Blue Sky Meditation: Radiance Sutras Verse 61

So today we are reading from the Radiant Sutras.

The Radiant Sutras is a beautiful translation of the Vijnana Bhairava Tantra.

In many ways I feel like this book is one of the greatest journeys of tantra.

People often ask,

You know,

Well where do I get started in the journey of tantra?

And this is so beautiful.

The challenge with using something like the Radiant Sutras as a tantric journey is we aren't used to trusting our own process.

It's like we're looking for a teacher who will guide us and take us and we get to learn all kinds of sort of external things and you know it's almost like our education system taught us that if you memorize a bunch of stuff you're on the journey,

You're learning something.

But tantra is not like that.

Tantra is where you start exactly where you are right now and you start to expand your consciousness.

This is the journey of tantra.

Truthfully the less you learn about any mechanics of tantra or stories or stories of gods and goddesses and all that,

In many ways those things are all distractions from our own unfolding because we don't realize that every one of us is divine right now,

Exactly as we are right now.

And it doesn't matter what you believe your life looks like or your health or your family,

It doesn't matter that every one of us is divine.

It's like in the heart there's a little spark plug that just it's always pumping this little energy and medicine,

Doctors,

Scientists have no idea where the energy comes from.

It's a mystery.

Every single one of us has this little spark going on inside our heart all day long.

No one knows where it comes from.

This is miraculous to me.

This is very significant.

So now imagine from that little spark,

That little divine energy,

Imagine this energy inside and nobody knows where it comes from.

This is where we start,

Every one of us.

And all we do is expand in that.

It's like we take that wonder and we start to let the wonder of the universe permeate our body and permeate our mind.

We just continue allowing this in a very gentle way.

That it isn't that you suddenly you learn all these things and now you've reached this level and then you learn this and now I've reached this level and now I'm an advanced tantric and now I'm a master tantric and I'm all this.

It's not like that.

We just keep organically expanding.

So in the radiant sutras,

Each sutra have they have a different purpose.

Some are philosophy.

They're a different way of seeing the world so that we can expand.

You know it's kind of like imagine you have this beautiful heart center,

This beautiful life center but there's like cages around it.

Belief systems,

Experiences,

Fears,

All these things that kind of keep it from being expansive.

So sometimes we have to hear a different way of seeing the world and see if any of those cages disappear.

We don't have to break the cages down.

It's sort of like that idea that light illuminating illumines the darkness.

You don't have to fight the darkness.

You just have to bring light to it.

So if you hear an idea that is actually truth,

That is actually light,

The darkness just falls away.

Some of the sutras are practices and the practices are interesting like the one we're going to read today.

And sometimes they seem so simple we don't want to do them.

Okay well that's just too easy.

Like that's that's not interesting.

I want something difficult.

Something that I know that I'm really working hard.

Then I'm sure that I'm I'm really advancing.

But that's not real life.

Like we've been taught that complexity is the way to success.

But that's not real life.

If we go out into nature there's no complexity.

Yet that nature has been here for thousands of years and will continue long after we're gone.

The world and life really is very simple.

And it's when things seem complex that they're that they're probably wrong.

Or it's actually an illusion.

The complexity is an illusion.

That's one thing I really find.

So you know behind me here is my magic bookshelf.

And when I'm studying the the ancient you know works in tantra and stuff,

As soon as they start getting really complex,

And this is my opinion but I'm pretty strong in it,

I think it's intentionally a distraction to keep people busy.

It's almost like if you fall for the distraction you're not ready.

Or something.

I can't I don't know how to put it into words but all I know is if they're telling you that you've got to memorize this and know this and memorize this and know that,

It's almost like they're playing to your ego.

And if your ego is still here wanting to seem smart or seem intelligent or whatever,

Then you're probably not going to be able to experience it anyway.

So anyway so there's lots of interesting exercises which is what we're going to do today.

So if you're new to our Radiant Sutras,

I'm going to read today's sutra.

Then we're going to have a conversation about it and then we're going to do a meditation so that we can experience it.

Guys ready?

Let's close our eyes.

For those of you who have the book,

We are reading number 61 today.

