As someone who came quite freshly and suddenly to the world of spirituality just few years ago I have encountered so many myths amongst the seekers of truth and liberation. Especially the ones who have been on the journey for decades and have gathered so much experience as someone on their way to the ultimate seeing. There seems to be much beliefs coming from this experience that those people want to pass on.
There seems to be in place a subtle “divine hierarchy” amongst the old seekers who have been with the great masters of the past and they are the new priesthood, the keepers of those secrets, holders of the lineage. I have encountered a well hidden undercurrent of aggression and power games in many forms on my way that have made me go "Ugh.. is this really how it is here in the world of awakening?"
One of the most stuck things seems to be the idea that the journey to truth is long and arduous. The belief seems valid to those professing it because when the previous generations were breaking out of their bondage they had such rigid and stuck conditioning and basically the world around was so much more sleepy that this breaking free seemed as something very hard and painful process.. and so it has been for many, no doubt, but this has lead to a kind of rigid conditioning of it’s own, repeating the mantra “The road to freedom is long and arduous”. One must enter into a lot of self-development work before..
AND
I have done my fair share of this work also and it has had it’s right place on my journey as well. It has been tremendously beneficial to go through therapies and self-development and meditation to make the mind more subtle and open, to make more space inside for a seeing to take place. But on the way I also encountered some abuse and delusions from those who facilitate and lead these things in the form of them putting me in my place for going beyond what the therapist had in mind for me, for not being able to completely compress myself into the framework. That seemed to threaten them and their structure of identity and work that seemed to lead them into a slight panic that caused them to push my head down when I was most vulnerable and open, when something could have been confirmed in a deeper way. In general I got a lot from this kind of work but also I could feel the limitations of it. I was not met as what I truly am, but rather I was an object to be worked upon and I needed to believe and identify myself as the unfinished and wounded, limited human that needed more work and needed patiently to keep going with it and if I work hard enough and succeed to remove all the endless shortcomings and heal all the traumas then I could maybe just be myself.
I felt quite exhausted after so many different workshops, groups, sessions and trainings. I felt the work endless and something just didn’t feel right in continuing in this way. I saw many people I know going group after group working their way towards the goal, counting how near they are to what they imagine to be freedom, when the work is finished.. and then... THEN.. and round and round the wheel spins and I saw almost no difference in them fundamentally, the same stories continued and same patterns came back and even if the patterns changed the same person was still there to celebrate these small victories until the feeling of being incomplete comes again. It is a clever avoidance indeed.
Something in me just felt like dropping it all and allowing my life to breathe again in more natural way. The most funny thing about what happened after that has been that with no effort or interest on my part my life has arranged itself to let everything come in place in it’s right time and WITH NO WORK. Something happened that shifted in me few months after I quit doing groups. I found myself in Portugal in a silent retreat with Mooji and then finally the directness of truth hit me and some recognition took place of something that has always been there in the background like the space where everything seems to happen. It’s something that cannot leave and was not really found either because it has always been there, it has always been me. It is the only constant there has ever been. I had had many things happening to me before too but only as passing experiences, fleeting moments of revelations, energetic releases and shifts of perspective but they were always phenomenal and they were always perceived and owned by the personality as something that came and went and must be had again, deserved and earned with vigorous self-work and practice. This was different though, it’s not the immature running after experiences and personality upgrades but it’s the most simple seeing where all these phenomena’s are seen and there is such easiness in it because it’s the most natural thing. I cannot claim to be a very good spiritual person anymore and there is no need, thank good. I still exist. I am. I stopped trying.
Seeing from that place the faults of personality do not mean anything, they are just a kind of distraction to put attention into and keep playing the game of coming closer, evolving. It was just a small shift of focus and after that the lost parts of me have started to come home on their own accord and integrate because I wasn't out looking for something. The evolutionary part of me has continued as appropriate as a refining and aligning but the truth itself is easy and effortless. The mind wonders sometimes but always the focus comes back to this unmoving presence that cannot leave. This is something that they don’t show you in self-development groups because it’s not their business, they are invested in something else. They are focused on the personal story even if they claim to be about meditation. Same goes with yoga and all other practices. They go on working on the body and the mind, refining them, making them more sattvik, more receptive and pure but the real seeing is not involved or dependent on it, only the person is.. and it can become a long habit especially accompanied with the old beliefs from the world of spiritual people that it’s hard work. For who is it hard work in the first place, then? Who is the one to be worked on?
It’s a circle feeding itself, a kind of divine joke; The seeking creates a journey and a sense of a seeker. The seeker gets more valid, has a nice sounding spiritual sanskrit -name and gathers more experience on how arduous the seeking is. Then another younger, innocent person feels suddenly something in their heart to move towards freedom, finds a book where someone who has realised their own true nature says something that touches them. They find the older seeker -personality in an ashram or a center who passes on the belief that the way to truth is narrow and long, there are dangers on the way and almost nobody gets to the end but fortunately they have the group/session/product/technique available.
We are now at a point where the human consciousness has become so much more ripe and so many young ones are coming and are already here. Those who are ready for the direct seeing that it simply demands more direct approaches and these new ones are ready for it. They don’t come with all the old crap that the older seekers carry around, they come with clarity and easiness. It’s time to shift gears and let go of many old concepts. At least it’s about time to let go of the need for the hard way to be the only way to truth, time to recognise that we don’t necessarily need to spend so much time simply readying the ground when the new plants come already in growing bags. The ground has been prepared for the new man but will the farmer recognise when it’s time to quit plowing and let the crop grow?
As someone quite young and fresh in this old field I feel the need to say to anyone who wanders to these areas of awakening in themselves please trust yourself and don’t listen to anyone saying you are not ready yet, that you need to get something first, you are too young. These beliefs have been a big hindrance I have come across and they have made me doubt myself because of looking up to others who have more experience than me and who have made a career out of staying there and holding the space and helping others, who are in fact dependant on your stories and problems. If it feels right in the moment those groups can be very helpful but they are simply a stepping stone. One must start from where they are and end up to where they never left. It all happens inside the grace. Could it be this easy? Why not..
