Awakening and Flow States, with Loch Kelly

[Music] Welcome to Deconstructing Yourself. The podcast for Metamater Mutants interested in meditation, awakening, Vajrayana, Tantra, Zen, the coming of fall, psychedelics, non-duality, love, devotion, hummingbirds, and more. My name is Michael Taftar, host on the podcast, and in this episode, I'm speaking once again with Locke Kelly. Locke Kelly is an author, licensed psychotherapist, and recognized leader in the field of meditation and awakening. He is the founder of the non-profit Effortless Mindfulness Institute and has worked in community mental health, established homeless shelters, and counseled family members of 9/11 victims. Locke graduated from Columbia University and received a fellowship to study in Sri Lanka, India, and Nepal. Locke has collaborated with neuroscientists at Yale, U Penn, and NYU in the study of how awareness, training, and enhance compassion, and well-being. His teachings are informed by Buddhist non-dual meditation, psychology, and neuroscience. And now without further ado, I give you the episode that I call "Awakening and Flow States" with Locke Kelly. Hey, Locke, good to say hi, and I'm so excited that we're talking together once again. Yeah, Michael, this is so much fun. I'm looking forward to it and, you know, great to be back in contact with you. Yeah, it's been years, and you've been a busy boy, so there's a lot to talk about. I think where I want to jump in is something that I've seen in your work that I'm also doing a lot with, but we're doing it in kind of different ways, is this sort of seeming difference, and it's not a real difference, but it's a seeming, it's at least a difference in a way of working, which is that I'll just kind of summarize it here clumsily and say, "When people start working with awareness, awake awareness, direct path, non-duality, whatever you want to say, there's almost always a pointing towards within, like look within, don't find a sense of self, you can find a sense of self, but you can't find self as thing, and notice that, and then that kind of drops. There's a million things we could say about that, but that sort of turn back, turn the light around as the tradition says. That's kind of the normal or let's say typical way of doing that, but something I was very pleased I was looking at some of your material and I saw you were pointing people out, right into the world, into activity, into lectures at me, I style flow states, stuff like that, and I got really excited and happy, because for me that's an important direction also, so I may have given away too much there at the beginning, but that's the thing I want to start talking about anyway here today, and of course we're just having a conversation, so wherever you want to take it. But I thought, wow, that's really cool. I like that too, so I just want to throw that out there and see what you want to pick up. Yeah, that's a really great starting point, Michael. Yeah, I mean two things. One is kind of intro or the beginning pointing of, you know, recognition of this dimension, which is not on the Western maps. You know, there's some use of attention and focus on the breath and then witnessing thoughts coming and going that can be done with classical language, but it is this unique ancient, and yet how do we help it become modern, discovery of what the wisdom traditions have said is the ultimate medicine, which is discovery of the nature of mind. We call it awake awareness. Ticknot Han called it interbeying, which starts toward what you were talking about is not just an inner meditative state, but what I call the next natural stage of human development. In other words, if there is a waking up from this thinking, I think, therefore I am small mind, which is called intubate and sem, SEM, to this nature of mind, which is called rikpa, or we say awake awareness, and then embodying or inter-discovering the non-dual, which in Buddhism isn't the non-dual awareness. Some people using that non-dual awareness is actually half of non-dual. That's right. It's not actually non-dual. The awareness is not non-dual. It's not dual, but then there's a new dualism because if you just stay in that pure awareness and see everything else as a movie or as illusion or as only coming going, then you don't discover the relative, what's called same taste or non-dual presence, the unity of emptiness and aliveness. These other descriptions of what I'm hoping that you and I can help people start to explore both that move to the awareness, which can be discovered either inside or initially, also there's a pointer for the awareness to open up for you to feel like your body is in mind or like a storm cloud and you're trying to clean it up by doing internal work, and then you have awareness actually step out to the space in the room. Yeah, so there's so many things in what you just said. I'm going to pick almost the last thing you said, but not the last thing, but just before it. To me, this is where you said that non-dual awareness is only half non-dual or however you exactly said that. This is exactly on point. This is something that I find is very confusing for people, especially because there are different traditions that call themselves non-dual, but they're actually teaching two different non-dualities and the one where we're only kind of staying in non-dual awareness and seeing the world as some kind of dream or some even some kind of like bad dream, like something you're supposed to kind of ignore and just go only into the spacious open stillness, just the awakeness with no content. I actually give that a different name. I call that non-dual one. It's not that it's not true, right? That's a powerful thing to notice, and I would even say that that's the one that most people get in touch with first, and also that that's important to get in touch with because it kind of prize your fingers, your clutchy little fingers off attachment to stuff or gripping onto stuff or getting involved in a way. But as you said very clearly, and I think it's super important, the way I would put it, that's only halfway there. It's like that's just this one mode, and it kind of forgets the most important thing, or maybe the equally most important thing, which is the whole world of experience, the whole world of form, which in non-dual one traditions they tend to denigrate or throw away or decide is some kind of illusion that we should not pay attention to. And there's this other further move available, if we want to call it that, I call it non-dual two, which includes non-dual one, which includes that understanding, but then takes it out to everything. Then now we're including the, as you would say, and so on sort of the ornament of the groundless ground, the sort of exuberant expression of everything, or as they say in non-dual shibatantra, you've got the Shiva, which is the non-dual one, but then you've got the Shakti, who to quote the recognition sutras is painting the whole world on the canvas, which is her body. It's like this non-dual awake awareness is totally non-separate from all experience. And so this is a different teaching and it's confusing for people if they don't understand that this is a different kind of tradition. I'm a little judgy about it. I would say it's a much deeper understanding and incredibly beautiful and incredibly important. So I just love that you brought that up because to me, this is like central. Yeah, so as you say, it's almost like there is a waking up from the dualistic mind