Category: Non-Duality

The End (Less)

On By centerlesscenterIn Advaita, Awareness, Love, Non-Duality6 Comments

It’s coming up on nine years ago that I posted my first Centerless Center entry, a quote from Blaise Pascal that inspired the title of this weblog:

‘Nature is an infinite sphere, of which the center is everywhere

and the circumference nowhere.’

It seems as though this nowhere circumference has come full circle around its everywhere center, and it’s time for a hiatus. I’m not going anywhere, but I have nothing to say at the moment (and haven’t had for months).

I don’t know if I’ll have anything to add in the future to what’s already been written. This weblog has been my way of sharing some of the discoveries made along the pathless path, with the secondary aim of letting interested readers know that there is a satisfying end to the spiritual search. And hopefully pointing them in the right direction so that they may discover the answers for themselves.

It’s been a joy spending time with you, and I’ve appreciated every insightful comment and inspiring conversation that we’ve shared over the years, be it in person, via letters, or phone calls. I truly enjoy all correspondence, and will continue to answer all emails. Just write to me at centerlesscenter@gmail.com.

For now, I’d like to offer this quote from my teacher and friend, Rupert Spira:

‘Leave the mind as it is, and remain as you are.’

 Until the inspiration arises to post again, peace, love, and happiness to All!

Will Wright

Mind Control

On By centerlesscenterIn Awareness, Non-Duality, Zen6 Comments

‘To give your sheep or cows a large,

spacious meadow is the way to control them.’

~ Shunryu Suzuki

You might hear a spiritual seeker, or possibly someone who meditates, say, ‘If only I could control my thoughts, stop my thinking, I could find lasting peace and happiness.’

To paraphrase Zen Master Shunryu Suzuki, if you want to control your sheep or cows give them a large pasture. If you want to control your thoughts, give them a vast space in which to go through their magical dance of appearing, lingering, and disappearing.

If you give your sheep or cow a large pasture, they will not try to break through the fence to find something to eat or a place to run free. They will be happy having such an expanse of land in which to graze, play, and rest.

Ultimately, there is no need to control your thoughts. In what do they appear? A limited, confined space? No, they appear in the unlimited realm of awareness. We think our thoughts are confined to the brain in our head, appearing in our mind, but if this were true, with the number of thoughts we have over the course of a day, month, year, or lifetime, our brains would explode!

All experiences occur in awareness, in which no limits have ever been found. All things, that is, all objects, that occur in awareness, including thoughts and feelings, have limits. There is nothing that we know that doesn’t have a beginning, middle, and an end. Except for awareness itself, the knowing element in all experience.

We don’t actually ‘know’ awareness, as it has no objective qualities and is therefore unknowable.

But awareness knows itself – knowing knows knowing. And at our core, this is who we are, who we all are. We think that we are a body-mind made up of a cluster of thoughts, feelings, sensations, and perceptions. And this is true on a relative level, that is, in relationship to other body-minds. But this is how all conflict and unhappiness arise – from the belief that we are separate individuals, who must defend our own particular positions and opinions, which are founded on the false premise that . . . we are separate individuals.

In fact, there are no separate individuals, only unique manifestations of awareness. Set aside your temporary attributes that make up your-body mind, as they are, in the truest sense, not real. Settle into your unshakeable self, that which knows all experience, yet itself is not an experience.

The terms ‘Set aside’ and ‘Settle into’ are a bit misleading. It implies that an action or actions must take place in order to be your, our, unshakable self, which actually takes no effort whatsoever. Think more of a raindrop falling from the sky and melting, dissolving, into the ocean.

Lucid Waking

On By centerlesscenterIn Awareness, Experience, Non-Duality4 Comments

‘You can lucid dream, in which you know you’re dreaming, but even then, when you’re lucid dreaming, you still perceive the dreamed world from the localized perspective of the dreamed character. It’s just that you realize the whole thing is taking place in your own mind.’ ~ Rupert Spira

Awareness is to the waking state as the dreamer is to the dream state. In other words, just as the dream is nothing other than a manifestation of the dreamer’s mind, the experience of the body, mind, and world is nothing other than a manifestation of awareness.

