Spirit Pages (continued)
J4) Spirit Web: Everything in existence is connected in that it is in “Spirit Plane” already.
No event happens outside of Spirit. There is only one Spirit and it is the only thing that is “happening.” This bija is the essence of pure Spirit consciousness. Spirit is a word that we use freely but it connotes different types of experience. Spirit is ultimately only one thing, the beginning and end of all experience and the place where everything is happening. It is not a dynamic of things interacting, but one single thing at one single moment in time.
Spirit only has one moment in time because that moment is made into all moments. Spirit has no context so it must create context inside of itself in order for experience to happen. Spirit creates many different identities, ourselves included, that explore this reality from different angles. Through the process of exploration, Spirit develops internally and has a process, a sort of timeline. However, that timeline is artificial in that Spirit is all that is and all that ever could be. Spirit in turn is encapsulated in God, which is beyond perception entirely. You could equally say that Spirit includes God, although when we refer to Spirit we usually refer to the aspect of it that is perceptual.
A way to wrap your mind around that is to understand that Spirit creates an essentially infinite environment to explore and unlimited possibilities for consciousness to evolve within it. So, each identity experiences growth and meaning. The basic metaphor for consciousness is the pursuit of desire within Spirit. Spirit asks the question in the form of an identity, and the answer is in the complete and endless process of that identity’s evolution.
A good model could possibly be a mathematical one. If the number one represents the set of all odd numbers, then that set would be infinite. Despite the infinite nature of that set, the number is just one. The infinite nature of “one” is ultimately captured by saying that “one” of anything can be infinite or finite, depending on what you are talking about. Spirit is the “one” that encompasses our infinite potential for experience. It is the set that contains all sets.
Spirit is a model for being closer to reality. The things we think and believe can and constantly do move us closer to and farther from reality. There are a million ways that we find ourselves lacking in what we want and need. As we move closer to Spirit reality, we can reduce those perceived flaws. This process of improvement doesn’t happen through sweat of the brow and self-beating to wipe out our sins. Rather, we adjust our beliefs to be closer to Spirit reality and the process occurs naturally. Making those new beliefs habitual does the rest.
The differences that we perceive ourselves as having from other people are real in one sense and not in another. Every moment of consciousness is made of Spirit; it doesn’t matter if that moment of consciousness is part of a “criminal” or “loser.” Spirit is in those moments and it is our own involvement in non-truth that prevents us from seeing Spirit in others.
That process does not come about by ignoring criminal or annoying behaviors, but by seeing through them and through the process that generates them to the “pristine” consciousness behind the operation that is every bit as much Spirit as the consciousness of a higher being. We have to make the journey of understanding to get through that wall of appearance to the motivations for generating the illusion of that particular identity.
As hard as it is to watch suffering and to witness violence, it is harder to watch ourselves “fail.” It is ironic to see others punish the loser, the person who cannot succeed at their game, when they themselves will ultimately fail at some level. The person who gets to define the nature of the game that gives us our kudos and denies them can in turn use the game to elevate themselves to a kind of demi-godhood and cast others out into the seas of oblivion. However, there is no fundamental game besides the one we choose to buy into.
We enslave ourselves in the endless chase for wealth, pleasure and status. Spirit is not just “in” everyone, but is also everything that is happening. The process of dynamic growth is constantly going on. So, ultimately the only game in town is evolution, not the pursuit of anything in culture. But we don’t have to be aware of that to be participating in it.
Spirit has a quality of intense intimacy. This in turn contrasts with the intense lack of intimacy in our society. People seek our arrangements as amicable coexistence rather than deep abiding intimacy. When we talk about love, there is a lot of confusion about what exactly that means. Is it what we feel or how we are treating our partner or what? Spirit is the model for both love and loving relationship by bringing the subject/object nature of relationship into a clear light. Only in Spirit is malice gone from the psyche and that is what allows love to be experienced.
Ultimately, Spirit never abandons anyone, does not judge anyone and never did. Our gods have become contaminated over time due to the tradition of not owning one’s Spirituality and inner self and giving away that power to “religious authorities” who are human beings with equally intense problems and lack of self-understanding as ourselves. The equation of religion with Spirituality hides the truth that religion often does things in the world that are in conflict with the ideas of both goodness and truth, and attempts to be anti-Spiritual as much as it attempts to uplift the faithful. It is a social power that gathers and power and wealth and attempts to dissolve the role of the individual seeker as much as possible.
Deities created in every society reflect some of the cultural biases and limitations in thinking that hold members of that culture into submission. The materialism and lack of Spirit truth reflected in most deities is reflected in how those who engage in their worship tend to become wrapped up in non-Spiritual practices in the guise of Spirituality.
