Outside the Window

I’d like to tell you a little story that is true....

One day, I had completely exhausted all of my usual ways of entertaining myself and I still had time to fill. I had played with my dolls and colored, and God knows what else. So, I decided to sit and look out the window. The next step unfolded quite naturally. I thought that I would experiment to see what something could happen while doing nothing. Something out of nothing! I was very curious about what might happen. But, I had no idea what! So, I turned our big cushy chair around to face the window and sat in it. I decided to just look at the big maple tree in front of our house and sit in the chair. And I waited. I just gazed. I think I had enough faith and curiosity combined to just simply sit and see. I felt empty.

That was the action within non action. I was opening to a possibility. Sitting there felt satisfying enough. And, I began to explore the tree very slowly. I was aware of how clear this picture was. I saw the branches and the different shades of black and the green of the leaves. My vision took in the shape of the leaves, baby leaves and really big ones, their directions hanging on the limb, the different sizes of the branches and twigs and how they were all so unique, like snowflakes. I traced their own path to reach the sun. I was lead to discover the space between the branches and a whole new world within that space. I noticed that I was very still and actively calm. There was a sweet, warm energy flowing in my body and mind.

Then, I began to notice something very interesting. And, very exciting and new! I couldn’t think about it with my mind! I was just allowed to notice it with my experience of what was inside of me and what was outside of me. It was like the window that was separating me and the outside just opened up. And, that openness was the something! The tree and me were having the same experience of “something”! We weren’t two separate things anymore, me and the tree. The “something” that was glistening cool diamonds of light sparkling in the tree and the sky and the branches and leaves was the same cool sweet feeling moving inside my whole body. I could sense myself in the tree and the tree could sense me and we perfectly still together even though the leaves were moving. We were occupying the same space. Just open light and love together, in this endless moment of pure awareness and being. It was all around me, in me, outside of me .and it was all the same. The tree was alive in me. It was in my eyes, my hair, my arms, my whole body, and I was inside of the branches and the trunk and the leaves and all the never-ending spaces in between. One becoming two and two becoming one.

When I experienced this, I felt so happy. I was amazed and very satisfied to know that there really was something in nothing, and that my question had been answered. I was very happy to be alive and grateful to know the secret living in the tree and in me. I didn’t quite know what to do with this information, but there was a completion in just knowing it. I saw the tree , went through it and found the sky on the other side. It was emptiness and it was fullness, simultaneously. Then, I heard my mother call me for lunch.

Written by Karen Ferguson

Sambogakaya

Recently I became aware of another dimension of being, another realm of experience of pure awareness that seemed, at once, totally divine and totally natural. I would not be able to separate the two. In it, I moved, breathed and sat in a large expanse of energy that was a crystalline structure of infinite length and depth. The matter of which it was formed was that of the highest and most refined light and of the essence of purity. Trying to describe this dimension is like trying to catch a reflection of a prism on a sunny day. It was there only to embrace with the entirety of my being. Ripples of light danced on the smooth surface of a pristine blue lake, extending into the horizon, and into the depths below. There was a silent echo in this space. Being in it and of it, there was a soft flow and a natural protection around me, which was so comforting. I know this space so intimately and trust it so deeply. I know that this is not a dissociative or disembodied state of consciousness that I’m experiencing. Nor, is it a trance state.

There is also a feeling of an intelligent force beyond me that is shining and revealing everything encircling this field around me. I sense intensity in this crystal home but it is more a benevolent healing frequency that bears no burden. It is like swimming in a crystal sea that has miraculous powers of purification, but there is no water. With every breath I am aware of this soft and natural light moving in me and around me. It is as if the light is filling every cell and each cell is opening to grace. There is an endless fountain of love to move in and with. It belongs to me and I am very grateful to all of my great teachers who embody this light and have lived in this truth. They have been so patient and so kind.

I am myself, truly and peacefully. As I extend into this light, I am saddened that there are people who are outside of this light. My wish is that everyone comes to know the light of their own Self. The crystal palace, as Rudy named it, is “home sweet home”. I want everyone to bathe in this soft water of love.

Healing resides in the crystal palace of the sambogakaya realm. I have found myself enveloped by light that embraces time and dissolves the edges of limitation. In this natural surrounding everything is effortless. Healing descends in this eternal abode of light. There is an omnipotent field of possibility and it seems sealed off, like a room without walls. It seems sealed in a vacuum of light and the master healers are busy at work. I am in a timeless void and merge in this light. I am healed as well. I have come to love this process and know that this process loves me.I feel myself moving in this light and am waking up to it’s presence with such delight and joy. It is like a great Homecoming.

