PRIME RE-POST (Now with video link): I’m Awake! What Do I Do Now?
VIDEO: I’m Awake! What Do I Do Now?
Once we’ve had a nondual breakthrough we discover we are on new ground. Whether our penetration was a momentary glimpse, a flashy angels-and-trumpets event, or something in between those two, our most pressing question is typically, “What do I do now?”
In an effort to be my sister and brother’s keeper, let me tell you that this question is most often asked by ego in the immediate aftermath of awakening. It’s just been seen that “our ego” is simply part of the dream and that it cannot, on the highest level, even be said to exist. In my case it was seen very clearly that there was no Fred Davis. So, even though we have just experienced the universal living truth of Oneness, which immediately smashes all notions of separation, nonetheless amid all of that stir, guess who shows back up?
Ego. Our character. It—our character—may not really exist; regardless, it functions as if it does. And we still have to deal with it. No matter how awake we get, our experience is that we are hung with the unit. I can sense that heads are already starting to ache, so let me jump in and explain myself the best I can.
When awakening occurs, what wakes up—as most of you know—is Awakeness itself—and only Awakeness. Given that there is no genuine free-standing ego that exists, it can’t possibly be awakened. If there is no sleeping Fred, there cannot be an awake Fred.
The unmanaged body and thought patterns will continue to run until they don’t. They have never been under your control, and they’re certainly not going to be now that you’re awake. You will, however, have a much better eye for your own unskillful patterns and thus it may look like things get worse before they get better.
I am talking about years of clearing, not weeks or months. Most patterns have to be seen through individually. Until they are, there will be egoic functioning. There’s no one home, but it sure looks like there is to an outsider, and sometimes even to you, the “insider.”
Having said all of this, which most of you have heard me say many times before, let me now say that character-clouded Awakeness, through the means of a unit, can and does ask its more clear reflection, through the character of a teacher, “What do I do now?”
It’s a bit of a paradox, is it not? It is. And it is that critical paradox that we will address in this post. What is meant is, “How do I—the Awakeness that is now awake to my True Nature—stay clear?”
What are the skillful means at our disposal that can facilitate clearing out the mountainous remnants of our dream character that remain in post-awakening? I fully realize that there’s no one there to have anything at its hypothetical disposal. No matter. So long as it feels like there’s someone there, I’m suggesting that you act as if someone’s there. You’re going to do it unconsciously anyway, so why not do it consciously?
This immediately gets you out of that head and into that life. Clearing is not an activity of the brain. We can’t think our way clear. Thus moving from the realm of thought to the realm of action is, in effect, the beginning of waking down, down out of the mind-story of division and into the apparent manifestation that is generally referred to as reality. That apparent reality is actually occurring within Reality, but one step at a time.
Here’s a review of The Book of Undoing that was posted on Amazon yesterday, which I just noticed while I was writing this post. Funny how that works…
ByGambit on May 26, 2015
Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase
You can have an awaking or a glimpse of it; it’s very easy if you follow Fred’s directions.
However…..awakening will not last very long if the emotional body (another term is the pain body) hasn’t been cleaned & transformed.
That’s why I also use releasing (as taught by Lester Levenson) and other resources such as Tom Stone’s Technic.
The ego is trying to run away to the “non-dual” state and doesn’t want to deal with the emotional body (pain body). So read this book, enjoy it, enjoy the awakening state but keep working also on clearing your emotional body….
I’ll note that the author does advise his clients to work on “embodiment” by clearing the out the blockages from the emotional body.
The reviewer makes a good point, one which I harp on all the time. Waking up is really wonderful and powerful, but it’s only an invitation to the real dance of abidance and embodiment. It’s the most important shift we’ll ever make, but if it’s the last shift we make, then a golden opportunity has been wasted and sleepy-time is dead ahead.
At the end of Awakening Sessions I will usually answer the “What do I do now?” question twice. First I answer in the same way I began this article—by pointing out to Awakeness that ego has just come in the back door and is now asking about how to best direct its free agency, about how to manage something that isn’t—an independent life-on-its-own. I can’t say this happens every time, but it does happen a great deal of the time.
Should that occur, I’ll then lead them through some additional clearing material until the preposterous idea of dream management is seen through clearly again, and then finally come back to answer, “What do I do now?” in a practical manner. I offer them three tools to work with, which I now offer to you: my videos, self-inquiry on a moment-to-moment basis, and a specific meditation which I discuss and demonstrate in these two YouTube videos:
30 Minute Guided Meditation: Falling Into the Sense of Being
If you read the works of Nisargadatta Maharaj beyond the ubiquitous I Am That, you will hear him say over and over again, “Simply dwell on the I Am” or “Meditate on the I Am—it will open the door to everything else.” He never gives instructions as to what that means, but if he had, they would sound much like the instructions I offer for The Sense of Being Meditation. To make it short and simple: You are practicing being Yourself. You are not sitting in order to be clear in some story of future, but in order to be clearer here and now.
I recommend my videos to clients because they are very clear and, given that I just woke that person up, I know they can “hear” me. I can’t tell you how huge this is. Don’t try to listen to someone you’re not drawn to or someone you used to be drawn to but aren’t now. Listen to whom you resonate with today. You’ll know them when you find them. If my approach doesn’t appeal to you, change the channel—no hard feelings. It’s not so much about “who has it?” as it is “who can hear it?” Most of us have specialized ears.
