Posts Tagged ‘Consciousness’
It’s interesting when past lives start to be remembered spontaneously.
It’s like consciousness can project itself into that life and experience it just as real as “this” life. My friend Davidya recently wrote a very fitting article on this topic which makes me laugh due to its alignment with my own experiences.
The dream world at night has the same level of (un)realness to any life, including this one.
All content is just an imaginative dream that arises within the context of awareness.
The I Am That I Am is everpresent throughout all space and time, here and now.
I Am infinite and eternal, able to call forth any aspect of myself for viewing and experience, as if the universes’ experiences were my own personal collection of movies.
I Am, here, living this human experience.
I am the watcher of the movies, not the character in the movies.
Yet the duality between the observer and the observed somehow are collapsing as well into simply just Isness.
There is the arising of Life as an expression of the I Am.
What is the I Am?
It is what I am. It is what You are. It is what All is.
There is only one true I that is. Pure beingness itself.
The I Am that you feel is the same exact I Am that I feel. That is the link that unites us.
You and I don’t have a life. You and I can’t lose our lives. We ARE Life itself.
There is One Life, flowing into and through itself. There is nothing but Life with which Life can interact with.
All mental ideas and things are but expressions of the One Life that is.
This lifetime you’re experiencing in this moment, any of your past lifetimes, the life experienced by other people, the lives lived by other conscious and unconscious beings… they are all equally dreams arising within consciousness.
You are the eternal undamageable Presence that is not subject to space and time nor anything that arises within it, the Presence that is in this world, but not of it.
I love me. I love you. I love life.
It is all One. Here and Now.
One Life, One Love, One Me, One You, One Us.
This awakening of mass consciousness that we’re seeing in humanity today, let’s put it into a larger context so that we can see where this fits. Enlightenment is not the final stage in our journey as spiritual beings, not by a long shot.
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Question:
Hey Ariel,
I just read your last post about losing your sense of identity and your memory, and it made me wonder…how do you function in the world right now?
I mean, I’m pretty scared of experiencing what you talk about, simply because it seems that this would mean being unable to fulfill life’s obligations, like finishing college, or doing your job or being there for your family. Do you know what I mean? How does everything work out for you in your current state? I mean stuff like finances and relationships or doing sports, whatever…Does it all happen synchronistically or what?
Ariel’s Response:
Great questions! These are among the questions that seem to arise the most, both from others as well as my own mind when I bring up this topic.
Let’s put it like this…
What if I told you that you could allow yourself to do what feels natural and right without worrying about how things will turn out. Would that be liberating or frightening?
What if you one day found out you were a chronic over-thinker and, simply due to habit and comfort, you thought more than you actually needed to. You had simply told yourself, innocently but incorrectly, that all this thought was actually necessary. What if it turned out that your life unfolded much more effortlessly when you weren’t busy tripping over yourself all the time. 
What if I told you that you could act in the moment without second-guessing yourself or second-guessing your actions?
If I told you that you didn’t have to constantly be worrying about the “what if’s” of life and could simply be yourself in every moment, AND that you would be totally supported in everything you did and that everything you needed would come exactly when it was necessary, would you believe that this is a viable and practical way of life?
This is a relaxation into the loving embrace of God, a surrendered trust into the arms of Creation.
Let’s look at a few topics more specifically.
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No, they exist in a subject-object relationship.
The one who watches a play is different from the one who is up on stage, acting.
Consciousness is what witnesses the mind. Without consciousness, thoughts would simply be floating in a sea of nothingness. The mind is not aware of itself, nor can it be aware of itself. Consciousness is aware of all, including the mind. Thoughts within the mind are just thoughts which arise within the sea of Consciousness.
There can be a thought that arises such as “I exist,” but it is really Consciousness which is noticing that thought, not the mind.
You are the one who is aware of the mind, not the one who thinks.
When thinking ceases for a moment in meditation, you don’t cease to exist.
When thoughts bounce around from one subject to another, you still continue to exist just the same.
Before you learned to think and speak in the english language, you existed. You are not the verbalized thoughts in your head.
You are the one who exists independently of the mind. It is Consciousness itself that is what your true nature is, not the mind. You are not the mind. The mind is something the conscious you observes, just like everything outside of you in physical reality. You are the one who sees.
Similarly, it is said that you are a Creator. Thought has no power to create whatsoever. It is consciousness/awareness focusing upon thought that leads that manifestation. Awareness is the Creator. Thus it is said that what you focus on expands. That which you think about you will experience, not because thought itself is creative, but because thought is an object upon which awareness, which is the engine of Creation, can be focused upon.
Thought is the object. Consciousness is the subject. You are Consciousness.
People talk about having a “spiritual awakening” and being a “conscious being,” but what does this really mean?
Awakening and consciousness are words that attempt to define the undefinable, so it’s only natural that there will be numerous definitions and descriptions of awakening and consciousness. Not only this, but the word means different things at different points along the spiritual path so not everyone is always talking about the same thing.
Some people use the term “awakening” to mean that I am awake and not being currently controlled by the ego. If I’m Present in the Now, I am awake, but this is only one stage in the process of awakening.
I actually use the word “awakening” to mean something very different. In my vocabulary, it is synonymous with “enlightenment.” It means to realize your true nature, not just intellectually, but to actually BE it. It is a radical shift of identity that involves the direct realization of the nonexistence of the “me” that I think I am. It is the direct experience of Oneness and Infinity/Nothingness as One’s actual Reality.
Let’s take a look at several different stages of awakening.
The following is not by any means an all-inclusive list, but it does highlight some of the common stages along the path to enlightenment.
