Barry Long - 4 - Final notes in the Myth of Life series - Habits, Thought, Life, Karma, Death, Love, Relationship, Prayer, Consciousness, I-am.

 

The Law of Life - Karma

This recording deals with:

• Honesty, and radical self-honesty of one's inner state and emotional state. An evolution of consciousness (in terms of maturity of understanding and being aware of one's inner state) is talked about, and how that initiates a direct understanding of how life and the law of karma works. 
• There is some talk towards the end of the recording about the mechanics of "reincarnation", which is rather unique with BL's teaching, and equates to a continuance of ignorance only versus the dying to the moment in the now by understanding the truth of one's being. 
• The idea of individuals being free rather than a mass awakening is discussed. This idea also appeared in Gurdjieff's teaching, and BL may have developed this idea from there. By "individual", BL also refers to the beingness itself, as opposed to the person, personality and body, which cease at death.
• The main takeaways here are to cultivate a radical self-honesty, know when one is being true to one's inner state and life situation, rather than covering up the truth and living a life based on automatism and habit for the sake of safety and egoic comfort. The rewards for doing so are a deeper understanding of the "law of life" and a dissolving of ignorance that perpetuates itself in time and existence.

Seeing through Death

This recording deals with:

• The truth of death, misunderstandings about death, "death is a dead body" and the errors of equating life and the individual with a body only, and the consequences of society's choice in removing death and dead bodies from daily life and people's experience.
• The main takeaways here are the differentiation between the body, mind, and life itself (which does not die), and correcting the errors in beliefs around death, dying and the emotional pain of grief.
• Love is also mentioned, and the act of cultivating love between parties well before death arrives, so that we are able to understand and deal with death both personally and around us when the time inevitably arrives.

How to Stop Thinking

This recording follows on from the Meditation recording and should be listened to after that recording. It deals with:

• The consequences of the unquestioned habit of thinking, continual thought, and its source, which is an entity consisting of past experience, pain and conditioning but endowed with life that has given it the ability to take over conscious living.
• Lessons in stopping the habitual action of thinking. There are 10 lessons, that range from becoming more aware of when and how the 'thinker' entity takes control of the mind/situation, to understanding how emotion and pain lead directly to thinking and bypassing.
• The best part of this recording is that by listening and practicing along with the recording in terms of attending, feeling inside, and not thinking, then the listener actually experiences what it is like to stop thinking and maintain an aware, mindful state of being (at least for the duration of the recording, which should carry over after the recording is finished, and deepen on repetition).

Making love

This recording follows on from the Living Joyously (Being Behind The Mask) recording and should be listened to after that recording. It deals with:

Barry's creative ideas and philosophy around how men and women began in creation and how "love making" fits in with the means to awaken

Advice on making relationships (man/woman) more loving, honest, and in particular focusing on sexual intimacy

Note- there's some odd material, probably even way off track, in this recording.. especially Barry's views around the badness or selfishness of celibacy and the need for everyone to get a partner and start making love appropriately. Let's face it, sexual union with a partner isn't cut out for everyone, just as celibacy isn't cut out for everyone. I feel BL went a little off track with this, although it's obvious he was appealing to the audience at the time of writing and what he thought people were in need of.

On the good side, this recording does bring to one's attention how unconscious and emotionally charged we all are when in relationship, and in particular, the differing needs between men and women while in relationship. If anything, it brings some attention to being mindful and aware of what's giong on during and outside of sexual union.

A prayer for life

This recording follows on from the 'About Death' recording and should be listened to after that recording. It deals with:

• The common idea of prayer, and the issues and problems it has created in the world today collectively and for individuals
• Wrong prayer, and how the person/ego uses prayer to implement its own desires, craving and ignorance
• Right prayer, and what this involves, including examples of how right prayer would work and sound
• Guidance on the inner work around 'right prayer'

Essentially, Barry Long reframes prayer from the usual mental focus on goals, even altruistic ones, into a form of inner awareness or inner alignment with being, life, and surrender. Some of these ideas occur in Gurdjieff's teachings on the behaviour of the masses, gain and loss, planetary influence and how man's automatic behaviour and lack of consciousness have wrought conflict and disharmony throughout the world.

