Great River Institute - Meditation Class 9-14-09

Great River Institute hosts Monday Meditation Classes each week at 6:30 PM Eastern, US. The subject is 'The Totality and Embodiment of God'.

This series of classes have been held regularly for two years. Some classes run 3-4 hours in length, so participants who have attended from the beginning have benefited from literally hundreds of hours of active meditation practice, sitting with a Master. If you are interested in joining, classes can be taken via teleconference as long as you register in advance. There is a small fee for each class. Email GRI at GrtRvrInst@aol.com for more information.
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The following text, that starts off the Discussion, is by no means a complete summary of the class it represents. Typically you are reading paraphrases, not actual quotes. The excerpts are from my class notes, so it is quite possible there are errors with respect to what Sensei is conveying. That being said, however, the main point is to continue to deepen our understandings and applications of the topic. MW

Answers to your Prayers
The further out in outer values that your prayers are in, the further out you tend to dwell. But if go more inward, you are changing the value of your reason for being. Depending on how you position yourself in that new location, will also affect the answers to your prayers. So your position on the line of value, as well as the way you are facing when you are on the line of value, both of these affect your effectiveness of higher purpose and reason for being – as well as the answers to your prayers. Think about that.

You HAVE to change the value for your reasons for being in the moment; otherwise you are not doing the deeper work. But when you DO things that change your value in the moment to be more inward, you enter into the values of a higher state of being. And when you enter there, there are things there that are waiting for you - gifts, things that you cannot access until you shift more inward.

Change your position on your line of reason; slide inward, in the moment. I am telling you that you can’t do that unless you practice Gratitude.

“There are Beings that are watching you, and know exactly what you are doing, and they will never forget it.” When they give to you, and you do not honor them and continue to honor them, they get tired of holding values for you that you won’t attend to yourself, values that they are giving their eternal life to holding on your behalf.

When people are praying, regardless of how they view it, they are praying to some aspect of God. Their prayer will be answered, but it will be answered by the beings who are dwelling at that particular value.

Send your prayers toward what has made up the most inward values over time, and those values will begin to open up in your life. Those places, those points inside of your self will begin to develop a sense of those values. And the Beings that represent those values will respond.

Understanding Deeper Understanding
If you are going to understand what I am saying or talking about from the position that you are in, then you are not going to have any deeper an understanding of what I am saying than from where you are at. But there IS deeper value and understanding in what I am saying. Typically people think there is no more value being applied than what they know.

The Beings doing the Work
The first being that came into the initial Adamic model of human being (and we are talking about the very first being, the initial one) – that being HAD to be aligned with the values that had put that first body together. And the next beings that began to come in also had to be aligned to the values of those next bodies. So, someone who couldn’t see the importance of those values or their necessity, could not enter a body at that point. The initial soul who came in to the first body in this model had to be (among other things) inclusive of everyone who had become lost in matter.

There have been enough people, over time, who have focused value throughout the body – including the hand, for example – that you can now come into a body, and more quickly and easily have dexterity and facility with your hand. Similarly, some people have been responsible for laying out the main course for humanity; some people have been responsible for the sustenance of humanity; other people have been responsible for the aggression of humanity. You can’t do the things you do except for these Beings.

If you have been smart about how you have lived over time, you could have a set of points within you that you could get aligned with that would allow you to be multi-dimensional for the reasons that you have been living all your lives for, so that when you come into this life you could call claim to those points. But you can’t do that if you are not willing to move towards those states of being, those reasons for being and their values. You have to learn to recognize those values, and to adjust yourself to them when they are presented, or you will not have access to those points.

You may know YOUR purpose for being, but you may never know the creator’s purpose for being unless you get to the Adam and Eve point within yourself. Those points within you are pre-loaded with that information.

Why put all this emphasis on these great teachers and masters of the past, when they are right here, right now? Living a life, maybe awake, maybe not. Buddha, Lao Tzu, Ghandi, Jesus, Adam and Eve… all of them. Think about them being here right now. For real.

Don’t look at these beings as though they are out of reach. Look at these beings as though they are your very best friends.

Any time you decide to take some time out and meditate, you are talking to one of those Beings, whether you realize it or not.

There are so few people who are doing this work that there are times that they have to come in and live lives inside of certain problems or circumstances, in lives that don’t seem particularly important, so that they can animate those points.

Every class we are circling something. What is it? Gratitude is one of the things that allows us to circle. We are getting to know these Beings, and our minds are having a hard time accepting that they actually exist.

The point between life and death
It’s insulting when people die, that they do all this gasping and closing of their eyes. They aren’t realizing that the Beings that are watching them aren’t at all impressed. They close their eyes so that they don’t have to see that they are dead, and so they don’t have to look at the higher value as they pass over. After a while, once they’ve past those points, they reopen their eyes and they realize that they have indeed died. But by then it is too late, because they have closed their eyes past the most important point: This is what the Tibetan Book of the Dead is talking about when it says you have to stay alert; this spot, as you cross over, is a point of eternal awareness.

The next generation
Politicians make promises, but they don’t want to get to the core causes. All they care about is getting over, and leaving the problems for the next generation. They think the next generation is their children. They’re wrong! The next generation is them. They are going to come in to the very problems that they have left behind.

