The Toltec I Ching Blog

Overview

The Unity of all things dwells in an undifferentiated state of living potential.  Neither awake nor asleep nor dreaming, it is the shining awareness everywhere present, the fount of time and eternity.  It is still and silent, utterly at peace and filled with harmony.

The Unity of all things produces a secondary world of birth and death when its living potential is activated by the intention of its parts.  This is unavoidable, since the harmony of the Whole could not be perfect if it denied in any way the natural creative impulse of its parts.  The unitary nature of the living potential produces a single field of intentions, so that no intention exists in isolation but, rather, enters the universe of intentions, where it becomes part of the vast interconnectedness of cause-and-effect.

The living potential bifurcates its generative energy along a line of further-dividing dualities:  the 1 becomes 2, the 2 become 4, the 4 become 8, and so on.  These numbers represent the ways in which generative energy distributes intention throughout the phenomenal world.  They are entities in the sense that they are comprised of intentional parts and comprise an intention of their own as a part of a larger whole:  the 8 trigrams is an entity that both contains all 8 of its trigrams and extends the intention of the 4 bigrams. The 4 bigrams double the original duality of solid and broken lines, producing two pairs of dualities.  The 8 trigrams double the duality of the 4 bigrams, producing four pairs of dualities.  This process continues until the 64 hexagrams produce 32 pairs of dualities. None of these entities, however, actually precedes another:  they all exist simultaneously and symbolize the multiple points of view required of human perception to appreciate its environment and respond to it successfully.

This cosmological process is perceptual in nature because it cannot be divorced from human perception—it represents the identification of human nature with the whole of the universe.  Because our perception arises from the same process as the rest of creation, we perceive the unfolding of the cosmos by perceiving the unfolding of our own perception.  That unfolding comes in a series of emanations coincident with the vast undifferentiated One.  Awareness stirs within the stillness of the Unity of all things, its creative urge producing a division in the unity.  Now there are two.  Thus is born Number.  Which produces Symbol:  in the case of Two, it is the Duality of complementary feeling-tones of Autonomy and Love, for the movement out of the unity requires independence of spirit even as it establishes the relationship with the Whole.  From Symbol comes Name:  in this case, yang and yin, masculine and feminine, heaven and earth, creative and receptive, movement and stillness, and so on.  With names, things enter into the universe of all other names and the ensuing relationships they form produce an intricate web of Meaning that explores all the possible distributions of generative energy within civilization.

The cosmological process whereby the material universe gives body to the spiritual Unity of all things, in other words, is mirrored in the process whereby civilization gives body to the original undifferentiated perception of human nature.  In both cases, it is the cosmological unfolding of ever-dividing dualities that creates a relational order and structure to the world of phenomena and experience—an order and structure resulting in the natural tendency of all things toward increased disorder and decay.

The unfolding of the Many out of the One, then, is the Way of Fate, where all things and relations between things forever spontaneously changes in the direction of greater disintegration.

And it is the return of the Many into the One that is the Way of Freedom.

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Reversing the Course of Fate

The return of the Many into the One is an ancient formula symbolizing the spiritual transformation we undergo when we cultivate our present self to the point where we spontaneously re-experience our original undamaged nature.  This return to our true self as it exists before and after social conditioning is likewise called uniting heaven and earth.  It comes about because we train ourselves to stop viewing the inner and outer world as pairs of dualities (like good and bad, right and wrong, self and other) and develop greater sensitivity to the Unity of all things.  This is commonly referred to as the mystical experience arising from the reunion of subject and object:  it points at the profound metamorphosis we undergo when there is no longer any distance between us and the universe nor is there any boundary between our individual mind and the one mind.  This is called reversing the outflow of generative energy and has long been associated with the real person, or sage, whose enlightened nature has been reclaimed.

As noted in the previous two posts, the Way of Fate is the entropic process carrying all things and the relationships between things ever further into disorder.  From the perceptual cosmology, this is the result of the initial division of the Unity of all things and its subsequent doublings into further dualities.

The Way of Fate is the realm of birth and death.  Everything that enters this realm must progressively deteriorate and die.  This is the first and greatest of the perceptual dualities.  From it arise all the other dualities comprising the law of Fate governing the lives of so many.

Running counter to the Way of Fate is the circulation of generative energy.  This is the flow of the subliminal force that gives life to life.  From the perspective of spirit, generative energy is matter.  From the perspective of matter, generative energy is spirit.  From the perspective of entropy, generative energy is information.  From the perspective of life, generative energy is mind.  It circulates among all things, entering all the dualities in order to hold them together in the Unity of all things.  It is the subliminal force that can postpone the arrival of Fate indefinitely.

The true person, the sage, the enlightened person, have long been those who cultivated this generative energy of the universal return within themselves and others.

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The Oracle of Freedom

Uniting heaven and earth is an act that happens within the human being.  It occurs within us in the present mind-moment when we stand at the center of the compass and open our heart-mind to the ever-present Unity of all things.  We bring the one spirit of heaven and the one body of earth back together within ourselves every time we re-experience the nonduality of reality.  Reuniting the one spirit and the one body in a conscious act is an act of conception that gives birth to a timeless intention—fueled by the generative energy of the return of the Many into the One, it reverses the course of Fate by spontaneously and immediately returning to the Act of Creation.  Such experiences not only benefit those who undergo them but spill out into the world of intentions, contributing to the metamorphosis of civilization itself.

