The Four Stages of the Zen Circle explains the process of awakening in the clearest way I have seen. It is a process of progressively letting go of attachments to illusion. Often people, including spiritual teachers, become stuck in one of the stages and believe that is the end of the process. Hopefully, this simple video will clear up any confusion that seems to be so common today.
Radiant Light and Love
Radiant Light and Love
A Spiritual Biography of the True Self
I experienced this Radiant Light and Love as a young child often when I was alone. By age twelve the noise of the world and my thoughts had drowned It out. At twenty-two years, It returned full force and completely overcame the noise of the world, thought and all self-identity. What I had thought I was dissolved completely in this Light and Love. The experience was pure heaven, absolute peace, bliss and unconditional love.
It was then that I first realized the great power of this Radiant Light and Love to heal people. Many people were healed in those ten days before thoughts of a separate self were re-established. This profound experience and the seeming loss of it after only ten days was the beginning of a dedicated spiritual search that lasted over thirty years.
In my early fifties, a Near Death experience from a bad surgery and several other profound awakenings initiated the return of this Radiant Light and Love in a more complete and permanent way. I found myself remaining in silence for long periods of up to a year at a time completely immersed in this Presence of God, for this is what I called It. It was then that this Light began healing people again. Since that time, It has continued to increase for the past twenty years.
Now a transmission is often felt by people around me, as this is what It does. I realize this Light and Love as my True Self and the True Self of all existence. All that is not This is but a dream of thought. Most people are not aware of It, nor are they able to see It. It is not a light of photons that can be seen with human eyes. I can’t honestly say how I can. Most people are distracted from realizing It by thoughts and thought-based perceptions of the world and a separate self. Yet, in Truth, beneath all this illusion and appearance shines this Radiant Light and Love. It is always here. Nothing that exists could exist without It.
Please understand that words cannot possibly describe an experience that is completely beyond words and thoughts, as all reality is. The only understanding is found in the direct experience beyond words and thoughts. And this is always available to you.
If you are open to it, this can be experienced in Satsang. I hold Satsang online every Saturday from noon to 2:30 PM Pacific Time and both online and at the Zendo in Sedona from 7:00 PM to 8:30 PM Arizona Time each Monday.
Directions to the Sedona Zendo of the Awakened Heart in Sedona, Arizona and how to attend online can be found here: Living Awake Satsang and Satsang – Living in Truth
Peter Cutler is a Zen Monk, artist and spiritual teacher living in Sedona, Arizona.
The painting “When Two or More” can be seen at the online Zen Brush Gallery:
The Birth and Death of Conditioning
A friend sent me an adorable picture of his new born nephew. My first thought, “Welcome to the dream, Little One.” Even at one day old, it is unlikely this little fellow will ever experience reality or what he really is. Before his birth, the conditioning had already begun in the fetus stage. The conditioned mind of his mother is transmitted without words to the growing fetus in the womb. And, as we all know, conditioning continues and is reinforced throughout our lives.This can give you some idea of your own conditioning, where it comes from, how pervasive it is and its effect on you.
Very few of us ever awaken from this conditioned dream. Very few of us ever experience reality, truth or what we really are. Yet some do. Perhaps this little one will be one of those few. I hope so. I hope it for you. I hope it for everyone.
Most of us don’t realize we are living in a dream. We consider it reality, life and who we are. But some do realize there is something more or feel there must be something more. That’s a start. Some of us have even had glimpses, direct experiences, of what that something more might be. And, far more rare, some of have awakened or are in the process of awakening right now. Perhaps this little guy will be one of those. I hope so. I hope it for you. I hope it for everyone.
As you can see conditioning is continuous in all societies. It begins even before birth in the transmission of the mother’s conditioned mind. It includes the conditioned minds of the father and everyone else connected to the baby. The conditioned mind is transmitted with or without words. Unlike what the conditioned mind perceives, there is really no separation anywhere.
