India and the West Need Each Other

Sri Prabhupada famously lit his lamp on one verse that makes a lot of sense once experienced:

“The west lives in ignorance while India is limping.”

This observation I found while visiting India: Rishikesh.

Rishikesh, at the foothills of the salty Himalayas, is supposed to be one of the spiritual capitals of the country. Though I haven’t travelled through the rest of India, 10 days in the city was enough to feel the flow of life. A mixture of Indians, Australians, Israelis, Russians, and a few Americans and Polish beings (my husband and I) dotted the roads in the constant heavy traffic.

It was absolutely sublime to come back to London and use a normal toilet, I must admit.

“How was India?” my friends would ask.
“It was a challenge.”
“You didn’t like it, then?”
“Of course I liked it. But it wasn’t a holiday.”

This is one unsuspected, ornamental, phrase that no Londoner likes to hear. It wasn’t 100% pleasureable, like that candy-wrapped Magnum ice cream bar? Smiles, nods, and adventure weren’t around every falafel stand?

No. When you hike into the Himalayas in upper 30-degree weather just to find out what’s happening a few kilometres on top, and you don’t drive, so you wear your best sandals and hope they will still be on your feet later. Are there bears? Or biting monkeys — stealing your nuts?

No. When you’re hungry as hell and just want a pocket of rice, because you’re crazy and vegan, and they accidentally forget (every time), and you wait one hour, because they don’t give a shit that you just came from Morocco to get there.

No. When the guy at the ashram takes advantage of your interest in Hindu astrology by letting you know “you absolutely need this ring, and it looks absolutely fabulous on you!” and you assume it’s cheaper than you could buy in London. And he literally goes to the metal smith to make it, and theeeeeeeen tells you the price and you discover your wedding ring wasn’t nearly as much and he hopes you feel guilty, because it’s being made in exactly your shade of moon-red and blood-orange by hand, right now.

No. When you drive 8 hours by cab and think you have shit in your pants already, but then a boat full of motorcycles with babies on board weaves into view. And the taxi driver tells you he’s not even that confident. Oops.

No. A young 20-something man in the Rishikesh community fell to his death off a cliff, because of a stupid, spontaneous, trip to the mountains.

But, India is also a house for the greatest spiritual wisdom and knowledge, or gnosis, in the world. China and Tibet have their hands also in the greatest, most peaceful, prognosis of the insatiable Buddhist brotherhood. They are neighbours, and though differing in their spiritual inclinations, it is clear that Brahma and Dharma reveal a similar affair.

Hinduism, a hot-pot of people free to choose fire, or water, or air to worship, or Shiva, Ganesha, Shakti, or Vishnu has come a long way from the days of the Vedas. I don’t know for sure; I wasn’t there. But what I do know is that without question, without nodding or tut-tutting, without strangeness, any divine object or being is fair game to worship. Even the Buddha. Even the idea of the Buddha’s message, which is much recommended.

Leave flowers to your Shiva Lingam.

Pour smoke from a fire over your head.

Sing to Krishna, dance with his photograph hanging right in your mind.

Sit down to meditate. Prostrate. 108 times. Prostrate. 107 times. Encircle a shrine. Exactly 8 times.

It doesn’t matter. All is creation. Creation is all.

But, even God cannot contain culture.

Open defecation for four in ten households is still a problem; the numbers are highest in rural areas, and the stigma of installing toilets and having to clean them like “certain members of castes” is stalling for time. The government’s programme to outdo open defecation is also being enforced by shame: teams of officials, roaming around to find perpetrators, stealing their buckets and replacing them with roses. But the good news is that 11 states in India are now open-defecation-free.

India is staggeringly populated and equally chaotic-feeling. To contain such a rich and diverse people would be much to the demise of a smaller higher-order. When teaching in China, I remember being told it was not legal to have sex in public… but you might as well try, because there’s too many people and not enough cops to keep up the pace. So it happens. So what happens in India, all over? I wonder.

But then I recall the chanting of alms, in the temples, late near 9:00pm at night:

Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna, Krishna, Hare, Hare…

It sounded slower and with more depth than in London, in our city. The metal kartal bells slowed down time and clanked each other, warmly. The humid temples house regular visitors, genuine to their overlord Krishna in an act of Bhakti Yoga. It’s not for a show, or a spectacle, though. It’s a supra-mundane part of their day where worship, the bread, holds the country’s hybrid soup together, en masse.

The west, the UK, is seriously missing the natural flow of spirituality that runs through the veins of a country like a river. Why should it be strange to chant on the street or smile at a ‘stranger’, for no reason, regardless of your own mood? Why do we feel guilty for self-enquiring, asking the question pertinently, relentlessly, “Who am I?” in silence, not only in our bedroom but in the open gates of a forest or park? Why aren’t more mothers resting underneath trees with crossed legs, just breathing, between cappuccinos and telephone calls?

As Sri Prabhupada notes, the west lives in ignorance and India is limping. Which is worse? They are a shared denotation of the divine, all in its good lila. But we need each other. The west needs India and her wisdom: how to stop and just be. And India needs the west: how to move up the material ladder.

Also, a good toilet infrastructure is necessary, road rules are there for a reason, and brotherhood in meditation and ecstatic dance goes a long way.

And there’s no shame in admitting to either.

What the Internet Is Doing to Us… For Wisdom’s Sake!

As a spiritual ‘person’, though ‘I’ don’t exist (more on this another time!), once in a while, I have to speak out. I have to speak out for my fellow humans in the materialist culture we come from as westerners.

