A Wise, Potentially Transformative Interview

    While listening to a Michael Neill interview, I discovered the host of nextlevelsoul.com Alex Ferrari. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND listening to this excellent interview, and for those who get more out of reading, there is also a fine transcript: https://nextlevelsoul.com/michael-neill-true-self/ 
    Below is Ferrari's very fine introduction:

"On today’s episode, we welcome Michael Neill, a thoughtful teacher of human consciousness who explores how fear, thought, and misunderstanding keep us from recognizing the deeper intelligence already alive within us. There is a strange habit in human life of assuming that if we feel unsettled, then something somewhere must be wrong. We search the world for the broken piece, and if we cannot find it in our circumstances, we turn inward and decide that the flaw must be in us. This is one of the great tragedies of being human: not that we suffer, but that we so quickly conclude that suffering means we are defective. In this profound conversation, Michael Neill opens a gentler door, one that does not ask us to become something else, but to notice what we already are beneath the noise.

There is something almost comical about the way we chase fulfillment, as if peace were hiding behind one more success, one more achievement, one more perfect moment in which the world finally arranges itself according to our preferences. We are taught this from an early age. We are told to improve, optimize, correct, and repair ourselves until we become worthy of rest. Yet the deeper wisdom of life suggests something else entirely. It suggests that beneath all the frantic movement of the mind, there is already a quiet wholeness, untouched by our personal dramas. The tragedy is not that this wholeness is far away, but that it is so close, so ever-present, that we overlook it while searching for fireworks in the distance.

What struck me most in this conversation was the way he dismantled the illusion of brokenness with such grace and precision. He spoke about how many people spend their lives trying to fix what was never actually damaged in the first place. That lands deeply, because so much of modern life is built on convincing us that we are lacking. If we are not enough, then we can be sold the promise of becoming enough. If we are not healed, we can be sold the process. If we are not awakened, we can be sold the map. But as he so beautifully implied, the map is often mistaken for the territory, and the territory itself is already alive beneath our feet. Or as he said so simply and powerfully, “we’re obsessed with the mess, and we miss the amazing bit.”

There is also a spiritual maturity in the way he speaks of success, because he does not condemn it, nor does he worship it. He simply sees it for what it is: neutral. Success can be a beautiful expression of inner alignment, or it can be a desperate attempt to patch an invisible wound. The world often celebrates the outer result without asking what energy created it. And that is why so many people can arrive at the summit, only to discover they are still haunted by the same insecurity they had at the bottom of the mountain. If inner poverty remains, no amount of applause can make one feel rich. This is why some of the most outwardly celebrated souls remain inwardly restless. They have achieved the dream the world handed them, but not the peace their own spirit was asking for.

As the conversation deepened, we moved into the nature of spirit itself, and here the waters became beautifully clear. He described spirit not as an ideology, religion, or special category reserved for monks and mystics, but as the formless intelligence from which life itself arises. That insight alone can loosen a thousand years of misunderstanding. To say that one is spiritual is almost redundant, because one cannot be anything else. The wave may forget the ocean, but it is never separate from it. The body moves, the mind chatters, the personality performs its little dance, yet beneath all of it there remains a stillness that does not come and go. It is there in joy, there in sorrow, there in confusion, and there in clarity. The mind may scream that life is unstable, but spirit remains as it always has been—silent, spacious, and complete.

What I also loved was his refusal to deny the darker side of human experience while still insisting on a deeper truth underneath it. This is not naive spirituality dressed in pleasant language. It is not pretending that cruelty does not exist or that human beings never lose themselves in violence, greed, or fear. Rather, it is the understanding that when people are deeply lost, they act from that lostness. That does not excuse harmful behavior, but it does illuminate it. It helps us see that confusion creates suffering, and suffering passed through an unconscious mind becomes suffering inflicted on others. The wisdom here is not in becoming passive, but in recognizing that if we only fight darkness as darkness, we will remain trapped in the same dream that created it. Something far more transformative happens when one begins to see beyond the behavior, to the misunderstanding beneath it.

Again and again, the conversation returned to trust. Not lazy trust, not wishful thinking, but a living trust in the intelligence of life itself. We have become so accustomed to strategizing our way through existence that we mistake anxiety for wisdom. We assume that if we worry enough, calculate enough, and control enough, we will finally become safe. But life has never offered that bargain. The river does not ask us to control its currents. It asks us to learn how to float. That is why one of the deepest revelations in this episode is the reminder that fear and awareness are not the same thing. Awareness is clean, direct, present. Fear is the mind trying to outmaneuver life before life has even happened. And from that misunderstanding, entire identities are built.