There are many aspects that go into every awakening from this heavily conditioned dream. One of those is a time of isolation from human contact for a period of time after the awakening experience. Without this isolation from other conditioned minds, an awakening experience, no matter how powerful, will eventually be pulled back into conditioning again. You can see this time of isolation from other conditioned minds in the experiences of Mooji, Eckhart Tolle, Ramana, Papaji and many other awake beings.
Another aspect is spending time in the presence of one free of the conditioned mind. This is the purpose of Satsang, silent retreats, etc. Unlike the transmission of the conditioned mind which happens with most people and reinforces our conditioning, this is the transmission of a mind free of conditioning and helps free us from conditioning.
Today being in the presence of an awake being is easier than ever. You have access through books, YouTube videos, internet, retreats, Satsangs, etc. You are most fortunate.
Many spiritual teachers today believe and claim they are free of this conditioning but are not. Only a small handful are. It has been like this throughout human history.
You may feel it is difficult to discern who is free and who is not, but it is far easier than you think. Thinking is only your conditioned mind. Leave it alone. You know entirely and only by what you experience. If you experience a great freedom, peace, bliss and unconditional love for no reason at all, then you are in the presence of someone who is free of the conditioned mind, someone who is awake. They may speak or not. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what they say or teach or if they say nothing at all. You know by your direct experience. Leave the mind alone. The mind is only conditioning. Trust your direct experience.
Both Mooji and Eckhart Tolle are easily accessible and both are awake. You have access to Ramana Maharshi and Papaji through books and videos. They are no longer in a physical body, but nobody really dies. Remember, there is no separation. You may have to take this on faith until you experience it.
You may find yourself sitting next to a stranger and suddenly this great freedom, peace, bliss and unconditional love overcomes you. You are in the presence of one free of conditioned thought. That is enough. You don’t need to ask questions or imagine you found your teacher. That experience is the teaching. That is enough. Leave your mind alone.
You may be totally alone and find yourself overcome with this great freedom, peace, bliss and unconditional love. This is even better. You have discovered your True Teacher. The appearance of all awakened beings is only an illusion. Remember, there is no separation. Stay here in this great freedom. Allow it to overcome you, to overcome the dream of you. This is the only teaching there is. Your mind will never understand this. This is truth. This is reality. It is not conditioning. It is freedom from conditioning. You’re waking up. Welcome Home.
Your True Purpose
Your True Purpose
Many people want to know their purpose in this life. “Why was I born?” “What am I here for?” “What should I be doing?” and “What happens after I die?”
As teenagers we begin to wonder how we fit into the world. “Who am I?” “What role do I play?” “Where do I fit in?”
Later as adults we can feel frustrated with our jobs, our careers, our lives. We might feel that this is not my true purpose. This is not why I was born.
We cannot think our way into our True Purpose. We cannot figure it out. Figuring it out is what gets in the way of our True Purpose. It is why we’re frustrated and still seeking.
Look at a tree. Does it wonder what its purpose is? Does it question why it was born or if it’s doing the correct thing?
In Spring, flowers and leaves begin to bud. In Summer, it is lush and green. In Autumn, the leaves change color and drop to the ground. In Winter, it stands naked of all leaves and the energy goes inward like a monk.
All of this happens naturally without any questions, without any doubt, without any worries or concerns.
At one point this tree was just a tiny seed or nut. At another point it will be compost for new life to grow.
All of this happens without the tree worrying about its True Purpose. And yet in every moment its True Purpose is fulfilled completely.
And so it is with you. In every single moment your True Purpose is fulfilled completely. Only your thinking has confused you. In every moment you are always fulfilling your True Purpose. Just like the tree, from the moment of your birth you have been doing this. You cannot fail to do this.
It is only your thinking that has confused you. All of life is fulfilling its True Purpose in every moment. Your thinking has made you imagine that you are something separate from all of life, something special and independent. This is the cause of your confusion and your searching. You are not separate from all of life anymore than a tree or flower is. Not one and not two, not the same and not different, but not separate. You are life. Life is you.
