The Spiritual Quest – A Tale too Terrible to Tell!

Jai Daemion © 2010 Syncresis

PART I.  PREPARING TO MEET ‘THE GREAT UNKNOWN’

Do you know what it means to go on a ‘spiritual quest?’

Let’s look at it with unusual openness.

Going on a spiritual quest means that you are choosing to set off on a path to an unknown destination, a path that will take you through lands that you have never heard of, where you will face obstacles that you cannot prepare for, requiring resources that you do not know you have and leading somewhere you cannot imagine.

You will never know when your journey is completed, or when it will end. Whenever you feel that you have ‘made it,’ you have not; whenever you feel as though you cannot take another step, you must; whenever you believe that your goal is in-sight, it will be but a mirage; whenever you try to talk to others about your journey you will not have words for what you are experiencing. Others will not understand, though they may believe that they do, because they are living in their own subjective confusion and so cannot see your difference through their own projections.

As you move along on your journey, you will be master of nothing and wholly ‘at effect.’ Nothing will be predictable and nothing will be understandable in terms of your past. Whatever you have already learned will not address what you still need to discover. Things that once served you as supports or crutches in the past will cease to exist or may become suddenly intolerable. And you will not know why.

Your preparations for your journey will come to nothing: you will have prepared for Fire and then find yourself sucked into a whirlpool of Water. If you prepared for Water, there will be Wind. You may be ‘guided’ before and during some parts of your journey (from wherever your guidance may come) but there will also be times when your guidance simply is not with you – and these times are likely to occur in the face of your greatest crises.

It will not matter, on this journey, whether you are holding the ‘magic crystals of Divine Encumbrance,’ the mala of an Incarnate Avatarial Magnificence, or volumes or scrolls or tablets of Holy Writ, relics of Great Others, images of The Ascended Masters or a ‘medicine bag.’ You can chant mantra as you walk, you can stare into celestial space, you can form the holy mudras or you can blow a conch to the four – or five – or seven – directions, and it will not matter at all: you are walking into ‘The Great Unknown’ and there is no lamp that can light your way.

This is the nature of the true spiritual quest: it is a journey from the known into the unknown, it is a leap into the Great Abyss, it is a flight into the center of the black hole of total uncertainty; a flight into the center of the Sun.

If this adventure was not inherently, well, terrifying, then everyone would be a yogi and whatever we call ‘enlightenment’ would be the baseline of open consciousness from which we would all begin… our very next spiritual quest. As it is, we have untold, unknown and unknowable defenses that collude to keep us within our cultural ‘comfort zones.’ Most of us, that is: some will always want to explore beyond whatever myths drive the culture of their incarnations.

><><><

Because we are all so painfully manifested through egoic behaviors, we try to shore up our fear of the Quest by wearing ‘special clothes,’ amulets, ethnic art – whatever – and we learn to talk in ‘spiritual’ ways and try to meet others in true humility – or not. Whatever. But all of these things serve only one ultimate purpose: they are a declaration by your ego to other egos that you are a spiritual being. Or wish you were, or will soon be. This is often a harmless dance and can help to consecrate your spiritual intention. Just don’t fall for believing that ‘it’ means anything at all.

Living in a materialistic world that is gorging itself on spiritual fastfood as it plunges into the Kaliyuga – the regularly occurring lowest point on the long cycles of consciousness and spirit – you may find encouragement, camaraderie and some moments of relative peace with other, like-minded souls. Those who honor and respect your path. Lovers, perhaps, or others you can sing and dance with ‘in Spirit’s open Love.’ But this is not The Quest. No indeed. This is merely the base-camp at the foot of Mt. Everest, where climbers (and would-be climbers) gather to swap stories of adventures in the lofty heights. And there are a lot more people who have shared base-camp experiences than have ever even set foot on The Mountain. The apres-skiers at St. Moritz; the armchair quarterbacks gathered around their TV sets; the Sunday-Christians looking their most pious in church for an hour every week. Base-camp dreamers all. If this is all you want, this is so easy to create. You are probably sitting in it right now. But if you want to make a true Spiritual Quest, there is simply nothing else to do but to push back from all these sumptuous tables of good cheer and self-delusion and walk out into the snow alone – with no direction, no light and no knowledge of what lies ahead.

The Spiritual Quest begins when you realize that you know nothing at all, and realize that there is nothing else to do but to surrender in to total openness. That is, letting go. That is, letting go as much as you can at every instant, knowing that you cannot possibly imagine (nor can your favorite books reveal) what lies in front of you. In front, behind, above, below, inside.

><><><

Does this mean that you can go on a ‘true’ spiritual quest simply by holding a large rock and jumping off a boat into the open sea? Probably so: for there is time enough in a single breath to process the whole of a lifetime of experience and to surrender into infinity. But we are fragile creatures. We need so much emotional support for every tentative step. And even if we are willing to die in our Quest, there is no reason just to throw life away. This would make no more sense than throwing away Spirit or God or Infinity if such presence were riding beside you in your little boat. And if they were – if it was – why ever would you choose to jump off?

Perhaps we had better just row back to shore and think this through more carefully. Surely there must be a better way!

><><><

The good news and the bad news are one and the same: the world is filled with spiritual ‘experts.’ Gurus, teachers, guides, scholars, shamans, channeled masters and ascended everything-you-can-imagine. We have religious and spiritual lore that goes back thousands of years – and the older the text, the closer to God, right? And during the past hundred years or so, virtually all of this lore has been brought within our reach. Ultimately, there are no hidden spiritual truths: every truth is written on the wall. There are only those who have not yet learned to read, and so do not recognize the presence or the implicit meaning of this constant reiteration of absolute simplicity.

There is one truth. There is one breath. There is one consciousness. There is but a single word.

So if you can read, in any tongue, everything is already laid out for your eyes. If you cannot read, it is all laid out for your touch, your feeling, your breath, your dream, your surrender. It is not important which vehicle you use to attain insight: only that you let it in.