Let's just breathe deeply.

Inhaling,

Expanding the belly.

Exhaling,

Contracting the belly.

Adorable one,

Sit or lie down completely immobile beholding the cloudless sky or if there are clouds the sky beyond as vastness envelops you the body vanishes thoughts forget to come in this moment you are the nature of the great sky what does that stir for you or what feelings rise or what words stay with you becoming one with nature one with the entire universe no boundaries vastness spaciousness freedom ah integrity absolute peace the image of the sky is one i've always found calming and expansive centering in the vastness purity expanding past the body it's like a reminder from the great mother to all of her children to reconnect with the heart of who we are stillness of spirit i'm gonna stay in this space today made me feel like it was a third eye vision a third eye vision so this is a very interesting one because again it seems very simple so this is a practice this is a tantric practice there's two parts of this that i want to talk about the first part i want to talk about is this idea of lying perfectly still when we do shavasana at the end of a yoga practice shavasana means corpse pose and the intention of shavasana how you do shavasana properly is to lie perfectly still it isn't just resting it isn't just lying down it's actually lying perfectly still that's really challenging because it's almost like all of these little micro movements in our bodies these little twitches and itches and stuff like that they keep us connected to the world it's like they keep us connected to the limited aspect of life they keep us engaged in the 3d they keep us engaged in the 3d world or in the limited world but if we can stop all that and lie perfectly still something else will happen for many of you guys who have read my books especially the divine union of the masculine feminine i think i talk about this in tantric intimacy i can't remember but years ago i read a book called aphrodite's daughters they told a story of this little nun and the nun every night would go to her room lie down in her cot and lie perfectly still and wait for god to come and make love to her and i remember reading it and at the time thinking well that's weird and then years later i was living in toronto i was on my own and it came back to me and i was lying in the bed and i thought okay lie perfectly still now first of all i couldn't believe what a challenge that was to actually lie perfectly still it actually took a a certain level of discipline that was like no i know it's itchy you can't move it was almost like my body was so wanting to stay engaged with the world but we can't be engaged in the world if we want to have this experience if we want to have this experience so i lay perfectly still and i breathed and i waited and all of a sudden my body filled with this hum this buzzing this vibration and i lay there in absolute ecstasy i was lying perfectly still lying on my bed doing nothing at all there's something really important about that and it's no small thing that we do shavasana at the end of a yoga practice and it's interesting how so often that's what we want to skip because we think it's rest we think it's rest and it's not rest it is a portal to something so that's the first part of this exercise like to lie perfectly still yes this has happened to me as well totally melissa it's really something it's uh i always savor shavasana communion with the divine exactly it's funny i have two meditations here on insight timer one is called experiencing god or something and one's for women and one's for men and it's funny because i had taken that experience and then looked at the polarities that they talk about in tantra and i had started playing with that because i started doing it i started doing this practice a lot just lie it was so euphoric it was like i couldn't always do it it didn't always work sometimes it was almost like my mind was too busy or i was emotional or something and i just couldn't always get there maybe maybe half the time i couldn't get there the other half the time i could how long do i think it took me to get there like five minutes it's almost like the second your body actually becomes still you know when you're meditating and your mind's kind of arguing and it's going back and forth and it's thinking about that and it's thinking about this and it's just it's just sort of all over the place but you've set a timer for 10 minutes and at some point your brain gives up fighting and you just surrender to it and you go fine in that moment the brain stops and meditation begins it's like as soon as you stop it's like as soon as you stop oh am i still yet is it happening yet as soon as soon as you stop all that then it happens every single one of us could experience this it doesn't you don't have to be experienced at anything to do it it's transported me into a white tunnel oh that's awesome i felt so much love is it that euphoric merging with light feeling yes yes the less i try the easy it is for me often when i try i don't get there i know well for me the only thing i have to try at is staying still that's the only thing i have to i it's almost like i just have to decide it's like let's say you want to give up sugar if you're like trying to give up sugar it'll never work it's almost like you just have to have this decision that says okay you know what done for 30 days i'm not going to do this thing and then you stop arguing with it you don't even entertain it that's the point where you're just like i'm not going to move and that's it but it and that's it but it requires a little extra something something like we're gonna we