Resting in Awareness and Finding God (a preview)
Embodying the Genuine in an Ordinary Life
I did not expect to to discover God when I first began resting in awareness. Yet, resting in consciousness is a settling into our most basic ground of being. It is the foundation from which all else springs, so it makes sense that God would be found here, too. It is what you unravel into, when you fully let go of trying to attain any kind of special state. It rejuvenates and brings relief. However, many of us, due to trauma and conditioning, lack the skill to settle into this inherently natural way of being, especially when facing challenges that evoke suffering and fear. Yet, it is never too late to begin, return to, or deepen with relaxed presence.
Although resting in awareness may be our simplest most natural way of being, the humble learning concerning it is endless. Eventually, when accessing what is genuine within, one may discover a love that exists beyond the sphere of good and bad, a love that is woven into the core of our being. My friend Nick Yorio wrote beautifully about this discovery saying, “There was a moment where I felt love emanate from the space of nothingness. The words fail here, but the experience regarded some knowing that love was accessible without efforting, underneath my existence of being alive. It was the most powerful experience of love I’d ever felt.” Perhaps you may also come to feel this love or an equally powerful sense that all is irrevocably held in God.
Each one of us is unique, so the actual experience of resting in awareness varies from one to another, one moment to the next. However, many perceive a sense of stillness and eternal changelessness when deeply settled in presence. Unfortunately, we have been conditioned to try hard and make effort when none is necessary. It has taken me a long time to realize that the path of natural unimpeded awareness, is actually easier and more direct than the complex wanderings of an ego and mind.
This article describes beneficial aspects of foundational consciousness that first came to me in dreams. Each dream captures an essence of consciousness, which I deeply longed for without realizing it. I have gradually learned that profound dream states may be actualized in waking life. Perhaps you have also had dreams that urge you into particular nuances of consciousness. And perhaps it has also not occurred to you that you could embody these dreams, so that eventually your life becomes a living manifestation of them.
The dreams that I venture into, are presented in the linear order in which they occurred. But awareness itself is nonlinear. Truth does not concern itself with order, steps, or stages. Levels of attainment may be a myth, which the mind loves to grasp onto and use to label and judge others or oneself. Everything that I write about is simultaneously alive in each of us. There is always more that may be received from the most ordinary situation. I hope that by sharing the details of my explorations, it may encourage you to forge your own.
Just Rest
I begin with rest, because it is the simplest most basic thing that one can do. But unfortunately, many of us have become so preoccupied with our mind and thoughts, that we have forgotten (or perhaps never even knew) how to rest in what is genuine within us. I find it easiest to experience resting in consciousness by actually lying down and resting. But eventually, resting may become a part of everything one does, as one discovers God consciousness within each activity. Meditation works best when it restores us to a basic ground of being. Otherwise, it becomes yet another layer, one more thing to aspire to and attain, thus perpetuating a cycle of achievement and perfection from which we are desiring to obtain release.
I first became intimate with the expression “rest in awareness” in 2005. I had been silently meditating with my friend Pearl Olsen, who was a Shambhala meditation instructor before she passed away. One day, during a particularly “good meditation”, I asked Pearl what I should do now that thoughts had dispersed and I’d entered into a relatively quiet balanced state. She replied, “just rest.” It was the simplest and yet most memorable spiritual advice that I’d been given. Though at the time it seemed as if I had to first attain “a state of good meditation” before resting, I eventually came to see that resting was everything and attainment meant hardly anything at all. A humble nothing had become more valuable than achievement of anything of substance.
One can rest in different kinds of meditation, as well as the everyday movements that comprise our lives. Perhaps the ability to simply rest in our experience, is all that may be necessary. Life and meditation tend to flow easier when we get out of our own way and settle into what already exists, instead of adding more on top of essential being. Any quality that a heart may desire, already resides in each of us. The key to accessing that which is authentic and alive in us, is an attentive space of rest. It allows one to hear “the genuine.”
Howard Thurman spoke beautifully about the discovery of the genuine when he told Walter Earl Fluker how to find his calling. He wrote: “The main thing is, you must wait and listen for the sound of the genuine which is within you. When you hear it, that will be your voice, and that will be the voice of God.”
“The ground shifted when I read that,” Walter said. “I had no idea what it all meant—but I knew it was right.”
This kind of receptive listening cuts to the core of what an embodied life is all about. When we feel and receive the genuine within us, we begin to sense who we are, and we begin to feel God. One cannot find one without the other, for we exist as part of one whole continuum. Isolation and separation arise from being immersed in and consumed by transient nonessential things. We have been conditioned to chase after prosperity and accomplishments that seem vitally important, but may ultimately leave us empty and hungry. When one dedicates oneself to inner listening, one may access the real (non) thing. One begins to receive a love and fulfillment that extend beyond our human predicament.
