In September, Dorothy Rowe, Andrew Hewson and I spoke about Perspectives of Awakening. Andrew and I followed that up with a conversation on the stages of enlightenment.

We both enjoyed the conversation so had another one. This time we explored the dismissal of stages, the value of understanding the bigger picture, issues with a masculine / renunciate emphasis, healing, surfacing, right action, integrating after awakening, and talking to the family about the changes.

On YouTube

Breath stopping came up on Transcending so I thought it worth breaking the points out into an article.

In a transcending meditation practice we quickly settle within. As we settle the mind, the body also settles. Oxygen consumption and other metabolic indicators drop. In a typical session, this can be 30-60%.

When we transcend the practice into samadhi (also called turiya or pure consciousness), we may notice a brief period of inner silence or no thoughts along with very deep relaxation.

But when we notice, the mind starts to think about it and the metabolism rises some again. Or the rest causes the body to purify which creates activity in the body, then the mind. In either case, we lift from the depths to complete a cycle.

We repeat this cycle of inward and outward strokes many, many times.

With experience, that inner pure consciousness begins to be maintained even while thoughts arise. They no longer disturb the silence as it has become clear and integrated enough.

Then consciousness shows even in daily activity. The sustaining of inner alertness becomes presence. We notice we’re “in” consciousness more than our mind or body.

We can then go deeper into silence in meditation. Then we may notice the breath pausing. The metabolism has become so settled that usual breath is not needed. There is no control whatsoever – this is arising spontaneously from a very low metabolism.

Then that deep rest allows purification to occur and activity resumes in the body and breath resumes.

We’re more likely to notice this when we’re well-rested and relaxed, like on a retreat. However, it can arise at any time.

Often, we’ll just notice coming out of a pause or blank period. Perhaps we’ll notice a wave of happiness as we rise through the bliss body.

So often, transcendence happens without us even noticing. Samadhi has no content for the mind to notice – it’s often recognized by absence. Once we establish a transcending practice, brief periods of transcending and breath stoppage are common but we may only notice them as moments when I wasn’t thinking.

In India, they sometimes describe unresolved stresses as sleeping elephants. When we meditate and settle within, we move through these elephants. But often, this wakes a few of them up and they stir and rumble around, kicking up dust.

Occasionally, we can sneak through the elephants and have a clear experience on the other side. More often, purification arises kicking up the dust. But this dust isn’t a bad thing. It’s an indication of clearing that brings deep long-term benefits. Thus, even a foggy meditation is of great benefit.

We shouldn’t judge the results of our effortless meditation by our subjective experience during it. Instead, look to the results in our life, in the world.

As we deepen still further, such as on a long retreat, we may get clear and settled enough that we can have long periods of transcendence. The breath will pause for 10, 20, 30 minutes or more. But when it does that, the lungs shift into a new mode and a fine vibration arises. Not an in and out breath.

That fine vibration seems to draw on prana (life force) rather than oxygen. Physical activity requires oxygen to burn fuel but if the body is in a pause, it’s not needed.

This takes a very clear experience and the ability to notice without disturbing or reacting to the experience.

Scientists have documented this breath stoppage in various studies. Note this differs greatly from yogis who have practiced body control and can stop the breath at will. What I describe happens spontaneously when breath is not required.

The Association for Spiritual Integrity (ASI) is holding a series of peer-to-peer discussions. In August, Craig Holliday and I conversed on spiritual bypassing. That was posted here. The video quality wasn’t great, so I just posted the audio.

Later the same month, we had another conversation along the same lines. At last it’s available.

We spoke to a wide range of topics around healing, ethics and challenges in spiritual groups, bypassing, and the nature of the current time. The conversations are on spiritual integrity so there is some overlap with the first conversation. But much of it is distinct.

For some reason, my video is out of focus even though it wasn’t during the conversation. Ah, the joys of technology.

On YouTube

On a recent retreat, Lorn Hoff mentioned pleasure vs joy in passing. I thought it would be worth exploring this further.

First lets define the terms:

Joy, happiness, and bliss are associated with the 5th chakra, throat, bliss body, and the space element.

Pleasure is associated with the 2nd chakra, our animal nature, emotions, sex, and the water element. (Desire can add fire.)

Pleasure is very enjoyable but is only ever short term. If we chase pleasure, it can lead to excess. Moderation is key or we fall into addictions, attachment, and so forth.

We may seek pleasure to gain happiness but this is folly.

In contrast, joy can become ongoing and create lasting benefit. If we explore what makes us happy rather than what stimulates our desires, we can find lasting fulfillment. This is why Joseph Campbell suggested “follow your bliss.”

