The ego is confusing. It’s not your enemy. And you already know that very often it isn’t your friend. It can cause a lot of trouble.

If you have too much of it, you may be blind to it—while it’s obvious to everyone else. If you have too little, you can’t function in this world.

You can’t live without an ego; you have to have one, but it isn’t real. It is created moment to moment by a conversation you have in your head: one moment you’re wonderful, the next moment you shiver in fear.

This ego, the one that’s forever busy chasing what it desires and protecting itself from what it fears, is the ego of suffering.

The ego is baffling and mystifying, and if you don’t understand it, and educate it, it will be your master, instead of the servant it is meant to be. Then it will lead you around by the nose, through a lot of pain and loss to exactly nowhere.

You’ve heard all the stuff about transcending, or even  ‘killing the ego.’ And you’ve also heard that you need ‘ego strengths.’ So what is it? Do we need to get over it, or make it strong?

The answer is: both. You think that’s paradoxical? Definitely!

Okay, lets start with the basics.

At birth you emerge into this world from what has been called “The Ground of Being,” the womb of the universe. And at death, that’s where you go. It is the Self, the alpha and the omega, spirit, THAT which many people call God.

From there you can picture the journey of your existence as a circle that begins and ends in the Ground of Being.[1]

You can then divide this circle into two halves. The first part of life is about building the ego, coming to know who you are in this short time-span of your existence; it’s about going out into the world, about self-assertion, about being some body. The second half is about returning back home to our essence, to your origins, to spirit, to Self-realization, to eternity, oneness, and truth.

The “I” changes throughout this circular journey.

We can also divide the circle into three parts, three pie shapes. In childhood the ego begins as soon as you start to think. At the beginning of thought there is a mechanism that makes you continuously relate everything in your world to this “I.” You make up this thing called “I” as you think. You believe it’s a stable ‘thing,’ but it isn’t; it’s like an optical illusion of the mind that appears real.

This first third of the journey is the pre-personal stage. The roots of your beliefs of “I am………” are laid here, good and bad. You identify with your body, your likes and dislikes, your emotional habits and your personal history. You praise yourself and experience pride, and you condemn yourself and experience guilt. Most of this is subconscious and quite automatic. You struggle to be who you think you are meant to be, and you judge yourself as to how well you think you are doing. This, as I said, is the ego of suffering.

At this stage you are unconsciously still fused with the collective mind, and your thinking is deeply conditioned. You think in the way your family or clan, religion or nation told you to think. You are under the influence of an internalized voice that sounds like a controlling and critical parent. You have not yet developed a fully independent sense of yourself, a free way to make up your own mind.

For that you have to cut the restricting ‘umbilical cords’ that bind you to the ways of your upbringing. Until you do, you do not yet have a fully functioning ego. You’re part of the group mind. You’re also still close to spirit and that gives you comfort. But the danger here is that you may be prone to fundamentalist thinking.

Once you cut the ‘umbilical cord’, you move into the self-conscious stage, become a fully rational person and see the blossoming of your personal identity. You become an independently functioning individual, a “person” in your own right. No longer bound by the fear of being rejected by your group if you were to be fully yourself, you unfold your unique gifts and abilities.

This is the culmination of what Western psychology calls the development of ego-strengths. Rational and relatively independent in your views, you act and operate in your world.

Western culture generally assumes that this is the totality and aim of human development. Once you are a strong individual, you ‘have made it’ in the eyes of our culture; you are done. Therefore, of course, most individuals do not evolve much beyond this point. They are still in the grip of the ego of suffering, and remain far removed from the nurturing reality of the true Self.

This is now changing, as more and more of us realize that the highly developed ego is not the end of the line. And the ego itself feels it, as it matures. Where it has been fascinated with material life at first, now a sense of unease arises, an existential loneliness, disconnection and lack of fulfillment, or perhaps a deep, but indistinct yearning. These can easily turn into despair and trigger addictions and relationship problems.

Such lack of fulfillment is often mistaken for regular anxiety or depression—but that is not what it is, and it should not be treated that way. The ego has to suffer this basic lack of fulfillment, because it knows deep down that it, along with the body and all its worldly achievements, is going to die—although it tries hard to ignore that fact.

But rather than despair, this is the time when the individual needs to evolve further, and only entry into the next stage, the spiritual stage of development can resolve these problems.

This brings us to the third pie shape, the trans-personal stage. This part of the journey has been deeply studied by the world’s mystical traditions. Particularly Indian Vedanta and Tibetan Buddhism have elevated this inquiry to a profound and fascinating science.

As long as you operate exclusively through your rational mind, you will remain unaware of the reality of this higher development, because it goes beyond the ego, beyond the rational mind. But it does not deny rationality; it includes and transcends it. Here the mind can evolve into intuitive intellect and into divine intelligence.

It begins with experiences that lead you into the spiritual realm. At first these moments of peace, or deep joy, or your ability to perceive a deeper truth, are fleeting. To make them more permanent, you must develop an ability for stillness. Meditation is the best known and time-honored way to do that.

The first part of the spiritual journey is the exploration of ‘spiritual wonderland.’ You are fascinated by all kinds of exciting options, collect spiritual paraphernalia, move from teacher to teacher, read many books, and, all-in-all develop a very cool spiritual ego, which is not much different at all from the rational ego. It feels special about itself, either in a good or bad way, and in that it is absolutely commonplace.

But as you explore the spiritual realm, you build another kind of ego, the ego of aspiration. Now you feel drawn to real sadhana, to committed spiritual practice. This is how you can free yourself of the shadow elements, the habits of suffering which you have acquired earlier in life and which are the true source of your pain.

