THE METHOD

5 INQUIRY STEPS TO ENLIGHTENMENT

By Kyle Hoobin

Foreword By Professor Kriben Pillay

© 2017 SIMHA SAT PUBLISHING

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Table of Contents

FOREWORD

INTRODUCTION

STEP 1
PROVE WHAT'S REAL
(without thinking)

STEP 2
WHAT'S REAL COMES FIRST

STEP 3
CONFRONT THE DREAM

STEP 4
ALLOW YOURSELF TO END

STEP 5
LET GO OF FREEDOM

STEP 1
(PROVE WHAT'S REAL)
Q&A
STEP 2
(WHAT'S REAL COMES FIRST)
Q&A

STEP 3
(CONFRONT THE DREAM)
Q&A

STEP 4
(ALLOW YOURSELF TO END)
Q&A

STEP 5
(LET GO OF FREEDOM)
Q&A

IN CLOSING

THE METHOD 2-HR VIDEO CLASS RECORDING

 DISCLAIMER

No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form

or by any means, mechanical or electronic, including photocopying or
recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, or
transmitted by email without permission in writing from the publisher.

Although the author and publisher have made every effort to ensure that
the information in this book was correct at press time, the author and
publisher do not assume and hereby disclaim any liability to any party for
any loss, damage, or disruption caused by errors or omissions, whether
such errors or omissions result from negligence, accident, or any other
cause.
 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

To all of you who I've crossed paths with and to those who I have yet to,

you have my gratitude.

 DEDICATION

For the ones who are on their last page.

 FOREWORD

I must be upfront and confess a long-held deep bias towards any system of
spiritual practice that contained a ‘method’. No doubt, this was ingrained
by my take on, and very long association with, Krishnamurti’s teachings,
and reinforced by the current small group of so-called radical nondual
teachers who stress that there is nothing to do because there is no self who
can actually do anything.

However, paradoxically, through the lens of Kyle Hoobin’s incisive

distillation of the awakening process that he terms ‘The Method’, I have
found that this little book maps very accurately ‘my’ experiential journey.
(And yes, ultimately, there is no journey, there is no self who has taken
one… there is no thing. But in the relative, unawake, human experience,
there is.)

What’s of great value in this book is that it provides a map that closely
corresponds to the awakening process. Be it Krishnamurti’s story or Byron
Katie’s story or Joe Blogg’s, there are similarities, and ‘The Method’
reflects this through a methodology of inquiry of five steps. But these are
not steps of assumptions or belief-making, but steps that engage the mind
to test its assumptions and beliefs, and in the discovery thereof, to die into
the unknown.

Kyle Hoobin displays an incredible spiritual maturity in not making

any claims for what he offers, but rather invites us to see what’s true in our
own experience. (He is also extremely pragmatic and asks you not to take
on his words if you cannot find their equivalence in your own experience.
He is not dogmatic.)

Divided into two sections, one descriptive of the terrain, and the other
analytical – the latter through questions and answers that either reflect the
workings of the five steps or bring clarity to the mind on particular sticky
issues – my sense is that those who are ripe and are exhausted with
spiritual seeking and the endless questions of the mind, will find a great
resonance with the words herein; and maybe, just maybe, a true catalyst
for the final step.

I find that I would have no hesitation is using this book in my

academic teaching and research of the transformation model Theory U,
which has interesting parallels with ‘The Method’. It is concise, and
avoids theory for what can actually be discerned in the experiential.

Professor Kriben Pillay

Graduate School of Business and Leadership

University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa

Author of The Poisons—greed, ill will, delusion
 INTRODUCTION

It's been a long journey.

You've searched for a happiness that lasts but continue to come up

short. There seems to be a key ingredient that continues to elude you.
Why? You're an intelligent, aware human being... right? If there were such
a thing as lasting peace and happiness then you should have figured out a
way to find them by now.

Perhaps the most bizarre part of it all is that you know in your heart of
hearts that there is in fact an end to your search. You can't explain it but
you know it. This knowing defies all logic and past experience and yet it
can't be shaken. You'd bet your life on it. In fact, you've already placed
that bet, haven't you? That's why you're reading this right now.

You're ready to go the distance. You've passed the point of no return

and are ready to stake your life.

It's time.

There are five key stages that every seeker of truth and freedom
encounters prior to genuine self-realization (enlightenment). These five
stages or steps, can vary in duration and intensity depending on who it is
that's moving through them. Someone whose suffering is very acute will
pass through these stages much more quickly than someone whose
suffering is only a mild persistent annoyance. While the duration and
intensity of each stage varies from person to person, the stages themselves
do not.

The intention behind placing these five stages into book form is to help
bring your story and search to a climax more quickly.

By seeing all five stages laid out in front of you, your search will be
given more clarity which in turn will solidify your commitment to
becoming total in everything you do.

Self-realization without totality after all, is impossible.

You only become total in your search when the medicine of the world
can no longer cure you. Only when your situation becomes terminal are
you ready to give the truth everything you've got.

The Method is for those whose situation is terminal. It is not a self-

help practice. The Method is a guide to help you during the transition from
self to no-self... from being asleep to being awake.

The mechanism that keeps you asleep is the delusion of attainment. On

a deep fundamental level, you believe that you can acquire an outside
source and make it become part of you, make it complete you.
 The reason that you can't just read these words and let go of that
delusion is that 'you' are also a part of that delusion. The 'you' or 'me' that
wants to become free of that delusion is the very thing that's secretly
maintaining it. 'Me' is a form of cosmic hypnosis; a cyclical self-
sustaining illusion formed from identification with existence. This
message comes from beyond that hypnosis but is being delivered and
interpreted within that hypnosis.

The value of this message lies in its intention: to render the hypnotized
state unfulfilling and thus unnecessary. Only when the hypnotized state
becomes unnecessary is it truly ready to end.

If the mechanism of sleep is the delusion of attainment, then why try to

help people wake up by using something called 'The Method'? Isn't that a
contradiction?

If you are not awake, not enlightened, then it's because you still believe
that you can attain awakeness, enlightenment.

OK, I choose to not believe that anymore. Does that mean I'm
enlightened now?

You can't just decide to not believe in something, you have to prove
that your belief isn't true.

Until you have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that attainment is

an illusion, your 'self' will still feel real and your search will seem
justified, necessary, unavoidable.

Taking this into account, it makes no sense to rely on words alone to

lead you to truth and freedom.

If proof is what you need, then a process of elimination is what is

needed. Yes, this method can only be carried out within the hypnotized
state, but once you remove the believability of everything within that state
then you're left with no choice but to wake up out of it.

For this reason, enlightenment will not be a result of this method, but a
byproduct of it.

You exhaust the seeker in you by removing the believability of what is

sought. You won't reach for a drug once you know it won't have any effect
on you anymore. And even if you do, that tendency won't last very long.
So how do you remove the believability of what is sought? By removing
the believability of what is seeking.

The usefulness of this method lies in its requirement of single-pointed

uncompromising totality through direct self-inquiry.

You can't attain truth, but you can burn through everything that isn't
truth.
 STEP 1
PROVE WHAT'S REAL
(without thinking)
You think you know. That's the problem. The truth is, you don't know very
much... in fact, you only really know one thing.

You don't search, struggle and suffer because of improper knowledge,

you search, struggle and suffer *because* of knowledge.

Your suffering continues because you think you have knowledge of

something about you and life that’s true even though it isn’t. So long as
you hold your mind’s knowledge to be ultimate truth, you will never wake
up to reality and you will never be truly free. Your mind IS knowledge. It
forms itself from the interpretation and accumulation of life experiences.
It’s also what you wear as ‘me’. The mind is what’s trying its best to give
you lasting happiness and it’s also the very thing that’s pushing it away.

What can make it so challenging to live beyond the mind is the

original sin you committed when you were very young. What was this
original sin? Your judgement of your primary knowledge (what you really
are) as not being enough, and therefore, wrong, untrue. If the only thing
you actually knew was wrong, then the world of second-hand knowledge
became your potential savior; your new best friend.

This is why the first step is to return to your original sight and to your
primary knowledge. You can’t expect to truly see and truly know for
yourself what is ultimately real if you continue to hold your second-hand
knowledge as ultimate truth.

Everything you *think* you know is second-hand knowledge.

Everything you know without thinking is what you *actually* know.
 See for yourself right now. Become quiet for a moment; when your
thoughts finally dissolve into silence, notice what knowledge remains
when thinking isn't happening. What do you still know with absolute
certainty? Eventually, you'll see that awareness of consciousness is the
only knowledge that survives this inquiry. This is your primary knowledge.

Navigating the world for practical reasons can require a great deal of
second-hand knowledge. To maintain your sense of self and the imagined
world that this self inhabits, second-hand knowledge is critical. While you
need second-hand knowledge to navigate the world for practical reasons,
you don't actually need it to maintain yourself. Maintenance is only
needed if something can stop working. Who you really are can't stop
working because it doesn't 'work' in the first place... it simply IS.

There's no need to look down upon second-hand knowledge – that sort

of thing is helpful if you want to build rockets or pay your bills. There's
nothing wrong with second-hand knowledge. Second-hand knowledge has
only become an issue because you now use it to tell yourself who you are
and how you should be.

Because you have relied for so long on knowledge from outside

sources to tell you who you are, it’s likely going to take a bit of time
getting your bearings straight while you find out what’s real.

As mentioned earlier, if your suffering is very acute and conscious,

this process will happen very quickly for you. If on the other hand the pain
you're experiencing is only just starting to become noticeable, it will be a
more gradual process where your inquiry will be at odds with your
attachment to your knowledge-derived sense of self.

The mind-made sense of self is obviously an illusion, but why is it so

convincing? A more helpful question would be: why are YOU so easily
convinced by it? The answer: because you want to be convinced... you
need to be convinced. Until you wake up, you won't fully accept the
illusory nature of mind because it would force you to accept the
unacceptable as being truth: that the only thing you really know is
awareness of consciousness (your primary knowledge).

You can only recognize illusion when you stop wanting to be one. Your
attachment to second-hand knowledge runs deep. This knowledge is what
gives your struggle meaning and justification. After all, you struggle
because you know something… something not good.

The first step in becoming free of your struggle is to prove what

knowledge is truly yours. You do this by proving what knowledge isn’t. By
directly scanning the imminent present and ruling out what can’t be 100%
verified through your direct immediate experience, you return to your
original sight and to your primary knowledge - essentially, the knowledge
of 'I'.

So let's do a test run and see what knowledge holds up against this scan
of the imminent present. Start with some of the obvious assumptions most
of us carry:
 — “I have purpose; I have arrived here and this is a momentary stop
before I keep moving on”.

Truth is without purpose because purpose is only possible for that

which can become more. Truth cannot become more of itself. Truth never
arrives because it can never leave. Past and future have nothing to do with
ultimate truth.

— “I have place; I am an important part of my surroundings and the

people’s lives I come into contact with”.

Truth has no place because truth is universal and cannot be defined by

specific surroundings or by the people in them. Truth cannot be located
anywhere specific because truth is everything that exists. You cannot
locate everything that exists. Truth is neither important nor unimportant, it
simply is.

Then the more subtle object-related assumptions:

— “I am in a room, I am sitting on a chair, I am reading a book.”

There’s no sense in denying that something is happening or that objects

exist, just reach out and touch your nose or pick up your cup - case closed.
The difference comes in when your label for what’s happening and for
those objects blinds you from seeing what’s really happening and what’s
really there. Your labels for life are what make up your narration of life.
This narration causes you to ‘see but not see’. In other words, the story
you tell yourself about what you’re seeing and experiencing is an act of
misdirection.

Then the most subtle of all assumptions:

— “I am.”

'I' is not an assumption, it’s simply, obviously the case. “I am” however
is belief-based. The movement from 'I' to “I am” is the transition from
truth to story, from wakefulness to sleep. You can prove 'I' but you can’t
prove “I am”. In other words, you can prove that you exist, but you can’t
prove that you exist as something in particular. This is the key recognition
that is needed to guide you through the following 4 steps: If you can’t
prove that you exist as something in particular then you are not something
in particular. Only when the present moment is fully aware of itself is this
recognition truly possible.

Obviously, “I am” feels more familiar to you than 'I'. After all, your
whole life up to this point has circulated around the assumption of “I am”
- of being somebody. The world, the body, the programming you've
received from family and friends was (and still is) put in place to reinforce
the illusion that you are a separate 'me'. None the less, in spite of how
persuasive these factors were, you and you alone were the one that allowed
yourself to adopt this illusory identity.

The framework of the mind is its concepts, ideas, judgments,

assumptions and opinions. Add all of them up and you have a seemingly
concrete reality – a world of information that tells you about the way
things are. The Achilles heel of this impenetrable reality of course is the
simple fact that you have to be told about it. This world of information
does not come from your direct experience (your primary knowledge)
which is the present moment. It comes from a remembered past, a
conceptualized present and an imagined future. Your direct experience of
life has nothing to do with memory, concepts, and imagination though,
does it? Direct experience is what you are experiencing without effort,
without thinking, without belief.

