Levels of Experience

    One summer night when we were around 14, my best friend Kazimir and I were walking through a park in Montreal near where we lived. We noticed 20 or more people near us all looking upwards. We stopped, looked up, and saw this extraordinary, large, bright white, stationary object overhead. We all stared at it for several minutes. We had no idea what it was, but decided that nobody would believe our description, so we went home and never discussed it.

     Roughly fifty years ago, while a university student working for the summer as an orderly in a large hospital, I was called to help clean up a mess. I arrived to find a tragicomedy unfolding. An elderly, apparently famous gentleman, dressed only in an untied, soiled Johnny shirt, was experiencing explosive diarrhea all over his private hospital room's bathroom. Several hospital staff were helplessly standing around, trying to keep him from slipping & falling into the mess. Only one person was quite beside herself - the gentleman's elderly wife. She was impeccably dressed in black, evening-at-the-opera attire, complete with all the jewellery, black gloves etc. The gentleman himself was impressively peaceful, gently trying to calm his completely distraught wife.

    During that summer in the same hospital, I chatted with a young man who was about to have heart surgery the next day. He was friendly, cheerfully looking forward to enjoying the rest of his life post-op. I wished him well. The next day, I came by to visit, and found his bed made and empty. I asked about him, and was told he had died during surgery.

    "Shit happens," no matter how obsessively we try to control ourselves, others & life in general. If we live long enough, we realize it's just a question of when. And yet we do have freedom, which depends on our perspective, which determines our response. 

    We can, and I fear many of us do, see each individual unwelcome event in our life as if it were some random or even intentional cruelty of chance, Nature or the Divine. We can keep count of these, and rationalize holding a grudge against the meaningless of life, cruelty of Nature, or malevolence of God. This is our noisy ego's last desperate, failed attempt to hang onto its own relevance. It is the ego / false self / separate self that goes through Kübler-Ross' 5 stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression & acceptance. 

    While our wiser 'part' / Self is aware of the bigger picture and our intimate connection with everyone & everything, our Oneness.
    "There’s a crucial 6th stage to the grieving process: meaning. ... we acknowledge that although for most of us grief will lessen in intensity over time, it will never end. But if we allow ourselves to move fully into this crucial & profound sixth stage – meaning – it will allow us to transform grief into something else, something rich & fulfilling." David Kessler. “Finding Meaning: The Sixth Stage of Grief.” Scribner, 2019. 

    But the ego does not give up pretending to be in complete control easily! One ploy is taking on the persona of "the liminoid ... when you start to take pride in the breakdowns, trouble & commotion of your life, because you think ... ‘it makes you windswept and interesting.’" Martin Shaw  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpi06B0mvSI&list=PLb7eXq8MJBchKf73SDzbcMyD3i-mhjJsn&index=2
    When all else fails, the ego's last act is to PROUDLY cling to anything: Charlton Heston, spokesperson for the National Rifle Association (NRA), "I'll give you my gun when you pry it from my cold, dead hands" and Dylan Thomas' call to the dying, "Rage, rage against the dying of the light." 

    Our Self knows better, and we can hear our own wisdom when the ego isn't yelling.

    But we require a lifetime of intentional training to recognize how thoroughly we have been conditioned by our stunningly shallow society to abandon our true nature and instead adopt a robotic level of self-centered left-hemisphere dominance.

    The training, the practice we need is one by which we progressively remember our true nature, who we truly are, and integrate this more & more consistently, into daily life. 
    "Growing pains" are inevitable on any learning journey, especially a spiritual one which requires us to release compulsive self-centeredness. It's probably easier for an obese life-long 'couch potato' to become an elite athlete, than for the average person who considers him/herself open-minded and 'good' to become moderately spiritual. 
    These 2 very recent interviews shed useful light on this process :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkX-Dc6WRcs

https://batgap.com/jurgen-ziewe-2/

 

The Jeff Healey Band - "While My Guitar Gently Weeps"

Our Best is Needed

    "The question we need to ask ourselves is whether there is any place we can stand in ourselves where we can look at all that's happening around us without freaking out, where we can be quiet enough to really hear our predicament, and where we can begin to find ways of acting that are at least not contributing to further destabilization.” Ram Dass

    We can easily remember Ram Dass' words with the help of these two short phrases:

    In the wonderful TV series, "New Amsterdam," Dr. Max Goodwin's response to even the most challenging situations was to ask, "How can I help?"
    And if we can't help, then: "At least do harm."

