This is a wonderful film about how our brain creates our reality. It demonstrates scientifically, so the mind can understand it, how this dream of reality is created. I have experimented with this many times. Purposely erasing – momentarily – neural pathways in the brain that described certain objects until I could no longer see them. They simply blended into the background and disappeared. It proved to me that without a thought about any object, you cannot see it. And, of course, there is a much deeper reality that lies hidden underneath all these thoughts and thought-based impressions and sensations, that lies hidden underneath the brain and its interpretations. When we lose our belief in the reality we see and think is here, a much deeper reality emerges that is always here. This film will help you realize that what you see is not as real as you think it is. Not real at all.
The Lesson of the Mumbling Man
It’s amazing where our blessings and teachings come from. We have to keep our eyes, ears and heart open or we can easily miss them and mistake them for something that is just the opposite.
Perhaps you have been blessed by an encounter with a mentally disturbed person who, while talking to himself, targets you with abusive language. This may feel disturbing. But it is the perfect lesson that everything people say about you comes entirely from them. It has little or nothing to do with you at all. In the case of someone like this it is far more obvious and not subtle at all. You can’t miss it. That is why it is a blessing.
Most of us are concerned about what people think of us. We want them to think we are good people and to like us. If we are particularly insecure we may ignore the hundred people that think we are wonderful and put all our attention on the one person who thinks we are an idiot. This is not as uncommon as it may sound.
The realization that whatever anyone thinks about us is a reflection of them, not us, is not only very freeing but true. This is far more obvious in the case of a severely mentally disturbed person. But it is actually just as true for all people. We may not want to admit this because we kind of like the positive attention we get from people. It strokes our ego. To admit this, we have to throw out the positive with the negative. They are both just the reflection of the one who thinks this, not of us.
If we care to look just a little deeper, we can’t even find this “us” who people are saying positive or negative things about. That is also simply a reflection of our own conditioned thoughts. It’s not really here. So the person who says something negative about us and the “I” that reacts to this criticism are both seeing something that is not really here. We are both only talking about a dream. Although this is a far more subtle illusion than the one the mentally disturbed person muttering to himself is suffering under, it actually has far more in common than we want to admit. Perhaps the only real difference is that one illusion is accepted as reality by the majority of the population and the other one is not.
The real point of my story is that we have much to learn from everything that occurs in our lives. Lessons are constantly occurring in great abundance every moment. When we stop resisting life, it becomes much easier to see just how incredibly generous it is.
You Are The River
Life flows like a river. All things come and go in this river: experiences, feelings, thoughts, sensations, perceptions. Notice how this happens. In every moment there is change, movement and transformation.
What appears to be happening outside of you is also happening in this river. Everything is happening in this river. Notice how what appears to be happening outside of you is also always changing, moving and transforming.
Sometimes a thought, belief or feeling may appear to be stuck. It doesn’t seem to move. It is like a stagnant place in the river that is no longer flowing. It is not really stuck but through our continued focus and attention, our thoughts, beliefs, fears and attachment, we prevent it from moving on. We prevent it from flowing as it naturally wants to. Eventually these stuck places reveal themselves as physical disease so that we will finally pay attention and release them. But even then, we often don’t. We seek a cure for the symptom (the disease) without looking at the cause (the stagnation, attachment, fear and resistance). And this too is just like a river. That stagnant parts that are not flowing become unhealthy. Sometimes it takes a great rain to wash through the river to release these stagnant places. Sometimes it takes a great trauma or crisis, like a serious illness or loss, for us to release these stuck places too and return to our natural healthy flow.
You are like a river. Everything comes and goes in you. Sometimes when the snows melt in the Spring, the river runs very fast. It can even overflow its banks. And other times, late in the summer, it moves so slowly and gently it barely seems to move at all. No matter how the river is flowing, it remains the river. To our superficial perceptions it may appear that the river is a raging rapids or calm and tranquil. But the river has no such opinions. It knows it is just the river. And this is also like us. No matter what is happening in our life, raging rapids or calm and tranquil, we remain just like the river.