There are many traditions of self-transformation whose goal is the mystical experience of nonduality.  Our complete metamorphosis into a true person that constantly stands at the center of the compass takes many years of genuine insights and sincere cultivation.  Standing at the center point of nonduality, voluntarily collapsing the distinction between subject and object, voluntarily letting go of all boundaries between my self and the One—this is the method and the goal of self-realization practices.  It is not a practice undertaken lightly nor attained effortlessly.  It is the Path of Freedom in every sense and those who keep it underfoot their whole life are still too few.

But it is not the only way of uniting heaven and earth.

There are many, equally old, traditions of divination whose goal is to make the voice of the one spirit accessible to the one body.  Across cultures and the millennia, the tradition of priest-diviners has arisen to give voice to the ancient Oracle guiding humanity away from the cliff edge of self-destruction and back toward the Living Monument of self-creation.  It is a tradition based on the recognition that our self-awareness works according to the same laws as the rest of creation:  our spirit speaks most directly and powerfully to our body in our dreams, just as the one spirit speaks most directly and powerfully to the one body in its symbols.  Long considered the first language, symbols speak with a directness and power that words cannot—laden with complex layers of meaning and emotional associations, they appear all-at-once, spatially, rather than in the linear, temporal, string of words of conscious language.

Divination, then, is the art of translating the symbols of the Oracle.  It is the human awareness breaking through the barrier of subject and object, voluntarily merging self with the one spirit, re-coupling the primal duality of spirit and matter.  It is the spontaneous and immediate act of uniting heaven and earth.  It is not necessary for the diviner to consciously strive to effect such a union—the act of divination collapses the subject-object duality by its very nature.

Engaging the Oracle automatically entails stepping back into the Unity of all things.  We cannot seek an answer from the Oracle and hold ourselves separate from the one spirit, we cannot receive the Oracle’s answer and hold ourselves separate from the one body.  To open ourselves to the invisible realm of unity underlying this world of the senses is to lose the ego-self and step into the oceanic dreamtime of nonduality:  this is called becoming the site of the return of the Many into the One.  As has long been said of the I Ching, inquiring of the Oracle is not a matter of any special knowledge or skill— the divinatory act activates a mysterious conjunction of dualities solely by the power of the questioner’s sincerity.

The Oracle is the speaking of the generative energy that circulates between the beginning and end of time, between the Act of Creation and the Act of Completion.  It circulates in the same way that the ocean’s water evaporates, forms clouds that are carried by the wind to the land where it falls as rain that accumulates in streams and rivers in order to flow back into the sea.  It is an all-at-once-ness circulation that is spatial and not a linear progression of time.  It is the flow of the unchanging life-that-gives-life behind the flow of perceptible change.  To life, generative energy is the unborn mind that moves at will backward and forward between the beginning and the end of time:  it is unborn because it does not ever enter the realm of birth and death and so stands forever outside the realm of Fate—it can move at will between end and beginning because it is the circulation itself.

The 64 hexagrams constitute the map of Fate.  They show the 64 possible mixtures of yang and yin generative energy that produce the world of phenomena.  They show the pitfalls and traps everything and everyone faces in the realm of birth and death.  They show the vast archetypal landscape of entropic change driving all changing phenomena.

Engaging the Oracle activates the creative intent of the living moment, revealing the way to transcend Fate and create a lifetime of good fortune.  Circulating among the lines of the hexagrams, the generative energy calls us to follow the way of freedom in every sense.

The Oracle speaks to us by selecting from the 64 possible hexagrams just those that represent the present situation we face and how it is developing into the coming situation.  In doing so, it points out the choices we have if we are to keep the path of freedom beneath our feet.

The Toltec I Ching is the newest iteration of the Oracle’s speaking.  By recasting the I Ching in the symbology of the Native Americans of ancient Mexico, its interpretative material gives a new voice to the emerging Dynasty of the Open Secret.  By marrying the two great cosmovisions of the indigenous civilizations of China and Mexico, it unites the East and West hemispheres for today’s global civilization.  By interpreting each hexagram with both original illustrations and written material, it unites the right and left hemispheres of the brain for today’s global consciousness.

I cannot distance myself from the I Ching anymore than you.  Those who haven’t yet internalized the I Ching may think the above considerations to be mere abstractions but those who know that the 8 trigrams are their own sense organs have already discovered that the 4 bigrams are the opening and closing of the Gate of Good Fortune.  May benefit pour out of you to cover heaven and earth.

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Next:  Reading the Map of Fate

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The Toltec I Ching, by Martha Ramirez-Oropeza and William Douglas Horden has just received a Silver Award in the 2010 Nautilus Awards.  It recasts the I Ching in the symbology of the Native Americans of ancient Mexico and includes original illustrations interpreting each of the hexagrams.  Its subtitle, 64 Keys to Inspired Action in the New World hints at its focus on the ethics of the emerging world culture.

Click here to go to the main site to see sample chapters, reviews and the link to Larson Publications for ordering the book.

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The wisdom teachings are clear on this point:  all of existence arises from and returns to the Current.  All form arises from and returns to this formless Current.  Everything visible arises from and returns to this invisible Current.  Everything known arises from and returns to this unknowable Current.

The Current cannot be described in its entirety—but there are aspects of it that can be described.  It is the on-going Act Of Creation that continues to flow, back up, fill up, spill over, fall, eddy, stall, dry up, submerge, surface, and flow ever on, from seed to fruit and back again to seed.