So what are the implications of sticking with what you truly know for
yourself? How much would change in your life if your life was lived from
your direct experience and nothing else? Could you still function in the
world? Of course. Your mind is always there when you need it. Want to go
to school? There it is. Want to do your taxes? There it is. Want to make a
grocery list? There it is. Use it when it's needed... like it was meant for. All
we're talking about is not using it when it isn't needed. Want to take a
walk? Leave it. Want to look at another human being? Leave it. Want to
stop struggling for your survival? Leave it.

Living from your direct experience simply means acknowledging

every moment that you're alive by giving your full attention to every
moment. Much of your experience of your world and the experience of
other people's worlds is one of problems that continuously need fixing
because attention is always being given elsewhere. There was nothing
wrong with you and the world until your mind came along and decided
that things should be better - right now.

Remember: If you face challenges, prove what's real and you will be
shown very quickly that challenges can't actually touch your primary
knowledge — you will see for yourself that challenges belong only to your
secondary knowledge... to your secondary 'self'. Then when you address
those challenges you will be coming from a place that knows regardless of
the outcome, the peace that you are can never really be touched.

Your primary knowledge is the imminent present. The imminent

present is all there really is. In reality, the ‘present’ doesn’t even exist
because of that fact. When it comes to ultimate truth, time is a complete
lie. ‘You’ have NEVER been anywhere. You WILL NEVER be anywhere.
You ARE nowhere… (now here). These are facts and they will never
change. The ‘present’ changes only in the present, change never happens
in a past or a future. 'I' can never be a tense.

So can we describe the experience of this 'I' once all of the knowledge
that’s been padding it has been stripped away? Not easily. For practical
reasons, let's say this: The experience of 'I' is that of an impersonal
witness that is aware of the present moment. This witness does not
identify with what is contained within the present moment nor does it
separate itself from the moment by claiming itself to be a witness. The
experience of the witness is not a state of cosmic duality where witness
and witnessed co-exist, but a realm of being where awareness is brought
forth and shines from within everything.

When you first shift from the world of knowledge to the world of the
unknown, you will be taking on the role of the witness. Once this shift is
almost completed, the role of the witness will be the last thing to go.

Ultimately, truth does not need to witness itself to be itself. Truth is

already itself.
 STEP 2
WHAT'S REAL COMES FIRST
Now you have a baseline to work with. You know the one thing that cannot
be disproven.

While it's one thing to experiment and see for yourself what you
actually know, it's a whole other thing to take that understanding and do
something with it in your life. You've proven what's real for you — what
you actually know for certain ('I'). Now it's time to let that truth sink in
and apply it to every moment of your waking life... or rather; to allow the
implications of that truth to become evident in every situation you find
yourself in. If the only thing you know for sure is that there is an
awareness of awareness, then where does that leave the rest of your life?
To allow what's real to come first marks a critical turning point in your
search for truth and freedom.

To acknowledge truth first in all situations you find yourself in

requires utter totality in your commitment to waking up.

But what would that look like exactly? How can you acknowledge truth
first when you obviously have a life that needs living, work that needs to
be done, people to see and places to go?

Allowing the truth of what you know to come first doesn't interfere
with the flow of life and any of its activities. In fact, allowing 'I' to be
acknowledged first in all of your activities only amplifies your experience
of them. Remember: 'I' itself is already here throughout all activities and
experience, so 'you' are not introducing a foreign element into what's
happening. What's really happening is that 'you' are being revealed to be
what's foreign. 'I' alone is your true nature. The 'you' or 'me' that believes
it can put 'I' first is what's actually illusory. None the less, that fact doesn't
really change the necessity of bringing the story of 'me' to its climax.

This process of revelation isn’t so much an effort on your part as much

as it is a willingness to acknowledge the truth that you’ve already proven
to yourself in step 1 *before* you acknowledge any other *supposed*
truths about yourself and the world.

Your daily life is now going to become a fully alive science experiment
where you acknowledge truth (the one and only truth of 'I') in *every*
situation, circumstance and interaction you encounter. Your daily tasks
may stay the same, but your experience of them will radically change.

So what does it look like to allow the truth of what you know to come
first? Whether you're taking money out at the ATM, making pancakes,
having a conversation with someone, driving your car, or watching TV,
your passion for truth will acknowledge 'I' first throughout all of these. As
a result, all activities will happen within the spaciousness of 'I', as if the 'I'
is witnessing everything that's happening.

Any assumptions about anything at all will have to fall under the sword
of your verification. Can it be proven right now in this moment? No? Not
entirely? Just a little? Then it’s not what’s actually real.

You are waking up now. You only care about what’s actually real.
 Here’s another example: You get up in the morning. You don’t think
about the day ahead because you already know what needs to happen.
When you pull the covers off, you pull the covers off only. When you put
on your slippers, you put on your slippers only. When you brush your
teeth, you brush your teeth only. In this way, complete and total focus on
*everything* you’re doing makes silencing your mind an effortless
practice. Through your total focus, your busy dream-generating mind will
gradually become unemployed because your attention will no longer be on
its content but on the content of what you’re experiencing.

Remember: totality is key here. This acknowledgment of truth

continuously is an absolute necessity for waking up. Acknowledging truth
continuously just means acknowledging what’s right in front of you and
nothing else. After all, there IS nothing else – right?

Acknowledging that there is nothing else can be made easier by deeply

recognizing that it's impossible to leave this moment. It simply can't be
done. This moment after all is the only thing that’s real. I’ll say it again:
this moment is the only thing that’s real. So if you can't leave this
moment, how often do you believe that you can? Recognizing this fact can
help silence the mind. After all, what more is there to think about once you
acknowledge that past and future are an illusion? There's obviously no
need to think about the present, so what need is there to think then? The
more this becomes apparent the more you will awaken. Self-realization
after all, is the realization of eternity... the truth that exists outside of
thought.

The awakened state awaits you in eternity - not in time. Eternity has
only one moment - this one.
 As you allow this second step to become your natural way of moving
through the world, you're going to be confronted with the energetic pull to
side with your beliefs. After all, to place what you know first can seem
very vulnerable in the beginning because you're placing your trust in
something that's essentially a mystery. Place that next to the logic and
influence of your beliefs and you will have an unfair match (initially). For
this reason, your beliefs about life will likely win over you for the first
little while. An example of this might be a bill payment that's due at the
end of the month – one in which you currently have no way of being able
to pay. Instead of just taking some practical steps to bring in some
additional income, you elevate the situation to one of concern because
you're assuming the worst will happen; because you're drawing upon your
second-hand knowledge. Since this belief is consuming your attention
first, what's actually real takes a back seat and you become lost again in
the illusory world of a separate 'me' that's struggling to survive.

While the initial pull to side with your beliefs will be strong at first,
your earnestness and vigilance in remaining with what's true will
gradually shift the gestalt and you will start to feel more at home in not
knowing than you will with your second-hand knowledge.

Eventually it will become very apparent that no matter how convincing

or real a belief might seem, no belief can survive the reality check that is
the present moment fully acknowledged. Your intelligence will eventually
conclude that if the present moment is all there is, and no belief can
survive in it when it's fully acknowledged, then ALL beliefs must not be
ultimately real.

Do you mean that when I leave home in the morning for work, my belief
that my home will still be there when I get back is false?
 The beliefs that I'm speaking of have nothing to do with the
phenomenal world. The phenomenal world is there whether you believe it
is or not. The beliefs I'm speaking of have to do with the illusory world
that exists within your mind. Every bit of that world is indeed false. In
other words, the thing referred to as a 'house' will likely still be there at
the end of your day, but the 'home' that 'you' reside in may not... it all
depends upon whether or not mind-identification is still running the show.
Who knows, 'you' might leave your home in the morning, a shift in
consciousness might take place at lunchtime and pure awareness may
return to the house at the end of the day. Anything is possible when truth is
given priority.

Allowing what's real to come first means energetically disengaging

from not only the story of 'me', but the stories of others as well. You can't
acknowledge truth first and energetically support a story at the same time.
One has to come second. Those in your life who thrive on your energetic
support of their stories may become increasingly agitated by you or even
stop speaking with you altogether. Dark doesn't like light. Before you
begin to question your sanity and try to reverse direction to try and save a
few relationships, just remind yourself that all you're doing is taking your
honesty further. You're not judging the relationships in your life, you're
simply inviting more authenticity into them. Sometimes that invitation
will be welcomed, and sometimes not.
 STEP 3
CONFRONT THE DREAM
Now that you’ve adjusted to acknowledging 'I' *first* in *every* situation
that you find yourself in, the basic framework of the dream that you’ve
created around you will become very apparent.

You see what’s been built, so it’s time to question its necessity and
confront it in yourself if necessary. Let go of believing that what you’re
getting is not what you’re asking for. See what’s right in front of you and
drop what's serving sleep.

You've established what your primary knowledge is and have made that
knowledge your primary concern, now it's time to acknowledge the
elephant in the room (ie. the life you've created for yourself).
Acknowledging this will not be difficult to do given that you've already
begun to unplug your consciousness from the believability of your life
story. When you're allowing what's real to come first, you're allowing
yourself to see the mechanics of the dream that you're currently involved
in. For example: once you acknowledge that you're sitting in a theatre and
not taking part in the movie, the reasons why the characters in the movie
are there become rather obvious. You see very clearly that each character
serves a very specific purpose that relates directly to the main character.
Just as there are no random characters in a movie, there are no random
characters in your life. Every person in your life is there to add
believability to the story of 'me'. Each person, no matter how small their
role may be, is helping to reinforce your illusory self. Does this mean that
all relationships are unhelpful? Not at all. So long as you understand that
another person's presence in your life tells you absolutely nothing about
what you *really* are other than who you've dreamed yourself to be, then
there's no problem. How many relationships in your life are there where
that understanding is present though? How many of those relationships
would last if you were to acknowledge that they are reflecting who you
choose to be? For this reason, toxic relationships that are still lingering
around tend to not survive this third step. Wolves aren't very enjoyable to
be around once you look past the sheep's clothing.
 Remember: You’ve adopted this dream and cultivated the relationships
in it for a very good reason - it's given you the sense of who you are… it's
made you feel like 'you' exist… even if that existence is a painful one.

The beautiful part about placing what's real first is that you're instantly
shown what's healthy and what's not in your life. When you're not
perceiving life through a filter of thought, what's right in front of you
becomes very apparent. Yes, sometimes it can be unsettling... but so what?
You're in this to wake up, not to stay asleep.

By questioning the necessity of what you’ve dreamed into being,

you’re going to come up against the core reason for why you adopted this
dream in the first place. You can expect this encounter to bring up very
deep feelings and emotional wounds along the way.

Is encountering emotional wounds an inevitable part of this process?

Yes. Why? Because the truth is, you’ve dreamed your life into being
because of pain - a pain that you've believed must be avoided at all costs.
This pain is very old.

When you came into this world you knew nothing. For the first little
while this wasn't a problem. You knew that the body responded to your
wishes and eventually you didn't mind calling it 'mine'. In spite of this
subtle identification that started to develop, life still felt relatively light
and care-free. Over time, as your brain and abilities started to develop, an
interest in defining who you were began to intensify. After all, you were
surrounded by others who appeared to know who they were. They seemed
to know what part they were supposed to play. You on the other hand
seemed to have a problem; your sense of identity felt incomplete. You
seemed to be missing some important piece of information that would
explain who you were. You searched for this missing puzzle piece until
you found one that seemed to fit just right. Unfortunately, because you
were never a puzzle that needed completing, the only way this puzzle
piece was able to 'fit' was if it claimed that you were flawed in some
fundamental way. And so it went; from that moment on, you knew who
you were: a flaw. A flaw that needed fixing. Thus began your search for
enlightenment and your departure from innocence.

This search, as you are now discovering, is futile... hence this 5-step
method of exhausting the original seeker in you.

By staying with your primary knowledge, you're returning to

innocence. You're realizing that there's no way out of your pain so long as
you agree that it describes something true about who you really are. You're
realizing that only by returning to your innocence can you become
innocent... free of being the supposed flaw that you had imagined yourself
to be long ago.

Pain dissolves when 'you' dissolve... when you place the truth of what
you know first, always. Pain will persist so long as you continue to
entertain your secondary knowledge first, as if it were ultimate reality.

Your pain fully dissolves when you fully awaken. To fully awaken, you
have to be done with wanting sleep, with wanting to daydream, with
wanting to numb yourself, with wanting time. All pain is time-bound.
When you no longer derive your sense of self from thinking (time), your
SELF is no longer painful.
 When you feel that you've fully confronted what it is in you that has
wanted to perpetuate the dream of 'me', it's time to allow that dream to end
(ie. yourself).
 STEP 4
ALLOW YOURSELF TO END
By allowing the dream to unravel and by no longer maintaining it, you're
allowing yourself to end.

You have recognized the illusions that you've attached yourself to

which have kept yourself alive. You've questioned these illusions and
confronted them. Now it's time to step off the cliff continuously.

In every moment, life is always asking you if you want to survive or if

you're ready to jump. Sometimes the cliff you're being asked to jump off
of is small and sometimes it isn't. Perhaps you're stuck in traffic and
you're running late for an appointment... the jump is small. Or you've just
been told that your father has passed away... the jump is big. In either case,
the invitation is the same and so is the destination. So where exactly is this
destination? Where you're not; the conscious aware space of pure 'I'. Only
in that space can life penetrate your dualistic consciousness and enable
itself to dissolve what's masquerading as itself. It's through this
penetration that life begins moving 'you' more and more and the personal
will starts taking a back seat. This back seat is essentially your will
aligning with the will of life (which is whatever happens). As these two
apparent wills gradually 'merge' into one, your judgements will lessen and
your motives will become transparent.

