See All my friends, my wonderful friends Hey Mariana from Europe I love my European friends must be like midnight over there. I especially extend a warm invitation to my European friends, I only have two, one here, my dear friend Mariana. And then the other one may not be my friend anymore because I don't see him anymore, just being goofy welcome everybody. We have been this is if you're free if you're new to this. This is our. I don't know what number we are in 659 59 Oh my gosh, social gathering thing that we started with COVID that has turned now into this, I think, you know, quite. At least I enjoyed q&a So it's just, this is the opportunity to bring your questions, a lot of really good ones were submitted, always helpful to be there if you if you wrote one in or two, raise your hand because then we can have some exchange. And so often what I'll do is, I may see one or two just kind of comments about what I may be thinking or writing, because I usually have to these things, After doing a whole morning of research and writing. That's how I spend my days I get up really early. I do my morning meditation I take my dog for a walk. I kick my cat. I have to work on my equanimity there Right. Just kidding. And then I come back and I do my writing and research and I do that, you know, four or five hours depending on how long my brain operates and so sometimes I read what I was working on in the morning, or share some of what I've been thinking about like research wise, so I wanted to just say one or two things about what I've been thinking about that. That is really big on my mind, it has been for many years and I'm focusing more on it, because it. It's just so central to my whole path and philosophically, this is talked about is the transition from materialism to idealism and so we live whether we know it or not, this is the default philosophical view on the West is, we were raised in the cult of materialism scientific materialism physicalism, mostly because the you know high priests of science are the arbiters of truth these days and so they profess most not all most profess materialistic world, that everything can be reduced, you know you go all the way down the pecking order from psychology to biology to chemistry to physics to who knows what. But it's this, you know, uses the power of reductionism which itself is not a problem. But the end result is a problem, thinking that everything arises from what my dear friend, I love this phrase from Ken Wilber calls frisky dirt. Isn't it fantastic mind consciousness love, passion, all the human emotions and whatnot, you know, can be reduced to frisky dirt. It's like really, I don't think so. And so, you know the great contemplative traditions, most of them now do traditions, Tibetan Buddhism for sure. Shiva Tantra, every, every non dual tradition, I've experienced, whether they say it overtly or not. Most of them really they're idealistic so idealism and philosophical language professors that the world is made of mind it's of the nature of mind. This is a co lawful topic in Buddhism, way beyond the scope of what we can talk about here, you know. But, just briefly, you know, there's massive transformation from the world of made of matter to one way to mate of mind in the personal stages in Buddhism, this is called the
transition from the traffic review to the to tomato review tomato means mind only, but it's mine only in a pejorative or negative sense. And so the reason I want to say this is that, you know, really, is I've come to understand it, whether we know it or not, a colossal part of the path is D reifying belting D solidify this completely ridiculous world view that that matter reigns supreme that matter is all that matters and if you can't count you don't count. If you can't, if you can't measure it if you can't count you don't count. And that's why, you know, psychology, spirituality, metaphysics is just categorically dismissed by hard. What Duffy John talked about a solid type scientists were the only thing that really matters is matter. It's a ridiculous worldview, and it causes so many problems. Too many to even talk about but one of the biggest ones I wanted advantages ever so briefly, is what David Chalmers they're quite influential philosopher talked about is the hard problem of consciousness, which is just this how do you explain consciousness arising from matter. They can't and they never will. Because it doesn't. And even though there's these incredibly sophisticated conjectures, you know microtubules thing and quantum mechanics and I mean there's just like unbelievable measures. They go to to try to reduce everything but the hard problem of consciousness will never be solved because consciousness does not arise from matter. It's actually the other way around. And so the way to immediately solve the hard problem becomes no problem at all, is that depending on how you define it mind consciousness awareness. That's the nature of reality. And so, I'm, I'm really big into this for a lot of reasons it's it's colossally important on my path, intellectually, it's super interesting to read about it to study it. And there's some pretty sophisticated thinkers that have been riffing on this but I wanted to just say one thing briefly and then I'm going to go right to these questions because there's so many really good ones. Is that a really interesting fact, around what brings about transcendent experience is, you know, in the western view consciousness arises from brain brain equals mind. No it doesn't, gross, gross brain is correlative correlated to gross mind it doesn't, you know correlation is not the same as causation, it doesn't cause consciousness but more importantly here. What's really interesting is actually a reduction in brain activity. That brings about transcendent experience. And so the brain therefore Huxley said it, decades ago, you know, the brain is a reducing valve, the brain is the look localizing shrink wrap mechanism that takes the universality of mind and zips it down into this little physical packet. But what's so interesting is that if you really look at what's hap what happens in the world would constitute a lot of transcendent experience almost always associated with not heightened brain increased but lessening of brain activity brain reduction, and so here's some interesting data on it. I met yesterday with this guy, I'm going to bring him on an interview and he just moved to town, he looked me up. He's a NASA he's an astronaut. This guy's been amazing. He's been a fighter pilot and Desert Storm. He actually sat new. That's the terminology and reading his book where he was one of the people that sat next to the phone, ready to fight on, jump on his nuclear equipped fighter bomber in a heartbeat and so he's the most amazing guy and he's been at the bottom of the ocean, he's been on a number, I think, at least four spacewalks he's traveled, you know, around the planet. I don't know how many countless times he's a super interesting guy. So we had a really long wonderful conversation and reading his book and I'm definitely gonna bring him on interviewing.