Spirit is not a deity nor does it have a face. It is not a deity because it is not “out there,” a distant and remote figure to be worshiped. We are in it and of it, and there is nothing else. Spirit can be called upon and will respond as any idea would, because reality is generated in our mind and thought changes our external world. But that response is limited by the nature of the person and what they are capable of hearing in the moment. The pace of our own evolution is our ultimate limitation in learning, which is in turn dictated by the comfort level of our identity in changing its belief systems.
However, that being said, we can accomplish a great deal through continuous effort. Coming back to Spirit over and over again in your mind will build a relationship with Spirit and ultimately allow you to identify with it. Remember that Spirit is infinite in nature; it is not a final, ultimate end but an endless process of reinvention and self-improvement with the ultimate goal of fulfilling all our desires. Spirit is timeless and wordless, but contains all emotions and words and all forms.
Exercise: Experiencing Unlimited Connection to Spirit
In this exercise we will be exploring the experience of being “plugged in” to Spirit. This connection will be unbroken and continue in an infinite manner up through Spirit. This does not mean that our experience will be infinite, but that the connection will be of a certain quality.
Start by getting relaxed and comfortable; you will not need your pen and journal for this exercise. Think about Spirit and its nature based on what I have written in this chapter. Imagine Spirit as a golden circle in the sky. This symbol represents Spirit as the unchanging and underlying nature of reality. Draw a cord of golden light from the core of your being, near your navel, up through the air and into the symbol for Spirit.
Now, relax and focus on the connection. Allow emotions and feelings to surface. You may experience changes in your sense of time or identity. Think about some of the problems you are facing and bring them into the light of this connection and receive answers. Also, place any needs that you have into Spirit at this time. In time, (not during this session, probably), the need will be redefined, and at that point put it back in Spirit again.
When you are ready, sever the connection and thank Spirit. You will sense when Spirit has contributed all it can at this point, and it may sever the connection itself. Thank Spirit and write down any notes in your journal when finished.
J5) Consciousness moves from being “people and things” to the other end of the spectrum of pure Spirit consciousness; this ascension from materialistic understanding to true understanding of reality is the only real movement that occurs throughout existence.
All things are made out of consciousness, but the degree of reality placed in one’s environment is representative of the degree of materialism in a person’s state of consciousness. That is to say that what a person sees when they are “alive” is an environment that reflects some degree of materialism that is held in their consciousness. Physicality is the highest degree of materialism.
In order for a person to see a material world, their state of consciousness must contain the desire for everything to be completely concrete and for the bulk of their existence to be in an externalized form. This desire wants to overturn reality, where everything is symbolic and internal to one’s own mind, made entirely out of one’s own consciousness.
If an astral or some other “afterlife” state is seen, then it represents a desire to see some degree of “reality” in the external environment but not as much as the physical experience. Here, one’s own power of thought moves you about, controls where you go and what you experience to a greater degree.
In a physical dreaming world, the mind desires to see a world of some lesser degree of materialism where the emotional content from physical experience is given a voice through circumstances. In all of these cases, the mind is like a projector that shoots an image on a screen, but the person having this experience sees it as being real. In actuality, the experience is always just a metaphor for what the person is feeling and thinking.
Feelings that convey brutality, violence, oppression, severity, fear, anxiety, doubt, confusion, hopelessness, sin, guilt, rage and so forth combined with a feeling of total reality and inescapability will be expressed in the form of projected experiences that appear to be physical events. When feelings like the ones above are combined with a less literal set of feelings, an unpleasant afterlife experience is seen.
Movement through levels of thought constantly changes the tenor of one’s feelings. It is as if you pass through different zones, and each zone hands you a different palette of colors to paint with, emotionally. As you move to the Spirit end of the spectrum, which is the least literal end, the colors become increasingly positive. The movement towards the physical end of experience leads to duller and more oppressive colors in general. That isn’t to say that there isn’t beauty in the physical, but the oppressive nature of the physical experience dulls the enjoyment that one gets from the physical’s positive experiences, while the negative experiences are much more severe than they are in higher levels of experience.
However, if one is in the more physical end of the spectrum of experience, one may experience events happening “to” them rather than coming out of their own mind. If they experience a lifting of mood through movement towards the more abstract end of the spectrum, they may feel that this end of the spectrum is more positive while the physical is more negative.
In fact, the truth is a bit different. What they are seeing in both cases is unreal. Although they think of these experiences as literal, they are just metaphors for the contents of their own minds. The physical reflects an emotional absolutism, feelings with no way out and no room for interpretation. The higher realms reflect the nature of the mind as being mercurial and interpretive. In both cases the quality of the experience reflects the feelings of imprisonment or freedom. In other words, the person’s feelings script what they see and who they become.
