“Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment ” - Buddha
“The miracle is not to walk on water. The miracle is to walk on the green earth, dwelling deeply in the present moment and feeling truly alive.” - Thich Nhat Hanh
“Life is Now. There was never a time when your life was not now, nor will there ever be” - Eckhart Tolle
“Before Abraham was, I Am.”- Jesus (John 8:58)
You cannot really argue with that line-up can you! It is like a who is who of spiritual awakening history.
The phrase ‘I Am’ has been one of the most controversial in history. Jesus repeats it several times in the Bible including the mind bending statement “Before Abraham was, I AM”. It is also mentioned directly and indirectly through the work of Eckhart Tolle which I have gained huge wisdom from.
All spiritual seekers and religion founders speak of the same one truth and its spiritual awakening. It is the same truth just expressed by different voices. It is similar to hearing about a football match from fans of opposing teams. Each have their own interpretation but ultimately they all saw the same game. The phrase “I am” means a breaking apart from the dimension of time. When you are in time you are subject to suffering, illness, dis-ease and on the positive side you can plan for the future and learn from the past. When you are in presence in the state of “I am” or “being” you cannot experience illness. Illness requires time. Jesus experienced timelessness and knew, as Zen Masters do today, that the mind cannot comprehend it so bypassed the mind. A great teacher will always tailor his teachings to the student.
“I am” is the state of a mind before it judges something which is the ultimate spiritual state – empty of preconceived notions. You are a human BEING remember, BEING right now. “I am X” means that something is not x which must be so it can be compared too. This is the first phrase which splits the world into two and takes away oneness. When something is described, there must be an opposite to compare it to or it could not be. This is why Lao Tzu says “Difficult and easy complement each other. Long and short define each other. High and low oppose each other.” I am is totally barren of judging. I am X brings multiplicity into the world.
When Jesus uttered the mysterious and profound phrase “Before Abraham was, I AM”, he knew that people would try and understand mentally in the dimension of time what this means but there would be no answer. How could you be in this moment, before something that has already happened? In this way it is similar to a Zen poem which has the aim to awaken you because there is no logical explanation. For example, when your foot touches the ground it is the foot feeling the foot. That one was a huge awakening for me.
It does not mean that he is God as common interpretations will have you believe. Jesus was a man like us all. He had emotional times like in the garden of Gethsemane, got angry at the people selling things in the church etc. These common interpretations come from trying to logically interpret what Jesus meant when the truth is actually ridiculously simple and you will only find it when you stop looking. Jesus is consciousness, perfectly awoken. And since he “Is” that means that he is now. Jesus understood that the spirit can never die but the form, or what he calls “being of this world” can die and shift form whenever it wants to. His form died but his spirit is here.
You are essentially presence. Whenever you are not presence, you are mind. When you are in your mind you are in the past and future so the present gets put on autopilot. The only place of possible change in your life is put on autopilot.
I remember starting to search for deep truth around 14-16 years old. I read books of people like Marcus Aurelius and time management and whilst they were good they felt somewhat skin deep and superficial and I had yet to find anything truly deep.
One day during my university life I was in a book store and saw the book “The Power of Now” on a bookshelf and bought it impulsively without ever having heard of the author or book previously (scarily similar to what happened to someone that I know). After reading it for a while I realised the deep truth in it and experienced alignment with the now for the first time.
It was incredible, everything was fresh and I was aligned with it all, a huge spiritual awakening. I knew that everything was good in the universe and that nothing external could beat this knowing that all was good mixed with deep joy. I remember taking a job after that shuffling files and at dinner times I would walk around the local streets finding trees and plants and having experiences like Moses with the burning bush. You can sense their aliveness by sensing them for the first time not through labels. When you look at something without a label and are totally focused on it, you sense your inner connection and can harm nothing as you know it as yourself.
Since that day I have read the book, I pretty much every week at least once. That was years ago too as I am now 20. It has bought a dimension of depth into my life through its spiritual awakening that I never had before and I see around me many are still blind too.
It taught me that this moment TRULY is the only moment there ever has been or ever will be. Consider this. Have you ever experienced something that did not happen in this moment? Of course not. Jesus WAS before Abraham, he WAS in a physical body and he is now. Or you could say Jesus is before Abraham, Jesus is the leader of Christianity and Jesus is now. Feel free to replace Jesus with any name/label.
I cannot tell you how fulfilling it is to know the deepest truth for yourself. You have to experience it (in this moment I may add). It is so fulfilling to know that every spiritual path leads to the same truth and there is ways for humans to find this as I did.
“I am” is the deepest spiritual awakening truth there is. An idea is to sit in meditation and say as a mental mantra “I am”. Try it a few hundred times 2 times a day for a week and it will give you a spiritual awakening.It might not happen during the mantras it usually happens as you go about your daily business and the statement is allowed to seep into your deeper consciousness.
For January 2010 one of the monthly goals that I set myself was to meditate for 30 minutes each evening. Bearing in mind that I’d meditated only a few times before this in terms of sitting down cross-legged. I was unsure initially and did not expect much results wise.
My meditation practice was the one that I described in Awareness Meditation previously. I basically concentrate on the stillness of the mind and the inner body, whichever appears to my awareness and if something comes over it like a thought or bodily sensation I watch for myself identifying with it and return to the silent source. It’s a great practice inspired by Eckhart Tolle and one I recommend wholeheartedly.
I was astounded at the benefits and side effects. I noticed things like:
A Jump In Awareness – If you want to do this you must be prepared for a rapid and noticeable change in your views on life. Issues that you have that you have barely been aware of or have not been aware of recently will stare you in the face daily.
A Deep Knowing That All Is Good - You know that something may not go right for you one day but even if it does then it’s OK. Things are things and are susceptible to change. You can work on it tomorrow. This is the basic teachings of the founders of all religions. All is good in the universe.
