Below is an extract from One Taste by Ken Wilber. It is part of an interview of him by Pathways magazine ('A magazine of Psychological and Spiritual Transformation'). It is interesting because Wilber believes that meditation can give you direct experience of what can be called either God or Brahman or Spirit (he uses all three terms in his book). He thinks that it can be proven in much the same way that any fact can be proven.
PATHWAYS: But what about the notion that these experiences of "One Taste" or "Kosmic Consciousness" are just the by-product of meditation, and therefore aren't "really real"?
KW: Well, that can be said of any type of knowledge that depends on an instrument. "Kosmic Consciousness" often depends on the instrument of meditation. So what? Seeing the nucleus of a cell depends on a microscope. Do we then say that the cell nucleus isn't real because it's only the by-product of a microscope? Do we say the moons of Jupiter aren't real because they depend on a telescope? The people who raise this objection are almost always people who don't want to look through the instrument of meditation, just as the Churchmen refused to look through Galileo's telescope and thus acknowledge the moons of Jupiter. Let them live with their refusal. But let us - to the best of our ability, and hopefully driven by the best of charity or compassion - try to convince them to look, just once, and see for themselves. Not coerce them, just invite them. I suspect a different world might open for them, a world that has been abundantly verified by all who look through the telescope, and microscope, of meditation.
PATHWAYS: Could you tell us ...
KW: If I could interrupt, do you mind if I give you one of my favourite quotes from Aldous Huxley?
PATHWAYS: Please.
KW: This is from After Many a Summer Dies the Swan:
"I like the words I use to bear some relation to facts. That's why I'm interested in eternity - psychological eternity. Because it's a fact."
"For you perhaps," said Jeremy.
"For anyone who chooses to fulfill the conditions under which it can be experienced."
"And why should anyone wish to fulfill them?"
"Why should anyone choose to go to Athens to see the Parthenon? Because it's worth the bother. And the same is true of eternity. The experience of timeless good is worth all the trouble involved."
"Timeless good," Jeremy repeated with distaste. "I don't know what the words mean."
"Why should you?" said Mr. Propter. "You've never bought your ticket to Athens."
PATHWAYS: So contemplation is the ticket to Athens?
KW: Don't you think?
The problem with this argument is that in reading Wilber's account of his spiritual experiences the only proof it offers is that there is a state of consciousness where you perceive that everything is part of you. That's all. It is not direct experience of God or Brahman or Spirit. It's not even proof that when you perceive that everything is part of you it is a correct perception: some perceptions are false.
I realize that part of his argument is that you're never going to see God. You can't see God, you can only be God, and look out on the world through God's eyes. He is the see-er who cannot be seen. I understand the meaning of this theory, especially after the 'pointing out instructions' earlier in the book. That doesn't alter the fact that God, Brahman or Spirit have not been proved.
Now that I know what pointing out instructions are in detail I am no longer impressed by them. I don't see how anyone is going to get a sudden enlightenment from them, which is what authors like Sam Harris believe. I have mentioned nondualists and their pointing out instructions in earlier posts on this blog, I doubt if I'm going to be mentioning them again.
There was a man who looked at Mars through a telescope and thought that he could see lines on the surface. He called them 'canali' which means 'channels' in Italian but which became translated into 'canals' in English. He believed they were evidence for a civilization on Mars. Many people believed years ago that there was proof of a Martian civilization that dug canals.
When you look at Mars through a telescope, you can see the disk of the planet and then perhaps shifting patterns of relative light or dark. That's all. They went too far in saying they had proof of a civilization there. So too people like Wilber go too far in saying they have proof of God, Brahman or Spirit. Or that there are higher levels of reality. Or that One Taste is something spiritual and not just neurological.
In the book he talks about the marriage of Buddha and Freud. Not a nice image. What he means is that Eastern mysticism should be combined with Western psychology to create a more complete system. You can be enlightened and still be selfish and immature. Without the ability to relax fully you will find it difficult to enter the depths of meditation. I used to believe that.
The interesting thing though is that Buddha did not teach a belief in God, Brahman or Spirit. Teachers in India who came before him taught the existence of Brahman, but Buddha went against that. This is the most important thing about Buddha, yet Wilber doesn't understand it. I know that his favoured forms of Buddhism are Mahayana and Vajrayana but even so he shouldn't be letting people think that all meditators come out of meditation with the same insights. That's not true.