Everything changes in our river: thoughts, feelings, beliefs, perceptions, sensations, experiences, situations. Everything is in constant flow. But, just like the river, we do not change. We remain what we are. We have been like this before this body was conceived. And we will continue just like this after this body is no more. There is an undying peace, love and well-being that never changes. Just like the river, we have always been absolutely complete and whole. Just like the river we see how everything is constantly changing in us and around us. And, just like the river, we see this and smile, for we never change. We remain always complete and whole.
I Am Just An Actor
For a brief time (80 or 90 years), I am like an actor playing the role of myself in a movie called “My Life”. As Shakespeare said, “All the world’s a stage. And all the men and women merely players.”And this is very true. What I think of as myself is just a role, nothing more. For a good section of this movie, I believed this role was real. I believed I was this constantly changing role. And this delusion of course leads to suffering, as everything that is untrue must inevitably.
But now I am free. I still play this role but with full awareness that it is only this. Child, adolescent, greaser, rebel, bad boy, hippie, rock and roller, father, husband, lover, friend, artist, photographer, film director, spiritual teacher, victim and hero. These are all the roles played in this movie, on this stage. There will probably be several more before this movie ends.
What freedom to no longer believe this is more than a role. What joy to play and act and be completely intimate with all aspects of this role in each moment, to think all the thoughts, to feel all the feelings, fully and completely, almost as if they were real but knowing that they are not. It is just a role, like all the other roles.
And what is this actor playing all these roles? Ahh, that is beyond all roles. That is this ultimate freedom. That is the purpose of all roles. And yet it is far too intimate to be described. It is simply what I am beyond any role.
What a great blessing to be here to see all of this, to be all of this.
I Love Movies
After awakening all my interests in the world seemed to fade away. Since I feel complete, I have no desires for anything that is not already arising in this very moment. That makes me very happy, but a terrible consumer. If everyone were to awaken I imagine this consumer economy would have to undergo a major change if it could even survive at all.
But I still seem to be interested in movies. Not just spiritual movies, if there is such a thing, but all movies. Action adventure. Comedy. Romantic comedy. Drama. Super heroes. Science fiction. Not horror or even thrillers. I don’t go for that anymore. I’m not interested in fear. So I was wondering the other night why, of all things, have Hollywood movies remained an interest?
I think it’s because it’s a beautiful analogy for how I see the world. I see the world as a movie, a projection. And I am like both a member of the audience watching and the movie screen that all these amazing things are projected onto. None of it is entirely real. None of it truly affects this infinite eternal beingness/awareness that I am anymore than the images on the screen affect the screen. I am just watching this show go on with a sense of curiosity, wonder, amusement, love and joy.
Energy and feelings occur in this body and I watch this too, just as I watch thoughts. It’s amazing. It’s an amazing movie. But this deep inner stillness is not touched by these thoughts or these feelings. It is always free. And this is very much like watching a movie. I can get interested and involved in the movie when my attention is there. Otherwise what’s the point? But I am still sitting in the audience of a theater or my couch at home. And just like the movie screen, when fire appears on the screen, it is not burnt. When a blizzard appears on the movie screen, the screen itself is not cold.
In this way life itself appears kind of like a movie. Things are continually changing, coming and going, being born and dying. This is the perfect way of all life. It’s why attachment to anything always ends in suffering. But this infinite Essence, this pure Awareness, is not touched by any of it. It always remains pure and clear and free.
And perhaps this is why I still love movies so much. Watching a movie is like this infinite awareness watching life. It is a reflection of this inner awareness. When attention focuses on one thing it can be intimately involved with that one thing. Just as we are when we watch a movie. But when the movie is over and the house lights go up, we are here sitting in the theater. We never really were in a fire or freezing on a remote mountain top. And this is also true of our True Self. It is aware of everything happening in life and through attention can become intimately involved. But it is never changed by what occurs. It remains always pure, clear and free. And this freedom is where our true happiness comes from. This is where peace comes from. This is where the true love that knows there is no separation anywhere in existence is born.
So movies, yes. Pretty cool. Much like we are.
Unconditional Love
Unconditional love has no need because it is complete unto itself. It is the Being of love. It does not love or receive love. It simply IS love. It needs no other person. But all in its presence are bathed in this love like a powerful perfume. As are all not in its presence. There is no need for an other because in truth there are no others, nor a self to perceive others. There is just love. That is all. And that is enough.
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