Peace, if You want it.

There’s an old saying: Peace begins within. But peace is also something we have to choose. It doesn’t begin if we don’t start. After we stop, that is.

As Velcrow Ripper, the maker of the film Fierce Light observed, activism alone will not bring peace. But nor will meditating alone. Find peace within, then bring it into the world.

As John Lennon famously put it, “If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there’d be peace.”

Did you know of Peace Day? That in 2001, the UN unanimously adopted a global ceasefire and non-violence day every Sept. 21? It’s been building for over a decade. With remarkable accomplishments the world over.

It’s called Peace One Day and it has quite a story.

Now they’re targeting a Global Truce for Sept 21, 2012.

Imagine all the people living life in peace.
You may say I’m a dreamer,
but I’m not the only one.
I hope someday you’ll join us,
and the world will live as one.
— John Lennon, Imagine

Will you join us?

Breaking Inertia

Inertia is a natural state of energy. In Sanskrit, they use the term Tamas. When in motion, it is known as Rajas. But they also have a third state known as Sattva, generally translated as purity. This is similar to Tamas in the sense of being more still but is it’s the opposite in quality. Where Tamas is resistance, Sattva is peace.

When we face inertia in our lives, it is usually due to change. The shifting of a state from still to moving. We may often experience change with resistance, emotionally as fear.

Fear does not have to mean no. Just caution. Is this the step we want to take? Then just be OK with what arises. Let fear be there if it comes, then it will pass. And do it.

Rajas will then arise to transform and ideally settle into sattva. However, we will soon find sattva may have degraded, becoming tamas. (lack of sleep, for example) Change is then necessary to transform it again.

If we are able to connect internally with our true nature, the energy will degrade into tamas less and less. Inertia will become less of an issue. However, the purer we get, the more inclined deeper inertia will come to the surface for its transformation. That process may make it seem like a never-ending series. But the difference is that now we’re rebuilding the whole environment, not just maintaining it. The profound benefits of that will soon become apparent.
Davidya

Necessary Expectation

I’ve had a couple of interesting conversations recently around expectation. I’m written on expectations before for a variety of reasons. Expectations can be a cause of suffering and a barrier to awakening. Yet they are also required for life and the fullness of enlightenment. The key, as with all things, is in our relationship with expectations rather than the expectations themselves.

As my friend put it: “it’s impossible to not have positive expectations. Otherwise why would people even go out on a second date?” Another friend had spouted the “Buddhist” teaching that desire has to end for enlightenment. (I don’t think that’s what Buddha meant)

In order to act and live in the world, there has to be an impetus or desire. In fact, the world itself exists because of desire. It has to be wanted. In order to want it, we have to know its value. Parents spend years teaching their children the value of one thing over another.

Put another way, to want it, we have to have positive expectations of its value. To have good expectations, we have to have knowledge. Thus, knowledge is necessary for expectations, expectations for desire, and desire for action. For best action, we want best knowledge.

This relates all the way from the desire for a cookie to the desire for full enlightenment. In fact, as Vasistha notes in the 7th Mandala of the Rk Veda, we have to want the fullness of enlightenment for it to unfold. So many teachers are suggesting that Self Realization is it. So it’s very important to understand it’s not – that’s the knowledge part.

The trouble and suffering part come with identification. When we relate to those desires as MY desires. They are my desires and I want them, I expect them. Indeed, we live in a culture that fosters a sense of entitlement, telling us of all the material goods we deserve and offering us credit to get it before we’ve earned it. (Why you’re not rich)

In fact, it’s the basis of the recent financial meltdown. Some people knowingly selling toxic financial products because they feel entitled to make lots of money. And other people who feel entitled to buy things they can’t afford. We may just say greed, but what is the driver?

It all serves to illustrate writ large how suffering works. This is not to say we shouldn’t desire big. But it’s necessary to act to get results and act in a rightful manner.

What confuses us a little is that sometimes, things just land in our lap. Through no apparent effort, the least attention yields fulfillment. In the east, they teach us that this is actually an example of karma; our past action has now borne fruit. In the west, we say “What you sew, so shall you reap“. This is lesson we seem to have forgotten in the west.

Another term they have in the east is tapas or warming. The idea is that we perform actions toward a goal, warming up the possibilities for it to unfold. We cannot predict when or how it will gel. Mainly because the field of karma is inclusive of everything, making it unfathomable. But we can know that what goes around comes around. No effort is wasted.

