The July Eckhart Tolle Meetup was set against the backdrop of a light summer drizzle, refreshing after such warm weather this summer.  The talk focused on the egoic identity that seems to want problems in order to thrive.  Eckhart described how the ‘self-identity’ can be somewhat addicted to thinking and in particular, projecting forward, looking back or judging what is.  Being focused on the now, allows some of that to slip away – in particular – the recursive thought that something isn’t right. That this moment isn’t enough.  Krishnamurti provides an interesting perspective as well on the tendency to look for problems:  “What is it that we are discontented with? Surely with what is. The what is may be the social order, the what is may be the relationship, the what is may be what we are, the thing we are essentially – which is, the ugly, the wandering thoughts, the ambitions, the frustrations, the innumerable fears; that is what we are. In going away from that, we think we shall find an answer to our discontent. So we are always seeking a way, a means to change the ‘what is’…” One of the eight who attended the gathering shared her strategy of pausing to take three full breaths.  I’ve used this in past, and even have a ‘pause-reminder’ taped onto my computer:  Am I Still Breathing?  It can be very effective to stop and fully be with the breath when circumstances are challenging – not needing to turn away from angst, but to simply be with it without telling stories about it.  A sharp tone in someone’s voice becomes simply a strange sound rather than an accusation… and my own defensiveness can simply be an odd human reflex.   And as I rest in awareness, there is no end to the stillness/peace in which these apparent ‘problems’ seem to emerge and then change or fade… They have no life of their own but that which the mind gives them. Thanks once again for the peace (and space) offered by KECC!  

Inquiry Sunday Sunday, July 5, 2015 A small group of four people showed up for the Sunday event.  The morning session included two videos by Dorothy Hunt, a non-dual psychotherapist and student of Adyashanti, and Rick Linchitz, a former doctor and cancer researcher who was himself diagnosed with and died from cancer.  Both talks were very interesting in looking at our assumptions about birth and death and who it actually is that is born and dies.  Both teachers had their own distinct flavour and at the same time spoke of the same fundamental insights regarding self and identity.  It was refreshing to listen to these clear expressions of basic truths that are so essential to our self understanding.  The videos were followed by group discussion and investigation of the issues raised.

Thanks once again to KECC for hosting our get-together. The June video talk was engaging – attended by 10 or so of us, we heard Eckhart explore the true power of deep surrender to ‘what is’.  He talked about noise or internal judgements that we sometimes carry, and how it can prevent or fetter our deeper sense or expression of the natural flow of that which life is unfolding.  Allowing ourselves to see, accept and be gently ‘with’ difficult emotions or situations that arise – this can allow them to detangle or transform.  It reminded me of K’s encouragement to lean in with curiousness, when we observe strong reactions in ourselves – to be with ourselves in full acceptance (turmoil tends to shift or fade in the light of our awareness).  This creates space within us, more room for sensing/allowing what is.  This is true power.

The past lives in our minds. It dictates our experience of the present from a very powerful position, operating as the very self we identify as “I”. This I is like an impostor from within our own consciousness, claiming our life experiences for its own and distorting them based on its conditioning. We see the world through the lens of this I, with its web of mental associations that colour our perception and have us constantly judging and labeling everything in our experience—including ourselves—according to the past. This I is constantly reinforcing and substantiating itself by projecting memories and thoughts into our consciousness that keep it front and center in the present moment. When we observe our thoughts, we can see how the stories in our minds almost always revolve around “I”, “me”, “mine”, and variations of “me and you”, “me and them” and “me and that”. We’ve come to take this dualistic internal dialogue for granted, unconscious of the fact that this drama inside is purely mental fabrication, including the I operating at the center of it all. Isolation, division and conflict are inherent qualities of this internal dynamic, and it causes a great deal of suffering in many people’s lives. The mind is such a powerful tool, so immensely powerful that consciousness itself is easily mesmerized by it, by its own creation. That is really what we are though: consciousness, pure and simple. When we take a good look at ourselves in the present moment, if we can differentiate between what is a projection of the past and what is actually here in the present, we might see that the self of the mind does not really exist. Instead, what is here is something formless, clear and indefinable, free from the past and full of the present. It is something that is both inherently whole and empty at the same time. All the commotion inside arises in a space that is naturally still and silent. Looking inside and seeing these as qualities of your true nature creates the opportunity to shift from a state of narrow identification with the “I” thought (and all its projections), to a state of openness, non-reaction and inner peace. Who we think we are is a complicated drama of memories and emotions that is often butting heads with reality, but what we really are exists only in the present, and is simplicity itself. Our conditioning is deeply rooted, and so seeing this may not transform us immediately, but with continued awareness we might finally shed the bondage of the past and find the peace that is always right here, right where we are. JR “There is a watching of the past as it goes by, but not occupation with the past. So the mind is free to observe and not to choose. Where there is choice in this movement of the river of memory, there is occupation, and the moment the mind is occupied, it is caught in the past: and when the mind is occupied with the past, it is incapable of seeing something real, true, new, original, uncontaminated. A mind that is occupied with the past – the past is the whole consciousness that says, `this is good; `that is right; `this is bad; `this is mine; `this is not mine’ – can never know the Real. But the mind unoccupied can receive that which is not known, which is the unknown. This is not an extraordinary state of some yogi, some saint. Just observe your own mind; how direct and simple it is. See how your mind is occupied. And the answer, with what the mind is occupied, will give you the understanding of the past, and therefore the freedom from the past.” -J. Krishnamurti, Collected Works Volume 7 Bombay, 4th March 1953