Nikolai1

If he is meeting people and not seeing energy work as absolutely crucial to a very large proportion of them, then he is teaching from a position of dogma. Maybe he realises he is doing that though. I think teachers who do, say things like: 'this is not what we say here' or, 'here, we teach that the most important thing is to let all things pass.' Such teachers would recommend that the student go elsewhere and will know precisely where to send them.

Yes what I've called in this thread 'normal' science is the approach nearly everyone takes to begin with. To go beyond this it really helps if you have an excellent understanding of science and the philosophy of science. The more you study the philosophical assumptions behind science, the more you loosen your blind attachment to it. Thus Einstein considered himself a religious man, Newton was almost mystically Christian etc. Only when the intellect is completely confused will it need to find an alternative science, the science of the heart. But it takes great intelligence to confuse the intellect!

Jetsun You talk about the guru taking a decision in the moment. He may presumably find himself advising energy practice to one person and disparging it to the next. Certainly, lots of great masters have been like this, and have seemed contradictory. But is Mooji? I suspect that disparaging energy practice is what he always does. Unfortunately this is the style of the dogmatic advaitin who will only view things from the very intellectual witness state. If I've got Mooji wrong I'd be interested to know? I always feel much more confortable with teachers who contradict themselves.

The way I see is is that when we practice we always concentrate on one area - be it the intellectual aspect, the feelings or energetic aspect, or the action/ethical aspect. Realisation will come, but it will take the form of the aspect we have focussed on. The distinctively ntellectual realisation is the attainment of the non-dual witness state. This is the fruit of the jnani. But we have to see that this endpoint is intellectual only, and that our feelings and actions have to 'catch up' with it. If we mistake intellectual realisation for total realisation we will find ourselves disparaging the Kundalini experiences which for our neighbour have been the main thrust of their practice. It can be very confusing when we reach the witness state, because from the intellectual perspective there really is no further to go. But when we look from our heart and see that there is further to go, we are able to admit that what we lack is what all those Kundalini yogis have already gained...(and what they lack, we have gained) We need to simultaneously honour our own path, while realising the narrowness of its focus. This is hard for all practitioners.

We all have breakthroughs - we all have moments of such dramatic insight that nothing is the same again. Kundalini is the felt version of this breakthrough. It was clearly without any prior expectation (which suggests a lack of intellectuality in the girl). She was suggesting that her life has been changed by the experience and the validity of this needed to be recognised by Mooji, somehow. But like many Advaitins, he had nothing else to offer than the rote 'how it looks from the witness' argument' - which is that it is all mere phenomena. We have to let ourselves talk in terms of process (spiritual breakthroughs) and talk in terms of no-process (all is empty). If that girl went away feeling her Kundalini was insignificant then that wouldl have been unskilful teaching I would have said.

There is only one desire of this nature and that is the desire for death. All other desires will return in either the same or different guise...and I mean ALL desires. Desire is life itself and only stops with the terminal desire.

Hi all It might help us to understand the heart's intelligence by thinking about mathematics. If I am a business man trading with a company in the US I don't need to travel to the US to check that my maths still apllies. A deal for $2000 of cloth and $3000 of cushions is a $5000 deal both in the UK and the US. There is a universality to the arithmetic. Wherever I go it holds true. Of course, we would never try and work out the feelings in another woman's heart by mathematics. But there is a field of knowledge with equal certainty and universality. With this we can solve the problems that outer maths and science simply cannot. By knowing what it in ourself, we can know what is in another. It is the science of subjectivity. With clear analysis of our own heart we can discover the contents of another's because at the heart level there is no separation. What is in mine is in hers. For normal outer science to produce fruit, there needs to be a purification of enquiry. We must make sure that we isolate the variable from other confounding variables so that we see clearly the effects. In inner science we must purify ourselves from all the confounding suppositions we have about truth. We must look clearly and directly at our own feelings, in all their forms, and ensure that they aren't being polluted by truths that are simply bleeding over from consensus reality. We have to become direct and empty. We need to see if the love is still there when all other considerations have been taken away. Our heart's desire either starts to purify and strengthen, or we find that it weakens. We may feel greater love for the woman, or we may find that we feel love and happiness at the thought of not loving the woman. When we have exposed a false love we will feel disticntly released and liberated. We will feel confident and happy not to be bogged down. We have exposed a true love we will feel confident and powerful. We will blissfully realise that we will love this woman no matter what, and to love her is our greatest pleasure. We will come to know that we don't even need her in the flesh because this love in the heart is satisfaction enough. When we are already satisfied in our heart, we know that she loves us as we love her and physical manifestation will happen effortlessly and obviously. It is as obvious as 2+2=4 ...and we don't need to go to her to check the math!

