F.: Next, see the parallel with the cycling of consciousness: from the Absolute (DEEP SLEEP) consciousness begins to “come to” as it manifests in a pure state; eventually it will AWAKEN to its presence and know ItSelf; later it will be bastardized and contaminated via programming; it will accept as true identities the false roles assigned and will begin to walk about on stage in the “Drama of the Lie”; it will be conditioned to believe it is AWAKE while it is really DREAMING and, like Pavlovian dogs, persons with such bastardized consciousness will behave in totally unnatural ways.
Yet a few might have a memory of What They Truly Are and begin to search for THAT. They might begin to slow down, to tire of the race taking place on an endless track, and move toward a state of less brainwave activity. They might enter the Theta state and receive a clearer vision. In a few cases, they will realize that everything they were told was a lie, and then they might see the truth. They will have left behind the DREAM state, will have passed beyond WAKING, and will be truly AWAKENED. For comparison, imagine Pavlov’s dogs hearing a bell and then jumping about in response; running around, totally out of control; salivating; feeling anxious; having a hunger that cannot be met. Then imagine one lone dog out of the entire pack in which the conditioning did not take effect. It is sitting to the side, calm…relaxed…taking it easy…not over-reacting, not even reacting to the sound of a bell at all. From there it witnesses the insanity of the dogs that are reacting to a sound as if the sound were a smell. How mistaken their perceptions and beliefs are, after conditioning. The lone dog that was not driven insane by conditioning can merely witness how mistaken the other dogs are and how they are behaving as if intoxicated. Then that dog can turn away from the dream that the others have bought into, can stop witnessing the insanity, and then can enter into a state of real and perfect rest.
Now, back to the cycling of consciousness. What happened next as the consciousness crossed the borderline from non-beingness to beingness in a human space? First, the True Self stage was entered but then left behind. The child began to witness at some point, looking left and right at parents or persons hovering over the crib. In the “Child Ignorance” stage, the child knew peace (at least if dry and fed and healthy). But soon, within a matter of years, the forced infliction of the DREAM state onto the child happened. The child was pushed into the dream by being told that he was a “gift from god,” (thus creating a spiritual ego-state/false identity). The child was told that it was a “Christian” or “Jew” or “Muslim” or “Buddhist” or whatever other labels were applied (thus creating a religious ego-state/false identity). If the family did not impose one or both of those ego-states, then they still bastardized the newly-manifested consciousness by applying all manner of false identities to the child and eventually creating a “mind,” their mind that would eventually be taken by the child to be “her/his mind.” After assuming those false identities to be real, the next step was for the child (totally in love not only with the “I Amness” but also with the “I am this” and “I am that”) to accept that it was the body even though it was nothing more than the space in which the consciousness was abiding. Thus, the child was exposed to “the Dream of the Planet,” trapped into a DREAM state while thinking he/she was “awake.” The child then walked onto the stage of “the Drama of the Lie” and began to play roles while being emotionally and/or spiritually intoxicated; began to display all levels of histrionics; and began to strut about as if always on a theatrical platform.