The higher reaches of spiritual realization will remain hidden to you until you do this work. But with the gradual easing of unconscious tensions, and with a greater and stable peace, comes the ability to look inward.

Now a great paradigm shift begins. You realize that who or what you thought you were was in fact a mistaken identity. Yes, the ego was useful enough for a while, just like the countless other identities you have built in past lives that are now gone and forgotten. And so will this one be gone in just a few years.

Now however this is not a source of despair, but of a great aspiration. You begin to intuit that you are in truth not this puny ego with its ongoing drama and self-importance, but the true Self, and your body and mind can serve as the perfect expression of divine presence in form.

You realize that you are not the body, but a ray of divine light that is reflected in you. And, going even further, you realize that this individual ray is one with the sun, the Self, the Source of infinite light.

In the expansion of this inner experience, the ego is transformed into the ego of the sage. Where it has formerly been opaque and confused, it now becomes transparent to the light. Where it has been a dictator, if not a tyrant at times, it now becomes your faithful and reliable servant.

Through the force of continued spiritual practice, sadhana, your being becomes the conduit of divine grace. The thinking mind with its judgments and stress dissolves and gives way to the intuitive intellect, which can run your worldly affairs perfectly.

The heart remains increasingly open and, since you are internally filled by the bliss of the Self, you can love freely. Your life becomes a life of joyful service to all beings around you, in whom you recognize the same presence of God that shines in you.

This is the way to absolute peace and to the fulfillment that does not die when the body is done. It is the realization of your true and immortal identity as the Self.

The ego evolves from being the source of much trouble to being a clear lens through which the presence of God shines into this world. How is it done? What are the mechanisms that are at work in this transformation? And what is the most crucial transformation from the ego of aspiration to the ego of the sage?  That is what we will discuss in Part 2.

We invite you to watch the video: The 3 Aspects of Ego by Ram Giri.
For more information visit our website www.Skillsforawakening.com

With love and gratitude,

Ram Giri 
and the Skills for Awakening Team

The ego has two very positive aspects, the Ego of Aspiration and the Ego of the Sage. They must be used to overcome the third, the Ego of Suffering.

The root cause of the ego of suffering is fundamental ignorance. It is the delusion that, “I am this body, this mortal personality. Happiness comes from enhancing myself.” This view creates the afflictions of egoism, attachment, hatred, and fear of death.

The Ego of Suffering does not have your best interests in mind. Quite to the contrary. It only wants to enhance itself, and by that you are entangled in a merciless net of pain of your own making. This ego is a tyrant that takes you over and holds you prisoner.

At the same time it is incurably insecure, because its existence is not based on reality. It is a fabrication of confused, self-centered thoughts, only concerned about its own maintenance, the continuation of its delusion.

The emotional part of this ego is knows as the pain body, the way you unconsciously cling to pain. To put it into words, you have a hidden belief, “I am this person who is used to a certain amount of suffering. That’s who I am.” And to maintain this identity you unconsciously sabotage your happiness and bring pain to you.

Although we like to believe that we are victims of an uncaring world, the truth is that all our suffering comes from the way we unconsciously incapacitate ourselves. This is why the ego of suffering needs to be rooted out.

To do this is the job of the Ego of Aspiration. Everyone knows it already first hand. You have experienced it in moments of deep peace, of unconditional love, or during flashes of great happiness. Although most people miss their true meaning, these incidences point out to you what you really are. They are sign-posts that say, “Come here, this is the way to yourself. You ARE this happiness!” But few stop long enough to read the signs.

The Ego of Aspiration enables you to translate your higher yearning into action, “I want to know my Self. I want to follow the glimpses I had of it, and realize the full unfolding of my inner potential.” This impulse enables you to engage in a spiritual practice and to connect with teachers and like-minded friends.

Then, as the Ego of the Sage develops through direct experience of the Self, you become increasingly unshakable in your orientation to liberation. This is true faith, which is not mere belief, but authentic knowledge of the shining wisdom of the Self and the profound and unlimited love in your heart.

But the Ego of Suffering will not simply give up and go away because you’ve had a spiritual impulse. Tyrants don’t give up so easily. They become bigger and more intimidating when we question their power.

You know how that works. You make a decision to mediate every day and suddenly all kinds of things get in the way. Distractions, demands on your time, laziness, discouraging thoughts are suddenly in your face. This is the secret art of self-sabotage. It’s alive in all of us.

The Ego of Suffering is depicted as a great demon in all the mythologies of the world. It puts up a hell of a fight, it terrorizes and tortures you. And in the end the demon loses. It must lose, because this is the way of it. Illusion can hold us prisoner for a long time, but it cannot win. Inevitably, if you follow the spiritual impulse with patience and determination, this gross ego dissolves.

Inevitably you become free. Inevitably you come to realize what in reality you already are. Inevitably, as the ego-sense dissolves, all that is good, auspicious and beautiful begins to manifest through the personality. I like that word: inevitably!

with love,

Ram Giri

Skills for Awakening

www.SkillsforAwakening.com

” The deepest wish we have is to feel the harmony and peace of an Open Heart. And if we want that strongly and ask for it, the universe will support us” – Ram Giri

Click Here to play

video time: 4:22min

Life will always have its ups and downs. This is inevitable. And in this continuous change, in this unpredictability, life meets beauty in its entire dimension. Here is where I ask myself and I invite you to do the same: How am I dancing with life?