So expect the best. But don’t be too attached to the form it shows up in. Sometimes, nature has an even better idea.
Davidya

The Leading Edge

The consequences of Quantum Physics theory are still unfolding. As theorists explore the implications of various discoveries, further exploration takes place seeking proofs. Some scientists question if this is really science as some of the ideas are technically unprovable. Plus, they seem to hold to equations past their due date, even if they require things like undetectable (dark) matter that is much greater than observable matter.

At the same time, the theories are bringing science progressively closer to fundamental reality as posited by the seers of old. Some scientists have seen this and it’s “loony” consequences. But they still tend to hold on to parts of a materialist perspective, leading to some curious distortion.

For example, in the following article in Scientific American, they explore free will and determinism from a quantum mechanical perspective.

Free Will and Quantum Clones: How Your Choices Today Affect the Universe at its Origin

(I’ve written on this subject previously)

The logic is interesting. He suggests that to determine if our choices are deterministic (driven by the past, etc) or are actual free will requires that we’re able to map the brain. However, the brain is increasingly understood to be quantum mechanical itself. As a quantum state is a probability, you can’t precisely map it. (wave vs particle) If you can’t accurately map brain activity, you can’t predict choice.

That leads to the point that it’s more a matter of degree of choice than a black and white division. And this leads to an explanation for “spooky action at a distance.” It’s not so much that your choice instantly changes particles at a great distance but that your choice and the particle are intertwined. The outcome is prearranged in the past. Everything “…can all be traced to the initial state of the universe.“

“…in a deterministic universe, those [sic] is no justification for saying that the initial state caused the decision; it is equally valid to say that the decision caused the initial state. After all, physics is reversible. What determinism means is that the state at one time implies the state at all other times. It does not privilege one state over another. Thus your decision [now], in a very real sense, creates the initial conditions of the universe.“

This is known as backward causation or retro-causality, one of the consequences of Quantum theory. While we experience time and causality flowing forward, there is no reason to suggest there is a physical law that constrains this. There have been experiments that suggest the future can influence the past and I’m seen experiences of the same.

“What you are is the confluence of countless chains of events that stretch back to the dawn of time. Every decision you make depends on everything you have ever learned and experienced, coming together in your head for the first and only time in the history of the universe. The decision you make is implicit in those influences, but they have never all intersected before. Thus your decision is a unique creative act.

This is why even the slightest violation of free will in a quantum entanglement experiment beggars belief. “Free will” in such an experiment means simply that your choice of what to measure is such a distant cousin of the particle’s behavior that the two have never interacted until now.“

Ironically, quantum mechanics has a principle of unitaryness (hence quantum) implying determinism. Determinism is thus the foundation of choice or free will. And as he observes, predictability doesn’t mean unfree. “compatibilism: I see no contradiction whatsoever between determinism and free will, because they operate at two different levels of reality. Determinism describes the basic laws of physics. Free will describes the behavior of conscious beings.“

It should be noted that science assumes complete free will in order to have objective results in experiments. They also assume life and consciousness are emergent properties from “particles’ collective behavior“. Essentially, that our awareness is accidental.

The model is still upside down as compared to the sages of old. In that perspective, particles and indeed the entire Unitary quantum state is an emergent property of consciousness. This can be verified by direct experience through systematic research in consciousness.

The article also implies the profound intelligence of creation in that every choice in all history is contained within its initial intention to be. Although I would suggest it’s better to think of it as containing every experience it wished to have. Does that sound accidental?

The article suggests your unique role in having unique experiences of creation, the core of your purpose I’ve spoken about here before.
Davidya.

Why Does Happiness Leave?

When someone suggests life is bliss and that it unfolds in an ocean of love (as I do), it may be a little hard to accept or even fathom. Our fullest experiences of happiness are often fleeting. Often we have trouble even remembering them.

What most of us routinely experience as happiness is the emotional variety. The emotions are our way of experiencing the energy qualities of life. But as they express in the field of action and change, they inherently come and go. Energy is also a flow between and thus has polar values; positive and negative, yin and yang, etc. This is why we experience emotions as polar – happy and sad, fear and love, and so forth.

The sages tell us that the issue is getting caught by our experiences and forgetting who we are underneath the noise. We get absorbed in the senses and emotions and thoughts that arise and are thus buffeted by the winds of change. We experience them as “mine” or me.

But underneath all the drama of action is the field in which it plays out, the ocean of pure existence. This is the field of the play of consciousness, the experiencer, that which you truly are.

When we step back into pure awareness, we discover the silent peace that we are, beneath the waves on the surface. In time, we shift from experiencing that to being it (as we already are); we become the peace.