Perhaps that is why conversations like this feel so necessary now. So much of the old world is trembling. Institutions, identities, and assumptions that once seemed immovable are cracking before our eyes. And while the mind interprets this as catastrophe, spirit often uses collapse as invitation. When the false begins to fall away, the real has a chance to be seen. What remains after the noise is not emptiness, but presence. Not despair, but a deeper kind of sanity. And maybe that is the hidden grace in all of this: that when we finally tire of trying to fix the movie, we may at last turn and notice the light behind it.

SPIRITUAL TAKEAWAYS

• Much of human suffering comes from the mistaken belief that we are fundamentally broken
• True spirituality is not something to attain, but something we already are
• Peace begins when we trust life more than the anxious strategies of the mind

So in the end, what lingers is not merely a set of ideas, but a softer way of meeting life. A way that does not demand perfection before peace, or certainty before surrender. It reminds us that beneath all striving, beneath all self-judgment, beneath all the endless noise of becoming, there is already a presence quietly waiting to be noticed. And once it is noticed, even for a moment, life begins to feel less like a battle and more like a sacred unfolding.

Please enjoy my conversation with Michael Neill." "Connecting To Your True Self" https://nextlevelsoul.com/michael-neill-true-self/  

 

Resilience

    We need resilience now more than ever. Here's Michael Neill's advice:

    "The conventional idea of resilience was our ability to bounce back from problems, bad situations, traumas, things like that. ‘Battered but not broken.’ ‘Sadder but wiser.’ I never loved it, because I don’t know if I want to be sadder but wiser. Can I just be happy and dumb? There are all sorts of lovely metaphors, ‘You can push something under water, but it’ll always rise back up to the surface.’ I don’t discount any of that. That is our nature.

    But for me, what makes us resilient is our ability to start from scratch any time, in any moment, to literally have a fresh start every day if we want, every hour if we want.

    Not, ‘Oh, I’ve got to start again!’ but that capacity to begin each day from a blank page, instead of as the next page in an ongoing novel of problems, suffering, despair and trauma. Now, of course we have those too. But if I’m carrying 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years of past problems, and I’m groaning how ‘I’m resilient, I can carry this load,’ that’s very different from knowing that I can live today free from that. I can start today without my backpack of rocks. That capacity to me is our innate resilience. That ability to start from scratch, to get a fresh start in any moment, to literally begin each day, each moment as good as new.

    The other thing is that 'battered & bruised but wiser.' I sometimes use the metaphor of a mirror. 
    A mirror can be reflecting horror, horrific things for years and years and years. But the mirror is untouched. It’s as good as new. And if the next thing that comes in front of the mirror is beautiful, the mirror will reflect beauty. It doesn’t matter if it’s been 50 years reflecting something else. And that’s just built into the nature of the mirror. Well, we’re like that. We are, as best as I understand, pure consciousness in form.

    Another metaphor I use is people think of themselves as the person on the ground, getting either rained on, or the sun is shining. And you hope for more sunshiny days than rainy days in your life. But it seems to me that we’re the sky, like we are the place within which weather happens.

    And so, yeah, there’ll be rainy days and I don’t think the sky minds that there are rainy days, because the sky is still the sky. I don’t think the sky minds if there are a lot of clouds on some days. We all have cloudy days. ‘Rainy days and Mondays,’ right? But the sky doesn’t mind because the Sun’s still there, just sometimes we don’t see it for a little while. But we know it’s there. There’s never been a police report filed for a missing Sun. 
    In the same way, if we start to get our innate spark, our innate intelligence, our responsiveness, our creativity, our sense of fun, our sense of play, they never go anywhere. They’re like the Sun. Sometimes they’re in evidence, sometimes they’re not, but they’re powering the system the whole time.” 
    Powerful Insights are Found in the Present Moment: Michael Neill Interview 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ssz_sz2mLA8

    Some will automatically dismiss all of the above as wishful, even delusional thinking.
    One major reason for such pessimism is that some (like me in the past) not just habitually consider, but envision (and dream!!) worst case scenarios in excruciatingly vivid detail. The logic is to be prepared, to never be caught off guard. And when anything less terrible happens, we're lucky!
    This is not only a sadly common, pessimistic view of life, but detailed imaginings (thoughts) of worst case scenarios have the exact same damaging effects on us as if we actually lived through them. Strange but true, it's very difficult to let go of a lifetime habit of pessimism. Pessimists tend to feel arrogantly superior eg "Well, I hate to be the devil's advocate, but ...."

