The Awakening Guide: A Companion for the Inward Journey (Companions for the Inward Journey Book 2)

by Bonnie Greenwell

  The true experience of liberation cannot be confined to words, nor adequately described, because it is a place of rest that is more vast than thought, and language is limited to its own relative world of expression. All that a teacher can do is offer pointers through words, or by silence, a transmission of what they are that may be felt by the part of you that is also that. It is called Self-realization because you are realizing what is already there, not acquiring something new. Awakened people have seen the Truth of existence. Liberated people are able to live from the Truth they have known.

  There are some common characteristics that we might expect to see in a liberated person, although their expression may vary greatly according to the tendencies of their unique bodies and minds. Some lives are naturally more introverted or extroverted, express more through language or quiet service, and are drawn to lives with partners or to celibacy. Even though the identity is no longer attached to these patterns, the unfolding of a life may continue to have the flavor of simple preferences or cultural conditioning. The internal world of those who are liberated is most often described using terms such as stillness, acceptance, non-attachment, compassion, presence, the ability to respond spontaneously, wisdom, love and freedom from division and fear. The drive to search for Truth no longer arises. In some cases a new creativity emerges.

  The chatterbox mind most humans endure has fallen away, along with conflict caused by unmet desires. There is a loss of “self”-consciousness, and so no need to make demands that others should conform to. As these things fall away a great stillness opens, and awareness is experienced with no personal demands.

  When a deep awakening occurs there can be a period of falling into stillness, followed by a period of confusion, because old ways of thinking about yourself and your life are shattered. It can feel like your mind won’t work for a while. One needs to learn to function from a softer more direct impulse than thought, to live in this moment, rather than in the past and future projections of mind. The ability to use the working or “toolbox” mind returns gradually, but without the judgments, comparisons and demands of the conditioned mind. In time, thinking re-emerges with the wisdom of realization, and clear expression arises directly from the stillness. Some speak of a quiet small inner voice as a guide.

  Many awakened people have spoken of an underlying happiness within, always present regardless of external events. True nature is happy, at peace with itself, having no objections to life at all. It is a wondrous discovery to find that no matter how ill you are, how stressful the circumstances are, there is an internal stillpoint that is happy, content and not engaged in the argument. It is as if we are wired for happiness but so much rust and corrosion has attached itself to our wiring over the years that we cannot feel it. We need to be cleared of our conditioning and our beliefs before the energy can flow freely.

  Liberation produces the ability to meet what arises, respond authentically, and let it go if it passes away. It is response without attachment. It is response without opinion or drama. Instead of struggling against the darkness and shadows inherent in the human condition, a liberated mind understands that opposites are part of the flow of thought, and the liberated heart responds to suffering with compassion and insight.

  Compassion in a liberated person is not the same as charitable compassion, sentimental compassion, or having a broken heart for someone else. It is compassion at seeing the misunderstanding our species carries about its own roots and origins. When a bird flies into your house, and dashes its head against a window trying to get out, you feel compassion for its ignorance. You know it doesn’t know better, and it is harming itself by following its instincts. Humans suffer the same way, on a much more grand scale, because we have many ideas that cause us suffering. Our entire belief system is like a house with exits we can’t escape because we don’t know how they operate. Because of this we judge and fear our self and others, limit our life options, struggle with many issues, and identify with thoughts that block peace and happiness. The mind thrives on conflict and all human life endures it.

  True compassion wants to lean forward and offer a hand up and out of this confusion, and into the stillness and wisdom that makes it possible to live free of suffering even within the chaos of human experience. Sometimes compassion falls like a sword shredding our illusions, and making us see what we did not want to see. Sometimes it is just tenderness holding the space for the pain to be burned through and released. Sometimes it is service to someone whose basic physical needs are obvious, and in the knowledge one is serving the Self. Compassion meets what is -- beyond getting caught up in the story, beyond pity, beyond expectation of gratitude or glory for the service done. It is faith in the survival of the spirit and its ability to continue unfolding. It is knowing that underneath it all there is no problem: no problem with dying, with living,

  A person cannot be liberated and be attached at the same time. They can love, they can enjoy what they enjoy and have preferences for ice cream over pickles, or country over city living, but they will not make themselves unhappy if their preferences are not met. They find a preference or pleasure simply is what it is, with no compulsion about it. There is a paradox in that liberated people can find that if a desire flashes by it is likely to manifest, and thus they try to avoid the pitfall of fleeting desire, knowing the nuisance of too much manifestation!

