Waking Up
What does it mean to “wake up?” To emerge from a subconscious or unconscious state? On one level, you do it every day emerging out of a dream state into relative consciousness. Yet, on another level, even in waking consciousness you remain mired in the illusion of your conditioned mind-based stories and fear. To wake up on the “spiritual” path, in other words, to the true Reality of your being, is not as it appears. At least, it is not as it appeared to me. After learning of such powerful states of awakening in spiritual teachers and their authored books, I envisioned something different than what has begun to take form (or lose form) in my own life. However, it makes most sense that everyone’s path looks a little different and there are multiple paths to access Truth. To be clear, I do not claim to be enlightened or awakened, I only claim a series of events that has shaped my own life and direction to practice the art of healing, happiness, and service. Furthermore, the words that I write have begun to emerge from a different source. Not my thinking mind per se, though the language may be filtered through these mechanisms, but a more intuitive source connected to the wisdom of Spirit. Whether you choose to believe that or not is up to you, but that is the best way I can explain the writing that emerges currently. Previously, my mind would have feared producing this kind of content, feeling like an imposter or some kind of preachy guru. However, the other source flowing within me naturally produces this language without fear or care for how it is interpreted. The process appears to take on its own rhythm and represent a clearer state of communication, one not so concerned with the illusions of perception and judgment. It is a simpler practice of simply conveying the experience as it unfolds.
The process of writing is a good example of the larger journey - one of ebb and flow, surrender and will, and moment-by-moment awareness. While writing, the ego mind may creep in and try to edit the writing to death, so concerned with how it may appear to others and, of course, how grammatically correct and intelligible it is. On a practical level, it is important to make the writing accessible; however, the true reasons of the ego mind are more based in perception and fear than reality and service. Will readers think I am smart enough? Too full of myself? Too “woo?” These thoughts are effectively impractical, concerned only with perception of Daniel’s identity, and only serve to interrupt the flow of truth meant to be shared. The practice of surrendering to what emerges while quieting the thinking mind has been challenging to say the least. Upon reflection, I recognize that I never really used my thinking to write. The writing always seemed to flow in some kind of Kerouac-style “stream of consciousness.” I recognize now that my writing always emerged from another source, though I frequently allowed the fear-based and stressful thinking to take over and make the writing presentable for evaluation in the given academic or professional system. Over time, I have simply practiced letting go of that thinking and seeing what happens. This is the result of that process.
My journey in writing parallels the description of “waking up.” As you relinquish the fears and perceptions of who you thought you were, including the source of information previously guiding your way, a new way of showing up in the world, or on the page, emerges with less resistance. To revisit the analogy of waking up from sleep, some wake up in an instant, like shot out of cannon ready to seize the day ahead, while others require a bit more time and patience to experience the gradations of consciousness expanding. Some may feel the light through the blinds tickling their eyelids while their inner world recalibrates to the current waking frequency. Others may feel they require external substances before they feel fully conscious. The process of waking up to the ultimate reality - the spiritual reality that flows through us all whether we openly embrace it or vehemently reject it, and the reality to which we all shall return - may similarly happen differently for each person. However, if the true influence of karmic inheritance over lifetimes is accounted for, the perceived variations in this lifetime would disappear because, though the paths look different in the human form, we are all going to the same place. The “waking up” may appear to happen in a few minutes, a few years, or a few lifetimes as your eyes begin to open and adjust to the truth of your nature. Unlike a strong cup of coffee after sleep, you cannot wake up through force, only with gentle movement and surrender to the powerful source pulling you along, though there are certainly external sources and substances that appear to support this process and heal trauma in the mind and body.
Waking up may be seen as molting or shedding layers of skin that no longer serve you and no longer represent who you are and who you are becoming. Waking up may come as a slow or fast realization that you have been blindly choosing and accepting certain conditioned states of being dictated by the survival mechanisms of the mind and body. As the mind and body begin to upgrade and rewire to support this awakening, you will gain access to previously walled off states and find more freedom and flexibility in the personality. You may experience tremendous states of bliss and peace, more powerful and substantial than ever considered possible. However, it is important to note that as long as you are in the embodied state, you will experience the bodily states that arise like anyone else, though the thinking may be permanently rewired and free from fear since you are not truly the body anyway. Below the surface of your conscious mind, you have been selecting and reselecting states of being that align with the frequency of your mind and body, both of which have been attached to certain levels of pain, suffering, and limitation. As you wake up, these levels begin to dissipate. Your body regains a sense of flow in the nervous system, your mind lets go of needless suffering in stories of your personal life, and your spirit expands beyond the limitations previously dictated by this mind body experience. The truth is that no fear can withstand the light within you when it begins to flow, and moment-by-moment you begin to see the possibilities in all time. Time appears linear only on one level of human reality. but is truly nonlinear in ultimate Reality. In waking up, notions of past, present, and future begin to blur into a more consistent state known simply as presence. In presence, all is possible and everything is in its rightful place. Out of presence, you suffer greatly under the weight of mental conditioning wired toward past and future. The human understanding of time is based predominantly on mechanisms of survival, including hypervigilance of what is to come and rumination over what has taken place. The mind searches frantically for answers to the problems it has created. All problems stem from fear and all solutions promise the relief from fear. However, true freedom from fear comes only from being in presence and from knowing your Light.