One of the things that we're talking about a little bit this, and that is that that pilots, when they go through this kind of G force induced loss of consciousness you see in the movies when they do the spinning thing or when they're in flight. Often the G forces are so dramatic that they temporarily go unconscious and a lot of people out of these pilots will actually have transcendent experiences. When that happens, when you take psychotropic agents psychedelics on the light, it doesn't increase brain activity it decreases brain activity. Jill Bolte Taylor the neuroanatomist who had a total mass of left hemispheric stroke, when half her brain was shut off she entered a really a unitary kind of mind blowing spiritual experience so that's another one. Sensory deprivation, there's interesting literature in the Greek tradition where the Greeks would actually go into caves to engage in sensory deprivation and had have transcended experiences there, again, a reduction of brain activity in Tibetan Buddhism, this is related to the Bardo dark retreat where you do the same thing you go into a completely dark environment, reduce sensory stimulus reduce brain activity and you have these kinds of transcendent experiences. Near Death Experiences of an Alexander the neurosurgeon who had this countless. His brain was flatlined. I mean he was basically dead. And he was having all these remarkable, you know, awakening spiritual transcendent experiences. And so there's more, there's the Savant experiences, there's all kinds of really interesting data about how brain reduction that brain amplification is a correlativity spiritual experience and so I just wanted to share a little bit about that this is a really big topic very near and dear to my heart, my book dreams of light is you know a lot of it is actually about this sort of thing. So that's what came to mind today that I wanted to share with you, and you'll probably hear more about this as we go on because I'm thinking more and more about this kind of stuff but in the meantime, I have to leave around two o'clock, three o'clock today so I wanted to get right to some of these really cool questions and then we'll get to some of the live ones as well. So, not in order of priority but kind of the way they came in. This first one is from Eris Hi Andrew the interview with Ian Baker Oh yes, I forgot to say that. So the usual little announcement thing. I interviewed my friend Ian Baker last Friday, and he gave a broadcast of it yesterday, we got some really interesting comments. This is an amazing interview, and that not because of me, but because of the topic. And because of he and he's an amazing guy. I know him. I met him in London I was part of a exhibit he did. I met him in Boulder, and I'm going to actually invite him I talked to already behind the scenes with him, I'm going to invite him into the, into the community to actually do his presentation on these hidden lands the bail because in our conversation we weren't able to show the slides the images of his journey to these lands so if you're a nightclub member check it out if you're not, you can, you know, you get the first 30 minutes of it. It's pretty amazing stuff so a couple of questions came in around that. But in terms, you know, retrofitting in terms of what I often do and I start the big announcement for this week is we've finally started to promote advertise to pretty big programs. For me, you know, the first one is in the Andy will put up the links and like in that column. So deep dive, my annual deep dive lucid dreaming Dream Yoga program, we're going to do this over two, three day weekends that dates around the link nightclub members get a colossal discount on this. This is by far my deepest dive into the natural stuff every year. I've done this, this particular event, I've done it live three times in Sedona, this year we're doing it online for a number of reasons.
I think it's going to work great because we have a month, about a month between each to the three day weekends all the stuff is recorded, and there'll be a really extended time to really work with some of these practices so this is by far my favorite best program related to the nocturnal meditations. The other one is actually what I previously had done in Sedona, some of you have been there this totally magical power spot in fact similar to kind of the Bayeux hidden land principle. When you go down there if you ever been there. There's definitely something going on down there. The landscape is unbelievably powerful. So in in itself has this kind of sacred space quality. This program at the end of October, I think, is basically a critique of the might summit meditation retreat critique of the mindfulness thing, somewhat based on this book I'm writing, and then an exploration of a handful of really powerful post mindfulness meditation practices. So if you're interested that kind of stuff will be clicked into the chat column there. So in relation to heiresses question the interview with Ian Baker was really inspiring. He and talked about sacred places with special energies. And when he practice there. What he would normally do on one year was now a day a week much faster. Can you talk about these sacred places, how can I bring these sacred places into my here and now. Well, I can talk about them, and I will also refer you areas to other resources both my own and others. This principle of sacred places I talked about, really, excuse me, in some way with my dear friend, Bob Thurman when we did the tantric pureland program that's still available. So, tantra pure lands are very close to, to the hidden land principle to the sacred place principle. So that's one place you can go to, to learn more about it. There's also a good literature on this and his book itself, the heart of the World Book by Jonathan cultural Lodi, called sacred ground texts on geomancy punkish way, I mean there's all kinds of stuff that riffs on this pilgrimage texts, there's a large literature, based on that, but you know I don't really want to reiterate everything that Ian said about this because I thought he did a pretty spanking good job but I can say a couple of things about these places and like where the power comes from right so the power of these sacred lands, and they're different from from pilgrimage sites to one extent and Ian and I talked about it, So going to pemecah the principle of bail or hidden land that we talked about, it's similar but it's not the same as going to boat Gaya, which is where the Buddha attained his enlightenment, I've been there. That is an extraordinarily powerful place, and the power of these of these two. They're somewhat similar, but they're not the same. So when you go to a sacred place so when you say sacred places, Eris, I'm not sure if you're meaning like, kind of, so to speak, generic sacred power spots are more of these more esoteric Dayle so I'll talk a little bit about both. When you go to traditional sacred places like the four classic sites of the Buddha's life Lumbini Krishna Nagar. Boat guy, you know, the places that marked the key experiences of his life, and other sacred places other pilgrimage spots. A large part of what brings these about is the Power of the Blessing of the event that took place in the in the masters that were there because it's super interesting. Again, this ties into what I was saying at the beginning, the world is not made of matter, the world has made a mind. And so at the highest levels at the Boomi levels if that means anything to you, the minds of these masters actually interpenetrates mixes literally with the land, literally, because that level of recognition they realize mind is not separate from this so called externality, it's just not and so when Great Beings, enter these places, even by their mere presence. They perfume they impregnate they stamped that land with their awareness, and so therefore the power comes from that. Also some of these sacred places are conjoined with these vital power spots. And just like their vital power spots in our body.
