Let the Guru Bow to You

Your words enthrall me, your thoughts are clean. You tell me everything is not as it seems.

Are you my teacher? Are you the wise master-guru that "I" seek?

The egoic self-construct will discard that which is not already there IN the student. The idea that there is something new to learn is a trick the student plays on the guru.

This way, the 'self' can be retained as not 'realized,' but forever seeking realization.

The dynamics of the 'enlightenment game' are cyclical, since you can dump all your ignorance on the exalted guru, who's job is to dump it back on you. This is how you maintain the 'cycle of ignorance' and your experience of the world never changes (Yet, you claim to be getting 'closer,' which, of course, only takes you farther away).

However, you can break from the 'cycle of ignorance' when you trust in the ignorant to teach you, because the ego will deny learning anything at all. In that denial, realize that you have learned more than could be learned from a million wise gurus.

But this is virtually impossible, because the ego-self seeks out what is useful based on its own requirements. Even before the teacher speaks, the ego-self knows what is said and so...

...listens intently.

If it resonates, then most likely it's what you've asked for... but not what you need, because you don't know what you need. (and if you don't know what you need, then it's best to trust in everything except what you've asked for).

The real teacher is the one that bows to you. But, most likely, "you" will have none of that, since that would negate the enlightened teacher and your goal to be 'one' (...of them).

Nevertheless, essentially, you teach yourself. The "teacher" only confirms what is already known by YOU. In that sense all teachers are useless and any enlightenment, realization, awakening, etc, etc, you give yourself, as there are no intermediaries for the contents of your mind since all intermediaries are content too. (although we tend to project it outward in the desire for an external reference point, but that's just Freudian "wishful thinking"). The "guru" always gives you what you ask for, although you may deny awareness of the asking.

Seems kinda silly when you really get down to it.

However, there are those who can give you what you do not want, nor ask for, but need. They are all around you. When will you bow to them in the realization that they are your teachers?

The real learning happens when you excuse yourself from the classroom.

Well the dawn was coming,
heard him ringing on my bell.
He said, "my name's the teacher,
that is what I call myself.
And I have a lesson
that I must impart to you.
It's an old expression
but I must insist it's true.

Jump up, look around,
find yourself some fun,
no sense in sitting there hating everyone.
No man's an island and his castle isn't home,
the nest is full of nothing when the bird has flown."

So I took a journey,
threw my world into the sea.
With me went the teacher
who found fun instead of me.

Hey man, what's the plan, what was that you said?
Sun-tanned, drink in hand, lying there in bed.
I try to socialize but I can't seem to find

what I was looking for, got something on my mind.

Then the teacher told me

it had been a lot of fun.

Thanked me for his ticket
and all that I had done.

Hey man, what's the plan, what was that you said?

Sun-tanned, drink in hand, lying there in bed.
I try to socialize but I can't seem to find
what I was looking for, got something on my mind.

(Jethro Tull - The Teacher)


(Image by Saturno Butto)

Hey You! Who Do You Think "You" Are, Anyway?

You pride yourself on the delusion of being uniquely individual. Obviously, you get real angry at the suggestion that you’re nothing but a trained monkey in a cage and your core identity was manufactured in childhood through extensive conditioning that you had no choice in. But then, anger was learned as well.

Yet, you do believe you’ve made crucial choices in the sculpting of your 'self.' but this is also a delusion, since all choices were made from the same social menu we all choose from.

Nevertheless, any later additions to your self that you ‘chose,’ pale in comparison to the core personae, which was not your choice at all. In this sense, your “individuality” is an illusion and your 'uniqueness' nothing more than a fantasy, not even of your choosing.

So, can it really be "you" in there?

All of this insures the perpetuation of the collective order. Your values conform to that order and not to replicate conformity in the manufacture of personalities is to generate an eventual collapse of the collective order. This collective arrangement (which you agree to) insures that you stay put and any delusion of 'transcendence' reinforces that you are "here" and serves to keep you firmly in place (all warm and comfy, no doubt).

In other words, everything about “you” has been taught and learned and nothing is uniquely free of conditioning. And so continues the ancient hatreds and fears, as well as the ephemeral pleasures and joys, that you've inherited from your parents as they inherited from their parents and theirs before them and so on and so on, etc, etc, etc.

