Taking Off Overcoats Introduction and Table of Contents
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Introduction seeker of truth follow no path all paths lead where truth is here e. e. cummings The Time of Awakening is Now It's a powerful time on planet Earth. Millions of souls are in the process of awakening. In the beginning, awakening souls may feel restless, or disillusioned, or inquisitive, or deeply confused. Some have been thrust into the messy process of awakening when their worlds imploded. Jobs lost, relationships over, money gone. A huge heartbreak may have catapulted others into the throes of the meltdown that often begins the process of waking up. Some feel compelled to leave their current life pattern in order to follow a dream that may seem wildly impractical, but cannot be denied. Others have an inner hunch that more is possible, but are not sure what to do next. Many seek a more meaningful life, a way of being based in eternal values, not current trends. Whatever our outer circumstances, there comes a point in the journey through all our lifetimes when we somehow know there is something more. The ways awakening unfolds vary, but the underlying dynamics are the same. We begin to sense that there is more to life than the outer level of reality would indicate. And that we are far more than the being we see in the mirror. Often, the journey inward is catalyzed by suffering. Wondering if there is a deeper meaning to our earthly dilemmas and struggles, we explore spiritual paths and practices. We seek understanding, and hope to find wisdom. Most of all, we want to experience more love and greater peace. In short, we know that it is time to awaken out of the nightmare of suffering. Even if we are not yet sure of what that even means. What Do We Mean by Awakening? In this book, we discuss awakening in a simple, easy-to-grasp way. For us, awakening consists of two mutually reinforcing processes: 1) Releasing our identification with who and what we are not, which allows us to 2) Experience more of who and what we truly are. Some describe this as the fundamental shift from seeing ourselves as the egoic, human self to realizing we are a divine, eternal soul. The problem with this approach is that many of us have turned against the ego, believing it is bad and must be eradicated if we are to awaken. This sets up an adversarial relationship that only gets in the way of awakening. For this reason, we prefer to use different language for what is essentially the same process. Rather than focusing on the ego, we will be talking about overcoats. Since most humans have never heard awakening discussed in terms of overcoats, the chances are good that you carry few, if any, negative associations about that term. This allows you to approach awakening from a neutral, open-minded standpoint. That can only help the process to unfold with greater ease and grace. Is Awakening For You? Many spiritual seekers believe that fully awakening in this lifetime is for the few, not the many. Living in an awakened state may sound great, but seem impossible. Compared to learning earthly skills, awakening may seem complicated and obscure. Some seekers have tried to read spiritual books, only to find them hard to fathom or relate to. Others believe awakening is difficult. Their minds may be filled with beliefs like It takes a long time and It requires a lot of effort. It may seem that awakening demands decades of arduous spiritual practice. But you know what? None of that is necessarily true. This book was written for all who know that now is the time to awaken. It is for those who are brave enough to imagine that awakening doesn't need to be complicated or take forever. It was written for souls who know deep inside that if they want to awaken, they must be ready for that to happen. We do not need to get a Ph.D in spiritual studies before it can begin to occur. We are ready to awaken when we glimpse the possibility that we are meant to be happy, not to suffer our way through life. In fact, that awareness means that awakening is already underway. How This Book will Best Support Your Awakening This book was written to facilitate your awakening. It presents a simple, effective way to use your “stuff” — whatever is going on within you and in your life — as a doorway to awakening. If you are willing to show up with What Is — now, and now, and now -- this book will help you to use anything that is present as a springboard to awakening. This is an experiential book. It offers a step-by-step, sequential, integrated journey into awakening. You will not only read about awakening — you will be an active participant in your own unique process of awakening. It can be helpful to keep a notebook or journal nearby as you make your way through each chapter. Writing about what happens within you as you travel through the book can expedite and enhance your awakening. This is not a book to randomly dip into or skip around in. It will most fully support your awakening when it is read and contemplated from start to finish. Complete the entire journey, one chapter at a time. Celebrate the awakenings that occur all along the way. Then, if you like, you can return to specific chapters to delve more deeply into specific topics. To Get What is Here, Slow Down Since there is a lot of white space around the words in this book, it might be tempting to read it quickly. But rushing through the book is not advised. It is meant to be slowly savored and absorbed over time. Although most of the sentences are short and simple, a lot of evolutionary stimulation is packed into each one. More opportunities for awakening are hidden between the lines, in the quiet spaces where shifts happen. The purpose of Taking Off Overcoats is not to fill your mind with yet more information. It has a far more significant purpose than that. Reading this book is intended to activate your divine Self, and to spark your awareness of who you truly are. Taking Off Overcoats contains a living transmission of the energy and consciousness of awakening. Resist the temptation to speed-read the book, or that transmission may not have a chance to land within you. Instead, approach Taking Off Overcoats with the unhurried spaciousness that is present in the book's layout. Read this book in the same way you would take a quiet walk by a stream. Imagine it's a long, Sunday afternoon with nothing else to do and no place else to be. You have all the time