We are living in an age where the internet, this very tool, is sanctified and where words, thoughts, and photos are set in stone for a longer time than we’d like to admit. The problem is that we worship this screen as permanent. We mistake the changing nature and flowing stream of life for a permanent and unchanging, solid, image.

This gets tricky when a person knows better and the goal is to live a harmonious, simple, and peaceful life, enjoying all the moments to live before they have to die.

In the Buddhist paradigm and in all great spiritual wisdom traditions, it is apparent that all words, thoughts, and pictures are fleeting. They don’t stick around. We can do this together! We can prove it together.

Try this right now: sit where you are and try to grasp what you are thinking about. Or feeling. Now what is the your mind thinking about now — in this moment after the last one? What is the next thing your mind is planning to do? Cook dinner, take the dog for a walk, text somebody? Where is your body in space? Did you just get up to do something? Where is the breakfast you ate this morning? Look at the clock — will you be in this exact moment tomorrow, sitting in this same position with exactly the same thoughts?

Everything is in flux.

Nothing lasts. Nothing. People get anxious just trying to pin down every little plan, every word, every single hair on their head. The reality is — as we have just experimented — that thoughts come and go. Actions and reactions come and go. Emotions… bodily sensations… all come and go.

We are not used to knowing this deeply, because we are so unaware of it. But it’s true. The body is in constant change; at birth, the body was tiny and now it is huge. The mind is always changing its viewpoints. The mind you had in elementary school is not the same mind you have now. However, because adults desire stability — a totally natural phenomenon — we mistake the changing for the unchanging and cling to things as permanent. This usually takes the forms of fame, wealth, property, other people (relationships), and habitual actions, reactions, and emotions.

Based on the evidence, isn’t it wise to suggest that impermanence, as the reality, should be accepted instead of avoided?

But the crucial issue here is that the holy grails of Instagram, Facebook, and the internet have us believing that image is permanent.

As a Buddhist, with real concern for all others over the entire planet, seeing the state of my brothers and sisters’ minds addicted and believing in this fantasy is and will continue to be detrimental to finding inner peace and true well-being.

For wisdom’s sake…

“Put down your phone!”

“Those five-star or one-star reviews aren’t real… they aren’t your experience. They’re somebody else’s fleeting moment that you haven’t experienced. Don’t hasten your judgment.”

“Look around you. Feel your environment. Pay attention to your body in space.”

At least 5,000 years ago, Sadhus in India had enough trouble disconnecting their identity from what they considered permanent — their bodies — by meditating endlessly in caves for years. Today, we have an extra layer: the bodily identity, the endless-multitude-of-possessions identity, and the internet/Instagram/Facebook identity to detach from.

How difficult it was for them, and how much more difficult for westerners today!

The Buddha, in the Pali Canon, pointed out that Samsara has no discoverable beginning and no discoverable end. Though I’m no expert on the way things ultimately work, I do sense that very intelligent people are capitalising on the notion that people cling to ‘things’ and are using it to mass control others. This is not just a village-wide problem anymore… it is becoming global and is especially prominent in the west.

Here’s a breakdown on what I believe is going on…

1. Individuals, feeling insecure, crave stability and resist natural change. Instead of turning  inwards, using intellect, asking questions to oneself instead of authority, push their insecurity towards acquiring more ‘things’. This includes more ‘experience’, such as holidays or spa treatments or self-help books or qualifications or promotions at work.

2. Money, as a first port of call, is invested heavily in so that more things and experiences can be bought to feel full and secure.

3. In the pursuit of more money than is necessary to have enough food, water, shelter, and free time to enjoy it with friends, an image or brand has to be created to ensure that more and more money comes in. Either we produce or consume a brand, or both. Brands may change from time to time, but it is always for the same pursuit of monetary stability underneath — otherwise, they would remain unchanged for the sake of their purpose. That’s why a recognisable logo or celebrity representing the brand has to be enduring and consistent.

4. Marketing and advertising the brand protects the individual’s motivation in having others believe that they are ‘not fulfilled enough’ without their product. On a large scale, this is called a company or corporation where the sole purpose is profit and the product is just a means to this end. Some even get caught up in inventing/creating something beautiful to benefit humanity and it eventually gets capitalised upon, either by themselves innocently giving into delusion or subtle coercion by others. When the light bulb was created, its longevity was eventually made shorter so that more light bulbs could be sold, for example.

5. The internet and the big corporations of the internet, including Instagram, Facebook, and Google, have realised that people are indeed easily subject to delusion so seek to enslave the ultimate wonder of the universe: the human ego / identity.. This is so subtle that the younger generations take it completely for granted and the older generations can’t even see the game for what it is. These programmes ‘solidify’ the modern human identity in photos, memories, and emotional outbursts, political opinions, and personal stories. It’s the best way to entrap people in their system. Nowadays, because we are becoming more aware of injustice and the limits to our wordly freedom, the smarter they had to become. Because we totally volunteer ourselves as slaves via our personal identity and autonomy (which we take to be ‘I’, ‘self’, or the most important function of that which is arising and passing), the more they win. And we don’t even blink an eye or question it!

