Remembering with love those we have lost.

A dear family member has suffered much loss this past year and is facing their first Valentine’s Day without their spouse. I feel their pain, so I decided to look for some words of wisdom regarding love and loss. Seneca’s Letters to Lucilius came to mind and did not disappoint.

In “Letter 63—On Grief for Lost Friends,” Seneca addresses the death of Flaccus, a friend of Lucilius. His advice at first sounds harsh, but as you read on you understand that Seneca is not exhorting his friend to not mourn. Instead, he encourages Lucilius to allow the pain to exist for a while, and then let that pain be subsumed by the love you still hold in your heart. Let your memories be comforting instead of painful. In Seneca’s words, “Let us see to it that the recollection of those whom we have lost becomes a pleasant memory to us.”

Seneca quotes his friend Attalus as saying, “The remembrance of lost friends is pleasant in the same way that certain fruits have an agreeably acid taste, or as in extremely old wines it is their very bitterness that pleases us. Indeed, after a certain lapse of time, every thought that gave pain is quenched, and the pleasure comes to us unalloyed.” Seneca goes on to say, “To me, the thought of my dead friends is sweet and appealing. For I have had them as if I should one day lose them; I have lost them as if I have them still.”

This has been key to managing my own grief after the death of my mother. Once I was able to think of Mom as still smiling, still with me, the pain eased. I still talk to her sometimes, silently, as we enjoy certain foods, watch certain shows, or make certain plans. Imagining her joy as we continue to experience this world together makes me smile and laugh sometimes. Yes, occasionally there is still the sharp stab of grief, but more often there is the warm glow of love.

Seneca talks about how society tends to put a limit on mourning periods, and he agrees that these are worthwhile. He has come to believe that chronic grieving is either “assumed or foolish.” And yet, he says, “I must be included among the examples of men who have been overcome by grief.” When a friend younger than himself died, Seneca “wept so excessively” that he now wishes he could have said to himself before then, “My friend Serenus is younger than I; but what does that matter? He would naturally die after me, but he may precede me.” He tells Lucilius that “I had never imagined it possible for his death to precede mine. The only thought which occurred to my mind was that he was the younger, and much younger, too—as if the Fates kept to the order of our ages!”

Seneca ends his letter to Lucilius with this thought: “Now is the time for you to reflect, not only that all things are mortal, but also that their mortality is subject to no fixed law. Whatever can happen at any time can happen to-day. Let us therefore reflect, my beloved Lucilius, that we shall soon come to the goal which this friend, to our own sorrow, has reached. And perhaps, if only the tale told by wise men is true and there is a bourne to welcome us, then he whom we think we have lost has only been sent on ahead. Farewell.”

From Seneca’s Letters to Lucilius: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Moral_letters_to_Lucilius/Letter_63

Diving deep into the meaning of life.

When I first picked up Tim and Robot, I thought it might be a children’s book. The title is so simple, and the cover—featuring a robot made of basic shapes and a young man in a white lab coat gazing up at the night sky—has a whimsical feel.

But once you start reading, you realize that Saro Varjabedian isn’t telling a children’s story at all. What he’s created is something far more reflective—a thoughtful, often funny, and surprisingly deep look at what it means to be alive.

Saro—an award-winning cinematographer, producer, and writer—weaves his own experiences into this semi-autobiographical story about curiosity, spirituality, and self-discovery. His own life has had its fair share of ups and downs, and that authenticity shines through on every page.

The premise is simple: Tim, a scientist, has built a robot. He programs it well enough that the two can carry on real conversations, and he gives the robot access to the internet so it can explore, learn, and grow. Over time, Tim hopes it might even start to feel emotions.

From there, the story unfolds through a series of conversations between Tim and the robot. They talk about everything—what feelings are and where they come from, why humans behave the way they do, and even whether religion still has a place in today’s world.

One of my favorite quotes comes from their discussion on religion:

So just maybe, if we took all the parts that…are supported by our current knowledge and understanding of ourselves and the universe, from all the religions and the philosophies our ancestors passed down to us, we’d come closer to a more complete understanding and a better way of being.

That line encapsulates my own views on spirituality—it’s not about preaching or choosing sides. It’s about being open to new ideas, having compassion for others, and accepting that there is no one “truth”, but only fragments of understanding scattered here and there.

What I love most about these exchanges is that Tim never pretends to have all the answers. Instead, Tim and the robot take turns playing devil’s advocate, pushing each other to look at things from new angles and to dig a little deeper.

At the end of each discussion, the robot sums up what it’s learned, giving readers a clear takeaway. This keeps the conversations philosophical without ever feeling heavy-handed.

In the chapter titled “Day 8: How Do I Determine What Is True?”, the robot stumbles upon misinformation online. Tim tries to teach it how to separate fact from fiction, pointing out that people often “skew their beliefs or even their perceived reality” as a form of self-protection. That insight reminded me of C.S. Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters, in which the devil and his helpers take advantage of how easily human pride and fear can be manipulated to cloud the truth.

Later in the book, Tim talks about meditation and how it can help break the endless loop of thoughts and emotions feeding off one another. By pausing, he explains, you create space for reason to replace reactivity.

When the robot asks for an example, Tim shares a personal story about how meditation helped him as he dealt with a difficult health issue. I loved that moment—it’s a perfect example of how this book doesn’t just talk about big ideas, it shows them. Saro fills each chapter with stories that make the lessons feel practical and relatable, like something you could actually use in your own life.

As the robot learns more about humans—our emotions, societies, and beliefs—the reader learns right along with it. The questions get bigger: What is the soul? Can humans evolve beyond conflict and fear? What’s the best way to live a good life?

By the end, Tim and the robot are reflecting on what we should do with the time we’re given. There are no tidy answers, but there’s plenty to think about. Tim simply suggests that we try to do more good than harm—a simple, powerful message that lingers long after you close the book.

Though Tim and Robot may at first glance seem like a simple story, it’s actually a deep meditation on the meaning of existence. With humor, humility, and grace, Saro Varjabedian invites us to slow down, ask better questions, and look inward.

I’m genuinely grateful that Saro shared this book with me. If you’re someone who enjoys reflecting on life’s deeper questions—or if you just love a good conversation between science and soul—this book deserves a spot on your shelf.

Thanks for listening. Until next time, may you find the peace you are seeking.

Links:


• For more information on Saro Varjabedian and his work, visit https://www.sarovarjabedian.com.

Let love reign.

Today I’d like to pass along my thoughts on the whirlwind of social and political chaos that surrounds us.

I know that a lot of those who voted in the 2024 US presidential election were influenced by conspiracy theories and fear-mongering spread through social media—I saw my own friends and family influenced by those stories.

I also know that the ego is easily tricked into believing things that create a sense of self-righteousness. It’s easy to get caught up in ideas that cater to your own worldview and suspicions, and it’s all-too-easy to find yourself caught in a web of anger and hatred for those who endanger the values you hold dear.

We humans are social creatures who find strength and safety in groups. In his book The Brain: The Story of You neuroscientist David Eagleman talks about how once you settle into a group you’re comfortable with, that automatically creates an “ingroup” and an “outgroup.” Experiments have shown that while we have empathy for members of our ingroup, many have less of an empathic response when viewing harm to someone in an outgroup. This makes it easy for someone to take advantage of this difference by encouraging divisiveness to drum up support for getting rid of those that he sees as lesser human beings. Dehumanization of “the others” can lead to bullying, brutality, and genocide.

We now have a president whose rhetoric is divisive and dehumanizing. He is unable to feel empathy for those he hurts. It is inconceivable to me that we are where we are, and yet—here we are.

If you are struggling with finding serenity in these troubled times, you are not alone. I’m including here some thoughts on how we can get through this.

First of all, it’s important to remember that each of us is on our own path, and our own life is the only one we can live. You cannot control the thoughts and behaviors of others, and others cannot control yours. We are, however, connected.

You, me, Trump, and all other living beings were created by a series of events that began with the first replication of DNA. You had no control over the genetic processes that created you any more than Trump had control over his. None of us had control over how we were raised, either. Each of us is a product of our own unique biological chemistries and growth environments. Even siblings can be as different as night and day. Every experience we have helps shape our views of the world, and those views help shape our actions and reactions to future experiences.

Now consider that each of us is made up of atoms with protons and neutrons and lots of empty space through which their electrons pass. Atoms get together to create molecules, and these molecules arrange themselves into DNA, RNA, cellular organelles, and cells. And these cells arrange themselves into tissues and organs that work together to keep us alive. And we interact with other things made of molecules—some are not alive, but they have the same basic makeup of atoms with protons, neutrons, and electrons.

Everything is connected to everything else. The elements of the universe have come together to create the stars, the planets, you, me…and Donald Trump.

Many of us have found the wherewithal to move forward on the path of enlightenment. We are opening our minds to the universe so that we can experience the limitless love and understanding of nonduality. Some find their way blocked can’t see a way past it.

If you’ve listened to my podcast on David R. Hawkins’ book Letting Go: The Pathway of Surrender, you may remember that Hawkins delineated the path to enlightenment with his trademark “Map of Consciousness”. According to this map, Trump and others like him are trapped in the Anger and Pride levels of consciousness (levels 150-175). According to Hawkins, “Anger expresses itself most often as resentment and revenge and is, therefore, volatile and dangerous. Anger as a lifestyle is exemplified by irritable, explosive people who are oversensitive to slights and become ‘injustice collectors,’ quarrelsome, belligerent, or litigious.” He also says, “Pride is defensive and…dependent upon external conditions,” and that “the inflated ego is vulnerable to attack.” An overinflated ego is always in danger of being deflated, knocking the prideful person back into Shame, the lowest energy level, closest to death.

It isn’t easy to get past these stages—to let go of our fears, desires, and pride—and move forward to Hawkins’ energy level 200, or Courage, and beyond.

I suggest you include these observations during your next meditation. If people can’t be but who they are—as defined by genetics, chemistry, and experience—and they don’t have the ability to rise to the energy levels of love and compassion, then we must accept them as they are. Getting angry or feeling hatred toward these people does no good. If we are to be loving and compassionate, then we must be thus to all people.

