CALISTHENICS FEBRUARY 3/4 1981 AWARENESS AND COSCIOUSNESS ---PARADIGMS ---THE PRACTICE OF DYING ---- FIELD A-- -
If we look at only three types of awareness (sensory, emotional and mental), we notice that the combination of the three gives you nine possibilities. Of these nine possibilities, people are educated to register only the sensory - sensory, sensory - emotional and sensory-mental -- discarding or possibly negating the others.
When you have a deep experience and you want to express it, you often have a very hard time finding words. You discover that the ability of your mind to make words expressing the impression is very poor -- not reliable at all. Sometimes you come out with words, then you have to take them back; you try another way, the resonance is half good or not good at all so you try again ... until you realize that each time you actually have a fullness of livance that is not acknowledged by your consciousness. Your consciousness is trained to acknowledge the sensory side of only three levels -- that's all.
You know that you make concepts about every experience you have in life. You figure out that things are so -- because you sense them that way, or you were told, or because science says so etc. You build one concept-- after the other and when you outgrow one concept you build another one.
Now if you go into a more basic situation, you have what might he called an overarching concept -- one that covers the entire system of concepts you use. This is called a paradigm.
A paradigm has a property which few people are aware of: It is self-validating. This means that if you adopt a paradigm overarching concept ) , whether you do it knowingly or unknowingly, you tend to gather only those experiences that will validate the paradigm and reject all others.
For instance: We live in the Western hemisphere in a Christian country and the majority of people belong to any of a number of Christian religions and follow an overarching understanding that man is born in sin and has to redeem himself -- this is supposed to be the teaching of the Bible.
Now, if you open the Bible to the first page it says: "Man was created in the image and likeness of God" -- this is the paradigm that the Bible sets in the first sentence. It's very well defined. Whereas, the angle of approach of popular religion is that we have to reach it, if we can, because we are sinners
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What I want you to realize is that willingly or not you are caught within the paradigm that society uses -- you were born within a region that adopts a given paradigm and you live according to it. And, you behave in a way that makes it real -- even if it is not.
In another example of how you follow a commonly-accepted pattern in your conceptualizing: They have recently discovered that the paradigm used in the western hemisphere is not the same as the paradigm used in the Eastern hemisphere; so, for example, when Westerners study Eastern spiritual science, they study within their own paradigm not the Eastern one. Now, very obviously, the eastern science goes along the Eastern paradigm not the Western one. When Westerners study Eastern mysticism they are looking for the phenomenal side – they want to see something "special" -- something that can be measured scientifically -- while, keen observers have realized, for the Easterner the Phenomena is possibly a side effect that is of no importance.
How will you ever have a chance to fulfill the words of Jesus:"You will do the same things and still greater ones"? Within the accepted paradigm you cannot; you can spend your whole life trying and it won't work. Whatever way you try it simply cannot work because you work under the rule of that paradigm. Change the paradigm and you have a chance, but you have to change. It's not just a minor change within a paradigm, it is the change of your entire angle of approach. If you change the overarching angle of approach you change completely. It means work, but the paradigm, has to change.
Then, once you have learned to change the paradigm, you can possibly learn that you can go without a paradigm at all. You can outgrow a
8concept or many, concepts, why couldn't you outgrow a paradigm or all the paradigms?
Now I have a shock for you. We have read recently that there is a man who has collected studies done on the event of birth using hypnotism to investigate how much unconscious awareness of birth a child has. The study was undertaken by hypnotizing mothers and children and questioning them separately as to the events surrounding the birth. And, according to the study ,the descriptions of both mothers and children concurred to an amazing degree ( down to the behavior of the doctors, nurses and other present in the room; instruments used, etc.) -- which made the study quite meaningful.
And the thing that came out of this study was that the child was never a child -- it was a full-fledged being trying to cope with a small body.
Now extrapolate: This destroys the entire paradigm based on stages of development from child to adult and the whole system surrounding it. All of psychology is based on this paradigm and you buy it.
How do you put together your overall understanding of having to grow, reach a higher level, mature from childhood to adult with the results of the study just described?
There is a full-fledged Being to begin with and it has no age. This is how we see you all the time -- and not--after reading the article.
We live in a very interesting period of time -- a time of tremendous change -- and you have evidences popping up all along the way. We have already discussed the new physics and here we have another example. The life of a human being is much more than what shows -- so if you want to know what to "do" -- live according to it.
It related to the experience of one participant who realized that the movement was already going on and that the movement was the activity. When you gain a little confidence you can let the movement work and let all the activism of the person drop. The movement is the doing, so the person does not need to do anything (which is actually a kind of copying movement). If you let the movement work though-out the person, you will notice that the person will change by the action of the movement, not by the action of your own personal mind -- which will mean that you will be able to act with or without personal awareness or personal understanding. You will learn that your identity is relative, because obviously you generated the movement and you are no longer the person -- maybe then you will realize (not understand but live) what we mean when we say that we see you differently than you see yourself.
