Tag: identity

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

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.

When All Is Said and Done

On By centerlesscenterIn Beyond Spirituality, Happiness, Love, Peace8 Comments

‘Once all our beliefs are uprooted, it’s not really necessary to assert what is true . . . even the assertion that consciousness is infinite and eternal should be thrown away.’ ~ Rupert Spira

All has been said.

Not all has been done.

Yet.

I hope to see you in the marketplace.

And when our eyes meet for a timeless moment . . .

. . . that we share a smile.

And don’t forget to play, sing, and dance!

Peace, happiness, and love to all

. . . in the Now Year!

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.

No Questions Asked

On By centerlesscenterIn Consciousness, Experience, Happiness1 Comment

We like to ask questions, such as: Who? Why? How? What? When? Where?

It could be said that our entire lives are driven by asking questions and finding or not finding their answers. Practical questions aside, as they are necessary for everyday survival, we might be slightly curious or even struggle to find our purpose in life and ask so-called ‘serious’ questions.

Who am I? Why is there suffering? How can I find happiness?  What is the meaning of life? When will I know I’m enlightened? Where can I find the answers?

Sit for a moment without asking a question, not even ‘why am I doing this?’

Notice the brief moment of stillness, emptiness, before . . .

. . . a thought arises.

Keenly observe the thought as it appears, lingers for an instant, and then disappears.

It’s like watching the night sky when suddenly a shooting star appears out of seemingly nowhere, streaks across the sky, and vanishes into the darkness.

For the sake of inquiry, you might ask yourself (HA!), in what does the thought appear? In what or where does it linger? And to where does it vanish?

Where could anything appear other than in that which knows all experience, consciousness itself? Where could anything linger other than in consciousness itself? Where could anything vanish other than in consciousness itself?

There is nothing other than consciousness.

Can you find anything outside of consciousness, the knowing presence that exists prior to any appearance in the body, mind, or world?

You can’t. It would be like finding a shooting star outside of the night sky.

Consciousness asks no questions because it is the answer.

Set aside all ideas of who you think you are, what you think of others, of things, of the world, of the Universe, and consciousness will give you, we, the gift of peace, happiness, and love.

No questions asked.

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.

Do Unto No Others

On By centerlesscenterIn Advaita, Awareness, Consciousness, Non-Duality8 Comments

Once you discover that there is no self, and therefore no other, your relationship with all things, animate and inanimate, changes dramatically. You no longer say, I am this and you are that, but that we are this and that, or simply, we are.

We distinguish ourselves from others by our individual body-minds. We each have our own unique body type, our own private thoughts, conditioned as they may be, our own feelings, sensations, and perceptions of the world.

But when we examine our personal attributes closely, we uncover the truth of our being: there actually is no individual self. All of our characteristics are ever-changing, temporary occurrences, no more real than a cloud in the sky. Yes, just as a cloud appears in the sky, we appear for a moment in time, but then, just as the cloud dissolves back into the sky, we, that is, the body-mind, come to an end and, one way or another, returns to the earth.

What is the only thing in our experience that does not appear or disappear? Isn’t the one unchanging element in all experience the knowing of it? Discover this knowing element in yourself right now. What is it that knows your present experience, such as a thought?

Observe a thought as it arises in your mind – it appears, seemingly out of nowhere, lingers for a moment, and then disappears. In what is this all occurring? Don’t say ‘mind’, as mind is just a part of our temporary body. It is something beyond mind.

Whatever it is, you can’t really name it, you can’t see it, hear it, or touch it, but it is undeniably present and aware. A knowing within us that is always here.

We do try to name it, calling it Consciousness or Awareness, perhaps God or the Absolute. But it needs no name, as it exists before, during, and after any attempt at conceptual identification. It just is, and at our core, this is who we are.

Examining the nature of this consciousness, we find that it has no beginning or end, and is therefore limitless or infinite. And upon further reflection, we realize that it is never not here, thus it is timeless or eternal. And then it dawns on us that there can’t be two of something that is infinite and eternal. It would be like trying to make room for two skies.

With this ‘not two’ being a fact, where can we find an ‘other’? We are all made out of the same stuff, the same consciousness or awareness. When we look at each other through the eyes of consciousness, I becomes you and you becomes I. I is you, you is I. Whether we recognize it or not, there is only one thing going on. Knowing this, our interactions in the world are spontaneous and true.

So do unto no others as you would have them do unto no self and all will be golden.