Jim: Usually we all have pretty busy lives these days, and we’re buzzing around doing this, that, and the other.  So this invitation here, is a chance for us to come together and to start to sort of let go of our conceptual minds, and our ways of defining and trying to make sense of life and understand what life is.

And instead, we kind of ease into meeting our experience directly.  So we’re putting to one side… not getting rid of it, because our adult sophistication and our theories and concepts, they’re very useful, very powerful.  So we are not getting rid of them, but they can have this effect of blinding us to seeing a deeper reality.

So, my invitation to you is to be kind of child-like, so you’re meeting the moment afresh, as if for the first time.  And if we do that right now, then maybe it’s helpful if you feel comfortable, close your eyes.  Just because the visual image can be very full of definitions, and full of concepts and ideas, and when we close our eyes we’re a bit more open, potentially.  So, as you close your eyes, just letting go of all the things that we think we know.  Let go of everything we think we know, what can we say, what can we say for absolute certainty?

Well, what’s absolutely clear that nobody needs to tell us, is that whatever we are is here now, whatever it is that we are.  So notice your mind might be coming in saying, “Well, I know what I am.  I’m a man or a woman.  I’m sitting on a chair.  I’m a mother, a father, a brother, a sister…”  Whatever.

So that’s the stuff we’re just leaving to one side for now.  Here now, this immediate experience, I don’t know what I am.  But I definitely am, whatever that is.  And there’s something else that I can say that I don’t need to learn from someone else, which is that whatever I am, that is, has this quality of being aware.  It’s aware of Jim’s voice right now, speaking, here it is, Jim’s voice appearing, and Jim’s voice disappearing.

When Jim’s voice disappears, I don’t.  Whatever I am, doesn’t.  So that kind of makes it clear that I’m not Jim’s voice.  Jim’s voice comes and goes, and when it’s gone, whatever I am is still here, noticing the disappearance of Jim’s voice.

Well, if we start to explore more widely, then the sound of distant traffic coming, going.  When it’s gone, I’m remaining, noticing its disappearance.  Not the sound of distant traffic either.  We start to slowly bring it closer, closer to home.  What about tingling sensation in my foot, say?  Well, that’s tingling, and that’s movement, right?  So when I’m not noticing the tingling sensation in my foot, whatever I am is still here.

When it moves to a different area, or when it dissolves and it feels quite neutral, I’m still here, aware of sensations arising and dissolving too.  So just like I’m not the sound, I’m not the sensation either, that comes and goes.  I’m aware of its movement.  What about feelings?  Feeling of joy, and as that feeling of joy fades, I don’t.  I’m still here noticing that fading of the feeling of joy.  Or it doesn’t need to be joy, it could be sadness, it could be any kind of feeling.  As it dissolves or shifts to something else, here I am, noticing the movement.

So I’m not the sounds, I’m not the sensations, I’m not the feelings either.  Smells and tastes, well they come and go too.  And when they disappear, still here, noticing their disappearance.  So not the sounds, not the sensations, not the feelings, not the smells or tastes.  What about thoughts?

So noticing whatever thoughts are coming up now.  Maybe a thought saying, “I definitely am this thought”.  And then that thought changes to something else.  Maybe there’s a gap between thoughts, and in that gap when there’s no thought, do you disappear?  No, you’re here noticing the disappearance of a thought, and a reappearance of another thought.

Maybe a thought now that’s tracking this conversation and having ideas about it.  Noticing that thought coming and going, like the sounds, like the smells, like the tastes, like the sensations.  So when thought isn’t here, I still am.  I can’t be made of a thought either.

So this is curious.  It’s curious because our common belief is that what we are is the sound, the sensations, feelings, particularly the feelings, sensations and thoughts.  That’s what we identify ourselves with.  But in this very simple childlike process, we’re sort of peeling away all of the parts of ourself that we identify with, and seeing that what we are is aware of those things appearing and disappearing.

So the obvious question that comes when you do this, is well “What am I?”  So again, out of habit, rational mind jumps in, might be doing it right now, looking for an answer to that question.  Searching, rummaging, through the experience, “What about that thought?  Is that what I am?  Or that sensation?  Or that feeling?”  It’s trying to focus in on something to answer the question.

But of course, what we notice is whatever we focus in on, whether it’s a particular sound or a particular feeling, it’s already something we’re aware of.  So it’s not what we are.  So we see this rational mind attempt to grasp, to grab the answer.  It’s kind of hopeless.  It can’t win, because whatever it focuses in on, we’re already here aware of that too.

Now, that’s not to say that the mind gives up.  It might go on and on and on for years, trying to answer the question.  And in a way that’s important, to become so exhausted in trying to find a rational mind answer, conceptual answer, that we’re willing to look in a different way.  And that’s instead of focusing in to try and grab, grasp it, there’s an easing of the focusing.  There’s a natural resting, letting go of needing to know conceptually.

Just feeling your feet now on the floor and sitting bones on the chair, letting the chair take the full weight of your body.  Allowing your breath to open.  Letting go of needing to know conceptually.  Resting, easing, softening.  Easing into what we always already are, that could never be described by a thought, that we can only acknowledge by being it, here, now.  Just notice the mind trying to work it out again.  Bow to the mind, “Thank you, you have a place, you have an important place.”

But right now we’re letting go of that needing to know.  Resting again, here now.  Not knowing conceptually, to reveal a different kind of knowing, wordless knowing, non-conceptual.  It’s incredibly familiar.  Resting, and as we rest here, often we call this a kind of emptiness.  Not in a bad emptiness way, but empty of all phenomenal qualities.  You can’t give it a size, or a shape, or a weight, or a height, or a passport picture.  This being, being-ness, empty of all qualities, indescribable.

So this is sort of half a story, and there’s a few more of us now, but let’s as this is a one-off event, let’s go the whole way.  So we’ve moved from our usual everyday understanding of being thoughts, feelings, and sensations.  And we’ve taken a sort of step back as it were, to see that who we thought we were, those thoughts, feelings, and sensations, are all appearing equally as those sounds and distant traffic noises.  All appearing equally, and that what we truly are is this awareness that’s noticing the body, equally as the environment that it’s supposedly moving around.

Our physical body is just like another object that we are aware of, but notice how that still sets up a duality between the awareness and that which it’s aware of.  This emptiness of awareness, and then the experience of life still seems out there.  So then we switch our focus back to the experience of the world, and we stay with this childlike simplicity.  And this is the key, we have to realize that this experience of life happening, is a spontaneous play of perceptions.

So this sound of my voice spontaneously appearing, here now.  Sensations of your body all spontaneously appearing, here now.  Let’s say you hear the sound of an airplane overhead, that sound spontaneously appearing here now, with its sense of spatial position, all spontaneously appearing, here now.  And here is not a place in space, now is not a moment in time.  It’s the place and the moment where the experience of time and space spontaneously appears.  The feeling spontaneously appearing here now.

So you get a feel for life immediately arising.  It’s not some fixed solid thing out there, it’s like a rich collage of experiencing that literally explodes into life.  Here now, here now, here now.