In every moment you are always completely fulfilling your True Purpose. Sitting, standing and lying down, moving and remaining still, awake and asleep, in every moment this is your True Purpose. For a moment let go of your thoughts so you can realize this. It’s okay to relax and simply be. It’s okay to allow the mind to be quiet and still. How else can you know who you are? How else can you know your True Purpose?
Living Awake with Peter
Zen Is Totally Ordinary and Totally Profound
Zen is not about something far away.
It is not about an after-life or an enlightenment that only a Buddha can attain.
Zen is about your daily life. It is about brushing your teeth, using the toilet, cooking and eating. It is about your work and your relationships. It is about every breath, every footstep, every thought.
If you only see the form and appearance of these things, you miss their substance. You do not see God. You do not see Buddha. You do not see your True Self.
Zen is about seeing what you don’t ordinarily see but is always here. Your mind has been conditioned to ignore what is here and only see what you think is here.
Zen is about seeing what is actually here.
It is very simple. Nothing new is added. Everything has always been complete. But because of your conditioning, when you do finally see it can seem quite profound, earth-shaking profound. Your entire life changes completely.
And yet you also realize that this has always been here the whole time. That can seem even more profound. You realize the irony of searching for peace, happiness, love or enlightenment when it has always been right here the whole time. You can never take a single blade of grass for granted ever again.
What you will discover on every page of this website is a pointing back to your True Self. Each video, each blog post, each guided meditation, each painting is pointing directly back to your True Awakened Self. Where do you find enlightenment? Right here in the midst of your ordinary life.
Zen Circle of Enlightenment
Awakening from the dream of conceptual thinking follows a certain route and process. The Zen Circle of Enlightenment is a useful way of understanding this. This post does not cover the practices that help this evolve. It simply shows the route and process of what happens for freedom from the conceptual world to be directly experienced and lived. Click here to download this graphic: Zen Circle of Enlightenment
Zero Degrees – The Beginning
We begin in this map at zero degrees. We are completely attached to our thoughts. We see the world and ourself completely through thoughts, concepts and beliefs. We don’t yet realize that these are just abstractions of reality and not reality itself. We believe this conceptual world IS reality. We believe our thoughts ARE reality. In spiritual terms we might say we are living completely in a dream or illusion.
90 Degrees – The First Step Toward Freedom
When we begin a spiritual practice, we move to 90 degrees on this map. We start learning new concepts, spiritual concepts. We leave some of our old concepts and beliefs behind and pick up new ones. If we read and study The Heart Sutra, for instance, we might now say that Form is Emptiness and Emptiness is Form, where at zero degrees we were believing that Form is Form and Emptiness is Emptiness.
We can get very excited about our new discoveries. They feel very liberating. We find new friends who are also practicing these new ways of thinking and experiencing. We find new teachers who lead us deeper into these new ideas and beliefs. It’s a very exciting time. But it can also be a little frustrating. We’ve got all these new and exciting concepts and beliefs, but somehow we’re still not awake. Somehow we still experience suffering in our lives. We may even tell ourselves that we are free and awake because we’ve had some amazing experiences, but deep inside we know this is not true. Deep inside, we still experience an incompleteness.
That’s because, even though these are new and exciting thoughts and beliefs, they are still only thoughts and beliefs. Reality is completely beyond all thoughts and beliefs, even spiritual ones. Given the powerful conditioning we’ve all undergone, it may be hard to accept this. But eventually, through frustration and continued suffering if nothing else, we break through. We break through the barrier of thought.