    "Would you rather be right, or would you rather be happy?" Marshall B. Rosenberg

    Pessimists usually continue to cling to 'being right' even though their bleak attitude causes them, and people around them, unhappiness.

    “One of the greatest misconceptions ever is the belief that … ‘It takes years to find wisdom.’ Many experience time, few experience wisdom. The achievement of mental stability and peace of mind is one thought (insight) away from everyone on earth … if you can find that one thought. 
     Throughout time, human beings have experienced insights that spontaneously and completely changed their behavior and their lives, bringing them happiness they previously had thought impossible. 
    Finding wisdom has nothing to do with time.
    Achieving mental stability is a matter of finding healthy thoughts from moment to moment. Such thoughts can be light years or a second away.”  
    Sydney Banks, "The Missing Link: Reflections on Philosophy and Spirit.” Lone Pine Publishing, 1998.

    Michael Neill's teachings are based on the Sydney Banks' awakening experience & subsequent teachings & books, which are imho very worth a deep immersion, which realistically very few readers will take the time to do. Many of those who have thoroughly acquainted themselves have benefited greatly.

    Here is 1 useful & important introductory talk: 
Sydney Banks “The Insight” (2006) 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TxQ6qsPgSsc

    Delve deeper: 

    Here are 4 talks that nicely summarize his teachings:
Sydney Banks Oahu, Hawaii 2001 PARTS 1-4: https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=Sydney+Banks+Oahu%2C+Hawaii+2001

Sydney Banks “The Insight” (2006)

Feelings are Important

    "Our feelings are a barometer of how our thoughts are being utilized." 
     Sydney Banks, "The Enlightened Gardener" Lone Pine Publishing, 2016.

     How am I? Seriously - check in with yourself! Why? Because the whole gamut of BAD feelings are caused by "thinking." It's NOT what happens to us, but how we THINK about it that causes MOST of our suffering. And we're OFTEN caught - much like whales entangled in fishing nets - in useless thinking (self-talk, internal chatter). We're almost constantly talking to ourselves in our heads, and 90-95% of it is useless, even harmful. We innocently but WRONGLY assume that this steady chatter tells us the objective truth, who we actually are and provides evidence that we're alive & thinking rationally. NO! The vast majority of self-talk is old, repetitious bits of "the story of me" - a poor, wronged, separate me, barely surviving in a crazy, hostile world.

    Whenever we're caught up in self-talk, we actually feel BAD: stressed, overwhelmed, out of control, contracted, sad / angry, lonely & disconnected. Our "mind racing" is not normal. "Multitasking" is not productive. There's often a real sense of "time crunch" - not nearly enough time to get everything done, even in a "half-assed" way. You may be thinking, 'Stop the world, I want to get off!' This is just rushing towards burnout.  

    “Every human being is sitting in the middle of mental health and they don't know it.” Sydney Banks

    So we can't stop the world, BUT each one of us CAN let go of the actual cause of most of our unnecessary, self-inflicted suffering - we CAN let go of self-talk!  

    We can easily detect when we're caught up in self-talk because it makes us feel BAD. So we first notice self-talk going on AND we drop it, just let it go, stop supplying energy that sustains noise. EVERYONE CAN DO THIS. Then repeatedly bring awareness to the silence that is always there between, behind, underneath the words & other noises. Be curious, "listen for" & enjoy resting, luxuriating in the silence. 

    Quickly you'll begin to appreciate all that comes with silence: peace (instead of stress & time-poverty); wisdom & calm competence (instead of feeling overwhelmed & out of control); spaciousness & relaxation (instead of contraction & tension); intimacy & oneness (instead of loneliness & disconnectedness). Within this peaceful silence we effortlessly connect with deepest intelligence or wisdom & creativity which far exceeds our personal (egoic) intelligence. We operate FAR more wisely, efficiently, empathically, and joyfully when we're acting from the depth of who we truly are.

    "When mind and soul are in unison, you will experience mental well-being."
     Sydney Banks, "The Enlightened Gardener" Lone Pine Publishing, 2016.

