72 Centered

As we meditate and go through our day how do we keep from getting lost in our dramas. It is easy to escape through our daydreams, thoughts, wallowing in our emotions, relational drama, etc. It is one thing to be aware of our dramas and it is another to be captured in our dramas. How can we be in this world but not of it? Enjoying everything yet being attached to nothing. How can we stay in our center?

These podcasts are a compilation of what I have found to be the most helpful over the last 50 years on my path of awakening. I feel these podcasts are most powerful when listened to in sequence from podcast one forward because each is built on the last. They, also, stand on their own. Since we are each different, if anything does not resonate, please disregard it and follow your heart. All my podcasts are here and free.
Though I am a psychotherapist, these podcasts are offered to be spiritually helpful and are not psychotherapy. Please reach out to a psychotherapist if needed.

Transcript

Hello, This is William Cooper. Welcome to Awakening Together, Relaxing into Happiness. I trust you're doing well. In the last two podcasts, We've been talking about your radiance, The oneness that flows through your incarnation, And as you melt away, That which makes your personality, Those blocks melt away and you flow radiantly. The best way to do that is to be as you are. Your radiant well-being, Your radiant aura, Your energy field is flowing through you just as strongly as it did Buddha and as it did Jesus, And what yours looks like is how your karma has shaped it. So it might not even seem radiant to you. It might seem like pain and hurt with some radiance or who knows what, But whatever your world is, That's your radiance, And you'll notice that pain has a certain intensity, A certain radiance. It's just twisted into something sharp that hurts, But it is radiant. So one of the best ways to work with all of this is to let it melt. You stay connected to your infinite self, The oneness, And just connect to everything in the world, Including objects of pain that are inside of you, And your thoughts are objects. We've talked about that in the past. Your emotions are objects. Some of them are painful, Some of them are not, But even objects that are not painful, Say you've created happiness, That isn't true happiness. It's sort of positive thinking happiness. You've created a feeling, But it's not really a flow that comes from beyond. It's just you wanted to cheer yourself up perhaps, So you've created a happy feeling. That's an object just like creating pain is an object. We're full of these objects. So the best way to release our radiance, In my opinion, Is just be connected because that's what we are really. We're connected all the time, And be present to that, Be present to our connection. Socrates said, An unexamined life is not worth living. In that sense, The connection, Our connection to everything is our examined life. Awareness is curative. We are connecting. We are aware of everything going on within us and around us. So that requires no movement, No thought, No emotion. It's simply awareness, Being aware of all the objects of all of creation. Creation is an object. It's a collection of lots of objects. So we connect to it all. Awareness is curative, And so as we connect to it all, It all melts, And it melts into that which it's made of, Love, Well-being, Peace, Happiness, Joy. The problem is if we try to do something, We have to create a personality which is doing that thing, And there is no us. So the deepest posture is to do nothing except to be aware, And in that awareness, You don't block things out. Therefore, You connect. Our natural posture is always one of connection, So we're in essence stopping doing an action that we previously did, And what that action was and is is disconnection. It's blocking. We're actively taking the effort to repress and block out things. So in full awareness, We stop doing that. We simply connect, And maybe some of that connection is a connection to our habit of blocking things. Maybe we can't stop blocking things instantly, But at least we can be connected to our habit of blocking. So, Flowing from our infinite awareness through connection to all objects, Including our personality, Our emotions, Our thoughts. The tricky thing about all this is, When we connect to our habits, Our emotions and thoughts, Often we get sucked into them. It's not simply that we're connecting to them as an energy and letting them radiate and expend their energy. We might start by doing that, But often, Because it's such an addiction to get involved in them, We get sucked in them. We can be watching them, Aware of them, And then suddenly we're lost in them. It's one thing to be connected to, For instance, The urge to think about