1 00:00:09,010 --> 00:00:10,710 What we are going to describe 2 00:00:10,716 --> 00:00:12,973 has been called ‘The Secret Of Secrets’, 3 00:00:12,980 --> 00:00:16,949 the esoteric wisdom that leads to samadhi. 4 00:00:17,589 --> 00:00:21,189 Samadhi is the goal of all spirituality, 5 00:00:21,420 --> 00:00:24,450 its union with the source. 6 00:00:24,880 --> 00:00:27,760 the truth of who or what you are. 7 00:00:27,960 --> 00:00:30,596 The truth that transcends the limited mind, 8 00:00:30,596 --> 00:00:33,860 cannot be seen by means of the limited mind. 9 00:00:34,040 --> 00:00:36,899 The still point cannot be reached 10 00:00:36,899 --> 00:00:40,200 by means of movement. If you want to 11 00:00:40,200 --> 00:00:42,660 realize the still point beyond thinking, 12 00:00:42,660 --> 00:00:47,490 let go of all interest in thoughts and sensations, 13 00:00:47,760 --> 00:00:51,050 all preferences, all phenomena 14 00:00:51,170 --> 00:00:54,080 generated by the mind and senses, 15 00:00:54,290 --> 00:00:58,310 and rest in naked awareness. 16 00:01:20,520 --> 00:01:23,159 There are two fundamental dimensions 17 00:01:23,159 --> 00:01:26,400 to existence in this moment. 18 00:01:26,400 --> 00:01:29,520 There's that which is changing 19 00:01:29,520 --> 00:01:32,040 and that which is unchanging. 20 00:01:32,040 --> 00:01:34,860 Thoughts and sensations are a field 21 00:01:34,860 --> 00:01:37,460 of constantly changing phenomena. 22 00:01:39,659 --> 00:01:42,960 What is unchanging is the awareness 23 00:01:42,960 --> 00:01:45,130 of that field of change. 24 00:01:49,140 --> 00:01:51,299 We are usually so caught up in the field 25 00:01:51,299 --> 00:01:55,079 of change, fixated on its objects, that we 26 00:01:55,079 --> 00:01:57,720 ignored the dimension of awareness. 27 00:01:57,720 --> 00:02:00,659 So we start our investigation by 28 00:02:00,659 --> 00:02:04,259 becoming aware of awareness, 29 00:02:04,259 --> 00:02:07,750 being conscious of Consciousness. 30 00:02:43,800 --> 00:02:46,140 The challenge with resting in awareness 31 00:02:46,140 --> 00:02:49,080 for long periods of time, is that 32 00:02:49,080 --> 00:02:51,060 most people have not cultivated 33 00:02:51,060 --> 00:02:53,940 the concentration and equanimity 34 00:02:53,940 --> 00:02:56,040 to stay in awareness. 35 00:02:56,040 --> 00:02:58,620 We are addicted to comfort 36 00:02:58,620 --> 00:03:00,350 and the limited mind will want 37 00:03:00,350 --> 00:03:03,000 to escape from this exercise, 38 00:03:03,000 --> 00:03:05,400 it will find it profoundly uncomfortable 39 00:03:05,400 --> 00:03:07,680 and will create every type of 40 00:03:07,680 --> 00:03:10,510 hindrance or distraction. 41 00:03:11,879 --> 00:03:14,730 There are two primary knots that 42 00:03:14,730 --> 00:03:18,239 bind us to ego identification. 43 00:03:18,239 --> 00:03:21,120 The body is attached to comfort 44 00:03:21,120 --> 00:03:25,220 and the mind wants to know. 45 00:03:26,040 --> 00:03:28,560 If we continue to seek the comfort 46 00:03:28,560 --> 00:03:31,319 of the body and continue to seek 47 00:03:31,319 --> 00:03:32,879 knowing with the mind, 48 00:03:32,879 --> 00:03:35,040 we will never move beyond the 49 00:03:35,040 --> 00:03:37,500 limited mind and body. 50 00:03:37,500 --> 00:03:41,040 We will remain like a herd animal, 51 00:03:41,040 --> 00:03:43,560 a creature that craves pleasure 52 00:03:43,560 --> 00:03:46,440 and avoids pain, endlessly responding 53 00:03:46,440 --> 00:03:50,460 to stimulus, endlessly doing, 54 00:03:50,610 --> 00:03:54,520 and unaware of the dimension of being. 