Harnessing Adversity: Growing Through Life's Challenges

adversity is a wonderful opportunity because adversity forces you to go deeper are you able to dig and find the foundation within yourself that frees you from Fear certain actions take place you do things you know they're not the optimal things to do but you can't help it it's something acts through you um there there seems to be some power there that makes you do things that you know know are not right or not good for you and yet you can't stop it that seems to be the case um and that of course um is often

the case with people who are with you it might be many different different areas of your life but uh um this is also the case with addictions for example people who are addicted to a certain substance or who are addicted to eating too much or drinking um there's something that overpowers them in you that seems to obscure the awareness or the awareness is pushed to to the S side and this thing this this powerful thing does it anyway and again my answer is a little bit similar to um what I say to the first questioner

tonight uh the the power of presence needs to grow in you so that it is strong enough not to is not willpower because willpower is not the best way of dealing with these things but it's what I'm talking about could sometimes be confused with willpower but willpower includes the um application of a force to hold something down let's say um if your addiction is to um have a to indulge in intoxicating beverages in other words booze is the British word uh then uh and you can feel it it's it comes on there it comes you

know the bottles are there there they are and you feel you have to go there and you have to reach out and you have to pour yourself a drink now when you're not aware at all you don't even know what you're doing you're so unconscious that you you're already holding the drink and you're drinking then you at that point you you even know that you're drinking uh the same with food I've spoken to people who have had addictions to food they often say they wake up when they already they've already eaten in the middle of

the night they've already unconsciously gone to the fridge taken out the chocolate cake and then they're already halfway through the chocolate cake when suddenly like what am I doing but so awareness comes in at a very late Point willpower would be to hold an urge down that say I go they have to pull or even what the example you gave you want to turn on the TV and you know it's not right because I I'm not here for that and he actually told us not to do it and I but I can't help it I

have to go I can't I can't no willpower you would you would say I'm going to hold this down I'm not going to do it and I you can feel the urge but you're holding it down um when you hold things down often after a while an explosion happen it's like a boiling Kettle can't hold it for that long and then you have some kind of rationalization in your mind why it's you'll do it anyway the mind will give you a reason I spoke to a man who is addicted to um to food and he

was his body was very unhealthy because extremely D dangerously overweight unfortunately his past away way but he was a wonderful man and he talked to me and um often before he goes to the to indulge in excessive eating he would his mind would say something like you've had a rough day you really deserve a treat it it it explains why it's the right thing I'm not going to do it for much longer but just today I I need a really need to treat life is not hasn't been treating me but it's the only pleasure I

have what do I do it's all I have there's no other pleasure in my life okay go to the French you listen um I um attempted to U be able to show him that this thought is a deception and I had a little bit of success but unfortunately it was too late to save him well he is no longer in the body but that's okay he the essence of never there is the he probably reincarnates now into uh the opposite perhaps in order to learn a a lesson um again what I said to the first

questioner to practice Presence Power when you're not particularly tempted by anything and you're just in your room there's no more particular Temptation go into the body feel the feel the inner body be aware be present when you sense perception I recommended that practice sense feel the presence pervading every cell in your body the inner body awareness and so that there is enough presence so when the this impulse comes you use it as don't don't say go away or something like that because it won't go away it'll do it anyway it the impulse comes whatever it

may be and You observe you realize it's not a good thing that you it wants you to do and if there is enough awareness use it as every every time an Impulse of that kind comes this this is your special spiritual practice so instead of wanting to get rid of it welcome when an Impulse of that kind comes and see that this is the specially spiritual practice specially designed for you of course it is uh and so how do how how do you transform this into spiritual practice first you realize this is an opportunity for

practicing and the first thing you could do is you practice is delaying obeying the impulse not obeying it immediately but delaying it so and You observe then let's say you you wanted to go to the TV and turn the thing on you feel the impulse or say okay oh here's my next spiritual practice I'm now going to delay the turning on of this show on TV for 3 minutes and during those three minutes You observe this the impulse in You You You observe it has it's an energy form and and You observe it oh there

you are there you are and you feel it it's like a little Gremlin or [Laughter] something and so this this time Gap can be a very useful first practice that you introduce a Time gap before you give in you're not saying I'm not going to give in no you say 3 minutes those three minutes I'm going to observe you and you Shine the Light Of Consciousness the light of awareness on this impulse which is an energy form and it can be an energy form that is in you as a kind of emotion it can also