Loving every being, even those who lash out and hurt others, doesn’t mean you can’t oppose their actions. In fact, your compassionate lifestyle is one mode of opposition. Find your own way to help those being threatened and oppressed. By protesting, writing your congressmen, or just sharing a positive message or a link to helpful information, you can have a positive impact on the world.

Most importantly, if you live in a country where you have the power of the vote, use that power. You can find information on upcoming U.S. elections using the Ballotpedia elections calendar. Vote in every election—for school board or city council members, judges, mayors, governors, state and national congressional members, and president. All of these positions have the ability to control the health of our economy, the well-being of our communities, and the power of our freedom to vote. In a nation built on the principles of a democratic republic, voting is your superpower.

According to an NPR recap of the 2024 presidential election, 63.9% of eligible voters cast a ballot. That means that 88 million people didn’t use their voting power, giving 155 million people the power to decide the fate of all 245 million eligible voters. A little less than half of those who voted voted for Trump.

All-in-all there is much you can do to anchor yourself amid the chaos. As Seneca said in Letter 67 to Lucilius, “If you have nothing to stir you up and rouse you to action, nothing which will test your resolution by its threats and hostilities; if you recline in unshaken comfort, it is not tranquillity; it is merely a flat calm.” By taking action and using your power and talents to better the world in your own way, you will find your tranquility.

As always, thanks for listening. Take care.

Links:


• Information on David Eagleman’s website about The Brain: The Story of You:
  https://eagleman.com/books/the-brain/

• Study published in the National Library of Medicine, The influence of group membership on the neural correlates involved in empathy:
  https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3644680/

• The Spiritual But Not Religious podcast on Letting Go: The Pathway of Surrender:
  https://www.spiritualbnr.org/letting-go

• Veritas Publishing information on the book Letting Go: The Pathway of Surrender:
  https://veritaspub.com/product/letting-go-the-pathway-of-surrender-book/

• Ballotpedia elections calendar:
  https://ballotpedia.org/Elections_calendar

• NPR recap of the 2024 presidential election:
  https://www.npr.org/2024/12/27/nx-s1-5222570/2024-politics-recap

• Letter 67 to Lucilius on Wikisource:
  https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Moral_letters_to_Lucilius/Letter_67

The memoir of a man of many talents.

Wildhouse Publishing recently sent me a review copy of Honest to God, a memoir written by John Hamilton. I had never heard of John Hamilton, but his bio reminded me of my own spiritual path, so I decided to give it a read.

John was born in South Boston to a firefighter father and a devout Catholic mother. His first encounter with the transcendent came through music, singing in the church choir.

At eight years old, serving as an altar boy, John first heard God's call. He went on to develop an appreciation for the mystical ways of the Church. By the time he was offered a place in seminary at the end of eighth grade, he had spent months in prayer considering this path. Yet the gift of his first guitar—and an awakening lust for life—led him in a different direction.

Throughout his life, John searched for meaning. He grew away from the Catholic Church, but when his young daughter was invited to a Protestant service, the family went along. There they found a welcoming, jubilant atmosphere that made them feel at home. From there, John’s path eventually led him to pursue a liturgical career, culminating in his ordination as a pastor.

The narrative of the book alternates between past and present, weaving a masterful tale of personal and spiritual transformation. Odd-numbered chapters trace John's evolution from his 1980s stint with the band Newsboy—“the best band you’ve never heard of”—through his successful career in advertising, to his 2002 pastoral calling. Even-numbered chapters chronicle his final days as pastor of First Congregational Church in Norwood, Massachusetts, interweaving tender memories of his life as the congregation’s spiritual leader. The two timelines converge elegantly, with the chapter describing John’s first day as pastor at First Congregational leading directly to the chapter describing his last.

In John’s final year as pastor, he feels a spiritual restlessness take hold. The God he knew as a child no longer seems real. John explores the wider expanse of our spiritual relationship to the universe and seeks to reconcile the cognitive dissonance of living in a world of wonder and suffering.

Though my own story may seem less dramatic than Hamilton's, I feel a deep kinship with his journey. Like him, I began as a child of the Roman Catholic Church, moved by its music and touched by God's presence. In my teens, I experienced a moment of divine connection that still resonates today. My passion led me to guide friends through RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults), hoping to share that sacred joy.

As I navigated adulthood—college, marriage, children—the Church's teachings began to feel discordant. When I sought guidance from my priest during this crisis of faith, instead of the dialogue I needed, he simply handed me a Catholic magazine. Its rigid outline of Church membership requirements made it clear: I no longer fit within those bounds. My Catholic journey ended there.

Like Pastor John, I found myself wondering, "Where do I go from here?" I wrestled with labels like "atheist" or "agnostic" but found nothing that could really define me. My mother, though a lifelong Catholic, embraced a gentler, more nuanced faith in her later years. She introduced me to Richard Rohr—a Franciscan priest teaching Nonduality—whose essays offered a fresh perspective on Christianity.

I was blessed with a mother whose generous heart never wavered in loving me. Another blessing came near the time of her passing: a guide who introduced me to the spiritual oneness taught by the Buddha, Baruch Spinoza, and other great thinkers.

Now I've found my place in the cosmic web, feeling connected to all that is. I've made peace with my past, present, and future. As John Hamilton beautifully concludes in Honest to God, our fundamental purpose is to infuse the world with compassion and kindness, helping to dispel the fear and confusion that clouds so many lives.

John's journey continues, as does ours. Perhaps as we walk our diverse paths, sharing love and understanding, we will all discover the peace we are seeking.

Links:


• For more information on John Hamilton and his memoir, go to:

  https://wildhousepublishing.com/honest-to-god/

Returning to daily practice.

I was first introduced to meditation during a time of great stress. My mother was slowly dying, and I was her sole caretaker. My time was split between caring for her as she cycled in and out of the hospital and caring for my own household, husband, children, and pets. My mind was rarely quiet and anxiety ruled my days and nights.

I sought help, going to therapist after therapist and finding nothing that really worked for me. Desperate, I reached out to a person who was not just a therapist, but a specialist in EMDR and hypnotherapy. I was hesitant to try these things at first, but after reading about how they can help with the very problems I was experiencing, I went for it.

These therapies taught me how to relax and see the world more objectively. I learned how to forgive those who had hurt me, and I learned how to forgive myself. By forgiving myself, I learned how to love more deeply.

My therapist then taught me how to relax into a state of self-hypnosis. He gave me a list of affirmations to work on during this hypnotic state, two weeks per affirmation. I practiced this every day for months and it really helped me.

I continued to learn more about meditation and found it is really no different than that self-hypnotic state. You don’t need to sit cross-legged or say “Om” or light a candle, though I did find it helpful to close my eyes and have the smell of lavender on my person or in the room.

I did this daily for a long time, and then I slipped to a few days a week, and eventually I found myself not meditating at all. I got caught up in daily life and neglected this twenty minutes of reflection time.

I can’t remember now what it was, but something recently made me remember how whole I feel when I meditate—fully relaxed, allowing thoughts to come and go, releasing the ego, and feeling the oneness of the universe. I am now back to daily practice, and will try to keep it up.

Do you meditate? If you did but lost the thread somewhere along the way, I hope this post serves as encouragement to return to it.

Journeying Through "Wake Up Call" with Tom Rapsas

Welcome to another episode of Spiritual but Not Religious with Jill Dominguez. Today we’re going to explore the book Wake Up Call by Tom Rapsas. Many thanks to Wildhouse Publishing for providing a review copy.

Tom Rapsas has followed a path similar to my own. He was raised a Catholic, but found the rituals and dogma uninspiring. As he reached adulthood, Tom left organized religion behind. But while working a regular 9 to 5 job, he eventually came to feel the need for something more than his daily routine of eat-work-sleep.

As he embarked on a journey toward enlightenment, Tom began consuming everything he could regarding spirituality—from books on Hinduism, Buddhism, and Christianity to other inspirational works. These led Tom to realize that “true wisdom” can’t be gained from any one religion or learned person. Everything you read, everyone you meet, and every experience you have will contribute to your own spiritual insight.

In 2010 Tom began writing about his spiritual journey, and in 2012 he started a weekly online column called “Wake Up Call.” In that blog he expounds on ideas he has gleaned from other inspirational authors and podcasters. The book I’m reviewing here is an anthology of lessons from that ongoing endeavor. As you might expect in a collection of essays quoting writers who ponder similar questions, there is some duplication of thoughts and ideas throughout the book. But that’s not a bad thing, as the reader gains perspective on these ideas from different sources and from different angles.

Wake Up Call is divided into 16 chapters. Each chapter comprises one week of stories. Each day of the week features a story that falls into one of seven categories: Inspiration, Awareness, Character, Calling, Practice, Inner Work, and Christian Contemplation. Tom includes a helpful guide at the beginning of the book which describes each category. He also shares his intention for the book to serve as not just a collection of essays, but also as an introduction to various thinkers who may serve as valuable resources for the reader’s own spiritual development.

True to his stated intent, the book is filled with essays quoting different spiritual writers and his own interpretations of their words of wisdom. Tom recounts his takeaways from the life and works of Thomas Merton, Eckhart Tolle, Richard Rohr, Seneca, the Dalai Lama, and many others. The Self, the ego, the Gnostic Gospels, finding your purpose, and the definition of God are some of the many topics discussed.

One key concept that’s mentioned repeatedly in Tom’s essays is the importance of listening. Truly listening to others when they speak leads to deeper connections and understanding. Listening during prayer and contemplation may bring you answers to questions that you don't even realize you’re asking.

The first chapter of Wake Up Call focuses on living fully in the moment, taking the time to stop whatever you are doing throughout the day and just appreciate what is. This chapter includes a quote by author Andre Dubus ("Duh-BYOOSE”) about how he came to realize, as he prepared lunch for his kids each day, that each motion is a sacrament. Tom Rapsas wrote that “finding the sacred in sandwich-making” gives us a different way to see our many “I’m busy” moments throughout the day. I found the quote from Dubus’s essay, which is titled "Making Sandwiches For My Daughters,” even more moving when I read the whole essay. You can a link to the essay below.

