There is an immense amount of obscure writing in connection with words
such as spiritual, consciousness, God, and death. However, most of us
come back to the fact that everyday life confronts us with the most
observable experience of reality that we have. Fortunately, if we
carefully examine what we experience every day, much of the mystery
surrounding the words mentioned disappears.
If we start with the word consciousness or
awareness, we can begin to open the book of our own life experience.
Daily we pass through an extraordinary change that we often take so
much for granted we miss the wonder of it. The change occurs between
sleeping and waking. For most of us being awake is when we most fully
feel ourselves. Compared with this sleeping is a period during which we
lose any focused awareness of being an individual, and we sink into
what is generally called unconsciousness -- the lack of personal
awareness.
This swing between waking and sleeping can be seen as the extremes
within the possibilities of our experience. Sleeping and waking are the
polarities, the North and South Poles of what we can confront. In quite
a real sense we can say there is nothing beyond what is included in
those polarities.
Think about it. Without awareness nothing exists for you. There is no
body, no world, nothing. So what you are aware of tells you the limits
of the world or universe you live in.
Obviously that is a very general statement and needs further
explanation. So to start with let me give you an example. When I was a
youth I met a man who quite subtly led me to listen to music in a way
that I had never done before. He played a piece of Beethoven and said
that some people believed they could hear several themes playing at any
one time. He asked me how many I could hear. I listened carefully and
thought I could hear three or perhaps four. He then played Beethoven's
pastoral symphony and asked me to tell him when I thought the storm was
approaching. These two exercises helped me to listen to music in a new
way and began my appreciation for the classics, something that I had
not previously experienced. It also showed me that things existed that
I had not been aware of. The music had been there, and I had heard it
before, but I had never known there were several themes playing at
once. I had never listened carefully to the music.
I use that example as an analogy of the way we live our life. There is
so much of our experience that we do not “listen to carefully” and so
do not appreciate its depth or possibilities. There are many aspects of
waking life that this applies to, but it is particularly relevant to
sleep. This may seem like a strange statement because in sleep we lose
awareness, so how can we more fully appreciate it?
Of course, one of the well-known ways of discovering what lies within
the obscure depths of sleep is to explore the resources of one's
dreams. When this is done the apparently black depths of sleep begin to
reveal an amazing life and energy. Light is taken into the darkness.
Things become visible that were hidden. What was unconscious begins to
become known. The huge area of our experience that seemed to be a blank
gains life and substance. Then the unconscious is recognised as an area
as vast and varied as the physical world.
Remember that your personal awareness is only a tiny portion of what
you are and what you are capable of. Most of your beingusually lies
beneath your waking awareness.
However, it has to be remembered that dreams occur when
our core self is almost awake. During sleep the core of our being dips
deep into what we call unconsciousness or 'the unconscious'. Several
times during sleep our core rises from those depths almost to the point
of waking. At that point we dream. In a dream, deeper - less conscious
- levels of our being express in the imagery and sensations of our
waking experience. They express in the images and experiences we have
gathered through our senses while awake, and are largely culturally
programmed. Such dream imagery is necessary as the processes they
reflect do not take place in words, in thoughts, in processes we know
or experience while awake. They are deeply biological, atomic and even
subatomic. So dreams link us with the enormous depths and different
dimensions of our existence.
It is only when we break through the dream images and touch the forces
those images portray that we begin to move into the unconscious. We
only then see what forms dreams and what they really reflect.
The picture on the left graphically illustrates what it is like to
break through surface appearances and enter into the formless worlds of
experience contained in our unconsciousness. When this happens we begin
to meet the cosmic forces that form our being and the universe.
In this way, the organic, cellular and other 'life' processes that are
usually unknown and unconscious, are met. Focussed consciousness can
dive all the way down through the levels of being and know them.
The Polarities of Existence
I want to bring the word “natural” in here because it is relevant to
what is being explained. If we see animals as examples of what is
natural, or what happens in nature without human intervention, then we
could say that it is not natural to have one's appendix taken out when
it is inflamed. It is not natural to have breast implants. It is not
natural to have vaccinations against disease. But these things are all
options we are capable of, along with the countless other things that
humans do because they are possible. So although animals do not spend
time examining their dreams, it is possible for us to do so, and
thereby expand our awareness of who we are and what the possibilities
of our existence are. Perhaps it was not natural for human beings to
travel to the North and South Pole's, or to journey into space; but by
doing so we have enlarged our awareness of the environment and the
cosmos in which we live.