in the world to savor everything you are feeling, seeing, and sensing within as you read. Let the messages encoded within and between the words reveal themselves at their own pace. As you travel through these pages, the inner process of awakening will be occurring. Often, awakening may be happening beneath or beyond your conscious awareness. From time to time, you may need to put the book down for a while, so that the next steps in your awakening can take place. You will know when it is time to pick it up again and keep reading. This is how you honor your own unique pace and process of waking up. Experiences of Awakening Taking Off Overcoats contains a wealth of guided, inner Experiences designed to catalyze awakening. You can download MP3 recordings of each Experience on our website. The title of each Experience is also a link to this web page. Written directions are also included for readers without internet access. As you come to each Experience, approach it slowly. Not much will happen if you merely read the Experience. Since many of the Experiences are short, it may be tempting to quickly read them and keep on going. If you give the Experience just a few moments of your time, you will merely skim the surface of your awareness. This is not likely to yield any very significant realizations about yourself. Instead, allow plenty of time to drop into your inner world and be present with everything that is going on inside of you during each Experience. When we drop below the thinking mind, we become aware of everything else that is happening within us. We discover bodily sensations, emotions, memories, and “unfinished business” -- all of which want our attention. This is the stuff of awakening. We cannot gloss over it and expect to become more self-aware. Give whatever arises all the time it wants and needs. This is how we nurture our own process of awakening. Engaging with the Experiences over time will help you to tell the difference between the voices of who you are not -- the voices of your overcoats — and the “still, small voice” of your soul. Then you can choose which voice you want to listen to, instead of being run by the language of suffering. As you read this book and work with the Experiences, you will come to know, through your own direct experience, that the Divine lives within you as your true Self. You will experience yourself as a soul, a radiant being of light with a purpose for being here that no other soul can fulfill. Be Gentle with Yourself The inner Experiences in Taking Off Overcoats are designed to help you integrate and embody the material in each chapter. As you dive into these Experiences, beware of the mind's tendency to judge what happens. Or what doesn't seem to be happening. The mind may even conclude that you are “failing.” You may also come up against resistance. A particular inner process may not seem easy or pleasant. It may even take you into inner recesses of pain that a part of you would rather not face. The mind may want to judge the Experience itself or make it wrong. This isn't working, the mind might insist. It may even loudly complain, I don't like this! Do your best to observe these thoughts without giving them any power or reality. Believing such ideas is optional, and not recommended. Instead, keep in mind that the outer world is a noisy, chaotic place. It is full of complex drama and blaring stimulation. Since this is where most of us habitually focus our attention, when we turn our awareness inward we may conclude that not much is happening. In contrast to the outer world of the senses, the inner realm of the soul is quiet and subtle. Its depth and stillness may seem unfamiliar, and might feel strange or empty. It may seem that something is missing. Or, emotions that have waited a long time for your attention may roar to the surface. The mind may try to convince you that this couldn't possibly be a good thing. Yet coming to know what lives within us is an essential aspect of awakening. Give yourself an all-important gift: drop any and all expectations and invite each Experience to be exactly as it wants to be. Let it take you wherever you need to go next in your journey of awakening. Trust that in every moment, you are always having the experience you are meant to have. The experience you need to have -- or it wouldn't be happening. And all of it is a part of your awakening. If you seem unable to experience a process, imagine that you are. Either way, your awareness expands. Awakening is not a race, and there is no finish line to reach before anyone else gets there. We’re all in this together. Whatever one of us realizes immediately becomes easier for the rest of us to become aware of. Like flowers in a garden, each of us blooms when we’re ready. When we reach the moment when it is time to blossom, nothing can stop that from happening. Contents Introduction PART ONE The Essence of Awakening 1 The Story 1 2 Can Awakening Really Be This Simple? 3 3 What Awakening Is — and Isn’t 11 4 Are Overcoats Inevitable? 13 5 Self and Not-Self 17 6 Overcoats R Us — Or Are They? 25 PART TWO The Foundations of Awakening 7 Opening to the Divine 33 8 Sparks of God 41 9 The Limitless Love, Intelligence, and Power of the One 47 10 Surrender 55 11 Grace 67 12 The Power of Love 73 13 Being Present with What Is 83 14 Our “Stuff” is not IN the way—it IS the Way 91 15 No Truth, No Reality, No Power 101 PART THREE The Anatomy of Our Overcoats 16 The Veils that Obscure the True Self 109 17 Bodily Sensations 117 18 Emotions 119 19 Fear 135 20 The Contents of the Mind 143 21 Judgments 151 22 Helplessness and Hopelessness 167 PART FOUR A Simple, Loving Approach to Taking Off Overcoats 23 Breathe, Feel, Witness, and Turn it Over to God 179 24 Breathe 183 25 Feel Sensations 195 26 Feel Emotions 205 27 Witness 219 28 Turn it Over to God 227 PART FIVE Taking Off Overcoats 29 Become Aware of An Overcoat Removal Opportunity 239 30 Breathe, Feel, Witness, and Turn it Over to the Divine 245 31 Drop into the Breath 251 32 Bodily Sensations 255 33 Emotions 259 34 Fears 265 35 The Contents of the Mind 269 36 Judgments 277 37 Turn it ALL Over 293 38 Forgiveness 297 39 When Overcoats Do Not Come Off 303 40 The No-Fail Spiral of Awakening 307 41 Neti, Neti 311 PART SIX The Divine Self Revealed: Experiencing Who We Really Are 42 The True Self 317 43 Moving Toward the True Self 321 44 Directly Experiencing the True Self 325 Endnotes Acknowledgements Afterword |