DO listen to this EXCELLENT 56 minute Michael Neill interview

 

Starting the Hero's Journey

    I boldly suggest that each one of us is on our own individual hero's journey, and will complete it in this lifetime, or after an unknown number of lifetimes. Most of us don't seem to be in any hurry, however, completion - awakening - does eliminate tremendous amounts of needless suffering. 

     In the forward, Angelo DiLullo dedicates his valuable guidebook to awakening with, "to anyone who, from this moment forward, is willing to forgo comfort and predictability to venture into the unknown in the name of truth." We do love our comforts and can quickly get very upset if our wifi is unexpectedly lost for a few minutes.

        “… we live in a society of endless distractions and any of these can be used to avoid discomfort. Well, when we take up an investigation of our deepest truths, we are voluntarily putting ourselves in situations that, by nature, make it hard to distract ourselves. As we do this, we will often notice some discomfort. Sometimes it is a mild uneasiness. Other times it might feel more intense. Either way it can be tremendously helpful to simply acknowledge the discomfort. ‘Okay, I am feeling uncomfortable. What is it like? What does it feel like in my body at this moment? Do I have to do something to immediately distract myself like my thoughts or habits suggest, or can I just be with it?’ You might be surprised. What you’ve been running from for years might turn out to be tolerable, even enjoyable after a time.

    ‘The ultimate measure of a human being is not where he stands in moments of comfort & convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.’ 

    Martin Luther King Jr. 

 

    Perhaps you can only sit with the discomfort for a few minutes at first, and that’s perfectly acceptable. Over time you will start to recognize that you have an innate capacity to relax into whatever the body is feeling in the moment. With this relaxation, you may notice an alchemical process. The restlessness & discomfort will begin to transform into an experience of presence & wholeness. An intuitive realization might dawn – the discomfort itself was not what was making us distractible, restless, & irritable. These were only side effects of the habitual activity of running from our emotions. With this realization, we start to recognize that there is intelligence in discomfort. It is like a messenger telling you, ‘Look here!’ This will begin to replace the old habit pattern that seems to say, ‘Run away!’ As we experientially recognize our capacity to sit with these processes, a certain spontaneous willingness begins to emerge. We see that by voluntarily opening to the intelligence of these uncomfortable moments, we are simply acknowledging what is already within us. We recognize that to run from these experiences is to run from ourselves. We’ve done that for too long, haven’t we? All that running is what is causing our suffering. This separation from ourselves is what perpetuates that sense of separation from others, and from life itself.

    You will find (awakening) to be the adventure of all adventures. 

    BUT if it’s not your priority at this time in life, then by all means, put it aside and pursue what most authentically moves you. This book will always be available if you choose to return and readdress this matter. There is no judgement from me or the Universe. If you genuinely feel that it is your path to be an exceptional parent and raise a family, then that is exactly what you should be doing. If you want to throw yourself fully into art or music, then that is exactly what you should do. If you feel genuinely moved to pursue a life of scientific investigation, then by all means go do that. This is your life, so doing what feels most authentic and relevant to you regardless of social expectation is what will be most fulfilling."
    Angelo DiLullo MD. “Awake. It’s Your Turn.” 2021. VALUABLE GUIDEBOOK

    After my awakening experience, "everything changed. Everything changed. What really stunned me, I was in the middle of really a lot of turmoil in my personal life at the time and literally an hour before my awakening, there were all the problems I was dealing with in my life, and an hour later there was no problem anymore. And this has absolutely nothing to do with the denying of facts. This is not about denying that things are not working, or that it’s some kind of inertia or lack of action or downplaying or denying the reality of the situation. It’s because the narrative drops. When the narrative – the thought-created narrative – is not there, then you actually get to have a very clear view of the situation, rather than overshadowed by the narrative. There was a situation, I can tell you with certainty that happened following this awakening, that would have been really shocking, really painful and devastating, had it happened before that awakening. I would have been devastated. It would have broken me. It would have broken me. And yet here I was, in that situation, dealing with it with such clarity and grace that I never thought I would be capable of. I was completely stunned by the lack of drama that I know otherwise would be there. Was there pain? Yes. Was there shock? Yes. But there was such clarity of perception and knowing how to navigate this situation that really was both personal and impersonal at the same time. It even stunned Michael (Neill – my teacher at the time) because when I told him that, he went very quiet. He was speechless because he got to hear what I witnessed and the details of what was so shocking and painful, and when I then told him how I dealt with it and shared with him how I saw everything, he himself went quiet and he said, wow, unbelievable, even I think I would lose it in the same situation.” 
    Angelo DiLullo “Academics to Awakening! - Interview with Maggie” 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvqlmackJN0  

    "If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is: Infinite. For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern." William Blake  

Leonard Cohen - "What Happens to the Heart?"

