Realize The Miracle Of A Silent Mind GF Live 11-30-24

We're going to have a special time together this morning.

I want to I want to help you see something.

We're going to work together to build an understanding that like a ladder will lead us to the top of a roof but the ladder is not the rooftop.

We're going to climb using our mind our heart properly and then we're going to take a little bit of a leap.

So please I trust you will stay with me all the way.

Kate let's bring up the key lesson that sets the stage for our work together.

Please don't pose for a moment while Kate puts this up so it can be there uninterrupted.

Read along with me.

Attending to completing each moment completing what each moment asks of us is the business of real life.

In the silence of this relationship is revealed and received the wisdom and wealth of true self.

These timeless riches include a faith no fear can shake and a freedom that no unwanted moment can ever take from you.

Attending to and completing what each moment asks of us is the business of real life.

What is the business of real life?

What are we asked to do moment to moment to moment?

And we need to be able to do some kind of simple spiritual math meaning we need to look at the equation so far of what we have created not just as individuals in this body in this time but as a race of beings because we are not apart from all who have come before us nor are we apart from all that will follow us any more than there's one part of a river that isn't connected the whole of it.

And if we look around and we should we can see that the world that we're in is the shape that it's in because of the spirit of humanity because of the way that we are you and I I know the left loves to put points at fingers right likes to point fingers everybody's pointing fingers at each other failing to realize that again ask yourself what what good is it if I could change most of the people around me I would still have trouble with the few who remain.

What needs to be changed in this world and this is an old saw you know the idea but we're going to look at it more deeply must begin with us so that we have to stop trying to change the world that we see and begin the inner work as we have discussed a thousand times of changing the way in which we see the world.

A change that's going to have to take place at the very core of our being a change because it affects the way in which we relate to life and we cannot relate a new way to life until we change the way in which we actually see it and that requires a change in the way that we think.

Please try to put this first part together when I look out and I see someone or something and I have a reaction to it.

The nature that's reacting in that moment to what it doesn't like came into that moment with me so that we walk around all the time embedded in a kind of unconscious nature whose roots are so deeply in the past that we don't understand that what we see perceive in front of us is always related to that which this nature wants to see or expects to see and when it doesn't it reacts.

So that until we understand that right now we have this reaction our thinking supports the reaction doesn't it?

Isn't the way you think towards a moment you don't want doesn't it support the fact that that moment is unwanted and the answer is yes.

So if there's going to be a transformation in the way we see life then our perception itself must be reborn.

Not how do I say the whole of the way in which we see life has to be reborn.

Not trying to change what we see so we feel reborn but understanding that this new perception Christ said we must have new eyes new ears in the East all of these things have the same source of truth behind them that what has to happen is we need to awaken to a new order of awareness.

It's already present as we'll see but we need to awaken to its presence within this person an awareness that isn't conditioned.

An awareness that cannot be habituated.

Right now we look out and we if we can understand it I react the way I do because I'm preconditioned.

My mind already knows how you should be the way the world should turn.

I know how I should look.

I know how I should be treated and though I don't know I carry all of this baggage with me into every moment it's immediately unpacked anytime any particular moment threatens these images and our identification with it.

So that this our awareness as we are now is non-existent.

We have this rudimentary awareness a sense of being apart from what we see but the separation between who we are and what we see is in fact an expression of this conditioned nature that has to judge and measure everything it perceives otherwise it doesn't know who it is.

We need an awareness that isn't conditioned.

But how?

Because perhaps you know this much with me.

Where do I where do I come into this new awareness?

The key here is this is not about another new way to think.

It's what the mind is always doing.

It's always looking for a new angle at an old problem so that it can solve that problem through the nature that essentially is responsible for the pain in it.

We don't want another new way to think.

We want to always think about things because we react to them.

We don't understand the dynamic immediately of our own experience so that we constantly are looking for a new set of thoughts that we can identify with that in that moment of identification there'll be a little bit of a peace associated to those thoughts and feelings but if you can understand what I'm saying it means that we're related literally to every moment related to every moment by an unconscious nature that literally perceives the present moment through the eyes of the past and when we see the present moment through the eyes of the past and we understand that this conditioned nature within us already has its own demands that what we're previously identified with isn't challenged then we can begin to understand what all this resistance is about.