The Current cannot be described in its entirety—but its entirety can be expressed.  In fact, we cannot avoid expressing it every moment.  All we see and experience is its on-going expression.  It is the living moment, whose continuous outpouring carries all of existence from one end of eternity to the other and back again.  It is the aware dwelling place, whose emptiness houses the natural unfolding of the universe as it expands to infinity and contracts back to infinity again.

It is for this reason that it is said, Move along with the Current and you will know no end.

It is not merely that nothing will be able to stop you—it is that nothing will want to stop you.

Indeed, the action of the Current is its own unfolding.  This is the action of self-revelation, by which the Current reveals itself to itself by means of its own unfolding.  To move with the Current is to align ourselves with its action, allowing its intention to be our own.  In this way, our own unfolding leads to our own self-revelation:  we come to discover our true potential by intending to move along with the Current’s unfolding rather than trying to direct it.  Moving against the Current is the source of all frustration:  trying to direct my life by the force of my own will power is like a leaf trying to make its own way against a rushing stream.

We are trained from birth to exert our will on others and the world in general.  We are taught, by word and by example, that the only way to succeed is to use our will power to overcome others in the competition for resources.  Yet this logic is patently false:  we often succeed, for example, because our competitor fails due to a crisis completely outside our awareness.  Or, just as likely, it is we who fail because of a crisis completely outside the knowledge of our competitor.  Will power cannot make a great sumo wrestler into a successful jockey nor a great jockey into a successful sumo wrestler.

Exerting my will power on circumstances does not bring me good fortune.  This is principally because I cannot be aware of the direction of the Current’s unfolding.  Because the Whole is greater than the sum of its parts, the behavior of the Whole cannot be perceived by its parts.  This means that blindly trying to direct my life by the force of my own will power inevitably leads me to move against the Current.  In this sense, exerting my own will power is the precise opposite of my expressing inner power.

Clearly, the difference between will power and inner power is one of intent.

When we speak of the chain of spiritual cause-and-effect, we are addressing the way in which intent changes the behavior of people and events:  spiritual cause, in this sense, refers to an intent, whereas spiritual effect refers to a change of behavior.  Intent is able to cause a change of behavior on the spiritual plane because the essence of one person is identical to the essence of another.  Just as salt permeates each drop of water in the sea, intent leaps from essence to essence.  This essence-to-essence communication lies at the root of all beneficial influence:  beneficial intent triggers a change of inner behavior—a change of motivation—on the inner, spiritual, level, which eventually results in a concrete change of behavior on the outer, physical, level.

In this context, will power is the energy directed by the lower self to achieve its aim:  its intent is to promote its own self-interest, even at the expense of others.  Inner power, on the other hand, is the energy directed by the higher self to benefit all:  its intent is to promote the well-being of the Whole, even at the expense of its own.

Both of these intents produce a change in behavior.  As far as the lower self is concerned, its intent to promote its own self-interest causes a backlash against it among the people and events it seeks to influence—no one likes to be exploited and sooner or later the exploited turn on their exploiters.  As for the higher self, its intent to benefit all causes a resonance in the people and events it seeks to influence—everyone wants peace and prospering and they will do everything they can to support those who are willing to sacrifice their personal interests for those of the Whole.

The backlash change-of-behavior brought about by will power stands in stark contrast to the resonance change-of-behavior brought about by inner power.  While both are certainly responses to my own intent that then become spiritual causes of their own, their difference lies in how they influence my progress on the Current:  backlashes hinder my advance, whereas resonances further it.

The backlashes caused by my lower self’s intent accumulate over time, raising inner and outer dams between me and good fortune.  They stand like intangible obstacles between me and the connections I need to make in order to advance.  They thwart my progress, leaving me with the sense of being penned-in and stuck in place—I seem to be unable to step off this treadmill that I no longer remember ever having decided to step onto.  The backlashes caused by my lower self’s intent accumulate over time, spinning a web of entanglements that hold me back, disrupt my sense of timing, and pull me out of the rhythm of the Current.  They accumulate over time, intensifying my own fears, frustrations, and resentments—which only intensifies my lower self’s intent.  By promoting my own interests, I set myself in motion against the Current and away from good fortune.

The resonances caused by my higher self’s intent to benefit all likewise accumulate over time, helping weave the strands of all beneficial intents everywhere into the single tapestry of beneficial coincidences.  These resonances stand like invisible crossroads that unexpectedly bring me together with people and events that open up opportunities and further the completion of my endeavors.  They increase my momentum, restore my sense of timing, and pull me into the rhythm of the Current.  They accumulate over time, intensifying my gratitude, happiness, and creativity—which only intensifies my higher self’s intent.  By promoting the benefit of all, I move along with the Current and toward good fortune.

This is attained by eliminating the lower self’s intent while cultivating the higher self’s intent.  It is not as complicated as it might sound.  It simply involves watching how our lower self single-mindedly intends to promote its own interests by trying to turn everything it encounters to its own advantage.  Once we observe how single-minded intent works, we simply exchange the higher self’s intent for the lower self’s.  It is not necessary, in other words, to intend a specific aim in order to generate a spiritual cause—it is simply a matter of consistently intending that everything benefits all.  If we practice this uninterruptedly for even a short while, we soon find ourselves collaborating with everything we encounter.