Moment-to-moment inquiry means living in inquiry. When you hear yourself say, “That shouldn’t be,” ask yourself “Who said that?” Can you trace that thought backwards and actually find an owner to it? Answering that from your head will do you no good whatsoever. You have to take the action and hit the wall. You have to show yourself that there’s “no Fred” over and over and over again.
You can also ask yourself “Is that true?” Is it true that something that is “shouldn’t” be? No. Never.
Is it true that something that isn’t “should” be? Nope. Never ever.
We don’t have to understand Life, but we do have to surrender to it whether we do so willingly or go down swinging. What happens is what happens. Of course, you are always free to suffer first and then surrender to it; I’m just trying to give you some options.
May 27, 2015 @ 7:24 pm
That was so beautifully clear and direct. Thank you Fred
May 27, 2015 @ 7:27 pm
Thank YOU, Tom! 🙂
May 27, 2015 @ 8:32 pm
Thank you for pointing this out Fred. I will look into your videos and guided meditations….
your book: “The Book of Undoing” was great.
Indeed Nisargadatta Maharaj never gave clear instructions as to what it means to dwell on the sense of “I Am” in his book “I am That”. So when I read his book I didn’t understand how to dwell on the sense of I am….
May 27, 2015 @ 8:46 pm
Great. Thanks for your comment. I’m so glad you liked TBU1.
May 27, 2015 @ 9:39 pm
Dear Fred,
I bought your Book of Undoing earlier this year, read it in one sitting late at night, loved it and then put it to one side. Also watched a few of your videos. Ive been meditating for 42 years and read a lot of the available advaita and mahamudra literature; and realise Ive probably gotten a bit jaded.
I re-read TBU while I was on a 30 day solo meditation retreat in the mallee (i.e. remote South Australian bushland). Just returned last week. It really made the difference to have protracted quiet time to sink into your pointing out instructions. Very clear, concise and direct.
I want to thank you very much for powerful (and entertaining!) way of teaching.
regards
Ian
May 28, 2015 @ 12:06 am
Thank you, Ian! You are so very welcome. I appreciate your comments.
May 27, 2015 @ 9:47 pm
Thanks, Fred (and to Gambit), for articulating this so well. I feel that the work I’m doing now (post awakening), is pretty much the same as what I was doing leading up to awakening, except that now I am much clearer in my direction, more motivated, and thus able to move forward more efficiently. But the practice is essentially the same – working to bring my will and perspective into line with the absolute.
I’m reminded of a friend who was in therapy leading up to her getting sober and then afterward as well. She made progress in therapy while still drinking, and it contributed to her finally getting sober. But once she got sober, her progress really accelerated.
All love,
Kathleen
May 28, 2015 @ 12:07 am
Kathleen, you just keep on doing what you’re doing. Clarity abounds.
Love,
Fred
May 28, 2015 @ 9:37 am
Fred I have another small question.
you wrote:
“If you read the works of Nisargadatta Maharaj beyond the ubiquitous I Am That, you will hear him say over and over again, “Simply dwell on the I Am” or “Meditate on the I Am—it will open the door to everything else.”
so Nisargadatta was not talking about the emotional body or “embodiment”. I guess his teachings lack something….
because I can dwell on the sense of “I am” all day long. But if I don’t take care of my emotional stuff
then it’s not going to lead me to complete freedom.
What do you think?
did Nisargadatta have all his emotions taken care of before he started meditating on the “I am”?
May 28, 2015 @ 9:42 am
I don’t see any relevance between dwelling on “I Am” and emotions. I do know that if you wait to get your emotions all in order before you wake up you will never wake up.
May 28, 2015 @ 9:58 am
Thank you Fred, I didn’t mean ‘to get your emotions all in order before you wake up’
I will write you a private message later 🙂
May 30, 2015 @ 11:22 pm
I just read this for the third time and will make it a repetition/clarity practice for me. This “what to do” question has gripped my life, and to see it addressed here – and hear how commonly so – gives me relief. I didn’t think in terms of “should” because the anxiety itself was such a loud should(n’t) that I stayed drowned in it (or more accurately, I alternated drowning in it with trying to tread water with it). I wanted so much for so long to be told what to do, I get it now that self-inquiry is MY answer. The anxiety runs out much faster because “there is no one there to be told what to do, especially since I can’t find who asked that!” No future either “to do” in, just clearer here and now (another rep for me!)
I love your twist on “acting as if”. Normally it’s about the “spiritual”, fake it til you make it. Here though we treat our feeling like someone’s there as if there is, in the opposite sense. We let it be the pretend play thing it is and have it “play itself” OUT. And WE choose what it gets to play with, knowing WHAT IS is in charge NOW. Is this how you meant it?
And I love the realization that of course it’s not manageable if it’s not even there! (along with the way you state it in Beyond Recovery: it isn’t bondage to self, but being bonded to the idea of separate self, that is insane.)
Thanks Fred!
June 3, 2015 @ 9:13 am
Thanks so much for this Mike. I really appreciate your support and encouragement.
January 8, 2019 @ 3:09 pm
Good to review this one. Clearing is essentially practicing being what you are. “Act as if,” and you’ll notice that you already are!
<3 K
February 10, 2019 @ 10:03 pm
Repetition, I do know, surrender….again and again….thank you, as always.
February 11, 2019 @ 12:20 am
Thank You, dear!