We're in a kind of a constant conflict born of a mind that we are unaware of its activity comparing what we see outside of ourselves to what we expect within and this conflict then brings up more thought trying to reconcile that which seems to you know the square peg in a round hole trying again and again which is what all thought is about in vain trying to change or control what we see so that we can bring the conflict in this immediate unconscious perception under control and then just think it through again and think it through again there are certain experiences that one has to have no one can give them to you if Christ himself was talking to you it wouldn't change it you yourself have to see certain things this mind this incessant thinking it never stops now we don't know it never stops because our present level of awareness sort of sits above the nature of thought like oil and vinegar and they very rarely mix so that the thinker of the thoughts who I take myself to be really believes that what it is thinking about is separate from itself we almost never are aware of this constant separation say for maybe in the morning I don't know if you've ever awakened in the morning and you realize your mind is talking who in the name of God is your mind talking to when you first become aware of that conversation it's just going on trying to figure stuff out solve problems looking back at the past dreaming about something later in the day it's they're fully involved and then you dip down then then the sense of oneself dips down into this dark muddled pool these waves of thought and suddenly I'm the one thinking no you're not the one thinking there's just this movement this endless movement of thought that never stops trying to resolve the very conditions that it created when the world didn't align with a former line of thought are you following me at all I don't want to go too deep too fast because I really have to bring you to a very distinct understanding if we're going to have success in discovering for ourselves the truth in this model that I'm describing to you we can see that our lower nature this unconscious mind believes that it is other than that it is different than the moment it doesn't want quick example you you catch yourself coming coming out of a dream you your minds talking to you you suddenly become aware of your own thoughts the minute you have this awareness of thoughts what happens this mind says I don't want these thoughts well it was the one thinking I don't want this experience it says well it was the one generating the experience so that in these moments this unconscious nature is resisting the pain born of a conflict that's a creation of its own comparison driven conclusions about the moment so that it is the experience it doesn't want now I can sit because that's my work my job on this planet to bring in from the invisible ether world of things that we can't see to bring it in to a moment's focus so that if we can gain some clarity then we can begin to understand that as long as we live from this kind of unconscious nature we will never under hat we will never have a quiet mind how can there be a quiet mind when this mind is always identified with the next string of thoughts and feelings promised to deliver us from the pain of the last string of thoughts and feelings so we're going to make a transition here first can we see it or if not see actually maybe just suspect how virtually all of our thinking with the very rare exception of what we might call practical thoughts where you're doing math or you're working on a problem of some kind connected to something that you're not identified with which is almost nothing can we see that looking to this this nature this chatty chattering nature can we look can we see that looking to it to rescue us from our struggles is impossible because these thoughts and these sensations are agents of the continuation of that unconscious nature we see it we see these things as different than ourselves we see the moment we don't want first through a reaction then the reaction and you'll see this one day when your mind is quiet enough the reaction is then what begins to gather around it all of the thoughts and the judgments that that unconscious nature that has reacted requires in order to prove that what you see is true and as you identify with these thoughts and feelings which is what happens mechanically now then this sense of self that is suffering the moment is validated in its perception failing to see the pain that it's having in that moment is in fact a creation of its own activity this is why it just goes on in perpetuity and it does this mind has no power none whatsoever to bring an end to the noise it makes because the more it tries to end the noise it makes the louder the noise becomes would be like throwing a stone in a pond hoping to quiet the ripples in it so that you could see something perfectly we're going to need a new way an undivided way of seeing that life real life the life that we're looking for begins with a new and higher order on a new and higher order of self-understanding I want to look at the word self-understanding for a moment with you what is self-understanding it means I understand myself it means that there is an understanding of all that includes what I call myself so that the understanding is greater than the sum of the parts not I understand this part because I'm that part not you're this way because I'm apart from you in my perception but an understanding that envelops everything that moves into that awareness and an understanding by the way born of an awareness that maketh the sun to shine on good and evil alike that doesn't judge it doesn't have to because it's not apart from its own understanding it recognizes the truth of its relationship to the moment and how whatever the moving parts are in that moment they cannot perturb it they cannot bring an end to it I what was I thinking about this was the way I'm up here in the mountains in southern Oregon and a couple nights ago we were