So you prepare for a spiritual quest – and by now you will hopefully understand that the ‘quest’ may mean your lifetime – or far beyond – with no promise of anything at all as a reward and no guarantee of any particular attainment to make it all worthwhile. It will simply be your experience – or it will not. Your choice may be limited to whether you take that first step or not – and whether you then take the next, and the next, etc. Beyond that, we are all virgins to our every next experience.

And sometimes… there is simply nothing else to do but to let go of one virginity only to open to the fears and wonders of another.

This is absolutely essential: “We are all virgins to our every next experience” means exactly that: unknowing, unprepared and vulnerable. And yet you must act, breathe, feel and be. And whatever you  do, holding awareness of your spiritual ( and epistemological, mental, emotional and karmic) virginity in your awareness is the ideal state for appreciating the all the meaning of all the experience that lies ahead, that lies within.

So you set out to prepare: you join an ashram, you read the current crop of spiritual books that ‘everyone’ is reading, you go to the ‘right’ musical events, eat local foods, ride a bicycle, wear a Tibetan woolly cap, and maybe even ask a guru for a spiritual name. As you make these changes in what is rightly called ‘life-style’ (because participating in any ‘style’ is a choice, an affect), you will likely find yourself grazing in a wildflowered meadow with other soft-eyed ruminants. And for awhile, perhaps you will find support, acceptance, guidance and encouragement there. You will have found your deer herd and you will feel as One. On the path to the very next mouthful of soft, raw, locally grown, organic grass.

The little herd is a satsang – a gathering of like-minded individuals who have moved away from the mainstream of life to follow a spiritual path together. You may not call it a satsang, but once you recognize your ‘spiritual family,’ you will be in the experience of satsang. In the cool meadow, with your nose in the flowers, dreaming of world peace and the enlightenment that will surely come.

Now of course you may be fortunate enough to realize already that within this protected lifestyle, within this spiritual herd, as it were, it would not really matter whether you read a beautifully crafted book of Sufi wisdom or spent the same time looking at the underside of a piece of bark. The ‘message’ is recorded everywhere, in everything, in infinite variation and in infinite sameness. In fact, it may fairly be stated that if you cannot find Infinity and Spirit in the scruffy stuff on the underside of a piece of bark, you are unlikely to find it in any spiritual book – but that is an epistemological issue for another time.

Traditionally, spiritual groups prize specific – indeed, very specific – sources above all others. And if you want to taste the sweet green grass of the meadow, then sometimes you have to live with other deer. And they will show you what to do – and what not to do. If you get restless and begin to do more… the other deer will run away. So you learn. And this might be very nice… for awhile. Deer are really beautiful creatures and their society is relatively balanced and in harmony with the Earth. So it is difficult to say this but, alas, it must be said:

If you are going to become one with Infinity – with pure consciousness – then you will have to let your experience move far beyond looking at grass and wildflowers (and other deer’s backsides) in the Meadow of Perfect Peace. Of course it is only because of our limitations of Vision that we need different manifestations to awaken us to that which unites and expresses… everything. You may need to experience the Mother Ocean, the sharp peaks of the mountaintop, the desolation of the great desert, or the center of the core of the Earth or the underside of a piece of bark throbbing with fungal life. Any or all of the above. But whatever it is that you need to experience in order to grow, sooner or later you will have to leave the meadow and begin to explore what lies beyond.

There are many ways to do this. Looking at the underside of a piece of bark has already been suggested. It is truly as good as anything. Or a wilted flower, pond scum, or whatever: same-same. And the good news is that you can actually do this, right in the meadow, right in the comfort of the presence of the other deer… at least until they notice what you are doing! Once they make this discovery, then you will have less and less peace. The peer-pressures of the herd to eat what they eat, to read what they read, to chant as they chant can be very subtle. But these pressures can also be enormous. This kind of peer pressure is not based so much on rigid rules, but on something called the Law of Attraction. If you want deer warmth and companionship, then you will want to attract them to you (and vice-versa).

But the time will come, for no satsang can last forever, when you begin to feel other pulls. If you are not a very good dancer and able to shift your balance as wave after wave of conditioning programming is played through your communications and your head, you may find that there is no longer any time, or space, or support in the herd for bark-watching. And whenever this happens, you will have to be brave enough to make that very next step. Stepping out into ‘The Great Unknown.’

><><><

From here on it is all Sidhartha. It is all a snowboarding leap into empty mountain air. It is all surrender to a swirling, raging river. It is sitting in the rain in the gutter of Telegraph Avenue. It is a floating on smiles through your health food store. It is a broken down Chevy in Good-Ol-Boy, Mississippi. It is anything. It is Everything. It is nothing. And from now on… it will never go away!

But sometimes… still… there is simply nothing else to do.

The special clothes, the beads, the ritual greetings, the favorite books can all begin to fall away now. There is no longer any need for props or posing or acting out ‘spiritual’ ways of being. For now you realize that being is spiritual… or it is not. It’s how you do it that matters. From now on you will likely wear whatever you have that creates the least reaction from others in any culture or social situation, to leave you the most freedom to move around inside your clothes and within the social milieu. You meet people eye to eye, heart to heart and (somehow try to) find patience as other ‘seekers’ lavish you with reading suggestions and sharing of their sacred stones, medicine rattles and toxic smudge. You find patience as you listen to guru stories, praise shamanic cultural artifacts ripped from the context of some ancient tribe and sing the songs of Rainbow Dreaming. You are patience, as others innocently talk you away from your meeting in the here-and-now perfection of infinite experience. Yours, theirs, ours, its.

“Oh! If you are into looking at tree bark, you would absolutely love this book!”

Or… “I was just at a sacred sexuality retreat and we learned an ancient, Siberian shaman-dance to awaken the tantric energies. Maybe it would help you see Infinity or synergy or suggestibility in that bark. It goes like this. You stand here… and then you turn toward your partner like this… and then you….”