So now we bring these seeming two things together, the awareness, this empty presence, and this spontaneous flow of perceptions that create the experience of life happening.  Where is awareness?  Here.  Where is this spontaneously arising?  Here.  So can we find a gap between here and here?  Where are you going to measure the gap from?  Where are you going to start measuring?  Where’s awareness?  Where does awareness end and experiencing begin?

So these funny questions are just inviting this extraordinary possibility, where this sense of division starts to collapse.  And what seemed like an empty awareness starts to fill.  Starts to fill with this sound, here now, with these sensations, here now, with these feelings and smells and tastes.  With this whole rich play of life, this whole rich mosaic of experiencing starts to fill that empty awareness, until we see that this aware presence that we are, isn’t standing back as some kind of witness to life, it’s being the experience of life happening.  Knowing and being each moment.

You, you that’s hearing this now.  You that’s hearing this being this sound.  Meeting yourself continually.  Just notice what’s happening as we go on this journey together.  Even the thought that comes that might move to resist and deny everything that’s being shared, is also appearing as part of this dance.  Being that thought too.  So what could we call this reuniting, this emptiness filling with the fullness of life?

This ultimate reunion, ultimate marriage of all things coming together, re-merging.  We call it love, not love of a me for you, but love in the collapse of seeing ourselves as separate and divided.  So this recognition is very simple, it’s extraordinarily ordinary.  Just seeing the everyday experience in a new way, shifting from being a solid subject, inhabiting a physical body, moving around in an outside world.

That’s the first way of experiencing the everyday way.  And then shifting to this experiential direct experience.  I awareness now, and being the whole display of life happening.  And curiously, when we really see that, we can even reintroduce all our concepts and ideas as convenient ways of framing reality, without being entrapped within them.  Invested, identified.  Can use this rich language, not have to censor it and use correct words, and all that nonsense.

So before I open things up and invite people to come on and speak, and explore together, I’ll say one more thing because as we start to include all of life, we also in that openness, start to clarify and recognize parts of ourself that we’ve been repressing, or denying.  Different patterns, different coping strategies, ways of operating that are constraining our authentic expression.

So we start to include those too in this loving presence, inviting everything to have a place.  And it’s a very important aspect of the journey in that it enables us to really live this understanding, to really be it in life.  Rather than it remaining as a kind of intellectual exercise, another philosophy to add to the pile.  And that takes courage to really open to what’s here.  It’s asking to be acknowledged.

So just see how that lands, and if anyone wants to ask anything or come on and explore together, you can write in the chat and I’ll go through in order.  And we can just hang out together.

From GG, “How do you view free will?”

That old chestnut.  Free will.  The thing about free will is it’s… free will for whom are we talking?  So often we imagine me, free will for me, right?  Me as the entity Jim, free will.  And so science tells us that we’re basically like organic robots, and everything is being determined by our nervous system, brain and nervous system.  And it receives new information, and it kind of reprograms itself, and there’s no ghost in the machines.  There’s no entity to have, or not to have, free will.

So from a scientific standpoint, there is no free will.  We’re just automatons, organic automatons.  And then when we look in this way, we’re asking, “Well, what is this me that would have, or not have, free will in a similar way?”.  And like we just discovered, just now.  The me that I thought I was, that’s made up of thoughts, feelings, and sensations, those are all appearing.  Like clouds.  The classic idea of clouds moving through the sky, blue sky.  Or leaves on the surface of the stream moving through.  So there is no fixed solid entity there, again, to have or not to have free will.

However, as you dis-identified from being exclusively that collection of thoughts, feelings and sensations, and we start to recognize ourself as the awareness, we then see that the awareness is being all of life.  So that’s not a personal self, that’s an impersonal self.  It’s being all of life.  So this movement of my hands now, the awareness, the presence, the capital ‘S’ Self, is being this movement of hands now.  Is being the movement of my mouth, and the speaking of these words.  Is being the listening of these words, and the asking of the question about free will.  Is displaying itself, dancing itself, in this movement now, of life happening.

So the freedom is for that one, to express itself.  So it’s not a personal freedom in that sense.  But here’s the thing, as I dis-identify from being the individual self, then I am that presence.  So its will, is my will.  Or my will is its will.  It’s the same will.  And in a way that’s the whole journey of the spiritual path, is to be a representative of the wholeness, the capital ‘S’ Self, whatever word you like to use.  Presence, being an advocate for presence.

So it’s not really a yes-no answer, I’m afraid.  But I love this idea that as the personal self is kind of given up… although the personal self doesn’t give itself up, that’s not possible.  But as the wholeness releases its identification of being simply that entity, that separate self, as that is relinquished, then the individual character becomes more itself than ever before.  Because now it’s unconstrained by the self-consciousness, and it can actually be itself.

So this is what I’m talking about, about showing up in life as an expression of wholeness.  Which we all are already, of course, but believing that we are not that, creates these patterns and constraints and distortions that limits our expression.  GG, does that make any sense to you?  You’re very welcome to come back.  Oh, I’ve got a good thumbs up.  I like your use of the emojis.

“Is awareness eternal, does it still exist when the body sleeps or dies?”

GG, you’re hammering me with all the classics.  So remember in the introduction there, we were looking at our immediate experience, right?  So I don’t have to tell you the answer to this question.  When we look at our immediate experience, okay… so if your eyes are open now, space, this whole spatial experience is spontaneously arising, here.  Remember I said, here is not a place in space.  Here is the place where space appears.

So you’re looking at the computer screen, maybe it seems, I don’t know, 30 centimeters in front of you.  So that’s spatial experience.  All of that is arising here, here now.  Here in this place that is out of space.  And similarly if I say, “You remember this morning when you brushed your teeth, or when you had dinner maybe an hour ago…”  And the sense of time passing from then to now.  That sense of time passing is also appearing here, in this moment now, that is out of time.  The sense of time appearing.

So the nature of awareness, if we call it awareness, call it what you like, call it… so that was like not referring to it as a word.  Then whatever that is, whatever it is that we are, must be out of space and out of time, because time and space are experiences that it gives rise to.  So eternal in a sense that it’s not in time, not it lasts for a long time.  It’s out of the dimension of time.  Time is a dimension it gives rise to.  You, I’m talking about you.  It, calling it it.  You.  Your real self.  “Does it still exist when the body sleeps or dies?”  Yes, bodies appear in awareness, as awareness being bodies.

We have it completely the wrong way round in our western culture.  We think awareness is a product of brain mechanics, whereas actually the whole notion of brains and worlds and people can’t exist without awareness.  It’s like we’ve got our cart before the horse.  So this is very good news, my friends.  It’s very good news because your direct experience is telling you something different to what our culture entrains us into believing.  Whereas your physical body is like the sort of surface layer of your being, you’re experiencing from a particular location, but the truth of what you are is that reality goes way deeper.

You’re welcome to come back on me, GG.  I don’t know if you want to speak or if you’re happy with the text, go for it.  I’ve got another one, “Does life have a purpose?  The sense of being has an objective.”  Great, I’m loving these questions.  It’s quite different to the normal groups I do, which are much more going into the different feelings that are coming up in the moment, which we can do that as well.  So this is quite interesting for me.