Deviance from this is frequently attempted, but only within the approved boundaries, simply because deviance is helpful in reinforcing collective order.

In fact, many cultures are adopting the western individualistic paradigm of competition, thereby, manufacturing a global cultural homogenization of conforming to the collective delusion of individual “uniqueness" or "me" before "us."

This is inevitable because the collective must remain joined in delusion in order to stay convinced of their separateness (even though we are all the same). So, go ahead have your “awakening” and your “enlightenment,” and continue playing the serious games that have always been played. Follow the rules like good boys and girls, because the games never end.

Thus, it seems reasonable to assume that what we seek to transcend, through the various religio-spiritual “enlightenment” ideologies (and their attached sacred paths of "peace and love") is nothing more than the social conditioning that we have been indoctrinated into and held captive by. But, make no mistake, your path to enlightenment comes from the same social menu from which all conventions are derived. These are the same old song and dance routines that have entertained us since time began.

It’s all the same shit, just a different day.

Yet, you were trained to take pride in who "you" are as a person and demand others recognize and applaud your unique ‘individuality, which, of course leads to higher ‘self-esteem.’ It is rather disappointing to consider that the self we take pride in, is nothing but a conditioned amalgamation, or composite, of the learned values of childhood social conditioning.

We can always expand the intellect, but the core egoic personality (belief system) is virtually unchangeable and the core self remains intact until death do you part. It seems that without a more intrinsic change the intellect will continue to fail us as it always has.

So how much of “you” is really you and how much is nothing more than conditioned responses based on early childhood socialization? It’s not just mom and dad, but all the institutions that shaped your personality or ‘self’ (who you ‘think’ you are) by indoctrinating you into the dominant system of values.

Are you even aware of who you really are, absent the indoctrinated beliefs that anchor you to social convention, demanding you take the games seriously by playing by the rules?

Essentially, we’re not seeking to awaken to some grandiose 'godhead,' or transcend into some whimsical nirvanic state of heavenly bliss. No, actually you’re simply trying to get free of collective hell by stripping away all the layers of delusional beliefs that collective indoctrination has burdened you with and that you have inadvertently passed onto your children in the belief that they can’t possibly thrive (or even survive) without them.

You live your “life” by perpetuating a “story” that you believe is uniquely your own. But this is delusional, since it was never “your” story to begin with.

Hey you, out there in the cold
Getting lonely, getting old
Can you feel me?
Hey you, standing in the aisles
With itchy feet and fading smiles
Can you feel me?

Hey you, don’t help them to bury the light
Don't give in without a fight.

Hey you, out there on your own

Sitting naked by the phone
Would you touch me?
Hey you, with your ear against the wall
Waiting for someone to call out
Would you touch me?

Hey you, would you help me to carry the stone?
Open your heart, I'm coming home.

But it was only fantasy.
The wall was too high,
As you can see.
No matter how he tried,
He could not break free.
And the worms ate into his brain.

Hey you, standing in the road always doing what you're told,
Can you help me?
Hey you, out there beyond the wall,
Breaking bottles in the hall,
Can you help me?

Hey you, don't tell me there's no hope at all

Together we stand, divided we fall.
(Pink Floyd)

Sorry, But You Cannot BECOME "Awakened"

What do you 'see'? Make no mistake, what you see is what you expect to experience, otherwise, you would not experience it or its opposite. The ego manufactures experience based on expectation and experience does not leave the mind of its maker, even when defined as a product of ‘perception.'

You will never stop manufacturing constructs for which to experience 'existence.' Even an ego determined to experience “beingness,” or “oneness,” manufactures that experience based on expectation. Experiences are ‘constructs’ because you make them up.

Your ego actually processes ‘beingness’ as a finite outcome for future acquisition or ‘becoming.’ The ego constructs finite experiences because they aid in promoting a fixed ‘self’ to contrast with your fixations of others and the world.

The self can never stop manufacturing personal constructs as experiences through which to identify and know itself. There seems no way out of this, because the ego-self must employ finite constructs to further perpetuate itself as becoming.

The problem with pursuing finite outcomes of ‘becoming,’ like non-dual, beingness, oneness, awakening, enlightenment, rapture, salvation, satori, nirvana, etc, etc, etc, is that the ‘self’ must be rigidly fixed in order to interpret these finite outcomes.

