The Infinite Heart
A Journey Into the Teachings of 150 Great
Mystics, Masters, Poets and Saints
WEEK TWO: The Flow of Being: Monday
So can I ask a question about the gaze of the Heart that’s been bugging me all weekend?
Certainly.
I can see how you could do it alone as a practice, and maybe start to get better at seeing people as a living spark of Pure Being. But to actually see someone that way while I’m talking to them, forget it. Sure, I could think it intellectually, but to be able to really feel it, I just can’t imagine it.
It’s no problem that you can’t imagine it, because it can’t be done with your imagination. Only Essence can recognize Essence. Yes, it is very difficult for most of us to really see another, to experience the pure spark that they truly are. In order to see that place we must see from that place. As our own layers begin to thin, or as we stop identifying with them, we begin to experience our own True Nature more deeply, and then experiencing another’s becomes more and more natural.
You know, it’s so damn easy to say all this stuff. That you just have to melt your layers away or stop identifying with them and then you can experience Essence. Just look inside, just shift your awareness, just look with your heart, just let go of your armor, just be still, it’s here all the time, it’s what we really are, and so on and so on. But for me to really experience all that– forget it! I mean, why are you even wasting your time telling me all this? I mean, what the hell’s the point of me having a conceptual understanding of this stuff, however basic, if I’m never going to get there? I’m sure everyone else at your talk that night just walks around in bliss all the time– Maybe you should just focus on them. Maybe I’m not ready to hear this stuff. Maybe I’m never going to get there so why should I even try!
I mean, it’s just suddenly hitting me how frustrating it is that we talk about all this crap and I’m probably never going to really experience it. Maybe a fleeting moment now and then, but hell, that’s just rubbing it in. I’m basically going to be stuck with just concepts of it for the rest of my life! And what the hell’s the point of that?
And I’m sorry– it’s not crap. I just don’t think I’ll ever get anywhere. I at least have the sense to know it has nothing to do with what you believe, what you read, what you conceptually understand. That ain’t it. You can think you understand this stuff in your mind, big deal. It’s what you experience, what you realize, how you live it that matters. So I fail! I flunk! I’m a flunking idiot! I’m stuck just being a caterpillar. I’ll either spend the rest of my life trying in vain to get it, or I’ll resent that I can’t get it so much I’ll just say screw it!
I mean, I know my life is missing something really important, I know I have a lot of defenses, I know I have a closed heart, I know I live in my mind, I know I don’t want to let go of my ego. What you’re talking about sounds so appealing– at least, up to that part about being annihilated. It sort of takes a turn down hill at that point. But I mean, to let go of all the tension, all the stress, all the fears, all the judging, all the trying to be liked and accepted and so on and so on, and to just be content and at peace and full of joy and love– to start with all that instead of always trying to get it or else trying to hide the need for it– who the hell wouldn’t want that? But let’s be honest. For me it’s just a fricking fairy tale. That’s all it will ever be. You say that I am Essence and I still can’t find it! How hard can it be to find if it’s what I am? If it’s all there is? Too damn hard for me, apparently. You like quotes– Here’s one for you: “Ignorance is bliss.” I mean, what’s the point of helping people realize what they’re missing if they’re never going to have it? You show some starving person a piece of bread and they say, “Yeah, that’s what I’ve been longing for, that’s what I need!” Then you walk away with it saying, “Yeah, well good luck finding another one!” It’s like you’re starting to uncover this deep need in me that will probably never be fulfilled. Well thanks for crashing my party!
And you keep saying that only Essence can experience Essence. That structure can’t experience Structurelessness. And then you say that what we think we are is just a shell. Just structure. Then how the hell am I supposed to get there? The only part of me that can experience it is the part of me that’s already it, and the rest of me, forget it! And since all I think I am is the rest of me, it’s pretty damn hopeless, isn’t it? I mean, the part of me that wants Essence can never have it. This “I” that I think I am can never experience Essence. Who I think I am can never be Self realized. Only the Self can realize the Self, right? So I can never become awakened! Does that make sense? Whatever the hell I really am is already enlightened, whatever that means, and the rest of me never will be! Can that be right? If only Essence can experience Essence, then the me that doesn’t experience Essence, which is the only me I’m aware of, will never experience it, because that me isn’t Essence, it’s structure. So who I think I am can never have Essence! I can never be Self realized! Help me out here! What am I missing? This doesn’t look good!
Ahh, you have brought us to the great paradox.
So bring us out of it! Quickly!
We pretend to be the shell, we think that we’re the creature, but truly we’re the Pearl, on a great adventure. We try to mold the shell into a precious stone, while in the center rests the Pearl, our pure and perfect Home.
That’s beautiful, really, but GET ME OUT of this mess!
Let’s start by looking into this predicament a bit more, and then we can see whether or not there is a way out of it. Do you want to take a moment to get more centered, or are you ready to continue?
I was born ready. But then the doctor dropped me. My parents filed a big law suit, but the hospital won. They said I should’ve had a warning label: “Slippery when wet.” Maybe we should’ve hired an attorney. Anyway, let’s get to it.
So, you are absolutely correct.
Yeah, but they’re so damn expensive.
About the predicament.
I am? You’re supposed to tell me it’s not that hopeless!
You are struggling with what may be the most important and difficult to grasp truth of awakening: That which you think you are can never attain enlightenment or Self realization. Ever. It can never know Home. And that which you truly are can never be other than enlightened. Other than Home. And yet, every spiritual seeker has tried again and again to become Essence. They have heard radiant pearls exist. They may have even encountered one. Or they may even have had fleeting moments in which they experienced themselves to be one. And they have been told that they can learn to permanently turn themselves into one if they work at it. So they try to transmute the finite shell they believe they are into a brilliant, infinite pearl. But they can never succeed. The finite cannot become the Infinite. The temporary cannot become the Permanent. The shell cannot turn itself into the Pure Pearl. The dragon skin cannot become an innocent child. The board game piece can never become a person. A preposterous idea, isn’t it? And yet, in an instant, the player of the game can realize the True Self they always were.