is the first step and then waking to the insight from there that which was the subject is now the object and it's changing contents. So there's the no self. And then waking to The new operating system over the nature of mind since it's no longer thought-based is awareness-based. And that experience of Rigpa, or awake awareness, or pure awareness, or is liberating, waking too, but then there's kind of a waking with, which is the recognition that there's not two things. Everything that's arising is coal rising, ornaments and the awareness or the awareness and the aliveness are not two. So the Buddhist understanding of the two truths that there's ultimate reality and relative reality and they're not two. So this is where it seems to be the unfolding continues to happen and that you, you know, kind of climb up the mountain and then come back down. I love the zen catchbowl, you know, zen paintings of the circles, of the journey of- The ox hurting pictures, yeah. So the third to last is an empty circle. So there's a hunt for the ox, which is, you know, you could say awakening, then there's the emptiness, which is the no self or the pure awareness. The next to last is just a flourishing of nature. So just a circle, the person's not there anymore, but all the aliveness, there's reads and trees and things, and then the last circle, which is what I think we're talking about, is often described as returning to the village with gift-bearing hands. So it's coming back into bodhicitta or compassionate interconnection or the full awareness that becomes, you know, more bodhisattva than kind of transcendent leaving the world. That's right. And you just said Buddhist understanding, which it is, of course, but I would add later Buddhist understanding, because I feel like this is one of the things about both traditional Advaita Vedanta and early Buddhism, is they tend to be what I'm calling non-dual one traditions, right? They tend to be focused only on this voidistic part of it, right? You use this phrase going up the mountain and coming back down. My metaphor is the opposite for the same idea where I talk about going down into source and then reversing that and coming back up into all things. But either way, this is just hugely important and hugely interesting. Now something that I've seen, you've taught thousands and thousands of people, and I've been teaching a lot now for the last 20 years. And so I want to see if my experience matches yours, which is it is true that you can point out a wake awareness to someone off the street rather easily, at least for a second. And then also there are certain people, but I would say not the majority, a small percentage who relate to this nature of mind view, what I call non-dual too. I don't know what we want to call it in this podcast, but it's never separate. The appearances are never separate from the awareness kind of you. A small percentage of people do relate to that directly. But in my experience, most people need to go through the first kind of seeing the just the emptiness part before they get the second kind of coming back into the world. I'm curious, do you notice that as well? Or is it something totally different? Yeah, and as long as we're doing the one and two, so they could have emptiness one and emptiness two. Yeah, exactly, exactly. So emptiness one is kind of the no self or the absence, which is often the insight, the first insight of insight, meditation, is things are changing, and there is no solid separate self. So that seems to be like, oh, it's not here. The solid separate self is not here. So that's emptiness one. Emptiness two, if you stay with that definition, is oh, there's not a solid separate self because everything's interdependent. So emptiness two doesn't mean empty like an empty cup. It doesn't mean invisible. It means interconnected, interdependent. So a tree, there's not such thing as a separate tree or separate ego, separate self, because a tree is not a tree without water, earth, sun, and air. So it's a process, you realize there's a process of interdependence, and that's what the root words V in Sanskrit for what Tibetans use for emptiness. The metaphors often, the invisible life force within a seed that helps it grow into a tree. Yeah, so interesting. The Takenhan's view of this, his expression of his view is very unique. I've never heard it express that way by other teachers, and it's very fascinating. So now that we've kind of got a sense of this, I think it's interesting that you're saying emptiness one, emptiness two, and my question was, did you see that most people kind of need to do it in stages? Yeah, but not everyone. And people come from different backgrounds, some have gone progressively through or need to go progressively through almost the classical shammata calming the body and mind, and they can do that not just through sitting, but through yoga or through exercise or through martial arts or through, you know, some self soothing, and even you could say some psychotherapy basically is starting to calm the body and mind, give you a kind of a sense, then the next is the four foundations of mindfulness, starting to see a Nietzsche, things are changing, you know, in that insight that people often say is, oh my god, I'm not my thoughts, you know, they're changing, they're coming, go, and I'm not them, and I'm not, you know, even before they say I'm not a self, they're in this, because what happens is they often go into this witness position of, you know, a mindful witness which is still a part of us or a point of view or Zen calls it a head upon a head. So we think we're have woken up from that because we can see that ego self, small self is an object or it's made of thoughts, but we're now in a point of view called a mindful witness that is, is kind of neutral and as, you know, the word non-judgmental is often used, but it doesn't have love, it doesn't have embodiment, it's detached, and so the next move is what we're talking about from those who have just started with classical progressive insight meditation is to look who's behind the camera or who's aware of both your body and this mindful witness, you open up or you discover this spacious, pervasive, clear, effortless awareness that you're mindful from that isn't using concentration or attention as its form of awareness and it starts to feel connected to what it's aware of. So yes, that's the classical way, but others who are more emotional types will go through the subtle body. So they'll almost have a subtle version of unity, you know, or those who come through psychedelics will have this unity of like feeling empathetic and connected and so it's not yet non-dual presence or same taste, but they're kind of coming not from a mental point of you which most come from where they're identified with the thinker, but they're coming from a kind of body emotional and they have some love and they have some qualities, but it's all just jumping around and they're taking things on and so they come in and they need to kind of almost discover, you know, how to unblend from that and yet not lose the juice. That's right, it's super interesting, you're calling it unblending. That's what I call pride, their fingers off the graviness, right? I'm glad you mentioned that a lot of people who have background in psychedelics, it does tend to be those folks and as you said, the emotional-based folks who can do the more unity consciousness version, the kind of non-dual two version, a little more, they relate to that a