Dangerously invade your mind and make you the explanation I gave just now with this friend of mine the thought thought comes into your head that explains why you should give in to this impulse that can happen easily and there too you need to be present enough sufficiently aware so that you do not believe in every thought espe especially those kinds of thoughts you don't believe in every thought that comes into your head oh You observe the thought because the thought is part of it and and it's even to the thought you say oh there you

are there's the thought and there's the feeling behind the thought and you you set aside 3 minutes during those three minutes You observe that isn't that interesting wonderful spiritual practice and you as While You observe you grow in Consciousness you you apply Consciousness to it there only 3 minutes 3 minutes and then after the 3 minutes see how you feel it may not it may have dissolved but probably not yet it's still there and then you can see can I do do another two or 3 minutes am I strong enough for that is my awareness

strong enough and yes it is don't believe you might no stop this nonsense do it anyway H and so you and then you achieve five or six minutes of and then um what happens after that we don't know it is possible that the impulse has receded gone back to a dormant State and you suddenly you don't have to do it it's also possible that the impulse is still there and you cannot after 5 minutes there's not enough awareness left and you just you you have to go and do it but at least the the 5

minute interval the time Gap was very important and when anything like that happens you always introduce a Time gap for your spiritual practice ER during which you do not hold it down but you observe it so you you don't push it down You observe oh there you are so if it's a gramlin you don't you don't say you hold you down no you you there's a gr you look at it there it is oh now the interesting thing when you you apply awareness to something you Shine the Light Of Consciousness on it the possibility of

transformation is also there it arises as you Shine the Light Of Consciousness on it um this is the famous um example from Fairy stories and so on the uh the Frog you don't you don't kill the frog or you or do something with it you you kiss the frog and the moment you kiss the Frog it turns into the prince and so the Frog stands well this is like mythology there's some wisdom embedded in these fairy stories which by the way were were not many of them were not created by the people who wrote them

they were already orally transmitted over long periods of time so they are mythologies that often contain a lot of wisdom and there certainly a lot of wisdom in kissing the Frog which then turns into something beautiful so there's something ugly but you give it you kind of you give it an acceptance and love you look at it and then it transformation happens so that is the spiritual practice and after a while you will find that initially perhaps after the time Gap you still do it but then gradually this time Gap gets longer and and then

you may observe that the energy behind the impulse weakens and it it subsides until until next time but gradually it weakens and this all the self- sabotage mechanisms then begin to gradually disappear if you apply the awareness to it observe them there it is so think of the Frog uh these are all the frogs and whatever they are gramlin frogs that uh live in you as energy fields and the energies are trapped there they're not in themselves bad they are trapped like the pain body is an energy that is emotional energy that's trapped when the

pain body dissolves it can transformed into presence it's like a fire you put a log into a fire or so the it's consumed and transmuted perhaps is the word it's transmuted into presence and there here we have again the famous example of in Middle Ages certain philosophers were very interested in alchemy Alchemy was supposed to be the transformation of Base metal into gold through a chemical process of transformation uh but the the true meaning behind Alchemy was the transformation of human consciousness and they have many images and so on they could not speak and write

about this openly because they would have been executed by the church at the time so they had to hide all these symbols as if it were to do the transformation of Base metal into gold of something that is first of all of not very desirable into something wonderful and that's the alchemical process of trans mutation which really is something in the human psyche um there's an entire long treaties written by Carl Yung the psychologist which on Alchemy with countless illustrations and just fascinating things but it's all it's the transformation of something undesirable initially into awareness

or into Consciousness so and this is so you you're lucky to have that tailor designed spiritual practice for you so it's wonderful pract that's your practice it doesn't matter where you practice whatever wherever you are in your life you practice every situation every moment is the two dimensions and that's the end of fear comes with that fear being a normal human condition for most people sometimes buried under something else fear in its many manifestations nervousness tension anxiety anger is really comes out of fear stress really is form of fear all many forms of fear quite

normal why that's all you know that's fear you don't know that once you know that also it's the end of fear because there nothing can be destroyed that's why they CA in Miracle starts which is all you need to know the the prologue the first before it all starts it says this course can be summarized in the following words nothing real can be threatened nothing unreal exists here in lies the peace of God nothing real can be threatened and that is here because nothing unreal ultimately exists in the world of form the form is ultimately

not real in itself nothing unreal exists herein which means knowing that lies the peace of God God of course is the formless Timeless Eternal unmanifested that is both within and Beyond beyond the world some of you as I mentioned earlier are able to step out of their mind and you can practice that through a conscious Choice be present nothing to think about right now just be present wow you don't carry your you don't carry your history with you when you're present your life sit duation I use that word in Power of Now very important your

