Spirit Pages (continued)
H2) The nature of reality is a balance between perception leaving and perception arising, out of which is born the appearance of the manifestation of everything, which we will refer to as trans-manifestation.
Trans-manifestation is creation without any actual creation, creation only through perception. The balance comes about when your perception weaves a web that accommodates ego, identity, activity and a sense of past and future. The balance of in and out perception that is both memory and anticipation, but never a truly present moment, causes the illusion of real experience.
The single moment of the present is much more complex than it first appears to be. For us it is a mere flash, a moment so short that we can never hold onto it, much less quantify it. For all intents and purposes we only see the overall pattern of present moments flowing by. We don�t see the individual moments themselves distinctly.
The inflow and outflow of perception is a series of false memories. We are not aware of the experience of the real present. This is because the experiences you are having in a physical world as a physical self are impossible in reality, in Spirit. So, a sort of dummy-reality has to be rigged up. The mind sees a movie of false memories that weave a false identity and false surroundings.
To clarify, let�s look at our �present moments� through a kind of time-microscope. We see the moments of experience pass, one by one, so fast as to be the most perfect movie-like illusion possible. There are no gaps that can arise in this illusion because the nature of it is so tightly woven. However, we are weaving this illusion ourselves from Spirit level.
We weave the structure of our reality one moment at a time. We return to our identity as the weaver of experience with each other moment. But, on the alternating moments we have the experiences that we have created for ourselves. This kind of rising and diving happens in such a manner that we are not conscious that it is occurring.
But, we are not going to deal with this particular level of involvement right now, because the alternating moments take us in and out of physical experience. Here we are simply concerned with the fabric of the physical world experience we are having. To begin with we must see that down to the finest detail of our moment-to-moment, time takes the trump position by being the ultimate illusion that fathers the rest.
With time moving forward, just as it appears to with the moving images of a movie, we can fill that time with a false self and false experiences. It is the necessary first illusion.
Then, we can go into the illusion of the moment itself and see a different dynamic. Strangely, the moment is a memory. It is remembered in its entirety. Imagine if you will a vast, endless white glowing wall. On this wall in front of you is a circle containing many different colors and patterns. This is your whole experience in the moment, this particular moment out of many.
This moment of experience is seen as being alone because it is placed on a blank background. But no background is truly blank. White is not �nothing,� it simply creates a kind of uninteresting negative space to frame the colored circle in. It is not the absence of anything except colors. But white includes all colors, so it is not even that, but rather it is the lack of an absence of any colors.
So, with this in mind, we see that setting off a particular memory against a background that contains everything sets it off in our mind as a distinct �thing.� This arrangement is purposeful in that it allows the mind to settle on one thing. But that thing is not actually seen but remembered.
The mind does not just �see� the circle of information that makes up that whole moment of time, it also has to unravel it and see it in a totally different manner than it was presented to it. It has to re-remember it in light of the information that is withheld from it at the physical level. So, this distorted memory is what is actually seen when the �moment� is experienced.
This experience is a memory because it is simply a misremembering of what was seen in the previous moment. The absence of certain information forces that memory to take on a distorted form. It is not distorted through an act of effort, but simply as a function of the lack of information that is present.
Now we return to the image of the alternating self that creates our experience and the self that experiences it in the next moment, one alternating with the other. The full circle of information that was seen is the whole of what the self in Spirit is consciously creating for its own experience. The self that is experiencing it as a physical experience is simply, moment-to-moment, misremembering the previous moment of experience as a being in Truth when it saw the whole circle.
Now, with this distorted memory in mind, the experience is woven entirely from this fiction. So there is no actual �present� moment when it comes to physical experience. Instead, what we are left with is a series of highly distorted and incomplete memories of one single set of experience in Spirit. With this in mind, we can easily see that it is in our best interest to return to the place where we can have actual experiences, in Spirit, rather than trying to be satisfied with a series of twisted memories instead.
Rather than an exercise, try this simple experiment. Read a random paragraph from a book that you choose randomly from somewhere in your current home or wherever you are at. Make sure it is a thick paragraph and ideally choose a book oriented towards adults.