To appreciate the parallel, imagine that you are in bed and in the Delta level of DEEP SLEEP. Then, imagine that the dormant consciousness begins to stir as light filters into your bedroom. Recall certain dreams that have come to you from the Theta state. In your dreams you have seen “you” (the body) supposedly interacting with others (other bodies) and you take that to be so real that on occasion you have bolted up in bed—screaming, shouting, sweating, calling out as if literally being attacked or as if experiencing joy. (That is the way in which ego-states experience themselves all day long because they are always DREAMING. They always imagine they are “under attack” or occasionally “feeling joyous.” While in the DREAMING state, you took the dream to be real, and that is the same way that bodies and contaminated “minds” are erroneously taking the false to be the real in the WAKING state as well. Only after AWAKENING fully do You realize that it was all a dream, only an illusion, Maya to the max; yet as long as personas, bodies, minds and ego-states are taken to be real, persons will remain trapped, will DREAM, and will take the dream to be real. A relevant pointer was offered in The Twice-Stolen Necklace Murders [ www.floydhenderson.com/twicestolen.htm ] when the editor interviewed the author:
How many who consider themselves to be a man or a woman are really nothing more than a bundle of concepts and labels and identities assigned by this culture? Is it any wonder that most, before making it to the grave, will wonder “Who am I?” or will state flat out, “I don’t even know who I am”? To be free is to be free of the false identities that jerk us around and jerk around the people in our vicinity who allow our role-playing and role-demands to impact them. Once we come to know Who We Really Are and stay in the ‘I Am’ state, we accept no false roles as identifiers of Who We Are, no false labels as identifiers of Who We Are, no dependencies as a result of believing we are what we do. We can take that knowingness into each day of the week, and perform tasks AS IF we are that; but knowing we are not that, we do not attach to the roles, we do not fear for loss of our very existence, we do not have the co-dependencies that always come with ego-states or false identities.
So the point is that consciousness manifests from the Absolute…from that “state” that is comparable to the DEEP SLEEP in the relative existence. To that it shall return, just as the body rises from sleep and returns to sleep in 24-hour cycles. In between, the consciousness can be pure and AWAKE and aware or it can be lulled into a misinformed DREAM state. Too, it can be re-purified and can leave the DREAM and can be truly AWAKE. In the end, though, just as the body and mind and brainwaves cannot refuse the sleep state, so the consciousness can do nothing that will prevent the eventual return to the pool of consciousness at-rest where nothing is known, where no forms or bodies exist, where no punishments or pleasures are experienced, and from which portions of consciousness might again manifest…or not. Either way, it doesn’t mean a thing. Know that the bliss can come in the relative only when it happens in a fashion like that of the Absolute. In that state, no needs are imagined so nothing is taken to be useful. When the manifested consciousness knows it is THAT, even while manifested, the peace of no needs and no desires and no fears just happens. That is the parallel that Advaitans invite protégés to know. That is the peace that Advaitans invite protégés to enjoy in the relative existence. Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
TOMORROW: “When Christians say that an inanimate object, such as a rock, has no soul, or you say consciousness manifests itself in anything with a nervous system, we are limiting the Absolute or God to only what we can understand—right?”
Yet a few might have a memory of What They Truly Are and begin to search for THAT. They might begin to slow down, to tire of the race taking place on an endless track, and move toward a state of less brainwave activity. They might enter the Theta state and receive a clearer vision. In a few cases, they will realize that everything they were told was a lie, and then they might see the truth. They will have left behind the DREAM state, will have passed beyond WAKING, and will be truly AWAKENED. For comparison, imagine Pavlov’s dogs hearing a bell and then jumping about in response; running around, totally out of control; salivating; feeling anxious; having a hunger that cannot be met. Then imagine one lone dog out of the entire pack in which the conditioning did not take effect. It is sitting to the side, calm…relaxed…taking it easy…not over-reacting, not even reacting to the sound of a bell at all. From there it witnesses the insanity of the dogs that are reacting to a sound as if the sound were a smell. How mistaken their perceptions and beliefs are, after conditioning. The lone dog that was not driven insane by conditioning can merely witness how mistaken the other dogs are and how they are behaving as if intoxicated. Then that dog can turn away from the dream that the others have bought into, can stop witnessing the insanity, and then can enter into a state of real and perfect rest.