 

    What do we value most in a human being? What are the best attributes of people we most admire? 

    Decency, honesty, trustworthiness, reliability, kindness, acceptance, humility, courage & nurturing stand out for me.

 

    Aren't these the very same characteristics that lie deep within us all? These attributes - sparks of the Divine - we all potentially or actually manifest under optimal conditions, when we feel sufficiently safe & brave enough to lower our hardened defenses, and be authentic - our true Self? 

    We can easily differentiate between feeling rigid with fear, guarded, aggressive, enraged, versus when we feel safe, relaxed, glowing with an open-heart & open mind. 

    BUT what's really valuable is learning to recognize how we habitually remain armored, at least somewhat tight & hyper-vigilant even when there's NO "clear and present danger" AND how this constantly corrodes all our perceptions, thinking, speech & behaviors. 

    ONLY by repeatedly recognizing & releasing this default survivalist, separate-self, adversarial illusion are we able to gradually stop sabotaging our own quality of life, and the quality of life of all those around us.

    What clues do we have, that we're lost in the default survivalist, separate-self, adversarial illusion? We feel physically tight, strained, anxious, impatient, 'time poverty,' 'empty' or 'lacking' something, desperate to 'keep busy,' competitive, aggressive. OR we may feel 'lack luster,' no energy, no interests, no plans, hopeless, down. OR we may feel constantly anxious, afraid & upset by a wide variety of things, and assume that it's these that are making us sick. But fear of living AND fear of dying are common. Meditation teacher Ezra Bayda calls it the "anxious quiver of being."

    Becoming clearly aware of what's really going on, here & now occurs only in stillness, not by "keeping busy" chasing after stuff, nor running away from other stuff. Perhaps that's why we fear to, and rarely stop & look carefully. Our compulsive activity - like furiously riding a rocking horse - gives the illusion of "getting somewhere." HOWEVER, intentionally being aware of what's really here & now gradually tames our fears, and intimately engages us with the awesome mystery of Reality.

    “When I change the level of my awareness, I start attracting a different reality.” Santon Saint Pierre, French philosopher

    Living in the default survivalist, separate self, adversarial illusion feels bad & harms myself & everyone around me. 

    I CAN learn to detect this default way of being, repeatedly let it go, relax, open my heart-mind, and ALLOW my true nature - decency, honesty, trustworthiness, reliability, kindness, acceptance, humility, courage & nurturing - to shine, which radically changes EVERYTHING - our perceptions, thinking, speech & behaviors. It's a lifelong adventure.

     

Passenger - "When We Were Young"

Ordinary Mysticism

    Many of us turn away from traditional organized religion, paradoxically, because we are more spiritual than most representatives of organized religion.  
    Organized religions are, in general, typical large corporations (group egos) that do 'whatever it takes' to survive & grow, and as a result have long ago lost understanding & interest in their founder's original intention. As self-interest (individual & group) increases, values & ideals proportionately diminish. 

    Those of us who are serious about healthy maturation / aging / spirituality travel, often alone, in the opposite direction:

“... as self decreases,
the Divine increases.”
Bernadette Roberts 

    Mystics have compassion for (all) religious traditions, but are spiritually independent. They hold specific religious affiliations (group egos) very lightly, and focus almost exclusively on their direct experiential connection with the Absolute. 

    "Thomas Merton once said, ‘The regrettable thing about the Christian missionary movement is that all too often the Christian missionaries failed to realize that people they were converting were as or more holy than they were.’"
    James Finley on Mysticism, Psychedelic Drugs, Transgenderism, Thomas Merton and Richard Rohr : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymSfaKy4CPI – EXCEPTIONAL

    It's confusing & sad when large corporate entities - be it food-supply multinationals, or major religions - that originally stood for something good & meaningful, progressively degenerate, 'sell out.'  
    Individuals who still pursue what's good & meaningful, must learn to do so independently.