If you like, you may join me in entering this realm. There really isn’t much to do, I don’t think, because it will just appear. There really isn’t anything to look for, either. You may begin to feel yourself being supported by the most benevolent field of energy. You may feel that your heart naturally grows and expands. You can lean forward an inch and may become aware of a cushiony presence of light that is so soft to the touch. It is a loving presence and with it there is a deep recognition and total acceptance of your entire being. With every breath you are able to move freely and more deeply into this gentle but strong presence. You might notice a feeling of timelessness and support beneath you and all around you. Notice the feeling of being held and completely known by this gentle breath of light. This is the world of light, within you and all around you. You are being invited to know that this is your own true Self; this is your true home. Even as you open your eyes, and become aware of the world around you, the crystal light of beingness remains. This light stays on.

Written by Karen Ferguson

DZOGCHEN AS A PHENOMENOLOGICAL THEOPHANIC MANIFESTATION

1. THE GREEK WORD PHANES MEANS APPARITION OR APPEARANCE….OF DIVINITY.

2. THE GREEK WORD PHAINO MEANS TO SHOW OR TO MANIFEST OR DISPLAY. TO APPEAR. APPEARING, SHOWING, MANIFESTING, APPARITION. PHANINO MEANS TO BRING TO LIGHT OR TO BRING INTO APPEARANCE. PHANEROS MEANS TO SHOW OR DISPLAY, TO MANIFEST.

3. PHENOMENOLOGY AS METHOD COMES FROM THIS WORD…THE EXPERIENCE OF APPEARANCE. ..THE UNFOLDING OF MULTIDIMENSIONAL APPEARANCE, THE ARTICULATION OF APPEARANCE AS KNOWLEDGE. THE PATH OF DZOGCHEN IS THE PATH OF AWARENESS WITHIN APPEARANCE AND APPEARANCE WITHIN AWARENESS. THE PATH OF PHENOMENOLOGY IS THE ARTICULATION OF APPEARING WITHIN EXPERIENCE.

4. THEOPHANY MEANS THE APPARITION OF DIVINITY WITHIN AND THROUGH APPEARANCE. DIVINITY MANIFESTING THROUGH PHENOMENA. THEOPHANY IS THE APPARITION OF GOD, DEUS…

5. AND SO AWARENESS AS YOU AND I KNOW IS MULTIDIMENSIONAL, THIS WONDERFUL AWARENESS MAY BE CONSIDERED A THEOPHANY…WE OFTEN THINK ABOUT THIS THEOPHANY IN ITS VERTICAL OR ASCENDANT HORIZON… THE GEOMETRY OF ASCENDANCY…OF MANIFESTATION. PURE AWARENESS UNBOUND OPENNESS OF DARK LUMINOSITY, ARISING AND MANIFESTING IS THE COSMIC LIGHT AND VORTEXES AND THE ARCHETYPAL DIMENSION OF THE DEITIES OR DEVAS OR DAKINIS…AND THEN THE ELEMENTS BECOME FLESH….ARISING OUT OF VOID, THE LIGHT AS ELEMENTS CONFIGURE AND CREATE THE POWERS OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND THEN THEY MANIFEST AS THE EARTH ELEMENT THE ELEMENT OF FLESH.

6. BUT THIS VERTICAL PRESENTATION IS ONLY AN IMAGINED GEOMETRY..AND SO THE THEOPHANY IS ALSO HORIZONTAL….AND SO ONE ENTERS THE THEOPHANIC DIMENSION DIRECTLY THROUGH WHAT IS IN FRONT OF YOU, BEHIND YOU, WITHIN YOU, AND ABOVE YOU…THE RELATIONAL WORLD IS THEOPHANIC.

7. OF COURSE THIS THEOPHANIC DISCOURSE IS THE MANIFESTATION OF LOVE, PURE LOVE COSMIC LOVE PERSONIFIED.

8. THE SINGULARITY OF LOVE , OF THE BELOVED IS THE SINGULARITY OF EACHNESS OR SUCHNESS...THE COSMIC WITHIN THE PERSONAL. IN THE THEOPHANIC LOVE, ALL LOVE IS COSMIC ...COSMIC COMPASSION AND PERSONAL. IN OUR POOR SOCIETY EROS HAS BECOME SEXUALITY AND A KIND OF DISCHARGE MECHANICS. BUT WITHIN GREEKS, DZOGCHEN AND MAHAMUDRA, AS WELL AS CERTAIN SUFI AND CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHIES ALCHEMICAL LOVE IS EROS... AND OF COURSE LOVE MASTERS US. LOVE IS THE THEOPHANIC MANIFESTATION. YOU AND I ARE THEOPAHNIC MANIFESTATIONS OF PURE LOVE.