There are, of course, other ways in which we can explore the polarities
of our experience. Meditation, and the use of certain drugs, enables
people to explore areas of experience that do not occur “naturally”.
For instance, some forms of meditation enable the practitioner to enter
the condition of sleep while maintaining a certain amount of critical
awareness, as happens in lucid dreaming. This really is a voyage of
exploration, and is different to what happens when a person explores a
dream. Exploring a dream brings contents of the unconscious into waking
experience. Meditation and lucidity enables a personal dive into levels
of awareness that are usually cloaked in unconsciousness. Perhaps this
can be likened to the first humans who dived under the sea with a
submarine and began to personally witness the immense range and variety
of life that exists under the surface.
But it has to be mentioned that the imagery of dreams and lucid fantasy
are still almost at the level of waking.
Almost immediately after Albert Hoffman discovered LSD in 1943, it was
used for psychological research and psychotherapy. During that period
of intense research and therapeutic use, huge areas of the unconscious
became available for exploration and mapping. As with meditation, the
person’s conscious sense of self could travel in areas that were
usually blanketed by the fog of sleep. The human experience behind such
obscure words as spirit and God became available for analysis and
study. The depths and heights of what is usually unconscious within us
revealed worlds completely different to what we know during waking
life. Those worlds are no less real than the world of our conscious
personality. They are in fact a balancing polarity to what we know and
experience in our daily life.
From the research mentioned it was seen that in waking life we
generally have a sense of ourselves as distinct from anybody else. Thus
your memories and experiences seem completely separated from those of
another person. We refer to this personal and unique set of experiences
and responses as, "Me" -- or "I". When the researchers examined the
experiences of people exploring their deep unconscious, it was seen
that this sense of self gradually diminishes. There are levels of this
experience that can be likened to what was said about the polarities of
experience. At one end of the polarity is focused self-awareness. At
the other end is an ocean of awareness without any focused sense of
self. This ocean of consciousness that is at the core of our being is
what has been called God in other cultures or Nirvana. In India it has
been described as Sat-Chit-Ananda - Being-Consciousness-Bliss. When we
discover it as the centre of ourselves it is no longer seen as exterior
or distant. But in waking life where we lack awareness of it we see it
either as non-existent or as separate and distant. See: Realms of the
Human Unconscious.
The Greek Ouroboros. The symbol is found in many other cultures.
One interesting part of this exploration of the depths of human
consciousness, is that if you go deep enough you arrive back at what we
call the external or physical world. The formless and the formed are
seen to be different ends of the same thing. The ancient symbol of the
snake with its tail in its mouth illustrates this closed system.
Quantum physics, digging deep into the world of form, is arriving back
to what mystics of all ages have discovered in their inner depths.
This leads us to an extremely important point - what we are not capable
of being personally aware of does not exist for us. In a very real way
nothing exist for us unless we can be aware of it in some way. There is
nothing outside of consciousness. Or to put it another way, without
personal awareness nothing exists for us. Therefore the polarities of
our awareness hold the whole cosmos of experience for us. If most of
that lies in darkness in our 'unconscious' then much of what we hold as
a possibility remains unknown. See: Tao of Physics or The Dancing Wu Li
Masters.
The Remarkable Roots of Being
Seen as a circle in which there are polarities of focussed awareness at
one end and unfocused sentience at the other, helps us to realise that
what occurs when self awareness plumbs the depths of it source - the
unconscious - is remarkable. The roots of our being lie in the
mysterious depths of subatomic particles. At this very moment you
contain in yourself that level of existence. It is also a fact that
what you are has emerged from, and is intricately enmeshed in, the
universe and its origins. Also, you are what you are because life on
this planet emerged and you hold in yourself in your very genes, cells,
organs and overall structure, the full history of that emergence. So
diving below the level of waking awareness is an entry into the most
profoundly amazing discovery of what you are and how you have come into
being. There is not space in this short feature to spell that out, but
such books as The Holographic Universe and Realms of the Human
Unconscious , vastly extend what is being said here.