55 00:03:57,120 --> 00:04:00,720 To be aware, to be fully attentive to 56 00:04:00,720 --> 00:04:03,239 what is happening, without the mediation 57 00:04:03,239 --> 00:04:06,840 of egoic conditioning, without concepts, 58 00:04:06,840 --> 00:04:10,500 without controlling, manipulating 59 00:04:10,500 --> 00:04:13,714 or distortion, without the filtering 60 00:04:13,714 --> 00:04:15,279 of the limited mind, 61 00:04:15,279 --> 00:04:18,370 is to be present without choosing. 62 00:04:19,079 --> 00:04:22,079 Present without choosing, and therefore 63 00:04:22,079 --> 00:04:24,800 without a chooser. 64 00:04:26,340 --> 00:04:29,100 Every time the mind moves without your 65 00:04:29,100 --> 00:04:32,750 willing, even the tiniest movement, 66 00:04:32,750 --> 00:04:35,700 it is due to filtering through the 67 00:04:35,700 --> 00:04:39,160 conditioning of the self-structure. 68 00:04:41,820 --> 00:04:44,520 The path leads to cessation of 69 00:04:44,520 --> 00:04:47,070 the entire whirlpool of mind. 70 00:04:52,080 --> 00:04:56,322 To realizing all levels of self as empty. 71 00:05:00,960 --> 00:05:03,410 How do I drop all doing, 72 00:05:03,410 --> 00:05:06,439 how do I drop mind activity? 73 00:05:07,259 --> 00:05:11,400 Listen closely, this is the paradox. 74 00:05:11,400 --> 00:05:14,880 The limited egoic mind hears that 75 00:05:14,880 --> 00:05:18,419 question and wants to know how, 76 00:05:18,419 --> 00:05:23,479 but that limited mind can't do it. 77 00:05:23,820 --> 00:05:27,180 The mind will always fail in any attempt 78 00:05:27,180 --> 00:05:32,360 to realize stillness, because the mind is movement. 79 00:05:33,440 --> 00:05:38,360 The mind itself is movement, 80 00:05:38,520 --> 00:05:41,820 it is an endless process of doing. 81 00:05:41,820 --> 00:05:45,240 We have to make the shift from doing 82 00:05:45,240 --> 00:05:47,419 to BEING. 83 00:05:47,419 --> 00:05:50,460 The you that you think you are is a 84 00:05:50,460 --> 00:05:53,994 process a constant movement, 85 00:05:53,994 --> 00:05:57,380 a collection of patterns. 86 00:06:02,400 --> 00:06:05,759 That YOU has to die. 87 00:06:05,759 --> 00:06:08,440 The pathological pattern of you 88 00:06:08,440 --> 00:06:12,419 has to end for Samadhi to be realized. 89 00:06:12,419 --> 00:06:15,860 Let that sink in... 90 00:06:16,320 --> 00:06:18,360 Spiritual teachers have given 91 00:06:18,360 --> 00:06:20,639 the instruction to reach Samadhi. 92 00:06:20,639 --> 00:06:23,639 Be still and know. 93 00:06:23,639 --> 00:06:26,940 Be still and know the True Self. 94 00:06:26,940 --> 00:06:29,819 Primordial Awareness beyond name and form. 95 00:06:31,359 --> 00:06:35,570 Be still and know that you are God. 96 00:06:37,620 --> 00:06:40,940 What exactly do they mean? 97 00:06:41,880 --> 00:06:45,860 What is it that becomes still? 98 00:06:47,280 --> 00:06:49,740 Obviously no one's physical body can 99 00:06:49,740 --> 00:06:51,890 become absolutely still, 100 00:06:51,890 --> 00:06:55,179 existing within time and space. 101 00:06:55,179 --> 00:06:58,620 Because time-space itself is movement. 102 00:06:59,539 --> 00:07:02,639 Time-space is mind, 103 00:07:02,639 --> 00:07:07,759 the Universe is big mind or Logos. 104 00:07:10,259 --> 00:07:13,500 The first Hermetic principle is that 105 00:07:13,500 --> 00:07:18,440 The All is mind, the Universe is mental. 106 00:07:19,319 --> 00:07:21,830 If the Universe is mind and mind 107 00:07:21,830 --> 00:07:26,340 is movement, how can I be still and know? 108 00:07:26,340 --> 00:07:29,520 How can you be still on a globe spinning 109 00:07:29,520 --> 00:07:34,460 a thousand miles per hour around its axis, 110 00:07:35,060 --> 00:07:40,190 spinning 67 000 miles per hour around the Sun, 111 00:07:41,340 --> 00:07:46,409 moving 500 000 miles per hour around the Galaxy, 112 00:07:46,539 --> 00:07:50,759 and millions more through the Universe? 113 00:07:52,380 --> 00:07:56,159 Your heart is beating, cells are moving inside, 114 00:07:56,520 --> 00:08:00,589 food digesting, the brain producing brain waves. 