life situation everybody has one past future relationships job Health finances where you live what happens to you what and all your life situation you have a life you're here with you have a life situation of course you do but you also have it's not that you have a life you are life itself and when you when your life situation is all you know about yourself which is another way of putting that's all you know then you miss life now you're very good at dealing with your life situation but you miss life you do all the

right things but it never really gets you anywhere because you missed life life is now and life is not in the doing life is in the being now step out of thinking into alert Stillness if you can and also another ways not to completely believe in every thought that comes into your head realize it's a thought it's a position it's a judgment not completely identified with it it's a story that you are telling yourself it's amazing how many stories people tell themselves in their head many are completely distorted it's not the reality it's the story

it's how you see the reality the reality usually is much more simple and more benign than the story one of the early lessons in the cing Miracles says you're supposed to look at things around you in the room and say nothing that I see in this room means anything this table doesn't mean anything this glass doesn't mean anything this hand doesn't mean anything this floor doesn't mean anything now what does that lesson mean it doesn't mean anything what it means is it's attempting to erase the continuous conceptualization of reality like scribblings on a Blackboard because

whatever you think it means is a concept in your mind and If you deny the continuous and compulsive conceptualization of reality it it's like erasing the the the conditioning of your mind and coming to the place where the Dal Lama is don't know so this lesson in the course of Miracles all it's teaching is to come to the place of spacious emptiness alertness not no longer trapped in conceptual thinking doesn't mean anything and of course that's another y you're moving into a different dimension by living in this way it's just you inhabit suddenly life opens

up and all the narrowness that the Mind had imposed on it dissolves and life becomes spacious because you found the space within there's suddenly a spaciousness to life and not a threatening Place anymore what's life going to do where's my next this next threat coming [Music] from and again the same thing for example there's an entire spiritual teaching based on denying the reality of your story and Byron Kat's teachings is based on the simple fact of denying your story of how do I know do I really know that this is true no I can't really

know that so you get take get you to the same place where the Dal Lama is don't know so it's a wonderful thing if you can enter that not knowing and then but it's only not knowing from the Viewpoint of the conceptual mind you're actually connect connected with a deeper intelligence unconditioned and if you really need to know something it comes but it comes out of the spaciousness of not knowing well it's a little bit like jumping off a cliff and then seeing if you can fly to the ego it's a little bit like that

the ego says don't go there because the ego has worked it all out it it explains the whole it has its philosophy of life it might be very defective limiting philosophy but it has some kind of philosophy of life every person has their story through which they interpret reality and usually it's a it's not a pleasant work of fiction but at least you you think you know it gives you some illusory foothold and of course the ego thinks I can't if I let go of that I won't know anything anymore which in a way is

true but not completely true in a deeper sense is you only let go of and a distortion of reality created by the conditioned mind which is part of the collective human mind in its present state of evolution and so the collective mind of which your mind is part has created this human-made world which is full of problems and they seem to be they pop out one after another when you think one thing is better now oh God now it's the economy and then it's that and then it's that another War what has happened through the

gradual evolution of thinking is that now humans tend to overthink there is a lot of not only unnecessary thinking that generates unnecessary and in many cases non-existent problems such as when you lie awake at night in bed and start worrying it generates a lot of unnecessary unhappiness so people don't realize that a significant part of the unhappiness in their lives is actually generated by unnecessary negative often destructive mind activity and they don't even know it mindfulness is first of all discovering the simple fact that there is a voice in your head that continuously comments on

your life or on what's happening around you it it's it's this the the the selft talk in the everybody knows what the selft talk is in the head you talk to yourself sometimes you talk to yourself in the first person I some people talk to themselves in the second person you so you can get annoyed with yourself and then you say you you shouldn't have done that and then you have another thought and says yes but I couldn't help it and you might even get a third Voice come in that and whatever it says to

this why can't I why can't I get out of myelf talk that that's selft talk too but it's an amazing the first thing what I call the first Awakening Spiritual Awakening is something very basic and something very simple it's a discovery that there is a voice in your head that always talks talks to you mostly silently if it talks out aloud then you're continuously and and there's nobody around then you are considered insane but and that's only if it's l but most people have that inside their heads and they are not considered insane it's considered

normal but there's not such a big difference between the two and sometimes when you when you listen to there might be a man walking in the street muttering oh and you say oh he's really insane but it might be that you are doing the same but it's just not out aloud it's in your head why didn't I should have said that why didn't I say that next time he does that I'm look exactly what I'm going to reply and it goes on and on or you lie awake at night and start worrying you wake up

