by Greg Goode
I was called to the spiritual path when my daughters were toddlers. This calling was so acute and powerful that despite the constraints of juggling my demanding full-time job and raising young children, I was impelled to make time for spiritual practices. I would wake up at four in the morning to meditate before they stirred. At night, I meditated in their room while they fell asleep. For several years, my life revolved around practices, kids, and work.
The Direct Path
When I came to the direct path, I had been meditating regularly for a few years in the Advanced Yoga Practices (AYP) tradition. My introduction to the direct path was through Greg Goode’s Standing as Awareness.5 Halfway through the book, a profound shift had occurred. Instead of seeing myself as a body-mind to whom awareness arose, I knew I was awareness to whom the body-mind appeared. There was a dropping away of suffering related to wrong identification or taking myself to be the body-mind. With the dropping away of suffering, life has become simpler.
The beauty of this path is the freedom it grants us to be engaged in life while continuing the inquiry. We need not give up our jobs and relationships in order to make spiritual progress. We don’t have to go away to an exotic ashram or change our lifestyles. Spiritual growth and blossoming can occur through ordinary life and experiences, even while we fulfill our duties to family and society.
The prerequisite for the direct path is “higher reasoning,” as Sri Atmananda Krishna Menon calls it. Higher reasoning is the intuitive ability to differentiate between subject and object, as inquiry proceeds systematically from gross physical objects to the subtle objects of the mind. With “ripening,” the subtle separation between the subject and the object eventually collapses into nondual realization. When we stand as awareness, the result of inquiry is the clarity of knowledge combined with the sweetness of love. In parenting, this clear love takes on a new dimension in our interactions with our children, even when they are challenging or unpleasant.
Since parenting is rich with experiences and elicits many emotions, thoughts, and beliefs, it provides continuous fodder for inquiry. In the way we parent our children and behave with them, we come face-to-face with the gross and subtle structures that keep us separate and ego-bound. In day-to-day living as a householder with a busy career and countless details to attend to, the direct path is a powerful tool for transcending inner conflict and discovering the joy of being. Additionally, the responses that our children evoke in us act as true tests of our progress along the path.
Inquiry acts as a spade to unearth the many inconsistencies in the subtle and confusing messages that we pass on to our children. For example, we might tell our children that happiness does not depend upon achievements. And yet, our parenting style might include a strong emphasis on getting ahead or on distant goals of higher education, fame, and wealth—the very things we eschew externally.
The direct path opens us to seeing our children for who they really are. We come to see that they have never been ours to own. They may have our noses and our skin tones, but they are unique strands in the vast fabric of the universe, without which its grandeur is unimaginable. Our kids aren’t smaller versions of ourselves, waiting to be molded into our own likeness. Yet, this attempt to force our children into our own image can be the default mode of operation in parenting. We may be so entrenched in our own views, problems, agendas, interests, and ambitions that we do not pause to think whether this molding is conducive to the way these unique strands fit into the fabric of the universe.
My children are my greatest teachers. They hold up for my inspection all the beliefs and views that remain from my long-standing conditioning. The process of raising them brings up my greatest fears, limitations, and flaws. They give me no room for inauthenticity and demand total honesty in all my dealings, even those that don’t involve them. They call me out on disparities, bringing my hidden inner conflicts to the surface. Their innocent eyes illuminate the dark places in me where fears and anxieties form the unseen strings that manipulate their lives. In this new light, I find that my goals for them have more to do with me. In every interaction with them, I am given the choice between continuing along the horizontal6 paradigm of time and space made up of instructions, chiding, rewards, goals, and consequences, or relaxing into the vertical paradigm of surrendering to the mystery of the Now.
The ego in parenting
False identification is the basis of all the suffering we create for ourselves and others. In this “normal” mode of functioning, we take ourselves to be either the body or the mind, or a combination of the two. When we identify as a body-mind in early childhood, we form an image in our heads of the “I.” This “I” is built on approval and attention from our parents, teachers, and peers and from ourselves. We then proceed to live our lives conforming to this image. We struggle to control our circumstances, our family, and our friends and colleagues to keep the precious image of the “I” intact.
Some time ago, I was doing teaching rounds in the hospital where I work and was asked to consult on a pregnant woman with a serious inherited vascular condition. She was a highly educated and well-informed nurse and knew that her child had a 50% chance of inheriting the genetic defect. I heard judgmental whispers among the trainees: “How could she think of having a child, knowing the risk?” Finishing rounds, I corralled the team into a conference room. One of the trainees was pregnant and most of the others had children. I asked them, “Why did you all decide to have kids?” They took turns answering: “I wanted to experience motherhood”; “I felt it was time for me to go to the next phase of life”; “I wanted to feel fulfilled”; and so on. I smilingly pointed out that their intentions to have children did not differ from that of the patient we had just seen—having children to actualize their own needs. It was no different for me.