A person might die and go to a heavenly state of being, but if they have not completely forgiven themselves and others, they must be reborn and suffer again and again as guilt draws them back into physical birth or other dark levels of experience over and over again. However this seeming movement from one plane to another or one state of being to another is illusory. It is all a projection of symbols representing the person’s feelings. The soul doesn’t transmigrate or “die” from one state into another, it only sees a shifting pattern of symbols that express what they are feeling.
When we have worked through all our feelings of guilt, we will only see Spirit. We don’t have to die to do this. It is only our feelings of guilt and anger that tie us to the physical experience. However, if we die before we can achieve this state, it is easier to go to Spirit in the after death state because of its permeable and mind-responsive nature. We simply focus on Spirit and in knowing what Spirit is, we can go there. Its reality is established in our mind but it can be experienced as being real. Once we are there, we will remain there as long as we like. Only if we have some unfulfilled desires that have a component of guilt or blame will we be drawn back into the physical or other lower states.
When we are born into the physical world, we are essentially innocent, at least in societal terms. However, the idea of Original Sin casts a shadow on that, making us guilty from birth. As we get older, we are expected to do certain things. If we don’t do them we are labeled as bad and are punished. We are expected to feel guilty for what we have done.
We are raised in a culture of guilt and blame. We are treated like slaves, pushed around like cattle, used, abused, lied to, cheated and generally mistreated by our own culture. Meanwhile, we are constantly being reminded of our debt to others. Even though our society is waterlogged with criminality, we are expected to be impeccable in our behavior, to hold down a job, raise a family and be grateful for everything. We are expected to sacrifice everything if our culture demands it, such as in the case of war.
The insanity of guilt is that it is undeserved. We have never hurt anyone, only seeing an illusion. We have the illusion of free will, which we do not possess. We also have the illusion of having other people exist outside of us and that we can harm them or take things from them. This is also not true.
Guilt and externalization of one’s feelings is one and the same. It is through guilt that we solidify our own materiality. Materialism represents feelings with a negative quality. There is no basis for negativity in reality as we are innocent forever and perfect. We are Spirit beings and not in any way, shape or form are we guilty or deserving of punishment. It is our desire to have an experience of being different from others that drives us to explore guilt and materiality. It is through suffering that we learn that we only wish to be equal to everyone else in guiltlessness.
Exercise: Compare and Contrast
In this exercise we will move from one end of the spectrum of experience to the other and experience the automatic shifts in our experience as we do so, for comparative purposes. We begin in the physical experience. There will then be five in-between zones, labeled A (most physical) to E (the least physical). Zone F will be Spirit.
Start by thinking about a particular issue in your life, like a relationship, a job or some other aspect of your life that you have feelings about. You are starting in the physical zone. Now, on a count of one to ten, shift from the physical zone to Zone A, the first of the five in-between zones.
What happened when you made that shift? You may have experiences a more dynamic energy around that issue, an awakening of your feelings and energy. It may feel like the problematic energy around the issue unclenches somewhat and the positive possibilities are brought to light.
Now, shift from Zone A to Zone B while still focusing on that one issue. Notice how this shift affected you. Did some of the heaviness and gloominess of the issue drop away? Did you see some things that you could do to reduce your internal tension and anxiety around this issue? Did you feel like you were reconnecting to what you really wanted out of that area, to your core purpose there?
Now shift from Zone B to Zone C. Now you may see a shift from a literal analysis of this area of your life to a metaphoric perception. You may see what this area of your life means, why you are seeing it and what it could be at an even higher level of potential.
Shifting from Zone C to Zone D, we see how what we are doing in this area perfectly dovetails with what everyone else is doing in this area. You can see how the metaphor is shared with everyone and that the metaphoric struggles are being worked through by everyone. We see how universal our contribution is, beyond a mere physical contribution, and how everyone benefits from what we do.
We also see that what we think we are doing “out in the world” is actually something we are doing within ourselves. We are building ourselves, constructing our selves, developing relationships with our selves, fighting with our selves, dedicating ourselves, sacrificing ourselves and writing ourselves as a story. We are teaching ourselves and managing ourselves. We are doing it all to our self, but for the benefit of everyone, for what we do, benefits everyone in a greater sense. The work we do never has to be done by anyone else again. The blanks we fill in are filled in forever.