Showing posts with label Ken Wilber. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ken Wilber. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 31, 2020
review of One Taste part 1
People say that you can't learn anything about enlightenment from books. It has to be personal experience. Books, however, are records of personal experiences. Also, how do you know that your enlightenment is the same as other people's enlightenment? How do you know that it is enlightenment at all?
Are we not all familiar with the idea that someone can think they are enlightened and yet there is another level beyond what they have reached? John Yarr used to say that Buddha had only got to the level of 'going beyond form'. I don't believe that. I don't believe John Yarr got as far as Buddha.
Ken Wilber has a lot of theory that I have found meaningless and pretentious. He is interesting however when writing about his own spiritual experiences.
I have said that I think the Lifewave enlightenment is the same as what Ken Wilber calls 'One Taste'. I am reading one of his books now that goes into greater detail. Both Suzanne Segal and Malcolm seemed to be saying that you get enlightenment suddenly and in one go then it's a permanent state of consciousness. Perhaps it was for them but Wilber says that he does not maintain this state for long periods of time.
In this passage from 'One Taste' by Wilber he is on holiday and spending a lot of time in the sea.
"I had fully expected to lose all access to the Witness, given our vino schedule. And for the first night and day this happened. But floating in the water has not only brought back the Witness, it seems to have facilitated the disappearance of the Witness into the nondual One Taste, at least on occasion. (The Witness, or pure witnessing awareness, tends to be of the causal, since there is usually a primitive trace of subject/object duality: you equanimously Witness the world as transparent and shimmering object. But with further development, the Witness itself disappears into everything that is witnessed, subject and object become One Taste, or simple Suchness, and this is the nondual estate. In short: ego to soul to pure Witness to One Taste.) So I am utterly, pleasantly surprised, floating here in nature's blood, to be dipped into One Taste, which in this case, is nicely salty.
There is no time in this estate, although time passes through it. Clouds float by in the sky, thoughts float by in the mind, waves float by in the ocean, and I am all of that. I am looking at none of it, for there is no center around which perception is organized. It is simply that everything is arising, moment to moment, and I am all of that. I do not see the sky, I am the sky, which sees itself. I do not feel the ocean, I am the ocean, which feels itself. I do not hear the birds, I am the birds, which hear themselves. There is nothing outside of me, there is nothing inside of me, because there is no me - there is simply all of this, and it has always been so.
My ankle hurts from dancing last night, so there is pain, but the pain doesn't hurt me, for there is no me. There is simply pain, and it is arising just like everything else - birds, waves, clouds, thoughts. I am none of them, I am all of them, it's all the same One Taste. This in not a trance, or a lessening of consciousness, but rather an intensification of it - not subconcious but superconscious, not infra-rational but super-rational. There is a crystal-clear awareness of everything that is arising, moment to moment, it's just not happening to anybody. This is not an out-of-the-body experience; I am not looking down; I am not looking at all; and I am not above or below anything - I am everything. There is simply all of this, and I am that.
Most of all, One Taste is utter simplicity. With mystical experiences in the subtle and causal, there is often a sense of grandeur, of ominous awesomeness, of numinous overwhelmingness, of light and bliss and beatitude, of gratefulness and tears of joy. But not with One Taste, which is extraordinarily ordinary, and perfectly simple: just this.
I stay here, neck deep in water, for three hours. How much of it I spend as ego, as Witness, or as One Taste, I don't know. There is always the sense, with One Taste, that you have never left it, no matter how confused you get, and therefore there is never really the sense that you are entering or leaving it. It is just so, always and forever, even now, and even unto the ends of the world."
Wilber writes that this isn't a permanent state for him. It can last for 24 - 36 hours, and once it lasted for eleven days. He says he believes that for some people it is permanent, including several teachers that he has met.
The other surprising thing to me about this passage is that he seems to have moved from what some people call One Mind or One Taste to what some people call No Mind. When he writes "I do not see the sky, I am the sky, which sees itself" etc what does this mean?
