Category: The Human Experience

Published: 14 June 2024

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It's important to understand the ego and its influence in each human life and humanity as a whole. The ego is the sense and belief of being a separate self, an entity separate from others. The ego grows from the mind's identification with the human form. The stronger the ego, the more it is identified with the human form and its sense of importance in and against the world. The extreme ego has a hardened mental shell that protects itself from others and distances itself from others. It clashes with others, often other egos with hardened mental shells. We are talking here of a clenched fists, angry, hateful, destructive ego, narcissistic and sadistic. It sounds harsh, but that's the extreme of the ego. It will cause misery and suffering to others wherever it goes.

Human history has seen this kind of ego dominate others and enrol others in its egotistic aims. We should be cautious of giving power to ego dominated people, yet it continues to happen. Sometimes people see a person with a strong ego as charismatic, and that may be the case, as it can often present as a distinctive personality with a certain charm and flair. A good lesson to learn is to recognise the ego when you see it, and to know its pitfalls.

Recognising the ego in others can also lead us to recognising the ego in us. Ultimately we experience the body, the perceptions, the feelings, the thoughts, and the identity within the mind. We experience the ego identity. It is not who we are. It is more like the opposite of who we are. The ego is the sense of separate self. Our true nature is the infinite and undivided selfless self. The ego is incomplete. It needs and wants. Our true nature is complete, without need or want.

The ego is the phantom ego, the mistaken identity, the great pretender, the false king. It is a bundle of thought forms that cling to its imagined identity with the human body. We perceive this. We are the Awareness that perceives the play of the ego and the world. It is through this sense of identity that we perceive the world.

What do we do about this pesky ego? There are things that we can do to lessen its control (it loves to control). Recognising that you are not the thoughts is a good starting place. See that the thoughts that arise are perceived by you but not thought by you. When thoughts about 'me' and 'mine' and 'others' run along, step back and know that you are perceiving them. Recognise that there are no limits to anything. There are no things. There are no limits that define who you are.

There are also practical actions that can be taken:

Peace - be at peace. Allow peace to permeate through the mind, the ego, the body, and to others and the world. You are the peace at the heart of being. You are unshakeable stillness. You cannot stop the motion of the world, but you can recognise the peace and stillness of your being. This allows peace to permeate through the human nature in its contact with others.

Acceptance - accept the mind, the ego, the body, others and the world. Let it be. Don't get caught up in it. It's okay for the world to be as it is. Know that you are unaffected by the ego's problems. This acceptance and realisation brings a centring of your being. It helps withdraw the mistaken sense and belief of identity and ego.

Love - be the love that you are. Allow love, the highest love, to shine through the mind and the ego, out into the world. Show kindness to others. Be selfless and caring and non-judgemental. Help where you can. But know that you are not the doer. You are not a body, ego or mind. This expression of love and kindness comes from the heart of your being and shines through the human form, bringing light into the world.

Category: The Human Experience

Published: 24 May 2024

Hits: 1486

Let's take it that you already understand and accept that the world is non dual, i.e. there is only One. The limits and divisions that appear, and which the mind labels, are not true. The One is an Infinite Singularity. I call it The Infinite One. It is the one being expressed as the apparent multiplicity of the universe. This recognition of the reality of Oneness helps us to understand the human condition.

Humans generally consider themselves to be the body. They may feel that they 'have a soul', which still means they are looking at spirituality from the aspect of being a body that owns a soul. This identification with the body is effectively the formless taking on form and believing itself to be the form. That's not what we are. This limitation and identity as the body rules the human world. That is, most human lives and the largescale decisions made by humanity come from this view of being limited separate beings.

Selfishness arises from this sense of being a limited separate self. Suffering arises. Lack, need, desire, sadness, loneliness, and despair arise because of this sense of being incomplete. Anger, envy, hate and blame arise because of the sense of me and them. All of humanity's problems come from the sense of being a separate self. The separate self is the root of all human suffering. But it's not true.

The mind has this sense of being separate, yet the truth is a Singularity. There is only infinite oneness. There is not truly a separate me and them, no more than ripples on a pond are separated. It is all the pond.

Recognising this sense of separation and the reality of Oneness can bring about a change. Peace is the nature of oneness. It is the heart of being, the still centre that encompasses all. Recognising oneness and living in the way of oneness can bring about a change in the human experience and humanity as a whole. There needs to come a recognition that the heart of our being is complete, peace, love and harmony. This sense of oneness dispels suffering, sadness, loneliness, despair, anger, hate and blame.

If we want an end to suffering we need to let go of the separate self. We need to live in the way of oneness, acknowledging the oneness of life. We need to allow the sense of oneness to spread through human life. We do this by letting go of holding on. We reclaim freedom by letting go. Let go of the limits that bind you, the attachments that define you, and the identity that hides you. Let the real you shine through. Allow the still, peaceful centre to be unrestricted. Allow the peace and love that is the heart of your being be unbounded.

You are the Infinite One, without limits. You are peace, love and harmony. Make it your life's work to be as you are.