Yes, so that’s an interesting one.  So we can go two different ways with that, because one way is to see that any kind of purpose or meaning that we try to give to life, is another way of trying to make sense.  Another way of trying to partition life up, conceptualize, make meaning, which is what the dualizing mind does of course.  And there’s nothing wrong with that.  But then we start to invest ourselves in those meanings and purposes that we’ve concocted, and then that can lead us into suffering again.  But yes, we can play with that, if we understand that what we’re doing is playing with concepts and ideas that will never be the truth.

And given that caveat, I would then really go for it, right.  I would say, let’s be really imaginative here.  Okay, we look at the universe, it’s been here for what, I don’t know, 13.6 billion years or something.  First 10 billion of which there was no life.  It was just formations of stars, suns, planets, solar systems.  And then we have the emergence of single cell life forms, 4 billion years ago.  Then multicellular life forms.  And then this kind of slow emergence of more and more complex organisms, that are able to start to experience the universe.

So you need a life form to experience this universe.  And then we get more and more complex life forms, that offer richer and richer stream of experience of the universe.  And then we get to human beings.  And then supposedly around as recently as say, I don’t know, 100,000, 200,000 years ago, this self-reflective ability to not only experience, but also to know that you are having an experience.

So we start to be able to conceptualize ourselves, so that we’re able to reflect.  So as far as we know, the human being is the first life form that has that ability.  So can you see what’s going on there, in that story?  So we start with this complete forgetting of what we are, I’m talking about the universe itself.  We could call it the universal mind, if you like.  And then this gradual complexification, where it starts to wake up to itself slowly and slowly, more and more and more.  And then we get to the human being, and this self-reflection comes in where now we can know that we know.  But at this point, that self-reflection falsely identifies with the human being self.

So all that we are doing right now in this meeting is, we are taking the next developmental step, which we could say is coming for all humans at some point.  Which is we go beyond the false identification.  So we’ve all got the self-reflection now.  Then we start to move beyond the false identification with the human self, and we start to reconnect to the truth of what we are, the source, the capital ‘S’ Self.

And so that means that through this incredible process of the universe unfolding, it’s slowly managing to recognize itself again.  So then you, just by existing, you don’t have to do anything.  Just by the fact that you exist, you are functioning as an essential component in the purpose of the universe.  Or the purpose of existence, being.  That’s a pretty good purpose if you want a purpose.

And so yes, you could extrapolate that forward, and maybe we start to wake up to who we are.  And then we could have this literal heaven on earth, where it’s like a lucid dream, waking up.  So you’re still here, human beings are still here, life’s still happening, but we recognize we are the one, we are the wholeness that is the ultimate creator, the source.  But we’re able to live within our creation, within the manifest world.  Free within the world of creation, of manifestation.

So that’s what could be possible if the experiment doesn’t fall apart.  Because it’s like we are writing it, we’re writing the script.  Not you, not me, but what we are, presence.  Like, “Which way is it going to go now in this moment?  Ah, it goes this way.  And now, which way is it going to go from this moment?  Ah, it’s going to go this way.”  So that experiment, where’s it going to go?  And can you feel the excitement of that right, here now.

Conceptual mind says, “Oh, no, no, this is how it goes…”  Nails everything down.  But as soon as you let go of that, you become like this child again.  Exuberant, alive, full of vitality possibility.  Who’s going to speak?  Is GG going to come up with another question?  What’s Jim going to say next?  I don’t know.  Didn’t know I was going to do that.  Do you know what your next thought is going to be?

So just to really blow it out the water, I’m just reading your question again, being has an objective.  You could say that the whole billions of years journey I just sort of sketched, it’s like an involution and an evolution.  Back to self recognition, and then who’s to say, maybe it just does it again.  It’s like a breath, the breath of the universe.  To completely lose itself, and then to remember itself, and then to completely lose itself, and then to remember itself.  Maybe it’s a kind of a hundred billion year breathing cycle.  I’m just throwing stuff out for fun now, because I gave the caveat.

Anyone’s welcome to jump in here.  GG’s back, I love your questions, GG.  “Do you agree with the notion that all there is, is the universe, and the universe is experiencing itself through life?”  All there is the universe, and the universe is experiencing itself through life.  Sounds good to me.  Although, why all there is, is the universe?  Let’s really blow our minds here.  What if the universe itself is like a child, or like an offspring.

Maybe there are infinitely many universes.  I don’t mean in the sense of parallel universe theories and all that.  I just mean maybe this universe is a mind, a universal mind that’s dreaming up this whole play, and you and I are like a contraction of that mind.  It can contract itself down to experience its own content, from a point of view within itself.  And that’s what you and I are.  And in that sense, you could say just as it can contract itself down to experiencing itself from a point of view within itself, as you or I, maybe that universal mind itself is a contraction of a greater, greater mind.  Again, I’m just throwing stuff out there.  So we can become like multi-versal.  Is that okay GG?  I don’t want to gloss over… good, thanks for the thumbs up.

Let’s see what Graham’s saying here, “Is this mode of being, if that’s a fair term, does it feel passive?  So for example the words you’re speaking, do they almost just happen?  Is that something you are constantly reminding yourself of, or are you in this constant child discovering-esque mode all day?”

No, so it moves around.  It’s dynamic.  I wouldn’t say it feels passive, because you are it.  So it’s very strange. because the words are coming, the words are flowing.  So it’s not a sense of like in the usual everyday way of a Jim, thinking up what he’s going to say and then saying it.  It just flows.  It’s just flowing, but at the same time, it’s me.  Not me Jim, but what I am is the essence of life, is being, so I am being myself.  And actually, when I take too long to think about things and cogitate, that can have its place, of course, if I’m trying to solve a problem or something that can have a place.  But what that can actually tend to do is introduce a sort of interference, a self-consciousness that breaks up the flow and actually makes me less effective, less optimal in what I’m expressing.

So it doesn’t feel passive, it’s dynamic, because it’s spontaneous.  So there’s no pre-determination, it’s all spontaneously rolling.  So that’s dynamic.  To feel passive it would have to be somehow… “Someone’s doing it to me”.  And that would already create that split again, “This thing is doing it to me”.  But those come together, so the dynamism of what’s happening is me.

And yes, what I’ve found is that like when you’re tired or when you’re ill, then there can be a kind of resurfacing of old patterning, and so sometimes it can feel less dynamic.  Sometimes you might get triggered, something might happen.  It triggers some part of you that hasn’t unravelled yet, some kind of old coping mechanism or shock in the system, and you can go back into some old way of operating to try and protect yourself.  And so when I work with people, this is part of the other aspect of the work I was talking about where you’re listening in, listening to the body, listening to the mind, and seeing the parts of you that are still split off, that are still running on the old belief systems.

And so the work is then naturally meeting those and sort of soaking them in this loving inclusion, unconditional inclusion.  And then slowly they gradually merge back and you reclaim more and more aspects of yourself that got split off.  So, it’s definitely a work-in-progress, always.  I would always be very cautious of people who claim they are… I don’t know, there’s nothing there to recognize or see anymore.  There’s always more, there’s always deeper to go, deeper to unravel, to unfold and to realize.  That’s been my experience anyway.

Thanks Graham, for the question.  I hope that makes some sense.  Yeah?  You’re welcome to come back.  It’s quite strange, I’m just sort of talking to the computer here!  I’m not hearing anyone and responding, but that’s okay.  Michael, “Purpose has an objective. This feels like a river, although it’s flowing into a destination, it does not care nor indeed know where it’s going, right?  As humans we need to feel control and have a need to direct, and this is at odds with the flow and letting the universe take control?”