  In an ordinary life it is desire, and thoughts about what we want, that fuel our drives, and lead us from experience to experience. Non-attachment arises naturally when we see clearly that exterior goals will never lead us to contentment for very long, and notice how relaxation comes in those brief interludes between goals when for a few brief moments nothing is wanted. It is seen that peace actually lies in the not-wanting, in the freedom we can feel when all the goal-setting and driving desires are obliterated. Something deep within is already satisfied, satiated, happy just to be! This has been called living in the moment, or being here now.

  Many spiritual seekers struggle to become non-attached through self-denial, adding a lot of self-denigration to the mix when they discover those things they are still holding onto. This is becoming attached to non-attachment. Liberated people are not attached because there is no one there to care, no “me” who thinks it matters an iota if they get what they want.

  Resonation

  I recognized my teacher, Adyashanti, because everything he had to say resonated in my gut, deep in the belly of being, and I found I was not listening with mind, which makes judgments and comparisons, but with my heart and my cells in a rare kind of openness and response. In this condition I could receive the Truth, not just from him, but from my own awareness, which began to realize itself and clear out the debris of misconceptions about spirituality. I’m going to call this resonance.

  When the One in you is ready it will hear the Truth and know it to be so. Even if the mind feigns confusion, or argues on a point of theology, some other part of you is going “Yes! I’ve been waiting all my life for someone to say this.” People laugh or cry spontaneously in the presence of a true teacher; in a few people energy or ecstasy arises, and in others there is just the stunned stillness of Self-recognition.

  Charismatic people can stimulate the mind or emotions into unconsciousness, even into the frenzy of a collective and destructive belief. A liberated person does not do this. Their simplicity and clarity can be disarming. They are not out to manipulate you, control you, or form you into a mindless group of followers. Their message is that you will find the Truth in you, not in them, and it is clear that they are pointing to a realization that is beyond any words they can use.

  Some liberated teachers follow a tradition, such as Dzogchen or Zen Buddhism, Advaita Vedanta, or Kabbala, Sufism or mystical Christianity. If you are going to reach the truth through a tradition that tradition and teacher needs to resonate with you, resonate in a way that you are sensing the essence behind the dogma. Otherwise you may have a life of good practice and be comfortable in a specific belief
system, but you will not break through the boundaries of thought and emotion into the stillness of Truth. If your teacher has broken through, he or she will acknowledge the universality of Truth to be found along many paths. As a Sufi mystic once described it at a conference, “There is only one spot on top of the mountain, but it can be reached by climbing many paths.” This is true of paths that point out the inward journey.

  Resonance is a lot like love. You know you have found what you were seeking, and you are humbled by the opportunity in this lifetime to see the Truth flowing from the eyes and heart of another being. Resonance stimulates your spiritual appetite, while at the same time reducing it to a simple inward turning and asking just to know what is so. There is resonance at times with those who offer spiritual adventures and bliss states, but ultimately one never feels complete by just moving in and out of experiences. The journey ends when a person finds the one simple Truth that lies behind all experiences, no matter how high and low, wide or deep, ecstatic or ordinary. A liberated person lives in this place of Truth, while simultaneously engaging in ordinary life. It is not magical; it is simply quiet and free.

  Many liberated people have said they no longer have fear. I have observed three forms of fear that fall away as an awakened life develops. The first could be called self-consciousness – the psychological fear about what people think, how one fits in, whether we are doing right or wrong. This is fear perpetrated by the super-ego, as Freud called it. It is a combination of anxiety about appearance and anxiety about our authentic goodness, built into us by the conventions of society, especially our families, schools and religions. When there is no longer a sense of “me” and we can embrace our personal conditioning as just a movement in consciousness that an “I” got attached to, these kinds of fear fall away. There is no one to hold on to them. The conflict about who I am is gone, and with it goes the conflict with others.

  The second fear that falls away is the fear of death. In a true and deep awakening there comes a moment when one knows the consciousness they are is all that is, and is indestructible, never having been born and never capable of dying. Death is seen more as a passage, a falling away of physicality and all the cares of the mind.

  The final fear is the fear of life, which is linked intimately with the fear that one cannot control whatever happens in life. For some reason the mind thinks it ought to control or is capable of controlling events, and often becomes infuriated or depressed when it hits the knot in the belly that wants this power. It is not unusual for spiritual seekers to unconsciously be seeking awakening because of the idea it will give them power over life, and control over their experiences. But no one can be free who would be free by evading or controlling life – that is a half-freedom at best – like breaking out of prison but having no where to live and being unable to expose yourself in the world. In the full circle of liberation one returns into life, no longer afraid of what arises, at peace with the play of the dream, participating however they are inclined in response to whatever arises, both within and without. It is living in the mystery and the unknown without an argument, without fear or conflict, and with only curiosity about what is coming next.

