Meditation exercise on "separate me"

[Stranger]

I'm just curious, what is the purpose served by keeping the teachings secret now, if it provides knowledge of our enhanced Free Will after death? Is it envisioned that too many souls are not morally perfected enough to take hold of this Free Will, so it remains reserved for the select few?

In the same message I explained that there is continuity in the soul's evolution, so, notwithstanding the Free Will, it is not possible to "jump" into these advanced nondual states. It is not about "moral perfection", it is about karmic structures of the soul that need to be gradually restructured for the nondual state, which takes time and for most souls usually multiple incarnations. For the souls in the dualistic state, if they would read about these realities of the advanced stages of nondual realization, these realities would be inevitably misunderstood because these souls would have no experiential references to comprehend them, so that's the reason to keep them secret. We actually see that in the modern non-nondualist sects where the practices and teachings became grossly distorted and misunderstood with detrimental consequences for the followers, which Cleric rightly pointed many times, and that is exactly what the masters of the authentic traditions were trying to prevent.

[AshvinP]

I'm just curious, what is the purpose served by keeping the teachings secret now, if it provides knowledge of our enhanced Free Will after death? Is it envisioned that too many souls are not morally perfected enough to take hold of this Free Will, so it remains reserved for the select few?

In the same message I explained that there is continuity in the soul's evolution, so, notwithstanding the Free Will, it is not possible to "jump" into these advanced nondual states. It is not about "moral perfection", it is about karmic structures of the soul that need to be gradually restructured for the nondual state, which takes time and for most souls usually multiple incarnations. For the souls in the dualistic state, if they would read about these realities of the advanced stages of nondual realization, these realities would be inevitably misunderstood because these souls would have no experiential references to comprehend them, so that's the reason to keep them secret. We actually see that in the modern non-nondualist sects where the practices and teachings became grossly distorted and misunderstood with detrimental consequences for the followers, which Cleric rightly pointed many times, and that is exactly what the masters of the authentic traditions were trying to prevent.

Thanks for elucidating the reason for secrecy.

What are these Karmic structures - how did they come into place, why do they need to be restructured, and why is none of that considered "moral perfection"?

[Stranger]

Is a rain drop incompatible with the atmospheric forces which produces the rain? The trap to watch out for is really simple - as soon as we say two perspectives which obviously exist are "incompatible" or "mutually exclusive" or something similar, we have created a dualism and a hard problem.

Cmon, there exist two ideas "2+2=4" and "2+2=5", the first one is coherent with reality, the second one is not, and they are logically incompatible with each other in a sense that a person cannot hold them both true simultaneously, but where do you see dualism and hard problem here?

This is not the same. Notice I said perspectives, and not 'ideas' or 'thoughts' (and even ideas are not mutually exclusive, but relatively incomplete in relation to other ideas). This is exactly the problem. You are not trying to inhabit the living first-person perspective of 'intuitive sense of me', but only treat it as a thought-abstraction which is mutually exclusive to another thought-abstraction of 'divine self which has awakened from the dream of separate me'. I am not saying you have not experienced any nondual state in which the sense of 'separate me' is absent, but that your intellectual analysis is forced to snap back into this dualism because you have largely forsaken any interest in exploring the lawful structures via higher cognition. It is only through the latter that we can overcome the dualism of 'non-dualism'.

I'm answering it in this thread because it is more relevant to he "separate me" topic.
You are right, that example was using analogy of abstract thought just to keep it simple. But in fact, if you noticed, I always called the "me" as "sense-idea". In idealism all reality is "ideations of Thinking", including feelings, percepts, thoughts etc, in that sense they are all "ideas", the difference is that some ideas take form of "abstract thought", and other take forms of intuitive senses, percepts, feelings, willing gestures etc.

Anyway, you are right that the "sense of me" is not just an abstract idea, it is a "perspectival perception", "a perspectival lens" through which we interpret the world looking from first-person perspective. But that does not make it any more coherent with the actual state of Reality/World.

Let's take another example - materialistic perspective. I grew up in a completely materialistic culture (USSR) where any religion was banned, so, from very early childhood I was culturally conditioned and absorbed the materialistic perspective on reality. I never took it as an abstract philosophical idea, but as an actual way the reality is. It became unconscious intuitive sense of "materiality of things". It was like a perceptual "veil" or "filter" through which perspective I was perceiving the world from my first-person perspective. If anyone would tell me that this is not how the reality actually is, I would think of such idea as outrageous. Nevertheless, this intuitive-perspective-perception-sense of the world as "materiality" is still incoherent with how the World actually is.