You Care Less About Your Public Image – I used to get anxious going out shopping or using my authority over my own life. I found myself taking less consideration of what others thought about my actions and appearance. I didn’t wear scruffy clothes or anything.
Unexplainable Experiences – During meditation if you stick at it you will experience altered states of being that feel absolutely fantastic, peaceful and abundant. You will also find that it is near impossible to describe to someone how it feels. It is literally beyond words. Many times in deep inner body meditation I lost the boundary of where my physical body started and began and my consciousness expanded literally beyond my physical form. Imagine trying to verbalize that?
Once I remember sitting at my kitchen table and starting an impromptu meditation session alone which turned into a long one of something like 45 minutes (I wasn’t counting). I experienced pure ecstasy. It was amazing. It’s like the greatest experience of your life that you can think of right now and have that ecstasy dial turned up 1000 times. It was the source of ecstasy I found and tied to no particular event. It was too strong for me and jolted me out of my meditative state. I’ll never forget it though and plan on reaching it regularly.
You Lose Sense Of Time (It’s A Good Thing!) – Time is something that is totally in the mind and in deep meditative states you come to the realization of this. When you are totally focused on the silence within and in the moment time has no place in your reality. Hours can go by in what feels like minutes.
Awareness of Eating Habits – I stopped binge eating junk food. I noticed 7 days into the trial that after meditating you feel an empty kind of inner peace. When I have found that in the past I have eaten to compensate unconsciously to “refill” myself again as my ego needs fullness that it perceives is lacking. It’s a habit I have just bought awareness too and it shows that even skinny guys/girls can comfort eat. It’s a psychological disorder not a physical one.
Awareness Of Drinking Habits – The last time I drank alcohol was New Years Eve 2009-2010. Got pretty drunk actually. I started the meditation ritual New Years Day. I notice that the habit has been burned into my mind and body that when I walk into a bar I HAVE to buy a drink and it has to be alcohol. I get a lot of stick from people who know me as a guy who drinks but it feels even better to know that I’m sticking to my principles through the criticism. I know they’ll respect me for that even if they don’t say it.
Awareness Of Deeper Issues - This is something that I really struggled with. Most people think that meditation will just solve their external problems. I found that it just brings them to your awareness when they were not so obvious before. You suddenly find yourself shifting away from views and paradigms that have controlled you for your entire life and it is unsettling but stick with it. You are unveiling all the mental emotional baggage that needs to come to your attention for you to improve your life.
Heightened Senses – One thing that I have found that improved dramatically by a huge amount of my senses. Especially me smell and taste. Eating after meditation is pure bliss. The foods taste explodes into your mouth feeling like it hits every single taste receptor on your tongue in increasing crescendos. I cannot give you examples per say but you notice it within yourself and the improvement is huge.
You Can See Others Suffering- You can see their suffering against woes that are all scenarios created in their own mind that have no reality basis. Sleeping people walk around with a state of frozen terror on their faces because they are rehearsing the worse case scenario all the time. They have no foothold in the present moment. It’s like I have said before this is really quite scary and can make you feel like they are robotic when that glazed over look comes to their eyes.
Other Things of Note
I found my eyes regularly opening in some meditations towards the end. It was like I was forcing them closed when they were attempting to stay open. I would go into a meditation tired and raise my consciousness and alertness to find my eyes opening alertly.
Meditating before bed helped me. If you can stay alert enough then you can improve the quality of your sleep as you connect with source through meditation and awake mentally and physically refreshed and recharged. I remember once waking from a sleep and just knowing I had gone so deep and touched my source. I awoke as alert as if I was going about my everyday life. No grogginess.
Don’t meditate when super tired. I once or twice made the mistake of meditating (at 11pm) after going out with friends and I fell to sleep a couple of times during it. It’s just not the same quality if you are really tired.
By the 20th day I found myself completely comfortable meditating for 30 minutes and just returning to my source. It turned from a chore into something that I just enjoyed doing. It was difficult to make sure that I did it on time daily but these are teething problems and will be cleaned up.
Areas I Will Improve On
I need to improve my posture. During meditation my back would arch as I have always had bad posture being a tall skinny guy. I need to improve this. One technique that is doing well for me is to ignore all of the “shoulders back, chest out” stuff and just feel as if there is a string attached to your crown on your head lightly tugging up. Let everything else below that relax.
A regular place. I meditated often on my bed, sometimes on my chair in the kitchen and sometimes on the sofa. Having a regular place helps cement the habit and just makes things easier.
Conclusion & Recommendations
These 30 days have felt like a year Sometimes in meditation I’d go so deep into the timeless realm within that I’d open my eyes after feeling hours had passed and it would be a few minutes.
Overall I am really proud of myself. I’ve never done anything as consistently as this and am going to continue with 30 minutes of evening meditation. I expect to add 30 minutes of morning meditation too one day in a natural location but I am happy that there is enough to still learn at this level and slowly but surely wins the race.
This is the first stop and basis for personal development. If you or anyone else knows someone who is getting into personal development then meditation is where it all begins. Success really is an inner game.
I would recommend that if you want to start meditating daily then start with 15-30 minutes daily if you are a total beginner using my Awareness Meditation technique or another if your intuition pulls you towards is. At the start your mind will be hectic and will pull you away with its excuses and nagging voices but just watch that little voice and you will eventually find the calm you are searching for and within one month too.
Start small and commit for just the next 30 days. A calendar month makes this much easier. If you do not like it after a month then you do not have to continue but you may also be leaving something amazing on the table if you do not try it out. It is really difficult at the start to concentrate for longer periods of time. I would recommend that you set aside an EXACT time each day to meditate in the exact same place.
