Householder and Monk

We’ve been slowly rising out of a dark age spiritually. For some time, real spiritual progress was best achieved by withdrawing from the heaviness of the world. Thus, for hundreds of years, the most illustrious examples of enlightenment have often been monks and nuns. Many traditions have come to teach the renunciate path as the only way to enlightenment.

While this has been relatively true for a time, it is no longer true. As world consciousness rises, dharma is restored and householders can once again make decent progress. Some are becoming remarkable shining lights. Older history shows many past examples as well. The majority of ancient texts like the Rk Veda were written by householders.

A householder is one who is out in the world, with work, family, and so forth. A renunciate or recluse is one who withdraws to an ashram, monastery or cave. The vast majority of people are the first.

The renunciate path you can recognize by its Neti Neti (not this, not this) approach. It is a disconnecting from all expression, seeking only the depths of silent being. The reality of the person is denied. Some promote this as the only truth. But there is a different approach for the householder.

For them, it is in some ways the opposite. And this, and this. A householder is obliged to very much engage their person as an aspect of their expression. They add the full range of creation to their daily life.

In the back of the book Science of Being, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi describes the “Paths to God Realization.” In it, he specifies that the Intellectual path of discrimination is the path of the renunciate. Other paths, such as that of action & perception, devotion, and so forth are generally householder paths.

If a householder tries to follow a renunciate path, they will succeed at neither. Very simply because they will be in conflict. Their natural inclinations will fight their practice. But because of teaching influences, many householders drift in a kind of middle ground, with one foot in each.

They pursue long daily spiritual practice while trying to hold down work and a life. Or they focus on practices that are better for monks such as long retreats or a deep practice of inquiry.

I say this from experience. When I first read Maharishi’s reference above, I thought this meant I had to be a renunciate. I didn’t even know how.(laughs) When I began, long practice was more necessary for good progress. But millions of meditators have softened and smoothed the way.

We have to note that it’s not all black and white, as my error above indicated. Many people are inclined to a combination of paths. Royal or Raja Yoga itself, outlined in the Yoga Sutras, is a blend of Yogas.

Further, people’s personalities vary. More introverted people will have reclusive tendencies, even if they’re householders. And renunciates may benefit from some activity in the world. Many do good works, for example.

This also does not mean a householder should not take periods of retreat from the world for rest, healing and deepening. And some retired people may find retreat ideal. But only the renunciate should pursue this over all. The householder should not see withdrawing as an escape from worldly troubles or a means to enlightenment.

Also, this does not mean a householder will not go through the same stages as a renunciate. There will still be a detachment and witness phase. But for the householder, this is a stage whereas for the renunciate, it is the emphasis. And they will relate to the stages differently.

The apparently indistinct line between the 2 can confuse people and there are many promoting detachment as the goal. But what feels natural? There is so much richness beyond ego-surrender, it cannot be imagined. To deny that over confusion about our path is to miss the fullness of our being.
Davidya

What Supports Happiness?

Really the question should be: What gets in the way of Happiness? Happiness is innate, it is the subjective experience of the flow of life itself. If we are alive, simply being, we should be happy. It’s our natural state. You’ll notice it shows up naturally when we open, like in awe or in love.

But it does move in the depths of our being. So the sheaths (koshas) or veils between our “bliss body” and the other layers of our experience need to be fairly clear.

From the kosha perspective, the first body is Annamaya or the food body. What we put in our mouth, its volume and its suitability are the difference between a plugged up system and a clear one. The body has great intelligence on what it needs if we don’t confuse it or overload it. We may need to learn to listen though.

The second body is the Pranamaya, the vital body, also known as the astral or emotional. This is another body that is often plugged up, but with unresolved traumas that cloud our feelings. Same rules as above. The tendency to excess (food, drink, activity, etc) is one way people try to mask how they feel. Avoidance is another but these don’t exactly support happiness.

