strange experience, please advise

[ethereal]

Just now I had a very strange experience that I am not sure what it is, may the more spiritually knowledgeable please advise me.

I was reading "I Am That" and contemplating the nature of consciousness and awareness when I had a sudden insight that everything was included in consciousness, and consciousness could not be there without awareness. Suddenly the knowingness of being God and/or the witness/Eye of God came unbidden, as well as the sudden fear that "I" was dissolving. At the time I felt it may have been the Final Doorway, or perhaps the Void; the knowingness that nothing could have existed without awareness/God came, and it did indeed feel beyond time and space and consciousness.

I froze, closed my eyes, tried to surrender everything, but the fear was there. Suddenly I felt multicolored lights flashing in my head and in my eyes, and my body spasming. Felt like the Kundalini was rising as well, and pressure at the 3rd eye chakra. I tried to meditate/close my eyes and surrender to the process, but it seems like after 15 minutes or so the feeling of possible dissolution went away and I still remained. However, my body is still spasming/shaking right now as I am typing this, as if with I were freezing, even though I am wearing multiple layers of clothing.

Has anyone had any similar experiences who can help advise me? I do not understand what this is, and the fear of the unknown is holding me back.

Namaste,
Ethereal

[ethereal]

did some googling and found my answer

Fear in Enlightenment and Zen
DEATH OF THE EGO: A Buddhist View

and "kundalini experience"

My question now is, how does this relate to enlightenment? Is it a gradual process of clearing out energy blocks and raising consciousness, or is it sudden and permanent ego-death? Was that actually the final doorway to enlightenment or just a satori, a warning signal?

Any info, insights, experiences appreciated.

Namaste,
Ethereal

[AndyMartin]

ethereal--

It just is. Words like enlightenment, satori, kensho, rapture, are invented after the fact to describe the indescribable. Anything you say about your experience is just a story -- an attempt to find symbolic representation for experience which is beyond expression. That story is for you and you alone; it cannot be held up to the stories of any other, because while the source is the same, the medium -- the person through whom the experience is expressed -- is not. If you think about it, that's far more valuable than being able to label it and rate it on a scale.

You're addressing a few separate things at once here. Ego reconciliation, expansion of awareness and spiritual growth are not one and the same, though they are related. What we would call enlightenment includes all of these (and possibly other) lines of development.

Structurally speaking, these things come in two ways: as states of being and as stages of growth. The distinction is states can come to anyone, anytime regardless of level of development, but they are not permanent. Stages are a permanent acquisition. States are like signposts along the road to stages.

The interrelation comes in that ego is opposed to all three of these, and a states tend to come suddenly, ego tends to backlash against them. This can come through fear, anger and a host of other negative reactions. We cannot always eliminate those reactions, but by not feeding them the ego gradually loses its power to oppose and we come closer to the next stage.

The risk is that we see the signposts as the destination, and we start seeking the states for their own sake or mistake them for stages and use them to feed the ego, thinking we are "enlightened." If you grab hold of a signpost, you stop moving down the road.

Hope that's helpful. Either way, just keep following the signposts.

[ethereal]

Thanks for the explanation! I think I've heard of these ideas before, is it from Ken Wilber's stuff?

I like the idea of states and stages, never thought of it that way. No wonder some developments are permanent and others temporary. The signpost analogy really clears things up too, thanks a lot for that

After taking a break and reading up on other people's experiences online I feel a lot more secure now, knowing that it's normal and just a signpost along the way

"The path is straight and narrow, waste no time." -- including spiritual egoic seeking!

[Sunny]

This is a great post! Thank you both for sharing your questions and insight. It cleared up a lot of things that I have been wondering myself. Perfect timing.......

Do either of you know how you can truly determine what stage you are in without your ego puffing it up? I have read about Hawkins' method in Power vs Force. Do you have any experience with this or another technique?

[Glass Joe]

ethereal - I'm not qualified to answer your questions one way or the other, but I can provide some comments (or ramblings) based on my own search and my own experience. So feel free to integrate whatever personally works for you and throw out anything that doesn’t.

Originally Posted by ethereal

Was that actually the final doorway to enlightenment or just a satori, a warning signal?

I don’t know. But I'm not sure if there actually is a "final doorway" to enlightenment, as in some barrier to break down or some portal walk through. But that’s just me. I used to think there was this final door too, but now I don’t think there is.

Personally, I like the idea of levels, stages, paths, and doorways. I find them helpful in my own personal growth. But I don’t think the “Final Step” is anything like climbing the last rung of the ladder. I think it’s more like kicking the ladder away. The “Final Doorway”, instead of picturing it as a person walking through a door and finding enlightenment on the other side, I think is more like destroying any and all concepts of “doorways” altogether, along with any distinctions between what’s on “this side” vs. what’s on “that side”.

If you are THAT, as the book you refer to says, then who needs doors anyway? Who is it that walks through them? Where is there to go?

Here’s a quote from one of your other threads:

Originally Posted by ethereal

The innate beauty of all that exists becomes progressively apparent. All things become of equal value so that all life and all that exists are honored for their presence and the sheer fact of their existence. The perfection of all that exists stands forth, and the illusion of imperfection dissolves. Each and every thing is the perfect expression of its essence manifesting as its innate existence, simply by being what it is.
--David Hawkins from "I: Reality and Subjectivity" (pg. 216-218)

So, along the same lines of the advice that "If you see a Buddha along the side of the road, you should kill him.” I think if you come across a "doorway to enlightenment", you should destroy it, or at least ignore it. Or even better, enjoy the experience for what it is and also for what it isn’t.

