Reflections of the One Life: Daily Pointers to Enlightenment ~ Scott Kiloby

This is Scott Kiloby’s second book on non-duality or enlightenment. It is a book of daily expressions or pointers to spiritual awakening–one pointer for each day of the year. The clarity is astounding. This demystifies spiritual awakening, strips it of all fundamentalism, and presents it in a clear and easy-to-read way. This is about the timeless presence that you already are.

Each pointer peels away beliefs, positions, and ideas about spirituality, including the idea that you exist as a separate self, only to reveal–in the end–that nothing is excluded. Its central message is that there is only One Life appearing in a myriad of forms. You are that One Life. This is when the distinctions between absolute and relative, form and formlessness, timelessness and time, no self and self, One and many, and all other boundaries collapse into a great and loving mystery that Scott calls ‘This.’

Scott Kiloby – Buddha at the Gas Pump Interview

Scott Kiloby is a “Non-Dual” author/teacher from Southern Indiana (USA). He is the author of “Love’s Quiet Revolution: The End of the Spiritual Search” and “Reflections of the One Life: Daily Pointers to Enlightenment.” He is also the creator of a revolutionary addiction recovery method called Natural Rest. His book, “Natural Rest: Finding Recovery Through Presence,” is scheduled for release in early 2011. In addition to details of his meetings and retreats, there are many essays, quotations and videos which can be viewed on his web site. He also holds frequent meetings all over the world, in person and online via Skype and teleconferencing.

To quote Scott, “We live our lives asleep. Our minds are programmed for self-centeredness. This programming causes us to spend our lives seeking the future for a sense of contentment we can’t seem to find. It causes conflict in our relationships. To say that we live in self-centeredness is not a moral judgment. It’s a statement of fact. The good news is that awakening from this self-centered dream is possible in this lifetime. This awakening reveals a depth of freedom and contentment that no relationship, job, material item, self-improvement plan, or any other accomplishment or attainment in the material world can bring. This level of freedom frees us from our endless seeking towards future. It frees us from conflict so that our real nature as love shines through, affecting every area of our lives.”

Interview recorded 12/4/2010.

Scott Kiloby – 2nd Buddha at the Gas Pump Interview

Scott Kiloby is reaching out to all people who are suffering or seeking or cannot seem to find fulfillment in this life no matter where they go or what they do. He is communicating to them that freedom is available and that it is actually contained in their very presence, yet it is overlooked. The benefits of recognizing presence are living with a mind that is at peace, a heart full of love and compassion for others, and the end of looking for happiness outside ourselves.

Scott is the author of “Love’s Quiet Revolution: The End of the Spiritual Search,” “Reflections of the One Life: Daily Pointers to Enlightenment,” “Living Realization: Your Present Experience As It Is,” and “Living Relationship: Finding Harmony with Others” (this upcoming book was the main focus of this interview).

He is also the creator of a new addiction/recovery method called the Natural Rest Presence Method. His book, by the same name, is scheduled for release in 2012.

Scott’s main websites are www.livingrealization.org and www.kiloby.com. These sites contain writings, videos, and audio interviews with a wide diversity of teachers, authors, scientists, and psychologists as well as information about private sessions with Scott and online interactivity groups.

The Facilitators trained by Scott can be found in the Facebook room “Relationship and the Unfindable Self.”

Interview recorded 5/26/2012.

Imperfect Spirituality: Extraordinary Enlightenment for Ordinary People ~ Polly Campbell

Pulling a raisin out of a two-year-old’s nose probably wasn’t on Buddha’s path toward enlightenment, but it was one of the obstacles for author Polly Campbell. For many, stuck raisins and other real-life moments provide sometimes the only opportunity for spiritual growth in a day. Imperfect Spirituality shows readers how to integrate those every-day moments with traditional spiritual techniques to experience personal growth and greater well-being all in the course of your regular routine. Any activity can be transformed into a spiritual practice. Don’t have a half-hour to meditate? Can’t drop everything à la Elizabeth Gilbert and trek to Italy or India? Do a mini-meditation while stopped at a red light. Working to be mindful and present? Start by brushing your teeth.