The beings who DO take on the load do so from the heart. And when they go into their hearts, they feel this tremendous load that everyone else is not taking responsibility for. We don’t stop to consider the reality of this, that these actual beings are actually here. Let’s say that there were twelve of them here, right now, spread around the world. Do you think a collection would be taken up to give to them, so that they could get together? No way! We can’t even pass a basic health care system.

What is the pain I feel when I go deeper?
You have had moments when you have turned away. The pain you feel when you are turning your heart toward going deeper is not because going deeper into the heart causes more pain. Rather, it is because you have made a decision in the past in which you turned away from the deeper values. And you are having to face and reconcile that, you are encountering that as you go deeper.

How to make consciousness shift
"It’s not like you have to go out and be a globally known point; it’s that you have to work on the global points that are in all of us."

September 15, 2009 at 21:52 | MW

Sensei,

So: quite a lot of these Beings do in fact have recognizable names: Jesus, Lao Tzu, Adam and Eve, and so on. So even if we can’t perceive them, we can still seek to align ourselves with them, with what they stand for. In the various religions, that’s nominally what people often try to do.

Indeed, it seems that it’s more: what they represent is already present, at least in potential, within each of us, and so it’s a matter of connecting with that potential, of getting more and more familiar with that so that we resonate more and more with it.

In all things that we have to learn, we start with the desire to learn it. And somehow, in a process that’s always seemed magical to me, we are able to learn it providing we have the native capacity to do so. Quite often, we do. So we start with a mere desire and the sincere intention, then we engage in appropriate effort, and – hey presto! – we do actually learn and thereby change our being.

The magic becomes more understandable if it’s a question of resonance with what was done for the first time by exemplar Beings. The average modern man may be able to do things very easily that could rarely be done in past centuries or millennia. A schoolchild may be able to do mathematics beyond the ken of the ancient Greeks, not because it is smarter than they were, but because they blazed the trail, and the trail, once blazed, is available to anyone who sincerely tries to follow it.

I can understand this, even though I can't say I actually perceive significant Beings. And it seems to me that prayer, in the spiritual ream, is a seeking to connect with that from which one can learn, and a willingness to do some relevant work or study so that one can learn.

Then comes the question of retention of learning, and building upon that learning with deeper learning. Do I feel this yearning for something, whatever it might be, because at some point I was closer to it? And did I turn away at some point? Or is the yearning just the call of potential that I have yet to come close enough to?

I sometimes think it’s not pain I feel, but frustration. Why, when it seems I want to get closer and closer, to arrive home, do I find any degree of difficulty with that? The answer might be ignorance, or forgetfulness. Ignorance seems better; forgetfulness may imply a certain amount of intention to forget, of being content with lesser values than I am capable of.

September 21, 2009 at 0:03 | ML

ML;

I think we do inwardly perceive significant Beings, but when we do, we usually do not value them for the Truer significance they represent. In my own life and experience, I have many examples of perceiving a significant Being and also of being in the presence of a significant moment. The problem, in my view, is that we do not have a true enough and loving enough relationship with the truer and more loving states of being. We often do not recognize the value of those inner relationships in ways that honor our deeper reasons for being. Because of this we miss Knowing the Beings and instead only know them, often denying them and even ignoring them.

You might have a deep Knowing experience of real Truth and Love, but because it comes along with other concerns and sometimes the difficulties this state of being is having to work through and with, the point of deeper Truth and Love- that are inwardly being Known- are dismissed to the lesser values that the being is outwardly engaging in life.

Then, after the denial of the inward Knowing experience, the experience moves to a more outward form of the inner to justify their denial, and when they do this, they now encounter the same reasoning at an even more outward point of value. If the Truer Love and Understanding is further denied, the problem of denial can be so great as to lose oneself and one’s reason for being to lower and lower forms, finally being so far out in truth and love that all that is around is shallow.

Back at our more inward experience, still lies the deeper truth and Love and if we admit we perceived it, we can call claim to knowing more about it and this can lead, through effective prayer and meditation, in our dynamics of living, to a True Loving Knowing of the Being of our Truer love.

The highly Known examples, such as Buddha and other great figures from our inner states, are in every one of us as are the lesser known and less great figures from within. Here is an example: Somewhere within you are your moments of greatest value, your moments of least value, your better understanding and your lesser understanding versions. When you engage in the moment, I am saying you are perceiving these states to some extent, but you may not be placing the value they deserve. In fact, you may be looking straight at your best friend or foe and not know it.

There is a “sense” that can be cultivated into fear, where everything becomes justified to fear, or you may choose a more productive sense to knowing everything in its more inner relationship. Maybe you choose to ignore, so ignorance becomes your way of knowing. Maybe you choose intrigue, so intriguing becomes your way of knowing. The point here is that the inner human has been activated by the human experience, and while we may not know we have a knowing relationship, we are having a knowing one even if our knowing is to be not knowing it.