My small self OR the Divine OR ...

     From my earliest childhood memories, I've sensed a wise, loving, guiding presence in my life. As an adult, I thought that somehow I'd forgotten who exactly this powerful influence on me was - perhaps my Dad, my favorite aunt or some other kind individual. This sense arose almost certainly before "individuating" into my small separate self.  
    Nevertheless, I maintained the connection to this relationship, understanding that my mind was not enough, that I needed all of my intelligences to deal with the challenges of daily life. So here I was assuming that this was something like intuition, perhaps bodily way of knowing, or even some spiritual connection to animals or nature.

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us." Marianne Williamson

    When I was 50 or so, I had the insight that a key spiritual shift was the realization that instead of desperately needing love, our very nature can somehow transform, and spiritually turn inside out, becoming the source of love. 

    “In my world love is the only law.  
     I do not ask for love, I give it.”                     Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

 
    Then, facilitating Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) courses, I would talk about each of us having both a "Hurt Inner Child" as well as a "Wise Grandparent" sub-personality or 'part' (Internal Family Systems {IFS}). When the Hurt Child in us is triggered & upset, the Wise Grandparent in us can see the bigger picture and bring loving comfort.

    This morning, while listening to Helen Hamilton's wise nondual teaching (below), I realized after almost 8 decades of wondering, that the mysterious presence from my early childhood was, is, and will be "Self" - the aspect of our unique personhood that is one with the transpersonal Divine. This is love, the life force that animates us and all phenomena as well as the unseen. 

"When we try to pick out anything by itself, 
we find it hitched 
to everything else in the universe." 
John Muir

 

    Recognizing nonduality is said to be as challenging as it is for fish to recognize the water in which they live. Water is everywhere outside & inside the fish, it's what they are, it's taken for granted, and therefore "hidden in plain sight" - almost undetectable. And yet, the difference in one's quality of life as one shifts from dualism to increasingly seeing from a nondualistic perspective is indescribable. Here is Angelo DiLullo's story: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OKU-3-jXAA

    Below, Helen Hamilton provides guidance in self-inquiry to help discern who/what we truly are, which is also "hidden in plain sight" - almost undetectable.

Helen Hamilton: “Cutting Through Illusion with the Sword of Discernment!"

 

Old Stories - OR - Directly Experiencing Reality

    I resonate with the nondual teachings of people like Lisa Cairns, Helen Hamilton, Gangaji, Angelo DiLullo, Henry Shukman, Louise Kay, Eckhart Tolle, Adyashanti, Richard Rohr, James Finley, Rami Shapiro, David Steindl-Rast, Norman Fischer, Rumi, Rainer Maria Rilke, etc.

    "I believe that, whatever we’re going to call it – God, Kali or whatever – is a nondual Reality. I don’t believe that there’s a God separate from Nature, who created the world, who judges us, and all that. I’m not a dualist. I’m a nondualist. And so I’m interested in the nondual aspects of Hinduism and Vedanta, in Taoism and Zen, Christianity, Islam, wherever – they all have this nondual perspective among their mystics. I’m interested in that. I will play in all those arenas, because I think they’re all leading us to the same ineffable experience. When you’re talking about that nondual reality, the labels are irrelevant. And I mean, every religious tradition has this mystic element. And because the mystics understand that - God or whatever they’re going to call it - can be experienced directly, in, with, & as you. And I’m interested in that experience. But that’s not what the conventional religious teachers tell you."
    Rami Shapiro "CHALLENGING BELIEFS: Are You a VICTIM of Spiritual Misguidance?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rZLlvXFQ7k 

 
    "The final stage of love is nondual love, or love before division, or love before separation. Love where there is no person or thing to love. There is just love recognizing itself. So, when love looks at something, that love sees itself in a different disguise. It doesn’t see a person or a thing, only recognizes itself."
    Helen Hamilton – “The Pathway of Love” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWkkmLx1G6Y 