we had we've had a big series of storms blow through here and but I was online doing the work that I do and I was sitting you're thinking isn't it miraculous here's all this rain and fog everything boom boom boom like that and yet there's this signal from a tower someplace and a beam of energy of radio waves whatever it is and it just nothing touches it just like a beam from a lighthouse through a stormy sea nothing touches the light this is what we want this this to be connected to something that everything can come into and move through it but it doesn't affect the connection our connection now is not to this incorruptible silent perfect stream of divine light of energy our connection is to a mind that is forever trying to create for itself what it calls the light so it can examine and then escape the darkness that it says is outside of it when the darkness that we're in is because there's something in us that actually believes we're apart from real life and the pain of constantly feeling the fear of that separation drives thought after thought after thought after thought so we're going to need a new understanding and the key thing here is that this understanding and somebody was asking about this just last night in one of our study groups have you ever have you ever have you had that experience it where you have heard or seen or maybe you had an epiphany an insight of some kind and you went to somebody and you spoke it to them and they look at look to you like you're out of your mind what do you mean I don't understand a word you're saying and you know in your heart of hearts that you've perceived something clearly because you heard it or saw it or it was given to you to understand because in that moment that which has touched you that truth and the momentary liberation of being released into up to least temporarily a new order of understanding then in that split second you had a corresponding part to that truth just like this computer this whatever this modem modem whatever allows this relationship between the radio waves the waves of light that whatever allows that that there was a moment where it was no interference at all just like the rain and storms lightning don't affect that beam from the mountaintop to the laptop that in that moment this corresponding part that is related to this higher consciousness this is what Christ meant by you need new eyes to see new ears to hear he was talking about another level of perception a new order of perception not perceiving through thought thought doesn't see anything a new order of perception and listen that begins with being free that begins with being complete not that seeks freedom outside not that's forever trying to put together whatever it is that this mind says it needs to put together so that it can feel safe and secure and complete again not a not a perception that's trying to create a world that is safe and holy but a perception that understands it's not apart from what it sees so that it is essentially experiencing itself when it sees and knows this new kind of holiness through these new eyes and these new ears so I ask again I don't want to go too far too fast but can can you at least see that you need new eyes that you need a new understanding one that isn't a constant mathematical problem because that's what our life is like like what purgatory is like trying to solve one giant mathematical problem where there's always new integers and things coming in and it upsets the old equation and then you have to go back in and write it all out again and get all everything there and then and for a moment I got it oh no you don't God you should be tired of trying to solve your life because you can't and you know why you can't solve your life because there's no you apart from a the problems that this nature creates and in yet on the other hand there is no you that needs to suffer that relationship save for an ignorance of your true nature which is what we work at understanding here where is this new perception what is the nature of this new perception I've been leading up to this we're gonna make a transition here that's gonna be a little bit challenging I understand that but it's necessary don't you think and not just myself don't you think that that that if there were and there have been true teachers on this planet don't you think they that if they could have just said well here it is here's here's the answer don't you think that that they would have said it by now they can't say it because what is true can't be can't be uttered in thought thought can only be like a pointer can only point to possibilities and if there's a participating part of the soul capable of seeing what is being pointed to then in that moment the communication is completed the teacher accomplishes the task because it allows the relationship between teacher and student which is really an interior story to have a split second where it sees for itself that what it wants is never going to come to it in thought that the peace the promise the consolation that these things don't sit outside of us thought is outside it can never put humpty-dumpty back together again so how do we understand this nice deep breath start as simple as I know how to start there isn't one teaching true teaching I should start the other way around all false teachings promise a time to come of abundance all false teachings point to a moment where at some experience relationship suddenly you're going to when you die you're going to go to heaven all false teachings that's what the nature of the false teaching is a false teaching divides the seeker from what he or she seeks and promises that that distance between the need the student has for what is needed just needs to be bridged by something that the student is going to create think into existence manifested all the rest of that crud false teachings true teachings every last one of them says the observer is the observed all true teachings the observer is the observed that what you see is not separate from the nature that sees