Am I meeting life with a balanced and peaceful mind and an open heart, no matter what? Am I seeing that on my side of the fence the grass is pretty green too? Am I treating my fears, self-doubt, self-judgment and shame with kindness and compassion? Do I love myself just the way I am? Or am I constantly comparing myself with others who seem ‘more successful’, ‘more attractive’ or ‘more spiritual’ than me? Am I indulging in the 10 million distractions of the world in order to hide and run away from what’s going on inside? Am I pretending to be someone quite different than who I really am…?

I find that it’s easy to love yourself when everything is going your way, when life fulfills your desires, when you find yourself at the peak of the mountain.  But it doesn’t last; life constantly and kindly shows us where we have yet some growing to do. What about when you get embarrassed, feel criticized, vulnerable or exposed? When you find yourself in that dark tunnel feeling that there is no light at the other end? How do you deal with that conversation in your head that keeps putting you down?

If you are seeking for a deeper truth, ask yourself these questions; you can do that now, even if it means to stop reading this article for few minutes. This process of self-inquiry opens up a new understanding of yourself. It can give you a road map to deal with the conditioned mind that constantly falls into the cycles of self-doubt and self-judgment. This sheds light into the dark shadow.

Constantly we hide our most sacred ideas, our most sacred secrets, because it’s easier to shelter them than exposing ourselves. To bring them out, whether that means opening a conversation, looking for help, or finding practices to undo our own cobweb, means to make yourself vulnerable. And this can be scary at first. So we wear masks and pretend not to be ashamed, but we’re always scared to be found out… If they knew what I‘m really like, they would never speak to me again. This is the tragedy of this world: we have lost access to our brilliant hearts and live dominated by fear. That’s why we suffer so much.

Loving yourself the way you are is like being on the peak of a mountain and knowing that you can merge with the vastness of the sky and the nature around you. It is being at peace with reality, however reality shows up. It is being kind, so kind with yourself even in those moments when you can’t stop the self-punishment for what you have or haven’t done. It is dissolving the voice that says: “it is embarrassing to be me”, or “men don’t cry”, or “I’m not good enough”, and so on.

The truth is that it is not embarrassing to be you. It is quite the opposite. It is freedom to expose your true self, it is liberating to feel vulnerable and allowing what is. It is an act of honesty, with you and with the world, to show your sensitivity, your happiness or sadness, and your compassion. It is courageous to show what is hidden behind that mask. It is an act of love to be authentic. Keep this sentence in your mind: The most attractive thing about a person is his or her authenticity!

To get to the peak of that mountain (which ultimately is the realization that you are what you seek to become) you need to start climbing, step by step. Stop when you need to take a deep breath, perhaps look back to see how much you have advanced… and continue climbing, with that deepest driving desire in your mind, with one-pointed focus. Allow yourself to be like water and move with the flow of life. And it’s ok if you slip down a few meters. No need to panic. There is always a new opportunity to begin again.

Be aware and listen when the ego is telling you that you are going too slowly, or that you should climb faster. Stillness, even while moving, can help you to distinguish the voice of the ego from the voice of love. It is wise to acquire what you need for your quest: the companionship of fellow climbers, the necessary tools to make your climbing easier, the skills that make you stronger. Listen to the guidance and experience of those who have gone before you and check in to see if they work for you. And most importantly, know that in this quest you are completely supported by a caring universe.

All minds are the same until they get educated for happiness. That is your task. If you are conscious enough to understand this, then you are capable of doing it.  You are capable of turning your life around, so completely that not long from now you will have a laughing fit when you remember how miserable you used to make yourself today.

Unhappiness is optional, but only for those who get serious about happiness. And when I say happiness I don’t mean the meaningless chase after distractions that serve to keep the ego fast asleep. I mean the complete wakefulness of the spirit. I mean the full realization of the immense brilliance of what you are. I mean the full miracle of you!

You must discover your heart if you want to enjoy the kind of relationship you dream about and deserve. The tensions created by insecurity and self-doubt will inevitably spoil the greatest experience. They must create conflicts in all your relationships and they will cause you to sabotage yourself every step of the way.

But when you feel bad you push your heart away, you try to bury it, and it always comes back. You live in escape mode from what you believe, from your truth, but you can’t get away from yourself. These are the moments when you need that open and authentic heart the most.

Remember: The most attractive thing about you is your authenticity. When you can be who you are, you are naturally fulfilled and others will notice. There will be a shine around you, but you won’t care. It is just the natural way you are.

You are already what you seek to become, only you are unconscious of it. Your bliss and your love are already fully present in you; you just haven’t discovered them yet. In you lies hidden the totality of all the love that is possible in this world. It is the true nature of the heart.

But in you lies also the enemy of forgetfulness. You have fallen asleep. You do not remember you. And there is another factor alive in you: your ability to awaken from the trance of your unhappiness, from your distraction of mind and your closed heart. That spark in you is reading this article right now. It can go to sleep again, or not. It is up to you.

If you decide to act on the impulse to awaken yourself, be prepared to see your life change. With the knife of self-love you will cut out the decay, you will stop in its track the tendency to indulge in what makes you suffer. You will realize that you—and no one else—create all your suffering. And that will set you free.

Your view of life will change rapidly as you discover nothing but kindness around you. You will want to dissipate the habits of sadness and fear and learn healthy habits. You will want to love yourself in the places where you now hate yourself. You will want to embrace yourself with only pure love

It’s too late to promise yourself you’ll do better when all hell breaks loose. It’s hard to find peace in emergency mode. The time is now, or when will it be? Your higher potential is staring you in the face, when will you look? Find out what happens when you give yourself the support you have wanted. Let yourself be around people who dare to assume that they have the courage for freedom.

