Conscious aging

Shushann is planning to create spiritual workshops and groups around helping people to age consciously and gracefully. Getting older has been on my mind a lot of late, so I offered to help her explore the subject. I compiled a document providing a framework and quotes.

Life is a Movie. Life is a Dream

I shared the link to the distilled summary of the book I'm writing (Life is Movie. Life is a Dream) to Notebook LM and it created a wonderful podcast using the power of AI.  It's really inspired me to focus on the book and get it written.

Listen to the Podcast here

Distilled Summary

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The Ultimate Experience

 

I Am

I am unremitting joy. I am utter despair.

I am languid peace. I am chaotic turmoil.

I am abundant generosity. I am insatiable greed.

I am adoring love. I am heartless indifference.

I am pure innocence. I am vulgar sleaze.

I am cocksure swagger. I am fearful doubt.

I am a shy smile.  I am a vicious snarl.

I am a soaring symphony. I am a fearful din.

I am a scurrying ant.  I am a motionless sloth.

I am a soaring eagle.  I am a crawling worm.

I am a gargantuan tree.  I am a tiny flower.

I am an omnipotent king.  I am a cowering subject.

I am an athletic champion.  I am a lazy slob.

I am a holy saint.  I am an atrocious tyrant.

I am an impenetrable jungle.  I am a withered land.

I am a  mountain peak.  I am a gaping abyss.

I am a blazing sun.  I am a planet of ice.

I am an endless galaxy.  I am a grain of sand.

I am a radiant light.  I am the darkest night.

I am this.  I am that.

I am here.  I am there.

I am him.  I am her.

I am you.  I am me.

I am the collective experience of all these things

and many, many more;

a kaleidoscope of a quintillion different perceptions

and I am that which makes experiencing possible.

I am the Eternal Subject

yet I also take the form of every object.

I Am All That Is.

I Am all Knowing.

I Am all Being.

I Am.

I Am.

I Am.

Written: 2021

Right now

Right now I Am…

   soaring high on outstretched wings

   opening my petals to the morning sun

   scurrying through a termite cathedral

  spinning an intricate web of silk

   trumpeting through an upturned trunk

   laying eggs in a little pond

   picking nits from my lover’s fur

   probing the damp soil with my spindly roots

   singing a duet through a twittering beak

   galloping along on mud-spattered hooves

   surfing waves with gleeful squeaks

   gazing out meditatively with large, luminous eyes

   stretching my branches up and out into the vast, open sky

   smelling for truffles with my sensitive, pink snout

   probing a hole in the rocks with a nimble tentacle

   paddling along a stream with powerful kicks

   hungrily sucking warm milk from my mother’s teat

   searching the ocean bed in search of a larger shell to call home

   charging headlong into the horns of another with a mighty clash

   licking my paws with a raspy tongue

   wriggling this way and that to shed my scaly skin

   breathing in air through my damp, permeable membrane

   bobbing up and down in an intricate dance with my life-long mate

   cutting the water with my dorsal fin

   rising up on thrusting haunches in orgasmic release

   stalking stealthily in pursuit of unsuspecting prey

   enclosing my young one in a protective embrace of flippers and feet

   staring patiently at the water with my rapier like bill ready to strike

   wagging my tail in unrestrained welcome

   sharing a belly-laugh with a beloved friend

   staring in wonder at a crimson sunset

   shedding grief-stricken tears at an untimely loss

   typing this poem with clumsy fingers and an open heart

All these things I, the Cosmic Mind,  experience in the timeless Now

and a quintillion quintillion more things

across countless different worlds and dimensions.

All experiences past, present, and future

exploding forth as pure perception from the Singularity I Am,

the Infinite Awareness I Am,

in a great, exultant cosmic bang,

creating the ultimate immersive, experiential work of art,

wondrous and beautiful,

epic and profound,

beyond all imagination.

Written: 2021

Embrace experience

Gaze at beauty like tomorrow you’ll suddenly find yourself blind.

Listen to music and birds singing like tomorrow you’ll be deaf.

Eat a meal like tomorrow your taste buds will dissolve and be gone.

Smell a flower like tomorrow your nose will be eternally blocked.