You cannot transcend the ego-self simply by dissolving its experiences through constructing more finite experiences for which to ‘become.’ However, you can perpetuate your 'existence' through infinite constructs that have no outcomes. Of course, infinite constructs are also beliefs, however, they tend not to attach to a predetermined past, but actually look to reinterpret the present moment without reliance on the past and thereby, create an entirely different experience.

To live infinitely is to exist through experiences that have no outcome, since all fixed, time/space outcomes are interpreted as meaningless. But this only asserts that you withhold your meaning and not that meaning is absent.

Make no mistake every guru, enlightened master or “non-dual” claimant you meet, is rigidly attached to a fixed ‘self’ if they teach ‘becoming.’ Whether it be enlightenment, awakening, realization, non-duality, etc, etc. They are teaching finite constructs which are processed as outcomes and those “transcendent” outcomes are considered rewards to be achieved.

INFINITE CONSTRUCTS

Infinite constructs are not bound or supported by past beliefs and require no teaching devices or conceptual subterfuge. Infinite constructs expect no rewards by eschewing all anchor points from the past. They are permeable and immediately open to change, because they are not rigidly attached to any particular ideology or conceptual belief system that requires 'becoming' or any other outcome. You cannot ‘become’ an infinite construct, because it is NOT fixed or predetermined. This can be frightening to an ego relying on its fixations to define itself, yet it can also be 'surprising.'.

You will manufacture and dissolve numerous experiences throughout your life completely of your own volition. However, most will be directly associated with some past ideological fixation, whether it be the monetary-value system (material wealth) or the spiritual-value system (awakening, enlightenment, salvation, non-duality etc), finite constructs are experienced as outcomes or goals to be attained. Make no mistake, anything taught as an outcome to achieve, acquire or become is undeniably a finite ego construct.

You can continue to play ego-games freely and the ego will eventually dissolve itself, but not in anyway you (or it) could ever know. No one owns the truth nor can it be taught and, therefore, no preparation is needed, contrary to popular opinion.

Infinite constructs seek no attainment whatsoever and are unattached to outcomes. Thus, egoic constructs become more associated with simply relating, or ‘relationship’ to other experiences, since all personal experiences are interdependent within an experiential fabric of ‘existence.’ Finite constructs impede relating by perceiving the world through rigid belief systems and associated value systems. It’s as if you knew the truth and this fixation devolves into a compulsion to repeat the past. History is replete with such repetition and this is the world you experience.

Infinite constructs naturally reject outcomes by making them meaningless. Without outcomes relationships are free to emerge as they will and reinterpretation of the ‘self’ is not restricted to past renditions. In addition, the ‘others’ experienced in your ‘world’ are also free to emerge, as no demands need be made by you upon them. Infinite constructs allow the world to BE not as it is, but as it WILL be and your WILL is the deciding factor, because you have freed it from a need for outcomes.

Infinite constructs replace finite constructs in the realization that purposes and functions are unknown to you. Not determining, and applying, purposes and functions to others, you free yourself and them. Thus, you will not ‘perceive’ your personal constructs (world and others) as conforming to expectations because you have none. There is nothing you can do to experience truth, because truth is not constricted to experiences the ego interprets and does not conform to your personal constructs of "awakening." Isn’t that a breath of fresh air?!

Currently you believe everything is open to question except the finite constructs that you have determined are truth. Yet, relative truth has many levels and degrees. Accept that you do not know truth and allow yourself to learn of it because it has no outcome. As long as you remain fixated on your finite constructs, you remain mired in the past. Finite constructs predict the future based on the past and so you will experience what you expect.

Infinite constructs can miraculously change your reality because of your refusal to manufacture experience based on past precedent. Unfortunately, non-reliance on the past will make you seem a little ‘crazy’ in contrast to all the sane and intelligent people seeking rewards through outcomes.

“He who experiences the unity of life sees his own Self in all beings, and all beings in his own Self, and looks on everything with an impartial eye.” - Buddha

Conceptual Imprisonment

Love cannot be conceptually understood and this is why it's not available. However, it can be experienced by engaging to understand it. Unfortunately, you engage from prediction and, therefore, suffer disappointment, because it can never be what you predict.

Attempting to extend outward from a concept is to demonstrate misunderstanding. To experience a concept is, of course, no experience at all. This is equally true for "non-dual awakening." If you think you've experienced “it,” then clearly you haven’t.