6. Now, it’s not about what you’ve created and enjoying the process of writing an engaging story, having an intellectual debate, making a song, or painting a portrait; it’s about the amount of ‘likes’ or ‘credits’ given to you for making it! Yet another layer is present, because the system is rigged! Those who get the most credit are already swept up in the very “stable” systems already in place: in the scientific community; the academic community; the music industry; the art galleries; and on and on and on. When Insta-celebrities fulfil the status quo, there are tenfold wads of cash in rewards. But most ‘normal people’ don’t know this until it’s too late. Until the joy is taken from every act of flow and creation, young people strive to measure their worth by those who have 25k likes whereas they only have 23 likes. This makes the individual feel inadequate for not measuring up to numbers on a screen. Though, their act of creation will never be accepted by the status quo, they keep striving to try to become something more. More stuff. More experience. More fame. More money. This is an extremely closed system where the mind is not able to be free — it is outright controlled by propaganda in a form we take for granted.

It is not harmless; it is harmful to be addicted to images. Firstly, to our own self as individual and autonomous in the first place, and secondarily, in an imaginary technologically-based ranking system where we say it’s okay! In our own vision of “becoming” something we are not, we have been duped into a fear-based collective instead of one that is community-based, happy, and free!

I dream of an earth where the street sweeper is as respected, just for being human, as the basketball player. Where the artist is free to create without feeling depressed because she gets less feedback than Mozart. Where everybody can dream, invent, learn, play, get dirty, be mindful, meditate, break and smash their routine, without fear of punishment by ethereal or flesh-and-bone authority figures.

Don’t mistake the image for you.

Please comment and let me know what you make of this conundrum!

 

You are just like everyone else; don’t worry!

“If everybody had a balloon above their head that showed what was really going on inside their mind, you would feel like, ‘hey! they’re just like me!’ and then you might feel a little compassion.” …Said the Portland Insight Meditation Community

Let’s get out of the spiritual fantasy that most of us live in (or blatantly reject). Let’s talk about real life, here.

In so many situations, we believe “How can this be happening to me? Why doesn’t this happen to the other guy?” and we feel so special… so alone… so separate. This is exactly what is meant by life is suffering. If we could only see the balloons above everyone’s heads right now:

This very simple notion of separation of circumstances creates self and other immediately. However, we all go through the same things. Is it possible that you’re the only one who went bankrupt? Got a bad business review? Lost a job, pet, home, stability, wife, girlfriend, best friend, or temper? Are you the only one who has a great job, beautiful house, booming business, enough money to satisfy any craving you desire, eat the best food, take beach holidays, go out dancing and drinking and socialising and smoking? Are you the only one who meditates, has a personal set of Mala beads, read the book “The Secret”, studied with the best monks and Sadhus in India, found yourself in India… lost yourself in India? Attempted suicide? Experienced Samadhi or happiness or bliss? Are you the only one who is a struggling author or an experienced and learned physicist? Waking up like an undercaffienated zombie because you’re raising toddlers, over-working in the city, or was raised by the best parents in the countryside?

Are you the only one?

OF
COURSE
NOT!

We are undeniably in this together. “The human condition” or “this human incarnation” is a tricky one to mesh through, sometimes. Yet, we all are encapsulated inside a body and have the same set of faculties: bodily senses, emotion, intellect, fear, comfort, desire, aversion, delusion, clarity, past, present, and future. To understand that “the other” is navigating just like us, we know we are not alone. The entire world and everything encapsulated in it is our Sangha — regardless of what we think or assume about it!

 

Little thoughts on unconditional love, the Buddha, & the Singularity

Questioning everything I’ve ever learned and digging into the “heart” ❣ is a little like drip-dropping on piles of compressed ice; the skates hit the top layer but never pervade the bottom layer. They glide over the top, creating thin punctures in the natural, frozen, scape in zig-zags, creating portraits and random events but never touching the water below.

That is what consciousness is like.

At the London Buddhist Centre, in a talk on the 8-fold Path, my comrade (husband, partner, lifelong other) asked the question aloud: “What is unconditional love, actually? I have a son and I loved him as a kid and that’s as close as it gets, and I still do, but what does that really mean? Should we fall in love with all beings once we reach enlightenment?”

Most people giggled.

We all think we know what it is and pretend to know — indeed, in the Q&A, the great female speaker was fervent that she knew the Buddha was the epitome of unconditional love, but how are we, as Buddhas, to feel that on a very real, tangible, level?

In the books and magazines, unconditional love is like an endless desire to see a baby happy and smiling, fulfilling all his dreams and keeping safe from all ghosts that live in the closet and the monsters cropping up from under the bed. Or forgiving an ex for throwing your clothes out the window and then threatening to spread every word of gossip ever known to her to the entire neighbourhood. Or hugging your brother after a 10-year conflict. What if a child grows up or passes away? Where does the unconditional love manifest? Through other adults (God forbid)?!

So often, shopkeepers and customers, in a timely role, act with each other like robots, giving and taking the cash with cultural “thank you”s and rather seldomly, meaningful glances showing the emotion they carry in their bodies, stemming from a moment or snap judgment. Rarer is the customer who forgets who he is, discarding cultural baggage and dives deep right into the taboo of naturalness without bounds and cracks a joke or says a line that doesn’t fit with the stereotypical scenario. How rare is it then, that two humans engage in unconditional love — not just from one side but from both? One in 6 billion, perhaps, is my estimate as a non-mathematician.

Furthermore, does consciousness desire unconditional love? Deep into seeing the dual reality for years and constructing and deconstructing patterns, things that hold me back (while meditating nightly on body scans and sweet words whispering “let it go” into my ears), non-duality also is known as the underlying Reality through all of this triumph and tree stump. It is like something in me knows but is playing rather slyly, never fully relaxed or open or aware of all possibilities.

Let’s picture this like a circle with a point at the top: let’s say this point at the top is “Infinity”, “Nothingness”, “God”, “Reality”, “The Big Bang” or whatever you want to call it based on your current belief/knowledge system.