Likewise, the intuitive-perspective-perception-sense of my own subjectivity-self as separate from other personal subjectivities is indeed not just an abstract idea, it is a perceptual "veil" or "filter" through which perspective we are perceiving the world from the first-person perspective, but it is still a perspective incoherent with how the World actually is.

These perspectives are not isolated math equations. They do not conform to Aristotelian logic, where either X or not X is true (law of excluded middle), but are the living source of that logic and all other forms of logic which are employed for our Earthly becoming. They manifest these cognitive tools for our inner perfection through their polar rhythmic interaction. The higher Self casts its inner being out as outer physiognomy so that it can be experienced objectively as a means of developing moral virtues in relative freedom, which then feeds back to the Self in its continued morally creative evolution. We call the lawfulness of the outer physiognomy, "logic". By becoming conscious of the detailed spiritual structure through which this rhythmic incarnational process unfolds, we gradually spiral the lower perspective into the higher one, bringing them into closer unity i.e. continuity of consciousness.

Yes, you can look at it as polar dynamics of evolutionary forces, that is a valid perspective. I already said somewhere that the perspective-force of "separate subjectivity" was in fact a progressive evolutionary force during a previous epoch of humanity/humanoids evolution. It is true that this perspectival "force" was a result of lawful evolutionary processes/forces directing the evolution of humanity. But in the current epoch it became de-evolutionary. So, currently, it is both de-evolutionary not bearing any progressive impulse anymore, and also incoherent with the state of Reality as it actually is.

It was in fact the incarnation of Christ that was the demarcation time between these two epochs. You often refer to the mission of Christ as an evolutionary impulse for the next epoch in the metamorphic development of humanity, but totally ignore when I point to the actual message and teaching of Christ that consisted in pulling humans from their perspective of "separate subjective self" and directing them towards the perspective of Oneness, which is One subjectivity-Self in the entire Universe of Consciousness. So, from the moment of the Nativity of Christ the perspective-sense of "separate self" can be considered de-evolutionary.

"I and the Father are one" (John 10:30)
I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity (John 17)
"I pray that they will all be one, just as you and I are one—as you are in me, Father, and I am in you. And may they be in us." John 17:21
"Jesus said, "I am the light that is over all things. I am all: from me all came forth, and to me all attained. Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up the stone, and you will find me there." The Gospel of Thomas
“I am crucified with Christ, but I live; yet not I anymore, but Christ lives in me" Galatians 2:20

[Stranger]

Thanks for elucidating the reason for secrecy.

What are these Karmic structures - how did they come into place, why do they need to be restructured, and why is none of that considered "moral perfection"?

I already answered in the above reply:

The perspective-force of "separate subjectivity" was in fact a progressive evolutionary force during a previous epoch of humanity/humanoids evolution. It is true that this perspectival "force" was a result of lawful evolutionary processes/forces directing the evolution of humanity. But in the current epoch it became de-evolutionary. So, currently, it is both de-evolutionary not bearing any progressive impulse anymore, and also incoherent with the state of Reality as it actually is.

So, this perspective guided by lawful evolutionary force formed specific karmic structure of human composition over many millennia of humanoid/human development. This karmic structure remains buried deeply in both individual and collective unconscious of humanity. The problem is that, as I said, it became de-evolutionary and needs to be transcended/transformed into a different structure free of the sense-perspective of "separate me".

In that sense, it is very difficult for an individual soul to transcend this force-perspective because it is so strongly conditioned by karmic structures in the human collective unconscious as well as cultural conditioning from early childhood. It becomes "contagious" like collective insanity. From the practical perspective, for a soul that switched to the nondual path, it is more efficient to take a "quarantine" from human form and incarnate into the realms or races that do not have the force of "separate me" in its collective karmic structures. And then, when the soul's karmic structure is completely clean from that "separate me" perspectival sense, it may return back to human form (as a bodhisattva mission) to help humans in their further evolution while being already clean and immune to the "separate me" perspective.

[mikekatz]

Again as a matter of technique, the only way I can really move into this feeling is to start from a position where I am relatively separated from myself. If I think that this is my feeling, it’s literally too terrifying. If there’s just the perception of the feeling as a sensation, equivalent to feeling my position on the chair, for example, then I can approach it. But there’s still the choice that has to be made to dive into it and experience it.