Endocrine centers in western languaging chakra centers in eastern languaging, just like there are power spots within our body. There are also power spots within the body of the planet, and so they're inherently more powerful spots in nature, period. And so the bales become these other sacred places become I think even more interesting because they they then become imbued with an elemental quality so there's a particular power in the landscape itself that heightens because again there's no difference between inner and outer and that's, that's why when we go to these places, the outer can profoundly affect the inner because they're not separate. And so you may have experienced this, you go into a cathedral, or really, you know, even a more conventional sacred space. It feels a whole lot different than when you go to a bar or some CD environment which takes you down these environments lift you up. So, there's a ton to say here, Eric, you know, the most important thing obviously was your second question, how can I bring that sacred space into my hearing now. Well, relative and absolute answers to this one on a relative level is literally clean up the environment, physically, like and burying that others who are longtime Tibetan Buddhists, just before the Tibetan new year lows are, there's always a period of time where everybody is invited to this is always so painful to me because my, my study is just a total disaster is to just clean everything up physically clean up the whole environment. Notice how that lifts you up so that's that's relative conventional level just clean up the pad, relatively speaking, you can also do what's called a loss song which is a smoke offering purification, lots to say about that when I do my programs we often do loss songs as a way to kind of BLESS invoke these energetics that come down to infuse that land that space. But on a more absolute level really two things here. One is practicing what he did refer to several times doc naam which is Tibetan for pure perception. It's actually a tantric vow is to, as part of tantric practice is to see the world as perfectly pure, as already sacred because it's a fake it till you make it event, it is that way. So you actually practice seeing the world as is the body of perfection, all the speech is monitored all thought is the play of the Deity and so that practice actually starts to lift you up because it's in resonance with the way things really are. And then lastly, there is one thing I really highly recommend obviously and I talked about this with, with Ian as well, is to meditation, right, because the esoteric he talked about outer, inner secret and very secret levels, young son very secret levels of hidden lands or bail. Well, when I first read about this stuff I immediately flashed on and I shared this with the end that the ultimate
hidden land is actually hidden within the present moment. So in other words, entering into what I talked about with him as the fourth moment. The moment that transcends past present and future. That, my friend. Lama Surya das very playfully refers to as Buddha Standard Time, but a standard time because it doesn't evolve by abide by time, not constrained by past, future or present. And so only through the conduit of the present moment, can you enter the timeless fourth moment which colloquially you can express and feel through things like flow states the zone that kind of thing. But this is really this is where this principle ties into Todrick pure land in what taken out Han talks about is the Pure land of the present moment, that literally if you just enter the timeless now, you will find the sacred quality always already forever present, in fact, that's all it really is, we are the ones that transform the sacred into the profane, with the veils of our perception with the bills of our ignorance. So the world if we just leave it alone or see it just the way it is. It is sacred. Perfect purity, what's called threefold purity pure perception sacred world sacred outlet. These are actually practices in Buddhism. And so that really to me, this is the most important thing is to purify the lenses of your own heart, mind, realize that the hidden land is opens for you as you open to it. So this is the inner rendering of what's called opening the bay opening the hidden land. You open it by opening the aperture of your awareness and realize oh my gosh, everything is already sacred and perfectly pure right here right now. So to support this in addition to what I said on the more, so called advanced esoteric level, studied the teachings of the great perfection, so check right perfect purity that teaching is all about this sort of thing. So, um, yeah, I thought what Ian said was pretty cool so there's a couple other things here this one, we got a little bit of traction on this as well. Something that Ian did say that was a little bit controversial, so And here's two questions that relate to it from Barry, make sure to ask Andrew about the features of sukawati No women. I didn't want to call him on that but I really, maybe I'll ask him behind the scenes like em Where did you get that. So anyway, because that's not in the any of the sutras I read. Bob Thurman when I did the program with him. He never mentioned at once. So I think, and again I have to ask him what he was referring to there. It's not that there's no women allowed in sukawati There's also no men allowed, there's no gender in sukawati, and it's one of the reasons. Interestingly enough, this is my riff on it while while they talk about psychopathy as being free from suffering. Well, it's interesting you know passion the translation of passion is literally etymologically suffering. The Passion of Christ, the suffering of Christ. So on one level, there's no suffering, on one level, there's no suffering and Sukabumi because there's no passion because there's no gender. So I'm not sure where he got that because I have read the sutras, and it's not mentioned in the sutras, but what they do say is yes there's no men, there's no women but there's also no men, there's no gender. So I'm not sure where he got that I'll have to ask him where that came from. Because that's not my experience and Bob who has studied this a lot longer than me also. He didn't say that so Daddy has a similar type of thing I was mesmerized by Ian's interview felt a powerful response to it. It was mostly a diffused and the feeling response rather than conceptual, cool. It spoke to so much of what I've always felt was true however I have a specific question the information about women not being able to enter Amitabha apparently and again that's not true. I don't I don't know where he got that. Without becoming a man, I mean that yeah this is the whole read, Rita grosses really seminal book Buddhism after patriarchy, there's unfortunately in all the wisdom traditions, there's, there's still this incredible stain of the whole patriarchal agenda, it. There's so much stuff to talk about here. And it's all BS. It's just ridiculous in my opinion.