Yes, it sounds good, I like it.  But you see, you are the universe, that’s the thing.  So when we identify as being the human, then you’re right, there’s a sense of fear, “I’m a little human in a huge world, and I’m under threat.  I’m under threat from everything around me.”  And so there’s that kind of animal sense, “I’ve got to fight, I’ve got to run, or I’ve got to freeze.  I’ve got to protect myself, protect my territory.”  And then with humans we have another level of that, which is the social sense, “I’ve got to be seen as good, or included, and not be rejected.  I’ve got to act in ways that make me acceptable, I’ve got to impress people, I’ve got to be seen to be successful…”  All that stuff.  There’s another level on top of the animal, that make us contract, and contort, and cause us all kinds of suffering.

“Yes, I need to create lists, be successful, have my top 10 objectives…”  All that stuff, right?  All of that, to try and be seen as a successful human in the world.  And it’s absolutely exhausting, and it’s crippling us.  And so a way of talking about this… you said the word human, but we call it human being, right?  So what we’re doing here is we’re reintroducing the being aspect, we’ve forgotten the being.  We’re doing the human, we’ve forgotten the being.  And so as we connect to the being, and that’s the presence, the awareness that’s here now… as we come out of the conceptualizing mind, or we go beyond the conceptualizing mind, beyond it, then we recognize the being, and we take rest.  We take nourishment in the being, and then there’s this is beautiful coming together of the human and the being.  And the being then supports the human.

The being supports the human.  So that all of that trying, all of that attempt to be good enough, to be acceptable, to not be rejected… that all can start to soften.  Because the human is unconditionally accepted by the being.  It’s the true parent, if you like.  It’s like, “I see you, I love you, just as you are.  Just as you are.”  How many of us have experienced that?  None.  Maybe in very rare moments, very rare moments.  But when we discover our being, it’s like we can turn our attention… the human, instead of looking outside itself all the time to try and get acknowledgement, and get approval, and not be rejected, and feel included… it can start to turn its wanting inwardly to the being.  And the being provides everything.  Everything that you need, it’s right here, right now.  Always has been, always will be.  I mean, to really get that, that’s life changing.  Everything you need and want is here, now.

Look at your mind… “What?  No, Jim, no, no.”  Yes!  We just haven’t had that modeled.  We’ve grown up, all of us, we grow up in a domination culture.  It’s all about being criticized, and belittled, diagnosed, interpreted.  Graham, good news, isn’t it?  Yeah I’ll say, it’s amazing news!  Yes, it is the good news.  It’s the great secret.  That the being won’t feed me, and get money, and make me healthy, right?  Well, I would contest that actually, because when you operate from being, life is pretty optimal actually.  So when you feel hungry, when you act from being, you dynamically move towards getting your needs met.

You’ll find a way, but you’ll find a way following the authentic flow of your being, and that will start to look like something.  But most of us, we’re too afraid.  We’re so afraid that we constantly go into our conceptual minds to try to do what we think we should do.  Which is obviously built around the information that we’ve learned and taken on from our environment, from our education, from our parenting, all of that stuff.

So this gets to the nub of the whole journey, which is this shift from being predominantly identified with the ego structure, the separate self structure, to being aligned with the spontaneous, authentic flow of being.  And that’s what will take you into the existential crisis, because our whole life has been revolved around investing our identity in the ego structure.  So it feels like to start to let go of that as our true north is dangerous.  And I can say that, and people might go, “Yes, whatever”.  But when you actually get down into that kind of place, it’s terrifying.

So you feel your feet on the floor, feel your sitting bones on the chair, you breathe.  There’s that great Zen saying, “Walk through all fear no matter what.”  And you feel the support more and more of your being, the truth.  You feel more and more aligned as that, as your identity… speak from there, move from there, live from there.  Amen.  “The Lord is my shepherd, I’ll not want”.  Psalm 23, “Though I walk through the shadow of the valley of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me, and thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.”  Serious stuff.  Louis, you can ask some questions.

Louis: Thanks. Yes, I don’t want to jump…

Jim: Ah a voice!  Another voice!  Woo!  Hey.

Louis: Yeah, I don’t want to jump ahead of anyone, if anyone else has got questions.  And I think I’ve got some more philosophical questions, and this is maybe more philosophical than your usual meetings, perhaps.

Jim: Yes, yes, that’s cool man, I’m up for it.

Louis: Two of them are probably quite closely related, and the other one is not so related.  So the first one is, I’m just trying to think how to articulate it… does all our sense of we are a separate person, does it all actually come down to identification with the physical body?  Is that ultimately what it comes down to?

Jim: Yes, kind of.  I mean, if you think about how it operates, you think of a child, like when we’re born we don’t have a sense of separate selfhood.  We do have a kind of sensory self.  They found out now that if a baby touches their own cheek, like a new born baby, if they touch their own cheek, then they won’t on the whole… it’s not a hundred percent, but they won’t go to root onto their own fingers.  Whereas if a different person touches their cheek, they immediately go to root, try and suck onto it like a nipple.  So even a new born baby can distinguish between what they call double touch, which is when you touch yourself, and single touch when someone else touches you.

So there’s already a sensory self, but it’s not the same as the reflective separate self that we know as adults.  And then the child slowly starts to build up, starts to construct objects.  So this is really interesting, we don’t think of it like this.  All of you now, it’s probably unquestioned to you, that you are just looking at life out there in front of you.  I mean, “Duh Jim, obviously.”  Right?  But I would seriously question that, and say even regular science, materialist science today, even your school books would tell you that your eyes are receiving information.

It goes through the lens and is projected onto the retina at the back, upside down.  And then there’s a cascade of chemical reactions that convert that light energy into electrochemical impulses that get sent down the optic note to your brain.  So in your brain, it’s giving birth to this virtual reality experience of three dimensions of space.  So even your regular scientific explanation is telling you you’re not seeing life directly.  You are literally seeing a virtual reality now, like a holographic projection of your brain.  Just take a moment to just think about that.  This isn’t woo-woo spirituality now, this is hardcore materialist science.

So there’s a computer you’re looking at now, is a product of your brain, your brain’s projecting it.  Now look a bit closer, your hand, your brain is projecting the image of your hand, and the sense of sensation, and touch sensation, all of that.  It’s being concocted like a theater, like a real-time rendering out of electrical-chemical impulses being sent to your brain.  So when we’re first born, we’re just getting this flow of perception, a bit like I was just describing in the beginning.  And then we start to notice, so like look on my phone here…  We start to notice, here’s a two-dimensional experience, but there’s a color differentiation between the phone and sort of yellow background.  It’s like there’s a border here.

So we get the idea of this thing in this particular orientation, and then we see it in a different orientation.  And then in a different orientation, and then another orientation.  And slowly by overlapping all of these different orientations, at some point we isolate out “phone”.  And we have a three-dimensional concept of a phone, a bit like in those Google adverts, where it’s got a white background and just this phone sitting there.  We do that, and we call that object permanence.