Now, close your eyes for a few seconds and then try to read back to yourself verbatim the contents of the paragraph you just read. You will find that unless you have photographic memory, you will probably misremember the wording of what you read. You might leave out some details, misremember names, or simply phrase things differently. But at any rate, the point is that you will see that a flawed memory leads to immediate distortion. This is how our world is generated. It is simply a series of distorted memories. So, what we are remembering are events that never happened. And thus you have experience without any actual �experience� at all. This is what the physical experience really is.
H3) Trembling: Just as the surface of a lake trembles with the wind blowing over it, creating a distorted, trembling reflection of yourself when you look into the water, so does the mind tremble and distort, and with higher degrees of distortion it creates more radical shifts of understanding from the truth. These departures from the truth are all reflections of the truth, so they are anchored in reality, no matter how far distorted they are. Only when the mind perceives itself and stops looking at the �self� or �environment� does it cease to vibrate in this manner.
The reason for this is clear. When mind tries to imagine something other than what is real, it has to distort in order to do this. Just as a flat mirror will faithfully reflect your appearances, positive or otherwise, so does the mind in Spirit always faithfully show you Spirit.
But, to see something other than Spirit the mind has to distort itself in order to accomplish this. What I mean by distort itself is that it has to imagine that it can to some degree be deceived in what it sees. To do this, it has to create an artificial state called �being,� which is somehow separate and different from the mind�s act of experiencing Spirit. This new middleman attempts to explain the experience as being a byproduct rather than the nature of the truth of Spirit and the mind itself, which it actually is.
If you owned a car, it would be yours to do with as you please. But if someone showed up at your door one day and managed to convince you that the car was theirs and it was stolen and that it ultimately ended up in your hands, you might be convinced to give it back to them. They would then, in this case, allow you to use it as long as you always tell everyone that the car is really theirs!
They generate the identity of themselves as the owner of the car. They �give� you use of the car at no cost except your sense of ownership. They allow you to keep the title to your car with the understanding that he can use the car when he wants. In the same way, being jumps in and convinces direct mind-experience that it is dependent on it for what it experiences. This new state, called �being� demands to constantly be recognized as the new true source of these experiences and the holder to the keys of Reality.
This con being achieved, the man then shows up at your door occasionally and demands to use the car for his own purposes. Since you think the car is his, you feel obliged to hand over the keys for him to use it whenever he feels like it. In the same way, the �being� usurps control by inserting itself artificially into the process. Being is kept locked up as some sort of mystery that no one can understand. This is especially convenient for �being,� who then is immune to examination in any real way.
However, a simple background check reveals this person to be the criminal that they are. They didn�t leave you the title of your car out of generosity, but because they lack the ability to �legally� take it from you. So the con gives him the use of your car without his needing the title at all. He circumvents it because he has to. In the same way, being circumvents the fact that it is useless in the equation of experience. Before it was ever conceived of, mind in Truth had direct experiences with no need of �being.�
But, when �being� succeeds in asserting itself, it presents itself as the alternative to �non-being,� a theoretical state where nothing exists. Although no one has seen or can validate such a state, it is argued to exist simply because �being� exists. If being exists, then �non-being� has to exist!
Now we see how both being and non-being are myths that are generated out of thin air. The key lies in our not examining closely enough the nature of being. Just as our own efforts to do a thorough background check on the car and this man would reveal him to be a thief, so would our careful examination of �being� shown it to be likewise a con artist extraordinaire.
Being allows the distortion of mind temporarily. Being is the extra unnecessary element that allows a Pandora�s box of illusions to enter our experience. A house built on quicksand can have no safe places within it and likewise there is no reality or safety in an experience built on the belief in �being� and �non-being.�
All that we have just described is just a self-imposed ignorance create by self in Truth to manifest an illusory experience. This was done to create the distortion needed to create this kind of experience.
But just as being creates a kind of self-consciousness where existing is somehow made into less than existing and a state of being that somehow prevents another state of being from occurring is needed like the child holding his finger in the leak in the dam, that is the source of all the false ideas we end up holding about ourselves.
Truth allows no distinctions, we simply are. We do not need being, simply because there is no alternative to being. It is impossible to disprove this but there is no basis for believing it either. No being on earth or in Heaven has ever experienced �non-being.� Darkness and peace are not non-being. It would be a non-experience anyways.