If you trace our experience of the body, mind, and world back to its source, you arrive at awareness. That is, if you have experienced the infinite and eternal nature of awareness. If you have a limited view of awareness, you believe that it resides somewhere in your body, or perhaps your mind, and with that belief it follows that all seven point nine billion of us have our own personal awareness. But if you look at our actual experience that is not the case. It’s the opposite.

If everything in a dream is made out of the same stuff, the dreamer’s mind, why isn’t it possible that everything in the waking state is made out of the same stuff, awareness?

Just as the dream world, which seems entirely real to the dreamed character, is a product of the dreamer’s mind, the so-called waking state, the ‘real’ world of the dreamer, is the dream world of awareness and only made of awareness.

In the dream state, the dreamed character thinks that it is moving and acting in its own world of people and objects when, in fact, it is moving in a world created solely by the dreamer. There is nothing there other than the contents of the dreamer’s mind.

In the waking state, we think that we move and act in a world of people and objects when, in fact, we are moving in a world created solely by awareness. There is nothing in our so-called world other than a manifestation of awareness.

Waking up to the truth of our existence in the waking state would be similar to lucid dreaming. i.e., we ‘wake up’ in the dream. Just as we know that we are moving and acting in a dream world when we are lucid dreaming, we know that the waking state is nothing more than objects, selves, and experiences made of awareness.

The dreamed character in a lucid dream has a kernel of the waking state mind – it knows that it is dreaming and can act in a way that is possible in the dream world, e.g., it can manipulate the circumstances, breathe in water, fly, etc.  

The character in the waking state contains a kernel of awareness, although this fact is often obscured by thoughts, images, memories, feelings, sensations, and perceptions. Even though this knowing presence never comes and goes, the waking character often associates his or her existence with the temporary, and therefore not real, attributes of the body, mind, and world.

But it’s more than that. It’s not that the dreamed character contains a kernel of the waking state mind, or that the waking state character contains a kernel of awareness, because that would be like saying the clouds contain a patch of sky.

The fact is that everything is made of awareness – the contents of the dream, the body-mind of the dreamer, and the world in which they both appear.

There is only one thing going on, awareness, and we are that.

R.I.P.

On By centerlesscenterIn Beyond Spirituality, Natural State, Non-Duality3 Comments

Die to your false identity as an individual self and rest in peace.

How do you do this?

There is no way.

Which is not very helpful.

So . . .

There is one way.

But no one knows it.

Very helpful!

Nothing Is Sacred

On By centerlesscenterIn Consciousness, Happiness, Non-Duality5 Comments

We might make fun those who bemoan, ‘Nothing is sacred anymore,’ but when you look at the present condition of our world, nothing is sacred. With every conceivable experience at our fingertips, there is very little, if anything, left to the imagination. Our lives are inundated with endless images of the good, the bad, and the ugly. The amount of information available, regardless of its accuracy, drives one group in one direction, one group in another, creating seemingly insurmountable division. Everything is overexposed, and in the process, can lose its meaning, its essence, its soul.

But if you look more deeply at our experience, we find that it’s not that nothing is sacred, it’s that no ‘thing’ is sacred.

Searching for peace and happiness, we first look at our objective experience for an answer. After all, this is what we have been taught, conditioned to do – seek our bliss in relationship to things in the world.

All things, all objects, though they might provide momentary pleasure and happiness, are ever-changing, temporary appearances in the world. All ‘things’ come and go, and therefore, even though we might hold a thing, an object, special, it is not sacred, it is not of God, the Absolute, the Divine. God, the Absolute, the Divine, is not a thing.

God, the Absolute, the Divine, has no objective qualities. It is ever-present and unchanging, untouched by any activity of the mind, body, or world.

By setting aside all that is temporary, that is, all objects – thoughts, memories, emotions, sensations of the body, and all perceptions of the world – we are left with our essential being: that which exists prior to, during, and after any appearance of the body, mind, or world has come and gone.

And what is this essential being that remains when all appearances are set aside?

Nothing.

‘Nothing’is truly sacred.