From that peace, we discover that the surface or edge of expression is a lively field of happiness. Each time we step into or out of silence, we might notice a wave of bliss. Once established in being or Self, the happiness comes to be with us all the time, even in deep sleep. Even during the most difficult experiences of life.

All of us know, at some deep level, that it’s there. Although it may not have made a memory impression, all of us have had some glimpses.

Most remarkable, this is just the foundation of full enlightenment. Eternal peace and happiness are just the beginning of the remarkable unfolding of what it means to be fully human.
A fine thing indeed.
Davidya

Scale

Here’s something to give you an idea of the scale of our universe – to the limits of current science.

http://htwins.net/scale/index.html

There’s a link to a “swirly” version at the bottom if you want to have fun with the zoom.

Nassim Haramein observes that we’re right about the middle of the scale. That suggests it’s because we’re the observer. The universe itself is larger than we yet know and is in turn contained within an even larger structure, etc. etc. Such visualizations as this do help us get a sense of it though.

 

My-Stery

I was amused by a little word play during a talk I heard yesterday. They said the Mystery of life was in my story. The Mystery was My story.

Not so much mystery when we’re not caught in my story…

Remember This

Memory is a very curious thing. While it’s a dominant aspect of our experience, science does not yet understand it. We can trigger memories from the brain but they’re not actually stored in the brain. Dr. Rupert Sheldrake suggests memories are stored “in the field”. The idea is that memories are stored “in mind” and accessed via the brain. In other words, the brain is a receptor rather than a storage device. It needs synaptic patterns to more easily access the mind patterns and retrieve the memories.

Our brain is constantly being rewired to attune to more recent and relevant experiences. This shifts what memories are most easily available. Science tells us that during dreams at night, we purge synaptic  connections that are less relevant or related to the priorities of our attention.

The body also stores memories or impressions. We tend to describe these as “sub-conscious” as they’re more primitive in mechanism and not “in mind”. We experience them viscerally but they may trigger emotions like fear or shame.

Memories can be considered neutral or charged by our relationship to them. For example, we can have strong positive emotions around an event like falling in love. We may see it as a nice memory. Strong emotions but we relate to it neutrally. Inversely, the memory can be charged due to either a craving or a resistance or both. These “charged” memories indicate the experience is incomplete. Perhaps we feel a lack of love and thus crave it’s infatuation. Or the experience ended badly and we now try to avoid similar experiences. In either case, the charge is getting in the way of our experience of life and happiness.

Clearly, part of our journey is to resolve these charged impressions that leave us feeling somehow lacking or incomplete.

Back to the memories themselves. What is it that memories are stored in? In mind? Mind and space have a close relationship in existence. Esoteric traditions talk of the “akashic records”; a storehouse of impressions that contains all experience. Akasha is a Sanskrit term for space.

What is the mechanism for storing something non-physical in space? Let’s consider the analogy of the effect of strong experiences as conscious evolves. They say that in ignorance, strong experiences are like a line carved in rock. They make a strong impression. As we become more flexible and easy with life, they’re like a line on sand. This is more easily washed away. Then on water and finally, like a line on air. But what of a line on space? Nothing but abstract geometry. (relationship) How is that storage?

Well, it’s not. Memory doesn’t really exist. It’s an illusion of perception. But it’s difficult to describe our experience without referring to it. All experience is relative to it’s space-time container. We could say that memory is a relationship with another point in time.

Perhaps you recall that time is an effect of a point of attention moving along the flow of consciousness? That everything is really just now? That past and future don’t exist as separate times but are really just right now? That’s the secret to understanding memory. Memory is a relationship with another point of experience. A sort of mental time travel to that point of experience where it’s currently “taking place”. The relationships form a mesh I’ve talked about prior. Space is the most flexible element, allowing the greatest access. It also has a direct relationship with mind so is the easiest “recall” field. Thus, while memories appear to be stored in space, it’s more that they are related through space.

As I’ve mentioned before, we only experience other “times” from where we are now, so our experience of it evolves as we change and our relationship with it changes. This is just like how we remember was it was like to be 8 years old. We really don’t, except in a broad way. Back to the charged vs neutral bit above: when the relationship is neutral, we can see it more or less as it is. But if there is something unresolved, we have a challenged relationship that is effecting our current perception. This distortion is the root of suffering. It’s not what we experience but how we relate to it.

Everything is being experienced all at once in the eternal now. For an even great stretch, recall that all of creation is structured in the Veda, shruti, a series of sounds with a specific structure and sequence (mantra and brahmana). The Veda is structured in Smriti, divine memory. Smriti is stored in  Lucite-like slabs that store complete 3D experiences. They’re grouped by the cognizer (sage) or experiencer. But how can such experiences be stored in something that is beyond even self-awareness? They’re not really. This is simply another human-limited way of experiencing the all of everything now that is eternally present in divine… um… words fail. You can’t even describe it as being when it is beyond even the duality of being or non-being.