Imperfect Spirituality is filled with practical tips and dozens of examples like these, as well as anecdotes from real people who are striving to grow both spiritually and personally. Each chapter features fascinating research about how the mind body spirit connection really works as well as illuminating quotes, and informative, easy-to-do takeaways from leading-edge academic and spiritual experts who both study and practice the techniques explored in the book.

Campbell is also a professional speaker and instructor with The Daily Om. Her writing appears regularly in national magazines and she has tested and tried many of the self-improvement strategies she writes about in her own quest to find more happiness, tranquility — and some days just socks that match. She is a writer, wife, mother, cat-litter changer, and avid player of Candyland from her home in Portland, OR.

Diane Musho Hamilton – 1. Enlightenment and Evolution 2. Understanding the Shadow [Updated]

Note: This video clip should be viewed as a follow-up to the ” The 3 faces of Evolving Spirit”

Here Diane talks about the ever present and unchanging nature of enlightenment as it manifests in the changing field of time and evolution.

Diane Hamilton – Understanding the Shadow

Join Diane Musho Hamilton, Zen priest and Integral spiritual teacher in a lively discussion about the Shadow: those tendencies and forces within us that hinder our spiritual practice and limit our attainment, with host Craig Hamilton

Free Spirit: A Guide to Enlightened Being ~Sundance Burke

Free Spirit is speaking as freedom, which is our Consciousness, the sweet essence of our lives. The freedom spoken here is an inner knowing. We cannot realize this liberation by catering to our bodies, emotions or minds. No, this freedom is spiritual; an altitude of perception that only arises when we are lighter than our surroundings. We can realize this lightness of being if we are willing to abide as Awareness and let go of the ego, the one who suffers mind. For this enlightenment to happen, a quiet mind is all we need. Why do anything for this, when only our stillness will suffice. Be silent, be still, be free.

Within this book you will find answered and unanswered questions, humor, poetic prose, experimentation with consciousness and passages that illuminate the sense that we are more than our thoughts, emotions, senses, body, and energy. The entire venture is directed to our essence, that we might realize our Free Spirit.

Sundance demonstrates the light-hearted wisdom and spontaneous creativity that is the energy signature of liberated Consciousness. Every word in this book is sourced by the power of silent Truth. Without contradicting this source, the writing inspires our active participation in the realization of Spirit, as only our direct experience is of any value to awakening.

For those of us who desire to be free, Sundance takes us by the hand and walks with us through the entire landscape of the egoic mind, until we reach its outer boundary. Here, he invites us to take a leap of Self-faith into simply being awareness. Will we survive?

Sundance says: “Who you think you are will not survive and who you are is never threatened. However, only by the leap can this be realized. Truly, all you surrender is your suffering and Now is the time.”

Sundance Burke was born in Seattle, Washington under the given name, Donald Russell Burke III. He is a graduate of the University of Washington and the Gonzaga School of Law. While traveling for business in 1982, he experienced a profound spiritual awakening that fundamentally dissolved his concept of self. In 1988, he met his future wife, Katie Davis, who had similarly experienced the miracle of Self-liberation. They immediately recognized their meeting as sacred and committed their lives to deepening in Loving Presence. Now an inseparable Spirit, they adventured the awakening in private until 1999 and then began to share the Truth of Being from their home. Soon, they were traveling up and down the West Coast of North America to meet with others. In 2004, Sundance and Katie moved to Maui to marry and write the realization of Beloved Being. Side by side their books took form and expression. Currently, they are traveling throughout the world to share the realization of Free Spirit and Awake Joy.