I hope this doesn’t sound discouraging. I’m stumbling in the dark too, if not more so! I mean, there is no way I can truly know what it was that you experienced. And I’m sure it’s difficult for you to reduce these kinds of experiences to a few paragraphs, and even more difficult to try to make someone else understand them.

But “I Am That” is a pretty good book. It doesn’t resonate with me as much as it does with other people, but I still think it’s a good book. So who knows?! Maybe reading that book was the final conceptual straw that broke your conceptual back. But only you can know that for sure. (No outside confirmation required.)

Also, I write this post more for myself than for anyone else. So please ignore anything here that doesn’t work for you. I’m very grateful you asked your questions. Because just trying to answer them myself helped me a great deal in clarifying my own understanding.

[DoAnyOfYouExist]

Thank you for sharing your story, it is similar to experiences I have been having for the past year or so. I do not know why the cold, shivering occurs but it happens to me also when the possibility of dissolving fades and I come back to a semi normal state. This no longer happens to me as I no longer fear or fight the experiences. I think this is where the cold and shivering comes from(possible fear of death). I no longer believe in a final death so I just go with the experience and learn what it has to show me.

[AndyMartin]

Originally Posted by ethereal

Thanks for the explanation! I think I've heard of these ideas before, is it from Ken Wilber's stuff?

States and stages are direct rip-offs of Ken's work. The rest is bastardization, synthesis and recombination of whatever other chaff is blowing around in my mind.

Sunny--I don't think there's any reliable objective way to gauge yourself in this. Hawking has some good ideas about the dynamics of consciousness, but I don't think this is one of them. The fact that everything we experience comes through the filter of identity and physical existence begs the question, how can we measure our expression of our infinite awareness from inside a limited incarnation? It would be like trying to measure the room from inside the fishbowl. Not only do you have no means to measure or reference to measure against, but also everything your whole perspective is skewed by your environment (ie curved glass and water).

For me it's important to always be aware that I don't know where this pursuit is leading, and there's no way I can know. What I can do is examine the stories these experiences leave me with and learn from them a greater truth to live without treating them as an end of practice or end of belief.

This begins to imply a personal measure that can be used -- not to rate one's progress, but to evaluate one's practice. Because an experience that brings the authentic self more to the fore will always trigger an egoic reaction, either in the form of an attempt to co-opt the experience into egoic structures, or through an all-out ego explosion. The goal seems to be to mitigate the effect either by lulling you back to unconsciousness or raising a perspective that is incompatible with the authentic experience.

I can observe the backlash as it arises from the experience, which means my practice is in full support of the state and implies that I am moving towards stage growth. Or I can become aware of it once I experience the effects of it, which means that I am not living my truth and implies that I am not progressing towards stage growth.

But -- to steal from Wilber again -- stages are just conceptualizations; they are not real. Actually that steals from Buddhism before it steals from Wilber: all dharmas are empty. The point is to become aware of your motion towards your infinite potential, not to rate oneself on an objective scale.

[Rocket Surgery]

You are God.

You cannot "dissolve."

You can only Awaken to a realization that You are MORE than what you currently believe yourself to be.

When you awaken from your dreams, what is it that dissolves.... you, or the dream? The dream, of course. You continue to exist. You even retain memory of the dreaming ego that you believed for a short time to be You. But when the dream world dissolved, you did not go with it. You merely awoke to an even greater ego, and said, "Aha! It was only a dream."

I submit that your experience was akin to this, but your fear kept you from awakening to a greater awareness of your Self. If you wish to experience your next "awakening," then I can only advise that you meditate towards adjusting your belief system to expect AWAKENING as opposed to DISSOLVING. Expect that when your soul "graduates" from its current state of awareness, that you will experience it as an "Aha!" moment; the same feeling you get when you realize you'd been dreaming -- and KNOW that you will continue forward with complete memory of your current, limited awareness, but now your consciousness will have EXPANDED to a greater awareness of your true self. Expect and BELIEVE that, and you will no longer fear dissolution, and should then be able to experience the expansion.

I celebrate your growth, and even envy you a little. But not too much as I'm having much fun playing at my current level.

~ RS

[hindweb]

wow... that sounds like some experience.

[MyFutureSelf]

I used to be able to do something similar when I was much younger, like 6/7, I'd stare into the mirror and buzz out slowly losing focus on the image in the mirror and voice would come into my head saying "This is not the real me", then things would go kind of black and I could feel myself expanding, I guess is the only way you'd describe it. As a kid I had absolutely no idea what was happening to me, I just knew I liked it haha, even if it was ************ scary. I think I may know now what it was, sort of connecting to my true self. Good times.

[sourceofmiracles]

I had a similar experience after a session with a zen master. It scared the crap out of me because I felt so overwhelmed I knew I would not be able to keep my composure (I was walking around in public after the session, that is when it happened.)

It felt like the ego was a vail that lifted and gave me direct interaction with the trees and building and grass and everything. It was so beautiful that I felt a rush of uncontrolable sobs of joy coming.

I had to focus on my ego just to maintain my composure. It lasted for about 5 minutes.