The Singularity says, “Hey, I’m all that there is and I’m kind of bored”… and I’ll personally interject to ask, “Was it out of boredom?”…and the Singularity says, “Let’s pretend I’m not singular but plural. And in pretending I’m plural, I can play a game to find myself again!” and KABOOOOOOOM! Lightning flashes, dinosaurs roar, humans arrive, stars explode, wars and love implode, extra terrestrials fly by on saucers made of metals not yet identified by the periodic table. The Singularity creates a complete circle containing all cycles of life on this planet and others. Pain and pleasure. Birth and death. Matter and anti-matter. Humans and animals and humans eating animals and animals eating other animals. Going routinely to work. Thinking the same thoughts over and over. Growing up. Observing déjà vu and coincidences, wondering, “did I do this before?”. Saying hello and goodbye. Loving and loathing. Eating, drinking, excreting. Sickness and health. Wisdom and stupidity. Inhalation and exhalation. Time. Sleeping and awakening (literally). Sleeping and awakening (spiritually). Making and spending wads of money. Politics. Having an opinion. Samsara (most definitely). Reincarnation (most likely). All important cycles that go around and around with no apparent end.

And this was done all to find out that we should be compassionate to one another; show respect and reverence, tolerance, and ultimately — unconditional love.

Is that what the Singularity is? Does it need to love itself or does it just want to? When it gets what it needs or wants, do all cycles end?

Is it just that language, a construct of the left-brain, cannot describe what real love is, through the non-dual, permeating, shimmering eyes of the Buddha?

The lovely female speaker told us that when those who fell at the Buddha’s feet asked him about his enlightenment, often he was just silent.

These questions may never be answered but I do desire to know… or, as the Singularity, I do want to know… and ultimately, I yearn to be united with the Singularity, the point of all possibility, and love my fellow human beings and You, even if we pretend to disagree.

Or something like that.

This is psilocybin: playful recollections

What have I learned through engaging in entheogenic behaviour? More importantly, what have you learned through ingesting the cosmos through nature? Have you tried?

Reading about a thing will never give the true divine spark of experience. But here’s a book list for the hesitant. Reading is a great tool to make decisions that can alter your behaviour for a lifetime, point out the way you really think and feel, and illuminate the interaction between you and your everyday world of 3-d objects:

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The Divine Spark: Psychedelics, Consciousness and the Birth of Civilization by Graham Hancock

Inner Paths To Outer Space: Journeys to Alien Worlds Through Psychedelics and Other Spiritual Technologies Journeys to Alien Worlds Through Psychedelics and Other Spiritual Technologies by Rick Strassman

Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge DNA and the Origins of Knowledge by Jeremy Narby

DMT: The Spirit Molecule: A Doctor’s Revolutionary Research into the Biology of Near-Death and Mystical Experiences by Rick Strassman

Supernatural: Meetings with the Ancient Teachers of Mankind Meetings with the Ancient Teachers of Mankind by Graham Hancock

The Archaic Revival: Speculations on Psychedelic Mushrooms, the Amazon, Virtual Reality, Ufos, Evolution, Shamanism, the Rebirth of the Goddess Speculations on Psychedelic Mushrooms, the Amazon, Virtual Reality, Ufos, Evolution, Shamanism, the Rebirth of the Goddess by Terence McKenna

Entheogens and the Development of Culture: The Anthropology and Neurobiology of Ecstatic Experience–Essays by John Rush

The Shaman & Ayahuasca: Journeys to Sacred Realms by Don Jose Campos

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There are some things we humans do which I find fascinating. All the time, we take our mental projections so seriously — the come in monologues and a ‘background noise’ of cultural conditioning, like a dramatic subconscious play we aren’t even aware is running. And they sabotage the moments we have, now. Every moment does not have to be totally full of stimulation and excitement, but we exist in our environment without a second thought. There’s no running away from reality. In your kitchen with your husband, in the forest with your dog, in the room with your colleagues, and on the street with many strangers, we only get these moments when we have them. Ajahn Brahm, one of the most chilled out monks on the net, explains it fluently when he tells a crowd of his listeners…

To notice…

How…

There are moments…

Of silence…

Between…

His words.

Was the mind truly silent in those spaces, or was she on a search for something outside of herself to get?

On an entheogenic trip, the moment is so spontaneous and different and intriguing to the senses that it’s a challenge not to be in the moment. In other words, reality is seamless. The line between ‘now’ and ‘next’ barely exists, and a pile of laughter in the company of friends is all that really matters.

Another monk, Thich Nhat Hanh, mentions the practice of mindfulness in dealing with other people: treat whoever is in front of you as the most important person in the world. That means listening. Deep listening. Are we truly taking in what another person is saying, or are we quick to judge and assimilate their speech for our own interests? Our minds so easily wander to worry, to past, to future when with our colleagues or friends. We are easily distracted into “another moment” or “another situation”. But this is nonsense! It’s a complete fairy tale of the imagination.

If you find anthropology and biology equally fascinating, perhaps this can be explained by the evolutionary, “primal”, mind of mankind to always be on the lookout for danger, threats, or advantages. After all, we have a body made of complex hormonal systems and many behaviours are deep-seated in our DNA just by the coincidence of being human. Our body is the last object we hope to lose, because we all believe that our biology is us. We carry the rational belief that when the body dies, we die, too. We all fear death in unequal proportions, but we also desperately want to eject fear in favour of living a really comfortable life; a life of relaxation.