Love is an awakening that is unpredictable and cannot be prepared for, since you have no idea what it is. To predict and prepare is to set conditions upon an experience for which you have no understanding. When you think you know, you only imprison another within your concepts, thereby, imprisoning yourself. To define what you need from your own “knowledge” is to deny the truth.

Yet, when you engage without knowing or defining, you allow an openness for surprise.

Surprise is natural, while concepts are completely made up. Love, like enlightenment, must come as a complete surprise. Otherwise, you can be certain you have come prepared for the experience you expect based on what you predicted and, make no mistake, you will have it as expected. Yet, it's funny how what is expected seems to lose value over time, which means your preparations have been useless.

This applies as equally to "non-dual awakening" as it does to love, since both transcend time and are thus, timeless. Prepare for either, based on past learning, and you will experience neither. However, your ego will inform you that you have experienced the concept you were prepared to experience and you, obviously, will become a “believer." Are you a believer?

The world is full of "believers," but exhibits little in the way of truth. Love transcends the world, but if you awaken to it based on the world’s specifications, you have nothing other than what you had before. And who wants that?

To predict is to construct experience based on past learning. What is “loved” is the concept of another and not the other at all. In fact, essentially the other has ceased to exist by becoming a concept that you have constructed for which to fantasize an exchange of conceptual "love" based on your predictions of what it is. But concepts are always empty and there is nothing you can experience from a concept. Duh!

Yet, it’s funny how we look to concepts for our salvation, rather than to each other. But wasn't that the Buddha/Christ message? What happened?

Imprisoning another through a concept means that the other will exist only as a concept and "love" must be predicated upon conformance to that concept and for the ego, nothing else will do and anything less feels like betrayal. Therefore, if another fails to conform to your concepts, the ego can only see "love" as absent and will adjust accordingly.

This is why the ego seeks endlessly for love, but dies without it. To awaken to it, is to live and many realize this just prior to dying. In a moment they immediately understand what they were here for. Do you know what you're here for?

Love is “awakening” to truth and therefore, can come to you only through another because the truth of you is in them. It can’t be realized alone, through deep contemplation or years of meditation. It must be engaged with in the understanding that you cannot predict or prepare for it, whatsoever. Fail to see it in them and you will mistake the truth of yourself and choose your own imprisonment by limiting what you can awaken to in them. This is because "they" are indivisible from "you."

"and all my instincts, they return
and the grand facade, so soon will burn
without a noise, without my pride
I reach out from the inside"

"in your eyes

the light the heat
in your eyes
I am complete

in your eyes
I see the doorway to a thousand churches
in your eyes
the resolution of all the fruitless searches
in your eyes
I see the light and the heat
in your eyes
oh, I want to be that complete
I want to touch the light, the heat I see
in your eyes"

(Peter Gabriel)

TransRelational Awakening

IS THERE A WAY TO TRANSCEND THE EGO?

The ego-self, or separate individual identity seeking to transcend itself, is committed to a hoax. The 'self' cannot transcend it 'self.' Nevertheless, the self attaches to past teachings that continue to inform it that self-transcendence is the end of all suffering and the beginning of infinite bliss. This keeps the self on a treadmill of self-reinforcing through the 'spiritual' projects it attaches to in order to transcend itself.

However, there is a way to dissociate from an exclusive egoic identity by immersing in other egoic identities.

Through deep engagement with another ego-self, the individual egoic identity can be essentially extinguished and awakened to a reality no longer exclusive to itself. The evidence for this is clear, since your most blissful and “enlightening” moments have been in loving extension to, and with, others. However, as soon as the exclusive self-identity resumed control, in opposition to mutual depth, such bliss through self-extension was gradually dissolved as the ego-self agenda predominated.

WHAT ABOUT THE ANCIENT MASTERS WHO “AWAKENED” TO TRUTH ON THEIR OWN

Most authentic past “wisdom” teachers have reported intense experiences of love from individual practices. This may be a mistaken interpretation of the individual ego, which subsumes the entire shared experience for itself when, in fact, this love was a “direct experience" correlated with a yielding extension to others. Most biographers of authentic ancient masters focus entirely on the master’s individual enlightenment ‘episode’ and fail to recognize the relationships from which this episode is directly correlated with and emerged from. Even today the focus is on some linear transference of “truth,” while the deeply engaged teacher-student relationship is ignored or minimized as subordinate to the transmission of proprietary truth.