Manonmaya comes next, the lower mind. This is the home of thoughts and identification. Out of touch with our source, we become ego-identified and build a false self-construct. We believe ourselves to be in control to feel safe. This creates a false barrier to who we are and what is here. Of course, Self Realization is the resolver of this trap.

You may have noticed by now that the bodies have a relationship with the chakras, the above being first to third. This isn’t one to one but there is close ties.

Vijnanamaya is the next. This is the intuitive mind and discrimination. While we do have to awaken this value within and remove some crusts, it is not typically as polluted or stuck as the lower energies.

And thus we come to Anandamaya, the bliss body. The prior sheaths don’t have to be perfectly clear. Just unfogged enough for the bliss to shine through. And then we’ll find happiness is indeed our birthright. It is only for us to prepare the way.

Readers of this blog know that the best way to clear the decks is transcendence (samadhi). When we practice an effortless meditation, we regularly touch down into source. That gives the body deep rest, allows feelings to release, and breaks the boundaries of the mind. Of course, we’ll still have healing to do through conscious attention. But meditation will lighten the load considerably.
Davidya

The Rose List

I first became aware of Rose Rosetree through her interview on Buddha at the Gas Pump (Batgap). She’s all about subtle perception and healing and developing skills for same. Her tag-line is “Reading People Deeper and Healing with Energy Spirituality“

As I’m exploring models of awakening, I was fascinated by the idea that her “energetic literacy” allows a person to read if someone is enlightened or not. I know a small number of people who can see this and can help people past their last barriers. As this is a potent way to support others and opens the door to objective ways to study transpersonal development, the ability to learn it was intriguing. But evaluating such a unique vision is not a simple matter.

She sees the stages very similarly to how I do. But she determines the shift quite differently, through auras. By auras though, she don’t necessarily mean coloured light around the body but rather energetic signatures. Light is only one aspect of that.

She describes an enlightened person as having a “stabilized, habitual state of consciousness with certain characteristics that would be easy to identify for someone with Stage Three Energy Literacy.” She refers to “databanks” in each chakra and said they’d all be working well, are relatively balanced, and are free of “stuff” – her term for astral or emotional debris. The aura will also be permeated with the divine in some way and there will be a value of joy from that connection.

In other words, the personal crud is cleared and they are feeling the divine. A dry Self Realization would not make the cut.

She’s rather fearless about calling a spade a spade and tells it like she sees it. A few teachers she mentions as being enlightened but having messed up (including ones she’s studied with).  A few others she mentions as awake but not enlightened, even if they say otherwise. I’d agree there are some who have recognized the Self but not become it yet. I was such for many years. And there’s a difference between Self Realization and its mature state, sat chit ananda (absolute bliss consciousness).

At first, I wondered if she was reading sattva development rather than atman. But her comments suggest more. “Permeated with the divine in some way” suggests a deep perception. Earlier, I had the impression that there was a standard underlying energetic process in enlightenment. The chakras are awakened and we connect with source in the crown. Advanced stages unfold during a decent. Some teachers and kundalini traditions follow this model. However, others experience the stages during the rise and there are kundalini traditions that support that as well. And so on. She has apparently recognized this variety in the results.

The List
The result of her reads is her Enlightenment Life List, people she’s rated as Enlightened by the above criteria. Unexpectedly, it includes some famous people like Obama, the Clintons, and George Clooney. Shades of Men in Black! (laughs) From comments, it would seem that being in the larger public eye can raise someones consciousness. (a group consciousness effect?) But I’ve never explored that. In most cases I’ve seen, people who are enlightened know they are. I have met a few who were unsure. But once verified, their progress accelerated.

Rose indicates that when she started expanding the edge of energetic literacy into enlightenment, she didn’t meet the standard herself. Also, as she’s more heart driven, there is less conceptual precision. Plus it’s kind of an organic unfolding like this blog, rather than a presentation of a fully formed teaching. But as Rick Archer (Batgap) said to me, “she’s a sweetheart, making her much-needed contribution.“

Of course, making pronouncements about others is tricky territory. David Hawkins, of Power vs Force fame, is notorious for having rated many famous teachers, all of whom he rated as lower than himself, save Jesus. His ratings are considered infallible by himself & adherents. (he’s a no on Rose’s list) There are also some guru rating sites that are essentially trash-em lists.