Patience. If you are going to leave the meadow – if you are even going to be a little rebel and raise your head during grazing time to stare at a distant mountain top – you will need patience to disengage. Simple rebellion is not enough: knowing that you need to move on does not easily give you the strength to leave the comfort of the herd.

Moving on in to ‘The Great Unknown:’ It is like a rocket ship leaving Earth’s gravity. A space shuttle needs to accelerate to 17,000 miles per hour to break in to free space – and it takes an enormous thrust of will to reach ‘escape velocity,’ even in a gentle herd of deer. Fortunately, where consciousness is concerned, ‘escape’ is as simple as true surrender: it is effortless. But the resistance of the entire human system around can feel like the Earth struggling to hold space shuttle in its gravitational embrace. After all, suck is suck, whatever its source (or its intention).

“I have read The Book! What do you mean you don’t need The Book? The Book is the universal Truth!”

“You know, The Buddha once said… “

Oh… did she?

It is rarely said; it is often implicit. Once you are really stepping out, not only Born-Again Christians, but Hindus, Sufis, Wiccans, Buddhists of all stripe, Theosophists, Anthroposophists, Materialists, Animists, Humanists, Feminists, Atheists, Religionists, Anthropologists, Metaphysicists, Vulcanologists and Psychologists will all assail you with their ‘special books’ and ‘studies have shown’ points of minimal experiential relevance. And as these projections are cast upon you, they will likely not even comprehend that there could be anything in the entire infinity of Spirit that was not included in the system in which they have placed all of their faith – and all their need. And all their fear, all of their ego, and all hope. And you will not be able to tell them in any language that they can possibly hear… that there is something else… that it is available to anyone who would surrender into the simplicity of infinity… and that it is already alive within the experience of every human being, just waiting to be noticed.

“Where are you going on your Spiritual Quest?”

“I don’t know.”

“What do you expect to find?”

“Nothing.”

“Then why leave the meadow?”

“Because sometimes… there is simply nothing else to do…?”

Are we not the very strangest of barely conscious beings? We are alive in the very midst of pure wonder and infinite oneness and we are so busy ‘being spiritual’ in our different little herds, that we miss the possibility of simply being – whole, complete, conscious, integrated and in oneness with ‘The All and Everything.’

Strange choices. But for now, at least, the grass in the meadow is sweet and green and we have songs to sing and hi-tech, purple yoga mats to bring us a little closer to Godliness. And many of us live in a pleasant, shared delusion that we are somehow in creative control of our minds and our destinies.

Or are we…?

To really believe that we are ‘creating’ our reality is only to admit that we have excluded everything beyond our awareness, beyond our wildest imagination. Seems a strange choice – and a self-limiting position.

And anyway… in time, winter comes equally to sylvan meadows and to landfills and each is hidden under soft blankets of snow. Sometimes it is hard to know which way to go.

><><><

Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism is the title of a book by a Tibetan lama, Chogyam Trungpa (Shambhala, 1971). This book is an object, a thing. You do not need to read the book to understand the invitation: things are of the material world. Things are manifestations of matter. Objects. No object is needed for your spiritual growth. To believe that things are essential to spiritual growth (or reflect higher spiritual consciousness) is a vanity – a projection – of ego. And this must include, of course, any printed word. Including this Word.

That said, some may put aside this ‘thing’ to be closer to their own pure experience. For those who are leaving here, now, Aloha! For those who have chosen to stay, Aloha! Apparently we must go on…

In recent years, given the gift of time to allow us to concentrate on spiritual pursuits (note that pursuit = a chase), our minds have become very facile. Most understand the notion that all time exists all of the time, that here-and-now is but a way of processing experience rather than a cosmic absolute.

This brings good news! After you have let go of all of your showy spiritual props and affects, you may feel very naked and alone. But you are very brave. You are going to do this spiritual quest no matter what. This is a wonderful dedication and commitment. But it is not quite a consecration. Not yet. What is missing is a simple piece of awakening. Let’s put your experience in the context of timelessness: everything you are experiencing has ‘always’ existed. All of your past is still alive and is dancing with all your future experience. Purely to protect you from the overwhelm of Infinity (it is just too much), your mind has literally been formed around a perception of a moment which we call ‘now’ (for want of a better word).

If you can understand that this is even possible, then that is all you need. There is no need to ‘prove’ anything: whatever is real and important to you will be self-revealed with-in your experience as you are able to experience it. Trust your place: you are doing very well!

If everything already exists, then where you are ‘going’ on your spiritual journey is already right here, right now.

Consciousness is Infinite. So easy to say, so hard to realize. Let us say this: you may come to realize that consciousness fills this universe (and all others as well) and is One with Infinity. Whatever. Don’t believe anything until you experience it for yourself. Until then, words are just words and the best they can do is to tickle your interest. Because…

The discoveries that you will make along your spiritual journey already exist. And somewhere, you are already ‘there.’ It only remains for you to find it: to let it in to your awareness.

It is common to speak of spiritual consciousness as ‘higher’ or ‘deeper’ than ordinary consciousness (whatever that is). This is a materialistic, hierarchical and even patriarchal way of understanding difference. Spiritual consciousness is simple allowing more of ‘The All and Everything’ (or, if you prefer, Infinity) to enter your experience. So your spiritual journey is a journey to no-where and the spiritual  consciousness you may discover has always existed. It is omnipresent in the infinity of universes and it is always present in you. What will be new is only this: that you will open to experience a little more of this consciousness than before. Maybe, in time, much more. Maybe, beyond time, The All. But that does not matter at all. Until you are one with the experience of Infinity, it is only an idea. Frankly, a spiritual masturbation fantasy. That which we aspire to and imagine that we are for a few moments of needed pleasure, release and neurological reintegration. And in that moment of surrender, “Oh God…!” says It All.