and oh my God what's going to happen what if that doesn't work and if that goes wrong and what if he does that and oh and then you go into it you get drawn one thought leads to another thought and another thought oh my God and then the body the body cannot distinguish between an actual reality an event that's happening in the real life and what your mind is saying so when you have fearful thoughts the body reacts to every fearful thought but the and that's an emotion the body reacts with an emotion the emotion

you feel in your body the body cannot dist distinguish between an actual event into thought so when you think fearful thoughts the emotions you feel are the emotions that are saying I am in danger there is an actual danger here so you feel the emotion of fear anxiety you might you might you feel agitated and it's not it's not only not pleasant if you indulge in that kind of useless dysfunctional destru itive thinking year after year after year it has its effect on the body and it decreases the ability of the body to have the

energy to fight disease even mainstream medicine is discovering the connection between your state of mind and your state of health and so gradually we are seeing in the past they denied it completely they only looked at your body and not only at the they they not they not didn't just look at the totality of the body even within the body they just like looked at one particular symptom what's wrong with that particular organ and you have of course in mainstream medicine you have Specialists I'm a specialist for the the liver specialist for this and this

and that not only not taking into account the toal ity of the body but more importantly not taking into account the totality of the person which includes the physical body and the mind so it's vitally important to discover first of all that there is a voice in your head that indulges in selft talk most of the time and for many people interestingly enough that selft talk for many people is not always negative but for many people a there it it is more negative than positive a good event that happened yesterday a nice you might have

gone to a nice reunion or you you went out into nature and you witnessed a beautiful sunset okay you can remember it today and think that was a beautiful sunset or we had a nice talk yesterday but you can't do that much thinking about a nice event but the mind when there's something negative that happens yesterday somebody offended you or didn't give you the attention that that you needed that you wanted from him then you can start thinking of how oh my God what he did he's really next time he does that I'm going to

say that or he's really should why doesn't he why you can go on for a long time dwelling on something negative much longer than dwelling on something positive it so seemingly a negative event is much more food for useless mind activity than a positive event and this is why for many people a significant percentage of their mind activity is negative uh for some people it is almost 100% % negative but it is unlikely that these people would get a job in this company and I mean that because the your predominant State of Consciousness your predominant

mental emotional state there's a certain correlation between who you associate with where you find yourself and even what kind of things happen to you there is a correlation which is not always immediately recognizable but there is a correlation between once's a person's predominant mental emotional state and who they are with who their friends are what where they work and even what happens to them so if you are if you are in a very negative ative State a long time you tend to attract also negative events but you can only have to find it out for

yourself I'm not saying believe me I know it from my own life because when I first discovered this I was still very young I discovered that there is a correlation between my mind activity and what happens to me I I found a I found a a book and that somebody several books that somebody left with us when I was 17 and there for the first time I read about a person's mind and I suddenly realized my mind was predominantly negative because I very I was a very unhappy child and so my childhood was not pleasant

and so the initial conditioning of my life was that my mind was continuously commenting and saying how bad my life was and whenever something bad happened to me I had a phrase that would occur again in my mindset of course bad things always happen to you don't they they bound to happen to you it's always happens to you so I was talking to myself and saying that bad things would always happen to me and they did so you can discover first what the spiritual awakening is to discover that there is continuous mind activity and for

some people it's the discovery that a significant part of their mind activity is negative but the vital thing is to discover that there is this continuous talk in my head which is called nor is considered the normal human State and of course you cannot abolish thinking of course there will be thinking but the question is is there an awareness behind the thinking if if and the if you can become aware that you are indulging or caught up in that useless mind activity and you suddenly become aware of perhaps certain repetitive thoughts that tend to re

reoccur in your mind again and again you might see it in others too more easily in others when you go for your Thanksgiving dinner I I think is it next week you will meet your family members or relatives and in some of you may realize you already know what they are going to say this year because it's the same thing they said last year and 5 years and 10 years ago and if they have negative judgments about you or somebody else then it's the same thing you will hear again next week when you go to

them so it's it's easier to see how others are caught up in repetitive if thought forms not as easy to see it in oneself this is why there's a saying that self- knowledge is the most difficult knowledge it's it's easier to see others but if you canover even in the midst perhaps in the moment of a certain thought appearing in your mind realizing oh that thought is I've had this thought for years it comes again and again and again and so you there is an observing presence and from there you can and that observing presence

isn't a thought it's just the ability to realize that that there is a voice in your head and that there are thoughts and you realize that some of those thoughts are negative and many of those thoughts actually are not only unnecessary but make your life very difficult such as worry so most people live with what I call a cluttered mind a cluttered mind means they are completely unaware that there's a continuous stream of mental commentary and they go and wherever they meet somebody and immediately certain judgments form and everything they feel they need to immediately

