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If you compare God-in-man with man-without-God, you have to notice that man-without-God is in a hopeless situation. A man without God is a life "full of sound a fury" but ultimately going nowhere.
Knowing God, having one's foundation in God, is to be born of God -- and to become a "dropout" from the materialist-atheist school of the world.
No matter your origins, you will likely start out with enthusiasm to embrace the world, like a child who projects his joyful spirit into his toys. "The spirit of play" they call it. As you grow -- assuming your family situation doesn't impede you -- you give yourself to life full of expectation. You immerse yourself in learning, adapting to the world, and taking responsibility for your own survival. It is the natural way, even the ancient way of responding to your environment. So you take it up not reluctantly, but with gusto.
One fine day during this growing process you see that the game doesn't go on forever -- you are going to die, and that inexorable doom becomes very clear to you. So you begin to contemplate the temporary situation in which you find yourself -- your "impermanence". From that point onward, if you are honest, you start looking for the legendary "God" or some other answer to death.
You may look for God in many ways, and you may or may not find Him. It almost doesn't matter, because fortunately God is also looking for you and knows exactly where you are. One fine day, without warning, God makes Himself known to you, and suddenly you enter a world of an altogether different kind. And this too is a world to which you must adapt, a world where you will learn, a world where you can (and must) take responsibility. It is the most ancient environment, the inner world, a world of form and formlessness, a world of ever-expanding knowledge and self-awareness.
You may (one hopes) identify the essence of this other world as consciousness itself. That's a terrific breakthrough, when it happens. I remember the very moment when I first fell out of the "sound and fury" of the mind into a direct realization of the nature of consciousness as the essence of our lives. It was in San Francisco, sometime in the early 1970s, sitting in the backyard of my house. I had had visions before, and seen the "other reality" before, and even spent almost three years in a Benedictine monastery coming to terms with those visions and that reality. But this experience was the one they can't put in books, the one the scriptures can only point to: it was the primordial mystical experience of the most exquisite truth of our existence.
Many of you have had the same experience, I know. It is certainly your birthright, so you ought to have had it by now. (I am sad for you if you have not been fortunate enough to have this experience.)
When you do finally have it, you are alone with it, because it is a solitary unbroken experience, undivided by relations and external appearances. It simply is. It changes the way you live, forever. It is the beginning of dissolution of the machinery of the world as it has impressed itself upon your brain.
In a way you could call it a "reprogramming" of the brain -- the gray matter in the skull being a kind of computer that has been operating on a provisional "beta" software system in order to survive. This "beta" operating system was evolved out of a need to adapt to outer experience, society, and "the world". It tends, in modern times, to work in dissociation from the necessary process of adaptation to dying and to the reality of the Living God.
But the brain, you will learn, evolved over millions of years not only as an instrument of the "survival of the fittest" game -- but also as an instrument of exquisite communication with the "mystical" Reality that exists before and after all temporal existence. And consciousness is its medium, the "bath" in which the brain is born and immersed.
The materialists are dead wrong when they assume that consciousness itself is a byproduct of physical evolution. I know this. You know this. We know this because we are consciousness, and as consciousness we realize the nature of consciousness. Our "data" is the experience itself -- the direct experience of seamless and unmodified consciousness.
You would find it difficult to measure such an experience. Although there have been interesting EEG studies of meditating Buddhist monks, all such experiments can only point to extraordinary states of brain activity. They are not evidence of the nature of consciousness. Only consciousness can know its own nature as the sourceless and unborn Self.
And you are consciousness. Only you can know your own nature. It can't be told to you by an external graph or a description in a book. You can only know yourself directly, as that which you are. And you do know that.
Now, I am quite disappointed that mankind, in general, has not made much of this self-knowledge. Indeed, it appears that there is even a resistance to real self-knowledge -- a refusal to know God directly, if you will. Or, put another way, the "beta" software is arguing defensively against its own ultimate obsolescence.
This refusal can get quite fierce at times, to the point of become a kind of orthodoxy, with its own authorities and canonical statements of "fact". This refusal has worked very hard to become the "officially approved" software for young and impressionable brains.
