Illusions and delusions

It is painful – and difficult – to recognize one's own illusions and delusions about oneself. But it is necessary and potentially liberating.

Being a sly man (or a sly woman of course)

The sly man is not a cunning man. He doesn’t deceive others. Being a sly man is not being a little smart ass.

The sly man knows that work on oneself is work on himself, not on others. The sly man knows that it is pointless and fruitless to try to correct others. The sly man only corrects himself.

The sly man doesn’t judge others’s negative attitudes or behaviours. The sly man knows through work on himself that he is filled as much as others with negative attitudes or behaviours, sometimes even worse than others.

The sly man doesn’t criticize others’s opinions, philosophy or religion.

The sly man knows that all philosophy or religion bear some truth worthy of attention.

The sly man doesn’t show off with his knowledge. He knows that he doesn’t know anything.

The sly man is seeking the Truth. He’s not trying to know the “truth” of the “behind the scenes” of the political or social games, about which he couldn’t care less.

The sly man knows he is going to die. He reminds himself constantly about it, so he doesn’t forget.

The sly man knows that he is not going to “save the world”.

The sly man strives to achieve peace, harmony and freedom within so that he can share peace, harmony and freedom with others.

In Silence...

Be "yourself"

There is a saying that is used frequently these days by spiritual teachers belonging to different traditions, or at least claiming their filiation to a spiritual tradition or another. It seems to be a kind of new “sesame” to help one to reach total freedom. This saying is : “Be yourself”. In a world where individualism (even though the term is highly misunderstood) in the form of the fulfillment of the individual has become the ultimate social achievement, it is no wonder that presenting the spiritual path as just being “oneself” is magnetically appealing. But is it really what true and genuine spirituality has to offer ?

All the spiritual teachings from different traditions, begin their teaching by informing us that in some way, there is something “wrong” within ourselves that is the main cause of our suffering. And they all agree with their own words that this cause is what is commonly known today as our ego or personality or “me”; in short : “oneself”. This “oneself”, this “me”, is exactly what one has to work on if one wants to realize who or what one really is and get rid of one’s suffering. In this light, it seems that the “be yourself” advice can lead to a huge confusion and misunderstandings about the actual spiritual path and consequently bring even more suffering. Even tough following a genuine spiritual path will lead one to be oneself ! (There is no spirituality without paradox)

Before being oneself, one needs to sort out what really is this oneself one takes for granted. Is “oneself" this collection of contradictory opinions, full of pretence, self-conceit, self-satisfaction, that gets upset over nothing and is always up to judge, to criticize and to give opinions about all and everything when in actuality one has no idea about what one is saying and is just repeating like a parrot what one heard or read somewhere and that was fitting with the mood of the moment ? Is this really “myself” ? Well if this is the case, what a piece of crap !

Relaxation

Reiki is a wonderful tool to help trigger a relaxed state of oneself. Receiving a Reiki session can bring one to a deep state of relaxation. This is a comment I have often heard from people receiving Reiki for the first time as well as with people already acquainted with this practice. In itself it is very good, relaxation being a “luxury” for most of the people nowadays, plagued with the cares, anxieties and stresses of their own lives. Unfortunatly, this state of relaxation is generally of a short duration and gets dissolved rapidly in the usual stress of one’s life. There are several reasons for this, one being the state of identification one is constantly in about one’s life and all the cares and anxieties that go with it. Another reason is that this state of relaxation has been induced from the “outside” : one laid down on a table and let the Reiki practitioner did the session. So apart from the desire to get rid of tension that led one to request a session, the relaxed state didn’t involve any conscious act to be brought about; it “happened”.

In the system developed by Gurdjieff to bring one to self-knowledge, a great emphasis was put on relaxation, conscious relaxation. It is reported by Maurice Nicoll that Gurdjieff said that the essence of his teaching was contained in “relaxation and self-remembering”. Gurdjieff was pointing to the state of tension in wich we live our lives and gave the advice to his pupils to get the awareness of this fact by realizing how our body bears so much unnecessary tensions even in the act of just picking something light on the floor. And it even goes further than that : just sitting on a chair, we still are in a state of tension.