It is an unnecessary illogic. We simply are and there is no alternative to it. No being in Spirit ever ceases to exist. Spirit does not destroy, it only brings the untrue into the truth, integrating it with it and bringing it into its fulfillment within itself. It is a builder and a fulfiller, not a destroyer. It does not �uncreate� or forget experiences, it only reinterprets them in the light of Peace. So there is no need to fear or even experience this kind of loss.
Now, all that is left is the mind itself in Spirit, which has never been lost. As the false self meditates on the mind in Spirit, it creates an effect of decreasing the waves of distortion. And, bit-by-bit it undoes what has been created out of the lies of being, and the mind returns to the peace and certainty of Spirit to remain undisturbed again.
To focus on the self creates new ripples of distortion because the self that includes the concept of a being is a lie and so it must create distortion every time it is conceived of.
To focus on the �environment� is to take the form and shape of the distortions you see and to give them some sort of validity of their own. All this does is to mount more distortions on top of existing distortions.
The only way out of distortion is to remove the sense of being. Then one simply is in Spirit, in Truth and there is no counterpoint or alternative in reality that can challenge it. It simply IS.
Exercise: Lowering Distortions
Simply meditate for twenty-five to thirty minutes or longer on the mind in Spirit. Don�t worry about what this concept looks like or what qualities it has. Your inner understanding will guide you. You will find that the peace and lessened state of stress that follows will speak for itself. Take notes if you find any insights that come out of this meditation helpful.
H4) Implantation: One idea may express itself in many different ways simultaneously in many different identities/experiences. This idea suggests that there is no true uniqueness in existence, as all ideas, although technically unique in being themselves, are also extensions of larger ideas that connect them to seemingly unrelated experiences in other identities. By looking at these larger themes we can better perceive the interrelatedness of all issues and explore their common solution.
The spread of an idea through an identity is very much one particular phenomenon, but the study of an idea through all the identities that it touches is quite another. The �root� of this idea will be something that sheds light on all those identities to some degree.
Every flower that gives forth multiple blooms will do so in a way that insinuates both that each bloom is desirable in its own way and that each bloom is much like the others in terms of its appearance, fragrance, etc. That sameness and difference is part of identity itself, that seeks to both evoke its specialness through attractiveness as well as evoking a comfortable feeling in others by expressing easily noticed qualities that will cause others to have those feelings.
These two themes of individuality and sameness hide a common underlying theme that binds them together. That which benefits the growth of a plant is desirable. Growth includes reproduction through the spreading of pollen through the blossoms. Survival is evoked by both of these types of growth. The self survives by maximizing its advantage in all available arenas.
Now, the spread of an idea is likewise tied to the theme of its survival. Every idea is ultimately motivated by that which best promotes its survival. The idea will twist and form reality around it in order to give itself the greatest chance of success. As an idea weeds its way into an individual�s life, it will seek to inhabit and multiply within that self. So an idea is ultimately its own reason for being.
Drawing from this, we can reason that reality is constantly being passed off onto one idea or another, which places its own unique spin on reality, based on what it perceives to be the most advantageous perception to promote itself in that particular individual. All ideas ultimately bend reality to their own purposes. So, speaking in purely logical terms, accurate perception of reality and any idea cannot completely coexist.
When dealing with any attitude or feeling within ourselves, we must look at the roots first. Where is this idea rooted at the most universal level? To see the idea�s roots causes one to gain an understanding of what thought this idea is growing out of. This gives us context.
Secondly, we must see the reason for being of this idea, which is an expression of its desire to maximize its growth and survival. To feel this thought is to feel how this idea twists reality to its own purposes. This in turn helps us understand the inherent distortions in this idea.
Exercise: Understanding an Idea
In this exercise we begin by choosing one idea that seems to permeate our life. This idea should have an all-encompassing impact on how we feel about our life. Write this idea down exactly and as simply as possible. We will begin by perceiving this idea as a plant that has extended many branches into our identity. See a visual representation of this metaphor, superimposing the idea you identified earlier over the image of the plant. Seeing this, what do you perceive and feel? Write this down.