><><><

WHERE THERE IS FEAR, MEANING IS NEAR

So you want to celebrate Change and Becoming?

Then simply let go and become Change itself. Ride the lip of the wave of becoming that unfolds continuously from the dance of the winds. Let it carry you over the edge of your beliefs and free-fall into the infinite arms of Life renewing itself and self-awakening consciousness. In you, in you discovering Change that Becomes You.

Step up to the very edge of what you know and then step off in to The Great Unknown. Wherever you seem to find new balance, go to the very edge of the known world and step off again. Wherever you alight, rest, breathe… and step off the edge again. Over and over and over again. You will know where to go: you need only follow your fears.

When you really let go, your free-fall will be controlled by your fears. Somewhere on every infinite out-breath, Fear will catch you and take control of your entire being so quickly and subtly that you may not even notice its intrusion. You will be letting go, becoming ever more open, soaring into timeless space and suddenly, your journey pauses. Perhaps the cat jumped into your lap, perhaps your cell phone dinged news of a text. Maybe you think you suddenly needed to check the time of a coming appointment. La de da.

Whatever it is that (you think) called you back does not matter at all. Whatever it was and whatever it will be next time has only one name and its name is Fear. Nothing else holds you away from realizing Infinity. Nothing else can control you so subtly that you are constantly fooled by its ploys. Nothing else can account for the synchronicity of outer-world intrusions that suddenly pop into your awareness. You are pointing your self toward Spirit, right? Then what keeps you from allowing Spirit to full-fill you? To connect you with Infinity and infinite Consciousness? There is only one possibility. Once you realize this simplicity, then there is only one way to move through it. Yes, that old pop-spiritual saying: ‘the way out is the way in.’

If Fear is the only stopper, then your only need is to find ways of moving through it. A hint: denial will not work. Magically dispelling it or transmuting it with a mantra can only work in the near-field of your awareness. But the fears that you know of are not the fears that are ultimately holding you back. The fear that holds you away from oneness with Spirit – Infinity – God – Consciousness lives far beneath your awareness.

The entire path of your yoga – whatever its form or appearance – needs only to meet, address and clear through the myriad fears that are working with amazing interactive precision to hold your experience within whatever boundaries you believe you need. Your fears are containing the fountaining of experience, feeling, awareness, consciousness that urges to rise up within you with every breath, every touch, every vision and every word that flows through you. There is simply nothing else standing in your way. So… if you want to celebrate change and becoming, just let go and become Change. And everything you do to move toward this goal of total surrender will either serve or defer your unfolding into wholeness, oneness and peace. And you might find this simple mantra user-friendly: ‘Where there is Fear, Meaning is near.’

You are a self-healing, self-unfolding, self-integrating and self-revealing consciousness. Take away the stops and blocks and feel the change that becomes you. Gently, self-lovingly, just let go. For there is simply nothing else to do.

Every tension in your body, every airy flight of your mind, every withheld feeling, every unfulfilled longing, every pain is simply a reflection and an expression of your programmed belief that you need to hold yourself away from total surrender.

Bits of repressed feeling break loose and ache for release through breath, through movement, through sharing, through your awakening. Whenever you are ready, you can open to accept them and invite their release. Dive into every pool of feeling. Welcome every uprising bubble of memory and even of fear itself.  Allow everything to find its natural place with in your awareness. Trust your self to be self-revealing, self-integrating, self-expanding – until you begin to lose your self at the far edges of awareness. Then you can begin to see how silly self can be… to even imagine that it is.  But this will come in its own good time. It is far easier to read about ‘selflessness,’ than it is to allow it to transform your experience. And there is never any need to hurry. Are flower buds impatient to open? Who can tell? They seem to wait so well….

><><><

Once you really take this in, once you really begin to understand what is implied in this realization, many things may happen very quickly. These basic principles of awareness and the essential urgency and wholeness of experience are not foreign concepts. They are neither complex nor abstract. In fact this state of openness is exactly what awakened in you as your body-mind formed within your mother’s womb. Openness is the gift of Being. It is a mystery, as is consciousness, but it is natural to each flower and it is natural to you.

Returning to a state of openness now, after so many years of cultural programming of what and how (and when and if) to think, may feel like a gentle settling in to a new-old state of peace. It is the feeling of coming Home at last. And in this Home you can just let go of all the myths and all the human-made theories, beliefs and systems. Here, Truth is what you know from your own (infinite) experience. And here you can discover that the spiritual journey is not a movement to a different place: it has been happening all along, all around and inside you.

The path to consciousness is not a path for walking, it is the path-way of surrender that only invites you to let go and open to let consciousness in. The more you can let go of your resistance (fear), the fears of others that have been programmed into your child’s openness, beliefs that have been implanted in you through the power of patriarchal (or matriarchal) authority… the more you can let go of Fear, the more awareness you will be able to allow.

If you could begin right at this moment to let go of any small presence of fear-tension-dogma-theory-belief-program that is being held anywhere in the whole of your body-mind, you would experience Life flowing in to fill the places that Fear has held for so very long. A tear or two let go invites a realization or two to take its place. Emotion surrendered in to genuine expression and release, frees you to feel something new. And when you do not need to hold tight in fear, wonder can once again open within you. And when it does, you will know.

Remember you are a self-unfolding, self-healing, self-revealing, self-releasing incarnation of consciousness that moves through myriad dimensions of your experience that you cannot even yet imagine. You are consciousness. The spiritual journey has already happened. It has always been happening. You only need to open your self to let it in.

><><><

You are opening. Your spiritual quest has begun. You are doing the little things that help you to let go. The feeling of a pillow against your cheek, its softness to your hand. You step gently in to running water – or maybe only a muddy puddle – and change flows up through you. You are standing in change. You are becoming Change and Change is becoming you.

