple, innocent, and expansive consciousness to a limited set of beliefs, patterns, habits and perceptual templates. We shift from living in a wondrous open view of reality to one that is limited and conditioned by our past.

Although obscured in adult life by the tenacious ego self, there remains a subtle continuous longing for the natural and simple presence of an open and unfettered awareness. There are moments when our essence breaks through – moments, for example, when we are absorbed in nature, music, dance, intimacy, and exuberance. In these moments our obscuring personal identity drops away, leaving a gap in which our essential self shines through, like the sun shining through a break in the clouds. We experience this as a lightness of being, a state of flow, a sense of wholeness and well-being.

Our usual self quickly takes over once again, obscuring the momentary touch of the true self. Not having a basis of understanding, we often perceive these glimpses as unexpected sweet and pleasant moments. We had the experience but missed the meaning. What we experienced was a moment of wholeness and flow, ever present but mostly obscured by our small self. What we missed is its meaning as a glimpse of our true self. Next time you have such a moment stop and abide in this glimpse of your natural essence.

The immediate question is how to hold and stabilize these moments, these glimpses of the deeper self. That, cannot be accomplished by force of the ego’s will, by effort, or wishful thinking. But there are approaches and circumstances that will point us towards these gaps in our usual consciousness.

We can increase the probability of creating a gap through the practice of meditation. As we intentionally withdraw our attention from random mental activity – thoughts, emotions, imagery, and sensory impressions – and abide in an observing awareness/presence, the mind slows and a calm stillness reveals itself. That stillness, with stability and patience can give rise to the momentary, or longer, dissolution of our ordinary self, leaving an open gap. In that gap we can abide in our essential expansive self. With time and practice these glimpses will become increasingly stable.

Although we usually do not notice the gap between two thoughts or feelings it is always there. Watch your mind to see if you can notice this gap. You can intentionally create it by holding the breath. Take a deep breath in, exhale, and then hold the breath for a comfortable period of time. Notice that during the breath hold cognition and mental activity ceases. Amazing. This occurs physiologically because breath-holding is one of a number of actions that suppresses the neural default mode – the series of brain centers responsible for the active mind.

You will experience an extended gap. Remain aware. Do not analyze or comment. Merely abide in this gap, subtly aware of the stillness and presence. That is who you are! You may work with this during your daily routines or use this method to deepen your daily awareness practice and extend the gap.

Another approach you can practice during the day is to intentionally stop your mental activity for a few moments and notice the ensuing gap that is present before mind talk resumes. Practice this frequently and it will slowly integrate into your daily life.

The gap, however it comes about, is a break in the dominance of the personal ego “I” which allows a glimpse at the underlying and ever present natural self. In time these gaps will gather together and create small islands of presence in your life. Slowly, this openness will once again become the foundation of your life, replacing contracted, limited, and judgmental self. You will notice this in subtle ways – a calmer life, less reactivity, less busyness, and more of a desire to just be.

Full Podcast: The Gap - Glimpses of Our Essence

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Virtual Reality to True Being

Simply stated, virtual reality is an experience that on first glance appears real but on further examination is found not to be real. The experience seems real, looks real, and sounds real, but it is isn’t.

Consider the water mirage on the distant desert road, an echo, or railroad tracks appearing to meeting in the distance. They all seem real, but they aren’t. They are a virtual reality. Or consider the night dream. From the perspective of the dream state it’s real – the emotions, the images, the body reaction. But when we awake in the morning, we discover that the night dream was in fact unreal. Finally, consider a virtual reality headset. We put it on and we can be skiing, bungee jumping, or any other activity. We become immersed in whatever comes through the headset, and if didn’t know otherwise what seems in the moment to be very real is likewise unreal, a virtual reality, a simulation of reality.

Each of these examples is well known to us and does not cause us grief or distress, as we know that a mirage is untrue, the virtual goggles are only a playful digital display, and we awaken from the night dream. Undeceived by these experiences, no harm is done to our life or psyche.

But consider our ordinary day-to-day life and activities – the usual experience of people, places, things, and mental activity. From the perspective of ordinary consciousness, it’s all very real to us, but can it be just another example of virtual reality? Let’s look at this startling possibility.                     