How can we relax, though? Having a quick peak through mushrooms, truffles, DMT, Ayahuasca, ibogaine, or all other strands of roots and barks throughout the forest can annihilate some of the bad habits we’ve picked up by sheer innocence of our parents, professors, and authorities. They show us not “another reality”, which is impossible, but the reality we inhabit in our own unique way. Bad trips are the consequence of what has always been present: the fear, the trying to “get out” that have been conveniently swept under the rug.

How else can a lifetime of depression be cured by one session of Ayahuasca: “years of psychotherapy crammed into one 9-hour session”? The author of Ayahuasca.com says:

“Ayahuasca allows conscious realization of how those experiences effect ones constitution and patterns of behaviour, giving beneficial insights into how the effects of the damaging influences on ones life can be greatly negated by changes of attitude and lifestyle.” (1)

Entheogens are not class-A drugs — they are medicines, and they have a very high rate of success compared with pharmaceutical medicines. They take less time, are more personal, and they change not only the chemicals in the brain and body but the perceptions and emotions of a human being: the most intimate of that which we call dear. Our reality.

The next morning, I took a run. The hues of aqua-green which permeated through everything last night disappeared, but the luminescence of objects remains non-scarce, and I can still see the browns of my flat as honeys, the trees like detailed plastic Lego sets, and the wide roads like flat silver playgrounds. The environment is bold and playful, as if through a baby’s eyes, making the mundane pop out.

The mind works seamlessly, with less a chance for reflection or doubt. Reflection is already imminent in the present moment. The sounds I hear in everyday reality were more profound, and I naturally noticed an inherent sensitivity to them that has always been present — you know when you go into a loud concert and have to step outside 30 minutes through or your eardrums suffer? Why is it that I cringe at the noise of people chewing their lunches loudly or recoil when sirens pass by my side? Perhaps this is a mild hyperacusis, but now I’m aware of the sensitivity to sound: a curse when building works are going on in the neighbourhood but a blessing for an electronic musician, also. In fact, my entire body picks up on the subtle sensations of my everyday world. This must by why I’m addicted to massages, hate the intense waves of vibration before passing out, or have an acute focus on my upper back ache as the last thing to throw out in every meditation session. Running, for me, is a way to accept the rise of fall of these constant sensations, or kalapas, in the big-mind which includes the body.

Furthermore, there is no beginning, middle, or end. Life is a constant process and that of change — perceptions change, thoughts change, moods, feelings, and the external world of forms always changes. And that’s what I’ll take away — there’s never something “out there” to “get” but just to be with whatever is rising and passing away.

 

 

Remember to forget about Uncertainty – a poem

“What is the purpose of life?
What is it I have to do?”
To please other beings, to not be my-Self,
often, we suffer
just from that notion.

Duality flowers
from form
     to form
          to form
abiding in ideas
to keep
falling over…

Forget modern frills!
and doubt! like the Buddha,
cast away worry
and open
to the purity
of the blessed One:
I Am.

In modern thought
arises
anxiety and competition;
“not good enough” or in “enough
activity”,
To be a false mechanism
within the eyes of ‘others’,
lacking in focus and,
brilliant clarity;
circling around,
The body a machine
and not a holy vessel.

Life is not here
for destruction or competing;
but a filter for the common…
Open the eternal,
not merely as a concept:
but the truth of what I Am.

When asking, then, “what is it I am to do?”
know that to be happy,
and unbound,
resting
as a lotus,
is the purpose
is the only.

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No one has the power to make you unhappy or miserable. Mainly, we do this by ourselves. Happiness is our real nature. Sadness comes mostly through habit and through identification with the personal self. We can be happy every moment but mostly, due to habit, we choose to focus on what makes us unhappy and so lose or hide our natural joy. Develop the excellent attitude of gratitude to all of existence. Overlook petty thoughts, worries and troubles —the bitter and the sweet. Instantly, you will begin feeling uplifted in your spirit and in a short time you will begin seeing life through brighter, wiser and more loving eyes.  Start today. Mooji ~

A post shared by Mooji (@mooji.official) on Feb 19, 2018 at 9:24am PST

How is Mindfulness a practical guide to living in the world?

Yesterday, I was in Screwfix — this huge DIY shop in East London…

At the counter, after listening to a podcast on meditation, the benefits of mindfulness were again reminded to me. As the young, attractive, slightly rebellious-looking man handed me the double-sided tape and damage-free wall hangers, his eyes were elsewhere. They were in the next moment or in the realm of paying attention to something else. In essence, his attention was elsewhere. When my attention was there, a different perspective showed up. I was truly grateful to meet this man in this moment, realising I am co-dependent with him. If it wasn’t for this shop existing, being relatively close to my house nor the service I received, I would not be able to work on my painting exhibition. I was paying attention to what I was supposed to be paying attention to.

Practising mindfulness is a gateway into a greater space where we can realise what’s right in front of us, around us, and break us from habits and tendencies that hold us back. It’s not a 10-step programme, it doesn’t cost money, and you can do it anywhere, anytime, for the rest of your life. If you forget how to do it, go off on a daydream for a few months, or act in ways you don’t find helpful to you along the way… nobody will punish you. There is no belief or dogma to adhere to.

Mindfulness is universal and can be applied to any human, in any situation, anywhere on earth so long as they are aware of it.

What is mindfulness?

It is just training the attention to be aware of what is going on, right now. There is much more going on than we give ourselves credit for. If you’re willing to examine the narrative you call “my life”, then that is the only starting point you need. Your mind works uniquely and nobody can tell you what is going on over there. Only you can. That’s how it works. You explore your own mind.

