Developing Awareness – Part 2
Photo by mslori411
“Awareness implies that you are not only conscious of things (objects), but you are also conscious of being conscious. If you can sense an alert inner stillness in the background while things happen in the foreground – that’s it! This dimension is there in everyone, but most people are completely unaware of it”. Eckhart Tolle – A New Earth
I wasn’t planning doing a second part to ‘Developing Awareness’ today, exactly following the first part. I was planning to let some other few articles in between.
However, I was flipping through pencil-written bookmarks and side notes I left on Tolle’s book*, when I came across the verse quoted above. It struck me a second time as being an important practical tip worth noting and sharing.
I would also love to hear your thoughts on this. (more…)
Developing Awareness – Part 1
photo by h.koppdelaney
Awareness is fundamental to all human activity. It is the basis of all our mental states and processes, creativity, perception, knowledge and culture. Everything starts from awareness. It is the portal between consciousness and the world around us.
Recently I have become more and more intrigued by the idea. The more I learn about it, the more I realize how it pervades everything we do and that by learning to focus it, expand it or redirect it consciously, we can transform ourselves by gigantic positive leaps. It’s the key to greater inner peace, happiness and self-mastery. In fact there is no possible way one can walk on the path of self-mastery without learning to direct his awareness. (more…)
After enlightenment, the laundry
photo by elaine faith
As I was reading the article “A gentle honesty” on the blog ‘Beyond Karma’ the other day, the Zen saying “After Enlightenment, the Laundry” came to mind.
In the article, Kaushik, the author of the blog and the post in question, was asking how it is that sometimes after some experience of deep inner awareness that awakens us from our limited patterns of thinking, we return back to our same old selves?
To quote Kaushik’s own opening lines:
“A strange thing about awakening is frequently we feel we are very conscious, but then life throws something at us and we react in the same conditioned way we always did. It’s a humbling experience, and that’s the point of it.”
How is it that after some brief moment of enlightenment we relapse back to the same old habits and limited views?
This naturally leads to other questions such as “is enlightenment or spiritual awakening ephemeral”? Is it some short excursion beyond our boundaries just to give us a taste of what it’s like to be in a higher state of consciousness?