You are right, Mike, this dis-identification between the feeling and the sense of "me" is the key, it breaks the vicious cycle of the causal link between the feeling (of irritation in this example) and the "me who gets irritated". When this link is intact, these two phenomena reinforce each other in a positive feedback loop ("she offended me" -> "feeling of being offended" -> "who is offended? - me!" - more feeling of being offended and so on). Once this link is broken, then we only experience just a phenomenon of feeling (which is almost a physical sensation of emotional energy) and a phenomenon of sense-idea of "me" without identification with any of those, so that their feedback loop is broken. And in this loop it is usually not only "me" but a bunch of other thoughts of the "story" intermingled with the feeling in a whole "blob", so it is important to disentangle this blob and simply experience the feeling and thoughts around it as a flow of phenomena in consciousness without any identification with them and with full awareness of them, and then they will naturally lose their energy and subside.

I also find it helpful to never reject or push away any feelings, no matter how unpleasant they are, but fully feel and embrace them without identification and with full awareness (like "here is a feeling"). In this approach the feeling will come but then naturally dissipate without the self-sustaining feedback loop when it connects with the sense of "me". But if I push away or reject any unpleasant feelings, they will just become repressed into subconscious but their energy will remain undissipated, so they will continue evolving and coming back. Embracing them without enacting or identification is the only way to let them go and dissipate their energy.

Also, maintaining the open Cosmic perspective of interconnectedness and oneness with the Divine Cosmos shifts the perspective of being too focused on what happens to "me" and "my feelings". In this state of openness and prayer to the Divine Cosmos all these egoic feelings revolving around "me" become nonimportant anymore.

Thanks Eugene, my experiences tally with this.

As to always allowing the feeling in, well, there are times when I know up-front I won’t be able to deal with them, so I don’t even try. Other times, I only realize it as they come up. And I understand that it makes it harder next time. It’s like the mailman who gets bitten by a dog once, and then, every time he comes to the same street, he’s scared.

I relate this to not being as established in the non-dual as I could. It’s strange that I can and do, like the disciples denying Christ, sometimes throw away what is most precious for the sake of preserving the non-existent ego.

[mikekatz]

Mike, could you be more detailed how you go about it when you start with feelings? Could you give an example?

My wife likes to tell me everything in lots of detail - lots. And I always used to get impatient, sometimes internally, sometimes externally. I used this exercise, and still use it, to get to the bottom of this.

If I start from thinking, I conjure up all the excuses in the book. She doesn’t have to go into such detail, she just interrupted what I was doing, etc. So I go to the feeling of impatience, or I try to. Sometimes, the mind actively tries to prevent this. I’ll suddenly remember something important I have to do. I might get a pain or itch, etc. There’s a non-action of letting go that’s sometimes needed to get to the feeling.

If there’s success, I connect to the feeling. I experience the feeling of impatience, and it’s uncomfortable. There is fear of connecting deeper to the feeling of impatience, and sometimes I have to back off.

But I go deeper into it, and it’s almost overwhelming. It’s not impatience anymore, that was just a smokescreen. There’s something much deeper, some kind of primordial fear. It has layers, and I am still penetrating the layers even today to get to the bottom of it. It’s like the whorls and jagged lines in my being that Cleric describes.

I have learnt a lot about this feeling, and I continue to work on it. I see how it extends to much of my behaviour, not just with my wife. And it’s changed things for me. I am now different in the same circumstances. I am more connected with her, and with others. But there’s much more to learn.

And the thing is, is that the impatience as such is now gone. It’s over for me. There’s no more mind tricks when I’m in a conversation. The ego knows the game is over with regards that particular feeling. And I know that when I get to the deeper pain that generated the impatience, and fully experience that, it will also go. But right now, that’s even more terrifying.

Again as a matter of technique, the only way I can really move into this feeling is to start from a position where I am relatively separated from myself. If I think that this is my feeling, it’s literally too terrifying. If there’s just the perception of the feeling as a sensation, equivalent to feeling my position on the chair, for example, then I can approach it. But there’s still the choice that has to be made to dive into it and experience it.


