Our hope is to provide the most efficient “path” to Self-realization. Self-realization is direct recognition as Essential Nature, Omnipresent Being. Since this always has been, is now, and always will be our inherent nature, we do not need to develop something new or go through a long, arduous process to attain a distant goal. Half the battle on the apparent path to awakening as Self is merely realizing we are already what we seek.
How, then, to recognize this Essential Nature? Since Truth is eternal, one approach is noticing This within us that does not change. If something is changing, it is not Truth, and thus, cannot be what we fundamentally are. Thoughts come and go, emotions change, beliefs change, and our bodies change. When we stop, look within, we notice This that does not change. “Be still and know that I am God.” ~ Psalm 46:10 (NIV)
When we stop and notice this still sense of “I am,” we find silent, spacious Awareness—THIS is our essence.
There are many simple pointers to silent Awareness. One direct pointer is by Saint Francis of Assisi: “What you are looking for is what is looking.” Stop and notice the silent Awareness that is looking out through our eyes, sees our thoughts come and go, and is unchanged while everything passing changes. “What is looking” is not some clever koan; it is what is looking this very instant at these words. When meditating/sitting silently, let everything be as it is with an openness towards This that notices the changing. Notice THIS and be free.
Self-inquiry is a direct approach to Self-realization. Simply ask the question, “Who, or what, am I?,” with openness to the direct experience as still, awake, unchanging presence. We immediately rest as Pure Essence, Nothing crackling with potentiality. Again, what we are looking for IS LOOKING.
These are not questions or exercises for the mind. They are meant to invoke the immediate and direct recognition as our eternal nature. If we find we are thinking about the answers to these simple pointers—STOP. Notice this serene Awareness that sees the mind distracting us from our direct and immediate experience as Stillness, Presence, Silence, Emptiness, Nothing, Everything, Peace. In this space, in the wholeness as This, there is no judgment or anger towards the mind going off on tangents. Instead, we appreciate the recognition, “I was caught up in a thought stream,” as Grace. Only when we realize we are identifying with a thought stream do we have an apparent choice: continue that activity of mind, or, notice what is looking. This attitude of openness and appreciation towards Grace allows us to come back to the perspective as still, awake Awareness that sees those thoughts. This effortless, open-hearted vigilance speeds our growth towards a stabilized recognition as Eternal Essence. When we recognize Presence as our fundamental nature, we notice we have always truly been blessed and, throughout the day, we notice life is meditation. What we previously viewed as a problem, we now recognize as an opportunity, an apparent choice to continue with this false identification, or to let go of all pretenses and live as our true essence. Until we directly experience the boundless silence as Pure Awareness, and recognize This as our essence, as Spirit, we see no choice. Recognizing we are not these identifications allows us to let go and directly live Life unfettered. Eventually, the old habit of false identification falls away as we no longer feed it with our attention. In this way, all life’s experiences serve to bring us home to recognition as This prior to, and beyond, all concepts.
Living all of life as meditation rapidly enlivens our direct experience as primordial Awareness. No longer do we identify as our bodies, thoughts, emotions, and expressions. We now have the apparent experience of being nothing and something simultaneously. The distinction between nothing and everything dissolves. We come to the direct experience of Truth as stated by Nisargadatta Maharaj, “When I look inside and see that I am nothing, that is wisdom. When I look outside and see that I am everything, that is love. And between these two, my life turns.”
As we investigate the experience as our essence, our true nature, as primordial Awareness, we clearly see there are no borders. It does not end at our body. It is not bound by time or space. Our direct experience is this Awareness is omnipresent. There is no place we could say, “No, my presence does not go there.” When we “see” we are not bound by time or space, this is direct recognition as the substanceless substance pervading everything. Returning to Nisargadatta’s quote, we see we are everything. This is the very nature of Unity. Contrary to many expectations, Unity does not necessarily appear unified. This knowing is the direct experience as Being. As Nisargadatta Maharaj observed, “. . . between these two, my life turns.”
Nisargadatta’s statement seems paradoxical but becomes our direct experience when we look inside and cannot find any specific location where we are, and at the same time, when we look outside and cannot find any location where we are not. We are the simultaneous expression as nothing and everything. Nothing and everything are not different, both experiences arise from, in, and as This from which Beingness flows. THIS that is before Silence/Awareness/Space even exists.
Shankara clearly states, “The world is illusory. Brahman alone is real. Brahman is the world.” (Brahman is the unmanifest absolute.)
Adyashanti beautifully observes, “Nothing becoming something while remaining nothing.”
With devotion, Bec and Steve