The Awe of Awareness

I sit here on a bench looking towards the 59th st bridge. Second avenue runs adjacent to where I sit...The tram takes passengers to Roosevelt Island, High Schoolers congregate and yell, and the homeless rest. It is a relatively warm February day here in New York City...And amongst all this over-stimulation I still find peace within myself. As the Auto's rustle, bustle, and roar I sit here in peace. There is this overwhelming sensation within me that I can only label as acceptance. And it is this feeling of awesome acceptance that grounds me into this unbelievable moment of now. My heart is wide open and joyous. "Everything" is running right through me -- yet I am not attaching to it.

In the not so distant past all this stimulation would drive me crazy. And yes, I do still hold the notion that some environments are "healthier" than others (for example, I may prefer to be sitting on the edge of the Grand Canyon...), but I experientially now know - in this feeling of utter acceptance of the now - that peace is an inward experience and has nothing to do with external situations. The possibility than exists, that even to be in the midst of great trouble, can one hold a sense of profound peace and awe. For witnessing oneself experience existence in the moment of now is all there really is. The rest is a static creation of the ego which detaches us from witnessing the reality as it is. It is the witnessing experience that allows us to step aside from the ego.

As things move "through me" I accept them by being conscious of my own ego and not letting the judgments and associations of my ego dictate my experience - but rather I allow this consciousness to immerse my perception and open me up to the glorious "what is" experience. In this place I am grounded even further into acceptance because I see that all is temporal - and in witnessing that temporalness I am grateful that I get to witness whatever it is that comes before me. In this sense both gratefulness and acceptance are synonymous.

This experience of profound acceptance is learned especially through our relationships. The more "troubling" the relationship, the greater the opportunity to become conscious of what it is to accept. This is not to say we should seek troubling relationships, but many of those relationships that we have had no choice in the matter of can sometimes be the most challenging...and for good reason, for these relationships give us experiences to which we must demonstrate an even greater degree of conscious awareness to observe how the ingrained ego patterns led us to react. But acceptance, profound acceptance, allows the ego and its reactions to rest. In this greater degree of conscious awareness the ego and its filter begin to dissolve and our true nature reveals itself in the experiential experience of gratefulness. We are traveling further up the evolutionary spiral of consciousness. This is the true movement of life...up the spiral, further and further into a deeper awareness...an awareness with no end... Now, that is awe-some!

This demonstrated awareness also brings us the understanding that those who may have troubled us in the past only do so, or did so, because they are acting in a way that is in-congruent in relation to our current state of being. For we are all different (yet the same through egolessness) - but this is who they are in this moment of now - and although you may want them to be a different way - this is who they are and who they believe they should be. Who are we to tell them to deny their own experience by asking they change it. For this is their experience...and although you may see their reactivity -- this is their karmic lesson -- to live as they are so that they may develop an ego that can be dissolved their own way through deliberate conscious awareness. Again...further and further along the spiral path of consciousness evolution do we travel...

Yes, through deliberate conscious awareness does the ego dissolve and we are brought into oneness (but keep in mind that oneness is as ever expansive as the movement of consciousness evolution up the spiral of awareness)...but because of the process of actually having an ego to dissolve do we come to experientially understand what it is to be a conscious entity (this is the supreme opportunity to be in awe and grateful)...so forgive oneself for ever thinking you should be better than what you are! Because when the ego dissolves you simply are! Nothing more than the perfect divine nothingness and everythingness that intertwines in the ethers of this physical, mental, and spiritual existence are we...Only through the darkness can we come to know what the light is...Through coming to witness our ego and its reactivity can we become realized to the state of communion with the all-that-is...this is awesome acceptance...this is awesome gratefulness...This is Awe...So forgive yourself and yourself to let go of what you believed you thought yourself to be...and stand in the awe of your own simple perfection...

The Duality of "Awareness" and Thought

Awareness: as a state of being...
Thought: as a state of mind...