     Below, two excerpts from Mirabai Starr - former professor of world religions, author of many books on spirituality, mostly about the great Christian mystics:

    “Your life is holy ground. And you are a mystic. 
     I know you are because all it means to be a mystic is to have a direct experience of the Sacred. You have had zillions of those. You may be having one right now. Some resonance in your bones that whispers, Yes, I belong. I am intertwined with all that is. A mystic is someone who skips over the intermediaries (ordained clergy, prescribed prayers, rigid belief systems) and goes straight to God. Meaning, someone who experiences the Divine as an intimate encounter, rather than an article of faith. A mystical experience may or may not be connected to established spiritual traditions, theological structures, or faith communities. Mysticism is not about concepts: it is about communion with Ultimate Reality. And Ultimate Reality is not some faraway prize we claim when we have proved ourselves worthy to perceive it. Ultimate Reality blooms at the heart of regular life. It shines through the cracks of our daily struggles and sings from the core of our deepest desires. 
     A mystic knows beyond ideas, feels deeper than emotions, is fundamentally changed by That which is Unchanging. Mysticism is a way of seeing – beyond the turmoil, the rights and wrongs, the good guys and villains – to the radiant Heart of things. The mystical gaze reveals the miracle in the summer thunderstorm and the bowl of ramen. It glimpses the face of the holy in the withered dahlias and blesses the sound of the siren in the middle of the night. It quickens the heart with yearning and soothes the soul with the felt presence of the sublime. A mystic gazes through the eyes of love, and love reveals itself as the only true thing. 
    For most of us, mystical seeing does not happen all the time, but for all of us, it happens some of the time. And for more and more of us, it is happening more and more of the time. In proportion to current challenges of systemic inequity and climate catastrophe, the flowering of grassroots activism and the uncovering of ancestral trauma in our own family systems, old filters are burning away and we are granted renewed access to the numinous nature of reality.  
    When you decide to walk the path of the mystic, the mundane shows up as miraculous, the boring becomes fascinating, and your own shortcomings turn out to be your greatest gifts. 

    My friend James Finley – a living mystic if ever there was one – puts it like this: ‘If we are absolutely grounded in the absolute love of God that protects us from nothing even as it sustains us in all things, then we can face all things with courage & tenderness and touch the hurting places in others and in ourselves with love.’ ” 
    Mirabai Starr. “Ordinary Mysticism. Your Life as Sacred Ground.” HarperOne, 2024.

 

     “The classical scholarly definition of a mystical experience is a direct experience of the Sacred, or of the Divine, or of God, depending on your tradition, and what language works for you. It’s unmediated through prescribed prayers, ordained clergy, or belief systems. It’s an experience of the sacred that is direct and transformational, even if subtly. 
    So what I’m talking about here is not past life regression, or sound healing, or anything like that. Those are beautiful, wonderful things, but that’s not what I mean by mystical. 
    I mean an experience of Union. It’s a unitive experience with the loving truth of reality. I say loving because to me Ultimate Reality – what you might call God or the Divine or the Sacred – is characterized by love. And so it’s a direct experience of that vast, loving reality. 
    (Quoting her 90yo agnostic mother), 'A mystical experience is when you have an encounter with something that is deeply moving, and you don’t skip over it, you stay with it, you make yourself available for the fullness of that experience.'

    So whether it’s watching an osprey landing on the mangrove outside our window, and look into your eyes, or if it’s about receiving a phone call that the lump in your friend’s breast is malignant. 
    A whole range of moments can be portals to deep presence - IF we don’t run away, IF we stay with it and cultivate a kind of curiosity and willingness to be transformed by the encounter, whatever it may be, willingness to be changed by it." 
    Insights at the Edge: “Your Life Is Holy Ground” with Mirabai Starr https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4lBH4A0zxU

Our Present Society is in the "Kindergarten of Consciousness"