Sundance Burke – Buddha at the Gas Pump Interview

SUNDANCE BURKE, Spiritual Teacher and Author, was born in Seattle, Washington under the given name, Donald Russell Burke III. He is a graduate of the University of Washington and the Gonzaga School of Law. Sundance is a former lawyer and businessman. He is the father of two children and the grandfather of three.

Sundance Burke is the author of Free Spirit: A Guide to Enlightened Being, published in 2008. He offers public talks, meditation gatherings, video recordings, private meetings, intensive workshops and retreats for those who long to awaken from the fearful dream of human separation and suffering.

While traveling for law business in 1982, Sundance was graced with the profound spiritual experience of being the loving witness to the mind’s dream of personal existence. This awareness of impersonal being completely shattered his former understanding of self-identity and the nature of his world. In the years that followed, he found himself undertaking an intense inward journey into the heart of this realization.

In 1988, he met his future wife and teaching partner, Katie Davis, who had similarly experienced the miracle of Self-liberation. Recognizing their meeting as sacred, Sundance and Katie committed their lives to deepening in loving presence. An inseparable spirit, they adventured the awakening in private until 1999 and then began to share the Truth of Being from their home. Soon, they were accepting invitations to travel throughout the United States, Canada and Europe.

In 2004, Sundance and Katie moved to Maui to marry and write the realization of Beloved Being. Sitting side by side, their books took form and expression. Currently, they are again residing in the Seattle area and they continue to point to our True Presence, as conscious freedom and causeless joy. Katie Davis is the author of Awake Joy: The Essence of Enlightenment. Interviews with Sundance and Katie about awakening are included in the recently published book, Conversations on Non-Duality; Twenty-six Awakenings.

Sundance says, “Your being is not a personal or temporary existence. You are the very consciousness manifesting this life. Thus, you naturally love and embrace every perceived experience without fear. Unborn…you are timelessly awake for all the comings and goings within your conscious presence. Just by the mere turning of your attention to its source and foundation, you can awaken unto the truth of who you really are.”

The AWAKE SPIRIT TEACHINGS of Sundance and Katie have helped many people throughout the world to find inner peace, wise love and greater fulfillment in their lives. At the core of this teaching is a spiritual awakening that transcends the ego-based state of consciousness into the harmony and unity of pure awareness, a field of infinite possibility and the sacred heart of all Being.

Interview recorded 5/5/2012.

Be Still and Know I AM God: The Direct Path to Knowing God Within by Nick Gancitano

It offers a direct path to knowing God in your own being. Through this series of conversations between himself and God within, Nick Gancitano leads you in the process of Self-inquiry, enabling you to shed the layers of conditioning concealing from you the fact that you are One with God to bring about authentic spiritual awakening.

Chapters Include: The All-Important Introduction, I AM, Religion, Ego, Death and Desire, Money, The Body, Conspiracy Theory, Humanity, Faith and Free Will, The Illusion, Surrender,
I AM THAT I AM

An Interview with the God Within – by Nick Gancitano

“You can talk to God and listen to what She says back to you. Everyone has the innate ability to do this, even if they aren’t aware of it, and in times gone by it was a much more common practice, which is why those ancient spiritual texts in the form of dialogues between a deity and a mortal were written.You’ll find many in Be Still and Know I Am God, which Cygnus has just published.” Ann Napier

How can I be certain I’m communicating with God?

Does this feel like Love or resonate as Truth?

Yes. Yet how can I be sure?

When your mind is still, your heart opens and the indescribable fills you.

So if it doesn’t feel like Love, then it’s not God?

Not what you would call the highest expression of God; I AM appearing to you in every conceivable way; even now I AM being perceived as a mere thought.

So You really are God?

As you would have Me Be.

Why do I see so many people leaving organized religion?

Religions are training wheels for spiritual seekers, so they are falling off because people’s intelligence has evolved beyond the need for them. They are realizing the Truth without the dependency on outside organizations that preach borrowed beliefs rather than encourage one to trust one’s own experience when Truth can never be discovered in the former way.

