There were two panel discussions in which i participated @ the Science and Nonduality Conference in Doorn, the Netherlands in May. The first, w/ Tim Freke, Paul Smit and i, was covered in the blogpost "What is 'Enlightenment'? Three different answers".
The second was w/Lisa Cairns, Tim Freke and i, and was moderated by the writer, and creator/leader of the meditation school, The Way of the Conscious Explorer, Jeff Warren. It was focused on "What is it like to live with an absolute perspective in a relative world?" (Video is called "Filling in the Details"). This is a slightly shortened version of the first half of that discussion.
The second was w/Lisa Cairns, Tim Freke and i, and was moderated by the writer, and creator/leader of the meditation school, The Way of the Conscious Explorer, Jeff Warren. It was focused on "What is it like to live with an absolute perspective in a relative world?" (Video is called "Filling in the Details"). This is a slightly shortened version of the first half of that discussion.
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| Jeff Warren Conscious Explorer |
Could each of you tell us your story about the shift in perspective, what it felt like for you, before and after?
Tim
I was rescued from
nonduality by having a child. This
mattered. My attachments were very real. This left me w/this
sense that there is a deep paradox in this moment. It is both "this" and "Oneness". How can i be "paralogically" conscious of both "this" and "Oneness" and embody it.
Here and there, there is this acceptance and love - impersonal and personal.
Here and there, there is this acceptance and love - impersonal and personal.
Gary
i found that my suffering was all
illogical and was from my self-referential narrative thoughts. So i tried to
get at this DIY. i used the teachings of Ramana Maharshi and Bassui, a 14th century Zen monk and did self-inquiry. (See "What is the 'Direct Path' to nondual awakening?")
Lisa
There was seemingly an
intense search. As to what there was I could
put together a story. i could tell you
all these different stories. But i don't know. i just know "this", really.
It is quite funny, all these faces looking at me.
It is quite funny, all these faces looking at me.
In the past, i saw
suffering. The dynamic was to help other
people who were suffering, particularly
animals. There was all this big "saving
things". I was looking at dead meat in the market and my boyfriend said, "all you see is your own death".
This idea of trying to help people...who's trying to help who? Who is it that you see out there? Who is it that we ever see?
This idea of trying to help people...who's trying to help who? Who is it that you see out there? Who is it that we ever see?
It's just a story
that we think is us. And we just project
that.
Jeff
When you're no
longer attached to people, you're actually more effective. you're not
projecting onto whoever you're helping so you have no sense
of a "doer"?
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| Lisa Cairns |
Lisa
There is just life
happening.
Jeff
Can you guys relate to that, that there's no doer, there's just life happening?
Can you guys relate to that, that there's no doer, there's just life happening?
Gary
Take the idea of Buddhists being compassionate. i have no sense of compassion. you're just, as Lisa was saying, "fully present". And if you're "fully present", then something comes out of that which is of a whole different character.
It is more appropriate and creative than anything that i could have thought up as to how it should look like or how some book says it should look like. you are much more useful and it is much more efficacious to be here right now.
Take the idea of Buddhists being compassionate. i have no sense of compassion. you're just, as Lisa was saying, "fully present". And if you're "fully present", then something comes out of that which is of a whole different character.
It is more appropriate and creative than anything that i could have thought up as to how it should look like or how some book says it should look like. you are much more useful and it is much more efficacious to be here right now.
Jeff
Are you surprised by your own actions?
Are you surprised by your own actions?
Gary
They are always much better than i could have thought up.
They are always much better than i could have thought up.
Jeff
So there is surprise then?
So there is surprise then?
Gary
Yes. The same thing happens in business meetings. Something arises that is so much smarter than i am. you understand that you aren't running the show. Not only are you not running it, but you're doing a very poor job of it.
Yes. The same thing happens in business meetings. Something arises that is so much smarter than i am. you understand that you aren't running the show. Not only are you not running it, but you're doing a very poor job of it.
So you just get
out of the way and let a much, much better answer emerge, whether it's helping
people or being in a business meeting.
Tim
Seeing this constant paradox leads me often saying the opposite. i normally see around me people who think they know what life is, yeah, me too, and can you see that it is a total mystery as well. Here i'm around people who see it's a mystery and i'm saying that i agree and i'm always wanting to add the opposite because i think they sit together.
Jeff
So you're attached to the idea that it's both.
Tim
Attachment is part of being human. i have my daughter; that's where i saw i was attached. No one was going to tell me i shouldn't be and i wasn't going to play that game anymore. i had to look into my own experience and see what was true.