going to the shopping center, The grocery store. Aware of that urge, We're aware of the thoughts happening about going to the grocery store. It's another thing when we get lost in those thoughts, Thinking, Oh yeah, And then I'll go down the first aisle, And I'll look here, And oh, I have to remember doing this, And I have to remember doing that, And I need to pick up this, And I need to pick up that at the grocery store. That's me getting lost in that which I previously was observing. And when I get lost in it, Now I have been engulfed in what's called maya, Or delusion. I'm lost in a world of fantasy that I've created in my head, Instead of simply watching these things so that they can expend their energy. Now because I'm lost in them, I'm fortifying them and giving them my energy so they stay frozen within me and become more intricate and deeper. That's the nature of the addiction of maya. We get lost in it. So it's very difficult to simply be aware of your thoughts, Aware of our emotions, Isn't it? Have you noticed that in meditation? We want to be aware of them, And suddenly we're lost in them. Well, How can we prevent that? How can we stay connected to our beingness, That which is aware, And not get lost in our thoughts and emotions? There are many techniques, And those are typically what we think of as spiritual practices. I'll list some, And you can find some or invent some that work for you. Let's start with conscious languaging. In conscious languaging, We connect to the peace within, And when we truly find that peace, Or that love, Or that radiance, Or that happiness, Or that joy, Our true nature, Peace or quiet or silence, When we find that, Perhaps it's in the midst of lots of other inner noises or outer noises, But when we find the true quiet, The true silence, Or the true joy, Or any of those things I mentioned, In order to stay connected, We might just occasionally repeat from that place, That word, Like if it's joy, Inner joy, That I'm truly feeling in the moment, I connect to it, And then perhaps every so often I'll just say to myself, Joy, And that reminds me to stay connected, Joy, Or peace, Peace, Peace, Or if I'm feeling love, Love, Love, Love. That's one of the qualities to remind us to keep us present and not getting lost in the maya, In the emotions or the drama. We'll just say the quality of that which we're connecting to, Peace, Or love, Or wellness, Or whatever it is for you, Happiness, Light, Radiance, We'll say that word, And that keeps us connected to our oneness. So we are less apt to get lost because we've got that centering that's going in this word that we keep saying. In conscious languaging we might make a sentence, We might go, I am love, I am experiencing love, I am peace, I am experiencing peace, Any of these, Or any other version that feels right to you. That's conscious languaging. You're languaging from your deepest self and it's a clear labeling of what you are experiencing so it opens you up. You can feel it, I am peace, I am peace, And it keeps you connected so you don't get lost in the maya. Mantras are like that but in a shortened version often. So I started off with the example when I was talking about conscious languaging of saying something like light, Light, Or peace, Peace. These are not sentences, They're just words and they can be very connecting. That's what mantras are often, Just words. But they can also be sentences like conscious languaging is a sentence often. And conscious languaging can just be words, They're all kind of the same thing or could be looked at it that way. For instance, A Sanskrit mantra would be om nama shivaya. Om is the sound of the universe. Nama is literally na, Not, Ma, Me. And shivaya is Shiva, That's one of the incarnations of the infinite, The oneness. And so there are many translations of this but om, The universal sound, Shiva, God, Not me. I disappear, There is no personality, There is no me, There is only Shiva, God has become me. And we've talked about that in other podcasts, God becoming me. I fall away and there's only God. There's not me and God, It's me as God or God as me, I should say. Or another thought that I like is you can't see God because God is the one doing the seeing. So there is no me. Om nama shivaya. Another way of translation would be, I bow to God and in that bowing, I let go of my ego, I let go of the illusion of my personality and I end up in the same way. There is no me, God has become me because I let go into God. Om nama shivaya. When you talk about Sanskrit mantras, They get a little bit more intricate on many, Many levels. One level for instance is in that mantra, Om nama shivaya, It has the sounds of na, Ma, Shivaya, Na, And those have the vibration of earth, Water, Fire, Air, And ether. So you actually vibrate in a way that