I suggest that nothing is ever transferred. However, truth is encountered simply because it is touched, or engaged with, through the intimate depth of relationship to one or more others. In other words, love or enlightenment is an emergent creative truth, solely contingent on the relationship between teacher student and having nothing to do with any linear transmission of truth. Truth is experienced IN the relationship. relationship is the content and the type of relationship, teacher-student, is merely another of many forms relationships take.

The deeply engaged and intimate relationship is not conduit to truth, but is the truth itself.

ARE YOU SAYING THAT I HAVE TO BE IN LOVE WITH SOMEONE TO BE ENLIGHTENED?

Love is unknown factor of 'reality' and only exists as a relative approximate interpretation based on the conditions determined by each separate mind (6 billion minds, to be more exact). Therefore, to seek love with another is merely an opportunity for the ego-self to apply its own conditions based on its own conceptual interpretation of love. This negates an absolute or non-conditional love or the Truth that we seek to awaken to.

Therefore, you cannot be “in love” with another, but you can seek to encounter love, with the understanding that you have no idea or accurate concept of absolute or unconditional love. Your only option is to seek to encounter an ‘experience’ of love by extracting your conditions from which this love can be encountered or “awakened” to and this would be an “enlightenment” episode from which insight, not of this world (truth), would be realized.

Keep in mind that the forms of expression are unimportant and confining love to specific forms only restricts the experience. However, you can employ the forms (parent-child, marriage, etc) that exist in your life presently to engage in the depth of intimacy through which you can be “awakened” to this truth. Nevertheless, romantic relationships are unnecessary and one could engage in the depth of intimate awakening through other relationship ‘forms’ such as parent-child, siblings, coworkers, friends, etc, etc, etc. The content is available through whatever form the deep engagement occurs. However, demanding that only certain forms are required to experience enlightenment (love) is to impede the experience and this is exactly what we do in seeking out the “teacher-student” relationship as the only means of awakening or enlightenment.

Therefore, as with the Christ message of "love thy neighbor as thyself," the reference to neighbor would include any relationship form you are currently involved with. This message is also presented in “A Course in Miracles” and the recommendation is to seek this intimate awakening, or “Holy Instant” experience through all relationships, no matter what form the relationship takes.

SO ARE YOU SAYING I SHOULD JUST GIVE UP MY MEDITATION AND ENGAGE INTIMATELY WITH OTHERS?

Absolutely not. However, you may wish to restructure the ideological premises of your meditative practices to take on a new role of facilitating shared extension as opposed to, or superior to, individual seeking or awakening. Now instead of facilitating self-awakening, meditation may serve as a means of clearing blocks that impede relationship depth. But it will be through relationships that impediments to love are realized and not solitary practices.

As such, meditative practices allow a calm, centered-self that facilitates a deeper engagement with others. A depth of engagement with others facilitates a depth of engagement with the world. Thus, nature no longer becomes a means of spiritual bypassing or escape from a world of others, but becomes a “spiritual” experience only to be shared with others and not to be simply engaged with alone. The more nature is a shared experience the more we no longer use it as means of escape to protect the psychological self, but as a means of enhancing a collective shared self.

The theory that mediation allows for the identification of self-defects or shadows is a flawed theory of egoic proportions. This presupposes that the self-concept was established separate from relationship and the constant flux of engaging with and fearing intimacy or deep understanding.

TransRelational awakening is an encounter with truth through understanding that your only purpose is to engage deeply with others in order to engage with your 'self' and the world since there is no division except in the egoic mind.

Populist Gurus and Spiritual Cowboys

Spiritual populism is certainly on the rise in the west and the cowboy-gurus are poppin' out of the woodwork. I imagine that as empirical reality begins to severely bite folks in the arse, many will begin turning to these circus masters.

It's interesting that we seek for new, more sustainable ideas for evolving the empirical world, but continue to accept the same old spiritual claptrap from the spiritual cowboys and 'action-heroes' of "awakening."

Consciousness clearly exhibits it’s resistance to evolution in its compulsion to repeat and idolize the same tired old stories over and over again.