What is all the repression about?

When feelings of guilt and being judged become too painful they are repressed, and the fear of being exposed manifests as rage, which when further repressed becomes depression. This is how depression has recently become pandemic in the world, because most religions have persuaded people that anger is wrong. This suppression has become a disease, and the prescribing of anti-depressants is likewise ignorant and founded in greed.

How is this related to religion?

Religious morality promotes shame and therefore repression, which consequently becomes depression. Preaching morality is unconscious arrogance. This arrogance implies I cannot express directly through those who are looking for direction. So, one need not use drugs or attempt to guide others; offer your loving presence instead.

If people felt they were being guided by You, maybe they wouldn’t need to look for guidance elsewhere.

This is the ego’s standard response, yet realize that one only turns to another for advice when one refuses to surrender. For if one surrenders, where is the need for guidance once it is realized there is no other?

It is best to forget about organized religions and the scriptures of the past. What I prescribe for you now is on a private basis. True-life spirituality is living life, not congregating like cattle to listen to pontification. So release yourself: play, dance, sing, make love, experience nature, laugh, cry, or even go for naked walks in the park with your dog.

Whatsoever, be creative and enthusiastic in all aspects of life. Live passionately – without holding back. Allow for emotional eruptions and sensual expression. Then feel the contrast of a new world untainted by fear or restrictions. Stop learning about morality from your preachers and go experience life.

Do you think people try to come to You through organized religion, rather than turning directly within, because they are intimidated by You?

Yes, religions have made it so. How can someone surrender if they are frightened? And why are you afraid? Because what is being shared in religions is not love at all, but behaviour control. Many even attend temples of worship to appear righteous, believing that I do not know the difference.

Why do You require my surrender if You’re egoless?

Who are you surrendering to but your Self? I AM You and You are All That Is. I AM that inner Presence within, felt as ‘I’. By loving Me, you love All That Is, including everyone and everything. Many have even been taught by religions to fear Me, yet I AM the mirror of one’s own Image and Likeness, so what one sees in one’s self, one will also see in Me. By loving All of one’s Self, surrender happens naturally.

Should one bypass God and go directly to this ‘I’?

They are the same, so whatever suits one is best.

The Bible says You are vengeful. Is this true?

Yes, I AM, yet you should understand the meaning of the word if you are to use it. To be vengeful is to respond with equal measure; it is the law of karma. When you hit something, do you not hurt your hand? So you learn not to hit. The hard surface is teaching you: Will you listen to its message or continue to inflict suffering upon your self? It is compassionate to respond, so you learn to love and not be aggressive. Would you expect anything different? How can you learn if I do not reflect behaviour? How will you experience Your Self if I AM not a mirror for You? I have said ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ Why? Because they are You. One attacks others only when one expects attack from others, even if the other is really one’s Self.

Once I felt that I was one with the entire universe, like I was enlightened, but after six months it disappeared. Why is that?

It was precisely as you imagined enlightenment would Be, correct?

That’s right.

If one is expecting enlightenment to be a phenomenal experience, then that is precisely what one will receive. This demonstrates how powerful intention is, and that one receives exactly what one imagines. This degree of knowingness without a shred of doubt, which is Faith, is what it is to Be God.

Would You explain?

Enlightenment is not an experience and there are no ‘enlightened masters’. No person can ever get enlightened because enlightenment is an Impersonal Happening that incorrectly gets labelled as a personal accomplishment when it is actually the meeting of consciousness with consciousness – God realizing it is God through the body. Love Thy Self and be free of worshiping ‘others’.

Isn’t loving my Self vanity or selfishness?

There is nothing wrong with loving Your Self. What leads to suffering is one’s self concept, yet if your sense of self extends to include all existence, then it is joyous to love one’s Self.

So what is the highest spiritual path?