Jetsun We can think we love a girl but when we truly inquire in our hearts we discover that it isn't truly love. Rather it is the idea of her as someone who would be good to love...because she looks right, or has the right friends, or would be likely to love us back and boost our self-esteem. We can also think we dislike people but if we truly inquire of our hearts we find we don't dislike them. It is just an inauthentic disliking that we have, based on values that we have inherited. I remember working with a client, a hard criminal, who all society would be expected to loathe. And yet, deep down I found it impossible to agree. He put a smile on my face that couldn't be faked. I think if De Mello truly searched his heart he would find that he did indeed like this person. The heart knows best!

I did an edit - can I have the Thank you now?

Another interesting thing about this video is that it reveals very clearly that Mooji doesn't understand the Kundalini experience,and has not experienced it for himself. He was asked straight out. But rather than give a straight honest affirmation he said: 'My Dear! All that is child's play!' Thus he was able to imply he knew all about it, while shutting the conversation down before he had to speak authoritatively about it. It is true that Kundalini can be felt in the body before the mind can make sense of it. But when the mind does finally make sense of it, it would not relegate it in the way Mooji did.

Realisation and energy work are the same thing. The student who sees with his wisdom that he is not trapped in time and space, will feel the same truth in his body. He will feel unbounded; the pleasure of liberation will be felt as a pleasure that cannot be contained by the body. Mooji's error is that he is seeing things only from the witness state, where all things are meaningless and passing phenomena. He relegates energetic experience as being more of the 'story' when in actual fact the energy work is itself the liberation. The opposite error is to turn energy work into a 'technique'. Practice X will cause effect Y, where Y= realisation. Both these errors are dualitic in nature. Mooji's dualism is relegating everything energetic to the category 'mere phenomenon'. It is what happens when you use your mind too much and interpret everything according to the way the witness sees. Damakos's student's error is in splitting the unsplitable into two components and seeing causal relations between them. Intellectual realisation and felt (energetic) realisation are the same thing, viewed from different modalities. An electrical storm looks like flashes of lighting to the eye, and crashes of sound to the ear. But we do not say that lighting causes thunder, or vice versa Energy work only looks like mere phenomena when viewed from the mind. Energy work only 'causes' realisation for those who aren't using the mind enough. Get the balance right, and you will see that Mooji and Damakos are saying the exact same thing!

Thinking people do get a hard time in spiritual circles. I think it is relic of Christianity which is such a heart based religion. What I am trying to say here is that the heart is not just the organ of love, it is the organ of wisdom. A beautiful philosphical theory is like a beautiful poem, or a symphony. It transforms humnaity and is a creative act straight from the Tao!

Jetsun I agree entirely, and I have been trying to capture this in what I've written. When we follow the heart we are going back to the source of both localised intelligence fields, hers and mine. The individual minds are like individual rays coming from the same sun. Normal science would discover that the love is real by examing what's going on in my own ray, and then asking her about her's. Awakened science is the ability to discern the truth that willl show in both rays. If we discover that our own love is truly coming from the heart, we won't need to ask what is happening in her ray, we already know. I think many of us will have experienced this. We can meet someone and in the first moments feel incredibly confident about our feelings and hers. But yes, the non-dual insight does not obliterate duality of perspective, does not render it wrong or illusory. It is being able to see that localised feelings of love or also united in mutual, nay, universal, feelings. What is exciting about all this is that we have this organ - the heart - that is capable of true wisdom and practical intelligence, once we have learned to hear it.

Yes, although I would say that what I am writing here Is the fruit. Some write ecstatic poems and songs, I offer theories. It is what the thinker does!

Hi Karl - welcome back The non-dual vision that all this is based on is not fully captured by the Kantian philosophy. It can be a good preparation for loosening our attachment to our thought-based theories, but only through direct experience can we know the, in Kant's terms, the noumenon. Any philosophy occurs within the normal view of time and space, subject and object. It is this we awaken from.