As we shift to Zone E, we may see how our story that we are creating creates worlds of ideas and that all of these worlds, built out of our thoughts and feelings, are filling in the blanks of existence. When we write a story, we create a world. When we feed our child, we create a world out of that feeling, which is particular and unique and will never be exactly duplicated again. The world created from that feeling is the idea of that experience made into a world where the idea can interact with all other ideas. We are not just having experiences, we are building worlds every second.
Regardless of whether or not the worlds we build in this way are beautiful or hellish, ultimately the point is in the world itself; there is no need to sell each world on its innate value. Rather, each world is a lesson, a means to understanding, a dream fulfilled or an insight into a problem. In each case, each world stems from the thought of that moment of experience. This world of worlds is our realm of creation and it will belong to us forever, but will be shared with everyone forever.
When we shift to Spirit, we see that everything we do is valuable and meaningful, that we can liberate ourselves by seeing the Truth and recognizing it, living in it in our minds and sharing it in that way with others. The beauty of our creations is that they will exist forever but never reflect anything innately negative about us. We will not be judged for our negative actions or “failures.” In truth we will be seen truthfully and found to be completely innocent.
J6) If a series of connected ideas were viewed as forming a kind of circuit board, then depending on which idea in that circuit board you stand on, the rest of the circuit board will appear to be something different.
In the classical story of the Minotaur, the hero ran a cord behind him to the exit in order to find his way out of the labyrinth. The labyrinth of any story, including the story of our “physical” life, has a distinct beginning, middle and end. And to get through that story, we follow a “thread” that connects us back to Spirit. We extend our distance from God while extending the thread as we explore the maze and we gather the thread when we return to Spirit.
The nature of each story or maze is individual. There are different rules and different problems to deal with. Some are heavenly and others are hellish. Some are somewhere in the middle. No matter where we are in any particular maze, we must be aware that we are bound by its rules until we exit it.
However, we are also a part of a larger reality, which is God. This being the case, even though we are within and bound by the rules of a particular story, we can still become liberated and return to Spirit. And Spirit’s rules work for our benefit, protecting and helping us.
This being the case, we must see that we are ultimately looking toward being free of all mazes or stories except our life in Spirit. That is because compared to Spirit all stories in some way bind or “a-maze” us into a state short of perfect happiness, which is the natural state within Spirit.
The integral aspects of any story are involvement, fulfillment and release. We enter into a story, getting more and more entwined in it. Then we must achieve some sort of ultimate fulfillment that this story offers us. That can be a painful fulfillment in some cases. Finally, having received our fulfillment of this story, we tie up the loose ends of our attachment to it and leave it. It is that simple.
If the story involves conflict, then we must overcome something or face something. Having faced it, this was our fulfillment and we return by the manner in which we came. To just live through a great trauma or fail in some major way to achieve something is still a fulfillment experience in some cases.
When we seek to achieve final liberation from the physical experience, we are not exactly sure what we are pursuing. We know we want out, that much is clear. But what we want to get “into” is more vague.
Then, as our inner work progresses, we form an increasingly clear idea of what God is and Spirit are and are not. We come to understand they are both sentient and states of being as well as being a community of beings. God and Spirit are whole planes of existence.
We also come to understand that God does not cause our suffering. This allows us to forgive God and pursue Him wholeheartedly. As God only wants us to have everything that we want forever, it stands to reason that we would want to be closer to God. Spirit is where we fully enjoy that freedom.
Then, we struggle with how to achieve this state. Are we seeking unity with God or just to be in proximity with God? How do we do that and what does that mean? We try various approaches to being closer to God.
Ultimately, we find all approaches to God in some way or another unsatisfying. We suffer greatly as we come to believe that it is impossible to reach God. Throughout this process God intermittently reaches out to us and shows us higher and higher states of proximity to Him.
But, the catch is that each state is temporary and can only be supported by an act of will on our behalf. If God shows us state “XYZ” that brings us closer to him, we have to uphold that state through counting, visualization or some other artificial means. Eventually our ability to sustain that state fails. In this process of continual effort we blame ourselves, and then finally God.
We see God as having put us in an impossible situation. We are stuck in our state of mind and any attempt we make to come closer to God only lasts for a while and then fades. No real liberation is achieved. And yet, despite our great sense of loss and doubt, we know that God represents everything that we want, even if we can never really seem to have him. We get glimpses, but we are denied the keys to the kingdom.
In this final dark night of the soul we are faced with our worst fear, that we will never achieve God. Our individuality separate from God is miserable and burnt out. We want nothing the world has to offer and we can’t get back to God. We are stuck in a terrible place.
But then, at this lowest of low points, God reaches out to us as we reach out to God, one last time. Our desire to be an individual separate from God has been spent, which means that we are completely ready to receive liberation. God shows us that we are part of the idea of God. God is an idea that encompasses a multitude of beings and states of being. God is a whole world unto Himself.