I don't believe that it literally means that the sky sees itself. This is his perception. It's as if consciousness has become fragmented. Differerent parts of the brain are processing sensory information, with no centre, no self. One Mind (or One Taste) means that everything seems to be part of you. No Mind means that there is no you. What is it that perceives sensory information when there is no you? It's as if they perceive themselves: sensations appear to be what some people call 'self-knowing knowns'.
There is seeing be no see-er. There is hearing but no hearer. There is thinking but no thinker.
Some people will say that One Mind and No Mind are the same. If you are everything then you are nothing. I don't think so. They have different characteristics. Is it possible for One Mind to shift into No Mind all by itself? I don't know. It's possible that it only happened to Wilber because one of the many forms of meditation he practiced was vipassana. Or it might just require a shift of perspective.
Are we not all familiar with the idea that someone can think they are enlightened and yet there is another level beyond what they have reached? John Yarr used to say that Buddha had only got to the level of 'going beyond form'. I don't believe that. I don't believe John Yarr got as far as Buddha.
Ken Wilber has a lot of theory that I have found meaningless and pretentious. He is interesting however when writing about his own spiritual experiences.
I have said that I think the Lifewave enlightenment is the same as what Ken Wilber calls 'One Taste'. I am reading one of his books now that goes into greater detail. Both Suzanne Segal and Malcolm seemed to be saying that you get enlightenment suddenly and in one go then it's a permanent state of consciousness. Perhaps it was for them but Wilber says that he does not maintain this state for long periods of time.
In this passage from 'One Taste' by Wilber he is on holiday and spending a lot of time in the sea.
"I had fully expected to lose all access to the Witness, given our vino schedule. And for the first night and day this happened. But floating in the water has not only brought back the Witness, it seems to have facilitated the disappearance of the Witness into the nondual One Taste, at least on occasion. (The Witness, or pure witnessing awareness, tends to be of the causal, since there is usually a primitive trace of subject/object duality: you equanimously Witness the world as transparent and shimmering object. But with further development, the Witness itself disappears into everything that is witnessed, subject and object become One Taste, or simple Suchness, and this is the nondual estate. In short: ego to soul to pure Witness to One Taste.) So I am utterly, pleasantly surprised, floating here in nature's blood, to be dipped into One Taste, which in this case, is nicely salty.
There is no time in this estate, although time passes through it. Clouds float by in the sky, thoughts float by in the mind, waves float by in the ocean, and I am all of that. I am looking at none of it, for there is no center around which perception is organized. It is simply that everything is arising, moment to moment, and I am all of that. I do not see the sky, I am the sky, which sees itself. I do not feel the ocean, I am the ocean, which feels itself. I do not hear the birds, I am the birds, which hear themselves. There is nothing outside of me, there is nothing inside of me, because there is no me - there is simply all of this, and it has always been so.
My ankle hurts from dancing last night, so there is pain, but the pain doesn't hurt me, for there is no me. There is simply pain, and it is arising just like everything else - birds, waves, clouds, thoughts. I am none of them, I am all of them, it's all the same One Taste. This in not a trance, or a lessening of consciousness, but rather an intensification of it - not subconcious but superconscious, not infra-rational but super-rational. There is a crystal-clear awareness of everything that is arising, moment to moment, it's just not happening to anybody. This is not an out-of-the-body experience; I am not looking down; I am not looking at all; and I am not above or below anything - I am everything. There is simply all of this, and I am that.
Most of all, One Taste is utter simplicity. With mystical experiences in the subtle and causal, there is often a sense of grandeur, of ominous awesomeness, of numinous overwhelmingness, of light and bliss and beatitude, of gratefulness and tears of joy. But not with One Taste, which is extraordinarily ordinary, and perfectly simple: just this.
I stay here, neck deep in water, for three hours. How much of it I spend as ego, as Witness, or as One Taste, I don't know. There is always the sense, with One Taste, that you have never left it, no matter how confused you get, and therefore there is never really the sense that you are entering or leaving it. It is just so, always and forever, even now, and even unto the ends of the world."
Wilber writes that this isn't a permanent state for him. It can last for 24 - 36 hours, and once it lasted for eleven days. He says he believes that for some people it is permanent, including several teachers that he has met.
The other surprising thing to me about this passage is that he seems to have moved from what some people call One Mind or One Taste to what some people call No Mind. When he writes "I do not see the sky, I am the sky, which sees itself" etc what does this mean?
