You can't witness The Witness, but you can get a sense of your deeper self by dis-identifying with the things it observes.

We can think of The Witness as or our ever-present sense of self – our very beingness, suchness, or unqualified consciousness; the constant awareness that “I am”, whatever else may be happening. The Witness is just a term, though, just a word.  Some people also call it The Watcher…  Some people in Quantum Physics call it The Observer.  Different spiritual or self-awareness traditions may also call it different things.  That sense of “I am” might be aware of different things in different moments, but whilst what it experiences, and how, may change, the underlying sense of existence or “I am” is always there.

The saying goes that ‘the only constant in life is change’, but this awareness or suchness is also a constant.  So we have two things.  And actually, these two can be equated to what I like to think of as definitions of Absolute Truth and Relative Truth; Absolute Truth as this constant presence of pure consciousness or being-ness, and Relative Truth as the ever-changing world around us; the come and go of events, people, conversations, factors, environments, mood, emotions, thoughts, beliefs, and so on. The latter is what we readily refer to or mean by our concept that ‘the only constant is change’. Some people also like to call this ever-changing quality of life as ‘the dance of finite things’, a phrase I, too, like.  And ultimately, we can re-integrate both elements of ourselves, to function effectively, and freely.

I was interested to note in his emailed writing this week, that Peter Ragnar also referred to this only constant as change, yet was also aware of the second constant, by his own name for it, as demonstrated when he wrote…

“I’ve concluded that most people would rather rust or rot than change. Yet few realize that in life, there’s nothing permanent except change. We’re either growing or dying; nothing ever stands still except the still center within us all. Finding that still point allows you to see change as a necessary step of growth.”

What we call The Witness, and what I’ve also known Peter Ragnar to call ‘The Watcher’, he is here referring to an aspect of this as the ’still center’ within us all. This, again, is the essence of wisdom and of wisdom coaching; the awareness that we are not ultimately subjectively the things that dance around us in our awareness; our thoughts, our feelings, our statuses and associations. They can and may come and go as they like – and do. I like the use of different names for this same, ever-present phenomen as I suspect it helps us to get a sense of something that is, by it’s very nature, impossible to pin down.

“You can’t witness The Witness, otherwise what part of you would be witnessing that?!”

So we can now think of life with the mindset that there are two things which are constant; the change that we are by now so familiar with – and we can see how well we can get in touch with what is our own constant essence before any qualifiable content is poured into it. It can’t be witnesssed. You can’t ‘witness The Witness’, because as soon as you say “Ah-hah, that’s it!”, you’re now talking about a relative thing, an object. But we can get a sense of it, and allow that sense to provide us with a ’still center’ of strength to operate ourselves by.

“You kind of have two Selves; an Empirical Self, and a Transcendental Self.”- Ken Wilber

Developing this sense of self that is ultimately dis-identified from final subjective identification with these relative, finite things is the development of wisdom.  They are things we experience, but ultimately not what we are.  The key is not to identify exclusively with this Finite or Empirical Self.

Best wishes ’til next time.

James Blacker

Peter Ragnar – The Watcher

Related Pages

• Ego and The Authentic Self (includes Video of Ken Wilber talking about The Witness)
• Newsletter: Only Two Things in Life Are Constant

Unconditional love. Attachment and fondness or affection are different things entirely.

Have you noticed how love starts as a blossoming flower, fully expressive, radiant and open, and often moves away from that, as expectations replace invitations, creativity dissolves into habit, and fear of loss replaces desire?

Attachment, and Conditional Love, which is really Neediness or fear by a more generous name, are pretty much the same thing, or at least the one causes the other.  In relationship, also, the extent to which we have the one, we exhibit the other.  This is not roughly, this is EXACTLY.  There cannot be any dissociation between the two.  They are totally associated…

Maybe we don’t outwardly express that conditional quality, but if there is Attachment then the Conditional Love is there, internally, working away on ourselves at the very least, gnawing, jarring, and this will also influence how we conduct and approach our relationships – and how we feel about them.

