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The purpose of awareness meditation is to become aware of Spirit all around you, flowing through you, and moving as you. I developed this meditation practice through trial and error over the past 2 years. I started out meditating the way I was taught at 8 - by watching my breath. Over a year ago, I set an intention to be a pure, clear, wide open expression of God. I wanted to remove anything that appeared to be separating me from Spirit. I also wanted to see what would happen if I completely removed the lens.
I went from developing a practice, to feeling exposed, to being immersed in joy. I am currently experiencing an overlap with other people’s consciousness and the ability to experience alternate choices.
Warning: You gauge your readiness for experiences. Delving into Spirit is safe, however, it can be a very scary process. You need to build your practice to these experiences without forcing them as they require mental and emotional preparation. If you dive in head first, you may experience significant physical and/or mental illness. Keep your intentions pure. Be patient with yourself. Practice forgiveness. (Disclaimer)
Loss of Edges
I would meditate for 3 months then stop because I would feel as if someone sandpapered my edges and left me raw and exposed. Sounds painful. Yes, it was a bit, but looking back I can see that it was the process of getting connected and conscious.
As I continued past the 3 month mark, I felt a slow dissolution into Spirit. I feel like I am gradated out into the Infinite. Sometimes, I feel afraid that I will disappear into the pool and loose my identity completely. On a few occasions in the past year, I did feel like I disintegrated, but I quickly regrouped because of the fear.
Swimming In Love and Joy
After about 4 months, I began to feel spurts of euphoria for no reason. I would be humming along to go to a customer and I would feel an overwhelming sense of joy. I felt like I was walking on sunshine. Over time, I began to feel this euphoria in the midst of “negative” situations.
One day I was walking to work and I felt like I was splashing around in love and joy. Nothing in particular triggered this feeling. It could have been the endorphins, but it wasn’t the same as the high that I usually get from walking. This was a feeling that all was right with the world, that there was nothing to fear. I was at peace and felt a sense of unshakable joy from deep within.
Today, though I might have experiences that evoke sadness, or anger, I am still living in that state of love and joy. I am conscious of it in every moment of every day. It helps me to forgive myself and others immediately. It enfolds me when I feel sad in a situation. I feel blanketed in love. I live from a fountain of joy that bubbles from within. I know as I go about my day that all is well and that everything is working together seamlessly for the Highest Good of All.
Lifting the Lens
For 30 minutes every morning, I consciously remove the lens that shapes my expression of Spirit and I consciously dwell in It. After that, I go about my day in love, joy, and peace.
Earlier this year, a friend of mine was grappling with a decision. My prayer for him was that he remained clear so that the answer could be revealed. After revealing his initial decision, he went about his life, but he quickly switched to the other side of the coin. He confided in me that he felt as though I intervened on his behalf.
At the time, I didn’t know what I was doing, but when he said that I realized that I lifted his lens so he could see clearly. At first, I thought that I was imagining it. Then, I decided to experiment with lifting the lens for a few other people.
I did it on a small scale at first. I would be in a conversation with someone mulling an idea. I simply waved the lens away and all of sudden they were clear on their path. Then I started experimenting with a few people remotely. Every time someone indicated that they were in the midst of a tough decision, I just waved the lens out of the way. I would suspend it for a moment so that they could be clear.
There are a few things that are important to note. I don’t dabble in people’s consciousness without their permission. When I can, face to face, I ask them, usually in the form of the question, “Would you like me to hold that in prayer?” If I’m not face to face, I ask them psychically. Everyone is not prepared to be clear.
Also, I just lift the lens for a moment so that you can see clearly. After that it’s still up to you to follow through on the guidance received. If you’re not prepared to follow through on the guidance, a good prayer is to remain clear so that you can see the answer and hold it in your consciousness.
Overlapping Consciousness
As my edges frayed away, I began to overlap the consciousness of those close to me. I can “dial in” to someone at the drop of a pin. I can also “hear” them if they call. So that if someone is thinking about me I can sense it.
Again, at first I thought that this was just my imagination so I started to experiment. When I felt that someone was trying to access me I called. Lo and behold, the first thing they would say is, “I was just thinking about you.”
Recently, I had the experience of being so interlaced with someone else’s consciousness that I could feel most of what they were feeling. Once again, this got really scary, so I backed off of my meditation practice. Since then, I have been asking friends what I can do to navigate through this phase. I picked up my practice again about a month and a half ago and I have been treading cautiously.