In the Week One / Day 6 section titled “Meditation Made Easy,” Tom talks about how the typical mantras—Ayum, I am, or Om—didn’t work for him; his mind would wander too often. During meditation, Tom says phrases such as “Love is Good. Love is God.” work better for him, keeping him more on task. I also find this to be true. I use Delta as a word for the infinite Nothingness in place of God. The meditation phrase I use most often is “Delta is accepting, so I am accepting.” This helps keep me mindful of what IS (instead of what should be or what should have been). Another very useful practice, which I covered in Episodes 7 and 8 of this podcast, is Neti-Neti meditation. Check it out if you haven’t already.

Several of the essays in Wake Up Call focus on how we can better live a more fulfilling life. In the Week Two / Day 2 essay, I especially like Tom’s take on a Guardian article on “awe” and how finding the awe in the ordinary can enrich our lives. He said, “When we teach ourselves to look past the things we know and expect, we may be surprised by what we see.…We may notice that the happiness and fulfillment we’ve been chasing have been with us all along.“

There is an especially pertinent message for our times in the Week Three / Day 3 essay. Tom distills a Dalai Lama quote down to “Do good. Don’t be a jerk.” He then suggests that, before you communicate an idea to others, you should ask yourself if it is True, Helpful, Inspiring, Necessary, and Kind—T-H-I-N-K. If what you have to say meets these criteria, then you are contributing to the world in a positive way. If not, THINK again before speaking or hitting Send on that email.

In the Week Six / Day 4 section, Tom includes “A Ten-Step Guide to the Next Phase of Your Life” with ideas taken from Finding Grace by Eiman Al Zaabi. The steps emphasize finding your purpose and making a difference in the world by using your talents to spread compassion and light wherever you are. I’m bookmarking this one.

The Week Seven / Day 7 passage talks about former Catholic priest Tom Stella and his realization that God is not some deity in the sky but a presence within everyone and everything. It’s been such a wonderful thing for me to discover that there are so many others who have found their way past Church dogma to feel this interconnectedness.

The Week Nine passages are a treasure trove of information and ideas for broadening your spiritual awareness. They include titles such as “Ten Valuable Life Hacks from the Urban Monk,” “The Dalai Lama and the Amazing Power of a Smile,” “The Lazy Person’s Guide to Meditation,” and “Ten Surprising Truths about Jesus (You Won’t Hear in Church).” One of my favorite quotes from these passages is in the 10th life hack from The Urban Monk: “Remember that everyone has something to teach you.”

The Week Ten / Day 6 chapter reminds us of the power of agape and how practicing this unconditional love and forgiveness can be healing. Tom quotes author Wendy Merron as saying, “Being angry is like holding a piece of burning coal in your hand and hoping the other person feels pain.” This is something I learned as I struggled to forgive the man who raped me. Holding onto the hatred and fear I still felt was only hurting me. Forgiveness leads to peace.

Another special moment comes to us in the Week Eleven / Day 1 passage. It includes the final thoughts shared with Tom by a friend who recently passed away. The text of the passage was taken from the last several curt emails Tom received as his friend’s health was failing, and it sums up the man’s recipe for a life of love and happiness in a very moving way. The main ingredient in this recipe is compassion. Tom’s friend wrote, “I believe that God resides in my own being and manifests itself in my acts of kindness, my simple sincerity, trying to respect each person I meet just as they are… .” Sincerity, kindness, respect. If everyone practiced these things, we all would be that much closer to Enlightenment.

The Week Twelve / Day 4 section is another that really spoke to me. It’s titled “How to Make the Most of ‘The Second Half’ of Life.” Tom includes quotes from David Brooks and his book The Second Mountain. Brooks describes the first half of life as The First Mountain, the time of life when you are working on achieving life goals such as starting a career, raising a family, building relationships, and generally enjoying what life has to offer. Brooks describes the second half of life as “The Second Mountain.” During this stage of life you may start to see your purpose on Earth less as “What can I get out of life?” and more as “What can I give of myself to others?”

This observation became meaningful to me recently when I went to visit the doctor about some pain I was having. I asked her if it could be related to ovulation, and she said to me, “Not at your age.” In other words, I am definitely in that “second half” of life. I am traversing “The Second Mountain” and I’m inspired to spend this time by paring down my material possessions and giving as much love and support to others as I can.

In the Week Thirteen / Day 1 section of Wake Up Call I discovered an illustrated fable that I hadn’t heard of but that I must add to my library. It’s titled The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse and it’s written by Charlie Mackesy. Tom elaborates on seven key takeaways from the book. One of my favorites is number six on Tom’s list: “When the big things feel out of control, focus on what you love.” In other words, stop scanning social media and news headlines and focus inward and close to home. Appreciate what you have, especially the small things, and spread the love stored in your heart to those around you.

Another Week Thirteen passage explores the ideas of spiritual writer Tom Stella (formerly a Catholic priest) and Richard Rohr (a Catholic priest of the Franciscan tradition). They came to see Jesus not as some deity to worship but as a fully realized human, someone who lived a life of love and giving, someone we can all aspire to emulate. Jesus knew that God is intrinsic to all of us, and when we feel that connection we see the world with different eyes and realize that God is not separate from us in some faraway place; God is everywhere—in everyone and everything.

In my Roman Catholic upbringing, these ideas were never taught. The Holy Trinity—three separate yet intertwined incarnations of God—is doctrine. You can pray to the saints to intercede with God on your behalf; or you can tell a priest your sins and ask for forgiveness. It all seems to emphasize our separation from the divine. According to tradition, God is the creator of our world and Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus died to expunge our sins, so we worship him. The Holy Spirit is a separate entity—more of an individual experience than a spiritual connection with the rest of existence.

So I was delighted several years ago to discover the writings of Richard Rohr, a present-day priest, and those of 17th-century Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza. Spinoza was ostracized and banned from his Jewish community for his belief in a universal God—the Substance of the universe. Here in the 21st century, Richard Rohr writes books, has a website, and emails his “Daily Meditation” to thousands of people (including me). His writings suggest “seeing with the eyes of the mystics” and existing in nonduality, defined in today’s email as “a way of thinking, acting, reconciling, boundary-crossing, and bridge-building based on inner experience of God and God’s Spirit moving in the world.” Rohr’s version of the Catholic faith differs so much from the version I experienced that it seems to be something else altogether. It’s still based around traditional Catholic tenets but incorporates more of the Eastern philosophies, putting the ideas of the universal Self and cosmic unity front and center—a much more inclusive worldview.

Moving on to the Week Fourteen / Day 2 passage of Wake Up Call, we find a reference to the Latin phrase memento mori, which roughly translates to “Remember, you will die.” The concept of focusing your life around the idea that life is fleeting and could end at any moment has featured in many philosophies, including Stoicism, Judaism, Christianity, and Buddhism.

Tom Rapsas quotes a lesson from the “Waking Up” app by neuroscientist and philosopher Sam Harris. This lesson, titled “The Last Time”, urges you to “think about all the things in this life that you will experience for the last time.” When you practice memento mori, you keep in mind that each moment is precious and could be your last—but this doesn’t mean you must fear death. When you fear death, that fear overshadows the wondrous joys of life. When you acknowledge death as the final stage of life, you are free to appreciate each amazing second of your time in this world. By slowing down and taking in every experience with your full attention—literally Being in the moment—you come to appreciate the little things that you’ve been taking for granted and relish life as it Is.

There is much more information and inspiration to be found in Wake Up Call. I know I found several resources within its pages that I plan to explore. I hope you find this book useful in your own spiritual journey. I’ll put links to more information about the author and his book in the episode description.

Until next time, this is Jill Dominguez for Spiritual But Not Religious. May you find the peace you are seeking.

Links:


• About Tom Rapsas and Wake Up Call:
https://www.tomrapsas.com

• Andre Dubus II essay:
https://sites.up.edu/portlandmagazine/making-sandwiches-for-my-daughters/



• NPR interview with Andre Dubus III:
https://www.npr.org/2023/08/01/1191357456/novelist-andre-dubus-iii



• The Guardian article on awe:
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2022/sep/23/how-getting-more-awe-can-improve-your-life-and-even-make-you-a-nicer-person



• Richard Rohr on nonduality:
https://cac.org/daily-meditations/the-dualistic-mind-2017-01-29/



• Eckhart Tolle interview "On Being":
https://eckharttolle.com/listen-on-being-with-krista-tippett/

Accepting what is.

Today I read Richard Rohr's newsletter from Monday, March 11, 2024, which you can find at https://cac.org/daily-meditations/our-limited-perspectives/. In this daily meditation, he talks about how humans tend to let the ego drive our perspective on reality. He says that unless we recognize and admit this to ourselves, "We will live with a high degree of illusion that brings much suffering into the world." He reminds us that the self is a small, petty product of the ego, but the Self is everything. According to Rohr, "People with a distorted image of self, world, or God will be largely incapable of experiencing what is Really Real in the world." This message hit especially close to home for me as I come to realize that my beloved dog, Sadie, is approaching the end of her life.

Sadie came to us from a shelter. She was malnourished and very anxious and only slowly warmed to our family. Eventually she really bonded with me and became my constant companion. She used to hate going on walks, as everything frightened her. With some anti-anxiety meds she came to love walks and demanded that I take her every morning.

Sadie was already mature when we got her, with a touch of gray on her face. The vet estimated she was at least six to eight years old. We've had her for seven years, so she's probably 15 or so now. Over the last year or two she has developed hip dysplasia, and eventually she needed assistance getting up off of our slick tile and wood floors.

The last couple of weeks she hasn't wanted to eat her food, so I started pureeing her canned food and encouraging her to eat it by spoon feeding it to her. Now she really has no interest in eating. She also stopped asking to go on walks—except for today. She seemed to want to go on a walk, so we went.

She took us on our usual path, stumbling now and then as we went down the street and down a hill. We didn't quite make it to the interesting clump of plants that she usually stops to smell, but she smelled deeply of the other plants we passed along the way. She fell sharply at one point and seemed stunned. She very slowly made her way home, dragging a foot now and then. Now she is resting on one of the many mats that we bought to help her get traction as she scrambles to get up.

