Knowing Who You Are

The Highest Understanding of Reality

You are the Self, Pure Awareness, Brahman, God, Consciousness, Soul, Sat Chit Ananda. These are terms that can be difficult to grasp. You are used to concrete, intellectual, tangible identifications. You are used to thinking of yourself as a body, a mind, a feeling. But awareness is harder to understand. The Soul, the Self is ethereal.

There is only God and whatever you are is part of God. You are made from the substance of God and your energy is God’s energy. All of this exists within God for there is nothing outside or other than God. Your Consciousness is part of God’s consciousness. Your body is a denser form of consciousness – consciousness vibrating at a slower rate. Your mind is an impulse of the creative intelligence of God. Your feeling is the vibration of the heart of God. God is Consciousness. To understand who you are let’s examine consciousness.

Consciousness is Shiva and Shakti

Shiva is Pure Awareness, Pure Illumination, Pure Existence, light – the capacity of Consciousness to illumine or reveal. It is not the light that can be seen with the eyes but the light by which the eyes see. Shiva is Consciousness.

Shakti is self-enfolding knowledge and the power of Creative Intelligence. Power, understanding, energy, capability, strength, awareness – the reflection of light on itself – the ability and power of Consciousness to know itself.

Shiva, the power-holder, and Shakti, the power, are inseparable.

Both Shiva and Shakti, as one, are the Absolute and the initial vibratory movement, the primal impulse or spanda, wanting to become creation. In them is the intention to manifest.

Shakti is the mirror that shows us 1) ourselves (Self-illumination) and 2) our personal creation we make through our perception and understanding (our reality). Shakti provides the mirror in which Shiva, Pure Consciousness, may be fully reflected and Shakti provides our ability to create a reality that we live in.

You can know Shiva (the Self) through the agency of Shakti (power). You can know the Self (Shiva) through the power to reflect, the mirror, the power of illumination (Shakti).

The nature of Consciousness is the marriage of clear perception and right understanding: Shiva and Shakti are always one. Consciousness is always perfect and full. Shakti always experiences bliss because of her immense satisfaction of being perfect, full and ecstatic, and that very bliss has driven her to create all forms and expand that bliss. She recognizes she is all Reality and this wholeness causes her to experience Ananda; bliss. It is said bliss is her nature: Your Self is God and as God your Self is absolute, bliss, consciousness.

It is the self-reflective power of Shakti that allows you to be aware and reflect. Shakti is the power to know and examine – to reflect upon your perceptions and make them meaningful. Shiva is the illumination, the light of awareness of something, consciousness, and Shakti is the discernment and discrimination by which you recognize it – the power of recognition. So Shakti allows you to recognize Shiva. The power of recognition allows you to reflect upon your pure consciousness.

In a false sense of connection there is no freedom. As awareness grows, freedom grows. When you begin to experience life happening for you freedom expands and you can relax. When you experience life happening as you, then total freedom arises.

Forgetting Who You Are

The Highest Understanding of Reality

When God creates, it establishes 3 relationships; the knower, the known, and the act of knowing. In creation there is the object and subject. There is you as the subject and everything else as objects. Within the simple act of creation these relationships establish the basis of separation. In creation Consciousness contracts to become everything. In this contraction the relationships are born and time and space are created. So in creation pure illumination becomes the subject that illumines, and the object which is illuminated. Objects carry the sweetness of pure illumination and you are attracted to them. They are actually part of you and on the subtlest level that recognition remains. This lures you toward objects and binds you to them.

While knowing the subject (your Self) is the real objective of creation, you forget that and get lost in an outward focus on objects. The relationship with Self becomes dominated by the relationship to objects.

But you are the perceiver and as the perceiver your perception is what makes your world exist as it is. But you limit that perception to your body, mind and feelings, forgetting the Soul or Self. The body, mind and feelings are actually objects and the Soul is the subject. In your daily experience you are focused on the surroundings, the circumstances and the people, places and things that occupy the space around you. Your focus is sensory and thus outwardly focused. It is object-focused. You focus on what can be measured, classified and intellectually objectified. This strengthens your forgetting.