The great paradox. Your personality, your identity, your ego, your mind, which is comprised of structure, can never become enlightened. That which you believe yourself to be has no possibility of Self realization. None at all. And yet, it is possible to become Self realized, to intimately, directly and unceasingly KNOW yourself to be the True Nature you have always been. This creates a very difficult and frustrating situation for those who seek Self realization.
Yeah, I noticed.
Some of us spend our lives trying to reach Self realization when it cannot be reached! Ramana Maharshi said “You speak of various paths as if you were somewhere and the Self were somewhere else and you had to go and attain it. But in fact the Self is here and now and you are it always.” This has been realized again and again, throughout the centuries. Confucius: “To find the Tao, there is nowhere you need to search. If it is not inside you, it is not the Tao.” The Buddha: “Please don’t think when I attained enlightenment there was anything I attained.” The thirteenth century Zen master, Dogen: “Truth is not far away. It is nearer than near. There is no need to attain it, since not one of your steps leads away from it.” Ibn Arabi: “Nothing but the Reality is; there is no separate being, no arriving and no being far away.” The early twentieth century sage, Krishnamurti: “The real is near. You do not have to search for it.” Huang Po: “That there is nothing to be attained is not idle talk; it is the truth.” And remember Shankara: “As Brahman constitutes a person’s Self, it is not something to be attained by that person.”
But no matter how many times we may hear this, we know we don’t experience it to be true. We know we don’t experience ourselves as the Pure Self. We know we usually feel very far from our True Home. We know there is something missing. We long for Essence, and we refuse to just give up. What else can we do but keep trying, keep searching? Perhaps we have moments, blissful or clear or astounding moments, of experiencing Essence. But then they fade away, and we are again left searching for that which we long for. But Essence cannot be found anywhere that can be searched.
One more time?
Essence cannot be found anywhere that can be searched. The very words “searching” and “seeking” require an object, an other, that is sought. The only way to search is to search for something other. But Essence is not other. It is All. It is Oneness. It is Pure Otherlessness. Seng-ts’an wrote “In the world of things as they are, there is no self, no non-self. If you want to describe its essence, the best you can say is ‘Not-two’. In this Not-two, nothing is separate, and nothing in the world is excluded… In it there is no gain or loss; one instant is ten thousand years. There is no here, no there; infinity is right before your eyes.” The very act of searching for something limits our search to the realm of duality. Oneness cannot be found in that realm. And so, Yung-chia Ta-shih tells us, “So long as you seek Buddhahood, specifically exercising yourself for it, there is no attainment for you.” And Yazid al-Bistami says, “This thing we tell of can never be found by seeking, yet only seekers find it.” So what’s a spiritual seeker to do?
Run like hell.
At times that’s a tempting option. It cannot be found by searching for it. That which we believe ourselves to be can never discover it. We consider this for a few minutes and find ourselves hopelessly, completely lost. The mind says, “What can I do? Surely there must be something I can do. It certainly won’t happen if I don’t do anything! Millions of people don’t do anything and it isn’t happening to them!” And so, at a loss, the mind goes back to trying to find it and trying to become it, the wind circling the hurricane, trying to become the eye.
What do you mean?
No matter how much effort the wind puts into trying to blow the right way, it can never become the eye. It can never even find it. No matter how fast or how hard or how diligently the wind blows around in its circle, the eye is nowhere to be found. But where else can the wind possibly look? Its search is limited by the boundaries of where it can exist. Wind cannot enter the still and silent center. It cannot exist there. So all of its effort goes into searching in the circumference, where the eye can never be found. What else can it do?
Then what do we do? What’s the solution?
As long as it’s the mind asking what it can do, there is no solution. There’s nothing the finite can do to discover the Infinite. The temporal cannot know the Eternal. There is nothing the small self can do to know the Center of the soul. The eighteenth century Christian mystic, William Law, wrote “Though God is everywhere present, yet He is only present to thee in the deepest and most central part of thy soul. The natural senses cannot possess God or unite thee to Him; nay, thy inward faculties of understanding, will and memory can only reach after God, but cannot be the place of His habitation in thee.” And in the early seventeenth century, the German shoemaker and mystic, Jakob Boehme, wrote–
–I bet he saved a lot of soles.
And he heeled a lot of people. He wrote, “But how shall I comprehend it? If thou goest about to comprehend it, then it will fly away from thee, but if thou dost surrender thyself wholly up to it, then it will abide with thee, and become the Life of thy Life and be natural to thee.”
So whateth is the wayeth outeth?
Since our structured minds can’t do anything to get out of the situation, maybe a better question is: How can we become aware of the part of us that is always Structurelessness? Or, more accurately, how can we become aware of what we really are?
So what the hell’s the answer?
To answer that, we need to start with looking more into what our True Nature really is.
Great. I’d love it if you would keep stalling as long as possible.
* * * * * *
Now it bears repeating that Essence is inconceivable. It can’t be grasped. We can still use concepts to help us try to get a sense of it, but we must remember that they cannot fully succeed. So let’s use our intellects some to expand our conceptual understanding of what our Essence is, and then we’ll look at how we can realize it as what we truly are. This may get a bit difficult for the mind, but I think you’ll find it worth while. We’re getting to the heart of what Self realization and True Surrender are really about.
I’m all ears. At least, that’s what they used to tell me in kindergarten. The teacher was always supportive though. “Children, stop making fun of Dumbo.” Anyway, go ahead.
So, one of the ways of conceptualizing Essence is as Pure Awareness. Plotinus wrote “We ought not to class the One as a ‘Thinking being’ but, rather, simply as ‘awareness’, for awareness does not think.” Essence is pure, nondual Awareness, without a subject or object. It’s not aware of any thing, nor is it unaware of any thing. In the pristine realm of Pure Awareness, there are no objects for it to be aware or unaware of. There is only the nondual no-thing-ness of Pure Awareness itself. We can’t even say it is aware of itself. That would still require two-ness. It would require an object of its awareness even if that object is itself. Pure Awareness is not some thing that it can be aware of. It is simply Pure Consciousness without an object. An endless beam of light cannot shine on itself. And if it is all there is, it cannot shine on anything else. It can only shine. We can imagine our True Nature to be a shining beam of Pure Awareness.