Dream Jaguar Art by Carlos Caban
of Mexico
So, with a little reflection it can be seen that each of us experience
these polarities every day. As our sense of self diminishes we become
unconscious. In the depths of sleep the self we know in waking does not
exist -- or at least, it is greatly diminished. But these areas of
human experience can be known if we learn to “listen carefully”. This
is what some forms of mental and emotional discipline help us to do.
Anyone who seriously undertakes this voyage into what was previously
unconscious meets phenomena that at first seem strange, or sometimes
even frightening. Remember that usually we enter this realm of the
unconscious in the form of sleep and dreams, and in most cases dreams
use our cultural and everyday imagery and experience. So our focused
self-awareness is guarded from a direct confrontation with these
phenomena. The nearest most of us get to experiencing life under the
surface is when we recall a dream. And in fact a dream illustrates this
first level of what we meet.
We are probably all acquainted now with looking at the instruments on
the dashboard of a car. On such a panel we can see an indication of the
speed, of the amount of fuel, and of the temperature of the water
cooling system. When we look at any of these gauges we are not of
course directly aware of the hot water, of the amount of fuel, or of
the engines revolutions. We are only seeing a graphic display of what
is taking place in unseen parts of the car.
Our body and mind are far more complex than any car. There is far more
that goes on in the hidden places of our being than ever goes on in an
engine. But dreams perform the same function as the gauges on the
dashboard. They illustrate processes that are going on in the depths of
our body and mind -- and in fact often in the very deepest places of
the unconscious. As with the gauges, we are not directly experiencing
the processes displayed in images and drama. What we are witnessing is
a process that puts into imagery, into emotions and drama, things that
in themselves may be quite formless, that may never previously have
come near to verbal definition or conscious conceptualisation. The word
imagine has its root in the word image. We literally put into images
those things that lie beyond our usual senses in the formless and
timeless regions of our being.
One of William Blake's images
showing aspects of his unconscious.
So this image making process, this myth forming creative activity of
dreaming, forms environments and experiences that seem as convincing as
waking life. If we find ourselves in the midst of a dream, or in the
midst of this virtual reality without understanding how it works, we
may be completely immersed in its apparent reality. I suppose this
might be likened to looking at our hand, then looking at it with a
microscope, and then with an electron microscope. There are worlds
within worlds.
For many people, especially those who have stumbled upon this inner
journey without guidance or understanding, or have been “opened” to it
through the use of a drug, shock or mental illness, this is as far as
they can travel. They become lost in the imagery and the emotions, the
conflict and fears, the subtle and enchanting glamour or illusion of
this first level. Or they may lose some of their mental balance,
haunted by what is revealed or released into consciousness, as often
happens to people who frequently take mind expanding drugs without the
skills to deal with what they confront. They release these aspects or
'creatures of the unconscious without having learned the
psychotherapeutic tools or personal disciplines and understanding to
integrate what they meet. They are then haunted by what emerged.
Many myths throughout the ages have illustrated this part of the
journey in various ways. One Arabic myth instructs the traveller to use
a sword to cut down whatever appears in front of them, even if it seems
to be their mother or father. Perhaps this is a bit harsh, but it does
point to the fact that at this level things are not what they may
appear. Neither are they complete illusions. They are images and
environments portraying something. The aim is to break through the
surface level to the source from which they emerge. The point being
that if you can destroy or cut through an image you are still not
meeting its source. The core self is indestructible.
The Indian sage Ramakrishna says of his own journey beyond forms, “Tota
Puri taught me to detach my mind from all objects and to plunge it into
the heart of the Atman (self). But despite all my efforts, I could not
cross the realm of name and form and lead my spirit to the
Unconditional state. I had no difficulty in detaching my mind from all
objects with the one exception of the too familiar form of the radiant
Mother, the essence of pure knowledge, who appeared before me as a
living reality. I said to Tota Puri in despair, ‘It is no good, I shall
never succeed in lifting my spirit to the “Unconditioned” state and
find myself face to face with the Atman.’ He replied severely, ‘What!