The "right prayer" sounds a lot like mindfulness of one's intentions, and aligns with his teachings of being conscious of one's inner sensations, feelings, and alignment with 'life' and 'being'. Overall, this is a good recording, and can be used with the meditation series and as a daily practice in affirming one's surrender of the destructive personality in favour of being, life, and flowing with our true nature.

A Journey into Consciousness

This recording is the last recording in the series along with "Who am I?". It deals with:

• The origins of man's existence and the cosmic nature of life
• The start of the 'spacesuit' or the human body and how this evolved along with the unexpected problems that came about with its use and identification, particularly with the emergence of the past and time
• Advice of resolving the problems above, and how to orient oneself in order to make sense of the mind, body and world that one finds oneself in
• Eternity, the present moment and how this is constantly bypassed by the mind that escapes into time, past and future.

A key point in this recording is the idea of the body being a vehicle to house the cosmic intelligence or 'life' that we are. By rightly orienting oneself in the body, but knowing oneself as life, or consciousness, or being, then one is able to live rightly in the present.

Who am I?

This recording is the last recording in the series. It deals with:

• One's true identity as "I" or "I am", and how this has constantly been covered over or erroneously oriented due to the mind's lack of logic and disoriented use of language
• Rightly orienting oneself as "I" and "I am" in daily life, and undoing the tendency to project one's "I" outward onto external objects rather than know one's "I" as the subject

There are many good points in this recording, and it attempts to deliver an experience along the lines of what Gurdjieff would call "self-remembering", and advaita teachers such as Nisargadatta called the "I am".

"Wisdom and where to find it" (book of transcripts from 1969)

This is an interesting book if you are interested in Barry Long's early career starting off from as far back as 1969. This book is a collection of various transcripts given in the UK to a small audience of seekers (presumably in response to an advert). The talks are around various topics and questions related to becoming more conscious, less habitual and how to relate to others and the world. Some of the advice is very specifically aimed at the person asking the question, so will be of limited use to those reading the book decades later.

Barry mentions teachers in the book such as Gurdjieff and Krishnamurti (alive at the time), and those teachings clearly come through in the talks given by Barry at this time. There's some mention of a sort of 'mystic death' experience that Barry had in India prior to coming out at a teacher in the 70s (or even 1969). The details of this event are a little vague, and I've not found much written on the actual experience in BL's books. This book has a vibe of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky's philosophy with a bit of Krishnamurti rebelliousness thrown in. Barry seems sincere in addressing the audience at this time.

There's some good parts in this book, being those on self-observation and habit breaking. There's also a lot of philosophy as well which sounds much like Ouspensky's content. Later Barry moved into a totally different direction with emotional work, relationships, sexual union, and mindfulness, which is a good direction to proceed. Eckhart Tolle probably took the best parts out of Barry's teachings, and used those in his simplified approach.

Still, Barry does have some interesting creative content in his later teachings, particularly around the origins of man, the psyche and why emotional work is important, as well as the basics of entering back into the body as a valid means for awakening.

Some of the best recordings in terms of being useful for personal awakening and inner work are- "Start Meditating Now", "How to stop thinking", "A prayer for life", "A Journey into Consciousness", and "Who am I?". Those in relationships could do with listening to "Making Love", if only to become aware of how unconscious behaviour and emotionality affect our close relationships with the other gender with whom we are in close relationship with.

Barry Long - 3 - The being behind the mask - notes

 

The 3rd book in the Myth of Life series is "How to live joyously" and consists of two parts- 'The being behind the mask' and 'The law of life - Karma'.

Here's a few notes on the first part of that book or course, which is "The Being Behind the Mask".

This teaching lecture goes for around 60 minutes and deals with the difference between what BL calls the 'personality' and 'being'. It details the issues that have arisen with the mistaking of personality to be one's self, and then goes on to detail one's true nature of 'being'. It also deals with nature's remedy for the descent of man into the physical world, how this works for animals (but not man), and some other courses of action one can take in remedying this abnormal situation, which is the cause of maladies both personal and worldly. Finally, it gives 10 tips or pieces of advice with the aim of conserving energy and stopping the leakage of vital energy needed to conduct the work in setting things 'right' again within and without. Examples include ceasing voluntary but aimless activity, talk, pandering to the personality etc.