Now I’ve abstracted out the object.  So now if someone hides it, it still exists to me because I’ve abstracted it out.  But that’s a purely mental creation.  So as soon as we do that… again, going with the story of the child, now I’ve got an object, now I become a subject that’s aware of the object.  Now I’m starting to self-reflect properly, and this usually happens around 18 months, but it’s still not the final… animals can do that, some of the most intelligent animals.  But the final step comes where I realize that this isn’t just… if I’m looking in the mirror, this is not just me, but this is the me that everyone else sees.  That’s the clincher, that’s the seemingly unique human trait.

And there are these amazing stories of people who went to remote tribes where they have very dirty, muddy rivers, they’ve never had a reflection of themselves.  So they’re obviously aware of themselves as a body-mind, if you like, but they’ve never had that self-reflection, that extra step has never happened.  And they show them these mirrors, and these explorers describe how when they first saw themselves and realized, “This is what I look like to everyone else, this is what everyone else sees.”  Then suddenly you feel like this independent figure in the world.  And often they cover themselves up, their face creases up in embarrassment, in shame.  And that’s the first response, because now they’ve become aware of how they appear to everyone else.

So that seems to be the moment that creates the suffering.  And we could say that it’s necessary, it’s not a mistake, because the fact that we can all sit here now and understand each other is because of the beauty of language, and the beauty of conceptualizing.  And if we didn’t have that, we wouldn’t be able to communicate and create in the way that we have as humans.  But we pay a very, very heavy price for that.  So yes, it’s not just being aware of myself as a body, but it’s that extra little… because the kids say, they say things like, “Oh yes, that’s me.”  They see an image of themselves and they say, “Oh, that’s me, but why is he wearing my shirt?”.  So they haven’t quite got it, hasn’t quite clicked in.  They kind of recognize it, but they haven’t fully stepped into that yet.

So that step, usually about three or four, it’s a bit older when that happens.  And if you look at Down’s Syndrome, conditions like that, where they’re not able to take on that, they’re not able to make all those conceptualizations, and make that shift into… it’s like the birth of what people sometimes call the psychological self.  If you can’t do that, then you really suffer.  You can’t access modern life, you can’t access the complexities of modern living, because you can’t conceptualize properly.  So it’s not a mistake and it’s important to point that out.

So we’re not trying to go backwards, we’re not trying to go backwards into a kind of pre-egoic womb-like bliss.  That’s a big mistake in thinking.  We want to go forwards into the next developmental step, not the previous one.  We want to go into the next developmental step, which is using the self-reflective consciousness that we’ve developed, but now allowing it to rest on its true source, which is the capital S “Self”, our true nature.  And if we manage to do that as humans, then we will create… heaven is not something out there somewhere, it’s what’s possible when we operate in the flow of life.

And it might sound a bit idealistic, but just imagine, just imagine the difference when humans are not operating out of self-interest, and egoic posturing, and a sense of deficiency, trying to be good enough, trying to be better than the other in order to prove that you are good enough.  Or even seemingly innocent movement like trying to help someone, but in order to feel valid.  So even that, it’s still the movement, the activity’s still coming from a sense of inadequacy and lack.  How’s that, Louis?  How’s that sounding to you?

Louis: Yes, I don’t think I’ve really got a response.

Jim: I’m just saying all that because if we try and isolate, “Oh, it’s because I think I’m in a body, so now I’m going to drill right down into that.”  I’m just trying to bring this playful, open sense of exploration.  Because can you see it’s another pattern, another pattern trying to grab hold of the thing.  “There it is, that’s the thing!  And now I’m going to latch onto that and drill into that as fast and as hard as I can, to get to that place I want to get to.”  So that’s another fantasy, all of that.

Louis: I think the question was partly prompted by what you actually said.  I’m going to paraphrase and I’m possibly going to get it wrong, but you said in one of your other meetings.  I think someone in your meeting was… I think for them there was a lot of fear of death coming up.  And I think you mentioned that, “You can only really start living once you’ve let go of the fear of death.”  But I’m paraphrasing and I may have that slightly wrong.  But I think that’s kind of what the question is really tied to.

Jim: Yes, I hear what you’re saying.  So where that’s coming from is, when you’re still operating from the ego structure, then you are still trying to do life, right?  You’re still trying to have it your way.  And that’s what creates the suffering, because when your way doesn’t align with what life is unfolding, then there’s this frustration and this kind of anxiety.  When we live in flow with life, then whatever life brings is what is, there’s no argument with it.  Or if there is an argument with it, that’s part of the flow that is moving through.  Like we were just saying with the leaves on the surface of the river, or the clouds moving through.  You include that.  That’s included too, as another part of the constellation.

So what I think I meant by that is as long as you’re still gripping on, as long as you’re still invested in an aspect of the ego structure, then your kind of movement will be orchestrated by that constraint.  So it’s when we come here, that’s what I was inviting you at the beginning, come here now, right now, not knowing.  So just now as I’m pausing here now, looking into the camera, here now, I don’t know.  I don’t know what I am, I don’t know what life is, I don’t know what this is, I can’t say.  I can come up with lots of ideas, and sprinkle the definitions on, and try and make sense.  But in truth, I don’t know.

And when I really let myself be here nakedly, there is, there’s an exuberance to that.  It’s like a kind of vitality and aliveness, a kind of childlike spontaneity.  And as soon as I start to think I know something, then I’m closing that down.  And I can play with knowing, that’s kind of what we’re doing all night, right?  Nothing I say, that’s why I’m very careful, I did give the caveat… nothing I say is the truth.  These are all ways of speaking, to kind of evoke something maybe, within those of us that are here.  To try and conjure some unspoken inspiration.  But yes, so that is a kind of death, it’s like a kind of death of my conceptual identity.

And then that can go deeper because we start to realize there are aspects of self, of the ego structure, that we haven’t discovered yet that are unconscious.  That are here, but they’re so suppressed that we can’t even notice them.  And so my experience has been the more we open, the more these kind of hidden patterns and beliefs start to arise up, start to come into consciousness.  It’s like they become… this sensitivity starts to pick them up, they come up onto the radar.  And then so we meet deeper and deeper aspects of ourselves, that we then dis-identify from.  Letting go, more and more and more and more.  Does that make sense, Louis?

Louis: Yes.  I think I have one more question then I’ll let other people go.  So again, I’m still struggling to articulate it a little bit.

Jim: Yes, take your time.  Take your time.

Louis: Maybe I’m not speaking for myself from this behalf, or maybe I am unconsciously, or maybe this was more the case in the past, but things you are saying… what are your thoughts and what’s your response to the whole wanting to control this process, whether it’s a spiritual process, or as you say kind of a releasing process?  There might be a wanting to control, or wanting to change things.  So I guess what I’m saying is, where does wanting to control, wanting to change, and wanting to control the process, where does that fit in?  Because people do want to control, they want to control what happens, they want to improve their life and feel better and so on.  So yes, I guess where does that fit into what you’re saying?

Jim: Yes, good question.  So the wanting to control, there’s nothing wrong with that.  So this is the kind of stock phrase, “It’s all good, it’s all good.”  Because if I say it’s something otherwise, and everyone starts trying to root out their wanting to control, and try to exterminate it.  And what’s that?  That’s the wanting to control, trying to get rid of the wanting to control, in order to control.  It’s like whatever you say, the kind of ego structure is genius.  It kind of wraps it into its own… takes it onto its own side, becomes part of its new philosophy, its new programming.