On February 8, 2016 I dream: I am at my parent’s house. In their backyard there are these very large dead brown bears with huge round bellies. At first I think that there are just a few, but then I realize that there are about seven or eight of them. They are huge, rounded, magnificent animals. They vary somewhat in size and are arranged in family groups. I am in awe of them. Their magnificence is in the stillness of their huge, rounded bodies, not their aliveness. They have come in from the wilderness to die in my father and mother’s backyard, like some kind of momentous offering, a gift. I wonder what we will do with them? But then I think that the authorities will want to figure out what they died from. I think that I will call someone.
My subconscious packed a lot into this short and seemingly simple dream. So much so, that I am writing a separate article about it and the related dreams that followed. The bears represent lying down buddhas with their enormous full bellies. They evoke great peace and happiness. But what I want to highlight here is the magnificent gift of power that it is to lie down in your spiritual father and mother’s backyard, to die to yourself, and simply rest. A momentous death and gift resides in this simple ordinary task. We die to external authority, as well as the parts of ourselves that have agendas, and surrender to resting in the unknown mystery of life. One realizes that one exists as part of that which is expansive and wise. One may allow oneself to be moved and carried by life itself. One may listen and surrender to the genuine sound of God.
The Pleasure of Pure Sensing
On October 6, 2016 I dream that I am traveling In the back of a car. Where the trunk would be, there is a seat that faces back so one sees behind where the car has been. This seat area is actually a whole watery space filled with 7-9 platypus like animals with flipper like arms. These animals are especially sensitive. They are much more skilled than humans in their ability to sense into things. The feeling of being with them is like swimming with dolphins, however, these animals are not swimming. They just sense into things with intelligent awareness. It is dark so I feel the animals rather than see them with my eyes. The animals are upright and almost clothed, like they verge on becoming human. Their flipper arms emanate this embracing and warm hugging feeling, but they are not actually hugging anything. Their flippers just give this back and forth subtle movement sensation. I awaken from the dream, realizing that there are layers upon layers to life. Everything is sentient and alive on all different levels. The pure comforting pleasure of sensing fulfills me like an ecstatic drug.
The Kindness of Presence
When settling into just resting, there may be a feeling of unraveling and release, as layers of thought, emotion, tension begin to dissipate and drift away. However, one is not trying to release or relinquish anything. It is more a stopping of the egoic mind’s demands and allowing what is. When one ceases to make effort, that which has been propped up with agenda falls away. One may even feel as if they themselves are falling. The degree to which one has identified oneself with the mind’s agendas, is the degree to which loss and death occurs. At times the process of self discovery may be incredibly uncomfortable. All that one has pushed away or tried to escape from is likely to clamor to the surface.
Learning to rest when facing difficult emotions and experiences is daunting, and one cannot do it for the rewards. For me, learning to develop presence was crucial in order to be able to rest in awareness as a restorative state. I began holding presence for my body and self, in order to unravel layers of stored trauma. Initially, there may be a lot of resistance, which may show up in various ways.
After rest, presence was the most foundational spiritual muscle that I learned to embody. For me personally, everything arises out of or is held in presence. It is the simple fact of being here with that which is occurring in this moment. When I was younger, without realizing it, I used spirituality and meditation as a means of escape from distressing circumstances. While this may be useful for a time, it is much more beneficial to learn to be here and present with what is happening without the need or desire to escape from it. Cultivating presence has been enormously helpful in that regard. Awareness and consciousness is vast. Due to unresolved trauma, it has been a somewhat easy for me to relax into disembodied states of consciousness. Without realizing it, I relied on expansive states to find relief and escape from my suffering. It took many years of disciplined practice to learn to hold a state of embodied presence for myself. Now that state holds itself. I feel held in and comforted by vast consciousness itself.
For me, the state of presence has come to embody rest and relaxation and a feeling of being held with kindness and compassion. It all comes together as one unit. If I am present I am also kind. When I am exhausted and spiraling out of control, I am often not kind to myself or someone else around me. When I am criticizing or complaining I am not present. Presence entailed learning how to hold and acknowledge all parts of myself with kindness.
May 9, 2017 I dream: On a bed there are 6 to 9 handmade figures that are power objects meant to be used in a shamanic way. The figures are long, sinuous, and powerful like limbs. Each figure consists of sculpted human form, but the smallest details have been painted in. Each figure is painted with a different design and is slightly different in size. They have been well made out of some kind of layered paper mache. They have a slightly rough texture to their surface, and are extremely hard and durable They have been painted so that they have a shiny lacquered surface. They are painted with intricate stripes and designs that go down their bodies. The paint alternates black against very bright and warm colors like yellow and red. They are designed so that in the right kind of light, they come alive and can flash like lightening and exhibit other phenomenon. The figures are somewhat fragmentary and not fully finished at the edges, so that they can dissolve into dark space in the right circumstances, even though they appear extremely solid and hard. They are also hollow and open at the back so that they can be worn on your arms and legs and moved. I am impressed with the care and attention to detail with which they are made.
Awareness and consciousness are vast. For me, learning to develop presence was crucial in order to be able to rest in awareness as a restorative state.