"The Cause of Suffering" - Adyashanti

"If you filter my words through any tradition or '-ism', you will miss altogether what I am saying. THE LIBERATING TRUTH IS NOT STATIC; IT IS ALIVE. It cannot be put into concepts and be understood by the mind. The truth lies beyond all forms of conceptual fundamentalism. What you are is the beyond—awake and present, here and now already. I am simply helping you to realize that." 


-- Adyashanti

Diffusing emotional reactivity. Understanding the cyclic process of our thoughts, interpretations and emotions.

This is a wonderful avenue of inner exploration which I have been becoming curious about recently and funnily enough, this morning I came across this talk by Gil Fronsdal who is a Buddhist monk and public speaker from the Insight Meditation Centre in Red Wood City California. I love the way he simplifies complex streams of thought through quaint little stories. They seem to stick. The following is a combination of a transcription from the talk and my own words on the topic. 

The relationship between our story making, our thoughts, interpretations and our emotions is a cyclical relationship, a kind of two way exchange. Sometimes its clear that we make stories according to the emotions that we are experiencing, and sometimes we experience emotions because of the stories we tell ourselves.

“For example. It’s like if you go for a walk down a street and you pass a dark alleyway. You see in the shadows a figure approaching you from the darkness. You start to tell yourself “oh no it’s a thug coming to rob me... I’m sure that’s what it is... and I have all my money and life savings in my bag! What if they rob me i'll be homeless and no one will love me... oh and I wont get to shower! Then you get even more afraid as everyone on the streets becomes scary and intimidating. There all judging you saying that you are homeless, cause you obviously look pretty shabby. The fear triggers all this story making and finally when you gain the courage to look down the alleyway, you see a little kitty kat, and there is a light coming up from below, blowing up this scary shadow on the wall making it a whole lot bigger than it actually is.”

So this demonstrates how we create stories from our initial fear and then how our stories trigger all the secondary emotions in response. What starts the emotional spiral? We can’t really know. It’s sort of like the chicken and the egg. How much of our emotions are mediated through concepts and stories is a fascinating investigation, and a pracice we can embrace through our everyday life. All it takes is a moment of relaxed, attentive reflection.

This week take a few moments, when you might reflect upon your story making. There are hidden invitations in every interaction. See if you can catch yourself before you leap. And see how that is for you. 

With love

Lewin

We hurry about our whole lives. We follow the advice of our parents and teachers, we heed the words of the ones we admire,or we reject them finding others to project our greatness onto. We chant our prayers, maybe we never pray at all, yet we still search. We search within our own answers and still deeper questions rise up from the depths. 
"Who am I, Where did I come from? What does it all mean?" 
Eventually all diversions lead to dead ends. We come up empty handed yet again, and through virtue or vice there comes a time when all seeking stops...

A time when the fog settles and the wind drops to a soft breeze, 

And a greatness stretches out before you, 
formless yet you know it is there, 

you feel its pull, you hear its lenitive melody. 

A voice is carried on the wind....           

There is a fear in your belly. 
There are voices saying no. 

But there is somewhere deeper telling you, 

You don't need to answer. Don't say a word, 

just stop here a moment...          

The Great Way is like a level road.

Yet there are many side roads leading you astray.

The first of these roads is called Personal Consciousness

The next is consciousness of the Future

One is consciousness of the Past

Another is consciousness of Sound and Form

The last is Causal Consciousness

If all paths are forgotten and Personal Consciousness remains, the level road of the Great Way is forgotten. Therefore most importantly one must let go of all attachment to personal knowledge. 

My interpretation and addition to Lu Tzu's writings on "Personal Consciousness". Personal Consciousness (Ego, Conditioned Consciousness) is often mentioned by Lu Tzu as being one of the primary diversions from what he called "The Great Way". Lu Tzu was one of the pioneers of "The Complete Reality" schools of Taoism. Click the link for an explanation of that particular school of philosophy. 


http://www.goldenelixir.com/publications/eot_quanzhen.html


Photo by: Lewin de la Motte

Albert Hofman on Entheogens as a tool for generating a Holistic Perspective

In this world, the point which something happens is determined by the circumstances that call for it to happen. This Encyclopaedia of Psychoactive plants had to appear at just this time, for our contemporary society has need of such a work. This need is connected with the spiritual and material dilemma of our times. It is not necessary to list all of the things which are no longer right in our world but we can mention some: in the spiritual domain, materialism, egoism, isolation, and the absence of any religious foundation; on the material level, environmental destruction as a result of technological development and over industrialization, the ongoing depletion of natural resources and the accumulation of immense fortunes by a few people while the majority become increasingly destitute. 

These ominous developments have their spiritual roots in dualistic worldview, a consciousness that splits our experience of the world into subject and object. This dualistic experience of the world first emerged in Europe. But is had already been at work in the Judeo-Christian worldview, with its god that sits enthroned above creation and humankind, and his admonition to “subdue...and have no dominion...over ever living thing that moveth upon the earth.”

 This is now occurring at a terrifying rate. A change for the better will come about only when a general shift in consciousness takes place. Our fractured consciousness, which Gottfried Benn characterized as a “fateful European neurosis”, must be replaced by a consciousness in which creator, creation, and created are experienced as a unity.

All means and all ways that will help lead to a new and universal spirituality are worthy of support. Chief among these is meditation, which can be enhanced and intensified through a variety of methods, including yogic practices, breathing exercises, and fasting, and through appropriate use of certain drugs as pharmacological aids.

The drugs I am referring to belong to a special group of psychoactive substances that have been characterized as psychedelics and, more recently, as entheogen (psychedelic sacraments). These effect an enormous stimulation of sensory perceptions, a decrease or even neutralization of the I-Though boundary, and alterations in consciousness in the form of both sensitization and expansion.

The use of such psychedelic drugs within a religio-ceremonial framework was discovered among Indian tribes in Mexico at the beginning and in the middle of the twentieth century.

This sensational discovery led to ethno-botanical investigations to remote areas around the world to search for psychoactive plants, the results of which were documented in numerous publications and pictures. 

The encyclopedic compilation of ancient knowledge and new discoveries about psychoactive plants that is in your hands was produced by a well qualified author who has contributed important new insights on the basis of his own fieldwork. It is an undertaking of great value.

Disseminating knowledge about psychoactive plants, together with the proper ways to use them, represents a valuable contribution within the context of the many and growing attempts to bring about a new, holistic consciousness. Transpersonal psychology, which is becoming ever more important in psychiatry, persues the same goal within a therapeutic framework.

The holistic perspective is more easily practiced on living nature than on the inanimate objects created by humans. Let us look into a living mandala instead, such as that found in the calyx of a blue morning glory, which is a thousand more times perfect and beautiful than anything produced by human hand, for it is filled with life, that universal life in which both the observer and the observed find their own individual places as manifestations of the same creative spirit. 

- Albert Hofmann PHD. Summer 1997 

Taken from "The Encyclopaedia of Psychoactive Plants, Christian Ratsch 1998 Park Street Press