It starts with a parable or fable about a man (existing at a prior time when man and woman were not so attached to bodily form) who comes into possession with something novel, being an amazing mask (representing the fabricated personality), that becomes the source of much excitement and pleasure out in the world, but ultimately ends up becoming a source of pain and suffering due to habit and identification. At the same time, the loss of one's knowledge of one's self as the real identity and source of joy also adds to the catastrophe of man (and woman) having totally identified with the mask. The fable does have a happy ending, but you'll need to listen to the whole story in order to gain some appreciation for the problem and the solution.

The advice given towards the end of the lecture is helpful in terms of immediate practical actions one can take to save energy and reduce stress. There is no direct practice given here around mindfulness of the body or going back to the energy field of the body as an anchor- which was adviced in the previous two recordings. This lecture is more about discriminating between the false self, the personality, versus the real self or being behind the mask. 

The lecture as a whole fits in with the previous 2 lectures in terms of naming the personality as yet another manifestation of the previously mentioned 'thinker' and 'pygmy', which are both accumulations of past pain, emotion and fabricated self-ing.

There is some subtle use of pointing towards one's beingness or conscious presence that exists prior to the 'personality' and indeed IS one's true nature. But there is not direct or implicitly pointing out of this fact at this stage in the series (which is the main aim of the last recording in the series).

Barry Long - 2 - Notes and "Start Meditating Now" book and audio.

 

The first book or audio in the "Myth of Life" series is "Start Meditating Now". This is a fitting start for the series, and it's refreshing to find a purely practical teaching at the start, which sets some foundation for actually experiencing the points and philosophy that Barry Long puts forth throughout the rest of the parts in the series, and indeed future talks. Contrast this to a lot of teachers that give a heap of philosophy and theory up front, then at some point find the need or call to deliver a practical means of experiencing that to their audience. Both theory and practice should be one whole.

Start Meditating Now

The basic meditation itself is similar to a body scan / vipassana scanning routine, though it is purely around the inner subtle sensations within parts of the body, rather than gross sensations.

There are 5 points in this lecture that goes for around 1.5 hours.

(A) The actual meditation process and instructions

- The what and why

- Posture, set up, initial breathing yoga (similar to HA breathing, or tan tien breathing)

- Attention within the body, directed to between the eyebrows (a classic point of focus)

- Attention to the subtle energy sensations in the hands, face, lower body, upper body parts

- Entering into stillness once the body scan has been done, or returning for a repeated cycle

- Returning to inner feeling, body anchoring as much as possible outside meditation

(B) Releasing tension in the body and in attending to sights and sounds

(C) Dropping inner bodily tension and emotional tension into the lower abdomen

(D) Resting in stillness

(E) General tips and advice outside formal sitting sessions

- Habit of mind curiosity

- How the mind becomes distracted by hooks

- Ceasing unnecessary and nervous related bodily activity

- Ceasing thinking automatically about past and future events, memories etc.

--

Overall, it's a nice routine and a complete set of instructions and guidelines around establishing a meditation habit. A couple of points could probably be developed more, such as coming out of the meditation session (for some reason this seems to  have been omitted), and also a little more on integrating the formal meditative experience into times outside of formal sitting. Otherwise, done repeatedly, this lecture would yield good results over the long term.

Some quotes:

“Unless you intend to act, there’s no excuse whatsoever for thinking, and certainly not brooding.”

"Meditation is discovering what you are now. Not what you have been or what you think you are, but what you are now."

"Meditation is a process of self-unfoldment and can't be rushed."

"Why do you need to meditate? To know yourself. Why do you need to know yourself? Because what you are at present, what you think you are, is not yourself."

"Meditation is the art of entering your own unconscious.. where your true self lies is inside your body. It is a place of extraordinary stillness and creativity."