115 00:08:01,680 --> 00:08:06,000 Your blood is pumping, energy is moving, 116 00:08:06,000 --> 00:08:08,520 how can we be still? 117 00:08:08,520 --> 00:08:12,350 When the spiritual Masters say 'be still and know', 118 00:08:12,660 --> 00:08:15,720 they must be talking about something else, 119 00:08:15,720 --> 00:08:19,160 something Beyond time and space, 120 00:08:19,160 --> 00:08:23,280 something beyond the physical and mental. 121 00:08:23,280 --> 00:08:25,979 What is meant by stillness is something 122 00:08:25,979 --> 00:08:30,179 that we have no word for in our modern language system. 123 00:08:30,500 --> 00:08:33,580 The Sanskrit language, the language 124 00:08:33,580 --> 00:08:36,779 of the yogis, has more precise terms 125 00:08:36,779 --> 00:08:39,919 which point to the non-dual. 126 00:08:40,620 --> 00:08:44,940 The term 'shunyata' is often translated 127 00:08:44,940 --> 00:08:48,610 as ‘voidness’, stillness or emptiness. 128 00:08:49,380 --> 00:08:51,839 It is what is used in connection 129 00:08:51,839 --> 00:08:55,019 with 'anata' or no-self, 130 00:08:55,019 --> 00:08:58,172 the realization of Buddha nature. 131 00:09:01,500 --> 00:09:05,169 Stillness is maybe the closest English word, 132 00:09:05,220 --> 00:09:07,440 but it is inadequate to describe something 133 00:09:07,440 --> 00:09:10,250 that is not of this dualistic world. 134 00:09:11,519 --> 00:09:15,580 What is actually realized is the Primordial Consciousness, 135 00:09:15,580 --> 00:09:18,720 which is beyond stillness and movement, 136 00:09:18,720 --> 00:09:22,270 beyond time. It is eternal, 137 00:09:22,270 --> 00:09:24,519 the ground of your being, 138 00:09:24,519 --> 00:09:27,210 the essential nature of reality 139 00:09:27,210 --> 00:09:30,800 that does not change. Actually it is beyond 140 00:09:30,800 --> 00:09:34,200 change and the changeless. 141 00:09:34,200 --> 00:09:37,440 When our true nature is realized 142 00:09:37,440 --> 00:09:40,450 it becomes obvious that stillness and movement 143 00:09:40,450 --> 00:09:43,490 are a duality created by the Mind, 144 00:09:43,490 --> 00:09:48,910 silence and noise are a duality created by the mind. 145 00:09:50,640 --> 00:09:53,580 Everything is already inherent within 146 00:09:53,580 --> 00:09:56,459 that primordial stillness, the movement 147 00:09:56,459 --> 00:10:00,749 of the world is identical to stillness. 148 00:10:01,580 --> 00:10:04,080 Be still and know, 149 00:10:04,080 --> 00:10:07,380 be in motion and know. 150 00:10:07,380 --> 00:10:10,300 It is all emptiness dancing. 151 00:10:10,300 --> 00:10:12,690 This is not something philosophical, 152 00:10:12,690 --> 00:10:14,340 but an entirely different way 153 00:10:14,340 --> 00:10:16,990 of interfacing with the world. 154 00:10:17,191 --> 00:10:20,090 Actually it's about dropping the interface, 155 00:10:20,339 --> 00:10:23,139 dropping the reducing valve which is 156 00:10:23,139 --> 00:10:26,840 the self-structure, and experiencing your true nature 157 00:10:26,840 --> 00:10:29,410 unmediated by the limited mind. 158 00:10:30,300 --> 00:10:33,120 The so-called outer world is transcended 159 00:10:33,120 --> 00:10:37,710 by realizing stillness, which when realized, 160 00:10:37,710 --> 00:10:41,090 includes that which it transcends. 161 00:10:42,300 --> 00:10:46,219 The duality of stillness and movement collapses. 162 00:10:47,399 --> 00:10:51,240 Realizing samadhi, this great awakening 163 00:10:51,240 --> 00:10:54,440 is just the beginning of the path. 164 00:10:54,440 --> 00:10:57,540 Patanjali says that the entire endeavor 165 00:10:57,540 --> 00:11:00,600 of yoga is aimed at the cessation 166 00:11:00,600 --> 00:11:02,579 of the whirlpool of the mind. 167 00:11:02,579 --> 00:11:05,579 'Chitta vritti nirodha'. 