Take a jump and you will notice the ground rise up to meet you.

With Love,

Ram Giri and Julia

Skills for Awakening

When depression is not depression but disillusionment, it still feels like depression. But in reality it is the first step toward the recognition of your inherent freedom and peace. Dis-illusionment is the beginning of waking up from illusion. It is a difficult stage with enormous promise.

What is the illusion that is about to be lifted, and what reality beckons us? Our primary illusion is that we experience ourselves as separated from our Source, as egos subject to a meaningless and uncaring world. Because of this fundamental error in perception we grasp for things we hope will fulfill us and reject what we fear. We live in the tension between hope and fear, perpetually chasing after substitutes for real joy, unfulfilled and blind to the fact that the Source of all we yearn for is within our own hearts.

Human beings lived in this confusion for thousands of years and for many of us it can now come to an end. The process of awakening breaks us open from the inside and this is be highly upsetting to the old ways of our thinking, the view of the old paradigm. And it is good that what is not true should be destroyed so the truth can blossom in us.

To find the bliss of Self in the depth of the heart is the greatest adventure of humankind. As all adventures it brings along dangers and discomfort. To brave these and to triumph over our fears and our weakness is the price of success. That is why I invite you to welcome your dis-illusionment and, instead of trying to reach back to a former state of tranquility, move forward to embrace the astonishing truth of your being.

We embrace this truth and the love it brings through sadhana. Sadhana is the effective practice of waking up from illusion and replace it with the taste of reality. This is done by practicing specific skills, first among them stillness, devotion, self-inquiry, presence, and the support of spiritual community.

Sadhana demands focused self-effort. Through self-effort you are creating your destiny. It is magnificent to be able to change the course of your life by your own power! Your habit of blaming the events of the past, other people, or ourselves enhances the ego and contradicts your efforts to awaken. What appears as your destiny today is the effect of self-effort—or its lack—in the past. What matters therefore is how you conduct yourself now. You are capable to practice easy-to-learn, powerful skills to break free. It is simple. The alternative is to continue to suffer.

The greatest aspiration is to realize our highest goal and manifest it in this world. This is the aspiration to awaken from suffering and realize the radiance of the Self. And the truth is: you are already on the path to this goal. Everything is part of the path to enlightenment, whether you know it or not, even your pain and confusion. Your path looks like this now. Your journey had to go through all your experiences, just as they were. You have not failed, you have not gone wrong; this IS the path to your fulfillment.

What obstruct you from realizing this highest goal of your life is your thoughts. All suffering is experienced not in the outer events we blame, but in the mind. And even the body is exterior to the mind. Therefore your constricting, fear-based mental habits are the true source of your pain. You have inherited them from the society you were born into; they are entirely conditioned and you have not known how to question them to break free of their spell.

How heartless have you treated you and robbed you of the joy of your life! How cruelly have you imprisoned your heart by judging others and yourself constantly! Of course it was all done innocently, out of confusion. And what enormous joy will come to you when you find yourself, when you connect once again with your innermost ability to love yourself as you are and to let this love overflow into the world around you!

That is why I invite you to find your way back to the core of your Being. HeartSourcing is the central practice for that. The essential answer to all you, or anyone, have ever yearned for is the unconditional love and self-acceptance that waits for you in your heart. It may sound too simple and yet it is true. The fundamental nature of your innermost core is that happiness, and once you find it, it can never fail you.

To gain permanent access to that inner Source you can question your basic assumptions with the question, “Who am I?” This is self-inquiry. It frees you of your stressful beliefs and opens you to the realization of a deeper truth that will set you free. Through Open Attention you can shed your patterns of restricting emotions, which you have mistaken for an identity. This will take some effort, yes, but it is not at all difficult to do. The alternative is to suffer more. What will you do?… You are the architect of your destiny!

with love,

Ram Giri

SkillsforAwakening.com

I’m in the prime spot for Flamenco here in Miami, in a restaurant on Calle Ocho (that’s ‘8th Street’ for you gringos), right in the heart of Little Havana. The place is bubbling with excitement. Tonight there is a performance by Miami’s First Lady of Flamenco Clarita Filgueiras, and Natalia Merino, a famous dancer from Spain. The place is going to be on fire!

We have the best table in the place, right up to the stage and our group of 15 friends is in a great mood. The waiter comes to take our order and apologizes because they are overbooked. There is not a single seat free and everyone wants their food at the same time. I assure him that everything is all right and just do the best he can. Then we enjoy the superb show. We’re in heaven.

But not all is well on our table. As I later hear, two of our friends—let’s call them Sue and Mike—are hungry and are getting increasingly upset. I don’t know any of this because I am watching the beauty and artistry of the dancers. Only after I notice that Sue and Mike have left during the intermission I am told the story. It’s a classic tale of the painbody.

The painbody is the way we are unconsciously programmed for pain. Impulsively and blindly we choose pain and cling to pain, simply because its’ been an ingrained part of our experience of life and, while fearing the unknown, we cling to the known. So we sabotage our chances for happiness and for peace out of this primal addiction. It begins with the way we think.

When we believe our stressful thoughts we don’t experience reality as it is. We experience reality through what is going on in our mind. Our stressful thoughts shape our reality, make it stressful. We’re not our true selves; we are possessed by the painbody.

Here is what might have gone on in the thoughts of Sue and Mike: “This service is terrible! I’m hungry. I can’t stand it. I wish I didn’t come here. I’m miserable!” Talking to each other only confirms how terrible everything is. They’re in hell. And what’s worse: they paid for it! – Haven’t we all been there!