Aligning ourselves this way with the higher self allows us to move along with the Current, increasingly finding ourselves in the right place at the right time, enjoying the sense of belonging that comes with being part of a steady stream of beneficial coincidences.  No selfish intent in the world can carry us into this stream of unselfish coincidences—only when we act as part of the Whole do we sense the movement, rhythm, and harmony of the Whole.  Unforeseeable things happen by chance and we are an integral part of them, employed by them to advance the well-being of all.  Unexpected things happen by accident and we seem to arrive just in time to help shape them into wellsprings of benefit overflowing into the lives of all.  Each moment is a crossroads of resonances, where we arrive together with the momentum of all the beneficial intents everywhere carrying us toward the destination of our shared longing.

This is called using inner power to foster beneficial coincidences.

And it defines the difference between shock and inner Surprise.

Shocks are created to capture attention in order to advance the interests of a particular group or individual.  Inner Surprises are serendipitous coincidences that we have made room for in our lives:  they arrive unforeseen, their very unpredictability opening new windows of opportunity for all.

Shocks are like rocks tossed into a pool, each creating ripples that intersect with the others, generating an on-going series of more and more complicated backlashes.  Inner Surprise is like moonlight falling into a pool—by its very nature it cannot make ripples.  In this sense, moonlight is the essence reflected in every pool of awareness facing the immeasurable night of sleep.

Shocks are intentional and destructive.

Inner Surprises are unintentional and constructive.

We are able to avoid using shock to influence people and events by incorporating the previous stages of Calm, Resiliency, Autonomy, Gratitude, Nonresistance, Curiosity, and Insight into the least expected acts of inner Surprise.  By intending that everything benefit from our every thought, word, and deed, we find ourselves as surprised as those around us by the good fortune we share.

Stabilizing this single-minded intent by returning to it immediately every time it is interrupted, we unexpectedly find that we have crossed the threshold of wisdom and are traveling, irrevocably and irresistively, the path of good fortune.

You cannot create or construct such coincidences—trying to direct or control the Current like that merely reveals the quality of your motives, causing an untold number of backlashes that work against your advance.

Such coincidences occur—and involve you—because you coincide with other beneficial intents.

Certainly, the lower self will argue, everyone knows that such concepts sound fine in principle but have no place in the real world of dog-eat-dog and big-fish-eat-little-fish competition of everyday life.

Yet, the higher self will assert, two ants from the same colony will struggle over the same piece of dung even though both of them intend to carry it back to the same destination—after we have tried the path of competition and found it unfulfilling, how much further down the road must we go before taking a new one?

Interesting, the lower self will argue, but I practiced these principles all day yesterday and nothing whatsoever changed for the better.

Yet, the higher self will assert, you do not think it strange that the light from a distant star takes years to reach your eyes—the more your intent harbors hopes of personal advantage, the longer the time lag between the spiritual cause and its material effect.

Lightning and thunder, the symbols of shock, are natural characteristics of powerful storms.  They may be accompanied by rain, bringing much-needed water to the land.  But they may also be accompanied by the wind, bringing destruction and hardship to people.  Before the storm, it is calm.  After the storm, life wants to return to calm.  Things cannot thrive and prosper in a climate of constant storms.  Our own endeavors should not contribute to sustaining a climate of constant shock.  Our own endeavors ought to use the element of inner Surprise to help return things to their state of calm.  Shock may shake people out of their routines of thought and feeling, but so can inner Surprise.  There are enough natural and historical shocks that it is not necessary to fabricate any—especially when they are merely attempts to gain some advantage for our own interests.

Real freedom is able to exercise self-control for the benefit of the Whole.

Real wisdom serves the needs of people and the natural world upon which we all depend.

Real good fortune is being a well of benefit overflowing into the lives of others.

Real joy is being carried on the Current through this life into the Beyond.

Exercise One—Sit quietly with your eyes closed, breathing slowly and deeply.  Visualize yourself as having achieved complete peace of mind, sitting calmly in the center of a circle.  Around you, turning clockwise, are the four seasons, each of which is fixed to one of the cardinal directions:  Spring to East, Summer to South, Autumn to West, and Winter to North.  As the seasons and directions turn around their center, visualize yourself as a great tree whose roots extend vertically deep below you and whose trunk and branches extend vertically high above you.  Now align yourself with this vertical axis running through you, running through the center of the turning seasons and directions.  As you open yourself to sensing the power and peace of the unchanging center of all change, silently repeat the catch-phrase, Tranquility is the center from which all my actions and reactions come.

Exercise Two—Lie down and close your eyes, breathing slowly and deeply.  Visualize yourself on your deathbed, surrounded by your loved ones.  Visualize who is present and how they are acting and how you are feeling about them.  Allow yourself to feel that these are your last moments alive, that these are your last breaths.  As life slips away and you look upon your whole life from the end, ask yourself, What was most important? Linger in these feelings, absorb them deeply, allow yourself to be affected by them.  Complete the exercise by writing your future self a letter setting forth your priorities.  Now govern the rest of your life accordingly.

If we respond to this age of overexcitement, agitation, and frenzy with encouragement, tranquility, and good will, then we can capture attention without shocking, we can influence people and events without creating backlashes, and we can succeed without causing suffering for the Whole.  Before following the example of others who are competing with us, we ought to study the consequences of using shock to attract attention to our endeavor—we ought to look deeply into the backlashes it produces and how it disrupts the natural unfolding of people’s lives.  We ought to keep in mind that just because we can do something doesn’t mean we must.  We ought to try to begin right away, uninterruptedly intending for all to benefit from our endeavors, accumulating resonances in the field of spiritual cause-and-effect that will draw together the diverse forces needed to create the most beneficial surprise possible.