In the process of waking up, you may frequently fall back asleep, as if entering a dream that feels familiar yet more and more uncanny over time. The uncanniness of the dreams you slip into are signals that you no longer belong in the dream state and are being guided to a more awakened state of being. Upon each waking from the dream, your mind may punish you for “napping,” or falling back into the familiar thinking cycles. Watch these subtle forms of punishment as the ego tries to sneak back in and control the show. The more clarity you find in the waking state, the more forgiveness you will have for yourself and the more relaxed you will feel about illusions like “waste” and “time.” In Reality, nothing is wasted and time is forever. As stated in A Course in Miracles, the only true prayer is for forgiveness, and prayer is necessary only until we see we are already worthy.
As you awaken, you will experience states of bliss like never before, and upon leaving such states, you may feel a sense of loss and a longing to stay. As you slip back into old dream states, you may even question whether those blissful states were real in the first place or whether they were, in fact, a dream. The blissful states are not necessarily meant to be lived in just yet, they are more like glimpses into the realm of possibility as you navigate the ebb and flow of your personality and daily life relationships. Others may not recognize what is happening to you and you may not be able to speak to the experience very well yourself. You may find yourself confused, at a loss for words, yet driven in a direction that aligns more and more with these higher states of consciousness. Meanwhile, your personality may continue to engage with others, rely on familiar strategies of communication, and get triggered by all of the emotional conflicts and beliefs you will continue to shed as you expand. Rather than seeing these frustrations as blockages to your expansion, see them as necessary triggers for you to continue surrendering to the construction of this personality while it slowly crumbles and reorganizes itself at a higher frequency. You may have thought your personality was forged from steel but really it is paper thin. In order allow this construction to crumble, you must be effectively triggered as many times as it takes. You must fall asleep at the wheel and crash into the limitations of your previous states of mind and deeply rooted emotional traumas. With practice, the crashes will be less fear-inducing until you are so certain in your knowing that you take your hands off the wheel completely, realizing you were never the one driving in the first place.
As you surrender to the process of waking up, you recognize it was not you “doing” the waking up after all, but it was the universal intelligence that flows through you all along once the stickiness of your ego clears out and heals the thinking. The more you wake up, the more you surrender this process, allowing it to takes its natural course without the need to “do” anything. You realize that the ego’s form of “doing” never really accomplished what you truly wanted anyway. This is not to say your ego completely dissolves or dissipates, though it may for some, but you will begin to dance with your ego. Your ego will continue to exist with its challenged states of thinking while you move rapidly toward more permanent states of Light. The ego cannot hold tightly in states of pure light frequency, and rather than continue to do the ego’s bidding in finding answers to unsolvable problems, you simply move toward the light growing within you like a moth to a flame and this practice becomes the solution to all questions. All you must do is go toward the light. In meditation, in breath, in movement, and in all states, simply cultivate the highest light source frequency within you. Presence becomes more readily available and you will feel less and less need to defend or explain your arrival into it. Lower level questions will begin to bounce off of you, not requiring an explanation or defense. In fact, you may notice others begin to move toward the light along with you, and those that choose to resist your light may get triggered or fall away from you naturally, mired in their own shadows and limitation. However, you must practice releasing your own judgments of those who do not follow suit as they will remain your most important teachers - your most important medicine - until you release the remains of your own darkness clinging on for dear life, knowing its days are numbered.
Waking up is not easy nor is it hard, these judgments are illusions of the mind. Waking up simply flows to the true rhythms of the universe, not bound by the human mind’s illusory check points or time stamps. The difference in pacing may initially cause significant distress within your mind and the minds of others. Family and friends may not understand as they watch you let go of control and allow the car to drive itself, going where it needs to go, adventuring at its own speeds, sometimes racing across enormous landscapes and other times appearing to idle motionless on the freeway while other cars whiz by. Others, who will continue believing they are in control of their cars, may honk wildly at you until they realize your frequency refuses to engage with their ploys to bring you back in “control” of your car and your life - the reality being that the tighter you grasp at the wheel the further asleep you fall. Over time, your life will begin to match the rhythm of other sources of natural light, the rhythm of the trees and the flowers. As a result, life will become filled with more ease, grace, love, and gratitude than you could have ever dreamed of. While dreaming, states of grace exist only temporarily in time when circumstances align, yet in presence such states have a permanent quality or essence. Take your time, there is no need to rush. Wherever you are in the waking process, trust you are being shown all that needs to be seen in this moment. Take care of the body, be watchful of the mind, and move toward the light as you are called to. All is there for you. All is forgiven.