You say you cannot? You must!’ Looking about him, he found a piece of
glass. He took it and stuck the point between my eyes, saying,
‘Concentrate your mind on that point.’ Then I began to meditate with
all my might, and as soon as the gracious form of the Divine Mother
appeared I used my discrimination as a sword, and I clove Her in two.
The last barrier fell and my spirit immediately precipitated itself
beyond the plane of the ‘conditional’, and I lost myself in Samadhi
(unconditioned bliss).
However, for many people there is an enormous amount to be experienced
and used at this level, existing as it does amidst the images of the
'psychic' realm, and expressing in a sort of more fluid mirroring of
the three dimensions, time and space limited experience we meet through
our senses and body. This is the world the psychic works in when they
extend their perceptions to 'communicate with the dead', tell us about
our life situation without us giving clues, and having glimpses of the
future.
In attempting to understand these experiences, it must be remembered
that beyond the images of a person, of a situation, of voices heard, in
the way dreams present things, lies a more formless dimension of
experience. It is one where the boundaries of personality and distance,
time and space break down. So for many people, it is an easier task to
look at this formless dimension through the translating instrument of
dream image formation, and see people, places, environments, or hear
voices talking to them.
The Guardian of the Threshold
This breaking through into other dimensions of experience that occurs
in successful dream insights, meditation and in some facilitated drug
use, takes one to the next level of the unconscious.
In one of the old western traditions in which people were guided to
make this journey, the illusionary imagery and environments were called
the psychic world, as described above. One was warned that at some
point you would meet The Dweller or Guardian of the Threshold.
Sometimes this was illustrated as a shadowy and perhaps frightening
figure, the sort we often meet in scary dreams. If you could face the
Dweller without running away, the realm you enter beyond the Guardian
was described as the meeting with all the forces you had perhaps
unwittingly released or created in the past. They are the factors or
experiences out of which the waking experience of your life has been
woven. In the past this was called one's fate, kismet, or karma. Today
we tend to think of it as the many influences carried from genes, birth
and early childhood, that shape the way we respond in our daily life.
In other words, inherited tendencies, cultural programming and
psychological traumas. But the Guardian also represented influences
from prior to ones present birth. Not only is it a guardian, but also,
if you meet it without fear and pass the tests it presents you with, it
is also a guide and companion on the journey. If you meet this by
actually facing the 'scary monster' of a nightmare, a similar thing
happens - you meet forces that arise from the past and shape your
present personality.
Frankenstein's
creation.
Any deeper exploration of the unconscious shows that it is not simply
one's infancy and its problems that we face. There are influences
streaming from the long past through the body that we have inherited.
There are the family influences and massive inputs from the culture we
were born into, and also other intangible forces playing upon our life.
As we cut through the images and drama of the dream creator, we begin
to discover and gain insights into this incredible process of creation
that forms and guides our life.
The image of Frankenstein's creation illustrates the Guardian of the
Threshold very clearly. The Guardian, like Frankenstein's creation, is
made of many different people or bodies. We face, in the Guardian, what
has been created in our long past; the many personalities assumed, and
lives lived, by our core self. See: Archetype of the Shadow.
Light of My Life
This world of the formative, of the archetypes, of the physiological
and the cosmic processes -- even the intelligences -- that are the
creative matrix out of which we have arisen, is strange and wonderful.
Very often the traveller has to lose a great deal before they can
safely explore this realm with awareness. The reason for this is quite
simple. Identity, the ego, what one calls self, is an extremely new and
vulnerable thing in terms of evolution. It might be likened to the
fragile filament in an electric light bulb. When the current is
switched on the filament glows brightly, and we can liken this to
personal awareness. The current passing through us is the air, water
and food that flows through in an almost continuous stream to form our
energy. Whether we consider the electric light bulb, or our own sense
of self, behind the existence of both, immense activities take place
making them possible. The light bulb needs a great deal of cable,
switching gear, and some sort of generator. Our personal existence
needs a great deal more. The whole universe lies behind the 'light' of
our self awareness. Without the cosmos we do not exist. Without the sun
and the earth we do not exist. Without the bacteria and processes of
plant and animal life on our planet we do not exist. Without other
human beings who have taught us language and perform the constant
background and foreground to our life, we do not exist.