If you encounter this step too soon it will be because of desire, not
exhaustion. You're only ready for this step once you've fully realized that
your desires aren't getting you anywhere. You've exhausted any possibility
that they will continue to bear fruit. The key indicator of whether or not
you've encountered this step through exhaustion or desire is if you're
harbouring a pessimistic outlook on life. Pessimism is born of desire – an
existential tantrum intended to mask the hope of something better. When
your exhaustion is genuine, you'll be neither optimistic nor pessimistic,
you'll just know that it makes no sense to want to be something different
than what you are.

Given that you've confronted your dream and all of the self-avoidance
tactics that have been perpetuating it, your world may start to look like it's
falling apart. Relationships may end, jobs may become intolerable, and
even your ability to be socially acceptable may disappear. In spite of these
seemingly disastrous consequences (resulting from confronting your
dream), your yearning for truth will prevail. Your trust in this process of
dissolution will be reinforced by your constant returning to what's actually
real, to your primary knowledge of 'I' where no suffering is possible. You
will know that it's okay for everything to fall apart and for everything to
end because you will know that 'I' is the one thing that *can't* end. How
could it? You know that 'I' is not manifested and therefore cannot be
unmanifested.

Only dreams can begin and end, reality has no beginning and therefore
no end.

It's time to accept the reality of the way things are. Through
confronting your dream, you've made conscious what was previously
ignored. What has been made conscious cannot be made unconscious
again. There's no going back now; you either accept that the world you had
previously inhabited was for a false self, or you try to maintain that world
by ignoring what's been revealed. Keep in mind though that the latter
option will only work for a short while. Eventually, even your ability to
ignore the light will disintegrate as it becomes far too difficult to blur the
line between lie and truth. This slow (often painful) process of letting go
can be remedied by not trying to un-see what has been seen when it is
seen. Once you recognize illusion, drop it. Don't pretend you didn't notice.
The degree of your honesty will determine the degree of pain you will
experience. Allow yourself to end over and over again. If a part of you can
end, then it wasn't really a part of you anyway.

'You' are the dreamer and you are also the dream. The dreamer and the
dream are one and the same. When you allow yourself to end, you are
awake within the dream; so what purpose does the dreamer serve
anymore? You have seen all of what needs to be seen, what happens next is
not your problem anymore.

Now it’s time for the last step - to awaken *from* the dream where
dreamer and dream are left far behind.
 STEP 5
LET GO OF FREEDOM
Freedom and the lack of freedom is only possible for the dreamer.

The freedom that these steps point to is not a relative freedom, but an
absolute truth; a realm of consciousness where mind and its contents are
revealed to be an illusion... and thus, duality also.

The freedom that the mind seeks is a relative freedom, which is

impossible. The mind wants to be free but only if it can have freedom, not
be it. It claims to want oneness but can't accept that oneness means the end
of duality... the end of itself. Duality can't become one, it can only give
way to non-duality.

The lack of freedom that the mind claims is an assumption that duality
is real, was once unified, and can become unified again. Needless to say,
the mind's idea of duality and oneness is fundamentally dualistic as a
whole. On the level of mind, freedom and the lack of freedom are both
illusions. True freedom is the realization that you are not separate from
life.

There was never actually a point where you became separate from life
– you've only lived a life that has claimed this to be the case. Yes, on the
physical level, freedom isn't fully possible while the body is alive. After
all, you are the infinite contracted into a finite, seemingly separate thing...
a gross mis-representation of your true nature. None the less, even the
apparent dualistic reality of your separate body can be seen through in
deep silence. Existence is dualistic, silence is not.

The human bridge to absolute truth is absolute silence.

Now you're ready for silence, because...

Now you know what’s real.

Now you acknowledge what’s real first (the knowledge of ‘I’) before
entertaining any other second-hand knowledge.

Now you’ve confronted the framework of the dream.

Now you're allowing the dream (yourself) to end continuously.

So now it’s time for the core delusion to dissolve. Now it’s time to let go
of the goal of freedom.

In spite of having implemented the previous four steps wholeheartedly,

the truth has remained fundamentally the same (as it always has and
always will). What IS fundamentally different now however, is your
impulse to seek. It's become severely eroded. The core delusion that time
will make things better has all but become extinguished. The previous 4
steps have served their purpose – they've brought you to this place of
spiritual exhaustion. You can no longer move forward because you know
there's nothing more to see. What started out as a practice: proving what's
real, putting what's real first, confronting the dream, and allowing yourself
to end has become an automatic process. Those steps are no longer steps
for you; they have become the way of sanity.
 Freedom can’t become the case until you truly stop trying to find it…
until the very idea of freedom has been fully recognized *through your
own experience* (not through your own ideas) to be an illusion… an
impossibility. When this recognition crystallizes, it will consume 'you'...
literally. The fire of conscious aware presence is what consumes the
mechanism of seeking. It's through this fire and this fire alone that the
very notion of freedom is eventually revealed to be an illusion.

This fifth and final step symbolizes the end of who you think you are.
'You' are essentially the goal of freedom. That's why 'you' end when this
goal is finally given up. When you're ripe, you'll stop drawing
nourishment from the tree of knowledge that has sustained who you think
you are. When that happens, it's only a matter of time before that tree no
longer has any ability to hold onto you. You will be let go of. This is why
enlightenment is not an attainment. You can't choose to be let go of, you
can only stop trying to hold on.

Needless to say, this last step is a non-step. When the time comes for
you to be let go of, it will be completely without choice. You will have
finally surrendered your will completely to the will of life. The shift in
consciousness (enlightenment) that happens after that happens as a
byproduct of your surrendered will, not as a result of it being
implemented. This is why enlightenment happens through grace; a refined
space where life is no longer opposing itself, trying to live itself, trying to
be itself.

Your last moments as a separate 'me' will be when you stop trying to
hold on and life lets go of you. That's when you'll fall. This fall is the
mysterious space in which enlightenment happens. An experiential
realization of your oneness with all of life flowers here. This shift in
knowing who you are is not just an experience, but an irreversible,
fundamental transformation of your consciousness.

When the time comes and you find yourself falling, you won’t care to
know if or where you’ll land anymore. You’ll know that freedom is only
truly possible when you’re falling - not when you’re landing.
 STEP 1
(PROVE WHAT'S REAL)
Q &A
 Question:

I observe that my thoughts like to return to certain feelings and patterns

with the intention to sustain them. It feels as if this activity of my thoughts
is one of the biggest sources of identification because it really feels as if
I'm doing it; that part of me is doing this. This part also decides when it's
time for a renewal of sadness or anxiety. It feels intelligent, alive and very
intimately "me". Is it clear for you? Is it your experience that everything is
happening completely without you or a “me”?

Answer:

There is no ‘me’ outside of your thoughts. Thinking feels so intimately

‘me’ because it can’t be otherwise. I talk about the witness a lot… that’s a
different feeling than the feeling that comes from being in the ‘me’ state.
Resting as the witness is not about witnessing your thoughts (because
when you’re resting as the witness there are no thoughts) it’s about
recognizing the space BETWEEN thoughts and rooting yourself there as
often as you can. The more you root yourself in that ‘gap’ the easier it will
be to go back there when thinking finishes itself.

The ‘journey’ to freedom comes into play when you as the ‘me’ begins
to want to remain in that gap more and more often. Obviously a ‘me’ can’t
remain in that gap because that gap is only made possible by the absence
of ‘me’… hence the dilemma of a seeker of truth. You can't witness your
thoughts… you can only rest as the witness when thinking isn’t happening.
 This obviously brings up the topic of free will: Wouldn’t you choose to
remain as the witness all the time if that’s where freedom is? Of course
you would. So is it possible to do that all of the time then? No. Why not?
Because it’s the ‘me’ (thinking) that wants to remain there all of the time.
What you really are is the witness and the witness is ALREADY there all
of the time. So freedom gradually draws closer the more you recognize
yourself as being the witness rather than the thinker. Again… the witness
can’t ‘choose’ itself because it already IS itself.

When the ‘me’ starts yearning to remain in the gap between thoughts
forever, the pain that the ‘me’ generates will usually start to become
worse. After all, the 'me' wants to become timeless, but 'me' IS time itself.
This is why the ‘me’ in a sense ‘dies’ eventually because eventually it will
realize that it can never become free.

My experience is that experience itself is my experience... it's not 'my'

experience anymore though. A realization has happened where what's
happening is now seen to be the only thing that's real – as a result, the
ownership of what's happening is no longer needed.

Truth is whatever's happening. Illusion is ownership of whatever's

happening.
 Question:

You say that there is either the witness or there is thoughts. I experience
the two to be more fluent, merging somehow. When I realize that I am
trapped in thinking, the thoughts don't disappear but the perspective on
the thoughts changes. Thoughts may linger a bit and then drop away. After
a while new thoughts arise and either float on or pull my identification
back into them. The lingering thoughts and reappearance of thoughts feels
totally welcome and ok for me, even kind of loving. But this is not possible
if there is either a witness or thoughts, exclusively. If that were true, my
experience was just a justification for being trapped in a slightly nicer
state. Not fighting the appearance of thoughts and hence not trying to be
thought-free seems ok to me.

Answer:

Throw out everything I say if it does’t help or if it causes you to question

what’s working for you. I am your worst enemy if you don’t! I would
describe the realization that you’re trapped in thinking as the moment you
recognize that you are the witness. When the witness is recognized amidst
the thinking then the return to thinking doesn’t have as much of a hold
over you anymore, almost like the thoughts aren’t as convincing… and if
they aren’t able to sell you on what they’re saying then they will drop
away more frequently or ‘dissolve’ back into the witness. It’s like when
thinking / thoughts return, the fragrance of the witness is still lingering
and too strong to ignore. Definitely not an abrupt thing when thinking
switches to witnessing… more like a wave in the water losing its shape
and returning to its original expansive state. There were never two distinct
/ exclusive states. It’s all the ocean and the wave is just a temporary
appearance of it in a *much* smaller form.
 It makes sense that you feel a love arise for the reappearance of
thoughts - like feeling love for well-intentioned but misguided children. I
made it a point earlier to make a clear distinction between the witness and
thinking so that you can more easily recognize the difference between the
two - but even thinking is a part of the One, so definitely no need to create
a separation where there isn’t one. As I mentioned, if my words don’t help
then treat them as just another bunch of those well-intentioned but
misguided children.

Question:

The world is run by egos, they are the problem. They have good intentions
but they're really just promising more beliefs – not truth. How can
humanity ever wake up when there are so many people who are asleep?

Answer:

There are no egos, it's all God. It's all undivided consciousness.

I talk about the false self, some call it the ego, but this 'thing' we're
talking about is an illusion that has no reality in and of itself. If you see a
human being as an ego, then you are an ego too. When you truly know
yourself, yourself is all you see. It's all God pretending not to be God.
 Question:

I've been sitting with "Who am I?". It's been driving me a little crazy that I
can't wrap my head around what I really am. So it's like I have to sit in this
experience and get past the fear of being stuck in a nightmare. It reminds
me of trying to bathe a kid who's afraid of the water. You have to soothe
them into it. I assume that if I show perseverance and patience, everything
will work out in the end.

Answer:

You don't need to wrap your head around what you really are – the simple
answer (the answer that you've already received) is that you don't know
what you are. That is the TRUTH, so don't argue with it. Live by that truth.
When you live by that truth, you're forced to acknowledge that you don't
know anything else either... you don't know that something is wrong or that
something needs to be fixed. You start accepting the suchness of life and
start living less from your mind (second-hand knowledge).

This is a great process you're involved in; little processes contained

within one overall process. You can liken it to a birthing; complete with
contractions and an innate knowing that there IS an end to it... and that the
end is worth it.

Question:
A year ago, in a deep depression, I took magic mushrooms and
experienced something incredible that changed my life. I have come to
think of it as "an awakening", but it was not permanent. What happened
was this: the whole world started to collapse and everything disappeared,
including space and time, and only I remained. Not "I, this particular body
or person" but rather "I, the one who has always been aware, here and
now" - it's the unchanging sense of self that has been behind everything all
my life. Then it became obvious that I am not separate from the world, and
everything in the Universe is literally me. Everyone and everything is just
me, and it has always been this way. It was obvious that I am eternal, that I
can't die, and that everything is perfect - that this is what the word "God"
means. But I also felt that this wasn't the whole story, that this wasn't
enlightenment yet.

Lately I've started to wonder about expressions that get thrown around
a lot, such as "there is no self", "the I is false", and other things that seem
to suggest that even this "I" that remained is false. I wonder if this is in
contradiction with what I experienced a year ago, as I would never have
said "I don't exist". I would rather have said "Only I exist, and everything
else is just me, made of me, experienced as me". Did I misinterpret my
realization? Could it be that my ego interfered? Does all sense of self have
to go away for enlightenment to be allowed - including the sense of
awareness I call "I am" that's behind every experience? Or is the sense of
"I am" who I really am, and that isn't going anywhere?