adopt a position towards it immediately say I'm against it I dis I like that so immediately adapt adapt a mental position and being identified with one's mental position which is a thought and a few more practical tips so that you don't get uh distracted too much while you take your attention more deeply while you're here take your attention more deeply into being or or into attention itself purely practical don't turn on the TV in your room please I have not installed hidden cameras to check on you second limit your interaction the interaction with your devices

if you cannot eliminate interaction with your devices completely and I understand that you may not survive if you do at least put aside just maybe once a day 15 minutes when you check your whatever it is that comes through whatever text Emil email um Facebook um Snapchat uh Tinder it's all very important but there's something more important and that's why you're here if you so now let's see I suggest to you that you make an agreement with yourself that not to uh go there unless any more than is absolutely necessary and I mean if you

occasionally you have you get it out and to take a photo is okay but also don't interact with things around you you only through imagining what it would look like as a photo on your [Music] phone and then say okay I'm going to fully experience this beautiful thing when I get home and look in my photos in the mean time I'm more interested in taking this photo because that's what the there's a species that has developed out of homo sapiens a branch species called homo turisticos and they they walk around continuously with either camera or

you see them every day they come in buses and then in the evening the homo turisticos goes home mostly and then you are left here and you might notice it becomes quite still outside at this time and the days are very very long here you may find it unusual if you come from a more sou Southern place that there's still daylight around even at 10:30 there's still light in the sky so and then it comes very still here so you can walk along the lake or just wherever you are and just be become aware of

that that surrounding Stillness and as you become aware of the surrounding Stillness of course you become still yourself and if you are still it means you're not thinking or very little thinking and it means you're aware it means you're present it means you are living through the Deep eye so use nature that is around you live through the Deep eye and during the daytime if you're walking and there's lots of there's a long weekend here in tomorrow is a holiday in Canada here so there's more tourist homo touristical than usual um and if you get

um upset by the fact that there are so many tourists walking around then you just practice this beautiful spiritual practice of accept acceptance of of the isness of this moment and immediately you become still too without needing external silence complete acceptance of this moment including the tourists and you still are I don't know how tourists will develop in the future future as a species in Thailand in are just near Bangkok somebody they interviewed some uh near Buddhist Monastery they interviewed some farmers and uh Farm Workers they would give food to the monks that's a tradition

in Buddhism in TI in the South terada tradition of Buddhism the monks come with their begging bowls every morning they just stand there and then the local people come and put food they dependent it's done on purpose there's a wisdom behind it on the Western and would say why don't they work for [Music] living it's the monks stand there with their begging bones and then the poor people who hardly have enough who hardly have enough themselves they come and put some food bit of rice whatever in the begging Bol and the monks just stand they

would they don't they don't say thank you because it's a privilege for you to give food to the monks that's part of the tradition so the westerners interviewed the Farm Workers say why do you give your food to the monks when you have so little yourself and they they were they begin to to talking to each other and say well well because we want a uh we want a better in better Incarnation next time so we are accumulating Merit so next time we come we are born into a better condition and then the Western asked

so what do you want to come back as in your next Lifetime and then they talked amongst each other and finally the agreement was we want to come back as tourists because they observe these people like they are they out of their step out of their buses they're well dressed and some are obviously so privileged that they are quite um big bodies uh which means they have 20 of money that they can eat as much as they like so that's a great thing and then they do all kinds of things they they seem to have

sex all the time and so it's a great thing that so wouldn't it be great in my next lifetime to spend my whole lifetime as being a tourist they don't realize it would be a dreadful nightmare oh yes one more practical thing intoxicating beverages um there's no prohibition here on anything there's just a recommendation and that is to refrain as much as possible from intoxicating if English is not your native language it means alcohol refrain as much as possible from intoxicating beverag is however if you cannot enjoy dinner without a glass of wine then you

can have a glass of wine it one glass of wine would not unduly interfere with the arising presence in you but two might and three it will unless you are really already deeply engaged in presence deeply rooted in presence in which case you wouldn't even want to drink too much and you certainly wouldn't get drunk so as little as possible I recommend none at all would be great but since everybody here is spiritually Advanced if you do have a glass of wine you will not be [Music] judged I'm not one of these spiritual teachers who

have very unconventional ways of teaching um there I know of two or three that did that they give their students as much alcohol as they want and say drink drink up in order to observe if they can stay conscious even while they are intoxicated a very questionable practice but I won't do that here with you I think one or two are feeling sorry now [Music] that so we've talked about the distractions on the external level television devices intoxicating beverages or other intoxicating substances I would advise against it at least here and never indulge even when