little more easily. But as you say, it's all mixed up together with a lot of grasping and so there's even in that case a need to kind of back up a little bit and focus on emptiness or what I would call spaciousness openness and learn to let go a little bit, right? It can be really, really caught up and reified even though there's more of an ability to kind of tune into that. So something that I found in your teaching that is really, really interesting is that you've got a large number of methods for helping people who let's say are used to turning the light around, used to doing inquiry, used to seeing that. ego where the self is not an object, helping them to start to focus on experience, focus outward. So, why don't you talk about that a little bit and maybe even show us one of those exercises if you don't mind. I think it's really interesting, especially because you use the psychological idea from me. I took sent me high of flow to help people do it, which I've never seen that before, even though I get why it's possible. I haven't seen many people teaching that way. So, I think that's really fascinating. Yeah. I mean, the reason that I discovered is one is that I had some awakening experiences playing sports as a kid. So, a way of being totally embodied, feeling like a cat, interconnected, not in my mind, trusting that I'd gone beyond having to be hypervigilant or in an attention-based focus, that if I went to the next level of what musicians and athletes call flow or being the zone that Chik sent behind, notice some of the same qualities as a wake consciousness in action with eyes open in relationship, which is there's a sense of timelessness or being in the now that time either slows down if you're absorbed, what I call absorbed flow, if you're in a focused, but then there's panoramic flow, which is when time slows down and you feel like you're beyond time, and yet you're very much here, in connected to the present, you can access the past and think about it in the now, or you can make a plan for the future of a list of shopping list in the now. So, it's not being in the present moment as much as being in this flow. And what I notice is that, you know, if the premise is that the awake consciousness, which this is one of the keys of this approach, the awake consciousness that we're seeking is already here inherent within us, in everyone, as a natural dimension of consciousness. It doesn't have to be created or developed or doesn't have a skill that has to be, you know, achieved. So, it just has to be recognized almost like a background shift or, you know, a kind of a dropping out of. So, when I ask people, I say, okay, if the description is that you're in the now, your eyes can be open. So, this is like the awake in the world. So, we're going to the almost an example of where awake people are after they've meditated for 20 years. They're now in the world. So, I'm saying, but if it's natural, I betcha you've had an experience of this. Why wouldn't you have had if it's natural? And if it has a quality, as Chik sent Mahai says, and as Bodhi Chita says, you know, as Sat Chita Nanda, it has a bliss, you know, both Chik sent Mahai and it has a quality of joy or loving kindness or what's called ultimate compassion rather than just relative compassion. And I ask people, okay, can you tell me either a peak experience or what you do in your free time that you love, that your eyes are open and you're in activity, but you drop out of the small self naturally and you optimally connect function and enjoy yourself. So, people name playing sports, listening to music, playing music, gardening, being with animals, children, hiking in nature. And when you look at that and you allow yourself to feel, okay, what happens? And when does it happen? You know, where do I go and who am I? Is it related to the activity, the person the place where thing or is it actually the doorway to reveal this optimal sense of connectivity, joy, optimal functioning, certainly musicians playing jazz or extreme athletes have to go. They have to have a challenge and then they go to the next level. So, people are able to do that. And then I do one of these glimpses called the memory door, which it's a little long to do here, but I'll do another glimps that I'll describe is basically so bring to mind and body and consciousness that experience, close your eyes, visualize, see, feel, enter that situation, go back, realize, see the place, the situation, the things, feel the qualities and feel who's having the experience. Now drop the situation, let go of the visual, let go of even the qualities and still be the one who was revealed and now come back and open your eyes. And most people are like, oh my God, I'm here in this room. And now this is the same quality of awakeness that I had at my peak experience, but it's me. It's not the place or the state. And so this is what you're calling the memory door, right? So we remember a very deep flow state. And then just kind of bring that state to the now. Yeah. So, you know, you could call it a flow state, you call it a wake consciousness, because that's the premise they ask, you know, like what are the reasons that if it's already here, if the awakeness is already inherent, why don't we recognize it? And they say the four reasons are because it's so close, you can't see it. This is the first one. So it's closer than our breath. We're looking out from our mind, looking for it. We're looking in at contents of consciousness rather than just being it. Second one is it's so non-rational. It's not a thought that we can't know it. So we're trying to think about it, know it, read about it, but it's actually just here. And it's prior to thought, can use thought is beyond thought, is wisdom. And then the third one is it's so simple. When you recognize it, you can't believe it that this is what they're call awakening. It's not, you know, like fireworks or it's not special. It's not psychedelic. And then the fourth reason, which is that when you really realize it, it's so good. It's hard to accept that it's you. Yeah, you don't deserve it. You feel like you don't deserve it because the psychological parts come in and try to manage. Like, I can't be this way. I've made mistakes. I have shame. I've guilt. It's like, no, no, the essential you has no shame, no fear, no worry. And it can be with those parts of you that have shame, fear, worry. Now, what about the case with the flow research of chicks and me? Just like all of these things, it's not binary. There's very, very mild flow states. And what both of us are kind of pointing to is the deep end of that, where much deeper end. And so what about the case? How do you work with what must I'm just going to guess? Often be the case, which is that people are remembering a very mild flow. Yeah. Yeah. So it's about, you know, how do you language or introduce something? And particularly how do you introduce this premise or this hypothesis, this awake consciousness is not something that's developed. It's already inherent within you. So you've had it. So let me give you a category that maybe you've had a peak experience or can access it. So it could be just a glimpse, you know, a small version of it. So the idea is that there's an optimal functioning awareness based knowing that goes beyond thought. So one of the examples is typing. So if you, that's a great example. So if you realize that you have to do the first part. So this is good too. You have to learn the keyboard. So you have to learn some