    “Vigilance is awareness of what does not disappear even when objects appear. Whether those objects are exquisite or horrible or mundane, always there is awareness aware of itself. Whether those objects are emotional or mental or physical, always there is awareness aware of itself.  
    Pure vigilance must be an ease of recognition; otherwise, there is doing vigilance, and this is already not vigilant. When you hear this thought, Now I am going to do vigilance, ask yourself, ‘Who’ is doing vigilance? This is direct self-inquiry. You will see that it is quite natural to be aware of passing objects as well as aware of what is aware of both passing objects and itself. 
     It is a mistaken understanding that implies vigilance to be a burden. The real burden is the denial of your beingness as awareness itself. The idea that vigilance is a burden comes from the concept of spiritual practice. You are admonished to practice. ‘You have to keep your practice.’ 
    I don’t know what the word practice is translated from, but it is a bad translation, because in English practice means some kind of preparation for a real event. You practice for the football game. You practice for your recital. So I don’t use the word practice in terms of vigilance. I am talking about being vigilance. Be that right now. You are that already. Recognize yourself as that, and be vigilant to your true nature. Then see. Without looking for anything, see. 
    In Western culture, particularly in America, we are trained to know what is going to be ahead and to attempt to make it be what we want it to be. This is why there is so much suffering here, trying to force life to be something based on a particular concept. Then we search for agreement with that concept and fight any disagreement of that concept. Even if we are victorious in our fight, we are left unsatisfied, unfulfilled. 
    Wait and see doesn’t necessarily mean you sit on your couch and never move. It also doesn’t necessarily mean that you get off your couch and move. It is much deeper than that. An active life can be lived as vigilance, and an inactive life can be lived as vigilance. 
    There will be many insights. There will be many revelations and deepening experiences. In the midst of it all, be vigilant to what has not moved, what has always been whole, what has always been radiant & unpolluted. There will be even deeper insights. Enjoy them as they come, wave them good-bye as they pass, and be vigilant to what has not moved, what has not been lost by the experience of loss, and what has not been augmented by the experience of gain. 
    Be vigilance. The deepest joy of the human experience is to be vigilant. It is not a task. It is bliss itself. A bliss that is awake & vigilant to what never moves, to what is always present. Be that. Then you will see that this entity called your lifetime unfolds exquisitely, as a flower unfolds. As it begins to die, it will die exquisitely, as a flower dies. You don’t need to dip it in wax so that it will stay forever at a certain stage. Death is not the enemy. Fear of death is the enemy. Fear of death is the result of the misidentification of yourself as some particular entity. Your true identification is the sky of being.”
    Gangaji. “Freedom and Resolve. Finding Your True Home in the Universe.” Hampton Roads, 2014. VALUABLE little book!

 

    May this guided nondual (30 minute) meditation help you feel into, remember & re-experience deep calm, homecoming & peace - that you (& everyone & everything) already are, have always been, & will always be: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkhrKy4FStE

 

    “Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. 
     ... live in the question.” Rainer Maria Rilke

 

 

Reality Beyond Words

     From before recorded history, mystics in the form of shamans, medicine women & men, sages, saints, alchemists, various varieties of artists, and most recently quantum physicists have been pointing out how reality is INFINITELY greater and FAR more complex than we can describe, or even imagine. 
    Our mind filters out (blocks from our consciousness) most of our perceptions, to prevent us from being overwhelmed, thus allowing us to focus only on what's necessary for survival. So our mind is both an information 'receiver', and a 'reducing valve.' 

    Our society's mindset has become far too narrowly, self-destructively, self-centered - using Iain McGilchrist's profound understanding, 'Left-hemisphere dominant': http://www.johnlovas.com/2024/03/knockin-on-heavens-door.html Our current mindset is 'Unwise' both in terms of secular academic wisdom research, http://www.johnlovas.com/2021/06/loads-of-information-some-knowledge.html as well as humanity's timeless wisdom traditions. 
    Wisdom traditions can be compared to politics. Many politicians put self-interest & their own party's success, ahead of the welfare of their country. Such "partisanship" - a form of individual & group narcissism - is tearing the US apart. However, some politicians are decent mature human beings, who take their job seriously, primarily serve their country's, & ideally the world's, best interests. Wisdom traditions, taken seriously, guide practitioners toward ethical behavior, unconditional love of self & others, and the capacity to gracefully navigate life's most difficult existential challenges. Like politics, religions (both often working as one) have a shameful history of incompetence, corruption & criminal behavior. Nevertheless, both politics and wisdom traditions - when taken seriously - are vital & irreplaceable for a deeply meaningful life.
    Clearly both individuals and society have a duty to deeply care for, to wisely nurture, themselves & each other. 