I agree that you may not know you are perceiving inner Beings in the outer sense of perceiving, but in the inner we should consider that we are and this is where the idea of “beware, you may not realize the angels you have been entertaining” is directing us to be more knowing of. Why would we need to be warned to be aware. It is because when we or any other being from within engages outwardly in life, the outward forms of our ways of being can cloak the truth of our inner Truths and Loves.

Our morphic resonance has a reality far greater than is realized in our awareness. It can take us toward or away. We can focus on the inner or the outer and we can substantiate the positives or the negatives as ways we are living to be more about. The morphic resonance of learning has not only to do with being on a common point of an idea, it also requires a commonality with the idea and the state of being that the idea represents. This is why Sheldrake finds familiarity to be important. We have to develop our familiarities to being more in line with what we want to truly be more about…and we better choose wisely!

We all have our points of inner challenges, hardships and misunderstandings that must be reconciled. By opening our minds and hearts to a better way of being, we can move from one state to another instead of being forever held captive by our unwilling or less able dispositions. And by our using our creative relationships within to pray for the states of being that we truly do want to be more about, we can be living with a mindfulness to acknowledge them when they are present in our moments and especially when they present themselves in our moments of difficulty and challenge…and this is often when we consciously choose to pray. We are often closer to the pathways leading to our Truths and Loves than we realize. And remember, even the beings of Truth and Love can be engaged in difficulties, sometimes severe.

How do we perceive them? You will now them by allowing yourself to Know them within. Meet them in their hearts and you will Know them and can Know where you belong and you can Know the more important Truths. To do this, we must Love doing it and we must be willing to see our Truest Loves even when they are in trouble and when they are hidden from us or separated from us because of our troubles.

Is there anyone, anywhere who you would give your life for? Is there any Being in the entirety of being that you Love beyond any problem or difficulty? When you pray, do you pray with that Love in mind?

Think about Love and your perception of it. Is it something you or anyone has ever fully embraced? Even though it is present in many forms, we only choose portions of it and sometimes we even deliberately choose to deny our Truest forms of Love when those Beings are present because they may be occupied in lower forms of being, some even being very distressed. We also have those times when we unintentionally ignore an opportunity for closer relationship with our Truer Loves, and somewhere inside, which can be verified through effective hypnosis, we can find that we were perceiving more than we outwardly acknowledged or realized. But are we willing to admit it? Or maybe we reach for lower, more outward versions of our more inward Loves, so we can more comfortably reach them from our current outward positions in matter. But when we do, we find these outward examples lacking what we Truly Love while our Truer Loves are still busy working on matters as well, hoping to find us.

Our prayers need to be given with a more open appreciation of the inner states of being that we are praying to and for. When we pray to, we are praying to move toward that point of prayer. When we pray for, we are praying for that point of prayer to be applied in some way. Our givings must match our prayers or we are distorting our relationships to the inner state of prayer. This may be an unwillingness, or even a rigid expectation that does not match the actualized state of being that we are praying to or for. We may pray for something and then turn away when it appears. Why turn away? Because we have to learn to look through the matters of life to see and perceive the deeper Knowings and to open ourselves through our matters in life so we can live in Harmony and accord with our Truer Loves. But we may need to give some outward loves away to make space for the inner, and this begins our willingness to find our deeper friends, reasons and Loves in life.

The living forms of the inner states look different that the static definitions created through some particular, isolated expressions. The points within are within everything and everyone, and they live in our moments on the basis of how we value and recognize them. We mistakenly think the inner states are not within, instead believing them to be without, and this happens because we have seen, read, or heard about someone else’s inner connection; we hear about it outside of ourselves and fail to realize it was an inside experience for them. We should instead be centered on an appreciation that the inner states of being exist in every one of us and that we need to focus on showing a truer gratitude when we encounter even the least examples of these. And this should be when the least is in ourselves or someone else…because in either case, it is the inner truth showing through.

What will we focus our lives on? Our prayers are the focused intentions of our life actions being planted and realized. What are we praying for? and what are we praying to?

Imagine Adam’s prayer during the creation of Eve. He goes so deep into his heart, he falls into deep sleep; not resting sleep, deep meditative sleep where he goes to the most inner True Love he Knows. He then focuses on the Truest Love he knows and gives this innermost Love to the outermost side of his total self, thereby creating woman. We then have True Love in human form, where Adam is the true side and Eve is the love side. And together they form True Love in human form.

This is the meaning of prayer and it shows the True Love of giving of Self. If and when these two are joined, humanity has known True Love and humanity’s reason has been further realized in Truth and Love. These points are within each one of us. Do we look for them? Do we look to bring them together? Do we recognize them in our lives and relationships? When they are in trouble do we pray for them and help them? Are we willing to look through the conditions of life to find them? Or do we deny them, fear them, hate them and find condemning fault with them?

It is a lot like our moments of death. Do we close our eyes and grimace at passing, or do we smile and embrace the summing of our life’s value? We can live with our eyes and hearts shut, acting like we do not perceive love and truth and care and promise, and this denial can even be present at death…but I think we do inwardly sense we are passing by, through, or with something significant. When we open to feel love and truth, we can. We can even feel life through death if we keep our eyes and hearts open. And we can feel the beings and Beings within when we open our hearts and minds to them and to what we inwardly represent and want to truly be more in love with.