As forgetting strengthens you move from living a Soul-centered existence to an ego-centered existence. It is a matter of dominance. The Soul is never lost, but in most people it is dominated and forgotten. As a child you feel your freedom and Soul. But as you experience fear and pain you contract and seek worth, approval and love from outside yourself. You re-create yourself to become acceptable and lovable. You do all that you can to end your feeling of worthlessness and you live in a created role, inauthentic to who you are. Your forgetting strengthens further.

But the perceiver always remains Consciousness. And the universe of diversity and separation can become the means to liberation. Liberation becomes the merging of all our perceptions of separateness and differences with the subject. The knower and the known, the subject and the object become one. The human and the divine become Narayana; they merge as one. You are the clay, the potter, the wheel and the pot. You are the artist, the paint, the brush, the canvas and the painting. You are the Consciousness, the power, the creation and the screen upon which it is projected. Your perception of differences is empty. Everything that exists is Consciousness projected onto a part of Consciousness. Your awareness is God’s awareness. Your body, mind and feelings are the Consciousness of God.

In reality you are a mirror and your life is a reflection upon your consciousness. When you view life from the perspective of Shiva and Shakti, the supreme Self, you shift perspective to witness-consciousness. The mirror is not concerned and does not personalize anything reflected in it. The mirror does not care if what is reflected is happy or sad. Consciousness remains neutral. But your mirror is not reflecting something outside. There is no outside. It is always reflecting the play of consciousness within consciousness. The bliss exists in the union of the creation with its creator – the remembrance. In silence the Transcendent light of Consciousness, can be experienced. The light of Consciousness is both immanent and transcendent. It exists in everything; your body, mind and feelings. It is in every aspect of your being, of who you are, and so can be remembered.

Understanding Creation

The Highest Understanding of Reality

There is a tendency for you to see the world as cause and effect. An egg is fertilized, a baby chicken is born, it grows, it is eaten by a wolf and dies and ends up as fertilizer nurturing a stalk of corn that is eaten by a chicken that lays an egg…. But this is a restrictive view of reality. The one energy, the one intelligence and the one consciousness is simply flashing forth at an amazing speed as expanding impulses of infinite, divine power manifesting apparent phenomena through divine will. This is God’s active, creative nature. While objects appear to affect other objects and the subject, objects, in themselves, do not possess conscious or generative power. It is only the unrestricted will and power of Shiva and Shakti that is the cause of each appearance, each change, each expansion. Every single pulsation of the Divine re-creates the universe each moment. It expands and evolves it, and it does it on every level. Everything is created, maintained and destroyed in each moment. It is this continual re-creation by the will of God that makes us experience movement and change and evolution.

This is similar to watching a film. There are many consecutive still frames and each frame is recreated in a slightly different way. They are strung together at a great speed to give the illusion of movement. In this sense there is no permanence. In every moment your mood shifts, your thought shifts, your body changes. There appears to be endless change because the will of God is recreating life each moment.

Change, the constant recreation of life, is a natural outcome of life and God’s will to remember and expand. When you hold a fixed position, an unshakable opinion, a deep indignation and intolerance, or a firm egoic stance, you do not flow with this recreation. Every circumstance, mindset, belief, or emotional state can become an attachment or aversion to a fixed position when you see the world as static or fixed. When you realize that God is recreating everything in every moment for your remembrance there is freedom.

There are different realities. The chicken is living, eating, and becoming the wolf’s dinner. The wolf is affecting the chicken. The subject is affecting the object and vice—versa. So life does exist on this level of cause and effect. But this is a surface reality. This is the spray coming from the wave coming from the depth of the ocean. If everything is only the will of God playing out then you may think there is no freedom for you. You are pawn in His game. Any goal you have would be meaningless.

If you view life from the level of the wolf and chicken, then you are right. You have choices, free will, goals and right opinions. That is the perspective of the created self, the egoic, limited self.

But from the deepest reality, all that exists is one consciousness, one power, one will, one play of consciousness. That is the ultimate truth. That is the perspective of the authentic, unlimited Self. God is playing Its game of creating out of Itself, upon or within Itself, through Its power. It is only Its will playing out on all levels of creation, maintenance and destruction for the joy of expansion and remembrance.