Make love like tomorrow you’ll lose all sense of touch.

Express love like tomorrow like you’ll be struck dumb and illiterate.

Reminisce like tomorrow all your memories will be lost.

Written: 2021

Correspondence with Yogi

 From Yogi

Beautifully said Graeme. You are being of enormous help to me. Thank🙏 you!!

Presence

Notice that you’re noticing. Resting deeply in the awareness of being aware. Resting knowingly as the presence of awareness (Rupert Spira).

Surrender

All is exactly as it is meant to be at this moment. This includes anxiety. I don’t care what happens - (Krishnamurti). God/Life is running the show. God, universal intelligence, is having a human experience through me. Yogi is just a character in the movie. Trust that all is well. Be welcoming. Sit back in the seat of awareness & enjoy the show. Be curious as to what will happen next. Enjoy every twist in the plot, & the synchronicities. You are in the world but not of the world. Don’t take it so seriously. No self, no problem.

AA - God, I turn my will & my life over to your care.

AA. Nothing, absolutely nothing, happens in God’s world by mistake.

VRE - God is well, & so are you, if you would but know it.

VRE - The awareness of the presence of a higher & friendly Power.

NM - You see yourself as in the world. I see the world as in me.

Spaciousness

Remaining relaxed & open to events, emotions - not closing. Not rushing.

Yogi. Do one thing at a time. Take your time. Pause between activities. Do everything for its own sake, not as a means to an end.

From Graeme

Wow, Yogi, that's a superb synopsis.  I love it.  Really great.  It really sums up the philosophy that has brought me a great deal of freedom and peace over the past year or two.

As you said in your follow up text, the "I don't care what happens." has absolutely nothing to  do with apathy or indifference  - and everything to do with surrender and acceptance.  When you know that there is an Infinite Intelligence unfolding all experiences and events, you surrender to that power and let it run your life.  You thus allow these unfolding experiences and events to be as they are, trusting that all that arises is for the ultimate Good of the All.  All is as it's meant to be even if it doesn't feel like it at the time.  In my experience, the good of what the mind labels as bad is often revealed much later in hindsight.   

It is very much in this sense that Krishnamurti said "The difference between you and me is that I don't care what happens."  As Eckhart says, he is totally aligned with life and with what is unfolding in the present moment. He is fully surrendered to God and to Life's unfolding.  

In this state of consciousness, paradoxically, the choices that get made and actions that get taken in order to deal with life's challenges are so much more inspired and intelligent.  You have access to universal intelligence. In a sense, God is choosing and acting through you. 

In an even deeper sense, there is no you.  Only God experiencing being you and everyone else. In this sense, the life of Yogi really is like a movie and Yogi exists as a character in it. And who would want to experience a movie where nothing ever seems to go wrong?  It would be dull and there would be no character development or profundity. The "movie of life", I believe, is all about the experience of limitation and the experience of transcending that limitation in order to increasingly discover our true limitless nature.

I so loved our discussion yesterday and the brilliant quotes you shared.  It brought a beautiful sense of clarity.

G

The power of awareness

Hi there Aimee

I had this thought and wanted to share it with you...

If you were God, you could go to anyone, spiritual or not spiritual, and offer them the entire world and all they could ever dream of (all the money, fame, love, intelligence, talent, good looks, experiences, special powers and indescribable pleasures imaginable).  In exchange for this, all they need to sacrifice is their conscious awareness.  No-one in their right mind would make the exchange!  Without the light of awareness, these things would go on in the dark, unknown and in-experiencable and therefore, meaningless.  That’s how precious awareness is!!

In my circumstances, if God were to come to me and offer me 100 million dollars and in exchange for it, all I need to sacrifice is my ability to be aware of being aware while thoughts arise. In other words, I'd go back to and stay in the state I was in 7 years ago of being totally identified with my thoughts and mind.  I'd say "thank you, God, but no, I'll stick with my awareness."  That's how sacred awareness is to me: the ability to rest in it and know myself as it.

So it has just struck me how precious awareness is. And we can rest in it knowingly (bask in it, Be it) whenever we want.  It's effortless and free and our innermost essence.  Wow, what a priceless gift!!!!