Our prayers are heard and they are answered, but we have to be willing to acknowledge the Love and Truth becoming more clearly known to us. If we hold rigidly to lesser versions of ourselves and others, we will never know what Heaven Knows. But if we are willing to open our hearts and minds to what is Truer and more Loving, we will be shown the pathway to a more Truthful and Loving being. And may we pray to be more Loving and more True when we encounter that being.

September 22, 2009 at 11:23 | sensei

ML... you say, "I can't say I actually perceive significant Beings."

Sensei says (among other things)..."The living forms of the inner states look different that the static definitions created through some particular, isolated expressions."

this gets me to thinking about expectations of perception... for a very long time my perception of God was as an old man... when i would pray i would try to imagine this man who lives in heaven, another concept that i felt i couldn't perceive... so for years i said i couldn't say i actually perceived God... the problem wasn't that i wasn't perceiving God... the problem was i had no understanding of what that meant...

so it seems it could be the same when we say something like we can't actually perceive significant Beings... but, we can (and do) perceive significant Beings... we just don't understand that's what we are doing... speaking for myself, i wasn't understanding that what i was perceiving was significant Beings because my expectation of what that perception would be like was not what i actually experienced (and in fact do experience all the time)... it is a lack of understanding rather than lack of perception. I understand this better today after a significant experience with Sensei's help... navigating around the inner landscape i experienced in far more aware and concentrated form the significant Being called guilt... the significant Being called feeling Bad... the significant Being called "i'm not sure"... the significant Being called "confusion"... were (and are) they significant?... so significant in fact that when hanging around them without understanding, i even become physically ill and disoriented... so, if i want to sit with the Being called guilt, for example, i need a better understanding of that Being... without understanding i suffer pain when i am with that Being... that Being's function is to BE guilt... so, with better understanding comes peace and with peace came stillness...

so maybe for some of us it is more familiar and therefore easier to acknowledge that we have been with significant Beings such as "guilt", etc... but if there is a significant Being called "guilt" which is so familiar, it isn't a very far stretch to understand there are also other Beings... like Jesus, Buddha, etc.,, and that we have also perhaps encountered those Beings without having spent enough time in the presence of the significant Being of understanding to even know it...

September 23, 2009 at 7:46 | JO

JO,

It seems to me we need a definition of “Being”. What is this? Is it an entity with a soul, or is it the “personification” of positive and negative factors that influence us? I was taking it, from what sensei said, as being the former, and if so, I find that very difficult to accept.

That doesn’t mean that if that is the correct interpretation (entities with a soul who have lived and in some sense continue to live), I don’t believe that sensei can’t detect these Beings, only that, in the absence of that kind of perception, I can only say that accepting that would be, for me personally, a kind of lie. My position is analogous to a blind man accepting that I saw the sky as blue, but at the same time being aware he himself had not actually seen the sky and had no idea what blueness was. Only by gaining sight himself would he be able to verify what I saw. So it’s not skepticism, so much as acknowledging the fact of an absence of perception.

If your interpretation is correct, then it seems somewhat different. Sensei has in another context used the word “model” in the term “Christ model”, and if I understand correctly, referred to that as a state of being, not a person. Jesus was the incarnation of a particular soul, initially incarnated as Adam, who came to live out and activate for the rest of us the potential of that model. So there is a kind of Beingness in the model, but it doesn’t in and of itself have a soul as I understand it. That it has real existence as a kind of archetype or pattern, and that we can sometimes be aware of it, each to a degree dependent on his or her point of dwell, is something I can more readily understand and accept.

I suppose I want to be quite clear in my own mind what “Being” means. If it refers to a model or form or archetype, then I can accept that and see the merit in regarding Beings as real and existent at every moment. But if they are particular souls, if we are talking about Jesus or Buddha, or for that matter Ghengis Khan, as actual entities with a soul, and who exist and influence us and can be perceived, I have more difficulty.

I realise that what sensei means by “Being” may be more nuanced than the concepts I have been discussing. I’m grateful for your contribution because it has helped me identify what it might be that is causing my difficulty and express it in a form that sensei might be able to address. Before you contributed, I was at sixes and sevens as they say...

September 23, 2009 at 10:19 | ML

Being in the eternal plane and being in the temporal plane, which is an aspect of the eternal, refers to a state of being, a way of being, something being, someone being what is, has been and will be in something that is, that was and will be. It represents and refers to “be”ing and anything and anyone that is, was and will… and to the many ways that can be expressed and that which is being expressed and that from which the expression comes, serves and intends.

Being, being of, and being a certain way means that something has been, is being or will be that way. Nothing can be unless it is.

Thoughts, ideas, feelings, dreams, memories…everything…attitudes, knowings, inspirations, and inventions are all from being and beings being the form of that being. It was written, “to be or not to be,” and many believe this refers to living or dying, but it really refers to being this or something other than this.

When we believe there are no beings, we fellowship with the beings who believe that. When we believe that all beings are good, we fellowship with the beings who believe that. When we believe in fear, we fellowship with other beings of fear. This happens outwardly and inwardly and the inward will produce more outward.