You don’t have to do anything to be nothing, which is what we all are at our core. Or, more accurately, we are no ‘thing’ at our core – our essential being has no objective qualities. It is not a thing. Resting in and as no thing, or nothingness, our true nature is revealed as awareness or consciousness, the knowing presence in all experience that is not itself an experience. A knowing presence that is always here and has no boundaries, whose nature is of peace, because it is undisturbed and unchanging, of happiness, because it is inherently full, and of love, because it is indivisible.

Pendulum of Change

On By centerlesscenterIn Natural State, Non-Duality, Original Self6 Comments

You are not the pendulum of change:

Thoughts, moods, sensations, perceptions,

Swinging back and forth, this way and that.

You are that which knows the pendulum of change.

Notice this fact, and you are home:

The Changeless One.

We Are the Emptiness

On By centerlesscenterIn Bliss, Music, Non-Duality, Original Self8 Comments

~*~

We are the Emptiness

In which Silence resides

And from this Silence

Emerges a Sound

A joyful, rich, fulfilling Sound

Swelling with

Waves

of

Rhythm

     Melody

  Harmony

Lapping on the shore of our Being

A gentle Touch

Crashing onto the shore of our Being

A full and loving Embrace

Then . . .

Dissolving back into

The Silence . . .

which resides

In the Emptiness

We Are

~*~

Words inspired by Beethoven’s Sonata “Hammerklavier” – Adagio

Heard during the Seven Day Retreat with Rupert Spira, Garrison Institute, October, 2021

Two Things In Common

On By centerlesscenterIn Consciousness, Experience, Non-Duality2 Comments

Every human being on the planet has two things in common: birth and death. We are all born and we will all die. Beyond that, whatever else our lives might share in common depends on our culture and conditioning, and there will be very little consistency in this area when you consider that there are almost eight billion of us.

Actually, there are three things that we all have in common: birth, death, and consciousness. The beauty of consciousness is that it isn’t subject to the laws of time and space. Our body-minds are born into a world, live for a period of time, and then perish. But consciousness is always present, and therefore is never born and never dies.

And what is this consciousness? It’s that element of our being that knows all experience, but is not itself an experience. The element of our being that allows us to say unconditionally, I am, or I exist. The element of our being that knows the coming and going of all things, yet doesn’t come and go with them.

Most importantly, consciousness is the element of our being that exists prior to our being, and then manifests as a body-mind, allowing us to experience thinking, feeling, sensing, and to perceive the world through sights, sounds, tastes, textures, and smells.

And what a world it is! As manifestations of consciousness, we have this unique moment in time and space to think myriad thoughts, feel intense emotions, sense pleasure and pain, and see, hear, taste, touch, and smell the extraordinary world around us.

And then it will be gone. Not consciousness, but the body-mind, with all of its fantastic abilities, limited as they may be, and the world, with all of its wonders.

Consciousness, as it is everywhere and, therefore, everything, never goes anywhere. It never appears or disappears. It just is. Can you find any place, any object or thing, any self, where consciousness is not present? No. It would be like saying you can find a wave without an ocean.  

Look at your experience and recognize that consciousness is not in you, us, but that you, we, are in consciousness. Therefore, none of us are ever born and we will never die. Yes, our body-minds appear at birth and disappear at death, but the stuff we are made of, consciousness, is ever-present and unchanging. Infinite and eternal.

As you, I, we, are that . . .

. . . be that.

All that is.

Be The Changeless

On By centerlesscenterIn Advaita, Awareness, Non-Duality

The phrase ‘Be the change you want to see in the world,’ commonly attributed to Mahatma Gandhi, is often heard around self-help and self-actualization groups, as well as in numerous spiritual and political circles. It’s a wonderful concept: instead of trying to change others to lead a better, more conscious life, change yourself first and lead, inspire, by example.

But change is just that, change. In other words, we change the image or behavior of ourself in the hopes that it will rub off on others. Who is to say that our ‘change for the better’ is good for someone else? And if we can change once, what’s to say that we won’t change again, perhaps in another direction?

For a more stable and conscious society, shouldn’t we be trying to locate that unchanging element which is common to all of us? Something that we can all relate to as a neutral starting point for dialogue and action?