So, in order to the very best of my understanding and if somebody out there knows more, and can correct me on it I will be corrected, but I've never heard this, you know these pure lands are not based on these kinds of visa requirements, you know, you have to be a man to be reborn there. No way. It just makes no sense whatsoever to me this is the patriarchal state interpretation, in other words some individual guy some somewhere and this happens like all the time, just kind of came up with this little thing and somebody latched on to it and propagated it and, and, you know, it's not in the original text. Please help me understand the other options. Well, you can go to Amitabh is pure land, you know, don't worry about that. All the other stuff you know the Yana Shambala, that's a huge topic, I probably don't want to go there right now, and also how this relates to having taken the bodhisattva vow. Okay, I can't say something about that, because this is a common question Dottie and as a good one. The Bodhisattva we take you know to remain in samsara, until all sentient beings are liberated well how do you maintain your bodhisattva vow when you're making aspirations to FedEx your consciousness after death into a pure land doesn't that violate your plan, your tantric vows, I mean your Bodhisattva vows. Well, no it doesn't. Because you want to go there, because it's like going to Harvard, instead of staying back in kindergarten, you know you're in an environment that's so conducive to awakening that your evolution, your development is rocket fast, and so therefore you can get your PhD so to speak in spirituality, you can wake up, you can attain awakening, and you have been more so much so much more power efficacy to help people. So by going to these places. It's like going into retreat in order to advance, so you go there, so that you can so to speak, come back and be of so much more benefit, so you're not, you're not reneging on your bodhisattva vow, You're actually actualizing it astir, let's see here. Yeah. And so that was that. And then again if anybody's here and wants to follow up on these more than welcome. So, yeah, I'll get to you in a second, my friend, I wanted to ping off a couple more. John from last week most likely I will not be able to attend. I'll answer it anyway. To be considered lucid, that's the dreaming question, is it necessary that the words I am dreaming or I am awake or this is a dream come up. No, not necessarily. Not at all. In the past year my clarity and recall of dreams is increased exponentially, good for you. That's awesome. There's a strong sense of lasting awareness of the dreams. I get up in the morning, they often just seem like previous waking life moments yeah for me to actually, On occasion, the phrase I am dreaming occurs, and this, I read this, Johnny wasn't clear to me. I am dreaming that phrase occurs to you when you've woken up and you're looking back, that's kind of what I think you're saying so you're talking about what's happening in life are you talking about what's happening when you're actually in the dream, I think it's from what I can intuit what's happening in life. And then of course the following experience has a specific equality associated with it. I'm not sure what the reference is here is associated with, what did I say clear to me, John, if you're here, raise your hand. Come on, Maybe you can clarify this and help me out. So because of that, the rest of your question, my friend, is a little bit and vague to me. So John, if you're on, and want to come in, raise your hand and clarify what you're asking, I'm happy to run with it. But, you know, you do not have to say, This is a dream I'm a dreaming, whatever to attain lucidity. That's one powerful way to practice, what's called dreaming eight initiated lucid dreaming is in fact by working with these kind of Maxim's aphorisms statements slogans, but it's not necessary. So that answers what could be the core of your question, and again if you're here want to come on, we can chat about it. Okay.