There are many ways to be and there have been many ways of being recorded within the human and also recorded on the outside in our history, architecture, art, music, language, science, religion and more. Just as there are beings dwelling in various states of being in our outside world, there are beings dwelling in various ways in our inside worlds.

Being in the spiritual plane means something is being in the spiritual plane and there are many ways of being, therefore there are many states of being and these can only be because they have been, are being or will. For anything to be it has to become, and to become is to come to being that which is the way that defines it.

There are states of being that exist because- meaning caused to be- they were animated or existing in the form described by the state of being that they were being, or are being or will be. Beings must always exist for anything to be. If something is being something, then something has to be the something that is being what the something is. Nothing exists unless it is. When nothing becomes something, it is. It is not always what we think it is, but it is. Any form of being may have more or less to do with what it is being. This is why we must be careful in how we judge the way something or someone is, has been or is becoming.

When I speak of beings I am referring to the beings being the beings I am referring to. Even general states of being have beings being them or they would not be states of being. Souls are beings and they exist as they have been and are now being. The current state of being of certain souls can be different from what the being was being before but the being that was being the experience of the soul is still being something, and the newer something includes all that it has been and how it combines the many beings into a way or state of being in the current moment.

Some beings have been being what they are being more consistently that some beings that are less consistent. Some more consistent ways of being become tendencies and pulsars in the starry heavens are examples of this type of being. Some beings tend more to conduct higher forms of love and truth and some beings tend to deny truer love and more loving truth. Archetypes exist because something is being them. If the somethings that are being them were to cease being them, they would no longer be.

Some people may think that beings that are no longer being are still being but only as memories. But the only way the memories can still be is when the beings that were being them are still being, even though they may also be being something else and they may also have been something and will become something else.

The potential for what has not yet become a state of being is still being the potential and the potential will still be the potential even when it gives itself to become a being other than the potential. The only way the potential can cease to be is when the potential has been changed in form from the potential in every regard, and even then the potential will be existing as a being that became the being that it gave itself to become. In this example, the potential would still be within those beings that Knew it.

Some states of being are inhabited by many beings, while others are uniquely sparse and even solo states of being. The state of being created by the being of a being living in that way of being, can also be being in that state by other beings that have adopted the way of being in that particular state, who might continue the way of being that form of being while the former being or beings being that way moved on to another way of being. The ones moving on bring with them a sense of the former state of being, which can influence the new state of being, and it can even know that influence if it still Knows what it was being before it became what it currently is. And if it does become aware, it will change the state of being to one that also Knows what it is, based on what it was, and taken further, it can also come to Know itself to realize what it is becoming.

Within each of us is an awareness of our former states of being, our current inner states of being and what we have come to be and are becoming. Even our current and past current relationships over time in eternity are affecting our being what we have been, are being and will become. We do not typically access this awareness because of the space within us that lacks an awareness of it, or because we are tending to dwell in states of being that are in denial of our greater awareness. Negative beings and negative states of being tend more toward this, not because of something necessarily bad, but because the relative negative state turns us away from the more Knowing being positions within.

Maybe we do not have enough relationship with the beings within that do Know, or maybe we are moving away from being what that Knowing would reveal. There are many values for being and each value reasons according to its position.

Knowing the beings and Beings is to know ways of being and to Know Ways of Being. Our inner world is made up of a myriad of beings and states of being just as we can see outward examples of in life. Remember, whatever has come to be, has come to be from within!

Look at the stars and galaxies in space and know that those stars are also within you. They all came from within and so have you. Everything that has ever been is still existing within everything that is. It is our way of dwelling in the moment that makes us more or less aware of everything that is.

September 23, 2009 at 15:45 | sensei

Sensei,

I hardly know what to say.

Thoughts, ideas, feelings, dreams, memories…everything…attitudes, knowings, inspirations, and inventions are all from being and beings being the form of that being.

I was contemplating what you’ve said about being while lying in bed, not concentrating on intellectual analysis, but in an awareness that all I imagine myself to be is actually a conglomeration of various beings. And out of that arose an awareness of the presence of a significant Being I’m very rarely aware of – one that I take to be my Self. I think I once before had a similar awareness; on that occasion, the Being was noble, loveable, but this time it was fearless, adventurous, strong, free, not the timorous little creature I am more used to. It was as if my beings have been limiting me, filtering me through a thousand obscuring lenses.

How odd it is that I should have limited myself. As I write, the presence of this Being is fading, becoming a being of memory. I wonder what it would be like to be centred in It in ongoing present awareness.

September 24, 2009 at 14:07 | ML

Existing in memories of past lives, time between lives and real time 'journeys' to the other side are beings and states of beings. I have had experiences in each of these circumstances, and during those experiences I have seen actual beings being in various states of being, ranging from active to passive.

One time, in a meditation class with around 30 other people, Sensei said, "Go to your star."

I found myself rapidly moving through space, and quickly arriving on what seemed to be a small, dark airless planet or moon. There was a single lit building there, and inside was a laboratory. In the middle of the laboratory was a table. Gathered around the table were some people (beings). One of them was the leader, while the others seemed to be assistants. They were studying what was centered in the middle of the table. It was a globe, hovering, and was approximately 2.5 feet in diameter. It was the earth. Whether it was the actual earth or a scale model was not clear to me. They were viewing the earth as a project.