Well, I think my batteries might be running low.
The Eternal Sun can never run out of Pure Energy.
It keeps going and going and going.
The eighth century Buddhist monk, Padma-Shambhava, wrote “In its true state, mind is naked, immaculate, transparent, empty, timeless, uncreated, unimpeded; not realizable as a separate thing, but as the unity of all things, yet not composed of them; undifferentiated, self-radiant, indivisible, and without qualities.” The mind he is speaking of is Pure Awareness itself, without duality, without other, without any qualities at all. Shankara said “The Atman is one, absolute, indivisible. It is pure consciousness. To imagine many forms within it is like imagining palaces in the air. Therefore, know that you are the Atman, ever blissful, one without a second, and find the ultimate peace.”
This nondual Pure Awareness is all that is. We can’t even say that there are separate realms of duality that are outside of its nonduality. Pure Awareness is all encompassing. Nothing is beyond it, nothing is excluded from it, nothing is other than it, and nothing is separate from it. While we experience ourselves and this level of reality to be in the realm of duality, separate from Essence, from the vantage of Essence it’s clear there is only One. There is only Essence.
That’s hard to picture. It sounds like from our end of things there’s duality, but from the other end there’s not.
Exactly. Imagine a laser show, in which different colors and shapes and patterns and forms are displayed. They appear and disappear and perhaps even seem to interact. Entire stories can be experienced. Different patterns and energy frequencies create a very convincing experience of duality and form. Yet from the view point of the laser beam, it’s clear there is only itself. All of those forms and patterns which seem so real are not other than the pure light itself.
Similarly, waves may experience themselves to be separate from the ocean and from other waves. But this does not make it so. The ocean is always one, seamless, indivisible. Essence is an infinite ocean of Pure Awareness. A wave is just oceanness that has narrowed the focus of its awareness to one particular crest of flowing ocean and to its surroundings. When the wave sinks its awareness down deeply enough into itself, it sees that in truth, there is no other. There is no separation. Its True Nature is infinitely more vast than it had ever imagined. In that realization, it loses its identity of being just a wave, but it does not, it cannot lose anything that was truly its Self. Only the temporary can be annihilated.
Gee, that’s comforting to my temporary little mind.
Now let’s return to the laser show, and stretch our imaginations by supposing that the laser light has awareness. Imagine that one of the shapes being created is the figure of a star. If that beam of light making the form of a star has awareness, we can imagine that it might focus its awareness on the star so much that it begins to identify that form as what it is. Rather than experiencing itself as a pure, aware beam of light, it now thinks of itself as the star. All of its awareness is focusing towards the direction of this world of forms and patterns it’s creating. So it’s no longer aware of the existence of the light that it truly is.
Now, if this figure of a star were told it’s really a beam of light, it might feel a subtle remembrance deep within of that being true. And then it might try to find this light it really is. It might look around the world of form, both inside and outside the star. But it cannot see this beam of light anywhere! It then might try to somehow transform the star it thinks it is into a beam of light. But that form of a star, that is actually being created by the light, can never become the beam of light. From the perspective of the light it isn’t even real as a separate thing. Are you following me so far?
Right up until that part where you started talking. I mean, like you said, the mind can’t get it. How in the hell can Essence be nondual, and still include within its nonduality everything in the world of duality? It’s like duality is really nondual, which is probably dangerous to think about without medical supervision.
It is impossible to grasp. We clearly experience duality. But since all is Essence, nothing is other. So from this perspective, there is only Essence itself. Nothing is excluded. Nothing is separate. Nothing is other. All is One. The eighth century Tibetan Buddhist nun, Yeshe Tsogyel, wrote “We are not two, yet you look for me outside. When you find me within yourself, your own naked mind, that Single Awareness will fill all worlds. Then the joy of the One will hold you like a lake.”
So, if that beam of light that thinks it is just a two dimensional star can simply let its attention effortlessly sink back into its awareness itself, rather than constantly directing it towards objects in the world of form, then it can experience directly what it truly is. If it can stop trying to be aware of anything, and even stop trying to be aware of the light, and if it can just rest its attention in awareness itself, its awareness can return back into the pure beam of awareness it has always been. Whereas before, its awareness was narrowed to focus only on the world of form, and seemed to be stationed there, now awareness can be experienced as the entire beam of light. And in that moment, the star would clearly be seen as just a form, a figure, a structured pattern, dependent on the light for its existence, and truly not separate from it. And the beam of light would be seen to be much more real, much more substantial, much more vibrant, and much more vast than anything in this created and temporary world of form.
An enlightened laser beam.
And this awakened beam of light might then look around to all the other forms created by the light. When it believed it was a star form it also believed the other shapes and figures it saw were what they appeared to be. Now it sees very clearly that the entire realm of patterns and forms it had taken as true reality is actually created by the light, and not fundamentally other than that light. It sees that its world of form is two dimensional and insubstantial of itself.
Because now it sees this whole new dimension of being. Like when you talked about seeing through the surface of the ocean into the depths.
Right. So, perhaps this self realized beam of light is filled with compassion for these other beams of light that experience themselves to be so much less than what they are. Because their attention is directed towards the realm of form, the realm of duality, they are completely unaware of pure light. So this newly awakened beam of light uses the form of its star to communicate with the others. It says, “Can’t you see? You aren’t really this form you think you are. You are a beam of pure light!” Most laugh at it. But some search for this supposed light, by focusing their attention even harder in the direction of other, the direction of form, for that is the only direction they know how to look. And they find no light.