Here's an interview with Jed Mckenna, another populist guru singing the same sad songs we’ve all heard, ad nauseum, for centuries. I was going to purchase one of his books until I read this interview. I was not surprised to encounter the same pithy “pointing to the moon” platitudes that are repeated endlessly.

However, I will admit that Jed's a bit different from the norm in that he adds that good 'ole fundamentalist “fire and brimstone,” of the early 20th century evangelist preachers, to non-dual entertainment. Now we have non-dualist teacher as evangelical cowboy lassoing you for the big round-up of souls. Jed McKenna's gonna beat that 'dualism' right outa ya!

Notice that his third book is called "Spiritual Warfare." Seems to me if we could just get rid of all the testosterone tainted spirituality out there, we might be able to finally get somewhere with this "awakening" business. It is becoming clear, with all these western gurus, that you can't be "male" and enlightened too. But that's just a growing observation I've been experiencing and, obviously, I lump myself in that pile.

In the interview “Jed” tells us what “awakening” is NOT about:

“If it’s soothing or comforting, if it makes you feel warm and fuzzy; if it’s about getting into pleasant emotional or mental states; if it’s about peace, love, tranquility, silence or bliss; if it’s about a brighter future or a better tomorrow; if it makes you feel good about yourself or boosts your self-esteem, tells you you’re okay, tells you everything’s just fine the way it is; if it offers to improve, benefit or elevate you, or if it suggests that someone else is better or above you; if it’s about belief or faith or worship; if it raises or alters consciousness; if it combats stress or deepens relaxation, or if it’s therapeutic or healing, or if it promises happiness or relief from unhappiness, if it’s about any of these or similar things, then it’s not about waking up. Then it’s about living in the dreamstate, not smashing out of it.”

Ahhh… how the western mind loves to “smash” its way to enlightenment, “bring it on dude, I’ll blast ya! Let's kick some ass people!" So who's the Alien we've got to destroy? Why none other than the evil and dreaded "ego" and its "dreamstate" world.

Jed's a hard worker and his brand of enlightenment easily conforms to the paradigm of working to transcend the ego or "no pain, no gain." I’ll bet you his ego loves it and yours will too!

Jed’s “awakening” is:

“On the other hand, if it feels like you’re being skinned alive, if it feels like a prolonged evisceration, if you feel your identity unraveling, if it twists you up physically and drains your health and derails your life, if you feel love dying inside you, if it seems like death would be better, then it’s probably the process of awakening. That, or a helluva case of gas.”

Skinned alive, prolonged evisceration, twisted, drained and derailed, dying inside and seeming like death…is “awakening.” LOL! Seems more like a Bruce Willis movie to me.

Notice that the interviewer writes that Jed’s hobbies are, “he plays video games, he rides a mountain bike, he skydives, he reads Walt Whitman. Jed McKenna is an enlightened teacher.”

Walt Whitman? So what happened to “O CAPTAIN! my Captain! our fearful trip is done.”

Nope! Not for Jed. He’s no sissy and in this game, only the strong survive.

So how do we know he’s “awakened”? Well..he said so.
But also “he had an ashram in Iowa, numerous students (several of whom became enlightened), and has three books to his name.” There ya have it, folks. He’s awakened others and wrote books about it. What more proof do you need?

But Jed recognizes he doesn’t fit the bill for your average enlightened guy. But he don’t care a speck,

“a few pockets of resistance pop up, but I plow over them. Their indignation is as meaningless to me as the growls of little pink puppies. I’m indulging myself with a somewhat more forceful manner of communicating now, mainly for my own amusement, and their reaction at this stage is not a factor.”

Ha! And he eats "little pink puppies" for breakfast, don't ya know! This guy sounds like a goon from the Sopranos. He just plows over 'em, yee haw!

Good grief…"but where are the clowns? Quick, send in the clowns. Don't bother, they're here."

So how how does our super-hero want you to "awaken"?

“An exodus not outward toward Japan or India or Tibet, but inward, toward the self—toward self-reliance, toward self-determination, toward a common sense approach to figuring out just what the hell’s going on around here. A wiping of the slate. A fresh start. Sincere, intelligent people dispensing with the past and beginning anew. Beginning by asking themselves, "Okay, where are we? What do we know for sure? What do we know that’s true?"

