Living Conscious Presence

Get Bob's New CD! - See his website for details on how to order it.

Words can only be a rough indication and language is mostly biased in dualistic notions.
Still, we need to talk about it, until it is seen clearly.
What is a ‘person’? - Is it not a psychological pattern of belief?
A ‘person’ has a ‘point of view’.
‘People’ argue over the meaning of ‘things’, words and 'points of view' and never realize the futility of such activities.
The basic undermining principle is that a ‘person’ is only a series of transitory points of view and they all depend entirely on the energy of belief.
- As soon as something else takes the attention away from one fixation, it vanishes, although a residue may hang about for awhile.
The ‘person’ cannot truly realize anything at all. (not popular news - downright unpopular!)
- It is just a pattern of belief and has no independence or power to realize anything in or of itself.

The so-called Advaita masters point directly beyond those conceptual realms of mind to the essential fact of conscious presence. - Their words are clear enough, although very few hear the essential message directly.
- Usually the mind grapples with re-arranging itself to accomodate things. - (No wonder we get exhausted by it all.)
A simple sentence, of the master, often says something extremely profound. - It is coming from a natural confidence and a natural view- from this living presence awareness.
- The seeker's personalized mind construct only registers the paradox of it because it is biased mind (me and other than me) it is dualistic.
- The clear empty space of knowing commonly called mind is apparently split by the self-centered fixation called ‘me’ and ‘other then me’. - That is the sense of separation, which seemingly limits the conscious presence to a realm of idea, concepts and thought patterns. - That is also an erroneous depiction because the empty space of knowing is not split or even touched by the content of mind.
A simple sentence can convey ‘the essential’ very clearly. - One in ten million may ‘see it’ directly.
It is only paradoxical for the psychological pattern called a ‘person’. - However, such simple sentences are in fact a ‘direct introduction’ or initiation through words and presence.
It may be helpful to see it like this:
A ‘person’ is a habitual psychological framework which is nothing but a series of recurring patterns made up of ideas, notions, images and driven by the energy of belief.
- Only when the energy of belief is abating are these ‘things’ ‘tasted’ for what they are.
- They can’t really be seen, as such, since they have no true existence.
The knowing essence beyond it all is not a person and never could be limited to any pattern, no matter what it may be made of, or appear as.
No pattern of energy is actually separate from the knowing essence.
Some call it Awakened Mind.
Seekers of such notions are immediately caught by their own projection of what they think that means. - Awakened Mind is for the seeker, just another ‘mouse trap’.
You may devote every hour of the day to the study of sacred scriptures and attempt to go into the so-called deepest meditative state of mind.
- You can attend a hundred silent retreats and do penance via hard physical labor and use all manner of spiritual disciplines and yet it will all amount to nothing at all. - Those who profess to have attained something are really deluding themselves.
- Such ones love the extra attention such proclaimed attainments bring from others because it gives a (false) validation to the beliefs.
See with Naked Awareness.
If the habitual mind activities, the belief patterns do not reveal themselves in a clear view, a clear taste, that you are not those ‘things’, then that habituated fixation of believing that you are a ‘person’, with all its heavy baggage, will not release its hold on the mind.

As the profundity of your own conscious presence, meets the direct ‘pointer’ of the master (a living stabilized conscious presence), then ‘the egg cracks’.
Even though the master points the way out of your conundrum, you must take the appropriate steps yourself – consciously! - That cannot be taught.
The ‘shell’ of separation falls away as the energy ceases to flow into old beliefs.
Conscious presence opens out into a living subtlety (beyond any description in words).
You may have read very good books on the subject, attended umpteen lectures, retreats and ‘done’ all kinds of spiritual activities and yet it seems that the ‘prize’ still alludes you.
Why is that so?
So often, it is unrealistic fanciful notions of a ‘spiritual self’ that is the ‘problem’.
All fanciful spiritual self-images are just a feeding on fantasy and it is an old appetite. Such self-images often include a wanting to be seduced into paradise.
- How many times has one been convinced into believing that one has arrived?
- Only to find that it all dissipates into thin air as the relentless seeking returns.
The clear emptiness of an unmediated knowing, conscious presence is most often too short lived. - It is interrupted by the restless mind, which wants to return to the habitual terrain.
- So it is felt to be threatening.
The habitual patterns of belief must be broken.
Those sweet speaking spiritual teachers only induce more delusions.
- It is no doubt seductive and not unlike other ‘drugs’ with the addiction to ‘getting a fix’ and the ever renewed promise of ‘a future time of deliverance’.
Wishy-Washy spiritual notions will never cut the crap away.
- They only put more icing on the cake.
Harsh words, cutting words can strike like a Zen Masters Bamboo stick.
Those habitual belief patterns must be shaken lose. - They must be seen clearly and I must know with a cutting directness with no doubt that I am not those patterns.