I don't believe that it literally means that the sky sees itself. This is his perception. It's as if consciousness has become fragmented. Differerent parts of the brain are processing sensory information, with no centre, no self. One Mind (or One Taste) means that everything seems to be part of you. No Mind means that there is no you. What is it that perceives sensory information when there is no you? It's as if they perceive themselves: sensations appear to be what some people call 'self-knowing knowns'.
There is seeing be no see-er. There is hearing but no hearer. There is thinking but no thinker.
Some people will say that One Mind and No Mind are the same. If you are everything then you are nothing. I don't think so. They have different characteristics. Is it possible for One Mind to shift into No Mind all by itself? I don't know. It's possible that it only happened to Wilber because one of the many forms of meditation he practiced was vipassana. Or it might just require a shift of perspective.
Thursday, February 13, 2020
beyond the mind
Someone made an interesting comment. He said that Enlightenment is 'beyond the mind' and so there is no point talking about it. If you are not enlightened your opinion has no worth.
If Enlightenment was about Atman and Brahman - as I used to think it was - then that would be correct. However, concepts of Atman and Brahman are explanations of the enlightened state, they are not descriptions of it. People may choose to interpret their enlightened state in terms of a universal cosmic consciousness, but that isn't what they have experienced.
It would be reasonable to think that each person's enlightenment would be different. When I read Malcolm's account of his Enlightenment and then I read Suzanne Segal's account of hers, they seemed so similar that I was forced to conclude that there is no variation in the end state. Although there seem to be different ways of getting there. And it does seem that there is another form of Enlightenment apart from theirs.
From Malcolm's and Suzanne's accounts, and what Ken Wilber has written, it looks as if Enlightenment is to do with the senses. Whereas previously the brain had interpreted some sensations as being external to the self, after Enlightenment the brain interprets all sensations as being internal. Everything you look at seems to be part of you. Nothing you turn your attention towards seems to be separate from you.
When you are moving it seems to you that your body is moving through yourself to get to where you already are. Both Malcolm and Suzanne have said this. It can be overwhelming when you first experience this, especially perhaps if you are an impressionable person, but then you get used to it and it becomes quite ordinary.
If Enlightenment is to do with how your brain processes sensory information then I would say it is below the mind, not beyond it. It is not to do with your thoughts, emotions or memories and so it is not of the mind. That doesn't mean however that it is beyond the mind.
Only someone who has smelled cat pee knows what cat pee smells like. There is no point talking about it, there is no point discussing it. If you have dwelled in cat pee then you are the one who knows it. If you haven't then your opinion is of no worth.
Many say that Enlightenment can't be described. Well, I think that Malcolm and Suzanne have made a pretty good job of it. If I had known this decades ago then I would have walked away from Lifewave without getting involved. I wouldn't have been the only one. Perhaps they knew that so they kept quiet about it, only talking about it in very vague terms.
They tell you what they want you to know, not what you need to know. That's the way it is with cults. They will tell you your opinion is of no worth, that you can't possibly think it out for yourself. Only they know. Don't talk about something you don't know, they will tell you.
Their state is an illusory state because it isn't true that everything is part of you. There are other people who have attained this state in other movements. There are people who experience the Inner Light and don't think that it is a divine energy. They understand what it is and can better help people who want to experience it. Meditation in Lifewave was always hit and miss: the minority who took to it went far but the majority didn't get the guidance they needed.
There are people who have experienced the vast empty void and don't think of it as a higher level of reality. They have experienced the perception that everything is part of you but they know that there is something beyond that.
If Enlightenment was about Atman and Brahman - as I used to think it was - then that would be correct. However, concepts of Atman and Brahman are explanations of the enlightened state, they are not descriptions of it. People may choose to interpret their enlightened state in terms of a universal cosmic consciousness, but that isn't what they have experienced.
It would be reasonable to think that each person's enlightenment would be different. When I read Malcolm's account of his Enlightenment and then I read Suzanne Segal's account of hers, they seemed so similar that I was forced to conclude that there is no variation in the end state. Although there seem to be different ways of getting there. And it does seem that there is another form of Enlightenment apart from theirs.
