When you follow a teacher or a teaching, you will, eventually, encounter limitation. If, rather, you learn to follow your own voice, you will find Source and Limitlessness.
Avtar
Introduction
Perhaps, the greatest shift in the awakened life is the shift from the subjective to the objective life experience. We shift from being subject to circumstance, emotion, and our thoughts, in fact the entire reign of the false and subsuming egoic paradigm, to having it become the object of our alert, enlightened, observation. This shift, as we will see, not only frees us from our status as subject, but, also, informs us as to whom we really are: That Which Perceives. The importance and effect of this shift cannot be overstated. We awake as if from a dream. We discover the nature of our dreaming. We experience who it was that dreamt and who it is that is subject to the dream no longer.
Part One: Preparing
Take a moment, or two, to consider the possibility, just the possibility, that everything that you need to be free, that which can change your experience of life forever, lies as potential in these very words before you. Is it possible? Stop now and consider this. Is it possible?
If, after consideration, you are able to allow for that possibility, however remote, then you have already achieved the first step in preparation.
If, however, you cannot, at this time, allow for the possibility that your attention to, and participation in, these words can alter your life experience beyond your present ability to imagine, that in fact rebirth, awakening, absolute freedom and empowerment may not be found here, in this time of setting our attention together, then set these words aside, they can be of no use to you now. You have already chosen what can and cannot be. Nothing will change that.
Further, if you have said to yourself, rather than, "Yes, it is possible, however remote, for my participation here, now, to forever alter my life experience", but, rather, "I will read to the end, and then judge", these words will be of little value to you, either. The purpose of these words is not to persuade or contest with the "mind", to talk you into something. No. There are, already, enough voices, ideas, and thoughts clamouring for your attention. Judgment is ego fuel. The ego can be of no help here.
The purpose, the possibility, of this time, this space we now share together, this very moment, is not to convince, but, rather, to allow for the possibility of resonance-to provide the opportunity for that which is already within you, that which does not weigh, which cannot be persuaded, for it knows all things, to say, "Ah!". It is my experience that when what is, is recognized and resonates with what knows, awakening arises and the dream falls away. We are reborn!
To experience, for yourself, the fullness of the possibility available in these words to you now, requires your participation. We are used to consuming words and ideas, weighing them, assigning a value, and moving on. We look at truth as if it were a thing outside of our self. Here, should you choose to fully explore this opportunity, we will do something different. I do not ask you to come to my table to consume what has been prepared for you, but, rather, to use this time to turn inward-to be reminded of what it is already known to you. I offer you the suggestion that all you need is already inside of you. To experience these words as being of value to you is to move from being a consumer to a rememberer. There are millions of voices, ideas, traditions and beliefs constantly seeking to capture your mind and attention. Our purpose here is, merely, to allow for a possibility, that you might be alert to that which resonates from your deepest being, and, in that process, to be awakened to remembering.
Thusly, the first step in preparation was to allow for possibility. The second step is to make a decision to actively participate. It is the only way to experience the possibility that is here.
If you have completed these two steps, you are well on your way. Even now, you may begin to sense recognition, and the great joy that arises with it.
Exercise I:
Read the following italicized paragraph without resorting to the mind. Merely, read it, feel it, and let it be. It may immediately resonate, it may not. It is of no matter.
Being prepared, I greet you Beloved. You are Holy. You are held Most Precious. You are the Very Purpose of Creation. You are the very culmination of the Unfolding: The Beginning of Endings, and the Ending of Beginnings, the culmination of all that has gone before. I tell you this Beloved, you are the Expression of the Great Mystery, the End of Suffering and Separation. In you, the Creator and creation become one expression!
Your awakening or fuller expression thereof, needs nothing but your objective attention to arise. Once you have experienced it you may be, as I was, dumbstruck by just how effortless and simple it is. In fact, effort, as in the concentration of energy by will, is of little help here. Some simple practice and objective attention is all that is needed.
In the past, it may have been necessary to sit in a cave for several lifetimes. I do not know. I do know, however, in this time, Consciousness would seem to be arising everywhere. Like spring reveals the shoots of dormant seeds, so too, at this time, does dormant Consciousness begin to shrug off its sleep and begin to rise toward the Sun.
Exercise II:
I invite you to stop reading, for a time, now. Wherever you are, rest your mind. Move away from your thoughts. Relax. Allow a spaciousness to arise in you. In that space, and outside of thought, feel the feelings of what you have just read. Turn inward and, merely, sense the effect the words you have read are having on you. Observe. If thoughts insist on being present, simply observe them. Observe them not for their content, but rather as things, say clouds, and let them drift away. Do not attempt to struggle here, just observe, as best you can, and relax.
Having spent some time here together, preparing the ground for our lesson, I suggest you set aside these words until you have the time and space to fully attend to what is to follow. There is no hurry. The things we consider here are outside of time, they are eternal. There is nothing to be gained from rushing through.
Exercise III:
Between now and the time you set aside to return, take moments, here and there, to practice observing, rather than being actively caught up in, the content of what occurs within you. Do not strain or judge, just observe.
Until we meet, in these words and space again, may your every breath be Peace.
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