opens up these various aspects of you. And so that is what many people say is the value of, Or one of the values of repeating a Sanskrit mantra. It's probably true, In fact I'm sure it is, But it's on such a subtle level, I wouldn't get lost in that. I think it's more powerful to be authentic to yourself rather than get lost in Sanskrit or some other language, Which you can do, And if you're pulled to do it, I definitely would do it, And if you go to India, You definitely will be doing that, But as a start, I would just be connected to yourself. I am love. I am peace. Using the language that you use regularly. If you speak French, Speak French. If you speak English, Speak English. I just wanted to explain some of the deeper aspects of mantras, But the most powerful and direct aspect of a mantra or conscious languaging is that by repeating something that comes from your deepest place, That you feel, That comes from your oneness, You're more apt to stay centered there as you observe that which is melting away in front of you, As you observe your thoughts, Your emotions, As you're aware of them. And just like ice cubes in the hot sun, They can begin to melt away. So that's the value of mantras. Ramana, A deeply enlightened saint that we've talked about, He's from Tarav Anomali and that's where I normally go when I go to India. I've been to many places in India, But this place I've settled in because it's so, So powerful. But what he talked about, He said, Use any spiritual practice that's helpful for you, Whatever calls or speaks to you. But as you deepen, Use it less overtly. For instance, Mantras, You might start with saying them out loud, Om Namah Shivaya, Om Namah Shivaya, Om Namah Shivaya. But then as you deepen, As you're staying connected to your oneness, You might say it silently, Om Namah Shivaya, But silently. Or you might bring it to a whisper and then the next step might be silently. And then the next step might be to repeat it once every minute instead of once every three seconds, Because you're already connecting to the oneness until you just let it go all together and you simply be. You simply stay connected to the oneness and the oneness is your mantra. That's your centering energy, Is your soul, Is your being. So you stay connected to your being and that's your mantra. And from your being, You simply connect to all things. The advantage of that is, First of all, That's all that's required to be in life. That's the most real posture you can have instead of inventing a personality that needs to chant mantras in order to keep you focused, In order to connect with who you are, In order not to have to do that. Well, At this point, You're not having to do that. So you just kind of go direct and you just be yourself. You are yourself always. And even the things that don't seem to be harmonious, Like emotions that are running counter to the nature of your being, Emotions of separation, Hurt, Fear and anger, Even as you connect to them, They are a part of the whole and they always have been. So you're just connected to them naturally and they will reorient to you as oneness. Awareness is curative. They will relax, Release and flow from your being nature rather than through the nature of separation, Which is hurt, Fear and anger. So they'll reorient. Your whole personality will reorient naturally. So these are a couple of examples, Conscious languaging, Mantras that you can use to keep yourself connected to your beingness as you simply observe and experience and connect to thoughts and emotions as they melt and open up. You may find other spiritual practices that you find more compelling that help you do the same thing. So do those. The point is, Once they've done their job and you're starting to need them less and less, Let them wind down until it's just everything as it is. No movement needed. Any movement is too much. Any doing is too much. You just are. Radiant. Whole. Your true self. OK, I've enjoyed it. I look forward to the next time we get together. Take care. Bye.

Reviews

I always appreciate that you always mention do what works for you. I have tried mantras so many times and they don’t speak to me and I don’t feel them. I do feel the words we say when we go through the chakras. And the other word that really helps me connect to or feel the divine is, Yahweh. But saying it in the ancient way… Using breath to say it. that’s a powerful word for me. 💕🌹✨🌈♥️💕🌹✨🌈♥️💕🌹✨

Oh I love the cross-cultural discussion in this podcast. I have Orthodox and Hindi clients and Shiva is important in both cultures. ❤️ Thank you for the open and kind and multi-cultural way you introduce concepts. What a way to be! ✨

Reassuring and encouraging. Thank you.

Excellent William! Thank you so much. I look forward to the next one.
Be well!
~ Jennifer

Thank you 🙏