  Liberated Wisdom

  Many spiritual seekers believe that liberated people know everything that is happening everywhere all the time. This is the great omniscience and omnipresence religious groups attribute to God. But God is only omnipresent because it is everything that exists. That does not mean that one single mind can hold every small nuance of creation simultaneously, only that the consciousness from which we stream holds everything (or emptiness as potential for everything).

  Adyashanti once said that the way it works for him is that whatever he needs to know is there when he needs it, but not a moment before. This gives us insight into the awakened mind, and shows how stillness and emptiness rests and then responds, when there is no interference from streams of thought.

  Wisdom is a spontaneous activity of Truth, being wise because it sees the overall play of human experience without the limiting boundaries of space and time. It functions in the present moment, fresh and full of potential, not hobbled in the way mind is by a set of memories, disappointments and expectations. Wisdom is not for the liberated person, who really has no need anymore of knowing anything for himself or herself. It is not simply exploring curious questions about the nature of things and getting answers. It is not genius, to be called upon to solve all the problems human “intelligence” has generated.

  Wisdom is an entirely different way of seeing and expressing, when understanding or words come through unchecked that point to what is True. It is seeing the underlying structure of how things work in human minds and experiences, meeting it with neither resistance nor emotion, spontaneously untangling a thought or concept that is blocking the Truth in oneself or another. And then it is gone, because there is no one to hold on to this knowing.

  The willingness to use wisdom to serve is love

  Certainly there are many other aspects to a liberated life, and each life that fades into this passage glows anew in its own unique way. We cannot take these qualities as goals to be learned, practices to do, or even as expectations for ourselves. Why then, I wonder, do I even share these perceptions with the reader? In asking my own wisdom I can only suggest that it is to offer clarity about what liberation is not, and to show the natural evolutionary potential of human capacity at this moment in time. These are aspects of human freedom. They break forth in someone who is willing to step aside, and drop personal agendas.

  It is an act of trust in the unknown to fall into awakening, and a falling in love with the unknown that allows liberation to unfold afterwards. This is not a conventional way to live, not the way ordinary lives function at this apparent moment in time. Yet underneath all the gyrations of billions of human personalities, myriad cultures and unending chaotic thought forms, stillness and wisdom rest, potent with the offering of a liberated life.

  One aspect of trusting the Truth of your whole being is that once awakening happens there is an inclination from deep within to bring your life into alignment. You can learn to release the training and structures accumulated in the mind over the years and explore your capacity to be in presence with others and move with the natural intuitive flow of the moment. Stop trying to figure things out and get comfortable with the truth “I don’t actually know!” Your body and consciousness hold an organic memory of what you’ve learned and the inner wisdom will use it in the service of life in a spontaneous way As you trust intuition in your work and relationships you will discover new congruence between your spiritual life and your working and relational lives.

  Sometimes a person longs to express what is seen in a moment of insight, but struggles to find the words. Creative expression -- poetry, art, songwriting, dance --is a great way to release the need of expressing what is inexpressible. Here is a prose poem that followed an awakening in a retreat, an attempt to capture the essence of the insight it brought.

  HOW IT IS.

  I am vast and endless awareness,

  space, fullness, presence.

  I am vibration becoming the

  subtlest sound

  Ohmmmmmm is this essence.

  My vibration creates movement,

  ether, moving like the breeze

  The movement generates friction,

  becoming heat

  As heat I bring forth moisture,

  vapor, drips of liquid

  Water and gases become particles until

  Forms begin to bubble

  Water-forms, land-forms, plant-forms,

  life-forms softly arise within me.

  Staying vast and endless awareness

  I become all species, experiencing

  separate solitary beingness in space.

  I give of myself to support life.

  As animal forms I am movement

  through territories

  drawn by instinct and senses,

  As human forms I am awareness


  creating, dancing, living, dying

  exploring roles in consciousness.

  Thus I know time and attachment.

  Thus I hold memory of past.

  This I imagine future.

  Thus I hold emotion, mind and senses.

  Thus I experience desire and death,

  Pleasure and suffering.

  Thus I create relationship and religion.

  I generate world-expansion.

  And I destroy old forms.

  I am Vast and endless awareness,

  Fullness and presence always.

  I love emptiness and Beingness equally

  Every moment and movement flows from

  This.

  Chapter 11

  A World Awake

  Ultimately, waking up is an all-or-nothing orientation to the human experience. The deepest perception of our non-dual nature reveals that the life force which lives through us is the One life force, radiating through everything as consciousness, and operating everything; an invisible and invincible power that generates the apparent beginning, carries on and sustains the appearance of all forms, and turns itself back into source.

  Our life and our passing are paradoxically insignificant and essential pieces of the hologram of divine imagination, and we live either identified with the small roles we play, or identified with the divinity playing the entire scene. We are the whole, and our awakeness is always present as the silent ground within which everything arises.