"Look at the stars and galaxies in space and know that those stars are also within you. They all came from within and so have you. Everything that has ever been is still existing within everything that is. It is our way of dwelling in the moment that makes us more or less aware of everything that is."

September 24, 2009 at 16:52 | MW

MW,

Thanks for your examples of experiences as a student of sensei. You did actually refer to such things back at HR, and I think I expressed at that time my wariness about them because spiritual figures have warned us not to get too attached to them or substitute the seeking of them for the seeking of Truth.

I still think these admonitions are valid, but I think I may have failed to credit the fact that you weren’t and aren’t seeking them for their own sake, but rather the Truth; and this is also where I am trying to maintain my focus. More than anything, I want to Know the Truth and to live that out, to exist in that Truth. I want to be a Being existing entirely in Truth, insofar as my particular capacities allow.

As for sensei, I feel an affinity with him, as if he’s a companion that somewhere, somewhen, I have met, and whom, unbeknownst to me, I have been missing. A big brother, perhaps, or somesuch. It’s as if we once travelled together over some forgotten landscape, some timeless, sepia–tinted scene. At some stage, maybe I wandered off and got lost and he faded from memory, though I still felt the missing of something.

I think this may be just how current consciousness is framing my feeling of affinity. But I suspect there is an element of truth in it, that it represents in its own particular way some harmonic of an existent relationship, a certain state of being.

September 25, 2009 at 0:33 | ML

ML...

it seems to me what you are describing is an experience...(as MW is offering one of his many experiences)...you describe an experience of affinity, of someone you have been missing, a fellow traveler, brother, etc.... all from thousands of miles away... it seems to me that is a very valuable experience!... from what you post, it is clear you value this experience... (the way MW is valuing his as well)... so, what does one do with these experiences?... i'm thinking this is why Sensei talks about principles so much... because to stop at the experience itself is to close a door in a way (or to ground out)... it seems to me this closing off is what eventually leads us to devalue our experiences, deny they ever happened the way we remember them, and come up with more "rational" explanations for them... so while i agree with you in what you say about attachment to the experience as the end in and of itself, i do think it is important to keep respecting, appreciating, being grateful for, and finding value in those experiences for how they can (and do) point the way toward deeper truth...

September 25, 2009 at 10:24 | JO

JO,

I agree with the general thrust of what you say. We can ground out the energy of our experiences if we so wish. The ones I have spoken of weren’t very detailed and didn’t possess, for me, the clarity of actual perception that, say, sight brings. But let’s transpose the situation to NDE experiences, where experiencers may be able to recall in almost cinematic terms. It’s been observed that the Beings that they report seeing (Jesus, Krishna, etc.) may be culture-specific, and therefore likely to be influenced by upbringing/societal conditioning.

The skeptic seeks to ground such experiences out, dismiss them for that (and other) reasons. But I for one don’t. Whilst accepting that there are cultural influences, I believe strongly that there is an underlying truth in the experience. NDE-ers are frequently profoundly changed: they may alter their priorities and live entirely differently, in deeper, richer and more meaningful ways. Likewise, I am not dismissing the experiences I have described. I feel I am honoring them and the way they point to deeper truth.

You see, if I were to accept them literally, and they weren’t in fact literal, but figurative representations of truth, to my way of thinking, that would be grounding out their real potential. Think of those who believed in past times in spontaneous generation, i.e. that simple organisms could arise spontaneously from inorganic matter. They were hampered because they didn’t have instruments (e.g. microscopes) and techniques (the developing scientific method) for determining what was really happening, that living organisms were arising from previous living organisms. And so, they honored what they actually perceived, which was organisms seemingly arising spontaneously where none had been before. Therefore, it was they rather than the experimenters and microscopists who effectively closed off and grounded out the potential of a deeper underlying truth.

To my mind, as soon as one makes a decision that a particular experience is definitely this or that, then one terminates its potential, its multivalence, its capacity to be something else possibly more meaningful and useful. One terminates the looping process by which one, through practice, (and scientific practice, for me, shares much in common with sensei’s practice of the art of giving), approaches nearer and nearer, goes deeper and deeper.

I’ve only mentioned a couple of experiences, but there are others that are ongoing that don’t have the character of “revelatory impressions”, so much as a delightful and spontaneous arisings of new ways of apprehending things that I have observed and thought about many times over the years. You will be aware of my admiration for Rupert Sheldrake and his theory of morphic resonance, and what sensei has said has enriched my appreciation of that; transformed it from something primarily intellectual to something more experiential and participative.

One can sense a beingness in all sorts of things: take, for example, the many different musical, literary, artistic, architectural (to name a few) genres; or cultural forms; or the spirit of a given age...

Or, there is my very recent realization that scientists are worshippers of the Being of Truth, whom they pray to, honor and obey, even though they try to limit science to the non-spiritual realm. They are every bit as much “seekers after Truth” as those who would normally call themselves such, and, like them, subject to matterwards influences that make them less effective in their quest than they could be. And, realizing that also hints that overtly spiritually-oriented types may fall into the parallel trap of dismissing the worth of Science, of grounding out its very real potential in helping us progress in knowledge and understanding.