From Rahim, I would like to do a simple practice in my dreams that would create merit to benefit others. Very cool. And of course, most important dedicate the merit. Yeah, you can do that. Even before I continue further with your question Rahim. If you're lucid. In the dream, and have this level of stability and lucidity, you can dedicate the merit of what you do with your lucid dreaming Dream Yoga practice for the benefit of beings, absolutely, positively, great thing to do. I have read or heard from you that dreams can produce. Yeah, this comes from the tantra so I did not say, I did not make this up. Now I'm kind obj quoting that Tantra says that the practices that we do in the dream state can be up to nine times more efficacious beneficial, because you're working with more subtle dimensions of being again you're more deeply into the nature of mind. And that's why the effects are more transformative. What practice would I recommend. Okay, Well, Rahim if you're here that would help me recommend for what for doing greater benefit to others, is get I guess what I'm hearing. I'm pretty sure I can be lucid for a short time without waking up. So, what practice would I recommend well Rahim, I would recommend a number of different practices depending on the strength and stability of your lucidity, so if your lucidity is really strong. And you're doing and it's one reason we have, we started this track on the, on the nine stages of Dream Yoga. You can do any one of those tracks that resonates with you or that you have enough stability for. And then this will benefit others in a number of ways one like you alluded to, is if you have the stability, the wherewithal to actually dedicate the merit of what you've done in your nocturnal practice for others. That's great. Here's the other kicker, if you can't remember to do that well guess why you kind of wake up in the morning and you can say, First thing you wake up I dedicate the merit of whatever benefit I've accomplished this night whether I even am aware of it or not, for the benefit of all beings. And again, similar to what I was starting at the outset because the world is not made of matter and the world is made is made of mind Bob Thurman talks a lot about this puppy. We think that what we dedicate and make aspirations for the practices we do. They're ineffectual because I've got this wispy thing called Mind, and I'm setting out this aspiration against this monolithic material universe well with that view. Yes, what you see think do pray, meaningless right. But that's not the way reality is if reality is of the nature of mind and you and your mind is deeply inextricably connected to that, what you do in here affects out there because fundamentally there is no in here or out there, right. So therefore completely overthrowing this ridiculous fallacious notion of materialism is super important, it empowers all these sorts of things. So if you don't have lucidity at night right here, wake up in the morning, even if you didn't have a lucid dream, and say I dedicate, you know in your own language, unless you have a formal liturgy, you know whatever benefit or married I've accumulated during this night whether I know it or not. I dedicate for the benefit of all sentient beings. The other reason this help can be a benefit for you is it will obviously start to work with you during the day so that's the whole point. On one level these doctrinal practices have bi directional tentacles they will work you'll start to affect you during your day. And then that type of lucidity lucid dreaming leads to lucid living, then that naturally spontaneously starts to benefit others because you're waking up. So really the most important thing here, my friend is just maintaining this aspiration before you go to sleep, set the aspiration. This is one of the secret ingredients remember the magic induction methods that before you go to sleep. Perfume your aspiration perfumer night. May I attained lucidity this night. I wake up in my dreams for the benefit of all sentient beings that actually can facilitate catalyze lucidity itself. So you frame it that way on the front end, you frame it, when you wake up in the morning saying whatever merit I have accumulated last night may that be dedicated for all beings so you make the aspiration you make the vacation. And then, that's super helpful whether you know it or not, it's super helpful. So, in terms of the practices. On one level, you know I have to be a little careful when I say this, it doesn't really matter but on one level, it doesn't really matter as long as you're doing a practices, that's working with your own heart mind is helping you wake up, doesn't matter what that practice is if you dedicate that, that has a lot of benefit to others, and also benefit to you. Okay, so one more from Maria and then I'll get Ed's question, how would you answer
this question from a precocious five year old granddaughter, these kind of questions always kind of freaked me out because I don't have kids. But anyway this precocious five year old says Does my brain, tell me what to do. That's really precocious that's great. Maybe she's a Toku or he's a Toku oh yeah she granddaughter. Oh, Marie, these are sweet Christians aren't they and what an adorable five year old right. First of all, give her a big hug and say What a great question, isn't that amazing. And then when you could say again you have to just speak from your own heart at her level it speaks to her. As you might, you might tell her so you could say, on one level, your brain does tell me what to do, because that's just kind of the way the brain works, but then what you could say based on this new information, then you could tell her, but you know dear. The brain is not the whole story and again this is where you have to be you have to use your sensitivity so she doesn't just like freak out and get to bug guide. This is, this is what the find skillful means is meeting people, including children where they're at, not where you're at. And so that's why I say this with some reservation because I'm not a parent, let alone a grandparent. And so, this is one of the challenges of translation, you are now a cultural translator, so I can give you some general guidelines but really for me Marie it's just the sensitivity of opening up to where she is. What you feel she's capable of hearing, and then expressing your truth at a level that you think will resonate with hers. And because I don't you know, because I don't have this type of experience in my own life I can only speak to it somewhat theoretically and I don't like really doing that, I try to be as practical as I can, if there's anybody else out there that has kids, and has this kind of precocious child, and they have questions like that I'm more than willing to put you on and you can share something but I think it's just a matter of connecting to where they are and maybe saying something, you know, does my brain, tell me what to do, you can say you can tell her yes on one level, it does here. But it's more than that. And then from there, then you can start to see what she might be available for sometimes children have tremendous wisdom and you'd be surprised if you told her, Well you know honey, there are some people who think that everything isn't just related to the brain. And then you can kind of dance from there. So maybe within those guidelines where you can find your own way. I'm always cautious, giving advice in an area where I really don't have a tremendous amount of personal experience, okay. All right. Yeah, are you there. My friend was there with his hand up,
damn, indeed, you know, Hey guys, so I'll speak to that quest the kid, I've had a passel of kids so when I have grandkids. You're all over the place. So, what I would usually say is, you know, what you, what your brain does is translate what you feel in here, inside, and just put words for, you know. Yeah, just keep them using their words, but staying in touch with what they feel. Great. That's good, but it so the reason I raised my hand that I took it down is because everybody's questions were about Ian Baker, and that was what mine was too. Alright, loved it I was in my garden listening, you know, to this beautiful nature talk and I'm just, I'm in my own bale right there in the garden, and, and then he gets to this part about, you know, the women and it's like spiritual bypass he even said, and I was like whoa, you know, He also mentioned, yeah merit, you know he was, he was likening it to indulgences, right in the medieval times with the Christian, the Catholic indulgences you could buy your way out of Purgatory and he gave enough money. And so I'm really interested to follow up on that and find out where that comes from because it sounds like there's, there's some source somewhere where that whole notion is coming from,
which notion, are you talking about like the accumulation of this kind of merit.