I've been avoiding the reality of the situation for a while, letting my ego drive my thinking, hoping to keep her with me just a little while longer. And now I must let her go. I must let go of the idea that perhaps if I just encourage her to eat more food and get more exercise she will bounce back from the edge of death.

Maybe I was selfish to encourage this last walk with Sadie, but I'm grateful I got to spend some time with her in the sun of this cool, spring morning. Sadie got to sniff many interesting things, always her favorite part of a walk.

We have an appointment with the veterinarian this afternoon. If he agrees that it is time to put an end to Sadie's suffering, then we will euthanize her. I realize how fortunate I am that I can facilitate her death in a painless and humane way, something I could not do for my mother.

My last loving gift to Sadie will be a release from the pain of this world. I will look back on our time together as sweet and ephemeral, and I will  always be grateful for the time she spent with me.

"Be free from the idea of birth or the fear of death." ~ Ramana Maharshi

I found this quote in Robert Wolfe’s Ramana Maharshi: Teachings of Self-Realization. The relevant text surrounding this quote on pages 24-25 is as follows:

The world of objects, names and form is only the mind; when the mind dies [into the Self], the “world” dies with it. Only the Self then remains. The “personal” God is the last of the unreal forms to go. Only the absolute Being is real. Hence not only the world, not only the “me”, but also the individual God are of unreality. Yours is eternal life. Let a person consider if he has been born, or if the Self ever has any birth. He will discover that the Self always exists; then he will abide in the ever-present inmost Self and be free from the idea of birth or the fear of death.

I feel this most fully during my morning walks with Sadie, my elderly golden retriever. She sets a leisurely pace, giving me plenty of time to observe the world around me. I’m able to see the world with soft eyes, allowing the colors and shapes and sounds to speak to me. I feel the silent communication of the trees, the photons flowing all around us, the so-called solid ground beneath my feet with its innumerable electrons, protons, neutrons, and quarks and the space between them.

When we define things with our minds, these things become real to our egos. Each of us develops a particular point of view from which we interpret the world around us, so what one person sees one way may not be the same to another. However, according to Ramana Maharshi, “only the absolute Being is real.”

I endeavor to bring this way of Being to full fruition in my life. It’s often hard, with 50 years of life behind me spent immersed in the ideas of materialism and the importance of the individual self. But when I am able to let go of my preconceptions of the world and my place in it, when I am able to immerse my consciousness in the Being of the universe, I feel free. I can feel the world around me, in me, through me. I am no longer “me”, I do not exist as an individual, I am merely a bundle of subatomic particles held together by forces I do not understand, mixing with all the other particles that exist. Just—Being.

In this state, I appreciate the life I have and do not fear death. I realize that my birth was merely the result of a mixing of genetic material and the energy provided by my mother’s metabolism. My death will only result in the return of matter and energy to the universal Being.

This acceptance of the forces of the universe leaves me at peace, and I hope that you too will find the peace you are seeking.

One man’s journey through the pain of grief to the acceptance of the fleeting nature of existence.

The Winding Way Home, a novel by Wesley J. Wildman, takes you on a journey through the latter half of the life of a brilliant, prideful man. Jesse, a 41-year-old university professor, revels in the wonder of all things as they exist in the universe, the beautiful interconnections of philosophy, biology, mathematics, physics, and chemistry. He has the ability to remember everything he has ever learned or experienced, and to organize these ideas into stacks in his memory. He can then pick and choose things to experience from those memory stacks. Jesse visualizes all of this in striking detail throughout his daily interactions with others.

Jesse and his wife Alexandra love their three children, but they spend a great deal of time worrying about what will happen to them. Their youngest child is sweet and beautiful, but she seems to attract a lot of stares and attention from strangers, so they are constantly on guard around her. Their eldest son is high-functioning on the Autism spectrum and has trouble with social interactions. The middle child, though easy-going and very social at first, develops problems with substance abuse. They also worry about Alexandra, as her mother had Alzheimer’s disease, and Alexandra eventually does develop memory problems. Although they are a close, loving family, all of these issues lead to much anxiety and drama.

When one of their children goes missing, an undiagnosed anxiety disorder sends Jesse reeling. Disdaining a therapist’s warnings of an imminent mental collapse, Jesse develops his ability to visualize everything even further to feel more connected with his lost child. Jesse incorporates the horrific possibilities of his child’s fate with the beautiful images of his child’s life with the family. These forge in Jesse a sense of wonder and worship of the lost child and their place in the universe. This leads to actual hallucinations of his child and conversations with the hallucination. These visions, while frightening at first, end up being therapeutic. They represent a down-to-earth view of life as seen from a child’s perspective. They are a part of Jesse’s mind that can help him work through the stress and trauma he has experienced.

One of the central themes of this book is viparinama dukkha. Even though Jesse uses this phrase to help his kids understand how letting go of something pleasant can be satisfying, he struggles with this concept himself when it comes to dealing with his own life.

But through his conversations with the hallucinated images of his lost child, he is reminded of the importance of acknowledging pain, grief, and even pleasant experiences as fleeting. If you let these events and feelings wash over you and then let them go, you do not suffer. Keeping fresh the pain of the past, feeling the frustration of the present, and fearing the loss of the ephemeral, beautiful moments—these things prevent one from achieving the acceptance that leads to peace.

There is much more to this book that I will leave for you to discover. I found it difficult to read at first because the imagery evoked by Jesse’s thought processes and the trauma experienced by the family overwhelmed me. I’m very glad I made it through, though. Days later, I still feel the power of the lessons learned and Jesse’s journey towards spiritual fulfillment.

I was inspired by this book to find out more about viparinama dukkha. I found that it is but one of three kinds of suffering in Buddhist teachings, and that my therapist actually taught me these things in his own way.

Dukkha dukkha is the kind of suffering we inflict on ourselves when we dwell on an unpleasant condition—physical pain, mental anguish, etc. If we are able to let these things happen and pass as the impermanent things they are, we do not suffer; we go on with our lives and make room for other experiences. This is something I personally need to conquer as arthritic pain spreads and intensifies as I age. It’s easy to focus on the pain and let it drown out everything else, but when I accept it as just another part of my physical being, I can let it go and achieve serenity.

Viparinama dukkha arises when we are experiencing something pleasant and fear its loss. We try to hang onto these moments, knowing that when they pass we will feel sad, longing for what was lost. This makes it difficult to actually enjoy what we have while we have it. I have struggled with this myself. My life and my relationships with my children and husband have been so fulfilling that I have often felt maybe things were going too well. I often worried that every little tiff with my spouse would lead to divorce. I feared the loss of my children to kidnapping or death. It took a long time for me to realize that simply accepting what comes is the key to happiness.

Sankhara dukkha correlates with what my therapist calls “the memo”, wishing for things to be the way you want them to be. When you are frustrated by being stuck in traffic, or you get angry when a server gets your order wrong, your memo to the world says, “This isn’t what I wanted! I need to go faster! I want what I ordered!” When you accept that the world doesn’t owe you anything and things don’t always go according to your wishes, you are one step closer to peace.

As you read this book, think about these things and how the different characters go through these stages of suffering. Then look at your own life. Try to let go of your longing for the world to fit your idea of what it should be. Strive to accept what is and is not, and then let go of the rest.

When we realize that we all constitute Self, love follows.

I'm reading through Ramana Maharshi: Teachings of Self-Realization by Robert Wolfe. It's written as if someone is having a Q&A session with Ramana, with the answers being a collection of his teachings. This is a quote that spoke to me today:

When once you realize your own Self,
and that there is nothing other than this Self,
you will come to look upon the whole universe as the Self....
The totality of all things and beings constitute Self.

This simple statement strikes me as something that could change the world if everyone took some time to contemplate it. If we taught this from day one to our children, they would grow to be compassionate citizens of the universe. We could include it in our personal conversations with them, and we could integrate it into every aspect of their education, discussing the implications in more detail as they grew.

What a beautiful world it would be if everyone saw themselves not as separate individuals, but as part of a whole—a whole that includes every person, animal, plant, and rock; every whirlwind, ocean, and star. Would we not be more apt to care for and love our neighbors if we saw them as part of the Self? This Self does not recognize religion, national identity, or race…it just is.

It can be difficult when you are raised with a set of beliefs. Many are brought up with the belief that they are unique, that they must forge their identity to make their own special place in the world. They are taught to "get ahead" and "look out for number one." They are taught that their religion, race, nationality, or social class is superior, and that those who are not like them are lesser and do not deserve to be heard, or that they must be converted somehow.

Although these and other ideas of self-identity are the norm in most societies, it doesn’t have to be that way. You and I can help by teaching our children well, and by loving everyone and everything as they are, not as we wish they could be. Love is healing and unifying, and it is even easier when you realize that when you love, you love the Self, and that is all there is.

How all people can spiritually transform their lives regardless of religious beliefs.

I was recently approached by the publicity manager for Wildhouse Publications. She suggested that the book Higher and Friendly Powers: Transforming Addiction and Suffering might be a good fit for my podcast. I read it and found that it was a fitting addition to my spiritual journey, so here are my thoughts.

The book was written by Peg O’Connor, a professor of philosophy at Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota. It’s at once a loving homage to William James’s life work and a personal tale of recovery from alcohol addiction.

While reading this book, I learned quite a few things. I learned about the origin of the 12 Steps espoused by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). I learned about how one of the founders of AA (Bill Wilson) was influenced by the book by William James titled The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature. I also learned about the life and work of William James and how his extensive research on the subjects of addiction and spiritual experiences helped Peg navigate her own journey through recovery. But I think that the most important takeaway from this book is that even if you are not a believer in God as a higher power, there are spiritual paths to transforming your life.