Graeme

---

Wow... that is so beautifully put. I really had to take a few moments to sit in the Awareness-I-AM and feel the preciousness of that.
And you are so right, AWARENESS is the treasure, the gift, the jewel, the diamond...
What ELSE could possibly be? I am laughing even thinking about the concept that anything could be more precious than the conscious Awareness-Infinite Mind-we are.
But we think fame, money, beauty etc etc etc is the PRIZE for Awareness - Never!
This Awareness is unpossessed and that's what makes it so incredible... no amount of external pleasure can make you feel more Aware...
How blessed are we, Graeme? Truly, we have found the most prized jewel that is free for all.. paradoxical yes...but also simply the Truth.
AND YET we also get to experience being this unique individual called Graeme and Aimee.. what a Wonder of Wonder ! ! !
Aimee x o x

Mystical experience: There is nothing but God. It's all God, Godding.

I was driving past Milson's Point train station in Sydney, quite close to home.  There were a number of people walking along the side-walk. I saw them and felt love. A powerful and sudden gnosis (an indisputable intuitive knowing beyond words) arose in me that each person was God. Each person was God having a human experience. God was looking out into the world through each person's eyes.  Everyone was God.  Everything was God. There was nothing but God. There was nothing but God Godding.

This mystical state and knowing lasted for several days.  There was an immense sense of oneness, connectedness, wonder, peace, love and euphoria.  Also, my mind felt it was more connected to universal intelligence than usual.  There were a series of deep insights and revelations.  There was deep mental clarity. 

In the midst of this, I met up with Aimee at The Botanica. There was a beautiful sharing of insights. At times, as I shared, I felt such love and wonder that tears streamed from my eyes.

I went to 5 Rhythms Dancing. Deep insights kept arising and I kept going off to write them down on my phone.

In the days following this experience, I felt inspired to write essays entitled "Life is God's experience" and "Why would God choose to experience objective experience?"  The words just flowed through me.  

I also started collecting quotes on the topic "Life is God's experience" for Wisdom Trove. This reached its climax in Mauritius.

Entry into a photography competition (theme: the power of sight)

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Gazing into the eyes of this majestic lion, I saw my own soul reflected. I realised that he and I and all living creatures, in essence, are one being. We are Life itself, seeing the world through a trillion eyes. And the result?  A visual kaleidoscope of unimaginable wonder; a cosmic work of art. What a gift; the power of sight.

---

Gazing into the eyes of this majestic lion, I saw my own essence reflected back. We all look at the world through different eyes, yet what is looking is somehow the same. Life itself.   When eyes connect, the sacredness in another is so clear to see.

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It is all just happening (2016)

There is no person. No thinker. No doer. No chooser.


There is nothing to be, nothing to to do, nothing to think about, nothing to choose, nothing to to plan and no need even to notice.


All these things happen spontaneously, naturally and effortlessly within the Presence I Am; exactly as they are meant to


No need to worry or fear; no need to try, no need to control anything at all ..


... simply a sitting back on the sofa of Life  ...


... an enjoying of the stream of life experiences as they flow into and out of the Awareness I Am ...


… the joy of creating, expressing, loving, choosing as they naturally arise ...


... an allowing of all things to come and go ...


.. and a resting in the peace that passeth all understanding.



---

I remember Eckhart posed the question: to become present in any moment, does Presence choose us or do we choose Presence?  He said it doesn't really matter.  In this play of form, there is the appearance of choice, and that's all that matters.


I like to think of free choice in this way: When I am unconscious, I follow the script of my conditioning so there isn't really any free will or choice. When I'm truly present, I surrender completely to Presence, so it is the Presence I am (not the script of the thought identified mind) that makes all the choices.  I surrender completely to Life's flow. And that is true freedom.


A puppet is free as long as he loves his strings.   Sam Harris

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In presence, when the little "I" falls away,  there is no longer a "chooser."  All sense of "self will" falls away and is replaced by a sense of "Your will be done, Life".  Choices arise and are made naturally and spontaneously in Presence; sometimes through thought; sometimes through intuition. Choices are made within a vastly deep, intelligent space that is free of the limitations of conditioning. Thus, the script falls away and infinite possibility arises.