Yeah, the merit and the spirit, you know, acting as if it's spiritual bypass that you can't really well the way you're doing it is through this physical way of material way of getting money and, you know American all that stuff, and women thing, you know, it's just
probably all what I've already said around that, it's not in the sutures, I know I personally have never crawled across a pure land text that mentions that so I think maybe, again I'm just guessing. It was this notion that, again, it's just there's no gender period, there's no men or women. So in that sense it's kind of ultimate liminality but you know the merit thing, and this is a really big super important topic. You know, a lot to say here I don't know if you saw purely a program with Bob that I addressed that I think in the first weekend where there are a number of ways, deal with this parent thing on a highly provisional level again, their marriage is a multi valence principle if you can apply it across a vast spectrum and so on one level, making recitations making offerings, doing physical gestures kind of like, you know you're creating you're collecting these merit badges or these merit credits. That's a very entry level provisional and therefore provisionally valid way to look at it, that there is some accumulation of literally narrowed, that's what's taking place through these kind of mechanistic ways but at the more refined levels is married becomes more and more refined, it becomes more and more subtle and
therefore marriage can be most efficaciously most powerfully transmitted through in fact what we do with our own mind and heart through our intentionality, through, you know, magnifying what are the things you can do with the mind, that you can't do, it's causal vehicle levels is instead of just giving away your car physically or giving away your house, physically, which is a beautiful fantastic. You can visualize through generation stage practices you can amplify this, that's this is the as you know the principle of mandala offering. That's what mandala offering does. It's basically a colossal accumulation of merit, using the powers of the mind that amplifies it, because, you know, as you know as well I do brain can't really tell the difference between what's imagined and what's experienced, and on a cosmological sense, It's even more so, and so therefore, this is the genius of mandala offering the principle behind it. By engaging in this vast amplification that you're not just giving away your car you're giving away everything. We're giving away the universe that has a proportional level of efficacy is amplified by our mind. So, we if you have another question on that I'm happy to answer with you a little bit on it, Merit one thing I wanted to say this is a very subtle topic and to share one story with you. When I did my three year retreat. At the end of my three year retreat. Minji Ribbit shake him and he was there, he came in to give us a talk. And I for one, I can't speak for my other betweens but I think it would pretty similar to me. Here we are feeling we're somewhat highfalutin graduates of the super long training, and I thought he was going to come in and talk to us about, you know, super esoteric things like you know Mahamudra, all these injuries, he came in he totally busted least my chops. He spent the whole time talking about marriage. It was like, on one level that was such a letdown. On another level it was a massive teachable moment. And then he went through this really elegant riff on understanding what's actually taking place with a merit principle, and how it has these motivated applications from doing certain regulations around for offering lights, offering candles, offering. But fundamentally, you know even more refined than that is the actual spirit of offering itself. And so, to really study this stuff is super important because marriage is just, it just isn't the right word marriage is a form of karma is karma with intentionality. So when these are very you're talking about karma and karma creates individual and collective world systems, and so when you can join verite, put it in the rubric the framework of karma, then you realize what we're talking about something super powerful. And just again to show you how big a deal it is whether we know it or not, everybody listening right now. We are on the first of the five paths leading to awakening is called the path of accumulation. We are on that path, whether we know it or not, what are we accumulating. Two things, mostly merit. Secondary I would say secondarily the Secondly, wisdom, merit is the currency that transforms into wisdom merit is the currency that transforms into landscape, that's how lands, literally are created, right now we're experiencing a co creative world brought about by our instructions. When you create a pure land or go to a pure land, marriage is what gets you there. So I'll pause for a second to see if any of this lands with you if you want to take us another direction, but because the topic is so big I want to make sure I'm getting your sweet spot.
Yeah, no, you know, I, I, you know, I get that in it, it makes perfect sense to me and I you know I participate, I'm, we need to be creating merit, this world really needs some right about now. but I was just I didn't quite, I didn't quite understand where Ian Baker was coming from, you know like that, that he put that in the same sentence as a merit being spiritual bypass it was only like in the he had these three or four lines in row about the women thing and then it was like, where we're creating, we're getting to the halfway house of enlightenment, because we paid our dues, and then we get to get enlightened. And so that whole thing, that's where, you know, so I'd like to, you know, I want to know the follow up to that I just want to know, where did that come from.
Yeah, I have no listen to it since I recorded with him. And often when I, when I'm doing these things he's ripping away, I'm taking some notes about where to go so I'm not 100%. Everything he does and also I'm a little careful to put words into his mouth. All the more reason to bring him back to actually have him on and do a full presentation on this topic. And then we can ask him these questions point. Great.
Thank you.