All spiritual paths ultimately fail, thereby throwing one back upon oneself, so one may know the futility of seeking happiness elsewhere. The greatest obstacle to Self-realization is arrogance, which is the absence of humility. Your greatest failure humbly becomes your greatest victory, whereby You surrender to find out Who You Are and All divisions blur in the Light of Eternal Love.

So all paths are a waste of time?

There is no time and there are no paths ultimately. You are already what you are looking for.

From Be Still and Know I AM God, © 2012 by Nick Gancitano, published by Cygnus Books.

A Lasting Taste of Spiritual Enlightenment

Nick Gancitano

Author and spiritual teacher at The Self-Inquiry Center, Nick Gancitano graduated from Coral Springs High School in Florida, where he was an All-American Soccer Player and earned a football scholarship to Penn State University. He was the place-kicker for the Penn State Nittany Lions under the legendary coach Joe Paterno, where his team won the National Championship in 1983. Nick graduated in 1986 with his degree in Biomechanics, and played briefly with the Detroit Lions before a knee injury retired him to the business world as a regional vice-president for A.L. Williams. Four years later, Nick entered the public school system to teach science and coach wrestling, soccer and football. Nick has privately mentored nearly 50 place-kickers who received Division 1 collegiate scholarships, emphasizing the significance of yoga and meditation to assist athletes with finding The Zone. He then transitioned into teaching yoga and then meditation to the general public. After discovering Self-inquiry, he experienced a profound shift and sought the direction of various conscious teachers, including Ramana Maharshi, who then guided Nick to share the Self-Inquiry in the West.

In 2002, several of his students formed the South Florida-based Atma-Vichara Ashram, where he was the acting spiritual director known as I Am for five years before teaching abroad from 2007 to 2010 and writing his first Be Still and Know I AM God. In early 2010 he established The Self-Inquiry Center in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, Florida. When he is not traveling to share the Self-Inquiry or Be Still and Know I AM God, Nick resides at the Center and disseminates the teaching with humor and lucid precision.

Nick Gancitano – Buddha at the Gas Pump Interview

Nick Gancitano has spent most of his adult life delving into the mysteries of the ancient spiritual teachings and has undergone a conscious transformation that has made him a specialist in the field. Nick studied under some of its most respected sages and has traveled extensively around the world to deliver this teaching. In addition, Nick himself has been recognized for his simplification of the often complicated spiritual system of advaita (wisdom through direct insight).

After returning from his journey, Nick became committed to disseminating these teachings among friends and associates who became students and soon erected The Self-Inquiry Center for Conscious Living, where Nick now provides his lighthearted works to a growing population of devoted spiritual seekers.

U. G. Krishnamurti: The Mystique of Enlightenment ( updated May 9, 2012 )

An underground spiritual classic distributed widely for the first time in the U.S., this is the story of one of the most unusual figures in contemporary spirituality, U.G. Krishnamurti, in his own words. The Mystique of Enlightenment is a scathing critique of contemporary spirituality. In a world in which spiritual techniques, teachers, concepts, and organizations are legion, U. G. stands nearly alone in his rejection of it all: “I am only interested in describing this state, in clearing away the occultation and mystification in which those people in the ‘holy business’ have shrouded the whole thing. Maybe I can convince you not to waste a lot of time and energy looking for a state that does not exist except in your imagination… The natural state is acausal: it just happens.” The author does not equate the natural state with enlightenment, which he describes as an illusion created by our culture. He states emphatically that one can do nothing to attain the natural state. In fact, any movement towards it separates one from it.

U. G. Krishnamurti is an original voice in which much of contemporary spirituality is understood in a new way. For those interested in the full spectrum of modern spiritual thought, this is a “must read.” In the well-known history of J. Krishnamurti, few names have been so strongly associated with his message as U. G. Krishnamurti, who shared a close but contentious relationship with him over many years. U.G. was raised to take on the mantle of guru, much like J. Krishnamurti. When the two men eventually met, each had rejected the guru role, and for years they conversed regularly, struggling to uncover the nature of truth, before a falling out led each in a different direction.