Yea, well (yawn) we’ve heard that “seek the kingdom within” spiel before. Nothing much new here. However, for Jed this “truth’ is mighty painful and your gonna suffer mightily for it. Non-dualism meets the crucifixion (playing at a theater near you!)

But then imagine my surprise when the interviewer writes this:

“Jed McKenna doesn't exist (I'm sure "he" would agree with this on one level!) -- there is no teacher named Jed, no ashram in Iowa, and no students as described in his books. It is all a fake. What evidence do I have for this? the fact that there is no evidence for any of it. No photos, no face-to-face meetings, no one saying they have ever met the man, much less been a student of his (I welcome any evidence to the contrary)."

"McKenna expertly diffuses this objection.”

JED: "This whole thing really has nothing to do with me personally and it would be counter-productive to shift the focus onto me. I’m not relevant to anyone’s search. I’m just a finger pointing at the moon. There’s nothing to be learned from the finger. Everybody’s eager to find a distraction from the real work of waking up, but that’s all it is, a distraction.”

So there is NO Jed Mckenna and just a finger pointing at the moon? HA!

Doesn’t matter though. Who cares who Jed Mckenna is? Not Jed, since "Jed McKenna" is a pseudonym. Now we have dozens of blogs all gossiping about who Jed McKenna really is.

But here is an important point that "Jed" makes, “Don't you think it's reasonable to ask to know a teacher's success rate? The proof is in the pudding, right? Didn't you ask them about the fruit of their teachings when you started with them?"

Well, maybe that’s not because of the teacher, but because there is NO “enlightenment.” Therefore, anyone who proclaims to teach a fiction should stick to writing books and therefore, "Jeds" teaching is fictionally relevant.

Your experiences are NOT "illusory" and there is no “real” that you need seek. But don’t tell the seekers. Unfortunately, when the new inmate enters the asylum, confidently proclaiming himself Jesus, all the other inmates quickly vie to become his disciple. Look at the history of "awakening" and this "monkey see-monkey do" process becomes abundantly clear. The whole paradigm is an ego fixation. It's time for awakening into the anti-awakening movement. You will learn the truth, but the learning is infinite and can have no outcome.

In fact, if you want to start “awakening” you’re probably better off not reading books by these self-proclaimed charlatans and I haven’t found one that doesn’t fit that bill. However, "Jed" has offered you one piece of sound advice.

Read Walt Whitman.

Now there’s a real guru and a truly enlightened teacher!

NEW ADDENDUM TO THIS POST - "Making Egos Real (or Jed McKenna is one big fact ego)" 

What are You Defending Against in This Moment

It’s never really about attack, since attack comes from the need to defend. Attack is merely an aspect of an ego defense system. However, your ego-self system is ever vigilant against attack (psychological and physical) and this is because it's an active player in the game of death. The objective of that game is different from all 'life' games since you must avoid the outcome rather than seek it. In avoiding this outcome we press into our experience of 'life' by demanding outcomes to life experiences to prove our 'living' and this involves the enlightenment or awakening paradigms.

Enlightenment is sought in 'life' primarily in opposition to the experience of 'death.' It is conceived as the greatest method of asserting 'self' into the experience of 'world,' in opposition to the most diminished experience which we refer to as death (or end of 'self').

However, keep in mind that the ego-self is not as concerned about ending it’s concept of ‘body” as it is with ending the total experience of a ‘self,’ in which the body is only one part of that comprehensive integrated experience.

This is because ‘self’ is only an experience. Its 'world' has no tangible or physical properties only the experience of tangible and physical properties. The ego-self constructs numerous and variable experiences for which to ‘live’ (experience) through its construct of 'self.'

Yet, your ego-self has no experience of death, other than an experience of 'inevitability' and you do experience that everyday.

The ego-self constructs each and every experience it encounters and this is why there are no coincidences in 'life' ("you" just deny responsibility and that denial is the foundation of an 'ego-self'). It provides itself with teachers and teaching moments (and not the ones you consciously choose). This helps maintain an experience of a ‘world’ as directly received from a 'world.' Nevertheless, it cannot construct the experience of death and this cannot be taught from the 'world.' Oh sure, it can experience others dying, but, it cannot construct its own experience of death since it allows for no teachers or teaching moments in time.