I have recently been discussing how Attachment is a different thing to both fondness, and commitment.  This is an important distinction to make, because we don’t want to become aloof in interpersonal relations as a result of thinking we’re being ’spiritual’ by being cold or withdrawn, because apart from anything else, if we deny these qualities of fondness and desire and commitment, that in itself becomes Resistance – another form of Attachment.

Attachment, and its opposite, Resistance, is any belief or thought process in which we put our sense of self outside of our already liberated nature, and in things.  These things may be people, possessions, protocols, rules or habits, associations, statuses, thoughts, beliefs, our body, or any other things.  To enjoy them may be healthy.  To directly attach to and identify one’s ultimate sense of self with them leads to self-constriction…  and fear.

And with that fear comes self-condition and Conditional Love outwards to others, and in relationships this can be a killer.

So if we can recognise Attachment and Resistance in ourselves in relationship, and we release them and let them go, we shall become naturally and effortlessly unconditional lovers.

Best wishes as always,

James

Related Pages

• Love

So if you fancy a little exercise to get you more in touch with the deepest, most grounded you, your Authentic Self, you might like to say the following along with me, either out loud, under your breath or in your head.

“I have thoughts, but I am not my thoughts.”

“I have emotions, but I am not my emotions.”

“I have desires, but I am not my desires.”

“I have a body, but I am not my body.”

And would you like one more for a variation on that theme?  This one from Deepak Chopra;

“I am not the body, the body is in me.”

“I am not even the mind, the mind is in me.”

As a daily practice mantra, this may really help you to build up steam in your own transformation.

And just to be sure, spiritual practice is for spiritual practice and NOT for Shadow practice.  BOTH have their place.  Don’t mistake denying any shadow elements you may have for transcending them.

So you won’t get at your Shadow by dis-identifying with all things - and you don’t want to deny it either, in the mistaken belief that this practice above implies that it isn’t there.

On the basis that we have a Shadow, we could say;

“I have a Shadow, but I am not my Shadow.”

But today’s blog is all about the Spiritual practice wisdom mantra at the top, above.  So let’s do that.

Best wishes,

James

Related Pages

• Ego and The Authentic Self
• The Shadow Website Area

Strength

“Tell a person they are brave and you help them become so.” – Thomas Carlyle

Persistence

“It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s just that I stay with problems longer.” – Albert Einstein

Stability

“Let us never confuse stability with stagnation.” – Mary Jean LeTendre

The one slight caveat I have with the strength one is that if we think we need to tell people they’re strong in order to believe that we’re strong ourselves, we’re kind of suggesting to ourselves that we’re not already strong or brave, which I’m concerned might reinforce the belief.  But other than that I think there’s still a good message in the strength quote and I do it all the time anyway and I know it automatically has a positive rub-off effect back on me, so worth developing as a habit, I say.

And I’m also reminded of the Tony Robbins definition of Persistence, which is always worth another hearing…

“PERSISTENCE: The willingness to keep seeing that even though nothing has worked up until now, the next thing can.”

Happy New Year!

James

Someone has placed a comment on the YouTube site under John’s video clip on Charisma, which explains the act of uncovering one’s natural charismatic self, asking if there is any way you can speed that process up?

Yes, you can. 

I’ll embed the video in question here, but here below that is the answer to the question which I’ve also posted back as a comment reply;

This kind of inner achievement is known as Transformation – we could say from an Ego-nagging mind to a naturally expressing one (Authentic Self).

There’s also what we call Translation – uncovering what we call The Shadow – the bits of our True Personality we suppress – often when we’re young.

Working on all this is known as Transformative Practice – primarily Meditation – which is the only thing proven to date to help people transform (overcome the nagging Ego mind).

Speeding up Transformation. Integral Life Practice was pioneered to give you 'the most bang for your buck'.

…that’s not to say that other things can’t, but that as yet they haven’t been demonstrated to get people up what we call ‘Vertical Stages’ – the ability to take deeper perspectives on one’s own self, and on life.