of the basic glimpses and shifts of consciousness to find which ones you work for you and that it becomes as the Tibetan word for meditation. GOM is translated familiarize. So you learn, you familiarize the basics. A little bit small glimpse at a time, glimpse by glimpse. And then it becomes second nature or you know it by heart. And what happens is you are optimally functioning. So if I were to ask you or anybody listening, okay, so can you type, you know, a few sentences without looking, right? No problem. Yeah. Okay, can you tell me the letters on the keyboard on the middle row starting right to left? Hell no. Right. So this is an example of what I believe is kind of the next stage of development in a common way that you can go into this optimally functioning where memory is serving and thought is serving this more awake flow. This is very common but and it's not doesn't have some of the loving qualities, but it's also where a lot of people say, you know, I have these glimpses. I'm able to do it when I'm sitting quietly or even when when if I'm walking down the street, but what about when it becomes difficult at work? I was like, okay, how about typing? How about when I have to deal with the problem and solve a problem? It's like, okay, well, you can go out of the current problem solver into this consciousness, which will give you another view of the problem and then you can make choices from what IFS calls self-leadership or what you could call the awake mind in action. Good, so that was an example I think of the memory door, correct? And you were saying that you had one that was easier to do a guided version of quickly. So what door would that be? Okay, so this one I'll do, I'll just kind of set it up a little bit here, which is, again, it's almost like let's go at the place where we're most identified and what is the bind of the identity which primarily is around surviving and thriving, right? So the mind is serving the body and the personality is trying to solve problems to not walk out in the middle of the street. So it has to solve the problem and have distinction and use discrimination of the mind and use attention to look at, is that a green light or red light? You bet, and just for the record, meditation and awake awareness and non-duality, none of this is brain damage, right? We're not trying to get rid of that. That's right. It's super important that we keep that highly functional. Yes, and there's no reason for it not to be functional. That's right, and in the way that I go about it, I think probably you, whereas if you go through some other directions where you just, as you were talking about, stop in pure awareness, you can become a couch potato. But I've never had any of my students go through a couch potato dysfunctional self. I've had them go through a kind of a not knowing gap, but then because they've been introduced to the knowing, the awake awareness can know this part of them that's confused or doubting or becomes a doubting part that's like, uh-oh, I don't know what's going on. I don't know what I'm supposed to do now because I used to be driven, but now it's like, okay sweetheart, I'm here with you, but we can just show up for the next thing. So by introducing the solution first, then looking at the problem is the way, the modern way for a householder, I feel. So rather than gradually going through deconstructing the self and we know the research of, some people know the research will be Britain, we do this dark night study where she studied people going through a five day retreat for the first time and found that 40% of them in an insight, meditation, classical retreat would calm their body, then they would deconstruct the self and then they would become flooded by the unconscious because not only did the self or the ego get deconstructed but the ego defences and there was no introducing of what is aware now. There was just a deconstruction. So 40% of them said it was, you know, very difficult experience. So this approach is saying, all right, just get a glimpse of the solution and from here come back to the problem or the anxiety or the situation. - That's right, this is why pointing out first is really important and even just the framework of let's say Bodhichitta or Buddha nature or this inherent wholeness or whatever you wanna call it is like the antidote for the problems of deconstruction. I see this even though I do teach a lot of deconstruction, I too, I just don't have the experience of people cracking up in that way that we hear that can happen with mindfulness because this view enoculates you from that, right? And what's interesting, the worst it gets is if sometimes people come up with something that I'll call emptiness poisoning where it's like they're just going into the non-dual one, everything's a dream, kind of a little too intensely without remembering the whole view. And so they will start to get just a little bit nihilistic for a little bit demotivated, but just a little bit. - Yeah. - And the minute you bring back this more non-dual to full spectrum view, it just solves that. - Yes. - But you're right when I've seen this happen to people inadvertently even, like someone like Akartola, that's what happened to him, right? It's like you have this one kind of awakening and you just end up totally unable to do anything. - Yes. - And I've seen that happen to several people just kind of organically. - Yes. - So it's really, really interesting, just interjecting to basically totally agree with what you're saying. - Yeah, and as you say, that people have these spontaneous awakenings, which can be of any variety and many people who come to us are people like, oh, I had this awaken, then I heard you on this podcast with Michael and Dad, and then I had to look up what you did and it was like, oh, now I just did this, but I didn't keep going. So yeah, so why don't I do this one that follows exactly what we're talking about? So again, it's kind of taking this ancient wisdom, which we both have studied with great fortune of these amazing masters from many traditions and then kind of bringing them back here. - I think I'll say one more thing that the other topic we were on is that, there's this kind of saying that, oh, it can be dangerous to give pointing out instruction without it coming from a monk or a lama or somebody like that. - Yes. - And so I've asked them all. I said, what is dangerous? Well, okay, you're saying it's dangerous. Yes, yes, that's the tradition, okay? But what is the danger? Is it that people will go crazy? Because they're already gone crazy. You know, they're gonna play any reason, you know? Like you can just by doing first stage mindfulness, you can get flooded and there's all sorts of studies of adverse effects from going to psychotherapy or from any change of consciousness, you know? So that's not it, but that's not what they say. What they say is, oh, what the danger is, if you get pointing out and you don't recognize it and you think, oh, that's not a big deal that you won't come back. - Right. - You know what, it's just kind of like, you just take it like anything else. It's like if you, you know, try, you know, Chinese food and you didn't like it, you won't try it again. Well, maybe you won't, then maybe you won't, then you're like, oh, this dish is great. Or you try to learn a sport and you're not good at it. You're like, oh, I really didn't like that tennis. It was too hard and then, well, come on, try, you know, try play with, you know, well, just play