We see that we have always been part of the idea of God. We see that we are still part of the idea of the physical world. We now have dual consciousness; one part of us now permanently existing in God while the other exists in the physical. We understand that when we leave this physical experience that we will be entirely in God and will be free of all pain.
Furthermore, we can partially enjoy the fruits of being in God even now. We can wish for and have what we desire by bringing that desire to God or Spirit. Because the individuality separate from God hates itself and wants to punish itself, but the identity in God only wants to make our life better, then it stands to reason that the positive influence of our God identity (in Spirit) will offset much of the pain of our individuality separate from God.
We can, in time, even work miracles, asking for things that seem beyond the boundaries of what we would ever consider asking for. We can make our dreams into reality as well as helping others in ways that far surpass our previous efforts.
Most importantly, this new state is a simple state of understanding. For this reason it remains with us and cannot be removed or challenged by anyone or anything. It is through the activity of this new state that many beings are brought much closer to final liberation as well. We become an agent of God on earth.
And we retain our sanity and humility. If we were depressed, angry or discouraged before this experience, it is lessened now. We are no longer afraid of people and things. Although some lightened elements of our previous neuroses remain, they do not disturb us as much as they did before.
And so, this is both the end of one journey and the beginning of another. We will never return to our old way of thinking. Although to others it will seem like only a mental change or a mood shift, we will see immediately how different our life looks and feels to us. Liberation is an unmitigated success.
So, no matter how much you struggle and fail to achieve God, remember that when the time is right and your desire to return to God is completely ripe your identity separate from God will crumble in painful despair, only to be replaced with deep and constant joy that will never fail you. And the best thing of all is that you will finally KNOW that you are there with no doubts whatsoever. If you are not there yet, keep working toward that goal. Every effort towards God will ultimately reap great rewards. And don’t be afraid of the painful journey that leads out of the physical maze. It is a sign of success, not defeat.
K) You can be the center of existence, and have everything be a part of you. This means that there is a single idea of everything and that one idea is therefore at the center of everything, in a sense. By identifying with this idea you can be at the center of everything and have everything be a part of you.
We can call this one idea Ohm. The vast majority of Ohm is what would be considered to be Spirit. It also contains elements that are beyond Spirit as well as the physical experience. The physical makes up only a tiny portion of the whole of Ohm.
Ohm is timeless, in the sense that it creates many internal timelines that it can explore, but it is not planted in any of them in terms of its own identity. It is free to explore all that is and ever has been, as well as what could be. But it has no timeline outside of itself, no environment or body or being other than what is conceived of inside of itself.
That which is in Ohm and is beyond Spirit is beyond any sense of time. That is to say that it is consciousness that is no longer engaged in events. Rather, it engages in direct contact with other consciousness through Love, which is the medium of expression at this level. This love is not personal but all-encompassing. It is also timeless, unconditional and has no words or emotional elements other than pure love itself.
This kind of existence would be considered to be beyond Spirit only in the sense that we think of Spirit as a place of exploration of identities and environments. But technically it falls within the scope of Spirit. And, in a sense, all of Ohm is within Spirit; we just have to expand our view of Spirit to the widest possible definition allowable to encompass it all.
Beings beyond environments and bodies engage in higher ideas that flow in the form of Love. That is to say that Love is not always the same but is a medium of the exploration of higher ideas. These ideas no longer deal with metaphoric expressions of our feelings that we treat as if they were our reality. So, there is no body, no environment and no circumstances other than the exchange of higher ideas.
It might clarify your view of this type of existence to think of all ideas that we have been referring to as higher ideas as being Love in the sense that they would feel to us like a vast love beyond anything we had ever experienced. It would cause our own sense of love to pale in comparison.
This is because we lose the very essence of our existence when we start engaging in our metaphoric existence and turn away from reality. We lose this essential love and create things to replace it. These poor substitutes only disappoint us in the end, creating suffering for us.
It is up to us to ultimately realize that we want this higher love without any environmental or external form. Then we can have it. It isn’t limited by our being in the physical, because we can tune out of the physical for periods of time and experience it.
For referential purposes, we can refer to this higher state as being called “Super-Spirit.”
Ohm contains all levels of reality. It is the one idea that ties it all together. What does it want? What is its reason for existence, its ultimate purpose? It only exists to enjoy the process of the fulfillment of desire that goes on constantly throughout existence. So, as this is its purpose and function, it does this and nothing else. And in observing this process with one mind, it constantly weaves a web of ideas, although in a sense that web has been cast all at once.