Rose’s approach doesn’t fall into these traps but is instead a simple is or isn’t (yet). She says it’s about clarity rather than judgment. And offering examples for students to read. But a few issues still come to mind. For example, it’s not the person who is enlightened. It is the Self that wakes up to itself, through an apparent person. Making a list of names points to the person. But addressing that requires only a caveat. She talks about some of this here.

It’s useful to note here that she differentiates Householder and Renunciate enlightenment. A renunciate is Neti Neti (not this, not this) oriented whereas a householder still very much engages their person as an aspect of their expression. If this difference isn’t clear and a householder tries to play a middle ground, they succeed at neither. I’ll write more on this later.

Secondly, her process is by perception which can be fallible. The perception is also reading the effects of awakening not the awakening itself. She does however mention a few exceptions who appear to meet criteria but have issues that overshadow that development. She also notes it’s her read and opinion. No absolutes stated. That’s a good sign.

Clearly, it depends on the skill and experience of the reader. As I don’t have these skills, I’m keeping an open mind to get a better sense of what this is. I’ve bought her book Aura Reading Through All Your Senses but have just started it. She’s since recommended more recent books to me, like Read People Deeper. Thus, this article is more a work in progress than a review.

Here’s a good article on how her outlook evolved. She also talks about what she sees as the 10 most significant things about enlightenment there.

Meanwhile
Meanwhile, I commented on her blog a few times. One she quite liked and moved forward to a more recent post, then offered to read me for her list.

I found the exercise interesting as it looks to the question from a different angle than usual and confirms a couple of subjective impressions.

As prior posts mention, I’ve stayed pretty low key about who I am here, for various reasons. And awakening really isn’t about a person anyway. So it was a consideration if this was even appropriate. But now I sit at #180 on her list. (laughs)

I’ll do some more reading & exploring before I have better handle on the techniques she teaches. She certainly has a unique vision and some excellent insights. If her processes are as effective as she suggests, they could be quite useful in a number of ways.

Meanwhile, we’ve exchanged blogroll links. 
Davidya

What do Concepts Feed?

This blog is all words. Words are symbols for concepts.
“Taking concepts to be reality. That’s the basic human dysfunction that we call maya or illusion or original sin…  we form all these concepts in the head, and then we take the concepts to be reality. And the concepts are words about reality at best…”
– Francis Bennett (1:09)*

In other words, if I feed your concepts that create barriers to what is here, this blog fails. But if the words here offer pointers that help you recognize what is already here, it succeeds.

“Peace will come one enlightenment at a time.”
–John Mark  (1:32)*

*Both in an interview by Rick Archer on Buddha at the Gas Pump.
Both bring a Christian perspective to the enlightenment discussion.
Davidya

Front Row Seat

Imagine you’re watching a play at the theatre. It is a vast spectacle and you have a front row seat. In fact, that play is a custom play, written and performed just for you. While the audience feels very large, there is only one watching. The play is called “My Life.” In spiritual parlance, this experience is called witnessing.

This play is unfolding simultaneously with billions and billions of other such plays and they’re completely interconnected. No play could go on without all of them. The actors on your stage are, at the same time, also at play in others plays. When they leave your stage, they enter the stage of others. Even death is just a change of act, a brief curtain call. As in the film Cloud Atlas, we begin the next act in a new but related role. And you, in your front row seat, are also on your own stage and the stage of everyone else in the play.

This play is unfolding at all scales. From galaxies to stars to animals to bacteria to atoms. The stage extends in all directions for eons. The billions of sets have an unimagined complexity. Plus, it is unfolding not just here in the vast physical world but on multiple layers of reality that interpenetrate each other, even in your play. In other words, there are actors you don’t necessarily even see. And there’s other universes as well.