Answer:
Drugs can definitely be helpful sometimes (not so much for recreational
purposes) to give you a taste of life's deeper reality. The only catch as you
mentioned is that it’s not permanent. It’s becoming aware of something
greater at work in life but not being quite ready for it just yet.
Enlightenment definitely brings with it those moments, but it’s also very
ordinary at times. I suppose the difference is that there’s no need to take
drugs anymore in order for those moments to be brought about.

You raise a really great point: is all of the ‘I’ false? Of course not. And
you know this. As you mentioned, it’s more accurate to say that only ‘I’
exists and everything else is just a part of you. Those who say that all ‘I’ is
false are either trying to say that all identification is illusion OR they are
very afraid of the idea of enlightenment and so assume that it’s a worse-
case scenario where even intelligence doesn’t exist.

The true ‘I’ is VERY subtle though… the full experience of it is only
possible in deep silence when there is no longer ownership being claimed
over anything. Then the ‘I’ stands alone… all-one as they say. As soon as
the ‘I’ turns into ‘I am’ then illusion returns. ‘I am’ however is simply the
human experience - there’s nothing wrong with it. There’s nothing wrong
with illusion. 'I' is the enlightened human experience; when the realization
of ultimate truth becomes the go-to place for all ‘I am’ activities.

You KNOW what you witnessed can be trusted, there’s no need to let
others' opinions discount that knowingness. Basically, there’s no need to
complicate something so simple.. something so profound.

Just know that if you yearn to return there then you have to be finished
with leaving here.
 Question:

I've been hearing over and over through multiple channels that all is
consciousness. Science will clearly show that we can never be looking at
or experiencing an external object. Any sensory perception is by definition
an emergent phenomenon of consciousness. My perception of my body
would be as well. Thoughts must also be consciousness. Anything
seen/known/happening must be an emergent phenomenon of consciousness.
That's the only way it can be known. Further, any and all things
seen/known are "built" of the same substance: consciousness.

Then we get to this idea of awakening and searching/seeking. I cannot

stand outside of the consciousness and look in. My writing to you must be
part of that dream. My desire to awaken must be part of that dream. My
sense of self must be part of that dream. Even my belief that 'I' am in
charge and activating all of my life is part of that dream/emergent
phenomenon of consciousness.

As I write this I have to realize that any question is just stupid. It's the
dream asking the dream how to awaken. That said, I am freaking out a bit
because I still feel very much encapsulated in my body/mind. Autonomy
feels so real. To switch off the belief that *I* am thinking and move toward
seeing that these thoughts, movements, etc are just happening feels almost
impossible.
 I guess I'm asking if this is true? Is my recognition correct? What does
let-go feel like?

Answer:

I think I can make this simple; if you have to ask if something is true then
ultimately… it isn’t.

You have a great mind there, greater than mine I’d say... but all great
minds die eventually and so do all great questions / conclusions.

You ask me what let-go feels like… hmm, what would it feel like if
you realized that your deepest question could never be answered? …ever?
Who you already are IS the answer but that answer can never be given to
the questioner. Answers don’t ask questions, they just accept themselves as
being enough. Questioners are only satisfied with more questions. Yes, I
know in my own experience that consciousness is all there is – when
you're ready to accept what you are unconditionally, forever, you will
know this too.

Question:

What we really are is awareness. But then there are also appearances;
they cannot be separated from awareness, though they do come and go. So
what is meant by: "enlightenment is what you really are, and *nothing*
else”?

Answer:

Appearances come and go, but what is returned to when they go? Is it a
living realization of being aware nothingness or a sense of self that is
being labeled as awareness? The *nothing else* is the absence of self-
generating labels. In that absence, everything (including appearances) is
seen to be made of awareness (intelligent nothingness).

Question:

How exactly should one practice something that by itself means no goals
and therefore no practice?

Answer:

It makes no sense for a seedling to try to be a flower. It makes more sense

for a seedling to focus on growth. Yes, the essence of the flower is already
contained within the seedling but just because the seedling exists doesn't
mean it can just decide to become a flower. Growth is needed first. All
growth takes time. Indeed, a flower is no more a manifestation of truth
than a seedling is, it's just a full expression of it. So how do you practice
when you know that the flower state is one of complete surrender to what
is? With the understanding that your practice is to prepare you for total
surrender. This preparation is your growth. The mind itself cannot
surrender, it can only develop a practice where it sees more and more of
its own limitations. It's that seeing which produces spontaneous surrender
more and more. So an effective practice is one in which the mind is shown
its own futility - then the mind is forced into silence... but not of its own
choosing. Instead of the mind trying to find enlightenment, tell the mind
to find itself. Do that over and over again and surrender will gradually
arise as a byproduct; keyword is byproduct. Remember that truth cannot
find itself, it can only stop trying to be something other than itself.

Question:

To think that there is nothing one can do to reach enlightenment makes

sense to me.

Answer:

It's easy for a mind to claim that there's nothing it has to do but not so easy
for it to stop claiming.

Enlightenment can only happen when no more claims are being made -
even the ones that say there's nothing that has to be done. A constant
practice of turning the mind back in on itself and inquiring into its
supposed reality removes all claims (eventually). Only then does the
debris that covers and conceals enlightenment disappear.
 STEP 2
(WHAT'S REAL COMES FIRST)
Q&A
 Question:

You once said that “you ARE let-go.” I keep thinking about this and can't
quite grasp what you're saying. Can you expand on this more?

Answer:

While it's important to play your part by letting go of all resistance, it's
also helpful to recognize that what you REALLY are is *already* let go of.
In other words, the 'me' isn't really letting go of something and going into
something else, the 'me' is an illusion itself and that 'something else' is
what's already present. In other words, illusion does the dance of let-go
until truth spontaneously appears at the forefront of awareness... but the
appearance of truth is not a direct result of the 'me' trying to let-go. A 'me'
can't produce truth because truth is what's already the case.

Question:

You've mentioned that the universe exists independently of human

awareness. Many experts say that the universe is only possible because of
awareness. Or simply, consciousness is all there is. To me this does not say
the universe is predicated on a human being present. Only that a universe
is made of and by consciousness. Is that your understanding as well?

Answer:
Yes, I’d agree that consciousness is all there is and that the universe is not
dependant on a human to be present in order for it to exist. That’s where
the dream analogy (in regards to waking up from ‘me’) doesn’t always
match up exactly. Keep in mind (pun intended) that your mind can only
view things as separate and so any conclusion you arrive at will be based
upon an idea of separation and ultimately unclear and untrue. There is a
silent knowing that comes from just resting as the witness, but that
knowing only comes through deep silence and as soon as your mind tries
to grasp that knowing it becomes muddied. If you are drawing conclusions
about the nature of who you are from your mind then your conclusions
will always be false. The witness is what you are and it does not need to
draw conclusions because it IS the conclusion. Rest as the witness and all
that’s important as far as revelations go will be revealed to you in good
time.

Question:

What about the people in South Sudan who are facing death by starvation
or ethnic cleansing? Would you still recommend this practice to parents
who are watching their child die of leukemia? Life can be utter misery and
pain, no matter what else is happening; such as mass starvation in parts of
the world. These are settings of utter hopelessness that we can't possibly
understand while sitting behind the glow of our laptops and mobile phones
indulging in spiritual ideals.

What fails to bring me peace is the idea that life is supposed to be

processed a certain way. I can't truthfully say that "peace" or self-inquiry
in ANY context is, necessarily, a more compassionate response than other
potential responses.

It feels like a bit of a con job, where if you aren't feeling peaceful, then
there is something not right with you.

Mainstream religion tries to justify the suffering in this world as the

will of God and that we can't possibly understand the reasoning behind
God's will. It all sounds like ignorance of the part that we play in the
creation of suffering in this world.

Answer:

The events of this world are imperfect and will always be. Life is a
constant dance of the negative with the positive. True spiritual awakening
is not about eliminating the negative from life, it's about waking up from
the illusion that the positive can exist without the negative.

So long as you believe that positive life experiences can exist

independently of the negative ones, you will seek to sustain them. You will
view the negative as something that shouldn't be happening and will suffer
because of it. When you finally realize that the positive can't exist without
the negative, you will stop trying to find peace in that polarity.

Needless to say, the key to peace involves transcending your

attachment to positive life experiences. This happens when you approach
world events with compassion but not preference... when what's real
comes first. You know from experience what it's like to believe that life
should happen a certain way and so you sympathize with those who still
believe that. You know how much suffering that belief can cause. So when
you see suffering, you'll help, but not because it's wrong and not because
it's right. The more human beings treat suffering in this way the less
suffering there will be in the world. After all, the wide-spread suffering of
this world continues because most human beings believe that they must
fight for what's supposedly right and condemn what's supposedly wrong.

If peace is a goal then it will always fail. Recognizing the peace that
arises by allowing what's real to come first is not a con job, it's being
awake within the dream of polarities.

Question:

As one drops back into the aware presence and sees the falseness of the
story of 'me', a question arises: What about purpose? What about
dreaming big, one's intent, pursuing one's joys. Are these all false as well?
Or is it that the dissolution of the old personal story removes the
resistance toward that which was already inherently wanted?

Answer:
The degree to which you are able to drop back into this aware presence is
dependent upon how much you believe that your purpose, dreams and joys
will bring you fulfillment.

Usually, you only drop back into THIS after you’ve clearly seen that
your pursuits will *always* come up short. You may still be pulled along
by your ideas of fulfillment, but if your *priority* becomes recognizing
what’s real here now then anything else that you believe holds just as
much value will become more and more suspect. Why? Because you start
to realize that THIS is the only thing that can ever be fulfilling… because
it’s ALREADY fulfilled. Only fulfillment can be fulfilling. A cup can be
filled but it can also be emptied… only an empty cup can never be
emptied. Only the recognition of your emptiness can align you with true
fulfillment. Only that recognition can dismantle the believability of
superficial pursuits.

Question:

Is meditation helpful?

Answer:

Meditation can be helpful because it develops your familiarity with that

which witnesses life unfolding. The more you witness, the less you are
trying to control and the less you try to control the more you are being
what you really are. Traditional meditation isn't always the way though.
‘Active’ meditation, which is just as useful (and in reality, more in
alignment with the flow of life), is simply resting as the witness while
daily tasks are carried out. When you place what's real first, you are
resting as the witness.

Question:

I've experienced that my mind is just a torrent of random thoughts that I

have little or no control over. I do have a meditation practice where I stop
and try to observe my thoughts during the day but I am still getting caught
up in them. I feel stuck.

Answer:

Getting caught up in thoughts is only really possible for thoughts. Only

thinking can get caught up in thinking. You are pure awareness and that
awareness can never get caught up in thinking because thinking can never
touch it. So, it’s a matter of recognizing the difference between thinking
and pure awareness. Directed awareness is not pure because it’s confined
(has thought boundaries). Pure awareness is that which cannot be
directed… it’s in a permanent state of witnessing. Your practice has served
a great purpose up until now… but now it’s time to let it go by going into a
deeper recognition of what can’t be ‘practiced’. In other words,
acknowledging the witness as the permanent state and the thoughts as the
transient one (not the other way around).
 Question:

Wouldn't enlightened Buddhists recommend that you continue a

mindfulness practice?

Answer:

Practice serves a valuable purpose up to a certain point, but once a person

has been doing it long enough there comes a point where it can start to
become more of a hindrance than a help. If the intention behind practicing
is to eventually become enlightened, then the practice will eventually have
to be dropped. Practicing is a subtle form of seeking, and of course,
seekers can never find, they can only seek. Practice does help to exhaust
the seeker though (which is necessary) so it's helpful in that sense (hence
this method). None the less, practice can never bring about awakening
directly. If by mindfulness the Buddhists mean recognizing and thus
resting as the witness then that's helpful... but if it's about exerting some
kind of personal effort to bring about a mindful existence then that's not so
helpful.

Question:

I find that I'm intellectually trying to figure out how to wake up. The more
I engage my mind in this way, the more I begin feeling the need for a
straight jacket. Lately I've been doing my best to stay as 'aware' as
possible with 'intent' as opposed to just allowing my thoughts to happen
and doing nothing about them. I find that just 'watching' them can get very
difficult. My mind is always telling me to do something about these
thoughts that I've been experiencing.

Answer:

Mind is indeed the ultimate straight jacket; it can only look at things from
an actionable point of view. When mind hears the word ‘allowing’ it can
only assume that it’s a form of doing... almost like a failsafe to keep itself
in the game. You obviously can’t ‘do’ watching because YOU ARE the
watcher (or witness). Mind will always become desperate when you stop
feeding it with your attention.
 STEP 3
(CONFRONT THE DREAM)
Q &A
 Question:

How did you handle the awakening process while still interacting with
your family?

Answer:

I never disclosed what was happening to me to my family other than

asking for spiritual books for Christmas. There just wasn't a space there
where I could share what I was experiencing and have it be received with
enough awareness. I knew that they wouldn’t really understand what was
happening and be able to help me on a deep enough level. Any
reassurances I could have received from them wouldn’t have touched what
was going on inside of me. Ultimately, this was a blessing in disguise; I
was forced to see that freedom was never going to come from outside
supports.