Even the choice of whether to be present or not arises in Presence, whether we are aware of it or not.  And the only true response when awareness does arise is the deepest gratitude to Life.  For what greater gift is there than the arising of the Presence we are.  That's true Grace.



---



To get to the heart of it, I don't think it matters whether we believe in free choice or not. Free choice is merely a concept of the mind, arising in awareness.


In the spiritual realm, all thoughts and concepts are inherently empty, arising from emptiness and returning to emptiness.  No need to attach. Nothing to believe in.


Ypgi, if the thought, "I choose presence" or the thought "The awareness I am makes choices" helps you to reach a state of presence, then it is a beautiful signpost for you, pointing to a surrendered state in which choices are made effortlessly and intelligently. No need to discard it.


Buddha once said, to awaken, we do not need the entire forest, just a few leaves.  To awaken, we do not need to try to understand the entire workings of the cosmos, just a few useful pointers to stillness.


Of course, any particular pointer is subjective. It may work for one, not for another. That's the beauty of the diversity of consciousness's expression through the human form.

---

Waves

By being a tranquil space for the waves that flow into and out of our lives, we learn to ride them with a beautiful grace; even the mighty waves that seem unsurfable at first.

As the practice deepens, we merge more and more with the immense ocean currents that give rise to the very waves themselves.  And so we become instruments for the endless, loving power of the ocean to surge through us like a spring tide.

To recognise our oneness with the exquisite oceanic force, we don't need to search with exhausting kicks along its turbulent surface.  By Grace, we surrender and sink effortlessly into the serenity of its depths where we are embraced by a love vaster and deeper than even the ocean itself.

Written: 2016

Mystical experience: Waking up to life as God's movie

One morning in 2015, I woke up in a state of the most profound peace. I could see my entire life to that point stretched behind me and the utter perfection of its unfolding. I could see that my life was a kind of movie choreographed by a genius movie director. The movie of my life to that point and going forwards was already in the can and there was nothing I needed to do to influence it.  For the next week, I existed in a kind of blissful, enlightened state, sitting back on the sofa of awareness, watching events unfold.  Actions, choices, thoughts, perceptions all choreographed and arising perfectly. I was in a state of constant awe and wonder and a state of curiosity too as to what would arise next.  After a week, my enlightened state slipped away and I got lost, once again, in my sense of being a conscious agent living my life. But the sense that life is a kind of movie still remains.

What impact has this had on me?  Some fear that waking up to the “non-reality” of the world will make them lose interest in life.  In my experience, the opposite has been true.  Even if the physical world is not real, the experience of it is indisputably real.  In fact, the experience of it feels far more vivid and intense for me now.  I have awoken to the fact that life is a wondrous, mysterious, joyous experience to be embraced.  It still has its ups and downs and challenges, for that is exactly how life on this planet has been designed to be.  But I no longer take it all so seriously. I have realised that Graeme is no more than a kind of movie character that God I Am is experiencing the world through.  And all I need to do is sit back in the seat of awareness and enjoy the passing show.  I find myself playing more and laughing more and loving more and creating more, because knowing who I truly am somehow opens the gate to amazing spiritual creativity and power.  Also, I am no longer afraid of death. Death is but the end of the movie. It is waking up from the dream to become more truly yourself.

I have also been able to embrace my humanness and my limitations, and this has been immensely healing.  I am now able to love every part of being this character called "Graeme" especially his foibles and imperfections.  I no longer think of myself as a human being trying to become perfect like God.  I am God wanting to have a human experience.  And this character; this temporary form, including its body and its mind, is perfect in every way for the experience to be exactly as it is meant to be.  All is well, and all is as it is meant to be.

Most wonderful of all has been the blissful recognition that God is not just experiencing being “me”.  God is experiencing being everyone. God is experiencing being my loved ones and Mack, my dog. God is experiencing being everyone I meet and have ever met. And God is experiencing being every ant and every plant.  Everyone and everything is God.  God is experiencing nothing but God.  It is all God.  And I Am That.  With this realisation comes a love and a joy so deep and explosive, it is beyond description.