Because there is only one watching, there is really only one play. In Sanskrit, they call it Lila. But because of the complexity on the stage itself and the diversity of perspectives, it has the appearance of many, many unique plays. Other beings experience your stage quite differently, be they bird or angel. The play has laws or rules of the game, though those rules may depend somewhat on what act you’re in and who’s present on stage.

While some may discount such ideas as “intelligent design,” creationism, and faith-based nonsense, what I describe is actually a direct experience at a specific stages of development. But this doesn’t discount evolution in the slightest. Notice I said stages of development. It’s both.

Whosoever thinks it’s all an accident has not yet seen the script. Or the author.
Davidya

Life is…

“Life is a process of giving birth to ourselves.”
- Rev. Austin Hennessey

Healing Perfection

I’ve noted that people’s life passion often arises out of what they had to overcome or heal. In a sense our mission may be fueled by what we don’t want or what we want to help others avoid or overcome. Thus we become seekers, psychologists, helpers, and healers.

In another forum, this came up in the context of spiritual teachers. Byron Katie apparently said that she still teaches “because she realized that some aspects of the Self have not yet been integrated.” This is similar to the idea that a teacher learns more than the student. Much the same way, I write as a process of clarification and integration and have found that sharing this is valued by others.

The commenter observed that everyone in a satsang who shows up is a part in the process of being made whole, including the teacher. A good healer or therapist or teachers job is to heal what shows up in whatever form. You may recognize the related idea of Ho’oponopono. Heal within what is showing up outside and both are healed. This is seeing the Self in all.

This cannot take place on the level of mind. If a teacher sees themselves as the “realized one”, they divide themselves from students and fail to support this process. Many teachers don’t recognize this dynamic at all. Similarly, if we see teacher or God as other or more than ourselves, we artificially divide. We’re all in this together.

A non-dualist may balk at such statements. They may deny any healing should take place as reality is only whole and perfect. And while this is true, when wholeness experiences itself as identified or attached or ill, then some healing can take place in a return to wholeness. It may seem a paradox but if you recognize there is only literally one of us here, it makes more sense. The paradox is resolved in true oneness.

The time real healing takes is directly related to the depth of surrender. Surrender isn’t something we do but rather allow. We let go of the grip or resistance and what is already whole replaces it. You may better relate to this as stress – a cause or complicating factor in the majority of physical and emotional illness.

When surrender is deep enough there is an awakening. As it deepens, more and more wholeness arises. What I call stages unfold.

The apparent individual processes the integration of what remains to be integrated, heals what remains to be healed, and releases what remains to be released. In that process, we see activity that might be called satsang or teaching or healing.

There is perfection in wholeness and healing in the coming together of the parts into wholeness.
Davidya

The Curious Nature of Awakening

There are some curious paradoxes around spiritual awakening. Some cannot really be met by the mind. We say it happened through grace or the mystery or by “accident.”

But some aspects we can address. For example, most teachers will recommend certain practices to help you awaken. A practice will not cause you to awaken though. Awakening isn’t something you do. It’s something you surrender. It’s more that a practice makes the ground more fertile, the process more smooth, and helps quality of life. If awakening happens by accident, come practices will make you more “accident prone.”

We can see this more clearly with another step. In the process of becoming, awareness becomes aware of itself both globally and at every point within itself. It is self-aware, a 2-in-1 dynamic. It’s not that you as a person awakens. It’s that the point wakes up to its wholeness.

What is surrendering? That which has been holding back, not allowing Self to be as it is. The point value has been identified with its experience rather than the whole from which it arose. Like Self globally, it has looked within and forgotten to look back upon itself.
Davidya

The Gap Trap

Models of human development can be very useful on the journey. They give context to our experiences and help us open to the new and unexpected. They give language to our unfolding experience.

However, if we take the models too literally or fixedly, they can confuse. Everyone has their own way of experiencing unfoldment, just like we all experienced puberty a little differently. Your own process may or may not align with a specific model.