Is it ‘energy?’ Is it prana? Is it yin energy from the Mother Earth? Is it the contraction of your circulatory system in the coolness of the water? Is it a message from your Guidance? Of course. But as soon as you stop (note: as soon as you stop) to think – to name it, to fit it into something you have read, to match it up with some ancient wisdom – then ‘it’ stops. Your openness stops, your experience of whatever-it-was stops.

If you experience this little dance for many years, in many different ways – and if you are very fortunate – then one day you will begin to feel what happens within your experience just before you stopped the flow by trying to understand what was happening and what it meant. It is hard to believe before it happens to you right before your very eyes, right down in the depth of your own belly or in a breath that makes a tiny jerk somewhere along its way. And yet… once you see it, feel it, own it, be it, then you will begin to understand that in the very face of peace and wholeness, in the very moment of your inner flower beginning to open in to something new and wonderful, you stop the magic. You withdraw. You displace your awareness and trade open, timeless feeling for a busy mind.

It is almost unbelievable, isn’t it? Why would you do such a thing? And why (if you can bear to wonder) do you always do this in response to beauty, surrender, peace… and love? Do you do it when you feel love as well? Do you do it when pleasure begins to fill your body?

If you could look behind the moment, if you could re-create the moment of excitement and then move back to feel what happened just before you shut it down, what do you imagine would be there? No, not a minute before, not a second before, but a millisecond or so before your went ‘mental.’ What can you feel there? One thing. Only one thing. Always this one thing. The only thing that has more power in your psyche than the feeling of release-peace-love-wholeness that you cut off. It is, it was, it will always be this: it is fear.

Consciousness, knowing, self-realization (or whatever) is self-validating but only when it becomes real within your own experience. No dogma, theory or belief can be overlaid on your experience without causing violence to your deepest experience. But there is a secret to understanding fear. It is easy to understand that it must be released, moved through, healed in some way if openness is to continue and move you on your way, but it is very hard to do this when you do not know where to look or how fear works inside you – and why it is there.

Be gentle with your self. All you need to do to begin to let go of fear, is to know that it might be there. This is the most sensitive issue that humans face – if, indeed, it is ever faced it at all.

To just pause from unconscious flights of fear for but a moment, to let this possibility of all your fear-based habits and avoid-dance become real in your imagination, begins the beautiful process of self-unfoldment that will dis-solve the blocks and pains and let you fly free at last.

There are so many paths that you can follow to begin your letting go yoga. Some will work better for you than others. But whichever paths you choose to explore, it is sometimes helpful to remember a simple, pragmatic truth: whatever path you take to surrender in to your own experience will also lead to self-integration. So all paths to surrender, by any name or tradition, will eventually lead you Home.

><><><

© 2010 Syncresis. This material may be reproduced all or in part for non-commercial purposes, in its original form, with author and this blog referenced.

Created in His Image? The Spiritual Quest for True Gender Equality

Jai Daemion © 2010 Syncresis

THE PATRIARCHAL RELIGIONS OF FEAR

Looking for true gender equality in any cultural manifestation is often very difficult. Looking for gender equality in any of the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) can be a very depressing experience. For Woman simply is not there. If you want to really feel the actual life-effect of six thousand years of the denial and repression of Woman, you need look no further than the exclusively patriarchal hierarchies formed by these institutions.

Float like a satellite above these woman-fearing cultures and imagine being a woman with no power, no voice, no recognition, no official presence in the religion-based culture of your birth – and that state of alienation as an expression of thousands of years of systematic oppression and violence. It is a shocking view of irrational denial by obviously frightened – no, by absolutely terrified – men. Men, banded together and hiding behind great beards and big hats, each holding within their hearts a secret so terrible that they could not even reveal it even to other men. All acting out the prescribed duties and rituals of their faith with such monumental hypocrisy that it defies comprehension. Then… and now.

What was (what is) their terrible secret? Simply this: in their God-fearing hearts each man knows the power of Woman. Every man knows – however deeply this knowledge is denied – that Woman is the very center of all incarnate (embodied) life. As a primordial manifestation of the very essence of creation and evolution, if anything is holy, it is Woman.

And yet, from the first stories of creation (in The Book of Genesis), Judeo-Christian culture sets itself on a path of the denial, repression, oppression and carefully programmed cultural ignorance of the natural power of the feminine. In the temples, the mosques and the churches, men bustle about with self-important expressions on their faces. But in his heart, each man knows where lies the very center of his life, his family, his heart and, most threatening of all… his soul.

Why is this so threatening? Why is Woman so threatening to the Culture of Man that she must be so oppressed? Here is a hint: it is not because she is unworthy, unimportant or lacks spiritual authority. No, of course not. If Woman was as inferior as our traditions have continuously maintained, there would be no need to oppress her, hold her captive or to try to kill her spirit. We do not waste time persecuting rocks. We do not hate sparrows. The only things that evoke our hate and violence are those which terrify us. And for untold thousands of years, the forces of men have been ganging up to hold the terrible threat of Woman away – away from acknowledgment and acceptance, away from social power, away from positions of religious authority and away from the powers of education and money. Away from men’s trust, away from men’s surrender. “Out of sight, out of mind” – or so fundamentalist Islam hopes. “In their proper place” – or so fundamentalist Christianity prays. And the motivation is the same, and it is simply Fear. No other explanation fits the historical facts.

So why are women so traditionally feared by men? Is it truly because they are ‘unworthy’ and hence hold no spiritual power? No, it is because they are so powerful that every man is somewhere afraid in the face of this enormity. That’s all it is. Six thousand (or more) years of horrific subjugation and violence, because Woman is so powerful – so powerful that Man is terrified.

Woman begins us all, protects us in her belly, births us, saves our lives a thousand ways, offers a total commitment to our lives and releases us into the world. Not all human beings have experienced this total love and commitment of course. But this potential is the archetype of Mother and individual human beings participate in this archetype at different levels of being and awareness.

