Consciousness & Awareness

I’m on my 2nd read of “I Am That”, and I think I’ll need to read it at least 2 more times before it all sinks in.  I don’t read full time, just whenever the mood strikes me, so I wouldn’t call myself a serious devotee by any stretch.  I wonder about it all fairly incessantly, however.  I mean I’m constantly thinking about the true nature of reality.  I was talking with my Mom last night about how you never really can perceive true reality.  We perceive the world around us with our senses which are nothing more than electrical impulses that all get processed by the brain.  The brain communicates to… uh, I wanted to say “us”, or “me” here, but all of the sudden it doesn’t make sense to me.  The brain gets the signals, then does something with them – I don’t know what – , then the perceiver perceives.  Who’s the perceiver?  Where’s that guy?

I love Douglas Harding’s “closed eye experiments”, particularly this one:

“With EYES CLOSED … consider the following:

Going by your own, present experience, not by memory, hearsay or imagination, how big are you?”

If you really – I mean really  – do that, it can mess with your head.  If you really close your eyes, and don’t use memory at all, then ask that question, you will find that there is no answer.  How big are you?  What is “big”?  How can you know how big you are when you can’t use memory to compare anything with?  Plus, you’ve got your eyes closed, so there’s nothing to see.  How big are you?  Wow!  And where are you?

To me, the perceiver, the one that is aware of all that’s happening is the one that you sense when you ask yourself how big you are.  That guy is infinite, and not attached at all to anything – everywhere all the time.  Wow!

Now, mind you, I have no experience whatsoever in the esoteric realm of “reality”.  At least, none that I can claim expertise over.  I continue to rely on the words of those who have touched “it” and realized their true nature, envying them all the while.  I ran across another very interesting read that links quantum physics with metaphysics and the oneness of nonduality (Advaita).  This is deep stuff, but I highly recommend it: www.faculty.virginia.edu/consciousness/Word%20Consciousness.pdf

Meanwhile, I’ll be in this shell I’ve chosen, with my bundle of imaginary energy until I’m not.  You should check out www.nonduality.com if you’re interested in this stuff (thanks, Jerry!).

Thoughts & the way it is

I’ve gotten much better at not having to hook on to whatever happens to be crossing my mind lately.  Looking back, I see how easy and natural it is to grab a thought with a death grip, and follow it all the way until the end.  It’s so easy that other thoughts are quickly grabbed as well feeling like the fall of dominos.  In short order, the mind is all abuzz with the thousands of thoughts, bouncing back and forth, demanding immediate attention and resolution.  You, me, the witnesses of all this chaos, thinking that there’s something that needs to be done with each of these spoiled brats, quickly become overwhelmed.  The heart races, the breath shortens, and tension develops in the base of the neck.  It all comes to a head at last and you find yourself standing in the shower, attempting to wash it all away with water as hot as you can physically stand it, on the verge of tears, wishing it all would go away – that you could start over.  Please, just let it start over again.

Fortunately, my mind doesn’t take me there.  I’m almost aloof anymore, but not ambivolent.  I love my life, my wife, and my family.  I now know the exact date that I’ll be laid off, and I’m still not worried about it.  It’s obvious to me that this is the way it should be.  Really, it would be painfully idiotic of me to think otherwise.  As they say, “It is what it is.”  Funny, ’cause it’s always that way.  If, even for a brief moment, you can relax into that knowledge, that things are exactly as they should be, you will find that there’s nothing at all to be worried about.  There’s nothing even to fear.  When you don’t believe that things are precisely as they should be, ask yourself, “How else could they be?”  If you’re honest, the answer will always be that it can’t be any way other than the way it is.  Relax, it’s all going according to plan.

Check out Byron Katie (www.thework.com) … she’s great for this stuff.