My Mantra

Thank you, Divine Consciousness, for this experience of Life on this wondrous, beautiful planet.

Thank you that underlying this universe of form, All is Well, exactly as its meant to be.

Thank you for the love, abundance, health, inspiration, enthusiasm and grace that flows through this experience of Life.

Thank you for the freedom to do what I love and be fully alive.

Thank you for the fellow beings who share the journey and the chance to share love, laughter, wonder, wisdom, fun and adventure.

Thank you for the chance to play, experiment, explore, discover, hike, photograph, dance, leap ....

Thank you for the chance to break patterns, push boundaries, transcend limits and open to new possibilities.

Thank you for challenges and the chance to be courageous, to learn, to grow and to experience triumph of the spirit.

Thank you for pain and the chance it offers to lift illusions from the mind, open the heart to love, deepen the spirit, and to awaken to Who I Really Am.

Thank you that Who I Really Am can never be threatened, harmed or diminished.

Thank you that Who I Really Am is complete and whole containing everything within for perfect happiness and fulfilment.

Thank you that the temporary human form I take is perfect for the Consciousness I Am to experience what it is here to experience.

Thank you for the greatest gift of all; the gift of this sacred, perfect, priceless moment of Now.

- Free in this moment to be inmost calm and still, resting in the aliveness of the body.

- Free in his moment to let it out, let it be, let it go, let it flow.

- Free in this moment to surrender to life's unfolding and love what is.

- Free in this moment to sense my oneness with all.

- Free in this moment to be a calm, loving and open space for Consciousness to flow into the world ...

… a space for love and connection.

… a space for compassion and kindness.

… a space for peace and stillness

… a space for wonder and delight.

… a space for wisdom and insight.

… a space for inspiration and creativity.

… a space for fun and laughter.

… a space for  abundance and gratitude.

… a space for healing and vitality.

… a space for adventure and aliveness.

… a space to serve Life by sharing the gifts of this form.

… a space for the Consciousness I Am to experience and express through.

… a space space to be free.

… a space space to Be.

I Am ...

I Am ...

I Am ...

Life is an epic work of art (Feb 2013)

Life is God's novel. Let him write it. Isaac Bashevis Singer

Perhaps when the Universe returns to formlessness, we as Consciousness will get to view a collage of Life's moments of grace - moments of pure love, joy, triumph, insight, inspiration, passion, courage, tenacity, wonder and beauty that occurred in time and form. 

But would those moments of grace really mean anything at all without the backdrop and context of pain, sorrow, suffering, difficulty, challenge, adversity, hardship, fear, ugliness and even hate?  What would a movie or book be worth if it were about nothing but living happily and perfectly in non- stop peace and harmony?  What would the story of Life and it's awakening to Itself be if it were just non stop light with no dark?  

As human beings, we love to create, watch, read, tell and be inspired by stories.  We love stories and epics and dramas with hardship and struggle and the victory over it and we love fairy tales with heroes and villains.  Maybe this part of us is inspired by our Divine Essence.  Maybe Consciousness loves stories as much as we do.  Maybe, at the end of time and form, Consciousness, of whom We are all merely temporary expressions, will watch a reel of Life's highlights and be inspired and moved beyond anything that can possibly be described. What a work of Art that would be. How epic. How sublimely beautiful. Joyful. Sad. Poignant. Profound. Inspiring.  

Footprints

Kruger 2012

Footprints

Through the loving ways that people connect;

laughter between friends, a couple holding hands,

the generosity of a stranger, the smile of a child.

Through the gift of knowing I am enough, no matter what.

Through my highest thoughts, my truest words, my kindest deeds.

Through the wonders of sunsets and mountains, ocean waves, dolphins and daffodils.

Through the uplifting beauty of music, art and poetry.

Through the infiniteness of time and space and the intricacies of atoms and less.

Through the mighty power of silence and the peace that stillness brings.

Through these things,

I see the footprints of a benevolent Mystery unfolding

and I look out into the vast night sky

and I smile at the stars and the moon

content in the knowledge

that the universe smiles back.

Written: 2004

Uyuni Salt Pans, Bolivia, 2006

Northern Beaches, Sydney, 2008