I read all the discussion that goes on here between Ashvin, Cleric, and Eugene (in alphabetic order lol). It’s interesting, and attractive, and it piques my interest, but it doesn’t serve a spiritual purpose for me. My intellect, my thinking, has got me to its limit. It’s showed me that there is a non-dual state, and I now experience that. It’s showed me that I have to work on myself, and I do that. It can’t take me further, it can only distract me. And that is where I am spiritually. Of course, if you are somewhere else, and these discussions are vital for you, that’s great! We are all where we are, and we should all respect that.

Like Eugene, and probably even less than him, I lose the non-dual state far too much. You just have to experience it once to know that this is our birthright that we have lost, and that we can get it back. I use meditation and prayer to “achieve” and strengthen the non-dual state.
The detailed work on myself, smoothing out the soul as Cleric puts it, or purifying it as is commonly stated - this detailed and difficult work has to be done. For me personally, without the anchor of the non-dual state, I would never be able to truly approach it.

Frederica, I hope you connect to this in some way. I invite you to try the same thing, and see what happens. Drop the thinking, drop trying to fit anything into a theory, just try simple, direct experiencing of a negative feeling, and see what happens. And no need to publicly report the details.

Mike,
Thank you so much for your openness! It's really appreciated. I know you have the best intentions.
Because I have been following Rupert Spira for a short time, before encountering this forum, I understand the experience you describe, and the work with feelings you are doing. I know it can generate a sense of appeasement and a sense of having distanced oneself from the turbulence of unpleasant feelings.

What I know today, that I didn't know back then, is that the price to pay for that relative sense of pacification - relative, in the sense that it is both incomplete and unanchored - is enormous. We cut the link to our feelings. Of course we are not going to suffer as much from them. Instead of inquiring it, we dismiss our responsibility for the turn we have taken along our feeling. Of course we are not going to feel its weight as much. We lock up the uneducated and uncared for child in the furthest room. Of course we are not going to be disturbed by the screams and cries for a while. But that child is us. We have to face the discomfort an the fear, with the appropriate tools, and take responsibility, and care for it. There is no way around it. Or rather, there is, but it's a mourning place. It's a dead end.

Hi Federica

“Distancing from unpleasant feelings”? “Pacification”? This is just the opposite!
The way to “not feel its weight too much” is exactly to stay with the mild irritation (in this case). That is exactly what keeps the child locked up, because one is not prepared to ACTUALLY look inside and FEEL what the child feels.

I have a deeper feeling now of where this path is leading me, and I believe you are on a different trajectory. And that’s fine. We each have to follow our own path, and they will eventually merge.

[AshvinP]

Thanks for elucidating the reason for secrecy.

What are these Karmic structures - how did they come into place, why do they need to be restructured, and why is none of that considered "moral perfection"?

I already answered in the above reply:

The perspective-force of "separate subjectivity" was in fact a progressive evolutionary force during a previous epoch of humanity/humanoids evolution. It is true that this perspectival "force" was a result of lawful evolutionary processes/forces directing the evolution of humanity. But in the current epoch it became de-evolutionary. So, currently, it is both de-evolutionary not bearing any progressive impulse anymore, and also incoherent with the state of Reality as it actually is.

So, this perspective guided by lawful evolutionary force formed specific karmic structure of human composition over many millennia of humanoid/human development. This karmic structure remains buried deeply in both individual and collective unconscious of humanity. The problem is that, as I said, it became de-evolutionary and needs to be transcended/transformed into a different structure free of the sense-perspective of "separate me".

In that sense, it is very difficult for an individual soul to transcend this force-perspective because it is so strongly conditioned by karmic structures in the human collective unconscious as well as cultural conditioning from early childhood. It becomes "contagious" like collective insanity. From the practical perspective, for a soul that switched to the nondual path, it is more efficient to take a "quarantine" from human form and incarnate into the realms or races that do not have the force of "separate me" in its collective karmic structures. And then, when the soul's karmic structure is completely clean from that "separate me" perspectival sense, it may return back to human form (as a bodhisattva mission) to help humans in their further evolution while being already clean and immune to the "separate me" perspective.

OK, but do you see any role for our fragmenting desires, feelings, thoughts (turned towards the sensuous and personal egoic interests), at both the individual and collective scales (species, races, nations, families, etc.), over the course of many incarnational cycles, in the elaborating of these Karmic structures which condition our current soul-perspective? And if so, what is our responsibility in redeeming them? Do we simply have a nondual realization during our current incarnation and the negative Cosmic effects of this entire Karmic complex is wiped out, so we are completely free of its conditioning? This should intersect with your most recent discussion with Cleric on this thread as well. The "separate me" perspective cannot be understood, let alone redeemed, through 'quarantine' or otherwise, apart from this Karmic complex which has entangled it within personalized interests. Why should our collective-individual Karma be wiped out simply by making a one-time decision to incarnate in another realm or race?