I do so frequently forget - forget to be aware of the things I see - because so often my "awareness" is funneled through the filter of thought and memory. There are of course no cut and dry rules to observation and awareness, but I do realize myself getting lost in my own thoughts. Yet I seek another state of being that bypasses this process. I seek a state of awareness where thoughts and judgments begin to dissolve. The key then to achieving this while my mind is in analytic mode, it seems, is to observe the judgments, but to see the unimportance of them. Because simply put, these thoughts are illusions in the sense that they are temporal. For what I see in the visual plane is what it is and nothing more. It extends into the eternal moment of now. The application of words to the visual experience only limits the actual experience, by funneling this inherently experiential experience through the filter of words which are inherently limited themselves. As Krisnamurti stated, "you cannot know the unknown through the process of the known." What he was eluding to is that we cannot observe the divine through the lens of the collected known (thoughts, ideas, and memories).

More practically speaking, my ego, although an aspect of my being that should not be condemned, engulfs my being in its "drama" and funnels the energy that could be used to be "aware" into the area of thought and limited existence.

*I state that the ego should not be condemned because when you judge the ego as something bad or something that should be changed, what happens is only the perpetuation of more ego. So when I say to myself, I should not judge myself like this, I kept alive the very force that I desire to dismantle. Yet, what makes things interesting is the observation of the paradox I find myself in...For in my state of awareness - where I sense and feel that "all is one," I loose sight of the ego as if it never existed...but the days are eternal and I am drawn back down into my state of ego (the state of relative existence) because I do witness myself as a separate entity. And on many levels this warrants the discriminating judgments, both internal and external. So the paradox seemingly exists; that I am both a piece of existence, an entity, as well as the whole itself (that is if I am to honor feeling and not just rational intelligence, for "awareness" in the way I tell of it is a feeling and not necessarily a thought, although thoughts may follow). Amazingly, both the relative and the oneness exist simultaneously.

This is something that I admit is beyond my current understanding...How both a sense of separateness and oneness can exist at the same time (non-duality)...Because I have my own ability to think and decide for myself apart from the rest of the masses. The mind understands that both I and the rock are separate, but from a grander more divine perspective I realize that the relative world could only possibly be experienced if there were a "fabric" that holds it all together. This divine "fabric" is what I sense when I sense the "oneness." Because only when I bring myself away from my thoughts can I sense this; only when I see beyond the relative can I sense the whole. And it is the senseing of this fabric and the knowing that I am a part of this fabric brings me to the realization that all is one.

And what does this sensing feel like? It feels like love. For what else would hold existence together if not love? For what emotional energy would we attribute to the phenomena of having the desire to live in the first place? To illustrate: as the trees climb higher to capture the sun, as the fish eludes its predator, as the people procreate... I wonder why? to live? but why live if not propelled by the force of love... and we should realize that the fear of non-existence is nothing more but the fear of not being able to experience oneself anymore. Are we really afraid of death, or are we really afraid of not being able to experience existence?...is that not fueled love?. And through this feeling is what brings all of this together and an experiential understanding of the "ether" that holds all of this that we call life, together. All of this relative and oneness stuff... For the basis of our relationships are inextricably tied to this natural experience.

From this realization we can begin to see how blessed we are for being different (in all capacities). This relative existence gives us the ability to see how we exist among others and it therefore allows us to see, in a greater capacity, how we choose to live and create who we are; for our differences create the contrast in our lives. For we relate to the relative...This is our blessing, our gift, and although this may make us feel alone and isolated from time to time, although it creates the ability for extreme differences and prejudice to form, and for wars to exist....it creates the opportunity for ultimate connectivity, unity, and the experiential realization of love. So the wise see that the greatest gift of the relative is our ability to choose how we relate or not relate to what we experience...and in that we are only left with choice...The choice to be aware or to be reactive...The choice to live from love or from fear....and the choice to connect through our differences - for we could never experience ourselves if it was not for the other.

So in conclusion, awareness is both an activity of thought and non thought. It can allow us to experientialy experience the oneness all around us and within us and help us live and base our lives on this glorious experience or it can dictate our lives based on our beliefs and thoughts so that we become reactive. The former seems more pleasing, yet our egos are tied up in the latter, for who are we if we are not to relate? The answer, from an intellectual capacity, still eludes me...but the feeling most certainly does not.