Maybe there have even been religions developed in this world of laser forms, around the lives and words of those forms that have glimpsed this light in the past. These religions worship the light as something above and beyond and separate from the world of forms. Then these beings hear a star form saying, “I am not a star. I am the Light itself!” and “There is no one here but the Light!” What blasphemy! What delusion! What danger! It must be stopped! Before others become infected. Yet from the perspective of this newly awakened star form, it is only speaking the truth. Not with the slightest pride or arrogance or self delusion. But with complete humility. For to realize that the light is all is to fully let yourself see that the form is nothing. This form you have spent your life protecting and defending and living for and making plans for is completely empty and absent of value as itself.
Wait a second. You’re saying that we’re all completely worthless?
This world of forms is beautiful and precious. But since this is all we see, our entire spectrum of value, from that which we value most to that which we value least, is based only on this world of form. When children dress up in costumes and play pretend all afternoon, their dolls and their dinnerware have great value. It all really matters. But as soon as their mother or father walks in the door from a long trip, they instantly change their value spectrum. Suddenly those things that seemed so important are not. For now they are faced with that which really matters in the depths of their hearts. Before them is that for which they would gladly give up all of their dolls and silverware and costumes. For they realize that, in comparison, they would really be giving up nothing at all.
* * * * * *
So, if you have been identified with the form of a star created by a beam of light, once you see things clearly, it is this pure light that is of supreme value. This star becomes an empty shell. You no longer occupy it. You relax your awareness back into what it always has truly been. And then the “I” that you were is gone. It is dead. It is no longer here. All of the structures that were within that star may remain. But the identifying with the sum total of all of those patterns as “me” is finished. Your awareness is finally resting again in pure awareness. The “I” that you now experience yourself to be is Pure Light. Absolute Selflessness. Absolute Structurelessness. Free-flowing, Unhinderable Radiance. And you cannot help but exclaim, “The old me is dead! Now, I am one with the Light. I know it’s hard to believe, but this Light is real! Even more real than this world of form! Please, let me show you the way to our True Home.” Many in our world have been killed for simply speaking this truth. Including several of those I have been quoting. But in that death they lost nothing. They had already let go of all that could die within them, long before.
But there are some deluded people out there that really think they are the Light or God or God’s Chosen One or whatever, and you can tell they’re way off. And sometimes they have just enough of something inside them that people believe it and follow them and things usually get pretty ugly from there.
When you try to turn the small self into God, when you try to make the ego divine, that is blasphemy. That is having another treasure greater than God. That is being your own Beloved. Bowing down to yourself. But when you let all that you thought you were fall away, so that Pure Being can use the structures of your body and mind and personality as vehicles to be in this world, while the living center of consciousness that is all that survived the shedding of your false skins simply rests in the Heart of God, then to say, as did Yazid al-Bistami, “There is nothing under my robe but He.” is not blasphemy or distortion or arrogance but it is the simple Truth.
It just sounds like blasphemy and distortion and arrogance.
Yes, when it is a closed mind that hears and analyzes the words. But when we listen with the Innocent Heart, we can sense whether it feels like distortion or like Nectar, arising and spreading outward from a True Place. The twelfth century Indian poet and mystic, Mahadeviyakka, said “When the body becomes Your mirror, how can it serve? When the mind becomes Your mind, what is left to remember? Once my life is Your gesture, how can I pray? When all my awareness is Yours, what can there be to know? I became You, Lord, and then forgot You.” The mind might hear arrogance. But the Inner Heart hears utter and uncompromising humility. Such complete humility that there is nothing of the old remaining. And then Living Newness can continuously flow. Lalla said “The soul, like the moon, is new, and always new again. And I have seen the ocean continuously creating. Since I scoured my mind and my body, I too, Lalla am new, each moment new.” Ahh, such beauty!
But that’s just so far from anything most of us can relate to. It’s pretty damn hard to believe. And sometimes it’s hard to tell if someone is really really awake or really really screwed up.
Yes, it can be. And as you said, many have been hurt by following someone who turned out to have serious distortions.
So how do you know? I mean, some people have really “known” they found the real thing and turned out to be wrong, and I’m sure others have stumbled upon someone who was actually the real thing and they didn’t realize it.
This is getting ahead of ourselves a bit, but the beautiful thing about true surrender is that it is infallible. Even though you and a teacher are not.
Meaning?
True surrender is a falling inward towards Pure Being. An unconditional free fall. It isn’t grasping onto the form of a teacher or to the form of their teachings. It is complete Graspinglessness. A true teacher is one that lives that Graspinglessness. One that is always in a continuous free fall. This does not mean their mental structures are necessarily completely free of distortion. The body is imperfect, the mind is imperfect, all form is imperfect. In a very beautiful, perfect way. The imperfections of form help us remember not to confuse the shadows we can touch with the Pure Sun we cannot.
So, when you encounter someone who emanates a flow of Surrenderingness that helps that same way of being begin to arise within yourself, it may feel true to spend time with them, to open your heart to them, to love their True Nature, and to surrender to the Pure Being that flows from the Center of their being. But this does not mean you are surrendering to their personality or their mind, their words or their actions. You are not surrendering to any structures, but to Structurelessness itself. There is no requirement that form be a certain way for that to happen within you. The teacher’s psychological structures do not have to become completely distortion free in order for you to recognize and resonate with the flow of Surrenderingness you sense in their presence.
I guess that makes sense.
So, the only way the distortions of a teacher can interfere with your own surrendering is if instead of truly letting go of everything, you are just subtly redirecting your graspingness to the teacher, holding on to their words and teachings and personality as much as you had been holding onto everything else.
So basically, you’re saying the only way a teacher can drag you through the mud is if you’re holding on to their legs.
Well put. You hold on for dear life and then you become indignant and outraged at what they have dragged you through. So in spite of a teacher’s distortions, they may still be a wonderful, invaluable guide in showing you how to completely rest in what is. It is their way of being that is worth following. Not their way of doing or thinking or living. All of that has to do with how their particular form manifests in this world. It isn’t worth surrendering to or following or emulating or revering. And it isn’t worth fighting or pushing away or defending against. It’s all structure. But their way of resting in what is, surrendering to this moment without the slightest resistance– if you feel that kind of continuous, unconditional letting go within them, and feel stirrings of it within yourself in their presence, then that is really worth falling into. Without grasping onto anything, not even them, as you free fall into the way of Pure Living Softness.