From Malcolm's and Suzanne's accounts, and what Ken Wilber has written, it looks as if Enlightenment is to do with the senses. Whereas previously the brain had interpreted some sensations as being external to the self, after Enlightenment the brain interprets all sensations as being internal. Everything you look at seems to be part of you. Nothing you turn your attention towards seems to be separate from you.
When you are moving it seems to you that your body is moving through yourself to get to where you already are. Both Malcolm and Suzanne have said this. It can be overwhelming when you first experience this, especially perhaps if you are an impressionable person, but then you get used to it and it becomes quite ordinary.
If Enlightenment is to do with how your brain processes sensory information then I would say it is below the mind, not beyond it. It is not to do with your thoughts, emotions or memories and so it is not of the mind. That doesn't mean however that it is beyond the mind.
Only someone who has smelled cat pee knows what cat pee smells like. There is no point talking about it, there is no point discussing it. If you have dwelled in cat pee then you are the one who knows it. If you haven't then your opinion is of no worth.
Many say that Enlightenment can't be described. Well, I think that Malcolm and Suzanne have made a pretty good job of it. If I had known this decades ago then I would have walked away from Lifewave without getting involved. I wouldn't have been the only one. Perhaps they knew that so they kept quiet about it, only talking about it in very vague terms.
They tell you what they want you to know, not what you need to know. That's the way it is with cults. They will tell you your opinion is of no worth, that you can't possibly think it out for yourself. Only they know. Don't talk about something you don't know, they will tell you.
Their state is an illusory state because it isn't true that everything is part of you. There are other people who have attained this state in other movements. There are people who experience the Inner Light and don't think that it is a divine energy. They understand what it is and can better help people who want to experience it. Meditation in Lifewave was always hit and miss: the minority who took to it went far but the majority didn't get the guidance they needed.
There are people who have experienced the vast empty void and don't think of it as a higher level of reality. They have experienced the perception that everything is part of you but they know that there is something beyond that.
Tuesday, April 2, 2019
nature of the Lifewave enlightenment
what is the nature of the Lifewave enlightenment?
When I was in Lifewave in the 1980s there weren't any accounts of people's enlightenment. They talked about it in general terms as if it was the same as Shankara's view of enlightenment. The merging of Atman with Brahman, the realization that Atman and Brahman have never actually been separate, or union with God.
This is the same sort of idea that is found in the Radhasoami and Santmat traditions in India, and with DLM I guess. The philosophy of Lifewave derived more from the teachings of the Theosophical society and from Alice Bailey. However, they all seem to agree on much the same idea of what enlightenment is.
Recently though someone did give an account of their enlightenment experience on an internet forum. Someone called iamthat or Malcolm went through Second Initiation in Lifewave, then after it ceased he went through enlightenment on his own. In my previous post I quoted his account of Second Initiation.
When I read his account I was surprised though. Instead of writing that he merged with Brahman he wrote that everything seemed to be part of him. I will give a fuller quotation at the end of this post but this is the important bit: "I was everywhere. I was the walls, the carpet, the furniture, the space between it all. There was one Being pervading everything, and I was that one Being".
I thought 'Is that it? Is that all?' I didn't think it would be like that. I remembered that somebody else had written a similar account, but I couldn't remember who it was so it took me a while to track down the book. Suzanne Segal in book Collision with the Infinite wrote this:-
"In the midst of a particularly eventful week, I was driving north to meet some friends when I suddenly became aware that I was driving through myself. For years there had been no self at all, yet here on this road, everything was myself, and I was driving through me to arrive at where I already was. In essence, I was going nowhere because I was everywhere already. The infinite emptiness I knew myself to be was now apparent as the infinite substance of everything I saw."
At first I thought that he must have copied from her, especially when you consider this paragraph from iamthat's account:-
"Travelling in a car was also interesting, especially as a passenger. My body was still, and I was still, but there would be all this scenery moving within the stillness. And I could see that I was already at the end of the road, but my body had to move through me to get to where I already was."
Then I realized that quite a few people have had this experience. Ken Wilber, for example, calls it 'One Taste'. Below is a quotation from his book Grace and Grit:-
"That's right. The soul, as I am using the term, is a sort of halfway house, halfway between the personal ego-mind and the impersonal or transpersonal Spirit. The soul is the Witness as it shines forth in you and nobody else. The soul is the home of the Witness in that sense. Once you are established on the soul level, then you are established as the Witness, as the real Self. Once you push through the soul level, then the Witness itself collapses into everything witnessed, or you become one with everything you are aware of. You don't witness the clouds, you are the clouds. That's Spirit."