Since you were a child you, have learned to work, with your brain in a standard way, In the work we do you don't have to free yourself from one standard and adopt another, you have to be able to work without any paradigm of any kind.
When what you experienced over Christmas takes over, little by little, the paradigms are gone -- utterly gone. You experience a movement, for instance, and at first you want to "do something" with it, but then you suddenly realize that the movement is the action. And, the action is generated by a "you" that the consciousness doesn't know because it is located in another order of life.
How can you know it? There are many, many ways within the knowing paradigm and all lead to the point where you must finally drop the paradigm, itself.
There are signs ... Look at yourself when you express: You have the fullness of livens in a given situation, but the expression is terribly poor. This is your everyday situation. It means that the way your paradigm works is not fit. If it is not fit, change it. For a long time now, I have suggested that you live with the fullness of livens -- without trying to understand -- until it expresses throughout.
Of course, you have thoughts, perceptions about, but this is not living it. When you live it you forget about the perceptions.
…..When you begin practicing an exercise for instance -- you apply the system instead of living. Whereas the evidence of an exercise can be practically instantaneous and the exercise is already finished. You take the position, you live the evidence and that's it. But, the ability to take the position is not instantaneous because of the resistance of the habits; so you learn to take the position and one day you can really do it easily.
To discover that behind the desire, for instance, there is a kind of overarching need; behind the need you have several openings (at least two ) : one leading to soul -- this is an experience not a movement of the mind.
When we play music together it's an experience, whether you understand it or not.
If further on in the book you challenge your own thoughts and the challenge triggers another position, this means that the challenge itself comes from another position -- again, it's an experience.
As long as your attention is on applying an exercise you won't go far. If it is spontaneous it will work, after that it's routine and doesn't work anymore. However if it becomes a discipline of position, that's another story because when you take a position it's a little bit like changing your paradigm.
You have an inbred understanding of exercising that is practically automatic, but we mean something else -- it's something you have to live. You cannot exercise living -- it's spontaneous -- but you can exercise changing position.
But what I really want you to understand is that you are not the child. The human mind must adjust to this situation instead of relying on the appearance of things. You rely on the words being said ... What are you living now? Why not live with the evidence. It's there all the time, it's simply a matter of learning to check yourself and change position -- until you can be in no position at all (which is not an absence of position, but a condition where you don't speak of position at all).
In society you are very rarely yourself. You have an image of yourself, an image of what people around you are, and you handle situations according to these images. You present a facade according to what you believe you are. What about being fully open, making available all that is hidden -- total exposure. Symbolically speaking, you expose everything that is inside your body for all to see. You could do the same thing with your feelings, thoughts -- everything you don't show. If you are available for work it is always the whole of you, you cannot hide anything.
In the reality of life you cannot hide anything -- it simply is not possible. Just because you are blind does not mean that everyone else is blind. In the work that we do we are not alone -- then is always a "we". It's no good to ignore the ability of others to see. You simply are as you are.
The Practice of Dying.
You know that death has a very real place in esoteric language; you die to old positions, old points of view, old ways of acting and so on. You have minor deaths (trends and habits that are no longer satisfactory etc.) and you also die when you let go of your body -- this is a very popular one.
Your ability to change depends a lot on your ability to die, so in this exercise you are going to give up everything that you know: cravings, habits, the way you see your surroundings, the way you see people, including yourself -- everything.
But I want to stress that the purpose of the exercise is not to reach a high condition far away from earth, the main movement is one of getting away from everything and allowing the dampening veil to act. What happens after is another story. We are mainly concerned with your effectiveness in dropping your patterning, conceptualizing, paradigms , etc . We are concerned with your ability to drop your ties (of any kind) because they are reflected ties not the real ones. It's not easy, but if you have the courage to do it you will live a beauty and freedom that cannot be put into words.
First, relax (you are dead). There is no time delay, you are immediately caught by death. Now.
Feel yourself going. Consciously let go of everything, all that you are tied to, including the people your are closest to, even us, even your own children -- as it actually happens in death.
Very concretely let go of everything that holds you.
Then, a gray veil will settle between you and the surroundings. This veil has a dampening effect -- all sounds are dampened and the reality of what was is dampened as well.
The veil is here in the room, it doesn't go away with you. You go away, away from the veil. Symbolically, you go away from the earth itself. You put a distance between yourself and everything that you know. If you become aware that you've brought something with you, you drop it with a distance and move further away. The distance is, however, not in miles, but rather in planes (levels if you want).
And when you go away you go backwards, facing what you knew here -- until you are so far away that the earth is completely gone, and all the conditions related to life on earth are gone too. when you come to this point, allow yourself to bloom in the new condition.
You have no body, it's gone. There is no etheric condition, no astral condition, no mental condition, no condition of any kind that belongs to what you have known. If you practice this exercise very seriously, your usual mode of awaring will go. You will live an awareness that is not body-based, not even personality-based.