When I began to think about having children, I thought it would be fulfilling, enriching, beautiful, and challenging—for me. Only in passing did I think about the future children’s wishes, idiosyncrasies, and personalities. I simply assumed that these children would be new and improved versions of their parents—smart, self-driven, talented, and basically flawless. Little did I know that these little beings would take every opportunity to smash my carefully constructed “I” with their stubbornness, independence, and personalities that did not match my expectations!
The first false assumption in parenting is that we own our children. This assumption leads to several other beliefs, actions, and consequences. For instance, we use our children in subtle ways to enhance our self-image, the “I.” We dump our unlived dreams and unrealized fantasies onto them, feeding them an image of who they should be. We place upon their fragile shoulders the heavy mantle of responsibility for making us happy, sad, proud, disappointed, and so on. In this displacement of responsibility, we unwittingly contribute to the creation of their own self-image or the “I” that they will struggle to conform to for the rest of their lives. Even though we love our children deeply and as unconditionally as is humanly possible, our subtle intentions to enhance our self-image through them can be hidden under false projections of altruism. We create suffering for our children and for ourselves when we believe that our behaviors serve to further their best interest.
Our children are our mirrors
My friend Shanti asked me for advice about her five-year-old daughter, who was affectionate and giving by nature. She loved to make homemade gifts for her friends and was hurt easily when they did not reciprocate in kind. When she broke down in tears and tantrums, Shanti was quick to promise her gifts and treats to get her to stop crying. I asked Shanti if she believed that her child’s friends should reciprocate with gifts and attention. She hesitantly replied in the affirmative. It hurt her to see her child’s efforts being dismissed; in her helplessness, she tried to make up for this lack by buying her things.
Most often, circumstances like these point to our own minds and actions. We pass on our beliefs to our children in subtle
, non-verbal ways; hence the saying that they are much more likely to do what we do rather than what we say. Our beliefs and stances are plainly evident in the tone of our voices, our criticism of others (or ourselves), our behavior with people in front of and behind their backs, our response to the world’s (and our own) shortcomings, what we really value, and so on. Our children mirror our behaviors perfectly.
Thus, if my child has the belief that giving must result in a similar gesture from her friends, I need to look at how I might be contributing as a model for this behavior. Do I give with reservations and expectations, or do I give freely of myself as an expression of joy and love? For example, do I really give unreservedly to my spouse? If my concept of a strong intimate relationship is one of giving to get something in return, I can never teach my children to give unreservedly. The barter model of give-and-take is more about taking than about giving, in which we covertly manipulate the other person to get things our way. This behavior does not end at home. It permeates all our interactions. At work and in the community, we give only when there is something in it for me. If there is no promise of personal gain, we are less likely to be interested in giving. Even service-oriented activities are performed to collect credit or to earn praise, or as material for college applications. Our children pick up these mind games and begin to own them, integrating them into their sense of self, their “I.” We cannot expect our children to rise above their “I” if we haven’t done so ourselves.
The “I” is the ego and is fragile by nature; it employs every tactic in the book to feel more secure and complete. For the ego, giving is a disaster because it feels threatened by someone else having more. The inherent insecurity of the ego is also the driving force for pushing our children to succeed. When my children succeed, I feel good and validated for having done my job so well. When they fail, I feel like a failure and it hurts.
When we want our children to earn praise for being talented, smart, capable, strong, and so on, we would benefit by questioning our motives. When we encourage lack of transparency in order to come out on top, we place winning at all costs higher than joy and freedom. When we push our children to be recognized every single time they venture out, we plant the seeds of insecurity and fear of failure. We can never teach our children graciousness, equanimity, and the path to inner freedom if we are caught up in the drama of the ego.
What is the greatest gift I can give my children? This question is worth its weight in gold for parents. From the contrasting experiences of suffering and freedom in my own life, I know what I wish for them: to discover that who they are is beyond definition, and beyond wanting, grasping for, or needing
completion. They are already complete, perfect, and full.
The process of inquiry
My husband and I grew up valuing academic achievement. One of our daughters is feisty, bubbly, and stubborn, while the other is studious, mellow, and easy-going. In early elementary school, we began to notice how they differed in their attitude towards school work. While the older, studious child made getting straight A’s look easy, the younger one showed little interest in grades or school work. For the better part of a year, we were on her case. While we did everything to “help” her, she merely ignored us, refusing to let our anxieties change her performance in school.
One day, she came back home with a C. Instead of lecturing her, I was drawn to sit with my disappointment. Holding off on reacting, I took several days to inquire deeply into this anxiety. I proceeded like this:
❖I began with the Heart Opener.7
❖I began my inquiry as the discomfort of my daughter’s non-stellar academic performance arose. In this non-reactive space of witnessing awareness, I became curious about the feeling. Where was it? What did it feel like? It felt like a knot in the stomach area.
❖Was the knot separate from the stomach? The knot wasn’t in the stomach; it was the stomach. It arose and subsided.
❖Was the stomach separate from the feeling of the knot? No. There was no stomach there and a feeling here. They arose as one.