It is as if, in the country of the blind, blindness was made into a law, taught as such in the universities, and the very idea of sight was declared an impossible fantasy.
The attack against seeing isn't made directly, most of the time. The teachings of sages like Ramana are mostly ignored. Instead the religion of simple folk is set up as a strawman to be shot down by the materialists. So, for instance, the arguments of the "neo-Darwinians" are all directed against "creationists", or believers in dogmatic scriptural poetry. Folks like myself are not even allowed in the classroom. We're invisible.
As a direct knower of God, I can see quite clearly that the human brain has evolved in two directions. I know from experience that its cells and synapses have adapted to a higher kind of experience, an experience that transcends death. The "omega" operating system is already functioning in me. (Hopefully it has taken charge in your brain as well.)
So it's rather funny and sad to see the partisans of the old "beta" software fiercely defending its limitations by using evolution and natural selection as blunt instruments with which to bludgeon those of us who see humanity as containing and expressing the profound Reality beyond our individual living and dying.
But the "beta" advocates rule the educational culture, and they have their deleterious effect, even on those who have had some variation of mystical experience. I cite an example from Broken Yogi, quoted from his recent blog writing:
BY: But at least with spiritual mysticism we are dealing with an open universe, rather than a closed one, and this alone is a good argument in its favor. We can't dismiss the relationship between mysticism and brain phenomena, but we can reject the notion of reducing it to merely that. Even so, we have to consider that because all mystical experience is indeed filtered through the brain, it is changed and modified to suit the brain's capabilities. Which means that mystical experience is inherently unreliable, and probably even more so than physical experience. We have to admit, I think, that our brains our better designed and formulated to process physical experience than mystical experience, which I think is why so much of our mystical experiences are chaotic, discontinuous, in conflict, and contaminated by personal and structural biases.
This view is a pretty good attempt to find a meeting place between the neo-Darwinian science and mysticism. Unfortunately it ends up siding with the atheists, in that the brain is seen as "better designed and formulated to process physical experience than mystical experience." The brain is viewed as largely limited to the provisional "beta" operating system, which is an outward-adapting system. The "omega" software -- which developed alongside the "beta" system, if pretty much discounted or ignored. This despite the author's familiarity with the literature and practices left by the explorers of consciousness -- the yogis and sages of India. So, for example, there is no mention of what the yogis named the ajna and sahasrar chakras, nor of direct brain-experience via those long-known brain functions. And "our mystical experience" is described as "chaotic, discontinuous, in conflict, and contaminated by personal and structural biases."
This is the philosophy of a mind that is still encumbered by the "beta" operating system. He has a glimmer of the "omega" operating system, but he finds himself discounting it due to the fact that he is "filtering" it through the bias of the obsolete op-sys, just like any run-of-the-mill neo-Darwinist atheist.
The willingness to not indulge in new-age myth-making is appreciated. But a greater purity of insight is called for...and a willingness to discard received pseudo-scientific propaganda about the nature of the world. That will only happen when the veil separating the two operating systems parts, the "omega" system becomes dominant, and there is a direct mystical experience unmediated by the "filtering" of the dead mind of the world.
Now, I do understand that the neo-Darwinist myth does play into this particular commentator's version of "non-dualism", which is essentially materialist in that it tries to deny the sacred nature of the physical world. This commentator sees the body -- and the evolved human brain -- as "illusions" that must be unceremoniously discarded upon "awakening beyond illusion" to and as "non-duality". It works for him that the earth and its populations are a kind of temporary scaffolding whose spiritual awareness is "chaotic, discontinuous, conflicted, and contaminated by personal and structural biases".
regards,
Elias
Broken Yogi has posted a wonderful monster of a reponse to my last screed here:
http://brokenyogi.blogspot.com/
Much food for thought. I especially like the line: "Mystics, in that sense, are people who are finding ways to “hack’ the brain, and allow us to gain access to information that not just the brain's software, but the hardware itself."
Will comment at some length later.