    It takes a certain type of intelligence to quickly become a billionaire, to become a populist dictator, to become a wealthy slum lord, or 'succeed' in any other criminal activity. But to mature into a peaceful, generous, collaborative, loving, nurturing human being requires a rare & infinitely more precious quality: wisdom. 
    Our society has almost completely forgotten about the value, or even the meaning of wisdom. As a result, we're democratically electing an increasing number of world leaders who have all the attributes & more of Batman-movie villains, but none of the attributes of wise leaders such as: Mahatma Gandhi, Václav Havel, Nelson Madela, Jacinda Ardern, etc.

    We MUST re-educate ourselves about, and individually & collectively embody wisdom in order to heal our broken Earth so that our children, grandchildren and as yet unborn future generations can survive & even thrive. 

    A senior nondual teacher - Tony Parsons - points us towards wisdom which is nondual. Our dualistic minds find nonduality paradoxical at best. The most highly spiritually-evolved mystics & saints of all our wisdom traditions have always lived & pointed toward nondual wisdom, BUT even their own 'conservative' religious institutions have been systematically persecuting & murdering them out of fear, ignorance & jealousy. 
    HOWEVER, we're NOW at the tipping point where the hubris of our common dualistic 'cleverness' MUST evolve, or more accurately, shift into nondual wisdom before humanity extinguishes itself. 
    This provides some sense of the direction in which Parsons is pointing: 

    “It seems that in the boundless energy that is oneness there can also arise a contracted energy which brings about apparent self-awareness. A powerful and convincing sense of self-identity seems to arise together with a belief in personal free will and choice in what is experienced as a real life story. All of these personal experiences can only apparently arise in what seems to be a very real but dualistic reality in which everything appears to be separate. This sense of separation can bring with it a sense of loss and a need to seek guidance, an understanding or a path or process that can promise fulfillment. There are attempts to seek unity which are totally futile because the separate seeker is apparently the very dualism from which it is trying to escape.” 
    Tony Parsons https://www.theopensecret.com/ 

 

      “What goes on in these (Tony Parsons) meetings is not so much to do with conceptual clarity. It is to do with an energetic shift, it’s to do with energy. Basically, the energy of being separate is contraction. At a very early age there’s a contraction of energy into a sense of a center, ‘I’m “me.” Oh! Now I’m “me”!’ Basically, the apparent separate individual in the dream is in the contracted state – ‘I’m in here, this is my boundary, and everything else is out there.’ And it can seem threatening, or not. 
    So what happens in these meetings and, interestingly, directly after them, is that somewhere that contraction meets boundlessness. That boundlessness isn’t anyone’s; it’s just boundlessness. The speaker is speaking to itself. The speaker is meeting nothing and speaking to nothing. So conceptually, there can be a clarity about that. The most powerful thing in these meetings is that the contracted state can open out into boundlessness. It’s an energetic shift.” 
    John David interviews Tony Parsons in 2007 • Wisdom of the European Masters https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvokZJjemfg

 
    “What we’re talking about here is just an energy that can’t be known. The energy of empty fullness. It’s a mystery. It can’t be understood. I use the word energy as everything. All there is, is energy. All there is, is everything and anything. For me energy is a good word, it’s like aliveness. All there is, is aliveness or energy. This is it. 
    This is energy in the form of a room, people, breathing, thinking, feeling, sitting on a chair. It’s simply energy happening. And that energy is absolutely boundless. Nothing influences it. It’s completely free and wild. It appears as everything and nothing. It’s a mystery. 
    And because it’s free, it has no purpose or meaning. There’s no meaning to any of this. This aliveness is utterly, wonderfully, meaningless. 
    But because it’s free energy, it can also be limited. And so in its apparent limited form, nothing is real, everything is only an appearance. In its apparent limited form, what arises in the human being is a self-awareness. At a very early age after birth, suddenly, there’s a sense of self-awareness – a sense of ‘me,’ ‘I am real.’ And that child goes into the world full of other apparent individuals, who also feel that they are real, so it lives, in what I call, ‘a dream.’ It lives in a dream of you could say, of ‘dualism.’ He’s in the dream of being separate. I am a separate individual. The world is something that’s happening to me. So that sense of awareness keeps me separate from everything. That wouldn’t necessarily be recognized by most people, but that’s actually what happens. That’s the dream state of individualism. Most people in the world you could say feel as if that is absolutely real, being a separate individual in the world. 
    What’s being suggested here is that that whole idea, that whole sense of being separate, and being individual, and having free will and choice, and living in a story that seems to be real - all of that is a complete & utter dreamt illusion. Most people think it’s real, but what’s being suggested here is that it’s an illusion, and there’s something else, another possibility which completely explodes the whole idea of individuality or separation.