Category: Non-duality

Published: 02 August 2024

Hits: 1488

If there is One Infinite Consciousness why can't we know other people's thoughts? Some people may find it difficult to accept that there is One Consciousness. We perceive a world of differences. There are many people with different beliefs, languages, cultures, ethnicities, fashions and interests. We all seem to have our own mind, think our own thoughts and make our own choices. How can I be the same consciousness as all those other people? I don't know their thoughts. Surely I would know all thoughts if I was the same consciousness.

Let's understand this better. I could say that in my mind I experience my thoughts, images and dreams. However, I'm already limiting my mind there. It would be more accurate to say that in my mind I experience thoughts, images, dreams, feelings, perceptions, the body and the world. It would be fair to say that all my experience is in my mind. I don't experience anything of the world outside my mind. Even my sense of inside my mind and outside my mind is actually all in my mind. The mind only seems to be inside the denser human form. So where does my mind end?

Truly we cannot find a limit to the mind. I can close my eyes and reach out indefinitely in the mind without finding a limit. Even the perception of the universe I experience in my mind when I look up at the sky on a clear night has no end. We will search forever trying to find true limits.

Is this mind then the same as Infinite Consciousness? Yes, but we call it the mind when it has a sense and belief of being limited and separate. It's not really 'my' mind, and really there is no mind. There is only Infinite Consciousness. But Infinite Consciousness cannot know a multitude. It cannot know many. The human experience allows Infinite Consciousness to seemingly focus and limit itself to perceive itself as a being in a world of many. Our dream experience is a smaller representation of this, where we experience our mind through the activities of a being in a dream world. The sense of limits in the dream world are weaker but it's not unusual to meet a character in the dream world and not know what they are thinking. Yet the dream is wholly the mind. In a dream my character, the other characters and the places I go to are all the mind.

This world that we experience then is wholly Infinite Consciousness appearing to be limited and separate. The apparently limited mind is like a mini Consciousness, with similar qualities. What happens in the mind is that thought forms develop a sense and belief of separation, limitation and identity. If we truly let go or dispel these false senses and beliefs of limitation, the mind sinks back into its true nature of Infinite Consciousness. This is what we call Nirvana, Moksha, Self Realisation, or Enlightenment.

This doesn't mean then that an Enlightened One can hear all thoughts or indeed know all things. The thoughts, the being and the world only appear by Consciousness focusing and condensing. When Self Realisation occurs it is a withdrawing of focus and a letting go of limits. As mentioned earlier, Infinite Consciousness cannot know the many. Although Infinite Consciousness is at the heart of all experiences, the experiences of the many beings belong in the apparently separate world, not in the Awareness of Pure Being. As far as Infinite Consciousness is concerned, there is not a world, there are not many people, nothing happens, and there is no space or time.

So it is not that Infinite Consciousness knows all things. Infinite Consciousness knows only itself. Although it is the essence of intelligence it does not know many things, because 'many things' is not the reality. Infinite Consciousness is the reality and the peak of knowing. It is the Pure Clarity of Being. It is our core nature, self knowing and knowing no other.

Category: Non-duality

Published: 04 June 2024

Hits: 1485

The human sense of being a separate limited self comes from the perception of distance and limits. The mind feels that it is at the centre of perception. The sense of distance spans outward from 'itself'. Through sight it perceives distance. Through sound it perceives distance, and also to a certain extent through touch. Even with our eyes closed we can perceive where our hands and feet are, and they are perceived as being a distance outwards from our centre of awareness.

This 'centre' or heart of awareness is not strictly accurate. It may be a conceptual point where all perceptions are known and where dimensions seem to be perceived from, but it is a relative centre dependent on the apparent outer shell. The mind has a sense that it is in the head, where the eyes see from and the ears hear from. But this is an assumption. Truly, if you reach out with the mind you will not find any limits.

Similarly, the mind can assume identity with the body and can feel that it is within the body. This is based on the faulty assumption that the body's limits are firm and impervious. But we know that the body or indeed any physical matter is not impervious. Matter gives an appearance of solidity, but we know that radiation can travel through matter that seems to be solid. For example, x-rays are used to examine bones within the body, and ground penetrating radar is used to analyse buried structures beneath the soil.

Back to the human being. There is a sense of being within, because we perceive these apparent limits, the outer shell of the head and body, and the distance away from us that things appear. As I've mentioned elsewhere in these blogs and in my books, our perception of distance is always right here. We may recognise that, but there is still the sense of 'here' being within the human form.

Truly, this point 'here' is not enclosed. It is a spaceless space, within which the sense of inside and outside is experienced. We experience this sense of being within the apparently limiting human form from a field of open awareness. We perceive the imaginary limits of the heart and the whole from here, from nowhere.

So, although the spiritual seeker learns to look within to 'know thyself', it is found that there is no within. The heart of being is not a centre, because there are no limits to define it. But in seeking this heart of being we realise that there is no inside or outside, and that there is no divide that separates the heart and the whole. It is in realisation of the Infinite One that the sense of being a separate limited self falls away.

This is what is called enlightenment, self realisation, or nirvana, where the illusory separate self is "snuffed out". Maya, or the illusion of separation, is rooted out at the source and reality is perceived clearly as it is. The limits that seemed to define the separate self disappear, and it is revealed that there is no identity. Pure formless aware being.