Elias
The pupil of the eye of experience
(This continues the discussion of the thread "The World and the Myopic Despair of Materialism".)
BY: The physical brain is, indeed, a physical mechanism, evolved in most respects to process information in relation to the physical world. It does seem that it can also process information that comes from deeper experience as well, or we wouldn't be able to report visions and meditative experiences at all. What I think needs to be examined is how accurate it is in processing this information, and what kinds of corruption errors enter into that process. Obviously all kinds of people have had legitimate spiritual experiences over the millennia, and just as obviously many have had conflicting interpretations of those experiences. I am of the view that much of that conflict is not merely conceptually based, but is literally based in the structural processing of the brain itself, and how it deals with spiritual phenomena. I think that this could even be described as an evolutionary process, that our brains are adapting to such things, and that not all brains are equally adept at cleanly processing and interpreting these experiences. Add on top of that the cultural interpretations that have been put in place, plus the conceptualizing, cognitive differences in individuals, and you get the general mess that is the current state of affairs in religion.
And this is the problem with mysticism in general. Visions are not merely subject to conceptual interpretation, the mere having of them implies that the physical brain has some capacity to receive and process the raw extra-sensory data of the vision, and thus we have to have some faith in the brain's ability to do that reliably, in such a way that accurately reflects not just the physical world, but the spiritual realms as well, and their relationship to the physical. The materialistic interpretation of visions is that they are merely the product of overactive imagination, or psychosis, or some other process within the brain, but even if we reject that reductionism in favor of the reality of spiritual consciousness, we do have to acknowledge that the physical brain must play a key role in the process, and that it represents a bottleneck on many levels that tests the reliability of not just the conclusions, but the raw data itself.
The first assumption in BY's overall argument is that visionary experience, being subjective, is filtered (or distorted) by "the structural processing of the brain itself", which can vary widely from individual to individual.
The second assumption he seems to make, by his embrace of the scientific view, is that we ought to develop a consensus understanding of what constitutes spiritual reality apart from the "bottleneck" of the mostly unreliable reports.
These aren't wrong assumptions, but in my opinion they tend to sidestep (or devalue) the central fact of all mystical experience: it is what I say about what I experienced.
In the first assumption, what I say is devalued because it is a "given" that it is "filtered" by an imperfect brain.
In the second assumption, what I say is devalued because it has to prove itself to a consensus standard, or a communal agreement of what constitute reality.
And in that two-pronged view of spiritual experience, the "I" of the experience is seen not only as untrustworthy, but secondary to the experience (or "raw data") itself.
This is a right approach, if one is trying to bring the method of science to mystical experience. But it is also the self-limiting approach of science which places all worth in the object and devalues the subject.
Jung was one scientist who found a way around the rational dead-end of scientific objectification: he used a method he called "amplification" to compare the data presented by the psyche with cultural and religious data going back thousands of years. In this way he was able to open paths toward consensus interpretation. Beyond that you can see, from reading him in depth, that he was also working a spiral around a great unknown -- and that unknown was the Self, the most sacred component of all mystical experience.
It is important to note that the Self can never be pinned down. It cannot be put under a microscope. It cannot be turned into a "set of proofs". And, most of all, it cannot be subjected to a consensus description of reality.
The closest you can get to it, other than to "realize" it, is to contemplate an iconic symbol such as Christ or Buddha. As symbols, Christ and Buddha are profoundly mysterious, and simply allowing oneself to meditate on their mystery is to be drawn beyond the superficial mind of "objective science" into the participatory path of spiritual and meditative experience.
To "realize" the Self, on the other hand, you also have to cease devaluing yourself. You have to begin by "getting it" that society and consensus politics and science are always asking you to give up the most precious thing you have: the "I" of experience.
Now, you can argue about the "ego" vs. "the Self" all day long if you want. But a lot of that kind of discussion is another way that collectives have of discrediting the individual as the central reality -- the very "pupil of the eye" of all experience.
And such attempts to dismiss the "I", as in the case of BY's well-intentioned arguments, often begin by stating that the "I" of a vision cannot be trusted because of "corruption errors" due to the structure of the evolutionary brain, and so forth.