It’s not so much that I want to protect myself because I realize that I am in a safe space. It was more that I was not prepared for that level of connection or its repercussions. Today, I still feel connected, but I am more of an observer than a participant.
Parallel Realities
That brings me to another experience that I’ve had recently. I was sitting on my couch one day working on a post when I experienced an entirely separate reality. It was as if I asked myself what would happen if I chose xyz and it played out like a movie. Only it wasn’t like a movie or day dream and I didn’t ask that question. I was actually engaged in what I was doing, but I was also experiencing this alternate reality.
I have not done anything to explore this phenomenon further as once again I am in uncharted territory. I’m just continuing to keep my intention pure - that I am a clear, pure, open channel for Spirit.
Has anyone had any of these or similar experiences as a result of prolonged meditation?
Soon I’ll post a podcast with a guided awareness meditation.
In Spirit,
Nneka
Entry Filed under: Spiritual Growth, Prayer and Meditation, Spirituality
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Earlier I gave a few examples of polarity in an effort to further explain the concept and better understand it myself. I posted the following in response to someone’s rant about darkworking.
I got the lightworker/darkworker thing when I figured out the difference between these 2 statements.
- Being a lightworker means you only take actions that serve the highest good of all.
- Being a lightworker means that you take actions that serve the highest good of all only.
Aligned Action
The first statement means that all of your actions serve the highest good of all, but they don’t only serve the highest good of all. They may be of benefit to you. As a lightworker, you are only concerned with the service to all and what you get out of it is a byproduct.
You concentrate on creating, giving, and let the receiving take care of itself. This is what gives the level of clarity. You ask the question, “Is this serving the highest good of all?” If it happens to serve you so be it. As a darkworker you would ask, “Is this serving me?” If it happens to serve others so be it.
An darkworker example is saying whatever it takes to win a presidential race. Yeah, it might help some people out, but the bottom line is, “Am I going to win?” Once you win, you ask, “Is this going to help me stay in power?” If it happens to help people, it’s a by product. You’re not asking, “What can I do to serve the citizens?”
Constipated Flow
With the second statement, “being a ligtworker means that you take actions that serve the highest good of all only”, you are actually blocking the flow of Energy. That’s why it feels so hard. No action taken will only result in energy given or gained. It comes full circle. So trying to take actions that only result in energy given or gained causes internal conflict. In other words, as a lightworker your question is, “Is this action serving the highest good of all?” You don’t need to worry about if its only serving the highest good of all.
Now things get tricky if you are not honest. You can convince yourself of anything. That’s why in order to polarize you must be highly conscious. You’ll feel great in either direction.
As a lightworker, you’ll feel great giving to the highest good of all. If you’re open, your life will hum along nicely and you’ll want for nothing. Once fear is introduced, you’ll start thinking, “but what about me?” That’s when the mind begins to play tricks. As a darkworker, it’s the same. The rush of power and domination is intoxicating. If love seeps in and you get an attack of conscience looking at all the people you may have harmed, then you start rationalizing.
Does this make sense?
In Spirit,
Nneka
Entry Filed under: Spiritual Growth, Spirituality, Personal Development
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Close to the beginning of the life of this site, I introduced the Lens Theory. It starts off with the following assumptions:
- God is all there is, and is absolute good.
- You are an expression of God.
It states that the degree to which you express and experience God in the world is based upon your lens. Your lens is the total of experiences, thoughts, and conditioning. But then, it begged the question, “If God is all there is, what creates the lens?”
At this point in most philosophies and theologies, the ego is introduced as the thing responsible for all the gunk that make up your lens. I have a different idea. What if God as the creative force and Energy of life creates the lens?
Now, don’t think of God as the man in the sky God. Think of God as the stuff that life is made of, the Essence of Life. A better word might be Spirit. It is underlying everything and coming into expression as you. It is not just the content, but the Intelligence that is you as well.
What if Spirit creates the thoughts, experiences, and conditioning so that you have the conditions to create the other experiences that you want? Here’s an example.
I recently decided that I wanted to polarize as a “lightworker”. In plain English, that means that I want to live from love, I want to be in service to the highest good of all, and I want to do it exclusively. “Isn’t that what you were doing all along?”, you ask. Not really, I was hanging out on the fence.