easy. We're just, oh, man, this was so great. I had such a good, I love this now. So anything that's new, you may not get in the beginning because you're a beginner. So there's not real danger. And the guy who taught me, Toco Ergen Repache, had the opposite story, which is he would answer, well, why are you giving this out to Westerners when I went there pointing out instructions? And he said, well, I went through three, three year retreats. And then I realized after the third retreat that when I was 16, my uncle gave me pointing out instruction. And it's no different at the end of three, three year retreats than it was initially getting pointing out instruction. - That's right, you know, Toco Ergen Repache, what an amazing being. You're so lucky to have studied with him. But he tells another story that reveals the same point, which is about this Toco, in his lineage, because he's a Toco, he comes into the monastery when he's like three, right? And so he's living in the monastery as a little boy. And when he was eight, he was just like any eight-year-old boy just goofing around, like playing around. And there was Alama there, not a famous Lama, not a big teacher, nothing. It was the guy who takes care of the offerings on the altar and so on. So he is Alama, but he's kind of a janitor, you know, at the same time, nobody famous. But the Lama got a little annoyed with him and said, "Hey, little Toco, quit goofing off like that. I'll just use our language. Look at Awake Awareness. - Yeah. - Look at mind itself. Remember that they make the difference in between mind and mind itself, sems and reek. And he said, "Look at mind itself." And so the little eight-year-old boy goes, "Just what is the awareness?" The Lama just said, "Just look at who's seeing." - Yeah. - And that little boy, the Toco, ended up becoming a major, major teacher, founding whole monasteries. He was a big deal, but he said, "That instruction that I got when I was eight, "nothing has ever given me something deeper than that." - Yes. - Right? It was that simple, it was that direct. Just look. - Yeah. - It was like, so he takes this very minor Lama, who's this, you know, what I'm kind of looking at. amusingly calling a janitor as his Ruku. He's just doing service. But he took him as his Ruku, because that's the one who gave him the instruction. Yeah. And I'm very respectful and was curious just asking many of the teachers that are well known. So I've asked about 12 of them just that question like, well, yes, the tradition is dangerous. They pretty much say that. And then I kind of in discussion, they go, but you know, it's dependent on people and situations. And you know, in the modern times, there's the tradition that Zogchen is the best way to teach in the West is what is most effective. And you know, so you could almost say, if you dare say, it's almost more dangerous to not teach if you have access. And if it can be experienced and it gives such relief and freedom and access to love and reduces suffering, it's almost more dangerous not to share it, to see if maybe some people will get it. You know, so that's my hope that, you know, trying to be, you know, just not saying that everyone's going to get it or that I'm anything special. In fact, you know, as we now come back again to this glimpse, I'm going to do that, you know, the way I do it is a non-guru approach. So basically, I try to set it up in a scientific way. So I basically say, and I'll do it right now, is that first, there's a hypothesis that, and the hypothesis is the awake consciousness that you're seeking is already here. And the description of it is that it's not a tension coming from your mind. It is more spacious, effortless, invisible, holistic in its initial sense that it's kind of panoramic, subtle, non-thought-based, clear, and yet alert. The knowing is not informational. It's alert and potential to respond. So what if you could shift out of the current, agitated, thought-based, ruminative, analytic sense of the small mind into this, and then you come back and see and be with and within that thinking. Because thinking, the other premise is that thinking in Buddhism is considered the sixth sense. So it's not who I am. So who do the five senses and thinking appear to? They appear to this awakeness, which is non-thought-based. It's not connected to smell or hearing or thought, and then it can use your hand or it can use thought. So that's the premise. And so, and again, what's the name of this particular door? Well, this one is going to be the door of the functional self, the problem solver. Great. Yeah. So this starts with kind of a psychological, mental identity that is kind of just a little bit conscious, a little bit unconscious. So the feeling is, can you realize that most of what we're doing is trying to be safe and thrive by solving problems, by avoiding the negative and trying to get solutions to find positive, and that that's an actual felt sense in your body, usually between your ears and looking out of your eyes. So if you can feel kind of this constellation of the problem solver as kind of a part of you or a constellation of changing thoughts, feelings, and functionality, and then you can just thank it for all its hard work, as if you can kind of ask it for some space so you can be aware of this as part of you and not you, not the center of you. So now you're a little mindful of it. And then see if you can ask just for now if this problem solver would just soften back. And then be curious what's aware, what's here now when there's no problem to solve. So when it's relaxed, it doesn't even have a job. And then you can open, feel this subtler, clear, non-thought-based awareness that isn't located in one place, but is everywhere, nowhere, and here, so equally outside and within. And just notice that awareness is kind of aware of itself by itself. And then see if you can rest as this alert knowing awareness. Just be curious not about what you're aware of, but about the felt sense of this awake alert awareness that's effortless doesn't need your help to concentrate. And then as you rest as this, just be curious what's the relationship to vibration, sensation, energy, thoughts, feeling, your body, and the room if they're not separate. So remaining aware from this spacious, pervasive nature of mind, just feel the arising like an ocean of awareness arising as your body, and arising as things in the room. Just feel that you can let go into this intervening so that there's a kind of same taste. There's not too, but there's uniqueness that doesn't take away from the new way of knowing and just notice that you don't have to go to thought to be here, to be aware. And you can move your hand if you want, lift it up, put it down. And you could even intentionally bring your phone number to mind, intentionally, and then let it go, and go back to peace of mind. That is equally embodied, and open-minded, open-hearted. So we can take a little deeper breath, let out a sigh, kind of drop even more from head to heart space and into this open view. That's very embodied and welcoming, welcoming of any emotions, parts without needing to blend with them. Just welcoming the changing, anything that arises, just welcome, welcome, so that feeling of that capacity and loving-kindness, natural, ultimate loving-kindness, ultimate, and then feel like from this kind of heart space, you can may all beings be well and happy, kind of connect to everyone and everything, just as it is. So now the key is to stay home, because