This is called the art of making the whole world the path of good fortune.

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The above is an excerpt from The Spiritual Basis of Good Fortune by William Douglas Horden.

If you’d like to learn more, visit the website:  http://spiritualbasisofgoodfortune.com/

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The Toltec I Ching, by Martha Ramirez-Oropeza and William Douglas Horden has just received a Silver Award in the 2010 Nautilus Awards.  It recasts the I Ching in the symbology of the Native Americans of ancient Mexico and includes original illustrations interpreting each of the hexagrams.  Its subtitle, 64 Keys to Inspired Action in the New World hints at its focus on the ethics of the emerging world culture.

Click here to go to the main site to see sample chapters, reviews and the link to Larson Publications for ordering the book.

Gradual influence is both the seed and the fruit of Insight.

It is the seed of Insight in the sense that external factors gradually influence our internal state, building up greater sensitivity until it triggers a new Insight.

It is the fruit of Insight in the sense that our inner Insight gradually influences the external situation by consistently encouraging harmful things to change and beneficial things to be preserved.

So although Insights seem to come full-blown and of a sudden, they actually result from a slow accumulation of subliminal experiences that gradually sensitize us to our surroundings.  We are not suddenly more insightful, in other words—rather, a growing awareness of something new works its way up through our unconscious until it crosses the conscious threshold and we can grasp it conceptually.  Insights seem to arrive suddenly because we have unconsciously been preparing for them by building up an emotional tension to be released once they enter conscious awareness.  This is why Insights are experienced as important and meaningful:  they arrive as the marriage of a new idea and a profound emotion—a marriage whose union gives birth to the breakthrough experience.

And although it seems that our Insights do not significantly impact our surroundings, this actually reflects a failure of our own perseverance.  Once we accept that each thing is on its individual path to perfection, then our influence can only add to or subtract from the other’s momentum:  criticism and conflict cause friction that impedes momentum, whereas approval and encouragement help propel each along its path.  The way of gradual influence, therefore, is the way of facilitation and accord:  we are able to put our Insights into effect when we methodically and consistently help others break through the impasses holding them back on their path.

The lower self will argue that this may sound nice enough but it is not practical because not everyone is a good person deserving of goodwill or kindness.  In fact, it will argue, there are those who are so cruel and malevolent that they deserve only cruelty in return.  This kind of argument—reducing issues to their extremes, as if that disproved a point that holds valid in a vast number of other cases—is a favored tactic of the lower self when it feels its interests threatened.  Wisdom does not express itself in obvious arguments against a compassionate and egalitarian ideal.  Anyone, after all, can construct hypothetical cases in the extreme that show how religious, spiritual, and philosophical ideals cannot work in the real world.  It takes the Insight of the higher self to see how they can.

For example, it is self-evident that if everyone everywhere was treated from birth with kindness, approval, and encouragement, generation after generation, so that no one anywhere experienced any cruelty or malevolence, then the number of people who became cruel and malevolent would drop each succeeding generation until the trait all but disappeared.  Those who claim this itself is impossible will admit that under the right circumstances they themselves would be able to extinguish their own tendencies toward cruelty and malevolence—but they will not admit that others would be able to do the same.  Such is the nature of the lower self, which fears most of all the prospect of living up to the potential of its light half.

As already stated above, although it seems that your Insights do not significantly impact your surroundings, this actually reflects a failure of your own perseverance—it requires the long view and a faith in the principle of metamorphosis for you to keep acting in a way that ennobles all when so many others appear to be doing just the opposite.  However, once you accept that your ideas, goals, and endeavors are all part of your own individual path to perfection, then the conduct of others no longer has any bearing on your own.  Rather than you being impacted by others’ actions, in fact, it is your conduct and demeanor that gradually influence others to change what is harmful and keep what is beneficial.  This form of inner power emerges because your attitude and behavior stem from inner Insight rather than short-sighted self-interest.

Success of every kind depends on this alternating expression of Insight:  on the one hand, external events gradually bring about internal breakthrough experiences and, on the other hand, internal breakthrough experiences gradually affect external events.  In this sense, we become more sensitized to our surroundings, which leads to more penetrating understanding, which we express through our actions, which better sensitizes others to their surroundings, which leads to their own Insights.  And just as we are motivated to act in accordance with our Insights, others are motivated to act in accordance with theirs.  By allowing others to influence us, in other words, we are able to influence them.

Fail to keep increasing your sensitivity to your surroundings, however, and you will lose the creative momentum that keeps you moving from success to success.  Fail to keep increasing your sensitivity to your surroundings, furthermore, and you will lose touch with what motivates those you seek to influence.

Failure of every kind depends on a lack of Insight.

What is holding me back?

Increasing my sensitivity to everything in my surroundings may not always be enough to answer this question.  There are times when I need to turn Insight back upon myself in order to advance the next step on my individual path to perfection.  This is both simpler and more complex than deriving Insight from my external surroundings:  simpler, in the sense that my internal impasses depend wholly on me for their existence—and more complex, in the sense that much of my identity is formed around my internal impasses.  Once I break through them and leave them behind, they no longer exist—but so long as they do exist, they deform the natural flexibility and adaptability of my personality and character in much the same way that dams change the natural flow of a river.

