This whole idea of spiritual awakening must be seen in the context
in the context ... if we are going to awaken what are we awakening from?
Right?
It is easy to say 'We are awakening from illusion,
we are awakening from the separate self,
we are awakening from separation to unity, to oneness, to all that.'
We say these things, these kind of things are easy spiritual teachings to throw out there,
they're easy things for people to listen to,
but the question is 'What does all that mean?'
What is it actually, what is it specifically, what is this dream state that one is awakening from?
I think this is a really vital question!
Otherwise someone is just endeavoring to awaken to reality,
but they have no idea what they're awakening from!
And if you have no idea what you are awakening from
then the tendency is that you are going to keep taking your dream state to be real.
And you're going to imagine that reality is going to look like
sort of like an improved dream state,
if that makes any sense.
So when we take the notion that we could be dreaming,
we could be actually dreaming right now
and we could be dreaming,
we could be taking our dream to be real!
We could be taking something other than this moment
to be more real than what is actually happening in this moment.
We could be taking our collected ideas, beliefs, and opinions,
we could be taking
our memories,
all these things that we have collected from the past.
We could be taking them to be more real,
to actually be the only reality.
We could be taking in this moment our fears or anticipations about the future to be more real
than this moment right now.
And when we do that
we actually become caught in this dream, this illusion of time.
This illusion of time, we become caught in
consciousness becomes caught, wrapped in this cloak of time.
And it is this cloak of time
that real spiritual inquiry has to address, has to look at!
You start to see that who you think you are,
who you imagine yourself to be
is something that is constructed in time, of the past.
Your whole notion of yourself is something that is being created in the present moment
out of the past, out of
experiences from the past, memories from the past, beliefs from the past,
things you inherited from your past,
good experiences, bad experiences, wonderful experiences, horrific experiences.
That one's whole notion of themselves is actually being created
by notions that you borrowed from the past.
And now you're imposing them on the present moment,
actually perceiving through this distorted filter.
That's why when we're dong this, when we're caught in the dream state
life feels very repetitious,
because it is repetitious, because
when we are caught in the dream state
we are basically doing is reliving the past over and over, every single day!
Or reliving past experiences, past regrets, past blames, past angers,
or reliving past judgements, reliving past ideas,
past regrets. We are actually living in the past!
An image we have of ourselves that is derived from the past.
This is what comprises the dream state.
So when we are in the dream state
we are in this repetitive loop, that seems very difficult to get out of, you know.
Even though the scenery changes from day to day.
One day it is cloudy, the next day it is raining
one day this happens, the next day that happens.
Even though on one level there are changes,
but internally when we are in the dream state it is extraordinarily repetitive.
It's why the Buddha called it the 'Wheel of Samsara'
because it has a quality of being a wheel,
of something that just is like a catch 22.
And the reason it feels like that is because
when we are living in time, in the past and in the future
we are living in the mind,
the mechanical nature of mind, the repetitive nature of mind.
There is nothing new, there is nothing fresh,
there is a disconnect with what actually is, because we are paying so much attention
to what the mind is creating, to time, to the past.
We are letting it distort our perception to such an extent
that we don't actually feel and experience what is really happening right here and right now.
Most people's experience of 'now' isn't actually 'now' at all.
Their experience of 'now' is actually the experience of the past!
The past imposing itself
superimposing itself on the perception of right now.
So spiritual awakening is literally awakening from time,
from the mind imposing the past unto the present moment,
for the mind constantly living in the future,
imposing the past and the future on the present moment
and then looking at the present moment through the cloak of time,
through the distortion of time.
And that gives a whole different experience or quality to the present.
It actually limits it into something extraordinarily narrow,
confined.
It makes you feel confined in a self that is defined by what was!
Isn't this how most people experience themselves?
Most people experience themselves as something that is defined by their whole history of their past,
from the time they can remember up to the present moment.
The experience of themselves is actually the experience of what was and not the experience of what is!
And in the same way people's experience of each other
your friend, your lover, your husband, your wife
most people experience each other in terms of the past,
in terms of who the person was yesterday, the day before that, and a year before that, and two years before that, and five years before that.
So it's not only something we do within ourselves to ourselves, we do it to each other.
We experience each other in terms of
the whole past memory we have of them.
So we don't actually see each other fresh and new
in each moment and each instant,
but each moment and each instant is being corrupted in a sense,
contaminated by this memory, this superimposition, this cloak of the past.
In fact the whole state of separation and ego is something that can only be created out of memory!
If there is no memory who are you without a memory?!
Who are you without all the ideas and believes about who you've been without ...
Who are you without referring in any way to anything that ever happened?
Who are you now?
Not who were you!
Not who
who you are in terms of everything that has ever happened,
but who you are right now, actually now.
You see.
Because now everything that was is being held in the mind, in the brain.
And of course that is a fine capacity to have.
I am not suggesting that you somehow erase all the memories you have,
or pretend like things didn't happen.
That is not what I am speaking about at all.
Our minds have this capacity for memory.
And they have a capacity for projecting into the future.
I am not suggesting that you try to lose your memory or wipe your memory out.
The difficulty isn't that you have memory,
the difficulty becomes when you perceive through memory!
Two very different phenomena!
One is simply to have certain memories in your mind,
to learn something is to have a certain memory.
But when we perceive through memory
when our perception is actually going through the distortions of memory
then it's distorting what we are perceiving right here and right now.
So is it possible for one not to perceive through memory?
Is it possible in this moment as we are together, everybody listening to this program, we are here together now
that is the reality, this instant is the reality.
This instant is the only reality that there is!
It's the only reality that you have!
And this instant is at (?) timeless.
Timeless does not mean 'it lasts a long time,' timeless means there is no time to it.
There is no past or future to it, it is just one Now.
And can you experience right now
without experiencing Now through the filter of the mind?
What is the experience of Now
without experiencing it through memory?
What is that?
What are you now?
What is the nature of what you are when you don't experience it through the past,
through any memory whatsoever?
If you are actually following me in experience, not just conceptually
but actually in experience,
if you are really following me
there will be a tremendous and totally natural silence that opens up!
When you're not perceiving through the past,
there is a tremendous amount of silence, a tremendous space that opens up.
Or that enters into awareness.
And for many people that are not familiar with this kind of space
they don't value it!
They actually value the past and the future,
they value their memories and their concepts, their ideas, and all of that which has been inherited
from the past. They value the past more than they value the present.
People take the past to be more real than what they are experiencing in this moment!
But if we really investigate
in a meditative way, which means in an experiential way
so we are actually looking, perceiving now
without any relation to the past, without it being defined by the past,
we are not perceiving through the past.
Can you perceive this moment simply as it actually is?