Man provides but a single spark of sperm (which is an absolute bare minimum of effective physical form). Ideally, man protects and nurtures his unborn children (and their mothers). Man provides an interface between his family and the world-at-large – enfolding, protecting, providing, serving. Man attracts his children into a world beyond the Mother-Child bond and (with the mother) guides their development in myriad ways. Individual men participate in this archetypal function more or less. But Man knows that in the primal manifestation of Life in embodied, human form, Woman is primary. Woman is the source of all human life. If there is a ‘first sex,’ it would be Woman.

In the face of this awareness, in a sometimes pitiful attempt to ‘save face,’ men have gathered together for untold thousands of years and pretended with each other that other things matter more. Men make a ritual of holding secret the wonder, awe and inspiration that flow to and through them from Woman. It is acknowledged in signs and gestures. It is admitted usually only when directly asked. But whenever it is stated, the statement is absolute: every man knows. Wherever such awe and wonder exists, human psyches are very malleable. And in this state of openness, men are guided, invited, directed, urged (and, let’s face it, manipulated) by their desire to merge into oneness with Woman.

Man has wasted thousands of years pretending that Woman is inferior when, in fact, She is the primal power of all physical manifestation in the universe-of-universes. Thus we have the foolishness of the Christian trinity of Father, Son and Holy Ghost – the whaaat? Are we so afraid of including Woman’s spiritual presence that we obliterate her and replace her with an apparition? Yes, obviously we are. God help us if we realized a holy trinity of mother, father and ourselves as the children of that union.

Men! Unite! Put on your funny hats and pray to God that God-the-Father is the only holy force. And when you go home at night and surrender your last breath of the day in to Woman, with such relief and gratitude, we will just agree that this shall be our little secret. I won’t tell if you don’t tell. In the morning we will again dress in our regalia and finery and the hierarchy of Man shall be re-created and we can walk freely away from the absolute magnificence of Woman – as indeed we do, every morning-after – and we shall rule and we shall be the Kings once again. At least, we shall be the rulers until we are deposed in battle – or until we go home and meet the deeper calling that awaits us there, be we men or women.

><><><

BUILDING GILDED CASTLES IN THE SAND

These principles are based in our history and reflected in the empty shells of the major world religions and the cultures-of-denial that they have spawned (and which they will fight and kill to maintain). But why speak of these things here? What does this have to do with your lifelong spiritual quest? At least this:

If you follow the teachings of any religious/spiritual tradition and find there a basic and constant denial of Woman, then how complete can the overall system of belief actually be? What point is there in ‘believing in’ anything that is absolutely committed to including only half of humankind, only half of human experience, half of embodied consciousness, only half of the spiritual presence in the cosmos? Why buy into a programmed system of belief that is committed to creating God in the image of Man and so betrays the very most primal, experiential truth known to every human being – of the absolute equality or primacy of Woman?

Our culture is coming awake to this massive and deeply ingrained inequality between men and women. In what may be later seen as grossly clumsy and reactive stabs at ‘correcting gender inequality’ we pump out rhetoric and demand organizational changes. Women act out what they think is competitive within the ‘male-dominated culture.’ Men meekly assume the position of ‘discovering their feminine side’ that they hope will evoke acceptance from women. How much this exchange of attitudes occurs in American culture can only be seen from somewhere far away from this massively coercive cultural vortex. In any case, we now feel pride as we collectively exhort and threaten and cajole and compromise with the traditional, patriarchal establishment to ‘allow’ women to participate – at all levels of society. This has been going on for well over a century and yes, we have become a little closer to androgynous equality, but perhaps at the expense of knowing Man and knowing Woman. For so long as Woman has been denied, neither gender has been free to find its essence and to realize its respective consciousness.

In your spiritual quest, what we seem unable to admit as a culture, you may have to admit to yourself: these traditional ‘faiths’ cannot be corrected or adjusted to admit Woman and all that she is. We can enlarge our contexts to accept women as ministers or priests. But the religions themselves are based so squarely in patriarchal ignorance that ultimately, the religions cannot be salvaged.

It is time to begin again. Somewhere beyond religion. It is time to take the ‘God of Wrath’ off of his throne and in to our Hearts, to nurse him at woman-breast and let him breathe in her power and her love. It is time to recycle god into a new awareness. No more thrones, no more Basilicas, no more Cistine Chapels. And no more Holy Inquisitions. Just Open-Heart Surrender that allows spirit to be at home in your consciousness. A direct one-to-one relationship.

This is beyond belief! Beliefs are programmed values that you have been told to try your best to accept as real. You are told to ignore any contradictions that you see in the program, ‘as a matter of faith.’ Belief is powerful, but knowing is absolute. Knowing occurs when something is real with in your experience. And there is no doubting what you know to be true for you. No doubt means that no faith is required to build understanding and expand your consciousness.

><><><

WELL THANK GOD FOR BUDDHISM!

Since the Abrahamic, monotheistic (one-God) religions are hopelessly mired in pseudo-masculinist auhoritarianism; it is perhaps understandable why so many millions are turning to the ancient religions of Asia with fresh hope. So we might say, ‘Thank God for Buddhism!’ at such a time of cultural religious crisis. But alas, there is no god in Buddhism, so those who declare Buddhism as their religion have already lost the plot. Buddhism is a god-less philosophy. It is a Way, a model, a path and a paradigm.

It would be nice – and convenient – if you could escape the anti-woman bias of Christianity (and maybe, especially, Islam) by ‘becoming a Buddhist.’ Unfortunately, this is a fanciful dream: the original Buddha,  Gautama (or Shakamyuni), refused to teach women when he was traveling around seeking converts to his personal system of belief. This denial of women was as common to the Buddha’s cultural context as were the similar denials in the Judeo-Christian-Islamic traditions. Ordinary, perhaps predictable, but not necessarily easily excusable. These are foundational beliefs that affect everything that is built upon them.