it and that the experience presently as it is is full of this divisive relationship between a condition nature that looks at the world that looks at people around it that looks at itself and compares what it sees to what it expects to see what it has been conditioned to want so that the conflict is always between that which desires and that which is desired and when life seems to take from us what's desired then this desiring nature suddenly panics goes into thought tries to figure out how to put everything back together again simplest example of this I don't know where you live but I can tell you that we had the most splendiferous fall that I can remember in my lifetime I guess you call the magic moments now for us most of us magic moments are far and in between a magic moment is when you turn a corner when suddenly something awakens you from the thought and you look up and in this instance you see as I was so fortunate this year you see you see this you see these these endless forms you see these endless colors you see this endless movement of a relationship between the forms and the colors and the invisible forces that are moving these things and every birch leaf every madrone every pine every maple everything as it's fluttering to the ground literally raining leaves you have a corresponding part of yourself much as if you look at a waterfall have you ever had your attention taken by a waterfall why because there is a corresponding part literally to every single drop every single glitter of light off of those moving waters you have a part of yourself that that actually experiences not the waterfall but the relationship between that movement in creation and the creative force within you that actually was responsible for its existence so that there's no difference between the fall colors the light the shadows the movement of the waters and your nature it is a singularity there's no division this is what we call beauty beauty is in the eye of the beholder simply means that when you behold beauty that which is holding the beauty is not holding what's outside of itself it's experiencing itself the observer is the observed can you look around in any way have you and see the truth of this this ocean of life these endless waves in which we dwell that never stop what's our fascination with the ocean it's because we experience the depth the breath the strength the vastness of it the movement of it all at once there's no me that pulls out one part look at that little diamond flash look at that wave if we're really present to us we have an awareness of a ceaseless movement and we're not apart from that ceaseless movement in fact we are in one respect the fulfillment of that movement how is that possible there is koans now why in the name of God and we'll just go to Buddha or Christ and it doesn't make a difference Christ said you you split a split a rock turn over a log I'm there that's a koan what is he talking about where are you I don't see you I said you you must be reborn Nicodemus as you go back into the womb Buddha said if a tree falls in the woods and no one's there to hear it doesn't make a sound what's the sound of one hand clapping what are these teachers trying to drive us nuts no they're pointing to they're pointing to something that if we were drawn sufficiently enough to want to understand that because who wants to understand any of this until a person begins to see that their understanding is limited that their understanding as it is is part of the misunderstanding of their life because what other misunderstanding do I have besides my understanding and the way it relates to the world around me so if my understanding is incomplete my life is going to be incomplete that's the problem and then I turn to that understanding to this constant thinking to try to complete something that by its nature is separating me from what needs to be understood which is a need for this new understanding what is this new understanding if we can see that this awareness of all of this movement of this color in these moments I get it this is why it's so difficult for us to talk that within us there is a corresponding level of consciousness that isn't just the same as the depth and the breadth of all that it sees but in truth is the experience of it is the awareness of it what good the vast ocean the colors the fall the movement unless there was something in us that corresponded to it and that understood without thought what this beauty is when you see beauty you don't think about what's beauty when you're present to harmony you don't think about what's harmony you are the beauty you are the harmony when you see and feel something deep and true there's no you thinking about these things something will certainly jump in as a rule and try to steal it but the fact of the matter is in that moment there isn't anything that isn't unfolding around us that isn't unfolding within us at the same time there is no moment in which whatever seems to be unfolding around us isn't unfolding within us at the same time this is why this idea if a tree falls in the woods no one's there to hear it does it make a sound Buddha was saying and asking his students to see the following I trust you've been reading listening I'm gonna ask Kate to bring up a very special key lesson in the form of a question we're going to study it together please here we go if there isn't one without the other no observer without the observed then which is the one and which is the other if there's no experience of a night sky without the observer and the sky that it observes which is the one and which is the other does the night sky exist without the perception of it does the magnificent buck standing there in his nobility the beauty of a dough does any of that natural relationship exist without the awareness of what it is that we are made aware of or are they a singularity if there isn't one without the other no observer without the observed which is the one and which is the other or are these seeming opposites an expression of