Joy is the signal of right action, life supporting choices, and natures support. Pleasure is a signal of short-term satisfaction.

When you say “I like…”, do you mean what gives you pleasure or joy? There’s a big difference between saying “I like Greek food” and “I like meaningful work.”

Pleasure does bring richness to life but if it’s not backed up by happiness, that richness will be unreliable. This seeds attachment and resistance leading to suffering. For example, we may enjoy dancing but if we stay out late overdoing, we’ll suffer the next day. A rich meal may bring pleasure to our senses but can upset the stomach and make us sluggish. Shopping may bring us short-term pleasure but if we can’t afford the purchase or it detracts from our goals, it becomes self-defeating. The net result of excess is suffering, not joy.

The monkey wrench is unresolved emotional pain. This creates a blanket over happiness. All too often, we compensate by seeking pleasure. Yet because of that addictive quality, there is then the tendency to overdo. Alas, the more we chase pleasure, the more we need to satisfy the itch. This reinforces its addictive qualities. Eventually it stops satisfying. And yet we may continue to chase it. Life’s richness dries up and we can become a reactive bundle of unmet needs.

We’re also surrounded by a culture that represses emotions and pushes pleasure as a solution. Comfort food, escape, and owning stuff. But what’s driving the bus? Do you possess your possessions or do they possess you? Advertising constantly appeals to our unmet needs. But this is not the path to anyone’s happiness.

The key is becoming conscious of these dynamics in ourselves. What triggers our reactive behaviour? When do we reach for the sweets or go shopping? When we can see the drivers and our patterns, we can heal our wounds. If we recognize the consequences of our choices, we can make better ones. If we follow our bliss (not pleasure) we’ll find the “happiness for no reason” within.

Moderation is the rule for pleasure. Less is more. Then we can enjoy without suffering. We can go dancing more often if we set healthy boundaries. If we can eat healthy foods we like, we make the body happy. We can follow a sensible budget that leads to long-term wealth. This is maturity.

If this seems unsatisfying, it’s not because of the lack of pleasure but lack of happiness. When happiness is present,

An important detail to understand about this blog is that it’s not about the wisdom of some person named Davidya. It’s not “my” knowledge.

Someone who sees themselves as a person has a limited capacity for knowing. This is partly because there is a “me” claiming to know. That identification creates limitations, keeping us in a bit of a box. It also limits us to sensory experiences. But as the entanglements of a me fall away, the fetters on knowing fall away too. (As they also do with love, compassion, energy, and more.)

After a clear awakening, the intellect associates with silent being instead of the mind. Thus it becomes clear and resolute. In Unity, we become (recognize we are) whatever we experience, bringing new ways of knowing. Then the intelligence within experiences gradually becomes obvious – particularly into the Refined Unity stage.

This is not to dismiss the role of the person. The knowledge is still arising through the laws of nature of this form. The body-mind is the vehicle of expression and it will have certain abilities and inclinations. We’ll put attention on some areas and not others. What we experience, how we understand it, and how we’ll express that will vary. We may favour poetry, physicality, support, presence, healing, words, or some other style.

I’m also yet to meet a person free of shadow. Whatever knowledge we can recognize, it’s still coming through that filter too.

Putting all this another way, the more Davidya forgets, the more knowledge becomes available. But Davidya remains the vehicle of expression. That shows up here as writing.

Fundamental reality is profoundly simple. But when expressed through the multiplicity of forms, the interplay get complicated. The laws of action are very simple, for example. But they get very complex in play. Mind is designed to work with the world and senses. It’s not designed to recognize the simplicity of reality. But that can be known through being.

The deeper you go, the simpler and more universal it gets. When we become established and work from deeper levels, our vision and understanding deepen and broaden and become more universal. For example, in mathematics, they discovered that a 9-page long formula to describe gluon particle dynamics could be reduced to a one-term expression in an underlying geometry (geometry is more fundamental than fields).

To go deeper, we have to let go of the box the me wants to stay in. We have to transcend. Then we step out of the boundaries of knowing something and the concepts that creates. Those concepts are just symbols of reality, not reality itself. Like a map, they are but pointers.

As such, the goal of this blog is to point to what is behind all the words.

Davidya

Mind is a big topic. Fundamentally, mind is a kosha or field around our body that is the medium for what we experience as thinking. But there’s a great deal more to it than that. Let’s explore my current take.

This field surrounds the whole body but we feel mind is “in the head” because the senses are concentrated there. Mind is the hub that processes and integrates our senses.