"When you're sitting doing nothing, your mind tends to wander all over the place.. the mind has gotten into the wandering habit and you've probably never thought to stop it.. stopping thinking is a gradual process and not an easy one."

"Finally, you will have to master the subtle, unsconscious thinker that has been controlling your mind for so long without your realising it."

Barry Long

Barry Long - 1 - General notes on his teachings and content

Barry Long was an Australian spiritual teacher in the 70s to the early 2000s and presents a mixture of teachings but in a cohesive whole. He draws on techniques and traditions from Buddhism, Tantra, Gurdjieff Work, Krishnamurti, and much of his content seems to have been created by BL himself.

Barry Long is an excellent 'next step' after exploring the teachings of Eckhart Tolle (for example) or similar surface level teachings that don't provide much structure apart from attending satsangs and talks. Barry Long influenced an enormous amount of ET's teachings, for instance, and some of the concepts are pretty much word for word or have been substituted with a new label (e.g. Barry Long's concept of 'the pygmy' was translated into Eckhart Tolle's concept of the 'pain body', which of course is a bit more palatable and politically correct nowadays).

Barry Long is relatively unknown as a teacher, and doesn't have the wide audience appeal that many of the more charismatic teachers have. Time is also getting on, and there aren't too many new people taking up his teachings, and some of the older students have moved on elsewhere.

That said, one of the BEST spiritual DIY courses that I've come across happens to be Barry Long's "Myth of Life" series. It's a superb and brilliant DIY set of audio teachings that covers pretty much all bases that one would want or need in a spiritual path. Topics covered in the series include meditation, stopping habitual thinking, mindfulness, love and emotions, sexuality and sexual union, somatic experiencing with emotions, self-enquiry and self-remembering, and the use of storytelling in an attempt to impart some self-awareness on the listener regarding the unconscious plight that humankind now finds itself trapped in.

I'll be going through this series over the next few posts. The series can be listened to and studied and used practically for a while, even years, and still yield benefits over time. It's a little unfortunate that this series was pretty much a one-hit-wonder, and some of BL's later talks, lectures and focus seemed to move off the early material in works such as the "Myth of Life" series, and onto more mundane topics such as love and relationships between men and women, integrity, and emotional management... which is all dealt with in the Series too, but the overall focus is that of liberation and mastery of the self.. which again doesn't appeal to the wider audience as much as talk above love, relationships, emotions, and life situations.

I'll leave this here for now and continue on with the next post on Book 1, Part 1 of the Myth of Life series.

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Eckhart Tolle - Some further notes and recommendations for approaching his teachings - The Power of Now and related teachings.

 

Here are some further notes on Eckhart Tolle's material and teachings. I'm writing this for those attacted to his teachings, and the introductory ideas expressed in his books, talks and audio sessions. There are some who may stay with Eckhart's teachings for quite some time, or indefinately, others may receive the inner guidance to move on however, to deeper work and more thorough teachings and approaches to 'enlightenment' outside of what Eckhart teaches.

Key issues and things to note:

- Eckhart does a great job in all his books, talks, lectures etc. in detailing the issues around thinking, self-ing, conceptualising, and habitually thinking about the past and future. He also does a great job in examining how the ego works, the "pain body", and personal and social issues in general as a result of this. HOWEVER, the solutions that he provides are just too surface level to do any of this justice. He makes a great case for change, he explains the "what", and the "why" perfectly.. but the "how" is not sufficient or deep enough. Just provided snippets of approaches, or a shotgun approach in doing things such as watching thoughts at one point, or going into bodily sensations at another, or staying present, etc. without any structured framework or approach isn't going to cut it.

As a result, many of his students are stuck asking the same questions over and over, and left trying to work out how to meaningfully and effectively put these tools and lack of approach into practice.