can't get there in our normal lazy state and i'm gonna say lazy even if we're not lazy people but sometimes we don't want to be so disciplined in things like that can that stillness happen to an degree when awake and having to do a job and letting go of what you can't fix or control yeah it's different that feels different to me what that feels like to me and again that this is just my experience it's like let's say you have to do something you don't really want to do it or you're having to deal with people or whatever right whatever it is that's really not ideal and not joyful and if we're not careful our mind will be like arguing and making it worse right like here's what i have to do but now i'm actually in constant reaction mode and my mind is like oh i can't believe i have to do this this is so sucks and this person drives me crazy and this is so dumb and oh my god the clock is like and our brain is going everything our brain is saying isn't unnecessary but it's adding to the difficulty so there is something that allows us to say well i'm gonna do this and then all of a sudden inside we become still like there's this quiet inside that says okay and we just do it for me i i believe this is a it's a kind of maturing process that many people go through often when we have children or we have to care for parents who are struggling or we have difficult jobs that we can't change certain things there's something that happens that we develop something inside an ability to actually find peace inside even though things aren't ideal and i believe that really brings our character forward so the other part i want to mention is there's a line here as vastness envelops you the body vanishes and that's another big piece when our body is still when it's still it has a chance to vanish as long as it's moving there's a consciousness there the next line is thoughts forget to come thoughts forget to come so this weekend at one point i was lying in the tub and i love lying in the tub it is one of my all-time favorite things to do many of you guys know that in two places ago that i used to live didn't have a bathtub tub so i bought a Rubbermaid container a big Rubbermaid container and i used it as a bathtub because i so love being in a bathtub but i have a really nice tub now and i'm lying there the water's warm it's got lovely sea salts in it i've got a bath pillow i've got a glass of water that i'm drinking i'm just like in total bliss and then all of a sudden i noticed my thoughts and my thoughts was they were playing out scenarios they were redoing experiences i'd had before and having different outcomes well if i'd said this then this would have happened oh i should call them and i should try to start that up again to start that up again or something or i was making up things completely well if someone said this to me then i would say this and then they would say this and i would say this and and then i was imagining what might happen at this event that i'm going to and then i would and i was lying there thinking what is your brain doing right now like what are you thinking about why why are you having these fictional thoughts because of course the thoughts i was having they were very juicy they were very i mean all these arguments i was having with people you know they were all where i was really smart and they were really ridiculous so i had all of these emotional things flowing through my system but i'm lying in a tub totally relaxing and it reminded me of i remember hearing this shaolin master speak once and he said the most important thing that you ever have to do is learn how to control your thoughts you have to control your thoughts and i thought thought huh control and he was adamant he says like you will never accomplish anything if you can't control your thoughts and this is really similar to the talk that we had last week on wednesday called how to not let thinking get in the way of your life it's now uploaded on insight timer by the way and i was lying there thinking that's so interesting and then i was thinking about in harry potter for any harry potter fans there was a point where they realized that the bad guy voldemort was able to tap into harry's brain and of course if he could get into harry's brain he could find out what people were doing so they were trying to get harry to be able to control his thoughts so that the bad guy couldn't find out stuff by hacking into his brain and of course harry was having a horrible time with this because he didn't know how to control his thoughts he didn't know how to you know he didn't know how to do that and so i was lying in the tub going this is imperative these are ridiculous scenarios i'm having here that it's almost like my my my body is split i'm now two people my body is lying in the tub but my brain is on a completely different timeline not even a real timeline or it is a real timeline or it's someone else's timeline and then i had the thought is someone else thinking in my brain is someone else thinking me what's going on like there's this whole there's a book called multiple man or something i can't remember what it's called but it was all about how psychically when we're connected to people people can actually get inside of our heads and when we're arguing with them we're actually arguing with them they're arguing with us too in their head somewhere else and that how we have to be really careful that we aren't arguing with people in our heads that are alive right now because it's almost like they're just they don't mean to be doing it they don't know they're doing it but they're arguing with you too and it actually is it's of no value like it's not a healthy thing