❖Was the feeling separate from witnessing awareness? No. Feeling as a sensory modality is awareness itself.
❖Was there a separate feeler of this feeling? No. In direct experience, the feeling and the feeler are the same.
❖Now I was curious about what I’d called the knot—anxiety. It was time to examine it. Did the feeling come with a label? No. It was just a sensation, not separate from witnessing awareness.
❖Did the word “anxiety” come up with the feeling of the knot? When I examined the word, I saw that it was an arising. When this word arose, the previous experience of the knot was no longer directly experienced. The knot had come and gone before the label “anxiety” arose.
❖Did the label “anxiety” point to the knot? When I experienced the word, it was seen to be not separate from witnessing awareness, just as the feeling of the knot was. But wait. Another thought had risen claiming that the knot was anxiety.
❖Did this claim-thought join the knot and the label? By the time it had risen, the knot and the label were no longer in my direct experience. The claim-thought was seen to be not separate from witnessing awareness.
❖The knot, the label, and the claim-thought were all pointing to the same thing: witnessing awareness.
❖The inquiry continued, moving to the story that my daughter “should” be a good student. Each story, thought, and belief examined in inquiry dissolves into witnessing awareness. As the inquiry deepened, another belief was uncovered—that her performance reflects mine as a parent.
❖Could this parent be found? The feeling of the “I” arose. It was in the chest area. Was this “I” separate from witnessing awareness? No. Witnessing awareness was never not present, but the “I” came and went. It was an arising, like any other.
❖Labels associated with the “I” were no different than labeling for the knot. Claim-thoughts arose independently, each an arising in witnessing awareness.
❖As the inquiry continued, the stories of my daughter’s imagined future arose. Every story of the past or the future arose in witnessing awareness as awareness, now. Every concept of success and failure arose as an arising. The labeling of arisings as “good,” “bad,” “desirable,” or “undesirable” were additional, unrelated arisings brought together by claim-thoughts. No thought actually referred to another. Every thought and feeling always referred to awareness only.
❖As the inquiry proceeded, the anxiety collapsed along with unquestioned assumptions, beliefs, and concepts. From the perspective of awareness, I saw that clarity gave way to peace and sweetness. There is great joy in seeing a delightful playfulness in this type of inquiry. Witnessing awareness stands everywhere, pouncing on us with a “Gotcha!”
In the love that emerges as a fruit of inquiry, my daughter was released from the tyranny of my “I,” the competent parent. As the inquiry proceeded, it was clear that neither one of us, my daughter or I, is the body-mind entity of the default mode. 8When I stand as awareness, she is me: vast, spacious, unlimited, unbounded joy and love with neither a past nor a future.
With this clarity, I talked to my family, asking that we back off and allow her to be. They complied, but reluctantly, since they believed that children must be pushed to realize their potential. We never said a word about this to her, but the energy in the home had shifted from one of dissent to one of love and acceptance. I met her C grades with the same excitement and delight as her sister’s A’s. Being sensitive and intuitive, she began to blossom in this new environment. A few weeks later, she came home from school bursting with excitement: “Mommy, I got my first A in math!” We celebrated her joy. Overnight, she had transformed into the child we knew she was—curious, interested, and joyful about learning. Her grades improved steadily until she was getting straight A’s.
Inquiry into the parent identity
We can inquir
e into beliefs about giving with wanting something back, such as success, our worth as parents, and so on. Every single time, we will come to see these concepts to be temporary arisings in witnessing awareness. They cannot be found to exist separately outside of awareness. Significantly, the “I” arises as the fear, the longing, and the pain. Again and again, we come to see that the “I” in its many forms of mental and emotional constructs is merely an arising. When we see this, the non-separation of the arising from the witnessing awareness becomes intuitively evident, and false identification is mitigated. We realize that we are awareness and that we are already complete and full. Suffering falls away and life becomes an outpouring of this fullness.
As our children begin to soak up this new paradigm of living, they can learn to give without fear. They can compete in academics, sports, and extracurricular activities without bitterness or rivalry. They can intuitively come to appreciate their friends without jealousy or one-upmanship. They can learn to question their own assumptions about reality and find freedom from suffering.
We don’t inquire to gain a specific result with respect to our children, spouses, colleagues, or life situations. The purpose of inquiry is not to change our circumstances, but to examine our assumptions about them. Nothing in our lives may change as a result of inquiry, but nothing will seem quite the same when our assumptions dissolve. Although the situation with my daughter seemed to improve because of inquiry, such improvement is not always the result. When my children rebel, question my judgment, or undermine my suggestions, inquiry dissolves my assumptions that they “should” behave in certain ways. When I stand as awareness, I allow experience to arise as is, without manipulating it. In this allowing, the way I discipline my children also changes. I don’t take their behavior personally; I can allow them to express themselves in unique ways even as I gently steer them away from harmful thinking and behaviors. Greg calls this delightful state of being “joyful irony.”9