- Eckhart doesn't openly acknowledge his teachers and the sources of the material that he puts forth as his own.. based on some magical awakening event story of what occurred for him one night. If we dig deeper and look at some of his source material, such as Barry Long's teachings, A Course in Miracles, and bits and pieces from other mystics and teachers (more recently in Advaita), it becomes really obvious that these previous sources are almost taken word for word with a slight variation in language. The "fountain of all knowledge" effect is lessened by this, but it's just more honest. The whole organisation around ET thrives on him being some enlightened teacher who has come up with all of this on his own due to his own awakening that apparently didn't require any pevious work or practice. This just isn't correct, and frankly, is a bit of a red flag.

- Eckhart's teachings have changed over time, according to the various interest and flavour of the month.. lately it's more about awareness, consciousness, and neo-advaita type pointing, whereas originally is was more about mindfulness, concentration, and awareness being focused attention in the body or on the mind stream. This is sort of interesting, but prompts one to wonder why the change, and why the need to appeal to the mass audience (apart from the monetary advantage of doing so). Why the need for such a massive organisation built up around ET The Teacher, if the whole point of the message is to be nothing, nobody and live with as little structure and baggage as possible?

- ET's ideas about 'enlightenment' as just too simplistic. He mainly defines 'enlightenment' as disidentification with the mind, and the mind-made self. Further, he makes it sound like no big deal.. so we can all quite easily make it 'enlightenment', without having to do any of the usual hard yards that progressive paths have stressed over the centuries such as conduct, ethics, developing concentration, developing sustained mindfulness, having devotion to the teacher/path, etc. etc. It's all reduced to just living 'in the now', stopping thinking, and feeling/dissolving the pain body (with quite minimalistic instructions, mostly taken from other approaches that use somatic work or body scanning etc.)

Taking the above into account, here's some GOOD material that can assist with the gaps in his teaching.. look for these audio lectures if you can find them, since they're the closest to what we might consider "meditation" or structure, which is clearly lacking in most of the talks, books, etc.

Recommended material:

1. Gateways to the Now -- an audio with 3 parts that goes for around an hour (with another hour of music), that details 3 ways to enter 'the now', being via the inner body, silence, and acceptance

2. Practicing the Power of Now - which has taken out the practical parts of The Power of Now, and made these parts into a manual so to speak. Although the practices even here aren't deep enough to likely effect permanent change or insight, they're all in one spot at least for review and consumption.

3. Essential Meditations with Eckhart Tolle - this 7 hour audio compilation is one of the better ones that focuses more on the idea of meditation and how to implement some of the teachings and philosophy that ET talks about elsewhere

4. Meditations for a New Earth - Although this is mostly given by Kim Eng, it does contain some good structured practices that can be used daily to give life to the information presented elsewhere.

5. Non-live material - When starting off, leave out the live audience material and hours and hours of live talks.. preferring the specifically given content and books such as Power of Now, Stillness Speaks, or the above audio lectures. The live talks tend to cater for large audiences attending a huge talk who are looking for a bit of entertainment and a bit of spiritual chit chat, and thus the live talks tend to contain mainly teaching stories and surface level pointers that are repeated throughout all the talks over time. The non-live material is more structured, and also was created for a specific purpose and thus it's more effective at delivering the message.

Overall:

Eckhart Tolle and his teaching material contains a lot of benefit in terms of providing an easy to understand philosophy around topics such as mindfulness, self, ego, emotional pain, and the ideas behind why and what is needed to be transcended for spiritual growth and liberation. There's tonnes of free content available online as well, which is generous. This makes ET appealing to beginners on the path, and also those interested in spiritual talk, conversation and entertaining ideas around the path.

However, the "how" isn't developed deep enough, and the teachings generally remain on the surface, in an attempt to cater for as wide an audience as possible. Because of the sheer volume of content available, trying to sort the wheat from the chaff is also a challenge for beginners with these teachings. As such, many seekers have encountered ET's ideas, and agree on their value, but end up confused, or doubful as to where and how to EXACTLY implement these teachings to give lasting change and the sort of 'enlightenment' that is promised in much of the talks and books.

These teachings are worth delving into, trying, checking out, and confirming for oneself.. but do keep in mind that they're more of a starting point on the path rather than a destination or complete approach.

Eckhart Tolle - General notes and some practical quotes from The Power of Now.