Or, something that has long been taxing me, the meaning and significance of Islam in the modern world. 9/11 was a very great shock for so many of us, and I, one who had studied Sufism for many years and therefore come to a benign and respectful understanding of Islam and Mohammed, was thrown into confusion. The more I studied orthodox interpretations of Islam, its scriptures and adherents, the more I came to see very great problems with it. How to reconcile my erstwhile respect with some very troubling observations about it? How to avoid developing an antipathy to it and to Muslims in general?

This antipathy has a life, a being of its own, as does the experience of Muslims who find themselves, having once been at the forefront of human development in places like Moorish Spain, now tending to live in backwards nations, or sometimes, virtual ghettoes in the West. They may have great difficulty in coming to terms with what has happened to them; there may be a tension between their devotion to their religion and their place in the general affairs of humanity. There may also be a defensiveness: it can’t be that Allah has favoured the Kafirs; it must be that what the Kafirs have achieved is relatively worthless, and only a return to the basic principles of Islam will rectify the situation.

The being of Islam in modern times has become backward-looking, and that can be seen as grounding out its developmental potential for some Muslims. In extreme cases, it may be leading to violence, intolerance and misery, probably as much in Muslim lands as anywhere else.

By being able to view my own tendency to antipathy, and Islam itself, as having being, I am becoming more able to abstract my Self from personal involvement, from being swept away by identification. There is a truth in the current being of Islam, albeit that it is incapacitating, invalid-ating, for some Muslims. Thus I am more able to understand, to empathize, to be compassionate. None of this is to say that all is perfect in non-Muslim societies, which also have a being with characteristics that can’t be said to be wholly admirable.

For me, this is a very significant thing. It offers me a chance to develop my own being, which previously was tending to become grounded out, to become fixed and inflexible. Sensei’s teachings are generally causing new currents to flow in circuits that once could have been deemed terminally grounded.

September 26, 2009 at 2:11 | ML

ML, you say the following..."as soon as one makes a decision that a particular experience is definitely this or that, then one terminates its potential"

i think this sums up really well what i was getting at (but you have stated more clearly)... regardless of one's way, whether it is the religion of science or the religion of Islam or the religion of Christianity, etc., it seems to me the human tendency to be declarative about this or that inevitably opens the door to bias and therefore error... even science for all its methodology often turns out to be wrong with further study and information... scientists like to think they are open minded, but how open are they really? there are differing levels of openness, but how tightly someone clutches to their methods and declarations and interpretations versus how much room they allow for adjustment seems to me a good indicator of how much someone really loves the truth...

It was probably rhetorical but your question gets me to thinking, "How to avoid developing an antipathy to it and to Muslims in general?"... one could easily substitute other words in for where you have put the word "Muslim"... how to avoid developing an antipathy for strict adherents to anything, whether it be antipathy on the part of some Christians for scientists who want to teach evolution in schools, or antipathy on the part of some atheists for Christians who believe in God, or antipathy for Muslims because of 9/11 or antipathy for Christians because of the inquisition, crusades, etc.... so, what does antipathy accomplish?... at any point in history the anger could be pointed in any direction, really, because whenever the finger gets pointed outwardly humans can and will create and see enemies all around with the inevitable interpretation that they are "right" and everyone else is "wrong" ...

by making adjustments and facing more inwardly we have the capacity to not only effect change within ourselves and benefit our own lives but we are also capable therefore of effecting change throughout humanity... if we really are all as "one", then if i make an adjustment in my inner landscape or learn to overcome this or that struggle, i would hope this adjustment isn't something solely limited to my own benefit (if that were true what would really be the point of my trying... any benefit would end with me )... how much more motivation i have for continuing to practice when i understand the effort isn't solely for me and my benefit, but i am actually being of some use to others, both others who are in my nearby life, and others as a more general term... if more of us were willing to actually do that all of humanity could make significant progress toward peaceful coexistence and reconciliation...

it gives me a fresh burst of motivation to think about how awesome it will be not only for me but for others who dwell in the rooms with the beings of guilt and self doubt when, after having gone pretty deeply into those dwelling points myself, i can also find my way out of them ... and therefore be a participant in paving the way for others ...this also makes me feel even more grateful to those who are willing to help me in that paving, who see me struggling in those dark caves and are willing to go in there and find me where i am stuck and shine a light toward the exit because they've been there before too... we're all pathfinders and trailblazers (whether Nissan or Chevrolet, we're finding and making the way together)... :)

September 28, 2009 at 7:30 | JO

As for sensei, I feel an affinity with him, as if he’s a companion that somewhere, somewhen, I have met, and whom, unbeknownst to me, I have been missing. A big brother, perhaps, or some such. It’s as if we once travelled together over some forgotten landscape, some timeless, sepia–tinted scene. At some stage, maybe I wandered off and got lost and he faded from memory, though I still felt the missing of something.