Since it has no experience of death, but death is conceptualized as inevitable, it is conceptualized as an 'ending.' This entails a moment to moment self-experience we refer to as "mortality." It is this mortality that makes the ego-self entirely unsafe with itself. How can you trust what you teach yourself (and you pretty much teach yourself everything) if within the construct of 'self' is mortality and the complete cessation of 'self' at any moment?

Certainly, the world provides theoretical and conceptual teachings on death (religion and spirituality), but always doubt is inherent in every theory simply because they cannot be tested. But obviously the ego-self will construct an experience of death since death is inherent to its self-construct and this is because it constructs the experience of ‘others’ dying. Yet, the experience of death, unlike other life experiences cannot ever be confirmed until the moment of death.

Therefore, you are never NOT constructing an experience of death in your experience of life and this tends to put a damper on things.

All of our experiences tend to interface with one another and this is why just having “intent,” as the Law of Attraction proponents advocate, is rather inconsequential, since any 'intention' construct must compete with its opposite. What’s important about the egoic experiential construct of death is that you will spend your entire ‘life’ constructing your experience of death and this is the function of all religious-spiritual concepts and ideologies.

However, you will NOT realize or 'know' the culmination of this death-construct until the time of death. It’s not important to realize the ‘when’ of death, because the game is about preparing for that 'event' at any moment and this is why death is the only experience the ego-self must defend against IN every moment. Since it cannot define or construct it, it must therefore always be vigilantly prepared for it. Interestingly enough, there are examples of individuals who, upon accepting the diagnosis of a terminal condition, discard all preparation and report this to be the most joyous time of their entire life.

Essentially, your defense against death is how the ego-self defines life because all assertion of ego-self into the world is in opposition to death. To "live life to the fullest" is only to oppose the dualistic opposite of life, which is death. The paradox is that the ego-self construct, or experience of ‘self,’ includes living-unto-death within it and this tends to buffer or dumb down all experiences because deeply inherent within each experience of living, is the construct of death. Subsequently, Living-unto-death reinforces the experience of ‘time’ because there is so little of it available to 'life.'

All ego-self experiences tend to dualistically nest within each other reinforcing and canceling-out other experiences and this merely supports the ego’s need TO experience ceaselessly. Will the ego-self experience ceaselessly after death? The answer is denied because there is no construct of experience through which to define itself in-death. This demands 'fear' and fear is the warning to the self of the immediacy and mortality of death, because it has no experience to go on.

The name of this game is defense and your defenses reinforce the ego-self concept of death and this is what must be defended against through asserting the ego-self into its experience of ‘world.’ But how can you assert into life and defend against death at the same time? Essentially, "you" have no choice since you cannot escape the dualistic 'self' that "you" require. To completely end one process would end the other and you would cease to exist and "you" certainly cannot allow that to happen. You cannot just defend against death or assert for life. You must do both, alternately and cyclically.

However, you can experience a reduction of defense, and this seems equivalent to the levels of the enlightenment experience. Recognize the ego-self use of defenses to protect the ‘self’ against death (not just embodied self, but more importantly the psychological self). This defending against can be experienced from moment to moment, like when your child talks back to you, you are cut off in traffic, argue with a coworker, etc, etc, any experience that has anger, anxiety, depression or guilt is solely related to fear of death. Anything that threatens the self-package is treated as threat of an end to the experience of 'self.'

Keep in mind that it’s not survival of the body that is of most concern, but the survival of the whole experience of ‘self,' including body, mind, others and world. If the psychological component of ‘self’ is threatened (the experience we believe as located in "mind") this is equal to bodily threat and can create as much panic and fear as if the body were threatened.

It is fear that you defend against because it warns of death. This fear creates vigilance and vigilance demands defense and constant defense can drain you to exhaustion (but this will not stop it because of your dire need to defend). Stillness of mind and body (not necessarily “meditation”) is helpful in recognizing your perpetual vigilance toward defense. This is because all your hustle and bustle, within your experience of ‘world,’ is actually from fear. Let fear guide you to your defenses so that you can fully examine why you do what you do. Therefore, the question is, when I experience fear, what am I defending against in this moment and what is the purpose I have assigned to this fear.

This might help you realize the need to do less, since it’s only the experience of death that you are protecting yourself from in all your 'doings' and to limit such self-protection can be quite liberating to say the least. Essentially, you must substitute the need to defend with an evolving experience of complete safety.

Good Luck With That!