and so anyway i was lying in the tub and i thought you know what we're gonna stop this right now and i just said no and i stopped the dialogue in my head and i laid there and suddenly i was back in the tub and i'm like lying there breathing and then all of a sudden another scenario pops in but what was interesting about this one it was a little bit more creative it wasn't kind of so negative so i played with it for a minute and then i thought okay let's let that go let's close that down come back to zero and the way i come back to zero is it's a it's probably the first meditation technique i learned when i was about 14 years old where you inhale and you think the word one and you exhale and you think the word one and that's what that's how i stop the thoughts i inhale one exhale one until the stories have stopped and i did this for like about an hour lying in the tub and as thoughts came in one one and i kept doing it over and over and over again and i really believe this is a really important practice because it's almost like we don't get to experience the vastness of the moment if our brain keeps dropping into imaginary dialogues does anyone else have any thoughts or comments before we go into our meditation it's just very interesting i really think that this is an extremely important piece going forward in this time i think i think we have to develop the ability to control our thoughts we have to be able to shut down and be zero how do you know when you have to clear your mind versus when there's a topic or issue that you need to focus on at some point i always find that when there's a topic i need to focus on it's just very productive like i'm having little aha moments like oh that's a good idea or something like that and if it's something that i really need to think about like let's say there's an issue going on in a relationship or something right like there's something something's amok and it's a real thing and i do have to think about it i don't know i it's almost like i lie there and i ask myself is this helping you know sometimes we might play out scenarios like well i could say this but i don't know i find something like journaling or actually talking out loud to somebody helps most very seldom does that is that helpful getting grounded often throughout the day seems to help get to zero totally well what's interesting about getting grounded is very often being grounded is being in your own body this body that we live in this is shakti shiva is consciousness shakti is our body this is what it means to be grounded and so sometimes that works when we're out in nature because it's almost like nature vibrates like our body and nature's so big it helps us come back into our own body so no matter what you're doing just do what you're doing wash the dishes drive the car cut the lawn eat the food whatever but really stay in the body yes and stay in the present moment these are the number one things and then there are no thoughts then you're actually just thinking about what you're doing all right now let's do a meditation together so you can be sitting upright you can lie down you can be sitting in any way you would like now let's close our eyes connect with the belly feeling your belly expanding as you inhale and contracting as you exhale and then notice in your body if there's anywhere that there's pain or discomfort and allow all of your focus to go there focus on the part of your body that you're experiencing discomfort and then see if there's another spot that you're feeling discomfort and focus there bring your breath to these areas of discomfort and then imagine that you are a tree and you have huge beautiful roots down into the ground reaching through the soil and feel this wonderful solid connection in the earth feel your upper body like the trunk of the tree trunk of the tree feel your body become beautifully still and in your mind's eye i'd like you to imagine yourself sitting in a meadow it's a beautiful day the sun is shining you're sitting in green grass and there's wild flowers trees off in the distance you can feel the warmth of the sun on your shoulders and your head and you naturally take a big breath filled with all the smells of the meadow and then you gently lie down on the grass maybe you're lying on a blanket if that's more comfortable your arms are at your side you look up and you see the beautiful blue sky and you see how vast it is how deep the blue goes and you become fascinated wondering what you're looking at how far does the blue go how deep how wide and you're so intrigued with the blue your body becomes perfectly still resting on the earth fully supported you can feel the magnetism of the earth's core holding you to the earth fully connected your belly rises and falls as you breathe your eyes are open and soon all the thoughts disappear as well as you take in this beautiful blue sky your body falls away the earth falls away and you soon become the sky you become this infinite space you are so light so pure you are so light so pure let's just breathe in this space for a while Devi adorable one sit or lie down completely immobile beholding the cloudless sky or if there are clouds the sky beyond as vastness envelops you the body vanishes thoughts forget to come in this moment you are the nature of the great sky so in your mind's eye envision yourself envision yourself closing your eyes and gently sitting upright on the meadow feeling all the vastness of the sky within your eyes and feel that vastness flowing through your whole body breathing it with every breath and then opening your eyes and let's come back together so thank you so much for being here hope you have a wonderful day