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Exploring our true nature
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“Change is the only constant in life”- Heraclitus
In my last newsletter “Endings = Beginnings” I talked about our relationship to change. I mentioned the only thing that’s constant/permanent is change. Now while that is true in the context of what I was talking about, it isn’t actually the only permanent thing because, change also changes. The way change presents itself in life changes as your life unfolds.
So, what is the one constant throughout our lives?
Our awareness of the change.
In other words, the thing that is aware that the change is happening. It can also be called consciousness. It is who we are at our core. When you strip back all the layers of who you think you are, you arrive at this truth. I talk about this briefly in my newsletter “The Most Important Question” where I explored the question “Who Am I?” but today, I want to dive deeper.
The Invisible & Visible
“The lamps are different, but the light is the same” - Rumi
There is an invisible intelligence that has no labels. It is the intelligence that keeps your heart beating and blood flowing without you having to do anything. That same intelligence is what makes the sun rise and set. Its what makes a baby grow inside the womb without you having to do anything.
That intelligence manifests itself through everything in all the forms we see around us. The invisible is made visible through all the variety of forms it takes. But underneath all those forms is one reality.
Along my spiritual quest I came across a book called The Upanishads. It is a collection of texts from the Vedas, an ancient Hindu scripture. It is comprised of a collection of conversations between teacher and student about the nature of reality.
It explains that this is all one reality expressing itself in many forms.
There is a beautiful story in the Upanishads that illustrates this well:
A father imparts spiritual wisdom to his son by first asking him to place salt in a glass of water and to bring it to him the next morning.
The next day, the father asks the boy, “where is that salt?”, to which the boy replies “I do not see it”. The father then asks him to sip the water and says, “how does it taste?”, to which the boy replies, “Salty, Father”. His Father makes him sip different parts of the water and each time asks him how it tastes and the boy replies, “I taste salt everywhere”.
So you see there isn’t a place that this reality isn’t, it is the foundation of everything.
Think about it like this, who is inside your body?
You might reply “well, it’s me”, but who is me? Who is the one talking?
You are not the mind. Think of the mind as plugged into a light source that is illuminating it.
We have 3 states of mind:
Waking
Dreaming
Deep Sleep
All of these states come and go, but there is one underlying reality that does not change which is aware of all of these states.
The brain is an instrument of the physical body. Consciousness is not found in the brain. Consciousness is needed for the brain to work.
"Looking for consciousness in the brain is like looking inside a radio for the announcer." - Nassim Haramein
Where do you go when you are in deep sleep? You are still there. What happens when you wake up? The same you is still there. How did you know you were in deep sleep even though the brain was switched off?
It isn’t the absence of presence you are experiencing, but the presence of absence.
Presence is always there.
There are 3 layers to us:
Causal body - soul (think of this as a seed from which fruit is born)
Subtle body - thoughts, emotions and sensations
Physical body - the outer appearance which you see in the mirror
Underneath these 3 is one foundational reality that is animating us all.
Glimpse Of Truth
“Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes” - Carl Jung
Reading about this and understanding it logically is one thing, but at some point this has to become the experience from which you live for you to call it truth.
One of the famous phrases from the Upanishads is “Tat Twam Asi” which translates to “You Are That”. Essentially, you are the reality that is inside all things everywhere all at once.
But how do you experience this?
A few years ago I stumbled onto a meditation called “Neti Neti” (which mean ‘not this, not that’), by Sri Ramana Maharshi. Having tried this a number of times I felt a deep sense of peace and tranquility that I hadn’t felt before.
I invite you to try it:
Sit in a quiet place and one by one repeat the following and feel yourself disconnecting from that part of yourself as you do:
I am not my senses (one by one disconnect from your eyes, ears, skin, nose, tongue)
I am not my limbs
I am not my genitals
I am not my internal organs (go through each one)
I am not my torso
I am not my head
I am not my thoughts
I am not this thought
I am not “I” either
Total silence.
For me “God” isn’t a person or a higher being, it is a universal energy that is continually expanding through everything and everyone. It is the invisible energy that resides inside us all. As I reflected on this truth a few years ago, I wrote a poem which is now in my book “Searching in Silence” :
the boy sat quietly on his bed one evening
and reflected on the concept of god.
it seemed everyone thought of god as a man
sitting in a room upstairs in the sky watching over us
at all times from birth to death,
and then we either go to meet him or
we go to meet his enemy, the devil,
but the boy felt this idea was rather odd,
If there was a man in the sky why could no one see him?
and why is he called “him” and not “her”?
then a thought entered his heart;
what if god wasn’t a person after all,
but an experience inside each of us?
a great feeling of joy gushed into his veins
as he tasted a glimpse of who he really was.
Psychedelics are also a tool that can be used along your healing journey to help you come home to your true self. They aren’t the one and only solution but they can help at the right time in the appropriate way.
Last year I received an extraordinary blessing when I went to visit with my friend and brother Parker who has now passed on. He was a great spiritual wizard and teacher. He guided me through a beautiful Huachuma ceremony. Huachuma is a Peruvian cactus plant from which tea is a brewed. It is used to expand the heart and connect more deeply to consciousness. That evening I journaled the following:
The Spirit resides in us all. Everywhere you look there it is. In the criminal, in the priest, in the child, in the adult, in the teacher and in the student.
It is in all places simultaneously and unconditionally.
It is quietly illuminating your eyes with sight. Quietly illuminating your tongue with taste and your nose with smell. Quietly illuminating your ears with hearing and your hands with touch.
The Spirit gently dances through us all but is left unnoticed because it does not shout. It has no desire to be at the forefront of anything because it is the foundation of everything.
To recognise that foundation within yourself and to acknowledge it in others is unity.
Us vs Them
“Men build too many walls and not enough bridges” - Joseph Fort Newton
The problem I feel we have in society is that we lack a sense of unity.
We see everything as separate from us. On the surface we all look different and believe different things about the world. As a result, we treat people unkindly and distance ourselves from things we do not understand and believe ourselves. In some cases we hate those who do not see the world the way we do.
We struggle to embrace the natural variety life has to offer and our skepticism about about the world brews based on external appearances and internal beliefs.
I don’t think we should all look and believe the same things, but I do feel that if we all realised that we are all part of this one intelligence we could begin to have conversations from a place of open curiosity and compassion.
So, what’s the answer?
“The highest education is that which does not merely give us information but makes our life in harmony with all existence” - Rabindranath Tagore
I don’t know the answer to all of the world’s problems, but maybe a good place to start is by each of us taking responsibility for our own healing.
Once we really begin healing we’ll recognise that we’re all different based on our conditioning, and that it does not have to define us and separate us.
All of the wisdom in the world will not solve our problems because wisdom alone cannot do anything. Wisdom must also be met with an open heart and conscious action.
The idea of love cannot change the world, but love in action can.
As you open yourself up to heal your wounds, your capacity for self-compassion will expand and as a result, your compassion for others will expand too. It will change the way you treat others.
This is how I feel we begin to build a society based on oneness, compassion, kindness and love - a culture of reconciliation and harmony.
Your soul is home to ancient wisdom, your heart has the capacity for expansive love, and your mind enables you to think freely. Connect to them and use them well.
1 thing I’m loving right now
I recently received a beautiful deck of tarot cards by Asha Frost called Sacred Medicine. Every once in a while there comes a product that truly blows me away. This is one of them. As soon as I lay my hands on these I could feel the sacred energy they carried. I've used a few different oracle/tarot decks in the past and these are by far my favourite. This includes 56 cards with a little book to help you understand the message of the card along with a unique meditation and affirmation.
One love,
V
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