Our body-minds, made up of mortal flesh and bone, are a constantly changing flow of thoughts, feelings, sensations, sights, sounds, tastes, textures, and smells. Granted, some changes are imperceptible or gradual, and others more obvious, but there is constant change, nonetheless.

But there is an unchanging element to our experience, an unchanging element to our being that has been with every one of us for our entire lives, and is with us now at this very moment.

What is this changeless element? How do we identify it? How do we identify anything? We acknowledge its presence and observe its behavior.

With a simple investigation, you can discover for yourself the changeless element to your being. Sit quietly for a moment. Notice a thought as it comes to your attention, lingers for a short time, and then disappears. The thought comes and goes, but that which notices the thought remains.

This changeless element is that which notices all experience of the body, mind, and world, but is not itself an actual experience. All experiences come and go, but that which knows all experience doesn’t come and go with them. This is the changeless element to our being.

Once we identify this changeless element to our being, we might think that it is unique to our personal self. But upon further investigation, we discover that this changeless element is not in our personal self, our individual body-mind, but that our individual body-mind, our so-called separate self, is in this changeless element.

You can check the validity of this for yourself. Ask yourself, can anything exist outside of this changeless element? If you say yes, where would it come from? If you look carefully, no boundary can be found to that which knows all experience, and there is no time when it is not present. In other words, it is infinite and eternal. We have to conclude that nothing can exist or come from outside of this changeless element, and, this being the case, we can further conclude that we all must be made out of it. We are all unique manifestations of the same limitless, timeless stuff. All one. Not two. 

Instead of being the change that you want to see in the world, discover the changeless being that you want to see in the world – the open-hearted, clear-seeing, right-acting being that we all are at our core. Maybe, just maybe, this might inspire someone else to do the same.

Seeing Eye to Eye

On By centerlesscenterIn Awareness, Experience, Non-Duality8 Comments

When we agree with someone, we are said to be ‘seeing eye to eye’. When we don’t see eye to eye, it can lead to a minor disagreement between two friends or a brutal war between nations.

But what is this eye that sees? And what does it actually see?

Just as a drum doesn’t do the drumming, the eyes don’t do the seeing. A drum is a vehicle for the rhythms played by the drummer, the eyes the vehicle for the seeing done by the seer.

Who is the seer? Isn’t it that which we call I? As in, I see?

Examining this I, we first discover the obvious: we each call ourself I.

What is this I that we so easily use to identify ourselves?

The common definition used by billions of us is that this I is made up of our individual body and mind, with all of its associated attributes of thinking, feeling, sensing, and perceiving. But these attributes are all temporary, ever-changing, and totally unreliable when it comes to discovering our real identity.

Our experiences of the body, mind, and world are constantly changing, but the awareness of, the knowing of these ever-changing experiences is ever-present and unchanging.

And this unchanging awareness is common to all of us. It’s as though life is a grand play, with one master actor able to don billions of different costumes and take on a multitude of roles. Beneath every unique costume is found the same actor, the same being, the same awareness.

If we look at the nature of this awareness, we discover that it has no limits or boundaries, no point at which it ends and something else begins. Or, in other words, that it is infinite. And if we continue with our investigation, we discover that there is never a time when it is not present. This being so, we can say that it is timeless, or eternal.

For a true coming together, especially when it comes to relationships, shouldn’t we be seeing I to I? Awareness to Awareness? It’s actually not a question of shouldn’t we be seeing I to I, but recognizing the fact that this is the way we see, the only way we see. If we remove our costume of the imagined individual self for just an instant, our true character, which is not a character at all, is revealed.

We think that we either see eye to eye, or we don’t, but in fact, we only ever see I to I, or aware presence to aware presence. You can tell in another’s eyes which one is looking at you. You either see eyes clouded by the limits of the conditioned separate self, or the shining eyes of pure awareness.

There is a new math, or perhaps it is as ancient as the stars: ‘I’ plus ‘I’ does not equal two ‘I’s. I plus I equals I. There is only one I, the I of Awareness, and you, we, are that: One Shared Being.

So even though we might appear to be strangers, we are really cosmic lovers: inseparable in essence, one without a second. To quote Rumi:

The minute I heard my first love story

I started looking for you, not knowing

how blind that was.

Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere.

They’re in each other all along.