If you wish to have a glimpse about this, right now as you read, just try to turn your attention on yourself and especially on your body. Try to feel, or to be more precise, to sense your body in a general way : the way you are sitting. How do you feel ? How is your neck ? Your shoulders ? Your belly ? The arm you use to move the mouse of your computer ? How is your face ? How is your breathing ? Do you feel relaxed ? If you have sincerity towards yourself, and you are not someone that is used to practice conscious relaxation, the answer is probably negative. You probably caught your body in more or less this state : stiff neck and shoulders, contracted belly, tense face (clenched jaws, wrinkled brow), short breath.

Now, as you keep reading, you can try to relax in a conscious manner. Bring your attention to your face...and then bring it to your eyes...just sense the muscles of your eyes...and relax them consciously (here of course, not to the point they get closed, so you can keep on reading !)...then slowly move down your attention under your eyes...around your nose...and let it expand to your chicks...and relax them...consciously...let your attention spread to the other parts of your face...your lips...your chin....until it encompasses your whole face...then move to your forehead...feel the tension there...and relax it...consciously...then spread your attention to include your entire head...be aware of your head...and the tensions going on it...and relax them...consciously...then move down to your neck...the back of your neck...then the front of your neck...and let them relax...now move to your shoulders...relax them... bring down the attention to the arms...relax them...consciously...try to feel the relaxing effect combine with the outgoing breath...as you do this, can you notice a flow of energy spreading into your body ?...now bring your attention to your upper body, the torsoe and the back...and let them relax in the outgoing breath...do this for a moment : just try to feel your entire body...and let it relax in the outgoing breath, natural breath...do it for a moment...how do you feel now ? Can you feel a flow of force in your body ? Do you feel different ? More alert but at ease. Look around you at your direct environment. Isn’t everything more clear, more vivid ? And at the same time, isn’t there a stronger sense of presence and attention ? If this is so, you have a slight taste of what Gurdjieff called self-remembering. Of course, this is not going to last and you’ll be brought back to your usual state of tension without even realizing it. But you have a clue of what conscious relaxation means.

If you can practice everyday an exercise of this type, say for 10 minutes, you’ll be amazed to see what changes it can bring to your life. Gradually you’ll be able to evoke this state of relaxation in the midst of your activities and so take some distance with the tensions provoked by the events that you encounter everyday; events that invariably drain force out of you and leave you in a state of negative emotions. In short you will begin to understand what drags you down in your life and brings identification -- I still have to remind that it’s not going to happen in a few days (we’re so used today to have what we want by pushing a button). You will begin to grasp that another state of yourself is possible, even in the midst of your daily life, without having to engage into a spiritual retreat (short or long) or looking for the “secret practice” or the “ultimate mantra” or whatever of the sort.

This way of working on oneself has been beautifully summed up by Machik Labdron, a tibetan yogini from the 12th century, in these words : “Relax, be aware.”

Three-brained being, multiple 'I's

It became a “standard” to present the Reiki teaching together with an introduction to the chakras. For those of you who are not familiar with this, the chakras are described as wheels of energy forming the parts of the subtle energetic anatomy of man. Gurdjieff, when he started to introduce his teaching at the beginning of the 20th century, presented a model of the inner functioning of man that has a certain resemblance with the indian chakras system but which is actually different. One element that is similar to the chakras system is the number of centers which in both cases is 7. So far, the comparison stops here. To me, Gurdjieff model is more coherent and insightful to bring an understanding of the way man functions. It is truly a map that can help one understands oneself.

As was said, the system of centers presented by Gurdjieff is sevenfold. In this post, I will mainly focus on presenting three of them, which is more or less what Gurdjieff did at first with great ingeniosity, for it connects to other “ideas” that composed the whole teaching. “Ideas” that I intend to touch few words on in future posts.