Oh, a couple more came in. Oh yeah, Joe, what do you think of the book The realm of Shambala by yeah Kempo jumble Dojo I know him control MPJ I know him, your conversation with Ian Baker reminded me a lot of this book I haven't read it yet, Joe, I know him, I attend to some of his teachings I would call a chakra. Um, it's on my list of like you know, if I look at my to do read, I can maybe get that to that book in 10 years. Just kidding, sort of, is on my list to get because there's not much written about the realm of Shambala, in his I met him and I attended some teachings with him I thought he was a cool guy. So unfortunately I can't speak with it because I haven't read it yet. So, send it to me. I'll read it. And then I'll let you know what I think. But anybody really, especially at his level that talks about Shambala, I'm interested in reading what he has to say so you jog my memory that I should order this book for Steve I think the power energy of the sacred places can be found in the wild places. If we look for it. Absolutely, Steve 100% This is what Trump Jay talked about his draw of principle, that it's another way to talk about drama, literally means beyond the enemy. Beyond the enemy of the profane, beyond the enemy of duality ego. And so Trump MPJ talks speaking or Shamala talked a ton about these wild places. That's one reason I like to do retreats at Sedona, or these other magical landscapes that that have this profound element of body, and then you can engage in practices like draw the principal walks and such that are actually designed to evoke heightened relationship to the environment where in fact, you simply open to the fact that that that sacredness impurity is there and so I'll finish the rest of your question to see but fundamentally, it goes even farther than that because we use these sacred wilderness places initially provisionally we use nature of little reality. The natural world, to work with the natural state of the mind, but then fundamentally we want to go even further and this is why in tantric Buddhism, you have these, you know, seemingly outrageous images of where in the skull comes at transformation you, you will create the most repulsive elements of humanity. And the idea there is to actually try to evolve to realize that even in what we conventionally designate is the most repugnant in pure in this essence there's actually sacredness even there. So that's really important because otherwise, that becomes the type of spiritual bypass where you just want to go to these skilled workplaces. Well you know your happy place your feel good place a spiritual place important at first, but that if you make that your only place, then that becomes spiritual bypass a serious trap, but I totally agree with what you're saying. Back to you when we find these spots. We can bring that energy out by seeking it out and blending it and blending with it. Yes, totally agree. I like to do Tai Chi and odd natural spaces like nature centers, I don't think is odd to do it my friend I think it's actually the way to go. If you look at where many of the world's great religious masters gain their insights, but, next to a river underneath a tree. Maha, Christ in the desert, well how about in the cave, I believe, a lot of these profound insights occurred in natural environments and so one of the things I recommend which you seem to be doing is my friend David Lloyd writes about this beautifully I'll look at that. That's great, thanks for the image. Practice more outside nature of mind. Deficit Disorder, mixed your mind with the natural environment practice outside as much as you possibly can. So, good for you, my friend, that is of some resonance with you. I simply encourage you to do more of it so we got a couple more here. Okay. These questions are so good, so late, Elisa, if you're here, here, you had a really long question. And as you put it at the very end of it. You say here if you couldn't decipher, I will try to do the meeting. If you're here, I'm going to, I'd like to bring you front and center, because I couldn't decipher some of it. So if you are here you are here, and I'm here. Oh good, perfect, so ask away.
Well, this time I kept it. And interestingly I had a talk of Ellen Wallace today, and he was referring to exactly the same thing. And it was about how we, we can tell truth, and my, my opinion was that maybe we, you know in Buddhism and in the spiritual paths from the blue state stage. It's always about final truth,
way before we go further define for people, the blue stage because they probably don't know Carl decks cartography,
it's It's the stage where it is about fundamentalism, be it religious fundamentalism, or any of those that came before our Western scientific stage, And, and it's about finding final truth, and some God tells the truth. Right. That's all just short. And I thought, when we interact with reality. It might even be when we come from a really quantum physics approach that we actually, that is not like we we get closer to reality with each change of consciousness and and stage, but we actually create co create different worlds. And when we look at them from a very dense and ego approach, it might actually be more dense co creative. And as you always say the ego wants this or that, my, my, my first approach was. And we reifying the ego by doing that, right. So, but it led me to this further thoughts, and today ALAN WALLACE was referring to a quantum physicist, and he was referring to some string theory. And he said, that actually physical laws are different in different worlds and it's about the consciousness, which looks at that world and CO creates these different, even on a, on a physical law level, different worlds.
Yeah, I mean, what a fantastic question and Alan is really wonderfully equipped to talk about this way of being, but so a couple of things come to mind. First of all, I completely agree. And again beams of light, there's a lot of material on this where it's in my languaging is what I call on tick play plasticity, the world and Ken Wilber writes about this beautifully somebody's really gifted people write about this beautifully. Based on state structure levels of development predispositions all these factors, we don't grow into a world we grew up with the world, we co created. And so therefore, this is an extremely powerful thing to understand also ties into what I said at the outset, the illusion that we're going into a world is based on materialism. The reality that we're going with a world as the world is more idealistic, tell the world is made up mind and so therefore, what we even think of as world matter itself is just the materialistic way is a provisionally valid, but very limited way of looking at the world, that is largely dictated by egoic dimensions of evolution. And so, what is so elegant about this is it brings about a tremendous sense of empathy, compassion and understanding about how it is that people create different realities. The animal experiment comes into play here you know that if you gathered 100 different animals and we all brought them into this room and I do this experiment is a thought experiment and we all held up this thing and then we asked every one of these animals to explain what they thought you'd get 100 different descriptions of what we call glass. Well what's the real reality, that's the wrong question because it depends on the constructs of the structure, and all these other factors of the observer. So the most important thing for me and a really good question here is just that it brings about a sense of understanding, compassion, empathy that people act behave based on their own particular worldviews based on the structures they bring to that world, but there isn't an endless sliding scale. So that's one thing I would contest that's, you know, this idea of radical relativism postmodern assertion. I don't, I don't mean that. Yeah, exactly. I'm so glad to hear that because that's a little bit what I was picking up and that, that's. So there is, There is some reduction but it isn't fundamentally you're reducing Lee sliding, fundamentally, you do so to speak, bottom out into the bottles into reality, at least according to the World wisdom traditions, there is this thing called foundational reality from that groundless ground, then you can see in fact how the relative expressions arise so I'll pause there to see a Bad's landing with you. So I think the question also like many others can be addressed from a more relative and absolute perspective. But that's what comes to mind. Well,
I would say. I thought you would think it's Pomo it's not FOMO. Not postmodern, it's not relativistic postmodern what I mean. Yeah, I think, from, from integral perspective, We always define what values depending on context and goal, right. So it's not relativistic and anything goes like. Correct.