It also interfaces with the brain and nervous system and emotional body in one direction. And the other way with the intellect, memory, and cosmic mind. The cosmic mind is essentially the lively inner surface of self-aware consciousness.

Mind isn’t really local. In a sense, mind is nothing in itself but a field attuned to the cosmic mind in one direction and the brain and body in the other. We might call it an interface.

We can say mind is powered mainly by the energy of the third chakra in the upper belly. This is the power center of the will and personal protection. We can consider it the highest personal chakra. It defends from the collective and universal to sustain a personal sense of self, the core identity.

For most, only the content itself, the thoughts are conscious. The mind itself and its underpinnings are not. We have what is conscious, what is subconscious, and what is unconscious.

Research has shown that the unconscious mind operates vastly faster than the conscious mind but runs only existing programs. Unconscious processing is typically over 90% of mental activity. What rises to the surface in the conscious mind can be contemplated and choices made but it is much slower.

If we don’t have good mental and emotional habits, which is typical of most, we often resist experiences and build up a backlog of unprocessed junk. That triggers a lot of background noise, babbling away as a “monkey mind.”

But by gradually becoming more conscious, we can complete the unresolved experiences and reduce the noise.

The Theosophists divided the 7 layers of expression into 7 sub-levels each but I’ve not found it this tidy. Certainly there are subsections though.

The Vedic tradition talks of 3 primary aspects of mind:

1: Manas: the sense-directed mind. This produces the content we’re most conscious of. The information from our senses is sub-consciously heavily filtered for relevance, compared to prior experiences to check for danger, then the net result pops in to our conscious mind. (Note this filtering and comparing is done by programs. See below.)

And yet the identified ego below claims these results as “my thinking.”

2: Ahamkara: the I-sense that helps us distinguish what is self and other. The intellect, more subtle than the mind, discriminates the distinction. The mind then builds this up as an I-sense. It adds a set of self-concepts and impressions. We become identified with the I-sense as a Me. I am a plumber who is married and lives in Albuquerque, for example.

This self-sense develops early on as we separate from mother and continues around age 2 into Asmita, the My sense or possessive. We identify with our body and possessions as aspects of myself. We should outgrow this stage but many don’t. Waking up kills asmita though.

3: Chitta: this word means ‘divided from consciousness’ aka subconscious. It is those aspects of mind that are stored away and unresolved yet create activity in the mind. Many translate chitta as mental activity but Vritti is the more accurate term for that.

Chitta is classed in 2 types:

a: Vasana: unresolved desires,

Karma means action. Action or energy always seeks balance so for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. If we resist the consequences that flow from our actions, we can develop energetic sludge and knots.

Resistance doesn’t stop the flow of action but can interfere with its smoothness and completion. This is much like a log can partly block a pipe. Water still flows but there can be a build-up and eddies. The log and the water both seek resolution and the disturbance shadows our daily experience.

The cycles of time and the collective determine when older consequences will flower. We may experience this as events that show up in our life. Or we may experience emotions. Or both. Emotions are subjective qualities of energy. This is why clearing emotions allows us to better perceive energy.

I’ve mentioned before about our dominant guna or quality of consciousness. This flavours our experience of both events and emotions. In a recent webinar, Dorothy Rowe gave the example of the guna and astrological house or area of life. If the trends of time are triggering the 12th house of our (Vedic) birth chart, what is unresolved in that arena can show up as events and experiences. Our dominant guna will influence the style of what shows up.

In the example, the 12th house is about endings and completion. A strong influence there can show up as a need to withdraw from the world. If tamas guna is dominant, that can express as a prison stay. If rajas is dominant, events may unfold as a hospital stay. And if sattva is dominant, an ashram stay.

It’s the same basic influence triggering events but they’re arising through our flavour. The same energy obliging withdrawal will express in different ways depending on what it is expressing through. Three people can have completely different experiences of the same influence. Of course, this is a simplification for illustration. Actual events will have far more nuances.

But note the key detail here. It’s not about the content of the experience. It’s about the qualities of energy that seek balance and the style or flavour of life that is expressing through. The content or forms are almost irrelevant yet it’s usually what gets our attention.

If we’re open and skilled with releasing, we may find the nugget or energetic driver of an arising event and resolve it energetically within. If we follow the sensation and discover a charged contraction, our simple attention can release it, often with a wave of emotion.

Yet because of the need of the time, we may not see the core and will still need to allow the experience to unfold as events in our life.