However, this fragile thing we call self often builds powerful defences
or boundaries to protect it from knowing its dependence upon the forces
forming it. These defences often show themselves in rigid beliefs, in a
fog of ignorance, in emotional outbursts against anything that might be
felt to threaten, and also of course in the many ways in which we use
drugs such as alcohol, medications and nicotine to deaden our sense
perceptions of what is taking place around and within us. We do this
because our ego is fragile and vulnerable. We may also do it because
the journey into the unconscious diminishes the sense of self, and this
can be threatening. It can be felt as a form of death, or an experience
of breaking open. The boundaries that were so necessary at a certain
stage of our growth fall away. The journey into that more inclusive
polarity of our being is actually a form of growth, of greater
maturity, of a meeting with something more permanent than the fragile
ego.
Another way of looking at the business of defences against a widening
awareness of oneself is to see all of it as a process of growth.
Perhaps we cannot let go of our defended relationship with our identity
while we still feel vulnerable or insecure. Perhaps the change comes
about naturally once we feel confident enough to let down our defences.
If you have managed to enter this level of experience for any length of
time you will be confronted by an enormous paradox. This is, in
essence, no different to the paradox we face every day in experiencing
focused individual identity, and the loss of that identity in sleep.
What we meet when we pass beyond the dream stage in which everything is
represented as images external to us, is a vast ocean of mind or
consciousness in which all that has lived exists. It exists as an
unseparated part of the ocean of awareness -- yet at the same time it
can manifest independently and as a separate identity. This applies to
oneself also. You sense yourself as having no real separate existence
from what lives and knows itself in all things. Yet at the same time
you experience your own separated identity. This is a difficult
paradox, and human language tends to express things as either this, or
that. Things cannot be both things at once. But in this journey to your
own centre such separation is transcended. You experience a sense of
things that transcend the limitations of time and space. Things can be
here and there at the same time.
The old Newtonian physics
has never included mind or consciousness in its equations. As the atom
was the fundamental particle, and the atom was seen as a physical
object, it was believed there could be nothing beyond the body, its
molecules and atoms. Therefore personal awareness was a trick played by
the play of chemicals, and organs in the body. As for consciousness
surviving death, it was seen as a childish superstition created by weak
minds to deal with fear of death.
But the new physics, quantum physics, has since its earliest days
included mind and consciousness in its concepts. It has had to because
from the earliest days of quantum experiments two unimaginable
phenomena were unveiled. Irish physicist John Stewart Bell put forward
a quantum theorem that has revolutionised the way reality is
considered. In brief, the theorem states that when sub-microscopic
particles are split and moved to a distance from each other, the action
on, or of, particle 'A', is instantaneously reproduced with particle
'B'. This interaction does not rely on any known link or communication
and is considered to stand above normal physical laws of nature, as it
is faster than light.
Faster Than Light
Prior to such findings it was thought nothing could transcend the speed
of light. Nick Herbert, in an interview published in High Frontiers
writes: 'THERE ARE LOTS OF THINGS that are being kept from the public
as far as the subjects of physics and consciousness are concerned.
Bell's Theorem was proved in 1964, and it is still not taught in
physics classes, and you don't hear it on your science news programs. A
theorem is a proof, and no one has found a flaw in this theorem. It's
such a simple proof that a high school kid can understand it. So
physicists can understand it. They have various ways of trying to
ignore it, but it can't be refuted because it's so simple.'
The second finding that transformed our understanding of life and the
universe, is that an electron can be either a particle or a wave like
energy. The change occurs when a human observes it. If we do not
observe it an electron remains as an energy form. If we observe it a
transformation occurs and it changes into a particle. This locks human
consciousness into the very fundamental workings of the deepest levels
of our body and the universe. In fact quantum physicists have said we
are co-creators because consciousness alters 'reality'.
To quote Gary Zukav, 'Quantum mechanics is the theory. It has explained
everything from subatomic particles to transistors to stellar energy.