In ordinary day-to-day consciousness there is a sense of outer and inner. Some experiences seem to occur outside of us and others inside. Is this actually how reality is? There is also the experience that people, places, and things are distinct and separate from us. Is this actually how reality is? The people, places, and things that we experience appear to have substance, stability, and autonomy. Is this actually how reality is? And most often we are immersed in a personal drama of one sort or another that appears quite real. Is this actually how reality is? We could go further, but it suffices to say that we experience our world to be solid, divided into inside and outside, comprised of distinct and separate entities, filled with drama, and more or less seemingly permanent.

To ordinary consciousness this is how things appear to us. But as we have seen, awakening from dream consciousness and the night dream exposes the dream as actually unreal. Similarly, awakening from the “day dream” exposes as well the unreality of our ordinary day-to-day experience. Our usual world and life reveals itself as a virtual reality. And that, changes everything.

Awakening from the night dream requires that we step out of dream consciousness into wakeful consciousness. This shift offers a larger view of our situation. The same is required if we are to recognize the illusionary nature of our ordinary reality. We must step out of ordinary consciousness into a witnessing or observing consciousness, a meta consciousness. From this more expansive and uninvolved viewpoint, we can see that ordinary day-to-day reality is also a virtual, mentally constructed, illusory reality.

That is a difficult one to bear. What seems so real, true, and tangible to us at the level of wakeful consciousness is seen as an extensive inner drama projected outward to simulate an external world, things, people, and events. There are 7 billion inhabitants on our planet with 7 billion different worlds.

Understanding that our seeming outer ordinary reality is in fact virtual, allows us to live with others in this illusion without distress and suffering. We can share enough of our illusion to function together and attach to none of it. However, when our inner virtual reality differs from others or we become attached to our story as universal truth, it can become a source of considerable personal and cultural strife. To avoid that we must each strive to create the healthiest illusion possible.

Since our experience of ordinary reality arises and appears in our consciousness, we can influence the details and character of day-to-day life. We can take steps to create as healthy a personal perspective as possible – reading, studying, self-improvement, and psychological development can help in that effort to create the healthiest day-to-day human life.

Living in but not attaching to ordinary reality allows more ease, simplicity, and inner peace. By recognizing that ordinary reality is a virtual reality, transient and not truly existent, we can enjoy, but cease to attach to what is unstable and unreal. This motivates us to turn inward to the final and true reality – our inner and unconditioned awareness and beingness, the heart center of our being.

Stripping away the obscuring dreamscapes, we discover the spacious and ever-present deeper and true self to be the foundation and source of all life’s experiences. At this center of our being we find unchanging stability, serenity, and freedom. We abandon distress and suffering and discover oneness and wholeness. We become experts at navigating two worlds – the true reality of fundamental being and the virtual reality of ordinary life.

And in time, we will come to the final recognition that there are not two worlds. In actuality, they is one.

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Zooming In – Zooming Out

Our fundamental nature is a simple, innocent, unconditioned, and easeful awareness. This ground awareness is the source of all of our experience. Without it we would not have any experience. We are born into this natural awareness, but as our personal self develops we lose access to it. If fortunate, we will recognize and dwell in it during adulthood, regaining the natural essence of our life amidst the cacophony of a complex personal world.

Consider the world of the infant before the commencement of personality/ego development. It is one of pure awareness without commentary, judgment, or elaboration of its simple and innocent experiences. The infant directly experiences one phenomenon after the other without lingering, emotion, memory, or reaction of any sort. Take the opportunity observe this in an infant – the curiosity, astonishment, delight, and non-attaching awareness.

In the East they use a metaphor. Consider a young infant looking at a complex wall tapestry. The child’s experience will dart back and forth experiencing the colors, texture, and shape, without comment or judgement. An adult viewing the same tapestry will rapidly move into cognition – liking or disliking, seeking a meaning, storyline, symbolism, or comparing it to this or that. The infant has a direct experience unconditioned, unshaped by past experience stored in memory. It is very much different for the adult whose experience is cognitive, conditioned, and far removed from a direct and unembellished experience. There is neither a good nor bad here, but two different ways of experiencing each with its benefits and losses.

For the adult who lives in the limitations of a “thinking and interpretive” world, there is the loss of vitality, freshness, astonishment, and immersion in what truly is

As adults, we may consider the words of the poet T.S. Eliot from Little Gidding.

“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.”