I suppose the fact that consciousness can and does get distorted, neurotic, or even psychotic should give us pause about the report of a vision. In other words, it might seem that because some people are mentally ill, or tell lies, then nobody can be trusted to make an honest and healthy statement!
Again, are we looking for a consensus here? Or are we talking about the "I" of my experience?
I am the judge of my own experience. You are the judge of your own experience. I am the one who dies. You are the one who dies. Or, to use an image, I am the one shooting this arrow into a target. And you are the one shooting that arrow into your target. No "consensus religion" ever shot an arrow into a target. And no "consensus science" ever had a mystical experience.
Do you see how much doubt rises up in the mind when the possibility of self-authentication is considered? That voice you hear is the sound of the crowds running around madly looking for an answer...outside themselves.
Now, if I report my vision to you, and you report your vision to me, there is no expectation of "belief" or "approval". These are simply reports, and we can each make of the other's vision what we will. It would be good if we could be respectful of each other, of course, but even that is not a duty or an expectation.
In my life I've had many many visions. It didn't take me long to learn that there were people who didn't want to hear them, or who reacted in strange ways when they did hear them. Fortunately I was able to find some people who "knew where I was coming from" -- they had visions of their own, and were glad to share them with another visionary.
The most mutual respect, you see, is engendered between those who respect themselves -- those who have refused to devalue the precious "pupil of the eye" of experience. And this singular refusal to compromise self-awareness is what makes them what they are: men and women of real experience.
Eleyeas
this just in...
The common failing of religions is their search (and their claims) for an ideal unitary experience of spiritual reality.
It's so very easy for people of a religious bent to criticize mysticism for its "filtering" effect or its "conflicting interpretations" of an abstract and largely mythologized unitary spiritual reality.
But I can't find any reason to assume that spiritual experience has to be unitary in nature, or easily identifiable as something already known: i.e., agreeable to consensus ideas of "the divine"?
Why can't we accept mysticism for what it clearly is: diverse, individual, and reflecting astonishing multiplicity rather than a "unitary vision"?
This living universe contains a vast diversity of conscious experience -- nobody can doubt that. Who is to say the same law doesn't apply to mystical-visionary experience and life-after death?
The operative metaphor, it seems to me, is Christ's statement: "My father's house has many mansions."
The opposite of that wisdom, of course, would be a cult, would it not?
The only singularity you will every find, among the complexity of realities -- both material and spiritual -- is your "I". Stripped of it's illusions, it is your greatest and saving treasure.
Elias
Don't confuse "I" with "identity"
Something I have noticed in discussions about Ramana and the Self over the years, is that people tend to see "the Self" as something other than their "I".
By this I mean they view "I" as the ego, and they view "the Self" as something magical and unattainable -- almost like a distant God.
So it is they don't get what Ramana meant by the "I-I".
What did he mean? He clearly meant that the ego is an "I", and the Self is also an "I".
How do we disguish between the two "I"s?
There is an easy way to do that: simply learn to distinguish between "I" and "identity". As Ramana said, the ego is always "this or that". But the real "I" is not "this or that".
In other words, to contradict the title of Nisargadatta's famous book, I am not That.
I am I.
The first stage of self-inquiry is to deconstruct your "identity" -- to question your tendency to unconscious identification with roles, persons, images, and objects.
Is your "I" your name?
Is your "I" your property?
Is your "I" your function?
Is your "I" your self-image? (Hello, Narcissus!)
Is your "I" your public personna?
Is your "I" your personal history?
Is your "I" your place in society?
Is your "I" the approval or disapproval you receive from others?
Is your "I" your conflicts within the mind, or with other minds?
Is your "I" your Shadow (your unconscious dark side)?
Is your "I" your pride in your "accomplishments"?
Is your "I" your associations and business relationships?
Is your "I" the nattering of the mind?
Is your "I" your obsessions, your desires, your fears?
Answer: NONE OF THE ABOVE (neti neti)
Besides being the witness of all that stuff, your I is free of all that.