Hell—and heaven for that matter—are states of mind, pure and simple. And hell hooks us when we blame our miserable (or angry, depressed, anxious…) state of mind on something else. We volunteer to become prisoners in hell by believing that anything other than our state of mind is to blame. It never is.

Hell is what happens in our thoughts and emotions. As long as we don’t see that, we’ll be frequent visitors there. But once we do, once we turn inside to find the road to heaven, a miracle happens. Suddenly we understand that the world we have been blaming is in fact exceedingly kind to us. It is kind in that it will push all our buttons until we have seen them all and have freed ourselves from them. This is how the amazing kindness of the world guides us to enlightenment.

Now many of us understand that to some extent. To some extent. But very often we get caught once more in negativity and we grumble “Damn, here comes another f#*%#!! growth experience!”

We just love the drama of our unhappiness! How we love to hate it! It gives us something to feel, someone to be: the miserable one we’ve been for so long and so often. And the ego once more gets its way and the painbody its pain. How is all that working for you?

And then comes the moment of grace, when we the whole paradigm shifts and we awaken once more. Self-awareness is the key to freedom and you have that potential. In particular it is the awareness of the painbody that dissolves it. For that you have to look directly at what you cannot see.

I know that sounds impossible. It’s not. Here is how you can do it. After you become aware that you experience an emotional reaction to something, do the following:

1. Stop and notice your reaction: your behavior, your words and your thoughts
2. Come into the present moment and realize what you feel in your body
3. See the painbody reaction as a reaction, not as ‘reality’

As you become aware of the painbody reaction you shed the light of awareness into what was unconscious and hidden in darkness. When you shed light into darkness, what happens to darkness? It’s already gone. Becoming aware of the mechanisms of how you have unwittingly created pain for yourself dissolves the painbody.

Repeated practice and effort will lock the door to hell permanently and open the gates of heaven. This happiness is what you wanted all along, isn’t it? It’s what we all want because it is our destiny.

If you’re ready to take your higher evolution into your own hands, you can stop your old ways of suffering from interfering with your life. The painbody will cease to sabotage your experience of happiness, peace and the attainment of freedom. With the right determination, guidance, skills and support you can soar to your goal on eagle’s wings.

If you’re ready for that, I invite you to devote yourself to the study and practice of the Skills for Awakening. They are the highly developed essence of the means to your freedom. I put them in your hands along with the guidance and support for this path. Now it’s your turn to act. Can you love yourself enough to practice your freedom?

with love and gratitude,

Ram Giri

Skills for Awakening

For Jane it’s her weight. George thinks he is not a good enough provider for his family. Since the kids teased her in school, Carol believes she is not pretty.

This is how we carry our hidden pain with us like a snail carries its house. And every so often we withdraw right into it, into our most private terror.

It’s like we are saying to God, “Love me—but not in this place. In this place in my mind leave me my shame, leave me my lack of self-love.” And we think it cannot be another way, and we believe our lies.

And God, in that innermost place in the Heart, listens, and is powerless because love does not force itself. This infinite love in us waits, and waits some more, with infinite patience, until we are ready to open.

Until we trust enough, like a flower gives itself entirely to the sun. Until we open to the power in us to love, to trust, to know with absolute certainty that we are powerful enough to free us from any pain we carry in us.

Imagine the flower, basking fully exposed in the midday sun. How glorious! It absorbs every last ray, every magnificent bit of warmth. It is fully alive.

It doesn’t say, “Not this. Not this love. It is too strong. I have to hold on to the darkness in me. I am not ready for love.”

No. It surrenders to the splendor of life. You can be like that.

In you lies this type of openness, this kind of surrender to the light and the love in you. It is the absolute and unconditional love of the Self. And it never forces itself. It waits. It waits for you to respond to its many calls.

This love, this courage, will never betray you. It is your very own. It flows from your heart and only you can evoke it—or shut it down.

Call on that love to set you free of all you don’t need. Let it shine into the concealed crevices of the mind where darkness still hides.

Light and love are a higher reality than darkness and fear. When you invite them to flow from your heart to free the rest of your being, miracles happen.

Light dispels darkness instantly, leaving not a single trace. Love dissolves fear and reveals it as a bad dream of a past that is over and gone and a future that can be much more kind than you imagine.

If you’re still, you can feel it right now, right here in the very core of your chest. It is the infinite Source, the strongest power of healing.

You are equipped like that, imagine! As someone who knew once said, “If you had faith, you could move mountains.” This faith has its roots in your Heart and you can discover it there.

But because no one ever showed you that you have divine inner capacities, they have remained unused until now. But you can learn to use them until all the pain is dissolved and you are free.

with love,

Ram Giri

Skills for Awakening

If you want to engage in a highly effective practice to end the pain in your life, call us between 10am and 6pm (ET) for a free consultation.

Skills for Awakening +1 (305) 567-1406

In the light of 9-11 and the killing of Osama bin Laden we understand the reactions of revenge and of hatred. Their expression was easy enough to see in the outburst of joy at his death in many parts of the US. It made some of us rather uncomfortable.

That we are staging the equivalent of the mob scenes we see on TV that burn American flags, is pathetic and not a reason for pride.

What are the implications of a state-sponsored killing from a spiritual perspective? Are there karmic repercussions for us since it was done by our government in our name? How do we best react to that?

We participate in the collective karma of our nation and will harvest its outcome. But what we contribute to our collective fate depends on the level of our awareness.

As we can see time and again, hatred creates more hatred, violence more violence. Is that what we want? When we act from anger in an attempt to make the world a more peaceful place, we simply pour fuel on the flames of aggression. An eye for an eye makes both people blind.