Question:

Isn't the enlightened experience like the dream model where there's only a
single dreamer dreaming? For example, when a character in your dream
walks out of the room, you don't assume that they still exist in another
location. How is it possible that I am all-inclusive awareness if other
experiences exist elsewhere unknown to me?
 Answer:

There are 2 dreams happening — the microcosmic dream and the

macrocosmic dream. There's the little dream of 'me' in which universal
consciousness is identified with a human mind, and then there's the greater
dream which is existence itself; a product of the macrocosmic aspect of
universal consciousness. Regardless of what some 'experts' might think,
the universe does exist independently of a human being. A tree makes a
sound when it falls in the forest even when you're not around because the
tree is just as alive as you are. Everything is consciousness.

When you wake up out of the dream of 'me' you are waking up into the
greater dream that is the cosmos. This is why the experience of a dream-
state can only truly end when the body dies. Then both dreams are truly
left behind.

You are PART of all-inclusive awareness. While this partitioning is

ultimately an illusion, it's the human experience and will remain so while
the body is alive – even for enlightened ones.

The enlightened experience is that you are not separate from the One
(universal consciousness) and that the One is living your life and all other
lives as well. It's the experience that everything in existence is made of
and by the One.

It's very easy for a spiritual 'me' to get caught up in ideas of 'I AM
THAT'. That line of *thinking* requires a subtle identification in order for
it to be true. It's safer and healthier to say that you are an inseparable part
of the whole rather than saying you are the only creator and all other
manifestations in existence are an illusion.

Question:

I have found that some awakened people have a very strong presence.
Sometimes when I'm near one it feels like my energy is uplifted and I feel
much clearer. It feels like they hold a door open so that I can sense / feel
what's on the other side. I've had the same feeling in being with hospice
patients; a feeling of being bathed in awareness.

I recently met with a teacher and noticed for about two days after a
lessening of my pain and a stronger connection to the witness. Is it helpful
when you begin this step of confronting the dream to have direct contact
with an awake person?

Answer:

An awake person can't cause another person to ‘become’ awake, but taking
the flame of your consciousness and putting it next to one that's burning
brightly can sometimes help you to burn brighter as well and work to
dissolve things more quickly. Obviously, this can be helpful when you're at
the point of confronting the dream since you'll likely be encountering old
emotional wounds and repressed feelings.
 Question:

At the moment I'm going through a crisis in my relationship. We've been

together for many years. The hardest part is that I see myself giving up. I
feel like I'm running on empty and nothing makes sense anymore. Is this
normal?

Answer:

Things only make sense when you think you know who you are. Once you
begin confronting your dream, you start pulling the thread on the entire
fabric that makes up your knowledge-based life. Everything that you used
to find certainty in starts to feel out of alignment; your job, partner,
family, friends, society, the world. The reason is simple: your knowledge-
based life is a veil intended to blind you from realizing the truth of who
and what you are. When you start pulling the thread on that veil, things
usually start to become pretty chaotic and disorienting... hence the saying
“Better not to start; once you start, better finish.” In reality, it's not a
choice that initiates this unravelling process – it happens when your
seeking has ripened you to the point that you're ready to attract the
circumstances that will facilitate total let-go.

Your world may be ending but you know that it's not because you're
giving up on it, it’s just stopped serving your growth.
 Question:

I've been looking for ways to manage the increasing chaos in my life and
have found a teacher who comes across as spiritually advanced. Am I silly
for being interested in them?

Answer:

If you feel that a teacher can be of help to you then by all means try them
out. Better to try something out and find out for yourself that it’s not a
good fit than to rely on someone else's opinion. Having said that, a fairly
simple way to gauge whether or not a teacher is genuine is if they help you
to realize more of what's already within you as opposed to what's within
them. Teachers whose primary interest is themselves usually don't want
you to think for yourself.

Question:

I feel so fake most of the time now. I'm going to be meeting up with a group
of friends who claim they want truth above all else. I used to look forward
to these types of meetings and now it all feels like one big charade. I don't
know what else to do so I guess I'll just keep playing my part and saying
my lines until I reach the end of my story.
 Answer:

That's a great barometer for truth... are you being fake or not? 'The end'
comes when fake-ness ends. Truth is already here so you can only fake
that it isn't. From an enlightened point of view, nobody wants the truth
above all else or else they'd have it. Until you're ready for enlightenment
your search to become human will continue.

Question:

I'm seeing my projections in just about everyone in the room - and it's so
maddening. I went to dinner with a couple of people who tried to talk
themselves (and me) into believing that we were already awake just
because we intellectually agree with a conceptual understanding of
enlightenment and because we all live in the 'now'. I'm suspicious of this
conceptual understanding because it still requires me to think about it in
order for it to be true... it still needs time for it to be real.

Answer:

Your suspicions serve you well. The mind-made ‘me’ is a time-dependent

illusion that keeps itself alive through memory and future projections. It
calls ‘what is’ the ‘present moment’ because it equally believes that past
and future are just as real.
 Spiritual people like the conceptual idea of living in the ‘present
moment’ because it offers them some relief from the torment of their false
sense of self but also allows them to keep that self alive. When the ‘me’ is
ready to be let go of though, there’s no longer any need to 'live in the now'
because you realize that there is no ‘now'… there’s just what is, always.

Eternity (truth) has no 'now' because it has no past and future.

Question:

As I go deeper into step 3, I feel the need to teach others that they should
have gratitude for everything and that everything is a gift from the One;
that they are a part of God.

Answer:

What if there was no one to teach? If you want to wake up, then it helps to
question the idea that there are 'others' out there... especially ones who
'know less' than you. It can be a subtle way for the false in you to claim
itself as truth.

When you think about 'others', do you know that you're actually
thinking about yourself ultimately? Or are you under the spell that says
oneness is proprietary?

Question:

My world is collapsing around me. I'm fed up with the thoughts that try to
defend or alert 'me'. I feel like I'm always re-living the same pain day by
day and that there's nothing I can do to stop it. How can this pain stop?
Can it die?

Answer:

Yes, the pain can die, but you have to die with it. All that can be left is this
moment... are you ready for *only* this moment to exist? The person who
is fed up is also a part of the continuous story.

Question:

I used to practice feeling the sensations when an emotional wound was

triggered in me, and it was peaceful when I fully allowed them to be there.
Now I find that these emotional triggers are happening all of the time
regardless of where I am and it's becoming increasingly difficult to feel all
of them. My mind keeps reminding me that I am not free because if I were
then these triggers wouldn't be there.
 Answer:

As your willingness to confront this dream intensifies, the painful

mechanics that have kept it running will start to surface more and more
frequently. The 'me' that keeps being reminded by the mind that it is not
free is also mind.

Deep inquiry dissolves the hell. Hell is only for the false. Suffering is
only for the false. What you really are is the truth. Inquire into what's real
and freedom will be there. True inquiry doesn't require effort, just an
openness to recognizing what's actually real here now... forever. It's a
passive awareness that aligns spontaneous recognition of no-mind with
your heart's desire for freedom.

Question:

You've said that life is never hiding the truth from me; that my external
world is a reflection of me. Can you explain what you mean by that? That
idea makes me want to scream in frustration... nothing is obvious right
now nor is it good. If there's anything that's obvious it's that I'm sick of
myself.

Answer:
If you say you want to wake up and that you want to be shown what is
keeping you asleep then just look at your life. Who do you engage with?
Why do you engage with them? Why? Why? Does that engagement foster
waking up? Or does it foster keeping you asleep? There is no such thing as
being half awake, or half asleep. When it’s time to wake up, you stand up
straight, look all around you with the eyes of simple seeing and say on the
most fundamental level of your being “No more survival.”

The self-sickness is important, why else would you want to drop

yourself? The self that is sick of the self is all the same self though, it
can’t drop itself. Only the awakeness that you are can step out of that hell.
Sickness persists only for as long you continue to consume something
that’s contaminated. The only answer now is to rest where you’re not.
Truth doesn’t need to be helped. You are the truth. Be the truth, or be hell.

Question:

Over the past year I've been experiencing strange, often painful physical /
emotional effects from this searching. Lots of painful revelations about my
'self' and the beginning of a deep level of understanding (rather than just
an intellectual belief) that I'm not what I thought I was. Rather than
feelings of love and one-ness which I read about, my experiences are
closer to horror and terror and (recently) rage. I can feel everything
which I thought I knew about my self being ripped away. The emptiness
behind my eyes feels like pure chaos and death. Some nights I lay in bed
with waves of what feels like electricity or strong vibrations running thru
me, starting at the toe and flowing thru to the top of my head. Some days I
find that I'm overcome with horror of what lies just out of my sight. I've
also been having moments of complete meltdowns where my whole body is
wracked with grief – they usually start with me seeing something that
reminds me of my story. I've come to accept many painful revelations about
my self but I have the strong sense that there is much more worse things to
come. Where's all the peace and light?

I'm convinced the reason that enlightened teachers don't go into detail
about what to expect during the awakening process is that their followers
would run for the hills if they did and then they'd be out of business.

Answer:

I’m sure if someone could ask a caterpillar what it’s like after its sealed
itself inside of its cocoon it would probably say something like “it fu*king
hurts, it’s pretty scary at times, my body seems to be changing right in
front of my eyes and I have no idea why I put myself inside of here.”

Cocoons are not for peace and light.. they’re for destruction and
rebirth. In reality, you’re not moving towards the light, you’re tearing
away everything that isn’t light… and if you try to stop that process once
it's begun then fear and terror will have their way with you.

Metaphors like the one above obviously don't give the awakening
process any real justice, however, better to use a metaphor to offer some
perspective on what's happening then to view the pain you're experiencing
as proof that who you think you are is who you really are. After all, one of
the biggest traps during the awakening process is to identify with the pain
that's being experienced; to turn it into another identity.
 Your grief is there to help evaporate what it is in you that's still
resisting - there’s nothing that quickens the awakening process more than
pain that's made conscious. This evaporation is a process of opening your
heart to what's happening and what wants to happen, regardless of what it
may look like.

Suffering (being asleep) is a closed heart, freedom is an opened one.

Question:

Is there such a thing as a perfectly enlightened relationship? The more

that I confront my dream the more that idea is starting to look like a
fantasy. All of my relationships seem to be on the rocks.

Answer:

There is no perfectly enlightened relationship, there’s only allowing love

to be as it is. You know your heart, so you know if your heart will stay
open or become closed if you let a relationship end or keep it in place.
 STEP 4
(ALLOW YOURSELF TO END)
Q &A
 Question:

I can feel the machine, the programming, scrambling to find a foot-hold. I

used to keep an inventory of all the great things I had going for me, but
lately I find myself coming up with nothing. Now I'm trying to find a
spiritual angle on how to handle the despair I feel inside. Now I try to keep
an inventory of all of the spiritual advice I received the previous day. My
whole coping system seems to be breaking down. The less I feel like I can
cope the more I feel like I've been abandoned.

Answer:

An inventory… that’s a good way of putting it. ‘Me’ is a continual

inventory of the pros and cons of where ‘me’ is at. No wonder for some
business owners, going out of business feels like freedom; no need to
maintain an inventory anymore. Letting go of the need to draw from your
memory is a powerful thing; after all, what is ‘me’ without a past? Even
though you ultimately don’t have control over the comings and goings of
your different states of being, you still have a part to play in this great
undoing of yourself. In other words, watching your inner world with
passivity is important but recognizing the moments when you’re being
called to “play your part’” is just as important too. You are the state of let-
go AND you are also that which is being asked to let go. Life is the
puppeteer that moves the strings but the puppet is the one in the unfolding
story. 'Surrender’ happens by itself but sometimes surrender is an *act* of
surrender too.

Question:
Would you define what the tightrope is? I've heard to you talking about
that before.

Answer:

The tightrope is unique to each person, so I couldn’t really tell you what it
is for you, only that it’s what fuels your motivation to survive. It’s the
story that you tell yourself about why making the right choice is crucial…
or else. To step off that rope means accepting the unacceptable… and only
you know what’s unacceptable for you. The unacceptable sometimes feels
like a dark terrifying void, or something similar; it's the aspect of your
consciousness that you've been fighting to avoid your entire life. The
tightrope is your method of fighting yourself.

Question:

In most seeker circles I find that people are giving lip service to non-
duality, mixing Christian and eastern thought to create a new definition of
enlightenment. I see them teaching others that they have a choice as to
whether or not they want to be enlightened, as if the personal will holds
real power and can produce enlightenment.
 Answer:

The notion of self falls away in stages, like the notion of choice. For most
of the journey the belief in choice can serve a seeker well because it helps
prepare the mind for silence (if the choice is to inquire into the nature of
mind). Once the understanding of choicelessness and no-mind becomes a
deep seated experience then there comes a point when it's time to let the
chooser fall away. So to you I will ask... just who do you think ‘you’ are
that you can even make a choice? The chooser is the seed of the seeker.
What you really are has no right answers, so making the right choices is an
act of futility... it's an avoidance of emptiness; an avoidance of your true
nature.

Question:

I've been trying to find where I'm stuck or in denial. There's this track that
I've been on where I go around in circles trying implement the 'right'
spiritual teaching in order to become free. I was watching a popular non-
dual spiritual teacher this morning on my computer; as I was trying to
follow what they were saying the thought arose: “maybe if I put all of my
faith into this one thing then that's all it will take.” I'm so tired of being so
gullible. I have the growing sense that this journey has more to do with
deepening one's acceptance for the way things already are rather than
trying to fix a supposed problem.