[Cleric K]

In that sense, it is very difficult for an individual soul to transcend this force-perspective because it is so strongly conditioned by karmic structures in the human collective unconscious as well as cultural conditioning from early childhood. It becomes "contagious" like collective insanity. From the practical perspective, for a soul that switched to the nondual path, it is more efficient to take a "quarantine" from human form and incarnate into the realms or races that do not have the force of "separate me" in its collective karmic structures. And then, when the soul's karmic structure is completely clean from that "separate me" perspectival sense, it may return back to human form (as a bodhisattva mission) to help humans in their further evolution while being already clean and immune to the "separate me" perspective.

One additional question before we can make the conclusion.

In the nondual state there's no longer me and other. There's oneness, even though still experienced through an unique perspective. That's OK. But how it follows from this that the activity we think, feel, will from that state, is absolutely original creation of the One Self (with which we're now fully one)? The two things (the absence of distinction between me and spiritual phenomena (1), and being a direct perspective of the First Cause (2) ) are quite independent. There's logical disconnect here and we have established this already. For example, in a form of pathological depersonalization the distinction between me and environment can be completely smeared out, yet does this mean that now everything that happens within this perspective is the original and unquestionable expression of the One Self? Obviously not and you have also stated that this is one of the dangers of depersonalization. It may be that we're simply free falling through quite structured potential, even though in a very nondual state (no distinction between me and environment).

But then the question is at what point we decide that whatever happens with our perspective is no longer explainable in any other way but only through being pure and free expression of the Divine Self that we are? Taking the example with reincarnation again (I'm using this only because we're already familiar with it, not that I want to return on that question), how can you be sure that your decision not to reincarnate is the decision of the Divine Self that you are and not shaped by certain potential wells of which you are unconscious in your present state of depersonalization?

[Stranger]

OK, but do you see any role for our fragmenting desires, feelings, thoughts (turned towards the sensuous and personal egoic interests), at both the individual and collective scales (species, races, nations, families, etc.), over the course of many incarnational cycles, in the elaborating of these Karmic structures which condition our current soul-perspective? And if so, what is our responsibility in redeeming them? Do we simply have a nondual realization during our current incarnation and the negative Cosmic effects of this entire Karmic complex is wiped out, so we are completely free of its conditioning? This should intersect with your most recent discussion with Cleric on this thread as well. The "separate me" perspective cannot be understood, let alone redeemed, through 'quarantine' or otherwise, apart from this Karmic complex which has entangled it within personalized interests. Why should our collective-individual Karma be wiped out simply by making a one-time decision to incarnate in another realm or race?

Our responsibility in redeeming these karmic structures is in making all efforts to redeem them first of all within our personal steam of spiritual activity. I have very little capability to redeem your or anyone else's karmic de-evolutionary structures, the only way I can do it is through writing on these forums and convincing people to take their responsibility to do the same. This work can only be done on the level of the individuated spiritual activity from the first-person perspective. It is similar to healing from a decease, and whatever means are efficient for healing then they should be used, including quarantine if needed. The Karma will not be "wiped-out" by one-time incarnation in another race, it will be gradually redeemed and transcended over however many lives it needs to take, but the healing process will be much more efficient when a soul is quarantined from the contagiousness of the collective decease of humanity. I'm not saying that it is a necessary route, but only a possible one. It can be compared to going to another country to get a good education unavailable in your native underdeveloped country so that you can then return back and help your country to develop further in a better way than you could if you would not get that education. But whatever reincarnational route is taken, you are right that the mechanisms of the "separate me" perspective needs to be well understood in order to be redeemed and healed. And, for example, the meditative exercise in the root of this thread is designed exactly for that.

[Federica]

how can you be sure that your decision not to reincarnate is the decision of the Divine Self that you are and not shaped by certain potential wells of which you are unconscious in your present state of depersonalization?

Unless I am misinterpreting what you are asking here, Cleric, I already asked this question (just not about reincarnation specifically) twice. Eugene ignored it twice. Let's see, it would be nice to get an answer