This brings us to the Seventh Paradox Of Wisdom: the more fixed my internal impasses, the more fixed my sense of personal identity.  If I do not periodically look for and identify my internal impasses, then I come to live with them so long that they seem to be part of me.  If I do not find a way to pass through them and resume my original direction, then the very course of my life is changed by the artificial reactions I have to my surroundings as a result of the habits that have replaced the natural flexibility and adaptability of my personality and character.

I am not fully myself, in other words, until I resolve all the internal impasses still haunting me.  Which is to say that I cannot reach my full potential so long as I fail to break through my internal impasses.  This is because I allow these internal impasses to create friction and conflict in my life—I myself slow my own momentum on my individual path to perfection.  If I am to reverse this tendency, I must increase my sensitivity to my unconscious habits of thought, emotion, memory, and instinct, identifying and then breaking through each in turn.

A straightforward approach to that end is for me to ask evocative questions and then follow the train of associations that my answers set in motion.  It does not take long to see how each habit has developed into an internal impasse that has shaped my reactions, and therefore my relationship, to my surroundings—

My habits of thought come to light when I inquire, What do I believe strongly?

My habits of emotion come to light when I inquire, What do I strongly dislike?

My habits of memory come to light when I inquire, What do I react to with alarm?

My habits of instinctual drives come to light when I inquire, What do I feel compelled to do?

As I encounter each impasse, I identify it quickly and accurately—is it a true impasse, a false impasse, a receding impasse, a sticky impasse, a hard impasse, or a soft impasse—and then treat it accordingly.  Using these questions to draw my impasses out of the unconscious and into awareness where I can break through them consciously, I feel myself progressively lighter and lighter, as if burden after burden has been lifted from me.  As impasse after impasse is penetrated and passed through, my sense of buoyancy and good will spontaneously result in my reverting to the natural flexibility and adaptability of my true personality and character.  In this way, my authentic reactions to my surroundings are restored and my relationship to the world more accurately reflects my individual path to perfection.  I regain my creative momentum and find it many times easier to break through the external barriers to good fortune.  My ideas and plans are part of the underlying harmony of the world and I find collaborators with whom to reap success.

This is called using Insight to release trapped power.

It is a principle otherwise expressed in the Eighth Paradox Of Wisdom: the longer an internal impasse goes undetected, the more powerful the resulting breakthrough experience.  Once broken through, in other words, it is the oldest, deepest, and most unconscious impasses that are the most liberating.

What is holding me back, it turns out, is what ultimately propels me forward.

Freed from internal impasses, where does Insight propel us?

Or, perhaps more to the heart of the matter, What are the further reaches of Insight?

As impasses are penetrated and left behind, we gradually realize that we ourselves are becoming Insight, in the sense of a special form of awareness, of attention, that, like a beam of light penetrating the dark of night, cuts through the entangling vines of the senses to perceive the real nature of existence.  We don’t want to be misled by the words special form, however—this metamorphosed form of Insight is simply the natural and normal awareness of the higher self.  As the barriers to contentment and fulfillment fall away like a butterfly’s cocoon or a serpent’s shed skin, so do the persistent misconceptions and uncertainties that plague the lower self.  As these impasses dissolve and melt away, our identity undergoes a gradual but profound transformation:  we identify less and less with the single lifetime of this material body, and more and more with the immortal lifetime of this immaterial awareness.

It is at this point that Insight is turned around to shine full upon itself, like light reflected back upon its source.  It is here that Insight empties out into the source of awareness, like a river empties out into the sea.  And it is here that Insight comes to embody a living emptiness, a dwelling place where all life might dwell, a timeless garden where all might ripen to perfection.  Insight turned back onto itself is the gate of the Great Reunion.

The further reaches of Insight, it turns out, extend all the way back to its origin in the Beyond.

Exercise One—Close your eyes and breathe slowly and deeply.  Visualize a dark grey stone wall before you.  Visualize your attention as a steady gentle wind blowing against the wall.  Visualize that wind gradually eroding a hole through the wall.  Visualize that hole growing larger and larger, until the wall gives way and falls.  Once you have succeeded in breaking through the wall, begin the exercise again, this time repeating the catch phrase:  Is this the limit of awareness?

Exercise Two—In the routine of everyday life, see each person you encounter as having an enlightened master within them.  See each person’s inner master as testing the quality your spiritual perceptiveness by pretending to be opinionated, hypocritical, greedy, ambitious, self-centered, and driven by instinctual needs.  Hone your Insight until you can see the enlightened nature of each person’s inner master peering out from behind the persona of the lower self.  When you can hold this perception steadily for periods of time, then turn your Insight around and see the enlightened master peering out from behind your own persona.

Just as there cannot be good fortune without wisdom, there cannot be wisdom without Insight.  And there cannot be Insight without gradual penetration of the impasses that afflict us within and without.  When we break through all impasses, we return to the state of wholeness.  When we return to the state of wholeness, we relive the time before we were ever wounded.  When we relive the time before we were ever wounded, we reclaim our perfection.  But we don’t want to be misled by this word perfection—this is not the static stereotyped perfection of the temporal imagination but, rather, the ever-evolving individual perfection of eternal Insight.  In this sense, the higher self is the Wind Of Light coursing through the Night Of Matter, patiently, gradually, carving the one infinite impasse into a perfect mirror of the Beyond.

So what the lower self calls success is achieved when we are able to influence our surroundings in a way that furthers our goals, whereas what the higher self calls success is achieved when we are able to influence our surroundings in a way that furthers the perfection of the Whole.  Treat all of existence as a single soft impasse through which you are flowing, wearing away all the detritus until only the hidden diamond remains:  fulfill your role as part of the great spiritualizing influence and the unrelenting wind of your good will and encouragement will assure your ultimate success.

