Live Session Summary, Sunday, February 18, 2024: It was good to be with you for our Live session today. The talk was on the theme of ‘Waking Up Here and Now.’ We continued the discussion of two roads—or two ‘ways of seeing’—that lead to awakening : 1) the Buddha’s gradual path of training leading to freedom from suffering; and 2) the approach I term ‘already free,’ shared by contemporary teachers of awakening who point to freedom, peace, and joy as being our true nature—who we truly are, rather than somewhere we are not that we need to get to.
The specific teachers and books we have been discussing in this second way of seeing are:
• Adyashanti: The End of Your World
• Gangaji: The Diamond in Your Pocket
• Eckhart Tolle: The Power of Now
I shared how it can helpful to view these two approaches as ways of seeing that lead to the same end—freedom, awakening, enlightenment, the end of suffering. Ways of seeing provide a framework, attitude, or lens through which we can experience or gain understanding of something. For example, we might try to understand a difficult relationship through the lens or way of seeing of ‘who’s right and who’s wrong?’ or the lens of judgment; on the other hand, we could look at the relationship through the lens of compassion and what we see would be quite different.
I put forward the view, based on my own experience and understanding, that these two approaches can be mutually supportive and integrated into one’s practice. At times, it may be important to cultivate beneficial qualities over time—like loving-kindness, compassion, equanimity, and others; or let go of states such as clinging or aversion; at other times, remembering that freedom is always and already here can be a powerful spur to letting go and awakening.
I shared these quotes that stress that freedom, peace, and joy are our true nature—who and what we already are:
• Adyashanti: “The great definition of enlightenment is simply the natural state of being” (The End of Your World, p172); and, “From the very beginning, there was only nirvana, as the Buddha would say. But we were misperceiving things… We didn’t realize that that nirvana is right here, right now, exactly where we are.’ (pp.169-170)
• Gangaji: “The search is over when you realize that the true and lasting fulfilment you have been searching for is found to be nowhere other than right where you are” (The Diamond in Your Pocket, p9-10); and, “What you have been searching for desperately, furiously, relentlessly, and with great frustration has always been present exactly where you are! It is present now, in you, and it can be revealed to you now as your own self.” (p35)
Another central focus of these ‘Already Free’ teachings is the emphasis on the present moment and what is alive and happening right now as the only place and time that we can be experience freedom, peace, and true happiness. We experience disconnection, division, and suffering when we are unconscious and living in a dream state:
• Tolle: “Make the Now the primary focus of your life. Always say ‘yes’ to the present moment. What could be more futile, more insane, than to create inner resistance to something that already is? What could be more insane than to oppose life itself, which is now and always now? Surrender to what is. Say ‘yes’ to life—and see how life suddenly starts working for you rather than against you.” (The Power of Now, p28)
• Adyashanti: “We may think, ‘So-and-so shouldn’t have said that to me,’ but the reality is that they did. As soon as the mind says something shouldn’t have happened, we experience internal division. It is immediate. Why do we experience division? Because we are in an argument with reality.
This much is assured: if we argue with reality, for any reason, we will go into division. That is just the way it works. Reality is simply what is. As soon as we have anything in us that judges it, that condemns it, that says it shouldn’t be, we will feel division…
We think of this divided state as the natural way things are, but when we come into “the deeper realms of realization: we realize there isn’t a justified reason to argue with reality, because we’ll never win the fight. Arguing with reality is a sure way to suffer, a perfect prescription for suffering.” (143)
• Gangaji: “Opening to whatever is present can be a heartbreaking business. But let the heart break, for your breaking heart only reveals a core of love unbroken… Recognize that the capacity to open to the truth of your being is always here.” (The Diamond in Your Pocket, p26-27)
I highlighted some of the other key understandings from these teachings:
• The distinction between context and content: between the awareness or consciousness (the context) that knows all experiences—emotions, sensations, thoughts, sounds, tastes, etc., but is not caught up in them, for example, when we are aware of fear, the awareness is not fearful; and the content, which includes everything that can arise in awareness—sights, sounds, tastes, emotions, thoughts, etc. This way of seeing invites us to give our attention more and more to the awareness, the knowing, i.e., the context, rather than being entangled in the changing, impermanent content of experience.
• A focus on truth and honesty—and the recognition that we cannot experience true freedom while we are not opening fully to the truth of our experience, when we are in denial or by-passing what is true in a situation or relationship. In Adyashanti’s words: “If you avoid those aspects of your life that are not in harmony—those where you may still be in denial—that kind of avoidance is going to hinder your spiritual awakening… To be anything less than real, to be in avoidance of anything at all, diminishes our experience of who we are.” (p79)
• An emphasis on self-inquiry—asking ourselves questions that can free us from our stories and narratives and bring us back to direct experience of our true nature, such as, ‘Who is aware?’ ‘Who am I?’ ‘What am I?’ ‘Who or what is aware?
I shared the poem, ‘I will not die an unlived life,’ by Dawna Markova; and some lines from the Rumi’s ‘The Guest House.’
I hope this is helpful. Wishing you a week of presence and joy--and see you next Sunday, February 25 at 9am eastern. Warmly, Hugh 🙏🏻 💜 🌻