ML,

I certainly feel the same thing about Sensei. I declared a long time ago that he is my teacher, from this life and past lives - I have recalled other lives together. The recalls have been actual memories. Some of them have been the recollection of scenes in past lives. Other recollections have been deeper, inner feelings... 'knowings'. Either of these - actual recalls of scenes/lives/events or inner knowings - are just as legitimate as the other, in my opinion. They become reliable when we learn to identify and trust what I call our deep inner truth barometer, that spot within that is our reliable Truth meter.

September 28, 2009 at 18:19 | MW

"it seems to me this closing off is what eventually leads us to devalue our experiences, deny they ever happened the way we remember them, and come up with more "rational" explanations for them..."

JO,

This is a valuable point.

When we have a deeper inner experience, what do we do with that? Enjoy it for the moment? Be intrigued over its entertainment value? These are appreciative values, and, as we have learned, the further out we go into appreciative value, the further away we get from the inner value. So, as you point out, while we may be valuing something in an appreciative sense, the very act of doing that can be devaluing or completely ignoring the inner value. This is often what happens.

We get resentful when someone comes along and points out what we are doing. And we get angry when someone comes along and puts an inner value on the same experiences that we are putting outer value on. As Sensei has pointed out, there is nothing wrong with outer value. The wrong arises when we don't find an equivalent or deeper inner value. The wrong occurs when we stop looking for the inner value, the inner message, the inner voice that is always there, always speaking. Consequently, we become habituated and call our backwards, outer-facing orientation 'normal'. And so does everyone else. We normalize upside-down, inside-out behavior.

So, as Sensei frequently points out, instead of getting resentful and angry at deeper truth, we need to learn to love and embrace deeper truth.

September 28, 2009 at 18:36 | MW

JO,

You are completely correct, I believe: One could substitute any number of things for “Islam” or “Muslims”, and each of us may have our own particular examples that we struggle with every day. They tend to ground us out, to ossify us and stop the march Sourcewards. I definitely agree with the idea that the scientific establishment is no exception to the rule – I could write thousands of words about past and present abuses by it of its own stated rules and methodology. Scientist are human like the rest of us, and can and do sometimes abuse what on paper are fine principles.

Actually, I have been thinking about what MW said concerning his “star”, where people were sitting round looking at a holographic image of earth, being Beings who perhaps have a role in observing/directing progress on our planet. From our little perspectives, we do not see the grand picture. So rather than identifying with the whole of humanity, we identify with universes of one, our immediate family, our tribe/nation, etc.

Historically, there have been all sorts of events that threatened or harmed human groups. As members of such groups, we tend to see the other as evil, perhaps forgetting that when our group was in ascendancy, we ourselves were less than fair and just with the other. Empires rise and empires fall, but somehow, the beacon of civilization continues to be carried forward for the whole of humanity.

And in that, certain notable Beings play great roles – not just the religious figures, but scientists, artists, composers, writers, statesmen, philosophers, and so on. So you are definitely right that individuals (“heroes”) can make a difference, that their message, often delivered with great courage in trying circumstances, can change the world. But of course, that can’t happen without other individuals like you and me who hear and act on the being of their message, who help give it wider being.

Something I’ve been struggling to articulate for a while now is a kind of paradox. In a way, I think each of us does actually need to be mindful of ourselves as individuals, separate from the various groupings we may feel affinity with. In this way, we can cease identification with the group, not getting carried away by jingoism.

The paradox is, that by doing this, we can come to identify with the whole of humanity, each member of which is, like us, a universe of one; equally noble and worthy of respect. We as individual Beings can thus come to be aware of the Being of the whole of humanity, and feel a part of that. So you can get to the universal via the individual, but to get to the individual, you may first have to abstract yourself from identification with familiar groupings: such-and-such a nation or religion or ideology - any number of possible beings.

When one learns to value one’s own being, one can learn to value all being. Before one can love others, one first has to learn to love oneself. Why would only oneself be lovable, and not anyone else? On the other hand, if oneself isn’t lovable, why would anyone else be? And of course, as you intimate, when we love ourselves and hence everyone else, that is bound to affect people around us who are open to us.

Hence the work, it seems, begins with ourselves: “Know thyself” as the saying goes. Know all the beings, positive and negative, that are in play inside oneself, and be able to judge their value and how to deal with them. By going inside ourselves, we gradually go more and more into the whole of humanity.

September 28, 2009 at 20:13 | ML

MW,

You are fortunate that you have such strong intimations; I myself (so far, anyway), never have. I don’t doubt what you say, but can only report my own intimations. But despite mine being more “fuzzy”, I believe I am respecting, honoring and showing gratitude for them. I agree strongly that we need to learn to identify/trust our Truth meter (or detector as I have referred to it in earlier postings).

It may be that you have a longer and stronger association with sensei, and that that at least in part accounts for your experiences. Perhaps one reason I don’t have such strong ones is that I tend to get the “heebie-jeebies” about such things. Maybe I am closing myself off to them, or, on the other hand, maybe we each have different ways of responding to similar stimuli, each of which could be equally valid given our specific natures and experience.

Whatever the case might be, I do feel for the first time an affinity with someone I am happy to call my teacher. However “weak” my intimations, rest assured, their presence is something extremely valuable to me.

September 28, 2009 at 21:09 | ML