I found something else on a forum. G Tyler Wright gave his account on Quora.
"After some time in the thought-free state, my awareness expanded. I became my entire surroundings!
I was the bed, I was the closet, I was the door, I was the air. I was everything! I felt like I was awake for the first time in my life! I thought, How could I ever have mistaken myself to be that little body and that little mind?"
What all these accounts share is that they perceived that everything they saw was part of them. Everything they turned their attention towards did not seem to be separate from them. This isn't just a thought or a feeling, it is their perception. It seems to me that this can be better explained by brain functioning than by Hindu philosophy.
Most people's brains work on the basis of Subject and Object. You are the Subject, and something you observe is the Object. They are perceived to be different. This is called the Subject/Object dichotomy. The dichotomy can be overcome, in which case everything seems to be part of you.
The problem though is that everything is not part of you. There is no evidence apart from your altered perception that everything is part of you. If you look at someone and perceive that they are part of you, then you would be able to be aware of their thoughts just as you are aware of your own thoughts. That doesn't happen though.
You might say that enlightenment doesn't necessarily involve telepathy, but in the absence of any independent evidence that it is true we have to say that it is false. There are no psychic powers, you can lie to them (as I did) and they can't tell.
Someone can do this and they think that everything is part of them, or they are part of everything, or they and everything are one. They are at one with the universe. Then they start thinking they must have attained unity with God, or they have merged with Brahman or that they have always been Brahman but only now do they see their true identity. If they have done it all by themselves without a guru then they start thinking they must be the Kalki Avatar or the Maitreya Buddha. This is what happened to John Yarr.
It doesn't make people compassionate, or emotionally stable or less greedy. It could be it does the opposite. It doesn’t free you from the cycle of birth and rebirth because reincarnation isn't true. Neither is any form of life after death.
What's more there are two ways that someone can overcome the Subject/Object dichotomy. You can end up with all Subject and no Object. Or you can end up with all Object and no Subject (no Self). The first is Hindu enlightenment, the second is Buddhist enlightenment. The situation is complicated because some forms of Buddhism such as Tibetan Buddhism may have more in common with Hinduism than early Buddhism.
Some people will say that both forms of enlightenment are the same. When you are everything you are nothing. You are not everything or nothing though. The two forms are different. When I believed in reincarnation I thought that Buddhist enlightenment truly frees you from the cycle of birth and rebirth and Hindu enlightenment does not. Now I don't care what people do, I'm not interested in either path.
The Inner Light and Sound is not a spiritual energy and does not require initiation to experience it. Second Initiation does not take you a higher level of reality. Enlightenment does not help you see reality, free you from rebirth or make you a better person.
Below is the quote from iamthat about Lifewave enlightenment:-
"It felt as if the entire range of sound was flowing through my spine, from the deepest sound at the base of my spine, to the finest sound at my throat. My head was empty, beyond all sound, and the energy continued to flow. The light was golden-white and brilliant, and I gazed upon it, every part of me striving to surrender. I had no thought except to lose myself in that light, when suddenly the light dissolved. There was just emptiness. The flow of energy which had been so strong suddenly ceased. Everything was still and peaceful. I sat there for a while, enjoying the stillness, but wondering what had happened to all that energy. Eventually I came out of meditation and turned on the light, as the room was now dark.
I was everywhere. I was the walls, the carpet, the furniture, the space between it all. There was one Being pervading everything, and I was that one Being. My body was just another physical object sitting in this one Being. Nothing limited me, nothing interrupted me, I was complete Being. I went downstairs to make a cup of tea, and I was not moving; instead my body was moving in the stillness that was me.
I woke up the next morning, and I was still everywhere. After some more meditation, I went for a walk outside. I was the pavement and the houses and the trees and the sky and the clouds. I was the cars as they drove through the one Being that was me. I was everyone I saw – we were all physical bodies expressing this one Being. There was nothing in this world except me, and I existed without limits.
Travelling in a car was also interesting, especially as a passenger. My body was still, and I was still, but there would be all this scenery moving within the stillness. And I could see that I was already at the end of the road, but my body had to move through me to get to where I already was.