Yeah, okay.
But I think about this fundamental truth that is what I question
that there is such a thing.
Yeah, I think we, there is, there is some but I don't think that humans can finally perceive it,
well that's, you know, that's, that's a personal philosophical stance, And that works for you, that's fine. I'm not going to contest that and who's to say with ultimate authority that someone has his ultimate omniscience, I mean I'm certainly in no position to address that but what I can say, that is, is some interest is there does seem to be just like there's a consensual reality of this materialistic way even cross culturally there does seem to be a consensus, especially in the non dual traditions about what the Buddhists would call shunyata absolute truth. And so, again, your, your bias make our your, your view may not resonate that way I can tell you one thing for sure what we know is his mind, ego self absolutely positively that we'll never know that because there's always a dualistic level of even knowing taking place there. So when I fall into here and this is such a beautiful deep elegant question, Lisa that oh my gosh, we have an entire weekend on this is that on another on the deepest levels we're talking about the transformation of knowledge to wisdom and to true Gnosis where you're no longer even knowing in a conventional sense where it's top Tommasi a Dow are that you know, in this deep embodied Gnostic sense, and so therefore that type of absolute truth. I mean the Western tradition say there is that, and then it is an invitation for us to find it. So whether we can test it on that. That's the question.
May I May I say one sentence. Yeah, I think this is a blue approach, right, the Absolute Truth, and I really, I don't think
I wouldn't again,
I know I know you don't think so, but I think so. And I think when we look, you know, the, the, the one who is the observer, and creates these different levels of density or reality. This is the final not known for me. Who is the final one who is not to find the one who, who creates who co creates these realities
because you're saying that that can't be found. Yeah, yes
yeah don't agree.
Yeah. And do you know Steven Wolinsky I do, yeah, yeah. I read him many years ago and his quantum approach, and he said that each observation needs a different observer.
It's all context dependent that's what that's called nonconceptual realism. Yes, exactly. So, yes,
and that is probably what I mean and that is, there is no final answer to that
you I don't agree with you. And I think you know this very slippery dangerous. And this is where are you a little bit, it'd be very interesting to actually talk to Elon about this. We, it's very easy to kind of default into the overt covert supremacy of even things like the quantum physicists, these are incredibly sophisticated thinkers, but in my estimation, you know, they're still held in overt or covert levels of materialistic views. So this is, I have to let this question go in here because I have to run it's three o'clock. Okay, this is such a great. Here's the question. Here's the book I might recommend for you and you probably already read it is integral, spirituality, have you read Ken Wilber and go spirituality, read the latter chapters of that book again and again this is this is one of the great questions ever since cod even before this is one of the great philosophical, religious, spiritual, pre modern postmodern post postmodern questions, we're not going to resolve it in 10 minutes of conversation, but it's a beautiful one, I think it's elegant and you bring a tremendous skill set to it, but I, I simply have a slightly different view, whether mine is correctly yours, knows, to me it's just, I don't know. Mine is correct. Exactly. For me it's, it's, celebrating also what Zan talks about is don't know mind, resting in the power of an open question, resting in the mystery and resting in wet region called divine ignorance. I mean that could be the point because I totally hear this. I totally hear you when you say that the very search for truth and absolutism is itself a form of blue. I think that is correct. But with that said I still do think, and actually I wouldn't say thing, it's from my experience, that there is something called reality that there is an absolute truth. The minute you append to any label to it, you're screwed. But I think there. The blue quality I see what you're saying, I just do think and believe in my experience the study, that there is something that can't be used on Earth revealed that is in fact the groundless ground the absolute, so I gotta let it go from there I got Iran sorry, I don't, I don't doubt, any, any experience of course, experiences, absolute undoubtable. Yeah, yeah, thank you for your wonderful questions thanks everybody. Sorry, I didn't get to all of them today, but I have to rush off to another appointment I apologize. Stick with us, there's more stuff coming up, usually I don't have to run quite as quickly but I got to do it, I got to do. So thanks, Andy, thanks everybody. Stick around, not today but for other events coming up and see you around town, so to speak. Thanks, everybody.
Bye. Bye. Have a good round, I buy, buy, buy, buy, buy, who am I.