Did you ever follow a teacher? Or maybe I should ask, did you ever follow the way of being you sensed in a teacher?
Yes. There have been those whose surrender was so much deeper than mine that to be in their presence was a profound catalyst. They effortlessly saw me and all the world with the gaze of the Heart, and reminded me what was most Real within. And like many others, at first I grasped on to their forms, and even got dragged through the mud a few times. But gradually I realized that as long as my own willingness to surrender to the Infinite Heart of the Divine was dependent on the words and actions of others fitting in with my own expectations, it wasn’t real, unconditional surrender. I had been focusing on judging other people’s degree of surrender as a way to avoid my own.
Sounds like it worked for a while too. I’ll keep it in mind as a back up plan.
I have yet to meet a mind that left me convinced it was completely free of distortion. But I have met such beautiful, tender, overflowing hearts, that have let themselves be completely shattered open until not even the slightest separation between their heart and the One Heart remained. To be in the presence of such a heart is to stumble upon an oasis after a long desert journey. An oasis that may seem small and inconsequential at first. Easy to overlook. Easy to mistake for a mirage. Perhaps not even worth the trouble of stopping. But once you let yourself rest in its rejuvenating shade and drink from its vibrant spring, you may discover hidden within it a great river, that can effortlessly return you to the Endless Sea, if you will only let yourself be carried by its flow.
* * * * * *
All right. Let’s get back to our laser analogy. The star was trying to show all the other laser forms the truth about what they really were. Some of these laser-created forms felt the truth of what this star was saying, but they couldn’t find this light no matter where they looked. If only they would have stopped all their searching, and just allowed their awareness to fall back into itself, then they would’ve directly perceived that their true nature is that pure beam of awareness, and not the form it was identified with.
But those forms are actually created by the light itself. They are part of it.
Right. In the realm of form the experience of duality is very, very real. But from the perspective of the Light, form has no separate substance. Form is not other than Light itself. Remember Emerson: “From within or from behind a light shines through us upon things and makes us aware that we are nothing, but the light is all.”
I just hope the bulb never burns out.
This Eternal Light of Awareness is our True Nature. We are Pure Awareness itself. Padma-Shambhava wrote “The self originated clear light is eternal and unborn… Although the clear light of reality shines inside their own mind, most people look for it outside.” And Huang Po: “The pure mind, which is the source of all things, shines forever with the radiance of its own perfection. But most people are not aware of it… Blinded by their own sight, hearing, feeling, and knowing, they don’t perceive the radiance of the source… Above, below, and around you, all things spontaneously exist, because there is nowhere outside the Buddha mind.”
And the pure mind or Buddha mind is like the same thing as Pure Awareness?
Right.
Why do they call it “mind”?
The Chinese character for “mind” also means “spirit” or “soul”. It’s usually translated into English as “mind”, but this doesn’t really convey the depth of what is usually being expressed. The word “soul” is much closer. Maybe the closest translation, although it’s a little awkward, would be “pure soul consciousness”. That living, eternal awareness within ourselves is already one with Pure Awareness. Hui Hai wrote “Don’t search for the truth within your intellect. Don’t search at all. The nature of the mind is intrinsically pure.”
So, our True Nature is Pure Awareness, Awareness without an object. But we usually only experience our awareness in relation to some other. It is usually limited to being aware of thoughts, feelings and perceptions within the realm of form. So we don’t realize what we are. And we spend years searching for Essence. We’re told to look within ourselves, so we look and we look. But as long as our awareness is searching for something, it is searching for some other, limiting it to the realm of duality, where Pure Essence cannot be found. If Essence cannot be found in any object, in any other that our awareness can focus on, even if that other is somewhere deep within ourselves, then Essence must not be other than our awareness itself. Do you follow?
Not even slightly.
If Essence can never be experienced in duality, it cannot be experienced as other. So the only way we could possibly experience it is if it’s true that it’s not separate from that which experiences it. If it were separate, we would never be able to experience it, for it would be something other. And Essence is never other. So our awareness cannot be separate from Essence. The awareness that is searching for Essence is Pure Awareness itself! Or, as the thirteenth century monk, Saint Francis of Assisi put it, “What you are looking for is what is looking.”
Wow. I either just had a brief flash of profound understanding or a mild stroke. I’ll let you know how the MRI turns out. So go ahead.
In the Bhagavad Gita, the deity Krishna, one facet of the infinite diamond of Pure Being, tells the warrior Arjuna, “Creatures rise, creatures vanish; I alone am real, Arjuna, looking out, amused, from deep within the eyes of every creature… I am the Self, Arjuna, seated in the heart of every creature. I am the origin, the middle, and the end that all must come to… I am always with all beings; I abandon no one. And however great your inner darkness, you are never separate from me. Let your thoughts flow past you, calmly, keep me near at every moment; trust me with your life, because I am you, more than you yourself are.”
It’s us even more than we are! It is the very Center of the soul! Yet we search and search and search for it! Thomas Aquinas wrote “Great is the blindness and exceeding the folly of many souls that are ever seeking God, continually sighing after God, and frequently desiring God; whilst all the time, they are themselves the tabernacles of the living God since their soul is the seat of God in which he continually reposes.” And the eighteenth century Japanese Zen master, Hakuin, wrote “Not knowing how near the Truth is, people seek It far away,– what a pity! They are like one who, in the midst of water, cries imploringly for a drink of water.” And very similarly, Ramana said “When you pray for God’s grace, you are like someone standing neck-deep in water and yet crying for water. It is like saying that someone neck-deep in water feels thirsty, or that a fish in water feels thirsty, or that water feels thirsty.”
Maybe sometimes salt water feels thirsty. Or not.
We’re told it’s right here, so we immediately start looking for it. “They say it’s right here. Where could it be?” It is closer than here. It is before looking. Listen to Ramana again: “There is no greater mystery than this, that we keep seeking reality though in fact we are reality. We think that there is something hiding reality and that this must be destroyed before reality is gained. How ridiculous! A day will dawn when you will laugh at all your past efforts. That which will be on that day you laugh is also here and now.”