But to make this as quick as possible, pioneers have designed INTEGRAL Transformative Practice, and now Integral Life Practice, with Mind, Shadow and Body exercises put next to the Spirit (mostly Meditation) element.

Our own colleague, Gary Hawke, also runs the London Group for this Integral Life Practice.

So as this Transformation and Translation is the cornerstone of everything, this is why we’re considerably focussed on developing support areas for this;

http://wholelifewholeworld.com/practice/

AND if you live in London, you can even come along and join us in person…

http://ilp-london.wholelifewholeworld.com/

Regards,

James Blacker

We are in the process of developing a series of support areas for an Integral Life Practice, the first of which, Body, is already live and underway.

If you want to get straight into it as quickly as possible, we recommend the book, ‘Integral Life Practice’.

Related Pages

• John Christian Seminars

Related Links

• ‘Integral Life Practice’, The Book

You can click here to go to the page if you wish.

I will put up a further blog when any of the other pages of that new section, and a planned, further advanced section of wisdom-based coaching principles, are added.

Best wishes,

James

In fact, if you’re interested in transformation and any kind of personal Practice, I’d say watching this video is a very good exercise in itself, perhaps both in a ‘Spirit Module’ sense, and in a ‘Mind Module’ sense.

If truth and authenticity and reality are more important to you than avoiding aloneness, or its feeling, you probably won’t mind or resist too much to the video below.

And just to remember and make the point also, as I explain in Wisdom The Course, aloneness and loneliness are two entirely different things.

Related Pages

• Wisdom The Course: Module 4. Adulteration: The Loss of Inner Sense and The Shadow (including Loneliness and Aloneness)

When I realised also that my emotions often changed with the same kind of frequency, from dull to bright and back again, I realised also that in addition to any exercises I may do to embrace my emotion and get to the bottom of it to find it’s ‘gifts’, I didn’t either need to see the emotions as any kind of permanent negatives in themselves.  Uninspired moments pass.

This is an exercise in observing - seeing the come and go of emotions as passing things.

With the awareness that I had developed of how my – and perhaps everybody’s – emotions come and go, I was able to get into the habit of thinking to myself, “Ok, so I know I’m not feeling too hot now, but because I know how my emotions work I know that in the next chunk of life that arises I will be inspired again, so there’s no permanent bother really because the mood will pass”.

And that’s not to deny the ability that we each have to control, choose, heal or deal with our turbulent emotions, either.  It’s an extra element or string to your bow.  I do indeed assert that we can be the masters of ALL of our emotions, and that we are the manufacturers of them.  Rather, this understanding is a complement to it.  What this is about is an exercise in observing, seeing the come and go of emotions as passing things – things that are not really what we are, but things that we are aware of.  Our Authentic Self is not dependent upon them.

So that’s something to become or practice becoming aware of; the simple coming and going of emotions, arising and falling…  We can observe them as objects, not ultimately what we are at our core, but passing like the weather.

Best wishes and happy and successful emotion mastering!

James Blacker

Related Pages

• Wisdom The Course: Emotional Mastery: Wisdom Opens The Door

The Summer has gone, and for some that can be a big loss.  But unless you intend to chase the sun round the world – a valid option in itself - then learning to live in the moment by enjoying all four of the seasons starts with recognising that we can live more consciously in the current moment by looking for whatever beauty and opportunities are there, and what better way to begin than with the season that is on our doorstep right now.

We hear a lot about living in the moment for personal fulfillment, and it’s a valid point.  Actually, we always do live in the moment – we cannot not.  What we’re talking about when we use this phrase is being conscious to enjoy and be fully consciously present within the moment we’re in, rather than waiting on possible future moments.  And we cannot do that if we are pining for the Summer.

Changing seasons bring opportunities for different things. What do you like most about the Autumn, Winter or Spring?