It has never failed. It has no competition.' The implications of the
theorem are enormous. Something can be in two places at once.
Apparently distant objects, or people, are intricately linked in an
immediate way. There is no separate existence as we previously thought.
Our view of the world is not one supported by the facts of physics.
Time and space are transcended. David Bohm, an eminent physicist, goes
as far as to say that all things in our observable universe are
inextricable linked. Nothing has separate existence.
There is a self that lies
behind the changing phenomena of our external life and personality.
When we personally meet this level of experience, when we transcend our
awareness of separateness, the experiences we have gathered through our
everyday life are gradually transformed. They shift, wherever possible,
into concepts or insights that approach the universal or timeless and
unchanging. Just as our physical body is formed by the continuous
partaking of food water and air, so a more permanent body or identity
is formed by the transformation of sensory experience into a body or
identity that has connections with the unchanging and eternal. Buddhism
calls this the diamond body, the imperishable self.
We can glimpse the meaning and possibility of this by once more looking
into everyday life. At some point in human history an individual must
have realised how to count. This realisation could be passed on to
other people. They in turn developed it until we have the incredibly
subtle knowledge of mathematics available today. This knowledge, the
concepts of mathematics, preceded your own personal existence. It will
also survive your own demise. In this sense it has a subtle life of its
own, transcending the individual lives of those who first realised it,
and also those of us who now learn it and perhaps develop it further.
As one meets the deeper levels of the unconscious a similar experience
of self emerges. The identity we know is seen to be something that has
emerged from countless lives lived in the past, the essence of which
have given us shape and form. This is precisely the same as we meet in
language. The language we take for granted is the result of thousands
of years in which individuals, cultures and groups contributed their
concepts, passions and wisdom to form new words. The words we use are
living connections with the past, and if we investigate them unfold
their history. Similarly, as we meet the deeper levels of self we find
our own personal connections with the past. The difference is that the
connections we meet in the deeper levels of self are living and
profoundly felt.
In confronting this awareness of what contributes to our individual
existence we cannot help but be transformed in some measure. The
limited viewpoint of life we had drops away. A more inclusive and
deeply centred viewpoint arises. In some manner you also meet with the
realisation that all that has ever lived, and all and everybody that
exists today, is alive at the core of your being. (See Creativity –
Doorway to the Wonderful Fire). This incredible background to personal
life is so vast and inclusive, and holds so many wonders, that when we
meet it, it becomes apparent that this is what many people have called
God. It presents another of the paradoxes we find in this experience
beyond opposites. It is both impersonal and yet we can have a personal
relationship with it, experiencing direct communication. It is this
real life beyond the limitations of our sensory experience and limited
waking self, that is indicated by the word spiritual or spirit.
However, this is not the fundamental level of being. The causeless
cause, the self-existent centre of us, when we find it, is seen to be
one and the same as the origin of the physical universe.
In brief, our present theory of the emergence of the cosmos is that
there existed what has been called a Singularity. From this emerged
what is known as the Big Bang. One commentator describes our
understanding of this as follows:
Because scientists cannot look back in time beyond that early epoch,
the actual big bang is hidden from them. There is no way at present to
detect the origin of the universe. Further, the big bang theory does
not explain what existed before the big bang. Time and space began at
the big bang, so that it makes no sense to discuss what happened
“before” the big bang from a consciousness locked in a sense of time
and space. (2)
As is suggested, it is
understood that time and space were actually created during the Big
Bang. So what existed prior to the big Bang is known to be beyond our
concepts of time and space. Because of this we cannot even think about
it because our concepts are all formed around our experience of time,
space and individual existence. This is exactly what we meet when we
touch that indefinable core of our being. It is impossible to reason
about this experience or in any way to describe it. One translation of
the Tao Te Ching, an ancient Chinese classic about the foundation of
existence, says that ‘The Tao that can be named is not the Tao.’
Who am I?