As adults lost in the contracted and worrisome world of the ego “I,” what we yearn for is to re-ground our life in a foundation of simplicity, direct experience, and innocence – but, unlike childhood, know that place for the first time. Our home can once again become an unconditioned awareness that manifests, as needed, access to worldly skills and capacities without the afflictive effects of a concretized and inflated identity.

To know it for the first time is to live from this core essence as a wise adult rather than an innocent infant. We live the essential truth of who we are while simultaneously manifesting, as needed, a simple mere personal “I” to navigate day-to-day life. We can cultivate this ability to zoom in to our true essence and zoom out to navigate the day-to-day world. We seek access to both worlds and the capacity to surf them as needed.

Our first effort is to recognize and reconnect, to the natural experience of a pure, unconditioned, timeless awareness – our unchanging essence. The movement in this direction can be stimulated by suffering and its vulnerability, frustration with unsuccessful efforts to find sustained serenity and happiness in outer experience, or the subtle yearning for more to life.

Every adult has re-touched this foundational presence. Perhaps this forgotten moment was experienced in nature, exercise, dance, beauty, intimacy, or other moments of flow. The common thread is a momentary loss of our sense of personal identity and opening into our larger nature at the center of our being. These moments are brief, as our ego structure tenaciously reasserts itself. But they are memorable tastes of our true nature.

It is through meditation that we can, in a focused manner, visit this still center of our life and gradually stabilize its presence. It is important to note that this must move beyond a meditative emphasis on relaxation and a calmer ordinary mind, although this has its own value. Our direction should be toward a simple awareness-based meditation that is absent the focus and dependency of method-based practices.

I have been teaching meditation for decades and regardless of my previous belief that “dropping into awareness” without a focal point is far more difficult the evidence is to the contrary. In practice, with skilled guidance, it is far easier to drop into a simple presence and beingness than it is to set-up an ongoing struggle with mental activity that is too often the result of a focused-based method. Awareness-based meditation cuts through the cognitive mind and takes us directly to the aim of all traditional meditative experience – a direct encounter with the expansive, timeless, and unconditioned awareness that is at the center of our being.

As we zoom in repeatedly and become increasingly stable in our experience of a simple awareness, we ask how can be zoom out to ordinary life and still “hold” our center. When we need to be in day-to-day life we simply reach into our vast unconditioned consciousness and manifest those aspects of memory, cognition, intellect, creativity, imagination, and relational skills that are required in the moment. We create a temporary “mere I” that is needed to navigate our daily life and we let it drop back into consciousness when no longer need.

Our base is our natural unconditioned consciousness and the assembled and transient mere “I,” when needed, comes and goes. Our fundamental source is our broad awareness and the “I” is a mere construction that helps navigate worldly life for the moment.

It is possible to practice accessing and stabilizing our essential awareness through regular awareness-based meditation practice. During the day we can practice zooming in and zooming out. In time we will become masters of two worlds and there will come a time when the final truth emerges and those two worlds will become one unity. There will then be no further need for zooming in and zooming out.

Personal Love – Essence Love

I approach the topic of Love with hesitation. Although we speak of it so often, our understanding of love leaves much to be desired. Perhaps we can begin by agreeing that there are two fundamental kinds of love – personal love and essence love.

Although the first, personal love, may take many forms, it is characterized by the love of one person for another within the scope of our usual mind/body life. That love will vary in character and quality following the psychological development of the individuals involved. The most rudimentary personal “love” is needs based, transactional. I meet your needs and in return you meet mine. That’s the stated, or too often the unstated premise. Such relationships are characterized as co-dependent transactions.

With psychological development personal love evolves. There is a diminishing focus on one’s own needs and an increasing focus on the other. Self-cherishing shifts towards other- cherishing. My happiness is increasingly derived from seeing the happiness of the other. Kindness, care, patience, open communication, and emotional intimacy characterize the increasingly mature and relatively selfless personal relationship. The poet Rainer Rilke describes it in these words:

                  For one human being to love another; that is perhaps the most

                  difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the

                  work for which all other work is but preparation.

The work he is referring to is the progressive maturation of the personal ego self – the shift from “I ness” to “other ness.” However, there are limits to this shift. By its very nature the individual self is experienced as distinct from other individuals and similarly is by design self-cherishing, defensive, and self-righteous. Even the most highly evolved personal consciousness – which is to be affirmed as a major achievement – will remain subtly subject to these tenacious egoic forces.