~

The above is an excerpt from The Spiritual Basis of Good Fortune by William Douglas Horden.

If you’d like to learn more, visit the website:  http://spiritualbasisofgoodfortune.com/

~

The Toltec I Ching, by Martha Ramirez-Oropeza and William Douglas Horden has just received a Silver Award in the 2010 Nautilus Awards.  It recasts the I Ching in the symbology of the Native Americans of ancient Mexico and includes original illustrations interpreting each of the hexagrams.  Its subtitle, 64 Keys to Inspired Action in the New World hints at its focus on the ethics of the emerging world culture.

Click here to go to the main site to see sample chapters, reviews and the link to Larson Publications for ordering the book.

In the human sphere, Earth stands for the power to carry good beginnings all the way through to good endings.  The power to bring beneficial creations to completion.  The power to raise all boats together on the same tide.

But where does this power come from?

On this point the wisdom teachings are unambiguous—it arises from voluntarily ending all inner resistance to the unitary nature of the world.  Failure to do so, in fact, forms the very core of resistance keeping us from fulfilling our purpose in life and finding lifelong fulfillment.  It is what keeps us from living the ecstatic life.

At this very moment, there are imperceptible waves and particles passing through my body.  I am taking in part of the atmosphere, converting it, and breathing it back out into the atmosphere.  I am converting food and water that I have taken in and will return to the world in changed form.  Nutrients I have taken in from the world have been converted into hair, nails, and skin cells that are regularly being sloughed back off into the world.  I have played my part in a marriage of sperm and egg that has produced an entirely new human body in the world.

My experience that there is a “me” that is separated from the rest of the universe by this boundary of skin, in other words, is as naive as the idea that one of the cells in my body is a “me” that is separated from the rest of my body by the boundary of its cell wall.  Yet this illusion of separateness is what we maintain throughout our lives despite all evidence to the contrary.

Inner Nonresistance depends, therefore, on eliminating our core of resistance once and for all by daily increasing our sensitivity to the oneness of all that exists.  This means that our first-hand experience of the unity of all creation is of paramount importance to “sensing the openness of Earth within”.  But it also means that if we are to “train ourselves to achieve inner Nonresistance” we must cultivate our openness to the unity of all creation in such a way that our appreciation and understanding continue to deepen over time.  That way, the longer we work to stabilize our sensitivity to the Whole, the more we can see how our social and familial conditioning have taught us to view the world dualistically, with “me” as the subject inside and “everything else” as the object outside.

On this point the wisdom teachings are unanimous—there is no “inside” nor any “outside”.  There is just this single vastness, this one unified ocean of existence, whose infinite number of parts makes up the one indivisible Whole.  And whose unitary nature imparts to each of its innumerable parts a trace of the Whole, just as each drop of water in the sea carries the taste of salt.

Although it seems like this perception of the indivisible Whole is difficult to achieve—somewhat like a fish trying to see water—the opposite is, in fact, true.  What requires tremendous energy is our effort to ignore this very perception:  while a fish living its entire life in the sea may never actually see the water in which it lives, it does sense the water temperature, water pressure, and myriad other aspects of its invisible environment.  Likewise, we are subliminally aware of the indivisible One that is the unchanging background of permanence from which we arise and to which we return.  So it is impossible to be completely ignorant of the single Source and Destination of all that exists—but it is just as impossible for our minds to experience it consciously without right preparation.

Therefore, the first half of this course was about breaking the conditioning that stands in the way of our experiencing the world as it truly is, whereas the present lesson builds on that foundation in order to begin our cultivation of the inner power that will enable us to make real what we can envision and thereby live the ecstatic life.

Inner power is attained once we stop wasting energy on resisting awareness.

As noted above, there is nothing but our own resistance to sensing the unitary nature of the world that is holding us back from achieving our own lifelong success.  While this identifies the principal obstacle on the path of good fortune, however, it does not yet make clear precisely how it is that we resist awareness nor how we are to reclaim that wasted energy through Nonresistance.

So, what is the precise mechanism of resistance and Nonresistance?

The governing of attention.

Attention is energy.  Active attention expends energy.  Passive attention stores up energy.  Active attention looks for things to pay attention to, whether they be external or internal in nature.  Passive attention waits for things to present themselves to awareness, whether they be external or internal in nature.  Active attention is like a hunter’s arrow.  Passive attention is like a fisherman’s hook.  Active attention is like a scalpel.  Passive attention is like a sponge.

Active attention is focused on acquiring, whether those acquisitions be concrete or abstract, real or imaginary, in nature.  Active attention moves out from the center of awareness, pursuing security, status, recognition, relationships, knowledge, self-knowledge, and so on.  This constant pursuit of acquiring results in a steady outpouring, an unrelenting diminishing, of energy.  Suffering from the misconception that such acquisitions will replenish our energy, we redouble our outpouring of energy and redouble it again.  It is as if a lion spent all day trying to catch a hummingbird to eat—even if it ever managed to actually catch it, the minute amount of energy recouped from such a meal would never make up for the tremendous outlay of energy expended in the great beast’s day-long activity of running, leaping, and stalking.  The paradox of active attention is that the more it acquires, the more depleted it becomes.