Hi Michael I think that the mindset we enter into upon awakening is a non-dual one. From this place all characteristics - whether hers or mine - are overcome. We enter a place where any differences are overcome. Whatever my feelings are for her, they will be the same as her feelings for me. The question is: how do we come to know what they are? Normal science would be to assume that my feelings of love for her are genuine. All I have to do is ask her if she has the same feelings. Awakened science proceeds by asking deep questions of ourselves first: 'I may think I love her, but do I really?' Once we have found the truth in ourselves, we have no need to ask her about her own feelings. We already know. So in summary, I'm talking about going to a place inside ourselves where there is no possibility of difference between her feelings and mine. It is my heart that shall tell us alll we need to know about us. And my heart is her heart is OUR heart. The heart decides. The heart is there steering us through life, creating a distinct path through possibility. Of course we can defy the heart. Often we defy the heart when we take the path that makes most sense according to how everyone else seems to live their life. In other words, we defy the heart when we choose to copy other people who are following their hearts rather than their own. By the way, I'm not talking about the heart as some abstract thing. The more we learn to live our awakened life, the louder and more obvious the heart speaks. It's obvious because its really the only one talking in clear terms. The intellectual voice has become two voices and they have withdrawn to a corner arguing in circles about something, with neither one being convincing. Yes, we reach a point where the heart not only speaks the most sense, it is saying what, deep down, we actually want to hear. In our society the healthy person is usually the one who prioritises the truth of shared reality - their inner specualtions of reality match up with those of others. There is a person who reverses this and says many things about the outer world that are nothing other than inner specualtions - this is psychosis in extreme forms. Psychosis is the naive projection of inner dynamics onto the world, and being completely unconscious that they do this. The psychotic does not believe that the world is created by themselves; rather, it is the non-psychotic person who accuses them of trying to do this. Neither of these people have awakened to the non-dual truth, which is that inner and outer are part of the same reality. What we call a thought and matter intersperse each other. The notion of another person thinking, is itself our thinking. When we come to know their thoughts, it is another of our own thoughts as well. All instances of another person's subjectivity, are themselves more of our subjectivity. Self and other therefore breaks down. So too, does the distinction between an inner world and outer world. There is nothing 'out there' to discover by science, therefore our science must occur at the non-dyal place where the intellect can't reach. This is where the heart takes over. Nature's laws are only objective once they have been manifested. So if I discover, in myself, that the girl is indeed in love with me as I am her we will end up sharing our life in manifest reality. My life as a single person is now over. I must come to terms with the fact of this in nature - I can't be both IN a manifest relationship AND manifestly single. Inner science comes first. The laws of nature reflect the dictates of the heart that we discover inside us. The constants of the cosmos reflect the constancy of our heart's love. You could say that the outer world, and the way it works our just external projections of an inner reality. Though we all do it, it is simply more of the same psychosis and differs only from clinical psychosis because it is conventional - the mechanism is the same. When we imagine ourselves bound by nature, we are actually bound by our own hearts. If we find ourselves entertaining impossible fantasies, we are defying ourselves and what our heart has created for us. As we settle in to our the peace of our non-dual life, we will find ourselves increasingly accepting of the iron constraints of the cosmos - as well as our nationality, our ugly body, our feeble intellect. Deep aspects of our lives we may not wish to change because not wishing to change and not having the power to change are the same thing. But this doesn't mean that our creative lives are over! There is lots in our lives that is not of our heart's choosing, but has been manifest because of our former habit of following other people's hearts. All this kind of stuff can change as we see fit in our hearts. Awakening is both losing our belief in ourselves AND discovering that you are the place where a heart wants to see things done in an entirely new and creative way. I also had lots more to say on this but I look foward to more of your comments Michael!

What do you mean by lineage refinements?

It is clear that Jesus, despite his radical new truth, saw no real need to depart from the Mosaic Law, or even Caesar's law. It was his immediate successors (though not Paul) who were unable to reconcile the new with the old. It was either / or to them...and this shows their failure of understanding. The same failure that we see Jesus lamenting in the Gospels.

The inner science I speak of is not simple introspection, because both sciences involve this. Normal scientific introspection is internally mulling over all the different explanations and deciding upon one that best fits the facts. Post-awakening introspection is of a very different nature. There is no truth out there to fit our thoughts to. What the truth will be is open. It is therefore up to us to create truth according to our will. But how do we know what our will is? As I said in the OP we may will many different things: for example, we might simultaneously wish something, and not wish the shame that will fall on us if we get it. The determinant of truth for the awakened scientist is what is felt in the heart as love. We must learn to hear what our heart is telling us to do. This isn't actually hard. For the person who has very clearly seen the non separation of thought and matter, their intellect no longer works for them anyway. There is no truth to discover with the mind. The heart is what comes to the rescue. Love is the only remaining determinant of action and is the thing that creates truth. What we love in our hearts, we bring into our reality. Of course this is what we do anyway, even before awakening. If we fall in love we are powerless as if under some kind of spell. But if we don't trust that feeling of love and cleave to it, then what we love will be lost to us. If we allow ourselves to think that what we love is 'untrue' then we will lose the permanent manifestation of love. We must lose our manifested love and wait for it to return again in a different guise. If we are faithful to the feeling in our hearts there will be no need for the object of our love to change, we will love constantly in whatever guise it has taken. Before awakening our will is taken over by what we think we desire. What we think we desire is shaped by the society we are in. To awaken is to become an autonomous self. We are no longer able to find pleasure in something just because it makes sense to everyone else around us. We become painfully independent and must find our own truth. This is where the heart steps in to guide us. And what it shows is intelligent and enduring. It will show us howw to replace all the things that have fallen by the wayside since we lost the taste for the pleasures of the herd. We will learn to fill our loves with objects of love that stay with us, and do not need to be constantly replaced when we have lost belief in their truth. Finally we meet the woman we love, and in her we see all the women that we have loved before. We love her because we see it is not 'her' we love, but the loveof following the imperatives of the heart inside us...because there is nothing else to follow.