It is fairly common in reading modern spiritual books to find references to U. G. Krishnamurti’s influence on both teachers and their students. His books have been translated into nearly every European language, as well as Chinese and Japanese. Widely regarded in India and Europe, The Mystique of Enlightenment is considered by U.G.’s closest associates to be the best summary of his ideas.

The book consists of transcripts of informal talks with those who come to ask him questions. In one of these talks, he relates his life story, including the events leading up to and comprising what he calls his “calamity,” or his entry into the natural state. Since his own experience of coming into the natural state at age 49, he has spent his time traveling throughout the world, staying with friends or in rented apartments for a few months at a time. He gives no public talks, but meets with people who come to see him.

What he offers is not hope or encouragement, but stark reality: “Of one thing I am certain. I cannot help you solve your basic dilemma or save you from self-deception, and if I can’t help you, no one can.” His message is simple: he has no message. Nevertheless, his words can inspire you to face your own assumptions and motivations and discover for yourself what is true.

“If you have the courage to touch life for the first time, you will never know what hit you. Everything man has thought, felt and experienced is gone, and nothing is put in its place.” —U.G. Krishnamurti

NOTE: This is an excerpt from the full 90-minute DVD.

Those who offer enlightenment or salvation appear to often operate more as businessmen than as authentic spiritual teachers. In part one of this two-part series, U. G. Krishnamurti he denies any possibility of knowledge of enlightenment. The very attempt to achieve enlightenment is an obstacle in the path of the proclaimed goal. The search for enlightenment is a device of the mind to perpetuate itself, in denial of its mortality.

In part two of the full DVD, he critiques various disciplines, both mystical and psychotherapeutic, which are said to lead to states of enlightenment. He proposes that states of enlightenment, if they are to be attained, must be gained in spite of–not because of–meditation, devotion, prayer, acceptance, forgiveness, or compassion. Stripped of all our pretenses, facing the despair of the human condition, freed of the imaginary diseases from which “enlightenment” may save us, we can build realistic and practical lives.
U. G. Krishnamurti was a world traveler and author of Mind Is a Myth and The Mystique of Enlightenment. Viewed by many as a liberated individual, he eschewed all gurus, teachings and followers.

Living Fully: Finding Joy in Every Breath ~ Shyalpa Tenzin Rinpoche

We all aspire to live fully and freely in the moment.

In Living Fully, Shyalpa Tenzin Rinpoche reveals timeless wisdom that can help us fulfill this deepest aspiration. Each succinct teaching is a luminous jewel, an invaluable guide to actualizing our innate potential and breathing with joy and ease.

Today, with so many struggling with financial, relationship, and career challenges, Living Fully: Finding Joy in Every Breath is a timely prescription. Rinpoche offers the tools we need to experience genuine inner freedom, uncorrupted by endless craving for something better. Topics include beginning with a pure motivation, the preciousness of breath, healing oneself and others, the essence of meditation, and spontaneous fulfillment.

Shyalpa Tenzin Rinpoche has written the book that our troubled age has been yearning for. It is a treasure trove of heartfelt advice on how to seize the moment and live with kindness and understanding. Rinpoche’s teachings gently beckon us home to the purity and simplicity of our true nature. At peace with ourselves and at ease with the world, we can discover what it means to live our lives fully.

You can also view the full contents here:
http://www.livingfully.org/

Shyalpa Tenzin Rinpoche

His Eminence Shyalpa Rinpoche is a highly accomplished meditation master and learned scholar in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. With dignity and clarity, Rinpoche uncompromisingly transmits the profound teachings of the Buddha for the benefit of all.

His fresh and authentic teaching style provides a framework for using everyday situations to realize our highest potential. With genuine compassion, he manifests in order to meet the needs of each individual. Quite simply, he is a living expression of the precious wish-fulfilling jewel of Buddhadharma. He is one of the greatest living Dzogchen masters and a perfect teacher and guide for these complex times.