Answer:
This journey of let-go is much more intimate and drawn out than
something that could be easily dropped by just implementing the ‘right’
non-dual / spiritual teaching.

When my personal story was at its most intense point, I used to sit in
the bathtub for an hour or so every day just gently touching my body (in a
non-sexual way) making sure that each and every touch was done with
great love and respect. Processes and visualizations like that were very
helpful in healing the harsh criticisms that had plagued my personality for
so long. For a while this helped tremendously and also helped me to
become more loving and forgiving of others as well. At the time it seemed
like trying to be as loving and compassionate as possible was the whole
point of life. After all, how could there be anything else that could trump
that? It wasn’t until I entered college that even my positive personality
traits started to come up short. My biggest problem; the problem of who I
believed myself to be (on the most fundamental level) was still there. It
was only at this point that I was truly ready to implement a more zen /
non-dual approach to things. I realized that no matter how much I could
love and forgive myself, my ‘self ’ would still be there and I was becoming
more and more tired of having to support it. I realized that finding lasting
peace for 'me' would never be truly possible. Only when that became clear
was I ready to stop loving myself (by no longer having a 'self' to love).
The more I inquired into what was real the less reality ‘I’ seemed to have
and so the less convincing my story became. Eventually, when I was ready
to finally, truly, absolutely, unequivocally call off all searches did
enlightenment happen.

When I call the ‘me’ a false self, it's not to disrespect it, it’s more to
help point out something that’s simply not true. 98% of the awakening
process is about developing self-love and compassion while the other 2%
is about implementing non-dual understandings. Only when your 'self' has
learned to be more loving and compassionate towards life is it ready to see
that its positive efforts can only take it so far. Only then is the story of 'me'
ready to come to an end.
 Question:

If a person dies to self and their world is no more, then who is it that is
holding the memories, feeling anger, feeling happiness? Who is thinking in
the present and relating to others? As I contemplated letting go, I came to
a realization that I really truly love myself. I don't really want this me to
die. This is the self that greets me every morning and is always there for
me no matter what. At the end of every day it is this self that I come home
to and makes me feel complete. It's my self that fills my heart with joy and
comforts me in sadness. I love myself unconditionally. I have learned to
love all of me; the light and the dark. How can I just allow this 'me' to
end?

I have been working on dismantling all of my facades and the roles I

play to prove my worthiness. I have only recently been able to see the real
me and embrace all that I am. The awareness I hear about is an experience
of actually being one with all things. I know all is one. I know I am God
expressing. My body is matter through which God expresses. Mine has
been a work unfolding, sometimes surprising me with the shifts in my
expression and perception.

Maybe the problem is that I am looking for a 'knock my sox off'

experience where the trees are brighter and the grass gets greener and I
am in a blissful void floating around with God.

Answer:
It sounds like you’ve been swept away by a flurry of devotion to THIS and
I would not want to, need to, or ever desire to get in the way of that. It’s a
thing of beauty. I can tell that you now know how to listen to what feels
real and THAT is the golden ticket.

You asked if a person 'dies before they die', who is it that has memories
and feels feelings? To that I would ask, who is it *right now* that has the
memories and feels the feelings? Death is ultimately an illusion, at best
it’s a word that describes what happens when awareness finally realizes
that ‘me’ is ONLY identification and not a state of ultimate truth. Because
to talk of death is to assume that you know what it is, and to assume that
you know what it is means that you assume that you know what ultimate
truth is. Feelings and emotions are expressions of life but they are not the
core of life itself. Positive feelings and emotions are wonderful to
experience, but are you at peace when they are not there? Or do you feel
the need to have them keep happening? You fear losing touch with positive
feelings and emotions when you label them as ultimate truth. Essentially,
labeling ultimate truth as something that's impermanent means that fear
will be a constant companion. In order to no longer fear losing 'truth', you
first have to realize what part of truth can't be lost.

I’ve realized in my heart of hearts what is ultimately real, but that

realization still lives within this form called Kyle who still experiences the
spectrum of emotions like anyone else. In regards to ‘loving myself'… in
reality there is no ‘I’ AND ‘myself ’. There is not the One + Me. True
oneness has no companion.

’Me’ loving itself can be beautiful, indeed! But realizing that ‘me’ is
not what's ultimately real is even more important because without that
realization you will remain at the mercy of life’s ups and downs; you’ll
subtly seek to keep the ups and avoid the downs because there will be no
knowledge of something outside of the two.

The truth is in the ‘I’, it’s just not in the ‘me’.

Question:

Why would I be given a canvass, if I was never meant to paint... to feel the
joy of creating the dark, the light, the colors of all I dreamt could be?

Answer:

The deeper human beings are asleep, the darker their paintings. The less
asleep they are, the brighter they become. Existence was created more for
the painters, not so much for the enlightened. Life after all is a great
journey through consciousness; the longer you’ve been on the journey the
more bright and beautiful your painting will be. Eventually though,
retirement comes knocking on your door. Your hands become too tired to
hold the brush and so all that’s left to do is put it down and stand back to
marvel at the artwork.

Question:
I'm in the midst of a divorce and the mental/emotional pain I've been
feeling has hit a boiling point. It's like I keep getting pushed under the
water and then I'm let up every now and then for just a breath or two and
then down I go again. NOTHING IS WORKING. Today I felt like I got a
taste of something... like defeat only with a sense of peace this time. I've
looked at this from a lot of different angles, been involved in self inquiry
for years, group self inquiry, friendly confrontation from teachers and
fellow seekers. I've tried different ways of asking the same questions
because sometimes that seems to help. I have the feeling that the whole
surrender thing is useless until it's really time for it to happen.

In the meantime, it feels like there's two levels of pain happening inside
of me. One stays with me all of the time; a physical pain in my chest and
solar plexus. The other one is deeper and comes and goes; it feels like a
pain that has its roots buried in some kind of childhood trauma. I re-read
a chapter of one of your books that said when you really face the pain, it
dissolves... but that's not been my experience. This feels different, this pain
can't dissolve because this pain is myself! It feels like life or death.

Answer:

True defeat is a good thing. The fire has been burning in you for some
time now and it’s starting to run out of things to burn. When the fuel runs
out, the fire will extinguish itself. Let the fire burn... it’s a fire you can’t
control anyway. Nothing is working because nothing is supposed to work;
dying isn’t a movement towards success, it’s a movement towards defeat /
dissolution. Dying isn’t finished until death happens. The pain is not for
nothing though... it brings death (birth) closer, faster.

Pain dissolves when you look at it because 'looking at it' is just another
way of saying that you're dying into the moment consciously. If you leave
the moment (to survive) however, then indeed your pain will be there
waiting for you.

Ultimately you are not in control of your freedom but you can exhaust
the belief that you are in control.

Surrender is simply the present moment aware of itself and nothing

else. In reality, when your awareness aligns with the present moment, there
is no 'your awareness' and 'the present moment' anymore... all separation
dies. What gives birth to your separation and pain is that you still believe
that leaving the moment is possible and that doing so offers you some sort
of benefit. Unfortunately, only more pain can teach you how untrue those
beliefs really are. How much more pain can you handle? Your pain (all
levels of it) is beckoning you to fully die... to not leave the moment
anymore.

Your hope may be bringing you up for air temporarily, but only into a
world where you can still be drowned. The moment lived consciously is an
aware space where pain isn't; where death isn't, but it's also the space
where 'you' aren't either. Ultimately you can't win freedom; it's either
freedom or you.
 Question:

I once heard you say "You can sense 'your' presence in the eye of the storm
because it's the only thing that's still," and “Once that outer storm dies
down and also becomes still then your sense of presence suddenly expands
to include ALL that is present." It seems like sensing one's presence in the
eye of the storm is a nice respite but not really a way to get that outer
storm to die down.

Answer:

I'll expand on that metaphor a bit more here. There is no way to get the
outer storm to die down because the outer storm is fueled by the belief that
something needs to die down. YOU are the eye of storm. The eye of the
storm can NEVER experience the storm dying down because the eye ('I') is
already still. When the eye finally gives up on believing that it’s the storm
instead of the eye, the eye will only see itself from that moment forward.
The storm will then vanish (it won’t really die down in that sense). So
there’s really no way ‘to’ a state of no-storm, there’s only a way ‘back’
into the eye.

‘You’ as the storm will never experience peace because the storm is by
its very nature a rejection of peace. In reality, the storm that ‘you’ are has
never withheld the truth from the eye, it’s only occupied the eye’s
attention.

You move into freedom by recognizing what has never moved, what
can never be moved.
 Question:

Did you have a high level of unexplained anxiety before your awakening?
Did everything stop working? Did your story take up every waking
moment? It's like my ego / mind is in overdrive and I'm pretty helpless to
do anything other than watch and feel this terrible mess inside. I don't feel
like I can actively participate in any kind of transcendental self-inquiry
anymore. I know that I just need to relax into what's breaking apart but as
much as I try I just can't seem to get there.

I recall a phrase used by a zen master, he called it "reversing the

vector" which is when the tension of the seeking has built to such a high
fevered pitch that there's no longer any possibility of being able to turn
around or stop what's happening... that surrender will be extracted from
you. For some reason 'why' questions have no meaning anymore for me.
I'm in a state of high anxiety and discomfort but something is different –
like there's a disinterest / dispassionate attitude growing inside of me.
Realizing that nothing is going to work anymore has ignited a whole new
level of fear.

Answer:

Yes, my story took up every waking moment; it was an absolute

nightmare. Did I have a high level of anxiety before waking up? Yes,
constantly. Was it unexplained? No. I KNEW that I did not want to die. I
couldn’t accept the possibility that my big problem could go forever
unresolved. I did not want to give up which is why the pain continued in
spite of how nightmarish it was. I knew deep down that it wasn’t just me
I’d be giving up on but EVERYTHING. I didn’t want my entire universe to
disappear into a black hole forever.

Eventually it will just become obvious that your struggle will never
yield success and you’ll stop avoiding the unavoidable; you’ll stop
avoiding the void. When you stop avoiding the void, you ‘become’ the
void… the unmanifested eternal aspect of consciousness.

The disinterested / dispassionate attitude is your story losing its

momentum as you realize the futility of seeking more and more. This
whole new level of fear is normal too; when you've been holding onto the
edge of a cliff for a while and then you realize that you’re losing your grip
the fear will intensify ten-fold. You know that you won't be able to hold on
for much longer.

Question:

Last night I experienced an intense state of suffering – almost like a dark,

bored, panicked feeling had formed around the edges of my awareness. As
this experience started to take me over I felt the urge to DO something. So
instead of just staying with that experience consciously, I quickly found
something to distract myself. When that kind of experience comes, should I
just stay with it and let it overwhelm me?

Answer:

It can be easy sometimes to deceive yourself. ‘You’ ARE your darkness, so

when the darkness comes to the surface, the nuts and bolts that make up
'you' are exposed. Whenever they're exposed, the opportunity exists for
them to be seen, felt and dissolved. You’re right, the feelings can be
overwhelming but only for as long as there is resistance to them being
there. In reality, only when you can’t find an escape route anymore will
you allow those feelings to overwhelm you… but it won’t be an
experience of overwhelm when that time comes, it will be an acceptance
of death. If it’s not death then it's an unwillingness to die; you’ve managed
to hang on somehow. After all, only a ‘somebody’ can experience
overwhelm.

What you really want to know is if it’s safe to go into that overwhelm;
if it’s safe to allow it to consume you. It’s not safe for what’s untrue in
you… that can’t be protected, but that’s not worth protecting anyway is it?
If you don't go into it, you can't pass through it.

In regards to my own personal story, I don’t really remember the pain

itself, just that it was bad… very bad. I also remember that the pain
persisted only for as long as I felt like my life could still be salvaged… for
as long as I felt like the pain could still be ‘beat’.
 Question:

Law of attraction. Is that pure BS? From what I've gathered after listening
to some of your videos it sounds like that's your viewpoint. The way I've
interpreted your words is that whatever is going to show up is whatever is
going to show up; including one's motivation to say, do, or act in a certain
way. If there is a law of attraction (based on how I understand your
words), it's basically an understanding that you can accept what is
happening now and let go, or resist and suffer.

On the other hand, those who claim there is L of A say that by

adjusting your story you adjust your emotional vibration which adjusts
what shows up.

How do you see these things?

Answer:

Absolutely, whatever is going to show up is what's going to show up.

Waking up has nothing to do with making the right choices; it’s about
waking up out of the hell of choice. It’s about consciousness rooting itself
in itself while witnessing the mind play it’s game of attraction and
repulsion… as if that could ever touch the reality of who and what you are.
 How can freedom always be present if it can be chosen or unchosen,
attracted or unattracted? Freedom is what you really are; you can’t choose
what you are. If you don’t know yourself as freedom then attracting
something to yourself becomes not just a play but a necessity… because
freedom isn’t here... it’s over there.

L of A is important for those who want to achieve a certain state of

being; waking up is for those who are ready for being itself to be enough.
Yes, *sometimes* it can appear that you can adjust your story, adjust your
emotional vibration and attract a pleasant experience for yourself, but
that’s only because your particular story is ready for that type of
experience. All choice happens within the story of who you want yourself
to be, not outside of it. Choice IS a story.