And just where is it again?
Pure Awareness is closer than our thoughts, closer than our hearts, closer than our breath. Rumi said “When you seek Him, look for Him in your looking. Closer to you than yourself to yourself.” And Saint Augustine agreed: “It is closer to us than our most inward part.” Hugh of Saint Victor wrote “…In spiritual matters, when something is called ‘the highest’, this doesn’t mean that it is located above the top of the heavens, but rather that it is the inmost or most intimate of all.”
It’s so intimate that it’s closer to us than we are! It’s much too close to be found by searching. The moment you start looking for it, you’ve already missed it! It’s like using your flashlight to look around in the dark for your flashlight. Or like driving around in your car, looking all over town for your car. You won’t see it out your window, no matter where you drive.
I remember once I looked all over my house for my glasses, and then suddenly I realized– I don’t wear glasses. And I don’t have a house. I used to, until Pyro-kitty burned it down Friday. My new fire extinguisher was in that garage! Its warranty is probably void too, since I didn’t keep it away from high temperatures. Sorry. I was just distracting my conscious mind for a minute so that what you said could really sink in unconsciously. Go ahead.
Pure Awareness is closer than close. Even closer than looking for your glasses when you are already wearing them. Even closer than looking for your contacts when you’re wearing them. It’s like using your eyes to try to find your eyes. But so much closer than that. It is your Ray of Pure Awareness looking for Pure Awareness. It doesn’t realize it already is what it is looking for. And the moment it starts looking, it has already gone too far. That we can never find it by searching is actually very good news.
You lost me.
Any direction we look is the wrong direction. We have been putting incredible effort into approaches that cannot give us what we want. When this is deeply realized, it’s a wonderful relief! It frees us from a great burden. We feel freer and lighter. We can stop being the wind trying to find the eye. We can stop feeling that if only we would search hard enough, or long enough, or in the right place or for the right thing, we would find it. We can never find it by searching. And so, we can finally stop the search!
But we have to do something. What can we do?
Nothing at all.
Then we’re right back where we started! There has to be something we can do!
Pure Awareness doesn’t try to do. It simply is. It is Beingness itself. Effortless Flowingness. Any effortful doing is done by the ego, the small self, the personality, the mind. And there is nothing it can do to finally unveil what you really are. Any doing adds another layer to the veil, another distraction, something else for awareness to focus on. The circling wind can do nothing to expose the eye. All the wind can do is blow. And the eye doesn’t try to do anything. It can only be. It is Stillness itself. So nothing can be done. There is nothing, nothing you can do to become Self realized. There is, however, much you can stop doing.
Okay, now we’re getting somewhere. As long as there’s some way to make it happen.
You can’t make it happen.
I mean as long as you can get there.
But you can’t get there.
You know what I mean! As long as there’s something you can do!
I’ll say it again. There’s nothing you can do. Any doing is done by the mind, by your identity, by what you believe you are. Form cannot know the Formless. So no doing by form can result in the effortless, permanent, intimate knowing of the Formless.
Structure can never touch Pure Structurelessness. Your mind can do anything and everything and it won’t cause awareness to re-member itself. No matter which square the board game piece gets to, it doesn’t make the person playing the game remember who they are. There is nothing our mind, our small self can do. And our True Nature doesn’t do, it IS. Pure Essence is Pure Nondoingness. The Silent Center. The Still Point of Existence. So nothing can be done. Nothing at all. But you can take your hands off of all the patterns happening in this moment. Fully letting them be, while you simply let go of your grip and rest in Letting-go-ness. It’s just an inner stopping. A resting. An inner stillness. “Be still, and know that I am God.”
“Stop, in the name of love.” Okay, so what all do we have to stop doing? I hope we don’t have to make a lot of sacrifices. I gave up sacrifice for Lent.
Becoming aware of Pure Awareness has nothing to do with what the body is doing, although it can be much easier at first if the body is still and quiet. It has nothing to do with what thoughts the mind is pumping out, although it can be much easier at first if the mind is still and quiet. Our surface patterns and issues and defenses can be as strong as ever, and it doesn’t matter. They don’t have to change first. They are all structures. They are completely free to be as they are.
Then what do you stop?
Our awareness constantly, habitually and effortfully grasps onto and identifies with other. With the world of form. It becomes so entangled with our minds and bodies, our thoughts and feelings, that it comes to believe they are the sum total of what it is. We usually attach our awareness to our thoughts so strongly that we aren’t even aware of consciousness as a Living Flow that is separate from thought.
“I think therefore I am.”
Exactly. One of the main reasons the mind incessantly generates thoughts is because we so strongly equate thinking with the survival of our awareness, and we equate the silent spaciousness that arises when our mind is quiet with annihilation. For the mind, “I think so that I am.” But Pure Awareness is simply “I am that I am.” Isness without other. Without conditions or requirements. Eckhart said “As long as I am this or that, or have this or that, I am not all things and I have not all things.”
Which I guess means as long as we’re grabbing onto something, anything, it keeps us from kind of relaxing and expanding into Pure Awareness, where somehow we’re one with everything.
Exactly. And it’s not the objects of our awareness that are the problem. Not even our thoughts are the problem. Krishna told Arjuna to “Let your thoughts flow past you.” They don’t have to be stopped.
We just have to stop grabbing them and identifying with them.
Right.
So how do we do that?
* * * * * *
We’ve spent our entire lives attaching our awareness to thoughts and feelings and sensations and objects. Doing this takes constant effort. But since it’s so automatic and ingrained, we’re unaware of it. So to stop grasping onto the world of form takes no effort at all. It is simply stopping the effort that we have constantly been making. There is nothing we can do to stop. We can only cease. We can only discontinue the efforting. We can stop pushing away the ever-present inner-knowing that all our grasping is a lie, and then simply let it all go.
But that’s still a kind of doing.