Meanwhile, I had a plan for this weekend. My cousin, who is also my best friend came to town. I was planning to canvass with her and spend the whole weekend catching up. On Tuesday, I got hit with the flu. I was down for the count. I’m talking difficulty breathing, aching body, can’t leave the bed – let alone the house. So my plans went all haywire. All I kept asking was how can I be of service to the highest good of all. The answer came clearly, “You have to be healthy first.”
See, I’d been processing the polarization thing. Trying to figure out how it all works. How do you receive if you’re concentrating on giving? How do you give if you’re concentrating on receiving? Where is the balance? I decided to take it on faith and go with the giving flow. It felt more nourishing and in alignment with my personality. I get the answers clear as day with the flu.
You choose a direction for energy flow. Always ask the question consistent with that polarity. The answer will lead you to do what is necessary, even if it seems counterintuitive to the flow that you’ve chosen.
All that drama, just so I could get, at a cellular level, the idea of polarity. The flu answered several other questions and asked even more, but the experience is now a part of my lens.
Spirit is always creating, always expressing as each and every one of us, always present in every moment, and always for the highest good of all.
In Spirit,
Nneka
Entry Filed under: Spiritual Growth, Self Awareness, Spirituality, Personal Development
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Steve Pavlina has been talking about polarity for over a year now. I poo-poo’d the idea in favor of balance. I didn’t think that it was healthy to concentrate your energy in either direction.
Last week I was looking at the political landscape and trying to understand what was motivating the presidential candidates. I finally saw what Steve meant by being consciously focused on the direction of energy flow.
I realized that you can become extremely effective by consciously and consistently applying yourself in either direction. I also realized that indeed 99% of the population is not polarized. Only a tiny percent of the population is even paying attention or conscious. Of that percent, still fewer take the same side consistently and exclusively. As I looked around for more examples and a better understanding of polarity, here’s what I found.
Lions for Lambs
Spoiler Alert
There are 3 major characters in the movie Lions for Lambs: a college professor who was drafted into the Vietnam War, a journalist that’s been in the industry for 40 years, and a young, upwardly mobile senator.
The professor has dedicated his life to engaging young minds as a political science teacher. At one point in the movie he admitted that he started out wanting to get the accolades that come with getting papers published and presenting theories. After a while he realized that no one read his papers, and theories needed to be actionable. He decided that he needed to engage his students and press them to be active in the political process. He remained in academia because he thought he could serve more people by waking up the apathetic promising students and having them take action.
The senator started off as a breath of fresh air to the party (GOP), according to the journalist. However, he was always self motivated and held his gaze on the presidency. He called the journalist in to present a new plan for Afghanistan. The plan was really an attempt to divert public focus from the problems happening in Iraq, and to provide a quick win for the senator in particular. He had many high-minded reasons for the new strategy in Afghanistan, but he finally admitted what he really wanted was PR.
The journalist walked away knowing that she was a pawn. She stormed into her boss’ office and hurriedly blurted out all of her reservations. She even admitted to feeling icky about the whole plan, least of all her involvement and responsibility in promoting the war in Iraq. Her boss reminded her that she has a mother that requires 24-hour care. She responded by saying she still can’t publish the story from the senator. Her boss urged her to earnestly consider the consequences of her actions.
At the end of the movie, we see the report as given by the senator in a ticker on the television screen that the apathetic student is watching.
In the movie, the professor’s primary concern was service to his students - outflow polarization. The senator’s primary concern was eligibility for the presidency (inflow polarization). The journalist was aware of what was going on and had good intentions, but caved in the end. She may have been conscious, but she was not polarized (or maybe she was inflow polarized).
Inflow Polarized Example: The Salesman
When I was a consultant I worked on a project sold to a customer without regard to whether or not it was feasible. I worked on many of these projects, but what made this one rare was that I admired the guy who made the sale because of his clarity, precision, focus and consistency. Let’s call him Al.
Usually these sales are made by someone who truly does not understand the scope of the project or the machinations of the client, but Al was well-verse in both. He was sharp, smart, and quick. It wasn’t an oversight that made the project unfeasible. He sold it because it would significantly boost his career.
Typically salespeople sold and moved on, but the company was in the middle of a restructure and he had to stay and implement. Instead of folding and taking a backseat at that point, as some of the other salespeople did, Al pursued the project with tenacity. He didn’t skip a beat. He determined that it would be an even bigger boost to his career if he could implement the project. He was intent and clear on the outcome and was willing to say or do whatever was necessary to make the project successful. Sometimes it meant treating the team to dinner. Other times it meant mandating 12-hour days.