an of another order of undivided being of a consciousness that waits within us to be awakened and that's the answer it drives us crazy I get it what's the sound of one hand clapping Buddha's that that if there isn't an opposite there's no sound if there isn't an ear to hear the tree fall in the woods there's no sound because there's this this inherent natural relationship between the opposites mutual dependency there is no one without the other our life is predicated on the belief that there is one without the other and then I'm either the one that needs to change the other or the other is threatening the one and it's not that way our mind though it requires this conflict because it is a problem-solving mind since the beginning of time and it doesn't know who or what it is without something to solve only the problem is it can't solve itself but it can and has been given the capacity to see itself to be aware of itself to whom does this awareness belong that doesn't exist without something how do I say who does this awareness belong to that doesn't exist without something to be aware of it do you understand without the awareness of the of the forest does it exist whose awareness is it that allows for these opposites and encompasses them at the same time I know I brought you to a point here when I was a boy I used to think to myself when I'd see something beautiful I think to myself all of this beauty who sees it and I would think to myself thank God that the divine light the divine nature doesn't say you know what what's the point of all of this creation of everything that has been brought to exist that one can be aware of if no one's aware of it to what in that beauty if no one feels the beauty to what end how amazing the depth and breadth of the human soul even in its undeveloped state is if there's no one to appreciate all that can be brought out of that soul all that that soul can experience so what we're looking at here if you're looking at it with me is that apart from a practical physical level what needs to be done my job I'm cooking made myself something took seven hours to prepare something last night to what end apart from that all of that in order to be free or at peace with the moment that begins if I am in this moment silent doesn't silence hold everything that enters into it isn't silence a way in which everything is announced to the ear so that if I am as I'm describing to you all that I behold now and evermore because that's the point the observer is the observed new eyes new ears see a world a life in which the lilies of the field don't have to toil because those eyes and ears understand that everything that that lily needs to be beautiful is never not being given to it that there is a ceaseless feast set but that we sit outside of it stealing crumbs and this is why we must at all times as best possible if we want to understand anything about the silence the miracle of a silent mind what is the miracle of a silent mind it's that it is not apart from what is reflected within it in fact all that is reflected within it is so that it can be aware of its all-encompassing relationship to see as best we can and I don't know if I've made it far enough to get this clear to you if what I see is not separate from the eye that sees it now I'll say it this way if what my eye sees is not separate from the eye that sees it if they are in fact a reflection of one another then there is at all times in every moment the fact that we are in this world as an instrument the eyes of the divine if we're aware that something acts on us and at the same time aware of what is receiving and rejecting or accepting if we're present to this constant relationship between what seems to be outside of us and the experience of it within us if we're fully present to that and what we are experiencing in the fullness of that present isn't isn't me it's not guy it's not your name it's a light a life an awareness that was there before we took this body that was always present that sees what it does because it is in all for all intents and purposes the eyes of the divine looking upon its own creation experiencing itself developing itself even though it is already full of fully developed like the bud of a rose already holds the rose that opens to remember ourselves to remember to gather ourselves in the moment that's unwanted or that we find ourselves caught up in more thought to realize that all of that conflict is driving more of this thought process trying to resolve what it's creating and to remember to bring all of this back into ourselves this is the the symbol you know that the all-seeing eye in that try in that period in that triangle the all-seeing eye seeing all three active passive reconciling everything brought together into a singularity the one witness but a witness that isn't some idle person standing by a witness to a ceaseless foment of ceaseless creation taking place within itself the experience of a ceaseless creation because what is it experiencing it is experiencing the growing awareness of its relationship to the world around it and the world within it as a singularity where the will of heaven is done on in the will of earth and when the two things are brought together they're not async they're not apart when the moment comes and acts upon whatever it finds to act upon it's a marriage created in heaven but we stand outside of that marriage we stand outside of that Union because there is a nature inside of us that wants to create for itself what it calls heaven that wants to create for itself life and all that can create is disparity conflict and ultimately death remember yourselves try to try as best you can sit outside sometime and just for a moment try to try to be the the try to be as quiet as you can not by thinking as best you're capable experience outside and inside without and within as a singularity that can't be done in thought it requires a new order of receptivity based on a new wish to realize the truth of yourself remember yourself remember yourself that's it