If you do the exercise properly -- which means that you mean it and do it -- you might receive a shock, because suddenly it's now. If you have strong ties with certain people, certain situations, certain types of work, you have to drop them now -- no waiting. You might not feel ready to do it, but you do it anyway because it's now.
Of course, the idea of being "ready for" is kind of artificial. Life is an ongoing movement, it doesn't stop somewhere. When you die you are in an ongoing movement you drop your personality, but you continue. And, you remain yourself, whether alive or dead. Since you remain yourself, you will notice that the "dead" condition does not exist. You drop the body, yes, but you are not dead.
Also, when you practice dying -- meaning you let go until everything is gone and you really live another condition -- it will show in the field. The field will become more and more empty .
If you really practice you will find that it is extremely enjoyable to die. You let go of all the heaviness..
Participant: This exercise seems different from "Down-and-away" -- what relationship do they have to one another?
Martin: They are the same, except this dying is a more fundamental "Down-and--away". "Down-and-Away" is only an introduction in which you learn to drop your thoughts, for instance, until there is no thought movement, but in the practice of dying everything goes, including your body. It's related to Major Death. In Major Death you drop everything.
….In the book we speak of Major Death. Actually Major Death is much more than the kind of dying we are working with in this exercise. In the dying exercise you express something that is quite real but you can't go -further than a certain distance (whatever distance means, of course -- not necessarily a distance in miles - it can be a distance in levels). But, you can't go further than a certain point because your are linked to the incarnation process. If you go through Major Death, this is gone, you are no longer linked. In Hindu terminology you have the Jivanmukta , meaning the free man, the man who is no longer bound to the wheel of incarnation. This means that people who have not "reached" that stage are compulsively bound to incarnation. It's the old way of expressing. You may continue to incarnate, but it is your choice -- meaning you accept a task and you do it -- but there is no compulsion, it's your movement.
…..: In mastery, the main action is done from the soul (or higher) but not lower . As Jesus said: "It's not me but the Father in me". You speak of mastery with the "me" not the Father in you. So the paradigm at the base is no good.
It's surprising to see how people skip the main point. "If you haven't opened the eyes of the spirit you are in darkness indeed." Practically no one knows what that means. Everyone thinks that because they have a mind they have opened the eyes of the spirit. "If the blind lead the blind...shall they not fall into the same pit". These words are forgotten -- they are too embarrassing. If you die to one condition it means you are born into another. The cross has two sides.
We are now going to play the same music for you to look either at the field with Georgette or with me, or obviously both. You don't have to go with it, but look for what you can sense. As you see me now, I'm speaking and coming to you at your level, as I am dying that level is going to change.
….. If I am dying it doesn't mean that I am inactive. I can be active on this earth whether alive or dead. For your sensory mode there is a difference, yes, but remember the sensory mode is based on the brain and nervous system, among other things. When you die this is gone. You can, in another condition, train yourself to recognize the awareness that is not brain based. There is a difference -- a very typical difference. But I'm speaking of the same awareness : the mind that is brain-based and the mind that is not brain-based, for instance. This is where the confusion always steps in, because people read about Mind and they "mind" it brain-wise, and it's not meant that way, so there is some confusion.
If you train in dying, the awareness that shows itself little by little will allow you to go from being alive to being dead with practically no difference for you -- it's simply that the brain-based aspect is gone, and the limitations related to it will be gone too.
…..You know, when we work, we always look first at what is going on --it's above consciousness, but it's still what is going on -- and we step in consciously with what is going on. It's not the consciousness that decides. I can decide what I'm going to tell you, but what goes with it cannot be decided before we are here together because there is an overall action that implies you and also what is going on in the room that is more than you -- this has to be taken into account. So the action does not come from the mind figuring something out.
I'll give you another example: We have given you an exercise to do that we call Field-A. Field-A is highly directive. When you live Field-A the direction is given, there is no need to look for something else. The need exists if A is a fantasy; it does not exist if the A is real.
Or, you have heard of core activity. Suppose the core activity in you is alive, and suppose we come through you that way -- more or less consciously for you -- and you ask yourself what you can do ... Stop! It is in the core activity and this decides. The movement is already going on and this movement is the activity (and you want to superimpose a picture on it).
Learn to rely on basic activities -- even if your mind does not understand. You (the real you) can set in motion an activity that is completely unconscious, then set the personality to rest and let the activity go on, and it works -- which is in direct contradiction to the overall assumption of the consciousness that nothing can be going on if the consciousness is not involved. The paradigm again -- you have to change it.
When you gain a little confidence you can let the movement work and let all the activism of the person drop. The movement is the doing, so the person does not need to do anything (which is actually a kind of copying movement). If you let the movement work through-out the person, you will notice that the person will change by the action of the movement, not by the action of your own personal mind -- which will mean that you will be able to act with or without personal awareness or personal understanding. You will learn that your identity is relative, because obviously you generated the movement and you are no longer the person -- maybe then you will realize (not understand but live) what we mean when we say that we see you differently than you see yourself.