 

After many years, I've been revisiting "The Power of Now" by Eckhart Tolle. This was prompted after seeing some content on YT, and also having quite a few audios from his live events, which I felt like reviewing all at once over the next few weeks/month.

I find 'The Power of Now' to be an excellent introduction into spirituality in general, and something for the more serious seeker starting off. However, as I will go into in future posts, the approach and framework in making the ideas in that book 'come to life' is sort of missing. Try giving the following pointers, detailed in the book, a sincere run through for a few days, and check to see in your experience if any of these pointers or 'tips' work for you (or not), and if they 'stick'.

As you will likey find out, or have intuited, there's such an array of practices or pointers given in that small chapter, and each require their own way of approach or background explanation and practical means of use, that these pointers become challenging (especially for newcomers) to actually put into practice and integrate into experience. There's a massive different in the practice of feeling one's presence (or beingness, or "I am"), which was a key approach of Nisargadatta's for example, and filled multiple books.. vs the approach of present moment awareness of phenomena. Giving out these mini-practices and approaches in a mixed order like this really does them a disservice, and makes it extremely likely a beginner will feel inadequate and some sort of failure because they tried (and failed) in performing any of these for more than a second or two (if that). This is a repeated issue with Eckhart's teachings, and why people keep having to attend again and again, and listen to talks again and again, in order to establish some form of mindfulness in the approach that he is attempting to convey.

Granted, Eckhart Tolle does have some meditation instructions and material available, such as "Gateways into the Now" (which happens to be one of my favourite ET instructional audios, though is hardly known), and various guided meditations (which more more like talks).. though these came well after The Power of Now was published, and likely his followers were asking for a "How" in terms of implementing those ideas. Some of these lessen known sessions and audio teachings are excellent in terms of actually leading the listener/student into exactly what Eckhart is trying to convey. In general, look for the audio recordings or sessions that were NOT done with a live audience. This is because the audio had a set aim, and there's no entertaining banter or live audience chatter to distract from the contemplation and experiential insight that needs to happen outside of thinking or conceptualising.

Chapter Two of PON introduces one of Eckhart's main teaching ideas, which is the 'emotional pain body', which he likens to a separate entity that has been created due to unconsciousness accumulation of pain, and is then identified with by the individual and 'becomes' the individual. His advise (again) is to pretty much become aware of one's inner state, emotional state, emotional feeling tone and energy, and then keep watching until attention or consciousness dissolves this 'pain body' or at least the identification of the individual (ego) with this aspect.

While I have no issues at all with the ideas about the 'pain body', or the proposed way of dealing with it, again, the reader or seeker is left unsatisfied and wanting, because the surface level advice just isn't deep enough. REAL inner emotional work could involve any number of deep work activities, such as somatic experiencing, somatic therapy, TRE, inner child work, or developing skills in sense based mindfulness along with mindfulness of feeling tone and emotion. However, none of these are proposed, and instead Eckhart Tolle just hands out some very basic, surface level advice on just being with the feeling, being present, being in the Now etc.

Again, the experiential teachings that Eckhart does give out ARE there, though buried under thousands of hours of talks and banter, and it can take a while to actually discover what material is essential and what is non-essential. In terms of the books such as the Power of Now, and live talks that were given, the advice is fairly short and surface level. The usual ideas that we've heard again and again, but hasn't penetrated deep enough.. the 'Now', accepting it, accepting the present moment, focusing one's attention on it etc etc.. which, is hardly deep enough or sophisticated enough to penetrate into something as deep seated as the 'pain body' he has just spent pages detailing and analysing for example in Chapter Two in The Power of Now (or A New Earth). Again, without a framework, or practice, this advice would be of little assistance for the beginner. The philosophy is there, but not the means to bring about the promised changes. I should say-- the means is there, but is buried within thousands of hours of content, and it requires someone particularly knowledgable or already familiar with meditative and contemplative approaches to siphon out what is useful and what isn't so useful. 

Some practical quotes from Chapter One (You are not your mind)

Stillness:

"You can only know it when your mind is still."

Presence, present moment awareness:

"When you are present, when your attention is fully and intensely in the Now, Being can be felt.."