Multiplicities of meditations exist, and it can be a bit jungly. Meditation is not a club. It is more like a ‘skill’ that you hone to become, quite literally, more peaceful and calm within, less stressed out, more attentive, and inspired. Mindfulness is rather easy because it can be applied anywhere; there are no rituals, special positions, or time frames. You don’t have to believe in any notions of liberation, enlightenment, awakening, or non-self to practice mindfulness. After all — what is belief without experience?

Mindfulness has layers of benefits but here are a few:

You’ll get to accomplish and focus on the things you truly want to and follow them through. (I couldn’t write this post to its full if the attention was not trained to be here, where I am. I am not daydreaming about the future or in the normal mode of freaky-worry, “what if my house sets on fire?” consciousness)

You will figure out when you are worrying and tense and when you are relaxed and find that being relaxed and comfortable is the greater state

You might find beauty and awe in things that were previously in oblivion to you

When danger arises or situations come that require quick response and immediate action, you won’t be tricked into over-thinking it through and waste precious time — you will act appropriately in the moment

You’ll begin to sort your feelings out. You’ll discard and take distance from what is not of service to you and create a sense of freedom and space around monologues in the mind that are on autopilot, recurring negative feelings, judgements, reactions, and fears

Moments of space open up where you see your mind not as a constrained, tight, area, but more like an open endless space where everything takes place; from this ground, you can constantly refresh

When can you practice mindfulness?

Morning: showering, making coffee, breakfast, and getting dressed

While relaxing and decompressing

Taking the bus, car, feet, or bicycle to work

Being at work

Walking the dog, taking a walk for pleasure, running, or other sports

Reading, painting, writing, cooking, woodworking, sewing, or any hobbies

Meeting with friends

Eating, drinking, and shopping

Philosophising, ruminating, feeling emotional turbulence, worrying, and strategising

Mindfulness is not separate from your “real life” — it is your real life! 

When the Buddha went through the five aggregates, he simply came to the conclusion, “I am not these”. If these are all that humans are aware of in their conscious experience, they will think, “I am these” in a very complex way. They are:

Form: the physical body and physical objects
Sensation: the interpretation of pleasure, displeasure, and indifference
Perception: putting together a picture of what is going on and defining it
Mental Formation: enduring mental positions, opinions, and judgements
Consciousness: life force, the sense of being and experiencing all of the above, the total of the mind

This continuum is what we call oneself, though when experimented with and looked at, none of these is actually permanent and all wash away. Furthermore, they are fragmented parts when we claim to be a ‘whole person’. Sleep is the best indicator of how we become completely unaware of any of the above aggregates for about 8 hours every single night. Nothing seems to function, but yet, we arise from bed and run to the coffee maker and start the whole thing over again! There are clues.

What have I learned from being aware on my search for liberation?

Nothing is permanent and everything changes, including the pictures I have in my mind about how my friends and other people should behave and show up

It’s perfectly healthy to get excited, plan, use the imagination, be confused, shrug off worries, not be attached to outcomes but make action anyway, not over-think, think when it’s helpful, realise impatience when it arises, and know that everything is okay and nothing is particularly wrong

It is easy to get lost in a field of information, regarded as true knowledge, without experiencing it. It is easy to repeat something from a book or screen, but it is no good if benefits do not follow

We all have different ways of understanding and assimilating ourselves in our daily lives, and that’s completely okay. Nothing is dogma, and nobody can force anybody to think anything they have no interest in and the world does not work from one perspective

I am no more important than anyone else. Though it may seem like that, it is just habit to identify with the survival instinct of the ego and believe that everything going on in my mind is so important. Who says? To you, your dreams, goals, problems, idiosyncrasies, and families are all-important. Which one of us is right? It’s ridiculous to believe we are the centre of the universe. Perhaps neither of us are. That means there is literally no separation between us. We are accustomed to thinking there is, though, through our five aggregates

It’s supremely easy and innocent at times to be mindful and aware yet at others it is supremely tricky and intimidating. Liberation, as I call it, requires an actual interest and dedication to the subject for benefits to show

“Learning” does not mean going off on a tangent; it is “understanding”, “discovering”, or “realising” something. It is a spontaneous attribute that is not strained after, strived for, or held on to

If you are still interested in the potential of mindfulness and meditation, here are two brilliant podcasts to start with:

Stuff To Blow Your Mind – Meditation Lab: Empathy and Energy

The Psychology Podcast: Why Buddhism Is True

What is Non-duality and How do I get There?

Duality is like the splitting of an atom: at first it was one, and now it is two.

This is duality.

Duality is responsible for chopping reality into constituent parts, and it is done by every single human being in different ways, because we all have unique minds, seeded with our own personal identification. This identification you take to be “you”. Thus, you are a collection of atoms (ideas, memories, likes, dislikes, actions, and reactions) different than another. You are two.

You and other.

But here’s the good news: duality is not reality. It is illusory. That’s what makes the game more fun.

Non-duality just means “not two”. It is the full atom, the full moon: self-fulfilled, sustaining, both empty and full.

All Zen teachings, Buddhist scriptures, and Advaita gatherings — more historical records of the truth — point to the exact same essence: you are One. Not two.

There is nothing missing from you. There are no goals to reach, no money to be made, no Himalayas to climb, and no meditations, rituals, or yoga moves that will get you there. You are already YOU.

Why is this so difficult to discover?

Because you’re used to being two. Habitual states of mind keep the sense of separation alive. Since childhood, we were told that mommy and daddy make the rules and you follow them. You have followed rules and traditions for a lifetime, questioning them and turning them inside out, finding new rules and boundaries — but still you’ve been two.