    So we could talk about how the individual seems to take form, what it’s like, all the belief systems it collects around itself to believe in its life and its story. We could talk about that. And it’s possible, that in just talking about it conceptually, and hearing a few suggestions that come from somewhere else, it’s possible that that whole belief system of separation, that whole belief system of individuality of awareness, can unravel. It may not. 
    But the other thing that can happen is, where there’s an openness to something that’s beyond the sense of self, when there’s an openness to another possibility – a terrible possibility, but a possibility nonetheless. There could be something energetic that’s very freeing and boundless about that energy, and then, the contracted energy of being the self can melt or fall back into that whole, because the contracted energy is also oneness. Contracted energy is also the boundless in the contracted form. 
    There is nothing that is right or wrong. There’s nothing above or below. There’s nothing that’s here or there. There just is what is and is not. That’s the mystery we’re talking about. And again, it cannot be known. So what you will go away from here is with absolutely nothing at all. There’s nothing to learn or understand about what we’re discussing here. But something could possibly apparently collapse – but only apparently collapse. It’s the restricted feeling of being an individual in the world that’s separate.

    This is not a teaching. There’s nothing to learn. It’s just a communication. It’s an illumination of what seems to be the human condition, and a suggestion that something else that’s completely beyond that but somehow by confronting can also unveil liberation. But you can’t do anything about it. The you that thinks you can do something about it simply can pour water and benefits. Yeah, it’s this. It’s this. It’s nowhere else, it’s this.

    Q: When the contracted sense of separate self falls away, are there any physical manifestations that you or others can notice?

    Tony Parsons (TP): No, not necessarily. The physical thing that can happen when the whole contracted sense of being a ‘me’ collapses – but only apparently collapses – the body relaxes, because all the time in there’s a sense of me, and the me is trying to maintain its image in the world, who’s trying to play the game of the world, so there’s a lot of tension and fear involved in that, which suddenly falls away, so there’s a relaxation. Noticing that there’s a lot more energy, just available, not to anyone, because it takes a lot of energy to be a ‘me’ in the world, to try to make that illusion work.

    Q: I’m here to ... – I’m probably wrong,

    TP: There is no wrong.

    Q: OK, I’m looking for something

    TP: You’re looking for a better experience

    Q: No actually, I wondering if I’m looking in the right direction

    TP: There isn’t one. So seekers, people come here, apparently come here, seeking a better experience or a different way of living for themselves which will support and bring them a better experience of life. That isn’t available here. This is about death. It’s about the end of that which seeks to find a better experience. This is about the death of that which feels it is separate that’s what can go on here. But there’s no one that can do anything about that.

    Q: So what is the point?

    TP: There is no point. This is a meeting which is absolutely, completely, pointless. It’s of no value to the seeker at all.

    Q: Will it make someone’s life better?

    TP: No it won’t. It won’t make your life better. First of all, it will point out what you may hear, that you don’t have a life, and so the whole idea of your life could be better by being here completely collapses.

    Q: Will I be a better person? 

    TP: No, you certainly won’t be a better person. If anything, you’ll be a bit worse. You won’t be anything. What possibly could happen is the sudden collapse of the idea that there is anyone to be anything or to get anywhere. It’s the collapse of the whole sense or illusion that you are someone, who by applying a certain principle or process, can reach somewhere called ‘be better.’ There isn’t a better or worse. There isn’t an inner or outer. There isn’t an upper or lower. There is only what is. This is what is. This is what is and what is not. It is and it isn’t. It’s empty performance. It’s a mystery, and you’ll never understand it. I don’t. It can’t be known.” 
    Tony Parsons – London, June 2018 https://www.theopensecret.com/ (ABOVE first 12 minutes, BELOW remainder of 2hr mostly Q&A)