We are only too familiar with primitive feelings like hatred, but perhaps a bit confused about the dynamic of the higher principle of compassion.

Superficially we tend to see compassion as weak. But is it true that turning the other cheek is for wimps who can’t help themselves, and that compassion is a completely unrealistic approach in the world of ‘real facts and real dangers?’

In my view, compassion is as powerful as it is all-embracing. And, contrary to acts of aggression, its effects last.

Consider this: The works of all the great bullies in human history are now (or will be soon) nothing more than footnotes in history book, their empires destroyed, their memories discredited, their names in disgrace. Ashes to ashes.

The great teachers of compassion on the other hand continue to shine. Buddha and Jesus and so many others changed the world in a way that uplifts us. This is because they acted from love and compassion which became an integral part of their being and of their message. This takes extraordinary courage and strength.

Compassion is Jesus’ message of turning the other cheek—and it is also the fierceness with which he threw the money changers out of the temple with such power that no one dared to obstruct his actions. In the Eastern religions, the ‘wrathful’ deities are known to be the compassionate expressions of the enlightened mind. How so?

True compassion acts on all levels against what creates suffering. It eliminates the causes of pain, ignorance and confusion. It shakes us awake.

Can we then deal from compassion with highly disturbed individuals like an Osama bin Laden, a Gaddafi, a Hitler? How can we stop the creation of suffering by such individuals?

Compassion demands that we do not respond to hatred with hatred or fear, that we do not participate in the creation of suffering, but eliminate it. This can sometimes require fierce action.

What may such fierce compassion look like in today’s world?

Imagine you are a soldier guarding people in a crowded square. You stand here watching the traffic and you see on the far side of the square a man with a bomb belt approaching a school bus full of children.

It is clear what the man intends to do. It is a matter of seconds and life and death.

You recognize the only means you have to stop him from blowing up the school bus and you raise your rifle and shoot to kill.

What karma will that action create? What repercussions will it have? It depends on your motivation.

- If you were filled with anger or hate your delusion of separateness is reinforced, hatred is strengthened, and the view of this world as a brutal eye-for-eye place, a ‘valley of tears’ is further cemented in your awareness.

- When you do it out of compassion for the children on the bus, that karma is softened, but still you live in a world filled with danger and enemies.

- Here is a third option: How would you act if you had complete compassion for the terrorist?

I don’t think you would act differently, the moment is too compelling. But you would act from a very different intention, a very different state of mind.

True compassion is rooted in the highest awareness, the recognition of the oneness of all life. This realization opens the intuitive mind.

Realizing that you and the terrorist are one, the eye of compassion would clearly show you the enormous disturbance in a mind that considers it right to kill children in the name of Allah.

What is then the most compassionate action you can take for the terrorist? Would it not be to stop him with any available means to protect him from the horrendous consequences of his own actions?

If you were a terrorist, would you not—on the soul level—want someone to stop you?

I will leave it to you to transfer this scenario to the killing of Osama bin Laden.

And it doesn’t stop there. How do we now relate to this soul, this part of us, which just ended an extremely difficult incarnation? Would it not be by enfolding him in the great compassion we carry in our hearts?

Who needs our compassion more than a soul who is so disturbed? And because the reality of the soul is non-local, which means it is not obstructed by the limits of time and space, we can be sure that our compassionate impulse will be received.

Yes, whether we like it or not, Osama is part of us. He is part of the oneness of life, as are all beings, high and low.

In the way we deal with terrorists—or with anyone for that matter —can we afford to continue to reinforce the illusion of ‘us against them?’

If we stay in this mode of ‘us against them’ will we have a world to live in, in a few generations?

It is time to use compassion to solve the problems of life. It is a much more powerful approach than hate.

Ram Giri

Skills for Awakening

For more information visit our website: www.SkillsforAwakening.com

There are countless levels of consciousness. No one lives on one level permanently, it shifts and moves, but more or less we have most of our experiences on a stage of awareness to which we are most habituated.

Within this stage we strive to be happy and to avoid suffering. And we also strive to evolve to higher stages to avoid the typical suffering we encounter in our stage and eventually get to what we call enlightenment or salvation or the peace that is beyond understanding.

First let’s look at the particular stage you are on. There is a spectrum of good experiences and bad experiences, of happy and sad, of peace and war. And all this happens on this same stage of consciousness. It’s the world of duality and we’re quite caught in it.

Now if you observe yourself closely you may find that when you get too low down you seek to elevate your consciousness because the higher your awareness is, the less you suffer. So with therapy or a vacation or a pill or by making some changes you make yourself more comfortable and then you feel better and your great desire for change is satisfied for a while – until something else happens and you get unhappy again. In this way you stay within your habitual range.

We can also observe that when we get happier than our customary state, we sabotage our happiness and create pain for ourselves. You may remember a thought like: “This is too good; it can’t last,” and sure enough it doesn’t because in some unconscious ways you call pain into your life again. Or you may have noticed that you are saying something to your partner and you have the thought, “Why am I saying this? I know where this leads, this leads to a fight and I don’t want a fight!” Nevertheless the words come out of your mouth and two minutes later you are embroiled in your fight. You get the pain you were unconsciously seeking. Then you make up and all is well again, until the next time.

This is what we call the pain body, the unconscious desire for pain.  It is a strange compulsion or addiction, an enchantment not unlike a curse and every one has it. It is bewildering but very real. Everyone has a pain body and if you are lucky enough to know about it that means that you have a chance to get free of it. With most people it is completely unconscious.