you're not here as you probably know I I I've already mentioned I I tried it a couple of times I have to because people ask me questions about it I cannot answer if I haven't tried it it wasn't that great I prer my normal State of Consciousness is it felt a little bit almost oppressive but I can see a person who is tortured on a daily basis by their mind it can be a relief to have a smoke but here we have something better we're not falling below thinking we're Rising above thinking and that is

the next step in in human evolution when you R and as you rise above thinking you don't need to fall below thinking anymore because you become liberated from your mind in the dimension that is transcendent to thought so and another practice of course here is the daily the moment to moment practice of um accepting the isness of the present moment just that's a powerful way of and quick way of going beyond the surface self the egoic self which means stop complaining either internally or externally of course if there's something that needs to be changed of

course you go to the reception or you make a phone call if suddenly uh there's water coming through the through the ceiling I hope hopefully I'm not manifesting it by talking about it there's water coming through the ceiling and the mattress and you on it getting drenched you don't say except what is stay stay on the bed a said don't complain so that's that's not the practice but it does mean that when you finally go to the telephone and tell them what happened it's not done in the complaining manner that says how Dreadful this place

is how can you allow something like this to happen to me this is Dreadful that strengthens the ego no you just explain what is and what can we do about it and in the meantime you surrender to the fact that you're wet that's what is The Dark Knight of the soul is a term from it goes back a long time maybe goes back to the Spanish Mystic St John of the Cross I'm not sure if it does but it goes back a long time it describes something well the questioner seems to imply that he is

he or she is going through something like this at at the moment the uh Dark Night of the Soul which yes I have also experienced that's a term then used to describe a what one could call a collapse of a perceived meaning in life an eruption into your life of a deep sense of meaninglessness and the the inner state in some cases is very close to depression maybe some Dark Knight of the Soul often to do with what is conventionally called depression but it is basically a sense of empty or meaninglessness nothing makes sense anymore

there's no purpose to anything and sometimes it's triggered by some external event some disasters perhaps on an external level external than within the death of someone close to you could trigger it especially premature death for example if your child dies or you had built up your life and give it meaning and the meaning that you had given your life this is what my life is about your activities your achievements where you're going what is considered important and the so the meaning that you had given your life for some reason collapses so as I said it

can happen if something happens that you can't explain away anymore some disaster which seems to invalidate the meaning that your life had before and really was has what has collaps then is the whole conceptual framework for your life the meaning that your mind had given it and so that results in a sense of Darkness a dark place but people have gone into that you're in that dark place for a while and then you emerge out of that there is the possibility that you emerge out of that you can emerge out of that into a transformed

state of consciousness where life has meaning again but it is no longer a conceptual meaning that you could necessarily explain it is often from The Dark Night of the Soul not necessarily but quite often it's from there that people awaken out of their conceptu ual sense of reality which has collapsed they awaken into something deeper which is no longer based on Concepts in your mind a deeper sense of purpose or connectedness with a greater life that is not dependent on explanations or anything conc perceptual any longer it's a kind of rebirth and The Dark Knight

of the soul is a kind of death that you die what dies in The Dark Knight of the soul is the egoic sense of self and of course the yes death is always painful but nothing real has actually died there only an illusory identity now it it's probably the case that some people who have gone through this transformation they have been through the Dark Night of the soul and they discovered that out of that a new self emerged that was a non-conceptual self but it a deeper being the awakened Consciousness and they they somehow looking

back they realized that they had to go through that not every everybody does of course have to go through that but some people do and they've even in some spiritual Traditions they Rec they try to recreate the experience of The Dark Knight of the soul in order to bring about a spiritual awakening and that was probably part of the so-called mystery schools of ancient Greece and Egypt uh which were designed they even survived into Roman times mystery schools and with rituals and so on not much we don't know much about it because they were kept

secret not much was written about it and in one tradition you spend a prolonged period of time in Darkness sometimes even in a coughing coughing like place in complete isolation and darkness that is an attempt I would say on the part of someone who's gone through the natural Dark Night of the soul to recreate the experience of it in kind of artificial more artificial way of actually experience that the that utter Darkness where things break down whether to what extent that works when it's uh not a natural experience but a created experience for how many

people that worked and actually did bring about an Awakening and a collapse of the Mind Made self I don't know how it whether it truly worked for many people but it must have worked to some extent because it's an the tradition went on for a very long time they are other in other forms of in mythological forms also they speak of similar things sometimes described as the the night journey in mythological tradition or also The Descent to the underworld they all point to the same experience which is not ultimately negative it just seems negative when