There was once a professional rugby player called David Campese – unofficially the sport’s first millionaire – who didn’t see the Summer for ten years.  He would follow up a Winter’s season playing in Australia with a Winter’s season playing in Italy.  Not my advice if you really do love the Summer that much that you can’t be without it, and if that’s true then why not try to find some way to do the reverse of what Campese did, living only the Summers…  But you can bet he could only have achieved his success by living and being fully present in each moment.  We talk a lot about living in the moment in our coaching and teaching discussions, about what it means and what it doesn’t mean.

Here’s my colleague, David Heard, and I discussing living in the moment.

• Strength for Life: Living in the Moment

One of the best ways to enjoy the changes of temperature throughout the seasons is to start by building good health and vitality and a healthy diet.  A healthy person copes much more easily with extremes of temperature of both heat and cold, and so developing this is the first thing I sought to do in aiming to enjoy the four seasons as much as I can.  I realised three or four years ago that I wasn’t living in the moment in the colder months for the sake of wishing it was the Summer, and so that had to change.  It’s actually this improved awareness, and the improved quality of life that went with it, that has motivated me to write this article, to share the idea and the thinking, in the hope that you might also see something you want to do differently or think differently, feel differently, for the better.

I’ll leave you with this rather great speech by Eckhart Tolle.

Best wishes,

James

The Art of Presence by Eckhart Tolle

Some quotes from this video;

“Some Egos love to be personally offended when these things happen.” – Eckhart Tolle

…and a great one of relevance to our theme for today;

“…the weather should be warm by now…” !

If people allow themselves to cry if they feel like it this is a strength, rather than a weakness.

It would be anecdotal, and is certainly speculative on my part, but I would guess that the prevalence of diseases such as cancer is slightly higher among those who don’t allow themselves to cry when they feel the need to do so, compared to those who do. Cancer and what else? Depression? Heart disease? Relationship difficulties or breakdown? Entropy?

We have developed a society which isn’t really comfortable with the idea of people – adults – crying, and particularly men.

I don’t believe in crying for the sake of it, or puttng it on, and certainly believe in the development of emotional strength into adulthood which can genuinely dispel the need to cry on many occassions. However, the intellectual thought that one must not allow oneself to do so is a negative, limiting belief, indeed, and one which may cause much damage until we renounce it, individually and socially.

At a spiritual group I once belonged to I had the mickey taken by the group leader, albeit quite gently, for crying. He later apologised, stating his own belief that it was right to express emotion, and how his ridiculing had really gone against what he truly believed, that to hold in tears is akin to a cloud holding in rain, and therefore not to be endorsed in any life affirming circles or groups.

…I already knew that allowing myself to cry if I felt like it was a strength, rather than a weakness.

Of course, this specific area of crying is a sub-set of the more wider area of freedom for authentic self-expression generally. Moreover, not crying does not neccessarily equate to not needing to…

There is a difference between not needing to cry and not admitting to the occassional need. Those who never cry don’t neccessarily never feel it arising in them. Many have been conditioned to keep it inside. Unless someone tells us how they feel, how will we ever really know? But more importantly, what damage are they doing to themselves by denying the expression of their very truth and beinghood?

How many times do we say it; the Mind – great servant, lousy master.

And I believe also that freedom to cry leads to the greater inner strength which makes upset less likely, bearing most of the comings and goings of life against the backdrop of personal inner peace, which is gained from knowing who you are and an unshakeable commitment to being true to self.

Just as the mucus that comes from poor diet is better off in one’s handkerchief than in one’s lungs, the notion of better out than in for our tears also follows the wisdom principle of operating from the inside, out. We are guided from within as to what is right for us, and so when we have faith in this we can easily override the mental limitations of social conditioning as and when they arise in our internal dialogue and intellectual thoughts. That is why it was possible for me to know already that the freedom to cry is a strength.

Crying itself is the practice – the action. As such it is inherently neither right or wrong. That is dependent upon our intentions and motives. The principle is the important part in all this. And that principle is the freedom to cry, if we find we wish to or need to.

James Blacker