9. LOVE. EROS IS GOD..AND GOD IS EROS... UBI CHARITAS ET AMOR DEUS IBI EST.

10. IT IS NOT LOVE THAT THE LOVER FALLS IN LOVE WITH BUT THE DIVINITY MADE MANIFEST BY LOVE .

11. AS DANTI DESCRIBES IN HIS FIRST SIGHT OF BEATRICE WHO IS COSMIC AND PERSONAL. FOR THE DZOGHCEN SHAVITE AND AS WELL AS SUFISM OF ILB ARABI, LOVE IS COSMIC PERSONAL, LOVE IS ALWAYS THEOPHANIC..

12. WHEREVER YOU LOVE THERE IS GOD.

13. TRUE SPIRITUALITY IS AN ANIMA EXPERIENCE...PSYCHE. OF COURSE THE LOVE OF YESHE TOGYAL AND PADMASAMBHAVA IS A THEOPHANIC DESCRIPTION…AND THE ONENESS OF THE COUPLE SAMANTABHADRA AND SAMATABHADRI IS INDICATIVE OF THEONENESS OF THE MASCULINE AND FEMININE IN ONE PERSON AND THE THEOPHAINIC EXPERIENCE OF LOVE BETWEEN TWO.

15. THE PRACTICE OF THE INNER HEART ESSENCE IS A PATH OF LOVE, A THEOPHANIC PATH OF NON DUAL ONENESS, OF LUMINOUS FLESH,

16. SPACE MAKES PLACE FOR THE MANIFESTATION OF THE ANIMA …SPACE MAKES PLACE FOR THE ANIMA MUNDI. THE DAKINI IS THE ANIMA EXPRESSION OF PRIMORDIAL AWARENESS IN HER MANY FORMS. AS SOURCE, AS APPARITION. VORTEXUAL, AS HUMAN BEING AND AS THE EARTH ITSELF, THE EARTH IS THE DAKINI.

17. ALTHOUGH PATRIARCHICAL IN INSTITUTIONALIZATION, THE PATH OF AWARENESS IS THE ANIMA, GNOSIS , DIRECT PERCEPTION AND IS FEMININE. DIRECT PERCEPTION, GNOSIS IS LOVE ITSELF.

18. THERE WAS THIS AMAZING AND SECRET GROUP THAT CROSSED THE BOUNDARIES OF SUFISM AND CHRISTIAN MEDIEVALS…CALLED FEDEI D'AMORE, THE SERVANTS OF LOVE. AND THIS WONDERFUL GROUP WENT THROUGH SPAIN, ANDALUSIAN SPAIN, INTO ITALLY. DANTI WAS A MEMBER. A SUFI NAMED RUZBEHAN BAQLI OF SHRIRAC D1209 WROTE A TREATISE THE JASMINE OF THE FEDLI D'AMORE. MARSSILO FICINO WROTE DE AMORE, AND SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE LABORS LOST WRITES A DEFENSE OF THE FEDEI D'AMORE. THE SUFI IBN ARABI IN 1201 FALLS IN LOVE WITH A YOUNG WOMEN NAMED NIZAM AYN AL-SHAMS, meaning HARMONY. THE EYE OF THE SUN AND OF BEAUTY. SHE REVEALS THE SOPHIANIC RELIGION OF LOVE.

19. IF ONE READS THE TEXT OF DZOGHCEN AND THE MAHAMUDRA SIDDHAS ONE SEES OVER AND OVER THE VAST EMPHASIS IS ON HUMAN LOVE AND THE MYSTERIOUS CONJUNCIO AS DIRECT MANIFESTATION OF NON DUAL ONENESS.

What is the Wonder of all Wonders? The Unfolding of Awareness

To experience the unfolding of the kayas of the awareness field, the dimensions of awareness, is to experience the manifestation of consciousness in ourselves and in the world around us...it is to experience the unfolding of gnosis, direct perception, as the ground of our being. This is a gifted experience...and at times this gift and manifestation is wrapped in the cloth of excess and saturation. The mystic life is excessive. It is useful to read and hear the lives of yogis ofi the various traditions i.e., The Play of Consciousness: A Spiritual Autobiography of Swami Muktananda, and The Lion of the Siddhas: the Life and Teachings of Padampa Sangye, The Life of Meister Eckhart, the Life of Ibn Al-Arabi, and the experiences of Namkhai Norbu, Yan Xin the siddha qi gong master, Lama Norhla, Kunsange Dechen Lingpa, Dudjom Rinpoche, Amma, to name a few.