(I am trying to wear myself down mentally. I want to succumb to this feeling completely.)
Now, pull back your perception in order to see the plant as a whole, which extends through many other identities that make up your larger identity, as well as other peoples� identities. See the full vast scale of it. Write down any insights you receive after thinking about this image.
Next, see the root system of this whole plant. See that the ground that this root system is planted in is simply another idea. Mentally reach out and touch that idea and write down what it is.
(I must stop)
Finally, identity with the whole plant which represents that whole idea you chose. Include the entire root system as well. Now focus in on your reason for being. Feel that exclusively and write down what you think about that form of distortion of reality.
(I must interfere with happiness, clog the machinery of life with problems and wear down parts with excessive pressure. I must make the life process distasteful. This will ultimately lead to a complete shutdown of the life. I must make goals seem out of reach. I must numb the senses with dread. I must cause the self to act out of fear, withdrawing and inhibiting support. I must receive less than I give. I must demonstrate futility. I must always fall behind others at all costs. I must not be energized by my experience.)
Now that the whole reason for being of the idea is seen, you can see how it impacts your life in many unforeseen ways. What may seem like a simple observation on life reveals itself to be a very active participant in the life process itself. There are no spectator ideas in life, only participants. Knowing that this idea has such a profound impact on reality, you have to ask yourself if it is worth your while to continue to support this idea. Every time you think this idea, you are actually shaping your perception of reality in radical ways.
Finish this exercise by performing it with the opposite thought. For example, if you said, �I am worn down,� simply choose, �I am energized.� Go through the same steps and see how this idea impacts you.
Now, being able to compare these two experiences, you are now able to see the power of �seeding� positive and empowering ideas while also using positive ideas to cancel out the effects of negative ideas. This becomes a kind of gardening of one�s own life, by removing weeds and planting desirable seeds.
H5) Fortress: a boundary-line dividing two movements of one�s own consciousness in countering directions creates a dynamic of self vs. environment that seems like the real conflict. In actuality, there is no conflict, as the friction of the two movements of mind is intentionally created by our one self in reality. But, the intention is not to create hurt to one�s self or others, but to experience what consciousness is not, thereby learning about what it is through juxtaposition.
In Spirit, the mind sees its own creations without any opposition by any other consciousness or force. What is desired is had without the need to think about what is desired in advance. There is no middleman of a �world� that needs to be manipulated into giving us what we want. This is because we are fully aware that our world is made out of consciousness.
In this case, consciousness flows in one direction. A movement of consciousness against itself can still be created, but it is not inherent to Spirit. On the other hand, in the physical experience, it is the world that we see that seems to be the middleman, allowing or not allowing us to have what we want. In fact, however, the world we see is just a symbol of our belief in the ability of our mind to move in two conflicting directions at once. In other words, it represents the belief in a self split against itself.
This is impossible in reality. A self is one mind, and that one mind does not split. It only has one set of desires and one will. It cannot split against itself unless it engages in fantasy and imagines that such a split is possible. This is how our world is created.
The impossibility of a split self in reality is based in total consciousness. For consciousness that belongs to self to be in conflict with itself, there must be something that is not consciousness that stands between the two of them. Lack of consciousness defines the boundaries of an identity. If two such battling areas of consciousness have the area that defines their difference turned back into consciousness again, then one identity united would result.
It is impossible for an identity in reality - Spirit to not be completely conscious. So, with no non-conscious element of self being possible, no split into sub-identities is possible. Such a thing can only be imagined. And even then the imagined state is not equivalent to a real split in identity, because it is the united identity in reality that not only generates the fiction but that allows it to happen while it is happening. It sustains the illusion.
There always has to be a fundamental reality in place to support any illusion. A reality made out of or supported by fictions is impossible. We know that our experience is fictional through a process of logical deduction, and we must conclude that there is a reality to support that illusion. And, in the same way, we must be willing creating this fiction in order to imagine a world in conflict.
Any two beings, no matter how far gone they are into the illusion of hatred of each other, can be redrawn in such a way that they have one identity. And, if such a thing could occur, they would only have one set of desires.