Now, back to the cycling of consciousness. What happened next as the consciousness crossed the borderline from non-beingness to beingness in a human space? First, the True Self stage was entered but then left behind. The child began to witness at some point, looking left and right at parents or persons hovering over the crib. In the “Child Ignorance” stage, the child knew peace (at least if dry and fed and healthy). But soon, within a matter of years, the forced infliction of the DREAM state onto the child happened. The child was pushed into the dream by being told that he was a “gift from god,” (thus creating a spiritual ego-state/false identity). The child was told that it was a “Christian” or “Jew” or “Muslim” or “Buddhist” or whatever other labels were applied (thus creating a religious ego-state/false identity). If the family did not impose one or both of those ego-states, then they still bastardized the newly-manifested consciousness by applying all manner of false identities to the child and eventually creating a “mind,” their mind that would eventually be taken by the child to be “her/his mind.” After assuming those false identities to be real, the next step was for the child (totally in love not only with the “I Amness” but also with the “I am this” and “I am that”) to accept that it was the body even though it was nothing more than the space in which the consciousness was abiding. Thus, the child was exposed to “the Dream of the Planet,” trapped into a DREAM state while thinking he/she was “awake.” The child then walked onto the stage of “the Drama of the Lie” and began to play roles while being emotionally and/or spiritually intoxicated; began to display all levels of histrionics; and began to strut about as if always on a theatrical platform.
To appreciate the parallel, imagine that you are in bed and in the Delta level of DEEP SLEEP. Then, imagine that the dormant consciousness begins to stir as light filters into your bedroom. Recall certain dreams that have come to you from the Theta state. In your dreams you have seen “you” (the body) supposedly interacting with others (other bodies) and you take that to be so real that on occasion you have bolted up in bed—screaming, shouting, sweating, calling out as if literally being attacked or as if experiencing joy. (That is the way in which ego-states experience themselves all day long because they are always DREAMING. They always imagine they are “under attack” or occasionally “feeling joyous.” While in the DREAMING state, you took the dream to be real, and that is the same way that bodies and contaminated “minds” are erroneously taking the false to be the real in the WAKING state as well. Only after AWAKENING fully do You realize that it was all a dream, only an illusion, Maya to the max; yet as long as personas, bodies, minds and ego-states are taken to be real, persons will remain trapped, will DREAM, and will take the dream to be real. A relevant pointer was offered in The Twice-Stolen Necklace Murders [ www.floydhenderson.com/twicestolen.htm ] when the editor interviewed the author:
How many who consider themselves to be a man or a woman are really nothing more than a bundle of concepts and labels and identities assigned by this culture? Is it any wonder that most, before making it to the grave, will wonder “Who am I?” or will state flat out, “I don’t even know who I am”? To be free is to be free of the false identities that jerk us around and jerk around the people in our vicinity who allow our role-playing and role-demands to impact them. Once we come to know Who We Really Are and stay in the ‘I Am’ state, we accept no false roles as identifiers of Who We Are, no false labels as identifiers of Who We Are, no dependencies as a result of believing we are what we do. We can take that knowingness into each day of the week, and perform tasks AS IF we are that; but knowing we are not that, we do not attach to the roles, we do not fear for loss of our very existence, we do not have the co-dependencies that always come with ego-states or false identities.
So the point is that consciousness manifests from the Absolute…from that “state” that is comparable to the DEEP SLEEP in the relative existence. To that it shall return, just as the body rises from sleep and returns to sleep in 24-hour cycles. In between, the consciousness can be pure and AWAKE and aware or it can be lulled into a misinformed DREAM state. Too, it can be re-purified and can leave the DREAM and can be truly AWAKE. In the end, though, just as the body and mind and brainwaves cannot refuse the sleep state, so the consciousness can do nothing that will prevent the eventual return to the pool of consciousness at-rest where nothing is known, where no forms or bodies exist, where no punishments or pleasures are experienced, and from which portions of consciousness might again manifest…or not. Either way, it doesn’t mean a thing. Know that the bliss can come in the relative only when it happens in a fashion like that of the Absolute. In that state, no needs are imagined so nothing is taken to be useful. When the manifested consciousness knows it is THAT, even while manifested, the peace of no needs and no desires and no fears just happens. That is the parallel that Advaitans invite protégés to know. That is the peace that Advaitans invite protégés to enjoy in the relative existence. Please enter into the silence of contemplation.
TOMORROW: “When Christians say that an inanimate object, such as a rock, has no soul, or you say consciousness manifests itself in anything with a nervous system, we are limiting the Absolute or God to only what we can understand—right?”