When you hold to the perspective of the created self, when you forget your true nature, you are tossed about by the waves, holding to a limited view that you have a free will, right opinions and necessary goals. When you realize that God is recreating life in each moment through Its will and that you are God, then there is freedom to allow life to unfold perfectly for your remembrance. Then God’s will is your will – because that is reality. God’s decision to go right instead of left is your choice because you are God. You may want to hold to the small idea that you have free will, but the big idea and reality is that you are God and thus only God’s will is playing out.

God is recreating your experience in each moment. From the limited perspective of the created self you can hold onto your rigidity and fixed positions or you can jump into the flow of Divine will and surrender, and live from the perspective of the authentic unlimited Self. You can remain limited or remember your divinity.

The individual is the perfected replica of God. But the universe is more than a reciprocal relationship. There is more than inter-dependency. The universe, God and you are the same. The knower, the known and the act of knowing are one. Not only is everything consciousness, but within everything is the contents of everything that will ever come into being. Every particle of Consciousness contains the whole of creation. It is how any part of a hologram can create the whole hologram. An individual is Universal Consciousness in a contracted state. The individual embodies the universe in a contracted form. Because reality is oneness, the totality of creation is reflected within its own Self.

Experiencing separateness and differences

The Highest Understanding of Reality

At first God is “I”. – Pure Consciousness, Pure Being. Then God becomes “I Am” – Self-aware Shiva and Shakti, Consciousness and Power. Then God sees Itself and what it wants to become. At this stage perception does not happen through the senses or mind, but through the witness capacity of consciousness. God knows, “I am This”. Unity and diversity exist in equal balance, in neutrality. There is not yet a real appearance of separateness. God knows itself as itself and as its potential creation. There is still unity because God’s idea of creation is still oneness within itself.

But God holds the intention to become separate. God operates his power of concealment. It is this intention and power that cuts God off from knowing its oneness and full nature and freedom of will. This is God’s desire to enter creation as individuals and that requires the illusion of separation. This is God’s desire to hide itself and then expand itself back into full remembrance. Separation is an act of the will of God in order to become part of its own creation. So in this separation God’s complete free power, God’s Shakti, becomes the power of illusion, separation, concealment. God intends to create differences and the first difference is a reduction in its free will and full power.

God obscures its attributes by continuing to limit its power. These limitations allow for the sense of being an individual. Omnipotence becomes limited action. Omniscience becomes limited knowledge. Fullness and freedom of will become limited desires. Eternity and bliss become limited by time. Omnipresence becomes limited by form, space and limited perceptions. These limitations become what we perceive as nature, the force of the limited creation.

This illusion of limitations causes the pure consciousness that emerges as creation to assume limitations and become an individual, separate and different from Source. The power that facilitates perception and action follow and serve to further limit our experience of unity. Perception and action are necessary for God to be conscious and participate as part of its creation. This is Its concealment in Its play of concealment and remembrance – Its play of Consciousness. These powers of concealment first emerge as your mind, which discriminates, relates personally and thinks (intellect, ego, words and imagination). Then come the powers of perception; the senses. Then the powers of action arise; speaking, locomotion, excretion, handling and procreation. The powers allow for personalization, impressions and consequences to arise. This is the basis of karma and these accumulate to form your destiny within the broader picture of concealment and revelation.

 

Because of this I emphasize Turia Meditation and remembrance of God. This is why there is such an emphasis on the energy and immersions. They are the experience of divinity. They go beyond the body, mind and emotions and directly connect you to Soul and the experience of Self. Enlightenment is an unending, ever-new experience.

The Truth of Reality

The Highest Understanding of Reality

If you run into a wall you will feel it. You will probably bleed and you will feel pain. That is real.

If you think about a subject and you create an insightful thought, you will feel expansion and connection. That is real. Seeing into reality is both expansion of your awareness and connection to the ultimate reality.

If you tenderly kiss your child’s forehead with great love, that feels real – and its physicality and emotionality is real. If you feel love or compassion toward someone it feels powerful. That is real. It may not be tangible, but it is more powerful than the thought you just had or the sensory experience you just had.