you are in it but it is part of a larger purpose it's part of a The Awakening not for everyone it doesn't have to be but often it is part of the Awakening process the death of the old self the birth of the true self so once you know that if it should come or if you should even be in the middle of it now you can just the more you surrender the more quickly you go through it surrender means don't judge it anymore you accept whatever it is that's your experience at this moment but

as I said not everybody has to go through that for many people The Awakening process starts and begins without that sometimes even after the Awakening process begins it might still happen you and then finally you will break through but that's fine allow life to do what it does you don't need to seek that and we don't need to recreate it in some artificial way so don't shut yourself in a dark room for days on end it's unlikely to work it's unnecessary the first lesson in the Course in Miracles says nothing I see in this room

means anything and you're supposed to look around the room and whatever you look at happen to be looking at you say this doesn't mean anything that doesn't mean anything this table doesn't mean anything this hand doesn't mean anything what's the purpose of a lesson like that well that's a little bit like recreating the what can happen during The Dark Night of the Soul which is the collapse of a mindmade meaning conceptual meaning of life believing that you understand what's it all about so by the CA in miracles in lesson one it's a voluntary relinquishment of

the human mindmade meaning that is projected and you go voluntarily into saying I don't know what this means this doesn't mean anything you you wipe the board clean in the Dark Night of the Soul it collapses and in some spiritual Traditions then you can actually you're encouraged to relinquish your conceptual reality and so you're then meant to arrive at a place of conceptual one could say meaninglessness or one could say a state of ignorance where you don't things lose their the mean meaning that you had given them which was all condition and cultural and so

on and you can then look upon the world without imposing a mindmade framework of meaning I'd like to share with you a short passage from the Bible doesn't happen very often that I read from the Bible as part of a teaching this is from uh the New Testament and it is a parable uh that Jesus tells that is very profound and absolutely relevant to the present time so here we go everyone who listens to these words of mine and does them will be like a man building a house who duck deep and laid the foundation

on the Rock the rain fell the floods came and the wind blew and beat against the house but it did not collapse it had been set solidly on rock and everyone who listens to these words of mine but does not do them will be like a fool who built his house on Sand the rain fell the floods came and the wind blew and beat against the house and it collapsed and was completely ruined so let's understand the deeper meaning of this everyone who listens to these words and does them means obviously anybody who listens to

the teaching and practices the teaching and of course Jesus teaching is find the kingdom of Heaven that is within you not anywhere else in space or time find the Transcendent Dimension the Kingdom of Heaven that is within you which is a deeper Dimension or higher dimension of Consciousness accessible to everyone and the man that's building the house is you the house is you the floods come the rain comes beating against the house of obviously means some form of adversity you encounter as you inevitably will in your life uh some form of Fairly extreme adversity whether

it's in a personal level or as we're experiencing now on a collective level now if you haven't gone deep enough because remember you are the house if you haven't gone deep enough you have not found anything beyond the conceptual thinking mind then the floods the rain the wind the adversity whatever it may be in this case we know what it is Will devastate you and even if you do not fall ill or contract the virus the fear will consume you as it's consuming millions of humans at the present time and why do you fear what

does what is fear fear are certain thought forms you project yourself into some future moment and you're not present because if you were present you would realize that in this moment there's nothing to fear only when you leave this moment fear arises as a thought form which then creates an emotion so what does it mean then to dig deep and to find the foundation on the Rock what is that rock the foundation for the house that you are you are that house and I'd like you to take into a little meditation now in order to

illustrate and to enable you to experience at firsthand what it means to dig deep for a moment just become aware that you're breathing become aware of yourself not the conceptual self not become aware of your personal history or become aware of some imagined future moment but become aware of yourself as the conscious presence of field of conscious presence and thinking does not help you there thinking is an obstacle so you go deeper than thinking and you can be completely awake and present and yet with very little mind activity and that is the beginning of the

realization of your deeper identity what are sometimes called your essence identity and your essence identity is inseparable from the present moment it is the Timeless Eternal present it is a deeper dimension of consciousness than the one that you ordinarily identify with and that is the meaning of digging deep and finding that unshakable Foundation that is deep within you within everyone adversity is a wonderful opportunity because adversity forces you to go deeper adversity forces you to awaken to the deeper dimension of who you are why does adversity Force you because life becomes almost unbearable when you

live only on the surface the surface of sense perceptions and your conceptual mind and then you listen to the newscasts and you read all kinds of things and everybody's in state of fear that is the house built on the sand that when the floods come the wind comes the storms come the house collapses meaning since you are the house in this Parable you are devastated in a state of extreme anxiety extreme suffering or the nothing actually has happened yet unless you contract a disease and this is something we'll talk about next time right is the