The second kind of love is what I have called essence love. It exists outside of the realm of personal identity, outside of conventional consciousness. It exists at the source of our being. It is the source of our being. We cannot actually know or describe it, as we can personal love, because it cannot be known through our usual sensory or mental capacities. It can only be known through direct experience, by being one with it. It then knows itself.

Essene love is not one entity loving another. The word love as used here is more a sense of wholeness and oneness, existence itself, the treasure house of human life. We have all had this experience at one time or another. As indefinable as it is, Rumi speaks of it this way:

“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing
and rightdoing there is a field.
I'll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass
the world is too full to talk about.”

Beyond “rightdoing” and “wrongdoing,” beyond our personal ego self, there is a field. That field is the experience of being, wholeness, presence, timeless awareness, love. It is there that essence meets itself. We call that the love of which there is none greater. It is perfect peace, harmony, union, and communion. Although we call it “love,” it has no name. How do we arrive there? Rumi goes further:

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek

and find all the barriers within yourself that you

have built against it.

This second kind of love cannot be gained through effort or will. Why, because it is already there and complete in each of us. It is the perfume of our natural self, of pure awareness, of presence, and beingness. It is our essence. And that we can only experience when the ego barriers that hide our natural state dissolve. And that is where meditation can assist.

In the great traditions meditation is not a relaxation or stress reduction technique. It is a contemplative process which allows us to observe and dissolve the barriers to gaining access to our true nature. There are no techniques or methods necessary, just a shift in attention from the objects of awareness to awareness itself, from the wandering mind to its essence. Watch your mind. Observe that it cannot easily sustain awareness or witnessing. It is rapidly drawn, like a gravitational pull, into all sorts of mental and sensory experiences. And this entanglement is what we let go of in meditation. We learn to once again be the knower, the awareness, the seer.

Without methods or techniques, we drop into a state of being. Nothing to do. No goal or destination to aim towards. No one to be. We remain in the here and now, in our natural state. Of course, the dynamic energy of the mind will manifest all sorts of appearances – thoughts, feelings, images, sensory experiences – but we don’t grasp onto, elaborate, or become involved with these movements. They are not who we are. We remain in the continuity of our natural state of presence, awareness, beingness. That’s who we are. With practice and persistence we will increasingly be able to sustain a state of natural and easeful awareness, and the gravitational pull towards mental appearances will progressively diminish.

When we rest with ease in our natural state, absent a personal identity, we will increasingly experience the perfume of our natural being. That includes the perfume of a natural, whole, selfless, and indescribable embrace that we can call love. It cannot be described in words, as it is not cognitive. However, we will know it when we see it, and be filled by its energy, pervasiveness, and naturalness. From this direct experience all lesser forms of love lose their interest. From this perspective all love becomes selfless, joyful, and filled with grace.

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Seen But Not Real – Not Seen But Real

There was a time when I could share stories with my grandchildren about wonderful mysterious animals. There was the Garufula, a four-legged bear-like animal that had various configurations depending on the telling. Sometimes it was yellow, sometimes red, but always with vivid polka dots and a colorful tale. There were many adventures to speak of.

Then there was the pink Giraffe with blue dots, a green tale and bright yellow eyes. His/her head would often appear at night in my grandkids second floor window. He could also serve as an easy slide down a big tree in the back yard or a ladder to climb heights. It was lots of fun.

As it does, there came a time when the young ones were proud to announce that there are no Garfulas or pink Giraffes. From where I do not know, but in response, Zoe, my oldest granddaughter, blurted out – “There are some things you can see but are not real and there are some things that are real that you cannot see.” Amazed, I thought I had found my next teacher. Unknown to herself, Zoe was speaking that enduring accessibility to a natural wisdom, present but obscured in most of us, that revealed itself in those simple words.

I reflected in her words. A desert mirage, an echo, train tracks appearing to meet in the distance, and magic tricks are among those experiences that we can see or hear, but they are not actually real. These are sensory-based illusions that we initially think are real, but later learn that they are not real.

Love, kindness, patience, and spirit cannot be directly seen. They have no form, shape, texture, color, weight, or location. We cannot touch, feel, see or smell them. However, we would all agree that they are real.

If we doubt their reality our lives would be quite bleak.