Buddhahood is a state of consciousness, and does not refer to a specific individual. So there have been many Buddhas throughout time. One of the most important Buddhas was Amitabha Buddha, whose vision described ‘The Land of Ultimate Bliss’ – which gave rise to Pure Land sect of Buddhism in the 1^st and 2^nd century c.e. (approximately 500 years after Gautama Buddha). Amitabha is revered throughout Asia and is known for his ’48 Vows,’ which serve as a model that millions of people hope to follow.

This is Amitabha’s 35^th vow: “If, when I attain Buddhahood, women in the immeasurable and inconceivable Buddha-lands of the ten directions who, having heard my Name, rejoice in faith, awaken aspiration for Enlightenment and wish to renounce womanhood, should after death be reborn again as women, may I not attain perfect Enlightenment.” Read this again. Can you see the deeply implanted rejection of woman as inferior? This is not a casual ‘misspeak’ of a mass media newsperson or a politician: this is a carefully considered revelation of a basic, foundational, belief. And it has been repeated and revered for almost 2000 years! Now, maybe it is time for something completely different!

Not only do we allow such blind ignorance to continue, today millions of followers rationalize the ancient anti-woman bias as a ‘thing of the times’ and so struggle to remain students of these traditional teachers. But you cannot say, “Oh, well that’s just about women, the rest of his teaching must be very wise.” You cannot say such a thing because you are woman – whether male or female in your body – and you carry the potential to experience direct relationship to woman in every XX and every XY chromosome of every cell of your body. And with every outbreath. And in the stillness of every night. And in so many other ways….

There is no need to make excuses for any teacher, for any religion, for any spiritual tradition or any form of cultural madness. No excuses are needed and none are possible. And so there comes a time when you simply have to walk away from what your experience knows is untrue. When you discover that perhaps all that you have ever known is untrue, this is a very scary thing to do. Fear often produces panic and blaring inner questions.

What if there are no real guides to light my way? What if no tradition includes ‘The All and Everything’ of my experience, or my consciousness, or the consciousness that abides beyond-the-beyond?

Yes, what if…?

><><><

BUT THERE IS ALWAYS YOGA… ISN’T THERE?

The ancient wisdom of the Vedas –which is known as Vendanta – serves as the foundation for all the yogas of India. As each new generation of humans discovers the promise of yoga, a common hope is awakened: “Surely I will be able to find wholeness in this sacred and ancient wisdom.” Well, you may find traces of true gender equality in the yogas, often enough to silence your suspicions for awhile so that you can surrender to the ‘masters’ and become a true chela (a disciple, a student). Indian religion is monotheistic (based on a single God), but it also has thousands of lesser Gods that are worshipped in different (and often spectacular) ways in the world’s greatest variety of temples, sects and beliefs. Some of these gods are female deities, and many of the great teachers (or gurus) of the yogic traditions are women. “Maybe here there is a place to turn where I can expect true gender equality….” And maybe not.

In the Vedantic yogas, the ‘highest’ form of spiritual practice is that of the celibate – the celibate male. By taking the vows of Brahmacharya, a student consigns all of his sexual energy to the nourishment of his higher consciousness. Especially lately, women can also become Brahmacharya under the guidance of their gurus. Traditionally, in the realm of the male, celibacy was intended to hold him away from temptation (sound familiar yet?) while delivering him from evil (or now?). For the dedicated yogi, emotion is the experiential equivalent of the Christian Satan. It traps the unwary in the realm of desire and creates karma that will require many extra lifetimes to ‘work through.’

Some male yogis get married and have families. These men are called, ‘householders.’ Although they are believed to be compromised in their spiritual attainment by their association with women and sexuality, they are accepted as being ‘the best that they can be’ for this lifetime. Usually without too much disdain, the true Bhramacharya students and the gurus accept the householders as sincere devotees. However, even today gurus advise their householder students to have sex no more than once a month. Why? Because women are fearsome things and if you give in to what is assumed to be woman’s insatiable sexual desire, it is taught that she will suck you dry of your vital essence (your ojas) and you will wither, become ill and suffer a premature death. On top of that (as if this was not enough ignorance to trigger your red flag), you will be cautioned against feeling too much pleasure. Because pleasure breeds desire, desire breeds attachment and attachment breeds untold thousands of extra lives before you can sit at the Godhead.

><><><

TANTRA – THE FEAST OF SPIRITUAL SEX

There are many yogas, all focusing on slightly different pathways (practices) to enlightenment. One branch of yoga is based upon sex – or, more precisely, on the interaction of the cosmic polarity of yin and yang. It is called Tantra and its teachings are found in sacred texts known as the Tantra-Shastra. The ultimate practice in yoga tantra is the ritual experience of Divine Sexual Union. A man with a woman. A man who seeks the direct transmutation and the experience of oneness with and through Woman. As this occurs, each individual moves beyond the polarities of gender and may experience ‘The All and Everything,’ Infinity, Cosmic Union, enlightenment.

This form of yoga has always been regarded as dangerous. Only a few students are believed to be able to survive the dangers of the limitless sexual attraction and the powerful transmutation of energies and consciousness that result – from successfully or unsuccessfully experiencing the ritual practices. In ancient times, only men received instruction in Tantra. Women were not allowed to follow this path.  When it was time for a sexual ritual, the guru would select a partner for the male student. Perhaps his wife, perhaps a prostitute. The self of the female partner did not matter. What mattered was how much she could channel pure yin (feminine) spiritual energy.

The males were admonished not to allow themselves to ejaculate and learned sometimes very elaborate ways of redirecting their sexual energy to return the energy of their ejaculate back into their own bodies. Because… if the males experienced an orgasm and flooded their energies into the woman, she would drain them of their ojas (vital fluid) and they would suffer for it.