now this is where most people go back to their mind for a second opinion. Oh, that was pretty cool. I wonder how I did that. Maybe I can do that by myself. What does that really get? That can't really be it. That was so simple, that was so direct, that was so obvious. It wasn't special. It wasn't psychedelic. Doubt, doubt, doubt, doubt. Yeah. So those doubting parts, so the idea is the welcoming at the end is you're welcoming doubting parts, you're welcoming. So all the hindrances are really just parts. They're not of the nature of mind, but they're of the relative body that once you're not identified, there doesn't mean they're not going to arise, but you now have a relationship almost like sometimes they call a grandmother awareness. It's like a kindergarten teacher and these kids are doubt, well, what about this? Okay, sweetheart, you just kind of stay with it, welcome them. You know, your family, they're part of the team, but you don't have to engage debate with them, or you're just listening. You're kind of saying thanks for sharing, you know. Yeah, fabulous. Thanks for leading us through that practice block. And I'm curious, you know, what do you see as let's say someone finds this new and interesting, maybe even kind of wonderful. Where do you then typically want them or out? them or invite them or point them to go next. Yeah. You know, the amazing thing about something like that, if it was a good doorway for those who were listening, is to realize that it is so good, it's hard to accept. You know, it's like, oh, that's me. I have this potential. Like, you know, somebody said to me, oh, that was five minutes is the same way I felt at the end of a five day retreat. How could that be? So that's kind of the assurance that it's not a meditative state. So that's one of the questions I'll ask as I say, okay, now as you start to make it simpler and make it your own and be able to lead yourself through this consciousness, you kind of recognize the problem solver, you know, let it soften, open to the awareness rest as the awareness now begin to feel the sky of awareness is more like the ocean of awareness. So now it both equally inside and out and front and back. And, you know, so you start to kind of dance a little bit, you know, just what is noticing, it's not a doing, the thing is it's not a doing from the doer or from the meditator. You know, one of the things I studied with Dan Brown, who was a Mahmoudra teacher. So he studied quite a bit with him as well. So it's an interesting connection. Wonderful maps of Mahmoudra and translation of classical texts into modern language. And one of the translations was that awake awareness has intentionality. So in other words, it's not passive. Sometimes people meditate. It's kind of a passive experience. You're sitting still. You're like, okay, now I have inside. All right. Now I'll get up and I feel more calm. But it's no. It's like off the cushion. What is this self leadership or this, you know, self with a capital S or this no self leader, no self awake awareness? What's the choice from here? You know, sometimes with that exercise, I'll do like a version of it where I say, okay, start by thinking about a problem you have in your life. Something that feels like a problem and really like feel what it's like. Okay, now go to the problem solver. Now open to step out to the awake consciousness. Now come back as the ocean of awareness. And now from here, let's go back to what was considered a problem, not from the problem solver, but from your awake consciousness and see what the view is and people like, oh, I can see it's almost like I'm walking around it. Like the problem is now like this, you know, pattern of or it's two positions that have been arguing and you're kind of like, oh, now I see, oh yeah, well, I can do this or that or but you know what? I don't know. I think I'll do this. You know, we're all, I'll do a third thing because that's the goal. There's a new sense of awake in the world that is like a developmental stage that awakening, you know, has been described like as a state or something that you have to stay in a monastery or keep meditating. But once you get a feeling of navigating your own consciousness, which is this particular way that I learned from Tucker Ergen and others of shifting your awareness so that awareness opens or drops so that it starts by saying to somebody, okay, can you notice that the awareness is identified? Okay, can the awareness now move from thinking to the bottom of your left foot? And do you notice that you can feel that there's a kind of awareness that isn't attention that's aware of the sensation, the vibration that wasn't noticed before? And now it's almost aware of the space and aware of the whole field of your whole body. And so starting to talk to the awake you, the awake consciousness immediately to start doing the practices or doing the navigating or doing the untying of knots or the letting go or the unhooking that what's unhooking is the awareness that knows understands and has ability to move and be intentional rather than thinking, oh no, it just is, you know, it's effortlessly here, but it actually can be, it can lead. Thanks for pointing that outlock. This is something I get so excited about. Is this exact point that awake awareness or true nature has intentionality? And this is something that comes with this non-dual two view. With the non-dual one view, there's this idea that the awakeness itself is utterly placid that it never does anything that it has no aliveness at all, right? It's just total stillness. So you get this idea that if you're really in it, so to speak, resting there that you're not going to want anything or do anything and then when you're done with your meditation, you get up and go back into kind of the delusion of the world or whatever a little bit. It's very odd view because of course, when we recognize that the awakeness and the appearance are never separate, they're actually always come together. They're primordially inseparable. That with that view, we recognize that Rigpa, that Buddha nature is highly active, tremendously energized and full of intention. It wants to do stuff. It loves to, yeah, I feel like one of the metaphors I use is and people say it without me saying it's like when they come together, I feel like a kid on the first day of summer vacation because I can like, oh, I can rest here, I can go do this, I can go do that, I have to do this, but I want to do something. Let's go. Yeah, it's ready to go. It's like a puppy. Yeah. And it does have that kind of innocent, playful and tons of energy. And you have to recognize from the traditional viewpoint, this source is giving birth to the entire universe every moment. So that much energy. It is the meaning of Shakti, right? And so sometimes we do, sometimes I see that there's a little crossover period. I always use this metaphor. I'm from Michigan and everyone in the town I grew up in worked in the car companies. And so there was a time in late August when they're changing over from one model year at the factory to another model year at the factory. And there's just this downtime or like when we press to use a different metaphor of not automatic car, right? A car with a clutch when you trying to shift from one gear to another, you press in the clutch, right? So there's just a little while where it's not engaged. And what can happen is when we're used to coming from the ego coming from our egoic desires or from our fear of inadequacy