Jeff
Lisa and Gary - how did nondual awakening affect your relationships?
Seeing this constant paradox leads me often saying the opposite. i normally see around me people who think they know what life is, yeah, me too, and can you see that it is a total mystery as well. Here i'm around people who see it's a mystery and i'm saying that i agree and i'm always wanting to add the opposite because i think they sit together.
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| Tim Freke |
Jeff
So you're attached to the idea that it's both.
Tim
Attachment is part of being human. i have my daughter; that's where i saw i was attached. No one was going to tell me i shouldn't be and i wasn't going to play that game anymore. i had to look into my own experience and see what was true.
Jeff
Lisa and Gary - how did nondual awakening affect your relationships?
Lisa
i don't know. It just does what it does.
Jeff
What about your attachment to the other person? your romantic relationship?
i don't know. It just does what it does.
Jeff
What about your attachment to the other person? your romantic relationship?
Lisa
i find all of this confusing. i don't really know.
Whatever you tell is just a story. i could tell the story of how this has changed, or i could tell the story of comparison to before, but it doesn't really matter. you could tell a story of different perspectives, but it just really doesn't make sense.
i find all of this confusing. i don't really know.
Whatever you tell is just a story. i could tell the story of how this has changed, or i could tell the story of comparison to before, but it doesn't really matter. you could tell a story of different perspectives, but it just really doesn't make sense.
Jeff
So what has changed is your ability to describe what is happening to you moment-to-moment?
So what has changed is your ability to describe what is happening to you moment-to-moment?
Lisa
The thing is, was it ever true? Was it ever true what everybody was saying?
So you tell a story about 5 years ago i had this type of relationship and now i have this type of relationship. Do you really know that? It's just a story.
The thing is, was it ever true? Was it ever true what everybody was saying?
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| SAND Panel |
So you tell a story about 5 years ago i had this type of relationship and now i have this type of relationship. Do you really know that? It's just a story.
It's not wrong,
but we can't even remember. we remember
fragments depending on the
mood. There's nothing wrong w/it. Telling stories is great fun. How can we stand by anything really? Can you even
remember those relationships?
All we ever know
is this. Everything else is a mystery.
Jeff
Gary?
Gary?
Gary
One of the big surprises for me and for folk i work with is that things like sexual drive do fall away. It does dramatically change. i try not to script this into folks' perceptions, but you see that a lot of sex is mentally driven. As you lose your "i" and your attachment, that falls away and is less prominent.
One of the big surprises for me and for folk i work with is that things like sexual drive do fall away. It does dramatically change. i try not to script this into folks' perceptions, but you see that a lot of sex is mentally driven. As you lose your "i" and your attachment, that falls away and is less prominent.
The same thing
happens in your relationships. you and
someone close to you have come up w/ways
in which you interact. Those ways change for you and you don't respond as you did before.
This can be very difficult in a
long term relationship as the other partner is accustomed to
how you respond.
Also, the partner
can't compete with this transcendent state, and you're spending more and more time there, which is threatening.
Jeff
So how did you work with that?
So how did you work with that?
Gary
If your "i" really does fall away, then there is no one to hold the other end of those emotions. So they really lose their potency and the nature of them changes. There's no one to hold the other end of "I need you", or "I want you".
If your "i" really does fall away, then there is no one to hold the other end of those emotions. So they really lose their potency and the nature of them changes. There's no one to hold the other end of "I need you", or "I want you".
Jeff
i've heard that from quite a few people who have told me that their drivers change. That things that really motivated them fell away. Sex and arts that really motivated them had fallen away, and then came back in another way.
i've heard that from quite a few people who have told me that their drivers change. That things that really motivated them fell away. Sex and arts that really motivated them had fallen away, and then came back in another way.
Can any of you
relate to that?
Tim
Things fall away and come back all the time. My journey is much less linear.
I feel like I've
come to the wrong place, because this doesn't sound attractive to me. I don't want to lose my sex drive. I don't want my wife to feel that I'm not
holding the other end of our relationship. There is now more authenticity in our
relationship.
Things fall away and come back all the time. My journey is much less linear.
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| Bittersweet |
There is this infinite
meeting itself but in two different forms. These forms are limited and human and
vulnerable and flawed; that is what
makes them so delicious. What is
connecting is the one meeting itself as
two. Can I be there as one and two at the
same time?
There is love, this deep bittersweet love that i can aspire to find.
There is love, this deep bittersweet love that i can aspire to find.