It is the exact opposite of doing. There are two ways of stopping something. Active and passive. Through additional effort, and through ceasing all effort. When you approach a red light, you stop actively, by stepping on the brake.
You’re supposed to step on the brake? That explains a lot.
Most stopping in our lives is active, and that is the easiest for the mind to comprehend. It still gets to do something to stop. But with passive stopping, nothing can be done. Not the slightest effort can be made. So the mind cannot do it. There is only a passive, effortless allowing of effort to cease. A surrendering. A releasing. A deep resting within in which the heart stops putting effort into trying to control all the patterns of our mind.
What do you mean?
Our heart is like a shepherd that has spent years trying to control the movement of every last sheep. And then we finally take a deep breath of cool evening air, lie down on the grass, and let the sheep do as they will. At first, they may be filled with excitement that they are free. They may run around, seeing how far they can go. But sooner or later, they grow tired and find they prefer to just follow the example of their shepherd. They come back to where you are resting, and lay down around you.
You know, the other day I saw this guy trying to walk five or six dogs at once. He had leashes on all of them, and they were pulling him all over the place.
A perfect analogy. Letting ourselves stop inside is like letting go of the thousands of leashes we hold. We don’t have to let go of them one at a time, working with and understanding each one. We just gently say “Enough”, and let go of our grasp. Then they all fall free effortlessly on their own. And for a time, all our patterns may run around with the new energy of freedom. And we may be tempted to grab the leashes again, to stay in control of the situation. But when we let ourselves just rest in that letting go, even when our patterns seem to be going crazy, sooner or later they all come back and lie down at our feet.
This letting go isn’t something we can do. Wanting it to happen and trying to make it happen are just more patterns trying to do stopping. But we can just gently and effortlessly let it happen within. We can stop our continuous resisting of it.
You know, that sounds a lot like biofeedback. When I was in college, we studied it in one of my psychology classes. We experimented with a finger temperature monitor and with an EMG monitor that gauged muscle tension. The idea with the temperature monitor was to try to make your hands get warmer, which means your blood vessels have to dilate, and that happens more when you’re relaxed. So the first few tries we were all watching the monitors, trying to make our temperature go up, and it always ended up going down. The harder we tried to make it happen, the more tense we got. We couldn’t figure out how to do it. We tried everything. But finally you start to relax into it, kind of like seeing those Magic Eye 3D posters.
3D posters?
You haven’t seen those? They’re really cool. They look like they’re just random designs, but if you look at them long enough, a 3D image shows up. When they first came out, I would stare at them forever but I could never see the damn image. I even wondered if it was all a big hoax. Maybe the joke was that there wasn’t an image, and once you figured out what a fool you were for staring at it so long, you just played along so you could laugh at all the others standing there. But finally one time when I was staring at one, I just relaxed into it and I finally saw it. It just happened. And then the next time it still took a while but it was easier than the first time. Now when I look at one I can usually see the image pretty quickly. It takes a whole different way of perceiving. And you aren’t even sure what you’re doing differently. You aren’t really doing anything. You’re just relaxing and it happens by itself.
Yes, it is something like that. I’d like to see one of these 3D posters sometime.
You should. You can find them online, and also at some poster shops. Anyway, back to the biofeedback, after you’ve been at it for a while, you aren’t really sure how or why, but you start to notice the temperature is going up. Then you get excited and say “I’m doing it!”, and it nose dives. But you stay with it, and after some practice you can just sort of allow your hands to get warm anytime you want, and you feel yourself getting more relaxed. You never have a clue how it happens, but you still learn– Well, I was going to say you still learn to do it, but the truth is you don’t do anything. You just sort of let it happen. Somehow you affect your blood vessels in a way that lets them dilate, but you can’t do it by effort. The only way they react to any effort is to get more constricted.
Yes, exactly. Another excellent metaphor.
And the EMG is the same way. It measures muscle tension, and you hook it up to your forehead or jaw or wherever, and try to make your muscles relax. But you can’t use effort to relax muscles. The only way the muscle can react to effort is by increasing tension, increasing the energy there waiting to be used. So after a lot of frustration you finally learn to stop trying. To just sort of, I don’t know, just allow. And then it happens by itself. There’s nothing you can do to make it happen. But eventually you just let go of all the effort, even effort you didn’t know was there that was making the muscles chronically tense, and it happens on its own. You really can’t do anything to make it happen. But you can learn to allow yourself to stop doing whatever you were doing that kept it from happening. Then it happens by itself. It just flows.
Wonderful. Yes, it’s exactly like that. You try and try to make your awareness let go of all those things it is grabbing on to, most of which you aren’t even conscious of. And you never make progress. Trying to force yourself to change so that you can be the way you are attached to being actually keeps you limited to the exact way of being you are trying to get rid of.
Say that again?
Trying to let go of our attachments in order to make ourselves become what we are attached to becoming- that actually ensures that we remain limited to the way of being we are trying to get rid of.
The fourteenth century Indian Swami, Vidyaranya, wrote “How shall I grasp it? Do not grasp it. That which remains when there is no more grasping is the Self.” That says it about as simply and accurately as it can be said. For awareness to be still, it is not required that all mental and physical objects that attract awareness be still. But all following, all grasping, all holding, all identifying, all entanglement by awareness must stop. Not by doing. Not by taking action. Not stopping as a verb. This stopping is the stopping of all action, of all verbs, of all effort. It is inner actionlessness. Verblessness. Effortlessness. Seng-t’san wrote “Be serene in the oneness of things and dualism vanishes of itself. When you strive to gain quiescence by stopping motion, the quiescence so gained is ever in motion. So long as you tarry in such dualism, How can you realize oneness?”
