A Taste of the Other Shore

 The Consciousness of Aliveness

There may be many other universes, but this universe that we find ourselves in, this one is ours. Did you know that there are more stars in the sky than there are grains of sand on all the beaches of the world? So it’s very busy, this universe of ours. It’s very dynamic. But it is also absolutely still. That sounds like a contradiction to the mind, but it’s true. So those who have not found the silence and the stillness only know, can only know, half of the universe. The stillness is essential.

When the dynamic is known and the stillness not yet known, then of course one is in movement, as the universe is, but the movement that one is in, which of course is influenced by the universe, becomes its own captain. The individual dynamic of the life takes over control and steers the ship. And of course, when a ship is at sea, it is moving from the last position to the next position on its way to some destination, so the next movement has already been decided by the last movement, and so the future becomes just an extension of the past - a continuity. And then maybe we feel the ship is going in the wrong direction, towards the wrong destination, so we aim for another port. We turn the ship and go westwards instead of eastwards maybe, and then we continue on our new route, one day following the next.

But when you really find the stillness, then that situation can change rather radically. When you find the stillness, then you find a still point in yourself. That is the source of your life energy. And if you stay in touch with that, then each moment is expressed from the beginning - from the eternal beginning. Then, in a way, each moment is on its own; each moment is independent of the previous moment and the following moment.

Now, what determines the action or the movement of the life in that moment, that which determines it, which is your still point, is a personal point. And that personal point, if you like, has an intention. I don’t believe that it’s completely random. I don’t believe that if you go to that point, then anything can happen at any time. In a way, that is potentially so, but actually not, because that universal energy does intend something for all living beings. So there may seem to be a continuity between each instant’s expression of your life, but it won’t be the same feeling, and it won’t be the same movement, and it won’t have the same quality as the one that comes from merely following the trajectory of your life when you are not in touch with your source. And anyway, you will find that when you connect with that source, then simply living what comes from that source each moment is now primary, and the direction and goal that is normally primary is no longer primary.

Now, I am sure that many people actually connect with the source in the way I am speaking about, and I am sure that many of those people, if they were alone somewhere in the mountains or on a desert island without any real connections with society or families, could move towards living in that way moment by moment, each moment being fresh and unique. But the trouble comes because in moving the way we have moved all our lives, we have established a certain structure. We have a set-up: a family set-up, a friendship set-up, a business set-up, an entertainment set-up. All these set-ups we have. And the fear is that if one were to switch to living each moment as an original moment detached from the last moment, then the expression of that source might be extremely dangerous. We might find ourselves, through that, being thrown out of all that we are familiar with. If we hand ourselves over to a source which takes no notice whatsoever of our history, or our desires, or our wants, our intentions, our goals, then who knows where it might take us? And so this possibility is sacrificed, and we continue following the routines and the arrangements of our life up till now. The alternative seems to be too drastic, too radical.

But it’s my experience that it is possible to include both - to acknowledge the set-up that is there, and at the same time to be true to the originality of the source. It is as if… It is not really like this, but it is as if you connect with your source, you feel your source, you feel this instant bubbling up inside you, this unknown energy which is its own master and is not under your control, you feel that coming up and in a way you ask it to express itself within the set-up you have. You compromise. You bring the two together, or you allow the two to come together. You acknowledge the world that you’re in, you accept and acknowledge the world that you’re in, that includes you and which includes all those who are in it, and, in a way - I say ‘in a way’ because it’s not exactly how it happens - in a way it is as if you ask your source and the original energy that is moving through you to express itself, to flower, to explode even, to complete its movement, within the set-up that you have, and you find a way to make a balance.

If you don’t do that, if you find the source and then you say, “Right, from now on wherever my source wants to go I will follow it, whatever it wants to do I will do it,” then you will have a very revolutionary and unpredictable life, for sure. And some people have done that. The records of them are there to be consulted. But it’s a rare person who can do that, and also, I’m not sure that it’s necessary. By that I mean that you can live a fulfilled life without having to be so radical.

You see, one aspect of being in touch with your source in this way, not just as a thought or an idea but as an actual experience and reality, is that it doesn’t express itself continuously in action. If it did, then you would have to be making the kind of balance, or compromise, or coming together that I described all the time, and that is not the case. A lot of the time when you find your source, you find that it is perfectly content to just be, that there is no outer movement. There is a lot of activity within you as the energy moves in you, but it doesn’t have to come out of you towards the world or towards others in any way at all a lot of the time. And when it is still like that, when it is, in a way, contained… (pauses) Well, ‘contained’ is not really the right word, because ‘contained’ suggests that it is being contained, but it is not that it is being contained, it is just that it is self-contained. The energy is self-contained, and then it is just in you, and it is there, and it is not going anywhere, and yet at the same time you get the beauty and the satisfaction of feeling that you’re there at the very beginning of things.

Now, one of the most important concepts or realities in Buddhism, as I’m sure most of you know, is what is known as shunyata, which is invariably translated as ‘emptiness’. And this concept can be very bewildering to Western people, because it is saying that nothing is there, and if nothing is there, then you’re not there, and then to hell with the whole thing, really. But what I have come to believe emptiness means is the state of being you’re in before you make anything, before anything is made, before anything is manifested. It is just a presence of energy, and that is emptiness, because it has no form in it. And when you come home within to the source, and rest in that stillness and silence, and are with that source energy, and that energy is not in these moments wanting you to do anything or wanting to move through you into action, then you are, in a way, in emptiness. But it’s a tremendously dynamic place.

In that place, the stillness and the dynamism of the universe are together without any difficulty at all. And that feeling of aliveness that comes is so beautiful that you have no desire to do anything or involve yourself with anything, you are content to be with the energy when it is expressing itself in this still and silent way. And then it starts to move through you into action, and that is perfectly beautiful too, but when it does that, it’s easy to then get carried away by the expression, and then you’ve lost half the universe - you’ve lost the stillness again. But if you stay with it, then to all appearances you are moving as everybody else is, in a continuous process, whether you’re talking, or going for a walk, or giving a lecture, whether you’re at work or with your family, and the whole feeling is that it is a movement, there is a process going on, but inside it is not like that.

Inside, each moment is all there is. And each moment is all there is when it is. It is not part of time. It is not moving from two minutes past nine to three minutes past nine - it is independent of that movement. Each moment is, in a way, a timeless moment. And if you find that moment, then you find the eternal moment, because each moment is the same.

At the source, each moment is the same. On the periphery where the expression is, each moment is different, but at the centre, each moment is the same. And there is no preference, there are no degrees, there are no hierarchies; there is no hierarchy of pleasure or success. All sorts of hierarchies exist out in the world, but at the centre, each moment, as energy for each moment comes, they are all equal. Beneath the tears and the sadness, and the joy and the laughter and the love, there is the same point.

Now, the energy of this being at the source is very strong, it is very resonant, and it’s very contagious. So look for the source these days you are with me. Don’t merely be with the effect on you of the energy that comes through me, and say, “Aha, this has been good,” or, “This is this.” Not only that, not only get a sense of your energy giving you maybe new experiences, or experiences you’ve known before again, but get a feeling of looking for that place where you are always at the beginning. And when you find that sense of being at your beginning, then it feels like the same beginning as whenever life began. It doesn’t just feel like the beginning of this instant, it feels like the beginning: the beginning of what you are, whenever that was. And not just the beginning of what you are, but the beginning of consciousness; the beginning of consciousness of something - the consciousness of aliveness.

Talk given during the Winter Festival in Pettenasco, Italy, 28.12 2004.