So yes, if you find you’re trying to control, just notice that.  Don’t make it wrong.  But remember the seeker instinct, the one that wants to feel better or whatever, it’s very important, that’s what draws us into the path.  That’s what gets us dissatisfied with the kind of regular way we are living, what I call the no-win cycle.  When we’re just going round and round and round, and even if we have success and we get the job, or the money, or the house, or the car, or the partner, or the kids, or the… whatever, fill in the blank.  Sooner or later we realize that’s not it, it doesn’t give us what we’re looking for.  That’s the no-win cycle.

And then realizing that takes us deeper, takes us into these kinds of explorations, into spirituality, into religion, into philosophy.  And so that movement, that spiritual me, you know the “spiritual me”, it’s really dedicated, and reads all the books, and watches all the videos, and comes on all the webinars… that one, right?  It’s really important right, because that gets us in the game.  And it gets us listening to the teachings, and it gets us inquiring, and it gets us exploring.  So you don’t want to get rid of that, it’s useful, until… until you start to realize that it’s time to go beyond that.

And when that time comes, just as we’re doing here now, you start to recognize the movement in you to try to control, to try to do the right practice, to try to get there, to the holy place.  Start to notice that aspect of you when it’s operating.  Not to get rid of it, not to judge it, not to make it wrong.  Just recognizing it.  Clarity.  And in being clear and seeing it, you are already disidentifying from it.  Naturally.

You’re already starting to build a space around it, and you can actually include it from this loving presence of awareness.  This being-ness.  You can include the part of you that’s desperately trying to get there, because that’s what it needs.  It just needs to feel seen, and heard, and loved, and included.  And in being able to disidentify from it, then you stand as being, and then you can offer that loving inclusion to that part of yourself that’s desperately needing that.  And then naturally, it slowly dissolves because it’s having its needs met.

So, I don’t know what that sounds like, Louis.  But I’m just trying to say it so we don’t make anything wrong.  And whilst we’re identified as the spiritual seeker, that serves a purpose.  And then when we feel like it’s limiting, and we notice it’s constraining, we’ve outgrown it.  Then just like we notice the sadness, that we notice a sense of tension in the belly, or then we also notice the desperation of that seeker that’s trying to get somewhere.  And we can include it in the same way as we include everything else, give it a place.  Does that make sense?

Louis: Yes. That’s kind of the contradictory nature of all this… as you say, you’ve talked about this other times, ultimately you have to let go of the seeker… sorry, I mean eventually the seeker, I guess, will fall away.

Jim: Yes, the seeker identity.  Because remember ultimately there is no seeker, you are already it.  We have to keep turning it around.  But you are it, pretending you’re not it, looking for it.  So what starts to happen is a sort of remembrance, and you realize you don’t need to play that seeker identity anymore.  So you start to let go of the seeker identity.  But it can feel like a death because you’re identified previously with that seeker identity.  But as you let go, you realize you were never that, that was just a contraction within you.

You always already are, everyone here, you always already are what you’re seeking.  And as that starts to dawn, then you don’t need the seeker identity anymore.  And it starts to soften.  But I just want to go back to… I remember you said, we all want to feel better, get better, right?  So in that shift of identification, what you realize is that everything you’re looking for is being, is in being.  So the seeker is still looking for it somewhere.

As you start to realize it, you are everything you’ve been looking for.  And I don’t mean that in a kind of woeful, egotistical way.  But you as the being that you are, is everything you’ve been looking for.  And so as that starts to dawn, then you start to realize that the only way, the only place you want to be really, is home in your being.  And so then all these other distractions sort of lose their magnetic pull, because being is the thing, it’s what you really long for.  And so there’s that surrendering.  You could say it’s the ultimate selfishness, capital S, because you realize that’s what you really, really want.  To be who you are.  That’s what we all really, really want.  To recognize who you are and be it.

Louis: Okay.  Thanks Jim.

Jim: Thanks, Louis.  Michael’s written another question here, but I think Michael’s left, he’s not here anymore.  He says, “We love physical, hence why we don’t measure success with personal growth, but with tangible stuff like money.  The challenge is that religion and the frameworks which we were taught, don’t deal with these concepts, hence why we are lost with direction and purpose.  Is that right?”  Sounds great.  Unfortunately, Michael’s not here to go with that.

Yes, the focus is outward on concepts and trying to be good enough, trying to live up… you know, most of us are born into family environments where it’s not okay to be who we are.  We’re punished and rewarded.  Punished if we do it wrong, rewarded if we do it right.  And if we get angry, parents can’t allow kids to be angry, “He’s like this when he’s two, what’s he going to be like when he’s 16?  God, we better shut this down right now.”

So we can’t be angry, can’t be sad.  Especially boys, often tears are not good.  So we can’t be angry, we can’t be sad, we can’t be who we are, we’ve got to be what’s expected of us.  Then we get love, then we get the kindness, then we get the reward.  No wonder by the time we’re about five or six, we’re just totally scrambled.  And then we meet the outside culture, which then bombards us with advertising images, and peers, competition… it’s a wonder we get to adulthood and are actually sane.  Well, maybe you could say we’re not sane.  Human race is insane, because we’ve all been scrambled out of our natural inclination, our natural sense of things.  This is what Michael’s talking about here.  So what we’re doing really is we’re becoming sane.  That’s what we’re doing.

GG says, “How would you define and view non-duality?”  Non-duality, non duality, non dual.  It’s pointing to wholeness.  Basically what we did in the introduction.  So if you see life through the regular everyday sense, in the regular everyday sense let’s say, then what you are is exclusively a separate self.  Usually most people, if they were asked to think about it, they’d say they’re in their heads.

I did an experiment once, I went to my local shopping center in Exeter, with a camera.  Friend was filming it from a distance, and I just went round asking people, “Where are you in your physical body?”  That was quite fun.  Some people look at me like I was completely nuts.  I think it was 70% of people went there like that [pointed to their head], about 20% pointed to their hearts, I think a couple of people pointed to their belly.  One guy pointed to his feet, which was quite interesting because then I asked him, “Why did you point to your feet?”

And because it was raining he said, “My feet are wet, and they’re really uncomfortable.”  So that was a really interesting reply, because they’re uncomfortable, that’s where his focus was, and so he placed himself where his focus was.  So most people’s focus is in their heads, because the image we’re experiencing seems to be centered here.  So it’s like, you know when you’re at school and you do those vanishing lines.  Well, the vanishing line seems to point to here.  So we imagine we’re in here behind the head.

So that’s most people’s everyday experience, “I’m an entity inside my skull, and the world is outside of me.”  So that’s duality, right?  Subject, objects, two things.  Subject, object.  Non-duality is what we just did.  When you take this step and you collapse the subject into awareness, you collapse the objects into spontaneously arising perceptions, and you see there’s no gap or boundary between them.  So the awareness is being the flow of life happening.  So that’s non dual, non-duality.  It’s wholeness.  There’s no subject, there’s no object, there’s just the happening.

