Proof of Heaven

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There are many fascinating stories arising on the front lines of the awakening process, but Eban Alexander’s has to be one of the wilder ones. Great book! Terrifying to the rationalists!

Eban is a neurosurgeon. He earned his   M.D. at Duke University in 1980, continued his residency there as well as at Mass General Hospital and Harvard, went on to explore neuroendocrinology and cerebrovascular surgery and spent fifteen years on the faculty of Harvard Medical school as an associate professor of surgery with a specialization in neurosurgery. As a practicing surgeon, he operated on countless patients, many with serious brain injuries and aliments. He is a scientist par excellence. ” I adored that simplicity-the absolute honesty and cleanness of science. I respected that it left no room for fantasy or for sloppy thinking. If a fact could be established as tangible and trustworthy, it was acceptted. If not, then it was rejected.”

And, in November of 2008, he  suddenly came down with a rare brain illness.

If you are familiar with Jill Bolte Taylor’s “My Stroke of Insight” you might guess where this is going. But Eben’s story is even more mind-boggling. He developed a case of bacterial meningitis and was in a coma for seven days. His neocortex shut down totally. His attending physicians eventually told the family that he was never coming back, there had been too much trauma from the infection, which did not seem to respond to the various anti-biotics the medical team administered. But he did eventually awaken, rather suddenly, from the coma. And the story he returned with was shattering; shattering at least to his ‘sceptical-logical’ scientific mind.

In his out-of body travels he discovers the ‘underworld’, the ‘gate way’ and the ‘core’ and the absolute impossibility to describe his experiences in words or relate them to our earth bound ‘ordinary’ reality. “I know my biology, and while I am not a physicist, I’m no slouch at that, either. I know the difference between fantasy and reality, and I know that the experiences I am struggling to give you the vaguest, most completely unsatisfactory of, was the single most real experience of my life.”

“To say that there is still a chasm between our current scientific understanding of the universe and the truth as I saw it is a considerable understatement.” And, “perhaps the best way of conveying that part of that experience is to say I had a foretaste of another, larger kind of knowledge: one I believe human beings will be able to access in ever larger numbers in the future.”

“I saw the abundance of life throughout the countless universes, including some whose intelligence was advanced far beyond humanity. I saw that there are countless higher dimensions, but the only way to know these dimensions is to enter and experience them directly.”

Finally, “It is my belief that we are now facing a crucial time in our existence. We need to recover more of that larger knowledge while living here on earth, while our brains (including its left-side analytical parts) are fully functioning. Science—the science to which I’ve devoted so much of my life—doesn’t contradict what I learned up there. But far too many people believe, because certain members of the scientific community, who are pledged to the materialistic world view, have insisted again and again that science and spirituality cannot coexist.

They are mistaken…. The unconditional love and acceptance that I experienced on my journey is the single most important discovery I have ever made, or will ever make, and as hard as I know it’s going to be to unpack the other lessons I learned while there, I also know in my heart that sharing this basic message—-one so simple that most children readily accept it—is the most important task I have.”

Cranial Sacral Rhythms

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I love trinities. The process of cosmic emergence also seems to love threes. So, as we deepen our enquiries into the energetic realms of aliveness, we can add the cranial sacral cycles to the heartbeat and respiratory rhythm to create an energetic trinity of waves and pulses. I was first attuned to this possibility long ago (1979)  by Itzak Bentov and his pioneering book “Stalkiing the Wild Pendulum when he described the meditative state manifesting standing waves in the aorta, rhythm-entraining the cerebro-spinal fluid, when the breath was still. (To feel this however has proven to be rather elusive.)  Bentov’s next book, ‘A Cosmic Book”, published posthumously, took his explorations way out into the cosmic realms, but I did not yet see the connection to the csf. (Nor did I discover the magnificent sphenoid bone, or the spheno-basilar junction, the fulcrum of the cranial movements.)

The possibilities were further elaborated when B.K.S. Iyengar, is a rare moment of inner disclosure, described how he would monitor his poses by the height and temperature of the cerebro-spinal fluid in the spinal canal. (This might have been during the celebrations and classes for his 70th birthday in 1988.) Again, sensitivities still were behind the conception. It sounded great, but there was still a lot of noise in the system. Some energies I could feel, but not the csf!

A big breakthrough came about 5 years ago when I discovered Charles Ridley’s “Stillness: Biodynamic Cranial Sacral Practice and the Evolution of Consciousness. His bibliography included all of my favorite authors from both science and spirituality and it was like finding a spiritual dharma brother with info on this mysterious realm that has fascinated me for years. His approach is both hands on ad non-dual! Wow! I’ll cover his work in more detail in later posts and articles.

Most recently I am blessed to be the recipient of cranial sacral work from both my friend Caryn McHose, who needs hours for her cranial sacral training, and Pat Cunningham, an amazingly sensitive healer here in Arlington who uses cranial sacral work along with other modalities. The cosmic links are opening up as the causal body and the causal fields directly affect the cranial sacral energies.

From Caryn I discovered Franklyn Sills, founder of “Polarity” and ‘Cranial Sacral Biodynamics. (Just like the yoga scene, the cranial sacral world is full of leaders, followers and politics!) Franklyn, and Roger Gilchrist in Cranial Sacral Therapy and the Energetic Body”, offer even more perspectives and points of view of the energetic nature of aliveness, healing, trauma and awakening. In the coming months I am hoping more clarity will come and I will be adding a new section to the resources menu on this work. I have my new skull. Happy New Year!

More clarity from Adyashanti

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It is always amazing to see a brilliant teacher continue to refine the teaching. I find Adyashanti to be simple, clear and profound and last month a new book by Adya appeared in our mailbox, a divine Christmas present, a solstice surprise. Less than 50 pages long, ‘The Way of Liberation’ is his ‘practical guide to spiritual enlightenment’. I’d love to reprint the whole thing here, but I’ll let you track down the book at (www.opengatesangha.org). I will include what he calls the three core practices and some of his observations regarding them. (Italics are straight from the book.)

‘Think of spiritual practice as a sort of ‘applied folly’. “Core practices are something you need to get the feel of, somewhat like getting the feel of balance when learning to ride a bicycle.” ” You should not apply the core practices too willfully, or with a great amount of struggle.” “…just remember the element of grace is all-important and ever present. And it is always darkest just before dawn.”

The core practices are meditation, enquiry and contemplation. “Meditation is the art of allowing everything to simply be, in the deepest possible way. In order to let everything be, we must let go of the effort to control and manipulate our experience – which means letting go of personal will.” ” The silence and stillness of meditation is the bedrock upon which this teaching rests.” “True meditation is effortless stillness, abidance as primordial being.”

“Inquiry is a way of addressing the deepest existential issues confronting every human being. Who or what am I? What is life? What happens after death? …Or simply, Do I know with absolute certainty that this current thought, belief, opinion, interpretation or judgment is true? ” The realization of Truth and Reality can never be created by the mind; it always comes as a gift of grace. Inquiry clears away mis-perceptions and illusions, making one available to the movements of grace.” “Question everything! Leave no stone unturned, no assumption unexamined, no form of denial left intact.”

“Contemplation is the art of holding a word or phrase patiently in the silence and stillness of awareness until it begins to disclose deeper and deeper meanings and understandings. In the Zen tradition, phrases, questions or short teaching stories called koans are used as objects of contemplation…”

Some phrases for contemplation:
“Suffering is how Life tells you
that you are resisting or mis-perceiving
what is real and true.”

“There is only being living itself
through you, as you, and as all that exists.”

“The infinite is pure formless potential
prior to being and non-being, life and death,
form and formlessness.”