Real-World Nonduality
Page 17
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John Lamont-Black trained as a geologist and undertook his doctoral research work on the chalk of southern England. He is presently the managing director (CEO) of a small geotechnical engineering company that he founded with academic colleagues from original research in university. John’s inquiries have encompassed Christianity, New Age, TM, Zen Buddhism, and nonduality. While exploring broadly throughout his earlier years, at the age of 40 he encountered the teachings of the direct path through Rupert Spira and Greg Goode and has been carried along to this day. John lives with his wife in Edinburgh and enjoys long-distance mountain trekking, fell running, and hill-walking, especially in the Highlands of Scotland.
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Terry Moore’s lifelong interest in mysticism took him down many roads before he finally came to a traditional perennialist universalist perspective and the practice of Sufism, which he has recently found to be greatly enriched by the direct path. He lives in New York City, and enjoys Islamic geometry as it reveals the underlying unity behind the veil, and studying Arabic. He is active with the TED organization.
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Sandra Pippa lives with her husband in the village of Katonah, an hour’s drive north of New York City. They are recently retired from the wine-importing business and spend time debating whether to move away. Sandra has been interested in paths of self-inquiry for many years. She enjoys gardening, cooking, reading, and walks in the woods.
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Zachary Rodecap is a public-school teacher in Portland, Oregon, where he lives with his family. Prior to the direct path, he explored nonduality through Korean Zen, the Ordinary Mind School of Zen, and Toni Packer. He enjoys writing and commuting by bike.
Reading List
The following works are a selection of the nondual wisdom teachings inspired by Sri Atmananda (Krishna Menon). The list (alphabetical by author) is not exhaustive, but it does include the representative, well-known works in this field.
Sometimes this line of teachings is referred to as the “direct path,” though that term is also used in a broader sense to include Ramana Maharshi, Nisargadatta Maharaj, and others. All these sources of wisdom agree that self-knowledge isn’t achieved through a developmental process such as quieting the mind or becoming less attached to things. In this sense they are all “direct.”
By (or featuring) Sri Atmananda (Krishna Menon)
Nitya Tripta (2009) Notes on The Spiritual Discourses of Shri Atmananda (3 volumes). Non-Duality Press
Atmananda: Atma Darshan and Atma Nirvriti. [out of print]
By Greg Goode
Goode, G. (2009) Standing as Awareness: The Direct Path, (Revised Edition), Non-Duality Press
Goode, G. (2016) The Direct Path: A User Guide, Non-Duality Press
Goode, G. (2017) After Awareness: The End of the Path, Non-Duality Press
By Jean Klein
Klein, J. (2016) Be Who You Are, Non-Duality Press
Klein, J. (2016) Who Am I?: The Sacred Quest, Non-Duality Press
Klein, J. (Jan 2019) Open To The Unknown, New Sarum Press
Klein, J. (Jan 2019) Transmission of the Flame, New Sarum Press
By John Levy
Levy, J. (2004) The Nature of Man According to the Vedanta, Sentient Publications
By Francis Lucille
Lucille, F. (2008) Eternity Now, Non-Duality Press
Lucille, F. (2006) The Perfume of Silence, Truespeech Productions
Lucille, F. (2006) Truth Love Beauty, Truespeech Productions
By Philip Renard
Non-Dualisme (Non-Dualism, in Dutch)
‘I’ is a Door: The essence of Advaita as taught by Ramana Maharshi, Atmananda & Nisargadatta Maharaj
Non-Dualism: Eastern Enlightenment in the World of Western Enlightenment https://tinyurl.com/ya3gqtmh (accessed 25 Aug, 2017)
By Rupert Spira
Spira, R. (2017) Presence Volume I: The Art of Peace and Happiness [2nd edition, revised]. Sahaj Publications
Spira, R. (2017) Presence Volume II: The Intimacy of All Experience [2nd edition, revised], Sahaj Publications
Spira, R. (2017) The Transparency of Things: Contemplating the Nature of Experience [2nd edition, revised], Sahaj Publications
By Ananda Wood
Some teachings from Shri Atmananda (Krishna Menon)
https://tinyurl.com/yc39gabu (Accessed 26 Aug, 2017, at which time some of the internet links in this
document were no longer active)
https://tinyurl.com/y9hta29f [accessed 17 Oct 2018]
https://tinyurl.com/y9lexjdf [accessed 17 Oct 2018]
Appendix: The Heart Opener
“The Heart Opener is a way to emphasize more directly the loving aspect of your nature as awareness. It is also an antidote to feelings of nihilism. It counteracts despair and hopelessness. If doing Self-inquiry hasn’t provided a sense of sweetness, then The Heart Opener just might do the trick!”60
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Before you begin61
Immediately before doing an experiment, take a few minutes to try what I call the “Heart Opener.” It is akin to falling in love with awareness. It is akin to a reminder that awareness is the nature of you and all things. Experiencing this reminder opens the heart, and you’ll find more ease and less resistance when doing the experiments themselves.