or our need to survive type stuff, when we're used to coming from that. And then we run into the intentionality of awake awareness, which is coming from an utterly different place, right? Fundamentally different. There can be a moment where people sort of lose when the clutch is pressed in or the factory's down for a minute, like they can't find how to make a decision or what to do. But typically, at least in my experience, it's very short, especially if we let them know that, hey, this other kind of intentionality is right there. It's going to come on and just go with it. And so we can make that downtime very short, but it is an utterly different place for action to come from and intentionality to come from. And what's so fascinating is it's not about fear and it's not about inadequacy and it's not about trying to make yourself into, I don't know how to talk about it exactly, except that it is the doubt itself just giving birth to the next moment with tremendous love and verve and a kind of total playful spontaneity. Yeah, beautiful. Yeah. You know, as you said, there's some stages of going into no self and some stages early where you're almost doing kind of the classical, the way Buddhism developed was as ascetic, you know. So you're going to just stop everything. You just stop everything as a way to not grasp and not be averse. You know, so this is more the tantric or the Kashmir shabism or the, you know, going right into the Mahmoudra. So, you know, there's a story that there was a time in North India when Mahmoudra developed because it developed prior to Tibetans took it over, but so it was a North Indian kind of Mahayana plus tradition where everyone was teaching each other in the, you know, village square. You know, hey, check this out. You know, look back onto the face. Okay, now come, all right, let's, let's create this, you know, and they were very creative and then, you know, so that would be the goal is kind of this juicier feeling, you know, my experience, especially during COVID when, you know, we were indoors and people would be engaged in my wife and I would start to have a feeling of, you know, like, a little. You know, and then we were like, "You could feel it come up," and then we'd be like, "Oh," and then you kind of laugh, and she would laugh and we would. But we became so much closer, and so much more like human, fully human. And that's what it feels like. It feels like I'm more sensitive, you know, in some ways, but it doesn't stick. So I feel it, but so it's like the difference in empathy and compassion. Empathy, some people define it. You feel what other people are feeling, but you almost tune in and start to feel upset if they're upset. But this is like, "Oh my God, this poor person." Even when they're talking to me and they're saying, "Oh, I don't know what you're doing." I'm like, "Oh, that person is suffering there." Like, let me just stay for a minute here and see if I can respond. But it's like, it's more fully human that it allows all the emotions and the parts to be unburdened. Maybe we could talk a little about, you know, bringing psychology in because in some ways, it's the modern link that has been helpful and that many people start with meditation to come this, but many people start with psychotherapy because you can start with an intention to awaken, or you can start with the light of a peak experience or the fire of suffering that brings you to something like this. And many people, as we know, have small T-trauma. We all have small T-trauma, just being a human being. Some people have big T-trauma, which is more severe incidences or chronic sustained trauma. But those kind of collapse our personality into protective systems and into these shadow parts or exiles that keep us from even wanting to be curious enough to go to the next stage because we're still in this survival mode. Or we're very mental. The other group is they're very mental and their ego has found a way to kind of, you know, check the boxes and get a job and, you know, be successful. And so that ego development, which can be helpful, actually becomes the biggest obstacle because they have to let go of that. But all the information and all the tenderness that, you know, trauma ties parts can now find the capacity of this awake consciousness to love them back to health. Yes, I feel like you covered a whole bunch of stuff in there that hopefully we can get into in a further podcast because there's a lot there. Something I do want to point to that you brought up. I think of it as there are two dimensions here. One is the Awakening Dimension and one is the Liberation Dimension. And of course, they're very related. But the Awakening Dimension is, you know, how much we can rest in awake awareness. But the other dimension, the Liberation Dimension is how sort of like under what conditions can you do that? And that's where our baggage, our junk, our material, our psychology really comes in. And where, okay, one has gotten good. A person has gotten good at kind of finding these states of awakenness under kind of pretty good conditions. But then what about when you're in a fight with your partner? What about when your job is threatened? What about when something terrible happens to your child? All those sorts of things which tend to suddenly contract us back into just a sentient being suffering, egoic mind. What about that? Or just when our stuff comes up, the kind of stuff that comes up when we go back to Thanksgiving dinner with the family or whatever. So to me, I just call this the Liberation Dimension. And even though most Western psychology doesn't go deep enough with it, the psychological world is focused on the Liberation Dimension, which ends up being incredibly important. Yeah. Yeah. And sometimes we call, we were talking about maybe what's called spiritual bypass, which is attempting to not try to remain above open awareness, above the fray. And skip the Liberation. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So that's the spiritual bypass. And then there's, I call it the psychological underpaths where people just do psychological work and never recognize their true nature. So they're just cleaning house all the time, which can help, you know. But until you find the capacity, when you have both, that which can bear what seem to be unbearable is here as the main healing agent. And that's where just the clarity about what are these emotions that are described in Buddhism like clasias and skundas and the five hindrances, which are basically grasping and aversion and doubt and these attitudes, they have in, you know, this internal family systems model, which is similar to parts-based therapies. So you could even say, you know, Freud was, you know, his model, he said at one point was, you know, they were ego-id and subrier like billiard balls. And the ego wants to knock one of the other two out of the center, you know, which is kind of a funny metaphor. But and then young had personas and, you know, gestalt. So it's not a lot of new, but there's just kind of a simple, elegant understanding I find in this IFS in that it's talking about protective parts and shadow or exile parts and then firefighters who act out. And once you realize, okay, here comes some anger, which would be like or fear, here comes fear, you know, oh, it's just fear. Let's just recognize it's coming and going and it'll just go away. So you can zap it with meditation and dissolve it. But if you recognize it like, oh, here comes fear. So, oh, I'm not