Rinpoche is renowned for his sophisticated understanding of Eastern and Western cultures. His students treasure his great compassion and kindness, unyielding loyalty, sense of humor, and skill in stripping away pretense. Rinpoche enjoys an active family life with his wife and three young children.

For over twenty years, His Eminence has tirelessly given teachings, retreats, seminars, and empowerments around the world and has lectured at universities, including Harvard, Yale, and Naropa University. In 1989 he founded Rangrig Yeshe, Inc., a nonprofit organization in the United States to preserve Vajrayana teachings. He also founded the Tibetan Children’s Fund, which has educated over three hundred children in India and Nepal. In Kathmandu, Nepal, he reestablished the Shyalpa Monastery and Retreat Center, and he founded Shyalpa Nunnery. Here, Shyalpa Rinpoche guides over 130 monks and nuns in the Dzogchen Longchen Nyingtig tradition.

His Eminence Shyalpa Rinpoche is in the process of establishing the Center for Enlightenment at Buddhafield in Millerton, New York, which he calls a sanctuary for complete awareness within ourselves, in the center of our hearts. Rinpoche has also established the Dharmachakra Teaching Funds in the United States and Europe. All the revenue generated from Rinpoche’s teachings goes into these funds and is used to organize and sponsor future teachings and retreats.

Rinpoche founded the nonprofit charitable organizations Wencheng Gongzhu International Foundation in Hong Kong in 2009, WGIF Taiwan in 2010, and WGIF Malaysia in 2011, in order to support his compassionate activities throughout Southeast Asia.

Shyalpa Tenzin Rinpoche, author of Living Fully: Finding Joy in Every Breath

New World Library Publisher Marc Allen talks to renowned Tibetan Buddhist lama, Shyalpa Tenzin Rinpoche about his book LIVING FULLY: Finding Joy in Every Breath.

1. Can I choose to wake up? 2. How Do I Know if I’m Enlightened? 3. Does Enlightenment mean no fear of death? 4. How does Enlightenment effect the Environmental Movement? ~Jun Po Denis Kelly

1.Can I choose to wake up?

Is enlightenment an accident or is it something I can choose? What role does choice and free will have in waking up?

2.How Do I Know if I’m Enlightened?

A seemingly simple question was posed to Jun Po Roshi: How do I know when I’m Awake? Is it self-evident? Is there a danger I may think I’m awake, when in fact I’m actually still tightly bound to my ego?

3. Does Enlightenment mean no fear of death?

When we Awaken, does our fear of death disappear? As temporal, finite beings, can we ever be truly at peace with our mortality?

4.How does Enlightenment effect the Environmental Movement?

[Jun Po Denis] Kelly was born to a military family in northern Wisconsin on April 14, 1942. A troubled youth and an early spiritual hunger led him west to California in 1963, where he was quickly taken up in the exploratory ferment of the counterculture. He became a first-generation psychonaut and self-described “urban shaman,” a friend of Alan Watts and the Grateful Dead, a contemporary of Ken Kesey’s Merry Pranksters, and one of the freewheeling inventors of the legendary Clear Light “Windowpane” LSD. He also began a dedicated study of Buddhist meditation, spending time with both Shunryu Suzuki Roshi and Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche before finally meeting the man who would become his teacher, Rinzai Master Eido Shimano Roshi of the Zen Studies Society in New York.

“A Shift of Perception” ~ Adyashanti

Your version of reality is an illusion. It doesn’t exist outside your head. Enlightenment is just seeing things as they are-all that’s needed is a shift of perception. But beware, Adyashanti warns “there’s nothing in it for the ego.”

Katie Davis ‘Awake Joy’ Pt 4 to Pt 6

Katie Davis ‘Awake Joy’ Pt5

Katie Davis ‘Awake Joy’ Pt6