house your house the house that you are are you living on the living on the surface is your house built on Sand or are are you able to dig and find the foundation within yourself that frees you from Fear now when things are going well it's unlikely that most humans can't be bothered with going deeper what for what you think are going okay I'm looking forward to my next vacation weekend is coming up and uh whatever it is a nice meal is waiting for me everything it's comfort zone you're in your comfort zone I've never

heard of anybody who awakens in their comfort zone there's nothing wrong with Comfort don't enjoy them when they're there they last for a while and and then some form of adversity adversity arises either on a personal level or on a collective level minor forms of adversity and occasionally huge forms of adversity potential calamities whether it's you suddenly confronted with the fact of mortality some great loss serious illness on a personal level or on a collective level war Civil Strife Civil War uh Financial collapse invasion of your country uh um all kinds of things can happen

on and at the present time we experiencing the so-called pandemic Collective adversity not affecting just one person now affecting Millions at the same time and this is an invitation to go deeper because if you don't you suffer unnecessarily millions are in a state of fear and anxiety but use this as an opportunity to either awaken out of the Mind identified State of Consciousness that continuously project itself into the future that you have no control over it is never PR present this mind identified State of Consciousness it's the house built on the sand or it's an

opportunity to come to this realization that you are much deeper than you had known before you're forced to go deeper because you can't stand the suffering anymore the UN happiness or whatever you want to call it the anxiety and so the most vital thing in any situation is the State of Consciousness with which you meet the situation and you should pay more attention to that than to the newscasts and whatever it is that you listen to and watch yes you can do that also but what is your state of consciousness that's something you can do

something about is not the very much that you can do about the external situation you can take precautions you can help other people to the extent which it is possible all that's good you do all the things that you need to do and perhaps many people are now forced to stay at home and suddenly they have to you have to be on a suddenly on a private retreat at home now that's an opportunity too so use this precious time that is here because it is part of the Awakening consciousness of humanity it seems almost paradoxical

to say that something that on the surface looks very negative and looks like an obstacle to the well-being of humanity and yes it's an obstacle to the well-being of Humanity on a purely physical level perhaps temporarily yes but something that looks like an obstacle from a conventional point of view is actually an opportunity for you to awaken to a deeper or you could say higher level of Consciousness humans don't awaken when they're in their comfort zone They awaken when they are taken out of their comfort zone not everybody does it's an opportunity if you do

not awaken when you're no longer in your comfort zone you suffer you're unhappy you're anxious you're fearful you haven't found the rock now the the difference between this Parable and actual life is in this Parable the man had already dark deep and he had already built his house on the rock and then the floods came and so on and the house was untable in real life often it is the case that the wind the floods the rains that all beating against the house which means adversity arising in your life the adversity forces you if you

haven't already gone deeper it forces you to go deeper and so it's not too late to start digging now in the face of adversity many of you already in the process of Awakening probably most of you listening to this and What's happen happening to us now is a wonderful opportunity for you to go deeper a deepening of that an acceleration of the Awakening so as much as possible especially whenever you feel you feel yourself drifting off into a fearful State of Consciousness and a fearful emotional state whenever you realize that realize that in this present

moment there's nothing to fear and you have to verify this for yourself uh whether this is true or not when you fear something it's of some imagined future moment am I going to catch this disease am I going to die is a loved one going to catch it is a loved one GL my child there are they going to die you imagine it it could happen but it's right now it's not happening so whenever you feel yourself drifting off into fear realize okay I have lost the present moment and I and I lost myself in

my mind in the thinking mind and over and then the emotion reflects that mind activity so the moment you notice it okay I've lost the present moment I am lost in the mind come back into the present moment a few little things I helpful be aware of your breathing be aware of the inner energy field in your body the body is alive there is and and this energy this life energy that pervades the body you feel that you're breathing you feel the aliveness in the body you're aware of sense perceptions you look around you're present

and then be again you become aware of that presence that is inseparable from who you are that presence that is inseparable from who you are that's an amazing realization there's more to you than the person that presence is deeper than the person and you had you needed the adversity either to find it or to to deepen that which you had already found it but it was not not yet a deep realization so this is a time of great opportunity use it don't waste it there's a saying that goes when the ego weeps for what it

has lost the spirit rejoices for what it has found so what looks bad on the surface has a an essential function I will speak to you again soon in the meantime be here be present don't lose yourself in the mind don't lose yourself in fear find and be rooted in this rock that is your essence identity thank you that