He showed that the project was progressing at a steady clip in the right direction and exited. To the project team, it came out of the blue. All the other salespeople were stuck in implementation of projects they sold, but this was steadily negotiating his rise up the corporate ladder. In fact, he made it look easy. He was well aware of his power and was not afraid to use it the subjugate, manipulate, or flatter someone. He may not have used the term polarity, but he was very clear that anything that he did would benefit him. If it benefited someone else, that was gravy. If he needed to help someone in order to advance, he would do so, but he did not go out of his way to help anyone.
Al was an extremely successful salesman and is probably CEO of a company today.
Inflow Polarized Example: The Spiritual Zealot
It’s easy to label whole professions as lightworker or darkworker professions, but what we must really examine is motive. There are many people in search of enlightenment who can be considered darkworkers by Steve’s definition.
Think of the person whose sole motivation in life is to be enlightened for its own sake. They will do anything to stay in an enlightened state including cutting themselves off from society. They love the spiritual high of melting into Spirit. Rather than deepen their spiritual understanding for the benefit of all, they pursue spiritual understanding so that they can have nirvana.
Similarly, if the spiritual zealot manages to improve the consciousness of mankind in the process of gaining enlightenment it’s a bonus. If they have to neglect their families and society to do so, they will do that as well.
The spiritual zealot will achieve enlightenment because of his persistence, but there may be a string of casualties in his wake.
Lightworker/Outflow Example: Google
From Google’s corporate site:
“Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.”
It’s more than a platitude. It’s reinforced by Google’s 10 things:
- Focus on the user and all else will follow.
- It’s best to do one thing really, really well.
- Fast is better than slow.
- Democracy on the web works.
- You don’t need to be at your desk to need an answer.
- You can make money without doing evil.
- There’s always more information out there.
- The need for information crosses all borders.
- You can be serious without a suit.
- Great just isn’t good enough.
Google went public with a stock price close to $100 per share and is now over $500 per share. When they went public the analysts were skeptical of the value assigned to the stock, and the followers were concerned about its integrity. Google has kept its focus on service to the user and expands by asking how many more they can serve and what will enhance their user’s life.
For another view of polarization you can check out Christine Kane’s article on creating and getting.
In Spirit,
Nneka
Entry Filed under: Spirituality, Personal Development
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After years of getting what you were told is important (the house, car, good job), you realize that you are not happy. You get more things, but you still aren’t happy. You drink, you eat, you get angry, you take a class, but you still aren’t happy.
There is a nagging discontent.
The discontent is calling you to do more with your life. It will not be squelched with alcohol, TV, games, parties, food, promotions, or small talk. You can no longer complain about the state of things in the world without the nagging discontent.
It’s time to wake up and pay attention to your life. Look around and take stock of where you are: your health, your finances, your skills, your talents, your inherent gifts. Instead of asking what you can do to feel better or what toy you can buy to lift your spirits, ask yourself what gifts you have to give to the world.
If you’re not sure what your gifts are, try this scenario. Imagine you are diagnosed with a terminal disease and you have 3 weeks to live. Your son or daughter is 10 years old. You have a will and you’ve set up guardianship. You have a house and you’ve saved some money. Your friends and relatives will be a cocoon for them. What do you want to make sure to teach them before you leave the earth?
Do you want to teach them how to do 10 riffs on a guitar that you contrived when you were on a retreat one weekend in your 20’s? Do you want them to know about the importance of an education? Do you want to show them how to treat their husband or wife? The answer to this question is a clue to a gift. Something as unique to you as your DNA. It is latent within you and waiting to be shared with the rest of the world.
Another method is to pay attention to your complaints. What do you find most annoying in the world? Is it voter apathy? Is it information privacy? Is it the healthcare system? Your avid complaints signal a passion for change in that arena.
At this point, many people ask where they will find the time. Some people say that they will pursue their passion once they are retired. Others say that they don’t have the luxury of pursuing passion, they have to make a living.
What good is a living without a life? If you spend the most productive years on your life pursuing someone else’s dream, when will you have the energy to work on your own? If you don’t have the time to work on your passions, what are you spending it on?
Most important, if not you, WHO?
In Spirit,
Nneka
Entry Filed under: Personal Development, Purpose and Work
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