And this has been my daily reality since December 1986. It never changes, it never goes away. The mind is still present, with all its limitations. Emotions are still present, with all their highs and lows. My personality is still there, with all its strengths and weaknesses. But behind it all, unchanging, always present, there is limitless Being. It is hard not to take it for granted; I can spend hours absorbed in daily trivia, and then I pause and gaze around me, and I see myself everywhere. For me, this limitless Being is the only true reality of life."
When I was in Lifewave in the 1980s there weren't any accounts of people's enlightenment. They talked about it in general terms as if it was the same as Shankara's view of enlightenment. The merging of Atman with Brahman, the realization that Atman and Brahman have never actually been separate, or union with God.
This is the same sort of idea that is found in the Radhasoami and Santmat traditions in India, and with DLM I guess. The philosophy of Lifewave derived more from the teachings of the Theosophical society and from Alice Bailey. However, they all seem to agree on much the same idea of what enlightenment is.
Recently though someone did give an account of their enlightenment experience on an internet forum. Someone called iamthat or Malcolm went through Second Initiation in Lifewave, then after it ceased he went through enlightenment on his own. In my previous post I quoted his account of Second Initiation.
When I read his account I was surprised though. Instead of writing that he merged with Brahman he wrote that everything seemed to be part of him. I will give a fuller quotation at the end of this post but this is the important bit: "I was everywhere. I was the walls, the carpet, the furniture, the space between it all. There was one Being pervading everything, and I was that one Being".
I thought 'Is that it? Is that all?' I didn't think it would be like that. I remembered that somebody else had written a similar account, but I couldn't remember who it was so it took me a while to track down the book. Suzanne Segal in book Collision with the Infinite wrote this:-
"In the midst of a particularly eventful week, I was driving north to meet some friends when I suddenly became aware that I was driving through myself. For years there had been no self at all, yet here on this road, everything was myself, and I was driving through me to arrive at where I already was. In essence, I was going nowhere because I was everywhere already. The infinite emptiness I knew myself to be was now apparent as the infinite substance of everything I saw."
At first I thought that he must have copied from her, especially when you consider this paragraph from iamthat's account:-
"Travelling in a car was also interesting, especially as a passenger. My body was still, and I was still, but there would be all this scenery moving within the stillness. And I could see that I was already at the end of the road, but my body had to move through me to get to where I already was."
Then I realized that quite a few people have had this experience. Ken Wilber, for example, calls it 'One Taste'. Below is a quotation from his book Grace and Grit:-
"That's right. The soul, as I am using the term, is a sort of halfway house, halfway between the personal ego-mind and the impersonal or transpersonal Spirit. The soul is the Witness as it shines forth in you and nobody else. The soul is the home of the Witness in that sense. Once you are established on the soul level, then you are established as the Witness, as the real Self. Once you push through the soul level, then the Witness itself collapses into everything witnessed, or you become one with everything you are aware of. You don't witness the clouds, you are the clouds. That's Spirit."
I found something else on a forum. G Tyler Wright gave his account on Quora.
"After some time in the thought-free state, my awareness expanded. I became my entire surroundings!
I was the bed, I was the closet, I was the door, I was the air. I was everything! I felt like I was awake for the first time in my life! I thought, How could I ever have mistaken myself to be that little body and that little mind?"
What all these accounts share is that they perceived that everything they saw was part of them. Everything they turned their attention towards did not seem to be separate from them. This isn't just a thought or a feeling, it is their perception. It seems to me that this can be better explained by brain functioning than by Hindu philosophy.
Most people's brains work on the basis of Subject and Object. You are the Subject, and something you observe is the Object. They are perceived to be different. This is called the Subject/Object dichotomy. The dichotomy can be overcome, in which case everything seems to be part of you.
The problem though is that everything is not part of you. There is no evidence apart from your altered perception that everything is part of you. If you look at someone and perceive that they are part of you, then you would be able to be aware of their thoughts just as you are aware of your own thoughts. That doesn't happen though.
You might say that enlightenment doesn't necessarily involve telepathy, but in the absence of any independent evidence that it is true we have to say that it is false. There are no psychic powers, you can lie to them (as I did) and they can't tell.