After the pain body takes over and you have created some pain for yourself you’re back on your habitual level of consciousness and your ego feels well because now it doesn’t have to stretch and grow and it gets to stay with the way it’s been which is the most important thing for egos.

So most of the things people do, maybe 98% of it, is designed to make their egos more comfortable. This is very confusing. They say they want enlightenment but they’re on the slow road. They are still feeding their egos by seeking more comfort. Eventually everyone gets enlightened, but unless you address and overcome what keeps you stuck on your habitual level of (dis-)comfort, it may be a long time until you get there.

But what if you’re really getting determined to grow, or even have the idea, the yearning to reach enlightenment and true freedom, the only way to experience true and full happiness? What would you need to do then? Then the search for more comfort would not be enough because the comfort never lasts. It just puts you on one side of the dualities of your life. You would need to transcend your present level of consciousness and in the end transcend all the levels of dualistic consciousness with their mix of pleasure and pain to reach non-dual or unity awareness.

This is a completely different state, outside of duality and therefore free of suffering in a lasting way. This is possible for you. It will take some work but the path-breaking news is that it is possible for you. I say path-breaking here because so many of us have been on a spiritual path for a long time and yet we are mostly busy to stay comfortable with what we know, we stay in our habitual state of consciousness and are not quite sure we want to go into the unknown that scares us, even though that unknown is true happiness.

We have to break that path open and begin to truly liberate our minds and emotions if we want to realize what we have been wanting for a long time perhaps. This is where the Skills for Awakening come in. They are the essence of reaching for true freedom and they are so simple that everyone can use them with a little practice.

with love,

Ram Giri

Skills for Awakening

Question: “Sometimes it is hard for me to feel my Heart. What can I do?”

Ram Giri: The mind has a tendency to run after distractions. This is caused by the subtle desires of the unconscious mind. It is an addiction that keeps the mind agitated and focused outward, away from the Heart. It is the greatest obstacle on the spiritual path and a source of tremendous suffering. Because of this unconscious and powerful mental addiction the soul is unable to know its true nature and freedom.

There are two answers to your question of what you can do. The first answer is consistent and patient practice, to discipline the mind by the use of HeartSourcing or other meditative techniques. Although you will not have a great experience every time you practice, the effort is cumulative. You cover a distance of 10,000 miles one step at a time.

The second answer is that inside your Heart is the presence of the Divine. Some people imagine it as a spark of the great light of God. This divine presence has a masculine and a feminine aspect. The masculine aspect is absolute Truth. The feminine aspect is absolute unconditional Love and Compassion. This feminine aspect is known as the Divine Mother, the Goddess. She dwells in all beings.

To free yourself from the addiction of the mind to the unending distractions of the world, you can turn toward this all-compassionate inner presence. In the sublime psychology of the higher mind that we know as the ancient wisdom of India, this tendency toward distraction is known as the (inner) demon Mahisha. The (inner) Goddess is known as Mahishamardini, “She who kills the demon of distraction” and so sets you free. This means that it is the very function of your inner Divinity to set you free. She exists for that purpose.

This tendency to distraction, ignorance and subtle desires is a knot in the Heart (kama granthi). When the inner Goddess frees us of this powerful ‘demon’ this knot is destroyed and the Heart opened by the ascending power of kundalini. This awakens in us great spiritual and material prosperity and good fortune.

But there is a quality to love we have to remember: love never forces itself. So if you want that presence of powerful divine Love to come to your aid, you have to activate it by asking the Goddess to set you free of the distracted mind. This should be particularly easy for women who are the manifestation of Her form in the world. But men as well have within themselves this great power of self-liberation. So whether we are in a male or female body, we can turn to our own nature in the form of this absolute motherly love.

If but for a moment we can put pride aside, we can find in the depth of us a place of childlike surrender. It’s been there ever since we were very small children. Later we may have developed a litany of problems with our mothers, but let’s just leave all this aside for a moment. Deep in us is the pattern of this trusting surrender, and now we activate it not toward another being (who may leave us) but toward the presence of absolute motherly care in us. This makes this surrender completely safe.

This asking to be freed of the demon of distractedness is surrender. Instead of years of psychotherapy or austerity, instead of pounding on heaven’s doors, try to simply turn to that motherly presence in your own Heart and ask to be set free. Instead of being a hero in your quest for peace, try to be a child for now. Be simple and egoless, just for a moment. Find that place of trust in the divine in you that will be fulfilled.

This place of primal trust exists in the depth of your Heart. Evoke it there. It is just a simple and honest asking. You can do it now. You do not have to wait until many years of accumulated pain give you enough despair so you finally discover this place of surrender. No, surrender is easy. It’s child’s play. For a moment be that child of the Divine Mother in you and ask Her for help, and She will unfailingly give you that help. She will give it to you in Her way and in Her time, but it will unfailingly come and you will be free to live out of the unobstructed purity of the unlimited Love in your Heart.

“One can’t believe impossible things,” Alice said. “I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”[1]

We’re all Alice. We can’t believe what we cannot yet believe. But that can change. So here are six impossible things you can imagine before breakfast:

1. You can be happy today. And every day.
2. You don’t have to be aggravated, worried or sad.
3. Instead you can you can question your beliefs and realize that you are aggravating and worrying yourself, and stop.
4. Instead of feeling bad, you can treat negative emotions are not as a threat but ‘a part of you that needs help.’
5. You can give that part of you some love and attention and watch the emotions melt away.
6. You can be free!