Passive attention, on the other hand, is unfocused.  It is completely open awareness.  Like a blotter, it soaks up.  Like the open sky, it absorbs every cloud.  Like the open ocean, it absorbs every wave.  It is that which receives and, specifically, that which receives impressions.  This constant state of receiving results in a steady in-pouring, a limitless increasing, of energy.  It is as if innumerable torches were lit at noon—no matter how many torches were added to daylight, its capacity for brightness could never be exceeded.  The paradox of passive attention is that the more it empties itself, the more energy rushes in.

Active attention resists new awareness in the same way that someone who is always talking never hears what is being said.  Passive attention welcomes new awareness in the same way that the newborn are completely open to the undifferentiated world around them—or the way the ocean welcomes the inrushing river.  Or the night welcomes the morning light.

In general, most of us nowadays engage only in active attention, having forgotten that passive attention even exists.  This keeps us bottled up in the dualistic world view of subject-and-object and, therefore, closed off from a first-hand experience of the unitary nature of the Whole.

Passive attention makes conscious our subliminal awareness of the Whole, thereby granting us access to the source of awareness, creativity, insight, problem-solving, and belonging.  By enabling us to consciously sense the oneness of all things, passive attention brings us into harmony with the one intent of the Whole.  Harmonizing our individual intent with the one intent ranks among the most profound experiences of Nonresistance:  with time, we increasingly stop thinking of our personal needs, increasingly succeed at helping others identify and fulfill their hearts’ desire, and increasingly participate in the world with a sense of joyful belonging.  This last point is particularly telling, since it speaks to the connection between passive attention and the ecstatic life—a connection that is of great moment on the path of good fortune.

Passive attention awakens our awareness of the Whole, leading us out of resistance and into Nonresistance.

Nonresistance, in turn, harmonizes our individual intent with the one intent, awakening our inner power.

Inner power, in turn, allows us to accomplish things as if they were long-fated, removing all blocks to the ecstatic life.

This is a chain of spiritual cause-and-effect to which we will return in Part Seven of this course.

Exercise One—Sit quietly with eyes closed, breathing slowly and deeply from the abdomen.  Visualize yourself sitting in the middle of a clear stream, your hands folded in your lap, facing upstream.  As you gaze at the water coming toward you, you notice bits of debris, such as leaves and twigs, floating closer and then on past you.  Now occasionally a bit of debris floats close enough to you that it catches in the crook of your elbow, just large enough that it cannot pass where your arm rests against your torso.  Visualize yourself responding immediately by silently repeating to yourself, Pass Through, as you move your arm enough to let the small piece of flotsam continue its journey downstream.  Every few moments, another small piece of debris catches in the crook of one arm or the other, to which you respond immediately by silently repeating to yourself, Pass Through, as you move your arm enough to let the small piece of flotsam continue its journey downstream.  After practicing like this for a while, visualize yourself recognizing those currents that are consistently carrying the bits of debris which are catching on you.  Identify the bits of debris earlier and earlier that will catch on you, silently repeating Pass Through as you move your arm even before it catches on you,  After practicing like this for a while, visualize yourself sitting with your arms permanently held away from your body enough that nothing, not even the current, catches on you as you silently repeat the catch-phrase, Pass Through.  In practicing this exercise, it is important not to skip or rush through any of the steps in its progression.

Exercise Two—Sit quietly with eyes closed, breathing slowly and deeply from the abdomen.  Visualize yourself as an open window in an ancient stone wall that runs across a vast plateau ringed by mountains and crowned by clouds.  The wind blows this way and then that way, constantly shifting, rushing first from one side of the ancient wall and then from the other.  As the wind pours through you, first this way and then the other, silently repeat the catch-phrase, One.  After practicing this for a while, visualize the wind passing through you in one direction with each inhale and then shifting to pass through you in the opposite direction with each exhale.  With each inhale, silently repeat the catch-phrase, One. With each exhale, silently repeat the catch-phrase, One.

The practice of Nonresistance is the practice of Inner Nonresistance.  It is the cultivation of a more refined awareness that no longer clings to ideas, emotions, and memories in order to fabricate an artificial sense of self.  It is the stabilization of an awareness that allows thoughts, feelings, and memories to pass through it without catching on it.  It is the harmonizing of that awareness with the unitary nature of the World.  Because our reactions to events around us are based on the degree to which we can respond without preconceptions, we will lead a more fulfilling life if we can tap into the wisdom making up such an enduring part of the universality of human nature.

This should not be mistaken for political Nonresistance, which, as an ideological response to political repression and violence, carries into a situation an already-established set of responses.  While such an approach is unquestionably superior to its alternative in theory and nearly always in practice, the wisdom teachings are clear in pointing out that there are no fixed and certain guidelines in this world—wisdom has to be a living presence within us, the expressed ability to discover our own guidelines and create our own responses to each evolving situation.  It is in this way that wisdom grows toward its limitless potential with the arrival of each generation.

~

The above is an excerpt from The Spiritual Basis of Good Fortune by William Douglas Horden.

If you’d like to learn more, visit the website:  http://spiritualbasisofgoodfortune.com/

~

The Toltec I Ching, by Martha Ramirez-Oropeza and William Douglas Horden has just received a Silver Award in the 2010 Nautilus Awards.  It recasts the I Ching in the symbology of the Native Americans of ancient Mexico and includes original illustrations interpreting each of the hexagrams.  Its subtitle, 64 Keys to Inspired Action in the New World hints at its focus on the ethics of the emerging world culture.

Click here to go to the main site to see sample chapters, reviews and the link to Larson Publications for ordering the book.