If freedom is the utmost and highest state to figure out as a human being, then I recommend questioning your identity from the highest place. Not merely moving the blocks around and joining a different religion or having another career. Knowing not-twoness. Freedom from being against anyone or anything.

Non-duality is also our most natural state.

How do I know?

Because wherever you go, whoever you have been from birth until now — you have been there. You never left you. As a child, a teenager, an adult, a poor or rich person, you have worn a different mind to suit the needs of that decade; like a snake, once one lining is worn out, it sheds, and a new identity is picked back up. But who, underneath all those changing decades and eras, were you? Were you not still there? Look and see!

The best question to make this discovery is to ask, “If I am present, and I have always been present, then who or what is present?”

Awareness is the intuitive knowing “I” or “I am” or “I exist”.

Presence is a synonym for awareness. Are you not aware, right now, of what you are reading, hearing, thinking, and feeling? To think, feel, see, and describe those states means that there is something that is aware of them. The lights are on in there! But most stop at that and say “I am thinking…”, “I am feeling…” and take the comings-and-goings, the passing feelings and thoughts, as the truth of the matter, the reality, without further investigation. This creates life’s turmoil, the sense of a struggle. So really, that is why freedom is important. Because we know what we’re after but have always been confused how to get it.

Pay attention only to the awareness itself. Whoever, whatever, nothing, or something — it doesn’t matter what it’s called — is aware. Zoom in on that.

When attention travels elsewhere, to the thoughts or feelings in this moment, just notice that is happening and move back only to awareness itself.

This is subtle, but you will get it. It will become a new habit. Relaxation, freedom, and new abilities start to set in.

The reason it’s a subtle practice is because awareness is not tangible — it comes before taste, touch, smell, and even the most poignant and beautiful blissful moments in meditation. It’s like an invisible engine.

When we really experience and know this, as a direct fact, then duality begins to fall away.

Like the leaves in Autumn, we shed our old skins and don’t pick up any new ones.

Karma: is it just for the ‘spiritual’?

Once in a while, jokingly, the non-spiritual, atheistic, politician-type (I jest) will turn around and say, “that was definitely karma biting me in the ass!” The thing is that they half-believe it, but they waver and their voice cracks as they say it. Why, though? Because that’s for hippies, new-age weirdos, and those searching deep into their spirituality.

By admission… yes, it is. Us ‘mystics’ have taken lots of time to delve into subtle aspects of life. We have researched, experienced, and observed by paying attention, like anyone else in whatever activities they are interested in.

In other words, we got what we asked for.

If a person takes no time to observe in a spiritual manner, they will observe how they have always observed or are inclined and interested to observe.

Imagine a modern-day psychologist who goes through psychology school and comes out with their papers and begins to work with clients in a private practice, advising their lives using the studies she’s learned. She passed her psychology course through a rigorous 4-8 years which guaranteed her a job in the field. There were scary times when she scrambled to finish essays and more worried times about forgetting important information or even what the future career market held. Then were those times of illumination when her memory worked perfectly, giving her confidence to continue on the course. She finally has an office position and a list of clients given to her to treat! It is expected in her personal office that she will treat these patients in a manner that aligns with all that she’s learned. If she breaks the code of conduct, which is the fear, she will be fired and unable to feed herself. So she strictly adheres to her knowledge gained (after all, she worked terribly hard for that knowledge) and treats people as a professional psychologist. Her paradigm, her brain, and her actions are now wired in the way of a “psychologist”. If she scoffs at the words “karma” and “spirituality”, it is simply because she never considered spirituality important, perhaps because she never had a spiritual experience or also because her mind is now wired to do what she set out to do — become a psychologist and be a psychologist. In the best case, she lives her life with little struggle, is happy with her work-mind-home balance, and is happy at the end of it. In the worst case, she gets fired, is hateful or spiteful, and stressed and burnt out at the end of it. That’s perfectly rational.

In other words, we get what we ask for.

This is to be taken literally! There is nothing specifically new-age or funky-monkey about it. Our minds and brains are wired through our own effort, actions, reactions, and the environments and people we choose to surround ourselves with.

Would it be hilarious if I told you that that is exactly what karma is?

Karma can best be translated/understood as one word: “action”.

Karma is happening now, and it is happening now because of what happened before. The future is also karmic.

Miss psychology’s karma is her being a psychologist, because all of her mind power went in that direction. The fruits of her action, or karma, is that now she’s a psychologist. Since birth, she has been thinking thoughts and creating actions and reactions. This endless stream is basically karma.

However, there’s a twist, and this is where karma gets complicated: how many people do you know who have a perfectly clear mind? Though the west views life as straight and linear from birth to death, therein lie many paths we choose to take: many decisions, countless successes and failures, a multiplicity of pains and pleasures, gardens of stresses and relaxations, and mountains of self-consciousness and inner struggle. This is because, amongst other things, one action has not concluded in its cessation in the mind. Why is that? The mind clings and goes through phases, stages, and addictions. Multiple karmas are acting out simultaneously, from the past. If all those were cleared, the mind would be cleared.

Let’s take another example. One day you smoked your first cigarette! Congratulations. Your karma, from the action of smoking that cigarette is either deciding that you loathe smoking and will never do it again, that you will be addicted in the future, that you will pick up cigarettes socially from time to time, or that you will one day have a drawer full of patches and gum and e-cigs to quit. This is very common-sensical. Once an action is registered in consciousness, meaning you have paid attention to it, then reactions start to take place and snowball. One small action, like smoking a first cigarette, can be blown totally out of proportion later.