Now if you’ve practiced the Skills for awakening for a while, you know all that—but at times we forget. Then it’s good to believe at least these six impossible things every day before breakfast.

]]> http://blog.skillsforawakening.com/blog/six-impossible-things-before-breakfast/feed 0 http://blog.skillsforawakening.com/blog/our-lives-through-buddhist-eyes http://blog.skillsforawakening.com/blog/our-lives-through-buddhist-eyes#comments Fri, 17 Dec 2010 12:50:07 +0000 Ram Giri http://blog.skillsforawakening.com/?p=336

From a Buddhist perspective, busying ourselves with worldly activities is a form of laziness, because we’re lax in self-cultivation. Our lives are so busy in modern society: Our appointment books are completely full and we’re always running here and there. We often complain there isn’t enough time for the Dharma.

However, whenever we have a spare moment, we work overtime or call some friends to fill in the gap. We always have time to eat, but we hardly ever have time to nourish ourselves spiritually by attending Dharma classes or meditating. When the temple has entertainment and free meals, we go; but when there is meditation or lessons, we’re busy.

This hindrance to spiritual progress comes because we’re attached to worldly pleasures: food, money, reputation, amusement, and friends. The harm comes from our inappropriate way of relating to them. Attached, we selfishly indulge in them. However, these things in and of themselves aren’t bad. Through pacifying our afflictions, we can enjoy these things with a good motivation–to improve ourselves for the benefit of others.

–from Taming the Mind by Ven. Thubten Chodron,

]]> http://blog.skillsforawakening.com/blog/our-lives-through-buddhist-eyes/feed 0 http://blog.skillsforawakening.com/blog/are-you-ready-for-the-future http://blog.skillsforawakening.com/blog/are-you-ready-for-the-future#comments Mon, 13 Dec 2010 22:51:01 +0000 Ram Giri http://blog.skillsforawakening.com/?p=334

The prominent futurist Ray Kurzweil says that in 2045 computers will be one billion times more powerful than all human intelligence today!

So what will the most important functions for human beings be if thinking is so much more effectively done by machines, knowledge is readily available and we have come to the end of the quest for knowledge?

Perhaps the most important role of humans will be to provide wisdom and the power of the Heart. Get ready for the future today by clearing your mind and Heart of the interference of stress, confusion and fear. This will free you of suffering now and reveal wisdom and openheartedness as your true nature.

You would never do this to yourself consciously. You, like everyone else, do not like to suffer. And yet, you, like everybody else, are sometimes subjected to the hidden force of self-sabotage.

Committing yourself to a practice to awaken to your higher potential and to end the pain in your life is a sure way to activate this unconscious process. If you don’t want to fall prey to it, it is necessary to take a close look at the forces that will fight to maintain the status quo, that want to make sure your old level of pain is maintained. These are two-fold, the fear of change and the pain body.

Fear of Change

The unknown scares us, even when what is unknown is happiness or peace. Imagine living permanently in true freedom and joy. It would be like living in a different world, wouldn’t it? And stepping out of the zone of our habitual way of life can be very scary. When that fear arises we are likely to do something to prevent us from changing.

The Pain Body

The pain body is our unconscious tendency to cling to that part of our identity that is used to pain. “Who would I be without my pain?” is a difficult question for many to answer. We’re just so used to our difficulties.

Who hasn’t had the thought during very happy times, “This is too good to last!” who hasn’t noticed repetitive patterns of self-inflicted suffering? This is how we unconsciously call back our discomfort and do something that brings us pain. (You can read more about it here: http://skillsforawakening.com/teachings/the-pain-body/)

We create our own reality through our thinking and our emotional patterns. Unless we change them, the same problems are likely to happen again and again, including our tendency to self-sabotage. This is how we can stay stuck for a long time.

When you make the decision to take your life onto a higher level of functioning, the unconscious force of self-sabotage rears its head. It can come in many forms, all of them appearing completely convincing: You have no money, no time for it, the effort is too much trouble, or you get yourself distracted. Although these may be untrue pain body manifestations, they appear completely compelling to you.

Even more difficult to see are self-sabotage events that appear to come from outside: external interferences, family objections, accidents, illness, a sudden increase in problems or outright chaos and more can all be the outcome of your unconscious desire to reject your impulse to improve your life.

Some interesting self-sabotage events are completely unforeseeable events that interfere with your life. Most people would not ever suspect that such events can be brought on by their own subconscious – until such events repeat themselves at similar junctions in life. There are also what I call ‘metaphysical delusions,’ the conviction that grace will take care of you, that all is really fine, or that no action on your part is necessary. The truth of course is that grace comes to us in exact proportion to self-effort.

The resolution to this challenge comes when our fear of change and self-delusion gives way to the will and courage to change. This happens when our yearning to experience the true freedom of liberation from suffering has become stronger than the old habits of interference.

How does that happen? This inner maturing can be accomplished by two forces: by suffering and by a decision to do what is necessary to reach this freedom, aided by a deep yearning or desire for it. Yes, we have a choice here: if we are able to make the decision to free ourselves proactively from the inner obstructions, we can avoid the necessity for suffering to give us this motivation.

When we are thus no longer fully subjected to our pain body and the fear of change, we arrive at a true commitment to our freedom. This gives us the ability to listen to our internal wisdom and to follow the Heart, our inborn ability for self-love. It empties us of the small self, the contraction of the fear-based aspects of ego, and opens us to the astounding presence of the Higher Self. This alone is true freedom.

Namaste,

Ram Giri

“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” ~ Jalal ad-Din Rumi ~ Was born on September 30, 1207 (Persian poet and mystic, 1207-1273)