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We tend to think that there’s an objective world out there and that we can affect and are affected by this outside world. There is a world “out there” that we are born into and interact with.
If we like the interaction between us and the outside world, we call this “good.” If we don’t like it, we call it “bad.”
The above drawing (awesome, I know, thank you 
) is how we typically perceive the world.
Notice that there is a “me” independent of the outside world who is perceiving what’s happening in the outside world. There is a sense of separation.
What’s actually going on is quite different. Let’s take a look.
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photo by ceoln
A few months back I was on a plane to Chicago. As we soared through the air at 35,000 feet, the sun was bright and intense with no clouds obscuring its light. At this altitude, it was completely obvious that the sun shines continuously and there’s nothing we need to do to “find” the sun or “connect to” the sun. Just simply sit back, relax, and be with the warmth that the sun radiates towards us. Whether we were a good person or a bad person, the sun shines just the same.
Now as we started nearing our destination, we began our descent down into the windy city. On this day, the clouds below us were particularly thick, with no gaps in the clouds. The earth below us wasn’t visible whatsoever. There was this thick cover of grayish white cloudiness obscuring our view of the earth below.
Our descent continued and the plane dropped more and more until we were just skimming the top of the clouds. Then we swooped down into them and noticed that our view of the sun’s direct light was changing as well. Sinking deeper and deeper into the clouds, it became apparent that we couldn’t really see anything at all anymore beyond the thick veil of white fogginess everywhere. There was still light around us, sure, but not really coming from anywhere in particular. It was a glow emanating from everywhere. The source was now obscured, essentially invisible even though its effects were visible.
Descending down even further, we finally popped out of the bottom of the clouds and a whole ‘nother world opened up below us. We could see land, water, buildings, vehicles, roads… What was always there but beyond our range of vision had suddenly popped into awareness.
But where had the sun gone? We intellectually knew the sun was now “above” us somewhere, but all we could see was this continuous blanket of cloudcover. That’s it. Just glowing clouds obscuring the light of the sun.
We need that sunlight. It gives us life-giving warmth and energy. If we were not getting enough sunlight, it would be absolutely silly to try and create more of it. The sunlight is already there.
What’s necessary is to dissolve the clouds obscuring the light.
When the clouds dissolve, the sunlight that was ALWAYS THERE naturally shines forth and is radiantly apparent.
Spiritual growth is just like this.
Instead of trying to become enlightened and reach this state of Oneness with all beings (which is actually the way things already are), simply let go of the veil of separation that apparently comes between you and all others. The veil is the reality created by your mind.
The reality is that God’s Love is unconditional ever-present. Like the light of the sun, it is always shining down upon the earth, no matter what. What’s necessary for us is to simply be open to receiving it, to let it in.
Don’t try to find God or find the sun or find spiritual truth or find enlightenment.
Of the many earnest, and how earnest, people we may observe reading, attending lectures, studying and practicing disciplines, devoting their energies to the attainment of a liberation which is by definition unattainable, how many are not striving via the ego-concept which is itself the only barrier between what they think they are and that which they wish to become but always have been and always will be?
-Wei Wu Wei
Just let go of all resistances to Love, of all false ideas about who you think you are, and what you will discover is that what you have been looking for has been here all along.
Question:
Dear Ariel,
How can anyone come to truth by not using their mind? Yes experience, peace and oneness are wonderful things but has it ever come to your mind that those experiences are illusions? All it really is is shifting your brain into altered states of delta, and alpha states. Shifting your brain states with a brain that eventually does turn to dust.
The mind and the brain are tools that we can use to play in this physical dimension. It’s not who we are. THAT is the key point. Disidentification with the mind.
Thanks,
M.
My response:
My question is how CAN you come to the realization of Truth by using the mind? 
If you sit around and think and think and think all day, will you one day discover the truth of what an apple tastes like?
No, you have to EXPERIENCE the taste of an apple in order to know its taste.
Is it necessary to think about the apple while you’re eating it? Not at all. You can simply sit in silence and enjoy the taste of the apple as it is chewed around in the mouth. Whether you’re thinking about the apple, thinking about what you have to do next week, or thinking about nothing at all, your senses are STILL going to register the taste of the apple.
Most people are under the belief that thought is the only way to discover Truth. Either we have the right thoughts about it and thus know it, or we are lacking the correct thoughts and thus don’t know it. Therefore we have to either learn about it, imagine it, or discover it. When the mind is seen as the sole source of authority, to know about something is the same as to actually know it. This is a delusion.
Have you ever had a bad feeling about something? I don’t mean a fear of doing something, but just an intuitive knowingness that something’s just not right. It you drive down this road, you’ll suddenly discover exactly what the “bad feeling” was telling you. How did you know? There was no possible way the mind could have known what was to come, nor any external hints to point out the danger. At first it may be just random chance, but when one starts to experiences a few of these strange “coincidences”, then dozens, then hundreds… it becomes really difficult to truly brush it off as mere chance.
What about the little children who are born and at the age of 3 or 4 can already play the cello like a master, recite major historical facts, and demonstrate other amazing talents that no one can quite pinpoint from where they were developed?
What about those situations when you’re in a state of “flow” with life. You don’t know what’s to come or what to expect, yet everything seems to happen perfectly. You naturally say the right things, doors open up for you, situations somehow fall into place effortlessly, you just so happen to keep making the right decisions. This state of flow may only last for a short period of time, but there’s clearly something that’s been tapped into.
There’s other seemingly mystical sources of knowingness. (Mystical is nothing magical. It simply implies that which is unseen, perhaps undetectable by our physical senses.)
The mind is not the only source of knowledge for us to tap into.
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