afraid. Like I do this meditation that starts basically like this. Like you just say to yourself, I am afraid. Then you feel that for a few seconds. Then you say, I feel fear. Then you feel that for a few seconds totally. Then you say, I am aware of feeling fear. Then you say, I am aware of a part of me that feels fear. Then you feel that and then you say, I am aware of the awareness that is here. And then you say, awareness and fear are not to. Awareness and fear are together. Awareness welcomes the part that's afraid. So basically by localizing and almost treating, this is the paradox is that rather than starting with, you know, like what we know that fear is just thoughts, feelings, their feelings, they come and go, yeah, let's just dissolve it into emptiness. It's really just a different lens. I mean, both lenses are good. It's almost like taking glasses and you use attention to look at an object. Then you use a microscope. If you use, you know, microscope, you can see parts if you're losing a like electron microscope, you can see emptiness. You know, there's just energy. There's no boundaries. So these parts, the way they tend to think of themselves as if they're you, as if they're a person. I'm really afraid of public speaking. I'm afraid of what's going to happen, you know, like, so they use I or they use you, like, well, you shouldn't be afraid. You should try to, you know, then they have the positive psychology, but you just go in there and, you know, visualize everyone as naked, you know, like, you know, then you have a protective part, kind of dealing with this child part. But if you realize that ultimately, they're just awareness. On the first relative level, there just thoughts changing contents, feelings, thoughts. On the next level, they're actually patterning into personality. And that's kind of an important dimension because that's how they show up. And that's what they think they are. So if you treat them with respect and say, like, all right, sweetheart, you've been patterned, you know, as an eight-year-old, you know, boy, who got hurt and that you're afraid of public speaking because somebody laughed at you, I hear you, but you know what? What I realized is a first grader who was having trouble with some dyslexia and doing, like, spelling tests felt like he had to really learn how to do this and be a good writer. And so he was trying to write my first book, you know, so he kept showing up and then he'd be like, I'd be like, oh my God, I don't know if I can do this. And then I realized, oh, I see who you are. Yeah, oh, yeah, but don't I have to help? I said, no, you don't have to write this book. You can go play. Really? But I thought because I've been trying to make sure I got this, you haven't trying to keep Going and be a good speller and a good writer is like, "Yeah, you did a great job. You did it as far as you could at your age, but you're in first grade. You can go play. I'll write it now. I got you," and that changed everything. So it's that kind of missing link of bringing ancient wisdom, modern psychology. And they're similar in that, particularly the way I unhook awareness from thought. And then IFS talks about unblending, that awareness and this part are blended or identified. So then you unblend or ask for permission, ask for space, the unblend, then you're aware of this part from this another kind of awareness. So it's great for liberation. What's your experience, Michael? Thanks for sharing that lock. That is so interesting. This goes into a whole other direction, the direction of psychology, the direction of IFS, which is a big direction for you and something I really want to explore more deeply. So why don't we pause here and then we'll pick that up in a future podcast. Great. Yeah, that would be great, Michael. It's been so much fun. I mean, we could talk for hours and this is our heart's love. I love this because it's my avenue of compassion. I worked as a clinical social worker and created soup kitchens and shelters and worked in outpatient psych and felt that's where I came back from when I had my experience with Taco Irgen. I thought, "Oh, should I be a monk or stay here now?" And then after a few days, I was like, "No, it's kind of already where I feel I am. Let's go back to New York and help those in need." Just immediately like that, this kind of non-du two comes into the body, it comes into relationship and active compassion. So this, to me, is trying to just serve people to offer helpful hints, to be kind of a bus driver on the journey for them not to be anything, except be curious and explore. That's why it's so much fun to explore with you as a colleague and friend. So I really appreciate it having this time together. Yeah, you said it's like a heart's love and it's true and it's something you're bringing up Taco Irgen again and Rinpoche again, and it's something I don't mean to compare myself to such an individual, but something that I recognize is after a while kind of pointing this out, you just can't help it. It's just what you want to do and it's like without imposing it at people or anything like that, but it's such a joyous thing and it's right there. It's right there. Thank you, Michael. Thank you, Locke. That's it for this episode of Deconstructing Yourself. If you enjoyed the podcast, please recommend it to a friend or talk about it on social media. Doing that helps it find its way to more people who might be interested. If you're moved to support the podcast, you can do that by contributing to the production costs on my Patreon page. That's at patreon.com/microsoft. The money goes to support the recording, production, and bandwidth costs of this program, which are substantial. By contributing to Patreon, you're making it possible for me to continue to create and share these conversations as often as possible. A special perk for high-level contributors is a monthly or even bi-monthly event with me on Zoom, or you can ask me any meditation questions you have. I deeply appreciate your support. I also have a number of free resources for you beginning with my YouTube channel. There are hundreds of hours of free guided meditations and videos there, so if you're interested, that's quite a large resource, and offer to you completely free of charge. The channel address on YouTube is mwt111, or you can just search my name, Michael Taft. I encourage you to subscribe to the channel and join me each week for a new live guided meditation session. And of course, there's the deconstructingyourself.com website itself, which has articles, interviews, and more about meditation going back over 12 years at this point. So be sure to check that out. Beyond these free options, I also have a number of paid online courses to help you grow and develop in your spiritual practice. You can find out about those either by signing up for my email list at deconstructingyourself.com/signup, or at the site deconstructingyourself.org. I look forward to seeing you in class. The deconstructing yourself podcast is always at excellent sound, which is the result of an amazing audio engineer and amazing human being named Steven McNamara. He's an all things audio person with many decades of experience in producing, music, and spoken word audio. If you're interested, you can contact him at his website, yogitarr.com. That's y-o-g-i-t-a-r.com. Music on the deconstructing yourself podcast is a track by Peter Baumann entitled Crossing the Abyss, from his album Machines of Desire. Thank you for listening. [MUSIC]