One of the main constituents of what we call 'me' or myself, is
identification. Although our sense of self seems so concrete and
definite, if we turn attention back on it the creature we call self is
a very slippery customer to get hold of. What does seem obvious as we
make the journey to our core self, is that the body sensations, the
thoughts, the emotions felt, and the image we have of ourself, are
identified with so deeply, that most people take them to be who they
are. They believe their body is who they are; or they believe their
thoughts are what constitutes their real being, or their emotions or
sexual experience are what they identify with. However, one can lose
limbs, or even even be paralysed and still have a sense of self. And if
you gradually 'undress' yourself of all these things - imaginatively
take away hearing, remove visual impression and body sensations - you
still have a sense of self without them. Dreams make this very clear.
Without the senses being active, without sight, without body
sensations, you still dream and have a sense of existing. Usually
though, even in dreams you clothe yourself in the usual trapping of the
three dimensional body life of waking awareness.
When we approach our core awareness it is like undressing. We lose body
awareness if we do it while asleep. We pass through the realm of
thought governed by language - so we lose thoughts. We lose all the
things consciousness 'clothes' itself in while awake - yet we still
exist. It is a very different form of existence, beyond the limitations
of the body, and even time and space, but we still exist as an
incredible creature alive in a world with what is felt to be no
boundaries. We are godlike. In fact it seems to many when they
experience this, that they are meeting God.
This Core experience is often described as enlightenment. It can also
be described as naked awareness. This is because what we usually know
of self has become "undressed". What that means is that what we usually
call self has dropped away.
This dropping away of self, as alread said, is what had been called
'enlightenment'. However, there is enormous confusion about this, as
what some people who have touched it say is that you are left with no
self. They say this sometimes almost like a threat - "Go there and you
will lose everything. You will no longer exist."
I see this as an incomplete process of meeting and integrating the
polarity of the Core. Certainly the self that we believed we were from
our sense impressions and our almost total identification with our
body, thoughts, emotions and sexual feelings drops away. But what such
statements fail to tell is that the Core is EVERYTHING. An unimaginable
amount is added, and in the end nothing is taken away. You still have
your body sensations, you can still make love with even more wonder,
you have your thoughts, your emotions, you can still love and laugh and
carry on with life - you simply do not identify with them as fully as
you did. The concepts and sense of self arising from them is seen as
limiting.
Also, one great fact that is almost never mentioned, is that the
formless and the formed are not seperate. They co-exist at the same
time. To gain one is not to lose the other. It is part of that huge
paradox that is life.
Beyond Time and Space
This opening to naked awareness, can, when healthy and adjusted to, be
recognised as an expanded awareness, an unconditional love, and a deep
understanding and compassion for the human condition. The limitations
of time and space have fallen away to some extent. So the past, present
and future are all here and now. In terms of waking awareness, this
means the person will often know something of the future, and of the
past - the far past. The boundaries between themselves and other people
have also to some extent fallen away, so they frequently know very much
what is going on in another person's mind and feelings. (Witness the
life of Swedenborg and Edgar Cayce).
When this transcendence of time and space, and its boundaries, are very
marked in the person, they express extraordinary genius and great
creativity. They often demonstrate a multitude of abilities, as for
instance seen in somebody like Rudolph Steiner. Whoever the author of
the Shakespeare plays was, the enormous insight into human nature and
the wonderful creativity, suggest he had transcended the usual
boundaries of self. Wouldn't you know a great deal more, express a
great deal more, if you had transcended the boundaries of time and
space, knowing as you would your core self - a self that is at the same
time the core of the universe?
Of course there are all stages in between normal waking awareness
bounded by the body and sense impressions, and the boundless self of
naked awareness. It is a new and emerging possibility for our race, and
many people only reach it either in a maladjusted form, or in small
degree in a sort of psychism.
To achieve it reasonably fully in waking awareness does not make a
mystic or peculiar human of you. Self awareness is fairly new to the
human species. Being self awareness has an enormous range of ways it is
expressed - from criminal to genius. This is also true of achieving the
Core experience. Touching your core does not make of you an all wise
guru. The experience is new and unstable in our species as yet. But if
you achieve it you are no less human than someone who has achieved self
awareness. Maurice Bucke, in his major work Cosmic Consciousness, spelt
all this out in 1863.
In meeting this core however, there is something we do know. We know
that everything has emerged from that Core, and all will fall back into
it. The changing changes and passes away – the changeless remains
pouring forth change.
source
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