The three centers I want to talk about can be acknowledged by anyone. They are what compose the fabric of our inner life : thinking, feeling, moving/sensing. These three elements are the means through wich we live our life. We have thoughts, emotions, sensations and movements. Unfortunately, these elements are not working in harmony towards one another and that is one of the reason why we bear much suffering and contradictions within. They actually run by themselves, in a mechanical way, by reacting to the influences of the outside world. It can be said these three centers have “minds” of their own. They have “independent” impulsions, reactions, towards the events that we have to face in the course of our life. Say we decided in our thinking, to wake up earlier the next morning to be able to have a longer meditation session, thoughts that brought with them a slight emotional response colored with enthusiasm, then the next morning when the alarm rings, we definetly don’t want to wake up and actually don’t. What happened ? Well, another “mind” took control of the situation that is not the same mind that decided the night before to wake up. This example shows how divided we are innerly without really being aware of it. We actually have multiple ‘I’s living inside of us due to the lack of harmony between the three fundamental aspects of our being. Those ‘I’s have their origin in one or the other center and combine or use the other two. And this without any form of consciousness or attention but mainly through mechanical reaction. One doesn’t acts, but reacts. And what reacts is one of the multiple ‘I’s that developed itself through one’s life and the situations one has had to go through. The only way to “see” this for oneself, so that it doesn’t remain just an information that we agree with, is self-observation over a long period of time. One has to recognize by “taste” how one or the other of these centers is at work in a given situation. That is, throughout one’s daily life. This is the object of work on oneself : first, acknowledging our inner divisions (the mess we call our inner life), then working towards unification.

This three-brained being model is really worth putting one’s effort to understand. Enounced by Gurdjieff almost a hundred years back, it matches today the discoveries made by science in the neurobiological field over the last fifty years with its three-fold brain description : reptilian brain, limbic brain and neo-cortex that developed in the course of evolution. And in the practical spiritual field, the alignment or unification of these three “brains” is probably the only way to reveal the most elusive, mysterious and quite not understood part of our being : Consciousness.

Resources :
Man - A Three-brained Being. Keith A. Buzzell. Fifth Press
Becoming Conscious With G.I Gurdjieff. Solange Claustres. Eureka Editions

The Pharisee syndrom

"...God, I thank you that I'm not like the other men..."

Anyone following a spiritual path should be familiar with this parable found in the Gospels. But somehow, I wonder... True there are several interpretations of this parable. But I feel that it exemplifies perfectly well an attitude that we find widely spread among the people that claim to follow a spiritual path (but not only : self-righteousness is endemic in the social and political). And I've been affected the same at some point. Who can claim that he or she had not been feeling superior to others after discovering and starting to follow a spiritual teaching ? And this affection can last a long time if not all of one's life. This attitude is the perfect "compost" to develop a cultic and fanatic approach. And it doesn't have to refer to any church or group or teacher. It can definetly turn to be just the cult of "me", of my view, my way, my approach, especially in these times of self-proclaimed gurus. The Reiki world is not devoid of such an attitude. And this is also the case of many other teaching. So we might do well to try to understand this parable and avoid to be affected by the "Pharisee syndrom". For this matter, sincere and honest self-observation will be the only cure.

Reiki : the 5 Principles

For today only,
Anger not,
Worry not,
Be humble,
With gratitude work on yourself,
Be kind.

In these principles, enounced by the founder of Reiki, Mikao Usui, we find the essence of all spiritual teaching. Seemingly simple, they actually bear a profound meaning. In the Reiki teaching they are proposed as a daily attempt to actualize them in our life. I feel that they are somewhat underestimated in the Reiki world (but not by all). Nevertheless, they are the essence of the teaching. They are made to undermine a major cause of our suffering : our egotism. Can we honestly say that we don't get irritated, if not angry, over nothing ? Can we say that we're not plagued by worries of all sorts, specially nowadays in this uncertain world ? And how many times do we feel we're better than others ? And are we really grateful when we are shown by life that we're not the perfect human being we believe to be ? As for kindness... Still, if we deeply intend to work those principles in our day, as it is suggested, and repeat this exercise day after day, we might begin to smell that in many places in our life, there is something "wrong" going on. Also we might begin to taste from time to time an unusual feeling of ourselves. A feeling of ourselves devoid of tension and anxieties. Sure it's going to be fleeting and almost immediately swallowed by the usual stuff made of tension and anxieties. But after that, you have a first taste of what freedom could be. One thing : it's not going to happen in a matter of a week or even a month. Patience is paramount on the inner journey to freedom. Gurdjieff used to say : "Patience is the Mother of Will."