I think I have touched on this enough to honor Zoe’s revelation that there are things seen that are not real and things that cannot be seen that are real. I would like to take this to a bit more subtle level by extending her words. I would like to suggest that from an ultimate perspective all experiences are unreal – sensory based or mind based.

What do I mean by this? Here I must add another statement: all experiences are transient expressions of our foundational consciousness/awareness. My visual sensory apparatus experiences light waves reflecting on an outer object. These form an imprint on my retina which is converted to electrical activity that travels to my visual brain cortex where it is converted into chemical reactions. By some unknow mystery this appears in consciousness as a mental image that I label, as learned from culture, a tree.

But, this is not the object outside. That I can never truly know. It is a mental representation that is labeled and projected outward, magically appearing in front of me. The experience I have of the tree is not the real object outside. It is a transient expression of consciousness. Although we can conventionally consider it to be the tree in front of us it really isn’t. Like all other experience, including our personal self, it seems real to conventional experience but in reality it is unreal. Experiences do not exist in the manner in which they appear to exist. That is the most subtle understanding of reality.

Yet it all works and functions as we understand that underlying ordinary life is the true essence of reality, an all-manifesting consciousness. If we forget this, as we do, we get attached and desirous of that which is ultimately transient and unreal. The result is confusion about how self and life really exist and invariable loss, distress, and suffering.

So ultimately, Garufulas, polka dot Giraffes and all other experiences have an equal nature. They are all simple manifestations of consciousness, neither real nor unreal. They just arise and dissolve on their own. Some are catalyzed by our senses, some by memory, and some by imagination. As we dive deeper into our understanding of how things really are, we can play in our ordinary world of experiences, all of them, without holding on. And that is joy and bliss.

That brings me back to my grandchildren. Pela, my second grandchild, was the most insistent several years ago that in the “real” world these wonderful animals don’t exist. A wonderful artist, she surprised me for my birthday with a painting of our beloved Giraffe. Like everything else it was both real and unreal. Its true home was in consciousness along with love and kindness. Actually, it was love and kindness.

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Reclaiming Your Center: Small Self to True Self

Our lives are influenced and guided by our sense of “self.” When we refer to our self – I believe, I think, I feel – it is important to ask what self, what “I,” we are referring to. Is it our customary, personal day-to-day self, or our natural, inner self? Which “self” have we placed at the center of our life?

We can imagine our life as a mandala with a central hub and spokes radiating out to the periphery. Our sense of self is located at the central hub. It is our operating system. The character of our life is sourced and determined from this center. When we awaken to the possibility that we can re-design our life, we get to choose which self we place at the center of our life. It can be our acquired personal self or our natural, true self. That choice makes all the difference.

What we place at the center of our life will define how we experience the world. When our small personal self is at the center – past history, ideas, perceptual patterns, and learned identities – will determine the character of our relationships, reactions, and life. For most of us that is our default, perhaps for a lifetime. We are defined and guided by the automaticity and acquired traits of our personal identity that we have placed at the center of our existence.

Yet, that is not how we started life. We were born into a simple awareness – no past history, no fixed perceptions, or identities. We were just present, open, unconditioned, and aware. I do not wish to glamorize this youthful and innocent presence and innocence, as individuation must occur to live a full human life.

However, as a result of individuation, we spend our adult years functioning under the influence of our personal self. It is the default center of our being. Life has its achievements and delights as well as difficult challenges. But the self-centered, protective, defensive, and self-righteous character of the personal self permeates our day-to-day experience. It is the source of subtle and gross distress, anxiety, and suffering that we falsely consider an unavoidable part of human life.

Too often we follow the faulty operating system of the small self. That’s how we are programmed. We’ve placed the wrong “self” at the center of our life. We live with small self- leadership rather than large Self-leadership. And that, is the realization we must arrive at if we are to transform our life, if we are to shift from person to presence.

We may check on this moment-to-moment by simply asking “Who is in charge right now? Is it my small self or my larger self?” We know the feeling of tenseness and contraction of body, mind, and spirit when the small self is in charge. We also know the feeling of openness, heart, expansiveness, and ease when the larger Self is at the center of our being. Which self is leading us right now? How easily can we switch from the small self to the larger Self?

What is it like to live under the guidance and leadership of our larger Self? Can you remember an experience of openness and flow? Do you remember the wonderment, awe, and curiosity of a child? Can you recall as an adult a moment of flow in nature, intimacy, music, art, dance, or other such moments? All of a sudden, likely unknown to you, in that moment your personal self dropped away, revealing your natural self, your simple moment-to-moment awareness that temporarily becomes the center of your life.