Chapter 1 of Higher and Friendly Powers is quite long, giving a thorough overview of subjects that will be detailed later in the book. Peg begins with an introduction to Bill Wilson, a struggling alcoholic at his nadir in 1932. She describes the transformation Bill experienced while in a last-ditch stay at a rehab facility. She tells of how William James’s book, The Varieties of Religious Experience, influenced Wilson so much that he thought of James as a co-founder when he went on to found Alcoholics Anonymous.

This chapter also describes James’s core concept of “the habitual center of personal energy”, defined as the ideas around which you center your life. Peg then introduces us to James’s concept of “world sickness”. This is a feeling of melancholy that comes when one’s habitual center of personal energy shifts in such a way that one feels a loss of control and the world feels hostile.

Peg goes on to discuss the psychiatric diagnosis of Substance Use Disorder (SUD). A person is diagnosed with SUD when their addiction negatively impacts their ability to function in the world. In one paragraph, Peg describes in detail how as a person’s habitual center of personal energy changes with SUD, they find themselves behaving in ways they never thought they would. She describes it so well that by the end of the paragraph, you can understand the worthlessness and hopelessness that an addict might come to feel.

Peg also makes clear that one doesn’t need to descend to the depths of utter hopelessness to turn things around. Some may see the writing on the wall and be able to tap into the spiritual spark that has been flickering throughout their lives, while others may undergo a sudden transformation of spirit brought on by some new knowledge or event. These changes make it possible for them to shift their lives to center around a new set of ideas, steering them towards a more positive life experience.

In the last half of the chapter, Peg contemplates the difference between the terms “religious” and “spiritual”. She notes that though William James’s book is titled “The Varieties of Religious Experience”, it includes tales from people of various spiritual inclinations who all sought to better their lives. Peg describes spirituality at its most basic as an understanding that there is something more to existence than you and your life. If you center your life’s actions around your belief in something More that exists beyond your own thoughts and ideals, everyone and everything will benefit.

According to Peg, “Anyone who ponders questions about spirituality opens herself to the possibility of a spiritual transformation or regeneration.” Once awakened to this possibility, a person is more apt to make a meaningful change.

William James made a concerted effort to keep his own beliefs from influencing those reading his works. He called a person’s pre-existing belief system “over-beliefs” and noted how those can tinge a discussion of spirituality. Peg points out how the founders of Alcoholics Anonymous, though basing much of their program on James’s book, allow their own Christian over-beliefs to preclude true inclusiveness in their organization, as God is mentioned throughout their doctrines. AA recommends that people hand over their troubles to God and ask Him to remove their defects of character and their shortcomings. Peg suggests that these ideals have kept atheists and those of other spiritual inclinations from feeling welcomed and worthy. Sometimes, having joined AA, non-Christians become uncomfortable with the over-beliefs of AA and leave, wondering where to go from there. Peg assures us in the words of William James that once someone becomes accepting of any power that is larger than their conscious selves and friendly to them and their ideals, they will find a path forward.

In Chapter 2 of the book, Peg goes into a lot of detail about the life of William James and his family. It’s very interesting and I won’t go into the details here, but it tells of the life and struggles of James, his parents, and his siblings, including famed author Henry James. Through this chapter you gain a lot of insight into James’s life and his inspiration for writing “Varieties”.

Chapters 3 and 4 of Higher and Friendly Powers explore James’s ideas of “the healthy minded” and “the sick souls”. The “healthy minded” act with optimism and look forward to new possibilities. They have no tolerance for distress and will make whatever changes are necessary to minimize misery. They feel whole and integrated with the world. Their material, social, and spiritual selves are balanced. The “sick souls” live in constant fear. They are wary of change and strive for perfection in all aspects of their interactions with others. They crave acceptance and feel like they need to live up to the perceived expectations of others, leading to burnout and the prospect of disaster if any one thing goes wrong. They may turn to drugs or alcohol to keep themselves going.

One fact in chapter 3 struck me in particular. Our brain naturally makes two neurotransmitters—serotonin, which gives one the feeling of well-being; and dopamine, which induces feelings of pleasure. These two chemicals are released at a higher rate when someone expresses gratitude and optimism. Fear induces the release of dopamine, but it also releases the stress hormones cortisol and adrenaline, which make your heart race and increase your blood pressure. Fear also impairs the part of your brain responsible for reasoning and judgment, leaving you unable to make sound decisions. By letting go of fear and expressing more gratitude and positivity, a person can break a downward spiral.

The final chapters of the book discuss the process of conversion, which Peg describes as “a psychological process within a person that brings about profound change”. Peg shares details from James’s Varieties that describe the gradual and sudden conversions of several individuals. She talks about how someone cannot just see all the wrong things about their life and decide they must change; they must also have a specific goal to work towards, a “positive ideal or vision” to reach for. Some people may have had such a rough life that they cannot imagine such a positive vision. That’s when a group such as AA can help. When addicts share their stories of recovery, others can imagine that outcome for themselves. They can see the possibilities and work towards that ideal vision.

Peg points out that to achieve a conversion from addiction to recovery there must be a mix of willingness to make a change, renunciation of former habits and attitudes, and acceptance of the enormity of the task. One must also have faith, a belief that one’s actions will make a difference and a willingness to act even when the results are uncertain.

William James writes in his essay “Is Life Worth Living?”: “Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create the fact.” When people let go of self loathing and regret and then re-center their lives around positive goals, they find peace. They find themselves reaching outward and inward towards something More, experiencing an expansion of their being beyond their own selves. As Peg puts it, “Choosing gratitude over grievance is the greatest way to say Yes to life.”

Higher and Friendly Powers includes a couple of appendices that tell us more about William James’s over-beliefs and the strengths and weaknesses of Alcoholics Anonymous. They also include Peg’s ideas on how AA could rework their tenets to be more inclusive of those who do not share a God-centric view of spirituality. She proposes that by doing so, AA could reach many more people and help them along the path to recovery.

Thanks for reading. For more information on Peg O’Connor, her work, and her books, please visit the links below. I’ve also included a link to the Alcoholics Anonymous website and a link to the Project Gutenberg page for “The Varieties of Religious Experience”.

Links:

https://gustavus.edu/profiles/poconnor (faculty bio of Dr. O'Connor on the Gustavus Adolphus College website)

https://pegoconnorauthor.com/ (Peg's author website)

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/621 (link to the e-book for The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature by William James on Project Gutenberg)

https://www.aa.org/ (Alcoholics Anonymous website)

Thoughts on life and what we are meant to accomplish with this gift.

I saw this leaf lying alone on the pavement during a recent morning walk. Autumn is in the air and the trees have begun to let loose the leaves they birthed just months ago. Before long, bare branches will reveal themselves as the trees await the spring when they will bear new leaves again.

As I considered this leaf, I thought about its purpose. When sun and water were plentiful, the tree produced this leaf. The leaf took in the minerals and moisture provided by the nourishing tree, mixed in a little sunlight and carbon dioxide, and created the fuel necessary for the tree to grow and stay healthy. The leaf’s efforts were compounded with those of other leaves produced by the tree, and together they were able to sustain the tree through spring and summer and into fall, until the sun’s rays weakened, the days grew shorter, and the leaves could no longer produce their life-sustaining energy. The leaf then died having fulfilled its purpose, ensuring that the tree would be well-prepared for the coming winter and ready to bear new leaves come spring.

This leaf was one of the first to drop from the tree, its life over after a lifetime well-spent just doing what a leaf does—sustaining the tree. This made me think of our lives as we live them.

People are like the leaves of a great tree, the tree of humanity. When we come into being, we are nurtured to adulthood by others who are already mature parts of the whole. When we live our lives in a way that sustains the whole, we benefit all by ensuring that when we die, having fulfilled our purpose, the next generation will be birthed in a healthy, nourishing environment.

We need not worry about the other leaves (people) and how they go about managing their own lives; we only need to make sure that we are doing the most with our own lives. A tree cannot be sustained by leaves that do not thrive and leaves cannot be sustained by a tree that does not thrive—they nourish each other. When we take care of the whole, we take care of each other. Likewise, when we take care of each other, we make the whole world a better place.

“The spirit of life never dies."

We’d had no rain in our area for about 2 months, and whole areas of our lawn just dried up and looked dead. The rains did finally come this week, blessing the earth with several inches of rain locally, and today I found that in the “dead” patches—not just ours, but in all the scorched lawns around us—signs of life have emerged. What seemed dead was full of potential energy, just waiting for the right conditions to release that energy and break through.

As I’m reading Lao Tzu’s “Tao Te Ching” as translated by Ralph Alan Dale, I feel this spark of energy in everything—that potential for being, flowing with the Tao, experiencing all the potential that exists in the cosmos. According to Dale’s interpretation of Lao Tzu’s philosophy, “To live life in accord with the Tao is to be in harmony with all others, with the environment and with one’s self. It is to live in synchronicity with processes, and to be completely authentic, sincere, natural and innocent.”

In section 6 of this book (“Life’s Spirit”, page 13), I found a verse apropos to my discovery today:

“The spirit of life never dies.
It is the infinite gateway
to mysteries within mysteries.
It is the seed of yin,
the spark of yang.
Always elusive,
endlessly available.”

I’m reading “The Tao Teh King, or the Tao and its Characteristics” on Project Gutenberg at the same time. The wording in “The Tao Teh King” tries very hard to capture the literal translation of the Tao Te Ching, but can be difficult to read. I really like the way Dale and his photographer and illustrator, John Cleare, captured Lao Tzu’s work in a poetic, pleasing, inspirational format, including the original Chinese characters on each page. Dale enlisted the help of several colleagues and reference texts to complete this edition. I am very glad to have this book as part of my collection of texts as I travel the path toward enlightenment.

Exploring the feelings that accompany the death of a loved one— loss, grief, guilt—and the search for answers.

One of the turning points of my own spiritual growth came around the time of the death of my mother. Mom and I were very close, and I was her principal caregiver during her final years. She died in my home in the early morning hours as I was taking a brief respite to sleep. When I returned to her side It was dark and her hand was still warm. It took me a while to realize that she was gone.

One of the things that helped me get over the guilt and the pain of my sleeping as she died was a session with my therapist. He helped me detach the negative emotions from the memory of my mother. He helped me bring up an image of Mom waiting for me in a forest glen. I talked with her and she told me how much she loved me and appreciated all that I had done for her. Through this session, I was able to let her go and be at peace.