So, no tarrying. Helpful enlightenment tip. You know, this may not make any sense, but I’m getting this image of a spaceship with thrusters all around it. And different ones are going off sporadically all the time, so that the spaceship is kind of just hurling through space. It’s like that’s our mind and the thrusters are all the bursts of effort of various kinds that are constantly going on in it. And when we hear people say, “Just stop and be still”, then what we try to do is stop the spaceship, to make it be completely still, by countering all the thrusters that are going off with thrusters on the opposite sides. It’s like we go, “uh oh, I’m thinking about this, I better stop.” And then we make an equal and opposite effort to try to stop. So what we end up with is even more thrusters going off than before, all around the ship. Maybe we’re able to make our spaceship seem more or less stabilized for a while, but the thrusters are going crazy.
Yes, exactly.
And it sounds like what you’re talking about is just turning off the thrusters. Just allowing them all to stop. Not trying to control the position of the spaceship, like trying to stop all our thoughts or make our body perfectly still or whatever. Forgetting about all that, and just stopping the thrusters. To just be still. Silent. Maybe the spaceship is hurling. Fine. Maybe thoughts are coming. Fine. But just stopping all the thrusters. And they can’t be stopped by doing anything. Maybe it’s like we just kind of let go of all the effort we were putting into opening their throttle. It’s like we have to hold their throttles open for them to fire, so to stop we just stop holding them open. We just relax all that effort. Just rest the doing. And then the thrusters stop and there’s just stillness, even if the spaceship is still hurling.
Perfect. Thrusterlessness. Wonderful. Your metaphors are much better than mine. Since you seem to have such a good grasp of Graspinglessness, how about if we switch gears and see if we can give you a little taste?
Well, I guess I could give thrusterlessness a try. But the truth is, I think I’m more comfortable talking about it than trying to experience it.
Yes, of course. The ego is quite reluctant to volunteer for euthanasia.
Why do they need volunteers? They’re just like kids everywhere else.
So let’s give it a try.
* * * * * *
So, right now, in this moment, whatever you are experiencing is fine. Nothing needs to be pushed away, no thoughts need to be suppressed, no feelings need be locked up or expressed. The endless sky of Awareness has room for everything. No need to try to become physically relaxed, no need to be mentally calm. They certainly have their place, but they are not requirements. No matter what state or condition our mental and physical structures are in, Structurelessness remains untouched. No matter what thoughts and feelings and sensations arise, our awareness can release all entanglement with structure, all grasping of form, and fall back into Pure Simple Awareness. It can happen right now! This instant! It’s not required that you put in a certain number of years of meditation first, that you read the right books first, that you find the perfect teacher first. It is your birthright. It is your True Nature. It is the Face you wore before the birth of your soul. Nothing is required of any structure for Awareness to be itself!
In every moment is a Living Doorway, softly whispering you Home. This Doorway is never the slightest step away. It is always exactly beneath you, quietly inviting you to relax the grasping that limits you to the surface of Life… Even if you can’t find that Living Doorway, say yes to it. Not with your mind, but with your inner heart. Just let go. Release everything you have been holding. And then you will see that what is Most Real, that which you have most deeply longed for, has always been gently holding you.
Lost in your thoughts? Grasping to understand? Simply let go. Those clouds cannot hold on to you. They can only try to seduce you into grasping onto them. Such effort it takes, to grasp something so ethereal. Such work, to dutifully follow the clouds wherever they choose to take you, doing what they say, being their servant. Have they truly earned the right to be your master? Just gently stop grasping and serving your thoughts. The True Master is so much quieter and gentler and softer than they are. Let them be, just as they are. And sink beneath them.
Frustrated? Plenty of room for frustration. Let it be. One more little thunder cloud in the infinite sky. Confused? Plenty of room for confusion. The clouds bump into each other, unsure which way to float. But a little storm cannot effect the Living Spaciousness in which it arises. Bored? Wrestles? Hopeless? They’re all very welcome to be here. If your mind wants to stop working so hard and rest for a time, let it. Your inner heart can listen, while your mind is lost in the clouds. Pure Awareness is far too simple to be held by the heavy mind. The Silent Center is far too still for wind to enter.
Not sure what to do? Wonderful! What an opportunity! What a precious, Grace-filled moment! Let yourself cease all doing. Stop all trying. You are Effortlessness itself! You cannot be grasped, you cannot be found, you cannot be learned, you cannot be unlocked. You can only BE! You are Pure Being!… Pure Awareness is so, so simple, any looking is over looking. The slightest step is a step away. Any grasping is trying to catch air with your fist. Trying to capture the sunlight. Only the open hand can know the sun. Close it, and it can only know darkness. No matter how bright the sun. No matter how hard you squeeze. Why not let your grip fall away?
Tired of the struggle? What a blessing! Let it go. Be done with struggle. Just stop. Fall into the endless surrender. The endless bow. Sink into the Infinite Sea of Living Nectar. Feel like giving up? What a gift! Give up! Let go of the rope! It is a serpent in disguise, leading you farther into forgetting. Let it go! Release all trying, all hiding, all searching, all working, all grasping, all pushing. Give it all up! In this moment. And this one. And this one. In this heartbeat. And this one. And this one. Every breath is a birth and a death. Release and release and release until there is only Releasingness itself! Why resist the gravity of Pure Awareness? Give in to it. Free fall into the Center of the Soul, the Eye of Existence, where the Real Self has always been. You are the Freedom that remains when all grasping is forever finished!
Enough talking. Enough thinking. Enough trying to understand. Now is the time to rest in Living Peace. The Peace that passes all understanding. Most people actually believe they must wait until the body dies to rest in Peace! How tragic! It is here right now! But where are we? The Sun always shines! The moon is always whole! The stars are always sending us their light! But where are we? We can choose to rest in Peace right now. In this moment. The only moment it can ever be found.
The search is over! No more excuses for trying to find it. All that is finished! It is closer than searching! It is before looking! Essence is our Self even more than we are! It is only found in the still and silent center of this moment. In the Pure Present. Where there is only Pure Awareness, without other, endlessly shining into itself. That Light blinds the mind. It burns away all shadows. Until it alone remains. The Light that we have always truly been. The Center of my soul and the Center of yours are the very same. Oh, my friend, the Light of Essence is burning through my shell! It gazes into your endless eyes, and sees only itself! Namaste, my dear friend! Namaste.