Even when we seem to be in conflict internally about what we want, we have to acknowledge that we do not fully �want� something until all our doubts and reservations are overcome. We can be flooded with a desire, but if some part of us cannot engage in that desire for some reason, then we do not yet �want� what we think we want. To want is to accept and be able to actively take up with a particular desire in terms of bringing it into fulfillment.
If conflicting movements of consciousness create a self vs. world experience, and that in turn includes pain, then we are creating pain for ourselves. Why would we do that? We want to have the experience of what consciousness in reality is not. This serves as a counterpoint to our understanding of what consciousness is.
We can say that air is invisible and creates wind, but only by being stuck in an absence of air will we truly understand how important air is for breathing. As we gasp for breath, panicking, we understand something that can�t be taught simply by reading about the properties of air. Although in our model the absence of air is impossible, the illusion of it is possible to experience, which gives us a better understanding of what we do have.
Showing ourselves that conflict, pain, a self stuck in an environment and other such impossible conditions are ultimately undesirable is the ultimate point. In doing this we explore and ultimately find such alternatives to Truth to be unpalatable. The experience also sheds light on how desirable the Truth is and on how much we need it, as well as why there can be no viable alternative to it.
It is strange but ultimately true that we can reverse-engineer, reinvent from a purely conceptual level, the Truth that we have been talking about all along. Necessity truly is the mother of invention. A system of illusions must be supported by some sort of fundamental reality. That reality must have a nature in Truth. A physical reality is impossible because it depends on a fundamental level of solid material that cannot be made up of more than one observable quality. Such a subatomic particle is impossible because by nature, in order for a �thing� to be a physical entity, it must have multiple perceptible qualities in a three-dimensional universe.
In other words, a fundamental building-block subatomic particle would have to be irreducible to any smaller degree of particles, which would mean it could only possess one fundamental quality, which in turn would mean it would not exist in three dimensions. A reality made out of consciousness and nothing else is ultimately a necessity. Consciousness without a vehicle of consciousness can be manipulated by itself into various forms including a physical world, but a world of consciousness cannot be created out of matter, because a material reality is logically impossible.
Elements of untruth can haunt us even at higher levels of being beyond the physical illusion. Identities have to evolve out of certain patterns of belief and feeling based on residual untruth. The elasticity of identity allows us to stretch to embrace new experiences but then draws us back to our old identity through our unresolved desires, like a rubber band snapping. Ultimately the limits of our identities are tied to small areas of unresolved desire for conditions that do not exist in reality. By satisfying these desires in physical experiences we free ourselves from the perceptual limits of our own identities and allow ourselves to move forward to higher states of identity.
Exercise: Two Into One
In this exercise we will take two seemingly conflicting desires and examine them as if they were one united desire. Begin by having a pen and paper handy and get comfortable. Start by thinking about something you deeply want, but some element of your mind always remains uncomfortable with having this desire fulfilled.
Having identified these two conflicting desires, we will remove the barrier of unconsciousness that seems to divide them and we will make them into one united desire by doing so.
Visualize the two desires as being two spiraling currents of dark soup in a single bowl. The currents can be seen clearly and distinctly. Together these two spiraling currents take up the whole bowl of soup. The larger current represents the desire that you strongly hold, and the lesser spiral represents your doubts.
There is a semicircular piece of plastic in the bowl that keeps the two currents divided. This represents the unconscious area that allows the conflict to seem to exist. Imagine that you are making this unconscious area into consciousness. As you do so, see the plastic melt into liquid soup and disappear. The two spirals of soup then reconsolidate into one spiral the fills the whole bowl. Now these two desires are one.
Take a moment and rethink the situation of these two conflicting desires. How do you perceive them now? What insight do you have about what you really want in this area of your life? Write down your observations and insights.
You will experience some increased clarity about what you want. You might discover that rather than not fulfilling a desire, you just needed to clarify within yourself more specifically what you really wanted. Or, you might find that you really don�t want what you thought you did, but some alternative. There are many possibilities. I found this exercise to be very eye-opening for myself.
If you find that your desire now has some rather specific conditions on it that might be hard to make happen through your own efforts, don�t despair. Being clear about what you want is a real pre-condition to having it appear in your life. Bring your newly refined desire to Truth/God in your mind and you will have speeded up its manifestation process a great deal.