People often search for answers when they lose a loved one. Why did they die now? Would they still be here if I'd done something different? Are they at peace? Will I ever be at peace? Some people turn to grief counselors or therapists, some turn to their priest or pastor, and some turn to spiritual mediums. While I don't really believe in an afterlife like you'd find in a physical heaven or hell, I do believe in the continuity of the energy which dwells in all of us. I've also come to realize the comfort and closure that can be had by speaking with someone spiritually inclined.

Recently, I was contacted by the publicist for the author Brandon Wainwright, and they sent me a review copy of Brandon's book called "Tyson's Gift—How an 8-Pound K9 Became a Man's Greatest Spiritual Guide". If you are interested in learning more about Brandon and his book, go to https://tysonsgift.com.

Reading Brandon's book broadened my horizons a bit. I've had many animal companions during my lifetime and each one of them was considered a part of the family. But I've never felt so connected to an animal as I've felt with my Bella. Well, she was my mother's cat. Bella came to live with me when Mom died. Just knowing how she curled up with Mom, how Mom petted her with the same hands that she used brush my hair when I was a child, and how Bella kept Mom company during those long, hard days leading up to her death, that all comes together and makes me feel especially close to this sweet companion.

Brandon's story, as told in the style of a diary through "Tyson's Gift," is a bit more tragic. Brandon had a rough history with the dogs that his mother would randomly bring home. His father would tire of the problems that they caused, so the dogs would not stay long. Later in life, when Brandon's girlfriend adopted a dog named Tyson during a rough patch in their relationship, Brandon felt upset and jealous at first. But he made up his mind to get on Tyson's good side.

As the years passed, Tyson's influence helped Brandon mature emotionally. They grew very close. And when Tyson died, Brandon embarked on a search for answers about life and death and what it all means. Through many conversations with pet communicators and spiritual mediums, he finally found the peace he was seeking. Brandon found peace not just regarding Tyson's death, but also regarding his relationships with his parents and friends. He then turned to learning more about spirituality and how he could help others, eventually learning about Reiki and becoming a Reiki practitioner himself.

All of this just reminds me that everyone's path is different. Enlightenment itself is not a destination, but a journey. Your individual experiences through life will lead each of you down different pathways towards peace. Everyone will start their own journey at a different point and from a different perspective. But if you persevere, you will experience the joy and peace that comes from a life of giving and accepting love.

As the Buddha said in the Dhammapada—"The way is not in the sky. The way is in the heart. All things arise and pass away. But the awakened awake forever."

Seeing past manifest reality and experiencing the Absolute in our everyday lives.

In the previous episode, we talked about the first half of Andre Halaw’s book “Neti-Neti Meditation.” In this episode, we'll cover the last half of the book, starting with Chapter Four, “Neti-Neti on the Cushion”. In this chapter, Halaw describes the process of Neti-Neti meditation in detail.

First of all, no formal position is necessary for this meditation. I’ve heard this from more than one person regarding meditation in general. Just get comfortable in an upright position in a chair or on a cushion, relax, close your eyes, and slow your breathing.

Then you'll concentrate on your body. Ask yourself, “What is this body? Where does it begin and where does it end?” Examine any discomfort you are feeling, including any labels or stories associated with it. Then let go of these things.

Next you'll investigate the question of “Where do I find the ‘I’ of my body?” Work up from your toes, through your organs, to your head. Is your ‘I’ located in any of those places? No, they are all Neti-Neti; our beingness transcends all of our body parts and the “I” is a myth.

The process is the same as we examine the question of “Am I my whole body?” Although it makes sense that none of our individual body parts is “me”, we still tend to identify ourselves with our complete bodies. But if our “selves” were found only in our whole body, what would happen if we lost a limb? Would I no longer be “me” if I lost a part of my body? The answer is no, so the “I” cannot be found in the complete body.

Next, go through your senses to see if you can find the “I” there. “Am I my eyes? Am I what I see? Am I my tongue or what I taste? If I lose my sight or sense of smell, am I still ‘me’?” With thorough investigation, we find that our senses are not “me”.

The idea that you are not your senses can be difficult to overcome. We tend to identify very strongly with what we see, as well as what we smell, taste, hear, and touch. It’s important to include these ideas in your daily meditation to help you negate them.

Halaw points out that these meditations can be especially useful for someone experiencing chronic pain. It helps to realize that pain is neither good nor bad, just a labeled idea. Through Neti-Neti you will find that your pain does not define you. The pain just “is”—it is not “yours” and you are not the pain.

During meditation, after analyzing your physical self, look at your emotions. Ask yourself, “Am I anger, fear, anxiety, joy, love, sadness, any other emotion?” Bring them to the forefront and experience them fully. Examine whether they are “I”, “me”, or “mine”. The answer will always be no. Your true nature transcends all labels. As Halaw puts it, “Sensations arise from Nothingness, last for a bit, then subside into Nothingness.” To define yourself with a label such as “anxious”, “depressed”, or even "joyous" gives these base objects more permanence than they deserve. These labels obscure the Thusness that is your true nature.

The next step of the Neti-Neti meditation process is to identify your most common social and family roles and realize that you are not them. You may be a father, mother, employee, teacher, Buddhist, Christian, etc. Bring each role to mind along with the emotions engendered by any relationships and associations you have with others through each role. Experience each fully, and then realize that you are not these roles; each is a fleeting idea that does not represent your true nature.

In the next stage of the meditation, you will examine your thoughts. Actively think, and when you hear your internal voice, ask yourself, “Am I my thoughts?” This cannot be true. If you were your thoughts, then you would cease to exist when you sleep and don’t think. By investigating the question “Where do these thoughts come from?” you’ll find they come from nowhere, out of the Nothingness of the Void, manifestations of the Absolute. Thoughts are just ideas and have no form in the real world. Nouns such as “paper”, “person”, and “mouse” are just words we use to make sense of the Absolute made manifest.

According to Halaw, “Reality precedes and transcends concepts.” This is key to seeing past manifest reality and experiencing the Absolute in our everyday lives. In trying to locate the origin of our own thoughts, we find emptiness, our true nature.

Our next meditative exploration will be the story we tell about ourselves. Though we have many stories that we tell others to explain who we are, Halaw encourages us to find one central story to focus on during this meditation. His examples include, “I am the victim, the loner, the rebel, the smart person, the dumb child, etc.” He stresses that these are just stories, nothing more. They no more define our true nature than a fictional novel would. Any story that you have about yourself is inherently untrue, a narrative about a character that does not exist. Nobody was ever “the cool kid,” “the dork,” “the star football player,” or “the shy kid in class.” The “I” in these stories never existed, and these are just labels on linear events that do not define anyone.

The final stage in the process is to try to find the “I Am-ness” of your self. When you try, you may find yourself shying away from looking into your own emptiness. “I Am” relates to your own beingness, and you may be tempted to see your own will as your “self”, but your “self” precedes your will. You will find that anything you can perceive is not you. As Halaw says, “The eye cannot see itself; the ear cannot hear itself; and the mind cannot know itself.” After searching for your “self”, you will be left with a “vague impression of existence, void of a substantial ‘I’.” You are not “I Am”, only Neti-Neti.

In the next chapter, Halaw summarizes everything that we have learned so far and takes us directly through the whole Neti-Neti process. In the end, we can declare that we are “none of these” things—not my body, emotions, roles, thoughts, personal story, or the feeling of “I am.” When it comes time to ask, “What am I?”, there is no answer. As Halaw says, “Anything that comes and goes is NOT you.” He asks you to contemplate what existed before you were born, and what will exist after you and your thoughts disappear. What is there before nonduality, Thusness, and the manifest realm? Words cannot express it. The closest we can come is to call it the unmanifest Absolute.

In the final chapters, Halaw explains that this is not the end, but the beginning. He emphasizes that experiencing this awakening now is but a moment in your journey. As you go out into the world, take this knowledge with you. He says, “True meditation is being awake to the Absolute moment after moment.” Emotional states of being are transient, so don’t try to hold onto them. Instead, carry with you the “understanding that the entire world of form is a manifestation of the Absolute.” With this realization, you are now free to embrace the world and the things you have negated, for they are all expressions of It-with-a-capital-I.

Neti-Neti is a never-ending process. We are still human after all, and we are easily seduced into thinking that there is more for the “I” to know. If we think we are enlightened, then we are not, because the “I” is incompatible with the Absolute. But don’t be discouraged. As Halaw puts it, “The ‘I’ is just a provisional label that we assign to the flow of experience interpreted by our nervous system. It serves a social function, but should not be taken too seriously.”

After investigating what we are not and discovering the Absolute, we will go about our lives, interacting with the world of the manifest realm. But our lives will be richer for having examined our true nature, and finding that we are all part of what Halaw calls “the great Not-That.”

All experiences involve change, but the Absolute is unchanging.

In Episode 6, I talked about my takeaways from Andre Halaw’s book, “God is Nothingness”.  Now I’ll discuss another book by Halaw called “Neti-Neti Meditation”. This episode will be split into two parts as this book delves deeply into the process of negation, how it applies to meditation, and how meditation conveys to everyday life.

One of the most basic concepts Halaw puts forth is that what you think is…just a thought. Thoughts are not reality, yet they can lead to emotions like fear, hate, and anger that cause physical changes in our forms—tensed muscles, grinding teeth, increased heart rate. This physical response reinforces the thought you just had—if this person, place, or thing makes me feel this way, my thoughts about it must be true. The reinforced thoughts then self-validate the feelings. This circular validation happens within moments of an interaction, and it happens to all of us when we are ruled by our emotions.

The Neti-Neti process allows us to see beyond the thoughts that we have about people and things. It frees us from the habit of seeing the world in rigid, unchanging terms based on thoughts and emotions derived from limited data. It also acknowledges that there is no such thing as experiencing raw reality. Our senses provide input to the nervous system which then processes it based on our past education and experiences. By the time our nervous systems process the data and we have a thought or emotion, Reality has changed.