"Instead of watching the thinker, you can also create a gap in the mind stream simply by directing the focus of your attention into the Now. Just become intensely conscious of the present moment."

"You can practice this by taking any routine activity that normally is only a means to an end and giving it your fullest attention, so that it becomes an end in itself.."

"Pause for a few seconds and observe the flow of your breath.."

"Become aware of a silent but powerful sense of presence.."

Beingness, presence, feeling of "I":

"Nobody can claim exclusive exclusive possession of Being. It is your very essense, and it is immediately accessible to your as the feeling of your own presence.."

Watching the thinker, watching the mind, self-observation:

"The moment you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated."

Witnessing, listening to thoughts, "the voice" in the mind:

"You can take the first step now. Start listening to the voice in your head as often as you can. Pay particular attention to any repetitive thought patterns.. be there as the witnessing presence"

"You'll soon realize: there is the voice, and here I am listening to it, watching it."

Practical quotes from Chapter Two (Consciousness: The way out of pain)

"Whereas before you dwelt in time and paid brief visits to the Now, have your dwelling place in the Now and pay brief visits to past and future when required to deal with the practical aspects of your life situation."

"Surrender to what is. Say "yes" to life - and see how life suddenly starts working for you rather than against you."

Pain body:

"So the pain body doesn't want you to observe it directly and see it for what it is. The moment you observe it, feel its energy field within you, and take your attention into it, the identification is broken."

"Let me summarize the process. Focus attention on the feeling inside you. Know that it is the pain body. Accept that it is there. Don't think about it .. Stay present, and continue to be the observer of what is happening inside you. Become aware not only of the emotional pain but also of 'the one who observes', the silent watcher. This is the power of Now, the power of your own conscious presence. Then see what happens."

Sedona Method, Release Technique .. what's good and what's missing?

 

I've been continuing a deep dive into The Sedona Method (aka Release Technique) over the last month or so. There's a lot of good points related to learning and using this method, and also some things that are missing in this method that could become an issue for some, and hence why some people become road blocked at some point along their 'releasing' journey.

There has been an obvious evolution in the method from the 1950s when Lester Levenson first thought about and designed a way to release tendencies (vasanas) and allow for someone to rest in their own beingness/awareness/I AM. That evolution in itself has been both good and bad in different ways and I'll comment on that below.

The Good

- There's tonnes of information out there on the Internet about The Sedona Method. In fact, it's almost not even necessary in forking out the cash to purchase the entire course, since the whole method and aspects of the course are all out there (e.g. in YouTube, or other sites), and one can basically pick up the method and run with it. The later developments such as the 5th way (which is really a form of self-enquiry that is used with the intent to release emotions and recognise awareness) is also freely available. Hale in his graciousness has been good to open up the method and approach for free via podcasts, YT videos, books and other means, which makes it pretty much accessible for anyone.

- The method itself is fairly easy to learn. The proviso is that it is practices over and over again until it becomes a habit that is mastered. Just going through a few releases and the course (which has become more and more complex and informational now) will not cut it. This needs to be a constant practice (as mentioned in Lester's 6 points for success or imperturbability).

- There's various approaches now to the method, other than the original Questions / Queries approach. Larry Crane has a more direct releasing method based on the body sensations and also confronting the mind, whereas other newer teachers such as David Ellzey incorporate self-enquiry and some nondual practices into the mix. Any of these approaches could work better for someone. Hale also includes at least 5 ways to release now.

- The course does allow someone to be able to learn to categorise and identify emotions (on the AGFLAP-CAP chart) and identify them in the body and release on them. This is a real bonus as so many people come to the course with no idea about what an emotion is, where it can be experienced or how it could be classified and noted etc.

- The course can lead to deeper spiritual work, such as self-enquiry etc. In fact, Lester's original goal was for the course to be a tool to aid in the quest for self-realization and enlightenment, rather than an end in itself or a self-help tool, or a productivity tool-- which of course is much easier to market and have people sign up for vs a tool aiming at spiritual development.

What's missing or could be an issue?