If we use ideas to try and “figure it out” ahead of time, we’ll go in circles and see a lot of apparently contradictory statements. When you were a pre-teen could you understand adults? We may set expectations that can lead to unnecessary suffering or even see the process as undesirable. But we can’t avoid the mind’s natural tendency to make stories about our experiences. Even if you think you have no concepts, that too is a concept. It’s what the mind does. It is very common for our ideas about awakening to be the last barrier to living it. Better we recognize this and are easy about it. Ready to let it go when experience offers something better.

Recently, another wrinkle on this came up in a discussion. That is the tendency to replace our experiences with a model. This is like replacing the journey with the map. We discover a model that aligns with our experience. But as it seems more complete, we then use it to fill in the “gaps” and concepts replace our direct experience. That’s a mistake. It is direct experience that should be your guide to what is real, not someone else’s concepts – however enlightened they may be.

I fell into this trap recently myself. I found a superior model of the energetic process underlying the subjective experiences of higher stages. It explained a few experiences nothing else had. And it seemed to fill in a few “gaps” (according to the model) in my own experience. I mistakenly then saw it (as the author had) as the underling process that drives our experiences of awakening.

However, I soon ran into a teacher with far more expertise in this area. He observed that there are 3 incompatible processes described by different traditions out of India. While I might have decided only one was right, the teacher himself had experienced his process aligning with a different tradition. And that seems more typical of people with more energetic awakenings. But it doesn’t align with my experience. It was a good reminder that awakening is not driven by the energy system at all, as I’ve written here myself. (laughs) It’s simply another layer of the process of the physiology adapting to awakening. What needs to clear and open will do so however is required. Up, down or all around. (I’ll write more on this later)

There is also the related issue of making up a grander story than our experiences indicate, enhancing our individual identity. While it’s natural to celebrate spiritual progress, we have to be careful not to invite humbling experiences. Terms like “half-baked”, “half way up the mountain”, or “premature immaculation” arise but these are often used as judgments.

Similarly, it’s common for people to discount experiences they don’t understand or that don’t align with self-conceptions. I’ve seen several people lose the witness because they refused to accept they were “there”.

Awakening is a very simple thing but it unfolds in a vast array of ways, leading to many unique subjective experiences. It affects all layers of our reality. The underlying process originates beyond creation and thus takes whatever form is necessary in the circumstance. If we agree that we’re all here to have unique experiences of the whole, it will inherently be so.

Hold your ideas lightly and follow the wind.
Davidya

Some Quotes

Ran into a small stash of good quotes today

“Even after seeing the pain and sorrow of people, merely saying, “I am  the Self. I am beyond all this,” instead of trying to console and help them, is not Advaita. Such people are neither Vedantins nor religious. Any Vedantic study or religious belief is meaningless unless it moves one to console the distressed, to wipe away their tears, and, forgetting oneself, to offer oneself as their support and shelter.” ~  Amma

“Everyone sees the unseen in proportion to the clarity of their heart, and that depends upon how much they have polished it.” ~ Rumi

“Completion comes when we not just wake up from all form, from all identification, but when love causes us to re-embrace it all.” ~ Adyashanti

“Not all awakening is the same. There are different qualities of awakening. Not everybody awakens to the same thing. The idea that everyone awakens to the same thing is sort of a myth. A misunderstanding. It’s actually quite rare that someone awakens to the whole of Reality all at once. Usually we get a piece of it. Of course any piece of the whole feels like the whole. If you bump into any aspect of reality, every aspect feels complete, because in a certain sense, every aspect is complete.  So reality always comes with it. A felt sense of completeness. Of totality. That unequivocal sense of “This is it”. That’s how it feels. And also that can lead to certain misunderstandings. We often awaken to certain aspects of reality. Rather than awaken to the whole of it all at once. The deception is that each aspect feels like the whole. And so you may just get attached to an aspect and think it’s the whole. See what I mean? It’s like getting hold of a foot of an elephant and thinking you’ve got hold of the whole elephant.” – Adyashanti