Through Neti-Neti meditation, we question the nature of Reality. Who am I? What am I? Am I my body? Am I my mind? Am I my thoughts or emotions? When I am angry, where is that emotion? Am I anger? Where does anger come from, and where does it go? As we examine the anger, it loses its identity and it loses its power over us. We can understand this emotion as simply a part of human experience and then let it go.

All emotions can then be transcended, experienced as part of the nondual fabric of Reality. Emotions do not define us, but they are integral to our human experience in this world. Our goal along our spiritual journey is to recognize our humanity while not falling victim to the whims of the ego and its array of emotions.

Neti-Neti reveals to us that everything is just a manifestation of the Absolute. We identify a rock as a rock because that is what we have been taught to call a hard conglomeration of minerals in that form. In reality, it is just the Absolute manifesting as a form that we call a “rock”.

As Halaw puts it, “Neti-Neti exposes everything we can conceive of to be just ideas, thus negating their reality as things.” When we examine any “base object”—defined by Halaw as anything we can “perceive, sense, experience, or investigate”—we will eventually find it lacking any sense or logic. This leaves us with, as Halaw puts it, “a nondual experience beyond words.” Buddhists call this Thusness or Suchness, a direct manifestation of Reality beyond words and concepts.

Halaw writes that when we recognize that our “I”-ness is just our idea of self projected onto the manifest world, we see the reality beyond the delusion, the beautiful Thusness that is in us and is us. This allows us to see that we are all just expressions of the Absolute, Neti-Neti, “not this, not that.”

Halaw talks about the Hindu and Buddhist cycle of Samsara. Samsara is defined by emotional turmoil, the ups and downs of our human feelings that can go from extreme highs to extreme lows within minutes or hours. Halaw stresses that just exchanging bad thoughts for good thoughts in order to bring on good emotions is not enough. Attachment to any thought will only lead to suffering. Instead, we must come to realize that we are “not this, not that,” beyond thought and feeling, beyond awareness. We are the Absolute from which everything springs.

In Chapter Three of “Neti-Neti Meditation,” Halaw takes us through an exercise to help us learn how to use Neti-Neti to navigate our everyday lives.

First, he tells us to identify a base object that needs investigating. This can be anything—a thought, emotion, etc. He uses the emotion of frustration as an example. 

Instead of trying to figure out why you are frustrated or what led to the frustration, you must see the emotion for what it is. Deny the emotion its power by taking a deep breath and allowing yourself to witness it objectively. Remember that frustration is the result of thoughts, which lead to emotions, which are not Reality. In reality, there isn’t even an “I” to be frustrated. 

Now that you have defused the base object’s emotional power, experience it fully. What is its texture? Where in your body do you feel a reaction to it? What other emotions does it elicit? Where do those feelings manifest in your body?

Carefully witness each of these emotions and feelings as they appear, but do not try to make them disappear. Your role is not to change the base object into something more pleasant. You should neither push it away nor pursue it, just examine it. 

If the base object (in this case frustration) disappears, you may ask, “What was it, and where has it gone?” The answer is always, “It arose from and has subsided into Emptiness.” It was never more than an idea.

One reason we find ourselves attached to or repelled by certain thoughts or emotions is that we tend to apply labels to them such as “good” or “bad”. Neti-Neti allows us to transcend these labels along with the objects, dissolving their hold over us. We do this by identifying the emotion along with any physical response. It also helps to identify any other charged thoughts or labels related to the emotion—for example, shame, anger, or frustration at being frustrated. Once we identify them, we can observe them and let them go.

According to Halaw, “The longer we observe an emotion or thought without actively engaging it or acting upon it, the more detached we grow, as it becomes apparent that whatever we are observing is not us, and thus we are free from it.”

When we stop labeling any base object as good or bad and we strip away the labels and the charged thoughts about it, it stops being an object. As its form and substance disappear, we can recognize that it just “is.” Just like you and me and everything else in the universe, this object is not a “thing”, it is merely a part of Thusness, the nonduality that encompasses us all.

The big questions in Neti-Neti meditation are usually, “What is this? Is this me? Is there any ‘I’ in there?” Halaw notes that traditional forms of Neti-Neti skip past the identifying and de-labeling of base objects and jump straight to teaching that you are “not this, not that.” 

But Halaw says that it’s not enough to simply reject all things as not us. We must also realize our part in Nothingness, that our bodies do not exist in a way that defines us. Halaw refers to The Buddha’s Diamond Sutra, which teaches that to be free of the objects of the world, we must empty them of their self-hood. To do this, we must, for example, negate the body’s “body-ness”, the eye’s “eye-ness”, etc. When all of a body’s properties are negated, we are left with only an idea and no “thing” to attach to. With no “thing” to attach to, we are no longer separated from everything else in the universe. This leaves us ready to tackle the question, “Is this me?”

The answer to this question is always “No,” but there is more to it than that. A simple “No” implies there is a different answer. If you go looking for the “I” of your Self, you will find that, like all other “things”, it is merely an idea.

Once you come to this realization, you have unlocked the door to nonduality. This may be enough for many who want to improve their everyday experiences with equanimity and grace.

But Halaw offers one final step for those who want to go further in the Neti-Neti process. He invites us to negate all that remains. For those who have experienced the Absolute through formal meditation practice (something he describes in Chapter 4), he explains how to bring awareness of the Absolute into our everyday lives.

Halaw says that anything you experience—all sights, sounds, thoughts, and even nondual experience—is not the ultimate truth and must be cast aside. Doing this, you will pass from “the void of Thusness” to “the Void-with-a-capital-V of Nothingness”. 

All experiences involve change, but the Absolute is unchanging. Anything you experience is not It-with-a-capital-I; it is all Neti-Neti.

In the end, once everything has been negated and the universe has been emptied of its contents, only the Absolute, “your true face,” remains. Since there is nothing left to say “not this, not that” about, we have negated the process of negation itself. We have transcended Neti-Neti, and all separateness about the world falls away.

In the next episode, I’ll discuss chapter four and beyond of Halaw’s “Neti-Neti Meditation”. In the meantime, identify some of the emotions you go through each day. Examine them and try to understand the thoughts that bring on these emotions (and vice-versa). Consider how you might be able to avoid emotional turmoil associated with certain thoughts and actions by approaching things more objectively. This will help prepare you for bringing Neti-Neti into your daily interactions. 

I’ve found that when I do these things, I’m much calmer and content. When I forget these lessons and allow frustration or fear or another emotion to possess me, I become very uncomfortable. And when I find myself too busy with everyday life to take 20 minutes for meditation, I’m much more susceptible to emotional turmoil. Feeling guilty about that won’t help though, so I just get back to it when I can. The more I practice the meditation, the easier it is to live the Neti-Neti way and love life for what it is.

Links:

"Neti-Neti Meditation" by Andre Halaw on Amazon.com: https://smile.amazon.comd/dp/B00GP62LU0

Link to "True Meditation" by Adyanshanti on Audible.com: https://www.audible.com/pd/True-Meditation-Audiobook/B002V0153I?asin=B002V0153I

Don't be distracted from the reality of now.

In his fifth letter to Lucilius, Seneca recalls something he remembers that the Stoic Hecato once wrote: "Cease to hope and you will cease to fear." He expounds on that, pointing out, "Fear keeps pace with hope... Both belong to a mind in suspense, to a mind in a state of anxiety through looking into the future. Both are mainly due to projecting our thoughts far ahead of us instead of adapting ourselves to the present."

He goes on to say, "Wild animals run from the dangers they actually see, and once they have escaped them worry no more. We however are tormented alike by what is past and what is to come... Memory brings back the agony of fear while foresight brings it on prematurely."

This is the very concept behind accepting that the only Reality is in the Now. The past is done, and the future cannot be known. Wasting time and emotional energy on worrying (or lamenting or hoping or fearing) about things beyond the present moment just brings about anxiety and suffering.

Live each and every moment as if it is the only one that matters. That is the way to contentment with life as it is.

Quotes taken from Seneca: Letters from a Stoic, selected and translated by Robin Campbell; Penguin Classics.

Meditation can bring us closer.

I've found that my morning walks with Sadie (my elderly golden retriever) are excellent times for meditation. I am fortunate to live in an area with lots of trees, grass, and flowers—nature as natural as it can be in a manicured suburban neighborhood.

Today it came very clearly to me how alike the trees, the grass, the dogs, and the humans are. We are all products of the happenstance of the emergence of DNA from the primordial slime. If not for that occurrence, there would be only dirt and rocks and water on this planet. While we are kindred to the earth as much as we are to each other—everything coming from “stardust” as it has—we do tend to feel a special kinship with other living beings.

All living beings here on this rock we call Earth have a common ancestry, something often visualized as the trunk of a tree. From the first spark of life, biology did what it does and adapted to various stimuli and circumstances to branch out in many directions with varying degrees of success, a process that continues to this day.

And so it just struck me today how alike we are to the grass and the trees, how closely linked we are to the dogs and the cats, and of course how not different we are to every other human being. Human beings are just one accidental expression of the universe’s diversity. We have not always been here, and we will not always be here. We should be supporting each other, celebrating our similarities, and savoring the opportunity to share this time together.

We all breathe in the air of this planet, afforded to us by billions of years of starstuff in the form of oxygen-producing organisms emitting just the right amount of oxygen to mix with the nitrogen, etc., that we have adapted to breathing. Everyone and everything that exists does so because the universe wills it. What we do with our time here as we breathe this air and exist side by side with all other things, living and non-living, dictates the degree of peace or suffering that we all must accept.

I find myself on my morning walks thinking of these things sometimes; other times I merely allow the sensory input from the birds, the wind, the lawn mowers, the cars, the other people, and the sun on my skin and the trees and the gardens and the pavement to wash over me and meld together into an experience of just being. I think this quote from The Buddha speaks to all of us as we try to find our way to Nothingness:

The enlightened one,

intent on meditation,

should find delight in the forest,

should practice meditation at the foot of a tree,

attaining his own satisfaction.

May you find the satisfaction you seek as you contemplate the mysteries of the universe.