Happily, the principle is simple enough that we can see the unintended consequences and the means by which we can clear the roots of suffering. Happy day… er now.
Davidya

Pamela’s Story

Pamela Wilson is a teacher from the Ramana lineage. I’ve not yet heard her give satsang but have heard she’s very heart-based. She woke with Neelam whom I have met. A friend of mine sent this quote from her site. I love her approach to the stories of the mind. (Interestingly, she’s registered a church for her teaching and teaches in partnership.)

I’m not in the don’t-touch-it school. Maybe it’s my Italian heritage. I call it Mediterranean satsang. I say, “Come here, poor little story!” If the story keeps coming back, it means it’s desperate for a little loving attention.

If you are always going, “Oh, it’s just story,” of course it’s going to renew its effort: “No, I’m not!”

If a certain situation continues to arise, just let it sit with you. See it as your devotee. Grant it the compassion to be able to sit with you. Say, “Yes, you are welcome here.” Even story. In the beginning it’s good to get firm with stories, because there are way too many of them. But it’s like Reader’s Digest; you have them condensed down to the top five issues, right?

When you’re feeling strong, or if you have a friend to sit with, just sit in the silence until you’re soothed, until the body and brain are soothed, and then invite the story to come sit. It will start to activate the body, and then the brain will start to bring in strategies to fix it and try to help. So thank the brain, and then attend to what’s happening in the body. Stories have another function, other than bothering us. They’re designed to dissolve the defenses in the body. They’re like armor. So you sit with the issue, the upset, and see where it’s triggering in the body, and then just allow awareness to move into it and permeate the upset – like awareness has hands, and it’s soothing and loving.

What you’re doing is helping the body let go of the past. One of the ways the body creates release is by recreating something from the past in order to pull it out of the earth of the body. Otherwise it stays deep. This system of release is strange – almost reptilian, it’s so ancient. These bodies are from another time. Even though you get a fresh, new body every time, a lot of the defenses are recreated through thought. That’s why I say bring the story here. There’s no lack of brilliance in the design of either the body or the way it lets go, or even that this world is so harsh. Robert Adams used to call this the remedial planet, because when you really want freedom, this is where you come.

It’s sweet: the body asks for a blessing through its upset, its agitation. It’s invoking the Beloved, awareness-consciousness: “Please, master, come here. Please heal me.” And if it’s really frantic, then it will be sending out distress signals all the time. So it has another function: to awaken the Beloved. It awakens the satguru through its distress.

Ramana used to say, “I would follow a devotee into hell if need be.” So when hell or agitation arises in the body, it’s luring the satguru out of the heart. Everything is an invitation for the Buddha to awaken and bring peace, even to the body. It calls for the laying on of hands, the welcoming and soothing. Even doubt is asking for your love. Doubt is talking to you, saying, “Master, is this true?”

When you see your body and thought as your devotees, you have a completely different relationship with them. Where else are they going to go for truth?

Pamela Wilson
www.pamelasatsang.com

Anita’s Love

A friend sent me an interview with Anita Moorjani. This reflected beautifully on the recent theme of Value. Most of us have spiritual experiences as a result of a practice or circumstance. But occasionally, someone gets a glimpse of truth through dying, then coming back to tell about it. These are called NDE’s or Near Death Experiences. I’ve mentioned the Mellen-Thomas NDE here a few times. Anita’s is quite different. While in a coma with terminal cancer, she heard everything around her. When her body formally died, she apparently didn’t leave but instead felt a great deal. Her deceased father urged her to stay and fulfill her purpose. She said that her disease was the result of living in fear. She experienced her value and oneness and her fear was relieved by discovering she was love. She chose to return and her cancer was cleared in a few days.

Interview with Lilou Mace (about 47 min)

Here’s a few quotes I really enjoyed. I’ve paraphrased a bit.

Be yourself and allow, live life with abandon and the purpose of your life will unfold before you.
Don’t pursue it – it means you don’t think its yours.

When you find your centre, you can allow everything thats yours to come into your life.
When you know you are amazing and deserving then you know you just have to allow it.

Don’t try to suppress the ego or it will fight back. Just allow.

The most important take-away:
All of us, at our core, it’s who we are. We are love.
When you are totally being yourself, all you can be is love. So don’t be afraid to be who you are.

Anita Moorjani
Remember your magnificence.
anitamoorjani.com