We have learned to falsely trust our small self with its limits and protections. We are accustomed to it driving our life, avoiding dangers, and gathering pleasures. But there will be a time when we recognize that our limited self can never offer us a stable, serene, wise, and fulfilled life. That is when we can correctly identify the problem and apply the appropriate remedy, re-installing our true self at the center of our being. That leads us to meditation, the contemplative life, and Self-leadership.

When our life unfolds from that center, it will be authentic and clear, easeful and peaceful, content and creative, wise and loving. At any moment in life a choice and shift are possible. We transform our life by choosing the central core of our being, shifting from the limited personal self to an expansive and natural presence.

The Decisive Experience

We have all had moments when the tumult of life stops and clear and truthful insights arise from the depth of our being. We call them “aha” experiences. These moments of understanding are neither planned nor organized. They come unexpectedly and spontaneously. They are brief and carry with them a sense of truth, authenticity, and authority. We don’t know how or where they come from. We might not be able to explain these insights to others, but without question we know them to be our truth. They have a clear and decisive impact on our lives.

These spontaneous insights may be about concerns we’ve been struggling to understand or they may offer a glimpse into the great questions of life. Suddenly there is clarity. But what would it be like if we were able to have a decisive experience that fully and permanently resolved the essential questions of every human life – How can we find unchanging happiness and serenity in the midst of human life? What is our essential nature, our authentic unchanging larger self? What is the final truth of reality? There are many ways to ask these basic human questions, but I sense you know what I am aiming at. We all want to know what is the essence of human existence.

Throughout human history these are questions that philosophers, religious scholars, and mystics have sought to answer. Not surprisingly their answers have been much the same. For us their answers are instructive, but not transformative. Intellectual knowledge can inform but cannot shift one’s life towards truth. For that we each need to have a personal “decisive experience” that illuminates, in heart and spirit, the direct knowing of these truths. When it occurs, that experience is a blessing. It is grace.

When it occurs, the actual experience of life’s fundamental truths is spontaneous and unplanned, precisely because it is already and always present within each of us. However, it is densely covered over by our tenacious belief that we are our ego, our personal self. The resulting overactivity of our ego with its ruminations and doings obscures the basic ever present truth of our being.

Although we cannot, through the accumulation of knowledge or through any method or technique gain access to these revelations, we can clean up the “room” of our personal identity. We can clean up our runaway mental chatter, fixed beliefs, rigid habits, and so on – so that we can live a calmer more loving life. That increases the probability of a spontaneous breakthrough and realization, a decisive experience.

If we choose to use meditation as a tool for cleaning up our life and taking us to the near shore of the truth, we must choose carefully. Why, because meditation can be as much an obstacle as an aid. Meditation is generally taught as a technique or method to calm the mind with the aim of relaxation and stress reduction. This approach works within the scope of our ordinary mind to shift, at least temporarily, our mind and body towards greater balance and harmony. But these practices all remain within the context of the ordinary cognitive mind, the personal ego mind. To arrive at the answers to the great questions of life we must access a greater consciousness beyond the limitations of the ordinary mind.

If that is our aim, we begin at the end. We drop all of our notions about what meditation is, let go of methods and techniques, abandon hope, effort, or any goal. We simply drop into being, into presence, into awareness. That, you might say seems quite difficult. What do I do with my active mind? The answer is – nothing.

You simply observe mental activity, abiding in awareness, the witness. It’s OK for the mind to be active. The problem is our identification and attention to it. As we rest our attention in awareness and observing, the mind quiets down by itself. We are engaged in a “non-meditation” merely abiding in our true, simple, innocent, effortless, unconditioned and unfettered awareness.  

And that is who we are and as close as we can come to a decisive experience of our true nature and the source of our life. The rest is grace. We merely leave everything go, cease grasping onto mental movements, and just be and abide in awareness. If you get entangled in mind traffic simply abide again in the witness state of awareness. Do nothing. Just be. Trust the natural unfolding of this sacred space of presence and learn from the experience.

That is how we fertilize the ground, preparing it for the light to open, wisdom to arise, and a decisive experience arise naturally and spontaneously.

Website: www.elliottdacher.org

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