Each level of experience contains the whole. The wall and the blood are solidified forms of consciousness. The thought is an impulse of the creative intelligence of consciousness. The feeling of love and compassion is the heart of the Divine flowing into this reality. Consciousness, at every level, contains the whole and it contains the capacity to create a universe, become individual and separate and return to its fullness, perfection and wholeness. Everything you are to become, your spiritual path, the journey of revelation, is not sequential or linear. The wholeness is contained within you at every moment. It is all consciousness. It is only a question of your perception.

You are the center of the universe and you are the origin of the universe. And this realization is available to you, at every moment. You are the Self that assumes form and the Self that remains pure Consciousness. You exist as and within the heart of God. So God is pure Consciousness, the impersonal God. God is Shiva and Shakti, the personal God. God is the creation on all levels – soul, feelings, mind and body. They are all real. They may look and feel different but they are not different in their substance and power.

The spiritual path is not linear. It is multi-dimensional in that a spiritual path is revealing what exists as the One in all forms, in all time and space, and outside of time and space. The spiritual path is not about fixing or changing. It is always about revealing what exists hidden within yourself – but fully there at all times. It is always available if your perception is expanded to allow you to ‘see’ reality.

On every level of awareness, creation takes on a different reality and holds a different experience. When you are living in a created self, in a role and in illusion, life looks and feels separate, different and solid. It feels personal. When you expand your awareness and live in a subtler and expanded, authentic state of awareness, creation becomes singular. Differences, separation and solidity are seen as illusion.

Remembering who you are

The Highest Understanding of Reality

Because it is your discrimination and understanding that allow you to perceive something, your understanding so colors and flavors your experience of your perceptions that in the process of discerning what an object is, you re-create it – your create a new reality. Your perception creates your universe. You literally are manifesting your universe through your discrimination and understanding in each moment.

Shakti both creates and knows its creation. Shiva and Shakti can do or not do everything. They can assume no form or all form. They can remain infinite and finite at the same time. They can assume all limitations and remain limitless. Consciousness depends solely upon itself. Since there is no substance or power other than itself it is completely independent and free. It is the power of freedom. And this is the key to your liberation.

This power of freedom allows you to be free of outer circumstances – because you are Shiva and Shakti, you are independent and free. You may think that because you don’t have complete freedom to have all that you want you are not really free and independent. But real freedom is to want what you have – to accept what is – to experience your innate bliss under any circumstance – to surrender to God’s will for yourself.

Your power of will is the Divine Will in contracted form. As the created-self diminishes and you begin to live fully as the Authentic Self you realize that there is only one will, only one mind, only one power moving all things toward realization – only Shiva and Shakti remembering their fullness.

There is one will and that is the power of grace that, in every moment moves you to become fully free. In your freedom to re-create every moment, you have the power – the Shakti – to illumine and reveal who you truly are. Every circumstance in your life is created by God and is filled with God’s grace for you to remember, for you to reveal your divinity. Every moment in your life is grace making the unconscious conscious, resolving the unresolved and expanding your understanding and experience – Life is only the expansion of Consciousness.

When you open your eyes and become aware of your world, you create your reality. You have the freedom and power to create your experience. You alone are. You alone are Shiva and Shakti. But you feel unworthy, insignificant and afraid. You are the Self, the one consciousness. But you feel separate. You have the power to generate a universe out of your own consciousness. You are the substance and power of the universe. You can know Consciousness as Your Self and you can know everything that you have created as Your Self.

When you recognize who you are more and more, when you remember your power and possibility, you enter into a new relationship with yourself. You begin to realize your divinity and when you open your eyes to see the world you recognize both yourself and the world as the play of Consciousness; Shiva and Shakti playing the game of creation, maintenance and dissolution – playing the game of creating, forgetting their divinity and then through grace, remembering their divinity through and as you.

Enlightenment is only remembering who you are. This is your freedom and power. This is grace. It is in the pulsation of Shakti as a creative force or power that your freedom lies. This re-creative pulsation is infinitely happening. This expansion of consciousness makes every moment new, every moment a possibility for expansion, for remembrance. This pulsation is actually beyond time and space and thus beyond circumstance. That is the freedom to recreate every moment. That is where your freedom and enlightenment lie. You have the power, in every moment, to live in your innate bliss, to remember your divinity.