Being awareness – The Heart Opener
Take a deep breath slowly. Exhale slowly, all the way. Take another deep breath. Exhale all the way. Now take three-quarters of a deep breath and exhale as you normally would.
Close your eyes. Notice that there might be sounds, sensations, feelings and thoughts arising, but that YOU, the witnessing awareness to which these things are arising, are always already present.
Notice that you are this clarity. You are present whether there are objects arising or not. If there are objects, you are already there as THAT which knows the presence of the objects. If there are no objects, you are already there as THAT which knows the absence of the objects. Regardless of the presence or absence of objects, you are there.
Notice that you are not an observed object at all, but the open, spacious, brilliant clarity in which objects arise. You cannot grasp or hold this clarity, for it is the very spaciousness in which grasping arises.
Notice that there are no walls to this clarity, no edges to YOU. You are borderless. You are not contained by anything. You are limitless.
This doesn’t have to take long. You can do it just until you get a taste of yourself as this limitless awareness. There is a sweetness to this taste, which will cause you to fall in love with awareness all over again. And then when you do the experiments, it will guide you home.
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“This opening of the heart can’t be owned. You can’t grasp and hold on to this clarity. You can’t keep it around because something feels so good. The reason you can’t grasp the clarity isn’t a matter of the clarity being subtle and slipping out of your grip. Rather, it’s because you already are this clarity. If a grasping desire happens, it isn’t even ‘yours.’ It’s just a temporary object arising against this same background of clarity that you are.” 62
60 From After Awareness pp.104-5. See Reading List 61 From The Direct Path: A User Guide. See Reading List 62 From After Awareness pp.104-5. See Reading List
Available to order from amazon
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The Ten Thousand Things
by Robert Saltzman
A new and more affordable edition of the acclaimed book, The Ten Thousand Things by Robert Saltzman. This edition is text-only and without the photographs present in the first edition.
“You do not have to believe anything in order to be alive. Like the stars in the sky, this aliveness is present whether noticed or not, and when the contraction called “myself” relaxes sufficiently, the aliveness feels obvious and indisputabl
e. That relaxation of the clenched “myself” feels like having been roused from a dream to find oneself alive and aware ... What is, simply is, and cannot become anything. Each moment feels fresh, different from any other, and entirely unspeakable. The future never arrives. Enlightenment is a non-issue—not worth thinking about. One simply experiences what living human beings experience from moment to moment, and that’s it. And that is sufficient.”
NEW SARUM PRESS
www.newsarumpress.com
Paperback | $15.95/£12.50 | 5.5” x 8.5” | 230p
Available to order from amazon and all bookshops
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Conversations on Non-Duality
Twenty-Six Awakenings
edited by Eleanora Gilbert
The book explores the nature of true happiness, awakening, enlightenment and the ‘Self’ to be realised. It features 26 expressions of liberation, each shaped by different life experiences and offering a unique perspective.
The collection explores the different ways ‘liberation’ happened and ‘suffering’ ended. Some started with therapy, self-help workshops or read books written by spiritual masters, while others travelled to exotic places and studied with gurus. Others leapt from the despair of addiction to drugs and alcohol to simply waking up unexpectedly to a new reality.
The 26 interviews included in the book are with: David Bingham, Daniel Brown, Sundance Burke, Katie Davis, Peter Fenner, Steve Ford, Jeff Foster, Suzanne Foxton, Gagaji, Richard Lang, Roger Linden, Wayne Liquorman, Francis Lucille, Mooji, Catherine Noyce, Jac O’Keeffe, Tony Parsons, Bernie Prior, Halina Pytlasinska, Genpo Roshi, Florian Schlosser, Mandi Solk, Rupert Spira, James Swartz, Richard Sylvester and Pamela Wilson.
CONSCIOUS.TV
Cherry Red Books
To study the self is to forget the self.
To forget the self is to be enlightened by the ten thousand things.
—Eihei Dogen (1200-1253)
The rage for wanting to conclude is one of the most deadly and most fruitless manias to befall humanity. Each religion and each philosophy has pretended to have God to itself, to measure the infinite, and to know the recipe for happiness. What arrogance and what nonsense! I see, to the contrary, that the greatest geniuses and the greatest works have never concluded.
—Gustave Flaubert
Humility is not a peculiar habit of self-effacement, rather like having an inaudible voice, it is a selfless respect for reality . . . .
—Iris Murdoch