+ The tool can get overly intellectual for some people. If someone is caught in a tendency state, zoned out or trance state, an addiction or purely physical - emotional loop, then asking these questions and releasing tends to become an intellectual exercise that doesn't really get to the core of the emotional issue. Just repeating the questions, and not connecting with the body or sensation or emotion itself doesn't produce any effect in most cases. There's no development of body mindfulness or sensation awareness etc., which for the most part needs to be done at some point to full access the body where emotions are stored and become part of our experience.

+ There's no use of meditation or contemplation in the course at all. The sorts of spiritual principles (along the lines of Advaita Vedanta) that Lester was emphasising in the 60s and later, really need to be contemplated and used in meditation. Just using the technique during daily activities and without the assistance of deep meditation and contemplate makes it hard to integrate fully into all states of being. 

+ The course is secular or purely psychological , self-help in delivery. One could theoretically become devoted to the method (or perhaps Lester), though the focus on the course is essentially still a self-help tool, rather than a psycho-spiritual path or approach that incorporates other areas as well such as ethics, meditation, contemplating principles etc. This makes a bit hard for some to commit to, and stay motivated for the long run.. few can remain motivated and constant or devoted to a tool or method or technique.

+ Integration. I found the earlier versions of the course, such as the 1992 Sedona Institute version, to be much easier to integrate and use during the day and throughout all waking hours.. ie. full integration.. due to the simplicity of the course and single way of releasing. The worksheets and drills in the earlier course versions were great as well. However, the later versions of the course just contain too much material, information, ways to release, and options. As such, it's a real challenge and becomes extremely difficult for the brain to integrate all of these items into one's daily activities or experience. Again, meditation and focused sitting sessions are missing, which means that the subconscious mind doesn't have an easy, ready to go approach within reach when emotions start flying or an unexpected issue or tendency arises.

+ Complexity. As mentioned above, as the course evolves over time, it tends to have more information, ways to release, complexity and options added over time. This seems to be in the official channels as well as with other teachers. This is understandable because it gives more flexibility in ways to release, and is a larger offering in terms of marketing the course and getting it out there. However, being a double edged sword, more complexity, offerings, options and information also acts as an obstacle for people getting a handle on ONE preferred way to release and just getting the practice and time spent releasing clocked up over time. The old metaphor of 'digging many holes that are shallow being less effective that digging one deep hole in a preferred area that hits oil' can be true here.

+ Moving away from the original goals of the course and how Lester Levenson first gained his insights and realizations. Reading Lester's biographies and own notes on his awakening(s) around 1952, it's clear he was very focused on self-enquiry, Advaita in the style of Ramana Maharshi, and also seemed to have performed a variety of forgiveness and 'love'/metta type contemplations and practices at the time, which would have been beneficial on his health situation. He was greatly motivated due to his critical health issues at the time as well. His talks in the 60s where fully in line with Advaita teachings. Slowly over time, the method and focus shifted away from this, and moved into a psychological emotional self-help tool, but recently with the upswing in interest in nonduality and awareness teachings, this has been added back in via the "5th Way" releasing style etc. It's worth keeping this in mind, because TSM was really designed as an aid to release tendencies and obstructing emotions/thoughts as an aid to self-enquiry and self-realisation. There also seems to be a gap in the explanation of how Lester originally used his forgiveness/metta/loving-all type practices in regards to his health and his past grievances and relationship issues, and why this wasn't incorporated into the method as another facet. Lester was a bit of a pioneer, and tried his best to come up with a method that would suit the mainstream in releasing tendencies and obstacles so that they could live happier lives and possibly embody a more aware experience.

Takeaways

Sedona Method is a great little tool for introducing emotional release work, gaining some understanding of emotions, feelings, how they are experienced in the body, how they can be noted and labelled and released or allowed to pass through etc. It's also portable, and easy to learn. However, there's a few missing pieces if you're looking at it from a holistic point of view, and it seems a lot of long-term users have incorporated other teachings, approaches, and therapies (e.g. EFT, Mindfulness, nondual awareness approaches, bodywork etc.) into their practice to supplement those missing areas in TSM.