A helpful inquiry would be to ask: Where does the ability to choose

come from? Where does choosing start from? Do you choose to start
choosing? Or does choosing just start by itself?

In my own experience choosing starts by itself and then I witness the

events that unfold with an aloofness. Sometimes the events that come are
challenging and sometimes they’re not. Either way the true purpose of
each event is to encourage a deeper and deeper let-go into life… to let go
of the steering wheel more and more. Those who want to attract don't want
to let go of who they believe themselves to be or who they believe they
should be.

Question:
Going through this life obediently self-observing in order to hopefully
have the liberating moment of enlightenment occur seems like such a waste
of time and energy. The only alternative though is to live through a self
that is known to be false, smoke, not real. It feels like I'm working on a
practice that has no known influence or acknowledged effect on the actual
event of enlightenment. In fact, witnessing itself seems to be false now. I
can't witness. Witnessing just is. Any attempt to become the witness is itself
witnessed. It does NOTHING. It's so frustrating seeing that "I" am useless
at creating freedom.

Perhaps this is the end of the road. I cannot come up with anything else
to do to wake up.

If I had to guess it would be that either through enough suffering,

where the will to carry on becomes unbearable or through sufficient,
radical self honesty, acceptance, and scrutiny of mind; ultimate truth will
eventually reveal itself. My interpretation is that truth kills the false
because the false would never be able to kill itself.

So much angst comes from presuming that I have yet to see the whole
truth, because clearly I have not had the awakening that others have
described having. I don't know how to stop seeking. I can't stop because I
see that I'm not free yet.

Can you offer a description of how you see freedom?

 Answer:

It's noble of you to search and struggle for this thing called freedom, but
it's another thing to be willing to die for it.

The realization of the One is a BYPRODUCT of freedom, it is NOT the

cause of it.

Yes, truth eventually kills the seeker rather than the seeker killing
itself... but the seeker could not be killed if it didn't exhaust itself through
an arduous search first. Descriptions of freedom do it an injustice but they
do help the seeker to exhaust itself... after all, aren't you getting pretty
tired by now?

I don't 'see' freedom, I AM freedom... there's a difference. A seeker

thinks that if they become free or see freedom 'out there' somewhere that
they'll start to feel free inside, but that's a fantasy. That's also why there is
so much struggle and suffering for seekers. When the seeker in you finally
gives up completely (when the time is right) freedom will realize itself
internally first; then (and only then) will that realization become reflected
'out there' in the world. BEING freedom comes first, seeing freedom
comes after.

Question:
I can see that consciousness is simply awakeness, awareness, knowingness,
a non-thing-presence. Great. Nothing to solve there. Life appears to
revolve around this singular point of consciousness.

What I have trouble with is the fact that my rent still has to be paid and
it seems like thinking and planning (not being awake) is the only way that's
going to happen. So the issue seems to be that, yes, you can recognize what
wakefulness is but so what? It seems a bit naive to think that once
enlightenment happens that everything is going to be hunky dory and that
the universe will just pay your rent for you.

If I give total attention to the moment continuously, forever; will life

provide for and take care of this body / form? How is anything going to get
done? I feel like I need proof in order to be able to trust. I think my guard
is up all of the time because I think that life couldn't care less if this body /
form lives or dies.

Answer:

How is anything going to get done? Well, how is anything getting done
already? If the false self is false, it means that it's never truly gotten
anything 'done'. It means that what's happening is always a product of
truth… even if truth is wearing the mask of the false while it’s happening.
So it’s not about figuring out how to get things done while trying to rest as
the truth, it’s about deeply recognizing how things are *already* getting
done. You don’t bring awareness into the present, awareness IS the
present. ‘You’ are not brought into the present, you ARE the present.
When awareness becomes aware of itself, ‘you’ are absent. Awakeness
becomes the case. Awakeness is what witnesses the unfolding of any doing
that’s happening… it also 'becomes' the doing at the same time. There’s no
separation between witness and doer. The moment that life recognizes
itself unfolding, it's awake.

Life always wants to support itself... but if life (you) believes that it's
separate from itself then its support will not be recognized when it's given
and may even be labeled as a threat.

Realizing / recognizing the wakefulness that you are and giving your
attention to THIS is what enables life to start supporting itself again
because it's gotten out of its own way. When the knot (not) that is 'me'
becomes untied through continuous recognition of wakefulness, life's
natural supporting functions flow freely without restriction.

Yes, rent gets paid by thinking and planning but that's not an issue if
awakeness has realized that it's not a thinker or planner. When awakeness
realizes that it's not a process of thinking, it can pick up the time-bound
tools of thinking and planning with playfulness... not serious life or death
determination. When life is truly awake to itself, it knows that thinking is
not really what takes care of itself. The hand doesn't need to think before it
can feed the mouth.

Question:

You speak of deep silence as being ultimate truth; is this something that
you abide as or does it come and go? Based on my personal inquiry I
would assume that deep silence cannot be 'done', rather your essential
nature becomes recognized AS deep silence? If deep silence comes and
goes that would mean that at certain times self is the assemblage point and
other times silence is the assemblage point. Is this your experience?

Answer:

There's the silence you realize as being the background of all experience
(your true nature) and then there's the silencing of the mind (which can
fluctuate / come and go). To wake up is to realize yourself as that
background. Mind will still fluctuate, but when you truly know yourself as
not mind then you will also know that those fluctuations can't really touch
what you really are. What you really are never comes and goes. It's the
difference between watching a show on the TV and believing that you're in
the show. Mind is TV, truth is what's watching.

Question:

I'm tired of trying to figure all of this out.

Answer:

There comes a point when the mind can no longer answer its own
questions. At some point, simple pure awareness has to take over and be
given priority over the mind's need for answers.
 Question:

There seems to be an in-between state where I'm just okay; kind of neutral.
It's this place that's peaked my interest; what causes me to go from
extreme pain to neutrality and back again? Does some thought process
stroke my sense of self into feeling better? It feels like this is what we do
all our lives; constantly doing maintenance work to make our 'selves' feel
better. I feel like I'm being torn apart inside but the fear that says my
whole life is going to fall apart is being seen through more now. Parts of
my life have already fallen apart and it's still been okay for the most part.
I still feel like I'm in over my head though and to make matters worse I've
been getting 'talks' from my family members who are recommending that I
get some 'help'.

It feels like my ego is out of control, scared and backed against a wall.
How can an imaginary fantasy cause so much anguish?

Answer:

Either we work to make and maintain a self or we don’t… deceptively

simple.

Any idea of arriving anywhere into any kind of future state is an

illusion. Enlightenment is an amazing and profound transformation of
consciousness, but it's a realization of what's already here.
 You’re stuck with where you are forever… but is where you ARE able
to actually experience suffering? Isn’t it when you claim ownership over
where you are that suffering arises? As long as you still think that you can
‘own’ where you are, suffering will keep paying you a visit. The world
(including your mind) can only see you and know you as a time-bound
being with a past and a future who's in the midst of struggling or
succeeding at something. The world can NEVER know or understand what
you really are because you can’t be located anywhere or identified by any
means. How can you pinpoint aware emptiness? Death is not an event that
you can own, it’s a willingness to let go of ownership for good. Notice that
you don’t need to own the present moment… it won’t go anywhere if you
stop owning it. What you REALLY are can’t go anywhere or be touched by
any struggle… or be ‘owned’.

’Me’ is an illusion. Unidentified consciousness (pure awareness) is

what’s real, so consciousness trying to get rid of the ‘me’ is an attempt to
get rid of something that doesn’t exist. It can’t be done. Obviously, this
‘me’ seems very real and the suffering experienced as a result of this
apparent ‘me’ makes it seem as though there really is something that
needs to be gotten rid of. None the less, ‘me’ is a conditioned illusion; a
contraction of awareness. This means that there’s nothing to grab onto that
can be thrown away. The only thing that dissolves illusion is continual
recognition of truth; of the moment; of the space where 'me' doesn't exist.

Question:

I'm stuck. I don't know what to do to end all of the pain and I don't think I
should do anything because doing something will only get me further away
from my goal. I don't think I should even have a goal! You know what I
mean?
 Answer:

Truth is always stuck, it can never go anywhere. You however are not
stuck, you still think you can go somewhere, attain something. That's
perfectly normal and that's why the pain is still with you. Pain can only
survive for as long as it has room to move around in. There's no room for
pain in truth because truth can't move an inch so it can't make room for
anything else. Pain needs your past and your future. Truth has no past and
future. Truth is timeless, pain is time-bound.
 STEP 5
(LET GO OF FREEDOM)
Q &A
 Question:

Can you give me an idea of what the run up to you're awakening was like?
Was there a buildup of painful emotional waves before it happened? If so,
how long between waves? Any nausea? How did you feel a few seconds
before your awakening? How did you feel a few seconds after?

In one of your books you say that you were picking up a bucket or
something and then something released inside of you; how did you
perceive your environment before and after that happened? You said that
everything appeared sacred, what does that truly mean? Sacred to me is
graveyards, temples, churches, religious paraphernalia, angels, chanting
and the like. How can a bucket appear sacred?

Answer:

I started my search for freedom when the pain inside of me started to

intensify (around the end of elementary school and beginning of high
school). In a way, my ‘spiritual’ search started by looking into new-age
things and discovering the practice of self-inquiry. This practice of self-
inquiry helped sensitize my ‘being’ to the lightness of the present
moment. It can be likened to dipping your toe into a warm bath and then
gradually sensitizing the rest of your body to the temperature of the water.

By the time I reached 20, my story of suffering had reached a boiling

point and my ‘beingness’ had sensitized itself enough to the present
moment that I was ready to ‘merge’ with it. The event with the bucket was
the climax of my story. Yes, I experienced waves of emotional anguish
leading up to my awakening. The frequency of those waves intensified as I
moved through high school to the point that there was very little space
between them anymore. Sometimes these waves brought on physical
sickness as well.

How did I feel a few seconds before the awakening? Exhausted.. totally
utterly exhausted. It became crystal clear that the end had come. I didn’t
know what that meant at the time, just that I didn’t have it in me to seek
out a solution anymore. How did I feel seconds after? Perplexed, in awe, at
peace. How did I perceive the environment before and after? Before, ‘Me’
was still there and so ‘me’ was where the focus was, not on the
environment. The environment was already labeled and ’known’ so I never
really saw it. After, ‘me’ was not the focus anymore and so existence was
all that was left… labels fell away. IT awoke to itself and could finally see
itself… hence I say that everything suddenly appeared sacred; IT realized
that everything was IT, everything was intelligent, everything was full of
this intelligent presence... even a bucket. Sacredness is not in the things or
ideas that we assign specialness to (like temples, churches, religious
paraphernalia, angels, chanting), it’s in recognizing the God-presence in
everything that exists… EVERYTHING. Recognizing that presence in
everything is only truly possible in deep silence, which is why ‘me’ blinds
most people from seeing it. 'Me' is ignorance of silence. Everything that
exists is sacred because it's all made from One universal, eternal,
intelligent awareness.

Question:
I've heard one teacher say that when they woke up they realized that they
were what was behind everyone's eyes; that they were literally, actually
behind everyone's eyes. Is this what you mean when you talk about the
realization of oneness?

Answer:

I can’t see behind other people’s eyes. If what this teacher was trying to
convey is that the source of every human being is pure undivided
intelligent awareness and that that undivided awareness is what's behind
all eyes then that makes sense to me. I can’t feel another person’s feelings
directly but I can deeply sense / sympathize / empathize with another
persons feelings. It's very misleading, unhelpful and untrue to say that you
can own another person’s experience. The truth is that you are a PART of
ALL that exists. The enlightened human experience is not that you can
suddenly experience what every other human being is experiencing, it’s
that you recognize that all experiences and manifestations in existence
originate from One consciousness. There’s a great saying….“A buddha
gets hungry in his belly, not in yours.”

Question:

I started my awakening a few years ago when I realized that I wasn't just a
human being anymore, but instead One consciousness behind everything.
 There's one nagging thought that's been eating away at me though.
How can I know if my awakening isn't just another trick of my brain? After
all, the brain works by creating a holographic projection of the world
based on the flow of electrons coming from the sensory organs of the body.
So what if 'awakening' is just the brain breaking down one's sense of self to
the point of seeing the hologram as 'one' hologram. Maybe I don't really
see all of reality as One but instead see all of my own hologram as One.

How can I know that I'm not just delusional?

Maybe I'm just the first 'awakened' person who has ever considered
this?

Right now, the only way I've been able to make peace with this is to find
a flaw in my thoughts or to accept that I will never know the answer.

Answer:

Your awakening has not penetrated deeply enough yet. You still believe
that awareness is the same as intellectual intelligence. Enlightened
awareness is not the same thing as a thought process. Enlightened
awareness is a singular knowing, not a dualistic one. All thoughts are
dualistic. True enlightenment reveals that undivided awareness is the
ground of all phenomenon; it's the unmanifested reality from which all
dualistic experiences arise. In other words, if it's authentic, enlightened
awareness is not something that can be subjected to debate by a thinking
mind.
 As you said, thought is a clever trap of the ego… thought IS ego.
There’s definitely a common tendency in many who awaken to identify
with awakening itself and then label their experience as something that
can be identified with. It’s certainly delusional, albeit a more refined and
less suffering-based form of delusion.