On the other hand, if we’re unwilling and resist what is arising or get caught up in the content, our experience will be more difficult. Rather than just dealing with heavy traffic, we’ll have an incident. If the energy cannot resolve through us, it will come around again later. This is the wheel of karma.

An example that comes up: in a prior life I didn’t fulfil family expectations of a military career. The family let it go, but it remained unresolved for me. That lack of resolution became karma to resolve. In this life, it showed up as a police career that dominated a decade of my life – all because of how I responded to it in a prior life. It’s good to clean up our stuff.

Our resistance to experience may even reinforce the knots, adding another layer of resistance each time it comes around. Those layers complicate unfolding events when we live through them.

By the time we get to energy healing, we can find some of our energy nuggets, knots, and charges have multiple layers to peel off before we get to the core.

Surrender is a key part of enlightenment unfolding. A recent question has led me to explore the word in more detail.

The surrender I refer to is not giving away our power. That is submission, keeping our control but giving responsibility for it to someone else. That is disempowering.

True Surrender is allowing; it is letting go; it is permitting life to lead us; it is harmonizing with the Divine.

Surrender is allowing our higher nature to lead, letting go of the controller, our ego identification. Once the controller falls way, we can begin to operate from our infinite source. We gain infinite resources, inner peace, happiness, and profound support from the world.

But this surrender isn’t something we do. We’re so used to doing that just being without doing is foreign. It’s somehow lazy or insufficient. Surrender is a non-doing, it is allowing everything to be as it is. This has nothing to do with an idea or story of letting go. It is letting go of that too. It is a way of being.

Awakening is profoundly simple. But because we’re so used to doing, we don’t know how to just be. It is when we finally relax, just for a moment, that the Self can shine through and see itself.

Yoga Sutra 1 v2-3:

Yoga is the complete settling of the activity of the mind.

Then the observer is established in their own nature.

A similar thing can happen after awakening. If we try to hold on to it or control it, the mind can temporarily overshadow it. Part of settling in is learning to let it be as it is. Settling in to a deeper surrender to deepest being.

A pre-awakening example comes to mind. When I first started witnessing sleep, it was fascinating and exciting. I watched the body fall asleep and observed and manipulated dreams. But soon I realized that watching the details means the mind was still awake as it’s what processes the senses. In deep sleep, the mind also sleeps.

I had to surrender more deeply into it to allow the mind to sleep too. Without senses, there was no detail. Sleep was more like a deep, silent meditation. Testing showed that the breath often stopped during deep sleep. That’s a key symptom of transcending or samadhi. The body is in such a deep state of rest that the need for breath pauses*.

Yet even if there was no sensory awareness, there was a continuity of Self that hadn’t been there before. ‘I’ was eternal. (But the controller stayed in charge awhile longer.)

This is the nature of the spiritual process. An effortless meditation can teach non-doing. But if we confuse that simplicity with insufficient, we’ll corrupt the practice and drift away. In the same way, awakening is only hard because we’re looking for something. It happens when doing ends. When we stop, that’s when we wake up.

It is just that simple. Surrendering the need to be something and just Be. Surrendering the need for awakening to look a certain way. Surrendering control, just for a moment. Pop.

And then we can learn surrender to our higher nature more and more deeply as we step through the higher stages.

After I woke up, I remember Lorn Hoff talking about perpetual surrender. This horrified me. It took me all this time to surrender for a moment. How was I possibly going to surrender perpetually?? (laughs)

It comes down to deepening into our infinite nature and learning to trust. Then the contractions can relax and we can let go more and more deep...

Thousands of years ago, in a higher age, there was a group of very enlightened seers known as the Saptarishi’s or seven sages. They lived much longer than we do now. A need was seen to support people in the future, especially in the current time of transition from the dark to light. They wrote descriptions of thousands of peoples’ lives along with remedies for the major blockages they faced.

The rishis wrote by scratching letters on dried palm leaves. We know these leaves as Nadi leaves.

They have been carefully maintained over the many centuries since. Originally written in Sanskrit, many were translated into old Tamil in the 14th century by King Sarbhoji of Tanjore. Those scattered around India although many are still in Tamil Nadu. They collected some into a library near Chidambaram.

The leaves themselves are not just designed to be a life reading but to be read at a certain time. Imagine having a jyotish reading by an enlightened sage done thousands of years prior. They saw your life when the reading would be needed.

Finding your leaf can be an adventure. I heard about them years ago but finding it was a big unknown. There is travel to India, finding a legitimate reader with good skill, waiting for an appointment, having the search, and then repeating the process until your leaf is found. This can be time consuming and costly. I’ve read a few such stories.