168 00:11:05,579 --> 00:11:08,570 You could say it is the cessation of karma, 169 00:11:10,740 --> 00:11:14,250 the cessation of deep unconscious patterns 170 00:11:14,250 --> 00:11:17,940 on many different levels. 171 00:11:17,940 --> 00:11:20,519 When we realize our true nature, 172 00:11:20,519 --> 00:11:23,160 we temporarily cease our identification 173 00:11:23,160 --> 00:11:25,210 and reaction to the mind. 174 00:11:26,700 --> 00:11:29,940 It's like pulling the plug on a fan. 175 00:11:29,940 --> 00:11:32,869 When we pulled the plug on a fan, 176 00:11:32,869 --> 00:11:35,107 inertia of the Fan's blades keeps it 177 00:11:35,107 --> 00:11:37,720 keeps it going as long as we don't 178 00:11:37,720 --> 00:11:39,420 plug the fan back in, 179 00:11:39,420 --> 00:11:43,579 it will eventually come to stillness. 180 00:11:43,800 --> 00:11:46,320 Karma is simply the tendency for energy 181 00:11:46,320 --> 00:11:49,188 to follow established pathways. 182 00:11:49,188 --> 00:11:52,730 When Consciousness slips back into pattern, 183 00:11:52,730 --> 00:11:55,440 it's like plugging in the fan. 184 00:11:55,440 --> 00:11:58,360 Energy follows Consciousness. 185 00:11:58,360 --> 00:12:01,667 Energy goes back into the old patterns. 186 00:12:04,380 --> 00:12:06,519 Another way of describing it, 187 00:12:06,519 --> 00:12:09,480 is through the law of inertia. 188 00:12:09,480 --> 00:12:12,870 A mind in motion stays in motion, 189 00:12:12,870 --> 00:12:16,620 unless acted upon by an outside force. 190 00:12:17,339 --> 00:12:19,620 In the matrix of the conditioned mind 191 00:12:19,620 --> 00:12:21,839 that we call the Universe, 192 00:12:21,839 --> 00:12:24,420 energy and thought cycle through fractal 193 00:12:24,420 --> 00:12:27,600 labyrinths that exist on a Continuum, 194 00:12:27,600 --> 00:12:29,820 for micro to macro levels, 195 00:12:29,820 --> 00:12:32,880 branching and exploring endlessly 196 00:12:34,519 --> 00:12:37,920 All spiritual practice is an intervention, 197 00:12:37,920 --> 00:12:41,040 an outside force, 198 00:12:41,040 --> 00:12:43,680 a Consciousness which diverts energy 199 00:12:43,680 --> 00:12:47,300 from flowing in the conditioned pathways. 200 00:12:47,300 --> 00:12:51,210 You have to be willing to change your life. 201 00:12:53,639 --> 00:12:55,920 Someone can do all the meditation 202 00:12:55,920 --> 00:12:58,440 in the world but if they go back to their 203 00:12:58,440 --> 00:13:00,000 same old patterns, 204 00:13:00,000 --> 00:13:02,040 their same old routine, 205 00:13:02,040 --> 00:13:05,040 then the wiring remains in place. 206 00:13:06,800 --> 00:13:10,079 Our unconscious motivations must be 207 00:13:10,079 --> 00:13:12,600 excavated and faced. 208 00:13:12,600 --> 00:13:15,120 If through great perseverance and 209 00:13:15,120 --> 00:13:18,060 determination, we managed to not plug in 210 00:13:18,060 --> 00:13:20,160 the fan, then there is an actual 211 00:13:20,160 --> 00:13:23,220 cessation of the 'vritties'. 212 00:13:23,220 --> 00:13:26,040 A profound silence that is born 213 00:13:26,040 --> 00:13:28,380 within the self-structure. 214 00:13:28,380 --> 00:13:31,920 Every time we identify with and react to 215 00:13:31,920 --> 00:13:34,740 some preference produced by the mind, 216 00:13:34,740 --> 00:13:37,124 we plug the fan back in. 217 00:13:37,124 --> 00:13:39,779 The longer we remain in awareness, 218 00:13:39,779 --> 00:13:42,839 the more of the samskaras are purified. 219 00:13:42,839 --> 00:13:45,959 The more the fan slows down, 220 00:13:45,959 --> 00:13:47,769 and the human vessel becomes 221 00:13:47,769 --> 00:13:50,490 more permeable to awareness, 222 00:13:50,490 --> 00:13:53,621 the more we become empty of self.