180 Degrees – The First Glimpse of Freedom
In Zen koan practice, we call this The First Gate. The purpose of our koan practice is to introduce this impossible impasse, barrier or gate that the mind of thought cannot get through. No matter how hard we try, none of our usual mental strategies work. The only way through is without the mind. Finally, in that great breakthrough, body and mind drop away. Because this is beyond the mind, there is nothing we can say about it. None of our mental labels can describe what this is. In Zen, we call this Emptiness. It is completely beyond all words and thoughts. It is not nothing. It is not everything. It is not inside. It is not outside. It is not duality. It is not nonduality. It is not self. It is not other. It is not existing, nor is it not existing. There is absolutely nothing we can say about this.
Now we have come face to face with reality, but we don’t yet know what this is. All our words, concepts, beliefs, knowledge and previous experiences cannot touch this. All the spiritual knowledge and experiences we accumulated at 90 degrees cannot touch this at all. We are completely emptied out and all there is is reality itself.
Quite often people become a little unsettled and resistant to this complete freedom at first. They may quickly resort to thoughts in an attempt to exert at least a little imagined control. That’s unfortunate, but it’s the nature of the conditioned mind. The longer we stay in this freedom from thought, the more wonderful we realize it is. Here we are directly experiencing life, reality, without any thoughts getting in the way. The longer we stay here, the more we realize that this is the very source of the peace, love, contentment, freedom, creativity and wisdom we have been seeking. This is it. This is our True Self, even if there is not a thing we can say about it.
Because this freedom from thought is so liberating, we can also become attached to this stage and not move on and embody it in the world for the benefit of all beings. Eventually most of us do want to do this. We realize we are not separate from any being, unconditional love is our very nature, and so we move on.
270 Degrees – Embodying Freedom
At 270 Degrees, we’re free to use language, concepts, and thoughts without any attachment to them. They’re just language, concepts and thoughts. They have no reality or validity beyond that. When they’re useful, beneficial and appropriate, we use them. Otherwise we remain silent. Great creativity flows through some of us in this stage. But we’re not attached to it. It doesn’t even feel like we’re doing anything. It’s simply happening by itself. It’s simply life happening.
Some us find ourselves as spiritual teachers here. We feel called to help others discover this great freedom and liberation from suffering. Although people may become attached to our words, we never are. And we do our best to encourage them to see all our words as merely pointers to something beyond words and thoughts. It is never the words we are pointing towards. It is always the freedom beyond words and thoughts.
Although we’ve learned to use words and concepts again to communicate, the underlying emptiness and freedom remains. In the Zen tradition teachers often say things that sound like nonsense to the conditioned mind in an effort to help serious students break free of the prison of their conditioned thoughts. That’s the purpose of Zen koans. When we’re free of the conceptual dream world, what appeared as nonsense is completely understood as pointing directly at reality. It’s often a time of great hilarity, without any thoughts about why it’s so funny.
Here we’re free to use words, thoughts and actions in any way they are truly beneficial without having the slightest attachment to them. It’s like being a bucket without a bottom. Whatever pours in immediately leaves without a trace. In this way, we live in freedom. In the Christian bible, it’s called living in the world but not of it.
360 Degrees – Returning Home As Freedom
At 360 degrees on this circle, we have returned home. We live fully in the world, but without any attachment or resistance to any of it. We live in complete freedom. Now we can say that “mountains are mountains” without any attachment or belief in these words. The difference between saying “mountains are mountains” at zero degrees with attachment and belief and saying “mountains are mountains” at 360 degrees with complete freedom is profound. From the outside, it may appear that these are the same, but they are not at all. No longer imprisoned by our thoughts, no longer imprisoned by a sense of separation, we are free to be fully in the world and act in the highest benefit for all beings.
That doesn’t mean our journey has ended. In one sense it has just begun. But it’s no longer a personal self with needs and goals taking this journey. The journey is happening by itself. In every moment it is unfolding fresh, new and alive. Whatever arises in each moment is the journey. And each moment is fully complete in and of itself. There is no longer a desire to get something or get somewhere. The fullness of life is revealed in every moment. What more could be asked for? This is returning home.
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