Someone can do this and they think that everything is part of them, or they are part of everything, or they and everything are one. They are at one with the universe. Then they start thinking they must have attained unity with God, or they have merged with Brahman or that they have always been Brahman but only now do they see their true identity. If they have done it all by themselves without a guru then they start thinking they must be the Kalki Avatar or the Maitreya Buddha. This is what happened to John Yarr.
It doesn't make people compassionate, or emotionally stable or less greedy. It could be it does the opposite. It doesn’t free you from the cycle of birth and rebirth because reincarnation isn't true. Neither is any form of life after death.
What's more there are two ways that someone can overcome the Subject/Object dichotomy. You can end up with all Subject and no Object. Or you can end up with all Object and no Subject (no Self). The first is Hindu enlightenment, the second is Buddhist enlightenment. The situation is complicated because some forms of Buddhism such as Tibetan Buddhism may have more in common with Hinduism than early Buddhism.
Some people will say that both forms of enlightenment are the same. When you are everything you are nothing. You are not everything or nothing though. The two forms are different. When I believed in reincarnation I thought that Buddhist enlightenment truly frees you from the cycle of birth and rebirth and Hindu enlightenment does not. Now I don't care what people do, I'm not interested in either path.
The Inner Light and Sound is not a spiritual energy and does not require initiation to experience it. Second Initiation does not take you a higher level of reality. Enlightenment does not help you see reality, free you from rebirth or make you a better person.
When I was told that enlightenment is beyond the mind, that we can never understand it with the mind, I used to accept that. We cannot understand it, only experience it. That made sense to me, because I believed that there were higher levels of reality, beyond the mind. I believed in the occult theory of different planes.
However, the reality of enlightenment seems to be very much to do with this material level of reality. That is what surprised me when I read accounts of enlightenment such as Suzanne Segal's. It seems obvious that it is to do with the way that the brain processes sensory information. That being so, we can understand what it is. There is nothing ineffable about it.
I have edited my original post. I used to think that John Yarr could have been influenced by nondualist teachers, perhaps Krishnamurti. I now no longer think this could be true.
Also I am beginning to think that John Yarr was never enlightened. He told people to meditate for many hours. He took the credit for whatever states of consciousness they achieved. They could have done it for themselves, just by meditating all those hours. He didn't give them his state of consciousness. If he could enlighten people at will, why did they need to meditate for hundreds of hours?
Below is the quote from iamthat about Lifewave enlightenment:-
"It felt as if the entire range of sound was flowing through my spine, from the deepest sound at the base of my spine, to the finest sound at my throat. My head was empty, beyond all sound, and the energy continued to flow. The light was golden-white and brilliant, and I gazed upon it, every part of me striving to surrender. I had no thought except to lose myself in that light, when suddenly the light dissolved. There was just emptiness. The flow of energy which had been so strong suddenly ceased. Everything was still and peaceful. I sat there for a while, enjoying the stillness, but wondering what had happened to all that energy. Eventually I came out of meditation and turned on the light, as the room was now dark.
I was everywhere. I was the walls, the carpet, the furniture, the space between it all. There was one Being pervading everything, and I was that one Being. My body was just another physical object sitting in this one Being. Nothing limited me, nothing interrupted me, I was complete Being. I went downstairs to make a cup of tea, and I was not moving; instead my body was moving in the stillness that was me.
I woke up the next morning, and I was still everywhere. After some more meditation, I went for a walk outside. I was the pavement and the houses and the trees and the sky and the clouds. I was the cars as they drove through the one Being that was me. I was everyone I saw – we were all physical bodies expressing this one Being. There was nothing in this world except me, and I existed without limits.
Travelling in a car was also interesting, especially as a passenger. My body was still, and I was still, but there would be all this scenery moving within the stillness. And I could see that I was already at the end of the road, but my body had to move through me to get to where I already was.
And this has been my daily reality since December 1986. It never changes, it never goes away. The mind is still present, with all its limitations. Emotions are still present, with all their highs and lows. My personality is still there, with all its strengths and weaknesses. But behind it all, unchanging, always present, there is limitless Being. It is hard not to take it for granted; I can spend hours absorbed in daily trivia, and then I pause and gaze around me, and I see myself everywhere. For me, this limitless Being is the only true reality of life."
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