When karma is not cleared out of the consciousness, then the result is us feeling as if we are in a personal relationship with a situation. This is called a samskara. It is our present state of mind and being. It is the feeling of bondage. A samskara is described as “an ache in the heart” and the Buddha further outlines the five samskaras, aggregates, or heaps, that make up our present state:

1. Form
2. Sensation
3. Perception
4. Mental Formation
5. Consciousness

Samskaras are latent tendencies that have been buried in the subconscious that likely drive our current behaviour patterns, so we’re not aware they’re operating. Anything that has imprinted a strong positive or negative influence in our consciousness before is a samskara. Adults have piles of them, and thus, often trip up throughout adulthood.

Karma is responsible for the process of personal growth, the continuance of relationships, the drama in the workplace, hanging on to ideologies, and raising the same questions or going through the same situations over and over again but barely learning.

It is literally us, right here, with the collection or bundles of all the phenomenon going on in our minds and hearts. That’s it! Now how to clear such karma? That’s another matter… and we might have to call in the medicine Buddha!

Maya, illusion, is the 3-dimensional Mind

Breathing with life, the realisation has come about this Maya, this illusion.

Maya is 3-dimensional.

This discovery was not forced upon me; I discovered it through taking a peek, many times. It is not somebody else’s discovery — though many have discovered it themselves.

This illusion is the mind. The mind is like the frosting on a cake that keeps us one layer away from the unified truth of the middle, Ourselves. Through meditation, I’ve seen that the mind is totally all-encompassing as to who or what we think we are. All that I see, I believe – all that I hear, my intellect is free to believe or discard – all the experience I’ve collected must be all that there is, because you know, I’m not somebody else and I’m sure as hell not reality. Even though a wiggling thought comes to scare me saying, “You could go back to poverty, living in a basement, with a basket of potatoes and a bucket to shower in”, I know that is a worst-case scenario that probably won’t repeat itself in exactly the same way. Verging on age 30 now, the material plane is totally fulfilled. So, with enough potatoes in my basket, what else am I supposed to do?

Find out how to live peacefully within the vast sea of Maya, that is my own consciousness or individuality. And that means leaving it one day.

I used to believe that in meditation, I was supposed to close my eyes and find one specific reference point within myself and see “thoughts” as little pictures float on by, clearly identifiable and label-able. But then I realised that my mind doesn’t work that way. Oops. For one, I don’t necessarily have a visual brain. It is much more emotional and intuitive. So my “thoughts” are more like feelings. And I’m finely tuned to bodily sensations. Closing my eyes, looking for pictures, I found that there was nothing but a pile of blackness and a bundle of feelings.

The first reference point, the blackness behind my eyes, I’ve found… is just another aspect of mind, or more broadly, another form of consciousness. It is not who I am nor who/what is witnessing the mind.

Relaxing on a park bench near London Fields this summer, in meditation, with eyes wide open, the mind revealed itself as the entire field of consciousness, quite literally. Simply observing, paying attention to what was going on, I saw many facets of my own mind operating simultaneously: snap judgments about what other people were up to and their motivations (which were most likely wrong), sensations in my body, disillusionment in my own dull mind, the presence of my husband next to me, wondering about the near future, taking in the atmosphere and the sunshine, moments of calm brought by the sight of three women walking closely in unison and the beautiful sound of chattering people in the park enjoying the daylight with numerous beers. It was all happening at once.

But here’s the kicker — those things came and went. That moment lasted about an hour and is now gone to memory, yet another function of the mind. But then it was so real. But if things of the mind come and go, can the mind be the ultimate reality? This all-encompassing bubble of excitement and suffering, past, present, future?

I was shocked when I found out that the mind is all of this and it is difficult to separate myself from it. It seems to have no discoverable beginning nor end. The mind is aggregates that cannot be separated.

This is what philosophers (I think, therefore I am) and awakened ones (I am, therefore I think) have found and what scientists (I don’t bloody know) are now trying to decipher. Consciousness is the mind and all of its functions, and watching them is one of the fun parts. The final part is finding out who/what watches them. But I’m not there yet. I’ve just discovered what my mind is up to.

The Buddha got it right. He awakened from the 3-D dream.

The Pali Canon, or first literature ever written on what the Buddha actually said, is a go-to for those remotely interested in Buddhism, the Dharma, or awakening. On page 38, he talks about Samsara having no discoverable beginning. This is what the mind is like. It’s our little bubble and everything inside that bubble are aggregates that seem real. Happiness, excitement, sadness, boredom, fear, inspiration, feeling, addiction, drama, remembering, planning, loving, wondering, judging, and on and on is all Maya, illusion, mind.

I leave you with the Buddha’s words to ponder:

(2) Balls of Clay

“Monks, this samsara is without discoverable beginning. A first point is not discerned of beings roaming and wandering on hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving. Suppose, monks, a man would reduce this great earth to balls of clay the size of jujube kernels and put them down, saying [for each one]: ‘This is my father, this my father’s father.’ The sequence of that man’s fathers and grandfathers would not come to an end, yet this great earth would be used up and exhausted. For what reason? Because, monks, this samsara is without discoverable beginning. A first point is not discerned of beings roaming and wandering on hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving. For such a long time, monks, you have experienced suffering, anguish, and disaster, and swelled the cemetery. It is enough to become disenchanted with all formations, enough to become dispassionate toward them, enough to be liberated from them.” (SN 15:2; II179) Page 38, In the Buddha’s Words by Bikkhu Bodhi