Jimming, there’s Jimming happening.  Computering.  So it’s a dynamic happening, for itself.  But here’s the thing, you are that thing, you are that self.  You that’s hearing this, it’s you.  It’s no one else, it’s you.  You speaking and listening to yourself now.  Extraordinary, isn’t it?

You may be criticizing what I just said, or feeling inspired by it.  Both those things, still you.  You disagreeing with everything I’ve said, or you agreeing with everything I said, still you.  Still non-dual.  So that’s how I would define non-duality.  And how would I view it?  Well, I would view it as a beautiful way of experiencing reality, that I think is… like the next developmental step is recognizing who we really are.

And then, if I go back to that model I painted earlier, it’s universal mind that contracts itself down to experience its contents from a point of view within itself.  That’s what you are.  So then if you really get that, you are that one universal mind.  Then as I look round, well Graham’s also that, Louis is also that, so is Colm, so is Kevin, so is GG.  If I missed anyone out, Kenneth, and Kevin, I couldn’t see you on my screen.

You are all contractions of that one universal mind, viewing its own content from different perspectives, within itself.  So we are all the same mind.  Well if you really, really, really get that, not just as an idea, but you experience it, then you know… I can’t treat Graham in an unkind way.  How could I do that?  That’s like masochism, unless I’m a masochist.  I couldn’t treat Colm in an unacceptable manner, I am Colm.  I’m a different expression of it, there’s the source.

Do you see how it just naturally unfolds a completely different way of being?  But that’s not the story of our culture.  That’s not the cultural myth.  The cultural myth is – the world is made of matter, and we’re all separate lumps of it, that are fundamentally divided off from one another.  And so we feel under threat from one another.  And then we get all the suffering that then is generated through that belief.

I just want to try and give you a sense of what’s possible through the human being.  Human beings are getting a bit of a rough ride these days.  We’ve just had this COP thing, there’s all this kind of blame and guilt and judgment, and how awful we all are, how we’re polluting the environment… that’s polluting the environment.  Can you see?  Blame and judgment, we’re attacking ourself.

So this goes way beyond treating the environment with love.  It’s treating each other with love, treating our conversations with each other with love.  Recognizing each other’s feelings and needs, working together to create a more wonderful experience.  And I think non-duality can potentially lead us towards a new story.  I mean that strictly speaking is not non-duality.  Non-duality, strictly speaking, is not modelling, it’s beyond conceptualizing.

So a lot of what we’ve been talking about just now, they are conceptual models.  And so direct experiencing is about going beyond the conceptual models, becoming the immediacy, the immediacy of right now.  But when we start to know ourselves as that immediacy, that presence, then we can play with these conceptual models.  And we can choose new models that are more aligned with our understanding, that inspire a new way of being, rather than conspiring to make us believe we’re these separate lumps of matter that are fundamentally separate and divided.

But you can see the problem that the universe through the human is facing at the moment.  Because to take that step, it has to shift its identification from this false identity through the self-reflection that we talked about, the capacity of the human to self-reflect.  It’s now that self-reflection is falsely identified with the human self.  And now the invitation is for the next developmental step for it to identify with the true self, its true nature.  But to make that shift, it has to disentangle we, not it, we.  We are it.  Have to disentangle from identification with this ego structure, and the thought process that we’re identified with.

And that’s the rub.  That’s the rub, because if your identity is projected into something, then in order for it to release, will feel like death.  That’s the challenge.  And some people would actually prefer to die physically than to face that psychological death.  So that’s like we were saying before, they want to go backwards, they want to go backwards into unconsciousness, like back into the womb.  They don’t want to go forwards into the next developmental step because it’s too terrifying.

But that’s where we’re being drawn, and my sense is the more and more of us that make that movement, will create a propensity in a collective psyche.  Like a sort of attractor that will actually draw more and more people into that movement.  That’s my sense of it.  But, what will be required… if you look at individuals, look at myself, people I work with, often it’s a period of really deep suffering or struggle, that creates the possibility of that new way of exploring, that new way of seeing.  So maybe, and I hope it’s not too severe, but maybe collectively that’s what’s needed.  Maybe we have to be humbled out of our arrogance before we are willing to look in a different way.

Louis: Can I just respond to that, Jim?

Jim: Yes, please do.

Louis: From what you just said, would you say it’s also true that for some people it’s actually enjoyable and easy, so it doesn’t necessarily need to be harrowing or difficult for everyone?

Jim: I have no idea.  Maybe.  Maybe it will come to a point where we understand what’s going on so well, that when children are going through that movement we talked about… 2, 3, 4 years old, we intelligently support them through that movement because we know what it is.  Like I just described it, if we knew that’s what was going on, then we could have a very powerful support intervention around that age.  Where as the child becomes self-aware, we actually support them in being who they are, rather than what seems to happen at the moment which is we do the entirely the opposite.

We actually get to work in convincing them they should be something different.  Imagine that.  Imagine that if we had enlightened parenting where we understand, yes, this kid is going to go through the fall where he gives birth to a psychological self.  In order to access the culture that’s needed, in order to be creative, in order to have an understanding of concepts and subject-object, and all these great discoveries that we’ve developed as a culture.  They need to go through that.

But I understand what they’re going through.  So when they start screaming, like the terrible twos when they start screaming, I’m not going to shut them down, I’m going to make sure that they don’t bang their head against the radiator or anything, I’m going to make sure they’re safe.  I’m going to hold the space for that frustration, that anger at losing everything, to burn itself out rather than forcing them to bury it in their physicality.  Or when they’re sad or when they’re feeling upset, instead of ignoring it, I’m going to notice it and I’m going to say, “I see you’re feeling sad.  Is it that you need some recognition, you need some acknowledgement right now?”  I’m going to really be able to meet them in their pain.  I’m just putting it out there, I’m just talking off the top of my head.

Louis: I was going to say the only reason I mentioned that is just someone I’ve spoken to related to this, for them the whole, for want of a better phrase, spiritual journey, it was really easy and enjoyable.  And they were actually surprised when they started to hear that a lot of people, it can be quite a difficult process.

Jim: Yes, well maybe.  I’ll always be cautious of what other people report because you don’t know how far along the journey they are.  I’ll give an example for myself.  I recognized my being and I recognized the wholeness, that I am life itself.  I recognized that beautiful recognition, and I thought that was it.  And in the openness, the openness that brought, as time went on, my God, all of this unconscious material started gunking itself up.  Stuff that I never even knew was there.

And that’s a whole other journey that then I had to embark on, which is still going on, meeting deeper and deeper layers that have yet to be met and included.  And so I’m always cautious when people report things like that, because I would have said exactly the same thing about 10 years ago.  So now I’d be tempted to say, “Oh great.”  And leave it there.  I’m just saying that Louis, I mean I might sound a bit cynical, but I’ve never met anyone who had parents that didn’t put something on them.  That nothing was interjected from their upbringing.

I think you can recognize who you are quite simply.  I mean, we did it for five minutes at the beginning of this meeting.  And then I would understand a comment like that, “What’s that?  It’s easy, it’s no big deal.”  And then, when all the unconscious materials start surfacing, they’ll revisit that comment, I would suggest.  But maybe I’m wrong, I don’t know.  I can only speak from my own experience and all the people I’ve worked with.