There is a famous statement in phenomenology..."what gives itself,shows itself,what shows itself gives itself". Awareness manifests itself in you in so far as it gives itself in you and in as much as awareness gives itself in you awareness manifests itself in you. The field of awareness manifests awareness itself in us as us. Actually in the manifestation of awareness, awareness creates itself as the body of light in us as us...awareness creates and brings forth awareness in us. The experience of awareness is a gift and not a function of intentionality, of the mind as the noetic noema function ... awareness is not a thought, awareness is an experience of what is given...when asked who is god Swami Muktananda would say god is this fantastic experience that is within you as you.

The divine experience is not a movie, not outside of you, there is no distance, no distance whatsoever, it is your youness that is the place of manifestation.

The sense of subjectivity that takes place within you when you are located in your solipsitic mind, is not the same sense of subjectivity that takes place when you are in awareness of your mind, and the sense of subjectivity that arises out of your becoming aware of your own awareness is not the same sense of subjectivity as in those prior events of knowning. Subjectivity is a floating metaphor. The sense of subjectivity that takes place within the infinite unfolding of the kayas is subjectivity that is pure unbound and unbinding openness of the ground of beingness which is awareness itself...without reference.

As the kayas or as the dimensions of awareness unfold themselves in you as you as nirmanakaya, sambogakaya and dharmakaya, your subjectivity is the dimension. You do not have a kaya, you do not visit a kaya, aham ah I am that...these experiences of subject, experiencer is vastly different then your earlier experience of being a subject locked in the mind or locked in a particular function of the mind...like the affective function or the thinking function...such is the wonder of all wonders..translucent openness as flesh, translucent openness as light, translucent openness as pure potential space..unbound.

The very sense of subjectivity is transformed, disolved and reinvented within these developemental movements. The becoming one with the awareness field is not the simple expansion of mind, actually the mind may expand very little, if at all. The expansion is the vaste expansion of awareness..into gnosis, becoming knowingness...this is a gift that is given...in certain ways the mind never catches up to what has happened.

With each step in this step by step unfolding your sense of subjectivity transforms and is given...by the gift of awareness manifesting. In the begining of your life your mind contained subjectivity, containing awareness like in a bottle or in a vase...as awareness gives itself to you and shows itself to you as you, awareness then contains your mind, and you know less with your mind...with the functions of your mind and more through your unbound openness...ineffableness...and basic faith arises...confidence in your experience.

Since you are the receiver of the gift, the gifting of unbound and unbinding awareness, this gift of awareness with its intensity and ineffability brings forth suffering and bliss. The very fleshing of the luminous awareness in its incessant manifestation in your body stretches the receiver, the recipient, in every way possible. The manifestation of cosmic awareness in your body is excessive and saturating...as event, as iconic radiance, as flesh and subtle body, the saturation of the infinite experience in a finite body mind continium.

The receiver of manifestation is put in the situation of feeling the experience of unbound and unbinding awareness as their own self, their own fragile embodiment. The gift of awareness is not simply given into a subjectivity like a dollar being placed in a bucket, but given as subjectivity... subjectivity itself undergoes the alchemical gifting of self manifestation of gnosis. There is no distance whatsoever..and so the very structures of person are undone and redone.

The receiver of awareness not only receives what awareness gives to him or her , the receiver allows the given to show itself in so far as it gives itself in him or her. Awareness is not grasped it is received. As the receiver receives the gift of awareness, the receiver accomplishes or completes the giveness by transforming the gift into manifestation...according to what gives itself in you shows itself in you.

many thanks to Jean Luc Marion for his inspiration on the phenomena of giveness

Becoming Aware of Your Own Awareness

To become aware of awareness itself is to open a vast area of experience. Most often people are located in their mind...in there thinking, feeling, sensation, memory, imaginal functions. Then one day they suspend their mind just a bit, and rather then their awareness being focused in their mind and the functions of the mind, they begin to focus on awareness itself.. and in that brief moment they begin to glimpse ever so briefly that there mind is not their awareness, and they may even experience the sense that their awareness is a field, and is infinite in its horizon and multidimensional. With this tiny shift in attention the very light of awareness itself begins to open up to them..with immediacy, ineffability and simplicity.