Your I is not what or who you see, but the seeing itself, which is "always already" unattached to the forms and content of conscious experience.
It's sometimes hard to remember this truth about the nature of "I", because we get so involved and immersed in our experience and relationships.
In fact, we get so involved in the "form and content" that we tend to devalue the "I" itself. Indeed, society is held together, for the most part, by a general agreement to devalue the "I" in favor of identification with experience and objects.
So it is that "the pearl of great price" is lying in the gutter of the marketplace, unnoticed and unappreciated.
So it is that a thousand voices, from the time you are a child, are admonishing you to abandon your Self -- the true "I" -- in favor of "identity".
Identity can be a paying proposition, you see. What can "I" do for you? How are you ever going to accumulate wealth simply resting as "I", the ungrasping essence of Being?
Well, if wealth is your goal, obviously you have already lost your innate appreciation of "I" in favor of the list of identity-attributes cited above.
But, alas for identity, it doesn't last. Identity dies. (Some seem satisfied that identity may live for awhile on in "history", or in the memory of others...until they too pass away.)
I is reality. Identity is a passing season, then dust in the wind.
I speak of "I" not simply because I read about it in a book. I speak of "I" because I tested both "identity" and "I", and found that "I" (or consciousness itself) is irreducible happiness, indestructible, infinite in all directions, unborn, and transcendent of "identity".
Yes, "I" is naked, without possessions, and void of all the world's concerns and obsessions. Yes, it may take death itself to recover the full awareness of "I". But there's no reason to postpone this "transvaluation of values".
Better, in my opinion, to jettison the false hopes of identity now, and live the world from "I". Who (indeed who) would want to postpone irreducible happiness?
"I" is the Self. The Self is "I".
Elias
(to be continued...I want to say something about ego-identification with the Self and the "cosmic identities" of false teachers and pseudo messiahs.)
spiritual feudalism...
The "i" of identity isn't confined to our immersion in the mind of this world.
It easily transposes itself to the next world -- which is why there are a vast multiplicity of bardos, lokas, astral heavens, hells, and ghost realms.
The "i" of identity even transposes to the so-called "siddha lokas" -- the societies of the advanced spirits who have gotten close to realization or who presume their realization as accomplished.
Out of these highly conscious realms come some of the most misguided spiritual teachers of all. Misguided because they know a lot...but not enough to have attained real humility or the death of the ego.
The Self is so close, you see. And yet so obscured by our love of "maps" of attainment, concepts of spiritual status, and the politics of saints.
Listen, God is not a smug self-congratulating fool sitting in a Big Chair.
Nor is God the Wizard of Oz, throwing up illusions to mystify the common folk.
God does not engage in the feudalism of spiritual fairy tales. (You know, the archetypal "Kings and Queens" that appear as mythical absolutes in the literature of children.)
Ah, this teaching of dis-identification is very difficult, even impossible to comprehend. But when was the unreal ever the Real? When was the little "i" ever the "I"?
The little "i" always wants a map and it wants to know where it stands on that map, relative to the structure of the map and to the "spiritual genius" who built the map.
So the seeker falls into a kind of consoling trance, infatuated by maps and self-measuring.
And in that instant he completely misses the truth of his own existence: that all sacredness is found in the experience and transformation of consciousness itself -- his own seeing.
Look for tools to help with the naturally arising process of breaking the spell of the world. Look for guides who are really useful and do not require any kind of adulation or worship.
Be respectful of everyone's path, but find your own unique path.
Be an individual, not a follower. Be a rebel not a submissive.
What authority resides in your own heart? Why do you doubt it?
(Yeah, the great "danger" of these admonitions as that the "ego" or little "i" will try to coopt the authority of the heart. It happens all the time. But I tell you it happens even in the case of cultic submissives. Get to know them, and you discover a smug arrogance at work in these supposedly "selfless" folk. The politics of the cult literally empower the ego, puff up the self-image, and block access to the Self within.)
Anyway, you are the one who has to do the dying. Your feudal cult guru can't do it for you.
Get on with it, then. Time is growing short.
cheers,
Elias
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