Earlier this year, I found out about someone who has contacts with the mentioned library and readers in India. As the library has a batch of sets, it’s much more likely they can find your leaf. Plus, they arrange a remote reading via Skype. Much cheaper than a trip to India.

I’ll also note this is a good connection. There are many frauds in this market too, even on YouTube. Think of it like a newspaper sun sign reading vs a detailed description of your life.

On YouTube

It’s still a bit of a process – you pay half up front along with a thumb print they use to determine which sets of leaves to search. There is 108 types of fingerprints in this system. The librarian in India goes to the section for your thumb-print type and meditates, selecting 2-3 bundles your leaf may be in. And they make an appointment. At the allotted time, Vera goes over the process with you, then you both connect with India and meet the reader and translator.

Each leaf starts with a series of qualifying statements. You confirm or deny each one. Like “you have 2 brothers”. Or “you’re having legal issues”. No? Next leaf. Through this long series of yes/no questions you find the right leaf. For me, the matching took 45 min. We found my leaf part way into the second bundle.

Sometimes, the reading can happen then and the balance is due. Sometimes, some preparations are required before the reading, like a puja. And sometimes, the leaf is not found in those bundles.

In the latter case, other bundles can be searched but there obviously isn’t a leaf for everyone. Yet if you feel called, it’s likely there is one. Or they’ll refund you the initial payment.

For me, the reading started after a short break. It began by going over the basic details. The leaf included my detailed birth info, fathers name, mothers unusual name, my name, number and gender of my siblings, number and gender of my children, and so on. My teachers were also mentioned by name as true gurus.

Everything existing was accurate. There was an hour of information, some of it sorted by time, talking about significant events for the rest of my life. Some expected, some a surprise. Some very specific advice, like eating more oranges. The sage had a wry sense of humour too.

Regular readers know I frequently mention effortless meditation. This is because of the key role it plays in culturing the ground for enlightenment. Over time, I’ve come to see its value more and more deeply.

Yet there’s a key point about practices to make. Enlightenment isn’t caused by anything we do. It arises from the grace of the Divine. The purpose of spiritual practices is not to get enlightened but to prepare the ground. Then when grace arises, the shift is more likely to be smooth and supported. If the ground is not ready, grace will come as a profound but passing experience. Practices will also improve our quality of life and cleanse our old karma through purification.

Devotional recitation, contemplation, body awareness, and other techniques are each distinct with different benefits. But is there transcendence? This is the key for awakening.

Transcendence is going beyond the mind and into our source, our nature under all the noise of the mind and emotions. This is the Samadhi of Yoga and the Turiya of the Upanishad.

Why do we want transcendence? It does several things:

– the experience of source, our true nature

– culturing letting go for healing and awakening

– the settling of the mind settles the body leading to deep rest and healing

– the experience of going within makes the layers between the surface and pure consciousness gradually more conscious, refining perception, and culturing sattva

– transcendence triggers soma, a fine substance that increases refinement, purification, and the support of nature

An ideal practice for transcendence has 3 aspects:

1: a suitable vehicle for transcending into samadhi

2: the correct technique to create the conditions for transcending

3: the correct experience of correct technique

To explain:

1: a suitable vehicle for transcending into samadhi. Samadhi brings us to source and the experience of Yoga or union plus soma for refinement.

There are many ways of transcending. But the most common vehicle for going within is a mantra or sound. Sound is the most subtle sense and can bring us closest to source. Then we let go of the vehicle and transcend the practice into samadhi.

Such a mantra should be of known good effect and suitable for the lifestyle of the student. The classic Om, for example, is a renunciate mantra. This is unsuitable for most people and tends to cause relationships and possessions to fall away. Picking a random or generic mantra may not be beneficial for you. Don’t underestimate how potent mantras become at a deep level.

Mantras usually come from Sanskrit and an ancient science of mantra. For effortless transcending, we practice the mantra without meaning. Otherwise meaning engages the mind and we don’t go beyond it.

Some suggest using an Eastern mantra is praying to Hindu gods. Everything in Sanskrit is associated with a god, including your house, chair, and food. But in a simple, effortless meditation, the meaning or associations are not contemplated. That’s a different practice. (Devotional practices may diverge from this, but again that’s a different approach.)

2: the correct technique. As noted I recommend an effortless practice that leads to regular samadhi. Innocent attention on the mantra and allowing the mind to go where it goes. When it’s not preoccupied by its daily concerns, the mind naturally settles deep within as it is drawn by the greater power and happiness present on...