Jeff
The important word is "bittersweet". What Gary and Lisa describe is that there are things that are not sweet.
The important word is "bittersweet". What Gary and Lisa describe is that there are things that are not sweet.
Tim
My mum has cancer, just diagnosed. Saying that, I can feel that attachment to my mum. I love her, I want to feel that, I feel that I would lose something terribly important to my humanity if I lost that. I can feel the emotion coming up into my eyes as I think about her.
And also there's that mystery. So it's bittersweet. Everything is what it is and ooohhhhh (grimaces) right now.
My mum has cancer, just diagnosed. Saying that, I can feel that attachment to my mum. I love her, I want to feel that, I feel that I would lose something terribly important to my humanity if I lost that. I can feel the emotion coming up into my eyes as I think about her.
And also there's that mystery. So it's bittersweet. Everything is what it is and ooohhhhh (grimaces) right now.
And I want to be
with her suffering, because she's my mum, but not so overwhelmed by it that I'm
crushed. Both together.
Jeff
(To Lisa) How you experience emotion has changed? you may feel sad but it kind of goes through you more quickly?
(To Lisa) How you experience emotion has changed? you may feel sad but it kind of goes through you more quickly?
Lisa
i'm not talking about removal from feeling. It just appears and disappears.
i'm not talking about removal from feeling. It just appears and disappears.
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| Shinzen Young |
Jeff
My teacher Shinzen talks about equanimity. There's more fluidity so you feel things more but it goes through you quickly.
My teacher Shinzen talks about equanimity. There's more fluidity so you feel things more but it goes through you quickly.
Lisa
What seems to fall away is this storyteller.
Sadness arises and then it disappears.
What seems to fall away is this storyteller.
Sadness arises and then it disappears.
Joy arises and
it disappears.
Jeff
Gary?
Gary?
Gary
i differ from both of these folks, obviously.
It really, fundamentally changes.
i differ from both of these folks, obviously.
It really, fundamentally changes.
When my self-referential thoughts fell away,
then self-referential
desires fell away, and self-referential fears fell away. my world
fundamentally, unequivocally changed. It hasn't changed "back".
That's what
nonduality means to "me", that's how i've experienced it, that's how my
life operates. Fears i had in the past
just fell away.
i still don't step
in front of buses, but the mentated fears just don't hang in
there. The same thing w/mentated
desires, they don't arise. you can still
recognize a form, but it just doesn't go anyplace.
my life has fundamentally, dramatically changed.
Jeff
Do you have any experience of fear? Is that completely gone?
Gary
i don't walk off of cliffs. As far as imagined fears, that just doesn't come up because there's no "I" there to hold the fear. There's nobody to go out and grab the storyline and make something out of the fear.
i don't walk off of cliffs. As far as imagined fears, that just doesn't come up because there's no "I" there to hold the fear. There's nobody to go out and grab the storyline and make something out of the fear.
Jeff
Was there anything that was surprising to you when you found yourself in this place that wasn't what you had read in spiritual texts?
Was there anything that was surprising to you when you found yourself in this place that wasn't what you had read in spiritual texts?
Gary
It was all surprises. i had practiced for a long time. i had wandered around in the dark for much of my journey, but when it happened it was "Whooaaa!". It was nothing like what i had expected. It was so much deeper, more vast, more still. I had never expected this awesome, staggering, stillness that gets deeper and deeper.
It was all surprises. i had practiced for a long time. i had wandered around in the dark for much of my journey, but when it happened it was "Whooaaa!". It was nothing like what i had expected. It was so much deeper, more vast, more still. I had never expected this awesome, staggering, stillness that gets deeper and deeper.
i did not expect my desires to fall away or my fears to fall away. i expected my thoughts to stop but i didn't think they would STOP.
BTW1, the 270 comments to all of my blogposts have disappeared. The comments still exist, but aren't currently visible. Working w/two Blogger Top Contributors a "work around" has been found that "may help". This involves my editing the HTML to change a "timeout limit value" for these new dynamic template displays. Supposedly "the Google staff is looking for a long term solution". Given these caveats and my concern about making a serious error in HTML editing and causing real damage to the blog, i'm waiting for a solution "soon". If it doesn't happen, i'll get some IT help.
BTW2, many gasshos (zen bows) to all of you for your support and interest in this blog and the videos. we now have well over 350,000 page views, mostly over the last year. The youTube channel now has > 630 subscribers and > 73,000 views. It's not viral, but folk are reading and watching.
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