What has too often been overlooked through thousands of years of tantric practice is that sex is an exchange of energies. From well before (and long after) the male ejaculates, if he is sensitive to it, pure yin energy floods into him from the woman. Mutual surrender and shared orgasm more than replenishes whatever vital energy the man spurts into the woman with ejaculation.  In fact, of course, such a mutually empowering exchange increases the likelihood of true dissolution of self into the one-ness that is the goal of Tantra.

So why was ejaculation denied? Because it is a moment of complete surrender in to woman. And pleasure. And so desire. And so attachment. And so more egoic karma… etc. Yet western students of tantric yoga still hold back, rationalizing this basic, dogmatic woman-fear in whatever way they must to ‘keep the faith’ in their teacher and the yogic tradition that they (believe) they are following.

Moving forward into Western culture in the seventies, as yoga students (female and male) brought new ideas of gender equality and women’s liberation to their teachers, the gurus were all being pressed to ‘teach us Tantra!’ Many of these teachers were, themselves, lifelong celibates and had to ask their female students what ‘happened’ during sex. Often this lack of experience did not stop them from instructing followers in some form of Tantra. In the face of the likely lack of direct experience, the practices that were taught were often confined to exploring the natural yin-yang polarity of breathing, yoga asanas (postures) and meditations aimed at moving ‘beyond’ sexual duality – beyond male and female.

A decade later (in the 1980’s) tantra was being defined for eager workshoppers as ‘all about relationship’ – and many of the principles of female assertiveness and the new cultural attention to women’s sexual needs that had arisen in the women’s movement generally, were suddenly being plugged in as a new kind of tantra.

A decade later (in the 90’s) the word ‘Tantra’ would lose its meaning altogether. After all, if even the ancient texts of the Tantra-Shastra and all the practices that have been taught through thousands of years are based in the same woman-fearing paranoia that was running rampant through Judeo-Christian and, later, Islamic culture, then what good is the total package? One might as well be a Christian fundamentalist as a Tantric fundamentalist.

Wherever the feminine is denied, oppressed, violenced or ignored, whatever is left can never be whole, can never achieve the tantric goal of transmutational oneness, can never satisfy the needs of humanity for the absolute acceptance of the natural equality of woman and man. Equality at least. If only true equality.

You may need to go one step further, as many now realize, and feel that any religion, any practice, any religious institution, any Temple, Church or Mosque that discriminates against Woman, must now be dissolved, dismantled, deconstructed. It is no longer a question of if we can use these traditional, patriarchal institutions, it is coming to be a question of whether we can allow them to denigrate even one more generation of our beloved daughters – and to limit and de-nature our sons that they might maintain the false, patriarchal authority upon which all such institutions and beliefs are built.

><><><

IF WE DON’T KNOW WOMAN, WHAT IS MAN?

While you consider this and how all of this may affect your own spiritual quest, here is another thing to be aware of. There has been an upheaval of cultures over (especially) the past forty years, aimed at findings ways to include women in the all of human experience, culture and Life. Of course many of these thrusts have led to valuable reframing of individual and cultural positions. But consider this: a culture which has evolved through the constant denial of the gifts, the importance and the consciousness of woman, will develop a warped relationship with women, of course. But it will also have created a warped configuration of Man.

As our present culture strives to include women, all too often this has taken the form of women acting out maleness as they have been conditioned to perceive it throughout their lives – basically in order to feel competitive/competent in what they perceive as a male-dominated culture. This is an unfortunate necessity – especially because the ‘maleness’ that our culture knows is so deeply based in defensive, anti-woman gender oppression and maintained by fear and violence. This has impacted our cultural (and individual) Man as much as it has our collective understanding of Woman.

While our broader society has made progress in dissolving some of the barriers to true equality, the least change has occurred exactly where change is needed the most: in the very heart of the unyielding patriarchy, in the hierarchies of religion. The world’s ‘faiths’ tend to be monolithic structures dedicated to holding power over their masses of followers. Life-and-death control, political power, wealth and property.

We can ordain women and make little steps to include them in the all-male religious traditions. But where the edifices of religions are founded in woman-fear, the hypocritical oppression of women and the systematic denial of the long histories of women in relation to god and spirit, whatever towers are built cannot stand for long. So long as they do, we will not be able to fully experience the natural redefinition of woman and man, of what it means to be female and what it means to be male, within the context of our hopefully evolving cultures and our (hopefully evolving) consciousness. It is the very ‘moral’ foundations of our cultures that perpetuate patriarchal oppression and denial of Woman. We have built up the castles of our triumphal faiths on blind ignorance and it is this programmed belief that holds us away from realizing true gender equality.

What is the nature of liberated Woman? And what is the nature of Man? Perhaps all that we can know is that when these archetypes can manifest within us, then we will be ready to begin the tantric ritual of mutual transmutation.

Tantra is based not in ‘acting out’ gender roles, but in surrendering in to the natural consciousness and powers that are inherent in each gender (and each other- and inter-gender as well, of course). No attribute of either (or any) gender can be pre-defined: essence is a revelation of direct experience. What we can know is that whatever emerges will be different than anything that we have yet imagined. For when we open to total surrender, ‘We are all virgins to our every next experience.’

This work is well begun. The youngest of our living generations in some of the world’s cultures are approaching each other with open equality. With pure hearts but often lacking the understanding that a mutually respectful cultural tradition might have imparted. So in some ways they still struggle with uncertainty. Nevertheless, the movement toward wholeness and true equality is continually unfolding through our collective consciousness.

Once it gains only a little more in its momentum, then the artificial edifices of towers, castles and cathedrals will no longer be needed. Sure, we could rebuild them to reflect the new wholeness (holiness?) that we may discover… but it is more likely that we will see no further need for such symbols of grandeur and power.

Are you personally ready for such an adventure, undertaken with open awareness and surrender to the guidance of your own experience? And if you are, may we gently ask…

When will you begin?

><><><

© 2010 Syncresis. This material may be reproduced all or in part for non-commercial purposes, in its original form, with author and this blog referenced.