“All things are born of being; being is born of nonbeing [Nothing].” ~ Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

In the last couple of episodes I summarized the things I learned from reading two books by Dr. David R. Hawkins. In this episode I’ll talk about my takeaways from a book written by Andre Halaw (pronounced like “hallow”): God is Nothingness: Awakening to Absolute Non-being. The book is only 79 pages long, but it is packed full of thoughtful wisdom. If you need to pause during this podcast to think on some of the concepts, please do.

Halaw is an ordained monk in the Five Mountain Zen Order and a high school English teacher in New Jersey. His insights throughout God is Nothingness really resonated with me.

First, he quotes from the Tao Te Ching.

All things are born of being; being is born of nonbeing [Nothing].

He spends the rest of the book unraveling the meaning of that in such a way that it becomes absolutely clear.

Halaw begins by describing Nothingness, which he spells with a capital N to differentiate it from the common word “nothing” that is the opposite of “something”. He says, “Bound by neither space nor time, Nothingness is dimension-less, time-less, and form-less.” He likens Nothingness to Nirvana, Dharmata, and Tao. He dislikes using the word “God” because it means so many different things to different people. In this book, God is called Nothingness, akin to Baruch Spinoza’s Substance and Dr. David R. Hawkins’ Presence. It is the “true nature of all that exists.” In that sense, you and I and everything in the universe is Nothingness, “beyond the limitations of form.”

Halaw explains that his preference for the word “Nothing” or “Nothingness” over the word “God” stems from the many connotations attached to the word “God”, and that, “No one has ever killed someone over the word ‘Nothingness,’ but the same cannot be said about ‘God’.”

Halaw describes the teachings of Advaita Vedanta. These state that people are intuitively aware that their true nature is “identical with God,” but that during our daily lives we tend to become confused. We end up pursuing earthly pleasures in place of the bliss of realizing our true nature. A thorough understanding of our nature eludes us. Instead, we retain a vague notion of non-being and fear nothingness as annihilation of our selves.

According to Halaw, the infinite Nothingness or Non-being precedes the finite being. Halaw describes Nothingness as “the vibrant void from which all of existence continuously springs.” It is the “unknowable source” that neither “is” nor “becomes,” yet sustains all of existence. 

I love the way Halaw words things. Here are a few of my favorite quotes:

Everything originates from, resides in, and eventually returns to Nothingness.

Nothing changes and yet everything happens.

Nothingness sings as birds, sighs as the wind, breathes as humans, and knows as mind.

Without the ocean, there are no waves. Similarly, without Non-being there is no ‘being’.

Halaw’s Nothingness shares the same foundation as the traditions of apophasis, the via negativa, and Neti-Neti. The general idea is to negate all of the limiting characteristics of traditional existence. Doing this exposes the infinite underlying basis of all beingness, which is Nothingness. In Halaw’s words, “we must look beyond our ordinary experience to find the Absolute.” But then he says, “Once we have negated everything, we awaken to the fertile Nothingness….that is the true nature of all existence.” And once we have done that, “we are…free to reaffirm all of those things that we previously negated.”

Like Dr. Hawkins, Halaw also talks about how we need to let go of our attachments to emotions, thoughts, and objects. Doing this gives us the freedom to recognize that these things are not “the Absolute” and denies the ego the ability to control our reactions.

He also defines the nature of awareness and the mind. Like Hawkins, Halaw notes that experiencing “raw reality” is not a thing. Our senses pass input to our nervous systems, and then they must interpret the data so that our consciousness can make sense of everything.

According to Halaw, suffering comes about when we let our egos drive us to think that the world needs to be a certain way. Each of us has an idea of the way people, things, and events should be; if they aren’t the way we expect, then we experience anguish. If we want to experience the divine in our own lives, then we must give up those expectations.

Once we give up our ego and follow the Neti-Neti or Taoist way of seeing things—”Not this, not that” or “Not I, not me”—we find that our thoughts and senses do not define us. We find that there is no “I” or “me” to be satisfied by our experiences in the world. The universe owes us nothing and does not need to conform to our expectations in order for us to feel complete. Giving up those ideals and expectations frees us to be our true selves, embracing both “being” and “Non-being.”

Halaw describes how to go through a checklist of feelings and thoughts and negate them as we try to find the “I” of our selves. In the end, a definitive “I” is nowhere to be found. What remains after this investigation is the Absolute Nothingness that underlies all of existence.

Halaw then assures us that once we master this way of finding our way to Nothingness, we will learn to incorporate this mode of being into our everyday lives. We’ll be able to recognize when we are succumbing to emotional turmoil and negate those thoughts and feelings as objects that are not It (with a capital I). We’ll be free to enjoy life without the anxiety of trying to control every aspect of it. As Halaw puts it, we’ll become free to experience “the divine dance of Nothingness.”

I’ve talked before of our journey as a search for nondual spiritual awakening. Halaw delves deeply into what nonduality really means. Traditionally, nonduality is defined as the realization that we are connected to every other thing in the universe, that even the Source of all being is a part of all of us. Halaw says that while nonduality encompasses “all that is” in the sense of beingness, we must also incorporate the idea of Non-being, “which precedes and acts as the very basis of ‘being’ itself.” He describes it with a metaphor of Nothingness being a canvas, while nonduality with its interconnected matrix of “being” is the oil painting on the canvas. Everything can only exist because of Nothingness. 

It’s a short book, and Halaw repeats many of his ideas in a variety of ways, but I found every single page worth reading. There is also a Works Cited section at the end that one could use as a reference for further reading.

Divesting the Ego from the Self.

Today I'll be talking about Dr. David R. Hawkins' book The Eye of the I: From Which Nothing is Hidden. This book delves deeply into awareness, what it means to exist, the meaninglessness of time, the role of the mind, and the nature of God. 

As I was reading this book, it took me a while to realize that Dr. Hawkins was describing his own life in many of the chapters. He had let go of the ego which most people identify as the core of a person, and he had found the essence of his own Self-with-a-capital-S (the Eye of the I). Instead of using the pronouns "I" or "me" to refer to himself, he wrote the passages referring to his own life with the passive voice.

You may remember from my episode “Getting to Know Baruch Spinoza” that Spinoza referred to the energy that inhabits everything in the universe and connects all things as the Substance. Dr. Hawkins calls this the Presence. According to Hawkins, when you experience spiritual awakening, you become accustomed to the Silence of the Presence, which acts to block out the distractions of the material world.

You may wonder how you could possibly live a fruitful life and block out life’s distractions at the same time. The trick, it seems, is to allow yourself to witness the world as a person normally would, but to remember the fact that the ego trying to interpret the input is not the real you. 

In the chapter called "Circumventing the Ego", Dr. Hawkins suggests that you give up your habits of forming opinions and being judgmental, and that you see the world from more of a 3rd-person point of view. When you view the world without using the "I" of your ego as a vantage point, you are better able to discern the reality around you. Instead of seeing people and things as they "should" be, you will see them as they are, and know that they cannot be any other way. If they could be different then they would be different, but they are as they are and that is the reality of Now.

According to Dr. Hawkins, a single moment in the Now, as perhaps captured by a photograph or painting, is perfect in and of itself. But when we perceive a sequence of events as life unfolds, we tend to interpret the people involved or the events themselves as "good" or "bad". When we are able to move beyond interpreting the world as it affects our emotions and opinions, we move one step closer to realizing the reality of the perfection of the universe as it stems from the Presence. One key to this realization is recognizing that every "thing" can be defined merely by its "beingness". Beingness is the very definition of existence.

Dr. Hawkins also points out that by the time you internally process what you hear, see, taste, or feel, one-ten-thousandth of a second has passed, and your thought about what you sensed is already based on old data, not on the reality of Now. Not only that, but the inner programming of your ego—what you have been taught to believe and understand throughout your life—takes all information and runs it through the filters of your past experiences to form your next thought. Distortion of reality is immediate and automatic. When you are able to let go of your idea of self as defined by your ego, letting go of your expectations of yourself and of others, you are free to experience the world in an unbiased, clear-eyed way. You find yourself transformed from the little-m-me and small-s-self to the capital-M-Me and the capital-S-Self, and the beauty of the universe reveals itself to you.

In the chapter entitled "The Resolution of the Ego", Dr. Hawkins describes the idea of cause and effect as a fallacy that relies on our belief that a person can be identified as “good” or “bad” as a result of his roles, thoughts, and actions. For example, someone is "good" if he goes to church every Sunday; or he is "bad" because he gets into fights. These are all opinions that derive from thinking "this" causes "that", and seeing a person as a combination of a thinker of thoughts, a doer of actions, a feeler of feelings, etc. But if you see others (and yourself) in terms of "beingness" beyond the ego's thoughts and actions, you understand that every person just "is". Your ego may have the opinion that a person's actions or thoughts are "good" or "bad", but those labels do not serve to define the essential nature of that person. These are dualistic ideas that do not align with our journey toward nondual spiritual awakening.

This quote from Chapter 1 pretty much sums up this idea:

When the criticalness and discrimination of dualistic perception are set aside, the absolute perfection and beauty of everything stands revealed.

In the chapter called "The Nature of the Quest", Dr. Hawkins describes the process of spiritual evolution. He says that most of humanity scores below level 200 on his calibrated Scale of Consciousness, stuck at the levels of shame, guilt, apathy, grief, fear, desire, anger, and pride. But those who desire it will rise through the levels to ultimately find Peace at level 600, and some may ultimately break through to Enlightenment. Dr. Hawkins describes both the joys and the struggles one might encounter along the way.

He goes on to discuss the differences between religion and spirituality, and how the messages of the great teachers, such as Christ and The Buddha, often get distorted when relayed by those whose egos warp the meanings. When you add in some church doctrine created by those who crave power, the original spiritual teachings become very garbled, a far cry from the original universal messages of peace and love.

There is much more detail in the book, including chapters on the mind, advanced awareness, and the nature of God. There is also a whole section of discussions and lectures in a Q and A format, as well as several appendices.

It's not a quick read, but it is full of thoughtful guidance for those seeking spiritual enlightenment.