Seeing oneness is not delusional though, telling your ’self ’ that you’re
seeing oneness is. I talk about seeing oneness a lot but that’s only because
I have no other way of pointing to something that can’t be pointed to.
Talking about oneness is the same as pointing to the moon's light to tell
you about the existence of the sun.

Going into thoughts about holograms and brain function is definitely

the false self (which is any self) trying to conceptualize awakening. It may
seem like honest scientific inquiry, but so does seeking for anyone else
who has not woken up. The moment of awakening is a moment of
complete and utter let-go; a total willingness to let go of all knowledge.
You realize that you are the source of knowledge and that knowledge itself
comes after you. If you’d like to lay your question to rest and be at peace,
then you have to step back into THIS space of not-knowing, not-
identifying, not-being. In that space of not-knowing a deeper knowing will
gradually become evident, only it will be a knowing that is only known
unto itself.

Question:
I've always been fascinated by death. Before I encountered people who
were 'into' enlightenment teachings I found my community with the dying.
I've worked with the elderly for a number of years and have had the same
energetic experience around certain awake teachers as I've had around the
dying.

I've never really been concerned with where I go after death, my real
fascination is: where does all of this go when I die (my home, children, the
world)?

Answer:

Leave physical death to the physical. As far as false-self death goes, your
home, children and the world remain; the main difference is that your
relationship to them changes… or rather, it ceases. Not that you stop
relating to others and your environment, but that the illusion of believing
you are a separate ‘somebody’ relating with other separate ‘somebodies’
ceases. You realize on a deep level that there are no relationships in the
traditional sense when it’s only ever the Self interacting with itself. All
relationships become sacred.

When the false self dies, everything remains but it’s the remains of
one, not two. There's no longer 'my' home, 'my' children or 'my' world…
there’s home, children, world and IT recognizing that IT is all of those
things. The beauty and intimacy of life remains, always.
 Question:

You and I very briefly touched this subject a while back but you chose to
not answer my question. Your reason was that no answer would be
satisfactory. I'd like to ask you again as it's a sticking point for me. You've
spoken of fundamental silence before and that you see God everywhere.
Can't this silence and 'God vision' just be a basic running program of the
brain or something similar? After all, neurological studies can literally
turn off speech, movement, time perception, memory etc.. The enlightened
argument is that these alterations still have to be observed by something.
Obviously this would mean that awareness is still present; that awareness
can't be turned off. The test for that of course is death. But how can anyone
verify the result of that?

Answer:

I once told you that I see God everywhere. That statement is true but it’s
also misleading in a way. I don’t ‘see’ God in the traditional way you
would think of seeing something. When I initially turn my attention to a
particular object and look at it, I’m using my brain to do that. Once my
attention is on that particular object however, I can stop looking at it even
though my eyes are still directed towards it. This 'stopping' of looking at
something is the same moment that God reveals itself in the object I was
previously looking at. This ‘stopping’ is what I can’t put into words for
you… but essentially it’s the same as a kind of death; the function of
seeing stops and in that stopping perceiver and perceived fall away and
what is revealed is an inherent intelligent presence.

The brain needs time to function - it only works by connecting point A

to B to C etc. which is how vision works (light is transmitted to the eyes
which send that information to the brain. The time it takes for that to
happen is what creates the illusion of perceiver and perceived. It takes
time for human vision to happen.

Enlightenment is seeing reality outside of time. When that happens

reality sees itself. No light is being transmitted to the brain (because time
has completely stopped). The light that was previously being transmitted
now has nowhere to go; it can’t travel anymore and because of that all
‘objects’ shine unto themselves. The enlightened eyeball analogy is
helpful here: the eyeball realizes that the only way to know itself is to stop
trying to look at itself and just start being itself. It's in that ‘beingness’
that a different kind of seeing takes place, one that doesn’t need light
transmitted in order for understanding happen.

As you said, death is the only thing that can verify what I’m saying.
Death can indeed happen while the body is still alive by aligning your
consciousness with the timeless… this eternal instant.

Before enlightenment, when you look to the present moment, you can
sense ‘your’ presence but you don’t necessarily sense that presence
anywhere else because you’re just resting in the eye of the storm for a
moment. The storm is your busy, fear-motivated mind; it blinds your
presence in all ‘other’ things from you; it keeps you in time.
Enlightenment finally happens when light stops travelling and starts
being… everywhere. When that happens, the functions of the body become
something that you can smile at but not put much stock into (as far as
telling you what’s ultimately real).
 Question:

The idea of enlightenment confuses me. Obviously there's something

profound that shifts in a human being when it happens and yet so many
teachers say that the true Self (the divine Self) does not become
enlightened because it's already one's true unborn nature. It sounds like
enlightenment is only a dramatic change for the human mind / being, but
not for consciousness itself. Is this right?

Answer:

I understand that the idea of enlightenment makes no sense when trying to

understand things from a non-dual perspective. After all, if all is one, then
who becomes enlightened? On the deepest level, undivided consciousness
is all there is. This is the untouchable reality of eternity. On the human
level, human awareness is evolving in consciousness, gradually
transcending mind, gradually returning to its original resting ground of
pure unidentified awareness.

Another way to look at it is like a seed; a seed and the flower it

becomes are made of the same stuff, their essence is one but the state of a
seed and the state of a flower is obviously very different. Ultimately, a
seed that grows into a flower doesn't add anything more to truth, it just
becomes a fully manifested expression of truth. Enlightenment is a
flowering after a long period of growth in consciousness. When an
enlightened person leaves this earth, the great dance of growth comes to an
end and the consciousness that flowered is ready to return to itself as the
everything.
 Question:

What is Nirvana? Is it a place? Does bliss come into it? And if so, is it
constant?

Would it be right to say that awakening is a kind of 'blending' with the

infinite? When one wakes up, what is important to them?

Answer:

Nirvana is when you no longer leave this moment. In reality, it's the only
place there is. Yes, bliss comes into it sometimes but it's not always
constant. What makes Nirvana Nirvana is that you realize WHO YOU
ARE is a peace that can never really go anywhere; that it has never really
left you; that it could never really leave you. You could never leave you.
Sometimes this peace encounters joy, bliss, agitation etc., but what's most
important is the peace that can't be touched; the peace that can NEVER
leave.

You could say that there is a 'blending' or 'merging' with the infinite,
but the truth is that there is nothing that can merge because there's 'not
two'. That's why enlightenment is dying the deathless death; it's the
dissolution of the great cosmic hypnosis called duality.
 When one wakes up, nothing AND everything is important. You
understand that ultimately real reality can never be destroyed and yet you
have great compassion and appreciation for this great play even though it's
only temporary. So what's 'important' is whatever you assign importance
to. The appreciation for all of THIS also has a kind of importance to it,
though it's not serious.

Question:

People with egos who are not prepared to understand truth have great
difficulty with the concept of living in the moment. How do you help them?

Answer:

Don't even go there anymore. Talking of egos gives reality to egos, it

reinforces the illusion that you are separate from life and that life is
separate from you. It makes it seem as though an 'ego' is separate from
you.

I could choose to see Bob as “Bob, the guy with an ego” but doing so
means that I'd separate myself from him and so I'd end up with just as
much of an ego. Being awake means only seeing what's awake. Yes, other
humans are playing the sleeping game but recognizing their awakeness is
what's most important; otherwise you put yourself to sleep by believing
that sleep is reality; that separation is reality.
 Question:

I don't understand how it's possible to surrender and at the same time
practice and have a goal. Isn't it true that the more I practice and cling to
this goal of enlightenment the further away from enlightenment I get?

Answer:

Nothing can push you away from enlightenment because enlightenment is

not an attainment, it's a dissolution. The more you practice, the more you
exhaust the seeker in you. When you are fully exhausted, you dissolve into
enlightenment. You don't become enlightenment, enlightenment finally
stops being something other than itself.

Question:

Isn't enlightenment a state of no desire?

 Answer:

Yes and no. Yes in that you realize that your true nature is what is most
fulfilling and that nothing could ever compare. No in that doughnuts are
still delicious and spaghetti is a wonderful way of filling a hungry belly.

Question:

Isn't enlightenment a state of complete surrender to what is?

Answer:

Yes and no. Yes in that enlightenment is a realization of what you really
are, and that what you really are can only be seen through deep surrender
to what is. No in that emotions can still arise and cause resistance to what
is sometimes. The main difference is that you no longer mistake ultimate
reality to be a state of emotion anymore. You've realized that emotion isn't
the ocean, just waves on the surface. Enlightenment helps you to reside as
the ocean more which means that the waves become less frequent, less
turbulent.

Question:
Isn't enlightenment not wanting things to be different from what they are?

Answer:

Yes but so what? A seedling still has growth (preparation through

exhaustion) to do before it's ready to flower (totally surrender).

Question:

Isn't enlightenment a state in which one accepts pain and suffering?

Answer:

There can still be pain after enlightenment but suffering is only possible
through identification with pain (building a personal story around it).
Enlightenment is the end of stories.
 Question:

I find that I'm always getting stuck on trying to figure out the origin and
nature of mind.

Answer:

Inquiring into the nature of mind is helpful but the origin not so much.
Finding out its supposed identity here now wakes you up, finding out what
created it doesn’t.

Understanding the origin of mind comes in time. Suffice it to say that

when consciousness emerges through a human form, the climate for
identification is perfect; consciousness is given interests through feelings
and a body that responds immediately to the wishes of those interests.
Everything that's given (the body, interests, feelings) serves to create the
hypnosis that is ‘me’. Just as a country is an illusion and nothing more
than the conceptual sum of its parts, so too is the mind an illusion and
nothing more than the conceptual sum of what is given from the time of
birth.

That which gives these parts is the truth, the creator, source, the void.
This giver remains a mystery until these parts are fully removed (physical
death). This is the case even for enlightened ones.

Mind creates nothing because mind is an illusion, a hypnosis.

 ‘You’ are a manifestation of the creator AND because of that, you are
the creator manifested. Your will exists not because ‘you’ choose for it to,
but because it's always being given to you. There is only One will, not two.

Question:

Is enlightenment the same as death? Does it happen when there's a death

of identification with 'me'?

Answer:

Identification can't die because identification is not a 'thing'. Only things

can die. Enlightenment is when identification dissolves; it's a deathless
death... the death of a contracted sense of self called 'me'.

When a hypnotized person comes out of hypnosis, did their hypnotized

self die or did the illusion of that self simply disappear?
 Question:

I've had the shift in consciousness that's referred to as enlightenment. One

afternoon, several years ago, while feeling psychologically sick, I had a
transformative experience where something deep inside of me gave up.
Shortly after I noticed that everything was alive with presence; with 'my'
presence.

The intensity of that initial experience has since subsided, but it was,
and still is, seen that everything is awareness. I still feel like there is a
sense of self present though, almost like a thinker that should not be
present. While intuitively I know that this feeling arises from a fear-based
thought and so is ultimately untrue, the feeling is none the less a persistent
one. Is it possible that I'm still not completely done?

Answer:

I've mentioned the fan-blade analogy before. What I’ve come to observe
and experience is that after someone wakes up there are still echos of the
old self that take time (often years) to slow down and fade away. The fan
has been unplugged but it's blades have some momentum left in them. For
some, this slowing down process can happen rather quickly and for others
not so much.

From what you’ve described, it sounds like you have woken up, so you
now KNOW experientially that death is an illusion and that fear has no
ground to stand upon anymore. This means that any echos / thoughts of a
'self' that are still present are going to dissolve in due time as you continue
moving through various life experiences. The good news is that because
you now know that death is an illusion (and have the ‘vision’ to
accompany that knowing), it’s far less difficult now to be willing to die
over and over again whenever life asks you to.

It’s been well over a decade now since I woke up and in that time I’ve
encountered many challenging / difficult life situations. All of these
challenges have worked to chip away at any attachment to ‘self ’ that
remains. In other words, my fan blades have slowed down considerably
since I first woke up but I can still feel some movement there from time to
time.

You know that ultimate reality is already ‘done’, it’s the gradual fading
away of the deeply programmed belief that you can ‘be done’ that takes
time.

You are home now. Life will still have its ups and downs, but you are
home now.
 IN CLOSING

If there's anything worth taking away from this book it would be a

validation that ultimate truth exists.

If that suspicion has been validated (even just a little), it means that
your life is forever changed. There's no going back now. Now you know
that life is not just made up of a series of relative truths that can change
from person to person, moment to moment. Now you know that accessing
this absolute truth is possible for anyone who's willing to become total in
their search for it.

The game is weighted in your favor now... what happens next?

Kyle

P.S. - For more guidance on the application of these steps, you can also
take The Method class (video recording) by following the link on the next
page.

Also, when you have a chance, let me know what your thoughts and
feelings were as you read through this book. Please Click Here to leave a
review on Amazon.
 THE METHOD 2-HR VIDEO
CLASS RECORDING

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in your day-to-day life, you can purchase the 2-hour video class recording
by following the link below. The Method class recording covers each of
the 5 inquiry steps in-depth.

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