This is the worldview I call materialism. There is a world, independent of us, and it is as it is. We can either understand it, or not, but it makes no difference to reality - which will continue as before. Awakening is realising that this is not the case. Materialism is what we awaken from. Obviously from the standpoint of materialism this thread is going to make zero sense. It is a post-materialistic science I'm talking about.

Yes there is a question we ask when we already know the answer. It is an empty formality, but still we must ask it! That question is a creative act. It is the means by which the tacit becomes real and manifest. It is rather like the position a couple find themselves in when they keep meeting up, even when the rest of the gang aren't there, chatting on whatsapp each night - but on the surface are still friends. It still comes as a relief to both when one of them 'makes it official', even though neither of them were in any real doubt about what was happening. The difference with the question of the wise person is that only he knows the answer beforehand. To the other, it might come completely out the blue...but she does not say 'no' to him! The awakened person is much more attuned to their feelings. They see what to others is still unseen. Tell me why you felt uncomfortable?

I'm saying that to the wise, the question is an empty formality. And he only needs to ask it if he knows the question is going to be 'yes'. As you can see, its a total reversal of science. We ask because we already know. Our asking IS the knowing.

Readers of these two different types of enquiry might ask: But does it matter? In both types of science there is a search from unknowing to knowing. Whether we perform the verification on the outside or the inside, what difference does it make? It is true that the outcome is the same in both cases, but our situation while the verification is occurring is much different. The outer scientist Is fretting day and night over the truth. With great nerves and intrepidation, plucks up the courage to ask her Places her in a very difficult and awkward situation. He is way off the mark. Suffers great disappointment and a lack of confidence in his own judgement. This painful experience will make him even more blind to reality next time he likes a girl. Next time he won't trust himself, and settling down with a girl will be a doubtful and protracted process. The Inner Scientist All the turmoil is contained within the crucible of himself. Aloof he observes the to and fro until certainty reveals itself. There is no outer awkwardness. His relations with the girl are cool and confident throughout, whatever the final outcome. He has taken on all possibility for outer unpleasantness and kept it on the inside while he patiently reveals the truth. His hidden work looks on the outside like nothing is happening at all. When thr truth has been determined, his action is swift, effective and totally natural. Truth will out, in either scenario. The Tao will have its way. But to the awakened this truth will manifest calmly, confidently and without hitch. Before awakening we have to go through all manner of stressful byroads.

Here's a concrete example: Imagine a young man has recently met a woman at his work. They have spoken a few times and yet each time he has felt the most amazing rush of energy. Although he can't explain it, he really feels like he's in love. It seems that he has known her for ages; there seems to be something in the way they look at each other. Of course, his worry is that it is all an illusion. He can't deny that he would love to find a mate and he knows that he can fall prey to wishful thinking. His question - the thing he is almost frantic to know - is: does this girl feel the same way? The assumption of normal science This is the assumption that somewhere on the other side of town there is a girl who already knows the answer to this question. The truth is out there, waiting to be discovered. She is aware of something he needs to know. All he has to do is ask her the question and then he will get the answer. There is a truth to the situation, but he does not yet know it and is therefore in ignorance. The assumptions of post-awakening science The truth is not 'out there' waiting to be discovered by asking the question. Whether the girl loves him is a fact still waiting to be determined. This does not mean she has not made up her mind. It means that he has not made up his. Whether she loves him or not will be directly dictated by him and the inner validity of his mental processes. What are these? There are two conflicting thoughts in his mind: 1) That his love for this female individual is real. 2) That the love is nothing more than a desire for any female, not necessarily this one. One of these thoughts will predominate, and will in fact determine the answer she gives when he asks her next time he sees her. His task is simply to determine, through what I call inner science, which of these two conflicting thoughts is of the higher truth. His scientific investigation therefore occurs not 'out there in the world' but inside his own inner world. If he comes up with the right answer as to the nature of HIS love for the girl, her love for him (or her disregard) will naturally manifest in reality. Such a scientist has no need for outer empiricism. He has no need to ask her whether she loves him. He hs completely stopped projecting his own self-ignorance onto the world, and then trying to regain it through empirical verification. Rather, the world naturally affirms what he already knows inside hinself and willls. Needless to say, an awakening to the nature of reality completely reverses our behaviour. No longer do we search outside for answers; we search inside for truth in the knowledge that the outside will necessarily mirror it.

Just as thunder and lightning are the same event viewed through different modalities, breath and thought are the same thing. We can not set up causal relations between breath and thought just as we cannot say the light of lightning causes the sound of thunder.