And also, there’s something else in that, right?  Because fury, for example.  Fury is not wrong.  Fury is a doorway into power and strength.  Sadness, grief is not wrong.  Sadness and grief is a doorway into deep loving kindness and compassion.  Guilt and shame is not wrong, it’s a doorway into pure self-expression, uninhibited, unselfconscious expression.  And so actually meeting these deeper aspects of the psyche actually offer doorways into our essence energies.  And if we haven’t met those doorways, and we haven’t opened those doorways, it would be very difficult to be able to access the full spectrum of what it is to exist as a human being.  That’s what I would say.

This is not about just blissing out, it’s about living the fullness of the human experience.  That’s what it’s about.  Being who you are fully, freely, authentically.  And that doesn’t look like anything.  It looks like what it looks like.  And I would ask you Louis, I’m going to put this back to you, what is it that appealed to you about that?  When the person said that.  Did you feel like, “Oh yeah, I don’t fancy all this existential fear and angst, I quite fancy what this person’s talking about.”

Louis: Oh no, it wasn’t like that, I think I was slightly surprised.  I know it’s different for everyone, from my point of view, I can’t remember what I’ve told you actually in the past, it was a lot more difficult.  I’ve been sort of involved in this for a long time, but for whatever reason it seemed to really, I guess, kick in around 30.  And it was a lot more difficult at the start, and it seems to have become… obviously I’m speaking ahead now, but it seems to have become ever more easier.

And the difficult part for me seemed to be early on.  Maybe I had a difficult personality, whatever it was.  But that initial, I don’t know, softening or however you want to describe it, it was very difficult, incredibly difficult.  And it’s become, it’s like the opposite now.  It wasn’t that it appeals to me because as you know, when we’ve spoken in the past, I didn’t know what was going on initially, because one particular meeting around the age of 30 just really stirred me up, and it stirred me up for months.

The way I describe it, which is possibly about as accurate as I can get it, is my ability to put stuff to the back of my mind had been turned off.  So I had to actually deal with stuff, so I couldn’t hide from my feelings or whatever else anymore.  And I didn’t know what was going on, and I didn’t know how to deal with it, and I guess it took a long time to sort of develop some skills or approach that made easier.  And then it just became easier and easier in time.

And that’s why I was so drawn… I know this meeting’s been more philosophical than the more feeling and releasing based, which a lot of your meetings are.  But that’s why I was drawn to some of your meetings, or drawn to your approach because you take a releasing approach.  So very feeling based and releasing based.  And I found that helpful during the difficult periods and then yes, it became easier.

But that’s why I feel that releasing is important because I feel it can be very beneficial.  And as you say, it’s the opposite of hiding from your feelings or expressing your feelings, it’s actually looking at them and dealing with it.  But on the other hand, for me, it became a system for a while.  It became a system.  It became something I did, it worked for me, and then at a certain point it stopped working and I couldn’t do anymore.  And I was a bit confused and…

Jim: Yes, because you have to release the releaser.

Louis: Well, yes.  So yes, that’s why for me it was difficult, especially initially, and that’s why… I just thought it was interesting when someone I spoke to said actually for them it was really easy, and they were surprised so many people find it quite difficult, but…

Jim: But then maybe they’re living their journey backwards to yours.  That’s quite common, you know.  Yours is less common, I would think.

Louis: How do you mean?

Jim: Well I meet a lot of people that it clicks, right?  They see who they are.  Do the self-inquiry and something drops, and they recognize in the moment the awareness, the presence is here.  And then they can even realize if it’s well explained, they can see the non-duality between awareness and what’s happening.  The dynamic arising of life happening.  So they can see all that.

And then great, time goes on, time goes on, and there’s a relief, there’s a sort of relaxation in that recognition.  And in that relaxation, everything starts to move in the system, starts to come up.  And then the difficult bit starts hitting.  So this is a good analogy for this, I know we’ve just finished the timing, so we won’t go on for too long…  But Stanislav Grof, the psychologist, psychiatrist, he has a great analogy for this that he uncovered working with thousands of people, a lot of them using high doses of LSD actually.  And he managed to see this pattern that was coming up all the time, and he describes it in terms of the birth cycle, four stages.

So you’ve got the oceanic bliss of being in the womb, this kind of blissed out, floating, no responsibility, ease, relaxation.  And then the second phase, the uterus starts to contract, but the cervix is still shut, so it’s like hell on earth.  Like I’m in hell, there’s nowhere to go, everything is collapsing around me, and we start to feel hopeless, pointless, sadness, grief.

And then the third stage, cervix starts to open, and then there’s a new energy, and the baby starts to push through into the birth canal.  So now it’s fire energy, this kind of vitality, “I want to live, I want to be born, I want to be born into the world.”  Pushing, thrusting, it’s kind of passionate, sexual.  And then the fourth stage is the birth itself, when the child is released into the world, so it’s another release.  It’s a very different release from the first release, which is in the womb.  It’s a different kind of release.  You’re stepping into the world, being responsible.

So my experience has been, we go round and round these four cycles, but one of those cycles predominates.  So for me, initially in realizing who I am, it was that bliss that was predominating, like the in the womb bliss.  And then as time went on, it sort of clicked on, and then all this unconscious gunk came up, which is like the hopelessness and the grief.  The grief for being neglected, and unseen, and unacknowledged as a child.  All that stuff, not seeing who I am.  And then it clicked on again, and then all these powerful feelings of strength, and courage, and passion, and sexuality, and this kind of like worldly passion.  And then it clicked on again into this new release, new release into the world.

I’ve just seen how people kind of move through these different stages.  Some people use meditation and spirituality to go backwards into the womb.  And to be in the unconscious bliss of no responsibilities, just in that kind of space.  And that’s what I keep saying, we’re not going backwards, we want to go forwards and through, into that new birth.  And that is a huge process, and he found in almost all of his subjects that same archetypal journey playing out.

And so, maybe your friend is very unusual, but I would be surprised if they truly go on their journey, and they don’t experience those four, or something that replicates those four stages.  Then they’re a very rare individual.  I would meet them in 15 years and ask them if they still think the same thing.  Even the great gurus that everyone kind of holds up as the sort of Mecca of all, they all had periods of incredible suffering.

Anyway, thank you everyone.  GG, I hope my response to your question was satisfactory, before Louis asked the last question.  Oh, I got a hand clap this time.  Thank you GG.  Nice to meet you through your emojis and questions.  Well thanks Louis, thanks for inviting me on.  I hope it was helpful for everyone.

If you’d like to hang out with me more, I do actually have a weekend retreat coming up online, which is free.  You don’t have to attend the whole weekend.  You can drop in whenever you fancy, and you’ll see what Louis was intimating there.  How there are some questions like we had this evening, but on the whole, we start to explore feeling states.  Like, what’s arising right now?  So if you check in with yourself right now, what are you feeling?  What are you noticing in your body?  Maybe tensions, or images, or sentences, or patterns unfolding.  And then we start to explore those, and we start to see where it leads us.  Which I found is essential part of the journey.

So if you’re interested in that or finding out more, then you can sign up.  My website is in the chat, JimEaton.org, E-A-T-O-N.  So if you go there, JimEaton.org, and you go to Live Events, you can just click on and then sign up and you’ll get all the details.  And yes, it would be great to see some of you there, and see how I work.